MEETING WITH HSCA STAFFERS (CIA-HSCA PROBLEMS)
Originator: CIA
From: BRECKINRIDGE, SCOTT D., OLC
Document date: 1978-06-29 00:00:00
Document type: PAPER - TEXTUAL DOCUMENT

# DOCID-32401055

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JFK ASSASSINATION SYSTEM

IDENTIFICATION FORM

-----------

AGENCY INFORMATION

AGENCY : CIA

RECORD NUMBER : 104-10145-10214

RECORD SERIES

: JFK

AGENCY. FILE NUMBER

: 80T01357A

DOCUMENT INFORMATION

AGENCY ORIGINATOR : CIA

FROM

: BRECKINRIDGE, SCOTT D., OLC

TO

TITLE

:

MEETING WITH HSCA STAFFERS (CIA-HSCA PROBLEMS)

DATE

: 06/29/1978

PAGES

: 10

SUBJECTS : JFK ASSASSINATION

HSCA MEETING

DOCUMENT TYPE : PAPER

CLASSIFICATION

: SECRET

RESTRICTIONS

CURRENT STATUS : RELEASED IN PART PUBLIC - RELEASED WITH DELETIONS

DATE OF LAST REVIEW

COMMENTS

Pages it 2 origined Missing

Released under the John F. Kennedy

Assassination Records Collection Act of

1992 (44 USC 2107 Note]. Case#:NW

65924 Date: 10-26-2021

[R] - ITEM IS RESTRICTED

104-10145-10214

FORM

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M UNCLASSIFIED

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s82 Chromo.

APPROVED FOR RELEASE 1993

CIA MISTORICAL REVEY PROCAN

MEMORANDUM FOR:

"r. Carlucci

I net with Mr. Plakey this afternoon for a half

Inshowing the draft memo I noted that what

I said to him yesterday on the subject may have

seemed rhetorical, but that feelings at the gency

are very deep on the subject. I exprêssed the

thought that we had not yet explored every avenue

of mechanical devices for solving this problem, and

it seemed best at this time to not forard this

I said I assuned ve would have problons

doinstream, but there is still a chance to solve this

He noted hou complete our response had been on

the defector problem

I said I wanted to be able to say that he also

feels there is sull room for some solution, which

he confirmed.

He also said the Chairman is preparec

to so a long way on just about any issue.

In essence, tiere remains room for, and desire to,

compromise, even if ve haven't a clear solution in

hand at the moment. I think we can hold up this

nemo for the monent, and try to work it ot orally.

If you want me to speak to the DOT I will, but we

have to dovise a rocedure Date

that neets everone's needs.

7 cu

FORM

USE PREVIOUS §,D.B20e

5-75 101

EDITIONS

29. Juke'? f

21662

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OLC $ 73-2761

29 June 1978

MEMORANDUM FOR THE RECORD

SUBJECT : Meeting with HSCA Staffers

I. The undersigned, in the company of Messrs. Joannides,

and Rininger

and Goldsnith yesterday for about two hours, starting at

met with Messrs. Blakey, Cornwell,

about 1600: After some preliminary bowing and scraping as

to who would go first, I started.

First, I passed to Mr. Blakey a package of papers

prepared for release under FOIA, involving records of

conversations with him in reference to a HSCA staff employee

who did not meet all security criteria for work on this

matter.

I stated that we wanted to know if it gave him

any problems; he undertook to let us know today.

I reported that we had notified Mr. John McCone

McCone was Director, and was the channel through which

Mr.. McCone preferred to have contacts of this sort made.

Elder had reported that Mr. McCone was departing his home

for Seattle at the time of his telephone conversation with

him, and that he had not heard further. I had spoken with

Mr. Elder about dealing directly with the HSCA and gave

them his

telephone number (376-5565)} Elder will keep us

posted of developments.

4.

I stated that we are trying to look ahead to

potential problems that can be resolved before the last

minute.

I asked specifically what plans they had for the

public hearings in September, and what they would require

of us.

I specifically noted

considerations.

and he woula come a ceo save necta

our interest in security

days.

I replied this would give us plenty of time to

address the problem.

E2, IMPDET

CL by 13190

21663

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5. I noted that

I had written asking for an up-to-date

statement of the internal practice of access within the HSCA

staff.

I knew that they observed a need-to-know principle

and it would be helpful to us to know who was approved for

access

to certain matters. After saying that everyone was

cleared basically, with some having extra clearances, he

said that the basic principle was by team.

I noted that

the Mexico and defector issues involved sensitive matters,

and who should be given access to this was useful information

to us.

He said he would check my written request--which he

did not recall--but did not make any other commitments.

I asked about the Beachhead agreement and the

subsequent issue. He said that there had been no formal

acknowledgement of the beachhead draft proposal, as it did

not coincide with his understanding of what had

been agreed.

