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to do they want to do He's

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actually quite feared by

1:12

these quite powerful services quite powerful

1:15

services and countries. This is Cold

1:17

War Conversations. If you're new here If

1:19

you're new here, you've come

1:21

to the right place to

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listen to first Cold War history

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accounts. Do make sure make sure you

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follow us in your podcast app so

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that you don't miss out on

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future episodes. episodes. In the the and 1980s

1:34

and 1980s Prague became

1:36

a for destination for the

1:38

world's most prominent terrorists and

1:40

revolutionaries. They They arrived here

1:43

to seek refuge, enjoy

1:45

recreation or hold secret meetings

1:47

aimed at securing arms and other

1:49

and other forms of

1:51

support. the Jackals is the untold is

1:53

the untold story of Czechoslovakia's

1:55

complex relations with terrorists and

1:57

revolutionaries, including factors. of the

2:00

Palestine Liberation Organization, along with some

2:02

of the era's most infamous terrorists,

2:04

including Carlos the Jackal, the Munich

2:06

Olympics Massacre Commander Abu Dawold and

2:08

the Abu Nidal Organization. I'm delighted

2:10

to welcome Katerina Richterova to our

2:13

Cold War conversation. I decided to

2:15

write this book because I thought

2:17

that there was a lot more

2:19

that needed to be said about

2:21

Czechoslovakia's relationship with the Middle East

2:23

and with various violent non-state actors

2:25

that is, mostly from the Middle

2:28

East, and I decided to... call

2:30

these groups and members of these

2:32

violent non-state actor groups Jackals. I

2:34

chose to do that because I

2:36

think that a lot of their

2:38

methods resemble the activities that the

2:40

Jackal, the fictional character of Frederick

2:43

Forsytes, the day of the Jackal,

2:45

carried out in that legendary book

2:47

which is now a new series.

2:49

You know, in many ways they

2:51

were like him, they were enigmatic,

2:53

they were prone to targeting high-ranking

2:55

officials and also attacking symbolic... targets

2:58

and were feared by powerful governments.

3:00

But I think that they were

3:02

also in many ways, much like

3:04

wild jackals, right? So jackals who

3:06

attack their targets with much precision,

3:08

they also attack in impacts and

3:10

are quiet territorial about their beliefs

3:13

and causes. So that's why I

3:15

decided to. to go for this

3:17

term, I also thought that there

3:19

was a lot more that could

3:21

be said in general about how

3:23

states use their spies to interact

3:25

with various groups who use violence

3:28

as their means. But it wouldn't

3:30

really be possible without having access

3:32

to documents. And I think it

3:34

was kind of a lucky coincidence

3:36

that at the time when I

3:38

was thinking about diving deeper into

3:40

this topic, documents in Prague, especially

3:43

in one of the archives there,

3:45

the security services archive on this

3:47

topic became available. Not all of

3:49

them, not at the same time.

3:51

Some of these documents I waited

3:53

for for... most of the decade,

3:55

especially some of the foreign intelligence

3:58

documents. But I was quite lucky

4:00

because the Czech Republic, unlike many

4:02

other states, including the US and

4:04

the UK, has an extremely liberal

4:06

rival policy, a link to this

4:08

particular type of documents to these

4:10

security documents from the Cold War

4:13

era and also from the Nazi

4:15

era protectored. And the reason why

4:17

they have quite a liberal take

4:19

on this is that this is

4:21

us. basically making these documents produced

4:23

by these infamous security and intelligence

4:25

services is a way the authors

4:28

of this legislation argue to come

4:30

to terms with this past and

4:32

really understand what these organizations did

4:34

and how they went about oppressing

4:36

the Czechoslovak population. So it is

4:38

kind of thanks to this approach

4:40

at dealing with the past that

4:43

actually the security archives in Prague

4:45

have such a liberal policy. And

4:47

what this really means is that

4:49

you have quite a lot of

4:51

detail there. There's no redictation. So

4:53

I was just in the archiving

4:55

queue, the national archive here in

4:58

the UK. It's a beautiful place

5:00

with amazing material, but a lot

5:02

of it is redacted or is

5:04

taken out withdrawn. So that is

5:06

typically not the case in Prague

5:08

with documents that were created during

5:11

the... Cold War or in the

5:13

decade or so prior. So you

5:15

get all sorts of fascinating files

5:17

that you don't really see in

5:19

the West. So you get files

5:21

of the officers, you see how

5:23

their career progressed within these security

5:26

services. You see some of the

5:28

challenges, some of the issues that

5:30

they had while serving there. You

5:32

see details of the operations that

5:34

they were engaged in. Then you

5:36

also get access to the target

5:38

files, so people who were either

5:41

subjected to surveillance or who became

5:43

other. targets, maybe targets of kidnappings,

5:45

targets of various active measures, various

5:47

operations. Yeah, there's amazing photos, there's

5:49

surveillance reports, very detailed reports where

5:51

you can see what everyone was

5:53

wearing on that day, including the

5:56

officers, including the... targets and all

5:58

that stuff. So that's been, it's

6:00

been a joy to work with

6:02

this kind of material. At the

6:04

same time, I must admit, it

6:06

gets a bit challenging because of

6:08

the sheer volume of this. So

6:11

there is a lot there and

6:13

the archive was kind of taken

6:15

over by the post-communist authority 30

6:17

years ago and they're doing an

6:19

absolutely fantastic job at organizing the

6:21

file of scanning these documents, but

6:24

there's still a lot of corners

6:26

within those, you know. masses of

6:28

files which we don't have a

6:30

good understanding of. So it's not

6:32

always easy to find what you're

6:35

looking for. You have to be

6:37

quite creative. You need to know

6:39

how the SDB worked, how it

6:41

was structured, who answered to whom,

6:43

in order to find out where

6:46

you could maybe find more on

6:48

what you're looking for. So this

6:50

is the archive that really made

6:52

this book, the security service archive

6:54

in Prague, but there were other

6:56

ones, especially the national archive in

6:59

Prague, which houses documents of the

7:01

Communist Party. So this was very

7:03

important to understand some of the

7:05

higher level discussions about... Prague's relationship

7:07

with these Jackals, especially with the

7:10

Palestinian Liberation Organization, with the PLO.

