After the 1971 Pentagon Papers leak, the White House created a Special Investigations Unit nicknamed the Plumbers, led by former CIA officer E. Howard Hunt and former FBI agent G. Gordon Liddy. Their Operation Gemstone proposals included firebombing a think tank, kidnapping protesters and entrapping Democrats on a yacht, and Attorney General John Mitchell rejected them mainly as too expensive. The cheaper plan was to bug the Democratic National Committee at the Watergate. Early attempts left burglars locked in a closet overnight and foiled by the wrong lock tools. The bugs planted on May 28 barely worked, so the team returned on June 17, 1972, when James McCord taped garage door latches horizontally and security guard Frank Wills found the tape twice and called police.
An undercover squad in street clothes arrived in an unmarked car, and the lookout across the street missed them. The cover-up that followed included shredding, hush money and the June 23 smoking gun tape, in which the president approved having the CIA ask the FBI to halt its money trace on national security grounds. Associate FBI Director Mark Felt fed Bob Woodward, a White House aide revealed the Oval Office taping system, and the Saturday Night Massacre ended with Robert Bork firing Archibald Cox. After United States v. Nixon forced release of the tapes, Richard Nixon resigned on August 9, 1974.
- The Plumbers nickname came from a staffer’s grandmother, who thought fixing leaks meant actual plumbing.
- Theories for the target range from Cuban campaign money to an escort ring to CIA sabotage.
- Martha Mitchell, who recognized McCord, was held at a California villa, had her phone cord ripped out and was sedated against her will.
- Woodward signaled Felt with a flower pot, and Felt replied with a clock drawn on page 20 of Woodward’s newspaper.
- One subpoenaed tape held an 18 and a half minute erasure blamed on the president’s secretary, and 69 officials were charged.
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