From The Associated Press, 6/2/05:
http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/wire/sns-ap-watergate-qa,0,5797557.story?coll=sns-ap-nationworld-headlines
Watergate Mysteries Remain Unsolved
By CONNIE CASS
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON --
Even with Deep Throat out of the shadows, basic mysteries about the
Watergate break-in remain unresolved more than 30 years after Richard
Nixon resigned as president.
Some lingering questions and possible answers:
Q:
What were the burglars after when they broke into the Democratic
headquarters at the Watergate building on Friday night, June 17, 1972?
A:
It's known that the break-in was a follow-up to replace a faulty
telephone bugging device installed during an earlier, Memorial Day
weekend break-in.
But why break into Democratic headquarters at all?
The most obvious theory may be the right one: that Nixon was always a
nervous candidate and simply wanted to keep tabs on the opposition.
If that theory does not satisfy, there are others:
That the burglars were trying to find -- or plant -- evidence linking
the Democrats to left-wing radicals;
that Nixon feared Democratic Party chairman Lawrence O'Brien had
damaging knowledge of a loan from billionaire Howard Hughes to Nixon's
brother, Donald;
that the wiretaps were set up to find information about a call-girl
ring that served both the Democrats and the White House.
Q:
Did Nixon send the burglars?
A:
None of Nixon's White House tapes so far made public reveals him
saying anything that shows he had advance knowledge of the Watergate
break-in.
But the tapes showed Nixon was aware of other illegal activities by
subordinates.
A year before Watergate, he is heard telling his chief of staff, H.R.
"Bob" Haldeman, that he wanted Haldeman to steal a file on Vietnam
from the Brookings Institution.
"Break in and take it out!" he directed.
The order was never carried out.
A former Nixon aide, Jeb Stuart Magruder, said for the first time in
2003 that he remembered listening in on the phone as Nixon gave the
go-ahead for the Watergate bugging plan.
Some historians reacted with skepticism.
Q:
Why didn't Nixon destroy the tapes before they brought him down?
A:
Nixon's presidency probably would have survived Watergate had the
tapes not survived.
Treasury Secretary John B. Connally proposed burning them.
But lawyer Leonard Garment advised Nixon that the tapes could not
lawfully be destroyed.
Also, Nixon was convinced he would never have to give them up.
In his 1978 memoirs, he wrote that their destruction would have
created an impression of guilt and they "were my best insurance"
against another unfaithful aide like John Dean, who spilled the
Watergate beans to investigators.
Q:
Who caused an 18 1/2-minute gap in one important tape?
A:
The disclosure that one crucial tape -- a conversation three days
after the break-in -- contained a noisy 18 1/2-minute buzz was
enormously damaging.
Nixon aide Alexander Haig blamed "a sinister force."
Rose Mary Woods, Nixon's personal secretary, took some of the blame.
She said the phone rang while she was transcribing the tape, and her
foot inadvertently held down the recorder's delete button for four or
five minutes.
But a panel of experts that studied the damaged tape concluded Miss
Woods could not have done the whole thing.
The experts found evidence of at least five, possibly as many as nine,
deliberate erasures.
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It was just yer normal right-wing criminal activity.
Harry
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