S. Eugene Poteat

S. Eugene Poteat is a retired senior Central Intelligence Agency executive [ [http://www.cicentre.com/intelligencespeakers/ISB_L-Z/SP_POTEAT_Gene.htm S. Eugene Poteat, Biography, Center for Counterintelligence and Security Studies] ] He was awarded the CIA's Intelligence Medal of Merit [Awards and decorations of the United States government] [ [http://www.fas.org/irp/cia/product/fact97/medals.htm FAS Factbook: CIA Medals] ] and the National Reconnaissance Office Meritorious Civilian Award. He is President of AFIO - the [http://www.afio.com Association For Intelligence Officers] and is on the Board of Advisors of the International Spy Museum.

He graduated from The Citadel (military college) with a B.S. in Electrical Engineering in 1957, and holds a Master's degree in Statecraft and National Security Affairs with a specialization in Intelligence Studies from the Institute of World Politics in Washington, D.C. He has also taken graduate courses in foreign policy, national security and intelligence at Cambridge University.

After college he worked for Bell Telephone Laboratories in New Jersey and Cape Canaveral.

He joined the CIA in 1960, and worked there for 30 years, also serving abroad in London and Scandinavia.

He was a participant in the Gulf of Tonkin Incident.In the Fall of 1999, he wrote that he was asked in early August 1964 to determine if the radar operator's report showed a real torpedo boat attack or an imagined one. He asked for further details on time, weather and surface conditions. No further details were forthcoming. In the end he concluded that there were no torpedo boats on the night in question, and that the White House was interested only in confirmation of an attack, not that there was no such attack [ [http://www.tbp.org/pages/publications/Bent/Features/F99Poteat.pdf S. Eugene Poteat, "Engineering in the CIA: ELINT, Stealth and the Beginnings of Information Warfare", The Bent of Tau Beta Pi, Fall 1999] ] (For a historical parallel to this incident, see Iraq and weapons of mass destruction.)

He was a program manager for the sensors on the Lockheed U-2 and the Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird.

He has written about intelligence problems in the AFIO newsletter. [ [http://www.afio.com/publications/Periscope05.pdf S. Eugene Poteat, "Intelligence analysis paralysis", AFIO Periscope Newsletter, 2005, pages 3-6] ] He was written about in Wired Magazine [ [http://www.wired.com/news/roadtrip/1,61137-0.html Michelle Delio, "A peek inside the secret world", 10 November 2003] ] , and in a book about CIA science and technology [Jeffrey T. Richelson, "The Wizards of Langley: Inside the CIA's Directorate of Science and Technology", Westview Press (July 2001), 386 pages, ISBN 978-0813366999] .

He is a 32nd degree in Freemasonry [ [http://www.srmason-sj.org/council/journal/feb00/poteat.html S. Eugene Poteat, "George Washington: Spymaster Extraordinare", February 2000] ] , and is a member of the [http://dorchesterlodge.org/ Dorchester Lodge No. 369] of North Charleston, South Carolina, and a member of the Scottish Rite Bodies of Charleston.

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