PJ 46
CHAPTER 3
REC #1 HATONN
TUE., MARCH 3, 1992 7:35 A.M. YEAR 5, DAY 200
TUESDAY, MARCH 3, 1992
CIA CONTINUED
PROPRIETARY ORGANIZATIONS
As far as depots of "untraceable arms", airlines and other installations are concerned, one wonders how the CIA could accomplish the tasks required of it in Southeast Asia without such facilities. Lyman Kirkpatrick, Former CIA Executive Director, U.S. News and World Report, Oct. 11, 1971.
[H: Since the writing of IMA's book, the proprietary list has grown enormously but not quite as "obviously", due to scandals and Congressional hearings. All that actually happens is that the operations go further and deeper underground.]
"THE INTELLIGENCE ESTABLISHMENT"
Late one windy spring afternoon in 1971 a small group of men gathered unobtrusively in a plush suite at Washington's Mayflower Hotel. The host for the meeting was Professor Harry Howe Ransom of Vanderbilt University, author of The Intelligence Establishment, a respected academic study of the U.S. intelligence system. He was then doing research for another book on the subject and had invited the others for drinks and dinner, hoping to gather some new material from his guests, who included ex-CIA officials, congressional aides, and David Wise, co-author of THE INVISIBLE GOVERNMENT and THE ESPIONAGE ESTABLISHMENT, two of the best books on the CIA and clandestine intelligence operations ever published. [H: I concur with that opinion--at the time--these same authors have presented more current work in various forms and I recommend them if you can still find them. These books are often written by a "team" but if you will search under the lead author you will be able to find the information and whether or not it is out of print. Every book on the subject which can be really damaging is removed from the shelves in an effort to get it out of print. Sometimes "establishment" publishers and/or printers will take a manuscript in full intention of burying it--it is accepted but simply never gets to wide publication. Patriots rarely get their material published by "establishment presses" in these days. Beware of the ones which do--for there is usually a bigger purpose on the part of the establishment.] That afternoon someone brought up the CIA's use of front companies.
"Oh, you mean the Delaware corporations," said Robert Amory, Jr., a former Deputy Director of the CIA. "Well, if the agency wants to do something in Angola, it needs the Delaware corporations." [H: Pay attention here. This is no longer a valid place (Delaware) to get the best protection although there is still some shelter. Nevada remains as the only state in which privacy is assured, at this time.]
PROPRIETARY CORPORATIONS
By "Delaware corporations" Amory was referring to what are more commonly known in the agency as "proprietary corporations" or, simply, "proprietaries". These are ostensibly private institutions and businesses which are in fact financed and controlled by the CIA. From behind their commercial and sometimes non-profit covers, the agency is able to carry out a multitude of clandestine activities--usually covert-action operations. Many of the firms are legally incorporated in Delaware because of that state's lenient regulation of corporations, but the CIA has not hesitated to use other states when it found them more convenient. [H: They moved to the utilization of incorporating heavily in places like Panama, the Grand Cayman Islands, etc., also. But their favorite, as with all entities wishing privacy--is Nevada, if in the U.S. This is an excellent opportunity to remind you to utilize those shelters set forth for the benefit of the few for they are totally legal and there is a reason for their existence. You can function in the same shelter streams if you attend your business, follow the rules and explicitly follow the laws--and remain small. You have no idea how much "stuff" did NOT GET NOTICED AS TO TRANSACTIONS in any of the scandals--because the people involved FOLLOWED THE RULES AS TO MANAGEMENT.]
* * *
RADIO FREE EUROPE & RADIO FREE LBERTY
The CIA's best-known proprietaries were Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty, both established in the early 1950's. The corporate structures of these two stations served as something of a prototype for other agency proprietaries. Each functioned under the cover provided by a board of directors made up of prominent Americans, who in the case of RFE incorporated as the National Committee for a Free Europe and in the case of RL as the American Committee for Liberation. But CIA officers in the key management positions at the stations made all the important decisions regarding the programming and operations of the stations.
RADIO SWAN
In 1960 when the agency was preparing for the Bay of Pigs invasion and other paramilitary attacks against Castro's Cuba, it set up a radio station on desolate Swan Island in the Caribbean to broadcast propaganda to the Cuban people. Radio Swan, as it was called, was operated by a New York company with a Miami address, the Gibraltar Steamship Corporation. Again the CIA had found a group of distinguished people--as usual, corporate leaders with government ties--to front for its clandestine activities. Gibraltar's president was Thomas D. Cabot, who had once been president of the United Fruit Company and who had held a high position in the State Department during the Truman Administration. Another "stockholder" was Sumner Smith, also of Boston, who claimed (as did the Honduran government) that his family owned Swan Island and who was president of the Abington Textile and Machinery Works.
