FTR#461—Update on 9/11 and Related Matters—(Two 30-minute segments)
(Sources are noted in parentheses.) (Recorded on 5/23/2004.)
Note: FTR#’s 260-316, 317, 324, FTR#325 and succeeding programs are streaming on Real Audio at www.wfmu.org/daveemory. FTR#’s 01-270, 316-324 are available for download only, also on Real Audio, on their Archive Page.)
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Summary of FTR#461—(Note: The massive
volume of “For The Record” programs about 9/11 and related topics is summarized
and analyzed in the periodically-updated description for FTR#391. FTR#’s 454, 455, 456 are
compilations of much of the key documentation culled from Mr. Emory’s investigation
into 9/11. Along with FTR#391, they should give
listeners/readers a substantive grasp of this momentous event. It is
recommended that listeners use this description and e-mail it to others. Also:
The book “Martin Bormann: Nazi in Exile” is
available at About Paul Manning. In addition,
the professional history of the late Paul Manning, the book’s author, is
presented in the description About Paul Manning.
This enables listeners to acquaint others with Mr. Manning’s journalistic
credentials. Key material from the book is synopsized in an extended
description for FTR#305. Understanding the
Bormann organization is essential to comprehending the concept of “the
Underground Reich.”)
In addition to updating the investigation of terrorist financing, this broadcast
highlights behind-the-scenes deals between the Bush family, the oil industry
and Saudi Arabia to manipulate the results of American elections. The broadcast
also sets forth the impending arrival in the United States of Tariq Ramada, the
son of Muslim Brotherhood kingpin Said Ramadan and the heir to his father’s
unsavory political tradition.
Program Highlights Include: A meeting of the Carlyle Group allegedly involving discussion of the
Saudi Binladen Group’s continued funding of Al Qaeda; continued investigations
of the funding of terrorism by Saudi charities and businesses targeted by
Operation Green Quest; review of some of the Bush administration’s connections
to the above-mentioned businesses and charities; proof of Bank Al Taqwa’s
involvement in the funding of Al Qaeda; the alleged involvement of Yassin
Al-Qadi in the funding of terrorism; allegations in a recent book that the
Saudis were conspiring with the Bush administration to lower gas prices in
order to assure Bush’s election; recent announcements by the Saudis that give
credence to the allegations in that book; review of the 1970’s conspiracy
between George H.W. Bush’s CIA, the Saudis and the petroleum industry to create
a phony oil shortage; the role of that phony oil shortage in destabilizing the
Carter administration, justifying the defense and budgetary policies of the
Reagan/Bush administrations and justifying arms sales to Saudi Arabia.
1.
Much of the first part of the program deals with the issue of terrorist
funding—Operation Green Quest in particular. Discussion begins with an
allegation that the Carlyle Group was considering the issue of continued
funding of Al Qaeda by the Saudi Binladen Group—the primary Bin Laden family
business enterprise. (For more about the Carlyle Group, see—among other
programs—FTR#’s 329, 342, 347.) “Directors of one
of the world’s largest armament companies are planning on meeting in Lisbon in
three weeks time. . . . The financial assets of the Saudi Binladen Corporation
(SBC) are also managed by the Carlyle Group. . . . The Portugal News has been told by a reliable source that the
Carlyle Group meeting in Lisbon will discuss the relationship between the Saudi
Binladen Corporation [sic] and Osama bin Laden. Many US officials claim that
the SBC continues to finance his political activities, and has done so for many
years. If true, this would place George Bush senior and his colleagues at the
Carlyle Group in an embarrassing position. As managers of SBC’s financial
investments they might well be accused of indirectly aiding and abetting the
United States’ number one enemy.” (“US Arms Group Heads for Lisbon”;
The Portugal News; 4/4/2003; accessed
at: http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0404-13.htm
.)
2.
