frank wisner death

Wisner expected the United States would help the Hungarians. The growth of the OSS brought conflict with John Edgar Hoover who saw it as a rival to the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Later he became an informal adviser to the royal family. Covert action (orchestrating coups, anti-Communist insurgencies, academic conferences, labor unions, political parties, publishing houses, and shipping companies) required considerable manpower, and it drew the intellectual crme de la crme. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. Wisner managed to get a copy of the speech that Nikita Khrushchev made at the 20th Party Congress in February, 1956, where Khrushchev launched an attack on the rule of Joseph Stalin. Over the next few weeks thousands were arrested on suspicion of communist activity. Legal Statement. Franklived in month1918, at address, Illinois. If it gets near the coast of Guatemala we'll sink the son-of-a-bitch. ' Market data provided byFactset. He was Richard Nixon, the Vice President. After leaving the OSS Wisner joined the Wall Street law firm, Carter Ledyard. Hector (Rip Robertson) said only one, a courier . It was the nearest thing to an expletive I ever heard Dulles use. Quotes displayed in real-time or delayed by at least 15 minutes. For months, waves of airborne spies in mission after mission landed, and each was killed straightaway. Frank Wisner killed himself with one of his son's shotguns on 29th October, 1965. Athan Theoharis, Richard Immerman, Loch Johnson, Kathryn Olmsted, and, Assistant Secretary of State for Occupied Areas, guerrilla warfare in Soviet-occupied Europe, "Our History: Featured Alumni: Wisner, Frank G., 1934", Report on X-2 Activities in Bucharest, 25 April 1945, "Foreign Relations of the United States, 19451950, Emergence of the Intelligence Establishment - Office of the Historian", "National Security Council Directive on Office of Special Projects", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Frank_Wisner&oldid=1141757345, United States Navy personnel of World War II, People of the Central Intelligence Agency, People of the Office of Strategic Services, University of Virginia School of Law alumni, Short description is different from Wikidata, Articles with unsourced statements from August 2019, Articles with unsourced statements from February 2021, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 26 February 2023, at 17:05. ", Later that year Wisner established Operation Mockingbird, a program to influence the American media. As Thomas Polgar later pointed out: "Sure, we never said rise up and revolt, but there was a lot of propaganda that led the Hungarians to believe that we would help. Frank Wisner married Antonie Chalupsky, daughter of Frantisek Chalupsky and Katerine Chudly about 1881 and they . This was the elite which ran American foreign policy and shaped legislation at home. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles added that the Guatemala people were living under a "communist type of terrorism". Samuel Zemurray, United Fruit Company's largest shareholder, with the help of Tommy Corcoran, organized an anti-Arbenz campaign in the American media. To give some idea of how aggressively Wisner worked to build his spy network and subvert the Soviet Union, when the OPC was finally and officially absorbed into the CIA as the Directorate of Plans, it dwarfed the rest of the Agency, and consumed 75 percent of the CIA budget. He condemned the Great Purge and accused Stalin of abusing his power. After Pearl Harbor, he found himself in the Office of Strategic Services, where he spied behind enemy lines, eventually becoming head of OSS operations in southeastern Europe. Wisner, as head of the Office of Policy Coordination (OPC), took overall responsibility for the operation. Wisner arrived in England in September, 1959. His lineage is impeccable, since his father, Frank Wisner Sr., was a senior CIA official (from 1947 until his suicide in 1965) who was involved in the overthrow of Arbenz of Guatemala (1954) and Mossadeq of Iran (1953). Harrison E. Salisbury commented: "He (Wisner) was the key to a great many things, a brilliant, compulsive man, of enormous charm, imagination, and conviction that anything, anything could be achieved and that he could achieve it. It would nominally report to a senior State Department official. These organizations were run by people with well-known right-wing views such as William Paley (CBS), Henry Luce (Time Magazine and Life Magazine), Arthur Hays Sulzberger (New York Times), Alfred Friendly (managing editor