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Anthony Ulasewicz


John Simkin

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Anthony Ulasewicz is a very interesting character in the Watergate Scandal. In 1949 Ulasewicz joined the NYPD's Bureau of Special Service and Investigation (BOSSI). His assignments included escorting and guarding the security of world leaders and their families. People who Ulasewicz protected included Dwight Eisenhower, Nikita Khrushchev, John F. Kennedy, Rafael Trujillo and Fulgencio Batista.

Ulasewicz's intelligence work included the investigating the kidnapping and murder of Jesus de Galindez, the academic who had written a book critical of the Trujillo's military dictatorship. He also investigated the activities of George Rockwell and the American Nazi Party.

Soon after being elected to office, President Richard Nixon decided that the White House should establish an in-house investigative capability that could be used to obtain sensitive political information. Jack Caulfield, a former member of the New York City Police Department, was hired by H. R. Haldeman in May 1968.

In March, 1969, John Ehrlichman had a meeting with Caulfield and asked him to set up a private security entity in Washington to provide investigative support for the White House. Soon afterwards Caulfield employed Ulasewicz to carry out this work. Ulasewicz met Ehrlichman at the VIP lounge at the American Airlines Terminal of New York's La Guardia Airport. Ehrlichman agreed to pay Ulasewicz $22,000 a year plus expenses in return for "discreet investigations done on certain political figures.

Ulasewicz then had a meeting with Herbert W. Kalmbach who paid him out of surplus funds from the 1968 presidential election campaign. All told, Kalmbach paid more than $130,000 for the Caulfield-Ulasewicz operation. In an attempt to hide his activities Ulasewicz was told to apply for an American Express card in the name of Edward T. Stanley.

Over the next three years Ulasewicz travelled to 23 states gathering information about Nixon's political opponents. This included Edward Kennedy, Edmund Muskie, Larry O'Brien and Jack Anderson.

One of Ulasewicz's first tasks was to investigate the role played by Edward Kennedy in the death of Mary Jo Kopechne. Ulasewicz was told about the incident by Ehrlichman and as a result was one of the first to arrive in Chappaquiddick. Ulasewicz spent most of the next few months investigating the case.

Ulasewicz worked under the direction of John Ehrlichman, H. R. Haldeman and Charles Colson. Ulasewicz also worked closely with Rose Mary Woods and her brother, Joseph Woods. In December 1971 appointed former New York City police detective, Anthony LaRocco, to help Ulasewicz in his work.

On 17th September, 1971, John Dean and Jeb Magruder arranged with Caulfield to establish a new private security firm. Caulfield was told that Ulasewicz and his associates would be required to carry out "surveillance of Democratic primaries, convention, meetings, etc," and collecting "derogatory information, investigative capability, worldwide." Ulasewicz was told that this was an "extreme clandestine" operation. Given the name Operation Sandwedge, its main purpose was to carry out illegal electronic surveillance on the political opponents of Richard Nixon.

Ulasewicz was given $50,000 by Herbert W. Kalmbach to carry out this work during the 1972 presidential election campaign. Charles Colson suggested to Jack Caulfield that his men fire-bomb the Brookings Institute (a left-wing public policy group involved in studying government policy in Vietnam). Caulfield sent Ulasewicz to investigate the location of offices, security provisions, etc. According to Calfield the fire-bomb plan was eventually "squelched" by John Dean.

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JFKUlasewicz.htm

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Absolutely it was. There was a second man with him but I do not recall the name of the second man. Ulasewicz was the dominant figure. It is POSSIBLE the second man was Caulfield, but I do not really remember his name. I remember Ulasewicz in part because of the notoriety he gained as the "bag man" in the Watergate cover-up.

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I have just read side by side The Senate Watergate Report (1974) and Anthony Ulasewicz's autobiography, The President's Private Eye (1990). It definitely raises several very important issues.

In March, 1969, John Ehrlichman had a meeting with Jack Caulfield and asked him to set up a private security entity in Washington to provide investigative support for the White House. Soon afterwards Caulfield employed Ulasewicz to carry out this work. This work was paid for by Herbert W. Kalmbach. All told, Kalmbach paid more than $130,000 for the Caulfield-Ulasewicz operation.

Over the next three years Ulasewicz travelled to 23 states gathering information about Nixon's political opponents. This included people such as Bobby Baker, Edward Kennedy, Hubert Humphrey, Edmund Muskie, Larry O'Brien, Howard Hughes and Jack Anderson.

On 19th July, 1969, Ulasewicz received a phone call from Jack Caulfield: "Get out to Martha's Vineyard as fast as you can, Tony. Kennedy's car ran off a bridge last night. There was a girl in it. She's dead." This phone call took place less than two hours after the body of Mary Jo Kopechne, the former secretary of Robert Kennedy, had been found in a car that Caulfield suspected Edward Kennedy had been driving.

Ulasewicz admits he had been paid to follow Edward Kennedy. Was he actually on Martha's Vineyard when they accident took place. What is clear that he was the first person to interview several key witnesses. This included Sylvia Malm who was staying in Dike House at the time. Dike House was only 150 yards from the scene of the accident. Malm told Ulasewicz that she was reading in bed on the night of the accident. She remained awake until midnight but no one knocked on her door.

Ulasewicz also discovered that the request for an autopsy by Edmund Dinis, the District Attorney of Suffolk County, had been denied. Dinis was told that the body had already been sent to Kopechne's family. This was untrue, the body was still in Edgartown. Ulasewicz also interviewed John Farrar, the scuba diver who pulled Mary Jo Kopechne out of Kennedy's car. Farrar told Ulasewicz that the evidence he saw suggested that she had been trapped alive for several hours inside Kennedy's car.

Ulasewicz also discovered that the "records of Edward Kennedy's telephone calls in the hours after the accident at Chappaquiddict were withheld by the telephone company from an inquest into the death of Mary JO Kopechne without the knowledge of the Assistant District Attorney who asked for them". He leaked this information to various newspapers but it was only taken up by the Union Leader of Manchester, New Hampshire. It was not until 12th March, 1980, that the New York Times published the story.

On 17th September, 1971, John Dean and Jeb Magruder arranged with Jack Caulfield to establish a new private security firm. Caulfield was told that Ulasewicz and his associates would be required to carry out "surveillance of Democratic primaries, convention, meetings, etc.," and collecting "derogatory information, investigative capability, worldwide." Ulasewicz was told that this was an "extreme clandestine" operation. Given the name Operation Sandwedge, its main purpose was to carry out illegal electronic surveillance on the political opponents of Richard Nixon.

Ulasewicz was given $50,000 by Herbert W. Kalmbach to carry out this work during the 1972 presidential election campaign. Charles Colson suggested to Jack Caulfield that his men fire-bomb the Brookings Institute (a left-wing public policy group involved in studying government policy in Vietnam). Caulfield sent Ulasewicz to investigate the location of offices, security provisions, etc. According to Caulfield the fire-bomb plan was eventually "squelched" by John Dean.

When the Watergate break-in took place John Ehrlichman immediately assumed that Ulasewicz had been involved. Ulasewicz found the whole case very confusing. As he wrote later: "as the burglars didn't even know enough to tape the door jam up and down instead of from front to back which exposed it, I assumed the break-in at the DNC had been orchestrated with an army in order to cover the real purpose of the effort ".

Herbert W. Kalmbach and John Dean decided that Ulasewicz was the best man to deliver the "hush money". He admitted later that he gave Dorothy Hunt a total of $154,000.

Jack Caulfield told the full story when he gave evidence to Sam Ervin and the Senate Watergate Committee (he had obviously done a deal with the Senate Committee). This put Ulasewicz in a difficult position when appeared before the committee on 23rd May, 1973. To his surprise, the senators did not ask any specific questions of his work for Richard Nixon. Instead they concentrated on how he delivered the money to the Watergate burglars. When it seemed they were going to ask some awkward questions about Operation Sandwedge, John Tower stepped in and said that they would recall Ulasewicz at a later date. Of course this did not happen.

Yet Ulasewicz was obviously a key witness. In fact, he had been running the dirty tricks campaign since 1969. This would have included any actions taken against George Wallace.

In June 1974, Alexander Haig began a classified investigation to determine whether Nixon had received cash contributions from leaders of Southeast Asia and the Far East. Ulasewicz was interviewed about the possibility that he had collected some of this money from people in Vietnam. In his autobiography he claimed he had not been involved with Nixon in this scam. However, he added, if he had, they would never have found out.

Although he admitted to the "crime of obstructing a criminal investigation" he was never charged with this offence. However, in May, 1975, he was indicted for failing to include on his tax returns the money he had received from Herbert W. Kalmbach. He was found guilty in February, 1977, and sentenced to one year's unsupervised probation.

In 1977 Ulasewicz had a meeting with Richard Nixon at his home at San Clemente. They had a "heart to heart" talk. Nixon asked him: "What was it, Tony? What did it? What do you think caused Watergate? Ulasewicz replied: "You had a lot of guys around you who were trying to protect their own future at your expense." He admitted in his autobiography that he did not tell Nixon the full truth. Ulasewicz said Nixon had "enough problems as it was".

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I have just read side by side The Senate Watergate Report (1974) and Anthony Ulasewicz's autobiography, The President's Private Eye (1990). It definitely raises several very important issues.

In March, 1969, John Ehrlichman had a meeting with Jack Caulfield and asked him to set up a private security entity in Washington to provide investigative support for the White House. Soon afterwards Caulfield employed Ulasewicz to carry out this work. This work was paid for by Herbert W. Kalmbach. All told, Kalmbach paid more than $130,000 for the Caulfield-Ulasewicz operation.

Over the next three years Ulasewicz travelled to 23 states gathering information about Nixon's political opponents. This included people such as Bobby Baker, Edward Kennedy, Hubert Humphrey, Edmund Muskie, Larry O'Brien, Howard Hughes and Jack Anderson.

On 19th July, 1969, Ulasewicz received a phone call from Jack Caulfield: "Get out to Martha's Vineyard as fast as you can, Tony. Kennedy's car ran off a bridge last night. There was a girl in it. She's dead." This phone call took place less than two hours after the body of Mary Jo Kopechne, the former secretary of Robert Kennedy, had been found in a car that Caulfield suspected Edward Kennedy had been driving.

Ulasewicz admits he had been paid to follow Edward Kennedy. Was he actually on Martha's Vineyard when they accident took place. What is clear that he was the first person to interview several key witnesses. This included Sylvia Malm who was staying in Dike House at the time. Dike House was only 150 yards from the scene of the accident. Malm told Ulasewicz that she was reading in bed on the night of the accident. She remained awake until midnight but no one knocked on her door.

Ulasewicz also discovered that the request for an autopsy by Edmund Dinis, the District Attorney of Suffolk County, had been denied. Dinis was told that the body had already been sent to Kopechne's family. This was untrue, the body was still in Edgartown. Ulasewicz also interviewed John Farrar, the scuba diver who pulled Mary Jo Kopechne out of Kennedy's car. Farrar told Ulasewicz that the evidence he saw suggested that she had been trapped alive for several hours inside Kennedy's car.

Ulasewicz also discovered that the "records of Edward Kennedy's telephone calls in the hours after the accident at Chappaquiddict were withheld by the telephone company from an inquest into the death of Mary JO Kopechne without the knowledge of the Assistant District Attorney who asked for them". He leaked this information to various newspapers but it was only taken up by the Union Leader of Manchester, New Hampshire. It was not until 12th March, 1980, that the New York Times published the story.

On 17th September, 1971, John Dean and Jeb Magruder arranged with Jack Caulfield to establish a new private security firm. Caulfield was told that Ulasewicz and his associates would be required to carry out "surveillance of Democratic primaries, convention, meetings, etc.," and collecting "derogatory information, investigative capability, worldwide." Ulasewicz was told that this was an "extreme clandestine" operation. Given the name Operation Sandwedge, its main purpose was to carry out illegal electronic surveillance on the political opponents of Richard Nixon.

Ulasewicz was given $50,000 by Herbert W. Kalmbach to carry out this work during the 1972 presidential election campaign. Charles Colson suggested to Jack Caulfield that his men fire-bomb the Brookings Institute (a left-wing public policy group involved in studying government policy in Vietnam). Caulfield sent Ulasewicz to investigate the location of offices, security provisions, etc. According to Caulfield the fire-bomb plan was eventually "squelched" by John Dean.

When the Watergate break-in took place John Ehrlichman immediately assumed that Ulasewicz had been involved. Ulasewicz found the whole case very confusing. As he wrote later: "as the burglars didn't even know enough to tape the door jam up and down instead of from front to back which exposed it, I assumed the break-in at the DNC had been orchestrated with an army in order to cover the real purpose of the effort ".

Herbert W. Kalmbach and John Dean decided that Ulasewicz was the best man to deliver the "hush money". He admitted later that he gave Dorothy Hunt a total of $154,000.

Jack Caulfield told the full story when he gave evidence to Sam Ervin and the Senate Watergate Committee (he had obviously done a deal with the Senate Committee). This put Ulasewicz in a difficult position when appeared before the committee on 23rd May, 1973. To his surprise, the senators did not ask any specific questions of his work for Richard Nixon. Instead they concentrated on how he delivered the money to the Watergate burglars. When it seemed they were going to ask some awkward questions about Operation Sandwedge, John Tower stepped in and said that they would recall Ulasewicz at a later date. Of course this did not happen.

Yet Ulasewicz was obviously a key witness. In fact, he had been running the dirty tricks campaign since 1969. This would have included any actions taken against George Wallace.

In June 1974, Alexander Haig began a classified investigation to determine whether Nixon had received cash contributions from leaders of Southeast Asia and the Far East. Ulasewicz was interviewed about the possibility that he had collected some of this money from people in Vietnam. In his autobiography he claimed he had not been involved with Nixon in this scam. However, he added, if he had, they would never have found out.

Although he admitted to the "crime of obstructing a criminal investigation" he was never charged with this offence. However, in May, 1975, he was indicted for failing to include on his tax returns the money he had received from Herbert W. Kalmbach. He was found guilty in February, 1977, and sentenced to one year's unsupervised probation.

In 1977 Ulasewicz had a meeting with Richard Nixon at his home at San Clemente. They had a "heart to heart" talk. Nixon asked him: "What was it, Tony? What did it? What do you think caused Watergate? Ulasewicz replied: "You had a lot of guys around you who were trying to protect their own future at your expense." He admitted in his autobiography that he did not tell Nixon the full truth. Ulasewicz said Nixon had "enough problems as it was".

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I have just read side by side The Senate Watergate Report (1974) and Anthony Ulasewicz's autobiography, The President's Private Eye (1990). It definitely raises several very important issues.

In March, 1969, John Ehrlichman had a meeting with Jack Caulfield and asked him to set up a private security entity in Washington to provide investigative support for the White House. Soon afterwards Caulfield employed Ulasewicz to carry out this work. This work was paid for by Herbert W. Kalmbach. All told, Kalmbach paid more than $130,000 for the Caulfield-Ulasewicz operation.

Over the next three years Ulasewicz travelled to 23 states gathering information about Nixon's political opponents. This included people such as Bobby Baker, Edward Kennedy, Hubert Humphrey, Edmund Muskie, Larry O'Brien, Howard Hughes and Jack Anderson.

On 19th July, 1969, Ulasewicz received a phone call from Jack Caulfield: "Get out to Martha's Vineyard as fast as you can, Tony. Kennedy's car ran off a bridge last night. There was a girl in it. She's dead." This phone call took place less than two hours after the body of Mary Jo Kopechne, the former secretary of Robert Kennedy, had been found in a car that Caulfield suspected Edward Kennedy had been driving.

Ulasewicz admits he had been paid to follow Edward Kennedy. Was he actually on Martha's Vineyard when they accident took place. What is clear that he was the first person to interview several key witnesses. This included Sylvia Malm who was staying in Dike House at the time. Dike House was only 150 yards from the scene of the accident. Malm told Ulasewicz that she was reading in bed on the night of the accident. She remained awake until midnight but no one knocked on her door.

Ulasewicz also discovered that the request for an autopsy by Edmund Dinis, the District Attorney of Suffolk County, had been denied. Dinis was told that the body had already been sent to Kopechne's family. This was untrue, the body was still in Edgartown. Ulasewicz also interviewed John Farrar, the scuba diver who pulled Mary Jo Kopechne out of Kennedy's car. Farrar told Ulasewicz that the evidence he saw suggested that she had been trapped alive for several hours inside Kennedy's car.

