The Bigger Picture - Part 34

Watergate

Introduction

This is the fifth part of the Watergating of Nixon. First part is here.

Let me make one thing clear. I’m in no way defending Nixon. What he and Kissinger did around the world, killing millions of innocent people, destroying countries, and meddling in other countries’ governments should have sent them both to jail for war crimes, decades ago.

My focus is, how the Cabal installed puppets to infiltrate his presidency and make a Coup D’état without firing a shot. This Coup D’état had a lot of similarities with what we today call a Colour Revolution.

Quote Price of Power
THE NOTION THAT a group surrounding the president could be working to do him in might sound preposterous to most of us. But not to veterans of America’s clandestine operations, where the goal abroad has often been to do just that.

My goal is to show how decades of Cabal infiltration in the US had now reached a degree where it was possible to make such a Coup. Because they didn’t just have puppets in the government, the CIA, the FBI, and the military – but also in the press, in the House, the Senate – and in the Judiciary.
The Nixon presidency was a turning point. The Cabal was now in control.

In the last part I wrote, that this would be the end. It isn’t.

Once again I started reading another book about Watergate, ‘The Forty Years War’ by Colodny and Tom Schachtman - written in 2009. They re-visit the Nixon presidency and give a lot of new information.
I’ve worked hard to boil it down – but there are so many interesting details that I have to split it up into two parts.
So the next part WILL be the last, LOL.   

White House recordings

President Nixon decided from the first day in office that he would have all conversations in the Oval Office recorded – for historic reference.

Only a few knew about this recording – and I’m quite sure White House Counsel John Dean was in the know. Because he was the instigator of two conversations that he would later use to condemn Nixon during the Watergate hearings.  

The first conversation was recorded on June 23, 1972. ‘The Smoking Gun’ tape – as journalist Woodward would later name that conversation in an article.

As I wrote in the last part, Bush came to the Oval Office on March 20, 1973, and suggested that Nixon let Dean testify. Nixon didn’t immediately buy that idea. The next day, Dean set a trap: A conversation with the president that will later be named ‘The Cancer on the Presidency’.

So let’s start with these two conversations. The Smoking Gun tape is in audio here

Smoking Gun (June 23, 1972)

In police and prosecutorial slang ‘smoking gun’ means evidence of criminal guilt.

Quote Silent Coup
On this tape, the president is heard directing the obstruction of justice by instructing Haldeman to have the CIA impede the FBI’s investigation into the Watergate burglary.

Dean initiated this recording. As we saw in the last part, he had been busy covering his tracks in regard to the Watergate break-in, e.g. taking the Hermes notebooks from Hunt’s safe.

He didn’t want an FBI investigation showing, that he ordered – and paid - the Plumbers. He came up with an idea to avoid that.
He went to Chief of Staff Haldeman and talked about the FBI being “out of control,” and that Acting Director Gray “doesn’t know what the hell to do, as usual,”
He warned, that they had found a check with the signature of Kenneth Dahlberg - and other connections to a Mexican bank.

Quote Forty Years War
“They’ll know who the depositors are today,” Dean warned Haldeman […] Dean continued on to tell him that “our problem now is to stop the FBI from opening up a whole lot of other things,” especially the names of contributors who had been guaranteed anonymity. Mitchell and Stans, Dean said, “are really worried about that,” and “they say we have to turn off that investigation of the Mexican bank fast, before they [the FBI] open up everything and spread this mess a lot wider than it is.”

So as usual Dean is twisting facts. He pretends to bring word from AG Mitchell, who allegedly is worried, that the Townhouse Money – which I wrote about In the last part will become known.
As Colodny proves in ‘Silent Coup’, Dean hadn’t talked to Michell before this conversation – and DEAN was the one that had used Townhouse money to pay the Burglars. Not to mention that HE had ordered the burglary. The Hermes notebooks – with his and his coming wife’s names in them - were the real target of the break-in.

Quote Silent Coup  - Dean talking to Haldeman:
“Gray has been looking for a way out of this mess. I spoke to Mitchell, and he and I agree the thing to do is for you to tell Walters [Deputy Director of the CIA] that we don’t know where the Mexican investigation is going to lead. Have him talk to Gray—and maybe the CIA can turn off the FBI down there in Mexico.” 

