Latest / The Lone Gunman Podcast : JFK Assassination / Ep. 234 ~ King of Dirty Tricks & Tricky DIcks

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Ep. 234 ~ King of Dirty Tricks & Tricky DIcks · The Lone Gunman Podcast : JFK Assassination

0:12
Everything is going to hell down here in Dactic and don't come and find that
0:28
we take that back and don't come my cant here is sholside over and don't
0:39
come with fine das we take that brock, then don't come and find here
0:48
your side for holy shit, what's up? Everybody? Hit your boy?
1:19
The trip will be think bad vibe here with you man. Once again,
1:26
my buddy Roger has to out done himself with the intro. I'm gonna starting
1:30
to sound like a real goddamn show away off here. Uh you it's killer.
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I love it. Hopefully everybody else likes it. Gets me pumped up
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to do the show for sure. Uh, I got a good one today.
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And then uh, it's actually inspired by Roger, my buddy from Shepherd
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to Fire does all the music here the lenit on the podcast. He asked
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me to do a show about Richard Helms. So we're gonna kind of get
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into some of that Richard Hilmes Tooby CIA talked today and try to dig dig
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in a little bit because you know, the CIA really got exposed in the
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eighteen seventies, the Watergate and the Senate hearings, and a lot of it
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was as with Richard Helms, you know, at the head of it.
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So there's always been a big giant stain on Richard Hilms career. And to
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hear this guy talk and you can listen to his HCA testimony, it's pretty
2:53
wild. Wow, you know he's he's definitely a character. I mean all
3:01
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Peace. So you know I can sit here and I can give you the
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the Wikipedia version of Richard Hills, you know, and he leads his biography
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and all that. But you know, if you if you're that worried about
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all that when he was born, in his background and that, you know,
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you can read up on that. But U yeah, I came across
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a I guess it's it's it's an in memory and appreciation of CIA director Richard
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Hilmes on the actual CIA website. Um so this is an official CIA in
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memory and appreciation writing on Richard Helms from their perspective. We all know it
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from our perspective, you know, when we think he's a weeze on a
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dirt bag and two phase piece of ship and a liar and you know,
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just nerdy to the court. Um but let's hear things. It's from the
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CIA perspective, because it's always good to get, you know, the other
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side's perspective. And this was actually approved for release by the CIA and February
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Ray of two thousand and eight, and it was written shortly after he passed
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in two thousand and two. And the author of this, David Robars,
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worked as a research assistant for Richard Helmes while the ambassador was reading his memoirs
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and also interviewed him extensively for other historical projects. In the course of those
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and many other professional and social contacts with the ambassador and his family, the
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author came to regard Holmes as a friend and counselor so, of course.
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Richard Helmes was the director of the DCI from nineteen sixty six until he was
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fired by Nixon in nineteen seventy three. Central Intelligence Agency Alan Dullis once told
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Congress should be directed by a relatively small but elite corps of men with a
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passion for anonymity and a willingness to stick at that particular job. Richard Holmes,
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the eighth Director of Central Intel Ligence who died in Washington on the twenty
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three of October two thousand and two, at the age of eighty nine,
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embodied those qualities. He was among the last of a dwindling group of trailblazers
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who dominated American intelligence for much of the Cold War. When Helms entered on
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duty with the new agency fifty five years ago, he was one of a
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cohort of young veterans clan destined warfare during World War Two who chose to stay
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in the secret world to fright and new and in many ways more formidable enemy.
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Seemingly a naturally managing secret operations. Helms rose from desk officer to the
7:40
Director of Central Intelligence and came to represent a new type of government professional,
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the career intelligence officer, steached in the culture of clan destiny. Clan destiny,
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yeah, that's a word, clan destinity, and devoted to the agency
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as an institution. Intelligence work Helms would later say was not merely a job,
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but rather a calling. And of course he goes into his formative years.
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He was born in nineteen thirteen into a family of means and international connections,
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and I was grew up in Philadelphia and New York, upper middle class,
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well educated, well traveled, interested in good schools and sports. With
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a social life centering around the country club. Helmes took part of his schooling
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and academies in Switzerland and Germany and became fluent in French and German. In
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nineteen thirty one, he entered Williams College, a major in literature and history.
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He became class president and the head of the school paper, what was
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voted most respected, best politician, and most likely to succeed. In nineteen
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forty two, Richard Helmes joined the US Navy Reserve, received a commission of
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lieutenant, and worked in the from the Seafrontier Headquarters in New York City,
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plotting the locations of German submarines in the Atlantic Ocean. A former Wire Service
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colleague approached him about working for the new Office of Strategic Services in its Morale
9:13
Operations branch, which produced black propaganda. In nineteen forty three, the Navy
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transferred Holmes to OSS in Washington. He underwent the standard trade tradecraft training in
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the Cover Facility in suburban Maryland, which included hand to hand combat from the
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legendary English expert Colonel William Fairbarn and an exercise and infiltraining and spine on a
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local defense contractor. When finishing the OSS boot camp, Helms began what he
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would spend most of his intelligence career doing, and that is planning and directing
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espionage operations from an office in Washington. In this case, the target was
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Germany and the agents were running out of Central Europe and Scandinavia. Early in
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forty five, Helms got his first overseas assignment in the London office of the
10:03
OSS's espionage branch. Working under and sharing a gross Vendor Street flat with William
10:11
Casey, Helms organized infiltrations of agents behind German lines to spy and set up
10:16
resistance networks. Late in the war, he was forward deployed to Paris.
