Adenauer, Konrad

Sources: 2002, David Rockefeller, 'Memoirs', pg. 412-413, referring to the Pesenti Group; April 6, 2003, The Observer, 'So, Norman, any regrets this time?'; June 18, 2004, Chancellery of HRH Crown Prince Alexander II of Yugoslavia, 'Reception in honor of the "Le Cercle" conference; September 5, 2004, Sunday Times, 'Le Cercle of the elite'

Adenauer was a lawyer and a member of the Catholic Center party. Became lord mayor of Cologne 1917. Became a devout follower of the Paneuropa Union, set up in 1923 by Count Richard Coudenhove-Kalergi, son of an Austro-Hungarian diplomat. The Paneuropa was also quickly embraced by the Habsburgs, the Vatican, and the soon to be founded Opus Dei. Member of the provincial diet of Rhine province from 1917 to 1933, when he was dismissed by the National Socialist (Nazi) regime.

Twice imprisoned, in 1933 and 1944, by the Nazis. Co-founder of the Christian Democratic Union (1945) and its president from 1946 to 1966. Attended the May 1948 Congress of Europe, which was convened by the United Europe Movement in The Hague. It was organized by Jean Monnet with the help of Joseph Retinger. Its chairman was Winston Churchill while Alcide de Gasperi, Paul Henri Spaak, Leon Blum, and Robert Schuman attended the conference. Chancellor of the Federal Republic of West Germany 1949-1963. Served as his own foreign minister 1951-1955. Took up Hans Globke in his secretariat and made State secretary and his most important National Security Advisor from 1953 to 1963. Globke was a former catholic Nazi collaborator (including persecution of the Jews), who wasn't allowed to join the Nazi party, because of his strong catholic affiliation. That's the only reason Globke's career (and freedom) survived during the de-nazification program right after WWII. Globke, often seen as Adenauer's Eminence Grise, brought Reinhard Gehlen in contact with Adenauer. Adenauer had also taken up Franz-Joseph Bach, a later organiser of Cercle meetings, to run his secretariat. Adenauer was hardline in his policies towards the USSR. Secretly contacted by Monnet and Schuman over the "Schuman Plan" (Monnet Plan) in 1950 to establish the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) in 1951. After Adenauer agreed, the plan went public. Negotiated the 1952 West German peace treaty with the Western Allies and obtained recognition of West Germany's full sovereignty through the Paris Pacts (ECSC) and through an agreement with the USSR in 1955.

Friend of Charles De Gaulle. Received the Charlemagne award in 1954. In 1956, Adenauer chose former Nazi general Reinhard Gehlen as the initial chief of the BND, West Germany's post-war intelligence agency that succeeded the Gehlen Organization. Earlier, Adenauer had allowed Gehlen to run his Gehlen Organization, undoubtedly at the recommendation of the CIA. The political architect of the astounding West German recovery (quite possibly through the Bormann flight capital), he saw the solution of German problems in terms of European integration, and he helped secure West Germany's membership in the various organizations of what has become the European Union. One of the signers of the Treaty of Rome in 1957, which founded the European Economic Community. In 1961 his party lost its absolute majority in the Bundestag, and he formed a coalition cabinet with the Free Democrats. In 1962 a cabinet crisis arose over the government's raid of the offices of the magazine Der Spiegel, which had attacked the Adenauer regime for military unpreparedness. Resigned from public office in 1963. Adenauer received the Magistral Grand Cross personally from SMOM (The Sovereign Military Order of Malta) Grand Master Prince Chigi.

Aitken, Jonathan

Sources: 1993, Alan Clark, 'Diaries', p. 369-374; July 10, 1997 An Phoblacht/Republican News, 'Editor's Desk'; February 1, 1998, News Confidential, 'Jonathan Aitken MI6, CIA?'; 18 June 2000, Sunday Telegraph / Lobster Magazine, Issue 40, winter 2000-2001

Great nephew of Hitler-intimate Lord Beaverbrook, whose son ended up in the 1001 Club. Attended the 1990 Pinay meeting in Oman and the June 2000 meeting in Lisbon. Served as a war correspondent (and MI6 agent) during the 1960s in the Middle-East, Vietnam, and Biafra (short-lived state next to Nigeria). For 18 years he was on the backbenches. Then became a Conservative Member of Parliament in 1974. Admirer of Richard Nixon, who attended meetings of the Cercle after having left the White House. In the 1980s Aitken was a director of BMARC, a company that exported weapons to intermediary countries, who sold these weapons again to the intended countries (Iraq in that case). CEO of TV-Am and chairman of Aitken Hume Plc, a banking and investment group. In 1992 he was appointed as Minister of State for Defense. During this time he stood in close contact with co-Le Cercle member and MI6 head of Middle-East affairs Geoffrey Tantum. Aitken has been a chairman of Le Cercle. Protege of Lord Julian Amery, another former head of Le Cercle with a very significant zionist family history. In 1994, he joined the Cabinet as Chief Secretary to the Treasury, but resigned in 1995 to defend himself against accusations that whilst Minister of Defence Procurement (1993) he violated ministerial rules by allowing an Arab businessman to pay for his stay in the Ritz Hotel Paris (and a stay in Geneva). After telling lie, after lie, after lie, he was jailed in 1999 for 18 months (eventually he served 7), supposedly because he told a lie under oath about a 1500 pound bill. In the end it turns out that Aitken was lobbying for 3 arms contractors, GEC, Marconi and VSEL, in an effort to sell many, many millions worth of arms to Saudi-Arabia. His Saudi business contact was Said Ayas, who worked for Prince Mohammed, son of King Fahd. Through multiple offshore companies in Switzerland and Panama, submarines, howitzers, medium-range laser guided bombs, Black Hawks, and EH101 helicopters were sold and shipped. In 1997 he was asked to resign as chairman of Le Cercle, but within a few years a report surfaced he had been taken up again in this group. Chaired many Parliamentary committees and business groups including The British Saudi Arabian Parliamentary Group. One of the few people who had to resign from the Privy Council. Often the media has been confused about Aitken being an Anglican or a Roman Catholic. June 12, 1999, The Tablet, 'Jonathan Aitken says Sorry':

"This week the fall of Jonathan Aitken, once a star in British politics, was complete when he was sentenced to 18 months in prison. Earlier he had given an assistant editor of The Tablet access to a revealing text in which he bares his soul. "I am a man of unclean lips." The speaker is Jonathan Aitken, and he is referring quite explicitly to his perjury, for which he was sentenced on Tuesday to eighteen months in prison. He is, of course, quoting Isaiah 6:5, but he hastens to add, "I'm not for one second comparing myself to Isaiah"... The trouble with Jonathan Aitken is that the public will never take him seriously again. He held a press conference to launch his libel action against the Guardian and Granada television with these words, "I will cut out the cancer of bent and twisted journalism with the simple sword of truth", only to be impaled upon his own sword. The Guardian were able to uncover evidence to prove that he had lied over the question of who had paid his hotel bill in Paris. It might seem a small matter, but on it hung allegations of taking secret commission for multi-million-pound arms dealings, over which Aitken had lied not only to the press but also apparently to his own Government. The deceit even involved the corruption of Aitken's own daughter, 13 at the time of the hotel incident, whom he had persuaded to sign a false statement saying she was in Paris. Corruption of the young, and self-enrichment from arms dealings, are commonly put high on the list of mortal sins. How do you emerge from a reputation as a mega-liar?... he has been a church-goer for years. It is a surprise, however, to hear that he has done the Alpha course, not once but three times, graduating from a humble student to a helper who pours coffee. Even more astonishing, he has done Ignatian retreats. His first experience was in the Westminster retreats in daily life, for MPs and others working at Westminster, and in due course he went away to the Coach House in Inverness to make an individually directed eight-day retreat with the Jesuit Gerry W. Hughes."

Ignatian retreats refers to the spiritual exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Society of Jesus. Gerry Hughes is a well known religious author; his name appears in prayer located on the website of the Jesuit Centre of Ignatian Spirituality, Malta. This same news report also claimed:

"... stripped as a bankrupt of his Rolex watch, still able to draw from an unspecified source living expenses of 11,400 [pounds] a month" Aitken, like his follow-up chair at Le Cercle, Lord Lamont, is a serious eurosceptic.

September 2, 2005, ePolitix, 'Jonathan Aitken - former Conservative minister':

"The times have also changed in that there is no constitution referendum coming, the debate now is not should we go forward with more European integration, it is now should we come out of Europe... People have realised that the dream of a federal Europe with Britain at the centre of it has been a dream that has failed. I and a few others could see that it would fail and it has. The Conservative Party, a party that said under Heath "we are the party of Europe" is now the party of changing our relationship with Europe which is a very healthy thing. So I think that the views of the early eurosceptics has been vindicated."

Albertini, Georges

Sources: 1993, Brian Crozier, 'Free Agent', p. 217-218

Born in 1911. Went to school with Georges Pompidou, a later president of the France. Teacher in History and Geography. Militant and leader of the Section Française de l'Internationale Ouvrière (SFIO) from 1933 to 1939, an important communist/socialist party, and part of Leon Blum's Popular Front. Just before the war, he became a fascist. Joined the Rassemblement National Populaire (RNP), the Vichy Laval-supporting group of Marcel Deat, which was founded early in 1941. Deat was another SFIO-socialist-turned-Fascist. Both Deat and his assistant, Georges Albertini, ended up working for Pierre Laval, Marshal Petain's premier, supposedly a top player in the secret and subversive Synarchist Movement of Empire, and one of the biggest nazi collaborators of the Vichy regime. Albertini, within a few years second-in-command of the RNP, worked closely with Jean Bichelonne, Vichy's Secretary of Industrial Production 1942-1944 and allegedly another major player in the Synarchist Movement of Empire. Patron of Cercle Européen, together with Deat. Jailed in Fresnes in September 1944. Supposedly first met with Hippolyte Worms in jail in September 1944, who, according to EIR quoting French intelligence documents from the 1930s, was identified as one of the original 12 members of the Synarchist Movement of Empire (SME). Albertini was sentenced to 5 years of forced labor and an additional 5 years of regular jail, but was released prematurely. According to former Cercle president Brian Crozier, who described Albertini as a friend: "From my SDECE friend, Antoine Bonnemaison, I learned that he [Albertini] was initially condemned to death but reprieved." Released after a few years and went to support De Gaulle, free enterprise and the market economy. Political advisor to Hippolyte's Banque Worms since 1951, and received regular payment since 1962. Crozier, 'Free Agent', p. 103: "For many years he held two jobs: In the mornings he was political advisor to the merchant bank and business consortium, Worms. In the afternoons, he crossed the Boulevard Haussman to run his fortnightly Est & Quest, the most authoritative publication in the French language on the problems of Communism." In 1956, some time before it actually happened, Albertini accurately predicted the seizure of the Suez Canal by Colonel Nasser (who was advised, in part, by escaped Nazis). Thereby he saved millions for the investors in Compagnie Universelle du Canal de Suez, securing his job at Banque Worms practically for life. One of Albertini's post-war associates was the anti-communist marxist Boris Souvarine, who was employed by Banque Worms since the 1930s while editing La Critique Sociale. Souvarine also worked for Les Nouveaux Cahiers, a bimonthly magazine founded in March 1937, which is said to have been a Synarchie front to weaken the fascist resistance of the anti-communist left. Frequently went to South-America. Met with Filippo Anfuso in Paris in January 1957, who was a former member of Mussolini's Grand Council of Fascism and a leading neo-fascist. Crozier, 'Free Agent', p. 103 & 214:

"He [Albertini] had built up a huge network of informants and helpers and was increasingly consulted by those in high offices of state to which he had ceased to aspire. Moreover, he and Georges Pompidou had been at school together, and during the Pompidou presidency [1969-1974] and beyond he was a true éminence grise for the Elysée [French presidential office]... Under President Pompidou, both Albertini's network and Jean Violet's Cercle had continued the modest London-Paris axis."

Albertini ran some kind of private anti-communist outfit in France, with which the British IRD severed its relations in the late-1960s after a change in leadership. The new leadership, as opposed to Crozier, still regarded Albertini as a Fascist. In partnership with Albertini, Brian Crozier's Institute for the Study of Conflict (ISC) published 'Le Monde des Conflicts' in the 1970s, the French version of the ISC's 'Conflict Studies'. Crozier, 'Free Agent', p. 217-218:

"AT THE CERCLE meeting in Washington in December 1980, Georges Albertini had brought along a quiet Frenchman named Francois de Grossouvre. This was an impressive example of his foresight. De Grossouvre, a physician, was the closest friend and confidant of the Socialist leader and presidential candidate Francois Mitterrand. For many years, Grossouvre had carried out special missions for Mitterrand. By nature and training, he was self-effacing. He played no part in our debates, but listened carefully, taking notes. Five months later, Francois Mitterrand narrowly defeated Valéry Giscard d'Estaing in France's presidential elections. One of his first actions was to appoint de Grossouvre as his coordinator of security and intelligence. Shortly after, having obtained his direct line from Albertini, I went to see him in his modest office in the Elysée Palace."

De Grossouvre is said to have been the head of the French Stay Behind network. According to Brian Crozier, when his 61 intelligence network was alarmed in March 1981 by a possible invasion of Poland by the Soviet Union, Albertini was the one who informed the Vatican about the situation. At the time the Reagan administration was working with the Vatican to undermine Soviet authority in Poland. Died in 1983.

Al-Faisal, Prince Turki

Sources: 1997, Robert Hutchinson, 'Their Kingdom Come – Inside the Secret World of Opus Dei', p. 153-158; June 21, 2005, Royal Embassy of Saudi Arabia - London / Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 'Ambassador talks to major foreign policy-security group'

Also spelled as Turki bin Faisal. Born in 1945. Son of King Faisal, who was assassinated in 1975, and grandson of King Ibn Saud. His father King Faisal was a major force behind the Arab oil embargo against the United States in 1973. He is a nephew of the late King Fahd al-Saud, head of the House of Saud until his death in 2005. Faisal studied at Princeton, Cambridge, and Georgetown (Jesuit) Universities. Chairman King Faisal Center for Research and Islamic Studies. Co-Founder King Faisal Foundation. Supposedly promotes a peaceful version of Islam. Big fan of expensive cars. He is a visitor of DAVOS and headed the Saudi foreign intelligence services from 1977 to September 1, 2001, which is when he "asked" to be replaced. As the head of Saudi intelligence during the 1980s, Prince Turki was a partner of Cercle member William Casey in supporting the Afghan resistance against the Soviet invasion. September 1, 1991, Washington Post, 'Pakistan's illicit economies affect BCCI bank...':

"According to diplomatic sources, Saudi intelligence chief, Prince Turki bin Faisal - working with Pakistan's main intelligence agency - distributed over $1 billion in cash to Afghan guerrillas during the late 1980s... The financial transactions were handled principally between Saudi intelligence and Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency (ISI), the main liaison between the United States, Saudi Arabia and the Afghan guerrillas, the sources said... As for drug trafficking, the sources acknowledged that Pakistan's ISI routinely condoned heroin manufacture and sales by some Afghan guerrilla groups. But they said there were also occasions when ISI cooperated with U.S. government efforts to eradicate poppy fields in Afghanistan."

Some of the major Mujahedeen warlords were Abdul Rasul Sayyaf (abbu Sayyaf), Burhanuddin Rabbani, and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. One of the spiritual founders of militant Islam was Abdullah Yusuf Azzam, a Muslim Brotherhood member who believed in a "clash of civilizations", not unlike Samuel Huntington. Bin Laden was an associate of all these people. After Prince Turki resigned from his position as head of Saudi intelligence, ten days before 9/11, he became the Saudi Ambassador to Great Britain. December 5, 2002, Daily Telegraph, 'Saudi snare':

"On closer examination, though, Prince Turki's appointment raises grave doubts. Some believe that he has been sent here in order to confer diplomatic immunity on him from law suits in America brought by the families of September 11 victims... Should the Saudi royal family be planning an exit strategy in the event of a popular uprising, then Prince Turki would certainly be the man to conduct it. He has scores of chits to call in with his long-time friends in the British establishment. Thus, in the current political climate, the SAS might be likelier to assist in a rescue mission for the House of Saud than America's Delta Force. On the same basis, London is a safer haven for their funds these days than New York: fewer questions asked."

Because of the role of Saudi Arabia in 9/11, his old ties to Bin Laden and Wahabism have been re-examined. Turki Al-Faisal was named in a lawsuit from relatives of several hundred September 11 victims. In this lawsuit it is alleged that Prince Turki struck a deal in 1998 with the Taliban in Afghanistan whereby Saudi Arabia would stop trying to extradite bin Laden in exchange for a promise that he would not attack the kingdom (anymore). Members of the Saudi royal family, including Prince Turki, Prince Mohammed al-Faisal, and Prince Sultan, as well as Khalid bin Mahfouz are are also accused of having supplied the Bin Laden terror network with trucks and money, whether the kingdom was blackmailed or not. Had several meetings with bin Laden (and other Afghan anti-Soviet warlords/opium dealers), although he rejects any suggestion that he had dealings with the al-Qa'eda leader since the latter founded the terror group in the early 1990s. Faisal is named in a huge 911 law suit that has been launched by the victim's families against a number of Saudi princes, banks, and charities that are alleged to have funded the terrorists responsible for the attack. Faisal, together with the ISI and the CIA, played a major role in bringing the Taliban to power. In public, Faisal defends western intelligence agencies by never mentioning the role of the CIA or MI6 in financing the Bin Laden network. He did, however, talk about it at a meeting of the CFR.

Wolf Blitzer of CNN interviews Faisal in January 2001 (aired February 1, 2001):

"The last time I met him [Osama Bin Laden] was perhaps early 1990. It was after the soviets withdrew and he was back in the Kingdom, and he came to say hello, and he had other projects in mind which I turned down at the time, because they were so extraordinary and unacceptable." (what kind of projects, Blitzer didn't ask)

November 05, 2001, The New Yorker, 'The House of Bin Laden':

"Both Al-Fagih [Saad Al-Fagih, a London-based surgeon and Saudi dissident, who heads a group called Movement for Islamic Reform in Arabia] and Abdel Bari Atwan [editor of Al-Quds al-Arabi, an Arabic daily newspaper in Britain, interviewed Osama bin Laden in November, 1996, and is well acquainted with people close to bin Laden] claim that bin Laden's mother has twice met with her son since he moved to Afghanistan, in 1996. Atwan said that a trip in the spring of 1998 was arranged by Prince Turki al-Faisal, then the head of Saudi intelligence. Turki was in charge of the "Afghanistan file," and had long-standing ties to bin Laden and the Taliban. Indeed, Osama, before becoming an enemy of the state, had been something of a Turki protege, according to his biographers. Prince Turki, Al-Fagih said, "made arrangements for Osama's mother and his stepfather to visit him and persuade him to stop what he was doing... he didn't promise anything... The second trip, according to Al-Fagih, occurred last spring [2001]...They wanted to find out his intentions concerning the royal family. They gave him the impression that they wouldn't crack down on his followers in Saudi Arabia" as long as he set his sights on targets outside the desert kingdom."

November 1, 2001, The Guardian, 'CIA agent alleged to have met Bin Laden in July':

"Two months before September 11 Osama bin Laden flew to Dubai for 10 days for treatment at the American hospital, where he was visited by the local CIA agent, according to the French newspaper Le Figaro... [French] Intelligence sources say that another CIA agent was also present; and that Bin Laden was also visited by Prince Turki al Faisal, then head of Saudi intelligence, who had long had links with the Taliban, and Bin Laden. Soon afterwards Turki resigned, and more recently he has publicly attacked him..."

Dr. Muhammad al-Massari, head of the head of the London-based Saudi opposition group (which is just a more focused Pan-Arabic hideous pro terror group than Bin Laden's Al-Qaeda), Committee for the Defence of Legitimate Rights (CDLR), in a November 2003, published by the neocon Jamestown Foundation:

"Never forget that the al-Sauds were once a small and irrelevant tribe. By aligning themselves with the Wahabi movement they evolved, over two and a half centuries, into the powerful establishment we see today. The legitimacy of the regime has always rested on its claim to be Islamic. That has been undermined, so everything else is coming under question... The [Saudi] regime invited the U.S. and it has to pay the price... There are two types of people in the regime who support bin Laden: 1) Some are sincerely fed up with the corruption and lack of respect for Islam. 2) The others hope to use the Jihadis for their "power game" inside the royal family. Turki Al-Faisal, the ex-intelligence chief and current Saudi ambassador in London, is one of the prime suspects... Al Qaeda has now become a jackass suitable for carrying any load... The connections are ideological and mostly informal. It is very difficult to forge operational connections. The real point is that Western intelligence can not penetrate these groups. We are talking about two divorced worlds with diametrically opposed cultures. Western intelligence is used to using bars, prostitutes and dancing clubs to entrap people, and of course the Jihadists have nothing to do with these things. Even Saudi intelligence, many of whose officers are devout classic Wahabists, has a hard time penetrating these groups. I knew someone in Kabul, and he told me that almost every one in Kabul knew, just before 9/11, that something big was going to happen in America. But of course Western intelligence had no clue."

Since the London bombings al-Massari finally had some problems for being pro-terror, but London remains a relative safe haven for terrorists; many tend to be MI5 and MI6 informants. Al-Faisal was present with his wife at the wedding of Prince Charles and Camilla Parker-Bowles on April 9, 2005. Partial guest list published in the Sunday Times of April 10, 2005:

"The King of Bahrain; The King and Queen of the Hellenes; Prince and Princess Constantijn of the Netherlands; The Crown Prince and Princess of Norway; Prince Radu of Hohenzollern and Princess Margarita of Romania; Prince Turki al-Faisal and Princess Nouf bint Fahd of Saudi Arabia; Prince Bandar bin Sultan of Saudi Arabia; Crown Prince and Princess Alexander of Yugoslavia [Le Cercle]."

Zac Goldsmith, son of the late billionaire Sir James Goldsmith [Cercle associate], and Lord Rees-Mogg were among the staff at the wedding. In July 2005 Turki al-Faisal became Saudi Ambassador to the United States as a follow-up to Prince Bandar bin Sultan, who resigned after 20 years in that post. August 8, 2005, The Independent, 'Attacks in London: Home Office denies Saudi warning of imminent attack':

"Prince Turki al-Faisal, the Saudi ambassador to the UK, said yesterday that details of a possible plot to attack London " obtained from terror suspects under interrogation " had been given to British intelligence four months ago. Insiders denied receiving detailed intelligence, with one saying: 'It has been suggested a number of times that somehow or other the Metropolitan Police was aware the attacks were going to happen but did nothing. You only have to use common sense. Do you really believe that if the Metropolitan Police had such detailed intelligence they would do nothing about it or tell the public? 'There was certainly a close liaison between the Saudi Arabian intelligence authorities and the British intelligence authorities some months ago when information was passed to Britain about a heightened terrorist threat to London.'"

Both Prince Bandar and Turki Al-Faisal are close to the Bush family. In the 1990s Faisal worked closely with western intelligence trying to estimate the threat posed by Saddam Hussein and his weapons of mass destruction. Supported the Iraq invasion and in 2005 he still thought the Iraqis were now "masters of their fate". At least a member of Le Cercle since 1997, but his membership probably goes back further. Spoke to Le Cercle in June 2005, where he gave his full support for the Bush Administration's agenda and denounced Al-Qaeda and the Israelis. June 27, 2004, The Telegraph, ' Saudi envoy's Zionist claims 'are offensive'':

"The Saudi ambassador to London has reinforced controversial claims by the kingdom's royal family of a link between "Zionists" and recent al-Qaeda terror attacks in the country. In a television interview, to be broadcast today, Prince Turki al-Faisal is asked about comments made by Crown Prince Abdullah, Saudi Arabia's de facto leader, that "Zionist hands" have been behind the attacks... Prince Abdullah made his original remarks when he addressed a conference of leading Saudi officials and academics last month after an attack on contractors at the Yanbu oil facility that left six Westerners - including two Britons - dead. "Zionism is behind it," he said. "It has become clear now. It has become clear to us. It is not 100 per cent, but 95 per cent that Zionist hands are behind what happened." In his interview today, Prince Turki contends that Saudi Arabia has been subjected to concerted attacks by "so-called 'experts' with Zionist connections" for 50 years, and particularly since the terror atrocities of September 11, 2001... He insists that the regime is doing everything it can to root out terrorists and rejects claims that the Saudi royal family's days are numbered."

Earlier, on April 27, 2004, Prince Turki said to the CFR:

"To respond to the two first allegations, one must look into the phenomenon of al Qaeda and its figurehead, [Osama] bin Laden. Though a Saudi by birth, he developed his ideology and methodology in Afghanistan, under the tutelage of a radicalized cult of the Muslim Brotherhood, an organization I assume every one here knows."

In 2005 and 2006, Al-Faisal warned that oil prices could rise to $200 if the United States would decide to attack Iran.

Amery, Lord Julian

Sources: November 1988 – Issue 17, Lobster Magazine, 'Brian Crozier, the Pinay Circle and James Goldsmith' (quoting from the Langemann papers); 1993, Alan Clark, 'Diaries', p. 369-374; 1993, Brian Crozier, 'Free Agent', page 193; June 29, 1997, The Independence, 'Aitken dropped by the Right's secret club; Is it the ultimate dishonour' (claims Amery was chair before Aitken); February 1, 1998, News Confidential, 'Jonathan Aitken MI6, CIA?'

Son of Leopold Amery (1873-1955), who concealed his whole life the fact that he was a Jew. However, Leopold was extremely pro-Zionist and Churchill once said of him that he regarded the Empire as his own personal property. As political secretary to the War Cabinet (appointed by Lord Milner) he was the author of the final draft of the Balfour Declaration which committed Britain to establishing a Jewish 'National Home' in Palestine (this letter was sent to Lord Lionel Walter Rothschild). He was highly significant in helping to create the Jewish Legion, the forerunner of what later became the Israeli army. As Dominions Secretary in the mid-1920s, he sympathetically presided over a seminal period in the growth of the Jewish community in Palestine. The senior Leopold Amery is described as "a passionate advocate of British imperialism"; he was on the staff of the Times, and wrote a 7 vol. history of the South African War for the Times; served in the Cabinet from 1916-1922; MP 1911-1945; first Lord of Admiralty 1922-1924; Secretary of State for India 1940-1945, and arranged for India to have independence. Trustee of the Rhodes Trust. Supporter of Rothschild/Warburg-financed Paneuropa Union of Count Richard Coudenhove-Kalergi. The envisioned Paneuropa Union did not include the British Empire. Cercle co-founder Otto von Habsburg became Coudenhove's successor while Leo's son would become head of the Cercle some day.

His second son, Julian Amery, the later Cercle chairman, was born in 1919 and educated at Eton and Balliol College, Oxford, before starting work as a left wing war correspondent in the Spanish Civil War from 1938 to 1939. Attache on British missions to Belgrade, Ankara, Sofia and Bucharest 1939-1940. Julian was an MI6 operative, although it isn't really known what he has been doing in this function. During WWII, he enlisted as a sergeant in the RAF, but was rapidly transferred to the Army, with the rank of Captain, and sent to the Middle East. Amery was a close associate of Lt.-Col. Billy McLean, a later Cercle member (and devout christian), since these days. Another rapid transfer sent him to Yugoslavia, to liaise with the partisans fighting Germany. In 1944 he was in Albania, working with the Albanian Resistance. Churchill’s personal representative to Chiang Kai-Shek (a notorious Triad leader, Opium smuggler, and all-round criminal) in 1945 (at the time that Baron Robert Rothschild was present there, at his own request, as secretary at the embassy in Chungking, the headquarters of Chiang Kai-shek's government; Jean Monnet had earlier bridged Kai-Shek's Chinese economy with the West). In 1950 he became a Conservative member of parliament. Married Harold Macmillan's daughter in 1950, although politically he was often at odds with him. Co-founder of the CIA-sponsored Congress for Cultural Freedom and met on 24/25 June 1950 with other founders as Melvin J. Lasky of Encounter, Arthur Koestler, Richard Lowenthal and others. Representative to the Round Table Conference on Malta in 1955. Representative to the Council of Europe 1950-1956. Parliamentary Under-Secretary for War under Macmillan 1957-1958. Same function at the Colonial Office 1958-1960. Member of the Rhodesia and Nyasaland Club in the 1950s and 1960s. Member of the Other Club since 1960, over the years together with the Duke of Devonshire (Cavendish), the 7th Marquess of Salisbury (Le Cercle), Lord Carrington (Pilgrims Society president), Lord Richardson of Duntisbourne (major Pilgrims Society member), Lord Rothschild, Lord Rees-Mogg, Prince Charles, Paul Channon (Le Cercle), Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, Sir Edward Heath, Sir Denis Thatcher, and Winston S. Churchill. Member of the Privy Council since 1960. Secretary of State for Air 1960-1962. Minister of Aviation 1962-1964. With his friends David Stirling and Billy McLean, and help from the Cercle-affiliated royal houses of Jordan and Saudi Arabia, he set up a private SAS war in Yemen in the early 1960s in an effort to get Nasser out. 1999, Adam Curtis, 'The Mayfair Set' (broadcasted on BBC2), videoclip of a Julian AMery speech:

"The prosperity of our people rests really on the oil in the Persian Gulf, the rubber and tin of Malaya, and the gold, copper and precious metals of South- and Central Africa. As long as we have access to these; as long as we can realize the investments we have there; as long as we trade with this part of the world, we shall be prosperous. If the communists [or anyone else] were to take them over, we would lose the lot. Governments like Colonel Nasser's in Egypt are just as dangerous."

Stimulated considerable controversy by his enthusiasm for the Anglo-French Concorde project in the early 1960s. At this time De Gaulle first rejected British entry into the European Union January 1, 1992, The Times, 'Secret war waged on protesters; 1961 Cabinet Papers':

"Harold Macmillan's government conducted a secret war against the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament during the autumn of 1961. R.A. Butler, the home secretary, told the cabinet that evidence should be obtained against the movement's organizers showing "a definite intention to commit breaches of the law". Searches would be made the day before the protests at the homes of CND members, he said. "Evidence might become available which would warrant the immediate arrest of some its main organizers on charges of conspiracy." Julian Amery, the secretary of state for air, said if any of the demonstrators gained access to an airfield "forceful action including the use of fire-hoses and police dogs will be taken.""

Out of Parliament 1966-1969. Minister of State at Public Buildings and Works under Heath 1970. Minister of State at at Housing 1970-1972. Minister of State at the Foreign Office when Great Britain joined the European Union under Heath in 1973. Foreign Office 1972-1974. Since then served in the backbenches in Parliament until his retirement in the 1990s. From about 1970 to 1992 Amery was an active member and Patron of the Conservative Monday Club, where he became friendly with general Sir Walter Walker, subsequently writing the foreword for Walker's 1980 anti-Soviet book 'The Next Domino'. President of the Conservative Monday club was Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, the 5th Marquess of Salisbury, from 1961 to 1972 (KG; PC; married into Cavendish family). His son, the 6th Marquess of Salisbury, took over in 1974 and ran it until 1981. The 7th Marquess of Salisbury (since 2003) is a member of Le Cercle while the third son of the 3rd Marquess of Salisbury, the supposed co-ordinator of the Round Table, is known to have been a member of the Pilgrims Society. The Cecils also are generational members of the Roxburghe Club, putting them in touch with the old ruling families of Britain, including Howard, Cavendish, Rothschild, Oppenheimer, and Mellon.

February 22, 2002, The Independent, 'The Airey Neave File':

"Critics of British policy in Ulster maintained that British intelligence became involved in treasonable policies. In 1987, the Labour MP Ken Livingstone used the cover of parliamentary privilege to suggest in the House of Commons that Airey Neave was a co-conspirator with MI5 and MI6 in disinformation activities involving the controversial whistle-blowing spies Colin Wallace and Peter Wright. He also alleged that, a week before his murder, Neave sought to recruit a former MI6 officer to set up a small group to involve itself in the internal struggles of the Labour Party... These were not the wildest allegations. There were improbable tales about how Neave, and others, had a decade earlier planned to set up an "army of resistance" to the Labour government of the Wilson era to "forestall a Communist take-over" and talked of assassinating Tony Benn should he become prime minister. Yet such was the febrile atmosphere of that Cold War epoch that some sceptics gave credibility to the possibility. This was, it must be remembered, the time, about 1970, when Auberon Waugh - fed by various sources, including his MI6 agent uncle Auberon Herbert - produced a series of clearly defamatory articles in Private Eye openly alleging that the former prime minister Harold Wilson was a KGB agent. Even as late as 1975, when Mrs Thatcher became leader of the Conservative Party, groups of senior Tories were secretly gathering to hear spy-writers such as Chapman Pincher [and Brian Crozier, an old friend with whom he worked] address them on the "grave dangers facing Britain from the left"... It was in response to such beliefs, according to claims by the anti-fascist magazine Searchlight, that plans for secret armed cells to resist a more left-wing Labour government were drawn up by a group that included George Kennedy Young - the ex-deputy director of the British intelligence service MI6 and a notorious racist and anti-Semite - and Airey Neave. The claim gained unexpected credence when, despite official MoD denials, two former British Army generals - Sir Anthony Farrar-Hockley, the former Nato commander of Allied Forces Northern Europe, and General Sir Walter Walker, another former head of Nato's forces - confirmed that a secret armed network of selected civilians was set up in Britain after the war and was secretly modernised in the Thatcher years and maintained into the 1980s. Moreover, Searchlight alleged, Neave and Young were key figures in an extreme-right group called Tory Action, which was at the centre of a smear campaign, involving the secret services, aimed at discrediting the Labour government in Britain in 1975."

Like the Cecils, Amery was one of the most prominent supports of Ian Smith's racist white-minority government in Rhodesia in the 1970s. Smith's pro-business Rhodesian government had broken itself of from the Wilson government in 1965 to keep the wealthy white minority rule in place. Corporations like Lonrho supported this decision until the situation in the mid 1970s became untenable. Attacked Thatcher in 1979 in a bitter and powerful speech over her decision to abandon the Rhodesian Muzorewa-Smith government (Sept 5, 1996, The Independent, Amery's obituary). May 17, 2002 issue, Jeffrey Steinberg for Executive Intelligence Review, 'Ariel Sharon: Profile of an Unrepentant War Criminal':

"On Nov. 15, 1982, a final meeting took place on several real estate purchases, mostly through Arab middle-men, to push the massive expansion of Jewish settlements throughout the West Bank at a handsome profit. Attending the meeting at Sharon's ranch were: Kissinger [Cercle], Lord Harlech (Sir David Ormsby-Gore), Johannes von Thurn und Taxis [1001 Club], Tory Parliamentarian Julian Amery [Cercle], Sir Edmund Peck, and MI-6 Mideast mandarin Nicholas Elliot [Cercle]."

Appointed president/chairman of Le Cercle at the suggestion of Brian CRozier in 1985 and remained in this post until the early 1990s. Known to have attended the 1990 Cercle meeting in Oman. Present at a January 22, 1986 dinner hosted by Margaret and Denis Thatcher in honor of Shimon Peres. Jacob Rothschild and his wife, Mrs. Montefiore, Sir Geoffrey Howe, and Leon Brittan were among the few dozen guests. Chairman of the London branch of the Global Economic Action Institute, which which was funded by Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church. July 6, 1986, Sunday Times, 'Top Thatcher aides linked to Moonie cult':

"Two of Mrs Thatcher's top advisers, the head of the No 10 policy unit, Brian Griffiths, and her former economics guru, Professor Sir Alan Walters, have unwittingly joined an organization funded by the Moonie cult along with a senior backbench Conservative MP. Both Griffths and Walters are listed as standing committee members of a free-market organization called the Global Economic Action Institute, which holds economic and political conferences around the world. Following accusations by a cult monitoring group in the United States, the institute admitted last week that it was funded by the Moonie organization. Also on the standing committee of the institute is the president of the Moonie church, Dr Mose Durst, who is listed as a senior director of the institute. The London arm of the institute is chaired by Julian Amery, the Conservative MP for Brighton Pavilion. The headquarters of the organization are on Fifth Avenue in New York... In 1981 a British jury accepted that the controversial Moonie organization - officially called the Unification Church - split families and used brainwashing to recruit and keep its predominantly young membership... Walters said that although he was told 'some time ago' by the institute's chairman, Robert Anderson, that the church was one of the funders of the institute, he felt that the actions of the institute should be judged on their own merit and he would not be resigning. Walters last week called for a more tolerant attitude towards the religion although he said that he was not a member." May 19, 1989, The Times, 'Social charter 'treat to employment': "Mr Julian Amery (Brighton Pavilion, C) said that Britain should agree to join the European Monetary System, not just when the time was right, but when British inflation was lower and there had been time to study the consequences of other EC countries abandoning their exchange controls."

This would have put him at odds with Margaret Thatcher and later Cercle chairman Lord Norman Lamont. Consultant to the extremely corrupt Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI) in the 1980s. August 7, 1991, Washington Post, 'BCCI Adept at Courting the Powerful and Rich':

"In Britain, two senior Conservative members of Parliament and one former member listed themselves as consultants to BCCI - part of what has been described as a global network of highly placed advisers. They are Sir Julian Ridsdale, a former defense minister; Julian Amery; and former Parliament member Sir Frederic Bennett, an honorary director of BCCI in Hong Kong until 1986 who received $10,000 a year from BCCI, according to the Sunday Observer. Amery declined to tell the Observer how much he received and could not be reached for comment here, but he has said he advised the bank on international affairs."

Sir Frederic Mackarness Bennett (owned a Rolls-Royce and four homes, one of them in the Cayman Islands; director Kleinwort Benson Europe (his mother was a Kleinwort); long time Lloyds underwriter; influential member of Parliament from the 1950s to the 1980s; member Monday Club; always warning people about the KGB threat and supported every regime that opposed the USSR; chair FARI in 1978; vice-president of the European-Atlantic Group; leading official in the private group Council of Europe in the late 1970s and 1980s; honorary director of the BCCI in Hong Kong until 1986; Member of the Privy Council since 1985; ridiculed his party's (Conservatives) for their Euroscepticism after his retirement in 1987; supported Pinochet; Freeman of the City of London; has been to Bilderberg) was a member of relatively high society. In October 1998 Bennett wrote in The Times:

"Sir, Of course it is true that Britain owes General Pinochet (reports, October 19, 20; letters October 20) and his then Government a deep debt of gratitude for the attitudes and actions by Chile from the onset of the Falklands war and throughout the conflict. It is undeniable that they shortened the war, and saved many British servicemen's lives."

Lord Norman Lamont of Le Cercle also defended Pinochet; Cercle member Kissinger helped him to power. Became a Baron in 1992. Mentor to Jonathan Aitken, a later chairman of Le Cercle and another member of the Privy Council. Consistently voted against the return of the death penalty. Announced he would leave the House of Commons in January 1991 to spent more time with his wife, who was ill. Lady Catherine Amery, Julian's wife, died in July 1991. At the memorial services were present: the Duke of Devonshire (Cavendish; Roxburghe Club), the Marquess of Salisbury (Cecil; Roxburghe Club), Viscount and Viscountess Cranborne (Cecil; Cercle; Roxburghe Club), Lord Charles Cecil, Philippa Viscountess Astor, Paul Channon (Cercle), Sir Erik Bennett (Cercle), Dr Omar Al-Zawawi (personal advisor to the Sultan of Oman of the Cercle), Jonathan Aitken (Cercle), Nicholas Elliott (Cercle), and Winston S. Churchill (MP). The Times described him after has retirement announcement:

"Julian Amery has trod the boards for 40 years. Like many of his generation, he had a good war, and has been defending the British empire ever since. To listen to him orate is to return to the pre-war House of Commons; plummy and proud, he could have stepped neatly out of the pages of Chips Channon's diaries. More recently, hidden behind a camel-driver's beard, he has said ``a few words'' over the grave of his chief enemy, Russian communism."

Died in December 1996. Robert Cecil, a good friend of his, wrote an obituary:

"The evening before his memorial service, Julian Amery's children held a party in his house in Eaton Square... As we drank, the sense of Julian Amery's spirit in the room was overwhelming. It seeped from the faded green paint on the walls; from the well-used but elegant furniture; from the photographs of foreign monarchs and statesmen on the tables; from the presents they had given lying about the room, golden swords and daggers, oriental carpets, arcana from all over the world. Above all, it seeped from us: British Cabinet ministers and politicians, spies, adventurers, servants of Empire, post-imperial servants of the Crown in foreign lands, Omanis, Afghans, Romanians, Albanians, Persians, Jordanians, Americans. Some, including the British, were political exiles. Some were high in their countries' governments... He was a British politician who never became a member of the Cabinet, an Air Minister who later became Minister of Housing and Minister of State at the Foreign Office. He was caricatured by the press as a white supremacist, a right-winger, an anachronism. And for them it must have been true. He had a plummy voice to prove it. In fact, Amery was a politician with a certain idea of this country. He was a patriot who believed in a British mission to the world, but who was convinced that our place was in Europe. He was a romantic, reared on the romance of Empire and of the great game, but who made a study of the realities of power. He believed in British culture and tradition, but he sympathised with the traditions of the peoples of the book."

The older brother of Julian, John Amery, was a gun-runner for General Franco (Knight of Malta) and an Italian intelligence officer. He met with Jacques Doriot, a French Fascist leader and was recruited by the Nazis. In November 1942, he began making pro Adolf Hitler broadcasts in Berlin. In April 1943 Amery established the Legion of St. George and attempted to persuade British prisoners to fight for Germany against the Soviet Union on the Eastern Front. In the final months of the war Amery moved to Italy where he made propaganda speeches on behalf of Benito Mussolini.

He also made broadcasts on Italian radio. Amery was captured by Italian partisans in Milan in April 1945, and soon afterwards was handed over to the British authorities. After being interviewed by MI5 John Amery was tried for high treason and hanged.
 

Andreotti, Giulio

Sources: October 1989 – Issue 18, Lobster Magazine, 'The Pinay Circle and Destabilisation in Europe'; 1993, Brian Crozier, 'Free Agent', pages 186, 191-193, and 241; 2002, David Rockefeller, 'Memoirs', pg. 412-413, referring to the Pesenti Group

Born in 1919. Former Italian prime minister, Knight of Malta (SMOM), and and great sympathiser of Opus Dei (other sources claim he is, or was, a member). June 28, 2001, Wall Street Journal, 'Knights of Malta Seek Respect From U.N. as Bona Fide Nation':

"Count Marullo, whose 12,000 knights world-wide include King Juan Carlos of Spain and former Italian Premiers Francesco Cossiga and Giulio Andreotti, is bent on making the world pay more serious attention to all these trappings of sovereignty." May 18, 1992, New York Times: "In one of the most hotly debated acts of his papacy, Pope John Paul II beatified the Spanish founder of the conservative Opus Dei religious movement today, elevating Msgr. Jose Maria Escriva de Balaguer to a status just short of sainthood only 17 years after his death. The crowd overflowing St. Peter's Square numbered more than 200,000 and was one of the biggest ever seen at the Vatican - testimony to the reach and influence that inspire many liberal Catholics to label Opus Dei a sinister and powerful force for conservatism in the church and elsewhere. One of the guests at the occasion was Italy's caretaker Prime Minister, Giulio Andreotti."

1997, Robert Hutchinson, 'Their Kingdom Come – Inside the Secret World of Opus Dei', p. 208:

"Of the five [most important anti-communists of Italy], Andreotti took precedence in matters of policy, being nearest to the power structures of the Church and the Free World's political systems. Andreotti was the closest layman to Paul VI and he had his admirers in every capital of the Western Alliance... Andreotti had been on an Opus Dei retreat at the Castle of Urio on Lake Como, in northern Italy, and was received at the Villa Tevere by Escrivá de Balaguer."

Graduated in Law in 1941 and later specialized in Canon Law (Roman Catholic Law). When Andreotti was head of the Catholic University Students' Federation from 1942 to 1944, he served as an assistant to Monsignor Montini, the later Pope Paul VI from 1963 to 1978. Co-founder of the still illegal Christian Democratic Party in 1943, together with the Paneuropean Alcide de Gasperi, who had a more dominant role in the founding. The Christian Democratic Party was the dominant party in Italy from 1948 to 1992. National delegate of the youth group of the Christian Democrat Party in 1944-1945. Became a member of the National Council of the Christian Democrat Party in 1945. Deputy in the Constituent Assembly since 1946 and would remain so throughout his entire political life. Under-secretary of State 1947-1954, until 1953 under de Gasperi. Minister for the Interior in January 1954. Minister of Finance 1955-1958. Secretary of the Treasury 1958-1959. Minister of Defense 1959-1966 under 5 different prime ministers. 2005, Daniele Ganser, 'NATO's Secret Armies', p. 70-71:

"On election day in April 1963 the CIA nightmare materialised: The Communists gained strength while all other parties lost seats.... the Socialists were also given cabinet posts in the Italian government under Prime Minister Aldo Moro of the left-wing of the DCI [Christian Democratic Party]... Kennedy had allowed Italy to shift to the left. As the Socialists were given cabinet posts the Italian Communists, due to their performance at the polls, also demanded to be rewarded with posts in the cabinet and in May 1963 the large union of the construction workers demonstrated in Rome. The CIA was alarmed and members of the secret Gladio army disguised as police and civilians smashed the demonstration leaving more than 200 demonstrators injured. (46) But for Italy the worst was yet to come. In November 1963, US President Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas, under mysterious circumstances. And five months later the CIA with SIFAR, the Gladio secret army and the paramilitary police carried out a right-wing coup d'état which forced the Italian Socialists to leave their cabinet posts they had held only for such a short period. Code-named 'Piano Solo' the coup was directed by General Giovanni De Lorenzo whom Defence Minister Giulio Andreotti of the DCI had transferred from chief of SIFAR to chief of the Italian paramilitary police, the Carabinieri. In close cooperation with CIA secret warfare expert Vernon Walters, William Harvey, chief of the CIA station in Rome, and Renzo Rocca, Director of the Gladio units within the military secret service SID, De Lorenzo escalated the secret war. Rocca first used his secret Gladio army to bomb the offices of the DCI and the offices of a few daily newspapers and thereafter blamed the terror on the left in order to discredit both the Communists and the Socialists. (47)"

Andreotti earned the label "the most powerful man in Rome, after the Pope" in the 1960s. Minister for Industry and Trade 1966-1968. Head of the Christian Democratic Party 1968-1972. Appointed by president Guiseppe Saragat on July 11, 1970 to try to form a new government with the four parties of the center-left coalition. In December 1970 another right-wing coup called Operation Tora Tora was about to happen, but it was called off at the last moment. Knight of Malta Prince Valerio Borghese, rescued by Knight of Malta James James Angleton at the end of World War II, was the leader of the coup. Stefano Delle Chiaie was another leading figure in the coup, which was supported by right wing elements in the CIA and NATO. Italian Prime Minister 1972–1973. Minister of Defense March-November 1974. Denied the existence of Gladio in 1974. Minister for the Budget and Economic Planning 1974-1976 under Aldo Moro. Prime minister of Italy 1976-1979. Again denied the existence of Gladio in 1978. 2005, Daniele Ganser, 'Nato's Secret Armies', p. 80:

"Italy was in shock [over the kidnapping of Aldo Moro in 1978]. The military secret service and acting Prime Minister Giulio Andreotti immediately blamed the left-wing terrorist organization Red Brigades for the crime and cracked down on the left. 72,000 roadblocks were erected and 37,000 houses were searched. More than 6 million people were questioned in less than two months. While Moro was held captive his wife Eleonora spent the days in agony together with her closest family and friends and even asked Pope Paul IV [not a supporter of Opus Dei], a long-standing friend of her husband, for help. 'He told me he would do everything possible and I know he tried, but he found a lot of opposition.'"

In March 1981, Italian police raided the villa of Licio Gelli, a Knight of Malta and the ultra-right leader of the P2 Lodge. 2005, Daniele Ganser, 'Nato's Secret Armies', p. 74:

"Frank Gigliotti [one-time assistant to a hypnotist; Presbyterian clergyman; worked with teenaged boys, for whom he organized a social club named the Guiseppe Mazzini Club; recruited by the OSS; active in Italy] of the US Masonic Lodge personally recruited Gelli and instructed him to set up an anti-Communist parallel government in Italy in close cooperation with the CIA station in Rome. 'It was Ted Shackley, director of all covert operations of the CIA in Italy in the 1970s', an internal report of the Italian anti-terrorism unit confirmed, 'who presented the chief of the Masonic Lodge to Alexander Haig'. According to the document, Nixon's Military adviser General Haig [later Pilgrims Society executive], who had commanded US troops in vietnam and thereafter from 1974 to 1979 served as NATO's SACEUR, and Nixon's National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger [Le Cercle] 'authorized Gelli in the fall of 1969 to recruit 400 high ranking Italian and NATO officers into his lodge'. (60)... the secretive anti-Communist P2 members list confiscated [in 1981] counted at least 962 members, with total leadership estimated at 2,500... 52 were high-ranking officers of the Carabinieri paramilitary police, 50 were high-ranking officers of the Italian Army, 37 were high-ranking officers of the Finance Police, 29 were high-ranking officers of the Italian Navy, 11 were Presidents of the police, 70 were influential and wealthy industrialists, 10 were Presidents of banks, 3 were acting Ministers, 2 were former Ministers, 1 was President of a political party, 38 were members of parliament and 14 were high-ranking judges. Others on lower levels of the social hierarchy were mayors, Directors of hospitals, lawyers, notaries and journalists."

Although Gelli's files had vanished by the time his villa was raided, the index of his files was discovered, and some of the headings included Giulio Andreotti's name. Roberto Calvi's [Knight of Malta, "God's banker", and found hanging below a bridge in the City of London] widow pointed to Giulio Andreotti as the true head of P2. 1997, Robert Hutchinson, 'Their Kingdom Come – Inside the Secret World of Opus Dei', p. 263-264:

"P2 was formed in the late 1960s, allegedly at the behest of Giordano Gamberini, a Grand Master of the Grand Orient of Italy and friend of Gulio Andreotti. But he was much closer to Francesco Cosentino, who also was well introduced in Vatican circles. Either Andreotti or Cosentino, or perhaps both, were said to have suggested the creation of a small cell of trusted right-wing personalities in key national sectors, but especially banking, intelligence and the press, to guard against what they perceived as 'the creeping communist threat'. The person Gamberini chose to develop the P2 Lodge was a small-time textile magnate from the Tuscan town of Arezzo, midway between Florence and Perugia, who after two as a Freemason had risen to the Italian equivalent of Master Mason. His name, of course, was Licio Gelli. But the P2's top man, according to Calvi, was none other than Andreotti, followed in line of command by Cosentino and Ortolani [Umberto Ortolani; secret chamberlain of the Papal Household; member of the inner council of the Knights of Malta; said to be a member of Cardinal Giacomo Lercano; met with Licio Gelli, Roberto Calvi, and others in Rome in December 1969]. Andreotti always denied Calvi's allegation. But the fact remains that Calvi feared Andreotti more than Gelli or Ortolani. As for Cosentino, he died soon after the P2 hearings began. The truth of the matter, [professor] Javier Sainz said, is that the P2 Lodge was part of a secret right-wing network created with the Vatican's blessing as part of the Occident's bulwark against communism. The P1 Lodge was in France and the P3 Lodge was in Madrid. The P3 was headed by a former minister of Justice, Pio Cabanillas Gallas [cabinet minister under Franco, the dictator of Spain until 1975; secretary of the Council of the Realm, Franco's highest advisory body; Minister of Information and Tourism; remained influential in government after Franco's death; Minister of Culture; Minister of Justice 1981-1982; more centrist than Cercle member Munoz; member of the European Parliament]".

Minister of Foreign Affairs 1983-1989. Supported the installing of American nuclear missiles in Europe. Prime Minister of Italy 1989-1991. On August 3, 1990, after having been put under pressure by Italian judge Felice Casson, Andreotti was the first person to admit that there existed a secret army of "stay-behind" units in Italy. In the case of Italy this unit was called Gladio and it had been involved in terrorist attacks on its own citizens, while blaming it on left-wing groups. This is how it kept the communist influence out of Europe. It soon turned out that these were hidden away in the secret services of most western countries. In 1993, Andreotti was investigated for corruption and accused of protecting the Mafia. Indicted in 1995, he also went to trial in 1996 for ordering the murder of a journalist said to have incriminating information. In 1999, he was acquitted of both sets of charges, a decision that ultimately was upheld on appeal.

1997, Robert Hutchinson, 'Their Kingdom Come – Inside the Secret World of Opus Dei', p. 350:

"In 1994 Andreotti's friend and former foreign trade minister, Claudio Vitalone, brother of the lawyer Wilfredo with whom Carboni had been in almost hourly phone contact while shadowing Calvi's flight to London, was charged with ordering Pecorelli's [journalist who informed Andreotti beforehand he was putting out some damaging information on him] slaying. Accused with him were Mafia bosses Gaetano Badalamenti and Pippo Calò. Andreotti, friend of three popes who claimed never in his long career of public service to have forsaken his Catholic principles, joined them at trial, accused of issuing the contract against Pecorelli. Magistrates in Palermo had already stunned the world by accusing 'Uncle Giulio' of 'protecting, assisting and consorting with the Cosa Nostra' in return for electioneering support that helped maintain the Christian Democrat Party and Andreotti at the apex of Italian political life for more than three decades."

Has been named as a member of the controversial Order of Zion, if it even exists or existed. Other rumors about the Order of Zion have named Cercle members Alain Poher and Otto von Habsburg.

Auchi, Nadhmi

Sources: April 6, 2003, The Observer, 'So, Norman, any regrets this time?'; September 5, 2004, Sunday Times, 'Le Cercle of the elite'

Born in Iraq. Graduated in Economics and Political Science from the Mustansiriyah University, Baghdad in 1967. Worked with the Iraqi Ministry of Oil, becoming Director of Planning and Development. In 1979 he founded General Mediterranean Holding SA of Luxembourg. Auchi's business empire, which has assets worth more than £1bn, is held offshore in structures whose ownership is difficult to penetrate. His holding firm, General Mediterranean Holdings SA, is registered in Luxembourg, and the Luxembourg and EU politician Jacques Santer sits on its board (in 1999, the Santer (EU) Commission resigned from their posts after charges of corruption. Santer is a Bilderberger and a supporter of Opus Dei). Lord Lamont, the Rothschild associate who headed Le Cercle, used to be another employee of General Mediterranean Holdings. Has links to British intelligence, through the former senior MI6 officer Anthony Cavendish (Le Cercle), who acts as a consultant to Auchi's business empire. Served on an advisory committee to the Institute for Social and Economic Policy in the Middle East at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government 1996-2000. President of the Anglo-Arab Organisation (AAO) since its founding in 2002. The July 2004 meeting of the AAO was attended by Prince Andrew, the Duke of York, Michael Howard (Le Cercle), the Conservative Party leader and leader of the opposition, king Abdullah of Jordan, Sheikh Badawi (Islamic College of London), together with many political, business and media elite.

During the 2004 AAO conference Auchi said:

" [the organisation, at its core] is the desire to build on, and further enhance, the fruitful, warm and productive relations which have existed over so many centuries between the United Kingdom and the Arab world."

Auchi stressed AAO's important role in furthering interfaith dialogue as well as supporting initiatives aimed at "further integration of the welcomed British Arab community into mainstream society." On one of the pictures Auchi is shaking hands with Prince Andrew and King Abdullah. Another ambiguity of his relations with the UK is demonstrated by one of his mementos, hanging in pride of place in his office - a portrait of the houses of parliament which 130 MPs of all parties have signed. It was presented to him by the science minister, Lord Sainsbury, "on behalf of Tony Blair" at the 20th anniversary ceremony of his GMH company. In November, 2003, Auchi was given a two-year suspended prison sentence for his involvement in the Elf scandal. A French court found him guilty of accepting £50 million worth of illegal commissions. He was also fined £1.4 million. In 2003, the Guardian and the Observer wrote a number of articles that Auchi has been involved in numerous corruption scandals and that he was a long supporter of, and arms supplier to, Saddam Hussein.

Auchi later claimed these allegations were completely wrong, which led to the newspapers retracting their stories. During Gulf War II, Auchi was reported to have a full run on the palace in the Green Zone and met with "everyone important," including CPA top leader Paul Bremer. Auchi has also been named as a central figure in the U.N. oil-for-food program in which both the U.S. Congress and a special U.N. investigation have been looking after accusations of massive corruption and a missing $10 billion. In November 2003, Auchi was honoured by the Catholic Sacred Military Constantinian Order of Saint George and the Royal Order of Francis I.

Bach, Dr. Franz Josef

Sources: 1993, Alan Clark, 'Diaries', p. 369-374; 1993, Brian Crozier, 'Free Agent', page 193; June 29, 1997, The Independence, 'Aitken dropped by the Right's secret club; Is it the ultimate dishonour'

Born in 1917. Personal assistant to Konrad Adenauer (ran his office), who was chancellor of the Federal Republic of West Germany from 1949 to 1963. CDU (Conservative) member of the Bundestag from 1969 to 1972. German ambassador to Iran. Commercial and financial advisor to the Siemens Corporation, which later went into business with Northrop, the General Telephone and Electronics Corporation, and the Nippon Electric Company in Iran. At about the time Bach retired from the Bundestag, he went to work for the swiss-based Economic and Development Corporation (EDC), an unacknowledged lobbying group for Northrop. The EDC received hundreds of thousands of dollars from Northrop. When Bach was interviewed over the phone during the 1975 Church Committee hearings about bribes that had been paid by the Northrop Corporation, he stated that he received no payments from Northrop or the EDC. On the other hand, he had been named as a shareholder of EDC and acknowledged that he had,

"advised them [EDC] about political things - the stability of a country, whether it was going to be an industrial country or not, whether it was going to be stable or not... I go to the country, see the country and make a report." (June 10, 1975, New York Times, 'Northrop Apologizes on Saudi Bribes; Senator Church Urges Sales Reforms')

He refused to say what countries he had worked on, but said it did not involve Germany. He "could not remember" exactly if he started to work for the corporation when he still was a member of the Bundestag. In March 1975, Bach and other senior members of EDC were invited to the headquarters of Northop. Senator Church said about the Northrop arrangement:

"an intelligence network like a government would emply to get inside information, to pull the strings... the records itself show that Northrop has been doing it." (June 10, 1975, New York Times, 'Northrop Apologizes on Saudi Bribes; Senator Church Urges Sales Reforms')

Northrop officials had described it "a way of live, a necessary evil." EDC, founded in 1971, described itself as a company that tries "to seek economic relations with developing countries with the purpose of encouraging the economic development of these countries" (June 10, 1975, New York Times, 'Northrop apologizes on Saudi Bribes; Senator Church Urges Sales Reforms').

In 1972, Bach wrote a report for Andreas Froriep, a Zurich lawyer who ran the EDC. Froriep did acknowledge that he regularly relied on advise from people like Franz Josef Bach, "whose knowledge and expertise is of a unique nature" (July 27, 1975, New York Times, 'The F-16 and how it won Europe'). By 1975, Northop's F-17 had lost from its General Dynamics competitor who had built the F-16. Alan Clark about the 1990 meeting of Le Cercle:

"The Cercle, an Atlanticist Society of right-wing dignitaries, largely compered by Julian Amery and Herr Franz-joseph Bach, staged one or two conferences a year and this one was travelling to Oman at the hospitality of the Ruler."

In his 1993 biography, Brian Crozier wrote:

"In 1980, Violet, who had serious health problems, asked me to take over the Pinay Cercle. In practice, I mostly shared the burden with a leading German member of the Cercle, Franz-Josef Bach, who had run Adenauer's secretariat and later served as ambassador in Tehran."

Died in 2001.

Bennett, Sir Erik

Sources: 1993, Alan Clark, 'Diaries', p. 369-374

Born in 1928. Briefly served as an adviser to King Hussein of Jordan before moving to Oman in the early 1970s. In Oman he became an officer successfully helping Sultan Qaboos overthrow his father and fight Marxist rebels in Dhofar. Became a commander (Air Marshal) of Oman's Air Force in 1974, and still was in 1990 when Le Cercle held a meeting in Muscat in 1990. Alan Clark about the 1990 Le Cercle meeting:

"I had a good meeting with Erik Bennett. He is a courtier of the very highest class. What are the characteristics? The voice, the intonation, the clarity of diction. The superficial speaking well of all and everyone. The way all communication occurs by the lightest of implied comment. Smooth, unwrinkled skin, and limitless endurance through ceremonial tedium. Also, in Erik's case, intelligence and wit. He has set up a draft letter 'from' HM inquiring about surplus military equipment sales after (EB said) 'rapprochement with Iraq'. I substituted 'a clearer determination of unpredictability in the region', which he admitted was preferable."

When the Sultan's car was rammed from behind by a speeding car in Salalah, where he likes to spend the summer, on September 11, 1995, Bennett was sitting right next to him, and was seriously injured. Qaboos' deputy premier for economics and finance Qais Al Zawawi was killed in the crash. September 17, 1995, Sunday Times, 'Oman draws a veil over mystery car crash Briton; Air Marshal Sir Erik Bennett':

"IT WAS a curious kind of crash. When Sultan Qaboos Bin Said of Oman stopped his four-wheel-drive vehicle in the middle of a wide, flat and empty highway last week to listen to the complaint of a shepherd, a speeding car appeared from nowhere and smashed into him and his passengers. Even more curious was the fact that although the most important person in the Sultan's life a powerful, reclusive Briton was badly hurt, nobody dared mention it publicly. However, Air Marshal Sir Erik Bennett, 67, is one of Oman's (and Britain's) best-kept secrets: the key figure in a group of elderly former military and intelligence officers who help the Sultan to run his rich, strategically vital country at the mouth of the Gulf... No doubt it would have all been an overnight wonder except for the unmentionable figure who had been sitting next to the Omani ruler. The dapper, ginger-haired Bennett is now said to be recovering in an Omani hospital.

 

But the refusal to acknowledge his presence only reinforces the fact that Oman is where the last remains of the British empire have still not been laid to rest much to the Sultan's (and London's) delight. Even King Hussein of Jordan had to get rid of his beloved Glubb Pasha, the British commander of his troops, long ago. But the sultan of Oman is a more absolute ruler and a more determined Anglophile. Sent to England at 18, he was tutored privately for two years while living with an English family and was then trained at Sandhurst. He served for a year in the Cameronians before returning home in 1964. His father, Sultan Said, a man of medieval habits, responded to his raging Anglophilia by putting him under virtual house arrest in the family palace in Salalah, allowing him only a Koran to read. His mother smuggled in The Times every day, however, and eventually a few friends were allowed up to play bridge.

 

Prominent among them was Timothy Landon, a classmate at Sandhurst, who was serving as an SAS officer fighting Marxist rebels attacking Oman from Yemen. Both Qaboos and Landon knew that the British were unhappy at the sultan's failure to fight the rebels adequately and at the medieval situation of Oman. With a population of 1m, it had only 10 miles of paved roads, 500 telephones and three schools. The gates of the walled city of Muscat were closed at night and strollers had to carry lanterns. Radios and just about anything else modern were illegal. The wearing of spectacles could lead to jail. In 1970 the British encouraged a palace revolt by Qaboos which ended when his father pulled a pistol to defend himself and shot himself in the foot. He was bundled on to an RAF jet waiting on the British base behind the palace. The old man lived out the remainder of his years in the Dorchester hotel on Park Lane while British soldiers and airmen fought the rebels for five more years. Among them was Bennett, shy of publicity and happiest mingling with other figures from the world of cloak-and-dagger wars and secret intelligence. A short, shadowy figure with an Anglo-Irish background he had been educated at King's Hospital, a Protestant school in Dublin Bennett had transferred to Oman from Jordan after doing a stint as Hussein's air adviser. While Bennett took command of the Omani airforce, Qaboos took the throne and hankered after London.

 

He spent Pounds 100,000 on a bronze-and-gold-leaf clock that played the Westminster chimes, flew out a British circus on his birthday, and commissioned the entire London Symphony Orchestra to fly to Salalah to celebrate his accession. Because of the sensitivities of Arab nationalism, the sultan in recent years has had to be more clandestine about his Anglophilia. He instituted a programme of ``Omanisation'', and British officials now work behind the scenes. But a British major-general, Jeremy Phipps, and 65 army officers are still on ``loan service'' to the sultan. They eat curries, wear cummerbunds at formal dinners, and go ``wadi-bashing'' for fun. Another powerful figure is Tony Ashworth, a civilian with Whitehall connections whose influence is crucial in the tight limits that are kept on the number of visitors to the sultanate.

 

Bennett is now officially retired, but he still gives his address as his palace in northern Oman and remains the sultan's ``special adviser''. Many in Oman say the two men, both unmarried and without children, are the closest of friends. Once in a while Bennett still performs mysterious missions. A few years ago, when British special operations officers who had fought a secret war in Albania returned for the first time since the war, Bennett went along as a friend although he had never visited the country. Landon, the SAS officer and former bridge partner, also keeps up his connection. He is listed as a ``counsellor'' at the Omani embassy in London. The connection between these men and the sultan is more than just Anglophilia and friendship. Oman has 1,000 miles of coast on the Indian Ocean and controls the strait of Hormuz through which pass the tankers of the Gulf oil states. With its output of 800,000 barrels of oil a day, it is also rich and likes to buy British. As Mark Thatcher found, when the sultan wanted a university he picked the British firm Cementation to build it."

