EN ESPAÑOL
CIA Agent Captured in Cuba
An employee of a CIA front organization that also funds opposition groups in Venezuela was detained in Cuba last week
By Eva Golinger
An article published in the December 12th edition of the New York Times revealed the detention of a US government contract employee in Havana this past December 5th. The employee, whose name has not yet been disclosed, works for Development Alternatives, Inc. (DAI), one of the largest US government contractors providing services to the State Department, the Pentagon and the US Agency for International Development (USAID). The employee was detained while distributing cellular telephones, computers and other communications equipment to Cuban dissident and counterrevolutionary groups that work to promote US agenda on the Caribbean island.
Last year, the US Congress approved $40 million to “promote transition to democracy” in Cuba. DAI was awarded the main contract, “The Cuba Democracy and Contingency Planning Program”, with oversight by State and USAID. The use of a chain of entities and agencies is a mechanism employed by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to channel and filter funding and strategic political support to groups and individuals that support US agenda abroad. The pretext of “promoting democracy” is a modern form of CIA subversion tactics, seeking to infiltrate and penetrate civil society groups and provide funding to encourage “regime change” in strategically important nations, such as Venezuela, with governments unwilling to subcomb to US dominance.
DAI IN VENEZUELA
DAI was contracted in June 2002 by USAID to manage a multimillion dollar contract in Venezuela, just two months after the failed coup d’etat against President Hugo Chávez. Prior to this date, USAID had no operations in Venezuela, not even an office in the Embassy. DAI was charged with opening the Office for Transition Initiatives (OTI), a specialized branch of USAID that manages large quantities of liquid funds destined for organizations and political parties favorable to Washington in countries of strategic interest that are undergoing political crises.
The first contract between USAID and DAI for its Venezuela operations authorized $10 million for a two year period. DAI opened its doors in the Wall Street of Caracas, El Rosal, in August 2002, and began to immediately fund the same groups that just months earlier had executed - unsuccessfully - the coup against President Chávez. The USAID/DAI funds in Venezuela were distributed to organizations such as Fedecámaras and the Confederación de Trabajadores Venezolanos (CTV), two of the principal entities that had led the coup in April 2002 and that later headed another attempt to oust Chávez by imposing an economic sabotage and oil industry strike that crippled the nation’s economy. One contract between DAI and these organizations, dated December 2002, awarded more than $10,000 to help design radio and television propaganda against President Chávez. During that time period, Venezuela experienced one of the most viscious media wars in history. Private television and radio stations, together with print media, devoted non-stop programming to opposition propaganda for 64 days, 24 hours a day.
In February 2003, DAI began to fund a recently created group named Súmate, led by Maria Corina Machado, one of the signators of the “Carmona Decree”, the famous dictatorial decree that dissolved all of Venezuela’s democratic institutions during the brief April 2002 coup d’etat. Súmate soon became the principal opposition organization directing campaigns against President Chávez, including the August 2004 recall referendum. The three main agencies from Washington operating in Venezuela at that time, USAID, DAI and the National Endowment for Democracy (“NED”), invested more than $9 million in the opposition campaign to oust Chávez via recall referendum, without success. Chávez won with a 60-40 landslide victory.
USAID, which still maintains its presence through the OTI and DAI in Venezuela, had originally announced that it would not remain in the country for more than a two year period. Then chief of the OTI in Venezuela, Ronald Ulrich, publically affirmed this notion in March 2003, “This program will be finished in two years, as has happened with similiar initiatives in other countries, the office will close in the time period stated…Time is always of the essence”. Technically, the OTI are USAID’s rapid response teams, equipped with large amounts of liquid funds and a specialized personnel capable of “resolving a crisis” in a way favorable to US interests. In the document establishing the OTI’s operations in Venezuela, the intentions of those behind its creation were clear, “In recent months, his popularity has waned and political tensions have risen dramatically as President Chávez has implemented several controversial reforms…The current situation augers strongly for rapid US government engagement…”
To date, the OTI still remains in Venezuela, with DAI as its principal contractor. But now, four other entities share USAID’s multimillion dollar pie in Caracas: International Republican Institute (IRI), National Democratic Institute for International Affairs (NDI), Freedom House, and the PanAmerican Development Foundation (PADF). Of the 64 groups funded from 2002-2004 with approximately $5 million annually, today the OTI funds more than 533 organizations, political parties, programs and projects, mainly in opposition sectors, with an annual budget surpassing $7 million. Its presence has not only remained, but has grown. Obviously this is due to one very simple reason: the original objetive has still not been obtained; the overthrow or removal of President Hugo Chávez.