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Then after V Day he moved to Luxembourg in Germany, where he was made
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deputy chief of the espionage element in vs Baden. In August to forty five,
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he was transferred to a similar job in Berlin under Alan Dulles. From
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there he tracked down Nazi sympathizers and work criminals, collected information on stolen goods,
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rased German scientists, and monitored Soviet military misdeeds. After President Truman abolished
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the OSS in late in eighteen forty five, Helm was moved into the Berlin
10:54
Office of the Strategic Services Human Terry over Operational Organization warehoused in the War Department.
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In December excuse me, he came back to Washington to run the Central
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Year of Branch and the short lived Central Intelligence Group. In late forty seventy
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took a similar position in the new CIA's Office of Special Operations. After the
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Directorate of Plans was created in nineteen fifty two, Helms served as Special or
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as Chief of Operations, which was the number two job for years, largely
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running the Directorate as DDP Frank wizards health deteriorating. Besides overseeing sp nolage operations
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during those years, Helms smooth relations between completing factions between competing factions in the
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Directory, the Bihandlers and the covert operators. They represented different cultures and often
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worked with cross purposes and helped protect the agency of Senator Joseph McCarthy's efferences to
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see with informance. Probably Helms' greatest personal disappointment through this phase of his career
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was not being chosen to replace Wisner as the DDP in nineteen fifty eight.
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If Helms had been selected rather than Richard Bissell, he might have kept the
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agency from committing its biggest blunder to date, known as the Bay of Pigs
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operation. Although the Eisenhower administration almost certainly would have avoided the CIA to do
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something to remove Fidelcastro from power, Helms probably would not have approved any project
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anywhere near as large and unwieldy as the one Bissell backed. Without that covert
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action disaster on his record, Alan Dulls most likely would have finished his directorship
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quietly in the year or two and turned over a respected, even popular agency
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to his successor, assumed by many of the time to be Richard Hilmes.
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As it turned out, helms eventual selection as DDP in nineteen sixty two under
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John the DCI, who had replaced Allen Dullas the year before, proved important
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symbolically and substantively acquired many of the room lands from clandestine service careers after Bistles
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and Dullas's ousters and allied their fears that McCone and Shipping and construction tycoon was
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bent on running the agency like a big business. Helms's promotion also signal to
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shift in emphasis from covert action to espionage. The reorientation with which he wholeheartedly
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agreed. So Helms was more of the belief that he was more into the
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spying, the espionage, and the covert rather than the covert military coup action
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that was going on that the CIA was trying to do, as far as
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ousting leaders and planting sympathetic leaders in these various countries for political reasons. During
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the bitter peace of the Cold War, when nuclear superpowers and their proxies faced
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off in hotspots all over the globe, Helms and his CIA colleagues had to
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be in communists George Will's words, resourceful, tough minded people who were not
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too squeamish to do hard things wherever CIA operatives were behind the Iron curtain in
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Third world cities or out in the Jogord desert. Espionage is not played by
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the marquis Pleasonbury rules, Helms noted, and the only sin in espionage just
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getting caught. Secret intelligence work demands a special character in its practitioners, who
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must be able to hear the bleak reality that they have only each other on
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whom to leave. Those on the outside either don't know them or don't like
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them. Those above them seek their loyalty, their competence, but hasten to
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distance themselves when something goes under they're too wrong. After Truman abolished the OSS
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in late forty five, sorry sorry, whenever that now. Richard Helms had
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several credos that he lived by throughout his intelligence career. So let's get through
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a couple of them, because they're interesting, all right. He expressed most
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of them in catchphrases which he included, which he used often focus on the
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core missions collecting and analyzing foreign intelligence. That was believed that the CIA is
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best at acquiring secrets and telling policymakers what they mean, but the COVID action
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in peacetime can cause the agency no ending, no end of trauma. Espionage
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and analysis informed policy. But CIA programs too often become substitutes for IT.
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Operations intended to be plausibly deniable usually ended up as neither the agency gives blamed
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for the unintended consequences. Having seen how covert action failures Cornish and CIA's imaged
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during and supposed Golden Age Undervellas, Helms was determined to prevent similar flaps when
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he was DCI. As far as collection methods were concerned, Helms duly appreciated
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the contribution of technical means, but he insisted in satellites and sensors would never
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replace spies as the best way to learn about in the adversary's intentions. Although
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a fan, he disliked the term humans, remarking that it sounds too much
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like a type of fertilizer. He was quoted as same Solassical espionage has been
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termed the second oldest profession, and I want to predict that it will know
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more out of business in the future than the first. Now, human,
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of course means human intelligence, and that's more boots on the ground, eyes
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and ears to the walls type of thing. Keep the game honest. Helms
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thought that the purposes finished intelligence was to inform, but not second guess,
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policy decisions. He was sensitive to the fact that intelligence is inherently political,
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that it exists in a policy environment and sometimes tips the balance in favor of
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one decision or another. In that way, analysis can never be truly objective
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because the policy making community will use it to justify or sidetrack initiatives. At
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the same time, Helms believed that finished intelligence should not be politicized huge to
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support a particular course of action or an ideological or departmental viewpoint. Instead,
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it shouldn't reflect the honest appraisal of all available evidence evaluated by fair minded observers.