Botta, Colonel

Sources: October 1989 – Issue 18, Lobster Magazine, 'The Pinay Circle and Destabilisation in Europe'

Swiss Military Intelligence Chief of Provisions. Attended the June 28-29, 1980 Zurich meeting of the Pinay Circle.

Brzezinski, Zbigniew

Sources: 1993, Brian Crozier, 'Free Agent', pages 186, 191-193, and 241

MA in Political Science of McGill University in 1950. PhD from Harvard University in 1953. Institute government and research fellow of the Russian Research Center at Harvard University 1953-1956. Guest lecturer at numerous private and government institutions since 1953. Participant in many international conferences since 1955. Assistant professor of government and research associate Russian Research Center and Center International Affairs at Harvard University 1956-1960. Associate professor of public law and government at Columbia University 1960-1962. Member of the faculty of the Russian Institute 1960-1977. Member of the Joint Committee on Contemporary China at the Social Science Research Council 1961-1962. Director of Research Institute of International Change 1962-1977.

1991 version, (1979 original) Deborah Davis, 'Katherine the Great', p. 177:

"Without asking Katherine [owner of the Washington Post], [President] Kennedy appointed John Hayes, still the [Washington] Post Company's vice president for radio and television, to a secret CIA task force to explore methods of beaming American propaganda broadcasts to Communist China. The other members of the team were Richard Salant, president of CBS News; Zbigniew Brzezinski, a professor at Columbia University who had been on the agency [CIA] payroll for several years; Cord Meyer of the CIA [and Operation MOCKINGBIRD]; McGeorge Bundy, special assistant to the president for national security; Leonard Marks, director of the USIA; Bill Moyers, who went on to become a distinquished and highly independent journalist for CBS and then for PBS; and Paul Henze, the CIA chief of station in Ethiopia who had established secret communications capabilities there and who later worked on African problems for Brzezinski in the Carter White House."

Member of the Policy Planning Council of the Department of State from 1966 to 1968. Always been very anti-communist. Columnist of Newsweek 1970-1972. Director of the Council on Foreign Relations from 1972 to 1977. Set up the Trilateral Commission at the request of David Rockefeller in 1973. Director of the Trilateral Commission 1973-1976. National Security Advisor to Carter 1977-1981. January 15-21, 1998, Le Nouvel Observateur, Interview with Zbigniew Brzezinski:

"According to the official version of history, CIA aid to the Mujahadeen began during 1980, that is to say, after the Soviet army invaded Afghanistan, 24 Dec 1979. But the reality, secretly guarded until now, is completely otherwise Indeed, it was July 3, 1979 that President Carter signed the first directive for secret aid to the opponents of the pro-Soviet regime in Kabul. And that very day, I wrote a note to the president in which I explained to him that in my opinion this aid was going to induce a Soviet military intervention... That secret operation was an excellent idea. It had the effect of drawing the Russians into the Afghan trap and you want me to regret it? The day that the Soviets officially crossed the border, I wrote to President Carter. We now have the opportunity of giving to the USSR its Vietnam war. Indeed, for almost 10 years, Moscow had to carry on a war unsupportable by the government, a conflict that brought about the demoralization and finally the breakup of the Soviet empire... Nonsense [that Islamic fundamentalism represents a world menace]! It is said that the West had a global policy in regard to Islam. That is stupid. There isn't a global Islam. Look at Islam in a rational manner and without demagoguery or emotion. It is the leading religion of the world with 1.5 billion followers. But what is there in common among Saudi Arabian fundamentalism, moderate Morocco, Pakistan militarism, Egyptian pro-Western or Central Asian secularism? Nothing more than what unites the Christian countries."

Cercle members William Casey and Turki Al-Faisal would step up the funding of the Afghan resistance in the early 1980s under Reagan. Advisor to Ronald Reagan in the 1980s. Professor of public law and government at Columbia University 1981-1989. According to Nexus Magazine, the following statement was made more than 25 years ago in a book which Brzezinski wrote while a professor at Columbia University:

"Political strategists are tempted to exploit research on the brain and human behaviour. Geophysicist Gordon J. F. MacDonald [JASON scholar] -specialist in problems of warfare-says accurately-timed, artificially-excited electronic strokes 'could lead to a pattern of oscillations that produce relatively high power levels over certain regions of the Earth... In this way, one could develop a system that would seriously impair the brain performance of very large populations in selected regions over an extended period..."

Trustee and counselor at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) since 1981. Co-chair of the CSIS Advisory Board (located at the Jesuit Georgetown University, from which Brzezinski holds honorary degrees). Member of the President's Chemical Warfare Commission in 1985. Member of the NSC's Defense Department Commission on Integrated Long-Term Strategy 1987-1988. Member of the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board 1987-1989. Co-chairman of the Bush National Security Advisory Task Force in 1988. In 1991, identified as a member of the advisory council of Americares (former honorary chair), together with Cercle member general Richard Stilwell. J. Peter Grace is chair of the advisory council and it counts heavy involvement of the Bushes and SMOM. August 11, 1991, Hartford Courant, 'Americares' success hailed, criticized charity uses clout and connections...':

"Other international relief agencies marvel at AmeriCares' ability to cut red tape, navigate complex international protocol, perform in the public spotlight and simultaneously claim some of the lowest administrative expenses among groups of its kind... Much of AmeriCares' success comes from its ability to harness three potent forces: powerful political connections, alliances with influential religious figures and groups and cooperative ventures with businesses... Knowledgeable former federal officials, many with backgrounds in intelligence work, help AmeriCares maneuver in delicate international political environments. Its connections with the Roman Catholic Church have brought AmeriCares an influential ally in the Knights of Malta, a Catholic group that helps deliver relief supplies. And its ventures with pharmaceutical companies have filled AmeriCares' warehouses with donated supplies... n the international relief community, where there is an expectation that groups will operate altruistically and free of political motives, some complain about the way AmeriCares aggressively seeks media coverage and appears to design its missions to benefit conservative political causes... Photographs on the office's forest-green walls show [Robert C.] Macauley [wealthy; founder and chairman of AmeriCares] with former President Reagan, Pope John Paul II and Mother Teresa... Macauley's friendship with [George W.] Bush dates back to childhood... Bush's son, Jeb, and the president's grandson, George P. Bush, went with AmeriCares to Armenia in 1988 to help survivors of a devastating earthquake... The president's brother, Prescott S. Bush Jr. of Greenwich, is a member of AmeriCares' advisory board... The chairman of the advisory committee is J. Peter Grace Jr... Retired Army Gen. Richard G. Stilwell, former deputy undersecretary of defense in charge of intelligence under Reagan, is also on the advisory committee. Another member is William E. Simon... Simon was also president of the Nicaraguan Freedom Fund, a now defunct private group formed by the Washington Times newspaper to send aid to the contras. (The Washington Times is owned by a group that includes officials of the Rev. Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church.) Gordon J. Humphrey, a retired Republican senator from New Hampshire who was a member of the Senate foreign relations committee, is also on the committee. And Zbigniew Brzezinski, the conservative former national security adviser for President Carter, is honorary chairman of the AmeriCares board of directors."... "Personally I have some questions about the way they focus," said one longtime worker in international aid. "They're connected into the American Republican power elite. You might say they work in areas where there is a large anti-communist benefit."... criticism has come from writers who contend that AmeriCares made shipments of aid to the contras in Nicaragua... Among the aid AmeriCares sent to Nicaragua in 1985 was newsprint for La Prensa, the anti-Sandinista newspaper... A review of AmeriCares' well publicized airlift missions shows that the organization sends aid rapidly and frequently to "hot spots" of public attention, places where disaster aid from America might reflect favorably on the U.S. government... In 1988, AmeriCares sent a series of airlifts to Armenia in the Soviet Union to help survivors of an earthquake. "That did more for the image of the United States than anything in recent history," Macauley said... In the early 1970s, at a time when his interest in international aid was beginning to coalesce into AmeriCares, Macauley heard about a Catholic priest named Bruce Ritter who was struggling to help runaway children on the streets of New York City... The alliance between Macauley and Ritter led to an audience with Pope John Paul II in Rome in 1982. (Ritter left Covenant House in February 1990 after accusations of sexual misconduct with some male runaways he was helping). The meeting with the pope gave life to AmeriCares. Although Macauley started AmeriCares in 1979, the organization did not go on its first relief mission until 1982, when the pope asked Macauley to send aid to his native Poland. AmeriCares' contacts with important Catholic figures brought it a valuable ally in the Knights of Malta, a Catholic organization that has helped distribute AmeriCares supplies. The Knights of Malta, formally known as the Sovereign Military Order of Knights Hospitallers of St. John and Jerusalem, is a worldwide Catholic charity founded in the 11th century to care for soldiers in the Crusades. Today, the group is based in Rome. J. Peter Grace, a member of AmeriCares' advisory board, is president of the American chapter of the Knights of Malta, based in New York City. William Simon, another AmeriCares advisory committee member, is also a member... The Knights of Malta make AmeriCares' job easier because of its worldwide network of volunteers, said Johnson, the president of AmeriCares. Members of the group, many of whom are independently wealthy, can be trusted to deliver the aid to its intended destination and do so more efficiently than AmeriCares, he said. "By using the Knights, there's very little opportunity for diversion," Johnson said. "They've all made their fortunes. Now they're interested in charity."... Because almost 50 countries afford the Knights of Malta the same status as a sovereign nation, they are often exempt from fees for border crossings and can pass customs inspections more easily. "The host country will generally waive inspection and duty," said Thomas L. Sheer, executive director of the American chapter of the Knights of Malta and an assistant to J. Peter Grace. "We can use that diplomatic status to move right through customs and to not pay customs fees. We can exploit that, particularly within a time of crisis."... Despite his ties to the Roman Catholic Church, Macauley is not Catholic, although he describes himself as a religious man. "They say I'm a right-wing Catholic conservative," Macauley said. "I'm not a Catholic, even though I go to Mass almost every day. I'm a very devout Protestant, I guess you'd call it." AmeriCares also receives small donations from Pat Robertson's Christian Broadcasting Network and the Rev. Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church. AmeriCares has kept the commitment to Poland it began at the behest of the pope. "We go to Poland every week, either by ship or by plane," Macauley said. Between 1982 and this March, AmeriCares sent $94 million in aid to Poland, almost a quarter of all the aid it has dispensed. When the pope called on Macauley to help Poland, Macauley turned to corporate America for help... To get donations for Poland, he and some colleagues sat down with lists of the boards of directors from the nation's largest pharmaceutical companies. Among them, the group found, they knew at least one person on every board."

Wrote a book titled 'The Grand Chessboard' in 1997, which describes a kind of upcoming 'Clash of Civilizations' (Samuel Huntington) and how the should isolate China and Russia from the mineral reserves of the Middle-East. Some of his main points were:

1) "About 75 per cent of the world's people live in Eurasia, and most of the world's physical wealth is there as well, both in its enterprises and underneath its soil. Eurasia accounts for 60 per cent of the world's GNP and about three-fourths of the world's known energy resources."
2) "The most immediate task is to make certain that no state or combination of states gains the capacity to expel the United States from Eurasia or even to diminish significantly its decisive arbitration role."
3) "It is also a fact that America is too democratic at home to be autocratic abroad. This limits the use of America's power, especially its capacity for military intimidation… Democracy is inimical to imperial mobilization."
4) "Moreover, as America becomes an increasingly multi-cultural society, it may find it more difficult to fashion a consensus on foreign policy issues, except in the circumstance of a truly massive and widely perceived direct external threat."

Governor of the intelligence-linked Smith Richardson Foundation, together with Christopher DeMuth (the president of the American Enterprise Institute) and Samuel Huntington. Former member of the National Advisory Council of the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, together with Jeane Kirkpatrick, Jack Kemp, Senator Claiborne Pell, Senator Bob Dole, Richard Pipes, and Cercle member Edwin Feulner, Jr. Brian Crozier, former Cercle head, sits on the International Advisory Council of the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation. Still a significant influence in Washington today and generally respected by both neoconservatives and liberals. Appointed chairman of the RAND Center for Middle East Public Policy Advisory Board in 2005 (where he followed up Franck Carlucci) and a member of RAND's President's Circle. Anno 2006, a member of the advisory committee of the American Committee for Peace in the Caucasus (ACPC), which is advocating against Russian intervention in Chechnya (used to be co-chair). Other members of the advisory board include neocons Frank Gaffney, Alexander M. Haig, Jr., William Kristol (PNAC), Robert McFarlane, Richard Perle (friend of Cercle chair Brian Crozier), Richard Pipes (associate of Brian Crozier in the Reagan years), Caspar Weinberger, and James Woolsey. September 9, 2004, ACPC member Richard Pipes in a New York Times article called 'Give the Chechens a land of their own':

"A clever arrangement secured by the Russian security chief, Gen. Alexander Lebed, in 1996 granted the Chechens de facto sovereignty while officially they remained Russian citizens. Peace ensued. It was broken by several terrorist attacks on Russian soil, which the authorities blamed on the Chechens (although many skeptics attributed them to Russian security agencies eager to create a pretext to bring Chechnya back into the fold)... This history makes clear how the events in Russia differ from 9/11. The attacks on New York and the Pentagon were unprovoked and had no specific objective. Rather, they were part of a general assault of Islamic extremists bent on destroying non-Islamic civilizations. As such, America's war with Al Qaeda is non-negotiable. But the Chechens do not seek to destroy Russia - thus there is always an opportunity for compromise... Russia, the largest country on earth, can surely afford to let go of a tiny colonial dependency, and ought to do so without delay."

Brzezinski is a critic of the Israel Lobby.

Mark Brzezinski, Zbigniew's son, was accused of undermining Ukrainian elections in 2004 (together with the NDI, Eurasia Society, and George Soros). Soros has been accused of doing the same in Georgia and Russia, and having caused the financial instability in Asia in 1997.
 

Brunello, Monsignor

Sources: October 1989 – Issue 18, Lobster Magazine, 'The Pinay Circle and Destabilisation in Europe'

Vatican prelate and BNG agent. Can't find anything about this person, besides what has been claimed by the original author.

Burnside, David Wilson Boyd

Sources: June 29, 1997, The Independence, 'Aitken dropped by the Right's secret club; Is it the ultimate dishonour'; July 10, 1997 An Phoblacht/Republican News, 'Editor's Desk'

A Northern Ireland politician, and was Ulster Unionist Party Member of Parliament for South Antrim. In the 1970s Burnside served as Press Officer for the Vanguard Progressive Unionist Party. After the collapse of Vanguard he joined the Ulster Unionists. In 1984 David Burnside was recruited by the British Airways Chairman Lord King to become the company's head of public relations. In this role Burnside is widely acknowledged to have become one of the most powerful PR men in Britain, speaking for King, administering a £5 million budget and receiving numerous PR awards both in the UK and around the world. British Airways was witnessing the emergence of a dangerous rival, Richard Branson's Virgin Atlantic. Virgin, which began with one route and one Boeing 747 in 1984 was beginning to emerge as a serious threat on some of BA's most lucrative routes. In 1991, King is reported to have told Burnside and CEO Colin Marshall to "do something about Branson".

This began the campaign of dirty tricks, masterminded by Burnside, which ended in Branson suing King and British Airways for libel in 1992. In January 1993, following the settlement and investigations by BA's lawyers the board decided to sack Burnside. He was awarded a settlement of approximately £400,000 and free first class travel on BA for four years. He later reentered politics and had some criticism on the IRA.

Casey, William

Sources: June 29, 1997, The Independence, 'Aitken dropped by the Right's secret club; Is it the ultimate dishonour' (named as once a regular)

Irish-American catholic from Queens, born in 1913. Graduated from the Jesuit Fordham University in New York in 1934 and St. John's University School of Law in 1937. Also attended the Catholic University of America. After law school, he joined the Research Institute of America in Washington. Chairman of the board of editors of the Research Institute of America 1938-1949. Joined the Navy in 1943. In 1943, William Donovan, founding head of the OSS, hired Casey to organize the OSS secretariat. After that, he was sent to London and was soon managing the infiltration of Allied agents into Nazi Germany from there. At one point he had 150 agents reporting directly to him from occupied Europe. These included Richard Helms, like Casey, a later director of the CIA; and John Singlaub, a later Army general deeply involved in anti-communist warfare. Allen Dulles, William Colby, James Jesus Angleton, and David Bruce were among his OSS colleagues during WWII. December 17, 1986, Chicago Sun-Times, '...perhaps, but secrecy is vital to foreign policy':

""Great secrecy was necessary," Winston Churchill told a cheering Parliament, as he revealed the first Nazi surrender at the close of World War II, capitulation in Italy. It followed months of top-secret talks between German commanders and Office of Strategic Services "spy master" Allen Dulles, later the celebrated director of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency. Historians have suggested that Dulles' triumph, code-named Operation Sunrise, was diplomatically flawed, that excluding the Soviets from those meetings - for the sake of secrecy - triggered the initial distrust between Allies that led to the Cold War. But in [March] 1945, few Americans would have doubted that ending the fighting was worth a spat with "Uncle Joe" Stalin. Sunrise was a milestone in the annals of U.S. secret intelligence, marking the start of that postwar crypto-diplomacy twilight zone where secret agents often supplant striped-pants ambassadors. And William J. Casey was there, privy to the secret as one of the best and brightest of young OSS executives. Now, 40 years later, he is the latest of Dulles' unenviable successors as head of the CIA."

After the war, Casey was offered senior jobs in U.S. intelligence, but turned them down because he thought he should establish his financial independence first. Developed his publishing business and thrived as a tax lawyer, making a personal fortune estimated at between $8 and $12 million, and earning a reputation as a corporate dealer willing to take almost any risk if the potential return was worth it. Published a series of about 20 books explaining the intricacies of complex legislation. Special counsel of the small business committee of the U.S. Senate 1947-1948. Associate general counsel at the European headquarters of the Marshall Plan 1948. Jean Monnet from France (and initial member of Le Cercle) was one of the key players here. Lecturer tax law New York University 1948-1962. Lecturer Practicing Law Institute of New York City 1950-1962. Co-founder of Capital Cities in 1954, together with Thomas E. Dewey, who went from crime fighter to crime backer (Lucky Luciano & Meyer Lansky). Another founder of Capital Cities was Lowell Thomas, who was a close friend and business contact of CIA director Allen Dulles. Thomas reportedly was also connected to Lansky's mafia. Capital Cities grew so powerful that it was able to buy the entire ABC TV network in 1985, which was ten times as big. Casey supposedly still had a significant interest in the company through a blind trust created when he became CIA director in 1981. Cap Cities/ABC was bought in 1996 by Walt Disney, who changed its name back to ABC. Partner in Hall, Casey, Dickler & Howley 1957-1971. Founded the National Strategy Information Center in 1962, with alleged CIA links, to push for increased military spending. Member General Advisory Committee on Arms Control 1970-1971. Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission 1971-1973. April 29, 1974, Time, 'Their Own Best Witnesses':

"John Mitchell, 60, the former U.S. Attorney General, and Maurice Stans, 66, the former Secretary of Commerce, had in a measure won their gamble-though not necessarily their cases. They had indeed been their own best witnesses against the Government's charges that they had plotted to gain special favors in Washington for Financier Robert Vesco, 38, in exchange for the moneyman's secret $200,000 cash contribution to Richard Nixon's 1972 presidential campaign... It simply never occurred to him, insisted Mitchell, that Vesco had given the $200,000 in order to get help in his struggle with the Securities and Exchange Commission (which eventually charged Vesco and 41 associates with perpetrating a $224 million stock fraud)... Mitchell freely admitted, as the prosecution charged, that after Vesco's donation was received he set up a meeting between the financier's lawyer and William Casey, then head of the SEC."

Undersecretary of State for Economic Affairs 1973-1974. Member of the Council on Foreign Relations since the 1970s. Member of the Atlantic Council of the United States. President of the Export-Import Bank of the U.S. 1974-1975. Member President Ford's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board 1974-1976. Member of the in 1976 revived Committee on Present Danger, a reactionary anti-communist think tank that included people like John F. Lehman, Clare Booth Luce, Paul H. Nitze, Richard Perle (friend of Brian Crozier, head of Le Cercle at that time), Richard Pipes, (a later associate of Crozier), Eugene Rostow, Admiral Elmo Zumwalt (former Chief of Naval Operations), George Shultz, Richard Stilwell (Le Cercle), Richard Allen, Jeane Kirkpatrick, and David Packard. Co-founder of the Jamestown Foundation in 1984, together with the Cercle member Donald Jameson. The Jamestown Foundation's purpose was to protect and sponsor a group of high-level international defectors as they travelled the United States speaking out against the tyranny of communism. Today, the Jamestown Foundation has three program areas: China, Russia/Eurasia, and Terrorism, and counts the involvement of Glen Howard (SAIC; DoD; National Intelligence Council; Mid-East and Central-Asia oil consultant), James Woolsey, Zbigniew Brzezinski (attended at least one Le Cercle meeting), Dick Cheney, and Frank Carlucci. Counsel at Rogers & Wells 1976-1981, the law firm that represented Wackenhut. Outside legal advisor to Wackenhut during this time. Campaign manager of Ronald Reagan in 1980. Robert Keith Gray, chair of Hill & Knowlton, the all-powerful (described by critics as a "secret government") Washington-based lobbying firm, was deputy director of communications in Reagan's 1980 presidential campaign. Gray reported directly to Casey. Sen. John DeCamp, 'The Franklin Cover-Up,' second edition, p.178-179:

"Said to be Harold Anderson's [chair Larry King's Franklin Credit Union advisory board and part of Larry King's Nebraskan homosexual, pedophile, and ritual sacrifice ring] closest friend in Washington," Gray is also reportedly a specialist in homosexual blackmail operations for the CIA. Gray's own sexual proclivities were the subject of an article in the July-August 1982 issue of the The Deep Backgrounder, entitled "Reagan Inaugural Co-Chairman Powerful 'Closet Homosexual'?" The Deep Backgrounder tabloid featured exposes of homosexual networks in Washington, D.C.; its contributing editor was former CIA official Victor Marchetti. During the Watergate era, Robert Keith Gray served on the board of Consultants International, founded CIA agent Edwin Wilson [of Shackley's secret team]. When Wilson and fellow agent Frank Terpil got caught running guns abroad, Gray tried to deny his connection with Wilson. "Yet ten years before," according to Peter Maas' book Manhunt, "in a top secret Navy review of Wilson's intelligence career, Gray described Wilson as a person of 'unqualified trust,' with whom he'd been in contact 'professionally two or three times a month' since 1963."

Sen. John DeCamp goes on to quote from the book 'Secret Agenda' of Jim Hougan:

"According to fugitive ex-CIA officer Frank Terpil, CIA-directed sexual blackmailing operations were intensive in Washington at about the time of the Watergate scandal. One of those operations, Terpil claims, was run by his former partner, Ed Wilson. Wilson's base of operations for arranging trysts for the politically powerful was, Terpil says, Korean agent Ton Sun Park’s George Town Club. In a letter to the author, Terpil explained that ‘Historically, one of Wilson’s Agency jobs was to subvert members of both houses [of Congress] by any means necessary... Certain people could be easily coerced by living out their sexual fantasies in the flesh... A remembrance of these occasions [was] permanently recorded via selected cameras... The technicians in charge of filming. . .[were] TSD [Technical Services Division of the CIA]... The unwitting porno stars advanced in their political careers, some of [whom] may still be in office."

Besides Terpil, affidavits written and signed by Col. Edward P. Cutolo (assassinated) and special forces soldier William Tyree (in jail for murdering his wife. Cutolo - his boss -, and others, confirm Tyree was framed) confirm part of this story. Cutolo and Tyree talked about Operation Watch Tower, one of the many government-sanctioned drug-importing operations (from Escobar's Colombia to Noriega's Panama, over sea), and Operation Orwell, which was a specific program to spy on politicians and other important people to make sure A) that no outsiders were aware of Operation Watch Tower B) that the Army would have advance warning if anyone might want to expose the operation, and C) that some dirt could be gathered on those who might some day be in a position to expose Operation Watch Tower. Edwin Wilson was Cutolo's and Tyree's superior officer. Cutolo said something highly interesting in his affidavit:

"I was notified by Edwin Wilson that the information forwarded to Wash. D.C., was disseminated to private corporations who were developing weapons for the Dept. of Defense. Those private corporations were encouraged to use the sensitive information gathered from surveillance on U.S. Senators and Representatives as leverage to manipulate those Congressmen into approving whatever costs the weapons systems incurred... As of the date of this affidavit, 8,400 police departments, 1,370 churches, and approx. 17,900 citizens have been monitored under Operation Orwell. The major churches targeted have been Catholic and Latter Day Saints [Mormons]... Per orders from Edwin Wilson, I did not discuss the implementation of Operation Orwell with my staff or others outside of the personnel assigned to surveillance. The only matter discussed with Operation Orwell personnel was what the SATs needed to know in order to carry out their mission. Certain information was collected on suspected members of the Trilateral Commission and the Bilderberg group... Among those that information was collected on were Gerald Ford and President Jimmy Carter. Edwin Wilson indicated that additional surveillance was implemented against former CIA director George Bush, who Wilson named as a member of the Trilateral Commission. I do not have personal knowledge that Ford, Carter, or Bush were under surveillance."

According to the affidavit, Wilson was involved in parallel operations with people like Thomas Clines, Robert Gates and William Casey. Col. Cutolo expressed his concerns to superiors that Wilson was talking too much. A few years later Wilson ended up in jail. Cutolo ended up dead. Ton Sun Park, the owner of the George Town Club where Wilson ran his sexual blackmail scheme, was an associate of radical cult leader Sun Myung Moon. October 31, 1978, a report printed for the use of the Committee on International Relations, 'Investigation of Korean-American Relations':

"During 1976, the subcommittee also received information about an apparent attempt by Moon and his followers--along with Tong-sun Park--to buy a controlling interest in the Diplomat National Bank (DNB), which opened in Washington D.C., in December 1975. Neil Salonen, president of the UC of America, was called to testify concerning this and other allegations. Salonen said he had bought DNB stock at the suggestion of Pak Bo Hi, but denied the UC was in any way involved in financing the DNB stock purchases."

Moon has been a major anti-communist activist and is connected to all the reactionary elements within this movement, most notably those involved with the World Anti-Communist League. These include Cercle members Count Hans Huyn and Otto von Habsburg in Bavaria, Germany, Paul Vanden Boeynants in Belgium, and Arnaud de Borchgrave, Rev. Jerry Falwell, George Bush, John Singlaub, and many others in the United States. Moon has also been tied to sexual blackmail rings. December 20, 2002 issue of Executive Intelligence Review (EIR), 'The 'No Soul' Gang Behind Reverend Moon's Gnostic Sex Cult':

"The sex is a specialty of Moon's own Gnostic "family" cult. Remember the Congressional Madam scandals of the 1970s, featuring Tong Sun Park and Suzy Park Thomson? That was just the tip of the iceberg of "The Reverend" Moon's sexual-favors operation. Military intelligence officers who investigated Unification Church operations in Washington in the 1970s and '80s, report that the recruitment device used on ranking, conservative political and military officials was to hold weekly orgies, arranged by Col. Bo Hi Pak, the Unification Church official who was a top officer of the Korean Central Intelligence Agency (KCIA). The special treat at these affairs were the "Little Angels" - Korean schoolgirls brought over by Moon as a singing group. The photo files from these sessions are reported to be a powerful influence in certain circles to this very day." DeCamp again, p. 179-180: "Gray’s associate Wilson was apparently continuing the work of a reported collaborator of Gray from the 1950’s - McCarthy committee counsel Roy Cohn [of Permindex, according to EIR; and connections to Fascist International in Europe since the early 1950s], now dead of AIDS. According to the former head of the vice squad for one of America’s biggest cities, ‘Cohn’s job was to run the little boys. Say you had an admiral, a general, a congressman, who did not want to go along with the program. Cohn’s job was to set them up, then they would go along. Cohn told me that himself.’ The first president of Tong Sun Park’s George Town Club, where Wilson’s sexual blackmail operations were reportedly run, was Robert Keith Gray. The first president of Tong Sun Park's George Town Club [in Washington], where Wilson's sexual blackmail operations were reportedly run, was Robert Keith Gray. Gray maintained his intelligence connections during the Reagan Administration, according to an affidavit filed... by Daniel Sheehan for the Christic Institute. The affidavit states that when CIA chief Casey, national security adviser Robert McFarlane, and NSC staff member Lt. Col. Oliver North were devising a method to circumvent a congressional ban on arming the Contras, they turned to Gray and Company. Gray employee Rob Owen set up a private group to solicit funds for the Contras. Owen was called before Congress, to testify on how he delivered bags of cash to the Contras [in return for the dope?]. In February 1989, Hill and Knowlton's Charles Perkins rushed to New York, for a fraction of the firm's usual fee, to help with public relations for Covenant House. The youth organization's director, Father Bruce Ritter, was alleged to have molested youth who took refuge with him."

Larry King (not the one from CNN), the person who headed the Nebraskan pedophile, homosexual, and ritual sacrifice ring, greatly admired Casey. September 7, 1988, interview of the Metropolitan with Larry King (as quoted by Sen. John DeCamp in his book 'The Franklin Cover-Up,' second edition, p.175):

"I know some of the people I admire aren't very popular. Ed Meese. The late Bill Casey of the CIA. And I love former Chief Justice Burger [Pilgrims Society]. Those are the people I really like to talk to. Bill Casey... I just thought so very highly of him."

On page 327 and 329, Sen. John DeCamp, who has claimed he is barred from discussion large portions of the Franklin Affair case, adds some more context:

"Larry King, FBI agent Gerry Wahl, Alan Baer, Harold Andersen, and former Omaha Police Chief Robert Wadman have all been reported as collaborators with this Satanic military-based ring. King reportedly told Paul's captors at Offutt, "He's young-but you trained him good." A member of Nebraska's Concerned Parents group reported hearing from two North Omaha witnesses that "King used to send limousines down to Offutt Air Base to pick up CIA agents for parties." Larry King reported his own adoring relationship to the late CIA Director William Casey in a Sept. 7, 1988, interview in the Omaha publication Metropolitan... Paul Bonacci reports the following "Monarch"-related activities, often involving his "Commander" at Offutt AFB, Bill Plemmons, and Lt. Col. Michael Aquino..."

Although most people who attended Larry King's parties, were not aware of his pedophile network, Casey seems to awfully close involved with this person and some of the accused. In fact, his working partner George Bush Sr. (Julie Walters report, p.12; DeCamp adds "This was not the last time that the name of George Bush would surface in the Franklin affair") has been named as a member of the homosexual pedophile ring while Reagan's daughter was also close to King. DeCamp, p. 55:

"It was the most impressive party I had ever witnesses... The attendance by top politicians was remarkable... At the center of the excitement was Larry King. Draped over him like a blanket throughout the evening was a heavyset woman, who I learned was Maureen Reagan, the president's daughter... I got to wondering... how does he do this supposedly on a salary of $16 thousand a year?"

The Franklin Credit Union scandal (which laundered money for the CIA) broke in November 1988. Within a year, in June 1989, a new scandal broke with close ties to the Franklin Credit Union and Larry King's pedophile/homosexual/ritual sacrifice network. Craig J. Spence, who seemed to have had the same clandestine job as Larry King, albeit in Washington instead of Nebraska, was investigated for illegally having organized a midnight White House tour and for running a pedophile/homosexual extortion network. Casey is known to have attended parties of Spence. Also, later on, Spence would have remarked just before his death that "Casey's boys" were after him. June 30, 1989, Washington Times, 'Power broker served drugs, sex at parties bugged for blackmail':

"Craig J. Spence, an enigmatic figure who threw glittery parties for key officials of the Reagan and Bush administrations, media stars and top military officers, bugged the gatherings to compromise guests, provided cocaine, blackmailed some associates and spent up to $20,000 a month on male prostitutes, according to friends, acquaintances and records... The man, a business associate of Mr. Spence who was on the White House tour [arranged by Spence and attended by two male prostitutes], said: "He was blackmailing people. He was taping people and blackmailing them."... After arriving in Washington in the late 1970s, Mr. Spence was hosting parties during the early Reagan years attended by, among others... former CIA Director William Casey [and] Gen. Alfred M. Gray [named by Kay Griggs as one of the top players in a network of criminal covert ops and sexual blackmail], the commandant of the Marine Corps... The businessman said this week that he did not know exactly what work Mr. Spence did, but that he often bragged about his contacts with Japanese businessmen and political leaders, particularly Mr. Nakasone. He described Mr. Spence as "strange," saying that he often boasted that he was working for the CIA... The businessman also said he attended a birthday bash for Roy Cohn at Mr. Spence's house. He said Mr. Casey was at the party."

Roy Cohn, as an aide to Senator Joseph "reds under the bed" McCarthy, was accused in the early 1950s as an associate of the post-WWII Fascist underground of Skorzeny, Schacht, and Naumann while visiting Europe. Cohn, together with some members of the Fascist International, was later named by EIR as an initial director of Permindex, a corporation set up in 1958 which is suspected of having been a front organization in the planning of the John F. Kennedy assassination. As mentioned earlier, Cohn supposedly "ran the little boys". Arnaud de Borchgrave is also known to have attended a party at Spence's house. De Borchgrave, an intelligence-connected anti-communist radical and good friends with Sun Myung Moon, is a descendant of an obscure Belgian noble family. An unknown member of this family has coincidentally been named by one of the Belgian X-File witnesses, who came out in the aftermath of the Dutroux affair. Count Alexandre de Marenches, a good friend of Casey and Vernon Walters, is a cousin of the De Borchgrave family. November 13, 1989, Washington Times, 'In death, Spence stayed true to form':

"Craig J. Spence, the once-powerful lobbyist who entertained and influenced Washington's elite, died Friday... On a mirror in Room 429 of the Ritz Carlton Hotel, Mr. Spence on Friday left his final enigma in the form of a suicide note... During the past few weeks, Mr. Spence told several friends that the call-boy operation was being investigated by the U.S. Attorney's Office and other federal authorities as a possible CIA front. He told the friends that the CIA used the service to compromise other federal intelligence officials and foreign diplomats... One friend quoted him as saying, "Casey's boys are out to get me," an apparent reference to former CIA Director William Casey, now deceased. Mr. Casey and Mr. Spence were friends, and the former CIA director attended parties hosted by the former lobbyist... During a lengthy interview at a Manhattan apartment in August, Mr. Spence frequently alluded to deep mysteries. "All this stuff you've uncovered (involving call boys, bribery and the White House tours), to be honest with you, is insignificant compared to other things I've done. But I'm not going to tell you those things, and somehow the world will carry on."

February 2, 1990, Washington Times, 'Prostitutes corroborate Frank stories':

"Penthouse magazine's anxiously awaited account of sexual adventuring by congressmen quotes a female prostitute as corroborating Steven L. Gobie's earlier story that Rep. Barney Frank knew Gobie was operating a bordello in the congressman's Capitol Hill apartment... The magazine [Penthouse] said Mr. Spence had agreed to "provide lurid details of Washington's bisexual wonderland." But before the interview could occur, Mr. Spence committed suicide in Boston on Nov. 10... According to Gobie, Mr. Spence told him, "Do you know what kind of power you can have over people if you've got something on them? . . . I need boys and girls for people in government and high-level businessmen for my parties, for individuals, for whatever comes up." The magazine quoted Gobie as saying Mr. Spence was "the most dangerous man I'd ever met. If he hadn't turned into such a crackhead, he could have blackmailed half this town. He used to say, 'Hey, foreign intelligence agencies are doing it.'"

Casey is known to have visited Bohemian Grove camp Mandalay around 1980. Important adviser to Reagan 1981-1987. Director CIA 1981-1987. In the early 1980s, Casey was able to funnel almost $200,000 to Brian Crozier, the former head of Le Cercle who undermined the Labour government of Harold Wilson, for his 61 efforts. Crozier met with Casey, a member of Le Cercle, on several occasions during this time period. Casey and Oliver North supposedly never told Crozier about the Iran Contra affair, or drug imports for that matter. Spartacus Schoolnet:

"On 16th March, 1984, William Francis Buckley, a diplomat attached to the U.S. Embassy in Beirut was kidnapped by the Hezbollah, a fundamentalist Shiite group with strong links to the Ruhollah Khomeini regime. Buckley was tortured and it was soon discovered that he was the CIA station chief in Beirut. Buckley had also worked closely with William Casey in the secret negotiations with the Iranians in 1980. Buckley had a lot to tell his captors. He eventually signed a 400 page statement detailing his activities in the CIA. He was also videotaped making this confession. Casey asked Ted Shackley for help in obtaining Buckley’s freedom... The following month, Ted Shackley traveled to Hamburg where he met General Manucher Hashemi, the former head of SAVAK’s counterintelligence division at the Atlantic Hotel... At the meeting Shackley told Hashemi and Ghorbanifar that the United States was willing to discuss arms shipments in exchange for the four Americans kidnapped in Lebanon. The problem with the proposed deal was that William Francis Buckley was already dead (he had died of a heart-attack while being tortured). Ted Shackley recruited some of the former members of his CIA Secret Team to help him with these arm deals."

Besides arms shipments in return for the hostages, the Republicans of the Reagan team, including Casey and Bush Sr., also arranged with the Iranians to have the hostages released after the US elections, as this would almost certainly guarantee that Jimmy Carter would lose. This scandal would be called the October Surprise. Rodney Stich, 'Those Ugly Americans: 20th and 21st Centuries', p. 108 & 137:

"One of the key meetings [of Iran Contra and the October Surprise conspiracy] occurred at the PepsiCo International Headquarters building in Barcelona, Spain in late July 1980. One of my CIA sources was present with Casey at that meeting, arranging for procurement and shipment of the arms from various European locations to Iran via Israel. The final meeting occurred in Paris on the October 19, 1980, weekend... Salinger described his conversations with respected American journalist, David Andelman, who was the ghostwriter of the 1992 memoirs of Alexandre de Marenches, French spy chief [and friend of Gen. Vernon Walters; and like Casey and Walters, a member of SMOM; Arnaud de Borchgrave is related to one of De Mareches' Belgian cousins]. At Salinger’s request, Andelman asked Marenches about the alleged Paris meetings involving Casey and Bush. Salinger wrote in his book, “Andelman came back to me and said that Marenches had finally agreed [that] he organized the meeting, under the request of an old friend, William Casey.... Marenches and Casey had known each other well during the days of World War II. Marenches added that while he prepared the meeting, he did not attend it.” Andelman testified to this admission before the House October Surprise task force in December 1992, but as with other creditable witnesses, this testimony was ignored so as to deny the existence of this crime."

Casey modeled himself on the likes of Allen Dulles and John McCone (Bohemian Grove camp Mandalay), who ran things in the 1950s and early 1960s before serious questions were raised about the morality of covert action on a global scale. He thought Walter Bedell Smith, Allen Dulles, John McCone, Richard Helms, and George Bush were all great CIA directors. Bobby Ray Inman (director ONI; director DIA; director NSA; director Wackenhut; director SAIC) was his deputy director at the CIA in 1981 and 1982. He resigned in 1982 after a heated dispute with Casey (and Sharon) about limiting Israel's access to satellite data from locations over 250 miles from Israel itself. Inman was afraid that Israel would set the Middle-East on fire and Caspar Weinberger (Pilgrims Society executive in late 1980s and 1990s) supported this notion. According to Watergate journalist Carl Bernstein, Casey gave Pope John Paul II unprecedented access to CIA intelligence, including spy satellites and agents. In a 2006 interview Inman claimed that Casey intensely disliked George Bush, Sr. In 1981, Casey was called upon to co-ordinate the Polish Crisis where the Solidarity movement had risen up against the Soviet regime. This movement was largely organized by Opus Dei and funded through Calvi's (and Pesenti's) Banco Ambrosiano (according to Calvi, to the tune of $1 billion over several years). As a member of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta, Casey immediately decided to fly to Rome, together with co-SMOM members general Alexander Haig (Pilgrims Society executive) and general Vernon Walters. Unfortunately for Casey, he was under investigation by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and couldn't go. Instead, he send Vernon Walters who visited the Vatican about a dozen times in the next five months. Walters arranged for Reagan to meet the Pope in June 1982. During the same time, Alexander Haig and William Clark were conferring with Cardinal Casaroli (Pro-Opus Dei, if not a member; Vatican Secretariat of State during the 1980s; seen by Calvi as one of his enemies and Calvi supposedly had "compromising documents" on him; appointed the "three wisemen" in July 1982 to "investigate" the Vatican Bank's dealings with Calvi's Banco Ambrosiano. Among the three was former UBS chair and white collar criminal Philippe De Weck) and Archbishop Achille Silvestrini (under-secretary of Casaroli) in another part of the Vatican. Casey couldn't attend these meetings too, as Israel had just invaded Lebanon. On other occasions Casey would rarely visit Europe or the Middle-East without first stopping in Rome for a meeting with the Pope. Casey loved to take foreign policy advise from Cardinal John J. Krol, Archbishop of Philadelphia; Cardinal Terence Cooke of New York, the successor of Cardinal Francis Spellman and the Grand Protector and Spiritual Advisor of the Military Order of Malta; Archbishop (later Cardinal) Pio Laghi, former the Vatican's top man in Buenos Aires. All of these Cardinals were strong Opus Dei supporters. Casey, with support of the Vatican, harnessed radical Islam to counter the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. This way he hoped to contain the Soviets in the Hindu Kush mountains while the radical Muslims would be too busy to turn on some of the Middle-East dictators sponsored by the West. He convinced the Saudis to largely bankroll this operation. Under Casey the CIA supplied the Mujahedin with 30mm anti-tank guns, .50 caliber sniper rifles (provided with a self-destructive round if the gun was to be left behind), special forces Parapoint systems, Stinger anti-aircraft missiles, and training courses by ISA and Delta Force special forces. With the British MI6 and Pakistani ISI, the CIA agreed to mount guerilla actions in Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. The Afghan opposition leader with whom these operations were coordinated was Gulbuddin Hikmetyar. Casey also committed the CIA to support an ISI operation that recruited Muslims from all over the world to come to Pakistan and fight with the Mujahedin in Afghanistan. December 13, 2003, The Guardian, 'Smart money' (a combined review of Loretta Napoleoni's 'Modern Jihad: Tracing the Dollars Behind the Terror Networks' and Jeffrey Robinson's 'The Sink: Terror, Crime and Dirty Money in the Offshore World'):

"William Casey, Reagan's CIA chief, used Pakistan and its BCCI bank as fronts to train Afghan rebels against the Soviets. Covert operations required a "black network" within the bank and its state equivalent, the notorious ISI. The bank financed and brokered covert arms deals, complete with full laundry service. The short and logical step from there was a BCCI/ISI/CIA move into drug smuggling to feed the needy, and leaky, money pipeline to the Mujahedin. The Pakistan-Afghan connection became the biggest single supplier of heroin to the US, meeting 60% of demand, with annual profits a stratospheric $100-$200 billion."

The BCCI was set up by Agha Hasan Abedi of the obscure and elite 1001 Club, mainly tied to the financial interests in London. The shady MI6 operative, Privy Counsellor, and Cercle chairman Julian Amery was an advisor to the BCCI. His protege Jonathan Aitken, the follow-up chair of Le Cercle, has been accused of massive illegal arms with the Saudis. 2002 (third edition), John Cooley, 'Unholy Wars', p. 110-111:

"With President Reagan and CIA Director William Casey, a new era began. On January 21, 1982, the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) which had largely avoided drug matters, was plunged squarely into them. Attorney-General William French Smith announced that the FBI, instead of the DEA, would henceforth control anti-drug campaigns inside the United States. This effectively ended hitherto secret cooperation between the two services. It moved the DEA, which was struggling to control drug trafficking both inside and from outside the United States, further away from the main power centers in the Afghanistan war: President Reagan’s National Security Council (NSC) and Casey’s CIA. Casey was now able secretly to engineer an exemption, sparing the CIA from a legal requirement to report on drug smuggling by CIA officers, agents or other “assets.” Attorney Smith granted exemption in a secret memorandum on February 11, 1982, two months after President Reagan had authorized covert CIA support for the Nicaraguan anti-Communist Contra army. Investigative work in Washington in the late 1990s has disclosed that Casey realized that the CIA would face a serious legal dilemma if federal law continued to require it to report drug smuggling by its agents. On March 2, 1982, Casey thanked Smith for the exemption which, Casey wrote, helped to protect intelligence sources and methods. After many details of CIA knowledge, if not control, of large-scale cocaine traffic from South America became public, President Clinton’s administration in 1995 quietly rescinded the CIA narcotics exemption. The Contra-cocaine issue arose again in 1996 with investigative articles by a reporter for a California newspaper. Despite CIA denials, the Agency’s inspector-general, Frederick P. Hitz, compiled a two-volume investigative report. He admitted that the CIA did indeed know about Contra drug trafficking and covered it up. The second volume reportedly was even more damning for the CIA, but at this writing it hasn’t been released."

2002 (third edition), John Cooley, 'Unholy Wars', p. 108-110:

"All close observers of the war knew that the drug smugglers carried weapons into Afghanistan and took drugs back with them. Heroin laboratories began to spring up in the rear of the various Afghan battle­fronts... The Soviet account quotes the American Left-liberal magazine, Rolling Stone, reporting on a powerful narcobusiness network, including vast new fields of opium poppies on both sides of the Afghan-Pakistan border, created during the jihad. It was “complete with well-planned routes and a whole network of dozens of factories” to process the opium into morphine base and heroin. “Western experts” [names and nationalities unspecified] supervised creation of the labs in camps of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar’s [very radical and an associate of Bin Laden] group. However -and here, interestingly, the Russian view of the wartime drug traffic diverges from the Western one - “the real ‘King of Heroin,’” said Shvedov’s Russian team, “is considered to be Gaylani who has far surpassed Hekmatyar in narcobusiness and controls the overwhelming majority of the operations of the opium mafia.” The CIA, the Russians added, was working closely with both Hekmatyar and Gaylani... Sayad Ahmed Gaylani, called “Effendi Juan” by compatriots, headed the NIF [National Islamic Front of Afghanistan]. He was a wealthy Afghan aristocrat, supporter of the exiled king, Zahir Shah. Gaylani had a strong bent for business. In 1952 he married a woman of the royal dynasty, the Durranis. He wisely invested profits from holding the sales franchise for Peugeot cars in Kabul. At the same time, he kept the religious prestige attached to his descent from the Qadiriya brotherhood, one of the mystic Sufi orders of South Asian Islam... The Soviet intelligence report on Gaylani’s NIF found that it “has significant financial resources. Besides the aid from various foundations in the USA, Western Europe and Arab countries, it makes profit on selling drugs and exacting taxes from the population.""

Gailani is, an American-educated commander, is one of more than a dozen Mujahedin rebel groups in Afghanistan. He's a Pashtun royalist seeking the return of King Mohammed Zahir Shah, who is in exile in Rome. September 30, 2001, Star Tribune, 'Drug trade filled coffers of Taliban, Bin Laden group':

"Alfred McCoy, a professor of Southeast Asian history at the University of Wisconsin, said U.S. and Pakistani intelligence officials sanctioned the rebels' drug trafficking because of their fierce opposition to the Soviets. Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, a rebel leader who received $1 billion in covert CIA funds, was a major heroin trafficker, according to McCoy. Afghan opium production ballooned from 250 tons in 1982 to 2,000 tons in 1991."

Earlier, it is known that the CIA, in collaboration with other US intelligence groups and special forces, was importing hundreds of tons of heroine in the US from the Golden Triangle in Shan Land, Burma. The money was largely laundered through the Nugan Hand Bank in Australia. Ted Shackley, Richard Armitage, and mafia boss Santos Trafficante were as those that handled the heroin coming from the Golden Triangle. William Colby, Casey, George Bush, and again Shackley were named in the Nugan Hand Bank affair. The far less well known follow-up of the Nugan Hand Bank was Bishop, Baldwin, Rewald, Dillingham and Wong (BBRDW). Rodney Stich, 'Those Ugly Americans: 20th and 21st Centuries', p. 342 & 343:

"In March 1996, I acquired several boxes containing hundreds of CIA documents generated from the CIA’s secret operation in Hawaii, and within these boxes I found highly sensitive material, including notes that Rewald had made while the titular head of BBRDW. Certain notes and information provided to me by Rewald divulged CIA drug related activities, including drug money laundering. As I gathered from looking over the material and by talking with Rewald, he was unaware of much of the CIA activities originating out of BBRDW... Deeply imbedded in these documents was an envelope labeled “Lawyer- Client information.” The information was dynamite, divulging secret activities, including CIA drug trafficking, and CIA funding of secret overseas bank accounts for high U.S. officials. The information in this envelope included information from the “Green Book” that the CIA sought to get from Rewald while he was in the hospital recovering from the combination suicide and assassination attempt. The notes in the envelope listed high-level people with secret CIA-funded accounts. The names on the left side of the notes were the aliases Rewald used to identify the people on the right for which there were secret bank accounts opened and funded by the CIA through BBRDW.... Irwin M. Peach [=] George Bush... Mr. Bramble [=] George Bush... Mr. Branch [=] Richard Armitage... Mr. Denile [=] William Casey... Rewald‘s notes also indicated that fictitious names were used to hide money for B.K. Kim, Philippines’ President Ferdinand, and Imelda Marcos, among others."

Rodney Stich, 'Those Ugly Americans: 20th and 21st Centuries', p. 340:

"In November 1984, CIA Director William Casey complained to the Federal Communication Commission about the ABC television network for having aired a show featuring CIA agent Scott Barnes. In the television presentation Barnes said he was asked by two CIA agents in Honolulu to kill Ronald Rewald. This airing had the danger of revealing the CIA role in BBRDW and could expose an endless number of other covert CIA proprietaries and operations..."

June 29, 1999, Michael Ruppert, 'Don't Blink!':

"ABC's Peter Jennings, by the way, had been doing a series of investigative reports on the CIA drug bank (and successor to the Nugan Hand bank) Bishop, Baldwin, Rewald, Dillingham and Wong [BBRDW] when the buyout was initiated. Cap Cities (not surprisingly) secured SEC approval in record time and effectively and immediately silenced Peter Jennings who had previously refused to back down from Casey's threats. Thereafter ABC was referred to as "The CIA network." I have no doubt that the ABC "object lesson" was front and center for CNN founder Ted Turner and Time-Warner when Henry Kissinger, Colin Powell and (CIA vet) John Singlaub put the pressure on in the wake of April Oliver's 1998 "dead bang accurate" Sarin gas stories connecting CIA to the killing of American defectors."

Rodney Stich, 'Those Ugly Americans: 20th and 21st Centuries', p. 326:

"Parker said that [Michael] Hand [of Nugan Hand Bank] and Vice President George Bush were in frequent contact after Bush became vice president, and while Australian authorities were searching for Hand. Parker stated that CIA Director William Casey frequently met with Hand in Panama in the early 1980s concerning arms sales and drug trafficking. Parker stated that he and Hand took over one of the drug trafficking operations for the CIA in Central and South America. He said that Hand’s experience in developing the Golden Triangle drug operations for the CIA made him useful in expanding the drug operations from Central and South America into the United States...."

Casey, like his CIA predecessors, worked closely with drug smuggler Manuel Noriega (trained at the School of the Americas, a US-based assassination school) from Panama and the different cocaine/heroine cartels, like Medellin and Cali. The profits were used for all kinds of black ops. January 28, 1990, Washington Post, 'The Case Against Noriega':

"On Monday, November 14, 1983, Noriega's entourage took off for Washington... all expenses paid by the U.S. government. Almost two whole days, however, were set aside for the institutions that already had long-standing working relations with Noriega. At CIA headquarters in Langley, Noriega was swept off for a meeting with CIA Director William Casey. Back in Panama, Noriega would later boast about his four-hour lunch with Casey..."

In 1988, Noriega fell out of favor in Washington after some disputes about drug and arms profits. Therefore the US invaded Panama and brought Noriega to trial on drug trafficking charges. Some important revelations were made during this trial. September 4, 1991, Washington Post, 'Noriega Defense Team Vows to Detail Secret U.S. Deals':

"More than 20 months after he was toppled by a U.S. invasion, Manuel Antonio Noriega will go to trial on drug trafficking charges in federal court Thursday, and his defense lawyers vow to disclose new details about the former Panamanian dictator's secret dealings with the Central Intelligence Agency and high-level U.S. government officials... Court papers filed here describe Noriega as the CIA's "man in Panama" whose activities were conducted with the full consent and knowledge of the U.S. intelligence community for more than two decades... No written records tie Noriega directly to drug trafficking, prosecution sources said. But 60 to 80 government witnesses - many of them convicted drug traffickers, arms dealers and other felons - are expected to testify that he took multimillion-dollar payoffs from the Medellin drug cartel to turn his country into a "safe haven" for shipment of cocaine from Colombia to the United States... But most importantly, the motion describes Noriega's pivotal role in assisting CIA efforts to arm Nicaraguan contra guerrillas. Without citing new evidence, it calls that effort a "guns-for-drugs" policy in which drug-sale proceeds were used to finance shipment of arms to the contras. In addition, the filings - with heavy deletions from the security officer - allude to two meetings with Bush in 1976 and 1983 and numerous others with such figures as the late CIA director William J. Casey and former National Security Council aide Oliver L. North."

August 23, 1991, The Miami Herald, 'Noriega: CIA, DEA OKd Deals':

"Manuel Noriega says he had good reasons for allowing drugs and guns to slip through Panama: The last seven CIA directors, including George Bush, asked him to help with the guns, while four directors of the Drug Enforcement Administration sought his help on the drugs... The weapons shipments were destined for Nicaragua and Honduras, the papers said. Besides Bush, the CIA directors who asked Noriega to allow them to travel through Panama included Richard Helms, William Colby, James Schlesinger, Stansfield Turner, William Casey and William Webster... The DEA directors who purportedly asked Noriega to allow drugs to pass through his country included Terrance Burk, Francis Mullen, Jack Lawn and John Ingersoll... Diane Cossin, a spokeswoman for the U.S. attorney's office, said the prosecution will present evidence that links Noriega's BCCI money and drugs."

June 24, 1985, Miami Herald:

"Also involved in the anti-Sandinista [Contra] effort are several of Reagan's millionaire friends including beer tycoon Joseph Coors and industrialist J. Peter Grace... Grace spokesman Fred Bona said his boss "may have" asked the Central American chapters of the 900-year-old Knights of Malta order to help distribute privately collected humanitarian aid among Nicaraguan refugees. Grace heads the group's U.S. chapter. Former Treasury secretary William Simon and CIA Director William Casey also belong to the Knights of Malta. Simon and Grace declined comment on whether they had ever discussed with Casey alternate ways to help the contras. Simon heads the Nicaraguan Freedom Fund, a private aid group initially launched by the Unification Church-owned [Moonies] newspaper The Washington Times which received a letter from President Reagan dated May 30, 1985, expressing "wholehearted" support for its activity on behalf of the contras... While the contras get humanitarian aid from these groups, they rely mainly on retired Army Maj. Gen. John Singlaub and his World Anti-Communist League for private military aid."

Celerino Castillo, 'Powderburns - Cocaine, Contras, & the Drug War':

"The American Public would quickly lose interest in the Iran Contra scandal... Had they discovered our government hired and protected a squad of drug traffickers, and they gave them free passes into the U.S., the story might have ended very differently... My informants were perfectly placed... They fed me the names of Contra pilots. Again and again, those names showed up in the DEA database as documented drug traffickers. When I pursued the case, my superiors quietly and firmly advised me to move on to other investigations... I'll never forget Corr's [U.S. ambassador to El Salvador] response. "It's a White House operation, Cele. Stay away from it.""

Cele, a high level DEA agent, was assigned to represent the DEA in El Salvador at the height of the Contra war. It was there that he began to record intelligence on how known drug traffickers, with multiple DEA files, used hangars four and five at Ilopango airfield to ferry cocaine north and weapons and money south. Hangars four and five were owned and operated by the CIA and the National Security Council. He found out that the traffickers were also being given US visas by the CIA, in spite of their well known activities. Castillo also documented and spoke out about CIA and National Security Agency abuses in a manner utterly consistent with his heritage and the reats of his life. Then Cele discovered that the Contra flights were under the direct supervision of US Lt. Col. Oliver North and had the additional protection of Felix Rodriguez (a retired CIA agent) who ran hanger 4 at Ilopango. Castillo was repeatedly warned that the drug profits were being utilized to support the Reagan-Bush backed right-wing "Contras" in Nicaragua and surrounding countries and that he should stop his investigations. December 1998, Michael Ruppert, 'Only the Godfather':

"... a lingering and persistent body of evidence persists which indicates that Jim Sabow was murdered because he caught the CIA flying drugs onto a base where he was Chief of Air Operations. Much of the evidence indicates that the cocaine arrived on the same C-130s which had been given to the Forest Service. In a 1993 segment of her news program Eye to Eye, Connie Chung covered the Sabow death in detail and showed evidence of the murder by introducing statements from Sabow's brother, a medical doctor, that Sabow had been unconscious and aspirating blood for minutes before a shotgun was rammed so far down his throat that it sheared off the uvula. In that same segment, veteran Air America and CIA pilot Tosh Plumley stated that he flew loads of cocaine as large as 2,000 kilos onto El Toro in the years and months prior to Sabow's death - for the CIA. Plumley stated clearly that he was flying C-130s operated by the Forest Service and their contractors. In later conversations with this writer Plumley admitted that he routinely flew loads as large as 2,500 kilos onto military installations in California and Arizona for the CIA."

1991, Bo Gritz (ISA commander and Delta Force), 'Called to Serve', p. 341:

"I remembered the time in Panama in 1976, when I was commanding Special Forces in Latin America from headquarters at Fort Gulick in the Canal Zone. We had obtained information through our intelligence channels that Manuel Noriega was not only allied with the communists, but was also a drug smuggler. I recommended - and we had the means - to terminate Noriega "with extreme prejudice," since he was clearly hurting America and was behind the sabotage of our military facilities within the Canal Zone. Surprisingly enough, I was personally told to keep my hands off Noriega, that he was "of immense value at the highest levels of our government."

July 23, 1998, Michael Ruppert, 'The POWs, CIA and Drugs':

"The ISA, which ran Gritz's mission, was created by Army General Richard Stilwell. It has been repeatedly linked to drug smuggling by sources including the daughter of Col. Albert Carone who served as Oliver North's bagman and bill-payer during the eighties. Records left behind after Carone's death in 1990 and eyewitness statements clearly indicate that Carone handled both drugs and drug money for CIA, North and the NSC. Carone's personal phone book contains the home addresses and telephone numbers of William Casey [Le Cercle], Gambino crime boss Pauly Castellano and Stilwell [Le Cercle]."

2004, Michael Ruppert, 'Crossing the Rubicon', p. 164:

"A retired NYPD Detective, also a “made” member of the Genovese crime family, Carone spent his entire working career as a CIA operative... For more than 25 years before his mysterious death in 1990, Al Carone served as a bagman and liaison between George Bush, CIA Director Bill Casey, Oliver North, Richard Nixon [Le Cercle] and many other prominent figures including Robert Vesco [1001 Club], Manuel Noriega and Ferdinand Marcos."

Carone, a member of the Knights of Malta, was good friends with Santos Trafficante, Sam Giancana, Vito Genovese, and William Casey. Casey used Carone as a "cut out" to pass sensitive insider information to Mob capo Pauley Castellano, says his daughter, Dee. Carone was the bagman for Casey and Oliver North in many of their drug trafficking exploits. Casey was deeply involved in the BCCI, the bank whose extreme money laundering practices were exposed in 1991. 1992, Senator John Kerry and Senator Hank Brown, Report to the Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate, part 11:

"In the case of BCCI, former CIA officials, including former CIA director Richard Helms and the late William Casey; former and current foreign intelligence officials, including Kamal Adham and Abdul Raouf Khalil; and principal foreign agents of the U.S., such as Adnan Khashoggi and Manucher Ghorbanifar, float in and out of BCCI at critical times in its history, and participate simultaneously in the making of key episodes in U.S. foreign policy... On February 23, 1992, NBC News broadcast the allegation that former Director of Central Intelligence William Casey met secretly for three years with Abedi [1001 Club; head of the BCCI], that such meetings took place every few months at the Madison Hotel in Washington, D.C., and that they discussed matters relating to U.S. arms deals to Iran and the arming of Afghani rebels... The BCCI official explicitly described meetings between Casey and Abedi at the Madison Hotel in the mid-1980's... The late Cyrus Hashemi, an Iranian expatriate living in London, is a key figure in the "October Surprise" allegations charging that William Casey and other members of President Reagan's election team in 1980 engaged in negotiations with Iran, whereby Iran would delay the return of U.S. hostages held in Iran until after the November, 1980 election, in return for the U.S. providing Iran with needed arms for its war against Iraq."

A legal case brought before the District Court of Washington, D.C. in 1983, 12 citizens of Nicaragua and 12 members of the U.S. Congress sued President Reagan, CIA Director William Casey, former Secretary of State Alexander Haig, Secretary of State George Shultz, Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs Thomas Enders, Vernon Walters, Caspar Weinberger, Nestor Sanchez, and John Negroponte for violations of the law respecting U.S. support of the Contras. After being dismissed, the case was appealed to the Court of Appeals. The judge who filed the opinion on Aug. 13, 1985 affirming the dismissal was then Circuit Court judge and now U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia (spoke at the Bohemian Grove). Casey is reported to have been a good friend of George Shultz, Vernon Walters, Alexandre de Marenches, and Ronald Reagan. In his book 'The Conspirators' Al Martin claims that CZX Productions, which supposedly stood for "Casey, (adm.) Zumwalt, X-Files", was an Office of Naval Intelligence cut-out and one of the blackest parts of the Iran Contra dope affair. True or not, doing a bit of background checking (only one reference has turned up), it turns out that Dietrich Reinhardt, a shady Iran-Contra operative now connected to the flight school of Rudi Dekkers (dope-trafficking terrorists), was a partner in that firm. Martin also claims CZX and Casey made Oliver North head of the "National Programs Office," whose existence still is not confirmed. The NPO supposedly controlled much of the dope trafficking operations, the building of the US "Civilian Inmate Labor Camps", and the operations to some day overthrow the US government. Admiral Zumwalt, an associate of Casey since the 1970s and a major anti-communist warhawk, is part of a secret ONI group called "Goal Oversight Development" (GOD), according to Martin. No proof or other rumors exist about this group, but according to Martin GOD has/had almost unlimited powers to intimidate and assassinate people. December 17, 1986, The Times Union, 'CIA chief listed stable':

"Casey, 73, continued to undergo diagnostic tests designed to determine the cause of two minor cerebral seizures he suffered Monday, the hospital said. Casey had been scheduled to testify Tuesday before the Senate Intelligence Committee on the arms sale to Iran and the diversion of proceeds to the Nicaraguan rebels... Earlier, CIA spokeswoman Kathy Pherson said agency officials who talked with Casey on Monday found him "lucid and pretty cheerful" and "joking with the nurses."... Casey remained mentally clear throughout the episodes, a hospital doctor said."

December 30, 1986, San Jose Mercury News, 'Casey's condition is stable':

"CIA Director William Casey continues to recover at Georgetown University Hospital where he underwent surgery Dec. 18 for the removal of a cancerous brain tumor, a spokeswoman said today... Hospital spokeswoman Cynthia Byers said Casey's condition remains stable and he is "fully conscious and sitting up periodically.""

In January 1987 the operation was deemed successful, but it turned out he had other cancers that were spreading to other parts of his body (supposedly, he was already a year under treatment for prostate cancer). He died in May 1987 of pneumonia, a few weeks after Congress had begun looking into Casey mental health to determine if he could testify from his bed. In reaction to his death, Senator Patrick Leahy, the former vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said:

"Casey probably knew more than anyone about the Iran-Contra affair, with the possible exception of fired White House aide Oliver North... And of course that we'll never know, because he didn't really tell us much about it before he died."

July 11, 1987, San Jose Mercury News, 'Plan labeled 'Government within our government':

"William Casey, the late CIA director, seized upon the Iran arms dealings as a way to create a secret contingency fund to finance a wide range of covert operations outside regular government channels, Lt. Col. Oliver North told Congress Friday. Sen. Daniel Inouye, D-Hawaii, termed the scheme a "secret government within our government," and Sen. William Cohen, R- Maine, said the disclosure was "perhaps the most serious revelation" of the 2-month-old hearings into the Iran-Contra affair... North rejected the characterization of Senate committee chief counsel Arthur Liman that the operations were a "CIA outside of the CIA." But House Intelligence Committee Chairman Louis Stokes, D-Ohio, told reporters "that's what it amounted to," and charged that a main reason for the scheme was a desire to avoid any oversight by Congress."

In 1996 the neocon Center for Security Policy (CSP) created a compartment named William J. Casey Institute. It was tasked with studying,

"the nexus between international financial, energy, trade and technology flows and traditional U.S. national security policy concerns."

Just one week before Casey got his seizures (he was already dying of cancer) he allegedly wrote an affidavit, with Cercle member Nixon as his witness, that in part outlined the CIA's involvement in the drug trade to finance covert ops. He also gave his justifications for it (which basically constituted a big "fuck you" to Congress and everyone else who might not agree) and certainly didn't forget to mention Bill Clinton's role in it (while forgetting the role of all his political allies, or other groups within the government).

