1/2/13

Agents & informers did not merely spy on political activists, their main function was to discredit & disrupt. The FBI & police also waged psychological warfare from the outside, through bogus publication, forged correspondence, anonymous letters & telephone calls, eviction, job loss, break ins, vandalism, grand jury subpoenas, false arrest, frame ups, & physical violence were threatened, instigated or directly employed, in an effort to frighten activists & disrupt their movements. Government agents either concealed their involvement or fabricated a legal pretext, in the case of the black & Native American movements. These assaults, including political assassinations, were so extensive & vicious that they amounted to terrorism on the part of the government. The most intense operations were directed against the black movement, particularly the Black Panther Party. This resulted from FBI & police racism, the black community's lack of material resources for fighting back, & the tendency of the media & whites in general to ignore or tolerate attacks on black groups. It also reflected government & corporate fear of the black movement because of its militance, its broad domestic base & international support, & its historic role in galvanizing the entire sixties upsurge. Many other activists who organized against US intervention abroad or for racial, gender or class justice at home also came under attack. The targets were certainly not limited to those who used physical force or took up arms. Doctor King, D. Dellinger, & P. Berrigan & other leading pacifists were high on the list of threats to national security, as were projects directly protected by the Bill of Rights, such as alternative newspapers. The Black Panthers came under attack at a time when their work featured free food & health care & community control of schools & police, & when they carried guns only for deterrent & symbolic purpose. It was the terrorism of the FBI & police that eventually provoked the Panthers to retaliate with the armed actions that later were cited to justify their repression. Ultimately, the FBI disclosed six official counter intelligence programs, Communist Party USA 1956-71, groups seeking independence for Puerto Rico 1960-71, Socialist Worker Party 1961-71, white hate groups 1964-71, black nationalist hate groups 1967-71, New Left 1968-71. The later operations hit anti-war, student, & feminist groups. The black nationalist caption actually encompassed Doctor King & most of the civil rights & black power movements. The white hate program functioned mainly as a cover for covert aid to the KKK & similar right wing vigilantes, who were given funds & information, so long as they confined their attacks to Cointelpro targets (I'm a victim of this style of Cointelpro). FBI documents also reveal covert action against Native American, Chicano, Philippine, Arab American, & other activists, apparently without formal counter intelligence programs. Cointelpro's impact is difficult to fully assess since we do not know the entire scope of what was done (especially against such pivotal targets as Malcolm X, Doctor King, SNCC & SDS) & we have no generally accepted analysis of the sixties. It is clear, however, that... continued from Cointelpro post for http://betweenthebars.org/blogs/1491