Project Interloper

CIA STARGATE release

CIA-RDP96-00789R000600740002-3

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. .
Tu
Weather
Today: Mostly sunny. High 49.
Wind northeast at 6-12 mph.
Friday: Cloudy with scattered raid
and driedde. High 49.
Vesterday: AQI: 30. Temp. range:
34-65. Details on Page D2.
112TH YEAR ....
No.17
0 1004, The Welington Post Company
THURSDAY, DECEMBER 22, 1988
Prices May Vary in Areas Outside
Metropolitan Washington (See Box on A2)
25¢
Pan Am Jet Crashes in Scotland, Killing at Least 273
A piece of fuselage lies near burning houses ignited when i Pan American Boeing 747 crashed in Lockerbie, Scotland.
Dead Include 15 Villagers; On-Board Blast Suspected
By A. D. Horne
Washington Post Forciga Service
A Pan American jumbo jet bound
from London to New York crashed
into a Scottish village last night,
apparently killing all 258 persons
aboard.
The Boeing 747 slammed into a
gasoline station and several houses
north of the English border, igniting
a fireball that rose up to 300 feet.
into the sky.
.A police official in the nearby
town of Dumfries reported that at
least 15 villagers had been killed.
Local hospitals said 12 seriously
burned villagers had been rushed in
for treatment.
-There was no immediate indica-
tion of what caused the accident,
which took place in clear weather
less than an hour's flight time from
London,
"There were no mayday signals,"
a Pan Am vice president, Jeff Krien-
dler, told reporters in New York
last night. The plane had left Lon-
don's Heathrow Airport at 6:25
p.m. local time (1:25 p.m. EST),
and the last contact from the crew
was at 7:15 p.m., when the plane
was cruising at 31,000 feet, Krien-
dier said, He added that it was "pre-
cisety on course" when it disap-
As rescue teams reached . the
crash scene, about 275 miles north-
west of London, there were indica-
tions of an explosion aboard the
plane. The jet's cabin door was
found about 10 miles from the rest
of the cockpit, while an engine was
found on a highway outside the vil-
lage. At least one witness said the
plane may have been on fire before
it hit the ground.
The plane, Pan Am Flight 103,
"disappeared from radar contact at
7:15 p.m.," British Department of
Transport spokesman Mike Verti-
gans said in a telephone interview.
Kriendler gave the time the plane
hit the ground as 7:22. Britain's
Civil Aviation Authority said Scot-
tish air controllers had talked to the
crew minutes before the crash and
received no indication of any prob-
lem.
British aviation officials denied
reports that the 747 may have hit
another plane. One British news
service report said the jet may have
broken into two before hitting the
ground, Brian Reed, a spokesman
for Britain's Scottish Office in Ed-
inburgh, said his office had received
reports of wreckage landing in
Langholm, 10 miles east of Locker-
bie.
"All we know is that all those in
the aircraft are dead," said David
Brooks, air vice marshal for the
Royal Air Force in Scotland.
Pan Am's Kriendler said the air-
line would not release a passenger
See CRASH, A32, Col. 1
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The Washington Post
Sections
A News/Editorials
B Sports
: C Style/Television/Classified
D Metro/Obituaries
E Business
Escride: The Weekly Contics,
Washington Home
Detailed index on Page A2
in the town of Lockerbie 15 miles ' peared from radar screens.
THE WASHINGTON POST
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432 THURSDAYIdSABUBERCIA-10996-00789R000600740002-3
- Pan Am Jet En Route to New York From London (
THE CRASH OF FLIGHT 103
PAWAM
Edinburgh
Glasgow
The jet crashed
here less than an
hour after takeoff:
North Sea
'Lockerbie
· Carlisle
0
50
100
MILES
MILES
ENLARGED
AREA
Glasgow Edinburgh
Atlantic
Ocean
Lockerbie
NORTHERN
IRELAND
wisie of
BRITAIN
Man
IRELAND®
Irish
Sea
Dublin*
· ENGLAND
WALES
Pan Am Flight 103, a
Boeing 747, departed
London for New York at
6:25 p.m. local time.
Heathrow ( *
Airport
London
London
New York
English
Changel
FRANCE
ASSOCIATED PRESS
A car blazes in the street following the crash of a Pan American Boeing 747.
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THE WASHINGTON POST
Dumfries·
SCOTLAND
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(INGTON POST
FRIDAY, JANUARY 13, 1989 E5
E1
JACK ANDERSON and DALE VAN ATTA
Terrorists the U.S. Is Reluctant to Blame
ran is the most likely suspect behind the
December bombing of Pan Am Flight 103,
according to our intelligence sources in Western
Europe and Washington, but that isn't what the;
White House wants to hear.
British and West German intelligence services
have singled out Iranian-directed terrorist groups.
as the culprits. Some-but not all-of the
information the foreign spies have gathered has
been shared with the Central Intelligence Agency.
The British and West Germans are leery of a
CIA bias that seeks to make Libya's Moammar
Gadhafi the bogeyman and to blame him for the
270 deaths in Lockerbie, Scotland.
" One CIA official admitted to us that he
understood why foreign spies were wary about
sharing what they know. "It's hard to blame them,"
he said. "Look at the Reagan administration's past
shenanigans with Libyan-related intelligence."
He was referring to 1981 rumors about a Libyan
hit squad and the 1986 bombing of a Berlin disco.
West German police think the Reagan
administration hyped- or manufactured-flimsy
evidence blaming Gadhafi for the disco bombing in
which one U.S. serviceman was killed. President
Reagan used the incident to justify a subsequent
bombing raid on Libyan sites, including Gadhafi's
Tripoli home.
In 1981, the CIA paid tens of thousands of
dollars to a Middle East informant who gave the
CIA what it wanted to hear. He manufactured false
reports of a Libyan hit squad out to assassinate
Reagan. The story unraveled when alert West
European intelligence officers noted that the
informant had included among the alleged hit squad
members several people who had sworn to kill
Gadhafi, not Reagan.
Now the Pan Am bombing has become the CIA's
top priority. Our sources say the CIA is prepared to
spend "several million dollars" to find out who is
responsible. The flaw in this approach is that it
encourages gadflies to come forward with what the
United States wants to hear-that Gadhafi did it.
These espionage entrepreneurs know that
Reagan has been obsessed with Gadhafi for eight
years and might like to have the final say. The last
thing Reagan wants to hear is that terrorists
directed by Iran bombed Flight 103. Reagan has
been humiliated by Iran and is not anxious for a
final ignominious footnote in his dealings with
Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.
That's what makes the West European
intelligence services so wary of sharing
Iranian-related information with the CIA. They
pointed out to us that U.S. Embassy officials across
Europe and the Middle East have pooh-poohed the
claims of a shadowy pro-Iranian group that has
been trying to assert responsibility for the
bombing.
The group calls itself "The Guardians of the
Islamic Revolution" and claims it was motivated by
the downing of an Iranian airliner last July by a U.S.
warship. The group, in a call to London news
services, warned "there will be another present in
the new year for America" if the United States
doesn't deport Reza Pahlavi, son of Iran's late shah.
Iranian government officials have denied any
involvement. But to believe them is ludicrous.
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1
Approved-4
Washington Pref
AROUND THE WORLD 00740002
PLO Said to Aid
Pan Am Probe
Representatives of the Pal-
estine : Liberation Organization
have provided helpful informa-
tion to western agents trying to
determine who was responsible
for blowing up the Pan Am jum-
bo jet over Scotland last month,
according to ABC News.
The television network, quot-
ing
western
intelligence
sources, reported last night that
"several dozen PLO intelligence
agents". have been working
alongside British and West Ger-
man investigators and have de-
livered : "exceedingly valuable"
information in the case.
The report marked the first
confirmation of the PLO's in-
volvement in the crash inves-
· tigation. It followed a pledge by
PLO chairman Yassir Arafat to
assist in the probe.
The PLO's willingness to co-
operate is seen as an effort by
the organization to show that it
did not sabotage Pan Am Flight
103, which was en route from
London to New York. The main
suspects in the case are said to
be extremist Palestinians who
oppose Arafat's recent move to
renounce terrorism. and ac-
knowledge Israel's right to ex-
ist.
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HIGH 36, LOW 26-PAGE C10
The Washington Times
FA36
MONS
MONDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 1989
WASHINGTON, D.C.
PHONE: 636-3000
SUBSCRIBER SERVICE: 636-3333
25 cents
Pan Am jet crash called a 'hit' for Iran
By Bill Gertz
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
Western intelligence agencies
concluded last week that the bomb-
ing of Pan Am Flight 103 was com-
missioned by Iran's Revolutionary
Guards and carried out by Palestin-
ian terrorists - with support from
the Syrian and Libyan governments.
