more proof of hillary-bush connection

by RUSS BAKER and ADAM FEDERMAN

Research support for this story was provided by the Investigative Fund of The Nation Institute. Published in conjunction with The Nation.

In the Clintons' pursuit of power, there is no such thing as a strange bedfellow. One recently exposed inamorata was Norman Hsu, the mysterious businessman from Hong Kong who brought in $850,000 to Hillary Clinton's campaign before being unmasked as a fugitive. Her campaign dismissed Hsu as someone who'd slipped through the cracks of an otherwise unimpeachable system for vetting donors, and perhaps he was. The same cannot be said for the notorious financier Alan Quasha, whose involvement with Clinton is at least as substantial--and still under wraps.

Political junkies will recall Quasha as the controversial figure who bailed out George W. Bush's failing oil company in 1986, folding Bush into his company, Harken Energy, thus setting him on the path to a lucrative and high-profile position as an owner of the Texas Rangers baseball team, and the presidency. The persistently unprofitable Harken--many of whose board members, connected to powerful foreign interests and the intelligence community, nevertheless profited enormously--faced intense scrutiny in the early 1990s and again during Bush's first term.

Now Quasha is back--on the other side of the aisle. Operating below the radar, he entered Hillary Clinton's circle even before she declared her candidacy by quietly arranging for the hire of Clinton confidant and longtime Democratic Party money man Terry McAuliffe at one of his companies. During the interregnum between McAuliffe's chairmanship of the Democratic Party and the time he officially joined Clinton's campaign, Quasha's firm set McAuliffe up with a salary and opened a Washington office for him.

Just a few years earlier, McAuliffe had publicly criticized Bush for his financial dealings with Harken, disparaging the company's Enron-like accounting. Yet in 2005 McAuliffe accepted this cushy perch with Quasha's newly acquired investment firm, Carret Asset Management, and even brought along former Clinton White House business liaison Peter O'Keefe, who had been his senior aide at the Democratic National Committee. McAuliffe remained with the company until he became national chair of Hillary's presidential bid, and O'Keefe never left. McAuliffe's connection to Quasha has, until now, never been noted.

Another strong link between Quasha and Clinton is Quasha's business partner, Hassan Nemazee, a top Hillary fundraiser who was trotted out to defend her during the Hsu episode--in which the clothing manufacturer was unmasked as a swindler who seemingly funneled illegal contributions through "donors" of modest means.

In June, by liquidating a blind trust, the Clintons sought to distance themselves from any financial entanglements that might embarrass the campaign. Clinton spokesman Howard Wolfson argued that the couple had gone "above and beyond" what was legally required "in order to avoid even the hint of a conflict of interest." But throughout their political careers, Bill and Hillary Clinton have repeatedly associated with people whose objectives seemed a million miles from "a place called Hope." Among these Alan Quasha and his menagerie--including Saudi frontmen, a foreign dictator, figures with intelligence ties and a maze of companies and offshore funds--stand out.

"That Hillary Clinton's campaign is involved with this particular cast of characters should give people pause," says John Moscow, a former Manhattan prosecutor. In the late 1980s and early '90s he led the investigation of the corrupt Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI) global financial empire--a bank whose prominent shareholders included members of the Harken board. "Too many of the same names from earlier troubling circumstances suggests a lack of control over who she is dealing with," says Moscow, "or a policy of dealing with anyone who can pay."

Ideology does not seem to be the principal issue driving either Quasha or Nemazee. Nemazee backed the likes of archconservative Republican senators Jesse Helms, Sam Brownback and Al D'Amato before moving aggressively into the Democratic camp. Quasha, frequently identified as a Republican fundraiser, gave to both Bush and Al Gore in 2000 and so far in the 2008 race has given to Republicans Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani as well as Democrats Barack Obama and Chris Dodd, in addition to Hillary Clinton. But Quasha's concerted efforts to get into Clinton's inner circle are reminiscent of his relationship with a pre-Governor Bush.

A student at Harvard's business school at the same time as Bush, Quasha was a little-known New York lawyer when he took over the small Abilene-based Harken Oil in 1983, using millions from offshore accounts held in the name of family members. Quasha's now-deceased father, Manila-based attorney William Quasha, was known for his close friendship with Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos and his ties to US intelligence; he was also a member of the "Eagles Club" of major GOP contributors.

In 1986 Alan Quasha embraced a struggling George W. Bush, rescuing his failing Spectrum 7 oil company, folding it into Harken Energy and providing Bush with a directorship, more than $600,000 in stock and options and a consulting contract initially valued at $80,000 a year (which was raised in 1989 to $120,000). The financial setup allowed Bush to devote most of his time to the presidential campaign of his father, a former CIA director who as Vice President was the Reagan Administration's overseer of a massive outsourcing of covert intelligence operations, and who had his own warm relationship with Marcos.

Harken's financials were famously complicated. Reporters from top publications like the Wall Street Journal, Time and Fortune went at Harken with zest, but they ultimately failed to unravel all its labyrinthine activities. In 2003 Harken was described in the trade publication Platts Energy Economist as "a toxic waste dump for bad deals, with a strong odor of US intelligence spookery and chicanery about it." Indeed, the company was kept afloat by an all-star cast of financiers with ties to BCCI, Saudi intelligence, the South African apartheid regime, Marcos and the Shah of Iran. The company perennially lost money for ordinary investors while benefiting insiders like Bush, Quasha and Nemazee. Indeed, Harken has lost money nearly every year since Bush's days there, piling up cumulative losses in the hundreds of millions.

Nevertheless, in 1990, when the Dallas Times Herald ranked Harken fifth on its list of worst-performing local firms, the tiny oil refiner beat out the giant exploration company Amoco for an offshore drilling contract in Bahrain that was potentially worth billions. As George W. Bush biographer Bill Minutaglio wrote, "Oil analysts were stunned that bottom-feeding Harken...could hook such a meaty international contract...not only hadn't Harken drilled overseas, it had never drilled in water. Speculation immediately surged that it was because Bahrain wanted to do business with the son of the U.S. president."

Bush appeared to benefit from insider trading when he sold two-thirds of his stock in Harken at a peak price after the Bahrain deal--and just before news emerged that the company had failed to find oil and its share price plummeted. He also failed to report his sale of company stock on time, leading many to believe that he had something to hide. Immediately after a 1991 Wall Street Journal article detailing Bush's involvement with Harken, the SEC launched an investigation, but unsurprisingly, with George H.W. Bush in the White House, it came to nothing. The Journal article speculated that there was more to the picture:

What does emerge is a complex pattern of personal and financial relationships behind Harken's sudden good fortune in the Middle East, raising the question of whether Bahrainis or others in the Middle East may have hoped to ingratiate themselves with the White House. Even more intriguing, there are numerous links among Harken, Bahrain and individuals close to the discredited Bank of Credit & Commerce International, a banking empire that used Mideast oil money to seek ties to political leaders in several countries.

Thanks to his income from Harken, Bush was able to become managing partner of the Texas Rangers--a glamorous and highly visible sinecure that would eventually earn him nearly $15 million and make him a credible front-runner for the Texas governorship. This rescue and makeover of a ne'er-do-well son was a key step in W.'s path to political power.

Quasha's Clinton play began in 2003, when he bought Carret Asset Management, a once-revered private equity investment firm that manages nearly $2 billion in assets. Its founder, Philip Carret, a Wall Street legend and hero of Warren Buffett, died in 1998; the firm was sold twice before Quasha bought it for a song. Some were troubled when they learned the identity of the new owner. "I was horrified that he was going to hide behind my family's name," says Renee Carret, a longtime executive at the firm whose grandfather started the company in 1963. When Quasha took over, she resigned. "I just personally didn't want to be affiliated with him. There were too many questions that were left unanswered."

As his co-chair in the private firm, Quasha chose his old friend Nemazee, a fellow Harken investor. By the time of the Carret acquisition, Nemazee, a founding member of the Iranian-American Political Action Committee whose family was close with the late Shah of Iran, had become a significant fundraiser for the Clintons and the Democratic Party. In 1995 he raised money for the DNC. In 1998, in the midst of the Lewinsky affair, Nemazee collected $60,000 for Bill Clinton's legal defense fund in $10,000 increments from relatives and friends. Clinton subsequently nominated Nemazee as ambassador to Argentina but withdrew the nomination after an article in Forbes raised questions about Nemazee's business dealings in the 1980s and '90s--which noted that the American-born Nemazee magically became "Hispanic" by acquiring Venezuelan citizenship because of a requirement that certain California public pension funds be run by minorities.

Failure to be named ambassador did not, however, hamper Nemazee's rise within the Democratic Party. By 2004 he was New York finance chair for John Kerry's campaign, and in 2006 he served under Senator Chuck Schumer as the national finance chair of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC)--a period during which the committee raised about $25 million more than its Republican counterpart. This past March Nemazee, at the behest of McAuliffe, threw a dinner for Hillary at Manhattan's swank Cipriani restaurant, which featured Bill Clinton and raised more than $500,000.

The exact nature of McAuliffe's duties at Carret is unclear, and Quasha, Carret and McAuliffe all declined to answer The Nation's questions on this matter. But McAuliffe seems to have served, at least occasionally, as a good will ambassador for Quasha's business operations. He brought Wang Tianyi, head of a formerly state-owned Chinese firm and a business associate of Quasha's, to meet with Bill Clinton. And Quasha has visited the ex-President at his Harlem office over the past several years, according to Joe Wozny, former president of a Carret affiliate. Wozny recalls that Quasha "was up there quite a few times, meeting with Bill Clinton." As for that Washington office, the Carret website says only that it specialized in providing "information regarding products and services for institutions."

But the office seems to have benefited McAuliffe--and Hillary Clinton. When McAuliffe stepped down as DNC chair in February 2005, he said he planned to hit the lecture circuit and spend more time with his family. He may have done both, but he did so as vice chair of Carret from the new company office on the seventh floor of the venerable McPherson Building, once the home of the John Kerry campaign and just off K Street's lobbyist gulch. Simon Rosenberg's New Democrat Network, where Mark Penn, chief pollster and strategist for Hillary's campaign, has served as a fellow, was housed next door to McAuliffe and O'Keefe.

While there, McAuliffe found time to pen his memoir, What a Party!, his paean to the Clintons and his role in raising record amounts of money for them and the party. Yet the memoir itself, for which he earned a seven-figure advance, makes no mention of Carret or his role as its vice chair.

Three people working in nearby suites said they remembered McAuliffe and O'Keefe working out of the office, but none of them remembered the Carret name. Nor did any of them have any idea what McAuliffe was doing as Quasha's vice chair. One person who visited McAuliffe in the suite recalled that he was working on his book but said he was unaware of the official function of the office. "Terry holds his cards pretty close on his business activities," he said.

According to another visitor, McAuliffe was using his time to lay the groundwork for Hillary's long-anticipated presidential bid. With McAuliffe leading Clinton's ravenous fundraising operation, the possibility that Carret's Washington office was opened up, at least in part, to serve just such a function is bolstered by the fact that Carret opened the office only after hiring McAuliffe--and closed it down once he left. During that period, though no Clinton campaign committee yet existed, there were signs that he was already operating on her behalf. In 2005 he appeared on CNN's Crossfire, where the former Democratic chief did not bother to feign neutrality in the primaries: "Personally, I hope she runs," he said. "We would be lucky if she did run, I'll tell you that." In 2006 he kept one foot in Clintondom as a member of the Clinton Global Initiative, an organization whose membership is primarily by invitation to elite business leaders. Wang, whose China International Industry and Commerce partnered with Carret soon after McAuliffe joined the company, was also named to the initiative in 2006.

Meanwhile, during McAuliffe's employment at Carret, Quasha himself donated large sums to the DSCC. He gave $26,700 in June 2006 and $25,000 that October and also personally contributed $4,600, the maximum allowed, to the Hillary Clinton presidential exploratory committee.

Since his start as a young fundraiser on Carter's 1980 re-election campaign, McAuliffe has consistently melded politics, policy and private enterprise. By the time he was 30, he had launched a dozen companies, his own law firm and numerous venture capital companies. Perhaps his most controversial association was with the telecommunications company Global Crossing, where McAuliffe managed to turn a $100,000 personal investment into an $18 million windfall. After McAuliffe sold his shares and got out, the company collapsed; nearly 10,000 employees lost their jobs, and investors lost $54 billion. McAuliffe defended the firm's top executives, who were close with both the Bushes and Clintons, but went on to attack President Bush for similar patterns at Harken.

At a DNC meeting in Las Vegas in 2002, McAuliffe spoke about the recent collapse of Enron and questioned whether Bush could "restore confidence to Wall Street when he has engaged in the same practices he condemns today," a reference to Bush's Harken profiteering. That same year, associates of McAuliffe, fronted by a fake grassroots organization, released an aggressive ad campaign seeking to highlight the Harken-Bush connection.

It is not surprising, then, to learn that neither McAuliffe's connection to Carret nor Quasha's role in the firm have been widely publicized. Carret employees said they were surprised that when Quasha acquired the prestigious firm he did not choose to publicize his coup, instead keeping it quiet. In fact, the company's website does not reveal his role as chair--or much of anything about the firm. The company's chief financial officer, Marco Vega, said he was unable to provide details on Quasha's role in the company, or even to confirm his current title.

The silence is deafening. Repeated requests for interviews on this topic were ignored or rebuffed by the offices of Hillary Clinton's campaign, Bill Clinton, Alan Quasha, Hassan Nemazee, Terry McAuliffe and Peter O'Keefe. McAuliffe's spokeswoman, Tracy Sefl, who works for the Clinton-connected communications firm the Glover Park Group but represents McAuliffe informally, said that McAuliffe would not grant an interview or respond to detailed e-mailed questions on these matters. Sefl minimized McAuliffe's involvement with the company, claiming he was only "an adviser to Carret--as he was to many other companies."

But a vice chair is much more than just an adviser, and Carret's opening an office off K Street was not a casual gesture. Notably, though the DC office was closed after McAuliffe left for Hillary's campaign, McAuliffe protégé O'Keefe has stayed on as Carret's managing director for marketing--providing Quasha with an ongoing pipeline to the Clinton operation.

With an international man of mystery like Quasha, it's nigh impossible to definitively identify his endgame. But one thing he seems to have a stake in is free rein for hedge funds--and preservation of the low rate at which their profits are taxed.

In 2005, while McAuliffe was on his payroll, Quasha traveled to Bermuda to speak at the MARHedge World Wealth Summit, which addressed the topic "Hedge Fund Management in a Perilous Investment Climate." McAuliffe, too, weighed in on the well-being of hedge funds as the featured speaker at a 2006 investors' conference of the Carret unit Brean Murray, Carret & Co., where, according to advance publicity material, he planned to address the "current political debate in Washington, DC and its impact on Wall Street and the status of potential further hedge fund regulation." Also indicative of an interest in influencing hedge fund policy is the presence on Carret's International Advisory Board of Philippa Malmgren, who served as George W. Bush's liaison to the financial markets, and who often speaks and writes on politics and policy related to hedge funds.

According to the Center for Responsive Politics, Hillary Clinton, whose daughter, Chelsea, works for a hedge fund run by a prominent Democratic donor--came in second only to Joe Lieberman in cash raised from hedge fund managers during the 2006 election cycle. She has belatedly and reluctantly joined other presidential candidates in calling for a change in the law so that fund managers would pay taxes at the same rate as everybody else. Clearly, her supporters among hedge fund figures have much to gain by electing a President who feels Wall Street's pain.

Whatever Carret's overall objectives, the company is on the march. "We've taken the Brean Murray and the Carret platforms and expanded them into China, India, Eastern Europe and Russia, and we will be doing so in Latin America as well," Nemazee said in a 2006 interview with Leaders magazine.

While Quasha & Co. keep an eye on hedge fund regulation, they also appear to be helping the repressive Chinese government keep an eye on its own people. Brean Murray, Carret recently acted as the sole placement agent in an $8 million deal with the Shenzhen-based China Security and Surveillance Technology. China Security won a contract last year from the quasi-governmental Shenzhen Cyber Café Association to install video monitoring systems for more than 1,000 local Internet cafes, popular outlets for criticism of the regime. A Brean Murray, Carret press release celebrates its cooperation with the clampdown: "the estimated 2.19 million registered entertainment halls in China must purchase video-monitoring systems covering entrances, exits and main corridors. The Company is actively pursuing similar opportunities within the other provinces of China."

Is there cause for concern over Alan Quasha's apparent efforts to gain influence with a potential President of the United States? Amazingly, to reassure the public on the integrity of its operation, the Clinton camp has rolled out none other than Quasha's business partner Hassan Nemazee. In an interview with the New York Times on the implications of the Hsu affair, Nemazee, who describes himself as an economic policy adviser to Hillary but was identified by the Times as a "fundraising bundler for Mrs. Clinton, as Mr. Hsu had been," declared, "The Clinton campaign has done as much if not more than any campaign to protect itself from situations such as this, and none of the other campaigns, other than hypocritically, can point a finger at the Clinton campaign on fundraising problems."



Russ Baker is founder of the Real News Project.

Adam Federman is the research associate of the Real News Project.

this is the new america- buckle up

By ANNE D'INNOCENZIO



NEW YORK (AP) - The calculus of living paycheck to paycheck in America is getting harder. What used to last four days might last half that long now. Pay the gas bill, but skip breakfast. Eat less for lunch so the kids can have a healthy dinner.

Across the nation, Americans are increasingly unable to stretch their dollars to the next payday as they juggle higher rent, food and energy bills. It's starting to affect middle-income working families as well as the poor, and has reached the point of affecting day-to-day calculations of merchants like Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT) (WMT), 7-Eleven Inc. and Family Dollar Stores Inc. (FDO) (FDO)

Food pantries, which distribute foodstuffs to the needy, are reporting severe shortages and reduced government funding at the very time that they are seeing a surge of new people seeking their help.

While economists debate whether the country is headed for a recession, some say the financial stress is already the worst since the last downturn at the start of this decade.


From Family Dollar to Wal-Mart, merchants have adjusted their product mix and pricing accordingly. Sales data show a marked and more prolonged drop in spending in the days before shoppers get their paychecks, when they buy only the barest essentials before splurging around payday.

"It's pretty pronounced," said Kiley Rawlins, a spokeswoman at Family Dollar. "It seems like to us, customers are running out of food products, paper towels sooner in the month."

Wal-Mart, the world's largest retailer, said the imbalance in spending before and after payday in July was the biggest it has ever seen, though the drop-off wasn't as steep in August.

And 7-Eleven says its grocery sales have jumped 12-13 percent over the past year, compared with only slight increases for non-necessities like gloves and toys. Shoppers can't afford to load up at the supermarket and are going to the most convenient places to buy emergency food items like milk and eggs.

"It even costs more to get the basics like soap and laundry detergent," said Michelle Grassia, who lives with her husband and three teenage children in the Bedford-Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn, N.Y.


Her husband's check from his job at a grocery store used to last four days. "Now, it lasts only two," she said.

To make up the difference, Grassia buys one gallon of milk a week instead of three. She sometimes skips breakfast and lunch to make sure there's enough food for her children. She cooks with a hot plate because gas is too expensive. And she depends more than ever on the bags of free vegetables and powdered milk from a local food pantry.

Grassia's story is neither new nor unique. With the fastest-rising food and energy prices since the 1980s, low-income consumers are stretching their budgets by eating cheap foods like peanut butter and pasta.

Industry analysts and some economists fear the strain will get worse as people are hit with higher home heating bills this winter and mortgage rates go up.

It's bad enough already for 85-year-old Dominica Hoffman.


She gets $1,400 a month in pension and Social Security from her days in the garment industry. After paying $500 in rent on an apartment in Pennsauken, N.J., and shelling out money for food, gas and other expenses, she's broke by the end of the month. She's had to cut fruits and vegetables from her grocery order - and that's even with financial help from her children.

"Everything is up," she said.

Many consumers, particularly those making less than $30,000 a year, are cutting spending on nutritious food like milk and vegetables, and analysts fear they're further skimping on basic medical care and other critical services.

Coupon-clipping just isn't enough.

"The reality of hunger is right here," said the Rev. Melony Samuels, director of The BedStuy Campaign against Hunger, a church-affiliated food pantry in Brooklyn.

The pantry scrambled to feed 5,000 new families over the past 12 months, up almost 70 percent from 3,000 the year before.

"I am shocked to see such numbers," Samuels said, "and I am really concerned that this is just the beginning of what we are going to see."

In the past three months, Samuels has seen more clients in higher-paying jobs - the $35,000 range - line up for food.

The Regional Food Bank of Northeastern New York, which covers 23 counties in New York State, cited a 30 percent rise in visitors in the first nine months of this year, compared with 2006.

Maureen Schnellmann, senior director of food and nutrition programs at the American Red Cross Food Pantry in Boston, reported a 30 percent increase from January through August over last year.

Until a few months ago, Dellria Seales, a home care assistant, was just getting by living with her daughter, a hairdresser, and two grandchildren in a one-bedroom apartment for $750 a month. But a knee injury in January forced her to quit her job, leaving her at the mercy of Samuels' pantry because most of her daughter's $1,200 a month income goes to rent, energy and food costs.

"I need it. Without it, we wouldn't survive," Seales said as she picked up carrots and bananas.

