The Ford Foundation and the CIA: a documented case of philanthropic collaboration with the secret police
The Ford Foundation and the CIA: a documented case of philanthropic collaboration with the secret police
The CIA uses philanthropic foundations as the most effective conduit for channeling large sums of money to the Agency's projects without alerting ...
The CIA uses philanthropic foundations as the most effective conduit for channeling large sums of money to Agency projects without alerting recipients to its source. From the early 1950s to the present, the intrusion of the CIA into the field of the foundation was / and is enormous.by James petras
An investigation by the United States Congress in 1976 revealed that almost 50% of the 700 grants in the field of international activities of the main foundations were financed by the CIA (Saunders, pp. 134-135). The CIA considers foundations such as Ford "The best and most plausible type of financing coverage" (Saunders 135).
The collaboration of respectable and prestigious foundations, according to a former CIA agent, allowed the Agency to finance "a seemingly unlimited range of covert action programs that affect youth groups, unions, universities, publishers and other private institutions" (p. 135).
The latter included "human rights" groups from the 1950s to the present. One of the most important "private foundations"collaborate with the CIA for a significant period of time in large projects in the cultural field Cold War is the Ford Foundation.This essay will show that the Ford-CIA Foundation Connection it was a deliberate and conscious joint effort to strengthen the imperial cultural hegemony of the United States and undermine the left's political and cultural influence.
We will continue to examine the historical links between the Ford Foundation and the CIA during the Cold War, examining the Presidents of the Foundation, their joint projects and objectives, as well as their common efforts in various cultural areas.
Background: Ford Foundation and the CIA.
In the late 1950s, the Ford Foundation had more than $ 3 billion in assets. The leaders of the Foundation were in complete agreement with the projection of world power after the Second World War in Washington.
A leading scholar of the time writes:
"At times it seemed that the Ford Foundation was simply an extension of government in the area of international cultural propaganda.The foundation had a history of close involvement in secret actions in Europe, in close collaboration with the Marshall Plan and CIA officials. in specific projects. " (Saunders, p.139)
This is illustrated graphically by the appointment of Richard Bissell as President of the Foundation in 1952. In his two years in office, Bissell often met with CIA chief Allen Dulles and other CIA officials in a "search" mutual "of new ideas. .
In 1954, Bissell left Ford to become a special assistant to Allen Dulles in January 1954 (Saunders p. 139). Under Bissell, the Ford Foundation (FF) was the "vanguard of Cold War thinking." One of the projects of the First Cold War of FF was the establishment of a publishing house, Intercultural Publications, and the publication of a magazine Perspectives in Europe in four languages.
The purpose of the FF according to Bissell was not "so much to defeat the left intellectuals in the dialectical combat (sic) as to move them away from their positions" (Saunders, p.140).
The board of directors of the publishing house was completely dominated by the cold cultural warriors. Given the strong left-wing culture in Europe in the post-war period, the prospects did not attract readers and went bankrupt.
Another Der Monat magazine, financed by the Confidential Fund of the United States Army and directed by Melvin Lasky, was taken over by the FF to give it the appearance of independence (Saunders p.140).
In 1954 the new president of the FF was John McCloy. He personified imperial power. Before becoming president of the FF, he had been Undersecretary of War, President of the World Bank, High Commissioner of Occupied Germany, President of Chase Manhattan Bank of Rockefeller, Wall Street lawyer for the seven major oil companies and director of numerous corporations .
As High Commissioner in Germany, McCloy had provided coverage to dozens of CIA agents (Saunders p.141). McCloy integrated the FF with the operations of the CIA. He created an administrative unit within the FF specifically to deal with the CIA. McCloy led a three-person consultation committee with the CIA to facilitate the use of the FF for coverage and a conduit of funds.
With these structural links, the FF was one of those organizations that the CIA could mobilize for political war against the anti-imperialist and pro-communist left. Numerous "fronts" of the CIA received important FF grants. Numerous cultural organizations, human rights groups, artists and intellectuals, supposedly "independent", sponsored by the CIA, received grants from the CIA / FF.
One of the FF's largest donations was to the Congress organized by the CIA for Cultural Freedom, which received $ 7 million in the early 1960s. Numerous CIA agents obtained a job at the FF and continued to work closely with the Agency (Saunders p 143).
From its origins there was a close structural relationship and exchange of personnel at the highest levels between the CIA and the FF. This structural link was based on the common imperial interests they shared.
The result of their collaboration was the proliferation of a series of magazines and access to the media promoted by the United States. Intellectuals used to launch vituperative polemics against Marxists and other anti-imperialists. The FF financing of these anti-Marxist organizations and intellectuals provided legal coverage for their claims to be "independent" of government funding (CIA).
