【新闻周刊 20141017】超越深喉：水门事件的秘密线人

满仓

【中文标题】超越深喉：水门事件不为人知的秘密线人
【原文标题】Beyond Deep Throat: The Hidden Watergate Sources That Helped Topple a President
【登载媒体】新闻周刊
【原文作者】Max Holland
【原文链接】http://www.newsweek.com/2014/10/17/many-sources-behind-woodward-and-bernsteins-deep-throat-276291.html




2005年，W•马克•费尔特在《名利场》杂志上声明，自己就是新闻界最著名的神秘线人。这位91岁的前联邦调查局探员在家人的鼓励下，承认自己就是“深喉”。他在1972年到1973年之间，匿名向报道水门事件丑闻的《华盛顿邮报》记者鲍伯•伍德沃德和卡尔•伯恩斯坦提供了大量重要的线索。这个国家历经31年的猜谜游戏似乎终于结束了。

然而深喉的现身说法让事情变得更加复杂。媒体学者马特•卡尔森在2010年提到，身受中风困扰的费尔特几乎无法为自己代言。与此同时，“沃德斯坦”（《邮报》内部对这两位记者的称呼）已经不会再详细叙说他们对深喉的看法。疑窦依然存在，不仅仅是伍德沃德和伯恩斯坦如何使用线人提供的信息，而且存在于卡尔森所谓的“记者转述水门事件内容的准确性”，因为记者总是对自我夸耀的故事版本更感兴趣。


美国记者、《华盛顿邮报》资深编辑本杰明•布莱德利。

让这些疑问进一步发展的是2012年本•布莱德利——伍德沃德和伯恩斯坦在《邮报》的传奇编辑——传记的出版。作者杰夫•希摩尔曼曾经是伍德沃德的徒弟，他在《真相只为你》一书中提到，他曾经发现了布莱德利在90年代初准备他的自传小说时的一份采访记录。沃德斯坦把调查的过程写成一本书《总统班底》，在采访记录中，《邮报》的这位编辑对于沃德斯坦在书中对深喉的描述表示出怀疑的态度。

布莱德利在1990年接受采访时说：“我心中有一丝残存的恐惧，告诉我这并不都是真实的。”希摩尔曼还在布莱德利的故纸堆中发现一份伯恩斯坦的备忘录，说他在1972年12月与一位代号为“Z”的线人暗中会面。在《总统班底》中，Z提供的信息与深喉提供的信息重量级相当。希摩尔曼根据蛛丝马迹追查到，Z是一名大陪审团成员，这个陪审团在1972年首先对水门大厦失窃事件提起诉讼。但是沃德斯坦在书中明确否认从大陪审团中得到过任何信息。即使不那么擅于怀疑的人也会认为，伍德沃德和伯恩斯坦并没有把给他们带来无上荣耀的全部事情真相公之于众。


参议员在水门事件听证会上听取水门大厦一位盗窃犯詹姆斯•麦科德的证词。

一份文件从一个不大可能的地方浮出水面，不但进一步解释了沃德斯坦的报告，还让人们看到在揭发丑闻过程中媒体所扮演的角色。

奇怪的是，这份沃德斯坦从1973年1月开始编写的书籍草稿，被深埋在艾伦•J•帕库拉的文件堆里，他是沃德斯坦的畅销书在1796年被改编为同名好莱坞电影的导演。帕库拉死于1998年，他把自己所有的文件都转交给电影艺术与科学学会中的玛格丽特赫里克图书馆——就是颁发奥斯卡奖项的那些人。文件中有他对《总统班底》深入的研究，从很多方面来看，帕库拉的文件要比伍德沃德和伯恩斯坦自己的文件对这本书和这部电影更有启发性。沃德斯坦的文件被存放在德克萨斯州奥斯汀的哈里兰塞姆中心。

这份15页的草稿，史无前例地详细描述了《邮报》的两位记者如何利用他们煞费苦心培养出来的匿名线人。由于某些原因——伍德沃德和伯恩斯坦拒绝发表评论——他们向帕库拉透露了部分线人的身份。这些人的身份分别被潦草地也在边页空白处和单独的一张纸上。

6位匿名线人之一就是传说中的深喉，不像怀疑者说声称的那样，他并不是一个虚构的人物。另外一个是大陪审团成员“Z”。剩下4个人中的3个出人意料之外，其中包括水门大厦盗窃案最早的三名公诉人之一、被告的一名辩护律师，和那些对水门事件研究多年的专家也不知道的一位共和党私人侦探。总体来看，这些线人透露的信息不但揭露了沃德斯坦作品的真实内容，而且还透露了为《华盛顿邮报》赢得1973年普利策奖的那篇报道的幕后事实。


前司法部长约翰•米切尔在参议员水门事件委员会作证时点燃一袋烟。

“一切都隐瞒不住了吗？”

在讨论沃德斯坦的匿名线人以及他们如何取得联系之前，有必要了解一下这份草稿的复杂背景。

1972年6月17日，民主党全国委员总部位于水门大厦的办公室发生盗窃案，接下来的几个月时间被已故的大卫•哈伯斯塔姆称为媒体“使出吃奶的劲”报道这起案件。《时代周刊》、《新闻周刊》、《洛杉矶时报》、《纽约时报》和CBS晚间新闻都投入巨大的资源进行报道，但都不如《华盛顿邮报》执着。而且，媒体并没有比FBI和联邦公诉人挖掘出更多的有关更高职位的人牵扯其中的信息，尽管这7个人中的3个人（E•霍华德•亨特、G•高登•李迪和詹姆斯•麦科德）曾经直接在尼克松政府或他的竞选团队中供职。