The bombing was one of at least
seven terrorist operations con-
tracted by the Iranians in retaliation
for the downing of an Iranian com-
mercial airliner by a U.S. Navy war-
ship in July, Western intelligence
sources said last weekend.
Six of the operations, organized
by terrorists of the Popular Front for
the Liberation of Palestine-General
Command (PFLP-GC), were
thwarted when 13 suspected mem-
bers of the group were arrested in
October in West Germany, the
sources said.
The seventh operation was the
sabotage of a U.S. civilian airline
that intelligence agencies now be-
lieve was the bombing of Flight 103.
The Pan Am Boeing 747 jumbo jet
exploded over Lockerbie, Scotland,
Dec. 21, killing all 259 persons on
board and 11 on the ground.
The PFLP-GC has denied in-
volvement in the Pan Am bombing.
For the Pan Am bombing, the in-
telligence sources said, the PFLP-
GC used a "drug mule" - a courier
ferrying illegal narcotics - to
unwittingly carry the bomb aboard
the jet when he checked his luggage
at Frankfurt, West Germany
-
Flight 103's point of departure.
West German officials have iden-
tified the courier but have not re-
leased his name in order to protect a
possible case against the blast's per-
petrators, the sources said.
According to the sources, West
German authorities obtained details
of the bomb plot last week from
Khalil Dalkamoni, a PFLP-GC com-
mander.
Mr. Dalkamoni was arrested Oct.
26 along with 12 other suspected
PFLP-GC terrorists and is still in
West German custody. He had re-
mained silent since his arrest, but
began talking to authorities last
week, the intelligence sources said.
Mr. Dalkamoni said several other
members of the group remained at
large and were not identified at the
time of the arrests. These Palestin-
ians are believed to have carried out
the Pan Am bombing, the sources
said. They did not disclose the iden-
tities of the suspects, who are the
subject of a global manhunt.
Although some of Mr. Dalkamo-
ni's testimony surfaced in news re-
ports last week, State Department
officials denied having reached any
conclusions about the bombing.
The intelligence sources agreed
to discuss details of the case with
The Washington Times because they
said the State Department does not
want to face the serious implications
of naming three countries - Iran,
Syria and Libya - as being respon-
sible for the terrorist attack.
"Qualitatively, this is not just a
group of 20 radicals," one source
said yesterday. "These are nations
waging war. We're not talking fac-
tions; we're talking countries who
have supplied the ingredients" for
the bombing and other planned
attacks.
If Syrian and Iranian involvement
see CRASH, page A10
A senior House Democrat wants
a new dialogue with Iran. Page A11.
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PAGE A10 / MONDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 1989
The Washington Times
CRASH
From page A1
was officially sanctioned, the "next
question" the United States will have
to ask is, "What are we going to do
about it?" the source said.
"Terrorism isn't an 'ism,' it's a po-
litical act," said the source. "That is
what State [Department] has tried to
avoid."
President Bush has promised to
"seek hard" and "punish severely"
those responsible for the attack.
State Department officials, the
sources said, have disclosed some
investigative findings because they
fear the public's misapprehension
that the bombing was a radical Pal-
estinian retaliation for the United
States' opening of a dialogue with
the Palestine Liberation Organi-
zation.
L. Paul Bremer, the State De-
partment's ambassador-at-large for
counterterrorism, said yesterday
that it was "premature" to say any-
one in the U.S. government has
reached conclusions about the per-
pretrators.
"I'm confident we're getting
closer, but we haven't reached any
conclusions yet," Mr. Bremer said.
A State Department official, who
declined to be named, said he was
unaware that Mr. Dalkamoni talked
to West German authorities. The of-
ficial denied that the department
was attempting to downplay the evi-
dence.
As for the revenge theory outlined
by the intelligence sources, the offi-
cial said, "It's a plausible explana-
tion. It may very well come out that
way."
Information obtained during in-
terrogations of Mr. Dalkamoni con-
firmed facts that U.S. and British
investigators had gathered about the
bombing, including details about the
type of explosive used, how the
bomb was smuggled aboard and the
motivation for the attack, the
sources said.
"What Dalkamoni told us tracks
with [information obtained from]
other sources and findings of the in-
vestigation," one intelligence source
said.
