David Atlee Phillips (October 31, 1922 – July 7, 1988) was a

Central Intelligence Agency The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gathering, processing, ...

officer of 25 years and a recipient of the

Career Intelligence Medal The Career Intelligence Medal is awarded by the Central Intelligence Agency for a cumulative record of service which reflects exceptional achievements that substantially contributed to the mission of the Agency.CIA web pageMedals of the CIA See ...

. Phillips rose to become the CIA's chief of operations for the

Western hemisphere The Western Hemisphere is the half of the planet Earth that lies west of the prime meridian (which crosses Greenwich, London, United Kingdom) and east of the antimeridian. The other half is called the Eastern Hemisphere. Politically, the te ...

. In 1975 he founded the Association of Former Intelligence Officers (AFIO), an

alumni Alumni (singular: alumnus (masculine) or alumna (feminine)) are former students of a school, college, or university who have either attended or graduated in some fashion from the institution. The feminine plural alumnae is sometimes used for grou ...

association comprising

intelligence Intelligence has been defined in many ways: the capacity for abstraction, logic, understanding, self-awareness, learning, emotional knowledge, reasoning, planning, creativity, critical thinking, and problem-solving. More generally, it can ...

officers from all services. Phillips was repeatedly accused of involvement in the JFK assassination, named by both investigators and Agency family members. The House Select Committee on Assassinations investigated accusations from Cuban exile

Antonio Veciana Antonio Veciana Blanch (October 18, 1928 – June 18, 2020) was a Cuban exile who became the founder and a leader of the anti-Castro group Alpha 66. In the mid-1970s, Veciana told the United States House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) ...

that he Phillips had met

Lee Harvey Oswald Lee Harvey Oswald (October 18, 1939 – November 24, 1963) was a U.S. Marine veteran who assassinated John F. Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States, on November 22, 1963. Oswald was placed in juvenile detention at the age of 12 fo ...

. In 1980, a book by Donald Freed and Fred Landis was released accusing him of involvement. Phillips sued them for libel. In 1986, they settled for an undisclosed amount and retracted the allegations.

Early life and military career

Phillips was born in

Fort Worth, Texas Fort Worth is the List of cities in Texas by population, fifth-largest city in the U.S. state of Texas and the List of United States cities by population, 13th-largest city in the United States. It is the county seat of Tarrant County, Texas, T ...

and attended

The College of William and Mary ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...

Williamsburg, Virginia Williamsburg is an independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia. As of the 2020 census, it had a population of 15,425. Located on the Virginia Peninsula, Williamsburg is in the northern part of the Hampton Roads metropolitan area. It is ...

and

Texas Christian University Texas Christian University (TCU) is a private research university in Fort Worth, Texas. It was established in 1873 by brothers Addison and Randolph Clark as the Add-Ran Male & Female College. It is affiliated with the Christian Church (Discipl ...

in Fort Worth. Phillips was an

actor An actor or actress is a person who portrays a character in a performance. The actor performs "in the flesh" in the traditional medium of the theatre or in modern media such as film, radio, and television. The analogous Greek term is (), lit ...

prior to

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

. During the war, he served as a

nose gunner A nose is a protuberance in vertebrates that houses the nostrils, or nares, which receive and expel air for respiration alongside the mouth. Behind the nose are the olfactory mucosa and the sinuses. Behind the nasal cavity, air next passes th ...

in the

United States Army Air Forces The United States Army Air Forces (USAAF or AAF) was the major land-based aerial warfare service component of the United States Army and ''de facto'' aerial warfare service branch of the United States during and immediately after World War II ...

. He was shot down over

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

and captured by the Germans, but was able to escape and make it back to Allied lines.

CIA career

Phillips joined the CIA as a part-time agent in 1950 in

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the eas ...

, where he owned and edited "The South Pacific Mail", an

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ...

language Language is a structured system of communication. The structure of a language is its grammar and the free components are its vocabulary. Languages are the primary means by which humans communicate, and may be conveyed through a variety of ...

newspaper A newspaper is a periodical publication containing written information about current events and is often typed in black ink with a white or gray background. Newspapers can cover a wide variety of fields such as politics, business, spor ...

that circulated throughout

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the sou ...

and several islands in the

Pacific The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the contine ...

. He became a full-time operative in 1954, and operated a major

psychological warfare Psychological warfare (PSYWAR), or the basic aspects of modern psychological operations (PsyOp), have been known by many other names or terms, including Military Information Support Operations (MISO), Psy Ops, political warfare, "Hearts and M ...

campaign in Guatemala during the US coup and its aftermath. He rose through the ranks to intelligence officer, chief of station and eventually chief of

operations, serving primarily in

Latin America Latin America or * french: Amérique Latine, link=no * ht, Amerik Latin, link=no * pt, América Latina, link=no, name=a, sometimes referred to as LatAm is a large cultural region in the Americas where Romance languages — languages derived ...

, including

Cuba Cuba ( , ), officially the Republic of Cuba ( es, República de Cuba, links=no ), is an island country comprising the island of Cuba, as well as Isla de la Juventud and several minor archipelagos. Cuba is located where the northern Caribb ...

Mexico Mexico (Spanish language, Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a List of sovereign states, country in the southern portion of North America. It is borders of Mexico, bordered to the north by the United States; to the so ...

, and the

Dominican Republic The Dominican Republic ( ; es, República Dominicana, ) is a country located on the island of Hispaniola in the Greater Antilles archipelago of the Caribbean region. It occupies the eastern five-eighths of the island, which it shares with ...

. Phillips retired from the agency in 1975 and founded the Association of Former Intelligence Officers in the same year.

House Select Committee on Assassinations

While investigating

Lee Harvey Oswald's Lee Harvey Oswald (October 18, 1939 – November 24, 1963) was a U.S. Marine veteran who assassinated John F. Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States, on November 22, 1963. Oswald was placed in juvenile detention at the age of 12 f ...

possible ties to certain pro- and anti- Castro radical groups around the time of the

assassination of President John F. Kennedy John F. Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States, was assassinated on Friday, November 22, 1963, at 12:30 p.m. CST in Dallas, Texas, while riding in a presidential motorcade through Dealey Plaza. Kennedy was in the vehicle with ...

, the

HSCA The United States House of Representatives Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) was established in 1976 to investigate the assassinations of John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1963 and 1968, respectively. The HSCA completed its ...

obtained statements from then virulently anti-Castro paramilitary organization

Alpha 66 Alpha 66 is an anti-Castro paramilitary organization. The group was originally formed by Cuban exiles in the early 1960s and was most active in the late 1970s and 1980s. Its activities declined in the 1980s. Historian Alan McPherson describes it a ...

founder

that Oswald had met on several occasions with a CIA operative known as "Maurice Bishop". After one former CIA case officer (who had been assigned to the

JM/WAVE JMWAVE or JM/WAVE or JM WAVE was the codename for a major secret United States covert operations and intelligence gathering station operated by the CIA from 1961 until 1968. It was headquartered in Building 25 at the former Naval Air Station Ric ...

station in

Miami Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a coastal metropolis and the county seat of Miami-Dade County in South Florida, United States. With a population of 442,241 at ...

) stated to investigators that Phillips had been known to use the alias, the commission attempted to see if Veciana could identify Phillips as being "Bishop". Veciana insisted that he was not the same person and moreover that he had never met Phillips before either. Some committee members (and also lead investigator Gaeton Fonzi) doubted Veciana, reasoning that he should have at least recognized Phillips, a high-profile officer so heavily involved in Cuban operations.Phillips, David Atlee. ''The Night Watch: 25 Years of Peculiar Service''. New York: Atheneum (1977), p. 113. . . In 2014, at a conference named ''The Warren Report and the JFK Assassination: Five Decades of Significant Disclosures'', Veciana reversed his previous statements, asserting unequivocally that he believed that the agent he knew as Bishop had in fact been David Atlee Phillips.The Warren Report and the JFK Assassination: Five Decades of Significant Disclosures
/ref>
''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publish ...

