PARIS - Germany has astounded the international intelligence community by expelling a CIA officer. The agent, who was
under full diplomatic cover, was the first American intelligence operative publicly ordered out of Germany since World War II.
This unprecedented move is particularly noteworthy because Germany has been the CIA's main base for operations on the
continent since the war's end, and America's closest European ally after Britain. Two years ago, France expelled five US
agents - four CIA officers and a 'femme fatale' - who were caught in a hamhanded attempt to acquire economic intelligence by
seducing a key French trade official.
According to German security sources, the US agent was expelled for spying against Iran. In recent years, CIA has mounted
major operations against Iran and Libya from bases in Frankfurt and Hamburg. This incident is the latest example of growing
differences and tensions between Europe and the US over the Mideast and Africa.
Germany's action was clearly designed to warn the US to curtail the European decade-old campaign to overthrow the
governments of Iran and Libya. US intelligence has long been accustomed to operate in Germany without even bothering to
inform the German government. Germany is now demanding the US obtain approval from its security services for all covert
activities within the federal republic. In other words, Germany is telling the US: stop treating us like a banana republic. Respect
for the blundering, scandal-ridden CIA is at rock bottom.
Behind this flap is the sharp divergence of views over Iran and Libya - and Europe's desire to resume its role as a major
player in the Mideast, a region the US considers its exclusive preserve. Washington brands Iran and Libya as 'terrorist states.'
The US has imposed a punishing economic, military and political blockade on these nations and rebuffed their attempts to
improve relations.
Europe, except for Britain, refuses to go along with this policy, which is widely seen here as driven more by US domestic
politics than strategic rational. Europe, led by France and Germany, has adopted a policy of engagement with Iran designed to
access its oil resources, open its markets to European exports, and moderate the militant anti-western rhetoric of the Teheran
regime.
In January, the Clinton Administration seemed on the verge of adopting the European strategy. Robert Pelletreau, the senior
State Department official in charge of Mideast policy announced 'constructive engagement' with Iran and an end to
confrontation. This demarche abruptly ended when the strongly pro-Israel Madeleine Albright was named Secretary of State,
an appointment seen as a political reward to women's groups and supporters of Israel. Albright fired Pelletreau, and put her
own people in charge of Mideast policy. Iran, Libya and Iraq were to remain under siege.
Paris and Bonn grumble that Israel is using its political clout with the Clinton Administration to maintain America's
confrontation with the three anti-Israel Arab states. Israel has long pressed the US to attack both Iran's budding nuclear
installations, and alleged Libyan chemical warfare plants, crushing them like Iraq. 'America's policy may make sense for
Israel,' a French security official says, 'but not for Europe.' The Europeans have no love for Iran or Libya, they are not
deemed major threats.
Germany has just delivered a stiff warning to the US. Europe refuses to respect the US blockade of Iran, and intends to
resume trade with Iraq and Libya. Access to their oil, and lucrative markets for manufactured goods and arms, has become an
urgent domestic political issue and a strategic imperative for Europe, where chronic unemployment is over 11%.
Equally important, the good old days when CIA's famed 'cowboys' mounted all sorts of daring-do operations out of Berlin
station are history. Europe's spies demand to be treated as equals.
copyright eric margolis 1997
Reprinted with Permission
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Eric Margolis
Syndicated Columnist/Foreign Affairs Analyst
The Toronto Sun
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