Alternative Views - Covert Action (1982)

COVERT ACTION (Part I) Our three-part series on covert action, featuring former CIA official John Stockwell and Louis Wolf, co-editor of Covert Action Information Bulletin, begins with an overview of the general nature and activities of the CIA. We then discuss how the "Intelligence Identities Protection Act" and the Reagan executive order on intelligence agencies would promote media self-censorship and thus repress public scrutiny and criticism of intelligence (including FBI) activities -- including assassination plots, destabilization of foreign governments, and assorted "dirty tricks." John Stockwell explains how this legislation in effect amends the First Amendment by abridging freedoms of speech and press -- without having gone through the constitutional amendment process. Run Time: 59:30 Recorded May, 1982 News: May, 1982 Copyright June, 1983   (NC) COVERT ACTION (Part II) The focus is on specific covert and overt activities of U.S. intelligence agencies and their surrogates: the instruction in torture techniques to Salvadoran army troops by U.S. Green Berets; the attempted coup in the Seychelles Islands; the Argentine torture squads; the South African wars in Angola and Namibia; the attempted Klan coup in Dominica; and attempts to destabilize the Mozambique government -- all of which are reported in Louis Wolf's Covert Action Information Bulletin, which the U.S. government would like to put out of business. We also discuss how CIA "disinformation" tactics manipulate public opinion by planting stories in the press and by financing and supporting right-wing newspapers. Run Time: 59:23 News: June, 1983; May, 1982 Recorded May, 1982 Copyright June, 1983 (NC) COVERT ACTION (Part III) In the concluding segment of our series on covert action we discuss with John Stockwell and Louis Wolf the CIA operations in Central America, including covert operations and "disinformation" campaigns directed against the government of Nicaragua. In addition, we include a report by SANE spokesperson George Humphrey on the nuclear weapons freeze referendum in Austin News: May, 1982; May, 1983; May, 1985 Recorded May, 1982 Copyright June, 1983

Co-hosts: Frank Morrow and Doug Kellner Researcher: Mike Jankowski Technical adviser: Brian Koenigsdorf

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