Honduran Jets Raided Nicaragua, U.S. Says : Military Installations Up to 16 Miles Beyond Border Were Targeted, State Dept. Aide Reports

Planes of the Honduran air force bombed military installations up to 16 miles inside Nicaragua last weekend, informed sources here and a State Department official in Washington said Tuesday, contradicting repeated denials by the Honduran government and military of such a raid.

The air attacks by Honduran A-37 jet bombers followed reported Sandinista army attacks against Honduran troop outposts guarding the frontier.

The sources here said that U.S. officials were not informed that the Hondurans planned to attack positions inside Nicaragua and that the Americans were distressed to learn of the bombing runs.

Embassy Declines Comment

U.S. Embassy officials declined to comment on the report.

The United States is bound by treaty and other agreements to defend Honduras against attack. Any sharp escalation of fighting between Honduras and Nicaragua could pull the United States into open conflict in the region.

In Washington, a State Department official confirmed the bombings but stressed that civilian locations were not targeted.

“They didn’t bomb the villages--they bombed near the villages,” the official said.

On Monday, Nicaragua charged that five jets flying from Honduras bombed the Nicaraguan towns of Wiwili and Murra, about 11 miles northwest of Wiwili, in remote northern Nicaragua. The Nicaraguans said that seven soldiers were killed and two children were wounded in the Sunday attacks.

The locations are known to be staging areas for Nicaraguan military activity.

Honduran military officers scoffed at the charge, calling the report Sandinista propaganda.

Nicaragua called Tuesday for an emergency session of the U.N. Security Council to condemn what it termed U.S.-directed bombing attacks from Honduras.

In a message read after a Cabinet meeting, Information Minister Manuel Espinoza called the United States “the one responsible for these terrorist acts and the creation of a warlike climate to manipulate the government of Honduras.”

Managua’s leftist Sandinista rulers stopped short of military retaliation or even criticism of the pro-U.S. government in Honduras, apparently seeking to keep their campaign against Honduran-based rebels from blowing up into a war between Central American neighbors.

Threat to Peace

Instead, Nicaragua’s message said that “the escalation of North American aggressions are (sic) an element that threatens the peace, security and lives of the people of Nicaragua and Honduras.”

Honduran officials said Tuesday that they considered the border flare-up to be at an end. It began after Sandinista troops attacked Honduran army outposts late last week, according to the Hondurans.

Sandinista troops had been operating freely inside a border area called the Las Vegas salient for months in pursuit of U.S.-backed Nicaraguan rebels. For the last five years, the rebels have maintained base and supply camps in the area.

After the attacks on Honduran soldiers, the government here ordered troops flown to the border, some carried in U.S. helicopters, but it is not clear how much fighting the Honduran soldiers did.

The Honduran air strikes, which were ordered at the same time, may have played a major role.

‘No Need for Escalation’

“We are pleased that there has been no further need for escalation,” said Roberto Suazo Tome, a Honduran Foreign Ministry official in charge of Central American affairs.

Suazo Tome said Sandinista troops have retreated from Honduras.

“We had hoped the Sandinistas would be persuaded through diplomatic means to retire from our territory,” said Suazo Tome. “It was not enough. They apparently mistook our attitude for weakness.”

The use of jets to hit targets so far inside Nicaragua is a departure for the Hondurans. Last year, in retaliation for Sandinista shelling along the border, Honduran jets struck at Nicaraguan frontier artillery positions and shot down a Sandinista helicopter.

The Honduran action could revive calls in the Nicaraguan military for long-awaited Soviet-made MIG-21 fighter jets. The jets have been reported ready for delivery for some time, and pilots have already been trained.

The Reagan Administration, however, says it would order air strikes against any MIGs if they reached Nicaraguan airfields.

Nervous About Rebels

Despite the apparent end to the border crisis, Honduras is still nervous about the presence of the U.S.-backed contras on its territory.

“This is the main point of friction between us and Nicaragua,” said Suazo Tome.

At a meeting Dec. 1 of Honduran President Jose Azcona Hoyo, Honduran military officers and U.S. Ambassador Everett Briggs, Azcona pressed the American for assurance that the contras would soon leave Honduras for good and carry on their struggle within Nicaragua.

The Hondurans are concerned that the armed contras will be stranded in Honduras if they fail to overthrow the Sandinista government.

The worries increased recently in the wake of the Iran-contras arms scandal in Washington. U.S. congressmen have said that the revelations of the Iran arms deal and the subsequent transfer of funds to the contras have effectively doomed further funding from the United States for the rebels. If true, that would probably mean an end to the insurgency, which has been financed by the United States off and on since 1981.

According to top Honduran officials, Briggs told Azcona that the contras would be moving into Nicaragua this spring.

Times staff writers Richard Boudreaux, in Managua, and Doyle McManus, in Washington, contributed to this story.