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In some ways, like the journalism that he wants practiced, objectivity puts
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me on familiar ground as an old wire service hand Helms the market a group
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of newspaper editors in nineteen seventy one. But it's even more important to an
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intelligence organization serving the policymaker. Without objectivity, there is no credibility, and
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an intelligence organization without credibility as of little use to those that served never where
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two hats. Perhaps the best way for a DCI to avoid the politicization the
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politicization buyer, according to Helms, was to stick to the facts and stay
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out of policy debates unless explicitly requested. Helms avoided offering advice that would tie
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the CIA, even indirectly to a policy outcome. Otherwise, the agency's most
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valuable commodity, it's reputation as a source of independent, unbiased information and analysis,
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would be devalued, and the CIA would become just another voice in the
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chorus of policy advocates. According to Kissinger, Helms never volunteered policy advice beyond
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the questions that were asked them, though never hesitating to war in the White
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House of dangers, even when his views were encountered to the preconceptions of the
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President or his security advisor, he stood his ground where lesser men might have
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resorted to ambiguity. Helms were called that the meetings in the Johnson White House,
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the other people president had to be a little careful about the way they
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pushed their individual causes because they knew very well, probably had the facts fairly
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straight, and wouldn't hesitate to speak up to him. That was the best
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way a DCI could serve or president stay at the table. Helms thought the
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CIA officers sometimes forget that they work for a service organization, that the product
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they provide must be relevant, timely, and coaching to be of value to
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their customers. As the agency prepares analysis that are out of date by the
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time they are received, deal with topics that policymakers are not following or are
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crafted in ways to do not resonate with consumers, the CIA will lose its
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audience. On the operations side, Helm's acted from the presumption that presidents are
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not going to get done what they want done. Whether the DCI or the
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agency likes the idea or not, and nay, saying CIA will find himself
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left out of discussions about activities that it may be able to do better than
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anyone else the agency. Holmes said, it's part of the president's bag of
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tools, and if he and proper authorities have decided that something has to be
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done, then the agency is bound to try to do it. Serve only
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one president at a time. Henry Kissinger has observed that Helms never forgot that
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his best weapon with presidents was a reputation for reliability. Any DCI Helms believe
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must adapt their chief executive, who works for and has to suppress political or
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other differences that may arise when they knew occupant enters the Oval office. Living
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through the changes from John Kennedy, whom he often observed while DDP to Lyndon
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Johnston to Richard Nixon, Holmes saw that presidents have their own appreciation of intelligence
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in their own way of dealing with the CIA. They may be fascinated with
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certain kinds of secret information or types of clandestine activity, or they may not
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be interested in intelligence at all. A DCI who does not learn to live
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with those differences or tries to oversell the agency or obstruct policy, will soon
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find himself disinvited from the oval office, which Helm was watch happened with Matoon
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and Johnston. We would have a very strange government if everybody with an independent
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view of foreign policy decided he was free to take or not take the president's
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instruction according to his own likes and beliefs. And lastly, make intelligence a
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profession, not just an occupation. Helms had little time for officers who joined
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the CIA for any reason other than to serve their country by making intelligence their
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career. There was a big difference between that and being a careerist. However,
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with his characteristic bluntness, Helms warned a new class of trainees in nineteen
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sixty that figuring out where you'll be in five years is a feckless exercise.
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If you're already concerned about promotions and prerequisite and wasting your time and ours,
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you're either getting a kick out of your organization or not. If you are
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not, you'd be better off outside. You are the agency It's future.
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It will be as good or as bad as you are. No genius in
22:44
command will ever change that fact. But you are not God's gift to the
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CIA, and you have not been sent here to rearrange it. Committing one's
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life to the profession of intelligence often exactly a high price. But as Helms
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told him the assembly baseness the employees in nineteen ninety six, an alert intelligence
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community is our first best line of defense service service. There is its own
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reward that sort of pause here for a second, kind of explain things that
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you know. After Films was replaced as the DCI, it became more of
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a let's just say, an office position with a plaque that didn't really require
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much former intelligence training or CIA agency employment. Richard Halms was probably the last,
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um probably lifelong intelligence operative to have ran through the ranks of the Central
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Intelligence Agency to be a director of Central Intelligence. He lived it, he
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breathed it, he loved it, and he uh he lived it. You
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know, it was and of course this is a this is a roses In
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fairy tale angle of course from the CIA itself. But you can see where,
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you can see why Richard Helms is the way he is Telmes to dealing
24:34
with Cerveray people, and he did have some good philosophies. You know,
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um, if this you know auto biographical articles to be believed. Now at
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this point in the narrative, let's kind of take a side step, if
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you will. Hear from Victor Marchetti. Victor Marchetti Road to See and the
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Call to Intelligence in the early seventies, and he also served under Richard Helms
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when he was at the CIA. And of course Victor Marchetti believes that in
25:17
some way the Central Intelligence agent was involved in the assassination and the handling of
25:25
Oswald. So let's see what Victor Marchetti, somebody who actually served under Richard
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Helms, as to say about him. So the question is do CI agents
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tend to be Ivy League types, well born, upper class Marchetti says,
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at the time I was there, yes, most of them were Ivy leaguers.