Next, the broadcast turns to discussion of Operation Green Quest, the
code-name for the operation directed at interdicting the terrorist-funding
apparatus behind Al Qaeda. (For more about Operation Green Quest, see—among
other programs—FTR#’s 356, 357, 359,
366, 382, 387, 390, 406, 415, 423, 425, 432, 433, 454.) The Herndon Group
and the Al-Rajhi interests were targets of the 3/20/2002 Operation Green Quest
raids. FTR#462 details the subversion of
Operation Green Quest by the Bush administration, some of whose elements and
associates belong to the milieu targeted by the operation. “Federal prosecutors plan to seek indictments in the next
six to 12 months of a group of prominent Muslim businessmen who are at the
center of the U.S. government’s largest domestic investigation into the
financing of terrorism. In an unusual hearing sought by lawyers for the
businessmen, a federal judge pressed prosecutor Gordon Kromberg to spell out
the Justice Department’s plans. The wealthy Islamic activists are involved in a
group of commonly controlled businesses and charities in Herndon, Va., that
allegedly has financial links to the Al-Rajhi banking empire of Saudi Arabia.” (“U.S.
to Seek Charges in Terror Probe” by Glenn R. Simpson; The Wall Street Journal; 4/26/’04; p. A6.)
3.
“Former federal
officials allege that the Al Rajhi Banking and Investment Corp. has links to
the financing of terrorists. The bank has denied the allegations. Mr. Kromberg
told the court that he expects to ask a grand jury to hand up charges, possibly
involving a racketeering conspiracy. ‘We think we have a good case and we are
going to bring it,’ Mr. Kromberg said. Since the mid-1990’s, the U.S.
government has conducted an on-and-off investigation into whether the charities
support terrorist group such as Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and al Qaeda.
Some figures in the Herndon group have
been prominent politically in Washington, and several are affiliated with a
world-wide society called the Muslim Brotherhood that has ideological links to
terrorist groups. [Italics are Mr. Emory’s] . . .” (Idem.)
4.
FTR#462 will develop
apparent links between the targets of the Operation Green Quest raids and the
FBI. “ . . . Mr. Parker [lawyer for the Al Rajhi
interests Wilmer ‘Buddy’ Parker] asserted that FBI agents have recently told
Ms. Luque that the Herndon inquiry is no longer a terrorism case, prompting a
sharp rebuttal from Mr. Kromberg, an assistant U.S. attorney. ‘For Mr. Parker
to get up here and with a straight face tell this court that the FBI is not
investigating this case and . . . that the justice Department doesn’t believe
that there is a real terrorist-financing case here, boggles the mind,’ he
said.” (Idem.)
5.
Yet another evidentiary tributary connecting the Bush milieu to
terrorist-funding activities concerns the Riggs Bank, one of whose directors is
Jonathan Bush, the president’s uncle. (For more about Riggs Bank, see—among
other programs—FTR#431.) “The Senate
Finance Committee chairman has asked the 9/11 commission to look into
transactions totaling tens of millions of dollars at two U.S. banks by Saudi
Arabian diplomats. Sen. Charles Grassley (R., Iowa) sent letters to members of
the commission investigating the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, detailing
‘suspicious’ activity by Saudi officials and citizens at Fleet-Boston financial
Corp. and Riggs National Bank. People familiar with the letter said Mr.
Grassley cited Saudi Embassy payments for Saudi citizens’ flight-training and
payments to Islamic groups suspected of supporting terrorism. . . .” (“Senator
Requests 9/11 Panel Probe of Saudis, Banks” by Glenn R. Simpson; The Wall Street Journal; 4/29/2004; p.
A5.)
6.
Abdurrahman Alamoudi is a principal figure in the Operation Green Quest
investigation, connected both to the GOP-affiliated Islamic Institute milieu
and to the Al Taqwa network discussed below. (For more about Alamoudi,
see—among other programs—FTR#’s 433, 435.)
“ . . . The
Saudi donations of concern to Sen. Grassley include payments through Riggs to
the American Muslim Council of Alexandria, Va., two people involved in the
matter said. The council’s former president, Abdurrahman Alamoudi, is currently
jailed on charges of violating terrorism sanctions.” (Idem.)
7.
Next, the program turns to the Bank Al Taqwa. A recent book about
former Treasury Secretary O’Neill highlights Al Taqwa’s role in the funding of
Al Qaeda. “ .
