Grenada Documents – Introduction -format

GRENADA DOCUMENTS:

AN OVERVIEW AND SELECTION

Released by the Department of State and the Department of Defense
September 1984
Washington, D.C.

Some of the Grenada documents reproduced in this book are
marked Confidential, Secret, or Top Secret. These
classifications were put on the documents by the
Marxist-Leninist governments of Grenada, Cuba, the Soviet
Union, or other Communist countries. These documents were not
classified by the U.S. Government or its allies.

GRENADA DOCUMENTS:

AN OVERVIEW AND SELECTION

INTRODUCTION

BY MICHAEL LEDEEN AND HERBERT ROMERSTEIN

The military action by the United States and the members of the
Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) in October 1983
brought to a close the four-year rule of the New Jewel Movement
( NJM ) on the island of Grenada. During their stay on Grenada, the
combined forces found a considerable body of documents, constituting
an extensive archive of the NJM regime. There were roughly 35,000
pounds of material, ranging from official government treaties,
orders, minutes, and correspondence to personal diaries, telexes to
and from many foreign countries, and bank documents concerning the
finances of government and party leaders. Rarely has such a
complete documentary picture of a Communist state been available to
Western students. The entire lot is being made available to
scholars and other interested parties through the National Archives
in Washington.

Pending completion of the Grenada archive, we were asked to
assemble a cross-section of documents to give a preliminary picture
of Grenada during the rule of Maurice Bishop and the NJM, from April
1979 to October 1983. It was a daunting task, for the richness of
the material made selection difficult. The collection presented
here could easily have been replaced almost in its entirety by
other, equally significant material. Nonetheless, we have striven
to provide representative samples from areas likely to be of
interest to students of communism and of international relations.

We expect that in the future other scholars will produce more
detailed studies using the substantial documentation in the
archive. We judged the area we selected to be most important for a
first look at the Grenada documents. To these we added some
material dealing with life on the island during the NJM period,
particularly documents illustrating human rights abuses by the
Bishop regime. These include reports of treatment of prisoners and
legal proceedings, as well as the attempts by the regime — with the
help of its international allies — to deal with political opponents,
particularly the churches.

Finally, while this work was authorized and paid for by the
Government of the United States [Ledeen worked as a consultant to
the Department of State; Romerstein is an official of the United
States Information Agency], we are entirely responsible for the
selection of the documents and for the introductory material. We
did our work without any pressure from anyone, except insofar as we
were urged to work as fast as was reasonably possible. We are
grateful for freedom to make the selections we deemed most
representative and for the patient support throughout the many
months we worked on the documents. We are grateful above all to the
two senior officials who authorized the project; the then
Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs, Lawrence Eagleburger,
and the Undersecretary of Defense for Policy, Fred Ikle.

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We believe that the documents in this collection give , an
accurate albeit incomplete picture of Grenada under the NJM. ‘In ^i;
choosing a few hundred pages out of tens of thousands, the best
can be hoped for is that the selection was done fairly, with an >;^e|
to! understanding. We believe that we have done this. r^!

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THE NEW JEWEL MOVEMENT •

The revolution that overthrew the Gairy regime in Grenada’in ”
April 1979 was designed to create a Communist society and to bring
Grenada into the Soviet orbit. While the leaders of the New’ Jewel
Movement recognized that they needed to feign respect for political
pluralism and a desire for good relations with all neighboring
countries (above all the United States), the actual direction that
Maurice Bishop and his NJM colleagues wished to take was clear from
the outset. The close working relations the regime established with
the Government of Cuba — both in Grenada and in Cuba i tself –showed
that Bishop intended to model his revolution on that of the Soviet
Union and, more immediately, of Cuba. The attention shown to
delegations from the Soviet bloc and from such radical regimes as
Qadaffi’s Libya and Kim-il Sung’s North Korea, along with the lack
of exchanges with traditional friends such as Great Britain,
indicated the NJM’s real intentions.

By September 1982, Bishop could give an extended “now it can be
told” speech to the leaders of the Party and the Government, aptly
entitled “Line of March for the Party” (Document 1). In that key
presentation, Bishop flatly stated that the goal of the NJM was to
“ensure the leading role of the working class through its
Marxist/Leninist Party backed by some form of the dictatorship of
the proletariat.” Copies of the “Line of March” were closely held;
each copy was marked confidential and consecutively numbered by
hand. Many had been read, marked, and dog-eared, then returned.

The minutes of the NJM Political Bureau reflect the use of the “Line
of March” document in study classes attended by every member and
candidate for membership.

The “Line of March” contains Bishop’s reflections on the tactics
he adopted shortly after seizing power. People from all social
strata were included in the original ruling council and, according
to Bishop, “this was done deliberately so that imperialism won’t get
too excited and would say ‘well they have some nice fellas in that
thing; everything allright.'” This little deception was abandoned
by the time of Bishop’s speech, when the NJM was in complete
control, and Bishop was quite explicit about the way in which
control was exercised:

Consider how people get detained in this country. We don’t go
and call for no votes. You get detained when I sign an order
after discussing it with the National Security Committee of the
Party or with a higher Party body. Once I sign it — like it or
don’t like it — it’s up the hill for them.