Ulasewicz also discovered that the "records of Edward Kennedy's telephone calls in the hours after the accident at Chappaquiddict were withheld by the telephone company from an inquest into the death of Mary JO Kopechne without the knowledge of the Assistant District Attorney who asked for them". He leaked this information to various newspapers but it was only taken up by the Union Leader of Manchester, New Hampshire. It was not until 12th March, 1980, that the New York Times published the story.

On 17th September, 1971, John Dean and Jeb Magruder arranged with Jack Caulfield to establish a new private security firm. Caulfield was told that Ulasewicz and his associates would be required to carry out "surveillance of Democratic primaries, convention, meetings, etc.," and collecting "derogatory information, investigative capability, worldwide." Ulasewicz was told that this was an "extreme clandestine" operation. Given the name Operation Sandwedge, its main purpose was to carry out illegal electronic surveillance on the political opponents of Richard Nixon.

Ulasewicz was given $50,000 by Herbert W. Kalmbach to carry out this work during the 1972 presidential election campaign. Charles Colson suggested to Jack Caulfield that his men fire-bomb the Brookings Institute (a left-wing public policy group involved in studying government policy in Vietnam). Caulfield sent Ulasewicz to investigate the location of offices, security provisions, etc. According to Caulfield the fire-bomb plan was eventually "squelched" by John Dean.

When the Watergate break-in took place John Ehrlichman immediately assumed that Ulasewicz had been involved. Ulasewicz found the whole case very confusing. As he wrote later: "as the burglars didn't even know enough to tape the door jam up and down instead of from front to back which exposed it, I assumed the break-in at the DNC had been orchestrated with an army in order to cover the real purpose of the effort ".

Herbert W. Kalmbach and John Dean decided that Ulasewicz was the best man to deliver the "hush money". He admitted later that he gave Dorothy Hunt a total of $154,000.

Jack Caulfield told the full story when he gave evidence to Sam Ervin and the Senate Watergate Committee (he had obviously done a deal with the Senate Committee). This put Ulasewicz in a difficult position when appeared before the committee on 23rd May, 1973. To his surprise, the senators did not ask any specific questions of his work for Richard Nixon. Instead they concentrated on how he delivered the money to the Watergate burglars. When it seemed they were going to ask some awkward questions about Operation Sandwedge, John Tower stepped in and said that they would recall Ulasewicz at a later date. Of course this did not happen.

Yet Ulasewicz was obviously a key witness. In fact, he had been running the dirty tricks campaign since 1969. This would have included any actions taken against George Wallace.

In June 1974, Alexander Haig began a classified investigation to determine whether Nixon had received cash contributions from leaders of Southeast Asia and the Far East. Ulasewicz was interviewed about the possibility that he had collected some of this money from people in Vietnam. In his autobiography he claimed he had not been involved with Nixon in this scam. However, he added, if he had, they would never have found out.

Although he admitted to the "crime of obstructing a criminal investigation" he was never charged with this offence. However, in May, 1975, he was indicted for failing to include on his tax returns the money he had received from Herbert W. Kalmbach. He was found guilty in February, 1977, and sentenced to one year's unsupervised probation.

In 1977 Ulasewicz had a meeting with Richard Nixon at his home at San Clemente. They had a "heart to heart" talk. Nixon asked him: "What was it, Tony? What did it? What do you think caused Watergate? Ulasewicz replied: "You had a lot of guys around you who were trying to protect their own future at your expense." He admitted in his autobiography that he did not tell Nixon the full truth. Ulasewicz said Nixon had "enough problems as it was".

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I have just read side by side The Senate Watergate Report (1974) and Anthony Ulasewicz's autobiography, The President's Private Eye (1990). It definitely raises several very important issues.

In March, 1969, John Ehrlichman had a meeting with Jack Caulfield and asked him to set up a private security entity in Washington to provide investigative support for the White House. Soon afterwards Caulfield employed Ulasewicz to carry out this work. This work was paid for by Herbert W. Kalmbach. All told, Kalmbach paid more than $130,000 for the Caulfield-Ulasewicz operation.

Over the next three years Ulasewicz travelled to 23 states gathering information about Nixon's political opponents. This included people such as Bobby Baker, Edward Kennedy, Hubert Humphrey, Edmund Muskie, Larry O'Brien, Howard Hughes and Jack Anderson.

On 19th July, 1969, Ulasewicz received a phone call from Jack Caulfield: "Get out to Martha's Vineyard as fast as you can, Tony. Kennedy's car ran off a bridge last night. There was a girl in it. She's dead." This phone call took place less than two hours after the body of Mary Jo Kopechne, the former secretary of Robert Kennedy, had been found in a car that Caulfield suspected Edward Kennedy had been driving.

Ulasewicz admits he had been paid to follow Edward Kennedy. Was he actually on Martha's Vineyard when they accident took place. What is clear that he was the first person to interview several key witnesses. This included Sylvia Malm who was staying in Dike House at the time. Dike House was only 150 yards from the scene of the accident. Malm told Ulasewicz that she was reading in bed on the night of the accident. She remained awake until midnight but no one knocked on her door.

Ulasewicz also discovered that the request for an autopsy by Edmund Dinis, the District Attorney of Suffolk County, had been denied. Dinis was told that the body had already been sent to Kopechne's family. This was untrue, the body was still in Edgartown. Ulasewicz also interviewed John Farrar, the scuba diver who pulled Mary Jo Kopechne out of Kennedy's car. Farrar told Ulasewicz that the evidence he saw suggested that she had been trapped alive for several hours inside Kennedy's car.

Ulasewicz also discovered that the "records of Edward Kennedy's telephone calls in the hours after the accident at Chappaquiddict were withheld by the telephone company from an inquest into the death of Mary JO Kopechne without the knowledge of the Assistant District Attorney who asked for them". He leaked this information to various newspapers but it was only taken up by the Union Leader of Manchester, New Hampshire. It was not until 12th March, 1980, that the New York Times published the story.

On 17th September, 1971, John Dean and Jeb Magruder arranged with Jack Caulfield to establish a new private security firm. Caulfield was told that Ulasewicz and his associates would be required to carry out "surveillance of Democratic primaries, convention, meetings, etc.," and collecting "derogatory information, investigative capability, worldwide." Ulasewicz was told that this was an "extreme clandestine" operation. Given the name Operation Sandwedge, its main purpose was to carry out illegal electronic surveillance on the political opponents of Richard Nixon.

Ulasewicz was given $50,000 by Herbert W. Kalmbach to carry out this work during the 1972 presidential election campaign. Charles Colson suggested to Jack Caulfield that his men fire-bomb the Brookings Institute (a left-wing public policy group involved in studying government policy in Vietnam). Caulfield sent Ulasewicz to investigate the location of offices, security provisions, etc. According to Caulfield the fire-bomb plan was eventually "squelched" by John Dean.

When the Watergate break-in took place John Ehrlichman immediately assumed that Ulasewicz had been involved. Ulasewicz found the whole case very confusing. As he wrote later: "as the burglars didn't even know enough to tape the door jam up and down instead of from front to back which exposed it, I assumed the break-in at the DNC had been orchestrated with an army in order to cover the real purpose of the effort ".

Herbert W. Kalmbach and John Dean decided that Ulasewicz was the best man to deliver the "hush money". He admitted later that he gave Dorothy Hunt a total of $154,000.

Jack Caulfield told the full story when he gave evidence to Sam Ervin and the Senate Watergate Committee (he had obviously done a deal with the Senate Committee). This put Ulasewicz in a difficult position when appeared before the committee on 23rd May, 1973. To his surprise, the senators did not ask any specific questions of his work for Richard Nixon. Instead they concentrated on how he delivered the money to the Watergate burglars. When it seemed they were going to ask some awkward questions about Operation Sandwedge, John Tower stepped in and said that they would recall Ulasewicz at a later date. Of course this did not happen.

Yet Ulasewicz was obviously a key witness. In fact, he had been running the dirty tricks campaign since 1969. This would have included any actions taken against George Wallace.

In June 1974, Alexander Haig began a classified investigation to determine whether Nixon had received cash contributions from leaders of Southeast Asia and the Far East. Ulasewicz was interviewed about the possibility that he had collected some of this money from people in Vietnam. In his autobiography he claimed he had not been involved with Nixon in this scam. However, he added, if he had, they would never have found out.

Although he admitted to the "crime of obstructing a criminal investigation" he was never charged with this offence. However, in May, 1975, he was indicted for failing to include on his tax returns the money he had received from Herbert W. Kalmbach. He was found guilty in February, 1977, and sentenced to one year's unsupervised probation.