DEVELOPMENT ALTERNATIVES INC. IS A CIA FRONT ORGANIZATION
This organization dedicated to destabilizing governments unfavorable to US interests has now made its appearance in Cuba, with millions of dollars destined to destroy the Cuban revolution. Ex CIA officer Phillip Agee affirmed that DAI, USAID and NED “are instruments of the US Embassy and behind these three organizations is the CIA.“ The contract between USAID and DAI in Venezuela confirms this fact, “The field representative will maintain close collaboration with other embassy offices in identifying opportunities, selecting partners and ensuring the program remains consistent with US foreign policy.” There is no doubt that “selecting partners” is another term for “recluting agents” and “consistent with US foreign policy” means “promoting Washington’s interests”, despite issues of sovereignty. Clearly, all DAI activities are directly coordinated by the US Embassy, a fact which negates the “private” nature of the organization.
The detention of a DAI employee is a very important step to impede destabilization and subversion inside Cuba. This episode also confirms that there has been no change of policy with the Obama Administration towards Cuba - the same tactics of espionage, infiltration and subversion are still being actively employed against one of Washington’s oldest adversaries.
VENEZUELA SHOULD ALSO EXPEL DAI
Now that Cuba has exposed the intelligence operations that DAI was engaging in (recluting agents, infiltrating political groups and distributing resources destined to promote destabilization and regime change are all intelligence activities and illegal), the Venezuelan government should respond firmly by expelling this grave threat from the country. DAI has now been operating in Venezuela for over seven and a half years, feeding the conflict with more than $50 million dollars and promoting destabilization, counterrevolution, media warfare and sabotage.
In an ironic twist, currently in the United States five Cuban citizens are imprisoned on charges of alleged espionage, yet their actions in US territory were not directed towards harming US interests. But the DAI employee detained in Cuba - working for a CIA front company - was engaged in activities intended to directly harm and destabilize the Cuban government. The distribution of materials to be used for political purposes by a foreign government with the intent of promoting regime change in a nation not favorable to US interests is clearly a violation of sovereignty and an act of espionage.
Development Alternatives, Inc. is one of the largest US government contractors in the world. Currently, DAI has a $50 million contract in Afghanistan. In Latin America, DAI is presently operating in Bolivia, Brasil, Colombia, Cuba, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Haití, Honduras, México, Nicaragua, Perú, República Dominicana and Venezuela.
[All references in this article to DAI in Venezuela are thoroughly documented in The Chávez Code: Cracking US Intervention in Venezuela by Eva Golinger (Olive Branch Press 2006).]
6 comments:
The same thing they are doing in Venezuela and Cuba is being done in Puerto Rico. But in Puerto Rico it is more blatant where individuals in senate committees literally send money to political parties. I sent a letter to a senator who told me that congress funds billions of dollars to promote opposition parties in Cuba. In Puerto Rico the political parties are funding by outside politicians who work in the United States government.
For a detailed explanation of how these operations are carried out, from one who certainly knows having done it himself, I recommend reading Philip Agee's 2003 essay on Terrorism and Civil Society, posted to Counterpunch.
http://www.counterpunch.org/agee08092003.html
Dear Ms. Golinger,
I always enjoy your articles and was very pleased recently to learn about international appraisal of your work as a revolutionary journalist; nevertheless there are some unpleasant details in supposedly friendly media coverage of Bolivarian revolution which I would like you to be aware of.
It concerns your colleagues at „Venezuelanalysis“. I attempted many times to approach (and later to challenge) them proposing a serious, open discussion of the basics of social revolutionary transformation of society - and every time received no reply. I guess that it is because they cannot bear criticism of marxism, for they did publish some comments of mine, written deliberately in some rather naively-enthusiastic key.
Well, it is my impression that they are very happy having absolutely nothing to analyse - all their recipes and prayers were composed by Marx 1.5 centuries ago, and there should be no deviation or discussion anymore. If reality contradicts dogmatic abstractions of marxism, so it is the fault of reality and of those who notice this. Marxists have no strong arguments, therefore they silence their critics. This is, certainly, a purely religious attitude, a mild replica of the „Holy Inquisition‘s“ standard operating procedure - burning those who dare to criticize (sinners and witches) at stake. This marxist intolerance of criticism is very well known to me, as I was born in Soviet Union, where marxists nicely arranged the restoration of capitalism in 1989.