During the Bay of Pigs operation the following year, Radio Swan ceased fits normal fare of propaganda broadcasts and issued military commands to the invading forces and to anti-Castro guerrillas inside Cuba. What little cover Radio Swan might have had as a "private" corporation was thus swept away. Ultimately, Radio Swan changed its name to Radio Americas (although still broadcasting from Swan Island), and the Gibraltar Steamship Corporation became the Vanguard Service Corporation (but with the same Miami address and telephone number as Gibraltar). The corporation, however, remained a CIA proprietary until its dissolution in the late 1960's.
THE DOUBLE-CHEK CORPORATION
At least one other agency proprietary, the Double-Chek Corporation, figured in the CIA's operations against Cuba. Double-Chek was founded in Miami (which abounds with agency proprietaries) in 1959, and, according to the records of the Florida state government, "brokerage is the general nature of the business engaged in." In truth, Double-Chek was used by the agency to provide air support to Cuban exile groups, and it was Double-Chek that recruited the four American pilots who were killed during the Bay of Pigs invasion. Afterward the CIA, through Double-Chek, paid pensions to the dead fliers' widows and warned them to maintain silence about their husbands' former activities.
When the CIA intervened in 1964, Cuban exile pilots--some of whom were veterans of the Bay of Pigs--flew B-26 bombers against the rebels. These pilots were hired by a company called Caramar (Caribbean Marine Aero Corporation), another CIA proprietary.
INTERARMCO
Often the weapons and other military equipment for an operation such as that in the Congo are provided by a "private" arms dealer. The largest such dealer in the United States is the International Armament Corporation, or Interarmco, which has its main office and some warehouses on the waterfront in Alexandria, Virginia. Advertising that it specializes in arms for law-enforcement agencies, the corporation has outlets in Manchester in England, Monte Carlo, Singapore, Pretoria, South Africa, and in several Latin American cities. Interarmco was founded in 1953 by Samuel Cummings, a CIA officer during the Korean war. The circumstances surrounding Interarmco's earlier years are murky, but CIA funds and support undoubtedly were available to it at the beginning. Although Interarmco is now a truly private corporation, it still maintains close ties with the agency. And while the CIA will on occasion buy arms for specific operations, it generally prefers to stockpile military materiel in advance. For this reason, it maintains several storage facilities in the United States and abroad for untraceable or "sterile" weapons, which are always available for immediate use. Interarmco and similar dealers are the CIA's second most important source, after the Pentagon, of military materiel for paramilitary activities.
BIG FLEET
Direct CIA ownership of Radio Free Europe, Radio Liberty and the Bay of Pigs proprietaries, and direct involvement in Interarmco are largely past history now. Nevertheless, the agency is still very much involved in the proprietary business, especially to support its paramilitary operations. CIA mercenaries or CIA-supported foreign troops need air support to fight their "secret" wars, and it was for just this purpose that the agency built a huge network of clandestine airlines which are far and away the largest and the most dangerous of all the CIA proprietaries.
Incredible as it may seem, the CIA is currently the owner of one of the biggest--if not the biggest--fleets of "commercial" airplanes in the world. Agency proprietaries include Air America, Air Asia, Civil Air Transport, Intermountain Aviation, Southern Air Transport, (DELETED) and several other air charter companies around the world.
FLYING TIGERS BECOMES CAT (CIA OWNED)
Civil Air Transport (CAT), the original link in the CIA air empire, was started in China in 1946, one year before the agency itself was established by Congress. CAT was an offshoot of General Claire Chennault's Flying Tigers and during its early days it flew missions of every kind in support of Chiang Kai-shek's unsuccessful effort to retain control of the Chinese mainland. When Chiang was finally driven out of China in 1949, CAT went with him to Taiwan and continued its clandestine air operations. In 1950 CAT was reorganized as a Delaware corporation under a CIA proprietary holding company called the Pacific Corporation.
In a top-secret memorandum to General Maxwell Taylor on "unconventional-warfare resources in Southeast Asia" in 1961, published in The Pentagon Papers, Brigadier General Edward Lansdale described CAT's functions as follows:
FROM PENTAGON PAPERS;
CAT is a commercial air line engaged in scheduled and nonscheduled air operations throughout the Far East, with headquarters and large maintenance facilities in Taiwan. CAT, a CIA proprietary, provides air logistical support under commercial cover to most CIA and other U.S. Government agencies' requirements. CAT supports covert and clandestine air operations by providing trained and experienced personnel, procurement of supplies and equipment through overt commercial channels, and the maintenance of a fairly large inventory of transport and other type aircraft under both China (Chinese Nationalist) and U.S. registry.
CAT has demonstrated its capabilities on numerous occasions to meet all types of contingency or longterm covert air requirements in support of U.S. objectives. During the past ten years, it has had some notable achievements, including support of the Chinese Nationalist withdrawal from the mainland, air drop support to the
French at Dien Bien Phy, complete logistical and tactical air support for the Indonesian operation, air lifts of refugees from North Vietnam, more than 200 overflights of Mainland China and Tibet, and extensive air support in Laos during the current crisis....
EARLY VIETNAM FAILURE
The air drops at Dien Bien Phy occurred in 1954 when the U.S. government decided not to come directly to the assistance of the beleaguered French force but did approve covert military support. 1954 was also the year of the airlift of refugees from North Vietnam to the South. These were non-secret missions, but the CIA could not resist loading the otherwise empty planes that flew to North Vietnam with a cargo of secret agents and military equipment to be used in a clandestine network then being organized in North Vietnam. Like other guerrilla operations against communist countries, whether in Europe or Asia, this CIA venture was a failure.
Dharma, it is time for you to go. Thank you for your service; we must continue to get as much to print as possible. Salu.
PJ 46
CHAPTER 4
REC #1 HATONN
WED., MARCH 4, 1992 8:50 A.M. YEAR 5, DAY 201
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 4, 1992
CIA CONTINUED
PROPRIETARY ORGANIZATIONS
I am first asked by Dharma to make a statement herein about David Duke. This doesn't have much to do with "politics" but rather, unfolding of truth and insight in unexpected and casual ways.
DAVID DUKE
"FRONTLINE" had a program on the Public Broadcasting System Network last evening--subject: David Duke. Duke was not interviewed but a fair expose' of his past and activities to current seemed rather benign except the program, of course, was totally slanted to the "anti-Semitic" approach, along with "Black" hatred.
No, Duke doesn't "hate" either Jews or Blacks and is, in fact, a bit chagrinned over what to do with "Jews". The most embarrassing thing to these politicians is that they know that most of the "so-called" "Jews" of today are NOT Jews but rather right out of the ranks of the "white" race. Jews cannot be set aside as a race any longer for there are only rare fragments of the Judean race or original tribes remaining. So, what the politicians are "against" are the "so-called", "self-styled" tools of the Elite One World Order. THESE KHAZARIAN ZIONIST ELITE ARE DIRECTLY FROM THE NORDIC, RUS AND MONGOL RACES AND, THEREFORE, ARE OF THE SAME RACE AS ARE THE BRITISH RULERS. LET US BE LOGICAL, READERS, DO YOU FIND MR. SOLARZ, LANTOS, ETC., TO BE "COLORED" IN SOME MANNER? You see, you can be accused of something or other and often it only shows the total ignorance of the one making the accusation.
THE MARK OF THE ADVERSARY
However, this IS THE MARK of the adversary--to accuse in direct opposition to truth, with "authority", and all believe the accusation.
The major hit against Duke shakes down to be his outright, outspoken statement that he believes there was no Holocaust as stated and "...if there are more 'survivors' getting payoffs than there were Jews to be in the camps, there is something very wrong with the story." Now, I tell you the same thing--let REASON be the judge. If there were over 6-½ million Jews killed in the "death camps" and there were not even 6-½ million Jews in the European area in point--how can 6-½ million Jews have been killed? Oh, you quarrel, "...they say there were 6 million, not 6-½ million." You count again--this year THEY UPPED THE NUMBER BY 500,000--I REPEAT: THIS YEAR!
Do you not see? If there had only been ONE--it is too many and to take pictures from Eisenhower's death camps and pictures taken of the starving in the Civil War and tout them as "helpless Jews" is heinous and deceitful by any measure of decency. This is gross dishonor to those precious beings who did have great atrocities against them and this degrades their own suffering.
REAL JEWS ASKING FOR HELP
I have a stack of mail in which I am petitioned BY JEWS, to please help get the truth forth for they are stopped at every corner by the Zionist Organizations. These groups run ads in every paper which will carry them and they have a great many organizations desperate for funding to get the TRUTH to the public. I must remind you--THE "JEWS" OF GOD ARE THE FIRST TO BE WIPED OUT BY THESE DECEIVERS IN SHEEP CLOTH. WHAT WILL YOU SAY THEN, AMERICA? "Oops, guess I was wrong after all and shoulda' listened???"
This is not what Dharma was asking about--I wanted to honor these groups who work so hard, at all costs, for their honor, dignity and truth. I wish we had a daily press so that I could share all the information with you. But we will get there if we are but patient and continue in support of this work. We could fill three or four papers a day and still not get it all into your hands.
CIA. DAVID DUKE AND AIR AMERICA
As we are into the subject of the Proprietary Organizations of the CIA, we wrote yesterday on the Air Proprietaries and how and where they functioned. This is what stunned Dharma: On this program last evening, Duke was being pushed about his lack of participation in military services, etc. He countered with approximately the following statement: "I was very active in Vietnam--I flew on many flights in and out behind the enemy lines on air drops, rice drops, etc. Very dangerous missions these were and I served my country with honor--I went regularly behind enemy lines with Air America!!" Dear ones, by any note--THAT IS WITH THE CIA! So be it--I leave the deductions into your own hands.
