No Breach in Terrorism Policy, U.S. Asserts

Bush Administration officials insisted Wednesday that the U.S. role in helping free Americans trapped in El Salvador did not breach a longstanding U.S. policy of refusing to negotiate with terrorists.

They would not confirm whether there had been a deal allowing the Salvadoran rebels to go free along with the Americans and other foreigners caught in the Sheraton Hotel on Tuesday after a pre-dawn assault by Salvadoran guerrillas.

“I don’t know that there was an agreement to let them go,” Assistant Secretary of State Bernard Aronson told reporters at a State Department briefing. He said that during negotiations, the Salvadoran forces withdrew from around the Sheraton Hotel. “The terrorists probably took advantage of that opportunity and other opportunities to get out,” he said.

He and other State Department officials confirmed that a U.S. Embassy official arranged for the open phone line over which the Salvadoran government conducted negotiations with the rebels. However, the officials sought to avoid giving the impression that the successful outcome had been the result of a deal between the United States and the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN).

President Bush acknowledged that he had dispatched special U.S. troops to El Salvador on his own Tuesday, before either obtaining a request from Salvadoran President Alfredo Cristiani or seeking his approval.

“I told him (Cristiani) what we were going to do, and he acquiesced,” Bush said.

Talking to reporters aboard Air Force One on a trip to Memphis, Tenn., Bush said: “When you see Americans held hostage like this, there’s a message in all of this: the President, backed by our defense secretary, is going to protect the lives of Americans however we can and go to any ends to protect the lives of American citizens.”

White House Press Secretary Marlin Fitzwater later issued a statement saying the special U.S. troops had not been employed in the hotel crisis because “their entry proved to be unnecessary.”