[COVERT ACTION INFORMATION BULLETIN - PREMIER ISSUE - JULY 1978]

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88-01314R000100380007-7
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 24
• Document Creation Date: December 20, 2016
• Document Release Date: November 3, 2006
• Sequence Number: 7
• Publication Date: July 1, 1978
• Content Type: MAGAZINE

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C OVERTACTION
INFORMATION
BULLETIN
PREMIER ISSUE JULY 1978
CONTENTS
WHO WE ARE
WHERE MYTHS LEAD TO MURDER, BY
PHILIP AGEE
THROWING A CASE: THE TRIAL OF
ARMANDO LOPEZ ESTRADA
"RESEARCHING CONSUMERS": THE
MARKET FOR DESTABILIZATION
RECENT NEWS
NAMING NAMES
PUBLICATIONS OF INTEREST
15
22
23
24
FREE
CovertAction Information Bulletin, Number 1, July 1978, published by Covert Action Publications, Inc., a District of Columbia Nonprofit Cor-
poration, P.O. Box 50272, F Street Station, Washington, DC 20004. Telephone [phone]. All rights reserved; copyright ?1978, by Covert
Action Publications, Inc. Permission to reprint will be liberally granted. Typography by Art for People, Washington, DC.
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DIRTY WORK
The CIA In Western Europe
Edited by Philip Agee and
Louis Wolf
SPECIAL OFFER
This startling and invaluable new expose of the CIA, just
published, lists for $24.95. If you order your copy through
the CovertAction Information Bulletin, and at the same
time subscribe to the Bulletin, we will give you a $10.00
discount from the cost of your subscription. Just send the
enclosed order form in along with your subscription blank.
For the past several years, beginning in 1974, new
"enemies" have haunted the Central Intelligence Agency
- journalists and ex-agents. These people are bent on
exposing the CIA's unscrupulous tactics so the American
public can see what the CIA has spawned and what is
being done under the deceptive cover of "national
security."
John Marks, Victor Marchetti, Morton H. Halperin
and especially Philip Agee have shown considerable
courage in informing the world about the seamy side of
American espionage. They have opened much of the
secret portfolio, ranging from the routine planting of
phony news stories to assassination attempts and the
overthrow of legitimate governments.
In this startling hooka comprehensive picture of the
CIA emerges. More important, the authors explain the
simple way in which any competent researcher can
recognize the people behind the dirty work - thus
breaking the "coves' of thousands of CIA agents around
the world.
Dirty Work is a major expose of the CIA - what it
does and who does it -- on it scale never before revealed.
PIIILIP ACES, an ex-CIA operative, is the Agency's
number one nemesis and author of the best-selling Inside
The Company: CIA Diary. LOUIS WOLF is a journal-
ist who has done intensive research into the American
intelligence community.
DIRTY WORK: Order Form
Please send me a copy ofDirry Work. My check or
money order for $24.95 (U.S. funds, please), is en-
closed.
Name:
Mailing Address:
Number 1 (July 1978)
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WHO WE ARE
One and a half years ago the last issue of CounterSpy
Magazine appeared. Although the scope of coverage, the
depth of research, and the impact of CounterSSpy around
the world were on the rise, personal and political disputes
coupled with CIA harassment led to an impasse among the
staff. Those of us who had been working most closely with
Phil Agee left the magazine to continue research, and others
stayed on, ostensibly to continue the magazine. They were
not successful.
We have felt, since the beginning, that there is an im-
portant and vital role to be played by the sort of exposes
for which Counterspy had become world-famous. We
decided that the dissemination of such information must
resume. That CounterSpy and its uncovering of CIA per-
sonnel and operations around the world were so violently
hated by the Agency was our best endorsement. The com-
pliments and encouragement we received from progressive
people everywhere convinced us that we could not leave
this void in the mosaic of struggles against the U.S. intel-
ligence complex.
We begin modestly with a small Bulletin which we in-
tend to publish approximately bi-monthly. This first issue
is being distributed at no charge. We are confident that
there will be sufficient subscribers to make this publication
a permanent weapon in the fight against the CIA, the FBI,
military intelligence, and all the other instruments of U.S.
imperialist oppression throughout the world. We know that
the information and the research is there, crying out to
be published and disseminated.