John Vogel, a professor at Dartmouth College's Tuck School of Business, worries that the squeeze will lead to a less nutritious diet and inadequate medical or child care.

In the meantime, rising costs show no signs of abating.

Gas prices hit a record nationwide average of $3.23 per gallon in late May before receding a little, though prices are expected to soar again later this year. Food costs have increased 4.5 percent over the past 12 months, partly because of higher fuel costs. Egg prices were 44 percent higher, while milk was up 21.3 percent over the past 12 months to nearly $4 a gallon, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The average family of four is spending anywhere from $7 to $10 extra a week - $40 more a month - on groceries alone, compared to a year ago, according to retail consultant Burt Flickinger III.

And while overall wage growth is a solid 4.1 percent over the past 12 months, economists say the increases are mostly for the top earners.

Retailers started noticing the strain in late spring and early summer as they were monitoring the spending around the paycheck cycle.

Wal-Mart and Family Dollar key on the first week of the month, when government checks like Social Security and public assistance generally hit consumers' mailboxes.

7-Eleven, whose customers are more diverse, looks at paycheck cycles in specific markets dominated by a major employer, such as General Motors in Detroit, to discern trends in shopping.

To economize, shoppers are going for less expensive food.

"They're buying more peanut butter and pasta. And they're going for hamburger meat," Flickinger, the retail consultant, said. "They're trying to outsmart the store by looking for deep discounts at the end of the month."

He said the last time he saw this was 2000-2001, when the dot-com bubble burst and the economy went into a recession after massive layoffs.

For now, low-price retailers are readjusting their merchandising and pricing.

Wal-Mart is becoming more aggressive on discounting. It announced Thursday it is expanding price cuts to 15,000 items, ranging from Motts apple juice and Progresso soups to women's fleece tops, heading into the holidays.

Family Dollar, whose food offerings were limited to candy and snacks until two years ago, has expanded its mix of groceries like fruit cups, cereal and such refrigerated items as milk and ice cream while cutting back on shoes. This summer the chain began accepting food stamps.

Food pantries are also getting creative. Samuels said her church, Full Gospel Tabernacle of Faith, just started offering free cooking classes to teach clients who are diabetic or have other health conditions how to prepare vegetables like squash. It's also offering free exercise classes.

"We are trying to make them health conscious," Samuels said. "It's not right to give them just anything. Our mantra is eat well and live well."

how tv works

how close are we to world war 3?

PERHAPS YOU were watching a late-night film or dancing the hours away in some packed nightclub. Maybe you were already tucked up snugly in bed. Wherever you were, it's pretty much a dead certainty you were oblivious at the time to the dramatic events that were unfolding in the skies over Syria on September 6 - events so startling, so secret and dangerous in their implications they could have come straight from the pages of an international best-selling thriller.

But this was not fiction. Indeed, what took place in the small hours of that Thursday morning - still the subject of immense speculation - was a terrifying reminder of the dangerous times we live in, and how much more volatile the Middle East could yet become.

"If people had known how close we came to world war three that day there'd have been mass panic," one senior British ministerial source was later quoted in a magazine as saying.
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"Never mind the floods or foot-and-mouth, Gordon Brown really would have been dealing with the bloody Book of Revelation and Armageddon."

So just what were those shadowy, near-apocalyptic events of last month, that some intelligence analysts believe could have been a "dry run" for a military strike on Iran? A strike which, if it went ahead, in itself has the potential to plunge the world into an even bigger Middle Eastern conflict, and simultaneously unleash an unprecedented wave of global terrorist attacks.

In the small hours of September 6, Israeli air force pilots of 69 Squadron locked the missile guidance systems of their F-15 and F-16 aircraft on the target beneath them in northeastern Syria. The endgame of what had been codenamed "Operation Orchard" was about to be played out.

But it was six weeks earlier, in another deadly incident near the Syrian town of Aleppo, where clues lie to the chain of subterfuge, surveillance, and special operations that culminated in that lethal night mission.

On July 26, an enormous explosion had blown up a military ammunition dump in Musalmiya about seven miles from Aleppo. As the official version of events was released by the Syrian news agency SANA, it was claimed that "very explosive products" had detonated after local temperatures of up to 50˚C had sparked a fire at the facility.

Since then, however, based on information from what it says are Syrian inside sources, the highly respected magazine Jane's Defence Weekly has given a very different and alarming account of what happened.

To begin with, Syrian government claims of high temperatures being the cause of the blast were described as "implausible" by the Jane's source, who said the explosion occurred at 4.30am, the coolest time of the day.

Instead, they say, in what was actually a secret weapons complex rather than a simple arms dump, fuel caught fire in a laboratory as Syrian and Iranian engineers were attempting to activate a 300-mile range "Scud C" missile with a mustard gas warhead.

Given its range, the Scud C, originally sold to Syria by North Korea in 1991, could easily be fired into Israel. Even more worrying for the Israelis, who well remember the fear struck into its citizens by the Iraqi Scuds that plummeted into their country during the 1991 Gulf War, the more advanced type of the same missile is capable of accommodating a nuclear warhead.

For Israeli and US intelligence agencies it was nothing new to hear that Syria was in possession of Scud missiles or working on chemical and biological weapons systems. But news of the Musalmiya incident was given a further alarming twist as reports surfaced some weeks later that the Israelis had been monitoring the arrival of a North Korean flagged freighter - possibly the Al-Hamad - at the Syrian port of Tartous on September 3.

Though officially carrying a cargo of cement, according to intelligence sources quoted in the Washington Post newspaper, the Israelis believed that on board the ship was a consignment of nuclear material or equipment.

On September 15, Washington Post reporter Glenn Kessler wrote that "an Israeli official provided the US with evidence of Syrian-North Korean co-operation on a nuclear facility".

Many veteran Middle East intelligence hands believe this to be plausible explanation. Among them is Ray Close, a former CIA analyst in the Near East Division and former station chief in Saudi Arabia, who served for 27 years as an "Arabist" for the agency.

According to what Close himself admits is a "speculative" analysis, he believes that: "The Israelis offered us the US intelligence that Syria is beginning to develop a nuclear capability based on North Korean technology and urged the US to co-operate with them in mounting a military attack to destroy the Syrian site."

Close says the advantages of the action as presented by the Israelis would be to "to pre-empt a new and dangerous violation of Israeli and American proliferation red lines intimidate and embarrass Syria, and throw a scare into Iran".

Some accounts say that after the arrival in Syria of the ship carrying the suspected consignment, the Israelis then tracked it to a site near the town of Dayr as Zawr in northeastern Syria, which had already been under surveillance by Israel's own Ofek spy satellite.

What happened over the following few days became known as "Operation Orchard", and such was the unprecedented shutdown on information from Israeli, US, and Syrian government sources alike about the raid that Middle East analysts can only conclude that the stakes were extremely high for all sides and the significance of the event immense.

Yet, despite the censorship and security, some details have slowly emerged.

Last week, the New York Times quoted what it described as foreign nationals with access to intelligence reports as saying that the target of Operation Orchard had indeed been a "partly constructed nuclear reactor", modelled on North Korean lines.

Within the last 48 hours, ABC News have said that another US official told them that the Israelis first discovered the nuclear facility earlier this summer and that Mossad (Israel's intelligence service) had even been able to "co-opt" one of the facility's workers or to insert their own spy.

If this is true, then the activities would be reminiscent of Mossad's undercover work in 1982, which prepared the way for a similar Israeli raid that destroyed the Iraqi nuclear reactor at Osiraq.

According to the ABC source, pictures taken by Mossad showed a big cylindrical structure with thick reinforced walls deep in the desert along the Euphrates river which undoubtedly had been built with "North Korean expertise".

"It was a place where no-one would ever go unless you had a reason to go there," said the US official, who added that the plant had been there for at least eight months before the Israeli raid.

Until the ABC report little had been known about the specific target of Operation Orchard, but some logistical details have now surfaced from the fog of secrecy. What is certain is that Israeli jets, possibly as many as eight F-15s and F16s, armed with Maverick missiles and 500lb bombs, took part in the mission.

On the ground as part of the operation a "Sayeret Shaldag" Israeli Air Force Commando unit, not unlike Britain's SAS, would probably have been deployed to use laser beams in guiding in the pilots, who were not even told about their ultimate target until they were airborne, such was the level of security surrounding the operation.

Also flying with the Israeli bombers was an ELINT (ELectronic Signals INTelligence) aircraft used for gathering crucial data about any enemy's defence network, including radars and surface-to-air missile systems.

Indeed, one of the most significant aspects of Operation Orchard was the apparent ease with which the Israelis penetrated Syrian air defences.

The Kuwaiti newspaper Al Watan reported that the Americans provided aerial cover for the Israeli strike aircraft, and that Russian experts are studying why the two state-of-the-art Russian-built radar systems in Syria did not detect the Israeli planes.

"Iran reportedly has asked the same question, since it is buying the same systems and might have paid for the Syrian acquisitions," said an Al Watan reporter.

In fact, Iran has already bought and paid for the defence systems. Like Syria, it bought 29 of the Tor-M1 units from Russia for $750 million - to guard its nuclear sites - which were delivered in January and tested in February this year.

This, along with earlier reports in the Kuwaiti press that former Iranian deputy defence minister Ali Rheza Ali, who defected several months ago, supplied intelligence sources in the West with information about the site Operation Orchard targeted, will give little comfort to Tehran as the clamour for a strike against their own nuclear facilities gains momentum.

That such a plan to attack Iran exists is now an accepted fact, as is the belief among many Middle East watchers that its implementation might not be far off.

One year after the September 11, 2001 attacks, the Bush administration published a report entitled The National Security Strategy of the United States of America in which it outlined its response to any similar threats.

"We must be prepared to stop rogue states and their terrorist clients before they are able to threaten or use weapons of mass destruction against the United States and our allies and friends," the report concluded.

Today, the operational embodiment of that strategy is known as Contingency Plan 8022 (Conplan 8022), a strike plan that might be used in any pre-emptive strike on Iran or other countries and is able to be unleashed with 12 hours of a presidential order.

In terms of Iran, a detailed blueprint for a military attack on the country already exists. Earlier this year the Israeli air force held joint exercises with visiting US pilots, although Israeli sources are keen to dismiss speculation that the drills were connected to an attack on Iran.

For Israel, the coming months are crucial in dealing with Iran: either Tehran heeds sanctions and stops enriching uranium, or Israel might feel it has to attack decisively, as it did with Operation Orchard in Syria.

The question on many people's minds is whether Operation Orchard was simply muscle-flexing or a serious statement of intent by Israel to go it alone in attacking Iran's nuclear capacity if the US does not.

Yesterday, the resignation of Iran's chief nuclear negotiator, Ali Larijani, the country's main contact with the West over Tehran's atomic programme, struck another blow against diplomatic hopes.

