[News] Creative Associates International (CAI): It’s Not Exactly the CIA, but Close Enough

[Anti-Imperialist News]

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<https://orinocotribune.com/creative-associates-international-cai-its-not-exactly-the-cia-but-close-enough/>
Creative
Associates International (CAI): It’s Not Exactly the CIA, but Close Enough
Alan MacLeod - August 16, 2021
------------------------------

*While mercenary armies like Blackwater have at least been subject to
inquiry, making the company’s name infamous around the world, Creative
Associates International has largely flown under the radar — exactly where
the organization’s board wants it to be.*

CHEVY CHASE, MARYLAND — You have likely not heard of them, but Creative
Associates International (CAI) is one of the largest and most powerful
non-governmental organizations operating anywhere in the world. A pillar of
soft U.S. power, the group has been an architect in privatizing the Iraqi
education system, designed messenger apps meant to overthrow the government
of Cuba, served as a front group for the infamous Blackwater mercenary
force (now rebranded as Academi), and liaised with Contra death squads in
Nicaragua. As such, it has functioned as “both as an instrument of foreign
policy and as a manifestation of a broader imperial project,” in the words
<https://www.researchgate.net/publication/234576709_Creative_Associates_International_Corporate_Education_and_Democracy_Promotion_in_Iraq>
of
Professor Kenneth Saltman of the University of Illinois, Chicago.

*A G.O. posing as an N.G.O.*
An ordinary person arriving at Creative Associates’ website
<https://www.creativeassociatesinternational.com/> — festooned as it is
with images of smiling African children, Asian kids being taught how to
read and happy Latino farmers harvesting their fields — would likely
conclude that the outfit is some sort of progressive non-profit charity
tirelessly working to empower vulnerable people around the world.

Yet subjecting the organization to a little more scrutiny, some red flags
immediately begin to emerge. First is the indecipherable word-salad it uses
when describing what it actually is in its “Us At A Glance” section.
“Creative Associates International provides outstanding, on-the-ground
development services and forges partnerships to deliver sustainable
solutions to global challenges,” it says
<https://www.creativeassociatesinternational.com/at-a-glance/>, as if this
is any sort of answer to the question “Who are you?” Continuing, it boasts
that “Creative is recognized for its ability to quickly adapt and *excel in
conflict and post-conflict environments*” (emphasis added) — a statement
that sounds worryingly like one private mercenary armies use to advertise
their services.

In today’s world, the United States government does not use only overtly
violent methods (wars, invasions, coups, training of domestic death squads,
etc.) to achieve regime change; it also uses so-called “soft power”
techniques — the training of leaders, education, economic coercion, etc. —
to maintain a hegemonic grip on the world. And Creative Associates
International is a crucial part of that system.

The company was founded in 1979 by M. Charito Kruvant, the scion of a
wealthy landowning Bolivian family who fled the country after the
progressive revolution there in 1952. Today, it has grown into a massive,
for-profit behemoth working
<https://www.creativeassociatesinternational.com/at-a-glance/> in at least
85 countries with a full-time staff of around a thousand (and countless
more contractors). And while it is technically a private institution, the
vast majority of its funding comes directly from Washington. Over the past
20 years, the government has given Creative Associates $1,998,138,515 in
contracts, according to Tracey Eaton <https://traceyeaton.com/>, a
journalist who has studied
<http://cubamoneyproject.com/tag/creative-associates-international/> the
company’s activities in Cuba. Of this, USAID has supplied over $1.8 billion.
[image: Leland Kruvant]Leland Kruvant, acting President of CAI, speaks at a
CAI symposium on violent extremism with top U.S. government officials in
attendance

Furthermore, the organization’s global advisory board underscores that this
is not exactly some progressive arts charity, as its name and branding
often imply. Of the seven members of its board
<https://www.creativeassociatesinternational.com/global-advisory-board/>,
six are senior U.S. officials. These include Barack Obama’s assistant
secretary of state for South and Central Asia, a four-star general, and the
ex-under secretary of state for Civilian Security, Democracy and Human
Rights.

“Creative Associates is among the top U.S. government contractors entrusted
with trying to help engineer political transitions. The company is part of
that lucrative enterprise dubbed the ‘Democracy Industrial Complex,’” Eaton
told *Mintpress*.

In a roundabout way, former head of USAID Andrew Natsios (another member of
CAI’s board) seemed to agree with Eaton. When the Trump administration was
considering cutting the foreign aid budget, Natsios argued vehemently
against it. “What you’re basically doing is eviscerating the most important
tool of American influence in the developing world, which is our
development program,” he said
<https://www.jacobinmag.com/2017/07/usaid-el-salvador-gangs-drug-war-security-fmln-arena>.
“I don’t think they understand what the role of USAID is, what USAID’s
mission directors are. USAID’s mission directors are among the most
influential foreigners in the country,” he added, apparently confirming
that the organization’s focus is less helping others and more promoting
Washington’s interests through American social and economic power.

