Whispers From Shadows

"The difference between us and them lies in the fact that we want everything to be made public, and they want it all to remain secret," said Dusko Doder, one of the best in the world of journalism. Doder was trying to explain the difference between "us" and "them" to VREME. The "us" or "we" are journalists and reporters, "they" are the informers and spies. Doder has been accused recently of being "one of them", and is defending himself with a counter-charge that "they" are blackballing him because he refused to go over to "their" side.

At the end of last year, something very unusual in American and, for that matter, international journalism took place. The New York weekly "Time" brought a story "A Cold War Tale", which alleged that Doder had been recruitedin Moscow in the mid-eighties by the all-powerful Soviet Secret Police, the KGB. After a long investigation, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) had come to the conclusion that there were "no grounds for prosecuting Doder."

"Time" did not name its sources, but experienced US journalists told VREME that they had no doubts that only the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) could have inspired such a story. Underscoring that it was "extremely exceptional, even unique" that such pernicious claims should be made, bearing in mind that more than half a decade has passed since the time of the "issue," and that the case has long been dead and buried from the criminal-legal aspect.

Speaking for VREME Doder said: "The CIA is taking revenge. A change of administration in Washington is close. Many of its prominent figures are leaving and are taking advantage of the situation to settle old scores."

Doder was in Moscow from 1981 to 1985, as bureau chief of the "Washington Post", one of the leading US and world newspapers. Doder (55) is of Montenegrin descent. He was born in Sarajevo and grew up in the United States. Doder is without competition when it comes to the number and quality of scoops on secret events which took place behind the Kremlin walls. Doder was the first to reveal how Yuri Andropov had squeezed Konstantin Chernenko out of the succession to the post of General-Secretary after the death of Leonid Brezhnev in 1982, by using his position as head of the KGB.

In Moscow, Doder was friendly with his Yugoslav colleagues with whom he would exchange information. He speaks with warmth of Branko Stosic, TANJUG's Moscow correspondent at the time. Doder's greatest scoop is linked to another dear friend and TANJUG Moscow correspondent, the late Slavko Stanic. The scoop in question is a report dated February 10, 1984, in which Doder reported that Andropov had died. He had come to the conclusion thanks to close cooperation with Stanic. Both men concluded that changes in radio programs and late-night activities in state institutions and other signs could only mean that the General-Secretary had died. The "Washington Post" printed the information, but TANJUG did not. Doder took all the credit and gained world fame.

The "Washington Post" put Doder's report on page one. That same evening "Post" editors and owners asked US under-secretary of state at the time Lawrence Eagleburger what he knew of the matter. After consultations, Eagleburger said: "It's bullshit. Nothing's happened." He added that US diplomats in Moscow had joked saying Doder "was on pot" at the time of writing. Since the CIA and other services persisted in denying Doder's report, the "Post" moved the story in later editions to page 27. In the evening of the same day, Moscow announced that Andropov had died. Several days later the "Post" explained why it had doubted its correspondent, casting doubt among the public in the work of diplomats and intelligence services.

On the other hand, "Time" says the Administration concluded that Doder's reporting was "too good." US Ambassador to Moscow at the time Arthur Hartman told "Time" that it was his "impression that Doder had a very good source close to the Andropov group - probably KGB direct."

However, the main accusation against Doder was made by KGB colonel Vitaly Yurchenko. "Time" says that Yurchenko walked into the US Embassy in Rome on August 1, 1985, saying he wished to defect. In order to prove his credibility, Yurchenko talked about the ten most important cases he knew. "One of them involved Doder," writes "Time." Yurchenko said that he had heard from one of his colleagues that they had achieved a "major success" in late 1984 or early 1985. Allegedly, Doder, "while travelling with an unnamed Russian woman south of Moscow, had accepted a 1,000 dollars payment from a domestic KGB officer," writes "Time." Yurchenko suddenly returned to Moscow a few months later, casting doubt on all he had said, but the CIA and the FBI later came to the conclusion that "the accuracy of his disclosures was exceptional."

"Absolute lies. I never went south with any Russian woman. At that time it was impossible to take a foreigner in your car outside Moscow. It is also insulting to say that I, as bureau chief of the "Washington Post", could be bought for 1,000 dollars," said Doder. Just the advance money for his book "Shadows And Whispers" about the Brezhnev-Gorbachev period, published in 1986, was nearly sixty times as much.

In late October 1986, FBI director William Webster personally informed legendary "Post" executive editor Benjamin Bradlee of Yurchenko's accusations against Doder. The "Doder case" came under the competency of the FBI, because the CIA is only authorized to operate abroad, so that counter-espionage in the US comes under the FBI. Webster expressed concern because Doder, on returning from Moscow, had been assigned to cover national security. Bradlee and other "Post" bosses talked with lawyers and with Doder, and came to the conclusion that the FBI's suspicions were, as they put it, "bullshit." Doder could go on with his job.

