MAX HUGEL AND WILLIAM CORSON INTERVIEWED

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP91-00587R000100600001-6
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 12
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: March 18, 2011
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: December 12, 1986
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

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RADIO TV REPORTS, INC.
4701 WILLARD AVENUE, CHEVY CHASE, MARYLAND 20815 [phone]
Crossfire STAnON CNN-TV
December 12, 1986 7:30 P.M.
Washington, D.C.
Max Hugel and William Corson Interviewed
ANNOUNCER: Live from Washington, Crossfire. On the
left, Tom Braden. On the right, Robert Novak. In the crossfire,
covert operations expert William Corson; and in New York, Max
Pr Hugel, former Deputy Director of the CIA.
BRADEN: Good evening. Welcome to Crossfire.
Now it turns out that William Casey, Director of the
CIA, first encouraged Ronald Reagan to begin the secret process
of sending arms to the Ayatollah's army. Now it turns out that
William Casey was also the first to learn that the secret might
be blown. Some of Casey's friends and acquaintances had put
money in to the secret deal. They weren't getting paid off.
They were threatening to go public. So Casey went to Oliver
North and said, "Is any of that money being diverted?"
All of which leaves Washington with a suspicious
afterthought. Oliver North couldn't have done it on his own.
Nobody agrees to that. Could anybody have dune it on his own?
Why, yes, of course: Bill Casey.
ROBERT NOVAK: You know, Tom, I would call that
introduction disinformation, except it's really part of a witch
hunt against Bill Casey, who has restored the morale and the
esprit de corps of the CIA.
And I suppose that Colonel Corson, since you don't like
him any better than Tom, you join riqht in that witch hunt.
Isn't it a fact, however, that there is not one shred of
evidence to indicate that Bill Casey was running this operation
on his own as a rogue elephant?
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WILLIAM CORSON: I would say that it would be highly he
could run it on his own because I don't think he could run any
operations.
Important to remember -- and President Reagan has said
that he believed in Franklin Roosevelt. Franklin Roosevelt did
the right thing. Franklin Roosevelt took his campaign director
and he made him Postmaster General and we used to get our mail
delivered twice a day.
This guy, Casey, went in as the Director of the CIA and
is riot qualified for the job.
NOVAK: He ran more operations than you ever did, sir.
He ran the whole -- all the American agents in Europe during
World War II.
CORSON: So says the book that the letter that went from
the President nominating [sic] saying that he was in charge of
all OSS operations in London and all secret operations in
Eisenhower's theater of operations. Those are patent lies.
There was a guy by the name of David Bruce who ran it
all, a friend of Tom's and I, who's now dead. And there was a
general by the name of Silbert who might be surprised to find
out...
Germany.
NOVAK: Well, he ran them on the Continent, inside
CORSON: He did not run them on the Continent.
NOVAK: We're getting -- Colonel Corson, you have gotten
away frum the question I asked you. Is there one shred of
evidence to support Tom's thesis that the diversion of funds to
the Contras from the Iranian arms thing could have been dune on
its own by the CIA? Any shred of evidence? None, right?
CORSON: There's no evidence to indicate that the
Contras received any money, Mr. Novak.
NOVAK: So why would you say a thing like that? I mean
there is some...
BRADEN: Wait a minute. I didn't say that the Con
that the money to the Contras was all Casey's on his own.
NOVAK: Well you said "on his own." What does "on his
own" mean?
BRADEN: Wait a minute. Well, let me ask -- let me
straighten you out. Let me ask Max Hugel.
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Mr. Hugel, you were Deputy Director of' the CIA. Do you
think that Bill Casey is smart enough, on his own, to have
handled the whole Iranian arms deal without touching any money
from the CIA? That is, by going to his friends and acquaintances
who deal in what we -- what the newspapers euphemistically call
business. They're businessmen who deal in arms.
NOVAK: What do you think they are? Wait a minute.
What are they if they're not businessmen?
I'm asking Mr. Hugel.
