JustGetThere

Cryptogon | I don’t think anyone has the complete story on exactly what chemtrails are. I don’t doubt that weather modification is a part of it, but take your pick on the rest. There’s almost certainly a biological component to some of the spraying. There could also be some kind of scalar weapon application involving HAARP.

My guess is that the CFR came out with the relatively innocuous sounding weather modification stuff in order to take some of the focus away from the other questions. Even so, I find it extraordinary to see these words in a CFR document.

See: Geoengineering: Workshop on Unilateral Planetary Scale Geoengineering.

The quote below is from: Workshop briefing notes: Unilateral Geoengineering (PDF, 546K):

Geoengineering Strategies

Among all geoengineering schemes, those currently considered most feasible involve increasing the planetary albedo, that is, reflecting more sunlight back into space before it can be absorbed. There are a number of different methods that could be used to increase the planet’s reflectivity:

1. Add more small reflecting particles in the upper part of the atmosphere (the stratosphere which is located between 15 and 50 kilometers above the Earth’s surface).

2. Add more clouds in the lower part of the atmosphere (the troposphere)

3. Place various kinds of reflecting objects in space either near the earth or at a stable location between the earth and the sun.

4. Change large portions of the planet’s land cover from things that are dark (absorbing) such as trees to things that are light (reflecting) such as open snowcover or grasses.

…

Stratospheric Aerosols

Adding more of the right kind of fine particles to the stratosphere can increase the amount of sunlight that is reflected back into space.

Applied to geoengineering, various technologies could be used to loft particles into the stratosphere, such as naval guns, rockets, hot air balloons or blimps, or a fleet of highflying aircraft. Potential types of particles for injection include sulfur dioxide, aluminum oxide dust or even designer self-levitating aerosols that might be engineered to migrate to particular regions (e.g. over the arctic) or to rise above the stratospher (so as not to interfere in stratospheric chemistry).

Research Credit: JL

FederalJack.com | During the FIU New World Order Summit, a professor at the school named Dr. Mark B. Rosenberg raised the concern during a panel session about the possibility of a military coup taking place in the United States by the year 2012. This was not theorizing, he was simply citing a study that took place at the Army War College.

He explained that this rebellion would be a response to the military being overextended and being put to a use by the administration in a manner that is contrary to their official purpose. The invited speaker of the panel, Parag Khanna, treated the concern as if it was nonsense and dismissed it by asking the audience "Have any of you heard of this? No? Okay then."

It is interesting to note that both Dr. Rosenberg and Parag Khanna are members of the Council on Foreign Relations, a think tank dedicated to the purpose of establishing a one world government. Could Dr. Rosenberg’s statement exposing the white paper on the coup plot have been an example of dissent within the ranks of the CFR?

After the summit, Joshua from Orlando 9/11 Truth called into the Alex Jones show to relay the information (1:08:29 seconds into the 2/25/09 episode). An attentive listener managed to track down the actual document that Dr. Rosenberg was referring to, and you can read it below.

The Origins of the American Military Coup of 2012

CHARLES J. DUNLAP, JR.

Original PDF Document

Original Link

From Parameters, Winter 1992-93, pp. 2-20.

Go to Cumulative Article Index.

The letter that follows takes us on a darkly imagined excursion into the future. A military coup has taken place in the United States–the year is 2012–and General Thomas E. T. Brutus, Commander-in-Chief of the Unified Armed Forces of the United States, now occupies the White House as permanent Military Plenipotentiary. His position has been ratified by a national referendum, though scattered disorders still prevail and arrests for acts of sedition are underway. A senior retired officer of the Unified Armed Forces, known here simply as Prisoner 222305759, is one of those arrested, having been convicted by court-martial for opposing the coup. Prior to his execution, he is able to smuggle out of prison a letter to an old War College classmate discussing the "Origins of the American Military Coup of 2012." In it, he argues that the coup was the outgrowth of trends visible as far back as 1992. These trends were the massive diversion of military forces to civilian uses, the monolithic unification of the armed forces, and the insularity of the military community. His letter survives and is here presented verbatim.

It goes without saying (I hope) that the coup scenario above is purely a literary device intended to dramatize my concern over certain contemporary developments affecting the armed forces, and is emphatically not a prediction. — The Author

Dear Old Friend,

It’s hard to believe that 20 years have passed since we graduated from the War College! Remember the great discussions, the trips, the parties, the people? Those were the days!!! I’m not having quite as much fun anymore. You’ve heard about the Sedition Trials? Yeah, I was one of those arrested–convicted of "disloyal statements," and "using contemptuous language towards officials." Disloyal? No. Contemptuous? You bet! With General Brutus in charge it’s not hard to be contemptuous.

I’ve got to hand it to Brutus, he’s ingenious. After the President died he somehow "persuaded" the Vice President not to take the oath of office. Did we then have a President or not? A real "Constitutional Conundrum" the papers called it.[1] Brutus created just enough ambiguity to convince everyone that as the senior military officer, he could–and should–declare himself Commander-in-Chief of the Unified Armed Forces. Remember what he said? "Had to fill the power vacuum." And Brutus showed he really knew how to use power: he declared martial law, "postponed" the elections, got the Vice President to "retire," and even moved into the White House! "More efficient to work from there," he said. Remember that?

When Congress convened that last time and managed to pass the Referendum Act, I really got my hopes up. But when the Referendum approved Brutus’s takeover, I knew we were in serious trouble. I caused a ruckus, you know, trying to organize a protest. Then the Security Forces picked me up. My quickie "trial" was a joke. The sentence? Well, let’s just say you won’t have to save any beer for me at next year’s reunion. Since it doesn’t look like I’ll be seeing you again, I thought I’d write everything down and try to get it to you.

I am calling my paper the "Origins of the American Military Coup of 2012." I think it’s important to get the truth recorded before they rewrite history. If we’re ever going to get our freedom back, we’ve got to understand how we got into this mess. People need to understand that the armed forces exist to support and defend government, not to be the government. Faced with intractable national problems on one hand, and an energetic and capable military on the other, it can be all too seductive to start viewing the military as a cost-effective solution. We made a terrible mistake when we allowed the armed forces to be diverted from their original purpose.

I found a box of my notes and clippings from our War College days–told my keepers I needed them to write the confession they want. It’s amazing; looking through these old papers makes me realize that even back in 1992 we should have seen this coming. The seeds of this outrage were all there; we just didn’t realize how they would grow. But isn’t that always the way with things like this? Somebody once said that "the true watersheds in human affairs are seldom spotted amid the tumult of headlines broadcast on the hour."[2] And we had a lot of headlines back in the ’90s to distract us: The economy was in the dumps, crime was rising, schools were deteriorating, drug use was rampant, the environment was in trouble, and political scandals were occurring almost daily. Still, there was some good news: the end of the Cold War as well as America’s recent victory over Iraq.

All of this and more contributed to the situation in which we find ourselves today: a military that controls government and one that, ironically, can’t fight. It wasn’t any single cause that led us to this point. Instead, it was a combination of several different developments, the beginnings of which were evident in 1992. Here’s what I think happened:

Americans became exasperated with democracy. We were disillusioned with the apparent inability of elected government to solve the nation’s dilemmas. We were looking for someone or something that could produce workable answers. The one institution of government in which the people retained faith was the military. Buoyed by the military’s obvious competence in the First Gulf War, the public increasingly turned to it for solutions to the country’s problems. Americans called for an acceleration of trends begun in the 1980s: tasking the military with a variety of new, nontraditional missions, and vastly escalating its commitment to formerly ancillary duties.

Though not obvious at the time, the cumulative effect of these new responsibilities was to incorporate the military into the political process to an unprecedented degree. These additional assignments also had the perverse effect of diverting focus and resources from the military’s central mission of combat training and warfighting. Finally, organizational, political, and societal changes served to alter the American military’s culture. Today’s military is not the one we knew when we graduated from the War College.

Let me explain how I came to these conclusions. In 1992 not very many people would’ve thought a military coup d’etat could ever happen here. Sure, there were eccentric conspiracy theorists who saw the Pentagon’s hand in the assassination of President Kennedy,[3] President Nixon’s downfall,[4] and similar events. But even the most avid believers had to admit that no outright military takeover had ever occurred before now. Heeding Washington’s admonitions in his Farewell address about the dangers of overgrown military establishments,[5] Americans generally viewed their armed forces with a judicious mixture of respect and wariness.[6] For over two centuries that vigilance was rewarded, and most Americans came to consider the very notion of a military coup preposterous. Historian Andrew Janos captured the conventional view of the latter half of the 20th century in this clipping I saved:

A coup d’etat in the United States would be too fantastic to contemplate, not only because few would actually entertain the idea, but also because the bulk of the people are strongly attached to the prevailing political system and would rise in defense of a political leader even though they might not like him. The environment most hospitable to coups d’etat is one in which political apathy prevails as the dominant style.[7]

However, when Janos wrote that back in 1964, 61.9 percent of the electorate voted. Since then voter participation has steadily declined. By 1988 only 50.1 percent of the eligible voters cast a ballot.[8] Simple extrapolation of those numbers to last spring’s Referendum would have predicted almost exactly the turnout. It was precisely reversed from that of 1964: 61.9 percent of the electorate did not vote.

America’s societal malaise was readily apparent in 1992. Seventy-eight percent of Americans believed the country was on the "wrong track." One researcher declared that social indicators were at their lowest level in 20 years and insisted "something [was] coming loose in the social infrastructure." The nation was frustrated and angry about its problems.[9]

America wanted solutions and democratically elected government wasn’t providing them.[10] The country suffered from a "deep pessimism about politicians and government after years of broken promises."[11] David Finkle observed in The Washington Post Magazine that for most Americans "the perception of government is that it has evolved from something that provides democracy’s framework into something that provides obstacles, from something to celebrate into something to ignore." Likewise, politicians and their proposals seemed stale and repetitive. Millions of voters gave up hope of finding answers.[12] The "environment of apathy" Janos characterized as a precursor to a coup had arrived.

Unlike the rest of government the military enjoyed a remarkably steady climb in popularity throughout the 1980s and early 1990s.[13] And indeed it had earned the admiration of the public. Debilitated by the Vietnam War, the US military set about reinventing itself. As early as 1988 U.S. News & World Report heralded the result: "In contrast to the dispirited, drug-ravaged, do-your-own-thing armed services of the ’70s and early ’80s, the US military has been transformed into a fighting force of gung-ho attitude, spit-shined discipline, and ten-hut morale."[14] After the US military dealt Iraq a crushing defeat in the First Gulf War, the ignominy of Vietnam evaporated.

