Pseudonym: David, Paul
Paul David was an alias used by a CIA employee during an interview for the Church Committee. David was a Special Assistant to Richard Helms from 1961 to 1964. Furthermore, Gordon Mason was a Special Assistant to DDP (Deputy Director for Plans) in September 1964. Also, David had spells in Ghana, the Hague/Netherlands and Ethiopia, which matches to a great extent that of Gordon Mason mentioned in the obituary above.
Paul David was interviewed by Wallach and DiGenova of the Church Committee. Paul David believed that William K. Harvey was "egocentric, bombastic", and "one of the strongest proponents of compartmentalization and need to know." David appears to have worked in CIA until at least 1974. According to an obituary for Mason he retired from the CIA in 1977.
198-10004-10070: CUBAN HISTORIAN AVAILABLE IN WASHINGTON
04/30/62: Memo for the record from James K. Patchell, Lt. Colonel, USA, Office of the Assistant to the Secretary of Defense: Colonel Hutchison of SORO (EMerson 2-6710) stated that the following named Cuban refugee is a "first-class Cuban historian by any standards." Dr. Herminio Portell-Vila, 543 Connecticut Avenue (EMerson 2-6124). Colonel Hutchison indicated that Dr. Portell-Vila had been very helpful in the preparation of the Cuba handbook. Information from Gordon Mason: CIA tried to send on a speaking trip to England, but he did not cooperate and withdrew at the last minute and broke the contract."
1994.03.09.09:24:05:060005: Reel 4, Folder C - CISNEROS DIAZ, ROGELIO
09/11/64: Routing and Record Sheet from Alfonso Rodriguez (probably Earl Williamson), WH/SA/SO/AR to Gordon Mason, Special. Assistant to DDP: Note long note to "Gordon" in the Comments section.
1993.07.22.14:46:34:750280: IG FILE CARDS ON HOWARD HUNT AND OTHERS
12/20/73: Gordon Mason's name appeared on the right hand side of an IG file card on Howard Hunt. Also mentioned were Breckinridge, Tom Yale, Jack Blake, Chamberlain, W. Magnusson.
104-10224-10007: MILER, NEWTON S., OP.
03/10/75: Gordon Mason was DDO/Chief, Plans Staff.
157-10008-10246: INTERVIEW WITH PAUL DAVID (ALIAS)
07/25/75: SSCIA interview (Wallach and DiGenova) with Paul David: "This morning, Joe and I met with Paul David ('P. D.') at the Carroll Arms for approximately two hours. George Clarke from the CIA's General Counsel's staff was present for the last fifteen minutes of the interview. Background: 1948-51: Assistant to the Chief of Station-Romania. 1951-54: Chief Rumanian Desk. 1954-58: Chief of Operations Against Communist Areas (Eastern Bloc) - Operations from Greek base-stationed in Greece. 1958-61: Ghana, Chief Station. 1961-62: Special Assistant to Helms. 1962-63: National War College (June 1962 - July 1963). 1963-64: Helms' Special Assistant. 1965-66: Chief of Station, Holland/Hague. 1966-69: Chief of Station - Ethiopia. 1969-73: Chief of Operational Services - Chief of Staff in DDP. (Director Clandestine Services). 1973: Chief Career Management Personnel. 1973-74: Chief Plans & Programs for Directorate. Interview Summary: Bissell 'out of the blue' asked P.D. to read and comment upon (Ghosn) Zogby's Cuban operations paper. P.D. told Bissell that the paper/proposals 'stunk'...'much like another Bay of Pigs.' Apparently, Helms also read and liked P.D.'s comments. After Bissell 'left', Helms requested that P.D. come on board as his staff assistant. P.D. stressed that he was not in the operational line of command - 'I provided an interface for intelligence information.' A typical day in P.D.'s life: - Screening cable traffic (7 - 9 a.m.). Primarily cables relating to positive intelligence, to prepare Helms for his daily 9 a.m. hour-long meeting with DCI McCone. - Prepared a daily briefing for the White House on Cuban intelligence. - Preparing review of books such as 'The Invisible Government' and damage reports (i.e., reports setting forth what sensitive information exposed by book). P.D. stressed that he was 'out of touch with the day-to-day operations of Task Force W.' However, he believes that Harvey kept Helms fully briefed." (CONTINUED BELOW).
157-10008-10246: INTERVIEW WITH PAUL DAVID (ALIAS)
07/25/75: SSCIA interview (Wallach and DiGenova) with Paul David: "Harvey, in P.D.'s own words, was 'not an ordinary man',...'egocentric,' 'bombastic', 'one of the strongest proponents of compartmentalization and need to know.' In addition, Harvey had a law degree and a successful FBI stint prior to joining the Agency...P.D. noted Harvey's intense loyalty to 'his people' (including Helms and Starkey. However, P.D. is sure that even with these people, Harvey was likely to have been extremely close-mouthed."