Iran's own Revolutionary Guards, meanwhile, were in belligerent mood: "Now the enemy should ask themselves how many of their people they are ready to have sacrificed for their stupidity in attacking Iran," Mahmoud Chaharbaghi, a brigadier, warned.

A few months ago, Sam Gardiner - a retired US air force colonel who has been directly involved in the past with drawing up US strategy on Iran - offered another warning as to the dangers any pre-emptive strike poses.

"The fuel for a fire is in place," he said. "All we need is a spark. The danger is that we have created conditions that could lead to a greater Middle East war."

Wounded troops overwhelm care

Six years into the "global war on terror," the Bush administration, Congress, and federal agencies are scrambling to address the health needs of battlefield veterans back from Iraq and Afghanistan.

President Bush acknowledges that the current means of caring for wounded and traumatized vets is "an antiquated system that needs to be changed." A bipartisan commission says the need for fundamental improvements in care management and the disability system "requires a sense of urgency and strong leadership."

As a result, Mr. Bush has proposed administrative action and legislation that would streamline the system for providing postwar medical services and disability compensation to wounded veterans and their families.

The numbers are daunting:

•Of the more than 1.4 million service men and women who have served in the two war zones, nearly 700,000 have become eligible for Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) medical care, of whom about 230,000 have sought such care since 2002.

• Depending on future force deployments, VA medical costs associated with Iraq and Afghanistan could total between $7 billion and $9 billion over the next decade, according to Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projections. Disability compensation and survivors' benefits could add another $3 billion to $4 billion.

• A total of about 30,000 troops have been wounded in action. The survival rate of those wounded is higher than it was in Vietnam and much higher than World War II, due to body armor, advances in battlefield medical procedures, and more rapid evacuation.

Put another way, this means the number of those killed is a relatively smaller portion of overall casualties. It also means concern is growing about injuries and ailments that have come to mark this war: amputations, traumatic brain injuries (TBI), and the mental and emotional shock of combat.

"Of the [Iraq/Afghanistan] veterans who sought care from VA, about 38 percent have received at least a preliminary diagnosis of a mental health condition, and 18 percent have received a preliminary diagnosis for PTSD [post-traumatic stress disorder], making it the most common, but by no means, the only mental health condition related to the stress of deployment," Michael Kussman, undersecretary of the Veterans Health Administration, told a House Committee on Veterans' Affairs hearing last week.

According to the Congressional Research Service, between 2003 and 2007 about 60,000 troops were diagnosed with either PTSD or TBI.

The VA is one of the largest federal bureaucracies, operating more than 1,500 facilities providing help for veterans and their families and employing about 200,000 people, including some 13,000 doctors and nearly 55,000 nurses.

Despite this, one concern is the growing need for medical specialists to help war veterans.

In recent congressional testimony, Joseph Wilson of the American Legion cited federal studies showing that by 2020, projected retirements will create a shortage of about 24,000 physicians and almost 1 million nurses nationwide.

"Another challenge [is] acquiring staff trained in certain specialty fields … physical medicine and rehabilitation, blind rehabilitation, speech and language pathology, physical therapy, and certified rehabilitation nursing," warned Mr. Wilson. "Given the special rehabilitative and long-term care needs of combat wounded veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan – especially those residing in rural areas – shortages in these specialty fields will have a lasting impact on these veterans as they attempt to resume independent functioning."

Linda Bilmes, who teaches at of the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, estimates that the long-term costs of disability compensation and medical care to veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan could be as high as $700 billion.

"The cost of providing such care and paying disability compensation is a significant long-term entitlement cost that the US will be paying for the next forty years," professor Bilmes wrote in a research paper earlier this year. Reports early this year of inferior treatment and bureaucratic bungling at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center highlighted problems that still have not been fully solved despite steps to reform the massive and complicated system.

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) last week cited "fundamental system weaknesses" on the part of both the Defense Department (DOD) and the VA in how they treat wounded vets – including not enough staff and staff training.

"Delayed decisions, confusing policies, and the perception that DOD and VA disability ratings result in inequitable outcomes have eroded the credibility of the system," the GAO reported.

It is these criticisms that Bush addressed last week in meeting with the "Wounded Warriors" commission headed by former Sen. Bob Dole and former Secretary of Health and Human Services Donna Shalala. The President's proposals include:

•New procedures for evaluating disabilities and compensating injured military personnel, including pensions for those who cannot return to active duty.

•Greater emphasis on diagnosing and treating PTSD – especially addressing any stigma associated with the disorder.

•Assignment of patient advocates to monitor progress, guide wounded vets through government bureaucracies, and help in the transition to civilian life.

•Providing six months unpaid leave for family members who want to help aid the recovery of wounded GIs.

As the fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan continues, policy makers – like most Americans – say it's vital to separate a divisive war from those who fought.

"No matter where we stand on the war in Iraq, we all stand together in our desire to make sure that our returning service members get the healthcare they need, and the benefits they have earned," says Rep. Bob Filner (D) of California, who chairs the veterans' affairs committee. "We cannot fund the war, but fail to fund the warriors."

A Computer Display In Your Glasses

At last month's International Symposium on Wearable Computers in Seattle, MicroOptical debuted its prototype projectable-display glasses (see the photo). A tiny LCD in one temple generates high- resolution, 24-bit text, graphics, and video, viewed through optics hidden in the lenses. The display is projected in front of users, right in the middle of their surroundings, as if they were watching television.
MicroOptical is in partnership talks with PDA manufacturers and wearable-computer companies. Within the next two years, thanks to an alliance between MicroOptical and Essilor International, a maker of ophthalmic lenses, consumers will be able to purchase Bluetooth- enabled eyewear with MicroOptical's embedded technology from stores such as LensCrafters as part of a complete prescription eyeglass package, which will cost $400 to $600. MicroOptical is also looking to make the glasses compatible with cell phones.

Letting users pick standard frames and not blocking their view of their surroundings have been elusive design goals, according to Paul Zavracky, MicroOptical's president. "These have been our objectives from the beginning," he says. "People will be able to sit on a train or walk around and have access to information like e- mail, the Internet, GPS, and movies-and they won't have to wear helmets."

PeoplePC Online
A better way to Internet
http://www.peoplepc.com

In Britain, law has long arms, eagle eyes

THEY'RE WATCHING: A wall of video monitors showing live images from closed circuit television cameras (CCTV) installed in central London. Britain has the highest number of CCTV cameras -- about one for every 14 people.

It has the world's widest public CCTV surveillance system. Many don't mind it, but activists fear the state is turning into Big Brother.
By Kim Murphy, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
October 19, 2007
Gloucester, England

It used to be that troublemakers could lounge on the planters outside the McDonald's here and pick apart the geraniums to their hearts' content.

A Polish immigrant hamburger salesman might complain -- as if! -- or someone's grandma would tell the offending group of hoodlums to knock it off, if she dared. These days, Big Brother does the job.

The closed-circuit television camera lurking just down the street from the fast-food restaurant bellows menacingly at the first sign of danger to the flora, or a cast-off cigarette butt or fast-food wrapper, for that matter. "Pick it up," commands a booming voice from . . . where, exactly?

The CCTV cameras in Gloucester and several other British towns now come equipped with speakers, meaning Big Brother is not only watching, he's telling you what to do.

"When people hear that, they tend to react. They pick up the litter and put it in the bin," said Mick Matthews, assistant chief police constable in this old cathedral city of 110,000 in the rolling Cotswold hills.

For all the increased anti-terrorism security measures in the U.S., there is probably no society on Earth more watched than Britain.

By some estimates, 4.2 million CCTV cameras, or one for every 15 people, quietly, and sometimes not so quietly, monitor the comings and goings of almost everyone -- an average person is caught on camera up to 300 times a day.

Thanks in part to Britain's long history of terrorist attacks by the Irish Republican Army, some early, high-profile law enforcement successes helped imprint the potential benefits of closed-circuit television on the popular imagination. With more than $200 million in funding since 1999, CCTV was a fixture in British cities long before attacks by Islamic militants began prompting governments around the world to step up surveillance of their populations.

Cameras are fixed on lampposts and on street corners, above sidewalks, in subways, on buses, in taxis, in stores, over the parking lots, in mobile police vans, and in some cities, even perched in the hats of police officers walking their beats.

Surprisingly clear images of Britons engaged in apparently nefarious activities have become a staple on the evening news; few of the country's many terrorism trials unfold without the jury being presented with multiple images of the defendants purportedly carrying backpack bombs or driving up to a storehouse of explosives.

Pub patrons in one town last year had their fingerprints scanned as they walked in (bringing up their criminal records on a computer screen); some cities are considering putting electronic chips in household trash cans to measure output; a toll-free "smoke-free compliance line" takes snitch reports on violators of the new national ban on smoking in public places.

The DNA profile of every person arrested -- even those briefly detained for, say, loitering, and released without charge -- is on file in what is believed to be, per capita, the largest such database in the world, with 3.9 million samples. It includes the genetic markings of an estimated 40% of Britain's black male population.

For the majority of Britons, polls show, there is nothing at all wrong with much of this monitoring.

"I didn't know the camera was even up there until it started talking," said Clive Anthony, who blinked and twirled for a moment one recent afternoon in downtown Gloucester when the CCTV camera started barking at something. "I haven't got a problem with it, basically. To my mind, if you're doing what you're supposed to be doing and going about your business, just because somebody's watching that, it's not taking anything away from me."

Public acceptance of closed-circuit television skyrocketed after the murder of toddler James Bulger near Liverpool in 1993. In CCTV footage that shocked the country, the killers, a pair of 10-year-old boys, were shown leading the trusting 2-year-old away from a shopping center.

"The last known sighting of this boy was on CCTV. And there was this kind of iconic image that was used to say, 'If we had more CCTV, we would be more likely to spot horrible crimes like this,' " said Kirstie Ball, an expert on surveillance systems at Open University Business School in Milton Keynes. "It got to a point where if you were opposing CCTV, you were in favor of child murder."

But a growing number of people, including some police officers and the country's information commissioner, are beginning to wonder whether Britain isn't watching itself too closely.

"Local communities are pushing very powerfully for closed-circuit television. What they say is, I may live in this little village that has no history of violent crime, but I'll feel safer if I've got CCTV," said Ian Readhead, deputy chief constable of the Hampshire police, who recently warned that Britain risks "an Orwellian situation with cameras on every street corner."

"Suppose Mr. Brand is seen walking down the local street with Mrs. Wight. 'What's that about?' someone will ask. And in a village environment, it begins to cause a rumor, it begins to cause intrigue," he said in an interview. "You really only want to deploy this kind of equipment when you have clear knowledge of an identifiable situation, and when you've achieved your objectives, you want to take it down."

