(fwd) Christopher Ruddy on Colby 5/7/96 (fwd)

[anonymous-remailer@shell.portal.com]

Theories on cause of Colby death abound

By Christopher Ruddy
FOR THE TRIBUNE-REVIEW

WASHINGTON - The body of "the Old Gray Man of the CIA," William Colby,
has been found in waters near his
weekend home, but theories about his demise continue to thrive.

Colby, who served as CIA director under Presidents Nixon and Ford,
disappeared April 28. Maryland authorities found
his body Monday morning after it washed ashore. This followed an
intensive search of the Wimcoico River near Colby's
home in Rock Point, Md. Local police believe his body was lost in the
cloudy waters of the Wicomico while canoeing, a
favorite pastime of Colby's.

At 76, Colby was physically fit and, after surviving parachute drops
behind Nazi lines in War World II and stints in
Vietnam, he was a cautious, careful and cunning man who lived up to
his James Bond super-spy credentials. 

Last week, The New York Post's irreverent Page Six raised concerns
about Colby's disappearance and apparent death
with an article headlined "Conspiracy Crowd Snatches Colby." "The
theory among conspiracy-minded, cloak-and-dagger
buffs is that Colby was assassinated so he wouldn't spill any more
agency secrets," the gossip page began. Agency
insiders reportedly resented Colby for talking to Congress about the
"family jewels" - supposed illegal operations the
agency conducted in the decades before Watergate. As a result, Colby
lost the support of agency insiders and the Ford
administration. President Ford fired Colby on Halloween 1975.

Some theorists point to the similar circumstances surrounding the 1978
death of CIA deputy director John A. Paisley.
Paisley's sailboat was found adrift in the Chesapeake Bay just 15
miles from Colby's home. His body was discovered
days later. He died of an apparent gunshot behind his ear. His body
had been weighted with diving belts. Since no blood
was found on the boat, authorities theorized Paisley first jumped into
the water and then fired the shot into his head.
However, murder was never ruled out in the case.

While some refuse to believe 20-year-old grudges could have led to
Colby's demise, others, including Fred Davis, the
Maryland county sheriff in charge of the probe, still find the death
suspicious and haven't ruled out foul play Already, the
death has been the buzz of talk radio and the Internet. Pittsburgh's
Jim Quinn on WRRK-FM joked that Colby's body
will rise to the top as soon as "someone cuts the concrete slabs tied
to his feet."

New York shock-jock Don Imus, whose recent roast of the Clintons
caused a stir, started off one of his morning
programs wondering what the "Whitewater" connection was with Colby's
death - a reference, no doubt, to the high
number of deaths likened to a web of Arkansas scandal. Even though
Imus didn't realize it, Colby did have a Whitewater
connection. For the past two years, he has been a contributing editor
with a monthly financial newsletter, Strategic
Investment. Co-edited by James Dale Davidson and former Times of
London editor Lord William Rees Mogg, Strategic
is read by more than 100,000 subscribers worldwide and has been
closely monitoring the Whitewater scandal. 

Davidson has written in the newsletter that Vincent Foster, former
White House deputy counsel, was murdered and that
significant evidence links the Clintons to drug trafficking, murder
and organized crime in their home state of Arkansas.
Foster was found shot to death more than two years ago in Fort Marcy
Park near Washington, D.C. The Wall Street
Journal editorialized that it was glad to see James Davidson "pushing
the envelope" on the Whitewater scandal.

Colby began taking a more active role in the newsletter in February,
writing a weekly column on geo-political matters and
their effects on investments in Strategic Weekly Briefings - a
facsimile newsletter tailored for high-income investors. Colby
traveled with Davidson several times to Asia, leading groups of
investors.

In his columns, Colby never touched upon the Clintons or the
Whitewater affair. His name and former association with the
CIA was no doubt a real credibility boost for the newsletter and was
touted throughout the newsletter and its promotional
brochures (which often detailed the newsletter's reporting of the
darker side of Whitewater). "I find the death suspicious
for a lot of reasons," Davidson told the Tribune-Review. He does not
link his Whitewater coverage to the death, but
points to problems associated with Colby's disappearance. "It's not
clear how his life jacket and paddle, which he always
took canoeing with him, disappeared,''he said. 

Davidson also is disturbed by an early Associated Press report quoting
Mrs. Colby as having spoken with her husband
on the day of the death. The AP reported that Colby said he was not
feeling well, but planned to go canoeing anyway. In
a statement this week, Mrs. Colby, who was in Texas when she spoke to
her husband for the last time, said he was
feeling fine, and never mentioned any plans to go canoeing. 

Davidson described Colby as a "charming and fit" man who had great
stamina traveling. "He was a New Deal Democrat
like many who started in the OSS (the forerunner to the CIA),"
Davidson remarked. According to Davidson, one of his
staff members contacted local police who said they were perplexed as
to where the AP got the original report on Colby's
conversation with his wife.

Some old Cold Warriors recollect Colby's longstanding feud with James
Jesus Angleton, the longtime head of the CIA's
counterintelligence division. Angleton believed the CIA had been
infiltrated by KGB moles; Colby believed Angleton had
become symptomatic of Cold War paranoia and forced his ouster in 1974.
After his dismissal, a bitter Angleton told
associates he believed that Colby had been recruited by the KGB and
was a long-term asset of the Soviets. Angelton's
supporters noted Colby's association with far left committees -
including ones supported by the Institute for Policy Studies
- after Colby departed from the CIA. Colby also called for near
unilateral disarmament - an immediate 50 percent
reduction in the American defense budget during the height of
East-West tensions.

One friend of Colby's scoffed at such notions and suggested that his
espousal of unorthodox views were not based on a
longtime hidden ideology, but may be explained by his desire to live
down an undesirable reputation he acquired in
Vietnam for heading up the controversial Operation Phoenix, a program
to eradicate peasant support of the Viet Cong,
for which Colby had been branded by war protesters as a war criminal.