Said conversation with Mitchell had never taken place. Dean mentioned Mitchell - to “mask a desperate need to cover his own misdeeds” as Colodny points out.

Haldeman and Nixon met in the Oval Office – where the “Smoking Gun” conversation was recorded. When Haldeman had reported ‘Mitchell’s worries’ and the conclusion, that the CIA needed to deter the FBI from further investigations Nixon reacted as he did with the Military Spy Ring - as described in Part 33 – he “sought to limit the investigations and to prevent political damage” as Colodny writes.

After listening to ‘Mitchells worries’ Nixon jumped to the conclusion that the break-in had been a CRP operation that had Mitchell’s tacit approval - but had gone amuck.

So once again, we see one of Nixon’s worst shortcomings, in my opinion: He didn’t talk to Mitchell to check if his interpretation was true – that Mitchell had given tacit approval.

Nixon was probably preoccupied with the following line of conclusion:
Burglar E Howard Hunt = CIA = Bay of Pigs = Nixon involvement.
As we know Nixon had been involved in ‘Operation 40’ as VP under Eisenhower and he had tried for years, as president, to get the files about ‘The Bay of Pigs’ from the CIA – in vain. He had a strained relationship with the CIA.

Quote Silent Coup
Nixon bought Dean’s package, and left it to Haldeman to wrap it properly. Haldeman should call in the CIA and lean on the agency. However, the president couldn’t leave the matter without coaching Haldeman on how to “play it tough” in that meeting […] “it’s going to make the … CIA look bad, it’s going to make Hunt look bad, and it’s likely to blow the whole Bay of Pigs thing, which we think would be very unfortunate for the CIA and for the country at this time, and for American foreign policy.… I don’t want them to get any ideas we’re doing it because our concern is political.”

Haldeman followed Nixon’s advice – and when he mentioned the Bay of Pigs, Director Helms exploded and denied it had any relevance.
But they landed on an agreement. CIA stopped the FBI from further investigation.

Quote Silent Coup
The deed was done. Dean had succeeded beyond his expectations. He had deceived the president of the United States into joining a conspiracy to obstruct justice in order to cover up a crime that Nixon had not committed and to conceal Dean’s own crimes. And the president, once again reacting to a crisis without gathering the facts, willingly slipped the noose Dean had handed him around his own neck.

As I’ve stated several times about Nixon: It’s frustrating that nobody ever checked Dean’s claims about where his orders came from. Colodny brings up the same point in an interview with Haldeman years later.

Quote Silent Coup
Wasn’t Dean taking an incredible chance that Haldeman would not check with Mitchell before seeing the president? “He knew I wasn’t checking with Mitchell on any of this stuff. It wasn’t an incredible chance, really,” Haldeman allowed.

The Cancer on the Presidency (March 21, 1973)

Link to the Nixon/Dean conversation here:

Dean became famous when he wrote the book ‘Blind Ambition’ after Watergate.
Since then, several authors have revealed that he was telling more lies than truths. And still, – now 50 years later – more than half of the search results coming up, in a ‘Watergate’ search is Dean’s version of the story.
He was a very successful snake, spreading his poison.

As mentioned, Bush came to the Oval Office on March 20 – and a few hours later, Dean called Nixon and asked for a meeting. He would “lay out everything”. Nixon accepted and they set up a meeting for the next day. Nixon asked if anyone else should be present? Dean didn’t reply – and Nixon concluded, that it would be better if it was just Dean and Nixon.
The stage was set to Dean’s advantage. He could now blame others for his actions. 

Quote Silent Coup
D: I think there is no doubt about the seriousness of the problem we’ve got. We have a cancer within, close to the Presidency, that is growing. It is growing daily. It’s compounded, growing geometrically now, because it compounds itself. That will be clear if I, you know, explain some of the details of why it is. Basically it is because 1) we are being blackmailed; 2) people are going to start perjuring themselves very quickly that have not had to perjure themselves to protect other people in the line. And there is no assurance—
P: That that won’t bust?
D: That that won’t bust.

