Ike's Spies: Eisenhower and the Espionage Establishment
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8. Bissell’s testimony on these matters is fully corroborated, in detail, in separate interviews with John Eisenhower and Andrew Goodpaster.
9. Memo of conference, November 6, 1956, Whitman File, Eisenhower Library, Abilene, Kansas.
10. Dwight D. Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 91.
11. Dwight D. Eisenhower, “Phone calls, 12/56.” Ike recorded, or had Ms. Whiteman take shorthand notes of, almost all his phone conversations.
12. Cline, Secrets, Spies, and Scholars, p. 158.
13. Francis Gary Powers, Operation Overflight, pp. 308–9.
14. Bissell interview.
15. Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 301; Goodpaster interview.
16. Based on many discussions with Eisenhower during interviews.
17. Goodpaster interview.
18. Quoted in Stephen E. Ambrose, Rise to Globalism: American Foreign Policy Since 1938, p. 223.
19. Ibid.
20. Dwight D. Eisenhower, “Phone calls, 12/56.”
21. Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 595.
22. Ibid., p. 601.
CHAPTER TWENTY
1. Interview with John Eisenhower.
2. Dwight D. Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 546; italics mine.
3. Bissell interview.
4. Ibid.
5. Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 446.
6. Bissell interview; Gray interview.
7. Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 546.
8. Ibid.
9. Memorandum of a conference with the President, July 11, 1960, Whitman file, Eisenhower Library, Abilene, Kansas.
10. Bissell interview.
11. Francis Gary Powers, Operation Overflight, p. 229.
12. Ibid., p. 353.
13. Bissell interview; Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 547.
14. Bissell interview.
15. Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 543.
16. Ibid., p. 547.
17. Lyman Kirkpatrick, The Real CIA, p. 97.
18. Powers, Operation Overflight, p. 353.
19. The text of Khrushchev’s speech is in the New York Times, May 6, 1960.
20. Ibid.
21. Ibid., May 8, 1960.
22. Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 549.
23. New York Times, May 8, 1960.
24. Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 551.
25. New York Times, May 9, 1960.
26. Ibid., May 13, 1960.
27. Ibid., May 12, 1960.
28. Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 552.
29. Vernon Walters, Silent Missions, p. 342.
30. New York Times, May 8, 1960.
31. Eisenhower, Waging Peace, pp. 558–59.
32. Ibid., p. 553.
33. Walters, Silent Missions, p. 341.
34. Ibid., pp. 344–47.
35. Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 558.
36. James A. Nathan, “A Fragile Détente: The U-2 Incident Re-examined,” Military Affairs, vol. XXXIX (October 1975), pp. 97–103.
37. Los Angeles Times, August 28, 1977.
38. Powers, Operation Overflight, p. 357.
39. Helms to J. Edgar Hoover, May 13, 1964, Warren Commission Document 931, National Archives, Washington.
40. Hearing Before the Committee on Armed Services, on Francis Gary Powers, U. S. Senate, 87th Congress, 2d session, March 6, 1962.
41. Bissell to Immerman, October 29, 1979, Immerman’s possession.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
1. Church Committee, “Alleged Assassination Plots,” pp. 14, 15.
2. Harry Rositzke, The CIA’s Secret Operations: Espionage, Counterespionage, and Covert Action, p. 197; Thomas Powers, The Man Who Kept the Secrets: Richard Helms and the CIA, pp. 145–49.
3. Church Committee, “Alleged Assassination Plots,” p. 51.
4. Church Committee, book IV, p. 138.
5. Church Committee, “Alleged Assassination Plots,” p. 52.
6. Ibid., p. 64.
7. Goodpaster interview.
8. Church Committee, “Alleged Assassination Plots,” p. 55.
9. Ibid., p. 60.
10. Gray interview.
11. New York Times, December 26, 1975.
12. Church Committee, book IV, p. 131. Both Wisner and Hunt testified to the Church Committee that they knew of no assassination missions or planning by PB/7, beyond the general discussion among Pash and others in the process of establishing OPC. The capability was there, but it was never used. Pash testified that “I was never asked to undertake such planning.”
