Challenging The Secret Government: The Post-Watergate Investigations Of The CIA and FBI

by Kathryn S. Olmsted

Just four months after Richard Nixon's resignation, New York Times reporter Seymour Hersh unearthed a new case of government abuse of the CIA had launched a domestic spying program of Orwellian proportions against American dissidents during the Vietnam War. The country's best investigative journalists and members of Congress quickly mobilized to probe a scandal that seemed certain to rock the foundations of this secret government. Subsequent investigations disclosed that the CIA had plotted to kill foreign leaders and that the FBI had harassed civil rights and student groups. Some called the scandal 'son of Watergate.' Many observers predicted that the investigations would lead to far-reaching changes in the intelligence agencies. Yet, as Kathryn Olmsted shows, neither the media nor Congress pressed for reforms. For all of its post-Watergate zeal, the press hesitated to break its long tradition of deference in national security coverage. Congress, too, was unwilling to challenge the executive branch in national security matters. Reports of the demise of the executive branch were greatly exaggerated, and the result of the 'year of intelligence' was a return to the status quo. American History/Journalism

Genres: History, American History, Politics

255 pages, Hardcover

First published February 1, 1996

Reviews

[Jerome Otte · Rating 4 out of 5]

A balanced and well-argued work.

Olmsted argues that, rather than being emboldened to report more aggressively, the American media establishment retreated from more critical, adversarial coverage in the wake of Watergate and the congressional investigations of the 1970s into intelligence abuses, partly due to Cold War anxieties. Much of the book deals with Seymour Hersh’s revelations and the Washington Post’s investigation into FBI activities, how they sparked the Church and Pike committees, and how American politicians and reporters, contrary to past practice, began investigating the agencies more critically, but only for a time.

The book’s argument isn’t particularly novel, but Olmsted does a good job laying it out. There’s more detail on the Church investigation than the Pike one, though. She also notes the Ford White House’s own investigation of the intelligence community, arguing convincingly that it was an attempt to reduce the public profile of the intelligence community and to manage the congressional inquiry.

The book is based mostly on secondary sources, though, and the author doesn’t always seem to engage with them critically. Her treatment of Seymour Hersh is particularly glowing, for example. Also, her writing is a bit stilted, and some may find the level of detail a bit tedious.

A compelling and well-researched work.

[Max]

God for some reason I have NO interest in American government drama in this era?? I think this might well objectively solid and interesting but i had to truly force myself to get through it personally so I couldn’t tell you. I thought the focus would be broader, it’s very specifically about the several years after watergate, legislative branch investigations into the CIA, and media coverage of those investigations . Learned a lot!!

[Tyler · Rating 5 out of 5]

Found out about this book while looking into the bibliography of Rick Perlstein’s The Invisible Bridge, which covers the Church and Pike commissions pretty well, but left me needing even more.

Olmsted covers not just the investigations, but the media’s role in both unveiling the wrongdoing and their subsequent reluctance to pursue it to a productive end. Even faced with a republican administration and inherently reactionary and secretive intelligence agencies, the supposedly liberal press balks at not being very nice at all times.

[Ryan Nary · Rating 5 out of 5]

Made me despise establishment newspapers like WaPo and NYT even more for their deferential coverage of the intelligence agencies