MAX HUGEL: I just think everyone is taking their eye
off the ball. I mean we're talking about whether Casey did this
or that. But the real impact of what's happening here is whether
or not the President of the United States has a right to run a
foreign policy which he has espoused in 1980 when he won by a
landslide, in 1984 when he won by a mandate, over 53 million
votes in 49 states, where he clearly said that his foreign policy
initiative is to contain the Soviet Union and to support freedom
fighters wherever they might be, that those that want to
overthrow repressive dictatorships...
BRADEN: Okay.
HUGEL: And from that basic foreign policy comes the
Iranian situation or the Nicaraguan situation. That all is part
and parcel of what President Reagan has told the American people
he's going to do. And to get into...
BRADEN: Wait a minute. Mr. Hugel.
BRADEN: Well, you hold it. Just a minute. I asked you
a question and I asked you whether you thought Bill Casey was
adept enough, smart enough to have arranged all the financing
without touching funds frum the CIA.
HUGEL: Well, let me tell you one thing. I'm not there.
su I can't tell you that. But I'll tell you one thing. Bill
Casey is a very intelligent, bright man, and I think one of a
tremendous -- has dune a tremendous service to the country. And
I feel he's done a marvelous job within the CIA.
NOVAK: General Corson, you have a lot of animosity
toward Mr. Casey, for reasons that I'm not aware of. I don't
think in the time we have tonight we can go into an appraisal of
Casey's record, pro or con.
We are in a crisis in this country. Can you tell me
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where, on the record -- I'm not talking about suppositions or
guesses or innuendo -- where, on the record, the CIA in this
crisis has gone wrung or dune anything wrong, or Mr. Casey has
dune anything wrung? Everybody wants to fire him.
CORSON: Well, he shouldn't have been appointed
initially. But you -- let's say this. Casey...
NOVAK: I'm just talking about this crisis.
CORSON: Casey does not have the personnel that he needs
to do the job. Mr. Hugel, with no qualifications, became the
Director of Operations.
NOVAK: He hasn't been there in five years.
CORSON: We have to go -- when did this start, Mr.
Novak? It started in 1981, when...
NOVAK: Ohh...
CORSON: You .see, you've got to have some historical
HUGEL: Wait a minute, Mr. Corson. Let me tell you one
thing. When I was in there in 1981, the human intelligence was
dust about decimated by the Carter Administration. We had to
build from scratch to be able to rebuild human intelligence,
which is the only part of intelligence that can give you the
other side's intent.
Now, if you don't agree with that, then you really don't
happened what happened to CIA prior to Casey coming in there.
BRADEN: Mr. Hugel, I thought the CIA was an independent
agency and I thought that it did not -- it was not a partisan
agency. You said that the Democrats had destroyed it and the
Republicans had to build it up?
HUGEL: I didn't say the Democrats. I dust said under
the Carter Administration, there's no question about the fact
that the human intelligence part of the CIA was almost totally
decimated. Arid I guess they figured out they could do all human
intelligence with electronic surveillance. But that can't be
done.
NOVAK: Colonel Corson, I'm probably foolish for trying
to bring this thing back to what everybody in the country, or at
least in Washington, is concerned about. I want to ask you
once more. Can you tell me something -- I don't want to hear
about the fact that he wasn't -- that he named Max Hugel or that
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he did something in Germany 50 years ago. I want to know right
now if you can tell me where the CIA and Mr. Casey have done
anything wrong in this crisis so that everybody is yelling fur
his scalp.
CORSON: This crisis didn't begin on the 4th uF
November. This crisis has its antecedents. There are a lot of
dead Marines that attributable to the failure of Mr. Hugel's
so-called human intelligence.
NOVAK: That's not responsive.
HUGEL: Oh, wait a minute. I don't buy that. Where do
you get that information from? That's a lot of nonsense. You're
making statements that you don't even know anything about.
BRADEN: Well, there are a lot of dead Marines.
HUGEL: There are a lot of dead Marines, but you can't
blame that...