7:12

And then I also spent quite

7:14

a lot of time in the

7:16

Foreign Ministry of Foreign Affairs archive,

7:18

which obviously detailed some of the

7:21

foreign policies that were adopted by

7:23

Czechoslovakia during that time towards these

7:25

groups, but also towards a number

7:27

of Middle Eastern states who either

7:29

sponsored some of these groups or

7:32

were sort of save havens for

7:34

these groups. And they revealed quite

7:36

tough conversations that... actually these Czechoslovak

7:38

diplomats often had to have with

7:40

their Iraqi or Syrian or South

7:43

Yemeni counterparts. Yeah, indeed, indeed, because

7:45

I think I read in the

7:47

book that it gave you some

7:49

insight into how some of these

7:51

foreign intelligence organizations were because information

7:53

was being shared with the Czechoslovak

7:56

intelligence services. Yeah, it was shared,

7:58

but also also you know the

8:00

Czechoslovaks were doing their own surveillance

8:02

so they were conducting surveillance of

8:04

all of these embassies and had

8:07

a special department for that and

8:09

so they were quite interested in

8:11

what the Iraqi intelligence services were

8:13

doing on Czechoslovak territory what the

8:15

Syrians were doing and etc and

8:18

they they're while they were being

8:20

you know watched by the STB

8:22

they often saw that they were

8:24

interacting with these various Palestinian groups

8:26

so that's where these two worlds

8:29

intersected and we know and we

8:31

can talk about that later on

8:33

that for instance the Iraqi embassy

8:35

lent some of its cars and

8:37

safe houses to Carlos the Jekyll.

8:40

The Syrians allegedly provided support to

8:42

some of the members of some

8:44

of the more radical kind of

8:46

PLO groups such as Force 17.

8:48

So they were very much on

8:51

the SCB's radar because of the

8:53

operations that they were doing for

8:55

their own national kind of purposes

8:57

or goals or aims. but were

8:59

also on their radar because they

9:01

were clearly aiding some of these

9:04

more radical Palestinian groups and their

9:06

members who came to Czechoslovakia. Yeah,

9:08

and why did the Soviet countries

9:10

sort of give haven to these

9:12

jackals? Why were they supporting them

9:15

to some degree? Well, I argue

9:17

in the book that they were

9:19

a haven for some, but not

9:21

for others, that actually when we

9:23

look at the case of Czechoslovakia,

9:26

for instance, that we see that

9:28

that Prague had a very different

9:30

approach to say some of the

9:32

mainstream Palestinian groups, especially Fatah, the

9:34

main faction led by Yasser Arafat.

9:37

They created a longstanding, although quite

9:39

problematic in temperamental security and political

9:41

relationship with them. But with the

9:43

others, they weren't very keen to

9:45

have them on their territory. They

9:48

didn't ask Carlos the Jeko to

9:50

come. They didn't invite Abu Nidal's

9:52

men to come and recruit members

9:54

on their territory. They also didn't

9:56

invite him. 2017 or Black September

9:58

which were quite quite radical offshoots

10:01

of the PLO slash fatag. These

10:03

people, you know, traveled on fake

10:05

documents. They went to various countries

10:07

and Central Eastern Europe. And frankly,

10:09

I think that ultimately, especially in

10:12

the 80s, when countries such as

10:14

Czechoslovakia, but also others, I started

10:16

taking a harsher. kind of harsher

10:18

approach towards them and started adopting

10:20

various ways of countering these groups.

10:23

That's when these guys realized that

10:25

this wasn't a safe haven, that

10:27

they thought maybe that these communists

10:29

would welcome them with open arms,

10:31

but actually the documents I've seen

10:34

show that these at the ECB,

10:36

as well as their communist masters,

10:38

were very happy about having these

10:40

jackals who often engaged in various

10:42

terrorist attacks against Western, but also

10:45

Palestinian. targets. There was quite a

10:47

lot of Palestinian infighting. They didn't

10:49

want them on their territory. So

10:51

I would say that with those

10:53

that Prague and other countries decided

10:55

to strike a relationship with, which

10:58

is mostly, most notably, the Fatah

11:00

led by Yasser Arafat, that they

11:02

did that for strategic reasons. You

11:04

know, this was in the late,

11:06

late, late 60s, early 70s when

11:09

the PLO was becoming an important

11:11

player in the Middle East. This

11:13

was after the Arab armies were

11:15

defeated by Israel in 1967 in

11:17

the so-called Six Day War. And

11:20

Arafat and the other groups around

11:22

him became more prominent. They were

11:24

staging various guerrilla attacks against the

11:26

Israelis from, you know, places like...