Candidates for “the hill” were identified through a clandestine
system that monitored the population and foreign visitors (even the
predominantly American student body at the medical school). The
Special Branch (Secret Police) divided the island into regions for

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j ifeirf

surveillance; potential opponents of the regime were identified ]«$ | j
(generally on a class or religious basis) and closely watched. InT’rJ
addition, major institutions were targeted for surveillance: ,thd ; sf c |

government, the trade union, the police, the medical school, arid |feKe|S|
churches. That this represented a departure from previous practdf;cepi ;|
is indicated by a statement made by the . head of the Special Bfianci^r
Michael Roberts, in a May 1980 report to the Prime Minister drid
Minister of National Security (Document 9): “the old MI -5 –(:Bni^t!?ii^^”;:

counterintelligence) methods of work, after experimentation, have /[*ft .
proven to be not effective enough.”

THE CHURCHES J;

Church leaders were subjected to particularly close . vfe-bi i.

surveillance, and the Grenadans received considerable help from tliefi .1
Cubans and Nicaraguans in countering religious activities. • ; 1

document outlining the basic counterintelligence operations of h

Interior Ministry (Document 9), the scope of the NJM’s concern r.*w‘ii©0 p. H
the churches is evident from a list of duties of the Special Braril^Vi^
which included: . , ll!Hf r

— “Monitoring all sermons by the various parish priests and . !
preachers in the society? .

– — The controlling of all hirachy [sic) meeting of the \

church in particular the Catholic and Anglicans? ^ j.

Controlling all elements of the society that pay visits . j . Wji I
to the hirachy [sic]; – ij

— Tapping of the Hirachy [sic] of all the leading counter

churches phones.” ‘ -t’ :

(“Counter” was used as shorthand for “counterrevolutionary” by Ur 1
virtually all Grenadans.) | / |

The NJM took these security measures against church leaders |
because they believed that all major religious institutions on tjhe*l£
island were opposed to the revolution. In a top secret report
written in March 1983 (Document 4), Michael Roberts of the Spe^cdiaiy^ ‘ :
Branch stated that the Roman Catholic, Anglican, Methodist,- antfR :

Seventh Day Adventist churches were all hostile to the NJM, and4fehiji|i ,
the Catholic Church was the most important because of. its si.zje >!
internal discipline. Roberts was concerned about the Catholics , | ! fu?s^e! •>*
of the Jerusalem Bible because “this bible is written as a novel’ WM

is very easy to understand not being written in, old English This 1 ‘

means that the Church in understanding the struggle … has 1 k •

Revolutionized 1 is [sic] main ideological weapon — the bible.” ; I
Moreover, the Church distributed the Pope’s New Year’s me.ssager,*i|.ain;#’ j.,
Roberts considered it to be “the Church’s foreign policy documdridj .’if ,i J ;
and no doubt will be used to criticize our foreign policy.”

Similar concerns were expressed about the other churchesy to the . Il
point where, by July 1983, Interior Minister Keith Roberts couJ;d^dt’^ I.
write that “in the medium term, if serious measures are no/t takefifrjt M-k

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we can find ourselves faced with a Poland situation. •• .we see the
Church in the immediate period as being the most dangerous sector
for the development of internal counter revolution” (Document 5).

But perhaps most indicative of the great concern about the
churches was the interest shown by the Cuban Communist Party (PCC).
The Americas Department of the Cuban Communist Party prepared an
extensive analysis of “the religious situation in the country, and
the contacts for further cooperation between the PCC and the NJM
regarding the question” (Document 2).

The Cubans concurred that the churches were “in harmony with the
campaigns carried out by the reactionary governments in the
Caribbean” and were distressed at the lack of effective action by
the NJM. For example, the Cubans lamented that the Grenadans had
not infiltrated the churches (“there are no signs of systematic
progressive projections within the Grenadian clergy”), and, as of
the time of the report (August 1982), the Grenadans had not even
appointed a person to take charge of religious questions. This was
remedied forthwith, as Selwyn Strachan was named to this position,
and was supposed to spend nearly three weeks training in Cuba before
starting work. The Cubans foresaw that Strachan* s job would
■basically include the information work at the beginning and regular
contacts with collaborators from Christian organizations.” In other
words, he would place agents inside the churches, and then attempt
to manipulate them from within.

The other main Cuban suggestion was to bring Grenadan religious
leaders and laypersons into contact with Nicaraguan church figures
“and other Latin American circles linked to the theology of
liberation and, in general, to the idea of a church committed to the
revolutionary positions.”