即使是那些对犯罪行为比较感兴趣的美国人来说——实际上，很多人认为这只不过是大选年里的一个小把戏——入室盗窃似乎也算不上什么大事。尼克松已经在民意测验中遥遥领先，白宫为什么还会批准这种非法收集情报的行动呢？不管从哪个角度来看，偷鸡摸狗的事情（当时事件还没有升级成丑闻）对大选没有影响。

在11月尼克松压倒式的胜利之后，媒体对此事的报道热情逐渐消退，包括《邮报》，记者们依然期待着1月8日对7名共犯的审判中爆出新闻。如果在约翰•西里卡法官的法庭上没有任何戏剧性的证词出现，有关这个事件的新闻就会彻底消失了。

16天的审判已经进行了一半，几乎一星半点的新进展也没有出现。5名被告（亨特和4名古巴裔迈阿密人）一开始就表示认罪服法，不提出任何辩词表示他们不需要解释自己的行为。而自愿选择接受审判的麦科德和李迪，在宣称自己无罪之后就一言不发——这的确令人困惑，尤其是麦科德，因为他是在民主党全国委员会办公室被当场抓获的人之一。


罗伯特•雷德福（右）和达斯汀•霍夫曼站在华盛顿邮报大楼前，扮演他们在《总统班底》中的角色。

人们有无数的理由相信，最重要的问题永远不会找到答案，那就是谁下令入室盗窃？为什么？在庭审期间，《邮报》发行人凯瑟琳•格雷厄姆邀请伍德沃德共进午餐，影片《总统班底》详细刻画了这个场景，因为这是她第一次与把她的报纸置于孤立无援境地的记者之一会面。她无法掩饰自己焦虑的语气，问伍德沃德：“一切都隐瞒不住了吗？我是说，我们真的需要知道事情的真相吗？”伍德沃德不得不承认，他和伯恩斯坦并不确定水门事件的谜团最终是否会水落石出。

1月24日，伍德沃德听取了杰德•马格鲁特证词的一天之后——他是唯一一个出庭作证的尼克松竞选高官，这位《邮报》的记者通知深喉，他们需要继去年10月之后再进行一次面谈。这次审判的结果恐怕是一无所获，沃德斯坦决定发表一篇文章突破一下底限，曝光一些名字，发表一些法庭上只字未提的事情。也就是尼克松竞选团队或政府中即将逃脱法律制裁的大人物。

据《总统班底》中的描述，当天晚上与费尔特的会面令人格外沮丧。尽管在西里卡的法庭上正义被公然扭曲，但深喉似乎对此漠不关心，而且态度含糊得令人发狂。他再一次摆出只回应新问题，不主动提供信息的态度。于是伍德沃德把话题转到前司法部长约翰•米切尔和白宫助手查尔斯•寇尔森身上，这两名高官侥幸逃脱诉讼，沃德斯坦打算在即将发表的文章导言中点明这两个人。

据伍德沃德的打印手记，费尔特说：“他想不到有任何证据显示寇尔森和米切尔参与此事。但是，联邦调查局的高层人物和局长帕特里克•格雷都怀疑寇尔森和米切尔在幕后运作。尤其是寇尔森，扮演了非常积极的角色。而米切尔更加‘阴险’，他只是点头批准，并没有参与具体策划。深喉在后来提到，如果联邦调查局都无法证明这种“侦查性假设”，那么《邮报》就更加无力回天了。


查尔斯•W•寇尔森，理查德•尼克松的心腹之一。

心急如焚的伍德沃德不想两手空空地离开车库，他大致讲述了即将发表的有关米切尔和寇尔森的报道梗概，并直截了当地问费尔特，他是否认为《邮报》已经为这篇文章收集了足够的信息。深喉说，那是你们报社的事情。但是伍德沃德察觉到费尔特“似乎并不对报道内容非常感兴趣。”

在与伯恩斯坦商量过之后——当时，伯恩斯坦是唯一知道深喉的身份和他极为敏感的职位的第二个人，伍德沃德决定不理睬费尔特不痛不痒的反应，放手一搏。伯恩斯坦帮忙把文章修改了三次，最终的导言段落直接取自伍德沃德与费尔特1月24日在车库中密会的过程：

据可靠消息透露，联邦调查人员认定，前司法部长约翰•N•米切尔和总统特别顾问查尔斯•W•寇尔森，两人对于由水门事件的被告所实施的政治间谍行动有直接的了解。

这里所提到的“可靠消息”最主要来源于深喉，但是沃德斯坦还引用了另外5名保密、匿名的线人的话，以确保从记者的角度给出令人信服的米切尔和寇尔森的所扮演的角色。


美国导演、制片人艾伦•J•帕库拉。

草稿中提到的第一位匿名线人（不是费尔特）是一个“名字出现在庭审证人名单”中的人。这个人说，E•霍华德•亨特告诉他“[通过窃听获取的]打印报告被呈交给米切尔”。另外，寇尔森批准了盗窃行动，“因为他是行动的策划者，认为这样做很有必要”。

据帕库拉得到的文稿中的信息，这个匿名的线人就是罗伯特•F•班尼特，罗伯特穆伦公司的老板，这是一家位于华盛顿的精英公关公司。亨特曾经在穆伦公司兼职工作，同时还是白宫的一位“管子工”，这是对调查机密信息泄露事件的秘密单位的谑称。

人们早已知道班尼特（他后来成为犹他州的参议员）是沃德斯坦的线人之一，但很少有人知道，1973年的一份中央情报局文件透露，在白宫水门事件的听证会上，班尼特“为《华盛顿邮报》的鲍伯•伍德沃德提供信息，前提是保持匿名”。伍德沃德对这些有用的信息表达了适度的感谢，同时在保护班尼特的身份（和穆伦公司）。


