Angleton, the evil mastermind of the CIA. Jeff Morley talks to Lew Rockwell.

[Gene Kelly]

Actually, the Kimsey's "The Ends of a State" is essentially complimentary of JJA (although he uses academic language that I struggle to understand).  He has this to say;

I argue that, for a figure such as Angleton, disinformation and deception—supposed hallmarks of totalitarianism—are necessary if democracy, which Ransom compares to a beautiful poem, is to survive.

Gene

[Thomas Graves]

16 hours ago, Gene Kelly said:

Actually, the Kimsey's "The Ends of a State" is essentially complimentary of JJA (although he uses academic language that I struggle to understand).  He has this to say;

I argue that, for a figure such as Angleton, disinformation and deception—supposed hallmarks of totalitarianism—are necessary if democracy, which Ransom compares to a beautiful poem, is to survive.

Gene

Gene,

I took your suggestion and read it and about an hour ago. 

The "buzz" I got off of it was only moderately negative towards Angleton.  A relative breath of fresh air, if you will.

Please don't ask me to explicate or expound.  My poetry days are over, and I don't want to become a literary critic, a fate worse than death itself.

I would agree, however, that close readings are critically important in understanding Modernist poetry, and in waging / "practicing" counterintelligence

The devil is in the details.

Double, double toil and trouble,

Fire burn, and cauldron bubble.

 

Out, out, damn paradox!

Clot the bedded axle-tree.

 

--  Tommy 
 

From the essay:

In Cloak and Gown: Scholars in the Secret War 1939–1961, Yale historian Robin Winks makes clear that the OSS and early CIA were replete with Ivy League old boys and Yale alumni, and that the ranks of intelligence analysts were largely filled by academics from the language departments. Regarding Angleton, Winks emphasizes the habits of mind associated with Modernist “close reading”:  "[Intelligence work] called for men and women who were patient, methodical, curious, able almost as if by instinct to see relationships between the parts and the whole, people who understood what E. M. Forster meant by his dictum, 'only connect' (323).

The same point is made by William R. Johnson, a career counterintelligence officer who was recruited into the CIA by Angleton and who helped edit and publish Furioso while an undergraduate at Yale (Hood x):

At first glance, catching spies and studying English poetry do not seem to be closely related, but they do have one thing in common: Both, when competently done, are based on recognizing patterns. It is no accident that some of the most effective British and American CI officers in World War II were drafted into that war from positions as critics of English literature. They had been trained to look for multiple meanings, to examine the assumptions hidden in words and phrases, and to grasp the whole structure of a poem or play, not just the superficial plot or statement. (Johnson 9–10)

(emphasis added)

Edited February 13, 2018 by Thomas Graves

[David Andrews]

16 hours ago, Gene Kelly said:

Actually, the Kimsey's "The Ends of a State" is essentially complimentary of JJA (although he uses academic language that I struggle to understand).  He has this to say;

I argue that, for a figure such as Angleton, disinformation and deception—supposed hallmarks of totalitarianism—are necessary if democracy, which Ransom compares to a beautiful poem, is to survive.

Gene

This is a swell article.  How I want to look for, and find, more interdisciplinary studies of the cold war and the assassination.  I may write some further critique in the near future, when I can scratch up more time.  For now, the passage below stands as a great précis of the Golitsyn-Nosenko business, but accidentally, through giving Angleton too much credit.  Angleton forced a premature conclusion on the two defectors precisely because of his discomfort with the unresolved (underscoring added by me):

[Angleton] also had the professional’s necessary interest in ambiguity: an intense commitment to the elimination of ambiguity where sources conflicted (rather than the amateur’s tendency to attempt to reconcile conflicting statements, as though both might be true, rather than both being false) combined with the ability to live with the unresolved so that one did not force a premature conclusion out of sheer discomfort. (Winks 326)

 

 

 

[Gene Kelly]

Peter Gabriel ... "In Your Eyes":

All my instincts, they return
And the grand façade, so soon will burn
Without a noise, without my pride
I reach out from the inside

In your eyes
The light the heat
In your eyes
I am complete
In your eyes
I see the doorway to a thousand churches
In your eyes
The resolution of all the fruitless searches
In your eyes
I see the light and the heat
In your eyes
Oh, I want to be that complete
I want to touch the light
The heat I see in your eyes

[Thomas Graves]

40 minutes ago, Gene Kelly said:

Peter Gabriel ... "In Your Eyes":

All my instincts, they return
And the grand façade, so soon will burn
Without a noise, without my pride
I reach out from the inside

In your eyes
The light the heat
In your eyes
I am complete
In your eyes
I see the doorway to a thousand churches
In your eyes
The resolution of all the fruitless searches
In your eyes
I see the light and the heat
In your eyes
Oh, I want to be that complete
I want to touch the light
The heat I see in your eyes

 

Gene,

With all due respect, did Nosenko have nice eyes?

