Showing posts with label Laos. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Laos. Show all posts

Monday, May 13, 2019

Part 2 - Obama's Money Laundering: Chinese Global Domination?



Click here for related story:
[NYT 09012011 - Matthew Wald]

We recognized the Solyndra debacle was an Obama scam, but, we never quite grasped the depth of the corruption involved, or, how it would eventually tie to the Deep State shift of global control from the United States to China.  While America was distracted by the Russia scandal, which has dominated world news for more than two years, we were distracted from the actual Economic and Military threat from China.  This is a long and convoluted thread; take the time to read it all the way to the end which should open your eyes to the big picture from which the Leftist Media has been distracting us, while China has been subverting us from within.
NSA Map: Chinese Cyber Assaults on US Economy

A secret NSA map shows the Chinese government’s massive cyber assault on all sectors of the US economy, including major firms like Google and Lockheed Martin, as well as the US government and military.

The map's red dots mark more than 600 corporate, private or government “Victims of Chinese Cyber Espionage” attacked over a five-year period, with clusters in America’s industrial centers. The entire Northeast Corridor from Washington to Boston is blanketed in red, as is California’s Silicon Valley, with other concentrations in Dallas, Miami, Chicago, Seattle, L.A. and Detroit. The highest number of attacks was in California, which had almost 50.

Some of you may recall the Solyndra debacle, in which Obama declared he was promoting private enterprise, and US manufactured Solar Panels, to create jobs.  He invested $527 Million in direct loans from the Federal Financing Bank under the 2009 Stimulus Package to Solyndra -- by-passing the normal scrutiny by the Treasury Department auditors.  Private investors, thinking this was a solid, federally-backed program, invested another $1 Billion.   After all, President Bush had blessed it in 2006, so what could possibly go wrong!

Be sure you deposit $500 Million to my off-shore account


Obama visited the company in 2010, proclaiming it was "... leading the way toward a brighter and more prosperous future" and had hired 1,100 workers.  Below the radar, though, the OMB watchdogs noted that Obama had "... bypassed key taxpayer protections in a rush to approve the funds."




As federal auditors and investors watched helplessly, Solyndra executives were funneling the cash to offshore banks through bogus invoices to "partner companies" which existed solely to create invoices for future auditor review.

By 2011, the company executives had safely transferred virtually all the cash to a variety of offshore banks; they then decried the Chinese competition as underpriced, and therefore, Solyndra was declaring bankruptcy and firing its 1,100 workers.

A flurry of "investigations" followed, but, with Tim Geithner running the Treasury Department, and Eric Holder at the Department of Justice,  and Bob Mueller heading the FBI, not much progress was made in following up with investigations, much less prosecutions.

So, you say, why reprise this scandal!
The depths of that corruption have already been plumbed, and there's not much to be done about it now except to wring our hands and say, "thank God Obama is out of office!"

But, wait, there's more!

Well, no one ever really created an audit trail on that $1.57 Billion.
But, we do know that Obama entered office with a net worth of less than $250,000, and left with an estimated net worth of several billion dollars.  We are told that he was a frugal man and saved his money, and invested wisely.

So, where did all the money go?

It seems the Solyndra cash, along with many billions of dollars from the stimulus packages were passed through shell companies to a variety of off-shore banks in the Caribbean, China, and elsewhere in the Pacific. [Other monies, directly from the NY Fed were transferred to European and Indonesian banks in 2008 by Tim Geithner - then President of the NY Fed.  
The total that Geithner transferred to China was $15 Trillion, rapidly boosting China's GDP from $6 Trillion to nearly $13 Trillion a few short years.

And, what did Obama do with all that cash? [see comments below for China's spending]
We're slowly unraveling that as reports emanate from Trump's Treasury Department.

Obama's lifestyle at our expense
[house is based on design of a commercial Phuket estate]
As luck would have it, Obama's CIA was managing Intelligence/ Interrogation operations in a remote part of Thailand, and, while visiting, Obama decided he needed a hideaway.

The house, on 400 acres, is in the Northeast section of Thailand, near Ubol Ratchatani, a former USAF air base during the Vietnam War.  USAID had modernized the infrastructure of the area, and it showed growth promise.

Ubol Ratchatani
Obama's Insurgent HQ 






So, Solyndra, using its ill-gotten gains, bought a comfortable house, accessible to a semi-private airport [constructed by the USAF, with other attributes we'll discuss below, to accommodate Obama's international aspirations.

