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GovERlrMElrr F,rntt ARobert Upshur Woodward

rose from obscure reporterworking for the Washington Postto become one of the most fa-mous journaiists of recent timesfor his role, with that of CarlBernstein, in "breaking" the Wa-tergate Story. Togeth€r,woodstein,,broke one of the biggest news stories of alltime: a dlain of abuse by th€ Executive of-fice of the Presidenry that led to calls forimpeachment, and the wmtual resignation,of President fuchard Nixon.

Immortaiiz€d by Robert Redford in themovie based on the book AII the prcsident,sMen, the real Woodward is auit€ anenigma. Adrian Havitl, in hi rec€nt bookDeep Truth , pr<sfx:.ts the most comprehen-sive biography to date of both Woodward

THEY CO]I]IECT..To sort of take thetemlvatergete atd

reallyudafu.tt

BobWoo&uarEApril,1976.

BobWoodward.and B€rnstein. H€ also details some of thefabrications that passed for nonfiction inthe book from which the film was based.Most importantly, he gives us a greatwealth of background on who Woodwardreally is, where he comes from, and whathis conn€ctions are.

A YaIfu ald a Seret SocieG5rtrl[enber

The staunchly conservative Bob Wood-ward grew up in l4/heaton, Illinois. A goodstudent at Yale, he was ultimately one offifteen seniors "tapped" for one of thatuniversity's secret societies, Book andSnake, a cut below the more infamousSkull and Bones, but the top of the second-tier fraternities. woodward had his fustjournalistic experienc€ working for theBanne1 a Yale publication. In his 1965 year-book he was referred to as a ,,Banner mo-gul." Havill writes,

Cartalnly, wltl ihe CIA etrcouraged to re-clult 0n th€ Yale csmpus, psr cul8rly

8mo!g hlstory m4rors strd secret8ocl€tl€8, lt ls loote tbsD ressotr-able to 8s8umo 8ob may hsyebeea ole ol those sDDloaoh€d byth6 at€noy, or by 8 nlutery lntel-

ll6ence udt, especlslly Itt€r tour yesrs oltrav8l RoTC t!8hltrg. Althougtr lt would rD-rwet e lot ol questloas that hsye beenralsed rbout Bob Woodwald, st thls polntoDe c8tr olly speculate ss to metber he wssolfered the chstce to bgcor0e & "double-wsl-let Suyi as CIA ogetts w[o haye two ldetr -tl€s are dubbed. It woutd caltslnty beutrderstatrd8blc lf he d€clded trot to edhereto th€ strslght 8td accepted the Bubnergedpatllotlc gl8nou! snd e rs fuDds thst BuchMlatlooshlp would provlde. lt would alsoexpl&ln the oonxoents ot Pulltzer pllzo-wln-Illtrg author J. Anthotry Luk8s, wherl he1r!0te ln 1989 thst Bob woodward w&s .tem-persmetrtally secre ve, loath€ to volutrteerlnforoatlo! sbout hlnself,'or theWsshhgtoDlaD's reD&rks ln 198?:,H€ lssecretlve Ebout ev€rythtng., As Esqulremagazlne put lt, suunlng up ln lts lgge8ltlcle on Bob,'What ls he htdlng?"

Ihe ..Ffoadng Eeata4lor6ttf,g.ddn'neot

Three days aft* graduating from yale,Woodward was sent by the U.S. Navy toNorfolk, V[ginia, where he was commrs-sioned as an ensign by non€ oth€r thanU.S. s€nator ceorg€ Smathers from Florida,Bob's assigrunent was to a very specialship, called a "floating Pentagon,,, theU.S.S. trytight. The ship was a NationalEmergmcy Command Ship-€ place wher€a Pr€sident and cabinet cor.rld preside lromin the event of a nuclear war. It had elabo-rate and sophisticat€d communications anddata proc€ssing capabiliti€s. It had a small€rrepLica of th€ war room at the pentagon. Itran under what was called Slop-Singlelntegrated Operahon plan. For example, inthe event of nuclear war, the Wrip,ht wasthhd in line to take full command if thetwo ahead of it, the Strategic Air Commandin Omaha (sAC) and NORAD, wer€ ren-dered incommunicado. Woodward-straightfacedly-told authors Colodny andGettlin (Silent Coup) that he guessed hi waspicked for the ship because he had been aradio ham as a kid.

Aboard the tf4ght, Woodward had topsecr€t "crypto" clearance-the sam€ clear_anc€ researcher Ha.rold Weisb€rs found hadbe€n assigned to Lee Harvey Oivald whenhe was himself in the Marines. Such clear-ance rn Woodward's case gave him firll ac-cess to nearly all classified materials andcod€s on the ship. woodward also ran theship's newspaper Woodward has insistedthat possessing a high security clearance isnot necessarily indicative of intelligenceworK.

