In early 1963, African students in Bulgaria violently clashed with police after authorities banned their attempts to establish and all-African Students’ Union.
How could 🇬🇧 exploit this??
2/9
By forging a World Federation of Democratic Youth response obviously
(WFDY being a Soviet front)
3/9
They posted it in English, French and Spanish from an unknown location to 275 addresses across Africa and South America.
These included newspapers, youth orgs, and influential personalities.
4/9
The forged response professed to urge solidarity against “ultra-colonialist” (🇺🇸 🇬🇧) attempts to drive a wedge between European and African youth.
It was full of earnest statements about the scourge of racism and supporting African youth.
BUT…
5/9
… at the same time it slipped in references to African students being primitive, morally weak, and uncivilised.
6/9
It claimed: African students were “emerging from the jungle darkness of want” and so didn’t know how to behave in civilised society. ?!?!
So how did it go down?
7/9
The forgery received press coverage across the continent, with many newspapers reacting violently.
At least one college directly protested to the WFDY
8/9
It’s a fascinating example of western propaganda trying to inflame racial tension.
🚨 IMPORTANT CONTEXT 🚨
This took place on a much smaller, less aggressive, and less deceitful scale than concurrent Soviet activity
9/9
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Lots of recent analysis plays up the importance of exposing hostile Russian intelligence activity as a core part of the Western response.
But this is flawed because exposure isn’t enough - and can backfire
Here’s what recent research tells us ... 🧵 1/7
Exposure isn’t “a switch”. To have consequences it requires revelation too: “a collective recognition that something has happened”. See @stamp in @SecDialogue 2/7
Turns out it’s the 50th anniversary of Allende’s election win in Chile.
Guess what?
The U.K. had a bash at covert action to undermine him too.
[short thread on how and why] 1/5
U.K. admission (incredibly rare to see):
“Because there is a v real danger that the communists might gain control of this country by constitutional means, we are concentrating on covert operations which we think could influence the result of the next election”
2/5
What did U.K. do?
- bribed radio producers to buy airtime
- meddled in trade union politics
- influenced universities
- built up contacts in Christian Dems + “the left wing” parties
But all this was dwarfed by CIA activity. So why bother to take risk???
3/5