Reagan to Seek More Funds to Double Contra Forces : Guerrillas Would Step Up Attacks

Emboldened by congressional approval of $27 million in aid for Nicaragua’s anti-Sandinista rebels, the Reagan Administration has decided to seek still more funds next year in a bid to double the size of the rebel army and build it into a fighting force capable of genuinely threatening Managua’s leftist regime.

Administration officials, after months of bruising but ultimately successful battles with a reluctant Congress, say they are convinced that public opinion has shifted solidly against the Sandinistas.

They speak increasingly of the rebel effort, originally a modest proxy war run covertly by the CIA, as the center of U.S. policy in Central America--with the overt goal of toppling the Sandinistas.

Basic Problem

“We consider the problem in Central America basically to be Nicaragua, as supported by Cuba and the Soviet Union,” Secretary of State George P. Shultz declared during a recent visit to Mexico. “The people of Nicaragua . . . don’t accept that, and they want to fight for the freedom and independence of their country. I think that’s a cause worthy of support.”

“If the Sandinistas go on antagonizing the people of Nicaragua long enough, the people of Nicaragua are going to throw them out,” Elliott Abrams, the newly installed assistant secretary of state for Latin America, said in an interview. “That’s the direction they seem to be moving. It’s very unfortunate, but that’s their choice.”

Other officials, speaking on condition that they not be identified, are even blunter. One said: “The Sandinistas want communism in Nicaragua and Central America, and we cannot accept that. They must be removed.”

These officials said they expect to seek “substantially” more aid next year for the contras , as the rebels are called, without the limitation of this year’s congressional prohibition against purchasing weapons and ammunition. The aim, they said, is to expand the rebel force to 35,000 men or more from its present strength, which is estimated to be about 18,000.

Escalation Expected

As their force roughly doubles, the contras would be expected to escalate their attacks on the Sandinista regime.

Adolfo Calero, leader of the largest contra group, the Nicaraguan Democratic Force, said the $27 million approved by Congress this week would enable his men “to go beyond the stop-and-go performance we’ve had ever since we started . . . to put on a serious, continuous effort against the Sandinistas.”

He noted that, on Thursday, his troops briefly cut Nicaragua’s main highway some 60 miles north of Managua in one of their most successful raids in months.

His force has so far fought mostly a hit-and-run sort of war in the rugged mountains along Nicaragua’s northern border with Honduras, but “we’re going to the cities,” Calero promised, and added:

“We’re going to the Pacific seaboard (where the country’s population is concentrated). . . . It will take a little time--a few months, I would say. But if we’re not held back as before, we can do some serious damage.”

U.S. officials are more cautious, forecasting only that the contras will be able to increase pressure on the Sandinistas as their ranks increase. About 500 new recruits are joining the rebel force each month, they estimate.

They have good reason to hedge their bets. The contras’ war against the Sandinistas, which began in the aftermath of Nicaragua’s 1979 revolution as members of the old regime’s National Guard fled north, has had its ups and downs. The CIA spent more than $80 million to arm and organize the contras from 1981 to 1984, but the force never achieved any major victories over the growing Sandinista army--even when CIA gunboats and helicopters entered the fray.

Shift in Sentiment

That officially secret war came to a sputtering halt in April, 1984, when Congress objected to the CIA’s mining of Nicaraguan harbors and cut off support for the contras. But sentiment shifted over the following months, as the Sandinistas appeared to move closer to the Soviet Union and several Nicaraguan opposition figures threw their support to the contras, and the Democratic-led House voted in June to approve the assistance it had earlier denied.

Abrams said he believes Congress’ change of heart will last, although he added, “How much money we get will depend partly on . . . how the Sandinistas behave.”