I said that there was only one reason for the undertaking,

and that was support of the hearings, and that was what the

agreement had attempted to record.

I

said that there are

counterproposals on how to handle the materials for the

Mexico and defector problems.

I said that the given reason

for wanting to hold those materials for writing was their

concern we may learn of their thinking.

Noting that con-

venience may be a consideration (Goldsmith had

indicated

this to Rodger Gabrielson in a conversation last week), I

said we are prepared to install the two-combination safe

up there, to hold the materials on those two subjects

separately from the beachhead materials used relevant to

hearings, per se.

However, we did not intend to move

additional Agency documents to the HSCA area. I tabled

a draft statement of what we are prepared to do in this

respect.

I

said that we were not proposing an arranguent

to be negofiated, but are stating what we are prepared to

do in an attempt

to accommodate ourselves to their expressed

problem, under the existing agreement, and this is our answer.

If this was not acceptable, I said we could provide a four-

drawer safe at CIA Headquarters with a combination set and

controlled by them, for purposes of report writing, and

they could move their material to that safe.

Blakey said

he would review the draft statement (copy attached) and

let me know.

7. Blakey said that things had changed since his

early days.

Full agreements had been reached quickly,

then, but now things took longer. He noted the atmosphere,

and also noted the

"changing of the guards" (referring to

my arrival). I sald that one of the first things I noted

steelet

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in arriving on the scene was the atmosphere. I had

given it

considerable study, and felt that there was

problem of communications.

I stated that it is clear to

me that we say things to one another that are not heard or

understood.

8. I undertook

to tell them one thing I had done to

plumb the matter.

I said that I knew they tested hypotheses,

and I had done the same thing.

My experience was that there

is a

temptation on the part of some congressional staff

investigators to plant versions of things in the minds of

witnesses and then extract answers on

the basis of that.

cited the Schweiker Report as containing some examples, as

addressed directly in the 1977 CIA Task Force study on

Schweiker report. I said that as soon as they finished in

Mexico City I went there and interviewed the three former

employees they saw:

Zambernardi, Flick and Watson. I

said Flick wasn't very helpful

(we had only about a half

hour with him prior to leaving

zambernardi's description of his interviewwas interesting.

After having said that he didn't recall what photographic

coverage there was of the Cuban Consulate, at what time,

he was told that there was photographic coverage on

2l September, when Oswald is believed to have visited the

consulate twice that day. His response was that if there

pulse camera there at that time, and it was operating

properly, there should have been

a picture of Oswald if he

entered that door.

I said research since my return

disclosed the following: the Cuban Consulate entrance

had been closed for about two years preceding September

1963; when it reopened there were plans to install photo-

graphic coverage on 26 September; a later report showed

that technicians

were at the safehouse installing new

equipment on Friday, 27 September, to provide coverage

of the Consulate and that they experienced problems with

that new equipment on that date; that it was planned to

have four days testing; that records indicate coverage

commencing in October 1963; and later reporting showed

installation of a pulse camera in December 1963. I stated

that some of these documents were in files seen by HSCA

staff members on 26 May.

Others turned up as a

result

of our inquiries would be made available additionally.

Blakey said that Ann Goodpasture had said there was

coverage.on 27 September; I replied that the documents

we saw indicated there was not.

Goldsmith said he

personally would review the materials.

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UNCLASSIFIED

*ERNAL

ONLY

ROUTING AND RECORD SHEET

OLC 78-2120/A

ATTAL

SECRET

SUBJECT: (Optionol)

HSCA Request

FROM:

EXTENSION

S.D. Breckinridge

1046

TO: (Officer designation, room number, and

building).

DATE

RECEIVED

OFFICER'S

INITIALS

FORWARDED

1.

General Counsel

.2.

(Attention;

Mr

Chief, SE Division

Rininger)

:3.

Chief, CI Staff

airector of Security

Director of Medical

Services

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

10

11:

12.

13.

14.

15.

FORM

PREVIOUS

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17 CONFIDENTIAL

NO

DATE

29 June 1978

COMMENTS (Number each comment to show from whom

to. whom..

Drow o line across column after each comment.)

The

attached memorandum from

the HSCA is based on recent

testimony by the person in

question.

It involves

operational considerations

on the part of those who deal

with him during the period

his bona fides were under

question, as well as legal

considerations and possible

medical questions. It

would be appreciated if

you could have a representative

meet

with us in the conference

room in 6D-0107, at 1100 on

Friday, 30 June.

S. D. Breckinridge

APPROVED FOR HELENSE 1393

CIA MISTORICAL RENEW PROCLAM

2166/

INTERNAL

millie

17 UNCLASSIFIED

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9..

I said that I attributed this to communications.