In 1977 Ulasewicz had a meeting with Richard Nixon at his home at San Clemente. They had a "heart to heart" talk. Nixon asked him: "What was it, Tony? What did it? What do you think caused Watergate? Ulasewicz replied: "You had a lot of guys around you who were trying to protect their own future at your expense." He admitted in his autobiography that he did not tell Nixon the full truth. Ulasewicz said Nixon had "enough problems as it was".

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Confidential Memo of Timothy Gratz regarding Don Simmons (alias for Donald Segretti) to Tony Ulasewicz (18th December, 1972)

I received a telephone call at my apartment on Saturday morning, December 18th, 1972, from a man who identified himself as Mr Don Simmons. He said he wanted to find a young person in Madison to do work for the reelection of the President, for about ten to fifteen hours per month, and wanted to put this individual on a retainer basis. He said the work involved opposition research, etc.

He said he was from a political consultant firm in New York. He said he received my name from Randy Knox. We set up a meeting in the Park Motor Inn Lounge for that afternoon.

Simmons said he was interested in running a "negative campaign" in Wisconsin. He explained that the purpose of the campaign was to create as much bitterness and disunity within the Democrat primary as possible. He suggested doing things such as planting questions in student audiences before which the Democrat candidates were working, getting students to picket the Democrat candidates, e.g. a black student to picket Muskie regarding his remark on a black V.P. candidate, etc. He also said he was interested in planting spies in the Democrat candidate's offices. He said that he wanted to concentrate on Muskie, and give second priority to McGovern.

Simmons said he wanted topay someone $100.00 per month, plus expenses, to co-ordinate these projects. He also said he was willing to pay a salary of up to $50.00 per month to a person we could plant in Muskie headquarters.

I asked him if he was working for the CCREP or the RNC. He replied he was working on his own, with his own money. (He implied that he was saying this because he did not want anyone to be able to trace his activities to the Nixon campaign or the Party officially.) I asked him how I could establish his credentials, and he was, frankly, evasive, although I got the impression that he was implying this evasiveness was deliberate.

Although the whole incident seemed strange, I tentatively agreed to work on his project (as most of the ideas he suggested seemed like they were worth doing anyway). He gave me $50.00 in advance payment, and said he would call back in early January. He said I should concentrate initially on finding someone to plant in Muskie HQ. He said that we would communicate only by telephone, for security reasons.

Mr. Simmons registered at the Park Motor Inn on Dec 16, 1972, and checked out on Dec. 19th. He listed his home address as 1400 Olympic Avenue NW, Wash DC. He paid his bill in cash. He made approximately twelve local phone calls, and three long distance calls. One of the long distance calls was to Randy Knox' home in Fort Atkinson; one was to a Madison area (884 exchange) number, and one was to Peoria, Ill., 309-674-2143. (We are checking this number out through contacts in Illinois.)

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Tony Ulasewicz was a key figure in the Watergate Scandal. He had been organizing Nixon's dirty tricks campaign since 1969. Jack Caulfield was very frank with the Sam Ervin Senate Watergate Committee and told them about Ulasewicz. Ulasewicz expected to be given a bad time by the Senate Watergate Committee. Instead, while interviewing Ulasewicz they acted very much like the Warren Commission:

Neither (Howard) Baker nor any other Senator asked me about the specifics of any of my investigations, although they must have known about them because (Terry) Lenzner had made a list of them for the committee. My financial records, including receipts for all my travel and lodging expenses, were also turned over to the committee. I was never asked about my trip to check out the offices of the DNC at the end of May, who asked me to go there, or who was behind that request. Caulfield's call to me the afternoon after the Watergate break-in was never explored, although John Dean was the man who had ordered the call to be made. I expected to be asked about my meeting with Dean when Caulfield was clearing out his office in the Executive Office Building. Again I wasn't. Dean, I concluded, was obviously being protected for star billing as a witness. No one asked me if I had any documents or White House memos about any of my investigations. While I had no intention of playing cute with anybody, I wasn't going to volunteer information unless I was asked for it. I wasn't asked about meeting "Mr. George" or hearing his off-the-wall intelligence plans for the campaign, or about Colson and the Brookings Institution, or about Simmons in Wisconsin. I didn't mind not being asked; I just didn't understand why I wasn't....

Baker asked me in general what my arrangement had been under the agreement I made with Ehrlichman in 1969, but when he asked me "of whom and about what" did I investigate, I didn't get a chance to open my mouth before Baker said, "Let me say this, Mr. Chairman. It is my understanding that Mr. Ulasewicz will once again return for further testimony in another category of testimony." I affirmed Baker's assumption and said, "That's correct." Baker then cut off the inquiry and said, "So we will abbreviate this inquiry at this point, with the full understanding that we can pursue that aspect of it later." Senator Weicker said. He wanted Baker to continue the line of questioning he started, but Baker responded that Committee Chairman, Senator Sam Ervin, whispered in his ear that "if we don't get on with this hearing, we'll still be here when the last trembling tones of Gabriel's trumpet fades into ultimate silence."

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Tim had asked John Simkin to post the following memo in its entirety, which John has graciously done.  Perhaps by parsing the language in the memo, and comparing it to Tim's more current statements here, we can determine what was really being planned and/or accomplished by the Watergaters.

Confidential Memo of Timothy Gratz regarding Don Simmons (alias for Donald Segretti) to Tony Ulasewicz (18th December, 1972)

It is unclear to me whether the memo was written on December 18, 1972, as is suggested by John's header above. 

Clearly, the events depicted in the memo could not have taken place on the dates suggested - in December of 1972 - for by that date, Nixon had already been re-elected, making the events described wholly anachronistic, given that the primaries being discussed would have taken place far earlier in the same year.  This may well indicate that the memo wasn't written by Tim Gratz after all, as he has intimated may be the case.  Conversely, it might also be that Tim simply misstated the year in his memo, though this notion is far harder to credit. 

Even if the year is incorrect and we assume it was written very late in 1971, which comports with the facts described, the final graf of the memo indicates it must have been prepared on the following day, December 19, or thereafter.  The date it was written may prove important.  If Tim wrote it on the following day or soon thereafter, it seems that somebody - whether Karl Rove or Anthony Ulasewicz - prevailed upon Tim to record the events described in a most timely fashion, while his recall was still fresh. 

What is clear, irrespective of the date, is that Tim reported the "Simmons" episode to Karl Rove - who was senior to Tim in the Young Republican food chain, and the most sensible person to whom Tim would turn - but that rather than alert anyone inside the Republican party, Karl Rove seems to have turned the information over to the White House insider responsible for controlling the "dirty tricks" campaign being run by "Simmons."  If all this happened within only a day or so, it is highly unlikely that Rove would have had the chance to contact some unknown third party who then alerted the White House "dirty tricks" chief, Ulasewicz.  If anything, it suggests that Karl Rove was aware of and very much involved in the machinations of Watergate, the Ratxxxxers and Operation Sandwedge.  It is not an inescapable inference, but certainly must be considered possible, or even probable

I received a telephone call at my apartment on Saturday morning, December 18th, 1972, from a man who identified himself as Mr Don Simmons. He said he wanted to find a young person in Madison to do work for the reelection of the President, for about ten to fifteen hours per month, and wanted to put this individual on a retainer basis. He said the work involved opposition research, etc.

He said he was from a political consultant firm in New York. He said he received my name from Randy Knox. We set up a meeting in the Park Motor Inn Lounge for that afternoon.

We must question why "Simmons" placed a called to Knox, and why Knox suggested Tim Gratz was the man with whom "Simmons" would wish to speak.  Given the planned agenda of disrupting and sabotaging rival political candidates, surely "Simmons" was seeking operatives with both flexible morality and tight lips.  Unless "Simmons" was just cold-calling anyone and everyone within the Young Republican camp - a surefire invitation to the entire plan being exposed and backfiring against the Republican "dirty tricks" squad - "Simmons" must have had reason to believe that Knox was unethical and could be relied upon to keep his mouth shut, and/or Knox had reason to believe that Tim Gratz could be recommended for the same reasons.  It may prove to Tim's credit that he alerted Karl Rove.     

