LSD Experiments, Castro Death Plot, Home Break-Ins Among CIA Secrets Exposed In Files

[babylonsister]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/huff-wires/20070626/cia-family-jewels-glance/

Some Examples of CIA Misconduct

June 26, 2007 08:09 PM EST | AP

WASHINGTON — Some examples of CIA misconduct described in 693 pages of documents released by agency Tuesday:

One plot against Fidel Castro:

CIA Office of Security Director Howard Osborn described a plot begun in August 1960 to kill the Cuban dictator. Ex-FBI agent Robert Maheu, a top aide to Howard Hughes in Las Vegas, was recruited to approach mobster Johnny Roselli and pass himself off as the representative of international corporations who wanted Castro killed because he'd caused financial losses for their Cuban operations.

Roselli was to be told the U.S. government should never hear of the plot. Roselli introduced Maheu to "Sam Gold" and "Joe," who were actually 10-most wanted mobsters Salvatore Giancana, Al Capone's successor in Chicago, and Santos Trafficante. The mobsters turned down $150,000 and worked for free. CIA gave them six poison pills; they tried unsuccessfully for several months to have several people put them in the Cuban leader's food. This particular plot was dropped after the failed CIA-sponsored Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba, but other plots continued against Castro although they are not detailed in these documents.

At one point, Giancana asked Maheu to bug the Las Vegas hotel room of entertainer Dan Rowan to see if Giancana's girlfriend, singer Phyllis McGuire, was sexually intimate with Rowan. The technician, however, was arrested planting the bug and Osborn's office eventually had to tell Attorney General Robert Kennedy how the episode came about in order to get the Justice Department to drop charges against Maheu and the technician.

___

Studies of U.S. radicals:

The documents reflect the CIA's interest in Students for a Democratic Society. The radical left-wing group had chapters on major college campuses around the country.

In a document entitled "SDS and other student activist groups," the CIA said that it produced a 30-page study of the organization "and its foreign ties."

The agency produced another paper entitled "Restless Youth," including a "most sensitive section" that "was a philosophical treatment of student unrest, its motivation, history and tactics.

"It drew heavily on overt literature and FBI reporting on SDS and affiliated groups," the document said. Another section of the report comprised "19 chapters on foreign student dissidence."

more...

[HCE SuiGeneris]

1. This whole report is a manufactured distraction for the media and their audience.

Pisses me off to no end. :mad:

[babylonsister]

6. I don't think it's 'manufactured' at all. By introducing this crap, they want

the hordes to realize it's no big deal regarding what's going on now. And THAT pisses me off. It was wrong then, it's wrong now.

[HCE SuiGeneris]

8. A perspective I hadn't contemplated...

too much underhanded crap spewing out of "our" government either way.

[frylock]

9. limited hangout

[Kingshakabobo]

2. Hey, I just saw this movie last night - "The Good Shepard" n/t

[pitohui]

3. ha i knew it!

who hasn't heard these rumors for years and years?

[WinkyDink]

4. The timing is to smear JFK, and put a "they all do it" veneer over Bushco's crimes.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

5. The CIA hates us for our freedoms. But, they hate everybody for their freedoms.

Bunch of murderous, cowardly, thugs.

[LeighAnn]

7. Dan Rowan?!

Too bad he's not still around to get his reaction to this news!

[frylock]

10. i read about all this in a book published in 2004 entitled 'the strength of the wolf'..

this book is drier than 3 day-old toast, but Valentine goes into some detail about the Castro assassination attempt and MKULTRA. Lots of players.

The Strength of the Wolf: The Secret History of America's War on Drugs

Before the Drug Enforcement Administration was created in 1973, before the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs was founded in 1968, the Federal Bureau of Narcotics (FBN) served as the country’s primary drug law enforcement agency. In this thoroughly researched history, Valentine (The Phoenix Program; The Hotel Tacloban, etc.) offers an in-depth look at the FBN’s obscure organization and its various activities, which lasted from 1930 until the end of the ‘60s. Valentine writes extensively about Harry J. Anslinger, the commissioner whose "personality, policies and appointments" defined the agency and the government’s war on drugs for more than 30 years. He describes how FBN officers were trained to "make arrests, gather evidence for presentation in court, test and handle seized narcotics, tail suspects without being seen, and rule their informants with an iron fist." Drawing upon interviews with former agents and federal officers (such as Howard Chappell, George Gaffney and Col. Tully Acampora), Valentine also provides firsthand accounts of bureau operations both at home and abroad, and of business relationships fostered among FBN ranks. Despite the volume’s ambitious premise and Valentine’s hard work, however, this lengthy history will probably fail to engross most casual readers since its material proves dense and, occasionally, difficult. But for political historians and those already interested in the history of the war on drugs, Valentine’s unearthing of rare primary sources should prove invaluable.