CIA Propaganda And Disinformation

3/7/92 #1  HATONN

In psychological warfare... the intelligence agencies of the democratic countries suffer from the grave disadvantage that in attempting to damage the adversary, they must also deceive their own public.  Victor Zorza, Washington Post, Nov. 15, 1965.

By the mid-1960s most of the professionals in the CIA's Clandestine Services thought that the day of the balloon as an effective delivery vehicle in propaganda operations had long since passed.  Years before, in the early rough-and-tumble era of the Cold War, agency operators in West Germany had often used balloons to carry anti-communist literature into the denied areas behind the Iron Curtain.  These operations, although lacking in plausible deniability, normally a prerequisite in covert propaganda efforts, had scored high--judging from the numerous angry protests issued by the Soviet Union and its East European satellites.  Since then the propaganda game had evolved into a subtle contest of wits, and the agency's Covert Action Staff had developed far more sophisticated methods for spreading ideological messages.  Thus, there was a sense of "deja vu" among the covert-action staffers when officers of the Far East Division suggested in 1967 that a new balloon operation be undertaken.  The target this time was to be mainland China.

The People's Republic was at the time in the midst of the cultural revolution.  Youthful Red Guards were rampaging throughout the country, shattering customs and laws alike; confusion, near chaos, engulfed the nation.  But the CIA's China watchers in Hong Kong and elsewhere on the periphery of the mainland had detected that a reaction was setting in, especially in southern China around Canton and Foochow in the provinces of Kwangtung and Judien.  They believed that a kind of backlash against the excesses of the Red Guards was building, for increasingly, groups within the military and among the workers were beginning to resist the Red Guards and call for a return to traditional law and order.

To the agency's operators, these were conditions worth exploiting.  No one really believed that Communism could be eliminated from the mainland, but the short-term political objectives which might be achieved through covert propaganda were too tempting to pass up.  China was an avowed enemy of the United States and the CIA felt that each bit of additional domestic turmoil that could be stirred up made the world's most populous country--already experimenting with long-range ballistic missiles--that much less of a threat to American national security. Furthermore, if Peking could be kept preoccupied with internal problems, then the likelihood of Chinese military intervention in the Vietnamese war, in a manner similar to that so effectively employed years earlier in Korea, could be diminished.  Perhaps, too, China could be forced to reduce its material support to North Vietnam and to cut back on its export of revolution to other areas of the developing world.

The operation was accordingly approved by the 303 Committee (now the 40 Committee) and the agency took its balloons out of storage, shipping them to a secret base on Taiwan.  There they were loaded with a variety of carefully prepared propaganda materials--leaflets, pamphlets, newspapers--and, when the winds were right, launched to float over the mainland provinces due west of the island.  The literature dropped by balloons had been designed by the agency's propagandists to appear as similar as possible in substance and style to the few publications then being furtively distributed on a small scale by conservative groups inside China.  Names of genuine anti-revolutionary organizations were not used; fictitious associations, some identified with the army, others with agricultural communes or urban industrial unions, were invented.

The main thrust of all the propaganda was essentially the same, criticizing the activities (both real and imaginary) of the Red Guards and, by implication, those leaders who inspired or permitted such excesses.  It was hoped that the propaganda and its attendant disinformation would create further reactions to the cultural revolution, on one hand adding to the growing domestic confusion and on the other disrupting the internal balance of power among the leadership in Peking.  The CIA calculated that when the Chinese realized they were being propagandized, the U.S. government could confidently disclaim any responsibility.  The assumed culprit would most likely be Chiang Kaichek's Taiwan regime, the agency's witting and cooperative host for the operation.

Almost immediately after it began, the balloon project was a success.  The CIA's China watchers soon saw evidence of increased resistance to the Red Guards in the southern provinces.  Peking, apparently believing the reaction to the cultural revolution to be greater than it actually was, displayed strong concern over developments in the south.  And within weeks, refugees and travelers from the mainland began arriving in Hong Kong with copies of the leaflets and pamphlets that the agency's propagandists had manufactured--a clear indication of the credence being given the false literature by the Chinese masses.  It was not long, therefore, before the Clandestine Services were searching for other ways to expand their propaganda effort against the new target.

A decision was therefore made to install on Taiwan a pair of clandestine radio transmitters which would broadcast propaganda--and disinformation--of the same nature as that disseminated by the balloon drops.  If the Chinese people accepted the radio broadcasts as genuine, the CIA reasoned, then they might be convinced that the counter-movement to the cultural revolution was gaining strength and perhaps think that the time had come to resist the Red Guards and their supporters still more openly.

