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Ian Masters' "Truth Package" – Censored by the CIA

Alex Constantine - March 13, 2006

KPFK Listener Forum

 

Ian Masters' "Truth Package" - Censored by the CIA

Sun Feb 26, 2006 12:06

69.224.231.18

 

http://www.buzzflash.com/interviews/03/09/12_baer.html

 

Bob Baer, a "former" CIA case officer interviewed by

Ian Masters this morning, admits in the interview

below that his book - offered as a KPFK fund-raising

premium - was heavily censored by the CIA. Yet Masters

calls it a "truth" package. It's CIA from cover to

cover. Some "truth."

 

The trtipe coming from Pacifica these days is

unbearable to anyone who follows domestic fascism and

covert operations. I've noticed that callers to Ian's

show constantly accuse Masters of being compromised.

We're not all dupee, and some of know exactly what Ian

Masters is about - deceiving the listeners of KPFK

with complete arrogance because the management at KPFK

is more concerned with fund-raising than factual

reporting, and allows this farce to continue.

 

- AC

 

http://www.buzzflash.com/interviews/03/09/12_baer.html

 

...

BUZZFLASH: Let me begin by asking you, just to

establish your background, you wrote a book called See

No Evil, in which you talked about your career with

the CIA. Can you explain a little bit more about what

your background and areas of responsibility were with

the CIA?

ROBERT BAER: I spent 21 years in the CIA as what’s

called a case officer. That means that I went overseas

and served overseas almost all the years I spent with

the CIA, meeting with what we call agents. Those are

foreigners who spy for the CIA. And you write up their

reports and send them back to Washington. So I was a

field officer, in short.

BUZZFLASH: In what area? You did serve in Iraq, if I

recall, in reading your book.

BAER: I served in Iraq for awhile. A couple times I

was there on a temporary basis. I was mostly in the

Middle East – Lebanon, Syria, Egypt and Bosnia as well

as a couple of other countries.

BUZZFLASH: So you have extensive experience with the

Middle East.

BAER: Yes.

BUZZFLASH: As a gatherer of what is called "human

intelligence."

BAER: Yes.

BUZZFLASH: Now in reading through the book we’re going

to discuss, Sleeping With the Devil, I noticed there

are many thick black bars through it that I assumed

were censored by the CIA. Is that correct?

BAER: Yes. They get the manuscript in advance of

publishing.

BUZZFLASH: So the CIA basically vets it and approves

it, minus whatever they feel is necessary to black out

or censor.

BAER: Yes, they don’t mess with the content. They just

say: Listen, this is our stuff. You can’t publish it.

BUZZFLASH: The book’s full title is Sleeping With the

Devil – How Washington Sold Our Soul for Saudi Crude,

and you cover several administrations. The claims you

make here seem to apply, for the most part, whether

they’re Democrat or Republican. And you, of course,

focus on Saudi Arabia. What compelled you to write the

book?

BAER: I’d always been fascinated by Saudi Arabia. And

I’d always noticed that on general intelligence

reports that are sent around in the field, and in

Washington, there’s virtually nothing said about Saudi

Arabia. Every Arab that I talked to – and I know a lot

of them – kept on talking about the disputes in the

royal family, huge contracts, the Wahhabi's funding

Lebanese politics. It became clear to me, even though

I wasn’t seeing much in the CIA traffic, or State

Department, or anywhere else, that this was a key

country.

So when I got back to Washington in ’95 – and I stayed

there until I resigned from the CIA – I said, all

right, I don’t know a whole lot about Saudi Arabia.

What about Saudi Arabia? And I got onto the computer

and I took a look around, and there just wasn’t

anything useful. I mean, you, as a journalist, would

have looked at this and said: It’s junk. There’s

nothing here. And especially nothing that goes deep

into the problems in Saudi Arabia.

At the same time, I started running into these

assessments of the oil industry, and just how much

damage you could do to the processing facilities, not

the pipelines, if you were a terrorist and wanted to

bring the Saudis down. And then 9/11 came along, and

the 15 Saudis that caused it.