“and I've seen him on television and what have you. But even when the House Committee, the Intelligence Committee, after the brouhaha of John having left, when the House Intelligence Committee examined the situation to see whether Bill Casey actually did cook the NIE as was al”
“13-00000 SECRET call us in for, then?" So not everything the Executive does is right. Obviously. At least I don't think it is right. Nixon's forcing the Agency to go after Allende in 1970 without any kind of lead time, at the last second, was absolutely stupid. And we tol”
“ay." I said I wasn't interested in the political aspects of any kind of intelligence information and I didn't think Schwiker was either. "Well, why don't you just say hello to my friend here anyway, said Sturgis. "He's got an interesting background, I've known him for a number ”
“I understand our problem on the collecting side. And so, but gradually, I don't know what the system is today and how it works, but anyway we began to break it down, but it took, well, it began in '47 and took until '67. 20 years. What you've got is two different worlds. And ”
“that most of the foreign policy was coming out of Henry anyway. But with Nixon's support of course. And he had Nixon's chops to do what he had to do or wanted to do. But by and large we worked very closely, as an Agency with Kissinger. We provided all kinds of support, assets,”
“Congress in those days. And their concern was: a) not themselves getting to know too much of the secrets that went on; and b) they felt largely, you pick good people, you give them a job to do, you give them the tools to do it and don't muck around with them. Particularly, in ”
“initially. And I had to write a special memorandum to try to convince the powers that be in DDO and in personnel and in the Director's office that the things I had done which were not overseas — I didn't have enough to qualify. I had to explain and get their approval for the ”
“Hill. And that became an industry all of its own. I'm sure, I mean, just without even having been there, I know enough about the bureaucracy as to how it works. And it had to be. And it was a continuing operation. And it creates a hell of a lot of trouble among the troops and ”
“recommended abolishing DIA. Well, take a look at DIA today with a brand new building and everything else. I mean, Congress insisted to keep it that way after the circus period. And so there is a whole new attitude that came after this ‘75/‘76 circus era. And it was just a blo”
“saw a piece of intelligence that was worth the life of anybody. I differ with him about that. There was some intelligence which I think was worth more than the life of a person. I can give you an example of that later. But, the committees, I think, deliberately didn't want to”
“came from. They knew it was a Presidential directive. Nothing was hidden from them. Oh, no question about that. This was a part of the Johnson presidential requirement. What he was looking for was evidence of Soviet or domestic upheaval in the United States. We couldn't find ”
“13-00000 SECRET of Mount Sinai. You know. And he said, "Most of these things are done by people like you and me." He said, "I don't know what you had for breakfast. Whether you had a fight with your wife. Whether you had a cold and a headache that day." And a lot of these”
“13-00000 SECRET it. And I told them what I was doing. I told them I wasn't going to reply to the thing, I didn't need to as far as I was concerned, but I left it up to each individual that talked to me to make it up in his own mind. I don't know how many did or didn't, but”
“So I mentioned this a couple of times to Bill and he kind of said, "Okay, okay." I thought, "This is crazy." And I finally wrote him a letter, and I sent it to his home, not to the office, because I know what the hell happens with paper shuffling. Because I've done enough of ”
“want to look at it, from about 1970 on, we had been in the war in Vietnam, for five years by then. The recruits, the new people coming in, who passed all the tests and what have you, and been through the first training courses and what have you, and they were on their first a”
“of the things they were after was Rogue Elephant running operations against Cuba. And it had been written about quite a bit and all that kind of stuff. And they didn't have a clue. And they didn't like the idea that, as far as I was concerned, the Kennedy boys were in charge.”
“ana story to get more information but the g uy is in the Domican Republic fo r the week. Stur gis th en asked if it were possible to get a copy of the Tarabochia memo and I said I would check on that with my office. The conversation got back on the CIA: "The CIA is very funny," h”
“middle '73 with Schlesinger and Colby. But the program by and large continued in a slightly reduced fashion and a different terminology and with much more emphasis on doing that over there than in the States. I think it's the kind of thing that, you know, you're damned if you ”
“accept it more and more and more and more. And everybody has calmed down about it. In terms of the role of the Supreme Court, it wasn't written into the Constitution. It developed. Now as far as executive and legislative, nobody has come up with a simple way of handling that”
“were different. We were guys who had gone through the war and had started from scratch, building an organization and building a concept which was mainly an intelligence service. And particularly us in the Clandestine Service, long before we got into this covert action nonsens”
“everybody. But anyway, tnat was my relationship with Bill. I knew him well enough then. He's just a different kind of a guy. A nice guy. Easy to talk to, easy to get along with, but very opinionated, very firm in what opinions he holds, he holds, period. And it's a hell of a ”
“13-00000 SECRET and realize that certain things are not for discussion even at that level. I think a DCI has to glad-hand the people on the Hill -- not all 100 of them in the Senate or 435 in the House, obviously. But the House and the Senate have got to have some delegat”
“they were also attacking Sid through me and they knew I was a good friend of Sid's. And I was trying to defend the point as I did just a few minutes ago with you. They wouldn't listen. And these were old friends. Go way back. I mean, a part of my generation. It was just someth”
“13-00000 SECRET is coming off of the Executive Branch. Somebody is trying to get some kind of yea or nea. Or some pluses. And you can't run it that way. I'm sorry. I'm not looking for an Official Secrets Act, but something that has a better control over who says what, how”
“flies flop around. Nothing like that at all and I think if you look at Sid's testimony, at Gottleib's testimony, before the Kennedy Health Committee a couple of years after all this nonsense, in which he pointed out that we were really trying to find out what the hell the Sovi”
