' BEFORE THE SUN COMES UP'

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP99-00498R000200010121-8
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 20, 2016
• Document Release Date: March 22, 2007
• Sequence Number: 121
• Publication Date: September 8, 1980
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Approved For Release 2007/03/22 : CIA-RDP99-00498R0002000
ARTICLE AITEAR
ON PAGE --
WASHINGTON -' Vice Admiral
Bobby R. Inman, head of the National
Security Agency - the Big Ear that
monitors telephone calls and cables -
found himself in a terrible dilemma in
.early April.
.. On March 30, he had :sent Stansfield
'Turner of the C.I.A. a sensitive inter-
: cept showing how an unnamed
-American citizen was conspiring to
.break the foreign agents registration
law by receiving millions in commis-
sions on oil sales from Libya. Turner
:'promptly requested the name, then
.told Zbigniew Brzezinski at the White.
,House that Billy Carter was making
,his deal.
Now Bobby Inman had a second in-
tercept, proving that the President
-had done nothing to dissuade his
:brother from profiting, from opening
-the White House door to Libya. The in-
.formation indicated that Dictator Qad-
?dafi had ordered his man in Washing-
ton. to pay the President's brother-
$200,000.
":The dilemma: Should the White
'House, which had already breached
security and endangered sources by
revealing the first message to Billy
Carter, be trusted further? Or should
the National Security Agency enter-
tain suspicion of the abetting of crimi-
nal conduct in the White House, and
deny to Mr. Brzezinski and the C.I.A.-
chief information of such personal im-
portance to the President?
Admiral Inman consulted "Proce-
dures for Reporting Federal Crimes
Under Executive Order 12036," dated
August 15, 1979, and saw that the
crimes included "acting as an unregis-
tered foreign agent" as well as "com-
municating classified information."
He read the overriding Section H:
"When the head of an [intelligence],-
agency believes that circumstances of '
security warrant it, he may directly
report to the Attorney General .... "
On April 10 (according to Ben Civi-
letti's appointment calendar) Bobby
Inman met with the Attorney General.
He showed the nation's chief law offi-
1 E ?1 YORK TIMES
8 SEPTEMBER 1980
ESSAY
cer two pieces of evidence of the devel-
oping crime: the first item about Billy
Carter's oil deal that had gone through
the C.I.A.'s Turner to the White House,
and the second item about the impend-
ing payoff. .
With considerable courage; the-in-
telligence officer apparently made the
decision to withhold the second item
from the White House and the C.I.A.
He saw evidence of a crime and went
only to Justice: up to that point, the
System worked.
Then the System was subverted. The
Attorney General waited three days
and then called in the head of his
Criminal Division, Philip Heymann, to
tell him to leave the case open. Incred-
ibly, the politically sensitive Heymann
'did not ask for the information about
the President's brother. Neither man
did anything to help his own investiga-
tors.
Blocking these evidentiary. leads
from the lawmen with a "need to
know" .was the Attorney General's
first obstruction of Justice. The men in
Internal Security - cleared. for Top
Secret -were not even given the first
item which had been passed on. to
Despite the blockage of evidence at
the top, the professionals discovered
the payments on their own. When the
Attorney General ,learned of this
potential embarrassment to his lead-
er, he obstructed Justice officials a
second time. Having requested a '
meeting in the coming week with
Jimmy Carter, he instructed his men:
"Don't do anything for ten days."
(Civiletti claims he does not recall this
unconscionable intervention; at least
two witnesses swear to it.).:::...
Then Ben Civiletti went to the Oval
Office, asked Jimmy Carter's-legal
counsel to leave, and - with no.wit-.
ness present - told the President what
to tell his brother to do to escape pun-
ishment for his illegal influence-ph-d-
dling. _
After the successful obstruction,.
came the cover-up: 'both the White
House and the Attorney General, when
asked about direct contact in this case,
lied. Any communication? Answer: A
flat and pious "No." Only after the
Senate investigation was- launched,
and the President's diary note of the
Civiletti assurance of no punishment
became evidence that would have to
be revealed, was the truth forced out.
Without the inquiry, both the Presi-
dent and the Attorney. General would,
be insisting today that they had had
"no contact."
In his Senate testimony, my old
friend Baltimore Ben -a skilled attor-
ney as loyal to his President as John
Mitchell was to his - admitted he had
been "incorrect," -"wrong," "in
error."'But his protective falsehood
was no mistake at all; with deception
aforethought, he lied. .
"If a member of my Cabinet ever
lies to the public or to the Congress,"
promised Jimmy: Carter on April 4,
1976, "he or she will be looking for a
new job before the sun comes up the
next morning.".::
...ya "6 '"'. '', ... ..,- A.V.ov. I V. - It's the next morning. The sun is up.
two months, as Justice professionals AnA T;mm., P-*- ,?,, ,,;, Arr......e...-
.u...a ...GU ' ' s -0 AA-J G General are still pretending there has
- which took-Jimmy-.Carter safel _been "no impropriety.
past the primary season..: