'SHADOW WARRIORS'

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP91-00587R000200890010-4
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 6, 2010
• Sequence Number: 10
• Publication Date: April 13, 1986
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/06: CIA-RDP91-0
3 r ".')PEARED 'i
WASHINGTON POST
13 April 1986
`Shadow Warriors'
David Atlee Phillips' article on CIA
covert actions (Outlook, April 61 was a
poignant reminder of the complexity
of international relations. He indicates
that withdrawal of U.S. support from
clandestine operations against foreign
governments has caused remorse and
anger among "our paramilitary
forces" and CIA officers alike.
Mr. Phillips seems to be making a
case for continued aid to the contras,
but I think his assumptions about our
society, democracy in general and
moral tactics are open to question.
Mr. Phillips claims to tell us "some
painful things about our society:.. .
our covert-action operations . . . and
moral commitments we have made to
them." What he fails to realize is that
"our society" did not make these deci-
sions. The CIA is a specialized seg-
ment of our national bureaucracy that
has for too long acted in our country's
name without appropriate oversight
by Congress or the free press.
Too often the CIA has made commit.
ments to odious forces in our name, and
then the American people and Congress
have had to bear the blame, the shame
of these faded projects. Why Americans,
whether pnvate citizens or CIA intellec-
tuals, would comnut to supporting men
who were officers of the Nicaraguan
army under the brutal regime of dicta-
tor Somoza escapes me.
When we stoop so low as to hire for-
mer torturers and assassins to Rio our
bidding, even if we are backing the
"democratic" revolutionaries, are we
now assuming that the end that we de-
sire justifies the means, however evil?
Futhermore, just because CIA
forces are attacking or undermining a
"leftist government" does not make
the attackers automatically demo-
cratic or just, nor does it make the
"leftists" necessarily authoritarian or
despicable. In fact, CIA support
brought antidemocratic, repressive
military regimes to power in Guate-
mala and Chile, for example. And
catering to the whims of the shah of
Iran probably made the rise of the aya-
tolla more likely.
Mr. Phillips finally does question
whether we should be in the "para-
military covert action" business at all,
but for the wrong reasons. True, it is
wrong to leave our mercenaries
"hanging" when Congress changes its
policy. Yet we should also question
whether armed intervention against
"leftists" always serves our interests.
Could it be that the CIA's shadow
warriors are an anachronism in a
world that must now go beyond war as
a way to resolve conflict between peo-
ples and nations? If we value freedom
and self-determination, then let us
practice it at all levels of our lives, as
individuals under law and as a nation in
the international arena.
FRANK L. FOX
llechanic4il le. Va.
STAT
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/06: CIA-RDP91-00587R000200890010-4