Terrorism In The Cold War: State Support In Eastern Europe And The Soviet Sphere Of Influence [1, 1st Edition] 0755600231, 9780755600236, 0755636562, 9780755636563, 0755600258, 9780755600250, 075560024X, 9780755600243

Citation preview

TERRORISM IN THE COLD WAR

ii 

TERRORISM IN THE COLD WAR State Support in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Sphere of Influence

Edited by Adrian Hänni, Thomas Riegler and Przemyslaw Gasztold

I.B. TAURIS Bloomsbury Publishing Plc 50 Bedford Square, London, WC1B 3DP, UK 1385 Broadway, New York, NY 10018, USA BLOOMSBURY, I.B. TAURIS and the I.B. Tauris logo are trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc First published in Great Britain 2021 Copyright © Adrian Hänni, Thomas Riegler, Przemyslaw Gasztold, 2021 Adrian Hänni, Thomas Riegler and Przemyslaw Gasztold have asserted their right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Author of this work. Cover design by Adriana Brioso Cover images © UWE MEINHOLD/DDP/AFP/Getty Images; jsteck/iStock All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. Bloomsbury Publishing Plc does not have any control over, or responsibility for, any thirdparty websites referred to or in this book. All internet addresses given in this book were correct at the time of going to press. The author and publisher regret any inconvenience caused if addresses have changed or sites have ceased to exist, but can accept no responsibility for any such changes. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. A catalogue record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. ISBN: HB: 978-0-7556-0023-6     ePDF: 978-0-7556-0025-0    eBook: 978-0-7556-0024-3 Typeset by Deanta Global Publishing Services, Chennai, India To find out more about our authors and books visit www.bloomsbury.com and sign up for our newsletters.

CONTENTS Volume I State Support in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Sphere of Influence

Chapter 1 INTRODUCTION: STATE SUPPORT FOR TERRORIST ACTORS IN THE COLD WAR – MYTHS AND REALITY (PART 1) Adrian Hänni

1

Chapter 2 THE KGB’S ABDUCTION PROGRAMME AND THE PFLP: ON THE CUSP BETWEEN INTELLIGENCE AND TERRORISM Isabella Ginor and Gideon Remez

21

Chapter 3 SOVIET APPROACHES TO MUSLIM EXTREMISM AND TERRORISM Michael Fredholm

41

Chapter 4 PALESTINIAN TERRORISM AND THE STATE SECURITY OF THE GDR: ABU NIDAL BETWEEN EAST BERLIN, MOSCOW AND WASHINGTON 1973–89 Tobias Wunschik

61

Chapter 5 POLISH MILITARY INTELLIGENCE AND ITS SECRET RELATIONSHIP WITH THE ABU NIDAL ORGANIZATION Przemysław Gasztold

85

Chapter 6 CARLOS THE JACKAL IN PRAGUE: COMMUNIST CZECHOSLOVAKIA AND INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM – A CASE STUDY Pavel Žáček

107

vi Contents

Chapter 7 HUNGARIAN STATE SECURITY AND INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM IN THE 1980s Balázs Orbán-Schwarzkopf

123

Chapter 8 BULGARIAN STATE SECURITY AND INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM Jordan Baev

143

Chapter 9 YUGOSLAVIA, CARLOS ‘THE JACKAL’ AND INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM DURING THE COLD WAR Gordan Akrap

167

Chapter 10 NORTH KOREA’S ‘TERRORISM’ AND ‘COUNTERTERRORISM’ IN THE LATE 1980s Bernd Schaefer

185

About the Authors 195 Select Bibliography 198 Index 205

CChapter 1 INTRODUCTION STATE SUPPORT FOR TERRORIST ACTORS IN THE COLD WAR – MYTHS AND REALITY (PART 1) Adrian Hänni

Accounts of the relationships between states and terrorist organizations1 in the Cold War era have long been shaped by speculation, a lack of primary sources and even conspiracy theories. The scholarship on the issue goes back to the Cold War era itself and, in fact, has been shaped by the Cold War beyond the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the East–West conflict. In the last few years, however, things have evolved rapidly. Several original research projects for a wide range of states, areas and time periods, which are based on archival documents, have shed new light on the relations between government actors and terrorists. The new body of research demonstrates that these relationships were not only much more ambiguous, complex and multilayered than much of the older literature had suggested but also, in fact, crucial for the understanding of global political history during the Cold War era. By offering the reader new insights into state involvement with terrorist organizations, this book aims to present the current state of research, provide a preliminary assessment and blaze a path for further studies. The contributions focus on the European states on both sides of the Iron Curtain – with some excursions into the Middle East, the Americas, East Asia and South Asia – during the 1970s and 1980s. This period seems to be ideal to study the relations between state and terrorist actors, considering that in those two decades almost every major terrorist organization had some ties to at least one supportive government.2 State involvement seems to be a relevant factor for assessing today’s terrorist threats as well. Chris Quillen concludes that, compared to groups without relations to state actors, ‘state-sponsored terrorists would appear both more able and more willing to kill in large numbers’.3 Moreover, as Bruce Hoffman recognized in 2006 in his classic book Inside Terrorism, ‘Today, state sponsorship of terrorism continues unabated.’4 As Daniel Byman argued convincingly, state actors often attempt to use jihadist militants engaged in terrorist violence ‘to bolster allied regimes, weaken rivals, and placate opinion at home. Many more states simply tolerate their activity to avoid alienating powerful domestic constituencies or because they pay no

2

Terrorism in the Cold War

political or diplomatic price for their support.’5 Without this active or passive state support, Byman claims, groups like the Islamic State would have been far weaker. Interviews with several dozen defectors from the Islamic State, conducted by a team of researchers led by Anne Speckhard, seem to confirm this judgement as they detail mutual support and deals between the Islamic State and Syrian state actors.6 Moreover, Abu Mansour al-Maghrebi, who apparently acted as the group’s informal ambassador to Turkey, describes a ‘diplomacy where both sides benefit’ with the NATO country. According to al-Maghrebi, negotiations between ‘ISIS diplomats’ and Turkish intelligence led to political deals, in which the Islamic State agreed to refrain from attacks within Turkey, and to conduct proxy attacks against Kurdish forces, in return for water supplies and medical support, including the treatment of wounded fighters in Turkish hospitals.7 While this evidence of a secret deal between Turkey’s National Intelligence Organization and the Islamic State still needs to be corroborated by additional source material, the apparent deal strikingly resembles some of the agreements that Eastern and Western states made with terrorist organizations during the Cold War. The Yemeni government under President Ali Saleh, in turn, has apparently struck a deal with violent jihadists in its country, allowing them to travel to Iraq after 2003 to join the insurgency in return for their renunciation of attacks at home. Regional expert Gregory Johnsen described this understanding as a ‘tacit non-aggression pact’.8 There is convincing evidence that the Yemeni government later allowed Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) to renew itself in the late 2000s, in order to exploit the group as a ‘scarecrow’ to obtain international support, especially from the United States, and to use it against the regime’s domestic opponents.9 Even the war in Afghanistan has been shaped and sustained by the support provided to the Taliban and the Haqqani network by state actors, especially Pakistan’s Inter-Service Intelligence (ISI).10 These examples show that understanding cooperative state–terrorism relations remains a highly relevant subject for scholars and policymakers. A historical approach, as it is pursued in this book, allows for an examination based on archival documents and a rigid analysis of the primary source material. Such standards are necessary to investigate a topic that has too often been shrouded in rumours, disinformation and even conspiracy theories, as the following introduction will demonstrate.

Cold War myths Between the late 1970s and the second half of the 1980s, numerous publications appeared on the subject of state involvement in the violent acts of terrorist groups. This first body of research focused mainly on ‘state sponsorship’ of terrorism as a type of covert warfare and interpreted terrorist actors as ‘proxies’, ‘surrogates’ or ‘subcontractors’ of state actors. At the same time, governments on both sides of the Iron Curtain frequently accused each other of sponsoring, if not directing, the various international terrorist organizations.



1. Introduction

3

In early 1981, the incoming Reagan administration used ‘terrorism’ essentially as a synonym for communism and started employing the idea of Soviet-directed international terrorism as an ideological construct to build a new domestic consensus to relaunch the Cold War and return to a more interventionist foreign policy challenging the Soviet Union.11 In a canonical article in the January issue of Commentary, Jeane Kirkpatrick, the new ambassador to the United Nations, proposed the idea of Soviet-directed terrorism in Latin America as an opportunity to reinterpret the East–West conflict in ideological terms, reconstruct the Soviet Union as the present danger, and bring back the lost fear of communism. That way, Kirkpatrick argued, a political basis for a military build-up, foreign interventions – and, more specifically, military and economic aid for dictatorships in Latin America – could be created on the domestic front.12 At the same time, Harvard professor Richard Pipes, who joined the NSC staff, outlined ‘international terrorism’ as a discursive power strategy for the Reagan administration. Pipes recommended that the new government exposed as widely as possible the Soviet Union’s support for terrorism ‘because terrorism is a handy and relatively cheap weapon in their arsenal to destroy Western societies’.13 When the new NSC principals came together with key figures of the intelligence community for a first meeting in the White House on 24 January 1981 to discuss the threat posed by terrorism, Secretary of State Alexander Haig claimed that the roots of all ‘state-sponsored terrorism’ were without a doubt in the Soviet Union.14 Four days later Haig went public: at his first press conference as Secretary of State, he announced that ‘terrorism’ would be the top priority of the administration’s foreign policy and explained the paradigm shift by claiming that the Soviets were supporting international terrorism.15 Other principals of the Reagan administration, such as National Security Advisor Richard Allen and the president himself, soon asserted publicly that ‘international terrorism’ was directed by the Soviet Union as a Cold War weapon to undermine Western democracies.16 The same image was evoked repeatedly in much-noticed Senate hearings and through the Reagan administration’s public diplomacy efforts.17 The administration’s rhetoric was mirrored in terrorism research. In early 1981, the American journalist Claire Sterling published The Terror Network. According to the bestseller, which received vast attention from major US media, the Sovietcontrolled network consisted of about 140 terrorist groups from fifty different countries. The global conspiracy included the Red Army Faction (RAF), the Red Brigades, the Irish Republican Army (IRA), Euskadi Ta Askatasuna (ETA), ‘Carlos the Jackal’ and the Libyan strongman Muammar al-Gaddafi. The KGB trained, financed, and equipped the terrorists and employed the groups as ‘elite battalions in a worldwide Army of Communist Combat’ to destabilize and, if possible, dismantle the West’s democratic societies.18 In the following years, numerous books and studies argued along the lines of Sterling that ‘international terrorism’ was controlled by the Soviet Union.19 The Terror Network was one of the most cited works in terrorism research during the 1980s,20 and the reverberations of the conspiracy theory have hardly fallen silent in the years after the Cold War came to a close. As late as 2007, the German

4

Terrorism in the Cold War

scholar Michael Ploetz claimed that ‘the analysis of Soviet grand strategy proves that the support for terrorism and right-wing extremism was an inherent part’ of the offensive ‘with which Brezhnev’s politburo wanted to win the system rivalry’ and to destroy bourgeois society. According to this Soviet plan, Ploetz claimed, left-wing terrorist organizations such as the RAF, the Red Brigades, and Action Directe were supposed to act as a vanguard.21 On the other hand, a mirror-symmetric conspiratorial narrative about ‘international terrorism’ was put forward by pro-Soviet intelligence services, a global network of communist propaganda fronts and sympathizers, as well as leftwing activists and intellectuals in the West. According to this myth, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and other Western intelligence services were the masterminds orchestrating international terrorism, especially right-wing political violence.22 In this vein, left-wing milieus regularly saw right-wing terrorist attacks as part of a conspiracy between right-wing militants, the security services of their countries and often the CIA. Especially in Italy, the left claimed that right-wing terrorism was part of a plot tolerated or even actively supported by Italian state authorities to block the socialists and communists from gaining power and to establish an authoritarian regime. The CIA was believed to be the real ‘puppet master’ behind this alleged conspiracy against Italy.23 The post–Cold War legacy of such narratives are some of the more conspiratorial accounts of ‘Gladio’, which insinuated that the stay-behind structures established in most non-socialist states in Europe after the Second World War had formed a terrorist network coordinated by NATO and the CIA.24 This book provides a factual analysis of the Gladio case by Thomas Riegler. An exemplary, and highly symbolic, example of the parallel but diametrically opposed propagandistic efforts is the literature on the attempted assassination of Pope John Paul II. On 13 May 1981, the Turkish assassin and former Grey Wolves militant Mehmet Ali Agca shot and severely wounded the pontiff on the Vatican’s St Peter’s Square. In the following years, intelligence services, propagandists and scholars on both sides of the Iron Curtain blamed their respective Cold War enemy for the terrorist attack. The Western narrative of the Bulgarian Connection, claiming that the Bulgarian intelligence service and the KGB had directed Agca to kill the pope who had been seen as a threat to communist rule in Poland,25 was soon challenged by an Eastern narrative, fuelled by disinformation of East German and Bulgarian intelligence services, that alleged that the CIA had orchestrated the assassination attempt in order to implicate Bulgaria and the Soviet Union.26 There is, so far, no convincing evidence for state support for the papal assassination plot. To the contrary, the available archival source material very strongly suggests that neither the East Bloc intelligence services nor the CIA directed the attack.27 Another remarkable characteristic of the narratives about KGB or CIA control of international terrorism is that they were fuelled to a large degree by disinformation and forgeries of Eastern and Western intelligence services, manufactured during the second half of the 1970s and thereafter. The most significant Soviet forgery of this campaign is probably the so-called ‘Field Manual



1. Introduction

5

30-31B’ that attributes left-wing terrorism around the world to US intelligence operations. The purported US military manual, which was widely published in Europe from 1976 on, was particularly used to justify claims of US involvement in far-left terrorism in Europe, and especially in Italy, as part of the ‘strategy of tension’.28 On the other hand, intelligence services of NATO countries such as the Italian Servizio per le Informazioni e la Sicurezza Militare (SISMI), the French Service de Documentation Extérieure et de Contre-Espionnage (SDECE) and the CIA repeatedly planted disinformation about the Warsaw Pact countries’ support for individual terrorist groups, or even Soviet control of ‘international terrorism’ as such, in European media outlets and in publications of select research institutes.29 Some of these articles and reports were then recycled and put together by Sterling in The Terror Network.30

Beyond the myths As the available archival documents – many of which became publicly accessible only during the last couple of years – clearly demonstrate, neither the intelligence services of the Eastern bloc nor those of the NATO countries controlled a large number of international terrorist organizations or even a global terror network. Nor did they use terrorist groups as proxies as part of an offensive plan for victory in the East–West conflict and for global domination. The reality is much more complex. A new body of research, represented by the articles in this book, shows that the relations between state and terrorist actors were much more ambiguous and multilayered than much of the older literature suggested based on rumours, myths or even conspiracy narratives. The Soviet Union During the Cold War ‘international terrorism’ was not a monolithic network or even a communist conspiracy masterminded by the Soviet Union to destabilize Western democracies. The Soviet Union indeed supported a number of terrorist organizations. For the most part, however, Soviet intelligence services did not directly support groups that mainly or exclusively operated with terrorist tactics. The US intelligence community was aware as early as summer 1986 that the Soviets ‘appear to avoid all direct contact with transnational terrorist groups such as the Carlos Apparat and the Abu Nidal Group’ and that ‘Moscow evidently disapproves of the nihilistic new-left terrorists of Western Europe typified by the Red Army Faction (RAF) of West Germany, Action Directe of France, and the Communist Combatant Cells of Belgium and has no apparent contacts with them’.31 The most prominent example of Soviet support for a group that engaged in international terrorist violence was probably the KGB’s involvement with the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), and especially with its External Operations (PFLP-EO, later PFLP-Special Operation Group [SOG]). The leader of this Palestinian splinter group, which was responsible for some of

6

Terrorism in the Cold War

the most spectacular international terrorist attacks in the late 1960s and 1970s, was Wadi Haddad, a co-founder of the PFLP. Apparently, the KGB started collaborating with Haddad as early as 1968, and the Soviet intelligence service eventually recruited him formally as agent Natsionalist in May 1970. Thereafter, the KGB provided Haddad’s group with significant amounts of weapons, money and training for several years.32 In return for this support, the KGB tasked the PFLP-EO in 1970 to abduct a high-ranking CIA operative in Beirut in order to extract intelligence – as Isabella Ginor and Gideon Remez describe in great detail in this book based on newly accessible documents. But Haddad’s organization eventually refused to commit such ‘non-terrorist’ abductions for the KGB, demonstrating its freedom of action. According to the Israeli journalist Ronen Bergman, however, the PFLP-EO eliminated Soviet defectors for the KGB, which was eager to avoid being publicly associated with such ‘wet jobs’ in the West.33 Overall, the Soviet support for the PFLP was hardly part of an offensive terrorist strategy against the West. Already in 1971, Fedor Mortin, the head of the KGB’s First Chief Directorate, responsible for the collaboration with Haddad, made it plain that ‘it seems more expedient to more actively exploit “Natsionalist” and his militants for bold operations aimed only directly at Israel’.34 After Haddad died in early 1978, the PFLP-SOG split and the KGB subsequently proved unable to recruit a suitable replacement within the more radical Palestinian factions.35 In the 1980s, the Soviet Union continued to give some support, especially weapons and training, to various armed Palestinian groups, some of which were engaged in terrorist violence. Tellingly, however, the militants who received most military and other forms of training during that decade were members of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP), the most doctrinaire Marxist of the Palestinian groups – and among the least active in international terrorism.36 The Israeli professor Galia Golan wrote in her history of the relationship between the Soviet Union and the PLO in 1980: ‘Palestinian terrorism was generally – though not always – perceived by the Soviets as counterproductive.’37 Certainly, the Soviets have time and again tried to use their contacts and leverage their perceived or real influence to restrain extremist factions within the Palestinian movement, to dissuade them from launching terrorist attacks outside the Middle East and to urge them to work towards a political solution of the conflict.38 An example is the significant pressure the Soviet leadership at times put on the PLO to accept United Nations Security Council Resolution 242, which among other things would have recognized Israel’s right to exist in peace.39 A US intelligence document from 1986 unambiguously states that the Soviets had urged Palestinian groups under Moscow’s influence to stop when they conducted transnational terrorist campaigns. According to the recently declassified National Intelligence Estimate, the Soviet Union’s disapproval of Palestinian hijackings and other terrorist tactics outside of Israel and the occupied territories had the effect that the Soviets even suspended their support of the PFLP at one point during the 1970s because of the group’s involvement in international terrorism. The CIA



1. Introduction

7

concluded that since then ‘the concern that the Soviets would cut off aid again may have been a factor in dissuading the PFLP from resuming its international terrorist activities’.40 Furthermore, the support for Palestinian terrorist groups did not lead to Soviet control. The relationship between the KGB and Wadi Haddad illustrates this fact, considering that the PFLP-EO repeatedly refused to execute operations demanded by Soviet intelligence as payback for its support.41 Jeffrey Bale accordingly concludes that ‘it would be absurd to characterize the PLO as a whole, or even entire radical factions within it, as little more than the terrorist agents, surrogates, or proxies of the KGB’.42 This judgement is consonant with Thomas Riegler’s assessment of the relationship between the KGB and terrorist actors more broadly. The historian Riegler argues that the Soviet role did not amount to actual control of terrorism: ‘The groups maintained their autonomy and were no extensions of Soviet foreign policy.’43 The available source material suggests that since the beginning of the 1980s, direct Soviet support to terrorist groups or even the use of terrorism for political purposes abroad seems to have been limited to a few minor cases. The activities reports of the KGB, submitted annually to the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) by the chairman of the KGB, mention no cooperation with terrorist groups. To the contrary, in the early 1980s the various terrorist organizations are listed, besides the United States, China and domestic dissidents, as the main enemies of the Soviet Union.44 These documents clearly indicate that, at least in the final decade of the Cold War, the KGB regarded these terrorist actors more as a threat than as the spearhead of communist world revolution. The socialist states in Eastern Europe The Soviet Union’s satellite states in Eastern Europe and their relations with terrorist actors were a somewhat different matter. Any discussion needs to start with three basic distinctions regarding state, terrorist actor and time: (1) There was no joint ‘Warsaw Pact’ approach towards terrorist organizations. The policies and actions of individual states, which maintained their own agreements, dealings and cooperation with terrorist actors, varied widely. On the one hand, the German Democratic Republic (GDR), likely the most extensive supporter of terrorist actors in Eastern Europe, provided military training and weapons to various armed Palestinian groups such as the PFLP, the DFLP and the PFLP-General Command (GC).45 Its Ministry for State Security (MfS, commonly known as Stasi) further provided sanctuary to some of the most notorious and deadliest terrorist groups in the West: the Abu Nidal Organization (ANO) and the Carlos group. Some ANO members also received ideological education, and a few of its cadres were even provided with limited military training.46 Moreover, in the early 1980s the GDR granted asylum to ten RAF dropouts, on the condition that they

8

Terrorism in the Cold War

permanently renounced terrorism. Several active RAF members received weapons and explosives training in the GDR, and the MfS periodically exchanged intelligence with the West German left-wing terrorists.47 On the other hand, Bulgaria’s involvement with terrorist actors seems to have been limited to a passive (and in some instances temporary) toleration of a number of terrorist organizations such as ANO and the Carlos group and, potentially, using some of these groups as intermediaries for weapons deals between Bulgarian state-owned arms manufacturers and Middle Eastern buyers.48 Additionally, scholars should keep in mind that while different Eastern European states pursued different, often autonomous, policies towards terrorist organizations, different actors within the socialist state structures – for example, foreign, domestic and military intelligence services; foreign ministries; police services; government and party leaders – sometimes also pursued different approaches and interests towards a given terrorist actor. (2) Not surprisingly, the relations of a particular socialist state with the various terrorist organizations, even those who were seemingly aligned ideologically or strategically with the state actor, varied widely. Romania, for example, actually used the Carlos group for violent operations. Its intelligence service, the Securitate, tasked ‘the Jackal’ with attacks on Romanian exiles, including the bombing of Radio Free Europe (RFE) in Munich in February 1981. In return, the Securitate provided active support by equipping the Carlos group with foreign passports, a safe house, a bank account, access to training centres and even large amounts of weapons and explosives.49 On the other hand, Romanian authorities never closed an agreement with ANO, despite Abu Nidal’s efforts towards this end. Instead of providing sanctuary or even support to ANO members, they did not spare them from being arrested. As a result, among other violent and non-violent reactions, ANO carried out a rocket attack on the Romanian Embassy in Beirut in November 1986.50 (3) The relations between states and terrorist actors have for the most part been problematic, fraught with distrust and friction. Accordingly, these individual relationships have a history. They evolved and transformed, often radically, over time. To give only one illustrating example: as far as can be judged based on the available source material (which is quite vast on this subject and has been analysed extensively), the active support that the MfS provided to the RAF, already described earlier, was effectively restricted to the three years from 1980 until 1982, out of the approximately two decades that the GDR and the RAF coexisted. Before 1980, the MfS’ support seems to have been limited to allowing RAF members to transit to the GDR, either to evade manhunts by the West German police or to visit Palestinian camps in the Middle East, in exchange for information. In the 1970s, the MfS had declined requests for more farreaching support by both the first and the second generation of the RAF: the first time in 1970, when Ulrike Meinhof wanted to close a deal allowing her



1. Introduction

9

group to use the territory of the GDR to plan operations in West Berlin; the second time in 1979, when leading members of the second generation were probing for support in East Berlin. The eventual short-lived cooperation of the early 1980s broke down again as early as 1983/84.51 While a simple listing of the various forms of support the MfS provided to the RAF – military training, intelligence, sanctuary – might, indeed, indicate a major role of the East German secret service in the RAF’s terrorist violence, a historical ‘timeline analysis’ of the relationship suggests that the ‘unholy cooperation’ may have had little impact or significance, as Tobias Wunschik concluded.52 Besides these important distinctions, there are a few general findings regarding the Eastern European states and their relations with terrorist actors. State support from Warsaw Pact intelligence agencies was in most cases not essential for the survival of the sponsored terrorist groups. The terrorist actors pursued their own interests and political goals. Occasionally, they even manipulated their international ‘state sponsors’ to these ends.53 The direction of influence in these state–terrorism relations has, therefore, not always been unambiguous. Some left-wing terrorist groups such as the Red Brigades also seem to have consistently refused cooperation with any Soviet bloc state.54 Further, in the majority of cases support for terrorist actors likely occurred without Soviet guidance and was therefore the result of more or less independently reached decisions within the smaller socialist countries. Another intriguing and myth-busting finding that applies to several Eastern European states is how overwhelmed or even incompetent some of their supposedly all-powerful security services turned out to be when they were challenged by the presence of terrorist actors. Exemplarily, the Czech security services were taken by surprise by Carlos’ initial visits and, despite considerable efforts, were unable to prevent him from entering the country thereafter. Although the hotel selection for foreign visitors to Prague was quite limited at the time, it used to take the Czech intelligence services several days to find out that ‘the Jackal’ had been staying at the Hotel Intercontinental.55 The Yugoslav domestic intelligence service, in turn, did not realize for years that the Carlos group had been establishing a base in Yugoslavia, which it used for weapons transfers and to prepare for operations in Western Europe, until Carlos’ lieutenant Johannes Weinrich knocked on their door one summer’s day in 1983.56 The good access to historical archives in Eastern Europe and the research undertaken based on their records allow us today to identify a small number of core motives for state support. These motives were certainly not the driving force of every single instance of state sponsorship. Ideology, for example, sometimes certainly played a role as well. Yet they are quintessential to understanding why state actors in the Soviet bloc supported transnational terrorist actors in most of the significant cases. (1) Domestic security: The destabilization of Western democracies, or even the expansion of the communist sphere of influence into the First World,

10

Terrorism in the Cold War

was hardly ever a decisive motive. Far from constituting an aggressive furtherance of world revolution (as Sterling and many others have claimed), the relations with terrorist actors were of a rather defensive character. The East European security services regarded many of the organizations as a potential threat to their own countries and genuinely feared a spill over of the terrorist violence behind the Iron Curtain. The cooperation with these groups thus constituted an, implicit or explicit, trade of limited support for non-aggression. Paradigmatically, the CIA recognized in a major analysis of Yugoslavia’s terrorism ties in March 1986 that ‘Belgrade also seems motivated by concerns for its own internal security. It has long been worried about terrorist attacks both in the country and against its interests abroad […]. Belgrade probably calculates that it can prevent attacks on Yugoslav territory by some groups […] by cooperating with them.’57 In some cases, this motive was reflected in specific secret agreements between East European intelligence services and terrorist groups. Examples are the deals between Polish military intelligence58 and ANO in 1979 and between the MfS and ANO in 1982.59 Even in those very rare cases in which an East European intelligence service used a terrorist actor as a proxy for violent attacks, the target seems to have been domestic opposition to the socialist regime, not a foreign state or public.60 The most prominent case is the Securitate’s cooperation with Carlos to attack Romanian exiles in the early 1980s.61 Accordingly, the status quo-oriented state support by the socialist regimes in East Europe was qualitatively a very different phenomenon than some of the state support provided by Middle Eastern regimes. (2) Intelligence: The interest to gain intelligence has been a crucial factor driving decisions to support terrorist organizations for basically all socialist states. Its significance can therefore hardly be overestimated. This may not come so much as a surprise if one considers that the dealing with terrorist actors was the task of intelligence agencies, whose most fundamental objective is to collect intelligence. On one hand, providing sanctuary or active support put intelligence services in a better position for surveilling terrorist organizations as well as recruiting informants. The MfS, for example, ran six agents alone within the ranks or the entourage of ANO.62 Probably even more important, support for terrorist groups allowed the security services to demand intelligence as a quid pro quo. Certain terrorist groups were in a position to deliver extremely valuable information, for example, on terrorist groups that were considered a threat to the state sponsor, on political developments in the Middle East, on rival groups or on military installations of NATO countries. According to Christopher Andrew’s analysis of the Mitrokhin archive, even the KGB’s attempt to make contact with the Provisional IRA in 1977 was motivated by the hope of gaining useful information on British intelligence operations.63 The KGB’s relation with Wadi Haddad and his PFLP-EO likewise had a major intelligence gathering element, as Isabella Ginor and Gideon Remez impressively demonstrate in this book.



1. Introduction

11

(3) Commercial interests: In several instances, another important factor was the usefulness of terrorist groups as intermediaries in weapons deals between state-owned arms manufacturers in the socialist states and mainly Middle Eastern buyers (both states and non-state armed groups). Major examples of such ‘terrorist brokers’ were ANO and the Turkish Grey Wolves.64 The Middle Eastern clientele paid for the large amount of weapons in dollars – contrary to the socialist sister states in the Comecon,65 which paid their bills in roubles – thereby bringing some badly needed strong currency into the East European countries. Analysing the case of Poland, Przemyslaw Gasztold accordingly concluded that money, not ideology, was the decisive factor for Polish relations with international terrorism.66 Besides the arms trade, another motive to cooperate with terrorist organizations was that these actors could provide access to embargoed goods, especially Western electronics and weapons.67 Polish military intelligence required such deliveries even from ANO in their 1979 secret agreement and was able to acquire Argentinian-made Edda submachine guns and special ammunition for use in airplanes through the terrorist group. ANO also acquired sophisticated electronics from Swiss companies for their Polish hosts.68 In 1986, at the peak of its international terrorist violence, the same organization helped the GDR to obtain 100 state-of-the-art Enfield anti-riot weapons from the UK – arms that could be used against domestic opponents of the regime.69 More generally, East European states supported Middle Eastern (especially Palestinian) terrorist actors in order to advance or maintain good economic standings among Arab states.70 (4) Diplomatic influence/recognition: Although less significant than the motives described earlier, a further recurring driver is the ‘constructive’ potential of state support in the foreign policy arena, as opposed to the ‘destructive’ aims (e.g. frustrating particular policies, destabilizing or weakening a foreign state and so on) pursued through terrorist violence. ‘Constructive’ objectives included attempts to advance diplomatic or economic relations with states that had been sympathetic to the cause of the supported terrorist groups, or generally to strengthen the state supporter’s political influence in a specific community of states. Illuminating examples are the GDR and the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY). For the GDR, its strong interest in diplomatic recognition in (as well as the further development of economic relations with) the Arab world was a moving cause to support armed Palestinian groups at the turn of the 1960s.71 The desire of Tito’s Yugoslavia to strengthen its influence among member states of the NonAligned Movement (NAM) was a decisive factor even in its decision to support armed organizations that engaged in terrorist violence.72 Following the same rationale, in 1983, the Yugoslav domestic intelligence service decided not to extradite Carlos’s lieutenant Johannes Weinrich, because such an act would possibly have compromised the Yugoslav policy in the NAM.73

12

Terrorism in the Cold War

Another long-held myth was that the Soviet bloc remained free of the international terrorist violence from the 1960s through the 1980s.74 While the number of incidents was, indeed, much larger in Western Europe, the articles in this volume clearly show that several terrorist groups, not seldom acting as proxies for state actors, committed attacks in Eastern Europe and worldwide against representations of socialist states, sometimes directly, sometimes indirectly, targeting the socialist regimes. Croatian émigré nationalist groups, which fought for the destruction of socialist Yugoslavia and the foundation of an independent Croatian nation state, were not only among the first to globalize their operations but also among the most active terrorist organizations in the 1960s and the 1970s. Over one ten-year period, Croatian terrorists averaged one attack every five weeks, including more than fifty assassinations or assassination attempts, forty bombings and two aircraft hijackings.75 The terrorist campaigns by the Shia groups Amal, Hezbollah and Dawa against Hungarian targets are another illustrating example. In the same vein that Iran and Syria used Hezbollah as a terrorist proxy to influence the regional policies of the United States, France and Israel, the Iranian regime also exploited Shia terrorist groups to target Hungary. The most dramatic incidents of a series of attacks against diplomatic and business properties were an assault on the Hungarian Embassy in Aden in January 1987 and the bombing of the central office of Hungarian Airlines in Kuwait in May 1987. The apparent objective of the Iranian state sponsors was to intimidate socialist countries that had been giving significant aid to Iraq. And just like the direction of Hezbollah against the United States, France and Israel proved highly successful, Iran seems to have obtained some results with its terrorist proxy strategy against the socialist states: at the turn of 1987, Hungary started delivering war material to Iran.76 In any case, fears of terrorist violence were by no means restricted to the West. East European countries like Hungary massively expanded their own counterterrorism apparatus in the last decade of the Cold War, as Balázs OrbánSchwarzkopf analyses in his contribution to this book.77 Bernd Schäfer, in turn, shows in his article that by the late 1980s even the regime of North Korea was so paranoidly afraid of terrorist attacks that the hermit country engaged in an unprecedented international ‘counterterrorism’ intelligence cooperation with Warsaw Pact states, particularly with the East German MfS. The articles in the first volume illuminate the complex, multilayered and ambiguous set of relations that the socialist states in Eastern Europe maintained with terrorist actors, providing sanctuary and various forms of support to a number of groups, rejecting cooperation with others and finding themselves among the targets of terrorist organizations.

Notes 1 In this article, ‘terrorism’ signifies the use or threat of political violence by non-state actors aimed to influence, usually by instilling fear, a target audience beyond the



1. Introduction

2 3 4 5 6

7 8 9

10

11

13

direct victims of the violence. An individual, group, organization, etc. is classified as a ‘terrorist’ actor, when it makes considerable use of terrorist violence. The author is aware that the use of the labels ‘terrorist’, ‘terrorist organization’, ‘terrorist attack’ etc. is problematic as there is no definition shared by a majority of scholars. For a discussion see, for example, Alex P. Schmid (ed.), The Routledge Handbook of Terrorism Research (London: Routledge, 2011), 39–157. Additionally, critical terrorism scholars have made a good argument that ‘terrorism’ is largely a social construct and that the use of the ‘terrorist’ label serves strategic functions. For an overview see Richard Jackson, Marie Breen Smith and Jeroen Gunning (eds.), Critical Terrorism Studies: A New Research Agenda (London: Routledge, 2009); David Miller, Jessie Blackbourn, Helen Dexter and Rani Dhanda (eds.), Critical Terrorism Studies since 11 September 2001: What Has Been Learned? (New York: Routledge, 2014); Richard Jackson (ed.), Routledge Handbook of Critical Terrorism Studies (Abingdon: Routledge, 2016). Daniel Byman, Deadly Connections: States That Sponsor Terrorism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 1. Chris Quillen, A Historical Analysis of Mass Casualty Bombers, Studies in Conflict & Terrorism 25/5 (2002), 285. Bruce Hoffman, Inside Terrorism (New York: Columbia University Press, 2006), 263. Daniel Byman, How States Exploit Jihadist Foreign Fighters, Studies in Conflict & Terrorism 41/12 (2018), 931–45. Anne Speckhard and Ahmet S. Yayla, ISIS Defectors: Inside Stories of the Terrorist Caliphate (McLean, VA: Advances Press, 2016); Anne Speckhard and Ahmet S. Yayla, ISIS Revenues Include Sales of Oil to the al-Assad Regime, ICSVE Brief Reports, 27 April 2016, https​://ww​w.ics​ve.or​g/isi​ss-re​venue​s-inc​lude-​sales​-of-o​il-to​-the-​al-as​sad-r​ egime​(accessed 1 January 2020). Links and cooperation between the Islamic State and Syrian intelligence services are also documented in Islamic State files discovered in Syria. See Christoph Reuter, The Terror Strategist: Secret Files Reveal the Structure of Islamic State, Der Spiegel, 18 April 2015, https​://ww​w.spi​egel.​de/in​terna​tiona​l/wor​ld/is​ lamic​-stat​e-fil​es-sh​ow-st​ructu​re-of​-isla​mist-​terro​r-gro​up-a-​10292​74.ht​ml (accessed 1 January 2020). Anne Speckhard and Ardian Shajkovci, The ISIS Ambassador to Turkey, Homeland Security Today, 19 March 2019, https​://ww​w.hst​oday.​us/su​bject​-matt​er-ar​eas/t​error​ ism-s​tudy/​the-i​sis-a​mbass​ador-​to-tu​rkey (accessed 1 January 2020). Glenn Greenwald and Gregory Johnsen, Salon Radio Transcript: Gregory Johnsen, Salon, 24 December 2009, http:​//www​.salo​n.com​/2009​/12/2​4/gjo​hnsen​_tran​scrip​t (accessed 1 January 2020). Victoria Clark, Yemen: Dancing on the Heads of Snakes (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2010); Jeremy Scahill, Dirty Wars: The World Is a Battlefield (London: Serpent’s Tail, 2013); Larry Attree, Blown Back: Lessons from Counter-terror, Stabilisation and Statebuilding in Yemen, Saferworld, January 2016, especially 11, 37–8. Adrian Hänni and Lukas Hegi, Pakistanischer Pate: Der Geheimdienst Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) und die afghanischen Taliban, 2002–2010, Journal for Intelligence, Propaganda and Security Studies 5/1 (2011), 46–60; Steve Coll, Directorate S: The C.I.A. and America’s Secret Wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan (New York: Penguin Books, 2018). Adrian Hänni, Terrorismus als Konstrukt: Schwarze Propaganda, politische Bedrohungsängste und der Krieg gegen den Terrorismus in Reagans Amerika (Essen: Klartext-Verlag, 2018), 167–245.

14

Terrorism in the Cold War

12 Jeane Kirkpatrick, U.S. Security & Latin America, Commentary 71/1 (1981), 29–40. 13 Cited in Philip Geyelin, The Reigning White House Soviet Scholar, Washington Post, 12 February 1981, A19. 14 On the meeting see Timothy Naftali, Blind Spot: The Secret History of American Counterterrorism (New York: Basic Books 2005), 118–20; Joseph E. Persico, Casey: From the OSS to the CIA (New York: Viking, 1990), 220; David C. Martin and John Walcott, Best Laid Plans: The Inside Story of America’s War against Terrorism (New York: Harper & Row, 1988), 45–7; Bob Woodward, Veil: The Secret Wars of the CIA, 1981–1987 (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1987), 92–3. For a list of the participants see ‘Richard V, Allen, Meeting with Interagency Working Committee on Terrorism’, 24 January 1981, in George Bush Library, College Station, TX, Bush Vice Presidential Records, National Security Affairs, ‘Terrorism [1 of 9]’. 15 Excerpts from Haig’s Remarks at First News Conference as Secretary of State, New York Times, 29 January 1981, A10. 16 Hänni, Terrorismus als Konstrukt, 175–85, 231–7. 17 Ibid., 212–31. 18 Claire Sterling, The Terror Network: The Secret War of International Terrorism (New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1981). 19 See, especially, Samuel T. Francis, The Soviet Strategy of Terror (Washington, DC: Heritage Foundation, 1981); Herbert Romerstein, Soviet Support for International Terrorism (Washington, DC: Foundation for Democratic Education, 1981); Neil C. Livingstone, The War against Terrorism (Lexington, MA: Lexington Books, 1982); Ray S. Cline and Yonah Alexander, Terrorism: The Soviet Connection (New York: Crane Russak, 1984); Roberta Goren, The Soviet Union and Terrorism (Boston: Allen & Unwin, 1984), edited by Jillian Becker, the director of the British Institute for the Study of Terrorism (IST); Jillian Becker, The Soviet Connection: State Sponsorship of Terrorism (London: Institute for European Defence and Strategic Studies, 1985); and Desmond McForan, The World Held Hostage: The War Waged by International Terrorism (London: Oak-Tree Books, 1986). See also Jan Sejna, We Will Bury You: The Soviet Plan for the Subversion of the West by the Highest-Ranking Communist Ever to Defect (London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1982); Brian Crozier, Drew Middleton and Jeremy Murray-Brown, This War Called Peace (London: Sherwood Press, 1984); and Michael A. Ledeen, Grave New World: The Superpower Crisis of the 1980s (New York: Oxford University Press, 1985). 20 Edna F. Reid, Terrorism Research and the Diffusion of Ideas, Knowledge, Technology & Policy 6/1 (1993), 17–37. 21 Michael Ploetz, Mit RAF, Roten Brigaden und Action Directe: Terrorismus und Rechtsextremismus in der Strategie von SED und KpdSU, Zeitschrift des Forschungsverbundes SED-Staat 22 (2007), 144. 22 See, especially, Boris Svetov et al., International Terrorism and the CIA: Documents, Eyewitness Reports, Facts (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1983); Yu Pankov (ed.), Political Terrorism: An Indictment of Imperialism (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1983); and Vitaly Chernyavsky, The CIA in the Dock: Soviet Journalists on International Terrorism (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1983). Viktor V. Vitiuk, Leftist Terrorism (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1985), even claimed that the CIA secretly directed left-wing terrorism. The Soviet regime apparently produced a White Paper implicating the CIA in international terrorism as early as spring 1981. See ‘Staff Meeting Minutes’, Memorandum for the Record, CIA, 1 April 1981, 2, in CREST, CIA General Records, 84B00130R, Box 6, Folder 1, Document No. 398–9.



1. Introduction

15

23 A discussion of the conspiracy theories on the involvement of the US government in terrorism in Italy between the late 1960s and the 1980s is provided by Tobias Hof, U.S. Involvement in Right-Wing Extremism and Terrorism in Italy, Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR), Lexington, Kentucky, 19–21 June 2014. 24 See, among other books, Daniele Ganser, NATO’s Secret Armies: Operation Gladio and Terrorism in Western Europe (London: Cass, 2005); Regine Igel, Terrorjahre: Die dunkle Seite der CIA in Italien (München: Herbig, 2006). 25 See, especially, Claire Sterling, The Plot to Murder the Pope, Reader’s Digest, September 1982, 71–84; Claire Sterling, The Time of the Assassins (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1983); Paul B. Henze, The Plot to Kill the Pope (New York: Scribner, 1983). The narrative of the Bulgarian Connection has since been revived from time to time, most recently in a book by Paul Kengor, A Pope and a President: John Paul II, Ronald Reagan, and the Extraordinary Untold Story of the 20th Century (Wilmington, DE: ISI Books, 2017). For a critical discussion of the Bulgarian Connection, see Edward S. Herman and Frank Brodhead, The Rise and Fall of the Bulgarian Connection (New York: Sheridan Square Publications, 1986). 26 See, for example, Iona Andronov, On the Wolf ’s Track (Sofia: Sofia Press, 1983); Iona Andronov, The Triple Plot (Sofia: Sofia Press, 1984); Ivan Palchev, The Assassination Attempt against the Pope and the Roots of Terrorism (Sofia: Sofia Press, 1985); as well as Eduard Kovalev and Igor Sedykh, ‘Bulgarian Connection’: CIA & Co. on the Outcome of the Antonov Trial (Moscow: Novosti, 1986). On the disinformation campaign by Bulgarian State Security and the MfS implicating Western intelligence services in the plot to kill the pope, see Christopher Nehring, Die Zusammenarbeit der DDR-Auslandsaufklärung mit der Aufklärung der Volksrepublik Bulgarien: Regionalfilialen des KGB? PhD dissertation, Heidelberg University, 2016, 220–32. 27 See, for example, the article by Jordan Baev in this book; Nehring, Zusammenarbeit der DDR-Auslandsaufklärung mit der Aufklärung der Volksrepublik Bulgarien, 220–32; as well as Evtim Kostadinov (ed.), International Terrorism in the Bulgarian State Security Files, Documentary Volume (Electronic Edition), The Committee on Disclosing the Documents and Announcing Affiliation of Bulgarian Citizens to the State Security and the Intelligence Services of the Bulgarian National Army (CDDAABCSBNAF), 2011, https​://co​mdos.​bg/%D​0%9D%​D0%B0​%D1%8​8%D0%​ B8%D1​%82%D​0%B5%​20%D0​%B8%D​0%B7%​D0%B4​%D0%B​0%D0%​BD%D0​ %B8%D​1%8F/​mezhd​unaro​dniya​t-ter​oriza​m (accessed 1 January 2020). A recent primary source-based study by the Polish Institute of National Remembrance reached a different conclusion, claiming that Bulgarian special service agents played key roles in the plot through their participation in the preparation for the assassination attempt. See Michal Skwara and Andrzej Grajewski, Agca nie byt sam: Wokot udziatu komunistycznych stuzb specjalnych w zamachu na Jana Pawta II (Katowice: Instytut Gosc Media, 2015). 28 ‘Soviet Covert Action (The Forgery Offensive)’, Hearings before the Subcommittee on Oversight of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, House of Representatives, 96th Congress, 2nd Session, 6 and 19 February 1980 (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1980), 190–246; Soviet Disinformation during Periods of Relaxed East-West Tensions, Appendix to Soviet Active Measures in the Era of Glasnost: A Report to Congress by the United States Information Agency, March 1988, available at http:​//ins​ideth​ecold​war.o​rg/si​tes/d​efaul​t/fil​es/do​cumen​ts/So​viet%​20Act​

16

29 30 31 32

33

34 35

36 37 38

39

40

Terrorism in the Cold War ive%2​0Meas​ures%​20in%​20the​%20Er​a%20o​f%20G​lasno​t%20M​arch%​20198​8.pdf​ (accessed 1 January 2020). These disinformation operations are documented in great detail by Hänni, Terrorismus als Konstrukt, 117–65. Ibid., 95–165. The Soviet Bloc Role in International Terrorism and Revolutionary Violence, National Intelligence Estimate 11/2-86, August 1986, 15, https​://ww​w.cia​.gov/​libra​ry/re​ading​ room/​docs/​CIA-R​DP90T​00155​R0002​00050​001-6​.pdf (accessed 1 January 2020). See, especially, the article by Isabella Ginor and Gideon Remez in this book. See also Christopher Andrew and Vasiliy Mitrokhin, The Sword and the Shield: The Mitrokhin Archive and the Secret History of the KGB (New York: Basic Books, 1999), 380; and Letter from Yuri Andropov to Leonid Brezhnev, No. 1071-A/OB, 23 April 1974, published in Vladimir Boukovsky, Jugement a Moscou: Un dissident dans les archives du Kremlin (Paris: R. Laffont, 1995), as well as online by Julia Zaks and Leonid Chernikhov, http:​//buk​ovsky​-arch​ives.​net/p​dfs/t​err-w​d/plo​75a.p​df (accessed 1 January 2020). Ronen Bergman, Rise and Kill First: The Secret History of Israel’s Targeted Assassinations (Random House: New York, 2018), 196. On the KGB’s targeting of intelligence defectors in general, see Adrian Hänni and Miguel Grossmann, Death to Traitors? The Pursuit of Intelligence Defectors from the Soviet Union to the Putin Era, Intelligence and National Security 35/3 (2020), 403–23. Doc. 164/1430, Report by Fedor Mortin, 24.6.1971, Typescript of Notes by Vasiliy Mitrokhin, 80–1, in Churchill Archives Centre, Cambridge, UK, The Papers of Vasiliy Mitrokhin, MITN 2/24, Envelope K24: Near and Middle East. Emphasis added. Christopher Andrew and Vasiliy Mitrokhin, The World Was Going Our Way: The KGB and the Battle for the Third World (New York: Basic Books, 2006), 246–55. In 1974, the KGB had recruited a second agent in the PFLP leadership, Ahmad Mahmud Samman (codenamed ‘Vasit’). Like Haddad, he died in 1978. The Soviet Bloc Role in International Terrorism and Revolutionary Violence, National Intelligence Estimate 11/2-86, 21. Galia Golan, The Soviet Union and the Palestine Liberation Organization: An Uneasy Alliance (New York: Praeger, 1980), 211. On the history of the Soviet–PLO relationship, see Roland Dannreuther, The Soviet Union and the PLO (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 1998); Golan, The Soviet Union and the Palestine Liberation Organization; Galia Golan, Moscow and the PLO: The Ups and Downs of a Complex Relationship, in Moshe Ma’oz and Avraham Sela (eds.), The PLO and Israel: From Armed Conflict to Political Solution, 1964–1994 (London: St. Martin’s Press, 1997), 121–40. ‘Current PLO Position on 242; Soviet and Arab Advice to PLO on 242, Secret Intelligence Information Cable, Directorate of Operations, CIA, 20 August 1977, in President Carter and the Role of Intelligence in the Camp David Accords Collection, Document No. 527b88eb993294098d517722. See also Lutz Maeke, DDR und PLO: Die Palästinapolitik des SED-Staates (Oldenbourg: De Gruyter, 2017), 159–61. The Soviet Bloc Role in International Terrorism and Revolutionary Violence, National Intelligence Estimate 11/2-86, 15, 19–21. As Tobias Wunschik shows in his contribution to this book, the MfS of the GDR likewise made attempts to steer the actions of some Palestinian terrorist groups towards the ‘political struggle’, and in May 1986 East Berlin intended to ask Arafat to use his authority so that no Palestinian terrorist attacks would be executed.



1. Introduction

17

41 See the description in Isabella Ginor’s and Gideon Remez’ article in this book, based on documents in The Papers of Vasiliy Mitrokhin at Churchill Archives Centre. 42 Jeffrey M. Bale, Terrorists as State ‘Proxies’: Separating Fact from Fiction, in Michael A. Innes (ed.), Making Sense of Proxy Wars: States, Surrogates & the Use of Force (Washington, DC: Potomac Books, 2012), 18. 43 Thomas Riegler, ‘Es muss ein gegenseitiges Geben und Nehmen sein‘: WarschauerPakt-Staaten und Terrorismusbekämpfung am Beispiel der DDR, in Johannes Hürter (ed.), Terrorismusbekämpfung in Westeuropa: Demokratie und Sicherheit in den 1970er und 1980er Jahren (Berlin: De Gruyter Oldenbourg, 2015), 291. 44 Report of the Work of the KGB in 1981, KGB Chairman Yuri Andropov to General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev, 10 May 1982; and Report of the Work of the KGB in 1982, KGB Chairman Victor Chebrikov to General Secretary Yuri Andropov, 15 March 1983, in Dmitrii Antonovich Volkogonov Papers, National Security Archive, George Washington University, Washington, DC. 45 Matthias Bengtson-Krallert, Die DDR und der internationale Terrorismus (Marburg: Tectum Verlag, 2017), 262–70; The Abu Nidal Terror Network, Report, U.S. Department of State, July 1987, 8. For access to this document contact the author, who keeps a copy in his private archive. 46 On the relationship between the GDR and ANO, see the article by Tobias Wunschik in this book as well as Maeke, DDR und PLO, 329–496. On the relations between the MfS and the Carlos group, see Riegler, Warschauer-Pakt-Staaten und Terrorismusbekämpfung; John Follain, Jackal: The Complete Story of the Legendary Terrorist, Carlos the Jackal (New York: Arcade, 1998), 117–94; Oliver Schröm, Im Schatten des Schakals: Carlos und die Wegbereiter des internationalen Terrorismus (Berlin: Links, 2002). 47 Tobias Wunschik, Baader-Meinhofs Kinder: Die zweite Generation der RAF (Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1997), 389–403. 48 See the article by Jordan Baev in this book. See further, Patrick Seale, Abu Nidal: A Gun for Hire (New York: Random House, 1992), 204, 279; The Soviet Bloc Role in International Terrorism and Revolutionary Violence, National Intelligence Estimate 11/2-86. 49 On the relations between the Romanian Securitate and the Carlos group, see Liviu Tofan, Sacalul Securitatii: Teroristul Carlos in solda spionajului romanesc (Bucharest: Polirom, 2013). 50 See European Review, Supplement, EUR ER 85-015C, Directorate of Intelligence, CIA, 3 July 1985, 3–5, in CREST, CIA General Records, 85T01184R, Box 3, Folder 122, Document No. 1–8; Romania: Ceausescu Adopts a Harder Public Line Against International Terrorism, GIM87-20012, CIA, 23 March 1987, in CREST, CIA General Records, 90T00114R, Box 4, Folder 420, Document No. 1–8; [Bericht der] Abteilung XXII zur palästinensischen Organisation ‘Abu Nidal’, 25 April 1984, in Der Bundesbeauftragte für die Stasi-Unterlagen, Berlin, Germany (henceforth BStU), Hauptabteilung [henceforth HA] XXII 31, Vol. 2, 224–6; Seale, Abu Nidal, 279. 51 Wunschik, Baader-Meinhofs Kinder, 389–403; Tobias Wunschik, Baader-Meinhof international? Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte 40–1 (2007), 23–9; Bengtson-Krallert, Die DDR und der internationale Terrorismus, 176–95; Christopher Daase, Die RAF und der internationale Terrorismus: Zur transnationalen Kooperation klandestiner Organisationen, in Wolfgang Kraushaar (ed.), Die RAF und der linke Terrorismus, Vol. 2 (Hamburg: Hamburger Edition, 2006), 905–31 (especially p. 925); Martin Jander, Differenzen im antiimperialistischen Kampf: Zu den Verbindungen des Ministeriums

18

Terrorism in the Cold War

für Staatssicherheit mit der RAF und dem bundesdeutschen Linksterrorismus, in Kraushaar (ed.), RAF und der linke Terrorismus, Vol. 1, 696–713; Michael Müller and Andreas Kanonenberg, Die RAF-Stasi-Connection (Berlin: Rowohlt, 1992), especially 141–3. 52 Wunschik, Baader-Meinhofs Kinder, 402. 53 Mattia Toaldo, Origins of the US War on Terror: Lebanon, Libya and American Intervention in the Middle East (London: Routledge, 2013), 130. 54 Andrea Chiampan, Overlapping Conflicts: Italian Terrorisms and the Cold War, 1969–1982, Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR), Lexington, Kentucky, 19–21 June 2014. Likewise, the relations of the Red Brigades with other terrorist groups were not highly developed. On the linkage between the (leftist) international terrorist organizations during the 1970s/1980s, see, for example, various articles in Kraushaar (ed.), RAF und der linke Terrorismus. 55 See the article by Pavel Zácek in this book. On the CSSR and Carlos see, further, Daniela Richterova, The Anxious Host: Czechoslovakia and Carlos the Jackal 1978–1986, The International History Review 40/1 (2018), 108–32. 56 See the article by Gordan Akrap in this book. 57 Yugoslavia: PLO Ties and Terrorism, EURM86-200226, CIA, 3 March 1986, 5, in CREST, CIA General Records, 86T01017R, Box 4, Folder 350, Document No. 1–8. 58 The Second Directorate of the General Staff of the Polish Army. 59 For those two specific agreements, see the articles by Przemyslaw Gasztold and Tobias Wunschik in this book. 60 In Daniel Byman’s taxonomy of motivations, these instances of support/direction would be classified as ‘military or operational aid’ within the category ‘domestic politics’. As Byman explains: ‘Just as states can help a terrorist group become more lethal, terrorists at times can make states stronger and more deadly. Terrorists, particularly if they are affiliated with a broader insurgency, can become an adjunct of a regime’s military power and reach, fighting as soldiers in a civil war or [as in the Eastern European case described here] striking at dissidents wherever they may be found.’ See Byman, Deadly Connections, 49. 61 See, in great detail, Tofan, Sacalul Securitatii. 62 Analyse der IM-Arbeit Abteilung XXII/8 in den Kategorien IMB/IMS, 22 February 1989, in BStU, HA XXII 521. 63 Andrew and Mitrokhin, The World Was Going Our Way, 255. 64 See the articles by Przemyslaw Gasztold, Tobias Wunschik, Balázs OrbánSchwarzkopf and Jordan Baev in this book. 65 The Council for Mutual Economic Assistance was an international economic organization that existed from 1949 to 1991 under the leadership of the Soviet Union. Its members were the countries of the Soviet bloc (as well as Cuba, Vietnam and Mongolia). 66 Przemyslaw Gasztold, Zabojcze Uktady: Sluzby PRL i Miedzynarodowy Terroryzm (Warsaw: PWN, 2017). 67 It is interesting to note that the CIA used some of the same ‘terrorist arms brokers’ as part of the Iran–Contra operations. For example, the US foreign intelligence service paid the al-Kassar organization, at the same time that the latter was involved in the hijacking of the cruise ship Achille Lauro, for weapons deliveries to Iran and the Nicaraguan Contras. See Final Report of the Independent Counsel for Iran/Contra Matters, Vol. 1: Investigations and Prosecutions, Lawrence E. Walsh,



68 69 70

71 72 73 74

75 76 77

1. Introduction

19

Independent Counsel, United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, Washington, DC, 4 August 1993, Chapter 8, 159–72. Published online by the Federation of American Scientists, http://fas.org/irp/offdocs/walsh/ (accessed 1 December 2017). The al-Kassar organization also acted as an intermediary for Polish military intelligence to sell Polish arms to the Middle East. See the article by Przemyslaw Gasztold in this book. The Abu Nidal Terror Network, Report, U.S. Department of State, July 1987, 8. For access to this document contact the author, who keeps a copy in his private archive. Terrorism Review, May 1986, Directorate of Intelligence, CIA, 33, in CREST, CIA General Records, 87T00685R, Box 2, Folder 35, Document No. 3–7; BengtsonKrallert, Die DDR und der internationale Terrorismus, 107–51. For socialist Eastern Europe, Arab countries were particularly important as export markets, not only for arms but also for, for example, machinery and chemicals as well as engineering and construction projects. For a discussion, see Bengtson-Krallert, Die DDR und der internationale Terrorismus, 107–51; Maeke, DDR und PLO, 30–116. See the article by Gordan Akrap in this book, as well as Yugoslavia: PLO Ties and Terrorism, 4. See the article by Gordan Akrap in this book. That ‘terrorism’ as such was directed against the West and democracy, and that the dictatorships in East Europe were, accordingly, free of terrorist violence, was, in fact, a consistent postulation within terrorism studies during the last decade of the Cold War. During that time, terrorism was conceptualized in the West as a form of ‘low-intensity warfare against the West’ (Robert Kupperman during a hearing in the House of Representatives in 1983). See Hänni, Terrorismus als Konstrukt, 301–5. The assumption remained popular after the Cold War. As late as 2015, one could read in a peer-reviewed journal that ‘the [terrorist] attacks touched solely Western countries’. (Aviva Guttmann, Une coalition antiterroriste sous l’égide d’un pays neutre: La réponse suisse au terrorism palestinien, 1969–1970, Relations internationales 3 [2015], 96). Mate Nikola Tokić, Landscapes of Conflict: Unity and Disunity in post-Second World War Croatian Émigré Separatism, European Review of History 16/5 (2009), 739–53. See the articles by Balázs Orbán-Schwarzkopf and Ryszard M. Machnikowski in this book. For an overview of the counterterrorism apparatuses of the Eastern bloc countries in the 1980s, see Pavel Zácek, Kontrarozvedny protiteroristicky aparát vychodního bloku v osmdesátych letech dvacátého století, Sborník: Archive bezpecnostních slozek 15 (2017), 239–68.

20

CChapter 2 THE KGB’S ABDUCTION PROGRAMME AND THE PFLP ON THE CUSP BETWEEN INTELLIGENCE AND TERRORISM Isabella Ginor and Gideon Remez

Our interest in what is shaping up as the Soviet Union’s formally articulated programme, or at least its standard practice, of abducting foreign nationals for intelligence purposes arose in a context that would hardly qualify under the usual concepts of terrorism. This occurred while we were studying the numerous accounts of military veterans and other Soviet participants in the Soviet Union’s massive, direct intervention in the Egyptian–Israeli conflict between 1967 and 1973.1 This literature flourished in an interlude of relatively free expression that lasted about fifteen years, between the Soviet regime’s terminal tailspin and the gradual return of authoritarianism under Vladimir Putin. At the height of freewheeling disclosures, in 1998, a conference in Moscow brought together Soviet and Egyptian veterans for ‘a handshake after a quarter century’, marking the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Yom Kippur War. Most of the presentations, however, dealt with the previous, joint preparation for Egypt’s offensive across the Suez Canal in October 1973. In particular, they reminisced about the 1969–70 War of Attrition, when the Soviet intervention peaked. It then included some 20,000 servicemen at a time, most of them in an entire air defence division. Along with Soviet MiG-21 fighter squadrons, the Soviet-manned surface-to-air missiles (SAMs) vied successfully with the Israel Air Force (IAF) for superiority over the canal in what was then the hottest front of the Cold War. One of the speakers at the conference was Col. Valery Yaremenko, a Middle East specialist at the Military History Institute of the Russian Federation’s Ministry of Defense.2 He described the Soviet missile-men’s climactic engagement, on 18 July 1970, with Israel’s US-supplied F-4 Phantom jets and their state-of-the-art American electronic warfare (EW) systems. Newly developed EW pods, which had been installed by U.S. Air Force experts only a few days earlier, failed in their first trial to prevent the shoot-down of the lead Israeli Phantom in an attack on a SAM-3 battery west of the canal. As Yaremenko told the conference, ‘the plane, which fell into deep sand, remained intact – which immediately drew the attention of the Soviet experts. In short order, the plane and pilot were sent to Moscow’ – where the pilot’s trace vanishes.3

22

Terrorism in the Cold War

This revelation, a shocking one in Israeli terms, drew our immediate attention when, in 2000, we obtained a copy of the conference proceedings (which were published with a print run of only 200). The airman in question, Maj. Shmu’el Hetz (promoted ‘posthumously’ to Lieutenant-Colonel), was no ordinary pilot. An outstanding ace, he led the first group of Israelis who were trained in the United States to fly the F-4 and took command of the IAF’s first Phantom squadron. He was therefore privy to every detail of the vaunted plane’s specifications, systems and operational doctrine, as well as other top-secret data, presumably including nuclear weapons that Israel was by then widely suspected to possess. Our inquiry into the supposed recovery of Hetz’s remains and his official burial in 1974 established that they were highly doubtful, though well intentioned at the time, to provide his family with closure. In brief, Israel had no definitive evidence that could refute Yaremenko’s claim.4 In a series of interviews that we conducted with the Russian military historian, he stood by his findings, which he said were based on ‘our sources’ as well as two eyewitness testimonies. Voicing sentiments that were widespread in the early postSoviet years, Yaremenko said he was troubled by the case – preoccupied as he was with the thought that Hetz might still be alive in Russia ‘and his children might be going to school with mine’. He had made the case public at the veterans’ conference in order to see if anyone would deny it. For three years no one did, and by the time we spoke with him, a corrected and expanded account had been included in an official publication of the Military History Institute. This book’s editorial board included Gen. Aleksey Smirnov, the commander of the Soviet SAM division in Egypt in 1970–1, as well as such long-time Middle Eastern hands as President Boris Yeltsin’s foreign intelligence chief, foreign minister and prime minister (successively), Evgeny Primakov – who had been a KGB operative in the region under the guise of a journalist.5 Our Hetz dossier is still open; while the evidence we gathered in addition to Yaremenko’s is highly suggestive, we cannot yet conclusively certify the veracity of his version’s specifics. But for the purposes of the present chapter, what matters is that in the 1990s, all the authorities we just listed treated this account as entirely plausible – not exceptional enough to demand explanation. That is, they took for granted that the Soviet Union was, in 1970, prepared to commit an egregious war crime in order to obtain a human asset for its intelligence needs.6 The Israeli military was reluctant – to say the least – to reopen the Hetz case: his name appears on a gravestone in a cemetery near Tel Aviv, and he is officially listed as killed in action. But the US military took a strong interest in our inquiry. The head of the Russian Military History Institute who had signed off on both books that mentioned Hetz, Maj.-Gen. Vladimir Zolotarev, was also the Russian co-chairman of the Joint Commission on Prisoners of War (POWs) and Missing in Action from the Cold War period (USRJC), which had been set up with the United States in 1992. In a decade of meetings, the Russians had not confirmed so much as one of the multiple testimonies compiled by the Americans about sightings of US servicemen, especially airmen captured in Korea and Vietnam, in Soviet prison



2. The KGB’s Abduction Programme and the PFLP

23

camps and other facilities.7 Now, here was an unprecedented, unsolicited official Russian statement that a POW from a regional arena of the Cold War had been transferred secretly to the Soviet Union. In both the Military History Institute and the USRJC, Zolotarev had succeeded the eminent historian Col.-Gen. Dmitry Volkogonov. Up to the latter’s death in 1995, he had reported finding no trace of American Cold War POWs in the Soviet Union. However, in a letter to Yeltsin summing up his work in the Joint Commission, Volkogonov asserted that ‘we are not sure whether there were any individual cases in which aviation specialists were deported’. In his posthumously published memoirs, he added: ‘I am not sure we have found out everything. I know that not a few documents were destroyed.’ Most significantly, he revealed a KGB directive that was issued not long before Hetz’s disappearance: One sensational document was preserved, and a copy is in my possession. Its essence: in the late 1960s, the KGB – the First Directorate for foreign intelligence – was tasked ‘to bring informed Americans to the USSR for intelligence purposes’. When I discovered this sensational paper in the ‘special file’, I immediately went to E.M. Primakov (head of foreign intelligence). He called in his men. They brought a copy of this plan, which features the signature of, I believe, [then-KGB chief Vladimir] Semichastny […] For a long time the search went on for traces of this directive’s implementation. As I expected, none were found. I was told: the directive was not implemented. What actually happened? The regime then was such that the wildest versions can be assumed. The answer to this question remained a secret, which I never managed to penetrate.8

Volkogonov’s claim, too, was denied by Russian officialdom. At a meeting of the USRJC in 2001, the Americans confronted Zolotarev with his own publication on the Hetz case; he denied it, attributed the publication to an error on Israel’s part – and was then dismissed. However, this KGB policy in respect of ‘informed Americans’ is confirmed by newly released details of another Middle Eastern case. A few weeks before the Hetz affair, KGB chairman Yury Andropov sought and obtained General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev’s approval for a special operation. The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) would be deputized to abduct the CIA’s deputy station chief in Beirut, Lebanon, and hand him over for transfer to the Soviet Union.9

Are targeted intelligence abductions terrorism? Abductions in general, and those done for intelligence purposes in particular, illustrate the problematics involved in defining terrorism and terrorist acts. They straddle the fuzzy borderline between even the broadest definition of terrorism and other genres of violence, criminal or political.

24

Terrorism in the Cold War

Difficulties of definition are intensified by blurring the distinction between ‘terror’ (intimidation by a regime as an instrument of repression, by means of mass violence as in Robespierre’s ‘Reign of Terror’ or Stalin’s ‘Great Terror’), and ‘terrorism’ (use of violence by resistance or revolutionary groups to further the overthrow of a regime), a strategy perfected if not invented by revolutionaries in imperial Russia.10 The two terms are used interchangeably in present-day scholarship almost as much as in political parlance and the media. But they are substantively different both ideologically and practically, and their conflation in such phrases as ‘the global war on terror’ hardly helps to elucidate the issue. Neither does the frequent juxtaposition of ‘terrorists’ as against ‘freedom fighters’ as mutually exclusive; since one term refers to the means and the other to the ends, an individual or group can be both freedom fighter and terrorist, either of the two or none. Indeed, in British-mandatory Palestine, the ‘Fighters for the Freedom of Israel’ (‘Lehi’ or ‘Stern Gang’) not only practised terrorism – including abductions and assassinations – to combat ‘foreign occupation’ but also proudly declared so. They only resented still being called so when they believed the scope of their operations had outgrown this definition.11 Today, while Israel denounces and combats terrorism, the country’s cities have streets named after Lehi and several of the group’s heroes; one of its leaders, Yitzhak Shamir, ultimately served as Israel’s prime minister. In the 1940s, Lehi was infiltrated by Soviet agents and openly aligned itself with the Soviet Union. However, once the Bolshevik revolution had established itself as a state, it necessarily had to avoid any overt approval of terrorism: it now could be, and in fact was, resisted by domestic groups using the same tactics. Particularly in the period discussed here, as the Soviet Union progressed towards détente with the United States, which brought Moscow considerable benefits, this dictated limiting Soviet activity abroad to ‘clandestine methods of assisting terrorist activities’.12 Abductions in the sense discussed here cannot display the indiscriminate violence perpetrated on individual victims that is usually associated with terrorism, even if the targeted locale is deliberately selected. In this respect, these abductions differ from hostage-taking, which can be classified as terrorism when it is directed at achieving such goals as prisoner release or political concession rather than mere ransom (though that, too, as well as robbery or extortion, can qualify if earmarked for financing terrorist activity). Another exceptional characteristic of intelligence-motivated abductions among terrorist activities is their inherently furtive nature; neither side is likely to publicize the incident. The effect on public opinion, morale and ideological recruitment, which is a central rationale for terrorism in general, is thus absent. Furthermore, the necessary secrecy usually dictates that the abductee cannot be released or repatriated, but must be eliminated, ‘flipped’ or held indefinitely. The categorization of an abduction as a terrorist act thus boils down to the identity of the perpetrators and the overall classification of their group or movement, rather than the nature of the specific act. More easily than bombings or hijackings, abductions performed by state agencies can be accorded legality by regulating or even legislating provisions and terms such as rendition, covert



2. The KGB’s Abduction Programme and the PFLP

25

operations or anti-terrorist warfare – as distinct from legitimacy, which can be conferred by a positive description of the cause to be served. Even more starkly than other types of violence, then, abductions are termed terrorist acts if and when the other side commits them. While the unreported deportation of POWs as described in the Hetz case was a war crime par excellence, few would call it terrorism – if only because it was committed by a state agency. What now takes the discussion into the realm of ‘states and terrorism’ is that an abduction was outsourced to an organization universally considered, and indeed self-declared, as terrorist.

The gradual unveiling of the KGB–PFLP relationship The documents that provided the base for much of the subsequent writing about the KGB–PFLP symbiosis first surfaced shortly after the abortive ‘putsch’ attempt against Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev in August 1991, his eclipse by Yeltsin and the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Previously, in Western scholarship both contemporary and retrospective, it was widely held that despite occasional confluence of interests, the Soviet Union sought to restrain Palestinian groups from launching terrorist attacks outside Israel or against civilians. Representatively, one author claimed: ‘Palestinian terrorism was generally – though not always – perceived by the Soviets as counterproductive.’13 Public, mutual criticism between the Soviets and even avowedly Marxist Palestinian groups such as the PFLP was taken to represent genuine mutual mistrust and suspicion.14 The anti-Soviet backlash that followed the 1991 watershed in Russia was typified by Yaremenko’s specific disclosure in respect of the military, just as it was by Volkogonov’s in respect of the KGB. As part of Yeltsin’s campaign to outlaw the Communist Party, a commission was formed to officially investigate the KGB’s involvement in the attempted coup. The result was to delegitimize the agency and ultimately to dissolve it, among other means by publicizing its previous involvement in international terrorism and other pernicious activities. A commission member, the prominent journalist Evgenia Albats recorded in a 1993 book how she was given access to some KGB files and personnel – a glimpse that would never be repeated. She reported being allowed only to take notes but not to remove or photocopy files, and consequently her book quotes the documents rather than reproduce them.15 But photocopies of the same papers circulated widely in Moscow during the spring and summer of 1992. At least one was published in facsimile by Moskovsky Novosti, and brought to the attention of the English-speaking world by the CIA’s Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS).16 This document and several others were among the sheaf of papers – obviously photocopied many times over – that former dissidents, who had become Yeltsin staffers or supporters, presented to us while we were on assignment in Moscow on the first anniversary of the putsch, and were published in Israel by Isabella Ginor.17 By January 1999 several such documents were posted online in the Bukovsky archive.18

26

Terrorism in the Cold War

Although these documents were dated 1974 and later – that is, after the period discussed here – they did include a reference by Andropov to collaboration with the PFLP’s co-founder and foreign operations chief, Wadie Haddad, going back to 1968.19 Specifically, Haddad was entrusted with ‘operations against US and Israeli personnel […] in order to obtain reliable information’, as Andropov wrote to Brezhnev in 1974.20 This was at least two years earlier than previously estimated in Western studies, which continued to hold that the KGB ‘kept its eye’ on the avowedly Marxist PFLP only after the organization, and Haddad in particular, proved their mettle in a series of attacks during 1968–70. Pierre Marion, former head of the French Direction Générale de la Sécurité Extérieure (DGSE), even called Haddad the real inventor of modern terrorism; rather than any Soviet or other mentor, it was ‘he who refined tactics and techniques’.21 So it was the early date of Haddad’s recruitment, as also the Soviets’ direct initiation and supervision of at least part of his operations, which were the main innovation when, a decade after the 1992 defection to Britain of KGB archivist Vasiliy Mitrokhin, his trove of documents was summarized by Christopher Andrew in two books.22 Mitrokhin's ‘archive’ actually consisted of handwritten notes that he had made over decades (especially from 1972 until his retirement in 1985) from documents that passed through his hands. He stashed these notes in empty milk cans buried at his dacha in anticipation of an opportunity to defect, which occurred only in 1992. The notes vary in detail from brief summaries to verbatim transcripts of full documents. They are thus neither systematic nor exhaustive, but the reliability and authenticity of what they do contain were recognized  by the foremost authorities even at the time of Andrew's publication.23 The release in 2014 of Mitrokhin's full notes, as discussed later, enabled further scrutiny – as in our study for this chapter – which further buttressed their veracity.  One example is the aforementioned documents about the KGB–PFLP link, which we obtained in Moscow and published after Mitrokhin's defection but before his archive was published: they are among the papers that he copied in full, and his version matches the photocopied originals. They definitively identified Haddad (codenamed ‘Nationalist’) as a full-fledged, ‘reliable’ KGB agent. But the previous concept of an arm’s-length relationship was difficult to abandon. A specialized handbook written in 2003 (twenty-five years after Haddad’s death, who, as the handbook omits to mention, was under medical care in East Germany during the last days of his life24) describes him only as the organization’s ‘operational planner’ No reference was made to his KGB affiliation – though this had by then been common knowledge for a decade. The PFLP’s Marxist–Leninist ideology is highlighted, but the Soviet Union is mentioned in the organization’s history only to say that ‘the decline of the Soviet Union […] caused the PFLP to alter some of its ideological points’ – with nothing said of previous Soviet material support or operational complicity, let alone direct sponsorship.25 As late as 2012, attempts were made to harmonize old assumptions with emerging evidence by suggesting that ‘the Soviets seem to have pursued a twotrack strategy’. Even while criticizing the earlier approach, it was still held that ‘it would be absurd to characterize […] even entire radical factions within the



2. The KGB’s Abduction Programme and the PFLP

27

PLO [Palestine Liberation Organization] as little more than the terrorist agents, surrogates or proxies of the KGB’.26 The numerous examples provided, among others, by Mitrokhin demonstrate, however, that Soviet strategy was two-faced rather than two-tracked, as Richard Pipes pointed out as early as 1979: ‘The Soviet Union, while using terror abroad, nevertheless prefers not to identify itself with terror openly.’27 Andrews’s abridged (and occasionally misleading) version could be fleshed out only in mid-2014, when the Churchill Archive Centre at Cambridge University opened Mitrokhin’s complete notes for study by researchers.28 One of the instances more fully exposed exemplified the Soviets’ abduction programme as described by Volkogonov – as well as the role of Haddad and the PFLP precisely as KGB proxies. This case was the plot in 1970–1 to capture the CIA’s deputy station chief in Beirut and deliver him to the Soviets. The newly expanded detail – as well as other evidence that has emerged in the fifteen years since the appearance of Andrew’s books – casts new light on several significant points, reveals several errors and calls for some reassessment of the conceptual context.

