RETRACING THE ANALYSIS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000505110005-6
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 27, 2010
• Sequence Number: 5
• Publication Date: November 1, 1984
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/08/27: CIA-RDP90-00552R000505110005-6
ARTICLE APPEARED
ON PAGE- ?- V
rte Russians must have faown o!__
this can, as well as of other activities .
of Pope John Paul .11 in his native Po-
land, where Solidarity was catching
? ' ? fire. Yuri Andropov, then head of the
c~"?" K.G.B., could logically have come to
1.1 acm the Analysis the r _.tins of the tenth. -Volt o
li
o
s
h
f
en a .
orme" national security
?r } . ??
WAS INGTON adviser grumbles about his dovish
argaret'Tbatcher' escaped and former adversaries in the State De-
I.ndi.ra Gandhi was cut down; partment, that's not news; but When a
Ronald Reagan lived and man of experience in the use of inte i-
Anwar Sadat died; the Pope survived gence information suggests the possi-
and a pro-Solidarity Polish priest was bility of a "witting tool" -or mole-
secretly murdered.' Every world
leader is the target of some madman
or nationalist group, or religious fa-
NEW YORK TIMES
1 November 1984
in the C.I.A., that is worthy of note.
Mr. B pTinski has more than a
passing interest in this case. As be re-
natic, or other world leader willing to Counts in his memoir, during the first
employ terrorists. week of December 1950 the C.LA.
That last category most worries
our strategists. If it turns out that a
few journalists were right about'the
involvement of the KG.B.-controlled
Bulgarian secret police in the shoot-
ing of the Pope, then the trust that
detenteniks put in agreements with
the Soviet Union is misplaced.
The evidence . of - conspiracy
produced by Italian' prosecutors
means that our C.I.A., charged with
keeping the President and National
Security Coimdl'iaformed about the .
international. crime of the ritury,-
was inept in its I act-gathering' and
wholly mistaken in its evaluation.....
. We know that some of our intelIi
gence operatives did all they could to
pots cold water on the story and ? to
discourage the Italian authorities
from pursuing their investigation. tavestigation. -
detailed
years ago, the
C.I.A.
vice-chief of station in Rome
scoffed at Interior Minister Yuginio.
Rogaonl's description of the conspir.
acy to kill the Pope- "You have no"
proof," insisted our man on the scene,
in the presence of an astounded Senate . .
Committee staff member. This dero-
gation paralleled a Soviet campaign to
dissociate the KG.B. from any con.
nection with the deed.
"I think it is absolutely scandal-
ous,? charged Zbigniew Brteziaslsi
after more evidence appeared this
week, "that some officials in the
State Department and some senior of. I
ficials in the C.I.A. were unwitting - ,
or in some cases, perhaps even wit
ting - tools of that campaign."
warned of the imminence of a Soviet
Army move into Poland. The lame-
duck President authorized his na-
tional security adviser to put in a call
to the Pope to brief him on our infor-
mation. Speaking in Polish, Mr. Brze-
zinski and the Pope had a conversa-
tion that was, in Zbig's words, "his-
torically unique."
fully raised suspicion is correct, and
some tools of Russian disiafarmatim
were "witting" - surely a keg shot,
but never to be overlooked - them the
retracing would prove not only good'
management, but good Sec ty.'
Now It is up to the Senate Select
Committee on Intelligence, with Sena-
tors Durenberger and Leahy replacing
Senators Goldwater and Moynihan, to
make certain the agency does the re-
tracing. The purpose is not to embar-
rass, but to correct. If assassination is
a _ weapon the Russians have been
using, in what Pope John'Paul called
today the chain of atrocity that -is
staining the world with blood," we
cannot afford to have naive C.I.A.
operatives in the field: ' . r . 0
nationalism would end the, fncipiea
revolt- Six months later, the.attack cc'.
the Pope took place. , -
Since that time, Mr. Brreizmskl and
an associate ,who was -formerly the:
C.LA: `station chief in 'Ankara" have
been among the few to re
porters to follow this story. This was
in the face of repeated C.I.A-evahw-
tiers given to the Senate Intelligence
Committee, and presumably to the
President, that the "tradecraft. was
too clumsy" for the awn at-
tempt to have involved the Russians.
The conspiracy theorists seems now
to have been right and the official
pooh-poobers wrong.. 7n any well-run'
intelligence agency, an error of this'
magnitude would result in a laborious ?
operation Called "retracing the ?_
analysis. The, purpose would be to .
discover who made what wrrmg as-
sessments, based cm what misleading
..information, from what sources UVW
.to be considered unreliable and
we tried to help the Russians by
'disseminating the mistaken analysis. -
In that way,-the C.I.A.. would. kern
who misinformed our policy. makers
and why. If it was just sloppy work,.'.
the offenders would learn from their
-mikes. If Mr. Brzeziaski's cars.
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/08/27: CIA-RDP90-00552R000505110005-6