European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - February 18, 1989, Darmstadt, Hesse Page 10 the stars and stripes William f. Buckley or. West s anti communist resolve disappearing during the Campaign George Bush several times repeated a proud claim by Ronald Reagan namely that during his two terms in office not an acre of non communist soil had been yielded to the communists. Then As now the focus has been on Afghani Stan where we have seen the de Facto repeal of the Brezhnev doctrine. It is a development of staggering geopolitical and psychological importance that the soviet Union has been driven out of Afghanistan. The Active verb Here is important Mikhail Gorbachev did t simply repeal the Brezhnev doctrine which specifies that no country once under socialist control will Ever deliver itself from that control. What happened in Afghanistan was that three years after he came to Power Gorbachev realized that he was not winning the War and that it was costing him More than he could afford. The other two fronts in which Reagan s yield not an Inch policy was being challenged by the Brezhnev once a communist country always a communist coun try were Nicaragua and Angola. Bush has now made it official. He will not go to Congress and ask for Money for the contras. So far As we can Tell not even Oliver North proposes to raise Money for the contras. So what we have in Nicaragua working in favor of change is Only the utter bankruptcy of the sandinista regime at a moment when the soviet Union is watching the flow of its imperialist dollars. But since Moscow is still willing to pay $14 million per Day to continue to support Fidel Castro Daniel Ortega reasonably Hopes to hang on to that incremental soviet subvention necessary to eliminate any possibility that the tatter Demalio contras whom we deserted As definitively As we deserted the South vietnamese Freedom fighters will Ever seriously Chal Lenge the marxist Hegemony in Nicaragua. The third area of Contention has received remarkably Little attention. What happened suddenly just after the National election was the implementation of the Crocker Chester plan for Namibia Angola patterned after . Resolution 435 dating Back to 1978. That plan Calls for elections in Namibia on nov. 1, 1989, and for reasons that defy understanding the removal of the cuban Mili tary contingent that has secured the communist govern ment in Power in Angola not until july 1,1991. Now the geopolitical meaning of this is simply stated. The cuban military has kept the communists in Power in Angola. And the South african military has kept Freedom alive in Namibia by sustaining resistance to the marxist led Swap forces and in Angola by sustaining Gen. Jonas Sav Imbi president of Unita who has the Southeastern Section of Angola liberated from the marxists in the North. But our pressures on South Africa have accumulated William Safire to such a Point As apparently to have exhausted that country s reserves. It can no longer expend the Energy to hold the line for fear of increased sanctions. Swap will face Little effective political opposition now that the South african military is to be replaced by Blue helmeted . Troops in Namibia and the cubans remaining in Angola will provide pressure especially against a Sav Imbi weakened by the withdrawal of South Africa. Moreover As Sav Imbi recently declared to activist Howard Phillips head of the conservative caucus in Washington the offer to withdraw 50,000 cuban military says nothing about 10,000 cubans who Are Black skinned and speak portuguese and have now been 10 years in Angola. A trivial Force of 90 members from the United nations is Given the responsibility of verifying the cuban withdrawal. But if the anti marxist pro Western forces of Sav Imbi Are by Midsummer of 1991 thoroughly weak ened there is hardly any duty left for the cuban marxist mercenaries. Angola will continue to be governed by the marxist puppet government of Moscow the forces of Unita will suffer the Fate of the contras in Nicaragua and in the South a 40-year struggle by South Africa to yield what was once its protectorate Only to a non marxist government will have ended in failure. Score one More Triumph for sanctions. What has been happening in Central America and in Africa slips from the memory As we Are encouraged to think in terms of the end of the cold War. But the peasant in Nicaragua the forces of democracy in Al Salvador the Blacks in Angola and Namibia who yearn for an Independence not merely from portuguese and South africans but also from muscovites see no differ ence at All in the age of perestroika. Except that Western Resolution is fading. C Universal press Syndicate pulling the plug on intelligence second guesses Ati to � to _ 1_a 1_ n Iff la j _ i _ j i i to Ford s Sci is pulling the Peacock on translation from the whispered spook speak Ford s Sci is what intelligence types Call George Bush who served As president Ford s director of Central Intelli gence. Pulling the Peacock Means opening the valve be tween Hull Bottom and sea and results in scuttling the ship. Piff Iab makes a pronounceable acronym out of Pfab the president s foreign intelligence advisory Board. Now we Are Able to decode the cryptic message. George Bush when he ran the Cia in 1976, did not look kindly on a Bunch of prestigious outsiders second guessing him and reporting directly to the president he resented haying to appoint a team a to counter the Agency s misreading of soviet strength. Now that he is president he is folding up the prickly panel of Cia watchdogs just As Jimmy Carter did before him. In the scuttling he has the Active support of James a. Baker whose state department bureaucracy is angry at Piff Iab for secretly harping on electronic penetrations of embassy Security in Moscow As Well As Vienna Austria. Baker conscious of Power lines also does not want to have his policies challenged by a group that reports directly to the president especially since Piff Iab has been doggedly raising the Issue of verification in the proposed Start treaty. Ordinarily Piff Iab would be rescued by its chairwoman Anne Armstrong of Texas a close pal of the new president but she wants to retire. If Bush wants to tighten the Circle of intelligence now is the time. That s where this Peacock unplugging fits into a larger picture of the concentration of Power. No president wants his intelligence Community coming up with Maverick analyses and evaluations that heave Monkey wrenches into the formulation of new policy. As Robert Gates has written in a stunningly Frank article in the Washington quarterly presidents do not Welcome new intelligence assessments undercut Ting policies based on earlier Gates is the longtime intelligence pro who served As Deputy to William Casey at the Cia and was denied promotion by the Senate in the Iran Contra aftermath. He was brought in from the Langley cold and placed in the White House As Deputy to his Mentor Brent scowcroft the National Security adviser. To spook watchers that Gates Transfer meant that the locus of intelligence strategy was shifting to the White House. The current Sci William Webster is a High integrity Type who has recovered Public Confidence after the Casey activism no one can say i m cooking the books he tells me which is True. But the new no. 2, Richard Kerr is Long accustomed to operating in the Gates Shadow. Danger few Independent intelligence surprises from across the River. That May be tidy but it s not Good. The worst mis takes Are made when intelligence is too centralized. Better to be discombobulated on occasion and to have the Sci furious at outside meddling As Bill Casey was when professor James q. Wilson s Piff Iab task Force examined the Howard defection and the Kab s Yevchenko stunt. I Laid out the facts for Gates whom i know to be an opponent of competitive evaluation and put the ques Tion in his own inside Lingo was he the Mastermind of the anti Piff Iab Peacock caper i Haven t said a negative word about Piff Iab to anybody he protested and passed along an Intelli gence truism you can put together a set of facts and draw a wrong the Deputy National Security adviser went further it would be a mistake to dissolve let him March into the Oval office and say that knowing it s not what the president wants to hear. Let s see Brent scowcroft go up against James Baker whose emphasis on personal loyalty and scorn for intelligence experience has led him to choose Douglas Mulholland As state s intelligence Boss. The Piff Iab staff in room 340 of the executive of fice budding is awaiting the fall of the Bush a. Down the Hall at the moribund intelligence oversight com Mittee you cannot get through the door for the cob webs meanwhile the Senate intelligence committee conscious of the threatened demise of Piff Iab has begun sounding out knowing outsiders like James Woolsey Benno Schmidt and Eli Jacobs for its own counter intelligence panel and Richard Garwin Sid Ney Drell and Sally ride for a technical advisor panel. There May still be time to save Piff Iab and prevent the intelligence implosion but As they say Insoo speak it s up to Ford s Sci. C new York times
