---
created: 2026-06-13
updated: 2026-10-09
title: Watergate
aliases:
  - Watergate Scandal
tags:
  - Event
  - IntelligenceScandal
  - Nixon
  - CIA
  - 1970s
category: "Intelligence Scandal"
summary: "Watergate was the 1972 to 1974 political scandal, beginning with a break-in at the Democratic National Committee by operatives tied to the Nixon reelection campaign and the CIA, that culminated in President Nixon's resignation."
start: 1972-06-17
end: 1974-08-09
location: "Washington, D.C."
relations:
  - type: participant_in
    with: "[[Office of Technical Service]]"
    reverse: true
    start: 1971-07
    end: 1971-08
    role: "the Technical Services Division supplied alias documents, disguise materials, a tape recorder and a Tessina camera to Hunt and Liddy; the assistance was stopped August 27, 1971"
    fn: 3
---
Watergate was the political scandal that began with the June 17, 1972 arrest of five men who broke into the [[Democratic National Committee]] headquarters at the Watergate office complex in [[Washington, D.C.]], and that ended with the resignation of President [[Richard Nixon]] on August 9, 1974. The investigation exposed a wider pattern of covert operations, illegal surveillance, and obstruction of justice directed from the [[White House]].[^1]

### The Burglars and the Intelligence Connection

The burglars and their supervisors were drawn from the intersection of the [[Central Intelligence Agency|CIA]], anti-Castro Cuban exile networks, and the Nixon campaign. [[E. Howard Hunt]], a veteran CIA officer, and [[James McCord]], a former CIA security official, organized the operation, and several of the burglars were Cuban exiles from the [[Bay of Pigs|Bay of Pigs invasion]] milieu. Hunt and [[G. Gordon Liddy]] had earlier run the White House "Plumbers" unit, whose 1971 burglary of [[Daniel Ellsberg]]'s psychiatrist used disguises and equipment supplied by the CIA's [[Office of Technical Service|Technical Services Division]].[^1][^2]

The Technical Services Division had supplied the materials earlier in the summer of 1971. Hunt obtained alias documents in the name "Edward Joseph Warren," a wig, glasses and a speech alteration device on July 23, 1971. Through an unlisted telephone number he received a commercial tape recorder in a typewriter case and a Tessina camera disguised in a tobacco pouch. He also obtained a disguise and alias documents in the name "George F. Leonard" for an associate later identified as Liddy. On August 27, 1971 General [[Robert E. Cushman Jr.]], the Deputy Director of Central Intelligence, telephoned [[John Ehrlichman]] to say that further assistance could not be given, and the camera was returned as unsuitable. The Fielding office break-in took place on or about September 3, 1971.[^3] The Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities took executive session testimony in February 1974 from a TSD technician, the Deputy Chief of the TSD and the Chief of the TSD; the staff report appended to Senator [[Howard Baker]]'s views in its final report states that the CIA kept a file on Hunt's activities entitled "Mr. Edward" outside its normal filing system, that testimony indicated film the TSD developed for Hunt and Liddy was of Fielding's office, and that previous public CIA testimony of "no contact whatsoever with Mr. Hunt subsequent to 31 August, 1971" was contradicted by recent testimony and documents.[^4]

### Investigation and Resignation

Reporting in the *Washington Post*, an FBI investigation, and the [[Senate Watergate Committee]] revealed a secret taping system in the [[Oval Office]] and a fund used to buy the burglars' silence. After the Supreme Court ordered release of the tapes, which confirmed Nixon's role in the cover-up, the [[House Committee on the Judiciary|House Judiciary Committee]] approved articles of impeachment and Nixon resigned. The scandal directly preceded the [[Church Committee]] and Pike Committee investigations that exposed the broader history of intelligence abuses.[^1]

### Footnotes

[^1]: Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities. *Final Report*. Government Printing Office, 1974.
[^2]: Hougan, Jim. *Secret Agenda: Watergate, Deep Throat, and the CIA*. Random House, 1984.
[^3]: U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on Armed Services, Special Subcommittee on Intelligence, *Inquiry into the Alleged Involvement of the Central Intelligence Agency in the Watergate and Ellsberg Matters*, 93rd Cong., statement of Dr. James R. Schlesinger, May 11, 1973, pp. 1-3 (the Hunt narrative is on pp. 2-3), and testimony of General Robert E. Cushman, Jr. https://archive.org/details/InquiryIntoTheAllegedInvolvementOfCIAInTheWatergateAndEllsbergMatters
[^4]: U.S. Senate, Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities, *Final Report*, S. Rept. 93-981 (June 1974), "Appendix to Views of Senator Baker," pp. 1135-1141; main report p. 119. https://archive.org/details/WatergateErvinCommitteeReport