FF funding from CIA cultural fronts was important in recruiting non-communist intellectuals who were encouraged to attack the Marxist And the communist left. Many of these non-communist leftists later claimed that they were "cheated," that if they had known that FF was in charge of the CIA, they would not have lent their name and prestige.
This disillusionment of the anti-communist left, however, took place after the revelations of the collaboration of the FF-CIA were published in the press. Were these anti-communist social democrats really naive enough to believe that all the congresses in luxury villas and five-star hotels in Lake Como, Paris and Rome, all the expensive art exhibits and glossy magazines were mere acts of voluntary philanthropy? Maybe.
But even the most naive must have been aware that in all the Congresses and magazines the objective of the criticisms was "Soviet imperialism" and Communist tyranny "and" the leftist apologists of the dictatorship ":
- although it was an open secret that the United States intervened to overthrow the democratic government of Arbenz in Guatemala and the Mossadegh regime in Iran and human rights were massively violated by US-backed dictators in Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Nicaragua and other places.
The "outrage" and affirmations of "innocence" of many anti-communist leftist intellectuals after their membership in the cultural fronts of the CIA were revealed with a great deal of cynical skepticism. A leading journalist, Andrew Kopkind, wrote of a deep sense of moral disillusionment with CIA cultural fronts funded by private foundations.
He wrote:
"The distance between the rhetoric of the open society and the reality of control was greater than anyone thought, all those who went abroad for a US organization were, in one way or another, witness to the theory that the world It was divided between communism and democracy and anything in between was treason.
"The illusion of dissent remained: the CIA supported the cold socialist warriors, the cold fascist warriors, the cold white and black warriors, and the catholicity and flexibility of the CIA operations were important advantages. 408-409).
When an American journalist Dwight Macdonald who was editor of Encounter (an influential cultural magazine funded by the FF-CIA) sent a critical article about the culture and politics of the United States. UU 321).
In the field of painting and theater, the CIA worked with the FF to promote abstract expressionism against any artistic expression with social content, providing funds and contacts for highly publicized exhibitions in Europe and favorable reviews by "sponsored" journalists. "
The interlinked leadership between the CIA, the Ford Foundation and the Museum of Modern Art in New York led to a lavish promotion of "individualistic" art at a distance from the people, and a vicious attack on European painters, writers and dramatists writing from a realistic critical perspective. . "Abstract expressionism", whatever the intention of his artist, became a weapon in the Cold War (Saunders, p.263).
The history of collaboration and linkage of the Ford Foundation with the CIA in pursuit of the world hegemony of the United States is now a well-documented fact. The remaining problem is whether that relationship continues into the new millennium after the exhibitions of the 1960s. The FF made some superficial changes.
They are more flexible in providing small grants to human rights groups and academic researchers who occasionally disagree with United States policy. They are not as likely to recruit CIA agents to run the organization. More significantly, they are likely to collaborate more openly with the United States government on their cultural and educational projects, particularly with the International Development Agency.
The FF has somehow refined its style of collaboration with Washington's attempt to produce world cultural domination, but it has retained the essence of that policy. For example, the FF is very selective in the financing of educational institutions.
As the IMF, the FF imposes conditions such as the "professionalization" of the academic staff and the "elevation of standards".
In effect, this translates into the promotion of social scientific work based on the assumptions, values and orientations of the United States' empire; have professionals disengaged from the class struggle and connected with pro-imperial academics from the United States and officials of foundations that support the neoliberal model.
As in the 1950s and 1960s, the Ford Foundation today selectively funds anti-leftist human rights groups that focus on attacking human rights violations of US adversaries and distance themselves from organizations and leaders. of anti-imperialist human rights.
The FF has developed a sophisticated strategy for funding human rights groups (HRG) that appeals to Washington to change its policy while denouncing the adversaries of the United States for their "systematic" violations.
The FF supports HRG which equates the massive state terror of the United States with the individual excesses of the anti-imperialist adversaries. The FF finances HRG that does not participate in massive anti-globalization and anti-neoliberal actions and defends the Ford Foundation as a legitimate and generous "nongovernmental organization".
History and contemporary experience tells a different story. At a time when Washington's funding of cultural activities by Washington is suspect, the FF plays a very important role in the projection of the cultural policies of the United States as an apparently "private" non-political philanthropic organization.
The links between senior officials of the FF and the government of the United States are explicit and continuous. A review of the recently funded projects reveals that the FF has never financed any major project that contravenes US policy.
In the current period of a major political-military offensive in the United States, Washington raised the issue as "terrorism or democracy," just as during the Cold War he posed the question as "Communism or Democracy."
In both cases, the Empire recruited and financed "avant-garde organizations, intellectuals and journalists to attack their anti-imperialist adversaries and neutralize their democratic critics." The Ford Foundation is well-placed to resume its role as collaborator and cover of the New War Cold Culture.
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