February 11, 2009 4:38 PM

CIA Reveals Scandalous "Family Jewels"

(CBS/AP)  The Central Intelligence Agency released hundreds of pages of internal reports Tuesday on agency misconduct that triggered a scandal in the mid-1970s over domestic spying.

The documents detail assassination plots against foreign leaders like Cuba's Fidel Castro, the testing of mind- and behavior-altering drugs like LSD on unwitting citizens, wiretapping of U.S. journalists, spying on civil rights and anti-Vietnam war protesters, opening mail between the United States and the Soviet Union and China, break-ins at the homes of ex-CIA employees and others.

All of the activities described in the documents occurred during the Cold War, a very different time when Communism not terrorism was the main enemy, reports CBS News national security correspondent David Martin.

It's been fifteen years since Tom Blanton, the director of the private National Security Archive, sued to make these files available under the Freedom of Information Act.

"The CIA is finally coming clean on its own skeleton in the closet," says Blanton.

Well, sort of, says Martin. Number one on the list has been blanked out as still too sensitive to release.

The documents reveal the name "Johnny Roselli" and the CIA's failed attempt to use the mafia to assassinate Fidel Castro in 1960. While Castro is still alive and kicking, Johnny Roselli is not. His body was found stuffed in an oil drum floating in a Florida canal.

The CIA's failure to get Castro prompted one senator to label them, "The Gang That Couldn't Shoot Straight."

The 693 pages, mostly drawn from the memories of active CIA officers in 1973, were turned over at that time to three different investigative panels — President Gerald Ford's Rockefeller Commission, the Senate's Church committee and the House's Pike committee.

The panels spent years investigating and amplifying on these documents. And their public reports in the mid-1970s filled tens of thousands of pages. The scandal sullied the reputation of the intelligence community and led to new rules for the CIA, FBI and other spy agencies and new permanent committees in Congress to oversee them.

The CAESAR, POLO, and ESAU Papers
This collection of declassified analytic monographs and reference aids, designated within the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Directorate of Intelligence (DI) as the CAESAR, ESAU, and POLO series, highlights the CIA's efforts from the 1950s through the mid-1970s to pursue in-depth research on Soviet and Chinese internal politics and Sino-Soviet relations.
The Family Jewels
Almost 700 pages of responses from CIA employees to a 1973 directive from Director of Central Intelligence James Schlesinger asking them to report activities they thought might be inconsistent with the Agency's charter.

These documents also were one of the products of the Watergate scandal. Then-CIA Director James Schlesinger was angered to read in the newspapers that the CIA had provided support to ex-CIA agents E. Howard Hunt and James McCord, who were convicted in the Watergate break-in, which led to President Richard Nixon's resignation.

Hunt had worked for a secret "plumbers unit" in Nixon's White House. The unit originally was tasked to investigate and end leaks of classified information but ultimately engaged in a wide range of misconduct.

In May 1973, Schlesinger ordered "all senior operating officials of this agency to report to me immediately on any activities now going on, or that have gone on the past, which might be construed to be outside the legislative charter of this agency." The law establishing the CIA barred it from conducting spying inside the United States.

The result was 693 pages of memos that arrived after Schlesinger had moved to the Pentagon and been replaced as CIA chief by William Colby. Colby ultimately reported the contents to the Justice Department.

Former CIA Counterintelligence official James Jesus Angleton admitted to opening letters that American citizens had mailed to the Soviet Union.

"We believe that it was extremely important to know everything possible regarding contacts of American citizens with Communist countries," Angleton told an investigative panel.

"These are the top CIA officers all going into the confessional and saying, `Forgive me father, for I have sinned,'" says Blanton.

Inside the CIA, Colby referred to the documents as the "skeletons." But another name quickly caught on and stuck: "family jewels."

Some will read the documents and conclude that the CIA was a 'rogue elephant;' others will read the same material and decide it was doing exactly what the White House wanted it to, says Martin.

They first spilled into public view on Dec. 22, 1974, with a story by Seymour Hersh in The New York Times on the CIA's spying against antiwar and other dissidents inside this country. The agency assembled files on some 10,000 people.