Retaliation – or excuse for KGB-initiated action against the CIA? For example, Andropov’s letter of 21 May 1970 to Brezhnev proposing the abduction presents it as retaliation for similar acts by the CIA against Soviet personnel. By implication, the operation would help to restore deterrence from repeating such ‘brazen’ provocations, which had been enabled by ‘lack of appropriate measures on our part’. Andrew attributed this rationale to ‘conspiracy theorists in the Centre [who] remained convinced that the CIA was out to abduct KGB officers, as well as to induce them “to commit treason” (in other words, to defect)’. Whether or not ‘Andropov’s mistaken conviction […] derived not from any real CIA program but from his own addiction to conspiracy theory’, as Andrew confidently asserted, is beside the point. At least in respect of some defections, it would have been entirely reasonable to suspect CIA instigation.29 The three examples of ‘CIA provocation’ that Andropov listed for Brezhnev ranged back over four years and included only one actual ‘disappearance without trace’, as well as two alleged attempts to abduct Soviet operatives. If that was all his evidence, it was hardly enough to prove a pattern. It was, more likely, by way of perfunctory compliance with a standard Soviet procedure: even in internal, secret documents, proposals to initiate actions that would violate treaty commitments or international law had to be justified as necessary response to similar provocations, real or fictitious, by the adversary.30 Regardless of the supposed provocation, the actual purpose of the proposed abduction was stated explicitly (but was omitted by Andrew) as ‘possibly obtaining reliable information on US plans and concrete measures in the Middle East’. This shifts the emphasis of the abduction affair away from Soviet support for terrorist groups that were ideologically aligned with the Soviet Union or promoting causes generally congruent with Soviet interests (as it was categorized by Albats,

28

Terrorism in the Cold War

Andrew and others). Instead, it bespeaks subcontracting of specific missions directly beneficial to Soviet intelligence. The two are not unconnected – in the case of Haddad and the PFLP, both elements played a part – but they are nonetheless distinct, not least in respect of their very classification as terrorist. This distinction is underlined by several details that the full Mitrokhin archive has now added, after Andrew had omitted them. He did list some of the particulars that the KGB had collected about its target, either in advance or in ten days of intensive surveillance (18–28 March 1970), down to the make and colour of his car. But Andrew withheld the target’s name and other identity details, as well as the KGB’s description of his activities. Mitrokhin’s full notes name the putative abductee as ‘Sevier, L.V.’, born 1918 in Denver, Colorado. This identifies him positively as the Lewis V. Sevier who is listed in successive editions of the US Foreign Service’s Biographic Register.31 While it gives his precise birth date, 14 March 1918, and his native state, the register does not mention his native city – which indicates that the KGB did not merely copy this unclassified handbook. Elsewhere, Mitrokhin’s file describes an ‘operation Rubin (ruby)’, which involved bugging the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS, or Military Intelligence Section 6, MI6) station in the British Embassy at Beirut. The operation began in 1966; in June of that year, according to the register, Sevier was posted as a ‘political officer’ at the US Embassy there. By 1967, the information garnered by ‘Rubin’ included the identities of six CIA officers. Among them was the ‘acting’ station chief – presumably the chief ’s top deputy, who stood in for him in his absence – and the data about him ‘was utilized for a recruitment effort’ aimed at this deputy.32 So, assuming this was Sevier, the Soviets may have resorted to abduction after failing to recruit him.

The intended victim Sevier was quite an old-timer for a field officer. He had just marked his fifty-second birthday when the KGB began shadowing him. After military service ‘overseas’ in the Second World War, apparently as a counterintelligence officer with the 82nd Airborne Division from 1942 to 1945, he had a brief stint of ‘private experience’ as a salesman before entering government service.33 Between 1947 and 1959 he is listed both as a ‘ргоgram analysis officer’ at the Department of the Army and as chief of the economic treaties branch of the State Department’s Office of Economic Defense and Trade Policy. The Biographic Register also listed Sevier as married – a detail that the KGB either did not discover or, bizarrely, considered to be irrelevant to the possibility of offering him ‘asylum in a Socialist country’, which will be discussed later. Sevier had served in the Muslim world continuously at least since 1959 (in Cairo as ‘assistant program officer’ and ‘operations officer’, in Karachi as ‘program analyst’).34 If his assignments were considered high-risk, or his wife Doris nee Wrigley pursued her own career in Washington, she might have remained stateside even though



2. The KGB’s Abduction Programme and the PFLP

29

this would be conspicuously unusual for his diplomatic cover roles.35 This might explain the KGB’s failure to notice her – not to mention their three children, all by then in their twenties – and to take her into account in the operational planning. It did note a trip that Sevier made to the States in May–June 1970, without suggesting that it was possibly a family visit.36 What, then, was the KGB’s reason for selecting a veteran but rank-andfile CIA operative for an abduction that required authorization as high up as Brezhnev himself? Mitrokhin’s notes mention, without elaboration, another codename for Sevier, besides ‘Vir’, which was used for ‘Operation Vint (screw)’, the abduction plan. This other codename was ‘Fakir’ (possibly a throwback to his term in Pakistan), which indicates previous KGB interest. Another passage that was omitted from Andrew’s version may reflect at least part of the rationale for targeting Sevier. He is described as ‘virulently anti-Soviet, pathologically hostile to the USSR and Communist ideology. [He] heads a department operating against Soviet institutions and missions.’ These generalizations can be discounted as pro forma excuses akin to the purported CIA provocations. However, they are followed by a more specific accusation: that Sevier ‘operates against Soviet citizens, especially of Armenian extraction’. Lebanese Armenians figured among Soviet agents in Beirut (Andrew’s survey of the Mitrokhin archive names several, both ‘legal’ and ‘illegal’), but none of them are recorded as defecting. Still, Sevier may have been suspected of attempting to instigate such defection. But Andropov’s descriptions of alleged CIA abduction plots against Soviet operatives explicitly specified the targets’ intelligence function or their cover jobs. The general term ‘Soviet citizens of Armenian extraction’ appears, then, to apply to emigrants rather than agents already resident abroad. According to a State Department cable, ‘prior to … 1975 [the outbreak of the Lebanese Civil War], practically all Armenian refugees from the Soviet Union made their way to Lebanon (Beirut), where they were registered by VOLAGS [volunteer agencies] for USRP [US Resettlement Program] assistance and processed for conditional entry to USA’. 37 ‘Processing’ for the USRP routinely included security clearance, which in this case obviously involved weeding out planted Soviet agents. Sevier’s counterintelligence background had prepared him well for such a task. It possibly also extended to recruiting Armenians for US services. Andrew’s version holds that ‘Operation Vint […] ended in failure. “Vir” varied his daily regime and Haddad’s gunmen found it impossible to implement the original plan for his abduction’. This is prima facie a reasonable inference from the Mitrokhin file’s actual language, but the latter does not explicitly mention a failure nor attribute it to Haddad’s men: ‘No consistent regularities were observed in Vir’s behavior that could enable predetermination of the operation date.’ The surveillance effort did obtain sufficient data about Sevier’s routine to enable a rather easy abduction, such as the daily walks with his dog – a black poodle, no Rottweiler – presumably alone, since no escort was noted. Vir’s address is given in the full document as 168-174 Avenue Ramlet el-Baida (white sands). This was, in 1970, a new, upscale residential development noted for its modernist architecture, on Beirut’s only sand beach.38 It was situated in a predominantly Muslim area,

30

Terrorism in the Cold War

which would soon be the scene of a celebrated raid by Israeli commandos that killed several Palestinian leaders.39 During the Lebanese civil war, from 1975, the neighbourhood had become a stronghold of the PFLP and its allies, the locale for the assassination of a US ambassador with his ‘economic counsellor’ in 1976.40 Conditions for Haddad’s assignment thus appear to have been favourable and, given the competence that he had displayed in mounting other operations, this one should not have been excessively challenging. Mitrokhin lists several other cases in which the PFLP successfully abducted figures whom they suspected of hostile activity (including work for the CIA) and moved them out of Lebanon. In one case at least, they shared the resulting information with the KGB. But the abductees were not handed over, and these operations are not described as initiated by the Soviets.41 The stated reason for abandoning the ‘Vint’ plan thus seems dubious – perhaps an excuse. Haddad’s ‘three most experienced and reliable militants’ who were to be selected for the mission were to be told that its purpose was the ‘capture of an American diplomat-spy, [who] works intensively against the Palestinians’. They were to be fed a ‘legend’ whereby ‘the capture’s purpose is to transfer “Vir” to Syria and then to exchange him for Fedayeen held in Israel’. Did the PFLP men disbelieve it? Did they get wind of the equally fictitious scenario that was purveyed to the Soviet ‘participants on the part of the Beirut and Damascus rezidenturas [who] will be operative staffers of Caucasian and Tatar nationality’? These were to be told ‘the “legend” that the operation is conducted in order to extract a Soviet “illegal” who has turned traitor, for secret transport to the USSR’. Such an objective would have much less to do with Palestinian goals than with anti-US action, and it can only be speculated that Haddad or his men balked at it – but preferred to plead unfeasibility rather than outright refusal, in view of the support and armament that their group was receiving from Moscow. This support was just reaching a new level. Mitrokhin’s file shows that Brezhnev approved, in June 1970, another proposal by Andropov: to supply the PFLP with five RPG-7 grenade launchers, though other weapons that Haddad requested were denied. Andrew is evidently mistaken in stating that the RPGs were ‘followed’ (by implication, soon) by a much larger, advanced and meticulously camouflaged arms transfer to Haddad in the Gulf of Aden. Close examination of the evidence points to a much later date for the latter shipment.42 The CIA, then, was not so wildly wrong (at least in respect of the PFLP) when it reported in December 1970 that ‘there was no indication as of the fall of 1970 that the Soviets were yet supplying any direct material support to [any of] the Palestinians’.43 But the PFLP’s presence in South Yemen, and the RPGs it was already cleared to receive, were exploited by the Soviets a year after ‘Vint’. It was then that ‘KGB experts gave “Nationalist” an authoritative recommendation to organize and implement’ an attack on the Israeli-chartered, 80,000-tonne tanker Coral Sea as it carried Iranian crude oil through the Bab el-Mandeb Strait into the Red Sea en route to the Israeli port of Eilat. After the Soviets provided the necessary intelligence about the tanker’s itinerary and pinpointed the location for the attack, operation ‘Nasos’ (pump) took place on 13 June 1971. PFLP gunmen on a speedboat fired between



2. The KGB’s Abduction Programme and the PFLP

31

seven and nine rockets from three RPG-7 launchers provided by the KGB. Five of the projectiles struck the ship, causing a fire.44 However, Fedor Mortin, head of the KGB’s First Directorate (foreign intelligence) reported drily that the Coral Sea was not sunk.45 Mortin had been charged by Andropov with implementing both ‘Vint’ and ‘Nasos’, and as in the case of Sevier he did not explicitly report a failure – which in any case was apparently not entirely the fault of Haddad’s men. A recently disclosed Israeli version, indeed, confirms that it was only a fortuitous decision by the ship’s Greek captain, shortly before the attack, to release the oil fumes accumulated in the hold that saved the tanker from explosion (crude oil is flammable but not volatile in its liquid state).46 But summing up the tanker incident ten days after the event, Mortin suggested that ‘it seems more expedient to more actively exploit “Nationalist” and his militants for bold operations aimed only directly at Israel’.47 This agrees with our hypothesis that operating the PFLP purely as a Soviet proxy, as in the putative abduction of ‘Vir’, proved to be problematic. The organization was not averse to abductions per se; it did carry out several of them in 1970, and in one case documents of interest to the KGB were passed on to the Soviet agency. But the abductees were not handed over, the PFLP had its own motives against them, and neither Mitrokhin nor other sources attribute the initiation of these operations to the Soviets.

The one who got away At any rate, the KGB’s overall trust in and cooperation with the PFLP was not affected. Andrew evidently gathered the failure of ‘Vint’ from the report in Mitrokhin’s file that in the following year (1971) the KGB ‘developed and elaborated another variant’ (actually, the file details three of them) for the capture of ‘Vir’. These, too, involved Haddad’s group, as ‘alibis were elaborated for Nationalist and his militants’. Though no exact date is given, this was apparently in parallel with the Coral Sea episode and other Soviet-supported PFLP operations. Mitrokhin’s particulars about these plans are more than in ‘Vint’ about what was in store for Sevier. Plan A was ‘to transport him […] to a predetermined and prepared […] “isolator”’ on Syrian soil, where ‘interrogations were to take place for 1-2 weeks according to a KGB scenario and questionnaire, about top secret information and manpower of the CIA agentura’. Even more revealing than this indication that the KGB had its own, autonomous detention facilities in Syria is the directive that ‘“Vir” was to be driven to the conclusion of not returning to his country, but rather to start proceedings for political asylum in one of the socialist countries. If he agrees, action should proceed according to the circumstances’ – an outcome similar to what Yaremenko envisaged for Hetz. What was to befall Sevier if he refused the asylum offer is not specified, but ‘under another scenario’, Vir would be held and interrogated at an ‘isolator’ in the Saida (Sidon) region, 35 kilometres south of Beirut. Vir’s fate would be decided independently by ‘Naslednik’ (‘successor’; the holder of this codename is not

32

Terrorism in the Cold War

identified).48 And under the final variant, ‘Vir was to be transferred to the KGB in Syria or killed’. Releasing him was, then, not envisaged in any event. The Mitrokhin file is silent on the outcome of these plans, but it can now be determined that they too were not realized: Sevier turned up in January 1976 when Libération, a far-left French daily, ‘outed’ him among forty-four ‘employees’ of the CIA’s Paris station.49 His name actually led the second of two lists. The apparent breach – ‘more of a security than a public relations problem’ – was serious enough to be reported to Secretary of State Henry Kissinger himself.50 As pointed out by Le Nouvel Observateur, a rival and more moderate left-wing organ, the list in Libération was inaccurate to the point of sloppiness: it included US Embassy staffers who had nothing to do with the CIA, and some who were no longer in Paris at all.51 The embassy noted that ‘even though names of all embassy personnel are listed in [the] unclassified telephone book, we figured few people actually possessed [said] book and held to no comment’.52 Therefore, as with the KGB’s information about Sevier in Beirut, the French newspaper’s version might ostensibly have been gleaned partly but not wholly from open sources. But any uncertainty whether Sevier was erroneously named by Libération in its list of CIA operatives was resolved by his second ‘outing’ in Paris. A Polish exile group – which considered even the CIA as ‘dangerous’ – included him in a ‘blacklist’ that it published in August 1976. He was described as the first of two assistants to Eugen F. Burgstaller, the head of a ‘CIA Polish section’ at the US Embassy, who ‘conducts espionage against the Polish Ex-Combatants Association in France, the publishing house “Kultura”, the editorial office of “Narodowiec”, and other Polish organizations in which he maintains a network of informers’.53 How accurate the specific association of Sevier – or the entire list – with activity towards Polish expatriates was, is hard to establish. He had no known background in Polish language or affairs, and this was his first assignment outside the Muslim world – but it might have been similar in nature to his Armenian specialization in Beirut. On the other hand, Sevier’s description as a close aide to Burgstaller seems more significant. The latter was actually chief of the entire CIA station in Paris, and had previously headed the Beirut station concurrently with Sevier’s service there, including the period of the KGB’s abduction plans.54 They were transferred from Beirut to Paris simultaneously – which appears to indicate that the station chief took his associate along with him, rather than that the CIA got wind of a specific risk to Sevier in Beirut and extricated him. But there are some indications of the latter possibility, including a testimony from Burgstaller himself. Sevier’s boss was two years younger than he was, but outranked him; Burgstaller had the advantage of two Harvard degrees, while none are listed for Sevier. A year after he retired in 1979, Burgstaller was deemed senior enough to testify before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. The issue under discussion was the advisability of congressional oversight of the CIA. Burgstaller asserted his support for such oversight in principle, but indicated that certain activities, which by implication could not be approved by Congress, were better withheld. As an example, he related an incident that appears to mirror Mitrokhin’s account of the plot to capture Sevier.



2. The KGB’s Abduction Programme and the PFLP

33

I think it is evident that in foreign policy it is often desirable not to identify to the potential enemy what you will and will not do in certain situations. I might offer a thinly disguised, but what is substantially a very truthful account of how this can work. In the years that I served as COS [chief of station] in Beirut, Lebanon, we had an operation involving contact between one of my officers and a young KGB officer, a rather unusual KGB officer simply because he was undisciplined, and this, of course, is what led us to him. He drank too much. He gambled. The relationship between my subordinate and this officer seemed to be going along quite well, when all of a sudden the KGB officer vanished from Beirut.

Andropov, then, was not entirely paranoid in charging that ‘US intelligence is persuading Soviet citizens to commit treason’, and he had a case in point from the very arena where he proposed to retaliate. Burgstaller went on: Some months later a very senior KGB officer whom I had met earlier returned from Moscow to Beirut, invited me to lunch, and began to tell me a very strange sort of story in which he said […] that a zealous young CIA officer might well wish to score some successes against his organization.

Sevier may have been zealous, as Andropov described him, but at fifty-two he was hardly young. Still, the KGB officer may not have wished to identify his suspect and prospective target too obviously – or the ‘undisciplined’ recruitment prospect had tried to obscure his contact. This [Burgstaller’s interlocutor said] was all part and parcel of the world of espionage and counterespionage, but that there were two schools of thought within the KGB as to how they should react. One, he said, was the ‘soft, flexible school’, to which he said he was personally a subscriber; namely, that possibly one could toss this young man ‘a few bones’ to assist him in his career with our agency in return for his possibly tossing them something as a compensation. Then he went on to say […] ‘There are others, Mr. Burgstaller, whom we might call the hard-line school, who favor other types of action, and if we […] of the soft-line school cannot convince our superiors that our way is the way to handle it, the hard-liners may win out’.

The CIA’s Beirut station chief was experienced enough to see through the good cop–bad cop exercise. He evidently discerned a recurring Soviet tactic: to threaten a measure that had already been decided upon, by presenting it as a response to the Americans’ failure to meet an ostensibly reasonable demand. Well, at a certain point after listening to this I said, ‘May I ask, are you threatening executive action against this young officer? Are you threatening to take physical action against him?’ I said, ‘Because if you are, I would like to make clear to you

34

Terrorism in the Cold War that we have never done this, neither your service nor ours. If you were ever once to start that, it could become a two-way street.’

So denial notwithstanding, the CIA had a euphemistic code word for assassination (‘executive action’ is not a Soviet term), and the former station chief preferred to keep the matter obscure: I simply mean here the fact that the Soviets cannot exclude in this particular instance that we might not in retaliation assassinate one of theirs. It is simply part of that flexibility which derives from not telling your enemies what it is you’re going to do and what it is you’re not going to do.55

So was the CIA aware of the plot to abduct Sevier or to strike at him otherwise, and particularly of its instigation by the KGB? In January 1971, a CIA report stated that ‘there have been numerous reports during 1970 of planned PFLP operations, some of which have been borne out. […] In late March 1970 [that is, shortly before Andropov formally proposed “Vint”] a member of the PFLP Politburo said that the PFLP had plans to kidnap diplomats, especially those of Britain and the US, in the Latin American manner’, and listed several such examples.56 All of these, however, were intended to achieve the Palestinian organization’s own purposes – as indicated by Mitrokhin’s aforementioned notes. At any rate, neither the KGB nor the PFLP ever got Lewis V. Sevier. He lived to age eighty-six and died in Bethesda, Maryland, in September 2004. His obituary revealed nothing of his career, only that he was survived by his wife, three children and nine grandchildren – and that his middle initial stood for Valentine.57 The fate of Shmu’el Hetz and other possible targets of the Soviet abduction programme remains unknown.

Notes 1 Isabella Ginor and Gideon Remez, Veterans’ Memoirs as a Source for the USSR’s Intervention in the Arab–Israeli Conflict: The Fluctuations in Their Appearance and Character with Political Change in Post-Soviet Russia, Slavic Military Studies 29/2 (2016), 279–97. 2 The late Col. Yaremenko had personal experience in the Middle East as an Arabicspeaking military interpreter who witnessed, among other events, the Israeli bombing of Iraq’s nuclear reactor in 1981. 3 Valery Yaremenko, Sovetsko-Egipetskoe voyennoe sotrudnichestvo nakanune i v khode oktyabr’skoy voyny 1973 goda, in Valery Vartanov et al. (eds.), Rukopozhatie cherez chetvert’ veka, 1973–1998: Materialy nauchno-prakticheskoy konferentsii (Moscow: Institute of Military History, Council of Veterans of War in Egypt and Attaché Office of Egyptian Arab Republic, 1999), 52–3. 4 Isabella Ginor, Ta’alumat ha-tayyas Hetz, Yedi’ot Ahronot (Tel Aviv), 25 April 2001, 1, 5–7. An updated English version is included in Isabella Ginor and Gideon Remez, The



2. The KGB’s Abduction Programme and the PFLP

5 6

7

8 9

10 11

12

35

Soviet–Israeli War, 1967–1973: The USSR’s Military Intervention in the Egyptian–Israeli Conflict (New York: Oxford University Press, 2017). Maj.-Gen. Vladimir A. Zolotarev et al. (eds.), Rossiya (SSSR) v lokalnikh voynakh i voyennykh konfliktakh vtoroi poloviny XX veka (Moscow: Institute of Military History, 2000). Article 12 of the Third Geneva Convention ‘relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War’ (1949) permits the transfer of POWs between ‘coalition’ powers, if both are parties to the convention (as Egypt and the Soviet Union were). But the subsequent treatment of Hetz according to the Russian version violated numerous other provisions of the convention, such as immediate notification to the prisoner’s country (art. 69) and his right to correspond with his family (art. 70–71). Defense Department Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO), The Gulag Study: 2005 [fifth] edition. In 2001, the study had just begun and ran only to about one-tenth the length of the latest version. Upon the latter’s publication, DPMO’s newsletter The Torch (spring 2005) noted that ‘so far, the records of the security and intelligence agencies that operated the camps in which foreign (non-Soviet) citizens were held have not been made available to us […] We continue to acquire information from various sources about the presence of American servicemen in the Soviet camps and will update the Gulag Study to reflect new leads and the results of our inquiry. In this way, even if the political climate does not allow us to move forward with definitive results, we will at least be able to maintain visibility and recognition.’ However, The Torch and all versions of The Gulag Study have since been removed from the DPMO’s website and its page on the Library of Congress website. The fifth edition is still accessible on the website of the National Alliance of Families for the Return of America’s Missing Servicemen, http:​//www​.nati​onala​llian​ce.or​g/gul​ag/5g​ulag.​html (accessed 22 August 2016). Dmitry Volkogonov, Etyudy o vremeni (Moscow: Novosty, 1998): entry dated 1993, 50–1; letter to Yeltsin, 5 September 1994, 361–2. Andropov to Brezhnev, 21 May 1970, marked ‘approve’ with Brezhnev’s signature, 25 May. Andropov proceeded to instruct Fedor Mortin (then deputy chief, and soon after appointed head of the KGB First Directorate) to implement the plan. This and subsequent quotations from the Mitrokhin archive, the Churchill Archive Centre at Cambridge University, UK (henceforth MA), unless otherwise indicated, are from envelope K-24, ‘Near and Middle East’, 74–83, item #365. For a fuller discussion, see Anna Geifman, Thou Shalt Kill: Revolutionary Terrorism in Russia, 1894–1917 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993), 3–8, 59 (note 8). For example, ‘The Social Revolutionaries in Russia were definitely terrorists. Orsini, the Italian, was definitely a terrorist. But […] their acts are not considered morally negative. Therefore, we are not insulted if we are called this name [terrorists], especially if it is British mouths that utter this epithet. […] Undoubtedly, four or five years ago our operations were merely terrorist acts. But extended operations aimed at military installations, transport networks, government centers, and so on are usually called otherwise in global parlance.’ Terror in the View of Provincials, Hama’as (Lehi organ), issue 25, December 1947, in Lohamei Herut Yisra’el: Ktavim, Vol. 2 (writings; Tel Aviv: Committee to Publish Lehi Writings, 1960), 299–300. See discussion in Isabella Ginor and Gideon Remez, A Cold War Casualty in Jerusalem, 1948: The Assassination of Witold Hulanicki, Israel Journal of Foreign Affairs 4/3 (2010), 135–56. Ray S. Cline and Yonah Alexander, Terrorism: The Soviet Connection (New York: Crane Russak, 1984), 17.

36

Terrorism in the Cold War

13 Galia Golan, The Soviet Union and the PLO (Jerusalem: Hebrew University, 1976), 211. 14 Bard E. O’Neill, Armed Struggle in Palestine: A Political-Military Analysis (Boulder, CO: Westview, 1978), 196–8. 15 Yevgenia Albats, KGB: State Within a State (London: I.B. Tauris, 1995). 16 FBIS Report: Central Eurasia (Washington DC: The Service, 1992), 7. 17 Isabella Ginor, Ha-KGB tikhnen pe’ulot Hasha’iyot neged Yisrael ve-siye’a la-hazit ha-ammamit (The KGB Planned Operations against Israel and Aided the PFLP), Ha’aretz (Tel Aviv), 28 August 1992, 1A, 8A and 2B. 18 #911, 913, 915, http:​//www​.buko​vsky-​archi​ves.n​et/pd​fs/te​rr-wd​/terr​-wd-r​us.ht​ml (accessed 1 January 2020). 19 Albats, KGB, 228 (‘Vadia Haddad’). His first name is variously transliterated elsewhere as Wadi, Wadia or Wadih. 20 Ginor, Ha-KGB tikhnen pe’ulot Hasha’iyot neged Yisrael ve-siye’a la-hazit ha-ammamit. 21 Rémy Kauffer, Communism and Terrorism, in Stéphane Courtois and Mark Kramer (eds.), The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999), 354–5. 22 Christopher Andrew and Vasiliy Mitrokhin, The Sword and the Shield: The Mitrokhin Archive and the Secret History of the KGB (New York: Basic Books, 2000); and The World Was Going Our Way: The KGB and the Battle for the Third World (New York: Basic Books, 2005). 23 For example, Christian Ostermann and Odd Arne Westad in their introduction to Vasiliy Mitrokhin, The KGB in Afghanistan, Cold War International History Project Working Paper #40, 2002, 7–11, https​://ww​w.wil​sonce​nter.​org/s​ites/​defau​lt/fi​les/W​ P40-e​nglis​h.pdf​(accessed 5 January 2017). 24 PFLP website, http:​//pfl​p.ps/​engli​sh/20​14/03​/29/r​ememb​ering​-comr​ade-d​r-wad​ie-ha​ ddad-​on-th​e-36t​h-ann​ivers​ary-o​f-his​-mart​yrdom​ (accessed 22 August 2016). The article claims that his death was ‘the result of a targeted assassination via poisoning by the Mossad’ – apparently based on such a claim in a book by a former Mossad operative: Aaron J. Klein, Striking Back: The 1972 Munich Olympics Massacre and Israel’s Deadly Response (New York: Random House, 2005), 205. 25 Yonah Alexander, Palestinian Secular Terrorism (Ardsley, NY: Transnational Publishers, 2003), 33–5. 26 Jeffrey M. Bale, Terrorism or State ‘Proxies’: Separating Fact from Fiction, in Michael A. Innes (ed.), Making Sense of Proxy Wars: States, Surrogates and the Use of Force (Dulles, VA: Potomac, 2012), unpaginated. 27 Richard Pipes, The Roots of the Involvement, in Binyamin Netanyahu (ed.), International Terrorism: The Soviet Connection (Jerusalem: The Jonathan Institute, 1979), 62. 28 In fact, these are Russian-language typescripts made from Mitrokhin’s notes, with his handwritten corrections. They are very loosely grouped by theme or region, sequenced in no discernible order, and are neither indexed nor searchable – so that definitively covering any specific subject demands combing the entire collection. Still, there is a lot of new information to be mined. 29 In the single case Andropov cited where the alleged abduction succeeded, ‘on 9 March 1970 in Delhi, a staffer of the APN [Novosty News Agency] bureau, Bezmenov Yu[ry] A., disappeared without trace’. Andrew states that Bezmenov was ‘exfiltrated’ by the CIA from India to Greece, which would actually confirm Andropov’s charge (Andrew



30

31 32

33 34 35 36

37

38 39 40 41

2. The KGB’s Abduction Programme and the PFLP

37

and Mitrokhin, The Sword and the Shield, 379). But Bezmenov himself later claimed that he escaped, unaided, from India disguised as a hippie American student and walked into the US Embassy in Athens without any prior contact. ‘Useless Dissident’ blog, Interview with Yuri Bezmenov, 24 November 2008, http:​//use​lessd​issid​ent.b​ logsp​ot.co​.il/2​008/1​1/int​ervie​w-wit​h-yur​i-bez​menov​.html​ (accessed 1 January 2020). Either way, Andropov was presumably unaware of Bezmenov’s fate when the KGB chief ’s letter was written, less than two months later. A senior Soviet diplomat related the explicit prescription of this technique by Foreign Minister Andrey Gromyko in 1961. Oleg Grinevsky, 1001 den’ Nikity Sergeyevicha (Moscow: Vagrius, 1998), 355–7; translated and discussed in Isabella Ginor and Gideon Remez, Foxbats over Dimona: The Soviets’ Nuclear Gamble in the Six-Day War (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007), 3–4. The Biographic Register, Division of Publishing Services, U.S. Department of State (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1960), 687; 1968 edition, 456. 1967 Memo from KGB Maj.-Gen. Tsymbal, in MA, 58–59, #299. Some ‘CIA spotters’ list Sevier as the Beirut station chief in 1969, evidently reflecting one of the periods when he stood in for the chief: http://cia-spotters.blogspot.co.il/, posting of 17 March 2015 (accessed 1 January 2020). ‘2nd Lt. Lewis V. Sevier’, listed in John Mendelsohn, The History of the Counter Intelligence Corps (New York: Garland, 1989), 109. Department of State News Letter 59–68 (1966), 71. She was listed as a research analyst in the State Department’s Near Eastern Branch in 1947, when she authored an article on the development of the Arab League for the Department’s ‘Bulletin’, 1009; Biographic Register, 1947, 23. A list of foreign service officers provided to the US Senate by President Richard Nixon in 1972 gives Sevier’s domicile as Maryland. Journal of the Executive Proceedings of the Senate of the United States, vol. 188, 1972, 574. The dates indicate that the report was written after June. Mitrokhin mentions that ‘on 12 June 1970 an attempt was made on Nationalist’s life in Beirut’, which may help to explain the disruption of ‘Vint’ along with the other hypothesis detailed later. Andrew and Vasiliy Mitrokhin (World, 247), rather than giving Mitrokhin’s version of the date for this incident, oddly dates it to 11 July, based on a previous book: John Follain, The Jackal (London: Weidenfeld and Nicholson, 1998), 24. In 1974, the number of these refugees ‘peaked at about 4,000’ (of whom only 454 were registered for relocation to America) and their total in Lebanon reached 12,000. The flow was then ‘cut off ’ and channelled directly to the United States, due among other reasons to the refugees being ‘subject to pressure by Armenian Communist Party Organization within Lebanon’. Cables from US Mission, United Nations Geneva, to Department of State, 4 June 1975, https​://se​arch.​wikil​eaks.​org/p​lusd/​cable​s/197​ 5GENE​VA041​71_b.​html;​and from US Embassy, Moscow, to Department of State, 16 February 1977, https​://se​arch.​wikil​eaks.​org/p​lusd/​cable​s/197​7MOSC​OW022​32_c.​ html (both accessed 1 January 2020). Brooke Anderson, Karol Schayer’s Mod, Mod World: Restoring a Beirut Apartment Building to Its Midcentury Glory, The Wall Street Journal, 20 January 2014. Zvi Lavi, Bevadai ha-Yisre’elim Matqifim (The Israelis Must Be Attacking), Ma’ariv (Tel Aviv), 13 April 1973, 14. Robert Fisk, Pity the Nation: Lebanon at War (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), 83. Andrew and Mitrokhin, World, 248; MA, 12, #59.

38

Terrorism in the Cold War

42 Although this transfer, ‘Operation Vostok (East)’ and the rewards given to the Soviet participants are described in great detail, no date is given. Andrew implied that it came shortly after the initial RPG transfer, that is, later in 1970, and this was widely quoted as fact. But the massive quantity and types of foreign-made weapons and signal equipment appear more suitable to later stages of the Soviet–PFLP relationship. Indeed, the list, as well as the mode of transfer at sea, are almost identical with the second of two shipments which Mitrokhin records elsewhere as reported to Brezhnev by Andropov on 5 and 16 May 1975 (while resembling the types that Haddad was denied in 1970). The timing in 1975, unlike 1970–71, also conforms to the titles given for the senior Soviet officers involved in ‘Vostok’, such as Dmitry Ustinov and Viktor Kulikov. 43 Fedayeen – ‘Men of Sacrifice’, Intelligence Report, ESAU XLVIII, Directorate of Intelligence, CIA, December 1970, 37, http:​//www​.foia​.cia.​gov/s​ites/​defau​lt/fi​les/d​ ocume​nt_co​nvers​ions/​14/es​au-47​.pdf (accessed 1 January 2020). 44 It is unclear whether these were the same RPGs that were supplied a year before. If not, as Mitrokhin’s language appears to indicate, a new batch may have been necessary with rockets of a type specifically designed to cause the type of explosion described later. 45 Associated Press report, quoted from the Utica (NY) Daily Press, 18 June 1981. 46 Former Mossad operative Gad Shimron, interviewed on Israel Radio, 28 March 2015, and later elaborated personally to the authors of this article. The Israeli authorities downplayed the incident, and it was only in 1977 that the captain, Markos Moschos, received an Israeli decoration for his ‘courage and professionalism’ – the first and only non-Israeli national to be so honoured. See Itur ha-mofet sar ha-tahburah (decoration of valour from the Minister of Transportation), Davar (Tel Aviv), 12 April 1977, 3. 47 Our emphasis. Andrew and Mitrokhin (World, 250), omitted the crucial word ‘only’ and thus inverted the sense of Mortin’s recommendation. Mitrokhin quotes immediately after this sentence: ‘Under KGB influence, Haddad also expressed willingness to transfer the focus of his operations from third countries to Israeli territory and occupied territories.’ However, one of the documents reproduced in the Bukovsky archive clarifies that this concurrence by Haddad was reported not by Mortin in 1971, but by Andropov following Haddad’s visit to Moscow in January 1975. See http:​//www​.buko​vsky-​archi​ves.n​et/pd​fs/te​rr-wd​/plo7​5c.pd​f (accessed 1 January 2020). 48 An agent with the same codename is described elsewhere in Mitrokhin’s file, but the locale and character of his activity rule out his identification with this ‘Naslednik’. 49 La CIA à Paris: Deuxieme Liste, Libération, 14 January 1976. 50 Cable from US Embassy, Paris, to State Department, 14 January 1976, https​://wi​kilea​ ks.or​g/plu​sd/ca​bles/​1976P​ARIS0​1221_​b.htm​l (accessed 1 January 2020). 51 Rene Backmann, Franz-Olivier Giesbert and Oliver Todd, Ce que Cherchent les Agents de la CIA en France, Le Nouvel Observateur, 18 January 1976, reproduced in Philip Agee and Louis Wolf, Dirty Work: The CIA in Western Europe (New York: Dorset Press, 1987), 174–5, https://pdf.yt/d/9MwmH_nnJ4eOmL66 (accessed 22 August 2016). 52 Cable from US Embassy, Paris, to State Department, 14 January 1976. 53 Free Poland Special Report #3, 1–2, http:​//www​.foia​.cia.​gov/s​ites/​defau​lt/fi​les/d​ocume​ nt_co​nvers​ions/​17051​43/HA​NFF%2​C%20K​ONSTA​NTY%2​0%20%​20VOL​.%202​ _0016​.pdf;​ CIA English translation, http:​//www​.foia​.cia.​gov/s​ites/​defau​lt/fi​les/d​ocume​ nt_co​nvers​ions/​17051​43/HA​NFF%2​C%20K​ONSTA​NTY%2​0%20%​20VOL​.%202​



54 55 56

57

2. The KGB’s Abduction Programme and the PFLP

39

_0017​.pdf;​CIA reports discussing the disclosure, 9 September 1976, http:​//www​.foia​ .cia.​gov/s​ites/​defau​lt/fi​les/d​ocume​nt_co​nvers​ions/​17051​43/HA​NFF%2​C%20K​ONSTA​ NTY%2​0%20%​20VOL​.%201​_0045​.pdf;​ and 4 October 1976, http:​//www​.foia​.cia.​gov/s​ ites/​defau​lt/fi​les/d​ocume​nt_co​nvers​ions/​17051​43/HA​NFF%2​C%20K​ONSTA​NTY%2​ 0%20%​20VOL​.%202​_0003​.pdf (all accessed 1 January 2020). From June 1966, as ‘political officer’ at the US Embassy. The Biographic Register, 1971, 54. National Intelligence Act of 1980: Hearings before the Select Committee on Intelligence, U.S. Senate, 96th Congress, 2nd Session, on S. 2284 (Washington DC: Government Printing Office, 1980), 524–6. ESAU L: The Fedayeen (Annex to ESAU XLVIII: Fedayeen – ‘Men of Sacrifice’), Intelligence Report, Directorate of Intelligence, CIA, January 1971, 37, http:​//www​ .foia​.cia.​gov/s​ites/​defau​lt/fi​les/d​ocume​nt_co​nvers​ions/​14/es​au-49​.pdf (accessed 1 January 2020). Obituary in The Washington Post, 18 September 2004.

40

CChapter 3 SOVIET APPROACHES TO MUSLIM EXTREMISM AND TERRORISM Michael Fredholm

There is no doubt that during the Cold War, the intelligence services of the Soviet Union maintained contacts with terrorist groups. For instance, the KGB1 provided nationalist and leftist terrorist groups such as the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine – General Command (PFLP-GC) and the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP) with funds, training and arms.2 This was hardly surprising, since these terrorist groups were political organizations that remained more or less aligned with the ideological goals of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU). Ever since 1919, when Vladimir Lenin arranged for the creation of the Comintern,3 the CPSU had, when necessary, relied on clandestine means to keep in touch with ideologically linked political organizations elsewhere. By maintaining relations with them, Moscow ensured Soviet access to their leaders, some of whom in time emerged as presidents of established or newly independent states. For reasons of practicality and deniability, the links were often maintained by Soviet intelligence. Besides, Soviet intelligence could use the leftists with whom links were established as sources of information. If nothing else, such informers would be able, and willing, to report on their rivals. Some might also have been able to provide valuable intelligence on the countries in which they were active. None of the aforementioned Palestinian terrorist organizations was motivated by Muslim extremism, even though they had all emerged in Muslim countries. Their key defining ideology, beyond leftism, was nationalism. This begs the question of whether Soviet intelligence also maintained links with extremist organizations motivated by Islamic ideals, such as those groups that had begun carrying out terrorist operations already in the Cold War and, in the twenty-first century, grew into arguably the most serious terrorist threat to the Western world and secular society. In most cases, the Soviets did not. On Soviet territory, it will be shown, the security organs realized already during the civil war that followed the Russian Revolution that at times, they could use what they termed ‘revolutionary Islam’ as a means to fight the traditional Sufi brotherhoods, which were perceived to be the greater threat to the Soviet state.

42

Terrorism in the Cold War

However, direct support essentially ceased during the Second World War, even though their radical Islamic ideology was retained and incorporated into the Soviet state structures in Muslim-majority union republics. From the early 1970s, the Soviet security organs were aware of the existence of Muslim extremism, and of its general hostility towards the Soviet, atheist ideology. However, it was treated as purely a domestic security matter. From a foreign intelligence perspective, the Soviet services had little to gain from contacts with such groups. Besides, the focus of Soviet foreign intelligence was far more traditional, with an emphasis on foreign governments, leftist organizations and the subversive activities of the intelligence services of other countries. For obvious reasons, the Soviets were also more attuned to finding support among Marxists and others of ‘progressive’ political orientation than among religious extremists.

The domestic security approach to Muslim extremism – Sufi Islam versus revolutionary Islam Both in the Soviet Union and in the Western world, the real threat from Islam to Soviet power was identified in the Sufi brotherhoods that for centuries had dominated Islam in the Caucasus and Central Asia.4 It was the Sufi Naqshbandiyyah order, which in the nineteenth century had led the Muslim resistance against Russian rule in the Caucasus, under leaders such as Imam Shamil (1797–1871).5 In Central Asia, the situation had been similar. The resistance of the Tekke Turkmen tribe at Gök-Tepe in 1861 was led by another Naqshbandi, Kurban Murat.6 When revolts among Muslims occurred in the Tsarist Russian Empire, the politically powerful Sufi brotherhoods almost invariably played a leading role. The Andijon revolt of 1898 was led by a Naqshbandi, Muhammad Ali (Madali, also known as Dukchi Ishan).7 The early Soviet leaders had confronted the same problem during the 1918–20 Civil War, when certain Sufi leaders had also been involved in the Basmachi revolts in Soviet Central Asia, from 1918 onwards (including Junaid Khan, who probably was a Naqshbandi), and the first Daghestani and then Chechen uprisings in the Caucasus from 1924 onwards.8 Pan-Turkism had played a role as well. During the First World War, the Russian government had noted that Turkish agents were active in the Muslim regions of the empire.9 Then the former war minister of Ottoman Turkey, Enver Pasha (1881–1922), had assumed a prominent role among the Basmachi insurgents until he was killed in battle. However, the revolt ultimately failed, and many Basmachi migrated into Afghanistan, from where their leaders continued to threaten the Soviet power in Central Asia.10 Based on the experiences of the revolts in Soviet Central Asia and in the Caucasus, the Soviet leaders searched for an alternative vision of Islam for their many Muslim subjects. Their goal was the enlistment of ‘revolutionary Islam’ on the side of the Soviet power, against the conservative Muslims who might oppose Soviet socialist rule. When the Daghestani communists wrote the history of the Soviet conquest of the Caucasus, they drew the conclusion that ‘a war against



3. Soviet Approaches to Muslim Extremism and Terrorism

43

conservative Muslim insurgents must be conducted by revolutionary Muslim units or, at the very least, with the assistance of such units’.11 Revolutionary Muslims were found among those who, for one reason or another, were opposed to the Sufi interpretation of Islam. Most such Muslims were influenced by the Muslim reform movement of the late nineteenth century, which in time came to develop into the Islamic modernism now generally known as Salafism or Wahhabism. Several such groups and preachers joined the Bolsheviks in the revolution and the civil war. One such group was the Vaisite sect, founded at Kazan in 1862 by Bahauddin Vaisov. The group, the membership of which mainly consisted of artisans, seemingly combined Sufi mysticism, Salafi puritanism, extreme nationalism and, after 1907, Marxist socialism. In 1917, the son and successor of the sect’s founder, Inan Vaisov, accepted weapons from, and allied the sect with, the Kazan Bolsheviks. In 1918 he was killed, fighting for the Bolsheviks.12 Another revolutionary Muslim was Shami Domullah al-Tarablusi (‘The Syrian cleric from Tripoli’, born around 1867–1870), a native of Tripoli in present Lebanon who was active in the period 1919–32 when he fought Sufism apparently on behalf, or at least in support, of the Bolsheviks in Central Asia, motivated by Salafi ideology.13 The belief in revolutionary Islam was also expressed in Soviet foreign policy. When in January 1926 Ibn Saud declared himself king of Hijaz, the Soviet Union, on 16 February 1926, was the first state to recognize him.14 Saudi rule depended on the Wahhabi religious ideology. This was a radical interpretation of Sunni Islam, often referred to as Salafism, which advocated a return to the practices of the time of the Prophet Muhammad. The Saudi interpretation of Islam favoured armed jihad as a means of spreading Saudi rule and the uncompromising Wahhabi religious ideology. When the Soviet press reported the Soviet recognition of Saudi Arabia, it also labelled the Wahhabi political system an ‘extraordinarily interesting political-social programme’.15 Soviet–Saudi diplomatic relations were maintained until 1938, when the Soviet mission in Jeddah was closed and diplomatic relations severed. The early Bolsheviks and Soviet leaders supported Salafi thought because the proponents of Salafism backed the Soviet attempts to destroy traditional Caucasian and Central Asian Sufi Islam and its holy places. The Bolsheviks regarded this as a means to prevent Sufism from becoming a rallying point against Soviet rule. As such, Sufism would have been dangerous due to its popular appeal, mass following and potential for mobilization.16 After a few brief, failed attempts to eliminate religion altogether, the Soviet rulers concluded that a key threat to state control rested in popular Islam, which they believed almost exclusively consisted of Sufism and depended on Sufi leaders, some of whom might set themselves up as rival authorities to the state structures. As a result, the Soviet rulers tried to channel the religious aspirations of the Muslims into directions acceptable to the state by appointing and controlling a small number of state-controlled ulama (clergy). Except for a few periods, the Soviet authorities generally sought to promote atheism and discourage religion, not to eradicate religious faith as such. Faith was,

44

Terrorism in the Cold War

at times, even a quality of use to the Soviet state, such as during the Second World War. Besides, a key aspect of the Marxist ideology was the stubborn belief that religion would disappear by itself. In 1944, 1945 and in most years from 1953 onwards, the Soviet authorities organized Hajj pilgrimages to Mecca in Saudi Arabia. They also began to send a few young Muslims to the Islamic centres of learning in the Middle East, including several that had grown increasingly extreme in their interpretation of Islam. Upon their return, the pious young Soviet clerics were appointed leaders of the official Spiritual Directorates, through which the Soviet state and the Communist Party attempted to control religious sentiments among the Muslim population. Their first decrees typically included the abolition of traditional Sufi customs, the demolition of Sufi shrines, and the purification of Islamic practices to make the faith, in their eyes, more pure.17 An example was the official mufti (Islamic leader) in Central Asia in the period between 1957 and 1982, Ziyauddin Khan Ishan Babakhanov (1908–1982), who had been trained in Saudi Arabia in 1947–8.18 Babakhanov was not the only Soviet cleric who advocated Salafi beliefs. Another case was a newly appointed imam-khatib (cleric who conducts the Friday sermon and prayer) in Leningrad at the very end of the 1960s or in the early 1970s, a recent graduate of the official Soviet Mir-e Arab seminary in Bukhara, who forbade women from participating in funerals and proclaimed that it was a sin to go to the theatre.19 And even before Babakhanov became mufti, in 1956, there was a suggestion that religious textbooks, by this time presumably of an extremist nature, should be imported from Egypt for use in the Mir-e Arab.20 To a large extent, the young Salafi Soviets succeeded. Not in propagating Salafism among the Muslim masses, because these grew increasingly secular under Soviet rule. But they succeeded in eradicating many popular varieties of Sufi Islam, and they supported the Soviet security apparatus when it destroyed the traditional Sufi brotherhoods in the fear that these might mobilize a Muslim opposition to Soviet rule. These worries still haunted the Soviets. By the 1950s and 1960s, Soviet scholars and officials began to express concern that the Sufi brotherhoods, including offshoots from the Naqshbandiyyah, seemed to have made an unexpected comeback. This was worrying; the Soviets knew that Sufi leaders formerly had wielded considerable influence over the Muslim masses and that Sufi spiritual activities could not easily be controlled by the state.21 For this reason, the Soviet security organs continued to keep an eye on the possible existence of Sufi brotherhoods. Information in the Mitrokhin archive, a collection of handwritten notes made in secret by KGB archivist Vasiliy Mitrokhin who subsequently brought them with him when he defected to the West, shows that in certain areas and during certain periods in the 1960s, the Soviet security and intelligence service KGB did, indeed, carry out operations against Sufi brotherhoods.22 However, in most cases they adopted a live-and-let-live attitude, as long as Sufi activities did not break Soviet law too blatantly.23 Instead, a more insidious problem emerged. As a result of the close links forged with the Middle East, both through the Spiritual Directorates and through the practice of receiving Arab exchange students, many of whom were young and influenced by extremist religious views already upon their arrival in the Soviet



3. Soviet Approaches to Muslim Extremism and Terrorism

45

Union, Salafi extremism in the late 1960s gained a following among young, educated Soviet Muslims who deemed official Soviet Islam insufficiently radical. From the 1970s onwards, the exchange students included missionaries from the Middle East belonging to extremist organizations that originally grew out of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood.24 Soon underground mosques, led by radical and charismatic young preachers, emerged in Soviet cities. Their supporters did not share the communist view that religion was a mere phase through which the religiously inclined would pass before the attainment of communism. The underground, parallel form of Islam was firmly opposed to the Soviet vision of a state-sponsored Islam in support of the Soviet state.25 Following the entry of Soviet troops into Afghanistan in December 1979, it slowly dawned upon the KGB leaders that foreign Muslims too might pose a threat. In September 1981, the Politburo adopted a resolution proposed by the KGB on ‘measures to counter attempts by the adversary to use the Islamic factor for purposes hostile to the Soviet Union’. A month later, KGB chairman Yuri Andropov approved a First Chief Directorate (foreign intelligence) directive that ordered the KGB’s foreign residents to carry out offensive active measures against hostile Islamic forces abroad and to expose their links to Western intelligence. A First Chief Directorate plan was drawn up to counter attempts by the West to use the Islamic factor against the Soviet Union.26 Linked to developments in Afghanistan but also Syria, this was apparently the first time that Soviet foreign intelligence began to take a serious interest in Muslim extremism. In Syria, the Muslim Brotherhood was engaged in a terrorist campaign against the Syrian government and its Soviet advisors. On 5 October 1981, yet another such terrorist attack took place. As a direct result of this attack, the KGB within days asked its allies for intelligence on the Muslim Brotherhood.27 In its work, the KGB regarded the Muslim Brotherhood as essentially any other terrorist group, focusing on its leaders, organization and activities. By April 1982, the KGB had noted that the Muslim Brotherhood was a religious-political organization with the goal of saving Islamic societies from the destructive influence of Western civilization and causing the rebirth of Islam, and that it enjoyed the support of Saudi Arabia. However, since the organization also existed in Western Europe, in particular in Britain and Germany, the KGB concluded that it enjoyed the support of the Western intelligence services as well, principally in its struggle against the Afghan and Syrian governments. With regard to Afghanistan, it was in particular the United States, Pakistan and China that supported groups with links to the Muslim Brotherhood.28 The KGB also provided a reference report on the Muslim Brotherhood and its activities in various countries in the Middle East as well as in the West. The report described the ‘total unity’ of the organization’s and Saudi Arabia’s ideological goals, but noted that Jordan, Kuwait, Iraq, the United States, Britain and Germany, too, were primary sponsors of the Muslim Brotherhood. The report noted that the organization posed a threat to Soviet representatives and advisors in several countries. Perhaps not fully realizing the Sunni–Shia divide, the KGB also argued that Iran hoped to use the Muslim Brotherhood to export its Islamic revolution to the Arab world.29 The KGB’s allies too contributed

46

Terrorism in the Cold War

intelligence. A subsequent Czechoslovak report provided details on the history and activities of the Muslim Brotherhood. A hodgepodge of fact and bazaar rumours, the report recognized the Salafi ideology of the organization but, oddly, added allegations about Oxford and Cambridge universities and the freemasons as having been instrumental in its formation. The report also argued that since around 1952, British intelligence had supported the Muslim Brotherhood, indeed, being its ‘spiritual father’ and first supporter, and that since 1953, the organization had established links with Israeli intelligence. Yet the report also noted the strong presence of the Muslim Brotherhood in Western Europe, where it had by then established several new branches under different names. Taken as a whole, the report was perhaps indicative of how foreign intelligence approached the issue of an extremist organization. The report included snippets of history, names of high-level leaders and what apparently were translations of Muslim Brotherhood documents – but little that could be used to combat its activities on the ground.30

The foreign intelligence approach – little interest in Muslim affairs The previous lack of interest in Muslim extremism within Soviet foreign intelligence becomes clear from an examination of Soviet activities in Afghanistan, a country that had presented a threat to the Soviet Union from pan-Islamic activities since the very beginning of Soviet political power. Soviet intelligence had run agents in Afghanistan already in the period up to and including the Second World War, for which purpose it had established a residency in Afghanistan’s capital Kabul. Previously, Soviet intelligence had maintained a representation in Maimana, near the Soviet–Turkmen border. When a residency was established in Kabul in or around 1930, it was the Soviet intelligence chief in Maimana, who was appointed resident. From 1930 to 1934, the residency of the Soviet security and intelligence service in Kabul was subordinated to the OGPU31 in Tashkent. By the early 1930s, there was also a residency in Mazar-e Sharif near the Soviet–Uzbek border. From October 1935, the Kabul residency was directly subordinated to the Fifth Department of the GUGB, as the Soviet intelligence service OGPU had been renamed in 1934.32 Soviet intelligence in Afghanistan primarily concerned itself with political developments in Afghanistan as well as work against the activities of the British, Japanese and, in time, German intelligence services in Afghanistan.33 Still, antiSoviet Muslim groups, some of them extremist in nature, did pose a threat to the Soviet Union. A key problem for the Soviet power in Central Asia was the anti-Bolshevik Basmachi revolt, which broke out in the Ferghana Valley in 1918. Although the Basmachi had been defeated in the plains by 1923, fighting continued until 1928 in the mountains and until at least 1936 in the Turkmen steppes. The Afghans made contact with the Basmachi and sent agents, mullahs and troops into Soviet territory.34 In 1925, Soviet OGPU units retaliated by seizing Urta-Tagay, an island in the Amu Darya on the border with Afghanistan, which had become a Basmachi base. The OGPU units remained until August 1926, when a treaty



3. Soviet Approaches to Muslim Extremism and Terrorism

47

of neutrality and mutual non-aggression was signed between Afghanistan and the Soviet Union (Moscow had by then ceded its claims to Urta-Tagay).35 OGPU would soon again have to deal with Muslim insurgents in Afghanistan. One source of information to the Soviets may have been the future king, Muhammad Nadir Khan (1883–1933), who, Soviet intelligence claimed, had been ‘drinking vodka with the chekists36 of the Kabul trade representative’s office’. The chronology for this claim remains unclear, since Nadir Khan spent the latter half of the 1920s in Paris. However, following King Amanullah’s forced abdication in January 1929 in response to a rebellion, Nadir Khan reportedly entered into an agreement with the Soviets, through the OGPU chairman Vyacheslav Menzhinskiy (1874–1934) and the head of INO OGPU37 Mikhail Trilisser (1883–1940), that the Soviets would send military support against the rebels. As a result, in April 1929 a former Cossack commander named Vitaliy Primakov (1897–1937) led a primarily Soviet expeditionary force into Afghanistan. Ostensibly subordinated to the Afghan ambassador to Moscow, Ghulam Nabi (d. 1932), the Soviet–Afghan force captured Mazar-e Sharif and other places in northern Afghanistan. However, they failed to gain popular support, and Moscow recalled the force, which returned in June 1929.38 The threat to the Soviet power from Muslim insurgents was not over yet. In spring 1930, Moscow again sent OGPU units into Afghanistan, this time to a distance of a hundred kilometres. Their target was the Basmachi group of Ibrahim Bek (1889–1931). Moscow only recalled the force when Nadir Khan, having succeeded Amanullah as king under the name Nadir Shah, went to Moscow, where he signed a treaty of mutual friendship and non-aggression in June 1931.39 The Basmachi group of Ibrahim Bek was subsequently destroyed through a plan hatched by the new Soviet residency at Mazar-e Sharif. In 1931, Ibrahim Bek was enticed to leave Afghanistan for Soviet Tajikistan, where he was cornered and killed by OGPU units.40 It is thus clear that the OGPU in Tashkent, and its subordinate residencies in Afghanistan, dealt with Muslim insurgents. However, they did so from a counterinsurgency perspective. Besides, if the religious affiliation of the Central Asian insurgents was taken into account at all, they were regarded as conservative Muslims inspired and led by the Sufi brotherhoods. From a Soviet perspective, they should be suppressed, not relied upon for intelligence on other states, nor groomed as future leaders. Perhaps for these reasons, it is noteworthy that the key interest of Soviet foreign intelligence in Afghanistan was not Muslim insurgents but political developments and the activities of foreign powers. For instance, the official history of the Russian foreign intelligence service describes how one such informer, a beautiful and talented lady of Polish origin known as Maryam who was active from 1935 onwards, was a key source of information on activities and opinions within the Afghan government. Having lost her first husband during the Russian Civil War, she began to work for Soviet intelligence in Tashkent. She married an Afghan diplomat, Azizurrahman Fathi, which enabled her to report on Afghan activities in Tashkent, then followed her new husband to Kabul when he returned home. It

48

Terrorism in the Cold War

turned out that Azizurrahman Fathi’s brother was Ali Muhammad (c. 1893–1977), who served as Afghanistan’s minister of foreign affairs in the period from 1939 to 1952. Ali Muhammad too fancied Maryam, and when Azizurrahman Fathi died ‘under unclear circumstances’ (as the official history put it), Maryam became Ali Muhammad’s unofficial wife. Ali Muhammad subsequently became a deputy prime minister and, in 1963, minister of court under King Zahir Shah. This position gave him considerable influence in Kabul. Besides, Zahir Shah liked Maryam’s Russian cooking. Maryam was also an obstetrician, and in this capacity she was consulted by Zahir Shah’s wife. Maryam remained an active and useful source for Soviet intelligence at least into the 1960s. Ali Muhammad’s service as minister of court ended in 1973, when Zahir Shah was ousted in a coup, led by Muhammad Daud.41Another source was known as Salih, who served Soviet intelligence for forty-two years. During this time, Salih worked in various capacities within the Afghan Foreign Ministry, including as head of the cipher section. Salih eventually recruited three informers and handed them over to the residency.42 The same pattern of Soviet foreign intelligence activities continued throughout the Cold War. Soviet intelligence focused on Afghan politics and the activities of foreign intelligence services, not Muslim extremism and terrorism.43 Soviet intelligence personnel in Afghanistan was also the focus of foreign intelligence services, including those of China.44 The Soviets were successful. Nur Muhammad Taraki, the Marxist leader of the People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA), which overthrew and killed President Muhammad Daud in April 1978, had been a KGB informer since 1951. Babrak Karmal, whom the Soviets put into power in December 1979, had been recruited by the KGB probably in the mid1950s.45 Taraki and other Afghan informers had provided intelligence on Daud’s 1973 coup, so it had come as no surprise to the Soviets.46

The Soviet war in Afghanistan On 27 April 1978, a coup by leftist military officers of the PDPA under Taraki overthrew Daud and killed him as well as all members of his family. There is no evidence that the Soviets were behind the planned coup, despite rumours to this effect. For formal reasons, neither the Soviet ambassador nor the chief Soviet military advisor had retained contacts with the PDPA during the Daud government. As with leftist political organizations in other countries, it was KGB officers, who had maintained links with the Afghan Marxists. However, by all accounts none of the co-conspirators informed their KGB contacts about what they were planning.47 Apparently the KGB learnt of the planned coup only immediately before it took place.48 When KGB informers came to power, as it happened in Afghanistan, the KGB had to change the nature of its relationship with the informer. The latter would then cease his previous activities, instead becoming what the KGB referred to as a trusted contact or, in case of a head of state or government, a special unofficial contact. Henceforth, Taraki and the others continued to provide assistance to



3. Soviet Approaches to Muslim Extremism and Terrorism

49

the Soviet Union, but they did so within limits chosen by them, not the KGB.49 A formal KGB connection was eventually established. The Taraki government requested KGB support from the Soviet Union on 8 May 1978, and a KGB representative office was established in Kabul on 30 June 1978. Its first head, KGB Col. Leonid Bogdanov, arrived on 2 August. The representative office remained until early 1992.50 There had been a previous Afghan intelligence and security service, known merely as Istikhbarat (‘intelligence’).51 By the 1970s, it was extremely ineffective and not much trusted by the Afghan leaders, who relied more on personal connections.52 However, because of the coup that brought the PDPA into power, and the vastly increased degree of repression introduced to keep the new government in power, a new organization was needed. For this reason, Taraki established a security service named AGSA with the help of the Soviets in September 1978, led by Asadullah Sarwari.53 Following the 1979 coup d’état by Hafizullah Amin, in which Taraki was murdered, Amin changed the name of the security service to KAM. It was led in short succession by Sarwari’s cousin Aziz Ahmad Akbari and Amin’s cousin Asadullah Amin.54 Both AGSA and KAM, which were subordinated to the minister of the interior, primarily engaged in the arrest, torture and extrajudicial execution of those perceived to be enemies of the PDPA government.55 The excesses of the Amin government led to the Soviet military intervention and a coup in December 1979, which brought Babrak Karmal to power. Karmal disbanded the infamous KAM. Instead, a group of some 1,200 ‘activists’ belonging to Karmal’s faction of the PDPA, under the direction of Dr Muhammad Najibullah and Dr Baha, worked from December 1979 until March 1980, with Soviet support, to establish a new intelligence service.56 On 10 January 1980, Karmal formally established the KhAD, which until 1985 was led by Najibullah.57 Baha was put in charge of a special counterinsurgency unit.58 At first responsible to the minister of the interior, KhAD was detached from the Ministry of the Interior within months and transformed into a directorate-general within the Office of the Chairman of the Council of Ministers, that is, the office of the head of state. KhAD was subdivided into six or more directorates, responsible for various intelligence and security activities.59 KhAD, too, was heavily engaged in torture and extrajudicial executions, but unlike its predecessors, which to a considerable extent, perhaps primarily, operated against potential rivals within the government, KhAD had to spend significant efforts fighting insurgents inside and outside the country due to the intensifying civil war. There were also two separate security functions, a ‘military KhAD’ (KhAD-e Nezami), which formed part of the Ministry of Defence and functioned as a military security service, and a ‘KhAD-e Pulis’ within the Ministry of the Interior, which was responsible for security within the ministry and police.60 KhAD was upgraded to a ministry on 9 January 1986 and renamed WAD. WAD remained in existence until the fall of the Najibullah government in 1992. The service, which apparently came to include both the military and police KhAD, consisted of three directorates-general: the Directorate-General for Security, the

50

Terrorism in the Cold War

Directorate-General for Military Security and the Directorate-General for the Interior.61 The Soviet services provided support to the KhAD and its successor WAD during the entire Soviet war in Afghanistan. However, the KGB residency in Kabul, perhaps surprisingly, retained its previous focus on political intelligence and the activities of the Western services. While some Soviet sources, such as Vasiliy Mitrokhin’s notes, refer to KGB penetration of insurgent mujahidin bases in Pakistan, there is little or no evidence to back up these claims. Such penetration took place, but as will be shown, these operations were in most cases run by Afghan, not Soviet, intelligence, even if the latter may have taken credit for them or at least given Mitrokhin this impression. The possibility also remains that Mitrokhin exaggerated the power of his former employer, since his notes were written with a view to defect to the West.62 Afghan intelligence activities As always in intelligence work, it took time to build the capability that KhAD needed. In January 1980, the service had only 700 employees,63 a number which during the same year rose rapidly to several thousand. Still, information on the mujahidin remained very sketchy. From 1981 to 1983, KhAD relied primarily on SIGINT, the monitoring of the mujahidin radio communications. This was difficult, however, since radio reception conditions vary widely in Afghanistan depending on the terrain.64 For this reason, KhAD also strived to establish HUMINT networks. By late 1982, KhAD had established networks almost throughout the entire country. By the summer of 1983, KhAD had deployed 1,300 informers within mujahidin units, 1,226 informers along the communications lines, 714 informers in the underground political organizations, and twenty-eight informers in Pakistan.65 From this time onwards, KhAD had amassed such a level of experience and information that even mujahidin sources admitted that KhAD had a ‘quite detailed and exact picture’ of the mujahidin movement.66 Soviet KGB officers in Afghanistan agreed with this assessment, acknowledging that KhAD had essentially complete information about the mujahidin groups and their agents.67 It was accordingly KhAD that ran agents within the Pakistan-based Islamic parties and the mujahid units, and, indeed, within the Pashtun tribes as a whole.68 At a time when KhAD had twenty-six informers in Pakistan with access to the mujahid parties, fifteen of them were members of the Pakistani armed forces, intelligence community and bureaucracy.69 For KhAD, Pakistan was a key target, since it was Pakistan that supported and supplied the majority of the Afghan insurgents. For this reason, KhAD also gave sanctuary to and supported terrorist groups operating in Pakistan. Such groups included Al-Zulfikar, a leftist group formed by Murtaza Bhutto (1954–1996), the elder son of the executed Pakistani politician Zulfikar Ali Bhutto (1928–1979), and separatist groups in Baluchistan and Sindh.70 While this activity has been interpreted as KhAD acting as a mere surrogate for the KGB,71 this seems to be an overly expansive interpretation. KhAD



3. Soviet Approaches to Muslim Extremism and Terrorism

51

had its own reasons, and capabilities, for dealing with armed groups hostile to the government in Islamabad. KhAD was generally quite effective in establishing links with rural villages in Afghanistan. KhAD operatives tended to work in their native regions, where they could make good use of ethnic and kindred links. They were, also for this reason, often very good at negotiating agreements with local mujahidin groups when a ceasefire was needed.72 During combat operations, KhAD supplied Soviet forces with valuable intelligence and support, including guides.73 During the first half of 1982, more than 450 air and artillery attacks against mujahidin units were carried out on the basis of KhAD intelligence. During the first three months of 1983, 140 air attacks were based on KhAD intelligence.74 Without such support, the Soviet forces would have been far less efficient. KhAD may also have created fake mujahidin units to provoke clashes among genuine mujahidin units, to alienate the population from the mujahidin and to establish precedence by surrendering to the government at an opportune moment.75 In time, KhAD established a foreign intelligence directorate. KhAD residencies were established in Pakistan (Quetta, Peshawar, Islamabad, Karachi), Iran (Tehran, Mashhad, Chaman), India (Delhi, Bombay), West Germany (Bonn), Turkey (Ankara) and Kuwait (Kuwait City). However, KhAD had to rely on Soviet ciphers and communications through the Soviet residencies. A major concern of the KhAD residencies was to report on Afghan émigrés and the activities of the intelligence services of the United States, China and the Muslim countries.76 Soviet intelligence activities The successes of Afghan intelligence officers should not be interpreted as their Soviet counterparts doing nothing. The Soviet 40th Army, which operated in Afghanistan, included a KGB component from the outset.77 Besides, Mitrokhin’s notes suggest that some KGB special forces units, especially the Kaskad (‘Cascade’) units, successfully made contacts with mujahidin leaders who were then persuaded to take up arms against their former associates, and that Kaskad units were also engaged in the creation of fake mujahidin units.78 The KGB organization Kaskad was set up by Andropov on 11 July 1980 and served in Afghanistan from 15 August 1980 onwards. The members of these teams called themselves kaskadery, a word deriving from cascadeur, French for stuntman. They had the important task of training their Afghan counterparts. In addition, the Kaskad units carried out military special forces operations, often with an emphasis on acquiring targeting data for air strikes.79 From late 1980, Afghan intelligence also received support from the Soviet Interior Ministry’s Kobal’t (‘Cobalt’) special forces teams. Since the Interior Ministry was responsible for law enforcement, these teams, first formed in the summer of 1980, consisted of law enforcement officers with experience in criminal investigations. They supported Afghan intelligence in counterterrorism with regard to work with informers. As with the Kaskad units, the focus was on training their Afghan counterparts. However, some Kobal’t officers also ran informers

52

Terrorism in the Cold War

within mujahidin groups, although the focus was again on military intelligence, with an emphasis on the current location of enemy formations. Some informers were recruited in prisons and prison camps.80 Other special forces units belonged to Soviet military intelligence, the GRU.81 Intelligence officer Lieutenant Alexander Kartsev, who served in Afghanistan from 1986 to 1988, belonged to a motor-rifle regiment but had been trained by the GRU. He has related how he maintained connections with a certain Shafi, an Afghan informer who had studied in Oxford and Japan and presumably worked for renowned mujahidin leader Ahmad Shah Masud.82 Military intelligence officers like him were at times able to gather intelligence from sources within the mujahidin. Certainly such officers met with Afghan informers with information on mujahidin groups and at times also the leaders of such groups, when the latter contemplated changing sides or a ceasefire agreement.83 Some have suggested that in comparison with the KGB, which expected quick results from their sources, the GRU worked with a long-term perspective, expecting a new source to bring the return on the investment made in it only in the medium and long run.84 Another KGB special forces unit that served in Afghanistan, from 1983 to 1984, was Omega. This unit was reportedly engaged in an operation in Pakistan, which resulted in the car bomb assassination of a mujahid leader and two of his bodyguards.85 However, it remains possible that this operation was handled by KhAD, with KGB support, and not by the KGB alone. Certainly other, similar operations in Pakistan were, as noted, carried out by Afghan intelligence.86 As with the Kaskad special forces units, a key task of Omega was to gather intelligence for air strikes against mujahidin groups, and the unit prepared such targeting data for 1,500 air strikes.87

Soviet reassessment of the domestic threat from Muslim extremism and terrorism The Afghan war and the conflict in Syria gradually changed the Soviet perception of the threat from Muslim extremism and terrorism. This can be illustrated by the different levels of attention devoted to the threat in the 1970s and the 1980s. When in 1970 the security organs in Tashkent determined that a Salafi group was recruiting followers and had been doing so since the late 1960s, they responded only slowly. The devotees of the new sect did not really break any laws and they were few in number, even though they caused trouble by arguing that the official religious authorities issued instructions that deviated from true Islam. They also demanded the universal observance of the five daily prayers and opposed the secondary and higher education of girls. It was only in late 1972 or early 1973 that the security organs realized that somebody would have to deal with the sect. They conducted a house search, during which they found and confiscated illegal religious materials. The members of the sect were cautioned that they would be prosecuted, if they



3. Soviet Approaches to Muslim Extremism and Terrorism

53

continued their activities (which was a common way of addressing the problems of unregistered religious activities).88 And this, the authorities hoped, would be the end of the matter. Before the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan, KGB officers stationed in the country regarded the Afghan Sufi brotherhoods as a particularly dangerous enemy.89 While a fundamentally correct assessment with regard to the situation in Afghanistan, after the 1979 intervention they soon realized that this was not the whole story. Islamic extremists of the Salafi variety were as dangerous, if not more so. The same reassessment took place sometime later on the domestic scene in the Soviet Union as well. Following the intervention in Afghanistan, the local KGB in some Soviet cities in due course began to monitor the, for them, new and unexpected threat from underground Salafi groups. Serious problems were first discovered in Tajikistan, which shared a border with Afghanistan. In 1983, a group of twenty-two unregistered clerics, aged twenty-two to forty-five, in Kulob (then Kulyab) Oblast in Tajikistan came to the attention of the Soviet authorities. They called themselves Wahhabis and studied what Soviet officials referred to as documents advocating pan-Islamic ideas.90 During an investigation in 1986, the law enforcement organs in Tajikistan found a large volume of religious literature hostile to the Soviet system. A major part of the literature had been smuggled across the border, presumably from Afghanistan and possibly with the help of American and Pakistani intelligence.91 At around this time, some Tajik Salafis crossed the border to join the Afghan mujahidin,92 in effect becoming the first Soviet jihadist foreign fighters. As a result, in 1986 the Tajikistani security organs took action against the extremists, dozens of whom were arrested and sentenced to imprisonment.93 This did not come too soon. On a number of occasions from about December 1986 to April 1987, combat teams from the Afghan Hezb-e Islami group crossed the Amu Darya into Tajikistan to attack Soviet security forces there.94 These combat teams included, in 1987, Soviet jihadists as well – the first returning foreign fighters.95

Conclusions From the outset, the Soviets assessed that there was a threat from Islam and that it derived from the Sufi brotherhoods. Sufi Islam was a domestic security threat, a phenomenon to be identified and suppressed, and not a source of intelligence on other targets, especially not foreign ones. At an early stage, the Soviets assessed that what they called revolutionary Islam – currently better known as Salafism or Wahhabism – could be harnessed as a tool to fight the Sufi brotherhoods. Some Salafi preachers and ideas were accordingly cultivated as a means to combat Sufism. The dangers inherent in Salafism were overlooked, and it was only during the 1970s that it slowly began to dawn upon the Soviets that Salafism, at least by then, was the far more dangerous security threat to the Soviet state.

54

Terrorism in the Cold War

When the Soviets encountered Muslim extremist groups motivated by Salafism in Afghanistan, Soviet intelligence set out to collect intelligence on these groups that could be used to combat them. However, for linguistic and other reasons, most of this intelligence work was carried out by Afghan intelligence, which the Soviets trained and organized for this purpose. It was Afghan intelligence that infiltrated mujahidin groups, primarily inside Afghanistan but also in Pakistan, the regional centre for Salafi jihadist activities. Occasionally, the Soviets claimed credit for successful intelligence operations against mujahidin targets. However, the available evidence suggests that it was the Afghans who did most of the work. There is no evidence to suggest that Soviet intelligence, during the war in Afghanistan, maintained friendly links to, or cooperated with, Salafi groups, either in Afghanistan or elsewhere, for purposes beyond the occasional need to negotiate ceasefire agreements with individual mujahidin leaders. It thus follows that it was the Afghans, not the Soviets, who ultimately decided questions on which methods to be used, including torture, assassinations and similar ways and means of warfare against existential threats. This does not absolve Soviet intelligence from responsibility for acts of violence, since they trained and supported Afghan intelligence; however, it is unlikely that the Soviets were in a position to decide which means would be used, except in extraordinary cases. It was also Afghan, not Soviet, intelligence that provided support to leftist or separatist terrorist groups in Pakistan. Such groups were not motivated by Salafi ideology, and they had other reasons to oppose the Pakistani state. For these reasons, it can be concluded that during the Cold War the Soviet Union, although not adverse to providing support for, and cooperation with, terrorist organizations motivated by leftist ideology, had neither motive nor intention to support foreign jihadist terrorist organizations. Nor did Salafi groups solicit the support of the Soviet Union. During the Cold War, it was only Western intelligence, which supported jihadist groups, and then in most cases with the intention to fight the Soviets. At home, the Soviet security organs reacted only slowly to the growth of domestic Salafism. Lingering memories of the idea that revolutionary Islam could be used to combat Sufism seem to have prevented the Soviet security organs from realizing that domestic Muslim extremism derived from the same ideology as the phenomenon with which the Soviet state was at war in Afghanistan and which carried out terrorist attacks against Soviet advisors in Syria. When Tajik jihadists crossed the border into Afghanistan to join the war against the Afghan government and its Soviet backers, they were among the very first Western foreign fighters. And when in 1987 some of the Tajik foreign fighters returned to attack targets in their native Soviet Union, they not only became the first returning Western foreign fighters but simultaneously also the first Sunni jihadist terrorists in the Western world, to which the Soviet Union surely belonged as regards ideology and culture. It remains a sad paradox of history that both the Soviets, from the Russian Revolution, and, somewhat later, the Western intelligence services supported radical Salafism. The Soviets aimed to use Salafism against domestic Sufi Islam, while the Western services used it against Soviet power in Afghanistan. Both



3. Soviet Approaches to Muslim Extremism and Terrorism

55

failed to foresee the consequences of their actions, which remain visible in the contemporary struggle against jihadist terrorism in Europe and elsewhere. In comparison, the Afghan intelligence and security service appears to have had a better understanding of the threat, and of how to address it; however, its methods were typically harsher than would be palatable in the Western world. Besides, following the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Afghan intelligence did not have the resources to withstand the well-funded and well-supplied jihadist groups that operated out of Pakistan.