11:28

Jordan or Syria. And so they

11:31

became important players. They couldn't be

11:33

ignored. And so from 1970 onwards,

11:35

they started having serious discussions with

11:37

the Soviet Union and with various

11:39

other Soviet bloc states about what

11:42

kind of help they can provide

11:44

them money, guns, but also political

11:46

and diplomatic support in venues such

11:48

as the UN. And gradually I

11:50

think by the mid-1970s the Soviet

11:52

Union but also other countries such

11:55

as Czechoslovakia they kind of lean

11:57

in and they say okay well

11:59

listen give you the support you

12:01

can set up a an office

12:03

here which was kind of like

12:06

a diplomatic mission but not from

12:08

the very beginning. You can, you

12:10

know, send your fighters here to

12:12

recuperate, we'll send some humanitarian aid

12:14

back, and several years later they

12:17

also sat down and decided to

12:19

strike a security alliance with them

12:21

because they thought it was important

12:23

to support these more mainstream Palestinian

12:25

groups. And especially, and we see

12:28

this from the documents and I

12:30

know that at the time, not

12:32

very many people in the West

12:34

thought that this was the case,

12:36

but we see... that Prague and

12:39

its security services but also its

12:41

diplomat tried to moderate the Palestinian

12:43

so they try to suggest that

12:45

diplomacy is really the main main

12:47

way to go and they try

12:50

to dissuade them from carrying out

12:52

terrorist attacks on European soil. Yeah

12:54

I find it particularly interesting that

12:56

you know countries like Czechoslovakia were

12:58

able to pursue their sort of

13:00

own foreign policy. You have this

13:03

image of the Warsaw Pact just

13:05

being this monolith, towing the line

13:07

of Moscow, but you know they're

13:09

differentiating to quite a strong degree

13:11

to the Moscow line as far

13:14

as the reception for these people.

13:16

Yeah, I think with the, again,

13:18

with the mainstream Palestinian groups or

13:20

with the PLO and... and mainly

13:22

it's faction with, sorry, it's faction

13:25

Fatah. We see that there is

13:27

a kind of joined and coordinated

13:29

approach across the Soviet bloc. This

13:31

is a strategic issue. The Soviet

13:33

Union wants to have the kind

13:36

of diplomatic presence and wants to

13:38

be a player when it comes

13:40

to the Middle East and peace

13:42

process. So it's a strategic decision

13:44

to support these guys. And we

13:47

see that, you know, The Czechoslovaks

13:49

do let the Soviets know when

13:51

they're dealing with Arafat with his

13:53

security people. They typically do that

13:55

through someone who they refer to

13:57

in the documents as... Mr. P.

14:00

or Pan-Porata, so Mr. Advisor, and

14:02

these were basically KGB and

14:04

these were basically

14:06

at various bits of the

14:08

Czechoslovak state of the

14:10

Czechoslovak state security service

14:12

and the are liaison officers

14:15

between the the services

14:17

and the Czechoslovak ones, and

14:19

so they would keep them informed.

14:21

to the when it came to

14:23

the other groups, not just me,

14:25

but I think other scholars

14:27

who looked at these relationships of

14:29

different Soviet bloc with these groups

14:32

We're struggling to find any kind

14:34

of unifying any coordination when it comes to these

14:36

other groups. So it comes to these

14:38

to Carlos the instance, when it comes

14:40

to Carlos the Jackal, we see

14:42

that there's conversations between the the Germans,

14:44

between Germans, the Hungarians and between

14:46

the but but they're not on the

14:48

same page. page. Everyone has a

14:50

different take on whether to support and

14:52

so, how whether he should, you know, he

14:55

should haven, get safe haven in Eastern

14:57

Europe Ford in which which country. is quite is

14:59

quite a lot of diversity there.

15:01

I think think both things are true.

15:03

On one hand, there are certain

15:05

issues that are of strategic importance

15:07

where Czechoslovakia the the German

15:09

Democratic Republic, Republic, others, others very

15:11

closely very closely with Moscow. But

15:14

then there's others where. kind of left

15:16

to their own to their own own devices

15:18

by Moscow maybe even, doesn't quite

15:20

know what they want to

15:22

do by Carlos what they want

15:24

He's actually quite feared

15:26

by these He's powerful services quite

15:28

powerful services and countries. So yeah, think

15:30

that the story of the

15:32

of the Jackals of the 1970s, 1980s is,

15:34

1980s is, of many you know...

15:36

there's kind of And one of the one

15:38

of the is is Soviet bloc didn't

15:40

didn't always act with one speak with

15:42

one voice, but that they

15:44

adopted different approaches to these Just

15:46

to maybe give you an example.

15:48

example, for instance, Chachesco's Romania,

15:50

were they were quite, quite about

15:53

who they they themselves with. with. So

15:55

they, as as far as we

15:57

know, they never collaborated with with Abunidal,

15:59

but they What

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exactly did I get here? You're

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a Toyota Crown Driver, and only Crown

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Family. Toyota, let's go places. Yeah,

