During the current farcical trial of Ali Agca a most interesting snippet appeared in the press which looks like finally seeing off the alleged ‘Bulgarian connection.’ Signor Giovanni Pandico, a jailed former member of the upper echelons of the Naples-based Camorra, claimed that it had played a part in convincing Agca to accept the role of accuser of Bulgaria. He further claimed it was General Pietro Musumeci, former vice-director of Italy’s Military Secret Service (SISMI), who had proposed the plan to the Camorra. (Times 18 June 1983)
This allegation has appeared before, in 1983, when it wasn’t taken up with the seriousness it deserved. Information which has been collected since then means that its recent publication will make it an important lead in untangling the undoubted conspiracy formed around Agca’s “confessions”.
The tale begins in 1981 when Ciro Cirillo, the Christian Democrat leader in Naples was kidnapped by the Red Brigades. Cirillo was released three months later when the terrorists claimed that they had received the equivalent of £700,000. The Christian Democrats, the Secret Services (who were heavily involved), and the Cirillo family strongly denied this. (Times 18 June 1983). But jailed informants (Pasquale Barra being one – Guardian 18 June 1983) of the mafia-style organisation, the Camorra, told how their leader Don Raffaele Cutulo, had been asked by the Christian Democrats, to intervene with the Red Brigades. Cutulo agreed, and when the matter was resolved, the Camorra and the Red Brigades came out with a larger sum of £1.3 million.
It shouldn’t be too surprising that Cutulo was asked to be the middle man. A report from the Salerno investigating magistrate cites meetings and correspondence between the Camorra, Christian Democrats and Socialists: “Even in our day the politicians found in the Camorra a reservoir of votes due to the mass of support which it manages to mobilize.” (Times 22 June 1983)
It was also reported that the Camorra had agreed to kill several designated by the Red Brigades as the result of a ‘blood pact’ between the two groups. (Guardian 21/6/83) The Camorra had tried to kill a repentant terrorist, Patrizio Peci, while he was in prison, but failed. It is believed that Peci was one of Agca’s visitors in prison (Covert Action Information Bulletin Spring 1985)
During this period the Camorra leader Cutulo was imprisoned in the Ascoli prison which also housed Agca. But he was still able to keep command of the Camorra – at least until the big arrests of 1983. He used a nun, Sister Aldina Murelli, as a courier to the outside world and other gangsters. (Times 20 July 1983) The crime syndicates used secret codes which were based on biblical or religious themes. (Daily Telegraph 28/6/83) These were placed between the pages of copies of the New Testament which the nun gave to prisoners. The prison chaplain, Mariano Santini, was arrested in the 1983 Camorra round-up.(Times 18 June 1983). While Cutulo was in the prison Santini arranged for him to meet Agca.
One of the reasons Cutulo wanted to see Agca goes back to Cutulo’s role as mediator in the Cirillo kidnapping. Cutulo only agreed to that role if he received a letter acknowledging the Christian Democrats’ part in the affair. Also part of the deal was Cutulo’s transfer to a less secure prison from which he might escape. (Guardian 21 June 1983)
But according to Pantico “Cutulo was terrified because he was about to be moved to Sardinia (a maximum security jail on an island off the Sardinian coast) and the Camorra had heard rumours that he would die on the way in what would be made to appear to be an accident. His departure was postponed but in return he and his friends were told to convince Agca to accept the role of accuser of Bulgaria.” (Times 18 June 1983)
The same process was happening to Agca. “During their audience Cutulo allegedly guaranteed Agca that there would be no more attempts on his life by fellow prisoners if he would collaborate with the police.” Agca may have been frightened that his colleagues in the Grey Wolves would attempt to shut him up permanently as he had done to others in Turkey. The Camorra, who were very powerful in prison (Cutulo had his own valet, a convicted Camorra man, and had champagne served to him), may have seemed capable of giving Agca the protection he may have felt he needed.
Cutulo was then (April 1982) transferred to Sardinia. A month later Agca made his first statements on the role of the Bulgarian secret service in the attempted assassination of the Pope. But what of Musumeci’s role in this?
