REAGAN'S 'FOREIGN AGENT' CLAIM ABOUT FREEZE BASED ON MAGAZINE STORY

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00806R000100130065-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: May 24, 2011
• Sequence Number: 65
• Publication Date: November 17, 1982
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/05/25: CIA-RDP90-00806R000100130065-5
ASSOCIATED PRESS
17 November 1982
Reagan's 'Foreign Agent' Claim About Freeze Based on Magazine
.By MICHAEL PUTZEL, Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON
President Reagan's claim that Soviet agents are partly behind the American
campaign for a nuclear weapons freeze was apparently based on similar
allegations about the peace movement in Western Europe and on an article in
Reader's Digest, one of his favorite magazines.
When Reagan's assertion at a news conference last week was questioned, the
White House produced a list of published materials in an attempt to document the
president's statement. Those materials, however, contain few references to the
domestic freeze campaign. And what little evidence they do cite relates to the
charge that the Soviet Union has sought to stir up opposition to deployment of
the neutron warhead and modern nuclear weapons in Europe.
According to the White House press office, Reagan also had in mind a recent
Reader's Digest article when he told reporters that "there is plenty of
evidence" that foreign agents have helped organize major pro-freeze
demonstrations.
That article, written by John Barron and published in the October issue,
named five Soviet officials, three of them United Nations diplomats, one embassy
official and an official of the Soviet Institute for the U.S.A. and Canada who
were said to have participated in disarmament conferences in the United
States. The article identified them as agents of the KGB, the Soviet secret
Police.
Shorty after the allegations appeared, however, leaders of the freeze
.rovement charged that they were misleading because the officials-named had been
invited to appear and present their nation's views during public programs and
had not participated in the planning or organization of the events.
Reagan's charges have drawn demands, in Congress and elsewhere, for hard
evidence of infiltration. Sen. Gary Hart, D-Colo., and a member of the Armed
Services Committee, asked Chairman John Tower, R-Texas, on Wednesday to request
the administration to produce its proof at a closed hearing. "The conclusions
the president has drawn from this evidence are so serious that I believe he
should share it ... with the Armed Services Committee," Hart said. Tower did not
immediately answer the written request.
When Reagan was pressed for more detail at his news conference, he said, "I
can't go beyond what I've done because I don't discuss intelligence matters." A
well-placed White House official said, however, that the information to which
Reagan was referring served only to further document what was in the published
reports.
Earlier, Sen. Mark Hatfield, R-Ore., a sponsor of a nuclear freeze
resolution, declared that "I have not seen or been aware of any communist or KGB
member (in the movement) and I've literally looked behind the doors and in the
closet. If President Reagan has evidence of infiltration, he owes it to the
American people ... to disclose the evidence so that we may eject or expel those
infiltrators."
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/05/25: CIA-RDP90-00806R000100130065-5