The Security Industry extract from The "Terrorism" Industry

This page is an extract (chapter 6 'The Security Industry') from Ed Herman and Gerry O'Sullivan, The "Terrorism" Industry, 1989, Praeger, pages 117-147. It is reproduced with the permission of Ed Herman.

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From Union Busting to Counterterrorism

In both Great Britain and the United States there have been longstanding and close connections among the security industry, corporate business, and the police and intelligence services. As the demands of corporate business have evolved, the police/intelligence apparatus and the private security business have adjusted to meet them. For a long period in the l1nited States the focus of business demand was on the containment of unions, as well as physical security services (night watchmen, guards, and the like). The Pinkerton organization and "Pinkertonism," which originated in the nineteenth century, symbolized, first and foremost, strikebreaking and union busting in all its forms. The state and federal governments also contributed to union containment at strategic moments in the period 1870-1914.1

The surge in union organization during and immediately after World War I was effectively met by linking unionism with the threat of communism. In this effort, business firms, police forces at the federal, state, and local levels, and private vigilantes worked in a mutually supportive relationship. In the Red scare years of 1918-22, the FBI regularly supplied private vigilante groups with "documents" seized in Red raids, just as J. Edgar Hoover's FBI leaked information to friends during the Cold War era.2

Private detective agencies with surveillance capabilities, closely connected to the police, also grew rapidly during this period. They were regularly staffed with former government officials and agents who had served in parallel activities. Donner notes that after World War I, the agencies "offered career opportunities to military person¬nel who, after every war, seek private employment in intelligence specialties acquired in military conflict."3 Donner also points out that in this Red scare era, "The involvement of career personnel with some claim to professionalism in political surveillance did not reduce the hysterical quality of the radical hunt. The private agencies deliberately took an overheated view of the Menace because it was good for business."4 A similar interest in menace inflation characterized the terrorism industry in the 1980s. An important feature of the antiunion/antisubversion emphases of the V.S. private and public political intelligence system was the compilation of lists of union activists and "security" risks. These lists were put together by individuals, private agencies, corporations, and trade associations, as well as police and official intelligence bodies. They were used for blacklisting and propaganda, the latter through publication in pseudo-official congressional documents and leaks to right-wing authors who would funnel them into scandal sheets, articles, and books. As was noted in chapter 5, the American Security Council (ASC) came into existence as an antilabor intelligence and propaganda agency, acquiring the files of the anti-Semite and labor spymaster Harry Jung. It gradually broadened its activities to serve the military-industrial lobby, and accordingly broadened its antisubversive focus to include an international Red menace, against which it urgently demanded accelerated weapons acquisitions, and terrorism.

With the continued global expansion of the American economy, the intensification of the Cold War, and the conflicts between the West and the Third World, new problems confronted V.S. business and government in the 1960s and thereafter. Foreign sales and investment involved political risks, as American businesses that had invested in Cuba, Iran, Lebanon, and South Africa discovered to their discomfiture. Citizens of these countries sometimes resented the Western and American presence, and held the West responsible for putting into power and supporting the shah of Iran, the Latin American military regimes, and Ferdinand Marcos; for the Israeli assault on Lebanon, and for South Africa's aggressions against its black majority and the front-line states. From the standpoint of Western firms and officials, any such negative reactions from the West's victims were, of course, unreasonable and irrational, and could probably be explained, like union organization and strikes in earlier years, in terms of the sub rosa activities of Moscow and its proxies. These reactions were "terrorism," and Western states, American firms, and the security industry responded accordingly, in "defense" against these forces of subversion and unreason. For the security industry, there was a new demand for "risk analysis," protection of facilities and persons, and service to those wishing to take a more forward role in attacking terrorists.

In Great Britain as well as the United States, the private security industry evolved in accord with corporate and state demands, stressing union containment in the 1960s and 1970s, with a later and growing emphasis on risk analysis, security protection against potential terrorists, and provision of advisors and mercenaries to Western-supported states such as Saudi Arabia and to terrorist forces like the contras. The close connection and revolving door between police and intelligence personnel and the security firms has been similar to that in the United States.5 A report by the British security firm, the Research Foundation for the Study of Terrorism,6 notes that "in Britain, a number of such companies [are] staffed very largely or, in some cases, entirely by former members of the police, special forces ete. . . ."7

Paralleling U.S. practice, British industry funded organizations that produced lists of threatening worker activists and engaged in continuous surveillance and clearance (referred to in Britain as "vetting"). British industry tried hard in the 1970s, as we mentioned earlier, to smear the labor movement by attributing its strike and organizational activity to external (Red) influence. These activities were carried on by institutions that specialized in gathering such lists and engaged in antiunion propaganda,8 and by security firms. We saw also that one of the principal organizations that tried to tie labor unions and strife to "subversion," the Institute for the Study of Conflict (ISC), was not only a CIA-British intelligence creation but also a terrorism institute, already leading the vanguard into the new area of establishment interest. In both Britain and the United States, the evolution from an emphasis on subversion in union activity (and defense plants) to terrorism was simple. Terrorism was the new metaphor for the actions of subversives. Subversives, as defined by the British philosopher of counterinsurgency, Frank Kitson, were any persons who protested and pressured in ways that challenged established institutions and made their leaders uncomfortable. Subversion included "the use of political and economic pressure, strikes, protest marches, and propaganda" designed to force the governing class "to do things which they do not want to do."9 It is this supremely undemocratic world view that causes so many members of the terrorism industry to move easily from plane hijackers and saboteurs of airplanes to animal rights, antiapartheid, and peace groups as part of a continuing spectrum of subversives or terrorists.

As terrorism has a more international dimension than traditional subversion, the security business now involved more external risk assessment, the need for a multinational protection capability, and the ability to provide mercenary forces to advise, train, and kill. The industry grew rapidly to meet this new and enlarged demand.

