The Best of the Bureau/The_Best_of_the_Bureau_Bureau_Development_Inc._1992.iso/dp/0108/01084.txt

Text File | 1992-08-07 | 31KB | 542 lines

$Unique_ID{bob01084}
$Pretitle{}
$Title{Iran-Contra Affair: The Report
Chapter 24B  Misuse of Findings}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Various}
$Affiliation{}
$Subject{intelligence
finding
cia
congress
president
covert
arms
contras
central
casey}
$Date{1987}
$Log{}
Title:       Iran-Contra Affair: The Report
Author:      Various
Date:        1987

Chapter 24B  Misuse of Findings

     The Findings process was circumvented.  Covert actions were undertaken
outside the specific authorizations of Presidential Findings.  At other times,
covert actions were undertaken without a Presidential Finding altogether.
Actions were undertaken through entities other than the CIA, including foreign
governments and private parties.  There were claims that the Findings could be
used to override provisions of the law.  The statutory option for prior notice
to eight key congressional leaders was disregarded throughout, along with the
legal requirement to notify the Intelligence Committees in a "timely fashion."

"Stretching" Findings

     On December I, 1981, President Reagan signed a Finding that authorized
certain covert action programs in Central America, particularly in Nicaragua.
The Finding is directed toward the Cuban presence in Nicaragua and Central
America generally.  This conflicts with the Administration's explanation of
the Finding which emphasized its purpose as the interdiction of arms from
Nicaragua to the leftist insurgents in El Salvador.  Yet, under the aegis of
this Finding, the CIA provided assistance to Eden Pastora's rebel forces in
the south of Nicaragua, far from El Salvador.  The stated goal of these forces
was the overthrow of the Sandinista Government.

     Destabilizing the Sandinistas in Nicaragua was a different goal from arms
interdiction to El Salvador.  Director Casey, however, declined to seek a new
Finding that properly distinguished between these two objectives.

     If a Finding signed by the President and presented to the Intelligence
Committees for one purpose can be used for another, the Finding and
notification processes become meaningless.  In fact, while Casey was Director
of Central Intelligence, CIA personnel attempted to craft Findings in terms so
broad that they would not limit the CIA's freedom to act. Judge Sporkin, the
General Counsel of the CIA, analogized the formulation of Findings to the
preparation of a securities prospectus where the corporate purposes are
broadly stated to give management discretion to carry out a wide range of
activities.  Viewed in this way, a Finding becomes a blank check for the
intelligence agency and defeats the notion of Presidential accountability
under the Hughes-Ryan law.  At this point, it ceases to be a self-limiting
document confined to a specific program.

Dispensing with Presidential Findings

     In reaction to the adoption of the second Boland Amendment in October
1984, the NSC staff took an increasingly active role in support of the
Contras.  The NSC staff raised money for the Contras and, with Richard
Secord's assistance, created an organization outside the Government to procure
arms and resupply the Contras.  While the President has said that supporting
the Contras was his own idea, he told the Tower Board that he was unaware that
the NSC staff was directly assisting the Contras.  In any event, there was no
Presidential Finding authorizing these activities. National Security Adviser
Robert C. McFarlane testified that he was unaware of the magnitude of Oliver
North's operation although both North and Admiral John M. Poindexter disputed
McFarlane's denials.

     Efforts coordinated by North to ransom hostages constitute another
instance in which the legal requirements for a Finding were dispensed with.
This was in contravention of the President's own directive, Executive Order
12333, which provided specifically that all covert actions be contained in
Presidential Findings.  Not only was a Finding dispensed with, but funds to
support the operation were raised from private sources.  The operation was
pursued despite the objection of CIA and some DEA officials, and Congress was
not notified.

     There was also no written Finding when the CIA became involved in the
covert shipment of arms to Iran in 1985.  As McFarlane subsequently expressed,
"[t]he President was all for letting the Israelis do whatever they wanted to
do."  In November 1986, McFarlane asserted that the Attorney General had
opined that U.S. participation in the initial Israeli shipment, could be
justified on the grounds that the President had made a "mental Finding."  The
Attorney General testified to his view that the President's concurrence was
tantamount to an oral Finding and thus sufficient legal authorization for the
program.

     The December 1985 Finding sought to authorize retroactively the
CIA-assisted shipment of arms in November 1985.  It was drafted after the
shipment was made; presented to the President at the request of Casey and
urging of CIA Deputy Director John McMahon; and then signed by the President
without the normal full staffing of relevant senior Administration officials.
This process ignored a central purpose of the Finding requirement which is to
ensure that the President fully authorizes a covert action before it begins
and is accountable for its implementation. Further, the "unless and until"
language of the Hughes-Ryan Amendment clearly required a Finding before the
CIA could proceed.

     The us of Findings to ensure Presidential responsibility for covert
action operations also was disregarded in the diversion of money from the Iran
program to the Contras, which itself was never authorized by a Finding.
Neither the January 17, 1986, Finding relating to the Iran arms sales, nor any
Finding relating to assistance to the Contras authorized the diversion of
funds.  Poindexter testified that he believed the diversion would become
politically controversial if exposed, so he decided not to tell the President
in order to give him "deniability."

     Poindexter testified that he destroyed the only signed copy of the
December 1985 Iran Finding in November 1986 to spare the President political
embarrassment.  However, when the President signed that Finding - which was
written as a straight arms-for-hostages operation - he accepted responsibility
for his decision.  Along with that responsibility came the risk that the
public might disapprove of the decision if it were ever revealed.  In
destroying the record of the President's post hoc approval of the November
1985 shipment, Poindexter also sought to destroy the proof of Presidential
accountability that the law seeks to achieve.

Using Findings To Avoid Laws

     At times, certain members of the Administration used Findings to avoid
legal requirements.  A project to stockpile weapons for the Contras is a case
in point.

     In the summer of 1983, the CIA feared that Congress might refuse to
appropriate funds for the Contras in the next fiscal year 1984.  The Agency
thus devised a way of bypassing the appropriations process: the Department of
Defense (DOD) would secretly transfer military equipment to the CIA without
charge.  The Agency would then dispense the equipment to the Contras in the
following fiscal year even if Congress cut off aid.  To justify its request,
the CIA pointed to the broad Presidential Finding authorizing assistance to
the Contras even though nothing was said in that Finding about a donation of
DOD materiel to the Contras through the CIA.

     The Finding that was supposed to enhance control over covert action
operations was invoked to justify an evasion of one of the Constitution's most
fundamental safeguards, the dependence of the executive branch upon Congress
for specific appropriations.  In the end, the proposal was not implemented
because DOD would not transfer the equipment to the CIA free of charge.

     In the Iran initiative, the Administration also used the Finding to avoid
compliance with the laws regulating the export of arms.  When the January 17,
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