Byron Engle: Trained Japanese police after WWII

[Nathaniel Heidenheimer]

Thought this guy might be worth a thread. What interests me was his ties to occupied Japan (wondered who he knew there) and his arrangement for US police officers to train the police department of right wing Latin American regimes. I have read that he knew Many Pena well. Any details that could corroberate this? Pena, while working for the LAPD worked on the Senate Subcommittee that had documentation linking Oswald to the mail-order scope or rifle (?) This committee was led by Thomas Dodd, a prominant member of the American Security Council.

When he returned from the CIA-LAPD liason program in Latin America-- the CIA's OPS which was run through AID-- Pena was put in charge of Special Unit Senator, to direct the LAPDs investigation of the Assassination of RFK

Do we know of Engle's specific activities and connections while in post-war Japan?

According to A. J. Langguth, Engle was singled out for praise, as the leader of the OPS, by House Minority Leader Gerald Ford, following the 1970 murder of OPS officer and former Richmond Indiana Police Chief Dan Mitrione in Uruguay

Edited May 19, 2008 by Nathaniel Heidenheimer

[Guest David Guyatt]

Seems to be little available on his time in Tokyo. Not much either about his time in Vietnam.

Anyway, for what little it's worth...

Blum is far more straight forward than other commentators who say Engle was "close" to the CIA, and states he "was an old CIA hand".

http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Blum/Uru...uned_WBlum.html

URUGUAY 1964 to 1970

Torture -- as American as apple pie

excerpted from the book

Killing Hope

by William Blum

_ _ _ _

"The precise pain, in the precise place, in the precise amount, for the desired effect."{1}

The words of an instructor in the art of torture. The words of Dan Mitrione, the head of the

Office of Public Safety (OPS) mission in Montevideo.

Officially, OPS was a division of the Agency for International Development, but the director of

OPS in Washington, Byron Engle, was an old CIA hand. His organization maintained a close

working relationship with the CIA, and Agency officers often operated abroad under OPS cover,

although Mitrione was not one of them.{2}

Significantly, I think, he was a confidante of Hariman.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0966177142...10&go=Go%21

3.

on Page 25:

"... Byron Engle, a long time Harriman associate and friend, was assigned by Dulles to direct a sub committee authorized under the Special ..."

And

8.

on Page 188:

"... He collared his old OSS colleague, Byron Engle, who refused to fire Frank, and also refused to...

He was former OSS and later a CIA counterintelligence specialist:

http://www.hempforus.com/477.htm