I’m quite sure that Nixon’s adrenaline was pumping after this opening.
Dean then claimed that he would take the President over how the whole thing got started.

Quote Silent Coup
he [Dean] began his description of the whole Watergate episode to the president by putting the onus on Haldeman, rather than himself, as the person who originated White House intelligence operations.
Dean claims to Nixon that it was  Haldeman idea to set up a “perfectly legitimate campaign intelligence operation” at the CRP.

This was false. It was Dean who had pushed the plan on CRP and in the following conversation, Dean told facts about incidents and actions - but at every turn ascribed the initiator as someone other than himself. Every time Nixon asked a question, Dean jumped to another focus and in the process named Haldeman, Ehrlichman, Colson, and Mitchell.

Quote Silent Coup
Now Dean hit the heavy stuff, “the most troublesome post-thing.” He said that “1) Bob [Haldeman] is involved in that; 2) John [Ehrlichman] is involved in that; 3) I am involved in that; 4) Mitchell is involved in that. And that is an obstruction of justice.”

So here Dean cemented his lies - on tape: That Haldeman, Ehrlichman, and Mitchell are guilty. Dean and Alexander Haig had kept information from Nixon all the time and now Nixon heard about a lot of actions. My guess is, that his stress level must have gotten very high while listening – as a natural response to DANGER - and as previously mentioned: High-stress hampers critical thinking.

Quote Silent Coup
Dean started to explain Haldeman’s involvement, but soon shifted back to his real theme, the “continual blackmail operation by Hunt and Liddy and the Cubans.” This was a problem because “the blackmail is continuing,” again, not telling Nixon that only Dean himself was being “blackmailed” by Hunt.

As you’ll recall, if you have read the previous parts, Dean had stolen the Hermes notebooks from Hunt’s safe. Notebooks that would have revealed that Dean and his wife-to-be were both involved in the prostitution ring. Hunt had wanted those notebooks to use as defense – but Dean had gotten to them first.

Hunt then started blackmailing Dean - but Liddy didn’t. That’s a lie.
Dean and Liddy had met two days previously. Dean pretended the conversation was on behalf of Nixon – and Liddy assured Dean that he was loyal to the president and wouldn’t talk no matter what kind of pressure he faced.

Quote Silent Coup
Now Dean hit his stride and revealed his true agenda for the meeting—not, as he had promised, to tell the president everything Nixon needed to know, but to ask Nixon for money with which to continue to keep certain lips sealed. “There is a real problem in raising money,” Dean asserted and told of the difficulties that even John Mitchell had in finding money for this purpose. P: How much money do you need? D: I would say these people are going to cost a million dollars over the next two years. The president said that could be obtained, in cash if necessary.

Nixon apparently took the bait and said – on tape - that he would find hush-money for Hunt.
But he never took action to do so.

Nixon contemplated complete disclosure had to be made – but Dean said that “the person who will be hurt by it most will be you and the Presidency.”

Quote Silent Coup
Then Dean completed the last bit of his own selective confession, telling the president that he, Dean, could go to jail for obstruction of justice. Nixon scoffed at this, but Dean lectured as if Nixon were a first-year law student: “I have been a conduit for information on taking care of people out there who are guilty of crimes.” The president thought that could be glossed over with a little luck.

Do you recall the drama-triangulation – described in Part 25? Victim, Persecutor, and Rescuer. Dean laid out the bait - presenting himself as the Victim – and Nixon bit the hook, wanted to rescue him. 

Nixon didn’t know how much Dean had been involved, nor for how long.
When Dean suggested that Haldeman, Ehrlichman, Mitchell, and Dean should meet and get their stories straight, Nixon agreed that that would be a good idea. Ehrlichman and Mitchell were out of town – but they called in Haldeman.

In the following discussion, Haldeman suggested that they should come clean by producing a report to the grand jury. Nixon liked that idea and suggested a new Grand Jury – whereby they could avoid going before Sam Ervin, head of the newly established Watergate Committee.

Dean warned that they would have no control if they did that. Haldeman took the opposite position: They should ALL go to the Grand Jury.

