Wednesday, July 06, 2005
The mysterious motives and means of The Secret Man
The Secret Man, Bob Woodward's account of his dealings with Mark Felt, now known to be "Deep Throat," was released this morning, and The New York Times published its review this evening. Not being sufficiently interested to read the book, I was hoping that the reviews and other press accounts would answer a couple of questions that Stratfor asked a month ago($): why did Mark Felt help Woodward and Bernstein keep their Watergate story alive, and how did he know the stuff he knew? Unfortunately, the Times reviewer is so interested in making the point that presently concerns the Times -- that reporters should not have to divulge confidential sources -- that he fails to report whether Woodward's book tells us anything about Mark Felt that we really want to know. We may actually have to read the damn thing.
The revelation that "Deep Throat" was Mark Felt raises almost as many questions as it answers. Why did he help Woodward and Bernstein get President Nixon? The simple, "Hal Holbrook" version is that Felt wanted to expose the depredations of the Nixon White House, but knew that in 1972 it would not have been possible to do that within conventional legal process. J. Edgar Hoover was gone, and with him the power of the FBI over American presidents. The FBI now reported to Patrick Gray, who was thought to have been more loyal to Nixon than to the Bureau. Had Felt pursued formal channels, Gray would have cut him off at the knees.
But does the simple and popular explanation hang together? Not really. It is highly unlikely that Felt rose to his position within the FBI by rocking the boat on matters of principle.
What did it mean to be "Hoover's man"? For starters, Felt learned the ways of Washington from one of the most ruthless men ever to play the game. In that game, the press was just another pawn, which Hoover manipulated by collecting devastating private information:
Hoover died, and Nixon passed Felt over to appoint Patrick Gray. Felt, obviously, was not happy (the Times reports that The Secret Man says as much). You don't devote yourself to a man like J. Edgar Hoover only to lose the shot at the top job because Richard Nixon decides otherwise. So Felt deployed the lessons he had learned from Hoover to strike back at the President.
But how did he know what he knew? He had a means for monitoring the White House, almost certainly the same mechanism that Hoover used to resist all presidential efforts to curtail his power.
If Stratfor's speculation that Felt had an inside channel into the White House is correct -- and it sounds right to me -- there are a number of interesting questions that depend from that fairly shocking insight. It is impossible to believe that Mark Felt was the only person alive in 1972 who knew that the White House had been penetrated. Since Hoover's "mechanism" reached across many presidencies, it would have had to have been maintained over a long period of time, yet kept secret from people loyal to successive presidents. Who else knew about it? How long did Felt's inherited penetration of the White House persist? Since none of Nixon nor the plumbers discovered the penetration, it must have survived into the Ford Administration. Ronald Reagan pardoned Felt for subsequent offenses (related to warrantless searches and breaking and entering in the name of law enforcement) after his conviction in 1980. Did Felt have leverage over even the Reagan White House? Can we be certain that Felt did not have his own protege at the Bureau who inherited the "mechanism"?
Given the detailed information at Felt's disposal ("follow the money" in a hushed but raspy voice), he must have also known why the White House ordered the Watergate break-in. And other questions:
Good questions, apparently none of which are answered in The Secret Man.
The revelation that "Deep Throat" was Mark Felt raises almost as many questions as it answers. Why did he help Woodward and Bernstein get President Nixon? The simple, "Hal Holbrook" version is that Felt wanted to expose the depredations of the Nixon White House, but knew that in 1972 it would not have been possible to do that within conventional legal process. J. Edgar Hoover was gone, and with him the power of the FBI over American presidents. The FBI now reported to Patrick Gray, who was thought to have been more loyal to Nixon than to the Bureau. Had Felt pursued formal channels, Gray would have cut him off at the knees.
But does the simple and popular explanation hang together? Not really. It is highly unlikely that Felt rose to his position within the FBI by rocking the boat on matters of principle.
Let's consider who Felt was for a moment. He rose in the ranks of the FBI to serve as the No. 3 official, ranking behind only J. Edgar Hoover and Hoover's significant other, Clyde Tolson. He reached that position for two reasons: He was competent and, of greater significance, he was absolutely loyal to Hoover. Hoover was obsessed with loyalty and conformity. He expected his agents, even in the junior ranks, to conform to the standards of the FBI in matters ranging from dress to demeanor. Felt did not rise to be the No. 2 of the Hoover-Tolson team by being either a free-thinker or a gadfly. The most important thing to understand about Felt was that he was Hoover's man.
What did it mean to be "Hoover's man"? For starters, Felt learned the ways of Washington from one of the most ruthless men ever to play the game. In that game, the press was just another pawn, which Hoover manipulated by collecting devastating private information:
One of Hoover's favorite tactics was the careful and devastating leak.