of the Washington Post), Jerry O'Leary (Washington Star), Hal Hendrix (Miami News), Barry Bingham Sr., (Louisville Courier-Journal), James Copley (Copley News Services) and Joseph Harrison (Christian Science Monitor). In late 2002, Wisner co-chaired an independent working group that developed a model for the US's post-conflict role in Iraq, should an invasion occur. Funded with money from the CIA and MI6, the pro-monarchy forces quickly gained the upper hand. Powered and implemented byFactSet Digital Solutions. As previously described at Mental Floss, one of their more brilliant, but alas, never executed, operations involved airdropping enormous condoms labeled medium behind the Iron Curtain, as a way of demonstrating the anatomical superiority of the American fighting man.). This information was passed to Joseph McCarthy who started making attacks on members of the OPC. In addition, regardless of the principles being professed, when direct action was taken (whether clandestine or not), the interests of American business would be a consideration: if the flag was to follow, it would quite definitely follow trade. Members of what was later called the Georgetown Ladies' Social Club included Katharine Graham, Mary Pinchot Meyer, Sally Reston, Polly Wisner, Joan Braden, Lorraine Cooper, Evangeline Bruce, Avis Bohlen, Janet Barnes, Tish Alsop, Cynthia Helms, Marietta FitzGerald, Phyllis Nitze and Annie Bissell. At Arlington Cemetery, Frank Wisner was buried as a naval commander, his wartime rank. However, there is evidence that he was recruited several years earlier and had been spying on the liberal organizations he had been a member of in the later 1940s. He suffered a breakdown in 1958, and retired from the Agency in 1962. Later that year Wisner established Operation Mockingbird, a program to influence the American media. Continue with Recommended Cookies. Wisner leaked details of the speech to the New York Times who published it on 2nd June, 1956. According to Nina Burleigh (A Very Private Woman) these journalists sometimes wrote articles that were commissioned by Frank Wisner. The military now joined the opposition and Mossadegh was arrested on August 19, 1953. Frank Wisner was brilliant, tortured, and a founder of American intelligence. Market data provided by Factset. He announced a change in policy and gave orders for the Soviet Union's political prisoners to be released. By the early 1960s he held right-wing opinions. Frank George Wisner II (born July 2, 1938) is an American businessman and former diplomat. But Frank was a little excessive, even for me.". Bissell replaced Wisner as Deputy Director of Plans. By this time Operation Mockingbird had a major influence over 25 newspapers and wire agencies. The CIA sent Wisner to the Sheppard-Pratt Institute, a psychiatric hospital near Baltimore. [1] He was also tapped for the Seven Society. Hoover, claimed that Caradja was a Soviet agent. In 1953 the brothers helped out Edward Lansdale and the CIA in the Philippines: "Wisner actively courted the Alsops, along with a few other newsmen he regarded as suitable outlets. President Dwight Eisenhower responded by claiming that Guatemala had a "communist dictatorship.. had established an outpost on this continent to the detriment of all the American nations". The CIA propaganda campaign included the distribution of 100,000 copies of a pamphlet entitled Chronology of Communism in Guatemala. Wisner was disappointed by the US government's reaction to this news and he was forced to advise the Romanian royal family to go into exile. Through think-tanks to foundations, directorates to membership of gentlemen's clubs, these mandarins were interlocked by their institutional affiliations and by a shared belief in their own superiority.". Wisner remained as Deputy Director of Plans (DDP) until September 1958, playing an important role in the early history of the CIA. American diplomat and politician (born 1938), Genevieve Jeanne Marie du Fresne de Virel, Under Secretary of State for International Security Affairs, United States Ambassador to the Philippines, The Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington, "The extended family of Nicolas Sarkozy (de Nagy-Bocsa)", "La Giustizia amministrativa: Raccolta completa contenente le decisioni tutte della IV sezione del Consiglio di Stato, le decisioni pi importanti della Corte dei conti in materia di conti comunali, provinciali ed erariali, e di pensioni, le pi importanti sentenze della Corte di cassazione di Roma in materia elettorale e di competenza e monografie relative a questioni amministrative", "Nomination