I had an interesting conversation on Dec. 22 with Thomas Boghardt, the historian at the International Spy Museum in Washington, and Oleg Kalugin, former Major General in the KGB, who is a member of the museum’s advisory board.
Thomas is researching the Soviet Bloc AIDS disinformation campaign and wanted to talk with me about it. I showed him a copy of the original covert disinformation press placement on this issue – a July 16, 1983 story in the Indian English-language newspaper Patriot, which was set up by the KGB.
The article, “AIDS may invade India: Mystery disease caused by US experiments,” purported to be an anonymous letter from a “well-known American scientist and anthropologist.” But several language errors revealed it was not written by a native English speaker.
First, it referred twice to the “virus flu,” instead of the “flu virus,” as English speakers say. At another point, it talked about the “real danger that AIDS may rapidly spread to India with the grave consequences to the people of the country.” A native English speaker would say “grave consequences,” not “the grave consequences,” probably followed by “for” instead of “to.” There is no definite article, aka the word “the,” in Russian, so Russian speakers frequently use a “the” when they shouldn’t – a further clue to the article’s origin.
The article also showed the signs of thorough, professional research characteristic of KGB’s Service A, which was responsible for disinformation. It cited The Army Research, Development and Acquisition Magazine, an odd magazine for an anthropologist to be reading. Oleg Kalugin noted that Soviet intelligence officers pored through obscure U.S. government publications on a regular basis, searching for something that could be taken out of context and used for their purposes.
In March 1992, then-Russian foreign intelligence chief (and later Russian Prime Minister) Yevgeni Primakov admitted that the KGB had concocted the AIDS-made-by-Pentagon story. The Russian newspaper Izvestiya reported on March 19, 1992:
[Primakov] mentioned the well known articles printed a few years ago in our central newspapers about AIDS supposedly originating from secret Pentagon laboratories. According to Yevgeni Primakov, the articles exposing US scientists’ “crafty” plots were fabricated in KGB offices.
In Oleg’s estimation, Russian disinformation and “active measures” went through a period of relative dormancy after the collapse of the USSR, but have revived. More on that later.
Todd Leventhal is the Department’s expert on conspiracy theories and misinformation—stories that are untrue, but widely believed. He enjoys reading obituaries, which tell the personal stories of people who have shaped the fabric of American life.
Todd became interested in international affairs after a four-month trip to the Soviet Union, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India in 1972. He worked for Voice of America for seven years and bikes to work year-round.
Comments (2)
Dr.
20 January 2009 at 14:00 EST
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Well, regardless of what name we call the perps, the fact remains that HIV was created. Now, what facilities in what countries have that ability? Also, just because something may be manufactured in Syria (for a random example), does not mean Syrian people or the lawful Syrian government is behind it, endorses it, or even knows about it. This is where military entities come in handy. This is where “secret societies” and the intelligence community come in handy. If a certain group was legally branded, “above the law” then why wouldn’t they become lawless? Have agendas of their own? Have the ability to muzzle the press?
Snapple
29 September 2009 at 12:57 EDT
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I had a friend named Brent Anderson who got sick with AIDS in China in 1987. The Airforce brought him home because no airline company would help him. His dad had to pay about 50 thousand dollars. I read an article in a Soviet paper that basically said he was sent to China by the CIA as a biological weapon against the USSR because China has a long border with the USSR.
I lost that article, but maybe someone would know about it. I think it was Ukrainian.
Isn’t that stupid?
I have read that scientists have discovered that AIDS has been around for a long time in Africa.