UNDENIABLE TERROR

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000505120005-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 15, 2010
• Sequence Number: 5
• Publication Date: December 21, 1983
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/09/15 :CIA-RDP90-005528000505120005-5
taALL STREET JOURNAL
21 December 1983
1Ld~~T~~~~ ~ ~ ~LJ ~~~?~
~Jndeniable Terror
A Turk named Agca shot the pope.
t~'hy? Because the KGB, under Yuri
Andropov, paid him to do it.
.That may well be the verdict of an
Italian court next year. Judge Ilario
Martella, who's spent two years inves-
tigating the role of Bulgarian agents
in the attempt on the pope's life, com-
pleted his report. last week. The trial
on "active complicity" charges could
begin this spring against Sergei An-
tonov, a Bulgarian airline official-
cum-spy based in Rome. This would
tie xhe first official airing of evidence
pointing in the direction of Yuri-know-
who. Incredible? Yes. But, after con-
sidering the evidence, not unbeliev-
able.
Agca has admitted he didn't act
alone, telling reporters this summer,
"in the attack against the pope even
the KGB took part." We now have two
new books filling in the cracks in the
Bulgarian connection theory. Former
national security staffer Paul Henze's
"The ~ Plot to Kill the Pope"
(Scrfbner's) is already reaching the
bookstores. And Claire .Sterling, the
Rome-based American journalist who
.wrote the Reader's Digest article that
presented the first evidence of the
Bulgarian connection, is about to pub-
lish "The Time of the Assassins"
tAoit, Rinehart & Winston) ,excerpted
nearby.
It seems reasonably certain that
Ica was brought to t1?~e Communists
thrcu~h the Bulgarian-controlled arms
and drub smubglin-g in and out of Tur-
kel, and by the promise of big bucks.
And more particularly through Abuzer
Ugurlu, a Turkish- Mafia don who op-
erates from Sofia, Bulgaria. Ugurlu
has also been a Bulgarian spy since
1514, according .to U.S. intelligence.
. He runs drugs t~h Bul aria from
Turkey to Western Europe for pro ~t.
garia to release Antonov from prison
for "health reasons." But so far the
Italians have taken the- drugs?arms-
So~net terror link seriously, and so
should others.
VGfiat is needed in most V4~estern
nations is some political will to over-
come what might be called the "cult
of denial." The West seems generally
to have tuned out the plot on the pope,
"yellow rain" and other Soviet arms-
contro] violations in much the same
way it dismissed early reports of Sta-
lin's purges and Hitler's concentration
camps.. Admittedly the answers to
such cruel truths are not ~ easy to
frame, but surely the first step is to
stop. denying the .dangers we face.
Agca is recruited by a left-using
group. He spends the summer of 1977
i~r a PLO trainin.,q camp in Lebanon.
By December 1977 someone or some
organization opens a bank account in
his name. In January 1979 he con-
fesses to killing Abdi Ipekci, a left-
ist Turkish journalist, and gains right-
wing credentials. In November 1979
he escapes from jail, thanks to Abuzer
Ugurlu, who also arranges a false
passport. -He spends an all-expenses
paid summer at a hotel in Sofia.
There Agca meets one of Ugurlu's as-
sociates, who offers him $1.3 million
to kill the pope. while in Rome, Agca
is "run" by Bulgarian Rome secret
service chief Antonov, who drives
Agca to St. Peter's Square th.e day of
the shooting.
So Agca was a highly trained hit
man at the disposal of the Bulgarians.
The motive of Bulgaria's spymaster,
the KGB? Poland. The .Kremlin
feared that .the Carter White Honse
had arranged the election of Pope
John Paul II, and that his plan was to
help Solidarity lead an East bloc re-
volt against the Soviets.
This tale of spies and conspiracies
~is gripping, but there is an even more
sobering part of the story. The second
half of the Sterling book is entitled
"Publishing the Plot, Disturbing the
Peace." She describes how. U.S. and
other.. Western officials have pooh-
poohed the' Bulgarian link, and ig?
pored strong evidence: It is striking
how much distance Western govern-
ments have apparently put between
themselves and any real investiga-
tions. -
What we-know about Agca we owe
to the courage of Italian judges, who
live in bunkered homes to avs~id as-
sassinations, and who have all but
And he packs his trucks with weapons , neutralized the Red Brigades. Like
for ~t_ he return trip to Turkey,.helpinc ` Turkey, Italy has been a prime target
the Seviets tn~to to..pple.~de: ~ of So~~iei,terror exports. Prime ~Minis-
~,p ra v. ~ ter Bettino Craxi made drug-running
- . ZZra