Aleksy Kulak?

Dimiti Polyakov (before he started telling CIA things he wasn't supposed to)?

Yuri Loginov? 

Konstantin Volkov?

Edward Ellis Smith?

"Anna Chapman"?

etc, etc, etc?

--  Tommy 

PS  Not to mention Aldrich Ames and Robert Hanssen?

Edited February 14, 2018 by Thomas Graves

[David Andrews]

Gene, It's the season for Eliot:

http://eliotswasteland.tripod.com/

Thanks for turning me on to that article, and the journal it's in.

[Thomas Graves]

3 hours ago, David Andrews said:

Gene, It's the season for Eliot:

http://eliotswasteland.tripod.com/

Thanks for turning me on to that article, and the journal it's in.

 

David,

 

With all due respect, after 90-plus years of Soviet/Russian active measures counterintelligence operations against us and our allies, artfully interwoven with 58 years of strategic deception ops by same, it's no wonder that we now have one of KGB-boy Vladimir Putin's "useful idiots" for a president, and that our nation is, in effect, "like a patient etherized upon a table."

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/44212/the-love-song-of-j-alfred-prufrock

 

Question:  When are you and all the other "The evil, evil, evil CIA 'dood da deed' and is responsible for all of the ills in the world!" going to 'come to' and ... 'see the light'?

 

--  Tommy 

Edited February 14, 2018 by Thomas Graves

[David Andrews]

Tommy:

I don't think CIA dood it alone.  I think they were the executive arm of higher, monied interests.  I think the CIA had low-level collaborators from several anti-Kennedy concerns.

Hoo doo yoo think dood it?

Honestly - all this over literary theory, and an article that doesn't even mention the Kennedy thing.  Oversensitive?

Tommy, I'm starting to think you've leased your identity to Len Colby, and that he's posting under your name.  Your new picture even looks like Len's old picture.  And you're using phonetic comedy just like Len did: "dood da deed."  It's reminiscent of Len's satirical "blame da Jooz" tag line.  These little tip-offs make us literary theory lovers' ears perk up.

Edited February 15, 2018 by David Andrews

[Thomas Graves]

15 hours ago, David Andrews said:

Tommy:

I don't think CIA dood it alone.  I think they were the executive arm of higher, monied interests.  I think the CIA had low-level collaborators from several anti-Kennedy concerns.

Hoo doo yoo think dood it?

Honestly - all this over literary theory, and an article that doesn't even mention the Kennedy thing.  Oversensitive?

Tommy, I'm starting to think you've leased your identity to Len Colby, and that he's posting under your name.  Your new picture even looks like Len's old picture.  And you're using phonetic comedy just like Len did: "dood da deed."  It's reminiscent of Len's satirical "blame da Jooz" tag line.  These little tip-offs make us literary theory lovers' ears perk up.

David,

With all due respect, .....

You're right.

My bad.

Let me rephrase it:

"Some will-wee will-wee witch and weevil Uhh-wear-wee-cans and dare weevil weevil CIA done dood da deed. 

I wean I wean I wean, ANY-waddie but doze will-wee will-wee nice Woos-keys!"

--  Tommy 

PS  Regarding Len Colby (who happens to be a FB "friend"), don't get all paranoid on me, Wave-id.  Attempted "guilt" by "association"?

PPS  Did I mention "the Kennedy thing" in my post?

PPPS  Over-pensive?

Edited February 15, 2018 by Thomas Graves

[Michael Walton]

For my money, State Secret is far more revealing and important on the how of it all compared to the who of this story.

[B. A. Copeland]

3 hours ago, Michael Walton said:

For my money, State Secret is far more revealing and important on the how of it all compared to the who of this story.

Couldn't agree more although I need to contact Bill about why he never seemed mentioned Leo Setyaev. I mean Newman definitely does and I remember starting to read Simpich's fine work he'd mention it too but did not. I'm sure he had his reasons.

[Ron Bulman]

On ‎2‎/‎15‎/‎2018 at 12:52 PM, Michael Walton said:

For my money, State Secret is far more revealing and important on the how of it all compared to the who of this story.

Not sure I understand here.  Mr. Simpich's most important work State Secret regards Mexico.  The "who" of this story (thread) is Angleton.  Who flew to Mexico City to go to Winston Scott's house the day after he died to confiscate his files? 

Edited February 19, 2018 by Ron Bulman