13. Church Committee, book IV, p. 133.
14. Ibid.
15. This discussion relies heavily on Stewart C. Easton, World History Since 1945, pp. 685–91.
16. Church Committee, “Alleged Assassination Plots,” p. 53.
17. Ibid., p. 58.
18. Ibid.
19. Ibid., p. 15.
20. Ibid.
21. Ibid., pp. 16–17.
22. Ibid., p. 19.
23. Ibid., p. 48.
24. Ibid., pp. 64–65.
25. Ibid., p. 66.
26. Ibid., p. 73.
27. Ibid., pp. 73–81; Peter Wyden, Bay of Pigs: The Untold Story, pp. 40–43.
28. Church Committee, “Alleged Assassination Plots,” p. 72.
29. Ibid., p. 92.
30. Ibid., pp. 109–11.
31. Ibid., p. 112.
32. Ibid., pp. 112–13.
33. Ibid., p. 113.
34. Ibid.
35. Ibid., p. 115.
36. Ibid.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
1. Interview with Eisenhower. Ike put Goodpaster in a category with Robert Anderson and his brother Milton.
2. Goodpaster interview.
3. Church Committee, “Alleged Assassination Plots,” p. 92.
4. Ibid., p. 93.
5. Peter Wyden, Bay of Pigs: The Untold Story, p. 24.
6. Church Committee, “Alleged Assassination Plots,” p. 93.
7. Ibid.
8. Wyden, Bay of Pigs, p. 25.
9. Church Committee, “Alleged Assassination Plots,” p. 93; Wyden, Bay of Pigs, p. 25.
10. Dwight D. Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 533.
11. Bissell interview.
12. Ibid.
13. Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 537.
14. Taylor Report. Immediately after the Bay of Pigs, President Kennedy had General Maxwell Taylor make a full investigation and report to him. In 1977 a part of this report, in an expurgated form, was made available to scholars through the John F. Kennedy Library, Boston, Massachusetts.
15. Wyden, Bay of Pigs, p. 31.
16. Ibid., p. 69.
17. Bissell interview.
18. Ibid.
19. Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 534; Wyden, Bay of Pigs, pp. 22–23.
20. Wyden, Bay of Pigs, p. 68; Gray interview.
21. Bissell interview.
22. New York Times, October 20, 1960.
23. Wyden, Bay of Pigs, pp. 67–68.
24. Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 613.
25. Bissell interview.
26. Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 613.
27. Ibid., p. 614.
28. Wyden, Bay of Pigs, p. 69.
29. New York Times, January 10, 1961.
30. Wyden, Bay of Pigs, p. 73.
31. Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 614.
32. Bissell interview. Italics mine.
33. Ibid.
34. Eisenhower interview. See also Earl Mazo, “Ike Speaks Out: Bay of Pigs was all JFK’s,” Newsday, September 10, 1965; Gray interview.
35. Wyden, Bay of Pigs, p. 88.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
1. Howard Hunt interview.
2. Ibid.
GLOSSARY
Abwher: The military intelligence division of the German General Staff.
AJAX: Code name for the CIA covert operation to oust Iran’s Premier Mohammed Mossadegh and reinstate the Shah.
ANVIL: The Allied landing at Marseilles, 1944.
BI-A: Counterespi
onage arm of MI-5, responsible for handling double-agents.
“Bomb”: The device used at BP to break Enigma’s code.
BP: Bletchley Park. The British estate where Enigma’s code was broken and deciphered.
COBRA: U.S. General Omar Bradley’s plan that led to the successful breakthrough of the German lines at St. Lô in late July 1944.
Church Committee: Headed by Frank Church, the 1975 Senate Committee which investigated CIA clandestine operations.
CIA: Central Intelligence Agency. The modern United States intelligence agency, created in 1947.
CIG: Central Intelligence Group. Created by President Truman in 1946, the largely ineffectual precursor to the CIA.
COI: Coordinator of Information. The first United States intelligence agency, established in 1941 under William Donovan.
