Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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49 of 65 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
In a Nutshell, The Truth about Watergate, August 2, 1999
By A Customer
"Silent Coup" is the result of one of the most important journalistic research efforts of the modern era. It details an alternative view of the Watergate Affair, and blows a mile-wide hole in the commonly-accepted account of Woodward & Bernstein.As distasteful as it may be to some readers, the work generally supports the long-held claims of the G. Gordon Liddy camp, i.e. that Woodward & Bernstein's accounts in "The Washington Post" and their following books were merely an extension of John Dean's version of Watergate, wherein Dean is innocent and everyone else is guilty. However, while the book vindicates Liddy's testimony as to fact, it does not paint much of a flattering picture of the convicted felon otherwise. Colodny & Gettlin expose Dean's supposed role of "fall guy" for what it is: self-serving lies, and lies that were (or should have been) known to the Watergate prosecutors who used his perjured testimony, given in exchange for leniency, to bring down the Nixon Administration. A carefully researched and meticulously documented thesis is posited by the authors, namely that Dean essentially sent the White House up the river in order to save his own neck and conceal his own critical involvement in literally every aspect of the Watergate crimes and cover-ups. Specifically, an overwhelming case is made that Dean, in order to squash his own involvement in a seperate legal matter pertaining to the surreptitious use of DNC headquarters in Washington as a front for a high-class call-girl service, and in which his own future wife Mo was complicit, instigated the burglaries at the DNC in hopes of removing evidence belying his association therein. The DNC burglaries were conveniently tucked into the overall dirty tricks program against the advice of most of the operative conspirators, who, as Liddy has stated, saw no value in hitting the DNC. The value of the break-in, the authors show, was to Dean and Dean alone. The other primary bombshell dropped in "Silent Coup" is the very under-reported fact that journalist Bob Woodward was, astonishingly, a former Naval Officer involved in extremely sensitive communications intelligence, and that Woodward almost certainly briefed Alexander Haig and others in the Nixon White House in an official capacity prior to his departure from the Navy and rapid rise to the unlikely position of star reporter for the Post, and, conveniently, the lead newsbreaker in the Watergate matter! This direct link between Woodward and the Nixon White House should have disqualified Woodward from reporting on the matter. It did not disqualify him, because those who should have known about the link apparently either didn't know, or didn't care. This fine history of the Watergate era covers many other pertinent related topics, including the establishment of a top-secret communications "back channel", which Nixon instituted in order to sidestep the State Department and Pentagon in sensitive dealings with the former USSR, Red China, and in the prosecution and settlement of the Vietnam War. The evidence shows that the back channel was illegally compromised by Haig and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The implications with respect to the larger Watergate scandal are addressed in detail by the authors. The work also touches many historical issues exposed by the Watergate investigations, not the least of which is the implication that Nixon may have known the truth behind the Kennedy Assassination, and that some those connected to Watergate may have been directly involved, namely E. Howard Hunt, Frank Sturgis, and perhaps some of the Cuban "Plumbers". Again, this history encompasses more than just Watergate by virtue of the enormous amount of studious research that was necessary to document the central arguments contained within. The importance of this book is further magnified by the fact that a large number of the players in the Watergate affair are deceased; fortunately for history, the authors had the opportunity to interview most of the now-dead key players prior to their passing. This book is must reading for anyone interested in Watergate. The book's radical rethinking of the common wisdom of Watergate is both refreshing and disturbing, not only in its treatment of the facts of the case, but as an expose' of the secret agenda of Bob Woodward.
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19 of 31 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
This book should be required reading; puts things in perspec, February 2, 1998
By A Customer
The book is objectively written and relies heavily on eyewitness accounts of the events leading up to the resignation of President Nixon. I did not feel that there was any attempt to "white-wash" the episode, rather, it is an attempt to show what really happened. The role the main stream press played was disgraceful. It was obvious to most people at the time that the press was in the midst of an unprecedented feeding frenzy over the Watergate affair. It was not obvious that the presidency was under attack by self-serving individuals out to save themselves from their own misdeeds at the expense of the President and the country. The press and academe has a lot to atone for in presenting such a distorted look at this episode in American history; this book provides the necessary information for the reader to see through the distortions and realize the true motives and betrayal that occurred. This book provides extensive references to other works that have been written over the years by the players involved and official documents generated as the events unfolded. Richard Nixon is portrayed fairly and is not presented as a demon or a saint. I highly recommend this book and feel it should be required reading for American history classes in our high schools
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38 of 62 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The closest tale of the truth about Watergate, August 25, 1999
By A Customer
The only review I ever read on Silent Coup was in the Los Angeles Times when the book was first published, and the review took up an entire page in the book review section. The best version of the book is the paperback, where the authors tell of what happened after the hardback version was published. As an example, Mike Wallace of 60 Minutes read the book and wanted to do a report, but the higher-ups at CBS told him he couldn't do it. Wallace tried several times afterward to do a 60 Minutes story, but was stopped each time. Because of the author's statements in the book, John Dean launched a 50 million dollar lawsuit, but his lawyer, after reviewing the book and the author's notes and interviews, dropped the lawsuit. Why? In the view of the two authors, John Dean was the total insider (and more) of the Watergate scandal, because he was the only one granted full access to the investigation, and this was under Nixon's direct order. The author's premise of taking all the books, all the magazine articles, all the newspaper stories and putting them in chronological order is the basis for the book and tells the reader that out of all the people involved in Watergate, there are two individules whose stories do not match the overall timeline established by the author's investigation. Nixon was not one of them. There are many conclusions to be drawn from the book, but the one that stands out to me the most is this one. Why did the Democratic-controlled congressional committee running the investigation seal certain evidence in the national archives FOREVER (and is it still there?)! You'll have to read the book (the paperback version is the better choice for the entire story) to find out. The liberal media has never given this book any credence, and possibly for good reason. They just might have got it all wrong! I believe so.
in addition: may, 2006
former fbi agent mark felt revealed he was the 'deep throat' in the watergate affair. this may be totally true, but i still have issues with the watergate scandal based on 'silent coup.' and have some questions about mark felt.
1. 'in silent coup' the authors believed that only four people knew about the oval office taping system. mark felt was not one of them, and it was the washington post, according to 'silent coup' that kept pushing the watergate committee to ask if there was a recording system in the white house. remember alexander butterfield?
2. in a book written by alexander haig, he denied being 'deep throat' IN A FOOTNOTE. one has to wonder about that one. there are three sections, if you will, on deep throat stories during watergate. the middle section has no deep throat stories. why?
if alexander haig was deep throat, does this come into play anywhere? first third, haig was white house military advisor, or something to that effect. the last third, haig was white house chief of staff. the middle section, where there were no deep throat stories, haig was in belgium, as nato commander. this was the conclusion of 'silent coup.'
3. going back to bob woodward, again he worked in the white house during his military career, where he was spottted talking to alexander haig, no less by an admiral who would become chief of staff at the pentagon. woodward has said he never met haig in the white house.
4. has mark felt really granted an full-fledged interview to anyone to 'time stamp' the facts, so to speak? it would be really interesting if the authors of 'silent coup' would do the interview.
5. finally, maybe in reality there is really more than one 'deep thoat.'
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