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According to then Turkish army commander, General Semih Sancar, America financed it, committing terror attacks against the political left, one of many occurring in 1977 in Taskim Square, Istanbul. During a mass May 1 (May Day) trade union rally, snipers on surrounding buildings killed 38 attendees, injuring hundreds more during a 20 minute rampage. Several thousand police on hand did nothing to intervene.
"Counter-Guerrilla" also engaged in torture, survivors later explaining their ordeal. Some became outspoken critics, but never got authorities to investigate their ordeal or expose other crimes.
Spain's Secret Armies
From his Spanish Civil War victory until his 1975 death, Francisco Franco's fascist dictatorship ruled Spain, his government the embodiment of Gladio, according to early 1980s prime minister Calvo Sotelo.
In his book titled, "Gladio," its 1971 - 74 Italian commander, Gerardo Serravalle, explained that Franco tried to establish contacts with NATO's secret army long before Spain became an official NATO member in 1982. However, its secret service wasn't interested in a stay-behind function, but wanted a tool for internal control to neutralizes leftist elements.
Portugal's Secret Armies
Gladio was active in Portugal, the nation's press telling a national audience in 1990 about "a secret network, erected at the bosom of NATO....financed by the CIA" in the 1960s and 1970s. It was called 'Aginter Press,' " involved in assassinations and other terrorist acts, internally and in Portugal's African colonies.
A later Italian Senate inquiry learned that Yves Guerin-Serac, a French secret warfare specialist, directed Aginter Press. In November 1990, Portuguese defense minister Fernando Nogueira insisted he knew nothing about it, saying no "information whatsoever (existed) concerning (any form of) Gladio structure in Portugal."
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