Drug Fight in Colombia Questioned
By Ken Guggenheim Associated Press Writer Tuesday, June 5, 2001; 10:09 a.m. EDT
WASHINGTON �� U.S. drug eradication flights in Colombia are being flown by
the same private company that Oliver North used to secretly run guns to
Nicaraguan rebels during the 1980s Iran-Contra scandal.
Eagle Aviation Services and Technology Inc. has flown State Department
planes on dangerous missions in Colombia for 10 years. Three of its pilots
have been killed in two crashes.
But its work has received little attention, even as lawmakers scrutinize
the use of contractors in the Latin American drug fight.
EAST doesn�t work directly for the State Department. It is a subcontractor
of Dyncorp Aerospace Technology, the military company hired by State to fly
and maintain aircraft for counterdrug missions in Colombia.
EAST pilots spray herbicide on coca, the raw material for cocaine. They
frequently face gunfire, sometimes from leftist guerrillas protecting drug
traffickers.
Current and former State Department officials said EAST�s Iran-Contra past
has nothing to do with its Colombia work. �That was 15 years ago. The issue
is what they�re doing, not what they did,� said Jonathan Winer, a former
State counterdrug official.
But one lawmaker who wants to ban the use of private contractors for
antidrug missions in the Andean region said EAST�s work in Colombia merits
scrutiny.
�I think this kind of questionable background of being involved in covert,
unapproved missions does add another level of questioning: Who are these
people and who is holding them accountable?� said Rep. Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill.
Concerns in Congress about contractors have escalated since Peru�s military
fired on a plane of U.S. missionaries April 20. Contractors aboard a
CIA-operated surveillance plane identified the plane as a possible drug
flight. An American woman and her infant died.
EAST�s president, retired Air Force Col. Thomas Fabyanic, declined to
discuss the company�s work. �EAST is a privately held company and therefore
we are not obligated to release any information in that regard,� he said in
a telephone interview.
In the 1980s, EAST and its founder, Richard Gadd, helped North, then a
National Security Council official, secretly supply weapons and ammunition
to Nicaragua�s Contra rebels at a time that Congress had banned the
government from providing lethal aid.
North also arranged for another of Gadd�s companies to win a State
Department contract to deliver legal, humanitarian aid. That created what
Iran-Contra Independent Counsel Lawrence Walsh called �a rare occasion that
a U.S. government program unwittingly provided cover to a private covert
operation.�
Revelations of the Contra arms operation and that it had been partly funded
by weapons sales to Iran led to convictions of top Reagan administration
officials.
Gadd testified in the Iran-Contra case under a grant of immunity from
prosecution, and neither he nor EAST was accused of illegalities.
The company kept working for the government.
In 1999 and 2000, EAST received more than $30 million under several Defense
Department contracts, which included providing engineering, supplies, and
other services for Laughlin Air Force Base in Texas, according to Pentagon
records.
Dyncorp declined to say how much it pays EAST as part of its five-year,
$170 million contract with the State Department for antidrug operations.
Fabyanic said his company was prohibited from discussing its Colombia
operations under the terms of the contract with Dyncorp.
Asked if EAST�s role in Iran-Contra should be considered significant to its
Colombia work, Fabyanic answered: �Why would it be?�
Dyncorp spokeswoman Charlene A. Wheeless said her company checked out
EAST�s background before contracting it and found no wrongdoing.
�We feel strongly that EAST is a reputable company,� she said. �They do a
great job for us as a subcontractor. We feel that they act responsibly.� In
his Iran-Contra testimony, Gadd said EAST was one of several companies he
formed after retiring in 1982 as a lieutenant colonel from the Air Force,
where he specialized in covert operations.
In the 1980s, the Contra rebels were trying to topple Nicaragua�s leftist
Sandinista government. The Reagan administration backed the Contras,
viewing the Sandinistas as a Marxist threat to Central America. Democrats
who controlled Congress believed the United States should stay out of the
conflict and barred U.S. officials from providing lethal aid.
North turned to retired Gen. Richard Secord to set up a private arms
pipeline to the Contras. Secord hired Gadd in 1985 to oversee the weapons
delivery.
Through EAST, Gadd helped acquire planes to carry arms and ammunition from
Portugal to Central America, and to make airdrops directly to Contra
fighters. EAST also built an airstrip in Costa Rica near the Nicaraguan
border.
EAST received $550,000 for its covert work, according to Walsh�s final report.
�If you view the whole operation as somehow illegitimate and illicit, then
anybody who participated in it could, you might say, have been involved in
doing something wrong,� former Iran-Contra prosecutor Michael Bromwich said.
But Gadd and his associates �thought they were working for the White
House,� Bromwich added.
���
On the Net:
Federation of American Scientists link to Iran-Contra report:
http://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/walsh/
State Department narcotics control bureau: http://www.state.gov/g/inl/narc/
� Copyright 2001 The Associated Press