Quote Silent Coup
Trapped for the moment, Dean said little more. He was way ahead of the others in his understanding of the position they might shortly assume: that everyone must testify without immunity, even Dean. That, of course, would be devastating for Dean, so he kept his mouth uncharacteristically shut toward the later part of the conversation.

Later that same day, when Ehrlichman was back, they met again. Ehrlichman pushed for a document that would review the facts, as the White House saw them. Nixon and Haldeman agreed and Dean was given the assignment to produce a Report.

This meeting was on March 21, and over the next weeks, Nixon put pressure on Dean to produce a full report, coming clean to the Watergate Commission.

Quote Family of Secrets
[…] to issue a statement to the cabinet explaining, in very general terms, the White House’s willingness to cooperate in any investigations.

Dean tried to make them focus on Hunt and blackmail again – but the others were no longer interested in Hunt.

Quote Silent Coup
The others in the room didn’t for a moment realize the danger Hunt posed to Dean. […] What Dean could not say, and what those in the room never completely understood, was that the true cancer within the presidency was John Dean himself. That cancer had metastasized now, had reproduced itself in so many places in the administration that even radical surgery to remove the original tumor could no longer save the patient. The Nixon presidency was mortally infected, and Nixon did not know it.

When Mitchell was informed of the situation, he wholeheartedly agreed that full disclosure in front of a Grand Jury was the only way – after Dean had finished his Report. None of these three men had approved the break-ins, and for that reason, they thought they were pretty much in the clear.

Over the next weeks, they all put pressure on Dean to ‘finish’ the Report. Dean kept ‘saying yes - and acting no’.
But phone logs show a flurry of phone calls between lawyer Moore and Dean, especially in the final weeks before Dean turned on Nixon. Moore was “practically a member of the extended Bush clan” according to Russ Baker. He had been Skull and Bones like Bush and as we saw in Part 7, Skull and Bones members are “Brothers under the Skin”.
It sure looks like Moore was a Bush messenger. Dean decided to turn his coat and go to prosecutor Earl Silbert.

Quote Silent Coup
[Dean] convinced [a] counsel to call the prosecutors and tell them the single thing the prosecutors most wanted to hear: that Dean could “deliver the P,” that he could implicate the president as a co-conspirator in the sorry mess of Watergate. In other words, Dean wanted his counsel to tell the prosecutors that the lawyer for the president of the United States could and would now throw overboard the last and most important of all the men on the ship, its captain, Dean’s client, Richard Nixon.

Dean started talking to Earl Silbert, the first Watergate prosecutor, on April 2 – and it took twelve days before the White House realized, that Dean was singing.

On April 16 Dean met Nixon in the Oval Office – both men aware this was a parting of ways. Nixon wanted Dean to resign.

Quote Silent Coup
Dean told Nixon he would resign only if Haldeman and Ehrlichman also did so. Nixon may have misunderstood this as Dean’s attempt to lift himself to the level of importance of those two aides. It had an entirely different meaning for Dean; he wanted Haldeman and Ehrlichman to go at the same time because that would provide support for his claim that they were his principals.

Later that evening Nixon went on National  TV and said, that he accepted Ehrlichman and Haldeman's resignations. He also announced that …

Quote Silent Coup
… he was relieving Kleindienst of his responsibilities as attorney general, since he wanted someone who had no previous connection to Haldeman, Ehrlichman, Mitchell, or anyone else in the administration; that new attorney general, Elliot Richardson, would be empowered to appoint a special prosecutor for Watergate-related matters.

So once again Nixon walked into a Dean trap. Dean could now claim they were all part of a conspiracy.

Quote Family of Secrets
IF, AS IT APPEARS, WATERGATE WAS INDEED a setup, it was a fairly elaborate covert operation, with three parts: 1) creating the crime, 2) implicating Nixon by making him appear to be knowledgeable and complicit in a cover-up, and 3) ensuring that an aggressive effort would be mounted to use the “facts” of the case to prosecute Nixon and force him from office. The third area is where Lowell Weicker was absolutely indispensable.

Senator Weicker of the Watergate Commission – and Townhouse

Quote Family of Secrets
When the Senate created a committee to investigate Watergate, there was no guarantee that anything would come of it. The perpetrators—the burglars and their supervisors, Hunt and Liddy—were going on trial, and it was uncertain whether the hearings would produce any further insights. Moreover, the committee featured four rather somnolent Democrats and three Republicans, two of them staunch Nixon loyalists. This left only one wild card: Lowell Weicker, a liberal Republican from Connecticut.