We encourage everyone to keep in touch with us, to cor-
respond, to submit leads, tips, suggestions and articles. We
will try to track down all your leads. Most especially, we
will never stop exposing CIA personnel and operations
whenever and wherever we find them. We are particularly
anxious to receive, anonymously if you desire, copies of
U.S. diplomatic lists and U.S. embassy staff and/or tele-
phone directories, from any countries.
A major step in that battle has already been taken. Two
of our group, Phil Agee and Lou Wolf, have edited and pre-
pared a new book, Dirty Work, just published by Lyle
Stuart, Inc. This book describes in detail how to expose
CIA personnel, includes dozens of articles from many
countries which have done just that, and presents, in
Appendix form, detailed biographies of more than 700
undercover CIA and NSA personnel lurking in embassies
and military installations in virtually every country on earth.
We urge all our readers to study this book, and the simple
methodology it sets forth. And, of course, to let us know
the results of your own research.
The book, which is at present only in hardcover, is un-
fortunately expensive. While we recognize that the years of
research which went into it, and the expensive, complicated
and lengthy printing which it involved, justify such a cover
Number 1 (July 1978)
price, we have arranged for a special offer for our readers.
If you order a copy of the book through us-see the ad on
page 2-we will give a $10 rebate on all charter one-year
subscriptions to the CovertAction Information Bulletin.
If you are in the United States, this is the full price; if you
are overseas, you will only have to pay the postage.
One of our group was a CIA case officer for twelve
years; two others worked in finance and support for the
CIA for nine years; the rest of us have devoted much of the
past several years to direct research on U.S. intelligence
operations. We hope that we can put this experience to
valuable use through the pages of the CovertAction Infor-
mation Bulletin. We hope you will agree, and will support
us.
Phil Agee
Ellen Ray
Bill Schaap
Elsie Wilcott
Jim Wilcott
Lou Wolf
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WHERE MYTHS LEAD TO MURDER
by Philip Agee
Copyright 1978 by C.I. Publications. Inc.
This article is a slightly modified version of the intro-
duction to the book Dim, Work: The CIA in Western
I.urope, by Philip Agee and Louis Wolf, just published.
It expresses much of the philosophy of the
CovertAetion Information Bulletin.)
Today the whole world knows. as never before, how the
U.S. government and U.S. corporations have been secretly
intervening in country after country to corrupt politicians
and to promote political repression. The avalanche of re-
velations in the mid-1970s, especially those concerning the
CIA. shows a policy of secret intervention that is highly
refined and consistently applied.
Former President Ford and leading government spokes-
men countered by stressing constantly the need for the CIA
to retain. and to use when necessary . the capability for
executing the kinds of operations that brought to posher
the military regime in Chile. Ford even said in public that
he believed events in Chile had been "in the best interests
of the Chilean people." And even with President Carters
human rights campaign there has been no indication that
the CIA has reduced or stopped its support of repressive
dictatorships in Iran. Indonesia. South Korea. Bra/d, and
other bastions of "the free world."
The revelations, though. have not only exposed the
operations of the CIA, but also the individual identities
the names, addresses. and secret histories of many of the
people who actually do the ('IA's work. Yet. with all the
newly available information. many people still seem to be-
lieve the uryths used to justify this secret political police
force. Some of the myths are. of course, actively spread
by my former CIA colleagues: others come front their
liberal critics. But whatever the source, until we lay the
nrv the to rest. they will continue to confuse people and
permit the CIA literally to get away with murder.
flirtlr Number One. The CI;t is I,rinrarilr' engaged in Kathcr-
.
inK intelligence information against the .Sorict 011,111
This is perhaps the CIA's longest-playing myth. going
hack to the creation of the Agency in 1947 and the choice
of the name "Central Intelligcncc Agency." As the Agency's
backers explained the idea to the American Congress,
afraid even in those early days of getting dragged into un-
wanted foreign adventures, the CIA was needed to find out
what a possible enemy was planning in order to protect the
United States from a surprise attack. Americans at the
time still shared a vivid memory of the unexpected Japanese
at tack at pearl I larbor. and with the likelihood that the new
enemy the Soviet Union would soon have atomic bombs,
rnr one could really doubt the aced to know if and when an
attack Wright come.
