Church Committee
Covert operations: Assassinating foreign leaders
Wed Mar 24 18:09:27 2004
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Covert operations: Assassinating foreign leaders
http://www.tarpley.net/bush15.htm

The Church Committee launched an investigation of the use of covert operations for the purpose of assassinating foreign leaders. By the nature of things, this probe was lead to grapple with the problem of whether covert operations sanctioned to eliminate foreign leaders had been re-targetted against domestic political figures. The obvious case was the Kennedy assassination.

Church was especially diligent in attacking CIA covert operations, which Bush would be anxious to defend. The CIA's covert branch, Church thought, was a "self-serving apparatus." "It's a bureaucracy which feeds on itself, and those involved are constantly sitting around thinking up schemes for [foreign] intervention which will win them promotions and justify further additions to the staff...It self-generates interventions that otherwise never would be thought of, let alone authorized." [fn 1]

It will be seen that at the beginning of Bush's tenure at the CIA, the Congressional committees were on the offensive against the intelligence agencies. By the time that Bush departed Langley, the tables were turned, and it was the Congress which was the focus of scandals, including Koreagate. Soon thereafter, the Congress would undergo the assault of Abscam.

Preparation for what was to become the Halloween massacre began in the Ford White House during the summer of 1975. The Ford Library in Ann Arbor, Michigan preserves a memo from Donald Rumsfeld to Ford dated July 10, 1975, which deals with an array of possible choices for CIA Director. Rumsfeld had polled a number of White House and administration officials and asked them to express preferences among "outsiders to the CIA." [fn 2]

Among the officials polled by Cheney was Henry Kissinger, who suggested C. Douglas Dillon, Howard Baker, Galvin, and Robert Roosa. Dick Cheney of the White House staff proposed Robert Bork, followed by Bush and Lee Iacocca. Nelson Rockefeller was also for C. Douglas Dillon, followed by Howard Baker, Conner, and James R. Schlesinger. Rumsfeld himself listed Bork, Dillon, Iacoca, Stanley Resor, and Walter Wriston, but not Bush. The only officials putting Bush on their "possible" lists other than Cheney were Jack O. Marsh, a White House counselor to Ford, and David Packard. When it came time for Rumsfeld to sum up the aggregate number of times each person was mentioned, minus one point for each time a person had been recommended against, the list was as follows:

Robert Bork [rejected in 1987 for the Supreme Court] White McGee Foster [John S. Foster of PFIAB, formerly of the Department of Defense] Dillon Resor Roosa Hauge

It will be seen that Bush was not among the leading candidates, perhaps because his networks were convinced that he was going to make another attempt for the vice-presidency and that therefore the Commerce Department or some similar post would be more suitable. The summary profile of Bush sent to Ford by Rumsfeld found that Bush had "experience in government and diplomacy" and was "generally familiar with components of the intelligence community and their missions" while having management experience." Under "Cons" Rumsfeld noted: "RNC post lends undesirable political cast."

As we have seen, the CIA post was finally offered by Ford to Edward Bennett Williams, perhaps with an eye on building a bipartisan bridge towards a powerful faction of the intelligence community. But Williams did not want the job. Bush, originally slated for the Department of Commerce, was given the CIA appointment.

The announcement of Bush's nomination occasioned a storm of criticism, whose themes included the inadvisability of choosing a Watergate figure for such a sensitive post so soon after that scandal had finally begun to subside. References were made to Bush's receipt of financial largesse from Nixon's Townhouse fund and related operations. There was also the question of whether the domestic CIA appparatus would get mixed up in Bush's expected campaign for the vice presidency. These themes were developed in editorials during the month of November, 1976, while Bush was kept in Beijing by the requirements of preparing the Ford-Mao meetings of early December. To some degree, Bush was just hanging there and slowly, slowly twisting in the wind. The slow-witted Ford soon realized that he had been inept in summarily firing Colby, since Bush would have to remain in China for some weeks and then return to face confirmation hearings. Ford had to ask Colby to stay on in a caretaker capacity until Bush took office. The delay allowed opposition against Bush to crystallize to some degree, but his own network was also quick to spring to his defense.

Former CIA officer Tom Braden, writing in the Fort Lauderdale News, noted that the Bush appointment to the CIA looked bad, and looked bad at a time when public confidence in the CIA was so low that everything about the agency desperately needed to look good. Braden's column was entitled "George Bush, Bad Choice for CIA Job."

