Chose Targets to Fuel Coup Against Kadafi, Shultz Says

WASHINGTON —  Secretary of State George P. Shultz said Thursday that the United States chose the targets of its air strike against Libya this week in hope of fueling a military rebellion against Col. Moammar Kadafi.

“We tried in the targeting to send two messages,” Shultz said. First, “in terms of the equipment that the military puts some store by, the terrorist actions may cost them some of that equipment.”

Second, he said, “The Praetorian Guards that surround Kadafi and intimidate people are not invulnerable. They were a target.”

The Administration’s view, Shultz said, was that “if a coup takes place, that’s all to the good. . . . We know there are a lot of people in Libya who feel that if Kadafi was not there it would be better--and even more people not in Libya.” Shultz’s comments were the clearest public statement yet that the Reagan Administration’s goals in attacking Libya included pushing the country’s military toward launching a coup against Kadafi.

Dissident Libyan officers have attempted to organize several coups against Kadafi in the past, without success. But U.S. officials said the military remains the only apparent hope for a change in the Libyan regime.

“There is a considerable dissidence in the armed forces,” Shultz noted.

Shultz made his comments in response to a question about whether Kadafi himself was a target of the air attack, which struck at five military installations in Tripoli, including the Libyan leader’s headquarters at the Aziziya Barracks.

Kadafi “was not a direct target,” Shultz said, noting that U.S. law prohibits targeting a foreign leader for assassination.

Instead, he said, the headquarters was bombed because U.S. analysts believe terrorist attacks have been planned there--and because it gave the United States a chance to strike at Kadafi’s Revolutionary Guard, the elite paramilitary units which guard the building.

History of Friction

State Department officials said there has been a history of friction between the regular military and the guard, whose officers and men are drawn from among ideologically committed Kadafi supporters.

In the wake of the U.S. air strike, several gun battles have been reported between military units and the guard, both in the capital of Tripoli and at military bases--prompting some U.S. officials to speculate that a coup attempt might be under way.

But officials who monitored the reports said the skirmishes died down by Thursday and never reached the point of threatening Kadafi’s hold on power.

“We provided one spark (with the air strike), but now we need another,” said one. “The good news is that the gunfights happened. It showed that there is a real division within the military, that the opposition is just below the surface.”

Seeking European Sanctions

He said the Administration is concentrating now on persuading European countries to impose the kind of economic and political sanctions on Kadafi that they rejected early this week. “This situation is absolutely ripe for economic sanctions by the Europeans to have a real impact on the internal situation,” he said. “That could give the opposition real impetus.”

Shultz said he was encouraged by the decision of the countries of the European Communities, whose foreign ministers, meeting in Paris on Thursday, said they would consider “concrete action” against terrorism.

Despite criticism of the U.S. action from individual countries, he said, “the European view of terrorism is really much stronger than it was a week or so ago.”

“Broadly, we did what we intended to do, and I think the results, taken on balance, were very positive,” Shultz said. “As a general proposition, we’re ahead of the game.”

Sudan Shooting

Shultz and other officials also said that they believe Kadafi is behind the shooting of a U.S. embassy worker in Sudan on Tuesday but added that the evidence is not strong enough to touch off a new retaliatory strike against Libya.

Shultz said the Administration still intends to wait for clear evidence of responsibility before it retaliates for a terrorist act. He said military responses will be considered on a case-by-case basis.

“We are not going to get into a position where there is an automatic pilot here,” he said. “But certainly we will investigate the shooting, and we will react.”

The diplomat, William J. Cokals, 33, a communications officer at the U.S. Embassy in the Sudanese capital of Khartoum, was shot in the head by two men who drove up beside his car. After the attack, the State Department ordered nonessential diplomats and all embassy dependents evacuated.

Attacks Planned Earlier

Speakes said the Administration is not prepared at this time to call the recent attacks “retaliatory” acts by Libya for the U.S. bombing. “Many of these acts were planned and the people put in place to conduct them prior to our attack and that (was) one of the reasons for our attack,” he said.

In the long run, he said, Reagan believes the air strike will deter future terrorist attacks. But in the short run, he said, “we are prepared for an increase in terrorism. That’s why we’ve issued the alerts.”

Robert Lamb, chief of U.S. embassy security, said he is concerned about the safety of “60 or 70” U.S. diplomatic posts around the world. He noted that bomb threats against American facilities had doubled to “about a dozen a day.”

Washington Bomb Threats

In Washington, the White House, the Capitol and the State Department received bomb threats Thursday, as did the Washington Monument, the Justice Department, the Washington Post, the U.S. Passport Agency, George Washington University, a parking garage and even a fast-food restaurant.

As for Kadafi, U.S. officials said their intelligence reports indicate that he had gone to a desert military base near Sebha, his habitual refuge in times of stress.

“He’s behaving as though he’s in shock,” one senior State Department official said. “He’s keeping a low profile. But if he stays there long, it may become difficult to rule by remote control.”

“The one point we did disprove this week,” the official contended, “is that if you attack Kadafi, you make him more popular and stronger within Libya. That hasn’t happened at all.”