PILES OF MAIL
This does leave me opportunity to speak with you precious writers who send mountains of mail to me. I am in great appreciation and only ask that you be patient with us for Dharma simply cannot handle more load--I have over 200 pieces of mail needing response and I fear we are going to have to give her a rest at best, for her hands and arms are about to cease functioning. We tend them every day and we have encapsulated the tendons but even the elbow joints are now in serious handicap and we must begin to allow time for healing.
The JOURNALS and LIBERATORS must take priority in writing--I simply cannot ask that this mountain of mail filled with inquiries be attended daily. I do wish to say that I shall effort to respond to inquiries as quickly as we can--I would remind you, however, if you have only read one or two of the volumes--you are not getting the answers as, so far, 100% of the questions, other than personal ones, have been responded to at length, i.e., Melchizedek, Saul, Paul, the Church organizations, initiations, rituals, illumination, etc.
Our people are working presently at getting an overall INDEX to the Journals but the indexer doesn't have the same pull to get these works done as I desire--for he has no interest in the material because he knows nothing of it. I must suggest that ones wish to participate and glean from my work--they WILL care about the important order of things or they shall not participate. I want these JOURNALS indexed and a separate volume covering the prior printed books available to our readers. These are NOT novels--they are reference books for civilization and there can be no other "more important" jobs at hand. Our people are overworked, as the same ones who must do that job also must put together myriads of "project proposals" and we have to ask indulgence and patience from you precious readers.
OIL AND THE GULF WAR
I use as an example of need of indexing, such a thing as Gen. Schwarzkopf's statements regarding the war. I spoke long and in detail about that war and the leaders of and in that war. Now comes the General to make a statement in Jan. 1992: "The war was over oil, simple as that." Schwarzkopf told an audience of more than 2,000 in Miami Beach. "Sixty-seven percent of the world supply is in the Middle East; when the West runs out, they will still have a 200-year supply."
THE "MIRACLE" OF THE JOURNALS
This is true--but the main reason was that Hussein would not play ball and would not succumb to the "New World Order". But the biggest LIE of all for you ones to attend is this one: "Most of their income (Soviets) came from selling arms throughout the world. No one will buy Soviet equipment anymore." Oh, my goodness--not only is the entire Middle East buying Soviet arms but also importing Soviet scientists at full-bore ahead.
You need confirmation that I spoke of these things months and years past but I understand the problem--you can't find the information in the conglomeration of the many documents--some 52 volumes in 2-1/2 years. This is why Dharma's hands and arms are shot and so, too, is her voice going because I talk a lot also. This has been an incredible job--which I believe you might classify as one of those asked-for "miracles". The amount of work presented, published and distributed in just a period of some 24-30 months is without matching--anywhere. Further, the writings are on everything from evil activities to the Source and Order of the Universe. Please be patient with us, for our ones are doing absolutely all they can--for life goes on and they are constantly under attack even into the courts. Dharma and Oberli go to court for a full trial by jury on the next Monday, over their home--against the RTC. Evil workers NEVER back off for their goal is never lost sight of for even a minute. You, too, must always hold strong and unbending as these slings and arrows come against you. Please be patient and "wait upon the Lord" and God shall work His plan in His perfect time. Thank you.
THE AWAKENING FLOWS ACROSS THE LANDS
Let us just return to the subject in point. It is wondrous to be able to see and witness you ones putting the pieces together--I find a new awakening flowing across the lands as you see and hear with different intake--it is like new life to see reason and knowing of Truth, sorting out the lies and demanding truth of the presenters. You who become discouraged--know you are being heard. If your loved ones cannot find your truth--yet-know that THEY WILL for they will soon not be able to hide as the house of cards falls. You must release, for force is not of God and ones who deny--must be allowed to find their way--THAT is of God.
The masses feel panic as insight comes for the perception is that there is no way to counter this "thing" if it be true. You who KNOW must allow these precious ones to "find their own way into knowledge", part of your own journey is in the ability to stop judging and thrusting "your desires" upon another--make available the Truth and then "release it" for as the world comes apart--YOU OF TRUTH--are needed to fill your own missions and it will never be to "hold a single hand" for you are the guides of the many who must be gathered unto the Hosts that they can be brought into security of the fold. There will be many dropped to the wayside--and some of those will be precious to YOU--THAT IS YOUR BURDEN TO RELEASE FOR YOU CANNOT DO IT FOR ANOTHER--ONLY SELF. FURTHER, TO SACRIFICE SELF-SOUL FOR ANOTHER IS BUT TO PULL TWO DOWN INTO THE PITS FOR ONCE IN "KNOWING" THERE IS NO RETURN INTO DARK IGNORANCE.
Dharma, let us begin at the point of discussion of "air drops"- regarding the CIA.
CIA: CONTINUED AIR DROPS
By "the Indonesian operation", Lansdale was referring to the covert air and other military support the CIA provided to the rebels of the Sukarno government in 1958. Allen Pope, the pilot who was shot down and captured during this operation by the Indonesian government, was a CAT pilot. Six months after his release in 1962 he went to work for another CIA proprietary, Southern Air Transport. The attorney for Southern at that time was a man named Alex E. Carlson, who had only a year before been the lawyer for Double-Chek Corporation when that CIA proprietary had furnished the pilots for the Bay of Pigs.
The "more than 200 overflights of Mainland China and Tibet" that Lansdale mentioned occurred mainly during the 1950's (but continued well into the 1960's), when the CIA supported, on its own and in cooperation with the Chiang Kai-shek government, guerrilla operations against China. CAT was the air supply arm for these operations, and it was in a CAT plane that Richard Fecteau and John Downey were shot down by the Communist Chinese in 1954.
CAT SPLITS INTO 3 AIRLINES
By the end of the 1950's, CAT had split into three separate airlines, all controlled by a CIA proprietary holding company, the Pacific Corporation. One firm. Air America. took over most of CAT's Southeast Asia business; another, Air Asia, operated a giant maintenance facility on Taiwan. The portion still called CAT continued to fly open and covert charter missions out of Taiwan and to operate Nationalist China's scheduled domestic and international airline. CAT was best known for the extravagant service on its "Mandarin Jet", which linked Taipei to neighboring Asian capitals.
CIA OPERATES CHINA'S AIRLINES
In 1964, about the time of the mysterious crash of a CAT plane, the CIA decided that running Taiwan's air passenger service contributed little to the agency's covert mission in Asia, and that the non-charter portion of CAT should be turned over to the Chinese Nationalists. CAT's former public-relations director, Arnold Dibble, wrote in the Saturday Review of May 11, 1968: "A highly suspicious crash of a C-46 claimed the lives of fifty-seven persons, including that of perhaps the richest man in Asia, Dato Loke Wan Tho--the Malaysian movie magnate--and several of his starlets from his Cathay studios. The full story of this crash has yet to be unraveled; what is known has not been told because it has never been, for instance, an official airing of the part played by two apparently demented military men aboard who had stolen two radar identification manuals (about the size of a mail-order catalog) in the Pescadores Islands, hollowed them out with a razor blade so each would hold a .45 caliber pistol. The manuals and one pistol were found, but fire and perhaps inadequate investigation marred the evidence. It was never definitely determined if the weapons had been fired."
But the Nationalists' own China Air Lines had neither the equipment nor the experience at that time to take over CAT's routes, and the Nationalist government was not prepared to allow the CIA to abandon Taiwan's principal air links with the outside world. The CIA could not simply discontinue service, because such action would have offended the Chiang government and made uncertain the continued presence of the agency's other proprietaries and intelligence facilities on Taiwan.
The negotiations over CAT's passenger routes dragged on through the next four years. The CIA was so eager to reach a settlement that it sent a special emissary to Taiwan on temporary duty, but his short-term negotiating assignment eventually turned into a permanent position. Finally, in 1968 another CAT passenger plane--this time a Boeing 727--crashed near the Taipei airport. This second accident caused twenty-one deaths and provided that rarest of occurrences on Taiwan, a spontaneous public demonstration--against U.S. involvement in the airline. Bowing to public pressure, the Nationalist government then accepted a settlement with the agency: China Air Lines took over CAT's international flights; CAT, despite the agency's reluctance, continued to fly domestic routes on Taiwan; and the CIA sweetened the pot with a large cash payment to the Nationalists.
SOUTHEAST ASIA OPERATIONS
Air America, a spin-off of CAT, was set up in the late 1950's to accommodate the agency's rapidly growing number of operations in Southeast Asia. As U.S. involvement deepened in that part of the world, other government agencies--the State Department, the Agency for International Development (AID), and the United States Information Agency (USIA)--also turned to Air America to transport their people and supplies. By 1971, AID alone had paid Air America more than $83 million for charter services. In fact, Air America was able to generate so much business in Southeast Asia that eventually other American airlines took note of the profits to be made.
PIERRE SALINGER & CONTINENTAL AIRLINES
One private company, Continental Airlines, made a successful move in the mid-1960's to take some of the market away from Air America. Pierre Salinger, who became an officer of Continental after his years as President Kennedy's press secretary, led Continental's fight to gain its share of the lucrative Southeast Asian business. The Continental position was that it was a questionable, if not illegal, practice for a government-owned business (even a CIA proprietary under cover) to compete with truly private companies in seeking government contracts. The CIA officers who had to deal with Continental were very uncomfortable. They knew that Salinger had learned during his White House days of the agency's activities in Southeast Asia and, specifically, of Air America's tie to the CIA. They feared that implicit in Continental's approach for a share of the Southeast Asian market was the threat that if the agency refused to cooperate, Continental would make its case publicly--using information supplied by Salinger. Rather than face the possibility of unwanted publicity, the CIA permitted Continental to move into Laos where, since the late 1960's, it has flown charter flights worth millions of dollars annually. And Continental's best customer is the CIA itself.