. . Al Taqwa was an association of offshore banks and financial management
firms that had helped al-Qaeda shift money around the world. It was based in
the Bahamas, and virtually all the known money of al-Qaeda at that point--$20
million—was housed there. It was identified thanks to a break that was anything
but exotic: a Bahamian banking official simply blew the whistle on the group.
Internal Treasury documents estimated that another $80 to $100 million of
al-Qaeda funds was tucked into other, undetected accounts around the globe. . .
.” (The Price of Loyalty;
by Ron Suskind; Simon & Schuster [HC]; Copyright 2004; 0-7432-5545-3; p.
198.)
8.
Continuing the discussion of Operation Green Quest, the broadcast
develops the subject of the Al Taqwa network. Information about Al Taqwa’s role
in financing Al Qaeda was contained in a letter from a U.S. Treasury Department
official to a Swiss governmental officer. (For more about Al Taqwa, see—among
other programs—FTR#’s 343, 354, 356,
357, 359, 371, 377, 378, 382, 387, 415, 416, 423, 425, 432, 433, 435, 454, 455,
456.) “A
Bahamian bank controlled by a controversial Islamic financier in Switzerland
set up a highly secretive line of credit for a top associate of Osama bin Lden
as part of an elaborate scheme to finance attacks by Al Qaeda and other
terrorist organizations, according to a newly disclosed U.S. Treasury document.
In a January 2002 letter to Swiss authorities, a senior Treasury official
privately spelled out the U.S. government’s case that the Bahamian bank, one
arm of an international financial network known as Al-Taqwa (Arabic for ‘Fear
of God’), had a lengthy history of financing and facilitating the activities of
terrorists, including providing millions of dollars in funding for Al Qaeda and
Hamas.” (“Paying for Terror: Treasury Department Documents Detail
the Murky World of Al Qaeda” by Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball; MSNBC/Newsweek; 5/12/2004; accessed at http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4963025
.)
9.
“The Treasury
letter, and another one involving Saudi businessman Yassin A. Qadi, provide a
revealing new window into the murky world of terror finance, at least as viewed
by U.S. counterterrorism officials. Based largely on secret intelligence
sources, the Treasury documents attempt to show how Qadi and Al-Taqwa and its
founder, Youssef M. Nada, used concealed bank accounts, complex land deals and
other hard-to-trace methods to steer large sums of money to terrorists.” (Idem.)
10.
“The letters were
recently obtained by Ron Motley, the lead lawyer in a massive lawsuit against
Saudi business figures and others accused of complicity in the financing of the
September 11 attacks. In a little-noticed court filing on Monday, Motley placed
the document in the public record, a move that seemed to startle at least one
defense lawyer who noted that such private, government-to government
communications are almost never made public. The letters were written by
Treasury in an effort to persuade the Swiss to take legal action to shut down
the operations of suspect organizations. The most significant of the letters
involves Al-Taqwa and its founder, Nada, an Egyptian-born businessman based in
Switzerland who has long been a prominent figure in the world of Islamic
finance and who has consistently denied any involvement in the financing of
terrorism. . . .” (Idem.)
11.
“In the letter
dated Jan. 4, 2002, George B. Wolfe, then Treasury’s deputy general counsel, tells
Switzerland’s deputy chief federal prosecutor, Claude Nicati, that money pours
in to branch offices of the Al-Taqwa network in Lugano and Malta from Kuwait
and the United Arab Emirates for bin Laden. It alleges that, as late as
September 2001, Nada and a business associate, Ali bin Mussalim, provided
indirect investment services for al Qaeda, investing funds for bin Laden, and
making cash deliveries on request to the Al Qaeda organization.” (Idem.)
12.
“The most
startling allegation is that Nada’s Bank Al Taqwa appeared to be providing a
clandestine line of credit for a close associate of bin Laden, according to the
Wolfe letter. This bin Laden lieutenant had a line of credit with a Middle East
financial institution that drew on an identical account number at Bank
Al-Taqwa. Unlike other accounts, even accounts of private banking customers,
this account was blocked by the computer system and special privileges were
required to access it. Noting that no identifiable names were associated with
the account, the letter calls the circumstances surrounding the account highly
unusual, and suggest that they were created to conceal the association of the
bin Laden organization with Bank Al-Taqwa.” (Idem.)
