The Truth About “J. Edgar”

By Gerald Petievich

J. Edgar Hoover, head of the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation, 1961. The reviews are mixed about Clint Eastwood's new movie about J. Edgar Hoover, the longtime, controversial director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. As you may have noticed, the advertising for the film and all the reviews are consumed with the question of whether Hoover was a closeted homosexual. The truth is, no one knows because there is no reliable evidence that Hoover was gay.

The Soviet KGB began spreading disinformation about J Edgar Hoover's sexual proclivities in the 1960s. These included claims that Hoover was a gay cross-dresser. The fact is that in the well-regarded history book, The Sword And The Shield - The Mitrokhin Archive And The Secret History Of The KGB, authors Christopher Andrew and Vasili Mitrokhin, point out that like the CIA, the FBI was a major target of KGB disinformation operations and that, until his death in 1972, many of these measures were directed against J Edgar Hoover.