'VIVA LA CIA'?

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88-01350R000200610003-4
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 27, 2004
• Sequence Number: 3
• Publication Date: February 26, 1979
• Content Type: NSPR

Approved For Relea 04L1i M13FCJA-RDP88-01350
26 February 1979
6
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La
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NEGAtIVt and nefarious though
Eta's present tactics may be, two Eta
men v, ho v, ere murdered in December
must be numbered among the. found
ers of Spain's present regime.
Joaquin Maria Azaola, aged 55, 1
was shot by three youth in Bilbao on
December 19. Eta-Militar announced
that he had been "executed" because
he had become a police informer. In
the summer of 1974 Azaola was one of
the organizers of an Eta operation!
whose aim was to kidnap Prince (now
King) Juan Carlos and his wife, father,
and children in the Mediterranean
while they were sailing to Monte Car-
lo: Azaola, posing as the secretary of a
rich Belgian, hired a big yacht for the
purpose.
The hostages were to have been.
landed in the south of France and con-
cealed until Franco released 100 BasqueI
prisoners and paid a ransom; but they
might well have been killed. Azaola
had doubts about the plan and con-
sulted a member of the Basque govern-
ment-in-exile, who advised him to con-
tact the Spanish police. He did so and
cancelled the operation. Were it not
for Azaola, King Juan Carlos, the pi-
lot of Spain's transition from dictator-
ship to democracy, might never have !
come to the throne.
And but for 29-year-old Jose Mi-
guel Benaran, who was killed by anti-
Eta activists at Anglet, in Southwest
France, on December 21, the man hold-
ing Spain's political reins when Franco l,
died would, barring an accident, have
been Admiral Carrero Blanco, the dic-
tator's close adviser and prime min-
ister and his choice to supervise the
succession. Carrero, a tough Right-
winger, was the head of the main secret
services and controlled the adminis-
tration: He was committed to insuring
the "continuity" of the Franco regime
after Franco, and King Juan Carlos
C 4 'f :SPA r-rj
would have found it almost impossible
to persuade him to concede reforms of
a democratic nature. He was assas-
sinated in central Madrid on Decent-
ber 20, 1973, by four Eta men 'Alto
placed an explosive charge beneath the
street he drove along every morning
and blew the car he :vas driving in oser
a five-storey building. The man who
detonated the charge was Jose Miguel
Benaran.
A former Spanish secret agent, Luis
Gonzalez-Mata, alleges in a recently '
published book, Terrorismo Interna-
cional (Argos, Barcelona), that the
CIA knew something about the Bas_
clues' preparations to kill Carrero. The
Eta men neglected some elementary
security precautions-so flagrantly
that even my inexpert eye was surprised,
as I noted in an article after the assas-
sination-and their carelessness at-
tracted the attention of a CIA officer
in the nearby American embassy. Un-
like most Spanish stories about the
CIA, Gonzalez-Mata's account shows
the agency in what many democrats
will consider a favorable light. Having
consulted Washington, the CIA's Ma-
drid station not only did not denounce
or interfere with the plotters, it helped
them discreetly (Gonzalez-Mata says),
thus contributing to the demolition of
authoritarianism in Spain.
So should Spanish democrats spray
"Viva la CIA!" on the walls of Ma-
drid? That would be a delightful sight.
Unfortunately, Gonzalez-Mata can't
be sure; he knows only part of the sto-
ry. That's my trouble, too. I wish some
kind CIA defector (or nondefector,
preferably) would lend me the appro-
priate file for an hour or two.
Approved For Release 2004/10/13 : CIA-RDP88-0135OR000200610003-4