HOW MAJOR MEDIA WERE DUPED BY PHILIP AGEE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00845R000201250024-2
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 11, 2010
• Sequence Number: 24
• Publication Date: August 22, 1981
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/08/11: CIA-RDP90-00845R000201250024-2
l .i f x f PZAR,rD
Salvador `White Paper'
What is one to do about journals
that, however unwittingly, have served
as transmission belts for Communist
propaganda and then refuse to correct
the record? The most that can be done,
apparently, is to expose such journals
when they engage in such outrageous
practices......
The Wall Street Journal and the
Washington Post; we submit, are two
newspapers -which have served as such
transmission belts,. and neither has
made any effort to rectify the grave
damage.-it- has --done -to U.S.- foreign"
policy. - Both papers-` were obviously.
used by an ideological agent of the '4
Soviets and the Cubans, Philip Agee, to
undermine American. policy in El
Salvador and to help destroy the
American government's thesis that the
Soviet bloc has been instrumental in
furnishing aid to the Salvadoran guer-
rillas. In so doing, they have helped
greatly to foster the leftist myth that the
guerrillas are nothing more than
reform-minded freedom fighters, bat-
tling a horribly repressive regime. ?
On February 23 of this year, the
State Department, as was widely
reported, released a White Paper on El
Salvador which meticulously detailed
the Soviet Empire's heavy hand in
assisting the guerrillas. Relying on cap-
tured documents, the discovery of hid-
den weaponry and critical intelligence
sources, the State Department docu-
ment
disclosed that the Soviet Union,
and most of its thuggish satellites and
allies, such as Cuba, Vietnam,
Ethiopia, the PLO, East Germany and
the like, had combined in an effort to
furnish the guerrillas the wherewithal
to overthrow the non-Communist
Salvadoran government.
2-3
22 .1u ;us t 19:;1
di
The department said that the guer- 1 carping about the document, but that it'',
rillas were promised 800 tons of mod-
ern weapons and equipment-machine
guns, rifles, mortars, anti-tank wea-
pons and other supplies-and that
at least 200 tons were known to have
been delivered. The arms shipments
were arranged by the leader of the pro-
Soviet Salvadoran Communist -party,
was trying to destroy its credibility en- I
tirely. Indeed, the thrust of the Journal
story was that evidence of Soviet-bloc
interference in El Salvador was virtu-
ally non-existent.
The following day the Washington
Post unleashed its own savage indict-
men
Shafik Handal, who traveled to the fold, the Post headlin d' is story
Soviet Union and other Communist "White Paper on El Salvador Is Faul-
states during the period June 2- ty." Written by Robert Kaiser, the arti-
July 22. 1980. The arms were trans- cle strongly echoed the Journal's theme
ferred to the guerrillas via Cuba and i that the White Paper had highly exag-
-
Nicaragua.
The release of the White Paper
signaled the end of the Carter era prac-
tice of cozying up to the far left in Latin
America, and the beginning of a get-
tough policy with Communist in-
surgents in the region. Clearly, the aim i White Paper. Hodding Carter III, the
of the o document
policy was to give hjustifia- moderator of the Public Television pro-
tion "Inside Story," praised the
military aid to a Salvadoran govern- Journal and the Post for raising
ment menaced by Communist forces. .. .~
serious questions about the docu-
But this turn of policy was to be
deliberately undermined by both
the Journal and the Post, though
neither . would reveal that they
became the pawns of Agee in the
process.
On June 8, the Journal, in its lead,
front-page piece, ran- an article by
Jonathan Kwitny charging that the
White Paper was rife with error. The
headline immediately informed the
reader of the article's slant: "Apparent.
Errors Cloud U.S. `White Paper' on
Reds in El Salvador." The kicker read:
"Tarnished Report?" A subhead said:
"State Department Aide Says Parts
May be Misleading But Defends Con-
clusions."
The placement of the story the
gerated the evidence concerning Soviet- j
bloc involvement with the Salvadoran
guerrillas.
The articles in both papers had a tre-
mendously negative impact. Editorially,
ment. Though the White Paper had
been accepted as fact by Western of-
ficials, claimed Newsweek, "inde-
pendent investigations by the Washing-
ton Post and the Wall Street Journal
have raised serious questions about the
accuracy of the report and the validity
of its conclusions."
Thanks to the Journal and the Post,
len ?thv lead niece in the rieht-hand col-
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/08/11: CIA-RDP90-00845R000201250024-2