JIMMY'S TALE OF RUSSIAN DECEIT

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000101020068-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: June 28, 2010
• Sequence Number: 68
• Publication Date: January 14, 1980
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/06/28: CIA-RDP90-00552R000101020068-5
ON >?a:.;^ Z - 14 14 January 1980
ARTICLE APFE--R-':D
PERISCOPE
JIMMY'S TALE OF iW531AN DEW i
Jimmy Carter's hot-line exchange with Leonid Brezhnev over,
Afghanistan was not 'his first personal encounter with Soviet
duplicity. In the summer of 1978, Carter told White House
visitors about an experience with Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei
Gromyko, who had come to the Oval Office to discuss the;,
pending SALT II negotiations. Sitting on Carter's desk at that
moment was an intelli ence re ort so detailed-and accurate-
that it not only supplied c apter and verse on Soviet involvement
in Ethiopia's war against the Somalis, but named a Russian
general who had been taken ill in Africa and rushed back to
Moscow. Carter repeated the incriminating data to Gromyko,
who listened stoically and replied in effect: "Mr. President, what
general? What troops? We have no troops in Ethiopia." Telling
the story to his guests, Carter ended by saying: "And that man sat
there and lied to me. He lied to my face. I just can't imagine an
American diplomat doing that sort of thing."
AMO7a!. R IITELLIG V?CE FAI W'RI?
As in the aftermath of the Iranian revolution that toppled the
Shah, Washington is disturbed by the apparent inadequacy of
U.S. intelligence on the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. The CIA
and the Joint Chiefs of Staff are conducting a quiet postmortem to
find out why they missed a massive mobilization of Russian
forces. Almost up to the moment of the invasion, U.S. analysts
reported only 15,000 Soviet troops in position for a possible move
across the Afghan border. Yet 50,000 troops took part in the
invasion. Several thousand were transported from Baltic bases in
Western Russia to Central Asia, and the movement of those
troops either escaped U.S. detection or failed to cause any alarm.
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/06/28: CIA-RDP90-00552R000101020068-5