Mistakes Made, Bush Concedes, but Backs Sale

Vice President George Bush conceded Wednesday that “clearly, mistakes were made,” but defended the Administration’s sale of arms to Iran as a policy of “simple human hope” for better relations with a geographically vital land.

In his first substantial public comment since the unfolding controversy began, Bush said: “I was aware of our Iran initiative, and I support the President’s decision.”

But the vice president, in a speech to the American Enterprise Institute, said he had not known that some of the money from the arms sales had been diverted to bank accounts for the contra rebels fighting the Sandinista government in Nicaragua.

Particularly Sensitive

The issue of support for the Nicaraguan rebels is a particularly sensitive one for the vice president, who once headed the CIA and has been linked to Administration efforts to assemble a network of private individuals seeking to aid the contras. Furthermore, his substantial role in the national security apparatus is certain to raise questions about his involvement in the Iran operation and could complicate his candidacy for the presidency in 1988.

Indeed, Bush acknowledged Wednesday that many Americans are skeptical and troubled by the government’s clandestine arms sale to Iran, and he said polls showing a drop in the Administration’s credibility are “especially painful to the President and me as well.”

Apparently going a step further than many other high-level officials in conceding Administration error, Bush departed from his text to add: “Clearly, mistakes were made.” These “mistakes,” Bush spokesman Marlin Fitzwater later said, involved the channeling of funds from the Iranian arms sale to the contras.

However, the vice president reaffirmed his support for military aid to the contras, saying: “This nation’s support of those who are fighting for democracy in Nicaragua should stand on its own merits, not hang upon events related to Iran.”

Predicts Public Support

President Reagan is a “strong and honest” leader who will enjoy the staunch backing of a “forgiving” American public after the political storm subsides, the vice president said. When the “full truth is known,” Bush said, the people will say: “ ‘Our President told the truth. He took action. Let’s go forward together.’ ”

Bush insisted that the importance of Middle Eastern oil supplies and the proximity of the Soviet Union to the strategically vital region makes it essential for the United States to seek good relations with Iran. “Look at a map,” he said.

“Either a disintegrating Iran or an overly powerful Iran could threaten the stability of the entire Mideast, and especially the moderate Arab states--our friends whose stability and independence are absolutely vital to the national security of the United States,” Bush said.

‘Understandable Animosity’

In stressing the need to seek change in Iran, Bush recalled: “Here was a country that deeply humiliated the United States by kidnaping our diplomats and burning our flag. There is in the hearts of the American people an understandable animosity--a hatred, really--to Khomeini’s Iran. I feel that way myself, and so does the President, who has been vilified time and again by Iran’s radical leaders.”

“We’re told that most Iranians feel the same animosity toward us, the country they call the Great Satan,” he said.

However, Bush spoke of a “looming transition” in Khomeini’s Iran. When the 86-year-old ayatollah is followed by a new leader, “we must be positioned to serve America’s interests,” the vice president said.

Hostages Become Factor

Moreover, he said, the desire to win the release of U.S. hostages also justifies contacts with Iran, which is the primary sponsor of the Islamic Jihad, a group still holding Americans in Lebanon. “Although the Iranians themselves aren’t holding our hostages, we believe they have influence over those who do hold some of our hostages.”

Further strengthening the United States’ position is Iran’s fear of the 26 Soviet divisions stationed near their northern border and anger at Soviet soldiers in Afghanistan who are “committing atrocities on Iran’s Islamic brothers,” the vice president said. These “sobering realities,” combined with the “unbelievably horrible war “ with Iraq, have driven some Iranian officials to consider a friendlier attitude toward America, he said.

Thus, despite “mutual hatred,” the Reagan Administration and “certain elements in Iran” began a “tentative probing dialogue,” the vice president said.

‘Needed a Signal’

“Those Iranians who were taking personal risks by just talking to us needed a signal that their risks were worth it,” Bush said. “We were told the signal they required, and we gave them that signal by selling a limited amount of arms shipments that amounted to about 1/10 of 1% of the arms supplied by other countries.”

Bush admitted that the Administration violated its own policy against selling arms to Iran but said that “simple human hope explains it perhaps better than anything else.”

President Reagan “hoped that we could open a channel that would serve the interests of the U.S. and our allies in a variety of ways. Call it leadership; give 20-20 hindsight and call it a mistaken tactic if you want to--it was risky but potentially of great value.”