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/a-local-life-gordon-mason-who-caught-a-notorious-fascist-spy-during-world-war-ii-dies/2014/06/06/7f2972fa-e033-11e3-810f-764fe508b82d_story.html?noredirect=on
06/04/2014: Obituary by Emily Langer in The Washington Post to Gordon Mason: Mentioned that Mason retired from the CIA in 1977. Largely the same as the obituary below.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/gordon-mason-us-counterintelligence-operative-who-captured-an-expert-italian-spy-and-went-on-to-serve-in-the-cia-9560514.html
06/24/2014: Obituary by Emily Langer in the Independent newspaper to Gordon Mason: "Gordon Mason's quarry, a wily teenage spy named Carla Costa, was said to have been the best female agent working for the Germans in Italy. She was not yet 17 when she ran away from home in Rome and joined a cadre of Italian spies organised to aid German military intelligence. She proved so skilled at carrying messages to and from enemy territory that she received an audience with Mussolini at his northern headquarters near Lake Garda. 'Young woman,' Il Duce told her, 'if all Italian women were like you, we'd win this damnable war.' Mason was in the US Army Counterintelligence Corps. The son of Italian immigrants, and a future CIA career officer, he spoke Italian fluently and was ordered to arrest Costa. With information gathered from an agent in custody, his unit closed in on Costa in October 1944 near Pistoia in Tuscany. Mason was following her presumed route and spotted her on a bicycle. He detained Costa and brought her back to his station for questioning,..In the Counterintelligence Corps, Mason attained the rank of captain and participated in the invasions of North Africa in 1942 and of Italy the following year. He joined the fledgling CIA in 1947 and served in positions that included chief of external operations for the Soviet bloc and station chief in Romania, Ghana, the Netherlands and Ethiopia. He later held high-ranking positions in the CIA and was awarded the Distinguished Intelligence Medal. His wife of nearly 50 years, Louise Knapp Mason, sometimes joined his CIA missions. At least once she helped him bury money and other supplies for anti-communist organisers in Romania...He knew he had found her, he said, when he spotted her on the getaway bicycle with her tell-tale blue shoes. Gordon Mason, CIA officer: born Cherry Valley, Pennsylvania 20 January 1916; twice married (two children); died 3 April 2014."
https://historia.ro/sectiune/portret/gordon-mason-primul-sef-al-statiei-cia-la-569322.html
Article by Dr. Sorin Aparaschivei on the Historia website on Gordon Mason: ..."On December 8, 1947, Gordon Mason was 'appointed' economic attaché at the US Legation in Bucharest. He arrived in Constanța only on July 19, 1948, with the American ship Skagway Victory. Mason's mission was easily deducible: to observe and study on the spot how an independent, liberal democratic state, with a people of non-Slavic origin, predominantly anti-communist and with a pronounced national sentiment, was occupied, subjugated and transformed in a totalitarian state, completely dependent on the Soviet Union. But Gordon Mason also had clandestine tasks, such as combating Soviet influence and logistically supporting the National Anti-Communist Resistance Movement in Romania and the Balkans...Mason was proving to be a 'big fish' who deserved all the attention. It was established that under the guise of an economic attaché, Gordon Mason holds the rank of major of the newly established Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), and that in Bucharest he exercised the position of coordinator of clandestine operations of this agency for the entire Balkan Peninsula...Meanwhile, sometime in mid-August 1948, Romanian counterintelligence managed to intercept a confidential letter, addressed to 'Gordon Mason - Deputy Attaché at the American Legation, Bucharest, Romania'. The content of the letter was of exceptional importance both for the Romanian side and for the Soviet 'allies'...Therefore, through the direct connections he had within the American presidential administration and as head of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) station in Bucharest, Gordon Mason was at the center of attention of the political regime in Romania. In fact, the members of the US Legation in Bucharest also considered Mason 'the strongman of the day'...But, in 1951, the CIA transferred Gordon Mason to Albania, Bulgaria and then... to Ghana."
David Talbot, The Devil's Chessboard: Allen Dulles, The CIA, and the Rise of America's Secret Government (2016)
Page 186: ..."There was indeed a smoking gun: a $100,000 check from Malaxa deposited in Nixon's Whittier bank account. But Pearson was unable to get his hands on it. In a twist of bad luck for Nixon, one of the tellers at his bank branch turned out to be a Romanian refuge who loathed Malaxa. He sent a photostatic copy of the check to political rivals of the notorious industrialist in the exile community, who in turn forwarded the copied check to their contact in the CIA, Gordon Mason, chief of the agency's Balkans desk. By fall 1952, Allen Dulles was the number two man at the CIA and was in line to take over the agency with an Eisenhower-Nixon victory in November. As deputy director, Dulles was already making the agency his own, working with loyal associates like Frank Wisner-who would soon take over the agency's action arm-on ways to escalate the war against the Eastern bloc. But the ambitious plans that Dulles and Wisner were hatching for a long-awaited Republican presidency suddenly seemed in peril when Gordon Mason walked into Wisner's office with a copy of the Malaxa check. 'Jesus Christ!' Wisner burst out. 'We'd better see Allen Dulles.'"
David Talbot, The Devil's Chessboard: Allen Dulles, The CIA, and the Rise of America's Secret Government (2016)
Page 191: ..."As the smoldering Malaxa scandal threatened to erupt into flames in the final days of the 1952 presidential race, Dulles moved quickly to douse it. After Wisner and Mason showed him Malaxa's $100,000 check, the deputy CIA director knew that he would have to send it up the chain of command to his boss, General Walter Bedell Smith. But Dulles also realized that, in this case, passing the buck was as good as destroying the evidence. CIA director 'Beetle' Smith had served as Eisenhower's intensely dedicated chief of staff during the war, and he was just as devoted to Ike's presidential victory as Dulles. It was Gordon Mason who was given the unpleasant task of showing the evidence of Nixon's corruption to General Smith, who predictably flew into a rage. 'Smith was a man who could cuss in three languages and in almost every sentence,' recalled Mason. 'He also had a violent temper, and he acted as though I personally was trying to scuttle Eisenhower.' Smith demanded that Mason immediately gather up every scrap of incriminating material against Nixon and bring it to his office. 'The story was cleaned from the books,' said Mason. Wisner, too, had no doubt what was done with the evidence. 'Beetle just flushed it all down the toilet.'"