It was HSCA practice to not communicate with us, a result

of which has been to blind themselves in part.

Their

report inevitably would suffer in the end. We can help

them,

and can provide insights to a culture that they

should realize is strange to them. Nuances

with basic

substantive significance are lost to them.

I noted that

their reading a less technical file--Oswald's personality

file from Mexico City--had made it possible for them to

correct a mistaken memory by the former DCOS Stanley Watson.

Watson had recalled

seeing. Oswald's file with a photo of

Oswald

entering the Soviet Embassy in Mexico City, as well

as a four-or-five-line

extract from a telephone conversa-

They had persuaded him that he had not seen a

photograph of Oswald. I had checked on return to

Headquarters and found that they had reviewed the Mexico City

file on Oswald, which contained a picture of what we refer

to as the "unidentified man"

and not Oswald. I said that

distrust of the Agency was implicit in their approach to

things (and that they should understand that we are not

cloned from one figure making up one gigantic conspiracy)

and

that this contributes to the communications gap.

said I had been participating in inspections for some fif-

teen years, running

individual inquiries

much of that time

and directing a program for some five years. The biggest

problem is to avoid the "avenging angel" approach and

to

realize that the investigator does not speak from Mount

Olympus--my written instructions to inspectors so stated.

Objectivity takes a

lot, and its absence will affect rela-

tions.

10. ..I stated that arrangements had been made to obtain

U-< Clearances for Messrs Blakey, Cornwell, Klein and

Ms: Smith.. Some 1,200 linear feet of files were there.

By limiting the time period it could be reduced, and to

help them it would be useful to read a history,

and to

flights (it would show they knew perhaps more accurately

chan even the U-z altimeters showed what the height was

want to contact Hal Clark (0/DDS&T) this morning. I

pointed out that with the exception of a few lower-level

employees, those familiar with

the program are no longer

available. They said they would want to do this today

(I have alerted Clark to this).

11. I said I have two problems to table. The first

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has to do with a Mexican named Calvillo.

I said we did not

know they intended to interview him in Mexico City, and it

was some time before we knew there had been an issue there.

There was some back-and-forth between Cornwell and me about

what he told us and what we agreed to (part of which was

his being told we wouldn't help him with agents, and his

telling the station we had agreed to do so). In any

I said Calvillo was an unwitting co-optee, a man

who did not know that he ever had done anything for us.

We simply had arranged for some Cubans in Miami to hire

him--a journalist--to interview refugees and write stories

on it.

Blakey said their interest is apparent, Calvillo

having interrogated Elena Garo de Paz following the assasi-

nation of President Kennedy. No decisions were taken, with

my simply tabling the problem to be worked out.

12. I said that Casasin was another problem. The

had worked for us abroad under non-official cover.

He had left the Agency and now works in a UN organization.

He had run an agent into the USSR, that man having met a

Russian girl

and eventually marrying her. Our assumption

is that the interest in the man is that the agent was

successful in

getting his Russian wife out of the country,

as Oswald was in getting Marina out. We have no problem

in arranging an interview with Casasin, but the name of

the agent we do not wish to reveal, for reasons outlined

at the meeting. I noted that Casasin (which is a pseudo-

•nym) was also a chief of one of the SR Sections during

the time period of interest to them and this might make

him additionally interesting to them, as they had requested

the people for that period. Goldsmith said they are not

interested in the identity or any aspects of Casasin's

agent or his Russian wife, which I said resolved that

aspect of the matter (we can simply instruct Casasin to

not divulge the agent's name, etc., should there be some

Slip in this understanding, and make Casasin available for

interview). However, no action was taken at the meeting.

13.

Mr. Blakey described the physical problem growing

out of the failure to resolve the question of the beach-

head issue.

There are some six-eight depositions and

three-four hearings.

Transcripts, typewriter tapes and

notes are held in the two-drawer safe.

We observed that

once the transcripts have been corrected and verified

there is no practical reason for keeping either the type.

writer

tapes or steno notes.. They agreed to check on this.

14. Mr. Blakey stated that he felt there was a steady

5.

SECRET

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deterioration in relationships. He observed that it had

been

from 1 June to 28 June on the priority requests,

with no results.

I said that our move and a new reporting

system had delayed advising HSCA of results, which was

not acceptable to him. He felt that it would be useful

to have a

common document showing status of reports, to

which I demurred; I said that if we took time out to work

on yet another log system (having just gotten one started

for ouselves) we would further delay things. I wanted

to

work out the paper and then would be happy to give time

and attention to

a joint evaluation of where things stand.

As he envisioned it, it would record date of request,

date of completion and date of review.

15. Mr. Blakey said there is a sense of outrage in

the Committee over the Mexico incident.

It is a

"cancer."

He felt that third party solution was viable and reasonable.

