COMPANY INVOLVED IN COLOMBIAN DRUG MISSIONS HAS IRAN-CONTRA PAST

WASHINGTON (AP) -- 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/