The real success in watching the Soviets. however, came
Irony technological brcaktlrrouglrs like the U-2 spy plane
and spy-in-the-sky satellites, and the job of strategic intel-
ligence fell increasingly to the technically sophisticated U.S.
National Security Agency. The CIA played a part, of course,
and it also provided centralised processing of information
and data storage. But in its operations the CIA tended to
put its emphasis on covert action financing friendly poli-
ticians. murdering suspected foes, and staging coups cf'etat.
This deeply involved the Agency in the internal politics
of countries throughout Western Europe. Asia. Africa, the
.Middle East, and Latin America, as well as in the Soviet
bloc. And even where CIA officers and agents did act as
spies- gathering intelligence information, they consistently
used that information to further their programs of action.
-lire CIA's operatives will argue that the ultimate goal of
discovering Soviet and other governments' intentions re-
quires live spies at work in places like the Kremlin that the
Agency exists to recruit these spies and to keep them alive
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and working. A Penkovsky or two should be on the payroll
at all times to keep America safe from Russian adventures.
This argument may influence some people, because theo-
retically, spy satellites and other forms of monitoring only
give a few minutes' warning, whereas a person in the right
place can report on decisions as soon as they are made,
giving perhaps days or weeks of warning. Such a spy might
also be of great value for the normal conduct of relations-
whether in negotiations, cooperation, or confrontation.
Nevertheless, the vast CIA effort to recruit officials of
importance in the Soviet Foreign Ministry, Defense Ministry,
KGB, and GRU has never had significant success. There
have indeed been defections, but these, I was told in the
CIA, had nothing to do with the elaborate traps and snares
laid out by the CIA around the world. They resulted from
varying motivations and psychological pressures operating
on the official who defected. In this respect, the CIA's
strengthening of repressive foreign security services, neces-
sary for laying out the snares (telephone tapping, travel
control, observation posts, surveillance teams, etc.). can
scarcely be justified by the nil recruitment record.
Today. notwithstanding recent "reforms." the CIA re-
mains primarily an action agency doing and not just
snooping. Theirs is the grey area of interventionist action
between striped-pants diplomacy and invasion by the
Marines, and their targets in most countries remain largely
the same: governments, political parties, the military,
police, secret services, trade unions, youth and student
organizations, cultural and professional societies, and the
public information media. In each of these, the CIA con-
tinues to prop up its friends and beat down its enemies,
while its goal remains the furthering of U.S. hegemony so
that American multinational companies can intensify their
exploitation of the natural resources and labor of foreign
lands.
Of course this has little to do with strategic intelligence
or preventing another Pearl harbor, while it has a lot to do
with the power of certain privileged groups within the
United States and their friends abroad. The CIA spreads the
myth of "intelligence gathering" in order to obscure the
meaning of what the Agency is really doing.
Myth Number Two. The major problem is lack of control;
that is, the CIA is a "rogue elephant. "
This myth comes not from the CIA, but from its liberal
critics, many of whom seem to believe that all would be
well if only Congress or the President would exercise tighter
control. Yet, for all the recent horror stories, one finds little
evidence that a majority in Congress want the responsibility
for control, while the executive branch continues to insist-
rightly-that the Agency's covert action operations have,
with very few exceptions, followed the orders of successive
presidents and their National Security Councils. As former
Secretary of State Kissinger told Representative Otis Pike's
Intelligence Investigating Committee, "Every operation is
personally approved by the President."
For its part the Pike committee concluded in its official
report, first published in "leaked" form by the Village
Voice, that "all evidence in hand suggests that the CIA, far
from being out of control has been utterly responsive to the
instructions of the President and the Assistant to the Presi-
dent for National Security Affairs."
So the problem is said to be with the presidents
Democratic and Republican--who, over the past 30 years,
Number 1 (July 1978)
have given the green light to so many covert operations.
But why were the operations necessary? And why secret?
