The New Phoenix Program; CIA Blowback

NINE:

CIA BLOWBACK:

The Unites States has destabilized dozens of countries and overthrown their elected governments, just how many countries is uncertain. What follows is a brief history of three nations.

Iran:

In 1953, the Eisenhower administration joined forces with British intelligence to overthrow the government of Iran, which was seeking a larger share of its countries oil revenues (note from me: AGAIN oil). Britain began pumping oil in Iran in 1908, installed a fictitious monarchy to guard their profit of $116 million pounds sterling (1935-1950). The monarchy was overthrown by Mohammed Mossadeq who then sought more then the 5-15% share of domestic oil revenues. Allen Dulles and Kermit Roosevelt, the son of FDR, were able to direct Iranian army officers in a coup of the elected government and the reinstallation of the Shah. The Shah immediately granted British Petroleum a 40% share of the oil concession and American firms received 40% as a reward for their participation. The overthrow of Mossadeq emboldened the CIA and became a blueprint for future destabilization operations. Mossadeq represented the legitimate aspirations of a nationalist democracy that were thwarted in the name of anti-communism. The resulting chaos and radicalization of Iran is a direct result of interference in the internal affairs of that nation, what is referred to as blowback, the unintended negative consequences of covert actions against foreign elected governments. The Shah was described in a confidential CIA report as a sociopath who suffered from a dominating father and a sense of the illegitimacy of his mandate to rule. SAVAK is perhaps the most feared term in Iran, it is the name of the Shah's secret police agency that was set up with the help of the CIA and MI5. One archeologist who worked with an Iranian female student found that she was missing and reportedly arrested by agents of SAVAK. Her political affiliations with an opposition party had brought her to their attention, even though these actions amounted to an American college student joining the McCarthy Democrats. He was later informed that she had been interrogated, tortured, violated, and then executed. This occured to thousands of students, professionals, and loyal opposition members who criticized or opposed the Shah's regime. When publicly informed about these actions of his government by journalists the Shah was sanguine and considered it the price of stability. The excesses of the American selected and trained SAVAK as well as the unequal distribution of wealth led directly o the emergence of the Ayatollah Khomeini and the Iranian Revolution that kidnapped personnel in the American embassy and a hostile regime that views the U.S. as a force of evil in the world. Hence the litany of referring to the US as "The Great Satan".

Guatemala:

