Panels Probe Lost CIA Arms Role Evidence

WASHINGTON —  Congressional investigators said Wednesday that they are looking into the mysterious disappearance of two documents that apparently contradict a high-ranking CIA official’s claims of ignorance about the true nature of his efforts to aid a November, 1985, air shipment of U.S. arms by Israel to Iran.

Committee investigators are said to be looking into the possibility that the missing evidence was destroyed. “It is suspicious that these cables are missing,” one source said.

Official’s Account

The alleged discrepancy centers on the testimony of Duane (Dewey) Clarridge, the CIA’s European division chief, who was asked by then-White House aide Oliver L. North for assistance in obtaining landing rights for an Israeli plane carrying material to Iran to be used as part of a deal that would lead to the release of American hostages.

Clarridge, who ordered CIA and State Department officials in Lisbon to obtain permission for the plane to land there, has told investigators that he believed the aircraft contained oil-drilling parts bound for Iran. Its actual contents were 80 U.S.-made HAWK anti-aircraft missiles.

North, the central figure in the Iran- contra affair, had hoped to transfer the arms in Lisbon from an Israeli plane to a second aircraft in an attempt to maintain the secrecy of the mission. However, Portuguese officials reportedly denied the request to allow the plane to land, and North turned to a CIA proprietary company to make the delivery.

The CIA official in Lisbon who received Clarridge’s order has refuted his version in his closed testimony, a summary of which was released Wednesday by the panels.

The official, whose identity was not disclosed, said he informed Clarridge in a cable “that the flight would contain HAWK missiles and that they were being shipped to Iran to secure the release of American hostages,” said W. Neil Eggleston, deputy chief counsel of the House select committee investigating the scandal.

The disclosure of the discrepancy is a significant development because it may have been illegal for the CIA at the time to become involved in the shipment of weapons to Iran without an official authorization from President Reagan. That approval--known as a “finding”--was not signed until the following January.

Eggleston added that the CIA communications technician who was on duty then also recalls that the cable--sent on a private agency channel--specifically mentioned missiles. In addition, a State Department official in Portugal who was trying to assist in the effort also told the panels that he either recalls reading the cable or being told by the CIA official that it contained information about the HAWKs.

However, that document was not among copies of about 80 cables that Clarridge provided the committees. Also missing is Clarridge’s original cable telling CIA and State Department officers in Lisbon to help retired Maj. Gen. Richard V. Secord obtain landing rights for the plane. The CIA official said it was Secord who informed him that the plane was carrying missiles.

In Personal Files

“The committees were informed by the CIA that the only place where these (private channel) cables were located was in Mr. Clarridge’s own personal files at the agency,” Eggleston said. “No copies were maintained in the official files of the agency.”

The agency’s role in the delivery was also the subject of six hours of testimony Wednesday by former CIA general counsel Stanley Sporkin, who told the committees that he had advised the White House against using Secord as the middleman in the U.S. arms sales to Iran. His advice was ignored.

Secord, who was selected by North to serve as middleman in the Iran arms sales as well as a clandestine operation to provide military supplies to the Nicaraguan resistance, has proven to be among the Iran-contra affair’s most controversial figures. Despite mounting evidence that he reaped a sizable profit from the venture, Secord insists that he made no money.

Sporkin said he had known Secord since 1983, when the retired Air Force general was rejected for a CIA security clearance because of his friendship with former CIA agent Edwin P. Wilson, who had been convicted of illegally selling munitions to Libya.

During a 1983 meeting with Secord, Sporkin recalled, he explained his reason for rejecting the security clearance by quoting from a Russian proverb: “If you lie down with dogs, you come up with fleas.”

Calls Poindexter

As a result, Sporkin said he called then White House National Security Adviser John M. Poindexter in January, 1986, when he learned that Secord was going to be involved in the Iran initiative. “I asked him whether he knew about it; he told me that he did not know about it and would look into the matter,” Sporkin said.

Sporkin was not the first witness who has told of being concerned about Secord’s involvement. Felix Rodriguez, a former CIA agent in Costa Rica, told the panels May 28 that he warned North last year that Secord’s link to Wilson could cause a scandal that would be “worse than Watergate.”

Poindexter is likely to be asked when he testifies in mid-July why he did not follow Sporkin’s advice about Secord.

Sporkin, who is now a federal District Court judge, was challenged time and again by committee members to justify the so-called legal “findings” that he drafted in late 1985 and early 1986 that set in motion the U.S. arms sales to Iran.

A revised version of Sporkin’s finding, which was signed by Reagan on Jan. 17, stipulated that the Congress would not be notified of Iranian arms sales--even though the law requires the President to give Congress “timely” notice of all covert actions. Congress did not learn about the sales until they became public knowledge last November.

Despite loud objections voiced by the committees, Sporkin insisted that the President had every right to keep the Iran initiative secret from Congress. But he added that he assumed that Congress eventually would be told.

Notify Congress

“There are notification requirements,” he acknowledged. “You’ve got to notify the Congress. There might be different ways of notifying, but you’ve got to notify them.”

Outraged by Sporkin’s testimony, Sen. George J. Mitchell (D-Me.) said Congress will now be forced to revise the law to make certain that congressional leaders are notified sooner of covert activity. “Your testimony makes clear that one of the things we must do is completely revisit this act,” he said.

Sporkin said he was first drawn into the Iranian arms sale on Nov. 25, 1986, when he was asked by then-CIA Deputy Director John N. McMahon to provide legal advice in the wake of the CIA’s involvement in the November, 1985, arms shipment from Portugal to Iran.

He said his advice was that the CIA should draft a “finding” to be signed by the President approving the agency’s role in the affair. Although Sporkin actually drafted the finding, the initial version was never signed by Reagan.

Committee members were highly critical of Sporkin’s effort to draft a retroactive finding, which they contended was contrary to the intent of the law that requires the CIA to obtain prior presidential approval for all covert actions.

Sporkin was clearly sensitive to their criticism. “If I had realized that this would get me my 15 minutes in the sun, I think I would have given up that opportunity,” he said.

Defends Action

But he defended his action on grounds that the CIA role in the shipment had been minor.

“We were talking about 48 hours of activity--transportation and communications,” he said. “We were the tail end of the process. We only got brought in because they could find nobody else to do it. We were bailing out a project.”