RELATED CONTENT: Nicaragua: The Right to Live in Peace
<https://orinocotribune.com/nicaragua-the-right-to-live-in-peace/>

*“Even losing wars make money”*
Afghanistan is by far and away the country where Creative Associates’
projects have secured the most funding. Combined with its Iraq enterprise,
the company has raked in well over half a billion dollars worth of
government contracts.

“Even losing wars make money. If you go to the D.C. area, in the Virginia
and Maryland suburbs, there are all these types of companies that exist
because of the war. And the development industry got very wealthy off of
it,” said Matthew Hoh <https://matthewhoh.com/>, a former Marine captain
and Department of Defense and State Department official. “The whole grift
of it was simply breathtaking,” he added. In 2009, Hoh resigned his post in
Afghanistan with the State Department in protest of the U.S.’ escalation of
war.

Creative Associates has secured a number of lucrative contracts in the
reconstruction of both countries, particularly with regard to their
education systems — including building schools, writing and printing
textbooks, training teachers, and administering and managing education
systems. Hiring an American company to do this work rather than giving
local governments the funding and power to plan their own futures fulfills
a very important function, according to Saltman, who noted that this allows
the U.S. to essentially retain complete control over Iraqi and Afghan
society. Labelling it a classic example of “disaster capitalism
<https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jul/06/naomi-klein-how-power-profits-from-disaster>,”
Saltman describes
<https://www.researchgate.net/publication/234576709_Creative_Associates_International_Corporate_Education_and_Democracy_Promotion_in_Iraq>the
remodeling of Iraqi society as “a radical free-market experiment bent on
demolishing the public sector and shifting control of civil society nearly
completely to the private sector,” and “an attempt to essentially hand a
nation over to corporations.”

Creative Associates schoolbooks in Afghanistan have purged
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/in-afghanistan-a-new-approach-to-teaching-history-leave-out-the-wars/2012/02/03/gIQA57KNqQ_story.html>
any
mention of the past few decades of Afghan history or the Taliban from its
textbooks. “You can’t buy that kind of thought control — unless you have a
few hundred million,” wrote
<https://www.counterpunch.org/2012/12/05/usaid-in-afghanistan/> one
American educator.

Saltman also noted that working in warzones necessitated a high degree of
security, and that companies like CAI were likely giving tens of millions
of dollars of their contracts straight over to private mercenary groups
like Blackwater.

Hoh was keen to stress that many people working at the lower levels of
programs like these were well intentioned, but that as one went higher up
the commitment to the benefit of others waned significantly. “Groups like
CAI would do the [genuine] work but they would also be a front. It is a way
for the CIA and other security services to get people into countries,” he
said. In 2009, it was reported
<https://wondersofpakistan.wordpress.com/2009/08/16/american-ngo-covers-for-blackwater-in-pakistan/>
that
Creative Associates’ headquarters in Peshawar, Pakistan, was being used as
a front for Blackwater to stage military operations along the
Afghan/Pakistan border.

Creative Associates have also secured lucrative contracts to work in other
war zones, such as Libya and Yemen.

*Cuba: rappers and regime change*
For years, Creative Associates International worked closely with the CIA
and other government agencies, operating and overseeing a complex set of
projects targeting Cuba, all with one specific goal: the overthrow of the
Communist government (or “sociopolitical change tak[ing] place in Cuba,” as
its own documents <http://cubamoneyproject.com/2021/05/10/usaid-4/> preferred
to describe its mission).

Creative Associates’ most infamous project was perhaps its creation of a
Twitter-like app called Zunzuneo. Zunzuneo first operated as a very useful
communication tool but, slowly, its creators injected it with regime-change
messages, with the plan to eventually direct all users to attend
demonstrations and foment a Caribbean color revolution. The app’s user base
grew quickly, attracting
<http://cubamoneyproject.com/2019/09/21/zunzuneo/> 55,000
people by 2012 — a huge number for a poor country with little internet
access. The U.S. government attempted to hide its own role in the app’s
creation, secretly trying
<https://www.mintpressnews.com/documents-point-to-us-hand-in-cuba-protests/277987/>
to
convince Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey to buy into the company as a front man. It
is not clear what the outcome of these negotiations was. However, the
Zunzuneo project was abruptly abandoned, leaving Cubans wondering why their
service provider suddenly stopped working. Only two years later, through an
investigation <https://apnews.com/article/904a9a6a1bcd46cebfc14bea2ee30fdf> by
the *Associated Press*, did the truth come out.
USAID grant documents show CAI’s involvement in the ZunZuneo project.
Source | Cuba Money Project

That was far from the last nefarious project Creative Associates was
intimately involved in, however. Between 2009 and 2014, it was charged with
recruiting regime-change operatives on the island. Creative Associates
brought young activists from all over Latin America to Cuba under the guise
of a phony HIV/AIDS awareness drive, which internal memos describe
<https://www.mintpressnews.com/agent-orange-funding-opens-door-to-us-militarism-and-covert-action-in-vietnam/203634/>
as
the “perfect excuse” to ferry their people in and out of the country.

