Did Iran Help the Hijackers?

By John Kohan

The U.S. thinks so, but does not know how it can retaliate

The C-141 transport plane looked almost ghostly as it broke through the early morning mist and touched down at Andrews Air Force Base last week. For the fifth time since April 1983, a military aircraft was bringing home the bodies of innocent Americans slain by Middle East terrorists. When the flag-draped coffins of Charles Hegna, 50, and William Stanford, 52, were carried by an honor guard into the cavernous hangar for a memorial service, there were tears of sorrow and frustration in the eyes of many in the crowd of 150 Government officials and family members. Vice President George Bush delivered a brief and angry eulogy for the two officials from the U.S. Agency for International Development killed two weeks ago in the brutal hijacking of a Kuwait Airways flight bound for Karachi. "We shall know their murderers with the long memories of those who believe in patient but certain justice," said Bush. "Civilized nations can and must resist terrorism and demand that governments have the decency to bring terrorists to justice."

It was a clear message to the regime of Iran's Ayatullah Ruhollah Khomeini that the episode at Mehrabad Airport in Tehran had still not been resolved as far as the Reagan Administration was concerned. The six-day hijacking had come to a dramatic end early last week when three Iranian security officers disguised as a physician and cleaning crew slipped on board the grounded Airbus and rescued nine hostages, including two Americans, who were found tied to their seats. Four Arabic-speaking hijackers, thought to be linked to the same pro-Khomeini Lebanese Shi'ite terrorist groups that some U.S. officials believe carried out murderous bombing attacks on the U.S. embassy and Marine barracks in Beirut, were arrested without a struggle in the midnight raid.

But doubts persisted in Washington about Iranian complicity in the crime and whether the U.S. could, or should, take retaliatory measures. Secretary of State George Shultz called on the U.S. to pursue an "active defense" against terrorism. Said Shultz: "I think strong action, if we can identify [that action] precisely and execute it successfully, will command broad public support." Once the two American survivors, Businessman John Costa, 50, of New York City and Auditor Charles Kapar, 57, of Arlington, Va., were out of Tehran, the White House issued a toughly worded statement, charging that Iran had "clearly encouraged extreme behavior by the hijackers."

Iran certainly appeared to be in sympathy with the hijackers. It put intense pressure on Kuwait to meet their demand for the release of 17 terrorists sentenced to death or prison for the bombing attacks one year ago against the U.S. embassy and other targets in Kuwait. The negotiators were confined much of the time to the VIP lounge at the airport and had limited radio access to the hijackers. To apply even more pressure, the Iranian authorities allowed the negotiators to hear the screams of tortured prisoners and permitted photographs to circulate showing two slain Kuwaiti passengers. As it turned out, the hostages had only been roughed up and smeared with tomato catsup. When the Kuwaiti representatives finally gave up and left Tehran on Sunday morning, Iranian officials apparently decided that the hijackers' cause was lost and decided to end the episode.

There were unconfirmed reports of a more direct Iranian connection with the hijacking scheme. Two Pakistani passengers claimed that the four terrorists received additional weapons, handcuffs and nylon rope from the Iranians once the plane had landed. Many Kuwaiti officials privately believed the Iranians were involved in the hijacking. In Paris, the exiled former Iranian President Abol Hassan Banisadr charged that two of the terrorists had participated in the hijacking last July of an Air France jet to Tehran; Banisadr said he learned this through "sources." There was also circumstantial evidence to suggest that the Iranians had some inkling of how far the terrorists were prepared to go. Officials at Mehrabad Airport, for example, did not bother to move valuable aircraft parked only 300 yds. from the Airbus, even after the terrorists threatened to blow up the Kuwaiti jetliner.

Many details of the rescue also prompted suspicion that it might have been a "setup surrender." The hijackers' request for a cleaning crew was puzzling, to say the least. As a U.S. official explained, "You do not invite cleaners aboard an airplane after you have planted explosives, promised to blow up the plane and read your last will and testament. That is patently absurd." The security forces appeared to be so certain of success that they entered through only one door; once inside, they tossed so many smoke bombs that no one could see whether the hijackers showed any sign of resistance. (A Kuwaiti newspaper correspondent based in Washington reported that a U.S. Delta combat unit had set up base in a nearby country to prepare for a possible rescue mission if the plane should leave Iran and land in a place where it would be easier for the Americans to take action.) However tempting it was to jump to conclusions, U.S. officials had to admit, as one put it, that they had "indications rather than any hard evidence" of Iranian collusion with the hijackers. Iranian authorities insisted they had allowed the ordeal to drag on in order to win the release of as many hostages as possible by peaceful means. The two surviving Americans corroborated that statement. Kapar denied that any weapons were brought on the Airbus after it landed in Tehran, and Costa said he had "no evidence whatsoever" to implicate Iran in the plot.

The ordeal on the Airbus was, according to Kapar, "140 hours of hell." The terrorists veered from kindness to brutality, inflicting what a British hostage called "psychological torture." They ordered the Americans to lie on the floor, then stomped on their backs, chanting anti-American slogans. Costa was burned with cigarette butts because he refused to confess that he was an agent of the Central Intelligence Agency. When a Kuwaiti lighted up, one of the hijackers stuck the barrel of his gun into the hostage's mouth and warned, "This is the last cigarette you will ever smoke." The terrorists had told the Kuwaitis that because they were Muslims they would not be killed, but the torture, said one Kuwaiti, "made death look easy."

Administration officials said they would not make any final decision about how to respond to the hijacking until all the evidence was in. Even if a direct link between Iran and the terrorists can be proved, the U.S. may find it difficult to punish the Tehran government for its misdeeds. Indeed, a retaliatory strike might only endanger the lives of more Americans. Since the U.S. does very little business with Iran, economic and trade sanctions would have a limited effect. Said a frustrated U.S. official: "We ought to keep quiet unless we are going to act. There is no use just enhancing a paper-tiger image."

Washington was, at the very least, determined to put pressure on Iran to live up to its legal obligations under The Hague antihijacking convention of 1970 and either put the four hijackers on trial or send them to a country that would. But there is no evidence that Iran has taken any action against pro-Khomeini hijackers who have diverted two other planes to Tehran since last July. Iranian Premier Mir Hussein Moussavi made clear last week that his government had no intention of extraditing the latest group of terrorists. "The Americans still think that feudalism rules the world and therefore demand that Iran explain its handling of the hijacking affair," he declared. "Iran explains nothing to anyone but God." --ByJohnKohan.

Reported by Barry Hillenbrand/Kuwait and Johanna McGeary/Washington

With reporting by Barry Hillenbrand/Kuwait, Johanna McGeary/Washington