理查德•尼克松

第二位匿名线人被某些人描述成“认识4名迈阿密被告”，文稿中也引用了他的话，进一步印证亨特告诉古巴裔的被告，窃听行动“由米切尔策划”，以及“亨特向寇尔森汇报”。

这个线人在空白处被标记为“罗斯”，又名亨利•R•罗斯布拉特，他最初是在民主党全国委员会水门大厦总部被逮捕的4名迈阿密人的代理律师。

回顾整个事件，罗斯布拉特与沃德斯坦的合作并没有那么不可思议，因为辩护律师通常会在舆论法庭上试图兴风作浪。但更重要的是，这一次罗斯布拉特是迈阿密被告的前律师。他们在几个星期之前没有留意过这个人，因为他要求自己的被告拒绝认罪。罗斯布拉特死于1985年，他后来坚称这4个人曾被劝导改变证词。在后来针对水门事件掩盖行为的审判中，他作为原告证人出现。

文稿中提到的第二个匿名线人是某个“熟悉联邦调查程序”的人，这个人说米切尔和寇尔森从窃听到的谈话中“得到了相关的信息”。

沃德斯坦称这位线人为“EE”，是艾来恩•埃德伦德的首字母。这个人是水门事件大陪审团的成员，伯恩斯坦在12月份曾经私下与他会面。


前水门事件检察官希摩尔•格兰策在市中心的办公室。

埃德伦德的身份本应和费尔特一样被严格保密，因为大陪审团成员曾经宣誓将听到的证词和思考判断过程保密。前面提到过，沃德斯坦在《总统班底》中故意模糊了“Z”是大陪审团成员的事实，把她描述成一个普通的线人，同时断言他们没有从任何大陪审团成员处得到“任何信息”。她真正的身份在2012年被公之于众，当时，杰夫•希摩尔曼在布莱德利的文献中发现了伯恩斯坦与她会面的记录。即使到了这个时候，希摩尔曼依然不主动提及埃德伦德的名字，他并不知道她已经在1991年去世了。

根据文稿中的记载，沃德斯坦再次找到深喉——当时他被称为“熟悉联邦调查局运作流程”的人，重申了他们的导言内容，也就是“联邦调查局内部文件显示‘米切尔有参与，并且知道’”入室盗窃的行动。但是对于米切尔“是否有任何违法行为”，联邦调查局内部依然存在“重大的争议”。

帕库拉只知道费尔特/深喉是“鲍伯的人”（单独的名单中），或者“朋友”（笔记空白处）。所以，费尔特是唯一一个身份对电影导演保密的人。

文稿中提到的第四位匿名线人是“完全了解事实真相的有限几个人之一”。这名线人说，“FBI的调查主要集中在寇尔森身上”，这个人号称是尼克松的政治打手。如果还有第8个人要接受审判，“那必然是寇尔森”。

这名线人在空白处标记为“格兰”，清单中写的是“格兰策”，这当然就是希摩尔•格兰策——起诉7名水门事件被告的三位美国律师之一。


凯瑟琳•格雷厄姆，《华盛顿邮报》的发行人。

检察官在庭审之前和之后把消息透露给媒体，这让他们招致了众多的批评。但直到目前为止，还没有人知道（尽管有些人在怀疑）水门事件的一名检察官向沃德斯坦透露信息。一位同事说，格兰策肯定会激烈地否认向《邮报》二人组说过那些话，但有足够的证据让人相信这些同事夸大了他的措辞。

沃德斯坦所利用的最后一位匿名线人从未与记者打过交道，即使对于那些深谙水门事件所有细节的人来说，他也绝对是一个意外。文稿中说他是“白宫一位要求匿名的官员”，他曾经说过，“白宫普遍认为亨特在按照寇尔森的指示跟进某个秘密的项目，目的是确保总统再次当选。”

“弗莱民”这个名字出现在页边空白处，名单中显示了“弗莱明”。据前白宫顾问约翰•迪恩说，这说明他就是哈里•S•弗莱明。他的父亲亚瑟•S•弗莱明是个著名的教育家和公务员，曾于1958年到1961年间在德怀特•艾森豪威尔政府任医疗、教育和福利部长。但是哈里的资历远远比不上父亲。在尼克松1968年参选期间，他是选举团队和共和党全国委员会的联络人。大选之后，他加入白宫幕僚团队，任总统办公室的特别助理，两年后离开。在1972年的选举中，弗莱明在选举团队兼职，他认识很多水门事件的参与人。弗莱明于2003年去世。但是，作为一名次级官员，他无法参加类似讨论“电子监控”这种级别的会议，所以他的消息多半都是二手的。


1978年4月，马克•费尔特在华盛顿特区发言。

最大的丑闻

为什么帕库拉这个好莱坞的完美主义者，这个总是对自己的影片内容进行透彻研究的导演，对这份文档如此着迷？而对于沃德斯坦在1972年到1973年间写的另外几十篇文章草草略过？为什么沃德斯坦不但与导演分享他们的草稿，还透露了这些人的身份，唯独隐藏了深喉？讽刺的是，这一切都无从谈起，因为《邮报》从未发表过这份草稿。

根据《总统班底》中的描述，文稿“给伯恩斯坦和伍德沃德造成了自他们7个月前开始合作以来最严重的意见分歧”。尽管伯恩斯坦发表了诸多文章揭露事情真相，但伍德沃德表达了保留意见，说“他认为在取得更多的证据之前不应当发表报道”。

伍德沃德的犹豫或许来源于深喉不冷不热的态度，或者是他说的FBI都失败了，《邮报》更不可能成功这番话。而且，在发表前两三篇水门事件的文章时，伍德沃德在提到白宫幕僚长H•R•“鲍伯”•哈尔德曼时犯了一个致命的错误。白宫揪住这个问题不放，大肆批判，这篇报道给沃德斯坦带来的阴影让他们一度想要辞职。


