November 30, 2009
by intelNews
UCA massacre
By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
The CIA and the US State Department had advance knowledge of the 1989 murders of six Jesuit clerics and two women by troops of the US-supported Salvadoran regime of Alfredo Cristiani, according to declassified internal US government documents submitted at a Spanish court. On November 16, 1989, a group of soldiers from the Atlacatl Battalion, a counter-insurgency squad created and trained at the US Army’s School of the Americas, entered the campus of José Simeón Cañas Central American University (UCA) in El Salvador and summarily executed six Jesuit clerics. They also shot dead two UCA staff members, a woman and her 16-year-old daughter. In the months that followed, pressure from several countries, including the US, forced the Cristiani government to try the Atlacatl Battalion leaders. But the Salvadoran court sentenced only two individuals, both of whom were released in a 1993 Presidential amnesty. Now the declassification of thousands of US government documents sheds further light on the UCA campus massacre and allegedly shows that US authorities in Washington and El Salvador had prior knowledge of the murders. Read more of this post
intelNews.org 
Analysis: The Meaning of the Suicide Attack on the CIA
January 2, 2010 by intelNews 2 Comments
Chapman FOB
By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS* | intelNews.org |
The recent deaths of seven and the serious injury of another six CIA personnel in Afghanistan’s Khost province has undoubtedly shocked an Agency not used to mass casualties. But what exactly is the significance of Wednesday’s suicide attack at the Forward Operating Base (FOB) Chapman, and how will it affect the US military and intelligence presence at the Afghan-Pakistani border? Given that the CIA team at Chapman FOB could not have consisted of more than 15 to 20 agents, it would be logical to conclude that the attack virtually decimated the CIA presence in Khost. But the impact of this development on US operations in Afghanistan will be minimal, in contrast to operations inside Pakistan, which constituted the primary objective of the CIA team at Chapman FOB. Read article →
Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with Afghanistan, al-Qaeda, assassinations, CIA, double agents, Forward Operating Base Chapman, Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi, Humam Khalil al-Balawi, HUMINT, informants, Joseph Fitsanakis, Khost, Obama Administration, Pakistan, Predator drones, suicide bombings, Taliban, United States