'Washington Post' confirms 'Deep Throat' was FBI's No. 2 man
By Susan Page and Mark Memmott, USA TODAY

WASHINGTON � Three decades after he helped unravel the Watergate
scandal that forced President Nixon to resign, former FBI official W.
Mark Felt was identified Tuesday as the legendary source "Deep
Throat."

Felt met with Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward under
cloak-and-dagger conditions in the early 1970s to corroborate
information and provide tips. Woodward and his reporting partner Carl
Bernstein were investigating what Nixon dismissed as a "third-rate
burglary" at the Watergate hotel-office complex in Washington and the
government cover-up that followed.

"The number-two guy at the FBI, that was a pretty good source," their
editor, Ben Bradlee, said in an interview with the Post. "I knew the
paper was on the right track."

Felt had long been identified as a possible source because he was in a
position to know the information involved. And as a career FBI agent �
not a Nixon partisan � he was seen as someone who might have been
willing to tell a reporter about it.

He repeatedly denied being Deep Throat, a mischievous nickname drawn
from a porn movie. But an article in Vanity Fair magazine, released
Tuesday, said Felt in recent years told a longtime companion, his
children and a lawyer that he was the source.

"I'm the guy they used to call 'Deep Throat,' " Felt confided to John
D. O'Connor, the lawyer who wrote the article.

As reporters gathered around Felt's home in Santa Rosa, Calif., the
Post confirmed that he was the source it had so long protected. Felt,
now 91, came to the door of the house. "I really appreciate you coming
out like this," he told the reporters.

"The family believes that my grandfather, Mark Felt Sr., is a great
American hero who went well above and beyond the call of duty at much
risk to himself to save his country from a horrible injustice," a
family statement read by grandson Nick Jones said. "We all sincerely
hope the country will see him this way as well."

The identity of Deep Throat has continued to excite speculation
because the source played a crucial role in one of the most turbulent
episodes in American history. At the end, facing impeachment for his
role in the cover-up, Nixon resigned in 1974.

In a statement published on the Post web site, Woodward and Bernstein
said, "W. Mark Felt was 'Deep Throat' and helped us immeasurably in
our Watergate coverage. However, as the record shows, many other
sources and officials assisted us and other reporters for the hundreds
of stories that were written in The Washington Post about Watergate."