of Frank G. Wisner To Be United States Ambassador to Egypt", "Guiding Principles for U.S. Post-Conflict Policy in Iraq", "Ambassador Frank G. Wisner Joins Ergo's Advisory Board", "Frank Wisner, the Diplomat Sent to Prod Mubarak", Obama Egypt Envoy Frank Wisner Says Mubarak Should Stay, Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security Affairs, United States Ambassadors to the Philippines, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Frank_G._Wisner&oldid=1135372820, Ambassadors of the United States to the Philippines, Ambassadors of the United States to India, Ambassadors of the United States to Egypt, Ambassadors of the United States to Zambia, United States Under Secretaries of Defense for Policy, People of the Egyptian revolution of 2011, Acting United States Secretaries of State, People associated with Squire Patton Boggs, Short description is different from Wikidata, All Wikipedia articles needing clarification, Wikipedia articles needing clarification from October 2015, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 24 January 2023, at 07:44. According to Deborah Davis in Katharine the Great, "By the early 1950s, Wisner 'owned' respected members of the New York Times, Newsweek, CBS and other communications vehicles." Wisner also met Arthur Schlesinger, an OSS sergeant serving in Germany. [11] He went on to become a member of the board for EOG Resources. Wisner's death saddened but did not shock his colleagues. He worked in the Navy's censor's office before managing to get a transfer to the Office of Strategic Services (OSS). On August 2, 1936, she married Arthur S. Wisner in Sparks, Nev. Mrs. Wisner had been active in the Emanuel. Also involved was Richard Bissell, head of the Directorate for Plans, an organization instructed to conduct covert anti-Communist operations around the world. Wisner was obviously too sick to go to Spain. The man who sits at the head of the table is Frank G. Wisner, a bald, barrel-chested, martini-drinking (he gave up cigars, friends say) 72-year-old retired ambassador and businessman. This included George Kennan, Dean Acheson, Richard Bissell, Desmond FitzGerald, Joseph Alsop, Stewart Alsop, Tracy Barnes, Thomas Braden, Philip Graham, David Bruce, Clark Clifford, Walt Rostow, Eugene Rostow, Chip Bohlen, Cord Meyer, James Angleton, William Averill Harriman, John McCloy, Felix Frankfurter, John Sherman Cooper, James Reston, Allen W. Dulles and Paul Nitze. View. Over the next few weeks riots took place in Poland and East Germany. Frank G. Wisner discusses his distinguished career in public service, including working as former undersecretary of defense for policy, undersecretary of state for international security affairs . Internationalist, abrasive, competitive, these men had an unshakeable belief in their value system, and in their duty to offer it to others. Allen W. Dulles therefore sent him to London to be CIA chief of station in England. The Director turned to me "They tell me you know how to write. "Frank Wisner, Jr. was a big catch for Enron Corporation. He served as third secretary at the U.S. Embassy in Algiers, Algeria. Soon afterwards it was renamed the Office of Policy Coordination (OPC). Who made that decision?". Four months later he agreed to retire from the CIA. The Defense Mobilization Support Planning Activity? Wisner was transferred to the OSS station in Wiesbaden. Media in category "Frank Wisner" The following 3 files are in this category, out of 3 total. Khrushchev became increasingly concerned about these developments and on 4th November 1956 he sent the Red Army into Hungary. As Thomas Polgar later pointed out: "Sure, we never said rise up and revolt, but there was a lot of propaganda that led the Hungarians to believe that we would help. He whispered a number of questions: "Who is that? His army was outnumbered by the Guatemalan Army. You've averted a Soviet beachhead in our hemisphere." Dulles decided that Richard Bissell rather than Richard Helms should become the new head of the DPP. Later he became an informal adviser to the royal family. They also produced three films on Guatemala for showing free in cinemas. Thomas Braden later recalled: "Wisner brought in a whole load of fascists after the war, some really nasty people. Soon afterwards it was renamed the Office of Policy Coordination (OPC). The whole arrangement of American power in the world from the nineteenth century was based on commercial concerns and methods of operation his had given America a material empire through the ownership of foreign transport systems, oil fields, estancias, stocks, and