Operation Valuable Fiend

"In 1949, a newly minted branch of the CIA (the precursor of today's national clandestine service), flush with money and burning with determination to roll back the Iron Curtain, embarked on the first paramilitary operation in the history of the agency. They hatched an elaborate plan, coordinated with the British Secret Intelligence Service, to foment popular rebellion and detach Albania, the weakest of the Soviet satellites in Europe, from Moscow's orbit. The operation resulted in dismal failure and was shut down by 1954. In Operation Valuable Fiend, Albert Lulushi gives the first full…