Jump to content
The Education Forum

The Diem cables


Pat Speer

Recommended Posts

Yes, E. Howard Hunt had been asked - I'm not sure by whom, probably Chuck Colson...

Hi David. I think that with the pregnant phrase, "I'm not sure," you've concisely encapsulated the dense smoke cloud that surrounds claims of the existence of these entirely fictional "fabricated" or "forged" cables (or, by two accounts, "cable," since the perps can't even get their stories straight about how many supposedly existed). This question of the source of the purported "ordering" of forgeries would seem to be a rather crucial point to be "not sure" about, particularly by someone cited as something of an authority.

I can tell you that you're in good company, because nobody in the world is "sure about" it. This primarily is because it didn't occur at all.

I've invested a good deal of time and research on a three-part article (beginning at the next-to-last message on page 2 of this thread) that proves this beyond reasonable doubt. If you would be kind enough to invest a few minutes in reading my three-part article, and then, if you can, cite any corroboration at all for CIA operative E. Howard Hunt's sole claim that he ever was "ordered" to produce any such forgeries, I'd be vitally interested in seeing it. So far, none is in the record. Colson has never admitted to issuing any such order. Hunt, alone, claims that there was any such order at all. It is an entirely uncorroborated fabrication about an order for fabrication.

- to fabricate cables directly linking JFK to Diem's assassination, and he did so.

Do you have any evidence to support the assertion that "he did so"?

As I think you'll learn beyond question in reading my article and the follow-ups in this thread, Hunt did not ever create any forged cables at all. They are a whole-cloth fiction. Only three people in all of existence ever claimed to have seen such "forgeries"—E. Howard Hunt, John Dean, and L. Patrick Gray—and they not only disagree on the number of such alleged "forgeries," they disagree entirely on their form and substance. This is thoroughly covered with their testimony in my article.

L Patrick Gray testified about reading, and then destroying, one of them after John Dean gave him the documents in Hunt's safe. That is the main episode I remember.

Yes, but as I have proved conclusively in this thread, Hunt asserts that he produced two forged cables, and that both were necessary to the alleged deception, and even then only in context of authentic cables. Dean and Gray claimed there was only one such forgery, Gray going so far as to say, in his lunatic attempt to tell his part of the fiction, that Hunt had been able to write a magic "single cable" that all by itself completely indicted the Kennedy administration for two political assassinations.

L. Patrick Gray is an amoral xxxx who—with the able assistance of another xxxx, Lowell Weicker—gave three completely different and contradictory accounts of his purported handling and later "destruction" of evidence, which "evidence" clearly never existed at all. Dean's description of the purported forgery not only contradicted Gray's, it hopelessly contradicted Hunt's.

In short, there are only three people in all of history and existence who ever claimed to have seen these no-see-um "forgeries." You have named those exact three people: E. Howard Hunt, L. Patrick Gray, and John Dean.

In short, these are three liars attempting to tell the same lie, and even that attempt is such a train wreck of contradictions that there aren't even any pieces to pick up. There's just the lingering cloud of smoke.

While I appreciate greatly your participation in this, and would highly value any actual evidence you have that contradicts what I've proven in this thread and stated concisely above, so far you've merely stated "The Official Story," which story comes only from three admitted and proven liars.

Anything of actual substance would be welcomed. As for continued restatements of the fiction as though it were "fact," I think the world has had enough of that nearly to choke the life out of it.

Ashton Gray

Edited by Ashton Gray
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 98
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

Ashton, you scare me. Your ability to ignore what you want to ignore and believe what you want to believe is without equal.

You make this grand statement that you've proved the cables did not exist when nothing could be further from the truth. You've proved that you don't like the people who said the cables existed and from this you have concluded the cables did not exist. You offer no logical reason that the President's attorney, John Dean, who engaged in crimes trying to protect his client, the President, would invent this fiction, BEFORE he personally was ever in any trouble. AFTER the discovery of these cables, Dean coached Magruder in his perjury. While many have believed that Dean was a weasel, who tried to save his skinny neck by dragging others down, no one, until now, has been so bold to theorize that Dean set Nixon up from day one and deliberately sacrificed his career by participating in numerous crimes after he already had the goods on Nixon. I've said it before and I'll say it again: positively bizarre.

While you spend much time excoriating Pat Gray for his original lies, since you hold the cables never existed, you necessitate that these lies were part of the plot. In other words, since your whole theory revolves around this incredibly addled idea that Gray and Dean were collaborators, and Gray initially failed to support Dean's story, then you must believe Gray deliberately lied about reading the cables, only to admit he saw them later. As this would do little to help his personal or professional credibility, once again you've got me thinking: this would be positively bizarre. I mean, not only do you hold that the acting director of the FBI was a secret CIA operative, you hold that he unnecessarily destroyed his own career for...for...the heck of it... I guess. Would not your fantasy plan to incriminate the Nixon Administration have worked a lot better if Hunt actually did make the cables, and Gray not destroy the cables but testify that he was ordered to destroy them, by Nixon himself? You seem to think your supposed colloborators were incredibly adept at lying and making convoluted plots, but lacking the common sense to create plots that directly reflected on the President. I mean, Gray saying that he destroyed cables that were given to him by Dean does not reflect directly on Nixon, does it? Dean didn't say the President asked me to give this to you, did he? Neither man directly implicated Nixon.

So who does implicate Nixon in the creation of these cables? Nixon's top political advisor, John Ehrlichman, in the taped conversation quoted at the beginning of this thread. Ehrlichman says his recollection is that Colson told him they'd created fake cables. Nixon recalls the cables being shown to Life Magazine but swears into the microphone that he didn't know they were fake. Ehrlichman later testifed on 7-25-73 that he discussed with Dean how best to open Hunt's safe, and that later he discussed the contents of the safe with Dean and concurred with Dean that the incriminating materials be handed over to Gray. He also witnessed the transfer of these documents to Gray:

"We were there. He (Dean) said Pat I would like to give you these. The sense of it was that these were contents of Hunt's safe that were politically sensitive and that we just could not stand to have them leaked. I do not know whether he had talled to Gray before or not, because Gray seemed to understand the setting and the premise, so to speak. And he turned the documents over to him and John Dean then left."

Ehrlichman could have at any time in his dealings with Dean and the documents, asked to look at them. Evidently, he did not. As revealed by his conversation with Nixon, he had no doubt they were fake documents ordered up by Colson. Colson had told him as much. Ehrlichman never doubted that the cables existed, nor who was responsible. Why should we?

Watergate, by Fred Emery, p. 71.

"At a September 16 news conference in answer to a question sabout whether the United States ought not to use its leverage in Vietnam, Nixon answer that if what was suggested was "that the United States should use its leverage now to overthrow (President) Thieu, I would remind all concerned that the way we got into Vietnam was through overthrowing Diem, and the complications in the murder of Diem ." There was no great public outcry to this though specialists in and out of goverment wondered where the information had come from. There was nothing to support it in the files. Not yet, that is.

Two days later, on September 18, 1971, the president, meeting with Mitchell, Haldeman, and Ehrlichman, worked on a follow-up to Nixon's initial accusation. Ehrlichman's notes have Nixon saying that the Diem assassination was the best way to get at Teddy Kennedy and Edmund Muskie through the Democratic elder statesman Averiall Harriman, who held office in 1963. The president wanted friendly Republican senators to pick up his news conference statement and demand in particular that Lucien Conein--Hunt's recent contact--be released from his silence as a former CIA man. Krogh should be told that Nixon wanted the entire Diem file by the following Friday. The president must be kept out of it, it was noted, but Ehrlichman was to use Liddy and Hunt among others. And white they were at it, NIxon wanted the CIA to hand over the full secret Bay of Pigs file for his inspection, "or else." "Let CIA take a whipping on this," Ehrlichman's notes of the meeting read.

But ten days later, there was a key change of plan. Even as Nixon prepared to meet CIA chief Helms to insist that the reluctant director turn over the full Bay of Pigs file, Ehrlichman made a note about the other subject: "CIA--wait on Diem---Life Mag release."

What had happened was that Hunt was fabricating State Department cables to "prove" U.S. involvement in the Diem assassination, intending to plant them in Life magazine. Hunt asserts it was Colson's idea to invent the "missing cables" (though Colson later denied knowing about them). Using White House and State Department typewriters, plus an old 1963 date stamp--Kathy Chenow, the plumbers' secretary, remembers being asked to find one--and a razor blade to slice up photocopies, Hunt's talent as a writer produced plausible versions."

Ashton, there is a footnote on the second paragraph. It says "Ehrlichman note, September 18, 1971, HJC, SI Appendix III, p. 197. Evidently, Ehrlichman's notes are available to the public. Do you have them? Can you post them online? Or are you willing to concede that Nixon was the instigator of a plot to discredit the Kennedys via the release and exposure of information on the Diem assassination, and that it was with his knowledge and blessing that Hunt was part of this plot?