THE SOVIET CONNECTION

From the beginning. Bishop and the other NJM leaders sought to
bring Grenada into the Soviet orbit, and there are thousands of
documents showing the intimate relationship that developed between
the USSR and Grenada. Sometimes relations were embodied in formal
treaties between Grenada and Soviet bloc countries, and such Soviet
proxies as Cuba, Vietnam, and North Korea. On other occasions there
were secret agreements, such as those for providing counter-
intelligence or surveillence equipment, training for agents, and so
forth. We have included several of the treaties and par ty-to-par ty
agreements that gave Grenada a vast quantity of armaments as well as
military and political training. Thousands of weapons, far more
than could have been required for the security requirements of the
tiny island, were shipped by the Soviet Union and Communist-bloc
countries. Overall, the documents (samples of which can be found in

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this book) showed that the Soviet, Cuban, North Korean, and
Czechoslovakian agreements included the following items, which were
to have been delivered by 1986:

— Approximately 10,000 assault and other rifles;

— More than 4,500 submachine guns and machine guns?

— More than 11.5 million rounds of 7.62 mm ammunition;

— 294 portable rocket launchers with more than 16,000 rockets?

— 84 82 mm mortars with more than 4,800 mortar shells?

— 12 75 mm cannon with 600 cannon shells;

— 15,000 hand grenades, 7,000 land mines, 60 armored personnel
carriers and patrol vehicles?

— More than 150 radio transmitters, 160 field telephone sets,
approximately 23,000 uniforms, and tents for about 7,700
persons .

By U.S. Department of Defense estimates, equipment found on the
island (not all of it had arrived) would have been sufficient to
equip a fighting force of roughly 10,000 men. Furthermore, there
evidently were some plans for special forces, since the Soviets
promised to provide an airplane capable of transporting 39
paratroopers, as well as other special equipment.

All of this made Grenada a real military threat to its
neighbors, most of whom had only local constabularies rather than
standing armies. And there was little question that th€i airport was
going to be used for military purposes, since General Hudson
Austin’s deputy, Liam James, reported in his notebook on March 22,
1980, “The Revo has been able to crush Counter-Revolution
internationally, airport will be used for Cuban and Soviet military”
(Document 23). This apparently reflected a decision of the NJM
leadership.

The Soviets appreciated the geopolitical significance of
acquiring another proxy in the Western Hemisphere, as can be seen
from the picturesque account of a meeting between Major Einstein
Louison, Chief of Staff of the Grenadan Army (who had gone to Moscow
for military training), and his Soviet counterpart, Marshal N.V.
Ogarkov. According to the Grenadan notes on the meeting (Document
24), Ogarkov told Louison, “over two decades ago, there was only
Cuba in Latin America, today there are Nicaragua, Grenada and a
serious battle is going on in El Salvador.” The Grenadans saw
themselves as Soviet proxies. Their Ambassador to Moscow, W.

Richard Jacobs, reminded his comrades in Grenada that their
importance to the Soviets would eventually depend on their success
in exporting revolution: “To the extent that we can take credit for

bringing any other country into the progressive fold, our prestige
and influence would be greatly enhansed [sic]” (Document 26).

Jacobs felt that the first such project should be Suriname.

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There was no lack of Soviet support for Grenadan intelligence
and counterintelligence operations. A draft letter dated February
17, 1982, from General Hudson Austin to Yuri Andropov, then the
chief of the KGB, requested training courses for three Grenadans in
counterintelligence and one in intelligence work. Austin thanked
Andropov for the “tremendous assistance which our armed forces have
received from your party and government in the past” (Document 27).

Perhaps the most intensive Soviet assistance to Grenada was in
the field of indoctrination, for it was necessary to train a new.
Communist generation on the island. The Soviets participated in
some of the “ideological crash courses” that are referred to in the
minutes of several meetings of the Politbureau and the Central
Committee, and they also invited Grenada to send students to the
highest level Soviet training school for foreign Communists, the
Lenin School in Moscow. The Lenin School, in operation since the
1920s, has trained the leading Communists of almost every country of
the world. The NJM students there reported on their training,
including courses in “social psychology and propaganda” and “party
organization — intelligence/security” (Document 28). The Cubans also
assisted in courses in mass manipulation, offering training in
journalism, crowd control, propaganda, billboard painting, newspaper
and cartoon writing and drawing. A secret agreement between the
Cuban Communist Party (PCC) and the NJM provided for training of
Grenadans in Cuba and Grenada (Document 17). The document was
signed for Cuba by Manuel Pineiro, the former head of Cuban
intelligence (the DGI ) , and currently the head of the Americas
Department of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba,
the covert action arm of the Castro regime.

Twenty Grenadans were invited to Vietnam to study anti-chemical
warfare, anti-radioactivity warfare, “reeducation of anti-social and
counterrevolutionary elements,” and “Yankee tactics and the weapons
used in Vietnam” (Document 18). Others were invited to
Czechoslovakia, Libya, East Germany, and North Korea. We do not
know whether the invitations were accepted, but the proposals show
how thoroughly Grenada was integrated into the Soviet world.