The operations had to be secret, whether they involved
political bribes, funding of anticommunist journals, or
fielding of small armies, because in every case they implied
either government control of supposedly non-governmental
institutions or violation of treaties and other agreements. In
other words, hypocrisy and corruption. If the government
was going to subvert free, democratic, and liberal institu-
tions, it would have to do so secretly.
There is, however, a more basic reason for the secrecy
and for the CIA. Successive administrations--together with
American-based multinational corporations-have continu-
ally demanded the freest possible access to foreign markets,
labor, agricultural products, and raw materials. To give
muscle to this demand for the "open door," recent presi-
dents have taken increasingly to using the CIA to strengthen
those foreign groups who cooperate-and to destroy those
who do not. This has been especially clear in countries such
as Chile under Allende, or Iran 20 years earlier under
Mossadegh, where strong nationalist movements insisted on
some form of socialism to ensure national control of econ-
omic resources.
The CIA's covert action operations abroad are not sui
generis. They happen because they respond to internal
U.S. requirements. We cannot wish them away through
fantasies of sonic enlightened President or Congress who
would end American subversion of foreign peoples and
institutions by the wave of a wand. Not surprisingly, the
U.S. Senate rejected by a very wide margin a legislative
initiative that would have prohibited covert action pro-
grams by the CIA.
Only prior radical change within the U.S., change that
will eliminate the process of accumulating the value of
foreign labor and resources, will finally allow an end to
secret intervention abroad. Until then, we should expect
more intervention by the CIA and multinational corpora-
tions-not less. Increasingly important will be the repres-
sive capabilities of the Agency's "sister" services abroad.
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Mrth Number Three: Weakening the CIA opens teider the
door for Soviet expansion and eventual world donnnation.
This myth is peddled especially hard at times when
liberation movements make serious gains. Former President
Ford and Dr. Kissinger used it frequently during the CIA's
ill-fated intervention in Angola, and we continue to hear it
again as liberation movements seek Soviet and Cohan help
in their struggles against the apartheid policies of the white
Rhodesians and South Africans.
The problem for America. however. is not "Sot let eS-
pansionisnm." despite all the anticommunism with which sse
are indoctrinated practically from the cradle hhc problem.
rather. is that the American gosernnmenI. flicclullicl](1% tile
CIA. continues to umtersenc on the side of "fimends chose
property and privilege rest on the remnants of archaic social
systems long since discredited. The political repression re-
quired to preserve time old order depends on American and
other Western support which quite naturally is turning
more and more people against the I, nitcd State, acne
effectively- for sure. than any thing the k(,B could ever
concoct.
As Senator Frank Church explained in an interview on
British television. "1'nm apt to think that the Russians are
going to choose Isidesl better than we will choose nine
times nut of ten. After all sse're two hundred seats assn
from our resolution; were a yen conwi%,it sc comrnt %..
'Nish Vulnher 1-lair. Th?sr teho attack the ('I.1. rylrectallm'
those who hark tcc,rkcr1 tit tltr ilttellwcmc r,unnuutitr, arc
traitors, turncoats, or agent. ?1 the is GB
This has been the Agency's chief attack on me personally
and I'm certain that the fear of being tarred slob the same
brush is keeping mans ('IA veterans Iron] voicing their
own opposition. But as with earlier charts to hod the
"foreign hand" in the America] antissar 111wcolcut. tile
CIA has failed to produce a shred of cyidence that any of
its major American (or I.uropeanI crrucs are in the service
of any foreign power.
Would-be "reformers" of the CIA base also discovered
flow the Agency reacts to criticism. Aceordml, to Represen-
tative Pike. the CIA's Special Counsel threatened to destroy
Pike's political career. In a cr]nsenauon isitli Pike's elite/
investigative staff person. the Special Counsel was quoted
thus: "Pike will pay tic this Iduecnng the sole to ipprosc
the committee report on the C1,\1 on ss:ui and see. l'nt
serious. Ilmere will be political retaliation. Any political
ambitions in New York that Pike had are through. \4c will
destroy hinm for this."
CIA veterans most not he nitinudated by the Agency's
false and unattributed slander. We hale a special responsi-
bility for weakening this organisation. If put at the service
of those sve once oppressed. our knowledge of how the CIA
really works could keep the CIA from ever really ssorking
again. And though the CIA will brand us as "traitors."
people all Over the world, including the United States.
will respond. as they have already. with enthusiastic and
effective support.
