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Don Swaim Interviews

Audio Interview with John Dean

John Dean, White House counsel for President Richard Nixon, spent four months in prison for obstruction of justice as a result of his role in the Watergate affair. In this 1983 interview with Don Swaim, Dean discusses his book, Lost Honor.

Dean talks about Deep Throat, the secret insider informant for Washington Post reporters Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward. Although the identity of Deep Throat remains known only to Bernstein and Woodward, John Dean identifies Alexander Haig, then White House chief of staff for President Nixon, as the most likely person to be the secret source. (Note: In 2005, former FBI official W. Mark Felt admitted to being the informant known as Deep Throat.)

According to John Dean, the Watergate conspirators are categorized into three groups: the "stonewallers" were Richard Nixon and John Mitchell, the "soldiers of misfortune" were G. Gordon Liddy and E. Howard Hunt, and the "redeemed" were Chuck Coulson and Jeb Magruder. Yet, John Dean feels that he doesn't fit into any of these categories.

Listen to the John Dean interview with Don Swaim, 1983
(18 min. 59 sec.)