RELATIONS WITH THE UNITED STATES

The leaders of the Grenadan Government and the New Jewel
Movement consistently regarded the United States with hostility.
There were several contacts between the NJM and the Communist Party
U.S.A., both to raise money for Grenada and to coordinate propaganda
and public relations strategies in the United States. There was
also guidance from the Cubans provided by Gail Reed Rizo, the
U.S.-born wife of the Cuban Ambassador to Grenada, Julian Torres
Rizo. Gail Reed had been active in American radical organizations,
including the Venceremos Brigade, during the 1970s. Prior to the

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trip of Prime Minister Bishop to the United States in 1983, Mrs.

Rizo gave him detailed suggestions on how he should conduct himself
in his contacts with American officials, and recommendations on
which Americans he should meet (Document 31). She also reminded him
that Sanchez Parodi of the Cuban Interests Section in Washington
would be available to him if needed.

Most helpful to an understanding of the NJM’s attitude toward
the United States are the handwritten notes, evidently written by a
Grenadan participant in the conversation, describing Bishop’s
meeting with National Security Adviser William Clark (Document 32).
The notes reveal the NJM perception of American concern about the
ideological direction of the Bishop regime (Clark at one point
purportedly stressed the U.S. desire that Grenada remain within a
Western legal framework), and that the main obstacle to better
relations between the two countries was not political, but
geopolitical. According to the notes, Washington was worried about
the large numbers of Cubans and Russians on Grenada. Clark, Deputy
Secretary of State Kenneth Dam, and U.S. Ambassador to the
Organization of American States William Middendorf stressed that the
U.S. Government wanted actions, not mere declarations of good
intentions from the Grenadans. The notes indicate that Bishop was
■encouraged by [Judge Clark’s] response.”

In their efforts to persuade the United States to switch from
perceived hostility to support, the Grenadans exerted considerable
effort to create a lobby in Washington and to organize a propaganda
network throughout the country. They carefully monitored the
American media (with help from the Cubans, especially Ambassador
Julian Torres Rizo and Gail Reed Rizo), and responded vigorously to
criticisms, attempted to identify correspondents and television
producers sympathetic to their point of view, and even discussed
with the Communist Party U.S. A. the possibility of starting a new
radio station in New York City. (These themes are found throughout
the minutes of the Politbureau and the Central Committee. See, for
example, minutes for Politbureau of 13 May 1982, for their
preoccupation with a CBS broadcast they did not like.) A public
relations firm in New York was hired to monitor less important
publications.

Finally, Grenada coordinated its efforts with those of
Soviet-bloc countries and international Soviet-front organizations
in supporting and encouraging a worldwide “peace” movement, and in
turning against U.S. policy. In April 1981, an NJM representative
attended a World Peace Council Congress in Havana, and met with his
counterparts from the USSR, Bulgaria, East Germany, Hungary, and the
National Committee of Quebec. He reported that assistance would
soon be forthcoming from the Soviets, the Hungarians, and the East
Germans (Document 45).

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THE SOCIALIST INTERNATIONAL

The Declaration of the Socialist International (SI) adopted in
Oslo in June 1962, states that the Communist “one-party
dictatorships represent in fact tyranny, denying those freedoms of
speech, religion, criticism, voluntary organization and contacts
with the outside world which are the essence of a democratic
society.” (See Declarations of the Socialist International , London,
1978, p. 13.) The SI was therefore a natural target for the
Communists, and some of the Grenada documents show that “Active
Measures”* were conducted against the SI by Grenadans and others
acting under the direction of the Americas Department of the Central
Committee of the Cuban Communist Party. To further the objective of
subverting the SI, a , “Secret Regional Caucus” was formed by the
Nicaraguan Sandinistas, the Grenadan NJM, and some parties in the
Latin American Committee of the SI (Document 39). The NJM had sent
observers to SI meetings even before its successful revolution, and
in late 1979 Bishop applied for membership in the Socialist
International. The application was accepted in November 1980 at the
SI Congress in Madrid.

The Grenadans, taking their cue from the Cubans and from the
Soviets, viewed the Socialist International as a potential enemy,
and one unsigned document (Document 38) — apparently from the 1980-81
per iod–def ended the decision to join the SI, but made clear that it
was not because of belief in the Si’s principles. Membership was
supported on two grounds:

♦”Active Measures” is an expression used by the Soviets for their
influence operations. Soviet Active Measures are coordinated by the
International Department of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
(ID), which engages in both overt and semi-overt activities. The
KGB conducts the covert Active Measures in coordination with the ID.

Covert Active Measures include forgeries, agents of influence,
placement of false stories in the press, and so forth.

Some Soviet Active Measures are carried out through surrogates
(usually the intelligence service of another Communist-bloc
country). In the Western Hemisphere, the Cuban Communist Party’s
Americas Department conducts Active Measures on behalf of the Soviet
Union. The Americas Department combines both overt and covert
Active Measures by having officers of the Cuban Intelligence Service
(the DGI ) operate on behalf of the Department. For more details,
see hearings of the U.S. House of Representatives, Permanent Select
Committee on Intelligence, Soviet Covert Action, 1980 and Soviet
Active Measures, 1982 .

