McFarlane Details How North Got Instructions

WASHINGTON —  Former National Security Adviser Robert C. McFarlane testified Tuesday that he “passed along” a presidential directive in 1984 to Lt. Col. Oliver L. North that “we’ve got to find a way to keep (the Contra rebels in Nicaragua) together body and soul.”

McFarlane, who was North’s boss and then-President Ronald Reagan’s aide, said that Reagan expressed anger at the congressional cutoff of military assistance for the rebel forces because he “felt deeply” about their cause and thought Congress was “breaking faith with the freedom fighters who had risked their lives.”

McFarlane related Reagan’s instructions in the most specific terms to date under cross-examination by Brendan V. Sullivan Jr., North’s attorney. Sullivan has been trying to show jurors at North’s trial how the retired Marine officer was motivated to direct a secret program of financial assistance for the Contras after Congress prohibited it in 1984. North’s defense maintains that he believed he had high-level authorization for his efforts.

McFarlane said that Reagan’s instructions were given to him at a meeting in the summer of 1984 and that he “passed them along” to Adm. John M. Poindexter, his deputy, and to North, who had been designated as “point man” to keep in touch with Contra leaders. Poindexter has been charged with conspiracy and other crimes in the Iran-Contra scandal and is due to stand trial separately after North.

McFarlane, although he is the prosecution’s chief witness against North, finished his questioning by prosecutor John W. Keker on a note of tension when Keker accused him of writing a “nonsense” note to Congress shortly before his 1987 suicide attempt. Keker, apparently piqued because McFarlane has sought to excuse North’s role in drafting allegedly misleading letters to Congress signed by McFarlane about the Contra effort, suddenly turned on the witness and questioned his credibility.

McFarlane, who has pleaded guilty and been sentenced for misleading Congress, testified that he sought to clarify some of his false statements by sending a personal note to Rep. Lee H. Hamilton (D-Ind.), then chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, on Feb. 8, 1987--the day before he took a drug overdose at home.

But Keker, citing apparently misleading figures about Contra aid in the note, said to McFarlane: “That was just complete nonsense, wasn’t it?”

“It was not!” McFarlane shot back, angrily.

His voice rising, the normally low-key McFarlane continued:

“Mr. Keker, if I had sat down in my state of mind the day before I tried to take my life--if I had tried to parse every last dime that went to the Contras--it probably would have come out different.”

Keker pointed out that McFarlane’s 1987 note admitted knowledge of about a $5-million contribution from a foreign national “from his own wealth” for the Contras, although he previously testified that he had failed to tell congressmen in 1985 about his role in collecting part of a $32-million donation from the Saudi Arabian ambassador.

McFarlane, glaring at Keker, said: “If that’s your point, you’re right. I’m dead wrong. I knew darn well it was something close to a million dollars a month. . . . But I was acknowledging my participation in a third-country donation. And I wanted that on the record.”

McFarlane has previously testified that while Reagan never told his aides to lie to Congress, the former President instructed them not to share certain information with Congress, including solicitation of Contra aid from third countries while the congressional prohibition was in place.

Sullivan’s cross-examination Tuesday also brought agreement from McFarlane that, in Sullivan’s words, “you have a kind of gamesmanship in Washington between the executive branch and Congress--they want to know something, and we try to tell them as little as possible.”

North is charged principally with making false statements to Congress and obstructing congressional inquiries into his support for the Contras.