Mr. Dalkamoni said Iranian Revo-
lutionary Guards and other Leba-
nese Shi'ite fundamentalists met in
Beirut, Lebanon, last fall and De-
cember with PFLP-GC leader Ah-
mad Jibril, a former Syrian army
captain and explosives expert, the
sources said.
The Revolutionary Guards, one of
Iran's two military forces, asked the
PFLP-GC to carry out the terrorist
operations in West Germany in re-
taliation for the July 3 downing of an
Iran Air jetliner, the sources said.
All 290 persons on board the Iranian
plane were killed.
According to the sources, Libyan
government agents supplied cash
for the PFLP-GC terrorist oper-
ations. The Syrian government,
through its ties to Mr. Jibril, pro-
vided intelligence support and travel
documents, the sources said.
"The Libyan government paid the
bills, and there was active support
from Syrian intelligence," said a
source. Syrian support was de-
scribed as "large," although the
sources declined to elaborate.
West German authorities may
have"turned up the heat" on Mr. Dal-
kamoni to make him talk in order to
counter international criticism of
West German corporate involve-
ment in building what the Bush ad-
ministration has said is a chemi-
cal-weapons plant in the Libyan
desert, the sources said. Of the 12
others arrested with Mr. Dalkamoni,
eight have been released.
The bomb used in the Pan Am ex-
plosion contained Semtex H, an ad-
vanced, plastic explosive manu-
factured exclusively in the Soviet
bloc, and was detonated by a sophis-
ticated barometric mechanism de-
signed to go off at high-altitude air
pressures.
Flight 103 exploded at 31,000 feet
about a half hour after taking off
from London's Heathrow Airport.
The sources said the terrorists'
plan was to have the Pan Am jet ex-
plode over the Irish Sea. But strong
winds forced the jet to take a more
northerly course before turning east
over the ocean en route to New York.
Since the plane exploded over
land, investigators were able to col-
lect evidence they would not have
found in the sea.
Chemical residue of Semtex H
was found on a luggage pallet recov-
ered from the wreckage of the jet,
along with evidence of narcotics, the
sources said.
That evidence first linked the
bombing to the PFLP-GC because it
was the same type of plastic explo-
sive West German authorities found
in a bomb discovered in the group's
weapons cache in October.
The bomb found in West Germany
was built into a Toshiba portable ra-
dio, using Semtex H and a triggering
device connected to a barometric
sensor that sent an electric pulse
when it sensed high-altitude air
pressure.
AP
Palestinian terrorist Ahmad Jibril
devised the Pan Am jet bombing.
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20 marisa
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THE WASHINGTON POST
Hijack Alert Issued Before Lockerbie
Lawmaker Calls FAA Bulletins to Airlines 'Dangerously Inaccurate'
By Laura Parker
Washington Post Staff Writer
In the month before the bomb-
ing of Pan Am Flight 103 over
Lockerbie, Scotland, U.S. security
officials were bracing for a poten-
tial airline hijacking, not a bomb-
ing, according to documents re-
leased yesterday by a House sub-
committee.
In a security bulletin dated
Nov. 4, the Federal Aviation Ad-
ministration cautioned U.S. car-
riers operating in Europe about
the possibility of a hijacking in
Europe "in the first half of No-
vember."
Pan American World Airways
also posted an additional lookout
at the airport in Frankfurt to
watch for passengers who fit the
FAA profile of a terrorist, accord-
ing to the documents.
Subsequent bulletins warned
airlines to be on the watch for a
bomb concealed in a radio-cas-
sette recorder. But even after the
Dec. 21 bombing, the FAA was
still concerned about a possible
hijacking. A bulletin dated Dec. 24
listed the names of 13 people be-
lieved to be planning a hijacking.
Excerpts of 27 FAA security
bulletins issued in 1988 and six
bulletins issued through Feb. 16
were made public by Rep. Cardiss
Collins (D-Ill.), who chairs the
House Government Operations
subcommittee on government ac-
tivities and transportation. She
criticized the bulletins as being
ineffective and "dangerously in-
accurate."
The bombing of Flight 103,
which killed 270 persons, is likely
to bring a closer examination of
FAA security measures, existing
security rules and the emphasis
placed on information the agency
gives to airlines. Collins said yes-
terday she plans to hold hearings
on those subjects next month.
