]]]]]]]]]]]]]    THE AP MIRE SERVICE QUOTES THE FBI    [[[[[[[[[[[[[[ 

     It was all over the media. The way I heard it in a CBS news bull-
letin was this:
     "FBI Director William Webster contradicted President Reagan, 
stating that Soviet intelligence agents have tried and failed to 
manipulate the nuclear weapons freeze movement in the United States."
     Now hold it right there.
     An item like that should make you sit up straight away, before 
the whole story behind it comes to light. An FBI Director contra-
dicting his President? Not impossible, but it would make a bigger 
splash. The Soviets have failed to manipulate the peace movement? If 
you stretch semantics, maybe... 
     Now, still knowing nothing, we take the salient facts:
     Perhaps the most important is the existence of a trap that is 
used to dupe the -- well, the easily duped. There are some cranks who 
are anti-communists to the point of superstition. If it rains, it's 
because the commies have changed the weather; if it doesn't rain, it 
just shows to what dastardly lengths they will go to lull you into 
complacency. There are very few such cranks, but the media brain-
washers report every anti-communist statement as if it were cranky. 
The trap: Believing that EVERY anti-communist must be a crank. Don't 
ever fall into it!
     Beyond that, I take it as obvious that the overwhelming majority 
of peaceniks genuinely believes that disarmament will make war less 
likely; just because the Soviets say the same thing, they say, it does 
not follow that it is wrong.
     Furthermore, experience has shown that only in comparatively rare 
cases do the Soviets work with outright, knowing agents (paid or not); 
most of their work is done by manipulating the unwitting.
     Now let's look at what the FBI really said.
     Its "Report on Soviet Active Measures Relating to the US Peace 
Movement" said that the Soviets "do not view direct control or manipu-
lation of a movement as a necessary prerequisite for a successful 
active-measures campaign. The Soviet peace campaign, for instance, is 
designed to focus public attention on new American weapons systemsand 
to help create the impression that the Soviet Union is more interested 
than the US in serious arms-control and disarmament negotiations. The 
Soviets believe they can achieve these objectives through a planned 
series of arms-control and disarmament proposals  that play on the 
sentiments of the Western peace movements in concert with the systema-
tic use of the Soviet worldwide propaganda apparatus, international 
fronts and local communist parties and trusted contacts and agents..."
     Now compare this with AP's story (that's where CBS and the rest 
of the monopoly got it from): "Soviet agents have tried and failed to 
manipulate the nuclear weapons freeze in the US, FBI Director William 
Webster said..."
     Is that what he said?
     "The AP Interpretation of the Report," said Congressman Bill 
Young (R-Fla), "was, in most cases, the only information about the 
FBI's findings. As a result, the American public was mistakenly led to 
believe that the Soviet Union has been unsuccessful in its active-
measures operations."
     Did AP admit its mistake? Not publicly; but in a private letter, 
its President confirmed that "While the FBI Report indicated that the 
whole movement wasn't run by the Russians, it said among other things 
that the Soviets have directed the World Peace Council's anti-missile 
campaign in Europe and are trying to recruit and subvert religious 
figures and American peace activists. I don' think our piece was well 
done, and I don't think the facts support the lead."
     So what's the big deal, some will say. It happened once, and he 
apologized, didn't he?
     He did not apologize in public; and the big deal is that ALL the 
members of the media monopoly (CBS, NBC, ABC, NPR; and AP, UP), 
supposedly competent newsmen, failed to ask the obvious questions 
above -- the questions YOU should ask when you listen to the news. Was 
it untypical? Just keep listening and observe. Sharply.
     Don't trust the media; don't trust me; don't trust anybody but 
your own experience gained by direct observation. 
     That's the way science works. It takes a lot of observation; but 
is the truth not worth the price?

                         * * * 

Return to the ground floor of this tower
Return to the Main Courtyard
Return to Fort Freedom's home page