106. Telegram From the Central Intelligence Agency to the Station in the Congo1
Dir 36739 (Out 92559).
1. ODACID, and higher authority, concerned re arrival Gizenga (G) Leop and are communicating same to [Ambassador Gullion] via own channel.
2. Insofar as we understand it here, situation as follows:
(A) G held Leop under UNOC guard at Adoula (A) request.
(B) No official action against G possible until parliament lifts his immunity.
3. With G immunity lifted, several courses action open to A and GOC, including:
(A) Court trial and sentence.
(B) Leave G alone as private citizen Leop area.
(C) Banish G abroad or facilitate his legal departure (Cairo, Tanganyika or elsewhere)—medical treatment might be possible excuse.
(D) Permit G “escape,” with familiar “Lumumba” consequences.
[Page 145]4. If A to undertake G action before Lagos and UN trips will have to work awfully fast. Perhaps present UNOC detention until A return might be best interim solution while political pot continues boil and Tshombe negotiations come to some result. This particularly as G arrival Leop appears vastly reduce our own action capabilities. Request your views.
5. Realize above do not exhaust possibilities and request you and [Gullion] examine these (and others) and give us your views and recommendations, particularly interested A plans re G.
6. In event we should decide take some action, present thinking here that following caveats vital:
(A) Only with a knowledge or consent.
(B) ODYOKE hand not shown.
(C) Nothing should happen to G which could leave him martyr symbol.
7. Your views welcome.2
End of message.
- Source: Central Intelligence Agency Files, Job 78–00435R, DDO/ISS Files, Box 1, Folder 9, [cryptonym not declassified] Operations. Secret; Rybat; [cryptonym not declassified]; Operational Immediate. COS from Tweedy. Drafted by [text not declassified] and released by Tweedy (C/AF).↩
- A handwritten notation on the original reads: “Now moved to camp 1/24/62.” In telegram 2964 from Leopoldville to CIA, January 22, the Chief of Station informed Tweedy that, based on his talks with Congolese leaders, he feared that the Congolese Government had no definite plans regarding prosecution of Gizenga. He noted that none of the leaders seemed to have any grasp of the legal problems involved in convicting him. They merely thought it obvious that he was responsible for the gendarmerie revolt and therefore guilty. Nendaka, however, had asked if the United States could help them obtain a group of legal specialists to help prosecute the case. (Ibid.) In telegram 2985 from Leopoldville to CIA, January 23, the Chief of Station reported that Gizenga had left UNOC Headquarters of his own accord and was now established in a house under CNA guard. No incarceration warrant had yet been signed, but Gizenga was for all intents and purposes a prisoner. (Ibid., [text not declassified], Folder 1, Gizenga) See Document 195 in Foreign Relations, 1961–1963, volume XX, Congo Crisis, for the Embassy’s January 25 report on Gizenga’s incarceration.↩