Emphasis on the following activities is being considered in planning for
future operations:
Tab A
Paper Prepared by the Central Intelligence
Agency2
TENSIONS IN THE SOVIET UNION AND EASTERN EUROPE
CHALLENGE AND OPPORTUNITY
Introduction
At no time in the history of the Soviet Union to date have political
forces outside the Communist Party leadership played a significant
role in influencing events. The Party apparatus, the KGB and the
deeply vested interests of the Soviet State hierarchy are
experienced in coping with dissidence of all types, and have an
impressive record of asserting their will at any cost to the rest of
society. The KGB in particular has an almost perfect record of
successful penetration, manipulation and suppression of opposition
elements. In addition there is an historic tradition of public
apathy, largely unchanged even today among the workers and peasants
of Russia, and dissident elements find little encouragement at the
grass roots. The authorities have often exploited the antipathy of
the working class toward the intelligentsia in suppressing incipient
demonstrations.
Thus the experience of Russian history strongly argues against the
proposition that the internal dissident will significantly influence
Soviet society in the short term. The conditions, nevertheless,
which abet existing trends toward more active and articulate
dissidence could be
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affected by external developments. A discrediting of the regime by,
say, another Czechoslovak crisis or a serious economic crisis, might
well promote radical changes in the internal political climate. The
paragraphs that follow should be considered in this light.
Intellectual Dissent
To describe the nature and scope of dissidence in the Soviet Union
today poses the risk of over-emphasis. The Soviet regime is by no
means on the brink of collapse. On the other hand, something new has
indeed emerged in Soviet society since Stalin’s death. The growing
demand for freedom of expression has been widely reported in the
Western press, and its suppression by Soviet authorities has in turn
contributed to disillusionment among foreign Communists and Soviet
sympathizers.
The top rank of dissenters in the Soviet Union includes leading
scientists, some of whom share the views of Andrey Sakharov, an
eminent scientist. In 1968, Sakharov in a long pamphlet advocated
radical changes in human society the world over. Speaking of his own
country, he called for tolerance of political opposition,
elimination of censorship, and frank discussion of Stalin’s use of
terror. Later in 1968, other prominent scientists including Peter
Kapitsa, the Soviet Union’s leading theoretical physicist, told
Western colleagues that they agreed with Sakharov. The Sakharov
pamphlet has never been published in the Soviet Union, but through
Western radio broadcasts and publications Sakharov’s words have been
carried back to his countrymen.
After the scientists, next in prestige come the writers, whose
tradition of social concern goes back to Turgenev, Tolstoy and even
earlier. Their involvement in politics and protest has almost always
been reluctant. Alexander Solzhenitsyn tried for years to remain
aloof, but his determination to write what he believed and his
refusal to conform to the requirements of the Party put him squarely
against the censors and the Soviet Writers’ Union. Last fall the
Writers’ Union expelled Solzhenitsyn for his recalcitrance. Learning
that he had been expelled without an opportunity to defend his
position, Solzhenitsyn wrote a letter to the leaders of the Union
that epitomizes the attitude of the creative intelligentsia toward
the Party hacks who control the institutions of Soviet society. “The
face of your clock has been rubbed out: Your clock is far behind the
times. Open your heavy curtains. You do not even know that outside
it is already day….3 In this time of crisis in our
dangerously sick society you are not able to suggest anything
constructive, anything good, only your own hatred and your spying on
others and your determination to coerce and never to let go.”
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Beyond the circle of leading scientists and writers there are the
active dissidents themselves. Most of them are younger members of
the intelligentsia, but their ranks also include workers, teachers,
and other professionals. A leading physicist in this group runs the
only “underground press” known to exist in the Soviet Union. In May
1969 fifteen of the most active dissidents organized a Committee for
the Defense of Human Rights, and petitioned the United Nations to
protest against violations of human rights in the USSR. They were joined by some fifty
other persons who publicly announced their support of the Committee.
