CIA Analyses of the Tito-Stalin Split, 1948-1950
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ABSTRACT MEHTA, COLEMAN ARMSTRONG, “A Rat Hole to be Watched”? CIA Analyses of the Tito-Stalin Split, 1948-1950. (Under the direction of Dr. Nancy Mitchell.) This thesis studies Central Intelligence Agency analyses of the June 28, 1948, Tito-Stalin split. It discusses the many issues that the CIA confronted after the first public breach of a heretofore united Communist monolith. This thesis also places these analyses in context, examining the problems faced by the newly created CIA as it struggled to find a place in the national security bureaucracy. After the Agency was established in 1947, its very existence was consistently challenged by the Departments of State and Defense, organizations which were unwilling to cede any bureaucratic control away from their own intelligence operations. The Secretaries of State and Defense used their superior status on the National Security Council to bolster their positions, while the Agency’s ad hoc organizational structure and uncertain mandate provided a weak case for more authority. Along with its administrative struggles, the early CIA was also marked by a series of high-profile intelligence failures, among them the Tito-Stalin split. Despite its ongoing bureaucratic struggles, the CIA quickly recovered from the shock of the split. It provided remarkably prescient analyses of the rift’s consequences. Using a collection of newly declassified CIA files, as well as a series of interviews with the CIA Station Chief in Belgrade from 1948 until 1951, this thesis analyzes those reports. It follows a year-by-year progression between 1948 and 1950. The first chapter, covering 1948, discusses the CIA’s initial post-split analyses, in which the possibility was broached of provoking more “Tito” defections throughout Eastern Europe. It also discusses the initial likelihood of a Soviet or Sattelite invasion of Yugoslavia in order to depose Tito, Stalin’s initiation of “Titoist” purges in the Sattelite states, and the initial repercussions of Yugoslavia’s aid to Greek Communist rebels and disputed claim to Trieste. Concomitant with the deteriorating relations of the United States and Yugoslavia before the split, the CIA during 1948 considered Yugoslavia “a rat hole to be watched.” By 1949, that perception was beginning to change. The second chapter discusses CIA analyses of Tito’s staying power, as well as the harm this entrenchment caused to the Soviet-led International Communist Movement. CIA analyses of Stalin’s options for interference in Yugoslavia are again considered, with the addition of reports discussing possible Soviet-led insurrection in Yugoslav Macedonia. American economic and military aid, needed to offset a Soviet-Satellite blockade of Yugoslav trade, also receives consideration. In 1950, the outbreak of the Korean War caused a reassessment within the CIA of Stalin’s willingness to go to war in the Balkans. Chapter Three discusses these analyses, as well as the process by which the United States used a severe drought in Yugoslavia to offer military assistance. The beginning of each chapter offers context, noting major Cold War events and significant occurrences within the CIA. The thesis ends in early 1951, with the establishment of a joint Yugoslav-American intelligence sharing agreement. “A RAT HOLE TO BE WATCHED”? CIA ANALYSES OF THE TITO-STALIN SPLIT, 1948-1950 by Coleman Armstrong Mehta A thesis submitted to the Graduate Faculty of North Carolina State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts History Raleigh 2005 APPROVED BY: ________________________________ _________________________________ ________________________________ Chair of Advisory Committee ii DEDICATION To my Mother and Father, For teaching me more than you’ll ever know; To John and Emily, For putting up with me for the last twenty-three years; And to Tamara, For inspiring me every day. iii BIOGRAPHY Coleman Mehta will receive his MA in European History from North Carolina State University in August 2005. He served as President of NCSU's History Graduate Student Association, helping plan the Triangle (NC) region's first graduate student history conference. He was also a Teaching Assistant and Department Fellowship recipient. Coleman received his BA from the University of Virginia in 2003, and has accepted a Presidential Management Fellowship appointment in Washington, DC, following the completion of this thesis. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I am unsure of the exact point at which Dr. Nancy Mitchell became not just an adviser but a mentor, but I can surely say that it happened, and for that I am extremely fortunate. Dr. Mitchell consistently went above and beyond the call of duty, always ready to offer constructive advice and feedback. She never allowed me to be satisfied with easy answers, and remained an enthusiastic guide throughout the process. I firmly believe that I constituted for her a full-time job, and I owe her much gratitude and thanks. I am also grateful for Dr. Alex DeGrand’s careful readings of this and other works, and for Dr. Charles Carlton’s open door and ever-ready advice. Dr. DeGrand and Dr. Carlton each possess sharp intellects and even sharper wits; I enjoyed working with both immensely. The librarians and archivists at NC State’s D.H. Hill Library, the National Archives, the Harry S. Truman Library, Library of Congress, and Duke University’s Perkins Library were gracious and helpful to a neophyte researcher. Dr. Alex Dragnich provided invaluable first-hand knowledge of the events chronicled in this thesis, as did the unnamed CIA officer referenced throughout this work. Their insights and anecdotes gave color to black and white documents. Graduate study can be a lonely endeavor. I was extremely lucky to have a strong support network over the course of my tenure, and would especially like to thank Laura Farkas and Matthew Poteat. Finally, I owe a deep debt of appreciation to Tamara Clark, who kept me grounded and focused throughout the process. I could not have completed this thesis without her support and encouragement. v TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Introduction . 1 Chapter One: 1948 . 38 Chapter Two: 1949 . 65 Chapter Three: 1950 . 94 Conclusion: “A Rat Hole to be Watched”? . 120 Bibliography . 129 APPENDICES . .135 Appendix A. CIA Station Chief in Belgrade interviews. 136 Appendix B. Alex N. Dragnich interview. 151 Introduction In late November 1950, Frank Wisner, head of the Central Intelligence Agency’s covert operations arm, the Office of Policy Coordination, initiated discussions with Yugoslavia’s Deputy Minister of Foreign Trade, Vladimir Velebit, concerning a formal intelligence sharing agreement between the two countries’ intelligence services. For Wisner, the joint cooperation would help Yugoslavia’s Ministry of State Security (Uprava Državne Bezbednosti, UDB), “in the area of psychological warfare.”1 The CIA could also assist Yugoslavia in establishing a rapid communications system in the event of Soviet or Satellite invasion. Wisner broached the topic through Velebit because of the Yugoslav’s reputation among American policymakers as “perhaps the outstanding exponent within the Yugoslav Government for a Western-oriented Yugoslavia.” I came across this information while undertaking research at the Library of Congress in December 2004, buried in the W. Averrell Harriman papers on the sixth page of a memorandum concerning economic and military assistance to Yugoslavia. The next month, January 2005, I confirmed the CIA-UDB cooperation in a series of interviews with the CIA Station Chief in Belgrade, who served in Yugoslavia from August 1948 until January 1951.2 The Station Chief, who wishes to remain unnamed, served as the CIA point person for the negotiations under the guise of an interpreter. He explained that the cooperation entailed a formal agreement for sharing military intelligence, and even described the first manifestation of this cooperation: less than one week after the 1 “Economic and Military Assistance to Yugoslavia,” Memorandum for Mr. Webb, January 30, 1951. Geographical File: Yugoslavia, Box 296, W. Averell Harriman Papers, Library of Congress. 2 [Name withheld], CIA Station Chief in Belgrade, 1948-1951, telephone interviews, January 21, 2005 and January 29, 2005, personal interview, March 6, 2005. The process by which I found the Station Chief is detailed later in this Introduction. The transcribed text of the phone interviews is attached as Appendix A. 2 agreement was negotiated, Yugoslavia offered to the United States a Soviet MiG-15 fighter jet. The Yugoslavs had told the Soviet Union that the MiG crashed in Yugoslav territory and – refusing to allow Soviet intelligence inside its borders – that it was damaged beyond salvageable condition. The MiG was subsequently offered to the United States for inspection, on the condition that the CIA Station Chief facilitate the transfer (as far as the Station Chief knew, the Yugoslavs were unaware of his CIA connections; he was likely chosen due to his rapport with Yugoslav Ambassador Vlado Popović). Five Air Force Colonels went into Yugoslavia and retrieved the plane, at which point the Station Chief stepped out of the picture. Undoubtedly, this information helped the American military establishment in the prosecution of the ongoing Korean War. The United States and Yugoslavia were not at this time formal allies, and each maintained a mutual distrust of the other’s political system. Their relations in previous years had sunk to extremely low depths. Yugoslavia shot down two American C-47