Last week I tried three times to post a critical comment on the proposal of the „5th International“ at „Venezuelanalysis“, each time as a reply to a different article praising this idea. Small wonder that it was not published. Frankly, I am tired of dealing with people who pretend to possess the monopoly of the ultimate truth and resort to censorship in an attempt to avoid open discussion.
Therefore I think it would be fair to put my letter on your site for the consideration of those who might be interested. For further information please see my „blogspot“ with references, as well as an excellent book by William M. Baum „Understanding Behaviorism“.
With kindest behaviorist-socialist regards,
Alexei Brykowski
The text of my triple-censored (or “ignored”) letter to „Venezuelanalysis“ follows:
The text of my triple-censored (or “ignored”) letter to „Venezuelanalysis“ follows:
“THE „5th INTERNATIONAL“? - DEAR MR. CHAVEZ, HAVEN‘T YOU GOT ENOUGH PROBLEMS WITHOUT IT?
I could expect the desire to resurrect the cadaver of marxist religious cult from almost anyone - but certainly not from Mr. Chavez. Does he really need an international bunch of marxist priests - intellectuals and party functionaries, all these petty-bourgeois spit-lickers who applauded every hollow word of senile and decrepit Mr. Brezhnev, but several years later on not only did nothing against the destruction of Soviet socialism but gave their traditionally undivided „ideological“, i.e. demagogical support to the treacherous politics of Gorbachev and Yelzin?
Marxism is dead already many decades, at least since 1917 with Lenin’s implementation of the Russian socialist revolution, which contradicted and made null and void all dogmas and prescriptions of marxism. But Lenin had to gain support from all sorts of socialist and communist sympathizers in his struggle against Western imperialist military intervention - therefore he was compelled at least to pay lip-service to the ideology of marxism. The same also applies to writings of such presumably “marxist” thinkers as Gramsci, Mariategui and Gaitan.
All practical socialist revolutionaries after Lenin - Mao, Tito, Ho-Chi-Minh, Kim-Il-Sung, Lumumba, Bandaranaike, Seku Ture, Castro, Che, Allende, Neto, Machel etc. etc. emerged under the shadow of marxism and had to follow the same behavioral pattern: They all implemented socialist politics which served (good or bad is another issue) the needs of their particular people, but were compelled to demonstrate „good manners“ and proclaim their adherence to marxism. Comparing them with non-marxist social revolutionaries, such as Peron, Gandhi, Ghaddafi or Khomeini we can’t find any special differences either in immediate nor in long-term results of their rule.
Bearing in mind the fact that half-century-long compulsory marxist indoctrination of hundreds-million-strong peoples of Soviet bloc and China didn’t prevent them from naively embracing the restoration of capitalism, there is nothing to be said about marxism but that NOW - at last - it is as dead as a doornail! Marxist lifeless abstractions can serve nowadays only the interests of counterrevolution by messing-up revolutionary politics. Politics need clear understanding of actual situation and not the nebulous hegelian-marxist „ideas“ which were already wrong at their inception in the mid-19th century. Please see an excellent book written by Sergei Kara-Murza: „Marx against Russian Revolution“ for an eye-opening account of uneasy relations between revolutionaries and the priests of marxist dogmas.
Mr. Chavez, in my humble understanding of your „21st century socialism“ it should be the socialism which pays attention to political praxis, to the BEHAVIOR both of the people and of the leaders whom the people entrust to act as protagonists on the arena of social life, and not to the mind-boggling postmodernist interpretations of the defunct ideology of Marx. It should be the socialism of deeds, not words, it should be the behaviorist socialism, as I propose it on my site http://behaviorist-socialist.blogspot.com/
With kindest behaviorist-socialist regards,
Alexei Brykowski“
behaviorist-socialist? Lets just call you BS, k? Thankyou for the lesson on how not to arrange one's thoughts on a page. I've learned a lot from your example.
Unfortunate turn of events for the cia. Hopefully, the person learns his or her lesson. Pretty sure they plan to send someone in their place...or even facial reconstruction.
Satin will not stop coming, take care of him.
Keep the faith.
Post a Comment