Notes 1 KGB was the acronym for Komitet Gosudarstvennoy Bezopasnosti (Committee for State Security), the name of Soviet intelligence from 1954 to 1991. 2 Christopher Andrew and Vasiliy Mitrokhin, The Mitrokhin Archive II: The KGB and the World (London: Allen Lane, 2005), 143–5, 246–55, 257–8. 3 Comintern was the English term for the Kommunisticheskiy Internatsional III, Komintern (Third Communist International), a Moscow-led international organization that advocated the overthrow of existing governments and the creation of an international Communist state. 4 Michael Fredholm, The First Jihadists, published in a forthcoming book with the proceedings of the 2015 conference In the Shadow of the Cold War held in Biala Rawska, Poland (Warsaw: IPN, 2020). 5 Moshe Gammer, Muslim Resistance to the Tsar: Shamil and the Conquest of Chechnia and Daghestan (London: Frank Cass, 1994). 6 Alexandre Bennigsen and S. Enders Wimbush, Mystics and Commissars: Sufism in the Soviet Union (London: C. Hurst & Company, 1985), 32. 7 Edward Allworth (ed.), Central Asia: 130 Years of Russian Dominance, A Historical Overview (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1994), 167–9. 8 Basmachi, originally a Soviet propagandistic term, derives from Uzbek basmach,‘bandit’. 9 Sergey G. Rybakov, Na pochve obshchey dlya nikh religiii—islama, in D. Yu. Arapov (ed.), Imperatorskaya Rossiya i musul’manskiy mir: Sbornik statey (Moscow: Natalis, 2006), 468–77, here 471. Rybakov (1867–1922) was an expert on Islam at the Ministry of the Interior. His article was first published in 1917. 10 Bennigsen and Wimbush, Mystics and Commissars, 26–8, 35; Aleksandr I. Pylev, Basmachestvo v Sredney Azii: Etnopoliticheskiy srez (vzglyad iz XXI veka) (Bishkek: Kyrgyzsko-Rossiyskiy Slavyanskiy Universitet, 2006), 218–20. See also Michael Fredholm, The Great Game in Inner Asia over Two Centuries (Stockholm: Stockholm University, 2004), 28. 11 Alexandre Bennigsen, The Soviet Union and Muslim Guerrilla Wars, 1920–1981: Lessons for Afghanistan (Santa Monica, CA: RAND, 1981), 23; citing Najmuddin Efendiev-Samurskiy (First Secretary of the Daghestan Oblast Committee), Dagestan (Moscow, 1924) and Grazhdanskaya voyna v Dagestane (Makhachkala, 1925), and A. Takho-Godi, Revolyutsiya i kontrrevolyutsiya v Dagestane (Makhachkala, 1927). 12 Alexandre Bennigsen and Chantal Lemercier-Quelquejay, Islam in the Soviet Union (London: Pall Mall Press, 1967), 54, 243 (note 6); Vitaly V. Naumkin, Radical Islam in Central Asia: Between Pen and Rifle (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2005), 17.

56

Terrorism in the Cold War

13 Bakhtiyar M. Babadzhanov [Babajanov], Ashirbek M. Muminov and Martha Brill Olcott, Mukhammadzhan Khindustani (1892–1989) i religioznaya sreda ego epokhi (predvaritel’nyye razmyshleniya o formirovanii ‘sovetskogo islama’ v sredney Azii), Vostok (Oriens) 4 (September–October 2004), 43–59, here 53; Naumkin, Radical Islam, 40–1. Shami Domullah first came to Tashkent from Peking in February 1919, having spent fifteen to twenty years in Eastern (Chinese) Turkestan where he was a strong proponent of Salafi Islam. Martha Brill Olcott, Roots of Radical Islam in Central Asia (Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2007), 9. Shami Domullah (full name Sa’id ibn Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Bakhid ibn ‘Ali al-‘Asali al-Tarablusi) was arrested in 1932 and died, most likely, in internal exile at some point after 1940. 14 Alexei Vassiliev, The History of Saudi Arabia (London: Saqi, 1998), 265. 15 Stephen Page, The USSR and Arabia: The Development of Soviet Policies and Attitudes towards the Countries of the Arabian Peninsula (London: Central Asian Research Centre, 1971), 17; citing Novyy Vostok, 1925. 16 Vitaly V. Naumkin, Militant Islam in Central Asia: The Case of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (Berkeley: University of California, Berkeley Program in Soviet and PostSoviet Studies, Working Paper, 2003), 17; Naumkin, Radical Islam, 39–43, 52. 17 Michael Fredholm, Islam and Modernity in Contemporary Central Asia: Religious Faith versus Way of Life (Stockholm: Stockholm University, 2007), 29–31, 34–6. 18 Bakhtiar Babadzhanov [Babajanov], Islam in Uzbekistan: From the Struggle for ‘Religious Purity’ to Political Activism, in Boris Rumer (ed.), Central Asia: A Gathering Storm? (London: M. E. Sharpe, 2002), 299–330, here 306. 19 Yaacov Ro’i, Islam in the Soviet Union: From the Second World War to Gorbachev (London: Hurst & Co., 2000), 282. He was not alone. On mullahs in the Ferghana Valley who early on advocated Salafi beliefs, for example, that it was a sin to listen to the radio when music was broadcast, see ibid., 250. 20 Ibid., 587 (note 140). 21 Bennigsen and Lemercier-Quelquejay, Islam in the Soviet Union, 180–1; citing Sovetskaya etnografiya, 2 (1957), 60–72; Nauka i religiya 7 (1965), 22–3; and Nauka i religiya 9 (1965), 85–6. 22 Andrew and Mitrokhin, Mitrokhin Archive II, 373–4. 23 Ibid., 377. 24 The KGB noted some 300 foreign students in the Soviet Union since 1977 who were members of the Muslim Brotherhood, including in military schools, and contacts between them and the embassies of Jordan, Sudan, Pakistan, Iran and Iraq. See Secret report on the Muslim Brotherhood, 20 April 1982 (translated from Russian), in IPN BU 2394/598. Bulgarian intelligence, too, noted Muslim Brotherhood activity among students in the socialist countries, including the Soviet Union, Bulgaria, Romania, Poland, Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia. See secret report on a Muslim Brotherhood conference in Istanbul, 17 December 1987 (translated into Russian), in IPN BU 0 449/32/7. Files from the archives of the Institute of National Remembrance (Instytut Pamięci Narodowe, IPN), Poland, kindly made available by Przemysław Gasztold-Seń. 25 Fredholm, Islam and Modernity, 39–40. 26 Andrew and Mitrokhin, Mitrokhin Archive II, 379. 27 Secret request to Poland for information on the Muslim Brotherhood, 8 October 1981 (translated from Russian), in IPN BU 2394/598. Similar requests were also almost certainly made to other Warsaw Pact states, since documents in the IPN archive



3. Soviet Approaches to Muslim Extremism and Terrorism

57

include translations of subsequent reports on the Muslim Brotherhood from at least Czechoslovakia and Bulgaria. See IPN BU 0 449/32/7. 28 Secret report on the Muslim Brotherhood, 20 April 1982 (translated from Russian), in IPN BU 2394/598. 29 Secret reference report on the Muslim Brotherhood, received in Poland on 22 April 1982, in IPN BU 0 449/32/7. 30 Top-secret study of the Muslim Brotherhood, 6 December 1982 (translated from Czech), in IPN BU 0 449/32/7. 31 OGPU was the acronym for Obyedinennoye Gosudarstvennoye Politicheskoye Upravleniye, the name of Soviet intelligence from 1923 to 1934. 32 Yevgeniy M. Primakov (ed.), Ocherki istorii rossiyskoy vneshney razvedki, vol. 3 (Moscow: SVR and Mezhdunarodnyye otnosheniya, 2016), 201, 202. The chapter was written by Major-General L. P. Kostromin, who was deputy head of the KGB representative office in Kabul during the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan 1979–1989. GUGB was the acronym for Glavnoye Upravleniye Gosudarstvennoy Bezopasnosti, the name of Soviet intelligence from 1934 to 1941, when it formed part of the People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs, NKVD (Narodnyy Kommissariat Gosudarstvennoy Bezopasnosti). 33 Primakov, Ocherki istorii, vol. 3, 202. 34 Bennigsen, Soviet Union and Muslim Guerrilla Wars, 1 (note 1). 35 Valeriy V. Malevanyy, Sovetskiy spetsnaz v Afganistane (Moscow: Kuchkovo pole, 2009), 81–4. 36 The common Russian expression for security service personnel. 37 INO was the acronym for Inostrannyy otdel (foreign department), which dealt with foreign intelligence. 38 Malevanyy, Sovetskiy spetsnaz, 85–6; Sir Rodric Braithwaite, Afgantsy: The Russians in Afghanistan 1979–89 (London: Profile, 2011), 29; citing A. Lyakhovskiy and S. Davitaya, Igra v Afganistan (Moscow, 2009), 64; J. Bruce Amstutz, Afghanistan: The First Five Years of Soviet Occupation (Washington, DC: National Defense University, 1986), 14, with references. 39 Malevanyy, Sovetskiy spetsnaz, 87. 40 Primakov, Ocherki istorii, vol. 3, 201; William S. Ritter, ‘The Final Phase in the Liquidation of Anti-Soviet Resistance in Tadzhikistan: Ibrahim Bek and the Basmachi’, 1924–31, Soviet Studies 37/4 (1985), 484–93; William S. Ritter, ‘Revolt in the Mountains: Fuzail Maksum and the Occupation of Garm, Spring 1929’, Journal of Contemporary History 25 (1990), 547–80. 41 Primakov, Ocherki istorii, vol. 3, 202–3. 42 Ibid., 203. 43 In the mid-1950s, Soviet military intelligence reportedly sent a group of fifty-six agents from Tajikistan and Uzbekistan into Afghanistan, with orders to carry out operations against the United States and its allies in Afghanistan in case of war. However, two of them turned themselves in, and the attempt failed. Vladimir Snegirev and Valeriy Samunin, Virus ‘A’: Kak my zaboleli vtorzheniyem v Afganistan, Rossiyskaya gazeta, 2011, 220–1. The title translates to ‘Virus A: How we got infected by the invasion of Afghanistan’. Available in English as Vladimir Snegirev and Valeriy Samunin, The Dead End: The Road to Afghanistan (Washington, DC: National Security Archive, 2012), http:​//nsa​rchiv​e2.gw​u.edu​/NSAE​BB/NS​AEBB3​ 96/Fu​ll%20​Text%​20Vir​us%20​A.pdf​(accessed 1 January 2020). Page numbers refer to the English-language edition. Retired KGB colonel Valeriy Samunin arrived in

58

Terrorism in the Cold War

Afghanistan in 1975 and served for more than seven years as a foreign intelligence officer with the Kabul residency, while historian and journalist Vladimir Snegirev wrote the first investigative stories about the war in Afghanistan published in the Soviet Union (in Komsomol’skaya pravda and Rossiyskaya gazeta). Samunin described his own experiences in the book under the fictitious name Valeriy Starostin. See, for example, Vasiliy Mitrokhin, The KGB in Afghanistan (Washington, DC: Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, Cold War International History Project, Working Paper 40, 2002), 77. 44 Larisa Kucherova, KGB v Afganistane (Moscow: Eksmo, 2009), 256–7. 45 Mitrokhin, KGB in Afghanistan, 19–20; Andrew and Mitrokhin, Mitrokhin Archive II, 386, 387. 46 Mitrokhin, KGB in Afghanistan, 25. 47 Braithwaite, Afgantsy, 37, 39, 41–2. 48 Snegirev and Samunin, Virus, 7–9. 49 Mitrokhin, KGB in Afghanistan, 34 (note 54). 50 V. S. Khristoforov, KGB SSSR v Afganistane 1978–1989: K 20-letiyu vyvoda sovetskikh voysk iz Afganistana (Moscow: Moskovskiye uchebniki i Kartolitografiya, 2009), 4–5, 20. The representative office appears to have been in operation only from August 1978 onwards. See Mitrokhin, KGB in Afghanistan, 31. Details on how the intelligence relationship was established can be found in Snegirev and Samunin, Virus, 120–30, 202–6, 227–9. Among those who served within the KGB representative office was KGB colonel Alexander Mareychev, who arrived in Afghanistan in May 1978 and became a department head within the representative office in autumn 1979. 51 The KGB used the term Istikhbarat as the code name for the acting head of the service, which suggests a certain level of cooperation. See Mitrokhin, KGB in Afghanistan, 30. 52 Snegirev and Samunin, Virus, 122. 53 Mitrokhin, KGB in Afghanistan, 31; Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Asylum and Migration Division, Security Services in Communist Afghanistan (1978–1992): AGSA, KAM, KhAD and WAD (Brussels: Council of the European Union, 26 April 2001, DG H I 7953/01), 7. AGSA was the acronym for Da Afghanistan da Gato da Satane Adara, Pashto for ‘Organization for the Protection of the Interests of Afghanistan’. 54 Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Security Services in Communist Afghanistan, 8. KAM was the acronym for Da Kargarano Amniyati Muasasa, Pashto for ‘Workers’ Security Service’. 55 Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Security Services in Communist Afghanistan, 14. 56 UNHCR, Note on the Structure and Operation of the KhAD/WAD in Afghanistan 1978–1992, UNHCR, May 2008, 2. 57 Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Security Services in Communist Afghanistan, 9–10; UNHCR, Note on the Structure and Operation, 2. KhAD was the acronym for Khadamat-e Atala’at-e Dawlati, Dari for ‘State Intelligence Service’. 58 Kucherova, KGB v Afganistane, 36. 59 Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Security Services in Communist Afghanistan, 14; UNHCR, Note on the Structure and Operation, 2–3. Directorates were known as reyasat in Dari. 60 Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Security Services in Communist Afghanistan, 15; UNHCR, Note on the Structure and Operation, 3.



3. Soviet Approaches to Muslim Extremism and Terrorism

59

61 Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Security Services in Communist Afghanistan, 4, 10, 15. WAD was the acronym for Wazarat-e Amniyat-e Dawlati, Dari for ‘Ministry of State Security’. 62 Mitrokhin, KGB in Afghanistan, 119, 143, 149; Andrew and Mitrokhin, Mitrokhin Archive II, 410. Mitrokhin wrote his Afghanistan manuscript in 1986–1987, based on notes that he copied from the archives of the KGB First Chief Directorate in Yasenevo outside Moscow before he retired in 1984. Mitrokhin claimed that his notes were based exclusively on KGB information and, where possible, this seems corroborated by other evidence. Since Mitrokhin’s ultimate intention was to defect to the United States or Britain, and the Afghanistan manuscript was his ticket out, he consistently, and possibly excessively so, characterized KGB activities as pervasive and a negative influence. 63 Mitrokhin, KGB in Afghanistan, 141. 64 Antonio Giustozzi, War, Politics and Society in Afghanistan, 1978–1992 (London: Hurst & Co., 2000), 187–8. 65 Ibid., 98. 66 Ibid., 187. 67 Kucherova, KGB v Afganistane, 74. 68 S. N. Lebedev (ed.), Istoriya rossiyskoy vneshney razvedki: Ocherki, Vol. 6 (Moscow: SVR and Mezhdunarodnyye otnosheniya, 2016), 128, 129. In Russian terminology, the term agent may refer to either an officer of the intelligence service or a recruited informer. 69 Mitrokhin, KGB in Afghanistan, 145; Andrew and Mitrokhin, Mitrokhin Archive II, 360. 70 Mitrokhin, KGB in Afghanistan, 142, 147; Andrew and Mitrokhin, Mitrokhin Archive II, 358–60. 71 Andrew and Mitrokhin, Mitrokhin Archive II, 360. 72 Giustozzi, War, Politics and Society in Afghanistan, 1978–1992, 43, 44, 127. 73 Aleksandr Sukholesskiy, Spetsnaz GRU v Afganistane 1979-1989 gg. (Moscow: Russkaya panorama, 20123), 124. 74 Mitrokhin, KGB in Afghanistan, 143. 75 Giustozzi, War, Politics and Society, 99. 76 Mitrokhin, KGB in Afghanistan, 145. 77 Khristoforov, KGB SSSR v Afganistane, 23. 78 Mitrokhin, KGB in Afghanistan, 119, 143, 149; Andrew and Mitrokhin, Mitrokhin Archive II, 409. 79 Khristoforov, KGB SSSR v Afganistane, 35–6; Malevanyy, Sovetskiy spetsnaz, 172–3. However, Kaskad units also carried out HUMINT operations dealing with informers against mujahidin bands. Malevanyy, Sovetskiy spetsnaz, 182–3, 191, 192; Kucherova, KGB v Afganistane, 10. 80 Kucherova, KGB v Afganistane, 11–12; Malevanyy, Sovetskiy spetsnaz, 142, 146–7, 156, 159–60, 168–9. 81 GRU was the acronym for Glavnoye razvedyvatel’noye upravleniye, the Chief Directorate for Intelligence of the General Staff. 82 Braithwaite, Afgantsy, 126–7. 83 See, for example, Kucherova, KGB v Afganistane, 221–2, 230–4. 84 Ibid., 29. 85 Malevanyy, Sovetskiy spetsnaz, 212, 217, 235. 86 Ibid., 218.

60

Terrorism in the Cold War

87 Khristoforov, KGB SSSR v Afganistane, 37–8. 88 Ro’i, Islam in the Soviet Union, 425. 89 See, for example, Snegirev and Samunin, Virus, 407, 432. 90 Ro’i, Islam in the Soviet Union, 358–9, referring to a report on religious affairs to the CPSU Central Committee, dated 16 September 1983. The term Wahhabi was from about this time adopted by local theologians, ordinary believers and, eventually, those in the state structures as well, after which the term – following the dissolution of the Soviet Union – was turned into a derogatory categorization. 91 Sulton Khamadov, Mezhdunarodnyy kontekst: Afganskiy faktor, in Lena Jonson, Saodat Olimova and Musaffar Olimov (eds.), Religioznyy ekstremizm v Tsentral’noy Asii: Problemy i perspektivy—Materialy konferentsii Dushanbe, 25 aprelya 2002 g. (Dushanbe: Devashtich, 2002), 132–50, here 138. 92 Ahmed Rashid, Jihad: The Rise of Militant Islam in Central Asia (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2002), 97, 98. 93 Davlat Nazirov, Political Islam in Central Asia: Its Sources and Development Stages, Central Asia and the Caucasus 4/22 (2003), 154–62, here 159. 94 Washington Times, 23 April 1987; Mohammad Yousaf and Mark Adkin, Afghanistan: The Bear Trap: The Defeat of a Superpower (Havertown, PA: Casemate, 1992, 2001), 189–206; Rashid, Jihad, 43–4, 97–8. 95 Rashid, Jihad, 43–4, 97–8.

CChapter 4 PALESTINIAN TERRORISM AND THE STATE SECURITY OF THE GDR ABU NIDAL BETWEEN EAST BERLIN, MOSCOW AND WASHINGTON 1973–89 Tobias Wunschik

Translation from German by Adrian Hänni

Introduction In the Middle East, the Cold War between the two superpowers was manifest in conflicts between conservative, pro-Western monarchies and newly established socialist regimes. This animosity, which can also be interpreted as a stage of a decolonization process, was covered and transformed by the Arab–Israeli conflict.1 Palestinian terrorism – originating in the Middle East, directed against Israel, but affecting the whole Western world – constituted a specific consequence and intersection of all these lines of conflict. Its inflammation towards the end of the 1960s can be partially understood as a proxy conflict between Moscow and Washington, which directly affected the allies of the two superpowers: while the West European states and the global public were among the most important addressees of the politically motivated violence, the East European regimes provided Palestinian terrorists with a safe haven or even supported them through their intelligence services. Taking the form of airplane hijackings and other violent attacks, the actions of the Palestinians grew significantly more militant at the turn of the 1960s. In the 1970s, Palestinian terrorist groups such as the Abu Nidal Organization (ANO)2 were responsible for more international terrorist attacks than any single violent underground organization in the world.3 More than 200 attacks between 1968 and 1986 were perpetrated by these groups.4 Important conditions allowing for their ‘success’ were a broad recruiting base, a considerable supply of weapons, sufficient funding (e.g. through blackmail) and, last but not least, state support. These state

62

Terrorism in the Cold War

sponsors offered the terrorists a safe haven and, in some cases, even military training.5 The most important state allies of Palestinian terrorist groups were found in the Middle East: Syria, Libya, South Yemen and Iraq. In some cases, these states even issued diplomatic passports to terrorists, with which they could cross borders in an unimpeded manner, or organized the transport of weapons used for the perpetration of attacks. Thereby, alliances often shifted, and the various Palestinian terrorist groups were welcomed to a variable extent in the individual states, depending mainly on the general political situation and the rivalries between the groups. Despite this major support from Middle Eastern states, it came in very useful to the Palestinian terrorists that they were also tolerated in several socialist countries in East Europe during the 1970s and 1980s, especially in Poland, Hungary, the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic (CSSR), Yugoslavia and the German Democratic Republic (GDR). Particularly, the East German police state allowed Palestinian terrorists to live a relatively safe life undisturbed by Western manhunts or even attempts on their life by enemy intelligence services and rival terrorist groups. During medical treatments in a (relatively modern) East German clinic, they were generally also better protected against assaults than as patients in a Middle Eastern hospital. The GDR was also a suitable terrain to prepare violent actions, considering that the country shares a border (porous for diplomats and citizens of third countries) with the West. Additionally, a number of terrorists received military training in East Germany. In some realms, the support by the socialist states of East Europe was even more valuable than the support of allied regimes in the Middle East. For example, the former had precious intelligence on Western manhunts, potential double agents in their own ranks6 and the intentions of rival terrorist groups. In addition, during the summer months the moderate climate of Central Europe promised some recreation from the blazing heat of the Middle East. For that reason, the leaders of Palestinian terrorist groups often spent their ‘summer holidays’ in the GDR along with their families. Moreover, their older children could often study there, an option readily used because of the (relatively) high quality of the East German education system, security aspects and the opportunity to consolidate the political ties. Last but not least, the predominantly male Palestinian terrorists enjoyed amorous and sexual adventures with some female citizens of the GDR, who had fallen in love, were pursuing a material interest or were acting on the behest of the Ministry for State Security (Ministerium für Staatssicherheit, MfS, commonly known as Stasi). Exemplarily for the terrorist actors originating in the Middle East, the following case study focuses on Abu Nidal, one of the most important figures of Palestinian extremism – who himself liked to boast about his good contacts with the MfS until 1989.7 By analysing his case, I will explore which approach the government of the GDR, and especially the intelligence service directly dealing with the terrorists (on whose files this article is based8), actually pursued towards the Palestinian terrorist groups.



4. Palestinian Terrorism and the State Security of the GDR

63

The reason that terrorists wanted in the West were often able to stay in the GDR was sometimes only due to the fact that their true identity was not recognized when they entered the country, either because they carried forged passports or had taken possession of authentic passports of third persons. Abu Nidal, for example, reportedly possessed his own vanity case for this purpose, including high-quality wigs, glasses and beards, with which he could completely change his look.9 Repeatedly, terrorists also benefitted from the alleviated provisions for day stays in East Berlin.10 However, they recurrently made themselves conspicuous at the border controls – either because they carried a gun without permission or because the forgery of their passports was discovered after all. Even more often, though, the terrorists wanted in the West came to the GDR with the knowledge and acquiescence of the MfS. West German left-wing terrorists likewise cooperated with various Palestinian groups for years. At most they were stopped at the border crossing into the GDR, but never convicted or extradited to the West – if they shared their knowledge about current plans for attacks and disclosed the identities of their comrades-inarms.11 It is likely that the Palestinian terrorists and the MfS met on a similar basis. However, these groups (with often thousands of armed members in the Middle East) were much stronger than the handful of West German left-wing terrorists – and much less predictable than the strongly ideologized ‘urban guerrillas’ from the Federal Republic. Above all, with the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) there was at the same time a ‘legal arm’ of the Palestinian liberation movement (albeit at times fiercely combatted internally) that officially maintained cordial relations with the GDR. Therefore, the Palestinians could behave very differently than the West German left-wing terrorists despite linguistic hurdles. A suitable starting point for this case study is the year 1973, when the PLO was allowed to open diplomatic missions in various Eastern bloc countries. This intensified the bilateral relations and ever more Palestinian terrorists mixed with the growing number of travellers. Additionally, the tenth World Youth Festival held in East Berlin in the summer of 1973 constituted a ‘wake-up call’, as the government of the GDR feared a recurrence of the fatal attack of Palestinian terrorists on the Olympic Games in Munich the previous year.12 Even concrete evidence was received.13 As a consequence, a specific counterterrorism unit was set up within the MfS: the Department XXII (Abteilung XXII).14 The MfS’ Main Department II (Hauptabteilung II, in charge of counterintelligence) remained responsible for the PLO mission in East Berlin as well as the embassies of the Arab states including their entourages.15 The gathering of foreign intelligence on the other hand, for example, on the Middle Eastern states, was the responsibility of the Main Directorate for Reconnaissance (Hauptverwaltung Aufklärung, HV A).16

The GDR regime and the Palestinians The government of the GDR was principally well disposed towards the Palestinians, because it supported (left-wing) liberation movements in the lesser developed

64

Terrorism in the Cold War

countries due to ideological as well as power-political considerations, and because it considered itself not so much in Israel’s debt historically, for various reasons.17 The general framework for alliances were set by the Soviet Union, so that Moscow and East Berlin had common allies in the Third World most of the time. In accordance with the division of labour between the Soviet Union and its East European satellite states desired by Moscow, South Yemen, for example, even formed a focus of the foreign policy and development aid of the GDR.18 This included the support of the intelligence service there (through the dispatch of consultants), not least for the espionage war against the hostile sister state North Yemen.19 At the same time Palestinian terrorist groups were allowed to set up bases in South Yemen, where West German left-wing terrorists were trained as well.20 Other terrorist groups have been temporarily supported by Syria, where since 1967 government advisors of the GDR were officially engaged and provided development aid.21 In view of the growing terrorist threat at the beginning of the 1970s, East Berlin was well advised to maintain friendly contacts with the relatively moderate PLO.22 After initial talks and the first cooperation agreements, the PLO could open an official representation in the GDR in December 1972.23 Subsequently, agreements were made on political consultations and the treatment of ‘wounded fighters’ in East German clinics.24 The leadership of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands, SED) also acceded to a ‘strictly confidential request of Arafat’s’ to accommodate one of his confidants for several weeks to protect him from a feared attempt on his life by the Iraqi intelligence service.25 Additionally, starting from 1982 PLO members received military training by the GDR’s armed forces, the National People’s Army (Nationale Volksarmee, NVA).26 Above all, however, many young Palestinians came to the GDR over the years for study or to receive technical education ; at least 235 of them were organized within the General Union of Palestine Students in the GDR.27 The young men were mostly politicized and easy to mobilize due to the desperate situation of their people.28 Because of the tensions in Lebanon at the time, to take a single example, sixty Arab students spontaneously marched to the Syrian Embassy in East Berlin on 8 June 1976 aiming to deliver a protest resolution. Together with the Department of International Relations (Abteilung Internationale Verbindungen) of the Central Committee (Zentralkomitee, ZK) of the SED, the PLO representation then tried to impact the students in a moderating way.29 In Prague, three weeks previously, 100 Arab students had even occupied the Syrian Embassy.30 The PLO’s contacts with the host countries were not limited to the political realm. There were also connections to the secret police of the respective countries. As requested by Moscow,31 the MfS, for example, had the task of training cadres for the PLO’s intelligence service (Jihaz al-Rasd) headed by Abu Iyad and of exchanging important intelligence.32 Moreover, the Minister of State Security Erich Mielke confirmed in 1979 not only the training of PLO members but also the transfer of explosive charges for use against ships, hand grenades and two sniper rifles from Western production to the Palestinians.33



4. Palestinian Terrorism and the State Security of the GDR

65

The general diplomatic and trade political contacts were the responsibility of the PLO office in East Berlin, which was, accordingly, of importance for the MfS as well. As the official representation of a yet to be established Palestinian state, it was regarded as a potential target of Western espionage or terrorist attacks – and for all its hospitality, the GDR still wanted to keep a vigilant eye on its guests.34 In April 1974, the first head of the PLO office in East Berlin, Nabil Kouleilat, was therefore introduced to two MfS counterintelligence officers by Wolfgang Schüßler, a head of sector in the Department of International Relations of the SED’s ZK. Kouleilat ‘agreed to maintain a permanent and firm liaison with MfS officials. He is ready to meet us at any location. He instantly agreed that in the future no further talks should be held in the official PLO office, in order to not compromise him and the office, and to keep the connection to the MfS conspiratorial’. As a result he henceforth kept a conspiratorial contact with the intelligence service of the GDR, albeit probably with the knowledge and approval of ‘his headquarters’,35 which was likely a reference to Yasser Arafat himself. Moreover, the MfS employed Offiziere in besonderem Einsatz (OibE), a category of secretly operating and particularly reliable MfS officials, as secretaries, facility managers and drivers in the PLO office. In addition, the MfS recruited five Inoffizielle Mitarbeiter (informal collaborators, IM) in the entourage of the ‘embassy’.36 That the East German intelligence service would employ informants against the PLO office was assumed there anyway – and that this, in turn, had a disciplining effect on the ‘embassy’ staff corresponded to the intentions of the MfS.37 Furthermore, the latter eavesdropped on private and official telephone connections of the heads of the PLO office and inspected their mail.38 Time and again, Palestinians and citizens of various Arab states with Palestinian origins came to the GDR through official channels –passing in transit either to study or for business or to work at an embassy. At the beginning of the 1980s, 570 Libyans, 300 Iraqis, 250 Syrians, 170 Palestinians and 160 Lebanese lived permanently in the GDR.39 To be added are countless travel movements: travelling to the GDR in 1975 was, for example, a Palestinian who belonged to the group of terrorists that would, together with German fellow travellers, hijack an airliner en route to Tel Aviv the following year and subsequently be killed by Israeli special forces during the famous freeing of the hostages in Entebbe.40 In 1975, the ‘icon’ of the Palestinian struggle for liberation, Leila Khaled41, likewise travelled to the GDR. At the behest of George Habash, and probably as the first women ever, she had twice hijacked an airplane together with male accomplices in 1969 and 1970. Now, she was travelling to the GDR as part of a delegation of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), which refrained somewhat from terrorist actions at that time. Khaled herself was then still considered one of the most wanted terrorists in the world, and the Israeli intelligence service Mossad sought her life. Her participation at the World Congress of Women held in East Berlin as part of the International Women’s Year took place with the explicit approval of the SED leadership but was not made public in the GDR media.42 That the PLO turned away from terrorism from the mid-1970s on and aimed to attack Israel by force solely within its state borders significantly contributed to the

66

Terrorism in the Cold War

international recognition of the Palestinian liberation movement. Only in 1985 did the PLO once more revert to the older terrorist tactics by committing attacks on Israelis abroad. However, Tel Aviv’s reaction – the bombing of Palestinian camps in Tunis – convinced Arafat for good that terrorist attacks ultimately did not work to his organization’s advantage.43 The moderation of the PLO, however, brought other Palestinian groups all the more into the arena, protesting against a negotiated solution with Israel and convinced that they could force the creation of a Palestinian state with terrorist violence.

Abu Nidal, the MfS and the KGB Abu Nidal (Sabri al-Banna), born in Palestine in 1937, joined the Arafat-led Fatah, the largest faction of the PLO, in the mid-1960s. On the behest of this organization he went to Sudan in 1968–9 and then, on his own request, to Iraq in 1970. His contacts to the Iraqi intelligence service brought him politically closer to the leadership of his host country and thus in contradiction to Arafat and the official line of the PLO,44 although the background of these developments can be interpreted in differing ways.45 In any case, Abu Nidal went on to found his own group in 1974, which was called Fatah Revolutionary Council (Fatah-RC).46 Barely any other terrorist leader shaped his organization as much as Abu Nidal.47 In the 1980s he was regarded as especially brutal: ‘Compared to him Carlos is a mere boy scout’, one of his biographers judged for a reason.48 His organization is held responsible for attacks in twenty states with more than 200 deaths;49 other observers even estimate 900 casualties.50 Abu Nidal wanted to sabotage a political solution to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and opposed the moderate factions of the Palestinian movement, which in his opinion had ‘betrayed’ the ‘revolution’.51 Therefore, he considered not only attacks against the main enemy Israel as an appropriate means but also violent actions against representatives of the adversarial PLO.52 Accordingly, there were much more Arab than Israeli civilians and diplomats among his victims53 – probably also because he often acted on behalf of various intelligence services. The PLO reacted to the breakaway and the fratricidal war by requesting Abu Nidal’s extradition from the Iraqi authorities and sentencing him to death in absentia in 1975.54 Abu Nidal, who himself hardly ever made use of a weapon and initially was accompanied only by a driver, therefore always travelled with bodyguards from 1978 onwards.55 For its part, his organization now had a ‘blacklist’ of PLO representatives, seven of whom were killed until 1982.56 Abu Nidal spared the socialist states of East Europe from his attacks; only in April 1980 did he try to assassinate the two PLO officials Abu Iyad and Abu Hissam with a car bomb in Belgrade.57 After the failed attack both targets were flown to Budapest in a special aircraft, in accordance with the close political contacts with the host countries ‘on party level.’58 Even though the assassination attempt was exclusively a result of the fraternal strife between the two Palestinian groups, it could also be rated as a ‘warning shot’ for the Yugoslavian intelligence service.



4. Palestinian Terrorism and the State Security of the GDR

67

In  any case, with the help of the Iraqi government the latter now established a direct contact with ANO.59 Belgrade subsequently tolerated the group and allowed it to operate a secret headquarters in the Yugoslav capital for years.60 In the vein of Yugoslavia, most socialist states in East Europe left ANO undisturbed but tried to put it under complete surveillance and to learn of its attack plans. The Palestinian terrorist group, in turn, expected of the cooperation with the socialist intelligence services a sanctuary unhindered by law enforcement, aimed to sell weapons produced in East Europe profitably to the Middle East, and hoped to be able to drive a wedge between the governments of these states and the PLO in the political realm.61 By contrast, ANO took exception to the more open attitude of the SED leadership towards Israel in the 1980s, reflected, for example, in the honour of the chairman of the World Jewish Congress Edgar M. Bronfman by Erich Honecker in 1988.62 Abu Nidal would have liked to count the Soviet Union among his allies. He gladly called Moscow the ‘true friend of the Arabs’.63 Ideologically, he did not always accord with the socialist states, even if he liked to invoke Karl Marx in the bilateral talks,64 and submitted his followers to Marxist–Leninist indoctrinations. However, to the outside world he did not openly confess to this ideology, because he did not want to alienate the more conservative factions of the Palestinian movement, which he considered potential allies.65 When Abu Nidal was a guest in an Arab state, he promoted his socialist or nationalist or Muslim attitude, like a chameleon, according to the preferences of his hosts.66 It has to be assumed that he also practised this camouflage vis-à-vis the hosting socialist states. Until 1983, ANO’s contacts with Moscow were limited to an unofficial contact through the Soviet military attaché in Damascus, where the group’s headquarters was located at the time. Only in March 1984 did the Eastern superpower indicate a higher readiness to talk on a political level.67 Via the intelligence officials in the Soviet embassies in Damascus and Tripoli, the Palestinian terrorist group was now able to establish contacts with the KGB. ‘Stable contacts’ were allegedly established with several ‘leading officials’ at the KGB headquarters, whom Abu Nidal met in Warsaw and Sofia. One reason for the improvement of the climate at this stage was that Abu Nidal participated in the resolution of a hostage-taking of Soviet diplomats in Beirut.68 However, the Soviet Union eschewed official political relations, because it did not want to anger Arafat. The KGB nevertheless considered itself ‘operatively […] anchored’ in the group and intended to ‘operatively penetrate’ ANO in the future as well,69 indicating the recruitment of informants or agents. In early summer of 1986, however, the KGB was not fully in the picture of ANO’s front company Zibado.70 This is an indicator that the relations were not that close. ANO later regarded the Soviet reform efforts of glasnost and perestroika critically,71 while the group explicitly praised the SED leadership’s ‘adherence to principles’ (Prinzipienfestigkeit)72 – which could point to a certain dogmatism provided it was not just feigned. ANO operated bases in Yugoslavia, the CSSR, Bulgaria and Poland.73 Abu Nidal often resided in Poland especially, at least between 1981 and 1985/6. His physician advised him to stay in moderate climate zones during the hot summer

68

Terrorism in the Cold War

months, which is why he liked to stay on his country estate outside Warsaw in the summer for health reasons,74 but otherwise he mostly resided in Tripoli at that time. It came in very handy for the government in Warsaw that Abu Nidal was among the buyers and brokers of the thriving Polish arms production.75 His most important contact rail in Warsaw thus went through the Ministry of National Defence76 and not the country’s civilian intelligence service. However, bribe money was apparently also paid to leaders of Polish state security and the ruling party.77 Overall, ANO is reported to have earned several hundred million dollars from arms smuggling until 1989, especially through the front company S.A.S. Trade & Investment in Warsaw, but also through the subsidiary firm Zibado in East Berlin.78 Abu Nidal first came to the GDR no later than 1979 but direct ‘conspiratorial contacts’ with the MfS had not been developed until 1982.79 ANO had to pledge that the group would respect the ‘security interests of the GDR’, conduct no ‘actions on the territory of the GDR and its allies’, and also not prepare for any ‘militant actions in third countries’ from there. Additionally, strict silence about the cooperation was agreed on.80 Such a tolerance of terrorist attacks, as long as they were exclusively directed against the West and could not be attributed to the GDR, was also the MfS’ principal approach towards other terrorist organizations (such as groups from West Germany).81 Because Abu Nidal initially seemed to adhere to his commitments,82 the MfS wanted to strengthen their mutual trust and in 1984 supported ANO even more actively. From January to March, sixteen (and exactly one year later, twenty) ANO members completed a basic course of studies in Marxism–Leninism in the GDR. Subsequently, from April to July 1985, eleven ANO cadres could even undergo military training. Besides operative instructions and tactical lessons, they also received training in the use of rockets and grenade launchers.83 In this time period, the MfS considered ANO as especially receptive to socialism and therefore intended to propose to the SED leadership to organize a ‘secret meeting’ in the GDR with representatives of the left-wing Palestinian (terrorist) organizations – Abu Nidal, the PFLP, the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP), the Palestinian Communist Party as well as the group around Abu Moussa – and hoped to receive the consent of the KGB.84 In line with an ‘agreement’, the MfS also tolerated ANO setting up a commercial branch in East Berlin in February 1984 in the form of the front company Zibado. This company was formally part of an enterprise domiciled in Cyprus and acted as an intermediary between mostly Arab states; its ‘product range’ included weapons, explosives and ammunition. Allegedly because of financial irregularities and low profits, the lease contract for the company’s office space in the Internationales Handelszentrum (IHZ, international trade centre) in East Berlin was, however, not extended at a meeting between ANO representatives and MfS officials from the Department XXII in June 1986.85 The last head of the company’s East Berlin branch apparently fled to West Berlin, where he disclosed his knowledge to Western intelligence services.86 Abu Nidal suspected that the MfS had played him against his Palestinian rival Abu Daoud in the course of this affair.87



4. Palestinian Terrorism and the State Security of the GDR

69

The MfS had been well informed about the identities of ANO members, their plans for future attacks as well as their policy shifts88 Evidently, the East German intelligence service had informants (IM) available within ANO, who in some instances closely cooperated with the MfS – and were rewarded for their services rendered with GDR residency permits for them and their families.89 At last, the Department XXII (‘counterterrorism’) had run a total of six IM in the ranks, in the entourage of ANO, five of whom were so-called Inoffizielle Mitarbeiter mit Feindkontakt (informal collaborators with enemy contact, IMB).90 These IM delivered, not least due to the conspiratorial behaviour in international terrorist groups, partly corresponding to, but partly also differing, reports about their organization.91 From the viewpoint of these IM, an argument against independent contacts with the MfS was that ANO members had to envisage their liquidation in case they ‘betrayed’ their organization – in fact, they had to pledge to accept this fate at the time they joined the group.92 Counterproductive for smooth spying activities was, further, the different cultural background of the Middle Eastern informants and their East German case officers. If the reporting faltered for that reason or if already the recruiting was sluggish, the MfS, for example, alluded to its intimate knowledge from the Palestinian scene in the GDR in order to not be taken for a fool. Also, the MfS officials did not attempt to instigate their targets to a crude betrayal. Rather, they flattered them and tried to win them over as ‘consultants’ and ‘experts’. The East German intelligence service was even not reluctant to apply pressure to force recruitment, either by calling into question further residence permits for the GDR or by threatening to inform Abu Nidal about the alleged double agent.93 The psychologically trained case officers of the MfS were apparently well aware of the peculiarities of the recruitment of members or supporters of an international terrorist organization. Through ‘unofficial measures’,94 which probably means, above all, the use of informants, as well as the interception of communication of West German security services, the MfS was well informed about ANO’s plans for attacks (and the state of knowledge of the Western side hereto).95 In addition, the MfS could retroactively make use of the intimate knowledge of dropouts from ANO,96 and receive significant insider information from the PLO.97 A factor contributing to the MfS’ tolerating stance towards Palestinian terrorist groups has always been its fear that the GDR itself could become a potential target of attack for unpredictable terrorists. Reinforcing such concerns, Hungarian state security reported in February 1986 that Abu Nidal planned ‘new terrorist attacks against states maintaining contacts to Israel, without regard to the societal system of these countries’.98 This was clearly a reference to the socialist states. The MfS was further concerned that the group exploited the tolerance of the East European intelligence services and ‘abused’ the territory of the socialist states.99 This concern was always fuelled by the anxiety that the contacts with ANO, which was of extremely ill repute in the West, could become known to the global public. Accordingly, Abu Nidal himself probably agreed with MfS officials to ‘never talk about his stays in the GDR or in other socialist states’.100 Hence, it had always been

70

Terrorism in the Cold War

a balancing act for the intelligence services of the socialist states to control their guests who were ready to use violence during their stays without rebuffing them – and to hide all this from the global public. The cooperation between the East German intelligence service and ANO reached its peak in the mid-1980s. However, as mentioned previously, in June 1986 the MfS did not extend the lease contract with the front company Zibado, did not approve new training courses in February 1986101 and responded to a request in 1988 by stating that the training capacities for the following year were already exhausted, and that the contacts with the group had been ‘stagnating’ anyway.102 ANO now pushed more than ever for the MfS’ favour and declared that, especially, the previous political courses of its cadres in the GDR had contributed to a stronger orientation towards the ‘political struggle’ instead of only terrorist attacks.103 It’s anyone’s guess whether the Palestinian terrorists only wanted to please their hosts with this statement, or whether a certain moderation in the following years, indeed, originated there. East Berlin intended to ask Arafat in May 1986 ‘to use his authority that such terrorist actions [of the Palestinians], from whichever side they might be planned, would not be executed’.104 With this, East Berlin certainly overestimated the influence of the prominent PLO leader on the many different rival groups and on ANO in particular. The MfS itself also foiled the recruitment of new members among the Palestinian students in the GDR in at least sixteen cases. The new mission is formulated in a MfS report of October 1988: ‘The group has to be unsettled through appropriate offensive measures albeit without pushing it into the camp of the enemy.’105 Even if, as reported, Abu Nidal stayed in East Germany for the last time in March 1985, leading members of the group still visited the GDR, for example, to hide money in foreign currencies in accounts of the state bank.106 Other presumed ANO members could travel to the GDR because they were protected by a department head in the SED’s ZK owing to older personal contacts.107 That the relations with East Berlin were stagnating was probably neither the cause nor the result of a certain decline of ANO but, rather, a coincidence. Admittedly, the group could still recruit new members from some Palestinian refugee camps. Several Gulf states also continued paying blackmail to prevent ANO from committing attacks in their countries; King Fahd of Saudi Arabia, for instance, reportedly even received Abu Nidal personally in April 1988.108 However, the latter’s authoritarian leadership style, in particular, put his associates off,109 apparently leading to the execution of 300 suspected disloyal group members overall until 1989.110 Further important terrain was lost with the (forced or selfinitiated) retreat from Syria in 1986/7.111 The Syrian intelligence services now shared the names of twenty group members in West Europe with ‘enemy intelligence services’.112 As a result, Abu Nidal had to strive for improved relations with the PLO, which, however, saw no reason for an accommodation. In frail health, Abu Nidal now preferred to go down in history as a statesman rather than as a gang leader.113 With ANO’s relocation to Libya, the group received important support from Muammar Gaddafi,114 who had anyway been in direct confrontation with the



4. Palestinian Terrorism and the State Security of the GDR

71

Western community of states between 1981 and 1989.115 Gaddafi funded ANO and provided weapons, which were channelled through Libyan diplomatic missions into those countries where terrorist attacks were supposed to be committed.116 Because of this support for international terrorism, Libya had been subjected to US sanctions,117 until Gaddafi, too, wanted to rid himself of ANO in 1998 and expelled it from the country. After a clandestine stopover in Egypt, Abu Nidal found refuge in Iraq, where he committed suicide, or was assassinated, in 2002.118 The changing framework of global politics since the second half the 1980s had significantly contributed to the decline of his group.

The talks about Abu Nidal between Washington and East Berlin The GDR leadership repeatedly affirmed the ‘steadfast solidarity of the GDR with the Palestinian people’.119 While denouncing terrorist violence, it defined the phenomenon differently than it was conventional in the West and made no clear distinction between terrorist actors and the liberation movements in the Third World. Already before 1989 the question therefore arose whether terrorists were using East Berlin as an escape route or even prepared their attacks there. For instance, after the ANO attacks on the Vienna city councillor for transportation (Verkehrsstadtrat) Heinz Nittel and the Jewish religious centre in Vienna in 1981, the Austrian police arrested a number of suspects.120 Since a brother of the person presumed to be mainly responsible studied in West Berlin and the suspect himself had often travelled to East Berlin with a second passport, the media already considered a connection to the MfS as possible at that time.121 In line with their mandate to collect intelligence, Western intelligence services tried to receive information from GDR citizens who had fled East Germany or even to recruit agents there. In doing so, they ran the risk of being played off by MfS counterintelligence. A US intelligence service, for example, fell for a double agent when it tried to recruit a Syrian employee of an Arab news agency in the GDR. In return for 1,500 DM (Deutsche Mark, around $830) per month, he was expected to deliver important information on Abu Nidal as well as other Palestinian terrorists in the GDR and was provided with purpose-built radio equipment for this task.122 Likewise recruited by Western intelligence services were Palestinians and Arabs living in West Berlin when they returned from day stays in East Berlin. West German intelligence services knew, for example, that a threeperson terrorist commando of ANO had stopped off in Sofia on its way to West Europe in October 1986.123 In the same month, a car with an East German licence plate number was used for the preparation of a bomb attack in West Berlin,124 which entailed repeated requests for assistance. Probably because the car had been used by Abu Nidal’s company Zibado, the East German authorities did not even reply to the request.125 The new General Secretary of CPSU Mikhail Gorbachev revised the Soviet policy towards the Third World and the liberation movements in the course of perestroika.126 This allowed the West to align Moscow to a rejection of terrorism in

72

Terrorism in the Cold War

the context of the CSCE127 process.128 First contacts, however, revealed continued fundamental disagreement on the question of what exactly constituted terrorism. The CIA merely hoped to come to an understanding with Moscow for better protection of air traffic against hijackings. Its internal estimate of August 1986 was quite accurate: ‘The Soviets have avoided direct contact with Middle Eastern transnational terrorist groups outside the PLO, such as the Abu Nidal Group, the PFLP-Special Command, and the Carlos Apparat. […] Conversely, several East European states – East Germany, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria – have had direct ties to such groups.’129 Paramilitary components of the PLO engaged in terrorist violence would be supported with weapons, training, funding and intelligence but their attacks would not be directed by Moscow. The Soviet Union, the estimate further ascertained, trained fighters of left-wing liberation movements in the Third World, although leaving the leading role, in particular, to Cuba.130 In December 1986, US Secretary of State George P. Shultz then transmitted a documentation of Syrian support for ANO during the years 1983–6 to his government’s diplomatic missions. By tapping radio links, Czechoslovak intelligence was able to intercept the document.131 At that time, Western intelligence knew the names of at least fifty-four ANO members, who were supposed to commit attacks in the Federal Republic of Germany, France or Italy.132 Altogether, the US government made four attempts until May 1987, mostly by the use of bilateral non-papers, to prove GDR’s support for international terrorism to the government in East Berlin.133 Probably because a satisfactory reaction was absent, US ambassador Francis J. Meehan appeared in person at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the GDR in May 1987 to deliver a démarche of the US government, in which East Berlin and Warsaw were accused of tolerating a confidant of Abu Nidal, who was mentioned by name, on their territories: ‘I have been instructed to inform you that the U[nited]S[tates] G[overnement] views with the upmost gravity these links between the GDR and the A[bu]N[idal]O[rganization], which are inconsistent with the GDR’s stated intention of seeking to develop further bilateral relations. Your government must bear the responsibility for the negative consequences which these activities could have for our bilateral relationship.’134 The GDR officials rejected the accusations and called the announced publication of the material ‘blackmail’.135 The US ambassador in Warsaw delivered the same démarche to the Polish government,136 which likewise firmly rebuffed such accusations as ‘unfounded and untrue’.137 After a slight delay, the US government then apparently leaked the information to media outlets such as the New York Times.138 The French weekly news magazine L’Express and the West German weekly news magazines Der Spiegel and Der Stern reported it as well.139 Outwardly, the governments of East Europe still refused to cooperate.140 However, the MfS, for instance, informed itself in detail about the raised accusations prior to the mentioned diplomatic talks about Abu Nidal.141 There was now an increasing awareness in East European capitals that it was time to modify attitudes due to the altered Soviet position and for their own interest in a good reputation among the global public. The KGB accordingly informed the East



4. Palestinian Terrorism and the State Security of the GDR

73

European security services in 1986: ‘At large it becomes apparent that the socialist community of states cannot evade international regulations and conventions on terrorism, respectively. However, they have to serve the implementation of our policy and offer us new opportunities in the struggle against terrorism.’ 142 In January 1988, Ambassador Francis Meehan and Olympia Snow, a member of the Committee on Foreign Affairs of the US House of Representatives, appeared in person at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the GDR. They reminded the GDR government that it had voted for a resolution to prevent international terrorism together with 152 other states during the forty-second session of the United Nations (UN) General Assembly, but would speak out only unsatisfactorily about, for example, Abu Nidal.143 Only fourteen days later, the US Ambassador-at-Large for Counterterrorism Alvin P. Adams repeated this accusation in several East European capitals and wished for direct working contacts with the responsible security agencies. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the GDR rejected this request reflexively, notwithstanding that there was already an MfS official (using a cover story) sitting at the table during these discussions.144 It appears that the US government subsequently went public again. In March 1988 the Washington Times, invoking ‘State Department sources’, highlighted once again the continuing tolerance of ANO by the GDR and Poland, but also mentioned the shutdown of Zibado in East Berlin and S.A.S. in Warsaw a few months earlier. Perhaps, the American newspaper reasoned, the ‘powerful Polish and East German security services’ went further than ‘top East European leaders’ had known.145 In Vienna in January 1989, the OSCE member states finally agreed on adopting ‘effective measures to prevent and fight’ terrorism146 – the MfS took note of this disapprovingly.147 UN resolution 44/29, which was prepared during the fortyfourth session of the UN General Assembly in fall 1989, constituted the conclusion of this development.148 To be sure, the governments of the Soviet Union, the GDR, the CSSR, Hungary, Poland and Bulgaria still put out a joint statement about their stance on counterterrorism and backed up the liberation movements of the Third World.149 However, Moscow had informed in the run-up to the joint statement that its security experts had already held talks with counterterrorism experts from the United States, the Federal Republic of Germany and other Western states, mainly about legal viewpoints as well as practical questions about the protection against terrorist attacks.150 In plain terms, this should probably read: the time for tolerance and support of terrorist actors, including the Palestinian terrorists, was running out. In light of the shifted Soviet approach, the SED regime kept on losing its room for manoeuvre in the policy field of counterterrorism as well.

Conclusion Compared to the support Palestinian terrorist actors at times received from Tripoli, Aden, Baghdad and Damascus, the protection by East Berlin was less substantial, but has also been receiving scarce mention in the literature.151 Because the participants at the time were mindful of seclusion and conspiratorial

74

Terrorism in the Cold War

behaviour, little reliable information was available on the actual protection until 1989, and the ideological common ground with ANO, for instance, was often underestimated.152 Even today, overviews and comparative analyses are largely lacking; the facts presented in this article touch only certain aspects and select states,153 are based primarily on intelligence documents and cover only a specific time frame. Therefore, general conclusions are difficult. The governments of Western states, too, fought terrorist groups not always with maximal consequence for various reasons. Greece, for example, was surprisingly tolerant towards the November 17 Movement. France hardly ever took action against terrorists from the Middle East and the Basque country until into the 1980s.154 Austria had to concede during the attack on the OPEC conference in Vienna in 1975 and Chancellor Bruno Kreisky subsequently made a pact with the PLO in order to contribute to its moderation. Under the pressure of public opinion, the West German government had to give in after the opposition politician Peter Lorenz had been kidnapped during the same year, reverting to a hard line one month later during the occupation of its embassy in Stockholm.155 The GDR, however, made concessions to several Palestinian and West German terrorist groups on a larger scale and over the whole investigated time period. The premises for doing so were also quite different, considering that the GDR government itself did not face a terrorist threat or blackmail, and was not under comparable pressure from public opinion. Moreover, East Berlin had all police, secret police and legal means available for a decisive crackdown on terrorist groups operating underground. However, East Berlin, Warsaw, Prague and Budapest did lean towards fraternization with the perpetrators, not least because of ideological sympathy for the Palestinian movement. They tried to curry favour with leaders of relatively moderate organizations such as the PLO and the PFLP, and politically motivated acts of violence were, consequently, not opposed. To be sure, East Berlin was keen to receive international recognition at the same time but the MfS was convinced that it could reconcile both interests by banking on complete secrecy about its protection of West German and Palestinian terrorists. This belief turned out to be erroneous – Carlos, the West German ex-terrorists of the RAF living in the GDR,156 as well as Abu Nidal got busted at one time or another. Equally mistaken was the MfS’ assumption that it could always stay on top of things in the clandestine milieu of international terrorism. The highly motivated Palestinian terrorists overstrained the wiggle room they had been offered; the strategy of appeasement turned out to be unfeasible.157 Similarly quixotic was the fantasy of the Minister of State Security of the GDR Erich Mielke to have terrorists commit acts of sabotage in the West in case of a military conflict: ‘We could hardly control someone like Carlos inside East Germany in peacetime, so how would he prove dependable or even useful in the chaos of a war?’158 This assessment by the former chief of East German foreign intelligence Markus Wolf applies to Abu Nidal in equal measure. The socialist regimes of East Europe were not just ‘unwilling hosts’,159 trying to avoid goading the terrorist actors by any means to keep their territories free



4. Palestinian Terrorism and the State Security of the GDR

75

of terrorist attacks. The government of the GDR, rather, acted according to NIMBYism,160 approving a terrorist threat to third parties. However, it did not go to the extreme: East German authorities tolerated the planning of attacks by Palestinian groups from the territory of the GDR only teeth-grudgingly, gave limited logistical support (e.g. they provided no forged passports according to present knowledge), could have trained much more ANO members militarily, but in any case wanted to see no more recruitment of new members in the GDR from 1986 onwards.161 In addition, the GDR had probably not given significant funds to ANO,162 but enabled the group to maintain an important source of funds through the arms trade.163 The Polish government went further in its support for ANO, especially in regard to the arms trade.164 In its support of West German terrorism, the MfS shifted to a much more cautious approach as early as 1982/3. The guests, who had been prone to acts of violence, were now coerced to temperance and less and less protected, mainly in order to not endanger the international reputation of the GDR.165 In light of this development, before the accession to office by Gorbachev and before the outlined diplomatic offensive by the US government it cannot, still, be plausibly assumed that these factors alone effected the greater caution of the MfS and the KGB towards Abu Nidal in 1986. Nevertheless, the UN resolutions against international terrorism in 1988/9 can definitely be conceived as a diplomatic success, just like the UN’s condemnation of the use of violence by liberation movements in the Third World in the 1970s.166 Even in the transformed general political climate, the diplomatic intervention of the US government could bear fruit only because the global public could be mobilized – as the image of the SED regime, abroad and domestically, featured prominently at the back of the leading MfS officials’ minds. When GDR Television sided with Arafat in a broadcast in January 1986 and called Abu Nidal a traitor to the Palestinian cause, the MfS considered the effects on the public in the GDR ‘negligible’. If Palestinians living in East Germany had seen the broadcast, it was reasoned, on the other hand, that ‘negative political and operative consequences could not be ruled out’. Therefore, the MfS instructed its IM in the Palestinian milieu to downplay the broadcast. The intelligence service even ensured that GDR Television released no transcript of the broadcast.167 This censorship of the already censored GDR Television was the absurd result of the SED regime’s opportunistic and myopic approach to Palestinian terrorism.

Notes 1 Malcolm H. Kerr, The Arab Cold War: Gamal ‘Abd Al-Nasir and His Rivals 1957–1970 (London: Oxford University Press, 1971), cited by Trentin Massimiliano (ed.), The Middle East and the Cold War: Between Security and Development (Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2012), 3. 2 Mark Tessler, A History of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1994), 431.

76

Terrorism in the Cold War

3 Bruce Hoffmann, Terrorismus: Der unerklärte Krieg (Frankfurt a.M.: Fischer Taschenbuch, 2001), 87. 4 Ariel Merari and Shlomi Elad, The International Dimension of Palestinian Terrorism (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1986), 130–42. See also Arie Perliger, Middle Eastern Terrorism, in Leonard Weinberg and Wiliam L. Eubank (eds.), The Roots of Terrorism (New York: Chelsea House, 2006), 23. 5 Thomas Riegler, ‘Es muss ein gegenseitiges Geben und Nehmen sein’: WarschauerPakt-Staaten und Terrorismusbekämpfung am Beispiel der DDR, in Johannes Hürter (ed.), Terrorismusbekämpfung in Westeuropa: Demokratie und Sicherheit in den 1970er und 1980er Jahren (Berlin: De Gruyter Oldenbourg, 2015), 289–315, 315. 6 See, among others, Information [des Ministeriums für Staatssicherheit der DDR zur Abu Nidal-Gruppe] G/05819/09/03/84, in Der Bundesbeauftragte für die StasiUnterlagen, Berlin, Germany (henceforth BStU), HA II 37473, 82–7. 7 Information der Abteilung XXII/8 zur Abu-Nidal-Organisation, 30 October 1989, in: BStU, AOP 7116/91, Vol. 2, 85–7. 8 This requires an especially careful source criticism; not in all cases can the exact source and the motivational background of the author of such documents be identified. See Roger Engelmann, Zum Quellenwert der Unterlagen des Ministeriums für Staatssicherheit, in Klaus-Dietmar Henke and Roger Engelmann (eds.), Aktenlage: Die Bedeutung der Unterlagen des Staatssicherheitsdienstes für die Zeitgeschichtsforschung (Berlin: Cristoph Links, 1995), 23–39. 9 Darlegungen Abu Ayads zur Abu-Nidal-Gruppe, HV A III/B, 23 June 1987, in BStU, AOP 7116/91, Vol. 1, 166–70. 10 Schreiben der Abteilung X an Neiber betr. Aufenthalt von Carlos, 30 September 1979, in BStU, HA XXII 20005, 18–19. 11 See, among other Tobias Wunschik, Die ‘Bewegung 2. Juni’ und ihre Protektion durch den Staatssicherheitsdienst der DDR, Deutschland-Archiv 6 (2007), 1014–25. 12 Markus Wolf, Man without a Face: The Autobiography of Communism’s Greatest Spymaster (New York: Public Affairs, 1997), 269. 13 Bericht des IM ‘Brigitte’ zur Aktion ‘Banner’, 13 July 1973, in BStU, HA II 18652, 562. 14 Tobias Wunschik, Die Hauptabteilung XXII: ‘Terrorabwehr’ (Berlin: BStU, 1995). 15 Hanna Labrenz-Weiß, Die Hauptabteilung II: Spionageabwehr (Berlin: BStU, 1998). 16 Helmut Müller-Enbergs, Hauptverwaltung A (HV A): Aufgaben – Strukturen – Quellen (Berlin: BStU, 2011). 17 Stefan Meining, Kommunistische Judenpolitik: Die DDR, die Juden und Israel (Münster: Lit, 2002). 18 Miriam M. Müller, A Spectre Is Haunting Arabia: How the Germans Brought Their Communism to Yemen (Bielefeld: Transcript, 2015). 19 Wolf, Man without a Face, 264. 20 Thomas Skelton-Robinson, Im Netz verheddert: Die Beziehungen des bundesdeutschen Linksterrorismus zur Volksfront für die Befreiung Palästinas (1969–1980), in Wolfgnag Kraushaar (ed.), Die RAF und der linke Terrorismus (Hamburg: Hamburger Ed., 2006), 828–904. 21 Massimiliano Trentin, ‘The Pragmatic Politics of the Improvised Socialism’: The East German Advisors in Syria, in Trentin (ed.), The Middle East and the Cold War, 79–103, 89. 22 Wolf, Man without a Face, 269. 23 Vorlage des Ministeriums für Auswärtige Angelegenheiten für das Sekretariat des ZK der SED, in BStU, HA II 18656, 274–8.



4. Palestinian Terrorism and the State Security of the GDR

77

24 Vereinbarung zwischen der Sozialistischen Einheitspartei Deutschlands und der Palästinensischen Befreiungsorganisation (PLO) 1976/1977, in BStU, HA II 18656, 381–3. 25 Blitz-Telegramm von [dem zuständigen Sektorenleiter der Abteilung Internationale Verbindungen des ZK der SED Bruno] Sedlaczek, 22 June 1979, in BStU, HA II 18653, 94. 26 Klaus Storkmann, Geheime Solidarität: Militärbeziehungen und Militärhilfen in die ‘Dritte Welt’ (Berlin: Christoph Links, 2012), 397, 481. 27 Einschätzung der aktuellen Tendenzen unter palästinensischen Studenten in der DDR, 3 March 1989, in BStU, HA II 30159, 2–5. 28 Auch in der Bundesrepublik zählten die palästinensischen Studenten zu den Protagonisten des ‘bewaffneten Kampfes’. See Ido Zelkovitz, Students and Resistance in Palestine: Books, Guns and Politics (London: Routledge, 2017), 34. 29 Information der Hauptabteilung II [with Erich Mielke’s signature], 8 June 1976, in BStU, HA II 18656, 232. 30 Information des MfAA, 12 May 1976, in BStU, HA II 18656, 270. 31 Wolf, Man without a Face, 269. 32 Aktenvermerk der HV A/III, 3 April 1974, in BStU, HA II 18652, 508. 33 Bericht der Abteilung III der Hauptverwaltung A [des Ministeriums für Staatssicherheit der DDR], 23 August 1979, in BStU, Neiber 937, 3–12. 34 Vorschlag der Hauptabteilung II/3 zum Einleiten der Maßnahme B, 17 April 1974, in BStU, HA II 18652, 260–1. 35 Bericht der Hauptabteilung II/3 über ein Gespräch mit dem ständigen Vertreter der PLO in der DDR, Kouleilat, 5 April 1974, in BStU, HA II 18652, 254–8. See also Gesprächskonzeption für Kontaktaufnahme mit ‘Patriot’, [1975], in BStU, HA II 18656, 36–9. 36 Bericht der Hauptabteilung II/3 über die Vertretung der PLO in der DDR, 24 April 1975, in BStU, HA II 18656, 508–14. 37 Information der Hauptabteilung II/3, 15 June 1976, in BStU, HA II 18656, 230. 38 Vorschlag der Hauptabteilung II/3 zum Einleiten der Maßnahme B, 17 April 1974, in BStU, HA II 18652, 260–1. 39 Information der Hauptabteilung II/15 über operative Aspekte im Zusammenhang mit dem Besuch von Yasser Arafat, 1 February 1982, in BStU, HA II 18655, 324–6. 40 Schreiben des Leiters der Hauptabteilung II an Mielke, 17 June 1977, in BStU, HA II 18657, 283–5. 41 Leila Khaled, My People Shall Live: The Autobiography of a Revolutionary (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1973). 42 Bericht der Hauptabteilung II/3 über die Einreise der ehemaligen Terroristin, 16 October 1975, in BStU, HA II 18653, 210–14. See also Sarah Irving, Leila Khaled: Icon of Palestinian Liberation (London: Pluto Press, 2012), 74, 78. 43 Shmuel Bar, Deterring Palestinian Terrorism: The Israeli Experience, in Andreas Wenger and Alex Wilner (eds.), Deterring Terrorism: Theory and Practice (Stanford: Stanford Security Studies, 2012), 205–27, 210. 44 Yossi Melman, The Master Terrorist: The True Story behind Abu Nidal (New York: Adama Books, 1987), 62. 45 Kameel B. Nasr, Arab and Israeli Terrorism: The Causes and Effects of Political Violence 1936–1993 (Jefferson: McFarland & Co., 1997), 90. 46 Erkenntnisse [des Ministeriums für Staatssicherheit der DDR] zur terroristischen Gruppe von Abu Nidal, 10 February 1982, in BStU, Abt. X 204, 88–96; Thomas

78

Terrorism in the Cold War

Riegler, Im Fadenkreuz: Österreich und der Nahostterrorismus 1973 bis 1985 (Göttingen: V&R unipress, 2011), 138–9. 47 Melman, Master Terrorist, 43. 48 Ibid., 4. See also Riegler, Österreich und der Nahostterrorismus, 140. 49 Abu Nidal Organization (ANO), Council on Foreign Relations, 27 May 2009, http:​ //www​.cfr.​org/i​srael​/abu-​nidal​-orga​nizat​ion-a​no-ak​a-fat​ah-re​volut​ionar​y-cou​ncil-​ arab-​revol​ution​ary-b​rigad​es-re​volut​ionar​y-org​aniza​tion-​socia​list-​musli​ms/p9​153 (accessed 1 January 2020). 50 Daniel Baracskay, The Palestine Liberation Organisation: Terrorism and Prospects in the Holy Land (Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger, 2011), 150. 51 Melman, Master Terrorist, 63. 52 Information des MfS über die terroristische Gruppe um Abu Nidal, 30 November 1981, in BStU, HA XXII 20005, 10–13. 53 Zusammenstellung der Aktionen verschiedener Terrorgruppen nach Merari and Elad, International Dimension of Palestinian Terrorism, in BStU, HA II 18653, 17–18. 54 Information [des ungarischen Geheimdienstes] über die linksextreme Terrororganisation ‘Al-Assifa’, n.d. [1980/1981], in BStU, Abt. X 204, 84–6; Melman, Master Terrorist, 86. 55 Nasr, Arab and Israeli Terrorism, 91, 93. 56 Information des MfS über die terroristische Gruppe um Abu Nidal, 30 November 1981, in BStU, HA XXII 20005, 10–13. 57 Patrick Seale, Abu Nidal – Der Händler des Todes: Die Wahrheit über den palästinensischen Terror (München: Bertelsmann, 1992), 341. 58 Vermerk von Markus Wolf für Gerhard Neiber über ein Gespräch mit dem Leiter der ungarischen Aufklärung, 27 May 1980, in BStU, HA XXII 20005, 125–6. 59 Information [der PLO-Sicherheit] zur Abu-Nidal-Gruppe, 2 May 1988, in BStU, AOP 7116/91, Vol. 1, 247–59. 60 Seale, Abu Nidal, 341; Information des MfS über die terroristische Gruppe um Abu Nidal, 30 November 1981, in BStU, HA XXII 20005, 10–13. 61 Seale, Abu Nidal, 339–40. 62 Bericht der Abteilung XXII/8 zum Treff mit Mitgliedern der Gruppe ‘Händler’, 24 November 1988, in BStU, HA XXII 19464, 72–6. 63 ‘Wir werden den großen Brand entfachen’ (Interview with Abu Nidal), Der Spiegel 42 (1985), 182–205, 185. See also Interview with Abu Nidal, Al-Quabbas 597 (1987), in BStU, AOP 7116/91, Vol. 3, 251–66. 64 Seale, Abu Nidal, 339–40. 65 Bericht der Abteilung XXII/8 zur Fatah-RC, 4 December 1984, in BStU, HA XXII 5193, Vol. 1, 1–3. 66 Vgl. Seale, Abu Nidal, 339–40. 67 Bericht der Abteilung XXII/8 zur Fatah-RC, 4 December 1984, in BStU, HA XXII 5193, Vol. 1, 1–3; Konzeption der Abteilung XXII für die Beratungen mit Vertretern der 2. Hauptverwaltung des KfS, 3 December 1984, in BStU, HA XXII 31, Vol. 2, 217–20. 68 Information der Abteilung XXII/8 zu Hintergründen der Geiselnahme von sowjetischen Diplomaten in Beirut, 11 October 1985, in BStU, HA XXII 19464, 21–4; Bericht der Abteilung XXII/8 zum Stand der Bearbeitung des OV ‘Händler’, 26 January 1987, in BStU, AOP 7116/91, Vol. 1, 81–103.



4. Palestinian Terrorism and the State Security of the GDR

79

69 Bericht der Abteilung XXII über die Beratungen mit Vertretern des KfS der UdSSR zu Fragen der Terrorismusbekämpfung, 21 October 1986, in BStU, HA XXII 31, Vol. 1, 23–37. 70 Information 770/86 des KfS der UdSSR an das MfS der DDR [May 1986], in BStU, HA II 20616, 5. 71 Bericht der Abteilung XXII/8 zum Treff mit Mitgliedern der Gruppe ‘Händler’, 24 November 1988, in BStU, HA XXII 19464, 72–6. 72 Bericht der Abteilung XXII/8 zum Treff mit Mitgliedern der Gruppe ‘Händler’, 4 September 1988, in BStU, HA XXII 19464, 77–81. 73 Schreiben des MdI der UVR über die Abteilung X, 4 August 1989, in BStU, Abt. X 204, 320–1. 74 Nasr, Arab and Israeli Terrorism, 99. 75 According to the statement of the former Polish minister of the interior Czeslaw Kiszczak in 2010. See Riegler, Österreich und der Nahostterrorismus, 145–6. 76 Bericht der Abteilung XXII/8 zur Fatah-RC, 4 December 1984, in BStU, HA XXII 5193, Vol. 1, 1–3. 77 Ergänzung der Abteilung XXII zur Stellungnahme über den Vermerk der HV A, 11 May 1987, in BStU, AOP 7116/91, Vol. 5, 28–30. 78 Deal hinterm Bahnhof, Der Spiegel 41 (1991), 152–4. 79 [Bericht der] Abteilung XXII zur palästinensischen Organisation ‘Abu Nidal’, 25 April 1984, in BStU, HA XXII 31, Vol. 2, 224–6. 80 Bericht der Abteilung XXII/8 zum Treff mit Mitgliedern der Gruppe ‘Händler’, 24 November 1988, in BStU, HA XXII 19464, 72–6. 81 Bericht der Abteilung XXII/8 zur Fatah-RC, 4 December 1984, in BStU, HA XXII 5193, Vol. 1, 1–3. 82 Ibid. 83 Vermerk der Abteilung XXII zu Lehrgängen, 25 May 1987, in BStU, HA XXII 19421, 55–7. 84 [Bericht der] Abteilung XXII zur palästinensischen Organisation ‘Abu Nidal’, 25 April 1984, in BStU, HA XXII 31, Vol. 2, 224–6. 85 Analyse der Abteilung XXII zu dem durch den USA-Botschafter übergebenen Material, 25 May 1987, in BStU, HA XXII 19421, 44–50. 86 Bericht der Abteilung XXII/8 zum OV ‘Händler’, 21 June 1989, in BStU, AOP 7116/91, Vol. 2, 28–52. 87 Vermerk der HV A III/B/1 [zur Abu Nidal-Gruppe], 27 April 1987, in BStU, AOP 7116/91, Vol. 1, 164–5; Ergänzung der Abteilung XXII zur Stellungnahme über den Vermerk der HV A, 11 May 1987, in BStU, AOP 7116/91, Vol. 5, 28–30. 88 To this end, the MfS used the educational stays of ANO members to collect (presumably secretly) specimens of handwritings, photos and fingerprints. See Vermerk der Abteilung XXII zu Lehrgängen, 25 May 1987, in BStU, HA XXII 19421, 55–7. 89 Bericht der Abteilung XXII/8 zum Treff mit der KP ‘Tarek’ vom 14.10.1985, in BStU, HA XXII 19464, 25–30. 90 Analyse der IM-Arbeit Abteilung XXII/8 in den Kategorien IMB/IMS, 22 February 1989, in BStU, HA XXII 521. 91 Information der Abteilung XXII/8/IM ‘Bruno’, 2 June 1989, in BStU, HA XXII 489, Vol. 12, 1–2; Information der Abteilung XXII/8/KP ‘Faysal’, 12 September 1989, in BStU, HA XXII 489, Vol. 12, 3–4.

80

Terrorism in the Cold War

92 Bericht der Abteilung XXII/8 zum OV ‘Händler’, 7 September 1988, in BStU, AOP 7116/91, Vol. 2, 1–16. 93 Konzeption der Abteilung XXII/8 zum Treff mit dem IM ‘Hassan’, 23 April 1987, in BStU, HA XXII 6102, Vol. 3, 3–7. 94 Information des MfS über die terroristische Gruppe um Abu Nidal, 30 November 1981, in BStU, HA XXII 20005, 10–13. 95 Information [der Staatssicherheit] B/038548/10/11/87/09, 10 November 1987, in BStU, HA II 29141, 9. 96 Vernehmungsbericht eines ehem. Mitgliedes der Abu-Nidal-Gruppe, 10 February 1982, in BStU, HA XXII 19423, 4–11. 97 See, among others, Darlegungen Abu Ayads zur Abu-Nidal-Gruppe, HV A III/B, 23 June 1987, in BStU, AOP 7116/91, Vol. 1, 166–70. 98 Information der Sicherheitsorgane der UVR, 21 February 1986, in BStU, Abt. X 1954, 46. 99 Information des MfS über die terroristische Gruppe um Abu Nidal, 30 November 1981, in BStU, HA XXII 20005, 10–13. 100 Bericht der Abteilung XXII/8 zum Treff mit dem Mitglied der Gruppe Händler, 12 February 1986, in BStU, HA XXII 19464, 36–45. 101 Bericht der Abteilung XXII/8 zum Treff mit dem Mitglied der Gruppe Händler, 12 February 1986, in BStU, HA XXII 19464, 36–45. 102 Bericht der Abteilung XXII/8 zum Treff mit Mitgliedern der Gruppe ‘Händler’, 24 November 1988, in BStU, HA XXII 19464, 72–6. 103 Bericht der Abteilung XXII/8 zum Treff mit Mitgliedern der Gruppe ‘Händler’, 4 November 1988, in BStU, HA XXII 19464, 77–81. 104 Schreiben von Erich Mielke an Wolf und Neiber, 9 May 1986, in BStU, HA XXII 19826, 6. 105 [Bericht der Staatssicherheit über die] politisch-operative Lage, 6 October 1988, in BStU, HA XXII 665, Vol. 2, 50–2. 106 Abschlußbericht der Abteilung XXII/8 zur OPK ‘Bankier’, 13 March 1989, in BStU, AOP 7116/91, Vol. 8, 18–19. 107 Bericht der Hauptabteilung II/15, 31 July 1986, in BStU, HA II 18662, 70–2. 108 Bericht der Abteilung III/B der Hauptverwaltung A, 13 September 1989, in BStU, HA XXII 19421, 4–13. 109 Information der Abteilung XXII/8 zur Lage in der PWB, 15 April 1988, in BStU, AOP 7116/91, Vol. 1, 235. 110 Information der Abteilung XXII/8 zur Abu-Nidal-Organisation, 30 October 1989, in BStU, AOP 7116/91, Vol. 2, 85–7. 111 Seale, Abu Nidal, 314. 112 Information der Abteilung XXII/8 zur Gruppe Abu Nidal, 14 July 1987, in BStU, AOP 7116/91, Vol. 1, 213. In the literature, there are even references to a joint operation of the CIA and the PLO’s intelligence service, which is reported to have spread rumours about disloyal ANO members, thereby triggering their execution or defection and thus accelerating the decline of the group. See Timothy Naftali, Blind Spot: The Secret History of American Counterterrorism (New York: Basic Books, 2005), 194–8; Mark Perry, Eclipse: The Last Days of the CIA (New York: Morrow, 1992), 191–4. The author would like to thank Adrian Hänni for the tip. 113 HV A III/B: Darlegungen Abu Ayads zur Abu-Nidal-Gruppe, 23 June 1987, in BStU, AOP 7116/91, Vol. 1, 166–70.