When we graduated from the War College in 1992, the armed forces were the smartest, best educated, and best disciplined force in history.[15] While polls showed that the public invariably gave Congress low marks, a February 1991 survey disclosed that "public confidence in the military soar[ed] to 85 percent, far surpassing every other institution in our society." The armed forces had become America’s most–and perhaps only–trusted arm of government.[16]

Assumptions about the role of the military in society also began to change. Twenty years before we graduated, the Supreme Court confidently declared in Laird v. Tatum that Americans had a "traditional and strong resistance to any military intrusion into civilian affairs."[17] But Americans were now rethinking the desirability and necessity of that resistance. They compared the military’s principled competence with the chicanery and ineptitude of many elected officials, and found the latter wanting.[18]

Commentator James Fallows expressed the new thinking in an August 1991 article in Atlantic magazine. Musing on the contributions of the military to American society, Fallows wrote: "I am beginning to think that the only way the national government can do anything worthwhile is to invent a security threat and turn the job over to the military." He elaborated on his reasoning:

According to our economic and political theories, most agencies of the government have no special standing to speak about the general national welfare. Each represents a certain constituency; the interest groups fight it out. The military, strangely, is the one government institution that has been assigned legitimacy to act on its notion of the collective good. "National defense" can make us do things–train engineers, build highways–that long-term good of the nation or common sense cannot.[19]

About a decade before Fallows’ article appeared, Congress initiated the use of "national defense" as a rationale to boost military participation in an activity historically the exclusive domain of civilian government: law enforcement. Congress concluded that the "rising tide of drugs being smuggled into the United States . . . present[ed] a grave threat to all Americans." Finding the performance of civilian law enforcement agencies in counteracting that threat unsatisfactory, Congress passed the Military Cooperation with Civilian Law Enforcement Agencies Act of 1981.[20] In doing so Congress specifically intended to force reluctant military commanders to actively collaborate in police work.[21]

This was a historic change of policy. Since the passage of the Posse Comitatus Act in 1878, the military had distanced itself from law enforcement activities.[22] While the 1981 law did retain certain limits on the legal authority of military personnel, its net effect was to dramatically expand military participation in anti-drug efforts.[23] By 1991 the Department of Defense was spending $1.2 billion on counternarcotics crusades. Air Force surveillance aircraft were sent to track airborne smugglers; Navy ships patrolled the Caribbean looking for drug-laden vessels; and National Guardsmen were searching for marijuana caches near the borders.[24] By 1992 "combatting" drug trafficking was formally declared a "high national security mission."[25]

It wasn’t too long before 21st-century legislators were calling for more military involvement in police work.[26] Crime seemed out of control. Most disturbing, the incidence of violent crime continued to climb.[27] Americans were horrified and desperate: a third even believed vigilantism could be justified.[28] Rising lawlessness was seen as but another example of the civilian political leadership’s inability to fulfill government’s most basic duty to ensure public safety.[29] People once again wanted the military to help.

Hints of an expanded police function were starting to surface while we were still at the War College. For example, District of Columbia National Guardsmen established a regular military presence in high-crime areas.[30] Eventually, people became acclimated to seeing uniformed military personnel patrolling their neighborhood.[31] Now troops are an adjunct to almost all police forces in the country. In many of the areas where much of our burgeoning population of elderly Americans live–Brutus calls them "National Security Zones"–the military is often the only law enforcement agency. Consequently, the military was ideally positioned in thousands of communities to support the coup.

Concern about crime was a major reason why General Brutus’s actions were approved in the Referendum. Although voter participation by the general public was low, older Americans voted at a much higher rate.[32] Furthermore, with the aging of the baby boom generation, the block of American voters over 45 grew to almost 53 percent of the voters by 2010.[33] This wealthy,[34] older electorate welcomed an organization which could ensure their physical security.[35] When it counted, they backed Brutus in the Referendum–probably the last votes they’ll ever cast.

The military’s constituency was larger than just the aged. Poor Americans of all ages became dependent upon the military not only for protection against crime, but also for medical care. Again we saw the roots of this back in 1992. First it was the barely defeated proposal to use veterans’ hospitals to provide care for the non-veteran poor.[36] Next were calls to deploy military medical assets to relieve hard-pressed urban hospitals.[37] As the number of uninsured and underinsured grew, the pressure to provide care became inexorable. Now military hospitals serve millions of new, non-military patients. Similarly, a proposal to use so-called "underutilized" military bases as drug rehabilitation centers was implemented on a massive scale.[38]

Even the youngest citizens were co-opted. During the 1990s the public became aware that military officers had the math and science backgrounds desperately needed to revitalize US education.[39] In fact, programs involving military personnel were already underway while we were at the War College.[40] We now have an entire generation of young people who have grown up comfortable with the sight of military personnel patrolling their streets and teaching in their classrooms.

As you know, it wasn’t just crises in public safety, medical care, and education that the military was tasked to mend. The military was also called upon to manage the cleanup of the nation’s environmental hazards. By 1992 the armed services were deeply involved in this arena, and that involvement mushroomed. Once the military demonstrated its expertise, it wasn’t long before environmental problems were declared "national security threats" and full responsibility devolved to the armed forces.[41]

Other problems were transformed into "national security" issues. As more commercial airlines went bankrupt and unprofitable air routes dropped, the military was called upon to provide "essential" air transport to the affected regions. In the name of national defense, the military next found itself in the sealift business. Ships purchased by the military for contingencies were leased, complete with military crews, at low rates to US exporters to help solve the trade deficit.[42] The nation’s crumbling infrastructure was also declared a "national security threat." As was proposed back in 1991, troops rehabilitated public housing, rebuilt bridges and roads, and constructed new government buildings. By late 1992, voices in both Congress and the military had reached a crescendo calling for military involvement across a broad spectrum of heretofore purely civilian activities.[43] Soon, it became common in practically every community to see crews of soldiers working on local projects.[44] Military attire drew no stares.

The revised charter for the armed forces was not confined to domestic enterprises. Overseas humanitarian and nation-building assignments proliferated.[45] Though these projects have always been performed by the military on an ad hoc basis, in 1986 Congress formalized that process. It declared overseas humanitarian and civic assistance activities to be "valid military missions" and specifically authorized them by law.[46] Fueled by favorable press for operations in Iraq, Bangladesh, and the Philippines during the early 1990s, humanitarian missions were touted as the military’s "model for the future."[47] That prediction came true. When several African governments collapsed under AIDS epidemics and famines around the turn of the century, US troops–first introduced to the continent in the 1990s–were called upon to restore basic services. They never left.[48] Now the US military constitutes the de facto government in many of those areas. Once again, the first whisperings of such duties could be heard in 1992.[49]

By the year 2000 the armed forces had penetrated many vital aspects of American society. More and more military officers sought the kind of autonomy in these civilian affairs that they would expect from their military superiors in the execution of traditional combat operations. Thus began the inevitable politicization of the military. With so much responsibility for virtually everything government was expected to do, the military increasingly demanded a larger role in policymaking. But in a democracy policymaking is a task best left to those accountable to the electorate. Nonetheless, well- intentioned military officers, accustomed to the ordered, hierarchical structure of military society, became impatient with the delays and inefficiencies inherent in the democratic process. Consequently, they increasingly sought to avoid it. They convinced themselves that they could more productively serve the nation in carrying out their new assignments if they accrued to themselves unfettered power to implement their programs. They forgot Lord Acton’s warning that "all power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."[50]

Congress became their unwitting ally. Because of the popularity of the new military programs–and the growing dependence upon them–Congress passed the Military Plenipotentiary Act of 2005. This legislation was the legacy of the Goldwater-Nichols Defense Reorganization Act of 1986. Among many revisions, Goldwater-Nichols strengthened the office of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and mandated numerous changes intended to increase "jointness" in the armed services.[51] Supporters of the Military Plenipotentiary Act argued that unity of command was critical to the successful management of the numerous activities now considered "military" operations. Moreover, many Congressmen mistakenly believed that Goldwater-Nichols was one of the main reasons for the military’s success in the First Gulf War.[52] They viewed the Military Plenipotentiary Act as an enhancement of the strengths of Goldwater-Nichols.

In passing this legislation Congress added greater authority to the military’s top leadership position. Lulled by favorable experiences with Chairmen like General Colin Powell,[53] Congress saw little danger in converting the office of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff into the even more powerful Military Plenipotentiary. No longer merely an advisor, the Military Plenipotentiary became a true commander of all US services, purportedly because that status could better ameliorate the effects of perceived interservice squabbling. Despite warnings found in the legislative history of Goldwater-Nichols and elsewhere, enormous power was concentrated in the hands of a single, unelected official.[54] Unfortunately, Congress presumed that principled people would always occupy the office.[55] No one expected a General Brutus would arise.

The Military Plenipotentiary was not Congress’s only structural change in military governance. By 2007 the services were combined to form the Unified Armed Forces. Recall that when we graduated from the War College greater unification was being seriously suggested as an economy measure.[56] Eventually that consideration, and the conviction that "jointness" was an unqualified military virtue,[57] led to unification. But unification ended the creative tension between the services.[58] Besides rejecting the operational logic of separate services,[59] no one seemed to recognize the checks-and-balances function that service separatism provided a democracy obliged to maintain a large, professional military establishment. The Founding Fathers knew the importance of checks and balances in controlling the agencies of government: "Ambition must be made to counteract ambition. . . . Experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary controls . . . [including] supplying opposite and rival interests."[60]

Ambition is a natural trait of military organizations and their leaders.[61] Whatever might have been the inefficiencies of separate military services, their very existence served to counteract the untoward desires of any single service. The roles and missions debates and other arguments, once seen as petty military infighting, also provided an invaluable forum for competitive analysis of military doctrine. Additionally, they served to ensure that unscrupulous designs by a segment of the military establishment were ruthlessly exposed. Once the services were unified, the impetus to do so vanished, and the authority of the military in relation to the other institutions of government rose.[62] Distended by its pervasive new duties, monolithic militarism came to dominate the Darwinian political environment of 21st-century America.

Why did the uniformed leadership of our day acquiesce to this transformation of the military? Much of the answer can be traced to the budget showdowns of the early 1990s. The collapse of the Soviet Union left the US military without an easily articulated rationale for large defense budgets. Billions in cuts were sought. Journalist Bruce Auster put it bluntly: "Winning a share of the budget wars . . . require[s] that the military find new missions for a post-Cold War world that is devoid of clear military threats."[63] Capitulating, military leaders embraced formerly disdained assignments. As one commentator cynically observed, "the services are eager to talk up nontraditional, budget-justifying roles."[64] The Vietnam-era aphorism, "It’s a lousy war, but it’s the only one we’ve got," was resuscitated.

Still, that doesn’t completely explain why in 2012 the military leadership would succumb to a coup. To answer that question fully requires examination of what was happening to the officer corps as the military drew down in the 1980s and 1990s. Ever since large peacetime military establishments became permanent features after World War II, the great leveler of the officer corps was the constant influx of officers from the Reserve Officers Training Corps program. The product of diverse colleges and universities throughout the United States, these officers were a vital source of liberalism in the military services.[65]

By the late 1980s and early 1990s, however, that was changing. Force reductions decreased the number of ROTC graduates the services accepted.[66] Although General Powell called ROTC "vital to democracy," 62 ROTC programs were closed in 1991 and another 350 were considered for closure.[67] The numbers of officers produced by the service academies also fell, but at a significantly slower pace. Consequently, the proportion of academy graduates in the officer corps climbed.[68] Academy graduates, along with graduates of such military schools as the Citadel, Virginia Military Institute, and Norwich University, tended to feel a greater homogeneity of outlook than, say, the pool of ROTC graduates at large, with the result that as the proportion of such graduates grew, diversity of outlook overall diminished to some degree.

Moreover, the ROTC officers that did remain increasingly came from a narrower range of schools. Focusing on the military’s policy to exclude homosexuals from service, advocates of "political correctness" succeeded in driving ROTC from the campuses of some of our best universities.[69] In many instances they also prevailed in barring military recruiters from campus.[70] Little thought was given the long-term consequences of limiting the pool from which our military leadership was drawn. The result was a much more uniformly oriented military elite whose outlook was progressively conservative.

Furthermore, well-meaning attempts at improving service life led to the unintended insularity of military society, representing a return to the cloistered life of the pre-World War II armed forces. Military bases, complete with schools, churches, stores, child care centers, and recreational areas, became never-to-be-left islands of tranquillity removed from the chaotic, crime-ridden environment outside the gates.[71] As one reporter put it in 1991: "Increasingly isolated from mainstream America, today’s troops tend to view the civilian world with suspicion and sometimes hostility."[72] Thus, a physically isolated and intellectually alienated officer corps was paired with an enlisted force likewise distanced from the society it was supposed to serve. In short, the military evolved into a force susceptible to manipulation by an authoritarian leader from its own select ranks.

What made this all the more disheartening was the wretched performance of our forces in the Second Gulf War.[73] Consumed with ancillary and nontraditional missions, the military neglected its fundamental raison d’etre. As the Supreme Court succinctly put it more than a half century ago, the "primary business of armies and navies [is] to fight or be ready to fight wars should the occasion arise."[74] When Iranian armies started pouring into the lower Gulf states in 2010, the US armed forces were ready to do anything but fight.

Preoccupation with humanitarian duties, narcotics interdiction, and all the rest of the peripheral missions left the military unfit to engage an authentic military opponent. Performing the new missions sapped resources from what most experts agree was one of the vital ingredients to victory in the First Gulf War: training. Training is, quite literally, a zero-sum game. Each moment spent performing a nontraditional mission is one unavailable for orthodox military exercises. We should have recognized the grave risk. In 1991 The Washington Post reported that in "interview after interview across the services, senior leaders and noncommissioned officers stressed that they cannot be ready to fight without frequent rehearsals of perishable skills."[75]

The military’s anti-drug activities were a big part of the problem. Oh sure, I remember the facile claims of exponents of the military’s counternarcotics involvement as to what "valuable" training it provided.[76] Did anyone really think that crew members of an AWACS–an aircraft designed to track high-performance military aircraft in combat–significantly improved their skills by hours of tracking slow-moving light planes? Did they seriously imagine that troops enhanced combat skills by looking for marijuana under car seats? Did they truly believe that crews of the Navy’s sophisticated antiair and anti-submarine ships received meaningful training by following lumbering trawlers around the Caribbean?[77] Tragically, they did.

The problem was exacerbated when political pressures exempted the Guard and the Reserves from the harshest effects of the budgetary cutbacks of the early 1990s.[78] The First Gulf War demonstrated that modern weapons and tactics were simply too complex for part-time soldiers to master during their allotted drill periods, however well motivated.[79] Still, creative Guard and Reserve defenders contrived numerous civic-action and humanitarian assignments and sold them as "training." Left unexplained was how such training was supposed to fit with military strategies that contemplated short, violent, come-as-you-are expeditionary wars.[80] Nice-to-have Guard and Reserve support-oriented programs prevailed at the expense of critical active-duty combat capabilities.[81]

Perhaps even more damaging than the diversion of resources was the assault on the very ethos of military service. Rather than bearing in mind the Supreme Court’s admonition to focus on warfighting, the military was told to alter its purpose. Former Secretary of State James Baker typified the trendy new tone in remarks about the military’s airlift of food and medicine to the former Soviet republics in early 1992. He said the airlift would "vividly show the peoples of the former Soviet Union that those that once prepared for war with them now have the courage and the conviction to use their militaries to say, `We will wage a new peace.’"[82]

In truth militaries ought to "prepare for war" and leave the "peace waging" to those agencies of government whose mission is just that. Nevertheless, such pronouncements–seconded by military leaders[83]–became the fashionable philosophy. The result? People in the military no longer considered themselves warriors. Instead, they perceived themselves as policemen, relief workers, educators, builders, health care providers, politicians–everything but warfighters. When these philanthropists met the Iranian 10th Armored Corps near Daharan during the Second Gulf War, they were brutally slaughtered by a military which had not forgotten what militaries were supposed to do or what war is really all about.

The devastation of the military’s martial spirit was exemplified by its involvement in police activities. Inexplicably, we ignored the deleterious effect on combat motivation suffered by the Israeli Defense Forces as a result of their efforts to police the West Bank and Gaza.[84] Few seemed to appreciate the fundamental difference between the police profession and the profession of arms. As Richard J. Barnet observed in The New Yorker, "The line between police action and a military operation is real. Police derive their power from their acceptance as `officers of the law’; legitimate authority, not firepower, is the essential element."[85]

Police organizations are understandably oriented toward the studied restraint necessary for the end sought: a judicial conviction. As one Drug Enforcement Administration agent noted: "The military can kill people better than we can [but] when we go to a jungle lab, we’re not there to move onto the target by fire and maneuver to destroy the enemy. We’re there to arrest suspects and seize evidence."[86] If military forces are inculcated with the same spirit of restraint, combat performance is threatened.[87] Moreover, law enforcement is also not just a form of low-intensity conflict. In low-intensity conflict, the military aim is to win the will of the people, a virtually impossible task with criminals "motivated by money, not ideology."[88]

Humanitarian missions likewise undermined the military’s sense of itself. As one Navy officer gushed during the 1991 Bangladesh relief operation, "It’s great to be here doing the opposite of a soldier."[89] While no true soldier relishes war, the fact remains that the essence of the military is warfighting and preparation for the same. What journalist Barton Gellman has said of the Army can be extrapolated to the military as a whole: it is an "organization whose fighting spirit depends . . . heavily on tradition."[90] If that tradition becomes imbued with a preference for "doing the opposite of a soldier," fighting spirit is bound to suffer. When we first heard editorial calls to "pacify the military" by involving it in civic projects,[91] we should have given them the forceful rebuke they deserved.

Military analyst Harry Summers warned back in ‘91 that when militaries lose sight of their purpose, catastrophe results. Citing a study of pre-World War II Canadian military policy as it related to the subsequent battlefield disasters, he observed that

instead of using the peacetime interregnum to hone their military skills, senior Canadian military officers sought out civilian missions to justify their existence. When war came they were woefully unprepared. Instead of protecting their soldiers’ lives they led them to their deaths. In today’s post-Cold War peacetime environment, this trap again looms large. . . . Some today within the US military are also searching for relevance, with draft doctrinal manuals giving touchy-feely prewar and postwar civil operations equal weight with warfighting. This is an insidious mistake.[92]

We must remember that America’s position at the end of the Cold War had no historical precedent. For the first time the nation–in peacetime–found itself with a still-sizable, professional military establishment that was not preoccupied with an overarching external threat.[93] Yet the uncertainties in the aftermath of the Cold War limited the extent to which those forces could be safely downsized. When the military was then obliged to engage in a bewildering array of nontraditional duties to further justify its existence, it is little wonder that its traditional apolitical professionalism eventually eroded.

Clearly, the curious tapestry of military authoritarianism and combat ineffectiveness that we see today was not yet woven in 1992. But the threads were there. Knowing what I know now, here’s the advice I would have given the War College Class of 1992 had I been their graduation speaker:

• Demand that the armed forces focus exclusively on indisputably military duties. We must not diffuse our energies away from our fundamental responsibility for warfighting. To send ill-trained troops into combat makes us accomplices to murder.

• Acknowledge that national security does have economic, social, educational, and environmental dimensions, but insist that this doesn’t necessarily mean the problems in those areas are the responsibility of the military to correct. Stylishly designating efforts to solve national ills as "wars" doesn’t convert them into something appropriate for the employment of military forces.

• Readily cede budgetary resources to those agencies whose business it is to address the non-military issues the armed forces are presently asked to fix. We are not the DEA, EPA, Peace Corps, Department of Education, or Red Cross–nor should we be. It has never been easy to give up resources, but in the long term we–and the nation–will be better served by a smaller but appropriately focused military.

• Divest the defense budget of perception-skewing expenses. Narcotics interdiction, environmental cleanup, humanitarian relief, and other costs tangential to actual combat capability should be assigned to the budgets of DEA, EPA, State, and so forth. As long as these expensive programs are hidden in the defense budget, the taxpayer understandably–but mistakenly–will continue to believe he’s buying military readiness.

• Continue to press for the elimination of superfluous, resource-draining Guard and Reserve units. Increase the training tempo, responsibilities, and compensation of those that remain.

• Educate the public to the sophisticated training requirements occasioned by the complexities of modern warfare. It’s imperative we rid the public of the misperception that soldiers in peacetime are essentially unemployed and therefore free to assume new missions.[94]

• Resist unification of the services not only on operational grounds, but also because unification would be inimical to the checks and balances that underpin democratic government. Slow the pace of fiscally driven consolidation so that the impact on less quantifiable aspects of military effectiveness can be scrutinized.

• Assure that officer accessions from the service academies correspond with overall force reductions (but maintain separate service academies) and keep ROTC on a wide diversity of campuses. If necessary, resort to litigation to maintain ROTC campus diversity.

• Orient recruiting resources and campaigns toward ensuring that all echelons of society are represented in the military, without compromising standards.[95] Accept that this kind of recruiting may increase costs. It’s worth it.

• Work to moderate the base-as-an-island syndrome by providing improved incentives for military members and families to assimilate into civilian communities. Within the information programs for our force of all-volunteer professionals (increasingly US-based), strengthen the emphasis upon such themes as the inviolability of the Constitution, ascendancy of our civilian leadership over the military, and citizens’ responsibilities.

Finally, I would tell our classmates that democracy is a fragile institution that must be continuously nurtured and scrupulously protected. I would also tell them that they must speak out when they see the institution threatened; indeed, it is their duty to do so. Richard Gabriel aptly observed in his book To Serve with Honor that

when one discusses dissent, loyalty, and the limits of military obligations, the central problem is that the military represents a threat to civil order not because it will usurp authority, but because it does not speak out on critical policy decisions. The soldier fails to live up to his oath to serve the country if he does not speak out when he sees his civilian or military superiors executing policies he feels to be wrong.[96]

Gabriel was wrong when he dismissed the military’s potential to threaten civil order, but he was right when he described our responsibilities. The catastrophe that occurred on our watch took place because we failed to speak out against policies we knew were wrong. It’s too late for me to do any more. But it’s not for you.

Best regards,
Prisoner 222305759

NOTES

1. The Twenty-fifth Amendment to the Constitution provides that in the case of "death . . . the Vice President shall become the President." But Section 1 of Article II requires the taking of the oath before "enter[ing] the Execution of his Office."

2. Daniel J. Boorstin, "History’s Hidden Turning Points," U.S. News & World Report, 22 April 1991, p. 52.

3. Oliver Stone’s movie, JFK, is one example. See Joel Achenbach, "JFK Conspiracy: Myth vs. Facts," The Washington Post, 28 February 1992, p. C5.

