Olmsted, Kathryn S. Challenging the Secret Government: The Post-Watergate
Investigations of the CIA and FBI. Chapel Hill NC: University of North
Carolina Press, 1996. 255 pages.
It may come as a surprise to viewers of "The X Files," but prior to
the 1970s there was almost no information in the officially-acknowledged
public record to suggest that the FBI and CIA had ever engaged in illegal
or questionable activities. Then in the wake of Watergate, reports surfaced
in the press of CIA involvement in the coup in Chile, and massive domestic
spying by the CIA and FBI against war protesters. These were followed with
stories of CIA plots to kill foreign leaders. The Church Committee in the
Senate, and the Pike Committee in the House, were formed to investigate.
Congressman Michael J. Harrington (D-MA), and journalists such as
Seymour Hersh (New York Times) and Daniel Schorr (CBS), played a significant
role in exposing this secret history. At the time, many thought that the
momentum for exposure would lead to significant reforms. But a year later
the climate had changed dramatically. Harrington was in trouble with the
House Ethics Committee for leaking information about Chile, the Pike
Committee report was suppressed by Congress, and Daniel Schorr was fired
from CBS after leaking the Pike report to the Village Voice. The author
suggests that the momentum for reform was lost when the revelations became
more than a deluded, complacent public could comfortably bear.
ISBN 0-8078-4562-0
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