THE SECRET WORLD OF GENERAL SECORD

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000605790003-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 3
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 3, 2012
• Sequence Number: 3
• Publication Date: May 5, 1987
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified in Part -Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/07/03 :CIA-RD
5 clay 19 8 7
The Secret World
of General Secord
- In the national spotlight after years under cover
is face may be unfamiliar, his name
H largely unknown. But when retired
Maj. Gen. Richard V ~ac`nrtl takes
_the oath as the first witness of the House
and Senate public hearings on the Iran-
contra scandal this week, the lights and
cameras will focus on a type immediately
recognizable to anyone who reads spy nov-
els or watches TV adventure series. He is
the flyboy who pushes fighter planes to the
limit in countless World War II combat
dramas, the Bung-ho soldier who volun-
teers for impossible rescue missions in
improbable corners of the world. If Lt. Col.
Oliver North is the scandal's master plan-
- ner, Secord is the story's real-life James
Bond, the can-do covert-operations expert
whom North relied on to get things done.
Or at least that's the image Secord has
managed to portray. In testimony that
may run throughout the week, Secord is
expected to willingly provide a detailed
account of the contra arms-supply effort
that began in 1984, long before the first
arms-for-hostages swap with Iran was con-
templated. "The general feels sincerely
that he has nothing to hide and that. he
has done nothing wrong," committee
chairman Sen. Daniel Inouye told report-
ers last week. Others on the committee
say Secord may implicate President Rea-
gan as an enthusiastic cheerleader and
expose the administration's determina-
tion to assist the Nicaraguan contras even
if it meant circumventing the law.
That Secord would be embroiled in a
complex scenario involving secret ship-
ments. hidden bank accounts and military
derring-do comes as no surprise to those
who know the general or have followed his
career. Born 55 years ago in La Rue, Ohio
population: 867), Secord has spent nearly
half his life engaged in covert operations.
His first taste of the "black" world came
when he went to Vietnam as an "adviser"
to the South Vietnamese government, an
innocent-sounding assignment that actu-
ally involved flying more than 200 secret
combat missions in fighters. Later. Secord
helped the CIA run its covert air war in
Laos and advised the shah of Iran on how t~
build un his Air Force. Between his South-
east Asia and Iran assignments, Secord
managed to win a Distinguished Flying
Cross during a rescue mission in the Congo.
Secord was flying a Belgian commando
force to Stanleyville in a C-130 transport
when a wing panel opened, causing an in-
flated life raft to foul the tail controls. Se-
cord wrestled the plane down to an emer-
gency, but safe, landing.
But the general hardly restricted his ca-
reer to aerial acrobatics and behind-the-
scenes maneuvers. Six years ago Secord
was one of the Pentagon's rising stars, hold-
ing aseries of high-level desk jobs that
culminated in 1981 when he became the
deputy assistant secretary of defense, a job
in which he helped set U.S. defense policy
concerning close to 40 countries. "They
keep referring-to me as a shadowy figure,"
complained Secord in a rare interview with
the Chicago Tribune last January. "I've
held some of the highest-profile jobs in
government."
'Tar on his uniform': True enough. But it is
Secord's involvement in black operations
that has shaped the man who now stands be-
fore acongressional committee. The Iran af-
fair~is not the first time Secord has been dog-
ged byscandal. In 1981 a "60 Minutes" story
linked Secord to Edwin Wilson, the notori-
ousrogue CIA agent who has since been con-
victed of, among other things, selling ex-
plosives and paramilitary expertise to
Muammar Kaddafi. Though Secord denied
any wrongdoing and was never charged
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 Declassified in Part -Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/07/03 :CIA-RDP90-009658000605790003-5 ~
NOf`dl'S Op61~1115: Patriot or crook?
with a crime, the investigation by the Jus-
tice Department was enough to poison his
military career. Callingthe incident "tar on
his uniform," Secord retired from the Air
Force in 1983. "No matter what I have done,
I can't get rid of this shadow that's been
hanging over me," he said during a success-
ful libel proceeding against Douglas
Schlacter, the former Wilson aide who
made the "60 Minutes" charges. Now Se-
cord isunder aneven darker cloud.
WESLEY BOCXF 1.0. PICTURES
Secord's early years hardly
signaled the notoriety that
would later envelop the major
general. Built short and wide
like a fireplug, Secord was as-
signed to the "runt compa-
ny"comprised of cadets in
the 5-foot-6 range-when, he
arrived at West Point in 1951.
Secord's fellows called him
"the Fat Man" and laughed at
his habit of standing ramrod
straight at parade rest, even
while relaxed. According to
the class yearbook, Secord
dreamed "of becoming a spe-
cial-services officer," a goal
totally at odds with his later
proclivities: special-services of-
ficers mostly run recreational
events such as Bob Hope shows.