The document was leaked to the daughter of Albert Carone and has since then been classified Top Secret. According to Mike Ruppert, the document is factually correct, but it could still be a fake.

Cavendish, Anthony

Sources: 1993, Alan Clark, 'Diaries', p. 369-374; June 29, 1997, The Independence, 'Aitken dropped by the Right's secret club; Is it the ultimate dishonour' (named as an old member); September 5, 2004, Sunday Times, 'Le Cercle of the elite' ("thought to include")

Not a family member of the Dukes of Devonshire. Former MI6 officer. Worked with George Kennedy Young and James Goldsmith in the past. Member Unison Committee for Action, which was set up in 1973 to counter the threat from Labour Unions, which supposedly were infiltrated by Soviet intelligence. Army general Walter Walker and MI6 head George Kennedy Young were involved with this group. Has been a long time friend of the former MI6 Director General (1973-1978) Sir Maurice Oldfield. In his memoirs, that have been partly censored by the British government, he defends Oldfield from charges that he was a Soviet mole. December 28, 1987, The Times:

"Mr Cavendish, who left MI6 in 1953, has been trying to publish his book Inside Intelligence, to defend the reputation of his former friend and colleague, the late Sir Maurice Oldfield, ex-MI6 chief and Security Co-ordinator for Mrs Thatcher in Northern Ireland. The book contains many references to Sir Maurice, disputing allegations that he had homosexual relations with young men while he was Ulster security chief. It also details past MI6 covert operations, authorized by the Labour Government in the 1950s, which have been published in other books... Mr Julian Amery, Conservative MP for Brighton, Pavilion, who also received a copy of Mr Cavendish's book, declined to comment on the book itself but said that the Government's attitude towards publications by intelligence agents were 'wildly overdone'."

Supposedly, he also made the claim that 50% of MI6 is gay (In any case, Maurice Oldfield admitted that he "from time to time engaged in homosexual activities."). Known to have corresponded with Julian Amery in the 1990s, a former chairman of Le Cercle. Invested as a Knight First Class in the catholic Sacred Military Constantinian Order of Saint George in 2001. Promoted within the ranks of the Royal Order of Francis I, part of the Sacred Military Constantinian Order, to Knight Commander in 2005. Consultant to Nadhmi Auchi's business empire, who also has been honored by the Sacred Military Constantinian Order. He was still acting as a consultant in 2003 and could easily still do that today. Granta Magazine, issue 24:

"In 19--, Anthony Cavendish was made the -------------- officer of -----, the British ------. In 194-, he personally oversaw the illegal invasion of ------- that resulted in the deaths of ----------- of --------------. What did Cavendish finally see that we are not allowed to know now - over forty years later? And why has the British government spent hundreds of thousands of pounds trying to keep us from finding out?"

Cavendish, Andrew

Sources: 1993, Alan Clark, 'Diaries', p. 369-374

Not a family member of the Dukes of Devonshire. The younger of Le Cercle member and MI6 officer Anthony Cavendish. Major in the Life Guards. Served in the Sultan of Oman's Armoured Force. Friend of Alan Clark, who wrote about the 1990 Cercle meeting:

"Andrew appeared, tall and beautiful as ever. He moves among the delegates with a very faint smile on his face, but his eyes are always watching. What experience in childhood, what gene, makes him instinctively so observant, and from which side of the family does this gene come?... I detached myself from the group and we had supper together. Andrew told me of his tales, and of the mood among the Military. Oman is a long way from Iraq, and their traditional apprehension is of Iranian muscle, their principal irritant is South Yemen. But the men, many of them, think privately of Saddam as a hero, who is leading the West a dance."

Cecil, Robert Gascoyne (7th Marquess of Salisbury)

Sources: June 29, 1997, The Independence, 'Aitken dropped by the Right's secret club; Is it the ultimate dishonour' ; July 10, 1997 An Phoblacht/Republican News, 'Editor's Desk'; 18 June 2000, Sunday Telegraph / Lobster Magazine, Issue 40, winter 2000-2001

Member of the very powerful Cecil family that has produced numerous members of the Order of Garter and the Privy Council, starting with Sir William Cecil in the 1500s. They intermarried with elite blue blood families as de Vere, Arundel, Plantagenet, and Cavendish. Sir William Cecil was a student of John Dee, the official founder of Enochian Magic. The family forged links with the Republic of Venice around 1600 and built Hatfield House, which still is the family's residence, in 1607. William Cecil and his protege Sir Francis Walsingham devised an intricate spy network during the latter years of Elizabeth I's reign that succeeded in uncovering numerous Catholic plots against the monarch. Some people of that time have stated Cecil himself was a plotter behind these assassinations. Sir William Cecil’s daughter, Anne, married Edward de Vere, the 17th Earl of Oxford and a member of what was quite possibly the bluest of blue blood families in existence.

De Vere had worked for William Cecil and the throne since a young age and was later rumored to have written the works of Shakespeare. Lady Diana Cecil married the 18th Earl of Oxford.

This Pilgrim was the third son of (his namesake) Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury, who was a member of the Order of the Garter and the Privy Council. The 3rd Marquess of Salisbury was the Chancellor of Oxford University from 1869 to 1903, a fellow of All Souls, and a British prime minister for 14 years. Carroll Quigley described the Rhodes Secret Society and the Milner Group as having evolved from the 3rd Marquess' "Cecil Bloc". The 3rd Marquess grew to like Benjamin Disraeli, who he had previously been distrusted as a Jew. Disraeli eventually became a housefriend of the family and was invested into the Order of the Garter. Baron Lionel de Rothschild was another close friend of Disraeli. One of Cecil's sisters was the mother of Arthur J. Balfour (wrote a letter to Lionel de Rothschild in November 1917 declaring that the British government stood behind Zionist plans to build a Jewish national home in Palestine) and Gerald W. Balfour. Even today, the Hatfield House is the Hertfordshire home of the family, built between 1609 and 1611 by the1st Earl of Salisbury; a Privy Councillor and Knight of the Garter who was the Chief Minister to James I.

The 5th Marquess of Salisbury (KG; PC; married into Cavendish family) was president of the Conservative Monday Club from 1961 to 1972. This was the center of the pro-colonial movement in Britain, which even prepared for a coup against the "KGB-infiltrated" Labour government of Harold Wilson in the 1970s. General Walter Walker and later Cercle chairman Julian Amery were among the members of this club. His son, the 6th Marquess of Salisbury, took over the Conservative Monday Club in 1974 and ran it until 1981. September 13, 1965, The Times, letter of the 5th Marquess of Salisbury, 'Government in Rhodesia - Arguments against majority rule':

"[Churchmen] fall into the all too common error of assuming that the only form of Government compatible with the Christian way of life is majority rule. Actually, at any rate, in the case of primitive peoples, that has, I believe, never been so: nor, judging by our experience with other African states which have recently gained their independence, is it so now. Democracy is the most difficult of all sytems to work. It requires the highest degree of civilization. Can anyone who knows Rhodesia say that the average African in that country is ready for it yet? It could no doubt be argued - though I am sure that the signatories of the letter would not use such an argument - that majority rule is more important than the Christian way of life. But do they really expect anyone who has personal experience of Rhodesia to believe that the people of that country, whether white or black, would benefit either spiritually or materially by the introduction of majority rule at the present time?"

Lord Cranborne and later 7th Marquess of Salisbury. Born in 1946. Attended Eton College and Christ Church, Oxford and became a merchant banker before going to work on the family estates. He began using Robert as his preferred Christian name from his 21st birthday. In 1970, aged 23, he married Hannah Stirling, niece of Lt Col David Stirling. Stirling was the co-founder of the SAS, founder of GB 75 (seemingly a short-lived psyop in 1974), worked with MI6 at times, ran Television International Enterprises which ran a security service for overseas heads of state, was gold stick to the queen, and headed Operation Lock, a pro-apartheid assassination program in Southern Africa. Cecil was selected, unexpectedly, as Conservative candidate for South Dorset in 1976, where his family owned lands, despite the presence of several former MPs on the shortlist. He spoke at the 1978 Conservative Party conference to oppose sanctions on Rhodesia, which had broken off from England illegally to maintain its fascist white-minority regime. He won the seat in the 1979 general election, the seventh consecutive generation of his family to sit in the Commons, and in his first speech urged Ian Smith to stand aside in favour of Abel Muzorewa. He attracted a general reputation as a right-winger, especially on matters affecting the Church of England. Member of the Other Club since 1981, together with the Duke of Devonshire (Cavendish), Lord Carrington (Pilgrims Society president), Lord Richardson of Duntisbourne (major Pilgrims Society member), Lord Julian Amery (former head Le Cercle), Lord Rothschild, Lord Rees-Mogg, Prince Charles, Paul Channon (Le Cercle), Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, Sir Edward Heath, Sir Denis Thatcher, Winston S. Churchill (grandson of), and several dozen others. Took an interest in Northern Ireland, and when Jim Prior announced his policy of 'Rolling Devolution', resigned an unpaid job as assistant to Douglas Hurd. Lord Cranborne became known as an anti-communist through activities in support of Afghan refugees in Pakistan in the early 1980s, and sending food parcels to Poland (a joint operation of the Vatican, Opus Dei, SMOM and the CIA). He was involved in efforts to fund the Afghan resistance. His strong opposition to any involvement by the Republic of Ireland in Northern Ireland led him to oppose the Anglo-Irish Agreement and contributed to his decision to retire from Parliament in 1987. However, he had made a useful friendship with John Major while in Parliament. After the 1992 general election, Major utilised a rarely-used process known as a writ of acceleration, to call Lord Cranborne up to the House of Lords in one of his father's junior baronies. Lord Cranborne was summoned as Baron Cecil of Essendon (his father's most junior dignity), though continued to be known by his courtesy style of Viscount Cranborne. He served for two years as a junior Defence Minister before being appointed as Leader of the House of Lords. In 1994, he became a member of the Queen's Privy Council. When Major resigned to fight for re-election as Conservative Party Leader in July 1995, Lord Cranborne led his re-election campaign. He was recognised as one of the few members of the Cabinet who were personally loyal to Major, but continued to lead the Conservative Peers after Labour won the 1997 general election. March 30, 1997, The Independent, 'Courtiers down the centuries; Profile Robert Cranborne' (Lord Cranborne at the time and confidante of Prime Minister John Major):

"At least for a few weeks more, a Cecil is in a position the family knows well: very close to the seat of power. It may be a slight exaggeration to say that he is running the government, but Lord Cranborne, Lord Privy Seal and Leader of the Lords, is spending the election as chief of staff at No 10 Downing Street. The peer, who has emerged as something of an icon to the Conservative right, is not only the link between Central Office and No 10, but has day-to-day responsibility for the latter... As one (well-bred) Tory puts it: "Robert has a remarkably close relationship with the Prime Minister. He is an engaging figure with considerable charm. People rather like glimpsing into his solid, English, aristo world of which they are not a part. They find it rather intoxicating. The truth is that they all fall for the toffs - even Thatcher fell for Ridley."... After the Guards it was the City and in 1970 he married, causing a family crisis because his bride, Hannah Stirling (daughter [actually niece] of the founder of the SAS), was a Roman Catholic. The Cecils take the defence of Protestantism and the Church of England seriously and Robert's mother, Mollie, took time to be reconciled. A compromise was reached and the two sons (the "heir and the spare") were brought up as Anglicans, the three daughters as Roman Catholics. In 1978 domestic calm was shattered when Lord Cranborne's brother Richard was killed by guerrillas while filming in Rhodesia. The family were strong supporters of the white settlers - the name of the country's capital, Salisbury (after the 3rd Marquess), giving away the connection. Robert went to Africa to try to find out how his brother died. His brother's death seems only to have reinforced his public support for the whites. During the 1980s he helped organise a secret meeting between Ian Smith and Tory MPs, and backed sporting links with apartheid South Africa. For a decade Lord Cranborne had a habit of turning up in war zones, places he found intriguing, according to friends, because of his fascination with military history. Often visits were combined with business trips. He is thought to have done well financially during the 1970s although, as one observer remarks, "it's almost impossible to know with that family who's inherited and who's made money". Friends see him as a sort of 19th- century Romantic figure, popping up in support of the mujahedin's opposition to Soviet expansionism or to back Polish dissidents... Ironically, for someone now seen as a champion of the right, he did not prosper under Margaret Thatcher, perhaps because his Toryism is of a more "trad right" hue... But eight years in the Commons had not been wasted. For one thing Lord Cranborne had become good friends with a Conservative MP of more humble origins who was to go on to become the Prime Minister [John Major]... Mr Major joined later in the 1979 parliament and got on well with Lord Cranborne who, far from patronising the young MP, invited him to Cranborne for the weekend... Inviting Lord Cranborne to his Downing Street flat, Mr Major has more than once apologised for bringing a man used to inhabiting the great houses of England to such humble surroundings. When John Major won the last election he speeded Lord Cranborne into the House of Lords and, after a mere two years as a defence minister in the Lords (salvaging the VE-Day span-fritters fiasco), he was catapulted into the Cabinet with a direct line to the premier. Mr Major relies on him for advice, knowing that, unlike most of the other ministers around him, Lord Cranborne, who will never be party leader, is not a threat. He has thrown himself with enthusiasm into the job of leading the Lords... Meanwhile, his political salon at Cranborne Manor, and in London, attracts many of the most colourful right-wing thinkers, with a sprinkling of hard-line Unionists from the organisation he helped to found, the Friends of the Union... He is a fierce Eurosceptic, who, despite speaking excellent French, sincerely prefers Dorset to the Dordogne. Yet he has not actively engaged with the parliamentary sceptics... He practises politics only in the rather detached manner of someone who knows that his historical duties have been fulfilled and that he can always return to cultivate a rather substantial garden. "His agenda," says a close friend, "is rather different from the normal one. It looks 100 years ahead.""

When the new Prime Minister Tony Blair proposed the removal of the hereditary element in the House of Lords, Lord Cranborne negotiated a pact with the government to retain a small number (later set at ninety-two) of hereditary peers for the interim period. For the sake of form this amendment was formally proposed by Lord Weatherill, Convenor of the Cross-Bench Peers. However, Lord Cranborne gave his party's approval without consulting the Leader, William Hague (invited to Le Cercle), who knew nothing and was embarrassed when Blair told him of it in the House of Commons. Hague then sacked Lord Cranborne, who accepted his error, saying that he had "rushed in, like an ill-trained spaniel". All former Leaders of the House of Lords who were hereditary peers accepted Life Peerages to keep them in the House in 1999. Lord Cranborne, who had received the life Barony of Gascoyne-Cecil, remained active on the backbenches, until the House adopted new rules for declaration of financial interests which he believed were too problematic. Cranborne is known to have attended meetings of Le Cercle in the 1990s and 2000. Very good friend of Cercle chairman Julian Amery. Took 'Leave of Absence' on November 1, 2001. Therefore out of the House when he succeeded his father as 7th Marquess on July 11, 2003. Good friend of Lord Lamont, the Rothschild employee and Cercle chair. Member of the Other Club, together with the Duke of Devonshire (Cavendish), Lord Carrington (Pilgrims Society president), Lord Rothschild, Lord Rees-Mogg, Prince Charles, Lord Richardson of Duntisbourne (major Pilgrims Society member), Lord Julian Amery (Cercle head), Paul Channon (Le Cercle), Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, Sir Edward Heath, Sir Denis Thatcher, and Winston S. Churchill (grandson of). Member of the Grillion's Club, together with the Duke of Norfolk (Howard), the Duke of Devonshire (Cavendish), the Earl of Perth (Drummond), Lord Carrington, Lord Richardson of Duntisbourne, Nicholas Baring (vice chair Baring Brothers until 1989) and John Major. Like his father and a number of ancestors, a member of the Roxburghe Club, together with the several generations of the Dukes of Norfolk, the Dukes of Devonshire, the Earls of Perth, the Rothschilds, Oppenheimers, Lord Rees-Mogg, and formerly Paul Mellon.

His uncle and namesake was chairman of the Supreme Economic Council of the Versailles Peace Treaty, member of the Pilgrims Society, first chairman of the Royal Institute of International Affairs, and a principal draftsmen of the League of Nations Covenant in 1919. The 3rd Marquess of Salisbury was possibly the most important founder of Quigley's Round Table. An older generation Robert Cecil, either the 1th Viscount of Chelwood or the 5th Marquess of Salisbury, is supposed to have said:

"The Blood of Christ was replaced by the blood of the German war dead. From the Mayas to the Nazis, the shedding of blood to attract the attention of indifferent powers was the magic significance of human sacrifice. He would have sacrificed the happiness of the whole human race if ordered to do so by the mysterious Force whose commands he obeyed."

This is very similar to what Lord Lothian said to the New York Pilgrims on the eve of WWII:

"At bottom we are fighting a defensive war. We are trying to prevent the hordes of paganism and barbarism destroying what is left of civilized Europe."

It is also similar to what Fritz Kramer supposedly said according to his son:

"[He] publicly denounced Hitler's National Socialists as barbarian pagans and their communist rivals as proletarian thugs. He sometimes carried his small German imperial flag with its Christian cross of Malta into their street demonstrations..."

Channon, Paul

Sources: 1993, Alan Clark, 'Diaries', p. 369-374; June 29, 1997, The Independence, 'Aitken dropped by the Right's secret club; Is it the ultimate dishonour'

Born in 1935. Member of the aristocratic Guinness family from Ireland. Conservative member of parliament for Southend West until 1997 at which time, he stood down and was created a Life Peer. On 7 July 1972, Mac Stíofáin (one of the more violent leaders of the IRA) led an IRA delegation to a secret meeting with members of the British government, led by Secretary of State for Northern Ireland William Whitelaw, at Cheyne Walk in London. This was the Chelsea home of Paul Channon. Other IRA leaders in attendance were Dáithí Ó Conaill, Martin McGuinness, Gerry Adams, Seamus Twomey and Ivor Bell. Very much in charge, Mac Stíofáin spelled out the three basis demands of the Provisionals: (1) The future of Ireland to be decided by the people of Ireland acting as a unit; (2) a British government Declaration of Intent to withdraw from Ireland by January 1975 and (3) the unconditional release of all political prisoners. Member of the Other Club since 1973, together with the 7th Marquess of Salisbury (Le Cercle), the Duke of Devonshire (Cavendish), Lord Carrington (Pilgrims Society president), Lord Richardson of Duntisbourne (major Pilgrims Society member), Lord Rothschild, Lord Rees-Mogg, Lord Julian Amery (former Cercle chairman), Prince Charles, Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, Sir Edward Heath, Sir Denis Thatcher, and Winston S. Churchill. Channon's daughter Olivia was found dead in 1986 after a heroin overdose in the bed of Count Gottfried von Bismarck, a German nobleman living and partying in London. Von Bismarck has been described as:

"... looking a bit strange. Pale, thin and sweating a lot but full, as ever, of brilliant and obscure conversation. He knows an awful lot about 19th and 20th century German and English history - much more than most English - but he definitely came across as a darkly complex man."

(Update: in the mean time, in October 2007, Count von Bismarck shot himself chock full of cocaine and jumped off his balcony. October 11, 2007, The Daily Mail:

"It was from the roof terrace of this penthouse apartment [where the Count was found] that a partygoer plunged 60ft to his death last August after a gay orgy hosted by the homosexual von Bismarck... A pathologist told the hearing the 44-year-old's body contained the highestlevel of the drug he had ever seen... [The Count's friend] said: 'Gottfried had been up since Wednesday morning until early Fridaymorning. When he collapsed after a binge of partying it wasn't unlike him to sleep for 24 or 36 hours.' Tests on his body revealed that the levels of cocaine and heroin in his blood were both 'in the fatal range', the inquest heard. According to toxicologists, just 0.99mg of cocaine per litre of bloodis enough to kill, but von Bismarck's level was almost five times that amount.

Pathologist Professor Sebastian Lucas said Bismarck had advanced liver diseasecaused by years of alcohol abuse as well as HIV and hepatitis B and C.").

President of the Board of Trade and Secretary of State for Trade and Industry 1986-1987. Secretary of State for Transport 1987-1989. Sir Richard Loose, Sir Adam Butler and Paul Channon had been at university together and they were the ministers of state at the foreign office, the defence ministry and the department of trade during the same time. Seems to be a willing servant of the Lockerbie coverup. During his time as trade minister he allowed a chlorine plant to be sold secretly to Iraq by the British company Uhde Ltd, in the knowledge that it was likely to be used to make mustard and nerve gas, which was used in the war with Iran. Channon also instructed the export credit guarantee department (ECGD) to keep details of the deal secret from the public. Attended the 1990 Pinay meeting in Oman. Present at the memorial service of former Cercle president Julian Amery.

Created a life peer as Baron Kelvedon. The Duke of Kent is a good friend of his and they shared their birthday parties at the home of Paul Channon in October 2005. The Queen attended the party. Prince Charles and Camilla, and the widow of the Duke of Devonshire (Cavendish) were expected by the Daily Mail to attend the party.

Clark, Alan

Sources: 1993, Alan Clark, 'Diaries', p. 369-374; June 29, 1997, The Independence, 'Aitken dropped by the Right's secret club; Is it the ultimate dishonour'; April 6, 2003, The Observer, 'So, Norman, any regrets this time?'

Studied law. He did not practice however, and instead became a military historian. Controversial, irreverent, charming and vain, Alan Clark was one of the most colourful British politicians during the 1980s and 90s. Clark entered Parliament as MP for Plymouth Sutton in 1974 and served in various junior ministerial posts at the departments of Employment, Trade and Defence during the Thatcher governments of the 1980s. He attended the 1990 Pinay meeting in Oman. Clark was involved in the Arms-for-Iraq scandal, which eventually caused a landslide towards Tony Blair. At the same time he has cited in a divorce case in South Africa where it was revealed he slept with both the wife and her two daughters. He temporarily left politics, but he returned to Parliament as member for Kensington and Chelsea in the election of 1997. He died in 1999 of a brain tumor, a year before his book 'Diaries' was published, in which talked about the Pinay Circle being funded by the CIA. To date he is the only Member of Parliament to be accused of being drunk at the despatch box. To journalist Frank Johnson, Alan Clark is supposed to have said that:

"Yes, I told him, I was a Nazi; I really believed it to be the ideal system, and that it was a disaster for the Anglo-Saxon races and for the world that it was extinguished. Oh yes, I told him, I was completely committed to the whole philosophy. The blood and violence was an essential ingredient of its strength, the heroic tradition of cruelty every bit as powerful and a thousand times more ancient than the Judaeo-Christian ethic."

Colby, William E.

Sources: November 1988 – Issue 17, Lobster Magazine, 'Brian Crozier, the Pinay Circle and James Goldsmith' (quoting from the Langemann papers); October 1989 – Issue 18, Lobster Magazine, 'The Pinay Circle and Destabilisation in Europe'; 1997, Robert Hutchinson, 'Their Kingdom Come – Inside the Secret World of Opus Dei', p. 153-158; June 29, 1997, The Independence, 'Aitken dropped by the Right's secret club; Is it the ultimate dishonour' (named as a regular)

William E. Colby, the son of an army officer, was born in St. Paul, Minnesota, on 4th January, 1920. He attended Princeton University and graduated in 1940. In 1941 Colby joined the United States Army and in 1943 the Office of Strategic Services (OSS). The OSS trained him for special missions, and he served behind enemy lines in France and on one occupation helped to destroy a German communication centre in Norway. After the war Colby obtained a law degree from Columbia University in 1947. After working for a short time in a law firm, Colby joined the CIA. He served in Stockholm (1951-1953) and then in Rome (1953-1958), where he helped to arrange the defeat of the Communist Party in the Italian general election. Colby is said to have become both a member of Opus Dei and the Knights of Malta during his intelligence days and is known to have been a staunch Roman Catholic. In his 1978 autobiography, Honorable Men, Colby explains that he was sent to Scandinavia by Gerry Miller, chief of the CIA Western Europe desk, to build the Stay-Behind networks in Scandinavia. Some of his own words:

"[After WWII there was] undertaken a major program of building, throughout those Western European countries that seemed likely targets for Soviet attack, what in the parlance of the intelligence trade were known as 'stay-behind nets', clandestine infrastructures of leaders and equipment trained and ready to be called into action as sabotage and espionage forces when the time came... [This was carried out] with the utmost secrecy... Therefore I was instructed to limit access to information about what I was doing to the smallest possible coterie of the most reliable people, in Washington, in NATO, and in Scandinavia." 2005, Daniele Ganser, 'Nato Secret Armies', p. 169-170: "'Berlingske Tidende can reveal that Absalon is the Danish branch of the international Gladio network. This has been confirmed by a member of Absalon to Berlingske Tidende who wishes at present to remain unnamed', a Danish daily newspaper sensationally headlined its discoveries in 1990. (6 [November 25, 1990, Danish daily Berlingske Tidende, 'Ogsa Danmark havde hemmelig haer efter anden verdenskrig']) The source, named Q by the newspaper, confirmed what Colby had revealed in his book. 'Colby's story is absolutely correct. Absalon was created in the early 1950s', the source Q related... 'Colby was a member of the world spanning laymen catholic organization Opus Dei, which, using a modern term, could be called right-wing. Opus Dei played a central in the setting up of Gladio in the whole of Europe and also in Denmark', Q claimed. 'The leader of Gladio was Harder who was probably not a Catholic. But there are not many Catholics in Denmark and the basic elements making up the Danish Gladio were former [World War II] resistance people...(7 [Ibid])'... When another group of Danish journalist insisted to be given at least the name of a Danish CIA contact person, Colby revealed that 'his Danish contact person' for the Gladio net had been Ebbe Munck, a central figure of the Danish secret service and a former member of the resistance movement who later had entered diplomacy [immediately after WWII] to become an advisor to the Danish Queen Margarethe [II]. (10 [November 26, 1990, Danish daily Information, 'Mere mystik om dansk Gladio'])"

Colby was CIA station chief in Saigon from 1959 to 1962 and headed the agency's Far East division from 1962 to 1967. Then from 1968 to 1971 he directed the Phoenix program during the Vietnam War. It is estimated that as many 60,000 supporters of the National Liberation Front were killed during the Phoenix program, although Colby put the number at 20,587. Colby also maintained that the deaths arose in combat and were not the result of a criminal assassination program, as critics of Project Phoenix labeled it. Attorney of the Nugan Hand Bank, a money laundering center of heroin profits, mainly from the Golden Triangle, and run by different US intelligence agencies. After Nugan Hand's cover was blown and the operation abandoned, the CIA redirected many of the Nugan Hand operations to another Pacific financial institution based in Hawaii, named Bishop, Baldwin, Rewald, Dillingham and Wong (BBRDW). By the end of 1980, BBRDW started setting up offices in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Indonesia, Singapore, and Australia, all former Nugan Hand locations, staffing the offices with some of the same personnel. On 4 September 1973 President Richard Nixon appointed Colby director of the CIA. In 1973, he was questioned at a Senate hearing about the 40 Committee he was a member of. Here he admitted that Henry Kissinger was its chairman at that moment. When in 1975 both houses of Congress set up inquiries into the activities of the intelligence community, Colby handed over to the Senate committee chaired by Frank Church details of the CIA's recent operations against the left-leaning government in Chile. The agency's attempts to sabotage the Chilean economy had contributed to the downfall of South America's oldest democracy and to the installation of a military dictatorship. His testimony resulted in his predecessor, Richard Helms, being indicted for perjury. Colby was attacked by right-wing figures such as Barry Goldwater for supplying this information to the Frank Church and on 30 January 1976 president Gerald Ford replaced him with Admiral Stansfield Turner. In retirement Colby published his memoirs Honorable Men.

This resulted in him being accused of making unauthorized disclosures, and was forced to pay a $10,000 fine in an out-of-court settlement. In 1996 (age 76), after reportedly going out canoeing in the middle of the night, Colby died under suspicious circumstances near his home in Rock Point, Maryland. He did not mention any canoeing plans to his wife, which he usually did, nor was it normal for him to go boating at night at a rain swollen river while leaving his computer on, dinner at the table, and the door unlocked. Colby was found with no lifejacket, which he always wore when on the water, according to his wife. Some people claim that Colby was preparing to leak sensitive information to them. Steven Greer of the Disclosure Project and Kay Griggs of Colonel George Griggs were among those who claimed that. Also, Colby had lent his name to a small right-wing magazine called Strategic Investment, which blamed everything from Oklahoma and Iran Contra drug imports to the death of Vince Foster solely on Clinton.

The editors of this magazine suggested that Colby was murdered for giving the magazine credence and because Colby was going to give them information on a conspiracy between Vince Foster and Clinton. However, Colby reported to his friend Senator John DeCamp that he should not believe one word he, or anyone else, wrote in Strategic Investment. Sen. John DeCamp, 'The Franklin Cover-Up,' second edition, p.387-388:

"At the time of his death, Bill was working with Britain's Lord William Rees-Mogg, and his American sidekick, James Dale Davidson, publishing a series of newsletters, on international events, financial opportunities, and politics [Strategic Investment]. In fact, he was working on an article for one of those newsletters when he died. Rees-Mogg and Davidson are strange birds... After all, he [Rees-Mogg] used to write that in the coming age of society, an elite of 5% of the total population would rule over the other 95% as virtual slaves. But Rees-Mogg is not just nasty-- he represents great power... On several occasions, when I saw Bill or spoke with him during the last year of his life, I'd ask him whether I should subscribe to his newsletter, or, whether he'd just give me a few copies to look over. He always told me not to waste my money. "Ask me about any situation your interested in, and I'll give you as thorough a briefing as I possibly can. But don't believe a word you read in that newsletter I'm writing for." Strange. But, then again, Bill Colby spent his entire adult life in the shadow world of spies and counter-spies. Maybe his involvement with Rees-Mogg was more complicated than I ever speculated... And I recall another incident... Together with Rees-Mogg, the most savage press hound attacking Clinton was one Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, a Briton... [he] once called me, urgently demanding a meeting. I had never heard of him before, and so I asked Bill if he had ever heard of this fellow.... Bill answered, rather ominously, as I now look back, "His name is Ambrose Evans-Pritchard. And," he said, "be very careful."

Colby advised Sen. DeCamp to drop his investigation into the Franklin child abuse and satanism case, because he would certainly be silenced. Instead, Colby recommended that DeCamp write a book and let the world know what he came across. Rees-Mogg, by the way, is a member of the extremely elite Roxburghe Club, together with the Cecils, Howards, Cavendishes, Rothschilds, Oppenheimers, and formerly Paul Mellon. According to Steven Greer, Colby received access to extraterrestrial material, together with a black budget of about $50 million. In the mid 1990s, Colby, of the opinion that the covert projects were out of control, decided to transfer a large sum and a revolutionary energy device to Greer's CSETI.

But before he was able to do that, he was assassinated. The colonel who was the go-between between Colby and CSETI, and one of Colby's best friends, soon died of cancer. Greer and one of his closest associates also contracted cancer in that time period. Greer was the only one to survive.

Cradock, Sir Percy

Sources: June 29, 1997, The Independence, 'Aitken dropped by the Right's secret club; Is it the ultimate dishonour'

Born in 1923. Studied Law at Cambridge. Joined the British Foreign Office in 1954. Counsellor in Beijing. Charge d'Affairs in Beijing 1966-1969. Head of the Assessments Staff in the Cabinet Office. Ambassador in Beijing 1978-1984. In this position he opened and headed the Sino-British negotiations of 1984, which led to the agreement that the socialist system of the Chinese Republic would not be practiced in Hong Kong for 50 years, starting in 1997 when Hong Kong would have to be given back to China. Hong Kong would keep its capitalist system and its way of life. Foreign Policy Adviser (especially on British-Soviet relations) to Margaret Thatcher 1984-1992. Said to have believed that the slow collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989-1990 was a deliberate Communist hoax. Chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC), the coordinating board between the intelligence agencies (MI5, MI6, GCHQ, Defense Intelligence Staff) and politicians 1985-1992. According to the former City banker and ASTRA chairman Gerald James, a person named David Hart, a member of Thatcher's inner circle and close friend of William Casey, was especially close to Sir Percy Cradock. Hart at some point boasted:

"Thatcher told me so much. I could blow her out of the water in five minutes.", which was a reference to a possible smear campaign if Thatcher at some point would not go along with the City-Intelligence Services cabal. Not a whole lot has been written about the inner workings of the Joint Intelligence Committee.

1995, Gerald James, 'In the Public Interest', p. 128-130:

"Stephen Dorril tells us that when, in July 1961, Cabinet Secretary Norman Brook failed to pass to the Prime Minister information about War Minister John Profumo's affair with Christine Keeler (a friend of KGB officer Eugene Ivanov), 'Harold Wilson stumbled on a crucial secret, namely the fact that the Cabinet Office, not the Prime Minister's office, had overall control of the security service and, crucially, the overall flow of information': putting the real power into the hands of permanent government rather than elected government. Intelligence about arms comes from intercepted communications, MI6 agents and informers, embassy officials, and arms dealers. Robin Robison, former administrative officer for the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) responsible for disseminating that information, has put on record that GCHQ [British NSA] arms-deal information goes via JIC to the Bank of England, the DTI, FCO, MoD and ECGD, but is rarely passed into the parliamentary arena. Robinson's job was to sift through transcripts of bugged telephone calls and other intercepted material for inclusion in JIC's 'Red Book' before its distribution. 'Although the Director-General [MI5] has a right to direct access to the Prime Minister, he does not lightly go over the heads of permanent under-secretaries for fear of creating future problems,' writes one former intelligence officer. Ex-Deputy Chief of MI6, George Kennedy Young [whom Gerald James knew well], admitted that, when it comes keeping the Prime Minister informed, the Cabinet Secretary may conveniently fail to find an 'oppertune moment' to pass the baton of power from permanent to elected government. Dorril and Ramsay quote another security source saying that the Home Secretary 'hasn't got a clue what is going on. If he comes around, you lock away any sensitive files and set up a display file specifically for him to look at - a spoof file on some imaginary subversive with lots of exciting material in it. He's not going to know any better.'... Again, every week the Queen receives JIC reports while our own ministers remain relatively in the dark. We are told that Her Majesty makes useful comments on these, and it may be that her comments are more useful than those that might be forthcoming from ministers, but I believe that many ordinary people, brainwashed by the tabloids into thinking that the purpose of the Royal Family is to offer entertainment along the lines of soap opera, would be surprised to learn about this system of disbursement of vital information to government... If most Prime Ministers take up office without much or indeed any knowledge of the security services, in Thatcher's case she was briefed by people associated with Brian Crozier's [former head of Le Cercle] Institute for the Study of Conflict even as leader of the Opposition during Jim Callaghan's government... she was the first Prime Minister to insist that she sit in on the highly secret Joint Intelligence Committee meetings."

June 26, 1991, The Times:

"Sir Percy Cradock, the prime minister's top intelligence adviser, has become a fondly regarded face in the Pentagon... There is a more prosaic reason for defence secretary Richard Cheney's interest in the man who directs British intelligence traffic through the corridors of Downing Street: Mr Cheney is conducting a bureaucratic battle to control his own spies, and on the strategies necessary for inter-service fighting, Sir Percy is considered a modest master."

Made a secret mission to Peking to lay the ground for John Major's visit in 1991, the first by a major Western leader after the Tiananmen Square massacre. The purpose of this visit was to clear the differences of opinion over Hong Kong. Retired from government service in 1992. Member of the Privy Council since 1993. Member of the Order of Saint Michael and Saint George. Honorary Fellow of St. John's College, University of Cambridge. The most prominent critic of the liberalising policies of Lord Christopher Patten (Pilgrims Society), the last Governor of Hong Kong.

His argument was that Patten, fully backed by the John Major government, caused unnecessary trouble by fiddling with plans to create a more representative government in Hong Kong. According to Sir Percy, if the old line had been adhered to, Hong Kong would be enjoying a smoother transition in 1997. Spoke at the Cercle in 1997.

Crozier, Brian Rossiter

Sources: November 1988 – Issue 17, Lobster Magazine, 'Brian Crozier, the Pinay Circle and James Goldsmith' (quoting the Langemann papers); 1993, Brian Crozier, 'Free Agent', pages 186, 191-193, and 241; June 29, 1997, The Independence, 'Aitken dropped by the Right's secret club; Is it the ultimate dishonour'

Worked as a journalist for many different papers since 1936. Great supporter of the Truman Doctrine of Containment, which was first introduced in 1947 by George Kennan for the CFR's Foreign Affairs. Didn't think the Truman Doctrine went far enough and was of the opinion that this policy did not take into account Soviet clandestine subversion in the West. Reporter in Saigon and Singapore in 1952 and 1953, covering the French Indochina War and the Malayan Emergency for Reuters and the Australian Associated Press. Here he made his first intelligence contacts with the British and French. Joined the Economist in 1954 and became editor of the Economist Foreign Report in 1958.

Used his intelligence contacts for background info and scoops while writing for The Economist until 1964, the Sunday Times, and the BBC. Invited into John Hay "Jock" Whitney's circle of dining friends at the Connaught Hotel, when this person was ambassador to Great Britain from 1957 to 1961. Also invited at Whitney's residence in the London area. Whitney was a Rockefeller-associate, a friend of the British royal family, a CIA cooperator, and in a 1973 membership list of the Pilgrims Society, he appears as a vice president of this club, together with David K.E. Bruce (head of the Bruce family, of Robert the Bruce) and Winthrop W. Aldrich, an uncle of the Rockefeller brothers. Crozier became an anti-communist activist in 1958, working with the CIA, MI6, and IRD (Information Research Department; secret anti-communist intelligence organization of the Foreign Office 1946-1977) on projects he supported.

Got his own office at the IRD after some time. In their book on the IRD, Lashmar and Oliver note that,

"the vast IRD enterprise had one sole aim: To spread its ceaseless propaganda output (i.e. a mixture of outright lies and distorted facts) among top-ranking journalists who worked for major agencies, papers and magazines, including Reuters and the BBC, as well as every other available channel. It worked abroad to discredit communist parties in Western Europe which might gain a share of power by entirely democratic means, and at home to discredit the British Left".

Also began to work with the intelligence agencies of France, Germany, Holland, Belgium, Morocco, Iran, Argentina, Chile, and Taiwan. Invited to Antoine Bonnemaison's (a French colonel and SDECE agent specialized in psychological warfare) Centre de Recherche du Bien Politique in 1959, which initially was a secret discussion group involving intelligence officers, academics, businessmen, a few politicians, and trade union leaders of France, Germany, and the Netherlands. Besides countering communist subversion the "colloques" were aimed at Franco-German rapprochement. Crozier was a member of Interdoc, a European anti-communist subversion group in which the Dutch BVD officers who attended the "colloques" (and likely Le Cercle) played an important role. When Bonnemaison's Centre de Recherche was killed by de Gaulle in 1963, Bonnemaison set up the Centre d'Observation du Mouvement des Idées, this time financed by French corporations. The group lost its international character, and only Crozier remained a regular participant from outside France. In 1964, soon after he left the Economist, Crozier became an official consultant to the IRD and was approached by the CIA's Congress for Cultural Freedom (CCF) to reconstruct, commercialize, and take over their features services. Crozier turned down the offer, because he was writing for dozens of international newspapers, was giving lectures, and was working on a book. Some time later he did accept an offer to travel to South America and prepare a report on the CCF's Spanish-language services. Didn't know much about the CCF at the time, besides that it had been described to him as "very rum". Worried about Salvador Allende in Chile at the time, who described as a communist-oriented demagogue. Allende would be overthrown by the US in the 1970s. In 1965, Crozier was notified that his recommendations of professionalizing the Spanish-language services were accepted by the CCF. Therefore the CIA's CCF had attracted John Hay Whitney to gather the necessary funds to accomplish this. Brian Crozier now accepted the part-time job to reconstruct Forum Service (funded by the CCF), made it Forum World Features (FWF), and became its president until the early 1970s. Crozier wasn't to happy that John Hay Whitney had changed most of the terms that were orally accepted to, but nevertheless accepted the position. Whitney bought FWF in 1966. Richard Mellon Scaife bought FWF in 1973, until he quickly dissolved in 1975, just before Time out magazine exposed the role of FWF as a counter to communist propaganda. The International Herald Tribune (IHT) did a follow up article, which Crozier, as he would later do with Lobster's articles on Le Cercle, described as a "curious mixture of fact and fantasy." And of course, the author, Bernard Nossiter, turned out to be a KGB asset. In 1967 Crozier published his biography on Franco, for which he had lived a year in Madrid. July 10, 1967, Brian Crozier in The Times, 'Can the personal system of government survive?':

"Today, the killing of the rich and the burning of churches must have lost much of their old appeal. In fact, more Spaniards than ever before now have a stake in prosperity and progress. Why, then, are so many Spaniards indifferent or hostile to the regime that has brought them stability and a taste of affluence?"

October 28, 1967, The Times, 'Franco: the passion to survive' (review of Crozier's book):

"[Franco] was never an orator like Hitler or Mussolini, or a theorist like de Gaulle; nor is he, despite the propaganda of the Left, a "fascist dictator". Rather, as Mr. Crozier points out, it was Franco who smashed Spanish fascism- something the Republic failed to achieve. In his main purpose - to improve the material conditions of all Spaniards - Franco believed implicitly in Order and Discipline as the essential prerequisites of progress; and it is as the enemy of Order that he fears Communism - of which, Mr. Crozier reveals, he began to make a careful study as early as 1928... [Franco's] regime, despite its faults - it is vastly less oppressive than those of eastern Europe - has given his people the longest period of peace, stability, and progress in modern Spanish history. If it was not for love of him that they voted overwhelmingly in his favour in last year's Referendum, it was certainly for fear of what might take his place."

December 21, 1973, Brian Crozier for The Times, 'Prime Minister's assassination may push Spain even farther to the right': "General Franco is still a hate-symbol of the international left, which has never forgiven him his victory..." November 2, 1982, The Times, 'Is democracy such a good thing?':

"We all have our intellectual assumptions, and the prevailing assumption in the West is that party democracy is necessarily good and dictatorship necessarily bad... The cause of relief was that the fragile flower of Spanish democracy was being saved - the important thing being the salvation of party democracy, not whether party democracy is necessarily good for Spain or will necessarily solve Spain's problems, which is at least open to doubt if hard facts mean anything. Since Franco died in 1975, inflation and unemployment have soared in Spain. So have terrorism and non-political crime. Moreover, the politicians have saddled their country with an unworkable constitution... No doubt one should make allowances after a dictatorship of 40 years, but the assumption that democracy is going to work in Spain does, I think, remain to be proved. Within a year of Franco's death, more than 500 political groups had registered... In France, a big majority voted against [Cercle associate] President Giscard d'Estaing's desire to extend his own mandate - and landed the French people with a socialist-communist coalition they did not want. In Germany, Herr Helmut Kohl [funded by fringe Vatican interests] came to power by a constitutional device which leaves him dependent on the support of Herr Schmidt's former coalition partners, the Liberals, who will probably be wiped out at the general elections next March. Against this dismal record, it might be a sound principle to value freedom and good government rather than party democracy..."

May 2, 1985, The Times, Spain's Soldiers waiting for their orders:

"Contrary yo received opinion, the attempted coup four years ago was not to be a coup d'état but rather a coup de force. The army had no intention of taking over the government, but rather of forcing King Juan Carlos to suspend constitutial rule with army backing, for a limited period, so that various problems, especially terrorism, could be brought under control without allowing the civilian politicians to continue, as the plotters saw it, to make a mess of things. In other words, it was to be a temporary takeover on the Turkish model..."

In 1970, after consulting with Leonard B. Schapiro, an intelligence-connected anti-communist London School of Economics professor, Crozier set up the Institute for the Study of Conflict (ISC). The main object of the institute was to expose Soviet subversion worldwide. Page 96 of Crozier biography:

"Throughout my period as Director, the Institute for the Study of Conflict was involved in exposing the fallacies of 'détente' and warning the West of the dangers inherent a policy of illusion."

Tried to get initial funding by John Hay Whitney (through this person's financial advisor, John Train, a very close associate of Sir James Goldsmith), the CIA, the IRD, and MI6, but failed. Received some initial, but very limited funding from BP and Shell. Soon thereafter, through his CIA contacts, he met with the now quite controversial Richard Mellon Scaife, who granted $100,000 a year to Crozier's ISC. Scaife was part heir to the Mellon fortune, a major shareholder in Gulf Oil, and the person who took over Crozier's FWF in the early 1970s. When the ISC took off, Crozier developed a closer relationship with the CIA and met with its representatives about 4 times a year in Langley. In 1975, Crozier helped set up a Washington-based Institute for the Study of Conflict (WISC). George Ball, a close friend of Jean Monnet and next to David Rockefeller a long time permanent attendee of Bilderberg, became chairman of the WISC. Approached by Jean Violet in 1971, after this person had read a March 1971 interview with Crozier that appeared in the US News and World Report. Violet, a member of Opus Dei, and French, German, and Vatican intelligence, was funded and supported by Carlo II Pesenti, a person whose business empire was sponsored by the Vatican, and Otto von Habsburg, head of the Paneuropa Society and a member of Opus Dei and the Knights of Malta. Francois Duchene, one of Jean Monnet's closest associates; Crozier's former Economist colleague; and head of the elite International Institute for Strategic Studies, which describes itself as,

"the world's leading authority on political-military conflict," introduced Violet to Crozier as a person who represented "a powerful consortium of French business interests." (Crozier, 'Free Agent', p. 97)

According to Crozier, it took many years before he would find out that Violet worked as a Special Advocate for French intelligence involved in psychological warfare for French interests. Involved with the Pinay Circle between 1971 and 1985. The ISC received assignments from the "Pinay Committee". In 1980 Violet asked him to take over the presidency of Le Cercle. In 1981 the Cercle-linked Heritage Foundation was funding Brian Crozier's International Freedom Fund. In 1985 Julian Amery became the new president of Le Cercle, at the recommendation of Crozier. In 1976, Brian Crozier set up a covert advisory committee called 'Shield', in order to secretly brief Margaret Thatcher and her closest colleagues on security and intelligence. The idea came from Sir Stephen Hastings, a Conservative member of parliament who had been a SAS soldier and SOE agent during WWII, before being recruited in MI6. Shield was composed of Crozier; Hastings; Conservative backbencher and WWII MI6 agent Nicholas Elliott; and Harry Sporborg of Hambros Bank, who was a deputy head of the SOE during WWII. Lord Carrington (Order of the Garter, Privy Council, president Pilgrims Society, chairman Bilderberg; Kissinger Associates) was among the very few officials that were briefed, but opposed almost everything that Crozier's group wrote down. Crozier adopted Jean Violet's 'Psychological Action' programme, which was a technique to find quick, short answers to three basic questions: What do People want? What do they Fear? And what do they feel strongly about?

After reading Crozier's short answers to these questions, she said to him:

"From now on, Brian, these are my ideas." According to Hastings obituary in the Daily Telegraph of January 11, 2005: "Hastings's background in MI6 gave him a certain mystique, and he was often embroiled in controversy concerning Communist infiltration. In 1977 he raised a storm of protest by alleging that five prominent trades union officials were agents for Communist countries. This information was culled from tape recordings made by the Czech former spy and defector Joseph Frolik. The following year, before Mrs Thatcher came into office, Hastings and Brian Crozier wrote her a paper setting out "the diabolical nature of the Communist conspiracy" against Britain. Mrs Thatcher was appalled: "Stephen," she said, "I've read every word and I'm shattered. What should we do?... In 1986 Hastings successfully sued the Observer for libel following allegations that he had been one of two Conservative MPs involved in an MI5 plot to oust Harold Wilson.""

Thatcher subsequently was elected in 1979, 1983, and 1987. Council member of the Foreign Affairs Research Institute (FARI), together with Julian Amery (later Cercle head), Lord Chalfont (Jonathan Institute; anti-communist associate of the Cercle and Crozier), Robert Moss (Le Cercle), founder Geoffrey Stewart-Smith (Conservatice MP; adventures were allegedly sponsored by MI5; leading member of the Conservative Monday Club; chairman of its foreign affairs study group of the Monday Club in 1966; editor of East West Digest, an anti-communist magazine sent free to all MPs at the time), Sir Frederic Mackarness Bennett (son of a politician who was an appeaser to Hitler and member of the Anglo-German Society; owned a Rolls-Royce and four homes, one of them in the Cayman Islands; director Kleinwort Benson Europe (his mother was a Kleinwort); long time Lloyds underwriter; influential member of Parliament from the 1950s to the 1980s; member Monday Club; always warning people about the KGB threat and supported every regime that opposed the USSR; chair FARI in 1978; vice-president of the European-Atlantic Group; leading official in the private group Council of Europe in the late 1970s and 1980s; honorary director of the BCCI in Hong Kong until 1986; Member of the Privy Council since 1985; ridiculed his party's (Conservatives) for their Euroscepticism after his retirement in 1987; supported Pinochet; Freeman of the City of London; has been to Bilderberg), and air vice marshal Stuart Menual. Edgar O'Ballance of the International Institute for Strategic Studies was a scholar at FARI. FARI was said to have strong links to the CIA (which, of course, it had), and besides receiving money from the pro-apartheid government in South-Africa, reportedly also received funds from Lockheed. March 20, 2004, Daily Telegraph, Obituary of Geoffrey Stewart-Smith:

"In 1974 he had sought to distance his Foreign Affairs Circle from the World Anti-Communist League because of the WACL's strong anti-Semitic element, saying: "We wouldn't touch them with a barge pole." However, he later admitted that another of his organisations, the Foreign Affairs Research Institute, had been mainly funded by the apartheid government in South Africa. The admission came in 1987 when Stewart-Smith appeared at the London Bankruptcy Court, disclosing debts of pounds 150,388 and no assets."

In 1980, FARI began organising an annual 'balance of power' conference in Britain, which attracted people like Edwin Feulner (president of the Heritage Foundation; member Le Cercle; Knight of Malta), Ray S. Cline (OSS 1943-1946 and worked in the Far-East with Paul Helliwell and Gen. Singlaub; good friend of Chiang Kai-shek's son; set up the Asian People's Anti-Communist League (APACL) in Taiwan and South Korea in 1955-1956; CIA station chief in Taiwan 1958-1962; deputy director CIA 1962-1966; CIA station chief in Bonn 1966-1969 where he oversaw the local Gladio forces; confirmed the authenticity of FM 30-31A & B, instruction manuals of the DIA which included false flag terrorist actions that were to be blamed on the USSR; director Department of State's Bureau Intelligence and Research 1969-1973; director world power studies at Georgetown's CSIS 1973-1986; co-founder of the WACL with Gen. Singlaub; representative of CAUSA, founded by Moonie Col. Bo Hi Pak; the Jonathan Institute; founder of the US Global Strategy Council in 1981 and headed it from 1986 to 1994; great supporter of non-lethal weapons), Frank Barnett (founder National Strategy Information Center in Washington in 1976, a think tank dedicated to the preservation of containment militarism; member Committee on Present Danger), and General Daniel O. Graham (Republican Roman Catholic; deputy CIA director to William Colby in 1972-1974; director DIA 1974-1976; consultant American Security Council 1978-1981; founding chair High Frontier, Inc. 1981-1995, an organization intended to promote Star Wars; member USGSC under Ray Cline; member advisory board CAUSA; member of the Moon-linked American Freedom Coalition; director National Religious Broadcasters, together with Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson). In June 1978, FARI co-sponsored a conference in Brighton, England with Crozier's Institute for the Study of Conflict. Richard Mellon Scaife and William Casey (Cercle member) were among the participants. FARI in the late 1970s reported that the Navy of the USSR had shifted its focus from anti-carrier to anti-submarine warfare. It reported that the communists were trying to recruit men in the US Army, mainly blacks and Puerto Ricans. It also warned for the vulnerability of the West to a meltdown of the computer grid. August 15, 1978, Chronicle Telegram, 'U.S. vulnerable in computer war':

"The United States, moreover, has been far too eager to supply the Soviet Union with sophisticated computer technology and training, Baron believes. "Computer companies in the West fall over each other in their enthusiasm to compete for the favors of the Soviet buying agencies,", writes Baron. "The western businessman's sheer naivete in dealing with the astute Soviet negotiators is quite depressing.""

Following is an article from an author of the FARI group. It shows how Crozier and associates imply that the Soviet Union was behind terrorism worldwide. January 13, 1982, The Frederick Post, 'Terrorism a world war':

"(The following commentary is by Col. Ronald Waring, author of five books on politico-military subjects and two novels. He has published numerous articles in professional military journals. He currently serves as a governor of the Foreign Affairs Research Institute, London.)... Looking back, the year 1981 should go down in history as The Year of the Terrorist. It started with the attempted murder and serious wounding of President Reagan, to be followed shortly afterward by the attempted assassination of Pope John Paul II. In early October there was the brutal murder of President Sadat of Egypt. Finally, on Dec. 17, U. S. Army Brigadier General James Dozier was kidnapped by the Italian Red Brigade in Verona, Italy. While acts of violence against world leaders have made banner headlines, the deaths by terrorism of literally hundreds of men and women all over the world go almost unnoticed. In Northern Ireland thousands have died by bomb and bullet, in Spain and in Italy more are shot down. Virtually all over Europe, terrorists' bombs bring death and destruction. In Lebanon, terrorism has escalated into civil war, while in the bloody arena of Central America trucks go round collecting the corpses of those murdered by terrorist gangs. Only a few years ago we would have been sickened and horrified by all this, but today we have come to accept it as almost routine. Almost every country has its terrorist organizations and they are proliferating like dragons' teeth. In West Germany there is the Red Army Faction, which recently attempted to assassinate the Commander of the U. S. Army in Europe and has attacked other U. S. Military personnel in Germany. They are loosely linked with the remnants of the Baader Meinhoff Gang and are well organized and deadly. In Germany, too, there is the Grey Wolves Organization among the Turkish "guest workers" there. At first it was thought that it was they who had launched Ali Agca, the Turkish gunman who attempted to kill the Pope. Now it is generally believed that Agca was manipulated by a far deeper and more complicated plot, directed from Moscow. Italy has become the home of terrorism and kidnapping. The notorious Red Brigades are only one of many Italian terrorist organizations, one of which planted a bomb at the Bologna railway station a year ago that killed 85 people. In Spain, the Basque separatists and militant Marxist ETA carry out a systematic campaign of murder, kidnapping and bombings. In Ireland the objectives of the IRA and the Provisional IRA are roughly the same; that is, the expulsion of the British from Ireland and the unification of Ireland as a Marxist socialist state. The political objective of most terrorist organizations is the imposition of some form of extreme left-wing government. Some terrorism is attributable to far-right groups, but Left and Right become meaningless political terms, and we find ideologically left wing groups cooperating with rightists in a common objective, the destruction of organized society and civilization. Throughout the Middle East, various guerrilla and terrorist organizations operate generally under the Palestine Liberation Organization, and, operating from bases in Lebanon and Jordan, make attacks on Israeli territory. Earlier this year, a Pakistani group organized by the son of Ali Bhutto, the former President of Pakistan, carried out a spectacular skyjacking. This organization calls itself Al Zulfikar and is run from Kabul in Afghanistan by Murtaza Bhutto. It is, of course, ideologically on the far left. Polisario is operating on the borders of Morocco, armed, supplied and trained largely by Libya's Col. Gadaffi. This has now become a formidable military force which has inflicted defeats on Moroccan regular army units, occupied towns and large tracts of country. Again largely Marxist-oriented, their ultimate aim is to topple the King of Morocco. In the Americas there are numerous Marxist terrorist organizations. In Guatemala more than 4,000 leftist guerrillas are trying to overthrow the government. In El Salvador five identified groups, which have formed the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front, are fighting a guerrilla war. They are largely financed, armed and supplied by Cuba. On the other side rightist "death squads" have killed some 3,000 people in the past two years. In Brazil, in Ecuador, Colombia, Venezuela, Bolivia and the Argentine, terrorist organizations exist on a greater or smaller scale. In Puerto Rico there are at least five groups which have carried out terrorist attacks in Puerto Rico, and in the United States. These groups demand independence for Puerto Rico: in 1979 they attacked and ambushed a U. S. Navy vehicle and killed two servicemen, and in 1975 they set off a bomb in a New York restaurant, killing four people. The CIA reported 760 acts of international terrorism in 1980, and the Associated Press in a worldwide survey identified some 50 major terrorist groups. The numbers of assassins, bombers, kidnappers, skyjackers and terrorist killers now runs not just into battalions, but into divisions and armies. They are to be found everywhere in almost every country. The idea that murder for a political motive, if not quite respectable, is somehow more a misdemeanor than a crime is pernicious nonsense. An attack is being mounted against our society, no less deadly than a war for those that it touches. In fact it is a form of warfare, and we should combat it to the limit of our power."

In February of 1977, Crozier created The 61, together with Nicholas Elliott, general Vernon Walters (Graduated from Stonyhurst College, a 400-year-old Jesuit secondary school in Lancashire, England, without going to University; Still managed to become fluent in 8 languages, including Russian and Chinese; Knight of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta; lifelong bachelor and did not drink alcohol; Protege of Fritz Kraemer; aide to Pilgrims Averell Harriman and Henry Kissinger; co-founder and deputy chief of staff of SHAPE; BOSS (South-African intelligence) supposedly attributed the JFK murder to him; Military Attaché in Rome in 1963, which is generally overlooked in his biographies; deputy director CIA 1972-1976; Sent all over the world on to confidential missions by Ronald Reagan, together with co-SMOM member and Pilgrim Alexander Haig; Acted as a replacement of DCI William Casey for some time, making at least a dozen undercover missions to the Vatican; CFR) and "a leading figure in a major City of London bank" [p. 135]. Sir Peter Tennant is likely to have been the anonymous host, "a leading figure in the bank", that chaired Crozier's "very secret" Sunday morning , February 13, 1977 meeting at the executive suite of the anonymous "leading City of London bank", that established the private sector intelligence group The 61. The meeting was attended by three British (Crozier, Elliott, and the anonymous banker), four Americans (Gen. Walters; a Viennese born American who represented a big Belgian corporation; and two Congressional staffers), and one German (a member of the Bundestag and anti-Soviet author, probably Cercle member Count Hans Huyn).

Jean Violet could not attend because of ill health. Crozier proposed the creation of a,

"Private Sector Operational Intelligence agency, beholden to no government, but at the disposal of allied or friendly governments for certain tasks which, for one reason or another, they were no longer able to tackle."

Its main purpose would be to circumvent national legislation, avoid possible political embarrassments, and to conduct more effective non-violent counter-subversion operations. All members agreed on the fact that this organization should be created and that it should be kept very secret to any outsiders. The target figure for The 61 became $5 million a year, although it isn't known how these funds were gathered. The 61 supplied secret intelligence about the Communist empire (and its subversion) to specific people in the White House, the British government, the French government, and the Vatican.

March 13, 2006, The Daily Mail, 'A very British coup':

"Brian Crozier, the security expert who had made a study of communist insurgency in Britain and would later advise Margaret Thatcher, was twice invited to address officers at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst. 'I took it upon myself to make them understand the problems of communism and that they might, at some time, have to intervene to destroy this danger,' he says. 'There was absolute silence as I explained how the trades unions were very heavily penetrated by communists and their sympathisers and were exerting a dangerous influence on the Labour Party, which largely depended on them. They wanted to hear every word I said.' After his speech, he received a number of private phone calls from very senior serving officers. 'I have never named them and I never will,' declares Crozier. 'They were standing ready to act if necessary. There were no "buts" about it. If things had gone on as they were, they would have moved... [article gives many details about the plot]."

It was exposed in 1982 by the Langemann Papers. Crozier wrote 'The Rise and Fall of the Soviet Empire'. Claims he was a good friend of Richard "Prince of Darkness" Perle and general Richard Stilwell, the latter was a known Cercle participant and an expert in guerilla warfare. Brian Crozier and his protege Robert Moss were participants in the 1979 conference on international terrorism of the Jonathan Institute, a think tank set up in memory of Lt. Col. Jonathan Netanyahu, brother of Benjamin Netanyahu of the Likud party. Netanyahu helped organize the private, Israeli-based institute whose public board included people like Shimon Peres (Labour prime minister) and Menachem Begin (Likud prime minister). May 6, 1980, The Gleaner, 'Soviets and terrorism':

"The Jonathan Institute of Jerusalem, Israel, has published a pamphlet on "International Terrorism: The Soviet Connection". The pamphlet consists of a number of presentations made at the Jerusalem Conference on International Terrorism held July 2-5 last year... The first contributor, professor Richard Pipes [associate of Brian Crozier] of Harvard, ... stated "The Soviet Union has enjoyed great success with terror and profited from it in many ways... We must expose its support of terrorism as widely as possible, and make the public aware of Soviet complicity... Brian Crozier, Director of the Institute for the Study of Conflict in London [and still chairman of Le Cercle], discussed the direct support that the Soviet Union has given to terrorist movements... Mr Crozier declared that the Soviets have provided training for terrorists within the USSR. He goes on to note the use of proxies by the Soviets Libya for example benefited from one of the biggest arms deals in history, an estimated $12 billion worth of arms were sold here by the Soviets in 1976... The other contributors, Ray S. Cline [former deputy director CIA; member WACL; founder of the US Global Strategy Council in 1981 and headed it from 1986 to 1994], Executive Director of the Centre for Strategic Studies at Georgetown University, Robert Moss [le Cercle], Editor of the Economist Foreign Report, Congressman Jack Kemp, Major General George J. Keegan [chief Air Force Intelligence at the 7th Air Force in Vietnam, 1967-1969; head Air Force Intelligence 1971-1977; retired in 1977; directly after his retirement claimed that the USSR was working on charged-particle beam weapons; vice chair Coalition for Peace through Strength 1980-1993], and Senator Henry Jackson [neocon pro-zionist democrat; the Henry Jackson Society, founded in 2005, is named after him] also look closely at Soviet involvement in terrorism."

Some other participants in the 1979 conference were former CIA director George Bush, journalists George Will, Rome-based journalist Claire Sterling (published the book Terror Network in 1980, which claimed the IRA, ETA, PLO, and Red Brigade were all controlled by the USSR), Jacques Soustelle (allegedly responsible for the transfer of nuclear technology to Israel; founder of OAS that tried to destabilize Algeria and assassinate de Gaulle), and Lord Alun Chalfont (minister in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office 1964-1970; Privy Council since 1964; Pilgrims Society executive since 1979; Conservative Monday Club; pro-apartheid; director pro-junta British-Chilean Council; council member of FARI with Cercle members/presidents Brian Crozier, Julian Amery, and Robert Moss, just as the aristocrat Sir Frederic M. Bennett; chair Institute for the Study of Terrorism, a clone of Crozier's anti-communist Institute for the Study of Conflict; member Committee for a Free Britain, which spent more than Pounds 200,000 on press advertisements attacking Labour during the 1987 election; member Committee for a Free World, an American neo-conservative group; member Media Monitoring Unit, which attempted to "expose" left-wing bias in television news and current affairs programmes; consultant to private security firm Zeus Security Consultants (did high level government contract work), owned by Major Peter Hamilton, a close friend of Stephan Kock, the MI5, MI6, SAS agent who allegedly once headed a government assassination team, Group 13; director at the security firm Securipol; close friend of the extremely influential neoconservative John Lehman, apparently a top player in the military-industrial complex; chairman second neoconservative Jonathan conference; deputy chairman of the Independent Broadcasting Authority). Jacques Soustelle later became a board member, just as George Shultz. The second Jonathan Conference on international terrorism, organized in 1984, was opened by a keynote speech of secretary of state George P. Shultz (Bechtel executive and according to Dr. Greer part of a UFO insider study group; Bohemian Grove camp Mandalay; National Security Planning Group; chair advisory council J.P. Morgan Chase; ran Reagan's election campaign; largely put together the George Bush Jr. administration; etc.), who was a key organizer of the meeting with Douglas Feith and Benjamin Netanyahu.

He claimed that,

"pre- emptive actions by Western democracies may be necessary to counter the Soviet Union and other nations that... have banded together in an international "league of terror.""

This was the real birth of the War on Terror and a policy of pre-emptive strikes, which became standard almost 20 years later after 9/11. Caspar Weinberger (Also from Bechtel; Defense Secretary; National Security Planning Group; later Pilgrims Executive; member Bohemian Grove camp Mandalay) suggested that the United Nations might be called upon to deal with terrorism. Jeane Kirkpatrick, U.N. Ambassador at the time and still a very influential neoconservative, disagreed with that last notion and said it would be better to create a whole new organization to deal with international terrorism and "the power behind it, the Soviet Union". Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan (worked for Averell Harriman in the 1950s; important United Nations official in the 1970s; important DLC operative; chairman of the 1997 Commission on Protecting and Reducing Government Secrecy, which shed a little bit of light on the inner workings of the Black and Deep Black Programs, the latter officially known as Unacknowledged Special Access Programs; friend of the Rothschild family) and Yitzhak Rabin (Labour prime minister) supported Kirkpatrick. Senator Alan Cranston (D-Calif.), a member of the Foreign Relations Committee,

"told the conference that Iraq is shopping for a new nuclear reactor and is fortifying the atomic plant site bombed by Israel in 1981. He said he also has information that "unwitting" American firms provided Iraq with several components for chemical weapons used against Iran in the 44-month war between the two countries."