Roland Evans and Robert Novak, writing in the Washington Post, commented that "the Bush nomination is regarded by some intelligence experts as another grave morale deflator. They reason that any identified politician, no matter how resolved to be politically pure, would aggravate the CIA's credibility gap. Instead of an identifed politician like Bush...what is needed, they feel, is a respected non-politician, perhaps from business or the academic world." Evans and Novak conceded that "not all experts agree. One former CIA official wants the CIA placed under political leadership capable of working closely with Congress. But even that distinctly minority position rebels against any Presidential scenario that looks to the CIA as possible stepping-stone to the Vice-Presidential nomination."

The Washington Post came out against Bush in an editorial entitled "The Bush Appointment." Here the reasoning was that this position "should not be regarded as a political parking spot," and that public confidence in the CIA had to be restored after the recent revelations of wrongdoing.

After a long-winded argument, George Will came to the conclusion that Ambassador Bush at the CIA would be "the wrong kind of guy at the wrong place at the worst possible time."

Senator Church viewed the Bush appointment in the context of a letter sent to him by Ford on October 31, 1975, demanding that the committee's report on US assassination plots against foreign leaders be kept secret. In Church's opinion, these two developments were part of a pattern, and amounted to a new stonewalling defense by what Church had called "the rogue elephant." Church issued a press statement in response to Ford's letter attempting to impose a blackout on the assassination report. "I am astonished that President Ford wants to suppress the committee's report on assassination and keep it concealed from the American people," said Church. Then, on November 3, Church was approached by reporters outside of his Senate hearing room and asked by Daniel Schorr about the firing of Colby and his likely replacement by Bush. Church responded with a voice that was trembling with anger. "There is no question in my mind but that concealment is the new order of the day," he said. "Hiding evil is the trademark of a totalitarian government." [fn 3]. Schorr said that he had never seen Church so upset.

The following day, November 4, Church read Leslie Gelb's column in the New York Times suggesting that Colby had been fired, among other things, "for not doing a good job containing the Congressional investigations." George Bush, Gelb thought, "would be able to go to Congress and ask for a grace period before pressing their investigations further. A Washington Star headline of this period summed up this argument: "CIA NEEDS BUSH'S PR TALENT." Church talked with his staff that day about what he saw as an ominous pattern of events. He told reporters: "First came the very determined administration effort to prevent any revelations concerning NSA, their stonewalling of public hearings. Then came the president's letter. Now comes the firing of Colby, Mr. Schlesinger, and the general belief that Secretary Kissinger is behind these latest developments." For Church, "clearly a pattern has emerged now to try and disrupt this [Senate Intelligence Committee] investigation. As far as I'm concerned, it won't be disrupted," said Church grimly.

One of Church's former aides, speech-writer Loch K. Johnson, describes how he worked with Church to prepare a speech scheduled for delivery on November 11, 1975 in which Church would stake out a position opposing the Bush nomination:

The nomination of George Bush to succeed Colby disturbed him and he wanted to wind up the speech by opposing the nomination. [...] He hoped to influence Senate opinion on the nomination on the eve of Armed Services Committee hearings to confirm Bush.

I rapidly jotted down notes as Church discussed the lines he would like to take against the nomination. "Once they used to give former national party chairmen [as Bush had been under President Nixon] postmaster generalships--the most political and least sensitive job in government," he said. "Now they have given this former party chairman the most sensitive and least political agency." Church wanted me to stress how Bush "might compromise the independence of the CIA--the agency could be politicized."

Some days later Church appeared on the CBS program Face the Nation, he was asked by George Herman if his opposition to Bush would mean that anyone with political experience would be a priori unacceptable for such a post? Church replied: "I think that whoever is chosen should be one who has demonstrated a capacity for indpendence, who has shown that he can stand up to the many pressures." Church hinted that Bush had never stood up for principle at the cost of political office. Moreover, "a man whose background is as partisan as a past chairman of the Republican party does serious damage to the agency and its intended purposes." [fn 4]

The Brown Brothers, Harriman/Skull and Bones crowd counterattacked in favor of Bush, mobilizing some significant resources. One was none other than Leon Jaworski, the former Watergate special prosecutor. Jaworski's mission for the Bush network appears to have been to get the Townhouse and related Nixon slushfund issues off the table of the public debate and confirmation hearings. Jaworski, speaking at a convention of former FBI Special Agents meeting in Houston, defended Bush against charges that he had accepted illegal or improper payments from Nixon and CREEP operatives. "This was investigated by me when I served as Watergate special prosecutor. I found no involvement of George Bush and gave him full clearance. I hope that in the interest of fairness, the matter will not be bandied about unless something new has appeared on the horizon." Jaworski, who by then was back in Houston working for his law firm of Fulbright and Jaworski, sent a copy of the Houston Post article reporting this statement to Ford's White House counselor Philip Buchen. [fn 5]