After a shaky first year at
the academy during which he
almost dropped out, Secord
devoted himself to West Point
life in earnest: Some friends
attribute the newfound com-
mitment to his tactical-train-
ing officer, a tough young
captain named Alexander
Haig. By the time he graduat-
ed, Secord had proved himself
a scrappy boxer and had joined the Ger-
man and drama clubs. Still, the future
two-star general finished an unimpressive
193rd in a class of 470 in 1955. A notation
in his yearbook cryptically reads, "His
mannerisms will be with us always."
Retired Brig. Gen. Harry (Heine) Ader-
holt, Secord's commander in Southeast
Asia, provides a clue to the remark. "I
thought he was arrogant," recalls Ader-
holt. "He acted like a general when he was
^ BILL GENTILE FOR NEWSWEEK
~'011~'A $Ct1011: On patrol and getting supplies
a captain. But he was the best goddam
officer I ever had." Along with the arro-
i gance came an aloofness that characterizes
~ Secord to this day. Former West Point
I classmate Robert Soper recalls that years
after leaving the academy, Air Force col-
~ leagues of Secord would ask Soper about
the icy pilot. "People who flew with him
~ never got to know him," says Soper. "He
I was then like he is now-a very private
person. You had to know him a long time
before he would loosen up."But few people
ever got that far. "He was very close-
mouthed," says a former Pentagon official.
"A lot of people referred to him as the
Buddha."While Oliver North,forexample,
obligingly poses for photographers in his
station wagon, the general recently greet-
ed a NEW3WEEK photographer near his
home in McLean, Va., by shifting his Cadil-
lac into reverse and rapidly backing down
the street.
There are some similarities, however, be-
tween the buttoned-up Secord and the
more flamboyant North.. A classmate in
flight school recalls how Secord once im-
~ pressed his colleagues by outflying every-
one during a mock dogfight. Later the stu-
dent discovered Secord had gone up with
partially emptied fuel tanks, which low-
ered the plane's weight and made it more
maneuverable. ``He has this tenacity,"said
a onetime racquetball partner. "Very intel-
ligent, and very gutsy."
i SuAs~ trails: In 1966, after winnine four
combat air medals durine his vears as an
adviser in Vietnam, Secord was bored. "He
wanted to get closer to the war." recalls
j ~cfer olt, who pulled strings to eet Secord
j transferred to an Air Force base in Thai-
' an were e e t e con uct its
covert warm aos: _ ere_ r ~fly-
_i~ experience_ to top_his,earlier struggle
with the rubber life raft: the CIA asked him
to3rop a planeload of Calgoni_te dishwater
i detergent on tFie ~oZTii m Trail during
;the rainy season`The idea was to make the
trail too slippery for the communists to
'travel. record not only carri out the min-
i sion; Fie did itinTroad dayT'iglit so tiieZ7A
`could take pl~ures. - _---- ~~-
~ ~ecordle~e dirty wars in Southeast
?; Asia with an unblemished record in 1968.
His success there put him on a fast track
that led to advanced training at the Naval
War College in Newport, R.I., and his first
~ general's star at the age of 43. In 1975
Secord was put in charge of the 1,000-man
Air Force military-assistance group in
Iran, where he presided over the disburse-
s ment of billions of dollars in Air Force aid
programs. Then it was back to the Penta-
gon, where he was promoted in 1981 to
deputy assistant secretary of defense. In
Washington Secord got to know Oliver
North-then a young Marine working with
the National Security Counsel staff-when
the pair teamed up to lobby Congress for
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 Declassified in Part -Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/07/03 :CIA-RDP90-009658000605790003-5~
"approv`al of the sale of sophisticated In 1983 EATSCO pleaded guilty to the was supposed to provide the business acu-
AWACS electronic surveillance planes to ,illegal billings and paid $20,000 in fines; men, Secord the connections. The two
Saudi Arabia. Secord was awarded the ,the Egyptian partner paid $3 million in pushed hard to win a $100 million air.
