MAHEU ADMITS '54 ANTI-ONASSIS DRIVE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP81M00980R000600060029-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 15, 2016
• Document Release Date: May 18, 2004
• Sequence Number: 29
• Content Type: NSPR

Approved For Relea/0?/"RRtA,"M10980R00
R.el>tortedly Approved by CIA, Nixon
Maheu Admits '54 Anti-Oilassis Thrive
By Charles R. Babcock ( campaign by U.S. intelligence agen- could not be reacii.ed for comment.
Washington Post Staff Writer cies. In Rome, according to the Hougan
Private investigator Robert A. itla- { As head of the Justice Department's story, Gerrity had two CIA agents at
civil division at the time, Burger ap- in'; command. "I wasn't a CIA agent-
iheu was paid by a competitor of Aris- proved a massive suit against Onassis tae CIA. was my agent," he was
totle Onassis in 1954 to carry out a that same year, which alleged he. quoted as saying.
campaign of wiretaps and dirty tricks illegally bought some surplus Ameri- The Hougan article is
part of a
against the Greek shipping tycoon- can ships. Onassis also faced a crimi- forthcoming book about the use of se-
ith the knowledge and approval of nal indictment in the case, but it was cret agents by private corporations
the CIA and then-vice president Rich- dropped later as part of a settlement. and government. -
ard M. Nixon, according to a Playboy Burger said yesterday through a "We magazine article- spokesman that he received no such I that t the were CIA always being rem opera-
Maheu, a former FBI agent who intelligence reports- The spokesman was behind the opera-
la
Howard Hughes, was hired by Stavros
.Niarchos to undermine a lucrative
contract Onassis had signed with the
Saudi Arabian government to trans-
Port oil, writer Jim Hougan says in
the September issue of the magazine.
Maheu confirmed the basic ele-
ments of the article yesterday in a
phone interview from Las Vegas. But
the denied Hougan's allegation that his
actions were part of an international
conspiracy. "That's a crock," Maheu
said.
"I wouldn't take the assignment
[from Niarchos] until I cleared it with
the outfit," Maheu said. The "outfit,"
the added, was the Central Intelli-
gg,ence Agency. He was on a S500-a-
month retainer from the agency at the
time, he said...
He reported his anti-Onassis activi-
: ies regularly to the CIA. Maheu said,
including the use of the illegal and
"unproductive" wiretap on Onassis'
\New York office. The CIA also helped
his operatives in Rome, where deroga-
tory stories about Onassis were ped- i
also charged Niarchos, the would-be-, maneu associate was quoted as saying.
benefactor in the plot, in 1954 for aim- ? While confirming that he kept the
ilar activities. CIA constantly informed, Maheu in-
Nixon could not be reached for com- sisted that he was paid only by Niare.
ment on the Playboy article. The CIA hos for the anti-Onassis campaign. He
refused to comment. said an estimate that his bill was
11Iaheu's involvement in the cam- $187,000 was "peanuts."
paign against Onassis was alluded to, "I had four or five men in the Mid.
without naming the two shippers, in a east on that at one time," he said. "I
footnote in a Novemberh11975 Senate don't recall what the total was but it
Intelligence Committee report on CIA was a lot more than that."
assassination plots.
That report detailed Maheu's role
as a middleman between the CIA and
the Mafia in a plan to kill Cuban
leader Fidel Castro.
The CIA used Maheu in several sen-
sitive covert actions where it "didn't
want to have an. agency person or a
government person get caught," the
report said.
Maheu denied Hougan's contention
that Niarchos was fronting for the ma-
jor oil companies who feared their
own monopoly in Saudi Arabia would
be threatened by Onassis' deal.
A State Department official ar-
ranged the briefing for Nixon, Maheu
died to a newspaper, he added. Onas- i said, to bring him up to date on the
sis eventually lost the contract. He i seriousness of the Onassis contract. A
died in 1975, few days later in June, he added, the
Maheu also acknowledged briefing State Department issued its first pub-
Nixon about the campaign to subvert lie protest about the arrangement,
the Onassis contract, but said it came In the meantime, Gerrity- went to
after his extensive "research" for Europe to spread derogatory stories
Niarchos. Hougan's report alleges that about Onassis by bribing reporters,
Nixon gave Maheu and an associate, the Playboy article said. Gerrity, a
John Gerrity, the original "Mission: former Washington Post reporter and
Impossible" assignment. now a local financial correspondent,
The Playboy article quotes Gerrity
as saying then-Assistant Attorney
General Warren E. Burger-now chief
justice of the United States-was also
kept inf.rmed of the anti-Onassis
Approved For Release 2004/06/14: CIA-RDP81 M00980R000600060029-9
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