Saul Kohler of the Newhouse News Service offered the Ford White House an all-purpose refutation of the arguments advanced by the opponents of Bush during November and into December. "And now," wrote Kohler, "President Ford is catching all sorts of heat from a lot of people for appointing Bush to the non-political sensitive CIA because he once served as Chairman of the Republican national Committee." How unfair, thought Kohler, "for of all the appointments Ford made last weekend, the nomination of Bush was the best." For one thing, "you'd have to go a long way to find a man with less guile than George Bush." Bush had been great at the RNC- "he managed to keep the RNC away from the expletive deleted of that dark chapter in American political history." "Not only did he keep the party apparatus clean, he kept his own image clean..." And then: "Was Cordell Hull less distinguished a Secretary of State because he had headed the Democratic National Committee?," and so forth. Kohler quoted a White House official commenting on the Bush nomination: "The gag line around here ever since The Boss announced George for the CIA is that spying is going to be a bore from now on because George is such a clean guy." [fn 6]

In the meantime, Bush got ready for his second meeting with Mao and prepared the documentation for his conflict of interest and background checks. In a letter to John C. Stennis, the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, which would hold the hearings on his nomination, Bush stated that his only organizational affiliations were as a trustee of Philips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, and as a member of the Board of the Episcopal Church Foundation in New York City. In this letter, Bush refers to the "Bush Children Trust" he had created for his five children, and "funded by a diversified portfolio" which might put him into conflicts of interest. He told Stennis that if confirmed, he would resign as trustee of the Bush Children Fund and direct the other trustees to stop disclosing to him any details of the operations of the Bush Children Trust. Otherwise Bush said that he was not serving as officer, director, or partner of any corporation, although he had a lump-sum retirement benefit from Zapata Corporation in the amount of $40,000. According to his own account, he owned a home in Washington DC, his summer house at Kennebunkport, a small residential lot in Houston, plus some bank accounts and life insurance policies. He had a securities portfolio managed by T. Rowe Price in Baltimore, and he assured Stennis he would be willing to divest any shares that might pose conflict of interest problems. [fn 7]

Congressional reaction reaching the White House before Bush's hearings was not enthusiastic. Dick Cheney of the White House staff advised Ford to call Senator John Stennis on November 3, noting that Stennis "controls confirmation process for CIA and DOD." Ford replied shortly after, "I did." [fn 8] A few days later Ford had a telephone conversation with Senator Mike Mansfield, the Democratic majority leader, and one of his notations was "Geo Bush--for him but he must say no politics." [fn 9]

Negative mail from both houses of Congress was also coming in to the White House. On November 12, Ford received a singular note from GOP Congressman James M. Collins of Dallas, Texas. Collins wrote to Ford: "I hope you will reconsider the appointment of George Bush to the CIA. At this time it seems to me that it would be a greater service for the country for George to continue his service in China. He is not the right man for the CIA," wrote Collins, who had been willing to support Bush for the vice presidency back in 1974. "Yesterday," wrote Collins, "I sat next to my friend Dale Milford who is the only friendly Democrat on Pike's Committee. He strenuously questioned why Bush was being put in charge of the CIA. He likes George but he is convinced that the Liberals will contend from now to Doomsday that George is a partisan Republican voice. They are going to sing this song about Republican Chairmen and let the liberal press beat it out in headlines every day. I have heard this same story from many on the Hill who stand with you. Please use George in some other way. They are going to crucify him on this job and Senator Church will lead the procession. I hope you find an urgent need to keep Bush in China," wrote Collins, a Republican and a Texan, to Ford. [fn 10]

There was also a letter to Ford from Democratic Congressman Lucien Nedzi of Michigan, who had been the chairman of one of the principal House Watergate investigating committees. Nedzi wrote as follows:

The purpose of my letter is to express deep concern over the announced appointment of George Bush as the new Director of the Central Intelligence Agency.

As Chairman of the Special Subcommittee on Intelligence of the House Armed Services Committee since 1971, I have had the obligation and opportunity to closely observe the CIA, the other intelligence agen