29-11-2014, 04:03 PM
I picked up a boxed set (for $15) of all 65 episodes of the 1998 TV series Secrets of War, narrated by Charlton Heston. It's better than I expected, considering it was produced for US television. A lot of episodes focus on WWI and WWII, others on the 80s and 90s (I haven't watched most of those yet). One did talk about the recruiting of Nazis by the US.
The JFK episode blames the Bay of Pigs on the CIA's duplicity (Allen Dulles talked JFK into going ahead with the invasion, which was to include the assassination of Castro by the Mafia.) They interview Jack Hawkins, who personally blames JFK, Rusk and Richard Bissell for the failure. They also interview David Kaiser, Arthur Schlesinger & Philip Brenner on the Missile Crisis. The episode portrays JFK as being unwilling to send combat troops to Vietnam, so he encouraged covert ops/training. It simply says that JFK was assassinated in Dallas (nothing about who was responsible). The episode generally portrays JFK as a pragmatic peacemaker.
The Eisenhower episode discusses his use of the CIA in Iran and Guatemala, and how the Dulles brothers were financially linked to the United Fruit Co.
The Nixon episode is pretty good. It starts out with Nixon working behind the scenes in 1968 to sabotage the Paris Peace talks. They mention the Joint Chiefs-Radford spy ring against the White House, and the CIA-Kissinger-Nixon responsibility for the coup in Chile in 1973.
Another episode discusses the USS Liberty sinking, and takes a position of skepticism about the official story ("we may never the truth").
The JFK episode blames the Bay of Pigs on the CIA's duplicity (Allen Dulles talked JFK into going ahead with the invasion, which was to include the assassination of Castro by the Mafia.) They interview Jack Hawkins, who personally blames JFK, Rusk and Richard Bissell for the failure. They also interview David Kaiser, Arthur Schlesinger & Philip Brenner on the Missile Crisis. The episode portrays JFK as being unwilling to send combat troops to Vietnam, so he encouraged covert ops/training. It simply says that JFK was assassinated in Dallas (nothing about who was responsible). The episode generally portrays JFK as a pragmatic peacemaker.
The Eisenhower episode discusses his use of the CIA in Iran and Guatemala, and how the Dulles brothers were financially linked to the United Fruit Co.
The Nixon episode is pretty good. It starts out with Nixon working behind the scenes in 1968 to sabotage the Paris Peace talks. They mention the Joint Chiefs-Radford spy ring against the White House, and the CIA-Kissinger-Nixon responsibility for the coup in Chile in 1973.
Another episode discusses the USS Liberty sinking, and takes a position of skepticism about the official story ("we may never the truth").