Free The Black World of UFOs: Exempt from Disclosure by Robert M. Collins, Timothy Cooper, Rick Doty Page B

some of his acts of omission and commission while at the agency.
     
         He became a lightning rod for criticism of the CIA during its “time of troubles” in the mid-1970s. He was called back many times from his ambassadorial post in Tehran to testify before investigative bodies about assassination plots, domestic operations, drug testing, the destruction of records, and other activities of dubious legality and ethicality known collectively as the “Family Jewels.” He responded to inquiries about them cautiously, sometimes testily, as he tried to walk the increasingly fuzzy line between discretion and disclosure. Everything was kept, “in the family” and the black subject of UFOs was part of those family secrets.
     
         Helms ran into legal troubles resulting from his judgment about when and when not to reveal secrets. Testifying before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee just after leaving the agency, he firmly denied that the CIA had tried to influence the outcome of the Chilean presidential election in 1970. Helms described his quandary this way: “If I was to live up to my oath and fulfill my statutory responsibility to protect intelligence sources and methods from unauthorized disclosure, I could not reveal covert operations to people unauthorized to learn about them.” He eventually pleaded no contest to charges of not testifying “fully, completely and accurately” to the committee.
     
         To the end, Richard Helms was “at the table.” He remained privately engaged in public affairs for so many years after leaving Langley that it is easy to forget how long ago he entered the secret world and how far he traveled within it as Rick Doty will testify to in the next chapter. His now published memoir, “A Look Over My Shoulder, A Life in the CIA,” will enable us to accompany him on that journey, but there were never any public statements by him on the subject of UFOs as everything was done covertly except for personal “leaks” to friends (6). Perhaps we can better understand the man publicly, but not privately, who declared at the depths of the agency’s travail in the mid-1970s, “I was and remain proud of my work there. I believed in the importance to the nation of the function that the Agency served. I still do without regrets, without qualms, without apology.” If he could speak to us now, he would say the same—and probably add, “Let’s get on with it,” and so we shall with Rick Doty in Chapter 4.
     
    References/Footnotes
    (1) Remember that Allen Dulles had spent over 40 years in the cult of intelligence and was one of the original architects of the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Act of 1947.
     
    (2) Tim Cooper writes that on the 26th of March 2000 James Angleton, Jr. said that the piece this author wrote on his grandfather was “accurate and interesting (Chapter 1).”
     
         We had a 45-minute chat on the telephone in which he stated that Mangold (Cold Warrior) did terrible coverage on the CIA’s CI staff and irritated his family for years. He is holding his granddad’s papers which his father gave him for safekeeping, and some Dulles files which Angleton took from CIA headquarters.
     
         According to JA Jr. Angleton helped establish MJ MAJESTIC-12 CI operations BEFORE he was appointed DD of CI. He said that NSA runs the show pretty much now, but the CIA and DIA still have COMINT channels and sources. He wants to see my carbon copy of the (1960s) CIA/MJ-12 directive as I’m using it as a bargaining chip to see some of his holdings.
     
    (3) In 1950, President Harry Truman appointed Army Lieutenant General Walter Bedell Smith, a tough and respected military officer-diplomat with impressive credentials as the new Director of Central Intelligence (DCI). During Bedell Smith’s years, Angleton (Chapter 1) continued as chief of Staff “A” (foreign intelligence operations), one of four advisory staffs inside the CIA’s