INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88-01070R000301780004-7
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 12
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 8, 2010
• Sequence Number: 4
• Publication Date: July 7, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

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RADIO N REPORTS, irvc.
4701 WILLARD AVENUE, CHEVY CHASE, MARYLAND 20815 [phone]
~ American Interests srAnorv WETA-TV
PBS Network
DAIS July 7, 1985 4:00 P.M. CCTV Washington, D.C.
PETER KROGH: The United States is locked in a struggle
with an unpredictable and determined enemy whose activities
strike at the very foundation of the democratic process. The
enemy is international terrorism. In Western Europe alone,
almost two dozen terrorist incidents have occurred in the past
three months. NATO military installations and American
multinational corporations are the prime targets.
The Reagan Administration considers the eradication of
terrorism one of its principal foreign policy objectives, but
there's growing debate over how tht goal can best be achieved.
Should the United States launch a campaign of retaliation and
retribution against international terrorists, or would such
measures compromise our democratic values, and perhaps even
accelerate the cycle of terror in which we find ourselves today?
In a moment we'll discuss these questions with the two
men who have played critical roles in shaping American policy
toward international terrorism: Stansfield Turner, Director of
the Central Intelligence Agency under President Carter; and Ray
Cline, Deputy Director of the CIA under Presidents Kennedy and
Johnson.
But first let's take a look at recent terrorist
activities and how they differ from those of the past.
NARRATOR: February 1st, 1985. A West German
businessman finished a day's work at his office at a major NATO
defense contracting firm. That night he was murdered in his
home.
October 8th, 1984. The office of a Belgian subsidiary
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of an American firm was blown up. A terrorist group mistakenly
identified it as a supplier of parts for NATO missiles.
December 6th, 1984. Shiite Moslem terrorists hijack a
Kuwaiti jetliner. Their demands? Free fellow terrorists held in
Kuwaiti prisons. Two Americans were murdered?
In Europe and the Middle East, a de facto war is in
progress. Dozens of new terrorist groups, such as Direct Action
in France and West Germany's Red Army faction, have inherited the
mantle of defunct terrorist gangs which operated a decade ago.
Older groups, such as the Japanese Red Army, aspire to
create a climate of fear and repression in Western democracies.
The new terrorists -- for example, the Fighting Communist Cells
in Belgium -- attack specific targets, such as this pipeline
bring kerosene to NATO installations.
MAN: Terrorists' choice of targets is changing today.
A few years ago most terrorists were striking at targets that
were relatively symbolic. They'd blow up a public building
someplace. They would stike at a public figure. Today they are
increasingly identifying the critical modes of our civilization,
those slender lifelines on which our civilization hangs: our
water systems, our energy systems, our communications systems.
NARRATOR: Approximately 700 acts of terror were
committed worldwide in 1984, an increase of 40 percent over 1983.
In 1983 there were 185 terrorist incidents in Europe. In 1984
that number grew to 293. Acts of terror almost doubled in the
Middle East and North Africa as well, rising from 115 in 1983 to
200 in 1984.
Of all terrorism committed worldwide in 1984, 22 percent
touched American lives or property abroad. Last year, for the
first time, attacks against American businesses abroad
outnumbered attacks against American military installations.
Business firms are now the number one American target around the
world.
MAN: In 1984 there were more businesses that were hit
by terrorism than there had been in 1983, and somewhat fewer
military and diplomatic targets. So there seems to be a trend
toward including business, particularly American business, as
representing the United States.
NARRATOR: There is another, more sinister trend in
international terrorism today. It is the state support of
terrorist groups around the free world. Countries like Iran,
which sponsored 66 terrorist acts in 1984, are using terrorist
groups to attack their enemies.
MAN: We have this new phenomenon of state-supported
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terrorism, or state-sponsored terrorism. In other words, states
like Libya and Iran, which have decided to make war on the United
States utilizing terrorist surrogates and proxies as a matter of
their national policy. In other words, they're states that are
far too weak to engage us directly in a military conflict, but
are capable of carrying out a very sophisticated war in the
shadows against us.
