Did Nixon have prior knowledge of the Watergate burglery?

Factual Questions
1

Now, we all know that Nixon got in serious trouble because he was trying to cover up the break in at the Watergate hotel. But, did Nixon have prior knowledge of the break in? Also, who organized the group who were doing the break ins?

2

It depends on who you believe.

According to G. Gordon Liddy, the entire Watergate operation originated with White House Counsel John Dean. Nixon didn’t know about the break-in until after it happened.

The group doing the break-ins were five Cubans, a former CIA and FBI agent named Jim McCord, who also worked for the Committee to Re-Elect the President, and E. Howard Hunt, who was in charge of installing the bugs. Liddy ran the group, which, in turn, was part of a White House covert ops / dirty-tricks crew presumably run by Egil ‘Bud’ Krogh.

I offer Liddy’s view here because I’m personally persuaded by most of it - especially given that historian and traditionally-liberal researcher Len Colodny (“Silent Coup”) confirms Liddy’s facts through independent research. In short, Colodny demonstrate’s Dean’s perjury very convincingly. Liddy, whatever else you might say about his lawlessness, never testified at all about Watergate, even to avoid jail time.

Other possibilities are that it was a John Mitchell operation, that it was run by or through Erlichman, or that it was a Jeb Magruder brainchild.

However, given that the first mention on the Oval Office tapes was subsequent to the break-in, and dealt with how to derail the investigation of the break-in, it seems a better-than-even chance that Nixon didn’t know ahead of time what was going on.

That said, of course, he did use the power of the Presidency in an effort to shield the lawbreakers.

  • Rick
3

This Watergate Timeline, makes it sound as if Nixon had prior knowledge of the break in (see Mar 30,June 17, 1972 entries), but there’s no hard evidence.

4

Excuse me, Squink, but I don’t see what you mean. The conversation referenced on June 17th between President Nixon and John Dean clearly didn’t take place on June 17th - it’s Dean recalling, in past tense, June 17th. And Nixon says to him, “You knew who it was.” Dean agrees: “I knew it who it was.” That suggests Dean had prior knowledge, not that Nixon did.

Since the timeline quotes liberally from Will and Silent Coup, I believe I’m safe in saying that it supports the view that Watergate was a John Dean operation, and that Nixon did not know ahead of time.

  • Rick