Among the other participants were Israel's Minister of Defense Moshe Arens; Senators Alan Cranston (president of the World Federalist Society), Alfonse D'Amato (leading figure in Iran-Contra investigation), and Paul Laxalt (lieutenant governor Nevada 1962-1966; general chairman National Republican Party 1983-1987; chair of Ronald Reagan for President in 1976, 1980, and 1984; co-chairman George Bush for President in 1988 and 1992); Rep. Jack Kemp; William Webster (director FBI 1978-1987; director CIA 1987-1991; partner Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy since 1991; director Anhauser-Busch); presidential counselor Edwin Meese (Heritage Foundation); Michael Ledeen (CIA connected Zionist extremist); Arthur Goldberg; Eugene Rostow; columnist George Will and television newsmen David Brinkley. July 31, 1993, The US Economist, 'Free Agent' book review:

"The trouble is that all extremists see the world through distorting glasses. Brian Crozier's squint so far right that one can ask how much of what he saw was in his own head... He believes its Labour Party in the 1970s had "largely been taken over by the subversive left"; that in the nation "the dominant role, increasingly, was played by extreme-left Labour MPs and constituency managers"; that subversion would be Mrs Thatcher's "greatest problem" in power. And so on. "Bonkers," one (rightish) Labour MP wrote to him of such views; "a radical incomprehension of the Labour movement . . . contradicted by manifest facts."... Be grateful it has gone no further. For Mr Crozier, 1975-78 was a "critical" time, when Britain, via the then-ruling Labour Party, risked far-left takeover. He several times lectured army officers on their response. One bunch gave him a five-minute ovation... Should a journalist feed secret services? Or, like Mr Crozier, visit the Elysee "ostensibly to gather material for an article"; in fact to spy on de Gaulle? Should western spooks run "press" agencies? Mr Crozier's agency did not lie; that is, put out crude invention. But here is a man who calls even IRD analyses "rigorously accurate". Judge that by his account of Chile before the CIA/Pinochet coup of 1973. It is as if a puritan's account of Soho were offered as a guide to London."

Crozier was among those intelligence and army officers, supported by Lord Mountbatten (husband of Queen Elizabeth II; founder 1001 Club; lifelong associate of Sir Evelyn de Rothschild), general Walter Walker (counter subversion specialist in countries like Burma and Malaya; NATO commander-in-chief; like some others in Le Cercle, he believed the Soviet collapse was not the end of Soviet subversion of the West), and colonel David Stirling (founder of the SAS; founder GB75, which was intended to intervene against "communist" labor unions in the event of widespread strikes, and basically to shove Harold Wilson's government aside; associate of James Goldsmith, Tiny Rowland, and Lord Robert Cecil, all members or associate members of Le Cercle). Scholar at the Heritage Foundation 1983-1995. August 21, 1991, The Times, 'On guard: world security in the wake of Moscow coup':

"Sir, The amazing thing about the fall of President Gorbachev is not that he has fallen but that he lasted as long as he did. He had tried to square an ideological circle: declaring his allegiance to Lenin while attempting to undo the system Lenin created, and keeping the Leninist party in power. As his removal by the hardliners confirms, the system was unreformable. It was absurd to suppose that it could be reformed, and folly on the West's part to help a deeply unpopular and unelected leader to keep Lenin's party in power. With the hardliners (appointed by him) in charge in the Kremlin, the cold war will now be resumed. The only hope for a break with the past lies with Boris Yeltsin, Eduard Shevardnadze and others who broke with the party. But the obstacles they face are daunting: the army, the KGB and the interior forces. Perhaps, by now, President Bush may be regretting his parting words after his visit to Moscow: "God bless the USSR.""

Gorbachev fought to preserve a socialist government and the unity of the Soviet Union, while Shevardnadze advocated further political and economic liberalisation. He feared the nationalists. Shevardnadze returned briefly as Soviet Foreign Minister in November 1991 but resigned with Gorbachev the following month when the Soviet Union was formally dissolved. Yeltsin rose to power. In the aftermath of Iran-Contra and the BCCI scandal, in which leading members of the US establishment were (mostly behind the scenes) exposed as the largest drug traffickers on earth, Crozier decided to do blame the communists of doing the same thing, without mentioning the revelations about the much bigger scale trade of his US buddies. January 28, 1990, Sunday Times, 'How the Colombian cocaine chain leads to Fidel Castro'.

"Estevez revealed that Cuba had built up a multi-million-dollar drug trafficking network, with thousands of agents in the United States. He said Fidel Castro was personally involved in drug trafficking, with the aim of promoting violent crime, addiction and corruption in North America, while simultaneously financing terrorism in Latin America: a perfect definition of ``narco-terrorism''... By then the drug trade was bringing Castro's regime an estimated $10m a month. Another beneficiary was the Sandinista regime in Nicaragua. It emerged for the first time that the leading role in the drug traffic was played by Pablo Escobar Gaviria, now the most wanted of the Medellin cartel fugitives in Colombia. Escobar was living in Cuba with the full assistance of Fidel Castro. Another fugitive, the American financier Robert Vesco, was believed to be Escobar's number two. The American authorities had tried unsuccessfully to extradite Vesco from Costa Rica and the Bahamas... On February 10, 1988, Blandon [Medellin cartel baron] testified before a Senate sub-committee that Castro and Noriega were working together to promote ``drug-financed guerrilla movements throughout Latin America''. He saw Castro himself brokering an agreement in Havana to end a $5m ``misunderstanding'' between the Medellin cartel and Panama... There is little reason to doubt that Ochoa a friend of Fidel's brother and defence minister, Raul Castro was indeed involved in drug smuggling. But this was not the issue. His sin, in Castro's eyes, was that he was bypassing the mechanism controlled by the Castro brothers. Moreover, he had unwisely emulated the Castro brothers in the dispensation of patronage to friends and aides. This is the view of Arturo Cruz Jr, the son of a former Nicaraguan contra leader, and one-time friend of the glamorous Fawn Hall, former secretary to Colonel Oliver North. Not only did the execution of Ochoa remove a potential rival, it also enabled Castro, at no cost to himself, to improve his image at a time when continuing financial and military assistance from the Soviet Union may be in doubt, and when Castro's relations with Mikhail Gorbachev are notoriously under strain."

November 23, 1991, The Times, Brian Crozier:

"Sir, The outcry against a single European currency is puzzling. It would (will?) make travelling much easier: no more hurried reference to pocket calculators, no more middlemen's high percentage profits... All Europeans would welcome a responsibly and impartially governed central bank where an ecu (if that is to be its name) would be worth the same in 2001 as in 1991."

Wikipedia quoted Brian Crozier, seemingly as someone with an "objective" look at Opus Dei:

"Another historian, Brian Crozier, states that Opus Dei "is not, as its enemies either think or want others to think, a political party; nor is it a political pressure group...Opus Dei was not a group to be conciliated by being given a share in power, as the Monarchists were, or the Falange, or the Army."

Distinguished visiting fellow Hoover Institute, Stanford, California, 1996-2001. Member of the International Advisory Council of the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, whose leadership is involved with the Moonies. Cercle member Edwin Feulner sits on the National Advisory Council of the VCMF, and Cercle participant Zbigniew Brzezinski used to. According to Crozier, "neo-colonialism" is a term invented by the communists.

Duncan, Alan

Sources: June 29, 1997, The Independence, 'Aitken dropped by the Right's secret club; Is it the ultimate dishonour'; 18 June 2000, Sunday Telegraph / Lobster Magazine, Issue 40, winter 2000-2001; April 2, 2003, The Guardian, 'War in the Gulf: Billionaire linked to Labour arrested in London: France demands extradition of Iraqi friend of UK politicians'

Before beginning his political career he became a millionaire as a trader of oil and refined products first with Shell and then with an independent commodity company, but he remained involved in politics as an active member of Battersea Conservative Association. Between the years of 1984 and 1986 he lived in Singapore. Member of Parliament for Rutland and Melton. since 1992. From 1993 to 1995 he sat on the Social Security Select Committee, his first governmental position was as Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Minister of Health, a position he obtained in December 1993 and resigned from in January 1994 after it was revealed that he had made a 50,000 pound profit exploiting right-to-buy legislation to buy his neighbour's council house in Westminster.

When co-Le Cercle member and arms dealer Jonathan Aitken sued the Guardian two years ago, Alan Duncan defended Aitken by stating he was a "good and honourable man. I think he has struck a rich vein and good for him for taking a stand. There is not enough courage around and he has shown he's got it" (another Cercle member, Michael Howard, did the same). In July of 1995 he was appointed Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Chairman of the Conservative Party, Dr Brian Mawhinney. In June 1997 he was entrusted with the positions of Vice Chairman of the Conservative Party and Parliamentary Political Secretary to the Party Leader. In June 1999 he was made Shadow Trade and Industry Spokesman. Attended the June 2001 meeting of Le Cercle in Lisbon, Portugal. In September 2001, he was appointed a Frontbench Spokesman for Foreign & Commonwealth Affairs. In November 2003, he became Shadow Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs. In September 2004, he was appointed Shadow Secretary of State for International Development. He now sits on the front bench as Shadow Secretary of State for Transport, a position he has held since May 2005. Described as a libertarian, wishing to minimize the role of the state and abolish laws against drugs. He is on the council of the Conservative Way Forward group. Duncan is a passionate fighter against AIDS.

In 2004 he said:

"The poor of the world need deeper debt relief, better aid, and freer and fairer trade."

Duncan is openly gay since July 2002. Together with Nadhmi Auchi and Prince Andrew he is a member of the Anglo-Arab Organization. Auchi is the chairman. April 2, 2003, The Guardian:

"[Auchi's] Le Cercle meetings - originally a cold war group of businessmen and politicians - have brought him into contact with political figures such as Lord Lamont and the Tory MP Alan Duncan, and with intelligence officers such as the former MI6 officer Anthony Cavendish and the former head of MI6's Middle East division, Geoffrey Tantum."

Elliot, Nicholas

Sources: November 1988 – Issue 17, Lobster Magazine, 'Brian Crozier, the Pinay Circle and James Goldsmith' (quoting the Langemann papers); October 1989 – Issue 18, Lobster Magazine, 'The Pinay Circle and Destabilisation in Europe'; June 29, 1997, The Independence, 'Aitken dropped by the Right's secret club; Is it the ultimate dishonour'

Elliot was an officer in MI6's 'Section D', which was created when WWII broke out. Its purpose was to perform more violent operations than usual, like sabotage and unconventional warfare. In 1962 / 1963, MI5 head Arthur Martin, after having interviewed the Russian defector Anatoli Golitsin, arranged for Kim Philby (MI6 officer - head of Soviet Affairs who turned out to be a communist spy) to be interviewed in Beirut in 1963 by Nicholas Elliot. Due to some of the comments made by Philby during the interview, Elliott got the impression that he had been tipped off to expect a visit from MI5. In turn, this led Arthur Martin to believe there still was a high-level communist spy within MI5. In January 1963, Philby fled to the USSR, a very short time after his interview with Elliot. Elliot also sat on the board of directors of Lonrho during the time. Edward Du Cann, some time chairman of the Conservative Party and, until 1991 chairman of Lonrho, published his autobiography in 1995, 'Two Lives', which received little attention. He wrote:

"Yet another dissident was Nicholas Elliot, a director of MI6, the man who botched Commander Crabb's underwater investigation of the Soviet cruiser Ordzhonikidze at the time of Kruschev's visit to the UK in 1956. A former head of station in Beirut, he travelled there in 1963 to obtain the traitor Kim Philby's confession. He succeeded in this, but then allowed his old friend from MI6 to escape to Soviet Russia. On the face of it these were two of the most monumental blunders perpetrated by British Intelligence since the War. Presumably the reality must have been different from the way in which the public perceived these events or he would surely have been dismissed in disgrace. For a while, until the shareholders of Lonrho dismissed him for his disloyalty to Rowland by an overwhelming majority, we were both directors of Lonrho. I never heard him make a single contribution of substance at any of our Board meetings. I always sat as far away from him as possible: he suffered badly from halitosis."

May 17, 2002 issue, Jeffrey Steinberg for Executive Intelligence Review, 'Ariel Sharon: Profile of an Unrepentant War Criminal':

"On Nov. 15, 1982, a final meeting took place on several real estate purchases, mostly through Arab middle-men, to push the massive expansion of Jewish settlements throughout the West Bank at a handsome profit. Attending the meeting at Sharon's ranch were: Kissinger [Cercle], Lord Harlech (Sir David Ormsby-Gore), Johannes von Thurn und Taxis [1001 Club], Tory Parliamentarian Julian Amery [Cercle], Sir Edmund Peck, and MI-6 Mideast mandarin Nicholas Elliot [Cercle]."

Elliott has also been a Council Member of the Wilkinson / McWhirter / Ivens group, the Research Foundation for the Study of Terrorism. Elliot worked closely with co-Le Cercle member Brian Crozier, who included him in Margaret Thatcher's Shield committee and in 'The 61'.

Feulner, Edwin J., Jr.

Sources: November 1988 – Issue 17, Lobster Magazine, 'Brian Crozier, the Pinay Circle and James Goldsmith' (quoting from the Langemann papers); June 29, 1997, The Independence, 'Aitken dropped by the Right's secret club; Is it the ultimate dishonour' (named as once a regular)

Born in 1941. Feulner has studied at the University of Edinburgh, the London School of Economics, the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, Georgetown University, and Regis University. Has been a roommate of the very influential John F. Lehman, and both later attended the Bohemian Grove. Feulner has attended the Bohemian Grove's Cave Man camp. Treasurer Philadelphia Society 1964-1979 and president 1982-1983. Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) 1965-1966. Public affairs fellow at the Hoover Institution 1966-1968. Confidential assistant to Nixon's Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird 1969-1970. Campaign manager of the [Philip M.] Crane for Congress Committee 1972. Administrative assistant to U.S. Congressman Philip M. Crane 1970-1974. Member of the US delegation to the IMF/World Bank 1974-1976. Executive director of the Republican Study Committee of the House of Representatives 1974-1977. President of the Heritage Foundation since 1977, Washington’s leading public policy organization/think tank, to which the Bechtels are major contributors. Unlike most other think tanks, Heritage not only suggests ideas but actively pushes them in Congress. Following are the words of Heritage vice presidents Stuart Butler and Kim Holmes, published in the 1995 Annual Report issued in the spring of 1996:

Butler: Heritage now works very closely with the congressional leadership.... Heritage has been involved in crafting almost every piece of major legislation to move through Congress.
Holmes: Without exaggeration, I think we've in effect become Congress's unofficial research arm.... We truly have become an extension of the congressional staff, but on our own terms and according to our own agenda.
Butler: That's right. As Kim knows, things have been happening so fast on Capitol Hill we've had to sharpen our management skills to take full advantage of the opportunities. There has also been an unprecedented demand on us to "crunch the numbers" for the new congressional leadership.

Vice chairman of the trustees of Manhattan Institute Policy Studies 1977-1986. Chairman Institute for European Defense and Strategic Studies in London 1977-1996. Attended a meeting in Washington of Le Cercle in 1979, the covert European group set up by a mixture of Vatican intelligence, Opus Dei luminaries, and the Pan Europa leadership. Treasurer Mont Pelerin Society 1979-1996, which is a branch of the Paneuropa Union. Trustee Lehrman Institute 1981-1990. Member of the public delegation to the 2nd Special Session on Disarmament of the United Nations in 1982. Chairman of the US Information Agency 1982-1991. Member US Advisory Committee on Public Diplomacy 1982-1994. Member of the Carlucci Commission on Security and Economic Assistance 1983. Distinguished fellow of mobilization concepts at the Development Center of the National Defense University 1983-1989. Consultant to White House Counselor Edwin Meese, the seventy-fifth Attorney General of the United States from 1985 to 1988. Member of the national advisory board of the Center for Education and Research in Free Enterprise at the Texas Agricultural and Mechanical University 1985-1996. Chairman Citizens for American Education Foundation 1985-1989. Consultant for Domestic Policy to President Reagan in 1987. Director Sequoia National Bank 1987-1999. Member of the Sarah Scaife Foundation since 1988, which has been named after the mother of Richard Mellon Scaife. The Sarah Scaife Foundation is is financed by the Mellon industrial, oil and banking fortune, and Richard Mellon Scaife has been chairman since 1973. The Sarah Scaife Foundation is one of the biggest donators to Conservative and (formerly) anti-communist causes, often having worked in tandem with the CIA. On January 18, 1989 President Reagan conferred the Presidential Citizens Medal on Feulner as "a leader of the conservative movement."

Member of the US Committee on Improving Effectiveness of the United Nations 1989-1993. Vice chairman of the National Economic Growth and Tax Reform "Kemp" Commission 1995-1996. Member of the advisory committee of the American Political Channel 1994-1996. Counselor to vice presidential candidate Jack Kemp in 1996. President Mont Pelerin Society 1996-1998. Member of the board visitors of the George Mason University 1996-2004. Member of the Congressional Policy Advisory Board 1997-2001. Senior vice president Mont Pelerin Society 1998-2000. Again treasurer Mont Pelerin Society since 2000. Distinguished visiting professor of Hanyang University in Seoul since 2001. Member of the Gingrich/Mitchell Task Force on United Nations Reforming in 2005. Member of the National Advisory Council of the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, together with Jeane Kirkpatrick, Jack Kemp, senator Claiborne Pell, senator Bob Dole, Richard Pipes, and formerly Zbigniew Brzezinski. Former Cercle head Brian Crozier is a member of the International Advisory Council of the VCMF. By Georges Magazine he was ranked nr 45 in a list of the 50 most influential politicians. Greenspan was one, Cheney was two. Member of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta and the Knights of the Holy Sepulchre, according to his Who's Who. Member of the Union League (New York City), Metropolitan Club, Reform Club (London), Bohemian Club (San Francisco), and several clubs. Not a member of the CFR as of 2006.
 

Fraser, Charles Alan

Sources: November 1988 – Issue 17, Lobster Magazine, 'Brian Crozier, the Pinay Circle and James Goldsmith' (quoting from the Langemann papers)

South African General. Chief of the South African Army and G.O.C. Joint Combat Forces back in the 1960s and 1970s. Has written a dissertation on 'counter-insurgency measures' and how to avoid a communist revolution. The book he wrote around 1968 has set South-Africa's general counter-revolution policy up until the wall came down. Fraser believed that this counter-revolution "war" had to be fought by politicians for at least 80%. People who had a better lifestyle than the communists could offer, wouldn't be interested in a revolution. He was a close personal friend of the Shah and introduced Brian Crozier, as a representative of The 61, to this person at some point.

Gallois, General Pierre Marie

Sources: 1993, Brian Crozier, 'Free Agent', page 241

One of the main French sovereignist thinkers, and a staunch supporter of De Gaulle. Member of the Planning Group at SHAPE at the time it was founded. French Air Force General. Present at the October 1957 Bilderberg meeting in Italy, for which he had written the following text:

"For each of the powers of the Alliance which do not possess nuclear weapons the question is this: might it find itself in such a situation that an incident of major importance for its own security or independence might be considered minor not only by guaranteeing atomic powers, but also by the other member countries of the Alliance? This assessment of the major or minor nature of a threat against Western countries must be estimated according to a new criterion the size of the nuclear risk. Even if a vast airborne nuclear exchange appears improbable, or even impossible, and if everyone knows that they were being blackmailed with fear, it is clear that everyone would weigh the size of the stake and of the risk. And in such a calculation it is very likely that countries not directly and immediately threatened might consider some enemy intervention of major importance for the country against which it is directed to be only a minor incident."

Some time head of the French Air Force. Mostly known as the architect of the French nuclear deterrence. Brian Crozier wrote in 'Free Agent', page 241:

"We agreed that the best way to mobilise Mitterrand on this issue was to persuade him to invite General Gallois to brief him on the SS-20 [nuclear ballistic missile] danger. We both knew Pierre Gallois. I had translated his important Conflict Study analysing the SS-20 threat, and interpreted for him at Pinay Cercle meetings. Jean Violet gave him a 'genius' rating."

Later went into the aeronautic industry with Marcel Dassault, the aircraft maker, and became one of the most prominent architects of the French Air Force revival, working on the Mirage IV. Has written a lot about geopolitical issues. About the Balkan and Iraq bombings Gallois said that while some of our targets were clearly of a military nature, such things as water purification plants, sewage treatment plants, and fertilizer plants serve only to impoverish the population, not to promote military objectives. About the economic sanctions on Iraq, Gallois said they were "cruel, cowardly, ineffective, and stupid." April 16, 2004, Frontpage Magazine interview with Kenneth Timmerman, who has spent twenty years reporting on Europe and the Middle East:

"Iraq was a special case. I was invited in the late 1980s to visit the Iraqi Army staff college, and was surprised when I saw a plaque donated to the college by visiting French general Pierre-Marie Gallois, the “father” of the French strategic nuclear force. Many in the French Gaullist elite saw in Saddam Hussein an Iraqi De Gaulle, a fellow spirit: someone willing to stand up to superpowers, and take his country on a “third way.” That third way, of course, led directly through Paris, in opposition to Washington."

In 2001 a group of traditional Gaullists, including Gallois, signed a declaration calling on true Gaullists to vote for the candidate “who most respects the political choices made by the founder of the 5th Republic.” Without actually mentioning the name of the former Interior Minister, Jean-Pierre Chevènement, it is clear whom they mean. They also very explicitly denounced,

“the way in which the so-called Gaullist party has abandoned its traditions” and said quite clearly that they “do not find in the decisions taken by the president of the Republic (i.e. Chirac) any respect for the founding principles affirmed by General de Gaulle.”

The Fifth Republic emerged from the ashes of the French Fourth Republic (1945-1958), replacing a weak and factional parliamentary government with a stronger, more centralized system. The office of the president, which had recently been occupied by De Gaulle, gained much more strength in the new system.

Gehlen, General Reinhard

Sources: November 1988 – Issue 17, Lobster Magazine, 'Brian Crozier, the Pinay Circle and James Goldsmith' (quoting from the Langemann papers; probably an associate member)

Hans Langemann 1980 paper:

"Gehlen, who was always interested in the undertaking [of the Pinay Circle], its figures, its personalities and its results, succeeded in recruiting Violet [the Circle founder and Otto von Habsburg- and SDECE agent] as a special agent and granted him 6000 DM a month for many years. He also claimed that this sum had been agreed with the former head of the SDECE, General Jacquier because Violet is also receiving the same sum from the SDECE."

Major General Reinhard Gehlen headed the Foreign Armies East section of the Abwehr (German intelligence), directed towards the Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. Worked closely with the SS Reich Security Main Office (RSHA), the controlling agency of the Gestapo and German State Security (SD). 1971, Heinz Hohne & Hermann Zolling, 'The General was a Spy', p. 50-53:

"Moreover another SS man appeared with increasing frequency at Gehlen's side - SS-Sturmbannfuhrer [Major] Otto Skorzeny, commander of the SS Special Service Formations. In November 1944 Skorzeny was commissioned to set up a resistance organisation in the Soviet rear areas and gain contact with anti-communist partisans... Skorzeny accordingly had to consult Gehlen if he was to gain contact with the partisans... He [Gehlen] visualized an intelligence organization, run by FHO and the RSHA, covering the whole of Eastern Europe deep into the Soviet Union and making use of all racial groups in the east... Without realising it, Gehlen had thus patented the post-war organisation which later bore his name... He, Skorzeny and Hengelhaupt in concert assembled all possible information about the existence of East European resistance groups... Gehlen ultimately became so close an ally of the RSHA that, during the death-throes of Adolf Hitler's regime he, together with the SS officers Skorzeny and Prutzmann, was charged with military direction of that macabre partisan and resistance organization known as "Werewolf", intended to spread panic among the enemy."

Werewolf was dreamed up in the Autumn of 1944 by Heinrich Himmler, in cooperation with Skorzeny, Gehlen, and a few other high level German officers. It was to act as an early Stay-Behind army in case parts of Germany would be occupied by the Allies. Skorzeny's men gave intensive lessons in sabotage, demolitions, small arms, survival and radio-communications to these new Werewolf regiments, but in the end the lack of central command and sufficient resources made sure this operation was not effective. October 6, 1975, Star-News (Pasadena, CA), 'Plot to Kidnap Stalin Bared':

"More than 500 paratroops and other special units led by SS Capt. Otto Skorzeny were ready in 1942 [after German tanks had almost reached Moscow] to fly from a German airfield in Poland to kidnap Soviet dictator Josef Stalin from the Kremlin, a Danish newspaper reported Sunday... Quoting an unnamed Danish pilot who served in the German air force during World War II, the paper said the plan was called off only because the dearth of agents in Moscow made it impossible for German intelligence to say with 100 per cent certainty when Stalin would be in his Kremlin command bunker... All Skorzeny needed was the final go-ahead from intelligence chief Heinrich Gehlen. But the signal never came."

Gehlen had begun planning his surrender to the United States at least as early as the fall of 1944. At that time, after D-Day, the United States had begun setting up an operation to recover valuable German officers and scientists. It was first called Operation Overcast, renamed in 1946 to Paperclip. Operation Apple Pie was another project to locate and interrogate key German personnel, this time of the RSHA (SS Reich Security Main Office) and members of the German Army Staff who were knowledgeable about Soviet industrial and economic matters. From 1948 to 1950 there was a program called Bloodstone, which involved the recruiting of anti-communist individuals in eastern Europe, including nazis. Scientists and military officers like Wernher von Braun (father of the US space program and missile technology), General Walter Dornberger (head Peenemunde, where jews who worked there were horribly treated; also head of Braun's research there), Franz Six (led a nazi special forces group that assassinated opponents; went to train US special forces after a brief sentence), Emil Augsburg (SS major; same job as Franz Six), Willi Krichbaum (SS colonel; in charge of the deportation of the Hungarian Jews since 1944; shot Raoul Wallenberg), Walter Rauff (SS colonel; involved in the holocaust), Kurt Blome, General Walter Schreiber, Heinrich Rupp, Otto Skorzeny, Klaus Barbie, and others were brought to the US (or stationed elsewhere with CIA and Gehlen Org support) and either went to work in the new Military-Industrial Complex or went to work for US intelligence and special forces. Some scientists had already left for the US and were already working in the Military Industrial Complex. Theodore von Karmann and Edward Teller were among the people in this group. What happened to Martin Bormann (who liquidated most of the assets of the Third Reich and transported it overseas) and his secret police aide general Heinrich Muller is not known. Officially they died in Berlin in 1945 while journalists like Paul Manning maintain that both successfully escaped from Europe and became leaders in the post-WWII Fascist underground. This was initially done through ODESSA (also referred to as "Die Spinne", or "The Spider") and Deutsche Hilfsverein, the CIA/SMOM-approved Nazi-ratlines, set up by the Nazis, that smuggled Nazis to the Middle-East, Spain, or South-America. Besides Bormann and Muller, Adolf Eichmann, Josef Mengele, and Erich Priebke are among the Nazis that escaped using this (controversial) network. The ODESSA network brought Nazis, with support of high level officers in the CIA and the Vatican mafia (SMOM; through catholic monasteries), to Genoa, Italy, as part of the ratlines (with at least one alternative route). From there the whole Third Reich is said to have reorganized itself as a new underground Fourth Reich. Supposedly, one of the later umbrella organization of the Fascist International in South America became La Arana (according to journalist Paul Manning). Even though this faction still might have had some influence, this new "Forth Reich" was not dominated anymore by Germanic Pagans (of the Thule Society, inspired by Blavatsky and such) that opposed the Catholic church and Freemasonry. Starting in March 1945, Dulles and Casey were involved in Operation Sunrise: negotiations with SS general Karl Wolff that finally brought an early end to the Italian campaign. In early March 1945 a group of Gehlen's senior officers microfilmed their holdings on the USSR. They packed the film in steel drums and buried it throughout the Austrian Alps. On May 22, 1945 Gehlen and his top aides surrendered to an American Counter-Intelligence Corps (CIC) team. At first locked up, they were soon discovered by higher ups in the US intelligence community. Gehlen was invited to the US from mid-1945 to February 1946 to discuss what to do with his information on Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. In the end it was decided at these meetings, held at the army's Fort Hunt in Virginia, that Gehlen's spy organization would be kept intact through CIA funds. Gehlen's group, including his immediate staff of about 350 agents, went back to Germany in February 1946, and became known as the Gehlen Organization. They became the CIA's eyes and ears in Eastern Europe and in the Soviet Union. Hundreds of German army and SS officers were released from internment camps to join Gehlen's headquarters in the Spessart Mountains in central Germany. When the staff grew to 3,000, the Gehlen Org moved its headquarters to a twenty-five-acre compound south of Munich, Bavaria, operating under the innocent name of the South German Industrial Development Organization. Gehlen oversaw some of the post WWII recruiting programs (ratlines) of Nazis by the CIA. On November 17, 1948 SMOM (The Sovereign Military Order of Malta) awarded one of its highest honors, the Grand Cross of Merit, to Reinhard Gehlen. In 1948, Reinhard Gehlen's brother was in Rome serving as the secretary to Thun Hohenstein. Conveniently for Reinhard, who was negotiating with the U.S. for the preservation of his Nazi colleagues, Thun Hohenstein was chairman of one of SMOM's grand magistral charities, the Institute for Associated Emigrations, and had arranged for two thousand SMOM passports to be printed for political refugees. Thun Hohenstein was also related to the leading German Knights of SMOM. In the early fifties it was estimated that the Gehlen Org employed up to 4,000 intelligence specialists in Germany, mainly former army and SS officers, and that more than 4,000 V-men (undercover agents) were active throughout the Soviet-bloc countries. August 11, 1954, Winnipeg Free Press, 'Hitler's Shadow Man Takes Top Spy Role':

"Bruce Rothwell, foreign correspondent who wrote this story from Berlin, says his telephone was tapped while he and his staff were gathering the facts on General Gehlen. And during one important conversation, the line was disconnected... Gehlen, "The Man in the Shadows," already leads a $3,000,000 secret service from Munich paid for by the Americans. Now he will absorb the security organisation left headless by Dr. Otto John, who disappeared into Communist East Germany a fortnight ago... John, who feared tho rise of ex-Nazis in Germany, went into the East Zone accompanied by a pro-Communist psychiatrist. For some time there had been a struggle for supremacy between Gehlen's organisation and John's... Until late last night Gehlen was negotiating with officials of Dr. Adenauer's Government. It seems he has won an outright victory. Over 30 intelligence services... will come under Gehlen's hand. All this power goes to a man who is unknown to the German public... Bonn officials refuse even to say if he in married. News photographers have been trying vainly for five years to photograph him."

The following year, in 1955, the Gehlen Organization became the BND, the official German intelligence service. Gehlen remained its head. May 17, 1984, Boston Globe, 'Death of a Nazi':

"In the perverse climate of the Cold War years, Nazis such as [SS Col. Walter] Rauff, Reinhardt Gehlen, Otto Skorzeny and Klaus Barbie made themselves so useful to western intelligence services that they were able to transform the struggle against the Red Menace into a prolongation of the Fascist enterprise."

General Foertsch, one of general Gehlen highest level deputies, was invited to Antoine Bonnemaison's (a French colonel and SDECE agent specialized in psychological warfare) Centre de Recherche du Bien Politique in the 1950s, which was a secret discussion group involving intelligence officers, academics, businessmen, a few politicians, and trade union leaders of France, Germany, and the Netherlands. Besides countering communist subversion the "colloques" were aimed at Franco-German rapprochement. Foertsch was a German general who was accused of serious war crimes, but after his release became very instrumental in building up the new German military under Adenauer. Paul Manning, p. 212:

"When Colonel Nasser became president of Egypt [in late 1954], he asked the CIA for assistance in establishing a similar organization in his country. The CIA did not wish to become involved, and so referred him to General Gehlen, then chief of the West German federal intelligence organization, which was in fact maintained by the CIA. But Gehlen ducked the request, suggesting that former SS General Otto Skorzeny, son-in-law of Hjalmar Schacht, one-time Minister of Finance for Hitler [now worked with Aristotle Onassis], should be approached. Skorzeny, who made his headquarters in Spain, did not want the assignment either, for he was doing too well as an engineer and businessman in Spain [his secret Paladin group, located in Madrid, supposedly was a mercenary group], and was also owner of a large farming establishment outside of Dublin. But, urged by Schacht, he had Heinrich Mueller in Brazil send him a team of secret police specialists, who all arrived in Cairo as a German mission led by Skorzeny, who promptly returned to Spain after introductions had been made."

In 1954, in the middle of the McCarthy affair, a strange story appeared about a new "nazi-communist" political underground. Many people believed that the Gehlen Organization had thoroughly been penetrated by the Soviets, as many operations and foreign agents were betrayed. Even though a communist alliance with the Nazis seems far-fetched, the following article does seem to confirm the existence of a post-war underground Nazi movement, led by some of the individuals mentioned earlier. March 31, 1954, The Chronicle Telegram, Ohio:

"[Werner] Naumann [former State Secretary in Goebbels's Ministry of Propaganda] recalled the Nazi splinter parties behind him in an attempt to resurrect the Nazi movement. He praised Senator McCarthy and denounced President Eisenhower. Finally he was arrested by the British on charges of plotting to overthrow the West German government [his group was often referred to as "Naumann's Circle"]... Reporter Magazine charges that the "explicit aim of the Naumann group was to establish a Totalitarian West German Government oriented toward the Soviet Union." Naumann used a Dusseldorf export-import firm, the H. S. Luch Company, as a front for a world wide political network which kept in touch with Nazi exiles in Spain and Argentina, as well as pro Nazis in other countries. For example, Col. Otto Skorzeny, the rescuer of Mussolini, and Dr. Hjalmar Schacht, Hitler's former financial wizard, are connected with the company in Spain [where Skorzeny ran an underground mercenary group called Paladin, in Madrid]... Two members of the Nazi-Communist underground in Spain also took in Senator McCarthy's two junior G-men, Roy Cohn and David Schine, during their comic-opera, spy-hunting junket throughout Europe last year."

Roy Cohn was later named by EIR as an initial director of Permindex, a corporation set up in 1958 which is suspected of having been a front organization in the planning of the John F. Kennedy assassination. During the 1980s even information surfaced that Cohn had ran a pedophile ring to subvert members of the US government (see William Casey bio in Le Cercle list). Schacht, the godfather of Hitler with Fritz Thyssen, used to be great friends with Pilgrims Society Wall Street and City of London bankers. January 1982, Mae Brussell:

"Gehlen pioneered the setting up of dummy fronts and cover companies to support his farflung covert operations... By the time the Gehlen Organization became part of the West German state, Gehlen already had his agent-in-place in the United States. He was Otto Albrecht von Bolschwing, who had been a captain in Heinrich Himmler’s dreaded SS and Adolph Eichmann's superior in Europe and Palestine. Von Bolschwing worked simultaneously for Dulles' OSS. When he entered the U.S. in February, 1954, he cleverly concealed his nazi past. He was to take over Gehlen's network not only in this country but in many corners of the globe. He became closely associated with the late Elmer Bobst [Pilgrims Society; SMOM; anti-Jewish; accused of sexual abuse granddaughters and great-granddaughters] of Warner-Lambert Pharmaceutical, a godfather of Richard Nixon's political career, which brought him inside Nixon's 1960 campaign for the presidency. In 1969 he showed up in California with a high-tech firm called TCI that held classified Defense Department contracts. His translator for German projects was Helene van Damme, Governor Ronald Reagan's appointments secretary."

Gehlen remained head of the BND until his retirement in 1968. He produced numerous reports claiming a Soviet invasion of the west was imminent; that the Soviets were building a fleet of flying wing jet fighters; that the Soviets were planning a huge submarine fleet to starve Europe into submission; etc, which heightened the tensions between the two power blocs. Many are of the opinion that some of these reports were exaggerated to justify the existence of Gehlen's Nazi spy outfit. Doubts have also been raised over the effectiveness of the Gehlen Org in providing intelligence on Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union.

Gerber, Conrad

Sources: April 19, 2005, 18:30, Executives International, 'Forum Dinner - "The Barrel at $99?"' (Guest Speaker: Mr. Conrad Geber)

Studied economics, law, and diplomacy at the University of Cape Town and at the Institut des Hautes Etudes Internationales in Geneva. Worked as an economist in the government of Rhodesia. Admits that he first learned about the oil business in the 1970s when he was helping to circumvent international sanctions against Rhodesia and to procure illegal oil for his country. Started Petro-Logistics in 1980, shortly after the United Nations lifted sanctions against the country. Chairman and CEO of Petro-Logistics ever since, a firm that collects and analyses data on the world's supplies of oil. His company uses tricks from intelligence work to pierce the curtain of secrecy raised by oil-producing countries, especially the members of OPEC in the Persian Gulf. He tracks tanker loadings at major oil ports, relying on a network of about two dozen closely guarded sources. The tanker data is combined with tips from oil executives and synthesized into regular reports for his clients. Gerber's ability to move markets is well known. "Petro-Logistics estimates have a significant market impact, as they are widely recognized as an important source on OPEC supply," said Fatih Birol, the chief economist for the International Energy Agency (IEA), an organization based in Paris that is one of Mr Gerber's clients. Petro-Logistics, meanwhile, "is very well connected in the gulf and the Black Sea," said David Knapp, the senior editor for global markets at the Energy Intelligence Group, a publishing and information services company. Mr Knapp used to work at the International Energy Agency, where he said he relied on Mr Gerber's reports. Petro-Logistics is not the only group to rely on tanker tracking for supply data. Lloyd's Marine Intelligence Unit, part of the Informa Group, uses a network of 900 agents at 2,000 ports and cities, said Andrew Lorimer, manager of oil trade analysis for the unit, which is based in London. Lloyd's also publishes an estimate for seaborneoil on a regular basis. Among his business associates and friends, Mr Gerber counted Theodore G. Shackley, one of the CIA's most famous spymasters, who led efforts to battle Fidel Castro when he was station chief in Miami in the early 1960's. Shackley engaged in some oil trading after he retired from the CIA in 1979. Mr Gerber said he was at Mr Shackley's bedside just before he died last year. Fellow of the London Energy Institute. Member of the Club de Nice (for Energie et Géopolitique). Member of Le Cercle and President of CRES (the Centre de Recherches Entreprises et Sociétés), a consulting firm based in Geneva.

Ted Shackley, son of a Polish immigrant mother, went to work as an Army Counter Intelligence Corps officer in Germany in 1945, trying to recruit Polish agents. He himself was recruited into the CIA in 1953, and started to work for William Harvey (worked with mafia bosses Santo Trafficante and Johnny Roselli; CIA station chief in Rome in 1963 while Gen. Vernon Walters was military attaché in Rome) in the CIA's Berlin Station. Involved in overthrow of the socialist Guatemalan government of Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán in 1954. In 1962, Shackley was appointed by William Harvey (started ZR/RIFLE in November 1961, an assassination plot on Castro, which involved the recruitment of mob bosses Johnny Roselli, Santos Trafficante, Sam Giancana, and Meyer Lansky, and was originally negotiated by CIA chief Allen Dulles; demoted in February 1963 by Robert Kennedy and sent to Rome to become Chief of Station there, and just as DCI Allen Dulles, his Harrimanite deputy Bissell, and CIA deputy Director Charles Cabell (whose brother was the mayor of Dallas at the time Kennedy was shot).; he developed an extreme distaste for the Kennedy's) as deputy chief of JM/WAVE, the heavily funded CIA station in Miami that oversaw the operation to overthrow Fidel Castro. In April of that year, Shackley was involved in delivering supplies to Johnny Roselli (mob boss; murdered in September 1976, at the time of the Church committee; Roselli had been named as a participant in the JFK assassination) as part of the plan to assassinate Fidel Castro. Recruited Félix Rodríguez, who later organized the capture and execution of Che Guevara in Bolivia. CIA assassin David Morales first worked under Shackley at JM/WAVE, just as David Atlee Phillips, who, according to James A. Files was the co-handler of Lee Harvey Oswald and himself, together with mafia assassin Charles Nicolette, subordinate to Sam Giancana, one of the mafia bosses who was employed by DCI Allen Dulles in the anti-Castro war. Porter Goss, who knew Barry Seal and later became a CIA director, went to work under Shackley at JM/WAVE, just as Frank Sturgis, who would be convicted for his role in Watergate. After the Bay of Pigs fiasco, when Harvey was ousted, Shackley became head of Operation Mongoose, and quite possibly of Executive Directives, a worldwide assassination program. Responsible for gathering intelligence and recruiting spies in Cuba. During this time, he worked closely with mob figures as Sam Giancana (also murdered in June 1975, at the start of the Church Committee), John Roselli, and Santos Trafficante, all of them suspected of having been involved in the assassination on JFK. Headed JM/WAVE until 1965. In 1966, Shackley was placed in charge of the CIA's secret war in Laos. Thomas G. Clines was appointed his deputy. He formed the Military Assistance Group-Special Operations Group (MAG-SOG) political murder unit; Gen. John K. Singlaub was a commander of MAG-SOG; Oliver North and Richard Secord were officers of the unit. According to mainstream journalist Joel Bainerman in 'The Crimes of a President', Shackley and his Secret Team (in Laos), which included Thomas G. Clines, Carl E. Jenkins, David Morales, Raphael Quintero, Felix Rodriguez and Edwin Wilson, became involved in the drug trade at this time. They did this via General Vang Pao, the leader of the anti-communist forces in Laos. Vang Pao was a major figure in the opium trade. To help him, Shackley used his CIA officials and assets to sabotage the competitors. Shackley and Clines also helped Vang Pao to obtain financial backing to form his own airline, Zieng Khouang Air Transport Company, to transport opium and heroin between Long Tieng and Vientiane (Mekong Delta). Shackley used the dope proceeds in turn to fund his hit squads and other covert operations. Vang Pao gained a monopoly over the heroin trade in Laos, but in the late 1970s his army was defeated by the communists. At that moment Khun Sa and his independent Shan state in Burma rose to prominence. Virtually all the Opium produced (and turned into heroin) was either produced in the areas he controlled or was transported over his territory, which meant a tax had to be paid and he was able to stop it. Delta Force and ISA commander Bo Gritz, who was initially searching for POWs, made contact with this person in December 1986. He not only found out that Khun Sa was not aware of any POWs, but also that the only reason this person was selling opium was to fund his war against the communists. Khun Sa offered to stop virtually all the opium coming from the Gold Triangle (he controlled it) if the US would A) recognize his Shan state (to stop the continuous warfare against him) B) help the Shan State with the development of a normal agricultural economy. Gritz took Khun Sa's written offer, specifically addressed to vice president George H.W. Bush, to Washington. Through his contact Bill Harvey (not the associate of Shackley) at the National Security Council Staff, Gritz was informed to drop the issue, because no one was interested in stopping it. After Gritz refused to do that he and his teammate were persecuted. In reaction Gritz returned to Khun Sa's remote camp with a small special forces team. The did an interview with the druglord (who was respected, not feared, by his people) which was videotaped. Khun Sa told his secretary to read the names of his American customers. They were Theodore Shackley (in charge of U.S. Golden Triangle opium business from 1965 to 1975), Santos Trafficante (Mafia don in Miami and Cuba and an employee of the CIA in the subversion of Cuba. Trafficante assisted in trafficking the heroin inside the U.S. and when it was there, in distributing it), Richard Armitage (at the time the Assistant Secretary of Defense and head of the rescue effort of POWs from South-East Asia, which he continually sabotaged. Later a PNAC signer and George W. Bush's Deputy Secretary of State. Armitage handled all the financial transactions with banks like the Nugan Hand), Daniel Arnold (CIA station chief in Thailand and Armitage successor in the heroin and weapons trade), and Jerry Daniels (CIA agent who also was a replacement of Armitage. Died under suspicious circumstances). According to Daniel Sheehan of the Christic Institute (Gritz noticed how much their information overlapped with his own):

"From late 1973 until April of 1975, Theodore Shackley, Thomas Clines and Richard Armitage disbursed, from the secret, Laotian-based, Vang Pao opium fund, vastly more money than was required to finance even the highly intensified Phoenix Project in Vietnam. The money in excess of that used in Vietnam was secretly smuggled out of Vietnam in large suitcases, by Richard Secord and Thomas Clines and carried into Australia, where it was deposited in a secret, personal bank account (privately accessible to Theodore Shackley, Thomas Clines and Richard Secord). During this same period of time between 1973 and 1975, Theodore Shackley and Thomas Clines caused thousands of tons of US weapons, ammunition, and explosives to be secretly taken from Vietnam and stored at a secret "cache" hidden inside Thailand."

This money, with the help of Raphael Quintero, found its way into the Nugan Hand Bank in Sydney, a money laundering center of heroin profits, mainly from the Golden Triangle (opium from this location was managed by Shackley, Armitage, and Santos Trafficante) and run by different US intelligence agencies. After Nugan Hand's cover was blown and the operation abandoned, the CIA redirected many of the Nugan Hand operations to another Pacific financial institution based in Hawaii, named Bishop, Baldwin, Rewald, Dillingham and Wong (BBRDW). By the end of 1980, BBRDW started setting up offices in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Indonesia, Singapore, and Australia, all former Nugan Hand locations, staffing the offices with some of the same personnel. August 17, 1983, Wall Street Journal, 'Bank's Links to Ex-CIA Men Detailed':

"Few men have had more to do with U.S. covert operations in the cold war than Theodore G. Shackley. Before he retired from the Central Intelligence Agency after 30 years' service in September 1979, Mr. Shackley had led the secret war against Cuba, the secret war in Laos, been CIA station chief in Saigon at the height of the Vietnam war and then No. 2 man running the clandestine services division at CIA headquarters in Langley... The Australian government report, prepared and released to Parliament in March by the Commonwealth-New South Wales Joint Task Force on Drug Trafficking, cites Mr. Shackley as one of the leading characters whose "background is relevant to a proper understanding of the activities of the Nugan Hand group and people associated with that group. The report says that Mr. Shackley had worked closely with Mr. Wilson in the CIA since 1955 and that Mr. Shackley "continued a close relationship with him (Wilson) whilst Wilson was employed by (U.S.) Naval Intelligence from 1971 to 1976, and after that." The report refers to contacts between Mr. Shackley and Michael Hand, the currently missing former CIA operator who founded , owned and managed the Nugan Hand banking group. Mr. Hand's partner, Australian Frank Nugan, died of a gunshot wound in January, 1980, later ruled a suicide, and Nugan Hand failed a few months later. Investigations following Mr. Nugan's death and the failure of the bank revealed widespread dealings by Nugan-Hand with international heroin syndicates, and evidence of massive fraud against U.S. and foreign citizens. Many retired high-ranking Pentagon and CIA officials were executives of or consultants to Nugan-Hand... both Mr. Chavez [CIA] and Mr. Shackley were working for A.P.I. Distributors, an international trading firm funded with $500,000 lent by Mr. Wilson. According to the report, it shared office space in Houston with a Wilson company that helped sell 20 tons of plastic explosives to Libya, for which Mr. Wilson was convicted. A.P.I. was headed by Thomas Clines, who had just retired after 30 years with the CIA, most recently as training director of the clandestine services branch under Mr. Shackley. Another former covert agent, Rafael "Chi Chi" Quintero, also was an executive at A.P.I... Among the high-level Pentagon and CIA officials associated with Nugan Hand were former CIA director William Colby, who was its attorney... "

July 23, 1998, Michael C. Ruppert at FTW:

"I have met Bo Gritz twice through my close friend, Mrs. Francis Gary (Sue) Powers... That Bo brought back utterly damning videotaped interviews with opium warlord Khun Sa in which Khun Sa described the roles of Shackley, Armitage, Clines, and the CIA in heroin trafficking also cannot be disputed." Case No. 98-CV-11829 JLT, September 29, 1998, deposition of Desiree A. Ferdinand, daughter of the late Colonel Albert Carone who provided a link between the CIA, DIA, and mafia groups involved in the distribution of drugs: "Frank Nugan and Michael Hand, my father was good friends with. Nugan Hand Bank. It was a bank used in the Hong Kong area to launder different monies. There were General Leroy Manner was involved. General Stilwell [Le Cercle] was involved. A man by the name of Paul Hollywell was involved. It was an operation where drug monies in different accounts from certain people were absconded with. One through Nugan Hand bank and they were used for operations that were not sanctioned by the U.S. government, black operations."

Like Colby, Shackley heading Operation Phoenix in Vietnam for a while. Head of the CIA's Western Hemisphere Division from 1972 to 1976, and played a major role in the 1973 Chile coup where Pinochet was put into power. In 1976 a Cuban airliner with 73 passengers was blown up, killing all on board. Luis Posada Carriles has been the main suspect all these years, a CIA agent who worked under Shackley in Operation 40, a top secret assassination and sabotage group of the CIA which was directed against Cuba. CIA Associate Deputy Director of Operations from 1976 to 1977, while serving under DCI George H.W. Bush. Retired from the CIA in 1979 after Stansfield Turner took over as DCI from Bush. Went to work for Systems Services International Inc., International Research and Trade Ltd., and API Distributors Inc., recently set up and managed by his ex-CIA buddies Edwin P. Wilson, Thomas G. Clines, and Rafael Quintero. Already in late 1970s this network of companies was investigated by Justice officials who suspected it of illegally selling high-tech military equipment to Iran, Egypt, Libya, and Turkey. When Shackley was still in the CIA, he tried to limit these investigations, which wasn't appreciated by Stansfield Turner. Founded Research Associates International in September 1980, which specialized in providing intelligence to business. It was incorporated by Shaw, Pittman, Potts & Trowbridge, the law firm that also represented API, IRT, and SSI. Initially, Research Associates International shared the same office with SSI and IRT.

Former CIA chief Donald Jameson, who is known to have attended a 1980 Le Cercle meeting in Zurich, became a vice president of Research Associates International. July 23, 1998, Michael Ruppert, 'The POWs, CIA and Drugs': "A former CIA officer told me in 1995 that Ollie North was leasing office space for his 1995 Senate run from Shackley's company, Research Associates International, in Rosslyn, Virginia." Shackley was hired by oil baron John Deuss to organise shipments of oil to South Africa, then under a global oil embargo that Deuss cheerfully flouted. Became a very close friend of (later) Le Cercle member Conrad Gerber, who founded Petro-Logistics in 1980. Petro-Logistics would become the primary source of supposedly reliable data to the International Energy Agency (IEA), doing anything its power to penetrate OPEC's oil secrets. Suspected of involvement in the October Surprize, doing his part in defeating the Carter reelection campaign.

Giovanetti, Monsignor Alberto

Sources: 2002, David Rockefeller, 'Memoirs', pg. 412-413, referring to the Pesenti Group

Priest at the Vatican. Prominent member of Opus Dei and a virulent anti-communist, according to David Rockefeller in his 2002 memoirs. Defender of pope Pius XII, who has been accused of not standing up enough to Hitler during WWII.

Grossouvre, Francois de

Sources: 1993, Brian Crozier, 'Free Agent', p. 217-218

Born in 1918. During World War II, François de Grossouvre was a member of Joseph Darnand's Service d'ordre légionnaire (SOL), a Vichyst militia. He left in 1943 to fight in the Vercors region. After Liberation, it was discovered that he had in fact infiltrated the SOL on behalf of Organisation de résistance de l'armée (ORA) of which he was a member. Often considered a strange man who reveled in the secrecy. He was a doctor who had never practiced his profession because of his wealth. Went into politics after WWII. Some sources say De Grossouvre first met with Francois Mitterrand in 1959. The Times, in 1994, stated that De Grossouvre first met with Mitterrand on a plane to China in 1962. Around this time, De Grossouvre held the largely ceremonial post of head of the Committee of Presidential Hunts, which organizes occasional informal gatherings in the countryside for the French President. In any case, De Grossouvre became a good friend to Francois Mitterrand. 1993, Brian Crozier, 'Free Agent', p. 217-218:

"AT THE CERCLE meeting in Washington in December 1980, Georges Albertini had brought along a quiet Frenchman named Francois de Grossouvre. This was an impressive example of his foresight. De Grossouvre, a physician, was the closest friend and confidant of the Socialist leader and presidential candidate Francois Mitterrand. For many years, Grossouvre had carried out special missions for Mitterrand. By nature and training, he was self-effacing. He played no part in our debates, but listened carefully, taking notes. Five months later, Francois Mitterrand narrowly defeated Valéry Giscard d'Estaing in France's presidential elections. One of his first actions was to appoint de Grossouvre as his coordinator of security and intelligence. Shortly after, having obtained his direct line from Albertini, I went to see him in his modest office in the Elysée Palace. We had reacted with alarm to Mitterrand's victory, but de Grossouvre reassured me... 'One thing you need to understand about Francois Mitterrand is that he has a visceral hatred of the communists.' He did not explain the nature of this hatred which, later history suggests, probably reflected less an opposition to their policies than of Mitterrand's perception of the Communists as the main obstacle to his authority. Not for nothing was Mitterrand known as Le Florentin, in reference to his interest in Machiavelli and Florentine history. In his long career, he had been everything from apparently extreme Right to apparently extreme Left."

Became Counselor for Police Affairs and Special Services in 1981, chosen by newly-elected president François Mitterrand, and charged with overseeing national security and other sensitive matters, in particular those concerning Lebanon, Syria, Tunisia, Morocco, Gabon, the Gulf countries, Pakistan and the two Koreas. As emissary to the Arab nations no one ever knew if he made an official or unofficial visit. He was also was a leading officer in the French branch of Gladio, "NATO's" stay behind paramilitary secret armies during the Cold War. 2005, Daniele Ganser, 'NATO's Secret Armies', p. 90-91:

"Maybe the most famous member of the French secret anti-Communist Rose des Vents [French Stay Behind/Gladio] army was Francois Grossouvre who in 1981 became the adviser of Socialist President Francois Mitterrand for secret operations. During the Second World War Grossouvre had enrolled in a fascist Vichy-backed militia that he later claimed to have infiltrated on behalf of the resistance. After the war the military secret service recruited him for the Rose des Vents secret army. SDECE agent Louis Mouchon who had himself recruited many secret soldiers for the network recalled how Grossouvre had been contacted: 'Our responsible man in Lyon, Gilbert Union, who during the war had carried out missions for the BCRA, was a passionate car driver and at that time had died on the road. To replace him, the SDECE had recruited, in 1950, Francois de Grossouvre.' Mouchin elaborated that Grossouvre was not only chosen for his wartime experience but as well for his contacts: 'His business, the A. Berger et Cie Sugar company, offered ample opportunities to stage fronts. He really had excellent contacts.' As special adviser of President Mitterrand, Grossouvre influenced French secret warfare in the beginning of the 1980s but was eased out of his main responsibilities in 1985 as his cloak-and-dagger style became intolerable to Mitterrand's staider colleagues. Yet the personal relations to Mitterrand allegedly remained good and when in late 1990 after the pan European Gladio discoveries President Mitterrand in the midst of the scandal had to close down the French Gladio network 'he had first consulted his "grey eminence", Francois Grossouvre'. By the time of Grossouvre's death his participation in the secret war was no longer a secret. 'He was recruited into the French espionage service and helped to organise Gladio, an Americanbacked plan to create an armed resistance movement in Western Europe against a Russian invasion', the British Economist noted in his obituary after Grossouvre, aged 76, had dramatically shot himself in the Elysee Palace on April 7, 1994."

October 6, 1985, New York Times, 'Greenpeace ship reaches test site':

"The Greenpeace flagship has arrived off the coast of the French nuclear test site in the South Pacific, where it joined another protest ship from the organization... The Greenpeace replaced the Rainbow Warrior, which was blown up on July 10 by French agents in New Zealand's Auckland harbor... Meanwhile, the largest opposition newspaper in Paris, Le Figaro, reported Friday that Mr. Mitterrand must have known of plans to sink the Rainbow Warrior, which was preparing to lead the Mururoa protest. Mr. Mitterrand's Socialist Government acknowledged secret service responsibility for the sinking last month. Defense Minister Charles Hernu and Adm. Pierre Lacoste, the head of the secret service, resigned because of the scandal. Le Figaro, without citing its sources, said the decision to mine the Rainbow Warrior was made in June in a meeting at the Elysee Palace attended by Mr. Hernu, Admiral Lacoste and the presidential adviser, Francois de Grossouvre. It was ''not believable'' that Mr. de Grossouvre failed to inform Mr. Mitterrand of the sabotage plans, Le Figaro contended."

In the 1970s and 1980s, Greenpeace chairman David McTaggart was actively involved in opposing France's nuclear testings at Mururoa. In 1985, some time after the Rainbow Warrior scandal, De Grossouvre officially ended his functions as adviser to the president and was shoved aside for some reason. Remained chairman of Presidential Campaigns, an honorary position. However, he kept all the benefits of his previous position: office, secretary, car, apartment, bodyguard. Supposedly, François Mitterrand never fired those who had disappointed him nor those whom he no longer needed. He saved his victims from disgrace by making them wait for an explanation that would never come, and isolated them in their idleness. Not everyone is convinced that the friendship between de Grossouvre and Mitterrand had also ended privately. After his dismissal from Mitterrand's office, De Grossouvre worked as counsellor for arms trader Marcel Dassault, who headed Avions Marcel Dassault. Allegedly committed suicide on April 7, 1994 at his office at Élysée (presidential palace), although some, such as Captain Paul Barril, claimed that he had been murdered. It was the first time in the history of the Republic that a colleague of the Chief of State killed himself in the presidential palace. April 10 1994, The Sunday Times:

"Mitterrand was preparing to be interviewed for a live national television broadcast on Aids on Thursday when, for the second time in less than a year, his aides told him that a man he had trusted and worked with for more than 30 years had committed suicide. Like Pierre Beregovoy, the former Socialist prime minister who shot himself last May, Grossouvre was reported to have left no note... It also emerged that, like Beregovoy, Grossouvre was linked to one of the murkiest episodes in Mitterrand's rarely scrutinised past: his friendship with the late Roger-Patrice Pelat, a Socialist businessman who died of a heart attack in 1989 while awaiting trial on charges of fraud and corruption. To the dismay of Mitterrand's entourage, Grossouvre agreed to be interrogated last September by Thierry Jean-Pierre, the young judge who is investigating a Pounds 2m payoff that Pelat allegedly received as the middleman in a North Korean construction contract that was awarded to French companies. Pelat was also the man who supplied a generous interest-free loan to Beregovoy. The loan caused the former prime minister political embarrassment when details were disclosed shortly before his party's crippling defeat in the March 1992 elections. Grossouvre was questioned in connection with cartons of Pelat's files that mysteriously went missing. He was never charged, and his willing co-operation with a judge whose motives are questioned by Mitterrand aides appears to have increased his isolation at the Elysee... In an article in Le Monde on Friday,... [Edwy] Plenel was told that over the years Grossouvre had accumulated a number of files that he kept in a "safe place''. When he told Mitterrand last year that he was writing his memoirs, the president demanded that he hand over the files, which Grossouvre refused to do, Plenel wrote."
 

Habsburg, Otto von

Sources: 1999, David Guyatt, 'Circle of Power' (mentions Habsburg as a founding member); Simon Regan (Scallywag), 'Who Killed Diana?' (mentions Habsburg as a founding member); 2002, David Rockefeller, 'Memoirs', pg. 412-413, referring to the Pesenti Group; other books only confirm the close relationship between Otto von Habsburg, Jean Violet, and other figures of the Cercle and Pan-Europa Union.

Born in Lower Austria in 1912 as a member of the Royal House of Habsburg, who have been allies of the Vatican for many centuries. Eldest son of Archduke Karl and Princess Zita von Bourbon-Parma. The Habsburg dynasty was, and is, very close to the Thurn und Taxis family (1001 Club) and the Vatican. During WWI his family lost the throne to the Habsburg kingdom. The Austrian parliament officially expelled the Habsburg dynasty and confiscated all of its property. Opposed the Nazi Anschluss of Austria in 1938 and went to the US (with help of the Knights of Malta). Spent most of the war years in Washington (1940-1944), after escaping from Austria to Portugal with a visa issued by the Portuguese consul in Bordeaux. He became friends with FDR, George F. Kennan (the father of the Containment policy), Felix Frankfurter, Winston Churchill and other important individuals. One of his main opponents at the time was Pilgrims Society member Lord Halifax (important to UN and pro-Nazi), who bluntly asked him:

"Are you pursuing your intrigues even here?".

Cordell Hull, pro-Vichy and pro-UN, was another opponent of Otto. Part of a mainstream bio:

"A member of Koudenhove-Kalergi's Paneuropa Union since 1936 [24 years old then], Dr. Otto von Habsburg represented the organization in Washington D.C. beginning in 1940. In close collaboration with his brothers, the Archdukes Rudolf, Robert and Karl Ludwig, he convinced President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill to regard Austria as a victim state of Nazi aggression. Based on this recognition, Archduke Robert and Winston Churchill, who favored a postwar reconstitution of a Danube confederation forged the Moscow Declaration of 1943, which prepared for Austria's independence at the conclusion of the war."

The Paneuropa Union was founded in 1923 in Vienna by Count Richard Coudenhove-Kalergi, the son of an Austro-Hungarian (Habsburg) diplomat. Early leading members were Aristide Briand and Austrian chancellors Ignaz Seipel and Karl Renner. Opus Dei was founded in 1928 and at least in later times this group's objectives would essentially merge with those of the Paneuropa Union: 1) keep the Soviets out of Europe, and 2) create a Roman Catholic-oriented European superstate. Kalergi was of the opinion that Britain should be kept out of Paneuropa since it managed an autonomous empire. Unlike Russia, Turkey belonged to Asia and also should not be included in Paneuropa, according to Kalergi. The Paneuropean Union is also responsible for the 12 stars on a blue ground as official symbol for Europe, which symbolizes the stars of the virgin Mary. After the war Otto lived in exile in France and Spain. In Spain he received a secondary formal education by Benedictine fathers. An article in Lobster Magazine claimed that the impoverished Otto was subsidized to the tune of £50,000 a month by MI6 chief Stewart Menzies from 1939 to 1953. In 1949, together with Opus Dei member Alfredo Sanchez Bella (August 21, 1964, The Frederick News, 'Rev. Dr. Thorning Returns From Europe':

"In Rome, Father Thorning was the guest of Spanish Ambassador Alfredo Sanchez Bella"; November 4, 1969, Greeley Daily Tribune, 'Economic, Social Advancement Aims of New Franco Cabinet': "[Alfredo] Sanchez Bella, aside from his own talents as a diplomat, is the brother of Florencio Sanchez Bella, leader of the Opus Dei in Spain."; Bella was Ambassador to Rome until November 1969), Otto founded the European Centre of Documentation and Information (CEDI), "whose objective was to construct around the Spanish Borbóns a federation of European states united in Christianity and anti-Communism. This sounded very much like a modern resurrection of the Holy Roman Empire over which Charles V had reigned. Like the Spanish empire of old, the envisaged Catholic federation was intended to have large-spectrum antennae in Latin America and the United States. CEDI was believed to be an auxiliary operation of Opus Dei. Although headquartered in Munich, it held its annual general meetings at the Monastery of El Escorial, near Madrid, and it continued functioning throughout the Cold War. Its tentacles spread among Catholic Monarchist circles throughout western Europe... [Otto] reportedly became one of Opus Dei's most treasured Old Guard supernumeraries. Like Opus Dei, CEDI published no membership lists, but the president of its Belgian chapter, Chevalier Marcel de Roover, was known to have close ties with the Belgian royal family. Indeed, Archduke Otto's nephew, Lorenz von Habsburg, son of international banker Karel von Habsburg, married Princes Astrid of Belgium [daughter of King Albert II, who stands accused of child abuse in the Pinon Affair, not unlike other members of the royal family; chairwoman Belgian Red Cross; patron Belgian Kids Foundation for Pediatric Research. The support committee of the Belgian Kids Foundation includes the wife of Count Maurice Lippens, who [the husband] stands accused of some of the most horrific child abuse practices. The support committee is presided over by Count Jean Pierre de Launoit, whose name once appeared on a list of people accused of involvement in trade in children and drugs. Nobody has been prosecuted], daughter of King Albert II. Astrid's aunt, the former Queen Fabiola, was related through the House of Aragon to the Spanish Borbón family. Professor Luc de Heusch of the Free University of Brussels, an expert on Sacred Kingship, maintained tha Queen Fabiola, a disciple of Escrivá de Balaguer [founder of Opus Dei], 'introduced Opus Dei to the Catholic aristocracy of Europe.' An idea of the company gathered from the membership of a sister organization, the Pan-European Union, headquartered in Zurich. An idea of the company CEDI kept can be gathered from the membership of a sister organization, the Pan-European Union, headquartered in Zurich. Also headed by Archduke Otto, among its members were two Belgian prime ministers, an Italian industrialist close to the Vatican, a former French prime minister, his legal counsellor, an aide to Valery Giscard d'Estaing, the secretary of Giscard's Independent Republican Party... the deputy head of NATO's intelligence division, a director of West German intelligence, the Spanish ambassador to the European Community and Alfredo Sanchez Bella." (1997, Robert Hutchinson, 'Their Kingdom Come', p.153-154).

CEDI stood in close contact with the Belgian Cercle des Nations, which was a gathering place for Brussels fascist aristocracy which was founded in 1969. On the next page Hutchinson writes: "Otto is chairman for life of the CEDI. Married Princess Regina Von Sachsen-Meiningen in 1951 with the blessing of Pius XII. Vice-president of the Internationale Paneuropa-Union 1957-1972, working under Count Richard Coudenhove-Kalergi. His Opusian associate Jean Violet founded the Pinay Circle (Le Cercle) in the 1950s, one of the most influential behind-the-scenes anti-communist and pro-Europe organizations, which was, and is, riddled with questionable intelligence operatives. Otto's CSU (Bavaria) and CDU (the rest of Germany) party friends, Franz-Joseph Strauss (a hard-right politician), Count Hans Huyn (intermarried with Habsburg family), and Alois Mertes (important German politician in early 1980s) have all been leading members of both Le Cercle and the ultraconservative anti-communist faction in German politics. They are all suspected of having been members of Opus Dei. In 1959, Otto received the Knight Grand-Cross of Honour and Devotion of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta with the Cross of Honorary Professed Member. One of Otto's political secretaries, Jacques G. Jonet, is named as a co-founder of low-profile ultraconservative/fascist European-integration groups as Ordre du Rouvre, the Institut Européen pour la Paix et la Sécurité (IEPS), the Société Internationale de Wilton Park (Wilton Park conferences), and Cercle des Nations. Opusian Cercle founder Jean Violet was one of the few French members of Cercle des Nations (1990, Hugo Gijssels, 'De Bende & Co.', p. 130), together with Belgium's controversial hard-right aristocracy. Jonet was named as an individual that attempted to crush the Pinon investigation of the late 1970s and early 1980s, in which leading Cercle des Nations members like the Opusian Paul Vanden Boeynants, not to mention members of the Royal House of Belgium (counts Opus Dei and SMOM members in the family), were accused of child abuse. Jonet has been named as a member of Mouvement d'Action pour l'Union de l'Europe (MAUE), the Habsburg-founded Centre of Documentation and Information (CEDI), and CEPIC (of the Opusian Baron de Bonvoisin and Paul Vanden Boeynants, both named as child abusers in the Dutroux X-Files by a combination of X1, X2, and X3). Jonet is suspected of membership in Opus Dei and is the representative of the Belgian Order of Malta, while his wife is a member of the administrative council (anno 2006). In 1961, Otto finally renounced all claims to the Austrian throne and was eventually allowed to return to his home country in 1966. CEDI, earlier founded by Otto von Habsburg, had a secretary general named Paul Vankerkhoven, who became a member of the Ordre du Rouvre, the ultra right-wing catholic magazine Chantiers-Occident, and the fascist Cercle des Nations. Vankerkhoven was a co-founder and vice-chairman of l'Institut Europeen de Developpement, headquartered in the castle of the earlier-mentioned Baron de Bonvoisin. Vankerkhoven also founded the Belgian branch of the ultra-reactionary World Anti-Communist League (WACL), the 'Ligue Internationale de la Liberte' (LIL). The WACL was sponsored by the Sun Myung Moon sect and aristocrats like Count Hans Huyn and Otto von Habsburg were involved with it in Germany, at least in the late 1980s. Otto co-founded the Académie Européenne de Sciences Politiques, located in Brussels, somewhere in the 1960s or early 1970s. It was an ultraconservative Paneuropa affiliated group, managed by the Opusian Cercle founder Jean Violet and Paul Vanden Boeynants, also Opus Dei, is said to have been one of its prominent members. When Franco's regime was challenged in the late 1960s by members of Opus Dei and other reformer, Franco designated Prince Juan Carlos as king of Spain at the moment Franco died. It has been claimed that Franco initially invited Otto von Habsburg to become the new king, but Otto refused and recommended Juan Carlos. Franco, Juan Carlos, and Otto von Habsburg all were Knights of Malta. When Richard Coudenhove-Kalergi died in 1972, Otto followed him up as provisional president of the Internationale Paneuropa-Union. At the suggestion of French president, Paneuropa- and Cercle member Georges Pompidou Otto was elected official president in 1973. He still served in this position anno 2006. January 2004, Contemporary Review, 'Otto von Habsburg and the future of Europe':

"Archduke Otto was the right-hand man of Count Coudenhove-Kalergi, and when the Count died in 1972, the leadership of Paneuropa fell to him. Since then he has been the President. When interviewed in 1986, Otto von Habsburg was insistent that Paneuropa still had work to do, and would not be subsumed in the European Community (as it then was) itself. "

Anno 2006, Otto is an advisor to the Coundenhove-Kalergi Foundation, together with Count Hans Huyn, Jakob Coudenhove-Kalergi (nephew of Richard, the founder of the Paneuropa Union), and Prince Carlo della Torre e Tasso (Thurn und Taxis). Nikolaus von Liechtenstein (younger brother of Hans-Adam) is an executive member of the the Coundenhove-Kalergi Foundation. In December 1973 Otto gave a speech to the Benedictine monks at the Woodside Priory School on San Francisco's peninsula. Hosts for the luncheon were Phil Gregory of Raytheon (Philip L. Gregory; one of the buyers of Raytheon in the 1940s, with what would become his wife (Raytheon was originally founded by Vannevar Bush in 1922-1925; Pilgrims Society member and president-descendant Charles Francis Adams IV would sit on the board of Raytheon from 1938 to 1997); executive director of Raytheon, first in New England and then in California until 1979; founded the Semiconductor Equipment Materials International (SEMI) with two colleagues in 1970, the non-profit group that presents semiconductor manufacturers trade forums worldwide; president, chairman, and executive director of SEMI; he and his wife traveled extensively in building SEMI internationally; among their tours was a trip in the early 1970s to Beijing, China, right after Kissinger, Rockefeller, and Nixon had "opened it up"; his wife was active in numerous catholics groups, including the Legion of Mary) and Bill Keady Jr., president of Advalloy (November 19, 1973, San Mateo Times, 'Dr. Von Habsburg to Speak').

Also reported by the San Mateo Times of that day:

"Two distinguished visitors will be in the Bay Area next month and both will be guests of honor at Dec. 6 events at the Fairmont Hotel... Dr. Otto von Habsburg, son of the last emperor and king of Austria-Hungary, will be honored by the Woodside Priory School at a formal dinner dance... That noon, Monsignor John Patrick Carroll-Abbing, founder and president of Boys' Towns of Italy, will attend the Oscar de la Renta fashion show and luncheon benefiting Girls' Town of Italy (a part of Boys Towns)."

Member of the European Parliament for the CSU 1979-1999, the party of his reactionary Opusian Cercle friends Franz-Joseph Strauss, Count Hans Huyn, and Alois Mertes. Among the foreign policy advisors to the Hanns Seidel Stiftung (Hanns Seidel Foundation) since 1975 (established in 1967), as well as the Kuratoriums Mitglied of the Ludwig Frank Stiftung (Ludwig-Frank Foundation). The Hanns Seidel Foundation, based in Germany, receives funding from the European Union. The foundation is a geopolitical trust attached to the Bavarian CSU party (the Bavarian Christian Democrats) of the Strauss, Mertes, Huyn, and Edmund Stoiber. It was active on all continents in funding anti-communist militias. July 2005, The Trumphet, 'From the Editor: German Election Crisis - and a New Charlemagne':

"Here is what Mr. Armstrong’s Plain Truth staff wrote, September 1979: “On the United Nations, he [Otto] has declared that the organization is dominated by ‘anti-European illiterates, despots and cannibals.’... “Possibly von Habsburg’s most controversial suggestion has been his recipe for dealing with national emergencies. In the April 1978 issue of his conservative publication Zeitbühne, he suggested that in certain emergency situations (such as nuclear blackmail or other major acts of terrorism) governments should let a strongman take over for a period of nine months, allowing him to suspend laws and ‘take all measure necessary for the maintenance of the life of the population.’... Interestingly, von Habsburg counts Bavarian leader Franz Josef Strauss among ‘the few full-blooded politicians’ who ‘in the case of serious national crises are able to accept responsibility because of their clear-sightedness and indomitableness.’ Von Habsburg says he is ‘personally pretty close to his [Strauss’s] ideas in many ways on the European unity subject"... The zenith of Habsburg power came in the 16th century under Emperor Charles v. Chosen by electors in 1519 at the age of 20, Charles was crowned Holy Roman emperor by Pope Leo x in October 1520. He ruled until 1556 and is considered to have been the greatest monarch to bear the imperial crown since Charlemagne. He was the last emperor to vigorously attempt to realize the medieval idea of a unified empire embracing the entire Christian world... Christopher Hollis, in the foreword to von Habsburg’s book The Social Order of Tomorrow, points out that Otto ‘would like to see Europe resume her essential unity, and in the symbolism of that unity he thinks that the imperial crown of Charlemagne and of the Holy Roman Empire might well have its part to play.’ “Inter-European unity has long been a quest of the Habsburg dynasty. Otto himself often speaks of the similarities between the Holy Roman Empire of the Middle Ages and his view of a coming United States of Europe. In this regard, Otto has stressed the importance of religion in the formation of a united Europe. He regards Christianity as Europe’s bulwark: ‘The cross doesn’t need Europe, but Europe needs the cross.’"

The pope has also spoken out against Liberal Anglo-Saxon politics. Otto was a member of the Hilfskomitee Freiheit für Rudolf Hess (Freedom for Rudolf Hess Committee), which advocated the release of the former Thulist and number two in Hitler's early regime. Hess had secretly flown to England in May 1941, almost certainly trying to establish a peace between Hitler and the British Empire (through the opponents of Churchill affiliated with the British royal family) so both could attack Russia. Unfortunately for Hess, he was caught. After the war he was held in a prison until his death, mainly because the Soviet Union did not approve of his release. The Action Committee for the Freedom of Rudolf Hess made it to the international news a few times in the 1970s. SMOM member Kurt Waldheim, the secretary general of the United Nations who had to resign in 1986 after he was accused of war crimes, was a favorite of Otto. Otto was honored by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) in February 1988. On 19 August 1989 he was the Patron of the Paneuropean-Picnic in Sopron, which was a protest against the Iron Curtain. Since 1988 he worked on the extension of the Paneuropa Union into the countries behind the Iron Curtain, on the independence of the Baltic States from Moscow, and of Croatia, Slovenia, Bosnia-Herzgovina and Macedonia from Belgrade (Serbia). He is considered an enemy of the Serbs. When Croatia (90% roman catholic) and Slovenia (84% roman catholic) withdrew from Yugoslavia, the Vatican immediately supported the action, together with the German government.

1994, Jean-Paul Picaper, 'Otto de Habsbourg: Memoires d'Europe', pp. 209-210 (Otto to a Figaro correspondent):

"If German recognized Slovenia and Croatia so rapidly, even against the will of [then German foreign minister] Hans-Dietrich Genscher who did not want to take that step, it's because the Bonn government was subjected to an almost irresistible pressure of public opinion. In this regard, the German press rendered a very great service, in particular the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung and Carl Gustav Strohm, that great German journalist who works for Die Welt."

In the late 80s and early 1990s, Otto invited leaders from Croatia and Slovenia to the European Parliament. He visited these countries and stated they should prepare themselves for a place in the European Union. Habsburg and his allies warned about Milosevic, who had just become a prominent former-communist socialist nationalist and wanted to unite all land where a significant amount of Serbians (mainly eastern orthodox christians) lived. Civil wars followed in which the Serbians ultimately were driven back south and east into Serbia. German, US, an UK intelligence services, together with special forces, were secretly funding the (also quite brutal) opposition to Serbia. NATO also bombed the Serbs twice. Otto had called for the bombing of Belgrade (capital of the Serbs) in 1993. Some fear that Otto would like to see Serbia removed from the map, as he blames this nation for the downfall of his beloved Austro-Hungarian Empire. In 2005 Carla Del Ponte, chief prosecutor of the UN international criminal tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, claimed that the Vatican protected suspected war criminal general Ante Gotovina, a hero in Croatia. Before becoming a general in the Croatian army, Gotovina fought in the French Foreign Legion; then became a close collaborator of the hard-right Jean-Marie Le Pen. In good tradition of the Nazi ratlines, the Vatican allegedly hid him in a monastery. September 20, 2005, The Telegraph, 'Vatican accused of shielding 'war criminal'':

"Carla del Ponte, the chief prosecutor of the UN international criminal tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, said she believed that Gen Ante Gotovina was being sheltered in a Franciscan monastery in his native Croatia... She said: "I have information he is hiding in a Franciscan monastery and so the Catholic Church is protecting him. I have taken this up with the Vatican and the Vatican refuses totally to co-operate with us." In July, Mrs del Ponte travelled to Rome to share her intelligence with the Vatican's ''foreign minister'', Archbishop Giovanni Lajolo. He refused to help, telling her the Vatican was not a state and thus had "no international obligations" to help the UN to hunt war criminals. Mrs del Ponte complained: "They said they have no intelligence and I don't believe that. I think that the Catholic Church has the most advanced intelligence services."" In 1989, he said to the European Parliament: "The [European] Community is living largely by the heritage of the Holy Roman Empire, though the great majority of the people who live by it don’t know by what heritage they live."

Otto has met with Pope John Paul II to discuss at length the subject of European integration. In early 2006 he met with the new pope, Benedikt XVI (Ratzinger), whom he had already known. From September to December 2004 he travelled to Kosovo, Zurich, Rome, Vienna, Tyrol, Madeira, Croatia, London, again to Vienna, Paris, Strasbourg, Spain, Westphalia, Lower Saxony, Budapest, and three times to Hungary. In November 2002 the Austrian weekly Zur Zeit published an interview with Otto von Habsburg in which he had said:

"If we consider America's internal politics, then we find that it is split in two halves. On the one hand, the Defense Department, in which the key positions are held by Jews; the Pentagon is today a Jewish institution. On the other hand, the blacks are in the State Department: for instance, Colin Powell or especially Condoleezza Rice. It is an internal conflict between hawks and doves. Currently, the Anglo-Saxons, that's to say the white Americans, are playing a relatively minor role."

On April 20, 2005 National Public Radio (NPR) interviewed Otto and asked him about these comments. He confirmed what he said earlier and added:

"There are many nationalities making up America. There are four states that in twenty years will have a majority of Spanish language [citizens]; and I don't think that's a catastrophe. It's a very good thing. I'm already well located. I have many children and all my children speak Spanish too."

In the interview he's clearly hinting two or three times to the fact that he wants northern Africa to become part of the European Union. Otto thinks the rejected 2005 EU Constitution should be rewritten and reintroduced. Made a speech in German and French praising Valéry Giscard d'Estaing (former French president; like Habsburg, a good friend of Opusian Cercle founder Jean Violet; prominent member Paneuropa Union; received the Charlemagne award; Knight of Malta; Giscard's father had close connections to the Synarchy and Opus Dei) when this person was head of the Draft Treaty that should have established a Constitution for Europe. 2005, Ausgabe 2-3, Eurojournal pro management, p. 14, committee member Otto von Habsburg:

"The original wording of the Constitution draft by Giscard d'Estaing was quite short and comprehensible. So why did it fail to convince the voters? This is plain: a campaign launched with the help of a book thick with legal terminology which, the bureaucrats hoped, voters would read and comprehend. Much money was spent, but nothing was gained. A Commission full of aged politicians to work on the draft which spoilt it just as "too many cooks spoil the broth". Giscard d'Estaing knew what would happen with his initial draft, and later photographs show the expression of a man in desperation who knew that should this revamped version fail, then he would be responsible anyway... No attempt was made to reach out to future generations as did the late pope John Paul II or as Pope Benedict XVI now does; two old men who somehow managed and manage to enthuse the masses. It is therefore no wonder that the battle was lost; the idea however still lives on, but we need new politicians to bring the idea home to voters."

Giscard's initial draft version delegated a lot of authority to the EU presidency, who would be elected to serve for five years instead of the previous method of a six month rotation between all EU members. The European Council, the body made up of the heads of state of the member countries, would do the electing on the basis of Qualified Majority Voting. Giscard, who now favored the name United Europe, made many other proposals and was widely attacked for trying to reduce the influence of smaller EU countries, the commission and the European Parliament. Giscard did not see an EU president being directly elected by the European people "for another 50 years." Like Otto, Giscard d’Estaing is absolutely against Turkey joining the European Union. Tuesday 28 February 2006, Valery Giscard d'Estaing, speech at the London School of Economics entitled 'The Political Future of Europe' (transcript posted at website of LSE):

"Let's be clear about this: the rejection of the Constitutional Treaty in France was a mistake, which will have to be corrected. Was the mistake due to the over-complicated presentation of the draft, or the choice of a referendum [public vote...] at a time when politicians were highly unpopular? It doesn't much matter. Everyone has accepted the democratic verdict, whatever their regrets. But the main victim has been a Treaty, which, according to the opinion polls, the French were not against. At a time when second chances are the order of the day, the Constitutional Treaty will have to be given its second chance. When? When France has completed her great electoral debate, with the presidential and parliamentary elections which are due to be held 14 months' time, in spring 2007. How? By refocusing the debate on the only genuinely constitutional parts, that is to say, the first part, and the Charter of Fundamental Rights demanded by the European Left, neither of which have given rise to much protest. Then the third part could follow a parliamentary route, which is far better suited to its legal nature."

In this speech Giscard proposed that the two first parts of the Constitution could be subject to a new referendum, whereas the third and more controversial part would be subject to a parliamentary vote. On May 23, 2006 the Financial Times quoted Giscard d'Estaing as saying:

"It is not France that has said no. It is 55 per cent of the French people - 45 per cent of the French people said yes... I wish that we will have a new chance, a second chance, for the constitutional project." Otto concurs and added in 2006 "A short, clear constitution text must go", suggesting the average person in the EU is interested in reading the document. April 09, 2002, Christian Science Monitor, 'Europe, prepare to greet Islam': "For centuries, the ruling Habsburgs defended the Continent against the expansion of the Turkish Ottoman Empire. Now Mr. von Habsburg makes it clear that all nations bordering the Mediterranean Sea – including those in North Africa and the Middle East – have a place in his broad vision for tomorrow's Europe."

In other interviews Otto indeed claimed that as far as he is concerned, Africa starts with the Sahara. The small strip above it should still be included in Europe. Otto is also happy to see that Central and Eastern Europe starts to have more and more influence in the rest of Europe. When Otto von Habsburg visited the United States in April 2005, one of the few people he spoke with in private was Henry Kissinger. Also interviewed by a few newspapers during his visit to the United States. April 18, 2005, Washington Times, 'Habsburg, 92, has eye on future':

"The Cosmos Club's windows were ablaze with light... talk centered on Archduke Otto's lifelong quest to build and expand the European Union. "Ten new states have recently been admitted, and we are waiting for others, especially Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro and the Ukraine," he told a reporter... Archduke Otto, amazingly hale and hearty at 92, readily admitted the EU was "already too big and unwieldy" but said that shouldn't matter: "The new [member states] will be better Europeans than the old because they know the totalitarian alternative. They will enrich us enormously." Later, he praised the Ukrainians for courageously taking to the streets to ensure democratic rule."

Official supporter of Europe for Christ, which was founded in July 2005 and aims to insert the values of catholicism in the European constitution and the life of Europeans. The Vatican was "surprised" in 2003 that there was no specific reference to God and Christianity in the proposed EU constitution, even though the general importance of religions and spirituality on human society was in fact mentioned. Otto supports the Vatican on this issue. In November 2005 Otto denounced Putin as a KGB dictator and spoke in favor of Khodorkovsky, the famous oligarch, being released. Bavaria is known to have made large investments in Russia since the Oligarchs came to power. February 5-6, 2004, European Navigator/Jean Monnet Foundation for Europe, Otto von Habsburg interview in which he replies to the question what he thinks were the key players in European integration (translated from French):

"Charles de Gaulle in the first place. Certainly one of the big visionaries of Europe... I will certainly also say Adenauer. Adenauer with his Rhenish vision because the Rhine plays a fundamental role in this Europe... Coudenhove, certainly; and... Schuman... I put them at the same level... Coudenhove said: "You know, it is awfully difficult to make Europe with the English, but without them, it is impossible" That is very true. And in case of France, that's also true. There are a lot of difficulties with the French, but we cannot make it without them. They are an essential element to us and without De Gaulle... France would have collapsed completely."

February 5-6, 2004, European Navigator/Jean Monnet Foundation for Europe, Otto von Habsburg interview in which he replies to the question what he thinks about Jean Monnet (translated from French):

"Jean Monnet had a role, an important role, but he certainly was not the only one... the relations between Monnet and Coudenhove were not exactly very intimate... I was on the side of Coudenhove during the whole time, because I agreed with his vision. Jean Monnet was rather a technocrat and Coudenhove was a prophet and a visionary. It was that big of a difference, in my opinion."

In the end the only differences between Monnet and Otto seem to be that Otto is taking things slower and has traditionally not really been concerned with Britain entering the European Union, as this was not an original Paneuropean objective. Otto von Habsburg has been named as a member of the Order of Malta, a member of Opus Dei, and a member of the Mont Pelerin Society (a branch of the Paneuropa Union). Prominent Catholic and a patron of the Augustan Society. Former sovereign of the Order of the Golden Fleece, which has now become his son. King Juan Carlos of Spain is head of the only other Order of the Golden Fleece. Has also been named as a member of the controversial Order of Zion, if it even exists, or existed. Other rumors about the Order of Zion have named Cercle members Alain Poher and Giulio Andreotti. Otto and his wife reside at the Villa Austria in Pöcking, Bavaria, Germany.

Otto von Habsburg's oldest son, Karl Habsburg (b. 1961), who is to be the future head of the Habsburg family, married Baroness Francesca von Thyssen-Bornemisza in 1993. Baroness Francesca is the daughter of Baron Hans Heinrich von Thyssen-Bornemisza, who was a member of the 1001 Club. They had three children in the 1990s, whose godmother is Gloria von Thurn und Taxis, the wife of the late Prince Johannes von Thurn und Taxis. Karl is president of the Pan Europa Union in Austria and currently serves as the elected OVP Party representative of Austria to the European Parliament. His son Georg von Habsburg is a Hungarian diplomat to the EU and his daughter, Countess Walburga Douglas, is a Pan Europa representative, politician and author.

The Habsburg Empire did not entirely end after WWI. Currently HSH Prince Hans Adam II of Liechtenstein is a Habsburg monarch. He also has close ties to the Vatican, is a member of the Knights of Malta, and at least a supporter of Opus Dei. Hans Adam's younger brother sits on the board of the Coudenhove-Kalergi Foundation, together with Otto von Habsburg, Count Hans Huyn, Jakob Coudenhove-Kalergi (nephew of Richard, the founder of the Paneuropa Union), and Prince Carlo della Torre e Tasso (Thurn und Taxis). Hans Adam is known to have a lot of interest in the UFO/alien issue. He had an interesting conversation about this subject with Dr. Steven Greer.

According to Greer, Hans Adam is a radical end-of-the-world fanatic who privately claims aliens have invented all the world's religions. According to Greer, Hans Adam claimed to him that one of his brothers was kidnapped by aliens. Greer says he has spoken to people in the US who claimed Hans Adam's brother indeed was abducted; not by aliens, but by a human stagecraft team to bring him aboard of a certain agenda.

Hague, William J.

2002 UK Parliament record (Register of Members' Interests)

Born in 1961. Went to Magdalen College, Oxford, and while there he was president of both the Conservative Association (OUCA) and the Oxford Union, a noted breeding-ground for political hopefuls and high-flyers. At Oxford, Hague studied Philosophy, Politics and Economics (PPE) and graduated with first-class honours. Following Oxford Hague went on to study for an MBA at INSEAD (Elite French business school). Before entering Parliament, he worked for Shell UK and McKinsey & Co. Elected to Parliament in 1989. Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Lord Norman Lamont from 1990 to 1993, who was Chancellor of the Exchequer and chairman of Le Cercle. Entered the Cabinet in 1995 as Secretary of State for Wales. Member of the Privy Council since 1995. Leader of the Conservative Party from 1997 to 2001, in succession to John Major. When prime minister Tony Blair proposed the removal of the hereditary element in the House of Lords in 1998, Lord Cranborne (Cecil family), without consulting Hague, negotiated a pact with the government to retain a small number of hereditary peers for the interim period, which was later set at 92.

Hague was embarrassed when Blair told him of it in the House of Commons and sacked Lord Cranborne. Seen as a political lightweight by many, and was widely mocked for his claim that he drank 14 imperial pints (8 litres) of beer in a day in his youth. Chairman of the International Democrat Union (IDU) 1997-2002, the global alliance of Conservative, Christian Democrat and like-minded parties. Went to Bilderberg in 1998. Deputy chairman of the IDU since 2002, under Australia's prime minister John Howard. Shadow Foreign Secretary and Senior Member of the Shadow Cabinet since 2005. UK Parliament record about William Hague:

"27 June-1 July 2002, to Morocco, flights and accommodation for my wife and me paid for by Le Cercle, a political group which organises conferences. (Registered 17 July 2002)" Director AES Engineering, Rotherham.
 

Howard, Michael

Sources: 18 June 2000, Sunday Telegraph / Lobster Magazine, Issue 40, winter 2000-2001

He was called to the Bar (Inner Temple) in 1964 and specialized in employment law and planning issues. The late 1960s saw his promotion within the Bow Group where he became Chairman in 1970 shortly after the general election in which he was again defeated at Edge Hill. Howard entered the Government early, becoming Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Department of Trade and Industry in 1985 with responsibility for regulating the financial dealings of the City of London. This junior post became very important as he oversaw the Big Bang introduction of new technology in 1986. After the 1987 election he became Minister for Local Government where he became involved in two major political controversies. On behalf of the Government, he accepted the amendment which became Section 28, and defended its inclusion. He then guided through the House of Commons the Local Government Finance Act 1988 which brought in Mrs Thatcher's new system of local taxation, officially known as the Community Charge but almost universally nicknamed the poll tax. Howard personally supported the tax and was respected by Mrs Thatcher for minimizing the rebellion against it within the Conservative Party. After a period as Minister for Water and Planning in 1988/89, in which time he was responsible for implementing water privatization in England and Wales, Howard was promoted to the Cabinet as Secretary of State for Employment in January 1990 when Norman Fowler resigned "to spend more time with his family". Howard therefore took on responsibility for legislation abolishing the closed shop. He campaigned vigorously for Mrs Thatcher in the leadership contest following her resignation in November 1990. He retained the same cabinet post under John Major and made many attacks on trade union power as part of the 1992 general election campaign. His work in the campaign led to his appointment as Secretary of State for the Environment in the reshuffle after the election. He undertook some diplomacy to encourage the United States to participate in the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, but was soon after appointed as Secretary of State for the Home Department in a 1993 reshuffle initiated by the sacking of Norman Lamont. His tenure as Home Secretary was especially notable for his tough approach to crime, which he summed up in the soundbite "Prison works". When he was Home Secretary he released high-level drug dealer John Haase from prison just 10 months into an 18-year sentence, along with his associate Paul Bennett. Haase's criminal career began with armed robberies in the 1970s. He moved on when he realised there was much more money to be made in heroin.

He took control of the British end of the southern route for heroin smugglers, which runs from Afghanistan to Britain via Turkey and the Balkans. A member of Haase’s gang, Simon Bakerman, imprisoned for running an amphetamine factory, is Michael Howard’s cousin. His reputation was dented in 1996 when a critical inquiry into a series of prison escapes was published. In advance of the publication Howard made statements to assign blame to the prison service. Ann Widdecombe, his former junior minister in the Home Office, made a statement to Parliament about the dismissal of then Director of the Prison Service, Derek Lewis and famously remarked of Howard that "there is something of the night about him", a bitter and widely quoted comment that fatally damaged his 1997 bid for the Conservative Party leadership. The comment was taken as a "bitchy" reference to his dour demeanour, which she was implying was sinister and almost Dracula-like, related to his Romanian ancestry. Attended the June 2001 meeting of Le Cercle in Lisbon, Portugal. President and founding chairman of the Atlantic Partnership. After the 2001 General Election Howard was recalled to frontline politics when the Conservatives' new leader, Iain Duncan Smith, appointed him as Shadow Chancellor.

After Duncan Smith was removed from the leadership by the parliamentary party, Howard was elected unopposed as leader of the party in 2003. In February 2004, Howard called on Tony Blair to resign over the Iraq war, because he had failed to ask "basic questions" regarding WMD claims and misled Parliament. In July the Tory leader stated that he would not have voted for the motion that authorised the Iraq war had he known the quality of intelligence information on which the WMD claims were based. At the same time, he said he still believed in the Iraq invasion was right because "the prize of a stable Iraq was worth striving for". His criticism of Blair did not earn Howard sympathies in Washington, where President Bush refused to meet him; Karl Rove is reported to have told Howard: "You can forget about meeting the president full stop. Don't bother coming." Howard is an old friend and cabinet colleague of Cercle member and Arms dealer Jonathan Aitken. Governor of the Ditchley Foundation.

Howell, Lord David

Sources: June 18, 2004, Chancellery of HRH Crown Prince Alexander II of Yugoslavia, 'Reception in honor of the "Le Cercle" conference

Baron Howell of Guildford. Born in 1936. Educated at Eton and King's College, Cambridge. After five years as a journalist he unsuccessfully contested the constituency of Dudley in the 1964 General Election. Member of Parliament for Guildford from 1966-1997. Served in four other Government posts under Mr. Heath, including Minister of State for Energy and Minister of State for Northern Ireland. Member of the Privy Council since 1979. Secretary of State for Energy 1979-1981. Secretary of State for Transport 1981-1983. Writes a fortnightly column for The Japan Times in Tokyo since 1985. Regularly writes for the International Herald Tribune, E-biz Chronicle (New York) and to other newspapers and journals. Chairman of the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs since 1987-1997. Chairman of the UK-Japan 21st Century Group 1989-2002, the high level bilateral forum between leading UK and Japanese politicians, industrialists and academics. Member of the international advisory board of Swiss Bank Corporation from 1989-1996. Has been to the the Trilateral Commission several times since the 1990s. Advisory director and senior adviser to the board of SBC Warburg Dillon Read, London 1996-2000. Created a life peer as Lord Howell of Guildford in 1997. Chairman of the House of Lords European Sub-Committee on Common Foreign and Security Policy 1999-2000. Awarded the Grand Cordon of the Order of the Sacred Treasure of Japan in 2001. European Consultant to Japan Central Railway Company, to Mitsubishi Electric, Europe, BV and to the Kuwait Investment Authority. 2003 panelist of the Atlantic Partnership. Howell's website, 2003:

"With the support of the Atlanticist and free market-minded new members there is every chance of turning the EU away from its centralist obsessions and even repatriating powers to national parliaments."

President of the British Institute of Energy Economists (BIEE) since 2004. Attended a meeting of Le Cercle in Belgrade, Serbia on June 18, 2004. Upon taking his post at the BIEE, Howell wrote:

"I am delighted and honoured to take on this role. There can be no doubt that after a decade of relatively problem-free energy flows there are now major dangers ahead on both the supply side and on the generation and distribution sides. For the UK the situation is about to change radically. We will shortly become again, after many years, a net importer of both oil and natural gas, the latter being supplied by new contracts with Norway, Russia , Algeria and possibly Iran. This takes these aspects of energy supply right back into the heart of international politics in the most sensitive areas on earth. Meanwhile , here at home, we now have to make crucial new decisions on nuclear power. It is no longer a question of ‘keeping options open’ on nuclear power generation. Decisions have to be made now for a decade ahead. Investment in offshore windfarms cannot conceivably fill the gap which will be left by any nuclear closures. Finally, we now have to move towards a new generation of techniques for conservation and low energy consumption. There is much work to be done."

At a Chatham House meeting in April 2005. October 19, 2006, subject matter of Lord Howell's speech to the Japan Society:

"A new structure of International Relations is now in the making. As American power and influence diminishes, it will be replaced not by another bloc or superpower, such as The European Union or China, but by a complex new mesh or web of relationships between nations large and small. A vital strand in this new pattern will be the linkage between the UK and Japan. This linkage has the capacity to re-shape global affairs, including energy security and influence on both Middle Eastern and Asia-Pacific stability, to an extent far greater than hitherto realised. Lord Howell will explain how this scene will develop."

Member of the advisory council of New Europe, a cross-party eurosceptics group. Deputy Opposition Leader in the House of Lords and spokesman for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in the House of Lords. May 17, 2006, Viva Le Canada, 'The Commonwealth as the Ideal Model for International Relations in the 21st Century':

"The Lord Howell argues that the Commonwealth is becoming a completely transformed entity and that an enlarged and reformed version of it should be centre stage in addressing the problems of the new international order... The Commonwealth normally refers to 53 member countries, formerly members of the British Empire. The Commonwealth's membership includes both republics and monarchies. The Head of the Commonwealth is Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II and the Headquarters are at Marlborough House in London. Her Majesty also reigns as monarch directly in a number of states, known as Commonwealth Realms, notably the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, New Zealand and others. The Commonwealth's 1.8 billion citizens, about 30 per cent of the world's population, are drawn from the broadest range of faiths, races, cultures and traditions. About half of this population are less than 25 years old. Members range from vast democratic countries like India, Canada and Australia to smaller city states like Singapore. The Commonwealth has three intergovernmental organizations: the Commonwealth Secretariat, the Commonwealth Foundation, and the Commonwealth of Learning."

Huyn, Count Hans

Sources: November 1988 – Issue 17, Lobster Magazine, 'Brian Crozier, the Pinay Circle and James Goldsmith' (quoting the Langemann papers)

Hans Huyn was born in Warsaw, Poland, in 1930. A descendant of a noble Austro-Hungarian family that was involved in the defense of this Habsburgian empire in the 19th century. Studied in Munich, Paris, and South-Africa in Law, History, Philosophy, and Languages. Started his career in diplomacy, and was involved in some of the early negotiations dealing with the European Economic Community (EEC). Married Rosemary Gräfin Huyn in 1959, a descendant of Archduchess Maria Theresia of Austria (1717-1780), the first and only female head of the Habsburg dynasty. From 1963 to 1965, as an officer in the German Foreign Service, he was involved in European affairs and the Treaty of Elysée, also known as the Franco-German Treaty of 1963. This treaty was established as a result of clandestine meetings between De Gaulle, Pinay, Adenauer, and Strauss, with Jean Violet as a go-between. Retired from the Foreign Service in 1965 and became a journalist and lecturer. Government director of the Bundesfinanzverwaltung (Federal Finance Commission) in the late 1960s. Foreign policy advisor to Franz-Joseph Strauss in the Bundestag from 1971-1976, and Brian Crozier described him as a close friend of Strauss. Co-founder of the anti-communist Europäischen Konferenz für Menschenrechte und Selbstbestimmung (European Conferences on Human Rights) in Bern, Switzerland, in 1974. The ECHRS's 1974 topic titles included 'A Soviet handbook on war as an instrument of policy' and 'The whole of Europe must be kept free from communist dictatorship'. Entered the Bundestag in 1976 and has been reelected 4 times since then. During his career in the Bundestag he was a member of the Foreign Committee, the Committee on Germany's Domestic Affairs, and the Defense Committee. Acting chairperson of the Subcommittee for Disarmament and Arms Control. In the spring of 1978 he wrote an article in the Journal of International Relations, titled "Rhodesia and Southern Africa: Decision for the Future of the Free World". Presented a paper called "Countering subversion, neutralism and pacifism" at the second annual world balance of power conference in July 1982. In 1982 (August 17), the Miami Herald described Count Huyn as a "foreign affairs and defense expert for the Christian Democratic Party". At that time, he accused Chancellor Helmut Schmidt's government of not having investigated properly the possible use of slave labor by the Soviets a to build a Siberian natural gas pipeline to Western Europe. September 20, 1982, Miami Herald, 'Schmidt Fears Soft Attitude Towards U.S.':

"A conservative member of Parliament, Hans Graf Huyn, said the United States would get "considerably easier agreement" to the planned stationing of U.S.-made medium-range nuclear missiles under a Christian Democrat government... Huyn's, whose party has close links with the Christian Democrats, also said the Christian Democrats would not be moved by the mass protests expected here if the NATO missiles are stationed as planned at the end of 1983."

On August 16, 1984, the Philadelphia Daily News described Count Huyn as the "parliamentary foreign policy spokesman for the CSU, the second biggest party in the coalition government". The CSU (of Bavaria) was also the party of Otto von Habsburg. The CSU's national party was Franz-Joseph Strauss' CDU. Huyn countered some claims of a Polish-Soviet cardinal. Argued for German participation in the American Star Wars program in 1985. Member of the World Anti-Communist League. Member of Parliament in 1990. In 1990, Huyn favored more trade with the Soviet Union and the rest of the Warsaw Pact, except for high technology. He claimed Gorbachev remained a socialist in heart and soul and that therefore his perestroika would fail. April 9, 1990, Washington Times, 'Official figures indicate Soviet economy collapsing':

"A series of official reports from Moscow confirm recent dire predictions that the Soviet economy is heading for collapse. "The economic situation has never been as disastrous as it is today," said Hans Huyn, a West German expert on Soviet affairs and a member of the Bonn legislature. "We are witnessing the complete collapse of Soviet-style socialism. I think the real Russian revolution is still to come."... "It is a chaotic and disastrous situation," Mr. Huyn said. Soviet President Mikhail "Gorbachev has already failed with perestroika, so there will be further change. If labor and economic unrest combines against the leadership, that could be the start of a civil war," he said."

Cercle visitors Zbigniew Brzezinski and Count Hans Huyn were among important media spokesman during the crumble of the Soviet Union and its descent into anarchy. Supported the South African Apartheid policies in Namibia, before its independence in 1990. Involved with Radio Free Europe. Huyn headed the german department of the Catholic aid organization 'Aid to the Church in Need' (kirche-in-not.org) from 1988 to 2005. Besides giving human aid, the main purpose of this organization seems to be to spread Catholicism to all corners of the world. At the moment, Huyn is worrying about the rise of Putin and the communist influence in Russia.

He seems to have a lot of respect for Henry Kissinger. Anno 2006, advisor to the Coundenhove-Kalergi Foundation, together with Otto von Habsburg, Jakob Coudenhove-Kalergi (nephew of Richard, the founder of the Paneuropa Union), and Prince Carlo della Torre e Tasso (Thurn und Taxis). Nikolaus von Liechtenstein (younger brother of Hans-Adam) is an executive member of the the Coundenhove-Kalergi Foundation. Count Huyn has written quite a number of books on East (Soviet) - West policy.

Iliescu, Ion

Sources: April 6, 2003, The Observer, 'So, Norman, any regrets this time?'; September 5, 2004, Sunday Times, 'Le Cercle of the elite'

Born in Romania. Studied in Moscow and became a communist politician in Romania. He served as Minister of the Youth Problems in 1967. However, in 1971, he was marginalized by Nicolae Ceausescu and he was sacked from all his political functions. Iliescu was the main political profiteer (and leader) of the revolution that overthrew Nicolae Ceausescu in December 1989, as he assumed leadership. Said to have been a KGB agent, which Ceausescu of course didn't know. Iliescu was the President of Romania for eleven years, from 1990 to 1996, and 2000 to 2004. His final term ended in December 2004, and his successor is Democrat leader Traian Basescu. Currently, Ion Iliescu is a Senator from SDP party. It is unknown when Iliescu visited Le Cercle, but as far as we know this would not have been that unusual after the wall came down.

Jameson, Donald "Jamie" F.B.

Sources: November 1988 – Issue 17, Lobster Magazine, 'Brian Crozier, the Pinay Circle and James Goldsmith' (quoting from the Langemann papers);

Junior CIA officer in his mid-20s at the end of WWII, mingling with the displaced persons crowded into West German camps. Recruited some of these people to infiltrate back into the Soviet, which wasn't very successful. Chief of the Soviet division of the CIA's Operations Directorate in the 1950s and 1960s. Expert on the USSR and defectors. Interviewed Yuri A. Rastvorov, the 1954 Soviet defector, who supposedly told him that the Soviets held maybe 10 to 15 US prisoners of war from Korea. Coincidentally, a person called Col. Philip Corso said he arranged the interrogation of Rastvorov. In telephone interviews in 1994 and 1995, Corso recalled in detail his encounter with Rastvorov and said the defector told him several hundred American POWs had been sent to Siberia in rail cars during the war. Corso has maintained that the Eisenhower administration chose not to force the issue with Moscow out of concern that a confrontation might escalate into all-out war. March 7, 1997, The Augusta Chronicle, 'Defector caught up in dispute - Former intelligence officer denies US prisoners of war taken in Korean wars':

"At least two former U.S. intelligence officers say Mr. Rastvorov told them in separate conversations after his defection that he knew U.S. troops captured in the 1950-53 Korean War had been taken to Siberia and exploited by Soviet intelligence. One of those conversations is summarized in a long-secret White House memo that was declassified last spring... Publicity about the memo prompted the Pentagon to contact Mr. [Yuri] Rastvorov to see how much he knew. At a private meeting last Oct. 10, Mr. Rastvorov denied having any knowledge about U.S. POWs in Siberia. Further, he said that the statements in the White House memo were not his, and that he did not recall that any of the debriefings he underwent with U.S. officials in the 1950s dealt with POWs... Philip Corso, an intelligence officer in Korea during the war and later a National Security Council staff member in the Eisenhower White House, is equally emphatic that Mr. Rastvorov told him in a Jan. 28, 1955, debriefing that Americans had been taken to Siberia as part of a covert Soviet intelligence operation... Separate from Mr. Corso's assertions, Donald Jameson, a retired CIA officer, has said he recalls Mr. Rastvorov telling him in the 1950s that U.S. POWs had been taken to the Soviet Union and that Mr. Rastvorov had estimated it was 10 to 15 aviators. Mr. Jameson helped handle the Rastvorov debriefing after his defection."

Senior CIA Soviet specialist. Retired from the CIA in 1973. Went to a Cercle meeting in 1980 in Zurich, Switzerland, together with general Richard Stilwell. Consultant on Oil and on Soviet Affairs in the 1980s. December 14, 2002, New York Times, 'Theodore Shackley, Enigmatic C.I.A. Official, Dies at 75':

"In 1979, Mr. Shackley retired from the C.I.A. and founded Research Associates International Ltd., a Bethesda consulting firm specializing in analyzing risks and protecting executives".

Vice president of Research Associates International in the 1980s, a firm founded by the very controversial CIA officer Theodore Shackley, who is closely linked to Cercle activities, not to mention illegal dope and oil trade. 2002, Chief Executive Publishing (more detailed date and a headline were not given; scanned from some book or document, judging by one or two common OCR errors):

"In 1986, deals with the Soviets were lucrative, wrote Donald F.B. Jameson, a former member of the CIA and vice president of Research Associates International, a risk assessment firm in Arlington, Va. "The Soviets pay above-market prices and pay promptly. Negotiating can be trying, even for the big boys," he wrote in Chief Executive in a spring article titled, 'Trading with the Soviets'..."But if you have what they want and are persistent, you may well end up with a good deal, and after having done one deal, others usually follow. Trading with the Soviets is a race that goes to the strong," Jameson said."

July 23, 1998, Michael Ruppert, 'The POWs, CIA and Drugs':

"A former CIA officer told me in 1995 that Ollie North was leasing office space for his 1995 Senate run from Shackley's company, Research Associates International, in Rosslyn, Virginia."

Vice-president of the Jamestown Foundation, which was founded in 1984 (with the help of Cercle member William Casey) to protect and sponsor a group of high-level international defectors as they travelled the United States speaking out against the tyranny of communism. Today, the Jamestown Foundation has three program areas: China, Russia/Eurasia, and Terrorism, and counts the involvement of Glen Howard (SAIC; DoD; National Intelligence Council; Mid-East and Central-Asia oil consultant), James Woolsey, Zbigniew Brzezinski (attended at least one Le Cercle meeting), Dick Cheney, and Frank Carlucci. Has been a member of the ultra conservative National Security Advisory Council (NSAC) of the Center for Security Policy, together with Ed Feulner, Dick Cheney, Richard Perle (good friend of former Cercle chairman Brian Crozier), Edward Teller, Frank Gaffney, and Jeanne Kirkpatrick. Jameson was at a conference on 15 November 1991 where former KGB and CIA officers spoke together in public for the first time. President of Jameson Associates in Great Falls, Va. in 1994. Writer and consultant on international finance and politics to various financial institutions and governments. Probably involved to some extent in the remote viewing programs. January 25, 2003, Gold Coast Bulletin:

"In 1972, the CIA gave the institute $50,000 to study remote viewing. Russell Targ, who joined the project in 1972, recalls a CIA official telling him: "You are wasting your time looking at churches and swimming pools in Palo Alto." Two years later, the institute received the geographical co-ordinates of a "Soviet site of ongoing operational significance.'' The target was Semipalatinsk, in what is now Kazakhstan. A remote viewer provided a layout of a cluster of buildings and drew a puzzling, 'damned big crane'. He identified the underground facility as storage for Soviet missiles. Satellite photos verified the viewer's report, according to Donald Jameson, then a senior CIA Soviet specialist, who called the event a 'turning point'. One group within the agency refused to look at the Semipalatinsk data, objecting to the unscientific methodology. Another group called the process 'demonic'. When the CIA cut the program in 1975, the funds shifted first to the Air Force and then, in 1980, to the Defence Intelligence Agency. Between 1979 and 1994 Fort Meade's viewing site conducted roughly 250 projects involving thousands of missions."

General Albert Stubblebine was a key sponsor of the research at Fort Meade.

Karageorgevitch, Crown Prince Alexander II

Sources: June 18, 2004, Chancellery of HRH Crown Prince Alexander II of Yugoslavia, 'Reception in honor of the "Le Cercle" conference

Born in 1945. Descendant of Serbian royalty. Son of Peter II of Yugoslavia, the last King of Yugoslavia. Born in London. Godparents were King George VI and Queen Elizabeth II. Current pretender to the abolished thrones of Yugoslavia and Serbia. By marrying a Roman Catholic, Alexander lost his place in line of succession to the British Throne, which he had held as a descendant of Queen Victoria. The couple divorced in 1985. Crown Prince Alexander married Katherine Clairy Batis, the daughter of Robert Batis and his wife, Anna Dosti, legally on September 20, 1985, and religiously the following day, at St. Sava Serbian Orthodox Church, Notting Hill, London. Alexander first came to Yugoslavia in 1991.

He moved to Yugoslavia after Slobodan Milošević was deposed in 2000. In March 2001 Yugoslavian citizenship was given to him by the government and property seized from his family, including royal palaces, were returned. Alexander is a proponent of establishing parliamentary monarchy in Serbia within its current borders and sees himself as the rightful king. Hosted a 2004 meeting of Le Cercle.

Kelly, Crosby M.

Sources: 1997, Robert Hutchinson, 'Their Kingdom Come – Inside the Secret World of Opus Dei', p. 155

Born in 1918. BA, University Arizona, 1939. Postgrad., University Mexico, 1940. Best known as a public relations pioneer. Worked at Ford Motor Co. 1941-1948. Worked at several other companies the following 7 years. Assistant to the CEO at Litton Industries 1955-1965, a large defense contractor in the United States, bought by the Northrop Grumman Corporation in 2001. Worked at the Department of State in 1962. Head of the American delegation to the International Congress Air Force Associations, Turin, Italy, 1964. Chairman of Crosby M. Kelly Associates Ltd. 1965-1973. Chairman President Advertising Measurements, Inc. 1965-1970. Chairman of Performance Measurements Co., Detroit, 1968-1970. Order of Merit of the Republic of Italy 1969. Senior vice president at Litton Industries, Inc. 1973-1976. According to Len Horowitz, Litton Industries was given over $5 billion in military contracts during the first term of the Nixon administration, $10 million of which went towards the development of AIDS-like viruses. Vice president of communications at Rockwell International 1976-1978. Instructor at the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School Business 1978. Again Chairman of Crosby M. Kelly Associates Ltd. 1978-1986. President of the Sage Institute in Portland, Oregon, 1980-1983. Director Western World Insurance Co. Guest lecturer European Institute Business Administration Fontainebleau, France, 1966. Robert Hutchinson:

"Crosby Kelly made no bones about his political leanings. ‘I am a Rightist, Conservative and anti-Communist,' he told Hodgson. He was said to be a sometime CIA operative. He had designed and launched the sales campaign for the first Ford motorcar produced after the Second World War, and was among Robert McNamara's original 'whiz kids' at Ford. For thirteen years he had been on the board of Litton Industries. Kelly told Violet he would not invest a penny until satisfied that the invention was capable of finding water. [reference to the Sniffer Device affair]"

Died in 1986.
 

Kissinger, Henry Alfred

Sources: October 1989 – Issue 18, Lobster Magazine, 'The Pinay Circle and Destabilisation in Europe'; 1993, Brian Crozier, 'Free Agent', pages 186, 191-193, and 241; June 29, 1997, The Independence, 'Aitken dropped by the Right's secret club; Is it the ultimate dishonour'; 2002, David Rockefeller, 'Memoirs', pg. 412-413, referring to the Pesenti Group; April 6, 2003, The Observer, 'So, Norman, any regrets this time?'; September 5, 2004, Sunday Times, 'Le Cercle of the elite'

Henry Kissinger was born in the Bavarian city of Fuerth. He was a son of Louis and Paula Stern Kissinger. The elder Kissinger was a school teacher and after Hitler's rise to power, the family immigrated to London in 1938. After a short stay, they moved to Washington Heights in New York City. Recruited by Fritz Kraemer during WWII. Served in the U.S. Army Counter Intelligence Corps 1943-1946. According to Hersh, Kissinger stayed on active duty in West Germany after the war and was eventually assigned to the 970th CIC Detachment, whose functions included support for the recruitment of ex-Nazi intelligence officers for anti-Soviet operations inside the Soviet bloc. Captain in the Military Intelligence Reserve 1946-1949. Went to Harvard in 1947, where he was picked by the Rockefellers, three of whom were overseers there at the time. Executive director Harvard International Seminar 1951-1969. Became an consultant to the Operations Research Office in 1951. According to Hersh, that unit, under the direct control of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, conducted highly classified studies on such topics as the utilization of former German operatives and Nazi partisan supporters in CIA clandestine activities. Became a consultant to the Director of the Psychological Strategy Board in 1952, a covert arm of the National Security Council. The first director (and primary founder) was Gordon Gray, who served in this position from June 1951 to May 1952. Under Eisenhower, on September 2, 1953, the role of this department was expanded and the name became Operations Coordinating Board (OCB). Became an consultant to the Operations Coordinating Board in 1955, which was then the highest policy-making board for implementing clandestine operations against foreign governments. JFK would abolish the OCB in 1961 although a similar unacknowledged structure would remain operational. Became known as the most trusted aide to Nelson Rockefeller in the mid 1950s, who by then had served as Eisenhower's Special Assistant for Cold War Planning and overseer of all the CIA's clandestine operations. Member of the Department of Government, Center for International Affairs, Harvard University, 1954-1969. Study director of nuclear weapons and foreign policy at the Council on Foreign Relations 1955-1956. Director Special Studies Project for the Rockefeller Brothers Fund 1956-1958, which worked out basic cold war policy manifestoes (hardline).

They were in large part adopted by successive administrations in Washington. Author of 'Nuclear Weapons and Foreign Policy', released in 1957. Consultant Weapons Systems Evaluation Group of the Joint Chiefs of Staff 1959-1960. Consultant National Security Council 1961-1962. Consultant RAND Corporation 1961-1968. Consultant United States Arms Control and Disarmament Agency 1961-1968. Consultant to the Department of State 1965-1968. Right-hand man to Nelson Rockefeller during the 1968 Republican nomination campaign. Nixon's National Security Advisor 1969-1973. Chairman of the secretive Forty Committee, the covert apparatus of the National Security Council, from at least 1969 to 1976, which oversaw the CIA's clandestine operations. Nelson Rockefeller, even in his Senate bio, has been named as an (earlier) chairman of the Forty Committee. As head of this committee Kissinger had access to more information than the other members and he is said to have distorted it at times. During this same time period Kissinger also set up and headed the Washington Special Action Group (WSAG), another very important foreign policy group. Committee Secretary of State 1973-1977. Made two secret trips to China in 1971 to confer with Premier Zhou Enlai. Together with David Rockefeller involved in setting up the National Council for US-China Trade in 1973. Negotiated the SALT I and ABM treaty with the Soviet Union. Awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1973. Made other secret trips to China in later years to make extremely sensitive intelligence exchanges. Robert C. McFarlane was among those who went to China with Kissinger, in his case between 1973 and 1976. Negotiated the end of the Yom Kippur War in 1973. Said to have played a role in the 1973 Augusto Pinochet coup. Approved President Suharto's invasion of East-Timor in 1973, which resulted in a bout 250,000 dead communists and socialists. Oversaw the drafting of 'National Security Study Memorandum 200: Implications of Worldwide Population Growth for U.S. Security and Overseas Interests', which was completed in December 1974 and adopted as official U.S. policy by President Gerald Ford a year later. The title of NSSM 200 is enough to make it controversial. Suspected of having been involved in Operation Condor which started around 1975 and was an assassination and intelligence gathering operation on 3 continents. Set up the Iran-US Business Council with Hushang Ansary. A meeting of the Iran-US Business Council in 1976 included Peter G. Peterson, Paul Volcker, and David Rockefeller. Director Council on Foreign Relations 1977-1981. Together with Cyrus Vance and David Rockefeller he set up the US-China Business Council in 1979, the successor to the Council for US-China Trade. Annual visitor of Bilderberg since at least the 1970s. Annual visitor of the Trilateral Commission since the late 1970s. Visited Le Cercle. Member of the Pilgrims Society. Visitor of Bohemian Grove camp Mandalay. May 17, 2002 issue, Jeffrey Steinberg for Executive Intelligence Review, 'Ariel Sharon: Profile of an Unrepentant War Criminal':

"On Nov. 15, 1982, a final meeting took place on several real estate purchases, mostly through Arab middle-men, to push the massive expansion of Jewish settlements throughout the West Bank at a handsome profit. Attending the meeting at Sharon's ranch were: Kissinger [Cercle], Lord Harlech (Sir David Ormsby-Gore), Johannes von Thurn und Taxis [1001 Club], Tory Parliamentarian Julian Amery [Cercle], Sir Edmund Peck, and MI-6 Mideast mandarin Nicholas Elliot [Cercle]."

Founder of Kissinger Associates in 1982, a secretive consulting firm to international corporations. Some of the first members to join Kissinger Associates were Brent Scowcroft (vice-chairman), Lawrence Eagleburger (president), Lord Carrington, Lord Roll of Ipsden, and Pehr Gyllenhammar. Some served until 1989, others were still active for Kissinger Associates in the late 1990s. 1992, Senator John Kerry and Senator Hank Brown, Report to the Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate, part 20::

"Beginning in the fall of 1986, and continuing through early 1989, BCCI initiated a series of contacts with perhaps the most politically prominent international and business consulting firm in the United States - Kissinger Associates."

Chairman National Bipartisan Commission on Central America 1983-1984. Set up the America-China Society in 1987, together with Robert McFarlane and Cyrus Vance. Appointed chairman of AIG's advisory council in 1987. Received the Charlemagne award in 1987. Director of the Atlanta branch of the Italian Banca Nazionale del Lavoro (BNL) from 1985 to 1991. This was during the 1989 BNL Affair (Iraq Gate) in which it became known that the Atlanta branch had made $4 billion in unreported loans to Iraq. After the revelation, the money was said to be used by the Iraqis to buy food and agriculture equipment, but in reality they were buying loads of military equipment. His consultancy firm, Kissinger Associates, set up the China Ventures fund with CITIC in 1989, which would be in the same year that he defended the Tiananmen Square massacre, arguing against sanctions being placed on China. Director of the Financial Services Volunteer Corps (FSVC), which was founded in 1990 by Pilgrims Society members Cyrus Vance and John C. Whitehead. Paul Volcker has been among the chairmen of the FSVC, which describes itself as "a not-for-profit, private-public partnership whose mission is to help build sound banking and financial systems in transition and developing countries." In 1990, he sat on boards of American Express, Union Pacific, R.M. Macy, Continental Grain, CBS, and the Revlon Group.

Also a consultant to ABC news at this time. Member Atlantic Council of the United States. Member of the Council of Advisors of the United States-Azerbaijan Chamber of Commerce. Trustee of the Center Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), the Arthur F Burns Fellowship, the Institute of International Education, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Honorary Governor of the Foreign Policy Association. Patron of the Atlantic Partnership and the New Atlantic Initiative. Chairman of the Eisenhower Exchange Fellowships, the Nixon Center, and the American Academy in Berlin. Co-chairman of the Editorial Board of 'The National Interest' magazine. Chancellor of the College William and Mary. Honorary chairman World Cup USA 1994 (Kissinger has attended football matches with his friend and colleague Etienne Davignon). Honorary chairman of the National Interest, a neocon foreign policy magazine founded by Irving Kristol, who also founded the CIA's magazine Encounter. Members of the advisory council of the the National Interest have included Morton Abramowitz, Dov Zakheim, John Mearsheimer, Conrad Black and James Schlesinger. Daniel Pipes has been a long time contributor to the National Interest. Co-founded the privately-funded American Academy in Berlin in 1994, together with Richard Holbrooke, Richard von Weizsäcker, Fritz Stern, and Otto Count Lambsdorff. Named Honorary Knight Commander of St. Michael and St. George, 1995. Director Freeport-McMoRan 1995-2001.

Director of Conrad Black's Hollinger International Inc. Member of J.P. Morgan's International Advisory Council. Former member of the Advisory Council of Forstmann Little & Co. and American Express. Advisor to China National Offshore Oil Corp (CNOOC). Member of the Europe Strategy Board of Hicks, Muse, Tate & Furst. Director of Gulfstream Aerospace Corporation. Chairman of the International Advisory Board of the American International Group (AIG), a partner of Kissinger Associates. Also chairman of the Advisory Boards of AIG Asian Infrastructure Funds I & II and a director of AIG Global. In 1997, Kissinger became the central advisor to the Business Coalition for US-China Trade, a group of about a 1000 leading companies willing to invest in China.

In 2000, Henry Kissinger was quoted by Business Wire:

"Hank Greenberg, Pete Peterson and I have been close friends and business associates for decades."

Maurice Greenburg is head of AIG and Peter G. Peterson is head of The Blackstone Group, which is the other major partner of Kissinger Associates. Peterson is also a former chairman of Lehman Brothers. Kissinger is a friend of Lynn Forester and introduced her to Sir Evelyn de Rothschild at the 1998 Bilderberg conference. They would soon become married. After Pulitzer Price winning journalist Peter Arnett produced a CNN report on Operation Tailwind (a Vietnam operation in which US Special Forces allegedly killed US defectors with Sarin) in 1998, Kissinger and his friends called up CNN to demand that the news network should distance itself from the story (a story which CNN initially approved) and made sure that the producers of the show were publicly humiliated and fired.

Arnett was fired again by NBC and National Geographic in March 2003 immediately after he said the Bush Administration was looking for a plan B now that Iraqi resistance turned out to be much more intense than expected. Within 24 hours the Daily Mail hired him. When Henry Kissinger is invited to speak at the United Nations Association on April 11, 2001 Lord Jacob Rothschild is flanking his side. Picked as the initial head of the 9/11 investigating committee in 2003, although he turned out to be too controversial to remain in that position. Henry Kissinger is a patron of the Open Russia Foundation since 2001, together with Lord Jacob Rothschild. The Foundation was set up by Mikhail Khodorkovsky, a controversial oligarch, later locked up by Putin. Honorary trustee of the Aspen Institute. Director of the Board of Overseers of the International Rescue Committee (IRC), together with Madeleine Albright, Maurice Greenberg, Henry Kissinger, Felix Rohatyn, and James Wolfensohn. John Whitehead, Tom Brokaw, and Winston Lord have all been chairmen of the Board of Overseers. When Otto von Habsburg visited the United States in April 2005, one of the few people he spoke with, besides the general meetings, was Henry Kissinger. Because of previous international attempts by European and South American judges to question him, he is known to take legal advice before traveling to certain countries in either continent.

Lamont, Lord Norman

Sources: April 6, 2003, The Observer, 'So, Norman, any regrets this time?'; June 18, 2004, Chancellery of HRH Crown Prince Alexander II of Yugoslavia, 'Reception in honor of the "Le Cercle" conference; September 5, 2004, Sunday Times, 'Le Cercle of the elite'; Parliamentary biography; biography at Benador Associates

Born in 1942. Graduated from Cambridge University. Chairman Cambridge University's Conservative Association in 1963. Worked for eleven years for N.M. Rothschild & Sons in the financial City of London 1968-1979. Also director of Rothschild Asset Management during this time. Conservative member of Parliament 1974-1998. Opposition Spokesman on Prices and Consumer Affairs 1975-1976. Opposition Spokesman on 1976-1979. Under-Secretary of State at the Department of Energy 1979-1981. Minister of State at the Department of Trade and Industry 1981-1985. Member of the Queen's Privy Council since 1982. Minister of Defence Procurement 1985-1986.

Financial Secretary to the Treasury 1986-1989. Chief Secretary to the Treasury 1989-1990. Campaign manager of John Major in 1990. Chancellor of the Exchequer (Treasury Secretary) under John Major 1990-1993. Chairman of the G7 group of Finance Ministers and the European Union Finance Ministers in 1992. British negotiator at Maastricht. Lamont is former vice-president and now co-chairman of the Bruges Group, an independent think tank that describes itself as:

"Set up in February 1989, its aim was to promote the idea of a less centralized European structure than that emerging in Brussels. Its inspiration was Margaret Thatcher's Bruges speech in September 1988."

The opinion of the Bruges Group about the 2005 EU Constitution:

"The EU Constitution will significantly alter the European Union. If adopted, it will move the EU even further away from our vision of a free trading, decentralized, deregulated and democratic Europe of nation-states."

Lamont about the rejected 2005 EU Constitution:

"The Europe of Delors [fervent Roman Catholic socialist; received Charlemagne award], Mitterrand [fervent catholic socialist; received Charlemagne award] and Kohl [fervent catholic; received Charlemagne award] is dead. No means no. Europe's self-serving political elite will make a profound mistake and create an awakening of bitterness if they try to sidestep France's historic vote. Europe is a dysfunctional mess. Europe needs to go back to square one. Blair and the British Government in their role as the Presidency of the EU should renegotiate the existing treaties to create a looser free trade Europe of 25 countries."

Lamont and the Bruges Group support the European Free Trade Association (EFTA) and think Britain should rejoin that. Its four remaining members, Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Switzerland, have negotiated their own trade agreements with the EU, which allow them access to the single market. Switzerland and especially [the crown of] Liechtenstein are more oriented towards the EU then Norway and Iceland. Lamont handled Russia's negotiations with international financial institutions on behalf of Presidents Gorbachev and Yeltsin, and also represented Russia in negotiations to join the IMF. These negotiations were started in 1988 and after Yeltsin announced in 1991 to privatize the Russian economy, funds from the IMF started flowing in. The Rothschilds later turned out to be close business associates of the leading Russian oligarchs, who bought up the Russian media and raw material corporations for a dime and a nickel in the aftermath of the IMF negotiations. Allegations of fraud were numerous in the years following and one of these scandals seemed to have led to the death of 1001 Club member Edmond Safra. Director of N.M. Rothschild and Sons Ltd 1993-1995. July 2, 1995, Sunday Times, 'Rothschild rues its blues under the bed':

"Last week it started to look as if Rothschild was planning to make a bid to become the government itself when John Redwood, a former Rothschild fund manager, launched his campaign to become the Tory party leader with Norman Lamont, a Rothschild director, at his side. But Rothschild's position as the hotbed of Tory Euro-sceptic activity is understandably raising some eyebrows both within the bank and outside... Lamont's appointment, more than any other of the political refugees to appear on the Rothschild board, was made despite the opposition of senior Rothschild corporate financiers. Sir Evelyn, however, is renowned for making these sort of appointments without reference to anyone. Whatever the outcome of the leadership election, many at the bank now hope that Lamont's reign at Rothschild where he earns around Pounds 25,000-Pounds 30,000, considerably less than many believe will soon be terminated."

Strangely, Sir Evelyn was exposed in 2002 for funding Policy Network, the primary think tank for New Labour, which is very pro-Europe (September 22, 2002, Sunday Times, 'Rothschild bankrolls Mandelson think tank') Became chairman of Le Cercle in 1996 (he still was in 2005). Good friend of Lord Robert Cecil of Le Cercle. Member of the Royal Order of Francis I of the Sacred Military Constantinian Order, together with several other Cercle members. May 13, 2005, London Evening Standard, 'London Knight Life':

"Many of the recent additions, awarded the Royal Order of Francis I for services to industry, science and the arts, aren't even Catholic. These include Baroness Thatcher, the Duke of Westminster, Lord Lamont and the enigmatic Islamic art collector Professor Nasser David Khalili, one of Britain's richest men, who proudly wears his order on a turquoise silk ribbon at official functions. All members are encouraged to donate to the order's spiritual and charitable works."

Chairman of the Oil Club of independent oil corporations. Member House of Lords since 1998. Vice Lords Select Committee, Chairman House of Lords Select Committee on EU. Served as a director of Scottish Re since December 2001. Director of the Balli Group plc, a commodities trading company that specialized in steel, petrochemicals and non-ferrous metals. Director of Scottish Annuity & Life Holdings Ltd., Banca Commerciala Robank, European Growth and Income Trust, and Jupiter Finance and Income Trust. Chairman of the East European Food Fund. Advisor to Rotch Property Group Ltd., one of Britain's largest private property companies. Advisor to the Monsanto Corporation and to the Government of Romania. Director of the Luxembourg banking company Compaigne Internationale de Participations Bancaires et Financieres (CIPAF), which is a subsidiary of General Mediterranean Holdings, owned by Cercle member and Saddam associate Nadhmi Auchi. Vice Chairman of the International Nuclear Safety Commission (Chaired by Mikhail Gorbachev). Member of the Neoconservative Benador Associates. In February 2005 it was reported that John Major and Norman Lamont were holding up the release of papers on Black Wednesday under the Freedom of Information Act. Black Wednesday refers to September 16, 1992 when the government was forced to withdraw the Pound from the European Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM) by currency speculators - most notably George Soros who earned over USD$1 billion in doing so.

December 10, 2000, The Guardian, 'Revealed: Pinochet drug smuggling link':

"The Chilean army and secret police have spent almost two decades secretly flooding Europe and the US with massive shipments of cocaine. The trafficking began during the 17-year dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet and continues to this day, a year-long investigation for The Observer has established. Twelve tons of the drug, with a street value of several billion pounds, left Chile in 1986 and 1987 alone. The drugs, destined for Europe, have often been flown to Spanish territory by aircraft carrying Chilean-made arms to Iraq and Iran. Distribution to Britain and other European countries has been controlled by secret police stationed in Chilean embassies in Stockholm and Madrid. The revelations will come as an embarrassment to the Conservative Party, which criticized Pinochet's arrest in London in 1998 and backed his fight to avoid deportation to Spain on charges of murder and torture. The news will be particularly unwelcome to Lord Lamont, the former Chancellor, who was in Santiago last week to deliver a letter of support to the former dictator from Lady Thatcher. Under Conservative governments, large quantities of British arms were sold to Chile, and British firms such as Royal Ordnance collaborated with the development of Chile's weapons potential. There can be no doubt that Pinochet, whose power was absolute between the 1973 coup and his surrender in 1990, was a party to trafficking."

Lamont pressed Home Secretary Robin Cook for Pinochet's release from captivity in England, claiming it was something the people of Chile had to deal with themselves. Has visited Bilderberg. Chairman of the British Iranian Chamber of Commerce since March 2004. Arrived in Iran in May 2004 as co-chairman of a mission to strengthen the ties between Iran and the United Kingdom and to increase UK foreign investment into Iran. During this time the neocons in the United States, led by Dick Cheney et al, are continually threatening to bomb Iran. Lord Lamont in February 2006, BBC radio, 'Any Questions?':

"Well I think the idea of Iran getting a nuclear weapon is alarming. I think also President Ahmadinejad of Iran is a rather threatening person because of what he has said. Having said that I think we ought also to understand that there is an Iranian perspective which we don't always see in these matters. The first is that I think Iran actually has a deep sense of insecurity. The history of Iran has been interfered with by foreign countries. They remember how a prime minister, Mossadegh, was removed because he wanted - by the Americans and the British - because he wanted to nationalize oil. They remember above all the Iran/Iraq War in which Iraq with Western weapons invaded them, half a million people died. They're surrounded by countries with nuclear weapons as well. Second point I would just make about Iran is Iran is not nearly as anti-West, anti-American or as religious as it appears from the members of the government you see on television. After 9/11 there were demonstrations in favor of America in Tehran. President Khatami, the president of Iran at that time, actually made the strongest, most eloquent condemnation I've heard from anybody. Now the one thing I'm certain of is that sanctions will not work and we will find ourselves getting into a situation from which there is no exit. America already has sanctions because of the hostage crisis that maintained them ever since. I think a far better policy in the past would have been if we'd had no sanctions against Iran, we'd encouraged full economic ties, trade with Iran, admitted them to the World Trade Organization. It may now be too late. I don't think Iran is going to invade anybody but I think Iran - Iran has been a major beneficiary of the Iraq War, that is one of the problems which has emboldened, made them more confident. But I think in the past we have ostracized them, we have kept them at bay. I think Jack Straw has handled this very, very well because he's kept a dialogue going and although we are in a difficult situation I hope that Straw and the Europeans will still continue to maintain contact and still try to find a diplomatic solution, even though it is backed up with ultimate sanctions... I think they do want to have nuclear energy but I think they are - there was a program begun under the Shah but I think they probably do want to develop for the security reasons that I've outlined. And I think the awful thing is you would find that a huge part of the population of Iran agreed with that, I don't think you would find that - they see the West as interfering in their region. Dimbleby: But do you therefore believe that they represent - you described your perspective - do you believe - to go back to the question as it were in a yes or no - that they do represent a threat - it does represent a threat to world peace or not? Norman Lamont: I think Iran is a significant power in the region and its power has been increased by the Iraq world, a Shia belt has formed stretching Bahrain, Iraq, Lebanon - I don't think they're going to wage an aggressive war against somebody, I really don't believe that, I don't think they will. But they have leverage via Hamas, Hizbollah. I think we do need to continue talking to them. I think unfortunately we are in the grip of history and forces that have put us in this position." One of Lamont 2003 House of Lords speeches: "I first declare an interest in that I am a director of a company which was specifically formed to participate in the reconstruction of Iraq, although nothing that I say is likely to enhance the prospects of that company. At the time I strongly supported the war both in this House and outside, but subsequently I changed my mind because I gradually came to believe that the country was misled about the reasons for the war. Of course, I am not saying that the Prime Minister acted in bad faith. I am not saying that the Prime Minister misled the country intentionally, but that he was so keen to go to war that he seemed to lose all critical faculty. The fact that his motives were right does not in any way modify or justify the consequences. I watched with disbelief the evidence that unfolded from the Hutton inquiry and read with concern the conclusions of the Butler report. I find it impossible to resist the conclusion that No. 10 was desperate to grasp at any evidence to support a decision that it desperately wanted to make. Like other noble Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Butler, for his excellent report... To watch last week the Republican Convention in New York was to watch a gathering in denial that seems to have turned this war into a fantasy. We know that the two governments were wrong and out of touch with reality before the war. The question is: are they any more in touch with reality now?... The invasion of Iraq has been discredited also by the subsequent chaos hugely influenced by Iraqi exiles who have their own agenda. The "American appointed government" control only part of Baghdad; even there its Ministers are car-bombed and assassinated. According to the press, Baquba, Samara, Kut, Mahmoudiya, Fallujah and Ramadi are all outside government authority. In their efforts to retain and regain control the Iraqi Government re-employ some of Saddam's generals and re-recruit his secret police. Mr Allawi has said that he wants to slash some throats."

Lowenthal, Gerhard

Sources: October 1989 – Issue 18, Lobster Magazine, 'The Pinay Circle and Destabilisation in Europe'

In the 1980s, Lowenthal was the anchorman on current affairs programmes for ZDF television, the major German TV network. Died in 2002. Probably a relative of Richard Lowenthal, co-founder of the CIA's Congress for Cultural Freedom with Julian Amery and others.

Luchsinger, Fred

Sources: November 1988 – Issue 17, Lobster Magazine, 'Brian Crozier, the Pinay Circle and James Goldsmith' (quoting from the Langemann papers); October 1989 – Issue 18, Lobster Magazine, 'The Pinay Circle and Destabilisation in Europe'

Editor of the Neue Zurcher Zeitung in the 1980s. Recipient of the Freedom Prize 1985. Member of International Society for Human Rights, Resistance International, WACL, CAUSA, the Jonathan Institute, Konservative Aktion and the European Institute on Security. Attended the 1980 Zurich meeting of the Pinay Circle.
 

McLean, Neil "Billy" L.D.

Sources: 1990, Xan Fielding, 'One Man In His time: The Life of Lieutenant-Colonel N.L.D. ("Billy') McLean', p. 205

Colonel Billy Mclean & later co-Pinay Circle member Julian Amery were dropped in North-Albany in April 1944 as part of the British resistance against the Italian and German fascists. They worked with the Albanian resistance of Ihsan Toptani. After their task was accomplished they all became passionate anti-communists. In 1946, McLean was stationed as an intelligence officer somewhere near the Karakoram mountains. He was an MI6 officer for most, if not all, of the post-war period. After the war he became a member of Parliament who regularly travelled to different parts of the world to counter Communism. In 1962, Yemen was taken over by a communist regime and the Egyptian Nasser was supporting them by bombing Saudi-Arabia (who supported the deposed Imam). Already retired deputy head of MI6, George Kennedy Young, was approached by Mossad agents to find the right person to lead a guerrilla war against the Yemeni rebels, Young introduced Colonel McLean to the Israelis. Mclean's guerrilla war would eventually bring down the Yemeni regime and drive Nasser back to his own country. Very good friend of Julian Amery for all of his life. 1990, Xan Fielding, 'One Man In His time: The Life of Lieutenant-Colonel N.L.D. ("Billy') McLean', p. 205:

"There was another institution which gave Billy particular pleasure. It was called Le Cercle, and outside the circle nothing was known about it but the name. Its origins and membership were (and still are) as deeply cocooned in mystery as those of the most exclusive Masonic lodge. It appears to have been founded by the French statesman, Antoine Pinay, and when he retired Julian Amery took over the chairmanship. It seems to have been a small assembly of European and American Conservatives meeting on an ad hoc basis once or twice a year, for two or three days at a time, to exchange views on world affairs. Because of his knowledge and understanding of the Middle East and North Africa, Billy was a most acceptable candidate for membership, which, in due course he acquired. He had already attended several meetings - in Bonn, Munich, Washington and elsewhere - and looked forward to attending more."

1990, Xan Fielding, 'One Man In His time: The Life of Lieutenant-Colonel N.L.D. ("Billy') McLean', p. 100:

"It was at one of his many public meetings in the Highlands that the chairman, a personal friend of his [Billy], spotted that something was wrong with him, cancelled the meeting, and advised him to go home. Daska [his wife] put him to bed, hoping he would get some sleep, and watched over him. But he stayed awake, reading the Bible. He looked rather odd and told her he had had a revelation: there was dirty work afoot, a conspiracy against him; certain factions in the constituency were plotting to kill him; the Freemasons and Scottish Nationalists were actually going to crucify him - he had been shown the very hill they had chosen for the ceremony. Thoroughly alarmed, Daska sent for a doctor, who gave him a sedative which ensured him a good night's rest. But in the morning he seemed as confused as before. He told Daska that everybody had taken against him and only God was on his side. Seeing no improvement in his condition, she arranged for him to be transferred to a nursing home in London for specialist treatment. When the ambulance came to fetch him he grew more agitated than ever and cried out: 'They're going to take me away! Daska, don't leave me!... On arriving at the nursing home he at once asked for a Bible. The specialist advised Daska not to let him have it; instead she gave him Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. This did the trick, or at least must have helped, for by the time he had read all eight volumes he was cured... At the end of a fortnight he was able to leave the hospital and, after a short holiday in Portugal, was back to light parliamentary duties by the first week of November."

The doctors assumed he became paranoid through a combination of heavy moodswings (seemingly normal for Celts), nervous exhaustion, and possibly alcohol. Attended Cercle meetings until his death in 1986. While he was dying Dasha did everything she could to get a catholic priest on his bedside, in which she finally succeeded. Officially, Billy belonged to no church, but he was most sympathetic to the Roman catholic church. A memorial after his death was attended by Crown Prince Alexander of Yugoslavia and his wife, representatives of the King of Jordan (Le Cercle), King Leka of the Albanians, the Imam of Yemen, the Crown Prince of Ethiopia, the Speaker of the House of Commons, and several Army officers.

Mertes, Dr Alois

Sources: 1997, Robert Hutchinson, 'Their Kingdom Come – Inside the Secret World of Opus Dei', p. 153-158

Born in 1921. Studied at universities in Bonn and Paris. Joined the West German foreign service in 1951. Served in Paris and Moscow before being named head of the external security department in the Foreign Ministry. Elected to Parliament in 1972 as a Conservative Christian Democrat (CDU/CSU), where he served until returning to the Foreign Ministry in 1982. Contributed to the 1982 Trilateral Commission meeting. Parliamentary State Secretary (State Minister) at the Federal Foreign Office in Bonn in 1984. Ambassador Erdmann began his diplomatic career in 1984 as the personal assistant of Dr. Alois Mertes. Robert Hutchinson:

"Both Strauss and Mertes were said to be linked to Opus Dei, though Mertes later denied it."

Favored close relations with the United States and was very critical of Ostpolitik. Wrote 'Drei Deutsche in Russland: Osterman, Cancrin, Hass' in 1983. Count Osterman (1686-1747) was a German-born Russian statesman who came to prominence under Tsar Peter I of Russia (Peter the Great). Count Cancrin (1774-1845) was a German-born Russian Minister of Finance for 21 years. Mertes died in 1985.

Monnet, Jean

Sources: 2002, David Rockefeller, 'Memoirs', pg. 412-413, referring to the Pesenti Group

Roman catholic. Born in Cognac, France in 1888, in a family of cognac merchants. Abandoned his university-entrance examinations in 1904. Worked in the City of London at J.G. Monnet & Co., his father's company London branch 1904-1906. Represented J.G. Monnet abroad in Scandinavia, Russia, Egypt, Canada, and the United States 1906-1914. Sent to Canada in 1910 to open new markets for the family business. Here he hooked up with the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) and the Lazard Freres banking house. Due to his negotiations, J.G. Monnet's subsidiary United Vineyard Proprietors Co. started shipping large amounts of brandy to HBC, which this company sold on to the native Indians, a trade prohibited by law. At the time, HBC, a centuries old bastion of the British Empire, was headed by Privy Councillor and Pilgrims Society member Lord Strathcona who was replaced in 1914 by Sir Thomas Skinner (not much written about him). In 1916, Pilgrims Society member Lord Kindersley, a long time Lazard partner (chair at some point) and Bank of England director, became head of the company. Around this time, the Keswicks of the Pilgrims Society and Jardine Matheson started to gain a controlling interest in the HBC. Monnet was grateful for the deal with HBC, because he found it tough to compete on the legal market with better-known firms as Hennessy. When WWI broke out Monnet tested unfit for military service. In September 1914, one month after WWI started, Monnet managed to meet up with France's prime minister René Viviani. He convinced Viviani of a plan to coordinate the use of Allied ships bringing supplies to beleaguered France. As a result, Monnet was sent to London to set up the International Supply Commission, which organized the Anglo-French pool of ships to supply the Allied forces in France. According to Monnet, he arranged the meeting with the prime minister through his father's corporate lawyer. According to some outside writers, the HBC was responsible for arranging this meeting through its high level French contacts. In any case, in London Monnet arranged a $200 million contract for HBC to ship 13 million tons of goods to France on which HBC would take a 1% commission. Chef de Cabinet to France's economics minister Etienne Clementel in 1916. In 1917 he was instrumental in setting up the Inter-Allied Maritime Transport Council, to further improve the coordination of Allied shipping. He wanted this council to have full authority, but didn't get his way. He had, however, created his first supranational body. Before creating the Inter-Allied Maritime Transport Council, he had diner with Arthur Salter, who would become his lifelong friend, discussing the creation of this supranational body. Salter was a person closely involved with Quigley's Roundtable and his ideas of a federal Europe, which he would write down in 1931, would be adopted by Monnet, almost to the letter. Salter mentioned he was part of "small and secret committee" of economists who advised multiple prime ministers up to the outbreak of WWII. John Maynard Keynes (Cambridge Apostles member, just as Lord Victor Rothschild and Aldous Huxley; friend of J.P. Morgan & Co. chairman and CFR chair Russell C. Leffingwell) and Lionel Curtis (supposedly Round Table; primary founder RIIA) were involved in this committee. (Salter was educated at Oxford. First met Monnet in 1914. Had diner with Monnet in 1917, talking about the Inter-Allied Maritime Transport Council. Secretary of the Supreme Economic Council at Versailles in 1919, which also counted the involvement of Monnet from the French side. Head of the economic and financial section of the League of Nations secretariat, and in the League secretariat at Geneva, where he worked for stabilization of the currencies of Austria and Hungary, the former Habsburg empire. Arthur Salter wrote 'The United States of Europe' in 1931, a collection of papers which advocated a federal Europe within the framework of the League of Nations. Author and journalist in London in the early 1930s. Went to China in the early 1930s to advise the Chinese government on reorganizing its railways. Monnet was in China at the same time, working on the same issue. Appointed Gladstone professor of political theory and institutions at Oxford University in 1934, and became a fellow of All Souls College, Oxford, supposedly the core of Quigley's Round Table. Carroll Quigley wrote in his 1981 book 'The Anglo-American Establishment':

"In 1936, at least eleven out of twenty-six members of the council were of the Milner Group. These included Lord Astor (chairman), L. Curtis, G.M. Gathorne-Hardy, Lord Hailey, H.D. Henderson, Stephen King-Hall, Mrs. Alfred Lyttelton, Sir Neill Malcolm, Lord Meston, Sir Arthur Salter, J.W. Wheeler-Bennett, E.L. Woodward, and Sir Alfred Zimmern."

Also according to Quigley, Salter was also one of seven board members of the Montague Burton Chair of International Relations at Oxford in the 1930s, together with the Viscount Cecil of Chelwood, of the family that supposedly coordinated the Round Table. MP for Oxford University from 1937-1950. Vice chairman of the Franco-British Economic Coordination Committee just before WWII. Appointed a Privy Counsellor in 1941. Appointed deputy director-general of the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration in 1944. Minister of State for Economic Affairs at the Treasury, and Minister of Materials in 1952.) Appointed to represent France at the Allied Supreme Economic Council at the Versailles Peace Conference of 1919, where he worked with Pilgrims Society members as Lord Robert Cecil, Lord Milner, Nicholas Murray Butler, John and Allen Dulles, David Bruce, Elihu Root, and Russell Leffingwell. First deputy secretary general of the League of Nations 1919-1923. Sir Eric Drummond, the 16th Earl of Perth, was the original secretary general. Saw the League as a failure primarily because each member had a veto right. Rejoined the family business in 1923 to save it from a financial crisis. Obtained a loan from the HBC, which he was told he could treat as a gift, and saved his family's company. In 1925, Monnet moved to America to accept a partnership in Blair & Co., a New York bank which had done bonanza business in the war effort. Elisha Walker was head of the firm. Served as the company's representative in France and made a small fortune. Monnet's papers reveal that he received business referrals from Dulles and Lazard Brothers' banker Robert whose sister-in-law was Lady Nancy Astor. Monnet's work for Blair & Co. also brought him into the law offices of Blair’s attorney, John J. McCloy (Pilgrims Society) at Cravath, Swaine & Moore. Appointed vice president of Blair & Co. in 1928. Lost his small fortune in the great depression that started in 1929. A loan of the Lazard Bank, arranged through former Hudson Bay Company chairman Sir Robert Kindersley, helped Monnet back up on his feet. Monnet would only be able to fully repay the loan in the late 1950s/early 1960s. Blair & Co. merged with Bank of America in 1929, forming Bancamerica-Blair Corporation, which was owned by the Transamerica Corporation of Amadeo Peter Giannini (Bohemian Grove; largest competitor of the East Coast establishment). Elisha Walker was appointed chairman of Transamerica Corporation in January 1930; Jean Monnet became vice-chairman of Transamerica. Giannini retired to Italy, only remaining chairman of Transamerica's Advisory Board. On September 23, 1931, Walker announced that Transamerica would be selling most of its nation-wide banking assets, because of the financial crisis and because the board expected that nation-wide banking wouldn't be allowed anymore in the future. It is also announced that Lee, Higginson & Co., a Wall Street investment bank which started to fund the Nazis around this time, would be taking a majority control in Transamerica. Monnet's future investment partner, George Murnane, was among three directors of Lee, Higginson that were appointed to the board of directors of Transamerica, while Monnet remained vice chairman. In addition to the Gianninis, 19 directors were dropped from the Transamerica board. The following day Giannini announced that he wouldn't allow the sell off of Bank of America for what he termed a "ridiculously low" price. On December 10, 1931 the New York Times reported:

"A. P. Glannini announced tonight that he personally would head a "fight to the finish" to oust Elisha Walker, chairman of the Transamerica Corporation, and "Wall Street domination" from the corporation which he founded. He made the statement after he had read a letter from Mr. Walker and James A. Bacigalupi to Transamerica's stockholders. He called the letter "an attack on my personal honesty and integrity"... He said the letter had been timed "to catch me unaware" as it was not released for publication until after he had left San Francisco tonight for Ventura and Santa Barbara, where he planned to carry on the battle for proxies on behalf of Associated Stockholders."

Giannini won his Transamerica fight in February 1932, which is when Walker had to resign as chairman. Monnet seems to have been fired at the same time. Monnet was also fired as a director of the Bancamerica-Blair Corporation in March 1932. In November 1932, the Chinese Minister of Finance, Tse-Ven Soong (christian family; Green Gang triad family; governor of the Central Bank of China; sister married Chiang Kai-Shek; other sister sister married Sun Yat-sen, the person who established the Republic of China; still another sister was secretary to Sun Yat-sen) on behalf of Chiang Kai-Shek (the ruling Shanghai-based anti-communist pro-western warlord; member of the Green Gang Triad and close to its Soong family. This Green Gang was involved in the opium and gold smuggle, the sex trade, slave-girl trade, brothels, assassinations, and in keeping an eye on labor unions; would create the Taiwanese republic/police state after he lost the battle against the communists in the years after WWII), invited Jean Monnet to act as chairman of an East-West non-political committee in China for the development of the Chinese economy. Railroads played a central role in these economic developments. Monnet accepted, and in 1933 he took his assistant, David Drummond (the future 17th Lord Perth; from a catholic Hungarian family which emigrated to Scotland in the 11th century; two members of this family were among the eight original founders of the Order of the Thistle; son of Sir Eric Drummond, Monnet's superior at the League of Nations; raised by the Duke and Duchess of Norfolk, a very old catholic aristocratic family; later Privy Councillor; later chair of the Ditchley Foundation for 3 years; later representative of the Queen to the Vatican; arranged a meeting in his own flat during the early 1960s between Edward Heath, the minister responsible for the EEC negotiations, and Jean Monnet; became a member of the extremely elite Roxburghe Club, together with members of the Cecil, Cavendish, Howard, Mellon, Rothschild, and Oppenheimer families), to China where he lived until 1936. After some preliminary investigations Monnet found that his basic task would be the partnership of Chinese capital with foreign companies. This concept led to the formal inauguration of the Chinese Development Finance Corporation (CDFC), which was made up of the main Chinese private banks teamed with four government controlled ones. It was John Foster Dulles (Pilgrims Society) of Sullivan & Cromwell who provided the financial backing for Monnet's next investment company, Monnet, Murnane & Co., in 1935. Dulles wrote about Monnet to his partner W.N. Cromwell: "... one of the most brilliant men that I know" and "an intimate friend [who] has the full confidence of many of the most important financial people". George Murnane (vice president New York Trust Company; deputy commissioner for France in the American Red Cross; director Allied Chemical & Dye of the Speyer family; partner in Lee, Higginson & Co.1928-1935, a Wall Street investment firm once set up by Opium trade families who around this time were financing the Nazis; main advisor for the Belgian Solvays and Boëls in the United States; colleague of Robert Bosch who oversaw his interests at Mendelssohn Bank/NAKIB in Amsterdam since 1934; appointed chair of the American Bosch Corporation in 1935; in November 1940 he was designated by the Wallenbergs' Enskilda Bank as the sole voting trustee with complete power to vote the American Bosch stock at stockholders' meetings in the US. If Murnane would have died, John Foster Dulles would have taken his place; appointed director of North American Corp. in 1938; his firm Monnet, Murnane & Co. was briefly investigated in 1938 by the FBI for supposedly having traded with the Nazis; became a Lazard partner in 1944, personally picked by Andre Meyer; Trustee emeritus of the Rockefeller University; died in 1969) was a very well known investment banker and a former colleague of Monnet at Transamerica. They hired Frenchman Henri Mazot as an agent to set up their Shanghai office of Monnet, Murnane & Co., within the French concession of that town. Monnet tried to include Britain into the cooperation, rather than letting it conduct business on its own. Unfortunately for Monnet, many British diplomats felt he was looking after his own interests. Around this time Monnet wrote: "[Britain] is the one that best understands China and whose actions most benefit it." When Monnet returned to the United States in 1936 he was investigated for tax evasion. In 1938, Monnet, Murnane & Co. was briefly investigated by the FBI, suspected of having laundered Nazi money. The investigation was called off and no charges were laid, but today it is known that the Dulles brothers and Murnane's Lee, Higginson & Co. certainly were involved in trade with the Nazis, just as Monnet's later close friend, Clarence Dillon of Dillon, Read & Co. 2003, Christopher Booker & Richard North, The Great Deception, The secret history of the European Union, p. 21:

"Following his lucrative spell in China, Monnet's career as a merchant banker had continued to be murky. On his return to America he had been investigated for tax evasion. In 1938 his company company had even come under suspicion by the FBI for having laundered Nazi money, although this inquiry was called off without any charges being laid."

Appointed chairman of the Franco-British Economic Coordination Committee in 1939. Reunited with his friend Arthur Salter at the outbreak of WWII, who became vice chairman of the Franco-British Economic Coordination Committee. In December 1939, Jean Monnet was sent to London to oversee the collectivization of the two countries' war production capacities. When the French government fled Paris in June 1940, De Gaulle went to London to prepare for the French government's departure to North-Africa to continue the war from there. While in London, De Gaulle was approached by Jean Monnet who proposed to him the creation of a Franco-British Union. The two nations would be joined indissolubly as one, complete with a single government, joint armed forces, common citizenship, and even a single currency. Monnet had written:

"The two governments declare that in the future France and Great Britain will no longer be two nations but a single Anglo-French Union. The constitution of the Union will entail common organisations for defence, foreign policy and economic affairs... The two Parliaments will be officially united."

Monnet and a very enthusiast De Gaulle discussed the plan with Sir Robert Vansittart, Lord Halifax, and others who proposed it to Churchill. Churchill wasn't convinced, but after the positive reactions from his cabinet members all he crossed out was the common currency plan; everything else was approved and the British officials proposed the plan to the French government, still headed by Paul Reynaud. Unfortunately for Reynaud, his vice-premier Marshal Petain and his allies in government reacted with intense hostility to the plan, claiming it was a British plot to wrestle control over France. In the aftermath of this conflict, Reynaud resigned and Marshal Petain came to power, creating the Vichy state. The catholic anti-republican Petain government arranged an armistice with the Germans and soon actively collaborated with them. Britain was doomed, according to Petain. In August 1940, Jean Monnet was sent to the United States by the British government as a member of the British Supply Council, in order to negotiate the purchase of war supplies. He became particularly close to Harry Hopkins, FDR's right-hand man and a Soviet agent, according to the post-war ultra-conservative Le Cercle intelligence group. Through Hopkins he became President Roosevelt's personal advisor on Europe. After the war, the elitist John Maynard Keynes would say that Monnet probably shortened the war by a year. Went to Algiers in 1943 for the United States and British Munitions Assignment Board, which supplied the Free French forces with arms, headed by the two presidents, general Henri Giraud (supported Pétain and the Vichy government, but refused to cooperate with the Germans; supported by Robert D. Murphy, FDR's chargé d’affaires to the Vichy government who later became Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs and vice chair of the Operations Coordinating Board (OCB) under Eisenhower; mainly supported by FDR who was interested in supporting the anti-nazi elements in the pro-catholic anti-republican Vichy government) and general Charles De Gaulle (mainly supported by Churchill, who was responsible for keeping him in the picture; very much disliked by FDR), two bitter opponents which had to work together in this organization. According to his New York Times obituary, Monnet initially supported Giraud, who was ousted as co-president by De Gaulle within a year. After Giraud seemed to become the underdog, Monnet became a supporter of De Gaulle, who seemingly didn't held his previous support of Giraud against him. In 1943, while in Algiers, Monnet started to work closely with Harold MacMillan, Churchill's political representative to the Mediterranean. Both Macmillan and Monnet weren't fond of De Gaulle's high-handedness, but were of the opinion he was the only person to lead the French government in exile effectively. Monnet and Macmillan co-created the Comité Francais de Libération Nationale (CFLN), which was to be headed by De Gaulle in the end. At the same time, in Algiers, David Rockefeller, as a low-level Army Intelligence officer with almost unlimited connections, stood in close contact with both De Gaulle's and Giraud's aide-de-camp. In his 2002 memoirs, Rockefeller seemed to indicate he was more of a fan of Giraud than of De Gaulle, stating that by 1943 De Gaulle still was an obscure politician virtually none of the military officers liked. During a meeting on 5th August 1943, Monnet, who by this time had started brainstorming about post-WWII European integration, declared to the Comité Francais de Libération Nationale (CFLN): "There will be no peace in Europe, if the states are reconstituted on the basis of national sovereignty with its implications of prestige politics and economic protectionism... The countries of Europe are too small to guarantee their peoples the necessary prosperity and social development... the nations of Europe [must] form a federation of a European entity which will forge them into a single economic unit..." Went back to Washington in the 1944-1945 period. Immediately after the 1945 liberation, Monnet proposed a "global plan for modernization and economic development" to the French government. As Planning Commissioner of the National Economic Council from 1945 to 1952, appointed by De Gaulle, he carried out essential work for the reconstruction of the French economy. Henri Rieben, a later close associate of Jean Monnet, explained to the Empire Club of Canada in the 1967 speech 'Napoleon Failed - Will We Succeed? - Towards a United States of Europe':

"Jean Monnet and General de Gaulle had probably at that time [1943-1945] come into conflict over two issues: national sovereignty--Germany... For a country which has fallen into the abyss, a striving to accomplish a mission will help it regain its selfesteem. But, de Gaulle added, this mission must not be such that the nation becomes diluted in a European entity... De Gaulle also feared Germany..."

In early 1947, U.S. Secretary of State George C. Marshall (Pilgrims Society) created a team of officials to map out a strategy for economic support to Europe. Key members of this group were George Kennan, Dean Acheson, and Will Clayton, all three of the CFR and-or Pilgrims Society. Especially Kennan and Clayton had many consultations with Jean Monnet over this issue before they came up with the Marshall Plan, a scheme which gave economic aid to countries in Europe that renounced communism and opened up their markets (including economic assets) to the United States. In response to the Marshall Plan, 17 nations agreed to attend a Paris conference on July 12, 1947 and created the Committee for European Economic Co-operation (CEEC). As vice-chairman, Monnet was the key player in the CEEC, more so than its chairman, Oliver Franks. Pilgrims Society member and later permanent Bilderberg member George Ball worked for Monnet at the CEEC, advising how the CEEC case for economic aid could best be presented in the US. In 1948, the Organisation for European Economic Cooperation (OEEC) was created to administer the distribution of the Marshall Plan funding. Monnet pushed hard to create an executive council with supranational powers, but because of opposition by the British, Sweden, and Switzerland, the OEEC council remained intergovernmental. One of the main supporters of the Marshall Plan was the League for Economic Cooperation (ELEC), founded by Joseph Retinger (MI6; Vatican connections; knew many many people internationally; organized Bilderberg with his good friend Prince Bernhard) in 1946. In May 1948, the Congress of Europe was convened by the United Europe Movement in The Hague. It was organized by Jean Monnet with the help of Joseph Retinger; it's chairman was Winston Churchill while Alcide de Gasperi, Paul Henri Spaak, Leon Blum, Robert Schumann, and Konrad Adenauer, the latter soon to be chancellor of West-Germany, were among the attendants. The congress called for the creation of a Council of Europe, but was too large and unwieldly to reach any decisions on this issue. It was, however, agreed upon that the European Movement should be set up. Seven Resolutions on Political Union were adopted at the The Hague Congress. Resolution number seven stated: "The creation of a United Europe must be regarded as an essential step towards the creation of a United World." Retinger and Churchill's son-in-law Duncan Sandys, went to America after this congress to lobby for support for their campaign for European unity. Here they met two key figures, William Donovan (head OSS; founder in 1947 of the CIA; SMOM) and Allen Dulles (OSS; CIA; SMOM). These two very senior members of the intelligence community had recently joined in support of Coudenhove, an ally of the Habsburg family, to form a Committee for a Free and United Europe. But, as a result of the meetings with Sandys and Retinger, Coudenhove, who considered that he alone should lead any unity movement, was now dropped, amid some acrimony. A new organization was set up, the American Committee on United Europe (ACUE), which would be used as a conduit for covert CIA funds, augmented by contributions from private foundations such as the Ford and Rockefeller foundations, to support many important organizations in Europe that were pro-capitalist, anti-communist, and working towards European integration. This covert contribution never formed less than half the European Movement's budget until the 1960s. Allen Dulles, general Walter Bedell Smith (CIA; very good friend of prince Bernhard), and Mrs. John J. McCloy were among the ACUE's board members. In 1949, Monnet realised that the friction between Germany and France for control of the Ruhr, the important coal and steel region, was rising to dangerous levels. France was attempting to keep control over Germany's economy. The solution to this state of affairs could not however be the federation, because France, proud of its so-recently recovered sovereignty, rejected it. For this reason Monnet, together with a few collaborators, drafted a revolutionary proposal: to pool, under the control of a European government, Franco-German coal and steel resources. John Foster Dulles, the old friend and business associate of Monnet, called it "brilliantly creative." Monnet went looking for a prominent politician to promote his plan; he ended up with Schuman, France's foreign minister. The top secret Monnet Memorandum to Schuman stated:

"By pooling basic production and the establishment of a new High Authority, whose decisions will be binding on France, Germany and the countries that join them, this proposal will lay the first concrete foundations of a European federation, which is indispensable to the maintenance of peace".

Schuman, after having secretly conferred with Adenauer, accepted the proposal and rendered it public on May 9, 1950, not informing anyone the original text came from Monnet. Dean Acheson was among the handful that knew about the top secret plan before it went public. One year later, with the Treaty of Paris, six countries (France, Germany, Italy, Belgium, Holland and Luxembourg) founded the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC). The model of "Europe's government" was almost exactly the same as Monnet's friend, Arthur Santer, had proposed twenty years earlier. President of the European Coal and Steel High Authority 1952-1955. Received the Charlemagne award in 1953. First met Henri Rieben in 1955. Rieben collaborated with the Steel Division of the UN's European Economic Commission on the preparation of a report, published in 1949, which, in terms of metallurgy, was a kind of precursor of the Monnet/Schuman Plan. Rieben defended his thesis 'From agreements of metalwork masters to the Schuman Plan' in 1952, under the guidance of Professor Firmin Oulès and Philippe de Selliers de Moranville, head of the Steel Division and member of an elite Belgian family. Monnet wrote a paper, calling for the establishment of the European Defence Community, a supranational European Army. He gave this paper to the French premier Rene Pleven, who introduced it as his own idea. It ultimately was rejected by a Gaullist French parliament which was more in favor of the intergovernmental NATO. In 1955, Monnet was disturbed by the failure of his European Defence Community (EDC), which was rejected by France. He decided to change his work strategy radically and founded the Action Committee for the United States of Europe, together with Henri Rieben. The Ford Foundation website wrote:

"In the past the Foundation has assisted European agencies concerned with Atlantic-community problems - for example, the Center of Documentation of the Action Committee for the United States of Europe, headed by Jean Monnet - and similar groups in the United States."

January 27, 1960, The Oneonta Star, 'In Europe political unity plans growing':

"The Action Committee for the United States of Europe has recommended that the three executive organizations which head the Economic Community, the Coal and Steel Community, and Euratom be replaced by a single president and controlling board... Now Washington is worried... [The EEC] might close European markets to American goods. The United States is therefore seeking a merger of its own economic interests with those of Britain and the Continent, and with Canada, in a new overall organization to which other nations, especially. Japan, could be admitted."

July 3, 1962, San Mateo Times, 'Today and Tomorrow by Walter Lippmann':

"The committee has now spoken out unequivocally in favor of British membership in the European Economic Community and in a European political union. It has declared itself against the separatism of General de Gaulle which would lead to "profitless adventures and preserve that spirit of superiority and domination which not so long ago led Europe to the brink of destruction and could now engulf the world." At the same time the action committee declares for a partnership between the new Europe and North America, for a "relationship of two separate but equally powerful entities, each bearing its share of common responsibility in the world."... For if Great Britain and the Scandinavian countries and the European neutrals and the Commonwealth are all outside the Common Market, and in rivalry with it, it will be presumptuous of the Six to call themselves "Europe." and there will be little prospect of a partnership between Europe and the United States."

March 26, 1967, The Fresno Bee:

"Members of the Action Committee for the United States of Europe, which is headed by Jean Monnet of France, the "eminence grise" of the movement for unification of Western Europe. They [members] include Willy Brandt, West German vice chancellor and foreign minister; Pietro Nenni, Italian vice premier; Herbert Wehner, West German minister for all-German affairs - Socialists - and Rainer Barzel, leader of the Christian Democratic party in the West German Bundestag; Mariano Rumor, secretary general of the Italian Christian Democratic party; and Guy Mollet, head of the French Socialist party.""

June 25, 1969, San Mateo Times, 'French Foreign Minister Opposed De Gaulle':

"One of the more interesting cabinet appointments made by new French President Georges Pompidou is his selection of Maurice Schumann [Roman catholic who worked closely with Robert Schumann, De Gaulle and the UN in the aftermath of WWII] to be his foreign minister... In 1962 he [Maurice Schumann] became minister for development under Pompidou who then was premier. After a month, he quit in protest against De Gaulle's nationalistic policies... Also contributing to the "European" flavor of the new cabinet was the appointment of Valery Giscard d'Estaing to the post of finance minister. Giscard d'Estaing, a finance minister under De Gaulle for four years and a possible presidential candidate seven years from now, recently joined the action committee for the United States of Europe. This is an international group led by Jean Monet which favors both British membership in the Common Market and the political integration of Europe."

August 16, 1969, The Gleaner, 'Britain's new bid to enter the ECM':

"The Action Committee for the United States of Europe met for the first time in London on March 11, and expressed the belief that nothing is more important than to strengthen and continue the European integration which the Six have already begun by ensuring that Great Britain joins in. Both the main contenders for the office of President of France [Cercle members Alain Poher and Georges Pompidou] are vying with each other in their declarations that they want Britain in the Common Market, provided she will accept the terms of the Treaty of Rome. The West German Foreign Minister has expressed the belief and hope that negotiations for Britain's entry might begin before the end of the year; his colleague in the Finance Ministry, Herr Strauss [Cercle member], has urged immediate negotiations between Britain and the Six."

Monnet chaired his Action Committee from 1955 to 1975, after which it lost its influence. July 25, 1969, Time Magazine:

"They were all there, those aging statesmen who years ago committed their dreams to the ideal of European unity. Jean Monnet, 80, "the father of the Common Market," last week convened a session of his nonofficial Action Committee for a United States of Europe in Brussels. Former Common Market President Walter Hallstein was there, along with veteran French Politicians Antoine Pinay and Maurice Faure and dozens of other ranking European statesmen. Together, they constitute a sort of European shadow government."

Vice president of the Action Committee for the United States of Europe was Max Kohnstamm, who failed trying to revive the committee after Monnet's death. Kohnstamm had become the initial 1973 European chairman of the Trilateral Commission, which was founded by David Rockefeller. Kohnstamm visited the Trilateral Commission until the 1990s and Jean Monnet Association is still represented today. Kohnstamm also became a president of the European Policy Centre, which is allied with the King Baudouin Foundation. First met the extremely influential Pilgrims Society member C. Douglas Dillon (of Dillon, Read & Co.; Rockefeller associate; married into European nobility; vice chair CFR) in 1956 when the latter was US ambassador to France. Monnet, although not invited to attend the signing of the Treaty of Rome, which established the European Economic Community, did play an important role in the negotiations. Ernst H. van der Beugel (honorary secretary general of Bilderberger; vice chair of the Netherlands Institute for Foreign Affairs; Harvard lecturer) in his 1966 book 'From Marshall Aid to Atlantic Partnership' (foreword by Henry A. Kissinger):

"Monnet and his Action Committee were unofficially supervising the [Treaty of Rome] negotiations and as soon as obstacles appeared, the United States diplomatic machinery was alerted, mostly through Ambassador Bruce [Pilgrims Society; descendant of Robert de Bruce of Scotland]... who had immediate access to the top echelon of the State Department... At that time, it was usual that if Monnet thought that a particular country made difficulties in the negotiations, the American diplomatic representative in that country approached the Foreign Ministry in order to communicate the opinion of the American Government which, in practically all cases, coincided with Monnet's point of view."

Monnet's high-level friends, who assisted him in these strong-arm tactics, included President Eisenhower, Dulles, McCloy, Bruce, George Ball, and C. Douglas Dillon. When John Foster Dulles died in 1959 Jean Monnet came to the US to attend his funeral. Visited C. Douglas Dillon at this time and lunched with president Eisenhower. With behind-the-scenes lobbying and help from influential people like Douglas Dillon and John Tuthill (became head of the Atlantic Institute in the 1960s), Monnet managed to replace the OEEC in 1961, dominated by the British and their intergovernmental politics, with the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). He also initiated a proposal, via Douglas Dillon, to include Canada and the United States in the OEEC/OECD as to further dilute the influence of Britain. Founding board member of the Per Jacobsson Foundation, which was established in 1963 to carry forward the work of Per Jacobsson (League of Nations; BIS; IMF) in international cooperation in the monetary and economic field. Some other directors of the Per Jacobsson Foundation in the 1960s to early 1970s were Viscount Harcourt (Pilgrims; IMF; World Bank; chair Morgan Grenfell & Co.), Gabriel Hauge (Pilgrims; chair Manufacturers Hanover Trust; treasurer CFR; Bilderberg steering committee) Herman J. Abs (chair Deutsche Bank), MarinusW. Holtrop (chair BIS and the Nedelandse Bank); (Lord Salter (Privy Council; League of Nations), Lord Cobbeld (Privy Council; Bank of England), David Rockefeller (Pilgrims), Lord Arthur Salter (Monnet's longtime friend and associate in establishing the United States of Europe; supposed Roundtable member; associated with Oxford and All Souls; Privy Council; League of Nations), Allen Sproul (Pilgrims; NY Fed), Maurice Frère (BIS; Sofina; Banque Nationale de Belgique; family today owns Frère-Bourgeois Group), Albert E. Janssen (Chair Société Belge de Banque), Samuel Schweizer (chair Swiss Bank Corporation), and others. Eugene R. Black (Pilgrims; Chase; World Bank; Fed; Brookings; Bilderberg) and Marcus Wallenberg were among the chairmen of the foundation. Banks in Austria, France, Italy, Norway, Finland, Ireland, Canada, United Arab Republic, Pakistan, India, the Philippines, New Zealand, Brazil, Argentina, Peru, Chile, and Japan were also represented on the board of the Per Jacobsson Foundation. In 1961, the 17th Lord Perth, who went with Monnet to China in the early 1930s, arranged a meeting between Jean Monnet and Edward Heath (As Lord Privy Seal 1960-1963 responsible for the initial talks to bring Britain into the European Common Market; head Conservative party 1965-1975; Conservative prime minister UK 1970-1974; very committed to the EU; a close Sun Myung Moon associate) in his own apartment. This aristocratic and catholic Lord Perth was chairman of the Ditchley Foundation at some point, and in good family tradition, at times a liaison to the Vatican for the British queen. Edward Heath signed the United Kingdom into the European Union in January 1972, which became effective a year later. Jean Monnet and Paul-Henri Spaak were at his side during this signing. In earlier times, Monnet and his associates kept Britain out of the European Common Market, although Heath had been an early advocate of Britain joining the EU. December 13, 1972, New York Times:

"Mr. Kissinger talked the other day to President Pompidou privately about the monetary, trade and political questions between the U.S. and the European Common Market, and the related question of money and commerce between these two and Japan. He also had a talk in Paris with Jean Monnet, the architect and philosopher of European unity, and Monnet will be going to Washington late in January to carry on these conversations."

Died in 1979. April 24, 1981, the New York Times published an interview with Lazard banker Felix Rohatyn:

"A hero, Mr. Rohatyn said, is Jean Monnet, who guided the creation of the European Common Market. ''Monnet never had a voice in the French Government,'' he said. ''But he accomplished a great deal. I don't flatter myself into thinking I'm Jean Monnet. But I believe that ideas in themselves have great power, if you have a platform that has legitimacy."

Otto von Habsburg has stated that his ally and predecessor at the Pan-Europa Union, Richard Coudenhove-Kalergi, was a prophet and visionary, while Monnet was a technocrat. Because of this, Habsburg said, Monnet and Coudenhove-Kalergi didn't get along very well.

Moss, Robert

Sources: November 1988 – Issue 17, Lobster Magazine, 'Brian Crozier, the Pinay Circle and James Goldsmith' (quoting from the Langemann papers); 1993, Brian Crozier, 'Free Agent', pages 186, 191-193, and 241.

Moss was a protege of British disinfo specialist Brian Crozier since 1969. Moss was a journalist who gained fame suggesting that Soviet agents secretly controlled a network of left and liberal groups in the US. He has been accused of spreading disinformation at times. In 1970-1971 he was involved in setting up of the Cercle associated Institute for the Study of Conflict. By 1974 Moss had written a couple of ISC 'conflict studies' - 2 on Chile, 2 on Uruguay and 1 on Northern Ireland. In 1973, he was working with CIA front Institute for General Studies (IGS) in Chile and makes the first public call for a military government in Chile in CIA-funded magazine SEPA (March 1973). In 1975, he is a founding member of the Washington Institute for Study of Conflict - ISC's US branch. Founder member and then director of National Association for Freedom (NAFF) in 1975, together with Brian Crozier and Viscount De L'Isle. Stephen Hastings and Chapman Pincher were at NAFF, just as MP Sir Frederic Bennett. During this time, he worked as a journalist for The Economist. Wrote the supposedly CIA sponsored paper, 'Chile's Marxist Experiment' in 1975. Council member of the Foreign Affairs Research Institute (FARI), together with Julian Amery (later Cercle head), Lord Chalfont (Jonathan Institute; anti-communist associate of the Cercle and Crozier), Brian Crozier (head Le Cercle; Moss' mentor), founder Geoffrey Stewart-Smith (Conservatice MP; adventures were allegedly sponsored by MI5; leading member of the Conservative Monday Club; chairman of its foreign affairs study group of the Monday Club in 1966; editor of East West Digest, an anti-communist magazine sent free to all MPs at the time), Sir Frederic Mackarness Bennett (owned a Rolls-Royce and four homes, one of them in the Cayman Islands; director Kleinwort Benson Europe (his mother was a Kleinwort); long time Lloyds underwriter; influential member of Parliament from the 1950s to the 1980s; member Monday Club; always warning people about the KGB threat and supported every regime that opposed the USSR; chair FARI in 1978; vice-president of the European-Atlantic Group; leading official in the private group Council of Europe in the late 1970s and 1980s; honorary director of the BCCI in Hong Kong until 1986; Member of the Privy Council since 1985; ridiculed his party's (Conservatives) for their Euroscepticism after his retirement in 1987; supported Pinochet; Freeman of the City of London; has been to Bilderberg), and air vice marshal Stuart Menual. For more information on FARI see the biography of Lobster. Speechwriter for Margaret Thatcher in 1976 and was a close associate, possibly a member, of Crozier's Shield committee. Visited Argentina, addressed the Air Force on the value of the Argentine military government as a model for the rest of the continent. In 1976, he visited Angola with Evan Davies (MI6, Churchill's bodyguard, Saudi National Security Advisor). He sat on the editorial board of US 'new right' journal Policy Studies and wrote the cover story for first issue. In 1979, he was a participant at the Jonathan Institute's first conference on international terrorism from whence a good deal of the 'Soviets behind world terror' line has emerged. Moss has also been involved with the Royal Institute for International Affairs and the Heritage Foundation. In 1980 he wrote the book 'The Spike', together with the ultra-conservative Arnaud de Borchgrave, who is a good friend of Sun Myung Moon. The Spike dealt with KGB infiltration in the West.

Munoz, Federico Silva

Sources: October 1989 – Issue 18, Lobster Magazine, 'The Pinay Circle and Destabilisation in Europe'

Born in 1923. State lawyer in his early career. Member of the Asociación Católica Nacional de Propagandistas (ACNP) and known to have been very involved in Catholic activities. At the ACNP he first met Gonzalo Fernandez de la Mora, like Munoz, a fascist. They became great friends and close political associates for the rest of their lives. Has been a banker. Ministor of Public Works under Franco (Knight of Malta; always very afraid of a possible Masonic conspiracy) June 1965 - April 1970. During this time he was an opponent of a bill sponsored by an aging Franco, which was supported by the Vatican, that would give civil rights to Spain's non-Catholic people. February 24, 1967, Time Magazine, 'Struggle for Freedom':

"The most talked-about subject in Spain last week was something that did not happen: the failure of the Cabinet to pass a bill that would at last grant a measure of religious freedom to Spain's tiny non-Catholic minority... For years, Spain's non-Catholics have almost been non-people, barred from participating in the mainstream of Spanish life. They were, in fact, not even officially recognized as having been born, married or buried - since Spain acknowledged those milestones only when they were sanctioned by the Catholic clergy... Opposition quickly closed ranks. Interior Minister Camilo Alonso Vega, 77, who as Spain's top cop maintains that the Spanish are "the most unruly people in Europe", argued that religious freedom would only stir up trouble, just as the earlier measures granting workers and students more freedom resulted in the present rash of strikes and student riots. On a more philosophical level, Public Works Minister Federico Silva Munoz, 43, contended that granting religious liberty to minority sects would shatter Spain's spiritual unity. The ministers connected with the military supported the views of Vega and Munoz..."

Most Opus Dei connected members in Franco's regime supported the bill. The army was normally associated with the Falange, the Fascist party of Franco. Munoz was among the few that survived the reorganization of Franco's cabinet in October 1969, which became dominated by Opus Dei members. At the time Franco was under pressure by Opusian European-oriented businessmen and technocrats. Franco also designated Prince Juan Carlos, a Knight of Malta, as his successor during this reorganization. October 30, 1969, The Times, 'Riot as Franco Alters Cabinet':

"The Spanish Government officially announced the names of General Franco's new Cabinet tonight, and confirmed earlier speculation that members of the powerful Roman Catholic lay organization Opus Dei will dominate Spain's future... Only four of the 18 Cabinet posts are unaffected... The rise of Opus Dei, represented by young technocrats, is believed to signal the final languishing of the Fascist-rooted Falange as a significant element in the Spanish power structure... There is no doubt in Madrid that most of the new non-military ministers are members of Opus Dei, which only counts 20,000 members in all Spain. A spokesman for the organization told me today: "The victory is not for Opus Dei but for people who happen to be members. Our movement has no political policy." Nevertheless, the evidence would seem to be against this often repeated claim."

Munoz resigned as Minister of Public Works in April 1970 for reasons that weren't entirely known. April 11, 1970, The Times, 'Resignation of Spanish Minister':

"One of General Franco's "technocrat" ministers resigned today, possibly as the result of a deep ideological split in the government, reliable sources said. Senor Federico Silva Munoz, aged 46, Minister of Public Works since June, 1965, was said to have given his resignation to the General this morning... The present Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs, Senor Gonzalo Fernandez de la Mora, was said to have been chosen as the new Minister of Public Works. Like most of the present Cabinet, and unlike his predecessor, he is known to be a sympathizer with, if not a member of, the powerful Roman Catholic lay organization Opus Dei... [Munoz] is also thought, as a technocrat without any strong political orientation, to have been opposed to the reactionary political attitude of of Vice-President Carrerro Blanco [Franco's eminence grise; close allies with the CIA since the Dulles brothers; described as the main patron of Opus Dei in Spain; became Franco's prime minister in June 1973; hated by most of the population; assassinated in December 1973, apparently by the ETA] and some other ministries."

In December 1973, after the assassination of Franco's eminence grise, Admiral Blanco, who had become de facto ruler of Spain with the approval of Franco, Opus Dei influence was pushed back, at least temporarily. In 1974, as a member of the Cortes Generales (the Spanish Parliament), Munoz was among the first to propose a slight amendment to the principles of Franco's rule to decrease tensions between the Franco regime and the Catholic church. At the time this was still seen domestically as heresy, and internationally as evidence of another internal power struggle. Franco died in 1975 and King Juan Carlos, a Knight of Malta and supporter of Opus Dei, became the new Head of State and was in charge of Spain's process towards democracy. He initially kept the Francoist hardliner Carlos Arias Navarro, who had succeeded Admiral Blanco, as president/prime minister. Navarro promised a change to democracy, but he was fired in 1976 by Carlos, because of a lack of faith by the opposition that he was really interested in carrying out these promises. Munoz subsequently appeared on a short list of Carlos' highest advisory body to be made prime minister of Spain. Carlos, however, opted this time for the more centrist, but still conservative, Adolfo Suarez Gonzalez, whom he thought would be best suited to unite the different factions within the government. July 4, 1976, The Modesto Bee, 'King Juan Carlos names new premier of Spain':

"A third name submitted to the monarch by the Council of the Realm, his top advisory body, was that of Federico Silva Munoz, 52, a Christian Democrat and former public works minister." July 6, 1976, San Mateo Times, 'Boycott Stalls Spanish Cabinet': "Opposition members predicted technocrats of the Catholic lay organization Opus Dei who ran Spain in the 1960s were on the way back in. But political sources said Suarez was trying to balance his cabinet by naming one or two leftists... [on the other hand, I guess] The one name that seemed to come up most often [for consideration of a post in the cabinet] was that of Federico Silva Munoz, a public works minister under Franco."

Munoz does not seem to have made it to the cabinet of Suarez. Suarez, said to be an Opus Dei member, created the Unión de Centro Democrático (UCD), which was joined by the Christian Democratic Party and other right-wing groups. It also worked with the Socialists (PSOE) and Communists (PCE). Munoz headed the newly created right-wing Christian Democratic group Unión Democrática Española (UDE) in 1976 and co-founded the Alianza Popular (AP), a continuation of Franco's fascist Falange Party, in October 1976 to challenge the Suarez government and the UCD. It was a federation of several parties, which were all fascist or borderline fascist. AP opted for a "more gradual" change to democracy. A few other important co-founders of the AP were Munoz's sidekick Gonzalo Fernandez de la Mora (member Privy Council of Count Juan de Bourbon, father of King Juan Carlos, since 1959), Laureano Lopez Rodo (influential minister in the 1960s and early 1970s, who is said to have engineered the Opus Dei takeover of the Spanish government; preferred selecting ministers with proto-"Thatcherite" neoliberal economic views), and Manuel Fraga Iribarne. According to Fernandez, Munoz was the first president of AP although Fraga is usually seen as the most important founder and leader of the party (who also became president at some point). As expected, the AP was quite unpopular. A new Spanish constitution was approved in July 1978, replacing Franco's "Fundamental Laws" and turning Spain into a Parliamentary Monarchy. Hours before the constitution was passed, two senior military officers were assassinated, supposedly by the Grapo, an extreme leftists group. Many were sceptical of that claim. On November 1, 1978 the final version of the constitution was approved with an overwhelming majority. Founding members like Silva Munoz and his sidekick Gonzalo Fernandez de la Mora, seemingly the most hardline of this already fascist group, left the AP federation soon after, while Fraga decided to accept the constitution. Munoz and Fernandez continued with their UCD party which became Derecha Democrática Española (DDE) in January 1979. That same month the DDE began negotiations with Fuerza Nueva (New Force) of ultrafascists Blas Pinar and José Antonio Girón, and Raimundo Fernández Cuesta. January 10, 1979, El Pais, 'Silva Muñoz unites with the ultraright to be presented at the elections' (translated from Spanish):

"Federico Silva, Gonzalo Fernández de la Mora, Raimundo Fernández Cuesta, Blas Piñar, José Antonio Girón and other political leaders have formed a coaliton named Union of the Right [that] involves all political forces to the right of the coalition Fraga-Areilza-Osorio, in other words, the Derecha Democrática Española and the gathering of national forces [a reference to Pinar's New Force, which had the aim of "gathering the national forces"]."

 

This is a rough translation (as my Spanish is very rusty) from "Federico Silva, Gonzalo Fernández de la Mora, Raimundo Fernández Cuesta, Blas Piñar, José Antonio Girón y otros dirigentes políticos han formado una coalición unitaria que se llamará Unión de Derechas y que agrupa a todas las fuerzas políticas situadas a la derecha de la coalición Fraga-Areilza-Osorio, es decir, la Derecha Democrática Española y las llamadas fuerzas nacionales."

This alliance would fall apart almost immediately over a power struggle of who was going to get the top posts. Both groups were completely against the constitution. December 1, 1979, El Pais, 'The Constitution is a permanent factor of distortion, according to Federico Silva' (translated from Spanish):

"The Constitution that was passed and that we accepted, even though we don't agree with most aspects of it, will continue be a permanent factor of distortion on the national life and of the life of the right in particular, says Federico Silva Munoz, promoter of Derecha Democrática Española, in a declaration to the European Press Agency. Their [political] group will celebrate their first national congress on the 8th and 9th of this month."

Earlier, in mid November 1978, just after the final approval of the constitution, Manuel Fraga had formed a coalition with José María de Areilza and Alfonso Osorio Garcia while Munoz and Fernandez began teaming up with all their (even more) fascist friends. The coalition between Fraga, Areilza and Osorio, although more oriented towards cooperation with the outside world, was anything but left-wing. Fraga was a prominent Franco minister since the 1940s and is a great supporter of the old regime until this day, even cautioning left-wing prime minister Zapatero not to bow to pressure to reinvestigate still living members of the regime. It has been said that Fraga played a central role in the 1976 Montejurra assassinations, carried out by Gladio agents as Stefano Delle Chiaie. Fraga was a mentor to, and responsible for José María Aznar's appointment as head of the Popular Party in 1989. Aznar was prime minister of Spain from 1996 to 2004. Count Areilza was Franco's ambassador to Argentina from 1947 to 1950. During this time he stood in contact with a close friend, the Belgian fascist Pierre Daye, who helped Peron with the transfer of Nazis from Europe to Argentina. After that, Areilza became an ambassador to Washington (and France), where he lobbied for economic support for his country. Like Fernandez de la Mora, Areilza used to be a member of the Privy Council of Don Juan de Bourbon, the father of King Juan Carlos. Both Fraga and Areilza were contributors to the May 1986 Madrid meeting of the Trilateral Commission and Areilza was president of the parliamentary assembly of the Council of Europe from 1981 to 1983. In early 1977, Areilza set up an earlier Popular Party (not to be confused with the later one that evolved from the Allianza Popular) and made Pio Cabanillas Gallas, who has been named as (later) head of the P3 Lodge in Madrid (alleged sister of the exposed P2), its chairman. Osorio had been president of RENFE, the national railroad corporation of Spain before he was appointed by King Juan Carlos to important Cabinet posts. He has also was vice president of British Petroleum (BP) in Spain and a member of the Knights of Malta.

In October 1989, David Teacher in Lobster Magazine named Munoz a "present" member of Le Cercle and a senior member of Opus Dei. Opus Dei was usually associated with the less fascist factions who were interested in bringing about a more democratic Spain. However, Opus Dei members are known to have been involved with Blas Pinar's ultrafascist party, not to mention the Belgian ultrafascists. Furthermore, the efforts of Fernandez de la Mora and Munoz were sponsored by Opus Dei and the Cercle. Munoz became an important columnist of Razón Española (Spanish Reason), which was founded on October 1, 1983 as an outgrowth of the Fundación Balmes (Balmes Foundation), in turn founded a few months earlier by a grant of the German Hanns Seidel Stiftung (Foundation). The Hanns Seidel Foundation was the political trust attached to Strauss' Christian Social Union (CSU) party, and was/is considered an important Opus Dei front for international political manipulation. At the time this foundation and magazine were founded, the social-democrat Felipe González Márquez had become prime minister. Márquez quite liberal, privatizing vast portions of the Spanish economy, but the old Cercle clique seem to have been of the opinion that he was not right wing enough. Also, the Roman Catholic radicals often criticize too liberal economies, probably to minimize the influence of the Anglo-Americans. Razón Española is a fascist magazine and EIR has spent a little bit of time on it. No. 115, September-October 2002, Razón Española, 'La imagen de España en el Perú' reads:

"Seis meses más tarde, el 3 de septiembre de ese año, Inglaterra, tomando como excusa que Alemania había recuperado el llamado corredor de Dantzig, inicia la Segunda Conflagración Mundial, entre 1939 y 1945." Translated that is: "Six months later, on September 3 of that year, England began the 1939-1945 Second World War, using as an excuse Germany's recovery of the so-called Danzig Corridor." (thanks to Luis Vásquez Medina, writing for EIR).

Razón Española has at least one sister newspaper in Peru, which is surrounded by some of the worst fascists in that country. La Razón in Peru is one of the few media outlets over there that supported the U.S. invasion of Iraq. Munoz died in 1997 and an obituary was written in Razón Española, #85, by his lifetime associate Gonzalo Fernández de la Mora, who had founded the magazine and subsequently became its president. Munoz and Fernandez are known to have been friends with the Bavarian Franz Josef Strauss. When the BBC on May 12, 1980 broadcasted a documentary on Strauss, and highlighted his friendship with Munoz and Fernandez, Brian Crozier felt he should speak out in favor Strauss. On May 30, 1980 The Times posted his comments:

"Tom Bower made much of the fact that Strauss' foreign friends include two ex-ministers of General Franco, Silva Munoz and Fernandez de la Mora... neither Silva Munoz nor Fernandez de la Mora is an extremist: the former was a conspicuously successful "technocratic" minister of public works and the latter is a brilliant political analyst."

Additional info: Jose Maria Aznar, prime minister of Spain from 1996 to 2004, was the protege of Manuel Fraga.

Narjes, Karl-Heinz

Sources: November 1988 – Issue 17, Lobster Magazine, 'Brian Crozier, the Pinay Circle and James Goldsmith' (quoting from the Langemann papers)

Born in 1924. LLD from the University of Hamburg in 1952. Joined the German Foreign Service in 1955. Deputy chef de cabinet of the president Commission of the European Communities 1958. Chief of Staff for the EEC Commission's president, Prof. Hallstein, in 1963. Head of the EEC Commission's public relations division 1967-1969. Minister of Economy and Transport in Schlewig-Holstein from 1969 to 1972. In 1972 he was elected to the German Bundestag. Dr. Karl-Heinz Narjes was awarded the Bundesverdienstkreuz first class in 1977. In 1979 he attended a Pinay Circle meeting. In 1981 he was nominated European Community Commissioner, responsible for common market issues, tariff union, industrial innovation, environment, consumer issues and nuclear security. From 1984 until 1988 he was responsible for industrial policy, technology and research. During the same time, 1984-1988, Narjes was also a vice-president of the European Commission. Narjes has attended the Trilateral Commission and has been working on the internal market liberalization of the European Union.
 

Nixon, Richard

Sources: October 1989 – Issue 18, Lobster Magazine, 'The Pinay Circle and Destabilisation in Europe'; June 29, 1997, The Independence, 'Aitken dropped by the Right's secret club; Is it the ultimate dishonour' (went to Le Cercle after leaving the White House); April 6, 2003, The Observer, 'So, Norman, any regrets this time?'; September 5, 2004, Sunday Times, 'Le Cercle of the elite'

In 1934 he graduated second in his class [Whittier College], and went to Duke University law school, where he received a full scholarship. During World War II, Nixon served in the United States Navy. He could have been exempt from military service because of his Quaker religion, but volunteered anyway. He later said he hated Hitler and was horrified by the attack on Pearl Harbor. Nixon served as a Cargo Officer in the South Pacific theater. He rose to the rank of Lieutenant Commander and his superiors praised him as an excellent officer and leader. Nixon was elected to the United States House of Representatives from California in 1946. In the House, Nixon served on a committee that helped to implement the Marshall Plan which aided war-torn Europe. He also helped in the passage of the Taft-Hartley Act which set up controls over labor unions. He proposed a bill to facilitate servicemen's voting that was passed by both houses and signed into law. Nixon climbed the political ladder swiftly, making his name as an anti-Communist and a rough, no-holds-barred campaigner. In 1948, Nixon won both the Republican and Democratic nomination for re-election to the House. Nixon was elected to the United States Senate in 1950, defeating actress turned congresswoman Helen Gahagan Douglas, whom Nixon accused during the campaign of having communist sympathies. In 1952 he was elected Vice President on Dwight D. Eisenhower's ticket, although he was only 39 years old. In 1960, he ran for President on his own but lost to John F. Kennedy, ironically a friend of Nixon's (in contrast to Eisenhower). In the election of 1968, he completed a remarkable political comeback by defeating Hubert H. Humphrey to become the 37th President of the United States. He promised to end the Vietnam war, but that took many years.

William Colby, 'Honourable Men', p. 395:

"Certainly, in Track II in 1970 it [the CIA] sought a military coup [in Italy by Gladio], at the direct order of President Nixon."

The coup was cancelled at the last moment. In 1972 Nixon was re-elected in one of the biggest landslide election victories in U.S. political history, defeating George McGovern and garnering over 60% of the popular vote. He carried 49 of the 50 states, trailing only in Massachusetts. Nixon was eventually investigated for the instigation and cover-up of the burglary of the Democratic Party offices at the Watergate office complex. He resigned over it in 1974.

Pandolfi, Filippo Maria

Sources: November 1988 – Issue 17, Lobster Magazine, 'Brian Crozier, the Pinay Circle and James Goldsmith' (quoting from the Langemann papers)

Filippo Pandolfi born in 1927 in Bergamo, Italy, and holds a degree in literature and philosophy. He speaks Greek, Latin, French, and English in addition to his native Italian and managed a publishing house from 1952 until his election to Parliament. A Christian Democrat member of the Italian Parliament for more than twenty years, has held several important ministerial portfolios, including Finance (1976-1978), Treasury (1978-1980), Industry and Commerce (1980-1981 and 1982-1983), and Agriculture (1983-1988). In these ministerial posts he dealt with many central European Community issues, including the value-added tax, the European Monetary System, and the Common Agricultural Policy. He has played a central role in fostering the competitiveness of European industry, has expanded the EC investment in R&D in the member countries, and has established centers of excellence in many areas of technology. Pandolfi was a member of the Carnegie Group in 1991-1992.

Pesenti, Carlo II

Sources: 1993, Brian Crozier, 'Free Agent', page 193; 2002, David Rockefeller, 'Memoirs', pg. 412-413, referring to the Pesenti Group

The three major family-owned companies in 1928 were Pirelli, a rubber and Tire producer owned by the Pirelli family, Italcementi, a producer of cement owned by the Pesenti family, and FIAT, a car company owned by the Agnelli family. The history of these three family groups is remarkably similar. Pirelli was founded in 1872 by Giambattista Pirelli, Italcementi was set up in 1865 by Carlo I Pesenti, and FIAT in 1899 by Giovanni I Agnelli. The first went public on the Milan stock exchange in 1922, the second in 1925, and the third in 1924. Each of them soon acquired control of their product market with shares between 60 and 80 percent of the domestic market and then expanded outside their industry. The Pirellis expanded in the electric sector and abroad; the Pesentis invested in banks and insurance companies; the Agnellis mostly invested in the mechanical and electrical components sectors, and in real estate.

Born in 1907. Graduated in Engineering at Milan Polytechnic. Appointed to the board of directors of Italcementi in 1940-1942. General manager and managing director of Italcementi 1942-1967. It has been alleged that Italcementi came under Vatican control after WWII. In 1946 he reorganized the Group into four branches: Italcementi retained the core business of cement manufacture; Sacelit headed the cement-based construction elements sector; CIDI was active in the hydrated lime industry whilst all the financial participations were concentrated in the hands of the newly incorporated Italmobiliare. General manager of Italmobiliare 1946-1955, which has been named as one of the primary companies in business with the Vatican Bank (IOR), next to Banco di Roma (vice-president was SMOM member Prince Massimo Spada in the late 1960s), and the Banco di Santo Spirito. Authors Giuseppe Turani (1980) and Giovanni Galli (1984) have argued that the many acquisitions of Italmobiliaire were financed with monopolistic profits enjoyed by the group in the cement industry and with unlimited credit obtained through strong political connections with the ruling (catholic) Christian Democratic party and the Vatican. By 1953, Italmobiliare had gained control of an important stake in a traded company producing machinery, Franco Tosi, after subscription to its major capital increase, it had acquired a 38 percent controlling stake in a traded insurance company RAS (Riunione Adriatica di Sicurtà; a sister company to the Generali, owned by Allianz since 1984; president was SMOM member Prince Massimo Spada in the late 1960s; included among its directors members of the Giustiniani family (descendants of the malevolent emperor Justinian), the Doria family (chief Genoese financiers of the Spanish Hapsburgs), and the Duke of Alba (descendant of the brutal Spanish marcher-lord whom the Genoese bankers sent to the Netherlands four centuries ago to crush their independence)) and obtained indirect control of its traded subsidiary l’Assicuratrice Italiana (Prince Massimo Spada, senior layman at the Vatican Bank and SMOM member since 1944, was vice president and managing director of the L'Assicuratrice Italiana in the late 1960s). In this early period, the group also owned several non-traded banks, including Banca Provinciale Lombarda and Credito Commerciale. It also gained control over IBI in 1967. In 1952 Carlo was on the Board of Directors of 28 companies. Managing director Italmobiliaire 1955-1967. In 1960 he was on the Board of Directors of 38 companies. Honored by Italy's president as a Knight of the Order of Labor Merit in 1962. Chairman Italcementi and Italmobiliaire since 1967. David Rockefeller has written that Carlo Pesenti took him apart at an investment forum in October 1967 and invited him to join meetings of Le Cercle. Rockefeller referred to Le Cercle as the "Pesenti Group." Chaired some of the meetings of Le Cercle, according to Brian Crozier, likely somewhere in the 1960s and 1970s. Also set the agenda for Le Cercle meetings over an unknown period. In his 2002 book 'Memoirs', almost certainly talking about Le Cercle, David Rockefeller wrote:

"Bilderberg overlapped for a time with my membership in a relatively obscure but potentially even more controversial body known as the Pesenti Group. I had first learned about it in October 1967 when Carlo Pesenti, the owner of a number of important Italian corporations, took me aside at a Chase investment forum in Paris and invited me to join his group, which discussed contemporary trends in European and world politics. It was a select group, he told me, mostly European... I accepted his invitation... Pesenti set the agenda for our thrice-yearly meetings, and Maître Violet, who had close connections with the Deuxième Bureau of the Services des Renseignements (the French CIA), provided lengthy background briefings. Using an overhead projector, Violet display transparency after transparency filled with data documenting Soviet infiltration of governments around the world and supporting his belief that the threat of global Communist victory was quite real. While all of us knew the Soviets were behind the "wars of national liberation" in Asia, Africa, and Latin America, I was not personally convinced the Red Menace was quite as menacing as Maître Violet portrayed it to be, but my view was a minority one in that group. Even though I found some of the discussions fascinating, the ultraconservative politics of some participants were more than a bit unnerving."

In 1967, at the apex of its expansion, the Pesenti group was involved in cement industry, construction and real estate, mechanical and automotive sector, banking and insurance. At that time the Pesenti family was second in wealth only to the owners of Fiat group, the Agnelli family (rivals of the Pesenti family). In the early 1970s the Pesenti's vast business empire started to crumble and they had to sell some of their companies. In 1972 Carlo Pesenti was on the Board of Directors of 33 companies. Has been a director of companies like Falck, Bastogi, IBI, Banca Provinciale Lombarda, RAS, Efibanca, and Franco Tosi. Italcementi is currently the fifth largest global cement producer. Italmobiliare was also heavily involved in the infamous bankruptcy of Banco Ambrosiano, being its largest minority shareholder at the time of its collapse in 1982. Carlo II Pesenti died in 1984 during court proceedings against him and other executives of Italmobiliare for fraud related to Banco Ambrosiano.

His son Giampiero Pesenti took over the business empire. The Pesenti group went into financial distress in the 1980s and had to refocus on the cement sector by selling all control stakes in banks and insurance companies. Giampiero Pesenti is chairman of Italcementi, vice chairman of Fondazione Italcementi, head of Italmobiliare, and chairman of the RCS Mediagroup. Giampiero is a director of Pirelli, together with the Pirelli and Benetton families; and RAS, together with a De Benedetti family member.
 

Pinay, Antoine

Sources: Lobster articles; 1993, Brian Crozier, 'Free Agent', pages 186, 191-193, and 241; 1997, Robert Hutchinson, 'Their Kingdom Come – Inside the Secret World of Opus Dei', p. 153-158; 2002, David Rockefeller, 'Memoirs', pg. 412-413, referring to the Pesenti Group; April 6, 2003, The Observer, 'So, Norman, any regrets this time?'; June 18, 2004, Chancellery of HRH Crown Prince Alexander II of Yugoslavia, 'Reception in honor of the "Le Cercle" conference; September 5, 2004, Sunday Times, 'Le Cercle of the elite'

Mayor of Saint-Chamond from 1929 to 1977. Served in the French National Assembly for nearly fifteen years before being named Premier. October 1989, Issue 18, Lobster Magazine, 'Pinay 2: Jean Violet':

"In 1951 he [Jean Violet] was approached by Antoine Pinay, who was a cabinet minister at that point. On behalf of some Swiss lawyer Pinay sought to clear up the matter of a Geneva-based firm that had seen its factory in Germany seized by the Nazis during the war. Violet resolved the problem and Pinay was so satisfied he recommend him to the new French intelligence organization, SDECE. Violet duly became an SDECE operative, utilizing a global network of contacts to assist that agency in its work.(2) ..."

Pinay was Prime Minister of France from March to December 1952. During his time as prime minister he tried, with Jean Monnet and others, to establish a European NATO Army, under the European Community of Defense (CED). It failed. Attended the first Bilderberg meeting in 1954, which he helped to establish. 1997, Robert Hutchinson, 'Their Kingdom Come', p. 153-158:

"Rumours of Nazi collaboration led to Violet's arrest following the war, but he was quickly released 'on orders from above'. [2] Shortly afterwards, he offered his services to SDECE, the French counter-espionage establishment referred to in the trade as La Piscine (the Swimming Pool). He joined Antoine Pinay's entourage in 1955. By this time Violet had become close to several Opusian personalities, among them Alfredo Sanchez Bella and Otto von Habsburg..."

Co-founder of Le Cercle, which initially was called Cercle Pinay, together with Jean Violet and Archduke Otto von Habsburg in the 1950s. Pinay was France's Minister of Foreign Affairs 1955-1956; Jean Violet was part of his staff. Helped bring about Gen. Charles de Gaulle's return to power in 1958. Finance Minister in the cabinet of General Charles De Gaulle 1958-1960. Initially Pinay supported De Gaulle's right-wing leanings, but when De Gaulle granted Algeria its independence, Pinay strongly disagreed. Resigned in January 1960. De Gaulle would later survive several assassination attempts. Pinay remained widely popular in French political circles after leaving government, but rebuffed overtures to run for president in 1965 and 1969. Pinay defended the Apartheid in Africa and was either a member of Opus Dei or strongly influenced by this Catholic cult.

August 1984, Issue 5, Lobster Magazine, 'Brief Notes On The Political Importance Of Secret Societies':

"In France, Opus Dei has had a particularly notable influence going back as far as 1938. It became strong in the army and among ex-Vichyites and right-wing Catholic integristes. It was said to have influenced Robert Schumann, Antoine Pinay and Paul Baudoin..." 1997, Robert Hutchinson, 'Their Kingdom Come', p. 155: "Various sources claim that Pinay was an Opus Dei supernumary, most recently Nicolas Dehan in 'Un étrange phénomène pastoral: l'Opus Dei', Le Sel de la Terre No. 11, Paris, Winter 1994-95, p. 139."

1994, R.T. Naylor (Professor of Economics at McGill University), Hot Money and the Politics of Debt, p. 267:

"Pinay was installed by Bobby Leclerc in 1969 as president of the Compagnie de Guarantie des Investissements Industriels et Financiers in Geneva, which used Pinay's name to attract French funds. Leclerc also had good relations with... Valéry Giscard d'Estaing. Not least important of Leclerc's activities was his role, with Prince Jean de Broglie, cofounder of Giscard's Independent Republican party, in the administration of Sodatex, the Luxembourg-based holding company through which the principals of the notorious MATESA were looting Spanish government subsidy money in the 1960s... After the MATESA scandal broke,... came charges that Sodatex was the center of a huge arms- and drug-dealing operation across the French-Luxembourg border. All this assured that, when de Broglie was gunned down in a Paris street in 1976, the subsequent exposure of links to Sodatex set off a run on Bobby Leclerc's bank."

Pinay died in 1994 at the age of 102.
 

Poher, Alain

Sources: November 1988 – Issue 17, Lobster Magazine, 'Brian Crozier, the Pinay Circle and James Goldsmith' (quoting from the Langemann papers - "'The reporting from this [Le Cercle] complex which also included the French statesman Poher...)

Born in 1909. Educated at Lycées Louis-le-Grand et Saint-Louis (Paris), Paris Faculty of Law. Also received degrees in Political Science and Engineering. Deputy-head of section at the Central Administration of the Ministry of Finance. Won the Resistance Medal and the Croix de Guerre for his efforts in WWII. Chairman of the Ministry of Finance Liberation Committee in 1944. Head of Social Services at the Ministry of Finance since January 1945. Mayor of Ablon-sur-Seine in 1946. Chef de Cabinet to the Minister of Finance, Robert Schuman, June-November 1946. Rapporteur-general for the Finance Commission of the Council of the Republic 1946-1948. Secretary of State for Finance and Economic Affairs in the government of Robert Schuman for a few days in September 1948. Secretary of State for the Budget in the Govt. of Henri Queuille September-November 1948. Commissioner-general for German and Austrian Affairs 1950-1952, French delegate and president of the International Ruhr Authority. Elected Senator for Seine-et-Oise department as member of the Mouvement Républicain Populaire (MRP) Parliamentary group in 1952. Held many leadership positions in the Mouvement Républicain Populaire in the 1950s and 1960s. Member of the Joint Assembly of the European Coal and Steel Community 1952-1958. President of Transport Commission and chairman of the Joint Assembly's Common Market Commission 1954-1957. President of the Higher Trade Council in 1953. President of the Franco-German Governmental Commission for the Canalisation of the Moselle River 1955-1956. Secretary of State for the Naval Forces in the government of Félix Gaillard 1957-1958. Chairman of the Christian Democrat Group in the European Parliament 1958-1966. President of the European Parliament 1966-1969. President, Euro-African Parliamentary Assembly (CEE-EAMA: African and Madagascan States Associated With the EEC) 1967-1969. President of the French Senate 1968-1992. Acting president in April-June 1969, when Charles de Gaulle resigned. Attempted to formally run for the office, but lost to Georges Pompidou and re-assumed his Senate position once Pompidou was sworn in on June 20, 1969. Received the Robert Schuman Prize in 1971. The 1982 book 'Holy Blood, Holy Grail' reads:

"By the early 1970s the Prieure de Sion had become a modest cause celebre among certain people in France. There were a number of magazine articles and some newspaper coverage. On February 13th, 1973, the Midi Libre [French newspaper] published a lengthy feature on Sion, Sauniere and the mystery of Rennes-le Chateau. This feature specifically linked Sion with a possible survival of the Merovingian bloodline into the twentieth century. It also suggested that the Merovingian descendants included a ‘true pretender to the throne of France’, whom it identified as M. Alain Poher... As far as we know, M. Poher never commented, one way or the other, on his alleged connections with the Prieure de Sion and/or the Merovingian bloodline. In the genealogies of the “Prieure documents’, however, there is mention of Arnaud, Count of Poher, who, sometime between 894 and 896, intermarried with the Plantard family the direct, descendants supposedly of Dagobert II... We could even trace the Merovingian bloodlines up to the present day to Alain Poher, to Henri de Montpezat (consort of the queen of Denmark), to Pierre Plantard de Saint-Clair, to Otto von Habsburg, titular duke of Lorraine and king of Jerusalem."

Other rumors about the Order of Zion have named Cercle members Otto von Habsburg and Giulio Andreotti. Served again as acting president when Georges Pompidou died in office in April 1974. Went back to his Senate position when Valéry Giscard d'Estaing was sworn in as president on May 27, 1974. President of the Association of Mayors of France 1974-1983. Honorary Founding President of the Association des Liberté in 1977. President of the Association For Research and Information on Development Aid (ARIAD) in 1980. Contributed to a Trilateral Commission meeting of April 1989 in Paris. Member of the Honorary Committee of the French Organization for the European Movement. Vice-President of the Association for the Study of European Issues. Member, Honorary Committee, European Centre for Economic and Trade Research (CEREC). Member, Commission for International Exchanges in the Communal Domain. Member, Commission for the Study of Transport in the Common Market. Member, Patronage Committee of the European Centre for Observation by Opinion Polls (CEROS).

Member, Steering Committee of the Association Française pour le Conseil des Communes d'Europe (French Association for Advice to the Communes of Europe). Member, Patronage Committee of the "Général Pierre Koenig" Foundation. Member, Standing Committee of the Higher Council for Tourism. Member, Board of the Jean Monnet Foundation for Europe. Member, Board of the Robert Schuman Foundation. Founder member, "Economie et Progrès" Association. Member, Honorary Committee of the International League against Racism and Anti-Semitism (LICRA). Received the Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Sovereign Order of Malta.

Qaboos, Sultan

Sources: 1993, Alan Clark, 'Diaries', p. 369-374; April 6, 2003, The Observer, 'So, Norman, any regrets this time?'; September 5, 2004, Sunday Times, 'Le Cercle of the elite'

Oman has long established ties with the British Empire based on a 1798 Treaty of Friendship, and was a British protectorate since 1891. The current Sultan of Oman, Qaboos, hosted a 1990 Pinay Cercle meeting in Oman. Qaboos spent his youth in Salalah where he was educated. At the age of 16, his father sent him to a private educational establishment in the United Kingdom. In 1960, he entered the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst as an officer cadet. Here he was a classmate of Timothy Landon, a future SAS officer who would become one of Sultan Qaboos's closest advisors. Having passed out of Sandhurst he joined a British infantry battalion on operational duty in Germany and also held a staff appointment with the British Army. After his military service, Qaboos studied local government in England and went on a world tour before returning home. The next six years were spent in Salalah studying Islam and the history of Oman and its people. Despite the wealth that Oman accumulated through its vast petroleum reserves, Qaboos's father refused to use this money for the benefit of his subjects, and the country essentially remained a feudal monarchy, run at Said's whim. In 1965, the province of Dhofar revolted, this time with the support of China and some of the nationalist Arab states, followed by an assassination attempt in 1966, which had a marked effect on Said causing him to become even more erratic in governing the country. Reportedly, even wearing eyeglasses was discouraged, and the Sultan meted out punishments to people who appeared in his dreams. No one was safe from the sultan's paranoia, and even his own son, Qaboos was kept under virtual house arrest at the Sultan's palace in Salalah. "With the help of British advisors," (according to state.gov) Qaboos rose to power after overthrowing his father, Sa’id ibn Taimur, in 1970. The new Sultan abolished many of his father's harsh restrictions, established a modern government structure, and launched a major development program to upgrade educational and health facilities, build a modern infrastructure, and developed the country's natural resources, mainly oil. Oil was first discovered in Oman in the western desert in 1964. The Petroleum Development of Oman (PDO) began production in August 1967. Today, the Omani Government owns 60% of PDO, while Royal Dutch Shell owns 34%. The first immediate problem that Qaboos faced was an armed Communist insurgency from South Yemen, and with the help of British military officials, like Sir Erik Bennett, he quickly defeated the incursion with little external aid. Sir Erik Bennett became his Air Marshall in 1974 and the British still have a strong presence around the Sultan until this day. Oman joined the Arab League and the United Nations in 1971. Oman's GDP grew 339% in the Sixties reaching a peak growth of 1,370% in the Seventies. Qaboos had a narrow escape from death in the evening of Sept. 11, 1995, when his four-wheel drive vehicle was rammed from behind by a speeding car in Salalah, where he likes to spend the summer. He had stopped the car in the middle of the road and walked over to listen to the complaints of a shepherd. Then came the crash. Qaboos survived. But in the back of the car, his deputy premier for economics and finance Qais Al Zawawi was killed. Qais' elder brother Omar, sitting next to him, was seriously wounded. In the front seat next to the Sultan was Air Marshal Sir Erik Bennett, then 67, who was also seriously injured. September 2004, volume 8, no. 3, Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA):

"According to one Omani source, the sultan used to drive around at night by himself or with a friend "incognito." According to this same source, the car crash Qaboos survived was not an accident but a deliberate assassination attempt, and that many arrests were made following it."

Qaboos has a number of enemies, including some members of prominent families, mainly Sunnis. Qaboos is a member of the relatively tolerant version Islam, Ibadhism. Another quote from the MERIA article:

"... many Omanis (Ibadhis, Sunnis, and Shi'as) believe that Qaboos has indeed acted against the precepts of Islam in one important respect. Sultan Qaboos has been reported by several sources to be a homosexual... What Omanis think about this issue is hard to determine. Although I have been following Omani affairs for over two decades, only three Omanis have discussed this subject with me openly... All three agreed that the Sultan is generally believed to be homosexual by Omanis; All three agreed that Omanis only discuss this subject with trusted relatives and friends..."

As Qaboos is the Sultan of Oman, he traditionally holds absolute power. He holds the portfolios of the Prime Minister, Foreign Minister, Defense Minister and Finance Minister. Despite his wealth and power, he is generally regarded as a benevolent ruler who pursues moderate ideological goals. At least to the West, he is known for his selflessness and generosity, and in General Tommy Franks's 2004 book 'American Soldier', he described the sultan as a true friend to the United States in the War on Terror, with "no guile, no secret agenda". In the last few years, Oman has taken some steps towards democracy. Free and fair parliamentary elections (in which women have voted and stood as candidates) have been held and the Sultan has pledged greater openness and participation in government. Oman relies on oil revenue for as much as 75 percent of its export earnings and 40 percent of its gross domestic product, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. 1993, Alan Clark in his 'Diaries' about the 1990 Cercle meeting:

"Last night our delegation had dinner with the Ruler, Sheikh Qaboos, at the Barakha Palace. The drive was nearly a mile long, and every palm tree was floodlit... Qaboos had put me on his left, with Julian in the place of honour on the Ruler's right hand. He is intelligent, quick, almost feline in his responses, and commands the most perfect English - a mixture of Sandringham and Miss Newman. In contrast to the other Ruling Families on whom I had called in August, he is not frightened of Saddam. And his contempt for the oily little King of Jordan, who is, was palpable... Qaboos is delightful company. Wholly royal in manner and deportment, but never remote. He engages with you. Detached yes, but so different from the Windsors (except the dear QM) who are all of them remote - and obtuse."

Rockefeller, David

Sources: 1993, Brian Crozier, 'Free Agent', pages 186, 191-193, and 241; 1997, Robert Hutchinson, 'Their Kingdom Come – Inside the Secret World of Opus Dei', p. 153-158; 2002, David Rockefeller, 'Memoirs', pg. 412-413, referring to the Pesenti Group

Born in 1915 and youngest son of John D. Rockefeller, Jr. Attended school in New York City and graduated with a bachelor's degree in English history and literature from Harvard University in 1936. This was followed with a Ph.D. (1940) in economics from the University of Chicago and a study at both Harvard and the London School of Economics. Married Margaret "Peggy" McGrath in September 1940 and they raised six children, including son David Rockefeller Jr. Along with his brothers - John D. III, Nelson, Laurance, and Winthrop, David Rockefeller established the Rockefeller Brothers Fund (RBF) in 1940. Became a trustee of The Rockefeller Institute (later transformed into a university) for Medical Research in 1940. Trustee Rockefeller University 1940-1995. Secretary to New York City Mayor Fiorello H. LaGuardia 1940-1941. Assistant regional director of the United States Office of Defense, Health and Welfare Service 1941-1942. Enlisted in the U.S. Army in 1942. Military Intelligence officer in North Africa and Southern France 1942-1945. Set up an intelligence network in Algiers and was an insider to the battle between Charles De Gaulle and Henri Giraud for control over the French resistance. First became friends with William Paley (Pilgrims) and C.D. Jackson in Algiers. Met with ambassador Robert Murphy, a staunch Giraud supporter. Met David Bruce in 1945, head of the OSS. He would meet Bruce and his wife again in 1973 in China, where he would be invited for dinner. Assistant Military Attaché in Paris in the last 7 months of the war. Joined Chase National/Manhattan Bank in 1946 as an assistant manager under Winthrop W. Aldrich (Rockefeller intermarried) in the Foreign Department. Assistant manager in the Foreign Department, Chase National Bank 1947-1948. David Rockefeller, 'Memoirs', pg. 149:

"I received a visit one morning in early spring 1947 from the new president of the Carnegie Endowment for International peace... After the usual pleasantries Hiss told me I had been elected to the board of the Carnegie Endowment, and he hoped I would agree to serve... I was flattered to be asked to join the Endowment's prestigious board, which included such luminaries as General Dwight D. Eisenhower and Thomas J. Watson, the founder of IBM. John Foster Dulles, the eminent international lawyer, was chairman... I had known him and his family since my college years. Foster had a reputation of being cold, austere, and puritanical, but the man I knew had a sense of humor and could be a wonderful companion. His daughter Lillias had been part of a small group of friends during my college years and one of Peggy's closest friends. In fact, when I was courting Peggy in the 1930s, she always stayed with the Dulleses at their New York town house. When I mentioned Hiss's offer to Nelson, he told me in confidence that a high-level FBI official had warned him there was reliable information indicating Hiss was a Soviet agent. I reported this to Foster, who said he didn't believe it... I accepted his judgment and joined the endowment's board in May 1947. A year later the spy charges against Alger Hiss would become front-page news."

Played a major role in the development of the Morningside Heights neighborhood on the Upper West Side of Manhattan as president (1947-1957) and then chairman (1957-1965) of Morningside Heights, Inc. Second vice president Chase National Bank 1948-1949. Director of the Museum of Modern Art 1948-1958. Vice president Chase National Bank 1949-1952. Vice-president Council on Foreign Relations 1950-1970. Chairman of the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research 1950-1975. In 1953, at this position, he recruited Detlev W. Bronk as president of the Rockefeller Institute and head of its medical research program. Bronk, a biophysicist, appeared on the initial membership list of the MJ-12 study group. Senior vice president of Chase National Bank with responsibility for supervising the economic research department and customer relations in the metropolitan New York area, including all the New York City branches 1952-1955. Attended the first Bilderberg meeting in 1954 and was one of its founders. When Chase National and the Bank of the Manhattan Company merged in 1955, David Rockefeller was appointed an executive vice president in charge of the bank development department. In 1957, he became vice chairman of the Board of Directors with responsibility for the administrative and planning functions of the bank as a whole. Briefly chairman of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in 1958. Again chairman of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in 1962-1972, and again in 1987-1993. Life trustee of the University of Chicago (which his grandfather helped to establish) and an honorary trustee of International House (New York), established by his father. In 1958 David Rockefeller helped establish the Downtown-Lower Manhattan Association (D-LMA), serving as its chairman 1958-1975. 2002, David Rockefeller, 'Memoirs', pg. 448-449:

"In late 1959 we were guests of Stavros [1001 Club] and Eugenie Niarchos for a week's sail through the Aegean aboard their three-masted schooner, The Creole... I had met Stavros six years earlier when he came to Chase's headquarters for a business meeting... Even though Stavros and I had little in common, we developed a good personal relationship and became business partners in many real estate deals in the United States, including the purchase of Rockefeller Center.... Our friends Jack [H.J. Heinz II; Pilgrims Society and Bilderberg organizer] and Drue Heinz of Pittsburgh were also on that 1959 voyage, as were Hans (Heini) Heinrich and Fiona Thyssen-Bornemisza [1001 Club], whom we met for the first time. Heini was the grandson of the famous August Thyssen, the "Rockefeller of the Ruhr," founder of Germany's Vereinigte Stahlwerke... Our cruise brought out the fact that we were all interested in art... The following May [1960]... we all flew to Lugano to spend the weekend with the Thyssens. When we arrived at Heini's home, the Villa Favorita, we were awestruck... It was the most beautiful private [art] collection we have ever seen."

Primary founder of the Dartmouth Conferences in 1960, which was initiated at Dartmouth College in an effort to prevent U.S.-Soviet nuclear conflict. Only influential private citizens with no government positions were supposed to meet here. President Chase Manhattan 1961-1969. David Rockefeller, 'Memoirs':

"Given the similarity in our interests, I was disappointed that Jack [John J. McCloy] and I never developed a close personal relationship... Frequently at gatherings I attended, Jack related the story of his first contact with my family. He had worked his way to college and law school in part by tutoring during the summer and had travelled to Maine in the summer of 1912, three years before I was born, hoping to get a job on Mount Desert Island. One of the families he decided to contact was mine... [he was] turned away... Nelson [Rockefeller] reportedly told him the "family had used its influence" to make him chairman and that one of his jobs was to ensure that "David would succeed him when he retired." It seems quite possible that Nelson made the comment or one quite similar to it. He could be quite high-handed and no doubt thought he was doing me a favor. But if Nelson made a statement of this kind, it certainly was not the result of a family decision or a request from me. It would have been highly inappropriate for anyone in the family to make such a demand. Unfortunately, if the story was true, it may have permanently altered Jack's attitude toward me... Quite possibly Jack could never look at me without remembering the long, dusty walk up the hill in Seal Harbor and the big wooden door being closed quietly but firmly in his face."

In 1962, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey began plans to build the World Trade Center, which was pushed hard for by David and Nelson Rockefeller. Founding member of the Commission on White House Fellows, 1964. David had a two and a half hour meeting in Moscow with Nikita Khrushchev in the summer of 1964. He reported to president Johnson that Khrushchev would like to do more trade with the United States and David recommended that more credit should be extended to the Russians. Met Khrushchev's successor, Leonid Brezhnev, soon afterwards. Also met Chou En-lai in the 1960s, to discuss economic cooperation. Other leaders David met with are Deng Xiaoping, Nasser, Saddam Hussein, Fidel Castro, the Shah of Iran, etc. David is on very good terms with Nelson Mandela and they regularly meet each other. It's interesting to note that Mandela is one of George W. Bush's fiercest critiques. Instrumental in the formation of the International Executive Service Corps and chairman 1964-1968. Founder Americas Society in 1965 (then called Council of the Americas). Helped found the Rockefeller Family Fund in 1967. Helped form The Business Committee for the Arts in 1967. 2002, David Rockefeller, 'Memoirs', pg. 413:

"Bilderberg overlapped for a time with my membership in a relatively obscure but potentially even more controversial body known as the Pesenti Group [likely Le Cercle]. I had first learned about it in October 1967 when Carlo Pesenti [Vatican sponsored; Banco Ambrosiano shareholder], the owner of a number of important Italian corporations, took me aside at a Chase investment forum in Paris and invited me to join his group, which discussed contemporary trends in European and world politics. It was a select group, he told me, mostly European... Jean Monnet, Robert Schuman, and Konrad Adenauer were founding members of the group, but by the time I joined, they had been replaced by an equally prominent roster that included Antoine Pinay... Giulio Andreotti... and Franz-Josef Strauss... The discussions were conducted in French, and usually I was the sole American present, although on a few occasions when the group assembled in Washington, Henry Kissinger, at the time President Nixon's national security advisor, joined us for dinner. Members of the Pesenti Group were all committed to European political and economic integration, but a few - Archduke Otto of Austria... Monsignor Alberto Giovanetti of the Vatican and a prominent member of Opus Dei... and Jean-Paul León Violet... - were preoccupied by the Soviet threat and the inexolerable rise to power of the Communist parties of France and Italy. Pesenti set the agenda for our thrice-yearly meetings, and Maître Violet, who had close connections with the Deuxième Bureau of the Services des Renseignements (the French CIA), provided lengthy background briefings. Using an overhead projector, Violet display transparency after transparency filled with data documenting Soviet infiltration of governments around the world and supporting his belief that the threat of global Communist victory was quite real. While all of us knew the Soviets were behind the "wars of national liberation" in Asia, Africa, and Latin America, I was not personally convinced the Red Menace was quite as menacing as Maître Violet portrayed it to be, but my view was a minority one in that group. Even though I found some of the discussions fascinating, the ultraconservative politics of some participants were more than a bit unnerving. My Chase associates, who feared my membership could be construed as "consorting with reactionaries," eventually prevailed upon me to withdraw."

Chairman and CEO of the board of Chase Manhattan 1969-1981. Chairman Council on Foreign Relations 1970-1985. In May 1973 Chase Manhattan Bank opened it Moscow office at 1 Karl Marx Square, Moscow. Chairman of the Overseas Development Council of the US-USSR Trade and Economic Council, Inc., which was founded in 1973. Founder of the Trilateral Commission in 1973. 2002, David Rockefeller, 'Memoirs', pg. 207:

"We [Chase; mid 1970s] approached three banks in the Rothschild Group. Since both Evelyn de Rothschild, chairman of L.M. Rothschild, and Leon Lambert, chairman of Banque Lambert (a Rothschild through his mother), were personal friends, I had positive initial conversations with them."

Chairman Trilateral Commission 1977-1991. Founded the New York City Partnership in 1979 and was chairman 1979-1988. Chairman Chase Manhattan Bank Advisory Committee 1981-1999. Trustee Carnegie Endowment International Peace since 1981. President of the Harvard College Board of Overseers; life trustee of the University of Chicago; one of the most important members of the Bilderberg committee; visitor of the Bohemian Grove Stowaway camp; member American-Australian Association; chairman Americas Society 1981-1992; chairman Rockefeller Group 1981-1995. Helped to establish the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies at Harvard University in 1994. Chairman of Rockefeller Center Properties 1996-2001; became a director of the Shinsei Bank in 2000; chairman Rockefeller University; chairman of the Museum of Modern Art; member International Council of J.P. Morgan Chase; wrote 'Unused Resources and Economic Waste' (1940), 'Creative Management in Banking' (1964), and 'Memoirs' (2002); major shareholder of Atlantic Richfield Petroleum and International Petroleum Corporation (also a napalm manufacturer).

David is the last of the "Fortunate Five" brothers. Winthrop died in 1972 after having been devastated by a chemotherapy procedure; John D. III died in a 1978 car crash; Nelson died in 1979 in bed with his mistress. Laurance died in 2004 of natural causes. David and Laurance were members of the Peace Parks foundation. David has attended meetings of Le Cercle and is a member of the Pilgrims Society.

Schuman, Robert

Sources: 2002, David Rockefeller, 'Memoirs', pg. 412-413, referring to the Pesenti Group

Roman catholic. Born in Luxembourg in 1886. Moved to France in 1919 and was elected to the Chamber of Deputies. A moderate conservative he joined the more liberal Popular Republican Movement in 1940. In 1940 Schuman was arrested by the Gestapo, but escaped. In 1942 he joined the French Resistance. French prime minister 1947-1948. French foreign minister 1948-1953, in successive cabinets of Queuille, Bidault, Pleven, Faure, and Pinay. Attended the May 1948 Congress of Europe, which was convened by the United Europe Movement in The Hague. It was organized by Jean Monnet with the help of Joseph Retinger. Its chairman was Winston Churchill while Alcide de Gasperi, Paul Henri Spaak, Leon Blum, and Konrad Adenauer attended the conference. Presented the Schuman Plan in 1949, which became the basis for the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) that was established in 1952. Cercle member Jean Monnet was the person who had written the entire "Schuman Plan"; Schuman was only a frontman. Founding member of the initial Le Cercle group ("Pesenti Group"), according to David Rockefeller. In 1958 Schuman was elected president of the European Assembly in Strasbourg. Knight of the Order of Pope Pius IX. Intensely religious man and was strongly influenced by the writings of Pius XII, St Thomas Aquinas and Jacques Maritain. August 1984, Issue 5, Lobster Magazine, 'Brief Notes On The Political Importance Of Secret Societies':

"In France, Opus Dei has had a particularly notable influence going back as far as 1938. It became strong in the army and among ex-Vichyites and right-wing Catholic integristes. It was said to have influenced Robert Schumann, Antoine Pinay and Paul Baudoin..."

According to many articles in different languages Schuman was a great supporter of Opus Dei and could well have been a member. Died in 1963.

Schwarzkopf, H. Norman

Sources: 1993, Alan Clark, 'Diaries', p. 369-374

Attended the 1990 Pinay meeting in Oman. Born in Trenton, New Jersey to Norman Schwarzkopf, Sr., he graduated from West Point in 1956, and earned a masters degree in missile engineering from the University of Southern California in 1964. After graduating from West Point and receiving a commission in the infantry, Schwarzkopf had assignments in the United States and Germany before going back to school to earn his masters in guided missile engineering. Schwarzkopf then returned to West Point as a member of the faculty. Following Schwarzkopf's first year as a member of the faculty at West Point he requested a reassignment to Vietnam. Schwarzkopf served as an adviser to the Vietnamese airborne division during his two combat tours in the Vietnam War and received the Purple Heart after being injured. Schwarzkopf made general in 1978, and in 1983 was deputy commander during the US invasion of Grenada, and in 1988 was appointed to the U.S. Central Command. In 1990 he was chosen to run Operation Desert Storm, and was responsible for the "left hook" strategy that went into Iraq behind the Iraqi forces occupying Kuwait, and widely credited with bringing the ground war to a close in just four days. He was personally very visible in the conduct of the war, giving frequent press conferences, and was dubbed "Stormin' Norman." He was awarded the United States Republican Senatorial Medal of Freedom and the British Order of the Bath. Schwarzkopf has visited the Bohemian Grove.

Son of H. Norman Schwarzkopf, Sr. Schwarzkopf, Sr. was posted to Iran in 1942, due to the efforts of Mohammad Vali Mirza Farman Farmaian, and was tasked with organizing the Iranian police after the UK-Soviet intervention that made Iran an Allied protectorate. His recruits, the Gendarmerie, were active in suppressing the Soviet-inspired People's Republic of Azerbaijan (the so-called Marshabad Soviet) in 1946. After World War II, he was promoted to brigadier general, and in the late 1940s was sent to occupied Germany to serve as Deputy Provost Marshal for the entire U.S. Sector. Before retiring from the Army in 1953 with the rank of major general, Schwarzkopf was sent by the CIA as part of Operation Ajax (under Kermit Roosevelt) to convince the exiled Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, to return and seize power. Schwarzkopf went so far as to organize the security forces he had trained to support the Shah.

Spinola, Gen. Antonio de

Sources: October 1989 – Issue 18, Lobster Magazine, 'The Pinay Circle and Destabilisation in Europe'

Born in an old aristocratic and wealthy family in 1910. Entered Colégio Militar in 1920, a military school in Lisbon, Portugal. Joined joined Portugal's Military Academy in 1928. Fought as a volunteer for General Francisco Franco in the 1930s Spanish civil war. Fought with Hitler's armies on the Russian front in World War II. August 14, 1996, Chicago Tribune, 'General Spinola, led coup in Portugal':

"Gen. Spinola was encouraged in his military career by dictator Antonio Salazar [dictator of Portugal 1932-1968; strong Roman Catholic; supported by the former King Manuel II of Portugal; close friend of Ian Smith, who headed the illegal Rhodesian white minority government], a family friend. Trained under Spanish dictator Gen. Francisco Franco and Hitler's Russian front generals, Gen. Spinola earned a reputation for toughness and valor and became Portugal's most decorated officer. A hero of the old regime's wars against independence movements in the African colonies..."

Service in Angola 1961-1964 where he reached the rank of Brigadier-General. Governor and Chief of the Army Forces in Portuguese Guinea 1968-1973. Here he followed a policy of bombing defenceless villages, destroying crops and burning hayfields at the end of the dry season to prevent the resistance (and anyone else) to construct huts for the rain season. Invited to become Minister of the Colonies in 1973, but refused. Vice Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces 1974. Director of Companhia Uniao Fabril (CUF), which dominated Guinea-Bissau's economy, had large interests in Africa, and owned 10 percent of Portuguese industrial capacity. Director of Champalimaud, a steel and banking giant, also with extensive interests in Africa. Champalimaud and CUF were seen as two of maybe 5 or 6 companies that controlled virtually the whole economy of Portugal at the time. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the continuing wars in the colonies not only began to take a heavy toll on the morale in the Portuguese Army, but also with the citizens at home. The economy in Portugal also suffered from the war and the large corporations in Portugal criticized Marcello Caetano, the follow up of dictator Antonio Salazar, for not pushing hard enough free market (or better, monopolist) policies. In February 1974, Spinola's book 'Portugal and the Future' was published in which Spinola claimed the colonial wars could not be won by force. Instead, he argued that a moderate black elite should be created in the colonies who would cooperate within a federation, headed by Portugal. The book, published by Companhia Uniao Fabril (CUF), became enormously popular in the weeks ahead. In March 1974, Spinola was fired by Caetano for writing the book. His superior General Francisco da Costa Gomes was also fired for his support of Spinola. On April 25, 1974, the Movement of the Armed Forces (MFA), a group of of lower-ranking officers opposing the colonial war and the fascist regime (who took advantage of the book's momentum), headed a coup against Caetano. Spinola knew about the upcoming coup. The plotters intended to make him commander of the armed forces while the more moderate Gomes would be head of the transitional government. In the end, the coup succeeded, but the plotters had failed to capture Caetano, who then demanded he would only surrender if Spinola became his successor. According to Caetano, Spinola was "the only man who could save" Portugal. To avoid a bloodbath, the plotters accepted, and Spinola became head of the national junta of the MFA. He became president of Portugal in May 1974. Spinola, however, strongly disagreed on most points with the with MFA and was generally only interested in a "renovation" of the economy and the policy pertaining to the colonies. He completely resisted the MFA's efforts in giving independence to the colonies, but he forced to comprise in almost every instance because of the powerful influence of moderates and the left. The people of Portugal had risen up en masse after Caetano had been driven out, had dismantled the secret police and taking out their frustration on anyone who had ever repressed them or caused some kind of grief. Socialism and Communism became very strong movements and Spinola, together with his fascist friends, did everything in their power to contain and reverse the situation. Spinola met with Nixon, a later Cercle participant, in the Azores (considered a key location for NATO forces) in June 1974. In July 1974, Spinola appointed a former fascist cabinet member as ambassador to the UN, which provoked large street demonstrations. Spinola confined leftists troops to their barracks on July 6-7 and send troops considered right-wing to break up leftist demonstrations. An Economic reform bill was issued on July 6 that limited the right to strike, strengthened private property, and encouraged foreign investment. Thousands of civil servants demonstrated against law on July 8. Spinola was ousted in late September 1974, presumably after having attempted to take full control of the government. The MFA had prevented this and installed the more moderate General Costa Gomes, their first choice. October 7, 1974, Winnipeg Free Press, 'Why Spinola Bowed Out':

"With his resignation, President Antonio Spinola of Portugal has lost a long ideological battle with the Movement of the Armed Forces [MFA] which reluctantly brought him to power... According to young officers of the Movement [MFA], a coup d'etat was planned by right-wingers, some of them protesting loyalty to Gen. Spinola, who had been storing arms, indulging in economic sabotage, and creating an emotional climate of tension [sounds like Gladio]... So the Movement surrounded the presidential palace with tanks, took over the national radio and ordered newspapers to suspend publication. A sniper's rifle with telescopic sights is said to have been found in a house opposite the home of the prime minister, Brigadier Vasco Goncalves... Estimates of the right-wingers who have been detained vary from 70 to more than 300. Those arrested include Franco Nogueira, a longserving foreign minister to the late dictator Antonio Salazar,... Nuno Alves Caetano, son of the prime minister who was deposed by the April 25 coup, and Antonio Champalimaud, heir to Portugal's most powerful banking and industrial empire and son of Gen. Spinola's economic adviser... Gen. Spinola wanted to increase press censorship, ban strikes, enhance his own power and disband the Movement's co-ordinating committee. The Movement believed that if it allowed this to happen, its promises of democracy would not be carried out and the elections in March would be called off. Many of the members of the Movement not only believed that it was a disaster to appoint Gen. Spinola; they also believed that if real disaster was to be averted, he had to be removed. They feared that he would take Portugal back to something akin to what is now called the 'ancien regime' with a dictatorship ruling in the interests of the capitalisl interests... The young officers of the Movement are erroneously cast as left-wing and a few may be; but the majority at the centre of the Movement includes monarchists and conservatives." October 3, 1974, Winnipeg Free Press, 'Leftist Takeover Feared': "Top Portuguese financier Antonio Champalimaud warned in an interview published here of the dangers of a "totalitarian" takeover in Portugal "on orders of Moscow"...

Turning to the economic situation, the financier said that it was essential for Portugal to collaborate with other nations and in particular extend its link with the Common Market." This sounds very much like a propaganda effort ala Le Cercle of which Spinola is said to have attended meetings. In March 11, 1975 Spinola tried to get back with a vengeance with a (failed) right-wing coup attempt, aided by Nixon's national security advisor Henry Kissinger (Le Cercle) and US ambassador to Portugal Franck Carlucci (CIA). Spinola and 18 others fled to Spain and then to Brazil. The attempted rightist coup by Spinola caused another major leftist countermovement, a wave of nationalizations of banks and other businesses, and the seizure of many large farms in southern Portugal. 1977, Phil Mailer, 'Portugal, the Impossible Revolution', chapter 8:

"For three days the left and workers' group exercised total power. An article about Spinola in the Parisian paper Temoignage Chretien (March 6) had said that US ambassador Frank Carlucci (who had CIA connections) had given the go-ahead for a right-wing take-over in Portugal. Otelo's [head moderate MFA] remark on March 11 that 'Carlucci had better have plans to leave the country or face the con-sequences' was seen as related to the failed coup. Kissinger, according to a Sunday Times (London) report, had sanctioned the use of the CIA." April 23, 1975, Winnipeg Free Press, 'Mini-Cold War Weakens Portugal, NATO Ties': "[Soviet] Ambassador Kalinin's task has been made easy by U.S. and North Atlantic Alliance hostility toward the ruling leftwing military, who have made it clear that they cannot govern Portugal without sharing power with the Portuguese Communist party... Moscow is carefully moving into the power vacuum caused by the loss of influence and prestige during its [the US's] long association with the deposed dictatorship and its apparent support for Gen. Antonio de Spinola. Spinola's hostility to his former revolutionary associates led to an attempted coup last month... [US ambassador] Carlucci's image has been tarred with allegations that he is a top CIA operative assigned to destabilize Portugal and reverse the Socialist thrust of the revolution... Recently Dr. Kissinger contradicted the essence of the Carlucci speech in which he had expressed a measure of understanding for the idealism of the officers who deposed Portugal's rightist dictatorship last year... Ruling military moderates, among them senior advisers of President Francisco da Costa Gomes, are frankly distressed by a situation forcing them to strengthen Portugal's ties with the Soviet Union because "Nobody in the West is willing to help us so long as Washington remains aloof." They added: "Before our revolution, nobody wanted to help us because we were a right-wing colonialist dictatorship. Now that we are freeing the colonies and trying to create a pluralistic democracy, nobody wants to help us because we're left-wing."

Aginter Press was the name of the CIA-supported Stay Behind network in Portugal. It was founded in 1966 by Guerin Guerin Serac (anti-communist Catholic; did assassinations and terrorism for Franco; co-founder OAS that tried to assassinate De Gaulle and destabilize peace in Algeria; worked for Portugal's secret police; friend of Florimond Damman, who was appointed by Cercle founder Jean Violet to run the Belgian Académie Européenne des Sciences Politiques) and Stefano Delle Chiaie (fascist; friend of Licio Gelli, official head P2; P2 member; undermined Italian politics by assisting in coups and terrorism; associate of Prince Valerio Borghese, who worked with former Nazi commander Otto Skorzeny; associate of former Nazi officer Klaus Barbie; involved in Operation Condor and the cocaine wars in the Americas) to counter leftist influences in Portugal. They supported Spinola. 2005, Daniele Ganser, 'NATO's Secret Armies', p. 121:

"Upon learning that left-wing officers within the Portuguese military were planning a coup to start the 'Revolution of the Flowers', Aginter operatives plotted with right-wing General Spinola against the Portuguese centrists. Their plan was to occupy the Portuguese Azores islands in the Atlantic and use them as an independent territory and offshore base for covert operations against the Portuguese mainland. Unable to realize their plan Aginter Press was swept away together with the dictatorship when on May 1, 1974 the left-wing of the Portuguese military took over power and ended the dictatorship which had lasted for almost half a century. Three weeks after the revolutionary coup, on May 22, 1974, special units of the Portuguese Police on the orders of the new rulers broke into the Aginter Press headquarter in the Rua das Pracas in Lisbon in order to close down the sinister agency and confiscate all material. But by then the premises were deserted. With good relations to the intelligence community all Aginter Press agents had been warned and had gone underground and nobody was arrested. Leaving their offices in a hurry some documents were left behind. The special police units were able to collect a large amount of criminal evidence, proving that the CIA front Aginter Press had very actively engaged in terrorism."

Spinola was able to return to Portugal in 1976. Appointed Field Marshal in 1981. Named a member of Le Cercle in 1989 by Lobster Magazine. Died in 1996.

Stilwell, Gen. Richard Giles

Sources: November 1988 – Issue 17, Lobster Magazine, 'Brian Crozier, the Pinay Circle and James Goldsmith' (quoting the Langemann papers - spelled wrongly, like a couple of other names)

The original (translated) text named a DIA-affiliated "General D. Stinwell" as a participant of the 1980 meeting in Zurich. The proper name must have been Stilwell (often spelled as Stillwel), because the name Stinwell doesn't exist, especially not as a general. The "D" seems to refer to "Dick", like he was often called, and even how his name was often written down on official occasions. His son, who had the same name also used the name "Dick" himself (only a colonel). The name of Paul Volcker was also spelled wrong in the text ("Volker").

Born in 1917. Graduated from West Point. Graduate of the Army War College and was a commandant of cadets at the U.S. Military Academy, a post that the Army reserves for its most promising officers. Joined the U.S. Army in 1938. Commander of U.S. forces in China, Burma and India during World War II. Appointed in January 1946 as assistant military advisor to secretary of state James F. Byrnes, who was a U.S. member of the Council of Foreign Ministers, the quadripartite organization designed to deal with post-war problems. As an outgrowth of this assignment, Stilwell became special military advisor to the American ambassador in Italy from 1947 to 1949. In this position, his staff responsibilities encompassed the Trieste question, finalization of the Italo-Yugoslav boundary and Italian rearmament. Chief of the Far East Division of the CIA from 1949 to 1952, and head of the Office of Policy Coordination (OPC). His area of responsibility included Burma, China, Indochina and Korea. This was one of the most, if not thé most, important CIA/OPC division at the time, since the Korean war had just started and the French were fighting in Indochina. In early 1951 the first of many airdrops were made to the remnants of the anti-communist KMT army in Burma. The KMT, led by Chiang Kai-shek, lost the battle for China in 1949 to Mao had his communist army. Chiang retreated to the island now known as Taiwan, but several other KMT armies withdrew from China via the south-west, into Burma. The Burmese army fought the KMT and drove them into Laos and a small area near the Thai border. The situation looked very bleak for the KMT, until early 1951, when they started receiving weapons, food, and training from the CIA to prevent a possible communist take over of South-East Asia. 1972, Alfred W. McCoy, 'The Politics of Heroin in Southeast Asia':

"The first signs of direct CIA aid to 'the KMT appeared in early 1951, when Burmese intelligence officers reported that unmarked C-46 and C-47 transport aircraft were making at least five parachute drops a week to KMT forces in Mong Hsat. (143) With its new supplies the KMT underwent a period of vigorous expansion and reorganization. Training bases staffed with instructors flown in from Taiwan were constructed near Mong Hsat..."

The KMT never successfully invaded China, but they did manage to take control of the Shan State's (eastern Burma) opium production, which increased from about 40 tons in the early 1950s to about 300 to 400 tons in 1962. In these early days, KMT controlled opium was sold to the general Phao Sriyanonda of the Thai police, a CIA agent, who redistributed the opium through his airplanes, motor vehicles, and naval vessels, which were provided to him by the CIA. 1972, Alfred W. McCoy, 'The Politics of Heroin in Southeast Asia':

"The KMT shipped bountiful harvests to northern Thailand, where they were sold to General Phao Sriyanonda of the Thai police, a CIA client. The CIA had promoted the Phao-KMT partnership in order to provide a secure rear area for the KMT, but this alliance soon became a critical factor in the growth of Southeast Asia's narcotics traffic... Usually the KMT dealt with the commander of the Thai police, General Phao, who shipped the opium from Chiangmai to Bangkok for both local consumption and export. (160)... In 1951 a CIA front organization, Sea Supply Corporation, began delivering lavish quantities of naval vessels, arms, armored vehicles, and aircraft to General Phao's police force. (194) With these supplies Phao was able to establish a police air force, a maritime police, a police armored division, and a police paratroop unit."

The OPC, founded in 1948 and not responsible to the DCI until 1950, was a secret continuation of the tasks of the OSS, having been established in accordance with NSC 10/2. According to its secret charter, the OPC's responsibilities included,

"propaganda, economic warfare, preventive direct action, including sabotage, antisabotage, demolition and evacuation procedures; subversion against hostile states, including assistance to underground resistance groups, and support of indigenous anti-communist elements in threatened countries of the free world."

The OPC was largely created by the State Department's George Kennan (CFR), who came up with the policy of Containment around the same time. Head of the OPC was Frank Wisner, a veteran of the OSS, who initiated Operation Mockingbird (to subvert the foreign and domestic media), was involved in Operation Bloodstone (one of the programs that involved the recruiting of former German Nazi officers and diplomats who could be used in the covert war against the Soviet Union), and was a co-planner of the coups which brought down Mohammed Mossadegh in Iran and Jacobo Arbenz in Guatemala. By 1952, the OPC had 4,000 agents in forty-seven stations with a budget of $82 million. Money for the project was drawn from untraceable government accounts, such as those of the CIA, and laundered through American corporations whose leaders had expressed a willingness to work with Wisner and the OPC. Gehlen was deeply involved in the OPC project. Stilwell was in command of a regiment in Korea in 1953. Instructor at the Army War College in Korea 1954-1956. Chief of staff of the Presidential Mission to Far East in 1954. Chief of strategic planning at SHAPE 1956-1958. Left SHAPE in June 1958 to become Commander of the Western Area, Germany. In 1959, he drafted his recommendations for a special Presidential Committee under General William Draper reporting to President Eisenhower: that the U.S. help develop "higher level military schools" with political-economic curricula in the Third World, to encourage local armies to become "internal motors" for "socio-political transformation". He later formed a group of retired military personnel called the 'Gray Eagles', whose intent was to train third world armies. Member of the Council on Foreign Relations since at least 1961. Member of the Atlantic Council. Involved in 1962 in creating the big business and CIA-affiliated American Institute for Free Labor Development (AIFLD), aimed at taking control over trade union movements in Latin America. The AIFLD used to be chaired by Pilgrims Society, 1001 Club, and SMOM member J. Peter Grace. Stilwell's partner in creating the statutes of the AIFLD was Col. Edward G. Lansdale, a some time NSA director and designer of Operation Mongoose in 1961 and Operation Northwoods in 1962. Stilwell went on to command Army units in Vietnam and the the United States. Stilwell was at least informed of the 1963 Ngo Dinh Diem coup before it happened, and may have had an active role in planning it. Chief of operations of the U.S. Military Assistance Command in Vietnam in 1963. Chief of staff of U.S. Military Assistance Command, under general William C. Westmoreland, in Vietnam 1964-1965. Chief of the Joint U.S. Military Advisory Group in Thailand 1965-1967. Commanding general of the 1st Armored Division at Fort Hood, Texas 1967-1968. Deputy commander general at the 3rd Marine Amphibious Force. Commanding general of the XXIV U.S. Army Corps 1968-1969. In 1969, as opposition to the Vietnam war grew, Stilwell was the one who personally quashed the reports of dissenting colonels, and who, though he was not in intelligence at the time, went through the intelligence reports, tidying them up. Deputy chief of staff of military operations of the U.S. Army and senior Army member of the U.S. delegations Military Staff Committee of the United Nations 1969-1972. Commanding general of the 6th U.S. Army, San Francisco 1972-1973. Commander-in-Chief of UN and American forces in Korea from 1974 to 1976. Member of the in 1976 revived Committee on Present Danger, a reactionary anti-communist think tank that included people like John F. Lehman, Clare Booth Luce, Paul H. Nitze, Richard Perle (friend of Brian Crozier, head of Le Cercle at that time), Richard Pipes, (a later associate of Crozier), Eugene Rostow, Admiral Elmo Zumwalt (former Chief of Naval Operations), George Shultz, William Casey (Le Cercle), Richard Allen, Jeane Kirkpatrick, and David Packard. Friend of General John K. Singlaub, who set up the American chapter of the World Anti-Communist League (WACL). President of the Association of Former Intelligence Officers in the late 1970s. June 16, 1978, Washington Post, 'Intelligence Bill Called 'Overreaction' to Abuses':

"Former U.S. intelligence officers protested yesterday that a Senate plan for restructuring the nation's intelligence community would come close to stopping all covert operations. Continuing a series of intelligence-establishment complaints about the omnibus bill, the Association of Former Intelligence Officers assailed it at a Senate hearing as far too restrictive, "an overreaction to a few abuses of the past," in the face of a growing Soviet threat. Association President Richard G. Stilwell, a retired Army general who once served as the Central Intelligence Agency's chief of covert actions for the Far East, said his organization also feels that the bill is mislableled in being called "the National Intelligence Reorganization and Reform Act of 1978."... The head of the retired spy group, which claims more than 2,500 members, was even more critical of proposed controls on surveillance of foreign intelligence operations in this country. The Senate has already approved legislation to require the issuance of judicial warrants for such surveillance. Stilwell denounced the idea, insofar as it applies to "agents of foreign powers," as "incredible . . . unnecessary" and even "unconstitutional." He said it ought to be called "An Act to Convey Fourth Amendment Rights on the Soviet Embassy and all KGB Officers in the United States and All Other Foreigners.""

Stilwell went to the January 1980 Le Cercle Meeting in Zurich. In November 1980, as one of the national security advisers to the newly elected Reagan, Stilwell co-wrote a report called 'Strategic Guidance' that claimed the United States had to be ready to use force on its own without its allies and that no part of the world would be outside US interest. Then he came up with the idea to administer lie-detector tests to civilian staff on a regular basis before giving them access to sensitive information. Stilwell was Deputy Under-Secretary of Defense for Policy from 1981 to 1985. Brian Crozier, a friend, Cercle chairman, and founder of The 61 secret intelligence group, wrote in his 1993 book (p.177):

"A four-star general, Dick Stilwell had served with distinction in Vietnam. Under President Reagan, he was appointed Assistant Defense Secretary. While in this post, he joined the inner group of The 61... (He was not related to General "Vinegar Joe" Stilwell, who had liaised with Chiang Kai-shek during World War II: an assumption frequently made, to the annoyance of Dick Stilwell.)"

Stilwell's 1991 obituaries concur, sometimes after a correction, that he was not related to General Joseph Stilwell. May 15, 1994, The Washington Times, 'Crozier, covert acts, CIA and Cold War':

"I hesitate to envision the reaction of the late Gen. Richard G. Stilwell, with whom I worked in the 1980s, should he see himself publicly identified as a "61-er."... But Mr. Crozier is one of the heroes who spent a lifetime keeping the barbarians outside the gate. He, of all people, deserves a gloat over his victory."

In 1981, Stilwell was involved in the creation of the Washington-based U.S. Global Strategy Council (USGSC), together with media-magnate and Pilgrims Society member Henry Luce III (his grandfather bought and held on to the JFK Zapruder film; President of the Pilgrims of the United States since 1997), and former CIA deputy-director Ray Cline (a member of the World Anti-Communist League - WACL). As deputy under-secretary of defense from 1981 to 1985, he created SFD-K, a secret intelligence group which mainly operated in South-East Asia and was involved in trying to rescue US POWs in North Korea and North Vietnam. After it was exposed in the early 1980s, Stilwell began patroning (some sources claim he founded it) Intelligence Support Activity (ISA), a top secret special forces unit set up under Jimmy Carter to retrieve South-East Asia POWs and to conduct the most secret and sensitive special operations around the world. It trained and worked with Delta Force and DEVGRU (the follow-up of Seal Team 6) and had no Congressional oversight. The DIA and Navy tried to gain control over ISA in later years. July 23, 1998, Michael Ruppert, 'The POWs, CIA and Drugs':

"The ISA, which ran Gritz's mission, was created by Army General Richard Stilwell. It has been repeatedly linked to drug smuggling by sources including the daughter of Col. Albert Carone who served as Oliver North's bagman and bill-payer during the eighties. Records left behind after Carone's death in 1990 and eyewitness statements clearly indicate that Carone handled both drugs and drug money for CIA, North and the NSC. Carone's personal phone book contains the home addresses and telephone numbers of William Casey [Le Cercle; Wackenhut legal counsel; CIA; SMOM; Bohemian Grove camp Mandalay], Gambino crime boss Pauly Castellano and Stilwell [Le Cercle]."

2004, Michael Ruppert, 'Crossing the Rubicon', p. 164:

"A retired NYPD Detective, also a “made” member of the Genovese crime family, Carone spent his entire working career as a CIA operative... For more than 25 years before his mysterious death in 1990, Al Carone served as a bagman and liaison between George Bush, CIA Director Bill Casey, Oliver North, Richard Nixon [Le Cercle] and many other prominent figures including Robert Vesco [1001 Club], Manuel Noriega and Ferdinand Marcos."

Carone, a member of the Knights of Malta, was good friends with Santos Trafficante, Sam Giancana, Vito Genovese, and William Casey. Casey used Carone as a "cut out" to pass sensitive insider information to Mob capo Pauley Castellano, says his daughter, Dee. Carone was the bagman for Casey and Oliver North in many of their drug trafficking exploits. Deputy Defense Secretary Frank Carlucci, in a memo to Stilwell, described the ISA in 1982 as "Our own CIA... uncoordinated and uncontrolled". On February 4, 1983, a short cancellation notice was sent to a number of Defense Department officials at the request of Stilwell. The memo asked recipients to "remove and destroy immediately" any copies of two Defense Department directives in their possession--the top secret and confidential versions of a directive titled "The Defense Special Plans Office." As Stilwell explained in a memo two days earlier, "The directives were charter documents establishing a DoD activity whose establishment subsequently was not authorized by Congress." Chairman of the DoD Security Review Commission in 1985. Member of the Special Operations Planning and Advisory Group (SOPAG) in the mid-1980s, together with general Richard Secord. It had been set up in 1983 by Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Fred Ikle, and was chaired by general John Singlaub. Aderholt and Singlaub would both play a role in fund-raising for the contras and arranging their resupply. December 5, 1986, Philadelphia Inquirer, 'Secord lost position over disclosure form':

"Retired Air Force Maj. Gen. Richard V. Secord, considered a key figure in the Iran arms-contra aid controversy, was quietly dropped from his last Pentagon post a year ago because he refused to complete a personal financial- disclosure report, Defense Department officials said yesterday. Secord was removed from an unpaid position on the Special Operations Planning and Advisory Group, an 11-member panel dominated by retired senior generals who advise the secretary of defense and his top military and civilian officials on special and covert operations policy... According to R. Lynn Rylander [former executive director of SOPAG] and others, the panel was created in late 1983 to help Pentagon officials expand the role of Army Green Berets, Navy SEALS and Air Force Air Commandos in missions to aid anti-communist insurgencies and counterinsurgencies - including the Nicaraguan rebels, known as contras... Rylander described the special advisory group, which meets six to 10 times a year, as "totally non-sinister . . . merely a policy advisory group divorced from operational matters." An informed Defense Department official, however, said that the group was empowered to review all Pentagon covert operations, and one panel member said the group could consider such sensitive issues as military relations with the CIA. Both the panel member and the Defense Department official asked not to be identified. Current members of the group, all retired from active duty, include: Army Lt. Gen. Sam Wilson, former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency; Army Central Command Gen. Robert Kingston; Air Force Lt. Gen. Leroy Manor, a Southeast Asia commando leader during the Vietnam War; Army Chief of Staff Gen. Eugene C. Meyer; Army Gen. Richard Stilwell, a Korean War commander; Army Lt. Gen. William Yarborough, special forces commander in the Kennedy administration, and Army Brig. Gen. Donald D. Blackburn, former commander of the 77th Special Forces Group. They advise the secretary of defense, Caspar W. Weinberger; the assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs, Richard L. Armitage, and the commander of the Joint Special Operations Agency, Air Force Maj. Gen. Thomas Kelly."

General Edward Lansdale and general Harry Aderholt were other members of the panel. Secord was one of the key players in Iran Contra, and heavily involved with Shackley and the Nugan Hand Bank, which laundered billions of dollars of dope money coming from the Golden Triangle. Daniel Sheehan of the Christic Institute and Wall Street Journal journalist Jonathan Kwitny both exposed Secord's role in this bank. September 11, 1988, Washington Post, 'The ultimate conspiracy theory':

"Serving first as the CIA's East Asia operations chief and later as assistant deputy director of clandestine operations, Shackley (with his trusty aide Clines) supposedly stole tons of U.S. weapons from South Vietnam and stashed them in Thailand. Later, Sheehan claims, Shackley, Clines, Secord and a member of the "shooter team" named Rafael "Chi-Chi" Quintero siphoned off millions of dollars in Southeast Asia opium profits and laundered them through the mysterious Nugan Hand bank of Australia."

General Leroy Manor was head of the Philippine branch of the Nugan Hand Bank (name given by: August 17, 1983, Wall Street Journal, 'Bank's Links to Ex-CIA Men Detailed). Air Force colonel and CIA insider Fletcher Prouty wrote that general Sam Wilson of the DIA, also a member of the Special Operations Planning and Advisory Group, was aware of the use of drugs to pay some troops in Burma during WWII. Richard Armitage was one of the most important players in handling the financial aspects of the heroin trade in the Golden Triangle. On the other hand, Col. Bo Gritz, who exposed several of these dope dealers, named general Yarborough as one of his personal heros. President of Stilwell Associates from 1986 to his death in 1991, a consulting firm that specialized in national security affairs. It counted the Defense Department and the CIA among his clients (December 27, 1991, The Milwaukee Journal, Obituary of Stilwell). Consultant to the secretary of defense and to the CIA at the time of his death. Dick Cheney was secretary of defense in these years and William Webster was DCI. In 1987, one year after setting up his company, he travelled to the Philippines, where at that moment a coup against president Corazon C. Aquino was in the final stages of its planning. Aquino, a moderate socialist, was not very popular with either the Reagan administration or the communists. The coup would fail. September 16, 1987, Philadelphia Inquirer, 'U.S. backing for Philippine junta alleged':

"In part because of the heavy U.S. military presence - as well as memories of four decades of American colonial rule and Washington's longtime support of Ferdinand E. Marcos - Filipinos are markedly wary of American intervention in their affairs... No available evidence directly links any U.S. officials to the political upheaval here. Lack of documented evidence, however, has not been enough to check the spread of reports of improper U.S. involvement. For example, according to an official familiar with the operations of the U.S. Embassy, such reports were fueled early this year by the presence of Maj. Gen. John K. Singlaub, a key figure in the channeling of funds to the contra forces in Nicaragua and a leader of the World Anti-Communist League. Singlaub came to the Philippines in November and early this year on visits that he described as purely private, a search for sunken treasure [some have alleged that the Golden Lilly, an enormous Japanese war loot that was mostly buried in the Philippines, has been dug up over the decades to finance covert operations. Col. Lansdale, another close associate of Stilwell, is said to have been a key figure in this process]. But when the visits were disclosed in the Philippines, Singlaub immediately left Manila amid reports that his real purpose may have been linked to covert operations. "Such presence in the country over the past year has made a lot of people suspicious," the official said.

 

"There has been some right-wing American involvement in this country."... Last month, another American visitor to the islands raised further suspicions of U.S. covert involvement. That visitor was Richard G. Stilwell... Stilwell visited the Philippines for 10 days in August, leaving the country shortly before the Honasan uprising. He visited the islands of Cebu, Negros and Mindanao - islands that have been fertile ground for both the 23,000- member communist New People's Army (NPA) and right-wing separatist movements. Sources in Manila indicated that his mission was to look into a "contra- type" operation against the NPA. In an telephone interview from his consulting office in Washington, Stilwell denied that there was any official U.S. backing for his trip. "I was traveling at the request of no one," he said. "I had a compelling desire to see it firsthand." Stilwell however, did not deny that he was circulating a report on his findings in the U.S. military and intelligence community. In his report, Stilwell said that unless Aquino acted decisively on military and political fronts - and embraced the right-of-center leaders in the private and public sector - there could be "a political breakdown" resulting in a coalition government with the communists within the next two years.

 

"Washington is worried" about that, he said, adding that the United States "very desperately wants her (Aquino) to succeed, wants to preserve her as the one unifying symbol of the non-communist populace."... He reiterated that Washington's overriding interest was the establishment of a stable democracy. "The U.S. interest in the bases," he said, "is less than, or subsumed to, the emergence of the Philippine government as a member of the free world."... Another official who closely follows event in the U.S. Embassy noted that embassy personnel could not be sure what individual Americans were doing in the Philippines.

 

"The problem," the official said, "is that in the post-Iran era, people in the embassy aren't so sure any more that there is not some offshoot group operating here that they don't know anything about." One senior aide to Aquino said internal intelligence reports indicated that more than 150 CIA operatives were active in the Philippines. Last year, according to Reagan administration sources, President Reagan issued a ''finding" authorizing covert CIA operations in the Philippines. It is unclear exactly what that decision allows, but according to sources in Washington, Reagan's move would authorize the CIA to step up surveillance, counterrevolutionary training and assistance programs, and to sponsor and fund pro-U.S. groups in the Philippines. In a meeting Friday with several U.S. Embassy officials, a high-level Philippine government official described his own suspicion that a "lost command" of the CIA, maneuvering outside the normal channels of operations, played a role in events surrounding the Aug. 28 military revolt. In an interview later, the official said he met with the U.S. Embassy representatives at their request. They wanted to know, he said, "about perceptions of U.S. involvement in the events of the last two weeks." The palace official said he responded that "there was a general feeling that the U.S. was involved." He said he was not convinced that the United States had no role in the events and recalled, "I asked them why some CIA types were in town over the last eight weeks and what were they doing here."

 

He said the U.S. officials did not answer that question directly but instead responded that Reagan "made this very strong statement" in support of the Aquino government. Still, the palace source said he believed that American involvement could not be ruled out. "They never tell you what they are up to," he said. "These CIA guys who are in town, we perceive as part of the lost command."" In 1991 Stilwell was identified as a member of the Advisory Committee of Americares, the largest US relief organization tied to the Knights of Malta and the Bush family. August 11, 1991, Hartford Courant, 'Americares' success hailed, criticized charity uses clout and connections...': "Other international relief agencies marvel at AmeriCares' ability to cut red tape, navigate complex international protocol, perform in the public spotlight and simultaneously claim some of the lowest administrative expenses among groups of its kind... Much of AmeriCares' success comes from its ability to harness three potent forces: powerful political connections, alliances with influential religious figures and groups and cooperative ventures with businesses... Knowledgeable former federal officials, many with backgrounds in intelligence work, help AmeriCares maneuver in delicate international political environments.

 

Its connections with the Roman Catholic Church have brought AmeriCares an influential ally in the Knights of Malta, a Catholic group that helps deliver relief supplies. And its ventures with pharmaceutical companies have filled AmeriCares' warehouses with donated supplies... in the international relief community, where there is an expectation that groups will operate altruistically and free of political motives, some complain about the way AmeriCares aggressively seeks media coverage and appears to design its missions to benefit conservative political causes... Photographs on the office's forest-green walls show [Robert C.] Macauley [wealthy; founder and chairman of AmeriCares] with former President Reagan, Pope John Paul II and Mother Teresa... Macauley's friendship with [George W.] Bush dates back to childhood... Bush's son, Jeb, and the president's grandson, George P. Bush, went with AmeriCares to Armenia in 1988 to help survivors of a devastating earthquake... The president's brother, Prescott S. Bush Jr. of Greenwich, is a member of AmeriCares' advisory board... The chairman of the advisory committee is J. Peter Grace Jr... Retired Army Gen. Richard G. Stilwell, former deputy undersecretary of defense in charge of intelligence under Reagan, is also on the advisory committee.

 

Another member is William E. Simon... Simon was also president of the Nicaraguan Freedom Fund, a now defunct private group formed by the Washington Times newspaper to send aid to the contras. (The Washington Times is owned by a group that includes officials of the Rev. Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church.) Gordon J. Humphrey, a retired Republican senator from New Hampshire who was a member of the Senate foreign relations committee, is also on the committee. And Zbigniew Brzezinski, the conservative former national security adviser for President Carter, is honorary chairman of the AmeriCares board of directors."... "Personally I have some questions about the way they focus," said one longtime worker in international aid.

 

"They're connected into the American Republican power elite. You might say they work in areas where there is a large anti-communist benefit."... criticism has come from writers who contend that AmeriCares made shipments of aid to the contras in Nicaragua... Among the aid AmeriCares sent to Nicaragua in 1985 was newsprint for La Prensa, the anti-Sandinista newspaper... A review of AmeriCares' well publicized airlift missions shows that the organization sends aid rapidly and frequently to "hot spots" of public attention, places where disaster aid from America might reflect favorably on the U.S. government... In 1988, AmeriCares sent a series of airlifts to Armenia in the Soviet Union to help survivors of an earthquake. "That did more for the image of the United States than anything in recent history," Macauley said... In the early 1970s, at a time when his interest in international aid was beginning to coalesce into AmeriCares, Macauley heard about a Catholic priest named Bruce Ritter who was struggling to help runaway children on the streets of New York City... The alliance between Macauley and Ritter led to an audience with Pope John Paul II in Rome in 1982. (Ritter left Covenant House in February 1990 after accusations of sexual misconduct with some male runaways he was helping). The meeting with the pope gave life to AmeriCares.

 

Although Macauley started AmeriCares in 1979, the organization did not go on its first relief mission until 1982, when the pope asked Macauley to send aid to his native Poland. AmeriCares' contacts with important Catholic figures brought it a valuable ally in the Knights of Malta, a Catholic organization that has helped distribute AmeriCares supplies. The Knights of Malta, formally known as the Sovereign Military Order of Knights Hospitallers of St. John and Jerusalem, is a worldwide Catholic charity founded in the 11th century to care for soldiers in the Crusades. Today, the group is based in Rome. J. Peter Grace, a member of AmeriCares' advisory board, is president of the American chapter of the Knights of Malta, based in New York City. William Simon, another AmeriCares advisory committee member, is also a member... The Knights of Malta make AmeriCares' job easier because of its worldwide network of volunteers, said Johnson, the president of AmeriCares. Members of the group, many of whom are independently wealthy, can be trusted to deliver the aid to its intended destination and do so more efficiently than AmeriCares, he said. "By using the Knights, there's very little opportunity for diversion," Johnson said. "They've all made their fortunes. Now they're interested in charity."... Because almost 50 countries afford the Knights of Malta the same status as a sovereign nation, they are often exempt from fees for border crossings and can pass customs inspections more easily.

 

"The host country will generally waive inspection and duty," said Thomas L. Sheer, executive director of the American chapter of the Knights of Malta and an assistant to J. Peter Grace. "We can use that diplomatic status to move right through customs and to not pay customs fees. We can exploit that, particularly within a time of crisis."... Despite his ties to the Roman Catholic Church, Macauley is not Catholic, although he describes himself as a religious man. "They say I'm a right-wing Catholic conservative," Macauley said. "I'm not a Catholic, even though I go to Mass almost every day. I'm a very devout Protestant, I guess you'd call it."

 

AmeriCares also receives small donations from Pat Robertson's Christian Broadcasting Network and the Rev. Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church. AmeriCares has kept the commitment to Poland it began at the behest of the pope. "We go to Poland every week, either by ship or by plane," Macauley said. Between 1982 and this March, AmeriCares sent $94 million in aid to Poland, almost a quarter of all the aid it has dispensed. When the pope called on Macauley to help Poland, Macauley turned to corporate America for help... To get donations for Poland, he and some colleagues sat down with lists of the boards of directors from the nation's largest pharmaceutical companies. Among them, the group found, they knew at least one person on every board."

Chairman of the Korean War Veterans Memorial advisory board. Personal military decorations included two Silver Stars, the Distinguished Service Medal, the Bronze Star, the Legion of Merit and the Purple Heart, as well as awards from Vietnam, Greece, Italy, Belgium, France, the Soviet Union, Thailand and South Korea. According to Al Martin in an interview with Uri Dowbenko, "Stilwell was also very close to Armitage, Carlucci, and Pete Peterson." According to Al Martin, in his 'The Conspirators', Stilwell was part of William Casey's (Le Cercle) "Restricted Access Groups". On the advisory board of the Institute for the Study of American Wars, a research center set up in 1984. Other members of the advisory board were Alexander Haig, Dean Rusk and Admiral Elmo R. Zumwalt, Jr., with John H. Harkanson, a Wilmington manager of Du Pont, as chairman. Died in 1991. His son and namesake, who also used the name "Dick", died in a car accident in 2002. His son was a retired colonel.

Strauss, Franz Josef

Sources: November 11, 1977, supposed White House memo K3100092255 on Strauss visiting Cercle Violet in 1977; October 1989 – Issue 18, Lobster Magazine, 'The Pinay Circle and Destabilisation in Europe'; 1993, Brian Crozier, 'Free Agent', page 192; 1997, Robert Hutchinson, 'Their Kingdom Come – Inside the Secret World of Opus Dei', p. 153-158; 2002, David Rockefeller, 'Memoirs', pg. 412-413, referring to the Pesenti Group

Strauss studied germanistics, history and economics at the University of Munich from 1935 to 1939. In World War II, he served in the german Wehrmacht, on the Western and Eastern Fronts. While on furlough, he passed the German state exams to become a teacher. After suffering from severe frostbites at the Eastern Front at the end of 1942, he served as an Offizier fuer wehrgeistige Fuehrung (kind of political officer) at the anti-aircraft artillery school in Altenstadt, near Schongau. After the war, he was appointed deputy Landrat (county president) of Schongau by the American occupiers and was involved in founding the local (Bavarian) CSU there in 1945, in which Count Hans Huyn and Otto von Habsburg became involved. The national CSU was the CDU. He became a member of the first Bundestag in 1949 and, in 1953, Federal Minister for Special Affairs in the second cabinet of Chancellor Konrad Adenauer, in 1955 Federal Minister of Nuclear Energy (supported the idea that Germany should build nuclear weapons), and in 1956 defense minister, charged with the build-up of the new Bundeswehr. Became chairman of the CSU in 1961.Great orator, not unlike Hitler. Forced to step down as defense minister in 1962, in the wake of the Spiegel scandal (he lied to parliament). Held a lakeside talk at the Bohemian Grove in 1962. Minister of finance 1966-1969, in the cabinet of Kurt Georg Kiesinger. August 16, 1969, The Gleaner, 'Britain's new bid to enter the ECM':

"The Action Committee for the United States of Europe met for the first time in London on March 11, and expressed the belief that nothing is more important than to strengthen and continue the European integration which the Six have already begun by ensuring that Great Britain joins in. Both the main contenders for the office of President of France [Cercle members Alain Poher and Georges Pompidou] are vying with each other in their declarations that they want Britain in the Common Market, provided she will accept the terms of the Treaty of Rome. The West German Foreign Minister has expressed the belief and hope that negotiations for Britain's entry might begin before the end of the year; his colleague in the Finance Ministry, Herr Strauss, has urged immediate negotiations between Britain and the Six."

After the SPD provided the Chancellor in 1969, Strauss became one of the most vocal critics of Willy Brandt's Ostpolitik. Rival of Helmut Kohl (and Helmut Schmidt). The aristocrat Count Hans Huyn was his foreign policy advisor in the Bundestag from 1971 to 1976, and was likely a person involved in creating The 61. Huyn was a good friend of Strauss. From 1978 until his death in 1988, Strauss was minister-president of Bavaria, possibly the most memorable figure to ever hold that office. After Strauss became minister-president of Bavaria, he slowly retreated from German national politics. A major aim of Le Cercle was to influence West German elections to ensure that Franz Joseph Strauss, the ultra right wing leader of the Christian Social Union Party, became Chancellor of Germany. It failed. Strauss was a close friend of Alexandre de Marenches and was a frequent visitor of the SDECE's headquarters during Marenches' time. In late 1977 he went to a meeting of Le Cercle. The Hanns Seidel Stiftung (Foundation), the political trust attached to Strauss' Christian Social Union (CSU) party, is an important group in international parapolitical manipulation. Active in Latin America for the Contras, supporting Mobuto in Zaire, involved in the Fiji coup in 1987. It was caught diverting state development aid from Germany into right-wing party coffers in Ecuador in 1987. Strauss and CSU were the main beneficiaries of identified Pinay Circle activities; i.e. the promotion of right-wing European politicians through Brian Crozier, Robert Moss, Fred Luchsinger of the Neue Zurcher Zeitung and Gerhard Lowenthal, anchorman on current affairs programmes for ZDF television, the major German network. In the end, all Cercle's activities have not brought the desired 'regime change'. Strauss was a great supporter of the Paneuropa Union. July 2005, The Trumphet, 'From the Editor: German Election Crisis - and a New Charlemagne':

"The late Herbert W. Armstrong met with Mr. Strauss in 1970. Here is what Mr. Armstrong’s Plain Truth staff wrote, September 1979: “In the World Tomorrow television studios on April 2, 1970, Strauss reemphasized a theme that has been constant throughout his career - the urgent need, from his perspective, of a strong united Europe. Asked why he felt a united Europe was essential to the free world, he answered: ‘A united Europe is more essential now for the free world than it would have been anytime before. … Big powers have been established, the United States of America, Russia, Japan. I think that small and medium-sized European states are no longer able to face what the future demands from all of us. … “‘Therefore my political friends and I have been pleading for years and years now for a united Europe. … We need a strong Europe, a Europe with an attractiveness, a Europe with a fascinating cultural, economic, financial power, and a Europe which is also ready and prepared and capable of taking a greater share of the burden in Atlantic defense.’” The Plain Truth later quoted a Sunday Telegraph article about Strauss, which said that as Germany’s chancellor, “he will go for a tougher and more disenchanted view of détente [peace through negotiation]; a strengthening of nato’s defenses and a much stronger European profile within that alliance, including a new European nuclear profile” (July 9, 1979). (Mr. Stoiber has also been a proponent of German nuclear power.) “Strauss, who more than any man can lay claim to being the architect of the Bundeswehr [Germany’s army], is certain to voice his opinion on this issue and others loud and clear!” (Plain Truth, op. cit.)... In his book [The Grand Design], Strauss wrote, “An alliance of the great power of America with the great power of Europe is another matter. Both of them have an unlimited capacity for development in the economic, financial and technical spheres, and their alliance would enable Europe to return to its true historical function. Europe could again fulfill the historical role which it began to lose at the end of the First World War and which at the end of the Second World War appeared to have gone forever.”... That 1979 Plain Truth article contained some more history we must review... Interestingly, von Habsburg counts Bavarian leader Franz Josef Strauss among ‘the few full-blooded politicians’ who ‘in the case of serious national crises are able to accept responsibility because of their clear-sightedness and indomitableness.’ Von Habsburg says he is ‘personally pretty close to his [Strauss’s] ideas in many ways on the European unity subject... “On the United Nations, he [Otto] has declared that the organization is dominated by ‘anti-European illiterates, despots and cannibals.’... “Possibly von Habsburg’s most controversial suggestion has been his recipe for dealing with national emergencies. In the April 1978 issue of his conservative publication Zeitbühne, he suggested that in certain emergency situations (such as nuclear blackmail or other major acts of terrorism) governments should let a strongman take over for a period of nine months, allowing him to suspend laws and ‘take all measure necessary for the maintenance of the life of the population.’"

President of Deutsche Airbus during the 1980's. Died while hunting with Prince Johannes von Thurn und Taxis in 1988. In later years, it came out that Strauss was very corrupt: he accepted bribes, expensive gifts, and visited brothels, which other people paid for him. He and some of his friends have also been suspected of taking bribes from companies like Thyssen, to arrange export licenses for the weapons industry. Strauss also maintained contact with DDR Stasi-spy Alexander Schalck-Golodkowski, with whom he arranged a 3 billion mark deal in 1983 to save the economy of the DDR, a move nobody expected of him. Max Strauss, his oldest son, is an acquaintance of Dieter Holzer and Holger Pfahls, BND agents and politicians who were under investigation for illegal weapon sales for Thyssen. In 2005, Angela Merkel of the CDU, the national sisterparty to Stoiber's Bavarian CSU, became the new chancellor of Germany. Immediately it became clear that the CDU's stance toward Putin is far more hardline than Chancellor Schroder's, who actually was on good terms with Putin. Stoiber, who really wanted to be chancellor himself, only partially supported Merkel, but eventually agreed to become Merkel's Minister of Economic Affairs. Edmund Stoiber was Strauss' political protege, and is now head of the Catholic Christian Social Union (CSU). He's a friend of Pope Benedict XVI and of Austria's extreme-right leader, Jörg Haider. Strauss and Stoiber have done a lot to built up Germany's and Bavaria's economy, including a high-tech industry.

Talal, Hussein bin

Sources: April 6, 2003, The Observer, 'So, Norman, any regrets this time?'; September 5, 2004, Sunday Times, 'Le Cercle of the elite'

King of Jordan from 1952 to 1999. The country defied the west and the other allied leaders by siding with Saddam Hussein in the Gulf War. In 1994 King Hussein led negotiations to end the official state of war with the State of Israel resulting in the Israel-Jordan Treaty of Peace. The king wrote three books: Uneasy Lies the Head (1962), about his childhood and early years as king, My War With Israel (1969), and Mon Métier de Roi. King Hussein was an avid amateur radio operator. He also loved to fly airplanes (prop and jet) as well as helicopters. February 18, 1977, Washington Post, 'CIA Paid Millions to Jordan's King Hussein':

"The Central Intelligence Agency for 20 years has made secret annual payments totaling millions of dollars to King Hussein of Jordan, The Washington Post has learned... President Ford took no steps to stop the covert payments. Last hear Hussein was paid approximately $750,000 by the CIA. President Carter learned of the payoffs earlier this week after this newspaper began its investigation. He ordered that the payments be stopped... The secret arrangement with Hussein had not been disclosed to Carter by the CIA or by any member of the previous administration, including President Ford, former Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger, or former CIA Director George Bush... As justification for the direct cash payments to Hussein, the CIA claimed that Hussein was allowing U.S. intelligence agencies to operate freely in his strategically placed Middle Eastern country. Hussein himself provided intelligence to the CIA and forwarded money from the payments to other government officials who provided intelligence or cooperated with the CIA. Nonetheless, some CIA officials considered the payments nothing more than "bribes" and reported the matter to President Ford's oversight panel... The payments were first made to Hussein in 1957 during the Eisenhower administration.

 

The initial payments apparently ran in the millions of dollars but they were sharply curtailed to the $750,000 level last year. Hussein was only 21 when he first became a beneficiary of CIA funds. It was a time when Jordan was virtually a ward of the United States and Hussein had little money to support his lifestyle, which earned him the reputation as a "playboy prince." Hussein has a well-publicized taste for sports cars and airplanes. As once previously reported, the CIA has provided Hussein with female companions. The agency also provided bodyguards for Hussein's children when they were abroad in school... Over the years, Hussein has maintained friendly relations with the United States and his country has been the recipient of substantial military and economic aid - about $200 million in loans and grants last year alone. The "No Beef" payments to Hussein were made outside the conventional channel of military and economic assistance. Well-placed sources said that nonetheless the United States has not been able to direct Hussein's overall policy decisions. He has not been a "puppet," the sources said, but he has rarely drifted outside the U.S. orbit."

Tantum, Geoffrey

Sources: June 29, 1997, The Independence, 'Aitken dropped by the Right's secret club; Is it the ultimate dishonour' (named as secretary of the Cercle); 23 May-5 June 2001, Punch Magazine, 'Spooks in the House'; September 5, 2004, Sunday Times, 'Le Cercle of the elite' ("thought to include")

An MI6 officer since 1969 who has served in Jordan, Aden and Kuwait. From 1992 until his retirement in late 1995, Tantum was head of MI6's Middle East section. He met with Jonathan Aitken every six weeks. The minister and the MI6 officer traded information and contacts candidly about the Middle East as Aitken had maintained close contact with his Arab business associates. May 21, 1998, The Guardian, 'Aitken lied 'to hide intelligence role'':

"The former minister [Aitken] will say he was involved in at least 11 meetings with Geoffrey Tantum, the SIS director responsible for Saudi Arabia, and that, during his weekend at the Paris Ritz on September 17-19, 1993, he was discussing with the Saudis threats from Iranian submarines."

Tantum was mentioned as the secretary of Le Cercle in 1997.

Tennant, Sir Peter Frank Dalrymple

Sources: 1993, Brian Crozier, 'Free Agent', page 193

Born in 1910. Went from Marlborough to Trinity College, Cambridge, where he was senior modern language scholar and took a First in that subject two years later. In 1933 he was elected to a fellowship at Queens', and to a university teaching post. Spoke most European languages well, specializing in the Scandinavian tongues; his ear was so keen and his Swedish so perfect that he could not only pass in Stockholm for a native, but could imitate several regional accents as well. His first wife, whom he married in 1934, was Swedish. Colonel Sir Charles Hambro (head of Hambro Bank; close friend of Churchill and the Wallenbergs; head of the SOE 1942-1943; his son went to live with the Wallenberg family during WWII; Knight Commander, Order of the British Empire; corresponded with Leopold Amery in the early 1950s) recruited him into the Special Operations Executive (SOE) in the summer of 1940. Both were among its earliest members. Involved in German code breaking early in WWII. Among his many tasks, he helped Sefton Delmer (the Lord Beaverbrook agent who used to be in contact with Hitler's inner circle) with material for his black broadcasts to the German armed forces. He had a spy inside the German legation, for whom he secured British nationality and a new life after the war. Order of the British Empire in 1945. In the spring of 1945 the Foreign Office moved Tennant to Paris, where he spent five years with the title of Information Counsellor. This was, again, a propaganda task, but without the clandestine undertones of his work in Stockholm. Deputy commandant of the British sector in Berlin 1950-1952. Overseas director of the Federation of British Industry (FBI) 1952-1963. In his role at the Federation of British Industry he was much involved in the early debates over Britain and Europe and wrote a very prescient report on the negotiations that led up to the Treaty of Rome of 1957, which established the European Economic Community. In 1954, Humphrey Trevelyan, the British charge d'affaires in Beijing, and Sir Peter Tennant, the overseas director of the Federation of British Industry (FBI), met the Chinese vice-minister for foreign trade, Lei Renmin. As a result of this meeting, and an earlier meeting between Anthony Eden and Zhou Enlai, the Sino-British Trade Committee was established. Companion of the Order of Saint Michael and Saint George since 1958. Deputy director-general of the Federation of British Industry from 1963 to 1965. Special adviser to the Federation of British Industry 1964-1965 (the Confederation of British Industry since 1965, a political pressure group which represents about 200,000 businesses in the UK). Director-general of the British National Export Council 1965-1971. Gave a speech to the British Canadian Trade Association in May 1967. Knight Bachelor of the Order of Saint Michael and Saint George since 1972. Became a director of C. Tennant, Sons & Co. in January 1972. Joined Barclays Bank International as an Industrial Advisor in February 1972, located at the time at Lombard Street in the City of London, together with the Bank of England and Lloyds. Barclays is one of the primary Pilgrims Society dominated banks; examples are Pilgrims Gordon Adam, Sir Julian Crossley, Lord Carrington, and David Band. The Buxton and Oppenheimer families of the 1001 Club also have been involved with Barclays. Barclays replaced N. M. Rothschild & Sons when they withdrew from their daily gold fix ritual in 2004. Became a director of Prudential Assurance in January 1973. Identified as a director of Barclays International in 1973. Still identified as a Industrial Advisor to Barclays Bank International in 1976 and in 1978. Attended meetings of the London Chamber of Commerce and Industry and became its president in 1976. Remained president until at least the early 1980s. Member of the Council of the Corporation of Foreign Bondholders 1974-1975. Contacted by George W. Ball in August 1976 to co-organize a fundraising to save Canterbury Cathedral from decay. Ball, a Pilgrims Society member closely connected to the major globalist powers in the US, Britain, and France already had recruited Elliot L. Richardson (vice president of the Pilgrims Society since 1979 until at least the mid 1990s; Partner in Milbank, Tweed, Hadley and McCloy; closely associated with the NSA's legendary PROMIS software), Arthur H. Sulzberger (New York Times publisher who is said to have been recruited in the Mockingbird network; Pilgrims Society member; died in 1968?!), John Lindsay (Scroll & Key; NY mayor; brother Robert V. Lindsay, a J.P. Morgan and Morgan Guarantee Trust employee from 1949 to 1989, was a Pilgrims Society executive since 1991 until at least the mid-1990s, who also sat on the boards of the Fluor Corp. and Russell Reynolds Associates, Inc.), and Walter Cronkite (famous CBS managing editor; Bohemian Grove Hill Billies camp and said to have lent his voice to the Bohemian Owl). Head of a 19-men trade mission to the Caribbean in December 1976, where he met with government officials in Jamaica, Puerto Rico, Trinidad, and Barbados. Chaired some of the meetings of Le Cercle, according to Brian Crozier, likely somewhere in the 1960s and 1970s. Likely to have been the anonymous host, "a leading figure in the bank", that chaired Crozier's "very secret" Sunday morning , February 13, 1977 meeting at the anonymous "leading City of London bank", that established the private sector intelligence group The 61. Present at the meeting were Brian Crozier, Nicholas Elliott, General Vernon Walters, and several other unidentified people from Germany and the United States. Jean Violet was supposed to attend, but couldn't make it due to ill health. Chairman of the British Committee of the European Cultural Foundation. Joined the board of the International Energy Bank in 1981, which was founded in 1973 by Société Financière Européene (30%), the Bank of Scotland (15%), Barclays International (15%), Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (15%), Republic National Bank of Dallas (15%), and Banque Worms (10%). The bank financed worldwide oil and gas explorations, starting with the United States and Europe. November 20, 1986, Daily Telegraph:

"The Media Monitoring Unit was conceived and created last year by a small group of self-described Right-of-centre political activists. The driving force is Julian Lewis (part of Crozier's 61)... He runs a political pressure group called Policy Research Associates which pops up now and again in debates on such matters as council corruption, trade union law and CND. Lord Chalfont is a patron as is Norris McWhirter, who founded the Freedom Association, and Edward Leigh, MP... The increasing activity of the PRA and the decision to form the monitoring unit is indicative of a more aggressive approach in Right-of-centre circles to getting across its message... To get the unit off the ground he approached Sir Peter Tennant, 75, a senior City businessman and adviser to the CBI. Tennant in turn drew together a nucleus of sympathisers, mostly from the City, who put up the £25,000-or-so to hire a director, buy a video recorder and publish the report..."

Member of the Council for Industrial Design, the academic council of Wilton Park, and the Gabbitas Thring educational trust. Amateur painter and yachtsman. Died in 1996.
 

Twetten, Thomas A.

Sources: Simon Regan, 'Who Killed Diana?'

CIA Deputy Director of Operations January 1991 - December 1993. Retired in 1995 after a 34 year career at the CIA's clandestine services. Twetten spent the majority of his career in Africa, South Asia, and the Middle East. 1992, Pete Brewton, 'The Mafia, CIA and George Bush', quoting CIA agent Hemmings, who worked under Twetten:

"Twetten's decision and that of London station is highly suspect and negligent, as they knew, as I did, that the British government was, along with the British arms industry, Tiny Rowland, Ashraf Marwan and Adnan Khashoggi, his partner, deeply involved in such [arms] trafficking. Obviously, Twetten also knew that North, Shackley, Clines, Hakim, Robert Sensi, and Cyrus Hashemi, and Farhad Azima were also involved in such trafficking, as all these individuals were part of the same network; as him... My refusal to alter my testimony to fit the cover story then, and later in 1989 as a Senate witness, brought me under intense pressure to remain silent or else!! Death, unemployment and loss of access to my children were all used as weapons and threats." April 27, 1992, Time Europe, 'Pan Am 103: Why Did They Die?': "Thomas Twetten, who now commands the CIA's worldwide spy network, was then [1988] chief of Middle East operations based in Langley. He was also Ollie North's CIA contact."

In February 1998 it was revealed that he was working outside his office or jurisdiction in a plot by Iraqi Generals to murder Saddam. Supposedly, Clinton himself had approved a feasible death plot. Mysteriously, all the names of the plotters were leaked from Washington and the plot was thwarted. MI6 were actively involved on an operational level directly with Twetten. In all some 120 officers were shot as a result.

Violet, Jean

Sources: November 1988 – Issue 17, Lobster Magazine, 'Brian Crozier, the Pinay Circle and James Goldsmith' (quoting from the Langemann papers); October 1989 – Issue 18, Lobster Magazine, 'The Pinay Circle and Destabilisation in Europe'; 1993, Brian Crozier, 'Free Agent', pages 186, 191-193, and 241; 1997, Robert Hutchinson, 'Their Kingdom Come – Inside the Secret World of Opus Dei', p. 153-158; June 29, 1997, The Independence, 'Aitken dropped by the Right's secret club; Is it the ultimate dishonour'; 2002, David Rockefeller, 'Memoirs', pg. 412-413, referring to the Pesenti Group

1994, R.T. Naylor (Professor of Economics at McGill University), 'Hot Money and the Politics of Debt', p. 258:

"Violet's political formation came in the 1930s in Le Comite Secret pour l'Action Revolutionnaire (CSAR). A far-right political cult modeled on a Freemasonic movement, complete with Masonic-style rites and rituals..., CSAR was sort of a predecessor of Licio Gelli's P-2. It was intensely secretive in all but its admiration of Franco and Mussolini, and after the war some of its members were accused of being Nazi collaborators. In the 1950s, with his own record pronounced clean, Violet became a collaborator of French intelligence, and an active supporter of Opus Dei."

CSAR has been named as one of the more important fronts for the Synarchist Movement of Empire (SME). The CSAR undermined the regular French government and worked to establish what would become the pro-catholic anti-republican Vichy government. October 1989, Issue 18, Lobster Magazine, 'Pinay 2: Jean Violet':

"In 1951 he was approached by Antoine Pinay, who was a cabinet minister at that point. On behalf of some Swiss lawyer Pinay sought to clear up the matter of a Geneva-based firm that had seen its factory in Germany seized by the Nazis during the war. Violet resolved the problem and Pinay was so satisfied he recommend him to the new French intelligence organization, SDECE. Violet duly became an SDECE operative, utilizing a global network of contacts to assist that agency in its work.(2) ..."

Violet became involved in psychological warfare for French interests. As a close friend of Antoine Pinay, Violet was a primary founder of Cercle Pinay in the 1950s, which counted the involvement of his close ally Otto von Habsburg. 1997, Robert Hutchinson, 'Their Kingdom Come', p. 153-158:

"Rumours of Nazi collaboration led to Violet's arrest following the war, but he was quickly released 'on orders from above'. [2] Shortly afterwards, he offered his services to SDECE, the French counter-espionage establishment referred to in the trade as La Piscine (the Swimming Pool). He joined Antoine Pinay's entourage in 1955. By this time Violet had become close to several Opusian personalities, among them Alfredo Sanchez Bella and Otto von Habsburg... Many Pan-European members belonged to a right-wing association that had little formal structure but became known as the ‘Pinay Group'... Although it met under the auspices of Pinay, the co-ordinator for the Group was Jean Violet, a right-wing Gaullist and friend of Giulio Andreotti [Opus Dei; SMOM]. The Pinay Group was said to be another Opus Dei auxiliary operation, and its principal protagonists, Pinay and Violet, were variously reported to be connected with the Work... In his journeys, Violet came to know Father Yves-Marc Dubois, a French Dominican who was in charge of international relations for his Order... He [Dubois] was described as a 'member of the Vatican's intelligence network, if not its head'. [3]"

Violet would cross Dubois path on a regular bases over many years. October 1989, Issue 18, Lobster Magazine, 'Pinay 2: Jean Violet':

"Violet's early post-war deeds also featured a Roman Catholic priest, Father Yves Dubois. Both men figured in the creation of an Institute d'Etudes Diplomatiques, whose student body featured a young Yugoslavian refugee by the name of Jovanovitch. This individual would later acquire U.S. citizenship, call himself Daniel Boyer, and specialize in advising US and French businessmen interested in operating overseas. He would also cross Violet's path at regular intervals. (3) ... The Violet-Dubois combination proved durable and effective. As the Cold War raged, the pair acted as a conduit for SDECE funds used to maintain clandestine Vatican networks in Eastern Europe. During the Algerian war of independence (1954-62) Violet turned up at the United Nations, as part of the French delegation, and worked to shore up the support for France in the course of its traumatic struggle with Algerian nationalists. Not surprisingly, Father Dubois was also present, as part of the Vatican delegation, and he coordinated initiatives with Violet. Finally the man now known as Boyer was in the background; he has admitted to being in contact with Violet during this period."

1997, Robert Hutchinson, 'Their Kingdom Come', p. 153-158:

"Violet's boss, General Paul Grossin... was said by some to have transferred fees owing to Violet directly to Father Marmier's 'charities' [anti-Soviet] in Poland. [1]... According to Count Alexandre de Marenches,... Violet was 'given the heave' because he cost the French government more than any other spy on SDECE's long list of secret agents. De Marenches further claimed that Violet had been a triple agent working in addition for the Vatican and the West German BND."

1980, Langemann papers:

"Gehlen, who was always interested in the undertaking, its figures, its personalities and its results [of Le Cercle], succeeded in recruiting Violet as a special agent and granted him 6000 DM a month for many years... In our conversations with Violet the Pinay Circle was never mentioned in any depth. However, on General Gehlen's orders, I did once give him, 30,000 DM for this aim."

Said to have been involved in the 1970 smear of President Pompidou's wife (the Markovic affair). Approached Brian Crozier in March 1971, after reading an interview with him in the US News and World Report. Francois Duchene, Crozier's former Economist colleague, a director of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, and one of Jean Monnet's closest associates, introduced Violet to Crozier as a person who represented "a powerful consortium of French business interests." (Crozier, 'Free Agent', p. 97) Violet, without giving Crozier ever all the details surrounding his intelligence background, suggested that Crozier's ISC should put together a Study Group to inform Western leaders about the problems inherent the 'détente' process (relaxation of tensions with the USSR), a policy recently pioneered by Henry Kissinger, with the support of David Rockefeller. Violet introduced Crozier to Carlo Pesenti, who in October 1967 had informed and invited David Rockefeller to Le Cercle, and his Cercle. Violet and Crozier's ISC produced the 'European Security and the Soviet Problem' report in January 1972, which was funded by Carlo Pesenti and informed Western political circles about the USSR's subversion techniques. Kissinger, Nixon, Pompidou, Spanish and German ministers, and the Pope all received copies of the report. Launched the quarterly jounal Le Monde Moderne around this time with funds from Carlo Pesenti. At about the same time, Violet, together with Otto von Habsburg, founded the Académie Européenne des Sciences Politiques, a Brussels-based ultra-conservative Paneuropa think tank. Crozier, 'Free Agent', p. 99:

"Another of Violet's initiatives at that time was undertaken from Brussels. The operator Violet had chosen was an eccentric man, with the delectable name of Florimond Damman. Having made a small fortune from property deals, he ran a tiny business outfit with the grandiloquent name of Académie Européenne des Sciences Politiques. The three of us - Damman, Violet and I - drafted an appeal for 'Peace without Frontiers', in which we defined our concept of a true détente."

The fascist Belgian prime minister Paul Vanden Boeynants, who was a key player in the Belgian far-right shadow state that emerged in the 1970s; and Count Alain de Villegas, key player in Violet's Sniffer Device affair, a mystic, and a staunch believer that the UFO phenomenon is real, were among the members of Académie Européenne des Sciences Politiques. Damman was a member of the World Anti-Communist League (WACL) and a friend of CIA agent Carl Armfelt, who was a rabid anti-communist propagandist active in northern Europe, suspected of involvement in illegal arms deals. Like with Pinay, Violet became a good friend of Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, who had become a member of Pinay's political party in 1956. His father, Edmond Giscard d'Estaing, was a close associate of Jean Frederich Bloch Laine, the Lazard banker who supposedly was a key member in the French Synarchist Movement of Empire. Post WWII, Edmond had some very significant connections to Opus Dei through his close associate Prince Jean de Broglie, who had many connections to both Opus Dei and people in the Paneuropa movement. Edmond also got people on the board of his bank, Banque des Interets Francais, who supposedly were some of the most influential Opus Dei members in Europe. Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, a member of the Paneuropa Union, was president of France from 1974 to 1981. In 1980, Violet, in ill health, asked Crozier to take over the presidency of Le Cercle. Brian Crozier, 'Free Agent', p. 191-192:

"It was not until the spring of 1993 that I learned the details of Jean Violet's real secret service role when General De Gaulle was in power. A background document was given to me by of of Violet's ex-colleagues. Ironically, a few years before Gabriel Decazes [pseudonym] and I started spying on De Gaulle [about 1965], Violet was masterminding a Service Spécial to promote the General's objectives in defense and foreign policy. The document began with a paragraphy of wistful praise for Britain's remarkable achievements in intelligence and clandestine action. But France, too, offered a precedent: Louis XV [de Bourbon; 1710-1770; his grandson was overthrown during the French revolution] had set up a special service know to the few who were aware of it as the Secret du Roi. This service reported directly to the King, bypassing the Foreign Ministry of the day. Only two people were aware of de Gaulle's latter-day model: General Grossin, the then head of the SDECE [from 1957 to 1962], and a certain 'Monsieur X'. It required no great deductive powers to assume that Monsieur X had to be Maître Violet, but Jean refused to comment when I asked him. My other source, however, confirmed my supposition. No wonder, in retrospect, that Violet's shadowy role and apparently bottomless purse stirred resentful envy among his colleagues and poisoned Alexandre de Marenches's mind against Violet, whom he had never met.

 

By far the dominant theme in de Gaulle's foreign policy (as Violet interpreted it) was Franco-German reconcillation. A genius at (non-violent) operations of influence, Violet played an historically key role between 1957 and 1961 in bringing about this rapproachement, which is the real core of the European Community. He had developed a close friendship with Antoine Pinay, who had served as French Premier in 1951 under the unstable Fourth Republic. At a lower level, a complementary role was played by his SDECE colleague Antoine Bonnemaison. Violet was the go-between in secret meetings between Pinay and the West-German Chancellor, Konrad Adenauer, which culminated in the Franco-German Treaty of January 1963 [Treaty of Elysée]... The Pinay Cercle was a natural offshoot of Jean Violet's Franco-German activities. To describe it as a 'forum' is strictly accurate. There were no members in the formal sense. It was an informal group of broadly likeminded people, who met twice a year, once in Amerika, once in Europe. Usually, some distinguished figure was invited to speak... Within the wider Cercle, a smaller gathering called the Pinay Group met on occasion to discuss possible action."

Violet is said to have been involved with the Mont-Pelerin Society, another influential Pan-Europa outfit.

Violet, Paul

Sources: October 1989 – Issue 18, Lobster Magazine, 'The Pinay Circle and Destabilisation in Europe'

Son of Le Cercle founder and president Jean Violet. One of president Chirac's closest advisors, at least in the 1970s and 1980s. Le Canard Enchaîné, a French satirical magazine, once termed Paul Violet Chirac's 'adjudant'. Anno 2006, he's national secretary of the Mouvement Républicain et Citoyen (MRC), a Republican party in France, and vice president of l’Académie du Gaullisme.

Chirac, a "neo-Gaullist", was prime minister of France from 1974 to 1976 under Giscard and from 1986 to 1988 under Mitterrand. Georges Pompidou regards him as his protege. Chirac was chairman of the Rassemblement pour la République (RPR), mayor of Paris from 1977 to 1983, and is the president of France since 1995. In December 1974, then Vice President Saddam Hussein invited then French Prime Minister Jacques Chirac to Baghdad. Chirac accepted and visited Iraq in 1975. Hussein approved a deal granting French oil companies a number of privileges plus a 23 percent share of Iraqi oil. Chirac agreed to sell two reactors to Iraq, which would be repeatedly sabotaged and finally bombed by Israel. The Iraqis purchased a 70-megawatt reactor, along with six charges of 26 points of uranium enriched to 93 percent - enough weapons-grade uranium to produce three to four nuclear devices. Iraq also purchased a one-megawatt research reactor and France agreed to train 600 Iraqi nuclear technicians and scientists - the core of Iraq’s nuclear capability in later years. French intelligence chief Alexandre de Marenches assisted Chirac in this effort. Chirac has been pursuing an European agenda that gives as much power as possible to France. Chirac went on national TV in April 2005 trying to persuade the French people to vote in favor of the newly proposed European Constitution. The reasons he cited was that a no "would halt the European project in its tracks, and pave the way to an unregulated, uncontrolled free-market world, dominated by the United States." Even though Giscard was largely behind the constitution, he is a great rival of Chirac.

Volcker, Paul A.

Sources: November 1988 – Issue 17, Lobster Magazine, 'Brian Crozier, the Pinay Circle and James Goldsmith' (quoting from the Langemann papers)

Volcker was born on September 1927 in Cape May, New Jersey. He earned a bachelor of arts degree, summa cum laude, from Princeton in 1949, and a master of arts degree in political economy and government from the Harvard University Graduate School of Public Administration in 1951. Research assistant in the research department of the New York Fed during the summers of 1949 and 1950. Pilgrims Society member and later Rockefeller Foundation vice-chair Robert Vincent Roosa was his mentor there, and Paul Volcker became part of his 'Brain trust', or 'Roosa bloc' in the following years. Volcker would also become a member of the Pilgrims Society. From 1951 to 1952, he was Rotary Foundation Fellow at the London School of Economics (Rotary International and the Lions Clubs are still seen today by some as the most important recruiting centers for the Masonic movement). He returned to the New York Fed as an economist in the research department in 1952, and special assistant in the securities department from 1955 to 1957. Financial economist at Chase Manhattan Bank 1957-1961. Director of the Office of Financial Analysis at the Treasury 1962-1963. Deputy Undersecretary for Monetary Affairs at the Treasury 1963-1965. Rejoined Chase Manhattan as vice president and director of forward planning 1965-1968. Undersecretary of the Treasury for Monetary Affairs 1969-1974. Senior fellow at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University for the 1974-1975 academic year. Director Council on Foreign Relations 1975-1979 & 1988. President Federal Reserve Bank of New York 1975-1979. On July 26, 1979 the New York Times stated:

"David Rockefeller, the chairman of Chase, and Mr. Roosa were strong influences in the Mr. Carter decision to name Mr. Volcker for the Reserve Board chairmanship."

Chairman Federal Reserve System 1979-1987. Identified by BND officer Hans Langemann as a person who attended the December 1, 1979 meeting of Le Cercle in the Madison Hotel in Washington. Others that attended the meeting were the German Karl-Heinz Narjes (Bundestag; soon went to the ECC), William Colby (the recently retired CIA director at the time), Ed Feulner (president of the Heritage Foundation), Julian Amery (later chairman of Le Cercle; Privy Councillor; father was one of the closest Rothschild allies in building up Israel), and Jean Violet (French intelligence officer; Habsburg employee; Le Cercle co-founder and chairman; Fascist militant before WWII). Volcker became a member of the advisory board of Power Corporation in 1988 and is a friend to Canadian Paul G. Desmarais, Sr., a Privy Councillor and controlling shareholder of Power Corporation since 1968 (Desmarais and the Belgian Albert Frère jointly own about half of the major industries in France and Belgium, including Suez, Société Générale, Total, Imerys, and Groupe Bruxelles Lambert). Director of Prudential Insurance 1988-2000. Chairman of Wolfensohn & Co. in New York 1988-1996. North American chairman of the Trilateral Commission 1991-2001. Chairman of the newly created J. Rothschild, Wolfensohn & Company from March 1992 to 1995, Wolfensohn & Co.'s London-based joint venture. Visited Bilderberg in 1997. Attended meetings of the Ditchley Foundation and has chaired some of them. Advisor to the Japan Society and the International House. Member of the advisory board of Hollinger, together with Henry Kissinger, Richard Perle, and Zbigniew Brzezinski. Director of UAL Corporation, Bankers Trust New York Corporation, and Nestle, S.A. Director United States/Hong Kong Economic Cooperation Committee. Public member of the Board of Governors of the American Stock Exchange American Stock Exchange. Honorary trustee of the Aspen Institute. American Council on Germany, and the American Assembly. Co-chairman of the advisory board of Leadership Forum International and a principal of the Council for Excellence in Government. Member Circle of Presidents RAND Corporation, which means he has donated at least tens of thousands of dollars if not millions. Trustee International Accounting Standards Committee. Honorary chairman Financial Services Volunteer Corps, a firm founded by Cyrus Vance and John C. Whitehead in 1990. Honorary chairman Committee to Encourage Corporate Philanthropy. Chairman Independent Inquiry Committee into the Oil-For-Food program, which also employed Rockefeller’s granddaughter, attorney Miranda Duncan. Chairman board of trustees Group of Thirty (2005).

Paul Volcker is a visitor of the Bohemian Grove camp Mandalay. Director of the United Nations Association of the United States of America 2000-2004. Director of the Fund for Independence in Journalism. Wrote the foreword of George Soros' 2003 book 'The Alchemy of Finance'. Director of the Institute for International Economics, Washington, headed by Peter G. Peterson. Other directors of the institute are Maurice R. Greenberg and David Rockefeller. Trustee of the American Assembly anno 2005, together with Admiral Bobby Ray Inman (director ONI; director DIA; director NSA; deputy director CIA; director Wackenhut; director SAIC; Trilateral Commission; chairman of the "JPL Oversight Committee", which is not supposed to exist), David Gergen (Bohemian Grove; CFR; Trilateral Commission), and Frank A. Weil (governor Atlantic Institute; CFR). The American Assembly is sponsored by the Carnegie Corporation. Member of the President's Circle of the RAND Corporation, together with Lord Robin Renwick and Zbigniew Brzezinski.

Wilson, William A.

Sources: 1993, Brian Crozier, 'Free Agent', pages 186, 191-193, and 241

Born in 1914. BA Mechanical Engineering from Stanford University and a Doctor of Laws, Honoris Causa from Assumption College, Barry University, and Pepperdine University. Chief Engineer of Wilson Oil Tools from 1938 to 1955. Chairman of Wilson Oil Tools from 1955 to 1961 when the company was sold to Joy Manufacturing. Active in real estate development in California from 1961 through 1980. Director Jorgensen Steel Co. from 1973 to 1984. Active in ranching and farming in California and Mexico since 1980. Reagan's liaison with Le Cercle and The 61. Personal representative of President Reagan to the Vatican 1981-1984. Director of Pennzoil Company from 1983 to 1987.

United States Ambassador to the Vatican 1984-1986. Because of the opposition of the American Catholic bishops to the Reagan administration's economic and nuclear policies, some bishops feared the administration would use its ambassador to the Holy See to attack them in Rome. One archbishop claimed that Ambassador Wilson gave a list of twenty or thirty troublesome bishops to the Vatican. Wilson denied this. Again director Jorgensen Steel Co. from 1986 to 1991. According to Commodore Applied Technologies, Inc., of which Wilson is a director since 2002:

"Mr. Wilson is a Trustee of Saint John's Hospital and a member of the Knights of Malta."

His Who's Who confirms this.

Head of Dutch intelligence

Sources: 1993, Alan Clark, 'Diaries', p. 369-374 ( only description given is "Head of Dutch intelligence")

British politician Alan Clark described how he went to the 1990 Le Cercle meeting in Oman and met the head of Dutch intelligence when visiting the bathroom. Clark didn't mention the name of this person, but there are two possibilities. Karel Meulmeester of the IDB, the Dutch foreign intelligence agency (stood in close contact with the CIA, MI6, and the Mossad), is the most likely candidate.

IDB (former Dutch foreign intelligence agency) head Karel M. Meulmeester: As head of the IDB he incurred the anger of virtually his entire staff (at least 18 of the 22, including all 3 of his deputies), because he was very antisocial and hopelessly corrupt. On top of that, Meulmeester managed a secret annual fund of about $350,000 of which nobody knew what it was used for. He put phone taps on his own personnel or even on people that had left the IDB. At times, Meulmeester would go off to secret meetings in different parts of the world. Nobody would know any details of his location or what he would be discussing. In the early 1990s these dissatisfactions exploded. At the same time, Gladio was exposed in Italy and it became known that the Dutch version, Intelligence & Operations (I&O), was located at the IDB headquarters (at least, the Operations section). They had their attic stuffed with inflatable rubber boats, diving equipment, etc. As a result the IDB was dissolved in 1994, but not before a small group of intelligence officials had secretly been transferred to another government department while keeping close contact with the Raad van State (Dutch Privy Council; official head is the Queen). The ever-protected Meulmeester was one of them. Against all regulations, most of the archives of the IDB were destroyed. Meulmeester later became an advisor on data protection to the United Nations Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons. This organization checks if countries comply with the regulations set at the Chemical Weapons Convention. Very little is known about Meulmeester and unless he has been in the news for only a very brief period.

BVD (former Dutch domestic intelligence; now AIVD) head Arthur Docters van Leeuwen: Born in 1945. Went to the gymnasium and Law school. Became an established attorney and liberal politician. Produced a bundel of erotic stories in 1971. Head of the BVD 1989-1995. Attorney-general and chairman of the Council of Attorney-Generals 1995-1998. Chairman of the Autoriteit Financiële Markten (Authority Financial Markets; foundation that looks after the Dutch financial market; his predecessor was a member of the Peace Parks Club) since 1999. Quite a bit more prominent than Meulmeester and his (former) IDB. The pro-Bernhard/pro-colonial group within the BVD initially founded part of the stay-bihind networks in the Netherlands and visited Col. Antoine Bonnemaison's gatherings, which were quite similar to Le Cercle.

Pompidou, Georges

October 1989 – Issue 18, Lobster Magazine, 'The Pinay Circle and Destabilisation in Europe' (someone who the Cercle "forged links with")

Born in 1911. Lycee Louis-le-Grand in Paris. prestigious Ecole Normale Superieure. In France, "normaliens" form a powerful, small elite that serves as part of the country's most exclusive "old boy" network. Appointed professor of French, Latin and Greek at Marseilles in 1935, and later taught in Paris. Served as soldier in WWII, trying to defend the Maginot Line. Teacher during WWII. Wrote a classmate in 1944, Rene Brouillet, who had become deputy director of de Gaulle's staff, and asked him for a job in De Gaulle's staff. Pompidou got a job and would write every morning a one-sheet summary of the political situation and current events in France, which would be given to De Gaulle. De Gaulle became very impressed with Pompidou's concise summaries of complicated subjects, but briefly left politics in 1946, because he disagreed with the constitution of the Fourth Republic. Pompidou had to move into a new field and was appointed to the State Council, a sort of supreme court for administrative matters, although he had no legal training. Several months later, in 1947, De Gaulle organized the Rassemblement du Peuple Francais (RPF; Rally of the French People), the first Gaullist party. Pompidou became the key liaison officer between De Gaulle and his parliamentary troops in the RPF. In 1954, an old friend, Rene Fillon, a former professor who gave private lessons to Baron Guy de Rothschild when the Baron was a child, and who had become an official at the Rothschild Bank, arranged a job for Pompidou at this bank. Baron Guy, who knew about Pompidou's close links with de Gaulle, appointed him to a minor post. Eventually Pompidou became general manager of the Rothschild Frères from 1956 to 1962. He also became a director in 4 to 5 other companies. The Fourth Republic was tainted by political instability, failures in Indochina and inability to resolve the Algerian question. Hard-right French elements desperately tried to keep Algeria under French control, and organized a coup on the weak French government. Governor general of Algeria, Jacques Soustelle, an old friend of De Gaulle during WWII, became a major organizer of this coup to reinstate De Gaulle as president of France and to bring about a more right-wing constitution. In 1958, with the help of the Army and the population at large, this coup succeeded. Mitterrand, who was opposed to De Gaulle's return to the presidency, allegedly narrowly escaped an assassination later that year. The French people first noticed Georges Pompidou when De Gaulle was recalled to the presidency in January 1959. During the transition ceremony at the Champs-Elysees, De Gaulle pulled a plain-clothed man, Georges Pompidou, in the car while leaving president Coty, together with the president of the Senate, and the newly designated prime minister behind on the sidewalk. A few days later this mysterious man left the Elysee and returned to his Rothschild bank, of which he was general manager. Pompidou had been given a six-month leave for "personal reasons", and that leave was over. In September 1959, De Gaulle announced he was going to grant Algeria its independence, which was a slap in the face for the group that had brought him to power. When the cease-fire was actually arranged and the deal for independence was almost done, the Jacques Soustelle group created the OAS, a terrorist organizations that did everything it could to destabilize the cease-fire. It was involved in thousands of bombings, including many civilian targets, and organized several assassination attempts on De Gaulle. In the end, the OAS failed completely in its mission. Pompidou dined frequently with De Gaulle at Elysee Palace from 1958 to 1960, with the General often asking Pompidou advice on public and private affairs. He was elected prime minister by De Gaulle in 1962, which surprised people as Pompidou had never served in a public office; he had come directly from the Rothschild bank. Soon, Pompidou would be seen as De Gaulle's eminence grise. In his six years in office he had time to replace his men in all of France's key posts. June 25, 1969, San Mateo Times, 'French Foreign Minister Opposed De Gaulle':

"One of the more interesting cabinet appointments made by new French President Georges Pompidou is his selection of Maurice Schumann [Roman catholic who worked closely with Robert Schumann, De Gaulle and the UN in the aftermath of WWII] to be his foreign minister... In 1962 he [Maurice Schumann] became minister for development under Pompidou who then was premier. After a month, he quit in protest against De Gaulle's nationalistic policies... Also contributing to the "European" flavor of the new cabinet was the appointment of Valery Giscard d'Estaing to the post of finance minister. Giscard d'Estaing, a finance minister under De Gaulle for four years and a possible presidential candidate seven years from now, recently joined the action committee for the United States of Europe. This is an international group led by Jean Monet which favors both British membership in the Common Market and the political integration of Europe."

Hired by Charles de Gaulle to manage the Anne De Gaulle Foundation for Down's Syndrome (de Gaulle's daughter Anne had the disease). April 17, 1963, Wisconsin Rapids Daily Tribune, 'Pompidou, Gen. De Gaulle's Premier Appears to Have Good Hold on Office': "After ex-Gen. Edmond Jouhaud was sentenced to death for treason, De Gaulle seemed determined not to grant clemency. Jouhaud had taken part in the abortive generals' revolt in Algiers in 1961, and later helped form the terrorist Secret Army Organization [OAS]. Pompidou went to De Gaulle and told him, "If Jouhaud is executed, I resign." After a delay, De Gaulle granted clemency." Pompidou was very influential in his final years in office and dominated the National Assembly, forcing it to approve government programs unchanged even though the Gaullists were outnumbered by their opponents. Massive student and workers protests erupted in May 1968, as a result of a traditionalistic and repressive government (and likely with the clandestine support of the pro-NATO group since De Gaulle had withdrew from NATO in '66 and dispelled all Allied forces from France '67). The state had a monopoly on television and radio broadcasts, and woman did not have a lot of rights compared to men. Pompidou remained strong during these protests, as opposed to De Gaulle and most other public officials. Responsible for the crushing Gaullist victory that followed. A week after the votes were counted, De Gaulle again astounded everyone by firing Pompidou. Pompidou would privately state that De Gaulle made a big mistake and probably wouldn't remain president until 1972. He was right, as De Gaulle resigned in 1969 after having felt he had lost populair support. Pompidou was elected president of France in 1969, after De Gaulle's resignation, defeating acting president Alain Poher (Le Cercle). Though a Gaullist, Pompidou was more moderate than de Gaulle, notably allowing the United Kingdom to join the European Community in 1973. Earlier, in May 1972, he and British prime minister Edward Heath set up the Franco-British Council. Member of the Paneuropa Union and suggested that Otto von Habsburg became the new president of the Paneuropa Union in 1973. Died from Kahler's disease in 1974 while in office, which shocked most of the public. Georges Pompidou had one foster son, Alain Pompidou, now president of the European Patent Office. His private life has always been so protected that most Frenchmen did not know that he had a son.

Internationally, De Gaulle rebuffed the US, UK and USSR, pushing for an independent France with its own nuclear weapons, and strongly encouraged a "Free Europe", believing that a confederation of all European nations would restore the past glories of the great European empires ("Europe, from the Atlantic to the Urals"). He set about building Franco-German cooperation as the cornerstone of the European Economic Community (EEC), paying the first state visit to Germany by a French head of state since Napoleon. Signed the Franco-German Treaty of January 1963 with Adenauer, in which Jean Violet played a significant role behind the scenes. The Franco-German Treaty of Elysée is a relatively unknown agreement between France and Germany in which both agreed to consult with each other on important foreign policy and economic issues, ahead in time of general EEC meetings. In February 1966, France withdrew from the common NATO military command, but remained within the organization. Having vetoed Britain's entry into the EEC a second time, in June 1967, he condemned the Israelis for their occupation of the West Bank and Gaza following the Six Days War. This was a major change in French policy.

Until then, France had been a staunch ally, helping Israel militarily and jointly planning the Suez Campaign in 1956. This change was brought about because de Gaulle was angry that Israel had ignored his advice to let the Arabs attack first and had instead launched a preemptive strike. Israel's leadership, stung by what it considered its capricious abandonment in the face of de Gaulle's desire to appease the Arabs, turned towards the United States for military support. In July 1967, de Gaulle visited Canada, which was celebrating its centennial with a world's fair, Expo '67. On 24 July, speaking to a large crowd from a balcony at Montreal's city hall, de Gaulle uttered Vive le Québec! (Long live Quebec!) then added, Vive le Québec libre! (Long live free Québec!). De Gaulle left Canada of his own accord the next day without proceeding to Ottawa as scheduled. The speech caused outrage in Canada; it led to a serious diplomatic rift between the two countries. Nixon's first foreign visit after his election was to de Gaulle in 1969. They both shared the same non-Wilsonian approach to world affairs, believing in nations and their relative strengths, rather than in ideologies, international organizations, or multilateral agreements. De Gaulle is famously quoted for calling the United Nations le Machin ("the thing").

Rowland, Tiny

Sources: Simon Regan, 'Who Killed Diana?' ("associate member"; likely no evidence of membership)

David Stirling, Lord Lucan, James Goldsmith, and Tiny Rowland, were all members of The Clermont gambling club in the 1960s. During this time they were thinking about a fascist coup against the Labour government. The tycoon made his fortune in the mines of Africa before moving to Britain and buying the Observer newspaper. Became the chairman of Lonrho (London-Rhodesia) in 1961, became very popular with the shareholders, but was eventually ousted in 1994. In 1973 a group of Lonrho directors tried to oust Mr Rowland, claiming that he had bribed African leaders and violated international sanctions imposed on Rhodesia. The then-Prime Minister, Ted Heath, referred to his company around the same time as the "unacceptable face of British capitalism" because of its attempt to avoid tax. The former editor of the Observer, Donald Trelford, who worked with Mr Rowland for several years, called him one of the most remarkable and beguiling people in British life since World War II.

"He had a vision of Africa and its potential resources that was like Cecil Rhodes," he said.

But Mr Trelford added that after building up a huge conglomerate, "he virtually destroyed it by his single-minded obsession about getting Harrods". Lonrho tried to persuade the government to investigate the circumstances surrounding the al-Fayeds' acquisition of the store. He spent much of the rest of his career pursuing a feud with al-Fayed. Tiny is said to have been an intelligence asset. From 1974 and on Tiny financed the war of UNITA (Angola) rebel Jonas Savimbi (said to be a British intelligence asset himself). He and other members of Lonrho even visited Savimbi and his headquarters. The Soviets were supporting their more communist opponents, the MPLA. UNITA started out as a Maoist rebel group. During the 1980s, it turns out that Michael Johns of the Heritage Foundation (Foundation is represented in the Le Cercle) was also supporting UNITA, together with the Reagan administration. Also during the 1980s, Tiny was accused of helping the Marxist government of Mozambique manage its agricultural resources, and he increased Lonrho's South African holdings while sanctions against the apartheid government were still in place. Then in 1992, Rowland controversially sold a stake in some of Lonrho's hotels to the Libyan leader, Colonel Gadaffi, only three years after the Lockerbie bombing which was attributed to Libyan terrorists. Rowland has been a close associate of people like Ashraf Marwan, Gaddafi, Ahmed al-Dam, and Adnan Khashoggi. Marwan, son-in-law of President Nasser, was the head of Egyptian intelligence and a big time real estate buyer in Paris and London. His nickname in Egypt was "Dr. Death", because he ran a bunch of sophisticated torture chambers in the period 1974-1978. In early 1986 he led a secret delegation of Lonrho executives, lawyers and security personnel to Egypt to obtain information about the Al Fayed family. Al-Dam is a cousin of Gaddafi and runs Libyan intelligence. Al-Dam and his brother Sayad are said to have been instrumental in financing many terrorist attacks of Abu Nidal and his Abu Nidal Organization. Khashoggi, an international arms dealer and associate of the British crown, received an 8.6 million pounds loan from Tiny Rowland in 1985-1986. Khashoggi had some financial trouble at the time. Rowland secretly funded the documentary 'The Maltese Double Cross – Lockerbie', which questioned the claim that Libya was behind the bombing.

Soros, George

Sources: Mark Shernick, 'Did Le Cercle kill Diana?' (other names mentioned overlap with other reports, but still)

A Hungarian-born Jewish-American businessman. He is famous as a currency speculator and a philanthropist. In 1969 he co-founded the Quantum Fund with Jim Rogers, which is located at the tax haven of the Netherlands Antilles. Trustee chairman of the Central European University. Chairman of Soros Fund Management and the Open Society Institute. He is also a former member of the Board of Directors of the Council on Foreign Relations. Dr Mahathir Mohamad, prime minister of Malaysia, accused Soros of spearheading the manipulation that led to the 1997 East Asian financial crisis. He also accused him of having played a central role in the gigantic 1997 Asian fires. Accused of heading the successful movement to privatize the Human Genome Project in 2003, whereby many crucial patents went to Rockefeller University. George is known around the world for the role he played in Georgia's 2003 Rose Revolution, where his Open Society Institute had been financing the western-oriented side. Soros has been accused of doing the same in the Ukrainian revolution of 2004. Other names accused in the Ukrainian revolution affair were Mark Brzezinski (son of Cercle member Zbigniew Brzezinski), the National Democratic Institute (chaired by Madeleine Albright), and the Eurasia Foundation (president = Bilderberg / CFR / Carnegie / Rhodes scholar). Putin raided the Open Society offices in Russia after accusations that he was financing a coup there too. In the United States he is known for donating large sums of money to in an attempt to defeat President George W. Bush for reelection. Soros is a trustee of the Center for Russian Leadership Development (Open World Program), together with Bohos Bill Frist and James W. Symington. The program has brought nearly 4,000 young Russian leaders from 87 regions to 680 communities in the United States, including 150 members of the two houses of the Russian Parliament, the Federation Council and the State Duma. It has also brought 169 Russian judges to the United States. These Russians will return to Russia after having experienced the American way of life. Honorary director of Refugees International, together with Frank Wisner. Director of the International Crisis Group. Pilgrims Society member Richard Holbrooke has been chairman of the institute. George is close with Cercle member Sir James Goldsmith, a person intermarried with the Rothschild family. Cercle member Paul Volcker wrote the foreword of George Soros' 2003 book 'The Alchemy of Finance'.