DISCUSSION ON MATTERS AFFECTED BY HSCA SUBPEONA.
Agency: CIA
Originator: CIA
From: BRECKINRIDGE, S.D.
To: MEMORANDUM FOR THE RECORD
Document date: 08/18/1978
Document type: PAPER-TEXTUAL DOCUMENT

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CONAIDENTIAL

OlC. 1: 78-3012

18 August 1978

MEMORANDUM FOR THE RECORD

SUBJECT: Discussion on Matters Affected by HSCA Subpeona

1. This memorandum includes more than the above

subject as there was a preliminary conversation with

Ken Klein who initiated a request for an Agency position

on Nosenko.

I spoke with him briefly when I went down to

the Headquarters entrance today to pick up Mr. Cornwell.

I told Klein that we would not have someone available on

person is preparing for it.

person se prepring on testimay chaested house tea

thought it

inappropriate to address

staff member in giving an

Agency

position,

and that in this case it would place

in their record (thereby becoming HSCA property)

sensitive

matters that we have taken great pains to hold

within

• the

Agency.

I said that written answers to the questions

are being

prepared, in addition to the statement. He

asked if I would tell him who would make the statement;

I replied that it was intended that John Hart do so, as

he had studied the problem already and was not an actor

in the earlier phases of the matter.

I told Klein that

I had tried to contact him by telephone to give him this

message, but that in any event a letter from the DDCI

to Chairman Stokes was to have been delivered to the

Committee this morning.

2.

Cornwell and I met for slightly over a half

hour today.

I told him that I was embarrassed for

Chairman Stokes over his subpoena. I said that the

Harvey. OPF had been reviewed in the morning of the day

before the subpoena was voted.

I said that the document

being requested from the AMMUG file had not been found,

which was known to his investigators, and that a

subpoena

could not produce it.

I said that the other two matters

were of very doubtful relevance to the charter of the

Committee--the deception operation that I had described

to him earlier could not in good faith be requested by

the Committee,

and the Mexico City history covered

years of activity with the most limited reference

to the Oswald matter. I expressed the opinion that if

they pressed for the subpoena that they would essentially

be creating a constitutional confrontation at what is

probably the most inopportune time so far as the investi-

gation is concerned. I was not at all sure that the

RETURN TO CIA

Background Use Only

Do Not Reproduce

CONPOEATIAL

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Agency's response, if it had to become public, would not

be embarrassing to the Committee.

I said that I assumed

that the issues on the Harvey file and the AMMUG file had

been resolved already.

Cornwell expressed ignorance on

the AMMUG file and said that they had wanted to include

the year 1959 in the Harvey file (we have provided 1960

through the period of his service as COS

3. The balance of our conversation had to do with

how we would handle the Proenza 201 file for the period

in question and the Mexico City history.

I had explained

to Cornwell the difference between the 201 file and the

operational file, without comment from him.

4.

Cornwell

stated that he knew from our earlier

conversations that we wanted to limit access to these

two matters.

He was under instructions from Blakey to

say that they could not accept such a limitation at this

time; both Blakey and Cornwell are so busy that they

cannot take this on themselves. I pointed out the

dilemma between the situation created by their own time

restraints and our security considerations. I told him

that the investigators he wanted to look at this

(Hardway and Lopez) labored under a burden of credibility

in the Agency and that these young men are so callow:

that we did not want to trust them with the kind of

information that they had been seeking.

He said that if

I knew something about them that he ought to be made

aware of I should tell him.

I replied that it was

primarily their

attitude and conduct and I did not feel

it constructive to discuss it further.

5.

I pointed out that Messrs. Sturbitts and Hawkins

were ready to review the Mexico City history with him.

In fact, he did go through it very briefly with them,

noting that there were deleted

sections with hand

written explanations of the subject matter.

• Cornwell

asked me to get authority for Hardway and Lopez to review

these two matters.

I first asked that Mr. Leap, who

had worked the Mexico City problem be used, emphasizing

that he was a mature person.

I then asked if it would

be acceptable to limit the review to one of the two.

When he asked me which one it would be, I replied that

it should be Lopez as much of the Proenza file is in

Spanish which Lopez handles well.

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We left it that I would submit the Committee's

request for

Hardway and Lopez to review the matters,

and that in any event Cornwell who is leaving for

Dallas today would be back in town Tuesday to review

the matter further.

He wants Hardway and Lopez to see

the file today and Monday; I said that I doubted that

I could get a decision before later in the day. Cornwell's

Dallas address will be

the Holiday Inn on Regal Road

if I have to call him.

S.D. Breckinridge

Bikini

Distribution:

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1 - OGC (Rininger)

DDO

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Mr. Shepanek

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