If you haven’t read Part 33, here are some facts about Weicker.

The conspirators used Weicker as a tool to reveal condemning information about Nixon, like Townhouse. ‘Someone’ – well informed – send Gleason to Weicker, telling him that he might be implicated for allegedly accepting Townhouse money.
Weicker concluded that Nixon tried to set him up and got very angry. He contacted the special prosecutor’s office and “urged that it investigate Townhouse”.

My guess would be that this ‘someone’ was Dean – and that Dean was probably acting on behalf of Bush, his CIA ‘colleague’ – as I wrote about in Part 33.

Quote Family of Secrets
Here was a man [Bush] closely connected to the CIA, as we have seen, now both running the Republican Party and sitting in on cabinet deliberations. An intelligence officer couldn’t have asked for a better perch. Moreover, this put him in the catbird seat just as Watergate began heating up.

The Cabal wanted to make sure, that Townhouse got back in the newspapers – and provoked Weicker to act in their interest. That would be my guess.

They had previously tried to lay out bait when ‘someone’ leaked Townhouse information to the press - but it hadn’t caught attention. I’m quite sure that this ‘someone’ was Dean - because when Gleason left office all his papers were handed over to Dean, including a list of donors and recipients.

Quote Family of Secrets
Shortly after the files ended up in Dean’s hands, the media began receiving—perhaps coincidentally—leaks about the Townhouse Operation.

Stanford, author of “White House Call Girl”, obtained a copy of the Hermes notebooks – which confirmed Colodny’s claim that Dean and his wife were listed – and furthermore showed three interesting names:
Lowell Weicker
Sam Dash, the Chief Counsel to the Watergate Committee
Jeb Magruder, the Deputy Director of the Nixon campaign.
Magruder later falsely accused Mitchell of ordering the break-in and cover-up. That he lied is proved several times over in Silent Coup.

So these three men were compromised. The first two, Weicker and Dash, shouldn’t have had anything to do with judging Nixon.
Magruder was a traitor who sided with Dean in the Senate hearing – and thus sent Mitchell to jail.

Another thing about Weicker is: He helped Dean prepare his Senate testimony.
And: Dean and Weicker became neighbors, living in townhouses in Alexandria.

Deans ‘testimony’ (= allegations, lies, and false accusations)

As told in Part 33, Dean gave the rejected Houston Plan to judge Sirica alleging that it was approved by Haldeman and Mitchell.  
The fact of the matter is, that the plan had been rejected by Mitchell and Haldeman.

Dean told Sirica, that he would give a lot of evidence against Nixon, Haldeman, Mitchell, and Ehrlichman – on condition of immunity. The Senate embraced that idea.

Quote Silent Coup
Dean’s plan for his testimony was as brilliant as his manipulation of the president and the president’s men had been.

As Colodny shows in Silent Coup there are several examples of Dean handing over letters without letterheads, fake memo’s, documents with dates not aligning with Dean’s claims of meetings, etc.

‘Private Eyes’ – Caulfield and Ulasewicz - both testified that they took orders from Dean. Nevertheless, Dean got away with attributing responsibility to Mitchell and Haldeman.
His claims – on National TV under the Senate hearings - were never challenged. He got away with statements like:
“I was a restraining influence at the White House to many wild and crazy schemes,”
“I also made it very clear … I just didn’t want to get involved in doing the sort of things they wanted.”
“It just wasn’t my bag. It was something I just didn’t know how to do.”

Dean didn’t reveal his possession of the Hermes notebooks to the prosecutors, Earl Silbert and Henry Petersen. He kept them in his safe – until he had gotten what he wanted. Then he destroyed them.

Quote Silent Coup
Dean waited to reveal the destruction (1) until he had cemented his deal for a light sentence, (2) until he had pleaded guilty to one count of obstructing justice, and (3) until he had allowed the Special Prosecutor’s office to build criminal cases against John Mitchell and others based on Dean’s own testimony.