首次揭秘：鲍勃•伍德沃德（左）和卡尔•伯恩斯坦在推倒一届政府的过程中使用到很多线人提供的信息。

伯恩斯坦则毫无保留，认为《邮报》不需要提供明确的证据。报道的内容是调查人员的“想法”，并不是某些明确证据所指，所以文章的草稿可以发表。两位记者之间的争执越来越激烈，不止一次，他们离开会议室跑到自动售货机那里扯开嗓子大吵。

但是他们的合作关系从未出现破裂的迹象，J•安东尼•卢卡斯（译者注：美国记者、作家，普利策奖得主）将其称为“新闻界的人马怪，有一颗贵族的共和体头颅和短小精悍的犹太人后腿”。伯恩斯坦说伍德沃德站在白宫的立场讲话，伍德沃德指责伯恩斯坦即将发表的文章或许会让尼克松的新闻秘书让•齐格勒再一次对《邮报》发起暴风骤雨般的攻击。伍德沃德不想让一切重新来过，尤其是在他与凯瑟琳•格雷厄姆共进午餐之后。


厄尔•J•希尔伯特对参议院司法委员会说，他提起的水门事件诉讼案遭到阻碍，因为“我们无法获得内部人士”提供的信息。

帕库拉拍摄的是一部“兄弟电影”，不大常见的那种两个男人之间的关系情节让罗伯特•雷德福接下了这个角色。毫无疑问，这位好莱坞导演想要知道他们在1973年1月底的时候为什么分歧那么严重。回顾当时的情况，水门事件在当时即将成为继蒂波特山之后最大的总统丑闻，以及100年以来首次对总统的弹劾。因此《邮报》的记者让帕库拉接触到一些通常情况下只有报刊编辑才会看到的信息。

《新闻周刊》向伍德沃德和伯恩斯坦出示了一份文稿的复印件，他们确认这是“明显的真迹”。但是他们说不知道帕库拉如何得到了他们从未发表过的文稿，以及他为什么（或者说是否）对这份东西感兴趣。

他们不愿意讨论线人真实身份的泄露，主要原因是文稿页边空白处的手迹并不规整，而且使用的是缩写，比如“Ben”（表示罗伯特•F•班尼特）、“EE”（表示艾莱恩•埃德伦德）。沃德斯坦在电子邮件中写道：“空白处的手迹并不清晰（不一定是我们的），而且这里或许会涉及到依然健在的线人，所以我们对此不做评论。”

当然，谁在空白处潦草地写明线人的身份根本不重要，因为只有两个人有可能揭露这些信息，：一个是伍德沃德，另一个是伯恩斯坦。他们或许依然清晰地记得这些缩写代表的是什么，因为他们曾经告诉《新闻周刊》，草稿“再一次显示我们在水门事件中的调查有多个线人，来自政府内部和外部、各种不同的机构、个人和重要部门”。

这份文稿除了让人们看到沃德斯坦如何构建一个水门事件的故事之外，还传达出一个被人遗忘的历史事实。水门事件丑闻前后持续了26个月，从盗窃事件到尼克松在1974年8月辞职，这是一个极为复杂的事件。但是由于《总统班底》和电影的演绎，这个故事往往被演化成一个简单的、引人入胜的传说——两个年轻、饥渴的记者，把事实真相作为唯一的武器，推翻了一任总统。评论家威尔弗里德•希德说：“人们或许对水门事件的细节不甚了解，但至少他们记得这部电影：两个好管闲事的记者和一个告密者，对吗？”


被称为“管子工”的白宫保安团队成员，43岁的G•高登•李迪来到洛杉矶县监狱。

这份文稿更加深了神化的色彩。帕库拉的文件加上背景故事证明，水门大厦盗窃事件发生之后的7个月里，媒体就好像是在瞎子摸象——搜肠刮肚地理解手上的情报都代表了什么。与6月的时候相比，伍德沃德和伯恩斯坦在揭露谁批准的盗窃行为调查上，几乎毫无进展，更提不上发现后来的司法干预行为。毕竟，让尼克松陷入最终弹劾陷阱的是那些后续的掩盖行为。

如果说有更多的褒奖可以授予让案件最终水落石出的功臣，那么必然应当属于司法制度，尤其是三位检察官——前面提到的格兰策、厄尔•J 希尔伯特和唐纳德•E•坎贝尔。他们无情地收紧法律的铁钳，直到一位水门事件的被告詹姆斯•麦科德在1月30日被定罪之后招供了一些内幕。麦科德在3月23日至希瑞卡法官的信中，承认了包括作伪证之内的一些罪行。这件事发生在审判过程中，政府因此所遭受到的严重打击一直没有恢复。很快，参与掩盖行为的每个人都在找律师——尤其是白宫法律顾问约翰•D•迪恩——并且争先恐后地向检察官坦白。

媒体——最主要的是沃德斯坦——在让公众持续了解事件进展的方面做出了最大的贡献，尤其是在1972年大选之前，盗窃事件根本没有人屑于关注。媒体具有暗示性的文章与白宫在大选之前不屑一顾的“懒得否认”的态度之间的差异，造成了公众巨大的信任度反差。媒体的报道给检察官提供了一个保护罩，让他们可以不受外界干扰地履行法律程序，用实际行动践行了法律格言“正义的巨轮缓缓前进，天网恢恢，疏而不漏”。最终，当一位新的特别检察官在1973年5月被任命之后，让案件水落石出的是水门事件的大陪审团和检察官，而不是媒体。

