Former CIA Director William E. Colby (1920-1996) was thought to have damaged the CIA's reputation by cooperating with congressional investigations and disclosing information many felt should have remained covered, in order to pacify critics of the agency.

William E. Colby was the most controversial director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). He became director in 1973, when, for the first time in the agency's history, it had to explain its actions to hostile critics. Hoping to put the agency's problems behind it quickly, Colby decided to cooperate with congressional investigations. For a time he so demoralized the CIA that his harshest critics inside the agency argued that even if he were a Soviet agent he could not have done more harm.

William Egan Colby was born on 4 January 1920 in Saint Paul, Minnesota, the son of an army officer. The family moved around a lot and spent three years in...