28:39

it's constant challenges with the Czechoslovaks

28:41

to just keep all of these

28:43

organisations in line because they're also

28:45

potentially worried about a civil war

28:47

between these factions in Czechoslovakia. Yeah,

28:50

absolutely. So there's a number of

28:52

so-called rejectionist factions, so groups that,

28:54

you know, got really angered by

28:56

Arafat's politics more than once, typically,

28:58

you know, a couple times a

29:00

year. And some of them are

29:02

quite radical groups, especially the Abunidal

29:05

organization, which was set up in,

29:07

I think, the second half of

29:09

the 1970s, by someone called Abunidal,

29:11

who actually used to be Arafat's

29:13

envoy to Iraq, but then he

29:15

turned against him one. Harafad kind

29:17

of opened up to dialogue and

29:20

diplomacy instead of just sticking to

29:22

arm struggle. So basically since then,

29:24

Bounidal started killing off as many

29:26

Jews as he was killing off

29:28

modern Palestinians and he killed Palestinian

29:30

representatives and diplomats in Western Europe

29:32

and in Paris and in other

29:35

places. And the Czechoslovaks were really

29:37

worried that that fight was going

29:39

to come back to Czechoslovakia and

29:41

that they knew that there were

29:43

representatives there of all of these

29:45

groups. and that it took very

29:47

little to kind of, you know,

29:50

get them to a point where

29:52

when they'll metaphorically... their

29:54

swords And so so

29:56

this was another

29:58

reason why they

30:00

were watching these

30:02

jackals very intensely

30:05

and and very

30:07

closely you know, You know,

30:09

one of the things that Soviet block

30:11

states were worried about about is that

30:13

image that they were they were

30:15

know you know, of prosperity but also

30:17

you know of peace and that,

30:19

know these these regimes often

30:21

highlighted how there's, you know, how much know, how

30:24

much violence there was in the West and how

30:26

there wasn't any of that in

30:28

the East. And, you know, know if a

30:30

civil war between the Abu the

30:32

Abunidal faction and the you know fatah loyalists broken

30:34

out in Czechoslovakia, that would

30:36

be a disaster for this

30:38

image that Prague and its

30:40

other allies in the region

30:42

wanted to project. to project.

30:44

Absolutely absolutely and

30:46

the book obviously focused focuses

30:48

on the the Palestinian is

30:51

there but is there any evidence

30:53

in the files of any collusion

30:55

with people like the Red like the red

30:57

brigades or other Terrorists or

30:59

violent non -state actors. in

31:01

the in the rest of Europe. Yeah, so

31:03

I didn't find didn't

31:05

find any evidence show

31:08

that Czechoslovak that Czechoslovak intelligence

31:10

or security services would have

31:12

created an alliance similar, say, say

31:14

to that with Fatah with with

31:16

any of these groups. We

31:19

know that they watched members

31:21

of these groups when they

31:23

came to Czechoslovak territory closely if they

31:25

got a tip off. They were obviously were

31:27

obviously quite quite concerned

31:29

about this these Germans were mean, some

31:31

of these Germans were members

31:33

of some of these For groups,

31:36

right? For instance, Jackals, who was not He

31:38

was not I often have to use a have

31:40

to use a complicated term and

31:42

say he was associated with the

31:44

Palestinian cause because he was he was

31:47

a and he was basically was basically of

31:49

the Osama bin Laden He was

31:51

a Venezuelan man was a was

31:53

born man who was a family of I

31:55

call a a champagne Marxist. So very,

31:58

very wealthy business. who believed

32:00

in Marxism and who named his

32:02

three sons of Vladimir Ilich and

32:04

Lenin. So Carlos de Giacola was

32:07

the middle son Ilich Ramirez Sanchez.

32:09

And for very complicated reasons, mostly

32:11

family reasons, he ended up living

32:13

in London in his teens and

32:15

then he was sent to the

32:18

famous Atres Lumumba University in Moscow

32:20

in the late 60s to study

32:22

there with one of his brothers

32:24

by his dad. So his dad

32:26

sent him there to maybe turn

32:29

him into a... proper revolutionary. Carlos

32:31

the jackaloo at the time still

32:33

called and still went by his

32:35

birth name Ilich Aramira Sanchez wasn't

32:37

a very serious type. So he

32:40

got kicked out of this university,

32:42

I think after a year and

32:44

a half or so. And then,

32:46

you know, he befriended quite a

32:48

lot of Palestinians there, but were

32:51

also studying at the university and

32:53

decided to join their cause. And

32:55

so by the early 70s, he's

32:57

allegedly does. a bit of fighting

32:59

for them, it's quite unclear to

33:02

what extent those are just all

33:04

tales that he told journalists and

33:06

prosecutors later on or not. And

33:08

by 1970, mid-1970s, he's staging various,

33:10

you know, significant attacks because terrorist

33:12

attacks that we saw in the

33:15

1970s. He most famously... direct the

33:17

OPEC raid in 1975 in Vienna

33:19

where he raids this high-level meeting

33:21

of oil-rich countries and takes their

33:23

oil ministers hostage and then puts

33:26

them on a plane and tries

33:28

to take them to one of

33:30

them, you know, Middle Eastern North

33:32

African countries and ultimately I think

33:34

they end up in Algeria and

33:37

at this point he is still

33:39

working for one of the Palestinian

33:41

groups. His boss is Wadhi Hadad,

33:43

who I also talk about in

33:45

the book, and allegedly Wadhi Hadad

33:48

asked him to kill these guys,

33:50

but Carl Tajako decides to let

33:52

them go for a very, very

33:54

fact. financial reward. And so he's

33:56

kicked out of the Palestinian calls

33:59

or Palestinian group and sets up

34:01

his own. kind of terrorist outfit,

34:03

and he ends up, that's when

34:05

he ends up basically coming to

34:07

Central Eastern Europe. That's when you

34:10

can see that he's looking for

34:12

a place where his organization could

34:14

have a safe haven, he's looking

34:16

for headquarters, and for a while

34:18

he finds that in Hungary, but

34:21

then they also push him out.

