76-06-A7
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Terrorism[edit]
Transcript[edit]It's possible that some who led the charge against the C.I.A. the F.B.I. and police intelligence work in general are having, and should have, second thoughts. I'll be right back. In late September on the floor of Congress, a liberal member denounced the terrorist bombing in Washington that took the life of a Chilean foe of that country's present government. Obviously, the victim was to the left in his politics and the natural assumption is that his murderer or murderers were of the opposite persuasion. Other liberal Congressmen joined in demanding that the F.B.I. bring the murderers to justice. On that same September day, however, F.B.I. Director Clarence Kelly was testifying before a committee of Congress that his agency had reduced the number of domestic security investigations from a routine 21,000 or more a couple years ago, to a grand total at present of 626. This was the direct result of pressure by liberal policy makers who've been doing their best to dismantle and render ineffective all the agencies whose function and responsibility is our safety. The Attorney General of the United States laid down the anti-security guidelines that now restrict the F.B.I. in its work. Now let me interject right here, I don't hold with unwarranted prying by government into the lives of any of us, but note that qualifying word "unwarranted." I object when the Census Bureau, which is supposed to count us, busies itself with asking how many bathtubs we own. Government's principal responsibility is to protect us from each other, but at what point do we insist so much on privacy that our law enforcement agencies are unable to guard us against today's terrorism. In recent years, we've been subjected to an alarming increase in bombings, arson, hijackings and assassinations. Last year, there were more than 2000 bombings, causing 69 deaths. In the last 5 years, 43 policemen have been killed in terrorist violence. A number of anti-Castro Cubans in Miami have been blown to eternity in bombings. A bomb in New York was directed against the government of Puerto Rico. The New World Liberation Front claims credit for bombing the South African Consulate in San Francisco. In the face of all this we have forced police in our cities to destroy millions of intelligence files on revolutionary groups. The House Internal Security Committee has been abolished and I've told you about the restraints in the F.B.I. The principal attack has been against F.B.I. agents joining terrorist groups to learn their plans. But a few years ago, there was no objection when an F.B.I. agent joined the Ku Klux Klan and thus identified the murderers of young civil rights activists. Had the agent been exposed his life, would probably have been forfeit. Well the F.B.I. estimates there are some 15,000 terrorists in roughly two dozen groups or organizations in this country that threaten us from the left. The only effective way of dealing with this kind of guerrilla viciousness is to infiltrate, as that heroic agent once infiltrated the Klan. Do you know, if the F.B.I., the C.I.A. and our local police do this, I won't feel for one minute that my constitutional right of privacy has been endangered. This is Ronald Reagan. Thanks for listening. |
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