"Time" says that the FBI put Doder to the test, by arranging that Doder should come across classified information. They later checked if he had passed it on to the KGB. Doder did not, and the FBI concluded that he was not working as a Soviet agent in the US.

"I was not aware they were trying to screw me," Doder told VREME. He underscores that he did learn later that the FBI had checked all his tax returns with the intention of prosecuting for not reporting money earned from the KGB or some other tax violation.

Only a few days before Webster voiced his suspicions of Doder, the "Post" ran his story saying that "journalists cannot do good services to their country." The story concerned Nicholas Daniloff, the unfortunate Moscow correspondent of the "U.S. News & World Report."

Doder told readers and colleagues that as far as the press was concerned, the most important thing to remember in places like Moscow was that "doing small favors to the U.S. Embassy could land you in a lot of trouble," and that Daniloff had been "used by the CIA outpost" in Moscow.

It seems that the KGB planted a sham priest, "Father Roman" on Daniloff. The young and likeable priest gave the reporter his telephone number and asked him to pass on a letter to US Ambassador Hartman. The letter contained another letter addressed to CIA director William Casey, which, according to Daniloff contained "information which might interest the CIA." Daniloff soon broke off all contacts with "Father Roman", but at the Embassy's request he had given his telephone number to diplomats. When the KGB arrested Daniloff on August 30, 1986, the investigating judge showed him a CIA agent's letter addressed to "Father Roman" in which he styles himself as "a friend of Daniloff's."

"If I had known then what I know now, I would have burnt the letter," Doder quotes Daniloff as saying. "In places like Moscow, a US journalist must carry a white flag, making it absolutely clear that he has nothing to do with governments, including his own," said Doder in his article.

Doder recounted another of his experiences: in 1983 he gave a friend at the US embassy whose opinion he valued a copy of a confidential and sensational study by the Novosibirsk group of economists. The group had come to the conclusion that the Soviet system was the source of the state's permanent economic and social crises. When the "Post" ran the story with its, for those times, spectacular findings, it was flooded with telephone calls from numerous embassies clamoring for a copy of the report. The US embassy was the only one which did not call, and this was irrefutable proof for the KGB, which was tapping Doder's phone, that he was cooperating with US intelligence services.

In his book, Doder mentions several cases when he was faster and better than the US Embassy and the CIA in reporting on dramatic changes in the Soviet Union, and when the Embassy asked him to reveal his sources. Speaking of this, Doder told VREME: "When it happens once too often that the papers say one thing and embassy reports another, then someone is making mistakes, and the question of who is wrong crops up sooner or later. The United States spend 35 billion dollars on espionage annually, and then a journalist bum shows up and uncovers everything, including the fact that there are some who are not doing a good job..."

A Yugoslav journalist who has known Doder for a long time,told VREME that Doder is an "exceptionally honest man," and that accusations about his having worked for the KGB are "ridiculous." "The opposite is true - the US intelligence service tried to recruit him, but he turned them down," adding that Doder wasn't very popular with his American colleagues, "because he didn't cooperate with them and was far ahead of them."

A prominent US journalist VREME talked to does not believe that Doder was a KGB agent, saying, however, that Doder was "unreliable" and that he had very "close" links with the CIA. He interprets the blow in "Time" as a "settling of scores among former friends."

The "Washington Post" editor's office has said that it considers "Time's" writing about Doder "incorrect" and "unjust." "Because Doder's reporting was embarrassingly more precise and faster than Ambassador Hartman's or the CIA's, the Embassy and the CIA have long tried to discredit him," said the "Post." The "Post" underscores that Doder held a top position until 1987, when he decided to take on a job as the "U.S. News & World Report" China correspondent. The new job brought Doder a six figure salary, as VREME learned. "Time" claims that the FBI's suspicions cut short Doder's brilliant career at the "Post."

In 1989 Doder and his journalist wife moved to Belgrade, from where they report for several English-language newspapers, on the agony in their first homeland. Doder is thinking of suing "Time," but is aware that such proceedings would take a very long time and that lawyers cost a lot, and the fact that "an individual does not have much of a chance against big institutions."

"The damage done is the same as when you call someone gay and then say he isn't. Something always lingers on," said Doder talking about the article in "Time." "All this must be taken with a sense of humor, and you must also be aware that when you make powerful enemies, then you must respect them."

Doder concludes: "I made enemies unintentionally. I have never done anything against the US, my paper, or my readers. I never imagined that all this could happen in America."