13.
“A legal source
familiar with the investigation into Al-Taqwa said that another U.S.
intelligence document states that the Al-Taqwa account was originally set up
for Mamdouh Mahmoud Salim, a one-time member of Al Qaeda’s governing Shura
Council who was captured in Germany after the 1998 U.S. Embassy bombings in
Africa and has been awaiting trial while in prison in the United States ever
since. Just last week. Salim was sentenced to 32 years in prison in a separate
case stemming from charges that he stabbed a prison guard in the eye with a
sharpened plastic comb as part of a failed plot with other accused Al Qaeda
codefendants to break out of the Metropolitan Correctional Center in lower
Manhattan. (The prison guard suffered brain damage, lost an eye and is
partially paralyzed as a result of the attack.) After Salim’s arrest, other al
Qaeda figures continued to access the account, the legal source said. The Wolfe
letter also reveals for the first time that the government of Jordan had
accused Bank Al-Taqwa of financing a terrorist network linked to bin Laden that
was involved in plotting terror attacks at Western and tourist targets in
Jordan during the millennium celebrations. . . .” (Idem.)
14.
“ . . . In
addition, the letter notes that one of Al-Taqwa’s board members, Ahmed Huber,
had confirmed that he had met with members of bin Laden’s organization in
Beirut and had defended the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
Huber, a notorious Swiss Holocaust denier and far-right activist, is described
in the Wolfe letter also states that another Al-Taqwa board member, Ahmed Idris
Nasreddin, has supported an Islamic center in Milan that the U.S. government
believes may be Al Qaeda’s most important base in Europe, and which was linked
to the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, among other terror plots. . . .” (Idem.)
15.
Another Treasury Department communication concerned Yassin Al-Qadi,
another alleged terrorist financier. Al-Qadi
is discussed at greater length in FTR#462.) “ . . . The same goes for Qadi, a prominent
Saudi businessman who, in a Nov. 29, 2001, letter to the Swiss written by then
Treasury general counsel David Aughauser, is a described as having a long
history of financing and facilitating the activities of terrorists and
terrorist-related organizations, often acting through seemingly legitimate
charitable enterprises and businesses.’ Qadi was the founder of Muwafaq
(“Blessed Relief”) Foundation, an Islamic charity that employed or served as
cover for a number of Islamic extremists connected with bin Laden and other
terror groups, according to the Aufhauser letter. A lawyer for Qadi, whose
assets have been blocked by the Treasury Department in the United States, said
that the businessman is in the process of presenting evidence to U.S. officials
challenging the allegations against him.” (Idem.)
16.
“U.S.
counterterrorism officials have privately acknowledged their frustration in
pursuing cases against both Al-Taqwa members and Qadi as well as numerous other
targets in terror-finance investigations. Intelligence is one thing, but
gathering the evidence to support these allegations is another story, said one
former top U.S. law-enforcement official who worked on terror-finance cases.
Still, the justice Department is not done trying. In a recent court hearing,
Gordon Kromberg, the senior federal prosecutor in charge of a long-running
probe into Islamic charities based in Northern Virginia, including some whose
directors have been associated with Nada and Qadi, said that his case was
proceeding. ‘We expect them to be charged’, Kromberg said in a court hearing,
referring to the Islamic charities that have been targets of the investigation.
There will be indictments coming.’” (Idem.)
17.
Among the institutions allegedly used by Al Qadi to finance terrorism
is the Al Haramain Foundation, a Saudi-financed Islamic charity. That group is,
in turn, tied to the Muslim World League, founded at the instigation of Said
Ramadan of the Muslim Brotherhood. “The Treasury Department has designated an Islamic charity
that is a subsidiary of the Muslim World League, a Saudi religious
organization, as a terrorist entity. The Haramain & al Masjid al Aqsa
Foundation of Bosnia was designated last week as a ‘global terrorist’
organization by the U.S. government. The Treasury didn’t disclose the group’s
ties to the Muslim World League, which lists Al Haramain as a subsidiary on its
Web site. The League, which is controlled by the grand mufti of Saudi Arabia,
seeks to spread fundamentalist Islam around the world, according to scholars.