Political Risk Analysis

One segment of the security industry that grew rapidly in the wake of the new terrorist threat of the 1970s and 1980s was political risk analysis. This proved to be such a growth industry that in 1980 a trade group was formed in the United States called the Association of Political Risk Analysts. The firms in this industry have been run and staffed mainly by former FBI, CIA, DIA, and Secret Service officers whose backgrounds enabled them to claim special knowledge on political risk. According to Ted Kobrin, a former "outplacement officer" for the CIA who sought jobs forretiring agents, "The field of political risk is one to which many former agents would turn because of their experience. There are quite a few ex-CIA people doing that sort of thing."10

Risk consultants compile information on political hot spots worldwide and advise on potential terrorist threats to businesses; they may also provide introductions to friendly dictators and other "influentials" in Third World countries seeking to create a better climate for business. In fact, given the large number of ex-CIA agents currently working in the field and the agency's history of using front groups for covert purposes, "it is reasonable to ask whether agency sponsored activities are now being conducted under the rubric of risk analysis."11

Indeed, several former cabinet members and agency heads with inside connections to such friendly governments as Chile, Argentina, Taiwan, and South Africa have become private risk consultants, among them Henry Kissinger, William Colby, Richard Helms, and, prior to his 1989 elevation to National Security Advisor to President George Bush, Brent Scowcroft. Among the terrorologists who do risk analysis are Yonah Alexander, Ray Cline, Neil Livingstone, and Michael Ledeen. Colby, a former director of the CIA, currently heads International Business Government Counsellers, Inc. (IBGC), which prepares custom-tailored studies, ranging in price from $20,000 to $100,000 each, for a clientele of dozens of major firms, from Abbott Labs to Xerox. It offers analyses of political trends in particular locales and "strategic counseling." In 1983, IBGC prepared a report on the future of the Pinochet regime in Chile for wary business executives.12 Former UN Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick and her husband, Evron, a longtime OSS and State Department specialist in psychological warfare and propaganda, co-own Opera¬tions and Policy Research, Inc. (OPR, Inc.), which advises govern¬ments and businesses on matters relating to counterinsurgency, propaganda, and political behavior.13

Several risk assessment firms regularly update terrorism data bases and make their findings known to private subscribers and government agencies. The best known, Risks International, Inc., based in Alexandria, Virginia, and founded by a retired air force intelligence officer, regularly publishes its chronologies of terrorist incidents in Yonah Alexander's journal, Terrorism, and offers weekly risk assessment reports to subscribers. Risks International was purchased in 1987 by Business Risks International, a security firm that specializes in coping with industrial sabotage and counterterrorism. Business Risks International was founded in 1980 by Don Walker, a former FBI agent, and currently employs many former members of the FBI and DIA.14 Eugene Mastrangelo, the president of Risks International and a counterinsurgency warfare veteran, is also a noted terrorism expert and a regular contributor of articles to journals and papers at conferences.15

Robert Moss [[and Arnaud de Borchgrave are and were, respectively, co-owners of a risk analysis enterprise called Mid-Atlantic Research Associates (MARA), founded by John Rees.16 Rees, Moss, and de Borchgrave]] jointly edit a monthly private intelligence report called Early Warning, a "confidential" publication that offers subscriptions, by invitation only, at $1,000 per year. Subscribers are expected to sign a statement in which they promise to respect the confidentiality of the newsletter and its sources. Early Warning purports to offer informed predictions of political turmoil and watches the worldwide terrorist scene, offering readers analyses written by Rees, Moss, and de Borchgrave themselves.

Early Warning, currently excerpted on a weekly basis in the Moon owned magazine Insight on the News (edited by de Borchgrave), is the extension of an operation once run by Rees called Information Digest. Rees's Digest was little more than a private domestic spy sheet for the right, which gathered and reported data on "subversive" organizations. The "inside" intelligence that appeared in the pages of Information Digest was circulated to the CIA, IRS, and NSA, the House and Senate Internal Security Committees, the Customs Service, and the DIA. Each of these agencies has, at one time or another,used materials appearing in the pages of ID.17 Rees's information has also been used by Reader's Digest, and a number of his pseudonymous articles have appeared in National Review and Human Events. He is also a regular contributor to the John Birch Society's Review of the News, in one issue of which he reproduced a lengthy interview with de Borchgrave and Moss.

Several times, Rees's materials were used to instigate counterterrorism investigations against a number of peace and anti-interventiongroups such as CISPES. According to Frank Varelli, a former contract employee for the FBI charged with the task of infiltrating CISPES, the bureau provided him with materials prepared by Rees and published by the John Birch Society and Western Goals, the foundation run by the late congressman and Birchite Larry McDonald.18 Rees joined Western Goals in 1980 in order to create a private data base on subversives in the United States. In his book The War Called Peace: The Soviet Peace Offensive, Rees argues that the V.S. peace movement is essentially run and financed by MoSCOW.19 In 1982, Rees forwarded information to the FBI that charged that the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) was controlled by the Soviets. The bureau then passed this information along to the State Department, which officially declared WILPF to be a "Soviet front organization." The State Department later withdrew its charge20 In the late 1970s, the emphasis in Rees's Information Digest began to shift away from domestic subversion to international terrorism. With the aid of Robert Moss, it began carrying stories such as "Cuban Subversion in the V.S." (Oct. 7, 1983) and "Libya and Terror in the Americas" (Feb. 9, 1979). Over time, the publication evolved - following the ideological demands of the Reagan administration - into Early Warning, focusing on international terrorism and political risk analysis. Rees's new venture, run with Moss and de Borchgrave, became MARA, a risk analysis firm. MARA's new target audience was corporate, and offered "inside information" to investors, plan¬ners, and executives. Rees himself has appeared at several briefing panels and seminars in his capacity as a terrorism expert.21

Rees's operation, like other risk analysis firms, maintains a data base of worldwide terrorist incidents and regularly publishes its findings and figures in Early W arning.'iMARA's figures.~re always higher than "official" CIA and State Department estiMates. For example, while the State Department had reported sixty-seven terrorist attacks involving V.S.-owned businesses in 1985, and Security World magazine, an industry publication,testimated forty such attacks, MARA topped them with its figure of close to oneitJ.undred attacks.22

Firms like Risks International and MARA serve an important function in the terrorism industry as they supply seemingly "objective" data, in the form of numbers and "independent" reports, for use by terrorologists seeking to corroborate their claims in books, papers, and articles. We noted earlier Samuel T. Francis's heavy reliance on Rees's Information Digest in his book The Soviet Strategy of Terror. Likewise, Cline and Alexander's State-Sponsored Terrorism uses statistics and graphs drawn from both Early Warning and Risks International.

The Security Industry

In 1976, fear of terrorist attacks and kidnappings caused the demand for executive protection to double in one year, according to the Burns International Detective Agency,23 and this sector of the business has continued to expand. The Wackenhut Corporation (TWC), the world's largest privately owned security firm, reported a rapid increase in business after the V.S. embassy in Iran was seized in 1979 (some 280 guards were added to the Alaskan pipeline project immediately following the incident, and hundreds more were sent to cover sensitive installations).24 "These tides of terrorism and so forth have been helpful to our business," George Wackenhut told the Miami Herald.25

In 1980, a group of counterterrorism specialists from TWC infiltrated the Savannah River nuclear weapons plant in South Carolina, staging a mock raid and taking several "hostages. "26 Three years later, TWC was awarded a $41 million contract by the V.S. government to provide security support services at the plant.27 The company was awarded a new five-year contract, at $300 million, in April 1988.28 Wackenhut's active self-promotion, and its entry into the antiterrorism market, has paid handsome dividends, revenues increasing from $127 million to $208 million between 1977 and1981.29