shares. Work out a new speech for Brad We went to the White House in the morning. [6][7], Wisner arrived just as Romania joined the Allies and declared war on the Axis. She moved to Lodi in 1934. They were defiant and proud, but besieged. Later, several of the people involved in Operation Success, including Richard Bissell and Tracy Barnes, regretted the outcome of the Guatemala Coup. Wisner was a genteel lawyer from Mississippi who grew bored with office life and joined the Navy. All the top officials of the agency, from director on down, were in attendance. The CIA began providing financial and logistic support for Colonel Carlos Castillo. The growth of the OSS brought conflict with John Edgar Hoover who saw it as a rival to the Federal Bureau of Investigation. When the project collapsed, however, the Belarusians quickly settled in and obtained US citizenship and intelligence agencies protected them from exposure for decades. A close friend, Avis Bohlen said he "was so depressed about how the world was going he felt we were losing the Cold War.". It was an exhausting, stressful, and almost impossible job. Accepting that further resistance would only bring more deaths he announced his resignation over the radio. Nixon asked a number of questions, concise and to the point, and demonstrated a thorough knowledge of the Guatemalan political situation. Wisner reportedly suffered a mental breakdown after the Soviet Union quashed the Hungarian revolution in 1956, and in 1965 he committed suicide. [8] Twelve B-17 Flying Fortress planes flew out the prisoners in hourly shifts. On January 31, 2011, he was sent to Egypt by President Barack Obama to negotiate a resolution to the popular protests against the regime that had swept the country. "He realized that his life would be circumscribed by increasing cycles of depression. Wisner grew very fond of Philby and was unaware that he was a Soviet spy betraying all his operations to his masters in Moscow. Four months later he agreed to retire from the CIA. In defiance of federal law, John Loftus asserted, the Office of Policy Coordination helped obtain visas for Nazi collaborators from Belarus who were believed to have facilitated numerous atrocities by the Nazi Germany. Today, Wisner serves as an international affairs advisor for global legal powerhouse Squire Patton . With so many talented officers working in covert action, and with most of the foreigners involved being friendly collaborators and not "recruited" assets, the do could scarcely base promotions on the number of recruitments a case officer made each year. Wisner Sr. died in 1965 by michael gordon. Wisner and 21 OSS agents landed in Romania,[5] where he became head of OSS Bucharest. Wisner was a genteel lawyer from Mississippi who grew bored with office life and joined the Navy. They were the patricians of the modern age, the paladins of democracy, and saw no contradiction in that. Aid Groups Warn of "Secondary Disaster" as Death Toll from Turkey . This included the claim that Guatemala was the beginning of "Soviet expansion in the Americas". CIA, "Letter of . The lights were turned off while Brad used slides during his report. The President's final handshake was with Alien Dulles. Arbenz, on the other hand, had simply been trying to reform his country and had not sought foreign help in this. A decision was reached to create an organization within the CIA to conduct secret political operations. At his funeral the Bethlehem Chapel in the National Cathedral was overflowing with old friends who sang "Fling Out the Banner" as Wisner's family marched down the aisle at the end of the service. Any reaction? According to Deborah Davis (Katharine the Great): "By the early 1950s, Wisner 'owned' respected members of the New York Times, Newsweek, CBS and other communications vehicles.". Later, several of the people involved in Operation Success, including Richard Bissell and Tracy Barnes, regretted the outcome of the Guatemala Coup. The DPP now accounted for three quarters of the CIA budget and 60% of its personnel. The Office of Policy Coordination (OPC) was funded by siphoning of funds intended for the Marshall Plan. He gained support for this from James Forrestal, the Defense Secretary. He had upset the US government by nationalizing Iran's oil industry. After Cairo (from June 15, 1944) he spent three months in OSS Istanbul, Turkey, as head of SI (Secret Intelligence) branch. Now internal subversion communism from within - was an additional cause for direct action. Eisenhower shook hands all around. He served in South Vietnam until 1969, when he