NOVAK: I think your friend George Shultz is more
responsible for them.
HUGEL: You can't blame that on CIA and human
intelligence. You weren't even there to know what happened.
BRADEN: Well, tell me, Mr. Hugel. You are a former
Director of Operations. Can you conceive that it would be a good
plan, would you think this was a good scheme, to get a lot of
businessmen from Canada, from Saudi Arabia -- it all leads as far
as General Ver in the Philippines -- to finance the Iranian arms
deal apart from the CIA, because the CIA can't spend money that
Congress doesn't appropriate?
HUGEL: Well, that's a whole issue that we have to get
involved with here.
Number one, is Iran important enough for the United
States to be able to open up assets and contacts so that it can
prevent a Soviet takeover...
BRADEN: Yes, but I'm asking...
HUGEL: Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Let me finish.
Then I'll get to your point.
Because the Congress is a lot to blame for the fact that
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you have to go around in back channels to be able to follow up a
foreign policy that this President wants. The Boland Amendment
came in, and therefore absolutely took the CIA out of any
financing of the freedom fighters in Nicaragua, which is a policy
that the President of the United States enhanced and wanted done
to get the Soviet Union out of Central America, right off our
shores.
So, if you're talking about what can be done and cannot
be done as part of the CIA is concerned, a lot of the problems
and a lot of the back channels are caused because they can't do
it because their hands are tied.
BRADEN: Well, was it smart to get businessmen,
acquaintances, friends, old-time pals, was it smart to get them
involved, all the way to General Ver?
NOVAK: Wait a minute. You don't have any evidence
there. You hear something, Tom, and you just run with it.
BRADEN: General Ver...
HUGEL: You read it in the paper. Right?
NOVAK: He read it in the San Francisco Examiner.
BRADEN: General Ver got a little money out of this,
HUGEL: He read it in the -- look, Tom, let's be fair
about it. Whatever happens or whatever will happen in this
incident I think will all come out. But the fact of the matter
is, when you get private people involved to carry on a foreign
policy, there's a reason for it. Sometimes you can't come out.
Sometimes you have to do it secretly. Sometimes you have to do
these things because your hands are tied.
NOVAK: We're going to have to take a break for a
commercial, Mr. Hugel.
When we return we will try to find out whether this
incident, this crisis is reason for further restrictions and
further oversight by Congress on the activities of the CIA.
BRADEN: Mr. Hugel, there's a little discrepancy in Mr.
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Casey's testimony. He said that the CIA didn't have much to do
with this. And then he said that he -- and now it comes out that
he first warned -- first told Ronald Reagan of how the Iranian
arms deal might be dune.
NOVAK: No, he didn't. He didn't do that. That's an
incorrect statement. Sorry, Tom.
BRADEN: Yes, he did.
NOVAK: I'm sorry. He did not.
BRADEN: According to the Washingt on Post this morning,
NOVAK: No, sir. That's not what the Washington Post
BRADEN: Now tell me, Mr. Hugel, tell me, Mr. Hugel, do
you think that Bill Casey should be fired?
HUGEL: Absolutely not. I think Bill Casey has done an
excellent job, a job that had to be dune within the Agency. We
had to rebuild a total disaster when we went in, as far as human
intelligence is concerned; that morale was almost down to the
flour when we came in. I think Casey has dune an excellent job.
He's a very bright man. He knows foreign affairs. And I would
say that the last thing we should do is fire Bill Casey.
NOVAK: Let me just try to take up what Tom is talking
about. He's taking a story by Bob Woodward in the Washington
Post, and what happened was this -- and Colonel Corson, I think
you're a fair person. I just want to know, whatever you think of
Bill Casey, if there's anything wrong with this.
What happened was this: that Bud McFarlane, as National
Security Adviser, asked the CIA for some kind of verification of
Israeli reports that there were some moderate elements in Iran.
The CIA, at the request of the NSC Director, which is certainly
valid, came back and said, "Yes. We think that there is some
moderate elements."