,11t'th .%umber 1-7rc .A-aminv individual CL I o/firrrs c/-es
little to rhan,ge thr Agenrl', and is none 'tilt' h' t'.Tl,nse ill
not ens individuals to the threat ?t a.ssassrvtation.
Nothing in the anti-CIA effort has stirred up more anger
than the puhlishing of the nannies and addresses of CI iA
officials in foreign countries. especially since the killing of
the CIA Station Chief in Athens, Richard Welch. CIA
,pokesnmen and journals such as the [t'ashington Post
were quick to accuse tire and C'ounlcrSpv nmagarine of
haling "fingered" Welch for the charging that in
publishing his name. we were issuing "an open invitation
to kill loin." Tile Agcncs also managed to exploit Welch's
death to discredit and weaken those liberals in Congress
who wanted only to curtail some of the Agency's more
ohylous abuses. Subsequent research. noted in Dirty Work,
makes ahundantly clear that CotcltterSln' had nothing to
do whim the Welch killing
i he result (d tile ALenes's manipulations isn't hard to
predict l'he (IA. IM all its sins. cattle out of the recent
umsesugauons strrns,thencd by the Ford "reforms." sshile
the ( ongress nay attempt to pass an official secrets act
that will attempt to make it a crime for any present or
fnrn]ci government official user again to blow the whistle
by snaking public classified information. No more Pcnta-
e'm I'ul,rrs. No gnome Watergate revelations. No more
(Y. -I i)iane%.
Nonetheless. the naming goes on. More and amore CIA
people can now he field personally accountable for what
they and the Agency as an institution do for the real harm
tlmeS cause to teal people. I heir nmilitars coops, torture
chan]heis, and terrorism cause untold pain and their backing
of multinational corporations and local elites helps push
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millions to the edge of starvation, and often beyond. They
are the Gestapo and SS of our time, and as in the Nuremberg
Trials and the war in Vietnam, they cannot shed their in-
dividual responsibility simply because they were following
a superior's orders.
But apart from the question of personal responsibility,
the CIA remains a secret political police, and the exposure
of its secret operations-and secret operatives-remains the
most effective way to reduce the suffering they cause. Al-
ready a handful of journalists and former intelligence of-
ficers have managed to reveal the names and addresses of
hundreds of CIA people, and even the Washington Post-
which condemns us for doing it-has admitted that our
efforts added greatly to the CIA's growing demoralization.
We also noticed from our own investigations that the Agency
was forced to step up its security precautions and to trans-
fer many of those named to other posts. All of this disrupts
and destabilizes the CIA, and makes it harder for them to
inflict harm on others.
Of course, some people will always raise the cry that we
are "trying to get someone killed." But, as it happens,
violence is not really needed. By removing the mask of
anonymity from CIA officers, we make it difficult for them
to remain at overseas posts. We hope that the CIA will have
the good sense to shift these people to the increasingly
smaller number of safe posts, preferably to a desk inside the
CIA headquarters at Langley, Virginia. In this way the CIA
will protect the operatives named-and also the lives of
their potential victims.
From the old song and dance of the "intelligence gather-
ing" to the claim that "those who expose are the murderers,"
these five myths won't simply vanish. The CIA-and its
allies-will continue to propagate them, and the CIA's
critics will have to respond. We must increasingly expose
these myths and the crimes they cover up.
But besides debating, there is much more that we can
do-especially in furthering the exposure of the Agency and
its secret operatives. The CIA probably has no more than
5,000 officers experienced in running clandestine opera-
tions and it should be possible to identify almost all of
those who have worked under diplomatic cover at any
time in their careers. Dirty Work lists mainly those named
as CIA operatives in Europe; we hope additional volumes
can be published on the CIA's people in other areas. All
that is required is a continuing effort-and a novel form of
international cooperation. Here's how:
1. In each country a team of interested people, in-
cluding journalists, should obtain a list of all the
Americans working in the official U.S. Mission: the
Embassy, consulates, AID offices, and other U.S.
installations. This list can be acquired through a
friend in the host Foreign Ministry, in the American
Embassy-or by other means.