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There was a carry over from the wartime, I always asked, And
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the agency was heavily sea with Harvard, Yale and Princeton kind of guys,
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especially at the top. Although as you got more into paramilitary aspects you began
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to run into West Point, Annapolis, man X, Marines, Notre Dame.
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And question isn't William Koby, who runs the agency now in ivy type?
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He says, well, Kobe is not quite Ivy. He went to
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Princeton, but he's more in middle class boy. He's not the same as
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a Richard Hilmes, the director when I was there. Poby's family does not
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have money and my social position like Hilmes's family did. Air connected with James
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the poet Morgan JP Morgan, there's a difference. Kobe is a reflection of
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what's beginning to happen at the agency. Where it once was a kind of
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aristocratic club of smoothies who were doing this because it was part of their patriotic
26:53
duty and fun. It has now become one below that. It's now being
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something more like the military at covert military. Hobey is a good example.
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He lives in the suburbs of Virginia, Mountain Georgetown. He's not on the
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cocktail circuit. He's active in the boy Scouts. He's an Irish Catholic.
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A bit fanatical question. Is Howard Hunt, of the Watergate conspirator, a
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Brahmin like Hels. No, he's more like Colby. He went to Brown.
27:23
Hunt never really understood the upper class view of intelligence. For the upper
27:27
class, a lot of this was just a game that they didn't take all
27:30
that seriously. But a guy like Hunt accepted the war with Communism and face
27:36
value. I think he's very pathetic. He ended up being about as simple
27:41
minded as his friend William Buckley. Hunt is basically dumbed. He's just not
27:45
very smart. These guys who are so vehemently anti communists have a religious need
27:51
to hate something, not to believe in something, a Hunt of Buckley.
27:56
They don't believe in America. They have a negative belief there's something evil out
28:00
there, something's something attacking us. These are the kind of guys who are
28:04
really great in Spain during the Acquisition, who roasted people at the state.
28:10
I think they're mostly fighting something evil inside themselves. Communism for them represents evil
28:15
stalin Astro. All those guys are now the devil replacing Satan. This is
28:22
one type of person in the CIA. And then you have other guys who
28:25
are also attack commyists, but they're really more interested in operations for operations,
28:30
saying they are caught up in the life, in the activity. You know,
28:37
it's exciting playing games with government money. It's neal important. They have
28:41
the power to overthrow governments. These guys can come from any background, so
28:52
ah yeah, that's a question why I was Richard helm was relieved as the
28:59
head of the Sea. That did have something to do with the Watergate scandal,
29:03
Marchetti. The White House clearly wanted to use Helms and the CIA and
29:08
cover up the Helms proved usable only to a certain degree. The Nixon gang
29:14
didn't really trust Helms, so they turned to his deputy General Vernon Walters,
29:19
who they thought they had a stronger tie to on the basis of his friendship
29:22
with Nixon. Helms, the old school guy, appear to have gotten wind
29:29
of this and stopped it, and he probably got canned over it. But
29:33
before Watergate, Helms was very cooperative with the White House plumbers, with the
29:37
Houston domestic espionage plan and with breaking into embassies and other things, and he
29:44
thought were the legitimate functions of the CIA, and that he thought j Edgar
29:48
Hoover was going too slow on So yeah, Hotti goes on to say,
30:02
to the question you refer in the book to Special Operations Division with sounds like
30:06
a James Bond operation. You asked the assassination squad, what is it?
30:11
Marceti says, these guys are the CIA's own gorillas. They're sometimes referred to
30:18
as the animals. They provide to know how for running paramilitary operations, infiltrating
30:22
behind them and the enemy lines, sabotage and blowing up a bridge or something.
30:27
They're specialists. The area division would actually have control of the operation,
30:33
but these guys would be the ones that do it. Now, over the
30:36
years, this group has become largely just a body of experts. They themselves
30:40
don't do much anymore. They tend to hire out people to actually do the
30:45
dirty work for them, and that, folks, is what we call clausible
30:51
deniability. At the point blank asked, has the CIA tried, ever tried
30:57
to assassinate Castro Marchetti, I think there is no doubt the CIA was supporting
31:03
rebel groups that were out to assassinate Castro. You find reference to this in
31:10
interviews with the Watergate merkers who are working for the CIA. Question, can
31:15
you cite some triumphs of analysis as opposed to espion and lage in operations?
