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Over several weeks that winter of 1972, Hunt and Liddy criss-crossed the country trying to build a covert campaign dirty-tricks team. The two men treated themselves well on the road \u2014 traveling first-class, staying in the nicest rooms at the fanciest hotels and recruiting over meals at top restaurants, justifying the lavish expenses because, as Liddy would explain, \u201c[Potential recruits] must believe that money is no object to their employers if they are to accept the risk of that kind of employment.\u201d Beyond the money, though, Liddy wanted to signal that he would weather whatever was necessary to protect the identities of those who joined his team. At dinner in California with a woman he hoped to recruit as a potential plant in the Democratic campaign, he asked her to hold out her lit cigarette lighter, then placed his palm over the flame, locking eyes with her as his flesh blackened and smoked. Shaken by the demonstration of loyalty, the woman declined Liddy\u2019s offer.<\/p>\n
In Miami, he and Hunt tapped Bernard Barker, a onetime undercover CIA operative Hunt met while the two were helping to plan the Cuban invasion at the Bay of Pigs in 1961, and Barker\u2019s network of Cuban \u00e9migr\u00e9s to build a squad of counter-demonstrators, interviewing a dozen men who impressed Liddy with their toughness. Between them, Hunt bragged to his partner, the men had killed 22, including two hanged from a garage beam. At the end of their conversation, the leader spoke in Spanish to Barker, who laughed. \u201cHe called you a falcon \u2014,\u201d Barker translated back to Liddy, clutching his hands like talons, \u201c\u2014 the bird other birds fear.\u201d (The name would become Liddy\u2019s self-appointed code name for that year\u2019s operations.) Hunt also recruited a locksmith who could serve as the team\u2019s covert-entry specialist, a man who had once been part of Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista\u2019s secret police. Liddy was so pleased by the viciousness of his new colleagues that he pulled Bud Krogh aside when they crossed paths outside the White House and told him, \u201cBud, if you want anyone killed, just let me know.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\u201cI knew exactly what had to be done and why, and I was under no illusion about its legality,\u201d Liddy recalled later in his memoir.<\/p>\n<\/footer>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/aside>\nBy the end of January, they had a plan and a budget totaling a million dollars. \u201cI knew exactly what had to be done and why, and I was under no illusion about its legality,\u201d Liddy recalled later in his memoir. The radical left had declared war on his country. (Once passing a Vietnam war protester holding a candle on the streets of D.C., Liddy claims to have grabbed the man\u2019s wrist and used the protester\u2019s memorial candle to light his cigar. Ignition completed, he allegedly said, \u201cThere, you useless son of a bitch, at least now you\u2019ve been good for something.\u201d)<\/p>\n\n\n
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Finally, it came time to seek official approval for his sweeping covert plans from John Mitchell, the U.S. attorney general who was moonlighting as the head of Nixon\u2019s official reelection efforts. Liddy knew he couldn\u2019t exactly turn to the local neighborhood office supply store to help with his presentation, so instead, he turned to the CIA\u2019s in-house graphics department. One January day at precisely noon, Liddy was told to stand on a certain street corner near the White House and a CIA technician handed him a wrapped set of oversize charts. Then he needed to find an easel, asking around the office for one he could borrow.<\/p>\n
On Jan. 27, materials in hand, Liddy walked into the Justice Department. Inside the attorney general\u2019s office, he set his charts up on an easel before Mitchell, Magruder and Dean, and began to outline what he had dubbed Operation GEMSTONE.<\/p>\n
First up was Operation DIAMOND, Liddy\u2019s plan to undermine, attack and defeat demonstrators attempting to target the Republican National Convention by kidnapping the leaders of the anti-war movement, drugging them and holding them in Mexico until the event\u2019s completion. Liddy labeled the kidnapping plot Nacht und Nebel<\/i> (\u201cNight and Fog\u201d), after a 1941 directive from Hitler to disappear resistance leaders, and explained that it would be carried out by, as he told Mitchell, \u201can einsatzgruppe<\/i>,\u201d his special action group that boasted about 22 kills. If anyone was bothered by the Nazi-infused rhetoric, they didn\u2019t say.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n\n\n
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\n\nPresident Richard Nixon accepted the nomination at the 1972 Republican National Convention in Miami, Fla., and large anti-war protests occurred throughout the three-day event. Liddy\u2019s Operation Diamond, a plan conceived just months earlier to kidnap the protests\u2019 leaders, had been long forgotten. | AP Photos<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/aside>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n\n\n
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\u201cWhere did you find men like that?\u201d Mitchell asked, removing his pipe from his mouth.<\/p>\n
\u201cI understand they\u2019re members of organized crime,\u201d Liddy replied.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd how much will their services cost?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cLike top professionals everywhere, sir, they don\u2019t come cheap.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWell, let\u2019s not contribute any more than we have to the coffers of organized crime,\u201d the attorney general said, returning his pipe to his mouth, according to the participants in the meeting.<\/p>\n
The gems and rocks kept unfurling as one CIA-designed chart after another described schemes and plots to upend the opposition party\u2019s ability to compete in a free and fair election. There was Operation RUBY, an effort to seed spies into the Democratic campaigns, and Operation COAL, meant to stir up division in the primary campaign by laundering money to the campaign of Shirley Chisholm, the first Black candidate for a major party\u2019s presidential nomination; Operation EMERALD would equip a jet airliner as a specially modified chase spy plane to follow the Democratic nominee across the country and eavesdrop on the campaign in the air, while Operation QUARTZ would do the same on the ground. CRYSTAL proposed outfitting a luxury houseboat at the Democratic National Convention in Miami with additional spy equipment, while sex workers employed under Operation SAPPHIRE would seduce party power brokers and lure them back to the houseboat\u2019s king-size bed. Liddy had argued extensively over which women would be most enticing to Democrats: Hunt and Barker kept wanting to recruit dark-haired, \u201csultry\u201d Cuban women, while Liddy preferred fair-skinned; after reviewing photographs provided by one of their would-be operatives, Frank Sturgis, he had identified two Anglo-Saxon women he felt confident could seduce discerning men of power.<\/p>\n
Four different black-bag jobs fell under Operation OPAL (known as OPAL I through OPAL IV) \u2014 break-ins similar to the Ellsberg psychiatrist operation that would target the campaign offices of aspiring Democratic presidential candidates Edmund Muskie, the Maine senator, and George McGovern, the South Dakota senator, as well as the convention headquarters in Miami. GARNET proposed false-flag demonstrations on behalf of Democratic candidates meant to provoke public outrage, as well as attempts to disrupt Democratic events, fundraisers and generally spread disorder through the fall election. Lastly, there was TURQUOISE, an effort by Cuban operatives to sabotage the air-conditioning system in the main hall of the Democratic convention, forcing the nominee to address the packed delegates inside in 100-degree Miami summer heat.<\/p>\n
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