iu? SfuRci 1-86 | Mr. Goldsmith. In light of that, would it be expected that the people qustioning him would have had'a lot of | . 2 3 aed 5 experience: Mr. Helms. I would have thought the agency would have Lory put the best people in it that they could find. Certainly that | was my intention. . | | i : Mr Heims. I think there was a great deal of cooperation - my Mr. Goldsmith. Who made decisions concerning which areas | L é ! of inquiry were going to be addressedto Nosenko? _ | 1 an | r done within the DDP trying to work out the interrogation of | | pes Nosenko. It was so important to us and we had him for SO “long- I am certain there there was a lot of consultation and effort | | made to figure out ways to arrive at the truth here. | ' it Mr. Goldsmith. Other than the SR branch, which units wend | ' 1s | have been involved? | : 6 Mr. Helms. I do not know who was involved. That is all 7 on the record. I think it is fine to ask me these things, but le i fifteen years later I do not remember a whole list of names. | 9 | Mr. Goldsmith. Part. of the Committee's problem is that | 20 | the record is not all that clear and does contain errors. 7 2 Mr. Helms. The record contains errors? How does the record @ 22 contain errors? TI am not clear . , | Mr. Goldsmith: I am talking in a general sense. Part of 24 | the problem that. the Committee faces is the record, in fact, | a5 fi does not speak for itself and that records do contain errors. Docld: 32263410 Page oT THD @rrorr .
aa in oo Se) us ize] Docld: 32263410 i . . . 4 : . 7 | _. Mr. Goldsmith. In January, 1968 when the SR Division ig} position concerning Nosenko"s bona fides? i that I never heard of, that it still must be an open question. | | Mr. Helms. — I see. Mr. Goldsmith. I make no comment one way or the other whether the record contains errors in this particular case. How frequently were you briefed concerning the results of Nosenko's interrogation sessions? ‘Mr. Helits.:iE.do’not have any recollection: whatever. Mx. Goldsmith. .Do youcéver- recall’ béing briefed? Mr. Helms. Yes. I am sure I was asking from time to | time as to how we were finding out. After all, I felt I had | to go see Chief Justice Warren and tell him that we were not | able to establish Nosenko's bona fides. I obviously satisfied myself before I went that we were not able to. | | | ; j Mr.. Goldsmith. Did questions concerning Oswald constitute | a major facet of the overall inquiry that was being made of ! | 1 Nosenko? ~ 7 Mr. Helms. Yes. No question about it. ' | Report concerning Nosenko was issued, :what was the Agency's | on — | | , Mr. Helms. I do not think the Agency has ever had a | position. The only position I know of that could be called an . : i Agency position was we did not know whether he is bona fide | | | . a | or not. I never made a determination as to whether he was bona fide or not. But I believe unless something has happened | . age 0°  - TAR CFPRET
UF Bhi i | 1-88 | Or, let us put it this way, a matter of opinion. * 2 | ~ . | Mr. Goldsmith. Is it not so that the SR Report of 1968 | 3] . 4. 3 oe ' y indicated that in fact Mr. Nosenko was not a bona fide defector? . ® | Mr. Helms. I do not remember firsthand what the thrust sh , | | of the report was, but obviously this is a very difficult line | ° 6 | of inquiry for me because I read the magazines and newspapers ‘ | and books and so forth which have appeared since, and I do not 8 | know what I have read there and what I knew from that time. | 9 | I just judge from reading the New York magazine, for | 10 i example, that this is still an open. question. If the New J " York magazine isa bad source, I have nothing, to add. | 12 Mr. Coldemith. In January, '68, when the -- Mr. Sawyer. If counsel would yield for just a moment, me I ask the Ambassador, this is kind of intriguing to me, we having had a rather long session with Mr. Nosenko. Do you | 1s have an opinion yourself. on that question? | . Mr. Helms. No, sir, I do. not, because a lot of time has 13 passed since I have been out of the Agency: and. a lot of the i$ | factors that went into this argument and debate, I have now: | forgotten about. ‘Tehave been under constant appearances in Grand Juries, Congressional Committees and various investigations on all kinds of subjects, so my memory is even more wonky than it would be under normal conditions. 25 3 = do not know about Mr. Nosenko. I do know that there ee ne oe te ee re eee: ee conn a ne a J et pecra:sazeau10 vase oo «=f (sti‘<‘é‘ésr i ERT
ivr Bhunci | | 1-89 | are differing opinions, however, about him, but I do not have the housing of those defectors and what was the procedure in 2 | any personal feeling myself about him. . 3 I am sorry, I cannot help you. I do not know. o © 4 | Mrs. Burke. Since Mr. Sawyer has interjected a question | | 5 | at this time, I have a couple of questions I would like to rais | mo | : é | at this point. ; | There were many defectors from the Soviet Union and Cuba 4 | during that period of time. What was the usual procedure for | 10 terms of their places of detention? | Jv Mr Helms. Usually, Mrs. Burke, when these men were nO it brought to the United States ‘they are put in what is called a one safe house which was usually a relatively isolated residence ces) o+6 , where we could control the environment around it, and they in were lodged there -- normally very comfortably and well-fed and | -well-taken care of and interrogated. And the normal procedures | 17 | did not take terribly long, maybe a month or two or something ey of this kind, and then they would. be resettled, a.new identity 1g would be, given to them, ¢ or something. would occur. 20 . But the Nosenko case was so central to the whole problem Zz} 4 of: trying to establish this ‘relationship of the Soviet Union | to the assassination of: President Kennedy, and since we were | unable to resolve the case satisfactorily to ourselves, this went on far longer than any other casé I have ever remembered. a¢ ~~ And I must say also, because I do not want to mislead you
iwi WWI I 1-90 | | in any way, that whether or not the handling of defectors, the | way it was done in those days,.was in compliance with all the 3 | laws of the United States, I do not know. All I know was 4 @ 4 | inside the Executive Branch there was an Inter-Agency Committee 5 | on:which the PBI and the Army, Navy and State Department and | 6 | all these agencies sat, and they were the ones who decided what | 7 | was going to happen to these defectors. | § | I believe -- I am no lawyer, as I said, but I believe | 9 | that there is kind of a grey area in our laws as to exactly | 10 what their rights are when they defect because they do sign | 11 papers:.saying that they want asylum and all the sest of it, so | 2 | they do, ina sense, give up certain rights by making this | . 13 | request. | . : . _@ id ! Mrs. Burke. Were not some of the defectors tried in the | 1s 3 civilian courts? | 16 | Mr. Helms. I do not know any case of that. | 7 7 Mrs. Burke. Not: Soviet defectors? It has tobe in time 13 sof war? | | : i. 19 a Mr. Helms. (I think that is right. | 0 Mrs. Burke. May I inquire about how much longer does | a | counsel intend to. 90? | —_ | al Mr. Goldsmith. This might be an appropriate time for the | -@ 3 | Luncheon break. ee 7 _ 4 34 | Mrs. Burke. All right. | ae | Mri .Preyer had to leave. If there is no objection, his | |