Thirty-five years after his defection to the U.S., Romania's former spy chief under notorious communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu still lives under the protection of a CIA-created identity, but he will be honored in his native land Sunday in a major television event.
In this Eastern European nation that endured four decades of harsh communist rule – including 25 years under the megalomaniacal Ceausescu – six hours of broadcast time will be dedicated to Ion Mihai Pacepa, the highest-ranking defector from the former Soviet bloc.
Romania's B1 TV channel will feature an interview with Pacepa and former CIA director James Woolsey after showing the new two-hour WND Films documentary based on insider-information Pacepa has shared with Western intelligence, “Disinformation: The Secret Strategy to Destroy the West.”
Pacepa will be interviewed on the Romanian political commentary program "Aktualitatea B1" by host Andrei Badin.
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Badin told WND his channel is "delighted to see our former citizen, General Pacepa, as the hero of an American movie," and "we want to let our whole country know about it."
"In our view, he played a crucial role in freeing Romania from the clutches of the Romanian Dracula called Ceausescu," Badin said, "and our TV station decided to honor him in a way no other Cold War defector has ever been honored."
Badin said Pacepa is highly regarded by many in Romania today.
"General Pacepa may not be known by our new generation, which grew up in a Romania that had rid itself of tyranny with the general’s help," Badin said. "But he is certainly seen as a hero by my own generation of Romanians, who had the misfortune of living under Ceausescu’s boot."
Badin said he and his colleagues want Romanians to learn of Pacepa's impact on U.S. policy during the Cold War.
The film, he pointed out, recalls that President Reagan called Pacepa's first book, "Red Horizons," "my Bible for dealing with communist tyrants," after receiving a copy of the manuscript in 1985.
The film is accompanied by the newly released book "Disinformation: Former Spy Chief Reveals Secret Strategies for Undermining Freedom, Attacking Religion, and Promoting Terrorism," co-authored by Pacepa and Ron Rychlak.
Former CIA chief Woolsey said the "remarkable book" will "change the way you look at intelligence, foreign affairs, the press, and much else besides."
'You are a free man now, general'
Pacepa described July 28, 1978 as "the day I broke with communism and made the American Flag my own."
He noted that Sunday will be "the first time in post Cold War history a national TV station of a former Soviet bloc satellite has dedicated a day to a Cold War defector."
When he left Romania, he was head of Romania’s Presidential House, which he has described as the U.S. equivalent of being the White House chief of staff and director of the CIA, the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security.
Pacepa recalls landing at Andrews Air Force Base outside Washington, D.C., in a U.S. military plane on a secret flight from West Germany, where he had secured asylum.
He remembers sitting in the cockpit with the pilots.
"It was a glorious, sunny day outside, which only magnified the fireworks popping off inside of me," he recalled in a PJMedia.com interview. "I was a free man! I was in America!"
A ranking representative of the U.S. government greeted him.
“You are a free man now, general," he said. "Welcome to the United States!”
Pacepa said that to this day, his eyes mist up when he recalls the greeting.
At 84, he lives in the U.S. under a CIA-protective identity due to ongoing assassination threats and multi-million-dollar bounties on his head. The release of his new book and film have prompted further threats from powerful people in Romania who regard him as a traitor.
After his defection, he exposed the massive crimes and corruption of Ceausescu, providing evidence to Western leaders such as Reagan that the Romanian dictator's image in the West as a "maverick" was a ruse, bolstered by a disinformation operation.
Pacepa's defection gave Ceausescu a nervous breakdown and prompted him to send assassination squads to the U.S.
In 1988 and 1989, while still under communism, Romanians heard Pacepa’s “Red Horizons” read in broadcasts by Radio Free Europe.
On Christmas Day 1989, Ceausescu was executed by his own people at the end of a trial based on accusations that came almost word-for-word from "Red Horizons."
The next day, the new official Romanian newspaper, Adevárul (The Truth), began serializing "Red Horizons," declaring the book “played an incontestable role” in overthrowing Ceausescu.
IMPORTANT NOTE: Order Lt. Gen. Ion Mihai Pacepa's brand new book, "Disinformation: Former Spy Chief Reveals Secret Strategy for Undermining Freedom, Attacking Religion and Promoting Terrorism" or the companion film, “Disinformation: The Secret Strategy To Destroy The West.” Better yet, get both the book and DVD together – and save!