The Rand Corporation has estimated that U.S. businesses were spending $21 billion annually on security in 1986, and that a large percentage of that amount was being deployed in safeguards against terrorism.30 According to Terrell Arnold, former deputy director of the State Department's Office of Counterterrorism, counterterrorism will generate some $50 billion in revenues by the turn of the century, while at present the equipment market has reached annual sales of $5 billion or more per year.31 Arnold himself is part of this ever-expanding market and has served as a private consultant to several security firms. Each year, institutes and lobby groups sponsor conferences and seminars dedicated to the delineation and eradication of the terrorist threat. Many of these also serve as veritable bazaars for the advertising and sale of counterterrorism products ranging from police batons to camera-equipped helicopters.32 In January 1987, for example, Discover, Time, Inc.'s science magazine, sponsored a three-day conference on the topic "Terrorism in a Technological World" in Washington, D.C. Billed as "the first comprehensive symposium on international terrorism and the technological tools required to combat it," the event featured such notables as George Bush, Israeli Deputy Prime Minister Shimon Peres, and Senator David Boren of Oklahoma, and a televised appearance by Morocco's King Hassan. In addition to providing platforms for several dozen government luminaries, policymakers, and experts, the gathering also served as a trade showcase for "state-of-the-art counterterrorism systems and products" manufactured by, among others, Motorola, General Electric, Delta Scientific Corporation, Data Link Information Solutions, Philips Electronic Instruments, and Target International Corporation. The conference also carried a rather substantial entry fee of $1,000, or $350 per day.

Risk analysts and private security specialists regularly share podiums at symposia with academic, think tank, and journalist experts as there is a certain commutability of functions and coincidence of interests-both political and monetary-which guide them in their respective tasks. Several of the terrorologists dealt with in the next chapter also serve as private risk and security consultants to multi-national corporations, or work closely with individuals within the security industry.

While multinational corporations may be genuinely concerned about protection of facilities and personnel, terrorism also makes work for a growing number of security and risk consultants, advisors on counterterrorism tactics, executive protection specialists, behavioral and social scientists, surveillance and interrogation experts, and even architects schooled in the art of antiterrorism design.

In February 1985, George Shultz announced the creation of th;'; Overseas Security Advisory Council (OSAC), composed of eighteen} corporate representatives and four members chosen from the gov- I ernment. In the words of J oseph R. Rosetti, director of security for+'-¬IBM and vice-chairman of OSAC, the group "is the first attempt to I mesh the resources of the private sector with the resources of the ,US government to combat terrorist acts against US businesses abroad."33 Rosetti, addressing the thirty-second Annual Seminar and "EXIllbTts of the American Society for Industrial Security (ASIS) in September 1986, pointed out that OSAC would coordinate improved liaisons between the Department of State and the private sector, provide for the regular exchange of information, and recommend plans for operational security coordination.

In addition to the creation of OSAC, the U.S. government asked Congress in December 1985 to authorize a $4.2 billion budget to fund a ten-year project of counterterrorism training, construction, and security upgrading at over three hundred government facilities worldwide. According to the State Department, 75 percent of all , contracts generated by the plan were earmarked for U .S. security I corporations. And twice each year, the General Services Administration's Interagency Committee on Security Equipment invites representatives from the private security industry to conferences in order to let them know what they will be buying.34 Such innovations have been welcomed by the membership of ASIS, the security industry's trade, professional, and lobbying organization. Since 1982, ASIS has sponsored annual government - industry conferences on terrorism to encourage just such interaction between the state and private sectors, featuring keynote speakers like Edwin Meese, George Shultz, and Nestor Sanchez, former deputy assistant secretary of state for inter-American affairs. Despite its nonpartisan claims, speakers at ASIS functions and contributors to its monthly magazine, Security Management, have consistently argued the Reagan administration's line on terrorism. Sanchez, speaking on "the Cuban threat," traced much of the West's problems with political violence to plots hatched in Havana,35 while Meese repeated several standard administration canards, among them the charge that the Sandinistas support "narcoterrorism.:”36 Two additional articles in the ASIS periodical have made similar claims.37

Overlap between the risk analysis and security businesses is common, and many of the larger private security firms provide both risk analysis and the training, personnel, and paraphernalia necessary to counter the terrorist threat described in detail in their own reports. Like risk assessment businesses, private security firms provide a haven for retiring government agents and sometimes conduct "off the shelf" operations for the CIA, MI6, and the like. A 1985 study prepared for the Department of Justice found that some 80 percent of the managers of proprietary security firms had a background in law enforcement or military service, and a sizable proportion of the hired personnel of security firms have similar backgrounds.38

While there are literally thousands of security firms in the United States,39 rapid growth has attracted diversifying multinationals like Borg Warner and American Brands, and the industry has undergone a consolidation process. In the mid-1980s the three largest firms were Pinkerton's, owned by American Brands;40 Burns, owned by Borg Warner; and Wackenhut (TWC), the largest independent.

Wackenhut offers an interesting case study in the evolution ofcounterterrorism as a private - and salable - product. Founded in 1954 by George Wackenhut, a former FBI agent, and four colleagues from the bureau, Wackenhut became the leader in private counter-subversion by the mid-1960s. According to a 1965 prospectus issued by the company, it had by then compiled a file with the names of some 2.5 million suspected dissidents. After acquiring the holdings of Karl Barslaag, a one-time HUAC staffer, Wackenhut could boast of the largest, privately held files on suspected subversives in the nation.41 In January 1967, the governor of Florida, Claude R. Kirk:? hired TWC to establish a "private police force" designed to "investigate everyone and anyone who needs investigating."42 The right-wing governor sought to give Wackenhut the freedom to investigate I everyone in its own files, granting the corporation everything short of the power of arrest. George Wackenhut packed the company's board with ideological soul mates, many of them members of the John Birch Society and ASC. Each month during the 1960s, the Wackenhut Security Review, the corporation's house organ, attacked the alleged excesses of the antiwar movement and student radicalism, earning it accolades from a number of ultraright organizations.43 The October 1967 edition of the Security Review reported on a meeting of the Organization of Latin American Solidarity (OLAS) under the heading "COMMUNISM AND YOU!" The Review warned its readers that Castro was eXploiting racial turmoil in the United States for his own revolutionary ends, hoping to unify "American Negroes" against imperialism. Time and again throughout the sixties, TWC attempted to link both the civil rights and free-speech movements with international communism.44 More recently, the composition ofWackenhut's board of directors has continued to reflect its founder's agenda, and it also displays the firm's strong ties to the V.S. government. In 1986, Frank Carlucci, soon to be V.S. secretary of defense, was a member of the board of directors, along with William Raborn, a former head of the CIA, Clarence Kelley, former director of the FBI, Bernard Schriever, a retired air force general, long associated with ASC, and other former members of the CIA, FBI, and DIA. Prior to becoming head of the CIA, William Casey counted Wackenhut among his corporate clients at the law firm Rogers and Wells. Such ties to the government led a number of Canadian MPs to label the company a CIA-front orga¬nization when it attempted to engage in ajoint venture in the western part of that country in 1982.45