2. The team should then get past editions of neces-
sary public documents-U.S. Foreign Service Lists
and Biographic Registers (both published by the
Department of State) from a local library, and the
Diplomatic List and Consular List published regularly
by every Foreign Ministry. The Diplomatic and
Consular Lists will contain the names and addresses
of the higher ranking members of the official mission,
including some of the CIA people.
Number 1 (July 1978)
3. Check the names as suggested in the various ar-
ticles in Dirty Work, especially John Marks' "How to
Spot a Spook." Watch carefully for persons carried
on the Foreign Ministry's Diplomatic and Consular
Lists, but who are missing from the recent Bio-
graphic Registers and Foreign Service Lists. Most of
these will be CIA people purposely left off the State
Department lists.
4. After narrowing down the list of likely suspects,
check them with us and with other similarly oriented
groups. CovertAction Information will follow up on
all leads, and publish all the information it can con-
firm.
5. Once the list is fully checked, publish it. Then
organize public demonstrations against those named-
both at the American Embassy and at their homes-
and, where possible, bring pressure on the govern-
ment to throw them out. Peaceful protest will do the
job. And when it doesn't, those whom the CIA has
most oppressed will find other ways of fighting back.
Naturally, as new CIA people replace the old, it will be
necessary to repeat the process, perhaps every few months.
And as the campaign spreads, and the CIA learns to correct
the earlier and more obvious flaws in its use of State De-
partment cover, we will have to develop new ways to spot
them. Already the Agency has gotten the State Department
to restrict circulation of the all-important Biographic
Register, and it is likely that the Administration will in
future place more of its people under cover of the Depart-
ment of Defense (for example, in military bases, and in
Military Assistance Groups), the Drug Enforcement Agency,
and the multinational corporations.
In rare cases, the CIA may even attempt changing the
identities of certain operatives. Nonetheless, the CIA will
always need a secure base in embassies and consulates to
keep its files and communications facilities, and there are
many ways to identify the CIA people in these missions
without relying on public documents.
Within the United States, people can help this campaign
by supporting the groups struggling to stop covert inter-
vention abroad. There is also the need for continuing re-
search into current CIA operations, and new programs to
identify and keep track of all the FBI special agents and
informers, military intelligence personnel, and the Red
Squads and SWAT groups of local and state police depart-
ments.
Together, people of many nationalities and varying
political beliefs can cooperate to weaken the CIA and its
surrogate intelligence services, striking a blow at political
repression and economic injustice. The CIA can be defeated.
The proof can be seen from Vietnam to Angola, and in
all the other countries where liberation movements are
rapidly gaining strength.
We can all aid this struggle, together with the struggle for
socialism in the United States itself.
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THROWING A CASE:
THE TRIAL OF ARMANDO LOPEZ ESTRADA
"The testimony will essentially be this. On approxi-
mately August 15th of 1977 at approximately
10:00 a.m., Special Agei.t ? United States
Customs Service went to the It.;... Pedro Gil
at 52 Northwest 58th Avenue Ili .:,. ,. Florida.
Just a short ways off Flagler Street.
"At that location, which b a house, or a house that
is fairly close to the street, a single family dwelling,
there was a boat parked on a trailer in the driveway.
"The evidence will show that this is a Formula
outboard boat.
"At the time the agents went there they stet Mr.
Gil and after a brief conversation with Mr. Gil,
they boarded his boat and searched it.
"What they found on the boat then becomes the
subject of the evidence in this case.
"They found on the boat one 20 111111. cannon, one
.50 caliber machinegun, one .30 caliber ntachinegun.
two Browning rifles, five weapons that are contntonly
known as AR-15 Colt rifles, two of which had been
converted to fully automatic.
"Approximately ninety rounds of 20 inn. ammuni-
tion and thousands of rounds of additional ammuni-
tion to fit these other weapons."l
Thus begins the prosecutor's opening statement in the
trial of four Cuban exiles charged with unlawful possession
of unregistered firearms. Never once did any of the four
deny that they possessed the weapons. or that they were
intended for an armed raid against the Republic of Cuba.