In a worldwide survey conducted by Privacy International, a London-based civil rights group that monitors government infringement on privacy, Britain was roughly keeping company with Russia and China near the bottom, colored in black on a world map, with the U.S. not far behind, in red.

Britain has no written constitution, no bill of rights, and no privacy act. Its privacy protections are enforced mainly through the European Convention on Human Rights and a limited data protection law passed in 1998.

"In the area of visual surveillance, we are so far ahead of the field that it's beyond measurement," said Simon Davies, the group's director. "If we had a color that moved from 'black' to 'black hole,' we'd be talking about" Britain.

The national information commissioner, Richard Thomas, has warned that Britain is "waking up in a surveillance society," and has called for greater public discussion of what it really means to make one's life a virtual open book.

"The U.K. has more CCTV cameras per head of population than any other country in the world, but it's not only that," Thomas said. "Every time we use mobile telephones, every time we use credit cards, every time we use the Internet for shopping or a search, every time we interact with the government for social security or taxes or passport checks, every time we go to our doctors or hospitals now, we are leaving an electronic footprint. And this of course is not just a U.K. issue, it is an international issue."

Britain's move into the era of biometric passports, national ID cards and face-recognition software coincided in many ways with America's, and the advent of the Patriot Act. Britain had its own 9/11 -- the simultaneous attacks on the London transport system in July 2005 that killed 52 people and wounded hundreds of others.

The use of warrantless wiretaps, a subject of court battles in the U.S., hardly produced a murmur here. Police in Britain almost never require a judge's approval to listen in on people's phones.

And Britain, unlike the U.S., requires telephone companies to retain their customers' landline and cellphone records for at least 12 months for possible use by the government. Under regulations that took effect Oct. 1, the data are now available to more than 650 agencies, from tax and welfare authorities to local councils, in addition to the police.

And unlike the United States, where citizens may have medical record files gathering dust in clinics across three states that never talk to one another, Britain is in the midst of building a centralized, $24-billion databank containing the health records of 50 million citizens, billed as the biggest civil information technology project in the world.

The system is designed to provide access to patients' medical history no matter where they are receiving treatment. But some patients have challenged it, worrying that in a databank so vast and potentially leaky, their confidential information could end up in the wrong hands. Faced with this opposition, the government has decided patients will be allowed to veto their records being shared nationally.

The police DNA databank has faced critics too. A man in Somerset has spent much of the last year battling the local police department over a permanent DNA record that was established for his 13-year-old son, who was briefly suspected of writing graffiti in the town center.

The man, who did not want to be identified in order to protect his son, said he brought the boy into the police station this year when he heard officers wanted to talk to him. "They realized that [he] didn't have anything to do with it whatsoever, and the officer said, 'You're free to go.'

"Just before we left, he said, 'Oh, by the way, by law we have to take your DNA.' And I just couldn't believe what was going on. It was like he was being treated like some kind of convict."

Only recently, after the intervention of a civil rights organization, did the police department say the DNA file would be discarded. "We weren't looking for any compensation," the father said. "I've always had respect for the police. But I knew [my son] was innocent."

In 2003, a 51-year-old Essex man won $39,600 in damages in a judgment from the European Court on Human Rights when CCTV footage of him attempting suicide on a public street was given to local newspapers and the BBC (which broadcast it to more than 9 million viewers on its "Crime Beat" program).

"It's really a matter of dignity, and what it means to be a human being," said Shami Chakrabarti, director of Liberty, the human rights organization that represented the Essex man in court.

"The problem we face is that we're living in an age where we're even having to make arguments about why torture is always wrong, about why people should be charged and tried before they're imprisoned," Chakrabarti said. "And whenever those values are being challenged, something like personal privacy becomes very difficult to defend."

Government authorities say their new surveillance tools not only guard against terrorists, but also against welfare cheating, illegal immigration and the juvenile delinquents who pose a problem in many of Britain's cities.

"The public don't have a problem with being protected from thugs, or having CCTV cameras that catch murderers, or DNA that solves horrendous crimes that left victims and families without justice for 20 years," former Prime Minister Tony Blair said, responding to growing concerns before leaving office. "But there must always be safeguards."

Although studies have shown the CCTV cameras have had a negligible effect on crime in most areas where they're placed -- other than parking lots, where they do help prevent thefts -- police say they are an invaluable tool in catching suspects after the fact, helping track missing children or the elderly and directing police to potential problem situations before they escalate.

Gloucester has been able to reduce the number of patrols because of the talking cameras, which are monitored at a center at police headquarters by an officer who speaks into the microphone from there.

The CCTV cameras not only talk, but they also can be linked to software that scans vehicle registration plates to track suspects through the city even before they have committed crimes.

"If there's a criminal we're interested in, not necessarily in a position to arrest him, but if you're trying to track this criminal, learn his lifestyle, his movements, his vehicle number will be put into the system, and any time he comes into the city, his movements will be tracked," said Roger Clayton, chief inspector of police in Gloucester.

"Arguably, what Roger's just described is the debate: Is this picking on an individual?" said Matthews, the assistant chief constable.

"But if we know an individual with a record for offending is making their way toward an area where they've offended previously, and we have every reason to believe they'll offend again, we'll track them, and if they re-offend, we'll catch them."

These days, the wrongdoer sometimes is merely someone who gets caught riding a bicycle in the downtown pedestrians-only zone.

"Please dismount from the bicycle," the offender is told, by someone, somewhere. They're never sure who.

kim.murphy@latimes.com

THE ROTHSCHILD DYNASTY

THE ROTHSCHILD DYNASTY
(Condensced from "Descent Into Slavery" by Des Griffin, Chapter Five)

For many years the words international banker, Rothschild, Money and Gold have held a mystical type of fascination for many people around the world but particularly in the United States.

Over the years in the United States, the international bankers have come in for a great deal of criticism by a wide variety of individuals who have held high offices of public trust -- men whose opinions are worthy of note and whose responsibilities placed them in positions where they knew what was going on behind the scenes in politics and high finance.

President Andrew Jackson, the only one of our presidents whose administration totally abolished the National Debt, condemned the international bankers as a "den of vipers" which he was determined to "rout out" of the fabric of American life. Jackson claimed that if only the American people understood how these vipers operated on the American scene "there would a revolution before morning."

Congressman Louis T. McFadden who, for more than ten years, served as chairman of the Banking and Currency Committee, stated that the international bankers are a "dark crew of financial pirates who would cut a man's throat to get a dollar out of his pocket... They prey upon the people of these United States."

John F. Hylan, then mayor of New York, said in 1911 that "the real menace of our republic is the invisible government which, like a giant octopus, sprawls its slimy length over our city, state and nation. At the head is a small group of banking houses, generally referred to as 'international bankers.'"

Were these leading public figures correct in their assessment of the situation, or were they the victims of some exotic form of paranoia?

Let's examine history analytically and unemotionally and uncover the facts. The truth, as it unfolds, will prove to be eye-opening and educational to those who are seeking to more clearly understand the mind-boggling events that have been (and are) taking place on the national and international scenes.
HUMBLE BEGINNINGS

Europe, towards the end of the eighteenth century or at the time of the American Revolution, was very different from what we know in the same area today. It was composed oil a combination of large and small kingdoms, duchies and states which were constantly engaged in squabbles among themselves. Most people were reduced to the level of serfs -- with no political rights. The meager 'privileges' that were granted to them by their 'owners' could be withdrawn at a moment's notice.

It was during this period of time that a young man appeared on the European scene who was to have a tremendous impact on the future course of world history; his name was Mayer Amschel Bauer. In later years his name, which he had changed, became synonamous with wealth, power and influence. He was the first of the Rothschilds -- the first truly international banker!

Mayer Amschel Bauer was born in Frankfurt-On-The-Main in Germany in 1743. He was the son of Moses Amschel Bauer an itinerant money lender and goldsmith who, tiring of his wanderings in Eastern Europe, decided to settle down in the city where his first son was born. He opened a shop, or counting house, on Judenstrasse (or Jew Street). Over the door leading into the shop he placed a large Red Shield.

At a very early age Mayer Amschel Bauer showed that he possessed immense intellectual ability, and his father spent much of his time teaching him everything he could about the money lending business, and the lessons he had learned from many sources. The older Bauer originally hoped to have his son trained as a Rabbi but the father's untimely death put an end to such plans.

A few years after his father's death Mayer Amschel Bauer went to work as a clerk in a bank owned by the Oppenheimers in Hannover. His superior ability was quickly recognized and his advancement within the firm was swift. He was awarded a junior partnership.

Shortly thereafter he returned to Frankurt where he was able to purchase the business his father had established in 1750. The big Red Shield was still displayed over the door. Recognizing the true significance of the Red Shield (his father had adopted it as his emblem from the Red Flag which was the emblem of the revolutionary minded Jews in Eastern Europe), Mayer Amschel Bauer changed his name to Rothschild; in this way the House of Rothschild came into being.

The base for a vast accmulation of wealth was laid during the 1760s when Amschel Rothschild renewed his acquaintance with General von Estorff for whom he ran errands while employed at the Oppenheimer Bank.

When Rothschild discovered that the general, who was now attached to the court of Prince William of Hanau, was interested in rare coins he decided to take full advantage of the situation. By offering valuable coins and trinkets at discount prices he soon ingratiated himself with the general and other influential members of the court.

One day he was ushered into the presence of Prince William himself. His Highness bought a handful of his rarest medals and coins. This was the first transaction between a Rothschild and a head of state. Soon Rothschild was doing business with other princes.

Before long Rothschild tried another ploy to secure an 'in' with various local princes -- and to further his own aims! He wrote them letters that played on their princely vanity while asking them for their patronage. A typical letter would read:

"It has been my particular high and good fortune to serve your lofty princely Serenity at various times and to your most gracious satisfaction. I stand ready to exert all my energies and my entire fortune to serve your lofty princely serenity whenever in future it shall please you to command me. An especially powerful incentive to this end would be given me if your lofty princely serenity were to distinguish me with an appointment as one of your Highness' Court Factors. I am making bold to beg for this with the more confidence in the assurance that by so doing I am not giving any trouble; while for my part such a distinction would lift up my commercial standing and be of help to me in many other ways that I feel certain thereby to make my own way and fortune here in the city of Franfurt."

His tactics paid off. On September 21, 1769, Rothschild was able to nail a sign bearing the arms of Hess-Hanau to the front of his shop. In gold characters it read: "M. A. Rothschild, by appointment court factor to his serene highness, Prince William of Hanau."

In 1770 Rothschild married Gutele Schnaper who was aged seventeen. They had a large family consititing of five sons and five daughters. Their sons were Amschel, Salomon, Nathan, Kalmann (Karl) and Jacob (James).