When the first petition received no answer, they sent a second. Now,
ten months afterward, ten of the fifteen of the organizers of the
Committee have been imprisoned or placed in mental hospitals, a
favorite device of the regime for handling awkward cases.
In April 1968 the group began a bi-monthly Chronicle of Current Events, reporting in detail on
arrests, threats and other coercive acts the Soviet regime uses to
suppress opposition, plus the latest news concerning underground
literature and petitions. Ten issues of the Chronicle were subsequently circulated in hundreds of
typewritten copies inside the USSR.
A few copies of each reached the West, where they have been
republished and broadcast back into the Soviet Union.
The writing and circulation of protest documents of many varieties,
typed in carbon copies or handwritten, continues in the face of
regime repression. In early 1968 the trial of Ginsburg and Galanskov
inspired hundreds of Soviet citizens to risk censure, job loss or
imprisonment by appealing to the authorities on behalf of the
defendants. The petitioners and protestors have since supported
other causes, and have proposed their own political programs as
alternatives to the Communist Party’s dictatorship. As one leader of
the dissident movement, Lydia Chukovskaya, wrote: “The conspiracy of
silence is at an end.”
In reaction to the increasing repression of creative freedom in the
USSR, outstanding
representatives of the Soviet intelligentsia have forsaken their
homeland for life in the West. In addition to Stalin’s daughter,
Svetlana, they include three distinguished writers, a prominent
philosopher and editor, a young nuclear physicist, two outstanding
musicians, a magazine editor, two leading experts on cybernetics, a
movie director, a film critic and three students from Moscow
University’s Institute of Eastern Languages.
The picture of the Soviet Union that these defectors paint is one of
increasing cynicism and alienation on the part of the
intelligentsia, and apathy and bitterness in the working class. The
philosopher mentioned above had this to say on the subject: “People
are still afraid to trust one another entirely. I shared my real
views only with three other men. Yet one knows how everybody
feels—disillusioned, contemptuous of the bosses and frustrated by
the Party careerists who know nothing
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but how to win and keep power. Now these
careerists sense their isolation from the rest of the population.
They no longer believe in anything. There are no idealists like my
father left among them. They only know that to keep their power they
must stick together, like cattle surrounded by wolves.”
Minority Repression
Among many of the non-Russian minorities in the Soviet Union, dissent
is vocal and widespread. It is also vigorously repressed. In the
Ukraine, the arrests of hundreds of Ukrainian dissidents in 1965 and
1966, and subsequent repressions, have been vigorously protested by
leading Ukrainian scientists, artists, and writers, including Oleg
Antonov, one of the Soviet Union’s leading aircraft designers.
The contempt of the Baltic people for Soviet rule remains as strong
as ever. It is no longer expressed in hopeless armed resistance, as
it was twenty years ago. Instead, these small nations manifest a
vigorous determination to preserve their national cultures. Even the
local Communist Party apparatus has sought to assert a degree of
autonomy. In Estonia many works of Western literature that have
never been published in Russian are printed in the native language.
Two of the major underground documents recently proposing
alternatives to the Communist dictatorship originated in
Estonia.
Economic Unrest
Since the December 1969 Central Committee Plenum, the Soviet press
has given increasing attention to the lethargy of the economy. The
best informed defectors and even Soviet economists depict the
economy as suffering from overcentralization, rigid control, and a
system of falsification and misrepresentation that prevents anyone
from knowing what the true conditions are. A recent letter to
Brezhnev circulated
through underground channels in Moscow described the problems of the
economy in the following terms: “It is obvious to everyone that in
our system nobody is involved in real work. They only throw dust in
the eyes of the bosses. Phony events, such as jubilees and special
days, have become for us more important than the real events of
economic and social life…. Other states in which the economy is not
ruled from the heavens, but from earth … are outdistancing us more
and more … Freedom to discuss problems openly, only such freedom,
can put diseased Russia on the road to recovery.”