4. See Len Colodny and Robert Gettlin, Silent Coup (New York: St. Martin’s, 1991).

5. George Washington in his "Farewell Address" dated 19 September 1796 counseled: "Overgrown military establishments . . . under any form of government are inauspicious to liberty and . . . are to be regarded as particularly hostile to republican liberty." As quoted in The Annals of America (Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, 1976), p. 609.

6. Author Geoffrey Perret expressed the traditional view as follows: "The antimilitaristic side of the American character is forever on guard. Americans are so suspicious of military ambition that even when the armed forces win wars they are criticized as robustly as if they had lost them." A Country Made By War (New York: Vintage, 1989), p. 560.

7. Andrew C. Janos, "The Seizure of Power: A Study of Force and Popular Consent," Research Monograph No. 16, Center for International Studies, Princeton University, 1964, p. 39.

8. Mark S. Hoffman, ed., The World Almanac & Book of Facts 1991 (New York: Pharo Books, 1990), p. 426; Royce Crocker, Voter Registration and Turnout 1948-1988, Library of Congress, Congressional Research Service Report No. 89-179 (Washington: LOC, 1989), p. 11.

9. E. J. Dionne, Jr., "Altered States: The Union & the Campaign," The Washington Post, 26 January 1992, p. C1. Fordham University researcher Marc Miringoff reports that the Index of Social Indicators fell to its lowest point in 20 years. He describes the Index, which is an amalgamation of social and economic data from government sources, as "sort of a Dow Jones of the national soul." See Paul Taylor, "`Dow Jones of the National Soul’ Sours," The Washington Post, 16 January 1992, p. A25. The nation’s frustration was the cause, according to columnist George F. Will, of a rising level of collective "national stress." George F. Will, "Stressed Out in America," The Washington Post, 16 January 1992, p. A27. See also Charles Krauthammer, "America’s Case of the Sulks," The Washington Post, 19 January 1992, p. C7.

10. A 1989 Harris poll revealed that 53% of Americans believed that Congress was not effectively fulfilling its responsibilities. See Robert R. Ivany, "Soldiers and Legislators: Common Mission," Parameters, 21 (Spring 1991), 47.

11. Mortimer B. Zuckerman, "Behind Our Loss of Faith," U.S. News & World Report, 16 March 1992, p. 76. Many believed that democracy’s promise didn’t include them. Ninety-one percent of Americans reported that the "group with too little influence in government is people like themselves." See "Harper’s Index," Harper’s Magazine, January 1991, p. 17.

12. David Finkle, "The Greatest Democracy on Earth," The Washington Post Magazine, 16 February 1992, p. 16. Forty-three percent of those who failed to vote didn’t see any important differences between the two major parties. See "Harper’s Index," Harper’s Magazine, March 1992, p. 13. One in eight Americans was so pessimistic as to conclude that the country’s domestic problems were "beyond solving." "Harper’s Index," Harper’s Magazine, October 1991, p. 15.

13. A ten-year rise in public confidence was reported by Tom Morganthau, et al., in "The Military’s New Image," Newsweek, 11 March 1991, p. 50.

14. Michael Satchell, et al., "The Military’s New Stars," U.S. News & World Report, 18 April 1988, p. 33.

15. A survey of 163 new Army brigadier generals revealed that their IQ was in the 92nd percentile of the population. See Bruce W. Nelan, "Revolution in Defense," Time, 18 March 1991, p. 25. In many instances the curricula vitae of military personnel was more impressive than that of their civilian counterparts. For example, over 88% of brigadier generals had an advanced degree compared with 19% of top civilian business leaders. See David Gergen, "America’s New Heroes," U.S. News & World Report, 11 February 1991, p. 76. Similarly, 97% of enlisted personnel were high school graduates, the highest percentage ever. See Grant Willis, "DoD: Recruits in ‘91 Best Educated, Most Qualified," Air Force Times, 27 January 1992, p. 14. The services "had become practically a drug-free workplace." See David Gergen, "Bringing Home the Storm," The Washington Post, 28 April 1991, p. C2. Military sociologist Charles Moskos explained that the reason for the great decline in disciplinary problems is "simply better recruits." Peter Slavin, "Telling It Like It Is," Air Force Times, 14 March 1988, p. 60.

16. Ivany, 47; David Gergen, "America’s New Heroes," p. 76; Grant Willis, "A New Generation of Warriors," Navy Times, 16 March 1991, p. 12.

17. 408 U.S. 1, 17 (1972).

18. At least one observer sensed the peril which arises when power and respect converge in the military: "Our warriors are kinder and gentler, and have not shown the slightest inclination to lust for political power. But that potential always lurks where power and respect converge, and the degree of military influence in society is something to watch carefully in the years ahead." Martin Anderson, "The Benefits of the Warrior Class," The Baltimore Sun, 14 April 1991, p. 3F.

19. James Fallows, "Military Efficiency," Atlantic, August 1991, p. 18.

20. Civilian law enforcement agencies were intercepting only 15% of the drugs entering the country. See U.S. Code Congressional & Administrative News (St. Paul: West, 1981), p. 1785; Public Law 97-86 (1981) codified in 10 U.S.C. 371 et seq.

21. Newsweek reports: "The Pentagon resisted the [counternarcotics] mission for decades, saying that the military should fight threats to national security, and the police should fight crime." Charles Lane, "The Newest War," Newsweek, 6 January 1992, p. 18. See also U.S. Code Congressional & Administrative News (St. Paul: West, 1981), p. 1785.

22. The original purpose of the Posse Comitatus Act (10 U.S.C. 1385) was to restrain Federal troops who had become deeply involved in law enforcement in the post-Civil War South–even in areas where civil government had been reestablished. See U.S. v. Hartley, 486 F.Supp. 1348, 1356 fn. 11 (M.D.Fla. 1980). The statute imposes criminal penalties for the improper uses of the military in domestic law enforcement matters. See U.S. Code Congressional & Administrative News (St. Paul: West, 1981), p. 1786.

23. Additional amendments were added in 1988. See Public Law 100-456 (1988).

24. Although anti-drug spending will decrease in FY 93, the rate of decline is slower than that of the DOD budget as a whole. William Matthews, "Counternarcotics Request Increased," Air Force Times, 24 February 1992, p. 2. See also Lane, "Newest War," p. 18.

25. "Combatting Drugs," National Military Strategy of the United States (Washington: GPO, 1992), p. 15.

26. Some were suggesting the need for greater military authority in 1992. See Dale E. Brown, "Drugs on the Border: The Role of the Military," Parameters, 21 (Winter 1991-92), 58-59.

27. The rise in the rate of violent crime continued a trend begun in the 1980s when such offenses soared by 23%. See John W. Wright, ed., "Crime and Punishment," The Universal Almanac 1992 (Kansas City: Andrews and McMeel, 1991), p. 255.

28. "Harper’s Index," Harper’s Magazine, July 1991, p. 15.

29. George Will observed that "urban governments are failing to perform their primary function of protecting people from violence on streets and even in homes and schools." George F. Will, "Stressed Out in America," p. A27.

30. Using Guardsmen in a law enforcement capacity during riots and other emergencies was not unusual, but a regular presence in a civilian community in that role was unusual in those days. Guard members usually performed law enforcement activities in their status as state employees. This is distinct from their federalized status when they are incorporated into the US military. See U.S. Code Congressional & Administrative News (St. Paul: West, 1988), p. 2583; and K. R. Clark, "Spotlighting the Drug Zone," Pentagram, 30 January 1992, pp. 20-21.

31. Indeed, one of the specific purposes of the DC program was to "work with police to increase the uniformed presence in the neighborhood at night to cut down on illegal activity." See Clark p. 21.

32. For example, persons over the age of 65 vote at a rate 50% higher than that of the 18-34 age group. See George F. Will, "Stressed Out in America," p. A27.

33. The number of baby boomers in the population is expected to peak in 2020. See Marvin J. Cetron and Owen Davies, "Trends Shaping the World," The Futurist, September-October 1991, p. 12. Persons over 65 were estimated to constitute 18% of the electorate by 2010. This group, together with the boomers over 45 years, would constitute 53% of the electorate by 2010. These percentages were computed from statistics found in the Universal Almanac 1992, "The U.S. Population by Age," John W. Wright, ed. (Kansas City: Andrews and McMeel, 1991), p. 207.

34. Deidre Fanning, "Waiting for the Wealth," Worth, February/March 1992, pp. 87, 89.

35. A 1990 poll of Americans aged 50 years and older showed that nearly 23% believed that use of the military was the best way to combat the growing problems of drug abuse and crime. See Mark S. Hoffman, ed., The World Almanac & Book of Facts 1991 (New York: Pharo Books, 1990), p. 33.

36. "Plan to Open Veterans Hospitals to Poor is Dropped," The New York Times, 23 February 1992, p. 17.

37. Scott Shuger, "Pacify the Military," The New York Times, 14 March 1992, p. 25.

38. Andy Tobias, "Let’s Get Moving!" Time, 3 February 1992, p. 41.

39. U.S. News & World Report noted that "a third of the officers leaving the Army are qualified to teach high school math, and 10 to 20 percent can teach physics." David Gergen, "Heroes For Hire," U.S. News & World Report, 27 January 1992, p. 71.

40. For example, a District of Columbia National Guard unit entered into a "Partnership in Education" agreement with a local school district. Under the memorandum the Guard agreed to "institute a cooperative learning center providing tutoring in science, English, mathematics, and other basic subjects." See "Guard Enters Partnership with School," Pentagram, 13 February 1992, p. 3. For another example, see "Arlington Schools Join Forces with Defense Department Agency," The Washington Post, 12 December 1991, p. Va. 1.

41. The DOD budget for environmental cleanup for FY 93 was $3.7 billion. Anne Garfinkle, "Going Home is Hard to Do," The Wall Street Journal, 27 January 1992, p. 12. See also Peter Grier, "US Defense Department Declares War on Colossal Pollution Problem," The Christian Science Monitor, 2 March 1992, p. 9. The Army, at least, saw this activity as a "vital mission" as early as 1991. The National Journal reported: "Outside the Storm, a pamphlet heralding the Army’s post-Persian Gulf war `vital missions and important work’ touches on the war on drugs and `protecting the planet Earth’ (even reprinting a syrupy ode to environmentalism from the 1989 Sierra Club Wilderness Calendar)." David C. Morrison, "Operation Kinder and Gentler," National Journal, 25 May 1991, p. 1260.

42. In February 1992 Trans World Airlines became the eighth major airline to go bankrupt since 1989. Martha M. Hamilton, "Trans World Airlines Files for Bankruptcy," The Washington Post, 1 February 1992, p. C2. By 1992 US-flagged commercial shipping had virtually disappeared. See James Bovard, "The Antiquated 1920 Jones Act Slowly Sinks U.S. Shipping," Insight, 6 January 1992, p. 21. In the wake of Desert Storm, $3.1 billion was spent to build and convert ships for the military’s cargo fleet. Michael Blood, "An Idea to Use Shipyard as a U.S. Sealift Base," Philadelphia Inquirer, 16 February 1992, p. B-1. The precedent for "leasing" military resources can be traced to 1992. Just such an arrangement occurred in Germany following reunification: "A shortage of German [air] controllers and their unfamiliarity with newly reunified Berlin’s busy skies prompted Germany to hire a squadron from the US Air Force at a cost of $35 million for four years. . . . It is the only US military unit that guides civilian air traffic on foreign soil." Soraya S. Nelson, "AF Controllers in Berlin Keep Eye on Civilian Sky," Air Force Times, 10 February 1992, p. 22.

43. See, e.g., Helen Dewar, "Nunn Urges Military Shift: Forces Would Aid Domestic Programs," The Washington Post, 24 June 1992, p. A17; Rick Maze, "Nunn Urges Military to Take Domestic Missions, Army Times, 21 September 1992, p. 16; Mary Jordan, "Bush Orders U.S. Military to Aid Florida," The Washington Post, 28 August 1992, p. A1; George C. Wilson, "Disaster Plan: Give Military the Relief Role," Army Times, 21 September 1992, p. 33; and Rick Maze, "Pentagon May Get Disaster-relief Role Back," Army Times, 21 September 1992, p. 26. See also note 64.

44. See Shuger, p. 25. Similarly, noting the growing obsolescence of the Guard’s combat role, a National Guard officer proposed an alternative: "The National Guard can provide a much greater service to the nation by seeking more combat support and combat service support missions and the structure to support them. Such units can participate in nation building or assistance missions throughout the world, to include the United States. . . . Much of our national infrastructure, streets, bridges, health care, water and sewer lines, to name just a few, particularly in the inner cities of the United States, are in disrepair. Many of the necessary repairs could be accomplished by National guard units on a year-round training basis." Colonel Philip Drew, "Taking the National Guard Out of Combat," National Guard, April 1991, p. 38. Also jumping on the bandwagon are National Guard officers Colonel Philip A. Brehm and Major Wilbur E. Gray in "Alternative Missions for the Army," SSI Study, Strategic Studies Institute, USAWC, 17 July 1992.

45. Eric Schmitt, "U.S. Forces Find Work As Angels Of Mercy," The New York Times, 12 January 1992, p. E3.

46. See the legislative history of Public Law 99-661, U.S. Code Congressional & Administrative News (St. Paul: West, 1986) p. 6482. Public Law 99-661 codified in 10 U.S.C. 401 et seq.

47. Ken Adelman, "Military Helping Hands," Washington Times, 8 July 1991, p. D3; Bruce B. Auster with Robin Knight, "The Pentagon Scramble to Stay Relevant," U.S. News & World Report, 30 December 1991/6 January 1992, p. 52.

48. It was predicted that the AIDS epidemic would hit Africa especially hard with infection rates in some cities as high as 40% by the year 2000. See Marvin J. Cetron and Owen Davies, "Trends Shaping the World," The Futurist, September-October 1991, p. 12. Some experts have predicted that African famine might present a requirement for a military humanitarian mission (Weiss and Campbell, pp. 451-52). See also Richard H. P. Sia, "U.S. Increasing Its Special Forces Activity in Africa," The Baltimore Sun, 15 March 1992, p. 1. Long-term military commitments to humanitarian operations have been recommended by some experts (Weiss and Campbell, p. 457).

49. US troops assigned to African countries in the early 1990s were tasked to "help improve local health-care and economic conditions." See Sia, p. 1. Similarly, the notion of using the expertise of US military personnel to perform governmental functions in foreign countries was also suggested in the 1990s. For example, when the food distribution system in the former Soviet Union broke down during the winter of 1991-92, there were calls for Lieutenant General Gus Pagonis, the logistical wizard of the First Gulf War, to be dispatched to take charge of the system. See "A Man Who Knows How," editorial, The Los Angeles Times, 5 February 1992, p. 10.

50. As quoted in Dictionary of Military and Naval Quotations, Robert Debs Heinl, Jr., ed. (Annapolis: US Naval Institute, 1966), p. 245.

51. Public Law 99-433 (1986). Under the Goldwater-Nichols Defense Reorganization Act, the Chairman of the JCS was given much broader powers. Not only is he now the primary military advisor to the President, he is also responsible for furnishing strategic direction to the armed forces, strategic and contingency planning, establishing budget priorities, and developing joint doctrine for all four services. Edward Luttwak and Stuart L. Koehl, eds., The Dictionary of Modern War (New York: Harper Collins, 1991), p. 320. The law also mandated that joint duty be a requirement for promotion to flag rank. See Vincent Davis, "Defense Reorganization and National Security," The Annals of the American Academy of Political Science, September 1991, pp. 163-65. This facilitated development of senior military cliques which transcended service lines.

52. Many praised Goldwater-Nichols as the source of success in the Gulf War. See, e.g., "Persian Gulf War’s Unsung Hero," editorial, Charleston, S.C., News & Courier, 4 April 1991, p. 6. See also Sam Nunn, "Military Reform Paved Way for Gulf Triumph," Atlanta Constitution, 31 March 1991, p. G5. But the Gulf War was not a true test of either Goldwater-Nichols or joint warfare. About all that conflict demonstrated was that poorly trained and miserably led conscript armies left unprotected from air attack cannot hold terrain in the face of a modern ground assault.

53. One study concluded that because of Powell’s background he was "especially well qualified" for the politically sensitive role as CJCS. See Preston Niblock, ed., Managing Military Operations in Crises (Santa Monica: RAND, 1991), p. 51.

54. Representative Denton stated as to Goldwater-Nichols: "This legislation proposes to reverse 200 years of American history by, for the first time, designating by statute . . . a single uniformed officer as the "Principal Military Advisor" to the President. That change in the role of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is profound in its implications. Similar proposals have been specifically and overwhelmingly rejected in the past–in 1947, 1949, 1958–on the grounds that, in a democracy, no single military officer, no matter what his personal qualifications, should have such power." U.S. Code Congressional & Administrative News (St. Paul, Minn.: West, 1986), p. 2248. See also Robert Previdi, Civilian Control versus Military Rule (New York: Hippocrene Books, 1988).

55. In The Federalist No. 51 the Founding Fathers warned against the folly of constructing a governmental system based on assumptions about the good character of individuals who might occupy an office.

56. William Matthews, "Nunn: Merge the Services?" Air Force Times, 9 March 1992, p. 6.

57. This belief was enshrined in Joint Pub 1, Joint Warfare of the United States (Washington: Office of the JCS, 11 November 1991). It states (p. iii) that "joint warfare is essential to victory." While joint warfare might usually be essential to victory, it cannot be said that it is essential in every instance. For example, rebels–composed entirely of irregular infantry–defeated massive Soviet combined-arms forces in Afghanistan. Equipped only with light arms, Stinger missiles, and light antiaircraft guns, they triumphed without benefit of any air or naval forces, and indeed without unity among themselves. Furthermore, even in the case of Western nations, there are likely to be plenty of hostilities involving single-service air or naval campaigns.

58. Former Secretary of the Navy John Lehman described the value of this creative tension in discussing his criticism of the "unified" Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff occasioned by Goldwater-Nichols. According to Lehman: "Franklin Roosevelt . . . wanted to hear Admiral King argue with Marshall in front of him. He wanted to hear MacArthur argue against Nimitz, and the Air Corps against the Army, and the Navy against all in his presence, so that he would have the option to make the decisions of major strategy in war. He knew that any political leader, no matter how strong, if given only one military position, finds it nearly impossible to go against it. Unfortunately . . . now the president does not get to hear arguments from differing points of view." John Lehman, "U.S. Defense Policy Options: The 1990s and Beyond," The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, September 1991, pp. 199-200.

59. See, e.g., Arthur C. Forster, Jr., "The Essential Need for An Independent Air Force," Air Force Times, 7 May 1990, p. 25.

60. Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay, The Federalist, as reprinted in the Great Books of the Western World, Robert M. Hutchins, ed. (Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, 1952), XLIII, 163.

61. Shakespeare called ambition "the soldier’s virtue." Antony and Cleopatra, Act III, Scene 1, as reprinted in the Great Books of the Western World, Robert M. Hutchins, ed. (Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, 1952), XXVII, 327.

62. Samuel P. Huntington, The Soldier and the State (Cambridge: Harvard Univ. P

Colbert Nation | “Richard Haass believes this century has the potential for America to cooperate with other countries to make the world safer,” says Colbert Nation.

Richard N. Haass is president of the Council on Foreign Relations, a position he has held since July 2003.

“The CFR is the American Branch of a society which originated in England, and which believes that national boundaries should be obliterated, and a one-world rule established.” –Carroll Quigley

“Does it not seem strange to you that these men just happened to be CFR and just happened to be on the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve, that absolutely controls the money and interest rates of this great country without benefit of Congress? A privately owned organization, the Federal Reserve, which has absolutely nothing to do with the United States of America!” –Barry Goldwater

“The CFR is the establishment. Not only does it have influence and power in key decision-making positions at the highest levels of government to apply pressure from above, but it also finances and uses individuals and groups to bring pressure from below, to justify the high level decisions for converting the U.S. from a sovereign Constitution Republic into a servile member of a one-world dictatorship.” –Congressmen John R. Rarick

“The Council on Foreign Relations, another member of the international complex, financed both by the Rockefeller and Carnegie foundations, overwhelmingly propagandizes the globalist concept.” –Congressman B. Carroll Reece

Cryptogon | This is Geithner’s bio from the New York Fed. I’ve emphasized a few little mom and pop outfits that any agent of Change/Hope would obviously be involved with. By some miracle, though, he’s not a former CEO of Goldman Sachs!*

*But read the Bloomberg piece below.:

Timothy F. Geithner became the ninth president and chief executive officer of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York on November 17, 2003. In that capacity, he serves as the vice chairman and a permanent member of the Federal Open Market Committee, the group responsible for formulating the nation’s monetary policy.

Mr. Geithner joined the Department of Treasury in 1988 and worked in three administrations for five Secretaries of the Treasury in a variety of positions. He served as Under Secretary of the Treasury for International Affairs from 1999 to 2001 under Secretaries Robert Rubin and Lawrence Summers.

He was director of the Policy Development and Review Department at the International Monetary Fund from 2001 until 2003. Before joining the Treasury, Mr. Geithner worked for Kissinger Associates, Inc.

Mr. Geithner graduated from Dartmouth College with a bachelor’s degree in government and Asian studies in 1983 and from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies with a master’s in International Economics and East Asian Studies in 1985. He has studied Japanese and Chinese and has lived in East Africa, India, Thailand, China, and Japan.

Mr. Geithner serves as chairman of the G-10’s Committee on Payment and Settlement Systems of the Bank for International Settlements. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the Group of Thirty.

He and his wife, Carole Sonnenfeld Geithner, have two children.

Via: Bloomberg:

The appointment of Timothy Geithner as U.S. Treasury secretary would deprive Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke of his top troubleshooter on Wall Street, compelling the Fed chief to act fast to find a replacement.

Geithner’s departure would mean the loss of the Fed executive Bernanke has relied on most to keep the financial system from collapsing in this year’s credit crisis. His successor may be another official involved in the government’s response, such as Fed Governor Kevin Warsh or New York Fed markets chief William Dudley, economists said.

Bernanke turned to Geithner, 47, president of the New York Fed, to carry out the rescues of Bear Stearns Cos. and American International Group Inc., and to help stem market turmoil after the decision to allow Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. to fail. Geithner was involved in the weekend’s government rescue of Citigroup Inc. and oversees most of the Fed’s special lending programs set up this year to channel more than $1 trillion to banks and other financial institutions.

Leadership of the New York Fed is “always an important post but vastly more important at the moment,” said former Fed Governor Lyle Gramley, now senior economic adviser at Stanford Group Co. in Washington. “It would be very important to fill it as rapidly as possible.”

Obama’s Announcement

President-elect Barack Obama announced today that he will nominate Geithner as Treasury secretary, and will appoint Lawrence Summers, Treasury secretary under President Bill Clinton, to head the National Economic Council.

The president of the New York Fed serves as the vice chairman of the Federal Open Market Committee and is the only district bank president with a permanent vote on interest rates. The other 11 presidents rotate votes every two or three years.

The New York Fed is the largest of the 12 district banks and plays a unique role, serving as the central bank’s chief liaison to securities firms and trading with bond dealers to keep the Fed’s main interest rate close to the target set by policy makers. The bank, which employs about 2,800 people, supervises some of the biggest U.S. commercial banks, with examiners reviewing their books on a regular basis.

Should Geithner become Treasury secretary, Dudley, the New York Fed’s executive vice president for markets, may serve as interim president, Gramley said.

Dudley, 55, former chief U.S. economist at Goldman Sachs Group Inc., worked with Geithner on conceiving and operating the special lending programs. He joined the New York Fed in January 2007 after two decades at Goldman and is in charge of the central bank’s trading with Wall Street bond dealers.

In 74 days, President-elect Barack Obama will assume responsibility for guiding the nation out of two wars and through a daunting array of real and potential global crises.

By Warren P. Strobel and Jonathan S. Landay

McClatchy News | In 74 days, President-elect Barack Obama will assume responsibility for guiding the nation out of two wars and through a daunting array of real and potential global crises.

Obama is likely to benefit from initial goodwill across much of the planet, where there's profound relief that the Bush years are ending.

Still, the new president — untested in foreign affairs — faces what may be the most unsettled global scene since the 1930s and '40s.

• Iraq, where Obama has promised to withdraw U.S. troops by summer 2010, is less violent, but far from stable or self-reliant.

• Al-Qaida and the Taliban have grown stronger and now control parts of Afghanistan and Pakistan's tribal areas.

• Neither sanctions nor sweeteners have halted Iran's nuclear development.

• North Korea's leader is ailing, raising questions about the stability of the nuclear-armed dictatorship.

Just a day after the election, Iran's military officials Wednesday issued a notice warning U.S. forces that any violation of Iranian airspace will be met with force.

"It has been observed that helicopters of the U.S. Army were flying a short distance from the Iran-Iraq border," said a statement issued by officials at Iran's military headquarters. "Iran's armed forces will forcefully respond to any attempts to violate the Islamic Republic of Iran's airspace."

The notice likely stemmed from fears that U.S. commandos might stage an operation inside Iran like the recent American incursion from Iraq into Syria.

Bush polarizing

While Bush's polarizing persona alienated some countries who do business with Iran, a unifying figure like Obama may help convince fence-sitters such as India, China, Turkey, Malaysia and Russia to synchronize their Iranian policies with the U.S.

The United States is still the world's dominant power, but it's less dominant than it was and increasingly is challenged by China, Russia and others.

Another test may already have come Wednesday, his first day as president-elect.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev announced in his first state of the nation speech that Russia will station short-range missiles near its border with Poland if Obama proceeds with Bush's plan to station missile-defense systems in Poland and the Czech Republic.

It was a reminder that Russia, which seemed cooperative during most of the tenure of Obama's two predecessors, has turned anti-Western.

The global economic crisis, more than any other factor, could limit Obama's flexibility in defense and foreign affairs, whether it's increasing the size of the U.S. military, as he's promised to do, or ramping up foreign aid in an attempt to expand American influence, former U.S. officials said.

"The administration is not going to come out of the box" immediately with large new foreign-policy initiatives, said James Dobbins a former assistant secretary of state now at the RAND Corp., a defense and international-relations research company."Frankly, that's not necessarily a bad thing."

Richard Haass, the president of the Council on Foreign Relations, said that what makes the current situation unique isn't the multiplicity of challenges facing the United States, but the fact that the U.S. military is stretched in Iraq and Afghanistan and the economic crisis demands attention.

"It's going to be the president's first priority. It will probably limit the availability of resources. It could lead to increased instability in certain countries around the world," Haass said.

Bush is hosting 20 leaders of the world's largest economies for a summit here in 10 days. While Obama seems unlikely to attend, he could meet the leaders while they're in Washington.

Troop pledge

Obama has pledged to remove U.S. troops from Iraq in 16 months after taking office and to increase U.S. forces in Afghanistan. Whether he can meet that deadline remains to be seen, and the future of the U.S. troop presence is caught up in an agreement Bush is negotiating with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki that's been delayed repeatedly.

Meanwhile, Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Wednesday called on Obama to end U.S. airstrikes that risk civilian casualties after coalition forces allegedly killed dozens of people at a wedding party in southern Afghanistan this week. Karzai said that about 40 civilians were killed and 28 wounded on Monday after coalition forces bombarded a village during a clash with Taliban fighters.

Obama has also promised to open diplomatic talks with U.S. adversaries such as Iran. Both Dobbins and Haass said that by reversing course in his final months and sending out feelers to Syria and allowing a senior U.S. diplomat to attend talks with Iran, Bush has helped Obama. Bush is expected to announce his intent to establish a U.S. diplomatic post in Tehran in coming weeks.

If history is a guide, Obama will face early tests from abroad as president, either from leaders seeking to gauge his mettle, or from surprise events.

Bush was challenged early in his presidency when a U.S. spy plane collided with a Chinese military jet and crash-landed on Chinese territory. President Clinton's first year saw the 1993 bombing of New York's World Trade Center and the deaths of 18 U.S. soldiers in Mogadishu, Somalia.

While foreign leaders may or may not choose to test Obama, "the one thing I'm sure of is, events will test him," Haass said. "There will be coups. ... There will be genocide. ... There will be terrorism."

By Steve Watson

Infowars | Meet some of president elect Obama’s leading foreign and domestic policy advisors and likely administration members, every one of them a prominent member of the Council On Foreign Relations.

Will these people bring about "change" or will they continue to hold up the same entrenched system forged by the corporate elite for decades?

Susan E. Rice - Council on Foreign Relations, The Brookings Institution - Served as Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs under Clinton from 1997 to 2001. Former Secretary of State Madeline Albright is a longtime mentor and family friend to Rice. Critics charge that she is is ill disposed towards Europe, has little understanding of the Middle East and would essentially follow the same policies of Condoleeza Rice if appointed the next Secretary of State or the National Security Adviser.

Anthony Lake - CFR, PNAC - Bill Clinton’s first national security adviser, who was criticized for the administration’s failure to confront the genocide in Rwanda in 1994 and now acknowledges the inaction as a major mistake.

Zbigniew Brzezinski - CFR, Trilateral Commission - Brzezinski is widely seen as the man who created Al Qaeda, and was involved in the Carter Administration plan to give arms, funding and training to the mujahideen in Afghanistan.

Richard Clarke - CFR - Former chief counter-terrorism adviser on the U.S. National Security Council under Bush. Notoriously turned against the Bush administration after 9/11 and the invasion of Iraq. Also advised Madeleine Albright during the Genocide in Rwanda.

Ivo Daalder - CFR, Brookings, PNAC - Co-authored a Washington Post op-ed with neocon Robert Kagan arguing that interventionism is a bipartisan affair that should be undertaken with the approval of our democratic allies.

Dennis Ross - CFR, Trilateral Commission, PNAC - Served as the director for policy planning in the State Department under President George H. W. Bush and special Middle East coordinator under President Bill Clinton. A noted supporter of the Iraq war, Ross is also a Foreign Affairs Analyst for the Fox News Channel.

Lawrence Korb - CFR, Brookings - Director of National Security Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. Has criticized manor of the invasion of Iraq but has detailed plans to increase the manpower of the United States Army to fight the war on terror and to "spread liberal democratic values throughout the Middle East".

Bruce Reidel - CFR, Brookings - Former CIA analyst who wishes to expand the war on terror to fight Al Qaeda across the globe. Considered to be the reason behind Barack Obama’s Hawkish views on Pakistan and his Pro India leanings on Kashmir.

We Are Change Colorado confront globalists Henry Kissinger and CFR president Richard Haass during the RNC in Minnesota.

Infowars | Members of We Are Change Colorado caught up with globalist kingpin Henry Kissinger and CFR president Richard N. Haass during the RNC proceedings in Minnesota, who were both dismissive towards hard questions about policies related to terrorism and depopulation measures.

Dr. Kissinger grinned at mention of the New World Order before dismissing any knowledge of National Security Memo #200, which calls for the use of “food as a weapon” and otherwise advocates depopulation schemes that include extreme measures to be used against the ‘lesser developed countries’ in the third world, whose population growth supposedly threatens the National Security interests of the United States.

Kissinger penned the memo in 1974 while serving in the Ford Administration. Kissinger told We Are Change cameras that he believed terrorism and 3rd population explosion were directly connected.

Activist Joby Weeks also asked the former National Security Adviser if he believed AIDS could be a manufactured threat tied to depopulation schemes, to which Kissinger said he ‘had no idea’ before absurdly claiming he had “never heard of” NSSM 200. When he was reminded that he wrote the memo, he blurted out “Oh, come on!,” possibly thinking that his infamous memo was being tied to the notion of AIDS being a manufactured bio-weapon.

Kissinger, who was closed followed by police security and who was also mobbed by star-struck sycophants who have either over-looked or never understood his inherent evil (exercised repeatedly over the decades in brutal foreign policy, from the third world to the Vietnam & Laos and now in Iraq), left the scene quickly after questions were put to him.

Richard Haass, who was presiding over a Council on Foreign Relations discussion panel, told We Are Change cameras that there was no need of oversight in regards to the CFR. “We have no power; if people want to listen to us, that’s great, if not, that’s fine.”

This is a gross understatement of a think tank so powerful that it has staffed virtually every administration’s National Security Council and many other cabinet positions, including Vice President, Secretary of Defense, and Secretary of State, since the early 1950s. While its policy recommendations are technically separate altogether from government, its influence is more than dominant in government’s thinking.

Haass and the other CFR members present laughed at and brushed off concerns about one Philip Zelikow, who wrote a CFR white paper in Foreign Affairs in December 1998 about the potential for ‘catastrophic terrorism’ to “divide our past and future into a before and after

By TocqueDeville

Daily Kos | So what if I told you that the powers of financial capitalism (bankers etc.), had a far-reaching aim, nothing less than to create a world system of financial control in private hands, able to dominate the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole.

This system was to be controlled in a feudalist fashion by the central banks of the world acting in concert, by secret agreements arrived at in frequent private meetings and conferences. The apex of the system was to be the Bank for International Settlements in Basle, Switzerland, a private bank owned and controlled by the world’s central banks which were themselves private corporations?

TocqueDeville’s diary

And what if I told you they had succeeded?

