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blue bits. red rocks.
Tuesday 30 December 2008

The idealistic former altar boy joined the C.I.A. because he wanted to be part of the solution. It was 1957. Agee had tried law school and considered entering the family business — but blanched at the prospect of finding himself as one more drone in a gray flannel suit. He thrilled, as a young C.I.A. trainee, to explanations of the underlying purpose of the adventure he was about to embark upon: to secure democratic governments in order to help them “effect the reforms that will eliminate the injustices on which communism thrives.” He soon found himself in a vicious circle: “the more we work to build up the security forces like the police and military, particularly the intelligence services, the less urgency, it seems, attaches to the reforms.” The years went by; the Marxisant revelations unfolded inexorably. He started to wonder whether protecting oligarchs, while keeping their states in peonage to U.S. investors under cover of “development,” wasn’t in fact the purpose of U.S. policy. He was, Agee now reckoned, part of the problem. Philip Agee - Unspooked

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