Dean lied repeatedly before the Senate committee and to every other forum in which he testified. He ended up being sentenced to four years ‘in prison’.
He didn’t actually go to jail but to a safe-house – from where he was released after four months.

Townhouse & the Dr. Fielding Break-in become known

After Weicker had met with Gleason he contacted the special prosecutor’s office and “urged that it investigate Townhouse”.
And not only that. He had reporters waiting outside his door every day waiting for tidbits.
Dean gave information about the Huston Plan, the Plumbers, Townhouse, and …

Quote Silent Coup
[Dean] told Silbert of the Liddy-Hunt supervision of the burglary of Dr. Fielding’s office, information that he knew would totally disrupt the government’s case against Ellsberg.

As I wrote in Part 30 & 31: Kissinger set up the ‘Manhattan Round Table’ of which Ellsberg was a member. My guess is, that the Cabal wanted to save one of their puppets and hence gave Dean orders to disrupt the case against Ellsberg.

Dean had now introduced another scandal –  the ‘Dr. Fielding break-in - that they had not previously known about.

The prosecutors interviewed Magruder as well as Dean. When AG Kleindienst and Assistant AG Petersen received a report of those interviews – and saw that Haldeman and Ehrlichman were named in a cover-up they informed Nixon - who told Petersen to “stay out” of the matter since it involved “national security”

Two weeks later Petersen called Nixon again and informed him, that the break-in at Dr. Fielding’s office had become known to the grand jury.
Both Magruder and Gray – the Assistant Director of the FBI – resigned.
As you might recall from the last Part, Gray let Dean take a third of the papers from Hunt’s safe – including the Hermes notebooks - and he admitted to the prosecutors, that he had destroyed some of the remaining files from Hunt’s safe.

Quote Silent Coup
Henry Petersen was still bothered by the Silbert memo about Hunt, Liddy, and the Dr. Fielding break-in, and told Attorney General Kleindienst about it. Kleindienst agreed with Petersen and called Nixon on April 25; he threatened to resign if he were not allowed to send to Judge Byrne the Silbert memo and other documents telling what the government knew about the Dr. Fielding break-in. Nixon agreed, and when Judge Byrne got the documents he held a conference with the prosecutors about them; they wanted him to deal with the documents only in camera. Enraged, Byrne read the documents aloud in court on April 27, and made headlines.

Let me remind you of that break-in, described in Part 31: Ellsberg had leaked the Pentagon Papers to the press. Pentagon Papers were produced by Halperin – who got the assignment from McNamara while LBJ was president. Ellsberg, Halperin, and McNamara were all members of the Manhattan Round Table that Kissinger had established - on orders from the Committee of 300.

Dr. Fielding was an MK-ultra psychiatrist – which never came up when he made testimony in the Senate Hearings.
Ellsberg was allegedly his client – which I highly doubt. The Burglars’ assignment was allegedly to find and copy Ellsberg’s journal.
Instead, they smashed windows, spread pills, and papers – and thereby created a police report.
This break-in is what now became known – and ‘made headlines’. Papers were filled with guesses, that the Ellsberg journal should have been used for unethical purpose.

Quote Price of Power
Like Watergate, the Fielding office break-in was on its face a very bad idea that was not approved by Nixon but certain to deeply embarrass him and damage his public standing when it was disclosed.

But still: Polls showed, that despite all the things the media wrote about – it still wasn’t enough to turn the majority of the population against Nixon.

The defendants had told Byrne that they believed they had been wiretapped years earlier. Of course, Ellsberg would have known that, since he was Round Tabler with Kissinger - who ordered that wiretap.
Byrne had asked the prosecution for any information concerning “electronic surveillance” on Ellsberg and his associate, Anthony J. Russo.

Quote Silent Coup
The government had said it knew nothing of such wiretaps. On Monday, April 30, 1973, in the wake of the revelation of the Hunt-Liddy burglary, Judge Byrne reissued his earlier demand that the government produce any information concerning “electronic surveillance.” Shortly, the “1969 wiretaps” would be out of the bag.

I don’t know where Haig had been through all these revelations. But now he was back in the White House and on May 4 he was appointed Chief of Staff.
He immediately used his new position to put pressure on Nixon.

