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===VENONA files===

===VENONA files===

In 1995, when the VENONA transcripts were declassified, further detailed information was revealed about Soviet espionage in the United States.  FBI Director [[J. Edgar Hoover]] was among only a handful of people in the U.S. Government who was aware of the Venona project, and there is no indication whatsoever Hoover shared Venona information with McCarthy.  In fact, Hoover may have actually fed McCarthy disinformation, or dead end files, in an effort to put pressure on relatives, friends, or close associates of real Venona suspects by threatening to reveal embarrassing information about them in a public forum if they failed to cooperate and reveal what they might have known about someone's else’s activities and associations. <ref>FBI Silvermaster file, Vol. 150, [http://education-research.org/PDFs/Silvermaster150.pdf pgs. 50-64 pdf. Exerpts from memorandum by FBI agent Edward Morgan asserting that there was no possible legal case against the Bentley suspects and that investigation should be discontinued, with possible exception of trying to get one of the weaker suspects to break. </ref> And there is no indication McCarthy might have known he was being used by Hoover in this way.

In 1995, when the VENONA transcripts were declassified, further detailed information was revealed about Soviet espionage in the United States.  FBI Director [[J. Edgar Hoover]] was among only a handful of people in the U.S. Government who was aware of the Venona project, and there is no indication whatsoever Hoover shared Venona information with McCarthy.  In fact, Hoover may have actually fed McCarthy disinformation, or dead end files, in an effort to put pressure on relatives, friends, or close associates of real Venona suspects by threatening to reveal embarrassing information about them in a public forum if they failed to cooperate and reveal what they might have known about someone's else’s activities and associations. <ref>FBI Silvermaster file, Vol. 150, [http://education-research.org/PDFs/Silvermaster150.pdf pgs. 50-64] pdf. Exerpts from memorandum by FBI agent Edward Morgan asserting that there was no possible legal case against the Bentley suspects and that investigation should be discontinued, with possible exception of trying to get one of the weaker suspects to break. </ref> And there is no indication McCarthy might have known he was being used by Hoover in this way.

On February 7, 1950, three days before McCarthy's acclaimed Wheeling West Virginia speech, Hoover testified before House Appropriations Committee that [[Glossary_of_espionage_terms#Counterintelligence|counterespionage]] requires "an objective different from the handling of criminal cases. It is more important to ascertain his contacts, his objectives, his sources of information and his methods of communication" as "arrest and public disclosure are steps to be taken only as a matter of last resort." He concluded that "we can be secure only when we have a full knowledge of the operations of an espionage network, because then we are in a position to render their efforts ineffective." <ref>[http://www.fbi.gov/libref/historic/history/foxpaper.htm In the Enemy’s House: Venona and the Maturation of American Counterintelligence], John F. Fox, Jr., FBI Historian, Presented at the 2005 Symposium on Cryptologic History, 10/27/2005. </ref>

On February 7, 1950, three days before McCarthy's acclaimed Wheeling West Virginia speech, Hoover testified before House Appropriations Committee that [[Glossary_of_espionage_terms#Counterintelligence|counterespionage]] requires "an objective different from the handling of criminal cases. It is more important to ascertain his contacts, his objectives, his sources of information and his methods of communication" as "arrest and public disclosure are steps to be taken only as a matter of last resort." He concluded that "we can be secure only when we have a full knowledge of the operations of an espionage network, because then we are in a position to render their efforts ineffective." <ref>[http://www.fbi.gov/libref/historic/history/foxpaper.htm In the Enemy’s House: Venona and the Maturation of American Counterintelligence], John F. Fox, Jr., FBI Historian, Presented at the 2005 Symposium on Cryptologic History, 10/27/2005. </ref>