The M'Eht carried men from each of themilitary services, as well as CIA personnel.One of Havill's government sources re-port€d that the CtA would likely have hadadditional informants on a ship of suchs€nsitivity, adding that ,,the rivahy betweenthe servic€s was intense.,,

Aft€r a two and a half year stint on th€continued on page 26

tanua{f-Febr:uarJr, 1996 Flg3E

Bob Woodwardcontinued, from page 13

l4.fiht, Woodward was asslgn€d to go toVretnam. Woodward wrote the Pentagon ask-mg to serve on a destroyer. The wish wasgranted. One naval captain told tlavil that itseerned reasonabl€ woodward would have alittle pr l from his previous duty to avoid get-ting assign€d to Vletnarn. Another former na-val ofhcer disput€d that, saying "Nobody gotout of going to Mehrarn in 1968."

But Woodward did. He was stationedaboard the U.S.S. Fox, based in SouthernCalifornia. The personnel on board the Foxinclud€d an intelligence team, many ofwhom had studied Russian and Asian lan,guages at the famous armed services lan-guage school in Monterey, California

By 1968, Woodward ran the ship,s radioteam. In 1969, Woodward was awardedth€ Navy Corrunendation Medal for hisconmunications work. From th€re, Wood-ward moved on to a P€ntagon assignment,ajob that included briefing top officers inthe governmcnt. Mmiral Thomas Moorerand lormer secretary of defense M€lvinlaird are both on r€cord noting that woodward briefed Al Haig at the White Houseduring this period. What is suspiciou\ isWoodward's semi admittance to Houganthat he had done some bdefing, and hiscomplete denial to Colodny and c€ttlin thathe had ever briefed anyone at the White

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lbe E-di tl.r,r,t! llatrolc. DrEYasBd bH Er r tealDc€ o! ft*ahed Cen_d E-i-- rf'ntlttbo! omcer, IDJoFE Ct-dG - . . ? AnB qrtlor got r&,loulfurr o{ r&lrtty€ opbfoDs flln Ltrt€lllgerce€{'ctt8.It rould €rpl,srl bls asslgutre$ to theft4ht aod hls Etsleedjrg stat€nelts to rowrvrcwers. It {ould nakg utrd€Ntstdsble hls b€ttrgable io get out ot gotnd to VietlsD h lgBB. bls€rteDrton lor 8tr sddluotsl yesr st th€ peutagoD,bl8 behg chosgn to brlef at the nXlte Eouse atdbls ded8ls ss wal.It would slso help expLsh ht8subseque[t bldh.level ftletlrhlps wlth le8ders oIthe g.S. nlltsry atrd tle CIA.

It would also €xplain the role Wood_ward and Bernstein wittingly or unwrt_tingly played in keeping thi Cn,s noseclear while making sure the world sawthe President,s nose was dtty.lhc l€€laslr of DeGI, ttrtort

Whatever his background, whatever hisconn€strons, one crnnot trust what Wood_ward says as fact. Take, for instance, hisaccount in lzeil of his last interview withdying cL{ Director Wiltiam Casev. Havilltrack€d down Casey,s family, friends, hos_prlal security staff and CLA guardians andfound that the visit Woodward descriHwas impossible. First of all, Casey was un_der 24 hour guard by several lavers of se-curity: CLA members, hospitat sicurity, andCasey's family. And Woodward had at_ready bem stopped once while trying rosee Casey. According to one of Havill,isou.rces, Woodward was not rnerely askedfo leave, as Woodward reported in his book,but was forcibly shoved into th€ elevatorAnd Woodward's story kept shiftin6.Woodwad told a Knjght-fudder reporterthat he had gotten in by flashing his presspass. To tarry King, Woodward claimed heJust "walked in.,, But even assuming h€somehow rnanaged to get by all of that se_cunry Woodward would still have been theonly person to claim that Casey had uttq€dintelligible words in tircse last hours. The onlyother p€rson to rDake such a claim was RobertGates, who himself became CIA Dir€cto. Th€family, doctor ard m€dical statr said Cas€vcould not make wor& at this point, or ynob€s. At least cates qu€stioned wheth€r hemight have b€m tnagining he heard words.

House. Havill notes:

Conslded4 the evlde[ce, Bob lgoodwald's deDl,slIoore strl]ngly suggest8 lltel.UgeDce thatr lt do€shls ultlrvolyemeot h Wllt€ Eouse br{einge.Woodward's secrecy about his past, hi5

choice of associates, ana wU is tiu"rn ofhis activities caused Havil to write

$,bodward has neva retracted his ,,cpnversa_tim-" h aditi]n, t bodyvard once said thatCasey sat bolt uprtght, which wor. d seernhighly implausble givm his rapidly deterio_rating state. Ondime CIA Dir€ctor StansfieldT-nnq a frimd of tAbodward,s since 1966.saij l^bodwad told him hdd walked byCasry's rcom and Casey had waved to irim.Casey's bed was position€d in such a way nthe rcom as to rnake that impossible too.

fikewise, f /oodwad does not sesn to de_mand authmticity from subordinates. Underhis watch as Assistarlt Managing Editor of theMetro desk, the R st suff€red a humiliation ofthe highest proportions at the hands of one ofhis hires, Janet Cooke. It was this incid€ntthat knock€d the ftst fiDm its psrh as"Am€rica's leading n€wspap€q,, as it had bemcalerl in the wake of its Watergate reporting.