If you're willing to concede that much, then how much of a leap is it to suggest the cables actually existed? We have Hunt saying he created the cables, Dean saying he saw them, Fielding saying he saw them, Gray saying he read them as he destroyed them. We also have Ehrlichman saying he discussed them with Colson and Dean, and witnessing Dean's passing a package purpotedly containg the cables to Gray. We even have Mitchell testifying he participated in the cover-up in part because of his concern about these cables. And then we have Lambert and Conein, who are reported to have seen them. I'm still looking for confirmation from them that they saw the cables--I know I've read Lambert's account of his meeting with Hunt somewhere. (If either of them had denied seeing the cables I'm sure you would have posted that by now.) And then there is Emery's assertion that the plumber's secretary remembered fetching Hunt a 1963 date stamp. Not sure where he got this. Did she testify? Or is this news to you as well?

I fail to see why you're so stuck on this idea that the cables didn't exist. I've said it before and I'll say it again--your theories only elevate the reputation of one man: Richard Nixon. Nixon himself never suspected that these cables did not exist. Is it your contention that Nixon, perhaps the most paranoid man ever to hold high office in the history of the United States, wasn't paranoid enough?

Edited by Pat Speer
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Ashton, you scare me.

Boo.

You make this grand statement that you've proved the cables did not exist when nothing could be further from the truth.

"Cables"? Dean said it was one forged cable. Gray said it was just one forged cable. Hunt said it was two forged cables, each in separate folders marked "Fab I" and "Fab II."

Which lie are you trying to make a case for? Don't waste another second of my time with your fevered ravings until you can at least settle on which malicious fiction you're trying to shove down people's throats.

Which is it? Do you claim there were two forged cables, or do you claim there was only one?

(Aside to sane readers: Mr. Speer is completely incapable of answering this simple and most rational question. He will not answer it. He will post another long, barking mad filibuster in the process of trying to re-wallpaper his fool's paradise with fictional forged cables of uncertain number, never noticing that the walls are gone. This is his modus operandi in the face of incontrovertible facts, and he can no more escape it than a mangy dog can escape his mangy skin. Let's watch and see. ;) )

Well, Mr. Speer? Exactly how many forged cables do you claim existed?

Ashton Gray

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well, Mr. Speer? Exactly how many forged cables do you claim existed?

Ashton Gray

Mr. Gray prides himself on his skill at cross-examination. This is the same Mr. Gray who tried to crucify Douglas Caddy with such ball-breaking questions as this one:

"[*]Did you wait for Rafferty to come to your apartment, or did you meet Rafferty elsewhere?"

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Gentlemen, I do wish you'd resist the temptation to gutter-brawl with each other, and I'm sure I'm not alone in that wish. Clearly, you disagree about both certain key facts and the interpretations one might infer from them. That's fine, and much is allowable in the cut and thrust of spirited debate. Reasonable people can disagree without becoming disagreeable. You both have valid insights to offer, and I would encourage you to do so in a less combative manner. [End of sermon.]

Now, on to the details, where the devil resides. I have been giving this matter more thought in the past few weeks - as a direct result of your contretemps - than I have in a good many years. It has raised some troubling questions for me and I would welcome your comments on them.

Irrespective of how many forged cables may have existed, for the purpose of speculation, let us assume that was/were such [a] cable. We know that certain contents of Hunt's safe were turned over to the FBI, while other items seem to have been sequestered from the FBI, the purported cable among them.

And yet the official history informs that the same persons who sequestered the forged cable from the FBI then provided them to its head.

What, pray tell, would motivate Dean or anyone else in the White House to give same to L. Pat Gray, the acting head of the Bureau?

More to the point, what would motivate Dean or anyone else in the White House to all but instruct Gray to destroy same?

What would make Dean or anyone else in the White House think that Gray would accommodate the destruction of the very evidence that the White House had previously prevented falling into the FBI's hands?

Let us assume, again purely for speculative purposes, that because Gray was merely the nominee to become permanent head of the FBI, and that because he was anxious to secure that position, he was willing to destroy evidence for the Nixon White House.

Let us further assume that, once called to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee to have his nomination to the post ratified, he was asked some point-blank questions about his own possible role in Watergate, albeit of the most softball variety, as we'll soon see.

It seems, to me at least, that he would have two distinctly different avenues available: the first would be to lie under oath if necessary, in order to achieve his goal of becoming the FBI's head; the second, to tell the truth when asked hard questions, and thereby derail his own chances of achieving that goal.

And yet, if one pores over that testimony, one soon realizes that Gray took a third avenue that one finds hard to rationalize. Instead of folding under the weight of probing questions, Gray actually volunteered a truth about which he hadn't even been asked, and in so doing not only ruined his own career chances, but also doomed the Nixon White House.

To spare myself copious typing, I've cribbed the following from an internet site, but it comes from a book written by Washington Post editor Barry Sussman, called "The Great Coverup: Nixon and the Scandal of Watergate." It delineates both the bizarrely volunteered hari-kari by Gray, and what it created for Nixon [from page 152]:

"Gray expressed the hope that the Judiciary Committee "not get into the Watergate substantively," leaving that responsibility to the Senate Watergate Committee. Sam Ervin, chairman of the Watergate Committee, was also a member of the Judiciary Committee, and he told Gray that the timing of the nomination compelled him to ask questions he would rather have held off on.

Then, armed with an old Washington Post clipping of October 15, 1972, Ervin asked Gray what he knew about the assertion that a White House aide had shown Donald Sagrada [sic: Segretti] copies of FBI interviews.

Gray's answer was unresponsive. He said, "I think we only interviewed Segretti once, but I have to check that. Let me just check this record here. I know we interviewed him on the 26th of June and I am just trying to see whether there was another date on which we interviewed him.

"My recollection, first, is that we only interviewed him on the 26th of June. I don't know whether we interviewed him a second time. We didn't look into that allegation at all as to whether or not he was shown any FBI interview statements."

Sam Ervin had a lot of questions on his mind; other senators wanted to ask Gray about issues far removed from Watergate, such as the safekeeping of FBI records, allegations that the FBI kept files on congressmen, the infiltration of FBI agents in radical groups, fingerprinting records, the motivation behind the recent FBI arrest of writer Leslie Whitten, an assistant to columnist Jack Anderson.

"Then you can't give me any information on that question," Ervin said, apparently ready to go on to his next line of inquiry.

It would have been easy for Gray to say, "No, sir, I can't." But he didn't. He would not let Ervin change the subject. Gray said, "I can give you information on it but I can't tell you whether or not he was shown those statements---that is what I cannot tell you. To give you that information I am going to have to take time to tell you how we progressed on this investigation."

Ervin did not push for any lengthy explanation. He simply asked Gray to confirm that showing someone the account of his FBI interview "wouldn't be a likely procedure to be permitted by the FBI, would it?"

"Of course not," Gray said.

"So you, at the present time, can neither affirm nor deny that statement," Ervin said. "I take it that you give the committee your reassurance that if any such event happened, that is, if any copy of the FBI interview was given to Mr. Segretti, it was not given by you or with your knowledge or consent.

"It was not done with my knowledge or consent, that is true," Gray said.

Again, he could have concluded his answer there. "But I can go into it further if you want me to explain how it possibly could." On such slender threads, such unexpected and largely unnoticed moments in the actions of marginal figures, bit players of the world, does history ride.

"Yes, I would like to have that," Ervin said.

And at this point, on the very first day of his confirmation hearings, Patrick Gray effectively put to an end his own future in Washington and began to spin out, without being asked or pressured, FBI findings that for the first time confirmed the most damaging assertions that had been printed in The Washington Post and elsewhere the previous summer and fall, adding details that had never been made public. For openers, Gray revealed that in mid-July, 1972, John Dean had asked him to provide "a letterhead memorandum because he wanted to have what we had to date because the President specifically charged him with looking into any involvement on the part of White House staff members." Gray said he began forwarding material to Attorney General Kleindienst to be given to Dean on July 21, 1972.

"So you see the possibility here, Senator, and I think what is being driven at is this: the allegation is really being directed toward Mr. Dean having one of these interview reports and showing it to Mr. Segretti."

No one other than Gray had brought up Dean's name. Until February 28, 1973, Dean had lived publicly at the periphery of Watergate---a White House aide who had reportedly investigated the bugging incident for the President, never seen, seldom if ever in mind.

Gray said that after reading The Washington Post article of the past October, he asked Dean whether he had shown the FBI report to Segretti and Dean said he hadn't. At that point, Gray said, he let the matter drop.

The role of John Dean began to intrigue other senators on the Judiciary Committee. Philip Hart of Michigan, a former prosecutor in Detroit, asked, "When Mr. Dean said to you, 'No, I did not do it, I didn't have the FBI reports with me,' did you ask him if he knew who might have had them with him?"

"No," Gray responded, "because the thought never entered---" "Did you ask him whether anybody had done it?"

"You know, when you are dealing closely with the office of the presidency," Gray said, "the presumption is one of regularity on the conduct of the nation's business, and I didn't even engage in the thought process that I would set up a presumption here of illegality and I didn't consider it."

Gray said, however, again volunteering information that had not been sought, that after the Post story, he asked whether Segretti's political actions should be investigated, and "that opinion came back, no."