Distinguished Service Medal for his ef- ,restitution. By then Secord had chosen to craft-shelter deal in Abu Dhabi for Mar-
forts; Secord's third star, a promotion to ;retire from the Pentagon, his once fast- wail Steel Co. of Larkspur, Calif., but de-
lieutenant general, seemed imminent. ;track career derailed. spite contacts with relatives of the
Then came the tar on his uniform. Edwin But the very same month that he re- ruling sheiks there, another company
Wilson was a former CIA agent turned pri- 'tired from government service, Secord handily outbid them. Prince Bandar bin
vate entrepreneur who made millions as a ~ went to work for a private firm linked to Sultan, Saudi Arabia's ambassador to the
weapons dealer while brazenly represent- ~ Wilson-the very man he says helped United States, helped Secord get an excep-
ing himself as an agent of the U.S. gov- ;form "the shadow that's been hanging tion to the bidding deadline fora proj-
ernment. Secord's fall from grace began -over me." Secord teamed up with arms ect in the kingdom, but that, too, fell
genteelly enough, at Mount Airy Farms, dealer Albert Hakim, owner of Stanford through. "Secord may be a very good pi-
Wilson's lavish country estate in the Vir- ! Technology, a Silicon Valley firm that lot, but he doesn't have the brains or the
ginia hunt country. At a time when he was Wilson once represented as a salesman. guts for business," said a Sudanese busi-
making do on amodest government salary, ;Together, Secord and Hakim formed a nessman who dealt with him. During the
Secord, like former CIA men Theodore ~ subsidiary called Stanford Technology early 1980s a visitor to Secord's Stanford
Shackley and Thomas Clines, became a Trading Group International, located in Trading office said, "You got the sense
weekend visitor of Wilson's. The three men Vienna, Va., a suburb of Washington. that there was no trading going on. It
knew each other from the secret war in By most accounts Secord and Hakim made you wonder how they were able to
Laos. Clines is said to be Secord's best ;had an unproductive partnership when it make money."
friend, and Wilson-who is now in prison came to traditional arms deals. Hakim Activity picked up with the advent of
for shipping explosives to Lib- North's private-aid network.
ya-claims he taught Secord Secord and Hakim's Stanford
about turning government ex- Trading has been linked to the
perience into private profit. "If _ ~, ~~,. network-most notably last
I wasn't in jail," Wilson told ,. ., ';;`; -? '` October. Following the shoot-
NEWSWEEK, "I'd have headed ', ''? "~ -~:~~:_:~: ing down by Sandinistas of a
up this operation." - - contra su 1 lane and the
PP Y P
During this period Clines and ~ , ? ? - capture of one of its crewmen,
an Egyptian partner set up ?` =` Eugene Hasenfus, telephone
EATSCO-the Egyptian Amer- _ _ records of the safe house where
ican Transport & Services the crewmen lived revealed
Corp.-to ferry arms to Egypt that they frequently called Se-
following the Camp David ac- cord's home and his office at
cords. In 1982 the federal gov- Stanford Trading. But that
ernment accused EATSCO of supply operation, U.S. and
bilking it of $8 million in ship- contra officials have estimat-
ping charges. Wilson claims ed, cost no more than $5 mil-
that Secord, Shackley and Se- ~'~' lion. Congress and the special
cord's superior at the Penta- prosecutor are taking a hard
gon, Erich von Marbod, were look at where the rest of what
silent partners in the firm. All may be as much as $30 million
of them have denied Wilson's in diverted money went. Se-
charges. - - cord is expected to tell Con-
de detectors: In 1982, after 1V EST POI\T MILITARY ACADEMY NANCY MORAN-N.Y. TIMES gress that he made no money
Justice Department officials A careae~r of covert and that only $1 million or so
began investigating Secord's `~' operaYo~; Cadet got to the contras.
alleged involvement in the If indeed Secord was involved
EATSCO case, the Pentagon ,: SeCOrd graduated t0 SeCret in any illegal activity, friends
suspended the general from his ,A- ~ wars in Laos (above) and and colleagues assert that he
post. When prosecutors asked _ ~ secret rescue missions in the v'~ motivated by patriotism,
test, he a reed at first but set i~"~`~" ~""`$" v"`'""~~ -
g -, ,~,.. UP, would be painted of him as a
the condition that the prosecu- profiteer would be absolutely
tors drop their criminal Ives- erroneous," says Secord's law-
tigation if he passed the test. _ yer, Thomas Green. "Hakim
The prosecutors refused, and and Secord felt like they
Secord declined to be poly- were doing the Lord's work."
graphed. The Justice Depart- Perhaps now, with television
ment investigation got no- cameras trained to his every
where, Secord was never word and facial expression, the
charged with a crime and - ~ ~ American public will be able to
Defense Department official judge for themselves.
?____, n ,
nuu 1v ORDLAND UILC/t
natlona -security adviser, 01- RICHARD SANDZA?nd
fered to reinstate him to his DAVID N E W E L L LA WQSI3LIlgLOII,
Pentaann neat .. ERIK CALONIUSinMiamiand
Declassified in Part -Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/07/03 :CIA-RDP90-009658000605790003-5