6 Wednesday, December 3, 1986
University Daily Kansan
The Iran-contra connection Resolution of Iran controversy to take months
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — President Reagan's desire for a speedy resolution of the controversy swirling around his secret foreign policy evaporated yesterday with the administration's call for a special prosecutor and a Watergate-style congressional investigating committee.
"The die is cast." said one senior White House official. "It will go on now for months and months and months."
A Reagan aide, speaking on the condition that he not be identified, said the president realized when he addressed the nation at midday yesterday that the investigations of clandestine weapons sales to Iran and the diversion of payments to Nicaraguan rebels could well continue for at least a year. And if criminal trials follow the independent
counsel's probe, they most likely "will go beyond the end of this administration," the official said.
Analysis
Reagan's scandal has burst forth more quickly than the Watergate case which force-
ed the resignation of President Richard Nixon just over two years after the break-in at Democratic headquarters. But with the establishment of formal inquiries, the pace inevitably will slow.
"There's not a great deal that can be done now," the White House official said. "In a sense, it's out of our hands."
The official signaled that the administration will seek from here on out to deflect questions about the case, citing the ongoing
in investigations and the need to permit them to run their course before drawing conclusions.
"I've done everything in my power to make all the facts concerning this matter known to the American people." Reagan said in his speech. "I've pledged to get to the bottom of this matter."
But he chose to deliver that assurance from the privacy of the Oval Office, where he needn't submit to the questioning of an anxious and demanding White House press corps.
The pressure on Reagan's White House is fueled largely by revelations in the news media of new and damaging elements of the story, and it is by no means clear that the dimensions of the case will ultimately be measured by what has come out so far.
Although Reagan at one point last week
sought to blame "this whole thing" on what he called "a great irresponsibility on the part of the press," an aide said yesterday that the president now realizes the problem goes deeper than that.
Reagan himself satisfied at least one friendly member of Congress of his own innocence yesterday.
But others won't be so easily satisfied or quick to speak up in Reagan's defense.
House Republican leader Robert Michel of Illinois said after talking to Reagan yesterday, "I'm convinced the president hasn't broken any law."
And even those who accept the president's word that he didn't know money was being funneled to the contrais are demanding to know who else may have known. And, if no one outside the National Security Council staff was aware of the goings on, why not?
Asked to assess the fate of White House chief of staff Donald T. Regan, one knowledgeable official said Reagan's closest aide is determined "to ride it out."
"In the absence of new and dramatic revelations, he will," the official said, while actress Angela Lansbury stared.
The president characteristically will try to shelter Ragan as long as he can and won't abandon him to ease political pressure on Capitol Hill, but if Regan or others are found to have been involved in potentially illegal operations, it will be practically impossible for the president to keep them on.
"If you can get the fever down, this becomes a steady story" and the White House can get on to other business," one analyst observed. But he said the scandal still "is being driven by disclosure," and that fever pitch may continue for some time.
Leaders sympathize with Regan's position
United Press International
WASHINGTON — Republican congressional leaders expressed sympathy yesterday for beleaguered White House chief of staff Donald Regan, saying he is "taking a lot of heat" and his fate lies in President Reagan's hands.
The leaders appeared to agree that the 67 year-old top White House aide is needed by the president and his departure would be destabilizing.
Regan was present yesterday when Reagan met with the GOP chieftains to inform them of his latest moves to get the Iran-contra aid scandal behind him.
Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., said Regan and CIA Director William Casey should be fired to get the presidency back on track.
But peppered with questions after meeting with Reagan, other Republican leaders expressed an opposite view. Some of the "flak" Regan is getting goes with the job, they said. They expressed the view that critics do not want to blame the president, so they attack his staff, particularly his head man.
House GOP leader Bob Michael of Illinois called Lugar a "scalp hunter." and defended Regan as apparently being "outside the loop," meaning not privy to all National Security Council clandestine operations.
Senate Majority leader Bob Dole said, "I don't think it would serve any purpose at this time to have Don Regan leave.
"That's a judgment for the president. We visited with Don Regan after the meeting with the president. He told us precisely how he felt about it. He knew that he was taking considerable amount of heat. . . I guess a chief of staff expects that."