4. Palestinian Terrorism and the State Security of the GDR

81

114 Information der Abteilung XXII/8 zur Lage in der PWB, 15 April 1988, in BStU, AOP 7116/91, Vol. 1, 235. 115 Tim Niblock, ‘Pariah states’ & Sanctions in the Middle East: Iraq, Libya, Sudan (Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2001), 23. 116 Information der Sicherheitsorgane der CSSR, 12 September 1986, in BStU, Abt. X 1948, 191–3. See also Seale, Abu Nidal, 324. 117 Meghan L. O’Sullivan, Shrewd Sanctions: Statecraft and State Sponsors of Terrorism (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2003), 173–232; Niblock, ‘Pariah States’, 30. 118 Aaron Mannes, Profiles in Terror: The Guide to Middle East Terrorist Organizations (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2004), 102. 119 Statement by Hermann Axen, cited in Neues Deutschland, 10 July 1981, 2. 120 Süddeutsche Zeitung, 4 November 1981; BStU, HA XXII 16522, 1–3. 121 Kurier (Wien), 3 November 1981; BStU, HA XXII 16522, 4–5. 122 Bericht der Hauptabteilung II/13 zum Treff mit dem IMB ‘Anton’ vom 22.5.1987, in BStU, HA II 22852, 2–7. 123 [Information der Abteilung IX der HV A über die] Nutzung des Territoriums der VR Bulgarien durch terroristische Gruppierungen, n.d. [January 1987], in BStU, Abt. X 204, 291. 124 BStU, HA XXII 18834. 125 BStU, HA XXII 20428, 1–9. 126 Odd Arne Westad, The Global Cold War: Third World Interventions and the Making of Our Times (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 367. 127 Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe. 128 Peter Schlotter, Die KSZE im Ost-West-Konflikt: Wirkung einer internationalen Institution (Frankfurt a.M.: Campus Verlag, 1999), 127. 129 The Soviet Bloc Role in International Terrorism and Revolutionary Violence, National Intelligence Estimate 11/2–86, August 1986, 6, https​://ww​w.cia​.gov/​libra​ry/ re​ading​room/​docs/​CIA-R​DP90T​00155​R0002​00050​001-6​.pdf (accessed 1 January 2020). With Romania, however, Abu Nidal had already broken all his contacts in spring 1984 because a member of his group had been arrested there, supposedly at the instigation of the PLO intelligence service. See [Bericht der] Abteilung XXII zur palästinensischen Organisation ‘Abu Nidal’, 25 April 1984, in BStU, HA XXII 31, Vol. 2, 224–6. 130 See also [Synopsis of NIE 11/2-86:] Rolle des Sowjetblocks im Internationalen Terrorismus von Oktober 1986, in BStU, Arbeitsbereich Neiber 961, 10–14. 131 Information des FMDI der CSSR betr. Terror organisation Abu Nidal [von 1.1987], in BStU, Abt. X 204, 266–7. 132 Information der Sicherheitsorgane der UVR vom 25.3.1987, in BStU, Abt. X 1955, 66–8. 133 Analyse der Abteilung XXII zu dem durch den USA-Botschafter übergebenen Material, 25 May 1987, in BStU, HA XXII 19421, 44–50; Deal hinterm Bahnhof, 152–4; Riegler, Geben und Nehmen, 311–14. 134 Demarche der US-Administration [‘The USG has repeatedly expressed … .’], n.d. [May 1987], in BStU, HA II 32886, 136–40. 135 Vermerk der Abteilung USA des Ministeriums für Auswärtige Angelegenheiten der DDR über ein Gespräch mit dem Botschafter der USA Francis J. Meehan vom 22.5.1987, in BStU, HA II 32886, 128–9.

82

Terrorism in the Cold War

136 Information (mit handschriftlichen Vermerk Gehard Neibers) vom 26.5.1987, in BStU, Abt. X 204, 325. 137 Schreiben des polnischen Innenministers Czeslaw Kiszczak an Genossen Armeegeneral Erich Mielke vom 3.7.1987, in BStU, Abt. X 204, 332–3. 138 Der Tagesspiegel, 26 January 1988; BStU, Abt. X 204, 339. 139 Stellungnahme der Abteilung XXII/8 zu Veröffentlichungen vom 16.10.1987, in BStU, HA XXII 6102, Vol. 3, 24–5. 140 Vermerk für Genossen Generalleutnant Neiber, Rechtsstelle [des MfS], 8 February 1988, in BStU, ZA, HA XXII 18138, 150–5. 141 Schreiben der Abteilung X an Generalleutnant Neiber vom 8.4.1988, in BStU, Arbeitsbereich Neiber 968, 2. 142 These were the remarks of the KGB chiefs responsible for counterterrorism towards the chiefs of the MfS’ Abteilung XXII. See Bericht der Abteilung XXII über die Beratungen mit Vertretern des KfS der UdSSR zu Fragen der Terrorismusbekämpfung vom 21.10.1986, in BStU, HA XXII 31, Part 1, 23–37. 143 Vermerk der Abteilung USA [des Ministeriums für Auswärtige Angelegenheiten der DDR] über ein Gespräch von Genossen Bernhard Neugebauer mit […] Frau Olympia Snow vom 18.1.1988, in BStU, HA XXII 19984, 61–71. 144 Sonderinformation von [Oberstleutnant] Rüdiger [im Sekretariat des Stellvertretenden Ministers für Staatssicherheit Gerhard Neiber] vom 1.2.1988, in BStU, ZA, HA XXII 18138, 111–22; Zusammenfassung wesentlicher inhaltlicher Gesichtspunkte, Wertungen und Schlußfolgerungen aus den Expertenkonsultationen zur Terrorismusproblematik DDR – USA vom 2.2.1988, in BStU, ZA, HA XXII 18138, 44–57. 145 Bryan Brumley, East Block Helps Close Abu Nidal Operations, Washington Times, 8 March 1988; BStU, HA XXII 19984, 13–14. 146 Abschließendes Dokument des Wiener Folgetreffens vom 15.1.1989, printed in Ulrich Fastenrath (ed.), KSZE/OSZE: Dokumente der Konferenz und der Organisation für Sicherheit und Zusammenarbeit in Europa (Köln: Luchterhand, 2008), Teil B.3, 1–57, 6. 147 Persönliches Schreiben des Stellvertretenden Ministers für Staatssicherheit Neiber vom 11.5.1989, in BStU, ZA, HA XXII 18138, 750–1. 148 Measures to prevent international terrorism which endangers or takes innocent human lives or jeopardizes fundamental freedoms and study of the underlying causes of those forms of terrorism and acts of violence which lie in misery, frustration, grievance and despair and which cause some people to sacrifice human lives, including their own, in an attempt to effect radical changes, UN resolution No. 44/29, 4 December 1989, http:​//www​.un.o​rg/do​cumen​ts/ga​/res/​44/a4​4r029​.htm (accessed 22 April 2009). 149 Letter dated 89/10/17 from the Permanent Representatives of Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, the German Democratic Republic, Hungary, Poland and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics to the United Nations addressed to the SecretaryGeneral, UN Document Symbol A/C.6/44/4, https​://do​cumen​ts-dd​s-ny.​un.or​g/doc​ /UNDO​C/GEN​/N89/​246/0​8/img​/N892​4608.​pdf?O​penEl​ement​ (accessed 1 January 2020). 150 Bericht der HA Rechts und Vertragswesen über die Beratung der Expertengruppe der Teilnehmerstaaten des Warschauer Vertrages zur Fragen der Zusammenarbeit bei der Bekämpfung des internationalen Terrorismus vom 4.9.1989, in BStU, ZA, HA XXII 18138, Vol. 2, 16–21.



4. Palestinian Terrorism and the State Security of the GDR

83

151 Daniel Byman, Deadly Connections: States That Sponsor Terrorism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005); O’Sullivan, Shrewd Sanctions; Paul R. Pillar, Terrorism and U.S. Foreign Policy (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2001); Matthias Bengtson-Krallert, Die DDR und der internationale Terrorismus (Marburg: Tectum Verlag, 2017). 152 Seale, Abu Nidal, 339–40. 153 Romania apparently constituted an exceptional case: while the government of Nicolae Ceaușescu curried favour with and funded ‘Carlos’, other groups such as ANO shunned Bucharest, because the country had recognized Israel. See Ergänzung der Abteilung XXII zur Stellungnahme über den Vermerk der HV A, 11 May 1987, in BStU, AOP 7116/91, Vol. 5, 28–30; Liviu Tofan, Sacalul securitatii: teroristul Carlos in solda spionajului romanesc (Iasi: Editura Polirom, 2013). 154 Byman, Deadly Connections, 220, 239–44. 155 Matthias Dahlke, Demokratischer Staat und transnationaler Terrorismus: Drei Wege zur Unnachgiebigkeit in Westeuropa 1972–1975 (München: Oldenbourg, 2011), 160, 162, 318. 156 Tobias Wunschik, Magdeburg statt Mosambique, Köthen statt Kap Verden: Die RAF– Aussteiger in der DDR, in Klaus Biesenbach (ed.), Zur Vorstellung des Terrors: Die RAF–Ausstellung, Vol. 2 (Göttingen: Steidl, 2005), 236–40. 157 On the strategies in general, see Wenger and Wilner (eds.), Deterring Terrorism. 158 Wolf, Man without a Face, 275. 159 Byman, Deadly Connections, 15. 160 NIMBY is the acronym for ‘Not In My Back Yard’. 161 Brigitte Lebens Nacos, Terrorism and Counterterrorism: Understanding Threats and Responses in the Post-9/11 World (New York: Pearson Longman, 2008), 118. 162 Louise Richardson, State Sponsorship: A Root Cause of Terrorism? in Tore Bjørgo (ed.), Root Causes of Terrorism: Myths, Reality, and Ways Forward (New York: Routledge, 2005), 189–97. 163 Deal hinterm Bahnhof, 152–4; Bengtson-Krallert, DDR und der internationale Terrorismus, 339–45. 164 Riegler, Österreich und der Nahostterrorismus, 146; see also the article by Przemyslaw Gasztold in this publication. 165 Wunschik, ‘Bewegung 2. Juni’. 166 Pillar, Terrorism and U.S. Foreign Policy, 76. 167 Vermerk der Abteilung XXII zur Sendung des Schwarzen Kanal, 14 January 1986, in BStU, HA XXII 1211, Vol. 17, 2.

84

CChapter 5 POLISH MILITARY INTELLIGENCE AND ITS SECRET RELATIONSHIP WITH THE ABU NIDAL ORGANIZATION Przemysław Gasztold

It was lunchtime in a cosy, crowded restaurant located in the centre of the Jewish quarter in Paris. Guests were engrossed in conversation while eating lavish kosher delicacies: caviar, herring and chopped liver. Suddenly, three masked individuals threw a grenade inside the restaurant. The blast was so enormous it rattled the nearest buildings at the rue de Rosiers. The assailants went inside and opened indiscriminate fire on stunned clients, and soon after fled to escape to their place of hiding. The odious attack on the Jo Goldenberg restaurant on 9 August 1982 took the lives of six people while twenty-two were seriously wounded. The incident sowed fear among the inhabitants and tourists. Headlines stated outright that it was the biggest tragedy of French Jews after the Second World War. Rumours quickly attributed the deadly attack to the Abu Nidal Organization (ANO). Prosecutors laboriously collected evidence, but the investigation rapidly found itself in a deadlock. There were no witnesses nor evidence of the crime, which meant no useful toehold for further investigation. Fortunately, the police managed to find empty cartridge cases and one of the pistols used in the attack, which were passed for laboratory testing. The results were intriguing: a Polish submachine gun PM-63 ‘RAK’ (short for Ręczny Automat Komandosów, or ‘commandos’ handheld automatic’). The number ‘M.S 6541 II 1975’ engraved on the pistol clearly indicated that it was manufactured in Poland. In September 1982, Jean-Louis Bruguière – the investigating judge overseeing the case – asked Polish authorities for assistance. He wanted to find out how the Polish-made weapon came into the hands of terrorists. His requests induced panic in Warsaw, because the ruling regime of General Wojciech Jaruzelski had been finding itself a pariah on the international arena since the introduction of martial law on 13 December 1981. Warsaw feared that accusations of sponsoring international terrorism would do more damage and harm to the general’s reputation, who was already beleaguered after repressing the ‘Solidarity’ trade union. Thus, in the middle of 1983 Andrzej Krajewski, the chief of the General Prosecutor cabinet, stated that the ‘weapon with magazines have [had] been lost in Poland and was listed in the records of weapons lost after 1975’.1 The authorities knew very well that this was not true but could not publicly acknowledge that at the time Polish services were maintaining

86

Terrorism in the Cold War

a murky relationship with Abu Nidal. Instead, they strenuously disavowed and denied any links with terrorists. A detailed analysis of recently declassified documents proves that the aforementioned was by no means an isolated incident and Polish weapons were used in other fatal incidents carried out by ANO members. In 1976 terrorists fired with a WZ-63 submachine gun during attacks mounted on Syrian diplomatic posts in Rome, Islamabad, Ankara and Istanbul.2 In 1981 Polish-made pistols were found in an ANO hideout in Salzburg and according to Austrian police, one of the seized guns was used in the May 1981 assassination of Heinz Nittel, the president of the Austrian–Israeli Friendship League.3 Moreover, in 1988 Indian police captured a Jordanian member of ANO in New Delhi, who was in possession of a ‘modern pistol of Polish origin’.4 It was no coincidence that terrorists led by Abu Nidal favoured WZ-63 submachine guns. Apart from their lethal efficiency, the use of weapons manufactured in Poland marked only the tip of the iceberg of the shadowy connections between terrorists and military intelligence services in Warsaw. The declassification of communist intelligence and counterintelligence documents opened a rare window into files that could never have become available if communism had survived. While many crucial documents were destroyed during the transition period of 1989/1990,5 those that remained and were opened to the public permitted research into various fields related to history, political science and, especially, to intelligence studies. Moreover, Cold War-era files not only posed a great opportunity to challenge the myth, widespread in the past among many Western scholars, of the scope of Soviet bloc sponsorship of international terrorism but also shed light on several controversies and describe behind-the-scenes ties between terrorists and Eastern bloc regimes that had been unknown even to NATO intelligence services. The declassification of many archives of the former secret services of Eastern bloc countries proved how deeply some authorities were engaged in cooperation with international terrorism. East German secret services supported the West German Red Army Faction (RAF) in many ways and the Czechoslovak services tolerated the presence and activity of the organization of Ilich Ramírez Sánchez, better known as Carlos ‘the Jackal’.6 The Soviet KGB cooperated with several terrorist organizations, particularly with Marxist ones, such as the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP).7 The Hungarian, Bulgarian, Romanian and Czechoslovakian services emulated to some degree Moscow’s tactics.8 Practically all Soviet bloc countries provided material and financial help to the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and to its various extremist factions. The cooperation with countries regarded as sponsors of international terrorism, particularly with Libya, Iraq and Syria, poses a separate research problem. Even though in such cases the training or sale of weapons was conducted on the basis of mutual agreements signed by the sovereign state entities, such cooperation also benefitted the terrorists, who received aid from rogue regimes based in Tripoli, Baghdad or Damascus.



5. Polish Military Intelligence and Its Secret Relationship with ANO

87

The Polish military intelligence services cooperated in many fields with representatives of international terrorism – the very same ones who were on the persona non grata index and who figured in the counterintelligence documents as terrorists. The two best documented examples of such contacts were the relations with Monzer al-Kassar’s organization and with the terrorist network of Abu Nidal. Thus, this chapter narrows in on the latter. Its main purpose is to reconstruct secret ties between the Second Directorate of the General Staff of the Polish Army (Zarząd II Sztabu Generalnego Wojska Polskego) and the non-state actor ANO to present the circumstances, reasons and driving forces for collaboration. Accordingly, based on documents from the Archive of the Institute of National Remembrance, the Archive of Modern Records, the Military Archive and declassified CIA files, this chapter argues that the secret relations with the ANO that Polish military intelligence maintained in the 1980s were propelled by financial benefits rather than ideological factors.

The roots of the ‘dirty’ alliance between Polish services and ANO Thorough analysis of the Polish security apparatus’ documents suggests that Warsaw’s approach to international terrorism was double tracked. On the one hand, the civil services collected information and conducted operations to neutralize potential threats from the RAF or Middle Eastern terrorist organizations.9 Identified members of extreme movements were enlisted into a persona non grata index, that theoretically should have prohibited their entrance into the Polish People’s Republic.10 Guests from the Middle East and North Africa visiting Poland were strictly monitored and security services paid special attention to their plausible links with political and military structures. Students, diplomats and ordinary travellers were under constant surveillance as further targets for potential recruitment by Polish services. The official stance of the Polish government favoured the PLO as the only representative of the Palestinian nation. In July 1982, after the Israeli invasion of Lebanon, the PLO gained diplomatic accreditation and the following year Abu Iyad visited Poland. He suggested signing a secret agreement of cooperation between Polish (civilian) and Palestinian security services to Gen. Mirosław Milewski – a member of Politburo responsible for the security apparatus. However, Milewski was careful, and the final decision on the agreement was postponed.11 Three years later Abu Iyad once again arrived in Warsaw and the secret collaboration between Polish (civilian) and Palestinian services was signed – according to a report from the Palestinian source familiar with the matter.12 The primary purpose of the collaboration boiled down to sharing information on anti-Arafat movements, especially on ANO, and establishing common counterintelligence scrutiny of ANO’s envoys deployed in Poland.13 However, the officers of the military services at the same time cooperated with particular terrorist groups perceived as hostile to the PLO due to operational and financial considerations.

88

Terrorism in the Cold War

In 1974 Hassan Sabri al-Banna (the real name of Abu Nidal) became the head of the Fatah Revolutionary Council. His thuggish organization grouped together Palestinians who opposed Yasser Arafat’s policy and conducted terrorist attacks particularly against Jewish targets and those PLO members who represented a moderate line in the Middle East conflict. Throughout a number of years, the utterly unscrupulous terrorists carried out attacks in more than twenty countries killing or wounding around 900 people.14 At the outset of its establishment, ANO was supported by the Iraqi intelligence service, which used the group as a convenient proxy for pursuing Baghdad’s political and strategic views in the region. In 1983 Abu Nidal moved his organization to Damascus where he obtained Syrian backup and guidance in conducting terrorist activity. After a few years he changed his alliance again and moved to Libya, where he was welcomed by Muammar Gaddafi. Accordingly, Iraq, Syria and Libya became, chronologically, the sponsors of ANO’s terrorist policy and all three regimes belonged to the so-called ‘rejectionist front’ opposed to any peaceful talks or contacts with Israel. There was another very important factor connecting those states with Poland and ANO: in the late 1970s and in the 1980s, Syria, Iraq and Libya were the most important recipients of Polish military hardware in the so-called Third World and Abu Nidal companies that served as their trusted brokers. According to Patrick Seale, the author of Abu Nidal’s biography, the terrorist’s relationship with Warsaw dated back to 1974, when Banna made first contact with the Polish Embassy in Baghdad. At the time, his quarrel with Fatah had deepened, and he used bribes to strengthen his ties with East European authorities. One of his ‘lieutenants’ was responsible for maintaining good relationship with Polish officials through distributing gifts and commissions to officials, some even in cash on a monthly basis, which managed to earn much respect among impoverished diplomats. Moreover, in the late 1970s, Abu Nidal reportedly deposited US$10 million in a Polish bank. This move greatly improved his status in the higher echelon of the Polish authorities, making him more credible for future contacts.15 The details remain scarce, but if Abu Nidal really funnelled money into an account in a Polish bank, he might have done it in Beirut, where Bank Handlowy for the Middle East S.A.L. was located. It was established in 1974, when representatives of Bank Handlowy acquired 80 per cent stocks of Commercial Bank in Beirut from the Lebanese noble family Tawk. The deal seemed defensible: by getting access to Middle Eastern markets, Polish authorities wanted to stimulate their economic presence in the region and significantly facilitate the crediting of Polish investments. However, it quickly turned out that Handlowy’s branch in Beirut fell out of Warsaw’s control and Polish delegates involved themselves in illegal activities. They did not comply with internal regulations and arbitrarily granted high loans to local politicians and business associates, thereby notoriously exceeding the limits of acceptable loans. The lack of control of repayment terms caused great damage to the bank’s resources and in the first half of 1981, the company had lost 88,800,000 Lebanese Pounds (about US$26 million) – an enormous sum, which accounted



5. Polish Military Intelligence and Its Secret Relationship with ANO

89

for about 25 per cent of all receivables of the Polish–Lebanese institution.16 Bank Handlowy was also used by Polish authorities as a financial broker for conducting arms trade in the Middle East. Hence, if Abu Nidal deposited several million USD into a Polish account, it is likely that his money was placed in the safe haven of this Polish–Lebanese institution.17 In 1979, Abu Nidal underwent a complicated heart operation and after the surgery he had to avoid living for too long under tropical conditions. The doctors recommended him to rest and spend a few months in some place with a colder climate.18 For several reasons, communist Poland was a perfect place for recuperation and Abu Nidal was a frequent guest there between 1981 and 1984. He introduced himself as ‘Doctor Said’ and pretended to be a foreign entrepreneur, which was easy thanks to his company’s operations in Warsaw. As a man of caution, he found a safe haven in a large villa located approximately 60 kilometres from the Polish capital, where he moved in with his family. He did not speak Polish, but his children reportedly went to a local school and his daughter Badia acquired some fluency in the Polish language. At that time Abu Nidal rested, slowly recovered and supervised his vast organization through couriers. For the first year, Polish counterintelligence services were probably not familiar with his presence and did not know about his true identity. However, when the truth came to light and he was exposed, nothing happened to him nor was his status changed.19 Declassified documents serve as tangible proof that Polish services were totally aware about Abu Nidal’s arrival in Warsaw, as such information was acquired by counterintelligence in April and October 1983.20 The main source of information regarding the terrorist activity of ANO was the PLO diplomatic office in Warsaw. Members of Fatah monitored groups hostile to Arafat’s rule and sometimes shared crucial information with East European services, especially when ‘tourists’ or ‘students’ behind the Iron Curtain were identified as ANO envoys. According to the controlled leak from the PLO station, Abu Nidal travelled to Poland in April 1983 using a forged diplomatic passport. His arrival was allegedly of ‘the nature of medical consultation related to heart disease’ and he plausibly visited Łódź, Wrocław and Świnoujście. The leader of ANO was not travelling alone. He was accompanied by a carefully selected and skilled bodyguard acting as a ‘student’ named Nasr Noffal. He had visited Poland before and was thus known to Polish services. The head of ‘civilian’ counterintelligence, General Zdzisław Sarewicz, was briefed about the presumed stay of Abu Nidal and instructed border control services to brief him on the arrival of every suspected terrorist.21 However, none of the services identified Sabri al-Banna or gleaned information about his whereabouts – a fact that raises questions about their operational efficiency and capabilities. Were they so incompetent? The real reason why Abu Nidal could feel ‘untouchable’ in Poland was slightly different. He was protected by a ‘guardian angel’, Samir Najmeddin, one of the directors of ANO’s financial wing, a stalwart member of the organization and a middleman with excellent connections in the Polish military services and governmental circles.

90

Terrorism in the Cold War

The ties between ANO companies and Polish military intelligence Samir Najmeddin was a key figure in ANO’s business activities with Polish military intelligence services. A Palestinian from Iraq, he quickly became the man in charge of the group’s financial assets and the right hand of Banna in his commercial enterprises. He came to Warsaw in the late 1970s and established himself there as a broker for Polish state-owned companies. In 1981, he allegedly cooperated with ‘Metalexport’ and Central Engineering Board (Centralny Zarząd Inżynierii, Cenzin) – a state-owned company responsible for arms trade.22 During the 1970s and 1980s, Poland, just like other communist countries, was exporting large quantities of weapons to the so-called Third World. Most of the contracts dealing with military hardware were signed through brokers. They acted on behalf of various African and Middle Eastern regimes and earned a lot of money on commissions. Najmeddin was one of the best middlemen operating in Poland and over many years he gained a reputation as a trusted, highly effective and wellconnected broker. Declassified Polish documents indicate that as early as 1981 he maintained strong ties with Cenzin employees, who talked about him with awe.23 When on 1 August 1981 Mohammad Daoud Oudeh, also known as Abu Daoud, was shot six times in the Warsaw Victoria Hotel, Polish security services started to investigate every foreigner of Arab origin who was then present in the country. They managed to find connections between Najmeddin and the wounded PLO terrorist. Because it turned out that the latter had called the Iraqi businessman several hours before the shooting, Polish security services suspected Najmeddin had something to do with the incident. The attack at the Victoria Hotel sparked international interest in Polish links to international terrorism because pictures of the wounded Abu Daoud were showcased in every reputable news outlet. The Palestinian had many enemies, so the Polish law enforcement agencies analysed various motives and premises for the assassination attempt. Investigators perceived the shooting as Mossad’s revenge for the massacre of Israeli athletes during the 1972 Munich Olympics, considering that Abu Daoud had been one of the deadly plot’s organizers. According to another theory, considered within PLO circles, it was ANO who stood behind the attack.24 Polish services were, however, hazy about factional differences within the Palestinian movement. Somehow, they managed to identify Najmeddin as a suspect who might know something about the shooting. He was questioned but refused to admit any knowledge of the incident. However, his testimony seemed to be inconsequential and evidence linking him to the presumed assassin turned out to be so convincing that Polish services put him under surveillance. From 11 to 14 September 1981 all his moves in Warsaw were followed by undercover functionaries, who monitored his contacts. The stakeout revealed that the Iraqi was a very close acquaintance of Andrzej Urbaniak, a Polish army officer employed at the Ministry of Defense (Ministerstwo Obrony Narodowej, MON). Most probably Urbaniak was a Cenzin employee at that time, because according to the company’s records, he was in charge of signing and monitoring contracts to sell military hardware to the PLO. Moreover, Urbaniak maintained contacts with Zaki al-Hashimi, the first secretary of the Iraqi Embassy.



5. Polish Military Intelligence and Its Secret Relationship with ANO

91

This contact is significant for this analysis because Baghdad treated ANO as its proxy at the time.25 According to Abu Daoud’s testimony shared with Seale, Polish services arrested an alleged perpetrator of the shooting. The next day, however, the man was released because the Zibado company owned by ANO paid a US$200,000 bribe to some high-ranking officers from the Ministry of Internal Affairs.26 It was Najmeddin who was then representing the Zibado company in Warsaw, and it is highly possible that he pulled strings to veer the investigation into a dead end. Thorough analysis of more than 1,630 pages of investigation files allows us to raise the supposition that the investigation was staged and that the Polish authorities desisted from arresting the real perpetrator of the Victoria shooting.27 Moreover, it seems that security services deliberately nixed the links tying Najmeddin with the alleged assailant. One of the secret informants working for the Polish counterintelligence mentioned that the Iraqi was a bigwig ‘under special protection’ of the Komenda Stołeczna Milicji Obywatelskiej Passport Bureau, which meant, for a foreigner in communist Poland, that he was simply ‘untouchable’.28 According to Tadeusz Koperwas, a military intelligence officer working undercover as a Cenzin employee, Najmeddin was among the most significant private brokers (together with Monzer al-Kassar) for the Polish military complex, covering an Iraqi market then perceived by Polish authorities as a gold mine.29 In June 1981 Ibrahim Barzan al-Tikriti, the brother of Iraqi president Saddam Hussein, chief of the infamous Mukhabarat and a member of the country's top political leadership, arrived in Warsaw with his visible retinue. He held talks with the country’s top decision-makers on economic matters: Deputy Prime Minister Mieczysław Jagielski, Minister of Foreign Trade and Maritime Affairs Ryszard Karski, Deputy Minister Władysław Gwiazda, General Tadeusz Hupałowski and General Jerzy Modrzewski. The Iraqi special guest was also received by Prime Minister General Wojciech Jaruzelski, and his reception served as a cordial manifestation of the importance of the Polish relations with Iraq. The concrete outcome of the discussions featured an agreement to provide Iraq with military equipment, arms and ammunition worth around US$100 million. In return, Hussein’s envoy promised to increase Iraqi deposits stored at Bank Handlowy by US$100 million, a favour to a moribund centralized economy that desperately needed foreign currency.30 After Barzan al-Tikriti had signed the documents and left Warsaw, the technical details of the contract were still negotiated and it was Samir Najmeddin who supervised the execution of the arms deal on behalf of Iraq.31 The scenario was repeated during other visits from Iraqi officials, who were empowered to sign contracts on arms deliveries. In that way Najmeddin acted as a Baghdad representative residing permanently in Warsaw to supervise deals with Cenzin. The due commissions he earned were, however, transferred to ANO accounts, enabling terrorists to clean their money behind the Iron Curtain. In January 1982 the front company S.A.S. was registered in Panama with a capital of US$10,000. Jürgen Mossack, co-owner of the Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca & Co. was responsible for securing the necessary permission, for the paperwork and for representing S.A.S.’s interests. His dubious financial operations

92

Terrorism in the Cold War

were exposed in the Panama Papers affair, which blasted the international community in 2016.32 The S.A.S. brand derived from the first letters of the names of three ANO members: Samir Najmeddin, Adnan al-Kaylani and Shakir Farhan.33 The company’s branches were spread all over the world. The London office was registered in the UK registry in November 1982 and was led by Adnan Ibrahim Abdulhamid Banna, while Najmeddin and Farhan acted as directors.34 The branch in East Berlin was functioning under the cover of Zibado Co. for Trade and Consulting Ltd. and cooperated closely with the Imes Import-Export GmbH. Imes was an East German state company subordinated to the Ministry of Foreign Trade, supervised by the ubiquitous MfS, commonly known as Stasi, and involved in secret arms trade.35 In the second half of 1983, Najmeddin started preparing arrangements to establish the S.A.S. branch in Poland. He sent an official letter to Dom HandlowoAgenturowy (DHA) ‘M. Czarnecki’ – a Warsaw-based, licensed company responsible for representing foreign investors and businessmen: I intend to export Polish goods to Arab markets and to import goods to Poland […] and to invest an Arab capital in Poland. My trade cooperation with Poland started in 1970 and so far has been limited to contracts only with the Central Engineering Board.36

Najmeddin was seeking assistance to launch his company. He explained that he was going to hire two citizens from Arabic countries, two Polish citizens as well as a female secretary. He asked about the possibility of renting office space in the Intraco skyscraper and wanted to know whether phone and fax installations were available. To assure Poles about his credibility, he transferred US$30,000 to DHA M. Czarnecki’s bank account on 13 October 1983. Najmeddin was not alone in the preparations leading to the establishment of S.A.S. He could count on the support of Andrzej Urbaniak.37 Opening a company owned by Abu Nidal’s terrorists could not go unnoticed in a communist country like Poland, where foreign investors were under strict surveillance. Therefore, Najmeddin had obtained the secret approval from the government’s inner circle. The special agency agreement with DHA M. Czarnecki signed by Najmeddin may serve as ample evidence of the legalization of the activities of Abu Nidal’s financial wing on Polish territory.38 The company was officially opened in November 1983. One of the Polish citizens who was assigned to work at S.A.S. was Andrzej Marchewka, a graduate from the Main School of Planning and Statistics and a member of the Polish United Workers’ Party, who had previously worked for the Polish–Austrian enterprise Ostrana based in Vienna, where he had been involved in arms trade. Ostrana was used by Polish intelligence as a tool to breach COCOM39 regulations. It is highly possible that Marchewka met many brokers and dealers in Austria, connections that might have been useful while he was working for S.A.S. Moreover, Marchewka was an asset of Polish military intelligence, which had recruited him as a source of information, codenamed ‘Polityk’ (‘Politician’). It seems that working for ANO guaranteed generous pay. Monthly salaries at S.A.S. amounted to US$600, which



5. Polish Military Intelligence and Its Secret Relationship with ANO

93

allowed for a very comfortable lifestyle in communist Poland, where the average salary was limited to US$25 to US$30 USD at the time. Marchewka was a very valuable asset, because from 1983 to 1987 he regularly provided information to military intelligence about activities conducted by S.A.S.40. Moreover, his name appears in other declassified documents proving his close ties with ANO operatives. Most if not all luxury hotels in Warsaw for foreigners were under constant surveillance. Many cloakroom attendants, waiters, maidservants and taxi drivers were on the security services’ payroll and provided information on foreign guests from Western or Middle Eastern countries. Hotel Solec was also under surveillance, by a special branch of the civilian services known as ‘B’ office, which was specialized in ground surveillance. Skilled officials used to routinely follow foreign journalists and diplomats, and tracked every car arriving in the facility’s perimeter. On 19 October 1984 they noticed that Andrzej Marchewka met at the hotel lobby with Adnan al-Banna, a Jordanian-born ‘tourist’ who stayed at Solec for three days. The civilian services were not privy to the details of the army’s links with ANO’s commercial wing nor to the true identity of Abu Nidal’s relative and passed the information to military intelligence. A handwritten comment on the report indicated that Marchewka was working for the Panamanian company S.A.S. and that his meeting with al-Banna resulted from trade contacts.41 Marchewka’s reports to military intelligence allow us to reconstruct the secret network of Abu Nidal companies in various countries. According to his handwritten note from 1987, the first year of S.A.S.’s trade activities boiled down to efforts at establishing cooperation with firms belonging to ANO’s ‘financial group’ such as Zibado in East Germany, Zibado in Syria, al-Noor in Greece, al-Reem in Cyprus and the International Marketing Corporation (IMC) in Kuwait. The primary aim of building contacts and signing preliminary agreements with those companies was to find a way to export Polish goods to Middle Eastern markets with hefty profits. The idea was comprehensible but Marchewka suggested that his supervisors, especially Samir Najmeddin, were not really interested in dealing with ‘civilian’ goods and always found a good excuse to breach the potential contract. Marchewka took a dim view of his bosses at the S.A.S. umbrella organization, underlining that Mousa Rashid from the Kuwaiti IMC did not have any valuable experience nor the natural skills for conducting effective business. The S.A.S. exported silver Islamic prayer beads to Kuwait and blankets to Lebanon, but these were only minor contracts that did not generate much revenue. He also mentioned two trips to Iran made with his bosses that failed financially. In late 1986 the Zibado company in East Berlin was shut down. The next year the S.A.S. offices in Greece and Syria met the same fate. However, in 1986 a new branch was established in Tripoli, clearly indicating the shift from Syria to Gaddafi’s Libya in the state sponsorship of ANO’s terrorist activity. Marchewka also underscored that S.A.S. established contacts with small Swiss companies selling sophisticated electronics like TIG and Leer and collaborated with the Intermador company from Zurich.42

94

Terrorism in the Cold War

Marchewka by no means mentioned in his reports the ties between S.A.S. and Intermador, but according to recently declassified CIA documents, both companies belonged to a chain of ANO front enterprises. The Swiss branch of S.A.S. was established in 1985 and was operated by two equal directors: Andrzej Urbaniak and Ibrahim al-Abid.43 The first one was closely connected to the Central Engineering Board and probably with the Polish military services. Thus, his assignment to Zurich was supervised from Warsaw. According to his passport files, in April 1985 he was affiliated with the DHA M. Czarnecki company, which delegated him to Intermador AG to assume the post of a director.44 In April 1989 Urbaniak apparently registered the sister company Intermador in Cyprus, but the office in Zurich still worked and was closed only in September 1991.45 Based on passport files, it seems that Urbaniak’s official permission to work at Intermador on behalf of Czarnecki terminated in May 1989. It is possible, that, facing the irrevocable return to Poland, he wanted to hedge his bets and decided to continue working for Intermador on his own terms and without attending to his mother company DHA M. Czarnecki. Maybe the tender from ANO operatives was so tantalizing that he opted to violate the Polish regulations, thus avoiding being recalled. The last file within his passport dates from January 1990 and indicates he exceeded his contract illegally, without permission from Polish authorities. It was stated that his whereabouts were undisclosed. Moreover, he owed a huge debt of 20,000 Swiss francs to Polservice, a state-run company responsible for sending Polish contract workers abroad, but the details of his arrears are unclear.46 Nevertheless, at least until 1992 Urbaniak was believed to maintain particular relations with ANO as a broker working in Cyprus and linked with Polish military services.47 Despite thorough research on Intermador within Polish archives, the company still remains a mystery and its links to Polish intelligence services are not yet fully exposed. The Intermador documents in the Commercial Registry of the state of Zurich (Switzerland) were destroyed in 2001 in a rather uncanny way.48 The S.A.S. company prospered under Najmeddin’s management, earning a fortune on export–import broadly understood, real estate investments and weapons trade.49 In the early 1980s, S.A.S. signed several contracts with Cenzin, which at the time acted as a broker for the Soviet Union in terms of arms deliveries. Authorities in Moscow kept a low profile and did not want to present themselves as a primary and overt supplier of military hardware for Saddam Hussein. They chose Cenzin as a convenient middleman and Polish companies were used to transfer Sovietmade weapons to Iraq.50 The ANO terrorists made the biggest profits during the Iran–Iraq War, when they sold weapons to both sides. At that time, ANO’s assets increased rapidly from US$120 million in the early 1980s to around US$400 million in 1988.51 The money was deposited in Swiss, Austrian and Spanish banks in special slush funds. Until a certain time, the organization’s leadership also used the services of the London Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI), where Najmeddin had opened an account in 1981. As Mark Hosenball described in The Washington Post, some of the minutes of a BCCI board of directors meeting indicated that before 10 July 1986, Najmeddin, then representing the Warsawbased S.A.S., received a loan. This in itself would not be something unusual, but



5. Polish Military Intelligence and Its Secret Relationship with ANO

95

the BCCI board used to approve loans only over US$10 million. Other leaked BCCI financial documents show Najmeddin receiving US$9.6 million in credit until 1984.52 These numbers demonstrate that ANO’s financial branch earned so much ‘dirty’ money on arms trade that it had difficulties legalizing all the profits. S.A.S. and two other companies also signed a contract with Cenzin through the Polish Bank of Commerce (Bank Handlowy) for the sale of weapons and arms factories to Syria for a total sum of about US$2 billion. The three companies together were to receive a commission of 10 per cent on the agreement. The weapons bought under this 1986 contract were worth US$211 million.53 According to Abu Daoud’s testimonies, certain Polish generals earned ‘millions of dollars’ on the profitable business with Abu Nidal.54 Perhaps this also resulted from the character of the mutual relations, as Cenzin employees had very close relationships with Najmeddin. Rollicking parties in his spacious villa in Anin, part of a Warsaw suburb, were frequently attended by representatives of the Ministry of Foreign Trade. More intriguing, practically all Cenzin employees knew him. One of the flamboyant banquets organized by Najmeddin was even attended by Colonel Alfred Majewski, a deputy director of a company selling Polish weapons. Najmeddin was suave, gallant and knew how to take care of his Polish partners. He flaunted his money and rumours about his connections deep inside the governmental structure were legendary. In this way he earned adulation among Cenzin employees and, in return, was capable of negotiating better prices for his tenders. Secret collaborator ‘Dzik’ (Boar), who signed three contracts with Najmeddin during 1985−6 for the sale of weapons, characterized him as the ‘nicest’ contracting partner he had ever met. The testimonies found in the documents indicate that he would bribe his Polish partners. He always offered them some small gifts such as pens or bottles of Western alcohol.55 But it is possible that bribe money was also passed under the table. It was not just hefty commissions that linked Polish intelligence services with members of the Abu Nidal Organization (ANO). The mutual bond was more deeply and profoundly forged, beyond viable deals. Back then, the illegal arms market constituted a world of shifting sands and even established salesmen had to be very careful when arranging a clandestine agreement with communist security services. However, ANO with its main financial head Najmeddin was used not only as a broker for Polish and Soviet-made weaponry but also as a tacit and trusted provider of embargoed goods, such as the newest Western electronic devices, as well as a source of information about the current political situation in the Middle East. Marchewka underlined that during his work at S.A.S. he was able to acquire Edda submachine guns made in Argentina, special ammunition for use in airplanes, and sophisticated planting devices.56 It is noteworthy that several Polish military intelligence officers maintained constant contact with Najmeddin and his collaborators. Consequently, they were aware of Abu Nidal’s visits to Poland.57 They did nothing to prevent his presence on Polish soil. Moreover, they often misinformed their civilian counterparts about the true character of S.A.S.’s activity. The terrorist company was perceived by military intelligence as a very useful instrument to earn money and collect information.

96

Terrorism in the Cold War

Embargoed goods for scholarships: The ANO–Polish secret agreement From the mid-1980s onwards the American spy agencies were aware of the close relationship between Polish military intelligence services and the ANO.58 Based on declassified CIA reports, one can state that their knowledge was accurate and very detailed. In 1987, an estimate entitled The Abu Nidal Terror Network prepared by an anonymous author of the Counterterrorism Center (CTC) drew attention to the Warsaw-based company: SAS was established in 1983 and has been and may still be headquartered in Warsaw. […] SAS has described itself as an international organization involved in general trading, marketing, investments and construction. Since the early 1980s however, Najmeddin and other SAS company representatives have negotiated a number of deals to provide embargoed arms to Iran, Iraq, and Zimbabwe. Najmeddin is the director and general manager of SAS, the most profitable ANO company, and has maintained offices in the Intraco building. […] ANO relations with individual governments are beneficial to both sides. The ANO obtains bases for commercial activities, propaganda, and recruitment; access to weapons and training; and entrée into Western Europe for operations. Depending on the nature of their arrangements with the ANO, the East European governments obtain hard currency, access to embargoed weapons, and/or guarantees against ANO terrorist activities on their soil. A salient feature of the commercial network has been its intricate relationship with Poland and East Germany. ANO commercial organizations in Warsaw (SAS Foreign Trade and Investment) and in East Berlin (Zibado) have been staffed not only by ANO commercial representatives, but also by Polish and East German nationals who act as brokers between government export companies and foreign buyers. They have dealt heavily but not exclusively in arms trading in the Middle East and Africa. The SAS company in Warsaw has served as the hub of much of this activity.59

According to US reports, S.A.S. worked closely with Cenzin to broker arms transfers for the Polish authorities and Andrzej Marchewka acted as the chief contact for ANO’s commercial activities. His connection with communist security services did not go unnoticed. He was believed to be a ‘Polish Intelligence official’ and the ease with which he expedited visas and customs clearances for ANO travellers to Warsaw suggested close ties to the Polish security apparatus. US spy agencies even pinpointed the precise amount of his salaries paid by S.A.S., which totalled up to US$600 monthly, but US$500 allegedly went to the authorities and the remaining US$100 were transferred to Marchewka’s personal account.60 Other intelligence gleaned by the CIA post in Warsaw also proved the broad coverage of ANO activities on Polish soil: After his expulsion from Iraq in 1983, Sabri Al-Banna went to Poland. He may have resided in Poland from late 1983 until early 1985 and continued to maintain



5. Polish Military Intelligence and Its Secret Relationship with ANO

97

a residence in Warsaw afterward. The ANO holds general business meetings in Warsaw; Sabri Al-Banna presided over two such meetings in 1983 and 1984. In December 1983, meetings were held at the Solec Hotel and the Novotel Hotel near Warsaw’s airport. In September 1984 the meetings again were held at the Novotel Hotel. In June 1987, several officials from ANO companies in Europe traveled to Warsaw evidently for consultations with Najmeddin.61

The aforementioned quote suggests the high accuracy of information collected by CIA operatives, who might have had an insider within ANO’s inner circle or were able to acquire intel from the PLO security circles. According to the CIA, the undoubtedly deep relations between Polish intelligence services and the ANO encompassed various dimensions: The ANO’s ties to Poland date to at least 1979. Sabri Al-Banna and the Polish government entered an agreement whereby the ANO pledged not to undertake terrorist activities on Polish soil or against Polish interests in return for freedom to conduct ANO propaganda activities in Poland and for scholarships for ANO members. A senior official of the Polish Ministry of Education met the first group of ANO students at the Warsaw airport. The ANO has continued sending students to Poland each year and has maintained a liaison officer in Warsaw.62

Confronted with the CIA files, Polish records, indeed, demonstrate the undeniable presence of ANO ‘students’, who received special scholarships and particular treatment. For example, in October 1983 four ‘students’ belonging to ANO (Adel Hadid Doud, Halel Assad Suleiman, Ahmad Abbas Masri and Najua Kalil Kobroshy) arrived in Warsaw and then went to Łódź, where the School of Polish for Foreigners at the University of Łódź was located. According to civilian intelligence accounts, the fees for their scholarship, amounting to US$11,000, were paid in advance by someone called ‘Auni’, who was reportedly linked with ANO’s network.63 Polish counterintelligence services were familiar with the arrival of ‘students’ and searched their belongings when they appeared at the airport. Customs officers copied their passports and visa photographs, and intercepted several political brochures written in Arabic.64 Moreover, civilian services tried to monitor all their activities. Since their arrival, a secret informant codenamed ‘Marek’ – allegedly of Arabic origin – approached and befriended them and took them in his car to Łódź. He was also tasked by his supervisors from the Ministry of Internal Affairs to collect more intelligence on their behaviour and the connections the suspect group might forge.65 As soon as they showed up in Łódź and rented rooms in a local hotel, a special branch of counterintelligence bugged their phones and installed wiretapping devices. Postal interception was implemented as well. Secret collaborators among foreign students of Arabic origin belonged to a network overseen by security services and were also notified about their arrival and tasked to control the moves of the ANO members.66 The surveillance proved that the suspected terrorists held meetings in public spaces at different times during the day, for example, in Łódź City Zoo and at the train

98

Terrorism in the Cold War

station’s restaurant.67 Recognized ANO members in Poland and other countries contacted each other through coded messages sent via mail.68 Amer Taleb was believed by Polish counterintelligence to be one of the top ANO lieutenants responsible for overseeing ‘students’ linked with the organization. He came to Poland in 1979 as a first secretary of the PLO mission and quickly presented his harsh views on social and political conditions within his country of residence. During a meeting with Palestinian scholars he once claimed that ‘right now he understands Hitler’s idea of total extermination of Jews and Poles’. In July 1984 Taleb took part in a bar fight with a local taxi driver at the Warsaw Novotel hotel. He attacked the latter with a meat cleaver, nearly killing his victim. As a recognized diplomat, he did not face arrest or deportation. But surprisingly, the PLO office wanted to get rid of him from Warsaw. The reason was not related to his frantic and abject behaviour but was more of a political nature. According to PLO accounts, Taleb was a hidden ANO supporter, who collected intelligence on people loyal to Arafat. That is why in October 1984 PLO officials from the Warsaw station met with the representatives of the Polish Ministry of Internal Affairs and asked for support in conducting Taleb’s deportation. They wanted the PLO operative to be arrested and rapidly expelled from the country. The idea was rejected by the Poles because they did not want to interfere in factional quarrels within the PLO wings. Moreover, they feared Taleb might be armed, so the attempt to capture him on the street might have spiralled into an exchange of gunfire. Finally, the boisterous ANO member was tracked down and captured by a highly trained special group of the PLO security branch, who took him into custody, probably in one of the PLO safehouses. However, when the car with the detained Palestinian approached Okęcie airport, there were around fifty ‘students’ – supporters of ANO – waiting to foil the deportation. The first attempt to send him away failed, because no one knew how the agitated ‘students’ would react. They might have posed a threat to the PLO diplomats, and the Poles wanted to avoid an international commotion at an airport crowded with foreigners. An unintended incident might have brought calamitous effects and led to bloodshed. Other measures had to be taken. Authorities summoned a special branch of Citizens Militia specialized in quelling riots as well as officials of the Government Protection Bureau. With a demonstration of such manpower, the second attempt succeeded and Taleb was effectively sent to Tunis, where he was supposed to meet with Arafat.69 The incident demonstrated the scope of influence ANO had over ‘students’ from the Middle East and North Africa staying in Poland at the time. Identified members of the terrorist network were under surveillance and counterintelligence services gleaned information about their activities, but did not engage in any attempts to remove suspected individuals from Polish soil. ANO supporters among the students’ community were to some extent controlled by the state apparatus, but at the same time the authorities within the Ministry of Internal Affairs allowed them to pursue politically motivated actions. Moreover, there was, indeed, a secret agreement between military intelligence and ANO. According to a secret collaborator codenamed ‘Ino’, who reportedly saw the respective document, Polish services allowed ANO to operate freely and establish business enterprises



5. Polish Military Intelligence and Its Secret Relationship with ANO

99

in exchange for intelligence information. Accordingly, thanks to their ANO connections, Polish military services might have sold huge amounts of weapons after the outbreak of the Iran–Iraq and Libya–Chad wars.70

US pressure on Poland to break ties with ANO Since the second half of 1986, Polish intelligence services started to receive information frequently from various sources alluding to ANO’s strong and active presence within Polish territory. In September of that year, the incumbent Italian prime minister Bettino Craxi informed Polish diplomats that he possessed credible intelligence on Abu Nidal’s arrival to Poland.71 The same month the subject of ANO activities in Warsaw was raised by the French prime minister Jacques Chirac during a discussion with the Soviet ambassador.72 In October 1986, Abu Iyad, a leading PLO official, voiced his concerns on ANO’s presence in Poland.73 The next month, another startling message hit the civilian intelligence headquarters. According to Hungarian sources familiar with the matter, ANO’s main bases were located in three particular countries. The political centre was established in Damascus, the operational base responsible for conducting terrorist operations abroad was set up in Tripoli, and the commercial headquarter operated in Warsaw under the guise of the S.A.S. company led by Samir Najmeddin.74 Moreover, in November 1986 the director of the US State Department’s Office for Combating Terrorism, Robert Oakley, informed a Polish journalist, who was thought to have direct access to Warsaw’s governmental circles, that US officials were in possession of tangible proof that ANO operated freely in Poland.75 Independent of this information, counterintelligence sources received unconfirmed information on Sabri al-Banna’s reported arrival in Poland for medical treatment.76 The noose around Najmeddin’s neck seemed to be tightening and those clear-cut examples might have served as glancing references pointed at the Polish government that Western countries were aware of Warsaw’s cooperation with terrorists. However, the generals ruling the country disregarded the warnings and spokesman Jerzy Urban glibly denied the accusations that emerged in several Western news outlets as baseless, preposterous and hare-brained.77 Since such ‘soft’ pressure did not yield any results and ANO members could still operate easily in Poland with backup from military intelligence, the US government decided to use official diplomatic channels in order to break the Polish ties with Banna’s group. In May 1987, the US chargé d’affaires ad interim in Warsaw, David Schwartz, followed instructions sent from Washington and visited the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. There he handed over a démarche on Abu Nidal’s presence in Poland. Before addressing the crux of the matter, he recognized ANO as one of ‘the most dangerous terrorist organizations currently active on a worldwide scale’, which through notorious criminal attacks had recently harmed Western, Israeli and Palestinian targets. He underlined previous assurances from Polish diplomats that Warsaw had nothing to do with Abu Nidal and that he had never visited the country. Schwartz pointed out that the US government, in spite of these claims,

100

Terrorism in the Cold War

was aware of ANO’s continued activity on Polish soil, which was permitted with the ‘full knowledge’ of authorities in Warsaw. According to the démarche, ANO’s commercial activity was conducted under the tutelage of Polish services and S.A.S. was used as a broker to illegally ship military hardware abroad. The US envoy aptly described Andrzej Marchewka as a key Polish associate within S.A.S. responsible for issuing visas for ANO bedfellows visiting the company. Schwartz concluded that the Polish government had ignored previously raised US concerns on state sponsorship of terrorism and that he was taking this opportunity to warn Warsaw that if cooperation with ANO continued, details of Polish ties with these terrorists would be published as a part of a ‘white paper’ on Abu Nidal.78 Officials in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs were deeply perturbed, but their knowledge of the close behind-the-scenes relationship between ANO and military services was limited and beyond their reach. Even the director of the civilian counterintelligence service, General Janusz Sereda, admitted that US accusations had, to some extent, credibility, because S.A.S., indeed, operated in Poland, rented office space in the Intraco building and cooperated with Cenzin. Nevertheless, he perceived the US démarche ideologically, as another step undertaken by Washington to undermine the Polish government on the international arena.79 Marian Orzechowski, the minister of foreign affairs, noted that taking into account the delicate nature of the S.A.S. relationship with Cenzin, a full and adequate response to the US démarche was impossible. He thus suggested a vehement denial of any links between Warsaw and international terrorism.80 Such an approach obviously did not meet Washington’s expectations and in May, June and July 1987, Schwartz was a frequent visitor at the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, systematically exerting pressure on Polish officials to backtrack on the collaboration with ANO.81 On 13 July 1987, General Sereda prepared a classified memo on S.A.S., which reached top officials within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. According to the assessment, the ANO-linked enterprise had a licence to import and export agricultural machineries and its annual income was around US$10 million, which is why the DHA M. Czarnecki used to earn approximately US$250,000 yearly on commissions. Accordingly, Sereda concluded that S.A.S. was actually a small company and might be shut down without a strong effect on the Polish economy.82 However, his report missed the ‘special’ deliveries, namely S.A.S.’s involvement in arms trade with Cenzin, where the turnover was much bigger than in the ‘civilian’ area. Surprisingly, all documents related to the company’s activity were taken to the office of the minister of foreign trade on his direct order and counterintelligence services encountered difficulties in getting access to them. Moreover, it turned out that Polish employees of S.A.S. were under the protection of military services. This meant that ‘civilians’ from the Ministry of the Interior were reluctant to question them about the circumstances of the arms business.83 Finally, due to unrelenting US pressure, S.A.S. was disbanded on 3 August 1987 by the Ministry of Foreign Trade. In the beginning of November 1987, all employees were fired, and the company moved out from the Intraco offices. However, this decision did not mean ANO was breaking its relationship with



5. Polish Military Intelligence and Its Secret Relationship with ANO

101

Polish governmental actors. Military services were still interested in keeping Najmeddin within the country, because he had some unfinished business with Cenzin. He was under blatant CIA surveillance. Therefore, the American Embassy knew he still represented ANO interests, as if nothing had happened. When US Vice President George H. W. Bush visited Poland in September 1987, he raised the question of ANO bases on Polish soil and was assured that such ties had already been severed.84 Still, CIA intelligence stood in stark contrast to those claims. Schwartz had to intervene once more and in November 1987, he presented another US démarche, emphasizing with consternation the terrorists’ presence in Poland. He knew that communist officials conducted a two-pronged approach. At first glance, Warsaw had followed Washington’s remarks and dissolved the suspected ANO enterprise. In reality, this was only a smokescreen. While the company was, indeed, begrudgingly shut down, Najmeddin still acted as a broker for Cenzin, only this time pretending to be a Libyan salesman.85 The closure of S.A.S., accordingly, did not mean that Abu Nidal’s men were thrown out of Poland. Abu Nidal appeared in the persona non grata index only in 1987, which could not have been a coincidence. Some suspected terrorists remained in Poland and were still involved in arms deals with Cenzin. On 15 December 1987, President Bush wrote a special letter to General Jaruzelski warning him that further diplomatic wrangling resulting from Najmeddin’s continuous presence in Poland might implicate full disclosure of these facts by the US government, restrict cooperation on different fields and have deleterious effects on mutual relations.86 However, Bush’s statement still did not effect a fundamental change in Warsaw’s approach towards ANO members. Polish authorities tried to soften the Americans’ stance by issuing placating announcements and painting different narratives of S.A.S.’s deals, sometimes casting blame on unfounded rumours and feigning ignorance, but ANO’s activity was always a moot point during the Polish–American deliberations in the late 1980s. Najmeddin was apparently in Poland until as late as November 1989. It’s still unclear how much clout he had then with the military services and how deeply he was enmeshed in collaboration with the Polish army, but his name was listed among foreigners allowed to drive governmental (Cenzin) cars. At the beginning of 1990, members of ANO dissolved their bases in the GDR and Czechoslovakia. According to intelligence reports, they might have moved some of their activity to the newly established, independent Poland.87 But the files from this period are still classified.

Conclusion Through the late 1970s and 1980s, Polish military intelligence closely cooperated with companies owned by international terrorists from the ANO to sell Polish arms abroad. Thanks to a long-standing ‘alliance’ enhanced by a secret agreement, many ANO terrorists found shelter in Poland and regarded the country as a safe haven, where money laundering was possible without the security apparatus posing any troubles. Polish authorities were satisfied, because they could sell

102

Terrorism in the Cold War

weapons to Middle Eastern regimes and earn significant financial payoffs due to the ANO brokerage. They also used the circumstances to obtain embargoed goods and intelligence information. Terrorists from the ANO network were also satisfied because the company’s profits were used to keep their secret ring in operation. Some amounts of money were siphoned off and ANO militants could hide behind a bureaucratic machine, with the support of military intelligence. The simple truth is that in these dirty relations ideology did not play a crucial role. Marxism– Leninism was supplanted by a desire from both sides to gain huge financial benefits. Although cooperation with the ANO was suspended in the early 1990s, military intelligence continued to collaborate with other arms brokers linked with terrorist organizations, such as Monzer al-Kassar, until 2002. This is another argument in support of the thesis that money played the most vital role in Polish ties with international terrorism. Endorsing this thesis still leaves another question open: Could the Polish People’s Republic be perceived as a state that sponsored international terrorism? Applying Daniel Byman’s categorization of state sponsors of terrorism (strong supporters, weak supporters, lukewarm supporters, antagonistic supporters, passive supporters and unwilling hosts), one can see that the case of the close relationship between ANO and Polish state actors does not fit into the described methodological framework.88 Military intelligence not only turned a blind eye on terrorists’ presence in the country but also cooperated with them, especially with Najmeddin’s clique, on the business field. Companies such as S.A.S. in Warsaw and Intermador in Zurich, established as joint ventures between Polish military intelligence and ANO members, may serve as vivid examples of such deep collaboration. Accordingly, the Polish approach seems to fall somewhere between passive and lukewarm support. However, such a classification would miss several factors. Military intelligence controlled Cenzin and thus the arms business, and the weapons trade constituted the main sphere of cooperation between Polish intelligence services and ANO members. Ideology did not play any role in such contacts and the Polish government did not support any of the terrorist attacks conducted by Abu Nidal’s men. Bombing targets abroad, especially in the West and in Israel, never served Polish political goals. Moreover, based on declassified documents, it is still hard to estimate whether military intelligence and Cenzin employees were fully aware of S.A.S.’s criminal and terrorist nature. They might have just feigned ignorance, as long as military equipment could be shipped, and a pipeline of tainted money or embargoed goods was available for Polish authorities. Nevertheless, such an approach does not exclude communist Poland from the countries that supported terrorism and further declassification of Cold War-era documents may shed more light on the subject.

Notes 1 Archiwum Akt Nowych [Archive of Modern Records, hereafter, AAN], Prokuratura Generalna, sygn. 3/421, Pismo prokuratora Prokuratury Generalnej Andrzeja



5. Polish Military Intelligence and Its Secret Relationship with ANO

103

Krajewskiego do sędziego śledczego Jean-Louis Bruguière, Warszawa, VII 1983, pp. 92–3. 2 Patrick Seale, Abu Nidal: A Gun for Hire (New York: Random House, 1992), 107. 3 Yossi Melman, The Master Terrorist: The True Story of Abu-Nidal (New York: Adama Books, 1986), 115. 4 Archiwum Instytutu Pamięci Narodowej [Archive of the Institute of National Remembrance, hereafter: AIPN], 0449/26, vol. 28, Informacja Departamentu I MSW dot. wykorzystania broni polskiej produkcji do celów terrorystycznych [X 1988], p. 206. 5 Katarzyna Ostrowska and Mariusz Żuławnik, Niszczenie kartotek Biura ‘C’ MSW w latach 1989–1990, Przegląd Archiwalny Instytutu Pamięci Narodowej 4 (2011), 235–50. 6 Daniela Richterova, The Anxious Host: Czechoslovakia and Carlos the Jackal 1978–1986, The International History Review 40/1 (2018), 108–32. 7 Christopher Andrew and Wasilij Mitrochin, Archiwum Mitrochina II: KGB i świat (Poznań: Rebis, 2014), 280–2. 8 Liviu Tofan, Șacalul Securității: teroristul Carlos în solda spionajului românesc (Bucarest: Polirom, 2013). 9 Przemysław Gasztold-Seń, Der Sicherheitsapparat der Volksrepublik Polen und die Rote Armee Fraktion, Inter Finitimos: Jahrbuch zur deutsch-polnischen Beziehungsgeschichte 9 (2011), 144–54. 10 Przemysław Gasztold-Seń, Between Geopolitics and National Security: Polish Intelligence and International Terrorism during the Cold War, in Wladyslaw Bułhak and Thomas Wegener Friis (eds.), Need to Know: Eastern and Western Perspectives (Odense: University Press of Southern Denmark, 2014), 138–48. 11 Notatka z rozmów z delegacją Kierownictwa OWP, Warszawa, 16 VII 1983 (copy in author’s possession). 12 AIPN, 01228/2992/CD, Notatka z informacji tajnego współpracownika ps. ‘Toni’, Warszawa, 11 X 1986, pp. 936–7. 13 For more on the relations between Polish and Palestinian services, see Przemysław Gasztold, Zabójcze układy: Służby PRL i międzynarodowy terroryzm (Warszawa: Wydawnictwo PWN, 2017), 19–64. 14 Maciej Szalaty, Współczesne organizacje terrorystyczne, in Violetta KwiatkowskaDarul (ed.), Terroryzm: Materiały z sesji naukowej Toruń 11 kwietnia 2002 roku (Toruń: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Uniwersytetu Mikolaja Kopernika, 2002), 80. 15 Seale, Abu Nidal, 119. 16 AIPN, 514/15 vol. 2, Sprawozdanie z kontroli działalności Banku Handlowego for the Middle East S.A.L. w Bejrucie, Warszawa, 15 V 1981, pp. 7, 20, 40. 17 Archiwum Ministerstwa Spraw Zagranicznych, [Archive of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, hereafter, AMSZ], Departament V, 26/86, w-2, 242-1-82, Raport Andrzeja Biera, b. II sekretarza Ambasady PRL w Bejrucie, z pobytu na placówce w Bejrucie w okresie od 7 XI 1981 r. do 2 IV 1982 r., 28 IV 1982, no pagination. 18 AIPN, 01228/2992/CD, Pismo dyrektora Departamentu I MSW gen. Zdzisława Sarewicza do dyrektora Departamentu II MSW płk. Janusza Seredy, Warszawa, 12 I 1987, pp. 189–90. 19 Seale, Abu Nidal, 119. 20 AIPN, 01228/2992/CD, Notatka ze spotkania z Dawoodem odbytego w dniu 20 kwietnia 1983 roku, Warszawa, 21 IV 1983, p. 1024; Ibid., Szyfrogram, Warszawa, 5 X 1983, p. 118.

104

Terrorism in the Cold War

21 Ibid., Szyfrogram, 21 IV 1983, p. 67; Ibid., Notatka służbowa, 20 IV 1983, p. 65; Ibid., Szyfrogram, 21 IV 1983, p. 66. 22 AIPN, 0582/97, vol. 1, Protokół przesłuchania świadka, Warszawa, 5 VIII 1981, p. 145. 23 Gasztold, Zabójcze układy, 140–7. 24 Abu Daoud arrived in Warsaw from Vienna and it is likely that he might have been involved in a plot against Egyptian president Anwar al-Sadat, who was expected to pay a five-day unofficial visit to Austria. Abu Nidal’s people might also have taken part in the conspiracy, which, however, failed to succeed because Sadat cancelled his trip to Vienna. See Thomas Riegler, Ein Attentat, das nicht stattfand: Der verhinderte palästinensische Mordanschlag auf Anwar as-Sadat 1981, Zeitschrift für Geschichtswissenschaft 59/11 (2011), 938–59. 25 For more details on the Victoria shooting, see Gasztold-Seń, Between, 152–7. 26 Seale, Abu Nidal, 177. 27 Gasztold, Zabójcze układy, 329–40. 28 AIPN, 0204/1876, Notatka służbowa Inspektora Wydz. VI Dep. II MSW ze spotkań z TW ps. ‘Ali’, Warszawa, 5 IV 1983, p. 63. 29 AIPN, 00464/87, vol. 2, Informacja ‘Derwisza’ dotycząca Cenzinu, [1982], pp. 58/11v–58/12. 30 AMSZ, Departament V, z. 24/86, 0-220-2-81, Notatka służbowa J. Stępińskiego, Warszawa, 22 VI 1981, no pagination. 31 AIPN, 1405/23, Notatka Szefostwa Wojskowej służby Wewnętrznej dot. rozmów handlowych z przedstawicielem Iraku, Warszawa, 2 VII 1981, p. 23. 32 For more information, see Bastian Obermayer and Frederik Obermaier, The Panama Papers: Breaking the Story of How the Rich and Powerful Hide Their Money (London: Oneworld Publications, 2016). 33 Seale, Abu Nidal, 203. 34 Przemysław Gasztold-Seń, Biznes z terrorystami: Brudne interesy wywiadu wojskowego PRL z bliskowschodnimi organizacjami terrorystycznymi, Pamięć i sprawiedliwość 23/1 (2014), 174. 35 Thomas Riegler, Im Fadenkreuz: Österreich und der Nahostterrorismus 1973 bis 1985 (Göttingen, V&R unipress, 2011), 147. 36 AIPN, 00464/105, vol. 3, Pismo Samira Najmeddina do DHA Maciej Czarnecki, p. 84. 37 Ibid. 38 AIPN, 00464/105, vol. 3, Agency Agreement between S.A.S Trade and Investments Company Inc. and Dom Handlowo-Agenturowy Maciej Czarnecki i S-ka, S. A., pp. 85–91. 39 Coordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls. 40 Gasztold-Seń, Biznes z terrorystami, 176–8. 41 AIPN, 00464/105 t. 3, Pismo Z-cy Dyrektora Biura ‘B’ MSW ppłk. A. Mościckiego do Szefa Zarządu II Sztabu Generalnego WP, Warszawa, 26 XI 1984, p. 94. 42 AIPN, 00464/105, t. 3, Notatka A. Marchewski dot. S.A.S. [1987], pp. 102–5. 43 The Abu Nidal Terror Network: Organization, State Sponsors and Commercial Enterprise, Research Paper prepared by the Counterterrorist Center, CIA, July 1987, https​://ww​w.cia​.gov/​libra​ry/re​ading​room/​docs/​dOc_0​00528​3769.​pdf (accessed 1 January 2020). 44 AIPN, 1005/49716, Pismo do DHA M. Czarnecki, Warszawa, 29 IV 1985, p. 6. 45 Gasztold, Zabójcze układy, 152. 46 AIPN, 1005/49716, Notatka służbowa, Warszawa, 15 I 1990, p. 1.



5. Polish Military Intelligence and Its Secret Relationship with ANO

105

47 Joint Publications Research Service (JPRS) Reports, East Europe, 21 July 1992, p. 31, http://handle.dtic.mil/100.2/ADA333943 (accessed 1 January 2020). 48 I am grateful to Adrian Hänni for sharing this information with me. 49 Christopher C. Harmon, Terrorism Today (Portland: Frank Cass, 2000), 101. 50 AIPN, 01229/2992/CD, Notatka służbowa por. Włodzimierza Szpakiewicza, Warszawa, 1 V 1987, pp. 235–6. 51 Bruce Hoffman, Inside Terrorism (New York: Columbia University Press, 2006), 259. 52 Mark Hosenball, BCCI: Caught in the Coils of Cash, Washington Post, 29 September 1991. 53 AIPN, 01228/2992/CD, Pismo Dyrektora Departamentu I MSW gen. Zdzisława Sarewicza do Dyrektora Departamentu II MSW gen. Janusza Seredy, Warszawa, 12 I 1987, pp. 189–90. 54 Witold Gadowski and Przemyslaw Wojciechowski, Tragarze śmierci: Polskie związki ze światowym terroryzmem (Warszawa: Prószyński i S-ka, 2010), 80. 55 AIPN, 01211/43, vol. 9, Informacja Inspektora Wydz. VI Dep. II MSW sporządzona na postawie relacji ustnej TW ps. ‘Dzik’, Warszawa, I 1988 r., pp. 96–100. 56 AIPN, 00464/105, vol. 3, Notatka, p. 106. 57 AIPN, 01228/2992/CD, Notatka służbowa por. W. Szpakiewicza z rozmowy z komandorem Stanisławem Terleckim z Zarządu II Sztabu Generalnego MON, Warszawa, 9 IX 1986, p. 1445. 58 Duane R. Clarridge, Po prostu szpieg (Warszawa: Dom Wydawniczy Bellona, 2001), 278–9. 59 The Abu Nidal Terror Network, July 1987, in National Security Archive, George Washington University, Washington DC, TE00925. 60 Ibid. 61 Ibid. 62 Ibid. 63 AIPN, 01228/2992/CD, Pismo Z-cy Naczelnika Wydziału Dep. I MSW płk. St. Strei do Naczelnika Wydziału VI Departamentu II MSW płk. H. Jankowskiego, Warszawa, 10 X 1983, p. 121. 64 AIPN, 01228/2992/CD, Notatka służbowa Inspektora Wydz. VI Dep. II MSW kpt. A. Smoleńskiego i Mł. Inspektora Wydz. VI Dep. II MSW ppor. W. Szpakiewicza z czynności operacyjnych realizowanych w sprawie obiektowej krypt. ‘Terroryści’, Warszawa, 10 X 1983, pp. 122–3. 65 AIPN, 01228/2992/CD, Notatka służbowa Inspektora Wydz. VII Dep. II MSW kpt. A. Smoleńskiego ze spotkania z TW ps. ‘Marek’, Warszawa, 19 X 1983, p. 153. 66 AIPN, 01228/2992/CD, Pismo Z-cy Naczelnika Wydziału II KWMO w Łodzi mjr. W. Rottera do Naczelnika Wydziału V Dep. II MSW w Warszawie, Łódź, 17 X 1983, p. 152. 67 AIPN, 01228/2992/CD, Pismo Naczelnika Wydziału III Biura Paszportów MSW płk. Jerzego Piątkowskiego do Z-cy Naczelnika Wydziału VI Dep. II MSW mjr. St. Sieńko, Warszawa, 13 VI 1983, p. 72. 68 AIPN, 01228/2992/CD, Pismo Naczelnika Wydziału V Dep. II MSW płk. Michała Jankowskiego do Naczelnika Wydziału VI Dep. II MSW mjr. J. Koronowskiego, Warszawa 22 IX 1983, p. 74. 69 Gasztold, Zabójcze układy, 179–82. 70 AIPN, 00688/98, Notatka Służbowa Starszego Oficera Wydziału VI Szefostwa WSW kpt. Władysława Gałuszkiewicza dot. spotkania z TW ‘INO’ w dniu 6.01.1988, 12 I 1988 r., pp. 166–7.

106

Terrorism in the Cold War

71 AIPN, 01228/2992/CD, Szyfrogram Nr 3349/III z Rzymu. Notatka odręczna, 19 IX 1986, p. 1440. 72 AIPN, 01228/2992/CD, Szyfrogram Nr 4170/III z Paryża, 19 IX 1986, p. 1446. 73 AAN, KC PZPR, sygn. LXXVI-659, Notatka J. Majewskiego z rozmowy z Abu Ijadem, Warszawa, 10 X 1986, no pagination. 74 AIPN, 0449/48, vol. 3, Notatka informacyjna ‘Kossaka’ [Henryk Bosak] dot. k-10, Budapeszt, 12 XI 1986, p. 336. 75 AIPN, 02320/268, Szyfrogram Nr 9356 z Waszyngtonu, 26 XI 1986, pp. 311–12. 76 AIPN, 01228/2992/CD, Notatka służbowa Inspektora Wydz. XIV Dep. II MSW por. Włodzimierza Szpakiewicza dot. działalności na terenie Warszawy spółki polskoarabskiej pod nazwą S.A.S Trading Company, Warszawa, 20 XI 1986, pp. 187–8. 77 See, for example, John Tagliabue, Poland Says It Expelled Reported Abu Nidal Aide, The New York Times, 26 January 1988. 78 AIPN, 01228/2992/CD, Pilna notatka Jana Kinasta w sprawie démarche ambasady USA w sprawie działalności w Polsce organizacji Abu Nidala, Warszawa, 7 V 1987, pp. 195–9. 79 AIPN, 01228/2992/CD, Informacje Dyrektora Departamentu II MSW płk. Janusza Seredy dot. demarche Ambasady USA w Warszawie odnośnie rzekomej działalności w Polsce organizacji Abu Nidala, Warszawa, 1 VI 1987, pp. 232–4. 80 AIPN, 01228/2992/CD, Pilna notatka M. Orzechowskiego w sprawie odpowiedzi na demarche Ambasady USA w Warszawie dot. działalności w Polsce Organizacji Abu Nidala, Warszawa, 17 VI 1987, pp. 237–41. 81 Gasztold-Seń, Biznes z terrorystami, 183–4. 82 AIPN, 01228/2992/CD/CD, Informacja Dyrektora Departamentu II MSW płk. J. Seredy dot. firmy ‘S.A.S Trade Investments Company’, Warszawa, 13 VII 1987, p. 613. 83 AIPN, 01211/143, vol. 4, Notatka Naczelnika Wydziału V Dep. II MSW mjr. Jana Strzeszewskiego dot. firmy ‘SAS Trade Investments Company’, Warszawa, 10 VII 1987, k. 76–7. 84 AIPN, 02922/69, vol. 1, Teczka dokumentacji tematycznej krypt ‘Rando’, Notatka służbowa gł. specjalisty w kierownictwie KGMO, płk. M. Popiołka, Warszawa, 15 I 1988, p. 15. 85 Gasztold-Seń, Biznes z terrorystami, 185. 86 AIPN, 0449/1, vol. 11, List George Busha do gen. Wojciecha Jaruzelskiego, 15 XII 1987, pp. 63–4. 87 Gasztold-Seń, Biznes z terrorystami, 188–91. 88 Daniel Byman, Deadly Connections: States that Sponsor Terrorism (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 15.