The bulk of Wackenhut's business is in the provision of basic security services. This is low-margin business, however, and TWC and its rivals have been. searching for better opportunities. One pursued by TWC has been strikebreaking - the provision of advice, scabs, and protection - a new line that fitted the Reagan-era demands and the Wackenhut tradition well. Another has been counterterrorism. Wackenhut provides advisory and protective services to hundreds of wealthy individuals worldwide, and in September 1986 it established an antiterrorism division to be run by former CIA, FBI, and State Department agents. According to Conrad V. Hassel, the director of the new division, Wackenhut expected to seek contracts from among TWC's 16,000 U.S. clients, as well as from "unnamed foreign" governments.46 Working with Hassel are Christian Frederick, a thirty-year CIA veteran, and Christopher Ferrante, a one-time special agent with the State Department, specializing in Latin America.

Wackenhut is deeply involved in security operations in Latin America, with subsidiaries in Ecuador, Costa Rica, Honduras, El Salvador, Peru, Paraguay, Chile, and Guatemala. Most of its activities in these countries are not on the public record, but it is known that Wackenhut provides security to many U.S. and other embassies and to numerous private individuals and organizations who feel threat¬ened by violence. It is also claimed by some members of the industry and by journalists that Wackenhut trains and cooperates with both official and paramilitary forces in Central and South America.47 According to jefferson Morley, several employees of Wackenhut recently worked on an elaborate scheme to help death squad members kidnap the D.S. ambassador to El Salvador, Edwin Corr.48 The rightists evidently hoped to place the blame for the event on the FMLN. TWC also maintains close ties with the governments of Saudi Arabia and Argentina, and provided personal security for the shah of Iran when he fled to the Bahamas.49

Wackenhut obtained special permission to operate in Belgium in 1977-78, and quickly got involved with right-wing terrorists who I were themselves linked to state security agents, leading to the eventual departure of TWC from that country. TWC hired a number of right-wing thugs, including Marcel Barbier, an anti-Semite and member of the fascist Westland New Post (WNP). Barbier was involved in a spree of killings in the early 1980s and was convicted in 1987 for a double homicide committed in 1981. Barbier had been the guard of a j ewish synagogue on the Rue de la Regence in Brussels on behalf of Wackenhut when it was bombed in 1982. In August 1983, a search of Barbier's home disclosed that he had maps showing the plan of the synagogue, with details of points of access. Wackenhut's local director in Brussels, jean-Francis Calmette, was himself a rightist and arms enthusiast, who not only hired but gave instructions on methods of combat to members of WNP. In the earI'yJ eighties, it was reported in the press that Wackenhut guards were regularly luring immigrant children into basements and beating them. TWC left Belgium shortly after these dIsclosures.50 The British security industry has also grown rapidly, has close ties with British industry and the police/intelligence apparatus, and serves the British state, clients, and allies with protective and more aggres¬sive mercenary/counterinsurgency service. One such organization is the London-based Research Foundation for the Study of Terrorism (RFST). RFST is part of a cluster of groups closely associated with the right wing of the British Tories, among them the Center for Research into Communi~t Economics, Policy Search, the Ross McWhirter Foundation, the Freedom Association (formerly the National Association for Freedom, or NAFF), and Aims of Industry.51 Ross McWhirter, a key organizer of the network and an associate of Robert Moss in the Freedom Association, is on the advisory board of RFST, along with a number of right-wing academics, ranking members of the armed services, industrialists, and police and intelligence officials. The work of RFST is supported in part by the Foundation for Business Responsibilities.

Registered with the British government as an "independent non-party educational trust," RFST depends heavily on business for funding. In a fund-raising document entitled "Business and theScourge of Terrorism," RFST stresses that governments "do not have the resources to assist private industry and business to prevent, deter and counter terrorist attacks against their personnel, facilities and operations." RFST is ready to step into that breach by providing "independent" research and educational work through its distinguished body of advisory experts from "industry, the armed services, the law and the police." Generous support will help meet the "real challenge," which is "to outthink and outwit the terrorist."

In outlining the nature of the terrorist threat, the authors of this RFST document refer only to terrorism as defined in the Western model. This is entirely understandable given the business market to which the brochure is addressed and the strongly right-wing business¬government character of the advisory board. Its chairman is the noted academic expert on terrorism Paul Wilkinson, a terrorologist who never deviates from the Western party line, as we will describe in more detail in chapter 7.

Control Risks Ltd., another British-based security firm, has rather extensive operations in the United States. The company evolved out of the corporate vestiges of the A 1 Insurance Agency, and was originally intended by its founder, Julian Radcliffe, to provide kidnap and ransom insurance. Radcliffe was eventually joined by several associates with ties to British intelligence, police, the Special Air Service (SAS) Regiment, and the far right.52 Also going to work for Radcliffe were a handful of former researchers at Brian Crozier's CIA-sponsored Institute for the Study of Conflict, including Peter Janke, their resident specialist on South Africa. In London, with offices just across the street from New Scotland Yard, Control Risks' directors include General Sir Frank King, former commander of the British army in Northern Ireland, and Sir Robert Mark, the former metropolitan police commissioner. Its managing director, Arish Turle, is a former SAS major. Among the directors of their U .S. office are Peter Goss, former head of British military intelligence in Northern Ireland, and Karl D. Ackerman, a former director of security at the State Department. In 1984, Ackerman was busy peddling "daily intelligence reports on potential terrorists prowling L.A. streets" to Los Angeles-based multinationals during the summer Olympics, at $1,800 per package.53

Control Risks gradually diversified its activities, becoming both a risk analysis and security consultancy firm. It hired Major General Richard Clutterbuck (also formerly with ISC) to be its counterter¬rorism specialist. Clutterbuck, a media staple in Great Britain and the author of several books on terrorism, including Living With Terrorism (1975) and The Media and Political Violence (1981), is a staunch proponent of the counterinsurgency doctrines developed by Frank Kitson. He argues in the latter study that "violence in industrial disputes, violence in political demonstrations, and terrorism" are all of a type. Following Kitson and the pattern established in his 1973 book, Protest and the Urban Guerilla, Clutterbuck effectively conflates political dissent with political violence, and political violence with terrorism. That is, like many rightists, Clutterbuck seeks to criminalize dissent by labeling it terrorism.