31:19
You're obviously biased towards the analysis side. Well, we all know about the
31:25
Soviet military and the Chinese strategic forces in their capabilities. This all comes from
31:30
analysis based on materials that are collected either through technical sources, communications intelligence,
31:36
or satellite photography. There is no clan espionage involved. CIA can't spy against
31:42
them. Other good examples of information based on analytical work rather than clandestine espion
31:48
larging whether cin soviets split in the collapse of the Communist Chinese great lead forward
31:55
question. But things be better if an analyst ran the CIA. Well,
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if the CIA continues to exist as it is now, if it still has
32:02
a clandestine service, I would like to see an analyst run the CIA,
32:07
because analysis is the real name of the game. I would rather see the
32:09
agencies clandestine services activities be abolished completely. Though no spies Marchetti says, no
32:17
spies, not a single spy. Marchelli says, not a single spy.
32:24
I would be willing to give up whatever little good can be acquired through classical
32:29
espionage in order to be assured that we are getting rid of all the dirty
32:34
tricks. I would like to see the agency concentrate on collection of information through
32:37
technical and other clean, non provocative means, and on the processing and distribution
32:43
of that information, not just to the White House, but to the entire
32:46
government, even to the general public. So this guy Marchetti is stone polar
32:57
opposite of man like Richard Hilmes, who believes that espionage five versus spy is
33:06
the way to go for the agency. And check out some of the numbers
33:10
he's talking about here, folks, and this was in the early seventies nine.
33:15
You, according to your book, we spend more than sixty billion a
33:19
year on intelligence. Sixty billion a year in the early seventies, marche says.
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And that's just for intelligence. We spend about eighty billion for defense.
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When you add it all up, some sixty percent of our budget goes into
33:34
these kinds of things. And when you think of it, six billion is
33:37
more than we spend on most of our domestic problems. They ask, what
33:44
happened to you in nineteen fifty five. You were a firm believer in the
33:46
Central Intelligence Agency. What changed you? He says, Well, the world
33:52
changed, and I changed with it. I like to think around sixty four
33:57
to sixty five, I began getting turned off to the Vietnam Means war for
34:00
one thing. Began to get fed up with what I thought was over emphasis
34:05
on the military in this country. And when I moved into staff work,
34:07
I saw the agency was over emphasizing claimed destined activities, particularly covert action.
34:14
I decided to quit about six months before I actually did. I said,
34:21
you had no thought then of exposing the agency and says no. At that
34:25
point, no, I told the director why I was leaving. Of course,
34:30
I didn't make any bones about what I thought was wrong, but he
34:31
had heard me talk that way before. So I left. And in the
34:36
course of doing your Spine novel, I began to get really worked up and
34:39
I wanted to start writing some articles. So yeah, Now, this was
34:49
when he wrote his book in nineteen seventy one. He had to give it
34:52
to the CIA, who went through it and let's just say edited themselves.
34:59
I read acting whatever they wanted to. And he released his book with all
35:07
the redactions intact made by the Central Intelligence Agency. So a lot of things
35:15
are just redacted in It's pretty crazy. Closing question, why does the CIA
35:22
do do all this stuff? Are they afraid they'll lose respect amongst the intelligence
35:29
services of the world, So we have KGB and others and they keep their
35:31
people quiet. Oh yeah, there's a certain amount of that. But there's
35:37
one thing to remember. If I had worked for any other espionage agency in
35:40
the world. I would probably be dead by now. And there you have
35:47
it from my victor minds. Yeah, and just answered this interesting document that
35:57
I found dated December fourth, eighteen sixty three. This is a internal CIA
36:04
cable graham Um four year reviewed in May of nineteen seventy six. I don't
36:14
know when it was actually released. It was to the director of the CIA
36:20
redacted. Source redacted said he saw sang Hv Toppy for thirty November issue.
36:37
Sang Hv I made no mention CIA angle inserted by Krangjia two. Source reported
36:52
Soviet Counselor General told him well November the thirtieth that Oswald was sent to Russia
36:59
and married the Soviet girl and the instructions. Source also said that Soviets angry
37:05
with Karngia for organizing for uncommemorative meeting November the twenty ninth. You know Soviets
37:12
attended. So there you have the Soviet constil in General saying that Oswald was
37:22
sent to the USSR to meet Soviet girl under instructions. Interesting. But the
37:32
one thing that really parnishes the legacy is of course Watergate. If it had
37:40
not been for Watergate, which opened up the American government. Like an archaeologist
37:44
trench, Helms would have retired and remained unknown, in most part by the
37:49
general public. Even now, he remains an elusive figure. It's like dozens
37:53
of congressional hearings. He does not give interviews. His friends are cautious and
37:59
discussing him. His enemies found him hard to fathom, even when they worked
38:02
down the hall, and nobody connected with an intelligence agency really believes in letting
38:08
facts speak for themselves. That is not to say that Richard Helms was a
38:14
retiring public servant, one of those gray men who watches his in socks.
