SPYING FLOURISHES IN CENTRAL AMERICA

Document Type:

CREST [1]

Collection:

General CIA Records [2]

Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST):

CIA-RDP90-00965R000201180015-7

Release Decision:

RIPPUB

Original Classification:

Document Page Count:

Document Creation Date:

December 22, 2016

Document Release Date:

January 20, 2012

Sequence Number:

Case Number:

Publication Date:

May 10, 1985

Content Type:

OPEN SOURCE

File:

Attachment	Size
CIA-RDP90-00965R000201180015-7.pdf [3]	132.72 KB

Body:

`S1 Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20: CIA ARTICLE Al;'PEARED ON PAGE i I - I By Edward Cody Washington Post Foreign Service WASHINGTON POST 10 May 1985 Spying Flourishes in Central America TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras, May 4-Tall and slim, blow-dried even in the rugged military camp, the long-legged operative-known as "the crane"-was a welcome sym- bol of Nicaraguan womanhood for anti-Sandinista guerrillas enjoying a respite from the ugliness of battle. But to leaders of the rebel Ni- government in Managua, the lead- ers told visitors to the camp, or an- other infiltrator sent as a spy by the Sandinista General Directorate of I State Security. ` t As the U.S.-backed contra, or counterrevolutinary, guerrillas have expanded their fight to overthrow the Sandinista government, so has the Sandinista security apparatus expanded its efforts to penetrate the rebel group and obtain informa- tion on its plans and activities in Honduras, guerrilla leaders report. According to Honduran and U.S. officials, the Sandinista shadow war also has included several attempts to promote subversion within Hon- duras by training and supplying left- ist Honduran revolutionaries seek- ing to establish an 'underground movement to overthrow the Tegu- cigalpa government. Honduran and U.S. officials have accused the Sandinistas of starting su rt for Honduran rebels even before anti-Sandinista forces began ` to organise here in 1981 wit helD fr_om~ffie Honduran Army and the CIA. i The Reagan administration cited what it called the latest sign of such support-capture of seven Ni- caraguan agents in southern Hon- duras-in' announcing its economic embargo against the Sandinistas to punish "aggressive activities in Cen- tral America." Whatever the start-up date, sub- terranean Sandinista activities here appear by now to be part of a mul- tilateral struggle in which the nit- ed States is also involved and whose most visible element is the so-ca ed covert war being waged by the Nicaraguan Democratic Force from bases in Honduras, with vociferous encouragement from Washington. According to U.S. officials citing Honduran intelligence reports, the seven Nicaraguans captured in mid- April had infiltrated into southeast- ern araiso province with a double ! mission: to supply arms and other equipment for a leftist Honduran guerrilla network, but also to en- courage the Honduran leftists to at- tack anti-Sandinista guerrillas. Their central camp lies in the area where t e seven were apprehended. A Honduran source who monitors leftist activity here expressed skep- ticism at the administration reports emphasizing help to leftist guerrillas. Sending Nicaraguan agents to fo- ment a Honduran guerrilla network would be an unlikely tactic, he said. Several hundred Honduran left- ists from five different groups have been reported in exile in Nicaragua or Cuba seeking help to build such networks, he said. They, not Ni- caraguans, would be the obvious candidates for infiltration into Hon- duras, the source said. The more likely purpose of the Nicaraguans' mission here, he added, was to enlist Hondurans to help them sabotage or infiltrate the contras' camp, at Las Vegas in southeastern El Paraiso. The Honduran Army, which is holding the captured Nicaraguans, declines to-explain their mission, confining itself to confirming re- 1 ports from Washington and saying interrogation is continuing. caraguan Democratic Force, the beauty with the purple eye shadow also was a reminder of a broad un- derground conflict that has arisen during the past three years, with the Honduran-Nicaraguan border hills as its main arena. "The crane" was either a recruit to the . rebels' battle against the -RDP90-00965R000201180015-7 Many Nicaraguans who have said they crossed the border fleeing mil- itary draft have been similarly in- terrogated in recent months. Hon- duran officers suspect that Mana- gua has dispatched many agents among the scores of Nicaraguan youths entering Honduras every month, some of whom end up in the ranks of anti-Sandinista rebel forces. Despite the attention focused on large-scale U.S. military maneuvers and U.S. complaints about Ni- caraguan armor and troop buildups, secret Sandinista support for Hon- duran subversives has been re- garded by many military officers here as the major threat to their country. Reflecting these concerns, U.S. Special Forces teams from Fort Bragg, N.C., and Panama have held frequent counterinsurgency exercises in Honduras during the past year, often unannounced. Helping the anti-Sandinista reb- els, say some Honduran officers, increases chances of Sandinista re- taliation through subversion in Hon- . duras, particularly if Honduras can- not rely on U.S. backing. Rebel officials have acknowl- edged Sandinista infiltration, saying they, too, have their own plants in the Sandinista government. The way "the crane" t Its it; she was sent to infiltrate the'rebel lead- ership last year to provide intelli- gence to the Sandinistas, but decid- ed to remain with the rebels. Ac- cording to her story, this was her second change of mind. The young woman told reporters". that she started as a courier with a clandestine anti-Sandinista network inside Nicaragua. As part of her work, she said, she met and-even- tually became the mistress of a Ni- caraguan known only as "the fish." Although he claimed to be part of the network, she recounted, "the fish" turned out to a Sandinista spy. Rebels said he came to Tegucigalpa posing as an underground anti-San- dinista operative, obtained a list of clandestine rebel sympathizers and went back to Nicaragua to denounce them all-including his mistress. WMirt led Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201180015-7 Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201180015-7 a. In an extensive interrogation by Sandinista security agents, "the crane" said, she was persuaded to switch sides and go to Honduras to join the Democratic Force as a spy. But once, inside the group here, she said with its officers looking on, she decided that the rebels were right after all and told them of her mis- sion. Col. Enrique Bermudez, the force's commander, said the young woman has been allowed to stay in the main rebel camp while the lead- ership tries to figure out which of her loyalties is authentic. Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201180015-7