34:23

But his girlfriend and later wife

34:25

was someone who was in, you

34:27

know, who was a German woman,

34:29

Magdalena Kop, and she was a

34:32

member of these ex-member of these

34:34

German. groups so the SCB obviously

34:36

watched her very closely but no

34:38

I didn't find and I think

34:40

my colleagues who've looked into some

34:43

of these non-Palestinian groups and their

34:45

presence in Czechoslovakia also didn't find

34:47

any evidence that would support some

34:49

of the thinking in the West

34:51

in the late 1970s and early

34:53

1980s which suggested that you know

34:56

Czechoslovakia and other countries were training

34:58

all of these groups maybe without

35:00

even discrimination and just kind of

35:02

providing support to anyone who wanted

35:04

to hurt the West. we didn't

35:07

find any evidence that thus far.

35:09

And how much did the West

35:11

know about these jackals being in

35:13

Czechoslovakia and other Eastern bloc countries?

35:15

Were they aware that there was

35:18

some sort of linkage going on

35:20

there? Yeah, so they were aware

35:22

and they were watching this I

35:24

think as much as they... could

35:26

and they were quite interested in

35:29

this especially after Ronald Reagan came

35:31

to power in the early 80s

35:33

his secretary of state Alexander Haig

35:35

he he was a survivor of

35:37

a terrorist attack actually staged by

35:40

one of the German groups when

35:42

he was a high-ranking NATO representative

35:44

he got attacked in in Belgium

35:46

and he was at his first

35:48

press conference actually he made this

35:51

a key issue and he said

35:53

that Moscow is using various ways

35:55

and its allies are using various

35:57

ways to support the groups that

35:59

are, you know, designed to bring

36:02

down the Western Way of Life

36:04

and he spent a lot of

36:06

his time in office and so

36:08

did, but then head of CIA

36:10

Bill Casey in, you know, trying

36:13

to find out how Moscow and

36:15

its allies were supporting these groups.

36:17

They, I think during that time,

36:19

there were two so-called NIE's national

36:21

intelligence estimates that were published on

36:23

this issue. I've spoken to some

36:26

of the people who participated in

36:28

writing these in the US intelligence

36:30

community, and I think they're still

36:32

arguing over, you know, whether there

36:34

was or wasn't enough evidence, and

36:37

ultimately what seemed to come out

36:39

of these exercises was that there

36:41

was an unequivocal evidence that Moscow

36:43

was directing this network of international

36:45

terrorist organizations and giving them all

36:48

these weapons and telling them to

36:50

go and attack the West. And

36:52

I didn't find any evidence of

36:54

anything like this. But they had,

36:56

you know, they had some of

36:59

their sources, like for instance, I

37:01

found obviously there were diplomats and

37:03

intelligence officers that who were based

37:05

in the Soviet bloc, for instance,

37:07

in the 1970s, UK. diplomats were

37:10

reporting about these high-level visits by

37:12

Arafat to Czechoslovakia. Someone called Richard

37:14

Dearlove, whose name might be familiar

37:16

to your listeners, who became the

37:18

head of SIS in the late

37:21

1990s. He was based in Prague,

37:23

and I found a very innocent-looking

37:25

letter that he wrote, a report

37:27

he wrote to the FCO saying,

37:29

you know, Barafar just visited this

37:32

country and so, so they were

37:34

keeping tabs and who was coming

37:36

in, who was going out. And

37:38

Czechoslovakia, especially in the 80s, is

37:40

mentioned as a place where the

37:43

West thought the Americans thought CIA,

37:45

but also the Brits. That was

37:47

a place where a lot of

37:49

these Palestinian Williams would have been

37:51

trained and they weren't wrong. The

37:53

only difference there is is that

37:56

now we know that they weren't

37:58

trained in these, you know, Kerala

38:00

tactics that... or sabotage tactics that...

38:02

say the East Germans would have

38:04

trained some of them in or

38:07

that the Czechoslovak trained some of

38:09

the South Africans in for instance.

38:11

in the 60s. So I think

38:13

I say in the introduction that

38:15

although these claims about Soviet bloc

38:18

support and how unified it wasn't

38:20

coordinated and how thorough and long

38:22

term it was, they were exaggerated,

38:24

but at the same time I

38:26

don't quite blame the West that

38:29

it did go that far because

38:31

there were really lots of indications

38:33

of members of these groups coming

38:35

to Central Eastern Europe and I

38:37

think at the time without having

38:40

access to these documents, the West

38:42

didn't quite understand that the Soviet

38:44

book was struggling with keeping these

38:46

guys out in the same way

38:48

that they were. Yeah, yeah, because

38:51

you can understand Reagan's sort of

38:53

focus on this because you've got

38:55

the the bombing of the discotheque

38:57

in West Berlin, which eventually was

38:59

linked to the the the Libyans

39:02

and then obviously the the US

39:04

air raid on Libya and then

39:06

there's the bombing of the US

39:08

marine barracks in Beirut as as

39:10

well, so you can see why

39:13

they've got this focus on there.

39:15

Yeah, but this starts earlier, you

39:17

know, and it kind of predates

39:19

Reagan's first term in office because

39:21

I think there's quite a few

39:23

journalists, maybe more conservative journalists, especially

39:26

in the 1970s, who write books

39:28

where they try to... kind of

39:30

make this argument that there's this

39:32

big network and it's all connected

39:34

and it's all you know these

39:37

these these terrorists who are run

39:39

by the Soviets are designed to

39:41

bring down the Western Way of

39:43

Life. One of the most famous

39:45

books on this is called the

39:48

Terror Network it's by Claire Sterling

39:50

and I think famously when when

39:52

when Reagan came to power and

39:54

his head of CIA Bill Casey

39:56

took over you know he he

39:59

criticized his analyst saying, you know,

40:01

I bought this book for I

40:03

forget how much but very little

40:05

money and he said I'd pay

40:07

you guys a lot lot more

40:10

and you don't give me as

40:12

good stuff as these journalists do.