In 1986, Clutterbuck put his expertise to use as an associate of Control Risks Ltd. by spying on British animal rights groups for the chemical industry. Several leading chemical and food manufac¬turers had commissioned the Control Risks study in 1984 in response to heavy antivivisectionist lobbying. According to Kevin Toolis of the London Observer, Clutterbuck interviewed several leaders of the animal rights movement, claiming that he was writing a book. He neglected to mention that his "book" was, in actuality, a report underwritten by the chemical industry and that he was a director of Control Risks.54

One week earlier, the Observer had reported on another study undertaken by Control Risks, this one dealing with the anti-apartheid movement. A number of British companies doing business in South Africajoined a "syndicate" at £1,500 per place, in order to be briefed on potential violence from the anti-apartheid movement. According to a letter sent to prospective clients, Control Risks claimed that they would report in detail "the activities of anti-apartheid groups in Europe, their relationship with terrorist groups and their intentions," and assess the possibilities that "other militant or terrorist organizations will exploit the South African issue by penetrating the anti¬apartheid movement."55

The syndicate of companies doing business in South Africa was organized by Control Risks Information Services, a division of Control Risks Group. The chief researcher at Control Risks Information Services is Peter Janke, who, as we saw earlier, was a warm friend and servant of the South African government while working at Crozier's (and the CIA's) ISC in the 1970s.

A former Control Risks "security consultant," David Walker, now works for KMS Ltd., an organization staffed almost entirely by former SAS members and wryly referred to in England as "24 SAS," or the 24th regiment. The acronym itself stands for "Keeni-Meeni Services," a name derived from a piece of South Arabian slang meaning clandestine or "under-the-counter." KMS even draws upon the SAS motto, Who Dares Wins, for its own professional slogan¬Who Pays Wins.56 This is a fitting motto for one of the world's largest "private" recruiting networks for mercenaries. KMS achieved some notoriety when it was learned that Oliver North had used Walker as part of his private aid and resupply network for the contras. Walker was hired by Richard Secord to fly missions inside Nicaragua and to plan the sabotage of Soviet-made helicopters being shipped to Managua. John Nields, the chief counsel for the House Iran-contra committee, described Walker as "a professional sabo¬teur."57 For his services, the enterprise paid Walker $110,000.58 Overall, KMS may have recruited as many as fifty mercenaries to aid the contras.59

KMS has provided mercenary services elsewhere-to Ian Smith's apartheid government in Rhodesia; to train Sri Lankan soldiers in counterinsurgency techniques; and to assassination operations in Lebanon. Its activities, and those of similar organizations,60 are carried out with the close cooperation of the British Foreign Office and intelligence service. A London paper quotes a British military source as saying that "all the work Walker gets from the Saudis comes through the British Foreign Office. He is in constant touch with MI-6 [British intelligence] on foreign jobs."61 Walker also extended his services to the United States, with Walker men guarding the Saudi ambassador and facilities in Washington, D.e., and receiving diplomatic immunity and carrying State Department identification cards. The services rendered to Oliver North and the contra terrorists fit into a consistent pattern of official Western support, directly and through firms like KMS for "counterterror."

Like its U.S. and British security firm counterparts, Israel's International Security and Defense Systems (ISDS) is a wide-ranging, operation with full "counterterrorism" capabilities. ISDS, based in Tel Aviv, is co-owned by Leo Gleser, a former colonel in the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) who participated in the 1976 raid on Entebbe. ISDS has been very active in Central America, protecting business and government leaders as well as providing "counterterrorism" training to military, an~, paramilltary per~nnel in Honduras and Guatemala.

In an April 30, 1985 letter of presentation to the Guatemalan military, Sammy Sapyr, then director of ISDS's Guatemalan branch, described the company's services in great detail. These included antiterrorism training and the formation of antiterrorism "squads," electronic surveillance, intelligence gathering, and the sale of arms, including helicopters and airplanes. Jon Lee Anderson points out that the document also offers a course in "selective terror" under the general rubric "the training of military personnel."62 It should be noted, however, that in light of the role and performance of the Guatemalan army, all of ISDS's services under the name of "coun¬terterrorism" facilitate serious state terrorism.

According to Gerard Latchinian, a multimillionaire currentlserving a thirty-year prison term in Indiana for his role in the 1984 attempted overthrow of Honduras's civilian government, ISDS em¬ployees were active in training the Honduran death squads, as well as members of the Nicaraguan contras, in techniques of terror. In fact, ISDS's Gleser hired two ex-IDF members, Yehuda Leitner and Emile Sa'ada, to help train members of Gustavo Alvarez Martinez's notorious Battalion 3-16, the general's private death squad. Jose Valle Lapez, a former member of the battalion, has admitted to participating in a rash of kidnappings, torture sessions, and brutal murders, some of which took place in the presence of "Mr. Mike" from the V.S. embassy, who oversaw several torture operations.63

When Alvarez Martinez was eventually ousted from Honduras, his successor, General Walter Lapez Reyes, immediately severed all ties with ISDS. L6pez Reyes told John Lee Anderson that ISDS trained Alvarez Martinez's "special secunty groups" in hostage-taking and hijacking techniques, and that this was, in part, a front for training the contras, who also took the course. "There was coordi¬nation between them and the CIA," L6pez Reyes told Anderson. "So, I didn't renew their contract. . . . The Israelis had something to do with Alvarez's death squads. One way or another."64 Despite the severed contract, however, it appears that the "official" death squad organized by Alvarez Martinez lives on.65

In 1986, Yehuda Leitner, who had worked with Gleser and ISDS, fled Honduras after his connections with the contras were exposed by Anne- Marie O'Connor in a Reuters dispatch. His colleague in the affair, Emile Sa'ada, also admits to having contracted with the Honduran government "to teach the Hondurans counterterrorism," but now claims to be nothing more than a melon farmer. The company for which he works, Shemesh, currently employs some five thousand Honduran peasants as pickers and growers. But Shemesh also nominally owns ISDS, although as one U .S. military advisor told Anderson, "Israelis always go through front companies," and in Central America, "Shemesh has always been their front." And according to Carl Fehlandt, a former arms salesman in ISDS in Guatemala between 1982 and 1986, Shemesh/ISDS "is the official Israeli arms outlet. The Israeli government owns ISDS and the man who calls the shots is the Minister of Defense."66 Another Israeli security firm, Tamuz Control Systems, has long been active in the Philippines. Based in Tel Aviv and founded by a group of Israeli generals still active in the reserves, Tamuz provided security to Marcos and trained his police and security forces in; antiterrorism tactics. Like ISDS, Tamuz seems to enjoy a "special” relationship with the Israeli government. In 1984, two Tamuz operatives who had previously worked in the police anti terrorism unit were caught photocopying classified police training manuals for use by their new employer. The affair was never brought before the court, however, because, as H. Handwerker and Y. Levy reported in Ha'aretz, the company is headed by former generals and the transfer of material to Third W orId countries is coordinated with senior defense officials.67

Counterterrorism Training Camps A number of counterterrorism training schools have also sprung up over the last decade offering I hands-on seminars on detection, weaponry, and assassination. These schools operate as part of a network built largely around the activities of Soldier of Fortune magazine and the private contra aid enterprise established by both Oliver North and John Singlaub. Such schools serve a dual function. While ostensibly training individuals in coun¬terterrorism techniques for self-defense, the camps also offer classes in counterinsurgency and assassination. These academies have at¬tracted members of right-wing, racist, paramilitary organizations such as the Ku Klux Klan and Posse Comitatus, as well as executives interested in fending off terrorists.

