POLITICAL BOOK NOTES

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88-01350R000200050022-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 17, 2004
• Sequence Number: 22
• Publication Date: October 1, 1979
• Content Type: NSPR

T
Approved For Relea, l r0.q DP88-01
Pt1G~' 1~~i x. _~
ON
The Man Who Kept the Secrets: Richard
Helms and the CIA. Thomas Powers.
Alfred A. Knopf, 512.95. This is a i
meticulously researched, prudently baI-
anced account of the highlights of the
agency's history and its most cautious
professional leader, Richard Helms, a man
who for 30 years was at the. center of
national and international intrigue.
Powers talked to all the principals in
that drama still living. He read all the }
documents available to researchers and all
the narratives others have written. The
result is a remarkably lucid revelation of
the moral ambiguity of a career in
clandestine intelligence.
Working in the CIA's Clandestine Ser-
vices created a personality Powers sums up
thus: "CIA people are cynical in most
ways, but their belief in secrets is almost
metaphysical. In their bones they believe
they know the answer to that ancient
paradox of epistemology which asks: If a
tree falls in the forest without witness, is
there any sound? The CIA would say
no.... If no one knows we tried to kill
Castro, then we didn't d o it. If ITT's role in
Chile is never revealed, then commercial
motives had nothing to do with the Allende
affair. If the CIA's role in overthrowing
Mossadegh remains hidden, then the
Iranians did it all by themselves. If .
Operation Chaos remains a secret, the CIA
never joined the FBI as a threat to
American liberties. If no one knows how
many Free World leaders had to be bribed,
then we were something purer than the
highest bidder...."
-Joseph Burkholder Smith
Approved For Release 2004/10/13 : CIA-RDP88-01350R000200050022-5