Transcripts For CSPAN2 Book Discussion On Patriotic Betrayal

Colorado body colorado then deputy mayor of boulder and these experiences led to her coauthoring a book, running as a woman, an analysis of womens campaigns from 1920 to 1992. During the cart orer administration, she was appointed a regional director of the federal agency that supervised vista and the peace corps and other volunteer programs. Shes worked for foundations shes worked for the office of the president of the United University of california, and she has written a great deal for the magazine the american prospect. But mostly what shes been doing for the last 10 or 15 years is writing what i think is quite a remarkable book, patriotic betrayal. Its what were going to be talking with her about this evening its a subject, i think, of enormous importance. And even though its about things that happened 50 or 60 years ago, i think youll very quickly see that there is an echo in that book for many things that are going on today. So karen id like to given by just to begin by just beginning at the point in your life when you got involved with this story. You were a student, an undergraduate at the university of colorado, in the early 1960s. And then in 1964 you attended a conference of the National Student association. What was that and what was the conference like . Nsa was a membership School Pickup organization of about Membership Organization of about 300 universities and colleges in the United States. It claimed to speak for all American Students. It had huge annual conferences called congresses that mimicked political parties, and they were attended by delegates and alternates from the 300 member schools. They, about a thousand. I went not as a delegate from the university of colorado, i went as a wife. And so my First Encounter at the minnesota nsa congress was as a volunteer in the secretariat that produced mountain is of paper mountains of paper resolutions reports, etc. I should say that i married the student body president at the university of colorado, and i was also the secretary of Student Government, but it was a paid position because i wanted to be a secretary and hadnt quite figured out thats not why i was in college. [laughter] so thats, that was my initial engagement with nsa. But in your book you describe how when you went to this First National convention, it seemed to open up a whole new world to you. It was, as i try to describe and try to capture in this age i was from a town in rural iowa, had never heard of the New York Times, id never been east of chicago. I didnt watch network news. I was a cheerleader. I was a baton twirling and it twirler, and it opened up just a whole new world. And i think it did for so many people. Because there was no other way to have contact, and the regional differences or were really distinct. The accents were different, new jersey texas, boston. And it was a time when people who participated in Student Government were phi beta kappas smart, many of them were brilliant orators. Barney frank, you would have heard in the early a 60s. Jeff greenfield, the journalist thats been on cnn, abc, cbs. Amazing orator. He was the editor then of the cardinal at the university of wisconsin. So i had never heard political debate. I was from a family that was or very engaged this the community, but it was a kind of civic duty. There was i had no sense of partisanship. I didnt know the difference between republicans and democrats and almost failed a sophomore english exam on dickens because i didnt know the difference between republicans and democrats. Thats changed. [laughter] yeah. So here you were at this national convention, a thousand people. Student body prime ministers newspaper editors it seemed tremendously exciting. And then your husband got an invitation. What was that . The following spring one of the officers from nsa visited us and talk ad to him talked to him and invited him to apply for something called the interNational Student relations seminar. It was going to be held the coming summer in 65 at haverford college, pennsylvania. The nsa office at that point headquarters was in philadelphia. This was just outside. He applied and was accepted, and we had a tiny baby by then and they gave us an extra dorm room. I just want to say that that nsa baby, my oldest son, is in the audience tonight. [laughter] id like to recognize tim. So we trundled off to haverford a small family. And, again, i was the secretary. I was in a paid position to produce the material that about 12 handselected editors, area specialists, student body president s studied interNational Student politics. Many of them came expecting a course in international politics, but it is it was all about student politics. So a dozen students, student body president s and newspaper editors and so forth, who was leading the seminar . Two people who worked for nsa. There was a director and an associate director. And at this point, i mean theres no inkling other than this is the International Part of the National Student association. And i got to sit in on sessions whenever my typing was finished and the baby was asleep. And it was fascinating. And during these sessions certainly the leaders has a chance b to see what the political opinions were of the people in the room they got to see the papers that they wrote certainly would have had ample sense of what the feelings of the participants were about American Foreign policy right . Uhhuh. And i learned much much later that we all lived together for six weeks in the storm but that was also the time period in which security background investigations were conducted on any student that they wanted to hire at the end of summer. So enthen what was the next then what was the next step . Then your husband was contacted you were contacted . Well, he was