Whether you agree with that or not, isn't that a
perfectly valid function for the CIA?
CORSON: Well, Mr. Novak, I think that you'll find that
the so-called moderate element, Mr. Ghurbanifar, the vetting was
done by Israel and dune by David Kimche.
NOVAK: I agree with you.
CORSON: Well, I don't believe -- and the reason that I
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think that Bud bought that is the fact that if he went to the
Agency, the Agency would say, "Ghurbanifar whu?"
NOVAK: He went to the Agency. I mean I feel like I'm
the only guy here who knows what the facts are on these things.
I mean this...
BRADEN: Mr. Hugel, let me ask you this.
NOVAK: I think this is ridiculous. He went to the
Agency. That's the point.
BRADEN: Casey said that on October 22nd, on October
22nd he gut a telephone call about the Canadian businessman who
didn't get any money out of the deal, and that he was disturbed
and went to North.
But let me ask you. Do you think that Casey first
notified Meese that the investors were complaining and that Meese
then went to the President?
HIJGEL: I don't know what happened. I wasn't there.
But you know, the problem I have with all this dialogue
that we've been having here is, was it important to us to at
least try to open up channels of communication within Iran,
knowing how important, geopolitically, Iran was? And is the role
of the CIA to help in that regard? And the answer is yes.
Now, whether
those
--
whether
those
lines
of
communication were right
or wrong
or
accurate,
there's
no way
to
find out unless we do it.
And to allow the Soviet Union, with 26 divisions sitting
off the Iranian border, which I'in sure the KGB is working
overtime to identify their assets so that after Khomeini dies
they can have tremendous influence within Iran and do what the
Russians have not been able to do for 300 years, and that get a
warm sea -- deep-sea port in the Persian Gulf, which is vital to
our future -- is ridiculous. That's what the CIA is there for.
NOVAK: Colonel Cursun, you're a former -- I was going
to say only a former -- covert operations person. I just wonder
what you think of this: that the Director of Central
Intelligence is called up to Capitol Hill. He testifies,
closed-door, very careful who gets in that room.
NOVAK: The Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs
Committee admonishes the members that they're dealing with top
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secret material. They're not supposed to let anything out. The
minute the hearing is over, the members of Congress run out and
leak exactly what was said.
Does that bother you?
CORSON: No, that doesn't bother me, because when there
have been serious operations briefed -- and there is no record in
the entire activity of covert operations in the CIA where it has
been attributed to a leak by Congress. And what we have is this
testimony, which it may be top secret in somebody's mind, but it
isn't.
And the thing -- you know, you've asked the question
about Casey. I'll give you a specific. Casey violated his own
rules. He should be fired because of the Buckley case.
Now, that might sound pretty grim to you, but there is a
rule -- there was a rule, until Mr. Hugel came -- maybe he didn't
do it. Maybe Mr. Hugel didn't do it.
NOVAK: Hold on. Let's let the television viewers in on
what you're talking about.
CORSON: All right. I'm talking about the fact that
once a chief of station has been burned, you don't send him back.
And Mr. Buckley was burned in Islamabad -- and you know it -- and
we should never have sent him back to Beirut.
Now, we've had all these games. You left the Agency. I
(Jun 't think you sued the Washington Post for libel for why you
were driven out of the CIA.
HUGEL Wait. What the hell -- what has that got -- I
won a libel...
CORSON: That's got to do with your credibility in this
whole matter.
HUGEL: I won a libel suit against two...
CORSON: Because don't tell me that Casey knows what
he's doing, 'cause he's not.
HUGEL: Let me tell you something.
CORSON: There are cases, one after another.
HUGEL: I dun't think you know what you're talking
about. And don't...
CORSON: I know what I'm talking about, Max,...
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HUGEL: I won that libel suit.
CORSON: ...'cause I've been there.
HUGEL: You've been there, and I have too. And I'm
telling you...
CORSON: Where have you been?
HUGEL: Just one second. Don't you...
CORSON: What about...
NOVAK: Give him a chance.