KROGH: With us to discuss the problems posed by
international terrorism are Stansfield Turner, Director of the
CIA under President Carter from 1977 to 1981. During his tenure
at the CIA, Admiral Turner dealt with the problems of
intelligence-gathering following the takeover of the U.S. Embassy
in Iran in 1979. And Ray Cline, former Deputy Director of
Intelligence at the CIA, now a senior associate at the Georgetown
Center for Strategic and International Studies. Dr. Cline has
extensive experience in the international field, having served as
Director of the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and
Research from 1969 to 1973.
Dr. Cline, what is new about the international terrorism
we are confronting today?
RAY CLINE: I think what is new is the visibility of the
state support, the state sponsorship, and the proliferation to a
second and third generation of trained terrorists of the skills
and techniques that are so successful: how to use clandestine
explosives, how to pack the delivery vans, how to communicate,
how to use forged passports. All of that is carefully taught,
and it began being taught in the Soviet Union, mainly for the
Syrians and the Palestinians, over ten years ago. Now we're
seeing the people who are taught by those who were taught then.
And, of course, the Iranian angle, the Libyan angle --
and I call it the wild cards of the terrorist deck -- have been
deliberately trained, funded, armed, indirectly. So you have
proxy-state sponsorship, as well as state sponsorship, and a
tremendous pool of terrorists, probably 15 or 20 thousand who
have had professional training, even just in the Middle East.
KROGH: Admiral Turner, what do you find new about the
phenomenon we are confronting today?
ADMIRAL STANSFIELD TURNER: What is disturbing today in
Europe, this revival there, is that it's got this anti-military,
anti-NATO twist to it, and an anti-American background also. I
think that before we saw the terrorists striking out at their own
governments, against local complaints, against political issues.
It seems to me, Peter, that we've been pretty successful
in Europe with the deployment of the new missiles that took place
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in December a year and a half ago, and that has taken a lot of
wind out of the left-wing sails in Europe. And therefore the
left extremists are finding their power bases eroding. They're
turning to terrorism to keep their cause alive. I think it's a
desperation, in a sense, but it's very dangerous for us.
CLINE: Stan, that's a little optimistic, I think,
because that sounds as if, you know, we were winning. I feel...
ADMIRAL TURNER: I didn't say we were winning against
terrorism.
CLINE: I feel that a great deal of the prominence given
the issue of the deployment of our Pershing and cruise missiles
was political warfare sponsored by Eastern Europe and from the
Soviet Union against NATO, against Americans. We are the target,
as you say. But they are going to capitalize on it.
I think, in many ways, the terrorism was the second
phase of the political attack on our deployment of the missiles.
KROGH: Well, Dr. Cline, is it a combination of two
things? That is, the political left in Europe turning to
desperation and the Soviet Union, as well, stepping up its
support for terrorists in response to its failure to prevent us
from deploying our Pershings and cruises in Europe?
CLINE: Perhaps among the more naive political left it's
desperation. But I think that has never been the main element in
the resort to terrorism. It has always been the toughies who get
out and kill people. And they were determined to do this. I
think they would have done it whether we deployed the missiles or
not.
KROGH: Well, is this a network, Admiral Turner, do you
believe? Or are these isolated and rather uncoordinated
incidents. When we find a German businessman killed, a French
arms salesman killed, are these interlinked, or are they separate
incidents?
ADMIRAL TURNER: Well, the terrorists over there are
trying to make us think they're linked. They've made some
statements to that effect. And there apparently is some evidence
that the explosives used have perhaps come from a common source.
I think it's very difficult for us to really know how close that
coordination is, whether it really does exist in a meaningful
way. It may, but I think we should be careful about jumping to
conclusions that we suddenly have a very closely knit,
coordinated effort against us.
KROGH: Why do you think it is that Eastern European
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countries and the Soviet Union itself do not get hit by terrorist
actions?
ADMIRAL TURNER: Well, I don't think it's true that they
don't. The Soviets in Iraq a number of years ago had quite a few
people murdered by terrorists. They have much tighter controls
in those countries. They don't have the kind of freedoms that we
have, and so it is more difficult for terrorists in the Eastern
Bloc.