Sen. Frank R. Lautenberg (D-
N.J.), chairman of the Senate Ap-
propriations transportation sub-
committee, last week called for a
presidential inquiry into the
bombing.
FAA spokesman John Leyden
said the agency would have no
comment on the documents Col-
lins released until it had a chance
to review them.
. Generally, the FAA allows air-
lines to develop their own secu-
rity programs, dictating only that
planes be secured against the
threat of bombings or hijackings.
The bulletins issued last No-
vember prompted Pan Am to sup-
plement examination of carry-on
baggage with additional hand
checks. But Pan Am's increased
security for checked baggage in-
cluded only an additional X-ray
inspection, despite an FAA warn-
ing that some sophisticated bombs
can pass through X-rays unde-
tected.
The bomb that exploded aboard
the Boeing 747 jumbo jet was con-
cealed inside checked baggage.
Officials believe the bomb was
made of a plastic explosive known
as Semtex that can elude X-ray
machines.
A British Transport Depart-
ment memo written Dec. 29 said
bags transferred to the Pan Am
jetliner at Heathrow from a
Frankfurt flight did not receive a
second security examination, ABC
News reported yesterday.
Two weeks after the November
warning about a possible hijack -.
ing, the FAA issued a general bul-
letin to airlines about a bomb
seized by West German police in
an Oct. 26 antiterrorist raid in
Frankfurt. The bulletin said a To-
shiba "Bombeat 453" radio had
been seized by police in the arrest
of 16 people believed to be con-
nected with the Popular Front for
the Liberation of Palestine-Gen-
eral Command.
According to the bulletin, the
device contained approximately
REP. CARDISS COLLINS
.. . plans hearings on FAA measures
11 ounces of "a plastic type explo-
sive wrapped in a metallic coated
"Tobler' brand candy wrapper."
The bomb contained an electrical
detonator and "a barometric de-
vice connected to a computer
chip, which was believed function-
al and apparently part of the trig-
ger or arming function."
The bulletin continued: "The
potential target cannot be iden-
tified at this time although it was
identified that the [bomb] would
be very difficult to detect via nor-
mal X-ray inspection, indicating
.that it might be intended to pass
undisclosed through areas subject
to extensive security controls,
such as airports."
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51
CLOSING NON PAN AM BOMBER!
A London newspaper, the weekly Sunday I
press, reported Sunday that the person who mat.
the bomb that blew up Pan Am Flight 103 is a Liby
an known to international security officials as "The
"Professor" because of his knowledge of explosives.
The Express, quoting unidentified detectives,
also said a Lebanese student, 21-year-old Khalid
Jaafar, of Dearborn, Mich., unwittingly carried the
bomb onto the flight in a radio-cassette player given
to him as a gift. It did not say who gave it to him.
Investigators have concluded that the jet was
-blown up by plastic explosives hidden inside a ra-
dió-casette player.
2 90
Also Sunday, Britain acknowledged that a Dec.
19 warning about possible bombs on airliners was
not mailed until after Jan. 1 - at least 11 days after
the Pan Am jet blew up Dec. 21, killing all 259 peo-
«ple aboard and 11 people on the ground.
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THE WASHINGTON POST
14 APR'89
Pan Am Bomb Probers Differ on Courier Report
By David B. Ottaway
and Laura Parker
Washington Post Staff Writers
Government sources disagreed
yesterday over a report that named
a college student as the passenger
who unwittingly carried a bomb
onto Pan Am Flight 103, destroyed
: Dec. 21 over Lockerbie, Scotland.
Some U.S. intelligence sources
confirmed a CBS report Wednesday
that the dupe who unknowingly
brought the bomb aboard was a
Lebanese-American college student
traveling home to visit relatives in
Detroit for the Christmas holidays.
But other sources involved in
building a criminal case based on
the evidence available cautioned
that the number of possible dupes
has only been narrowed to a "hand-
ful.".
U.S. antiterrorist officials said
Khalid Jaafar, a Lebanese-American
college student returning to Detroit
from Frankfurt for the holidays, is
on the list of suspected dupes, but
added that several other passengers
with Middle East "connections" are
being studied as well.
Jaafar's parents, who operate a
gasoline station in Detroit, have
told FBI agents their son was not
involved in the bombing.
