Ion Mihai Pacepa, former intelligence general, who defected from communist Romania to the United States in 1978, died of COVID, aged 92 on February 14, 2021, in the U.S. Below is one story about how Pacepa’s defection and subsequent activity in the U.S. affected Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE(RL)
The Mysterious Death of Vlad Georgescu
Vlad Georgescu was a prestigious historian and dissident, who had a long history of trouble with the Securitate. Starting in 1974, the Securitate harassed him for criticizing the Ceausescu regime. He was accused of treason in 1977 and was jailed for writing several anti–Ceausescu essays and passing them on to the U.S. embassy for publication abroad. Because of the U.S. Government's interest in his case, Vlad was allowed to leave Romania and travel to Washington, where he asked for and received political asylum. Shortly afterward, he became a contributor to RFE’s broadcasts. Two years later, he was appointed associate director of RFE’s Romanian Broadcast Department and then became the BD director based in Munich, Germany.
In December 1987, Vlad Georgescu loaned me his copy of the recently published book, Red Horizons, by Ion Mihai Pacepa. The book was highly critical of the cult of personality surrounding Romanian Communist Party leader Nicolae Ceausescu and his wife Elena.
Pacepa, a former general of the Romanian external intelligence service (DIE), defected to the United States in 1978. Pacepa claimed in his book that he had inside knowledge of activities of the Romanian intelligence service against RFE/RL. These included bomb threats against RFE/RL, attacks and threats against RFE/RL Romanian BD staff, and the use of a secretary in the office of the director of Central News, Agent “Balthazar.”
Vlad Georgescu’s sister-in-law, who lived in Romania, was due to visit Vlad. He aired his first review of the book on a Saturday in November. She was called into the Romanian intelligence service (Securitate) office on the Monday following the broadcast. The Securitate officer castigated Vlad for reviewing the book. He then told her that if Vlad allowed a reading of the book itself to be aired, he would be killed. She was allowed to leave Romania to give Vlad Georgescu this threatening message.
Vlad was not intimidated and decided that RFE/RL’s Romanian Service would begin broadcasting a reading of the book starting the week of January 5, 1988. I sent a risk assessment report to senior management advising them to take this threat against Vlad Georgescu, and indirectly against RFE/RL, seriously.
On December 18, 1987, RFE/RL President Gene Pell expressed considerable concern about the broadcasts. He was even thinking about canceling the series: if RFE/RL canceled the book series, this would have been a political decision, rather than because of RFE/RL backing off due to the threats.
On December 29, 1987, the New York Tribune published a long article headlined “Book Exposing PLO-Romanian Intrigue and Scandals Said Targeted by Terrorists.” The journalist wrote that the FBI was investigating a possible terrorist plot designed to disrupt the distribution of the Pacepa memoirs. He went on to say there were at least three known death threats to those associated with the book, including RFE/RL employees. “Agents of the PLO are principal suspects in the threats against the book publishers and Radio Free Europe, the government defector says.” This was the first information that the Palestinian Liberation Organization might be involved in any threats against RFE/RL
The Romanian Service broadcast the first of four programs on January 4, 1988. A week later there was a meeting in Vlad Georgescu’s office to discuss the recent Romanian programs and what steps RFE/RL was taking regarding any security problems he and his staff might face. Four more programs were broadcast that week and four programs were broadcast the following week, for a total of twelve programs. After the broadcasts, Vlad Georgescu told the radio listeners: “If they kill me for serializing Pacepa’s book, I’ll die with the clear conscience that I did my duty as a journalist.”
Vlad Georgescu experienced digestive problems in the first months of 1988. In July 1988, doctors discovered a brain tumor. He had surgery to remove the malignant tumor. He flew to Washington to undergo unsuccessful experimental treatment at the National Institutes of Health. In early November, he returned to Munich where he died a week later on November 13, 1988.
In the middle of December, RFE/RL contacted the U.S. legal attaché office in Bonn regarding the U.S. News and World Report article on the death of Vlad Georgescu. He answered that the U.S. Department of Justice had not yet authorized any investigation into the allegations of “murder through radiation.” Therefore, any report that the FBI was conducting any such investigation or would investigate was premature. Activity by the legal attaché’s office in West Germany was put on hold, because of “some flap” about the unauthorized visit of an FBI agent to the RFE/RL Washington office.
The LKA (Bavarian State Police) decided that there was no cause to investigate the death of Vlad Georgescu.
In Washington, on December 27, 1988, an article by Bill Gertz appeared in the Washington Times. He quoted Pacepa in an interview as saying that he believed four Radio Free Europe officials had been killed with a radiation device designed by Romania’s Intelligence Service, CIE, with help from the Soviet KGB. He added that he warned the U.S. officials about the weapon during debriefing sessions in the late 1970s. In his book, Red Horizon Pacepa wrote: “In the spring of 1970, Service K added radioactive substances provided by the KGB to its deadly arsenal. Ceausescu himself gave the procedure the code name “Radu.” ... The radiation dosage was said to generate lethal forms of cancer.” Gertz quoted Pacepa as saying, “I don’t know anything for sure, because I was no longer in Romania when these events occurred. But I have no doubt this was not coincidental. I believe Ceausescu wanted these people killed with Radu.”
In my book Cold War Radio: The Dangerous History of American Broadcasting in Europe, 1950-1960, I give more details of how Pacepa’s defection affected RFE/RL.