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Against a closed-society target, simply providing information and news that the government wishes to keep from its people can have a significant effect.  If, in addition, some clever disinformation can be inserted, then so much the better.  The listeners, realizing that much of what they are hearing is true, tend to believe that ALL they are told is accurate.

One source of news used by agency propagandists was the CIA's own Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS), which daily monitors open radio broadcasting around the world from more than a dozen listening posts located in such varied places as Hong Kong, Panama, Nigeria, Cyprus, and even San Francisco.  The product of FBIS was also utilized to determine whether the broadcasts of the clandestine transmitters were reaching their target in China and creating the anticipated effect.

There was a third (and deleterious) way, however, in which the monitoring service played a role in the operation, and the Clandestine Services were slow to correct it. Unlike most of the intelligence collected by the agency, the programs monitored by the FBIS are widely disseminated within the U.S. government and to certain subscribers among the press corps and the academic community.  These daily reports, verbatim transcripts translated into English, are packaged and color-coded according to major geographical areas--Far East (yellow), Middle East (pink), and so on.  But even though the FBIS editors are members of the CIA's Intelligence Directorate, the operators in the Clandestine Services are reluctant to reveal their propaganda operations to them.  As a result, for its Far East daily report, the FBIS frequently monitored and distributed the texts of programs actually originating from the agency's secret stations on Taiwan along with the transcripts of broadcasts from real counter-revolutionary organizations on the mainland.

CIA operators seemed untroubled by this development and the accompanying fact that the agency's own China analysts back at headquarters in Washington (along with their colleagues in the State and Defense departments) were being somewhat misled.  Nor did they appear to mind that unwitting scholars and newsmen were publishing articles based on some extent the phony information being reported by the FBIS.  Eventually, the CIA analysts at home were informed of the existence of the clandestine radios, but no steps were taken to rectify the false data passed on to the other U.S. government agencies or the press and academia; operational security precluded such revelations.  Besides, Communist China was an enemy, and the writings of recognized journalists and professors publicizing its state of near chaos and potential rebellion helped to discredit Peking in the eyes of the world--which was, after all, in keeping with the CIA's interpretation of American foreign policy at the time.  The CIA's secret radios thus proved to be highly successful, even after the Chinese government discovered their origin and announced to its people that the broadcasts were false.

Meanwhile, the agency's operatives turned to outright disinformation in their effort to exploit China's internal difficulties.  For example,

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began to show results. The Red Guards turned their fury on the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, demanding that Chinese diplomats, too, be cleansed of Western ways and rededicated to Mao's principles of communism.

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I hope that you readers are now getting the realization of how the system works to give disinformation and actually how easy it is to brainwash people into accepting information from "supposed" valid and honest sources.  Let us consider CNN a minute--this is the authorized CIA and Administration disinformation network.  From this releasing of information, all other networks (ABC, NBC, etc.) follow suit with the disinformation.  There is enough "nothing" sprinkled among the disinformation to stop your "thinking" and insure your acceptance of "everything"--true or false.

As example, say, Mr. Umpty Ump says he is "tired of paying for Israel's debt".  By the time the ADL and other Elite organizations call Umpty names and bash him about and CNN takes up the cry and hue and Larry King interviews the opposition--let me assure you that you will think "Umpty" is not only a bigot but a citizen unworthy of less punishment than death or life incarceration for felony hate crime.  Before the barrage is over there will be thrust forth something such as "...and Umpty, in high school, struck a (minority person) in a bigoted fistfight over a girl who reported he raped her.  The (minority person) was only defending the girl."  Now, you see, they have set up a history of "bigoted and violent" behavior against which no person can respond for the "defendant" (Umpty) is NEVER GIVEN TIME FOR REBUTTAL IN ANY FORM WHATSOEVER.  FURTHER, LET US SAY UMPTY IS FOUND "INNOCENT"--THAT WILL NEVER HIT THE FRONT PAGE OF ANY PAPER--PROBABLY NOT EVEN THE BACK PAGES.

YOU MUST COME TO SEE HOW IT WORKS TO ENSLAVE YOU TO IDEAS AND LIES OR YOU WILL PERISH IN THE LIES.  Let us please take rest.  Thank you.

Hatonn to stand-by.

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Source: The PHOENIX LIBERATOR, March 17, 1992, Volume 18, Number 9, Pages 15-16.

http://phoenixarchives.com/liberator/1992/0392/031792.pdf

Transcribed into HTML format by R. Montana.