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Victor Marchetti
Victor Leo Marchetti Jr. (December 23, 1929 – October 19, 2018) was a special assistant to the Deputy Director of the Central Intelligence Agency who later became a prominent critic of the United States Intelligence Community and the Israel lobby in the United States.
Marchetti was born in Hazleton, Pennsylvania. From 1951 to 1953, he served as a corporal in U.S. Army Intelligence in France and Germany. Returning to the United States after his military service, he enrolled in Pennsylvania State University, where he majored in Russian area studies, graduating with a bachelor's degree in history in 1955.
After a few months working as an analyst at the National Security Agency, Marchetti joined the CIA in October 1955. He began his career as an analyst in the Office of Research and Reports, eventually serving a tour of duty in the Office of National Estimates (ONE).
From ONE, Marchetti moved to the Office of Planning, Programming, and Budgeting in 1966, where he worked for over two years. Beginning in July 1968, he served for nine months as special assistant to CIA Deputy Director Rufus Taylor. His final position in the Agency was on the Planning, Programming, and Budget Staff of the National Photographic Interpretation Center. Among other projects with which he was involved, Marchetti worked on setting up the Pine Gap satellite ground station near Alice Springs in Central Australia.
In September 1969, Marchetti resigned from the CIA.
After leaving the CIA, Marchetti began a writing career. His first work was a novel, The Rope-Dancer, published in 1971. The plot involves an officer in the "National Intelligence Agency" who becomes a spy for the Soviet Union. In a 2004 article for American Intelligence Journal, Jon Wiant, career member of the Department of State's Senior Executive Service and a faculty member of the Joint Military Intelligence College, reported a 1991 conversation with retired KGB General Oleg Kalugin in which the latter told him that Rope Dancer is assigned as required reading for every KGB officer assigned to the United States. Kalugin believed the novel was an excellent primer in American counterintelligence doctrine.
During public appearances promoting the novel, Marchetti announced that he was writing a non-fiction work about the CIA. In March 1972, he completed a draft of an article for Esquire which, according to a later CIA account, included "names of agents, relations with named governments, and identifying details of ongoing operations." The CIA received a copy of the article and decided to seek an injunction against its publication.
The basis for seeking an injunction against Marchetti was the secrecy agreement which he had signed when beginning employment at the CIA. The CIA presented the agreement and the parts of the draft article it considered in violation of the agreement, to Judge Albert V. Bryan, Jr. of the US District Court for Eastern Virginia, who granted a temporary restraining order in April 1972. The case proceeded to trial, at which Bryan found for the CIA and issued a permanent injunction requiring Marchetti to submit his writings to CIA for review prior to publication.
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Victor Marchetti
Victor Leo Marchetti Jr. (December 23, 1929 – October 19, 2018) was a special assistant to the Deputy Director of the Central Intelligence Agency who later became a prominent critic of the United States Intelligence Community and the Israel lobby in the United States.
Marchetti was born in Hazleton, Pennsylvania. From 1951 to 1953, he served as a corporal in U.S. Army Intelligence in France and Germany. Returning to the United States after his military service, he enrolled in Pennsylvania State University, where he majored in Russian area studies, graduating with a bachelor's degree in history in 1955.
After a few months working as an analyst at the National Security Agency, Marchetti joined the CIA in October 1955. He began his career as an analyst in the Office of Research and Reports, eventually serving a tour of duty in the Office of National Estimates (ONE).
From ONE, Marchetti moved to the Office of Planning, Programming, and Budgeting in 1966, where he worked for over two years. Beginning in July 1968, he served for nine months as special assistant to CIA Deputy Director Rufus Taylor. His final position in the Agency was on the Planning, Programming, and Budget Staff of the National Photographic Interpretation Center. Among other projects with which he was involved, Marchetti worked on setting up the Pine Gap satellite ground station near Alice Springs in Central Australia.
In September 1969, Marchetti resigned from the CIA.
After leaving the CIA, Marchetti began a writing career. His first work was a novel, The Rope-Dancer, published in 1971. The plot involves an officer in the "National Intelligence Agency" who becomes a spy for the Soviet Union. In a 2004 article for American Intelligence Journal, Jon Wiant, career member of the Department of State's Senior Executive Service and a faculty member of the Joint Military Intelligence College, reported a 1991 conversation with retired KGB General Oleg Kalugin in which the latter told him that Rope Dancer is assigned as required reading for every KGB officer assigned to the United States. Kalugin believed the novel was an excellent primer in American counterintelligence doctrine.
During public appearances promoting the novel, Marchetti announced that he was writing a non-fiction work about the CIA. In March 1972, he completed a draft of an article for Esquire which, according to a later CIA account, included "names of agents, relations with named governments, and identifying details of ongoing operations." The CIA received a copy of the article and decided to seek an injunction against its publication.
The basis for seeking an injunction against Marchetti was the secrecy agreement which he had signed when beginning employment at the CIA. The CIA presented the agreement and the parts of the draft article it considered in violation of the agreement, to Judge Albert V. Bryan, Jr. of the US District Court for Eastern Virginia, who granted a temporary restraining order in April 1972. The case proceeded to trial, at which Bryan found for the CIA and issued a permanent injunction requiring Marchetti to submit his writings to CIA for review prior to publication.