Congress Votes Contra Aid, Supporting Bush Strategy

The Senate and the House, seeking to end an era of bitter debate over Nicaragua, gave massive bipartisan endorsement Thursday to President Bush’s plan for diplomatic pressure in Central America--as well as $49.8 million in non-military aid for the Contras.

The Democratic-controlled House, which in earlier years blocked requests by the Reagan Administration for military aid to the Contras, approved Bush’s compromise proposal by a lopsided vote of 309 to 110. The Democratic-led Senate approved the Administration’s request by a vote of 89 to 9.

“This bill tries to set in motion a united, single-voice policy,” said House Speaker Jim Wright (D-Tex.). “It ends military involvement and covert efforts to overthrow governments in our hemisphere . . . (and) it says to Nicaragua that we are very earnest about you fulfilling these commitments that you made to internal democratization.”

“It was a compromise, and not one that everybody believed was a good compromise,” said a more skeptical Sen. Bob Dole (R-Kan.), the Senate minority leader. “We’ll see how it works. If it doesn’t work, we’ll be back to revisit it.”

“We have embarked upon a bipartisan approach with the Congress,” White House spokesman Steve Hart said afterward. “We are very pleased with the vote and with this expeditious action by the Congress.”

The votes give President Bush and Secretary of State James A. Baker III two tools that they had requested to get their new Central America policy off the ground: strong, bipartisan support in Congress and an assurance that the Contras will be kept alive for at least 10 months.

Bush and Baker, who devised their policy in an unusual round of negotiations with congressional leaders last month, have told Congress that their goal is to pressure Nicaragua’s leftist government into holding “free and fair elections” next Feb. 28.

If those elections are fair, and if the Sandinistas enact other democratic reforms, Bush and Baker have said that they would agree to disarming the Contra army, estimated at between 12,000 and 15,000 men, and resettling its members in Nicaragua or elsewhere in Central America.

But if the Sandinistas refuse to reform their internal political system, Bush and Baker have told members of Congress that they may attempt to revive the Contras as a military force and seek aid for them to resume their war against the Managua regime.

“There is nothing in here that precludes the Administration from asking for military assistance for the resistance,” Baker told a Senate subcommittee earlier this week. He added that he has little confidence that the Sandinistas will meet the U.S. demands for democratic reforms:

“Their record is abysmal,” he said. “They have not kept any of their promises. But we do have an opportunity here to focus public opinion, world opinion, on their failure to keep their promises.”

The compromise plan provides $49.8 million in U.S. aid for the Contras, to be used to provide food, clothing, shelter, medical assistance and non-military training. The Administration pledged that no aid would be granted to Contra forces that attempt offensive military operations or engage in human rights abuses.

The law also provides for $7.7 million to pay for transporting the goods, $5 million to administer the program, and $4.2 million in medical aid to civilian victims of the eight-year-old war.

The aid for the Contras is intended to run for 10 months, until Nicaragua’s scheduled Feb. 28 election day. But in an unusual feature that has caused controversy among legal scholars, Bush promised in a separate letter that he would halt the aid in November if any one of eight Democratic leaders in Congress objects to the way the policy is being carried out.

Baker said that was a key to the plan’s adoption. “We probably could have gotten a six- or five-month deal (without Bush’s promise). I think it’s better to have a 10-month deal. . . . It strengthens our hand.”

Most members of Congress, both Republican and Democratic, praised the plan in tones ranging from grudging to positively lavish.

But some conservative Republicans warned that it is a “sell-out” that will gradually lead to the Contras’ disintegration and the consolidation of the Sandinistas’ power in Nicaragua.

“Nicaragua is lost,” mourned California Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-San Diego). “The hope of freedom is gone. The dark curtain of the Sandinista Gestapo has descended on Nicaragua.”

Some liberal Democrats, on the other hand, condemned the plan as a way to keep the Contras alive and predicted that the Administration never would accept whatever reforms the Sandinistas enact.

“This accord hinges on winks, nods and handshakes,” said Rep. Thomas Foglietta (D-Pa.). “I’d really like to say I trust this new Administration, the Bush Administration, for reintegration of the Contras. But how can I when I read . . . that then-Vice President Bush played a role in supplying covert aid to the Contras?”

He was referring to documents released in the trial of former White House aide Oliver L. North that showed Bush playing a part in an effort to persuade Honduras to help the rebels in 1985, when Congress had banned U.S. aid.

More typical was the measured support of Rep. Henry J. Hyde (R-Ill.), one of the Contras’ most flamboyant champions on Capitol Hill.

“I support this bill on the theory that if you can’t get dinner, take a sandwich and keep hope alive,” Hyde said.

CHRONOLOGY OF U.S. AID TO THE CONTRAS 1981: Congress secretly approves $19 million in military aid for Nicaraguan Contras. Funds are managed by the CIA. 1982: Congress allocates another $19 million in covert aid, stipulates the money cannot be used to overthrow the Nicaraguan government. November, 1983: Congress votes $24 million to aid the Contras through mid-1984. 1984: Congress, angered by reports that CIA oversaw the mining of Nicaraguan harbors, cuts off aid to the rebels. June 12, 1985: House approves $27 million in “humanitarian” assistance. Senate approves measure in August. CIA and Defense Department are barred from administering the aid. June 25, 1986: House approves $100 million in aid. Senate votes approval in August. The fiscal 1987 appropriation includes $70 million in military aid and $30 million in non-military aid. Sept. 30, 1987: Fiscal 1987 assistance expires, but money and materiel in the pipeline continue flowing to Contras. Subsequently, Congress authorizes about $20 million in “non-lethal” aid. Funds expired Feb. 29, 1988. April 1, 1988: President Reagan signs $47.9-million bill to provide non-lethal aid. Sources: Facts on File, Associated Press