鲍伯•伍德沃德和卡尔•伯恩斯坦仅仅是水门大戏众多演员中的两个角色，而且可能还算不上是主要角色，尽管雷德福引发了一些明星效应。（去年他制作了另外一部水门事件电影，纪录片《重访总统班底》，耶鲁大学历史学家比富力•盖齐在《Slate》杂事上说这部影片其实就是《重复总统班底》。）

水门事件永远是新闻媒体界最闪亮的时刻之一。但是帕库拉的文稿内容告诉我们，即使沃德斯坦发掘出所有揭露真相的线人，最终正义得以伸张的功劳必须归于司法和国会程序。对伍德沃德和伯恩斯坦的崇拜应当果断、仁慈地停止了。

伯恩斯坦和伍德沃德在看过本文的草稿之后说：“伍德沃德现在同意当时的那篇报道应当发布了。”但是如果他们在当时真的这么做了，《华盛顿邮报》会陷入彻底尴尬的处境。《时代周刊》在1月29日的杂志中发表了有关米切尔和寇尔森几乎同样的内容，这不足为奇，因为马克•费尔特也像漏勺一样给《时代周刊》的仙蒂•史密斯提供信息。但是寇尔森曾经威胁要提起高达数百万美元的诽谤诉讼，《时代周刊》立即道歉，撤回了这篇文章。寇尔森的确参与了不少事情，包括在掩盖过程中的所作所为，但从未有任何证据证明他在事前批准了入室盗窃的行动。


至于马克•费尔特对于坏消息的散播——比如，把寇尔森而不是比米切尔说成是参与丑闻的高层人物——为什么如此无动于衷，那恐怕需要用另外一个故事来讲述了……



原文：

In 2005, W. Mark Felt came forward in Vanity Fair to identify himself as journalism’s most famous secret source. The 91-year-old former FBI executive admitted—with a little push from his family—to being Deep Throat, the anonymous source whose information was vital to numerous scoops about the Watergate scandal written by Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein in 1972-73. A national guessing game that had been played for 31 years seemed over.

Yet the arrival of Deep Throat in the flesh created new complications, as media scholar Matt Carlson observed in 2010. A stroke-afflicted Felt was unable to speak on his own behalf; simultaneously, “Woodstein” (as the reporting duo were known internally at the Post) could no longer dictate the terms for how to think about Deep Throat. Speculation persisted, not only over how Woodward and Bernstein had used sources but also over what Carlson called “the overall accuracy of the Watergate narrative as retold by journalists,” who have a vested interest in a self-glorifying version.

American journalist Benjamin Bradlee, longtime editor of the Washington Post, c. 1973.

Nothing did more to stoke these doubts than a 2012 biography of Ben Bradlee, Woodward and Bernstein’s fabled editor at the Post. In Yours in Truth, author Jeff Himmelman, a former Woodward disciple, described how he found an interview recorded while Bradlee was preparing his autobiography in the early 1990s. In it, the Post editor expressed doubts about Woodstein’s portrayal of Deep Throat in their book on the investigation, All the President’s Men.

“There’s a residual fear in my soul that that isn’t quite straight,” Bradlee told the interviewer in 1990. Himmelman also found in Bradlee’s papers a memo from Bernstein that described his clandestine encounter in December 1972 with a source identified only by the code name “Z.” In All the President’s Men, the information provided by “Z” was put on a par with disclosures made by Deep Throat. Himmelman put two and two together and realized “Z” was a member of the grand jury that had issued the original indictments against the Watergate burglars in September 1972—although in their book, Woodstein expressly denied getting information from anyone on the grand jury. One didn’t have to be a skeptic to believe that Woodward and Bernstein were still withholding the full truth about their exploits.

Senators listen to the testimony of James McCord, one of the Watergate burglers, during the Watergate hearings.

Now a document has surfaced in an unlikely place that sheds sorely needed light on Woodstein’s reporting while providing some perspective on the press’s role in uncovering the scandal.

Oddly enough, the document—a draft of a Woodstein story from January 1973—was buried deep within the papers of Alan J. Pakula, director of the eponymous 1976 Hollywood film based on Woodstein’s best-seller. Pakula, who died in 1998, deeded all his papers to the Margaret Herrick Library at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences—the people who give you the Oscars. The collection includes his copious research for All the President’s Men, and in many respects, Pakula’s papers are more illuminating about the book and the movie than Woodward’s and Bernstein’s own papers, which are housed at the Harry Ransom Center in Austin, Texas.

The 15-page draft article is an unprecedented guide to how the Post’s reporting duo utilized the many anonymous sources they had painstakingly cultivated. For reasons unknown—Woodward and Bernstein have declined comment on this point—the reporters disclosed to Pakula the identities of some of these prized sources. The names are both scrawled in the corresponding margins of the draft and listed on a separate sheet of paper.

One of the six anonymous sources is the fabled Deep Throat, and he is no composite character, as skeptics have often alleged. Another is “Z,” that grand juror. Three of the four others are surprises. They include one of the three original prosecutors in the Watergate burglary, a onetime lawyer for the defendants, and a Republican operative whose name is probably unknown even to those steeped in Watergate lore. Taken together and put in context, these sources reveal not only the true anatomy of a Woodstein story but also an important truth about the reporting that won The Washington Post a Pulitzer Prize in 1973.

Former Atty. Gen. John Mitchell lighting pipe during testimony before Senate Watergate comm.

‘Is It All Going to Come Out?’

It’s necessary to understand the complex backstory to this draft article before getting to Woodstein’s anonymous sources and how they were employed.