This is a swell spot to vacation, and to manage his Shadow Government if things get sticky elsewhere.  During his time in office, Obama visited Thailand six times, and in 2017, visited there another four times.  It apparently appeals to him.

But, aside from the obvious comfort levels, what else would take Obama to this remote part of the world!


As we've noted frequently in the past, there's more to Obama than meets the eye.

Before entering US politics, Obama was reared in an Indonesian Muslim environment, and appears on the rolls as a Muslim student [complete with a UK birth certificate from Kenya (when it was a UK colony].


In  the US with his mother (whom he later ignored and condemned), he was tutored by his Communist "father", Frank Marshall Davis who inculcated young Barack with Communist doctrine.  Once in the US, it seems that Obama's employer, the Ford Foundation, may have prepped him for the US political system, greasing the skids for a Blitzkrieg rise to the Oval Office.
Essentially, Obama is a double edged sword -- as a Communist AND an Islamic radical.

So, what, you might wonder; 
we already knew most of that history.

If you take his background, and his aborted attempts to create a Socialist/Communist state in America, he is likely now on the same path on a global basis.  He has announced he would like to lead the United Nations [probably not a certainty at this point], but, what better background to start tweaking developing countries.

He attempted to create a totalitarian Communist state in the US, populated with Muslim Brotherhood operatives, Iranians, and Communists.  He and Hillary did their best to undermine and overthrow the governments in a number of countries, and was finally outed as a result of Hillary's Benghazi fiasco -- which became a conduit of weaponry for ISIS and al Qaeda.

You may recall that Thailand has been beset by chronic Communist protests throughout the past decade, with a highly critical world Press condemning the Thai Military Government for its aggressive posture against dissidents.

Reportedly, a recent raid on the compound [quickly vacated] produced encrypted laptops,  $200 Million in gold bullion, and dozens of crates of Chinese weapons and explosives.

[The Thai government reportedly confiscated the estate under the provisions of the ASEAN Declaration to Joint Action on Counter Terrorism.]

That is not an aberration in either case, since the Communists have tried to overthrow the Thai Government since the mid-1950s.



NE Thailand Insurgency
Thailand was strengthened as a US ally during the Vietnam War, all the time fighting a Chinese  Communist insurgency supplied via Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos in the Northeast, and a Muslim insurgency at the border with Malaysia.

So, here, we get a two-fer. 

The insurgency in NE Thailand was headquartered right across the Cambodian border from Sisaket during the Vietnam War, while supplies and cadre crossed the river from Laos [via a North Vietnamese Binh Tram (logistics unit)] to operate near Ubol and Nakhon Phanom [NKP](another US air base)].
Obama's Mansion is strategically positioned
It was a viable and dynamic insurgent movement, with cadre recruited locally and trained in China, from which they would return to the region to recruit local villagers.

Mr Obama's Mansion is/was perfectly located to coordinate future insurgent paramilitary operations in this region already prepped for a renewed political offensive.



While in office as POTUS, Obama appointed Glyn Davies as his Ambassador, who immediately upon arriving, began supporting dissidents and supporting enemies of the Thai state.  This was in tune with the unwelcome UN involvement in Thailand which drew extreme criticism.
[and you'll recall how well UN involvement in the internal affairs of South Africa worked out.]

At the conclusion of the Vietnam War, a few stray bombs released from US F4s found their way across the Cambodian border, setting off more than 300 secondary explosions, incinerating insurgent soldiers, food stores, and weapon/ammunition stocks -- and essentially ending the insurgency.

What we learned later was that Henry Kissinger, in a 1972 letter to Chou en Lai, assured China that the US had no further interest in the region and would not interfere in a Chinese Communist incursion.  At the same time, Henry shut down all existing and clandestine Intelligence networks, some of which dated back to World-War-2 OSS nets.

Without those established nets, it would be difficult to monitor the flow of political activists and insurgent cadre and combatants as they flow in from China to be guided by Obama -- and Soros.

To tie all this information together,
Solyndra used the cash it siphoned from the US federal loans and private investors to acquire a number of real estate properties scattered about in Southeast Asia, valued at over $800 million. 

Given Trump's interest in these matters, we expect him to encourage other Southeast Asian countries to employ the ASEAN Declaration to Joint Action on Counter Terrorism.

--------
Editorial Notes:
1) I have some relevant knowledge of this situation as I served as the Regional Intelligence Advisor to the Thai Communist Suppressions Operations Command [CSOC (Now ISOC)], coordinating the Counter-Insurgency operations, in another lifetime.