History records that William of Hanau, "whose crest had been famous in Germany since the Middle Ages," was a dealer in human flesh. For a price the Prince, who was closely related to the various royal families of Europe, would rent out troops to any nation. His best customer was the British government which wanted troops for such projects as trying to keep the American colonists in line.

He did exceptionally well with his 'rent-a-troop' business. When he died he left the largest fortune ever accumulated in Europe to that time, $200,000,000. Rothschild biographer Frederic Morton describes William as "Europe's most blue-cold blooded loan shark" (The Rothschilds, Fawcett Crest, 1961, p. 40).

Rothschild became an agent for this 'human cattle' dealer. He must have worked diligently in his new position of responsibility because, when William was forced to flee to Denmark, he left 600,000 pounds (then valued at $3,000,000) with Rothschild for safekeeping.

According to the late Commander William Guy Carr, who was an Intelligence Officer in the Royal Canadian Navy, and whohad excellent contacts in intelligence circles around the world, the founder of the House of Rothschild drew up plans for the creation of the Illuminati and then entrusted Adam Weishaupt with its organization and development.

Sir Walter Scott, in the second volume of his Life of Napoleon, states that the French Revolution was planned by the Illuminati and was financed by the money changers of Europe. Interestingly enough, the above book (which this author has both seen and read) is the only book written by Scott that is not listed under his name in any of the 'authoritative' reference works. It is now a 'non book'!
"MORE BUSINESSLIKE" FACTS

For an account of what happened next we turn to the Jewish Encyclopedia, 1905 edition, Volume 10, p. 494: "According to legend this money was hidden away in wine casks, and, escaping the search of Napoleon's soldiers when they entered Frankfort, was restored intact in the same casks in 1814, when the elector returned to the electorate. The facts are somewhat less romantic, and more businesslike."

Pay particular attention to the last nine words. They are loaded with significance. Here the leading Jewish authority states that what Rothschild actually did with the $3,000,000 was "more businesslike," from a Jewish point of view, than what was stated in the legend.

The simple truth of the matter is that Rothschild embezzled the money from Prince William. But even before the money reached Rothschild it was not 'clean' (or Kosherl). The vast sum had been paid to William of Hess by the British government for the services of his soldiers. The money was originally embezzled by William from his troops who were legally entitled to it.

With the twice embezzled money as a solid foundation, Mayer Amschel Rothschild decided to vastly expand his operations -- and become the first international banker.

A couple of years earlier Rothschild had sent his son, Nathan, to England to take care of the family business in that country. After a brief stay in Manchester, where he operated as a merchant, Nathan, on instructions from his father, moved to London and set up shop as a merchant banker. To get the operation under way Rothschild gave his son the three million dollars he had embezzled from William of Hess.

The Jewish Encyclopedia for 1905 tells us that Nathan invested the loot in "gold from the East India company knowing that it would be needed for Wellington's peninsula campaign." On the stolen money Nathan made "no less than four profits; (1) On the sale of Wellington's paper [which he bought at 50 cents on the dollar and collected at par; (2) on the sale of gold to Wellington; (3) on its repurchase; and (4) on forwarding it to Portugal. This was the beginning of the great fortunes of the house" (p. 494).

Yes, the Jewish Encyclopaedia claims that the great fortune accumulated by the Rothschilds over the years was based on the "businesslike" method of fraud.

With their huge accumulation of ill-gotten gain the family established branches of the House of Rothschild in Berlin, Vienna, Paris and Naples. Rothschild placed a son in charge of each branch. Amschel was placed in charge of the Berlin branch; Salomon was over the Vienna branch; Jacob (James) went to Paris and Kalmann (Karl) opened up the Rothschild bank in Naples. The headquarters of the House of Rothschild was, and is, in London.
NATHAN

An anonymous contemporary described Nathan Rothschild as he leaned against the 'Rothschild Piller' at the London Stock Exchange, hung his heavy hands into his pockets, and began to release silent, motionless, implacable cunning:

"Eyes are usually called the windows of the soul. But in Rothschild's case you would conclude that the windows are false ones, or that there was no soul to look out of them. There comes not one pencil of light from the interior, neither is there one gleam of that which comes from without reflected in any direction. The whole puts you in mind of an empty skin, and you wonder why it stands upright without at least something in it. By and by another figure comes up to it. It then steps two paces aside, and the most inquisitive glance that you ever saw, and a glance more inquisitive than you would ever have thought of, is drawn out of the fixed and leaden eye, as if one were drawing a sword from a scabbard. The visiting figure, which has the appearance of coming by accident and not by design, stops just a second or two, in the course of which looks are exchanged which, though you cannot translate, you feel must be of most important meaning. After these the eyes are sheathed up again, and the figure resumes its stony posture.

During the morning numbers of visitors come, all of whom meet with a similar reception and vanish in a similar manner. Last of all the figure itself vanishes, leaving you utterly at a loss." (Frederic Morton, The Rothschilds, p. 65)
MAYER AMSCHEL'S WILL

When he died on September 19, 1812, the founder of the House of Rothschild left a will that was just days old. In it, he laid down specific laws by which the House that bore his name would operate in future year.

The laws were as follows:

(1) All key positions in the House of Rothschild were to be held by members of the family, and not by hired hands. Only male members of the family were allowed to participate in the business.

The eldest son of the eldest son was to be the head of the family unless the majority of the rest of the family agreed otherwise. It was for this exceptional reason that Nathan, who was particularly brilliant, was appointed head of the House of Rothschild in 1812.

(2) The family was to intermarry with their own first and second cousins, thus preserving the vast fortune. This rule was strictly adhered to early on but later, when other rich Jewish banking houses came on the scene, it was relaxed to allow some of the Rothschilds to marry selected members of the new elite.

(3) Amschel forbade his heirs "most explicitly, in any circumstances whatever, to have any public inventory made by the courts, or otherwise, of my estate .... Also I forbid any legal action and any publication of the value of the inheritance .... Anyone who disregards these provisions and takes any kind of action which conflicts with them will immediately be regarded as having disputed the will, and shall suffer the consequences of so doing."

(4) Rothschild ordered a perpetual family partnership and provided that the female members of the family, their husbands and children should receive their interest in the estate subject to the management of the male members. They were to have no part in the management of the business. Anyone who disputed this arrangement would lose their interest in the Estate. (The last stipulation was specifically designed to seal the mouths of anyone who might feel like breaking with the family. Rothschild obviously felt that there were a lot of things under the family 'rug' that should never see the light of day).

The mighty strength of the House of Rothschild was based on a variety of important factors:

(A) Complete secrecy resulting from total family control of all business dealings;

(B) An uncanny, one could almost say a supernatural ability to see what lay ahead and to take full advantage of it. The whole family was driven by an insatiable lust for the accumulation of wealth and power, and

(C) Total ruthlessness in all business dealings.

Biographer Frederic Morton, in The Rothschilds, tells us that Mayer Amschel Rothschild and his five sons were "wizards" of finance, and "fiendish calculators" who were motivated by a "demonic drive" to succeed in their secret undertakings.
TALMUDIC INFLUENCE

From the same authoritative source we learn that "on Saturday evenings, when prayer was done at the synagogue, Mayer would inveigle the rabbi into his house. They would bend towards one another on the green upholstery, sipping slowly at a glass of wine and argue about first and last things deep into the night. Even on work days...Mayer...was apt to tare down the big book of the Talmud and recite from it...while the entire family must sit stock still and listen" (p. 31).

It could be said of the Rothschilds that the "family that preys together stays together." And prey they did! Morton states that it is difficult for the average person to "comprehend Rothschild nor even the reason why he having so much, wanted to conquer more." All five brothers were imbued with this same spirit of cunning and conquest.

The Rothschilds formed no true friendships or alliances. Their associates were but mere acquaintances who were used to further the interests of the House of Rothschild, and then thrown on the garbage heap of history when they had served their purpose or outlived their usefulness.

The truth of this statement is demonstrated by another passage from Frederic Morton's book. He relates how, in 1806, Napoleon declared that it was his "object to remove the house of Hess-Cassel from rulership and to strike it out of the list of powers."

"Thus Europe's mightiest man decreed erasure of the rock on which the new Rothschild firm had been built. Yet, curiously, the bustle didn't diminish at the house of the [Red] Shield.... Rothschilds still sat, avid and impenetrable, portfolios wedged between body and arm.

"They saw neither peace nor war, neither slogans or manifestos, nor orders of the day, neither death nor glory. They saw none of the things that blinded the world. They saw only steppingstones. Prince William had been one. Napoleon would be the next" (pp. 38,39).

'Curious'? Not exactly! The House of Rothschild was helping to finance the French dictator and, as a result, had free access to French markets at all times. Some years later, when both France and England were blockading each other's coast lines, the only merchants who were allowed to freely run the blockades were -- yes, you guessed it, the Rothschilds. They were financing both sides!

"The efficiency which powered Mayer's sons brought on enormous economic spring cleaning: a sweeping away of fiscal dead wood; a renovation of old credit structures and an invention of new ones; a formation -- implicit in the sheer existence of five different Rothschild banks in five different countries -- of fresh money channels via clearing-houses; a method of replacing the old unwieldy shipping of gold bullion by a worldwide system of debits and credits.

"One of the greatest contributions was Nathan's new technique for floating international loans. He didn't much care to receive dividends in all sorts of strange and cumbersome currencies.

"Now Nathan attracted him -- the most powerful investment source of the nineteenth century -- by making foreign bonds payable in Pounds Sterling" (p. 96).
THE BATTLE OF WATERLOO

As the wealth and power of the Rothschilds grew in size and influence so did their intelligence gathering network. They had their 'agents' strategically located in all the capitals and trading centers of Europe, gathering and developing various types of intelligence. Like most family exploits, it was based on a combination of very hard work and sheer cunning.

Their unique spy system started out when 'the boys' began sending messages to each other through a networh of couriers. Soon it developed into something much more elaborate, effective and far reaching. It was a spy network par excellence. Its stunning speed and effectiveness gave the Rothschilds a clear edge in all their dealings on an international level.

"Rothschild coaches careened down the highways; Rothschild boats set sail across the Channel; Rothschild agents were swift shadows along the streets. They carried cash, securities, letters and news. Above all, news -- the latest exclusive news to be vigorously processed at stock market and commodity bourse.

"And there was no news more precious than the outcome at Waterloo..." (The Rothschilds p. 94).

Upon the battle of Waterloo depended the future of the European continent. If the Grande Armee of Napoleon emerged victorious France would be undisputed master of all she surveyed on the European front. If Napoleon was crushed into submission England would hold the balance of power in Europe and would be in a position to greatly expand its sphere of influence.