Hearing that, Robert C. Byrd, the Senate Majority Whip and one of the most powerful Democrats in the nation, questioned who it was that determined the scope of the Watergate investigation. Gray said the decision to limit the inquiry to the interception of oral communications, and to refrain from getting into more sensitive political areas, had been made by him "in conjunction with the Assistant Attorney General of the Criminal Division, and U.S. Attorney."

"Were you required to clear the scope of the investigation through the Justice Department?" Byrd asked.

"Yes, sir, we work very closely with them on that."

"But were you required to clear the scope of the investigation through the Justice Department, or was this a determination that you would make yourself?"

"No, I do not think it was a determination at all," Gray responded. "I could make a determination, but I would have to investigate what the Department of Justice told me to investigate."

Byrd asked whether Gray had ever discussed the investigation with anyone at CRP (the Committee for the Re-election of the President).

"No, sir."

"With Mr. John Mitchell?"

"No, sir."

"Or with anyone from the White House?"

"Yes, sir."

"Who?"

"John Wesley Dean, counsel to the President, and I think on maybe half a dozen occasions with John Erhlichman."

There was always a certain rumbling, earthquake nature to the forces that pushed breaks in the Watergate coverup into view, compelling investigators to deal with them. One cannot ignore an earthquake.

...In less than three weeks, the Watergate coverup was to be exposed to the public and a coverup of the coverup begun in the Oval Office. Patrick Gray's testimony was not the only rumble that warned of the earthquake but it was the first. One day, while still testifying, Gray endorsed a contention by Senator Byrd that John Dean had "probably lied" to FBI agents. There was no way of predicting what Gray might say next, and on the following afternoon Nixon himself phoned Gray, possibly in fear that Gray, having exhausted the subject of John Dean, might launch into a discussion of the President."

Having not been asked any questons about Dean, by Senators clearly prepared to settle for whatever innocuous comments he was prepared to make for the record, why would Gray deliberately set those same Senators on the scent of Dean's trail, particularly if Gray already knew that Dean was a dodgy character? Did he have so little regard for his own career ambitions that he voluntarily offered up the one man who provided these Senators an opening into the greater Watergate scandal?

How does one begin to explain this self-immolation by Gray?

Pat has previously derided any notion that "Gray and all the others worked for CIA in a massive conspiracy to bring down Nixon." While I don't posit such a "massive conspiracy," necessarily, this single act of giving unbidden testimony, against his own self-interest, surely must rank as one of the most mysterious performances among the principals in the Watergate affair. This opened the whole can of worms that led to Gray's confession he had destroyed evidence at the White House's command, and his immediate resignation.

Was Gray stupid? Or coerced or extorted into making this revelation by others who had a power over him greater than his own ambition to become the nation's number one lawman? Or did he fear that Dean was actually working against Nixon's best interests, and that by fingering Dean he was actually doing Nixon a favour? Or did he truly not know the importance of the Segretti operation, and the repercussions that would befall the White House by volunteering that it was Dean who provided FBI materials to Segretti?

What do you make of this strange behaviour?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hello, Mr. Dunne, and thank you for your genuine interest. I'll very briefly address your sage sermon first, than get on to the things of substance and relevance you appropriately raise:

Gentlemen, I do wish you'd resist the temptation to gutter-brawl with each other, and I'm sure I'm not alone in that wish. Clearly, you disagree about both certain key facts and the interpretations one might infer from them. That's fine, and much is allowable in the cut and thrust of spirited debate. Reasonable people can disagree without becoming disagreeable. You both have valid insights to offer, and I would encourage you to do so in a less combative manner. [End of sermon.]

I deal in good faith with and have the highest respect for people who demonstrate good faith, however much we might disagree. As the record shows, I tried for some time to deal in good faith with Mr. Speer, and he persisted so thoroughly in the most seditious twisting of my statements, and in sabatoging threads, and in the most wholesale and disengenuous attempts to smear me as an individual (while avoiding all mention of relevant facts), that I abandoned any hope of rational discussion with him and stated my intention simply to ignore him completely and not contribute to his vandalism of information.

As I've documented in this thread, though, he had said he was going to "slap me down big time" on the Diem cables issue, and I called his bluff, saying I would debate the case, so on this one issue alone I have responded, and I am still responding to his continuing underhanded tactics, which have not abated. I am here for rational and ordered discussion. At the same time, I won't be a doormat for his abuse, and I'll give as I get.

Meanwhile, he still hasn't even answered the seminal and primary question of how many purported "forged cables" he claims to be making a case for. Given the contradictions of testimony on that count (no pun intended) alone, it's impossible to take the discussion any further with him until he makes up his mind what he's talking about at all.

Now to several very pertinent issues and questions you raise:

We know that certain contents of Hunt's safe were turned over to the FBI, while other items seem to have been sequestered from the FBI, the purported cable among them.

As I mentioned briefly in this thread, I'm preparing (and am almost finished with) an article that deals with the events of 19 June 1972—the day that Hunt's safe was opened by Dean using GSA staff to drill it open—and the subsequent events leading to Dean's handing over two envelopes (or one envelope—also disputed) to L. Patrick Gray.

If you think the number of bizarre points raised so far surrounding Hunt's safe—and the relationship between Dean and Gray regarding same—are enough for a new Lewis Carroll book (there's something to be said for the Carroll name), you'll need a wheelbarrow for what's about to come.

I'm not going to try to lay it out here, because there is far too much information, but it is goes directly to several of the issues that you raise in relation to Gray and Dean. I hope you'll understand that this isn't an evasion of what you're asking, but an expansion on it that transcends the question of the purported "forged cables" alone, and so goes off-topic for this thread. Please bear with me until I get that article posted, and I'd love to explore some of these areas more in that topic.

And yet the official history informs that the same persons who sequestered the forged cable from the FBI then provided them to its head.

Yes. That alone is prima facie evidence of Dean's foreknowledge that the titular acting head of the FBI would never allow the contents of the envelopes—no matter what they were or were not—to be entered into the Watergate investigation. That single datum is enough to knock a normal human being unconscious.

Allow me to complicate it further for you. L. Patrick Gray, in his sworn testimony, pleaded like a puppy for understanding that he "was only following orders." That isn't complicated enough, though: these were orders that he says he never actually received, but orders, nonetheless, which came to him through ethereal means (an exact parallel to Liddy's claims of orders-by-telepathy), to wit:

  • L. PATRICK GRAY: It is true that neither Mr. Ehrlichman or Mr. Dean expressly instructed me to destroy the files. But there was, and is, no doubt in my mind that destruction was intended. Neither Mr. Dean or Mr. Ehrlichman said or implied that I was being given the documents personally merely to safeguard against leaks. As I believe each of them has testified before this committee, the White House regarded the FBI as a source of leaks. The clear implication of the substance and tone of their remarks was that these two files were to be destroyed, and I interpreted this to be an order from the counsel to the President of the United States issued in the presence of one of the two top assistants to the President of the United States.

He revisits this wormholing in his further testimony, but there's only so much I can take at a time.

However, compare the following from Gray's later testimony in the same session, where he has been recorded in a phone call to Ehrlichman. There is no way to shorten this excerpt and have it be understood in contrast to the above, and please note where I have put several words in italics in an effort to indicate the vehemence with which Gray says these words in his testimony:

  • SENATOR ERVIN: Now, you were very much concerned that it might come out in the Judiciary Committee hearings that the contents of Hunt's safe were delivered— Part of them were delivered at one time to agents of the FBI other than yourself, and that these two documents—rather these two envelopes—were delivered to you, yourself, at another time.
    PATRICK GRAY: I don't know that I was concerned. The message—if you're referring to that [Ehrlichman] telephone call—the message that I was giving him then, in that March the 6th [1973] telephone call, did not have to do with the contents of Hunt's—
    SENATOR ERVIN: I'm asking about the next one. In other words, it says, "Another thing—" Now, this is you, talking to Ehrlichman: "Another thing I want to talk to you about is that I'm being pushed awfully hard in certain areas, and I'm not giving an inch. And you know those areas. And I think you've got to tell John Wesley"—a good Methodist name that his parents gave John Dean—"to stand awful tight in the saddle, and be very careful about what he says, and to be absolutely certain that he knows his own mind, that he delivered everything he had to the FBI, and don't make any distinction between, but that he delivered everything he had to the FBI." Now, that was, in effect, to ask John Ehrlichman to tell John Dean, in case he testified before the Judiciary Committee, that he would say that everything was delivered to the FBI at one time.
    PATRICK GRAY: Well, Senator Ervin, what I was telling Mr. Ehrlichman there was told to him on the evening of March the 6th [1973], because— It's not March the 7th or 8th because that is the day on which we received the letter from the ACLU, and what I was— I can pin it down with that, because the language of mine is right there with reference to the letter that was delivered on that day, and that call was in the evening of March the 6th.
    SENATOR ERVIN: Well, but—
    PATRICK GRAY: And the areas—Mr. Chairman, if I may—the areas that I was being pushed awfully hard in were the fact that I had given to Mr. Dean reports of FBI interviews, and had permitted Mr. Dean to sit in on FBI interviews.
    SENATOR ERVIN: Well, the interpretation that I place on this is that you were calling John Ehrlichman— that you were asking John Ehrlichman to tell John Wesley Dean to be careful what he said, and always— to say that all these things that came out, all the contents of Hunt's safe, were delivered to FBI agents at one time instead of some of them being delivered to the agents, and the other being delivered to the Director. Acting Director.
    PATRICK GRAY: That's correct, and I— The message, Mr. Chairman, let me say that the message that I gave to Mr. Ehrlichman was to tell John Dean to shut up! But was not, certainly, a message to tell him that if asked under oath, that he could not testify, because I had previously spoken to John Dean, and on this very subject, and had asked him if he had told Henry Peterson everything about those same very files that he had told me.
    SENATOR ERVIN: Well, John Ehrlichman said, "Right," in reply to your statement.
    PATRICK GRAY: And I don't know what that means, sir.
    SENATOR ERVIN: Well, you were asking to tell John Dean to say that all of the contents of the safe were delivered to the FBI at one time instead of part of them being delivered to the agents and others being delivered to you.
    PATRICK GRAY: I was telling John Ehrlichman to tell John Dean to shut up unless he told the real facts of it. No question about that.
    SENATOR ERVIN: And the next— top of the next page it says, "And he—" "And he"—that is Dean—"delivered it to those agents. This is absolutely imperative."
    PATRICK GRAY: That is— That is correct. I told him that to distinguish between the Watergate evidence and the non-Watergate evidence as they told me.
    SENATOR ERVIN: And Ehrlichman says, "All right." And this same—of this bugging that John Ehrlichman did—shows that he called Dean. And he told Dean that you had called him, and that you had said for him, Ehrlichman, to make sure that old John W. Dean stays very firm and steady on the story that he delivered every document to the FBI, and that he doesn't start making nice distinctions between agents and Directors.
    PATRICK GRAY: Yes, sir, I did.
    SENATOR ERVIN: And then Ehrlichman asked Dean why— Rather Ehrlichman asks Dean, says, "Why did he call me?" That is why did you call him. "To cover his tracks?" And Dean says, "Yeah, sure. I laid this on him yesterday." Ehrlichman: "Oh, I see. Okay." Now, as a matter of fact, isn't the interpretation of that transaction that you called Ehrlichman and asked him to see that Dean said, whenever he talked, that all— That you— That all of the contents of Hunt's safe had been delivered to the FBI at one time, to the agents, rather than part to the agents and part to the Director?
    PATRICK GRAY: I think you've got to put that in the proper context, Mr. Chairman. I had just had a call the day before [March 5, 1972] with John Dean regarding this, and what— in which I went into a chapter-and-verse with him, because he had told Henry Peterson of the delivery of these two files to me. And I had asked John Dean, "If you, John, have told Henry everything you told me about those files—that they were non-Watergate evidence, non-Watergate related, should clearly not be allowed to see the light of day, were political dynamite." So this has got to be put in that proper context. But there's no question about it that in that telephone call I was saying to John Ehrlichman to tell John Dean to shut up! Because he was making nice distinctions there that those two did not make with me at all. My assumption was that they had delivered all of the Watergate evidence that was in Mr. Hunt's files to the agents.
    SENATOR ERVIN: It seems to me this is a much— is a very simple proposition. Isn't this it in essence: that you asked John Ehrlichman to see that Hunt [sic] refrained from telling the truth about— That Dean refrained from telling the truth about this, and tell, on the contrary, that all of it was delivered to the FBI at one time. And John Ehrlichman agreed to do that and to call Dean, and repeat your request to him.
    PATRICK GRAY: Certainly that was not my understanding of the call. They can't tell me one thing, Mr. Chairman, you know, and then tell another thing. I certainly told—I don't make any bones about it—I told John Ehrlichman to tell John Dean to shut up.
    SENATOR ERVIN: Yes. Well, isn't—
    PATRICK GRAY: But just— Just the day before, I had told John—
    SENATOR ERVIN: Mr. Gray, isn't— Isn't the interpretation to be placed on this is that you were asking Ehrlichman to tell John Dean not to tell the truth about how these documents, some of them got to you, and some of them to the agents of the FBI?
    PATRICK GRAY: No, sir. Because—
    SENATOR ERVIN: Well, I don't believe I'll question it further. Just let the record show that the two tapes of John Ehrlichman—the recording, I believe, instead of "the bugging," the recording—the two recordings of John Ehrlichman of his conversations with the witness be put into the record at this point, and let somebody else interpret it.

I don't know what to say. On the one hand, Mr. Gray claims to have received telepathic orders and acted on them because Dean and Ehrlichman were such august, vaunted representatives of "the President," then on the other hand he calls Ehrlichman and starts issuing orders to him and Dean for Dean to shut up.

This reply has gone quite long, and if you can bear with me until I can get the other article posted, I think that it will at least shed new light on, if failing to answer, some of your other very interesting questions regarding the Dean/Gray relationship, and not only in relation to the contents of Hunt's safe.

How does one begin to explain this self-immolation by Gray?

To me, there's every indication that the immolation was preordained, and, as with every one of the actors, they merely threw themselves into the fires of the phoenix.

While I don't posit such a "massive conspiracy," necessarily, this single act of giving unbidden testimony, against his own self-interest, surely must rank as one of the most mysterious performances among the principals in the Watergate affair.

It is only not mysterious when viewed as just that: a performance, and one meticulously timed. In fact, it absolutely had to come during his confirmation hearings.

This opened the whole can of worms that led to Gray's confession he had destroyed evidence at the White House's command, and his immediate resignation.

If his only role and purpose was to control and steer the Watergate investigation in tandem with Dean, including the "destroy Hunt evidence" hoax, then step off the stage, at least two essential elements would be required:

  1. The appearance of having been acting on White House orders in destroying purported evidence, and,
  2. The appearance of conflict with Dean.

I find an almost infinite fascination in the divine timing of Ehrlichman's sudden impulse to record a phone call. It ranks for divine guidance perhaps second only to Colson's inspired impulse to record a phone call with Hunt on the same day that Richard Helms was back-channeling a glowing endorsement of Hunt for White House employment. (Would God please pick up the white courtesy phone?)

Was Gray stupid?

Well, yes. But not in any conventional way.

What do you make of this strange behaviour?

That just as in the Case of the Fiction of the "First Break-In", the admitted co-conspirators gave "confessions" that were complete lies, which lies, upon actual inspection and comparison, crumble to dust.

I'll have the other article posted as soon as possible.

Ashton Gray

Edited by Ashton Gray
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Meanwhile, he still hasn't even answered the seminal and primary question of how many purported "forged cables" he claims to be making a case for. Given the contradictions of testimony on that count (no pun intended) alone, it's impossible to take the discussion any further with him until he makes up his mind what he's talking about at all.

Ashton Gray

Please enlighten us on where the contradictions are regarding the number of forged cables. Howard Hunt testified that he created two forged cables, one from the embassy in Vietnam inquiring whether the U.S. would grant asylum to Diem, and a reply from Washington saying that the U.S. would not grant asylum.

Hunt had in mind that a request of this magnitude, involving a head of state, would neccessarily have to be brought to the attention of the President, JFK, for the final decision.

Hunt has never recanted this testimony, as far as I know, and no one has ever contradicted him, as far as I know. Pat Gray testified that he read the reply cable from Washington, and just skimmed through the reminder of the file, but Gray does not say (and was in no position to say, since he did not read everything in the file) that there was only one cable.

[EDIT: Did John Dean muddy the waters on the number of forged cables?

  • JOHN DEAN: A bogus cable—that is, other cables spliced together into one cable regarding the involvement of persons in the Kennedy administration in the fall of the Diem regime in Vietnam. ...I subsequently met with Ehrlichman to inform him of the contents of Hunt's safe. I gave him a description of the electronic equipment and told him about the bogus cable...

Ashton Gray

Dean's testimony admittedly could be cited to show that he only saw one cable, or it could be cited to show that he saw more than one cable, and that they were "spliced together." Hunt testified that his safe contained several drafts of the forged cables, so it is entirely possible that Dean is referring here to one of the drafts. Dean's testimony on this issue is not very precise. It appears that the questioning of Dean was not very specific, presumably because the Committee members felt they had no reason to doubt that there were two forged cables, and they saw nothing in Dean's testimony to make them question that belief.

What did Chuck Colson have to say on this subject? Only Ashton Gray knows that, and he's not telling. END of EDIT]

Up to now, no one has questioned the existence of two forged cables, and I would be interested to know on what basis Mr. Gray is questioning that now.

Edited by J. Raymond Carroll
Link to comment
Share on other sites

[J. Raymond Carroll' date=Jul 7 2006, 01:47 PM' post='67508]

'Ashton Gray' post='67474' date='Jul 7 2006, 03:11 AM']

What did Chuck Colson have to say on this subject? Only Ashton Gray knows that, and he's not telling. END of EDIT] [/color

[/color] [/color] Mr Carroll:

Up to now, no one has questioned the existence of two forged cables, and I would be interested to know on what basis Mr. Gray is questioning that now.