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!• provided access to international movements which could be
persuaded to support New Jewel Movement policies.

2. The New Jewel Movement could use its membership in the SI to
“express organized support for the progressive struggles in
Southern Africa, the Western Sahara, Palestine, El Salvador,
Nicaragua, and other parts of Latin America, etc.”

There was evidently some concern within the government of
Grenada that the NJM might be violating its own principles by being
a member of a social democratic organization. The author of the
document responded that the Socialist International was
“sufficiently flexible to permit dissention [sic]” and therefore
“membership in the SI should be retained. It has proved useful and
if Grenada’s foreign policy initiatives are strengthened it can
prove even more useful in the future.”

The most detailed documents concerning the Socialist
International were apparently not written by Grenadans, but rather
by Cubans. Two documents found stapled together appear to have been
written by a Cuban and then translated into English. (The language
is stilted and the author writes from a vantage point outside the
SI. We believe they were written by the same person who wrote
Document 37A, definitely a Cuban.) They contain sophisticated
analyses of the SI from a Marxist/Leninist perspective. One of
them — Document 35 — is a report on the 15th Congress of the Socialist
International held in Madrid in November 1980. The report refers to
international documents that had been circulated confidentially
among the members of the SI Bureau. These confidential documents
showed that there were internal conflicts on a number of questions.
The author of the report complained that the “rightist and
conservative sectors of the International” (who, as we shall see,
included persons who are now the heads of government in Italy,

Spain, and Portugal) had succeeded in including in a draft
resolution references to “the Afghan problem; events in
Poland •••[ and ] the USSR’s alleged arms— race policy.”

The nature of the conflict between communism and democratic
socialism was spelled out in detail in the other document (Document
36): in the main contradiction of our times between capitalism and

socialism, led by U.S. imperialism and the USSR respectively. Social
Democrats as a whole are on the imperialist side up to now.” Thus
the social democrats were enemies of the Communists, and efforts by
the SI to exert influence on Latin America were to be resisted:

We see a dual nature in the projection of social democracy in
Latin America and the Caribbean. On the one hand, it does
represent a permanent enemy of the essential objectives of the
communist and left movements in that this trend intends to
prevent the triumph of socialist revolutions and the

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materialization of the communist ideal. On the other hand,
it is obvious that certain political positions of the
social democracy can be used by the revolutionary and
progressive forces of the continent at given junctures of
the struggle against a repressive and fascist military
regime and of the confrontation with U.S. imperialism.
Hence, in our view, while ideological struggle is
necessary, we should implement ways and methods of
case-by-case treatment of the parties related to social
democracy whose positions coincide with certain tactical
objetives [sic] of the Latin American revolutionary
movement (Document 36, page 14).

DEMOCRATIC SOCIALISTS VERSUS THE MARXIST/LENINISTS

Unison Whiteman, minister of external relations of the
Bishop Government, attended a two-day emergency SI meeting on
Latin America and the Caribbean in Panama on February 28 and
March 1, 1981. Whiteman had a dispute over El Salvador with
former President Carlos Andres Perez of the Venezuelan
Democratic Action Party, who insisted that if the SI meeting
was going to condemn the United States for supplying arms to
the Salvadoran Government, the Cubans and the Soviets should
also be condemned for arming the guerrillas. Whiteman
responded that “the U.S. supply of arms to the Junta is a
notorious fact, that the U.S. officially and publicly stated
this; that SI should not speculate on where the freedom
fighters are getting arms from; that in any event we should not
equate arms for the oppressors with weapons to defend the
people in their just struggle.” Whiteman worked for a
compromise resolution that named no names, and he implied that
the tone of the resolution was hostile only to the United
States (Document 41).

Whiteman’s position was that of the Cubans. In this
regard, an illuminating document is a Spanish-language report
on an SI committee meeting held in Nicaragua on June 25, 1981
(Document 33). The report was signed by Manuel Pineiro Losada,
head of the Americas Department of the Cuban Communist Party.

In this document, Pineiro complained of efforts by the
democratic socialists to urge the Nicaraguan regime to move in
a more moderate direction. Pineiro was particularly upset with
the actions of Carlos Andres Perez and Felipe Gonzales, the
head of the Spanish Socialist Party (PSOE) and now the Prime
Minister of Spain. Attached to Pineiro’s report were two
documents: an account in Spanish of the discussion between

Bayardo Arce (a member of the Sandinista National Directorate
in Nicaragua) and Felipe Gonzales and Carlos Andres Perez for
the SI; and an apparently intercepted telex from Hans Eberhard
of the German Social Democratic Party to Walter Hacker, the
International Secretary of the Austrian Social Democratic

– 12 –

Party. There was also a poor English translation (we have made a
fresh translation, included here as Document 33A). Evidently, the
Cubans’ distrust of the Social Democrats was so intense that they
carefully watched the behavior of their principal enemies within the
SI.

