White House Plumbers - encyclopedia article about White House Plumbers.

The White House Plumbers or simply the Plumbers is the popular name given to the covert White House Special Investigations Unit established July 24, 1971 during the presidency of Richard Nixon. Its job was to stop the leaking (hence "plumbers") of classified information to the news media during the Nixon administration. Its members branched into more nefarious projects working for the Committee to Re-elect the President (CRP, or CREEP), including the first Watergate break-in and the ensuing Watergate scandal.

History

The White House Plumbers group was formed in response to the publication of The Pentagon Papers in The New York Times, beginning June 13, 1971. These documents detailed the history of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War. Initially, White House Chief of Staff H.R. Haldeman downplayed the matter to Nixon, stating that the information mainly made the Kennedy and Johnson administrations look bad. However, National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger and special counsel Charles Colson advocated a severe response to the massive leak¹ in the form of publicly discrediting the leaker of the papers, former State Department and Defense Department analyst Daniel Ellsberg.

On July 1, David Young joined the White House and together with Egil Krogh penned a memorandum to Nixon advisors Haldeman and John Ehrlichman advocating the formation of a White House Special Investigations Unit.² Haldeman and Ehrlichman agreed to the plan and obtained the approval of Nixon. Young was put in charge of the unit and reported to Krogh. The nickname the "Plumbers" came to being when Young posted his name on his office door which read "David R. Young/Plumber".³

Members

The Plumbers came to include several Watergate figures. E. Howard Hunt was recommended by Colson and G. Gordon Liddy was recommended by Krogh. Liddy coined his own sensitivity indicator for the group in the form of "ODESSA" for "Organization Directed to Eliminate the Subversion of the Secrets of the Administration".⁴ The name reflects Liddy's admiration for Nazi-style intelligence operations as ODESSA was also the name of a Nazi fugitive network.

Another member of the group was its liaison to the CIA, John Paisley. In recent years Paisley's involvement has led to speculation the CIA had a far greater hand in the operations of the Plumbers than originally thought at the time. What is known is Paisley was assigned to the CIA's Office of Security (OS), of which Hunt was once a member. On August 9, 1971, David Young's memo indicates he met with Paisley and OS Director Howard Osborn in which Paisley provided a list of objectives for the Special Investigations Unit. ⁵

Operations

The Plumbers' first task was the burglary of the office of Daniel Ellsberg's Los Angeles psychiatrist, Lewis J. Fielding, in an effort to uncover evidence to discredit Ellsberg. The operation was reportedly unsuccessful in finding Ellsberg's file and was so reported to the White House. However, Fielding himself stated the file was in his office, he found it on the floor on the morning after the burglary and quite clearly someone had gone through it.⁶ In a September 1971 conversation, Ehrlichman advised Nixon, “We had one little operation. It’s been aborted out in Los Angeles which, I think, is better that you don’t know about." Eventually, the case against Ellsberg was dismissed due to government misconduct.

Aside from the Fielding burglary there are scarce few other activities the Plumbers were known to have been engaged in. Hunt reportedly looked into the Ted Kennedy Chappaquiddick incident and Liddy reported purported Kennedy administration involvement in the assassination of South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem.⁷

After the California break-in, Liddy was recruited by White House Counsel John Dean to perform an intelligence gathering operation for CRP. Liddy was transferred to CRP and involved Hunt in the operations which would later include the Watergate burglary.

Trivia

The term "plumbers" is a double entendre since the van the White House Plumbers used was to trick people into thinking they were real tapware plumbers although the van was used as a detective's vehicle, as depicted in the movie Dick.

Notes

Note 1: Hougan, Jim (1984). Secret Agenda. Random House. ISBN 0-394-51428-9. p.29-30
Note 2: Ibid. p.32-34
Note 3: Ibid. p.36
Note 4: Liddy, G. Gordon (1980). Will. St. Martin's Press. ISBN 0-312-88014-6. p.147-148
Note 5: Hougan, Secret Agenda, p. 38-40
Note 6: Ibid. p.47
Note 7: Liddy, Will, p.149

Additional Sources

The Watergate Files. The Watergate Files presented by The Gerald R. Ford Museum & Library. Retrieved on March 6, 2005.
G. Gordon Liddy deposition on December 6, 1996 in Maureen K. Dean and John W. Dean v. St. Martin's Press et al United States District Court for the District of Columbia. Case No. 92 1807 (HHG) http://www.nixonera.com/media/video/liddy/liddyhi1.ram

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A news leak is a disclosure of embargoed information in advance of its official release, or the unsanctioned release of confidential information.

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Classified information is sensitive information to which access is restricted by law or regulation to particular classes of people. A formal security clearance is required to handle classified documents or access classified data.
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The Committee to Re-elect the President, often abbreviated to CRP or CREEP, was a Nixon White House fundraising organization. This organization was found to have employed money laundering and slush funds. It was also involved in the Watergate Scandal.
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Total dead: ~314,000
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wounded: ~600,000+ [5]
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Harry Robbins Haldeman (publicly known as H. R. Haldeman, and informally as Bob Haldeman) (October 27, 1926 – November 12, 1993) was a U.S. political aide and businessman, best known for his service as White House Chief of Staff to President Richard Nixon and
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Charles (Chuck) Wendell Colson (born October 16, 1931, in Boston, Massachusetts) was the chief counsel for President Richard Nixon from 1969 to 1973 and was one of the Watergate Seven, jailed for Watergate-related charges.
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Daniel Ellsberg (born April 7, 1931) is a former American military analyst employed by the RAND Corporation who precipitated a national uproar in 1971 when he released the Pentagon Papers,
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David R. Young, Jr. (born November 10, 1936, Jersey City, New Jersey) was a special assistant at the National Security Council in the Nixon Administration and an administrative assistant to Henry Kissinger.
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Egil “Bud” Krogh, Jr. (born 3 August 1939 in Chicago, Illinois) is a lawyer who came to prominence as a Nixon Administration official who went to prison for his role in the what would be known as the Watergate scandals.
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John Daniel Ehrlichman (March 20, 1925 – February 14, 1999) was counsel and Assistant to the President for Domestic Affairs under President Richard Nixon and a key figure in events leading to the Watergate first break-in and in the ensuing Watergate scandal for which he was
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Everette Howard Hunt, Jr. (October 9 1918 - January 23 2007) was an American author and spy. He worked for the CIA and later the White House under President Richard Nixon. Hunt, with G.
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George Gordon Battle Liddy (born November 30, 1930) was the chief operative for White House Plumbers unit that existed during several years of Richard Nixon's Presidency. Along with E.
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Sensitive information is information or knowledge that might result in loss of an advantage or level of security if revealed (disclosed) to others who might
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