U.S. spy eyes blinkered by loss of Iran posts

Press, 14 April 1979, Page 8

U.S. spy eyes blinkered by loss of Iran posts

NZPA-Reuter Washington The director of the United States Central Intelligence Agency (Mr Stansfield Turner) said yesterday that the loss of United States-operated electronic stations in Iran impaired American ability to detect any Soviet cheating on the nearly completed nu-clear-arms treaty.

The Central Intelligence Agency chief, speaking at an overseas writers’ lunch, expressed concern about news leaks of steps the United States would take to offset the loss. But he said that one such step, acknowledged by President Carter’s Administration officials, was the planned use of improved U2-type spy planes over friendly territory ttf pick up electronic signals from Soviet missile tests.

Mr Turner said he would; give details on plans for: monitoring and verifying: S.A.L.T. II (the second Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty) only in closed session before the Senate, which must ratify the treaty, and not publicly.

The United States was forced to give up several Iran-based electronic stations which monitored Soviet missile developments, after the collapse of the Shah’s Government.

In other comments on the area, Mr Turner said he did not think Saudi Arabia — a nation which the United States considers a moderating force in the Arab world — was in the “dangerous” kind of situation which led to the overthrow of the Shah. “It is not a one-man rule,” he said. "It is a family rule.” 1

But he said Saudi Arabia clearly was subject to some of the same pressures which afflicted Iran, especially with its huge numbers of Yemeni workers. Mr Turner said the United States was getting over its post-Vietnam aversion to involvement overseas, but did not have to rush to the aid of every country which might appear to be succumbing to communism. He did not think that the move of some countries towards communism was irreversible and required United States action. He cited several countries, including Egypt and So;malia, which had once i depended on the Soviet Union for military supplies but which had since chosen to cut their ties with Mosicow.