The key to this statement is the point that he was speaking

of Committee members, per se, and

not just staff members.

16. As I had described the Calvillo problem, he said

then we should have no problem in their confronting

Calvillo. He wasn't an agent of ours and our sensitivity

could be met by not raising the activity in question. (At

a meeting: Thursday afternoon, he said he would agree to not

discuss possible CIA relations. His interest is Calvillo's

reported

interrogation of Elena Garro de Paz following

the assassination of President Kennedy).

17.

Blakey expressed some concern, not detailed, about

the Office of Security standards being extended to other

paper.

He reads

the agreement to the effect that we seal

off only polygraph and background investigation material

in Security files on Agency personnel but not on other files

such as DDO. We merely observed that there may be sensi-

tive matters, e.g., the identity of a live Soviet operation;

files have to be reviewed in such instances, but they

have

the

right to question the basis of it. We said we will

inquire further into the procedures being followed, for

we did not understand that anything other than this is

being done.

18. Blakey described the problems of sanitizing notes.

I had undertaken to see if notes (as distinguished from

summaries) could be summarized; if so we would sanitize

them rather than requiring summaries. Blakey mentioned

6.

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Cindy Cooper's notes and those of John Hornbeck. I said

that in the latter instance Hornbeck had copied extensively

from the unsanitized version of the 1977 Task Force Report,

emphasizing the portions already deleted from the sanitized

version; I had said he would have to do a summary. That

could have been

I avoided by exercise of discretion. Goldsmith

asked that we check the systemn for sanitizing.

19.

We got on the Mexico City affair again. I said that

Cornwell had been told that we would not help him with agents.

He said that he understood that agents could be brought out

(in fact, I was at a meeting at which his insistence made

it clear that this was not the case, per my M/R of that

meeting).

He said there was another meeting

at which Bill

Sturbitts had agreed to a list, which I said

I knew about,

but that this was not the point. Blakey said we shouldn't

argue over whether I was at a meeting or what was discussed

when.

I said that Mexico cabled quoting Cornwell as saying

that access to agents had been agreed by Headquarters, which

was not so.

Cornwell said I should review the cable, as

it didn't say that (it does).

In essence, Cornwell may

conclude that he was the object of our trip to Mexico:

there

is disagreement over what he was told here and what he said

there, and we went down and found that a witness had been

loaded with misinformation as a basis

for statements then

elicited (which led to our being able to correct the facts

on an issue they had obscured

from us under their practice

of arms-length business).

While it can't make Cornwell

any happier with his relations with us, it may prove salutary

overall.

- Be chan'

S. D. Breckinridge

Attachment

Distribution:

Orig - OLC Subject

1 - 0/DDCI (H. Smith)

1 - DDO

1

÷ C/SE

Division

1

- C/CI Staff

- DDA

- D/Security

1

- C/PCS/LOC

1

- Mr. Shepanek (PCS/LOC)

01 - Mr. Holmes (CI Staff)

1 - C/LA Division

1 - Mr. Rininger (OGC)

1

- Mr. Clark (DDS&T)

1 - OLC Chrono

SECRET

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AT TACHMENT TO OCL-78-2469

UNCLASSIFIED

This is to record an understanding about handling certain

specific classified materials relating to two subjects of

interest

to the HSCA in its investigation; the subjects relate

to defectors and certain subject matter in an agreed foreign

country.

The materials consist

of CIA documents and

materials (now held in CIA facilities located in the HSCA

area

mentioned below), materials derived from CIA documents

but involving HSCA analysis, and HSCA-generated materials

consisting of notes of interviews, depositions

and/or

transcripts of hearings.

The CIA will provide and install a two-combination safe

in the special area provided for it in HSCA quarters (herein

referred to as the "beachhead"). HSCA security officers will

set the combination of one of the two locks, and CIA security

officers will set the other, each combination to be held

exclusively by

the representatives of the respective

organizations.

The two-combination safe will be used to store only

materials relating to the two above subjects. Access to the

materials in the two-combination safe will be controlled by

CIA security officers, according to a list of approved

personnel agreed between HSCA and CIA.

Use of the materials

will be limited to the room in which the safe is located

in the HSCA area.

Upon conclusion of the investigation the materials

will be handled

as follows:

1. All CIA materials will be returned to CIA.

2. All materials not generated by HSCA hearings, or

depositions or formal interviews, but including

information derived from CIA documents and

materials

will be returned to CIA.

3. All notes of formal HSCA interviews, depositions and

transcripts of hearings, will be delivered by

HSCA to HPSCI for retention.

4. The safe will be returned to CIA.

This understanding is in addition to and separate from

another agreement of operation of that aspect of the ClA

beachhead for support of interviews, deposition and/or

hearings of the Committee and its staff, which is recorded

in a separate document.

UNCLASSIFIED

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