Honduran Jets Hit Nicaraguan Border Region

This country’s air force jets bombed a remote jungle region of the Honduran-Nicaraguan frontier Saturday for the second time in three days to make good on threats to force an incursion of Nicaraguan troops from Honduran territory, informed sources reported.

Details of the bombing raid were sketchy, and Honduran military authorities made no public comment. Sources said the bombing took place on both sides of the frontier around San Andres de Bocay, a town on the Nicaraguan side of the border.

Managua Confirms Raid

The Nicaraguan Defense Ministry in Managua confirmed that the raid had taken place, saying that two Honduran warplanes dropped bombs on Sandinista troops in Nicaraguan territory near the border. A ministry statement said that the attack caused no damage or injuries.

There was no immediate report from the Honduran authorities about any damage or casualties.

On Thursday, the Honduran air force bombed a Sandinista command post at Amaka, about 5 miles inside Nicaragua, in retaliation for the Sandinista incursion, which occurred during a Nicaraguan offensive against the U.S.-backed Contras.

Sandinista soldiers reportedly crossed into Honduras last week in their largest offensive ever against the Contras. The guerrillas’ strategic command headquarters, supply dumps and main base camps are in Honduras along the Coco River across the frontier from San Andres de Bocay, about 140 miles east of Tegucigalpa.

The Sandinistas, who said their offensive ended Wednesday, have never publicly acknowledged that their troops crossed the border, but their officials have done so privately.

Before Saturday’s bombing raid, a Contra commander said there had been no combat between the rebels and the Sandinistas since Thursday. He said that the Sandinistas were withdrawing from Honduras “little by little, in stages” but that Nicaraguan soldiers retained hilltop positions up to 600 yards inside Honduras.

As of Saturday morning, the Contras still held an airstrip just inside Nicaragua, near San Andres de Bocay, the Contra commander said.

“I don’t know if they (the Sandinistas) are just covering their retreat, or if they are mining the area,” he said.

During a similar offensive last May, the Sandinistas mined the area before withdrawing. A Honduran military source had said Friday that the air force would strike again if the Sandinistas were found to be planting mines, and President Jose Azcona Hoyo warned that there would be more bombing if the Sandinista soldiers were not out of Honduras by Saturday.

Near Border Airstrips

Two Honduran jets made reconnaissance flights along the border Saturday morning, and the bombing raid occurred in mid-afternoon, with several planes taking part, according to Contra and other sources. The bombing was concentrated around two airstrips on either side of the frontier.

Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega accused the United States of “encouraging and promoting these attacks” and said Sandinista anti-aircraft batteries had fired back at the intruding warplanes.

Speaking to reporters in Managua late Saturday, Ortega said Nicaragua will denounce the Honduran air assaults in the United Nations and other forums “to seek a solution in the framework of international law.”

Asked about the military situation at the border area, Ortega said Sandinista troops “are still fighting where the Contras are,” an apparent admission that his government forces are still inside Honduras.

It has never been clear how many Sandinista troops crossed the border during the recent offensive. U.S. and Honduran officials asserted that 1,500 to 2,000 Sandinistas had advanced up to 6 miles inside Honduras. Other Western diplomats say the figure was “in the hundreds,” and sources in Nicaragua said that the Sandinistas had just swept along the north bank of the Coco River, which marks the frontier.

U.S. officials have appeared more eager than the Hondurans to respond to the incursion. The Reagan Administration ordered 3,150 U.S. paratroopers to Honduras in a show of force. On Saturday, U.S. officials said troops would be deployed today for exercises in Jamastran, which is about 100 miles west of the frontier combat zone but only 25 miles from the Nicaraguan border.

The troops of the 82nd Airborne Division from Ft. Bragg, N.C., and the 7th Light Infantry Division from Ft. Ord, Calif., also are being deployed in joint exercises with Honduran troops in Juticalpa, about 90 miles northeast of San Andres de Bocay; in San Lorenzo on the Gulf of Fonseca, and at Palmerola Air Base.

Choppers Ferry Troops

U.S. Army helicopters have been ferrying Honduran troops to the exercise sites, but officials here said that the U.S. choppers would not carry Honduran soldiers to the border combat region.

In the wake of the bombing and the arrival of U.S. troops, the Nicaraguan government announced that it was reopening a case against Honduras in the World Court for letting the Contras operate from Honduran territory. Nicaragua had suspended the case last August after all five Central American presidents signed a regional peace plan.

Political leaders here, meanwhile, charged that Honduras’ bombing raids and the arrival of U.S. troops responded to the Reagan Administration’s efforts to secure more aid for the Contras rather than to the military situation on the ground.

The border crisis “was made in Washington,” Edmund Bogran, a congressman from President Azcona’s ruling Liberal Party, said. Bogran said he would present a bill in the Honduran Congress this week asking for the American soldiers’ withdrawal from this country.

Bogran charged that a letter from Azcona seeking U.S. support against the incursion used language that was “a translation from English to Spanish,” by which he meant he believed it was written by U.S. officials.

Western diplomatic sources here said that American officials had pressed the Honduran military to stage retaliatory air strikes against the Sandinistas sooner and deeper into Nicaragua than they did Thursday.

The sources, who declined to be identified by name and nationality, said that U.S. officials had urged the Hondurans to bomb the Sandinistas’ military base and fuel storage depot in Bonanza, about 45 miles south of the Honduran-Nicaraguan border.

U.S. officials have repeatedly denied that any pressure was put on the Hondurans to respond to the Sandinista incursion. A U.S. Embassy spokesman said reports that officials pushed for the bombing were “flatly wrong.”

U.S. Ambassador Everett E. Briggs told reporters Friday that “the United States was not suggesting to the Hondurans what type of military response to make.”

A high-ranking Honduran army officer also denied that the military was subjected to any pressure from the United States.

The Honduran military denies that it bombed Nicaraguan territory Thursday.