Sen. Alan Simpson, R-Wyo., said he did not see how Reagan could "possibly leave the president with a coming (congressional) session, the State of the Union Address, and budget considerations."
Rep Richard Cheney, R-Wyo., who served as White House chief of staff during the Ford administration, said:
"First of all, I have enormous sympathy for anyone who's got the job. It is one of the most difficult jobs in the city and I think Don Regan on balance has done a good job."
"It is not unusual, I think, given the extent to which President Reagan does delegate a lot of authority, that there should be very intense focus on the individual who receives that delegation of authority, and secondly in the midst of a controversy, he's going to have to take a lot of heat. That goes with the turf."
Speaking of the job and its perquisites, Cheney said, "You get that nice corner office. It's got a nice fireplace in it. A car picks you up in the morning and brings you to work, so when you get here you have to put up with an awful lot of flak, and you are the focal point of criticism.
“In terms of whether he can continue to serve the president well, it seems to me that is basically a judge. It seems to be the president to make.” Cheyne said.
CIA official approved arms, paper reports
United Press International
Phil Holsinger/Special to the KANSAN
WASHINGTON — Contrary to an account he initially gave House and Senate intelligence committees, CIA Director William Casey ordered the agency to provide "logistic support" for the U.S.-Iraeli shipment of arms to Iran in November 1985, a newspaper reported yesterday.
Casey told the intelligence committees Nov. 21 that John N. McMahon, then the agency's deputy director for operations, approved the arms shipment without his knowledge.
But the Los Angeles Times, quoting unidentified sources, reported Casey has since admitted giving the OK himself.
The director at first said he was traveling in China when Marine Lt. Col. Oliver North, then on the National Security Council staff, requested CIA assistance and McMahon approved it "without (Casey's) knowledge." Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, D.N.Y., told the newspaper.
Later, after McMahon contested Casey's version. Casey told the Senate committee he had misspoken, two unnamed sources said.
A Senate Intelligence Committee source told the Times the panel was satisfied with Casey's explanation of his authorization of the shipment.
"Sometimes people misspeak." the panel source said.
Another unidentified official told the Times that Casey has acknowledged the CIA relayed the request to him while he was traveling in China and he approved it.
"Anything the agency has to say will be said to the intelligence committees, the Justice Department or the Tower Commission," CIA spokeswoman Sharon Foster said.
Casey refused to comment on the shipment or the varying accounts of its approval.
The Tower Commission refers to the special three-person board, including former Texas Sen. John Tower, appointed by President Reagan to look at the operations of the NSC.
Reagan did not learn of the November 1985 shipment until February 1986, Attorney General Edwin Meese said last week.
McMahon, who left the CIA last summer and is now an executive with Lockheed Corp. in Sunnyvale, Calif., did not respond to several requests for comment.
Israel denies giving arms money to contras
The Associated Press
The shipment became the focus of inquiries by the two panels because it marks the first CIA involvement in the secret arms pipeline to Iran and because the CIA took action without a formal order from Reagan.
rebels, known as contras.
JERUSALEM — Israeli leaders yesterday denied new assertions that their country siphoned funds from arms deals with Iran to Nicaraguan rebels. Foreign Minister Shimon Peres called the reports a "complete falsehood."
Reagan signed the order, known as a finding, on Jan. 17, 1986, almost two months after the arms shipment. But Meese said last week Reagan did not know about the shipment until February 1986.
The CIA is barred by the National Security Act from aiding or conducting a covert action abroad unless the president issues a finding that the operation is in the national interest.
Denials from the top three government officials put Israel in an apparent conflict with President Reagan, who was quoted in Time magazine as saying that a third country channelled money to the rebels from inflated prices Iran paid for weapons.
Newspapers quoted U.S. officials as saying that Reagan was referring to Israel, which has acknowledged secretly shipping U.S. arms to Iran but has denied handling payments to the
Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin 1010 Ramadan during a 45-minute debate. "The Israeli government doesn't maintain contact or ties or supply weapons from here to the rebels in Nicaragua. It has not given approval for any Israeli to assist, supply know-how or weapons from Israel to the rebels."