Four days later. on January 10. 1978, they were acquitted.
What happened, and why? ('r,vert.-lction 1111'rtnat(nu
Bulletin obtained the complete transcript of the trial, never
before available. and carefully studied it and the surrounding
events. The conclusion is inescapable that the acquittal was
foreordained, and that the Central Intelligence Agency and
the Department of Justice were responsible. What is also
clear is that the Carter Administration's alleged detente
with Cuba, well before the recent Shaba incident and
Brzezinski's ravings, was hypocritical at best, and, on some
levels. a simple lie.
1 United States r. Pedro Gil, Annandu Lopez Estrada. Juan
Raimondo Arcc arnd Isidoro PineiroCastineira. No. 77-?181-Cr-JI .
United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida,
Official Transcript (hereinafter "Transcript"), January 6. 1978.
Part 1. pp. 5-6.
8 CovertAction
The CBS Documentary
The opening scene can be pinpointed. On June 10, 1977,
('BS-TV aired a Bill Moyers special: "CBS Reports--The
CIA's Secret Army." The show documented the paramili-
tary roles of certain segments of the Cuban exile com-
munity in the United States. It reviewed the preparation
and implementation of the CIA-directed invasion at the Bay
of Pigs in 1061 . the ignominious defeat of the benighted
invaders, and the subsequent recruitment by the United
States government of the veterans and sympathizers of the
fia.,:o into bands of terrorists hell-bent on attacking Cuba
and overthrowing the government led by Fidel Castro.
The TV correspondent of the Miami Herald reported
this in his review of the show:
"The Kennedy vengeance began, reports Moyers,
as soon as the members of the Brigade 2506 captured
during the invasion were ransomed months later.
Bobby Kennedy gave top priority to the CIA's mus-
tering of a secret army. based in Mianti, to start
covert sabotage operations against Castro and his
regime. It was called 'Operation Mongoose.'
"A CIA agent. Grayston Lynch. was its recruiter.
An Army general. Edward Lansdale. was its military
director.
"The CIA virtually dropped 'Operation Mongoose'
by 11)72, but few involved were aware of that ... .
Now . . . the onetime CIA soldiers are simply pro-
ceeding on their own. conducting their own war."2
The Moyers show had interviews with various members
of Brigade 2506, including Armando Lopez Estrada, the
"Chief of Military Operations" of the Brigade. It also ex-
posed to U.S. audiences some shocking scenes filmed in a
warehouse in Miami which was stacked floor to ceiling with
weapons. Two exiles one of them as it turns out being
Lopez Estrada again were filmed in the warehouse stand-
ing proudly in front of the weapons with sacks over their
heads to disguise their identities.
It was a difficult time, diplomatically, for such a show
to air. The U.S. and Cuban administrations were negoti-
ating the lessening of tensions, cultural exchanges, and the
mutual opening of Interest Sections in each other's country.
At the saute time. right-wing forces within the United
States were decrying any improvement in relations, self-
interest notwithstanding. Ironically, the same day that the
CBS documentary was aired, Senator Howard Baker was
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quoted as saying, "I think this is the worst time in history
to be cozying up to Cuba."3
Despite sentiments such as Baker's, it was clear that
something had to be done. The Cuban exiles had it, and
they were flaunting it: Warehouses full of weapons in
downtown Miami. Cuban exiles bragging about armed
attacks. Bombings and killings around the world. And
Brigade 2506 stage center, and proud of it. But, as we
shall see, what was done by the U.S. government was little
more than show.
Astonishingly, nothing ever happened to the warehouse
full of weapons. Presumably it is still there in Miami. CBS
was never questioned, never subpoenaed, nor were the
cameramen and still photographers from many newspapers,
all of whom saw the inside of the warehouse. Had the par-
ticipants been left-wing activists instead of right-wing
terrorists, one can imagine what would have happened.
Because of the public outcry, though, some kind of
investigation surveilling and following leading Brigade
2506 members was conducted, and as the Assistant
United States Attorney explained to the jury some months
later, on August 15, 1977, two months after the TV show,
the Customs agents searched Pedro Gil's boat. Thus began
the trial that, in the final analysis, might just as well never
have taken place.
