ACHILLES HEEL

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP75-00149R000600460006-3
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: November 17, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 17, 2000
• Sequence Number: 6
• Publication Date: May 9, 1967
• Content Type: NSPR

Approved For Release 2000/08W ~T#FXfZEi -8-bl49E200
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hard to assist in the rebuilding of the European free trade union
movement, the first victim of Hitler's brutality. Because the trade
unions were lacking in resources, and especially vulnerable to
communist subversion, the "UAW did reluctantly agree on one
occasion to the request to transmit Government funds to
supplement the inadequate funds being made available by the U. S.
labor movement."
Later, however, Mr. Reuther said, Tom Braden tried to persuade
Victor Reuther, then the European representative of the national
CIO to permit his office to be used as a "Front" for the CIA. Victor
Reuther rejected this, said his brother, the president of the UAW,
and subsequently Philip Murray, CIO president at the time, and for
whom Victor was working, concurred with his decision.
*
u
E have therefore reached the point in the whole CIA imbroglio
where Victor Reuther, who charged Messrs Lovestone and Brown
with CIA activities, himself is disclosed as having had a tic with
the CIA. From Walter Reuther's account, this was a one-shot affair.
In contrast, Victor Reuther has charged Lovestone and Brown with
conducting a continuing affair under CIA cover. Mr. Braden,
moreover, declared that Mr. Lovestone, spending about $2 million a
year, insisted on not accounting for his use of funds. His "AFL-CIO
superior," said Mr. Braden, kept urging the Government to let the
Lovestone operation alone.
What puzzles many people is the short-sighted behavior of Victor
Reuther in this matter. When he lowered the boom on Messrs
Lovestone, Brown et al., why did he not bring to light his own
involvement 15 years ago? It might have reduced the shock of his
first revelations about the others, but he would not now be facing
the charge of moral hypocrisy. Reuther's brother should himself be
above suspicion. Was Victor? so wrapped up in the cocoon of
certainty of his own moral, position as to feel secure against all
A YEAR ago Victor Reuther, director of the
International Affairs Department of the United
Auto Workers, charged that the overseas
activities of various affiliates of the AFL-CIO and
individuals in it were financed by the Central
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Then in February came the revelation that the
CIA had financed the international activities - in
whole or in part - of a whole spectrum of
organizations, such as the National Student
Association, the American Newspaper Guild, the
Stale, County and Municipal Federation, the
Retail Clerks internaional Association, the oil workers and others.
When asked two months ago about the involvement of Jay
Ilovcsto e, director of the AFL-CIO I n t e ?r n a t i o n a 1 Affairs
ci: ;:,rt:uen , President George Meany. denied it flatly, absolutely
without qualification. Ile did not then include Irving Brown, a
ciose Lovestone associate, in his protective embrace. He did so this
wvcck?
OW, Thomas Braden, former CIA associate, asserts in an
article in the Saturday Evening Post that both Lovestone and
Brow: wero involved in CIA-financed activities to the tune of
several millions of Dollars over a period of years. Mr. Lovestone
Braden charges .flatly. He himself says it is also a lie as
involvement. "Braden's a damn liar", Meany says,
craden went further. He says that back around 1951 or
,rent to the Detroit headquarters of the United Auto
~.s :.,;;dl gave Walter Reuther $50,000 in 50-dollar bills to be
as t:.d for European trade unions, mainly in West Germany.
Last Sunday, Walter Reuther issued a statement declaring the
11-radon account was "incomplete and misleading." Following the
end of the war, he said, the American labor movement worked
...L...D Liu
Approved For Release 2000/08/03 : CIA-RDP75-00149R000600460006-3