[/color]

Are you suggesting that Ashton Gray is having some telepathic communication with Chasles Colson?

May I suggest you re-read the entire section, re forged (non) cable(s) .

I am not trying to be funny or argumentative; I appreciate RCD's request for civility and will honor same.

Re Colson: See Memo for file, subject Howard Hunt, 6/20/72. Submitted to House Jud. Comm. (will post later, am working)

I am not aware of any " Colson testimony", are you?

Dawn

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Call me, Pollyanna, but when people say something, and it makes sense, I tend to believe them. Both Dean and Ehrlichman testified that they gave the stuff to Gray to keep it out of FBI hands and prevent its contents from being leaked, and that they considered the material political dynamite that had nothing to do with the Watergate break-in. As Ehrlichman testified, if they'd wanted it destroyed (and were willing to take the responsibility for its destruction) they could have put it in a burn bag. Gray, however, after moving it around for months, decided on his own, as pointed out by Ashton, that the stuff should disappear. He had no idea at the time he destroyed the documents that the Watergate investigation would rekindle shortly thereafter. Realizing his exposure on this issue, he later pressured Ehrlichman and Dean not to mention the envelopes.

The Watergate story can only be understood by realizing that virtually everyone involved was anxious to save his own neck. Only Liddy and the Cubans went willingly to jail. Everyone else including the president connived, wheeled-and-dealed, taped their conversations and manufactured memos to protect their own behinds. That's how it's done in Washington. The rats scurried but nevertheless got caught.

If Gray said too much in his confirmation hearings it was most logically because he felt he was clean as far as Watergate. Outside of his destruction of documents unrelated to the Watergate break-in, he was indeed relatively clean. The so-called smoking gun conversation between Nixon and Haldeman reflects that they were trying to get the CIA to turn off the FBI investigation. Subsequent conversations indicate that this failed to turn off the investigation. These conversations indicate that Gray himself was not at the beck-and-call of Nixon and his associates, and would not simply call off the investigation because they asked him to. He was only acting director, after all, and, unlike his predecessor Hoover, lacked the power within the Bureau to effectively pull off a cover-up. Felt, for one, would have undercut him.

Which brings me to my little trip to the library. Amazing things, libraries. Sometimes you can find the most amazing things there. It turned out that my local library has a couple of dozen Government Printing Office-issued editions of of Watergate material, including the 7-15-73 testimony of Charles W. Colson. While he denied his ordering Hunt to make the cables, he also acknowledged they existed.

The relevant testimony. p. 265-266

(When discussing the contents of Hunt's safe)

Colson: "I think I asked Mr. Dean at that point what had happened to the contents of the safe, and he said to me, everything was turned over to the FBI....but everything was not in the FBI's possession...

Jenner: Did you ask him to explain that?

Colson: Yes.

Jenner: What did he say?

Colson: He said, ah, forget it. I didn't pursue it any further.... I never saw the contents of Hunt's safe and I have no idea what was in it."

P. 280(When asked to read notes made by his secretary of a post Watergate break-in conversation she had with Hunt.)

Colson: (reading the notes aloud) "Lambert came with instructions from CWC to to see what was in safe."

Jenner: Who is Lambert?

Colson: Lambert is a reporter from Life magazine who had been dealing with Hunt and had called Hunt and later called my office and wanted to give me a message from Hunt, and Joan Hall (Colson's secretary) told him I was not accepting any messages.

NOTE: from this it seems likely that Hunt was trying to remind Colson that he knew where some bodies were buried, and that one of these bodies directly implicated Colson, and that Colson should do all he could to help Hunt with his legal troubles.

Jenner: The "CWC." Whose initials are those?

Colson: That is me.

Jenner: Charles W. Colson.

Colson: Yes.

P. 287

Jenner: Would you direct yourself, turn to Colson exhibit No. 11, Mr. Colson?

Colson: Yes, sir.

Jenner: About that last line, which reads "Lambert came with instructions from CWC"--that is you--

Colson: Right.

Jenner: "To see what was in safe." Now, having called that to your attention, Congressman Rangel wishes to know and I will ask you on behalf of the entire committee what your recollection is as to Mr. Lambert coming to you with--or came to somebody, Hunt, with instructions from you to see what was in the safe.

Colson: Lambert was a reporter who had been dealing with Hunt and I don't know. I never gave him an y instructions to get in touch with Mr. Hunt, so I can't imagine what the message means, although I do know that Mr. Lambert tried to reach me with a message from Hunt after he had talked to Hunt: and my secretary, Mrs. Hall, told Lambert, forget about it, Colson won't talk to you because he does not want any information from Hunt through you or anyone else. She has testified to that in other places.

Jenner: Is that sufficient, Mr. Rangel?

Rangel: I guess it is the best we will get.

P. 515 (During direct examination by the committee, Congressman Waldie returns to the issue of Colson's knowledge of Hunt's activities, and finally gets somewhere.)

Waldie: All right. Next question. You knew that the cables that were manufactured by Hunt at your direction were in fact, fabricated involving the Diem, did you not?

NO ANSWER IS NOTED.

Waldie: Well, he showed them to you, whether they were at your direction, and let's assume they were not, you saw the cables and you knew that they were fabricated, did you not?

Colson: I saw--I was aware of--I don't know that I actually physically saw one cable that was--

Waldie: Did you know it was fabricated?

Colson: YES SIR, I DID.

Waldie: Did you tell him not to publish that cable or not to use it or destroy it?

Colson: Yes, sir. I certainly didn't tell him to destroy it--

Waldie: What did you tell him to do, go back and work on it some more, didn't you?

Colson: No, Mr. Lambert--well, it's a very long chronology. Well, I have testified to it at some length and probably will again. But, I don't think we can do it in your 5 minutes. I can just say this to you, that once I knew he had shown that to Mr. Lambert, I did everything I knew how to get Mr. Lambert off of that story.

Waldie: Did you tell Mr. Lambert that what he had been shown by Mr. Hunt was in fact a fabrication?

Colson: Except for the fact that I didn't tell that to Mr. Lambert.

Waldie: So you did everything except tell Mr. Lambert the truth?

Colson: I was starting to say that; yes, sir.

So, there you have it... despite his attempts at avoiding the topic, and despite his attempts at casting himself as an innocent, Charles Colson left the door open that he saw the cables, admitted he was aware of the cables, admitted that they had been fabricated, and expressed personal knowledge that they had been shown to Life magazine. NEED WE DISCUSS THIS ANY FURTHER? WHY OH WHY WOULD HUNT try to fool Colson into thinking he'd made fake cables and then pretend to show them to Life magazine, when he could have just faked the cables?

Edited by Pat Speer
Link to comment
Share on other sites

============BEGIN DOCUMENT===============

CHARLES COLSON MEMORANDUM

JUNE 20 1972

Indistinct document retyped by House Judiciary Committee staff

MEMORANDUM FOR THE FILE

SUBJECT: Howard Hunt

June 20, 1972

The last time that I recall meeting with Howard Hunt was mid-March.

According to my office records, the date was March 15. At that time I

was under the impression that Hunt had left the White House and was

working at the Committee for the Re-election of the President. I may

have seen Hunt once or even possibly twice subsequent to that time.

These were (or this was), however, a chance encounter.

I do recall seeing him outside of my office during a day this Spring;

I recall inquiring about his health since he had told me in March he

had bleeding ulcers. During the brief conversation in the corridor,

nothing was discussed of any of Hunt's work or his areas of

responsibility. As I recall, he merely told me that he had been very

busy and that after getting some rest, his health had been restored.

I also talked to him on the telephone the night Governor Wallace was

shot simply to ask him for his reactions on what he thought might

have been the cause of the attempted assassination. (Hunt was known

of something of an expert of psychological warfare and motivations

when in the CIA.)

The only other communication I can recall subsequent to March 15 was

a memo I sent to Howard in connection with what I thought his duties

were at 1701, i.e. security at the Republican Convention. Steve Bull

told me he had a friend in Miami who had been stationed in the White

House but was now in the Miami office of the Secret Service who

wanted to be of help to whoever was handling security for the

convention. I merely sent Hunt a note suggesting that he get in touch

with Bull's friend.

To the best of my recollection, Hunt came to me during the month of

January and said he had no work to do here and no one was giving him

any assignments and that this was the only campaign year he would

ever probably have a chance to participate in, that he cared only

about one thing, the re-election of the President, and that he wanted

to be of help in any way he could, for pay or not for pay. I told him

I had nothing in my office, but that I thought once the Committee was

organized and Mitchell was in charge, there would be work for him to

do at the Committee. I told him that I would be sure the Committee

was aware of his desire to help. I did nothing further.

A few weeks later Hunt dropped by my office with Gordon Liddy, from

the Committee. I believe this was in February, possibly early in the

month, although my office records do not show the visit. Hunt said he

was in the building and just wanted to talk briefly. Both he and

Liddy said that they had some elaborate proposals prepared for

security activities for the Committee, but they had been unable to

get approval from the Attorney General. I explained that Mitchell

would soon be at the Committee and that they should be persistent and

see him because he was the only one who could authorize work they

would be doing. I have a vague recollection that Liddy said, "We

[referring to Hunt and himself] are now over at the Committee working

and we are anxious to get started but can't find anyone who can make

a decision or give us the green light" or words to that effect.