40:14

And you know, I think journalists

40:16

do amazing work when it comes

40:18

to investigations. I wouldn't be able

40:21

to write this book without a

40:23

lot of journalistic work and investigations

40:25

that came before me. But there

40:27

were some people in the 1970s

40:29

who I think maybe wittingly or

40:32

unwittingly fell for some of the

40:34

propaganda and some. that was generated

40:36

in the West about the links

40:38

between these groups and the Soviet

40:40

Union and some people have even

40:43

called this a blowback that you

40:45

know some of these links between

40:47

these Cold War jackals and the

40:49

Soviet bloc were actually you know

40:51

manufactured in the CIA or OSIOS

40:54

propaganda machine and that they were

40:56

then fed back to these services

40:58

through these journalists. So it was

41:00

a complicated environment and you know

41:02

maybe unlike today we didn't have

41:04

as much access to data you

41:07

know today there's so much information

41:09

out there it's still complicated obviously

41:11

to piece together various stories which

41:13

happened under the surface but at

41:15

the time it was even more

41:18

complicated so so I understand how

41:20

how this could have happened but

41:22

I think that what we're finding

41:24

in the archives is that in

41:26

some instances they were right in

41:29

some they were not right and

41:31

that again two things are true

41:33

at the same time that it

41:35

There wasn't this conspiracy I would

41:37

argue happening between the Soviet bloc

41:40

and these terrorists. These were quite

41:42

complicated interactions and the groups had

41:44

quite strong agency and weren't easily

41:46

manipulated by these Soviet bloc countries.

41:48

But on the other hand there's

41:51

clearly... some support being provided from

41:53

weapons to training to money to

41:55

diplomatic support to other things so

41:57

yeah it's a complicated environment but

41:59

it makes even it makes for

42:02

an even more fascinating story than

42:04

if it was this very clean

42:06

cut conspiracy. It is a veritable

42:08

wilderness of mirrors I think I've

42:10

heard that phrase somewhere before. How

42:13

did the Helsinki Accords change? Did

42:15

that? That changed Czechoslovakia's assistance to

42:17

these organisations. Yeah, so you know,

42:19

it's obviously, you know this, but

42:21

maybe just for some of the

42:24

listeners out here. So in the

42:26

1970s there was obviously this era

42:28

of the taunts or kind of

42:30

easing of tensions between the West

42:32

and the East and it was

42:34

characterized by kind of increased. political

42:37

negotiations and improvement in economic relations,

42:39

that kind of stuff. And in

42:41

the mid-70s, in 1975, both sides

42:43

committed to what's known as the

42:45

Helsinki process, which was basically a

42:48

treaty or set of treaties, which

42:50

put additional emphasis on kind of

42:52

east-west cooperation and also adherence to

42:54

human rights. I think it had

42:56

ultimately a moderating effect on how

42:59

Czechoslovakia and other countries in the

43:01

Soviet blog went about their foreign

43:03

policy. I don't think by any

43:05

shape or form that the Helsinki

43:07

process or the detente turned them

43:10

into beacons of democracy. They were

43:12

still suppressing dissent. They were still

43:14

running, you know, extensive surveillance operations

43:16

against their populations. They were still

43:18

towing the party. line, but I

43:21

think it made them a lot

43:23

more careful about how, you know,

43:25

about using some of the what

43:27

what the STB would call sharp

43:29

measures, some of the more radical

43:32

covert operations or covert means such

43:34

as kidnapping, sabotage, assassinations, that kind

43:36

of stuff. I think they didn't

43:38

want to upset that balance that

43:40

they achieved, maybe not forever, but

43:43

but briefly in in a health

43:45

sinking. And this kept on Popping

43:47

up in some of the interviews

43:49

I did. I did quite a

43:51

few interviews for the book, you

43:54

know, in the Czech Republic in

43:56

Slovakia, in travel to interview someone

43:58

in a very small town in

44:00

Germany. I managed to hunt them

44:02

down. And one of the... SB

44:04

officers who I interviewed, he basically

44:07

told me that the Helsinki process

44:09

was kind of a turning point

44:11

for how Prague engaged with groups

44:13

that perpetrated acts of international terrorism

44:15

and that the communist regime did

44:18

not want to be. associated with

44:20

anything that had to do with

44:22

international terrorism and the SCB, you

44:24

know, it was made very clear

44:26

to them. And so that then

44:29

impacted how they engaged with these

44:31

groups and where they drew those

44:33

red lines and in what ways

44:35

they decided to liaise with them.

44:37

You describe the Abenidarlen, Carlos, as

44:40

laison von Terripe, how did... the

44:42

Czechoslovakian government try to control their

44:44

actions because you know as you've

44:46

said they've they've got ID that's

44:48

real so they can easily get

44:51

into the country I think in

44:53

one description it's like two months

44:55

later that they suddenly discover that

44:57

someone's in the country who is

44:59

one of these enfante ribe. You

45:02

know what are they doing to

45:04

control them? Because they can't put

45:06

them in... Well, they could potentially

45:08

put them in jail, but how

45:10

do they restrict them? See, but

45:13

this is the question. I thought

45:15

about this a lot and talked

45:17

to various lawyers and others about

45:19

this, because that was my first

45:21

instinct. You know, you could just

45:24

arrest these guys who we think

45:26

are radical, who you think are,

45:28

you know, who you don't want

45:30

on their territory, on your territory.

45:32

But what do you arrest them

45:35

for, right? You could arrest them

45:37

for for forging, you know, documents,

45:39

official documents, but they're, you know,

45:41

if they call the Syrian embassy,

45:43

the Syrian embassy will probably say,

45:45

yes, we issued this. Most of

45:48

these countries for most of the

45:50

Cold War, Central Eastern European countries,

45:52

are not members of Interpol. So

45:54

they don't have an obligation as

45:56

part of this. And, you know,

45:59

it's the cold. war so they

46:01

won't be arresting people who are

46:03

generally being pursued by Western states

46:05

for attacks that they carried out

46:07

in the West. And you know

46:10

the other thing that comes out

46:12

of this that I didn't anticipate

46:14

coming into this research project is

46:16

that they're genuinely worried and and

46:18

scared. of people like Carlos the

46:21

Jackal. I mean, so, you know,

46:23

these, these, these jackals, they start

46:25

descending on Central Eastern Europe, in,

46:27

in the mid-late 70s, and when

46:29

they start coming, just like you

46:32

said, you know, it takes a

46:34

while, sometimes days, sometimes weeks, sometimes

46:36

weeks, sometimes a couple of months

46:38

for the ECB or their partners

46:40

to figure out who these people

46:43

are, they're just watching these. guys,

46:45

they're trying to figure out what

46:47

the hell are they doing here?

46:49

Are they here to conduct a

46:51

raid as well? Are they here

46:54

to attack us? Probably not. But

46:56

you know what? They're working for

46:58

various Middle Eastern governments. Maybe they're

47:00

here to attack their dissidents. They're

47:02

quite significant communities of, say, Syrian

47:05

and Iraqi communists living in Central

47:07

Eastern Europe. So for a while,

47:09

the SDB thought maybe Carlos de

47:11

Jeko has been sent here. by

47:13

the Iraqis or by the Syrians

47:15

to kill these opponents here. So

47:18

they're really worried and they're, and

47:20

so that's another reason why they're

47:22

not really, you know, looking to

47:24

confront them early on. But as,

47:26

you know, you've obviously raised this

47:29

and as the readers might find

47:31

out if they read the book,

47:33

at some point in the 80s,

47:35

the STB graduates to a new

47:37

method that they adopt towards very

47:40

few. of these people, but they

47:42

do adopt it. And I call

47:44

that approach trick announced. So they

47:46

decide to basically confront a number

47:48

of these most infamous terrorists at

47:51

the time and ask them to

47:53

leave. And they typically don't, you

47:55

know, come up to them and

47:57

say, hi, we don't like you

47:59

very much. We're very afraid of

48:02

you. Could you please leave? But

48:04

they come up with various... roses,

48:06

which by the way are quite

48:08

see-through. I think if I think

48:10

most of these guys saw through

48:13

them very quickly, but for instance

48:15

in the case of Carl is

48:17

the Jackal, he comes to, I

48:19

mean he came to Czechoslovakia approximately

48:21

10 times. The last time he

48:24

comes to Prague is in, I

48:26

believe, June 1986. We think he

48:28

came there so that his partner

48:30

at the time could give birth

48:32

there. She was expecting their child

48:35

Rosa. But very soon after he...

48:37

He comes, the SCB, basically activates

48:39

this trick and ousts approach and

48:41

it sends two of his officers

48:43

to this guy's hotel room. They

48:45

must have been terrified and they

48:48

basically tell him, listen, the French

48:50

know you're here, which is a

48:52

code for saying, you know, you

48:54

might get killed by French on

48:56

our territory. The French hated both

48:59

Abunidal and Carlos with passion because

49:01

they conducted many of their operations

49:03

on their territory. Carlos also killed

49:05

several French policemen in 1975. So

49:07

they tried to trick him. He

49:10

doesn't really buy it, but later

49:12

on, the Czechoslovaks actually staged this

49:14

fantastic operation where they bring the

49:16

Palestinians and they bring the Syrians

49:18

in and they basically... orchestrate a

49:21

you know this whole operation that

49:23

ends up pushing Carlos out and

49:25

he ultimately gives in you know

49:27

packs his weapons and and fake

49:29

documents and money and leaves Czechoslovakia

49:32

and so they graduated to this

49:34

approach but you can see that

49:36

they're always nervous about activating this

49:38

because they never know how these

49:40

guys are going to react and

49:43

typically I think they did this

49:45

in four or five scenarios and

49:47

all these guys were always very

49:49

unhappy. including Abu Dawood, the guy

49:51

who helped orchestrate the 1972 massacre

49:54

at the Olympic Games in Munich.

