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 This page intentionally left blank 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.