Poindexter Doubts Denial by President : Says He Still Thinks Reagan Would Have Backed Diversion

John M. Poindexter, President Reagan’s former national security adviser, said Friday he does not believe Reagan’s statement that he would not have approved the diversion of profits from the Iranian arms sale to the Nicaraguan resistance.

With his own credibility under attack, Poindexter told the Iran- contra investigating committees that he still believes--as he first testified on Wednesday--that Reagan would have approved the plan if he had known about it because it was consistent with his policy.

“I have not changed my mind,” he declared.

White House Statement

Poindexter contradicted a statement issued Thursday by White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater that Reagan would not have permitted the diversion and should have been given an opportunity to stop it.

By issuing this statement, according to Poindexter, the President was only taking advantage of the “deniability” that Poindexter intended him to have when he chose not to inform Reagan about the diversion in February, 1986.

“I would have expected him to say that,” he said. “That’s the whole idea of deniability.”

Rejects Nunn Conclusion

Nevertheless, Poindexter refused to draw the conclusion that--as Sen. Sam Nunn (D-Ga.) put it--”the White House is misleading the American people” about the President’s intention.

“I can’t speak for the White House,” he said. “I don’t know what they’ve got in mind over there.”

At the White House, Chief of Staff Howard H. Baker Jr. emphasized that Poindexter’s testimony was based only on supposition. “It’s based on no conversation with this President,” he said. “It’s based on no piece of evidence.”

While committee investigators continued to dissect Poindexter’s account of the Iran-contra affair piece by piece during his third day of testimony, other members of Congress added their voices to those who have accused the 50-year-old rear admiral of twisting the truth.

“Why should anyone believe this fellow?” asked Senate Majority Leader Robert C. Byrd (D-W.Va.). “He covered up for the President back then. How do we know that he isn’t covering up now?”

Referring specifically to Poindexter’s testimony that he did not tell Reagan about the diversion of funds, Byrd added: “It’s very difficult for me to believe that he didn’t know. If he didn’t know, why didn’t he ask?”

Protest by Attorney

Questions about his credibility have been raised so often, in fact, that Poindexter’s attorney, Richard W. Beckler, lodged a protest at the outset of Friday’s session. “This soldier, scholar, statesman has served the country for 30 years,” Beckler said. “He deserves fair treatment.”

Sen. Daniel K. Inouye (D-Hawaii) replied: “I don’t think it is improper for any member of this panel to characterize (Poindexter’s) testimony as being incredible, mind-boggling, chilling. I think they are all proper.”

Inouye said remarks by members of Congress were completely justified in light of Poindexter’s testimony that, as a White House aide, he “withheld information from or misled or misinformed” Congress, the President and the Cabinet.

End of Hearings Near

Yet even if many committee members do not fully believe him, Poindexter’s testimony appeared to be sufficient to convince them that the time is fast approaching to bring the hearings, which will enter their 10th week on Monday with another appearance by Poindexter, to a conclusion. Members said many potential witnesses are now being cut from the list with the hope of concluding the hearings by July 31.

Skeptics on the committees seemed resigned never to know for certain whether Poindexter was telling the truth or simply protecting the President. “No one will ever know whether he did fall on his sword,” Inouye said.

Even those members who did not attack the truth of Poindexter’s testimony expressed disappointment at his judgment. Rep. Henry J. Hyde (R-Ill.), one of the President’s staunchest defenders, said Poindexter’s decision not to tell Reagan about the diversion was evidence of “hubris--mild, benign, but nonetheless hubris.”

He said Poindexter’s decision had produced “a political calamity” for the President as well as the Republican Party. “And worst of all,” he added, “I think it might damage the causes that you and I so passionately believed in”--the Nicaraguan resistance.

Plight of Hostages

But Hyde used the bulk of his one-hour question time to expound on the strategic nature of Iran, the plight of the American hostages in Lebanon and the “bone-crushing” pressure Reagan felt from their families.

Hyde said the Iran affair gave “raw meat to the Reagan haters,” and he praised Poindexter for giving “freedom a fighting chance.”

Poindexter defended his decision as consistent with the President’s policy and cited as proof a memo that he had written on May 2, 1986, after a conversation with Reagan aboard Air Force One while they were returning from the Tokyo economic summit meeting. In the memo, he said Reagan told him that the Administration should “take action unilaterally” if Congress continued to stall in approving funds for U.S. military assistance for the contras.

“The President is ready to confront Congress on the constitutional question of who controls foreign policy,” Poindexter wrote.

Indicates His Thinking

Although this conversation took place about three months after Poindexter contends he authorized the diversion without seeking Reagan’s approval, he said it indicated the President’s thinking on the subject throughout the two-year time when direct U.S. military aid to the contras was banned by Congress.

