STATE IGNORED KIDNAP THREAT

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP75-00149R000700270037-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 21, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 7, 2006
• Sequence Number: 37
• Publication Date: October 19, 1964
• Content Type: REPORT

Approved For Release 2006W~fPW 75-00149
O CT 19 1964
` nurea
Kidnan Threat
ay ROSz:'a ALLEN;
AND PAUL SCOTT
Negligence by higlrplaced offi terrorist and other activities in
sills in the State Deparianen't ap-. ? Latin America.
pa1'ently is largely responsible for ? Rusk and Mann are forget-
tin. that the resolution was
the 3-day kidnaping of uieul:eualst'
mainly a face-saver to cover u13
Colonel Michael Smolen. their failure to induce the OAS
Confn cssional roves t I,, a . or s to really do somcti;in" about
have been informed that State ? ommunka: espionage avid sub-
Department and Central Intel- version. When the intelligencl:
i,. ligence Agency authorities were warning capie to their desks
warned by reliable 'sources aft ., that. the Reds intended to pull
?c least ten , days in advance that off another kidnaping, they just
Venezuelan Cpmmunist terror-.,, didn't :believe it and took no
are believing their own stale= ,ticket, but nothing came of the .'~
men's that this piece of rr !matter because of. Democratic
will nut an end to iC' nirnuniA nhiections
lief' that the rci,olution adopted ';niques also, because of lack of
by the Organization of Amer!- "hard information" that all the
can Slates to- 'break n oIZEions missiles had been ,removed as
with Castro has solved the Khrushchev promised.
Communist problen;a. In the closing days of the re
"Secretaries Rusk and Mann'.--cent congressional session,
are so exuberant over this,, OAS House Republican - leaders pro-
resoldtion," said' one veteran posed providing Secret Service
Department official, '"that they guards for their presidential
I
Y
?; were- taken to protect them in a conference with McNamara
despite the fact that the warn- at which Secretary Rusk was pres
i.: in- came from - excellent sourc- enl
.: es, and that last year 'the Ccan- The Pentagon chief, baci.c d .'
munists abducted 'Colonel '., by the head of the State De-,'m James Chennault, then deputy partment, urged McCone to
chief of the U.S. Military Mis- send certain intelligence reports
lion, and a Spanish soccer star direct - to them rather than
and held' them for nine days..--through the National Security
'The kidnapers wcre never run Council as required by laiv.
down. "You are working for us,"
Secretary Rusk Defense See contended McNamara.
retary' McNamara and Assistant,', "I am working for the Presi,-
Secretary of S t a t e Thomas', dent," sharply retorted ?McCone.
Mann, in charge of Latin Amer- That ended the argument.
!. dean Affairs, also knew about ,. Backstage relations between
the warning. But the congres-'.:age two officials have been cool
ional investigators have found since the 1962 Cuban missile
no indication they did any more ; crisis when McNamara staged
about it than Ambassador Stew-.,, his tc;evilsed press conference
art. `'. on the reputed withdrawal of
This astonishing Indifference the Russian nuclear weapons.
is attributed by State Depart McCune disapproved of this pub-,
meet insiders to high-level be- lie airing of, intelligence tech-
His Caraead strati?,-was not ad-'.. tlia.t---to put it mildly.
vised, and no special srafeguards` -I.e. made that intedl clear
o
rage, but blandly Ignored it, as chrectly under ins cord aL
:McCune is not enthusiastic about
tense inteligence Agency, wn,cn
about the threatehed 1-tcd out- ?
... ~. Y~.Y.~ ...; ?y ' , .
authority, is steadily enlarging'
'-distressing bumbling is that Am-
or CIA did anything about it. McNamara, in keeping with
'.been unable to uncover any evi of important information in poi-.
clene that either. the Slate. De icy-ranking circles of the John-
.
The congressional probers have'. IS not improving the aircutation
This warning went unheeded. and' CIA Director John McCone
member of tic U.S. embassy squarely on tnem.'
Approved ~orRelease 2006%08110: CIA-RaP75-00149R000700270037-9
STAT