In October 1984 General Pietro Musumeci, former vice-director of SISMI, was arrested on charges of embezzlement, conspiracy and alleged possession of arms and explosives. (Guardian 20 October 1984) But the important information was contained in a Times article of the same day: “Musumeci’s name was mentioned in a Parliamentary Commission inquiry’s report into the kidnapping by the Red Brigades in 1981 of Ciro Cirillo”. We come full circle. (And just for good measure he is now answering charges of allegedly impeding the inquiry into the August 1980 bombing of Bologna railway station (Times 18 August 1984) Musumeci also happens to have been a member of the P2 lodge, as was General Santovito, head of SISMI. It was their investigation of the Bologna bombings – perhaps under Gelli’s control? – which placed responsibility for the bombings on left-wing terrorists. As we now know, responsibility lay with those on the right-wing who had connections both to the intelligence services and Gelli. See Stuart Christie’s Portrait of a Black Terrorist, Refract, London 1984)
SISMI had other links to Ali Agca in Ascoli prison as well as Cutullo. Agca was visited by a Major Petrocelli of SISMI on 29 December 1981. Lt. Col. Guisippi Belmonte of SISMI (subsequently arrested) and Francesco Pazienza also reputedly visited Ascoli on several occasions. (La Republica 23 October 1984)
Pazienza is a fascinating character with links to prominent people in the US, close ties to P2, the Monte Carlo lodge known as Super P2, the mafia, SISMI, and, at the same time, Roberto Calvi, (See on Pazienza Covert Action Information Bulletin Spring 1985) He is linked to the Camorra through his friendship with Casillo, second-in-command to Cutullo, and another leading member, Giardili. (Parapolitics/Intelligence 1984/85)
In 1980 and 81, under SISMI head Guiseppe Santovito (arrested for arms-drugs traffic between Italy and the Middle East), Musumeci formed a ‘parallel SISMI’, or ‘Super S’, which, according to some reports (Parapolitics/Intelligence XII 1984-’85) included Pazienza, member of SISMI and liaison with the CIA and the French SDECE Lt. Col Guiseppi Belmont, and Michael Ledeen, American journalist involved in propounding the ‘Bulgarian connection’ and former SISMI liaison agent with the CIA. ‘Super S’ is accused by Italian Justice of creating the ‘Billygate’ scandal surrounding President Jimmy Carter’s brother.
If SISMI were behind the ‘Bulgarian connection’ what was it they were protecting, trying to divert attention from? German officials, who had extensive knowledge of the Grey Wolves, expressed doubts about “the reputation and efficiency of the Italian security services and referred to an ‘intentional disinformation campaign by the Italian authorities’ “.(Guardian 5 January 1983). On one level it was to publicise the ‘all terrorism is KGB-inspired’ line of Crozier and his friends in the Jonathan Institute, but on another it coincided with many scandals, including Calvi and the beginnings of the P2 affair. Unless someone confesses we probably won’t find out but I will put up one possibility.
In 1981 Signor Palermo, an investigating judge of Trento, received information from imprisoned mafia members which gave “an accurate outline of (a) complicated plot which implicated Middle Eastern arms and drug smugglers, former Italian secret service agents and masonic lodge members.” (Times 9 July 1983). According to the plan “These people were trying to destabilize Italy in two ways: by spreading the use of heroin among the young – an activity much more damaging than terrorism – and by investing the proceeds in purchasing arms, which were then placed in terrorist hands.” Palermo, who had been working on the case since 1980, left the case suddenly in 1983 without explanation. (Guardian 21 June 1983)
This drugs/guns case sounds very similar to that described by Le Monde de Renseigment (October – December l980) which said “the Turkey-Bulgaria-Italy smuggling route was run, in part, by officials from Italy’s Military Intelligence Agency (SISMI)” But it’s a report on NBC news (23 March 1983) which provides the real interest.
NBC reported that the three top CIA officials in Rome were in “deep trouble”, one source of their problems being that “they might have been using a guns and drugs smuggling route between Sofia, Bulgaria and Milan, Italy, to run their own agents into Eastern Europe.”
One can well believe they were in “deep trouble”, what with the guns/drugs smuggling route overlapping possibly with those of Flavio Carbono, Henri Arsan and, as mentioned above, General Santovito of SISMI – all with connections to P2 and Gelli. (See the various books on Calvi and Sindona.)
An important link in this episode is the 1981 sudden US cut-off of support to a joint campaign with the Bulgarians on stopping drug trafficking across the border. The Americans put the blame on the Bulgarians for not taking the initiative seriously and subsequently mounted a publicity campaign against KINTEX, the Bulgarian state run import/export business, saying that it was totally responsible for the drugs/ guns smuggling. Familiar phrases came out: “The heroin trafficking is intended as a political weapon to destabilize western societies,” and to…”supply and support dissident groups in the Middle East with arms and ammunition.” (Guardian 24 July 1984) The Italians followed the Americans and failed to take up a Bulgarian offer of joint action in blocking illegal arms drug trafficking. (Guardian 5 January 1983)
One could describe a conspiracy in which all these separate strands came together. In essence, the Americans (CIA), fearing exposure of their operations and all the horrors of investigations into CIA/mafia links, created a disinformation campaign which took in two parts: one, the campaign against KINTEX, which neatly provided the basis of the second: namely, the Agca ‘Bulgarian connection’.
SD