Apology, Reparations Urged by Ex-U.S. Aides : Such an Approach, They Contend, Might Help Minimize Pressure for Iranians to Retaliate

President Reagan, as a form of damage control, should offer an apology and compensation to the families of the victims on the Iranian airliner shot down over the Persian Gulf by the U.S. Navy on Sunday, two former national security advisers and several other experts on Iran suggested Monday.

The incident, in which 290 civilians were killed, will almost certainly prompt Iran’s militant Islamic regime to launch some kind of retaliation against the United States, the experts said, but a formal U.S. apology and an offer of compensation could defuse political demands inside Iran for a new wave of terrorism.

It would also minimize damage to Washington’s relations in the Middle East, they said.

“Paying compensation is a matter of established policy in a case like this,” said Robert C. McFarlane, who served as Reagan’s national security adviser from 1983 through 1985 and led a secret diplomatic mission to Tehran in 1986. “It is a routine thing when civilians are killed in a military engagement. . . . It doesn’t imply an admission of guilt.”

“We made a tragic mistake, and innocent people were killed through no intent of the United States,” said Brent Scowcroft, who served as national security adviser to President Gerald R. Ford. “It seems to me compensation, as a humanitarian gesture, is appropriate.”

Report Due in 15 Days

Reagan said Monday that he will not make any decision about compensation until he sees the results of a Defense Department investigation of the incident. The Pentagon board of inquiry is due to report within 15 days.

Reagan, speaking to reporters on the White House lawn on his return from Camp David, called the shooting “a tragedy” but did not acknowledge any U.S. error in the incident.

“I won’t minimize the tragedy,” Reagan said. “We all know it was a tragedy. But we’re talking about an incident in which a plane, on radar, was observed coming in the direction of a ship in combat. . . . So I think it was an understandable accident to shoot and think they were under attack from that plane.”

A senior State Department official said government legal advisers have warned that paying compensation might establish an unwelcome precedent. “The issue is not solely a political issue between us and Iran,” he said. “There’s a long history of military liability cases involved. . . . If troops fire in self-defense and a just case can be made for self-defense, then there is no liability.”

Several academic experts on Iran said the absence of an official apology by the United States will only heighten demands within Iran for retaliation against American citizens through terrorism or military attacks.

‘Seen as an Injustice’

“The U.S. position of not offering a formal apology and compensation will be seen (inside Iran) as an injustice, and there will be enormous pressure to do something,” said Robin Wright, a research fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, who recently returned from a two-week visit to Iran. “People may even go out and do things on their own.

“Many will be certain that this was a deliberate act of war,” she said. “Iranians have a hard time believing that American technology can’t tell the difference between an Airbus and an F-14.”

“The President has offered his regrets, but he did not really apologize,” said Shahrough Akhavi, a professor of government at the University of South Carolina. “He did not even come down from Camp David (until Monday). Some kind of additional gesture might have been useful. In Islamic law, revenge is undertaken only when a wrong has been committed and no compensation is offered. If you have compensation, there’s no need for revenge.”

Some Terrorism Expected

Most Iranologists said they expect the Tehran regime to launch some kind of terrorist retaliation against the United States--if only because the current power struggle in Iran makes it dangerous for any politician to appear soft on America.

Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations, Mohammed Mahallati, said Monday that a U.S. apology and reparations would be inadequate. “These are secondary issues,” he said. “Words of apology cannot wash away all that blood. . . . (The United States) should be severely punished in whatsoever means.”

Later, on the “McNeil-Lehrer Report” on PBS, the ambassador said: “American authorities should show their intention that they want somehow to correct and rectify their wrong policies, and that can be only proven by starting to move out of the Persian Gulf. . . . Otherwise . . . nothing will be solved.”

‘In the Same Boat’

“They’re in the same boat as we are,” Wright said. “Just as we can’t afford to withdraw from the gulf, they can’t afford not to react to an incident like this.”

“We should definitely brace ourselves for violence in the obvious locations--the gulf, Pakistan, Turkey, possibly in Europe,” said Howard Teicher, a former National Security Council aide who accompanied McFarlane to Tehran.

“There’s a high likelihood that they will try to find a way to retaliate. It may not be immediate, and it probably won’t be military; they have found that it is very difficult to take on the fleet frontally. . . . I would look for something in 40 days, when the Shia mourning period ends.”

One possible target for Iranian retaliation, he said, would be the nine U.S. hostages held by pro-Iranian terrorists in Lebanon. “Or they may decide to take more hostages,” he added.

Speaker, Premier at Odds

The incident came at a time of intense rivalry between the relatively moderate Speaker of Iran’s Parliament, Hashemi Rafsanjani, and more radical officials such as Prime Minister Hussein Moussavi. As recently as Saturday, the day before Iran Air Flight 655 was shot down, Rafsanjani called publicly for a new, more open foreign policy instead of one he described as “constantly making enemies.”

Rafsanjani, who is commander in chief of Iran’s armed forces, was already on the defensive because of a series of military defeats in the country’s nearly eight-year-long war with Iraq. The new confrontation with the United States will allow his more radical rivals to push for a return to Iran’s earlier, uncompromising foreign policy, the scholars said.

There has been no real movement toward improved U.S.-Iranian relations since the collapse of the Reagan Administration’s secret arms deals with Tehran, in which U.S. weapons were sold to Iran in exchange for help in freeing the hostages in Lebanon. Three hostages were released because of the talks, but seven more have been seized since.

‘Feelers’ From Tehran

A senior State Department official said there have been several “feelers” from Tehran about new U.S.-Iranian talks, but none have led to any direct contacts.

“We’re ready,” he said. “Name the date and the place, and we’ll be there. But they have to be official; we aren’t interested in becoming part of the factional maneuvering in Iran. And we can’t guarantee confidentiality; if someone asks whether we have had talks, we’ll say yes, and we’ll list who the participants were. That generally stops them, because they haven’t made a real governmental decision to have talks with us.”

In the meantime, he said, Iran and the United States have exchanged dozens of messages through third countries. The most recent such message was sent from Washington to Tehran on Sunday--a State Department cable explaining that the shooting down of Iran Air Flight 655 had resulted from the Navy’s mistaken belief that the plane was hostile.

Those communications make it possible that the U.S.-Iranian confrontation can still be defused, several former officials said.

Delay May Be Wise

“Iran’s self-interest really governs their basic policy, and their self-interest lies in rapprochement over time,” McFarlane said. “I wouldn’t expect them to seek to escalate this. . . . It calls for prudence on our side, a willingness in the short term to avoid encounters with Iranian gunboats if we can. If a (commercial) ship in transit through the Strait of Hormuz can delay by one day, it may cost $100,000--but it might be wise to do.”

“We should not overexaggerate the extent to which Iran may respond irrationally, as opposed to carefully,” Scowcroft said in an interview with Cable News Network. “It is not in Iran’s overall interest to escalate this situation.”

Iran can be expected to hold rallies against the United States, to seek support from other Muslim countries and to file complaints at the United Nations, Teicher said. “They have world opinion on their side. They’re going to play it up as much as they can.”

But he said a continued escalation of the military confrontation appears unlikely because the U.S. fleet in the gulf can still do enormous damage to Iran.