Battle Lines on Aid to Contras Being Formed

For the fifth time in two years, President Reagan is girding for battle with Congress over the cause that he maintains will determine the future of the Western Hemisphere: his request for $100 million in U.S. aid for the rebels fighting Nicaragua’s Marxist-led regime.

But with a new vote on the aid approaching in the Democratic-led House of Representatives, Congress and the public remain deeply divided over the proper U.S. policy in Central America, and Reagan Administration officials are still uncertain as to what their strategy should be.

The President himself displays no sense of doubt. “It’s time for an up-or-down vote on freedom in Nicaragua,” he told a news conference last week, “an up-or-down vote on whether the United States is going to stop expansionism on the American mainland while the price is not too high and the risk is still not too great.”

Lost in March

The House has already given Reagan an up-or-down vote on aid for the rebels, known as contras . The aid request lost by a 222-210 vote March 20. But some White House hard-liners believe that the Administration has gained ground since that vote and hope that the next test on the House floor, which could come as early as next week, will reverse the earlier defeat.

“There’s clearly been a growth (in support),” a White House official said. “Two years ago, it was 118 votes for military aid, then 180, then 210. So there isn’t any question about which direction we’re going in. The question is whether you get the contra aid before you lose the war in Central America.”

Others in the Administration are less confident. “It’s not clear that we’ve made any headway,” a State Department official said.

Some Administration officials, including Elliott Abrams, assistant secretary of state for inter-American affairs, have been negotiating with a group of uncommitted House members toward a possible compromise aid package that would give the contras most of the $100 million, but under tighter administrative controls than the White House has recommended.

‘Decent Margin’ Sought

“It’s got to be a very measured package aimed at helping negotiations in the area,” said Rep. Olympia J. Snowe (R-Me.), one of the uncommitted House members. “We’re attempting to find something that would pass the House with a decent margin of support, not one or two votes.”

Without the votes of this swing group, whose leaders include Rep. Dave McCurdy (D-Okla.), the President almost surely lacks sufficient support in the House for any type of contras aid. But Administration officials said Reagan has not yet agreed to any concessions, and an aide to House Minority Leader Robert H. Michel (R-Ill.) said the group’s demands--including $500 million in economic aid for all of Central America--are unacceptable.

“We are at an impasse,” Michel’s aide said.

“It may not be possible . . . to find a middle ground,” Snowe admitted.

Even in the Republican-controlled Senate, which only narrowly approved aid for the contras before the House took up the issue earlier this year, many members who share Reagan’s fears about Nicaragua are growing increasingly concerned that his policy may not be solving the problem.

Reagan Administration officials have assured Congress that, in proposing to arm the contras, their commitment is not to the overthrow of the Sandinistas in Managua, but to the task of forcing Nicaragua to conclude a Central American peace treaty that would guarantee a role for the contras in a democratic Nicaragua of the future.

Last month, however, when some thought that the five Central American countries might actually conclude a treaty, hard-liners in the Administration raised a flurry of objections, some of them saying that a treaty of any kind might not be in the best interest of the United States.

Commitment Questioned

“People are wondering what the commitment is,” said Sen. Nancy Landon Kassebaum (R-Kan.), who has previously voted for contras aid with some reservations. “I think that what it reflects is a division within the Administration.”

On Tuesday, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Richard G. Lugar (R-Ind.), normally a loyal supporter of Administration policy in Central America, will make a speech at the National Press Club calling on Reagan to recommit himself to achieving a negotiated settlement of Central American conflicts. Without such a commitment, Lugar will say, the President will never win Congress’ permission to resume military aid for the contras.

Focus of Controversy

The contras themselves have been a continual focus of controversy, with Reagan extolling them as “freedom fighters” and many Democrats denouncing them as corrupt and brutal. Some rebel leaders have attempted to improve the behavior of their guerrilla forces in the field and present a more moderate political image in Washington.

But so far, what some State Department officials call “the contras reform movement” has had little to show for its efforts.

“We still have to implement the tasks we have committed ourselves to,” Arturo Cruz, a moderate member of the contras leadership, says. “If we don’t, we’ll look like monkeys.”

At the same time, Reagan’s Democratic opponents have been investigating the contras’ behavior over the last two years, and they have uncovered allegations of misconduct that may eventually be their ace in the hole when it comes to defeating the $100-million aid proposal in the House.

Last week, congressional investigators said an audit revealed that almost $1.2 million in so-called non-lethal U.S. aid to the rebels, part of a congressional appropriation of $27 million last year, was paid out to the armed forces of Honduras and that another $3.6 million ended up in bank accounts in the United States, the Bahamas and the Cayman Islands.

Although Secretary of State George P. Shultz denounced the audit as something “concocted by people in the Congress who are opposing us on this vote,” members of Congress said they were concerned by the charges. “When you see that kind of apparent fraud and abuse with taxpayers’ money, it makes it difficult to vote for additional support,” Snowe said.

Snowe, McCurdy and other members of the small swing bloc in the House have proposed a compromise that would withhold about half of the Administration’s requested $100 million in aid until next February, when Congress would take another vote. It is a proposal that the debate-weary Administration strongly dislikes.

‘Important Dimension’

McCurdy has also asked for an Administration commitment to $500 million in new economic aid for the countries of Central America and has reportedly proposed that $300 million of that could come from the Defense Department budget. Snowe called such an aid outlay “a very important dimension of the package,” but other Republicans called it unrealistic.

“It’s a big sticking point,” one Republican aide said.

Finally, McCurdy has proposed a bipartisan congressional commission to monitor the use of the aid--a watchdog panel to make sure the Administration keeps its pledges to support negotiated settlements in Central America. The commission would issue a report just before Congress was to vote on releasing the second half of the $100-million contras aid package next February.