WHAT AIR AMERICA HAS DONE
But even with Continental flying Laos, the agency was able to keep most of the flights for its own Air America. This CIA airline has done everything from parachuting Meo tribesmen behind North Vietnamese lines in Laos to dropping rice to refugees in the Vietnamese highlands. Air America has trained pilots for the Thai national police, transported political prisoners for the South Vietnamese government, carried paymasters and payrolls for CIA mercenaries and, even before the Tonkin Gulf Resolution, furnished pilots for secret bombing raids on North Vietnamese supply lines in Laos. It has also been accused of participating in Southeast Asia, and its flights are almost never inspected by customs authorities. It has its own separate passenger and freight terminals at airports in South Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand. At Udorn, in Thailand, Air America maintains a large base which is hidden within an even larger U.S. Air Force facility (which is ostensibly under Thai government control). The Udorn base is used to support virtually all of the "secret" war in Laos, and it also houses a "secret" maintenance facility for the planes of the Thai, Cambodian, and Laotian air forces.
Before the cease-fire in Vietnam, Air America was flying 125 planes of its own, with roughly 40 more on lease, and it had about 5,000 employees, roughly 10 percent of whom were pilots. It was one of America's largest airlines, ranking just behind National in total number of planes.
Now that the U.S. military forces have withdrawn from the Vietnamese theater, the role of maintaining a significant American influence has reverted largely to the CIA--and Air America, under the circumstances, is finding its services even more in demand than previously. Even the International Supervisory and Control Commission, despite the membership of Communist Poland and Hungary, has signed a contract with the CIA proprietary to support its supervision of the Vietnam cease-fire. In 1973, Air America had contracts with the Defense Department worth $41.4 million.
AIR ASIA
A wholly owned subsidiary of Air America, Air Asia, operates on Taiwan the largest air repair and maintenance facility in the Pacific region. Established in 1955, Air Asia employs about 8,000 people. It not only services the CIA's own planes, it also repairs private and military aircraft. The U.S. Air Force makes heavy use of Air Asia and consequently has not had to build a major maintenance facility of its own in East Asia, as would have been necessary if the CIA proprietary had not been available. Like Air America, Air Asia is a self-sustaining, profit-making enterprise.
SOUTHERN AIR TRANSPORT
Until the CIA decided to sell it off in mid-1973, Southern Air Transport, another agency proprietary, operated out of offices in Miami and Taiwan. Unlike CAT, Air America, and Air Asia, it was not officially connected with the Pacific Corporation holding company, but Pacific did guarantee $6.6 million loaned to it by private banks, and Air America loaned it an additional $6.7 million funnelled through yet another CIA proprietary called Actus Technology. Southern's role in the Far East was largely limited to flying profitable routes for the Defense Department. Other U.S. government agencies have also chartered Southern on occasion. In the first half of 1972 it received a $2 million AID contract to fly relief supplies to the new state of Bangladesh.
But within the CIA, Southern Air Transport was primarily important as the agency's air arm for potential Latin American intervention. This was the justification when the CIA took control of it in 1960, and it provided the agency with a readily available "air force" to support counterinsurgency efforts or to help bring down an unfriendly government. While Southern awaited its call to be the Air America of future Latin American guerrilla wars, it "lived its cover" and cut down CIA's costs by hiring out its planes on charter.
16 LINES DELETED
When the CIA brought Tibetan tribesmen to the United States in the late 1950's to prepare them for guerrilla forays into China, the agency's Intermountain Aviation assisted in the training program.
Then in the early 1960's CIA air operations grew by leaps and bounds with the expansion of the wars in Southeast Asia and the constant fighting in the Congo.
51/2 LINES DELETED
But a reporter visiting Tucson in 1966 still wrote, "Anyone driving by could see more than a hundred B-26's with their armor plate, bomb bays, and gun ports". Not long after this disclosure appeared in the press, ( DELETED ) were made available to ( DELETED ) to build hangers for the parked aircraft. Prying reporters and the curious public soon saw less.
ILLEGAL SALE OF BOMBERS TO PORTUGAL
In 1965, Intermountain Aviation served as a conduit in the sale of B-26 bombers to Portugal for use in that country's colonial wars in Africa. The sale directly violated the official United States policy against arms exports to Portugal for use in Angola, Mozambique, or Portuguese Guinea. The U.S. government, at its highest level, had decided to sell twenty B-26's to Portugal, and the CIA proprietary was following official orders. Theoretically, the embargo on weapons exports for use in Portugal's colonies remained intact--but not in fact. The U.S. government was, thus, doing covertly what it had forbidden itself to do openly.
