A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life in the Central Intelligence Agency

by Richard Helms, William Hood, Henry Kissinger (Foreword by)

A Look over My Shoulder begins with President Nixon’s attempt to embroil the Central Intelligence Agency, of which Richard Helms was then the director, in the Watergate cover-up. Helms then recalls his education in Switzerland and Germany and at Williams College; his early career as a foreign correspondent in Berlin, during which he once lunched with Hitler; and his return to newspaper work in the United States. Helms served on the German desk at OSS headquarters in London; subsequently, he was assigned to Allen Dulles’s Berlin office in postwar Germany.

On his return to Washington, Helms assumed responsibility for the OSS carryover operations in Germany, Austria, and Eastern Europe. He remained in this post until the Central Intelligence Agency was formed in 1947. At CIA, Helms served in many positions, ultimately becoming the organization’s director from 1966 to 1973. He was appointed ambassador to Iran later that year and retired from government service in January 1977. It was often thought that Richard Helms, who served longer in the Central Intelligence Agency than anyone else, would never tell his story, but here it is–revealing, news-making, and with candid assessments of the controversies and triumphs of a remarkable career.

Genres: Biography, Nonfiction, History, Espionage, Politics, Memoir, Military Fiction

512 pages, Paperback

First published April 8, 2003

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.

Richard McGarrah Helms (March 30, 1913–October 22, 2002) was the Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) from 1966 to 1973. He was the only director to have been convicted of lying to the United States Congress over Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) undercover activities. In 1977, he was sentenced to the maximum fine and received a suspended two-year prison sentence. Despite this, Helms remained a revered figure in the intelligence profession. CIA historian Keith Melton describes Helms as a professional who was always impeccably dressed and had a "low tolerance for fools".

Reviews

[Covey Mcallister · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is on the incoming CIA agents list of recommended books to read, and I can see why. Helms details evolving departments various roles and responsibilities in the agency and gives lots of details about kinds of missions and research involved in intelligence in general. Full of information but a real dull read. Helms will put you to sleep...key take aways:

If you want to get into intelligence learn French and Latin as a kid. A third language is useful.

Become a Sherry expert. Drink lots of Sherry.

Find a wife that is as good at hosting as Lady Bird Johnson.

If you buy a house with a garage make sure it’s big enough for secret service to park the president in there.

It’s most effective to mix really good information with nice music and funny stories.

Lawyers suck unless they work for free.

Too many people die playing tennis.

Kissinger was a maniac.

You don’t make a lot of money working for Uncle Sam.

[Nathan · Rating 3 out of 5]

One of the biographies of former CIA director Richard Helms is called "The Man Who Kept the Secrets". In his autobiography, "A Look Over my Shoulder", Helms lives up to his previous biographer's title. Helms was a career CIA officer, in the agency from its genesis in OSS through CIA's birth through the aftermath of E. Howard Hunt's little field trip. He was Director of Central Intelligence at the end of Johnson's administration, was kept by Nixon, and was then fired by Nixon after refusing to have the CIA block the FBI investigation into the Watergate break-in. All of this, against a backdrop of the Vietnam War, James Angleton's mole hunts, MKULTRA, the CHAOS program, Nosenko & Golitsyn, the Kennedy assassinations, Air America, the Pentagon Papers, the Castro assassination plots and the Bay of Pigs. Fascinating times, by any man's estimation. Yet Helms manages to write 452 pages of text without revealing one shred of new information not previously revealed by someone else. It is one of the few books I've ever read by a CIA officer or director without one line of redacted text. Fitting, for a man who took a perjury conviction because he refused to reveal classified information in a Senate hearing. Anyone reading "A Look Over my Shoulder" for new revelations or new hints about old cases should look elsewhere, and assume this book gets a 1 star rating. Helms really is the man who kept the secrets. As a memoir, however, "A Look Over my Shoulder" lives up not to another biographer's title, but its own subtitle: "A Life in the CIA". Helms started his career as a journalist, and early in life, he dreamed of owning his own paper. In his biography, the pleasure he takes in writing is obvious, and his wit and personality come out in ways rarely seen in the rather dry world of intelligence memoirs. His reflections on the CIA focus on some unheralded (if previously reported) successes, and illustrates, more so than many recent CIA "histories" (Tim Weiner's "Legacy of Ashes", for example), the constant misuse of the agency by president after president. Despite the lack of revelations, there are subtle surprises in the book. He often seems to be saying as much between the lines as he does in them. An entire chapter, for example, is devoted to a solid defense of the much reviled James Angleton, even taking responsibility for many of Angleton's perceived mistakes. He also manages a whole chapter on Yuri Nosenko, all without ever mentioning Anatoliy Golitsyn. Also noteworthy is the respect and admiration Helms seems to have for most of his fellow veterans and associates, regardless of political affiliation, religion, sex and even sexuality. The tone changes somewhat, and a slight ugliness creeps into the work, when Helms speaks of Richard M. Nixon. The vindictive firing of Helms by Nixon notwithstanding, there clearly was no love lost between the two men. He also has a difficult time hiding his frustrations with subsequent DCI William Colby's decision to hand over classified material to the Church and Pike committees investigating CIA's activities, and his contempt for the congressmen leading the investigation. It is frustrating, as a reader, to see Helms lose his wit, and at times, his class, when discussing these matters toward the end of "A Look Over my Shoulder". His actual sound arguments against the committees would have been better communicated in the same tone reserved for the rest of his book. Ultimately, it is his humor and the quality of his narrative that makes his story interesting, and his biography is most successful when it stays on course. He took his secrets to his grave, and books about him by other authors probably reveal more about the CIA and his role in it. Despite it all, "A Look Over my Shoulder" leaves the distinct impression that Richard Helms was probably a very fascinating man.

NC

[Chris Bartholomew · Rating 2 out of 5]

Richard Helm's life as director of the CIA during the Johnson/Nixon years. Not so much a reminisce, but rather a defense of his time in the CIA and a rebuttal to accusations from the other side of the political aisle. I'm assuming he was actually a better CIA director than story teller.

[Geoffrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Now I know why President Nixon said “You don’t f**k with Dick Helms, period.”

[Evan Thomas · Rating 3 out of 5]

A fascinating look inside the CIA and U.S. intelligence operations the book, while often disappointingly self serving at times, also gives an interesting perspective on the numerous characters Helms met during 40 plus years of service.

[skye · Rating 3 out of 5]

I ran across this at my grandfather's house and opened to the chapter about Chile. I then read a bunch of other chapters, about half the book total. Fascinating look inside foreign policy in the 60s and 70s - a perspective I hadn't read before.

[Jeffrey · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a very good inside account of a career in the C.I.A. The turf battles inside and outside of the agency are put on full display but the book does not trash the agency or the work that it does.

[Mike · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting view of the CIA from it's inception in 1947 to the retirement of Director Helms in 1973.

[Mike Manos · Rating 4 out of 5]

Intelligence, covert activities and sheer meddling in the world to create an image of America in a favorable light. Richard Helms, hero, or something entirely different?

[Burky Ford]

An education. Lives given to intelligence usually end "not with a bang, but with a whimper."

[Peter · Rating 4 out of 5]

(added this years later; read it before Goodreads)

Probably enjoyed it.

Aurora library.