[IMC-DC] BTL Q&A 2-28-05: Bush Pick for Intelligence Czar Turned Blind Eye Toward U.S.-Backed Death Squads

[Scott Harris]

Between the Lines Q&A
A weekly column featuring progressive viewpoints
on national and international issues
under-reported in mainstream media
for release Feb. 28, 2005
http://www.btlonline.org
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Bush Pick for Intelligence Czar
Turned Blind Eye Toward
U.S.-Backed Death Squads in Honduras

Interview with Peter Kornbluh,
senior analyst with the National Security Archive,
conducted by Scott Harris

Listen in RealAudio:
http://www.btlonline.org/kornbluh030405.ram
(Needs RealOne player or RealPlayer)

Making the last high-level appointment in his administration's second
term, President Bush nominated career diplomat John Negroponte to become
the nation's first director of national intelligence. Also nominated to
the post of deputy intelligence director was Lt. General Michael Hayden,
who now leads the National Security Agency. Both positions were created
after Congress adopted recommendations made by the independent
commission that investigated the failures of government leading up to
the 9/11 attacks. If confirmed by the Senate, Negroponte will manage the
budgets of 15 intelligence agencies, establish new standards among those
agencies and ensure that vital intelligence is shared.

Negroponte worked with Henry Kissinger in the National Security Council
during the Vietnam War and later served  as U.S. ambassador to Honduras,
Mexico and the Philippines. President Bush tapped Negroponte to serve as
his ambassador to the U.N. and most recently as the first American
ambassador to post-invasion Iraq. Negroponte's most controversial tenure
was in Honduras where from 1981 to 1985 he was a key player in
coordinating the Reagan administration's clandestine and illegal attacks
on the government of Nicaragua via the Contra army. Negroponte stands
accused of being complicit in, or turning a blind eye to massive human
rights abuses committed by Honduran military officials supported by the
CIA.

Between The Lines' Scott Harris spoke with Peter Kornbluh, senior
analyst with the National Security Archive who discusses Negroponte's
past and why he feels it's important for the Senate to closely examine
this nominee's attitude toward human rights that could further undermine
America's moral authority.

Peter Kornbluh: There are really three strikes against Negroponte in his
tenure, in his very controversial tenure as ambassador to Honduras.
First of all, he essentially served as pro consul; he was a throwback to
the era of gunboat diplomacy when the United States attachés would
essentially run these little countries in Central America.

The first issue about him is that he was essentially managerially in
charge of the Contra war in an extraordinary way for a diplomat. We have
declassified documents including memos to President Ronald Reagan saying
that Negroponte as ambassador was suggesting 3,000 new AK-47s (rifles)
for the leading Contra force, for example -- and would the president
approve of this recommendation. We have the declassified document with
Ronald Reagan's two little initials, "R. R.," in the "yes" box.

That's just an extraordinary thing for an ambassador to be involved in,
micromanaging the amount of weapons going to a paramilitary force
attempting to overthrow a government with which the United States
actually still had diplomatic relations.

The second issue was that after the U.S. Congress decided -- because of
people like your listeners -- that the Contra war should be shut down
and cut all aid to the Contras in Honduras, Negroponte was part of a
team of people that included Oliver North and others -- and frankly, I
should say the father of the current president of the United States, who
was then vice president, the first George Bush -- participated with this
team in circumventing congressional restrictions, the congressional
cut-off on Contra aid.

Negroponte was instrumental in the bridge of communications between
President Reagan and Vice President George Bush and the senior Honduran
generals to bribe them, to offer them quid pro quos so that they would
continue, and in fact actually step up their support for the Contra war,
which was more needed than ever now that the CIA was supposed to get out
of the picture and official U.S. funding was no longer there. And of
course this kind of segment of the Contra War was funded illegally by
funds from the sale of arms to Iran, then flowing and buying arms that
then were illegally shipped to the Contras in Honduras.

And the final issue that has haunted him, his career and is the one that
I think people are raising the most right now is that he suppressed as
ambassador full reporting of the atrocities that were being committed by
the Honduran military, particularly its elite special operations unit
called Battalion 316, which was working very closely with the CIA and
which was clearly involved in death squad activity, in murdering
suspected leftists, anybody who was thought to be supportive of
Nicaragua or against the military government of Honduras. And even
though the scale of human rights atrocities were lower in Honduras than
in other countries that we were doing the same thing in, Guatemala etc.,
but there were  a number of murders there and it became very
controversial. The human rights record of the Honduran military
threatened to give Congress more ammunition to cut off aid to Honduras.
So, Negroponte as ambassador essentially appears to have told the CIA
and the diplomats there, the attaches there not to report on the
atrocities of Battalion 316.

Between The Lines: Why is it important in your view that John Negroponte
be scrutinized closely for his conduct as ambassador in Honduras, during
these upcoming confirmation hearings for his new position as director of
national intelligence?

Peter Korbluh: There are several reasons. One is that Negroponte may
well have misled the U.S. Congress in terms of his knowledge of human
rights abuses in Honduras and the degree to which he had intelligence,
as ambassador, on this and tried to distort that information getting
back to Washington. You don't want somebody in this most important role
of intelligence czar, who has a background of distorting the truth and
misleading the Congress of the United States. Congress needs an honest
broker to be the person that shares with it the information on our
intelligence needs and the threats against the United States of America.

Two, you don't want somebody who has a track record of turning his back
on human rights abuses involved with a situation where we're  already in
a very controversial and dire strait with the atrocities that are going
on, the torture of detainees in various secret detention camps around
the world.

You would want somebody who had some rectitude on that issue and could
step forward and say, "You know what, our intelligence needs are not
served by this type of abuse and it needs to end now. We’re going to do
it a different way. We're going to cease and desist these immoral and
reprehensible activities. Not only should a civilized country never
engage in this, but they actually don't help us to learn what we need to
know about the future threats to our country." And those are two reasons
why he would not appear to be the best candidate for this position.

I would have preferred to have seen somebody who had a long history of
intelligence and knew the intelligence community. John Negroponte as a
lifelong ambassador, even one who participated very heavily in a
paramilitary war  against Nicaragua, was a consumer of intelligence. So,
he certainly knows the whole issue of how intelligence flows to the top,
what quality it has. But in terms of managing these various intelligence
bureaus, in terms of knowing the intricacies of how they work, he has
not personally worked in any of them. And now he has been asked to
coordinate all of them.

Contact the National Security Archive by calling (202) 994-7000 or visit
their website at:
http://www.nsarchive.org .

Visit our website for related links at
http://www.btlonline.org/btl030405.html#2 hed:

"Negroponte, a Torturer's Friend," by Matthew Rothschild, The
Progressive, April 21, 2004

Scott Harris is executive producer of Between The Lines, which can be
heard on more than 35 radio stations and in RealAudio and MP3 on our
website at http://www.btlonline.org. This interview excerpt was featured
on the award-winning, syndicated weekly radio newsmagazine, Between The
Lines for the week ending March 4, 2005. This Between The Lines Q&A was
compiled by Anna Manzo and Scott Harris.

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