For several months following the June 17, 1972, break-in at the Democratic National Committee (DNC) headquarters at the Watergate office complex, all of what the late David Halberstam once called the media “powers that be” covered this unusual crime. Time, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, The New York Times and the CBS Evening News all devoted significant resources to the story, though none was more dogged than The Washington Post. Still, the press wasn’t having any more success than the FBI and federal prosecutors were in proving that someone higher up than the seven men indicted for the break-in were implicated in the crime, even though three of them (E. Howard Hunt, G. Gordon Liddy and James McCord) had worked directly for the Nixon administration or its campaign apparatus.

Even for Americans inclined to take the crime seriously—and many dismissed it as an election-year shenanigan—the break-in seemed to make no sense. Why would the White House sanction illegal intelligence gathering when Nixon enjoyed such a commanding lead in the polls? In any event, the caper (it was not yet a scandal) was having no effect on the election.

Following Nixon’s landslide victory in November, media coverage dwindled to a dribble, including at the Post. Reporters still interested in the story anticipated the next break would come during the trial of the seven conspirators, scheduled to begin January 8. If there wasn’t dramatic testimony or a breakthrough in Judge John J. Sirica’s courtroom, interest in the story as news seemed likely to peter out entirely.

Midway through the 16-day trial, it became clear that nary a glimmer of new information was going to come out. Five of the defendants (Hunt and four Miamians of Cuban extraction) pleaded guilty at the outset, and not mounting a defense meant they didn’t have to offer an explanation. Meanwhile, McCord and Liddy, who chose to stand trial, were uncommunicative after declaring their innocence—a plea that was especially perplexing in McCord’s case, since he had been among those caught red-handed inside the DNC.

Robert Redford, right, and Dustin Hoffman standing in front of the Washington Post Building for their roles in "All the President's Men."

There was every reason to believe the most serious questions—chief among them: who ordered the break-in and why?—would never be answered. In the midst of the trial, Post Publisher Katharine Graham invited Woodward to lunch, an encounter described in great detail in All the President’s Men because it was her first meeting with one of the reporters who was pushing her newspaper out on a limb. In a voice that barely masked her apprehension, she asked Woodward, “Is it all going to come out? I mean, are we ever going to know about all of this?” Woodward had to admit he and Bernstein weren’t sure if the Watergate mystery would ever be cleared up.

On January 24, the day after Woodward heard Jeb Magruder testify in court—the only high Nixon campaign official to do so—the Post reporter signaled Deep Throat that it was time for their first substantive meeting since late October. Already in despair over how little the trial would yield, Woodstein had decided to write a story that would push the envelope, name names and get into print what was not being said in court—namely, that culpable Nixon campaign/administration higher-ups were getting off scot-free.

According to the account in All the President’s Men, the meeting that evening with Felt was unusually frustrating. Despite the travesty of justice apparent in Sirica’s courtroom, Deep Throat seemed cavalier and was infuriatingly vague, taking the position once again that he would respond only to new information and not proffer any. Woodward steered the conversation to former attorney general John Mitchell and White House aide Charles Colson, two higher-ups who had escaped prosecution and names Woodstein intended to name in the lede paragraph of their prospective article.

Felt, according to Woodward’s typed-up notes, said that “there [was] not anything he would even consider circumstantial evidence to show that Colson and Mitchell [were] involved. However, it [was] the feeling of FBI heads and [Director L. Patrick] Gray that Colson and Mitchell were behind the operation—especially Colson, whose role was active. Mitchell’s position was more ‘amoral,’” Felt said, consisting of “giving the nod but not conceiving the scheme.” If the FBI could not prove this “investigative assumption,” Deep Throat later opined, he didn’t think the Post could either.

Charles W. Colson, one of Richard Nixon's men.

Desperate not to leave the garage empty-handed, Woodward outlined the prospective story about Mitchell and Colson and bluntly asked Felt if he thought the Post had gathered enough for an article. That was for the newspaper to decide, Deep Throat responded, but Woodward noticed that Felt “didn’t seem impressed with the story.”

After conferring with Bernstein—at the time, the only other person who knew Deep Throat’s identity and the extremely sensitive position he held—Woodward forged ahead, ignoring Felt’s tepid reaction. Bernstein then reworked the draft three times. The lede graph was taken directly from Woodward’s garage rendezvous with Felt on January 24:

Federal investigators concluded that former Attorney General John N. Mitchell and Charles W. Colson, special counsel to the president, both had direct knowledge of the overall political espionage operation conducted by the men indicted in the Watergate case, according to reliable sources.

The most critical “reliable source” in this rendering was Deep Throat, but Woodstein also wove in quotes from five other confidential, unnamed sources in the reporters’ effort to produce a persuasive account of Mitchell’s and Colson’s roles.

American director and producer Alan J. Pakula.

The first anonymous source (other than Felt) mentioned in the draft is someone “whose name appeared on the witness list” for the ongoing trial. This person is quoted as saying that E. Howard Hunt told him that “typed reports [from the bugging] were going to Mitchell” and that Colson had approved the break-in “because he is an operator and realized these things are necessary.”

This anonymous source, according to the guidance given Pakula, was Robert F. Bennett, then the owner of the Robert R. Mullen Co., an elite public relations firm in Washington. Hunt had worked at Mullen part time while also working as one of the White House “plumbers,” the jocular name given to a secret unit that investigated leaks of classified information.

That Bennett (who later became a U.S. senator from Utah) was a Woodstein secret source has long been known. The much lesser-known House hearings on Watergate located a 1973 CIA memo disclosing that Bennett “has been feeding stories to Bob Woodward of The Washington Post with the understanding that there be no attribution to Bennett. Woodward is suitably grateful for the fine stories and by-lines which he gets and protects Bennett (and the Mullen Company).”

Richard Nixon

A second anonymous source, described as someone “who knows the four Miami defendants,” is then quoted in the draft article to substantiate the point that Hunt told the defendants of Cuban extraction that the bugging operation “was for Mitchell” and that “Hunt [had] reported to Colson.”

