Active Measures: The KGB Targets Dr. Martin Luther King

Would you believe that the soviets wanted to create turmoil in the USA so badly that they resorted to race baiting? Well, believe it. During the mid-1960s, the Communist Party USA (CPUSA) failed yet again. The KGB's service A had come to realize the CPUSA could not direct King's policies as it had promised. Much to their chagrin, King, being the great American that he was, did not rail against America's alleged worldwide imperialism as they had hoped, instead he concentrated on encouraging African-Americans to fulfill their dreams. According to Mitrokhin, the KGB sought to discredit MLK so that he may be replaced with a more radical figure. Service A's Yuri Modin, who was the case manager for the Magnificent Five had approval to place articles in the African press saying that King was in fact merely an Uncle Tom, who was receiving funds from the Johnson administration to dilute the Civil Rights Movement. Furthermore, Modin was authorized to:

1. Distribute pamphlets and the like stating that the Johnson administration was using terrorist methods to suppress the Civil rights Movement.

2. Encourage leading figures in the world of law to discredit Johnson's administration in regards to their handling of the Civil Rights Movement.

3. Forge a document claiming that the John Birch Society and the Minutemen organizations were planning for the "physical elimination" of African-American civil rights leaders.

Service A soon began amplifying the violent images of the Watts race riots. The Center was hoping that such imagery of violence would encourage African-American radicals to replace King with Stokeley Carmichael, a self-proclaimed revolutionary who sought to change the American system through guerrilla warfare on American streets.

On April 4th, 1968 Dr. King was assassinated. Now, instead of brushing off King as a mere Uncle Tom, their course of action led them to depict King as a martyr of the African-American liberation movement. What did they resort to? Once again, conspiracy theories. One of which was to claim that King was murdered by white racists under the tutelage of American authorities.

Why? One might ask. Again, anything that tore at the fabric of American Society was good for the Soviet Union.

Ever notice how there seems to be friction between certain groups of African Americans and Jewish people, to this day?

Ponder this: In 1971, Yuri Vladimirovich Andropov, chairman of the KGB, approved the dissemination of fabricated pamphlets, which were full of racial insults toward blacks. It was purported that the pamphlets came from Meir Kahane's Jewish Defense League as a call to arms against the "black mongrels". Further forged media was sent to some 60 other black groups offering up fabricated details of "atrocities" committed by the Jewish Defense League. The problem being of course that none of it was true.

Furthermore, remember the story of Pandora's box? Enter (stage left) operation PANDORA. On July 25, 1971, Anatoli Tikhonovich Kireyev told the New York residency members to set up a delayed explosive device at one of the "Negro colleges", after which, members were admonished to clandestinely inform various black groups that the Jewish Defense League was responsible. Can you imagine going to such lengths to foment disorder?

Racial tensions and the fabricating thereof remained one of Service A's oft used themes. Right before the beginning of the LA Olympics in 1984, KGB officers sent fabricated letters to the African and Asian Olympic committees claiming to be from the KKK. Here is an example:

"THE OLYMPICS - FOR THE WHITES ONLY!
African monkeys!
A grand reception awaits you in Los Angeles!
We are preparing for the Olympic Games by shooting at black moving targets.
In Los Angeles our own Olympic flames are ready to incinerate you. The highest award for a true American patriot would be the lynching of an African monkey.
Blacks, welcome to the Olympic Games in Los Angeles!
We'll give you a reception you'll never forget!"

Incredibly, this and other like propaganda made it into print media around the world. When accused of perpetrating such active measures, the Soviets would feign indignation at the America's anti-Soviet stance.

This is a key tactic in propaganda: produce something so outrageous that mere notion of casting blame on somebody other than the perceived author would in turn cast dispersions upon the claimant. Perhaps McCarthy was not so crazy after all.