Is the CIA Incompetent?

by Ruth Wilson, Free Press contributor

omething struck me while scanning WhiteOut: the CIA, Drugs and the Press by Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair (Verso, 1998). The list of bizarre plans and attempts to murder Fidel Castro was unbelievable. Everyone knows that the CIA tried to kill Castro with a deadly cigar, but did you know that the CIA gave him a scuba diving suit lined with TB bacteria and arranged to drop exploding clams in his favorite diving area? Allan Robert Nye may have meant to kill Castro in 1959, when he was discovered sitting with a sniper's gun in a hotel room facing the presidential palace. But could the would-be assassins who followed really be serious? During the 1960s, the CIA doped cigars with psychoactive drugs, tried to slip poison pills to him via a waitress, and prepared an insecticide-filled ballpoint pen for the Cuban leader - all to no avail. How could the CIA fail so many times?

It's not as though the agency never participated in the successful murder of a national leader before. In 1961, gunmen who had been trained and provided with weapons by the CIA shot to death Rafael Trujillo, the dictator of the Dominican Republic. Also in 1961, Patrice Lumumba, the Prime Minister of the Congo, was tortured and killed by local friends of the CIA, and a CIA officer carried his body away in the trunk of his car. In 1970, Salvador Allende, the democratically elected president of Chile, was murdered in a coup orchestrated by the CIA with help from the US military. The Castro affair has left the CIA with a lasting reputation for incompetence, but there may be some bright spots amid the clouds blanketing the agency. If the general public thinks the CIA is filled with inept bunglers, people may believe the agency has made a mistake, when it's really doing exactly what it planned. Take Iraq, for example. Congress recently allocated $97 million dollars for the CIA to help opposition groups overthrow Saddam Hussein. The CIA has already spent over $100 million to "aid" Iraqi opposition groups since 1991, when George Bush ordered the agency to create conditions to topple Saddam. The net result so far has been doom for Iraqi opposition groups, as the agency has made it easy and convenient for Mr. Hussein to find and eliminate his enemies. Was this a mistake, or was this exactly the plan?

It is possible that key CIA officers didn't really want to kill Castro. Of course there has been sustained pressure from wealthy Cuban expatriates and right-wingers to eliminate Castro, but it is also true that the United States government needs enemies. The Soviet Union was a great enemy, but it was far away. Cuba is also close to Latin America and various Caribbean islands, providing a convenient excuse for US leaders who invade or intervene in countries such as Grenada or Nicaragua. The cry that Fidel Castro and his communist hordes are coming has been enough to send American marines and fighter pilots racing to the scene. Why kill an official enemy if he can be useful?

It's Economic

Saddam Hussein is more than just an enemy to frighten Americans into spending hundreds of billions of dollars on the military. He's the president of a country withs second largest proven oil reserves in the world. Shortly after Iraq was barred from the oil market in 1990, Saudi Arabia stepped in to fill the gap in demand by increasing oil production by approximately 3 million barrels per day. Between 1990 and 1997 the average real price of a barrel of oil was roughly $16, so during the past 8 years, Saudi Arabia has grossed approximately $136 billion that Iraq has failed to gain. Much of this windfall has been invested in U.S. companies and banks. Saudi Arabia is ruled by one family, which is very closely tied to the United States and depends on American support for its continued grip on power. Saudia Arabia has also become the greatest arms importer in the world, spending billions per year to buy American and British weapons and military equipment.

Keeping Iraq from selling oil has also allowed Saudi Arabia and the US to gain leverage over global oil prices. In general, higher prices mean higher profits for oil-producers, oil companies, and those who speculate on the oil market. Oil prices are very low at present, due primarily to the Asian economic crisis. There may be pressure to suspend the UN "food-for oil" deal, when the powerful decide it is time to raise prices. Meanwhile, Iraq is being allowed to pump roughly 50% of its pre-sanctions quota.

--Ruth Wilson