CIA Paid for Thank-You Notes to Nixon Backers, Documents Show [View All]

[deminks]

Source: Bloomberg

June 26 (Bloomberg) -- The CIA surreptitiously paid more than $33,000 in 1970 to cover the cost of White House thank-you notes to supporters of President Richard Nixon's decision to invade Cambodia, newly released agency documents show.

The secret financing of the notes, done at White House request, was one part of a complex relationship between the Nixon White House and the Central Intelligence Agency that eventually drew the agency into the Watergate scandal.

CIA officials were aware that paying for the thank-you notes could be controversial and took steps to conceal the true purpose of the expenditure from government auditors outside the agency, the records show.

``Think we can go ahead and do this. Have to be careful as to way this is documented -- that's the only thing,'' said Warren Magnusson, the CIA's deputy director for liaison and planning, in a telephone conversation with White House Staff Secretary John Brown on May 26, 1970, according to a transcript of the call.

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