HUGEL: Just don't get into personalities here.
I was -- I was charged by two crooks who subsequently
disappeared and who subsequently I won a libel action. And I'll
tell you, that has nothing to do with the situation.
As far as Bill Casey is concerned, he's been an
excellent Director of' the CIA. And you can stand here from now
until doomsday and say he's not, but I'll tell you he has been.
And you have nut been in the agency since 1981 and you don't even
know what's going on, and you can make those statements.
BRADEN: Mr. Corson, tell us. What about this -- what
about Buckley being burned? I had nut known that.
CORSON: Buckley was the chief of station...
BRADEN: The chief of station?
CORSON: ...in Islamabad.
NOVAK: And what happened to him there?
CORSON: Well, as you know, the embassy was stormed in
Islamabad. And once you're known you're not supposed to go out
again. And he was sent back to Beirut, and that's in violation
of the procedures that are used. You shouldn't have sent him.
And he's carrying boxes with him, and there were too many files
that were in Islamabad when the embassy was assaulted. And
Marines were killed there.
I mean I know the uld cliche about intelligence
successes are never advertised. Well, there are one intelligence
failure after another.
NOVAK: Colonel Corson, with all due respect, I asked
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you questions about things that are happening today, and you have
a bagful of grievances. Some of them, I'm sure, are valid. Some
of' them are nut. I can't judge it. But we're talking...
BRADEN: Well, you don't now whether they are or not.
But the point is, it's very interesting. What he says about
Buckley is interesting.
NOVAK: But it has nothing to do with what we're talkinq
about now. Not a thing. Not a thing.
Casey?
BRADEN: Did Hugel send Buckley over again, or did
CORSON: No, he'd been -- Mr. Hugel had resigned from
the Agency by that time.
NOVAK: Then why do you accuse him of sending him?
CORSON: We're talking about Casey. I'm talking about a
regula -- a ruling, internal ruling in the Agency.
HUGEL: Well, I think the man has absolutely been
violating every rules of decency in making the statement he made
about me. That's number one.
And number two, he never answered the question about
whether going before the Senate Select Intelligence Committee
udner secret, people can come right out. there and talk about it.
I don't care if it's important secrets or what, it is absolutely
a violation when right after secret testimony people can get out
and make statements of what happened inside. I think that's
wrung.
doesn't bother you, Colonel Corson?
BRADEN: But wasn't it a violation, Mr. Hugel, for Mr.
Casey to undertake this operation without notifying the
congressional committees? What do you think about that?
NOVAK: What operation? What operation? What are you
talking about?
HUGEL: What operation are you talking about?
BRADEN: The Iranian operation and the Contra operation.
NOVAK: He didn't Cu the Contra operation.
BRADEN: He did nut tell -- he did not tell
the congressional committees about it.
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CORSON: Mr. Novak, a number...
HUGEL: Let me tell you one thing. As far as concerned,
by trying to ...
BRADEN: I'm sorry, Mr. Hugel.
HUGEL: ...destroy Casey and destroy the President of
the United States by making innuendos that aren't factual is
totally wrung.
BRADEN: Okay. I'm sorry, our time is up.
Thank you, Mr. Hugel, fur being our goes.
And thank you, William Corson, for being our guest.
And Bob and I will be back in just a minute.
NOVAK: Tom, it's increasingly clear that a lot of
people, and I guess you're one of them, are using this situation
to try to redress old grievances, to try to destroy Bill Casey,
to try to drive him out of office, when the complaints about him
we're hearing don't have a thing to do with the current business.
BRADEN: I don't have any grievances against Casey.
I've known him since World War II. He ran the German operation
right near the end of the war. I think he's an excellent
operator. He was an excellent operator.
NOVAK: I'm glad to hear you say that.
BRADEN: We have to find out what went on, and therefore
we have to look at Casey.
NOVAK: And he didn't have anything to do with any of
the stuff. We don't know that.
BRADEN: Oh, ne didn't? All right. We'll find out.
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