The British response to CIA operations, it suggests, was in fact much more complex than talk of teeth-pulling or tune-calling would lead one to expect. Far from feeling themselves to be the victims of aggressive ideological colonisation, many on the British left positively welcomed the US intervention because they naturally shared its values and goals. In other words, this was, in part at least, an example of a phenomenon historians of continental European countries in the same period have termed ‘self-colonization’ or ‘empire by invitation’." By the same token, there is also evidence of members of the British left, including even strongly anti-communist Atlanticists, resisting aspects of the US campaign with which they did not happen to agree. The Labour leadership’s position on Europe is perhaps the most obvious instance of this. A third response which needs to be taken into account is appropriation, that is local groups or individuals adapting the apparatus and rhetoric of the American intervention to serve domestic purposes which had little or nothing to do with the Cold War. To suppose, then, that those British leftists who became involved in the ClA’s operations were dupes or slaves of American foreign policy is to repeat the mistake made by Gaitskell and his followers when they identified all critics of their defense policies as puppets of the Kremlin.

The other major problem with the existing interpretation of the ClA’s campaign on the British left - such as it is - is that it oversimplifies the nature of the campaign itself. The Agency did not, as a rule, intervene directly in Britain; the operations described here were carried out at ‘arm’s- length’, that is by private citizens on the American ‘non-communist left‘ (or ‘NCL’, to use an abbreviation favoured in Washington at the time) in a tactic directly imitated from the ‘front’ organisations created by the Soviets. The assumption has been that the NCL was a faithful and unquestioning instrument of the CIA’s will, but newly available documents indicate a more problematic relationship. Anti~Stalinist intellectuals and unionists had been waging their own war on communism long before intelligence professionals appeared on the scene and, even after they became ‘agents’ in the US Cold War effort, were determined to have a say in the planning and conduct of anti-communist operations. Moreover, relations between the American NCL and British left in this period were not simply a function of official strategy; rather, they need to be viewed in the context of a long-standing and ongoing Anglo—American leftist dialogue. Indeed, it will be argued here that western commitment to the Cold War was itself prompted to a significant degree by members of the left, on both sides of the Atlantic.

-The CIA, the British Left and the Cold War: Calling the Tune? by Hugh Wilford P. 2-3

While it's useful when analyzing anti-imperialist groups to look for direct CIA intervention and COINTELPRO infiltration, with pro-imperialist "leftists" the CIA has always had a passive role of encouraging viewpoints that were already present. People ask the wrong questions with these people. Instead of "does this person work for the CIA? are they getting funds from the CIA?" we should ask "does this person's opinions objectively align with CIA interests? are the CIA responsible for giving this person more influence and access to public opinion than he would otherwise?"

We can say that this guy is CIA without ever actually knowing if he works for or is funded by the CIA because he objectively supports CIA positions, works within a structure (pro-imperialist 'left' publication) that is enhanced by the CIA, and communicates with and intellectualy aligns with people who we know are CIA. We didn't need to say that every intellectual with the Congress for Cultural Freedom directly received funds from the CIA to say that they were objectively CIA assets in the true broad sense of the term.

e: Of course accusing people of being CIA is a CIA tactic. But this has a simple solution since anti-imperialism is the primary contradiction at present and thus is a dividing line for the CIA. The book goes into it more that the CIA refused to support anti-communist leftists in continental Europe and Britain who were anti-American and the reaction against American imperialism during the VIetnam war brought overt CIA involvement to a close (or at least it stoopped being disclosed). Obviously what principled anti-imperialism means is a discussion that the CIA can use to tear an organization apart but that's a different debate.

Edited by babyhueypnewton (Dec. 14, 2015 07:06:22)