HELMS' EXIT LINKED TO KISSINGER RIFT

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP84-00161R000400210049-4
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 23, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 20, 2014
• Sequence Number: 49
• Publication Date: December 4, 1972
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified and Approved For Release @ 50-Yr 2014/02/21 : CIA-RDP84-90161R000400210049-4
AASIIING TON STAR
4 DEC 19,72 ?
-
:.Hel s Exit Linit0d.-
.To .Ki?si ger oft:
By OSWALD JOHNSTON
Star-News Staff Welter
,
impending resignation
Richard M. Helms as the
;
nation's top intelligence officer
; - ?
,can in large part be traced to
serious and continuing policy
;disagreement with Henry A.
;Kissinger, according to in-
:formed sources in the intelli-
gence community.
t The disagreement reported-
ly began with Helms' position
.111 1969 on a key intelligence
'issue whether the Soviet
Union, with ?its giant SS-9
?Imissile, was going for a "first-
Strike capability," Helms took
the less, alarmed view.
? Helms' departure, which has
?,'been confirmed by authorita-
Aive sources in the administra-
tion', has not been announced
publicly pending a decision by
gie Central Intelligence Agen-
cy head to accept another po-
Sition.
It is understood the new po-
iltion will involve the foreign
? .policy field and will be pre-
sented publicly as a promotion
for the 59-year-old Helms, who
?has been involved in intelli-
;gence work ever since World
;War II.
Role'Was Expanded
But insiders already are
? -voicing skepticism that any
job outside the intelligence
,field could be anything but a
;comedown for Helms, who is
:believed to have been anxious
to stay on as CIA chief.
A key element in this view is
:the belief within the intelli-
? gence community that Helms
;.liad lost the confidence of the
? Wiah1i1tye. House?Kissinger espe-
. "Kissinger felt that Helms
;wasn't so much trying to sup-
'..port the administration as
playing politics on his own?
? ;trying to keep his constituency
.together in the intelligence es-.
tablishment," one source ex-
, plained.
In all ' outward respects,
however, Helms appeared to
':have been given President
!, Nixon's full confidence, ex-
pressed both in public state-
,nients and in Helms' assign-
,.ment just a year ago to a
position of broadened responsi-
bility in intelligence. ,
As a result- of a sweeping
reorganization of the intelli-
gence community in Novem-
'ber 1971, Helms' official title,
Director of Central Intelli-
gence, was expanded to in-
clude new budgetary and orga-
nizational authority over the
whole $5 billion a year U.S.
intelligence effort.
The origin of Kissinger's dis-
satisfaction with Helms is said
to reside in an incident, early
in 1969, in which Helms made
an intelligence assessment in-
volving a fundamental ques-
tion of national security that
was' -sharply at odds with the
view advanced by Pentagon
intelligence experts an held
privately in the White House.
The incident was one of
those rare occurences when
the latent disagreements in
the intelligence community
surfaced publicly, in this case
in the persons of two rival
ehieftans, Helms himself and
Melvin R. Laird, secretary of
Defense.
At issue were the massive
'Soviet SS-9 intercontinental
ballistic missiles, whose exist-
ence as a new weapon in the
Soviet arsenal became known
to intelligence early in the ad-
ministration's first year.
Liard testified before the
Senate Foreign Relations
Committee that the new mis-
siles, which are capable of
carrying a much heavier pay-
load than anything deployed
previously, meant that the So-
viet Union was going for a
"first strike capability."
About the same time, Helms
let it be known that in his
assessment the new missiles
did not indicate a shift from
? the traditional emphasis on de-
fense, and that the smaller
Minuteman-style SS-11 would
remain the backbone of the
? Soviet strategic missile arse-
nal.
Judgement Was Key
Later, in June 1969, both
men appeared together before
the committee in executive
session, and their views were
in some part reconciled.
Helms is said to have deferred
to the administration view,
which was that the Pentagon
intelligence a ssessmen t,
championed by Laird, was the
one on which to base polity.
The administration has sub-
sequently based some of its
fundamental decisions in the
nuclear strategy and national
security fields upon that intel-
ligence judgement. They in-
clude: ABM, whether to go
ahead with rapid development
of multiple missile warheads,
and basic negotiating positions
in the strategic arms control
talks with the Soviets.
The Soviet Union has now
clearly shifted to the SS-9 as
its basic strategic weapon, and
in this respect Helms' assess-
ment appears in retrospect to
have been wrong.
According to insiders, there
have been other incidents,
similar but less ?spectacular,
likewise involving an assess-
ment of Soviet strategic? capa-
bility in which Helms and the
?Pentagon were at odds. In
most of these, sources say,
Kissinger has sided with the
Defense Department.
The leading candidate to re-
place Helms is authoritatively
reported to be James R.
Schlesinger, chairman of the
Atomic Energy Commission,
?and a chief architect of a
study that' shaped the intelli-
gence reorganization.
Declassified and Approved For Release @50-Yr 2014/02/21 : CIA-RDP84-00161R000400210049-4