While Liddy and Hunt were in my office, I called Jeb Magruder and

urged them to resolve whatever it was that Hunt and Liddy wanted to

do and to be sure he had an opportunity to listen to their plans. At

one point, Hunt said he wanted to fill me in and I said it wasn't

necessary because it was of no concern to me, but that I would be

glad to urge that their proposals, whatever they were, be considered.

There was no discussion that I can recall of what it was that they

were planning to do other than the fact that I have the distinct

impression that it involved security at the convention and/or

gathering intelligence during the Democratic National Convention.

In March, Hunt sent me a memo explaining that when he retired from

the CIA he had failed to designate survivor benefits for his wife and

in view of the fact that he had had severe ulcer attacks, he wondered

if this could be changed in view of his present government service. I

told him to take the matter up with Dick Howard, which he did. Dick's

memo to Kehrli, copy attached, was the result. I assume Dick Howard

discovered at this time that Hunt was still on the rolls even though

not working for us.

I had assumed throughout Hunt's tenure in the White House that he was

charged to someone else's budget. I signed the original request for

him to be a consultant because everyone else was in California at the

time it was decided to bring him in. Shortly after he came on board,

however, he was assigned to David Young and Bud Krogh and I didn't

consider at any time after that that Hunt was under my supervision or

responsibility. From time to time after Hunt had come on board, he

did talk to me, normally to express his frustrations in being unable

to get things through the David Young operation. Of course, on

occasion also we talked socially and about politics, something Howard

and I had done from time to time over the years.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Dear Mr. Speer,

Your predictability is exceeded only by your propensity for shooting yourself in the foot.

As expected, you have saved me the trouble of completely, utterly, and finally impeaching the last possible salvation you had to hope for in frantically trying to fan life into the faint few acrid wisps of smoke, all that remained of your fantasy-world "forged Diem cables."

I knew all the way back in this thread when I was demanding that you finish making your case that the Colson "testimony" would be forthcoming from you sooner or later. I kept waiting for it. And when you refused to state whether you had finished making your so-called case or not, I knew exactly how this all would end. And when it ends with utter finality, at the end of this message, there won't even be any wisps of smoke left

And as I also predicted with uncanny accuracy only a few messages back, you cannot, will not, answer the simple question of how many fictional "forged Diem cables" you've been trying to build "a case" for. I'm going to summate why you won't herein.

Therefore, in this finalizing severance letter to you, I hereby summate the contradictions of the constantly lying liars who seeded this seditious myth all over the world, and every last one of the admitted and convicted liars and perjurers you call upon to build your "case" is impeached beyond any salvation. So your entire "case" is built on the quicksand of self-contradictory and mutually-contradictory lies of convicted criminal co-conspirators, and you have sealed the deal with Colson as your new star "witness."

Of course I understand completely that you are here to champion the "honor" and "integrity" and "truth" of statments made (or seemingly made) by such cruds. How could it be otherwise.

For me, I just see them as the pathological liars thay are.

So now, if you'll excuse me, since you've finally dragged in every last scrap you could scrape up to throw at the wall and try to make it stick (and it only took you to page 5 of this thread), I'm going to summate your case for you, and my summation of your case is my final closing argument.

This is my last farewell to you, Mr. Speer, because with this summation, I permanently sever all correspondence with you on any basis. And the same goes now for your teammate, Raymond Carroll.

Good-bye.

===================================

To other readers exclusively, here is a summation of Pat Speer's "case." Although I'll be happy to discuss any of this with anyone besides the Katzenjammer Kidz referenced above, with this message I am done with anything I really have to say on the subject.

I. DID COLSON ORDER CABLES FABRICATED OR NOT?

Career xxxx and convicted criminal E. Howard Hunt's story:

  • E. HOWARD HUNT: After a week or so [of going through State Department cables], I reported my findings to Colson, who said, "The full story isn't there, then?"
    "No, but anyone who read the cables as I have could never doubt the complicity of the Kennedy administration in the death of the Vietnamese Premiere."
    ...Colson pursed his lips. "You know and I know that the New Frontier was responsible for those murders."
    I nodded. ...I handed him the two most damaging authentic cables I had been able to locate in State's files. Quickly, Colson reread them, handed them back and said, "See if you can't improve on them."

Now convicted criminal and pathological xxxx Charles Colson's story:

  • QUESTION: ...You knew that the cables that were manufactured by Hunt at your direction were in fact, fabricated involving the Diem, did you not?
    CHARLES COLSON: [NO ANSWER IS NOTED]

This is the sum and total of information on who, if anyone, ordered any forgeries. Career xxxx, blackmailer (according to Pat Speer), and convicted criminal E. Howard Hunt's uncorroborated testimony is the sole foundation for any order ever having been issued to forge any cables at all.

II. THE INFAMOUS LAMBERT OPERATION

First, career xxxx and convicted criminal E. Howard Hunt's claims about Bill Lambert:

  • E. HOWARD HUNT: Colson suggested that I show Bill Lambert my entire collection of authentic State Department cables, with particular emphasis on the two fabricated cables I had produced. He [Colson] would notify Lambert that I had something of interest to show him... . Lambert...was not to be permitted to take them from the office for photocopying, as he might be expected to request. Lambert was elated with the cable texts, seeing in them a new scoop of national proportions. . ...I had begun to feel compunctions over my fabrications. Loyal as I was to Colson, I was unwilling to deceive a journalist...and make him innocent party to a deception of international proportions. ...Abandonment of the plan was a souce of relief to me.

Now convicted crimnal Charles Colson's completely contradictory testimony, in three self-contradictory parts:

  • CHARLES COLSON: Lambert was a reporter who had been dealing with Hunt and I don't know. I never gave him any instructions to get in touch with Mr. Hunt...although I do know that Mr. Lambert tried to reach me with a message from Hunt after he had talked to Hunt, and my secretary, Mrs. Hall, told Lambert, "Forget about it, Colson won't talk to you because he does not want any information from Hunt through you or anyone else."
    CHARLES COLSON: [Contradicting himself on receiving information from Lambert] I can just say this to you, that once I knew he [Hunt] had shown that to Mr. Lambert, I did everything I knew how to get Mr. Lambert off of that story.
    CHARLES COLSON: [Regarding his entire relationship with Hunt, in Memorandum for the File, 20 June 1972] I had assumed throughout Hunt's tenure in the White House that he was charged to someone else's budget. I signed the original request for him to be a consultant because everyone else was in California at the time it was decided to bring him in. Shortly after he came on board, however, he was assigned to David Young and Bud Krogh and I didn't consider at any time after that that Hunt was under my supervision or responsibility. From time to time after Hunt had come on board, he did talk to me, normally to express his frustrations in being unable to get things through the David Young operation. Of course, on occasion also we talked socially and about politics, something Howard and I had done from time to time over the years.

Please select which lie above you'd like to build your belief system on for "forged cables" that never existed at all.

III. THE AMAZING CHANGELING "FORGED CABLES"

What E. Howard Hunt claims to have "fabricated" and filed away in his safe:

  • E. HOWARD HUNT: I produced texts of two cables that I thought might answer Colson's purposes: One was an apparent query from the Saigon embassy concerning White House policy in the event that Diem and his brother-in-law should request asylum from the American Embassy. The second was a negative response, couched in State's typically Aesopian language. After Colson approved the texts, I began working with typewriters then available in the Executive Office Building and produced, with the aid of a Xerox machine, two cables which might be visually convincing to the reader, though not—as I had warned Colson—invulnerable to technical examination.
    ...The several hundred authentic State Department cables remained in my locked two-drawer safe in my White House office, and the fabricated cables, in their various phases from text draft to completion, were placed in manila files captioned "Fab. I" and "Fab. II." These files, among others, were to be extracted from my safe by John Dean...

Now convicted criminal John Dean's account of what he found in Hun't safe that had anything whatsoever to do with any purported "forged cables," which Dean gives the adjective "bogus" while listing in testimony what he claims to have found:

  • JOHN DEAN: A bogus cable—that is, other cables spliced together into one cable regarding the involvement of persons in the Kennedy administration in the fall of the Diem regime in Vietnam. ...I subsequently met with Ehrlichman to inform him of the contents of Hunt's safe. I gave him a description of the electronic equipment and told him about the bogus cable...

Please note that there is only one "bogus cable" cited by John Dean. Please note that he claims to have told John Ehrlichman about one, and only one, "bogus cable"—in the SINGULAR. Please note that Dean omits any mention of any folders marked "FAB I" and "FAB II." Please note that Dean omits any mention of any second cable at all. Please note that Dean omits any mention of any "text drafts" or any "various phases" of attempted forgery by Hunt, as Hunt claims. Please note, also, that Dean makes absolutely no mention of any stack of "duplicates" of this one "bogus cable." (Stay tuned.) No: Dean says there is ONE and ONLY ONE purported "bogus cable" in evidence. That is the sum and total of his testimony, no matter how much disinformation specialists sitting on this forum try to spin it.