offered a position at the end of the summer on the middle east desk of the National Student association for which he had zero preparation. And we went off to another congress. We moved the office moved to washington, we moved to washington. It was thrilling. I went back to school. And then in october one evening we had dinner with two people who identified themselves as former nsa officials. And after dinner we were driven somewhere northwest washington it was pitch black, to a house. And as we approached the house and as soon as the door opened the phone rang. One of the two men picked up the phone and then turned to my husband and said ive got an errand to run would you come with me . Leaving me behind with the second person. We went into the sun room, and he said to me, your husbands doing work of great importance to the United States government. Wed like id like to tell you more about the nature of that work, but before i do, i need you to sign this document. I was recovering from pneumonia, but we didnt know how to cancel the appointment, so i was still feverish. But im the daughter of several lawyers, and i know that im supposed to read fine print, only it was so fine, and i it just jumped off the page. But at that point an important point is i had no reason to distrust the United States government, as quaint as that may sound. This was 1965. 1965. No reason. Nor did i have any idea of what he was going to say. So i signed. And then i kind of, you know, i remember words of this. He said the United States government has to support france in its war against the algerian revolutionaries, but it behooves us to get to know algerian revolutionaryies future leaders. And this is part of what hes doing. I didnt have a my husband suddenly had a case officer, a code name and reporting requirements. What was his code name . His code name was his case officers code name who was male was aunt alice. [laughter] his code name was, i believe sinclair from sinclair lewis, it cant happen here. Wow. And he had to sign one of these oaths also. The same he had undergone the same ritual a week or so before i was. But they they always did this they took the wives out to undergo the same ritual because they worried about pillow talk. Yeah. They didnt want to leaf the wives hanging. Uncovered as it were. [laughter] and then what were you told about this oath and the penalties for violating it . You know, i dont i knew fairly quickly that this was a security oath under the espionage act and that if i told anybody anything that i had learned, i was subject to a 0year prison 20year prison term. So i was 20. [laughter] so then you and your husband remained in washington for a year or so . That year, we did that year. And it was a very terrifying year because for the first time the nsa president tried to oust the cia quietly and almost single handedly. So it was not a normal year. And he used to joke that one of your tasks was to identify every foreign contact you had as to whether the person was finish had procommunist tendencies or prodemocratic tendencies. And those who were made witting on the International Commission that year vowed to never identify anybody with procommunist tendencies. They decided they would say everybody had prodemocratic tendencies including 50yearold stalinists. That was a tiny rebellion. But an important point probably is that many people didnt know who else on the International Side knew or had been made witting, and some people were on staff, and they hadnt been made witting. And that was usually because there was something in the security background that was a red flag. And often it wasnt a red flag of the person or the student who was hired it had to do with his parents. So here you had a National Staff of the National Student association. How many people, several dozen people or whatever . Yes. I, you know since i wasnt in the office, there were two floors of two townhouses in washington, d. C. That housed the interNational Staff and two floors that housed the National Staff. So i would guess 40, 50 by that time. But only some of them were have signed these oaths correct. And knew that vir virtually all of the money came from the Central Intelligence agency. Anybody who had signed the security oath and was made witting had a case officer and reporting requirements. Uhhuh. And i should add got part of their got extra salary money wired directly into their bank account. Which was fairly unusual in those days. Nobody had ever heard you know, to my knowledge nobody ever heard of wiring money into a bank. Yeah. [laughter] yeah. So you stayed you and your husband stayed there for a year. A year. Then you left. And then your connection with the organization terminated then at that point. One exception, and that is with one exception and that is in the fall of 1966, early october, aunt alice showed up on our doorstep and rung the i thought we would never see these men you were back in colorado back in colorado, boulder. My husband had started law school. And, i mean, i nearly fainted ted away when i opened the door dead away when i opened the door. He took my husband down in our Unfinished Business basement and he was in pursuit of the leak. Ah. And that leads to what happened in 1966 and 1967. Right. Right. Well, maybe i can tell this part of the story. Right. Because i had some connection with it. Right. So this was 1966 october, yes, early, october 1966. Well, about two or three months after that, i at the time was a very, very young and naive reporter and editor at a magazine called ramparts which im sure some of you here are old enough to remember. And a very frightened, bushyhaired young man named michael wood came into the ramparts Office One Day with this extraordinary, unbelievable story having to do with the fact that the National Student association, which