Contras’ Future Remains Clouded by Unresolved Issues, Friction

Reagan Administration officials have managed to stave off the collapse of a U.S.-backed coalition of Nicaraguan rebels for the time being, but the issues dividing the feuding contra leaders have not been resolved and are likely to lead to continued infighting in the coming months, rebel sources say.

The Administration is trying to hold together the United Nicaraguan Opposition, as the coalition is called, to help win renewed funding for the contras from Congress. But the rebel leaders fear they were seriously set back last week by their own public squabbling and by news that one of their moderate leaders, Arturo Cruz, had received a salary from fired National Security Council aide Oliver L. North--a revelation that led to more finger-pointing among the rival factions.

“There have been some bitter comments that we’re going after each others’ throats,” a rebel official in Washington said. “It has been a terribly damaging week.”

Their internal power struggle has paralyzed other political work that the contra leaders normally would be doing, rebel sources said, and held up $40 million in U.S. military and other aid that was scheduled to be released last Thursday. The Administration must certify that the contras are making progress toward unity before releasing the money, representing the balance of $100 million in aid to the contras appropriated by Congress last year.

Amid the infighting, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee voted to block any further aid to the contras. That move is largely symbolic since it still must be approved by the entire Senate and the Administration has threatened to veto it, but it is a clear indication of sentiment in Congress.

The Administration plans to ask Congress for $105 million in contra aid for the next fiscal year, but that effort may be undermined not only by the contras’ present difficulties, but also by the fact that, so far, there has been no visible progress on the military front as a result of current aid. Contra leaders, however, say that 10,000 rebel fighters have infiltrated into Nicaragua and assert that the U.S. assistance has been slow to arrive.

Under pressure from U.S. officials, conservative contra leader Adolfo Calero stepped down as one of the United Nicaraguan Opposition’s three directors last week, and the two moderate directors who had threatened to resign, Cruz and Alfonso Robelo, agreed to stay in the leadership to press for reforms within the rebel movement.

Cruz and Robelo have asserted that Calero and a conservative clique in his Nicaraguan Democratic Force (FDN), the largest contra faction, hold too much power. They said their demands for expanded fiscal and military control of the rebel movement by the United Nicaraguan Opposition must be met by mid-April, or they will quit. That deadline could fall in the middle of debate in Congress over a new request for contra aid.

Several members of Congress have threatened to withdraw their backing for the contras if Cruz resigns. The Administration, while denying allegations of meddling in the contras’ internal power fight, made it clear that the rejiggered leadership of the umbrella group is an effort to appease Congress.

“Political power in this context comes from 535 votes, because if there is no money, there is no resistance,” declared Elliott Abrams, assistant secretary of state for inter-American affairs.

Abrams said that Congress has insisted on a democratic resistance to the Marxist-led Sandinista regime in Nicaragua, with broad representation. “Anything that we have done is an effort to stress to the resistance leadership that that has got to happen and that no one can be permitted to stand in the way of it,” he said.

State Department and CIA officials helped draft a telegram from Enrique Bermudez, military chief of the FDN, vowing to subordinate himself and his guerrilla fighters to the civilian authority of UNO, a promise he has made in the past.

Cruz also secured a pledge from Abrams that he would back their reform program.

Cruz wants the three rebel combat organizations currently under the umbrella of the United Nicaraguan Opposition to be merged into a single group under one command. Calero agreed in principle to a united force, but conflict is likely to arise over who would lead regional commands and who would head the whole army.

Cruz proposed former Sandinista commander Luis Rivas Leal as chief of a general staff of the guerrilla fighters. The 50-year-old Rivas, once a member of the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps at Tulane University, said he graduated from “Fidel Castro’s guerrilla school of the Americas” in 1959, although he says he was never a Marxist-Leninist.

Bermudez of the FDN, by contrast, was a member of the National Guard of toppled Nicaraguan dictator Anastasio Somoza.

A Cruz supporter said that he saw “very little” willingness on Calero’s part to relinquish control of his faction. He said that Cruz and his backers plan to visit rebel camps frequently in the next few months to have more direct contact with the fighters.

Another source of probable friction is on the political front. Cruz has called for a revamped United Nicaraguan Opposition Assembly, feeling that the present body is biased toward the FDN, and for the establishment of a new and larger directorate of the umbrella group.

Calero proposed Pedro Joaquin Chamorro Jr., son of the slain editor of Managua’s newspaper La Prensa, to succeed him on the present UNO directorate, adding that he himself would be a candidate for a post on any enlarged directorate.

“I am coming back,” Calero said in an interview.

Calero’s supporters, including his commanders in the field, argue that while Cruz may be more appealing to Congress, Calero has earned his role as a leader through hard work and by staying in close contact with the guerrilla fighters.

Cruz supporters say he has more legitimacy than anyone else as a contra leader because he was once a member of Nicaragua’s ruling Sandinista junta, was the opposition’s candidate for president in 1984 and is the best-known contra figure in Nicaragua.

Marjorie Miller reported from Miami and Doyle McManus from Washington.