William J. Quotes

Smithsonian: “Donovan, the chief of the OSS, was so eager to show off his agency’s latest lethal gadget—a pistol with a total silencer—that he took one and a sandbag to the Oval Office. While President Franklin D. Roosevelt was busy dictating to his secretary, Donovan fired ten rounds into the sandbag. FDR gave no notice and never stopped talking, so Donovan wrapped his handkerchief around the still-hot barrel and presented the weapon to the president, telling him what he had just done.” Donovan, Medal of Honor recipient and a wealthy Wall Street Businessman who recruited socialites, baseball players and other usual candidates, was a great favorite of Roosevelt’s, but his unorthodox methods and creative approaches tended to alienate him from J. Edgar Hoover of the FBI and the Military Intelligence Officers. Yet he had amazing successes—especially in Europe. When Roosevelt died Donovan’s conservative enemies successfully lobbied President Truman and his cabinet to terminate the OSS, create the CIA and keep Donovan out of the CIA leadership.

Bush was Reagan’s Vice President, but had little influence on top level appointments. Bush would have been particularly helpful with this appointment as he had previously served as a very successful CIA Director. Others also disagreed with this Regan appointment. See {637469}. See {637470}, {613419} and {623500} for Casey quotes that support Bush’s judgment

Casey was a disaster for the CIA. In addition to having the usual problems, Casey did not believe that the CIA should be constrained by law, and on numerous occasions his CIA broke the law—so much so that the distrust spilled over for the decades into the future. See {637470}, {613419} and {623500} for Casey quotes that support Ford’s judgment, and {636743} for another who agreed with Ford.

If Casey had listened to Sofaer as the State Department did, President Reagan would have been spared the worst Scandal of his Presidency—Iran Contra. Casey had a great antipathy to lawyers. See {637470}.

Donavan not only developed America’s Espionage Capacity by building the OSS in WWII, but he commanded the “Fighting 69th Regiment” most decorated in WWI. Donavan had personally also won the Medal of Honor.

Casey frequently withheld information from Congress that he was legally required to report, did things without Congressional authorization and often lied in his testimony and reports to Congress.

Casey continuously violated the law and lied to the President and Congress.

Bill Casey had an individual ideology of the world and being a strong administrator imposed that on most of intelligence analyses that the agency did during his tenure.