RIGHTS OF PASSAGE : Luck Is Still With Reagan As U.S. Deals With Libya

It was a good week for Ronald Reagan. “Mr. Lucky,” as one White House insider called the President, “certainly knows how to pick his opponents.” First, Libyan strongman Moammar Kadafi sent a ragtag group of undertrained and ill-equipped forces against a vastly superior U.S. naval armada--with predictable results. Then, Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega surprised and delighted his harshest critics by dispatching Sandinista soldiers into neighboring Honduras, prompting swift U.S. military assistance and ensuring victory in the contra aid fight, at least in the Senate.

But, to hear it from White House aides, these self-inflicted wounds suffered by old Reagan Administration nemeses aren’t coincidental. While not the result of specific White House efforts, staffers nonetheless regard these events as the fruits of their long-term planning. “It is part of a broader trend and approach we have initiated,” said one senior Administration policy maker.

This official explained that the Administration’s determination to put “regional security on the East-West agenda,” has placed the Soviet Union and its friends on the defensive around the world. As a result, whether in Libya, Nicaragua or Afghanistan (another example cited by this official) opponents’ mistakes are quickly pounced on by an Administration “willing to deal with threats and be responsive to friends.”

Although there was broad agreement within the Administration over the need to confront the Sandinistas, action against Libya, until two weeks ago, was much more problematic. Defense Secretary Casper W. Weinberger remained the major holdout in a months-, if not years-long campaign to confront Kadafi.

But at a high-level White House meeting on March 14, after what one observer called “much beating around the head,” Weinberger finally accepted the inevitable. “It took a certain tenacity,” admitted an Administration official, who explained the defense secretary has long been opposed to the use of U.S. force in the Middle East.

Weinberger was the most reluctant combatant in Lebanon during the American Marines stay there from 1982 to 1984. He initially opposed the U.S. interception of the Achille Lauro hijackers in October, 1985. After the Dec. 27 terrorist attacks in Rome and Vienna, Weinberger urged restraint in arguments with Administration hard-liners, such as Secretary of State George P. Shultz, who pressed for military retaliation against Libya. In reluctantly agreeing to proceed with scheduled naval maneuvers north of the Gulf of Sidra early this year, Weinberger and the Joint Chiefs of Staff still succeeded in keeping U.S. forces above Kadafi’s “Line of Death.” They accomplished this, in part, by arguing that two aircraft carriers were insufficient to meet the possible combat risk.

“Going to war you must have the Pentagon, and Casper Weinberger is a pretty big obstacle,” said one Administration insider at the time. “But,” this official added, “the attacks at Rome and Vienna allowed those who were after Kadafi for years to steamroll the opposition.”

So it was apparent this month, with the temporary stationing in the Mediterranean of a third U.S. aircraft carrier, the America, that Weinberger had run out of maneuvering room. Therefore, the defense secretary knew the decision he had acquiesced to during the March 14 meeting was likely to lead to confrontation. “We decided this was to be an ‘emphatic challenge’ ” said one senior U.S. official. “It was to be constant operations . . . not just darting in and out.”

Kadafi then played right into American hands. “He probably miscalculated,” says one long-time Arab analyst. “First, he underestimated the severity of the U.S. military response. Second, he probably had little or no understanding of our ability to render him militarily impotent.”

U.S. officials confirmed that the three carrier task groups operated under “a complete umbrella, as if we were taking on the Russians.” With improved technology--some learned from Israeli experiences against Syria in 1982--the United States, in the words of one White House official, “made the Libyans look like the Polish cavalry charging German tanks in World War II.”

Conventional wisdom has it that Kadafi, despite the military drubbing he received, will gain politically in the Arab world merely by having demonstrated his willingness to take on a superpower. As one analyst put it, “It is normal for small countries to lose to big countries.”

But other Arab affairs experts are not so sure. Thus far, one well-connected former U.S. official argues, the somewhat muted reaction from all but a few fellow Arab leaders testifies to what an outcast Kadafi has become in the Arab world. This expert explains, “Arabs don’t like a loser.” And, in his view, the pounding Libya took “has considerably shortened Kadafi’s life span.”

Still, experts both in and outside the State Department agree that the United States will not get off “scot free” in the Arab world. Pro-American Arab leaders lose credibility with their public when continually forced to chose between fellow Arabs and the West. One Middle East specialist says, “I know it is hard for Americans to accept, but there is such a thing as Arab public opinion, which all leaders there must deal with when crafting policy.”

An Egyptian official, who asserts the U.S. actions against Libya will have no impact on his domestic credibility, nonetheless regards the U.S. moves as counterproductive. “While we don’t shed any tears for Kadafi, we don’t want him to be a hero at home,” he says. “You Americans have rallied his people and hurt those who oppose him.” Moreover, reflecting the views of a number of other observers, this diplomat notes that, with the U.S. naval force maneuvers completed, “it will be clear to all that America can’t keep up the pressure.”

But if, as it appears likely, Kadafi continues to back terrorist actions against U.S. installations and American citizens, the Administration is ready to up the ante. Shultz is known to believe that, “an overwhelming application of force will embolden internal Libyan opposition.

Meanwhile, the Europeans, if judged by the reaction of their Washington-based diplomatic corps, have long been resigned to a series of U.S.-Libyan skirmishes. “It is no longer a question of ‘if’ but ‘when and how’ ” declared one well-informed European diplomat weeks ago.

Responding to Administration blandishments suggesting that cooperation from the Europeans on economic sanctions against Libya would reduce the likelihood of a shoot-out, this diplomat shrugged his shoulders and said, “It is an American issue whatever we think or do.”

The one-sided fire fight that took place in the Gulf of Sidra last week was indeed an American issue in the same sense as arms control is an American issue. It was designed and implemented by officials who in their own words were, “mindful of the need to send a broader signal.”

As one senior U.S. official explained: “Actions like these against Libya have a salutary effect on East-West relations. They demonstrate the limitation on the Soviet Union’s ability to defend client states. They show the superiority of U.S. (military) techniques. They prove the Soviets can’t score gains ‘on the cheek.’ They are part of a global trend and will necessarily impact on our (continuing) reassessment of the capabilities of the Soviet Union.”