Many of the civilian mercenaries and trainers connected with these camps received counterterrorism and Ranger instruction at U.S. Army Special Forces bases at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, Fort Benning, Georgia, and Fort Lewis, Washington.68 According to Jeff Gerth, "Some of the units were created to fight terrorism but have acquired broadened mandates and training for missions against insurgencies in developing countries in Central America, Africa, and Asia. "69

In July 1983, Tom Posey, a former marine corporal, Birchite, and member of the Alabama National Guard, along with four other National Guardsmen, organized Civilian-Military Assistance (CMA),70 as an instrument for sending mercenaries and military supplies to El Salvador. With extensive official support (both military and diplomatic), CMA sent numerous shipments of weapons to El Salvador.71 According to Posey, General Gustavo Alvarez Martinez of Honduras approached his group in 1983 with a request for training and advice.72 The V.S. embassy arranged the initial meetings between CMA and the Honduran.73 CMA soon turned to helping the contras, and not only provided material aid but also sent mercenaries to Honduras and Nicaragua to fight. Posey bragged to the Huntsville Times that he had fired three hundred rounds at the Nicaraguans and hinted at engagement in hand-to-hand combat. On September 1, 1984, two of Posey's men were killed when a helicopter they were flying over Nicaragua was shot down. There followed denials of the mercenaries' involvement, "claims of mercy missions," and so on. This entire operation was done with extensive official connivance,74 in violation of the Neutrality Act as well as the Boland amendment.

One of the largest and oldest of the training centers is SIONICS, Inc. (Studies in Operational Negations of Insurgency and Counter-Subversion), formerly Cobray International Training Center, with headquarters in Powder Springs, Georgia. Founded in 1979 by the late Lieutenant General Mitchell Livingston WerBell Ill, SIONICS is a frequent advertiser in such mercenary magazines as Soldier of Fortune, Eagle, and Gung-Ho. WerBell was an OSS officer in China during World War II and worked closely with both Ray Cline and John Singlaub (Singlaub was a frequent visitor and occasional instructor at the SIONICS camp). WerBell's training course at SIONICS involved classes in personal combat (martial arts, knife fighting, and marksmanship) and "field and urban survival studies." The ten-day "primary course" was designed to teach a trainee how to avoid sabotage, kidnapping, and spying, and how to spot potential terrorists. Writing in Eagle magazine (June 1982), Sidney Filson described the course as "expensive and worth the price." Students at SIONICS have included members of racist, paramilitary organi¬zations as well as groups like Lyndon LaRouche's (now defunct) D.S. Labor party. In fact, in 1978 WerBell was employed by LaRouche's National Caucus of Labor Committees as "personal security advisor" to LaRouche himself.75

WerBell was active in international far-right politics up until his death in December 1983. For example, he was involved in a 1982 coup attempt in Guatemala led by Mario Sandoval Alarcon's National Liberation Movement (MLN). According to Jon Lee and Scott Anderson, during preparations for the coup, WerBell remained in isolation in his suite at the Hotel Cortijo Reforma in Guatemala City, where a "retinue of Guatemalan colonels, businessmen, and a mem¬ber of the D.S. military advisory group to Guatemala attached to the American Embassy regularly visited him, usually at night."76

In addition to SIONICS, WerBell owned seven other companies, among them the Military Armament Corporation (which sold the Ingram M-10 and M-11, rapid-firing handguns to which WerBell added his own invented silencer) and Parabellum Corporation. Parabellum was licensed to sell weapons in Latin America and was the firm planned for use by Watergate conspirator Frank Sturgis to obtain weapons for Cuban exiles planning to disrupt the 1972 Democratic convention in Miami.77

In spite of the fact that WerBell's Ingram M-I0 and M-ll guns could be acquired legally only by special permission of U .S. officials, large numbers of them were in use among European fascist terrorists in 1976 and 1977.78 The Spanish intelligence agency, DGS, purchased many such weapons under license from U .S. authorities in the 1970s. It was later learned that DGS was coordinating the activities of right¬wing terrorists.79

Several other such camps have been established across the country, designed to train executives and security personnel in special "urban combat" techniques. Tuition rates are high; Executive Security International (ESI) of Colorado commands over $5,500 for its basic course in executive survival, and it counts among its faculty membe s Harvey McGeorge, a former Secret Service agent who has worked with terrorism expert Neil Livingstone. The Liddy Academy, the training division of G. Gordon Liddy and Associates, Inc., offers a seventeen-day program for close to $3,000.80.

Not all of the antiterrorism training camps operate on a for-profit basis, however. The previously mentioned CMA has operated training camps for mercenaries for several years on a non profit basis. Humberto Alvarado, a former member of Alpha 66, operated a nonprofit camp in Bordentown, New Jersey, until local officials shut the operation down.8I Camp Oliver North (and its sister operation, Camp Jeane Kirkpatrick) served to train predominantly Cuban-Amencan and Puerto RICan antIcommunlst forces for later "operations in Latin America, including planned invasions of Cuba and Nicaragua. "82

One self-styled "terrorism expert" succeeded in duping several police departments into hosting training seminars and conferences where participants were told that members of the peace and anti-nuclear movements were, in actuality, highly trained terrorists.83 James Davis, owner of a California-based private police-training company known as DanCor, Ltd., had been on the payroll of the San Diego state sheriff department's Red Squad in the 1970s, serving as an informant while a student at San Diego State University. He later worked as an instructor at the California Specialized Training Institute (CSTI), an agency founded by then Governor Ronald Reagan and his assistant, Edwin Meese. Upon his election to the presidency, Reagan appointed Louis Giuffrida, the head of CSTI, to direct the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Shortly after Giuffrida's move to Washington, Davis founded DanCor and began peddling his antiterrorism road show to police agencies across the country.

A 1985 Davis workshop held in Boise, Idaho, for about seventy-five police officers from the Pacific Northwest featured a lecture by an unidentified representative of ASC and a screening of The KGB Connection, a film produced and distributed by the right-wing Com¬mittee for the Free World. Davis's terrorism conference brochures listed sessions with titles like "Civil Disorder, Peace and Anti-Nuclear Power Groups" and "Central American Groups."