'' (UK) (Oct. 23, 2017).

Conspiracy allegations and lawsuit

In their 1980 book ''Death in Washington'', authors Donald Freed and Fred Landis charged that the CIA was involved in the

1973 Chilean coup d'état The 1973 Chilean coup d'état Enciclopedia Virtual > Historia > Historia de Chile > Del gobierno militar a la democracia" on LaTercera.cl. Retrieved 22 September 2006. In October 1972, Chile suffered the first of many strikes. Among the par ...

and the 1976 assassination of Orlando Letelier. The authors specifically named Phillips as being involved in a cover-up of the assassination and reiterated Fonzi's claim that Phillips served as Oswald's case officer while using the alias "Maurice Bishop". In 1982, Freed, Landis, and their publisher were named in a $230 million libel suit by Phillips and the AFIO. A

settlement Settlement may refer to: * Human settlement, a community where people live *Settlement (structural), the distortion or disruption of parts of a building *Closing (real estate), the final step in executing a real estate transaction *Settlement (fin ...

was reached in 1986 with Phillips receiving a retraction and an unspecified amount of money. Phillips donated these proceeds to AFIO for the purpose of creating a legal defense fund for American intelligence officers who felt they were the victims of libel. After the death of former CIA agent and

Watergate The Watergate scandal was a major political scandal in the United States involving the administration of President Richard Nixon from 1972 to 1974 that led to Nixon's resignation. The scandal stemmed from the Nixon administration's continu ...

figure E. Howard Hunt in 2007, Saint John Hunt and David Hunt revealed that their father had recorded several claims about himself and others being involved in a conspiracy to assassinate John F. Kennedy. In the April 5, 2007 issue of ''

Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner, and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. It was first known for its ...

'', Saint John Hunt detailed a number of individuals implicated by his father including Phillips, as well as Lyndon B. Johnson, Cord Meyer, David Sánchez Morales, Frank Sturgis,

William Harvey William Harvey (1 April 1578 – 3 June 1657) was an English physician who made influential contributions in anatomy and physiology. He was the first known physician to describe completely, and in detail, the systemic circulation and propert ...

and an assassin he termed "French gunman grassy knoll" who many presume was Lucien Sarti. The two sons alleged that their father cut the information from his memoirs, ''"American Spy: My Secret History in the CIA, Watergate and Beyond"'', to avoid possible perjury charges. Hunt's widow and other children told the ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the ...

'' that the two sons took advantage of Hunt's loss of lucidity by coaching and exploiting him for financial gain. The newspaper said it examined the materials offered by the sons to support the story and found them to be "inconclusive."

founder

's 2014 recantation of his House Committee testimony, denying he knew Philips with an unequivocal statement that he believed that the agent he knew as Bishop had in fact been David Atlee Phillips, reopened Phillips' possible central role in the JFK assassination.

Later life

Phillips wrote and lectured frequently on intelligence matters. He authored five books, including his CIA

memoir A memoir (; , ) is any nonfiction narrative writing based in the author's personal memories. The assertions made in the work are thus understood to be factual. While memoir has historically been defined as a subcategory of biography or autobiog ...

''The Night Watch'', ''Careers in Secret Operations: How to Be a Federal Intelligence Officer'', ''The Terror Brigade,'' ''The Carlos Contract,'' and ''The Great Texas Murder Trials: A Compelling Account of the Sensational

T. Cullen Davis Thomas Cullen Davis (born September 22, 1933) is an American former oil tycoon who is best known for being acquitted of murder and attempted murder in two high-profile trials during the 1970s. At the time of his first trial, Davis was believed to ...

Case.''