The U.S Justice Department informally has told Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir's government that it would seek to question some Israelis in an investigation of the Iranian arms deal.
been made.
They said Israel promised to cooperate with U.S. investigators, but no formal request had
He was replying to opposition demands for parliamentary supervision of Israel's extensive arms business.
Israel is seeking clarification from Washington about Reagan's remarks published in Time, said an Israeli legislator, who spoke of anonymity and would not elaborate.
The magazine quoted Reagan as saying: "Another country was facilitating those sales of weapons systems. They then were overcharging and were apparently putting the money into bank accounts of the leaders of the contras. It wasn't us funneling money to them. This was another country."
Israel radio said U.S. attorney General Edwin Meese III told Ambassador Meir Rosanne in Washington that the United States was not accusing Israel of routing funds to the contras. It said Rosenne telephoned Meese to repeat
Israel's position that it had no connection with the rebels.
Shamir also said on Israel radio yesterday that, whatever Reagan said, Israel would not change its declaration that it had nothing to do with the rebels "because that is the truth."
Peres is professed to be "shocked" by the allegations of Israeli involvement.
"Iisrael has no connection with the contras in Nicaragua," said Peres.
The arms sales to Iran caused much less stir in Parliament than in the U.S. Congress, but left-wing legislators have demanded an explanation of the alleged contra connection.
A report in Haaretz newspaper said that Shamir cabled Secretary of State George P. Shultz and repeated his last week's statement that Israel "passed no money to the contras."
CBS removes arms sale film
United Press International
NEW YORK - A comedy about arms sales to international terrorists, originally set to air last night on CBS, was pulled from the schedule because network officials decided the movie was "inappropriate at this time."
CBS replaced "Deal of the Century" starring Chevy Chase.
Poindexter called to hearing
"There was no official reason for the change; it was a schedule change," a CBS spokesman said. But he confirmed that the show was "deemed inappropriate at this time."
United Press International
WASHINGTON — Republican and Democratic leaders praised President Reagan's decision yesterday to call for a Watergate-style special prosecutor to investigate the Iran contra-army scandal and a key figure in the inquiry appeared before a Senate committee for 17 minutes.
Also yesterday, both parties in the Senate agreed that a single congressional investigating committee should be created to look into arms sales to Iran.
The Senate Intelligence Committee called former national security adviser John Poindexter to a hearing yesterday in its closed investigation of the entangled arms deals revealed last week by Attorney General Edwin Meese.
Poindexter arrived in the afternoon and left 17 minutes later amid reports another key figure in the investigation, Lt. Col. Oliver North, refused to answer questions in the committee Monday on constitutional grounds of self-incrimination.
But he said, "I do not believe you should draw any (similar) conclusions" about Poindexter's appearance "There have been varying degrees of candor" by witnesses, he said, contradicting the rosy assessment given to reporters by the committee's chairman, Sen. Dave Durenberger, R-Minn.
Sen. David Boren, D-Okla., a member of the committee, said he would not deny the reports about North.
from I have found to be very forthcoming, perhaps more than we might have anticipated." Durenberg said.
The committee is trying to keep its inquiry under wraps, refusing to discuss testimony before it except in the broadest of terms and declining to reveal its witness list. Its demands for secrecy resulted in a Capitol police officer, who said he was following orders, shoving a photographer who tried to take a picture of Poindexter as he entered the hearing room.
"All the witnesses we have heard
Durenberger said Poindexter was interviewed just by him and Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., the ranking Democrat. Leahy indicated that the national security adviser, who quit over the Iran arms affair, would be called back later to testify before the full committee, which today is to resume an expected three weeks of hearings.
Leahy told reporters as the hearings ended yesterday that, as in Watergate, congressional hearings in the arms deals will help prevent such a "foreign policy fiasco" from recurring.
Meese, in revealing the diversion of profits from Iran arms sales to the contra rebels in Nicaragua, said Poindexter was the only top-level administration official aware of the plan. Poindexter resigned as a result of the revelations and his deputy, North, was fired.
He said the affair has "set our antiterrorist policy back by at least a decade."
