‘If the United States ever experiences [a coup to overthrow the government] it will come from the CIA.”

“The C.I.A.’s growth was ‘likened to a malignancy’ which the ‘very high official was not sure even the White House could control … any longer.’ ‘If the United States ever experiences [a coup to overthrow the government] it will come from the C.I.A. and not the Pentagon.’ The agency ‘represents a tremendous power and total unaccountability to anyone.'”

From an Op-ed by Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times columnist Arthur Krock, published Oct. 3, 1963. Krock was quoting a piece by Richard Starnes of the Scripps-Howard news service, which described the internecine struggle between the CIA and the State Dept. in carrying out US policy in Vietnam.

16 thoughts on “‘If the United States ever experiences [a coup to overthrow the government] it will come from the CIA.””

  1. Check out CIA Programs.
    Operation Underworld, Husky, PBSuccess, Mockingbird, Zapata, Mongoose.

    See http://www.noplaceforcorruption.com Docs Section PDF

    See also Taking America 123 the Power Control Group via the
    Bay of Pigs (Ref Nixon said his impeachment will expose the
    whole Bay of Pigs Thing).

    Look at Nixon Library top benefactors Walter Annenberg and Max
    Fisher… Bay of Pigs was about restoring Chicago Mob Casinos
    in Havana via Max Fisher working with Eisenhower to setup the
    Bay of Pigs Program with the CIA.

    1. Krock is clear that the US officials leaking this information are in Saigon, not Washington. I think the anonymous very high US official is Ambassador Lodge, the other is one of his aides. The article does make clear that the dispute was over proceeding with the coup against Diem, which was supported by Lodge and Washington and opposed by CIA.

  2. Once the Office of Policy Coordination was ‘acquired’ by the CIA, OSO and DoP, it was all downhill from there.

    They set their own policy and were free to plan and implement such policy.

  3. Richard Starnes wrote an editorial on December 3 1963 called “Truth Won’t Out” –

    http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=7534&page=7#entry149244

    “If you believe the Dallas police will ever give up the truth about how Rubenstein got a clear shot at Oswald you will believe anything, possibly including the solemn assertion that Rubenstein was not paying off any officials for the privilege of skirting the law in operating his peltorama…Will the presence on the panel of Allen Dulles, erstwhile headmaster of the Central Intelligence Agency, assure us that the truth of Oswald’s sojourn in the Soviet Union will ever be known? The Russians suggest they suspected him of being a spy. Can any realistic person believe any tentacle of the nation’s elephantine espionage apparatus will own up to ever having Oswald on its payroll? Can we expect the FBI to explain why Oswald was not under close surveillance? How many would-be defectors to Russia did they have to watch that day in Dallas when the President’s widely-heralded visit was scheduled?”

  4. U.S. Ambassador to South Vietnam Henry Cabot Lodge fought with CIA over the proposed coup against Diem. Lodge supported the coup whereas CIA opposed it as CIA had a long relationship with Diem. Lodge forced the removal of the CIA station chief from Saigon over this issue. It is possible that Krock is quoting Lodge in the above quote.

    1. Dan,

      I looked up Krock’s column, and I agree: the source sounds like Lodge.

      Starnes attributed the quotes criticizing the CIA to U.S. officials in Vietnam, including one described as a “very high American official… who has spent much of his life in the service of democracy.” He quoted these officials saying that “twice the CIA flatly refused to carry out instructions from Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge …[and] in one instance frustrated a plan of action Mr. Lodge brought from Washington because the agency disagreed with it.”

      Krock wrote, “Whatever else these passages disclose, they most certainly establish that representatives of other Executive branches have expanded their war against the CIA from the inner government councils to the American people via the press….This is disorderly government.”

      1. http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/07/opinion/07richardson.html?_r=0

        Reading this obituary of John H. Richardson, I think there is no better reason to pursue the possibility, nay the likelihood, that THE CIA may have been set up. It’s time to drop the “THE,” and aggressively pursue those “rogue’ elements that were maneuvering around with agency credentials as well as their backers, some of whom may have been high up in the agency but not working on behalf of or answering to the elected government. In the words of Richardson’s son:

        “When “high official sources” start exposing C.I.A. officers to force their agenda, watch out.” We only have to review the Plame Affair to know what this is all about.

    2. Keep in mind this the same Henry Cabot Lodge who was a incumbent Senator JFK defeated in 1952 to become a Senator. Then in 1960 was Nixon’s VP running mate. As Ambassador to South Vietnam he basically refused to communicate with Washington during the lead up to the Diem coup.
      Coincidentally SS agent Irish Protestant immigrant (Orange Order) Will Greer who drove JFK in Dallas was at one time a chauffeur for the Lodge’s (he also worked for Abstergo Industries – Templar new world order).
      Jackie was critical of his actions in Dealy Plaza.

  5. Arthur Krock was very close to the Kennedy family, perhaps the “very high official” he quotes from Scripps-Howard was JFK himself. The timing of the piece could indicate that the president sensed–or knew–of a real and present danger to his life.

  6. There is nothing honorable or patriotic about a covert organization routinely lying to & withholding information from Congress, The House Of Representatives, the President & related Presidential Commissions and the citizens of the U.S.

    For good measure kick in drug trafficking & murdering foreign leaders, destroying foreign governments & murdering foreign citizens plus creating weapons that disguise murder.

    The problem is, despite all the warnings from former Presidents & journalists, nothing can be done about it from outside or inside said organization unless the organizations is dissolved.

    A quick view of the infamous Zapruder film is a graphic reminder to all of the penalty for messing with the Agency.

    1. I think that the argument could be made that to a certain degree a precedent had been set prior to the CIA’s assumption of said covert operations. Review of the intelligence and counter-intel efforts (US and as important, British) before the foundation of what we now refer to as The Agency, indicates that intelligence enjoyed a semi-private status (study the limited records of The Pond) and employed thousands of civilian/business-related informants, that it received funding from a variety of/and was passed to and fro from the State Department, the Pentagon, and the OSS-soon-to-become-the CIA, all fully aligned with private industrial wealth that enjoyed a symbiotic relationship with the US military which was protecting its lucrative interests around the globe. Congress, as representative of The People, did not have a clue what was going on. Had Our Nation stopped the momentum at that very moment, would we be here, debating?

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