But more than anything please note the following: first, we're supposed to believe that a seasoned reporter from Life magazine was completely snookered by these "forgeries" by Hunt. Then we're supposed to believe that a 20-year veteran of CIA black ops, Lucien Conein, had been completely fooled by Hunt's little forgeries (which Hunt himself had said couldn't stand inspection). Yet now we're supposed to believe that with one brief look, eagle-eyed John Dean immediately knew he was looking at a "bogus cable." Bam! Thank you, ma'am. You figure it out.

Now comes admitted xxxx L. Patrick Gray with his own cock-and-bull story about what John Dean supposedly passed to him in two sealed envelopes (or one envelope, which is contested in testimony, too):

  • L. PATRICK GRAY: To this point, I had not read or examined the files. But immediately before putting them in the fire, I opened one of the files. It contained what appeared to be copies of Top Secret State Department cablegrams. I read the first cable. I do not recall the exact language, but the text of the cable implicated officials of the Kennedy administration in the assassination of President Diem of South Viet Nam.
    I had no reason then to doubt the authenticity of the cable, and was shaken at what I read. I thumbed through the other cables in this file. They appeared to be duplicates of the first cable.

And that is the full sum and total of L. Patrick Gray's testimony on any purported "forged" or "bogus" or "fabricated" cable—SINGULAR—no matter how many different adjectives are attached to the non-existent fictions to create further confusion. Please note that, unlike Dean, L. Patrick Gray "had no reason then to doubt the authenticity of the cable." Yet, supposedly, this is the exact same "cable" that Dean had spotted as being "bogus" in an instant. Please note also that Gray omits any mention of any folders marked "FAB I" and "FAB II." Please note that Gray omits any mention of any second cable at all. Please note that Gray omits any mention of any "text drafts" or any "various phases" of attempted forgery by Hunt, as Hunt claims were in the now-missing folders he had made. No: Gray says that there is ONE and ONLY ONE purported cable, and now, somehow, magically, purported "duplicates of the first cable" have appeared in this envelope. The "forged cables" apparently are capable of asexual reproduction, and have been engaged in a self-orgy of same while sitting under L. Patrick Gray's shirts in his closet.

So pick whichever set of lies suits you so you, too, can believe in the corporeal existence of the Easter Bunny, Santa Claus, and E. Howard Hunt's "forged bogus fabricated" (you betcha') cables.

They were fabricated all right: out of whole cloth fiction. Hunt even puts that right in your face, over and over again, a favorite part of his serpentine modus operandi.

And now for Mr. Speer's big closer: What did proven xxxx and convicted criminal Charles Colson claim to have seen?

You've just read Pat Speer's presentation. Do you know? Can you say with any certainty? Well, if you didn't notice, Speer altered Colson's testimony. I noticed. Maybe he thought it would slide by. Not a chance. Here's what Colson actually said about having ever seen these purported "cables," and I'd advise you to read the following more carefully than anything you have read in your life:

  • QUESTION: Well, he showed them to you, whether they were at your direction, and let's assume they were not, you saw the cables and you knew that they were fabricated, did you not?
    CHARLES COLSON: I saw— I was aware of— I don't know that I actually physically saw one cable that was—
    QUESTION: Did you know it was fabricated?
    COLSON Yes, sir. I did.
    QUESTION: Did you tell him not to publish that cable or not to use it or destroy it?
    COLSON: Yes, sir. I certainly didn't tell him to destroy it—

Had you noticed that Mr. Speer had put a period at the end of the non-sentence, "I was aware of", attempting to make it look like it was an affirmative statement, instead of the faltering, noncommital false start it actually was? Did it sound like sort of a funny "answer" when you read Mr. Speer's fudged version? That's because it was. I'll leave you to judge Mr. Speer's motives for his subtle alteration of testimony.

Meanwhile, what did Colson actually say? Did he actually ever say he saw any forged cables at all? No, he did not—despite Mr. Speer exactly emulating Hunt's purported "improvements" on records—making real life, right here in this forum, follow the very fiction Speer is here trying to sell as "fact."

You can ask Mr. Speer why he did that if you want. I won't be bothering.

Colson only evaded, and got a "one cable" mention in to muddy the waters on the number again, and suddenly now we're supposedly talking about only one cable, but Colson didn't even admit having seen one! What he did do, quite artfully, was get the questioner jerked around in that direction. And then he respond affirmatively only to a question of knowing "it" was fabricated. And "fabricated" means very simply: "To concoct in order to deceive." And, to paraphrase one of our other great, wonderful, lying presidents, "What does 'it' mean?" It means anything you want "it" to mean. And why does Colson assert that he "certainly didn't tell him [Hunt] to destroy it"? Because Colson knew damned well at all relevant times that there was nothing to destroy. "It" was all a fabrication, and never anything but. And Colson knew it. And he answered accordingly

IV: ASHES TO ASHES, DUST TO DUST: THE GREAT BON FIRE OF NOTHING

There is only one of these lying cruds we can even call on to tell us that, and how, a "cable" that never existed, and its "duplicates," supposedly got burned, in order to ensure that it was totally guaranteed that no one ever could have any form of knowledge about any supposed such "fabrication" except by listening to a pack of known liars and criminals. The only source for this part of the fiction is L. Patrick Gray. So there's nothing to do but throw all three of his conflicting stories at you, and, in the immortal words of Senator Sam Ervin, "let somebody else interpret it."

  • TIME MAGAZINE: [A]t a meeting in Ehrlichman's office on June 28 [1972], Dean had handed the folders to Gray with the remark: "These papers should never see the light of day."
    Even though his own agents at the time were searching for Hunt to quiz him about Watergate, Gray obediently took these files home, put them in a closet over the weekend, then carried them to his office and discarded them in a "burn bag" to be destroyed. Although some other FBI officials do not believe him, Gray claimed he did not even look at the papers to see what he was burning.

And now L. Patrick Gray's other lie (or two or three):

  • SENATOR TALMADGE: One or two final things; I think my time's about expired, Captain. I believe you made a denial to someone that you burned the papers last Christmas, during the Christmas celebration, during that period in Connecticut. Who did you to?
    L. PATRICK GRAY: To Assistant Attorney General Henry Peterson on April 16th of this year [1973] in my office.
    SENATOR TALMADGE: And did you make any other denial that was a fabrication or falsehood?
    L. PATRICK GRAY: [Long pause] Well, I didn't tell the whole story, the correct story, to Senator Weicker. I testified to that yesterday, that, uh—
    SENATOR TALMADGE: You failed to volunteer it at that time, or did you tell an outright falsehood?
    L. PATRICK GRAY: To Senator Weicker?
    SENATOR TALMADGE: Yes.
    L. PATRICK GRAY: I told him an outright falsehood. I said that I burned those papers on the 3rd day of July in the wastebasket in my office at FBI, and it was not true. I didn't tell him the truth.
    SENATOR TALMADGE: All right, that's twice, now, Captain, that you yourself have admitted that you told a falsehood.

And finally, the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth—naturally—from the admitted criminal xxxx about the envelopes of purported "Hunt safe" partial contents:

  • L. PATRICK GRAY: I distinctly recall that I burned them during Christmas week with the Christmas and household paper trash that had accumulated immediately following Christmas. To this point I had not read or examined the files. But immediately before putting them in the fire I opened one of the files. It contained what appeared to be copies of "Top Secret" state department cablegrams. I read the first cable. I do not recall the exact language but the text of the cable implicated officials of the Kennedy Administration in the assassination of President Diem of South Vietnam.

What could I possibly add to do more damage to such a fount of pure sewage?

V. SUMMATION

As I tried to point out in my first series of posts on this package of lies and fiction, the most glaring, insane omission in a sea of insanity is that not a single one of these cretins ever says who in the Kennedy administration Hunt supposedly had framed for these murders. At least two of the liars, Dean and Gray, say Hunt had pinned it on anonymous "officials" or "persons" in the Kennedy admnistration, but they just never get around to naming any names. Why? Because it wasn't in the script of their hoax. Only the name "Kennedy" could be in the script of their hoax. Kennedy was dead as a hammer. They could get away with it. And they did.

And now, I'm done with my summation of Mr. Speer's "case," except to say the following, no matter how it's taken, no matter what you, the reader, thinks of me, personally. I simply don't care:

If, after all of this information has been presented to you, you want to subscribe to and embrace the mythological religion of "forged Diem cables," I think you fully deserve to have it, to cling to it, to proselytize for it, to spread it everywhere you can, no matter how much vicious damage it does, or has done, to anybody.

I realize fully that my entire presentation is not unlike walking into church on Easter Sunday, banging a gong, and saying loudly: "Hate to break up the party, but they found the body."

And if you think I'm rude, or obstreperous, or crude, or uncivilized, impolite in my presentation of a massive fraud perpetrated on the world for over thirty years, tough. I didn't enter a popularity contest. And, frankly, my entire handling has been with kindly kid gloves when weighed against the crime.

