In Search of Enemies - A CIA Story - John Stockwell

Author's Note
[n]
by authors-Philip Agee, Joe Smith, Victor Marchetti, and Frank
Snepp-but by the CIA directors who led the CIA into scandalous,
absurd operations. At best, the oath was used to protect those directors
from exposure by their underlings, although the directors themselves
freely leaked information to further their operational or political
ploys.
Their cynicism about the oath, and their arrogance toward the
United States' constitutional process, were exposed in 1977, when
former director Richard Helms was convicted of perjury for lying to
a Senate committee about an operation in Chile. Helms plea-bargained
a light sentence-the prosecutors were allegedly apprehensive
that in his trial many secrets would be revealed, blowing operations
and embarrassing establishment figures. After receiving a suspended
sentence, Helms stood with his attorney before television cameras,
while the latter gloated that Helms would wear the conviction as a
" badge of honor." ~s was.ur2ud of having lied to the Senate to
QfQtect a questionable CIA operation, but to protec!._his own person,
.. secrets would have been exEosed.
Faced with a similar choice in the Angolan program-my loyalty
to the CIA or my responsibilities to the United States' Constitution
-I chose the latter. The CIA's oaths and honor codes must never
+c-7 .----
~ precedence aver alleiiance to our country. Th_at is my_s_e.cond
reason for disregarding the oath.
Even with those two reasons, I would not have undertaken to
expose the clandestine services if I felt they were essential to our
national security. I am persuaded they are not. That is what this book
is about.
In discussing our foreign intelligence organ, we consistently confuse
two very different offices; referring to both ;s "CIA." The one,
technically called the Central Intelligence Agency's Deputy Directorate
of Information, fulfills the mission outlined in the National
Security Act of 1947, of centralizing all of the raw intelligence available
to our government, collating it, analyzing it for meaning and
importance, and relaying finished reports to the appropriate offices.
Had such an office existed in 1941 we would have been forewarned
of Pearl Harbor. The DOI is overt-its employees are openly "CIA"
to friends, relatives, neighbors, and creditors; it is passive; and it is
benign, without aggressive activity which can harm anyone.
Otherwise, we say "CIA" meaning the clandestine services of the