This source was identified in the margin as “Roth,” a.k.a. Henry B. Rothblatt, who initially represented the four Miami-based defendants arrested at the DNC’s Watergate headquarters.

In retrospect, Rothblatt’s cooperation with Woodstein was not that surprising, as defense lawyers often try to make their case in the court of public opinion. But, more significant, by this time Rothblatt was the former lawyer for the Miami-based defendants. They had dismissed him weeks before, on the grounds that he refused to change their pleas to guilty. Rothblatt, who died in 1985, would later contend that the four men had been induced to change their pleas, and he eventually served as a prosecution witness during the trial of those indicted for the Watergate cover-up.

The next anonymous source cited in the draft—described as someone “familiar with the federal investigation”—is quoted as saying that Mitchell and Colson “got information about what was received” from the wiretapped conversations.

Woodstein revealed that this source was “EE,” initials that stood for Elayne Edlund, the member of the Watergate grand jury who had been interviewed secretly by Bernstein in December.

Former Watergate prosecutor Seymour Glanzer in his downtown office.

Edlund’s identity was supposed to be as closely guarded as Felt’s. That’s because grand jurors take an oath to keep secret the testimony given before them and their deliberations. As noted earlier, in All the President’s Men Woodstein deliberately obfuscated the fact that “Z” was a grand juror, pretending she was a conventional source while asserting they had received “no information” from any grand jurors. Her true role became known only in 2012, when Jeff Himmelman found the memo of Bernstein’s interview with her in Bradlee’s papers. Even then, Himmelman shied away from naming Edlund, not knowing that she had died in 1991.

At this point in the draft, Woodstein turned to Deep Throat again—described as someone “who is familiar with the FBI investigation”—to reiterate their lede: namely, that “information in FBI files shows that ‘Mitchell was involved and knew’” about the break-in, but that there was still a “substantial debate” within the bureau about Mitchell’s involvement and “whether he had done anything illegal.”

Felt/Deep Throat was identified as “Bob’s Guy” (on the separate sheet of paper) or “Friend” (in the margin) for Pakula. Thus, Felt was the only source whose true identity was kept secret from the movie director.

The fourth anonymous source utilized is described in the draft as “one of the handful of people fully knowledgeable with the facts in the case.” This source is cited as saying that “much of the federal investigation concentrated on Colson,” widely reputed to be Nixon’s political hatchet man, and that if an eighth defendant had been indicted, “that person would have been Colson.”

This source, identified in the margin as “Glan” and on the separate sheet as “Glanzer,” was, of course, Seymour Glanzer, one of the three U.S. attorneys prosecuting the seven original Watergate defendants.

Katherine Graham, publisher of the Washington Post

Prosecutors are notorious for trying their cases in the press before or after trying them in court. But until now, it had not been known (though some suspected) that one of the Watergate prosecutors was apparently leaking to Woodstein. Glanzer, a colleague says, would vehemently deny making such statements to the Post duo, and there are ample grounds to believe that they stretched his words.

The last anonymous source Woodstein deployed has never been tied to the reporters. Even to persons steeped in Watergate minutiae, his role as a Woodstein source will come as a surprise. He is described in the draft as “one official at the White House who asked not to be named,” and was cited to support the contention that “it was generally understood in the Executive Mansion that Hunt was working on secret projects for Colson dealing with the president’s re-election.”

The name “Fleming” is scribbled in the margin, and “Flemming” is listed on the separate sheet of paper. According to former White House counsel John Dean, that means he was Harry S. Flemming. His father, Arthur S. Flemming, was a well-known educator and civil servant who served as Dwight Eisenhower’s secretary of health, education and welfare from 1958 to 1961. But Harry’s profile was much lower. During Nixon’s 1968 campaign, he was the liaison between the campaign and the Republican National Committee. After the election, he joined the White House staff as a special assistant for presidential personnel, leaving two years later. During the 1972 campaign, Flemming, who died in 2003, worked part time on the campaign and knew many of the key Watergate actors. Yet, as a second-tier official, he was barred from meetings when subjects like “electronic surveillance” were discussed, and his knowledge was generally secondhand.

Mark Felt shown speaking in Washington, DC on April 1978.

The Biggest Scandal

Why was Pakula, known in Hollywood as a perfectionist who researched his films deeply, so intrigued by this one article, out of the dozens written by Woodstein during the fall and winter of 1972-73? Why did Woodstein not only show the director the raw draft but share the identities of all but one of their confidential sources? Ironically, all this came to pass because the draft article was never published in the Post.

As recounted in All the President’s Men, the draft “produced the most serious disagreement between Bernstein and Woodward since they had begun working together seven months earlier.” No matter how many times Bernstein ran the story through his typewriter, Woodward expressed reservations, saying “he didn’t think it should run until they had better proof.”

Woodward’s doubts probably stemmed from Deep Throat’s tepid reaction, and his comment that the Post was unlikely to succeed where the FBI had failed. Then, too, just two or three Watergate stories ago Woodstein had made a damaging mistake in a story about White House Chief of Staff H.R. “Bob” Haldeman. The White House had pounced on that error, and the shadow it cast over Woodstein’s reporting left the duo thinking they might even have to resign from the newspaper.

Revealed for the first time: the many sources used by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein to bring down all the president’s men

Bernstein had no reservations, arguing that the Post didn’t have to offer definitive evidence. The story was what investigators “thought,” not what hard evidence showed, and on that basis the draft merited publication. The argument between the two reporters became so heated that on more than one occasion they retreated from the newsroom to the vending-machine area so they could shout at each other.

