ILLEGIB 18 July 1975 25X1 q h e following is for what its worth and in no way is meant to detract from any efforts of the existing Bicentennial Committee in the Agency I I The other day and I were discussing the enthusiastic feedback on the General's appearance befor the SAR national convention and recognizing the value of the carry-home reactions to the General's talk by some admittedly significant community leaders 25X1 STAT The conversation cameafo nd to au bag recalling thatQ 25X1 is the vice chairman of the --- ---- --Bicentennial Commissio d25X1 I chair theJ Commission We exchanged some ideas on how the Agencylgnt derive significant p r benefit by fulfilling a role in the national Bicentennial celebration using the opportunity to emphasize the traditional role of American intelligence dating much from the intelligence activities of those men who created our fundamental documents One such opportunity for which Agency participation might derive benefit we noted would be in compiling --without much difficulty thanks to published DAR records--an honor role of American intelligence officers spys if you will during the American Revolution perhaps publishing it Frankly we felt the bed-rock groups which pride themselves on descent from Revolutionary War forebears would not turn their backs on the patriots who by their efforts founded our heritage of intelligence work Rather we felt they would propagandize favorably the role of those men We even drifted into some type of thought of recognition to states or communities i e plaques with the names of their sons who served in American intelligence during the Revolutionary War we weren't smoking anything but cigarettes I assure you Anyway we saw quite a few opportunities by which the Agency would benefit from going Bicentennial using the celebration and the spirit it inspires as a rationale excuse for going public in a truly unclassified but logical surfacing of those early intelligence officers We even thought of the public speaking advantages to presenting plaques honor rolls in printed form etc We present only certificates of recognition to our local Bicentennial projects and they accept them as if they were gold But to the point Should you think the General would like to hear our thoughts on explolting the Bicentennial we would be giad to have a few minutes to unload Again to convey oui -- own thoughts and not to reflect in any way on the work of the Agency's existing Bicentennial Commission STAT HIC Approved For Release 2003 08 25 CIA-RDP80R01731R001900020029-3