Wow! The most powerful bankers creating a world system of financial control, dominating the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole, with secret meetings. Surely you would think Tocque has fallen under the spell of a wild conspiracy theory.

But you can put away the cat in the tinfoil hat. Those are not my words. And it’s not a theory. They are the words of one of the greatest, most eminent historians in modern times, the late Carroll Quigley - of Harvard, Princeton and the Georgetown Foreign School.

Here is Bill Clinton referring to his former college professor Quigley at the 1992 Democratic convention:

"As a teenager, I heard John Kennedy’s summons to citizenship. And then, as a student at Georgetown I heard that call clarified by a professor named Carroll Quigley, who said to us that America was the greatest nation in history because our people had always believed in two things: that tomorrow can be better than today and that every one of us has a personal moral responsibility to make it so."

Quigley could write credibly about the far reaching aims of these ruling elites because he himself was a member of the ruling class and, as such, he was given unprecedented access to their private files and records. When he published these words in his 1300 page tome, Tragedy & Hope: A History of the World in Our Time, not only was he adding to the historical record a previously untold story, he was making history himself in doing so.

The story I am about to share is critically important. One simply cannot understand politics without understanding the significant role the ruling class plays in it - behind the scenes, and beyond the grasp of democratic oversight. Quigley is an essential introduction to what I call the adult history of the world. And it is only with this historical understanding that we can understand the forces shaping our world, and possibly hope to affect them.

The time for the common man, or at the very least the educated political class like us, to be let in on the secret has long since passed. To take our country back, we must know who exactly we are taking it back from. And we must know what their real agenda is, and their methods for achieving it. It is simply unacceptable in this information age for so many to be oblivious to the real forces of political power, and to allow those forces to operate in secrecy.

These excerpts from Quigley are just the beginning. And while his revelations are about the financial powers of the early 20th Century, they are essential for understanding the power structures that exist today.

Perhaps most importantly, his revelations help us recognize that there is indeed a power class, working behind the scenes, acting upon our government, the mass media and education to bring about a world that is very much contrary to the interests and aims of the public.

The Historian Spills the Beans

Tragedy and Hope is not a book about the ruling class, and it is certainly not a "conspiracy" book. It is, as its title says, a history of the modern world. Quigley has merely reinserted the role of the ruling powers back into the narrative where they belong for any accurate account.

But in the process, Quigley drops a number of bombshells. And I don’t mean two week press cycle bombshells. I mean rewrite history bombshells. Here is an incredibly brief synopsis of some of them, followed by the relevant excerptions. (I have linked to the excerpt that corresponds to each item. Just click the number to quickly scroll down.)

BOMBSHELL #1

Cecil Rhodes, the founder of De Beers and creator of the Rhodes’ Trust (of which the Rhodes’ Scholarship is a part) formed a secret society with some of the wealthiest and most powerful men in Britain and New York. The primary goal of this group was to federate the English speaking world and to expand the British empire. The structure of this society was an inner circle of "initiates" and outer circles of "helpers." The outer circles were called Round Table groups.

This was during the Gilded Age and it is difficult to even comprehend the wealth of these people (I posted a pic of one of their houses just to convey). And to truly understand their aims, you have to appreciate the reach of their industry. These were the first globalists of the modern era and their vision was breathtaking in scope. They sought to create a transnational trading system that would allow them unfettered access to markets and resources worldwide with minimal red tape. In essence, they were the pioneers of globalization and national sovereignty and colonial unrest was their primary impediment.

It appears the specific goals of this group evolved over the years, and their dream of a world federation gave way to a softer, more subtle alignment. But one can only describe their general aim of recalibrating the political environment, consisting of most major nations, into a global free trading system as being highly successful.

We are witnessing now the fruition of a plan set in motion over a century ago, conceived in secret, and implemented over multiple generations. And while the modern world certainly differs from that imagined by these founders, they are truly the architects of what we may call the Anglo-American empire that thrives today. They laid the foundation, both for the transnational banking and industrial system we have now, and for the methods of exerting the power to create that system.

Intermission

At this point, if this isn’t blowing your mind a bit, it’s because you already know all about Carroll Quigley and his revelations, you haven’t been reading carefully, or you think I’m off my rocker. Let me assure you, I am not a conspiracy theorist. I have zero interest in secret societies. Skull and Bones bores me. My only interest in the ruling class is their subversion, for their own aims, of American democracy, and the many crimes against humanity and nature they commit daily around the world.

It is only to the extent that they are a force in politics that I have any interest at all. Through my involvement in the entertainment industry and academic associations I have known more than a few in the ruling class (mostly their offspring) and I can tell you unequivocally that they are not all evil, Bohemian Grove is not a cult but a fancy camping trip, and that almost all the conspiracy theories you will find on the internet are wrong. There is, as far as I know, no Illuminati or any other such bullshit. And this is not the X-Files.

What we have is pluralism meets feudalism with a hefty amount of mafia thrown in. The ruling class in the early 20th Century, as it is now, was not monolithic. And in spite of their working together to bring about one globalized order, they often compete and work against each other, just like any other political bloc. It is imperative to understand, this is not a conspiracy. It was in its conception. And the powerful certainly conspire and collude daily. But "globalization" is a movement, not too unlike the progressive movement. The difference is the globalists have literally trillions of dollars, euros, and pounds to throw around on their campaign.

BOMBSHELL #2

The Council on Foreign Relations was a front organization for this group. This shouldn’t come as any surprise. The CFR is known well now as a trade lobby. And many also already have a pretty good idea of their role in empire maintenance. But to discover their secret origins was one of Quigley’s greatest finds. And if one has any doubt about the power of the CFR, one merely has to read this bit of homespun wisdom spoken on the Senate floor from Senator Earnest Hollings (D) of South Carolina (Congressional Record, June 30, 1993, S8315):

If you ever run for President, you get very wonderful, embossed invitations from the Council on Foreign Relations and the Trilateral Commission, and you get the coffee and fine china, and, man, you are really a high muckety-muck.

And then what they do is get you to swear on the altar of free trade an undying loyalty and support—free trade, free trade. That is all they want. And they co-opt every one of these young Senators that want to run for President.

In England, the front is called the Royal Institute of International Affairs or Chatham House.

BOMBSHELL #3

Here Quigley describes the methods the group uses to implement its far reaching aims. I’m going to revisit this part in my next post. But this should be of special interest to us all. In fact, I place this as the most important of all of Quigley’s revelations.

"The methods can be summed up under three headings: (a) a triple-front penetration in politics, education, and journalism; (b) the recruitment of men of ability (chiefly from [certain universities) and the linking of these men to the [Group] by matrimonial alliances and by gratitude for titles and positions of power; and (c) the influencing of public policy by placing members of the [Group] in positions of power shielded as much as possible from public attention. (Carroll Quigley - The Anglo American Establishment)

Thus the title of this diary - Three Easy Steps. This movement has penetrated every power structure civilized life - from politics of course, to journalism (See bombshell #4), and even down to our schools and universities, all with the goal of facilitating their control.

BOMBSHELL #4

The group had significant control over the most powerful newspapers in the US and Britain, and infiltrated the Left-wing with such instruments as the New Republic:

The American branch of this "English Establishment" exerted much of its influence through five American newspapers (The New York Times, New York Herald Tribune, Christian Science Monitor, the Washington Post, and the lamented Boston Evening Transcript)

Here begins the excerpt section. It’s a hard read with many unfamiliar names - and some you will know. But I highly recommend reading it. There is far more treasure in here than I outlined.

#1 The Plot

This association was formally established on February 5, 1891, when Rhodes and Stead organized a secret society of which Rhodes had been dreaming for sixteen years. In this secret society Rhodes was to be leader; Stead, Brett (Lord Esher), and Lord Milner were to form an executive committee; Arthur (Lord) Balfour, (Sir) Harry Johnston, Lord Rothschild, Albert (Lord) Grey, and others were listed as potential members of a "Circle of Initiates"; while there was to be an outer circle known as the "Association of Helpers" (later organized by Milner as the Round Table organization)….Thus the central part of the secret society was established by March 1891. It continued to function as a formal group, although the outer circle was, apparently, not organized until 1909-1913.

Quigley describes the "outer", Round Table group’s formation thusly:

The Round Table Groups have already been mentioned in this book several times, notably in connection with the formation of the British Commonwealth in chapter 4 and in the discussion of appeasement in chapter 12 ("the Cliveden Set"). At the risk of some repetition, the story will be summarized here, because the American branch of this organization (sometimes called the "Eastern Establishment’ ) has played a very significant role in the history of the United States in the last generation.

The Round Table Groups were semi-secret discussion and lobbying groups organized by Lionel Curtis, Philip H. Kerr (Lord Lothian), and (Sir) William S. Marris in 1908- 1911. This was done on behalf of Lord Milner, the dominant Trustee of the Rhodes Trust in the two decades 1905-1925. The original purpose of these groups was to seek to federate the English-speaking world along lines laid down by Cecil Rhodes (1853-1902) and William T. Stead (1849-1912), and the money for the organizational work came originally from the Rhodes Trust. By 1915 Round Table groups existed in seven countries, including England, South Africa, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, India, and a rather loosely organized group in the United States (George Louis Beer, Walter Lippmann, Frank Aydelotte, Whitney Shepardson, Thomas W. Lamont, Jerome D. Greene, Erwin D. Canham of the Christian Science Monitor, and others). The attitudes of the various groups were coordinated by frequent visits and discussions and by a well informed and totally anonymous quarterly magazine, The Round Table, whose first issue, largely written by Philip Kerr, appeared in November 1910.

Money for the widely ramified activities of this organization came originally from the associates and followers of Cecil Rhodes, chiefly from the Rhodes Trust itself, and from wealthy associates such as the Beit brothers, from Sir Abe Bailey, and (after 1915) from the Astor family. Since 1925 there have been substantial contributions from wealthy individuals and from foundations and firms associated with the international banking fraternity, especially the Carnegie United Kingdom Trust, and other organizations associated with J. P. Morgan, the Rockefeller and Whitney families, and the associates of Lazard Brothers and of Morgan, Grenfell, and Company.

The chief backbone of this organization grew up along the already existing financial cooperation running from the Morgan Bank in New York to a group of international financiers in London led by Lazard Brothers. Milner himself in 1901 had refused a fabulous offer, worth up to $100,000 a year, to become one of the three partners of the Morgan Bank in London, in succession to the younger J. P. Morgan who moved from London to join his father in New York (eventually the vacancy went to E. C. Grenfell, so that the London affiliate of Morgan became known as Morgan, Grenfell, and Company). Instead, Milner became director of a number of public banks, chiefly the London Joint Stock Bank, corporate precursor of the Midland Bank. He became one of the greatest political and financial powers in England, with his disciples strategically placed throughout England in significant places, such as the editorship of The Times, the editorship of The Observer, the managing directorship of Lazard Brothers, various administrative posts, and even Cabinet positions. Ramifications were established in politics, high finance, Oxford and London universities, periodicals, the civil service, and tax-exempt foundations.

#2 Expanding the Empire to the US - Council on Foreign Relations

At the end of the war of 1914, it became clear that the organization of this system had to be greatly extended. Once again the task was entrusted to Lionel Curtis who established, in England and each dominion, a front organization to the existing local Round Table Group. This front organization, called the Royal Institute of International Affairs, had as its nucleus in each area the existing submerged Round Table Group. In New York it was known as the Council on Foreign Relations, and was a front for J. P. Morgan and Company in association with the very small American Round Table Group. The American organizers were dominated by the large number of Morgan "experts," including Lamont and Beer, who had gone to the Paris Peace Conference and there became close friends with the similar group of English "experts" which had been recruited by the Milner group. In fact, the original plans for the Royal Institute of International Affairs and the Council on Foreign Relations were drawn up at Paris. The Council of the RIIA (which, by Curtis’s energy came to be housed in Chatham House, across St. James’s Square from the Astors, and was soon known by the name of this headquarters) and the board of the Council on Foreign Relations have carried ever since the marks of their origin. Until 1960 the council at Chatham House was dominated by the dwindling group of Milner’s associates, while the paid staff members were largely the agents of Lionel Curtis. The Round Table for years (until 1961) was edited from the back door of Chatham House grounds in Ormond Yard, and its telephone came through the Chatham House switchboard.

The New York branch was dominated by the associates of the Morgan Bank. For example, in 1928 the Council on Foreign Relations had John W. Davis as president, Paul Cravath as vice-president, and a council of thirteen others, which included Owen D. Young, Russell C. Leffingwell, Norman Davis, Allen Dulles, George W. Wickersham, Frank L. Polk, Whitney Shepardson, Isaiah Bowman, Stephen P. Duggan, and Otto Kahn. Throughout its history the council has been associated with the American Round Tablers, such as Beer, Lippmann. Shepardson. and Jerome Greene.

The academic figures have been those linked to Morgan, such as James T. Shotwell, Charles Seymour, Joseph P. Chamberlain, Philip Jessup, Isaiah Bowman and, more recently, Philip Moseley, Grayson L. Kirk, and Henry M. Wriston. The Wall Street contacts with these were created originally from Morgan’s influence in handling large academic endowments. In the case of the largest of these endowments, that at Harvard, the influence was usually exercised indirectly through "State Street," Boston, which, for much of the twentieth century, came through the Boston banker Thomas Nelson Perkins.

The American Group and the CIA

Closely allied with this Morgan influence were a small group of Wall Street law firms, whose chief figures were Elihu Root, John W. Davis, Paul D. Cravath, Russell Leffingwell, the Dulles brothers (Alan Dulles was head of CIA) and, more recently, Arthur H. Dean, Philip D. Reed, and John J. McCloy. Other nonlegal agents of Morgan included men like Owen D. Young and Norman H. Davis.

Roots of the Anglo-American alliance

On this basis, which was originally financial and goes back to George Peabody, there grew up in the twentieth century a power structure between London and New York which penetrated deeply into university life, the press, and the practice of foreign policy. In England the center was the Round Table Group, while in the United States it was J. P. Morgan and Company or its local branches in Boston, Philadelphia, and Cleveland. Some rather incidental examples of the operations of this structure are very revealing, just because they are incidental. For example, it set up in Princeton a reasonable copy of the Round Table Group’s chief Oxford headquarters, All Souls College. This copy, called the Institute for Advanced Study, and best known, perhaps, as the refuge of Einstein, Oppenheimer, John von Neumann, and George F. Kennan, was organized by Abraham Flexner of the Carnegie Foundation and Rockefeller’s General Education Board after he had experienced the delights of All Souls while serving as Rhodes Memorial Lecturer at Oxford. The plans were largely drawn by Tom Jones, one of the Round Table’s most active intriguers and foundation administrators.(cont. below)

#3. The Triple Front

THE MILNER GROUP could never have been built up by Milner’s own efforts. He had no political power or even influence. All that he had was ability and ideas. The same thing is true about many of the other members of the Milner Group, at least at the time that they joined the Group. The power that was utilized by Milner and his Group was really the power of the Cecil family and its allied families such as the Lyttelton (Viscounts Cobham), Wyndham (Barons Leconfield), Grosvenor (Dukes of Westminster), Balfour, Wemyss, Palmer (Earls of Selborne and Viscounts Wolmer), Cavendish (Dukes of Devonshire and Marquesses of Hartington), and Gathorne-Hardy (Earls of Cranbrook). The Milner Group was originally a major fief within the great nexus of power, influence, and privilege controlled by the Cecil family. It is not possible to describe here the ramifications of the Cecil influence. It has been all-pervasive in British life since 1886. This Cecil Bloc was built up by Robert Arthur Talbot Gascoyne-Cecil, Viscount Cranborne and third Marquess of Salisbury (1830-1903). The methods used by this man were merely copied by the Milner Group. These methods can be summed up under three headings: (a) a triple-front penetration in politics, education, and journalism; (b) the recruitment of men of ability (chiefly from All Souls) and the linking of these men to the Cecil Bloc by matrimonal alliances and by gratitude for titles and positions of power; and (c) the influencing of public policy by placing members of the Cecil Bloc in positions of power shielded as much as possible from public attention.

#4. Controlling the Media

The American branch of this "English Establishment" exerted much of its influence through five American newspapers (The New York Times, New York Herald Tribune, Christian Science Monitor, the Washington Post, and the lamented Boston Evening Transcript). In fact, the editor of the Christian Science Monitor was the chief American correspondent (anonymously) of The Round Table, and Lord Lothian, the original editor of The Round Table and later secretary of the Rhodes Trust (1925-1939) and ambassador to Washington, was a frequent writer in the Monitor. It might be mentioned that the existence of this Wall Street, Anglo-American axis is quite obvious once it is pointed out. It is reflected in the fact that such Wall Street luminaries as John W. Davis, Lewis Douglas, Jock Whitney, and Douglas Dillon were appointed to be American ambassadors in London.

…This group wielded great influence because it controlled the Rhodes Trust, the Beit Trust, The Times of London, The Observer, the influential and highly anonymous quarterly review known as The Round Table (founded in 1910 with money supplied by Sir Abe Bailey and the Rhodes Trust, and with Lothian as editor), and it dominated the Royal Institute of International Affairs, called "Chatham House" (of which Sir Abe Bailey and the Astors were the chief financial supporters, while Lionel Curtis was the actual founder), the Carnegie United Kingdom Trust, and All Souls College, Oxford…

Infiltrating the Left-wing and the New Republic

More than fifty years ago the Morgan firm decided to infiltrate the Left-wing political movements in the United States. This was relatively easy to do, since these groups were starved for funds and eager for a voice to reach the people. Wall Street supplied both. The purpose was not to destroy … or take over but was really threefold: (1) to keep informed about the thinking of Left-wing or liberal groups; (2) to provide them with a mouthpiece so that they could "blow off steam," and (3) to have a final veto on their publicity and possibly on their actions, if they ever went "radical."

There was nothing really new about this decision, since other financiers had talked about it and even attempted it earlier. What made it decisively important this time was the combination of its adoption by the dominant Wall Street financier, at a time when tax policy was driving all financiers to seek tax-exempt refuges for their fortunes, and at a time when the ultimate in Left-wing radicalism was about to appear under the banner of the Third International.

The best example of this alliance of Wall Street and Left-wing publications was The New Republic, a magazine founded by Willard Straight, using Payne Whitney money, in 1914. Straight, who had been assistant to Sir Robert Hart (Director of the Chinese Imperial Customs Service and the head of the European imperialist penetration of China) and had remained in the Far East from 1901 to r9l:, became a Morgan partner and the firm’s chief expert on the Far East. He married Dorothy Payne Whitney whose names indicate the family alliance of two of America’s greatest fortunes. She was the daughter of William C. Whitney, New York utility millionaire and the sister and co-heiress of Oliver Payne, of the Standard Oil "trust." One of her brothers married Gertrude Vanderbilt, while the other, Payne Whitney, married the daughter of Secretary of State John Hay, who enunciated the American policy of the "Open Door" in China. In the next generation, three first cousins, John Hay ("Jock") Whitney, Cornelius Vanderbilt ("Sonny") Whitney, and Michael Whitney ("Mike") Straight, were allied in numerous public policy enterprises of a propagandist nature, and all three served in varied roles in the late New Deal and Truman administrations. In these they were closely allied with other "Wall Street liberals," such as Nelson Rockefeller.

The New Republic was founded by Willard and Dorothy Straight, using her money, in 1914, and continued to be supported by her financial contributions until March 23, 1953. The original purpose for establishing the paper was to provide an outlet for the progressive Left and to guide it quietly in an Anglophile direction. This latter task was entrusted to a young man, only four years out of Harvard, but already a member of the mysterious Round Table group, which has played a major role in directing England’s foreign policy since its formal establishment in 1909. This new recruit, Walter Lippmann, has been, from 1914 to the present, the authentic spokesman in American journalism for the Establishments on both sides of the Atlantic in international affairs. His biweekly columns, which appear in hundreds of American papers, are copyrighted by the New York Herald Tribune which is now owned by J. H. Whitney. It was these connections, as a link between Wall Street and the Round Table Group, which gave Lippmann the opportunity in 1918, while still in his twenties, to be the official interpreter of the meaning of Woodrow Wilson’s Fourteen Points to the British government.

A final word

Please use caution when reading this. There is a broader context to this that I am unable to address in this space. Quigley’s Tragedy and Hope is over 1300 pages and these citations are scattered seamlessly throughout.

The point is not to assert that there is a secret group who is pulling the strings of the modern world. It is far more complex. It is possible that there still exist the inner circle of "initiates." But I have no evidence for it. In fact, the evidence strongly suggest that after 1910 or so, the whole organization took on a new character. And it certainly got uglier.

The point is to draw light on this hidden part of our history and the inner workings of the one percent of one percent. They love the shadows and secrecy. They control the flow of information to a horrifying extent. They have untold influence over our government in ways most people can’t imagine.

And they have a perilous vision for our world. Who has jurisdiction over a transnational economy. Who can regulate it? What democratic institution can even stand up to it?

This is the central downfall of the globalization idea. As David Rothkopf observes in this Newsweek column, having a global economy is great for the pirates, but is devasting for democracy, sovereignty, and justice.

The current financial crisis is another such example, producing serious questions about the influence of the superclass. Of the world’s elites, none has strutted the world stage for the past decade like global investment bankers. Masters of money, they created something new: global markets and a constantly evolving array of securities that were both beyond the reach and the comprehension of regulators. Now, the value of some of the complex investment vehicles they created is proving to be illusory.

As a consequence, the world economy was set for the crisis that is currently unfolding. There was no effective global regulator to keep the system in check, and there was no real voice for the average Joe. The Federal Reserve stepped in to stabilize the burnout of one of these major market makers—even though they have no jurisdiction over investment banks, even though many of those supporting the bailout/buyout were the same who have long clamored for "self-regulation," even though many were the ones who had cited the moral hazard of helping to bail out homeowners and encouraging their bad borrowing behavior. And so you have a financial leadership structure that bails out investment bankers worldwide, but not homeowners.

I’ll leave you with this video clip I excerpted from the publisher of Harper’s and Texaco heir Lewis Lapham’s movie, The American Ruling Class

"The ruling class is so able to manipulate our democracy that they really control democracy, I feel." - Walter Cronkite