Saudi officials insist the group is independent of the government, although
most scholars—and even one of the group’s own officials—have described it as
government-sponsored.” (“U.S. Treasury Ties Bosnian Arm of Saudi
Charity to Terror Funds” by Glenn R. Simpson; The Wall Street Journal; 5/11/2004; p. A6.)
18.
“The Treasury
designation is only the second time since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, that
the U.S. has moved against an entity controlled by the League, which has
tremendous clout within Saudi Arabia’s deeply religious society. U.S. officials
have been wary of targeting the league for diplomatic reasons. . . .” (Idem.)
19.
“ . . . The al
Haramain & al Masjid al Aqsa Charity Foundation of Bosnia was set up to aid
Bosnia’s embattled Muslim population during that country’s civil war in the
mid-1990’s. It is a separate organization from the al Haramain Foundation,
another Saudi charity also under investigation for financing terror. Al
Haramain al Masjid’s board includes influential Saudi financier Yassin Qadi,
another alleged financial supporter of terror. Mr. Qadi’s lawyers had no immediate
comment yesterday, but Mr. Qadi has insisted the group, which was run by his
longtime associate Wael Julaidan, had nothing to do with terrorism.” (Idem.)
20.
Said Ramadan’s son Tariq is going to be
occupying a position at the University of Notre Dame. (For more about Tariq
Ramadan and allegations by Western intelligence experts that he is anything but
a “moderate,” see—among other programs—FTR#455.)
“The University of Notre Dame, the
elite university founded by the Holy Cross Order, (thanks to numerous readers
for the correction of the founding order) in South Bend, Indiana, has offered a
three-year professorship to the ‘moderate’ Muslim scholar Tariq Ramadan, a
resident and citizen of Switzerland. . . . For starters, he is the grandson of
Hassan Al Banna, the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, an Islamist terrorist
organization born in Egypt in 1928. The Palestinian branch of the Muslim
Brotherhood is none other than the terrorist movement Hamas, which routinely
commits brutal suicide attacks against Israeli civilians. . . .” (“Danger: Tariq Ramadan is
Coming to the US”; p. 1; accessed at: http://www.americanthinker.com/articles.php?article_id=3523
.)
21.
“ . . . According
to the French daily newspaper Le Monde,
he is suspected of having links with al Qaeda. In fact, Ramadan is said to have
organized a meeting back in 1991 between Ayman al Zawahiri, Al Qaeda’s number
two, and Omar Abdel Rahman, plotter of the first World Trade Center bombing.
Other troubling allegations can be found in a lawsuit filed by the victims of
the September 11 attacks: Ramadan greatly influenced Jamel Beghal, a French
citizen arrested for plotting to bomb the US Embassy in Paris and Ahmed Brahim,
an al Qaeda member arrested in Spain.” (Ibid.; p. 4.)
22.
The conclusion of the broadcast deals with
the Saudi/Bush/petroleum industry relationship. A recent book by Bob Woodward
maintained that Saudi Prince Bandar (a long-time intimate and political
co-conspirator of the Bush family) had promised George Bush that Saudi Arabia
would attempt to influence the price of oil in such a way as to assure that the
cost per barrel would come down—thereby benefiting W’s chances for re-election.
“ . . . Accusing President Bush of having
a ‘sweetheart relationship’ with Saudi Arabia, Democratic presidential
candidate John Kerry on Monday described as ‘disgusting’ a report that the
Saudis had promised the president to lower oil prices before the November vote.
Kerry was responding to an allegation by reporter Bob Woodward that Saudi
Ambassador Prince Bandar bin Sultan had promised Bush that his country will
increase oil output in the months before the election—which would have the
effect of driving down U.S. gasoline prices and giving the Bush re-election
campaign a big boost.” (“Election Gift? Kerry Blasts Price Deal Book Says Bush Made with Saudi
Prince” by Robert Collier; San Francisco
Chronicle; 4/20/2004; p. A1.)