Conflicts between the democrats and the Communists within the
Socialist International emerged at virtually eVery meeting of which
the Grenadans had a record. At a meeting in Bonn on April 1 and 2,
1982 (Document 37), for example, NJM representative Fennis Augustine
found that while there was considerable support for Grenada within
SI ranks, “some have reservations on what they see as a Marxist
thrust of the NJM. I believe that close relationship with Cuba will
continue. Nicaragua’s position is a little more difficult, although
there was a great degree of understanding and sympathy for them by
the time the meeting was finished” (Document 37). Augustine noted
that some of the social democratic parties were worried about the
actions of the Sandinistas, and cited in particular Carlos Andres
Perez* party’s criticisms of the Nicaraguans. Augustine was also
disturbed to encounter SI support for greater democracy in
Nicaragua, including elections, a two-party system, human rights,
freedom of religion, and freedom of speech. and press.

The same meeting was the subject of another report, this one
unsigned (Document 37a). Internal evidence (a reference to Cuba as
“us”) suggests that it was written by a Cuban, and it is quite
similar to Documents 35 and 36. It would not be surprising to have
a Cuban report of an SI meeting, since the Cubans were almost always
present at the site of such meetings, even though they were not
permitted to attend. But they gave instructions to the Grenadans
(and perhaps also to the Nicaraguans), and were thus able to get
detailed reports on what transpired. In any event, the author of
the report, while disturbed that the democratic socialists were
attempting to neutralize the “revolutionary” countries in the region
so as to limit Cuban influence, boasted that the “right-wing” forces
within the SI (identified as Felipe Gonzales of Spain, Mario Soares
of Portugal, and Carlos Andres Perez of Venezuela, two of whom are
now prime ministers and one a former president of their respective
countries) were effectively neutralized.

But Cuban and Grenadan optimism turned out to be misplaced. At
a meeting of the Socialist International European Bureau in Basle,
Switzerland, on November 3 and 4, 1982, there was outspoken
criticism of both the NJM and the Sandinista regime in Nicaragua.
According to a report of the meeting submitted by Chris DeRiggs, a
member of the NJM Central Committee and Minister of Health, there
was strong opposition to a resolution expressing solidarity with
Grenada and Nicaragua. Leading critics included Mario Soares,
Bettino Craxi of the Italian Socialist Party, and Rita Freedman of
Social Democrats USA. According to DeRiggs, “their major line of
attack was that Grenada was a one-party state and, therefore, could
not be considered a democracy” (Document 40, page 4).

Both DeRiggs and Paul Miller of the Peoples National Party (PNP)
of Jamaica tried to justify the lack of an opposition party in
Grenada, but apparently their rhetoric was not convincing, and so
they pondered ways in which the Socialist International could be
turned to their own purposes. DeRiggs suggested that the forces of
the Latin American left within the SI could be used to lobby the
European Socialists, and he observed that Guillermo Ungo of the
Salvadoran National Revolutionary Movement ( MNR ) — affiliated with
the Revolutionary Democratic Front (FDR), the political wing of the
guerrilla movement-had achieved a certain degree of success along
those lines. Thus, in DeRiggs’s words, “it is felt that similar
efforts from other SI members in the region can help to exploit
contradictions existing even within the membership of SI parties
like the Socialist Party of Portugal” (Document 40, page 8). In
other words, it was necessary to work within the member parties to
produce a shift in outlook. By January of 1983, these ideas had
taken a more concrete form.

THE “SECRET REGIONAL CAUCUS ”

January 6-7, 1983, a Secret Regional Caucus was held in Managua,
consisting of five parties affiliated with the Socialist
International, and the Communist Party of Cuba (See Document 39).

The five SI parties were:

— The FSLN of Nicaragua, represented by Antonio Jarquin
(misspelled as Marguin and Harguin in the document), the
chairman of the meeting;

—The Salvadoran MNR, represented by Hector Oqueli (this party
is one of the groups composing the guerrilla movement, and
Oqueli is the Secretary of the Socialist International
Committee for Latin America and the Caribbean, which has given
a patina of respectability to the Salvadoran insurgents);

— The Chilean Radical Party, represented by “Freda” (the
leadership of the party later denied that it had sent a
representative) ;

— The Jamaican PNP, represented by Paul Miller;

— The New Jewel Movement, represented by Chris DeRiggs.

The Socialist International was the main topic of the meeting.

