By Vestnik Kavkaza
The book presentation of the Russian translation of the book by a well-known British journalist and historian Frances Stonor Saunders, "The CIA and the World of Art: Cultural Front of the Cold War" took place in Moscow. According to the translator of the book, Veronica Krasheninnikova, Saunders is not a supporter of Russia or the Soviet Union, and acts as an independent journalist and historian.
An investigative journalist of the largest German newspaper "Süddeutsche Zeitung", John Goetz, believes that "along with the creation of secret prisons in Europe and the organization of coups around the world, the CIA was able to lead an extremely subtle and delicate cultural programs, because culture is the best means of political struggle and the most powerful tool of intellectual influence."
According to Veronica Krasheninnikova, Director General of the Institute of Foreign Policy Studies and Initiatives, “Frances Stonor Saunders is one of those critically-minded Westerners, a researcher who took on the challenge of understanding the true state of affairs. Propaganda does not affect her. To write this book, she conducted very serious research. The book took about five years, and a lot of time in the archives. What was the problem of the United States after World War II? The victory was won in large part due to leftist movements and communist parties in Europe, i.e. the victory over fascism. And the left-wing movements, and the Communists were very popular. After the war, in 1947-48, many European countries held the first post-war elections - in France, in Italy and in other countries communists were set to win these elections, which categorically did not suit the United States. A global program of impact on European elites was prepared. Elites, because they were mostly left-wing, and left-wing views were extremely popular in general. It was necessary, first, to push these elites who professed communist beliefs closer to the center, and secondly, to make them anti-Soviet, and thirdly, to instil into their minds love towards the American way of life. Therefore, a very multi-dimensional, multi-level cultural program was developed - a program to impact on the minds of Europeans. Later, it became known as "soft power."
But Krasheninnikova thinks that “talking about soft power, we need to understand who developed it and for what purpose. If the concept of soft power still belongs to the U.S., we must learn the true meaning of this concept and understand how these mechanisms work. The main instrument of the cultural front of the Cold War was the "Congress for Cultural Freedom," with offices in 35 countries and dozens of publications and programs. The majority of these programs were conducted through foundations and non-profit organizations. Some funds were very real, such as the Rockefeller Foundation, the Ford Foundation, the Asia Foundation, they exist today, and other funds were fakes, created specifically to transfer money and to clean the CIA as a source of funds for the organization. Non-profit organizations and U.S. funds are a mere extension of the U.S. state apparatus. If someone thinks that they are truly independent, then that person is deeply mistaken. As the author says, at one point in time there was a joke: "If any American philanthropic or cultural organization includes the words "independent" or "private" in their documents, most likely it is a cover for the CIA."
“We see today that many people in the U.S. government still live in the mechanisms of the Cold War and continue them with only some upgrade of new technical capabilities and resources,” Ilya Peresedov, political scientist, journalist, says. “Here, of course, the story of this very active cooperation between the CIA and intellectual and cultural spheres is certainly very interesting and allows us to draw basic conclusions about self-determination, including, I think, some Russian intellectuals, who identify themselves with the Russian cultural field.”
“We have no right to have illusions and have no right to make errors,” Krasheninnikova believes. “The U.S. may make mistakes because they have enormous economic, political and military weight, and their margin for error is wide. We have almost no margin for error. For example, the situation with Libya. We have made a decision, and Libya as a state does not exist. Our mistakes cost us too much. Therefore, we must, as experts, people who are involved in the processes of government, be responsible for the decisions, be responsible for the fate of the country. And so we must have the possibility of a deeper understanding of the current processes, understanding of history, as they provide a much more accurate prediction of the future, of the steps of the United States. America's not going anywhere, we have to deal with America for a long time, as long as we exist. Therefore, we need to know this actor exceptionally well.”