But Peter, to throw a little fuel on the fire here, I
don't think we should overlook the fact that your film clip
stressed state-supported terrorism. And it's very difficult for
me to say that the mining of the harbors of Nicaragua by Contras
supported by the CIA is anything but state-supported terrorism.
Or, in fact, the entire support of the Contra operation, which
was so disclosed in the manual on assassination and suchforth.
We're supporting terrorism ourselves.
KROGH: ...Is anyone's hands really clean in this, in
this field?
ADMIRAL TURNER: That's why I said it.
CLINE: I'm sure that why.
The purpose of paramilitary operations is a test as to
whether an activity is terrorist and destructive, or whether it
is part of a preventive and defensive action. I think our
program in Central America came long after the Cubans, the PLO,
the Russians, the Bulgarians, even the Koreans came to Nicaragua
to push the use of terror into what they call revolution without
borders, and that we are helping those people from Nicaragua who
are trying to fight against that establishment of a totalitarian
government.
To call that fight terrorism, I think, is really making
a mockery of our own values.
KROGH: But it may be in the eyes of to beholder.
ADMIRAL TURNER: Yes. Take yourself. Pretend you're a
Norwegian skipper of a ship going into Corinto, Nicaragua. You
have no complaint with the Nicaraguans. You have no complaint
with the Americans. You're trying to do business. And suddenly
you run into a mine. That mine, you are told, was put there by
the behest of the United States of America. That is
state-supported terrorism, from that Norwegian skipper's point of
view.
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And the reason I make this point, Peter, is very
important. The United States is going to have to, in my opinion,
over the next decade assume the leadership for the Free World of
a crusade against terrorism if we're going to stamp it out. It's
very necessary that we take the leadership of this in the whole
Free World. And we cannot do that, Peter, if our skirts are not
clean, ourselves, if we are tarred with this image of being
supporters of terrorism, even if you rationalize it that this is
good terrorism.
When you blow up farmers' fields and storage bins for
grain in Nicaragua, when you mine the harbors and blow up the
fuel storage, you're conducting terrorism. There's no two ways
about it.
Ray says it's good terrorism because there are bad guys
down there. But there isn't good terrorism...
KROGH: We'll let you get back at this, but we've got to
move to another segment here, and move from a discussion of the
nature of international terrorism...
CLINE: You've let Stan filibuster.
KROGH: No. You'll be able to get back.
CLINE: Okay.
KROGH: And look at the options countries have at their
disposal in countering this threat.
NARRATOR: The bombing of the American Marine barracks
and embassy in Lebanon in 1983 sparked a widespread debate within
the Reagan Administration on how to deal with terrorism.
Secretary of State Shultz, shaken by the loss of American lives,
vowed to take a tougher line to protect Americans abroad. He now
meets daily with a State Department team set up to secure
Americans overseas from terrorist attack.
Ambassador Robert Oakley, who leads the State
Department's war against terror, explains the reasons for
Secretary Shultz's growing concern.
AMBASSADOR ROBERT OAKLEY: The Secretary of State, as he
says, having once been a Marine captain, has learned that it's
important to keep the security of his personnel very much in the
front of his mind. And he really is concerned. And especially
since the bombing in Beirut, he feels an even greater personal
concern. He wants to be sure he's done everything possible and
that those working for him have done everything possible to
insure the security of Americans overseas.
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NARRATOR: In response to Secretary Shultz's call for
greater security, Congress voted a supplemental allocation of
$360 million in the fall of 1983 to help the State Department in
its efforts against terrorism.
AMBASSADOR OAKLEY: The additional money which the
Congress has voted is being spent very rapidly and very well to
improve physical security of our diplomatic missions around the
world. There's been a great improvement in the awareness against
the threat, and there's been an improvement in our intelligence,
which enabled us to do a better job of locating the terrorists,
at least in general, and of knowing in advance when they might
strike.
NARRATOR: Governments throughout the world are
grappling with the terrorist threat, and some have made real
progress.
Italy, particularly hard hit in the 1970s, has managed
to control terror in the 1960s. In the wake of the assassination
of Prime Minister Aldo Moro and the kidnapping of American
General James Dozier, Italy placed hundreds of suspected
terrorists on trial in a massive effort to clean up terrorist
groups.