Corps Franc d’Afrique: A commando group of young French patriots organized in part by OSS officer Major Carleton Coon.
DCI: Director of the Central Intelligence Agency.
Double-Cross System: The BI-A operation of turning captured German spies into double-agents.
Enigma: The German encoding machine, thought by them to be undecipherable.
ETO: European Theater of Operations.
FORTITUDE : Code name for OVERLORD deception plan.
FUSAG: The First United States Army Group. The imaginary force purportedly preparing for the Allied invasion at Pas de Calais.
G-2: SHAEF intelligence division.
G-3 : SHAEF operations division.
GAF : German Air Force, or Luftwaffe.
H.I.M. : His Imperial Majesty. Common reference for the Shah of Iran.
HUSKY: Allied invasion of Sicily, July 1943.
JCS: Joint Chiefs of Staff. Combined heads of the United States Army, Navy, and Air Force.
JED: Short for JEDBURGH, the code name for the three-man Allied teams that armed and trained the French guerrilla underground and coordinated activities with SHAEF.
JSC: Joint Security Control. U.S. counterpart of LCS. Responsible for devising and coordinating strategic cover and deception schemes.
LCS: London Controlling Section. British organization responsible for devising and coordinating strategic cover and deception schemes.
MacGregor Unit: OSS code name for a sabotage team.
Maquis: The French guerrilla underground, or Resistance.
Manhattan Project: United States effort to build the atomic bomb.
MARKET-GARDEN: Field Marshal Bernard Law Montgomery’s plan to cross the Rhine, September 1944.
MI-5: British Secret Service section responsible for security within Great Britain.
MI-6: British Secret Service section responsible for security outside Great Britain.
MULBERRY: Code name for concrete platforms that created an artificial port for OVERLORD.
NSC: National Security Council. Organized in 1947 along with the CIA, the White House agency integrating those departments responsible for advising the President on national security affairs.
ONI: Office of Naval Intelligence.
OPC: Office of Policy Coordination. The branch of the CIA initially in charge of covert operations.
OSS: Office of Strategic Services. The successor to the COI, the U.S. intelligence and covert action agency during World War II.
OVERLORD: Allied invasion of France, June 1944.
PBSUCCESS: Code name for CIA operation in Guatemala.
PWB: Psychological Warfare Branch, SHAEF.
RAF: British Royal Air Force.
SAVAK: The security branch of the Iranian police force.
SHAEF: Supreme Headquarters, Allied Expeditionary Force.
SLU: Special Liaison Unit. British and U.S. officers charged with relaying and interpreüng ULTRA information to the field commanders.
SOE : Special Operations Executive. The branch of MI-6 responsible for liaison with the French underground Resistance.
TORCH: Allied invasion of North Africa, November 1942.
U-2 : Plane used to overfly the Soviet Union for intelligence gathering.
ULTRA: British code name for the systematic breaking of the German code.
AN ESSAY ON THE SOURCES by Richard H. Immerman
THE BIBLIOGRAPHY lists the works cited in this book, but a study of covert intelligence operations is incomplete without some additional explanation of sources used. This is particularly true if the book deals with Dwight D. Eisenhower. Ike was so circumspect when it came to discussing—or writing about—his involvement in deception and clandestine activities that the author must be both researcher and sleuth. To uncover a secret operation is one thing; to reveal Ike’s knowledge and participation is another.
Our investigation of Ike’s conduct as Supreme Commander during World War II was made much easier by the excellent work of others, particularly the British historians, who are justifiably proud of their intelligence services and have written extensively about the subject. The British Government commissioned scholars like Michael Foot to make public previously unknown but critically important facets of the war effort, and recently the first volume of F. W. Hinsley’s official history of British intelligence activities appeared. After F. W. Winterbotham broke the silence about ULTRA in 1974, R. V. Jones and Ronald Lewin brought to light a side of the war more intriguing than the most exciting and imaginative novel. These studies, along with the others included in the Bibliography, proved invaluable to our own work.