Hoover knew how to work the press better than just about anyone in Washington...
In most Washington insider cases, Hoover was not interested in the grand jury route. The information he collected frequently was less concerned with criminal behavior than embarrassing revelations. What Hoover wanted to do was shape the behavior of people to suit him. It was the threat of revelation -- coupled with judicious leaks to the press, proving that Hoover was prepared to go all the way with it -- that did the trick. Hoover perfected the devastating leak -- and Mark Felt did not rise to power in the FBI by failing to learn that lesson or by following ethical codes other than J. Edgar Hoover's.
Hoover died, and Nixon passed Felt over to appoint Patrick Gray. Felt, obviously, was not happy (the Times reports that The Secret Man says as much). You don't devote yourself to a man like J. Edgar Hoover only to lose the shot at the top job because Richard Nixon decides otherwise. So Felt deployed the lessons he had learned from Hoover to strike back at the President.
But how did he know what he knew? He had a means for monitoring the White House, almost certainly the same mechanism that Hoover used to resist all presidential efforts to curtail his power.
Within days of the Watergate Hotel break-in, Deep Throat -- Felt -- was telling Woodward of the role of E. Howard Hunt. That meant that Felt knew what had happened. He could not have known what had happened had he not inherited Hoover's mechanisms for monitoring the White House. It is clear that Gray was not given that mechanism, and it is clear that Gray didn't know about it -- since Nixon didn't know about it. But Felt did know about it. What the mechanism was, whether electronic eavesdropping or informants in the White House or some other means, is unclear, so we will refer to it as "the mechanism." What is clear is that Felt, without the knowledge of his director, was running an operation that had to precede the break-in. Hoover died in May 1972; the Watergate break-in occurred in August 1972. Felt did not have time to set up his own operation in the White House. He had clearly taken over Hoover's.
Felt could not admit that he had penetrated the White House. The No. 2 man at the FBI could have forced a grand jury investigation, but he did not force one because to do so, he would have had to reveal his covert mechanism in the White House. Felt didn't go to a grand jury not because he was boxed in, but because he could not reveal the means whereby he knew precisely what Nixon and his henchmen were up to. It is fascinating that in all the discussion of Felt as Deep Throat, so little attention has been paid to how Felt would have acquired -- and continued to acquire -- such precise intelligence. It has been pointed out that Felt could not have been the only Deep Throat because he could not personally have known all the things he revealed. That is true, unless we assume that Felt was the beneficiary of an intelligence operation run by Hoover for years deep into successive White Houses. If that is the case, then it makes perfect sense that Felt was the one and only Deep Throat.
If Stratfor's speculation that Felt had an inside channel into the White House is correct -- and it sounds right to me -- there are a number of interesting questions that depend from that fairly shocking insight. It is impossible to believe that Mark Felt was the only person alive in 1972 who knew that the White House had been penetrated. Since Hoover's "mechanism" reached across many presidencies, it would have had to have been maintained over a long period of time, yet kept secret from people loyal to successive presidents. Who else knew about it? How long did Felt's inherited penetration of the White House persist? Since none of Nixon nor the plumbers discovered the penetration, it must have survived into the Ford Administration. Ronald Reagan pardoned Felt for subsequent offenses (related to warrantless searches and breaking and entering in the name of law enforcement) after his conviction in 1980. Did Felt have leverage over even the Reagan White House? Can we be certain that Felt did not have his own protege at the Bureau who inherited the "mechanism"?
Given the detailed information at Felt's disposal ("follow the money" in a hushed but raspy voice), he must have also known why the White House ordered the Watergate break-in. And other questions:
Why was the break-in carried out with such glaring incompetence? Consider the famous part in which a security guard removes a piece of tape blocking a door lock that had been placed horizontally rather than vertically, only to have it replaced by one of the burglars, leading to their discovery. If Felt had penetrated the White House and Committee to Re-elect the President deeply enough to be Deep Throat, then he had to know the reason for the break-in. And what else did he control in the White House? Were G. Gordon Liddy's people as stupid as they appeared, getting caught with revealing phone numbers on them? Could anyone be that stupid? Why was the break-in ordered, and why did professionals bungle it so badly?
This is the thing that Felt never gave to Woodward and Bernstein and which, therefore, Woodward and Bernstein never were able to explain. Yet Felt had to know it. The event wasn't random, and whatever else could be said about Nixon and his staff, they weren't stupid. They had their reasons, and it is hard to believe that Felt, who seemed to know everything about the conspiracy, didn't know this.
Good questions, apparently none of which are answered in The Secret Man.
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