Byrd Plans Probe of Deal With Iran : Administration’s Signals Mixed on Policy on Tehran

The Reagan Administration insisted Thursday that its policy of opposing arms sales to Iran remains in force, but President Reagan and other officials refused to comment on reports that they had secretly approved weapons shipments to Tehran in a deal aimed at winning the release of American hostages in Lebanon.

In a day of ambiguous and sometimes conflicting statements, U.S. officials said they could not answer specific questions about the Administration’s policy toward Iran or how the reported arms shipments squared with Reagan’s declared policy of making no concessions to terrorism.

“No comment,” the President said when reporters asked whether he had made a deal with Iran. He added: “The speculation, the commenting and all on a story that came out of the Middle East, and that to us has no foundation . . . is making it more difficult for us in our effort to get the other hostages free.”

Not a Specific Denial

A White House spokesman, Rusty Brashear, said later that the President’s comment was not intended as a denial of any specific account.

Government sources have told The Times that the Administration approved shipments of U.S.-made missiles and weapons parts to Iran in exchange for the Tehran regime’s aid in freeing the hostages. The sources said that the secret arrangement was negotiated last year by then-national security adviser Robert C. McFarlane with Reagan’s personal approval.

The clandestine supply line, operated from Israel, provided Iran with several planeloads of military equipment for its war against Iraq--and led to freedom for three hostages held by pro-Iranian militants in Lebanon, the sources said.

In Cleveland, McFarlane told the Associated Press: “I’m in the awkward position of being unable to comment about reports of very fanciful, largely fictitious issues that I would be very pleased to comment (on).”

“The government has stated that for as long as Iran is committed to a policy of supporting terrorism, our policy of not providing any weapons to them will continue,” McFarlane said. “. . . Adherence to and support of the policy I have just stated was carried out.”

Defense Secretary Caspar W. Weinberger, asked whether the Administration has eased its previous policy of blocking all arms shipments to Iran, said: “No. There has been no change in it.”

But spokesmen for the White House and the State Department refused to reaffirm previous policy statements which said that the United States would not ship arms to Iran or approve sales of U.S.-made weapons by other countries.

Earlier Statement

As recently as Oct. 22, State Department spokesman Charles Redman said: “The United States, in the Iran-Iraq War, reflecting our neutrality, does not supply weapons to either party, nor does it authorize the transfer by third parties to either side of U.S.-manufactured or licensed weapons.”

Asked Thursday whether that statement remains valid, deputy spokesman Pete Martinez said: “I can’t help you on that question.”

The uncovering of the secret supply line touched off protests in Congress and complaints from some Administration officials that it undercut U.S. efforts against international terrorism.

Sources said that both Weinberger and Secretary of State George P. Shultz were not informed when McFarlane first undertook his negotiations with Iran and that both were furious when they learned of the deal. Weinberger and Shultz both refused to comment on those reports.

‘Amateurish and Foolish’

“It obviously puts us in the position of acting in a way inconsistent with our own policy,” said a counterterrorism official who spoke on condition that he not be identified. “It strikes me as amateurish, self-deceiving and foolish.”

“An Administration which says, ‘We will not negotiate with terrorists,’ if it is in fact negotiating . . . is contradicting everything they said,” complained Lawrence Eagleburger, a former undersecretary of state. “I also happen to think it is very bad policy.”

Another terrorism expert, Thomas McNaugher of Washington’s Brookings Institution, noted that the State Department--apparently unaware of the secret arms shipments--has spent much of the past two years pressuring Israel and other U.S. allies to stop selling arms to Iran.

“Argentina wanted to sell tanks to Iran two years ago, but we told them not to,” McNaugher said. “The Argentines must be a little bit angry about this.”

Byrd ‘Shocked’

Sen. Robert C. Byrd (D-W.Va.), who is expected to become majority leader when the Democrats take control of the Senate in January, said he was “shocked” by the reports and vowed to investigate the supply line as a possible violation of law.

U.S. arms exports to Iran are prohibited by two laws that block the shipment of military equipment to any country that supports international terrorism. Reagan placed Iran on the list of such countries in 1981.

However, it was not immediately clear whether the reported shipments to Iran constituted a clear violation of those laws. Before August, when the arms embargo was strengthened with the second law, any shipment of military equipment valued at more than $7 million was prohibited. The Administration also refused to grant licenses for the export of smaller amounts of arms, but that ban was a matter of policy, not of law, officials said. The value of the arms shipped is not known.

Since Aug. 27, all arms shipments to Iran have been illegal unless the President makes a specific exception and reports that decision to Congress. “There has been no such report,” said California Rep. Howard L. Berman (D-Panorama City), author of the provision.

Arms, Bible and Cake

The Speaker of Iran’s Parliament, Hashemi Rafsanjani, said Tuesday that McFarlane arrived in Tehran in September, accompanied by a planeload of arms--as well as a Bible autographed by Reagan and a cake baked in the shape of a key.

Some officials and experts outside government suggested that McFarlane may have entered the negotiations with Iran out of a mixture of motives--both to explore the chances of freeing the hostages and to seek a possible opening of U.S. relations with Iran. The United States has had virtually no relations with the regime of the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini since its followers seized the U.S. Embassy in Tehran in 1979 and held 52 Americans hostage for 14 months.

“The United States should be trying to establish contacts with moderate elements in Iran,” said Shirin Hunter of Washington’s Center for Strategic and International Studies. “Shultz does not seem to agree with that idea, but some of the military and people at the NSC do.”

“The hostages (in Beirut) may have been the means to an end” for those forces in the Administration, McNaugher said.

But in the wake of the reports about the secret U.S.-Iranian negotiations, officials said that any rapprochement is probably frozen--if only because the relative “moderates” in the Tehran regime are under fire from more radical factions.

Waite Talks Endangered

Reagan and other officials also warned that the reports could endanger the continuing efforts of Anglican Church representative Terry Waite to negotiate the release of the remaining five American hostages in Beirut.

“Terry Waite has said that the speculative stories in the press make his job more difficult and may endanger his life as well as those of the hostages,” White House spokesman Pete Roussel warned reporters. “Therefore, I would urge all of you to be very cautious in what you put forward as fact.”

The secret U.S. negotiations with Iran were first reported by a pro-Syrian magazine in Beirut last weekend and then elaborated on by Rafsanjani in a speech in Tehran on Tuesday. The Times learned of the arms shipments in late October, but did not publish a story until it became clear that details of the shipments were being reported elsewhere.

Several Middle East experts said that the publication of the story in a pro-Syrian magazine suggested that the Damascus regime deliberately leaked information about the operation to halt the U.S.-Iranian talks--either to embarrass the moderates in Tehran or simply to reassert Syria’s key role in the hostage impasse.

Shows Syria’s Power

“Once again, Syria has demonstrated to the United States that you can’t get anything done in the Middle East without going to Damascus,” McNaugher said.

U.S. sources say that the secret link to Iran has supplied that nation with what were described as ground-to-ground missiles as well as spare parts for F-4 Phantom jets, American-made radar systems and C-130 transport planes and other war materiel.

The shipments were authorized by the White House, but were carried out by private American carriers under the top-secret direction of the Israeli government, one source said. Israeli officials involved in the operation in 1985 were identified by sources as then-Prime Minister Shimon Peres and Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin.