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http://www.nthposition.com/homelandinsecurity.php
Homeland insecurity: the politics of terror in America
by Douglas Valentine
[ politics | opinion - april 02 ]
Before the terror attacks, the stench of venality clung to Bush like
cigarette smoke and stale beer after a night of bar hopping. Since
the attacks, his standing in the polls has nearly doubled, and
there's been no more talk of an oil crunch, or the ailing economy, or
of pensions plans down 10 to 20 per cent, or of the looting of Social
Security and Medicare to pay for the war of revenge, or of the
Republicans losing Congress in 2002.
The inherent illegitimacy of the Bush Administration must be
remembered when considering how the apocalyptic events of 11
September changed the domestic political landscape. Symbolically,
they wiped the slate clean. The US remains the most powerful nation
in the world, but Bush's legitimacy is no longer an issue. As a
result, all the moral and psychological prohibitions on the
reactionary right have been lifted, and all the anger and
frustrations it cultivated during the Vietnam War, and the Carter and
Clinton Administrations, is poised to be unleashed under the aegis of
counter-terrorism, not only on the usual suspects - foreign enemies
sitting on vast oil reserves, suspected terrorists, and domestic
dissidents - but on the unwitting, flag-waving American public as well.
America was attacked and is at war; and in the rage and confusion
following the morning of 11 September Bush sought unprecedented
emergency powers to counter the threat of more terrorism. He received
those powers from Congress with near unanimous public support. The
logic was irrefutable at the moment: a murderous, suicidal enemy had
invaded our homeland, and the military had to be mobilized. Fear
gripped the nation, and while Bush was ignominiously hidden away in a
military bunker by security forces (because, his aides falsely
claimed, terrorists planned to attack Air Force One) the White House
was able to impose what amounts to martial law. Armed National
Guardsmen now stalk our airports, concrete barriers surround our
government buildings, and the president's press secretary cautions
our apologetic comedians (when they're not sports casting or sharing
emotional moments with Dan Rather) to watch what they say.
The job of co-ordinating the domestic counter-terror effort will fall
to former Pennsylvania Governor Tom Ridge, as director of the newly
created Office of Homeland Security (OHS). The OHS will co-ordinate
more than 40 federal agencies involved in intelligence, security, and
law enforcement endeavours.
Bush has granted the CIA unprecedented freedom to co-ordinate with
law enforcement and military officials, through the OHS. Previous
restrictions on CIA domestic operations have been waived. As Bob
Woodward reported in the 21 October Washington Post, CIA covert
action is now a key element in defending America from terrorist
attacks. Every day the CIA provides the Bush Administration's top
national security and intelligence officials -- including OHS
Director Tom Ridge -- with current intelligence on possible bombings,
hijackings or poisonings within the US. But other than the anthrax
outbreak, which appears to be the work of the radical right, none of
the threats has materialised, and there is no way of knowing if, as
the CIA is wont to do, the anthrax outbreak has been manufactured for
purely political and psychological warfare reasons. Hundreds of
businesses and institutions across the country have already been
placed on the CIA's watch list. According to Woodward, one Bush
official said that merely being on the list "could destroy the
livelihood of all those organisations without a bomb being thrown or
a spore of anthrax being released."
Defending our homeland will not be an easy task, according to Michael
Ledeen, a former counter-terror expert in the Reagan Administration's
State Department and National Security Council (NSC). In a 1 October
article for the National Review OnLine, Ledeen said the difficulty
will be getting the law-enforcement and intelligence agencies "to co-
ordinate better with one another." [1]
Ledeen defines this organisational problem as ideological, and he
specifically blames the Clintons, "for failing to properly organize
our nation's security apparatus." According to Ledeen, Clinton's
sneering lack of respect took "a terrible toll on the system, and
Ridge will not find it easy to instil a proper respect for proper
secrecy, even in his own offices. It takes quite a while to stamp out
corrupt habits of mind and action."
Ledeen's solution to the problem of domestic terrorism is "to stamp
out" the "corrupt habits of mind" (italics added) that are still
lingering around, somewhere. "This is time for the old motto, 'kill
them all, let God sort 'em out'. New times require new people with
new standards," Ledeen asserts. "The entire political (italics added)
world will understand it and applaud it. And it will give Tom Ridge a
chance to succeed, and us to prevail."
Ledeen is seriously proposing that the Bush Administration conduct a
counter-terror campaign against its political opposition in America,
through its nascent domestic political police force, the OHS. While
the OHS appeared immediately after the tragic events of 11 September,
like a rabbit pulled from a magician's star-spangled hat, it's
important to understand that it has been at least four years in the
making. Based on studies and predictions that a catastrophic terror
attack was inevitable, the US Commission on National Security in the
21st Century (co-chaired by former Senators Gary Hart and Warren
Rudman) had proposed an OHS-type entity in January 2001. But the
original concept for a domestic counter-terror, internal security
program is much older.
The counter-terror network
The CIA's counter-terror network, as established by William Casey,
was a direct descendant of the counter-intelligence special
operations unit, Chaos, formed by James Angleton in August 1967,
specifically to spy on the New Left and other radical political
groups in the anti-war and civil rights movements. From its earliest
beginnings, Chaos was distinguished from other CIA operations by its
secure communications system, its super inaccessibility and
"compartmentalisation," its inter-connected domestic and
international mandate, and its essentially political nature. All of
this was permissible insofar as Chaos was a "special" counter-
intelligence function designed to ferret out the plans and strategies
of foreign intelligence services.
The CIA underwent a major reorganisation in 1974 after William Colby
fired counter-intelligence chief James Angleton, and exposed the
CIA's "family jewels" at a Congressional Hearing conducted by
Representative Otis Pike (D-NY). Chaos became the International
Terrorism Group (ITG), and the repository of some of the "hip pocket"
operations that forced Angleton from the Agency. The ITG remained
buried in the bowels of the CIA until it was resurrected as Howard
Bane's Office of Terrorism in late 1977. The Iran hostage crisis and
the disaster of Desert One enabled Ronald Reagan to steal the
presidency, denounce Carter's Human Rights crusade, and initiate a
new foreign policy based on combating terrorism.
In 1981, Reagan's Director of Central Intelligence, William Casey,
saw the political possibilities of turning Bane's Office of Terrorism
into a "back-channel" mechanism, like Chaos under Angleton and
Richard Ober [2], for conducting secret "hip pocket" operations
outside the normal chain of command. Casey replaced aging Howard Bane
with CIA officer William Buckley, a special warfare expert who had
managed the CIA's Counter-Terror Program in Vietnam from 1969-1972.
Buckley renamed Bane's unit the Office of Domestic Terrorism, and the
ODT became the official manifestation of the off-the-shelf Enterprise
formed by Bush père, while he was Director of Central Intelligence
(Jan. 1976-Jan. 1997), and his anti-terrorism guru, the CIA's
Assistant Deputy Director of Operations, Theodore Shackley [3] in
mid-1976 [4]
The ultimate object of Reagan Administration policy was the
destruction of the Soviet Union through the application of "low-
intensity warfare" in Afghanistan; counter-terror in the Middle East;
and pro-active terror in Latin America. Effecting this policy
involved a number of illegal covert actions, and so Casey had to run
his Counter-Terror Network outside the CIA itself, through a cabal of
secret agents throughout the government, acting under his direction
through a group of veteran CIA officers who embrace the same
essentially fascist world view. Like Chaos, the Counter-Terror
Network had a secure communications system, as Peter Dale Scott
observed, "that excluded other bureaucrats with opposing viewpoints."
As Scott notes, "The counter-terrorism network even had its own
special worldwide antiterrorist computer network, codenamed
Flashboard, by which members could communicate exclusively with each
other and their collaborators abroad."
Casey laid the groundwork for this Counter-Terror Network in 1981,
when he appointed David Whipple as the CIA's National Intelligence
Officer (NIO) for counter-terrorism. A veteran CIA officer with
extensive service in the Far East, Whipple had been serving as the
CIA's station chief in Switzerland, where he'd conducted successful
counter-terror operations, before being summoned back to headquarters
to take on the job as Casey's NIO for counter-terrorism.
According to Whipple, Casey's staff consisted of 16 NIOs, eight of
whom were responsible for geographical divisions, while the other
eight were responsible for issues, such as narcotics, counter-
intelligence, nuclear weapons, economics, and in Whipple's case,
counter-terror. Under Casey's direction, every government agency
established a counter-terror office as part of this secret apparatus.
Whipple as NIO co-ordinated them all, collating all the information
they provided at CIA headquarters. In consultation with Casey,
Whipple assisted the CIA's division chiefs, making sure their station
chiefs were properly handling counter-terror issues in their
designated areas.
Whipple monitored Buckley's Office of Domestic Terrorism, and its
staff that included an operations chief, intelligence analysts, photo
interpreters, and several case officers. Because it had the authority
to access any division's files and to co-opt its most precious
penetration agents, the ODT was resisted by the divisions --
especially by the Near East Division, which was on the front lines of
the war against terrorism. Thus in 1983 Casey sent his pet, William
Buckley, to Beirut to personally oversee counter-intelligence
operations there. And he conscripted Oliver North, a doe-eyed Marine
lieutenant colonel assigned to the National Security Council, as his
penetration agent inside the NSC. Notably, Whipple served as North's
case officer in this monumental misadventure.
North was a Vietnam veteran, cut from the same ideological mould as
G. Gordon Liddy (the deranged former FBI agent who, as one of Nixon's
infamous Plumbers, burglarised the office of Daniel Ellsberg's
psychiatrist) and William Buckley. How he got the job has never been
explained, but in1982 North was named the NSC staff co-ordinator for
crisis management. Vice President Bush was in overall charge as chair
of the cabinet-level Crisis Management Committee. Starting in
February 1983, North, according to Scott, developed a secret Crisis
Management Center, and "a plan (REX 84) to suspend the Constitution
in the event of a national crisis such as nuclear war, violent and
widespread internal dissent, or national opposition to a US military
invasion abroad."
Sound familiar? In light of the recent national emergency, it is not
surprising that North's plan called for "the round-up and internment
of large numbers of both domestic dissidents (some twenty-six
thousand) and aliens (perhaps as many as from three to four
thousand), in camps such as the one in Oakdale, Louisiana." And just
as the vast majority of Congresspersons went along with the draconian
anti-terror legislation passed on 29 October, Senator Daniel Inouye
in 1986 cut off all debate about North's plan to suspend the
Constitution when Congressman Jack Brooks raised the issue during the
televised Iran-Contra Hearings.
North next formed a personal relationship with Vice President Bush in
the winter of 1983, when they inspected El Salvador's death squad
commanders. After that North's stock soared, and in April 1984 he
created the Terrorist Incident Working Group (TWIG) specifically to
rescue several American hostages, including Buckley, held in Lebanon.
North became TWIG's chairman, and in October 1985 he managed its
first successful operation -- the capture of the hijackers of the
Achille Lauro.
A few months earlier, in June, after the hijacking of a TWA Flight
847 to Beirut, Bush created the Vice President's Task Force on
Combating Terrorism. According to Scott, as the NSC's liaison to the
Task Force, "North drafted a secret annex for its report which
institutionalized and expanded his counter-terrorist powers, making
himself the NSC coordinator of all counter-terrorist actions."
On 20 January 1986, North's efforts were crowned with National
Security Decision Directive 207, making him chief co-ordinator of the
Administration's counter-terror program, and providing him with a
secret office and staff known as the Office To Combat Terrorism.
Working through the inter-agency Operations Sub-Group (OSG), North co-
ordinated the secret Counter-Terror Network and retired Air Force
General Richard Secord's Enterprise in a series of mind-boggling
illegal operations, including illegal arms sales to Iran through
Israel's counter-terrorism expert Amiram Nir; illegal Contra drug
smuggling by through CIA asset Manuel Noriega in Panama, by a group
of anti-Castro Cubans, all of whom were directly connected to Bush
through his chief of operations, Donald Gregg, via Rudy Enders and
Felix Rodriguez (all Phoenix Program [5] veterans); illegal arms
supply operations to the Contras through right-wing domestic terror
groups; and the repression of domestic dissent on a massive scale
unmatched until the recent assaults mounted on the civil liberties of
American citizens by fundamentalist Attorney General John Ashcroft
and the US Congress.
As Scott notes, "the Office to Combat Terrorism became the means
whereby North could co-ordinate the propaganda activities of Carl
"Spitz" Channel and Richard Miller (and) the closing of potential
embarrassing investigations by other government agencies."
The ranking members of this Counter-Terror Network included: Donald
Gregg (Bush's National Security Advisor); CIA officer Charles Allen
(Whipple's replacement as Casey's Counter-Terror National
Intelligence Officer in 1985); Robert Oakley at the State
Department's Office of Counter-Terrorism (a former CIA officer with
experience in political operations in Vietnam, Oakley co-chair of
North's Operations Sub-Group until mid-1986); Richard Armitage (a
member of the Enterprise) at the Defense Department, Lt. Gen. John
Moellering at the Joint Chiefs of Staff, FBI Counter-Terror Chief,
Oliver Revell, and, wonder of wonders, Michael Ledeen at the National
Security Council.
The linchpin between the Israelis and the Americans, Ledeen had
proposed illegal arms sales to Iran in 1984 through Mossad double-
agent Manucher Ghorbanifar. The CIA's Deputy Director for Operations,
Clair George, considered Ghorbanifar totally unreliable, and as
having only his personal financial interests, and Israel's security,
at heart. But George's objections were neutralised in June 1985, when
Bush formed the Terrorism Task Force, at which point the illegal arms
sales went forward. And to assure that no one else in the CIA would
obstruct Reagan's secret policy, Casey in January 1986 conscripted
veteran CIA officer Duane Clarridge into the Counter-Terror Network,
as its de-facto security chief, and directed Clarridge to form the
CIA's Counter-Terror Center, which exists until today. [6]
Terror central
Under the current "unpresident" Bush, counter-terrorism is a
mechanism to conduct illegal covert operations on behalf of his
economic patrons, to circumvent Congress, and to his harass domestic
critics. Counter-terrorism is the preferred political and
psychological weapon of the radical right wing, and it was perfected
in 1986 with the creation of the CIA's Counter-Terror Center.
Duane "Dewey" Clarridge, a man with an extensive background in
terror, was well equipped for managing this job. A rabid right-wing
ideologue, he was chief of the CIA's station in Turkey in the late
1960s and 1970s, when the fascist Grey Wolves went on a terror
rampage, bombing, shooting and killing thousands of officials,
journalists, students, lawyers, labour organisers, social democrats,
left-wing activists and Kurds. Since then, Turkey' military
dictatorship has been one of America's strongest allies.
A body-builder and certified member of the Old Boy clique that runs
the CIA, Clarridge in August 1976 helped Bush's ADDO, Ted Shackley,
recruit Albert Hakim, later a member of Secord's Enterprise, to spy
in Iran. [7] (Shackley was soon thereafter forced into retirement due
to his association with "rogue elephant" Ed Wilson, the CIA officer
who sold tons of explosives to Libya, and managed the original
Enterprise that was later inherited by Richard Secord.) Clarridge was
serving as the CIA's station chief in Rome when the Pope was shot,
and was chief of Latin America Division from 1981 until 1984, when
Nicaraguan harbours were mined and the psyops "murder manual" was
distributed to the Contras, with his approval. In this capacity
Clarridge helped Richard Secord move PLO weapons captured by Israeli
forces during their bloody invasion of Lebanon, through Noriega in
Panama, to the Contras.
Clarridge, as chief of the Europe Division, next played a pivotal
role in the illegal Iran-Contra operation, by providing the back
channel, through his station chief in Lisbon, that allowed North and
Secord's Enterprise to sell HAWK and TOW missiles to the Iranians, at
a huge profit for Secord and his Israeli counterparts, in exchange
for the release of several American hostages. The operation, which
subverted the US Constitution and the Bolland Amendments passed by
Congress, made Ronald Reagan into the world's biggest, but most
adorable, liar.
According to Scott, "The intrigues of North, Secord, Clarridge and
Oakley at this point showed a concern for politics rather than
security."
In that case, the political imperative was to gain the release of
hostages, so that Reagan, who had sworn "never" to negotiate with
terrorists, would not be unfavourably compared to Carter, or exposed
as bold-faced liar, and so Bush would not lose the up-coming
election. Gaining the release of the hostages, of course, involved
the illegal arms sales to Iran, which itself was a flagrant flimflam
by the Israelis and their agents in the US Government. One of those
Israeli agents, Michael Ledeen, while serving as a special assistant
on terrorism at the State Department, made the original proposal in
1982 to divert money from arms sales to fund covert counter-terror
operations. Ledeen also was responsible, while employed at the
National Security Council in 1984, for convincing North and Secord to
employ Mossad double-agent and world-class swindler Manucher
Ghorbanifar as the middleman between the Iranians, the Israelis and
the Americans. As the record shows, it was Ghorbanifar's duplicity
and avarice that led the entire misadventure to its ignoble conclusion.
The homeland salutes you, Michael Ledeen. You're exactly the sort of
corrupt public official we need advising the Bush regime on how to
wage its counter-terror campaign against the Muslim world.
In an interview with this writer, Clarridge described the Counter-
Terror Center, which has co-ordinated the CIA's back-channel
activities since its formation in 1986, as a central unit with
members from the four directorates, operating under a committee at
the National Security Council. With input from the different
divisions, the Counter-Terror Center "divines" anti-terrorism policy,
and then constructs entities that can conduct operations. It is not
function of the US Army Special Forces, according to Clarridge, but
pieces together counter-terrorism "action teams" -- commando squads
trained to capture suspected terrorists and bring them to the United
States to stand trial.
During his tenure from 1986 to 1988, Clarridge oversaw a massive
increase in intelligence gathering on suspected terrorists, and
developed new weapons for use against them. He worked especially
closely with George W H Bush, much to his advantage. Indeed, after it
was revealed that Clarridge had assisted North in the transfer of
surface-to-air missiles to Iran, he was forced to resign from the
CIA. He lied about it when called before Special Prosecutor Lawrence
Walsh, and was indicted on seven counts of perjury. But he never went
to trial, thanks to a last minute pardon issued by Bush on December
24, 1992. Bush's pardon provided blanket amnesty to Clarridge,
Reagan's Secretary of Defense Casper Weinberger, Elliott Abrams, a
former Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American affairs,
former National Security Adviser Robert McFarlane, CIA officer Alan
Fiers, and CIA officer Clair George.
Unlike Clinton, Bush received no criticism for his pardons, though
they were far worse than anything Clinton ever did. For with those
pardons, Bush assured that his role in the October Surprise [8], and
the Iran-Contra Scandal, and many other crimes, would never be revealed.
The moral to this story is crystal clear: Presidents Nixon, Reagan
and Bush created secret "counter-terror" cabals within their
administrations to conduct illegal operations and harass their
domestic political opponents. Under the aegis of counter-terrorism,
the FBI since then has conducted extensive surveillance against every
peace group that opposes any right-wing Administration's blatant
terrorism.
Oliver North blamed Washington for losing the Vietnam War. His hatred
of the peace movement was and is palpable, and it's no coincidence
that he exploited his power as chief of counter-terrorism to
terrorise his domestic opponents. As Scott notes, North believes that
"the most pressing problem is not in the Third World, but here at
home in the struggle for the minds of the people."
Thus, when Jack Terrell informed the Justice Department that North
was involved in drug smuggling, North labelled Terrell a terrorist
and sicced the FBI's counter-terror unit on him. Like all the other
rabid right-wing ideologues presented in this essay, Oliver North was
mostly concerned about his own personal power. But none of his
abuses, or those of the Reagan and Bush regime were ever exposed,
because, as McClintock notes, "the very notion of counter-terror as
terrorism was forbidden, while circumlocution was the norm." [9]
The last decade
Michael Ledeen, who was forced from the Reagan Administration after
the Iran arms fiasco became public, described George Bush in the 20
August 1987 Boston Globe as "the most powerful man" in America." And
after his election, Bush tried his hardest to prove he was the most
powerful man in the world as well. His devastating invasion of Panama
left thousands dead, and tens of thousand homeless, but did nothing
to curb international drug smuggling. Likewise, his massive terror
bombing of Kuwait and Iraq killed tens of thousands, and his economic
sanctions, endorsed by Clinton, have killed hundreds of thousands,
for no reason at all, save vengeance. Saddam Hussein is still in power.
For all the violence and terror he inflicted on the world, Bush did
nothing to make America a safer place. And while America's anti-
terrorism policy remained unchanged under his son and ideological
heir, our sacred homeland, according to Michael Ledeen, is a much
unsafer place.
In his 1 October article for National Review OnLine, Ledeen said:
"The last great chief of the CIA, Bill Casey, saw the necessity of
creating a counter-terrorism center where all the information came
into a central location and was analyzed in toto. He entrusted the
task to Dewey Clarridge," who "cracked his very active whip greatly
improving the quality of our intelligence."
Then came the "infamous" although unspecified "restrictions" put in
place by Clinton.
What it required now, Ledeen contends, is "a top guy with real power
and total support from the president, and it requires men and women
at the working level who not only have the resolve and the courage to
do it -- laying waste to dead wood as they go -- but who know the
system cold, know how the bureaucratic games are played, and know
which walls have to be broken down."
What Ledeen is prescribing, of course, is a recipe for the type of
domestic political repression that American's have endured under
previous right-wing regimes.
Will we never learn?
Our constitutionally-protected right to political activity has been
under constant attack for decades now, and it will only get worse. As
a result of the recent anti-terror legislation, even your email can
be subjected to permanent monitoring by the FBI, CIA or the new OHS.
As of this week, the FBI can "seek a peek" inside your home or office
without a warrant, and seize your files, property or computers
without any notice, and they don't have to tell you about until
afterwards. Committing any petty misdemeanour, which can in anyway be
interpreted as frightening some National Guardsman at some Office of
Homeland Security checkpoint of airport, is now grounds for
surveillance of your home and person, and monitoring of your internet
activity.
God forbid you should stoop to political dissent or opposition to
Bush's eternal war.
Internationally, the story isn't any prettier. Bush's ambassador to
the United Nations, John Negroponte, has stated that America must
attack more and more countries. Like other terrorists in the Bush
Administration, Negroponte is well suited to this task. As US
ambassador to Honduras under Reagan, he funded that particular right-
wing regime's most notorious death squads, Battalion 316.
In the name of anti-terrorism, the illegitimate Bush Administration
can be expected to revitalise this practice worldwide, training
torturers and tyrants to wage "global counter-terrorism" against any
nation that harbours suspected terrorists, or critics of US foreign
policy. And any connection you have to these foreign enemies, even if
it is merely sympathy for the Palestinians, subjects you to
imprisonment, loss of livelihood, and worst of all, forfeiture of
your sense of humour.
That's right. You can't even make fun of the situation anymore. Which
is, when you think of it, perfectly in keeping with out time-honoured
Judaic-Christian ethic.
Here at home, through the Office of Homeland Security, we will endure
more political and psychological warfare, more black and grey
propaganda, and more deceit and disinformation than any society on
earth before. We're told we must become new people in a brave new
world, where indefinite detention, torture and summary execution of
our suspected enemies will make us free.
Award-winning reporter Seymour Hersh tells us that we must resort to
the tactics the Jordanian security service used to catch the
notorious Palestinian terrorist Abu Nidal. "The Jordanians did not
move directly against suspected Abu Nidal followers but seized close
family members instead, mothers and brothers," Hersh notes. Then he
quotes an anonymous CIA officer as saying, "Jordan is the one nation
that totally succeeded in penetrating a group," because it was able
"to get their families under control."
So much for family values.
Hersh disingenuously adds that these tactics defy CIA procedures, but
suggests it's a better alternative than "sitting around making
diversity quilts."
Well, this is exactly the type of psychological warfare you can
expect to be subjected to on a daily basis from here on out. As noted
in the Marine Corps Gazette, "Psychological operations may become the
dominant operational and strategic weapon in the form of media/
information intervention. Logic bombs and computer viruses, including
latent viruses, may be used to disrupt civilian as well as military
operations. Fourth generation adversaries will be adept at
manipulating the media to alter domestic and world opinion to the
point where skilful use of psychological operations will sometimes
preclude the commitment of combat forces."
"Television news may become a more powerful operational weapon than
armored divisions."
Let me say it one last time: in the name of anti-terrorism, all of
the nation's pent-up anger and frustration over Vietnam, and a host
of other, mostly Clinton-related issues, is poised to be unleashed on
an enemy that lurks inside our borders.
And that enemy is you.
But in order to survive, and enjoy, and laugh, you need only know one
thing: when Bush and Cheney and Rumsfeld and Rice and Powell tell you
that America needs to wage unrelenting war for the next fifty years,
in order to achieve peace, they are lying.
War, dear Citizen, is not Peace.
Hail The Republic!
Notes
1 On behalf of Reagan's National Security Advisor, Robert McFarlane,
likely Mossad agent Ledeen directed Israeli Prime Minister Shimon
Peres to illegally sell weapons to Iran in 1985, thus instigating the
Iran-Contra scandal. [Back]
2 Veteran CIA officer Richard Ober was in charge of the CIA's Counter-
Intelligence, Special Operations Group (CI/SOG), codenamed MHCHAOS
and known as Chaos, which was created in August 1967, concurrent with
the Phoenix Program (and for a similar purpose), and existed until
March 1974. [Back]
3 Ted Shackley was George Bush's Number 2 man at the CIA when Bush
was CIA Director. [Back]
4 Some of the information on the Counter-Terror Network came from
Peter Dale Scott's essay, 'The Counter Terrorism Network: Bush,
North, And The Accumulation of Secret Power'. [Back]
5 The Phoenix Program (originally ICEX -- the Intelligence
Coordination and Exploitation Program) was established in June 1967
by members of the CIA's Saigon station; it co-ordinated Counter-
Terror and Interrogation Center Programs, as well as all other
intelligence, security, and counter-insurgency programs. On 15 July
1971, the New York Times revealed that 26,843 non-military Vietcong
insurgents and sympathisers had been "neutralized" in the previous 14-
month period. During Congressman Hearings that were being held at the
time, Representative Ogden Reid (D-NY) asked William Colby, the CIA
officer in overall charge of the Program, "Are you certain that we
know a loyal member of the VCI from a loyal member of the South
Vietnamese citizenry?" Colby said, "No." [Back]
6 Scott: "Clair George [..] testified how Casey bypassed him by
having Charles Allen, the national Intelligence Officer for Counter-
Terrorism, deal with Ledeen and Ghorbanifar on "terrorist"
matters." [Back]
7 Steve Emerson: Secret Warriors, p24. Shackley, Secord, Hakim, Tom
Clines and Ed Wilson were all linked to various money-making scams
conducted under the aegis of national security. [Back]
8 According to eyewitness Ari Ben-Menasche, Reagan's campaign
manager, William J Casey, had arranged for vice presidential
candidate and former CIA director George Bush to meet with Iranian
officials in Paris on the weekend of 18-19 October 1980. In exchange
for holding the hostages taken during the capture of the American
Embassy in Tehran on 4 November 1979 through the election, then
releasing them, Reagan, Bush and Casey agreed to sell weapons to
Iran, which had been invaded in September 1980 by CIA asset Saddam
Hussein and Iraq. The secret deal, called the October Surprise,
allowed Reagan, Bush and Casey to steal the presidency from Jimmy
Carter. The fact that the hostages were released on the day of
Reagan's inauguration highlighted the fact that a secret deal had
been made. [Back]
9 Michael McClintock: Instruments of Statecraft, p306. [Back]
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