'C.I.A. lies misled Congress about war’

Press, 9 May 1978, Page 8

'C.I.A. lies misled Congress about war’

By

SEYMOUR HERSH,

of

the “New York Times” (through NZPA) A former American intelligence agent, in a secretly published book, has accused high-level officials of the Central Intelligence. Agency of misleading Congress and the public about the scope of United States involvement in the 1975 Angolan civil war. John Stockwell, former chief of the C.l.A.’s Angolan task force, writes in his book,- “ In Search of Enemies,” that the agency, initially without the knowledge of the White House, Congress, or the State Department, used Americans as military advisers in Angola. Stockwell, who resigned in disillusionment from the C.I.A. in 1977 after 12 years as a clandestine operative in Africa and Vietnam, also says in the book that the C.I.A. was secretly underwriting various efforts around the world to recruit mercenaries to fight on behalf of two United Statessupported factions in Angola — a charge that the C.I.A. nas previously denied. More than SUS3O million was authorised by President

Gerald Ford in 1975 and early 1976 in covert support of the two groups, the National Front for the Liberation of Angola, headed by Holden Roberto, and the National Union for the Total Liberation of Angola, led by Jonas Savimbi. A third faction, which eventually gained control over most of Angola after independence from Portugal was declared in November, 1975, was the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola, headed by Dr Agos- ! tinho Neto, a Marxist intellectual who is now President. The C.l.A.’s secret operations inside Angola came at 1 a time when the agency was| undergoing intense public and Congressional scrutiny for its illegal domestic spy- ' ing activities and its assassination attempts against ' foreign leaders. “Because of those inquiries, it was all the more ; disillusioning,” Stockwell ’ writes, “that William E. . Colby, then the Director of Central Intelligence, repeatedly misled Congressmen ’ about what we were doing in Angola. ; The Stockwell book was

published and distributed to bookstores yesterday. It was not submitted to the C.I.A. for prior review. The Justice Department is now seeking : civil damages from the author of another C.I.A. expose last December, Frank Snepp, whose book also was written and published without prior clearance. Stockwell’s sharpest comments come when he describes what he considered to be the constantly deteriorat- ■ ing integrity of C.I.A. offi- . cials. “In the Angolan operation,” he writes, “we were ’ now lying to each other, even while we read and , wrote cables which directly (contradicted those lies. In fact, there were several levels of untruth functioning simultaneously, different stories for different aspects ; of our activities. “We would not falter as ■ we switched from one story to the next.” On a related subject, : Stockwell says that the C.I.A. also misled Congress ■ and the public about its in--1 volvement with the South ’• African troops that joined Savimbi’s forces later in i 1975.