WE WERE RIGHT

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP75-00149R000700220001-3
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 20, 2004
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: August 1, 1967
• Content Type: MAGAZINE

LA ca(I.Sr H
CIA CRISIS BY. PRESENT AND FORMER NSA OFFICERS
0 7002f .00DJ - .
(1 1 n 1,\
back of Senator Fulbright's recent criticism in The New.
The National Student Association etas organized partially York Times Magazine. But I don't doubt that it was vital
to serve as a bulwark against Commurtiist organizations in the late 'SOs, for example, to work with the leaders of
that were active both here and abroad shortly after World the Algerian independence struggle-even though the State
War II. Then, in 1952, NSA was approached about the'r. Department's official position was, at least implicitly, to back
possibility of extending some of its programs, using CIA I/ our ally, France. The student movement, especially in the '50s,
funds for the purpose. represented something the rest of America was losing-
Why this was done relates in part to the existing needs dynamic and progressive young people in an era when (with
of foreign policy, and, in part, to the climate of the times. all due respect to Eisenhower and Dulles) the country's world-
The early '50s were after all the M C th I
EDITORS NOTE: The word "president" figures heavily in Dennis
Shaul's past (and future?). President of the American Associ-
ation of Oxford while a Rhodes Scholar (1960-62), after his
graduation from Notre Dame (where he was student-body
president) he served as president of NSA during 1962-63.
Now an associate in the law firm of Buckingham, Doolittle
and Burroughs, in Akron, Dennis, 28, teaches at the University
of Akron Law School, hopes to combine a career in low and
politics. Outside interests include toe "Sierra Club," music.
.~- l . 1o.rn fan
spect, some people feel that NSA was a political organiza-
tion, sponsored unnecessarily by. the Government. NSA
projects could just as well have been run, they think,
through groups like-to take an extreme-the Rotary
Clubs, or, as a middle course, by scholarships and exchange
programs.
It is true that NSA was designed to reach political
I
WE WERE RIGHT
Q~ I NSA
BY
W. DENNIS SHAUC
budget this year, we would like to include $300,000 for
"
NSA
-which was then being' attacked by right-wing clubs
such as Young Republicans for MacArthur. Most people
who complain today cannot understand the mood of wide.
spread witch-hunting that existed then, the mood that moved
Arthur Miller to write The Crucible.
Some people say, "Well, granted that you couldn't hove
done all this openly, why was it necessary to do it of all?
Was it all that. important, anyway?" This connotation was
wide image was the exact opposite.
It's arguable that our working abroad became less impor-
font as time went on. I don't think so. I went to the Vienna
Youth Festival in 1959. Although Communist-inspired, as
they all were, if was the first to be held outside the Iron
Curtain. This gesture alone demonstrated the Soviets' own
feeling of strength in the youth field; they c.r' ld move into
a neutral country and expect 25,000 people fc, come, three-
fifth
f
,
organ
za
ons
s o
whom were from developing nations. And they fried
had perforce to deal with students on the middle-to-left- to hammer home that they were the rolling tide of history.
wing side of the political spectrum in Africa, Latin Arneri- They represented the progressive movements, the rising no-
ca, and Asia, because these grow s were mov' ' t
ti
l
peop e. In the early '50s
American student
i
ti
However, it would have, been obviously impossible o atothat
time for the, Government to support openly an organization
that was attempting to work with progressive, often very
left-,. in
- _
g grou
br
ona
ism, independence, onficolonialism. American societ
y
was decadent, without culture or dynamism, its young people
given over to politically irrelevant pastimes like jazz.
All too often we make the assessment that contacts ore not
Imagine the controversy, if someone had gone h UAVAke, "" scary; mar Tne Cora war has more or less changed. I agree
Senate floor and soi@ipp,ISq tF4rR* ~ h "01c rrr-r unism per se any
campaign, continued or page 362J
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