49:56

He was also outside in this

49:58

way and he was not happy

50:00

at all. He complained and said

50:02

he was never going to come

50:05

back to Czechoslovakia, Czechoslovaks were quite

50:07

happy about actually, but they were

50:09

worried. the whole night he was

50:11

meant to get on a plane

50:13

the next morning and they were

50:15

guarding him all night because they

50:18

were worried he was going to

50:20

do something. And ultimately, I think

50:22

this worked for the Czechoslovaks. They

50:24

did have to endure a bit

50:26

of abuse from these guys, but

50:29

ultimately they left and they never

50:31

came back. You've mentioned Abu Nidal,

50:33

who's almost mentioned in the same

50:35

breath as Carlos the jackal, certainly

50:37

in the 1980s, as a really

50:40

dangerous personality. Did he slip in

50:42

like Carlos and sort of get

50:44

in under the radar? So actually,

50:46

so I write about when you

50:48

doubt because he, I mean, I

50:51

think people don't know very much

50:53

about him actually, but his terrorist

50:55

group was actually the most lethal

50:57

Palestinian, or maybe any terrorist group

50:59

in the 1980s. He, I think

51:02

we mentioned this, he was killing

51:04

off Israeli Jewish targets. but also

51:06

moderate Palestinian targets. Now I didn't

51:08

find evidence of him ever coming

51:10

to Czechoslovakia, so I mean it

51:13

is possible that he came undercover

51:15

and that the Czechoslovaks never realized

51:17

that he came under another name,

51:19

but we know that quite a

51:21

few of his members would... turn

51:24

up in Czechoslovakia, especially in the

51:26

80s, and would attempt to recruit

51:28

various members of the Palestinian community

51:30

living there. And Czechoslovakia is quite

51:32

concerned about this. A, they, you

51:35

know, again, didn't want any of

51:37

this to leak. B, they were

51:39

worried, just like we said about

51:41

this violence and civil war between

51:43

these factions overspilling to Czechoslovakia. So

51:46

they somehow wanted to put an

51:48

end to this, but... They just

51:50

didn't have any eyes on the

51:52

ground there. So in the, I

51:54

think, the second half of the

51:56

80s, they, I think, stumbled upon

51:59

an opportunity to infiltrate the Abunidal

52:01

Organization. And it's a fascinating, you

52:03

know, there's fascinating detail about how

52:05

this happens. We know very little

52:07

about how states infiltrate. terrorist organizations

52:10

because you know Western states are

52:12

This is not the kind of

52:14

documents that you find in national

52:16

archives, but here it's it's it's

52:18

it's it's there's a lot of

52:21

detail about how the Czechoslovaks went

52:23

about this. So they attempted to

52:25

infiltrate this group and they did

52:27

it with with some success. So

52:29

they learned a little bit about

52:32

some of Apunidal's goals and operations

52:34

in Czechoslovakia, but obviously was very

52:36

difficult and and Apunidal had quite

52:38

a strong counterintelligence offenses. So that

52:40

was one approach another approach that

52:43

that we can highlight the Czechoslovak

52:45

I used, apart from watching the

52:47

jackals, liaising with some of the

52:49

jackals, ousting the jackals, they also

52:51

try to infiltrate and monitor the

52:54

jackals, and then ultimately, shortly actually,

52:56

before the fall of communism, one

52:58

of Abu Nidal's invoice came to

53:00

Prague and he basically pitched a

53:02

collaboration to the SCB, where again

53:05

we have amazing detail on how

53:07

this was done. again, typically don't

53:09

know very much about how the

53:11

terrorists pitch, you know, collaborations to

53:13

two states. And so this was

53:16

an attempt to create an alliance

53:18

with Prague, but the STB had

53:20

clear guidelines not to take up

53:22

this bait, but to kind of

53:24

not say, yes. So they decided

53:26

to... tell the Avondidal representative that

53:29

they were not going to, you

53:31

know, collaborate on any operational stuff

53:33

with them, but they were happy

53:35

to exchange information if this had

53:37

any relevance to Czechoslovak security. So

53:40

it was a bit of a

53:42

dance when it came to the

53:44

Abunidal organization, although their leader never

53:46

came to Czechoslovakia, he sent some

53:48

people over there who were meant

53:51

to negotiate and ideally, you know,

53:53

motivate Czechoslovakia into becoming their ally

53:55

and frankly into hosting them and

53:57

becoming their safe haven. And

54:00

I think what you've

54:02

highlighted there is some of

54:04

the incredible detail that

54:06

you have in the book.

54:08

These files are a

54:10

literal files are and you know,

54:12

we've gone through some

54:14

detail here, but obviously within

54:16

about the hour or

54:19

so that we've been speaking,

54:21

it's not possible to

54:23

cover everything. to cover any of

54:25

these of these in Czechoslovakia... when the

54:27

Velvet Velvet Revolution started.

54:29

Yes, yes, that's actually quite

54:31

interesting. I think that

54:33

there was a whole

54:35

group of Palestinians who

54:38

was being trained in trained

54:40

in Zazalka secret facility. The

54:42

Palestinian envoys were there.

54:44

were there, so. the the people who

54:47

were sent there by Yasser to

54:49

maintain this liaison. they were there

54:51

and, you know, you know, many

54:53

of them stayed there communism fell.

54:56

much of the much of the

54:58

Palestinian diaspora is still there.

55:00

But it was a watershed

55:02

moment for this alliance ultimately the

55:04

new non -communist government that came

55:07

in, they were not open

55:09

to continuing in this liaison.

55:11

and and gradually, quietly. in a subtle subtle

55:14

way. As far as I

55:16

can read the documents I've

55:18

seen, shut it it down. It

55:20

didn't continue in this. And

55:22

we know that when when came

55:24

to power, one of his

55:27

first big visits was to

55:29

Israel. visits was to diplomatic relations

55:31

with Israel, which were cut

55:33

off after the 1967 war. So

55:35

the Czechoslovak foreign policy changed quite

55:38

significantly following the fall of of

55:40

communism, started in November in November 1989.

55:43

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