In DeRiggs’s words, they considered “initiatives to neutralize
forces within SI that are against us.” And what were these forces?
“Our principal enemies are to be found among the parties of Soares
and Horgo [sic, Pietro Longo, the leader of the Italian Social
Democratic Party] in Portugal and Italy respectively — the Social
Democrats of the USA are also our sworn enemies.” DeRiggs boasted
that of the 14 members of the SI Committee for Latin America and the
Caribbean, “there are seven parties that are generally progressive
and some within a Mar xist-Leninist trend.” The Secret Regional
Caucus report shows that a resolution on Latin America and the

-14-

Caribbean drafted by Hector Oqueli of the Salvadoran MNR,
subsequently submitted to the SI, was actually based on guidelines
laid down at the meeting. A decision was made to maintain the
Secret Regional Caucus, and to “review membership in the future.”

This document shows that the NJM was fundamentally opposed to
the democratic ideals of the Socialist International, that the
Grenadans, along with others in the region, worked in lockstep with
the Cubans to undermine the Si’s effectiveness, and that the
Grenadans’ greatest objection to the SI was its insistence on
democratic institutions and democratic elections. In fact, on
February 3, 1982, Benny Langaigne, the permanent secretary in
Maurice Bishop’s office, showed the Prime Minister a draft letter
addressed to the official magazine of the SI, Socialist Affairs
(Document 42). The letter protested a story in the magazine stating
that Grenada would have elections in the near future. In fact, the
NJM had no such intention.

CONCLUSION

The documents selected for this volume constitute, in our
opinion, a representative sample of the total archive. We believe
that those who take the time to study them will find a remarkable
consistency, a single-minded dedication to the NJM’s objective of
creating, over time, a Communist society on the Soviet model.

Bishop and his colleagues not only wished to establish communism
in Grenada; they wanted to be active members of the Soviet Empire.

To this end, they sought ways to curry favor with the Soviets and
other bloc countries, and loyally followed the instructions that
came to them through Cubans. Thus, on both the domestic and
international levels, the Grenadans emulated the USSR and tied their
destiny to the Kremlin.

Nonetheless, and despite considerable assistance from the USSR
and its proxies, the People’s Revolutionary Government was a
failure, and the failure led to intense internal conflict, and
eventually to the overthrow and murder of Bishop.

The several documents that recount the internal crisis that led
to the fall and murder of Maurice Bishop in the autumn of 1983 do
not indicate any strong divergence of views between Bishop and those
who replaced him? rather, the struggle appears to have been almost
exclusively personal. The complaints against Bishop involved
inefficiency, insufficient ideological coherence, and lack of strong
leadership and guidance, not political deviation or betrayal of the
goals of the revolution. We saw no evidence that Bishop was removed
because the Cubans or the Soviets were dissatisfied with his
political orientation? as far as we have been able to discover.

-15-

there is no reason to think that his conversation with Judge Clark
and other American officials earlier in the year led his colleagues
to believe that he was “soft on imperialism.”

An archive of the dimensions and richness of this one from
Grenada will provide scholars with a wealth of information about
Communist activities in the Caribbean, Soviet and Cuban foreign
policy, and the problems encountered by Soviet-oriented Communists
in their attempts to mold a new generation of Grenadans who had had
little contact with Marxism/Leninism before the NJM took power.

Of particular interest is the material related to international
organizations, including negotiations with the International
Monetary Fund and attempts to manipulate the Socialist
International. We have given here only a brief overview of a few of
the themes that most interested us. We will be pleased if this
serves to whet the appetites of a wide audience for this collection
of documents, and for the many documents that will be made
accessible to the public with the opening of the Grenada archive.

Washington, D.C.
September 1984

CONTENTS

Note: Documents marked A-l were Maurice Bishop’s personal copies.

Notes on these documents seem to have been written by him.

SECTION ONE: LIFE UNDER THE NEW JEWEL MOVEMENT

1. “Line of March for the Party”

2. Cuban Communist Party Americas Department report on
Grenadan “Religious Situation,” August 13-24, 1982

3. “Top Secret” report on Catholic publications

4. “Top Secret” report on “The Church in Grenada”

5. “Top Secret Analysis of the Church in Grenada”

6. List of Persons in Detention, 1 January 1982

7. Secret Counterintelligence report on internal situation

8. Report on “Movements of Visiting Nationalities”

9. “Plan of Cl (Counterintelligence) Operations”

