Deadly Deceits Read Online Free Page A

possibility of our working for the CIA. I had never heard of it.
    Mr. Munson seemed to take an instant liking to me and asked if I would like to be his assistant. I, of course, accepted and worked in the “front” office. As his aide, I kept a daily attendance log and had the pleasant task of running occasional batches of typing over to the women in the typing pool around the corner.
    About once a week we were shown training films. They puzzled me, as none depicted the lifestyle of a foreign service officer that the telegram had led me to believe would be in my future. One movie was about Navy frogmen and how they operated. Another was an FBI training film that we all quickly labeled “White Shoes” because the tyro G-man wore those conspicuous shoes on what was supposed to be a discreet surveillance mission directed against a communist spy. Another movie dealt with picking a lock.
    I flunked the first test, the medical examination. The doctor discovered a small benign nodule on my thyroid. Fortunately the condition was correctable, and after an operation I went back to the processing. Some others, not so fortunate, failed the medical and were dismissed.
    Everyone whispered about the dread Building 13, where the he detector test was administered. Speculation and rumor were held to a minimum by threats to fire anyone who revealed details of the tests. I am still forbidden to reveal those details, but Victor Marchetti and John D. Marks stated in their book, The CIA and the Cult of Intelligence , that through the lie detector test “the CIA … finds out nearly everything imaginable about the private lives of its personnel.… Questions about sex, drugs, and personal honesty are routinely asked along with security-related matters such as possible contacts with foreign agents.” 1 One of my roommates—by this time I had moved into a small apartment with two other candidates from the pool—confessed to me that he knew his close friend had committed a murder. He had pledged to his friend he would never tell this to anyone. He agonized about what to say when questioned by the lie detector operator, but he apparently passed, for he was taken on board shortly afterhis examination. Still, many other candidates were dismissed following lie detector tests.
    During this period of testing and processing, a group of young people held a party and invited many of us to attend. One pleasant young man at the party seemed intent on cornering me and asking difficult questions. Whom was I working for? Why had I come to Washington? Where was my office? My intuitive sense immediately sent out warnings. I gave him all the answers prescribed in Mr. Munson’s briefing or, as we later called it, our cover story; i.e., one that was plausible, but had nothing to do with the truth. However, several days after the party various other members of the pool were fired.
    The most revealing test we had to take was the personality/intelligence test. The Agency used this test to identify the basic Externalized, Regulated, Adaptive individual—the ERA personality—that it prefers to hire. Years later I was able to get a copy of the test. If you read it carefully, you begin to see that the strengths and weaknesses of the CIA start with the selection of its people.
    Basically, the test analyzes three different aspects of personality—intellectual, procedural, and social. In the intellectual mode the Agency is looking for an externalizer rather than an internalizer. This individual is active, more interested in doing than thinking. He must exert considerable effort when compelled to work with ideas, to be self-sufficient, or to control his natural tendencies towards activity. He is practical and works by “feel” or by trial and error. In the procedural mode, the Agency prefers a rigid (regulated) person to a flexible one. This person can react only to a limited number of specific, well-defined stimuli. Such