AMBASSADOR OAKLEY: I think the shock of the Aldo Moro
assassination and the joy, if you will, of liberating Dozier
turned the political climate around. And the Italian government,
under Prime Minister Craxi, has continued to move ahead very
vigorously. And as a result, there's very little terrorism in
Italy in the past several months. It's been the one country that
hasn't been affected by this wave of terrorism in Western Europe.
And the politicians are very strongly anti-terrorist. The
security services are given a lot of support and do a lot of good
work in combatting terrorism. And public opinion is very much
with them.
NARRATOR: But the country that has had the most
experience with terrorism, and thus offers American policymakers
many lessons, is Israel. Basic to Israeli policy is retaliation,
swift action aimed at terrorists and their supporters in the wake
of an attack.
When the Israeli headquarters in Beirut was bombed in
November 1983, a suicide mission patterned after the attack on
American troops earlier that year, the Israeli response was
quick.
MOSHE ARENS: We're going to hit back, and hit back
strongly, against the perpetrators of these crimes. And, of
course, we will investigate just exactly what happens, how it
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happens, and what needs to be done in order that it doesn't
happen again.
NARRATOR: Even as Israeli troops dug through the rubble
in Beirut, Israeli jets flew overhead on their way to retaliatory
strikes against Syrian and Palestinian targets further north.
But does the Israeli policy of retaliation against
suspected guerrilla strongholds offer a model for the United
States?
MAN: It's perfectly clear to me that the people
sponsoring terrorism would like nothing better than to have us
retaliate against some place or installation where obviously we
injured innocent people. It's a standard pattern. And I think,
in fact, it goes so far that some of the terrorist support
installations are deliberately by hospitals, schools, and other
such installations; so if anybody retaliates, those schools will
get hit.
MAN: Well, there are three levels of force that we must
consider when thinking about the use of force against terrorists.
And the first is retaliation. Do we retaliate against terrorist
organizations and their supporters for attacks that would take
American lives, for example, any place in the world? And what
form should retaliation take?
The second level of the use of force is preemption. If
we know that terrorists are going to strike at the United States
or against our friends in the world and we know where they are
today, but we might not know where they are tomorrow, do we
preempt them? Do we hit them first? If we have the assurance
from our intelligence sources, with a reasonable likelihood of
credibility, that they're going to carry out such an action, do
we strike them first?
And finally, we have the consideration of retributive
force, retribution. Do we strike back at terrorists to punish
them later on in a way that might even involve the use of
hunter-killer teams? Do we turn the hunters into the hunted?
NARRATOR: Preemption, retaliation, and retribution.
These are the three elements of an activist policy against
terrorism and its supporters.
KROGH: Dr. Cline, clearly the best approach to
combatting international terrorism is preemption. What does
effective preemption require, in your view?
CLINE: It mainly requires precise information
intelligence, Stan and I would say -- knowing what's going to
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happen and who the people who are going to do it are before the
event. And then you must have, of course, the technical skills
to preempt.
I would be in favor, usually, of not using American
military force unless Americans are directly attacked. I would
try to deal with what is the real problem in most of the terror
areas, local people who are friends being undercut and damaged
and an effort being made to separate them from the United States
so they can be brought under a totalitarian form of government.
This is a political battle, and spreading fear and
violence is the name of the game. You have to strike back, but
you have to get the local people on your side. And that's why I
think we should support people who are resisting terroristic
totalitarian governments.
ADMIRAL TURNER: The real way to preempt, which we did
demonstrate in the period of '77 to 'S1, is to have intelligence
agents who infiltrate terrorist groups and then thwart their
activities very surreptitiously. They may not know that it's
been done to them.
But we were able on a number of occasions to prevent a
terrorist activity from taking place or from being successful in
achieving an objective. That, in my opinion, is the only way
really to preempt. Preempting with military strikes I don't
think is practical.
KROGH: Admiral, if we are hit, should we strike back?
ADMIRAL TURNER: Well, if you can really identify the
individual perpetrators and strike only then, yes.
And Mr. Reagan boasted four years ago and a month from
now that that's what we were going to do, and we haven't done it.
