THE ODYSSEY OF ROBERT WILLIAMS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88-01314R000100410001-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: October 14, 2004
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: March 20, 1971
• Content Type: MAGAZINE

y
Of all the I"!1yst riO11S voyagers in the-shadoly Worlds
of revolutionary politics, pert eps no Aralerican has
traveled so curious a route as Robert F. Willi. ms.
,
I-ILlnted,on all apparently trurll;ed-uj) Civil rights kid-
.-napping charge in North Carolina in i96a, the black
NAACP leader fled to Cuba. There he made anti-
American broadcasts aimed at American blacks, until
he tired of Fidel Castro's application Of the "class
t t
struggle" to the t1.merican 1'd.C!aI fight. He journeyed
to North Vietnam, North Korea and, finally, China,
where he stayed for three years as a prized guest.
Today lie is erlployecl as a consultant in the Center.
for Chinese Suold les at.-the University Of itiich!gan
(the next b st thing for him, since they do not have a
? department of clandestine arts) and is beg!!] 1Ii1V a
book about his expo}:fences in China.
Intelligence soil:ce:~ in 11'asl,i `;tea say the old i loiiil
Carolina charges arc 'dormant and going to stay
dormant." Williams fears they are still pending, -- at
r. j
least, he is still iln able to leave the state of Michigan
t ~
because Of the!n...TroiLson charges, which could be
placed against illili for bro dcast ? 'These _=a111C sources
t t
look blank - who woui:ci do s?ICh a thing to Williams?
All of us Milo covered or worked in civil rights
found-Williams' case interesting. I recall very well the
bizarre "kidnapping" -? aetuaily'the holding of a white
couple for a few hours as p:ot`ctian against Official
homicide against civil righters -- and I remember when
Williams [plned' up suddenly in C1.1be..
there in the Swimmer Of 10.65 a,ild asked about hill],
there was a chorus of hemrnin`, and hawing. Finally
the Foreign Office people told Inc, without much coll-
viction, that lie had left and gone to Chid.. Then,
suddenly, in -September, ic;L'J, he was back in the
United States. His ride 1101'e was better publicized
than his ride to Cuba. He }vas flying back on TWA,
just like any other traveler, when he }ids t11,011 off the
plane in London and held six days in priso;.i.
"Why don't they let me go on?" he asked his jailor;.
Ole replied, "They're afraid 011,11 hijack tile Plane."
"Hijack the plane!" he said, "lien, I've already been
in all the plac "S you hij .ck planes to!"
Unwilling to fly a "dar.garo`.!s ,radical" with other
folks, TWA gave him and his l;+.wyer a :),civito jet to
New York. "11? ey told rlhe it co=t tl1 I?1 Y O~oco," lr il-
liams told nee. I had,'pa' d $joo, and all I wanted to do
was fly on a rcguI A dd:FtfrtRe aset2.OQ4/10/IY8
20
Approved For Release 2004/10/28: CIA-RDP88-01314R00010
`.
rile a $j: o,ooo 'a'id'e, it was okay with inc."
I heir I found -hill.] in Detroit recently, at his broth-
GI's home in suburbia, I was ill mediately charmed.
Good-.100" inn, wearing a }vell-tr!Il med Afro goatee.
and an African-patterned skirt, he showed a quick
intelligence, an informed Judgment and, above all, a'
highly developed sense of humor about everything
that had llapp-gilled to him.-
.. Cuba? "Remember in the South they used to slap
the black Ulan on the back and give him a cigar?
Well, it's the same in Cuba, only it's a Havana Cigar."
INillian.s was not mistreated by' the Cubans. On the
Contrary, lie was a il,ei~iber of the_ Chte, with his o}.I11
house, car and gasoline phis $:i00 a nhonthl as an al-
lo,ance. Nor did his troubles, particularly in the be-
ginnillg, when he says the was "c.,Ztreinely bitter"
against the United.,States, revolve arol*n l any idea
he would not say what the Cubans wanted hima to say.'
A typical broadcast, on Jan. 19, 1963, for instance,
went: "Johnnyboy Kennedy paid a surprise visit to a
Conve11t!QI1 of what he Called 'Negro women sororities.'
J` 'fall, t :se pl".OIley politicians are a riot }\'hon they
want black vo'tc^?s. 'Novi, can you just imagine slick
John putting himself out for. the black'botto l l'h1Cl~s?"
In his NAACP job, Williams had been an iiitcgra-
tionist. After his Cuban experience he became a black
nationalist and separatist, and it ,cas then that hiss
troubles started. The cubaI s insisted that fife black
liimeriC?.'.ll's natural allies Were the white }','i{rking class.
"I openly disput ad this," Williams told roe. "I had
found ,hat t1;: whites. in the South who helped us
were the intelligentsia. The farmers and the InillYiork-
ers .. . were the ores trying to kill us and standing
on'the sides jcerinU. One day, the illu;licipal leader of
the party. in Havana Called me and said he Couldn't
support I11y position --r that waS in 6.1. One reason
they could'h't support Lilac:: nationalism, he said, was
r
that it advocated division and self-cletcrlniua.tian: If
they supported us . . . well, they had a heavy concen-
tration of black people: in Oriente province. What,
wortid happen if they wanted self-deterniin:ition? I
told him 'I understood their 1J re llC-lment. I said that
in the US people who made compromI es ]fire that
}'.ere callr_d Uncle Ton s .1 v asnrt going to be an
Uncle TOM for ca~)it alism, or for socieli[Jnl, either."
Ile was particularly irked when files Roca, one of
CA-R1)F198-q04,31]41 00D*00141boo 1-s&ldcci him. "I-:e
STM