PHILIP AGEE'S SOURCE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00806R000100370009-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 9, 2010
• Sequence Number: 9
• Publication Date: August 24, 1981
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/09/09: CIA-RDP90-00806R000100370009-1
ARTICLE IVPT!
011 PACE
f'-
NEW YORK TIMES
24 AUGUST 1931
Philip Agee's Source
To the Editor:
As the publisher of "White Paper?
Whitewash: Philip Agee on the C.I.A..
arc} El Salvador," we must respond to
Arnaud de Borchgrave's.ludicrous al-.
legation that Agee's "material -- sup.
plied by his Cuban friends -- was a pri-
mary source for recent articles in The
Wall Street Journal and The Washing-
ton Post."
Those newspapers and others indeed
received advance copies of the last
chapter of our book, Agee's detailed
analysis of the State Department's
white paper on Communist interfer-
ence in El Salvador. In it Agee con-
cludes that the "captured documents,"
even it all were genuine, do not support
the conclusions the department drew
from them. The two newspapers con-
firrned Agee's findings, as did many
others in Europeand Latin America:
however, the "material" Agee used
for his analysis -the white paper and
nothing but the white paper -. was
.supplied by the State Department, not
the Cubans or anyone else
This analysis was based upon flu-
ency in Spanish and an extremely
care;ui reading of the Spanish "ori gi-
nals," the English translations and the
State Department's conclusions-Agee
documents scores of mistranslation,
improper attributions and erroneous
or deliberately false conclusions. As
Jon Glassman of the State Depart-
ment, who wrote the white paper, ad-
mitted to The Journal, "We corn.
pletely screwed it up."
Mr. de Borchgrave's premise is' baf-
fling. how can it be an. example of
K.G.B disinformation to point out that,
a Spanish word has been mistranslat.
ed, or that a conclusion in theStateDe.-
partment analysis is not supported by
anything in the documents upon which
the analysis is supposedly based? Per-'
haps Mr. de Borchgrave should read
our book. MICHAEL RATNER
President, Deep Cover Publications
New York, Aug. 14,1981
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/09/09: CIA-RDP90-00806R000100370009-1