Operation Gladio

Operation Gladio was a post-World War II effort by NATO bloc spy agencies to suppress the dialectic swing away from fascism towards left-leaning political movements in Europe. The Italian branch of the stay-behind network was established using Junio Valerio Borghese as the primary OSS and later CIA asset. Unlike some fascist collaborators executed alongside Mussolini, Borghese was chaperoned to Vatican City by OSS spook James Angleton and became the figurehead of Italy's post-war fascist movement through his role in Gladio operations.¹

Trieste, part of the former Republic of Salo and a seaport city with a strong left-leaning labor union movement after the war, was one of the first targets of Operation Gladio using former Decima Flottiglia MAS operatives under Borghese's direction in 1953. In Belgium, a political faction aligned with the Parti Social Chretien (Christian Social Party, CSP) at its fringes was connected to Belgium's neo-fascist movement and Operation Gladio. Prominent figures involved with this political faction, and with the Societe Generale de Banque financial firm backing it, were identified in the X-Dossier as powerful figures in a network of child abusers linked to Jean-Michel Nihoul.¹

The X-Dossier contains accounts of youths being tortured and murdered at orgies attended by prominent members of Belgian society, including politicians, magistrates, barons, and royalty closely linked to Europe's neo-fascist movement and Operation Gladio. The ASCO Industries NV factory belonging to Roger Boas, a close associate of politicians, lawyers, and financiers orbiting the CSP, was identified by X1 as a site where snuff films were produced. The intersection of Gladio networks, fascist political movements, and the child abuse networks documented in the X-Dossier pointed to overlapping membership among Belgium's political and industrial elites.¹