Richard Helms Quotes
It’s not enough to ring the bell. You have to make sure the other guy hears it.
Richard Helms, 1913-2002, Director, U. S. Central Intelligence Agency, U. S. Ambassador to Iran, Frequent guidance to his staff about dealing with politicians on intelligence matters
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On May 11, 1998, India exploded a nuclear bomb. The CIA and the NSA were caught flatfooted. They had no inkling of such an event, and found out about it when the Indian Government announced it. The entire world balance of power had shifted and the United States had no warning despite the fact that the Indian Prime Minister and other Officials had publicly stated that they were working on a nuclear bomb. The American Warning System had failed totally. That is what prompted McCarthy’s statement. However, many key people at the CIA were angry at their old colleague for so dramatically drawing attention to what they regarded as a slip up. Later, when she returned to the CIA, there was much contention and she was fired by Republican Director Porter Goss, but the details of the circumstances have never been made public.
When he became a candidate, he modified this position and stated that he would abolish both agencies spying on Americans activities but not necessarily abolish all the functions of the agency.
The CIA did not have a long tradition. It was created after WWII when the OSS was are espionage organization had been disbanded In the early days of the Cold War, the CIA went rogue and engaged in covert activities without the knowledge and approval of the President and his cabinet. General Maxwell Taylor conducted a thorough investigation and the agency was brought under control. There hav been several more incidents since then and every few years there have been additional scandals of unauthorized operations which were harmful to American interests and values. In a democracy it is always hard to control a secret organization. Actually, at the beginning of WWII, we had almost no espionage capability and President Roosevelt had a series of friends who provided him with intelligence until William Donavan had time to establish the OSS which did such a wonderful job.
His catastrophic failure however was when he supported the Neocon ideology that Iraq had a nuclear bomb about to be deployed and urged a preventative war invading Iraq. Not only was there no bomb ready for deployment, there was net even a nuclear research or development program to do anything nuclear.
We bombed the building but it was the Chinese embassy. The map and intelligence as to what was in the building was provided as a recommended target by the CIA in another of their serious blunders.
Most of the successful intelligence agency administrators think that Cheney and some others are absolutely wrong that there should not be any discussion. There are times, of course, where secrecy is critical, but that does not mean that there cannot be classified discussion and coordination. Almost every one of the disastrous intelligence agency fiascos, could have been avoided if there were more and wider discussion in the planning. In many cases, Chaney, William Casey and others who hold their view prefer no discussions is that lawyers cannot block the operation on grounds of illegality. Or other agencies cannot get their priorities into the mix. If the NSA had discussed their plan to hack into the telephone calls of our most important allies with the State Department, the plan might not have gone through or if it had, the President would have been consulted. The Bay of Pigs was based on a set of assumptions that were not true and our government had a number of experts who could have debunked the assumptions the CIA planners were counting on which did not pan out.
Oswald was the assassin of President John F. Kennedy.
Richard McGarrah Helms was an American government official and diplomat who served as Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) from 1966 to 1973. Helms began intelligence work with the Office of Strategic Services during World War II. Following the 1947 creation of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) he rose in its ranks during the presidencies of Truman, Eisenhower and Kennedy. Helms then was DCI under Presidents Johnson and Nixon.