Eastern Europe
In addition to its domestic problems, the Soviet Union has had
chronic difficulty in managing its satellites in Eastern Europe. In
Eastern Europe the tensions in society are much greater than in the
Soviet Union, the Western orientation much stronger, and the
possibility
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exists that at
some future time one or more of these countries may successfully
make the transition that Czechoslovakia essayed in 1968. It seems
inevitable that, as long as the Soviet Union maintains its current
system, it will be impossible for the peoples of Eastern Europe to
live in real harmony with the Soviet Union and that, to maintain
hegemony in the area, the Soviets will have to continue to rely upon
force.
Dissident elements in the USSR and
Eastern Europe display remarkable sympathy and understanding for
their fellows throughout the whole Soviet dominated region. Pavel
Litvinov, Larissa Daniel and others were exiled from Moscow for
trying to stage a peaceful demonstration against the Soviet invasion
of Czechoslovakia. Others protested the biased reporting in the
Soviet press and Soviet threats before the troops moved in.
Intellectuals in all Eastern European countries have actively
collaborated with the Soviet dissidents, and have expressed their
sympathy for those arrested and imprisoned.
With its easier access to the West, Eastern Europe acts as a conduit
for books, letters, manuscripts and ideas. The flow back and forth
across the Soviet borders is relatively easy and constant. The fact
that Eastern European standards of tolerance and freedom of
expression, although restrictive, are well above the levels
permitted in the Soviet Union makes the region’s ability to
influence the Soviet Union a consideration of major importance to
the United States.
II
Covert Action Programs Targeted at Eastern Europe
and the USSR
Current CIA operations targeted at
Eastern Europe and the USSR are
designed to foster the tensions and cleavages outlined above. Their
aim is not to promote armed rebellion, but rather to encourage the
movement for greater personal freedom within the Soviet Union and to
weaken the ties between the nations of Eastern Europe and Soviet
Russia.
Radio Broadcasts
Free Europe, Inc., and Radio Liberty Committee, Inc., were organized
in 1949 and 1951 respectively by the CIA. The major activity of each operation is radio
broadcasting. Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty programming
centers are located in Munich, Germany. Their staffs, composed
largely of Soviet and Eastern Europe expatriates with Americans in
key policy positions, represent a unique concentration of expertise
and professional talent.
Radio Free Europe (RFE)
RFE currently broadcasts 19 hours daily into Poland, Czechoslovakia
and Hungary, 12 hours to Romania, and 8 hours to Bulgaria. It also
conducts an extensive and respected research program on Eastern
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Europe. The radio has
achieved a high degree of Eastern European listener acceptance as a
station which identifies with their needs, thoughts and aspirations.
It is estimated that over 30 million people listen to RFE
broadcasts. This percentage rises dramatically during periods of
international crisis. RFE is denounced almost daily by Communist
media, and on occasion by key figures of the Eastern European
governments. Czechoslovak Party Secretary Husak has publicly placed
a large share of the blame on RFE for his Party’s inability to win
over the Czechoslovak population.
The station is a political force with which the Eastern European
regimes must reckon. The reason for this lies partly in RFE’s
pattern of cross-reporting—i.e., reporting in detail to all the
Eastern European countries on domestic developments in the
individual countries. This is in effect the principal way the
peoples of the area learn of significant developments in their own
and neighboring countries. It can be demonstrated that RFE’s
repeated exposure of domestic policies and methods has forced
modification of censorship and similar restrictions in several of
the Eastern European countries.
RFE’s role in the 1968 Czechoslovak crisis is a striking example of
the radio’s effectiveness. Prior to the ousting of Party First
Secretary Novotny in January 1968, RFE was the chief source of
factual information and research analysis on domestic affairs for
much of the Czechoslovak population. After the Soviet invasion and
the loss of their new-found freedom, the Czechoslovak people again
became dependent on the round-the-clock reporting of RFE. Audience
research indicates that RFE’s listenership rose to 70 percent of the
population. The station received thousands of letters extolling its
programs, while the Communist news media unleashed an unprecedented
series of attacks on RFE. The Soviet journal Red
Star described the radio as the “most strategic weapon in
the global psychological war being carried on by the United States
against the world socialist system.”