Simmons said he was interested in running a "negative campaign" in Wisconsin. He explained that the purpose of the campaign was to create as much bitterness and disunity within the Democrat primary as possible. He suggested doing things such as planting questions in student audiences before which the Democrat candidates were working, getting students to picket the Democrat candidates, e.g. a black student to picket Muskie regarding his remark on a black V.P. candidate, etc. He also said he was interested in planting spies in the Democrat candidate's offices. He said that he wanted to concentrate on Muskie, and give second priority to McGovern.

How, exactly, does this square with Tim's current contention that he thought "Simmons" might have been sponsored by Democrats?  In this very thread, he has asserted:  "I was concerned that Segretti (who I knew as "Simmons") was being funded by a well-meaning but ill-informed rich Republican (perhaps W. Clement Stone) or by a Democrat or by the Democratic Party as an agent provocateur."  One cannot dismiss as wholly fantastic the notion that Democrats would recruit a young Republican to damage its own campaign, only to unmask the charade at a later date, for whatever damage it might do to the Republicans.  However, even in the murky world of political intrigue, common sense dictates that it is such a stretch of the imagination as to be highly unlikely.  The more compelling rationale is that it was what it purported to be: a campaign designed to inflict maximum damage against the Democratic candidate for President, be it Muskie or McGovern.

Simmons said he wanted topay someone $100.00 per month, plus expenses, to co-ordinate these projects. He also said he was willing to pay a salary of up to $50.00 per month to a person we could plant in Muskie headquarters.

I asked him if he was working for the CCREP or the RNC. He replied he was working on his own, with his own money. (He implied that he was saying this because he did not want anyone to be able to trace his activities to the Nixon campaign or the Party officially.) I asked him how I could establish his credentials, and he was, frankly, evasive, although I got the impression that he was implying this evasiveness was deliberate.

This is precisely the vague, but reassuring, come-on used by "Maurice Bishop" in recruiting Veciana: "I represent certain interests of considerable authority and influence, but they must remain unnamed.  Draw your own conclusions."

Although the whole incident seemed strange, I tentatively agreed to work on his project (as most of the ideas he suggested seemed like they were worth doing anyway). He gave me $50.00 in advance payment, and said he would call back in early January. He said I should concentrate initially on finding someone to plant in Muskie HQ. He said that we would communicate only by telephone, for security reasons.

One notes the interesting use of language in the graf above: "I tentatively agreed to...."  Upon acceptance of the $50 on offer, I suggest there was nothing "tentative" about the arrangement.  "Simmons" clearly thought he had bought and paid for services yet to be rendered, an impresson Tim deliberately sought to foster. 

One also notes that Tim didn't balk at agreeing to the arrangement, and did not storm out of the meeting or threaten to report "Simmons" to the authorities.  That he was never asked to actually deliver on what he had agreed to do was due only to the fact that "Simmons" never called back. 

Why didn't he call Tim back?  Because Ulasewicz [or someone within his White House group], alerted by Karl Rove, tipped off "Simmons" that Tim Gratz had loose lips.  Otherwise, "Simmons" would have continued to assume that Tim Gratz was his man - bought and paid for - and contacted him again to put the plans in motion.  Clearly, someone advised "Simmons" not to pursue contacts with Tim Gratz, or there would have been followup contacts. 

Mr. Simmons registered at the Park Motor Inn on Dec 16, 1972, and checked out on Dec. 19th. He listed his home address as 1400 Olympic Avenue NW, Wash DC. He paid his bill in cash. He made approximately twelve local phone calls, and three long distance calls. One of the long distance calls was to Randy Knox' home in Fort Atkinson; one was to a Madison area (884 exchange) number, and one was to Peoria, Ill., 309-674-2143. (We are checking this number out through contacts in Illinois.)

Precisely how did you ascertain the above details, Tim?  It seems as though you managed to procure a copy of "Simmons"' hotel bill.  Surely the staff of the Park Motor Inn - even in the less sophisticated times of 1972 - would not disclose to anyone confidential information about a guest, his home address, his method of payment, the number of phone calls he placed, the numbers to which those calls were made, etc.  In order to obtain this information, did you use the $50 to bribe a Park Motor Inn employee, or did you misrepresent yourself to such an employee as a police officer?  Who were these "contacts in Illinois" from whom you expected to learn the subscriber to whom the number 309-674-2143 was registered? 

Up until the final graf of the memo, one might reasonable believe your assertion that you were simply a waif who got caught up in something larger and uglier than you had expected to find.  The reportage of the above details, however, suggests that you were more skilled or schooled than you were naive, or that you wished to demonstrate to the memo's intended audience that you might offer some utility to them in their future plans.  Either way, it seems that your final graf in the memo sinks any plausible credibility to the central tenet of your story: that you were an "innocent" who found himself embroiled in something through no fault of his own.

All, of course, based on the assumption that you actually wrote the memo you can no longer recall penning.

Did you?      

Edited by Robert Charles-Dunne
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Robert, I did indeed write the memo, I am quite sure, but there are some problems, and most of your questions are easily answered.

First, I absolutely did NOT write the memo to Ulasewicz. I did not even know his name until he came to Wisconsin in early January. I am not sure if the error re who the memo was addressed to came from the book (or possibly even John's misinterpretaion). And you are correct about the date. It was December of 1971 not December of 1972 (obviously). It is certainly possible I made the error in the original memo (or the book made the error when it typset the memo).

The memo was probably addressed to Karl Rove, or to someone in CREEP (but I was not familiar with their names).

Second, although the memo does not indicate this clearly enough, I WAS concerned about SOME of the things that he suggested, e.g. printing bogus tickets to dinners, which is presumably fraud. Some of the things that he suggested, as noted in the memo (e.g. finding a black Republican college student to question Muskie about some remark he made that apparently was offensive to blacks) are just good political work that do not even raise ethical questions. But I was concerned that some of the bad ideas he was suggesting would get the Republicans in trouble, perhaps serious trouble.

I had decided to report him before our meeting was over. He insisted on giving me the $50 which I took so I could string him along. I ultimately tried to return it to Ulasewicz but he did not want it so I put it into expenses of campaigning for Nixon.

You ask how I got the details about Segretti's address, the phone calls he made, etc. Did I bribe the hotel? No, the answer is much simpler than that, my friend. Five years earlier when I was a junior in high school I obtained a job working at the Park Motor Inn in Madison. I was a parking attendant. It was a GREAT job for a number or reasons. I loved cars and I got the chance to park many expensive and exotic cars. It paid very well--most days I earned (in today's dollars) $250 in tips. It put me through college. And the hotel was right accross from the Wisconsin State Capitol so I met a lot of politicos from both parties. At the time the Governor was Patrick J. Lucey, who in 1960 was the Democrat State Chairman in Wisconsin and did much to help JFK win the 1960 Wis Primary. (I helped Governor Lucey into the governor's limousine (which I had previously parked) on numerous occasions). (It was a top-of-the-line Rambler Ambassador.) I also met Tommy Thompson who later became Wisconsin Governor and a Cabinet Secretary under Bush II.

But I digress. The simple answer is that because I was employed at the Park Motor Inn I was able to rather easily get a copy of Simmons' bill.

Re the timing of the memo. I do not recall if anyone suggested it to me, I think I give myself credit enough that I decided to do the memo myself so I could record the details while they were fresh in my mind; plus recording the details from Simmons' bill so I could report those to anyone who wanted to track Simmons down.

Back to the hotel. Although my encounter with Segretti is not recorded in the movie "All the President's Men", it does flash, very briefly, a copy of Segretti's bill at the Park Motor Inn (the very one I used to get his address and phone records).

Now let's go into the ethics of Knox and me. Segretti was indeed cold-calling. He got Knox's name because Knox had been the chairman of the University of Wisconsin Young Republican Club a year or two earlier. Randy Knox and I were from opposite ends of the Young Republican political factions (he was a liberal Republican) but a man I nevertheless respected. (In fact, he married the best friend of a lady that I was dating.) Knox was in law school at the time nad told Segretti he was too busy and suggested he contact me. I do not believe Segretti proposed anything objectionable to Knox or Knox would have reported him.

You wrote:

It may prove to Tim's credit that he alerted Karl Rove. I appreciate that, Robert, and that is the way the Senate Watergate Committee Report saw it. (The Report has language to the effect that I was about the only one that Segretti attempted to recruit that had the sense to turn him in.) As you remarked, I called Rove because Rove was my superior in the College Republicans. What I wanted Rove to do was to get my report to someone in the highest echelon of CREEP.

