32 Facts About Gust Avrakotos

Gust Lascaris Avrakotos was an American case officer and the Afghanistan Task Force Chief at the Central Intelligence Agency.

Gust Avrakotos worked closely with the regime until 1978, when he returned to a US posting.

Gust Avrakotos worked on the CIA's Near East desk, which included oversight of the agency's work in Afghanistan.

Gust Avrakotos acquired arms and ammunition from numerous sources, and worked with US Representative Charlie Wilson to build a coalition of international supporters to fund, arm and train the mujahideen.

Gust Avrakotos resigned from the CIA in 1989 after being moved to the CIA's Africa Division, and authoring a memorandum opposing the CIA's involvement in the Iran-Contra Affair.

The book was the basis of the film Charlie Wilson's War, released in 2007, in which Gust Avrakotos is portrayed by Philip Seymour Hoffman.

Gust Avrakotos was born on January 14,1938, in Aliquippa, Pennsylvania, the son of Oscar, a Greek American soft drink manufacturer from the island of Lemnos, and his wife Zafira.

Gust Avrakotos attended Aliquippa High School, where he graduated in 1955 as valedictorian.

Gust Avrakotos then attended college at the Carnegie Institute of Technology ; he briefly worked at Jones and Laughlin Steel mill in Aliquippa to earn money for his studies but left CIT after two years because of a strain on family finances.

Gust Avrakotos initially felt like an outsider at the CIA, which was heavily reliant on White Anglo-Saxon Protestants from Ivy League universities.

The working class Gust Avrakotos was one of the CIA's first White ethnic agents.

Gust Avrakotos spent time building relationships in Greek society, including within the military.

Gust Avrakotos had built strong links with the members of the junta; Crile wrote that the colonels:.

Gust Avrakotos lunched with the colonels regularly and socialized with them in the evenings and at weekends.

Two months later Gust Avrakotos's cover was blown, and he was pilloried in the Greek far-left press.

Several of his friends from the regime of the Colonels were assassinated and Gust Avrakotos had to increase the use of his fieldcraft to ensure he avoided being targeted.

Gust Avrakotos had his assistant, John Terjelian, write a report outlining the possibility of such an outcome.

Gust Avrakotos was concerned that he had been typecast in the position of an officer who undertakes such dirty work, and was delighted to be assigned as station chief in Helsinki, Finland.

Gust Avrakotos undertook a Finnish-language course in preparation for his role, but before he could be posted, a change in the CIA hierarchy led to the posting being canceled because Avrakotos was considered too unpolished.

When later summoned to Graver's office to apologize, Gust Avrakotos repeated the insult and again walked out.

Gust Avrakotos was sent to the United Kingdom to procure the ammunition, and assisted in Britain's covert operations to the mujahideen, providing MI6 with the money and equipment they needed.

In 1984, Avrakotos appointed Michael G Vickers from the CIA's paramilitary group to Operation Cyclone to revamp the strategy for the mujahideen.

Gust Avrakotos considered North part of a "lunatic fringe" following a reckless agenda that would go wrong for the CIA.

Gust Avrakotos wrote a memo to the CIA management, outlining his concerns about North's activities and questioning the legality and morality of the organization's actions, but as Iran-Contra had presidential support, his intervention was deemed unwelcome, and Avrakotos was moved to the CIA's Africa Division.

Gust Avrakotos was on the verge of marrying a fellow member of the CIA; his son from his first marriage was a member of the CIA.

Gust Avrakotos realized that if he made a fuss about his sideways move, both of them could suffer professionally.

Gust Avrakotos remained on the CIA's Africa desk until 1989, when he left the CIA.

Gust Avrakotos worked for defense contractor TRW Inc in Rome, and then for News Corporation, where he worked in Rome and McLean, Virginia; he began a business intelligence newsletter at the company.

Gust Avrakotos died of a stroke on December 1,2005, at Inova Fairfax Hospital in Northern Virginia.

Gust Avrakotos's funeral was held at St Katherine's Greek Orthodox Church in Falls Church, Virginia.

In 1988, Gust Avrakotos was awarded the Intelligence Medal of Merit, and, in 2015, a bill was introduced into Congress to award him the Congressional Gold Medal.

The actor and producer Tom Hanks bought the rights to the book, which was the basis of the film Charlie Wilson's War, released in 2007, in which Gust Avrakotos is portrayed by Philip Seymour Hoffman, who earned an Academy Award nomination for his performance.