Weinberger, Shultz Deny Ducking Duty in Iran Deal : Attempts to Block Plan Described

Secretary of State George P. Shultz and Defense Secretary Caspar W. Weinberger, in their first public reactions to the Tower Commission report, vigorously objected today to its finding that they let down President Reagan by quietly distancing themselves from the Iran arms deal.

“I do not agree that my actions were designed somehow or another to make a record to protect myself,” Shultz told a group of Western reporters in Shanghai. “I don’t operate that way.”

In Boston, Weinberger said the Tower Commission’s criticisms of him were “naked conclusions,” totally unsupported by the evidence.

Weinberger, at a news conference, said both he and Shultz had argued against the Iran arms deal.

“I am perfectly confident and content with the fact that I presented many, many times to the President all of the arguments that I could think of, as did George Shultz, both together and separately, as to why this shouldn’t be done,” Weinberger said.

‘Distanced Themselves’

In its Feb. 26 report to Reagan, the presidential panel headed by former Sen. John Tower said the two Cabinet officers, also members of the National Security Council, “distanced themselves from the march of events. Secretary Shultz specifically requested to be informed only as necessary to perform his job. . . .

“They simply distanced themselves from the program. They protected the record as to their own positions on this issue. They were not energetic in attempting to protect the President.”

But Shultz said today he was misled by members of the National Security Council staff who knew about the sales.

No Plans to Leave

He added that he looked forward to devising foreign policy with the new National Security Council director, Frank Carlucci, and the new White House chief of staff, Howard H. Baker Jr., and that he had no plans to leave office.

Shultz, asked whether the staff changes would affect him, said, “As far as I know, he (Reagan) wants me to remain as secretary of state and that is my intention.”

Shultz was winding up a five-day visit to China and was on a train between the towns of Qufu and Jinan in eastern China as he listened to President Reagan’s White House speech on the subject Wednesday night.

Officials said that although he had contributed ideas to the speech, he had not seen an advance copy and he heard the speech on a tiny portable shortwave radio.

Says He Tried

Weinberger, who has called the arms deal absurd, insisted in an interview in today’s Baltimore Sun that he had done all he could to oppose it. He said he has stood by that assertion “repeatedly and to the point of giving offense” within the Administration.

The commission’s claim that he and Shultz sat by passively and let down the President was “unjustified and unwarranted and not supported by any evidence,” Weinberger said.

Weinberger said he was “kept out of meetings and conversations and discussions” by former national security adviser Robert C. McFarlane and then-national security adviser John M. Poindexter.