Radio Liberty (RL)
Radio Liberty broadcasts round-the-clock in the Russian language, 14
hours a day in Ukrainian, and at varying lengths in 15 other
national languages. In contrast to RFE, RL is targeted against the
more restrictive Soviet system. Effectiveness is more difficult to
measure. However, letters from listeners, defector reports and legal
travelers indicate that there is a sizeable audience. It is
generally agreed that RL merits a significant share of the credit
for the increasing manifestations of dissent and opposition among
the Soviet intelligentsia. In this respect the Sinyavskiy–Daniel
trial of 1966 was a landmark. RL played a unique role in conveying
the facts, the significance, and Western reactions to the trial to
the Soviet people. RL has also broadcast back into the Soviet Union
detailed information on every important letter, protest
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document, and piece of
underground literature which has reached the West through
underground channels. Recent Soviet defectors, among them the author
Anatole Kuznetsov, have specifically cited RL’s vital function in
providing such information and thereby expanding the scope and depth
of dissident attitudes.
Communist Attacks on the Radios
Soviet and Eastern European attempts to discredit RFE and RL are
intensive and coordinated. The Communist regimes are particularly
discomfited by the two radios’ detailed news coverage and highly
effective cross-reporting of internal developments, and by their
exploitation of intellectual ferment, nationalist tendencies and
general dissent within the Soviet Union.
A measure of the Soviet concern over Western broadcasts is the extent
of the Soviet jamming effort. At this time, Czechoslovakia and
Bulgaria also extensively jam RFE broadcasts. According to a VOA
study, the Soviets use 2,000–2,500 jammers at an estimated annual
cost of $150,000,000. As indicated above, however, the jamming is
marginally effective inasmuch as the target audiences hear the
radios on one or more frequencies. The cost of the Soviet jamming
effort can be put into perspective by comparing it with the annual
operating costs of FE, Inc., and RLC, Inc., $21,723,000 and
$12,770,000 respectively. The radios represent a 20-year investment
of over $400,000,000.
Non-Radio Programs of Free Europe, Inc., and Radio
Liberty Committee, Inc.
In addition to the radios, FE, Inc., and RLC, Inc., sponsor book
distribution programs. FE, Inc., also administers a program of
support for exiles who fled Eastern Europe during the early post-war
period. RLC, Inc., sponsors the Institute for the Study of the
USSR in Munich, Germany.
FE, Inc., and RLC, Inc., have distributed a total of two and one-half
million books and periodicals in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe
since the late 1950’s. The titles comprise works which are not
available in those countries because their content is considered
ideologically objectionable.
The book programs are, for the most part, demonstrably effective in
reaching directly significant segments of the professional and
technical elite, and through them their colleagues in the Soviet
Union and Eastern Europe, with material that can inferentially be
said to influence attitudes and reinforce predispositions toward
intellectual and cultural freedom, and dissatisfaction with its
absence.
The [less than 1 line of source text not
declassified] is a research organization supported by Radio
Liberty Committee, Inc. It is also heavily engaged in a publications
program designed to counter Soviet propaganda
[Page 464]
in underdeveloped nations. In 1969
over 135,000 copies of its publications were distributed to the Arab
countries of the Middle East. The [less than 1
line of source text not declassified] also publishes the
prestigious “Prominent Personalities in the USSR” and sponsors symposia which bring together the
foremost Western experts on the USSR to consider new approaches to dealing with the
Communists. A recent budget reduction levied on Radio Liberty
Committee, Inc., has led to a decision to terminate the [less than 1 line of source text not
declassified], although efforts are being made to find ways
to carry on certain of its activities independently.
[6½ pages of source text not declassified]
Election Operations
There have been numerous instances when, facing the threat of a
Communist Party or popular front election victory in the Free World,
we have met the threat and turned it successfully. Guyana in 1963
and Chile in 1964 are good examples of what can be accomplished
under difficult circumstances. Similar situations may soon face us
in various parts of the world, and we are prepared for action with
carefully planned covert election programs when U.S. policy calls
for them.
