He helped word a secret 1983 presidential "finding" authorizing support for the Contras, as the Nicaraguan rebels were known, and met regularly with Honduran military officials to win and retain their backing for the covert action.

Today, even as covert operations in Central America are being scrutinized by Congress and by a special prosecutor, President Reagan has reportedly signed another "finding," authorizing increased covert activity by the Central Intelligence Agency in the Philippines.

Included will be testimony about the possible illegality of using a C.I.A. proprietary airline for the shipment without a formal Presidential finding authorizing the agency's involvement.

By law, the President must make a formal finding authorizing a C.I.A. covert operation, and inform the senior leadership of the House and the Senate Intelligence Committees.

It is designed to tighten a legal provision that permitted President Reagan to keep the House and Senate Intelligence Committees uninformed about his secret arms sales to Iran for 10 months after he signed a "finding" authorizing the deals.

Intelligence officials said the presidential finding authorizing the agency to kill terrorists was not limited to those on the list.

He had said, after all, that he had met Mr. Reagan shortly after the President had signed each of three findings authorizing the Iran arms sales, and that Mr. Reagan had not mentioned the documents.

But after the embarrassing exposure of the Iran-contra affair during the Reagan administration, Congress in 1991 passed a law requiring the president to sign a secret "finding" authorizing the C.I.A. to conduct a covert action and inform intelligence committee leaders.

In one of the worst-kept secrets in recent years, President Bush has signed a series of "findings" authorizing covert operations to overthrow Saddam Hussein.

Then he signed a "finding" retroactively authorizing the Iranian arms sale.