Quote Silent Coup
Taken together with other matters then in the news—John Dean’s safe-deposit box copy of the Huston Plan, the revelation of the Dr. Fielding break-in and the Plumbers’ activities, as well as the locating of the logs of the 1969-1971 wiretaps—the release of the Walters memcons made five incoming missiles aimed at the White House, all of which had to do with “national security” matters. With these matters in the air, and the Watergate committee about to start public sessions within a few days, Buzhardt and Haig pressed Nixon to draft a blanket denial, one ‘The Final Days’ [book by Haig’s accomplice, Woodward] suggested would have to be “a final definitive statement that dealt with the major allegations, both direct and implied.”

Let me remind you, that Woodward had worked for Haig in Navy Intelligence – and also remind you, what I showed about Buzhardt in Part 33: He was Haig’s friend. They knew each other from West Point. He was Pentagon counsel until he became Haig’s key aide. He’s the one that re-interviewed admiral Welander – whereby all mention of Haig’s culpability in ‘the Military Spy-Ring’ was excluded. Which I wrote about in Part 33.

They set a trap – and Nixon walked right into it, making such a statement.
A few weeks before, Nixon, Mitchell, and Ehrlichman had agreed that they should come clean in front of a Grand Jury – and now Nixon followed advice from Haig and Buzhardt to dismiss everything with a statement about “national security.”

I don’t think Nixon was stupid. I see this as a typical symptom of too high stress – deliberately inflicted, I might ad. His critical thinking was seriously hampered by stress hormones.

Number two from left, Sam Ervin was named Chair of the Committee

Televised hearing from the Senate Watergate Committee (from May 17, 1973)

Quote The Price of Power
One of the main reasons we fundamentally misunderstand Watergate is that the guardians of the historical record focused only on selected parts of Nixon’s taped conversations, out of context.

This is obvious when reading – or listening to - the transscripts. However, I won’t go into all the details of the Watergate hearings – but focus on John Dean.

On June 26, Dean began his testimony to the Senate Watergate Committee. A few hours before the public, televised testimony, the senators received a 245-page statement and  50 documents. So, the Senators couldn’t analyze it or prepare questions – just follow along while Dean read it to the nation.

Quote Forty Years War
For six hours he read from a prepared statement, and what he had to say, then and during the four days of questioning that followed, electrified the senators and a public that was riveted by the nationally televised coverage.

Buzhardt could have prepared questions – or ‘ammunition’ as Thompson, the advisor to the Committee, called it. He had informed Buzhardt what Dean would say ten days previously.  
But Buzhardt only gave Thompson one (pretend) attack – about a memo, signed by Buzhardt, that Dean had already testified to. Dean easily evaded this pretend attack.

Quote Forty Years War
[…] Buzhardt had the complete documents, and their details could have provided serious ammunition for a sharp questioning of Dean’s motives and actions. Without that ammunition, the committee could not effectively counter Dean’s denial that he had suggested using the CIA to block the FBI

So once again we see Buzhardt as a puppet of the conspirators – and probably Haig pulling the strings. As he had pulled the strings of Woodward for some time.

Quote Forty Years War
After Dean’s testimony, polls continued to show that it was still only his word against the president’s, and that if Dean’s allegations could not be proved by anything other than his say-so, most people still gave Nixon the benefit of the doubt. Nine months earlier, Nixon had been reelected by the largest electoral landslide in American history; few people had an appetite for overturning that mandate.

I’m glad to see, that the population in 1973 was able to do critical thinking.
Dean’s ‘say-so’ wasn’t enough to turn the people against Nixon - and the Conspirator’s decided, I guess, to throw the White House recordings into the ring.
We have seen how Dean had instigated two recordings, “The Smoking Gun” and “Cancer on the Presidency”.

Quote Price of Power
He [Nixon] had no way of knowing that, two years later, his conversation with Haldeman would be publicly revealed and construed as that of a man in control of a plot, rather than the target of one.

The population watched as Dean revealed information about one thing after another. Like the ’Military Spy Ring’ that I’ve described in Part 33.
But it was never revealed that Haig was the scoundrel in this scandal because - as we saw in the last part - he had made sure that Welander was re-interviewed and got no questions about Haig.