was an organization we all knew about, was secretly funded by the cia and had been for many years. And at first the ramparts editors didnt belief didnt believe him. Then the editors put people on checking out different parts of the story, and it immediately checked out. A researcher in boston, for example, began looking into the various foundations which were allegedly supporting the National Student association. One, you know theres a long list of foundations which nobody had ever heard of in connection with anything else. And it turned out all of these foundations were housed in law firms. All of the law firms said we cant discuss our clients business. And then this researcher did some further investigating, looked up these law firms in martindale hubbel, the big legal directory, and discovered every one of the law firms had something in common which was that at least one senior partner during world war ii had worked for the oss the predecessor of the cia. And at that point we knew the story was true. And then in early 1967, ramparts went public with it, and it created an enormous ruckus. Because this was a well known organization which had been presenting itself to the world for many years as the democratic voice of American Students. And then something happened which none of us at ramparts had anticipated, which is reporters began looking into what other organizations had been funded by this mysterious array of foundations and several hundred more private organizations were revealed to have been secretly funded by the cia for some years. I have to say as a journalist it was probably the most exciting story that i ever in any way was associated with even though i worked on it only in a very small way. So how was this ramparts expose experienced by nsa veterans at that point . Both those who were in the know and those who werent . Right. Well, all those in law school, and there were a good many by that point got very good grades because they all went to the law library and left the wives in charge of answering the telephone. [laughter] and, you know, but we still told no one. I mean only there was some wittingtowitting conversation, but we still took very seriously dont say anything or you could be in prison the for 20 years in prison for 20 years. It was years, i think before we talked about it publicly. But i did think i mean i remember at the time thinking but because the controversy was an enormous eruption but then it was shut down fairly quickly. And i remember thinking at the time there is so much more to this story. And sort of walked through my head that somebody someday will probably tell it. And you turned out to be that person. [laughter] but little did i know at that time. So you thought about it for years, and then when it was sort of in the 1990s or so, you decided you really wanted to get to the bottom of how had this relationship originated well, there was one antecedent and that was when i was running a foundation in the early 80s two pro bono attorneys came to me. They had piled a freedom of information suit on behalf of the successor to nsa which is the United States Student Association, ask theyd been at id and theyd been at it for about five, six years. And it was government wide, and i think it was at that point the fbi had acknowledged that they had a lot of files, but they were going to charge ten cents a page. Now, the two lawyers had been sent by somebody no one knew i knew anything about the story. So to their shock i said how many pages . They told me, and i gave the only grant i ever awarded on the spot. [laughter] and their purpose was so that someone could use these documents to write a history of what happened. And i tried for several years talking to people about writing this history one of who was Henrik Hertzberg of the new yorker who, by way, was in this interNational Student relations seminar with us the summer of 965. And 1965. And the time wasnt right for him. But he was instrumental to my decision, because a few few years later we talked about it again as we often did, and he said, karen, why dont you do it . He said you know more than all of us put together. And i think that was the seed that sprouted. And i finally committed myself in the late 90s when i saw an ad for an open Society Institute fellowship that was the largest fellowship monetarily id ever seen in my life. And appld. Well, this brings me to another question which is, you know certainly of interest to the students here how do you support yourself when you are writing this book . Not an easy question. Yeah. And, of course, i never realized it was going to take this long. In terms of three to five years. And i was extremely fortunate. I was not only blessed by the fellowship but my former foundation colleagues gave me discretionary grants, other grants, individual donors gave me grants. I had Family Support including may i say the nsa baby who grew up to be a hightech entrepreneur, was among my donors. And that Family Support was crucial to the Long Distance run. So then you started looking into how did this relationship originate, how did this organization that had, you know, operated on a big world stage for some 20 years of the democratic voice of American Students funded almost from the start by the Central Intelligence agency . How did that happen . Well, its really interesting because i thought logically the story had to start in 1947. Why . Because the cia was founded in 47, nsa was founded in 47. And for three years i tried to fit square pegs into round holes, and i could not make there were all these subtle hidden hands in the story. So i had to make the decision to knit the clock back until i identified and found all those hidden hands. And i will say the sheer number will stagger you, because it ranges from intelligence veterans to liberals to t