2) Update 1MAY2019]: 

I visited Thailand recently and learned that, after Kissinger [in Nixon's name] ordered all US troops out of Southeast Asia, and simultaneously, shut down all US Intelligence operations [covert and clandestine], his Domino Theory almost succeeded in placing all of Southeast Asia in Communist hands. 

By 1975, virtually all US forces had departed, as had all Intelligence officers, so, an event which could have sparked World War 3 was not reported in Intelligence Circles - although Kissinger was likely fully aware.  


PRC forces from Yunnan assembled in northern Laos
and invaded the Chiang Rai region with infantry, armor,
and combat air support in 1975 - but were defeated.


Coincidentally, in 1975, the Peoples Republic of China [PRC] invaded northern Thailand from Yunnan Province, via Laos and Burma, near Chiang Rai.  

Thai Defense forces and the Nationalist Chinese [KMT], along with Hmong tribesmen, and a few Australian Military advisors, fought the PRC forces for three years, suffering thousands of casualties [a memorial exists today, with the names of all the casualties, at the site of the battles.

Eventually, the PRC withdrew, and left Thailand, only to support insurgent organizations to undermine the Thai government. 





[As an aside, some may remember the movie "Apocalypse Now" which described the hunt for, and assassination of Colonel Kurtz - whom the DS designated as a devil.  The movie portrays hundreds of bodies hanging from the swamp trees of Kurtz's camp ; those were Khmer Rouge, who had slaughtered, at random, millions of Cambodians merely because they were educated.  

On the positive side, "Colonel" Kurtz, was an advisor to the Mountain People, who were guerrillas fighting to keep Southeast Asia from succumbing to communism.  Watch the embedded video, all the way through the commentary after the Movie extract; it gives you an idea of what war is really like, and how it affects honorable men.]




Currently, the PRC is attempting an economic takeover of all Southeast Asia by investing, with loans to build national infrastructures, constructing dams for hydro-electric power, high speed rail, improving ports -- all with the trillions of dollars funneled to China via Indonesia in 2008 by Timothy Geithner while he was President of the NY Fed [he is currently a financial advisor to the PRC].  

Water remains a critical issue as China's plans for dams to furnish hydro-electric power throughout the region will flood farmland and/or cut off vital water supplies to farmers.  

In Laos, farmers complained that the Chinese routinely open and close dam spillways, sending tidal waves ten to 15 feet high roaring down rivers, inundating farms and wiping out crops.  

Additionally, since dams have been built in a hurry with little or no oversight, several of  have collapsed, causing death and destruction downstream.

Although the improvements are welcome, the governments of Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, and Myanmar (Burma) are uncertain how they will repay these loans, which if unpaid, will result in the PRC seizing infrastructure assets and surrounding land.



The Third Prong on this economic threat, Chinese control of ports in Burma, Thailand, Cambodia, Malaysia, Vietnam, and Singapore.  As a part of what is now called the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road [MSR], it is clear that China's expansion strategy focuses on controlling regional ports, as well as those around the world.  




A fourth prong, though little known and yet to be accomplished enterprise is the Kra Canal, which will cross southern Thailand opening a sea lane from the South China Sea to the Andaman Sea, bypassing the Malacca Strait -- a maritime choke point adding enormous distance to maritime traffic between the two seas.  



The canal has considerable merit, 
but the reality is that China will control that conduit at the expense of Thailand, and the rest of Asia.


Global strategists have dubbed China's expansion into these sectors as the "Debt-Trap Diplomacy" - offered up as helping local economies through the "Belt and Road Initiative", but in reality, these huge developmental loans serve little to improve local life, but instead choke national economies with massive debt for unsound projects to secure Chinese access to resources or local markets. 

Cash strapped countries end up turning over their ports, their land, and their resources to China (just as Venezuela turned over its oil industry to China) when they can't meet their debt payments.  

In essence, China uses economic leverage in place of Military force to conquer target countries.  
The strategy is Wei Chi, or encirclement; in this case economic domination of regional and global ports cripples the ability to resist Chinese domination.  

From a military perspective, this high-speed rail could deliver troops and weapons system quickly and efficiently throughout Southeast Asia from Kunming to Singapore in a matter of hours.  Controlling internal waterways through dams allows for domination of the regional agriculture, and, control of ports means China declares what is imported or exported - thus controlling the economies of these countries. 

What the PRC could not seize through Military aggression, they are slowly seizing through economics.  
  
It seems that the Deep State's emissaries [i.e., GHW Bush, Clinton, G W Bush, Obama, and Kissinger] were routinely visiting the region from 1990-2016 to ensure China was not meeting any resistance in its expansion, and they would all profit immensely with China in control.  