returned to the State Department as officer in charge of Tunisian affairs. When Truman signed the CIA into existence, the new agency found a similar reception. I was vaguely uncomfortable. It is doubtful that many of the lawmakers who voted for the 1947 Act could have envisioned the scale on which the CIA would engage in operational activities all over the world. It said that Frank had died and gave no reason, but I knew." Contents During the Hungarian Uprising an estimated 20,000 people were killed. This resulted in the religious community turning against Mossadegh. However, he began to get suspicious in 1951 and he asked William Harvey and James Jesus Angleton to investigate Philby. Carlos Castillo and his collection of soldiers now crossed the Honduran-Guatemalan border. This became the espionage and counter-intelligence branch of the Central Intelligence Agency. His work involved planning a coup in Guyana, a country that had a left-wing government. "[15], During the early 1950s, Wisner was the subject of FBI inquiries in connection with his wartime work in Romania, including the claim that he had an affair with Tanda Caradja, daughter of Romanian princess Catherine Caradja during the war; Caradja was alleged in FBI reports to be a Soviet agent. Frank Wisner was constantly looked for ways to help convince the public of the dangers of communism. Khrushchev became increasingly concerned about these developments and on 4th November 1956 he sent the Red Army into Hungary. But the navy is watching a Soviet sub in the area; it could be there to evacuate some of Arbenz's friends, or to supply arms to any resisters.". Wisner told Clare Boothe Luce, the American ambassador in Italy: "All these people are getting killed and we weren't doing anything, we were ignoring it. Toriello accused the United States government of categorizing "as communism every manifestation of nationalism or economic independence, any desire for social progress, any intellectual curiosity, and any interest in progressive liberal reforms.". Wisner found one of his boys' shotguns and killed himself on October 29, 1965. According to Alex Constantine (Mockingbird: The Subversion Of The Free Press By The CIA), in the 1950s, "some 3,000 salaried and contract CIA employees were eventually engaged in propaganda efforts". Wisner worked closely with Kim Philby, the British agent who was also a Soviet spy. Eisenhower turned to his Chief of the Joint Chiefs. As one of the agents involved in Operation Bloodstone, Harry Rositzke, pointed out, Wisner was willing to use anyone "as long as he was anti-communist". The nature of Arbenz's government, however, meant that Operation Success launched both the CIA and the United States on a new path. This included James Truitt, Russell Wiggins, Phil Geyelin, John Hayes and Alan Barth. Eisenhower's first question was to Hector (Rip Robertson): "How many men did Castillo Armas lose?" Mussadegh in Iran was left-wing and had indulged in talks with Russian diplomats about possible alliances and treaties. The military now joined the opposition and Mossadegh was arrested on August 19, 1953. During this period Wisner worked closely with Kim Philby, the British Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) liaison in Washington. Wisner became head of this new organization and Richard Helms became his chief of operations. The OPCs mission was to take on the Soviet Union, and right from the start, the Pentagongearing up for World War IIIwanted everything from insurgencies in Western Europe to sabotaging the entire Soviet air force, and it wanted them now. Four days later, after a day in which Mubarak allies took violent reprisal against democracy activists, Wisner spoke to a security conference in Europe and called it "crucial" that Mubarak stay on in the interest of "stability." Frank G. Wisner, an ex-OSS man, was brought in from the State Department to head it, with a cover title of his own invention. Mockingbird: The Subversion Of The Free Press By The CIA, DHS Now Spies on Journalists, Keeps Records of Online Activity, Guatemala: The Coup that Radicalised Che Guevara, Smoking Out Fox News Correspondent Mort Kondrackes DIA/PSYOP Roots, Joe Conason on Elizabeth Dilling Glenn Beck's Favorite Nazi, BuzzFeed: Secret CIA Files Say Staffers Committed Sex Crimes Involving Children, Israels Propaganda War Blame the Grand Mufti, Crimes against Humanity in Guatemala: How the CIA and the Pentagon Supported the Military Dictatorship, Islamic Army in Iraq Denies Media Reports that the US Killed 18 Al Qaeda Combatants, Accused Liberian War Criminal Charles Taylor 