@Soubresaut
This is going to be a rather long post, but it is actually a heavily edited, abbreviated timeline of the Watergate operation and important subsequent events.
This is a major Deja Vu moment for many of us of a certain age. For me, it was a defining political moment and it has stuck with me. It was one of those things that I go back to now and then, like the JFK assassination, to review and look for new information and testimony from the players as they get old, reconsider their careers and lives, and then die off. You might say it has been a bit of an obsession.
Yesterday, when I was notified that the President had fired FBI director Comey within minutes of the firing, the first thing I thought of was Watergate. I turned on various US news broadcasts and it took nearly an hour before anyone mentioned the correlation between the Comey firing and Nixon’s ousting by White House pressure of acting FBI director Gray – who was being considered for the permanent position after the death of long-time director J. Edgar Hoover.
What followed was a series of firings of heads of investigatory agencies in an attempt to protect the President from prosecution for his involvement in the burglary of the Democratic Headquarters, the cover-up, and ultimately the undermining of American Democracy.
Watergate was a very complicated event and it took eleven months for the American public to understand the ramifications to the point of arousal, and the televised Senate Watergate Committee Hearings which dominated the news for the next 3 years was a defining event in the lives of Americans at the time.
For those here who don’t remember, or are too young to know, here’s the backstory of one the most grievous Presidential acts of obstruction of Justice and abuse of power:
1970: There were major leaks pouring out of the White House at the height of the Vietnam War. In order to plug these leaks, close advisors and long-time confidants to President Nixon, H. R. Haldeman and John Ehrlichman, suggested using current and former CIA operatives and their loyal minions to plug the leaks. This secret task force was aptly named “The Plumbers”, because plumbers plug leaks. The Plumbers were adept at infiltration, “dirty tricks” and psy-ops.
July 1, 1971: David Young and Egil “Bud” Krogh write a memo suggesting the formation of what would later be called the “White House Plumbers” in response to the leak of the Pentagon Papers by Daniel Ellsberg.
August 21, 1971: Nixon’s Enemies List is started by White House aides (though Nixon himself may not have been aware of it); to “use the available federal machinery to screw our political enemies.”
September 3, 1971: “White House Plumbers” E. Howard Hunt, G. Gordon Liddy et al. break into the offices of Daniel Ellsberg’s psychiatrist Lewis Fielding looking for material that might discredit Ellsberg, under the direction of John Ehrlichman or his staff within the White House. This was the Plumbers’ first major operation.
By early 1972 The Plumbers, at this stage assigned to the Committee to Re-Elect the President (CREEP), had become frustrated at the lack of additional assignments they were being asked to perform, and that any plans and proposals they suggested were being rejected by CREEP. Liddy and Hunt took their complaints to the White House – most likely to Charles Colson – and requested that the White House start putting pressure on CREEP to assign them new operations. It is likely that both Colson and White House Chief of Staff H.R. Haldeman did just that, setting in train events that would lead to the Watergate break-ins a few months later. This narrative is confirmed in the famous “Cancer of the Presidency” conversation between Nixon and White House Counsel John Dean on March 21, 1973.
May 2, 1972: J. Edgar Hoover dies; L. Patrick Gray is appointed acting FBI director.
June 17, 1972: The plumbers are arrested at 2:30 a.m. in the process of burglarizing and planting surveillance bugs in the Democratic National Committee offices at the Watergate Building Complex. At the time, this was considered just another burglary, but after the backgrounds and methods used by the burglars became known to certain members of the Washington press, this event gained gravitas over the coming weeks.
June 23, 1972: Not made public at the time: In the Oval Office, H.R. Haldeman recommends to President Nixon that they attempt to shut down the FBI investigation of the Watergate break-in, by having CIA Director Richard Helms and Deputy Director Vernon A. Walters tell acting FBI Director L. Patrick Gray to, “Stay the hell out of this”. Haldeman expects Gray will then seek and take advice from Deputy FBI Director Mark Felt, and Felt will obey direction from the White House out of ambition. Nixon agrees and gives the order.
The conversation is recorded.
September 15, 1972: Hunt, Liddy and the Watergate burglars are indicted by a federal grand jury.
January 8, 1973: Five defendants plead guilty as the burglary trial begins. Liddy and McCord are convicted after the trial.
February 28, 1973: Confirmation hearings begin for confirming L. Patrick Gray as permanent Director of the FBI. During these hearings, Gray reveals that he had complied with an order from John Dean, legal counsel to the president, to provide daily updates on the Watergate investigation, and also that Dean had “probably lied” to FBI investigators.
March 17, 1973: Not made public at the time: Watergate burglar James McCord writes a letter to Judge John Sirica, claiming that some of his testimony was perjured under pressure and that the burglary was not a CIA operation, but had involved other government officials, thereby leading the investigation to the White House.
April 27, 1973: L. Patrick Gray resigns after it comes to light that he destroyed files from E. Howard Hunt’s safe. William Ruckelshaus is appointed as his replacement.
President Richard Nixon then fired Watergate Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox, following Cox’s request for tapes of Nixon’s Oval Office conversations. Nixon initially ordered U.S. Attorney General, Elliot Richardson, to fire Cox. Richardson resigned rather than carry out the order. Richardson’s top deputy, Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus, also considered the order “fundamentally wrong” and also resigned. Instead of taking part in what they determined was collusion in this obvious Presidential attempt to obstruct justice, they decided to resign their posts.
This left Robert Bork, now the Acting Attorney General.
When Nixon reiterated his order, Bork complied and fired Cox, an act found illegal in November of that year in a suit brought by Ralph Nader. The Justice Department did not appeal the ruling, and because Cox indicated that he did not want his job back, the issue was considered resolved. Bork remained Acting Attorney General until the appointment of William B. Saxbe on January 4, 1974.*
May 17, 1973 : The Senate Watergate Committee begins its nationally televised hearings.
May 19, 1973: Independent special prosecutor Archibald Cox appointed to oversee investigation into possible presidential impropriety.
June 3, 1973: Not made public at the time: John Dean tells Watergate investigators that he has discussed the cover-up with Nixon at least 35 times.
July 13, 1973: Not made public at the time: Alexander Butterfield, former presidential appointments secretary, reveals that all conversations and telephone calls in Nixon’s office have been taped since 1971.
July 18, 1973: Not made public at the time: Nixon orders White House taping systems disconnected.
July 23, 1973: Nixon refuses to turn over presidential tapings to Senate Watergate Committee or the special prosecutor.
Vice President replaced: October 12, 1973: Gerald Ford is nominated as Vice President under the 25th Amendment.
October 20, 1973: “Saturday Night Massacre” – Nixon orders Elliot Richardson and Ruckleshouse to fire special prosecutor Cox. They both refuse to comply and resign. Robert Bork carries out the order.
November 1, 1973: Leon Jaworski is appointed new special prosecutor.
November 17, 1973: Nixon delivers “I am not a crook” speech at a televised press conference at Disney World (Florida).
March 1, 1974: Nixon is named as an unindicted co-conspirator in an indictment against seven former presidential aides.
April 16, 1974: Special Prosecutor Jaworski issues a subpoena for 64 White House tapes.
April 30, 1974: White House releases edited transcripts of the Nixon tapes, but the House Judiciary Committee insists the actual tapes must be turned over.
May 9, 1974: Impeachment hearings begin before the House Judiciary Committee.
June 15, 1974: Woodward and Bernstein’s book All the President’s Men is published by Simon & Schuster (ISBN 0–671-21781-X).
July 24, 1974: United States v. Nixon decided: Nixon is ordered to give up tapes to investigators. Congress moves to impeach Nixon.
July 27 to July 30, 1974: House Judiciary Committee passes articles of Impeachment.
Early August 1974: A previously unknown tape from June 23, 1972 (recorded a few days after the break-in) documenting Nixon and Haldeman formulating a plan to block investigations, is released. This recording would later become known as the “Smoking Gun”.
Not made public at the time: Key Republican Senators tell Nixon that enough votes exist to convict him.
August 8, 1974: Nixon delivers his resignation speech in front of a nationally televised audience.
August 9, 1974: Nixon resigns presidency. Gerald Ford becomes President.
September 8, 1974: President Ford ends investigations by granting Nixon a pardon.
December 31, 1974: As a result of Nixon administration abuses of privacy, Privacy Act of 1974 passes into law. Ford is persuaded to veto the bill by Richard Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld; Congress overrides Ford’s veto. (Note that the newly elected Congress had not taken office yet, this Congress was still the 93rd Congress.)
January 1, 1975: John N. Mitchell, John Ehrlichman and H. R. Haldeman convicted of conspiracy, obstruction of justice and perjury.
November 4, 1975: Ford replaces several Nixon cabinet members in the “Halloween Massacre”, engineered by Ford aide Donald Rumsfeld. Richard Cheney, George H. W. Bush and Brent Scowcroft join Ford administration; Rumsfeld becomes Secretary of Defense; Henry Kissinger remains as Secretary of State but not National Security Advisor.
January 20, 1977: Jimmy Carter is inaugurated at the 39th President of The United States.
May 4, 1977: Nixon gives his first major interview about Watergate, telling TV journalist David Frost: “If the President does it, it’s not illegal.”
May 15, 1978: Nixon publishes his memoirs, giving more of his side of the Watergate saga.
April 22, 1994: Richard Nixon dies aged 81, after suffering a stroke. In keeping with his own wishes, he was not given a state funeral, though his funeral service 5 days later was a high-profile affair, attended by all 5 living U.S. Presidents and a host of other VIPs.
May 31, 2005: W. Mark Felt, former Associate Director of the FBI during the Watergate years, declares that he is Deep Throat, this declaration would later be confirmed by reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein. Some writers would later dispute this claim.
*The above is an abbreviated list of events taken from the Complete Watergate Timeline.
***
Below are the names of “loyal” Watergate operatives that kept popping up in succeeding Republican administrations over the years, mostly unnoticed by the forgetful and forgiving American public – to my consternation and disbelief:
Robert Bork
Vernon Walters
Donald Rumsfeld
Richard Cheney
G. Gordon Liddy, became a popular right-wing radio host and today is a major Trump supporter and fund contributor.
E. Howard Hunt, the organizer and manager of the “Plumbers”, the bagman for illegal “slush”funds to the Committee to Re-elect the President (Nixon) aka CREEP. A former CIA field operative involved in the training and deployment of Batista loyalist refugees at No Name Key, Florida, and an organizer of the Bay of Pigs Invasion. He has been repeatedly linked to the planning and organization of the JFK assassination, is purportedly one of the three men in the Dallas RR yards near Daley Plaza, and one of the three men on the grassy knoll at the time of the assassination. According to his son, he confessed to all of this on his deathbed.