About a week or two went by and I got a call from someone in CREEP (it might have been Bart Porter) that they did not know who Simmons was and I should decide for myself whether or not to work with him. To me, that call did not make any sense at all. I thought CREEP OUGHT to know who was organizing this campaign on its behalf but apparently without its sponsorship (or so I was told).

It is POSSIBLE that at the time CREEP knew who Segretti was, and was trying to tell me, subtly, that it wanted me to help him. But again, that reply made no sense to me and if recollection serves me I recontacted Rove and expressed those sentiments to him.

A short time later I got another call from CREEP. This call was totally different in tune. This caller said they had picked up on someone using the same approach in New Hampshire and now they desperately wanted to find out who it was. They wanted me to set up a luncheon meeting with Simmons in DC so they could photograph him. I told them this suggestion would make Simmons suspicious. They asked if Segretti was going to call me. I said yes. The caller then said (in that call or a subsequent call) that they would send someone to Madison to try to tape-record the call. That is when Ulasewicz and his associate showed up. But Segretti never called.

You had posted:

Why didn't he call Tim back? Because Ulasewicz [or someone within his White House group], alerted by Karl Rove, tipped off "Simmons" that Tim Gratz had loose lips. Otherwise, "Simmons" would have continued to assume that Tim Gratz was his man - bought and paid for - and contacted him again to put the plans in motion. Clearly, someone advised "Simmons" not to pursue contacts with Tim Gratz, or there would have been followup contacts

A bit out of order but from December 18(?) on Segretti (calling himself "Simmons") repeatedly called me to see if I had found a college student to spy on the Muskie campaign. I kept stringing Segretti along (so he would not quit calling back) while I pursued the contacts in DC. For instance, I told Segretti that all of my College Republicans had gone gome for the Christmas break). Clearly, at some point, before Ulasewicz came to Wisconsin, Segretti had found out that I was reporting him.

It is my understanding that Segretti's operation was being run out of the WH by Dwight Chapin, an aide to Haldeman, and that at the time I first contacted CREEP through Rove most of the high officers at CREEP were unaware of the Segretti operation. (I only qualify this because it is possible SOMEONE at CREEP was aware of Segretti). Apparently it was because of my protests that CREEP first found out that the WH was running the Segretti operation.

I think it is possible Ulasewicz came to Wisconsin solely to convince me that Segretti was NOT a CREEP operative. Ulasewicz gave me his business card (boy, do I wish I had saved it!) and told me I should call him if I ever heard from Simmons again.

Re Karl Rove ("boy genius") Rove NEVER encouraged me or the Wisconsin College Republicans to engage in any dirty tricks. In fact, Rove organized a project he called Project Open Door which was designed to demonstrate the "open door" of the Republican Party to young people of all political persuasions (and he made me a vice-chairman of it). I have no reason to suspect Rove had ever met Segretti when I reported Segretti to Rove. I do not want to suggest that Rove has never in his career engaged in Machiavellian politics but I don't think he would have ever countenanced anything as stupid as Segretti.

The whole Nixon White House operation with the Plumbers etc seems as stupid as some of the tricks the CIA (Landsdale and Fitzgerald in particular) plotted against Castro.

I am convinced if Rove had been running Nixon's White House there would have been no Watergate. Rove is too smart for such operations, in my opinion. Nixon's problem was he had surrounded himself with persons of presumed high intelligence but no common sense.

I may have previously posted this but in the College Republicans Rove was known as such a "good guy" "moderate" that the hard right faction that controlled the Young Republicans only acquiesed in the election of Rove as College Republican Chairman if Rove agreed to hire as Executive Director a person who was considered to be more of a hard-liner than Rove: Lee Atwater. It was through the Young Republicans that both Rove and Atwater met Bush I (and Rove met Bush II through Bush I).

NOW BACK TO JFK:

The reason I do not believe in a large conspiracy is that had the conspirators approached someone like me the whole operation would have beem doomed. I can assure you that if Segretti had suggested physical violence against a Democratic candidate I would have gone immediately to the FBI. How would the JFK conspirators been able to avoid approaching at least ONE PERSON with sufficient morality to object to a MURDER?

Edited by Tim Gratz
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First, I absolutely did NOT write the memo to Ulasewicz.  I did not even know his name until he came to Wisconsin in early January.  I am not sure if the error re who the memo was addressed to came from the book (or possibly even John's misinterpretaion).  And you are correct about the date.  It was December of 1971 not December of 1972 (obviously).  It is certainly possible I made the error in the original memo (or the book made the error when it typset the memo).

Tony Ulasewicz includes it as a photocopy of the original document. Some parts of the memo are difficult to read. In fact, it appears that attempts have been made to rub the date out. Therefore, that is obviously my mistake in transcribing the document.

At the top of the document is the following: “THIS REPORT SHOULD BE CONSIDERED CONFIDENTIAL, FOR YOUR EYES ONLY”

At the bottom of the page is a note written by Ulasewicz for the book:

APPENDIX 19 Confidential Memo of Timothy Gratz regarding Don Simmons (alias of Donald Segretti).

As far as the Senate Watergate Report it has little to say about Tim. This is the only reference to the incident (page 256):

“Generally, the complaints were that there was an individual in the field who was causing serious problems for the Committee to Re-Elect the President. Such a complaint was sent from J. Tim Gratz of Madison, Wisconsin, to Carl Rove, President-elect of the College Republicans. This complaint was eventually assigned to Anthony Ulasewicz who flew out to investigate this mysterious individual. Ulasewicz did not succeed in tracking down Segretti, but while he was out in Wisconsin, he received a call from Jack Caulfield who informed him that Segretti worked for CRP.”

A note points out that this information is based on an interview with Tony Ulasewicz on May 8, 1973.

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John I know you did not intentionally mispost the date. It was also easy for you to assume I wrote the memo to Ulasewicz, but as I said, I did not even know his name until he came to Madison in mid-January. I am sure I wrote the memo and sent it to Rove so he could transmit it to a person of his choosing at the Committee to Re-Elect the President. My problem in the memo is I did not adequately record the things Segretti was proposing that were bothering me. Also, even if Segretti had only proposed ethical, innocuous operations, it would still have been my opinion that CREEP should know who was directing this loose cannon.

I think some young Republicans agreed to help Segretti with his proper campaign stratagems but he then lured them into illegal activity such as the distribution of bogus campaign literature. Several young men (I believe) ended up with criminal convictions because they agreed to help Segretti. It is also possible that they knowingly agreed to participate in the illegal activities because Segretti had convinced them he was working for the White House (which in fact he was). So it was, to them, alright even if illegal because they considered the directives to be from the President himself.

So Segretti hurt many people.

Edited by Tim Gratz
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Robert, I did indeed write the memo, I am quite sure, but there are some problems, and most of your questions are easily answered.

First, I absolutely did NOT write the memo to Ulasewicz.  I did not even know his name until he came to Wisconsin in early January.  I am not sure if the error re who the memo was addressed to came from the book (or possibly even John's misinterpretaion).  And you are correct about the date.  It was December of 1971 not December of 1972 (obviously).  It is certainly possible I made the error in the original memo (or the book made the error when it typset the memo).

The memo was probably addressed to Karl Rove, or to someone in CREEP (but I was not familiar with their names).

Second, although the memo does not indicate this clearly enough, I WAS concerned about SOME of the things that he suggested, e.g. printing bogus tickets to dinners, which is presumably fraud.  Some of the things that he suggested, as noted in the memo (e.g. finding a black Republican college student to question Muskie about some remark he made that apparently was offensive to blacks) are just good political work that do not even raise ethical questions.  But I was concerned that some of the bad ideas he was suggesting would get the Republicans in trouble, perhaps serious trouble.

I had decided to report him before our meeting was over.  He insisted on giving me the $50 which I took so I could string him along.  I ultimately tried to return it to Ulasewicz but he did not want it so I put it into expenses of campaigning for Nixon.