Personal life

Phillips was the brother of writer

James Atlee Phillips James Atlee Phillips (1915 – May 26, 1991) was an American writer who used the pseudonym Philip Atlee for the "Contract" series of spy novels. Atlee was born in Fort Worth, Texas and attended University of Texas at Austin, Texas Christian U ...

and the uncle of musician

Shawn Phillips Shawn Phillips (born February 3, 1943) is an American singer-songwriter and musician, primarily influential in the 1960s and 1970s. His work is rooted in folk rock but straddles other genres, including jazz fusion and funk. Phillips has rec ...

. In 1948, he married Helen Hausman Haasch. They had four children, then divorced in 1967. In 1969, he married Virginia Pederson Simmons who had three children from a previous marriage. The couple had one child together. Phillips died at his home in

Bethesda, Maryland Bethesda () is an unincorporated, census-designated place in southern Montgomery County, Maryland. It is located just northwest of Washington, D.C. It takes its name from a local church, the Bethesda Meeting House (1820, rebuilt 1849), which ...

from complications of cancer on July 7, 1988 at the age of 65.

Publications

Books

* ''The Night Watch: 25 Years of Peculiar Service''. New York: Atheneum (1977). . . * ''The Carlos Contract: A Novel of International Terrorism''. New York:

Macmillan MacMillan, Macmillan, McMillen or McMillan may refer to: People * McMillan (surname) * Clan MacMillan, a Highland Scottish clan * Harold Macmillan, British statesman and politician * James MacMillan, Scottish composer * William Duncan MacMillan ...

(1978). . . * ''The Great Texas Murder Trials: A Compelling Account of the Sensational T. Cullen Davis Case''. New York:

(1979). . . * ''Careers in Secret Operations: How to be a Federal Intelligence Officer''. Frederick, MD: University Publications of America (1984). . . * ''Writing for Pleasure and Profit in Retirement: How to Enjoy a Second Career as a Professional Writer''. Bethesda, MD: Stone Trail Press (1986). . . * ''The Terror Brigade'' (

novel A novel is a relatively long work of narrative fiction, typically written in prose and published as a book. The present English word for a long work of prose fiction derives from the for "new", "news", or "short story of something new", itself ...

). New York: Berkeley Publishing Group (1989). . .

Legal proceedings

* ''Freed Donald v Phillips David Atlee''. Civil Action No. 81-1407 & 81-2578. *
Deposition
(Mar. 25, 1983) *
Deposition
(Mar. 30, 1983)

References

External links

Arlington Cemetery Arlington National Cemetery is one of two national cemeteries run by the United States Army. Nearly 400,000 people are buried in its 639 acres (259 ha) in Arlington, Virginia. There are about 30 funerals conducted on weekdays and 7 held on Sa ...

David Atlee Phillips
at

Find-a-Grave Find a Grave is a website that allows the public to search and add to an online database of cemetery records. It is owned by Ancestry.com. Its stated mission is "to help people from all over the world work together to find, record and present fin ...

David Atlee Phillips
at The Weisberg Collection
David Atlee Phillips
at

WorldCat WorldCat is a union catalog that itemizes the collections of tens of thousands of institutions (mostly libraries), in many countries, that are current or past members of the OCLC global cooperative. It is operated by OCLC, Inc. Many of the O ...

* David Atlee Phillips collection (

part 1 Part 1 may refer to: * ''Part 1'' (Twin Peaks), the first episode of the third season of the TV series Twin Peaks * ''Part 1'' (EP), a 2016 EP by Guy Sebastian *''Part 1'', a 2017 EP by O-Town. See O-Town discography See also * PART1 In molecular ...

) ( part 2) at the Harold Weisberg Archive via

Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It provides free public access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, software applications/games, music, ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Phillips, David Atlee 1922 births 1988 deaths American spies United States Army Air Forces officers People associated with the assassination of John F. Kennedy People of the Central Intelligence Agency CIA activities in Lebanon United States Army Air Forces personnel of World War II Shot-down aviators American escapees Escapees from German detention American prisoners of war in World War II World War II prisoners of war held by Germany