CChapter 6 CARLOS THE JACKAL IN PRAGUE COMMUNIST CZECHOSLOVAKIA AND INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM – A CASE STUDY Pavel Žáček

It is widely known that the terrorist Ilich Ramírez Sánchez, called Carlos, was moving around in Central and Eastern Europe in the 1970s and 1980s. The capital cities of Soviet bloc countries – East Berlin, Prague, Budapest, Warsaw, Sofia – made it possible for Carlos and his group to carry out terrorist attacks and maintain an extensive network of extremists. Nevertheless, with the possible exception of East Germany, Poland and, to some extent, Hungary, his specific activity in these countries and the measures taken by the communist secret police have remained largely unknown.1 The gradual opening of files held by the former state security subordinated to the Federal Ministry of the Interior (Federální ministerstvo vnitra, FMV) has permitted research into previously inaccessible topics such as the visits by Carlos and his people to the CSSR, and especially its capital Prague.2 This gives us a basis on which to undertake a deeper analysis and more critical evaluation of the assertions that communist Czechoslovakia was one of ‘the greatest subversive centers in the world’ in regard to international terrorism,3 to refute the idea that ‘Carlos and his companions were allowed to use its training camps’,4 and to correct and supplement the published documentation of his visits to Prague.5 Perhaps somewhat surprisingly, it was the Bulgarian Ministry of the Interior (MoI), which in August 1977 provided the first mention of Carlos in the records of the state security in Prague. Added to the information were four portrait photographs of the well-known terrorist, which shortly afterwards were sent to all border posts for passport control. The Bulgarian ‘comrades’ emphasized at the same time that they wanted to maintain confidentiality in their use, to avoid uncovering the agent who had obtained them.6 In May 1978 colleagues in Poland provided the Czechoslovak Directorate for Counter-Intelligence in the Fight Against the External Enemy (Správa kontrarozvědky pro boj proti vnějšímu nepříteli, II Directorate FMV, later SNB) with a copy of a warrant for the arrest of perpetrators of terrorist acts of violence issued by the West German Federal Criminal Police Office (Bundeskriminalamt,

108

Terrorism in the Cold War

BKA) at the end of the preceding year. The terrorist Ilich Ramírez Sánchez, called ‘Carlos’, born on 12 October 1949 in Caracas (Venezuela), was ranked in twenty-eight place on the warrant.7 In autumn of the same year, state security headquarters listed 300 persons (including Carlos) described as terrorists in its computer information system.8 At the beginning of October 1978, ironically, fourteen days before Carlos first arrived in Prague, the II Directorate FMV reported that no specific knowledge regarding manifestations of terrorism had been obtained in the CSSR. The few measures implemented in the course of the previous two years in this area had been more of a preventive nature.9

Carlos’s first visits to Prague On 26 October 1978 Carlos flew to Prague for the first time, with a Yemeni passport, identifying him as ‘Al Bakri Mohsen Kassem’, and a tourist visa for forty-five days. He stayed first at the Hotel Belvedere, then spent one night in the  Interhotel Alcron, and ended up in the Hotel Intercontinental, room 328.10 With others, he looked after the Palestinian terrorist Souhaila Sami Andrawes Sayeh, who had been wounded in the raid by the West German anti-terrorism unit Border Protection Group 9 (Grenzschutzgruppe 9, GSG 9) during the hijacking of Lufthansa Flight 181 to the Somali capital of Mogadishu. Her six-month treatment at the First Orthopaedic Clinic in Prague Na Karlově under the false name of Al-Kasim Rihab was paid for by the Iraqi Embassy.11 The 5th Department of the II Directorate FMV, responsible for monitoring the missions of African and Asian states, was not informed about Carlosʼs visit until 24 November 1978, two days after the terrorist had left Prague by plane. An agent with the code name ‘Oskar’, a close friend of the Iraqi ambassador to Prague, Al Hadithi Anwar Abdul Kadir, told a state security officer that the terrorist famous for the 1975 attack on an Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries meeting in Vienna had a secret mission in the CSSR. According to the agent, Carlos – appearing to the outside world as ‘Salim’ – was constantly armed. It was anticipated that he would return to Prague after carrying out a task in Baghdad, where he had flown with the Iraqi ambassador.12 Several months later, another Arab agent, ‘Adam’, added that Carlos had inspected the interior layout of the building that housed the periodical Otázky míru a socialismu (Questions of Peace and Socialism) in Prague, from which exiles of the Communist Party of Iraq had unsuccessfully tried to evict him. The 5th Department of the II Directorate FMV assessed the information retrospectively, concluding that it was part of the preparation for a terrorist act against ‘enemies of Iraq’, probably against the Union of Iraqi Students or the Iraqi communists directly, on the territory of the CSSR.13 Carlos would spend one more night in the Hotel Intercontinental from 26 to 27 December 1978 while passing through Prague.14 Carlos then arrived from the Hungarian People’s Republic on 29 January 1979 and, an hour after midnight on 1 February, wanted to continue through Děčín



6. Carlos the Jackal in Prague

109

to the German Democratic Republic (GDR).15 However, while he was passing through customs, the East German passport control found a sealed envelope that he refused to open. His claim that the envelope contained three travel documents that he wanted to have extended at the Yemeni Embassy in Berlin did not help him.16 By 7.00 a.m., Carlos was back on Czechoslovak territory. He tried to cross the border again in the evening using a different passport, but was recognized through his photograph and definitively returned to Czechoslovakia.17 On this occasion he wrote a note in English on a piece of paper for the East German border guards that he was ‘Carlos’ and called himself a good man.18 The agent ‘Adam’ drew attention to the fact that it was not until a week later that Carlos returned to the Hotel Intercontinental in Prague (room 261). At the same time, the 5th Department of the II Directorate FMV found out that he had met the second secretary of the Iraqi Embassy and intelligence officer of the Iraqi Foreign Espionage Zaid Al-Nakib, who allegedly took part in organizing terrorist acts in Western Europe. According to the agent, Carlos’s group intended to assassinate an as yet unidentified Arab, a former pilot and document forger hiding in the embassy of the People’s Democratic Republic of Yemen (PDRY) in Prague.19 Through an immediately initiated operative check – under codename ‘Bak’ – by members of the Directorate of Surveillance (Správa sledování, IV Directorate FMV, later SNB), it was ascertained that Carlos was in touch with the Iraqi diplomat Al-Hamdani A. Salih, who came from East Berlin to see him and visited Zaid Al-Nakib’s apartment and the Yemeni Embassy in Prague. On 10 February 1979, state security checked, inter alia, the correspondence Carlos sent from the Hotel Intercontinental to Iraq, Syria and Great Britain.20 The next day, Carlos was followed to the departure lounge of Ruzyně Airport. He first ordered a sandwich and a beer at the bar and then entered a conversation with two Cubans thought by passport control to be diplomats. The surveillance report interestingly noted that the terrorist came back from Gate A to the transit area to pay his hundred-crown bill at the bar. Then he boarded a MALEV Airline airplane with the two Cubans and left for Budapest.21 Surprisingly, a member of the Central Committee of the Iraqi Communist Party responsible for Party Intelligence and Counterintelligence Activity, Ary Khachadour22 (who was covered under the code name ‘Vezír’ in communication with the II Directorate FMV), also passed information regarding Carlos to the Main Intelligence Directorate (I Directorate FMV). According to him, the terrorist believed to work for the General Intelligence Unit at the Office of the Iraqi President (al-Mukhabarat) had come to prepare and coordinate the assassination of an employee of the South Yemeni Embassy, Abdul Nabil Jamil, who was originally a member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) led by George Habash. ‘Vezír’ recommended to security and party organs Carlos’s rapid extradition from the CSSR.23 On 14 March 1979 Carlos arrived in Prague with a passport issued for a Yemeni diplomat by the name of ‘Adih Fawas Ahmed’. The next day, he said goodbye to Souhaila Andrawes (Al-Kasim Rihab) in the Hotel Intercontinental and thanked Dr Oldřich Čech, who had taken care of her in the Vinohrady Hospital. While

110

Terrorism in the Cold War

at the Hotel Intercontinental, Carlos held several meetings with Zaid Al-Nakib as well as two other members of Palestinian terrorist organizations, Ali Kamal al-Issawe and Ali Bin Thabet, about renewing cooperation, undertaking joint operations and merging into one organization. Carlos and his colleagues further tried to persuade Hana Nedělková, an employee of the consular section of the embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany in Prague, into cooperation. They forced her to pass over internal information about the granting of visas and an overview of individuals banned from entering West Germany, as well as the addresses of selected senior officers of the embassy.24 Through a series of active measures state security succeeded in having Nedělková dismissed from her post.25 Carlos left for East Germany early on 19 March 1979, returning the next day in the afternoon. He again communicated with Thabet and Issawe and they met in the  Hotel Intercontinental with an employee of the military department of the Iraqi Embassy, Umar Jumʼa Bashlan. Carlos eventually left Prague on 25 March 1979.26 At the end of that month, the head of the 5th Department of the II Directorate FMV officially investigated Carlos’s contact with Cuban citizens at Ruzyně Airport together with Maj. Angel Cámbara Licea, a representative of the Cuban Ministry of the Interior.27 Cámbara explained that Carlosʼs Cuban contacts were not embassy employees and promised to ask officials in Havana. Within a month he confirmed that it had been a chance meeting.28 On 14 May 1979, on the basis of a proposal from the 5th Department of the II Directorate FMV, Carlos was put on the Index of Undesirable Persons (Index nežádoucích osob, INO) for ten years by the Directorate for Passports and Visas FMV.29 This meant that he was not supposed to be allowed to cross the Czechoslovak border in the future. Carlos’s subsequent visits to Prague are not reliably documented. According to handwritten notes on one document, he left Czechoslovakia on 23 April 1979 for the GDR.30 The East German Ministry for State Security (Ministerium für Staatssicherheit, MfS, commonly known as the Stasi) sent notification on 17 May of his scheduled Interflug flight from Berlin to Prague under the name of Adil Ahmed Fawaz.31 Carlos’s visit to Prague in May – and even his alleged presence on 4 June 1979 at a meeting of the Union of Arab Students – are not confirmed by any source other than a report of an agent of the X Directorate FMV codenamed ‘Mušír’, obtained only after a four-month delay.32 More than a year later, Carlos’s stay in Prague was confirmed by Hana Nedělková, who said that on 7 May 1979 she had collected US$20,000 in a bank with him.33

Surveillance of the terrorist In spite of being listed on the INO, Carlos visited Prague again under the new name of ‘Adil Fawaz Ahmed Kassim’, a Yemeni diplomat, on 4 August 1979. Czechoslovak state security, somewhat better prepared than in the preceding cases and apparently in connection with Saddam Hussein’s seizure of power in Iraq, set themselves the task of protection from anticipated enemy activity and to bring about Carlosʼs departure from the country.34



6. Carlos the Jackal in Prague

111

An agent of the 5th Department IV Directorate SNB codenamed ‘Petr’, a receptionist at the Hotel Intercontinental, described Carlos as a ‘well-behaved’ guest, who rarely left the hotel and received visits in his room mainly from Arab guests.35 With the help of the hotel agent, the secret police managed to install a listening device in room 667 occupied by Carlos and probably in some other areas within a few days.36 By coincidence, the head of state security attempted to take action against Carlos through the Federal Ministry of Foreign Affairs on 10 August 1979, the day on which the intelligence device was installed.37 The head of the 8th Territorial Department of the Federal Ministry of Foreign Affairs Václav Jízdný invited the Chargé d’Affaires of the South Yemeni Embassy Abdo Yousif Mansour to his office to inform him that a foreign national involved in activities in conflict with Czechoslovak law was at large on the territory of the CSSR. Mansour replied that he had refused to cooperate in any way with Carlos, although the latter was in possession of a diplomatic passport. He had, however, received instructions from Aden to support him.38 The Iraqi ambassador A. A. Kadir Al Hadithi behaved in a similar way. He did not conceal the fact that he knew the terrorist personally and even declared that Carlos was known ‘as a fighter for the Palestinian cause and that no Arab who knew him would avoid him’.39 On the evening of 10 August 1979, a meeting took place in the bugged room, between Carlos and selected representatives of terrorist groups (among them Abu Daoud, responsible for the murderous attack on Israeli athletes during the Olympic Games in Munich in 1972).40 The security services’ recording of this meeting is twenty-five reels long.41 However, the Directorate for Intelligence Technology (VI Directorate SNB) was able to translate only those parts of the conversation that were in English and French. For a translation of the passages in Arabic, the recording had to be passed on to Moscow.42 The Soviet KGB later thanked its Czechoslovak friends, saying that the participants at the meeting discussed not only their political orientation but also their financial sources and immediate plans, predominantly in the Near East.43 Five days later two officers of the Romanian secret police Securitate claiming to be Romanian diplomats, Ioa Dobrescu and Sergiu Nitescu,44 arrived unexpectedly at the Hotel Intercontinental.45 It emerged from the report of the agent ‘Adam’ and from recordings that they were offering training in Romania for members of Carlos’s terrorist group.46 On 23 August 1979 the nervous leadership of the security services considered a number of ways of cutting short Carlos’s visit to the CSSR.47 The next day the terrorist slammed the door of his hotel room behind him and ran down the hotel corridor in a fury with a pistol in his hand. Ironically, an official of state security who was part of the hotel staff was able to let him back into his room by using a special key.48

Against Saddam Hussein It was only then that the foreign agents of the II Directorate SNB were finally able to reach Carlos directly. An agent of the 5th Department II Directorate SNB

112

Terrorism in the Cold War

codenamed ‘Radowan’ first overheard his discussion with the Syrian military attaché Maj.-Gen. Ezz-Eldin Idris in the wine cellar U Pastýřky. Carlos, who presented himself as Salem, said he came from Latin America, had studied for four years in  Moscow, and was a communist. While in the wine cellar he expressed dissatisfaction with the fact that the Arab forces were not unified and therefore could not achieve their aims. Some unity was apparent only in the grouping of Arab states against Egypt. He went on to say that it was impossible to hold negotiations with Israel, and that an open military struggle had to be waged against it. The national liberation movements of the Arab states should take as their example the struggle of the Nicaraguan people who were uncompromising in their stance.49 Subsequently, during Carlos’s lunch with General Idris, who clearly knew that this was an international terrorist, an agent codenamed ‘Filip’ registered that Carlos described South Yemen as the only progressive regime among the Arab states. He also criticized Iraq for suppressing the communists. ‘It is clear for us as Marxists that we have to be on friendly terms with the Socialist countries led by the Soviet Union.’ He praised Syria for its clear foreign policy with regard to the socialist states.50 ‘He considered the Libyan representative Muammar Gaddafi to be someone who had no idea what he wanted, since today he is your friend but tomorrow he is against you. For this reason, we cannot rely on him.’51 Members of the Directorate for Surveillance noted that the Marxist Carlos’s favourite shops were the special Tuzex outlets with luxury goods in the streets Opletalova, Rytířská, Železná and elsewhere, where he frequently purchased, for example, perfumes, cases of whisky and cartons of cigarettes.52 He also visited the polyclinic on Charles Square, the Wallenstein pub in the Malá Strana on two occasions, and once lunched in the Indian restaurant on Wenceslas Square.53 On 27 August 1979 the operatives shadowing him again accompanied him to Ruzyně Airport.54 After analysing how things stood operationally, the Head of the Federal Ministry of the Interior decided to prepare a plan to deal with the Iraqi Embassy and in particular with Carlos and company. If he came to the CSSR again, the agents codenamed ‘Radowan’ and ‘Filip’ would be deployed to secure his trust. A proposal would be prepared to make contact with the terrorist himself and interview him.55 During September 1979, the resident agent of Czechoslovak Counterintelligence in Sofia denied, in cooperation with Bulgarian State Security, Carlos and his wife Magdalena Kopp a visa and thus prevented their travel to Prague.56 At the beginning of October 1979, the source codenamed ‘Vezír’ received a message from Carlos in Bulgaria, about which he immediately informed Czechoslovak state security. Carlos assured them that he had interrupted all contacts with Iraqi intelligence and did not intend to carry out any sort of operation against the Iraqi communists. On the contrary, he wanted to cooperate with them. Carlos offered to participate in a top-secret operation – the assassination of the Egyptian president Anwar Sadat, prepared at the initiative of Libyan intelligence. Both the Iraqi communists and the leadership of Czechoslovak state security, however, rejected this proposed cooperation as very risky.57



6. Carlos the Jackal in Prague

113

Transport of weapons Information received from the Stasi at the end of July 1980 set off further frenzied activity on the part of the operational bodies of the security services. The news was that Carlos, in possession of a Syrian diplomatic passport in the name of ‘Michel Khouri,’ and his wife Magdalena Kopp under the alias of ‘Lilly’ alias ‘Maryam Touma,’ were planning to transfer weapons by train from Berlin to Budapest via the CSSR in a black leather suitcase measuring approximately 80 x 60 centimetres.58 On 1 August 1980 the international express no. 1373 Balt-Orient travelling across the CSSR was accompanied by individual groups from regional state security directorates from Ústí nad Labem in North Bohemia until beyond Bratislava, while a handpicked team was sent from the Prague headquarters of the II Directorate SNB.59 Capt. Richard Hofman and 2nd Lt. Jiří Král were startled when, shortly after they had got into the wagon, the ticket inspector identified himself as an officer of the Hungarian security services who was also following the two Syrian ‘diplomats’. Thanks to surviving documentation, we know that Carlos was asleep while the train passed through Central Station (now Masaryk Station) in Prague, that he ordered a coffee in Kolín, and that he had lunch and Coca Cola brought to the compartment while passing through Havlíčkův Brod. He stayed the whole journey with Kopp in their compartment, just looking out of the window a few times in  Bratislava. He then spent the journey from Nové Zámky to Štúrovo watching the passing countryside through the corridor window.60 In October 1980 Hungarian state security informed their colleagues in Prague that the cooperation of Carlos’s group with the Romanian Securitate, inaugurated in Prague in August 1979, had resulted in plans for the assassination of Romanian exiles in Western Europe (Emil Valer Georgescu, Ioan Emilian, Mihail Hohenzolern, Paul Goma and Faust Brădescu) and, above all, for an attack against the building of Radio Free Europe (RFE) in  Munich.61 The terrorist attack that occurred in the evening of 21 February 1981 did not, however, hit the Romanian section of RFE but the Czech and Slovak Service.62 Several employees of RFE were wounded, some lightly, others seriously.63 At the end of March 1983, the II Directorate SNB, believing that Carlos would not return to the CSSR, decided to archive his file and it was moved to the operational archive. The reasons given were that he held meetings on the territory of the CSSR with diplomats of Arab states and discussions with leaders of terrorist groups with whom he contemplated the preparation of terrorist operations, the air transport of weapons and military materials, and the financing and training of members of terrorist groups. Although there was no evidence that Carlos had been preparing operations on the territory of socialist states, there was the danger that he could damage the political interests of the CSSR abroad. The Head of the Federal Ministry of the Interior proposed that Carlos would be prevented from visiting the CSSR and expelled from the country. The financial outlay on the operation amounted to a total of 2,666.35 crowns.64

114

Terrorism in the Cold War

Final visit The terrorist’s last and best-known visit to Prague took place three years later. Carlos (alias ‘Walid Wattar’) flew in from Moscow with Magdalena Kopp (alias ‘Marie Aziz’) and Johannes Weinrich (alias ‘Farid Redwan’) on Czechoslovak Airlines flight 899 at twenty minutes to midnight on 10 June 1986. As diplomats, they again avoided having to go through immigration and also bypassed customs control.65 It was not until the evening of the second day that the hotel agent of the IV Directorate SNB confirmed that Carlos had again settled in the Hotel Intercontinental.66 A surveillance team in Operation ‘Turista’, was immediately activated, as well as a network of agents with listening devices.67 According to security plans there were also pyrotechnicians and an anti-terrorist unit. A guard was put at the American Embassy for precautionary reasons.68 On 13 June 1986 the Deputy Minister of the Interior of the CSSR Maj.-Gen. Vladimír Hrušecký and the head of the II Directorate SNB Col. Karel Fiřt visited Abu Hisham, the head of the diplomatic mission of the PLO, with an official request for his help in cutting short Carlos’s visit to Prague. Abu Hisham, labelled a ‘traitor’ in the PLO by the terrorist Carlos, did not accomplish that. Carlos left for the Syrian Embassy, which immediately received a request from the head of the Department for the Near East of the Czechoslovak Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ivan Voleš, to take no steps to extend his visa as a visitor.69 In the afternoon of 13 June, the head of the II Directorate SNB chose two English-speaking officers, Maj. Miloslav Pitr and Maj. Václav Wallis, who, under the guise of personnel from diplomatic protocol, were tasked with persuading Carlos and his retinue to leave the CSSR. The state security officers spent about an hour in room 442, where they told the three terrorists that their personal safety was under threat and the best solution would be a speedy departure from the CSSR. Carlos turned this recommendation down: He said he knew that Czechoslovak security services used ‘small agents’ from the ranks of the Arabs who spread disinformation among the service. This was followed by a very spontaneous speech in which he vented his political ideas, and what he thought of his circle of friends and enemies, that he was surrounded by traitors and that we two were provocateurs.70

Eventually the Czech intelligence officers added that agents of the French special services meant to capture or kill him, which prompted a change of heart and his willingness to leave the hotel. Pitr and  Wallis offered to arrange Carlosʼs return to Moscow and assured him that they would even provide the tickets. Carlos accepted, but when the representative of Czechoslovak Airlines in the hotel confirmed the departure of the flight, he exploded again. It was only when he was assured that the flight was secured and that the aircraft was waiting for him that he began to pack. Carlos was armed with a pistol, hidden in the right inside pocket of his jacket; Weinrich had one pistol in a shoulder holster under his jacket, and another under the belt on his



6. Carlos the Jackal in Prague

115

right hip. Before they left the room, Carlos’s wife (who was roughly six months pregnant), also fastened a belt with weapons to her maternity trousers under her pullover. The officers described Carlos in their record as about 175 cm tall, fortytwo to forty-five years old, noticeably light-skinned, with a narrow moustache, dark hair with a widow’s peak, brown eyes, a trapezoid-shaped face, fleshy chin and healthy teeth and a heavy figure with an arrogant bearing.71 After a taxi had been ordered, Carlos left with his entourage, followed by a substantial cohort of anti-terrorist units, for Ruzyně Airport, where the two officers released him into the transit hall via the service entrance.72 ‘They all left through the hall of the airport where they went round by the service entrance into the transit hall. 3 men (operational personnel) were waiting in the hall. TURISTA and his companions went with these men onto the tarmac where the aeroplane to Moscow was waiting. At 16.30 they took off for Moscow.’73 Carlos’s last visit to Prague thus symbolically ended with a flight to the Soviet Union.

Conclusion Czechoslovak state security first described Carlos as a well-known ‘international terrorist who took part in terrorist acts in many countries of the world’.74 Later they characterized him as the head of a terrorist group working for Iraq and planning an action on Czechoslovak territory against communist-oriented Arab nationals.75 Valuable intelligence acquired on the intentions and activities of this ‘Arab terrorist’ and his terrorist organization was passed on to not only the East German and Hungarian security services but also ‘Soviet friends’, ‘for further use’.76 Recordings from discussions between Czechoslovak and East German secret police reveal that the East European security services focused most of all on acquiring tactical and technical information about the visits of Carlos and his companions on the territory of the CSSR, what passport documents and what names they were using, the nature of their contacts with the employees of the embassies of South Yemen and Iraq in Prague, communication with various nationalist terrorist organizations, and so on.77 Carlos stayed in hotels, where most of his meetings took place during his visits to Prague. He presented himself as a ‘progressively’ oriented person who agreed with the policies of the communist states. Nevertheless, he sought contact with members of other terrorist organizations and communicated in suspicious ways with employees of the Iraqi, Yemeni and other Arab secret services. He declared, moreover, that he would not carry out ‘any act which would damage the interests of these states’ on the territory of the Eastern bloc. The intelligence agents monitoring Carlos and his group recorded discussions about the financing and preparation of terrorist acts that would take place outside the territory of the communist states.78 It is clear from the information acquired that these are dangerous extreme elements of Arab origin who operate in various regions of Europe. […]

116

Terrorism in the Cold War

Reasonable suspicion emerges from the assessment that these terrorists are trying to make use of the territory of the CSSR to contact each other and to plan various terrorist acts. An examination of Carlos’ contact base on Czechoslovak territory has ascertained its variety and extent. Up to now, contacts to nationals from Great Britain, Ireland, France, Sudan, Iraq, GDR, Romania and Syria travelling to the CSSR on business trips or as tourists have been specifically ascertained.79

The security services also regarded Carlos’s meeting with the Romanian ‘diplomats’ as interesting. The security services were initially taken by surprise by Carlos’s visits, and despite their efforts they were unable to prevent him from travelling to the CSSR on a diplomatic passport. In the operations II and IV Directorate FMV (SNB) ‘Bak’ (also ‘Orient’80) and IV Directorate SNB ‘Turista’ they gradually succeeded in deploying a network of agents as well as secret policemen to follow him, eventually aided by listening devices. Unlike their East German and Hungarian colleagues,81 the Czechoslovak secret police regarded Carlos’s presence in Prague as a potential threat capable of ‘damaging the political interests of the CSSR abroad’.82 Carlos and his contacts were placed on what was called the INO, as the security services were not prepared to allow him and his people ‘to visit Prague for relaxation’.83 In the beginning, Carlos perceived Prague as a peaceful backwater, full of Arab visitors and suitable for organizing meetings and negotiations. It was enough for him to have a diplomatic passport, and after a certain time a change of name, to get around standard security procedures and even his presence on the INO.84 Despite the fact that the choice of hotels for foreign visitors was extremely limited in the late 1970s and early 1980s, it always took the ‘Arab agents’ of the II Directorate several days to find out that Carlos was staying in the Hotel Intercontinental.85 State Security gradually combined surveillance of selected embassies, especially the Iraqi and Syrian embassies and their intelligence officers, with the use of what were known as hotel agencies and direct surveillance of Carlos and his companions. Since most of Carlos’s meetings took place in hotel rooms, state security succeeded in recording several of them (although it needed Soviet help to translate them).86 Surveillance of the terrorists became much more effective with the closer collaboration of Czechoslovak, East German and Hungarian security services.87 One could conclude provisionally that Czechoslovak state security treated Carlos just as they handled other terrorists with a presence in the country. Their approach was inhibited not only by fears of a precipitate reaction from the extremist but also by political considerations concerning the states supporting his group (over the years, South Yemen, Iraq and Syria). Nevertheless, in August 1979, state security organs wanted to expel Carlos from the CSSR in the course of his prolonged stay in Prague, and in June 1986 they managed to expel him for good.88 It is comprehensible that it never even occurred to Czechoslovak state security to arrest Carlos and his companions, and hand them over to the democratic states on the other side of the Iron Curtain. Like the other communist security services, they put their own immediate interests and those of the Soviet bloc first, without,



6. Carlos the Jackal in Prague

117

however, even knowing the specific standpoint of the Soviet KGB (except for official proclamations about the struggle against terrorism in multilateral talks).89 Daniela Richterová recently labelled Czechoslovakia as Carlos’s ‘anxious host’.90 Considering the findings of this article, it might be more appropriate to describe the CSSR as an ‘overwhelmed host’.

Notes 1 See Wilhelm Dietl, Carlos – Konec jednoho mýtu (Vimperk: Tina Vimperk, 1995) [Carlos: Das Ende eines Mythos. Die Jagd nach dem Top-Terroristen (Bergisch Gladbach: Bastei Lübbe, 1995)], 66–103; John Follain, Šakal: Tajné války Iljiče Ramíreze Sáncheze zvaného Carlos alias Šakal (Brno: Jota, 2000) [Jackal: The Secret Wars of Carlos the Jackal (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1998)], 157–81, 235–7, 243–4; Przemysław Gasztold, Zabójcze układy: Służby PRL i międzynarodowy terroryzm (Warszawa: Wydawnictvo Naukowe PWN, 2017), 64–86; Evtim Kostadinov, Tatyana Kiryakova, Jordan Baev and Kostadin Grozev (eds.), International Terrorism in the Bulgarian State Security Files: Documentary Volume (Sophia: The Committee for Disclosing Documents and Announcing Affiliation of Bulgarian Citizens to the State Security and the Intelligence Services of the Bulgarian National Armed Forces, 2010), 140, 179–80, 190–1, 274–5, 427–30. On states outside the Warsaw Pact, that is, Romania and Yugoslavia, see Liviu Tofan, Şacalul securităţii: Terroristul Carlos în solda spionajului românesc (Iaşi: Editura Polirom, 2013); and the article of Gordan Akrap on the Carlos Group in Yugoslavia in this publication. 2 See Daniela Richterová, The Anxious Host: Czechoslovakia and Carlos the Jackal 1978–1986, The International History Review 40/1 (2018), 108–32. 3 David Yallop, Tracking the Jackal: The Search for Carlos, the World’s Most Wanted Man (New York: Random House, 1993), 544. 4 Follain, Šakal, 167. 5 Ibid., 237, 243; Dietl, Carlos, 73–6; Oliver Schröm, Im Schatten des Schakals: Carlos und die Wegbereiter des internationalen Terrorismus (Berlin: Ch. Links Verlag, 2002), 188–9, 275–6; Miroslav Mareš, Terorismus v ČR (Brno: Centrum strategických studií, 2005), 88. 6 RAMIREC Iljič – informace z BLR [RAMIREC Iljič – information from PRB], 19.9.1977; RAMIREZ SANCHEZ Iljič – žádost o odeslání telefota [RAMIREZ SANCHEZ Ilyich – request for telephoto], 4.10.1977, both in Archiv bezpečnostních složek [Security Services Archive], Prague (henceforth SSA), collection (henceforth coll.) Historický fond (henceforth MV-H), H-720-2. 7 Věc: Teroristé – požadavek na zařazení do SAPO [Subjects: Terrorists – request for placing on the SAPO computer system], 19.5.1978, in SSA, MV-H, H-720-2. 8 Vyhodnocení práce a opatření, které 7. odbor II. správy FMV prováděl na úseku terorismu [Evaluation of work and measures that the 7th Department of the II Directorate FMV implemented in the sector for terrorism], 4.10.1978, in SSA, MV-H, H-720-2. 9 Zpráva k projevům terorismu v ČSSR za období let 1977–78 po linii II. správy FMV [Report on manifestations of terrorism in the CSSR in 1977–78 along the lines of the II Directorate FMV], 10.10.1978, in SSA, MV-H, H-720-2.

118

Terrorism in the Cold War

10 ‘CARLOS’: Fotokopie příjezdovek. Žádost o československé vízum [‘CARLOS’: Photocopies of arrival documents. Request for Czechoslovak visa], 26.10.1978, in SSA, MV-H, H-720-4. 11 Fritz Schmaldienst and Klaus-Dieter Matschke, Carlos-Komplize Weinrich: Die internationale Karriere eines deutschen Top-Terroristen (Frankfurt am Main: Eichborn, 1995), 88; Richterová, Anxious Host, 9; Informace o pobytu arabských teroristů v ČSSR [Information about the visit of Arab terrorists to the CSSR], 11.1.1979, in SSA, coll. Counter-Intelligence files – HQ (henceforth MV-KR), 728019 MV. 12 Příslušníci teroristické organizace – poznatky [Members of terrorist organizations – data], 27.11.1978, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 13 Al Bakri Mohsen Kuseen, člen teroristické skupiny – informace [Al Bakri Mohsen Kuseen, member of a terrorist group – information], 15.3.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 14 ‘CARLOS’: Fotokopie příjezdovek, žádost o československé vízum [‘CARLOS’: Photocopies of arrival document, request for a Czechoslovak visa], 26.12.1978, in SSA, MV-H, H-720-4. 15 AL BAKRI Mohsen Kassem, jemenský státní příslušník – vládní úředník – opakovaný pokus cesty do NDR [AL BAKRI Mohsen Kassem, Yemeni state employee – government official – repeated attempt to travel to GDR], 6.2.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 16 Informace o pobytu arabských teroristů na území ČSSR [Information about the stay of Arab terrorists on the territory of the CSSR], 15.2.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 17 Al Bakri Mohsen Kassem, jemenský státní příslušník – vládní úředník – opakovaný pokus cesty do NDR [Al Bakri Mohsen Kassem, Yemeni state employee – government official – repeated attempt to travel to GDR], 6.2.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 18 Zpráva o jednání mezi delegací MStB NDR a II. správy SNB v Praze uskutečněná ve dnech 16.8.–17.8.1979 [Report of the discussion between a delegation of the MfS GDR and the II Directorate SNB in Prague on 16.8.–17.8.1979], in SSA, coll. Subject Files – HQ (henceforth MV-OBZ), 19324/1. 19 Záznam o pobyte arabských teroristov v ČSSR [Report of the visit of Arab terrorists to the CSSR], 9.2.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 20 Informace o pobytu arabských teroristů na území ČSSR [Information about the visit of Arab terrorists to the territory of the CSSR], 15.2.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 21 Akce BAK – sledování [Operation BAK – surveillance], 11.2.1979, in SSA, coll. Files of the Directorate of Surveillance (henceforth SL/MV), SL-454 MV. 22 In Party documents, he appears as Ara Chačador (Chačadur) Voskanian. From 1965–68, 1971–78 and then until 1989, he was an agent of the Main Intelligence Directorate (I Directorate FMV) with the codename ‘Mohamed’ and later ‘Vezir’. See National Archives, Prague, Archive of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, Gustáv Husák, Relationship KSČ – IKS. 23 Akce VEZÍR – poznatky k terorismu [Operation VEZÍR – data on terrorism], 8.3.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 24 Informace o pobytu palestinských teroristů na území ČSSR [Information about a visit by Palestinian terrorists to the CSSR], 29.3.1979; and further part 3, files 1/2, Zápis o výpovědi [Interrogation report], 22.7.1980, both in SSA, MV-OBZ, 19324/1. 25 Týdenní informace č. 4 [Weekly information No. 4], 16.11.1979, in SSA, coll. II Directorate SNB (henceforth A 34/1), 1302.



6. Carlos the Jackal in Prague

119

26 Informace o pobytu palestinských teroristů na území ČSSR [Information about the visit of Palestinian terrorists to the CSSR], 29.3.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 27 Informace [Information, the 5th Department of the II Directorate FMV], 28.3.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 28 Informace [Information, the 5th Department of the II Directorate FMV], 23.4.1979, SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 29 Persons considered hostile to the regime, expelled from the CSSR, including terrorists, were placed on the INO. See Návrh na zařazení do INO Al Bakri Mohsen Kassema [Proposal to place Al Bakri Mohsen Kassem on the Index of Undesirable Persons (INO)], 3.5.1979, in SSA, MV-OBZ, 19324/9, folder KPP. 30 HASSAN SALEH ALI – sdělení [HASSAN SALEH ALI – communication], 11.5.1979, in SSA, MV-H, H-720-5. 31 AHMED ADIL FAWAZ – sdělení k OS-00258/05-79 a OS-08419/05-79 [AHMED ADIL FAWAZ – communication to OS-00258/05-79 and OS-08419/05-79], 17.5.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. Richterová reads from this information that he really did visit Prague on this date. See Daniela Richterová, Šakalovy pražské dny, Lidové noviny, 15 April 2017, 20. 32 Záznam č. 26, ABU DAUD, palestinský terorista na návštěvě v ČSSR, rozhovor o činnosti iráckého teroristy CARLOSE – zpráva [Record no. 26, ABU DAUD, Palestinian terrorist visiting the CSSR, conversation about the activity of the Iraqi terrorist CARLOS – report], 4.10.1979, in SSA, MV-OBZ, 19324/1. See Richterová, Šakalovy pražské dny, 20. 33 Zápis o výpovědi [Interrogation report], 22.7.1980, in SSA, MV-OBZ, 19324/3, files 1/2. Nedělková added that Carlos (alias George) had been in Prague in November 1979 and January 1980 as well. 34 Informace 5. odboru II. správy SNB [Information 5th Department II Directorate SNB], 8.8.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 35 Záznam č. 28, FAVAZ ADIL Ahmed, nar. 1949, jemenský st. příslušník ubytován v hotelu IHC – poznatky [Record no. 28, FAVAZ ADIL Ahmed, b. 1949, Yemeni citizen living in the IHC – findings], 16.8.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 36 Ibid. 37 Informace 5. odboru II. správy SNB k pobytu člena arabské teroristické organizace v ČSSR [Information 5th Department II Directorate SNB, concerning the visit of a member of an Arab terrorist organization to the CSSR], 13.8.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 38 Záznam o návštěvě A. Y. Mansoura [Record of the visit of A. Y. Mansour], 10.8.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 39 Záznam o návštěvě A. A. Kadira Al Hadithi [Record of the visit of A. A. Kadir Al Hadithi], 10.8.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 40 Vytěžení zvukového záznamu z akce ‘BAK’– anglicky [Extracted from sound recording from Operation ‘BAK’– English], 10.8.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 41 Informace KGB SSSR pro s. K. Vrbu [Information KGB USSR for Comrade K. Vrba], 18.2.1980, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 42 Záznam. Akce ‘BAK’ [Recording. Operation ‘BAK’], 20.8.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. The agent ‘Adam’ would normally translate written material in Arabic for the 5th Department of the II Directorate; however, he was not entrusted with the translation of the recordings of Carlos et al. 43 Informace KGB SSSR pro s. K. Vrbu [Information KGB USSR for Comrade K. Vrba], 18.2.1980 in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV.

120

Terrorism in the Cold War

44 Apparently this was Sergiu Nica of the Directorate for Foreign Intelligence of the Securitate. Dennis Deletant, Romania, in Krzystof Persak and Łukasz Kamiński (eds.), A Handbook of the Communist Security Apparatus in East Central Europe 1944–1989 (Warsaw: IPN, 2005), 307. 45 Záznam č. 25, FARHA AWAD – syrský st. příslušník – zpráva do akce BAK [Record No. 25, FARHA AWAD – Syrian citizen – report for Operation BAK], 16.8.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 46 Informace 5. odboru II. správy SNB [Information 5th Department II Directorate SNB], 4.9.1979; Záznam, Arabský terorista ‘CARLOS’ – udržování kontaktů s bývalým předsedou vlády JLDR ROBAJEM [Record. Arab terrorist ‘CARLOS’ – maintaining contacts with former prime minister PDRY ROBAY], 13.9.1979, both in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 47 Návrh na agenturně-operativní kombinaci v akci ‘BAK’ [Proposal for agentoperational combination in Operation ‘BAK’], vol. 16987, 23.8.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 48 Akce BAK – sledování [Operation BAK – surveillance], 24.8.1979, in SSA, SL/MV, SL-454 MV, vol. 1. 49 Záznam, Terorista ‘CARLOS’ – poznatky k pobytu v ČSSR [Record, The terrorist ‘CARLOS’ – findings on his stay in the CSSR], 6.9.1979, in SSA, MV-OBZ, 19324/1. 50 This is indicative of Carlos’s turn from Iraq to Syria as state-sponsor in 1979. See Magdalena Kopp, Die Terrorjahre: Mein Leben an der Seite von Carlos (Munich, Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 2007), 122ff. 51 Záznam, Arabští teroristé – poznatky k pobytu v ČSSR, styky a politické názory [Record, Arab terrorists – findings on their stay in the CSSR, contacts and political views], 29.8.1979, in SSA, MV-OBZ, 19324/1. 52 Akce BAK – sledování [Operation BAK – surveillance], 8.8.1979, 14.8.1979 and 24.8.1979, in SSA, SL/MV, SL-454 MV. 53 Akce BAK – sledování [Operation BAK – surveillance], 8. 8. 1979, 9.8.1979 and 17.8.1979, in SSA, SL/MV, SL-454 MV. 54 Akce BAK – sledování [Operation BAK – surveillance], 27.8.1979, in SSA, SL/MV, SL-454 MV. 55 Informace 5. odboru II. správy SNB [Information of the 5th Department II Directorate SNB], 4.9.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 56 Šifrovka plk. Jana Bokra z rezidentury Sofie [Ciphered note from Col. Jan Bokr from the Sophia residence], undated, 7.9.1979 and 28.9.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 57 Informace 47. odboru I. správy SNB [Information 47th Department I Directorate SNB], 8.10.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 58 Organizace CARLOS – informace z NDR [Organization CARLOS – information from the GDR], 29.7.1980, in SSA, MV-H, H-720-4. 59 Informace 7. odboru II. správy SNB [Information 7th Department II Directorate SNB], 1.8.1980, in SSA, MV-H, H-720-4. 60 Záznam ze služební cesty [Recording from business trip], 6.8.1980, in SSA, MV-H, H-720-4. 61 Věc: ‘C-79’ – kr. jméno případu – vyhodnocení. Hlášení [Subject: ‘C-79’ – shortened name for the case – assessment. Report], 9.10.1980, in SSA, MV-OBZ, 38160/1. 62 Mezinárodní terorismus – zápis z porady s představitelem MV MLR s. plk. Wargou [International terrorism – minutes of meeting with representative of the MI HPR Comrade Col. Warga], 25.4.1981, in SSA, MV-H, H-720-4; Týdenní informace [Weekly information], 27.4.1981, in SSA, MV-H, H-720-4, A 34/1, 1325; Richard



6. Carlos the Jackal in Prague

121

H. Cummings, Cold War Radio: The Dangerous History of American Broadcasting in Europe, 1950–1989 (Jefferson, MO: McFarland & Company, 2009), 92–121. 63 Dietl, Carlos, 78. 64 Návrh na uložení spisu PO ‘BAK’ sv. č. 16987 [Proposal to archive file PO ‘BAK’ file no. 16987], 28.3.1983, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 65 Informace [Information], 16.6.1986, in SSA, MV-OBZ, 24113/6, file no. 3. 66 Informace [Information], 17.6.1986, in SSA, MV-OBZ, 38160/1. 67 ‘CARLOS’, Věc: Akce ‘TURISTA’ – žádost o agenturní obsazení v hotelu [CARLOS, Subject: Operation TURISTA – request for agent occupation in the hotel], 12.6.1986, in SSA, MV-OBZ, 24113/3. 68 Informace [Information], 17.6.1986, in SSA, MV-OBZ, 38160/1. 69 Richterová, Anxious Host, 17. 70 Záznam z kontaktu vízových cizinců ve věci příjezdu vedoucího teroristické organizace ‘Ruce světové revoluce’ – CARLOS [Record from contact of foreign aliens concerning the arrival of the head of the terrorist organization ‘Ruce světové revoluce’ – CARLOS], 16.6.1986, in SSA, MV-OBZ, 24113/13, file no. 3/2. 71 See Kopp, Terrorjahre, 208–10. 72 Informace [Information], 17.6.1986, in SSA, MV-OBZ, 38160/1. 73 Akce TURISTA + 2 společníci – sledování [Operation TURISTA + 2 companions – surveillance], 13.6.1986, in SSA, SL/MV, SL-7037 MV. 74 Zpráva k projevům terorismu v ČSSR za období let 1977 – 1978 po linii II. správy FMV [Report on manifestations of terrorism in the CSSR during 1977–78 along the lines of the II Directorate FMV], 10.10.1978, in SSA, MV-H, H-720-2. 75 ADIL FAWAZ AHMED, vedoucí teroristické skupiny – dožádání [ADIL FAWAZ AHMED, head of terrorist group – request], 27.7.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. 76 Vyhodnocení hlavních úkolů práce 5. odboru II. správy FMV za 1. pololetí roku 1979 [Assessment of main tasks of the work of the 5th Department II Directorate FMV during the 1st half of 1979], 11.7.1979, in SSA, A 34/1, 692. Unfortunately, owing to incomplete documentation, we still cannot answer the question about the direct relationship between the KGB and Carlos. It is plain from available sources that the standpoint of the II Main Directorate of the KGB was not known to their Czechoslovak, Hungarian and East German partners. 77 Zpráva o jednání mezi delegací MStB NDR a II. správy SNB v Praze uskutečněná ve dnech 16.8.–17.8.1979 [Report on discussion between the delegations of the MfS GDR and the II Directorate SNB in Prague during the period 16.8.–17.8.1979], in SSA, MV-OBZ, 19324/1. 78 Informace o činnosti arabských teroristů na území ČSSR [Information concerning the activity of Arab terrorists on the territory of the CSSR], 25.10.1979, in SSA, MV-OBZ, 19324/1. 79 Dokumentace z celostátní porady II. S-SNB. Vyhodnocení činnosti II. správy SNB za rok 1979 [Documentation from Nationwide Consultations. Assessment of the activity of the II Directorate SNB for 1979], before 12.2.1980, in SSA, 34/1, inv. j. 939. 80 In the beginning, ‘Orient’ was the codename for all operations against Arab terrorists; later it became the codename for processing the representation of the PLO in Prague. 81 See, for example, Zpráva o jednání mezi delegací MStB NDR a II. správy SNB v Praze uskutečněná ve dnech 16.8.–17.8.1979 [Report on discussion between the delegations of the MfS GDR and the II Directorate SNB in Prague during the period 16.8.–17.8.1979], in SSA, MV-OBZ, 19324/1; Věc: ‘C-79’ – kr. jméno případu – vyhodnocení. Hlášení [Subject: ‘C-79’ – shortened name for the case – assessment.

122

82

83 84 85 86 87

88 89

90

Terrorism in the Cold War

Report], 9.10.1980, in SSA, MV-OBZ, 38160/1; and Mezinárodní terorismus – zápis z porady s představitelem MV MLR s. plk. Wargou [International terrorism – minutes of meeting with representative of the MI HPR Comrade Col. Warga], 25.4.1981, in SSA, MV-H, H-720-4. See further the prepared publication of documents ‘Ruce světové revoluce: Carlos a jeho teroristická organizace v dokumentech Státní bezpečnosti, 1976-1989’ [‘Hands of the world revolution: Carlos and his terrorist organization in the documents of the State Security, 1976-1989’], forthcoming from the Prague publishing house Academia. Současná situace a charakteristika mezinárodního terorismu a hlavní úkoly orgánů po linii II. S-SNB [The current situation and characteristics of international terrorism and the main tasks of the bodies along the line II Directorate SNB], 29.1.1980, in SSA, MV-OBZ, 19324/1. Vyhodnocení činnosti TO ‘CARLOS’ na území ČSSR v roce 1986 [Assessment of activities of the terrorist organization ‘CARLOS’ on the territory of the CSSR in 1986], 28.12.1986, in SSA, MV-OBZ, 24113/13, file no. 3/2. See Informace [Information, the 5th Department of the II Directorate FMV], 8.8.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV; and also Schmaldienst and Matschke, CarlosKomplize Weinrich, 115–16. See Informace o pobytu palestinských teroristů v ČSSR [Information about the visit of Palestinian terrorists to the CSSR], 20.3.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. See Informace KGB SSSR pro s. K. Vrbu [Information KGB USSR for Comrade K. Vrba], 18.2.1980, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. See, for example, Zpráva o jednání mezi delegací MStB NDR a II. správy SNB v Praze uskutečněná ve dnech 16.8.–17.8.1979 [Report of discussion between delegation of MfS GDR and the II Directorate SNB in Prague on 16.8.–17.8.1979], in SSA, MV-OBZ, 19324/1; Mezinárodní terorismus – zápis z porady s představitelem MV MLR s. plk. Wargou [International terrorism – minutes of meeting with representative of the MI HPR Comrade Col. Warga], 25.4.1981, in SSA, MV-H, H-720-4. See Návrh na agenturně-operativní kombinaci v akci ‘BAK’ [Proposal for agentoperational combination in Operation ‘BAK’], vol. 16987, 23.8.1979, in SSA, MV-KR, 728019 MV. See Vystoupení vedoucího delegace Výboru pro státní bezpečnost SSSR [Presentation of the Head of Delegation of the KGB USSR], Prague, 3.-5.4.1979, in SSA, coll. XIV Directorate SNB (henceforth A 28), 1; Доклад руководителя делегации КГБ СССР [Presentation of the Head of Delegation of the KGB USSR], Varna, 24.-27.11.1987, in SSA, A 34/1, 969. Richterová, Anxious Host.

CChapter 7 HUNGARIAN STATE SECURITY AND INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM IN THE 1980s* Balázs Orbán-Schwarzkopf

Introduction No country in the world is eager to let its citizens look into the secret service documents. This truism also counts for Hungary, but the political transition in 1989/90 created an opportunity for the victims of communist terror to access information. For this purpose, the Historical Office, the predecessor of the present Historical Archives of the Hungarian State Security, was established in 1997. These archives are specialized in preserving the already declassified secret service documents from 1944 to 1990, which were made available not only to the victims but also to researchers by the Hungarian National Assembly. Based on this trove of primary sources, this chapter attempts to gain insights into the relations of Hungarian State Security with international terrorist actors during the last decade of the Hungarian People’s Republic. It will address the question whether state security gave active or passive support to terrorist organizations, outline how and why Hungarian counterterrorism developed from a small group into a large department in the span of a mere decade and demonstrate how Hungary itself increasingly became a target of international terrorists during the 1980s. However, the sources available in the Historical Archives of the Hungarian State Security for research in the field of terrorism are fragmentary. One cause is the number of overlaps between the security situation in Hungary before and after the political transition. Suffice it to say that the West German RAF, a terrorist group which had its heyday in the 1970s and the 1980s, was suspected to be behind the attack in Budapest on 23 December 1991 against Russian Jews who wanted to emigrate to Israel.1 Another example is the 1998 explosion of a car bomb in the centre of Budapest, for which the Grey Wolves were probably responsible. The Turkish terrorist group likely wanted to intimidate a former Egyptian army

*  I have to thank Adrian Hänni, who made a significant contribution to the writing of this chapter.

124

Terrorism in the Cold War

officer. Earlier, explosives had been placed outside a Turkish restaurant.2 As will be discussed in this chapter, a group connected to the Grey Wolves had appeared in Hungary already in the early 1980s.3 Another major cause of difficulties is the fact that documents on terrorism were made not only by state security but, depending on different business deals, events or criminal cases, also by the police, the army, the border guard, the customs and finance guard and, of course, by the ruling Hungarian Socialist Workers’ Party. However, these documents are either still not declassified or have not been explored yet. Therefore, the findings of this article are to a certain degree preliminary and represent a beginning rather than the conclusion of research into the subject. In fact, this article constitutes the first academic investigation of the relations between Hungarian state actors and international terrorism.

Counterterrorism The Global Terrorism Database of the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START) at the University of Maryland lists no less than 40,998 acts of terrorism throughout the world between 1970 and 1989. In these violent acts more than 75,000 people died.4 From the mid-1970s terrorism started increasing in Hungary as well. Section 261 of the criminal code, which came into force in 1978, already specified the legal provisions of terrorist acts and hijackings of airborne vehicles, and even considered the preparation of such acts to be a crime. In 1979 the internal security agencies of nine socialist countries met in Prague to discuss the issue.5 In the same year the leaders of the Hungarian Ministry of Interior, that is, first the deputy minister and then the minister himself, dealt with the issue. At the time, the ministry’s III Main Group Directorate comprising the civilian intelligence services (state security) routinely collaborated with the National Police Headquarters and considered terrorism a state security task. According to the pursuant order of the interior minister: ‘To prevent, reconnoitre, impede and terminate acts of terrorism is a fundamental political and official duty of the whole personnel of the Ministry of Interior.’6 On the basis of this order it was the responsibility of State Security Department III/II-8 to coordinate and technically control the involved sections of the Ministry of the Interior, but beside the Departments III/I, III/III and III/ IV, other Departments of III/II also carried out similar tasks, specified as follows: reconnaissance of the methods and means used by terrorists, impeding members and equipment from getting into the country, finding Hungarian and foreign citizens connected to terrorists, defending the potentially targeted assets, impeding and terminating acts of terrorism with the lowest possible risk, and aiming for international coordination. International coordination took place especially with Eastern bloc countries, but cooperation with Western countries also happened.7 For example, the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) has regularly conducted training for Hungarian authorities since 1982.8 In the early 1980s, the whole structure of state security had to be reorganized due to the growing number



7. Hungarian State Security and International Terrorism 

125

of tasks. This reorganization affected counterintelligence and counterterrorism. The previous Department III/II-8 was divided into two departments: Department III/II-9 dealt with quests and warrants, whereas the former sub-departments III/II-8-B and C were reorganized as Department III/II-10 and charged with controlling terrorism and tourism. Within Department III/II-10, sub-department III/II-10-A was responsible for counterterrorism. A total of sixteen people were to be employed there in 1983.9 In order to get better and more intelligence, state security engaged about one thousand secret officers, mainly in the fields of tourism and youth protection, among scholarship holders and Hungarian communities abroad. In counterintelligence, the strictly secret officer was a professional police officer provided with an undercover job in a civil workplace. A network of about 100 to 120 officers was responsible for the reconnaissance of terrorism.10 However, reconnaissance was not the exclusive job of strictly secret officers. According to a report from 1987, at the end of 1986 about 150 strictly secret officers were supported by a network of about 700 secret informants in the field of tourism alone. However, reconnaissance of terrorism was only part of their duties: there were only sixty-five to seventy people in the network who were recruited specifically in connection with terrorism, 40 to 45 per cent of whom came from countries supporting terrorism.11 It is also known that Hungarian counterintelligence recruited twelve foreign citizens in 198312 and fourteen of them in 1984, but only one person was recruited for counterterrorism each year.13 The members of the network were not recruited directly from terrorist organizations, but, rather, from their peripheries. One of the most efficient ways of recruiting foreign citizens was by threatening them with withdrawal of their residence permits. Additionally, in the late 1980s so-called ‘relations of trust’ were formed with people connected to the leaders of terrorist organizations who were not part of the informants’ network. Hence, the activities of these groups could be influenced through them, while information about the organizations could be obtained at the same time as well. Naturally, these relations were confidential.14 Complementary to these efforts, a committee called ‘Erod’ (Fortress) was set up in 1982. Apart from gathering data in a systematic way – a task that, as outlined in this chapter, was carried out primarily by a unit within Hungarian counterintelligence – ‘Erod’ was also responsible for executive tasks. Its leader was the deputy head of state security (the Department leader of III/II), and his deputy was the deputy head of the National Police responsible for public security and transportation. The committee was constituted by members from different fields of the Ministry of Interior, including the head of the Border Guard Corps, the deputy head of the Republic Guard Regiment, the General Deputy of the Head of the Fire Services, the deputy head of Division I (Ministry of the Interior financial and material office department), the head of the Criminal Investigation Department of the National Police Headquarters as well as the head of the Section for Procedural Tasks within Department III/II. ‘Erod’ was in charge of preventing attacks against state and party leaders, and also had to defend foreign delegations, diplomats and political refugees while they were in Hungary. Furthermore, the committee was responsible for protecting some well-known public figures and a certain group of

126

Terrorism in the Cold War

Hungarian citizens. Another high priority task was to ensure that important public events would carry on uninterrupted, and that foreign representations, prioritized facilities, industrial plants as well as transport and communal infrastructure would be protected and defended or taken back if attacked. Another major responsibility was the prevention of violent border transgressions. However, ‘Erod’ was also responsible for keeping a watchful eye on the wellknown and lesser-known figures of international terrorism. For this purpose its officials were tasked with gathering a wide range of information – including information on terrorist acts, organizations and members – elaborating possible countermeasures, adapting to and applying the practical and theoretical novelties in the field, contemplating the creation of new methods and establishing and modifying the legal standards. The committee also had the authority to initiate a meeting of the leaders of the Ministry of Interior. It held a meeting at least once every six months, but obviously, if required by the circumstances, it could meet more often.15

Intelligence gathering By the early 1980s several well-known terrorist organizations had gained a foothold in Hungary. In 1984, the Hungarian internal security agencies received information with varying degrees of quality and detail about 250 radical groups or groups belonging to terrorist organizations. In 1985, more than three hundred groups were being watched. Each year the agencies were sent reports by different sources about eighty terrorist groups, referring to activities that could directly influence the People’s Republic of Hungary or other socialist countries. By 1987, the agencies of the Ministry of the Interior obtained ‘thoroughly deep’ data regarding thirty-five terrorist organizations, compared to thirty in 1984. The most important were the Organization of International Revolutionaries (OIR) led by Carlos, ANO, the Grey Wolves and the Muslim Brotherhood. Altogether, there were five confidential investigations regarding international terrorism between 1980 and 1984. The cases with the codenames ‘Nehéz’ (Heavy), dealing with the Grey Wolves, and ‘Gránátos’ (Grenadier), dealing with ANO, have been partially studied and published.16 ‘Nehéz’ was originally started not only to track the activities of the Grey Wolves in Hungary but also to collect intelligence on the Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia (ASALA), because after the first reports on ‘Nehéz’ – including information on an Armenian carrier business owner by the name of Saral Atalay – state security mistakenly thought that ASALA terrorists had set foot in Hungary.17 Aiming to liberate Western Armenia and unify it with Eastern (Soviet) Armenia, ASALA planned its attacks primarily against Turkish targets, but the range of assaults was extended to the Turkish assets in socialist countries. In September 1982, a successful attack was carried out against the Turkish consul in the Bulgarian city of Burgas. Then, in March 1983, the Turkish ambassador in Belgrade was attacked,18 after the perpetrators had reached Belgrade via Hungary.19



7. Hungarian State Security and International Terrorism 

127

‘Gránátos’ may be identified as Saker Selim Daud, who tested the vigilance of the border guards when he tried to cross the border, armed, in May 1980. Saker Daud’s investigative dossier (V-investigation dossier) can be found in the Historical Archives of State Security,20 but not the dossier of his case with the codename ‘Gránátos’ (O-operational dossier),21 which included eight people characterized as ‘other’ kinds of enemy. Most of them were Jordanian citizens.22 It seems that they were members of ANO. As to the case with the codename ‘Likvidátor’ (Liquidator), we know only that in March 1983 a rich Libyan merchant living in Hungary was unsuccessfully blackmailed in the name of Abu Nidal. The Libyan was prompted to give one million dollars as a ‘contribution to the revolution’. In the end, it turned out that the blackmail was the action of a single individual and that Abu Nidal had nothing to do with it.23 Likewise, there is no trace of the files of the ‘Világforradalom Karjai’ group led by Carlos (OIR) with the codename ‘C-79’. The portraits of members of ‘C-79’, Hungarian-language documents from the holdings of the Polish Institute of National Remembrance,24 can be found on the Hamvas Institute’s website.25 The fifth confidential investigation carried the codename ‘T-82’. Its protagonist was the Jordanian Mohamed Fares Baddad, whom the Soviet KGB suspected of being a founding member of the Black September Organization, which became infamous for the hostage-taking of Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics.26 For this reason, Baddad was put on the prohibited list in 1980 and thus banned from travelling to Hungary. In July 1982, the first secretary of the Central Committee of the Hungarian Socialist Workers’ Party received an anonymous letter. Therein, Baddad protested against the Hungarian authorities’ procedures concerning Arab people and threatened to carry out attacks in the name of a certain Arab Revolution/Liberation Vanguard Organization against national or international Hungarian assets if the Hungarian state did not change its practice in a minimum period of time. Since the handwritten letter was posted under a pseudonym at a public post office in Sofia on 5 July, the Bulgarian authorities were consulted as well. A comparison of scripts and the electrostatic method revealed Baddad as the possible perpetrator. Meanwhile, it turned out that the Arab Revolution/Liberation Vanguard Organization was not known. Since Baddad was previously related to another terrorist group, a confidential investigation was started to know more about him. The investigation concluded that Baddad either had not been related to Black September or was a rather simple cheat, who had tried to use his alleged information to get some money in 1974. The probable motivation for his action was also identified: after 1972 Baddad had lived in Hungary for a while with his Hungarian wife and two children. According to the core assessment regarding his wife, they moved together to Baddad’s place in Kuwait in 1978, then for a short time to the United Arab Emirates. But the family could not stand the climate, so the wife came home to Hungary with the two children. However, the banned Baddad could not return.27 His wife appealed to the Hungarian authorities, but she was turned down every time. Then, in 1982, after listening in on the conversation between husband and wife, the suspicion of corruption arose regarding an

128

Terrorism in the Cold War

employee of the Department of Alien Control at the Ministry of the Interior.28 In order to clear himself, Baddad was allowed to come to Hungary, which he did in December 1982. But his cooperation with the authorities was not satisfactory at all. For example, he tried to persuade one of his Egyptian acquaintances living in Hungary – who in the meantime had become an occasional informer of the state security agencies – to verify that he was not in Sofia when the letter was posted. Information obtained with regulation 3/e (eavesdropping in rooms) proved that Baddad expected enhanced control from the Hungarian authorities. Therefore, he had left some of his luggage in Italy. After being expelled from Hungary on 24 January 1983, he appeared in India, where he first published an article with personal details describing the Hungarian procedure against a homeless Palestinian, which, in his opinion, was an infringement on his human rights. The article was followed by a complaint handed in at the Hungarian Embassy in India.29 Later, information about an alleged group of the Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, whose activities centred on Hungary and the elimination of Libyan dissidents, was compiled in file ‘T-87’. Hungarian state security additionally tried to gather intelligence on the radical Islamist Hezbollah as well as on the Western European terrorist groups RAF, Action Directe and the Basque separatist organization Euskadi Ta Askatasuna (ETA). In 1988, another confidential investigation called ‘Mandula’ (Almond), was started to investigate the Japanese Red Army.30 The cases with the codenames ‘Bárdi’, ‘Skorpió’ (Scorpion) and ‘Alex’, on the other hand, were only marginally connected to terrorism. They were concerned with the collection of information on Syrian intelligence activities in Hungary.31 By 1989, research and analysis concerning the four cases ‘C-79’, ‘N-86’, ‘T-87’ and Hezbollah were still ongoing.32 Between 1984 and 1986 there were altogether eighty-six cases where regulation 3/a (domestic interception) was used for a total of 3251 days by counterintelligence and counterterrorism. Regulation 3/e (eavesdropping in rooms) was applied thirty-three times, with a total of 695 days of watching, regulation 3/r (watching with cameras) was used four times, 3/z (secret infiltration) thirty-five times and regulation 3/f (taking photos of documents) was applied forty-one times. ‘K’ checking (filtering postal services) was ordered forty-three times, and the ‘Boomerang’, a technique to trace back threatening phone calls, was applied thirtyfive times. In 1984 there were thirty-nine such calls, and the ‘Boomerang’ was used seven times with marginal success: four times the identification of the caller failed and three times the threads led to public phone boxes. In 1985, there were forty-three threatening calls, with the ‘Boomerang’ being applied fifteen times, failing nine times and being successful on six occasions, but four times the trail led only to public phone boxes. In 1986, the number of threatening calls suddenly increased to 102. But the ‘Boomerang’ seems to have been more effective, as from twenty-one cases only three failed and eighteen were successful, thirteen of which led to public phone boxes.33 From January 1986 onwards, the state security agencies had 24 hour surveillance on the citizens of thirty-one specific countries considered to pose an increasing



7. Hungarian State Security and International Terrorism 

129

risk of terrorism when they entered Hungary. The data gained in this process shows that 3200 people from those countries were on average staying in Hungary on any given day in 1986. Most of them were Turkish nationals.34 One of the means to keep records of terrorists was the so-called Filing System of Data on the Enemy or SOUD as abbreviated in Russian. SOUD was created after lengthy preparations on 29 December 1977. In fact, it was an electronic filing system where the countries of the Eastern Bloc could upload their data. As for the Hungarian state security, the Departments III/I and III/II entered their data on 57 people until 1981.35 However, the system was not at all perfect. Even as late as 1987 it was seen as difficult to use, and feeding the database was not considered a priority task. This could have several causes,36 such as the fact that intelligence agencies are often reluctant to share painfully obtained information among themselves.37 Hungarian authorities also expelled, banned and ran criminal procedures against individuals associated with terrorism. Department III/II-10 and the Action Subsection of the Police Headquarters in Budapest conducted joint raids every three months among the Turks and Arabs, as an effective method of forcing people out of the country. Those with fake documents were arrested and, as a result, fifty-five mainly Turkish people were expelled with their names being put on the prohibited list. Infraction procedures were initiated against thirty-five people, and criminal procedures were started against four people. However, because criminal procedures took a long time, the perpetrators, who remained at large due to the fact that their cases were not very severe, could continue their illegal activities.38 These circumstances could also explain why one of the target persons of the confidential investigation with the codename ‘Nehéz’ was active until the end of the procedure against him.39

Sanctuary In the 1970s and 1980s, Hungary was a temporary refuge for Basque, Turkish, Kurdish, Irish, Palestinian, Japanese, French, Italian, Arab and Armenian terrorists, among others.40 Despite the surveillance, some groups tried to set up their bases in Hungary and operate from there. One example is the rightist Indian Anand Marg, whose activists spread their ideas among foreign students studying in Hungary. Some Hungarian students were even ready to embrace them. Also, Sikh terrorists sometimes threatened the Budapest office of Air India. The Turkish Grey Wolves, in turn, have been fighting for the unification of the Turkic peoples, living in countries as dispersed as Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, the Soviet Union and China. A booklet of archival sources published by the Hamvas Institute in 2016 with the title Szürkék és farkasok a vörös árnyékában (‘Greys and Wolves in the Shadow of the Red’) reveals that a group connected to the Grey Wolves appeared in Hungary in the early 1980s. After the military takeover in Turkey in September 1980, they had to move their base first from Turkey to Bulgaria and then, after the assassination attempt against Pope John Paul II on 13 May 1981, to Hungary and Romania. Supposedly, the group was involved in the business

130

Terrorism in the Cold War

transactions between the countries of the Soviet-led Comecon and some Middle Eastern countries. These business transactions included weapons deliveries from the Comecon countries to Arab countries and organizations, which were paid for with drugs shipped to Bulgaria through Turkish and Greek go-betweens.41 Like the Grey Wolves, the group of the Venezuelan terrorist Ilich Ramirez Sanchez, better known as ‘Carlos the Jackal’, found sanctuary in Hungary for several years. The Hungarian authorities allowed Carlos to run his headquarters in Budapest during the first half of the 1980s and to operate from Hungarian soil. However, Hungary was a reluctant host. State security kept the group under close surveillance in the context of its confidential investigation ‘C-79’ and unsuccessfully tried to persuade Carlos to leave. After the Carlos group’s bombing of Radio Free Europe (RFE) in Munich in February 1981, Hungarian intelligence services set up operational liaison with their counterparts from the German Democratic Republic (GDR) and Czechoslovakia with the objective of coordinating the curtailing of Carlos’ activities on the territories of the socialist states and to push the group out. Against the backdrop of US pressure, Carlos and his comrades-in-arms were finally driven from Hungarian territory in 1985 and from then on, the most important task of ‘C-79’ was to prevent the return of the Carlos group.42 The Palestinian terrorist group ANO, led by Sabri Khalil al-Banna alias Abu Nidal, had likewise maintained a base in Hungary and also used the People’s Republic as a recruiting ground. ANO was keeping the Palestinians and generally Arabs, especially students, living in Hungary under surveillance and recruited some of them. Furthermore, the group watched the activities and methods of the Hungarian authorities and tried to form some relations with them. Another characteristic of ANO’s operations in the socialist republic was to temporarily bring families to Hungary before they were moved to their country of destination and given assignments. From 1980 on a first investigation of ANO was run codenamed ‘Gránátos’. Likely as a result of US pressure, state security eventually initiated a second confidential investigation of ANO in 1986. The purpose of the investigation codenamed ‘N-86’ was to eliminate ANO’s base in Hungary and to displace the group by peaceful means.43 In 1986 a state security report explained that ‘it is also a problem that we have little information on the Western European terrorist groups and their activities [rightist and ultra- leftist organizations like the ETA and the Red Brigades]’.44 This assessment is supported by the fact that no counterterrorism files were compiled on groups such as the IRA or the Red Brigades. Accordingly, it is unlikely that West European terrorist groups received significant active support from Hungarian intelligence services. Another result of this lack of intelligence on West European organizations is that we have so far only scattered evidence regarding their use of Hungarian soil as a sanctuary. There is some data suggesting that members of the Italian Red Brigades visited Hungary. Abu Daoud, a Palestinian terrorist who was known for his leading role in the attack on the Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics, wanted to return to Hungary, one of his favoured recreational locations, after he had been attacked



7. Hungarian State Security and International Terrorism 

131

in Warsaw in 1981. There, he intended to meet some friends, whom the Hungarian authorities suspected of being members of the Red Brigades.45 Just as interesting is the fact that a Hungary-based mafia group with Turkish, Kurdish and Armenian connections linked to the Grey Wolves – and under the confidential investigation codenamed ‘Nehéz’ – maintained relations with the Italian terrorist group, which was given arms through the Grey Wolves.46 A 1984 report states: ‘The state security organizations have the information that the [mafia] group has connections with the following terrorist organizations: the Italian “Red Brigades” and the Turkish “Grey Wolves”.’47 In addition, the Red Brigades commando involved in the kidnapping and, later, the assassination of the former Italian prime minister Aldo Moro in March 1978 used a Hungarian-made pistol, which, allegedly, had originally been delivered by Hungary to the Egyptian police.48 Another piece of raw intelligence suggesting the presence of Western European terrorists emerged at the beginning of April 1985. A masseur of the Hotel Flamenco in Budapest who was a Hungarian agent reported that a covered tennis court of the hotel was regularly used by the members of a Western European terrorist group with Belgian passports and cars.49 When the trial against the French terrorist group Action Directe started on 11 January 1988, the French authorities had prepared two versions of the indictment. One of them claimed the existence of documents proving the collaboration of Action Directe with the Bulgarian and Soviet secret services. The second, so-called ‘Arabic’ version, in turn, implicated not only Libya, Syria and Palestinian actors but also mentioned that Hungary was connected with the French terrorist organization – as a transit country, where terrorists could have a rest. Certain French personalities believed that the second version could have been included in the indictment, and the French minister of foreign affairs Jean-Bernard Raimond even postponed his trip to Budapest at that time.50 While further research is thus needed on whether Hungary tacitly or even explicitly allowed Western European terrorists to use its territory as a safe haven, there is some evidence that Hungarian authorities had no inclination to overtly provide sanctuary to Western terrorist groups. An intelligence report of September 1986 maintains that a Basque terrorist called Salegki-Urbieta and two of his companions, all of whom were in prison in France at that time, had written a letter asking Hungary for political asylum or a permanent residence permit. The reason for the Basques’ request was their fear that, once having served their sentences, the French authorities would expel them to Spain, where they would have to face another trial. The addressee of the letter, the Hungarian Embassy in Paris, did not reply to the application because of the political sensitivity of the case.51

Hungarian state support for terrorist actors Generally, the terrorists Hungarian state security was preoccupied with were assisted mainly by Iraq, Libya, Syria and the PDRY. These countries provided them with financial and technical support, bases, cover documents and also used them

132

Terrorism in the Cold War

as proxy forces. In Europe, their main supporters were Yugoslavia and Romania. Some organizations could build bases there, while the host countries would sometimes ask them to carry out certain tasks. The German Democratic Republic (GDR), in turn, provided some help to certain leftist and Palestinian groups.52 The available documents tell us little about the support Hungary provided to terrorist actors, and evidence that Hungarian state actors directly supported terrorist activities therefore remains thin. When in the late 1970s the Western press published news about guerrilla training in Hungary, the deputy minister of the interior ordered the civil secret service to investigate the claims. As a result, a brief report was prepared which concluded that the article was not groundless. After negotiations in March 1979, the Palestine Liberation Front (PLF) led by Abu Abbas (Muhammad Zaidan) was given Hungarian weapons free of charge, among them T-34 tanks, which, however, had been considered out of date already at the time of the 1956 revolution. As a part of the agreement, a total of forty-four armed Palestinians were taught how to use the tanks in Verpelét, and in Szabadszállás they were trained in their maintenance.53 Then they returned home to continue their fight in different Palestinian organizations. Lebanese and Israeli observers appeared several times at the training locations, a fact that makes it likely that information had been leaked. The Palestinians tended not to care about operational security and as a result even the locals knew what was going on. Obviously, the tanks and the corresponding training were not destined for terrorist operations but for more conventional warfare. The Hungary-based activities of the PLF were being watched in the case codenamed ‘Barco’ to prevent any potential action against Hungary. The PLF was most infamous for the hijacking of the cruise ship Achille Lauro off the Mediterranean coast of Egypt on 7 October 1985. A short time after the attack Abu Abbas was said to be hiding in Hungary and according to some information he intended to stay there for a longer period. When he arrived in Hungary, one of his comrades-in-arms was already waiting for him. As it turned out, the PLF had a permanent agent in the country. As Abu Abbas was soon forced out of Hungary, the confidential investigation focused on watching those militants who remained. By 1989, the case codenamed ‘Barco’ was closed. Hence, the Hungary–PLF relationship was not unambiguous. While the PLF was provided with weapons and training, state security feared that the group could turn violently against its sponsor and tried to keep it under close surveillance. Further, Abu Abbas’s presence in Hungary was not tolerated after the Achille Lauro incident, presumably because the risk of public embarrassment was considered too high. Another possible case of collusion deserves mentioning. Partly taking over from an article of the French weekly news magazine L’Express,54 the journalist Gábor Mezo writes that Alain Frilet claimed in his testimony at the second trial of Carlos in 2011 that he, as a member of the Irish Republican Army (IRA), participated in a transaction where at a Hungarian army base Hungarian soldiers loaded his car with weapons and accompanied him as far as the Yugoslavian border.55 According to the documents stored on the website of the Hamvas Institute, Frilet can be connected to the Carlos group as well.56 Additionally, a state security report



7. Hungarian State Security and International Terrorism 

133

from spring 1984 provides the following analysis: ‘The terrorist group to which “Carlos” tries to give a leading role has different levels of relations with a number of extremist organizations (the Basque “ETA”, the West German “Revolutionäre Zellen”, the Greek “ELA” and “November 17”, the Columbian “M-19”, the Irish “IRA”, the Italian “Red Brigades” and other terrorist groups working in Switzerland and France).’57 In his article, Mezo further argues that the Hungarian security services described the case as if the IRA had received the weapons from Carlos, who was headquartered in Budapest, but Frilet denied that claim. An interesting fact is that the IRA had at least one Hungarian member. Péter Kékes had been known to the authorities long before. In February 1953, at the age of fourteen, he tried to escape from the country to Yugoslavia through the Drava River. He was still in Pécs, when a plain-clothes policeman checked his identity in Népbüfé (Buffet) No.1 because of a previously issued warrant and subsequently handed him over to state security. During the following hearings he said that he was an apprentice and that he had organized the escape with his companions, who later had given up.58 According to his core assessment, Kékes was adventurous by nature and was often hit by his parents.59 Data found in the EGPR (unified computer-based filing system of the state security organizations) system reveals that in 1954 Kekes was sentenced to one year of imprisonment for his attempt to escape, and for cheating and embezzling social properties. But since he was a juvenile, he received an exemption from the disadvantageous legal consequences. In 1956, he finally left the country. A 1967 requisition says that Kekes had been on the prohibited list since 1964 as he was in jail in England at that time.60 In 1987, a Daily Operative Information Report stated that Kekes was serving a ten-year prison term, because he had participated in a terrorist act as a member of the IRA. He regularly wrote letters from the prison to keep in touch with his sister living in Nagykanizsa as well as with some other relatives. Therein he expressed his intention to return to Hungary, and he also mentioned that some of his IRA friends wanted to visit the country. He had already applied for repatriation to different state and party organizations but his petitions were always rejected.61 In one case at least, an apparent request for weapons from a Western European terrorist group was turned down. A report dated 2 October 1984 says that a few weeks earlier a man claiming to be a representative of ETA, the Basque terrorist group, visited the Hungarian Embassy in Brussels. He wanted to get some weapons for his organization. Although an employee of the embassy told him that diplomatic installations had no part in the arms trade, the man did not leave and wrote down his intentions. He asked to be informed about the embassy’s answer in a conspiratorial way. Since the embassy refused, the man promised to return in three to four weeks’ time. The report also mentions that the man did not go to the foreign representation of any other socialist country.62 On 5 October 1984 at 9.00 a.m. the man reappeared and when he was turned down again ‘he seemed to be rather disappointed’. For that reason, intelligence officials thought that it had not been a provocation. The same document also mentions that the previously introduced security measures at the embassy had to be carried on because of a certain Basque–Belgian conflict.63

134

Terrorism in the Cold War

Hungary as a terrorist target Contrary to widespread belief, Hungary was at least as much a target of terrorist organizations as it supported their activities. On average, Hungarian citizens were attacked, provoked or threatened by terrorists 266 times per year between 1977 and 1983.64 Between 1985 and 1986, Hungarian foreign representations and their employees were attacked or threatened at least twenty times.65 However, not only diplomats but also employees of companies connected to the international transport of goods and people, such as Malév Hungarian Airlines, the Hungarian Shipping Plc and Hungarocaimon could easily become targets. Other business targets were attacked as well, for example, when two Hungarian land surveyors were kidnapped by Iraqi Kurds in 1982 and later reappeared somewhere in Iran.66 Another case is the 1985 bomb attack against the Vienna Central Wechsel Bank, which was partly owned by Hungary. Nine Austrian citizens were injured in this attack. Finally, some terrorist attacks were carried out on Hungarian soil against representations of foreign states. An eminent example is the shooting of the Colombian ambassador in Budapest, Enrique Parejo, on 13 January 1987. The attack was connected to drug-related crimes. Parejo, who had served as minister of justice before his ambassadorship in Hungary, was hit by five bullets and was seriously wounded.67 Starting in late 1983, Hungary came into the crosshairs of Shia extremists. On 31 December 1983, a white Mercedes stopped in front of the Hungarian Embassy in Beirut at about noon. One of the two militants sitting in the car out took his gun and attacked the security guard of the embassy, who was in the process of taking the ambassador’s car to the garage. Instead, he was forced to hand over the car keys. Although the police were not able to catch the perpetrators, the Shia organization AMAL68 was soon under suspicion. The car was supposedly brought to Syria and, in fact, information of Soviet intelligence services shows that the Syrian secret services were also involved in stealing vehicles in Beirut.69 On 7 March 1984 unidentified armed men took another car from the Hungarian Embassy. The procedure was exactly the same as two months before. With Bulgaria (1 car) and the Soviet Union (6 cars), other socialist countries were likewise affected by car thefts.70 On 5 April 1984, the Hungarian Embassy in Kuwait received a bomb threat in the name of the Organization of Islamic Alliance, which had previously attacked the US Embassy in Beirut. During the subsequent search of the building, it turned out that the Kuwaiti security services did not have the necessary equipment and hence did not find any explosives. However, an employee of the Soviet Embassy reported that their embassy in Tehran was sent a letter with almost identical content.71 Experience showed that similar warnings had usually been followed by serious action.72 From 1984 on, the more radical Hezbollah, organized as a result of Israel’s invasion of Lebanon in 1982, took over the role of attacking Hungarian targets from AMAL, which tried to establish peaceful relations with the socialist countries. The Hungarian authorities seem to have been informed about the formation of



7. Hungarian State Security and International Terrorism 

135

Hezbollah only in November 1984, by Palestinians coming to Hungary.73 On 26 March 1986, members of the Iran-backed Hezbollah kidnapped a Lebanese citizen working for Hungarian Airlines in Beirut. The airline paid half a million Lebanese pounds for the kidnapped man, who was set free ten days later and even got back his stolen car.74 According to a document dated February 1987, Hezbollah had then been keeping the Hungarian Embassy in Beirut under surveillance for a long time and was planning to kidnap the ambassador and steal the records kept in the embassy.75 The planned operation was justified by the fact that Israel was represented at the Budapest Agricultural Exposition as an independent exhibitor. The Hungarian authorities were probably informed beforehand, considering that the embassy was closed in January 1987. An intelligence report from March 1987, at least, claims that Hezbollah was directly responsible for the closure of the embassy.76 In fall 1986, a state security report alerted Hungarian authorities that two Kuwaitis intended to carry out an action against a Hungarian Airlines flight from Budapest to Kuwait on 11 September 1986. Employees of the Ministry of the Interior together with an informant of Arab origin tried to find the possible perpetrators personally at the airport of Ferihegy-2.77 In the end, however, the information was proven to be false. In January 1987 the building of the Hungarian Embassy in Aden was shot at.78 The currently available documents suggest that this incident was connected to the long-running shadow war between Iran and several countries, including Hungary, in the 1980s. On 11 May 1987, the central office of Hungarian Airlines in Kuwait blew up at 7.30 p.m. local time. This was no accident, as investigations would later reveal. When some local cleaning staff opened the door of the office, a detonator went off killing one person.79 There are several possible explanations for the attack, on which the Kuwaiti authorities ordered a media blackout. According to the representative of Hungarian Airlines in Kuwait the reason for the attack was that Hungary hosted the World Jewish Congress Executive Committee meeting of 6–8 May 1987.80 It is also possible that Hungarian Airlines was not the intended target: at the same time, the US Deputy Secretary of State was negotiating in the area. Likewise, the Rashid Shipping Company, which maintained good relations with the Soviet Union and rented tankers for oil deliveries, had its seat near the location of the detonation or, according to some reports, even in the same building.81 Moreover, the Kuwaiti branch of Hungarian Airlines shared the building with Japan Airlines (JAL) and the US Trans World Airlines (TWA).82 However, the most likely explanation is that Iran had strategically targeted Hungary through a terrorist proxy. While State Security Department III/I concluded that the method of operation and the strength of the detonation suggested a group supported by Iran, Palestinian sources in Damascus reported that the operation had been accomplished by the Shia organization Dawa, supported by Iranian special services. Dawa, which had started its activity near the Iraqi cities of Basra and Karbala, had branches in Tehran, Beirut and Damascus. Apart from putting Islamic fundamentalist pressure on Saddam Hussein’s regime, the Dawa militants tried to intimidate socialist countries that had been giving

136

Terrorism in the Cold War

significant aid to Iraq.83 Dawa had a history of terrorist operations in Kuwait and it was also through Kuwait that some of the Hungarian weapons reached Iraq, a country that was under an arms embargo at the time. Iran seems to have obtained some results with its terrorist proxy strategy: a month after the explosion of the Kuwaiti branch of Malév in May 1987, the Technika Foreign Trade Company, which was dealing in arms, prepared a military chemical protection demonstration in Iran together with some other Hungarian companies. In the end, the show could not be held because the Islamic Revolutionary Guard, a law enforcement, military and national security corps responsible for defending the constitution and controlled directly by the supreme religious leader, thwarted it and confiscated the products already taken to Iran for that purpose.84 There were some previous instances when Iran wanted to purchase arms from the socialist countries, mainly through Syria. But it seems that until 1985 the Soviet Union did not sell military equipment directly to Tehran. In 1985, according to a Hungarian state security memorandum, Iran wanted to order 500 T-72 tanks from Czechoslovakia, but despite the urgent Iranian demand the Czechoslovak Communist Party thought that only fifty tanks could be delivered per year.85 We do not know whether Hungary delivered war materiel to Iran in the aftermath of the Islamic Revolution in 1979, but it certainly did so at the turn of 1987–88.86 Therefore, it seems likely that a broader strategy was at work behind the outlined explosions and attacks against business and diplomatic properties, with Iran successfully using terrorist proxies to put pressure on Hungary. Besides the Middle East, Hungarian interests also became a terrorist target in South America. On 15 October 1986, the driver of the Hungarian commercial representation in Peru found a menacing letter in the representation’s letter box: on one side there were photos (cut from newspapers) of terrorists kept in prison by the Hungarian government with the handwritten words ‘Freedom for our comrades’. On the other side one could read another handwritten sentence: ‘Now it is your turn, and this is an even more excellent point for blowing you up.’ At the end of the letter the signature read ‘MRTA’ for Movimiento Revolucionario Túpac Amaru. In a statement sent earlier to the local media, the MRTA, named after the last Inca ruler executed by the Spanish conquerors, had declared that the group would go on with its organized attacks until the elections in November. Indeed, the MRTA had followed up with action on 14 October.87 Then, on 20 October 1986, a paper package burnt on one side was found in a gap of the fence of the Hungarian Embassy in Lima. As it turned out later, the home-made consignment contained gunpowder and lead shot. The fact that it was burnt showed that it had been lit, but the flames had died out before getting to the explosives.88 As some well-informed Peruvians knew, the leftist terrorist group MRTA had sent threats with similar content to at least fifteen foreign embassies. The Hungarian intelligence agencies, however, were not aware of any bomb attacks against other representations.89 In Hungary itself, state security saw itself confronted with the threat of a terrorist attack when in 1986 a mighty bomb and some handguns were sent for unknown reason from state institutions of an unspecified country in the Middle East to their embassy in Budapest. The bomb was equipped with a timer. State



7. Hungarian State Security and International Terrorism 

137

security experts, who got into the building covertly, defused the bomb. However, the report does not mention how the defusing was carried out. The bomb could not be taken away since such a procedure would have revealed that the Hungarian authorities could enter and leave the embassy building at their will. Exploding the bomb would have been noisy, so the Hungarian officials must have executed some hardly noticeable mechanical modification.90

Conclusion During the 1980s, Hungarian counterterrorism developed from a small group into a large department. At the same time, Hungarian state security’s relations with international terrorist organizations also underwent a profound change. In 1985, the Carlos group was expelled from the country and Abu Abbas was forced out when he tried to hide in Hungary after the Achille Lauro attack. From 1986 onwards, state security also attempted to eliminate ANO’s base in Hungary. Towards the end of the decade, the terrorist groups still tolerated in Hungary, especially those from the Middle East, grew more and more inimical towards the country. That the previous friends slowly became enemies was mainly due to the political changes in Hungary. In the end, the opening towards the West, the obvious improvement in the Hungarian–Israeli relations and at the same time the lessening pressure from the Soviet Union resulted in a growing risk of terrorist attacks against Hungary. The result was further institutional change. A January 1989 report summarizing the work Department III/II had accomplished in 1988 maintains that confidential investigations about terrorist organizations were still done by Department III/II-10,91 but according to a work plan from January 1989, Department III/II-10 dealt only with tourism at that time, while counterterrorist activities became the responsibility of the Counterterrorist Department.92 In the synthesis report of the year 1989, the evaluation of terrorist groups was then attributed to Department III/II-13.93 The extent of change at the end of the 1980s is mirrored in the case of the Japanese Red Army (JRA), which had been quite active in Hungary.94 In 1988 a confidential investigation into the terrorist organization, codenamed ‘Mandula’, was finally initiated.95 In 1989, a member of the JRA who was staying in Hungary got in touch with some Arabs and the intelligence collected by state security showed that they were planning an attack, probably against a non-Hungarian target. The case was thoroughly investigated under the codename ‘Totem’ as a result of a full collaboration between Hungarian, Japanese and South Korean secret services.96

Notes 1 Kenessei István, The Ferihegy attack, Hetek, 20 December 2013, http:​/​/www​​.hete​​k​.hu/​​ hatte​​r​/201​​312​/a​​_feri​​hegyi​​​_mere​​nylet​ (accessed 1 January 2020). 2 Dávid Szakonyi, Grey Wolves in the Budapest Night, Hetek, 1 May 1998, http:​/​/www​​.he​ te​​k​.hu/​​belfo​​ld​/19​​9805/​​szurk​​e​_far​​kasok​​_a​_pe​​​sti​_e​​jszak​​aban (accessed 1 January 2020).