Earlier Monday, former national security affairs adviser Robert McFarlane testified in private for about six hours.
Republicans and Democrats alike praised as "constructive," "honest" and "a step in the right direction" Reagan's nationally televised announcement that he favors an independent counsel to take over a Justice Department investigation in the controversy and would appoint Martin Griffin as Carlucci his new national security adviser. They were also quick to reserve criticism of Reagan in the overall Iran arms controversy.
A spokesman for McFarlane's lawyer said yesterday he would complain formally to Durenberger about breaches of secrecy in the committee proceedings.
"The president made it very clear to us that he knew nothing about transfer of funds, and I think we all believe the president, obviously, and we want to get this behind us." Senate Republican leader Robert Dole told reporters at the White House. "I'd say the next move is up to Congress." Dole said, calling for quick action.
House Republican leader Robert Michel of Illinois noted the long delays in the Watergate investigations and said in the current situation "what we want to do is get at this thing as quickly as we possible can and surely get it behind us, but we know it's going to take a long time."
House Democratic leader Jim Wright of Texas said it was clear that administration officials under Reagan broke one law and stretched at least two others.
Text of president's address
United Press International
WASHINGTON — The following is the text of President Reagan's broadcast address to the country announcing the appointment of Frank Carlucci as national adviser and his intent to have a special prosecutor named to investigate the Iran arms deal.
Good afternoon. Since the outset of the controversy over our policy relating to Iran, I've done everything in my power to make all of the facts concerning this matter known to the American people. I can appreciate why some of these things are difficult to comprehend and you are entitled to have your questions answered. And that's why I've pledged to get to the bottom of this matter.
And I have said earlier that I would welcome the appointment of an independent counsel to look into allegations of illegality in the sale of arms to Iran and in other matters. I will oppose opposing the Sandpiper government in Nicaragua.
This morning, Attorney General Meese advised me of his decision that his investigation has turned up reasonable grounds to believe that further investigations by an independent counsel would be appropriate.
Accordingly, consistent with his responsibility under the Independent Counsel Act, I immediately urged him to apply to the court here in Washington for the appointment of an independent counsel.
Yesterday, I had my first meeting with the special review board. That review board is made up of three men of unquestioned integrity and broad experience in foreign and national security policy.
At a meeting of the board, they promised a tough, nonnonsense investigation, and I promised them the full cooperation of the White House staff and all agencies of the executive branch.
No area of the NSC staff's activities will be immune
With the appointment of an independent counsel we will have in place a dual system for assuring a
from review and when the board reports to me, I intend to make their conclusions and recommendations available to the Congress and to the American people.
I recognize fully the interest of Congress in this matter and the fact that in performing its important oversight and legislative role, Congress will want to inquire into what occurred. We will cooperate fully with these inquiries. I have already taken the unprecedented steps of committing two of my former national security advisers to testify before a committee of Congress. These congressional inquiries should continue, but I do believe Congress can carry out its duties in getting the facts without disrupting the orderly conduct of a vital part of this nation's government. Accordingly, I am urging the Congress to consider some mechanism that will consolidate this inquiry. Such a step has already been requested by several members of Congress. I support the idea.
thorough review of all aspects of this matter.
In closing, I want to state again that it is my policy to oppose terrorism throughout the world, to punish those who support it and to make common cause with those who seek to suppress it. This has been my policy and will continue to be my policy.
If illegal acts were undertaken, those who did so will be brought to justice. If actions in implementing my policy were taken without my authorization, knowledge or concurrence, this would be exposed and appropriate corrective steps will be implemented.
If the investigative processes as now set in motion are now given an opportunity to work all the facts concerning Iran and the transfer of funds to assist the anti-Sandinista forces will shortly be made public and the American people, you, final arbiters of this controversy, will have all the facts and will be able to judge for themselves, yourselves.
I'm pleased to announce today that I'm appointing Frank Carlucci as assistant to the president for national security affairs. A former deputy secretary of defense, director of the CIA and ambassador to Portugal, Mr. Carlucci has the depth of experience in foreign affairs, defense and intelligence matters that he has held. A him to serve as national security adviser. The American people will be well-served by his tenure.
Thank you and God bless you.