38:19
Far from it. He was personal, and he did looking in a dark,
38:23
brilliantined sort of way, and he got about a good deal. Socially,
38:29
he naded Barbara Oar and he was never at a loss for a lunching
38:32
partner. She says, who in the hell is Barbara Howar? Well,
38:40
She's from Nashville, Tennessee, Doug. She was a writer known for Who's
38:45
Who We Interrupt This Week in the Trials of Harry Kissinger. She was previously
38:52
married to Edmund nezie Hoar, and she was a friend of the Johnson family
39:02
who was later ostracized for the very critical views of the Johnston presidency. Also
39:09
the author of Laughing All the Way, a Georgetown searcher Light. So it
39:21
seems like a fun loving gal. We'll see here. The CIA lives on
39:37
a kind of sufferance, and it was Helms's job to see that the agency's
39:42
fragile charter survived intact. He often lunched with the kind of men senators,
39:46
senior government officials, important journalists, whose goodwill, whose trust in fact gave
39:52
the agency the freedom from scrutiny it needed to do a job. One of
39:57
the men Helms used to see regularly in this way was se L Sulzburger,
40:01
excuse me, the diplomatic correspondence of the New York Times. They would lunch
40:06
at Helms's regular table at the Occidental and talk about Soviets strategic capabilities, recent
40:12
Cyprus, and why the North Vietnamese failed to stage an offensive during Nick's trip
40:16
to p King things like that. You know, Helms told Sulzburger once,
40:22
I tell you almost anything. Note that he said I Note that he didn't
40:29
say, I tell you almost everything. He said, I tell you almost
40:32
anything. Helms's reputation in official Washington as opposed to His broader public reputation,
40:39
which was more recent, more sinister, and less precise, is that of
40:44
an able, honest man with the emphasis on honesty. The journalists who talked
40:47
to him and the Congressman who he briefed over the years trusted Helms implicitly.
40:52
Even at the height of the war in Vietnam, when Lynda Johnson was calling
40:54
for progress reports as a patriotic duty, Helms would go into an executive session
41:00
with Senator could Bright's committee and tell them the bad news. Like Saulsburger,
41:06
the senators convinced themselves that the Helms told them just about anything. They did
41:09
not grasp the extent to which he answered questions narrowly, or phrased himself exactly,
41:15
or volunteered nothing not even that covers it. There's some secrets he just
41:20
flat out lied to protect, and Helms knew a lot of them. Until
41:24
he became DCI. Helms' entire career had been in the Deputy Directorate for Plans.
41:30
He had lived through every bureaucratic battle in Washington and knew the details of
41:35
every operation abroad, not just the routine agent running, but Cold War exotica
41:40
involving Ukrainian emigrads, penetrating the denied areas of Russia, Polish undergrounds, counter
41:46
guerrilla operations in Latin America, the acquisition of the Galan Organization from Nazi Germany.
41:52
At the end of the war. The world looked quite different in the
41:55
early years of the Cold War, and things that seemed demented or criminal now
42:00
sometimes looked plausible. Then Helms knew every crazy crack brain scheme dreamed up over
42:06
drinks late at night or meticulously in the Committee were men was sometimes crazier still,
42:13
and he knew what would happen if these things ever got out. It
42:15
was bad enough having John Paul Sarta in half was Black Africa thinking that the
42:21
CIA had killed La Mumba. What would happen if the New York Times found
42:27
out about secret drug testing links to the mafia, poison pin devices. Helm's
42:31
new secrets, which could wreck the whole CIA and leave the United States where
42:36
they crippled intelligence agency or no intelligence agency agency at all. There's only one
42:42
man with the right to ask questions about such things, the President. And
42:45
if the President were to ask, clearly, unmistakably, Dick, what about
42:50
this story? The CIA tried to kill Castro with the help of the mafia.
42:53
This is true. Helms would have to answer a question like that a
42:58
god forbid the president should ever asked. Once you begin to look into such
43:01
matters, there were no telling what you found and what would follow where it
43:07
begins. So I think we got a pretty good idea of exactly who Richard
43:16
Elms was, what he stood for, the way he ran the CIA,
43:22
he under him, and why he believed in what he did following the assassination
43:32
of President Kennedy. It's filling the Holmes laugh to investigately Harmy Oswald. We
43:38
have the CIA, and of course this is a guy who knew where all
43:44
the bodies are buried and everything's going on and whatever brings up to. In
43:51
fact, in one of the most recent document dumps formally redacted, we get
43:58
this. We get this internal CIA memo. There's a memorandum from mister Lyle
44:10
Miller, Deputy and Legislative Council from Scott Breckinridge, Deputy Inspector General, on
44:16
the subject of the estimate of number of CIA employees involved in support of Warrant
44:22
Commission number one. We have surveyed the DdO, DDA and DDI components for
44:30
a statement of the number of employees engaged in support of the investigation by the
44:35
Warrant Commission. It was difficult to reconstruct this with any reliability. Many of
44:39
those involved no longer being available. Names have been taken out from old records
44:45
and the memories of those involved in some way at the time. We cannot
44:47
with the reliability to be sure how much time A visuals involved. Now I
44:52
believe I forgot to say that this was a memo from November the fifth,
44:55
nineteen seventy six, so they are talking currently about the time thirteen years in
45:02
the past, and we're two. We estimated very close to fifty fifty professional
45:09
employees were involved in this activity on either a daily or recurring basis. We
45:16
have identified twilities being involved on a daily basis. There obviously were others involved
45:22
on occasion, but not regularly. In addisition, there were a number of
45:24
secretary on clerical employees who provided support. We're not counted. The number may
45:30
be greater than fifty professionals estimated above. Attached for your information, but not
45:37
for release to the Downing Committee is the summary worksheet on this This memorandum is
45:42
classified confidential because of its attachment. The information in this memorandum can be extracted
45:47
and passed to the Downing Committee on an unclassified basis. Scott Breckinridge. Now
45:58
the attachment for this specifically goes into CIA personnel involved in the Oswald case during
46:07
the existence of the Warrant Commission. And these are all who were at um
46:14
involved on a daily basis, folks, daily basis, And it starts from
46:22
the top under McCone. This is this is not a daily basis, but
46:28
they were aware of what's going on. So John McCone being the number one
46:35
the DCI, of course he knew what was going on. The DDPS,
46:37
Richard Helms, the Thomas Karen Karen Messings whurch they knew what was going on.
