WITHIN A NATION'S PRIVATE SECTOR, A WEB OF 'SPOOKS'

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88-01350R000200420042-2
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 21, 2004
• Sequence Number: 42
• Publication Date: September 6, 1978
• Content Type: NSPR

Approved For Release 2004/1 CHI - CIA- B 2135 -
ARTICLE A? , ZAr ]
ON ?AGE 6 September 1978
i . ..nation's
l . 1- .spooks,
=3~4
By Rogers Wrc rt lirigtotl s3 ;a -
IM HOUGAN is' a' haunted mac. =19
has
lasted four -years, saven days'a , m 9.34 -
a.m.. to 3~ p.m.. Thos are. the hairs Hougan, spent,;,
bent over his typewriter in a. top floor office of a.'
friend's townhouse in Washington: D.C_ But when,
he.climbed into. his battered 1989 Ford: CraIaxy at night.: -
and made the- trek horse to his rented house fn Ariing
ton, Va., the haunting didn't end.
'rd wake- up- in the. middle. Of. thee .night, actually '
C frightened of: whether I was going too be:-able to pay.the
rent..' _ .
"Spooks..Tha Haunting .of America--The Privati
to
of Secret Agents" (William Morrow & Company,. $12.931,
is Hougan's just-published. nonfiction book. The title is, a
word coined. by State. Department' staffers abroad. for.?
the" CIA case officers assigned to U.S. embassies. Their
job, descriptions, their comings and goings, and the na-
ture - oL their work: were elusive and m rious to-.em-
bassy staffers. Thus the-word `spook3.. ? .s
But'Hougan's concerns was, with former CIA and other
federal intelligence officers. For four years the' subject ..
obsessed him, isolating him from his two children aacl;?
driving him into, debt.
frigbtenuM. On-.one;hand:I;.w?as obsessed with the book:'
Orr the other hand F war. totally broke? owing people I? ;.
was class to money. So, I would stop calling, them; stop
seeing them, because' inevitably, the., qud#on- would i
come; `When is the book going. to be donee?' ,?' -.-
It
was. the. classic struggling author's and iavestiga-.
tive ter's:7 imbroglio. Hougan found, himself im-
mersed?ia a convoluted subject that seemed to stretch.-
pedrspective. Once I told my publisher it would-be done
in a month, and it took me another year and a half.,,
When her tried to focus on the spooks, they. were ''
quickly?-eclipsed by the events they were involved in.
And the events themselves were often bizarre coca.
spiracies that whispered. and reeked of. to slim +g.:con.
unraveling a hidden bail of string- which it first you.
think is household ? siz+e? and then gradually come to sus.
peat may be as big as the house itself,
.. - - ? ..:
Th "
t
'"
nes
result of S
V sub rexsa? world where~ p4/10/13
late'unknowingly; whore, at tinier; the conn~
' Tfaehuae:castofcharaders*iugan
sefeded tomarchandslill eracrt t
page ofhis book fiWa 'e iiwer e nw~
tap es , flanabwyantas dczeati 'ems-err11
nlre,,. a17K~ll7+aIf-a-,~1 !J/ioIi /tar-a'year ,;-. ~'
~
. ?~-. ,... ~, J': - i .r c ' .
/J~,pQ VPPrJ?a1~JM?? +..?` 3.5
between ' organized crime, multinational corporations; the
dies: resin to,-merge into-ores huger phantasmic Gocdiaa?
knot.
AT?TE HEART'ot'it an Is a small army of lamer -
federat intelligence officers that, has, in.Hougan's words,,
"metastasized. across the landscape" since. World War
it Ex-CIA, FBI, and other government intelligence-, - - `
people always have been able to find. ready work in the
private sector. Their numbers have been sharply ate:: z - =.:
the CIA that unleashed' 3,0W employes from the agen?
cy's clandestine services. ...
But it was a well-timed exodus, ,for it coincided with.
pence operatives. Some?of the ex=CIA offIcers wet di-
up their owe "management consultant" firms'. ,- -
The huge cast of characters Hougail has: selects tar
march and slither across the pages of his book include
inventive wire tappers such. as Bernard Spindel, who
claimed to have once bugged conversations'. between.
Robert Kennedy and Marilyn Monroe; flame and
creative guns-for-hire such as Mitchell Livingston Wer-
Bell III, nicknamed "The Wizard of Whispering Death"
for his -invention of a.'silencer for. automatic weapons;
and such sophisticated: half-a-million. dblrar-a-year opera-
Eveq more intriguing are those who employ. their I
_multinational,- corporations,
fugitives, politicians, labor leaders, lawyers, eadiles;
foreign tycoons; heads of state, and. domestic- inte li-.
gence agencies.
The sweep of their collective. activities suggests to
Hougan that "there's. a. game going on. in the United !
Stateesd,? but that very "few people know it's being
players. The urbane and wealthy I laheu's career as
a spook began during World War Ir when he was a
- 8*1 o eou8D.a42M991~b2ounded
his own Washington-based agency, which was par-. 1
tially supported by' a CIA, retainer. _ ;