SOVIET RUMOR HAS SAMANTHA SMITH KILLED BY CIA

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00845R000200760006-7
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: June 16, 2010
• Sequence Number: 6
• Publication Date: September 12, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/06/16: CIA-RDP90-00845R000200760006-7
ARTICLE
BALTIMORE SUN
12 September 1985
WORLD
Soviet rumor has Samantha Smith
killed by CIA
By Antero Pietila
Moscow Bureau of he Sun
MOSCOW - An a arentl
or- whisper campaign is spread-
the g rumor ere that mantia
bmith, the ]3-year a school
irl who romoiea oodwur toward
the-Soviet Union. was Killed by the
CUV_
As if to reinforce those rumors,
an allegedly KGB-run weekly said
this week that American television
personality Jessica Savitch leas
done in" because one of her pro-
grams angered "those who specialize
in anti-Sovietism."
Ms. Savitch, a PBS reporter, died
in October 1983, when a car carry-
ing her and a friend plunged into the
Delaware Canal.
The Savitch article appeared in
the New Times magazine yesterday
and most diplomats had not seen it,
when asked for comment.
But one American diplomat said
the "article certainly does not sound
credible."
At the same time, the diplomat
added that the article seemed to re-
flect the harsher propaganda tone
toward the United States that he
said has become evident in the Sovi-
et media in recent days.
Rumors that the Smith girl was
killa by the CIA an almost as
soon as the official ass news agen-
cycy reported her death in a plane
crash Aug. 26.
The original Tass report may
have encouraged speculation about
a conspiracy because It said that the
plane carrying Samantha and her
father "had been diverted for an un-
specificed reason."
That reason was bad weather,
but Tass never mentioned it.
Although no direct allegations of
foul play have appeared in the Soviet
media, people from ordinary citizens
to intellectuals seem to believe that
Samantha was silenced so that she
could not continue her efforts to
build goodwill toward the Soviet
Union.
As a result of her much-publi-
cized 1983 visit to this country at
the invitation of then President Yuri
V. Andropov, Samantha was proba-
bly the best-known American here.
Jessica Savitch was not known
here at all.
But a three-page article in this
week's New Times is very specific
in charging two controversial public
figures constantly attacked in the
Soviet media with masterminding
her death.
Those two are named as Vladimtr
Bukovsky, a well-known and vocal
Soviet emigre and Rabbi Meier Ka-
hane, of the Jewish Defense League.
"Both leaders are CIA
unit e e r com gents,
mon ana c
hatred o e e nion the
weekl saki.
"The opist wreak brutal re-
venge on those who disclose the
truth about their victims," added the
weekly, which appears in nine lan-
guages and has a total press run of
500,000 copies.
A recent book, "The New KGB
by two former American intelligence
oiticers,_William rsonan o
the
as TMI un Several or he y
nes correspondents have On the
past been revealed to be KGB opera-
ves.
New Times bases its allegation
solely on a purported tape recording
from "a former Soviet citizen" want-
ing to return to his homeland from
West Berlin.
According to New Times, a pro-
gram Ms. Savitch did in June 1983,
on disillusioned Soviet emigres,
many of them Jewish, caused a
storm.
Protests were allegedly held and
"newspapers printed articles inti-
mating that Moscow was responsi-
ble and that Jessica Savitch was a
soviet agent.' "
New Times said that after the
programs' critics abandoned a con-
templated lawsuit, "a characteristi-
cally American decision was taken
- to kill Jessica Savitch to teach
others a lesson."
On a weekend trip, "Jessica Sav-
itch was shadowed by gangsters,
they were out waiting for her on the
road along the Delaware Canal," the
magazine said. A truck then alleged-
ly swerved Into the Savitch car at a
high speed, forcing It off the road
and into the water.
When the victim's car was recov-
ered. the dents made by the truck
were covered
Times. "Twith hat's deeper dews, New
even with Jessica Savitch."
The larger theme of the article is
that Soviet emigres are unhappy af-
ter leaving their homeland and i
when they want to return, often be-
come victims of "Zionist" revenge.
(A Delaware coroner's report
found that Ms. Savitch and her com-
panion in the car, New York Post
executive Martin Fischbein,
drowned within minutes after their
car plunged Into the canal during a
heavy rainstorm. The report did not
mention a second vehicle being In-
volved in the accident.)
"When I lived in Brooklyn, N.Y.,
PBS reporters asked me to tell them
about myself and the life of former
Soviet citizens and what they
thought of America," the magazine
quotes?its Savitch informant as say-
ing.
"I told them the whole truth. After
that I was nearly killed and had to go
In~ding," the man was quoted as
Another part of the article quotes
one Jewish former Soviet citizen as
writing that her 16-year-old son
"had been murdered by Zionists in
trying to leave Israel."
Yet another section of the article
declares: "Many acts of violence
against former Soviet citizens who
try to tell the world the truth about
the Zionist deception .have come to
light."
The Soviet media has stepped up
anti-Zionist attacks recently. Ob-
servers said that taken together, the
New Times article amounted to one
of the vilest collection of allegations
published in a major magazine in
years.
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/06/16: CIA-RDP90-00845R000200760006-7