Operation Gladio: The Unholy Alliance Between the Vatican, the CIA, and the Mafia

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A second level, formed by a rapid response guerrilla unit which was to be immediately activated behind enemy lines, recalling the partisan forces of WWII. a b The Dark Side of the West, Conference "Nato Secret Armies and P-26," ETH Zurich, 2005. Published 10 February 2005. Retrieved February 7, 2007. On May 7, 1952, General Broccoli traveled to Paris in the company of Colonel Santini, mentioned earlier. The decision not to join the CPC was relayed to allies. Confirming the judgment that had already been formed on the occasion of British offers of collaboration, SIFAR thus began a long road of exclusive ties with American intelligence services, refusing any type of multilateral agreement with other NATO powers.

Operation Gladio, Part I: the First Years Inquiry into Operation Gladio, Part I: the First Years

In 1965, police discovered a stay-behind arms cache in an old mine close to Windisch-Bleiberg and forced the British authorities to hand over a list with the location of 33 other caches in Austria. [12] The name ‘Operation Gladio’ first emerged in a meeting on 19 October 1956 between representatives of SIFAR (Colonel Giuliu Fettarappa Sandri, Major Mario Accasto) and representatives of the CIA (Bob Porter, John Edwards). From the very first meeting, particular procedures were adopted relating to the drafting and transmission of documentation regarding Gladio. Each official document (records of agreements, minutes of meetings, memoranda) was to be drafted both in English and Italian, with a maximum of four hard copies produced. The documents were filed under the ‘Gladio’ moniker, followed by progressive numbers. Accusations emerged that Gladio’s Greek wing had connections to extremist elements within the military and may have played a role in supporting the oppressive regime. André Moyen, former Belgian secret agent, also declared that Gladio had operated in Spain. [77] He said that Gladio had bases in Madrid, Barcelona, San Sebastián, and the Canary islands.A June 1 st document is significant because it unmasks the ultimate goals sought by the structure: to keep Italy within the NATO defence system guaranteed by the United States, through a structure depending on SIFAR. This dependence was justified by the necessity to avoid that “other uncontrolled organisations, or at the interest of other parties” could themselves create analogous initiatives.

Operation Gladio - Hard Evidence of Government False Flag Operation Gladio - Hard Evidence of Government False Flag

Despite the protestations of the ‘connected’ services, as illustrated by their frequent appeals to use Gladio structures primarily for joint planning, SIFAR defended the necessity of integrating pre-existing guerrillas into the clandestine network by reminding the Americans that the tasks entrusted to them were entirely in line with the stay-behind program, given that they were for the “control and neutralisation of communist activities” (‘Gladio/41’, 3 December 1958). Haberman, Clyde; Times, Special to The New York (16 November 1990). "Evolution in Europe; Italy Discloses Its Web Of Cold War Guerrillas". The New York Times . Retrieved 20 February 2015.Political policy encouraging violent struggle The interior of the Banca Nazionale dell'Agricoltura in Piazza Fontana, Milan, after it was bombed in 1969 It was the world right after World War II. Entire cities lay in ruins, battle scars were still fresh, and a new ideological war was taking shape. The Iron Curtain had descended across Europe, and the possibility of a Soviet advance was a nightmare scenario that haunted the West.

Operation Gladio: The Unholy Alliance between the Vatican Operation Gladio: The Unholy Alliance between the Vatican

Paul L. Williams (2015). Operation Gladio: The Unholy Alliance between the Vatican, the CIA, and the Mafia, Prometheus Books. ISBN 978-1616149741. Secret Warfare: Operation Gladio and NATO's Stay-Behind Armies. Edited by Daniele Ganser and Christian Nuenlist, 29 Nov 2004. Parallel History Project, ETH Zürich. ( Internet Archive mirror) Subsequent investigations have provided a glimpse into Cold War espionage’s complexity and moral ambiguity. Yet, many questions remain unanswered, and the full extent of Operation Gladio’s reach is still shrouded in mystery. Operation Gladio: A Cold War Relic or a Continuing Legacy? This article relies excessively on references to primary sources. Please improve this article by adding secondary or tertiary sources. More specifically the parliamentary inquiry concerning militia-activity (1980) and combatting serious crime and terrorism (1988), ( more).Leo A. Müller, Gladio. Das Erbe des kalten Krieges, 1991, RoRoRo-Taschenbuch Aktuell no 12993 ( ISBN 3499 129930). (in German) Speculation that the Netherlands was involved in Gladio arose from the accidental discovery of large arms caches in 1980 and 1983. [50] In the latter incident, people walking in a forest near the village of Rozendaal, near Arnhem, chanced upon a large hidden cache of arms, containing dozens of hand grenades, semiautomatic rifles, automatic pistols, munitions and explosives. [51] [52] That discovery forced the Dutch government to confirm that the arms were related to NATO planning for unorthodox warfare. [53] Amongst the papers of the 7th Division of SISMI acquired by the Parliamentary Committee of Inquiry are two versions of the “Gladio/1” document, which differ only in their title. One version (which is commonly referred to in the field of official Gladio documentation and which appears to have been the same sent to the Committee by the Prime Minister on March 1, 1991) translates the English expression “restatement of agreements” as “re-elaboration of agreements”; in the other version the title was simply (and unfaithfully) translated as “agreement”. Richard Norton-Taylor, " The Gladio File: did fear of communism throw West into the arms of terrorists?", in The Guardian, December 5, 1990

Operation Gladio: How NATO Conducted a Secret War Against Operation Gladio: How NATO Conducted a Secret War Against

However, the story of Operation Gladio is far from a heroic tale. Over time, allegations surfaced that these secret armies were involved in more than just preparing for potential invasions.

In Austria, the first secret stay-behind army was exposed in 1947. It had been set up by the far-right Theodor Soucek and Hugo Rössner, who both insisted during their trial that "they were carrying out the secret operation with the full knowledge and support of the US and British occupying powers." Sentenced to death, they were pardoned under mysterious circumstances by President Körner (1951–1957). Fernandes, Desmond; Ozden, Iskender (Spring 2001). "United States and NATO Inspired 'Psychological Warfare Operations' Against The 'Kurdish Communist Threat' in Turkey" (PDF). Variant. 12. Archived from the original (PDF) on 21 August 2023. Peer Henrik Hansen, "Falling Flat on the Stay-Behinds," International Journal of Intelligence and CounterIntelligence, January 2006, 182-186. S.T.C/Mob. [9] ( Dutch: Sectie training, communicatie en documentatie "Training, Communication and Documentation Service"), residing under the Staatsveiligheid and thus the minister of Justice.