138

Terrorism in the Cold War

3 See a booklet of archival sources published by the Hamvas Institute in 2016 with the title Szürkék és farkasok a vörös árnyékában (‘Greys and Wolves in the Shadow of the Red’). 4 Global Terrorism Database (Data file), National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START), 2017, retrieved from https://www​ .start​.umd​.edu​/gtd (accessed 1 January 2020). 5 Ágnes Hankiss (ed.), Terrorists in Budapest: The Communist State Security Services and Europe (Budapest: Hamvas Institute, 2011), 8–33, https://www.hamvasintezet.hu/ wp-content/uploads/2018/10/TerroristsInBudapest.pdf (accessed 1 January 2020). 6 The interior minister’s Order No. 28/1982 about tasks regarding the prevention and reconnaissance of and measures against terrorist acts, 6 September 1982, 2, in Historical Archives of the Hungarian State Security (henceforth ÁBTL), 4.2. 7 Ibid., 3–4. 8 Balázs Orbán-Schwarzkopf, An Assassination Attempt against the Colombian Ambassador, Betekinto 3 (2017), 2, http:​/​/www​​.bete​​kinto​​.hu​/s​​ites/​​defau​​lt​/fi​​les​/2​​017​​_3​​ _orba​​n​.pdf​ (accessed 15 July 2017). 9 45-13/6/a/83, Suggestion of the Department III/II, 29 April 1983, Annex 3, 1–18, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 10 45-13/4/84, Status report on the implementation of No. 28/1982, BM (Interior Minister) command (about tasks regarding the prevention and reconnaissance of and measures against terrorist acts), and No. 17/1982, BMH (Deputy Interior Minister) measure, additional tasks, Budapest, March 1984, 7–9, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 11 45-13/4/87, Experience of counterterrorism work, additional tasks, 9 March 1987, 10, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 12 Report for the statistics; Report on the network and operative data of 1983: supplement to the statistics report, 3, in ÁBTL 1.11.10, Series 1, Box 3, Dossier Synthesis. 13 Report for the statistics; Report on the network and operative data of 1984: supplement to the statistics report, 3, in ÁBTL 1.11.10, Series 1, Box 3, Dossier Synthesis. 14 40/11-1-11/89, Synthesis report on the Department III/II’s activities in 1989, 22 December 1989, 24, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 15 Order No. 28/1982 (6 September 1982) of the interior minister of the People’s Republic of Hungary about the tasks regarding the prevention and reconnaissance of and measures against terrorist acts, Regulations of the operation of the permanent coordination committee with the codename ‘Erod’ (Fortress), in ÁBTL 4.2. The regulations on ‘Erod’ mention that communication was to be ensured by the Operative Information Centre (OHK) of the Operative Coordination, Control and Secretarial Department of Division III. Order No.1/1984 of the head of the deputy minister of the interior’s secretariat calls OHK the Operative Centre of Information and Action, the predecessor of which was established in 1967. See Order No. 1/1984 (28 May 1984) of the head of the secretariat working for the interior minister’s state security deputy regarding the permanent duty shift system and tasks of the Operative Centre of Information and Action (henceforth OH) belonging to the Secretariat working for the interior minister’s state security deputy, in ÁBTL 4.2. 16 Balázs Orbán-Schwarzkopf, Greys and Wolves in the Shadow of the Red (Budapest: Hamvas Institute, 2016), 26. 17 45-13/4/87, Experience of counterterrorism work, Additional tasks, 9 March 1987, Annex 1, in ÁBTL 1.11.1.



7. Hungarian State Security and International Terrorism 

139

18 Ibid., 8. 19 Orbán-Schwarzkopf, Greys and Wolves, 5. 20 V-162137, Saker Selim Daud and her accomplice, in ÁBTL 3.1.9. 21 O-18499, ‘Gránátos’ (Grenadier), in ÁBTL 3.1.5. 22 Report for the statistics; Report on the network and operative data of 1980: supplement to the statistics report, 2, in ÁBTL 1.11.10, Series 1, Box 3, Dossier Synthesis. 23 45-13/4/84, Status report on the implementation of No. 28/1982, BM (Interior Minister) command (about tasks regarding the prevention and reconnaissance of and measures against terrorist acts), and No. 17/1982, BMH (Deputy Interior Minister) measure, additional tasks, Budapest, March 1984, Annex 2, 4, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 24 Institute of National Remembrance, https://ipn​.gov​.pl​/en (accessed 1 January 2020). 25 ‘C-79’, http:​/​/ham​​vasin​​tezet​​.hu​/u​​pload​​s​/ass​​ets​/f​​i les/​​BU​_0_​​​1304_​​363​.p​​df (accessed 15 July 2017). 26 O-18551, Isa Baddad Mohammed Fares ‘T-82’24 August 1982, 3, in ÁBTL 3.1.5. 27 Ibid., 1 October 1982, 57–8. 28 Ibid., 26 November 1983, 69–70. 29 Ibid., 16 May 1983, 5. 30 40-11/1/89, Synthesis report on the Department III/II’s activities in 1988, 6 January 1989, 15, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 31 40-11/1-24/87, Work plan of the Department III/II for the year 1988, Budapest, 14 January 1988, 19–22, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 32 40-13/2-168/89, Synthesis report on the Department III/II’s activities in 1989, 22 December 1989, 15, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 33 45-13/4/87, Experience of counterterrorism work, additional tasks, 9 March 1987, Annex 2, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 34 Ibid., Annex 3. 35 45-13/9/81, Report on the establishment and operation of the Hungarian subsystem of SOUD, suggestions as to the further tasks, Annex 1: Entering the data, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 36 Gábor Baczoni and István Bikki, Integrated State Security Database: The SOUD, in Trezor 3 (Budapest: ÁBTL, 2003), 217–34, https​:/​/ww​​w​.abt​​l​.hu/​​irato​​k​/cik​​kek​/b​​ac​zon​​ i​_bik​​ki (accessed 1 January 2020). 37 45-13/9/81, Report on the establishment and operation of the Hungarian subsystem of SOUD, suggestions as to the further tasks, 1–8, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 38 45-13/4/87, Experience of counterterrorism work, additional tasks, 9 March 1987, 11, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 39 Orbán-Schwarzkopf, Greys and Wolves, 26. 40 Hungary has remained a refuge for terrorists at least until recently, just like in the days of the Hungarian People’s Republic. One of the perpetrators of the attack in Madrid in March 2004 was the Moroccan Abdulhamijid Bouchar, who according to a recently published article has been living in Hungary for nearly one and a half years using a Syrian passport. See András Dezso, It’s fluke that terrorists only pass through our country, Index, 11 October 2016, http:​/​/ind​​ex​.hu​​/belf​​old​/2​​016​/1​​0​/11/​​tek​_n​​emzet​​ko​ zi_​​megit​​elese​(accessed 1 January 2020). Moreover, some of the perpetrators of the attacks in Paris in November 2015 and in Brussels in March 2016 visited Hungary. Some of them used SIM cards sold by Hungarian companies. See Hungarian SIM cards were used by terrorists, Magyar Idok, 5 October 2016, http:​/​/mag​​yarid​​ok​.hu​​/belf​​ old​/t​​error​​istak​​nak​-j​​utott​​-sim-​​karty​​​akbol​​-1064​​626 (accessed 1 January 2020).

140

Terrorism in the Cold War

41 In 2015, the Islamic State would follow the same scheme with the oil produced in the territories it occupied in Iraq and Syria. See Barbara Thüringer, Islamic State’s Oil Is Sold by the Bulgarian Gas Stations, Index, 1 March 2016, http:​/​/ind​​ex​.hu​​/kulf​​old​/2​​ 016​/0​​3​/01/​​iszla​​m​_all​​am​_be​​nzin_​​bulga​​​ria​_t​​oroko​​rszag​ (accessed 1 January 2020). In the 1980s, the drugs were then spread from Bulgaria to Western Europe, by using Turkish transport companies among others, while the Italian mafia controlled their distribution in the United States. 42 ‘C-79’; Daniela Richterova, The Anxious Host: Czechoslovakia and Carlos the Jackal 1978–1986, The International History Review 40/1 (2018), 108–32; Magdalena Kopp, Die Terrorjahre: Mein Leben an der Seite von Carlos (München: Deutsche VerlagsAnstalt, 2007). 43 O-8-421 ‘Ghaza’, Memorandum about the Abu Nidal Organization (ANO) and its activities, 320–4, in ÁBTL 3.2.5. 44 45-73/2/86, Central Command meeting, evaluation of the work done in 1985, the tasks in 1986, 12 March 1986, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 45 III/I-89-92/97, May 1982, in ÁBTL 2.7.1. 46 Orbán-Schwarzkopf, Greys and Wolves, 13. 47 45-13/4/84, Status report on the implementation of No. 28/1982, BM (Interior Minister) command (about tasks regarding the prevention and reconnaissance of and measures against terrorist acts), and No. 17/1982, BMH (Deputy Interior Minister) measure, additional tasks, Budapest, March 1984, Annex 2, 3, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 48 A-3958, Attila Gergely, Prevention and reconnaissance tasks as well as countermeasures regarding terrorist acts, Lecture notes (non-finalized), Police Academy, Budapest, 1984, 9, in ÁBTL 4.1. 49 III/II-66-67/11, 5 April 1985, in ÁBTL 2.7.1. 50 III/I-11-11/5, 18 January 1988, in ÁBTL 2.7.1. 51 III/I-184-184/13, 19 September 1986, in ÁBTL 2.7.1. 52 45-13/4/84, Status report on the implementation of No. 28/1982, BM (Interior Minister) command (about tasks regarding the prevention and reconnaissance of and measures against terrorist acts), and No. 17/1982, BMH (Deputy Interior Minister) measure, additional tasks, Budapest, March 1984, 2–3, in: ÁBTL 1.11.1. See also the articles by Gordan Akrap and Tobias Wunschik in this publication. 53 III/II-254-301/16, 29 December 1979, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 54 L’IRA n’avait ‘aucune relation’ avec Carlos, selon un ancien member, L’Express, 28 November 2011, http:​/​/www​​.lexp​​ress.​​fr​/ac​​tuali​​tes​/1​​/soci​​ete​/l​​-ira-​​n​-ava​​it​-au​​cune-​​relat​​ ion​-a​​vec​-c​​arlos​​-selo​​n​-un-​​anc​ie​​n​-mem​​bre​_1​​05557​​2​.htm​l (accessed 1 January 2020). 55 Gábor Mezo, Budapest was a terrorist paradise in the 1980s, Pesti Srácok, 28 March 2016, http:​/​/pes​​tisra​​cok​.h​​u​/ter​​roris​​tapar​​adics​​om​-vo​​lt​-bu​​dapes​​t​-nyo​​​lcvan​​as​-ev​​ekben​ (accessed 1 January 2020). 56 ‘C-79’, 143–4. 57 45-13/4/84, Status report on the implementation of No. 28/1982, BM (Interior Minister) command (about tasks regarding the prevention and reconnaissance of and measures against terrorist acts), and No. 17/1982, BMH (Deputy Interior Minister) measure, additional tasks, Budapest, March 1984, Annex 2, 2, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 58 V-110085 Kékes Péter, 3 March 1953, 16, in ÁBTL 3.1.9. 59 Ibid., 25 March 1953, 30. 60 Ibid., 41 (envelope). 61 III/IV-138-156/9, 7 August 1987, in ÁBTL 2.7.1. 62 III/I-193-193/12, 2 October 1984, in ÁBTL 2.7.1.



7. Hungarian State Security and International Terrorism 

141

63 III/I-201-201/8, 12 October 1984, in ÁBTL 2.7.1. 64 A-3958, Gergely, Prevention and reconnaissance tasks as well as countermeasures regarding terrorist acts, Annex 1, 56. 65 45-13/87, The edited version of the commanders’ meeting on 20 March 1987 evaluating the accomplished work in 1986 and establishing the tasks for the year 1987, Department III/II, 5, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 66 Balázs Orbán-Schwarzkopf, Background of a Hostage Crisis, Betekinto 3 (2007), http:​/​ /www​​.bete​​kinto​​.hu​/s​​ites/​​defau​​lt​/fi​​les​/b​​eteki​​nto​-s​​zamok​​/2007​​_3​_or​​ban​​_s​​chwar​​czkop​​f​ .pdf​(accessed 1 January 2020). 67 Colombian Ambassador Shot 5 Times in Budapest, Los Angeles Times, 13 January 1987, http:​/​/art​​icles​​.lati​​mes​.c​​om​/19​​87​-01​​-13​/n​​ews​/m​​n​-445​​3​_1​_​d​​rug​-t​​raffi​​ckers​ (accessed 1 January 2020). 68 The AMAL Movement in Lebanon, Memo, National Foreign Assessment Center, CIA, 20 November 1981, https​:/​/ww​​w​.cia​​.gov/​​libra​​ry​/re​​ading​​room/​​docs/​​CIA​-R​​DP83M​​ 00914​​R0003​​​00020​​014​-6​​.pdf (accessed 1 January 2020). 69 O-8-427 ‘Tiger’, General situation regarding the agents in Lebanon, 3 January 1984, 309, in ÁBTL 3.2.5. 70 O-8-440/1 ‘Asszi’ (Assi), Operative protection of the Hungarian colony in Lebanon, 11 April 1984, 217, in ÁBTL 3.2.5. 71 O-8-572 ‘Tájfun’(Taifun), Country knowledge and general situation regarding the agents in Kuwait, 5 April 1984, 278, in ÁBTL 3.2.5. 72 Ibid., 9 April 1984, 279. 73 O-8-440/1 ‘Asszi’ (Assi), Operative protection of the Hungarian colony in Lebanon, 28 November 1984, 223, in ÁBTL 3.2.5. 74 III/I-60-60/8, 26 March 1986, in ÁBTL 2.7.1. 75 BY/1987, An attack against the Embassy of our country in Beirut, Memorandum, 19 February 1982, 2, in ÁBTL 1.11.4. 76 45-13/4/87, Experience of counterterrorism work, additional tasks, 9 March 1987, 4, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 77 III/II-174, 12 September 1986, in ÁBTL 2.7.1. 78 45-17/22/88, Handout on the current issues of the operative situation (regarding the protection of the economy by the state security and counterterrorism): The presence of international terrorism and the experiences of counterterrorism in the People’s Republic of Hungary, 2–3, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 79 III/II-92, 13 May 1987, in ÁBTL 2.7.1. 80 III/II-92-93/9, 13 May 1987, in ÁBTL 2.7.1. 81 O-8-572 ‘Tájfun’ (Taifun), Country knowledge and general situation regarding the agents in Kuwait, 20 May 1987, 336, in ÁBTL 3.2.5. 82 III/I-93-93/8, 13 May 1987, in ÁBTL 2.7.1. 83 III/I-95-95/9, 15 May 1987, in ÁBTL 2.7.1. 84 III/II-118-119/11, 18 June 1987, in ÁBTL 2.7.1. 85 6-7/716/85, Memorandum on Iran’s armament plans, 30 September 1985, in ÁBTL 2.7.3. 86 Balázs Orbán-Schwarzkopf, India-2: Secret Mission of the Hungarian Cruise Ship, Betekinto 2 (2013), http:​/​/www​​.bete​​kinto​​.hu​/s​​ites/​​defau​​lt​/fi​​les​/b​​eteki​​nto​-s​​zamok​​/20​13​​ _2​_or​​ban​.p​​df (accessed 1 January 2020). 87 III/I-206-207/35, 23 October 1986, in ÁBTL 2.7.1. 88 III/I-207-207/36, 23 October 1986, in ÁBTL 2.7.1. 89 III/I-211-211/15, 29 October 1986, in ÁBTL 2.7.1.

142

Terrorism in the Cold War

90 45-13/4/87, Experience of counterterrorism work, additional tasks, 9 March 1987, 7, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 91 40/11/1/89, Synthesis report on the Department III/II’s activities in 1988, 6 January 1989, 15, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 92 45/11/1/2/89, Work plan of the Department III/II for the year 1989, January 1989, 14–15, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 93 40/11-1-11/89, Synthesis report on the Department III/II’s activities in 1989, 22 December 1989, 15, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 94 45-13/4/87, Experience of counterterrorism work, additional tasks, 9 March 1987, Annex 3, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 95 40-11/1/89, Synthesis report on the Department III/II’s activities in 1988, 6 January 1989, 15, in ÁBTL 1.11.1. 96 40/11-1-11/89, Synthesis report on the Department III/II’s activities in 1989, 22 December 1989, 22–3, in ÁBTL 1.11.1.

CChapter 8 BULGARIAN STATE SECURITY AND INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM Jordan Baev

Introduction Bulgaria and its intelligence and security services were systematically blamed during the Cold War years for sponsoring and masterminding various terrorist organizations and ‘illegal’ arms delivery to different subversive groups around the world. Still it is very difficult to give a universal definition and determine precisely the exact typology of terrorism since the modern and contemporary history shows so many examples of clandestine armed movements that formed future ruling elites, and their hunted leaders and commanders soon became respectful presidents or prime ministers of their newly established states. In the bipolar post-war world with a strong ideological confrontation, sometimes the logic of the support rendered to one or another hostile political or ethnic group followed simply the principle ‘the enemy of our enemy is our friend’, while their qualifications differed between ‘terrorists’ and ‘freedom fighters’. This logic became even more complicated from the mid-1960s onwards when the main actors competing for influence in the Third World were divided into three blocs due to the Sino–Soviet split. One of the leading UN counterterrorist experts, Alex Schmid has more than 120 different explanations for understanding the phenomenon of international terrorism,1and finally suggested a revised academic consensus definition.2 In the last two decades of the Cold War, the estimates on the international terrorism epidemic were mostly influenced by the bipolar model of global confrontation between the two military blocs. That was especially manifest during the last sharp wave (1981–5), when the two superpowers blamed each other for ‘sponsoring terrorism’ and carried out various covert psychological operations to gain public support for their political goals. This chapter about Bulgaria’s connections with international terrorism is based on the analysis of newly accessible security and intelligence records from the Bulgarian National Archives, among them the available operational (literal) dossiers on international terrorism. Some of the topics discussed here have been revealed in several previous publications of the author.3 This chapter focuses on three main issues: the first ever encounter of the Bulgarian communist state

144

Terrorism in the Cold War

with international terrorist acts; the appearance of international terrorists on Bulgarian territory and their eventual contacts with the Bulgarian authorities; the documented story of the most disputable case, the so-called ‘Bulgarian connection’ during the last Cold War wave in the early 1980s.

First encounters with international terrorist acts The conceptual and normative take of the Bulgarian secret services on ‘terrorism’ has been changed and rewritten in the last two decades of the Cold War. Initially, until the end of the 1960s, the understanding of ‘terrorist acts’ included, in principle, covert actions and ‘diversions’ of the ‘main adversary’ and the ‘enemy political emigration’ in the West against ‘socialist rule’. Even in the late 1960s and the early 1970s, political terrorism in Western Europe and ethnic-religious terrorism in the Middle East were qualified as a specific feature typical for the ‘capitalist world’, which could not be a real threat for the ‘socialist states’ in Eastern Europe. The drastic increase in aircraft hijackings by Palestinian extremists in 1968–9 provoked the attention of the secret services to this new form of political violence. Three months before the approval of The Hague Convention for the Suppression of Unlawful Seizure of Aircraft on 6 December 1970, the Warsaw Pact secret services discussed for the first time the problems related to the threats posed by international terrorism. At the end of September, a multilateral meeting took place in Warsaw on the initiative of the KGB. The participants agreed that each national service must ‘outline practical measures for the protection of East European planes’ and organize ‘joint operations for preventing the possibility of hijackings of civilian planes’.4 In accordance with the multilateral agreement, the Bulgarian minister of the interior approved in November 1970 detailed operational measures for preventing eventual attempts at aircraft hijacking.5 At exactly the same time, bilateral consultations on the issue were held in Sofia in September 1970 between representatives of the Ministries of Foreign Affairs of Bulgaria and Italy. The Italian side was concerned by the growing number of civilian airplanes hijacked by Arab terrorists in the European airspace and suggested launching a regular exchange of information on the measures taken for protection against ‘acts of air piracy’. After consultations with the Ministries of Defense, Interior and Transport, the Bulgarian Foreign Ministry responded positively to the Italian proposal.6 Additional tensions were created by several hijackings of Turkish aircraft by left-wing organizations, forcibly grounded at Bulgarian airports. The first such incidents took place on 3 May and 22 October 1972, when activists of the illegal factions of the pro-Marxist organization ‘Dev Genc’ (the Turkish People’s Liberation Army and the Turkish People’s Liberation Front) landed two Turkish airplanes at Sofia Airport with demands to release their leaders sentenced to death by the military regime in Ankara. The Bulgarian authorities were in constant contact with the Turkish Embassy in Sofia during the bloodless operations. The



8. Bulgarian State Security and International Terrorism

145

government of Turkey agreed, hoping to get off lightly, to offer the armed left-wing terrorists political asylum in Bulgaria.7 Under the provisions of the 1970 Hague Convention and the 1971 Montreal Convention, however, they were handed over to Bulgarian courts and sentenced to several years in prison.8 Subsequently, their sentences were changed to extradition from the territory of Bulgaria. In 1976, there was another hijacking of a Turkish airplane in the Bulgarian airspace, but the most notorious one was the incident of 24 May 1981, when activists of a clandestine left-wing organization, ‘Dev Sol’, forced a Turkish civilian plane to land at Bourgas airport. The Bulgarian government provided a Turkish delegation with an opportunity to arrive immediately in Bulgaria. The delegation included the secretary general of the Turkish Foreign Ministry, two generals from the General Staff of the Turkish Army and the Special Intelligence and Counterintelligence Service Milli Istihbarat Teskilati (MIT), as well as four senior security experts. The Turkish delegation proposed that a group of Turkish ‘commandos’ would neutralize the ‘pirates’ and rescue the airplane, but the Bulgarian authorities categorically rejected this proposal and insisted that they preferred a ‘more flexible approach’ of negotiating with and persuading the ‘hijackers’. After a special operation led by the Deputy Chief of Counterintelligence, Gen. Georgi Mladenov, the incident ended favourably without any casualties.9 In the first decade of intensive international terrorism activity in Europe (1968–78), the Bulgarian secret services received scanty information about the essence and organization of some notorious terrorist groups, mainly through the information exchange with the KGB. Despite the fact that this was a time of intensive terrorist actions by West European terrorist organizations, the received authentic data on those groups – such as the RAF, the Red Brigades (BR) and the Provisional IRA – was rather fragmentary, based on second-hand sources. Until today, not a single piece of archival evidence has been found for direct contacts between Bulgarian state security (Durzhavna sigurnost, DS) and BR members, as had been claimed during the Cold War years.10 Actually, state security’s very first contact with supposed Western terrorists came through the collaboration with the East German MfS (commonly known as Stasi). On request from the Stasi’s Hauptabteilung VIII (Main Department VIII), in the summer of 1971 an American Black Panthers member with the codename ‘Black’ arrived in Bulgaria to arrange his study at one of Sofia’s universities. However, Bulgarian state security officers urgently informed their East German colleagues that the subject had no intention to live in Bulgaria and just wanted to receive a false passport for travelling in Western Europe. After a short bilateral consultation on the case, ‘Black’ was sent back to East Berlin in a special Stasi plane on 21 September 1971.11 In those years (1969–71), some of the leaders of the Black Panthers Party paid several visits to Maoist China and North Korea; the organization was included in the ‘Enemies List’ in 1970 by the Nixon administration and was the object of intensive investigation and surveillance by the FBI, CIA, Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), and NSA,12 which could explain the special attention of East European secret services towards that militant group.

146

Terrorism in the Cold War

Quite different was the situation of direct contacts with some Palestinian armed groups. Until the beginning of the 1970s, the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) was considered an extremist organization because of its ultimate goal to liquidate the state of Israel. The following change in the behaviour of the Bulgarian leadership was caused partly by the Soviet attitude towards the PLO and the secret visit of Yasser Arafat to Moscow in 1970. A Bulgarian Communist Party Politburo resolution of July 1972 especially underlined the change in the previous Soviet bloc’s attitude towards the PLO: ‘The ways to establish contacts with the PLO are to be studied and our own approach to the Palestinian Liberation Movement elaborated.’13 In February 1973, Yasser Arafat visited Bulgaria for the first time. Among the first KGB messages to Sofia about extremist Islamic organizations, qualified unequivocally as ‘terrorist’, were some facts on the history, spiritual leaders and local branches of the Muslim Brotherhood in various Middle Eastern countries. A KGB reference of 12 August 1969, for instance, contained a detailed survey of Muslim Brotherhood activity in Egypt, Syria and Lebanon. Another reference of June 1973 described the Brotherhood as a ‘reactionary religious fanatic organization’. The document summarized at the end: ‘Recently the importance of the religious-political factor in the Middle East is growing constantly.’14 The ideological division of Europe in the post-war world made effective cooperation between the adversarial military blocs in Western and Eastern Europe in sensitive fields (such as regional anti-terrorist cooperation) almost impossible. However, on 21 June 1978, four members of the RAF’s ‘second generation’ led by Till Meyer were discovered and detained by Bulgarian state security officers at the Black Sea ‘Sunny Beach’ resort and handed over to the authorities of the West Germany.15 The decision for such an unprecedented anti-terrorist operation and cooperation with the security service of a NATO member state was taken at the ‘highest political level’16 (that is, by Todor Zhivkov17 himself) without informing ‘sister’ East European services in advance. As ‘retribution’ for the ‘treacherous act’ of the Bulgarian authorities, another West German terrorist group blew up two offices of a Bulgarian foreign trade company (Balkan Trading Co.) in Western Europe on 15 July 1978. Most probably, the unprecedented antiterrorist collaboration was motivated by the anticipated first official visit of the West German chancellor (Helmut Schmidt) to Bulgaria in September 1978, which was later postponed to May 1979. Two weeks after the incident, the Bulgarian foreign minister Petar Mladenov paid an official visit to Bonn. Six months later, in February 1979, a Bulgarian delegation led by Col. Dimitar Yotov, Deputy Chief of the Bulgarian counterintelligence service, visited the West German Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) headquarters in Wiesbaden for consultations and had two meetings with the BKA president, Dr Horst Herold.18 This establishment of professional contacts could also explain the immediate positive reaction from Bulgaria when two West German anti-terrorist experts visited Sofia in December 1985 with a request for cooperation in the search for another RAF militant, Inge Viett, on Bulgarian territory.19



8. Bulgarian State Security and International Terrorism

147

In the early 1970s, first working contacts with specialized security services from the United States and Western Europe in the fight against drugs trafficking and organized cross-border crime were established. The interest shown by the US customs authorities was due to the attempted smuggling of sensational quantities of narcotics through Bulgarian territory, which was discovered by the Bulgarian customs services (1968: 500 kgs; 1969: 1,166 kgs; 1970: 1,300 kgs; 1971: 5,200 kgs). In June 1971, a first official visit to Bulgaria was organized for Myles Ambrose, US Commissioner of Customs and President Richard Nixon’s advisor on drugs enforcement law.20 The high-ranking American guest proposed to the Bulgarian authorities mutual exchanges of criminal experts and the training of Bulgarian customs officials. In April 1972, the head of the Customs Department in Sofia, Lazar Bonev, paid a return visit to the United States. At the end of November 1971, a UN-organized seminar on the struggle against drug trafficking was held in Bulgaria with the participation of experts from the United States and France. As a follow-up to this initiative, a training seminar with the participation of four leading US experts was organized in Varna in May 1973 to combat drug traffickers.21 In the mid-1970s, regular cooperation with the UN Office on Drugs and Crime in Geneva was intensified, and in the period between 1976 and 1977 the Bulgarian side sent more than fifty forms with registered cases of drug trafficking along the Bulgarian border. Reports from the Customs Department to the Ministry of Finance claimed to have prevented 112 illegal drug transactions and captured 5,120 kilograms of narcotic drugs in 1976, while only in the first half of 1977 confiscated drugs exceeded 4,240 kilograms. This provoked visits to Sofia that same year by the director of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, Georg Lang and the Deputy Commissioner of the US Customs Service, G. Robert Dickerson. The US guest proposed that ‘for the first time’ an international customs conference for cooperation in the fight against drug trafficking should be organized in Bulgaria the following year to invite ‘authoritative officials from the customs offices of the countries producing, transporting and consuming drugs’, to exchange experiences and to identify control and cooperation measures in the fight against drug trafficking. The United States was committed to fund such an international forum from the budget of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). The proposal was accepted and approved by the Bulgarian Government on 13 November 1977. The Customs Anti-Drug Conference was held in September 1978 near Varna with the participation of officials from twenty-five countries, including Great Britain, France, Belgium, Austria, Turkey, Pakistan and others.22 The most authoritative was the seventeen-member US delegation, which included senior experts from the White House, the State Department and specialized US agencies. In their statements, American representatives, including the US ambassador to Bulgaria, Raymond Garthoff (1977–9), highly appreciated the work of the Bulgarian specialized bodies to cut drug trafficking channels from Southeast Asia and the Middle East to Western Europe. The second international customs conference was held again in Varna in September 1980, this time with the participation of representatives from over fifty countries.23

148

Terrorism in the Cold War

The presence of international terrorists in Bulgaria The Bulgarian state security archival documentation indicates clearly that the activity of international terrorist groups on Bulgarian and Warsaw Pact territory significantly intensified in the late 1970s. Their presence was carefully monitored by the counterintelligence service and, obviously, in certain cases DS officers maintained personal contacts with some terrorists, mainly with the purpose of obtaining new sensitive information. In January 1980, the Bulgarian minister of the interior, Dimitar Stoyanov, signed Order No. I-2 for the ‘detection, prevention and interruption’ of any possible terrorist activity on Bulgarian territory. The document was based on the conclusion that in the last years ‘terrorism assumes a more organized state and dangerous proportions’ in Western Europe, which suggested that real risks for a spill over of the ‘terrorist wave’ to Bulgarian territory existed.24 A first thorough discussion regarding the ‘international terrorism phenomenon’ was held at a Ministry of the Interior (MoI) Collegium meeting in May 1983. The counterintelligence chief and a deputy minister, Lt.-Gen. Georgi Anachkov, gave detailed data on the ‘colorful multitude of terrorist groups and organizations of different ideology’.25 The chief of the Bulgarian counterintelligence service dwelt especially on three notorious organizations connected to international terrorism that had been increasing their activity on Bulgarian territory since 1978: the groups of ‘Carlos’ (Ilich Ramirez Sánchez), ‘Abu Nidal’ (Sabri Khalil al-Banna) and ‘Abu Iyad’ (Salah Mesbah Khalaf). After the first appearance of Carlos, one of the most wanted global terrorists, on Bulgarian territory in September 1979, Bulgarian counterintelligence started the special operation DOR ‘RISOVE’ (Case for Operational Investigation ‘LYNXES’). This operational case consisted of two volumes with counterintelligence reports regarding each visit of Carlos or his followers (from the so-called Organization of International Revolution26) to Bulgaria in the period between 1979 and 1985 and summaries of intelligence exchanges with ‘fraternal’ Warsaw Pact secret services. Regarding Carlos’s appearance in some East European countries it was reported: Carlos’ activities in the socialist countries are of special interest to us. From 1979 till April 1982 Carlos and his closest supporters stayed in Budapest where they established their base. As a result of the measures, taken by our Hungarian comrades, they were forced to move and settle down in Romania. Romanian security services made contact with Carlos; they accepted his organization on their territory and created a training base in Bucharest. According to unofficial data, he has an exceptional reputation and was personally received by senior political and state leaders. Tasked by the Romanian State Security, on 21 February 1982 the group burst out the Romanian sector of Radio Free Europe,27 attacked the Romanian writer Paul Goma, etc. State Security services in Cuba and the GDR [German Democratic Republic] also had contacts with Carlos.

During his first stay in Sofia in September 1979, Carlos held a meeting with his close associates at the Vitosha New Otani Hotel, where they discussed the



8. Bulgarian State Security and International Terrorism

149

possibility of organizing a meeting with the leaders of different leftist extremist groups with a view to coordinate actions among them. During their stay in Sofia, the director of the Iraqi Secret Police arrived and had a secret meeting with Carlos. The Venezuelan terrorist attempted to get together representatives of a number of extremist organizations with left, right and nationalist orientation in Sofia in January of the next year. His ultimate goal, according to a counterintelligence report, was to establish a united world organization under his control with branches all over the world. According to the available counterintelligence reports, the terrorist leader did not visit Bulgaria himself between February 1980 and November 1983. However, starting from November 1983 Carlos crossed the Bulgarian border six times over two years. The last stay of Carlos in Sofia with two of his deputies (a former Lebanese officer and a West German terrorist) was observed in December 1985, when finally DS pointedly tried to impede him from engaging in further activity on Bulgarian territory.28 Since 1978 there had been a lasting aspiration of terrorist organizations of Arab origin to settle on Bulgarian territory, with the aim of recruiting their supporters among the international students in the country. The activity of the representative of the Abu Iyad group29 in Bulgaria, Abu Daoud (who used a false passport in the name of Tarik Shakir Mahdi in Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Bulgaria), was carefully monitored by DS. In a counterintelligence report of 19 August 1983 it was specifically underlined: We have enough information available to suspect Abu Daoud of drug trafficking, involving Arabic students and post-graduate students in our country. Arabic citizens, living in Bulgaria, are involved in drug distribution in Western Europe. […] In July 1983 Abu Ayad [Abu Iyad] himself arrived in Sofia on an official invitation. On 24 July 1983, he had a meeting at the PLO office with the representatives and leaders of the student organizations within the PLO. Abu Ayad raised the question of whom the Palestinians living in Bulgaria would join – Yasser Arafat, or the separatists Abu Mussa and Abu Salyah.

Another terrorist organization with adherents within the international students’ community in Bulgaria was the Abu Nidal Organization (ANO). This was an extremist group that had split from Arafat’s Fatah organization. The counterintelligence report of August 1983 stated: In the past years their activities were directed against PLO representations in Europe and prominent Palestinian figures. The group carried out acts against the representatives of the PLO in Belgrade in 1980, against the above-mentioned Abu Daoud in Warsaw in 1981, and Isam Sartauyi in Portugal in 1983, as well as four other attacks.30

The systematic acquiring and compilation of special operational dossiers on international terrorism by Bulgarian state security started at the beginning of the 1980s in pursuance of the Ministerial orders Nr. I-2 of 3 January 1980 and

150

Terrorism in the Cold War

I-80 of 8 June 1983. Some thematic files were created by the 17th Anti-terrorist Counterintelligence Department soon after its establishment in July 1983. From 1980 onwards, the state security’s secret information bulletin (the so-called ‘Red Bulletin’) started publishing a special bi-weekly review on ‘The Problems of Terrorism’, which included a lot of publications by Western experts on the subject. Several analyses and interviews by highly competent US experts on the ‘Globalization of Terrorism’, such as Brian Jenkins and Bruce Hoffman from the RAND Corporation, Yonah Alexander from Georgetown University and British counterterrorism expert Paul Wilkinson, were published regularly in the Red Bulletin in the period between 1981 and 1989.31 Likewise, from September 1983 onwards, the Bulgarian foreign intelligence service started issuing a secret weekly bulletin ‘On the questions of International terrorism’.32 In April 1985, the Seventh (Information-Analytical) DS Directorate issued a significant study on ‘Problems of terrorism and the organization of anti-terrorism in the capitalist countries’.33 Three main reasons provoked serious concerns among the DS leadership regarding terrorist activity on Bulgarian territory. First, the possibility that deadly terrorist acts could be realized, demonstrated by the murder of the Turkish Vice-Consul in Burgas, Bora Suelkan, by Armenian terrorists34 on 9 September 1982, and second, the linkage of the Bulgarian connection propaganda campaign (blaming Bulgaria for the attempt on the life Pope John Paul II in May 1981) with official Western claims of presumed Bulgarian support to international terrorists. In a confidential report from May 1984, the Bulgarian Counterintelligence Deputy Chief Gen. Georgi Mladenov noted explicitly: The case of Mehmet Ali Aĝca showed in reality what dangerous consequences the uncontrolled visits of international terrorists in Bulgaria could have and how they could be used by enemy special services.35

Third, the DS’s ‘sensitivity’ towards terrorism increased visibly in the period between 1983 and 1985 as a result of a series of bomb attacks inside Bulgaria by pro-Turkish nationalists – events that were without precedent in the previous three decades. In the mid-1980s, ‘combatting terrorism’ therefore became a leading priority for the Bulgarian security services. The foreign intelligence operational file ‘TRAMPS’ about the Muslim Brotherhood networks in various Islamic countries (Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Iraq, Lebanon, Sudan, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Yemen, Morocco, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Nigeria, Pakistan, Iran, Mauritania, Mali, Indonesia) and their legal representations in Western Europe was created on 4 April 1985.36 The specific case of that dossier was that its creation was proposed by Col. Ilia Gaidarov, deputy chief of foreign intelligence, who headed and coordinated a special group of intelligence officers from several Intelligence departments (the 1st, 3rd, 4th, 8th, 9th and 11th departments). On 30 April 1985, the chief of foreign intelligence, Gen. Vasil Kotsev, approved ‘Orientation – Tasks’ and ‘Operational Plan’ for intelligence work on ‘TRAMPS’. The main tasks were concentrated in the 9th (Arab countries) Department. On 11 May the two instructive operational documents were sent



8. Bulgarian State Security and International Terrorism

151

with ciphered cables by ‘KONDOV’ (Gen. Kotsev) to the intelligence residents in Ankara and Istanbul (1st Department), Athens, Nicosia and Thessaloniki (2nd Department), Bonn, Paris, Rome, Vienna, Geneva, Stockholm, Oslo, Madrid, London, Brussels, The Hague, and Luxembourg (3rd Department), Damascus, Amman, Beirut, Tripoli, Algeria, Tunisia, Rabat, Tehran, Bagdad and Cairo (9th Department), New York and Washington (10th Department), as well as Belgrade, Bucharest and Tokyo (17th Department). On 29 May 1985, a special discussion on the Muslim Brotherhood was convened by Dimitar Stoyanov, the minister of the interior. The immediate reason for such alarming activity of the Bulgarian secret services was the reception of confidential intelligence that Muslim Brotherhood adherents might intend to commit terrorist acts. Several counterintelligence agents (‘Ahmed’, ‘Omar’ and ‘Harry’) provided information about the existence and clandestine meetings of Brotherhood members among the Syrian, Sudanese and Palestinian students in Varna and Pleven. Followers of the Brotherhood were uncovered even among the Yemeni cadets who received their military training and education at the Military School ‘Vasil Levski’ in Veliko Tarnovo.37 The instructions to the intelligence stations (‘rezidentura’) subordinated to the 9th Department contained a request for acquiring urgent information in five main directions: (1) Muslim Brotherhood leaders and functionaries, locality, structures, goals, bases, channels of arms delivery; (2) activity in Bulgaria and against Bulgaria; (3) opportunities for foreign intelligence to recruit agents inside circles close to some Muslim Brotherhood groups; (4) identifying hidden Muslim Brotherhood members within the public administration, armed forces and secret services of some Arab countries; (5) possible contacts of Muslim Brotherhood members with US and NATO secret services. Though the activation of several foreign intelligence residents in the Middle East led to the acquiring of new information, on 25 July 1985 Col. Gaidarov (code name ‘Hrelkov’ in the secret correspondence) addressed the other Intelligence departments with a critical message, claiming that some of their officers in Western Europe underestimated the implementation of the assigned urgent tasks on Operational Case TRAMPS.38 Besides the Muslim Brotherhood, from 1986 on the Operational Case TRAMPS also included intelligence on another Islamic extremist group, the Lebanon-based Hezbollah. In a report dated 20 April 1987 about the results of the reconnaissance on TRAMPS, the head of the 9th Department Col. P. Pavlov announced that in the period between 1985 and 1987, 496 terrorists from the Muslim Brotherhood and Hezbollah had been identified and registered in the security databases. According to the report, Bulgarian foreign intelligence used several Arab agents and informers to fulfil that task: ‘Hatib’ (from Fatah), ‘Tarik’ (from the ruling circles of the Ba’ath party) and ‘Said’ (of Kurdish origin) in Syria; ‘Kadumi’ (from Hezbollah) and ‘Zoran’ in Lebanon; ‘Djuma’ and ‘Oran’ in Libya; ‘Sidon’ in Algeria; nine informers in Egypt, the most important of them being ‘Aladdin’; and ‘Ali’ in Tunisia. In general, the 9th Department had twenty-two agents and informers on Operational Case TRAMPS, while the 3rd Department (Western Europe) used seven of its informers for that purpose.39 The perspective of establishing operational contacts with representatives of some terrorist groups was discussed by the leaders of the Bulgarian foreign

152

Terrorism in the Cold War

intelligence service several times during the last Cold War decade (1979–89). For instance, in a MoI discussion about international terrorism on 9 May 1983, the chief of foreign intelligence Lt.-Gen. Vasil Kotsev informed that according to operational sources a few foreign partners of Bulgarian foreign trade companies had maintained regular contacts with terrorist groups. The question that occurred to the intelligence officers who worked undercover inside those foreign trade companies was whether it was reasonable to establish personal contacts with terrorists. After consultations with the KGB, the advice received from Moscow was as follows: ‘The Soviet comrades consider that it is not a good idea to set us the task to infiltrate our agents into the terrorist organizations. It is better to gain stronger positions from which to observe their activity.’40 Three years later, in another discussion of senior MoI officials about international terrorism, held on 22 April 1986, Gen. Kotsev raised the issue again, claiming that ‘without infiltration into terrorist organizations we can’t lead a successful anti-terrorist fight’.41 Finally, the Ministerial Order No. I-90 from 5 June 1986 demanded, in the paragraph on agent-operational tasks, that PGU [foreign intelligence] must a) infiltrate its agents into the antiterrorist units of our adversaries’ secret services in order to obtain more reliable information about the terrorist structures and activity; b) organize operational surveillance on the terrorist groups; c) examine the Western anti-terrorist experience.42

A typical example of the establishment of operational contacts with international terrorists was the secret meeting of a Bulgarian foreign intelligence officer with leading representatives of the ANO in Sofia in June 1985. The aim of the meeting was to receive reliable up-to-date information about the activities and intentions of the Muslim Brotherhood, the Grey Wolves, AMAL and Hezbollah. According to the report of the talks, which was sent to the chief of the foreign intelligence service43 Gen. Kotsev, the Abu Nidal representatives ‘firmly promised that they will not carry out terrorist activity on Bulgarian territory’ and ‘will inform about all accessible data on the activity of the Muslim Brotherhood and Grey Wolves’.44 In November 1986, a confidential informer of the Bulgarian secret services sent a report about his personal talks with the Hezbollah leader Sheik Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah in Beirut. According to the report, Sheik Fadlallah declared that his organization was not involved in the kidnapping of four Soviet diplomats in Beirut and would not organize any hostile actions against the Soviet Union and the socialist countries. Fadlallah also mentioned that he had good personal contacts with the newly appointed Lebanese ambassador to Sofia, who was of Iranian origin.45

The last Cold War wave The last confrontational wave in the Cold War years (1981–5) directly affected the development of official US–Bulgarian relations. The massive campaign against



8. Bulgarian State Security and International Terrorism

153

Bulgaria in connection with the assault on the head of the Roman Catholic Church, Pope John Paul II, led to a second, parallel propaganda campaign denouncing the ‘key participation’ of Bulgaria as a ‘state sponsoring terrorism and drug trafficking’. While in 1981 the brunt of the attacks regarding ‘terrorist sponsorship’ targeted two other Eastern European countries, Czechoslovakia and the GDR,46 in the second half of 1982 the attention increasingly focused on Bulgaria. The so-called ‘Bulgarian connection’ (Pista Bulgara) to the attempt on the life of Pope John Paul II in May 1981 was among the most discussed ‘mysterious’ cases of contemporary history. From the arrest of Sergei Antonov, an employee at the Balkan Airlines office in Rome, in November 1982 until today, this version of the papal shooting has had its strong proponents47 and opponents.48 As early as summer 1990, an inter-institutional investigation (Public Prosecutor’s case No. 53/1990) of all documents related to this issue began, was initiated personally by the first democratically elected Bulgarian president and former dissident Dr Zhelyu Zhelev. The subject was discussed at a meeting between Dr Zhelev and Zbigniew Brzezinski in Washington on 26 September 1990, during the first official visit of the new Bulgarian president to the United States. During the next months, all available information in the classified Bulgarian files was studied. In 1991 a special investigation commission, appointed by the new Bulgarian minister of the interior Hristo Danov, made a parallel inquiry in the security archives. The first significant evidence in the Bulgarian state security records, which showed DS’s particular interest in the attempt on the pope’s life and in the assailant Mehmet Ali Agca, appeared in information put together by the foreign intelligence service on 11 September 1981, just a few days after a documentary on a probable ‘Bulgarian and Russian intelligence connection’ with Agca was aired by the private British ITV on 5 September 1981. The information was addressed to the State Security Second Main Directorate (counterintelligence service), and, obviously, it caused an initial examination of Agca’s long stay in Bulgaria in 1980 alleged in the ITV documentary.49 It was found that the Turkish terrorist stayed in Bulgaria for two weeks in July 1980, with a false passport in the name of an Indian citizen named Yoginder Singh. On 30 July Agca returned to Turkey, but on the very next day, on his way to West Germany, he crossed the Bulgarian border again with another passport, identifying him as Frank Ozgun. The investigation of September 1981 revealed that Agca stayed at the Grand Hotel ‘Sofia’, which contradicted the Western allegations about his presence in the Vitosha New Otani Hotel and the Park Hotel Moskva. There is documentary evidence that the arrest of Antonov on 25 November 1982 and the extensive world media coverage of this event really surprised and shocked the Bulgarian political leadership. The first ever Bulgarian Communist Party (BCP) Politburo meeting, devoted to this particular case, was convened on 7 December 1982, two weeks after Antonov’s arrest and the ‘Bulgarian Connection’ media explosion. During the Politburo meeting of 7 December, four main decisions were made: (1) to establish a special working group on the case, led by Petar Mladenov, the Bulgarian foreign minister; (2) to start an inquiry against Mehmet Ali Agca

154

Terrorism in the Cold War

(the Investigation Case No. 179/1982 was opened on 10 December 1982); (3) to organize an international press conference (it was convened on 17 December); and (4) to make a request for support for countermeasures from the Soviet Union and other East European countries. It is interesting that Todor Zhivkov insisted on his own proposal that the special working group would be headed by Mladenov, and not by the Minister of the Interior Dimitar Stoyanov. During the next days, two consecutive Politburo meetings (on 20 and 29 December 1982) discussed some additional issues: a move from defensive to offensive actions; ensuring more coordination with the Warsaw Pact allies; and limiting the annual non-visa transit stream of more than three million people from Turkey through Bulgaria to Western Europe and back .50 In 1983, an additional working group ‘B’ had been established within the intelligence and security services, which was subordinated to Group ‘A’ led by Foreign Minister Petar Mladenov. The ‘active measures’ (propaganda and disinformation) undertaken by DS in the next months and, in particular, during the trial against Antonov in Italy in 1985 focused on four principal aspects: (1) obtaining more intelligence on the network and Western European activity of the Turkish nationalist terrorist organization Grey Wolves, and its previous contacts and instructions to Agca; (2) the role of the Western intelligence and security services in the organization of the propaganda campaign against Bulgaria (many contacts were revealed between Italian SISMI51 officers – among them Maj. Giovanni Tito aka ‘Petruccelli’ and the Deputy Director Gen. Pietro Musumeci – and Agca in prison between August 1981 and March 1982); (3) spreading disinformation claiming a role of the CIA and the Turkish intelligence service MIT; and (4) supporting new publications and arguments against the ‘Bulgarian connection’ hypothesis. This counter-offensive strategy brought some results. One remarkable success was a resolution and a conclusion announced by the leftist International Union of Democratic Jurists. In fact, this was a Stasi ‘contribution’ through their agents of influence inside this organization. The investigation case against Mehmet Ali Agca, led by the magistrate Yordan Ormankov, made its final Indictment Conclusion on 10 March 1985.52 The collected facts permitted the exposure during the trial in Rome of more than one hundred inaccurate or totally false stories, told by Agca during his interrogations. In June and November 1986, Dimitar Stoyanov sent two letters of gratitude to his East German colleague, Erich Mielke, for sharing intelligence on the Grey Wolves’ activity,53 and for disinformation on CIA involvement in the plot to kill the pope produced by the Stasi. Similar contacts were maintained also with Czechoslovak, Hungarian and Polish secret services.54 Of special importance were the regular consultations in the period between 1983 and 1986 that Bulgarian DS officials held with the KGB chiefs Victor Chebrikov, Vladimir Kryuchkov, Vadim Kirpichenko and others. During these talks, the ‘Antonov Case’ was frequently discussed and further propaganda countermeasures against the ‘anti-Soviet’ and ‘anti-Bulgarian’ campaigns in the West were agreed on. During a confidential talk with a Bulgarian delegation in



8. Bulgarian State Security and International Terrorism

155

Moscow on 1 November 1984, the Soviet foreign intelligence chief Vladimir Kryuchkov emphasized: In that particular case [Antonov case], the Americans started their provocation on a blank space, without whatever grounds. In the KGB we pursue a different approach – we undertake active measures55 only when we have at least a halftruth, some real facts. Then we add to those initial facts our fabrications and disinformation. But the Americans took the risk to start a provocation only on the grounds of lies, fabrications and slanders.56

On 11 April 2005, Jack Matlock, former US ambassador in Moscow, explained in an interview for Fox News Channel that in 1983 US president Ronald Reagan had ordered an urgent CIA report to reveal the truth regarding a possible KGB or Bulgarian connection. The report was ordered with regard to possible preparations of a meeting between Reagan and Yuri Andropov, the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU). According to Ambassador Matlock, the 1983 CIA Intelligence Estimate was negative. No reliable evidence for a KGB/DS connection to the attempt on the pope’s life was found. Matlock’s statement confirms the testimonies of Robert Gates, CIA Deputy Director in the 1980s, and Melvyn Goodman, former leading Soviet analyst for the CIA, before the US Senate Intelligence Committee in September–October 1991.57 Finally, a thorough analysis in regard to Washington’s reactions and the very cautious CIA National Intelligence Estimates about the so-called ‘Soviet–Bulgarian connection’ produced between 1983 and 1987, was presented by Dr Raymond Garthoff, former CIA Soviet expert and US ambassador to Sofia during the Carter administration.58 Like Claire Sterling’s publication in the autumn of 1982, ordered by Reader’s Digest, about the ‘Bulgarian connection’ in the assault on the pope, a similar role and widespread distribution was also given to the article ‘Drugs for Guns, the Bulgarian Connection’, written by Reader’s Digest’s editor-in-chief, Nathan Adams, for the November 1983 issue of the magazine. The publication was based mainly on the testimony of the former ‘Bulgarian secret services’ Colonel Stefan Sverdlev, introduced as the highest ‘Bulgarian KGB’ official who had escaped to the West. According to Sverdlev, at a meeting in Moscow in 1967, the special services of the Warsaw Pact countries approved a strategy to launch a massive operation to ‘destabilize Western societies’ by supplying weapons and drugs to radical and terrorist groups. The Bulgarian secret services were selected as the chief executors of this terrible operation, creating a special state-run foreign trade firm called Kintex59. Upon his escape to Greece in February 1971, Colonel Sverdlev took with him more than 500 pages of ‘top-secret documents’, including the supersecret directive M-120/00-0050 of 16 July 1970 on ‘destabilizing Western societies through drug trafficking’. In the unfolding propaganda campaign against Bulgaria, no one in the United States questioned the identity of Stefan Sverdlev and whether he could have access to ‘super-secret documents’ of this nature. Information in his personal file

156

Terrorism in the Cold War

shows that until 1965 Captain Sverdlev was the head of a border checkpoint at the Bulgarian–Greek border near Petrich. Only due to the high-level protection of his superiors in the MoI he was friends with did he reach the rank of colonel in less than five years. The highest post he had occupied by the time of his escape was that of the Head of the Mobilization Department at the Regional Office of the MoI in the city of Pernik. Among the documents he collected from his safe were the evacuation plan of Pernik as well as lists of the MoI Regional Office personnel and the leadership of secret divisions on the territory of the district. As for the notorious ‘directive’ M-120/00-0050, the registration number of the document shows that it is a copy of a ministerial order filed as a guiding document in the registers of the Combat Training Unit of the MoI, which established the ‘Position to Organize and Conduct Struggle against the Ideological Diversion by the Adversary in Wartime’.60 The propaganda campaign claiming a ‘Bulgarian connection’ to the illegal transfer of arms and drugs through the ‘Turkish mafia’ and ‘left and right’ terrorist groups reached its apogee in the summer of 1984 (June to September), when the US Congress discussed condemning resolutions against Bulgaria.61 One of the summoned ‘witnesses’ was Paul Henze, a former head of the CIA station in Turkey and senior expert in the US National Security Council.62 He called for a complete freeze, and even a break, of relations with Bulgaria, while Nathan Adams proposed to influence European allies to boycott the activities of the Bulgarian economic association for road transport SOMAT, which had succeeded in gaining a monopoly position in Europe. When asked by Senator Paula Hawkins whether the only documentary evidence available was the ‘M120 / 00-0050’ directive and why Colonel Sverdlev was not summoned to testify to the Senate Commission, Adams replied that the document in question was seized by the Greek authorities during Sverdlev’s escape to Greece in 1971 and that ‘it was unlikely’ that Andreas Papandreou’s government would assist Washington on this issue, while Sverdlev was afraid for his own and his family members’ life and therefore refused to testify personally. Officials from the DEA and the US Customs Service declared that they had ceased all cooperation with the corresponding Bulgarian authorities in the current situation. The last consultation meeting between the DEA representative in Vienna, Thomas O’Brady, and officials of the Bulgarian customs took place on 30 June 1983 in Sofia, during which O’Brady provided the Bulgarian customs officers with a list of Lebanese and Turkish weapons and drugs smugglers residing on Bulgarian territory. However, in an official statement shortly after Adams’s publication in Reader’s Digest, the DEA stressed that ‘there is no independent or documentary confirmation’ of his allegations of a strategy and directives for ‘destabilizing the West through illegal drug trafficking’.63 In his testimony to the Senate Commission, the US Assistant Secretary of State for Political–Military Affairs Richard Burt (who had visited Bulgaria in February 1984) pointed out that the DEA’s latest reports from the spring and summer of 1984 showed ‘improvement’ in the Bulgarian border control and successes with the confiscation of a significant quantity of drugs. According to Burt, the problem was that Bulgarians expressed willingness



8. Bulgarian State Security and International Terrorism

157

to cooperate on the border with Turkey and Greece, but categorically refused international controls on Bulgarian territory. The assistant secretary of state warned against hurrying to impose criminal sanctions against Bulgaria. Unlike other witnesses, the former US ambassador to Bulgaria Jack Perry (1979–81) drew attention to the false views about Bulgaria being only an obedient puppet of the Kremlin and even stated that ‘Bulgarians are a very patriotic and proud nation’. Ambassador Perry expressed his opinion that he did not believe that European NATO allies ‘are as sure as we are that the Bulgarians are guilty’ of the assault on the pope and the drug trafficking to Western Europe. As a paradox of history, it was at the end of 1984 and in 1985 that the idea of a secret, illicit operation was discussed at the highest level of the US government, which included President Reagan, to supply weapons to the Iranian regime and use the revenues to finance the armed groups opposing the Sandinista government in Nicaragua. This operation, of course, would go down in history as the Iran–Contra affair.64 On the eve of the organized campaign against Bulgaria before the US Congress, the US ambassador to Bulgaria Robert Barry (1981–4), in a meeting with Foreign Minister Petar Mladenov on 11 June 1984, had handed over a list of names that the DEA had information on about arms and drugs smugglers residing in Bulgaria. The list was immediately sent to the Second Main Directorate of the DS for scrutiny in the departments responsible for controlling the ‘hidden transfers’ in Kintex’s activity and for tracing individuals from organized crime or terrorist groups on Bulgarian territory (9th and 17th Department). The result of the examination showed that out of the twenty-five individuals mentioned in the DEA list, two had been in Bulgarian prisons for smuggling, four were ‘clients’ of Kintex, eleven were in the records of the 9th and 17th Departments for tracking and only eight people were not known to the DS. Based on this data, a special report was prepared in response to the United States, which was approved by the Deputy Ministers of the Interior and Foreign Affairs. By a special order of the minister of the interior, operation ‘Condor’ was launched in the 17th Department of the DS, tackling the presence of proven arms and drug smugglers on the territory of Bulgaria and their possible links with international terrorist organizations. After an initial operational data analysis, a proposal was made in December 1984 to improve border crossing control (checkpoints), register suspects in the ‘Scratch-1’ database system and to take measures to end any contact with them ‘irrespective of the interests of Foreign (PGU-DS) and Military (RU-GS) Intelligence services’ to use them for their own purposes.65 In January 1985, DEA representatives sent a new list of alleged smugglers, and in May, the US Embassy in Sofia requested, with note No. 609, additional information about a Turkish drug trafficker who had crossed the territory of Bulgaria. In response to the propaganda campaign against Bulgaria, a special press conference on ‘Bulgaria’s contribution to the fight against drug trafficking’ was organized at the Bulgarian Telegraph Agency on 19 February 1985 with the participation of 111 foreign media representatives. Bulgarian officials cited the DEA’s latest reports on the lack of data on the ‘official Bulgarian connection’ to drug trafficking from Asia to Western Europe, and stated that Bulgarian specialized services were ‘willing

158

Terrorism in the Cold War

to cooperate to cut smuggling traffic with all countries’.66 CIA secret reports from 1985–6 also show that confidential contacts with Bulgaria in the fight against drug trafficking were renewed, despite Washington’s propaganda statements about the involvement of Bulgarian secret services in organizing drug trafficking channels to Western Europe and the United States. One of the CIA reports also mentioned the MoI’s assistance to the security authorities in Denmark and Belgium in the investigation of several cases of drug smuggling.

At the end of the Cold War era Initiated by Bulgaria, a special multilateral Warsaw Pact counterintelligence meeting was organized in the Bulgarian Black Sea port of Varna from 18 to 20 November 1987. In his presentation at the meeting, Col.-Gen. Grigor Shopov, first deputy minister of the interior and as such responsible for DS activities, emphasized: During the last decade, the escalation of terrorism went beyond state borders and it is difficult now to distinguish between international and internal terrorism. Contemporary circumstances give a real opportunity for terrorist activity to be born at one place, to continue at another, and to end at a third place […] The struggle against terrorism is one of the most current political problems today. There are persistent attempts to re-direct terrorism against real socialism. […] For the first time in many years we encountered diversion acts, fires, destruction or damage of socialist property. There were also anonymous threats of terror and blowing up of trains, airplanes, airports, railway and bus stations, ports, etc.67

Under the new political conditions of intense Soviet–American dialogue following Mikhail Gorbachev’s coming into power in the Soviet Union, there were changes in the official Bulgarian–US relations in the area of security and the fight against terrorism. The US counterterrorism estimates also changed their intonation in comparison with the previous sharp line of the estimates from the 1981–4 period. For instance, a CIA National Intelligence Estimate of August 1986 had more balanced judgements and conclusions: Several East European states have had direct ties to such [terrorist] groups (Abu Nidal Group, PFLP-Special Command, Carlos Apparat). Their reasons appear to have been mainly defensive, but in some cases they may also have anticipated using the groups for their own or for Soviet purposes. […] In general, the Soviets and East Europeans advocate revolutionary violence mainly when that appears to be the most promising option. […] The Soviet Bloc keeps its distance from indigenous West European groups such as the Red Army Faction of West Germany and Action Directe of France.68

In March 1986, a Bulgarian foreign intelligence officer in Washington sent information about a statement by the chief of the Bulgarian section in the US State



8. Bulgarian State Security and International Terrorism

159

Department, John Cesswell, on the willingness of the State Department ‘to send its official counterterrorism officer to Bulgaria to hold meetings with our competent authorities and share US experience in the fight against terrorist acts directed against their official representations abroad’.69 Information from the foreign intelligence chief, General Vladimir Todorov, reported new data on 27 January 1987: ‘Recently, the US and Western countries have been paying more attention to the possibility of establishing cooperation between Western and socialist countries in the fight against drug trafficking.’ The intelligence information quoted the opinion of US Assistant Secretary of State Jon R. Thomas, who said that ‘the issue of East-West cooperation in the fight against drug trafficking is becoming more and more relevant’.70 In the wake of these developments, on 28 January 1987, a confidential talk on counterterrorism issues was held at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs between Deputy Foreign Minister Lyuben Gotsev and the US ambassador to Bulgaria, Melvyn Levitsky (1984–7). The meeting had been initiated by the US ambassador. Unlike in previous years, Levitsky declared that there was ‘a similarity of the positions of both sides on the condemnation of terrorist acts in the world’, and that the United States was also aware of ‘the prestige of the People’s Republic of Bulgaria in its cooperation with the FRG, in the case of the Baader-Mainhof Gang and others from the near past’. After that, Levitsky announced that he was authorized by the US government to report confidentially some data on the possible use of Bulgarian arms by Arab terrorist groups (ANO, etc.). Three days after the meeting with the US ambassador, ‘Considerations on the Position of the People’s Republic of Bulgaria’ were worked out considering the possibility that the same issues would be raised during the forthcoming talks between the Bulgarian foreign minister, Peter Mladenov, and US Deputy Secretary of State John Whitehead. The document was based on the view that ‘Bulgaria is working with all parties in the fight against international terrorism on a mutually advantageous basis’ but prefers ‘confidential treatment of the problem’. Indeed, during the meeting between Mladenov and Whitehead in Sofia on 4 February 1987, one of the major talking points was the problem of terrorism, raised a few days earlier by Ambassador Levitsky. After an exchange of views on the matter, Whitehead explicitly stressed that ‘the USA wants regular contacts with us on terrorism without disclosing its sources of information’. Mladenov stated that the Bulgarian side accepted this approach and outlined the possible channel for the transmission of confidential information.71 During the second visit of John Whitehead to Bulgaria in October 1988, Alvin Adams, Associate Coordinator for Counterterrorism at the State Department, was included in the US delegation. Responsible Bulgarian officials reported to him that in 1987 Bulgarian specialized services had uncovered thirty-eight cases of attempted arms and drugs smuggling.72 Several weeks before the ousting of Todor Zhivkov from power, the Bulgarian Foreign Ministry ‘brought the ball back’ when at a meeting with the US ambassador to Bulgaria, Sol Polanski (1987–90), a delegation of US security services was invited to visit Bulgaria. The unprecedented visit of senior CIA and FBI experts took place several months later at the beginning of the political transition period in Bulgaria in March 1990. In June 1990, Richard

160

Terrorism in the Cold War

Stolz, the CIA Deputy Director for Operations until February 1991, who had been the first CIA chief of station in Sofia (1960–3), paid an unofficial visit to Bulgaria.73 In the second half of the 1980s bilateral consultations with some European NATO countries for institutional anti-terrorist cooperation were held, too. When in July 1987 the Greek minister of Public Order Antonis Drossoyannis visited Sofia, the most significant agreement reached with his Bulgarian counterpart was to maintain a mutual information exchange about the activity of international terrorist organizations in the area.74 In 1987, one of the leading French investigative magistrates in charge of counterterrorism, Jean-Louis Bruguière, approached Bulgarian authorities with a proposal for informal collaboration and information exchange regarding some Arab and Armenian terrorists who resided in the Balkans. A special confidential dinner was organized between a Bulgarian security representative (the deputy head of the Bulgarian intelligence group in France with the code name ‘Gorov’) and Judge Bruguière in the presence of the Bulgarian ambassador Georgi Yovkov and the leading DGSE75 figures Gen. René Imbot and Gen. Jean Pons. In the following months, the Bulgarian–French informal contacts were carried out with the participation of Jean-Louis Bruguière, who visited the Bulgarian Embassy twice (21 March and 4 July 1989) and talked to Consul ‘Gorov’ (real name Milanov), requesting information on the investigation of the terrorist kidnapping of the tourist ship City of Poros in Greece in July 1988, during which three Frenchmen had died.76 Soon after the political changes in Bulgaria of 10 November 1989 and the following reorganization of the Bulgarian secret services in the beginning of 1990, those informal contacts were transformed into joint operational actions, the exchange of intelligence and bilateral agreements with several NATO and EU security services. In the period from the fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989 until the dissolution of the Warsaw Treaty Organization in July 1991, the radical changes in the East European foreign policy orientation and in the international situation in general caused visible changes in the regional security environment as well. The re-establishment of diplomatic relations with Israel, for example, brought a radical transformation in the attitude of some Arab terrorist groups towards Eastern Europe. In March–April 1990 there was a significant increase in alarming intelligence indicating the preparation of terrorist acts against aircrafts of some East European airlines (Aeroflot, LOT, Malév, CSA) was observed.77 In September similar messages about terrorist threats were received by Bulgarian intelligence and counterintelligence services.78 At the beginning of the Persian Gulf crisis ensuing from Saddam Hussain’s occupation of Kuwait and on the eve of the multinational military operation against Iraq, the Bulgarian secret services acquired new information about possible attacks by extremist groups. The operational information was confirmed by Western sources as well.79 A most dangerous situation was created when, at the end of December 1990, a group of Japanese and Philippine terrorists illegally came to Sofia. According to the received operational data, the principal targets of their missile fire were the US Embassy and some government buildings in the Bulgarian capital. The situation became even more alarming when in early February 1991, Fusako Shigenobu, a notorious leader of the Japanese Red Army (JRA) terrorist organization, arrived in Sofia from Belgrade. During the following



8. Bulgarian State Security and International Terrorism

161

anti-terrorist operation, the Bulgarian counterintelligence service80 established constant contacts and close collaboration with representatives of the US and Japanese secret services via their embassies. Finally, on 9–10 February 1991 the terrorists were forced to interrupt their preparations and escape immediately from the country.81

Conclusion The Cold War legacy still continues to influence the contemporary views and notions of state–terrorism relations in that era, reproducing long-held ideological prejudices and stereotypes. Currently we have, however, an unprecedented opportunity to distinguish between the deliberately crafted myths and the actual realities, making use of the unprecedented declassification of Central–East European intelligence and security records for the whole Cold War era. Bulgarian state security ‘dossiers’, cross-checked at the highest level of political (BCP Politburo), governmental (Council of Ministers), diplomatic and military records, can give a more comprehensive and realistic picture of the state’s policy towards international terrorism. The position of the Bulgarian communist authorities on ‘international terrorism’ had its own evolution in the last two Cold War decades: from underestimation and neglect to the consideration of the potential use of several paramilitary terrorist groups against the ‘main imperialist adversary’ to a stronger awareness of the real threat posed by the international terrorist activity to their own national security interests. According to its geopolitical location and the Warsaw Pact ‘allocation of roles’, Bulgarian state security focused its attention mainly on the Balkans and the Middle East area. Almost entirely engaged on the side of the Arab and Palestinian causes, Bulgarian authorities established and maintained contacts with a few paramilitary groups, qualified as terrorist in the West. At the same time, the Islamic extremist organizations were categorically considered as dangerous and they all have been subject to national counterterrorist measures, together with the ultra-nationalist groups from neighbouring Turkey (such as the Grey Wolves) or the Armenian nationalists (such as ASALA). When several terrorist groups intended to reside in Bulgaria at the end of the 1970s, the aims and tactical goals of the state security officials were ‘not to permit confrontation with them’ but also ‘not to allow the establishment of illegal terrorist bases on Bulgarian territory’. The actual documentary history of Bulgarian state security’s attitude towards the phenomenon of ‘international terrorism’ is far from the one-sided, strongly ideological interpretations of the past, confirming some but rebutting many other previous allegations.