And while I really couldn't care less about what anyone thinks of me, personally, for what I am doing and have tried to do here, at significant personal cost, even at the neglect of my own career and family, I will ask you to exhibit the decency to pause and ask yourself this:

What possible vested interest could I have? What is my personal gain in trying to put this into your view, and tell you that you have been the victim of a fraud and a hoax and felony crimes on the United States and its people and its government for over three decades? What does it win me?

As with most people who post here, I'm not writing a book. I have no subsidy for this. I have no support or funding or help at all, except for like-minded friends and family members who care enough, and are honest enough, and decent enough, to sacrifice their own time and contributions for the sole purpose of getting the truth known.

It's worse even than that: there's not even any joy or satisfaction in any of this for me. None. It is more a source of sadness. At every relevant moment I've been painfully aware of the number of lives that all of this has affected, and continues to affect, and will continue to affect. I'm vividly aware of how many fundamentally decent and responsible people have passed this fraud on, forwarded it, built careers and reputations at least partially on writing books about it, or giving lectures on it, or teaching it in educational institutions, believing, without sufficient inspection, that it all was true—even though there is no other single source for any of it except criminals and proven liars.

So there is no slightest joy in this. None. There is not even that reward for the work, the research, the writing. The only reward is the sense of having done my best to do an honest and thorough job, and to have made the information available, no matter how flawed my form, tone, demeanor or presentation. The facts are there for all to see. That's what I care about. That's all I care about.

So what possible vested interest could there be for me? There is not a scrap. This is simple relevant fact, relevant because it addresses my own motives, which you should have in front of you before weighing any of this.

And in weighing it, you might, or might not, care to notice the amount of effort and time expended by two others here in this thread—one of whom I have on record as admitting that they are working in tandem—both doing anything and everything they can to smear and demean me, and to ridcule my exposure of this decades-old fraud, while pouring post after post after post into this thread trying to sell you the same old snake oil.

Their only possible purpose for such industry is to make you continue to believe in the fraud. Why they would want you to, you'll have to ask them. I hope you do.

It's the fraud that's on trial. It isn't me, however much the twin hucksters try to put me on trial. They can't. The record is the record. The record is on trial. The source of the evidence is not Ashton Gray. The source of the evidence is the record. They cannot smear the record (except by subtle alteration), so they try to convince you that the information is Ashton Gray's, then try to smear Ashton Gray.

Ashton Gray doesn't matter. At all. What matters is the truth. What matters is the exposure of lies and of the criminal fraud.

What matters is justice.

You have the information now. With that, I've done everything that I, personally, can do. What you do with it now is your responsibility, and it is yours alone.

Ashton Gray

Edited by Ashton Gray
Link to comment
Share on other sites

"Every truth passes through three stages before it is recognized. In the first, it is ridiculed, in the second it is opposed, in the third it is regarded as self-evident." Arthur Schopenhauer 1788-1860

Ashton,

You did a fantastic job on this thread. Your efforts did not go unnoticed by John Simkin and Robert Charles-Dunne. That says a lot. Thanks for joining this Forum and giving us the benefit of your research and critical thinking on Watergate. I look forward to more.

Mike Hogan

Link to comment
Share on other sites

"Every truth passes through three stages before it is recognized. In the first, it is ridiculed, in the second it is opposed, in the third it is regarded as self-evident." Arthur Schopenhauer 1788-1860

Ashton,

You did a fantastic job on this thread. Your efforts did not go unnoticed by John Simkin and Robert Charles-Dunne. That says a lot. Thanks for joining this Forum and giving us the benefit of your research and critical thinking on Watergate. I look forward to more.

Mike Hogan

I concur. I saw a lovely quote last night that I thought might be appropriate here, though I was torn by the thought that Ashton's words should be the final words on this thread.

In 1992, one of the few heros of Watergate, the late former Texas Congresswoman Barbara Jordan, spoke these words:

"I've always felt that as long as you are alive you should be doing something that makes

a difference. You don't have to do gigantic things. Just do things incrementally that make a difference."

For me that is the sole purpose of this forum.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Ashton, while I admit your early ravings made me angry, your acknowledgement that you had Colson's testimony all along makes me positively furious. You treat this thread, as others, as some sort of game. If you have information to share, then share it.

In that spirit, I'll present another pertinent piece of evidence indicating that the cables existed: Nixon's May 8, 1973 conversation with his press secretary, Ron Ziegler. During the weeks leading up to this conversation, Nixon's Palace Guard has largely been forced to resign. Colson, Dean, Gray, Krogh, Magruder, Ehrlichman, and Haldeman have all been forced to abandon ship. He has no one to talk to besides Haig and Ziegler. Ziegler has just asked Nixon if his September 16, 1971 statements about Vietnam were based upon Hunt's forged cables. Nixon has explained to him that he based his statements upon a book he read. (This, apparently, is true. The cables were created afterwards.)

Nixon: Did I use the term "the Kennedy complicity?"

Ziegler: Kennedy complicity in the overthrow and murder.

Nixon: That's right, yeah.

Ziegler: But the murder was a result of the overthrow.

Nixon: That's right. That's right. Well, nobody questions it.

Ziegler: No, of course, not.

WITHDRAWN ITEM. NATIONAL SECURITY.

Nixon: Goddam. That Colson thing. Colson is--he said he just told him to improve the wires, or something. Oh Christ, he's looking like a Goddamn fool. ...What can he say? He'll make quite a witness, won't he?

he says if Hunt misinterpreted--maybe. I think Hunt probably did--did whatever out of loyalty, but Colson may have said make it clear or--what do you think, probably did happen? What's your guess? You think that Colson told him to take over?

Ziegler: YES, I DO.

So here we have a second adviser, first Ehrlichman on April 18 and now Ziegler on May 5, telling Nixon that they believe Colson was behind the creation of the cables. We also have Nixon saying that Colson said he'd just told Hunt to improve the wires or something. Hello? No one around Nixon has any doubts the cables existed. No one around Nixon has any doubts that Colson, who'd told the press he'd run over his own grandmother to get Nixon re-elected was behind the creation of the cables. (I urge anyone still doubting this to read Haldeman's The Ends of Power. Haldeman and others close to Nixon were worried about Colson's bad influence on Nixon from day one.) Hunt testified he made the cables. Colson testified he was aware of the cables and that they'd been shown to Life magazine. Ehrlichman told Nixon that Colson had talked to him about the cables. Dean testified that he saw the cables. Ehrlichman testified he saw Dean hand something to Gray that he believed were the cables. Gray testified he read the cable or cables as he burned them. Whether Colson ordered the creation of the cables or Hunt made them up on his own there can really be no reasonable argument over the likelihood that the cables in fact existed. That the men who discussed the cables and testified to their existence were less than perfect does little to demonstrate that the cables did not exist. If five disreputable characters independently testify to dumping an unidentified body in the ocean, but can't remember the exact height of the victim, it doesn't mean there was no body.

Perhaps, if Ashton or Dawn can cite one case in history where a number of people have admitted to a criminal conspiracy with the ultimate goal of damaging the reputation of someone not directly implicated in the criminal conspiracy, then there might be a reason to believe such a thing occurred. I asked Ashton to concede that the cables existed early on and focus on his other points. Instead he chose to waste everyone's time with his rants and insults. It's a shame.

Edited by Pat Speer
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...
Only E. Howard Hunt says William Lambert ever saw any "forged cables." Hunt is impeached. Hunt is a xxxx. Hunt is a professional xxxx. Hunt is a really bad xxxx.

Ashton Gray

Pages 1070-1075 of book VII of the House of Rep.s Committee on the Judiciary investigation into the impeachment of Richard Nixon includes the summary of an interview with William Lambert conducted by senatorial aides. Lambert discusses in detail Colson's pressuring him to meet with Hunt and discuss the Diem assassination. He also discusses Hunt's repeatedly showing him a cable and of his own attempts to get a copy of that cable. He also discussed Colson finally telling him to forget about the cable--that it was "unavaliable." This interview corroborates that the forged cable or cables did indeed exist.

On page 1058 of book VII is a 7-27-71 memo from Hunt to Colson which demonstrates that Colson and Hunt were conspiring to blame the Diem assassination on Democrats. On point 3 it says "Ask Dick Helms to expand on his allegation that Harriman engineered the coup."

On page 1060 is an 8-2-71 memo from Hunt to Colson. On point 5 of this memo Hunt tells Colson "I would also make the sincerely humble suggestion that LBJ not be attacked directly (as we have done here with JFK). My reasoning is that the hippies and yippies have been doing so for years, and Bob Dole or others adopting such a line would not only be a form of overkill, but possibly counter-productive. LBJ and his allies, after all, have much to gain from indicting the Kennedy Administration, and can be expected to augment whatever we are able to do. In short, we can hit at the advisers LBJ received from Kennedy without attacking LBJ directly on this issue."

I wonder why Hunt was so protective of LBJ?

Edited by Pat Speer
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Please sign in to comment

You will be able to leave a comment after signing in



Sign In Now

×
×
  • Create New...