Gaston Avrakotos (1938 - 2005)

Legendary agent of the CIA, a native of Lemnos , known in intelligence circles with aliases " Mister Dirty " and " James Bond of the poor ." Played a decisive role in the defeat of the Soviets in Afghanistan , but unwittingly paved the phenomenon bin Laden .

Gaston Avrakotos (Gust Avrakotos) was born in 1938 in the city Alikipa of Pennsylvania and was the son of immigrants from Lemnos . Forced to abandon small school to help poor family. Originally worked in steel mill and later sold cigarettes in taverns. He returned to school and graduated from the University of Pittsburgh in 1962.

That same year he joined the CIA, when the " charitable institution Langley " opened its doors to graduates not renowned universities. The knowledge of Greek was the main skill that brought him to Athens shortly before the coup of April 21 . Remained at the step of CIA in Greek capital until 1978 , when recalled to Washington because " burned " as an agent of the revelations of his colleague Philip AIDS .

Athens was the link service with junta and especially the invisible dictator Dimitrios Ioannides. Worked flawlessly with them , after they connected the hard anticommunism . Advised them , in fact, not to give the Andreas Papandreou passport abroad, as requested by the White House , but " to ... perform the bum , because you return and find him in front of you ! "

The most difficult moment of his career in Greek was the assassination of the head of Richard Welch from debutante then "November 17 " ( 23 December 1975 ) . Asked his superiors in America to give the "green light " to find the killers and make them pay with the same currency. His request was rejected .

After Athens, the Avrakotos remained without jobs after the CIA was unable to find a mission. Considered him uncouth , farmers and vromostomo . Profile of Greek immigrant did not fit with the refined ways of Anglo-Saxon agent " Company ". Having survived a large clearing in the late '70s , eventually got a job with the CIA station in Beirut , where he excelled and made ​​the big name.

In the office of Beirut belonged and the region of Afghanistan, which since 1979 had invaded the Soviets to support the friendly status. The Americans were alarmed and President Carter established an office in the White House to monitor the situation. Initially, the office ypoleitourgouse but the advent of Ronald Reagan to power changed the scene .

With the support of the powerful Congressional Committee on secret services , which headed a passionate anticommunist , Republican Senator Charles Wilson prepared a giant covert operation to strengthen the Afghan mujahedin who battled the Soviets. It was the largest in the history of the CIA, she has absorbed 70 % of its budget.

The Avrakotos was the man who brought it out. Went to Cairo and bought hundreds of thousands of " Kalashnikov " from the stocks of the Egyptian army , while in agreement with the Pakistanis , the mujahideen were trained in their territory by men of the CIA. The problem of a reinforcement around the steep lands of Afghanistan faced with an imaginative way. Buy mules of Cyprus, the load on a boat through Pakistan and ammunition arrived in the most inaccessible hideouts of rebels from the likeable quadrupeds .

The coup de grace for the Soviets came with anti-aircraft missiles " Stigker " Avrakotos supplied the rebels . These missiles caused great losses to the Soviet Air Force. And without sufficient air cover were doomed . The Soviets found it in a very difficult position. The company " Afghanistan" cost them more than $ 3 billion a year, the victims were many , the country's economy shambles . So Mikhail Gorbachev took the decision to withdraw Soviet forces from the region in 1989.

The contribution of the Greek American agent was instrumental in what it termed "Russian Vietnam ", which was the death knell of the Soviet Union. But over time , the business was turned against the Americans and the weapons and the money given to the Mujahideen nurtured the phenomenon of the Taliban and Osama bin Laden , whom today are fighting the Americans in Afghanistan and beyond.

The Avrakotos retired in 1989 and then worked as a journalist and analyst at News Corp. of Roumpert Murdoch . In 1997 he returned as an adviser to the CIA, when he was at the helm of another Greek-American , George Tenet . In 2003 he left permanently praktoriliki and 1 December 2005 the mundane . Celebrated two marriages and had a son .

The action was covered by a veil of silence, until it became known in 2003 by American journalist George Krail in his book " The War Charlie Wilson » («Charlie Wilson's War»). The rights to the book bought Tom Hanks and funded the eponymous film. The directed by Michael Nichols and starring Toms Hanks and Julia Roberts . The role of Avrakotou the film interprets the famous actor Philip Seymour Hoffman .