Raymond Leddy
 Raymond Leddy    (policeman, spook) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Born | 18 December 1912 New York, USA | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Died | 5 March 1976 (Age 63) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Alma mater | Holy Cross College, Fordham University Law School | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Spouse | Janet Leddy | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Interests | • Operation Success • LITEMPO • Mexico/President | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
CIA spook who participated in Operation Success and recruiting several Mexican presidents.
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Raymond G. Leddy was an American spook.[1]
Education
Leddy graduated from Holy Cross College in 1933 and received a law degree from Fordham University in 1936.[1]
Career
Leddy joined the FBI and during the Second World War he was sent to Cuba where from February 1943 he worked in the U.S. Embassy in Havana.[2]
After the war Leddy launched his own import-export business, the North American Transatlantic Corporation. However, in 1948 he joined the Central Intelligence Agency and took part in the fight against communism in Venezuela.[2]
According to a fellow agent: "He (Leddy) was very smooth, polished, and a good man to work for." As Jefferson Morley pointed out in his book, Our Man in Mexico (2008): "Before long Leddy was the chief of OPC operations for the whole hemisphere."[2]
In 1954 Leddy joined forces with Frank Wisner, David Atlee Phillips,Tracy Barnes, E. Howard Hunt and Rip Robertson in Operation Success, a plan to overthrow Jacobo Arbenz, the president of Guatemala. One CIA memo has Leddy saying: "It may be necessary to take more deadly plans might need development... The best way to bring about the fall of the Arbenz government would be to eliminate 15-20 of its leaders with Trujillo's trained pistoleros."[2]
In 1957 Leddy was sent to Mexico City. This enabled him to renew his friendship with Winston Scott, who was now CIA's station chief in Mexico. In December 1958, Leddy and Scott initiated operation LITEMPO, a network of paid agents and collaborators. This included Adolfo Lopez Mateos, Luis Echeverria, Fernando Gutiérrez Barrios and Diaz Ordaz. The CIA promoted the political careers of these men. The agency also arranged for taps on the phones used by political rivals such as Lazaro Cardenas and Vicente Lombardo Toledano.[2]
In 1961 Winston Scott began an affair with Janet Leddy. When he discovered what was going on, Raymond Leddy took a job at the Army War College.[2] From 1961 to 1967, Leddy was deputy commandant for diplomatic affairs at the Army War College. He was career minister with the Army's Southern Command in the Panama Canal Zone from 1968 to1970, when he retired from "diplomatic" service. Then, with the Department of Defense, Leddy was deputy assistant secretary for inter‐American affairs from 1970 to 1973.[1]
Spartacus Educational has a full article on Raymond Leddy
