A Break-In to End All Break-Ins (scarey isn't it?)

[Guest guest]

S

Thu, 09 Mar 2006 13:13:37 -0800

A Break-In to End All Break-Ins (scarey

isn't it?)

 

 

 

 

A Break-In to End All Break-Ins (scarey isn't it?)

 

A Break-In to End All Break-Ins

In 1971, stolen FBI files exposed the government's domestic spying

program.

by Allan M. Jalon

 

 

Thirty-five years ago today, a group of anonymous activists broke into

the small, two-man office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation in

Media, Pa., and stole more than 1,000 FBI documents that revealed

years of systematic wiretapping, infiltration and media manipulation

designed to suppress dissent.

 

The Citizens' Commission to Investigate the FBI, as the group called

itself, forced its way in at night with a crowbar while much of the

country was watching the Muhammad Ali-Joe Frazier fight. When agents

arrived for work the next morning, they found the file cabinets

virtually emptied.

 

Within a few weeks, the documents began to show up — mailed

anonymously in manila envelopes with no return address — in the

newsrooms of major American newspapers. When the Washington Post

received copies, Atty. Gen. John N. Mitchell asked Executive Editor

Ben Bradlee not to publish them because disclosure, he said, could

" endanger the lives " of people involved in investigations on behalf of

the United States.

 

Nevertheless, the Post broke the first story on March 24, 1971, after

receiving an envelope with 14 FBI documents detailing how the bureau

had enlisted a local police chief, letter carriers and a switchboard

operator at Swarthmore College to spy on campus and black activist

groups in the Philadelphia area.

 

More documents went to other reporters — Tom Wicker received copies at

his New York Times office; so did reporters at the Los Angeles Times —

and to politicians including Sen. George McGovern of South Dakota and

Rep. Parren J. Mitchell of Maryland.

 

To this day, no individual has claimed responsibility for the

break-in. The FBI, after building up a six-year, 33,000-page file on

the case, couldn't solve it. But it remains one of the most lastingly

consequential (although underemphasized) watersheds of political

awareness in recent American history, one that poses tough questions

even today for our national leaders who argue that fighting foreign

enemies requires the government to spy on its citizens. The break-in

is far less well known than Daniel Ellsberg's leak of the Pentagon

Papers three months later, but in my opinion it deserves equal stature.

 

Found among the Media documents was a new word, " COINTELPRO, " short

for the FBI's " secret counterintelligence program, " created to

investigate and disrupt dissident political groups in the U.S. Under

these programs, beginning in 1956, the bureau worked to " enhance the

paranoia endemic in these circles, " as one COINTELPRO memo put it, " to

get the point across there is an FBI agent behind every mailbox. "

 

The Media documents — along with further revelations about COINTELPRO

in the months and years that followed — made it clear that the bureau

had gone beyond mere intelligence-gathering to discredit, destabilize

and demoralize groups — many of them peaceful, legal civil rights

organizations and antiwar groups — that the FBI and Director J. Edgar

Hoover found offensive or threatening.

 

For instance, agents sought to persuade Martin Luther King Jr. to kill

himself just before he received the Nobel Prize. They sent him a

composite tape made from bugs planted illegally in his hotel rooms

when he was entertaining women other than his wife — and threatened to

make it public. " King, there is one thing left for you to do. You know

what it is, " FBI operatives wrote in their anonymous letter.

 

Under COINTELPRO, the bureau also targeted actress Jean Seberg for

having made a donation to the Black Panther Party. The fragile actress

ultimately committed suicide after a gossip nugget based on a FBI

wiretap was leaked to the L.A. Times and published. The item,

suggesting that the father of the baby she was carrying was a Black

Panther rather than her French writer-husband, turned out to be wrong.

 

The sheer reach of a completely politicized FBI was one of the most

frightening revelations of the Media documents. Underground newspapers

were targeted. Students (and their professors) were targeted.

Celebrities were targeted. The Communist Party of the U.S.A., the

Southern Christian Leadership Conference, the Student Non-Violent

Organizing Committee, the Black Panther Party, the Women's Strike for

Peace — all were targeted. " Neutralize them in the same manner they

are trying to destroy and neutralize the U.S., " one memo said.

 

Eventually, the COINTELPRO memos — some from Media and some unearthed

later — prompted hearings led by Rep. Don Edwards of California and by

Sen. Frank Church of Idaho on intelligence agency abuses. In the

mid-1970s, the wayward agency began finally to be reined in.

 

It is tragic when people lose faith in their government to the extent

that they feel they must break laws to expose corruption.

 

But a war that had been started and sustained by lies had gone on for

years. And a government had betrayed its citizens, manipulating their

fear to strengthen its grip on power.

 

Today, again, many people worry that their government may be on the

road to subverting its own ideals. I hope that the commemoration of

those unknown activists being held today in Media, Pa., will serve as

a reminder that fighting for democracy abroad must remain more than

merely an excuse to weaken civil liberties at home.

 

Allan M. Jalon is a longtime contributor to The Times and other

publications on issues of culture and media.

[Guest guest]

Hi,

 

Thanks for posting that great article. I have read others along the same

line, In fact not very .long ago I read a book called, " INSIDE THE FBI,'

by Ronald Kessler. It was a shocking book to say the least. I happen to

believe its all true. You might want to get the book if you want more data

as to the goings on of the FBI.