'Worked with the CIA' (Al Jazeera), The Role of the CIA: Behind the Dalai Lamas Holy Cloak. Henry Cabot Lodge tried to block the Security Council from discussing a resolution to send an investigation team to Guatemala. ", General Ridgeway answered. Hoover, claimed that Caradja was a Soviet agent. Frank Wisner, the first chief of the CIA's covert-operations unit, provides a top-down view of the early Cold War, while Michael Burke, a jack-of-all-trades charmer, delivers an agent's . According to Donald N. Wilber, who was involved in this CIA plot to remove Mossadegh from power, in early August, 1953, Iranian CIA operatives, pretending to be socialists, threatened Muslim leaders with "savage punishment if they opposed Mossadegh," thereby giving the impression that Mossadegh was cracking down on dissent. He was educated at Woodberry Forest School in Orange and the University of Virginia. After graduating Wisner worked as a Wall Street lawyer. The Central Intelligence Agency decided that Arbenz had to be removed from power. A large number of these prisoners were tortured or killed. A door opened near me. Thomas points out that he "considered his friends Joe and Stewart Alsop to be reliable purveyors of the company line in their columns". He was dismissed from the CIA in 1950 after an arrest a few years earlier brought his homosexuality to the attention of Senator Joseph McCarthy during the Lavender scare that saw a purge of the State Department personnel because of charges of homosexuality. Wisner leaked details of the speech to the New York Times who published it on 2nd June, 1956. Quotes displayed in real-time or delayed by at least 15 minutes. Wisner remained concerned about the spread of communism and began lobbying for a new intelligence agency. The whole arrangement of American power in the world from the nineteenth century was based on commercial concerns and methods of operation his had given America a material empire through the ownership of foreign transport systems, oil fields, estancias, stocks, and shares. In Hungary the prime minister Imre Nagy removed state control of the mass media and encouraged public discussion on political and economic reform. All the top officials of the agency, from director on down, were in attendance. In March 1953, 209,842 acres of United Fruit Company's uncultivated land was taken by the government which offered compensation of $525,000. http://spartacus-educational.com/JFKwisner.htm Categories: People Articles with hCards This information was passed to Joseph McCarthy who started making attacks on members of the OPC. Henry Cabot Lodge tried to block the Security Council from discussing a resolution to send an investigation team to Guatemala. Castillo now reversed the Arbenz reforms. I suspect that had we known more (it would have just made us more appreciative.) In Hungary the prime minister Imre Nagy removed state control of the mass media and encouraged public discussion on political and economic reform. After the war, he headed the Office of Policy Coordination (OPC), one of the OSS successor organizations, from 1948 to 1950. In 1951 Allen W. Dulles persuaded Cord Meyer to join the CIA. He was educated at Woodberry Forest School in Orange and the University of Virginia. In the darkness I could see only a silhouette of the person entering the room; when the door closed it was dark again, and I could not make out the features of the man standing next to me. Some of this money was used to bribe journalists and publishers. Sudden Death. http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JFKwisner.htm, Your email address will not be published. In early 2011, the Obama administration asked Wisner to carry views to Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak, including advice that Mubarak should resign to defuse the crisis. He said that the country needed "an agrarian reform which puts an end to the latifundios and the semi-feudal practices, giving the land to thousands of peasants, raising their purchasing power and creating a great internal market favorable to the development of domestic industry.". In the 1950s and early 1960s the CIA's top leaders - men like Allen Dulles, Frank Wisner, Richard Bissell, Tracy Barnes, and Desmond Fitzgerald - were profoundly devoted to covert action. Most men brought their wives to these gatherings. He was prescribed psychoanalysis and shock therapy (electroconvulsive treatment). "They don't seem to be up to anything. But the navy is watching a Soviet sub in the area; it could be there to evacuate some of Arbenz's friends, or to supply arms to any resisters.".