Possibly some may think that I have remained silent too long.

If I have, it has been only from a sense of obligation to an Administration of which I was so long a member.

It has not been through lack of desire to lay the record before the public.
The statements which will be made in the succeeding pages will not be entirely approved by some of my readers.

In the circumstances it is far too much to expect to escape criticism.

The review of facts and the comments upon them may be characterized in certain quarters as disloyal to a superior and as violative of the seal of silence which is considered generally to apply to the intercourse and communications between the President and his official advisers.