Palestinian groups, Eastern bloc nations, and Cuba;
Moscow accepted the support that its allies and friends gave to revolutionary groups because these actions either advanced its interests or were “the price to be paid” for maintaining and strengthening its influence with its friends and allies; and
the Soviet Union’s policy of supporting various forms of revolutionary violence was likely to continue because it enhanced Soviet interests at minimal cost and with little damage to Soviet prestige.29
The SNIE made it clear that the Soviets were responsible to a significant degree for the phenomenon of modern international terrorism. The Soviets became involved in the deadly movement after Israel’s stunning victory in the June 1967 Arab-Israeli War. After the war the Palestinians had concluded that conventional Arab military forces could not defeat Israel and decided to mount a protracted guerrilla war against Israel just as the Vietcong guerrillas were doing against the United States in South Vietnam. This change in Palestinian strategy coincided with Moscow’s determination to play a more prominent role in the affairs of the Middle East. The Palestinians believed that effective use of terrorism would demonstrate their national strength and would prompt Israel to respond with repressive measures that would turn international public opinion against them and encourage many Palestinians living in exile to join the armed struggle against Zionism. The Soviet Union and its allies in Eastern Europe developed the Palestinian insurgent movement into an effective fighting force and, in the process, trained several guerrillas in the complex workings of international terrorism.
In the late 1960s Soviet, Czech, and East German instructors trained a large number of PLO commandos in camps located in Czechoslovakia. The Palestinians then established their own training facilities in several countries throughout the Middle East and North Africa. By the early 1970s the Palestinians were training not only their own guerrillas but also members of several nihilist terrorist groups such as the West German Baader-Meinhoff Gang, the Italian Red Brigades, and the Japanese Red Army. In return the PLO received political and logistical support from several nihilist groups in Europe. By 1970 the Soviets had very little direct involvement in terrorist training yet, according to Reagan’s deputy CIA director Adm. Bobby Inman, little doubt remained that the Soviets were “the grandparents” of modern international terrorism. “They built the original training camps and gave the PLO the capability to train their own,” Inman said.30
The impact of the new Palestinian strategy was felt immediately. In the eighteen months following the June 1967 Arab-Israeli War the Israeli government reported more than twelve hundred terrorist attacks within the country’s borders. Furthermore, radical factions of the PLO, such as the Marxist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), refused to limit their guerrilla war to Israel. The PFLP vowed to attack Zionism and its supporters anywhere in the world.
Two essential conclusions can be drawn about Moscow’s involvement in international terrorism. First, although the Soviets were deeply engaged in supporting acts of revolutionary violence, their support was largely opportunistic. They hoped to advance their interests simply by creating trouble for their opponents. There was no centralized program for terrorism in Moscow but, if a revolutionary group sought assistance, the Soviets rarely turned it down. Second, international terrorism became self-sustaining largely through the efforts of the Soviet Union. Moscow conducted the initial terrorist training in the late 1960s and, by the end of the decade, its graduates were operating their own camps and carrying out their own terrorist operations. Therefore, since terrorism was operating independently of the Soviet Union, being able to persuade Moscow to disavow support for revolutionary or terrorist groups would not end the problem of terrorism. The SNIE did not support Haig’s view that the Soviet Union controlled day-to-day terrorist operations. The Soviets supported terrorism when the opportunity presented itself, but they did not call the shots.31
A decade later, after the collapse of Soviet communism in Eastern Europe, the former communist governments disclosed the true nature of the terror network. The Eastern Europeans, most notably East Germany, provided extensive support to several nihilist groups and freelance terrorist organizations. For example, the East German intelligence service, the Stasi, supplied the West Germany–based Red Army Faction with weapons, false documents, training, and funds. The East Germans also allowed Palestinian terrorists to use their country as an operating base and provided sanctuary to the notorious freelance terrorist Carlos. Hungary gave safe harbor to Carlos, Czechoslovakia operated a major terrorist training program, and Yugoslavia served as a major base of operations for the Palestinians. Sterling’s controversial hypothesis about a functioning terrorist network supported by interested outsiders, such as the Soviet Union, and Casey’s belief that the Soviet Union and its allies were extensively involved in international terrorism were both vindicated.32
The Reagan Administration Develops a Libya Policy
For senior policymakers in the State Department, the CIA, and the NSC there was no better target for Reagan’s advocacy of “swift and effective retribution” against terrorism than Qaddafi’s Libya. In a 1981 research paper titled Patterns of International Terrorism: 1980, the CIA identified Libya as “the most prominent state sponsor of and participant in international terrorism.”33 Whereas Admiral Inman referred to the Soviets as the “grandparents” of international terrorism, Claire Sterling labeled Qaddafi as “the Daddy Warbucks of terrorism.”34 Haig pointed out that Qaddafi’s oil revenue was “almost exclusively diverted to the purchase of armaments, the training of international terrorists, and the conduct of direct intervention in neighboring states of Northern Africa.”35 The CIA reported that Libya’s support for terrorism included “financing for terrorist operations, weapons procurement and supply, the use of training camps and Libyan advisers for guerrilla training, and the use of Libyan diplomatic facilities abroad as support bases for terrorist operations.”36
The Reagan administration immediately began crafting a systematic, comprehensive, and multifaceted strategy aimed at exerting extraordinary pressure on the Qaddafi regime. The strategy would consist of covert operations, diplomatic actions, economic sanctions, and demonstrations of military power.37 According to one official the plan would, as a minimum, “make life uncomfortable” for the Libyan dictator, whom many Reagan appointees erroneously perceived as a Soviet surrogate bent on spreading mischief throughout the Middle East and Africa.38 Administration officials hoped that an aggressive Libya policy would damage Qaddafi’s reputation as an Arab leader, isolate him diplomatically, dissuade him from new foreign adventures, and deprive him of international support in the event of a confrontation with the United States or one of its allies in the Middle East, namely Egypt. They wanted to weaken Qaddafi’s domestic authority and increase the likelihood that he would be removed from power. They sought the support of U.S. allies in Europe but were determined to carry out their plan with or without the help of the Europeans, who did not share their view of Qaddafi as a crazed terrorist and international menace.39
This dramatic change in U.S. policy toward Libya did not occur overnight. For a number of departments and agencies of the U.S. government—particularly the State Department, the Pentagon, and the CIA—producing a complicated strategy required several months of intense discussion and negotiation.40 Nevertheless, some of the components of the strategy were ready for implementation within a few months.
Planning covert operations against Libya began immediately. During his first week at the CIA Casey reviewed an SNIE titled Libya: Aims and Vulnerabilities. The secret study, which the Carter administration initiated following the attempted assassination in October 1980 of an exiled Libyan dissident living in Colorado, was completed only a few days before Casey took office. It contained a number of conclusions that piqued the director’s interest in taking direct action against Qaddafi.41 First, after his recent success in Chad, Qaddafi was likely to undertake other foreign ventures that would challenge U.S. and Western interests in the Middle East and Africa.42 Second, the number of recent