Notes 1 Alex P. Schmid and Albert Jongman, Political Terrorism: A New Guide to Actors, Authors, Concepts, Data Bases, Theories, and Literature (New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 2005), 40–2.

162

Terrorism in the Cold War

2 Alex P. Schmid (ed.), The Routledge Handbook of Terrorism Research (London: Routledge, 2011), 86–7. 3 I will cite only a few of those publications that appeared abroad: Jordan Baev, Bulgaria and the Armed Conflict in Central America, 1979–1989, in Evgenii Pashentsev and Hector Luis Saint-Pierre (eds.), Armies and Politics (Moscow: RPR, 2002), 33–45; Jordan Baev and Kostadin Grozev, Bulgaria, in Krzysztof Persak and Lukasz Kaminski (eds.), A Handbook of the Communist Security Apparatus in East Central Europe, 1944–1989 (Warsaw: IPN, 2005), 37–86; Jordan Baev, Bulgarian Arms Delivery to Third World Countries, 1950–1989: A Documentary Collection (Zurich: CSS, 2006), http:​//www​.php.​isn.e​thz.c​h/lor​y1.et​hz.ch​/coll​ectio​ns/co​ll_ar​mstra​de/in​ trodu​ction​4f28.​html?​navin​fo=23​065 (accessed 1 January 2020); Jordan Baev, Von der Entspanung zur Kriegspsychose: Die bulgarischen Sicherheitsdienste und der letzte Höhepunkt des Kalten Krieges 1975–1985, in Torsten Diedrich and Walter Süss (eds.), Militar und Staatssicherheit im Sicherheitskonzept der Warschauer-Pakt-Staaten (Berlin: Ch. Links Verlag, 2010), 341–58; Jordan Baev, Infiltration of Non-European Terrorist Groups in Europe and Antiterrorist Responses in Western and Eastern Europe (1969–1991), in Siddik Ekici (ed.), Counter Terrorism in Diverse Communities (Amsterdam: IOS Press, 2011), 58–74. 4 Centralized archive of the Committee on Disclosure of Documents and Announcing Affiliation of Bulgarian Citizens to the State Security and the Intelligence Services of the Bulgarian National Army, Sofia (henceforth COMDOS), Record Group ‘‍M’, Fond VI-L, A.E. 1381, Vol. I, 13–16. 5 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond VI-L, A.E. 508, Vol.1, Part 4, 3–10. 6 Central State Archive, Sofia (henceforth TsDA), Fond 1477, Opis 26, A.E. 1309, 1–3, 9. 7 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond 1, Opis 10, A.E. 2008, 1–15. 8 TsDA, Fond 1481, Opis 20, A.E. 224. 9 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond ІV-L, A.E. 1381, 25–35; Fond VІ-L, A.E. 922, Vol. ІІ, 62–69. 10 The first broader information about BR history, leaders, concepts and organizational structure was received by KGB in 1980. See COMDOS, Record Group ‘R’, Fond Operational Cases, A.E. 16168, vol. II, 71–80. 11 COMDOS, Record Group ‘R’, Fond 9, Opis 2, A.E. 539, 77–8. 12 According to CIA–FBI correspondence, among the plans of Black Panther functionaries was the kidnapping and execution of the US Attorney General John Mitchell and California Governor Ronald Reagan. See ‘Threats by Elbert Howard of the Black Panther Party against Attorney General John Mitchell’, Memo from CIA Director Richard Helms to Attorney General John Mitchell, https​://ww​w.cia​.gov/​libra​ ry/re​ading​room/​docs/​DOC_0​00544​4759.​pdf (accessed 1 January 2020). 13 TsDA, Fond 1-B, Opis 35, A.E. 3304. 14 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond 1, Opis 10, A.E. 1969, 94–8. 15 For more details, see Christopher Nehring, Die Verhaftung Till Meyers in Bulgarien: eine Randnotiz aus dem Archiv der bulgarischen Staatssicherheit, Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte 63/3 (2015), 411–24. 16 According to the testimonies of Col. Stefan Stefanov, former chief of the 17th Antiterrorist Counterintelligence State Security Department, interview with the author, Sofia, 9 March 2011. 17 Todor Zhivkov was the longest ruler of a Warsaw Pact country: Bulgarian Communist Party first secretary from 1954 and secretary general from 1981, prime minister



8. Bulgarian State Security and International Terrorism

163

(1962–71) and chairman of the State Council (1971–89) with the rank of president of Bulgaria. 18 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond 1, Opis 12, A.E. 112, 219–22. 19 COMDOS, Record Group ‘R’, Fond Operational Cases, A.E. 16169, Vol. III, 165–71. In fact, Inge Viett lived in Dresden, East Germany, in those years under the name of Eva-Maria Sommer. See Inge Viett, Nie war ich furchtioser: Autobiographie (Hamburg: Nautilius, 1996), 281. 20 In 1973, Myles Ambrose proposed the creation of the US DEA. 21 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond 1, Opis 10, A.E. 1000; TsDA, Fond 1481, Opis 19, A.E. 727. 22 Diplomatic Archive at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Sofia (henceforth DA), Opis 24-МОD, A.E. 553, 559. 23 DA, Opis 26-МОD, A.E. 640, 1–15. 24 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond 1, Opis 11, A.E. 329, 1–21. 25 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond 2, Opis 4, A.E. 95, 20–41. 26 The group is usually called ‘Organization of International Revolutionaries’ in the literature. 27 In fact, the bombing happened on 21 February 1981 and it affected the Czechoslovak section of RFE instead of the Romanian section. 28 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond IV-K, A.E. 11472. 29 Abu Iyad was in charge of the powerful PLO intelligence organization Jihaz al-Rasd. 30 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond 2, Opis 4, A.E. 95, 31–3. 31 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond 1, Opis12, A.E. 374, 375, 828, 836, 956. The Editorial Board defined the Bulletin’s main goal as giving operational information ‘about the development of contemporary terrorism, different terrorist trends and groups, […] the use of special anti-terrorist methods and tools, and about the organization of the anti-terrorist fight in the capitalist countries’. 32 COMDOS, Record Group ‘R’, Fond Operational Cases, A.E. 9974, Vol. VIII, 173–7, 185–7; A.E. 16160, Vol. V, 7–10; Record Group ‘M’, Fond VI-L, A.E. 1037, Vol. V, 176– 84. In the period 1986–9 Task Force ‘T’ (Counterterrorist Department) at the Sixth State Security Directorate issued about ninety thematic bulletins on international and domestic terrorism as well. 33 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond 38, Reg. I 2555, [22 April 1985], 123 pages. 34 Between 1975 and 1988 two concurring ethnic terrorist groups – the ‘Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia’ (ASALA) and the ‘Justice Commandos of the Armenian Genocide’ (JCAG), carried out 240 attacks in Europe, the Middle East, and North America, causing 577 casualties. The terrorist act in Burgas was assigned to JCAG. 35 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond 2, Opis 4, A.E. 95, 127. 36 However, the counterintelligence services had created their own operational files on the Muslim Brotherhood in 1981–82. See COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond 22, Opis 1, A.E. 65; Fond VI-L, A.E. 1258, Vol. I–II. In those files, older references and reports from the 1970s can be found as well. 37 According to further information from the Sixth State Security Directorate, sixtyeight members or followers of Muslim Brotherhood groups among the foreign students in Bulgaria were identified in 1985 alone. See COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond VI-L, A.E. 1258, Vol. I, 82–8; Record Group ‘R’, Fond Operational Cases, A.E. 16421, Vol. I, 87–94.

164

Terrorism in the Cold War

38 COMDOS, Record Group ‘R’, Fond Operational Cases, A.E. 16421, Vol. I, 171–2. 39 COMDOS, Record Group ‘R’, Fond Operational Cases, A.E. 16421, Vol. II, 224–36. 40 COMDOS, Record Group ‘R’, Fond Operational Cases, A.E. 9974, Vol. VI, 108–9. 41 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond 1, Opis 12, A.E. 722, 74–5. 42 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Reg. No. 000571/5 June 1986, 12. 43 From 1970 to 1990, the First Main Directorate of the Bulgarian State Security (PGU) acted as the Bulgarian foreign intelligence service. 44 COMDOS, Record Group ‘R’, Fond Operational Cases, A.E. 16421, Vol. I, 152. 45 COMDOS, Record Group ‘R’, Fond Operational Cases, A.E. 16421, Vol. II, 46–7. However, in March 1988 a foreign intelligence source in Beirut (aka ‘Walid’) informed about the preparation of a Hezbollah action against Soviet diplomats. See COMDOS, Record Group ‘R’, Fond Operational Cases, A.E. 16160, Vol. V, 143. 46 Terrorism: Origins, Direction and Support, Hearing before the Subcommittee on Security and Terrorism of the Committee on the Judiciary, U.S. Senate, 97th Congress, 1st Session, 24 April 1981 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1981); International Terrorism, Hearing before the Committee on Foreign Relations, U.S. Senate, 97th Congress, 1st Session, on S. 873, 10 June 1981 (Washington, DC, Government Printing Office, 1981). 47 See, for instance, the ‘classic’ books of Claire Sterling, The Time of the Assassins (New York: Henry Holt & Co, 1983); and Paul B. Henze, The Plot to Kill the Pope (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1983). A more complicated story was written by a MI6 historian and former Conservative MP, Rupert Allason, known as Nigel West, The Third Secret: The CIA, Solidarity and the KGB’s Plot to Kill the Pope (London: Collins, 2000). 48 Such as Christian Roulette, Jean-Paul II, Antonov, Agca: la fillére (Paris: Ed. du Sorbier, 1984); Edward S. Herman and Frank Brodhead, The Rise and Fall of the Bulgarian Connection (New York: Sheridan Square Publications, 1986); Eugeniusz Guz, Zamach na papieza (Warsaw: Krajowa Agencja Wydawnicza, 1983). In the third, revised edition of his book (Warsaw: Uraeus, 2001), Eugeniusz Guz reconsidered new evidence, including his interview with Col. Gunter Bohnsack, a Stasi officer who worked on this particular case. 49 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond 1, Opis 12, A.E. 405a. The check was assigned to Zhivko Nedelchev, a ‘Turkish’ Department counterintelligence officer. 50 TsDA, Fond 1-B, Opis 64, A.E. 692, 1–52. 51 Servizio per le Informazioni e la Sicurezza Militare (‘Military Intelligence and Security Service’) was the Italian military intelligence service from 1977 to 2007, subordinated to the minister of defence. 52 COMDOS, Record Group ‘S’, Fond DF 2, Vol. 5. 53 In 1984 Bulgarian state security received information from the Stasi with the names of 340 ‘Grey Wolves’ members. In the next months it was disclosed that seventy-three of them had crossed Bulgarian territory from Turkey to Western Europe and back. 54 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond 1, Opis 11-A, A.E. 118, 120; Record Group ‘R’, Fond 9, Opis 4, A.E. 659, 664, 670. 55 In the KGB vocabulary, Active Measures usually meant disinformation and psychological operations (PSYOPS in the CIA vocabulary). 56 COMDOS, Record Group ‘R’, Fond 9, Opis 4, A.E. 663, 28, 153. 57 Hearings 102–799, Select Committee on Intelligence, U.S. Senate, 102nd Congress, 1st Session, 24 September and 1–2 October 1991 (Washington DC: Government Printing Office, 1992), Vol. 1–2.



8. Bulgarian State Security and International Terrorism

165

58 Raymond Garthoff, The Great Transition: American-Soviet Relations and the End of the Cold War (Washington: Brookings Institution, 1994), 92–5. 59 In fact, the covert arms trade in Bulgaria started in 1956 with the Council of Ministers’ Secret Resolution No. 737 of 8 May 1956, when the special bureau ‘KINTEX’ was established within the Engineering Directorate of the Ministry of Foreign Trade. With the new Government Resolution No. 131 of 8 July 1966, that Bureau was transformed into an independent foreign trade company, whose activity was controlled by state security officers in cooperation with Ministry of Defence and Ministry of Foreign Trade officials. See TsDA, Fond 136, Opis 86, A.E. 650, 5–9. The first ever clandestine operation involving arms transfers to a Third World country was carried out in 1958–61 with several weaponry deliveries by sea to Tunisia for the Algerian National Liberation Front (FLN). See TsDA, Fond 1-B, Opis 6, A.E. 3691, 3737, 3811; Opis 33, A.E. 11; Opis 64, A.E. 274, 282. 60 This information was confirmed by the director of the ‘Information and Archive’ department at the Bulgarian ministry of the interior (MoI), Mr Slavcho Slavchev, and in an official letter No. I-1499 of 20 January 2011 from the deputy minister of the interior, Dr Veselin Vuchkov, to the author of this publication. 61 Bulgarian–Turkish Narcotics Connection: United States–Bulgarian Relations and International Drug Trafficking, Hearings and Markup before the Committee on Foreign Affairs and the Subcommittee on Europe and the Middle East, House of Representatives, 98th Congress, 2nd Session, June–September 1984 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1984); Drugs and Terrorism, Hearing before the Subcommittee on Alcoholism and Drug Abuse of the Committee on Labor and Human Resources, U.S. Senate, 98th Congress, 2nd Session, 2 August 1984 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1984). 62 Paul Henze started his activity as a CIA senior expert for the Balkans at the Radio Free Europe (RFE) office in Munich in 1952. See Paul Henze Papers, CN 2005C42, Hoover Institution Archives, Stanford, CA. 63 The Involvement of the People’s Republic of Bulgaria in International Narcotics Trafficking, Report of the Office of Intelligence of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), U.S. Department of Justice, May 1984 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1984). 64 Malcolm Byrne, Iran-Contra: Reagan’s Scandal and the Unchecked Abuse of Presidential Power (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2014). 65 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond. VІ-L, A.E. 1067, Vol. І, 9–18. 66 TsDA, Fond 1-B, Opis 101, A.E. 1280, 4–12. 67 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond 1, Opis11-A, A.E. 342. 68 ‘Soviet Bloc Role in International Terrorism and Revolutionary Violence’, NIE 11/286W, August 1986, 6–7, https​://ww​w.cia​.gov/​libra​ry/re​ading​room/​docs/​DOC_0​00051​ 8060.​pdf (accessed 1 January 2020). 69 COMDOS, Record Group ‘R’, Fond Operational Cases, A.E. 16 434, Vol. ІІ’І, 91. 70 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond. VІ-L, A.E. 1067, Vol. І, 42–3. 71 COMDOS, Record Group ‘R’, Fond Operational Cases, A.E. 16142, Vol. V, 67–89. 72 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond. VІ-L, A.E. 1067, Vol. І, 38. 73 Тодор Бояджиев, Разузнаването (Sofia: Trud, 2000), 55–8. 74 TsDA, Sofia, Fond 1-B, Opis 101, File 1586, 2–3. Additionally, see Jordan Baev, The Strange Case of the Bulgarian–Greek Security Cooperation at the End of the Cold War Era, Etudes Balkaniques LI/1 (2015), 174–89.

166

Terrorism in the Cold War

75 Direction Générale de la Sécurité Extérieure (General Directorate for External Security), French foreign intelligence service subordinated to the Ministry of Defense. 76 COMDOS, Record Group ‘R’, Fond Operational Cases, A.E. 16434, Vol. V, 167–9; Vol. VI, 157–60; Vol. VII, 171–2; Record Group ‘M’, Fond VI-L, A.E. 1084, Vol. II, 3–4. 77 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond VI-L, A.E. 1303, Vol. 1, 125–9; Vol. 4, 110–13, 117. 78 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond VI-L, A.E. 1303, Vol. 1, 139–42. 79 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond 87, Opis 1-A, A.E. 19, 15–19; Fond VІ-L, A.E. 1303, Vol. I, 170–2, 189–91; Vol. III, 29; A.E. 1324, Vol. 1, 83–5. 80 In those months, it was called ‘National Service for the Protection of the Constitution’, but a few months later it was renamed to ‘National Security Service’. In 2008 the Bulgarian counterintelligence service was restructured into the State Agency (DANS). 81 COMDOS, Record Group ‘M’, Fond 2, Opis 6, A.E. 29, 1–8; A.E. 142, 4–6; Fond 87, Opis 1-A, A.E. 19, 164–6.

CChapter 9 YUGOSLAVIA, CARLOS ‘THE JACKAL’ AND INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM DURING THE COLD WAR Gordan Akrap

The intelligence and security system of each state acts in accordance with its domestic and foreign policy. The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Yugoslavia/SFRY), which existed from 1945 to 1992, was no exception. The main creator of all key decisions and opinions, especially those in the field of domestic and foreign policy, was Josip Broz Tito (1892–1980), lifelong president of Yugoslavia (1945–1980) and the League of Communists of Yugoslavia (LCY).1 The internal policy of Yugoslavia was reduced to a complete fight against all those who had tried, or could try, to change Tito’s absolutism and governance in Yugoslavia. The clash with political opponents went up to the level of their liquidation, regardless of whether they were in Yugoslavia or abroad,2 using a system that was, from the beginning, created as a ‘political intelligence service’.3 The repressive system of Yugoslavia was developed along the lines of the Soviet model of secret political police in order to maintain the political dominance of the LCY and to not allow the absolute authority of Tito and the LCY to be endangered. The question of organization and operation of the security system in Yugoslavia has been treated, from the very beginning of its existence, as an ‘internal political [communist] organizational question’.4 Therefore, it can rightfully be claimed that the Yugoslavian political and repressive system, which has used violent methods in dealing with political opponents, was totalitarian and totally undemocratic. The monopoly on truth and all political and societal (sports, culture, arts, etc.) processes in Yugoslavia had to remain firmly under the control of Tito and the LCY.

Short presentation of Yugoslav foreign policy from 1945 to 1990 The foreign policy of Yugoslavia in the analysed time period passed several phases: from full cooperation with Stalin's Soviet Union through the severance of all ties with the Soviet Union and other communist states (1948), rapprochement towards the West and reconciliation with Khrushchev’s Soviet Union (1955) to the creation of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) as a counterbalance to the bloc division of the world (1961). The process of the NAM’s creation and

168

Terrorism in the Cold War

existence determined Yugoslavian policy towards organizations that used violent, even terrorist, means and methods in order to achieve certain political objectives (as was the case in the Yugoslavian state’s fight against its political opponents). In the official Yugoslav terminology, such foreign individuals, groups and organizations were called revolutionaries, revolutionary organizations, fighters against imperialism, neo-colonialism and Zionism, the fighters for national rights, freedom fighters, and fighters for socialism. The NAM quickly gathered a considerable number of countries and ‘revolutionary movements’ mostly from Africa, South America and Asia. The Yugoslav intelligence and security services followed the state’s policy aimed at developing cooperation with countries and organizations that had joined, or might join, the NAM. It should be noted that the first NAM Conference was held in Belgrade in 1961 from 1 to 6 September, and was attended by representatives from ‘28 countries: 10 from Asia, 12 from Africa, 4 from Latin America and 2 located in Europe. […] The conference was also attended by delegates from 24 liberation movements’.5 Tito supported the idea that every nation has the right to create its own nationstate6 and to decide about its own political future without outside influence. This was, for Tito and the LCY, a struggle against imperialism and neo-colonialism that was fully justified, acceptable and a necessary activity supposed to lead to the national liberation of each nation. In this respect, Yugoslavia supported Machiavelli’s thesis that the final goal justifies the means, and because of that Yugoslavia did not accept the Western attitude against some organizations that were members of NAM. Despite the fact that some of them were terrorist organizations that used terrorist methods and means, Yugoslavia insisted that they were revolutionary and avant-garde organizations that had an ‘advanced role’ in social change.7 This again showed the differences in the interpretation of the terms ‘terrorism’ and ‘terrorist activities’: terrorists on one hand, and freedom fighters on the other. From this premise stemmed the attitude of the Yugoslav state institutions to such ‘revolutionaries’. This approach is illustrated exemplarily by the initiative proposed to the UN General Assembly by four countries, mostly NAM8 members, in December 1987 to adopt a resolution that would clearly, according to the Yugoslav opinion, define the difference between a terrorist organization and revolutionary movements struggling for their respective countries’ national liberation. The resolution insists on ‘the inalienable right to self-determination and independence of all peoples under colonial and racist regimes and other forms of alien domination and upholding the legitimacy of their struggle, in particular the struggle of national liberation movements’.9 With the adoption of such a resolution, Yugoslavia would officially be able to resist interpretations and accusations of Western countries that Yugoslavia supported international terrorism by providing training for the members of terrorist organizations on its territory, allowing them unimpeded use of the territory of Yugoslavia for passage and transport of weapons and terrorist funds, as well as by its refusal to extradite suspected or indicted terrorists to the countries seeking their extradition (especially in the case of the West European countries). The activities of these ‘liberation movements’, organized and performed outside the territory of Yugoslavia, and part of the



9. Yugoslavia, Carlos ‘the Jackal’ and International Terrorism

169

‘liberation’ process, were acceptable to Yugoslavia. From this premise derived the modus operandi of the state institutions towards these violent actors during the existence of Yugoslavia, especially if those activities originated from politically leftwing oriented groups and persons. Yugoslavia expected that states newly created by these groups would certainly be part of the NAM and would follow Yugoslavia’s or Tito’s version of the socialist development of the state and society. The SFRY supported these activities for the following reasons:

Strengthening their political influence in the international community through the processes of conflict between existing political blocs Strengthening economic cooperation with the newly created states, primarily with a view to export weapons10 and to develop military relations11 Intensification of cooperation in ‘science and education’ or the ‘scientifictechnical’ field12 with particular emphasis on the training of officers of these states and movements, which encouraged the spread of the Yugoslavian political idea and built an excellent foundation for possible future cooperation in the event that these persons became holders of high positions upon returning to their countries/movements. In the process of imposing their own vision of the socialist development of the country and society in some ‘advanced countries’13 in Africa and Asia, Yugoslavia had serious rivals in other countries ruled by communist authorities, such as China and the German Democratic Republic (GDR), which were particularly active in trying to exert their influence on NAM member states.14

Yugoslavia and terrorism For official Yugoslavian policy, ‘terrorism is a form of class struggle’15 because ‘terrorism is used by certain national liberation movements in response to the terror of the colonizers. These activities are generally allowed, if the object of attack is properly selected.’16 The Yugoslav People’s Army (YPA) accepted the attitude of the Italian Communist Party, which warned that in Western Europe ‘behind the left-wing terrorist group is actually hiding politically right-wing policy’17 because ‘terrorism had become part of the special warfare strategy’.18 For terrorism to be a successful special warfare strategy meeting its set of goals, it ‘must be ambiguous, i.e. must pretend to be presented as politically left-wing terrorism’.19 On the other hand, it was pointed out that in the Middle East, ‘the intelligence services of both blocs [NATO and the Warsaw Treaty] tried and succeeded to incorporate some of their agents in the various terrorist groups and organizations and that these groups and organizations, among other things, are directed to act in the function of patron’s interests and objectives’.20 Regarding groups using terrorist methods that were not under the control of the ‘imperialist West’, the authors could find words of justification for their terrorist activities because they occurred ‘as an expression of revolt and as a consequence of sharpened contradictions and the

170

Terrorism in the Cold War

situation in which the modern world has been found (the Middle East crisis, the unresolved Palestinian issue …)’.21 In the ‘Review of the international terrorist organizations’22 written by members of the secret service, the German RAF, for example, is described as ‘the oldest terrorist organization in Europe consisting of the so-called left-wing extremists’.23 In the description of the PLO, it is stated that Yugoslavia ‘recognizes and fully supports the PLO as a legitimate movement for the liberation of Palestine. However, this review covers also the organizations that are part of the PLO since it is known that within them there exists a variety of extreme radical groups and individuals, who did not respect the proclaimed policy of the movement.’24 Fatah is defined ‘as a main organization of the Palestinian resistance movement […] a classical nationalist movement that is trying to gather members of all parts of the Palestinian society’.25 The Review also states that ‘during 1984 several members of the “Group 17”26 visited Belgrade and, together with the two Fatah activists already residing in Belgrade, kidnapped Belgrade’s Abu Musa supporters who were about to leave our country [Yugoslavia] and go to Syria’.27 The Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP) is described as an ‘organization that pleads for changes in Arabic countries, bringing to power progressive parties, because the Palestinian revolution cannot reach its main goal without the help of other Arabic regimes’.28 On the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), the Review notes that ‘its strategy could be defined as revolutionary violence and the struggle against the Israeli enemy “wherever it is”, without excluding from their activities the conservative Arab regimes’.29 The type and models of cooperation between the Yugoslav intelligence and security services and their counterparts from other countries and organizations is described clearly in a study of the Military Security Service (MSS; at that time named Department of Security, but generally known as Kontraobaveštajna služba [KOS], literally Counterintelligence Service): In the ISEC [Intelligence and Security Education Center – ObaveštajnoBezbednosni Školski Centar (OBŠC)], intelligence and security officers of various profiles from some of the non-aligned countries and liberation movements with which the Yugoslav People’s Army (YPA) established inter-army cooperation are trained. […] Cooperation and assistance in the education process of the members of the intelligence and security services of non-aligned countries was on the rise. It contributed very positively to the overall state of relations of our country [Yugoslavia] with these friendly countries.30

Cooperation organized and conducted by the Yugoslav authorities in the field of military and security training (at the military academy and in the ISEC for the intelligence and counterintelligence personnel) provided to NAM member states and movements occurred mostly within military institutions because the YPA was a federal institution which was not affected by the influence of the leadership from individual Yugoslav republics,31 reducing the risk of significant information leaks, and eliminating conflicts of jurisdiction with State Security Services (SSS; Služba



9. Yugoslavia, Carlos ‘the Jackal’ and International Terrorism

171

Državne Bezbednosti [SDB]) of individual republics. It is also necessary to take into account the fact that military personnel were under the control of and operated according to the orders received from Tito. After Tito’s death in 1980, the military was under the control of the LCY and the presidency of Yugoslavia. The MSS was a unique federal institution that was under the responsibility of only the federal minister of defence and the federal political leadership. The MSS had its own logistics network in all of the former republics, and it could organize, without the necessity to contact other institutions, any specialized training activities anywhere in Yugoslavia: Between 1960 and 1986 over 800 foreign auditors from 10 countries and 4 liberation movements were educated in the ISEC. Members of liberation movements were also trained in Yugoslav military schools to become helicopter pilots, commanders of low and higher level units, and officers in various special areas and services.32

The occasional cooperation with the intelligence and security services of different NAM member states and movements, as well as the training of their members, was also maintained through the system of the State Security Service of the Federal Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SSS FMIA SFRY – Federal SSS). However, this education was organized only at the federal level and, in Yugoslavia, in the framework of the Institute for Security (or Security Institute).33 It is necessary to add that foreign nationals from NAM countries also studied in all Yugoslav republics at civil universities, in even larger numbers than was the case with military personnel. These students were the responsibility of the SSS of each republic. The SSS used this opportunity to ‘cover’ those civilian students and to recruit operational sources among them. Foreign students in Yugoslavia were very often organized in their national student organizations, which sometimes served as a logistical support base in Yugoslavia in times of necessity for members of their national terrorist organizations. Foreign nationals within those groups, who were responsible for counterintelligence protection (but were not liaison officers) and took control of their activities, their political and propaganda work, tried to keep foreign students of a specific country together in order to strengthen their internal cohesion and, if required, to secure logistical support for individual persons during their stay in or transfer to Yugoslavia. However, it is known that the meetings of those groups, especially in the case of movements such as the PLO, would end up in quarrels, mutual accusations and even physical confrontations. The most common reason for conflict was the fact that not all students were supporters of the same political factions or organizations within the same movement. Such activities were actively monitored by the Yugoslav military and civil counterintelligence service, depending on whether the individual person studied at the military, or at a civil, university. One of the best examples that illustrate the position and attitude of Yugoslavia towards international terrorism during the Cold War is its relationship with one of

172

Terrorism in the Cold War

the most famous terrorists, IIich Ramirez Sanchez known as Carlos ‘the Jackal’, in the period from 1969 up to the dissolution of Yugoslavia. It should be noted that the Yugoslav military leadership defines Carlos as a ‘guerrilla man from Venezuela’.34 The development of the relation will be shown through the comparison of the two versions of Carlos’s arrival in Belgrade in September 1976 and the German request for his arrest and extradition at that time: one version was part of international public knowledge, and the other was, until recently, part of protected knowledge. Their differences are truly significant and show the application of the Yugoslav political and security policy to the countries’ effective position on international terrorism.

Carlos in Yugoslavia In the available documents, there are specific differences regarding Carlos’s and Hans-Joachim Klein’s35 stay in Belgrade in September 1976. As a representative example of how the Yugoslav side presented this case, which was of interest to the international public, we use the work of Slovenian author Polona Balantič written on the basis of documents from German official archives.36 The contents of these documents will be compared with the content of official documents of the Federal SSS, which were marked by the highest degree of confidentiality and offer a completely different view on the same case than the one that official Belgrade offered to the public. Carlos in Yugoslavia in 1976 – the version for Germany and the international public According to the analysis of documents from the archives of the German foreign ministry, the German Ministry of Internal Affairs officially informed the Yugoslav Foreign Ministry on 6 September 1976 shortly before 9.00 p.m. that two of the most wanted international terrorists, Carlos ‘the Jackal’ and Hans-Joachim Klein, had landed at Belgrade airport, from Algeria via Geneva on Air Algeria flight 3234. German diplomats who surveilled the disembarking of the passengers from that flight and their travel from Belgrade airport to the Belgrade Hotel Metropol recognized Carlos but not Klein. Germany immediately requested the Yugoslav authorities to arrest them and accordingly issued a warrant for their arrest and extradition. Since the Yugoslav side denied their arrival on the territory of Yugoslavia, the German side had to intensify pressure (public and political) on Yugoslavia, pointing out that both of them resided in Belgrade and that they intended, within the next forty-eight hours, to continue their flight to Baghdad. This led to negative Yugoslav reactions and a sharpening of the communication between the two countries. Representatives of the Yugoslav state institutions pointed out that none of these people had come to Yugoslavia. Yugoslavian officials said that ‘Yugoslavia is fighting against terrorism’.37 Intensive communication between German and Yugoslav institutions and officials continued after the German



9. Yugoslavia, Carlos ‘the Jackal’ and International Terrorism

173

side found that there was a high level of certainty that Carlos and Klein had left Belgrade on 8 September 1976, on board the Yugoslav airline (JAT) Flight JU 654 to Baghdad. The next day the head of the Yugoslav Interpol office in Belgrade38 told an employee of the German Embassy that the person that the German side claimed was a terrorist was, in fact, an Algerian professor of history, while the other person that had landed from the same flight had come to Belgrade upon an invitation from the Belgrade radio-TV broadcast company for vocational training. He added that Carlos had certainly not come to Yugoslavia because he was facing arrest. Germany did not believe in these excuses.39 According to available documents of the Federal SSS located in the Croatian State Archives, Germany was absolutely right in not trusting the Yugoslav authorities’ version of this case. Carlos and his travels to Yugoslavia from 1976 to 1983 – the true version according to the documents from the Federal SSS The Analysis40 of the events of September 1976, written by the Federal SSS in Belgrade in December 1983 – after the ‘treatment of isolation’41 (September– October 1983) of Johannes Weinrich42, a member of the core leadership of Carlos’s group43 – reveals the actual sequence of events in connection with the arrival of Carlos and Klein in Belgrade in September 197644 in the context of Carlos’s earlier arrivals in Yugoslavia. The special emphasis of the document was on the residence of Johannes Weinrich with the aim of developing Carlos’s organizations in Yugoslavia and establishing official contacts with the Federal SSS. The Analysis pointed out several times that in the archives of the Federal SSS (in December 1983, when the Analysis was written) a number of documents related to the case from 1976 were missing, such as phonograms of the conversations of the state officials with Carlos, photographic documentation, records and results of SSS surveillance activities against Carlos and Klein.45 However, a partial analysis has been made, which shows that Carlos really arrived in Belgrade on 6 September 1976. The Analysis confirms that the mentioned aircraft landed at Belgrade airport in the evening, coming from Algeria via Geneva. Carlos and Hans-Joachim Klein were on that plane. Upon exiting the aircraft, they headed to Belgrade’s Hotel Metropol, where they decided to stay. On their way from the airport to the hotel they were under surveillance by employees of the German Embassy in Belgrade46. The SSS apparently received the first information about their stay from German institutions indicating that Carlos and Klein had landed at Belgrade airport. After receiving this information, the SSS organized surveillance and arrest teams with the duty to identify them, to take Carlos and Klein ‘in isolation’47 from the Hotel Metropol, and to accommodate them in a highly protected building inside the complex of the Institute for Security, under the control of the Federal SSS and located in Belgrade.48 Both were in isolation until the evening of 9 September 1976,49 when they left Belgrade on a flight to Damascus, Syria. Carlos came to Belgrade using a Lebanese passport in the name of George Ibrahim Shaleen, while Klein used a passport in the name of Peter Klarseen. Other documents show that Carlos had often visited Yugoslavia since 1969. In a 1976

174

Terrorism in the Cold War

interview with staff members of the Federal and the Serbian SSS, Carlos said that he had been in Yugoslavia50 several times; in 1976 it was already his third visit to Yugoslavia. From 12 July to 12 August 1976 he visited the area of Split, Ploče, Mostar and Sarajevo, where he maintained contacts with his closest associates, as well as with members of other ‘revolutionary organizations’ from Europe and Latin America because ‘Yugoslavia at the time, provided very favorable conditions for having contacts with members of organizations that came to Belgrade from different directions and at different times’.51 Yugoslavia was used as a transit country for the travel from Western to Eastern Europe (GDR, Romania, Hungary) and to the Middle East (Lebanon, Iraq, Syria) and back, for smuggling weapons and explosives and for safe meetings. During the conversations with Carlos, which in 1976 were personally approved by Yugoslavia’s Federal Interior Minister Franjo Herljević, Carlos held the position of a ‘communist and revolutionary’,52 emphasizing the existence of many similarities between the goals of his organization and the Yugoslav foreign policy, especially in terms of ‘supporting progressive and liberation movements in the world’53 in their fight against imperialists. Carlos offered to the Yugoslav side concrete cooperation in fulfilling these goals. However, the Yugoslavian side did not accept that offer, stressing that it did not want to provide help to him or to his organization. But the decision to arrest and extradite Carlos and Klein was not even seriously considered because Yugoslavian institutions held the opinion that the arrest of the two terrorists could lead to revenge against Yugoslavia by Carlos’s organization at home and abroad. Moreover, it was feared that Yugoslavia would probably be faced with significant disputes from NAM member states and movements, while the benefits from the possible extradition would not be palpable. What intrigued Federal SSS was the fact that Carlos, even during isolation, maintained contacts with six Algerian nationals who had been on the same flight with him, when he flew to Belgrade. These persons were, in fact, part of an Algerian delegation. The SSS determined neither the nature of their relationship nor the actual identity of the Algerian nationals.54

Conversations with Johannes Weinrich (1983) Although Carlos had received a negative reply to his request for the establishment of official cooperation in 1976, he sent a letter on 1 June 1983 to Johannes Weinrich (his successor as the head of the cell in Yugoslavia, based in Belgrade) in which he, among other things, gave the following instruction: ‘I insist, as a priority, to establish official contact with Yugoslavs, if not with the security, then with another official side.’55 The reason why Carlos sent such a request to Weinrich asking him to establish contact with the SSS is not completely clear. It is possible that Carlos was encouraged by the fact that since 1976 he had often stayed safely and unhindered in Yugoslavia, that Yugoslavia was a transit country through which he had passed so many times without problems in transferring large amounts of weapons and explosives, where he had held numerous meetings, and where he had not been disturbed while establishing a logistic base. Therefore, while the Federal



9. Yugoslavia, Carlos ‘the Jackal’ and International Terrorism

175

SSS highlighted their ignorance about these facts, Carlos interpreted them as a tacit consent to act freely in Yugoslavia. It is possible, and indeed likely, given the fact that a large number of members of ‘revolutionary movements’ were students at Yugoslav military and civilian institutions, that the PLO knew about Carlos’s presence in Yugoslavia. Although Fatah’s Abu Daoud (a member of the ‘PLO’s United Security Service in charge of contacts with foreign security bodies’56) offered to connect Weinrich with the Federal SSS, Weinrich chose another mediator.57 The first official contact with representatives of the Federal SSS was established on 15 July 1983,58 during which Weinrich presented his real name and the reason why he sought a meeting. He pointed out that Carlos’s organization believed that Yugoslavia ‘is an ally in our struggle (objective and subjective)’59 and that the organization had ‘developed a lot since 1976’60 with the objective of becoming an ‘international organization to fight imperialism (Zionism & reactionary forces), a bridge between the national movements for liberation and the worldwide necessity to defeat imperialism’.61 Regarding the past, Weinrich repeated Carlos’s words: ‘For old times: a special gratitude towards you.’62 During a conversation with members of both the Federal and the Serbian SSS (one of whom was Jovica Stanišić, head of Serbia’s state security service from the time of the violent break-up of Yugoslavia until the fall of Slobodan Milosevic), Weinrich stated that Carlos had been in Belgrade, with short interruptions, from 26 June 1982 to January 1983 using a Syrian diplomatic passport in the name of Michael Khoury. For this reason, he rented an apartment in Belgrade (Nikšić street, number 39), and often used the telex machine in the Hotel Yugoslavia (in Belgrade) giving the name Michel.63 The SSS concluded that Carlos thus ‘established his base’64 in Yugoslavia ‘from which they performed actions in West European countries’.65 During that time, Carlos had been involved in two incidents that required police intervention and an emergency hospital treatment.66 However, none of these situations were recorded by the SSS.67 After Carlos’s departure from Yugoslavia, the task of keeping and strengthening the cell in Yugoslavia was taken over by Weinrich, who was staying unnoticed by secret services in Belgrade until he was directed to establish contact with the Federal SSS. Weinrich said that from 1976 to 1983,68 he and Carlos had been in Yugoslavia at least fifty times and that they had used the territory of Yugoslavia eleven times in 1982 and 1983 alone to transfer large quantities of weapons, explosives, ammunition and other means to commit terrorist acts. The SSS claimed that they had not recorded these activities.69 During their stays, Carlos and Weinrich had held a number of meetings with representatives of the intelligence and security services of the GDR, Hungary and Romania as well as terrorist organizations of European and Latin American countries (according to Weinrich, between June 1982 and January 1983 alone, Carlos had had more than twenty meetings with members of his and other ‘revolutionary organizations’ in Yugoslavia). He justified this because ‘for us it’s practically impossible to avoid Yugoslavia’.70 Weinrich repeated Carlos’s offer from 1976 to ‘exchange security information with the aim of mutual protection with the possibility to create cooperation and joint actions’.71 After the offer was considered in the highest political and security

176

Terrorism in the Cold War

circles, officials told Weinrich that the ‘SSS does not accept contacts with Carlos as he already knows that since 1976 […] Yugoslavia will not be a base for terrorist activities’72 because ‘accepting Carlos’ offer could seriously compromise Yugoslavia and therefore is unacceptable’,73 but that their ‘stay will be tolerated if they behave correctly’.74 Realizing that Carlos and his associates were not only passing through Yugoslavia but also using its territory for their terrorist activities, and faced with the information from the human and technical surveillance as well as the secret search of objects that had been used by associates of Carlos’s organization, the Federal SSS decided to open an official inquiry against Weinrich, and to proceed with Weinrich in the same way as it had done with Carlos and Klein in 1976.75 At the beginning of the investigation, the first secret search of Weinrich’s apartment was organized (2 September 1983),76 followed by an official one a few days later (5 September 1983). That day, an official 45-day investigation77 was started against him. The search showed that Weinrich possessed a large quantity of weapons, ammunition and explosives with the appropriate fuses and means to activate the explosives. During the raid, ‘he insisted only that they do not touch the documents located in two leather handbags pertaining to his organization, which was accepted’. After Weinrich had been placed in isolation (like Carlos and Klein in 1976), the Federal SSS gradually examined all of the collected documents, except those that they left with him untouched. However, when Weinrich refused to talk with the SSS employees, the pressure on him was intensified. Those documents that had been untouched so far were also opened, secretly removed and copied (about 2,600 pages). Weinrich was periodically placed in solitary confinement in order to force him into a concrete conversation during the investigation. During the investigation it was found that Carlos’s organization had its supporters and several bases in Western Europe.78 In addition to an apartment depot in Belgium,79 it maintained ad hoc depots in Austria, Switzerland, France, Germany, Ireland and Spain.80 Background logistic bases were established in the GDR (from 1979),81 Hungary (from 1979),82 and in Romania (from 1978, with the ‘largest depot in East Europe’)83. In these countries, the group had established solid contacts with the respective domestic intelligence apparatuses. From those logistic bases group members travelled to the West for terrorist activities using the territory of Yugoslavia (and they would cross Yugoslavian territory again on their way back). With representatives of the Romanian intelligence service Securitate they agreed to conduct meetings exclusively in Belgrade. From the beginning of the contact in 1978, Carlos has allegedly planned joint activities with the Rumanians, some of which were never executed because of disagreements in determining the objectives of those actions. During these discussions, a cooperation to liquidate operatives of the CIA in Western Europe was planned. In return, the Romanian intelligence service asked that Carlos organize liquidations of Romanian political dissidents that lived abroad. Since Carlos was apparently not ready to fulfil this task, the agreement on joint action to liquidate CIA operatives was not realized.84 During the investigation of Weinrich, the SSS assessed possible future scenarios and their possible consequences. If Weinrich was extradited on the basis of the



9. Yugoslavia, Carlos ‘the Jackal’ and International Terrorism

177

existing arrest warrant, the intelligence service reasonably conceived the suspicion that an attack against Yugoslav targets at home or abroad might occur, organized and executed by members of different terrorist groups. This would possibly lead to a compromise of the Yugoslav policy in NAM. Therefore, the idea to extradite Weinrich was rejected. If he were to be allowed to stay in Yugoslavia, there would be the risk of compromising Yugoslavia before the international (primarily Western) public. In case Weinrich was brought to court for an organized trial, that would likewise cause a reaction from Carlos’s organization and other terrorist organizations, as well as from Western European countries requiring Weinrich’s extradition. Then the public would be informed about details that would compromise the Yugoslavian security system due to the quite long and smooth stays and activities of Carlos and his associates in Yugoslavia. Therefore, it was concluded that Weinrich had to be handed over, secretly, to Syria, whose passport he held.85 On 20 October 1983, he was put on a JAT flight from Belgrade to Kuwait via Damascus. He was ‘discreetly conducted through official controls’ at Belgrade airport. The SSS provided him with a false identity under the name Fadil Mujagić.86 He took with him 98 kilograms of luggage.87 Weapons and explosive materials were taken away from him – everything else was returned. At the airport in Damascus, he was taken over by the ‘intelligence of the Syrian Air Force’.88 Two months later, on 16 December 1983, Carlos tried to enter Yugoslavia from Hungary at the border check point Subotica, with a Syrian diplomatic passport in the name of Michel Kassis,89 carrying a weapon, grenades and explosives.90 However, due to an ‘inadequate visa’ he was not allowed to enter Yugoslavia and was returned to Hungary. According to the assessment of the Federal SSS, Carlos did not accept the message that was sent by Weinrich, saying that ‘messages via inmates were not accepted’.91 Therefore, the Federal SSS proposed to undertake a tightening action on Carlos and members of his organization so that they would take the message that was sent seriously.92 Some of the members of the Carlos group in Yugoslavia were arrested and sentenced to prison terms (which were soon suspended), some of them were expelled from the country with the suggestion not to return if they wanted to continue with their illegal activities. It is not clear whether the Yugoslavian authorities shared the information obtained during the investigation of Weinrich and previous conversations with Carlos himself. The Federal SSS just noted that it did not have enough information about Carlos and his organization before September 1983 and that the service had received only some information from ‘Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Italy and Germany’.93

Conclusion The attitude of the Yugoslav intelligence and security services towards persons and organizations that had planned, organized and performed terrorist activities outside the territory of Yugoslavia was defined by the official policy of Tito and the Communist Party, and the role and position of Yugoslavia in the NAM. Yugoslavia

178

Terrorism in the Cold War

did not directly serve as an official logistical support base nor did it participate directly in the process of planning and executing terrorist acts. However, sometimes Yugoslavia did not prevent the activities of terrorist groups against Western targets abroad, either due to the lack of information or due to foreign policy considerations. As a result, the foreign terrorists in Yugoslavia were (in most cases) not arrested and extradited to the countries that issued Interpol arrest warrants for them (such as in the cases of Carlos, Klein, Weinrich and, later, RAF members). Because of its special position in the Cold War, Yugoslavia served as a safe transit country, through which persons designated as terrorists in the West could travel from the member states of one political bloc to the member states of the other bloc as well as to many Third World countries. Yugoslavia, whose security system was largely engaged in the monitoring and prevention of activities by the political opposition to the ruling Communist Party, paid less attention to the issues of international terrorism for obvious reasons. Yugoslavia was developing intensive cooperation with representatives of different states and ‘revolutionary movements’ that were members of the NAM. In a few cases, when the Western intelligence and security services found that many suspected terrorists freely resided and moved around in Yugoslavia, officials denied those accusations, as demonstrated in the case of Carlos. In other cases, Yugoslavia imposed conditions for the extradition of terrorists arrested on its territory that were difficult for democratic states to accept (e.g. when four German RAF members were arrested in Yugoslavia in 1978).94 Yugoslavia most often tolerated the movement of terrorists on its soil, under the only condition that the territory of Yugoslavia was not going to be used for any form of violent or terrorist activity. Yugoslavian state institutions did not cooperate with Carlos’s organization, despite the group’s repeated efforts to establish cooperation. Moreover, starting from late 1983 they no longer tolerated the presence of Carlos and his lieutenant Weinrich on its territory. On the other hand, cooperation with organizations and groups that the Yugoslav authorities considered ‘revolutionary and/or national movements’ took place at a high level. Their members were trained in (mainly military) state institutions with the aim of teaching them different specialist knowledge and skills. At the same time, Yugoslavia sought to offer those ‘revolutionary movements’ assistance with a possible redefinition of their international position by insisting that their violence was part of a struggle to achieve justified objectives. For that reason, Yugoslavian authorities argued, they should not be called ‘terrorists’ or ‘terrorist organizations’. It is therefore right to conclude that during the Cold War, Yugoslavia had taken a position close to that of a country tolerating activities of international terrorist organizations, especially from left-wing political positions. At the same time, the Yugoslavian regime did not restrain itself from using violence and even committing terrorist acts domestically and abroad in order to fight against its own dissidents and political opposition members who were in favour of the democratization of Yugoslavia. It was the fall of the Berlin Wall that finally created a fundamental necessity for the dissolution of (multi-)national countries under



9. Yugoslavia, Carlos ‘the Jackal’ and International Terrorism

179

communist totalitarian rule and the creation of the new/old states following the model of West European democracies. The fall of the totalitarian repressive system made it possible to gain access to the archives of the secret police services, at least to those documents that survived deletion, destruction and thefts. Thereby, details about Yugoslavia’s relations to terrorist actors came to light as along with some of the communist propaganda activities, which were finally clearly recognized as a part of the ‘active measures’ policy.

Notes 1 After Tito’s death in 1980, the decision-making process was transferred to the highest authorities of the ruling Communist Party and to the president of Yugoslavia. 2 In the period between 1968 and 1978, ‘in internal conflicts 57 terrorists’ were killed outside of Yugoslavia. See Nedeljko Bošković, potpukovnik, O teorizmu uopšte kao obliku specijalnog rata protiv SFRJ i iskustvima iz akcije ‘RADUŠA’, prošireno predavanje na Višem kursu ŠNO, Centra visokih vojnih škola, Vojna tajna, Poverljivo (Belgrade: Obaveštajno-bezbednosni školski centar, June 1978), 32. It should be noted that the number of emigrants killed abroad by Yugoslavian secret police totalled up to more than 100 until the year 1990. Most of those killed were Croats (at least 67), followed by Albanians and Serbs. The communist authorities’ propaganda euphemism ‘killed in internal conflicts’ was used to inform the Yugoslavian public on the violent death of each emigrant. In fact, it meant that such persons (or several persons together) were killed by the Yugoslav secret political police. For more details, see the author’s PhD thesis: Gordan Akrap, Information Strategies and Operations in Public Knowledge Shaping, PhD Thesis, University of Zagreb, 2011. 3 Mirko Simić, Istorijsko nasleđe vojnoobaveštajne službe: Razvoj oružanih snaga SFRJ, 1945–1985: Vojnoobaveštajna služba (Belgrade: Vojnoizdavački i novinski centar, 1990), 63. 4 Simić, Istorijsko nasleđe vojnoobaveštajne službe, 96. 5 Dušan Bilandžić, Hrvatska moderna povijest (Zagreb: Golden marketing, 1999), 382. [The participants of the first NAM Conference included twenty-five member states: Afghanistan, Algeria, Burma (from 1989 Myanmar), Cambodia, Ceylon (from 1972 Sri Lanka), Congo (Kinshasa; 1971–1997 Zaire), Cuba, Cyprus, United Arab Republic (Union of Egypt and Syria), Ethiopia, Ghana, Guinea, India, Indonesia, Iraq, Lebanon, Mali, Morocco, Nepal, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, Tunisia, Yemen (Sana – North Yemen), Yugoslavia; three observer states: Bolivia, Brazil, Ecuador; and movements like the Palestinian PLO, the South West Africa People's Organization, the Police Force of Zimbabwe and the Mouvement de Libération de Djibouti. 6 It must be emphasized that Tito considered that Yugoslavia had solved its innernational problems and that he insisted on creating a new Yugoslavian nation that all citizens of Yugoslavia should accept as their main national identity. 7 Bošković, O teorizmu uopšte kao obliku specijalnog rata protiv SFRJ i iskustvima iz akcije ‘RADUŠA’, 15–22: ‘Although the ultimate goal of all terrorist movements is the demolition of the system against which they fight – they have no idea of how the new society created on “the ruins of the old” should look like. In this respect, the only exception are the national liberation movements which, among other methods, are using the terrorist methods and means of struggle as well. These are the IRA, ETA,

180

Terrorism in the Cold War

PLO and so on. That is the reason that many called them anarchists. […] This means that the issue of terrorism is even today more and more politically sensitive. The provisions of the Convention on the Suppression of International Terrorism could not be applied to the activities organized and carried out by the members of the national liberation and anti-colonial movements, because those acts are not based on “low and selfish” motives. Especially if such an act is a response to foreign domination or undemocratic rule.’ 8 Cuba, Czechoslovakia, Malta and Yugoslavia. 9 ‘Measures to prevent international terrorism which endangers or takes innocent human lives or jeopardizes fundamental freedoms and study of the underlying causes of those forms of terrorism and acts of violence which lie in misery, frustration, grievance and despair and which cause some people to sacrifice human lives, including their own, in an attempt to effect radical changes: a, Report of the Secretary-General; b, Convening, under the auspices of the United Nations, of an international conference to define terrorism and to differentiate it from the struggle of peoples for national liberation: draft resolution / Cuba, Czechoslovakia, Malta and Yugoslavia’, UN General Assembly, A/C.6/42/L.24*, Forty-second session, Sixth Committee, Agenda item 126, 2 December 1987, 3, in UN Dag Hammarskjöld Library, http://hdl.handle.net/11176/151528 (accessed 20 September 2016). 10 Radomir Bogdanović, Vojna izaslanstva: Razvoj oružanih snaga SFRJ, 1945–1985: Vojnoobaveštajna služba (Belgrade: Vojnoizdavački i novinski centar, 1990), 246. According to Ivo Lučić, ‘exports of Yugoslav artillery and military equipment to NAM countries increased considerably. In 1974 alone there were more export agreements reached than there had been during the past 20 years.’ See Ivo Lučić, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Terrorism, National Security and the Future 2/3–4 (2001), 115, http:​//hrc​ak.sr​ce.hr​/inde​x.php​?show​=clan​ak&id​_clan​ak_je​zik=2​8807 (accessed 1 January 2020). The name of the state company that was responsible for the export of the weapons was Savezna direkcija za promet i rezerve proizvoda specijalne namene (Federal Directorate for Transport and Reserve of the Special Purposes Products). 11 Stevan Grba, Razvoj vojnoobaveštajne službe od 1945. do 1985. godine: Razvoj oružanih snaga SFRJ, 1945–1985: Vojnoobaveštajna služba (Belgrade: Vojnoizdavački i novinski centar, 1990), 135. 12 Operativna analiza 3: Akcija ‘Karlo-2’, SDB SSUP-V uprava, Strogo poverljivo, Belgrade, December 1983, IV/5, in HR-HDA-fond 1561-SDS RSUP SRH, nova akvizicija-šifra 2-strane obavještajne službe, br.229/6. Hereafter this document is cited as Analysis. 13 Bogdanović, Vojna izaslanstva, 239. 14 Gordan Akrap, Cooperation between Intelligence and Security Systems of German Democratic Republic and Yugoslavia, National Security and the Future 12/1–2 (2011), 35–57, here 49, http:​//hrc​ak.sr​ce.hr​/inde​x.php​?show​=clan​ak&id​_clan​ak_je​zik=1​ 32542​(accessed 1 January 2020). 15 Bošković, O teorizmu uopšte kao obliku specijalnog rata protiv SFRJ i iskustvima iz akcije ‘RADUŠA’, 18. 16 Ibid., 17. 17 Jere Grubišić, Ivan Baričević, Miodrag Selić and Dušan Vilić, Razvoj oružanih snaga SFRJ, 1945–1985: Vojna bezbednost (Belgrade: Vojnoizdavački i novinski centar, 1986), 195.



9. Yugoslavia, Carlos ‘the Jackal’ and International Terrorism

181

18 Bošković, O teorizmu uopšte kao obliku specijalnog rata protiv SFRJ i iskustvima iz akcije ‘RADUŠA’, 18. 19 Grubišić, Baričević, Selić and Vilić, Razvoj oružanih snaga SFRJ, 195–6. 20 Bošković, O teorizmu uopšte kao obliku specijalnog rata protiv SFRJ i iskustvima iz akcije ‘RADUŠA’, 14, 19; Grubišić, Baričević, Selić and Vilić, Razvoj oružanih snaga SFRJ, 196. 21 Grubišić, Baričević, Selić and Vilić, Razvoj oružanih snaga SFRJ, 196. 22 Pregled međunarodnih terorističkih organizacija [Review of International Terrorist Organizations], in HR-HDA-fond 1561-SDS RSUP SRH, nova akvizicija, šifra 2-strane obavještajne službe, br 229/10. The document is undated, and its author is not indicated. However, we can assume that it was created by the Federal SSS. Hereafter this document is cited as Review. 23 Review, 14. 24 Ibid., 10. 25 Ibid. 26 Force 17 was a Fatah intelligence unit that was also responsible for Yasser Arafat’s personal security. Federal SSS used the name Group 17 instead of Force 17. 27 Review, 11. 28 Ibid., 10. 29 Ibid., 12. 30 Grubišić, Baričević, Selić and Vilić, Razvoj oružanih snaga SFRJ, 236. 31 Yugoslavia consisted of six republics (Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Serbia, Macedonia), and two autonomous regions within Serbia (Vojvodina, Kosovo and Metohija). 32 Lučić, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Terrorism, 115. 33 The Institute for Security (or Security Institute) was a part of the Federal State Security Service, responsible for scientific research and the development of special weapons and technical solutions for the work of the State Security Service. It is located in the Banjica area, part of the city of Belgrade. Today this Institute is part of the Serbian Security and Intelligence Agency as a ‘Research, Development and Education Department’. See http:​//www​.bia.​gov.r​s/eng​/o-ag​encij​i/org​aniza​ciona​-stru​ktura​.html​ (accessed 2 January 2017). 34 Bošković, O teorizmu uopšte kao obliku specijalnog rata protiv SFRJ i iskustvima iz akcije ‘RADUŠA’, 19. 35 Hans-Joachim Klein, born 1947, German citizen, is an ex-member of the Revolutionary Cells (RZ), a West German leftist terrorist organization. (The SSS wrongly refers to him as a former member of the terrorist Baader-Meinhof Group.) He was close to Carlos since 1973, but later there was a break-up between them because members of Carlos’s organization felt that during a police interrogation [unknown to the author] he disclosed some sensitive information about the Carlos organization. Therefore, the question of his removal was raised. See Analysis – Annex VI/1/37-38. 36 Polona Balantič, Jugoslavija in mednarodni terorizem v sedemdesetih letih: Dva primera neizročitve teroristov Zvezni republiki Nemčiji, Prispevki za novejšo zgodovino, Contributions to Contemporary History, 55/1 (2015), 143–91, http://ojs.inz. si/pnz/article/view/107 (accessed 1 January 2020). 37 Balantič, Jugoslavija in mednarodni terorizem v sedemdesetih letih, 164. 38 Words of Mr Matović, head of the Interpol Belgrade office in the Federal Ministry of Internal Affairs, cited in Balantič, Jugoslavija in mednarodni terorizem v sedemdesetih letih, 162.

182

Terrorism in the Cold War

39 This text about Carlos’s and Klein’s stay in Yugoslavia in 1976 from German archival documents is derived from Balantič, Jugoslavija in mednarodni terorizem v sedemdesetih letih, 158–66. 40 The operational analysis of Operation ‘Karlo-2’, opened at the federal level on 8 March 1983, is written based on more than 8,000 pages of material, 181 sound recordings from the investigation, and documentation of the results of the measures and actions taken by the Federal and the Serbian SSS. The Analysis is divided into four parts, contains six chapters and annexes designated by Roman numerals. Pages in each chapter are separately numbered with Arabic numbers. The Analysis has a total of 309 pages. 41 For the Federal SSS the concept of ‘isolation’ meant, in this context, organizing a secret and protected accommodation for these persons in one of the secret service facilities under the supervision of the Federal SSS. 42 Johannes Weinrich, born 21 July 1947 in Germany, was a founder of the Revolutionary Cells, which collaborated with Carlos since 1973, a member of the ‘Council of Three’ and a leading member at the very top of the organization (Analysis, Annex VI/1/2). At that time, a red Interpol warrant was issued for him. In 1983 his and Carlos’s warrants were in the Federal SSS ‘provided for adaptation’ (Analysis, IV/4). In Yugoslavia, Weinrich was using a Syrian diplomatic passport in the name of Joseph Leon (Analysis, I/35). 43 The terrorist organization led by Carlos from the late 1970s to the mid-1990s had no official name but various labels. Group members sometimes referred to it as the Organization of International Revolutionaries. The Stasi recorded the organization as Separat, the Hungarian State Security investigated it as C-79. A third leading member besides Ramirez Sanchez and Weinrich was the Syrian Ali Kamal al-Issawe. 44 It should be noted that this was only two months after Israeli commandos successfully performed an operation that freed the hostages from a hijacked Air France aircraft (‘Operation Entebbe’). The plane was hijacked to the Ugandan city of Entebbe on 27 June 1976 by members of the Revolutionary Cells and the Palestinian PFLP. 45 Analysis, IV/8. 46 Federal SSS mentioned in the Analysis that the German diplomats were intelligence officials attached to the German Embassy in Belgrade. 47 Carlos and Klein were not arrested. They had an appropriate place to stay inside the complex that belonged to the Federal SSS in Belgrade. But they were not allowed to leave this object. Inside this object Federal SSS organized conversations, in fully controlled rooms, with them just like Weinrich (see note 42) a few years later. 48 Based on the Analysis, it can be concluded that Carlos and Klein were followed not only by German diplomats while driving from the airport to the Hotel Metropol but also by a surveillance team of the SSS (Analysis, IV/5). This version of events changes the situation and almost the entire Analysis, implying that the Federal SSS knew that the two of them had come to Belgrade before the German side officially informed the SSS. Polona Balantič wrote that the Germans informed the Yugoslavian side after Carlos and Klein had already arrived at Belgrade airport (Balantič, Jugoslavija in mednarodni terorizem v sedemdesetih letih, 158). If Carlos and Klein were under the surveillance of SSS employees (as it is clearly written in the Analysis) immediately after their landing in Belgrade, and before the German side told the SSS that they had arrived, the SSS likely knew of their arrival before they actually landed in Belgrade – or the German side informed the Yugoslavian officials about their arrival before they landed at Belgrade airport.



9. Yugoslavia, Carlos ‘the Jackal’ and International Terrorism

183

49 In the Analysis three different stays in Belgrade are listed: a) 6–9 September (a few times in the Analysis), b) 6–10 September (Analysis, II/34), c) 7–9 September (Analysis, Annex 3/1). We lean to the 6–9 September 1976 dates as the most accurate. 50 Analysis, II/34. 51 Ibid., II/34 and IV/4. 52 Ibid., I/8. 53 Ibid., I/8. 54 Ibid., IV/4-5. 55 Ibid., I/3. 56 Ibid., I/9. 57 The offer from the PLO should not be surprising because, according to Weinrich’s assertion mentioned in the Analysis, ‘Carlos was under the umbrella of the PLO in Beirut’ (Analysis, I/7). However, the Analysis mentions another attempt by Abu Daoud from the PLO to intervene in order to establish relations between Carlos and his organization and the Federal SSS in May 1979 (Analysis, I/9). 58 Weinrich was not arrested; he was allowed to move freely until he was ‘isolated’. Although he was under the control of the SSS, he managed to organize an attack on the Maison de France in West Berlin on 25 August 1983. For this crime he received a life sentence after his arrest in 1995. 59 Analysis, V/4. 60 Ibid. 61 Ibid. 62 Ibid. 63 Apparently, that was not known to the SSS (Analysis, IV/6). 64 Analysis, I/36. 65 Ibid. 66 In summer 1982, the Yugoslav customs authorities found weapons with Carlos when he was entering Yugoslavia from Hungary. On that occasion he used a Syrian diplomatic passport in the name of Michel Hadad. The second time, he started a fight with a local guy during an illegal money exchange in one of Belgrade’s cafés and was forced to seek medical attention. (It was very common to exchange foreign currency, during the existence of Yugoslavia, ‘in the streets’, not in the banks where they was supposed to be changed, because the exchange rate ‘on the street’ was much better for the holder of the foreign currency than in official institutions.) 67 Analysis, I/36. 68 Carlos admitted that he had also visited Yugoslavia several times in the period between 1969 and 1976. However, those visits were not analysed. 69 Analysis, IV/5. 70 Ibid., IV/10. 71 Ibid., IV/7. 72 Ibid., I/20. 73 Ibid. 74 Ibid. 75 Ibid., I/19. 76 Ibid., I/16. 77 Ibid., I/27. 78 The Analysis does not give much information about the data that the SSS exchanged with foreign intelligence services. 79 Analysis, II/39.

184

Terrorism in the Cold War

80 Ibid. 81 Ibid., II/14. 82 Ibid., II/16. 83 Ibid., II/17. 84 Ibid. More information about the relations between Carlos’s organization and the Romanian secret service can be found in Liviu Tofan, Sacalul Securitatii: Teroristul Carlos in solda spionajului romanesc (Iași: Polirom, 2013). 85 Analysis, I/30-32. 86 Ibid., I/36. 87 Ibid., I/30-32 and I/37. It is interesting that weapons, ammunition and explosives with appropriate fuses and arming devices were called ‘sabotage material’ and not means to carry out terrorist actions, which is what they essentially were. 88 Analysis, I/38. 89 Ibid., I/40, mentions a Syrian diplomatic passport in the name of Cheikh Moustafa. 90 He carried ‘10 bombs, 10 slot machines, 10 pistols, and a larger amount of ammunition’. He said that they were from Russia and that he had to bring them to the Libyan Embassy in Belgrade in order to send them to West Europe for ‘revolutionary activities’ (Analysis, I/40). 91 Analysis, I/43. 92 Ibid. 93 Ibid., II/A-1, IV/B, 7. 94 Gordan Akrap, Operation Esplanada, January 2016 (unpublished paper).

