Noam Chomsky - Turning the Tide U.S. intervention in

The Race to Destruction
Classics in Politics: Turning the Tide Noam Chomsky
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agent, noting that his “skills were badly needed”: “To our knowledge, his
activities had been directed against the underground French Communist
Party and Resistance, just as we in the postwar era were concerned with
the German Communist Party and activities inimical to American
policies in Germany.” 61
Kolb’s comment is apt. The US was picking up where the Nazis had
left off, and it was therefore entirely natural that they should employ
specialists in anti-resistance activities, whose “atrocities” were not
considered real atrocities, given the nature of the targets.
Kolb does not mention that he was in fact Barbie’s superior and had
vigorously defended Barbie when the French finally attempted to
extradite him. He wrote in a secret memorandum at the time that “while
charges against subject may possibly be true, they are probably not true
. . . Subject is now considered to be the most reliable informant this
headquarters has.” 62 It surpasses belief that US intelligence was
unfamiliar with the record of this leading Nazi torturer and assassin.
There should have been little surprise, then, when in the context of
President Reagan’s visit to the Bitburg cemetery, where SS veterans
were buried, it was revealed that a few months earlier he had criticized
Americans who fought for the Spanish Republic, stating that “I would
say that the individuals that went over there were in the opinions of
most Americans fighting on the wrong side.” They should have been
fighting for the fascists, not against them, in his view. Reagan is simply
more honest than most of his cohorts. 63
The postwar US project of crushing the anti-fascist resistance with
Nazi assistance establishes a direct link between Nazi Germany and the
killing fields in Central America. Linklater, Hilton and Ascherson observe
accurately that the “ideals and methods” of fascism found “fertile soil”
as they were transplanted to the Western Hemisphere: “The right-wing
dictatorships of Argentina, Bolivia and Chile and the secret police they