46:43
The CIA staff, the CI staff, the name's Angleton where he knew
46:49
what was going on. Now we get into the daily basis of the daily
46:52
basis involvement Raymond Rocca, T. Hall, A. Dooley, B.
47:00
O'Neill. And then we have not on a daily basis and editor Jane Roman
47:07
T. Flynn, Jay Lovedam P. Hartman, daily basis, J C.
47:12
King, Jay Winton from the that's the Western Hemisphere division, the SR
47:20
Division. So we at Russia Division we have D. Murphy and Tenant Bagley,
47:25
and then on a daily basis there we have l Wigran and Brasco.
47:30
From the Office of Security we have E. Mendoze on a daily basis.
47:35
Colonel Sheffield Edwards not on a daily basis. Division D question Mark added d
47:43
D one field stations, Win Scott daily basis, David Phillips daily basis and
47:49
good Pastor daily basis. Alan White not daily basis. We have two from
47:54
Miami Field Station, once in London, once in the Hague, one from
47:59
Germany, one from Stockholm, one from Elsinki, one from Madrid, one
48:02
from Burning, one from Brussels, one from Canberrat, won from Copenhagen,
48:07
one from Paris, one from Oslo, and one from Rome. Soviets or
48:13
Soviets sat Ops Paul Dylan don Vogel sent the Houseman Robert Steele, Cuban Ops,
48:20
Francis Sherry, stan Archinhold, Joseph Piccolo so from this list one,
48:31
two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine,
48:35
ten, eleven to twelve thirteen CIA personnel involved in the Oswald case thirting
48:40
the existence of a warrant commission on a daily basis and you have Alan Dullas
48:50
sitting on this commission knowing all this shit. And not that I think that
48:59
the sea I was involved per se, but there was a lot of shit
49:04
that they did not want to get out to the public. This is a
49:07
lot of cock blocking, a lot of monitoring to make sure that things did
49:12
not get said and things did not get out that put the CIA in any
49:19
kind of bad light. So that's a little illuminating for sure. Now let's
49:35
get into some CIA tactics, if you will. I thought this was interesting.
49:40
Another interview with Marcetti. Question if you were as an Asian in trouble
49:46
somewhere in America, Marchetti interrupts, I was never an agent. I was
49:52
an officer. Okay, Well, if someone were an agent and they were
49:55
involved in something and nobody believes they're an agent, he has arrested in trying
49:59
to communicate, let's say, and he is one of you guys, what
50:02
is the procedure Marchetti, I kill him. Question if I were an agent
50:12
for the agency and I was involved in something involving the law domestically in the
50:15
FBI, would I have a fun time to fall Marchetti? Yes, A
50:22
verification contact yes, you would. Would I be dead? It would all
50:29
depend on the situation. If you got into bad trouble. We're not going
50:31
to verify you, no how, no way. But there is a call
50:37
mechanism set up. Marchetti. Yes, so it is conceivable that Lee Harvey
50:43
Oswald was Machetti interrupts. That's what he was doing. He was trying to
50:47
call in and say tell them my mall right. Question was that his death
50:52
warrant? Marchetti? Do you bet you? Because this time he went over
50:58
the damn. Whether he knew it or not, or whether they set him
51:00
up or not, it doesn't matter. He was over the damn. And
51:05
at this point it was an executive action. Question. Is the contact person's
51:10
name ever the name of someone who is not necessarily an active agent, but
51:15
it's just a contact person, Chetty, that's right. Then that person would
51:22
go up to the next level, Chetting, that's right. You know it
51:24
would be a funny name, a pseudonym, like, for example, you
51:29
would have a number to call if you were my agent and you've got yourself
51:32
into a peck of trouble, you might try to contact me, but maybe
51:37
you can't get through to me. Question I would contact you by telephone,
51:43
right, I'm setting yes, but I might have covered my tracks real good,
51:46
so you can't contact me by telephone. In other words, I can
51:50
contact you if you're gonna contact me, but I give you an unintelligible number.
51:54
So you call him, and I've already talked to him and said don't
51:59
touch and you're screwed. But you would use for that a middleman, people
52:05
who were not necessarily active agents or agency people, right, Marchetti, that's
52:09
right. Most likely they would be cutouts. You would have to call indirectly.
