U.S. Should Mine Harbors: Ex-CIA Chief

WASHINGTON — Former CIA Director Stansfield Turner suggested today that the United States mine the harbors of Libya to retaliate against Libyan-sponsored terrorism.

Turner, a retired admiral, and Lawrence Eagleburger, a former deputy secretary of state, agreed in separate interviews on the “CBS Morning News” that U.S. officials have talked so much about retaliation that something should be done.

“We’re very close to being in a box here of having said so much about it that we’re going to look very bad if we don’t,” Turner said.

Turner said there are two fundamental options: “One is to bomb various targets inside Libya. I think the better option would be to mine the harbors, the ports of Libya, and in effect put the President’s (trade) sanctions against Libya into force.”

Mining the harbors, Turner said, “doesn’t put us in the position of killing anybody. We lay the mines. We warn people about them. And we say, ‘Go into those harbors at your own risk.’ ”

The disadvantage, he said is that “it will, of course, annoy our European allies because they’re the ones who benefit by that trade.”