Jacobsen Calls North Hero, Lashes Some in Press and Politics

Former hostage David P. Jacobsen on Tuesday hailed ousted National Security Council member Lt. Col. Oliver North as “an American hero” and praised President Reagan for moving to restore relations with Iran.

Jacobsen, speaking before the Orange County Board of Supervisors, criticized “a certain segment” of the U.S. news media for its reporting on arms sales to Iran and lashed out at “some self-serving politicians for conducting the 1988 presidential campaign at the humanitarian expense of the remaining American hostages.”

Jacobsen, a Huntington Beach resident who was administrator of American University Hospital in Beirut when he was kidnaped in May of 1985, was freed Nov. 2 after 17 months in captivity.

Bearded, slim and looking fit, Jacobsen received a proclamation from the Board of Supervisors but used the occasion to deny any link between his release and the secret sale of arms to Iran.

Credit Parceled Out

Jacobsen credited his release to the U.S. government, Reagan and the National Security Council, as well as Terry Waite, the special emissary of the Archbishop of Canterbury. He said his faith in God, prayers by millions of people around the world and the efforts of his family and relatives of the other hostages also helped him gain his freedom.

“An independent Lebanese group held me and now holds Terry Anderson and Tom Sutherland,” Jacobsen said. “They are not Iranians and I am confident they do not take direct orders from Iran, from Syria or any other nation.”

He also said that “it appears that arms have been going to Iran since 1981,” long before the Americans were kidnaped. There have been reports that Israel was selling spare parts to Iran in 1981, soon after the release of U.S. diplomats seized as hostages during the Carter administration, but Jacobsen declined to elaborate on his comments.

Jacobsen praised North, the Marine lieutenant colonel who worked for the National Security Council and who was fired last week after disclosures that Iranian money paid for U.S. arms was funneled to guerrillas fighting the government of Nicaragua.

“I feel that Col. North is an American hero, and I resent comments to the contrary,” Jacobsen said. Reagan and North “personally cared for my safety, but they would never, ever, under any condition compromise American policy or the safety of other Americans for six hostages.”

Jacobsen’s release followed the freeing of the Rev. Benjamin Weir and Father Lawrence Jenco. Hostage William Buckley was killed. Anderson, the chief Middle East correspondent for Associated Press, and Sutherland, dean of the agricultural school at American University, also were abducted last year and are still being held. All six were taken by a group called Islamic Jihad, or Islamic Holy War. Two other groups have claimed responsibility for kidnaping three other Americans in Beirut since September.

In his press conference Nov. 19, Reagan said the United States had not traded arms for hostages but said arms sales to Iran would not resume. He said he was trying to establish a relationship with a country “of great strategic importance” and at the same time fight terrorism and get American hostages freed.

Jacobsen endorsed Reagan’s philosophy, saying the President “recognized that we could not ignore Iran,” a country of great wealth and influence in the Persian Gulf region that could spell disaster for the United States if it fell “into the Russian orbit of influence.”

“Any negotiations that were attempted were for the safety of Americans of the future and not for me, one of the hostages,” Jacobsen said, reading from notes in a mostly calm voice that only occasionally quavered.

“I know that was a torment for the President. I know he truly cares. He had the best interests of this country at heart. . . . Give him a chance. Do not give love and comfort to the people that are holding Tom and Terry.”

News of the arms sales stirred a firestorm across the county and in Congress. Reagan last week told Time magazine that the press was guilty of “great irresponsibility” on the issue.

Jacobsen said he was “not giving a blanket condemnation of the press” but told reporters to be “responsible” because their accounts are read by the captors of Anderson and Sutherland.

Jacobsen’s son Eric said that it was an oversimplification to equate arms sales and hostage releases and that such a characterization “has probably delayed and definitely made it a lot more difficult” to win the freedom of the remaining hostages.