CChapter 10 NORTH KOREA’S ‘TERRORISM’ AND ‘COUNTERTERRORISM’ IN THE LATE 1980s Bernd Schaefer

Introduction Events that unfolded in Malaysia after the 13 February 2017 murder of Kim Jongnam, the eldest son of former North Korean leader Kim Jong-il and half-brother of the current leader Kim Jong-un, demonstrate that murderous activities involving the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) outside its borders are of a rather timeless nature.1 North Korea’s involvement in terrorist activities during the Cold War, defined and perceived by the outside world as ‘state terrorism’, is generally known. However, this knowledge is only fleetingly supported by available records from the communist world. The same applies to North Korean ‘counterterrorism’, as well as to North Korean intelligence structures and activities in general. No close bilateral intelligence relationship between the DPRK and other states of the communist bloc in Europe or Asia is evident through available records – if there actually ever was such a relationship (maybe with the Soviet Union pre-1950, or with China in the early 1960s or during the 1970s?). Complete inaccessibility of Soviet or Chinese intelligence files is particularly unhelpful in this regard. A glimpse through the highly opaque window of North Korean intelligence is provided, however, by East German Stasi files leading up to the 13th International World Youth Festival (WYF) held in Pyongyang from 1 to 8 July 1989. Those records include comprehensive material from a multilateral intelligence conference convened in Pyongyang in January 1989 in preparation for the WYF. It is probably the only multilateral Warsaw Pact conference of high-ranking intelligence officers ever attended by the DPRK, and in this case North Korea even served as its host. Attendees in Pyongyang in 1989 were generals from the ministries of state security, the respective Ministries of the Interior from the Soviet Union, Poland, the GDR, Bulgaria, Cuba and Czechoslovakia. Following the official visits of Kim Il-sung to the GDR in 1984 and of Erich Honecker to North Korea in 1986, a special relationship between the two leaders and states had begun to emerge.2 The DPRK was deeply critical of and averse to the developing economic and other reforms in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and the Soviet Union. From 1987 onwards, it found like-minded anti-reformist

186

Terrorism in the Cold War

socialist partners in the GDR and Romania (where conveniently both Erich Honecker and Nicolae Ceausescu had also embraced cults of personality to varying degrees). As Kim Il-sung told a visiting East German military delegation in July 1988, paraphrased in the GDR internal meeting report: GDR and DPRK don’t need reforms; you need reforms when you make mistakes, but GDR and DPRK are not making mistakes.3 While the DPRK stopped sending students or military cadres to the Soviet Union or the PRC, the GDR was now chosen by Pyongyang as a trusted ally to receive both of those groups. The available Stasi files dealing with the DPRK cover three major subjects and share one omission: ●●

●●

●●

●●

the GDR was a meeting place and transit country for South Korean and foreign Korean Workers’ Party cadres who visited the North Korean embassy in East Berlin and were sometimes rerouted to a visit to Pyongyang, which had a direct flight connection to the GDR capital;4 in summer and fall of 1989 travel restrictions were implemented for Eastern Europe concerning North Korean students, cadres and workers based in the GDR, whose evacuation back home the DPRK embassy in East Berlin ultimately organized in late 1989; an extensive body of archival material exists regarding preparation for, and organization of, the 1989 WYF in Pyongyang over the course of two years; there is no information on potential North Korean coordination with other international actors or on an involvement in a so-called ‘confederation of terrorist states’, as US president Ronald Reagan lumped together in July 1985 Libya, Iran, Cuba, Nicaragua and North Korea in a ‘new, international version of Murder Inc.’; he alleged, in particular, North Korean ‘support of terrorism’ in Asian countries and Latin America.5

North Korean international intelligence cooperation for the 1989 WYF In early May 1987, it was apparently Dear Leader Kim Jong-il, heir apparent of his father President Kim Il-sung, who frantically instructed DPRK intelligence organs to immediately send delegations to friendly states in Eastern Europe to ask for credits, acquire technology and seek various elements of counterintelligence cooperation to organize the 13th WYF.6 On 25 May 1987, the DPRK’s deputy minister for State Protection, Colonel General Jae Joo Sen, met GDR minister of State Security Erich Mielke in Berlin for a high-level talk to launch the cooperation.7 Two days later, the GDR began with presentations of technology to the delegation from the ‘Korean fraternal organ’.8 The grandiose dimensions envisioned by the DPRK to showcase its ‘antiimperialist struggle’ by hosting the WYF aimed at 20,000 to 25,000 official participants and foreign visitors. In a way it was the North Korean response to Seoul’s 1988 Summer Olympics. Not least, this was about saving face in light of Pyongyang’s triple failure:9 it had been unable to prevent the Summer Olympics



10. North Korea’s ‘Terrorism’ and ‘Counterterrorism’ 

187

being held in the South Korean capital; it was unable to convince the International Olympic Committee to agree on a joint North–South Korean hosting of the Olympics (new sports facilities built in Pyongyang for that purpose were thus to be utilized for the WYF); and it had been unable to persuade a significant number of its allies to ultimately boycott the competitions in Seoul (except for Cuba, Nicaragua, Ethiopia and Madagascar).10 Soon after the Seoul Olympics, it was the GDR that turned out to become North Korea’s most important international partner in preparing and securing the WYF. Intelligence cooperation between East Germany and North Korea became as close as it could get. Mostly, it focused on North Korean concerns over ‘terrorism’, targeting the DPRK proper, and subsequently the cooperation evolved into according joint measures of ‘counterterrorism’. This way the Stasi was now gaining insights into how the North Korean intelligence apparatus was structured and how it operated. Its partner was the DPRK Ministry of State Protection, which seemed to be under the supreme guidance of Kim Jong-il. In the past North Korea had been anything but shy to use ‘state terrorism’ as a useful tool to destabilize the political situation in South Korea, if not to launch an uprising to achieve a victory for assumed pro-North Korean forces in the South with northern support. The January 1968 commando raid to kill South Korean president Park Chung-hee clearly falls into that category;11 the 1974 assassination attempt on Park, which accidentally killed only his wife, appeared, rather, to be the action of a self-motivated pro-northern individual from Japan’s ethnic Korean minority;12 the 1983 killing of South Korean leaders in Burma might fall into a mixed category of ‘punishment’ or creating instability in the South. The 1987 downing of KAL Flight 858 appeared to be a ‘punishment’ for Seoul’s forthcoming increase in international prestige through staging the 1988 Olympics without the North.13 In all those cases the North Korean government officially denied any responsibility and involvement after the events since none of those plots triggered the desired outcomes. Furthermore, in 1968, 1983 and 1987 the DPRK had been put on the defensive publicly: one or two of the perpetrators were captured alive and subsequently revealed information to South Korean intelligence and the world about North Korean agency. In response, the DPRK lambasted South Korea to have manufactured these incidents in order to ‘smear’ North Korea before the eyes of the world. Given this mindset and history, Pyongyang was now, in turn, extremely paranoid about retaliatory ‘terrorism’ against the DPRK and its leaders before and during the 1989 WYF. The Stasi files contain no clues on the actual background of the KAL 858 bombing of 27 November 1987. A bomb had been planted in an overhead bin on a flight from Abu Dhabi to Baghdad, which killed all 115, mostly South Korean, passengers on board through an explosion over the Andaman Sea. North Korean assassin Kim Hyon Hui was later captured in Bahrain and confessed in South Korean custody. Kim Jong-il was directly implicated by Seoul, and for the next twenty years the DPRK was listed as a state sponsor of terrorism by the United States. The Stasi collected a lot of Western press clippings on the case

188

Terrorism in the Cold War

and translated English-language South Korean material presented to the United Nations. However, tellingly the East German security service neither provided any comments nor did it defend the action. It also did not seem interested in finding out about North Korean involvement nor did it inquire with DPRK intelligence services about the background. Incidentally, the plane bombing also came at a time when East Germany had secretly begun to develop ties with some South Korean corporations interested in business with the GDR. In any event, the KAL 858 bombing had no impact whatsoever on East German–North Korean intelligence cooperation during the following two years. In order to prepare for more than 20,000 guests expected from 180 countries, in late April 1988 the DPRK requested from the GDR ‘complete equipment for 20 border checkpoints at Pyongyang Airport’, as well as ‘equipment for passport control of passengers, a list of international terrorists and individuals not allowed to enter to be displayed on a video-supported system and photographic equipment to document data’.14 On 20 May the GDR assessed internally that it could not provide ‘video-cameras at all’. Support to install border checkpoints was deemed feasible to a limited extent and only if two GDR specialists would be allowed to conduct an on-site inspection first (‘by no means 20 checkpoints’). Instead, the Stasi donated to its North Korean counterparts as a first good-will gesture thirty used shortwave receivers and ten cameras.15 For most of 1988 intelligence cooperation remained rather low-key. When on 17 November 1988 the DPRK Ministry for State Protection asked for surveillance technology to monitor meetings of the WYF International Preparation Committee, where allegedly ‘South Korea has spies to gather information’ and a ‘counter-festival gets planned in New Zealand or Austria’, the Stasi did not follow up and asserted it did not have any intelligence insights in that regard.16 Cooperation, however, began to gather steam after the multilateral meeting of deputy ministers of state security organs from the DPRK, Bulgaria, GDR, Cuba, Poland, Soviet Union and Czechoslovakia held in Pyongyang from 24 to 26 January 1989. This meeting was supposed to coordinate efforts to secure the WYF, select country delegates and identify potential threats. Each country participating in that meeting was expected to send intelligence units (‘operative groups’) to Pyongyang in advance to help and liaise with the DPRK Ministry for State Protection on-site for the duration of the WYF.17 The speech given at that meeting by DPRK deputy minister Kim Won Il stood out for its paranoia about threats of ‘terrorism’ directed against North Korea. His stated main objective was to prevent the entry of international ‘terrorists’: ‘The enemies attempt to infiltrate their agents, terrorists, and anti-festival conspirators into the rank of festival participants.’ The National Security Planning Agency of the ‘South Korean puppets’ would work globally with their ‘Residenturas’ to prevent young people from attending the WYF; on the other hand, they would plan an ‘Offensive on Pyongyang’, ‘terrorist actions’ against North Korean state and party leaders, for which mock drills had already been held. Furthermore, an agent working with capitalist embassies in Pyongyang had already explored means to transport explosives and other weapons into the DPRK through food



10. North Korea’s ‘Terrorism’ and ‘Counterterrorism’ 

189

cans, perfume, shaving cream and toothpaste. According to the DPRK deputy minister, US intelligence services wanted to ‘infiltrate prostitutes’ in international delegations to corrupt delegates and discredit the festival. As a preventive measure, the DPRK would turn over lists of participants to socialist countries so that they could help with the identification of ‘terrorists’. Participants would have to travel to Pyongyang via meeting points at Berlin, Sofia, Budapest, Prague, Havana, Warsaw and Moscow airports, where they were supposed to be checked first. DPRK intelligence officers would travel to all these cities to coordinate on-site with local intelligence services. The socialist countries would issue travel permits and entrance documents, and DPRK intelligence officers would travel with approved participants to Pyongyang in all airplanes, trains and ships used by festival guests. For now, according to Kim Won Il, the DPRK wanted information on activities of hostile intelligence services against the WYF; lists of ‘international terrorist organizations’, their members, means and methods; material on political, religious and nationalist hostilities and tensions between countries participating in the WYF, and on differences between youth organizations as well as on ‘terrorist groups scheming to exploit these differences’.18 In the following months, this North Korean blueprint was implemented, especially in the case of the GDR and the Stasi. On 21 February 1989 the DPRK’s Ministry for State Protection alerted the Stasi representative in Pyongyang about information obtained by DPRK intelligence services in Norway: an ‘International Liberal Youth Confederation’ wanted to convene an international meeting in (West) Berlin to discuss a separate declaration about the WYF. Also, ‘during the WYF a dramatic event will be staged to provoke DPRK security organs to intervene and make arrests. This event will then be used for a campaign to slander the DPRK in Western media which have already been briefed on this scheme in advance.’19 Six days later, a DPRK State Protection operative alarmed the Stasi representative in Pyongyang with the following ‘information’ obtained by North Korean intelligence: four West European youth organizations wanted to hold an international youth meeting in Paris in late August ‘under the pretext of the 200th anniversary of the French Revolution’. This was intended to ‘overshadow the image’ of the WYF in Pyongyang and might divide the ‘democratic youth’ for cost reasons. The Paris meeting could draw participants from the WYF. The Stasi was asked to gather information about the Paris plans.20 In none of all those cases, however, was the Stasi able to verify any of the North Korean ‘intelligence’. Cooperation was more effective on other fronts. Between 30 March and 3 April 1989 the Stasi built at Pyongyang Airport a TV circuit monitoring centre with three work desks, two border checkpoint cabins with video surveillance and ‘secret pass-documentation technology’. DPRK State Protection officers were trained and instructed to use all this equipment. From 27 April to 4 May 1989 the Stasi built a third cabin and provided further training and more technology. The DPRK officers to be trained were portrayed as ‘receptive and intelligent. No technical problems expected’.21 (Those checkpoints and their technology, modelled after GDR checkpoints at Berlin-Schönefeld airport and Bahnhof Friedrichstrasse, were to survive their East German counterparts for decades and stayed in place

190

Terrorism in the Cold War

at Pyongyang Airport for the next twenty years.) On 7 April 1989, the DPRK Ministry for State Protection did its part of the deal and sent two officers to be based in Berlin for monitoring airport checkpoints there and assist flights to Pyongyang. The Stasi was asked to keep this mission secret and not to tell the DPRK embassy in Berlin, apparently because of the highly sensitive nature of the arrangement. GDR intelligence was requested to find secret accommodation for the North Korean officers.22 Time and again, the DPRK State Protection’s ‘Department for Research on Enemy Tactics’ in Pyongyang alerted the Stasi representative in the DPRK to alleged ‘threats’ to the WYF and asked for pertinent Stasi research and information on those matters. On 14 April 1989, the North Koreans stated that an ‘International Federation of Liberals and Radical Youth’ (IFLRY) would prepare for a ‘dramatic event’ at the WYF. They would plan to hold preparatory meetings in Japan, South Korea, Philippines, Singapore and Malaysia. Western youth organizations like this IFLRY and the ‘Swedish Youth Council’ would plan hostile propaganda during the festival. West European youth organizations were said to want to infiltrate ‘negative’ groups (‘rock and disco groups, homosexuals’) into the DPRK: such plans would be hatched by the ‘International Union of Socialist Youth’, the ‘Swedish Youth Council’ and the ‘Communist Youth of Austria’. ‘Ireland plans to send IRA members as delegates to the 13th WYF.’ The South Korean ‘Ministry for State Security Planning’ wanted to send overseas Koreans, particularly South Koreans working in international organizations, to the WYF as interpreters and recruit some of them as spies. The following Western organizations had allegedly agreed to assist South Korean intelligence with that plot: Christian-Democratic Youth Association of the Netherlands; ‘Swedish Youth Council’; ‘Liberal Youth Association of Norway’; ‘Young Union’ of West Germany; International Union of Socialist Youth; Christian World Student Confederation. A French citizen, member of the European Youth Committee, purportedly wanted to include representatives from the South Korean Christian Youth in the WYF delegation of the ‘International Christian Alliance’.23 On 28 April 1989 the Stasi responded to the above requests: There existed no intelligence yet on any potential plans to interfere with the WYF by any of the youth organizations mentioned. No information existed on institutions and individuals listed. That the IRA would be coming to the DPRK was unlikely, since it operated in Northern Ireland, the UK and against the British Army in Western Europe.24 On 9 June 1989 the DPRK State Protection liaison officer in Berlin, Lee Jong Gun, handed to the Stasi 100 pages of participant lists for a check in its databases. He turned over 696 more pages on 16 June, and 100 additional pages on 20 June.25 On 12 June, Lee Jong Gun sent a typed letter in German to the Stasi asking whether four named South Korean participants were actually members of the ‘World Catholic Student Association’. The DPRK had the following information: one South Korean was in the six-member delegation of the ‘Young Esperantists’ and six South Korean members of the World Council of Churches were among the participants. Did the Stasi have any information on them?26



10. North Korea’s ‘Terrorism’ and ‘Counterterrorism’ 

191

The East German side replied on 23 June after a review: One participant from Bolivia was possibly a member of the right-wing ‘Falange’. However, his identity was not yet confirmed, maybe he had just the same name. One participant from Canada/the United States had been subject to an unconfirmed suspicion of having a CIA connection in 1979. Nothing whatsoever would be available concerning all the other inquiries, including the World Federation of Christian Students, the World Organization of Young Esperantists and the World Council of Churches.27 Five days later the Stasi responded to another list from the Ministry for State Protection, which had named seven participants as being involved in ‘terrorist actions’ (three from West Germany, two from the UK, one Italian and one Swiss): ‘We have no information on any of the above.’28 Overall, the Stasi was to check, upon North Korean requests, more than 7,500 names in its databases and forwarded information on six of them to the DPRK intelligence organs. The WYF in Pyongyang between 1 and 8 July ultimately did not result in any of those ‘terrorist’ actions feared or expected by the North Koreans. The only concern for the Stasi and other communist security organs were various smallscale and symbolic ‘anti-Chinese activities’ undertaken by Western European youth delegations (Scandinavian countries, West Germany, Italy) both before and during the festival to protest against the bloody Tiananmen crackdown by the Chinese military in Beijing and elsewhere in the PRC on 4 June.29 From the North Korean perspective, this was merely a sideshow. Five days after the conclusion of the WYF, on July 13, 1989, Kim Jong Ryong, the acting DPRK minister for State Protection, wrote to Stasi minister Erich Mielke and expressed his great thanks and gratitude for the ‘moral and material help and support’, for the technology and for the Stasi liaison team on-site during the WYF. The festival was deemed a grand success – and the letter then immediately moved on to more detailed requests for further assistance: a DPRK State Protection delegation wanted to come to the GDR in September to buy special technology from the Stasi ‘based on long-term military-commercial payments’.30 With that, an ever closer cooperation between North Korean and GDR intelligence seemed to be on track. In his next letter from 11 October 1989, Acting Minister Kim Jong Ryong wrote to Minister Mielke about another DPRK delegation to travel to the GDR to inspect and acquire more technology.31 By then, large street demonstrations had already taken place in the GDR. On 18 October Erich Honecker was forced to resign. Nonetheless, from 26 October to 3 November 1989 the DPRK intelligence delegation visited its East German counterparts, inspected technology and placed its orders.32 Six days after the departure of this last ever North Korean delegation to the GDR, the Berlin Wall and the intra-German border were opened. Twenty days after the border openings, the Stasi unit in Rostock Harbour informed the ministry in Berlin on 29 November 1989 that ‘special transports (arms, ammunitions, explosives, military technology)’ (like, for example, the North Korean intelligence orders) could be shipped ‘only in covered containers’ due to the ‘current domestic situation’.33 Another five days later, most Stasi buildings in the GDR were occupied by dissident activists and all remaining Politburo and Central Committee members

192

Terrorism in the Cold War

of the Socialist Unity Party resigned. North Korea had lost forever one of its few trusted allies and, at the time, best intelligence partner.

Notes 1 Richard C. Paddock and Choe Sang-Hun, Kim Jong-nam was killed by VX Nerve Agent, Malaysians say, New York Times, 23 February 2017, https​://ww​w.nyt​imes.​ com/2​017/0​2/23/​world​/asia​/kim-​jong-​nam-v​x-ner​ve-ag​ent-.​html?​hp&ac​tion=​click​ &pgty​pe=Ho​mepag​e&cli​ckSou​rce=s​tory-​headi​ng&mo​dule=​photo​-spot​-regi​on&re​ gion=​top-n​ews&W​T.nav​=top-​news (accessed 1 January 2020). 2 Cf. Bernd Schaefer, Weathering the Sino-Soviet Conflict: The GDR and North Korea, 1949–1989, Cold War International History Project Bulletin 14 (2004), 25–38. 3 Stiftung Archiv der Parteien und Massenorganisationen der DDR im Bundesarchiv Berlin (SAPMO-BA) [Foundation Archive of GDR Parties and Mass Organizations in the Federal Archive Berlin], DY 30, 2508. 4 Der Bundesbeauftragte für die Stasi-Unterlagen Berlin (BStU) [Federal Commissioner for Stasi Records Berlin], Zentralarchiv (ZA) [Central Archive], Hauptabteilung (HA) [Main Directorate] X, 361, 362, 362, 364, 365. 5 Bernard Weinraub, President Accuses 5 ‘Outlaw States’ of World Terror, New York Times, 9 July 1985, http:​//www​.nyti​mes.c​om/19​85/07​/09/w​orld/​presi​dent-​accus​es-5-​outla​w-sta​tes-o​f-wor​ ld-te​rror.​html (accessed 1 January 2020). 6 See telegrams by the GDR embassy in Pyongyang to Berlin, May 1987ff., in BStU, ZA, HA X, 245, p. 304, 314; ZA, Zentrale Auswertungs und Informationsgruppe (ZAIG) [Centre Analysis and Information], 14077, pp. 63–7. 7 BStU, ZA, HA X, 245, pp. 290–302. 8 BStU, ZA, Operativ-Technischer Sektor (OTS) [Sector Operative Technology], 1620, pp. 107–9, 115–17. 9 BStU, ZA, HA XX, 5707, p. 42. 10 Sergey Radchenko, Sports and Politics on the Korean Peninsula: North Korea and the 1988 Seoul Olympics, North Korea International Documentation Project (NKIDP) E-Dossier No. 3 (Washington DC: Wilson Center, December 2011), https​://ww​w.wil​ sonce​nter.​org/p​ublic​ation​/spor​t-and​-poli​tics-​the-k​orean​-peni​nsula​-nort​h-kor​ea-an​ d-the​-1988​-seou​l-oly​mpics​ (accessed 6 February 2017). 11 Bernd Schaefer, North Korean “Adventurism” and China’s Long Shadow, 1966–1972, Cold War International History Project Working Paper No. 44 (Washington DC: Wilson Center, October 2004). 12 Bernd Schaefer, Overconfidence Shattered: North Korean Unification Policy, 1971–1975, NKIDP Working Paper No. 2 (Washington DC: Wilson Center, December 2010). 13 On the 1983 and 1987 bombings, see Don Oberdorfer and Robert Carlin, The Two Koreas: A Contemporary History (New York: Basic Books, 2014), 109–26, 144–6. The 1983 bombing in Yangon orchestrated by the DPRK embassy in Burma eerily resembles some features of the 2017 murder of Kim Jong-nam where the DPRK embassy in Malaysia was involved (see note 1). 14 BStU, ZA, HA X, 245, p. 44. 15 BStU, ZA, HA X, 245, pp. 72–3. 16 BStU, ZA, HA XX, 18751, pp. 7–8.



10. North Korea’s ‘Terrorism’ and ‘Counterterrorism’ 

193

17 See for the following BStU, ZA, HA XX, 17920, pp. 116–21; HA XX, 18751, pp. 67–80, 185–9. 18 Ibid., HA XX, 18751, pp., 67–80. 19 BStU, ZA, HA XX, 18751, p. 202. 20 BStU, ZA, HA X, 245, p. 19. 21 BStU, ZA, HA X, 245, pp. 20–2, 123–5. 22 BStU, ZA, HA X, 245, p. 118. 23 BStU, ZA, HA XX, 18751, pp. 231f. 24 BStU, ZA, HA XXII, 1112, pp. 73f. 25 BStU, ZA, HA X, 390, pp. 30–4, 37–45, 49–53. 26 BStU, ZA, HA X, 390, pp. 35f. 27 BStU, ZA, HA X, 245, pp. 105–7. 28 BStU, ZA, HA XX, 18751, pp. 255f. 29 See, for instance, BStU, ZA, HA XX, 13335, pp. 2, 11, 22–4, 26–38. See final internal Stasi reports from 13 July (BStU, ZA, HA XX, 18751, pp. 244–51) and 24 July 1989 (ibid., pp. 258–60). 30 BStU, ZA, HA X, 244, pp. 31f; HA X, 390, pp. 18f. 31 BStU, ZA, HA X, 390, pp. 15f. 32 Ibid., pp. 1–5; OTS, 1904, pp. 49–52. 33 BStU, Bezirksverwaltung [District Directorate] Rostock, Abteilung Hafen [Harbour Department], 98, p. 1.

194

ABOUT THE AUTHORS Gordan Akrap (PhD) graduated at the University of Zagreb’s Faculty of Electronics and Computing in 1994. In 2011 he received a PhD at the University of Zagreb, in the field of Information and Communication Sciences. During his career in diplomatic and intelligence structures of Croatia, he completed a number of professional courses, including the Diplomatic Academy. Gordan Akrap’s research topics include national and regional security, intelligence and the Croatian Homeland War. He has published a number of books, as well as papers in journals and proceedings. He may be contacted at [email protected]. Jordan Baev (PhD) is Professor of International History and Senior Research Fellow of Security Studies at Rakovski National Defense College and a visiting professor at Sofia University. He received his PhD in Contemporary History at the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences in 1982. Jordan Baev has written about 300 publications, published in fourteen languages, among them ten monographs and twelve documentary volumes on diplomatic, political, military and intelligence history, international terrorism, peacekeeping and civil–military relations. He may be contacted at [email protected]. Michael Fredholm (PhD) is a historian who has published extensively on the history, defence strategies, security policies, intelligence services, issues related to terrorism, and energy sector developments of Eurasia. He currently is Head of Research and Development at IRI, an independent research institute. Professor Fredholm has taught at Stockholm University, Uppsala University and the Swedish Royal Military Academy and Defence University. Additionally, he has worked as an independent academic advisor to governmental, inter-governmental, and non-governmental bodies for more than two decades. Michael Fredholm also led the team that developed the lone-actor terrorism counter-strategy and training programme for the Swedish National Bureau of Investigation and the Swedish Police Authority, which was implemented in 2014–2015. He is the author of Afghanistan Beyond the Fog of War: Persistent Failure of a Rentier State (2018). He may be contacted at [email protected]. Przemysław Gasztold (PhD) is a research fellow at the Historic Research Office of the Institute of National Remembrance in Warsaw and an assistant professor at War Studies University in Warsaw, Department of Security Threats and Terrorism. He received his PhD from Warsaw University, Faculty of Journalism and Political Science, in 2016. He is currently conducting research on the history of Polish Intelligence, on relations between communist Poland, the Middle East, and Africa,

196

About the Authors

and on the ties between the Soviet bloc and international terrorism during the Cold War. In 2017 he published Zabójcze układy: Służby PRL i międzynarodowy terroryzm (Deadly Conspiracies: Polish Communist Intelligence Services and International Terrorism). His recent book Towarzysze z betonu: Dogmatyzm w PZPR 1980–1990 (Comrades of Concrete: Dogmatism within the PUWP 1980– 1990) was published in 2019. He may be contacted at przemyslaw.gasztold@ipn. gov.pl. Isabella Ginor (PhD) and Gideon Remez are Associate Fellows of the Truman Institute, Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Their chapter expands on sections of their most recent book The Soviet–Israeli War, 1967–1973 (2017). They may be contacted at [email protected]. Adrian Hänni (PhD) is a historian and, since 2015, a lecturer at Distance Learning University Switzerland, where he is responsible for the Political History module. Simultaneously or previously he has been a post-doctoral fellow at Leiden University, a lecturer at the University of Zurich, a Visiting Fellow at the Centre for the History of Violence at the University of Newcastle (Australia), and a Visiting Fellow at the German Historical Institute in Washington, DC. His research interests include the history of propaganda, intelligence services and terrorism, with a focus on the Cold War era. In 2019, he edited the book Über Grenzen hinweg: Transnationale Politische Gewalt im 20. Jahrhundert (Across Borders: Transnational Political Violence in the Twentieth Century). His latest monograph, Terrorismus als Konstrukt (Terrorism as a Construct), was published in 2018. He may be contacted at [email protected]. Balázs Orbán-Schwarzkopf is a historian and archivist. Since 2004, he has been working for the Historical Archives of Hungarian state security in Budapest. His research interests are the operations of the Hungarian state security organs in the 1980s, with particular regard to organized crime, terrorism and industrial espionage. His best known work is the study Greys and Wolves in the Shadow of the Red (2016). His latest article, an attempt to reconstruct the assassination of Anwar Sadat based on Hungarian state security documents, was published in summer 2018. He may be contacted at [email protected]. Thomas Riegler (PhD), born 1977, studied history and politics at Vienna and Edinburgh Universities. He has published on a wide range of topics, including terrorism, film studies and contemporary history. He is the author of Terrorismus: Akteure, Strukturen, Entwicklungslinien (Terrorism: Actors, Structures, Trends, published in 2009), Im Fadenkreuz: Österreich und der Nahostterrorismus 1973– 1985 (In the Cross Hairs: Palestinian Terrorism in Austria 1973–1985, published in 2010), Tage des Schreckens: Die OPEC-Geiselnahme und der moderne Terrorismus (Days of Fear: The OPEC Hostage-taking and Modern Terrorism, published in 2015), and Österreichs geheime Dienste: Vom Dritten Mann bis zur BVT-Affäre

About the Authors

197

(Austria’s Secret Services: From the Third Man to the BVT-Scandal, published in 2019). He may be contacted at [email protected]. Bernd Schaefer (PhD) is a senior scholar with the Woodrow Wilson International Center’s Cold War International History Project (CWIHP) and a professorial lecturer at George Washington University in Washington, DC. He was a visiting professor at Tongji University and East China Normal University in Shanghai, Pannasastra University in Phnom Penh, and the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul. Dr. Schaefer was also a Fellow at the Nobel Institute in Oslo and the National University of Malaysia in Kuala Lumpur. He holds a PhD from the University of Halle in Germany. He may be contacted at [email protected]. Tobias Wunschik (PhD) is a research associate at the Chair for the History of Eastern Europe of the Humboldt University of Berlin. He received his PhD for a historical investigation of left-wing terrorism in the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG), published in 1997 under the title Baader-Meinhofs Kinder: Die zweite Generation der RAF (Baader-Meinhof ’s Children: The Second Generation of the RAF). Beside West German left-wing terrorism, Tobias Wunschik’s research interests include political penal systems and the Volkspolizei (German People’s Police, the national police force of the German Democratic Republic). He may be contacted at [email protected]. Pavel Žáček (PhD) is a Czech academic and government official. Starting in 1993, he worked for the Office for the Documentation and the Investigation of the Crimes of Communism, where he was appointed Deputy Director in 1998. He was a Delegate of the Government of the Czech Republic and became the first director of the Security Services Archive (2007) and the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes (2008–2010). Since 2011, Pavel Žáček has been a teacher at CEVRO Institute, Prague, and since 2013, he has also worked for the Department of Defense of the Czech Republic. In October 2017, he was elected to the Czech Chamber of Deputies, the parliament of the Czech Republic. He is the author of many historical publications, editions and documentary histories. He may be contacted at [email protected].

SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY Theoretical literature and general works Asal, Victor, Justin Conrad and Peter White, Going Abroad: Transnational Solicitation and Contention by Ethnopolitical Organizations, International Organization, 68/4 (2014), 945–78. Bale, Jeffrey M., The Darkest Side of Politics, Vol. 2: State Terrorism, ‘Weapons of Mass Destruction’, Religious Extremism, and Organized Crime (New York: Routledge, 2018). Bale, Jeffrey M., Terrorism or State ‘Proxies’: Separating Fact from Fiction, in: Michael A. Innes (ed.), Making Sense of Proxy Wars: States, Surrogates and the Use of Force (Dulles, VA: Potomac, 2012), unpaginated. Bapat, Navin A., Understanding State Sponsorship of Militant Groups, British Journal of Political Science 42/1 (2011), 1–29. Bergman, Ronen, Rise and Kill First: The Secret History of Israel’s Targeted Assassinations (Random House: New York, 2018). Byman, Daniel, Deadly Connections: States that Sponsor Terrorism (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005). Byman, Daniel, Passive Sponsors of Terrorism, Survival 47/4 (2005), 117–44. Byman, Daniel and Sarah E. Kreps, Agents of Destruction? Applying Principal-Agent Analysis to State-Sponsored Terrorism, International Studies Perspectives 11/1 (2010), 1–18. Kirchner, Magdalena, Allianz mit dem Terror: Iran, Israel und die libanesische Hisbollah 1979–2009 (München: AVM, 2009). Maoz, Zeev and Belgin San-Akca, Rivalry and State Support of Non-State Armed Groups (NAGs), 1946–2001, International Studies Quarterly 56/4 (2012), 720–34. Richardson, Louise, State Sponsorship: A Root Cause of Terrorism?, in: Tore Bjørgo (ed.), Root Causes of Terrorism: Myths, Reality, and Ways Forward (New York: Routledge, 2005), 189–97. San Akca, Belgin, Supporting Non-State Armed Groups: A Resort to Illegality, Journal of Strategic Studies 32/4 (2009), 589–613. Seale, Patrick, Abu Nidal: A Gun for Hire (New York: Random House, 1992). Siqueira, Kevin and Todd Sandler, Terrorists versus the Government: Strategic Interaction, Support, and Sponsorship, Journal of Conflict Resolution 50/6 (2006), 878–98. Travis, Philip W., Reagan’s War on Terrorism in Nicaragua: The Outlaw State (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2016).

Eastern Europe, the Soviet Union and North Korea Akrap, Gordan, Information Strategies and Operations in Public Knowledge Shaping, PhD Thesis, University of Zagreb, 2011. Albats, Yevgenia, KGB: State Within a State (London: I.B. Tauris, 1995). Andrew, Christopher and Vasili Mitrokhin, The World Was Going Our Way: The KGB and the Battle for the Third World (New York: Basic Books, 2005).

Select Bibliography

199

Andrew, Christopher and Vasili Mitrokhin, The Sword and the Shield: The Mitrokhin Archive and the Secret History of the KGB (New York: Basic Books, 2000). Baev, Jordan, Infiltration of Non-European Terrorist Groups in Europe and Antiterrorist Responses in Western and Eastern Europe (1969–1991), in: Siddik Ekici (ed.), Counter Terrorism in Diverse Communities (Amsterdam: IOS Press, 2011), 58–74. Baev, Jordan, Bulgarian Arms Delivery to Third World Countries, 1950–1989: A Documentary Collection (Zurich: CSS, 2006), http:​/​/www​​.php.​​isn​.e​​thz​.c​​h​/lor​​y1​.et​​hz​.ch​​/coll​​ectio​​ns​/co​​ ll​_ar​​mstra​​de​/in​​trodu​​ction​​4f​28.​​html?​​navin​​fo​=23​​065 (accessed 1 January 2020). Baev, Jordan, Bulgaria and the Armed Conflict in Central America, 1979–1989, in: Evgenii Pashentsev and Hector Luis Saint-Pierre (eds.), Armies and Politics (Moscow: RPR, 2002), 33–45. Balantič, Polona, Jugoslavija in mednarodni terorizem v sedemdesetih letih: Dva primera neizročitve teroristov Zvezni republiki Nemčiji, Prispevki za novejšo zgodovino, Contributions to Contemporary History 55/1 (2015), 143–91. Bengtson-Krallert, Matthias, Die DDR und der internationale Terrorismus (Marburg: Tectum Verlag, 2017). Blumenau, Bernhard, Unholy Alliance: The Connection between the East German Stasi and the Right-Wing Terrorist Odfried Hepp, Studies in Conflict & Terrorism 43/1 (2020), 47–68. Boyadzhiev, Тodor, Разузнаването [‘Reconnaissance’] (Sofia: Trud, 2000). Dannreuther, Roland, The Soviet Union and the PLO (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 1998). Follain, John, The Jackal (London: Weidenfeld and Nicholson, 1998). Gadowski, Witold and Przemyslaw Wojciechowski, Tragarze śmierci: Polskie związki ze światowym terroryzmem (Warszawa: Prószyński i S-ka, 2010). Gallagher, Aileen, The Japanese Red Army (New York: Rosen, 2003). Gasztold, Przemysław, Wars, Weapons and Terrorists: Clandestine Operations of the Polish Military Intelligence Station in Beirut, 1965–1982, The International History Review, published online on 26 September 2019, https​:/​/do​​i​.org​​/10​.1​​080​/0​​70753​​32​.20​​​ 19​.16​​64609​(accessed 1 January 2020). Gasztold, Przemyslaw, Zabójcze układy: Służby PRL i międzynarodowy terroryzm (Warszawa: Wydawnictwo PWN, 2017), 19–64. Gasztold-Seń, Przemyslaw, Between Geopolitics and National Security: Polish Intelligence and International Terrorism during the Cold War, in: Wladyslaw Bułhak and Thomas Wegener Friis (eds.), Need to Know: Eastern and Western Perspectives (Odense: University Press of Southern Denmark, 2014), 138–48. Gasztold-Seń, Przemyslaw, Der Sicherheitsapparat der Volksrepublik Polen und die Rote Armee Fraktion, Inter Finitimos: Jahrbuch zur deutsch-polnischen Beziehungsgeschichte 9 (2011), 144–54. Ginor, Isabella and Gideon Remez, The Soviet-Israeli War, 1967–1973: The USSR’s Military Intervention in the Egyptian-Israeli Conflict (New York: Oxford University Press, 2017). Golan, Galia, Moscow and the PLO: The Ups and Downs of a Complex Relationship, in: Moshe Ma’oz and Avraham Sela (eds.), The PLO and Israel: From Armed Conflict to Political Solution, 1964–1994 (London: St. Martin’s Press, 1997), 121–40. Golan, Galia, The Soviet Union and the PLO (Jerusalem: Hebrew University, 1976). Grba, Stevan, Razvoj vojnoobaveštajne službe od 1945. do 1985. godine: Razvoj oružanih snaga SFRJ, 1945–1985: Vojnoobaveštajna služba (Belgrade: Vojnoizdavački i novinski centar, 1990). Hänni, Adrian. Secret Bedfellows? The KGB, Carlos the Jackal and Cold War Psychological Warfare, Studies in Conflict & Terrorism 43/1 (2020), 69–87.

200

Select Bibliography

Hänni, Adrian, Terrorismus als Konstrukt: Schwarze Propaganda, politische Bedrohungsängste und der Krieg gegen den Terrorismus in Reagans Amerika (Essen: Klartext-Verlag, 2018). Herf, Jeffrey, Undeclared Wars with Israel: East Germany and the West German Far Left, 1967–1989 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016). Israeli, Raphael (ed.), PLO in Lebanon: Selected Documents (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1983). Jander, Martin, Differenzen im antiimperialistischen Kampf: Zu den Verbindungen des Ministeriums für Staatssicherheit mit der RAF und dem bundesdeutschen Linksterrorismus, in: Wolfgang Kraushaar (ed.), Die RAF und der linke Terrorismus, Vol. 1 (Hamburg: Hamburger Edition, 2006), 696–713. Kauffer, Rémy, Communism and Terrorism, in: Stéphane Courtois and Mark Kramer (eds.), The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999), 353–60. Kopp, Magdalena, Die Terrorjahre: Mein Leben an der Seite von Carlos (Munich: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 2007). Kostadinov, Evtim, Tatyana Kiryakova, Jordan Baev and Kostadin Grozev (eds.), International Terrorism in the Bulgarian State Security Files: Documentary Volume (Sophia: The Committee for Disclosing Documents and Announcing Affiliation of Bulgarian Citizens to the State Security and the Intelligence Services of the Bulgarian National Armed Forces, 2010). Lučić, Ivo, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Terrorism, National Security and the Future 2/3-4 (2001), 111–42. Maeke, Lutz, DDR und PLO: Die Palästinapolitik des SED-Staates (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2017). Malloy, Sean L., Out of Oakland: Black Panther Party Internationalism during the Cold War (London: Cornell University Press, 2017). Nehring, Christopher, Die Zusammenarbeit der DDR Auslandsaufklärung mit der Aufklärung der Volksrepublik Bulgarien: Regionalfilialen des KGB? PhD Thesis, Heidelberg University, 2016. Nehring, Christopher, Die Verhaftung Till Meyers in Bulgarien: eine Randnotiz aus dem Archiv der bulgarischen Staatssicherheit, Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte 63/3 (2015), 411–24. Oberdorfer, Don and Robert Carlin, The Two Koreas: A Contemporary History (New York: Basic Books, 2014). Orbán-Schwarzkopf, Balázs, Greys and Wolves in the Shadow of the Red (Budapest: Hamvas Institute, 2016). Persak, Krzysztof et al. (eds.), A Handbook of the Communist Security Apparatus in East Central Europe 1944–1989 (Warsaw: Institute of National Rememberance, 2005). Richterova, Daniela, The Anxious Host: Czechoslovakia and Carlos the Jackal 1978–1986, International History Review 40/1 (2018), 108–32. Riegler, Thomas, ‘Es muss ein gegenseitiges Geben und Nehmen sein’: Warschauer-PaktStaaten und Terrorismusbekämpfung am Beispiel der DDR, in: Johannes Hürter (ed.), Terrorismusbekämpfung in Westeuropa: Demokratie und Sicherheit in den 1970er und 1980er Jahren (Berlin: De Gruyter Oldenbourg, 2015), 289–315. Riegler, Thomas, Quid pro Quo: State Sponsorship of Terrorism in the Cold War, in: Bernhard Blumenau and Jussi M. Hanhimäki (eds.), An International History of Terrorism: Western and Non-Western Experiences (London: Routledge, 2013), 115–32. Ruce světové revoluce: Carlos a jeho teroristická organizace v dokumentech Státní bezpečnosti, 1976–1989 [‘Hands of the World Revolution: Carlos and His Terrorist

Select Bibliography

201

Organisation in the Documents of the State Security, 1976–1989’], source collection forthcoming from the Prague publishing house Academia. Simić, Mirko, Istorijsko nasleđe vojnoobaveštajne službe: Razvoj oružanih snaga SFRJ, 1945–1985: Vojnoobaveštajna služba (Belgrade: Vojnoizdavački i novinski centar, 1990). Sørensen, Anne, Stasi og den vesttyske terrorisme (Santa Barbara: Århus University Press, 2006). Tofan, Liviu, Ș viuLI Securității: teroristul Carlos în solda spionajului românesc (Bucarest: Polirom, 2013). Vielhaber, David, The Stasi-Meinhof Complex?, Studies in Conflict & Terrorism 36/7 (2013), 533–46. Volkogonov, Dmitry, Etyudy o vremeni (Moscow: Novosty, 1998). Wiel, Jérôme aan de, East German Intelligence and Ireland 1949–90: Espionage, Terrorism and Diplomacy (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2017). Wunschik, Tobias, Die ‘Bewegung 2. Juni’ und ihre Protektion durch den Staatssicherheitsdienst der DDR, Deutschland-Archiv 6 (2007), 1014–25. Wunschik, Tobias, Magdeburg statt Mosambique, Köthen statt Kap Verden: Die RAFAussteiger in der DDR, in: Klaus Biesenbach (ed.), Zur Vorstellung des Terrors: Die RAF-Ausstellung, Vol. 2 (Göttingen: Steidl, 2005), 236–40. Wunschik, Tobias, Baader-Meinhofs Kinder: Die zweite Generation der RAF (Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1997). Wunschik, Tobias, Die Hauptabteilung XXII: ‘Terrorabwehr’ (Berlin: BStU, 1995).

Western Europe and NATO States Albanese, Matteo and Pablo del Hierro, Transnational Fascism in the Twentieth Century: Spain, Italy and the Global Neo-Fascist Network (London: Bloomsbury, 2016). Arnson, Cythnia J., Crossroads: Congress, the President, and Central America, 1976–1993 (University Park: Penn State University Press, 19932). Bale, Jeffrey M., The Darkest Sides of Politics, Vol. 1: Postwar Fascism, Covert Operations, and Terrorism (New York: Routledge, 2018). Bell, Aaron T., A Matter of Western Civilisation: Transnational Support for the Salvadoran Counterrevolution, 1979–1982, Cold War History 15/4 (2015), 511–31. Bird, Kai, The Good Spy (New York: Broadway Books, 2014). Bohning, Don, The Castro Obsession: U.S. Covert Operations against Cuba, 1959–1965 (Washington, DC: Potomac Books, 2005). Bolender, Keith, Voices from the Other Side: An Oral History of Terrorism against Cuba (London: Pluto Press, 2010). Boumaad, Abdelhak, La Politique Américaine en Amérique Centrale: La Présidence de Ronald Reagan et le Nicaragua (Lille: Atelier National de Reproduction des Theses, 1999). Bülow, Mathilde von, West Germany, Cold War Europe and the Algerian War (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016). Bülow, Mathilde von, Myth or Reality? The Red Hand and French Covert Action in Federal Germany during the Algerian War, 1956–61, Intelligence and National Security 22/6 (2007), 787–820. Byrne, Malcolm, Iran-Contra: Reagan’s Scandal and the Unchecked Abuse of Presidential Power (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2014). Cadwalleder, Anne, Lethal Allies: British Collusion in Ireland (Cork: Mercier Press, 2013).

202

Select Bibliography

Carlton, David, The West’s Road to 9/11: Resisting, Appeasing and Encouraging Terrorism since 1970 (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005). Cento Bull, Anna, Italian Neofascism: The Strategy of Tension and the Politics of Nonreconciliation (New York: Berghahn Books, 2012). Chasdi, Richard J., Counterterror Failure: The Fadlallah Assassination Attempt, in: Richard Weitz (ed.), Project on National Security Reform: Case Studies Working Group Report, Vol. 2, March 2012, www​.dtic​.mil​/get​-tr​-doc​/pdf​?AD​=ADA558988 (accessed 1 January 2020). Chauvin, Luc, French Diplomacy and the Hostage Crisis, in: Barry Rubin (ed.), The Politics of Counterterrorism: The Ordeal of Democratic States (Washington, DC: Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, 1990), 61–90. Coco, Vittorio, Conspiracy Theories in Republican Italy: The Pellegrino Report to the Parliamentary Commission on Terrorism, Journal of Modern Italian Studies 20/3 (2015), 361–76. Cutonilli, Valerio and Rosario Priore, I segreti di Bologna: La verità sull’atto terroristico più grave della storia italiana (Milan: Chiarelettere, 2016). Dahlke, Matthias, Demokratischer Staat und Transnationaler Terrorismus: Drei Wege zur Unnachgiebigkeit in Westeuropa 1972–1975 (Munich: Oldenbourg, 2011). Dahlke, Matthias, Das Wischnewski-Protokoll: Zur Zusammenarbeit zwischen westeuropäischen Regierungen und transnationalen Terroristen 1977, Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte (VfZ) 57/2 (2009), 201–15. Evans, Martin, Algeria: France’s Undeclared War (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012). Frangi, Abdullah, Der Gesandte: Mein Leben für Palästina. Hinter den Kulissen der NahostPolitik (Munich: Heyne, 2011). Gal Or, Noemi (ed.), Tolerating Terrorism in the West: An International Survey (London: Routledge, 1991). Gaspardis, Paola, Lo status dell’OLP nella diplomazia italiana (Siena: Prospettiva Editrice, 2009). Grandin, Greg, Empires Workshop: Latin America, The United States, and the New Imperialism (New York: Henry Holt, 2006). Gyr, Marcel, Schweizer Terrorjahre: Das geheime Abkommen mit der PLO (Zurich: Verlag Neue Zürcher Zeitung, 2016). Heitzer, Enrico, Die Kampfgruppe gegen Unmenschlichkeit (KgU): Widerstand und Spionage im Kalten Krieg 1948–1959 (Köln: Böhlau, 2015). Hof, Tobias, The Moro Affair – Left-Wing Terrorism and Conspiracy in Italy in the Late 1970s, Historical Social Research 38/1 (2013), 232–57. Ingram, Martin and Greg Harkin, Stakeknife: Britain’s Secret Agents in Ireland (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2005). Lammert, Markus, Der neue Terrorismus: Terrorismusbekämpfung in Frankreich in den 1980er Jahren (Boston: De Gruyter, 2017). LeoGrande, William, Our Own Backyard: The United States in Central America, 1977–1992 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 1998). Ménage, Gilles, L’oeil du pouvoir, Vol. 3 (Paris: Fayard, 1999–2001). Merlen, Eric and Frédéric Ploquin, Carnets intimes de la DST: 30 ans au coeur du contreespionnage français (Paris: Fayard, 2003). Naftali, Timothy, Blind Spot: The Secret History of American Counterterrorism (New York: Basic Books, 2005). Punch, Maurice, State Violence, Collusion and the Troubles: Counter Insurgency, Government Deviance and Northern Ireland (London: Pluto Press, 2012).

Select Bibliography

203

Quemeneur, Tramor, La Discipline jusqu’au l’Indiscipline, in: Mohammed Harbi and Benjamin Stora (eds.), La Guerre d’Algérie (Paris: Laffont, 2004). Rabe, Stephen A., The Killing Zone: The United States Wages the Cold War in Latin America (New York: Oxford University Press, 2015). Report of the Congressional Committees Investigating the Iran-Contra Affair, with Supplemental, Minority, and Additional Views (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1987). Riegler, Thomas, Diplomatie und Terror: Die Operationen des PLO-Geheimdienstes 1979 in der BRD und in Österreich, Journal for Intelligence, Propaganda and Security Studies (JIPSS), 8/1 (2014), 30–58. Riegler, Thomas, The State as a Terrorist: France and the Red Hand, Perspectives on Terrorism, 6/6 (2012), 22–33. Riegler, Thomas, Im Fadenkreuz: Österreich und der Nahostterrorismus 1973 bis 1985 (Vienna: V&R unipress, 2010). Schenk, Dieter, Der Chef: Horst Herold und das BKA (Hamburg: Hoffmann und Campe, 1998). Seale, Patrick, Abu Nidal: A Gun for Hire (New York: Random House, 1992). Shapiro, Jeremy and Bénédicte Suzan, The French Experience of Counter-terrorism, Survival: Global Politics and Strategy 45/1 (2003), 67–98. Sidoti, Francesco, Terrorism Supporters in the West: The Italian Case, in: Noemi Gal Or (ed.), Tolerating Terrorism in the West: An International Survey (London: Routledge, 1991), 105–143. Talbot, David, The Devil’s Chessboard: Allen Dulles, the CIA, and the Rise of America’s Secret Government (London: HarperCollins, 2016). Urwin, Margaret, A State in Denial: British Collusion with Loyalist Paramilitaries (Cork: Mercier Press, 2016). Wieviorka, Michel, French Politics and Strategy on Terrorism, in: Barry Rubin (ed.), The Politics of Counterterrorism: The Ordeal of Democratic States (Washington, DC: Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, 1990), 61–90. Wischnewski, Hans-Jürgen, Mit Leidenschaft und Augenmaß: In Mogadischu und anderswo (München: Bertelsmann, 1989). Yousaf, Mohammad and Mark Adkin, Afghanistan: The Bear Trap-The Defeat of a Superpower (Havertown, PA: Casemate, 1992). Zala, Sacha, Thomas Bürgisser and Yves Steiner, Die Debatte zu einem ‘geheimen Abkommen’ zwischen Bundesrat Graber und der PLO: Eine Zwischenbilanz, Schweizerische Zeitschrift für Geschichte 66/1 (2016), 1–24.

Stay Behind / Gladio Ben Redjeb, Badis, The Central Intelligence Agency and the Stay-Behind Networks in West Germany: An Assessment, British Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences 14/2 (2016), 50–62. Cogan, Charles, ‘Stay-Behind’ in France: Much Ado about Nothing?, Journal of Strategic Studies 30/6 (2007), 937–54. Desmaretz, Gérard, Stay-behind: Les réseaux secrets de la guerre froide (Paris: Editions Jourdan, 2015).

204

Select Bibliography

Engelen, Dick, Lessons Learned: The Dutch ‘Stay-Behind’ Organization 1945–1992, Journal of Strategic Studies 30/6 (2007), 981–96. Kemmerling, Markus, Kaltes Kriegsspielzeug, Zoom: Zeitschrift für Politik und Gesellschaft 4–5 (1996) (‘Es muss nicht immer Gladio sein: Attentate, Waffenlager, Erinnerungslücken’), 6–9. Keßelring, Agilolf, Die Organisation Gehlen und die Neuformierung des Militärs in der Bundesrepublik (Berlin: Ch. Links, 2017). Lillbacka, Ralf, The Murder of Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme; A Rebuttal of the ‘Stay-Behind’ Scenario, Journal for Intelligence, Propaganda and Security Studies 11/1 (2017), 112–25. Matter, Martin, P-26: Die Geheimarmee, die keine war: Wie Politik und Medien die Vorbereitung des Widerstands skandalisierten (Baden: hier + jetzt, 2012). Maurice, Charles, Insane Killers Inc.: The Brabant Killers Mystery (Rayem Press, 2018). Meier, Titus J. Widerstandsvorbereitungen für den Besetzungsfall: Die Schweiz im Kalten Krieg (Zürich: NZZ Libro, 2018). Nuti, Leopoldo, The Italian ‘Stay-Behind’ Network – The Origins of Operation ‘Gladio’, Journal of Strategic Studies 30/6 (2007), 955–80. Nuti, Leopoldo and Olav Riste (eds.), Special Section: Preparing for a Soviet Occupation: The Strategy of ‘Stay-Behind’, Journal of Strategic Studies 30/6 (2007), 929–1024. Richardson, John H. My Father the Spy: An Investigative Memoir (New York: Harper Collins, 2005). Riegler, Thomas, Österreichs geheime Dienste: Vom Dritten Mann zur BVT-Affäre (Wien: Klever Verlag, 2019). Riste, Olav, ‘Stay Behind’: A Clandestine Cold War Phenomenon, Journal of Cold War Studies 16/4 (2014), 35–59. Riste, Olav, With an Eye to History: The Origins and Development of ‘Stay-Behind’ in Norway, Journal of Strategic Studies 30/6 (2007), 997–1024. Schmidt-Eenboom, Erich and Ulrich Stoll, Die Partisanen der NATO: Stay-BehindOrganisationen in Deutschland 1946–1991 (Berlin: Ch. Links, 2015). Stejskal, James, Special Forces Berlin: Clandestine Cold War Operations of the US Army's Elite, 1956-1990 (Philadelphia: Casemate Publishers, 2017).

INDEX Abbas, Abu (Muhammad Zaidan)  132 abduction as terrorist act, categorization of  24–5 Abdul Kadir, Al Hadithi Anwar  108 Abu Nidal Organization (ANO)  5, 7, 8, 11, 61, 66, 72, 83 n.153, 88, 126, 149. See also Polish military intelligence, relationship with ANO and GDR, relationship between  17 n.46, 68–70, 72, 75–6 Hungary as sanctuary for  130 MfS and  68–70, 73, 75, 79 n.88 Poland and  67–8, 75 relocation to Libya  70–1 Yugoslavia and  66–7 Abu Nidal Terror Network, The (anonymous)  96 Achille Lauro incident  132, 137 Action Directe  4, 5, 128, 131 Adams, Alvin P.  73, 159 Adams, Nathan  155, 156 Afghanistan  45, 53, 57 n.43 foreign intelligence approach of Soviet Union on  46–8 intelligence activities of  50–1 Soviet intelligence in  51–2 Soviet war in  48–50 Agca, Mehmet Ali  4, 153, 154 Akbari, Aziz Ahmad  49 al-Abid, Ibrahim  94 al-Banna, Adnan  92, 93 al-Banna, Hassan Sabri. See Nidal, Abu Albats, Evgenia  25 Alexander, Yonah  150 Algerian National Liberation Front (FLN)  165 n.59 Al Hadithi, A. A. Kadir  111 al-Hashimi, Zaki  90 Ali, Muhammad  42

al-Issawe, Ali Kamal  110 al-Kaylani, Adnan  92 Allason, Rupert  164 n.47 Allen, Richard  3 al-Maghrebi, Abu Mansour  2 Al-Nakib, Zaid  109, 110 al-Noor  93 Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP)  2 al-Reem  93 al-Tarablusi, Shami Domullah  43 al-Tikriti, Ibrahim Barzan  91 Al-Zulfikar group  50 Amal  12, 134, 152 Amanullah, King of Afghanistan  47 Ambrose, Myles  147, 163 n.20 Amin, Asadullah  49 Amin, Hafizullah  49 Anachkov, Georgi  148 Andijon revolt (1898)  42 Andrawes, Souhaila (Al-Kasim Rihab)  108, 109 Andrew, Christopher  10, 31, 36 n.29, 37 n.36, 38 n.42 KGB and  26–8 Andropov, Yury  23, 26, 27, 29, 30, 31, 33, 35 n.9, 36–7 n.29, 38 n.47, 45, 51, 155 Antonov, Sergei  153 Arab Revolution/Liberation Vanguard Organization  127 Arafat, Yasser  16 n.40, 65, 70, 75, 88, 98, 146 Archive of Modern Records  87 Archive of the Institute of National Remembrance  87 Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia (ASALA)  126, 163 n.34 Austria  73, 74 Ayad, Abu. See Iyad, Abu

206 Index Baader-Mainhof Gang. See Red Army Faction (RAF) (West Germany) Babakhanov, Ziyauddin Khan Ishan  44 Baddad, Mohamed Fares  127–8 Baha (Dr)  49 Bahrain  187 Balantič, Polona  172 Bale, Jeffrey  7 Balkan Trading Co.  146 Bank Handlowy (Beirut)  88–9 Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI) (London)  94–5 Barry, Robert  157 Bashlan, Umar Jumʼa  110 Basmachi revolts  42, 46 Bek, Ibrahim  47 Bergman, Ronen  6 Bezmenov, Yury A.  36–7 n.29 Bhutto, Murtaza  50 Bhutto, Zulfikar Ali  50 Bin Thabet, Ali  110 Blackbourn, Jessie  13 n.1 Black Panthers Party (US)  145, 162 n.12 Black September Organization  127 Bogdanov, Leonid  49 Bohnsack, Gunter  164 n.48 Bolivia  191 Bolshevik revolution  24 Bolsheviks  43 Bonev, Lazar  147 ‘Boomerang’ technique  128 Border Protection Group 9 (Grenzschutzgruppe 9, GSG 9)  108 Bošković, Nedeljko  179 nn.2, 7 Bouchar, Abdulhamijid  139 n.40 Brădescu, Faust  113 Brezhnev, Leonid  23, 26, 27, 30 Britain  45, 109 Brodhead, Frank  15 n.25 Bruguière, Jean-Louis  85, 160 Brzezinski, Zbigniew  153 Bukovsky Archive  25, 38 n.47 Bulgaria  4, 8, 15 n.27, 56 n.24, 72, 73, 185, 188 Bulgarian National Archives  143 Bulgarian state security  143–4 Cold War era end and  158–61

first encounters with international terrorist acts for  144–7 international terrorists’ presence and  148–52 last Cold War wave and  152–8 Burgstaller, Eugen F.  32–3 Burma  192 n.13 Burt, Richard  156 Bush, George H. W.  101 Byman, Daniel  1–2, 18 n.60, 102 Cámbara Licea, Angel  110 Canada  191 Carlin, Robert  192 n.13 Carlos Apparat. See Carlos group Carlos group  5, 7, 8, 17 nn.46, 49, 72, 83 n.153, 126, 131–2, 148 ‘Carlos the Jackal’  3, 9, 86, 107–8, 126, 130, 182 n.47–8, 183 nn.66, 68 in Bulgaria  148–9 final visit to Prague  114–15 first visit to Prague  108–10 PLO and  183 n.57 against Saddam Hussein  111–12 surveillance of  110–11 weapons transport and  113 in Yugoslavia  172–7 Ceaușescu, Nicolae  83 n.153 Čech, Oldřich  109 Central Engineering Board (Centralny Zarząd Inżynierii, Cenzin)  90, 91, 94, 95, 100, 102 Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)  4, 5, 6, 10, 14 n.22, 18 n.67, 34, 72, 80 n.112 on ANO–Polish secret agreement  96–7, 101 Bulgaria and  158 Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS)  25 KGB and  27–8 National Intelligence Estimate  158 Cesswell, John  159 Chebrikov, Victor  154 China  7, 45, 169, 185 Chirac, Jacques  99 Christian-Democratic Youth Association of the Netherlands  190

Index Christian World Student Confederation  190 Chung-hee, Park  187 Citizens Militia  98 City of Poros kidnapping incident  160 COCOM regulations  92 Cold war  61. See also state support for terrorist actors, in Cold War COMDOS  162 nn.4, 10, 163 n.31 Comecon  11 commercial interests, significance of  11 Communist Combatant Cells (Belgium)  5 Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU)  7, 41, 60 n.90 Communist Youth of Austria  190 Convention on the Suppression of International Terrorism  180 n.7 Coral Sea, issue of  30–1 Council for Mutual Economic Assistance  18 n.65 Croatian émigré nationalist groups  12 Cuba  72, 185–8 Customs Anti-Drug Conference (1978)  147 Czechoslovak Communist Party  136 Czechoslovak Directorate for CounterIntelligence in the Fight Against the External Enemy (FMV/ SNB)  107, 108, 111 Czechoslovakia  56 n.24, 62, 73, 185, 188. See also ‘Carlos the Jackal’ Czechoslovak Socialist Republic (CSSR). See Czechoslovakia Czech security services  9 Daghestani communists  42 Daily Operative Information Report  133 Danov, Hristo  153 DANS  166 n.80 Daoud, Abu  68, 90, 95, 104 n.24, 130–1, 149, 175, 183 n.57 testimony of  91 Daud, Muhammad  48 Daud, Saker Selim  127 Dawa  12, 135–6 declassification, of communist intelligence and counterintelligence documents  86, 89

207

Defense Department Prisoner of War/ Missing Personnel Office (DPMO)  35 n.7 Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP)  6, 41, 68, 170 Denmark  158 Department XXII (‘counterterrorism’ within the Ministry for State Security of the GDR)  69 Der Spiegel (magazine)  72 Der Stern (magazine)  72 ‘Dev Genc’  144 ‘Dev Sol’  145 Dexter, Helen  13 n.1 Dezso, András  139 n.40 Dhanda, Rani  13 n.1 Dickerson, Robert  147 diplomatic influence/recognition, significance of  11 Dobrescu, Ioa  111 domestic security, significance of  9–10 Dom Handlowo-Agenturowy (DHA) ‘M. Czarnecki’  92, 94, 100 Domullah, Shami  56 n.13 DOR ‘RISOVE’ (Case for Operational Investigation ‘LYNXES’)  148 Drossoyannis, Antonis  160 ‘Drugs for Guns, the Bulgarian Connection’ (Adams)  155 Durzhavna sigurnost (DS). See Bulgarian state security EGPR  133 Egypt  146 ELA  133 Emilian, Ioan  113 Engelmann, Roger  76 n.8 ‘Erod’ (Fortress) committee  125–6, 138 n.15 Ethiopia  187 European Youth Committee  190 Euskadi Ta Askatasuna (ETA)  3, 128, 130, 133 Fadlallah, Sheik Mohammad Hussein  152 Fahd, King of Saudi Arabia  70 Falange  191 Farhan, Shakir  92

208 Index Fatah  66, 89, 170 Fatah Revolutionary Council (Fatah-RC). See Abu Nidal Organization (ANO) Fathi, Azizurrahman  47 Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) (West Germany)  146 Federal Republic of Germany (FRG)  45 Field Manual 30-31B  4–5 Fighters for the Freedom of Israel (Lehi/ Stern Gang)  24 Filing System of Data on the Enemy (SOUD)  129, 139 n.35 Fiřt, Karel  114 Follain, John  17 n.46, 37 n.36 France  12, 72, 74, 147 French Service de Documentation Extérieure et de ContreEspionnage (SDECE)  5 Frilet, Alain  132, 133 Gaddafi, Muammar  3, 70–1, 88, 112, 128 Gaidarov, Ilia  150 Garthoff, Raymond  147, 155 Gates, Robert  155 GDR Television  75 Geifman, Anna  35 n.10 General Union of Palestine Students (GUPS)  64 Georgescu, Emil Valer  113 German Democratic Republic (GDR)  7–8, 11, 132, 169, 185, 186. See also Ministry for State Security (MfS) (GDR); Palestinian terrorism and state security, of GDR and ANO, relationship between  17 n.46, 72, 75–6 as North Korea’s international partner  187, 188 Global Terrorism Database of the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START)  124 Golan, Galia  6 Goma, Paul  113 good cop–bad cop exercise  33–4 Goodman, Melvyn  155 Gorbachev, Mikhail  25, 71, 158 Gotsev, Lyuben  159

Grajewski, Andrzej  15 n.27 Greece  74, 157, 160 Grey Wolves  11, 123–4, 126, 131, 152, 154, 161 Hungary as sanctuary for  129–30 Grinevsky, Oleg  37 n.30 Gromyko, Andrey  37 n.30 GRU  52, 59 n.81 GUGB  46, 57 n. 32 Gulag Study  35 n.7 Gunning, Jeroen  13 n.1 Guz, Eugeniusz  164 n.48 Gwiazda, Władysław  91 Habash, George  65, 109 Haddad, Wadi  38 n.47 relationship with KGB  6, 7, 10, 26–30 Hague Convention (1970)  145 Haig, Alexander  3 Hawkins, Paula  156 Henze, Paul B.  156, 164 n.47, 165 n.60 Herljević, Franjo  174 Herman, Edward S.  15 n.25 Herold, Horst  146 Hetz, Shmu’el  22, 31, 34, 35 n.6 Hezb-e Islami group  53 Hezbollah  12, 128, 134–5, 151, 152, 164 n.45 Hisham, Abu  114 Hissam, Abu  66 Historical Archives of the Hungarian State Security  123 Historical Office (Hungary)  123 Hoffman, Bruce  1, 150 Hofman, Richard  113 Hohenzolern, Mihail  113 Honecker, Erich  67, 185, 191 Hosenball, Mark  94 Hrušecký, Vladimír  114 HUMINT networks  50, 59 n.79 Hungarian Ministry of Interior  124 Hungarian Socialist Workers’ Party  124 Hungarian state security  69, 123–4. See also Hungary counterterrorism and  124–6 intelligence gathering and  126–9 Hungary  12, 62, 72, 73, 107, 139 n.40. See also Hungarian state security

Index as sanctuary for terrorist organizations and  129–31 state support for terrorist actors and  131–3 as terrorist target and  134–7 Hupałowski, Tadeusz  91 Hussein, Saddam  94, 110, 135, 160 Ibn Saud  43 Idris, Ezz-Eldin  112 imam-khatib (cleric conducting Friday sermon and prayer)  44 Imbot, René  160 Imes Import-Export GmbH.  92 INO  57 n.37, 116, 119 n.29 Inoffizielle Mitarbeiter (IM)  65 Inoffizielle Mitarbeiter mit Feindkontakt (IMB)  69 Inside Terrorism (Hoffman)  1 Institute for Security (or Security Institute)  181 n.33 intelligence, interest for  10 Intelligence and Security Education Center (ISEC) (Yugoslavia)  170 Intermador  93, 94, 102 ‘International Federation of Liberals and Radical Youth’ (IFLRY)  190 International Marketing Corporation (IMC)  93 International Union of Socialist Youth  190 Inter-Service Intelligence (ISI) (Pakistan)  2 Iran  12, 136, 186 Iran-Contra affair  157 Iraq  45, 62, 66, 71, 86, 109, 116, 131, 135 ANO and  88, 91 Poland and  91 Irish Republican Army (IRA)  3, 130, 132, 133, 145, 190 Ishan, Dukchi. See Ali, Muhammad Islamic Revolutionary Guard  136 Islamic State  140 n.41 Israel  12, 21–2, 83 n.153, 135 Istikhbarat (‘intelligence’)  49, 58 n.51 Italian Communist Party  169 Italian Servizio per le Informazioni e la Sicurezza Militare (SISMI)  5

209

Italy  4, 15 n.23, 72 Iyad, Abu  64, 66, 87, 99, 148, 149, 163 n.29 Jackson, Richard  13 n.1 Jae Joo Sen  186 Jagielski, Mieczysław  91 Jamil, Abdul Nabil  109 Japanese Red Army  128, 137, 160–1 Jaruzelski, Wojciech  85, 91, 101 Jenkins, Brian  150 Jihaz al-Rasd  163 n.29 Jízdný, Václav  111 Johnsen, Gregory  2 Joint Commission on Prisoners of War (POWs)  22 Jordan  45 ‘Justice Commandos of the Armenian Genocide’ (JCAG)  163 n.34 KAL 858 bombing  187–8 KAM  49 Karmal, Babrak  48, 49 Karski, Ryszard  91 Kartsev, Alexander  52 Kaskad (‘Cascade’), of KGB  51, 59 n.79 Kékes, Péter  133 Kengor, Paul  15 n.25 KGB  3, 5–6, 48–9, 56 n.24, 111, 121 n.76, 164 n.57 Bulgaria and  146 CIA and  27–8 First Chief Directorate plan on Islamic factor  45 Kaskad (‘Cascade’) of  51 Palestinian terrorism and  67 and PFLP, relationship between  25–7 Red Brigades and  162 n.10 relationship with Haddad  6, 7, 10 special force units of  51–2 targeted intelligence abductions and  23–5 Khachadour, Ary  109, 118 n.22 KhAD (Afghan intelligence)  49–51 Khalaf, Salah Mesbah. See Iyad, Abu Khaled, Leila  65 Khristoforov, V. S.  59 n.79 Kim Hyon Hui  187 Kim Il-sung  185, 186

210 Index Kim Jong-il  185, 186, 187 Kim Jong-nam  185, 192 n.13 Kim Jong Ryong  191 Kim Jong-un  185 Kim Won Il  188, 189 Kintex  155, 165 n.59 Kirkpatrick, Jeane  3 Kirpichenko, Vadim  154 Kissinger, Henry  32 Klein, Aaron J.  36 n.24 Klein, Hans-Joachim  172–3, 181 n.35, 182 n.47–8 Kobal’t (‘Cobalt’) special forces teams  51–2 Koperwas, Tadeusz  91 Kopp, Magdalena  112, 113, 114, 120 n.50 Kostromin, L. P.  57 n.32 Kotsev, Vasil  150, 152 Kouleilat, Nabil  65 Krajewski, Andrzej  85 Král, Jiří  113 Kreisky, Bruno  74 Kryuchkov, Vladimir  154, 155 Kucherova, Larisa  59 n.79 Kuwait  45, 135 Lang, Georg  147 League of Communists of Yugoslavia (LCY)  167, 168 Lebanese Armenians  29 Lebanon  23, 37 n.37, 64, 146 Lee Jong Gun  190 Leer  93 Lenin, Vladimir  41 Le Nouvel Observateur (French newspaper)  32 Levitsky, Melvyn  159 L’Express (magazine)  72 Liberal Youth Association of Norway  190 Libération (French daily)  32 Libya  62, 70–1, 86, 131, 186 ANO and  88 Lorenz, Peter  74 Lučić, Ivo  180 n.10 Madagascar  187 Madali. See Ali, Muhammad

Majewski, Alfred  95 Malaysia  185, 192 n.13 Malevanyy, Valeriy V.  59 n.79 Mandula  137 Mansour, Abdo Yousif  111 Marchewka, Andrzej  92–6, 100 Mareychev, Alexander  58 n.50 Marg, Anand  129 Marion, Pierre  26 Martin, David C.  14 n.14 Maryam (Polish origin lady)  47–8 Masud, Ahmad Shah  52 Matlock, Jack  155 Meehan, Francis J.  72, 73 Menzhinskiy, Vyacheslav  47 Metalexport  90 Meyer, Till  146 Mezo, Gábor  132, 133 Mielke, Erich  64, 74, 154, 186, 191 Milewski, Mirosław  87 Military History Institute  23 Military Security Service (MSS) (Yugoslavia)  170, 171 Miller, David  13 n.1 Milli Istihbarat Teskilati (MIT) (Turkey)  154 Milosevic, Slobodan  175 Ministry for State Security (MfS) (GDR)  7, 10, 16 n.40, 92, 110, 113, 145, 164 n.53, 182 n.43 ANO and  68–70, 73, 75, 79 n.88 and Carlos group, relationship between  17 n.46 North Korea and  186, 187–91 Palestinian terrorism and  63, 65 RAF and  8–9 mirror-symmetric conspiratorial narratives  4 Missing in Action from the Cold War period (USRJC)  22, 23 Mitchell, John  162 n.12 Mitrokhin, Vasiliy. See Mitrokhin Archive Mitrokhin Archive  26–31, 36 n.28, 37 n.36, 38 nn.42, 44, 47, 50, 51, 58 nn.43, 50–1, 59 n.62 Mladenov, Georgi  145, 150 Mladenov, Petar  146, 153, 154, 157 M-19  133 Modrzewski, Jerzy  91

Index Montreal Convention (1971)  145 Monzer al-Kassar  18–19 n.67, 87, 102 Moro, Aldo  131 Mortin, Fedor  6, 31, 35 n.9 Moschos, Markos  38 n.46 Moskovsky Novosti  25 Mossack, Jürgen  91–2 Mossack Fonseca & Co.  91 Mossad (Israeli intelligence service)  65 Moussa, Abu  68 Movimiento Revolucionario Túpac Amaru (MRTA)  136 Muhammad, Ali  48 mujahidin groups  50–2 Murat, Kurban  42 Muslim Brotherhood (Egypt)  45–6, 56 n.24, 56–7 n.27, 126, 146, 150–2, 163 nn.36–7 Muslim extremism and terrorism, Soviet approaches to  41–2 Afghanistan intelligence activities and  50–1 domestic security approach and  42–6 foreign intelligence approach and  46–8 Soviet intelligence activities and  51–2 Soviet reassessment of domestic threat and  52–3 Soviet war in Afghanistan and  48–50 Musumeci, Pietro  154 Nabi, Ghulam  47 Nadir Khan, Muhammad  47 Naftali, Timothy  14 n.14, 80 n.112 Najibullah, Muhammad  49 Najmeddin, Samir  89–95, 99, 101 Naqshbandiyyah order  42 National People’s Army (Nationale Volksarmee) (NVA)  64 National Security Planning Agency  189 Nedělková, Hana  110 Nehring, Christopher  15 n.26, 162 n.15 New York Times  72 Nica, Sergiu  120 n.44 Nicaragua  186, 187 Nidal, Abu  62, 63, 81 n.129. See also Abu Nidal Organization (ANO); Polish military intelligence, relationship with ANO

211

death of  71 in GDR  68 in Libya  70–1 PLO and  66 in Poland  67–8 Soviet Union and  67 Washington and East Berlin talks about  71–3 NIMBYism  75 Nitescu, Sergiu  111 Nittel, Heinz  86 Nixon, Richard  37 n.36, 145, 147 Noffal, Nasr  89 Non-Aligned Movement (NAM)  167–9 North Korea  12, 185–6 intelligence cooperation, for 1989 WYF  186–92 November 17 Movement  74, 133 Oakley, Robert  99 Oberdorfer, Don  192 n.13 Obermaier, Frederik  104 n.32 Obermayer, Bastian  104 n.32 O’Brady, Thomas  156 Offiziere in besonderem Einsatz (OibE)  65 OGPU  46–7 Olcott, Martha Brill  56 n.13 Omega special force unit  52 Operation ‘Turista’  114–15 Operation Condor  157 Operation Entebbe  182 n.44 Operation Karlo-2  182 n.40 Operation Nasos  30–1 Operation Rubin (Ruby)  28 Operation Vint  29, 30, 31 ‘Operation Vostok (East)’  38 n.42 Operative Information Centre (OHK)  138 n.15 Order No. I-2 document  148 Organization of International Revolu­ tionaries (OIR). See Carlos group Organization of Islamic Alliance  134 Orient  121 n.80 Ormankov, Yordan  154 Orzechowski, Marian  100 Ostrana (Polish–Austrian enterprise)  92 Pakistan  45, 50, 52 Palestine Liberation Front (PLF)  132

212 Index Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO)  41, 72, 80 n.112, 86, 89 Bulgarian leadership and  146 Carlos and  183 n.57 GDR regime and  63–6 on Taleb  98 Yugoslavia on  170 Palestinian Communist Party  68 Palestinian terrorism and state security of GDR  61–3 GDR regime and Palestinians and  63–6 MfS, KGB and Abu Nidal and  66–71 talks between Washington and East Berlin about Nidal and  71–3 Pan-Turkism  42 Papandreou, Andreas  156 Parejo, Enrique  134 Pasha, Enver  42 People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA)  48, 49 People’s Democratic Republic of Yemen  109, 131 Perry, Jack  157 Perry, Mark  80 n.112 Persico, Joseph E.  14 n.14 Pipes, Richard  3, 27 Pitr, Miloslav  114 Ploetz, Michael  4 Poland  11, 56 nn.24, 27, 62, 67–8, 73, 75, 107, 185, 188. See also Polish military intelligence, relationship with ANO Polanski, Sol  159 Polish Institute of National Remembrance  15 n.27, 127 Polish military intelligence, relationship with ANO  85–7 ANO companies and  90–5 roots of  87–9 secret agreement  96–9 US pressure on Poland and  99–101 Polservice  94 Pons, Jean  160 Pope John Paul II, attempt on life of  153 Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP)  5–6, 23, 34, 41, 65, 68, 86, 170 and KGB, relationship between  25–7

Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine General Command (PFLP-GC)  41 Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine Special Command (PFLP-SC)  72 Primakov, Evgeny  22 Primakov, Vitaliy  47 prisoners of War (POW)  23, 35 n.6 unreported deportation of  25 Putin, Vladimir  21 Quillen, Chris  1 Radio Free Europe (RFE)  113, 130 Raimond, Jean-Bernard  131 Ramirez Sánchez, Ilich. See ‘Carlos the Jackal’ Rashid, Mousa  93 Rashid Shipping Company  135 Reagan, Ronald  155, 157, 162 n.12, 186 Reagan administration, on Soviet Union  3 Red Army Faction (RAF) (West Germany)  3, 4, 5, 86, 123, 128, 145, 159, 170 MfS and  8–9 Red Brigades (BR)  3, 4, 9, 18 n.54, 130–1, 133, 145, 162 n.10 Red Bulletin  150 Reuter, Christoph  13 n.6 ‘Revolutionäre Zellen’  133 revolutionary Islam  41, 53 vs. Sufi Islam  42–6 Richterová, Daniela  18 n.55, 117, 119 nn.31–2 Romania  8, 56 n.24, 72, 81 n.129, 83 n.153, 117 n.1, 186. See also Securitate (intelligence service of Romania) Rote Armee Fraktion. See Red Army Faction (RAF) (West Germany) RPGs  30 Sadat, Anwar  104 n.24, 112 Salafism  43–5, 54, 60 n.90 Islamic extremists of  53

Index Salegki-Urbieta  131 Saleh, Ali  2 Salih, Al-Hamdani A.  109 Samunin, Valeriy  57–8 n.43, 58 n.50 Sarewicz, Zdzisław  89 Sarwari, Asadullah  49 S.A.S. Trade & Investment  68, 91, 92–6, 100, 101, 102 Saudi Arabia  45 Schmid, Alex P.  13 n.1, 143 Schmidt, Helmut  146 Schröm, Oliver  17 n.46 Schüßler, Wolfgang  65 Schwartz, David  99–101 Seale, Patrick  88, 91 Securitate (intelligence service of Romania)  8, 10, 176. See also Romania and Carlos group, relationship between  17 n.49 Sereda, Janusz  100 Sevier, Lewis V. (Vir) asylum offer for  31–2 as close aide to Burgstaller  32 as intended victim  28–31 Shamil, Imam  42 Shamir, Yitzhak  24 Shigenobu, Fusako  160 Shimron, Gad  38 n.46 Shopov, Grigor  158 Shultz, George P.  72 Skwara, Michal  15 n.27 Slavchev, Slavcho  165 n.60 Smirnov, Aleksey  22 Smith, Marie Breen  13 n.1 Snegirev, Vladimir  57–8 n.43, 58 n.50 Snow, Olympia  73 Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY). See Yugoslavia Socialist Unity Party of Germany (Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands) (SED)  64, 65, 67, 68, 70, 73, 75 South Korea  186–8, 190 South Korean Christian Youth  190 South Yemen  62, 64, 116 Soviet Union  3, 135, 136, 185, 186, 188. See also KGB Bulgaria and  152

213

‘Carlos the Jackal’ and  114–15 international terrorism and  3 support for  5–6 Palestinian groups and  6–7 on Palestinian terrorism  25 and PLO, relationship between  6 Speckhard, Anne  2 Stanišić, Jovica  175 Stasi. See Ministry for State Security (MfS) (GDR) State Security Service (SSS) (Yugoslavia)  171, 181 nn.22, 26, 182 nn.46–8 on Carlos and Weinrich  173–7 on isolation  182 n.41 state support for terrorist actors, in Cold War  1–2 Cold war myths  2–5 socialist states in Eastern Europe and  7–12 Soviet Union and  5–7 Stefanov, Stefan  162 n.16 Sterling, Claire  3, 5, 155, 164 n.47 Stolz, Richard  159–60 Stoyanov, Dimitar  148, 151, 154 Sudan  66 Suelkan, Bora  150 Sufi Islam vs. revolutionary Islam  42–6 Sverdlev, Stefan  155–6 Swedish Youth Council  190 Syria  12, 13 n.6, 31, 45, 62, 64, 86, 109, 116, 136, 146 ANO and  88 Syrian intelligence services  70 Szürkék és farkasok a vörös árnyékában (‘Greys and Wolves in the Shadow of the Red’)  129 Tajikistan  53, 54, 57 n.43 Taleb, Amer  98 Taraki, Nur Muhammad  48, 49 Tashkent  52 Technika Foreign Trade Company  136 Tekke Turkmen tribe, resistance of  42 terror and terrorism, comparison of  24 Terror Network, The (Sterling)  3, 5 Third Geneva Convention, Article 12  35 n.6 Thomas, Jon R.  159

214 Index Thüringer, Barbara  140 n.41 TIG  93 Tito, Giovanni  154 Tito, Josip Broz  167, 168, 171, 179 nn.1, 6 Todorov, Vladimir  159 Tofan, Liviu  17 n.49, 18 n.61, 83 n.153, 117 n.1, 184 n.84 TRAMPS  150, 151 Trilisser, Mikhail  47 Turkey  144–5, 157 United States  7, 12, 45, 191 Bulgaria and  147, 152–8 UN Office on Drugs and Crime  147 UN resolution No. 44/29  82 n.148 Urbaniak, Andrzej  90, 92, 94 US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA)  124, 147 US Resettlement Program (USRP)  29 Uzbekistan  57 n.43 Vaisite group  43 Vaisov, Bahauddin  43 Vaisov, Inan  43 Viett, Inge  146, 163 n.19 Vitiuk, Viktor V.  14 n.22 Voleš, Ivan  114 Volkogonov, Dmitry  23, 27 Vuchkov, Veselin  165 n.60 Wahhabism. See Salafism Walcott, John  14 n.14 Wallis, Václav  114 Walsh, Lawrence  18 n.67 Warsaw Pact  5, 7, 9, 12, 56 n.27, 161, 162 n.17 counterintelligence meeting  158 meeting attended by North Korea  185 special services  144, 148, 155 Washington Post, The  94 Washington Times  73

Weinrich, Johannes  9, 11, 173, 114, 182 n.42, 183 n.58 Carlos in conversation with  174–7 Wenger, Andreas  83 n.157 Whitehead, John  159 Wilkinson, Paul  150 Wilner, Alex  83 n.157 Wolf, Markus  74 Woodward, Bob  14 n.14 World Council of Churches  191 World Federation of Christian Students  191 World Organization of Young Esperantists  191 World Youth Festival (WYF) (1989) (Pyongyang)  185, 189, 191 Yangon bombing  192 n.13 Yaremenko, Valery  21, 22, 25, 31, 34 n.2 Yeltsin, Boris  23, 25 Yotov, Dimitar  146 ‘Young Union’ of West Germany  190 Yovkov, Georgi  160 Yugoslavia  10, 11, 56 n.24, 62, 117 n.1. See also State Security Service (SSS) (Yugoslavia) ANO and  66–7 Carlos in conversations with Weinrich  174–7 in 1976  172–3 from 1976–1983  173–4 foreign policy from 1945–1990  167–9 terrorism and  169–72 Yugoslav People’s Army (YPA)  169, 170 Zahir Shah, King of Afghanistan  48 Zhelev, Zhelyu  153 Zhivkov, Todor  146, 154, 159, 162–3 n.17 Zibado  67, 68, 70, 71, 73, 91–3 Zolotarev, Vladimir  22, 23

 215

216

 217

218