But Davis's hard right line often provoked strong reactions from local officials. In Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, one of Davis's training sessions for local police was canceled when an aide to the mayor realized that it was "essentially a program designed to provide police with an array of infiltration skills." Judith Panora, of the Massachu¬setts Criminal Justice Training Commission, reviewed the course materials offered by Davis and concluded, "I thought it was too right-wing. I felt it created in the mind of the police officers an inappropriate sense of paranoia.”84

Concluding Note

The security industry serves business and government; it therefore approaches "terrorism" from the standpoint of its employers and principals. Some segments, especially those providing security ser¬vices and recruiting and training mercenaries, are often arms of the government that carry out covert actions for which the government does not want to admit responsibility. Leaders of the security business organize and participate regularly in conferences, hearings, and seminars on terrorism, and are experts consulted by the media to explain and show how to cope with the terrorist threat. Because of their structural position and role, members of the security industry look at terrorism strictly within the frame of the Western model. And they have a material interest in inflating the threat of terrorism in order to elevate their own importance as supplier of counterter¬rorism services. Since the West engages in and supports a primary terrorism under the guise of responding to the violence of others, the security industry naturally gravitates to the support of and participation in real terrorism, as exemplified by advising the Gua¬temalan and Honduran military on apprehending and interrogating so-called terrorists and aiding the Nicaraguan contras. In the West this is all known as counterterrorism.

