"ROBERTSON STANDS BY HIS CLAIM OF SOVIET NUCLEAR ARMS IN CUBA" THE WASHINGTON TIMES-16 FEBRUARY 1988

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP91B00390R000300300003-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 3
• Document Creation Date: December 27, 2016
• Document Release Date: June 3, 2013
• Sequence Number: 3
• Publication Date: March 4, 1988
• Content Type: MEMO

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The New York Times
The Washington Times iaq - j
The Wall Street Journal
The Christian Science Monitor
New York Daily News
USA Today _
The Chicago Tribune
Robertson stands by his cl
Date '22/
of Soviet nuclear arms in Cuba
By Bill Gertz .
and Jeremiah O'Leary
THE WASHINGTON Times
Republican presidential hopeful
Pat Robertson continued yesterday
to stick by his claim that the Soviet
Union has deployed nuclear missiles
in Cuba, despite a White House de-
nial and a storm of questions the
charge has raised.
"I'm not going to back off from
that," Mr. Robertson said of the
charge he made Sunday during a
television 'debate. "I'd be happy to
have somebody prove me wrong."
He acknowledged, however, that
he had seen "no firsthand evidence"
to support the claim, which has been
challenged by two of Mr. Robert-
son's political opponents, Vice Pres- ?
ident George Bush and Rep. Jack
Kemp of New York.
Mr. Robertson said the allegation
was based on information supplied
by a Republican staff member of the
Senate Foreign Relations Commit-
tee and on Feb. 4 testimony to Con-
gress by Adm. William Crowe, chair-
man of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
But in California yesterday, White
House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater
issued a statement categorically de
nying that any Soviet nuclear mir
siles were deployed on the island 90
miles south of the Florida coast.
Privately, officials said the admin-
istration did not want to appear to be
trashing what Mr Robertson said
but felt it was important to issue the
'statement after many queries.
Mr. Bush and Mr Kemp continued
their challenges of the Robertson
Statement yesterday on the eve of the
New Hampshire presidential pri-
Mar/
"This is a very serious allegation,"
Mr. Bush said in an interview on a
Manchester, N.H., radio station.
!'You keep hearing these outrageous
charges from people, which are de-
Signed to scare the American peo-
ple."
Mr Kemp labeled Mr Robertson's
charge "rather rash and unsupport-
able," and said if the former televi-
sion evangelist had evidence of such
missiles, he should share it with the
American people.
U.S. military officials discount the
possibility that nuclear missiles are
in Cuba but admit that, given the
limits of verification methods, it is
possible for the Soviets to covertly
transport strategic weapons to the
;island.
: Mr Robertson made the charge in
criticizing the new U.S.-Soviet inter-
:mediate nuclear forces treaty, which
'would eliminate short- and medium-
:range missiles from Europe.
, He said the Soviets had placed 25
'SS-4 and 55-5 medium-range ballis-
tic missiles ? among the missiles
'covered by the INF pact ? around
:Cuba in violation of an agreement
;between President John F Kennedy
and Soviet leader Nikita
'Khrushchev following the so-called
!Cuban missile crisis.
Robertson campaign officials
later clarified the remarks by saying
'that the candidate referred to nu-
:clear missile delivery systems and
:not warheads and that the informa-
tion was supplied by David S. Sulli-
van, a GOP staffer with the Foreign
:Relations Committee.
? Mr. Sullivan told The Associated
'Press that "we do not know whether
nuclear weapons are in Cuba or not"
but admitted he referred the Robert-
son campaign to a Feb. 9 speech by
Sen. Jesse Helms, North Carolina
Republican, in Concord. N.H.
In the speech, according to Mr.
Sullivan, Mr. Helms did not say the
Soviets had placed nuclear missiles
in Cuba, but that they had reneged
on a pledge to permit on-site inspec-
tion in Cuba after the missile crisis.
Mr. Robertson said the charge
also was based on testimony by
Adm. Crowe during a Foreign Rela-
tions Committee hearing on the INF
treaty.
"The SS-4 and SS-5 missile sites
established in Cuba between late Au-
gust and mid-October 1962 were
confirmed as having been destroyed
in that year," Mr. Fitzwater said yes-
terday. "We also are confident that
the missiles were removed from
Cuba at that time."
The spokesman said the admin-
istration has had "extensive intelli-
gence collection" activities aimed at
Cuba since 1962 and that there has
been "no evidence" of SS-4s, SS-5s or
other strategic missiles on the is-
land.
Mr. Helms, ranking GOP member
of the Foreign Relations Committee
and the leading foe of the INF pact,
has charged that the U.S. intelli-
gence community would be unable
to determine if Soviet nuclear mis-
siles were re-introduced into Cuba in
violation of the Kennedy-
Khrushchev agreement.
He introduced an amendment to
the treaty Feb. 4 that would require
U.S. inspections of Cuban military
facilities as part of a search for any
former SS-4 and 55-5 missile sites in
Cuba that were destroyed after the
1962 U.S.-Soviet confrontation.
The Helms amendment was of-
fered following testimony the same
day by Adm. Crowe about the U.S.
. intelligence community's ability to
detect Soviet INF missiles in Cuba.
Under questioning by Mr. Helms,
Adm. Crowe agreed that the Soviets
could transport SS-20 intermediate-
range missiles and their launchers
into Cuba without U.S. intelligence
monitors being able to detect it.
But in the same testimony, Air
Force Chief of Staff Gen. Larry D.
Welch, who also directs the Air
Force's photographic spy agency, the
National Reconnaissance Office.
said there was "no place" outside the
United States that is monitored more
closely than Cuba.
Asked by Mr. Helms if he were
certain no SS-4 and SS-5 missiles are
in Cuba, Adm. Crowe deferred to
Gen. Welch, who answered: "I would
say that, yes, I can state that we have
high confidence that we know
whether or not there are Soviet mis-
siles in Cuba." He declined to com-
ment further in an open Senate ses-
.sion.
Contnued
Page
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.0
with an earlier Pentagon assess-
ment that the Soviets had violated
the Kennedy-Khrushchev accord by
sending offensive weapons, inter-
continental nuclear bombers and
'nuclear submarines to Cuba begin-
ning in 1969.
A U.S. official with access to intel-
ligence reporting, who asked not to
be identified. told The Washington '
Times that Soviet strategic weapons
"could" be in Cuba now because the
complete removal of the 1962 mis-
siles was.never verified through on-
site inspections.
We can reach no conclusion on
this because of lack of conclusive
evidence," the official said.
Also, Cuban and Soviet military
(
workers around Havana were re-
cently observed in the process of en-
larging the entrances to several
caves that could be used as missile
storage depots for SS-20 missiles,
the official said.
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