© 2009 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Add a Comment See all 88 Comments
by starleo146 June 27, 2007 5:54 PM EDT
I bet within 6months of the Bush administrations demise you will hear of there covert action and we will faint as to what undercover business these guys were involved with, that is if Cheney would just give all his secrets to archives.
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by starleo146 June 27, 2007 5:40 PM EDT
are any of you naive enough to know the CIA was involved in covert action. The bigger problem is this new CIA director appointed by Bush and Cheney spending day after day at the CIA This guy a military man which by the way a military person never was over the CIA, and he could not wait to devulge this information. Tell me why I do not believe this information was ever devulged before. What is the purpose of all this information? Is this to let us know the CIA was involved in covert action? Since Cheney is so involved with the executive branch of which he is not apart of as he says I am very suspicious of this man and why he spent so much time at the CIA. I personally don't care, the CIA is set up to investigate problems and to stop them. Are we surprised? I'm not. I am mad that this is out there for a reason and it will come up you will see the CIA doesn't forget and when a new administration all these snoopers and trouble makers will be gone. Keep your eyes open and your ears
Reply to this comment
by starleo146 June 27, 2007 5:40 PM EDT
are any of you naive enough to know the CIA was involved in covert action. The bigger problem is this new CIA director appointed by Bush and Cheney spending day after day at the CIA This guy a military man which by the way a military person never was over the CIA, and he could not wait to devulge this information. Tell me why I do not believe this information was ever devulged before. What is the purpose of all this information? Is this to let us know the CIA was involved in covert action? Since Cheney is so involved with the executive branch of which he is not apart of as he says I am very suspicious of this man and why he spent so much time at the CIA. I personally don't care, the CIA is set up to investigate problems and to stop them. Are we surprised? I'm not. I am mad that this is out there for a reason and it will come up you will see the CIA doesn't forget and when a new administration all these snoopers and trouble makers will be gone. Keep your eyes open and your ears
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by realpatriot1 June 27, 2007 1:20 PM EDT
infidel_US,

It goes back further than Kennedy. We overthrew democratically elected governments throughout the world during the 1950s, beginning with Iran.

It was the C.I.A. that pressured Kennedy into the Bay of Pigs and into increasing our prescence in Vietnam. Before he was assassinated, Kennedy was trying to get us out of Vietnam.

This wasn't brought under control by Carter, it was brought under control by a great American Senator from Idaho named Frank Church,Chairman of the Foreign relations Committee.

If we had anyone of his stature and character in the U.S. Senate today we wouldn't be in the mess we're in.

Of course, he accomplished this with hearings that were criticised as being political.
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by mcvet June 27, 2007 12:34 PM EDT
Well, well.....last night, I heard that this stuff goes back to Kennedy in the early 60's thru Carter in '76. They ALL (probably with the exception of Carter) had their hands dirty.
Posted by infidel_us at 08:05 AM : Jun 27, 2007

You "Heard"? Can't you read for yourself? You fascist have to have someone TELL you this stuff. Now, Assuming it did go all the way back to Kennedy as you claim, how does a small minded little Nazi know Kennedy or Johnson were involved. As someone who went up against Nixon and the Fascist in charge at that time, I KNOW how dirty he was and I KNOW he was using the CIA to spy on AMERICAN's. I also was intelligent enought during the 70's, when the scandal broke, to actually LISTEN to the testimony before Congress, guess what? Kennedy nor Johnson were ever mention on ANY Spying on U.S. Citizens. They WERE involved in some of the outside the US stuff though. Maybe you should get a little of your informantion from somewhere else? Sieg Heil Bush.
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by antoniof123 June 27, 2007 12:16 PM EDT
Why is it when the neo cons are in power that the CIA gets into trouble. Does anyone else see a pattern here?
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by searingtruth June 27, 2007 11:25 AM EDT
"CIA Family Jewel # 1 missing. Why does this one item remain completely censored after 35 years? ..."
EdHaslam


Keep digging fellow patriot, there are many dark jewels left to be found.

Thank you.
ST


"The value of liberty was thus enhanced in our estimation by the difficulty of its attainment, and the worth of characters appreciated by the trial of adversity."
George Washington, letter to the people of South Carolina, Circa 1790

A Future of the Brave - www.searingtruth.com
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by wiredwilly June 27, 2007 11:19 AM EDT
So what else is new ? This stuff is common knowledge. How about some more information on the current Seymour Hersh story about Mr. Cheney and his involvement with torture at Abu Ghraib.
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by edhaslam June 27, 2007 11:13 AM EDT
CIA Family Jewel # 1 missing. Why does this one item remain completely censored after 35 years? Every single word of it. Why would the CIA release a list of old news only to point out that there is one really important piece of bad news that the CIA has not told the public about yet? The "news" is "the missing jewel," not the old stories. I have posted the CIA document with "the missing jewel" on my website www.TheMonkeyVirus.com for those who wish to see it. Thanks. Ed Haslam
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by searingtruth June 27, 2007 11:13 AM EDT
"... if those "who are supposed" to uphold it, are the same as those who now "interpret" it to fit their needs -
0 democracy, 1 fascism."
neoconRcrazy

Well of course your current score is correct, but we Americans are restoring the rule of law to our land, and are ashamed it was ever subverted.

However, this has nothing at all to do with immigration or changing our Constitution.
ST


"People will believe in almost anything, except for reality."
SearingTruth

A Future of the Brave - www.searingtruth.com
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