10. “Top Secret” report on Special Branch operations

11. List of Detainees currently before the Courts

12. Report on Detainees sent to the Prime Minister 19
September 1981

SECTION TWO: INTERNATIONAL ACTIVITIES

13. Top Secret Agreement between Grenada and the USSR, 1980

14. Top Secret Agreement between Grenada and the USSR, 1982

15. Protocol to 1980 Agreement

16. Protocol of Military Collaboration between Grenada and
Cuba, n.d.

17. Secret Cooperation and Exchange Plan, Gr enada-Cuba , 1983

18. Note from Grenadan Ambassador to Cuba on Vietnamese assistance

19. Report from New Jewel Movement Branch in Havana, May 1983

20. Agreement between Grenada and North Korea, April 1983

21. Notes on Meeting between Bishop and Soviet Ambassador, May 1983

22. Bill of lading on shipment of rocket warheads from Prague to
Grenada via Havana, Cuba

23. Page from notebook of Liam James referring to military use of
airport

24. Louison-Ogarkov meeting in Moscow, March 1983

25. Louison’s graduation certificate from Soviet Defense Ministry

26. Report from Grenadan Embassy in Moscow on relations with USSR

27. Draft letter from General Austin to Yuri Andropov, head of KGB

28. Report from NJM Collective, at the Lenin School in Moscow,

Nov. 1982 to May 1983

29. Report to Bishop from Moscow Embassy, June 1982

30. Report from Moscow Embassy, November 1982, on meeting with
Soviet Ministry of Defense

31. Letter to Bishop from Gail Reed Rizo, wife of Cuban Ambassador

32. Notes on Bishop’s meeting in Washington with Judge Clark, et
al.

-i-

33.

33A.

34.

35.

36.

37.
37A.

38.

39.

40.

41.

42.

43.

44.

45.

the

Cuban document on Socialist International -wr itten by Manuel
Pineiro .

English translation of #33 1 .•

Report by an NJM delegate to a Congress in Libya, June 1982
Analysis of the 1980 Socialist International Congress! in
Madrid (probably written by a Cuban)

Analysis of Social Democracy in Latin American and
Caribbean (probably written by a Cuban)

Report on Socialist International meeting in Bonn, April 1982 1
Report by a Cuban on the same meeting ’• . -*:l li

Grenadan analysis of Socialist International
Report on Secret Regional Caucus of the Socialist
International, January 1983 j,-

Report on Socialist International Bureau meeting in Basle, r ■
Nov. 1982

Report on SI meeting in Panama, March 1981 ! ’ M

Draft letter to SI magazine Socialist Affairs i

Report on SI meeting in the Dominican Republic, Feb. 1983
Report on SI meeting, Aug. 1983 1

Report on World Peace Council Meeting, Lisbon, 1982.

I”

SECTION THREE: MINUTES OF POLITICAL BUREAU and CENTRAL COMMITTEE

Political Bureau

46.

Dec. 8, 1980

47.

Apr. 22, 1981

48.

Apr. 25, 1981

49.

Apr. 29, 1981

50.

May 6, 1981 (2

51.

May 13, 1981

52.

May 20, 1981

53.

May 27, ;1-981

54.

June 3, 1981

55.

June 10, 1981

56.

June 17, 1981

57.

June 24, 1981

58.

July 1, 1981

59.

July 8, 1981

60.

July 29, 1981

61.

Aug. 5, 1981

621 –

Aug; 12, 1981

63.

Aug. 19, 1981

64.

Aug. 26, 1981

65.

Sept. 2, 1981

66.

Sept. 9, 1981

67.

Sept. 23, 1981

68.

Sept. 30, 1981

69.

Oct. 14, 1981

70.

Oct. 21, 1981

-■Hi

! f

jib

< .• i.

. ‘UJ

|’ !
•If:! I ‘

-ii-

71.

72.

73.

74.

75.

76.

77.

78.

79.

80.
81.
82.

83.

84.

85.

86 .

87.

88 .

89.

90.

91.

92.

93.

Report to Political Bureau on meeting of World Conference of

Women and Women’s International Democratic Federation

( WIDF ) , Oct. 3-30, 1981

Nov. 4, 1981

Nov. 11, 1981

Nov. 18, 1981

Dec. 9, 1981

Dec. 28, 1981

Apr. 7, 1982

Apr. 14, 1982

Report from Women’s Committee, May 11, 1982

Sept. 15, 1982

Sept. 22, 1982

Sept. 29, 1982

Oct. 27, 1982

Nov. 3, 1982

Nov. 17, 1982

Dec. 22, 1982

Dec. 29, 1982

Jan. 5, 1983

Jan. 12, 1983

Feb. 23, 1983

Apr. 20, 1983

Apr. 27, 1983

May 4, 1983

Central Committee

94. Apr. 26, 1981

95. May 27, 1981

96. Resolutions of Central Committee

97. June 24, 1981

98. Resolution to Central Committee from study groups

99. July 22, 1981

100. Aug. 19, 1981

101. Dec. 30, 1981

102. Apr. 21, 1982

103. June 26, 1982

104. Aug. 27, 1982

105. Extra-ordinary Meeting Oct 12-15, 1982

106. Foreign Relations Report to Central Committee

107. List of countries with which Grenada does not wish to develop
close relations

108. Grenada’s membership in international and regional
organizations

109. Draft Resolution, Mar. 21, 1983

110. July 13-19, 1983

111. Emergency Meeting, Aug. 26, 1983

112. Extra-ordinary Meeting, Sept. 14-16, 1983

113. Extra-ordinary General Meeting, Sept. 25, 1983

-iii-

NOTE: The material relating to the international crisis of the NJM

and the People’s Revolutionary Government, including the fall and
death of Maurice Bishop, is found in Oct. 1982 to Sept. 1983
documents covering Central Committee meetings.

-i v-