“misinformation in there, it's not even funny. I mean, even they're screwed up. I mean the nature of the business. It's like Robin Winks, he's got a lot of misinformation in there, Ranelagh got a lot of misinformation. People just can't get . . . If I wrote a book, I'd have a l”
“13-00000 SECRET of a circus atmosphere there was. If it were a simple executive session kind of look-see and the Senators or the Representatives involved were not running for President — some. of them like Church did, and others — depends on a whole atmosphere. It's hard ”
“almost the equivalent of headquarters. It was JMWAVE. He had more people under his command than we had in the branch, or in the task force up in Washington. I think he ended up with about 600 staffers including commo and logistics and God knows what else. BL: So you did so”
“own gut feeling is that the leaks as they appear in the press and I don't know for the last 10 years what, you know, what really is classified. I've got a feeling for it, that's all.’ After 32 years in the business you kind of understand some of this stuff. But most of the st”
“staff, even by June, is just beginning to get their feet wet on something like this. And they were looking into other operations. One was an Indonesian operation which was brought under Eisenhower's aegis. And I think they were hoping to use that again as another example of a ”
“got out of there. And that night I see Frank Church on television telling about all this stuff they had just heard. Not once, he never mentioned my name. My name was never mentioned except, I was told later, in the late edition, a late city edition of The New York Times in Ne”
“-103-. over where he was by some people, arid I' 5 noticed at times that' he wasn’t aware that . he was. turning around and. asking a guy who) minutes before Rusk had come in to him was2 Lithe Department called him A among his comrades just, "This stupid jerk, It and so ”
“were a bunch of nuts not wanting all these things to do. But we didn't. You know clandestine collection is a tough goddamn job if you are going after hard targets. It's not cocktail gossip. In fact, the Russians used to say, get me a piece of paper, get me a document. That's ”
“-16- of getting the people most concerned with something, who could operate for the president, and having them get together and help form the policy, get the president’s approval, and they were the same ones who then couldister • immediately. - C to create another big bureaucr”
“closely together with them in terms of planned operations against various parts of Japanese held territory. And we wrote all kinds of papers for them and pulled together all kinds of stuff, and the question was in those days we felt more like we were all part of OSS and OSS w”
“13-00000 SECRET later, if we lose the war, there won't be any country to worry about anyway. And I'll take my chances with Congress afterwards." He had the guts, the fortitude to be President and make a decision. Nobody stopped him during the war. And after the war it was”
“reference library of the Congress. Sure, give them the intelligence reports that you give everybody else. You go up and tell them what's going on in the world. They can have NIE's if they want to read NIE's. They can have Special NIE's if they want to read those. But when it ”
“whole "shmear," let alone the CA stuff, the covert action stuff. So '75 was the first time there was across the board from A to Zed and back again. And it was the kitchen sink, soup, apples, nuts, everything. And it wasn't just CIA, it was the entire Community, which even hur”
“anything we could do. There wasn't enough evidence one way or the other and when you had Postmasters General who testify. Some testified it was totally illegal. But some say it was perfectly legal. Nothing wrong with it. We knew what was going on and we agreed. And that's got”
“You are going to find all kinds of references to 'as we discussed' and 'why don't we talk about this' and, you know,' let's see what we.can do about this', 'why don't we talk about this sometime in the future'. You are going to find very meaningless comments." And the guy said”
“-103-. over where he was by some people, and I 9 noticed at times that' he wasn’t aware that . he was. turning around and. asking a guy who) minutes before Rusk had come in to him was2 Lethe Depretment call«A him, / among his- comrades just, "This stupid jerk, it and so ”
“added it up and you guys didn't. That's all. Everybody was using pieces, using the magic figure it appeared was made up some years ago. Times have changed. The enemy has doubled its strength right under our very noses." That was my one nice big session with Bill Colby. That's”
“13-00000 SECRET was going to be problems in terms of the two Hersh articles. And Seymour convinced several of the powers that be in the Agency, including Bill, and then he finally convinced me to come on back to the Agency to help out, pulling together the stuff, because t”
“in the area units and I was looking from across the board. But it was the same idea. We used to kick this around at lunch. How do you get instilled into the new group, the upcoming generation, the guys who are going to take over from us, that there is more to this business th”
“-109- other foreign service officers who respect ’him very much." So finally, Nolting was:— a meeting was arranged with Nolting and I liked him very much when I talked with him ato He asked me if I would give him some briefings - on Vietnam, which I did do. And when I wou”
“13-00000 SECRET single executive session up on the Hill, including the one I was at, he had a television show right after the meeting broke up. They were waiting for him outside the door with cameras and lights. And we, you and I, as American citizens paid for all of the e”
“13-00000 SECRET they go in. They run around. They have access to everything. And I think that's crazy. That is micro managing. And there is no reason for that. None at all. I just don't believe in mucking up the system. If you want to change systems, say so. All the way a”
“to identify what you are looking for. And our job is a selected job and you have to go for the hard targets. I am not interested in finding out the railway statistics for you or the tonnage of wheat that goes through ports, for God's sakes. We can get that from the Department”
“SECRET! "4. Could Source obtain employment on a Congressional Committee on either side of the Hill which would give him access to the areas of interest? "Source has exceptional connections on the Hill and it is believed that through these con nections he might obtain som”
“when the call came later that day, and it was Dean Rusk. And I could tell from the conversation what is going on. And it points out that Dean Rusk didn't want to know the identity of the source, never asked for the identity of the source. All he wanted to know was how good is ”