MAGAZINE ARTICLES CITED IN KGB-FREEZE LINK

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000505410017-0
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 16, 2010
• Sequence Number: 17
• Publication Date: November 13, 1982
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/09/16: CIA-RDP90-00552R000505410017-0
A.' 5
THE WASHINGTCN POST
13 NOVEMBER 1982
Magazine Articles Cite
KGB-Freeze Link
By Joanne Omang
Wut ngton Post Staff Writer
The White House, challenged yesterday to pro-
duce documentation for President Reagan's
charge that Soviet agents are manipulating the
U.S. nuclear freeze movement, produced a list
that included two Reader's Digest articles as well
as State Department reports.
One of the Reader's Digest articles, by senior
editor John Barron and published in October, says
the Soviet KGB intelligence agency "helped orga-
nize and inaugurate" the freeze campaign.
In an interview, Barron refused to identify what
he said were "three intelligence and/or security
services" that were his sources, but he added: "I
have reason to believe that the president made
very extensive inquiries, before he spoke, on the
facts in that article."
Freeze advocates, meanwhile, were outraged,by
the charge, which Reagan made at his Thursday
night news conference.
Reuben McCornack, Washington spokesman
for the Nuclear Weapons Freeze Campaign, called
it "a red herring" produced to divert public atten.
tion from the international arms race.
Morton Halperin, director of the American
Civil Liberties Union's Center for National Secu-
rity Studies, accused Reagan of "returning to the
tactics of McCarthyism," referring to the virulent
anticommunist campaign of the late Sen. Joseph
McCarthy (R-Wis.) in the 1950s.
Sen. Mark 0. Hatfield (R-Ore.), who cospon-
sored a call for a nuclear freeze with Sen. Edward
M. Kennedy (D-Mass.), said he would demand
that Reagan produce the names of the agents. "I
fought the communists in China when I was with
the Navy," Hatfield said. "I fought them on the
platforms in a debate on an ideological basis. I
just haven't found one in the nuclear freeze move-
ment."
In his press conference Thursday night, Reagan
said the Soviet Union "saw an advantage in a
peace movement built around the idea of a nucle-
ar freeze." He added: "There is no question about
foreign agents that were sent to help instigate and
help create and keep such a movement going."
Reagan said there was "plenty of evidence. It's
even been published by some of your [journalistic)
fraternity."
He had charged in October that the freeze was
"inspired by ... some who want the weakening of
America." But nearly 11 million voters in eight
states and the District of Columbia endorsed bal-
lot measures earlier this month calling for a bilat-
eral weapons freeze despite strong administration
opposition.
Briefing reporters yesterday, White House
spokesman Larry Speakes listed "considerable
U.S. government documentation" for the charge,
beginning with twd State Department "special re-
ports" on Soviet "active measures" and two de-
partment "foreign affairs notes," one titled "World
Peace Council: Instrument of Soviet Foreign Pol-
icy," and the other on the expulsion of Soviet rep-
resentatives from foreign countries since 1970.
"Soviet efforts to exploit the well-motivated
intentions of those in other nations who are seek-
ing peace are well known," Speakes said.
He mentioned a House Intelligence Committee
report of February, 1980, called "Soviet Covert
Action," and then ticked off four magazine arti-
cles: the Readers' Digest pieces, a May article in
Commentary and a June article in The American
Spectator.
Asked if Reagan had read all the State Depart-
ment material, Speakes responded, "He's certainly
aware of it." He added, however, that he was "not
sure" whether Reagan was familiar with all the
magazine articles.
The book excerpt by Barron, a former Navy
intelligence officer, describes "active measures
campaigns" by the KGB "to make people support
Soviet policy unwittingly by convincing them they
are supporting something else."
"Today, the KGB is concentrating on one of the
largest 'active measures' campaigns mounted since
World War II. Its objective is to secure military
superiority for the Soviet Union by persuading the
United States to abandon new weapons systems,"
the article continues. "The name of the campaign
is the nuclear freeze."
After the late Soviet President Leonid I. Brezh-
nev called for a freeze in February. 1981, Barron
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/09/16: CIA-RDP90-00552R000505410017-0