You ask how I got the details about Segretti's address, the phone calls he made, etc.  Did I bribe the hotel?  No, the answer is much simpler than that, my friend.  Five years earlier when I was a junior in high school I obtained a job working at the Park Motor Inn in Madison.  I was a parking attendant.  It was a GREAT job for a number or reasons.  I loved cars and I got the chance to park many expensive and exotic cars.  It paid very well--most days I earned (in today's dollars) $250 in  tips.  It put me through college.  And the hotel was right accross from the Wisconsin State Capitol so I met a lot of politicos from both parties. At the time the Governor was Patrick J. Lucey, who in 1960 was the Democrat State Chairman in Wisconsin and did much to help JFK win the 1960 Wis Primary.  (I helped Governor Lucey into the governor's limousine (which I had previously parked) on numerous occasions).  (It was a top-of-the-line Rambler Ambassador.)  I also met Tommy Thompson who later became Wisconsin Governor and a Cabinet Secretary under Bush II.

But I digress.  The simple answer is that because I was employed at the Park Motor Inn I was able to rather easily get a copy of Simmons' bill.

You mentioned being hired five years prior to the Segretti incident.  Just to be clear: where you still employed by the Park Motor Inn when you had your meeting with "Simmons?"  And, whether or not you were still in its employ, do you think the Park Motor Inn management would have taken kindly to your poaching a guest's bill?

Re the timing of the memo. I do not recall if anyone suggested it to me, I think I give myself credit enough that I decided to do the memo myself so I could record the details while they were fresh in my mind; plus recording the details from Simmons' bill so I could report those to anyone who wanted to track Simmons down.

No offense, but the latter comment seems rather dubious.  You had a copy of the hotel bill, so it would seem reasonable you had no need to itemize its contents to keep your memory fresh.  On the contrary, it seems that the memo was written for consumption by someone else.

Back to the hotel.  Although my encounter with Segretti is not recorded in the movie "All the President's Men", it does flash, very briefly, a copy of Segretti's bill at the Park Motor Inn (the very one I used to get his address and phone records).

Now let's go into the ethics of Knox and me.  Segretti was indeed cold-calling.  He got Knox's name because Knox had been the chairman of the University of Wisconsin Young Republican Club a year or two earlier.  Randy Knox and I were from opposite ends of the Young Republican political factions (he was a liberal Republican) but a man I nevertheless respected.  (In fact, he married the best friend of a lady that I was dating.)  Knox was in law school at the time nad told Segretti he was too busy and suggested he contact me.  I do not believe Segretti proposed anything objectionable to Knox or Knox would have reported him.

You are certainly entitled to that opinion, since you knew Knox and clearly respected him.  However, do you not think it unwise for a man like Segretti to simply cold-call from a list of Young Republicans given what was on his agenda, and what kind of a person he was seeking?  You would have no way of knowing this, necessarily, but doesn't it make much more sense to you that Segretti had been pointed in the direction of those whom somebody within the Republican hierarchy thought both corrupt and efficient enough to be effective in the realization of the "dirty tricks" campaign?

You wrote:

It may prove to Tim's credit that he alerted Karl Rove.  I appreciate that, Robert, and that is the way the Senate Watergate Committee Report saw it.  (The Report has language to the effect that I was about the only one that Segretti attempted to recruit that had the sense to turn him in.)  As you remarked, I called Rove because Rove was my superior in the College Republicans.  What I wanted Rove to do was to get my report to someone in the highest echelon of CREEP.

About a week or two went by and I got a call from someone in CREEP (it might have been Bart Porter) that they did not know who Simmons was and I should decide for myself whether or not to work with him.  To me, that call did not make any sense at all.  I thought CREEP OUGHT to know who was organizing this campaign on its behalf but apparently without its sponsorship (or so I was told).

You are correct.  It doesn't make any sense.  Unless, of course, CREEP and the WH knew who "Simmons" was, and were content to let him continue.  The Bart Porter call was designed, I would suggest, to defuse your concern and give the Republicans plausible deniability in the event of subsequent blowback.  i.e. "We told Mr. Gratz that we didn't know who "Simmons" was, and that any decision to pursue the "Simmons" agenda would be Mr. Gratz's judgement call."  By so doing, they could gauge the level of your concern, and place the onus of responsibility on you, had you chosen to collaborate with "Simmons." 

It is POSSIBLE that at the time CREEP knew who Segretti was, and was trying to tell me, subtly, that it wanted me to help him.  But again, that reply made no sense to me and if recollection serves me I recontacted Rove and expressed those sentiments to him.

You are correct again.  However, what you think only possible I would consider highly likely.  Clearly, somebody within the upper management of the Republican party must have been not just witting of, but in control of, the Segretti agenda, in order to ensure the necessary compartmentalization, and that no wires be crossed.  This is, again, why I suspect that Segretti wasn't simply cold-calling, but had been provided a list of potentially useful names by someone higher up in the Republican food chain.  Otherwise, it is as though nobody was running the show, which is impossible to credit.

A short time later I got another call from CREEP.  This call was totally different in tune.  This caller said they had picked up on someone using the same approach in New Hampshire and now they desperately wanted to find out who it was.  They wanted me to set up a luncheon meeting with Simmons in DC so they could photograph him.  I told them this suggestion would make Simmons suspicious.  They asked if Segretti was going to call me.  I said yes.  The caller then said (in that call or a subsequent call) that they would send someone to Madison to try to tape-record the call.  That is when Ulasewicz and his associate showed up.  But Segretti never called.

Because by then, somebody within the Republican party had blown the whistle on you as non-secure.

You had posted:

Why didn't he call Tim back?  Because Ulasewicz [or someone within his White House group], alerted by Karl Rove, tipped off "Simmons" that Tim Gratz had loose lips.  Otherwise, "Simmons" would have continued to assume that Tim Gratz was his man - bought and paid for - and contacted him again to put the plans in motion.  Clearly, someone advised "Simmons" not to pursue contacts with Tim Gratz, or there would have been followup contacts

A bit out of order but from December 18(?) on Segretti (calling himself "Simmons") repeatedly called me to see if I had found a college student to spy on the Muskie campaign.  I kept stringing Segretti along (so he would not quit calling back) while I pursued the contacts in DC.  For instance, I told Segretti that all of my College Republicans had gone gome for the Christmas break).  Clearly, at some point, before Ulasewicz came to Wisconsin, Segretti had found out that I was reporting him.

Thank you.  My point, precisely.  It is only unfortunate that you didn't continue to take notes of developing events, so that we could know with certainty whether you got called by Bart Porter or somebody else, or the number of calls placed, who made them, and the order in which they were made.  All of this would have been most helpful, whether to the Republicans you were trying to warn, or to those later responsible for determining the depth and breadth of the corruption committed by your party.

It is my understanding that Segretti's operation was being run out of the WH by Dwight Chapin, an aide to Haldeman, and that at the time I first contacted CREEP through Rove most of the high officers at CREEP were unaware of the Segretti operation.  (I only qualify this because it is possible SOMEONE at CREEP was aware of Segretti).  Apparently it was because of my protests that CREEP first found out that the WH was running the Segretti operation.

I think it is possible Ulasewicz came to Wisconsin solely to convince me that Segretti was NOT a CREEP operative.  Ulasewicz gave me his business card (boy, do I wish I had saved it!) and told me I should call him if I ever heard from Simmons again.

Since Ulasewicz was running Segretti, it is clear that, whatever the motives for his trip to see you, tracking down his own operative wasn't among them.

Re Karl Rove ("boy genius") Rove NEVER encouraged me or the Wisconsin College Republicans to engage in any dirty tricks.  In fact, Rove organized a project he called Project Open Door which was designed to demonstrate the "open door" of the Republican Party to young people of all political persuasions (and he made me a vice-chairman of it).  I have no reason to suspect Rove had ever met Segretti when I reported Segretti to Rove.  I do not want to suggest that Rove has never in his career engaged in Machiavellian politics but I don't think he would have ever countenanced anything as stupid as Segretti.

Since Rove learned his chops at Segretti's knee, and has admitted committing at least one Segretti-style crime while being mentored by Segretti, I think it's safe to say that Rove could be as underhanded as he felt the occasion required.  If he learned anything about the Segretti situation, it was the importance of maintaining a plausible arms-length relationship with those who commit crimes or distort the truth on behalf of one's own candidate.  Swift Boat Veterans For Truth ring any bells, Tim? 

The whole Nixon White House operation with the Plumbers etc seems as stupid as some of the tricks the CIA (Landsdale and Fitzgerald in particular) plotted against Castro.

I am convinced if Rove had been running Nixon's White House there would have been no Watergate.  Rove is too smart for such operations, in my opinion.  Nixon's problem was he had surrounded himself with persons of presumed high intelligence but no common sense.