Through the spring and summer of 1965, seven B-26's were flown from Arizona to Lisbon by an English pilot hired by an ostensibly private firm called Aero Associates. By September the operation's cover had worn so thin that Soviet and Hungarian representatives in the United Nations specifically attacked the transaction. The American U.N. delegation conceded that seven B-26's had been delivered to Portugal, but Ambassador Arthur Goldberg stated that "the only involvement of officials of the United States has been in prosecuting a malefactor against the laws of the country." This was a simple mistruth. Ambassador Goldberg, however, may have not known what the facts were. Adlai Stevenson before him had not been fully briefed on the Bay of Pigs invasion and wound up unknowingly making false statements at the U.N.
The same techniques were used to distort the prosecution of the "malefactor". Ramsey Clark, at the time Deputy Attorney General, got in contact with Richard Helms, when the latter was the CIA's Deputy Director, and the agency's General Counsel, Lawrence Houston, to discuss the Portuguese airplane matter. Agency officials assured Clark that the CIA had not been involved. Recalling the case, Clark says, "We couldn't have gone to trial if they (the CIA) had been involved. I don't see how you can just prosecute the little guys acting in the employ of a government agency."
Still, the United States had been exposed as violating its own official policy, and, for political reasons, those knowledgeable about the facts refused to intervene to aid "the little guys". Thus, one agency of the government, the Justice Department, unwittingly found itself in the curious position of prosecuting persons who had been working under the direct orders of another government agency, the CIA. Five indictments were finally secured, but one of the accused fled the country, and charges against two of the others were dropped. But in the fall of 1966 the English pilot, John Richard Hawke, and Henri Marie Francois de Marin de Montmarin, a Frenchman who had been a middleman in the deal, were brought to trial in a Buffalo, New York, federal court.
Hawke admitted in court, "Yes, I flew B-26 bombers to Portugal for use in their African colonies, and the operation was arranged through the State Department and the CIA." However, CIA General Counsel Houston flatly denied under oath that the agency had been involved in the transaction. Houston did reveal that the agency "knew about" the bomber shipment on May 25, 1965, five days before it began, and that this information had been passed on to the State Department and eleven other government agencies. He also said that on July 7 the CIA was "informed" that four of the B-26's had actually been delivered to Portugal; again the CIA gave notice to State and other agencies. He did not explain why, if the U.S. government had so much intelligence on the flights, nothing was done to stop them, although their flight plans had been filed with the Federal Aviation Administration and Hawke, on one mission, even inadvertently buzzed the White House.
The jury found Hawke and Montmarin innocent. Members of the panel later let it be known that they had not been convinced that the two accused had deliberately violated the law.
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HELMS WON'T--HUMPHREY WILL
Former Director Helms, however, refused to fly ( DELETED) because he believed that its commercial cover was too transparent. He preferred instead to travel on legitimate commercial airlines. Less reluctant was Vice President Hubert Humphrey, who often used ( DELETED ) Gulfstream during his 1968 presidential campaign.
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THE CIA IN NEPAL
Perhaps the CIA's most out-of-the-way proprietary was located in Katmandu, Nepal. It was established to provide air support for agency-financed and -directed tribesmen who were operating the Chinese-controlled Tibet. CAT originally flew these missions, as indicated by General Lansdale's reference to CAT's "more than 200 overflights of Mainland China and Tibet". But flying planes from Taiwan to the CIA's operational base in northeastern India proved too cumbersome; thus the Nepalese proprietary was set up. As the Tibetan operations were cut back and eventually halted during the 1960's, this airline was reduced in size to a few planes, helicopters, and a supply of spare parts. Still, up to the late 1960's, it flew charters for the Nepalese government and private organizations in the area.
DIFFICULTIES OF SELLING A PROPRIETARY
The CIA's Planning, Programming, and Budgeting Staff back in Langley believed that the airline's usefulness as an agency asset had passed, and the decision was made to sell it off. But, for the CIA to sell a proprietary is a very difficult process. The agency feels that it must maintain the secrecy of its covert involvement, no matter how moot or insignificant the secrecy, and it does not want to be identified in any way, either before or after the actual transaction. Moreover, there is a real fear within the Clandestine Services that a profit will be made, and then by law, the CIA would be obliged to return the gain to the U.S. Treasury. The clandestine operatives do not want to be troubled by the bureaucratic red tape this would entail. It simply goes against the grain of the clandestine mentality to have to explain and justify such a transaction to anyone--let alone to the bookkeepers at the Treasury. [H: It may make more sense now, as to why Oliver North's little personal gains such as fences and security systems might have been reasonable and acceptable--it was the way everything was handled. This is also why the ones involved in the Iran mess felt they had earned money return for their services rendered and profits made. It is you-the-people who don't seem to understand the system.]