In 1954 the CIA accepted and carried out a proposal from United Brands (Chiquita Banana)to overthrow the Guatamalan government, which was the only democratically elected government Guatemala had ever had. Chiquita and the CIA replaced that government with 30 plus years (and still counting) of bloodshed under a series of almost barbaric right-wing dictators. The US taxpayers continue to fund these regimes under the recurrent threat that if they do not, the Guatamalan people will fall prey to the evils of communism. A mere 2% of the population owned 72% of the land, 90% of landowners were confined to the poorest 15% of the land. United Brands owned the railroads, the major port, and vast tracts of some of the most productive land on earth. President Arbenz had won the election with 65% in 1950. He tried to fulfill his mandate, which was land reform, minimum wage, and other extravagances modeled on FDR's efforts in the US. He seized the largest land holdings and distributed the 1.5 million acres to 100,000 families, including confiscating is own families land holdings. The land was paid for with 25 year interest bearing bonds, this was perfectly within the guidelines of Kennedy era Alliance for Progress program, or US programs in El Salvador and Chile. The only difference being the investment by United Brands and the political influence that they could bring to bear on the Arbenz government. US Secretary of State under Eisenhower was John Foster Dulles, a partner of the law firm Sullivan and Cromwell, he had personally handled the purchase of the Central American railroads for United Brands. His brother was Allen Dulles, head of the CIA, (and he was the father of Avery Dulles, a Jesuit) and together they orchestrated a campaign to paint the Arbenz government "red" and launch a mercenary war from Honduras. (when you click THIS you can read more about it, and see names such as E. Howard Hunt, and David Atlee Philips, and David Sanchez Morales, who were involved in toppling the regimes in Guatemala and Iran and who were CIA assets who were also involved in the Watergate scandal, the assassinations of JFK, RFK and MLK.) John Moors Cabot attacked from the State Department, Henry Cabot Lodge attacked them in the UN, and Eisenhower's personal secretary lobbied him for her husband who was public relations director for United Brands. Arbenz tried to buy weapons on the open market to defent himself but shipment was captured and held up as proof that he was "red". The mercenary army invaded Guatemala in force and was about to be defeated when CIA pilots representatives in Guatemala handpicked an unknown, Carlos Castillas Armas. The bloodletting among the peasant population numbered several hundred thousand, and at times took on the character of a genocidal war carried out by forces trained, equipped, and supervised by the US. In 1979 90% of the farmers continued to own 16.2% of the land, an eternal source of revolution that will continually have to be crushed with the help of the US taxpayer. In 1966 a swell of revolution brought a full scale counter insurgency response program to Guatemala-arms, advisors, and even Green Barets. A State Department study analyzed the program years later and stated, "To eliminate a few hundred guerillas, the government killed perhaps 10,000 Guatemalan peasants". Father Ronald Hennessy wrote of one event among many...July 14, 1982, The local military commander sent word for all of the people of the aldea of Pentenac to be assembled for his 11:00 arrival...
At 4:00pm all of the men, with hands tied behind their backs, were escorted by the soldiers to one house, shot, stabbed, piled one on top of the other, and covered with burnable items of the very house, which were sprinkled with gasoline and set on fire. The women were treated the same as the men, differing only in that some had live babies on their backs when they were stacked for burning. The other children were tied, one to another, and pulled alive into the flames of a third house by the soldiers. In September of 1981 an assiciation of Guatemalan coroners had complained that they couldn't keep up with the demand for autopsies because the number of violent deaths had increased so rapidly (50% higher each month than the last). Michael Deaver was instrumental in the election of Reagan in 1980 and one of his three closest advisors along with Edwin Meese and James Baker. His public relations firm of Deaver and Hannaford took on various right wing Central and South American landowners and businessmen as clients, among them a group of Guatemalans.

Iraq:

In 1958 General Abdel-Karim Kassem led a coup, took power and proclaimed a republic, legalized the
Communist party, decreed land reform, and granted autonomy to the Kurds. Allen Dulles declared Iraq,
"The most dangerous spot in the world", and in 1963 the CIA supported Ba'ath party overthrew Kassem.
Ba'ath party shared power until 1968 when the CIA again instigated a coup that culminated in the rise of Saddam Hussein, who had been on the CIA payroll since his early twenties.
In 1980 Saddam invaded Iran in fear of potential Iranian revolutionary influence among his countries majority Shiites. Iran began to win in 1982 and the USA, in fear of the Iranian revolution, began to covertly aid and arm Saddam. The Reagan administration funneled $5.5 billion through the Atlanta branch of the Italian Banca Nationale del Lavoro guaranteed by taxpayers under the Commodity Credit Corporation "to promote American farm exports." Between 1986 and 1989 73 transactions took place that included bacterial cultures for anthrax production, advanced computers, and equipment to repair jets and rockets. In 2002 Iraq was forced to deliver an 11.800 page dossier on the history of its weapons program to he UN Security Council. Bush administration officials took possession of the documents first and cut 8.000 pages that detailed American and Western company sale of weapons and dual-use technology sold to Iraq prior to 1991.
President Reagan sent Donald Rumsfeld to Iraq in 1984 and full diplomatic relations were reestablished.
Saddam became privy to the US satellite technology secrets in the effort to defeat Iran. Sales of a full range of munitions were stepped up, including the helicopters that were used to gas 5.000 Kurds in the village of Halabja in 1988. One winner of the Congressional Medal of Honor who spent decades in the service wrote that, "during that period I spent most of my time as a high-class muscleman for big business, Wall Street,
and the bankers... Thus, I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests
in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National bank boys to collect oil revenues in.
I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street...
In China I helped to see to it that Standard Oil went its way unmolested.