23.
“ ‘If . . . it
is true that gas supplies and prices in America are tied to the American
election, tied to a secret White House deal, that is outrageous and
unacceptable to the American people,’ Kerry said during a campaign stop in
Florida. Woodward’s new book about the Iraq war, Plan of Attack quotes Bush as saying ‘I’m worried about the
capacity of the oil market’ after an invasion of Iraq and asking about Saudi
Arabia’s ability to increase production. Woodward writes that Bandar said his
country ‘hoped to fine-tune oil prices over 10 months to prime the economy for
2004.’” (Idem.)
24.
Recent developments indicate that Woodward’s
allegation is not without substance. “In
a significant shift, Saudi Arabia’s oil minister said Monday that crude prices
have risen far enough, and he will urge OPEC to increase production, reversing
an output cut that began just last month. The change in Saudi oil policy, Oil
Minister Ali Naimi said, is due to concern that high prices could hurt the
world economy and reduce demand for oil. Oil prices have risen steadily in
recent weeks, with U.S. crude oil prices touching $40 a barrel Friday. . . .” (“Saudi Oil Official: Price
High Enough” [AP]; San Jose Mercury News;
5/11/2004; p. 4C.)
25.
Further indication that the Bush/Bandar
accord is substantive: “In an effort to
drive down record crude oil prices, Saudi Arabia, the world’s largest oil
producer, offered on Friday to increase its output by at least 500,000 barrels,
to 9 million barrels a day, starting June 1. In contrast to an earlier
suggestion by the country that OPEC increase its quotas, the offer is important
because it would truly add more oil to the market rather than simply
formalizing existing overproduction by the group’s members.” (“Saudis Offer to Increase
Oil Output by About 6%” by Neela Bannerjee; The
New York Times; 5/22/2004; accessed at: www.nytimes.com .)
26.
“With global
demand relentlessly high, oil prices rose above $40 a barrel in New York on May
11 and remained there until Friday. Nearly all oil-producing countries are
pumping at maximum capacity, and almost all the world’s spare capacity is in
Saudi Arabia. The offer, made by the Saudi oil minister, Ali al-Naimi, at a
conference in Amsterdam and confirmed by an official at the Saudi embassy in
Washington, shows the mounting concern—even among oil producers reaping a
windfall from high prices—that oil has become so expensive and volatile that it
could slow economic growth and encourage the development of alternative fuels,
Saudi officials and oil experts said.” (Idem.)
27.
Excerpting FTR#’s 214,
248, the broadcast reviews information about an
arrangement among George H.W. Bush’s CIA, the Saudis, and the petroleum
industry to create a deliberate, phony oil shortage. This oil shortage created
dissatisfaction with the Carter administration (and inflation), thereby helping
to defeat him in 1980. In addition, this phony oil shortage served as a pretext
for drastically increasing defense spending and arming the Saudis with the
latest American weaponry. The Saudi/Bush/petroleum
industry axis manipulated oil prices to defeat Carter in 1980. It appears that
they are working to manipulate oil prices in 2004 in an attempt to assure
Bush’s re-(?) election. “It is hard to recall why he
[Carter] was so despised when he was in office. Much of it has to do with the
secret history of oil politics. Even during the 1976 election campaign, the oil
companies viewed the Democratic candidate as Public Enemy Number One. Carter
certainly had some radical ideas about energy policy, which made the oil
companies fearful for the future and their profit levels. Carter’s first move
after the election didn’t please them. He nominated former CIA head and defense
secretary James Schlesinger as his secretary of energy. . . .Worse still,
Schlesinger was now a convert to ‘environmentalism.’ Conversation and
efficiency were the new buzz words. In their first few months in office in
1977, Schlesinger and Carter made energy their number-one policy issue. . . .” (The Secret War Against the Jews: How Western Espionage Betrayed the Jewish People; John Loftus and Mark
Aarons; Copyright 1994 [HC]; St. Martin’s Press; ISBN 0-312-11057-X; p. 333.)
