William Casey

"William J. Casey served as director of central intelligence from January 1981 until he resigned on January 29, 1987, incapacitated by a brain tumor. Casey had been director of President Reagan's successful 1980 campaign, but his appointment as CIA director was not seen as a political reward. During World War II, Casey had a distinguished record in the Office of Strategic Services, the forerunner of the CIA, serving as intelligence chief for Europe. He also was an experienced Washington hand, having served as head of the Securities and Exchange Commission and as under secretary of state for economic affairs in the Nixon Administration. As CIA director, Casey and President Reagan shared similar world views, at the center of which was their determination to roll back communism and bring about the collapse of the Soviet Union."

Pollard case

High-level suspicions about Israeli-Soviet collusion were expressed as early as December, 1985, a month after Pollard's arrest, when William J. Casey, the late C.I.A. director, who was known for his close ties to the Israeli leadership, stunned one of his station chiefs by suddenly complaining about the Israelis breaking the "ground rules." The issue arose when Casey urged increased monitoring of the Israelis during an otherwise routine visit, I was told by the station chief, who is now retired. "He asked if I knew anything about the Pollard case," the station chief recalled, and he said that Casey had added, "For your information, the Israelis used Pollard to obtain our attack plan against the U.S.S.R. all of it. The coordinates, the firing locations, the sequences. And for guess who? The Soviets." Casey had then explained that the Israelis had traded the Pollard data for Soviet emigres. "How's that for cheating?" he had asked.

Affiliations

• Central Intelligence Agency
• National Strategy Information Center
• Manhattan Institute