Janet Cooke was a gifted writer with iknack for capturing th€ essmce of thestr€ets of D.C. She went to th€ post for ajob, and Woodward hired her. More illus_trator than r€portet she painted vivid im_ages, if not mttely accurate ones. Thelatt€r trait soon brought her trouble.

Cooke's crowning glory----and worst di_saster-n'as a story called ,,Jimmv,sWorld," about an eight year old h€roin ad_dict. The story brought both praise andoutrage: praise for the vivid writing, out_rage that a reporter couldjust stand bv andwatch a kid taking drugs. The controversialstory managed to earn a pulitzer, butonly after some arm twisting bv thecommittee head, who overru'ied thecommittee's first choice for the pdzewin_ner to pick "Jlruny,s World.,, Some of th€committee m€mbers hadn,t even read thestory but not wanting to appear divisive,they stood togeth€r, for better or for worse.Made bold by the awad, Janet Cmkds fabri_caticns grcw even larg€r and rnore p€Tsonal.She started making up a history foi hoselfthat she didn't poss6s, rncluding training inEnguages she coutdn,t sp€ak. Sevqal at theftst, induding lrfoodward, wce worri€d tiathcr story of Jimmy may not be true. Thevpressured Cooke to produce ,.Jimmy.,, losingthe battle to-pmtat her source, it rapidly be_"came dear that she had.ro so*.. ?i-"

-*no Jiruqz And for the firut time ew4 a pu_ltz€r was rdtuned. The lbst was thoroughlycnbarrassed by a woman under Woodward',sdirert zup€rvision at th€ papcr... But Woodwa_rd's most stunning decep_tions come from the work that larinchdhis care€r, his tracking of the watergarestory as retold in the supposedly no-nfictionwork All the president,s Men. A&ian Havi.llfound curious discrepancies between ac_

countings of incidents as reported in thebook, and the r€st of the available facts (s€esidebar at lcft).

Givm his role in the Wat€rgate cover-up,arid the misrepresmtations in his own work,it r€rnains to us a huge mysto-y why thisman ls treated with the rwsance he is. Con_sidering his betnvioa his baclground. hisaedibility, and his connections, we now feelmmpelled to join Adrian fhvil in asking whob Bob \ .bod^'ard? t /hom does he serviz Ishis careo sustain€d for the pupos€s of thosen'ith a "sG€t agmda? +

clames Phelancontinued from page 24gan. Rob€rt Mah€u, a frimd and source forPh€lan, had gone from the Company toHughes. But, incredibly, in th€ entir; book,alter the Foreword, th€ CIA is mmtioned inor y two passages. The fi.rst is whmMaheu's role as Hughes CEO is introducedand thm again when the Clonar Explor€repisode is sketched in. In an interview h€did in Penthouse in 1977 phelan was askedabout Woodward and Bonstein and th€possibility that Robst B€nnett_Mr lenCompany orccutive, Hughes ernployee, CIAasset throughout the Witergate aflau_was "De? Throat.,, ph€lan discounted this.He said that Bennett ,,inherited E. HowardHunt" and Mullm served as a ,,cover fortwo CIA agents working abroad.,, He saidne had nterview€d Bennett ,,aad found himto b€ v€ry forthcoming.,,. As th€ CIA docum€nts present€d in thislssu€ reveal, ph€lan didn,t do his home-work in regard to any of these subj€cts. Inthat same int€rview, phdan praises th(work of Woodward and B€rnstein, whowere being deliberately led off the trail ofthe CIA by Agmry asset Bemett. In scan_dals, Scanl{,s, and. Scoulrdrets, phelan chalksup Watergate solely to Nixon,s obsessiveand quirky personality. This was w€ll afterthe publication of Fred Thompson,s booklse€ page 29) which details the role playedby the Mullen Company and Benneit in theWatergat€ affair-

As with his 1967 caricaturing of car_rison, those interested in what riallvhapp€n€d at Watergate and what rel vtranspbed between the CLA and Husheshad to.settle for- personality sketchei, vaguegenera.lities, and phelan,s own cleverlv dis_guised biases. On the two great traumaticshocks to the system-Waierqate and theJFK conspirary-phelan has bien anythingbut what Random House billed him as: anmvestigative reporter S

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