ADDITIONAL THOUGHTS FOR THE 1990S' SECTION IV

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP87T00307R000100070012-8
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 4, 2008
• Sequence Number: 12
• Publication Date: October 28, 1983
• Content Type: MEMO

Approved For Release 2008/12/04: CIA-RDP87TOO307R000100070012-8
N ? SECRET
28 October 1983
NOTE FOR THE RECORD
FROM : Hal Ford
SUBJECT: Additional Thoughts for the 1990s' Section IV
Events of the last week point up the necessity of bringing increased
future US intelligence focus -- collection, collation, analysis, policy
relevance -- to two additional areas of interest: Soviet-surrogate relations,
and terrorist activities in the Middle East and Latin America.
1. Soviet-surrogate relations
a. For many years US policy missed some good bets by looking on the
so-called Soviet bloc as a monolith. In more recent years the US has
recognized and profited from Sino-Soviet differences, and US intelligence
is now beginning to investigate whether there may not be certain Soviet-
Eastern European frictions that the US and the West can profitably
exploit.
b. Not so, as yet, Soviet-surrogate differences: many observers
(governmental and public) tend to treat Cuba and the rest as mere puppets
or allies of the USSR, and assume that similar sets of relationships
exist throughout. US policy hence is once again missing profitable
exploitable opportunities. The best recent example of differences is
USSR-Cuba re Grenada. Also, we know that there has been at least some
out of sync in the last year or so re the Sovs and Libya, Angola,
Ethiopia, Vietnam, and South Yemen, and that (including Cuba) these
examples involve different degrees of frictions, areas of maneuver,
etc. Numerous additional differences of national interest, comparative
emphasis, and the like almost certainly exist between the Soviets and
these and other clients, of which we are unaware; and certain of these
frictions may increase as the USSR's own economic difficulties grow.
c. Added intelligence effort might on occasion greatly aid the
sophistication and impact of future US initiatives (overt and covert).
2. Terrorism in the Third World settings
a. Our knowledge of terrorist groups and the effectiveness of
counter-terrorist (C-T) efforts are far better re Western Europe than re
the Third World. Many W.E. govts have substantial C-T programs, these
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govts are anti-terrorist, and we are in close intel and operational
contact with these govts; whereas in the Third World much weaker
government C-T programs exist, certain of those govt's themselves sponsor
or condone terrorist activity, our C-T liaison relationships are far
less, the intel targets are even more difficult than in W.E., and certain
of the Third World govts tend to be relatively unconcerned except where
terrorism injures their interests.
b. The massive Beirut bombings (Embassy, Marines - French, and
probably more to come) illustrate the manner in which quite small groups
can greatly complicate, pour fuel on, spoil, or have very high impact on
certain situations. And we can safely estimate that various sponsors
will take increasing advantage of such terrorist capabilities.
c. Granted such intelligence targets are very difficult ones, the US
nonetheless must do much better collection and analysis re terrorist
activities in the Middle East and Latin America if we are not to suffer
more terrorist disasters. This will obtain in particular as additional
small groups and their sponsors recognize the influence to be gained from
high impact atrocities, and as the Cubans sponsor heightened anti-US
terrorism in Latin America in retaliation for Grenada.
3. I'll be interested in learning whether I get any takers re the above
propositions, whether or not any additional language should be appended to
Section IV.
Distribution:
VC/NICs
All NIOs
EXO/NIC
DD/NIC/AG
HF Chrono
2
SECRET
Approved For Release 2008/12/04: CIA-RDP87TOO307R000100070012-8