In Search of Enemies - A CIA Story - John Stockwell

Author's Note
Oth~~ad reached the same conclusion.j>hilip Agee ~sed his
!?ook[jnside the Comp_an2: A Cl~i_E~ a sword to slash at the
~ncy. to put it out of business in Latin America. Deeply offended
by the CIA's clandestine activities, Agee attacked individual operations
and agents, publishing every name he could remember. Although
he made an effort to explain how and why he became disillusioned,
he did not illuminate the CIA "mind." Marchetti and Snep,Q
contributed valuable information to th ublic's knowledge of the
CIA. 'h 'A an t e u o ntelli enc includes a vast store of
information about the agency, drawn from Marchetti's experience in
the DDI and in the office of the director of central intelligence.
Snepp, for six years an analyst in the CIA's Saigon station, chronicles
the intelligence failure and betrayals of the CIA evacuation of South
Vietnam in April 1975.
My objective in writing this book is to give the American public
a candid glimpse inside the clandestine mind, behind the last veils
of secrecy. The vehicle I chose is the Angola paramilitary program
of 1975-1976. The anecdotes I relate all happened as described. Dates
and details are drawn from the public record and from voluminous
notes I took during the Angola operation. In most cases there were
other witnesses and often enough secret files to corroborate them.
However, for reasons of security, I was not able to interview key
individuals or return to the CIA for further research as I wrote. I
urge the CIA to supplement my observations by opening its Angola
files-the official files as well as the abundant "so ff' files we keptso
the public can have the fullest, most detailed truth.
Our libel laws restrict an author's freedom to relate much of
human foible. Nevertheless I have managed to include enough anecdotes
to give the reader a full taste of the things we did, the people
we were. But this is not so much a story of individual eccentricities
and strange behavior, though I mention some. I have no desire to
expose or hurt individuals and I reject Agee's approach. As a case
officer for twelve years I was both victim and villain in CIA operations.
In both roles I was keenly sympathetic for the people we
ensnarled in our activities. Perhaps they are responsible according to
the principles of Nuremburg and Watergate-which judged lesser
employees individually responsible and put them in jail-but I prefer
to address the issues at a broader level. Since my resignation I have
revealed no covert CIA employee or agent's name, and I stonewalled