John W. Nields Jr., chief counsel for the House investigating committee, challenged the idea that Poindexter--without consulting Reagan--could single-handedly exercise the extraordinary powers of the presidency in the realm of foreign policy.

“He’s talking about special powers of the President of the United States--not powers of the national security adviser who has never been elected by anybody,” Nields said. “ . . . What made you believe that he wanted those special powers exercised by you?”

Poindexter replied: “That was a judgment call on my part, based on a long time in government and a long time working for the President.”

Disagrees With North

Poindexter insisted that he never lied to members of Congress about the Iran-contra affair but simply failed to provide them with complete information. On this point, he disagreed with his former aide, Lt. Col. Oliver L. North, who openly admitted lying to Congress.

But Hyde disagreed, noting that Poindexter once told him that the Administration had sold only one planeload of weapons to Iran. Hyde said he was “embarrassed” to learn later that the information, which he had repeated frequently to others, was false.

Poindexter also insisted that the President said nothing inaccurate when, in a Nov. 13 speech, he condemned as “utterly false” the charge that he traded arms for hostages with Iran. Reagan made the statement shortly after the deal was first disclosed in the press.

Cabinet Members

As for Inouye’s charge that Poindexter misled Cabinet members, the witness replied: “I didn’t withhold anything from them that they didn’t want withheld from them.” Both Secretary of State George P. Shultz and Secretary of Defense Caspar W. Weinberger have said that they were not kept fully informed by the White House.

Nor was Poindexter shaken by a suggestion from Sen. Warren B. Rudman (R-N.H.) that it was improper for him and North to destroy documents pertaining to the Iran-contra affair after the Justice Department had launched an inquiry last November.

“Senator,” he replied, “I don’t have any problem with it. These were working documents in staff offices.”

Had Followed Orders

Nunn’s questions focused on an aspect of Poindexter’s testimony that many committee members have found troubling--that his decision not to tell the President about the diversion contradicted everything they have learned about his character. Published profiles of Poindexter have emphasized his pattern of following orders rather than taking bold initiatives on his own.

Even those who worked most closely with Poindexter at the White House have offered accounts that seemed to undermine Poindexter’s contentions that he authorized the diversion without clearing it with anyone else. Nunn pointed to earlier testimony by North and Robert C. McFarlane, under whom Poindexter had worked for four years before replacing him as national security adviser in December, 1985.

Nunn recalled that McFarlane testified that he would have reported to the President any decision as significant as the plan to divert profits from the arms sales to the contras.

“I think Mr. McFarlane probably would have,” replied Poindexter.

North Assumption

Nunn also recalled the repeated assertions by North that he had acted under the assumption that Reagan had been informed of the diversion all along.

“I did not tell Col. North whether I was going to talk to the President or not,” Poindexter said. “Frankly, I didn’t think that it was important for him to know who else knew about it.”

Because Poindexter is known as a stickler for detail and a man with a keen memory, Nunn questioned his claims of memory lapses regarding crucial events in 1985 and 1986 and his assertions that he did not involve himself in the details of North’s activities.

Fitness Report

Nunn quoted from a fitness report that Adm. James L. Holloway III, former chief of naval operations, wrote a decade ago of then-Capt. Poindexter, his executive assistant: “Capt. Poindexter has a spectacular mental capacity. He reads and understands every paper or report that comes into the office. Furthermore, he retains fully, recalls accurately and evaluates with a keen sense of what is important and what isn’t.”

Poindexter responded: “It’s important to note that the description he was giving there was a description of the way I functioned as an aide to him.”

A frequent critic of the news media, Poindexter flatly denied several earlier published reports--quoting unnamed sources--that he planned to build a legal case on the assertion that he had told Reagan on at least two occasions that the arms sales were generating funds for the contras.

“I don’t know the source of those stories,” he said. “They’re not true. I did not tell the President, and I didn’t tell anybody that I told the President.”

Sees Actions as Legal

As he had in his first two days before the panel, Poindexter repeatedly insisted that the actions of himself, North and other members of the National Security Council staff on behalf of the contras had been entirely legal. He contended that the NSC staff was not covered by the Boland amendment, which banned government intelligence agencies from aiding the rebels.

Rudman expressed disbelief that Poindexter had based this assessment on only one lightly researched legal opinion from the President’s Intelligence Oversight Board. He said he could not understand why Poindexter did not ask for verification from other legal resources that were available to him, including the Justice Department.

“Was there any consideration of the fact that you didn’t want to go outside for an opinion because you might get an answer you didn’t like?” Rudman asked.

Poindexter replied: “I don’t think that crossed my mind.”

Staff writer James Gerstenzang contributed to this story.