With great power comes great responsibility - and also scandal. SPYSCAPE takes a look back at three notorious Cold War calamities that shook the White House and reverberated across the spy agencies.
John F. Kennedy (1961-1963): Sex Scandals
A looming nuclear war undermined JFK’s administration, the Bay of Pigs invasion was a disaster, but it was the president’s sex scandals that created morale problems within the secret service. As one agent said in The Character Factor: “Everybody thought you were risking your life, and you were actually out there to see that he's not disturbed while he's having an interlude in the shower with two gals from Twelfth Avenue."
Perhaps JFK’s most dangerous liaison involved a mobster, a murder, and Hollywood legend Frank Sinatra. The singer introduced divorcee Judith Campbell to JFK and Chicago mob boss Sam Giancana and she reportedly had affairs with both.
Campbell claimed JFK asked her to courier cash to Giancana to ‘eliminate’ Cuban leader Fidel Castro - allegations that, at least in part, seemed to be backed up by the 2018 release of JFK documents by the CIA, FBI, and other agencies. One day after Marilyn Monroe died in 1962, Campbell said her apartment was burgled and phone records taken but her jewelry was left behind.
After the shocking 1963 assassination of JFK, Campbell isolated herself fearing for her life. The many questions about who killed JFK and why may never be resolved.
With great power comes great responsibility - and also scandal. SPYSCAPE takes a look back at three notorious Cold War calamities that shook the White House and reverberated across the spy agencies.
John F. Kennedy (1961-1963): Sex Scandals
A looming nuclear war undermined JFK’s administration, the Bay of Pigs invasion was a disaster, but it was the president’s sex scandals that created morale problems within the secret service. As one agent said in The Character Factor: “Everybody thought you were risking your life, and you were actually out there to see that he's not disturbed while he's having an interlude in the shower with two gals from Twelfth Avenue."
Perhaps JFK’s most dangerous liaison involved a mobster, a murder, and Hollywood legend Frank Sinatra. The singer introduced divorcee Judith Campbell to JFK and Chicago mob boss Sam Giancana and she reportedly had affairs with both.
Campbell claimed JFK asked her to courier cash to Giancana to ‘eliminate’ Cuban leader Fidel Castro - allegations that, at least in part, seemed to be backed up by the 2018 release of JFK documents by the CIA, FBI, and other agencies. One day after Marilyn Monroe died in 1962, Campbell said her apartment was burgled and phone records taken but her jewelry was left behind.
After the shocking 1963 assassination of JFK, Campbell isolated herself fearing for her life. The many questions about who killed JFK and why may never be resolved.
The assassination of JFK and the 1972 Watergate break-in at the Democratic National Committee HQ in Washington D.C. were almost a decade apart. Surely the two scandalous events can’t be related? Think again. Both have shadowy ties to CIA and FBI intelligence officers or their assets.
Nixon allegedly requested - and was repeatedly denied - CIA files involving the JFK assassination, the Bay of Pigs invasion, and the Cuban missile crisis.
"In a chilling parallel to their cover-up at Watergate, the CIA literally erased any connection between Kennedy's assassination and the CIA,” Nixon’s chief of staff, H. R. Haldeman, wrote in his book The Ends of Power (1978).
“No mention of the Castro assassination attempt was made to the Warren Commission by CIA representatives,” Haldeman added. “In fact, Counter-intelligence Chief James Angleton of the CIA called Bill Sullivan of the FBI and rehearsed the questions and answers they would give to the Warren Commission investigators."
University of California Berkeley Professor Peter Dale Scott, author of Deep Politics and the Death of JFK, argues that Kennedy’s assassination and Watergate are linked, claiming that secret American efforts to kill Cuban leader Castro are the key to a massive cover-up. What Haldeman and Scott lacked in their analysis, however, is hard evidence to back up their theories.
The Watergate scandal brought down many in the White House, leading to arrests, imprisonment, and the resignation of Nixon in 1974 before the full House could vote on the articles of impeachment.
Reagan and his team decided to tackle both problems with a plan that backfired spectacularly. The idea was to sell arms to Iran hoping the terrorists (who had links to Tehran) would release the American hostages. A cut of the profits from the Iranian arms deal would then be funneled to anti-communist Contra rebels in Nicaragua.
The problem for Reagan was that the plan wasn’t legal. For one thing, there was a US trade embargo with Iran. For another, the US was banned by law from funding the Contras because most of the rebel financing came from the illegal drug trade. Regardless, the plan went ahead. What could possibly go wrong?
When the Iran-Contra deal leaked out in 1986, the outcry threatened to bring down Reagan’s government. Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North of the National Security Council admitted diverting funds from the arms sales to support the Contras, even though Reagan had initially denied negotiating with terrorists. The CIA was involved in the subterfuge as well, training Contra fighters in the jungles of Central America, as ex-CIA officer Ric Prado told SPYSCAPE’s True Spies podcast Hidden Hand.
While US Congressional hearings probed the Iran-Contra deal, there were no convictions. Reagan - while taking full responsibility - denied knowing the extent of his administration's actions.
Listen to True Spies podcast Hidden Hand to hear CIA officer Ric Prado’s full story
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