Gen. Cushman, Ex-CIA Deputy, Dies

Robert Everton Cushman Jr., commandant of the Marine Corps during the final years of the Vietnam War and a deputy director of the CIA when the agency was criticized for Watergate-era activities, is dead.

Gen. Cushman, one of the most highly decorated combat veterans of World War II, died of what appeared to have been a heart attack Wednesday at his Maryland home. He was 70, and a spokesman said the Marine Corps’ 25th commandant will be buried at Arlington National Cemetery Monday.

Cushman, commandant from Jan. 1, 1972, to July 1, 1975, was awarded the Navy Cross as a captain in World War II. He spent 40 years on active duty and served in Vietnam from 1967 to 1969, becoming commanding general of 163,000 soldiers and Marines in the northern provinces. It was the largest combined combat unit ever led by a Marine.

He later was named to the No. 2 post in the CIA, serving there from 1969 until 1972.

In World War II, he led the 2nd Battalion, 9th Marine Regiment, 3rd Marine Division through some of the roughest fighting in the Pacific. He earned the Bronze Star at Bougainville, the Legion of Merit at Iwo Jima and the Navy Cross--the Corps’ highest award for valor after the Medal of Honor--during the recapture of Guam in 1944.

His citation for that battle described how Cushman “directed the attacks of his battalion and the repulse of numerous Japanese counterattacks, fearlessly exposing himself to heavy hostile rifle, machine-gun and mortar fire in order to remain in the front lines and obtain first-hand knowledge of the enemy situation. FOllowing three days of bitter fighting culminating in a heavy Japanese counterattack . . . he personally led a platoon into the gap and . . . repelled the hostile force.”

Cushman had been aboard the battleship Pennsylvania at Pearl Harbor when the Japanese bombed the ship. A third of the crew was killed.

Naval Academy Graduate

Born Dec. 24, 1914, Cushman was appointed to the U.S. Naval Academy before his graduation from high school. He graduated from the academy 10th in a class of 442 and was commissioned a Marine second lieutenant in 1935.

He was sent to Shanghai, China, as a platoon commander but returned to the United States two years later and was promoted to captain in 1941.

Cushman was promoted to full colonel in 1950 and served in London for two years on the staff of the commander in chief of U.S. Naval forces, Eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean.

He was assigned to the Pentagon and served four years on the staff of then-Vice President Richard M. Nixon. During that time, the two men developed a close relationship.

Promoted to brigadier general in 1958, he was sent to Okinawa and assumed command of the 3rd Marine Division there after promotion to major general in 1961.

He was sent to Vietnam in April, 1967, and by June was promoted to lieutenant general.

While in Vietnam he was nominated by then-President Nixon to be deputy director of the CIA, and was confirmed by the Senate in April, 1969. He was in the post until December, 1971, when he was nominated for commandant.

In 1973 Cushman was identified as the CIA official who had authorized the use of the agency’s resources in the burglary of the office of Daniel Ellsberg’s psychiatrist. Ellsberg was an outspoken opponent of the Vietnam War who became a target of the Nixon Administration.