Their partnership—what J. Anthony Lukas later termed “a kind of journalistic centaur with an aristocratic Republican head and runty Jewish hindquarters”—never seemed closer to being ruptured. Bernstein accused Woodward of playing into the White House’s hands, while Woodward accused Bernstein of trying to push a story into the paper that might lead to another, even more damaging attack on the Post by Nixon Press Secretary Ron Ziegler. Woodward did not want to reprise that episode, especially after his talk with Katharine Graham over lunch.

Earl J Silbert told the Senate Judiciary Committee that his prosecution of the original Watergate case was hampered because "we couldn't get any insiders" to provide leads.

Pakula was making a “buddy” film—the odd-couple nature of Woodstein was what had prompted actor Robert Redford to buy the screen rights—and the Hollywood director undoubtedly wanted to know why they had argued so bitterly in late January 1973. In retrospect, Watergate was on the verge of metastasizing into the biggest presidential scandal since Teapot Dome and, soon, the first effort to impeach a president in 100 years. So the Post reporters gave Pakula the kind of access normally reserved for newspaper editors only.

After Newsweek showed them a copy of the draft article, Woodward and Bernstein acknowledged that it was “obviously authentic.” But they said they didn’t know how Pakula got hold of their never-published draft, and why (or if) he had been particularly interested in it.

They would not discuss the disclosure of their sources’ true identities, partly because the handwriting in the margins of the draft article was not clearly legible and used abbreviations—i.e., “Ben” (for Robert F. Bennett) and “EE” (for Elayne Edlund). “Because it is not clear whose handwriting is in the margins (not necessarily ours) and the story may involve sources who are still alive,” Woodstein wrote in an email, “we just can’t comment.”

It matters not one whit, of course, who scribbled the identities in the margins. There were only two people who could have revealed that information: one of them is Woodward, and the other Bernstein. They probably had little difficulty remembering who the abbreviations refer to, since they also told Newsweek that the draft story “shows once again that we had multiple sources for our work on Watergate, in and out of government, from many different institutions, individuals, and vantage points.”

Besides this peek at how Woodstein constructed a Watergate story, the draft conveys an important historical truth that is frequently forgotten. The Watergate scandal, which played out over 26 months from beginning (the break-in) to end (Nixon’s resignation in August 1974), was an extraordinarily complex saga. Yet because of All the President’s Men and especially its film adaptation, the story is too often reduced to a convenient and appealing fable, the tale of two young and hungry reporters who brought down a president, wielding truth as their only weapon. Or, as the critic Wilfrid Sheed put it, “folks may be getting fuzzy about the Watergate details, but at least they remember the movie: a couple of nosy journalists and an informer, wasn’t it?”

G. Gordon Liddy, 43-year-old member of the White House Security group known as the "Plumbers," arrives at Los Angeles County jail

The draft explodes this myth. The document in Pakula’s papers, together with the backstory, demonstrates that seven months after the Watergate burglars were caught, the press was in a position akin to the blind men and the elephant parable: still struggling to understand what it had its hands on. Woodward and Bernstein were no closer to revealing who approved the break-in than they had been in June, and even further away from exposing the obstruction of justice that followed the break-in. And it was the cover-up, after all, that ensnared Nixon and put in motion the ultimate political sanction of impeachment.

If there are more accolades to be awarded for cracking the case, they belong to the legal system, in particular, the three prosecutors—the aforementioned Glanzer, Earl J. Silbert and Donald E. Campbell—who inexorably closed the legal pincers until one of the original Watergate defendants, James McCord, finally broke ranks not long after his January 30 conviction. McCord’s March 23 letter to Judge Sirica claiming that perjury, among other crimes, had occurred during the trial was a devastating blow from which the administration never recovered. Soon, everyone involved in the cover-up began to lawyer up—most significant, John W. Dean, the White House legal counsel—and the race to confess to prosecutors began.

The media, and most prominently Woodstein, deserve enormous credit for keeping the story alive, especially prior to the 1972 election, when the break-in was regarded with a combination of apathy and nonchalance. The dissonance between the suggestive stories in the press and the White House’s dismissive “non-denial denials” before the election created an enormous credibility gap. Press coverage served as a prophylactic for prosecutors, allowing them to proceed steadily and without interference, in keeping with the legal adage that the “wheels of justice turn slowly, but they grind exceedingly fine.” Ultimately, it was the work of the Watergate grand jury and these prosecutors—not the press—that produced a road map to all the criminal cases by the time a special prosecutor was appointed in May 1973.

Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein were only two of many actors in the Watergate drama, and perhaps not even the most important ones, notwithstanding Redford’s extended effort at idolatry. (Last year he produced another Watergate film, this time a documentary, All the President’s Men Revisited, which was really All the President’s Men Repeated, as Yale historian Beverly Gage observed on Slate.)

Watergate will always stand as one of the news media’s finer hours. But as the draft in Pakula’s papers shows, even with all the anonymous sources Woodstein developed, credit for justice being served must be shared with the legal and congressional processes. The era of worshipping the reporting of Woodward and Bernstein should be brought to a merciful, and decisive, end.

A footnote: “Woodward now agrees that the story should have run,” Bernstein and Woodward said in their response after seeing the draft article. Had that been the case, though, The Washington Post would have been sorely embarrassed. In its January 29 issue, Time magazine published virtually the same allegation about Mitchell and Colson—hardly surprising, since Mark Felt was also leaking like a sieve to Time’s Sandy Smith. After Colson threatened to file a multimillion-dollar libel suit, however, Time quickly apologized and retracted the story. Colson did a lot of things, including participate in the cover-up. But there was never any proof he approved the break-in beforehand.

As for why Mark Felt was so indifferent about spreading bad information around, i.e., making Colson the principal higher-up rather than Mitchell…that is another story.