About Deans account on the ‘Cancer on the Presidency’: The Committee never investigated the ‘blackmail’ - but they condemned Nixon for being willing to pay hush money. What they didn’t do was to point out, that Nixon never acted to do so. They took Dean’s words at face value.

Quote Silent Coup
But that interpretation of the March 21 tape is based almost entirely on the perception of a credible and truthful John Dean, and, as we have shown, Dean lied repeatedly before the Senate committee and to every other forum in which he testified.

Wire-tapping in White House Oval Office

Alexander Butterfield was a Nixon aide in charge of wiretapping in the White House, on Nixon’s orders.
And let me remind you: Butterfield had worked with Haig, looking after veterans of the Bay of Pigs invasion – those veterans that are here known as the Plumbers or the Burglars.

Butterfield volunteered to appear before the Committee, talking about some money he had stored in a friend’s safe-deposit box – allegedly at Haldeman’s request in April of 1972.
There was nothing illegal about that money – so let’s skip those details.

Quote Four Years War
Reaching the end of his description, he told his stunned audience, as they recorded in their own notes, “This is all something I know the President did not want revealed, but you asked me, and I feel it is something you ought to know about in your investigations. I was told no one was to know about the information I have told you.”

And then he mentioned the taping system in the Oval Office – out of the blue, apparently. He was called back the following Monday to give testimony about that.

Colodny writes a lot of information about why Butterfield showed up without being called to testify – and about who probably told Butterfield to reveal the taping system.
Haig had already tried to get the information about the taping system into the Committee. He had told an aide, Higby, more than a week earlier, to testify truthfully about it if asked. But Higby wasn’t asked.
So there’s no doubt in my mind, that Haig sent Butterfield. And not only that: He didn’t inform Nixon – who was in the hospital – about the bomb Butterfield had dropped and the coming hearing.
It’s obvious to conclude that the conspirators wanted these produced conversations, “Smoking Gun” & “Cancer on the Presidency” introduced to the Committee. And they wanted to prevent Nixon from blocking this.

High-stress level, as I’ve alleged many times that Nixon must have had, hampers the immune system and Nixon was hospitalized with pneumonia. But he conducted business from his bed - so his illness was no excuse for not informing him before Sunday night.

Quote Forty Years War
Haig finally got around to informing the president about the potentially explosive Butterfield testimony on Monday morning, and he also told the president that there was no way to stop Butterfield’s public revelation. As we have seen, there was plenty of time—and plenty of precedent—for the president to sign a letter to the committee and to Butterfield saying that his proposed testimony was prevented.

This revelation – the taping system – was the last straw on the camel’s bag. It was seen as clandestine to record private conversations without informing about it - and millions of viewers “gained new understanding of the dark side of the personality of Richard Nixon.”

Which was how it was presented via media. But as I see it, Nixon had an inflated self-image. He wanted to be seen as a Statesman – and he had the tapes made to support that view in historic archives.

Quote Forty Years War
Shortly thereafter, the senators decided to subpoena the actual tapes, the White House refused to turn them over, and the year-long, ultimately decisive final battle of the Nixon administration began.

That’s as far as we go in this part. In the next, final, part we will look at:

• Saturday Night Massacre

• Wiretapping

• Impeachment proceedings – and Hillary Clinton

• The Nixon resignation – and Ford’s pardon

Links:

The Dean’s trial against Liddy
https://www.ca4.uscourts.gov/opinions/Unpublished/011266.U.pdf

Smoking Gun record, audio

Cancer on the presidency record

The Forty Years War
https://archive.org/details/fortyyearswarris0000colo

Family of Secrets by Russ Baker
https://archive.org/details/familyofsecretsb0000bake_r7l6/page/161/mode/2up

Silent Coup
https://archive.org/details/silentcoup00lenc

Seymour Hersh, Price of Power – Kissinger in Nixon’s White House
https://archive.org/details/priceofpowerkiss0000hers/page/21/mode/1up?view=theater

Tricky Dick by Roger Stone
https://archive.org/details/trickydickrisefa0000ston/page/63/mode/2up