The Arrests
Pedro Gil, 41, was immediately arrested. Shortly there-
after, based on fingerprint identifications and interrogations,
Armando Lopez Estrada, 38, Juan Raimundo Arce, 37, and
Isidoro Pineiro Castineira, 38, were also arrested. They were
all charged with possession of unregistered Firearms and vio-
lation of the Neutrality Act. To this day, Pedro Gil has
never made any public statement about the case. The others,
however, from the day of the arrests, admitted that the
weapons were theirs, said they had been given to them by
the CIA, and proudly proclaimed that they were for use
against Cuba. The Miami Herald noted:
"Lopez Estrada confirmed that the boats and
weapons were part of a plan to attack Cuba. Ile said
one boat was to be used to transport the weapons to
a fourth `intermediary boat' somewhere outside the
U.S. limits. Lopez Estrada said that he didn't feel that
the group was doing anything wrong since the attack
was to be launched from outside the United States.
`If I take weapons outside the United States to be
used outside of the United States, is that wrong'?' he
asked."4
Following the arrests, Roberto Carballo, President of
Brigade 2506, called several meetings to gather support
for the defendants in the Cuban exile community and to
raise funds for their defense.
Brigade 2506
The Brigade, with perhaps 500 active members, is com-
prised of veterans of the Bay of Pigs and other sympathizers.
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They are a powerful force in the Miami area where well
upwards of 100.000 Cuban exiles reside A Miami cits
Commissioner is a member, as is the state Democratic
Party Chairman. A few years ago, when the Brigade held
its "I-irst Congress." Miami Mayor Maurice I?erre and V.S.
Representative Claude Pepper were featured speakers.
On the day of the arrest, the .lfiwni lleruhl news story
pointed out that the Brigade was "well respected' in the
community. Ironically, the editorial in the same issue of
the l/eruhl took a less-laudatory position:
"I'ntil the mid 1960s, overtluowinm, Fidel Castro
seemed to be the official policy of the I mired States
government. Toward that purlxlsc an agency of the
government armed and supported a group of exiles
in an abortive attempt to invade Cuba. Other efforts
were made to depose the Cuban dictator.
"But the policy gradually changed, and in recent
months the rate of chance appears to have increased.
Most Cuban exiles many of them now citizens of
the United States find the changes in policy hard to
accept. Some merely grumble. Others take their
cues from the fiery oratory of demagogues who
promise to turn back the clock. And a few a tiny
number, really take the law into their own hands."s
They did more than take the law into their own hands,
though: they seemed to have ignored it with relative im-
punity. On June 29, 1976, there was a meeting at the New
England Oyster House in ('oral Gables. Florida. involvine,
as a recent 1'cvthousc .lIa'a:iiu' article put it, hyo Chileans.
two Cuban exiles, and an American.t' It now appears that
the participants included Ilector Duran, Bernardo de
Torres and Armando Lopez Estrada, from the Brigade'
2506: General Juan Manuel Contreras Sepulveda, the
notorious then-head of DINA, the Chilean secret police :and
Michael V. Townlex , the American who conspired with
the fascist, paramilitary I'utriu e /.ihertarl against the regime
_I his meeting, which was apparently conducted under
police and FBI surveillance, and which may have included
an infumtant, centered on the murder of Letelier and
several sabotage actions. No police action followed this
meeting.
What is more, it is public knowledge that Carballo and
I ()Pei Estrada were also present at the secret meeting in
Juls of 1976 in the Dominican Republic which organized
the Coordination of United Revolutionary Organizations
t('ORU1, which claimed credit for the heinous bombing of
a (ubana Airliner in October 1976.7
We will return to the terrorists no ''tiny number" by
the way and to the Chilean connection, presently. But
what of the Miami trial?After so many years of openly
defiant and illegal behavior, Armando Lopez Estrada and
three of his colleagues were charged with possession Of LID-
registered weapons and violation of the Neutrality Act.
The Neutrality Act Charges
. iAl!
of Salvador Allende. became a DINA operative after the
coup, and was directly involved in the murder of Orlando
Letelier and Ronnie Moffitt in September of that year.
: Ihm i.
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