Creative Associates has also attempted to use the Cuban hip hop community
as a vehicle to drive regime change to the Caribbean nation. In 2009, it
sent Serbian music promoter and color-revolution expert Rajko Bozic
<https://thegrayzone.com/2019/01/29/the-making-of-juan-guaido-how-the-us-regime-change-laboratory-created-venezuelas-coup-leader/>
to
the island, where he attempted to identify and bribe rappers into joining
his project.

Rap had exploded as a genre on the island in the previous decades, partly
because of its new sound and partly because Afro-Cuban rappers were using
the medium to bring attention to taboo subjects such as racism. Creative
Associates — intersectional imperialists par excellence — smelled an
opportunity to use it as a wedge issue.

Bozic found a handful of artists willing to participate in the project and
immediately began aggressively promoting them and getting their music
played on Western radio stations. He also bribed big Latino music stars to
allow the rappers to open up for them at their gigs, thus buying them extra
credibility and exposure. Zunzuneo helped in this endeavor, sending users
links to this exciting new music that, it seemed, the whole island was
buzzing about.

While Creative Associates’ role in this was exposed, the general tactic of
using rappers for regime change is still clearly active. Grant publications
from USAID and its sister organization the National Endowment for Democracy
(NED) show that both groups are using hip hop as a vehicle for their goals.
For instance, one project from the NED’s latest publications
<https://www.ned.org/region/latin-america-and-caribbean/cuba-2020/>,
entitled “Empowering Cuban Hip-Hop Artists as Leaders in Society,” states
that its goal is to “promote citizen participation and social change,” and
to “raise awareness about the role hip-hop artists have in strengthening
democracy in the region.” Of course, for the United States, “democracy” in
Cuba is synonymous with “regime change.”

In July of this year, Cuban rappers led a bungled insurrection
<https://www.mintpressnews.com/documents-point-to-us-hand-in-cuba-protests/277987/>.
The movement’s face was Cuban expat Yotuel, an artist who is openly working
<https://thegrayzone.com/2021/07/29/foreign-agents-san-isidro-movement-cuba/>
with the U.S. government and whose song “Patria y Vida” was immediately
promoted upon its release by American politicians and senior officials in
Washington. “Patria y Vida” is consistently referred to in U.S. reports as
a success story in “democracy promotion” activities.

It is not clear whether Creative Associates was directly involved in the
July protests in Cuba. They appear to be relatively embarrassed about the
press they have received; in fact, there is no mention
<https://www.creativeassociatesinternational.com/search/?fwp_search=cuba> of
any Cuban activities whatsoever — historical or current — on the company’s
website.

RELATED CONTENT: Sanctions may Impoverish Nicaraguans, but Likely will Not
Change Their Vote
<https://orinocotribune.com/sanctions-may-impoverish-nicaraguans-but-likely-will-not-change-their-vote/>

*Latin America: intersectional imperialists*
The United States invaded Nicaragua in 1933, setting up the Somoza
dictatorship to look after its interests. With the Sandinista revolution in
1979, the U.S. lost control over the small Central American country. In an
effort to turn back the clock, Washington funded, armed, trained and
supported far-right Contra death squads infamous for their brutality.
Direct support for the Contras ended in 1989. But at exactly the same time,
the U.S. began employing Creative Associates to conduct all manner of
operations involving the paramilitary organization, efforts that helped the
U.S.-backed candidate, Violetta Chamorro, win the 1990 election. Local laws
prohibiting foreign funding of political parties were circumvented by the
establishment of a wide range of non-governmental organizations focusing on
voter registration and political education, including programs aimed at
uniting the anti-Sandinista opposition (including the Contras) behind
Chamorro.

Now that the Sandinistas have returned to power, Creative Associates is
back with avengence. As Nicaragua-based journalist Ben Norton
<https://twitter.com/BenjaminNorton> told *MintPress*:

Creative Associates has been very active in destabilization operations
targeting the Sandinista government. With plentiful funding from USAID, the
CIA cutout has cynically exploited sensitive issues to increase social
divisions, intentionally driving a [wedge] between Nicaraguans and their
Sandinista government with programs targeting racial and ethnic minorities,
people with disabilities, the LGBT community, and at-risk youth.”

