RICHARD HELMS AS DIRECTOR OF CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE

• Document Type: FOIA
• Collection: FOIA Collection
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): 0005307558
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: U
• Document Page Count: 15
• Document Creation Date: June 22, 2015
• Document Release Date: December 10, 2008
• Case Number: F-2008-01836
• Publication Date: January 1, 1993

(b)(1)
(b)(3)
Robert M. Hathaway
and
Russell Jack Smith
APPROVED FOR RELEASE DATE:
12-03-2008
 RICHARD HELms
As Director of Central Intelligence
1966-1973
/re t
 The DCI Historical Series
RCHARD HELMS
As Director of Central Intelligence
1966-1973
Robert M. Hathaway
and
Russell Jack Smith
History Staff
Center for the Study of Intelligence
Central Intelligence Agency
Washington, D.C.
 Warning Notice
Intelligence Sources or s Involved (WNINTEL)
National Security Information
Unauthorized Disclos sect to Criminal Sanctions
All material on this page
is unclassified.
 Contents
Editor's Preface ....................................................................................vii
Chapter 1. Relations With the White House .....................................1
Chapter 2. Intelligence Production ..................................................... 23
Chapter 3. Helms's Management Style:
Indochina and Operations ...................................................................59
Chapter 4. The 1970 Chilean Presidential Election .......................... 81
Chapter 5. Defectors and Hostile Penetration .................................. 101
Chapter 6. The Israeli Account ......................................................... 131
Chapter 7. Relations With Congress ................................................155
Chapter 8. Watergate .........................................................................187
Chapter 9. The Dismissal of Richard Helms ...................................207
 Chapter 6
The Israeli Account
Robert M. Hathaway
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 In many respects, the high point of Richard Helms's tenure as DCI
came in the early days of June 1967. On 5 June, Israeli military forces
launched a surprise attack against Egypt, Jordan, and Syria, bringing to its
climax a crisis that had been steadily building for months. For the Johnson
administration, tied by political interest and emotional commitment to
Israel, the Israeli strike raised grave questions: Could the Israelis triumph
without active American assistance? Even should they win, would a costly
victory sap Israel's future vitality? What role had the Soviet Union played
in bringing on the crisis? How would Moscow react if Russia's Arab
friends faced imminent defeat? What steps should the United States now
take? Should Washington airlift military supplies to Israel-even at the
cost of further undermining the American position in the Arab world?
For the Johnson administration, sound and speedy answers to these
questions were imperative. Even before fighting broke out on 5 June, the
Israelis had been pressing the White House for public statements of sup-
port; there had even been cautious suggestions of joint military operations
against the Arabs. Faced on the one hand with great uncertainties, and on
the other with high stakes and intense pressures, Lyndon Johnson, Helms
recalls, finally "came to understand what intelligence could do for him.""
For Helms, Middle Eastern developments first took on crisis propor-
tions on 23 May 1967. A week earlier Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser
had ordered the United Nations peacekeeping force out of the Sinai and
quickly moved Egyptian troops into the areas that United Nations units had
vacated. On 22 May, Nasser announced that the Gulf of Aqaba would, hence-
forth, he closed to Israeli shinning. effectively cutting off Israel's nort at
of 23 May, Johnson summoned Helms from a briefing of the House Armed
interview, 15 November 1984F--Iinterview, 16 November 1984.
"Helms Oral History, 4 April 1969, Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library, Austin, Texas.
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