 

Hugs,

Gerrie

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

----

 

califpacific

03/09/06 15:29:34

 

A Break-In to End All Break-Ins

(scarey isn't it?)

 

S

Thu, 09 Mar 2006 13:13:37 -0800

A Break-In to End All Break-Ins (scarey

isn't it?)

 

 

 

 

A Break-In to End All Break-Ins (scarey isn't it?)

 

A Break-In to End All Break-Ins

In 1971, stolen FBI files exposed the government's domestic spying

program.

by Allan M. Jalon

 

 

Thirty-five years ago today, a group of anonymous activists broke into

the small, two-man office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation in

Media, Pa., and stole more than 1,000 FBI documents that revealed

years of systematic wiretapping, infiltration and media manipulation

designed to suppress dissent.

 

The Citizens' Commission to Investigate the FBI, as the group called

itself, forced its way in at night with a crowbar while much of the

country was watching the Muhammad Ali-Joe Frazier fight. When agents

arrived for work the next morning, they found the file cabinets

virtually emptied.

 

Within a few weeks, the documents began to show up — mailed

anonymously in manila envelopes with no return address — in the

newsrooms of major American newspapers. When the Washington Post

received copies, Atty. Gen. John N. Mitchell asked Executive Editor

Ben Bradlee not to publish them because disclosure, he said, could

" endanger the lives " of people involved in investigations on behalf of

the United States.

 

Nevertheless, the Post broke the first story on March 24, 1971, after

receiving an envelope with 14 FBI documents detailing how the bureau

had enlisted a local police chief, letter carriers and a switchboard

operator at Swarthmore College to spy on campus and black activist

groups in the Philadelphia area.

 

More documents went to other reporters — Tom Wicker received copies at

his New York Times office; so did reporters at the Los Angeles Times —

and to politicians including Sen. George McGovern of South Dakota and

Rep. Parren J. Mitchell of Maryland.

 

To this day, no individual has claimed responsibility for the

break-in. The FBI, after building up a six-year, 33,000-page file on

the case, couldn't solve it. But it remains one of the most lastingly

consequential (although underemphasized) watersheds of political

awareness in recent American history, one that poses tough questions

even today for our national leaders who argue that fighting foreign

enemies requires the government to spy on its citizens. The break-in

is far less well known than Daniel Ellsberg's leak of the Pentagon

Papers three months later, but in my opinion it deserves equal stature.

 

Found among the Media documents was a new word, " COINTELPRO, " short

for the FBI's " secret counterintelligence program, " created to

investigate and disrupt dissident political groups in the U.S. Under

these programs, beginning in 1956, the bureau worked to " enhance the

paranoia endemic in these circles, " as one COINTELPRO memo put it, " to

get the point across there is an FBI agent behind every mailbox. "

 

The Media documents — along with further revelations about COINTELPRO

in the months and years that followed — made it clear that the bureau

had gone beyond mere intelligence-gathering to discredit, destabilize

and demoralize groups — many of them peaceful, legal civil rights

organizations and antiwar groups — that the FBI and Director J. Edgar

Hoover found offensive or threatening.

 

For instance, agents sought to persuade Martin Luther King Jr. to kill

himself just before he received the Nobel Prize. They sent him a

composite tape made from bugs planted illegally in his hotel rooms

when he was entertaining women other than his wife — and threatened to

make it public. " King, there is one thing left for you to do. You know

what it is, " FBI operatives wrote in their anonymous letter.

 

Under COINTELPRO, the bureau also targeted actress Jean Seberg for

having made a donation to the Black Panther Party. The fragile actress

ultimately committed suicide after a gossip nugget based on a FBI

wiretap was leaked to the L.A. Times and published. The item,

suggesting that the father of the baby she was carrying was a Black

Panther rather than her French writer-husband, turned out to be wrong.

 

The sheer reach of a completely politicized FBI was one of the most

frightening revelations of the Media documents. Underground newspapers

were targeted. Students (and their professors) were targeted.

Celebrities were targeted. The Communist Party of the U.S.A., the

Southern Christian Leadership Conference, the Student Non-Violent

Organizing Committee, the Black Panther Party, the Women's Strike for

Peace — all were targeted. " Neutralize them in the same manner they

are trying to destroy and neutralize the U.S., " one memo said.

 

Eventually, the COINTELPRO memos — some from Media and some unearthed

later — prompted hearings led by Rep. Don Edwards of California and by

Sen. Frank Church of Idaho on intelligence agency abuses. In the

mid-1970s, the wayward agency began finally to be reined in.

 

It is tragic when people lose faith in their government to the extent

that they feel they must break laws to expose corruption.

 

But a war that had been started and sustained by lies had gone on for

years. And a government had betrayed its citizens, manipulating their

fear to strengthen its grip on power.

 

Today, again, many people worry that their government may be on the

road to subverting its own ideals. I hope that the commemoration of

those unknown activists being held today in Media, Pa., will serve as

a reminder that fighting for democracy abroad must remain more than

merely an excuse to weaken civil liberties at home.

 

Allan M. Jalon is a longtime contributor to The Times and other

publications on issues of culture and media.