But learning of the United States’ involvement, and especially Ike’s still presented problems. There is no American official history, and almost all United States accounts of World War II intelligence are confined to the Office of Strategic Services. As explained in our book, the OSS was just one of several intelligence networks. Memoirs by Ike’s subordinates, including his G-2, General Kenneth Strong, filled in much of the story, and Sir Kenneth kindly consented to answer our questions by letter. We found out about the role of the SLUS through the Telford Taylor reports, deposited in the Modern Military Records branch of the National Archives, and helpful interviews with the participants listed in the Bibliography. Ike’s role emerged. The final ingredient was the Johns Hopkins University edition of Eisenhower’s papers, an exhaustive collection of Ike’s personal correspondence and memoranda, without which our task would have been virtually impossible.
Our task became more difficult when we began the presidential years. Fortunately our timing was opportune. After the Watergate break-in and the disclosure of CIA “dirty works,” there appeared a plethora of memoirs and scholarly investigations describing over two decades of intelligence operations. Interviews added to our knowledge, for an increasing number of former government officials welcomed an opportunity to set the record straight.
I want to express our thanks to all those who did cooperate so extensively, especially Richard M. Bissell, Jr., Howard Hunt, General Andrew Goodpaster, Milton Eisenhower, John Eisenhower, and Stuyvesant Wainwright III. These are all exceedingly busy men who took time out to spend hours discussing a myriad of subjects and often suggested additional avenues for us to pursue. Their collective memories comprise a great deal of our history, for they both described and explained what really went on.
We used our personal interviews in conjunction with the Columbia Oral History Collection and Princeton’s Dulles Oral History Project, essential source material for any scholar of the Eisenhower presidency. The post-Watergate period produced two other essential sources: the Pentagon Papers and the transcript of the Church Committee’s study of government operations. The value of these two publications to the student of the spies cannot be overemphasized.
The Johns Hopkins compilation of Eisenhower’s papers has not yet gone beyond the chief-of-staff period, and we still await the publication of the Foreign Relations volumes for Ike’s administration. To make matters worse from our standpoint, many of the documents relating to CIA activities were either never published or, as was more commonly the case, remained security-classified. Again we were he
lped by post-Watergate sentiment. By going through Record Group 59 of the National Archives Diplomatic Branch, we discovered numerous previously unused memoranda and dispatches and identified those still not released to the public. We obtained hundreds of these through the Freedom of Information Act.
For Ike himself, however, the main source was the Eisenhower Library in Abilene, Kansas. Director John Wickman, Dr. James Lyerzapf, and the rest of the library staff have expertly catalogued the thousands upon thousands of papers resulting from the Eisenhower White House, and assembled detailed finding guides as to their contents. The bulk of this collection—known as the Whitman File—provides insights into Ike’s administration and personality never before thought possible. Special mention should be made of Ike’s personal diary. Although obviously too busy to record a day-by-day account of his activities, Ike kept the diary periodically from the 1930s up until his death. Perhaps no other document reveals with such clarity the mind of this man who for so many years supervised our complex intelligence community.
One final note on the sources. We have attempted to obtain as much of the information as possible, but we will not pretend that the story is complete. The files from the White House Special Assistant for National Security Affairs and the National Security Council series are still primarily closed, as are many other documents in the Eisenhower Library’s holdings. It is unlikely, even with the newly instituted Executive Order 12065, that these documents will be declassified in the near future. Ike took many of his secrets with him to his grave. But he left enough for us to know that he believed in the intelligence community, that he used it to its fullest potential, and that it was never the same again after he retired.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
UNPUBLISHED SOURCES
Dwight D. Eisenhower, Papers as President of the United States, 1953–1961 (Whitman File), Dwight D. Eisenhower Library, Abilene, Kans.
James C. Hagerty Papers, Dwight D. Eisenhower Library, Abilene, Kans.
National Archives, Diplomatic Branch, Washington, D.C.
——. Judicial and Fiscal Branch, Washington.
——. Modern Military Records, Washington.
Richard G. Patterson, Jr., Papers, Harry S. Truman Library, Independence, Mo.