28.
“Even before
Americans voted for Carter, the oil industry had launched a quiet crusade of
its own, in anticipation of a Democratic victory. In the last months of the
Ford administration, the CIA had developed a series of papers on energy and oil
issues. Just after his victory in November 1976, Carter was shown a classified
CIA analysis of global oil supplies. The ‘old spies’ we asked about this point
insist that the report had a powerful impact on Carter and helped to define his
policies on the ‘energy crisis.’” (Idem.)
29.
“When Carter
launched his national energy plan in April 1977, he confirmed that the CIA had
provided him with intelligence assessments which made dire predictions about
future energy supplies in the Soviet Union. The CIA warning made front-page
news: ‘Russia would be importing oil from the Middle East by 1985.’ The Soviets
would need to buy three and a half million barrels per day, to be precise,
whereas in 1977 they actually exported one and a half million barrels daily.
‘Previously, the assumption had been that the Soviets would continue to be
self-sufficient in meeting their oil and gas needs.’” (Idem.)
30.
“ . . . In
effect, the CIA was telling President Carter that the Soviet Union would face a
domestic oil shortage in 1985, causing the worst energy crisis in American
history. When the Soviets ran out of domestic oil supplies, they probably would
look to the traditional oil suppliers of the United States, especially Saudi
Arabia and Kuwait. Our sources in the intelligence community say that the CIA’s
‘oil shortfall’ probably was the greatest intelligence fraud in American
history. . . .” (Ibid.; p. 334.)
31.
Bush’s father appears to have been a
principal player in the creation of the phony oil shortage. “ . . . According to several of our sources, the scheme to
manufacture phony CIA estimates and push them on Carter began in the last days
of Gerald Ford’s term. They claim that a cabal within the CIA realized that
Carter would be the new president, produced the first phony report, and then
promptly gave it to Carter as soon as he won, knowing how it would affect his
view of the energy crisis. It should be recalled that George Bush was the
director of the CIA at the time the oil scam was put in place in 1976. There is
some evidence to suggest that it was Bush himself who passed the fake oil
estimates to Carter.” (Ibid.; pp. 334-335.)
32.
“ ‘You have to
understand who was screwing the Jews,’ one ‘old spy’ told us. ‘The whole phony
scheme—the oil shortages, the predictions about Soviet troops in the Middle
East, the Saudi arms buildup—all of that crap started coming out of the agency
back in ’76. The CIA told their boss what he wanted to hear, and in those days,
the head of the CIA was an oil man.’” (Ibid.; p. 334.)
33.
“ . . . The oil
companies and the Saudi government both had access to similar advice from old
CIA hands. It almost seemed that Aramco had more of its ex-employees inside the
CIA than the CIA had agents in the Middle East. In public, the Saudis dismissed
the report as ‘ridiculous and obviously untrue.’ In private, they went along
with the CIA’s ‘declining production’ fraud. After some reflection, the House
of Saud realized that here was an opportunity to sell less oil but make more
money.” (Ibid.;
p. 338.)
34.
“In public, the
Saudis continued to insist that they had plenty of oil. In practice, they
helped create an oil shortage. The CIA had created a self-fulfilling prophecy.
The Saudis’ reserves mysteriously fell by millions of barrels a day, and their
pumping efficiency was said to be atrocious and sure to get worse. In a very
short time, American consumers would find themselves running out of gas.” (Idem.)
35.
“ . . . In the
short run, of course, the motive was more money for American oil companies. Our
sources in the intelligence community say that the oil industry used its CIA
contacts to fabricate both the Soviets-will-steal-our oil hysteria as well as
the dry-wells-in-Saudi Arabia predictions. The immediate goal of the phony
predictions was to scare the White House into doing what the oil companies
wanted: (1) lift the laws holding the price on domestic American oil; (2)
provide a panic to excuse raising world oil prices; and (3) appease the Arabs,
by arming the Saudis instead of the Israelis.” (Ibid.; p. 339.)
36.