Notes

2. Frank Donner illustrates this point by noting that "the documents seized in a 1922 raid of a Communist party convention, at Bridgman, Michigan, were exclusively made available by Bureau Chief Burns to R. M. Whitney of the American Defense Society, and together with other material from confidential Department of Justice files formed the basis for his pioneering compilation, The Reds in America." See Donner, Age of Surveillance, p. 414. On Hoover's use of leaks to blackmail, among many other purposes, see Taylor Branch, Parting the Waters: America in the King Years 1954-63 (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1988), chap. 15; Nelson Blackstock, Cointelpro (New York: Vintage, 1976), passim. 3. Donner, Age of Surveillance, p. 416. 4. Ibid. 5. Tony Bunyan, The History and Practice of the Political Police in Britain (London: Quartet Books, 1977), pp. 238-45. 6. This organization is headed by Professor Paul Wilkinson, a noted terrorism expert, consultant to CBS- TV and the British ITN network. 7. "A Review of Terrorist and Counter-Activity," June 1987, p. 9. 8. The important industry-funded organizations that carried out these activities in Britain were Economic League, Industrial Research and Information Services, Common Cause, and Aims of Industry. Bunyan, Political Police, pp. 248-52. 9. Frank Kitson, Low-Intensity Operations (London: Faber & Faber, 1972), p. 3. 10. Peter Stone, "High Times in the 'Political Risk' Business," Nation, Dec. 25, 1982. 11. Ibid. 12. Peter Stone, "Boom Days for Political Risk Consultants," New York Times, Aug. 7, 1983, p. E-1. 13. Simpson, Blowback, p. 109. 14. Ron Martz, "Investigative Firm Finds Answers to Security Problems," Atlanta Constitution, Dec. 7, 1987, p. E-6. 15. Mastrangelo has served in two countries in Southeast Asia and in Central America, assisting local security forces in "antiterrorist plans and programs," according to his own biography. His writings on terrorism fall squarely into the right-wing tradition of de Borchgrave, Sterling, and Wilkinson. For example, in discussing southern Africa, ANC and SWAPO are terrorists, South Africa is combating terrorism, and RENAMO is not mentioned. See his "International Terrorism: A Regional and Global Overview, 1970-86," in Yonah Alexander, ed., The 1986 Annual on Terrorism (Dordrecht, Holland: Martinus Nijhoff, 1987). 16. See Ross Gelbspan, "Groups Give FBI Data on Foes of U.S. Latin Policies," Boston Globe, March 15, 1988, pp. 1, 15; for further details on Rees and his background, see Berlet, Hunt for Red Menace, p. 13. 17. Donner, Age of Surveillance, p. 446. 18. Gelbspan, "Groups Give FBI Data. . ." 19. This is demonstrated by classic right-wing principles of guilt by association, along with hidden assumptions; see Berlet's statement, note 24, chapter 5. 20. Gelbspan, "Groups Give FBI Data. . ." Time and again the FBI has relied on information provided by Rees, in spite of a 1986 Bureau memo that referred to Rees as an "unethical" and "unscrupulous" individual (see Berlet report, Hunt for Red Menace). In addition to his FBI contacts, Rees may also have a connection to the CIA. In a letter written to Information Digest recipients, dated April 29, 1983, Rees requested that those receiving complimentary copies should send $25 to help covet "mounting postage costs." He asked that checks and money orders be made out to CIRA-the Central Intelligence Retirees' Association. 21. On February 25, 1987, Rees appeared on a panel sponsored by the American Defense Institute, along with Shire en Hunter of CS IS and Josh Muravchik, on "U.S.! Iran/The Contras: Foreign Policy Implications." In the press release announcing this briefing, the head of the institute, Captain Eugene "Red" McDaniel, USN, ret., referred to Rees's Early Warning magazine as "authoritative." 22. Rod Willis, "Corporations vs. Terrorists," Management Review, Nov. 1986, p. 18. 23. "Multinational Corps. Running to Security Firms," Liberation News Service,Sept. 11, 1976, p. 6. 24. Martin Merzer, "George Wackenhut," Miami Herald, Feb. 10, 1980, p. IF. 25. Ibid. 26. Milton R. Benjamin, " 'Terrorists' Easily Seize U.S. Reactor," Washington Post, Se pt. 17, 1982. 27. "Wackenhut Gets Contract for DOE Plutonium Plant," Miami Herald, Aug. 13, 1983. 28. "Wackenhut Unit Gets Contract," Wall Street journal, April 12, 1988. 29. John Boland, "Security Dealer: Wackenhut Cashes In on Demand for Protection Services," Barron's, April 19, 1982, p. 15. 30. Rod Willis, "Corporations Vs. Terrorists," Management Review, Nov. 1986, p. 18. 31. Neil Livingstone and Terrell Arnold, Beyond Iran-Contra (Boston: Heath 1988), p. 193. 32. Beau Grosscup, The Explosion of Terrorism (Far Hills, N.].: New Horizon Press, 1987), pp. 65-66. The Cleveland police department uses such helicopters, equipped with high-intensity searchlights, to conduct night "patrols" of black neighborhoods. 33. Joseph R. Rosetti, "Joining Forces in the Fight Against Terrorism," Security Management, Dec. 1986, pp. 41-43. 34. Joanne Omang, "Businesses That Offer Defense Against Terrorism Are Booming," Washington Post, Jan. 3, 1986, p. A22. 35. Nestor Sanchez, "The Cuban Threat," Security Management, Jan. 1983, pp.55-59. 36. Edwin Meese, "US Policy on Combatting Terrorism," Security Management June 1986, pp. 51-60. 37. John Warner, "Terrorism and Drug ~rafficking: A L~,thal Partnership," Security Management, June 1984, pp. 44-46; Alvm H. Buckelew, The Secret World of Narcoterrorism," Security Management, Sept. 1987, pp. 67-74. 38. William Cunningham and Todd Taylor, Private Security and Police in America [Hallcrest Report] (Portland, Ore.: Chancellor Press, 1985), p. 101. 39. Cunningham and Taylor estimate 5,173 guard/detection agency firms, with 245,171 employees in 1977. Ibid., p. 110. 40. In December 1987, American Brands sold Pinkerton's to CPP Security Service, a privately owned security firm and prior to this transaction the fourth largest company in the security business with sales of $250 million. "Pinkerton's New Parent Hopes to Get a Better Lock on Profits,"Los Angeles Times, Dec. 22, 1987. 41. Donner, Age of Surveillance, p. 425. Wackenhut donated its subversive files in the 1970s to the far-right Church League of America, although it continued to use them according to need. See Personal Privacy in an Information Society, Report of the Private Protection Study Commission, July 1977, pp. 333-34. 42. Martin Waldron, "Florida's Governor Sets Up Private Police Force," New York Times, January 8, 1967. 43. Its Security Review got awards from the Freedoms Foundation and the All-American Conference to Combat Communism in the early 1960s. 44. Waldron, "Florida's Governor Sets Up Private Police Force." 45. Robert Bork, Jr., "Big George Wackenhut," Forbes, Nov. 21, 1983, pp. 203-6. 46. "Wackenhut Creates an Anti-Terrorist Division," Los Angeles Times, Sept. 10 1986. 47. This is consistent with the official U .S. policy of helping advise and train private security forces of friendly countries. See above, p. 71. 48. Jefferson Morley, "The Vanishing Kidnap Plot," Nation, July 30-Aug. 6, 1988. 49. Merzer, "George Wackenhut." 50. See Jan Capelle, "Westland New Post: Ombres et Lumieres," Belgique, Article 31, July 30, 1987. 51. RFST has offices in Aims of Industry's building. 52. Jonathan Bloch and Patrick Fitzgerald, British Intelligence and Covert Action (Dingle, County Kerry: Brandon, 1983), pp. 208-9. 53. Sam Passow, "Protecting Corporate America Against Terrorism," New York Times, May 6, 1984, sec. 3, pp. 14-15. 54. Kevin Toolis, "Security Expert Drug Firm 'Agent' Says Animal Lib," Observer, Dec. 14, 1986, p. 41. 55. Kevin Toolis, "Secret Study of Anti-Apartheid Violence Risks," Observer, Dec. 7, 1986. 56. Stuart Christie, "The Golden Road to Samarkand," Anarchist Review, no. 6 (Summer 1982). 57. Joseph Volz and Nick Davies, "'Saboteur' Does Our Dirty Work," Daily News [London], Jan. 3, 1988, p. 3. 58. Ibid. 59. See also David Rogers, "UK Security Firm with Thatcher Ties Had Role in Contra Aid, Data Indicate," Wall Street Journal, March 25, 1987, p. 12. 60. Jonathan Bloch points out that the British government farmed out the training of intelligence agents from Oman and Nigeria to a company called Diversified Corporate Services in the 1970s; that in 1982 a company called Falconstar, run by former SAS/Guards officers was hired to train special riot police in Uganda; that a company called Argen Information Services, run by a former Rhodesian Special Branch officer, was hired in the early 1980s to train a Basque security force. "Training Other People's Police Forces," a paper given in June 1985, reprinted in Lobster, no. 9 (Sept. 1985). 61. Volz and Davies, " 'Saboteur' Does Our Dirty Work." 62. Jon Lee Anderson "Loose Cannons: On the Trail of Israel's Gunrunners in Central America," New Outlook, Feb. 1989, p. 29. 63. Alison Acker, Honduras: The Making of a Banana Republic (Boston: South End Press, 1988), pp. 115-17. 64. Anderson, "Loose Cannons," p. 26. 65. While President Azcona and the Honduran military insist that Battalion 3-16 was dissolved under Directive 2192, issued on September 11, 1987, former Sergeant Fausto Reyes-Caballero of the Honduran security forces told Julia Preston of the Washington Post in October 1988 that the battalion, with the aid of ISDS, was still active. Corroboration of this claim appeared in an administrative report from a customs office in El Amarillo on the Salvadoran border. According to Office Bulletin no. 2599 from the president's press office, dated September 7, 1988, the customs administration at El Amarillo had denied that contraband was passing through its jurisdiction, observing that even members of Battalion 3-16 were reviewing that sector of the border. Committee for the Defense of Human Rights in Honduras, "The Situation of Human Rights in Honduras, 1988," p. 13. 66. Anderson, "Loose Cannons," p. 27. 67. Beit-Hallahmi, The Israeli Connection, p. 30. 68. "CAIB Investigates Special Forces Camps," CovertAction Information Bulletin, no. 22 (Fall 1984), p. 61. 69. Jeff Gerth, "U.S. Military Creates Secret Units for Use in Sensitive Tasks Abroad," New York Times, June 8, 1984. 70. Subsequently, the name of the organization was changed to Civilian Material Assistance. 71. Ken Lawrence, "From Phoenix Associates to Civilian-Military Assistance," CovertAction Information Bulletin, no. 22 (Fall 1984), pp. 18-19. 72. See chapter 5, p. 85 and note 42. 73. Barry et al., New Right Humanitarians, p. 50. 74. Philip Taubman, "U.S. Army Officers Helped Private Group in Salvador," New York Times, Sept. 7, 1984. In the Iran-Contra Affair documents there is an explicit reference by Reagan administration officials to "periodic assistance" to the contras "from the Civilian Military Assistance Group [CMA] in Alabama" as part of a semi¬official apparatus. Appendix, vol. I, p. 324. 75. Marshall, Scott, and Hunter, The Iran-Contra Connection, pp. 67-68. 76. Anderson and Anderson, Inside the League, p. 182. 77. Heinrich Kruger, The Great Heroin Coup (Boston: South End Press, 1980), p.182. 78. Ibid., p. 183. 79. Ibid. 80. Connie Blitt and Dennis Bernstein, "Camp Oliver North Shuts Down," Progressive, Jan. 14, 1988, pp. 13-14. 81. Ibid. 82. Ibid. 83. See Maria LaGanga, "GURU: Anti-Terrorist Specialist Cashing in on Fear of Guerrilla Activity," Los Angeles Times, May 19, 1985; Bruce Shapiro, "Teaching Cops About Terrorism," Nation, Oct. 12, 1985. 84. Dan Popkey, "Officials: 'Expert' Couldn't Teach About Terrorism," Idaho State Statesman, May 1, 1985.