Leaving CIA
Agee stated that his Roman Catholic social conscience had made him increasingly uncomfortable with his work by the late 1960s leading to his disillusionment with the CIA and its support for authoritarian governments across Latin America. In the book Agee condemned the 1968 Tlatelolco massacre in Mexico City and wrote that this was the immediate event precipitating his leaving the agency.
While Agee claimed that the CIA was "very pleased with his work", offered him "another promotion" and his superior "was startled" when Agee told him about his plans to resign, the anti-communist journalist John Barron claims that Agee's resignation was forced "for a variety of reasons, including his irresponsible drinking, continuous and vulgar propositioning of embassy wives, and inability to manage his finances".
Agee was accused by U.S. President George H. W. Bush of being responsible for the death of Richard Welch, a Harvard-educated classicist who was murdered by the Revolutionary Organization 17 November while heading the CIA Station in Athens. Bush had directed the CIA from 1976 to 1977.
Read more about this topic: Philip Agee
Famous quotes containing the words leaving and/or cia:
“A leaping tongue of bloom the scythe had spared
Beside a reedy brook the scythe had bared.
The mower in the dew had loved them thus,
By leaving them to flourish, not for us,
Nor yet to draw one thought of ours to him,
But from sheer morning gladness at the brim.”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)
“And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”
—Bible: New Testament John 8:32.
These words of Jesus are inscribed on the wall of the main lobby at the CIA headquarters, Langley, Virginia.