Pentagon Holds Staff Inquiry on Leak of Weinberger Letter

The Pentagon has begun investigating whether any of its employees leaked a letter that Defense Secretary Caspar W. Weinberger wrote to President Reagan urging him to make no commitments at the summit conference regarding continued compliance with the SALT II agreement or the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, a defense official said Monday.

However, Pentagon officials said they are confident that the inquiry will find that no Defense Department officials are responsible for the public disclosure of the letter on the morning Reagan left Washington for his meetings in Geneva with Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev.

One official, speaking on condition that he not be identified, said the version of the letter that was circulated in the Pentagon did not bear the defense secretary’s signature and that the version printed in the New York Times and the Washington Post--like that sent to Reagan--was signed “Cap.”

The source said that this final version was sent to six people: Reagan, White House Chief of Staff Donald T. Regan, CIA Director William J. Casey, Secretary of State George P. Shultz, Kenneth L. Adelman, director of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, and national security adviser Robert C. McFarlane.

An Administration official said that after the letter reached the State Department, it was given further distribution, “which means they in turn spread it around.”

Making clear that he felt the leak originated at the State Department, the Pentagon official said, “We think someone who doesn’t like the President’s policies and wanted to discredit Weinberger . . . must have done this.”

But, he said, if the defense secretary “found that someone here did it, they’d be out the door.”

The publication of the letter was seen as an embarrassment for Weinberger, who is not attending the summit. It accompanied a report said to document Soviet violations of existing arms control agreements.