European spies sought lessons from dictators' brutal 'Operation Condor'
Source: The Guardian
European spies sought lessons from dictators’ brutal ‘Operation Condor’
CIA files show intelligence services wanted to learn from South America’s 1970s campaign of terror against leftwing subversion
Uki Goñi in Buenos Aires
Tue 16 Apr 2019 07.30 BST Last modified on Tue 16 Apr 2019 07.44 BST
British, West German and French intelligence agencies sought advice from South America’s bloody 1970s dictatorships on how to combat leftwing “subversion”, according to a newly declassified CIA document.
The European intelligence services wanted to learn about “Operation Condor,” a secret programme in which the dictatorships of Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay, Chile, Bolivia, Peru and Ecuador conspired to kidnap and assassinate members of leftwing guerrilla groups in each other’s territories.
Exactly how many people died as a result is unknown, but the conspiracy led to the deaths of at least 100 people in Argentina. And according to the CIA document dated 7 April 1978, European spies were keen to find out how it worked.
“Representatives of West German, French and British intelligence services had visited the Condor organization secretariat in Buenos Aires during the month of September 1977 in order to discuss methods for establishment of an anti-subversion organization similar to Condor,” states the document.
“The terrorist/subversive threat had reached such dangerous levels in Europe that they believed it best if they pooled their intelligence resources in a cooperative organization such as Condor,” the Europeans told the Condor secretariat in Buenos Aires, according to the CIA document.
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Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/apr/15/operation-condor-european-spies-dictators-cia-documents
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