Self-confessed spy in ‘U.S. foreign legion’

Press, 26 December 1986, Page 7

Self-confessed spy in ‘U.S. foreign legion’

NZPA New York A self-confessed United States spy who took a taxi to a Nicaraguan air base and was arrested taking photos said in a broadcast interview he was recruited by a private organisation founded two years ago in Washington. The group, Phoenix Battalion, “was formed as an American foreign legion,” Sam Hall told C.B.S. television in an interview from his prison cell in Nicaragua.

“I was picked as an American to go overseas and was given some money, about Si 2,500 ... by certain people, private industry,” said Hall, who was arrested last week.

Asked if the Phoenix Battalion was an arm of the United States Government, Hall replied, “No, it isn’t.” But he also said his involvement with the group started when he was “invited to the Pentagon.”

Hall, of Dayton, Ohio, refused to say who invited

him to join, saying he would identify the person only before a congressional hearing. Hall, whose brother, Tony, is a Democrat Congressman from Ohio, said that when the group was formed in 1984, there were 540 members, but since then “it was disbanded.” Hall said he was the only operative of the group left. He said there was also a three-member organisational group with a titular head code-named “Tinker.” Hall said that the aim of Phoenix Battalion was to be “an independent army” that was “counterterrorist, a paramilitary’ unit, where we would be based in different locales around the world.” He said he had trained as a commando in Israel, served in “counter-terror-ism” in South Africa, Angola and El Salvador and was a commander of Miskito Indian forces in Honduras.

Hall described how he arrived in Nicaragua with only high school Spanish, asked a cab driver to take him to the Punta Huete air ‘ base and bluffed his way in with a false press pass.

“There’s supposedly a big Soviet build-up. Cubans are supposed to be in the area. My main concern was to find out what they’re doing new in construction ... what’s underneath covered buildings,” Hall said.

He said he was arrested taking pictures from the back of the taxi. Hall also said that he had been in touch with the private aid network supplying United Statesbacked Nicaraguan “contra” guerrillas. Hall told C.B.S. his story could be checked with two retired United States Naval officers — Captain William Hamilton and Commander Francis Fane. The television network said both Captain Hamilton and Commander

Fane said they had encouraged Hall to organise an American foreign legion.

The Nicaraguan President, Daniel Ortega, has said that Hall, arrested last week, was not a spy, but was “mentally unbalanced.”

The Nicaraguan Interior Minister, Tomas Borge, told C.B.S. that Hall was “probably linked with organisations that in their turn are linked to the United States government.

“I think Mr Hall is trying to create a certain image for the purpose of regaining his freedom and to try and hide his true intentions here.”

Mr Borge said Hall would not be back in the United States soon like the recently pardoned mercenary, Eugene Hasenfus. who had been sentenced to 30 years in jail for running guns to the contras.