Historian John Reeves, a Rothschild partisan, reveals in his book The Rothschilds, Financial Rulers of the Nations, 1887, page 167, that "one cause of his [Nathan's] success was the secrecy with which he shrouded, and the tortuous policy with which he misled those who watched him the keenest."

There were vast fortunes to be made -- and lost -- on the outcome of the Battle of Waterloo. The Stock Exchange in London was at fever pitch as traders awaited news of the outcome of this battle of the giants. If Britain lost, English consuls would plummet to unprecedented depths. If Britain was victorioug, the value of the consul would leap to dizzying new heights.

As the two huge armies closed in for their battle to the death, Nathan Rothschild had his agents working feverishly on both sides of the line to gather the most accurate possible information as the battle proceeded. Additional Rothschild agents were on hand to carry the intelligence bulletins to a Rothschild command post strategically located nearby.

Late on the afternoon of June 15, 1815, a Rothschild representative jumped on board a specially chartered boat and headed out into the channel in a hurried dash for the English coast. In his possession was a top secret report from Rothschild's secret service agents on the progress of the crucial battle. This intelligence data would prove indispensable to Nathan in making some vital decisions.

The special agent was met at Folkstone the following morning at dawn by Nathan Rothschild himself. After quickly scanning the highlights of the report Rothschild was on his way again, speeding towards London and the Stock Exchange.
COUP OF COUPS

Arriving at the Exchange amid frantic speculation on the outcome of the battle, Nathan took up his usual position beside the famous 'Rothschild Pillar.' Without a sign of emotion, without the slightest change of facial expression the stony-faced, flint eyed chief of the House of Rothschild gave a predetermined signal to his agents who were stationed nearby.

Rothschild agents immediately began to dump consuls on the market. As hundred of thousands of dollars worth of consuls poured onto the market their value started to slide. Then they began to plummet.

Nathan continued to lean against 'his' pillar, emotionless, expressionless. He continued to sell, and sell and sell. Consuls kept on falling. Word began to sweep through the Stock Exchange: "Rothschild knows." "Rothschild knows." "Wellington has lost at Waterloo."

The selling turned into a panic as people rushed to unload their 'worthless' consuls or paper money for gold and silver in the hope of retaining at least part of their wealth. Consuls continued their nosedive towards oblivion. After several hours of feverish trading the consul lay in ruins. It was selling for about five cents on the dollar.

Nathan Rothschild, emotionless as ever, still leaned against his pillar. He continued to give subtle signals. But these signals were different. They were so bubtly different that only the highly trained Rothschild agents could detect the change. On the cue from their boss, dozens of Rothschild agents made their way to the order desks around the Exchange and bought every consul in sight for just a 'song'!

A short time later the 'official' news arrived in the British capital. England was now the master of the European scene.

Within seconds the consul skyrocketed to above its original value. As the significance of the British victory began to sink into the public consciousness, the value of consuls rose even higher.

Napoleon had 'met his Waterloo.' Nathan had bought control of the British economy. Overnight, his already vast fortune was multiplied twenty times over.
THE JEWISH ENCYCLOPEDIA VOLUME X, 1905 (P. 494)

Owing to Napoleon's seizure of Holland in 1803, the leaders of the anti-Napoleonic league chose Frankfort as a financial center where-from to obtain the sinews of war. After the battle of Jena in 1806 the Landgrave of Hesse-Cassel fled to Denmark, where he had already deposited much of his wealth through the agency of Mayer Amschel Rothschild, leaving in the hands of the latter specie and works of art of the value of 600,000 pounds. According to legend, thse were hidden away in wine-casks, and, escaping the search of Napoleon's soldiers when they entered Frankfort, were restored intact in the same casks in 1814, when the elector returned to his electorate (see Marbot, "Memoirs," 1891, i. 310-311). The facts are somewhat less romantic, and more business-like. Rothschild, so far from being in danger, was on such good terms with Napoleon's nominee, Prince Dalberg, that he had been made in 1810 a member of the Electoral College of Darmstadt. The elector's money had been sent to Nathan in London, who in 1808 utilized it to purchase 800,000 pounds worth of gold from the East India Company, knowing that it would be needed for Wellington's Peninsular campaign. He made no less than fonr profits on this: (1) on the sale of Wellington's paper, (2) on the sale of the gold to Wellington, (3) on its repurchase, and (4) on forwarding it to Portugal. This was the beginning of the great fortunes of the house,
CLEAN UP IN FRANCE

Following their crushing defeat at Waterloo, the French struggled to get back on their feet financially. In 1817 they negotiated a substantial loan from the prestigious French banking house of Ouvrard and from the well-known bankers Baring Brothers of London. The Rothschilds had been left on the outside looking in.

The following year the French government was in need of another loan. As the bonds issued in 1817 with the help of Ouvrard and Baring Brothers were increasing in value on the Paris market, and in other European financial centers, it appeared certain that the French governmant would retain the services of these two distinguished banking houses.

The Rothschild brothers tried most of the gimmicks in their vast repertoire to influence the French government to give them the business. Their efforts were in vain.

The French aristocrats, who prided themselves on their elegance and superior breeding, viewed the Rothschilds as mere peasants, upstarts who needed to be kept in their place. The fact that the Rothschilds had vast financial resources, lived in the most luxurious homes and were attired in the most elegant and expensive clothes obtainable cut no ice with the highly class conscious French nobility. The Rothschilds were viewed as uncouth -- lacking in social graces. If we are to believe most historical accounts, their appraisal of the first generation Rothschilds was probably valid.

One major piece of armament in the Rothschild arsenal the French had overlooked or ignored -- their unprecedented cunning in the use and manipulation of money.

On November 5, 1818, something very unexpected occurred. After a year of steady appreciation the value of the French government bonds began to fall. With each passing day the decline in their value became more pronounced. Within a short space of time other government securities began to suffer too.

The atmosphere in the court of Louis XVIII was tense. Grim faced aristocrats pondered the fate of the country. They hoped for the best but feared the worst! The only people around the French court who weren't deeply concerned were James and Karl Rothschild. They smiled -- but said nothing!

Slowly a sneaking suspicion began to take shape in the minds of some onlookers. Could those Rothschild brothers be the cause of the nation's economic woes? Could they have secretly manipulated the bond market and engineered the panic?

They had! During October 1818, Rothschild agents, using their masters' limitless reserves, had bought huge quantities of the French government bonds issued through their rivals Ouvrard and Baring Brothers. This caused the bonds to increase in value. Then, on November 5th, they began to dump the bonds in huge quantities on the open market in the main commercial centers of Europe, throwing the market into a panic.

Suddenly the scene in the Aix palace changed. The Rothschilds, who were patiently biding their time and waiting quietly in an ante room, were ushered into the presence of the king. They were now the center of attention. Their clothes were now the height of fashion. "Their money [was] the darling of the best borrowers." The Rothschilds had gained control of France...and control is the name of the game!

Benjamin Disraeli, who was the prime minister of Britain, wrote a novel titled Coningsby. The Jewish Encyclopedia, Vol. 10, pp. 501, 5O2 describes the book as "an ideal portrait" of the Rothschild Empire. Disraeli characterized Nathan (in conjunction with his four brothers) as "the lord and master of the money markets of the world, and of course virtally lord and master of everything else. He literally held the revenues of southern Italy in pawn, and monarchs and ministers of all countries courted his advice and were guided by his suggestions."
GROOMED "INAUDIBILITY AND INVISIBILITY"

The financial coups performed by the Rothschilds in England in 1815, and in France three years later, are just two of the many they have staged worldwide over the years.

There has, however, been a major change in the tactics used to fleece the public of their hard earned money. From being brazenly open in their use and exploitation of people and nations, the Rothschilds have shrunk from the limelight and now operate through and behind a wide variety of fronts.

Their 'modern' approach is explained by biographer Frederic Morton: "Rothschilds love to glisten. But to the sorrow of the socially ambitious, Rothschilds glisten only in camera, for and among their own kind.

"Their penchant for reticence seems to have grown in recent generations. The founder of the house enjoined it a long time ago; but some of his sons, while storming Europe's innermost bastions of power, wrapped their hands around every weapon, including the rawest publicity. Today the family grooms the inaudibility and invisibility of its presence. As a result, some believe that little is left apart from a great legend. And the Rothschilds are quite content to let legend be their public relations.

"Though they control scores of industrial, commercial, mining and tourist corporations, not one bears the name Rothschild. Being private partnerships, the family houses never need to, and never do, publish a single public balance sheet, or any other report of their financial condition" (The Rothschilds. pp. 18, 19).

Throughout their long history the Rothschilds have gone to great lengths to create the impression that they operate within the framework of 'democracy.' This posture is calculated to deceive, to lead people away from the fact that their real aim is the elimination of all competition and the creation of a world-wide monopoly. Hiding behind a multitude of 'fronts' they have done a masterful job of deception.
ROTHSCHILDS AND AMERICA

It would be extraordinarily naive to even consider the possibility that a family as ambitious, as cunning and as monopolistically minded as the Rothschilds could resist the temptation of becoming heavily involved on the American front.

Following their conquest of Europe early in the 1800s, the Rothschilds cast their covetous eyes on the most precious gem of them all -- the United States.

America was unique in modern history. It was only the second nation in history that had ever been formed with the Bible as its law book. Its uniquely magnificent Constitution was specifically designed to limit the power of government and to keep its citizens free and prosperous. Its citizens were basically industrious immigrants who 'yearned to breath free' and who asked nothing more than to be given the opportunity to live and work in such a wonderfully stimulating environment.

The results -- the 'fruit' -- of such a unique experiment were so indescribably brilliant that America became a legend around the globe. Many millions across the far flung continents of the world viewed America the Beautiful as the promised land.

The Big Bankers in Europe -- the Rothschilds and their cohorts -- viewed the wonderful results borne by this unique experiment from an entirely different perspective; they looked upon it as a major threat to their future plans. The establishment Times of London stated: "If that mischievous financial policy which had its origin in the North American Republic [i.e. honest Constitutionally authorized no debt money] should become indurated down to a fixture, then that government will furnish its own money without cost. It will pay off its debts and be without a debt [to the international bankers]. It will become prosperous beyond precedent in the history of the civilized governments of the world. The brains and wealth of all countries will go to North America. That government must be destroyed or it will destroy every monarchy on the globe."

The Rothschilds and their friends sent in their financial termites to destroy America because it was becoming "prosperous beyond precedent."

The first documentable evidence of Rothschild involvement in the financial affairs of the United States came in the late 1820s and early 1830s when the family, through their agent Nicholas Biddie, fought to defeat Andrew Jackson's move to curtail the international bankers. The Rothschilds lost the first round when in 1832, President Jackson vetoed the move to renew the charter of the 'Bank of the United States' (a central bank controlled by the international bankers). In 1836 the bank went out of business.
PLAN OF DESTRUCTION

In the years following Independence, a close business relationship had developed between the cotton growing aristocracy in the South and the cotton manufacturers in England. The European bankers decided that this business connection was America's Achilles Heel, the door through which the young American Republic could be successfully attacked and overcome.

The Illustrated University History, 1878, p. 504, tells us that the southern states swarmed with British agents. These conspired with local politicians to work against the best interests of the United States. Their carefully sown and nurtured propaganda developed into open rebellion and resulted in the secession of South Carolina on December 29, 1860. Within weeks another six states joined the conspiracy against the Union, and broke away to form the Confederate States of America, with Jefferson Davis as President.

The plotters raided armies, seized forts, arsenals, mints and other Union property. Even members of President Buchanan's Cabinet conspired to destroy the Union by damaging the public credit and working to bankrupt the nation. Buchanan claimed to deplore secession but took no steps to check it, even when a U.S. ship was fired upon by South Carolina shore batteries.

Shortly thereafter Abraham Lincoln became President, being inaugurated on March 4, 1861. Lincoln immediately ordered a blockade on Southern ports, to cut off supplies that were pouring in from Europe. The 'official' date for the start of the Civil War is given as April 12, 1861, when Fort Sumter in South Carolina was bombarded by the Confederates, but it obviously began at a much earlier date.

In December, 1861, large numbers of European Troops (British, French and Spanish) poured into Mexico in defiance of the Monroe Doctrine. This, together with widespread European aid to the Confederacy strongly indicated that the Crown was preparing to enter the war. The outlook for the North, and the future of the Union, was bleak indeed.

In this hour of extreme crisis, Lincoln appealed to the Crown's perennial enemy, Russia, for assistance. When the envelope containing Lincoln's urgent appeal was given to Czar Alexander II, he weighed it unopened in his hand and stated: "Before we open this paper or know its contents, we grant any request it may contain."

Unannounced, a Russian fleet under Admiral Liviski, steamed into New York harbor on September 24, 1863, and anchored there, The Russian Pacific fleet, under Admiral Popov, arrived in San Francisco on October 12. Of this Russian act, Gideon Wells said: "They arrived at the high tide of the Confederacy and the low tide of the North, causing England and France to hesitate long enough to turn the tide for the North" (Empire of "The City," p. 90).

History reveals that the Rothschilds were heavily involved in financing both sides in the Civil War. Lincoln put a damper on their activities when, in 1862 and 1863, he refused to pay the exorbitant rates of interest demanded by the Rothschilds and issued constitutionally-authorized, interest free United States notes. For this and other acts of patriotism Lincoln was shot down in cold-blood by John Wilkes Booth on April 14, 1865, just five days after Lee surrendered to Grant at Appomattox Court House, Virginia.

Booth's grand-daughter, Izola Forrester, states in This One Mad Act that Lincoln's assassin had been in close contact with mysterious Europeans prior to the slaying, and had made at least one trip to Europe. Following the killing, Booth was whisked away to safety by members of the Knights of the Golden Circle. According to the author, Booth lived for many years following his disappearance.
INTERNATIONAL BANKERS PURSUE THEIR GOAL

Undaunted by their initial failures to destroy the United States, the international bankers pursued their objective with relentless zeal. Between the end of the Civil War and 1914, their main agents in the United States were Kuhn, Loeb and Co. and the J. P. Morgan Co.

A brief history of Kuhn, Loeb and Co. appeared in Newsweek magazine on February 1, 1936: "Abraham Kuhn and Solomon Loeb were general merchandise merchants in Lafayette, Indiana, in 1850. As usual in newly settled regions, most transactions were on credit. They soon found out that they were bankers... In 1867, they established Kuhn, Loeb and Co., bankers, in New York City, and took in a young German immigrant, Jacob Schiff, as partner. Young Schiff had important financial connections in Europe. After ten years, Jacob Schiff was head of Kuhn, Loeb and Co., Kuhn having retured. Under Schiff's guidance, the house brought European capital into contact with American industry."

Schiff's "important financial connections in Europe" were the Rothschilds and their German representatives, the M. M. Warburg Company of Hamburg and Amsterdam. Within twenty years the Rothschilds, through their Warburg-Schiff connection, had provided the capital that enabled John D. Rockefeller to greatly expand his Standard Oil empire. They also financed the activities of Edward Harriman (Railroads) and Andrew Carnegie (Steel).

At the turn of the 20th century the Rothschilds, not satisfied with the progress being made by their American operntions, sent one of their top experts, Paul Moritz Warburg, over to New York to take direct charge of their assault upon the only true champion of individual liberty and prosperity -- the United States.

At a hearing of the House Committee on Banking and Currency in 1913, Warburg revealed that he was "a member of the banking firm of Kuhn, Loeb and Co. I came to this country in 1902, having been born and educated in the banking business in Hamburg, Germany, and studied banking in London and Paris, and have gone all around the world...."

In the late 1800s, people didn't study banking in London and "all around the world" unless they had a special mission to perform!

Early in 1907, Jacob Schiff, the Rothschild-owned boss of Kuhn, Loeb and Co., in a speech to the New York Chamber of Commerce, warned that "unless we have a Central Bank with adequate control of credit resources, this country is going to undergo the most severe and far reaching money panic in its history."

Shortly thereafter, the United States plunged into a monetary crisis that had all the earmarks of a skilly planned Rothschild 'job.' The ensuing panic financially mined tens of thousands of innocent people across the country -- and made billions for the banking elite. The purpose for the 'crisis' was two-fold:

(1) To make a financial 'killing' for the Insiders, and (2) To impress on the American people the 'great need' for a central bank.

Paul Warburg told the Banking and Currency Committee: "In the Panic of 1907, the first suggestion I made was, 'let us have a national clearing house' [Central Bank]. The Aldrich Plan [for a Central Bank] contains many things that are simply fundamental rules of banking. Your aim must be the same...."

Digging deep into their bag of deceitful practices, the international bankers pulled off their greatest coup to date -- the creation of the privately owned Federal Reserve System, which placed control of the finances of the United States securely in the hands of the power-crazed money monopolists. Paul Warburg became the 'Fed's' first chairman!

Congressman Charles Lindbergh put his finger firmly on the truth when he stated, just after the 'Federal' Reserve Act was passed by a depleted Congress on December 23, 1913: "The Act establishes the most gigantic trust on earth. When the President [Wilson] signs this Bill, the invisible government of the monetaary power will be legalized....The greatest crime of the ages is perpetrated by this banking and currency bill."
PLAN TO CONQUER THE WORLD

Having consolidated their financial grip on most of the European nations by the middle of the last century, the international bankers worked feverishly to extend their sphere of influence to the ends of the earth in preparation for their final assault on the United States -- a nation which, through its unique Constitution, remained free.

In the decades that followed it became apparent that, in order to achieve their goal of world domination, they would have to instigate a series of world wars which would result in leveling of the old world in preparation for the construction of the New World Order. This plan was outlined in graphic detail by Albert Pike, the Sovereign Grand Commander of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry and the top Illuminist in America. In a letter to Guisseppe Mazzini dated August 15, 1871. Pike stated that the first world war was to be fomented in order to destroy Czarist Russia -- and to place that vast land under the direct control of Illuminati agents. Russia was then to be used as a 'bogey man' to further the aims of the Illuminati worldwide.

World War II was to be fomented through manipulation of the differences that existed between the German Nationalists and the Political Zionists. This was to result in an expansion of Russian influence and the establishment of a state of Israel in Palestine.

The Third World War was planned to result form the differences stirred up by Illuminati agents between the Zionists and the Arabs. The conflict was planned to spread worldwide. The llluminati, said the letter, planned to "unleash the Nihilists and Atheists" and "provoke a formidable social cataclysm which in all its horror will show clearly to the nations the effect of absolute atheism, origin of savagery and of the most bloody turmoil. Then everywhere, the citizens, obliged to defend themselves against the world minority of revolutionaries, will exterminate those destroyers of civilization, and the multitude, disillusioned with Christianity, whose deistic spirits will from that moment be without compass [directionl, anxious for an ideal, but without knowing where to render its adoration, will receive the true light through the universal manifestation of the pure doctrine of Lucifer, brought finally out in the public view, a manifestation which will result from the general reactionary movement which will follow the destruction of Christianity and atheism, both conquored and exterminated at the same time."

At the time Pike wrote this remarkable leaflet there were five different ideologies extant on the world scene and involved in a "struggle for space and power." These were:

1. The secret ideology of the international bankers or the Illuminati as laid out in Fourth Reich Of The Rich. Their aim was the creation of a One World Government to be ruled over by the "Illuminated ones" at the top.

2. The Russian "Pan-Slavic" ideology which was originally conceived by William the Great and expounded in his will. According to A.H. Granger, the author of England World Empire, 1916, p. 173, this ideology called for the elimination of Austria and Germany, then the conquest of India and Persia and ends with the words: "...which will ensure the subjugation of Europe."

3. The ideology of "Asia for the Asiatics" as expounded by the Japanese. This called for a confederation of Asian nations dominated by Japan.

4. The ideology of Pan Germanism which called for German political control over the European continent, freedom from the Crown's restrictions on the high seas and the adoption of an "open door" policy in trade and commerce with the rest of the world.

5. Pan-American or the ideology of "America for the Americans." This called for "trade and friendship with all, alliances with none." Secretary of State Root stated in 1906 that, under this ideology which was given expression in the Monroe Doctrine of 1823, we are "debarred from sharing in the political aims, interests, or responsibilities of Europe, just as by the equally potential doctrine, now nearly a century old, the European powers are excluded from sharing or interfering in the political concerns of the sovereign states of the Western Hemisphere."

If the plans of the international banker/llluminati cabal were to be brought to fruition, Russia, Germany, Japan and the United States would have to be brought to their knees in unconditional surrender, poverty and ignominy.

The llluminati plan for world conquest, referred to by Albert Pike, was a diabolical masterpiece of Luciferian ingenuity that would take the lives of hundreds of millions of human beings and cost hundred of billions of dollars in its accomplishment.

The plan that the Illuminati devised to accomplish their world conquering goal is as simple as it is effective. Along the way towards the accomplishment of their final objective this plan has been adapted by the international bankers and their comrades in arms around the globe to amass vast fortunes in real estate. As we shall see. the implimentation of the plan has been so smoothly executed that it has frequently won applause from the ranks of those it is destroying. Their plan can be called Urban Renewal.

It has been said that there are three types of people:

1. Those who make things happen. 2. Those who watch things happen, and 3. Those who wonder what happened.

The vast majority of mankind find themselves in the last two categories. Most have "eyes to see" but don't "see" what is happening. Most have "ears that hear" but don't "understand" what IS happening -- LOCALLY, NATIONALLY OR INTERNATIONALLY.