Norton noted that, while Creative Associates claims to be working purely to
improve Nicaraguan society, it collaborates exclusively with
opposition-aligned groups, thus effectively subsidizing the country’s
right-wing. “One of several USAID programs run by Creative Associates in
Nicaragua has targeted vulnerable groups in Nicaragua’s Caribbean Coast.
The CIA cutout plays off differences there, in the Miskito indigenous
community and the Afro-Nicaraguan population,” he added.

Likewise, in El Salvador, U.S. efforts are branded as nonpartisan. But
rather than help the leftist FMLN Party, Washington pumps millions into the
country through a myriad of NGOs that promote neoliberal, private sector
solutions to problems. “Behind the heartwarming photo ops, USAID’s projects
in El Salvador are stealthily advancing the interests of the Salvadoran
corporate class,” wrote
<https://www.jacobinmag.com/2017/07/usaid-el-salvador-gangs-drug-war-security-fmln-arena>
 *Jacobin* magazine. Creative Associates has been at the heart of this
effort: since 2001, the organization has been awarded over $51 million for
projects in El Salvador. It has also been at the forefront of propping up
the U.S.-backed dictatorship in Honduras, helping the government militarize
<https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/how-hillary-clinton-militarized-us-policy-in-honduras/>
its
response to unrest and other social problems there.

And while the organization describes itself as being in the democracy
promotion business, it is often involved in quite the opposite. Saltman
notes
<https://www.academia.edu/5100200/Creative_Associates_International_Corporate_Education_and_Democracy_Promotion_in_Iraq>
that
the company was involved with the 1991 coup d’etat in Haiti, which removed
the democratically-elected president, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, from power.
When Aristide swept back to power in a landslide in 2000, Creative
Associates went back to work, attempting to remold the Haitian media system
based on the for-profit corporate American model.

Unsurprisingly, in Venezuela Creative Associates also supports U.S.-backed
opposition leader Juan Guaidó. Its senior advisor Jeff Fischer called
<https://www.creativeassociatesinternational.com/insights/an-electoral-solution-for-the-venezuela-crises/>
for
the “regime” of Nicolas Maduro to acquiesce to an election organized by the
OAS, a Washington-based group that played
<https://www.mintpressnews.com/5-fast-facts-military-coup-bolivia-can/262741/>
a key role in the overthrow of leftist Bolivian President Evo Morales in
2019. In his recommendations, Fischer suggested that an “international”
force would have to be flown in to provide security for any election, and
that the process should be designed by outsiders and not subject to
Venezuelan laws.

*Creative solutions*
Creative Associates International essentially serves as a semi-privatized
government in many countries, overseeing education and healthcare systems,
security services and local management. It also provides a wide range of
clandestine services: spying, intelligence and regime-change operations.

Once the domain of the CIA and other three-letter agencies, this sort of
work is now largely done by the private sector. As National Endowment for
Democracy co-founder Allen Weinstein told
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/opinions/1991/09/22/innocence-abroad-the-new-world-of-spyless-coups/92bb989a-de6e-4bb8-99b9-462c76b59a16/>
 *The Washington Post*, “A lot of what we do today was done covertly 25
years ago by the CIA.”

The utility of this is manifold. First, contracting out the work of nation
building to U.S.-based third parties allows Washington to maintain control
over a country without a formal occupation. In other nations, it trains an
entire class of people to see the world in a manner conducive to American
state and corporate interests. Furthermore, there are many opportunities to
make enormous (private) profits from these projects. Outsourcing dirty
activities to private companies also allows the U.S. government to distance
itself from any scandals. Perhaps most importantly, however, is that there
is no public oversight with private companies. As Hoh explained,

You can hide things by using these private companies. Private companies
don’t fall under Freedom Of Information Act requests. So, if you are
working in Nicaragua with USAID, theoretically, all your work should be
available to U.S. citizens by way of the Freedom Of Information Act and
other mechanisms. But if you are a private company, you don’t have that to
any degree. So there is a lot that can be done with these private companies
that the government can’t do, particularly with regard to plausible
deniability.”

Ultimately, Creative Associates International has grown into an important
part of the American military-thinktank-industrial complex. While
technically a private company, the fact that virtually the entirety of its
funding comes from Washington and that its board is full of high U.S.
officials demonstrates that the organization is an integral part of
Washington’s global strategy. However, the veneer of privatization helps it
avoid the public scrutiny that a government department would receive. While
mercenary armies like Blackwater have at least been subject to inquiry,
making the company’s name infamous around the world, Creative Associates
International has largely flown under the radar — exactly where the
organization’s board wants it to be.

*Featured image: Graphic by Antonio Cabrera*

(MintPress News
<https://www.mintpressnews.com/creative-associates-international-cai-its-not-exactly-the-cia-but-close-enough/278207/>
)


Alan MacLeod
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