U.S. intelligence agencies have
reached conclusions sooner than
FBI and other European law en-
forcement officials who are seeking
to obtain conclusive evidence be-
fore making their findings public.
The U.S. intelligence sources
said they believe the prime suspect
in the bombing is a relative of an
official in the Syrian-backed Popular
Front. for the Liberation of Pales-
tine-General
Command. Hafez
Dalkamoni, who was among 14 sus-
pected members of the PFLP-GC
arrested in an antiterrorist sweep in
West Germany last October, is still
in prison there.
But other sources said that while
Dalkamoni has brothers in Tunis
and' Algiers, he has no known rel-
atives in Europe, and denied that he
is cooperating with investigators.
"If someone [in the group] was
cooperating, we would have broken
the case some time ago," said one
official.
..
Investigators believe the courier
on the Pan Am flight was given a
radio cassette recorder, which con-
tained a well-disguised plastic
bomb, without realizing what it was.
The cassette recorder was put in-
side a suitcase and was placed
aboard Flight 103 as checked bag-
gage. The Boeing 747 exploded at
high altitude over Lockerbie, killing
all 259 people on board and 11 on
the ground.
In the October raid, police seized
weapons and three Toshiba cas-
sette recorders containing hidden
explosives.
The White House announced that
President Bush will visit Lockerbie
on his way back from a NATO sum-
mit in Brussels and visits to Italy,
England and West Germany in late
May.
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11
IGTON POST
JACK ANDERSON and DALE VAN ATTA
Hiding the Story on Flight 103
P
resident Bush and British Prime Minister
Margaret Thatcher secretly agreed last
spring to play down the truth about who blew
up Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland.
After both leaders had intelligence reports
pointing the finger at a terrorist hired by Ayatollah
Ruhollah Khomeini, Thatcher called Bush. In that
conversation, they agreed that neither could stand
the political heat of making the evidence public
because both were impotent to retaliate.
Highly placed White House sources told us that
the phone call took place about mid-March. By that
time, both the British and U.S. intelligence services
had followed the trail of evidence to terrorist Ahmed
Jibril as the hit man who was paid by Iran to blow up
the plane. The intelligence services had evidence
that Khomeini and his successor, Ali Akbar Hashemi
Rafsanjani, had approved the bombing.
Pan Am 103 originated in Frankfurt, West
Germany, stopped in London and was bound for
New York when a bomb exploded at. 30,000 feet
over Scotland on Dec. 21, 1988. All 259
passengers were killed, along with 11 people in the
village of Lockerbie:
Iranian-sponsored terrorists quickly asserted
responsibility, but the British and U.S.
governments put out the story that there were
several suspects. Behind the scenes, all the
evidence pointed to Jibril. He had been shopping for
money for his terrorist group, the Popular Front
for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command.
His usual sponsors, Libyan leader Moammar
Gadhafi and Syrian President Hafez Assad, were
short of cash.
The intelligence reports told Bush and Thatcher
that Jibril went to Iran in July 1988 and struck the
deal with Khomeini and Rafsanjani to blow up an
American plane in retaliation for the accidental U.S.
downing of an Iranian airliner earlier that month.
When the intelligence reports began to leak last
March, Thatcher called Bush to discuss their
problem. She said no purpose would be served by
making public the evidence against Iran because
neither the United States or Britain could respond,
Bush knew that Khomeini had proved the
undoing of Jimmy Carter and had nearly proved the
undoing of Ronald Reagan. Carter lost an election
because he couldn't get American hostages back
from Iran, and Reagan suffered the biggest blow of
his presidency when he tried to trade arms to Iran
for American hostages.
So Bush didn't argue when Thatcher suggested
that they "low-key" the findings-say that the
investigation was inconclusive and long-term.
After the call, word was quickly passed to top
officials conducting the Pan Am investigation that
they were not to make any off-the-record remarks
implicating Jibril or Iran. In Britain, when the press
speculated about possible perpetrators, investigators
called the speculation "wild" and "irresponsible."
U.S. intelligence sources who told us about the call
said the decision was political cowardice.
Thatcher, the "Iron Lady," earned her reputation
in a war with Argentina over the Falkland Islands.
But by last March, her popularity was on the wane
and she didn't need to be embarrassed by Khomeini.
Bush, still fighting his "wimp" image, didn't want to
face the ultimate calls for retribution.
Approved For Release 2003/09/09 : CIA-RDP96-00789R000600740002-3
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