SELLING SOUTHERN AIR BECOMES A FIASCO
Unloading Southern Air Transport in 1973 proved to be something of a fiasco for the agency. Following past practice, the CIA tried to sell it quietly to a former employee--presumably at an attractive price--but the effort failed when three legitimate airlines protested to the Civil Aeronautics Board. They complained that Southern had been built up with government money, that it had consequently received lucrative charter routes, and that it represented unfair competition. When word of this prospective sale got into the newspapers, the CIA backtracked and voluntarily dropped Southern's CAB certification--greatly reducing the airline's value but guaranteeing that the agency could sell it off in complete secrecy.
A "GIVEAWAY" FOR SECRECY
And with the Nepalese airline, CIA found a buyer who had previously worked for other agency air proprietaries. Since he was a former "company man", secrecy was preserved. He was allowed to purchase the airline's for a small down payment. Following highly unorthodox business procedure, the airline itself served as collateral for the balance due. A CIA auditor at headquarters privately described the sale as a "giveaway", but this was the way the Clandestine Services wanted the affair handled. The new owner remained in Miami although all his airlines' operations were in Nepal. Within a comparatively short period of time, he liquidated all the airline's assets. He wound up with a considerable profit, but the agency made back only a fraction of its original costs. The Clandestine Services was pleased with the sale, in any case, because it had been able to divest itself of a useless asset in a way both to guarantee maximum security and to assure the future loyalty and availability of the buyer.
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NO LAWS FOR CIA EXPENSES
While ethics of transactions of this sort are questionable, conflict of interest laws presumably do not apply to the CIA; the Central Intelligence Agency Act of 1949 conveniently states that "The sums made available to the gency may be expended without regard to the provisions of law and regulations relating to the expenditure of Government funds." In any case, the use of proprietary companies opens up to the participants an opportunity to make substantial profits while "living their cover".
NO REAL AUDITS OF CIA
The fact remains that CIA proprietaries are worth hundreds of millions of dollars, and no one outside the agency is able to audit their books. [H: Sounds just like the Federal Reserve and IRS, doesn't it???] And as will be seen later in this writing, CIA headquarters sometimes has only the vaguest notion about what certain proprietaries are doing or what their assets are. Undoubtedly, there are wide opportunities for abuse, and many of the people involved in fields such as the arms trade, paramilitary soldiering, and covert air operations are not known for high ethical standards. While only a few agency career employees would take money for personal gain, there is little to prevent officers of the proprietaries from doing so, if they are so inclined.
As can be seen, the CIA's proprietary corporations serve largely in support of special, or paramilitary, operations, information purposes and, like most other covert assets, proprietaries can also be used on occasion to further the espionage and counterespionage efforts of the Clandestine Services. In the main, however, there has been a definite trend in the agency for more than a decade to develop the air proprietaries as the tactical arm for the CIA's secret military interventions in the Third World. The fleets of these CIA airlines have been continually expanded and modernized, as have been their base facilities. In the opinion of most CIA professionals, the agency's capabilities to conduct special operations would be virtually nonexistent without the logistical and other support provided by the air proprietaries.
CIA CONSIDERS PROPRIETARY AIRLINES ESSENTIAL
The performance of the Pacific Corporation and its subsidiaries, Air America and Air Asia, in assisting the CIA's many special ops adventures over the years in the Far East and Southeast Asia has deeply impressed the agency's leadership. The exploits of the contract air officers in that strife-ridden corner of the world have become almost legendary within the CIA. Furthermore, the advantages of having a self-sustaining, self-run complex which requires no CIA funds and little agency manpower are indeed much appreciated by the Clandestine Services.
Without the air proprietaries, there could have been no secret raids in Communist China. There could have been no Tibetan or Indonesian or Burmese operations. And most important of all, there could have been no "secret" war in Laos. Even many of the CIA's covert activities in Vietnam could not have been planned, much less implemented, without the assurance that CIA airlines were available to support such operations. Thus, it is small wonder that the agency, when it moved to intervene in the Congo (and anticipating numerous other insurgencies on the continent), hastily tried to develop the same kind of air support there that traditionally was available to special operations in Asia. And one can easily understand why the planners of the Bay of Pigs operation now regret not having made similar arrangements for their own air needs instead of relying on the U.S. armed forces.
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COMING UP! GEORGE DOOLE
Let us close this chapter, please. When we write again we shall speak of the fabulous George Doole who "really got around!"
Hatonn to move to stand-by. I apologize for the over-long session. I do, however, note that you ones are very interested--isn't it refreshing to be on the inside with information instead of always the last to know? What you don't know CAN hurt you very, very badly. Good-day.