52:15
Did Oswald have had a name, Marchetti, He was probably calling his
52:20
cutout. He was calling somebody who could put him and touching his case officer.
52:24
He couldn't go beyond that person. There's no way he could. He
52:29
decided to depend on this person to say, okay, I'll deliver the message.
52:32
Now. If the cutout has already been alerted to cut him off and
52:36
ignore him, then he probably wouldn't even answer the phone or entertain a conversation
52:40
with this person. Question. Would CIA agents have been in the Dallas jail
52:45
as part of the investigation, Marchetti, Well, and I've been put into
52:51
jails to interrogate prisoners undercover before questions. So it's not inconceivable, well that
53:00
the CI, CIA agent of some type could have been there, Marchetti,
53:04
that's the name of the game. Get it whatever way you can. Pretty
53:10
wild stuff. So it was all this hustle and bustle and fluff, and
53:16
what if, what if some of these tramps were undercover CIA agents put into
53:23
jail to monitor Oswald, what he's doing in there, what he's saying.
53:31
And of course I'm sure that some of these Dallas police officers were also domestic
53:40
contacts of the CIA, which they used to obtain information as well. And
53:49
another part of this interview, and I thought it was it's got a lot
53:53
of good nuggets in it. Um. They asked him, do you think
53:59
the ci was involved in any way with the assassination? Marcetti, Yes,
54:05
but not officially. My ceiling, based on what I know, and I
54:07
may be absolutely wrong, is that there's no way the agency will get involved
54:13
in it's kind of mess. They may do a lot of things like overthrow
54:16
governments, prop up dictatorships, and a lot of other things, but there
54:21
are certain things beyond the pale. However, there are individuals within the agency
54:25
who are willing to go above and beyond. So there may have been an
54:30
individual or two or three within the agency who was involved. There are certain
54:34
renegades in the agency what were and probably still are, particularly people who were
54:40
involved in the Cuban affair and never forgave Kennedy. These people are perfectly capable
54:45
of pretty goddamn dirty tricks. Howard Hunt is the kind of guy, along
54:52
with a lot of other people who will contract agents, who in their anger
54:54
and fury, were capable of doing something crazy like this working along with other
55:00
people. They're also smart enough to have messed it up so well that you
55:04
could never figure out who was responsible for anything question. So you see individuals
55:09
of work, not agencies. Marchetti says, that's right, individuals such as
55:15
CIA contract agents David Ferry and Clay Shaw. Marchetti, Yes, I think
55:21
they were probably involved in some way. I just don't know how. They're
55:23
worried a lot of people who wanted to get rid of the president for one
55:27
reason or another, and I think they all just cover less somehow, some
55:31
way, maybe by accident. I think that in that group, and this
55:37
is strictly personal opinion, there was some FBI and Cia renegades who did their
55:43
job, cleaned up afterwards and got that all out of there. Then they
55:50
asked him, is David Phillips Marrie Bishop? Marchetti says no. Do you
55:58
know who Marie Bishop is? Marchetti says, yes, and it isn't Dave.
56:05
Was Maurice Bishop connected with the assassination to the best of your knowledge?
56:09
Marchetti said, Look, when you're dealing in pseudonyms, forget it. Question.
56:15
What do you mean forget it? I mean just forget it because you're
56:20
not going to be able to prove a thing. But no, he Phillips
56:22
was not Maurice Bishop. Question, but you did say you know who Maurice
56:27
Bishop is? Yes, Marchetti says, I'm sure if I asked you you
56:31
would not tell me his identity. Marshoon said that is correct, I would
56:37
not. So there's Victor Marchetti on a couple of things, and this little
56:51
nugget as we wrap things up here. Richard Helm's second in command, Thomas
57:00
Karen Messins, was expected to be questioned by the Household Committee on Assassinations.
57:05
However, he died of an appearent heart attackle on September the fourth nineteen seventy
57:09
eight at his vacation home in Grand Lake, Quebec before he give evidence before
57:15
the h SCA, my my mid my mind, isn't that a kinky ding?
57:22
Folks? Isn't that just a kinky Ding's? Well, that's it for
57:30
this one. Once again, thank you to Roger for all the music,
57:37
the intro and all that jazz. Go'll buy some hot sauce people, I
57:42
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at the Loving gum In seven on YouTube the Lone gum in Earth Yeah de
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Loning Gumbing podcast channel making us to like and subscribe and share and comment and
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all that jazz. The boy loves you the Triple Be Big Bad Bob is
58:14
out and enjoy conspiracy. A Shepherd of Fire three was like, chill everyone
58:45
down, She's an tell you. He be the be alight to tell you
59:17
the biggest that you Champtaine. Yet him by waiting, all was so far
59:42
the trouble up, and be gone the trouble. The thing I do was
59:49
go, and by a simple song, don't be on me, tell you,
1:00:15
let me down, you the thing that you champ wayside, wayside situatdro
1:00:39
my rain from me a can of him we got again, and he fell
1:00:45
down and back gat of his car. One was on in head, and
1:00:51
the canny cried on on down me. I only I the be the biggest
1:01:21
champt Yeah, they ain't gonna were more. Always I'm aware, always,
1:01:45
so does he listen as the