I may have previously posted this but in the College Republicans Rove was known as such a "good guy" "moderate" that the hard right faction that controlled the Young Republicans only acquiesed in the election of Rove as College Republican Chairman if Rove agreed to hire as Executive Director a person who was considered to be more of a hard-liner than Rove:  Lee Atwater.  It was through the Young Republicans that both Rove and Atwater met Bush I (and Rove met Bush II through Bush I).

NOW BACK TO JFK:

The reason I do not believe in a large conspiracy is that had the conspirators approached someone like me the whole operation would have beem doomed.  I can assure you that if Segretti had suggested physical violence against a Democratic candidate I would have gone immediately to the FBI. 

Which is why I suggest that Segretti was provided with a list of likely candidates, persons adjudged by somebody within the Republican party as being both sufficiently corrupt and could be depended upon to remain silent.  If Knox' name or your name were on such a list, you clearly didn't have the characteristics they were looking for, to your eternal credit.

How would the JFK conspirators been able to avoid approaching at least ONE PERSON with sufficient morality to object to a MURDER?

Given that persons who were approached in such a way were no doubt either intimidated into silence by threats against them or their family - or even summarily executed in the event that they balked after too much had been disclosed to them - we would have no way to testing your theory, would we?

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Robert wrote:

You mentioned being hired five years prior to the Segretti incident. Just to be clear: where [sic] you still employed by the Park Motor Inn when you had your meeting with "Simmons?" And, whether or not you were still in its employ, do you think the Park Motor Inn management would have taken kindly to your poaching a guest's bill?

Robert, the answer to your first question is "Yes", as I recall I quit in mid-January of 1972, and the reason was I had a short-term job working with the Rhode Island Repiblican Party. While I was so employed, we took a bunch of young people to New Hampshire for a big Nixon rally. Nixon was not there but there were a lot of celebrities supporting his re-election. The only one I recall was Lainie Kazan. (I wonder why?).

The answer to your second question is "No", but I don't think I actually "poached the bill"; rather, I obtained the information from it (with the help, of course, of a friendly desk clerk).

Working in hotels can be interesting in terms of meeting people. A few months ago I met a relative (daughter-in-law) of a rather famous anti-Castro exile, but I ought not reveal the name!

I wrote:

Re the timing of the memo. I do not recall if anyone suggested it to me, I think I give myself credit enough that I decided to do the memo myself so I could record the details while they were fresh in my mind; plus recording the details from Simmons' bill so I could report those to anyone who wanted to track Simmons down.

Robert responded:

No offense, but the latter comment seems rather dubious. You had a copy of the hotel bill, so it would seem reasonable you had no need to itemize its contents to keep your memory fresh. On the contrary, it seems that the memo was written for consumption by someone else.

If no offense was intended, none is taken. As I stated, I do not believe I obtained a copy of the bill; I think I just notated the information. But it's been over thirty years, I could be wrong about that detail. And I stated in my post, the memo was intended not just to memorialize the details but to be sent to someone at CREEP (through Rove).

Robert wrote:

You are certainly entitled to that opinion, since you knew Knox and clearly respected him. However, do you not think it unwise for a man like Segretti to simply cold-call from a list of Young Republicans given what was on his agenda, and what kind of a person he was seeking? You would have no way of knowing this, necessarily, but doesn't it make much more sense to you that Segretti had been pointed in the direction of those whom somebody within the Republican hierarchy thought both corrupt and efficient enough to be effective in the realization of the "dirty tricks" campaign?

Robert, you are wrong here. I KNOW how they got Knox's name, they got his name simply because he had been the chairman of the U.W. Republican Club. And, as I noted, Knox was associated with the "liberal good-guy" wing of the GOP. His friends, for instance, were supporters of liberal Rep. Sen. Charles Percy of Illinois (they were not, in fact, hard-core Nixon supporters: they were to the "left" of Nixon. And Segretti got my name from Knox. Let me also repeat that much of what Segretti proposed was not necessarily "dirty tricks" but in my conversation with me he did mention a few things which I considered unethical and in some cases illegal. It may have been Segretti's strategy to lure ambitious or energetic young Republicans into his negative campaigning (a negative campaign is not necessarily "dirty tricks") and then sucker them into his dirty tricks campaign. Now I don't know what it says that I was (apparently) the only young Republican that Segretti approached who was immediately suspicious of him. I think I know Randy Knox well enough to state that if Segretti had made the actual approach to him Knox would have reported him as well. Now part of the issue may be the nature of Wisconsin politics. Wisconsin has always been a very "clean" state politically with little political corruption in either party (perhaps as a result of the LaFollette tradition). In Wisconsin, for instance, there is a strong civil service system and little political patronage. This is to be contrasted with a state e.g. Illinois. So it is possible a young person working in a state with a more corrupt "senior" party might be more likely to be seduced by Segretti than someone like Knox and me.

I wrote:

About a week or two went by and I got a call from someone in CREEP (it might have been Bart Porter) that they did not know who Simmons was and I should decide for myself whether or not to work with him. To me, that call did not make any sense at all. I thought CREEP OUGHT to know who was organizing this campaign on its behalf but apparently without its sponsorship (or so I was told).

Robert wrote:

You are correct. It doesn't make any sense. Unless, of course, CREEP and the WH knew who "Simmons" was, and were content to let him continue. The Bart Porter call was designed, I would suggest, to defuse your concern and give the Republicans plausible deniability in the event of subsequent blowback. i.e. "We told Mr. Gratz that we didn't know who "Simmons" was, and that any decision to pursue the "Simmons" agenda would be Mr. Gratz's judgement call." By so doing, they could gauge the level of your concern, and place the onus of responsibility on you, had you chosen to collaborate with "Simmons."

I think Robert may be correct here. And I think it is possible that the first response from CREEP may have been intended for them to give me the "green light" while maintaining "deniability", just as Robert suggests. But I was naive, assumed CREEP was telling me the truth (that it did not know who Segretti was) which is why I persisted in my complaint. If CREEP didn't know who Segretti was, a guy running around organizing activities on behalf of its candidate that were at least "sensitive", it OBVIOUSLY should have wanted to.

Robert wrote:

. . . It is only unfortunate that you didn't continue to take notes of developing events, so that we could know with certainty whether you got called by Bart Porter or somebody else, or the number of calls placed, who made them, and the order in which they were made.

Robert, I can tell you that I received two calls from CREEP. The first caller said CREEP had no idea who "Simmons" was and it was my decision whether to work with him or not. After I further protested to Rove, I got a second call from CREEP stating it now WAS concerned about finding out who "Simmons" was and wanted me to meet Segretti in DC. I am quite sure the callers were different people, and one of them was Porter. But I do regret that I did not record for posterity who each caller was. To the best of my knowledge, I was not familiar with Porter's position in the CREEP hierarachy. I had met one person from CREEP (who was associated, as I recall, with Nixon's "youth campaign"), a gentleman named Ken Rietz. As I recall, Rietz ended up in some legal trouble over Watergate as well, And for what it is worth I had not cared much for Rietz.

Now on to a couple of your other points. I do not believe Ulasewicz was ever running Segretti. I have no personal knowledge, of course, but my reading of the Watergate material (including "All the President's Men") was that Segretti was being "run" out of the White House by Dwight Chapin, an aide to H. R. Haldeman.

I have never read ANYTHING linking Rove to Segretti. If you have any such information, can you please identify its source?

I think history may record that it was a Segretti type trick that damaged the Muskie campaign. Since Muskie was presumably a stronger candidate against Nixon than McGovern, that one action might have been quite important. But overall the whole Segretti operation seems pretty foolish--darn right stupid--to me. Let's get back to the idea of ruining Democratic fund raising dinners with bogus tickets. Can you imagine anyone jeopardizing the re-election of a president on such a childish but illegal operation that may have caused some frustration to a Democrat candidate but obviously had no worthwhile political benefits to the Nixon campaign?

As I have stated before, I think there may have been more to the Watergate burglary (a "secret agenda") than history has recorded. But clearly there was no "secret agenda" in the Segretti operation. Some (not all) of the things he did were illegal, but most were so pointless that one cannot help but question the judgment of not only Segretti but the person or persons behind him.

My political instincts told me Segretti spelled trouble. But my naivety led me to conclude that no one in a position of responsibility in either the WH or CREEP would have authorized that kind of operation, the illegality of parts of which was only exceeded by the stupidity.

Edited by Tim Gratz
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