Why? Because you just don't get that precise information. And
secondly, because it's against the moral standards of this
country and we won't tolerate it. That is, are we going to take
out 500 civilians in order to get five terrorists? Or maybe 50
civilians? And who in the United States Goverment wants to make
that kind of a decision? I don't. And I don't think this
country will do that kind of indiscriminate retaliation in which
you take out a lot of innocent people in order to get a few
terrorists.
CLINE: You've already stacked the problem, you see: a
few terrorists, take out hundreds of people. That's not
necessarily the case.
ADMIRAL TURNER: How many will you take out?
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CLINE: Admittedly, you have a margin of error. We do
in war, and this is a kind of warfare, and it's covert warfare
and it's spreading. And I think that the American public will
support preemptive measures.
KROGH: We're talking now about retribution, not
preemption.
CLINE: Well, preemption or retribution with military
force is what we were talking about.
Of course, I agree with Stan. If you can sabotage the
operation so it doesn't take place, by being inside, fine. But
there aren't an awful lot of red-blooded American boys who are
going to be able to infiltrate a Shiite Muslim group.
ADMIRAL TURNER: Well, you have to get a Shiite for
KROGH: Don't we risk just escalating a cycle of
violence by attack-retaliation, attack-retaliation?
CLINE: This is what I object to, the attitude both
you and Stan have that this is a...
KROGH: I don't have an attitude, Dr. Cline.
CLINE: Yes, you do. Yes, you do.
KROGH: I'm the moderator.
CLINE: Well, but you're taking the view that this is a
neutral moral problem, that it's just as bad for Americans to
fight against terroristic state organizations as it is for a
group of ideological enemies of the United States and democratic
governments to use terror to try to destroy those institutions.
I think it's quite a different situation.
KROGH: Well, Dr. Cline, at the risk of showing my real
colors, what do you think about retribution -- that is, making
the hunters the hunted, and actually assassinating and
liquidating known terrorists? Do you think that ought to be part
of our response?
CLINE: I think if you have a clear evidence that they
are indeed responsible for crimes of a terrorist kind -- they're
recognized as crimes, internationally and nationally -- of
course. If you are able to bring them to retribution, you should
do so. That will eliminate the future recourse to this terror.
Actually, in the last ten years...
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KROGH: We don't seem to be doing that, though. The
Syrians have turned themselves loose on the moderate
Palestinians. They're bumping them off one-by-one. And we're
standing aside.
CLINE: We're standing back.
ADMIRAL TURNER: The problem that Ray raises, he says
that you and I don't want to conduct this terrorism, don't want
to strike at these countries. And that's not the case at all.
What I'm saying is, because we are the most moral
country in the world we have to be very careful about the
techniques we use. If we want to stoop to all the communist
techniques around the world, to all the terrorist techniques
around the world, we've lost what we are here to defend. We
don't want to become terrorists. We don't want to become
communists in our techniques of government, our techniques of
foreign policy, because that's exactly what we are trying to
avoid.
KROGH: These create tremendous dilemmas for us. And do
they essentially translate themselves into inaction after the
event? We can be good at preemption, but we can't be good at
retaliation and retribution.
CLINE: We've become the Hamlet of nations. As
Secretary Shultz said, we argue about the morality of the case,
when in fact it is moral to protect your own political and social
values and your own institutions.
ADMIRAL TURNER: It is not moral to use every technique
in the world to protect your values.
KROGH: We just have a minute here.
Where do you think international terrorism is headed?
Is it headed up the ladder and escalating, or do you expect it to
level off?
ADMIRAL TURNER: I'm not terribly worried because the
Europeans got their terrorism under control once before. I
think, with good stern police action, it can be gotten under
control again.
The Middle East is more dangerous, it seems to me,
because it's more fanatical, from our point of view, and there
are more problems there that are not going to be solved easily.
KROGH: Dr. Cline, you have the last word, but only 20
seconds' worth.
CLINE: There will be a proliferation of terrorism in
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these areas and in Central America, and even perhaps in the
United States, because it pays off, it gets the attention of our
media. It is a troublesome issue for Americans to deal with. We
tend to be passive, frightened, and moralistic about responding.
And that is what they want.
KROGH: Thank you, Dr. Cline.
Thank you, Admiral Turner.
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