Lost Crusader: The Secret Wars of CIA Director William Colby

400 Pages·2003·4.24 MB·English

by  John Prados

Lost Crusader
Other Books by John Prados
America Confronts Terrorism: Understanding the Danger
and How to Think About It
The Blood Road: The Ho Chi Minh Trail and the VietnamWar
Combined Fleet Decoded: The Secret History of American Intelligence
and the Japanese Navy in WorldWar II
The Hidden History of the VietnamWar
Keepers of the Keys: A History of the National Security Council
from Truman to Bush
Presidents’ SecretWars: CIA and Pentagon Covert Operations
from WorldWar II through the Persian Gulf
Valley of Decision: The Siege of Khe Sanh (with Ray W. Stubbe)
Pentagon Games
The Soviet Estimate: U.S. Intelligence and Soviet Strategic Forces
The Sky Would Fall: The Secret U.S. Bombing Mission to Vietnam, 1954
Lost Crusader
The Secret Wars
of CIA Director
William Colby
John Prados
1
2003
1
Oxford NewYork
Auckland Bangkok BuenosAires CapeTown Chennai
DaresSalaam Delhi HongKong Istanbul Karachi
Kolkata KualaLumpur Madrid Melbourne MexicoCity Mumbai
Nairobi Sa˜oPaulo Shanghai Taipei Tokyo Toronto
Copyright (cid:1) 2003 John Prados
PublishedbyOxfordUniversityPress,Inc.
198MadisonAvenue,NewYork,NewYork10016
www.oup.com
OxfordisaregisteredtrademarkofOxfordUniversityPress
Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthispublication
maybereproduced,storedinaretrievalsystem,ortransmitted
inanyformorbyanymeans,electronic,mechanical,
photocopying,recording,orotherwise,withouttheprior
permissionofOxfordUniversityPress.
LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData
Prados,John.
Lostcrusader:thesecretwarsofCIAdirectorWilliamColby.
p. cm.
Includesbibliographicalreferencesandindex.
ISBN0-19-512847-8
1. Colby,WilliamEgan,1920–1996. 2. UnitedStates.CentralIntelligenceAgency—
Biography. 3. Intelligenceofficers—UnitedStates—Biography. I. Title.
B271.U52C657 2002 327.1273'0092—dc21 [B] 2002025794
1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2
PrintedintheUnitedStatesofAmerica
onacid-freepaper
To
Danielle and Natasha
with Love
...For the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.
Matthew Arnold, Dover Beach, Stanza 4
C
ONTENTS
Preface ix
Acronyms xv
1. The Mystery of Bill Colby 1
2. Baptism of Fire 7
3. Tianjin to Trondheim 19
4. The Crusade Begins 35
5. Political Action 52
6. Journey to the East 61
7. A Bigger Stage to Play On 89
8. Death in November 105
9. Arc of Crisis 132
10. Exhilaration of War 164
11. Rising from Ashes 189
12. The Fall of Phoenix 207
13. Back to Langley 239
14. The Top Floor 262
15. TheYear of Intelligence 297
16. Intelligence in a Free Society 331
Abbreviations Used in References 344
References 346
Index 369
vii
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P
REFACE
In the wake of the tragic terrorist incidents of September 11, 2001, it
was almost impossible for people to hear that the bloody attacks on New
York City and Washington, D.C., did not represent a failure of American
intelligence. That is, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and its counter-
parts in the United States intelligence community somehow had to have
known about the terrorists’plans for these events and had ignored the infor-
mation, or worse, misapplied or misanalyzed the intelligence. These allega-
tions of CIA failure were tremendously widespread at the time. But what is
especially significant is that charges of CIA ineptitude persisted both before
and after the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks: where so much in
America changed in the passage from before September 11 to after, harsh
criticisms of the CIA have remained consistent. If anything, they have risen
to accusations of agency buffoonery.
Public attitudes are related to the Central Intelligence Agency’s predispo-
sitions toward secrecy. American understanding of the work of the CIA is
so vague and ill-informed that the grossest kinds of rumors and misinfor-
mation about it flourish. The CIA and the other intelligence agencies have
actually preferred this state of affairs, using pat lines about how their work
must remain secret, with their mistakes known but their successesneversee-
ing the light of day. In sum, there has been a veritable cult of secrecy, the
darkness preserved by gameswith theFreedomofInformationAct,selective
recallandreleaseofrecords,carefullyconstrainedresponsestocongressional
inquiries, and similar measures.
AttheheightoftheColdWar,theCIA’scultofsecrecyseemedacceptable
because the agency was ranged against an ultimate enemy. In the contest
between the West and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the entire
social and political systems of both sides seemed to be at risk. Even then,
however, certain methods and techniques of the spy agencies were not ac-
ceptableinademocraticsociety.InitszealforprosecutingtheColdWar,the
CIA had used many such techniques, especially in operations in the less-
developed countries of the Third World. The political pressures of the mid-
1970sweresuchthatformalinvestigationsoftheCIA andtheotherelements
ix
x Preface
of the intelligence community forced information into the open, led to tight-
ened control and regulation of intelligence, and resulted in the retirementor
separation of some former intelligence officers. But these measures repre-
sented a compromise solution; in truth, the political pressures were of such
intensity that the CIA had been in danger of being swept away like a castle
of sand before a raging sea.
For very different reasons, with the end of the ColdWar the CIA entered
a political environment increasingly similar to the mid-1970s. Without the
overarching conflict, the agency’s extreme measures became progressively
lesspalatable.Newnationalandinternationalhumanrightsnormscalledinto
question standard techniques of spycraft, such as employing unsavory char-
acters as agents. Demands for a “peace dividend” of reduced costs led to
some reductions in CIA budgets and personnel. Although the agency suc-
ceededinreversingthosetrends,asuccessionofintelligencefailures,bungled
operations, and embarrassing episodes called into question the concessions
made to the CIA and other agencies. From the faulty intelligencethatledto
thebombingoftheChineseembassyinBelgrade(1999)toitsfailuretowarn
of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, theagencycompiledadismal
record.
At the same time the sense of purpose that had prevailed during the Cold
Warwasgone,leavingthepublicwithoutanyconvincingnotionoftheCIA’s
reasonforbeing,andperhapstheagencyitselfwithoutanyclear-cutmission.
Inshort,withtheendoftheColdWaritwasuptotheCIA toreinventitself,
reimbueitslegionswithdetermination,and,mostespecially,forgeacompact
with the American people. After the ColdWar, the public needed to be con-
vinced that the CIA remained useful and necessary. But, addicted as it was
to secrecy, the Central Intelligence Agency failed to create that consensus.
When it then adopted counterterrorism as its primary mission, and that en-
terprise failed so spectacularly on September 11, the CIA appears to have
concluded the ensuing national anger made unnecessary any effort at con-
sensus building. The underlying political situation, however, remains that a
public with little confidence in the Central Intelligence Agency has been
askedtoacceptevengreatersecrecycombinedwithfewercontrolsonagency
operations.InthisclimateanymajorspyfiascocanmaketheCIA vulnerable
to being swept away, reorganized out of existence.
In the controversies of the 1970s the Central Intelligence Agency proved
very fortunate to have as its director a man who understood thetruedangers
inherent in the politics of that day. The director realized that unless theCIA
gave way on some forms of openness and accountability the agency would
have no future. Despite his roots in the heroic era of intelligence work in
World War II and the classic Cold War CIA operations—breeding grounds
for the agency’s felt need for secrecy—the director acted in the way he un-
derstood to be necessary. The process itselfwaspainful,andforhispainshe
would be ostracized by those not capable of understanding the new era that
had dawned.