Centro addestramento guastatori

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Centro addestramento guastatori (CAG) (German: "Training Center for Battle Pioneers") is the name of a training facility of the Italian foreign intelligence service AISE . The facility is located in the north-west of Sardinia near the city of Alghero . The bodyguard takes a unit of the Military Association Raggruppamento unità difesa (RUD), in the protection of AISE objects Italy is responsible and whose name is also used as a code name for these facilities. The training facility CAG and the associated support point appear externally under the name RUD.

The CAG, which was set up in 1954, became known after 1989 as the central training facility of the “ stay-behind organization ” Gladio . It also played a role in the 1964 piano solo coup plan . The CAG was drastically reduced in size from the beginning of the 1990s, but expanded again from 2006. Today it is used not only by the AISE, but also by special military units from Italy and other NATO countries.

Location and name

The base is located almost seven kilometers south of Alghero near Torre Poglina by the sea. However, he became known under the misleading name of Capo Marrargiu . This cape ( ⊙ ) is located around 20 kilometers south in the area of ​​the neighboring municipality of Bosa . The base in Torre Poglina can be reached via the Alghero – Bosa provincial road.

The area on the bay of Cala Griegas is largely forested or covered by Mediterranean maquis . In addition to various buildings, there are or were training facilities on the site such as obstacle courses , shooting ranges and sports facilities, as well as a small boat harbor and a grass runway (no longer used by fixed-wing aircraft) .

history

The site for the base was acquired in 1954 by the front company Torre Marina of the SIFAR secret service . At that time it was very remote and difficult to access by land because the today's Alghero – Bosa provincial road did not yet exist. The Gladio base was built in the following years with the support of the Central Intelligence Agency . There, with the support of Allied special forces, the management staff and specialists of the Gladio underground organization were trained, which was then also used for domestic political purposes. The CAG was subordinate to the department of the Italian secret service responsible for Gladio, in SISMI this was most recently the 7ª Divisione .

The Piano Solo coup plan was related to the feared democratic takeover of the Italian Communist Party . With the first government of Aldo Moro , the Christian Democratic Party (DC) opened to the left at the end of 1963, which was followed with great suspicion by the USA and other NATO partners as well as the right wing of the DC. Because of the political instability, the Sardinian President Antonio Segni , who belonged to the right-wing DC, advocated the formation of an emergency government and the introduction of a semi-presidential system of government , as was the case a few years earlier in France under Charles de Gaulle . Against this background, the former SIFAR boss and then General Commander of the Carabinieri , Lieutenant General Giovanni De Lorenzo , developed the piano solo coup plan . With solo , German "only" or "alone", the Carabinieri were meant who should carry it out. A total of 731 left-wing politicians and union leaders were to be arrested at the CAG base in Torre Poglina. After the socialists involved in the government withdrew many of their demands, the plan became obsolete. To what extent it should really be implemented is still unclear.

The staff to be trained in the CAG were usually brought by air from the mainland to Alghero Airport. For a long time the transports only took place at night, so that the staff did not know exactly where they were. The CAG was assigned a flying unit of Army Aviation from 1964 to 2000 , which was stationed on the military part of Alghero airport. In the 1990s it was considered one of the best Italian units of its kind, among other things because it could fly missions with night vision devices . Until 1989 it was called 399 ° Squadrone , then 39 ° Gruppo Squadroni “Drago” ; until 1986 it was equipped with propeller planes, then with helicopters.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Tobias Hof: State and Terrorism in Italy 1969–1982. Oldenbourg, Munich 2011, pp. 29-30.
  2. ^ Paul Ginsborg : A History of Contemporary Italy. Society and Politics, 1943-1988 . Palgrave Macmillan, New York / Basingstoke (Hampshire) 2003, pp. 276-277.
  3. ^ Spencer M. Di Scala: Renewing Italian Socialism. Nenni to Craxi. Oxford University Press, New York / Oxford 1988, p. 154.
  4. ↑ Alexandra Locher: Leaden years. Left-wing terrorism in media negotiation processes in Italy, 1970–1982. Lit Verlag, Vienna / Zurich 2013, p. 54.
  5. ^ Paul Ginsborg: A History of Contemporary Italy. Society and Politics, 1943-1988 . Palgrave Macmillan, New York / Basingstoke (Hampshire) 2003, pp. 276-277.
  6. ↑ Tobias Hof: State and Terrorism in Italy 1969–1982. Oldenbourg, Munich 2011, pp. 29-30.

Coordinates: 40 ° 30 ′ 14.5 ″  N , 8 ° 21 ′ 16.7 ″  E