“The oil men in
the intelligence services promoted the fear that the Soviets would have no
other option than to move down into the Middle East, invade Saudi Arabia,
Kuwait, and Iran, and seize U.S. oil for themselves. If Carter didn’t move
soon, there would be no hope of withstanding a Soviet invasion of the Middle
East. The most powerful army in the area was Israel’s. But the Jews could
hardly be expected to go to war to save the Arabs’ oil for the West’s often
anti-Semitic oil companies. The time had come for the president to make a
clear-cut decision: either bow to the Jews’ resolute opposition to U.S. arms
sales to the Arabs and risk losing Middle Eastern oil to the Soviets, or arm
the Arabs, thereby ending Israel’s military supremacy—a sacrifice that would
have to be made in the American national interest.” (Idem.)
37.
“Our sources say
that the oil companies, and their friends in the CIA, had a very willing ally
in the Saudis, who secretly cooperated with the CIA’s fraud by artificially
decreasing production and simultaneously increasing the price per barrel of
oil. It was all meant to be a very profitable game, in which both the Saudis
and the companies would get huge windfalls, while their Jewish enemies were
finally put in their place. The Arabs soon would have the weapons they needed
to see to that.” (Idem.)
38.
“ . . . The fact
is that the CIA reports on the Soviet threat were as false as they were
frightening. As one of our sources put it: ‘Look, the Soviets couldn’t even
hang on to their puppet colony in Afghanistan. They were bleeding themselves
white. At one point during the Afghan war, the military was consuming nearly 28
percent of the gross productivity of the Soviet Union. The last thing the
Kremlin wanted was all out war with the Moslem world. They couldn’t finance
their own PLO hit squads, let alone start a second front in the Middle East.
The whole idea of the Russian army marching into the Saudi oil fields was a
fraud.’ But the fraud worked. According to the Red scare scheme, there was only
one thing to do: arm the Arabs so they could defend the oil fields themselves.”
(Ibid.; pp.
350-351.)
39.
“The cardinal
sin of statesmanship is naivete. Carter and Turner never suspected that their
own people would lie to them. The phony CIA oil reports completely fooled them.
‘Don’t you get it?’ asked one of our sources. ‘The gas shortage during the
Carter administration was as phony as the CIA’s prediction about the Soviet oil
shortage. The goddamn Middle East was swimming in oil during the Carter
administration, but less and less of it was shipped to America. For chrissakes,
there was so much oil in South America that they had to shut down refineries in
the Caribbean to keep it away from the U.S.’” (Ibid.; p. 353.)
40.
“This source has
a point. One of the largest refineries in the Western Hemisphere is located on
St. Croix, in the U.S. Virgin Islands. Most of its capacity went unused during
the Carter administration’s ‘oil shortage,’ yet it was greatly expanded during
Reagan’s term, despite the world glut of oil and falling prices. Most of the
‘old spies’ are adamant that the oil companies cut refinery production to cause
as much damage to the Carter administration as possible.” (Ibid.; pp. 353-354.)
41.
“By mid-1981, it
was embarrassingly clear that all of the CIA’s predictions, upon which Carter
had relied, were completely false. Not only was there not an oil crisis, the
whole industry had suddenly gone the other way. There was a worldwide surplus
of oil, not a shortfall. The CIA figures on Saudi oil were just as false as
their Soviet production estimates. By June that year, the Saudi Arabian
government had created an oil glut and was under intense pressure in the Arab
world to cut its production. The Middle East was drowning in oil. . . .” (Ibid.; p. 354.)
42.
Like his father and Ronald Reagan, George W.
Bush’s combination of tax cuts and massive defense spending are destroying the
American fiscal landscape. “ . . . Under the
Republicans, lucrative arms factories sprouted in what had previously been
rural Democratic states. The votes went where the jobs were. In the course of
the Reagan-Bush administrations, the defense budget was increased to a point
where more money was spent on arms than in all the wars in U.S. history
combined. To accomplish this massive defense buildup, the Reagan-Bush
administrations borrowed three times more money than all U.S. presidents
combined. The largest debt in America history was based on the faulty premise
that the Soviet Union was going to attack the Middle East.” (Ibid.; p. 355.)