Why have we not heard of these issues?  


Well, it's been reported, but the Obama cabal generated a great deal of noise and attention on the Russia, Russia, Russia meme to distract us from the Chinese economic - and Military threat.

Ultimately, the strategy has been to undermine the US to provide the PRC with full control, regionally, and eventually, globally.

Give that some thought as you listen to the Deep State Media continue the hysterics over Trump's alleged connections to Russia, Russia. Russia!







Sunday, January 6, 2019

Trump Pulls Troops Out of Syria and Afghanistan



Mattis, a superb combat warrior, disagrees with a  superb strategist
They're both right! 





We may take a bit of flack from pseudo-hawks and NeoCons, but we support Trump's decision 100%.

Old Military and Intelligence guys have wondered at the rationale of keeping our troops in the Middle East.
Saddam is dead,
Osama bin Laden is still dead.

We have no stake in the Middle East other than to assist governments to stabilize, which does not include the massive presence of Central Command Forces. Nor does it require keeping massive US Military forces in Europe under the European Command -- a relic of the Cold War. Let the Europeans fund and populate NATO; we're tired of taking their lip and funding their exquisite tastes.

As necessary, we have the capability of transporting a fully equipped combat division, with combat support aircraft from the US to a crisis site within hours via our Transportation Command's  C-5 and
C-17 cargo planes.  We can deploy supersonic bombers and fighters from the US to arrive over the Middle East with minimal flight time with maximized combat effectiveness.

We should learn from history [an odd idea, now, isn't it?]

We've been involved in these faux wars for decades, the purpose of which always remains vague - other than to support the Military-Industrial Complex -- as detailed by General/POTUS Eisenhower.

As the Soviet Empire was crumbling, we sat with Bill Clark, then the Assistant Secretary of the Army [General Mark Clark's son] as he bemoaned the future/demise of the Military without a defined enemy.

Specifically, without a definable enemy, we would have no reason to maintain a large, standing Military; and if a new global crisis arose, how could we mobilize in time to meet that crisis?

We've spent a few years in combat in a variety of countries, supposedly to "defend our country", only to learn the enemies we fought were once our friends, and our current friends were once our enemies.

Worse, we learned our "leaders" [e.g., Kissinger, Bush-1, W, Robert Gates, Obama, Billary] were the actual enemy we've come to know as the Deep State, all leading us into senseless wars.

After we [personally] were able to defeat the insurgency in Northeast Thailand, we gloated until we learned the insurgency had been sponsored by the Chinese who coopted the anti-government movement protesting the government's confiscation of farmlands in order to build a hydro-electric dam, funded by our very own Agency for International Development [USAID].  The dam construction devastated famers by claiming their fertile land and relegating this once prosperous group to generations of poverty and government subsidies.

But, the "greater good" prevailed as the region received electricity -- although few could use it.

That revelation in 1974, got us to thinking about our major Military commitments.

China and Vietnam [Ho Chi Minh] were some of our greatest supporters in WW2, establishing OSS spy networks (which we inherited during the Vietnam War) and recovering our downed pilots; but now, that enemy, Japan - the invading force, is our close ally in the Pacific, and China is now our enemy.

Ho Chi Minh worked in England and in France, and on the docks in Baltimore, so he was fluent in English as well as the US culture.

He led the movement for independence from France and formed the Indochinese Communist Party, and following WW2, sought Eisenhower's support for Vietnam's independence - which Ike declined.



LBJ initiated the war with North Vietnam by sending our warships into their territorial waters, drawing fire, thus convincing Congressional hawks to declare war.

As it turns out, the Tonkin Gulf Resolution was drafted a full six months before the attacks on US vessels occurred.

While we valiantly fought that war until 1975, Henry Kissinger, without the knowledge of Nixon, was selling us out to the Chinese in 1972, in exchange for a trade agreement.

But, throughout that war, we were often reminded of the heroin trade, via the Golden Triangle, through US Military transport, to the US.  Some folks are convinced that trade was sponsored or conducted by the CIA.

Iraq, for decades before we invaded to depose Saddam, was our closest Middle East Arab Ally [see our colleague, #Rick Francona's book "Ally to Adversary"], as well as our principal oil supplier.

Dick Cheney's Defense Contractors made a fortune exploiting the war -- and our soldiers, and we then had a generation of soldiers succumb to the Gulf War Syndrome [attributed to the oil vapor from burning wells, or, depleted uranium munitions, but in fact, derived from the Anthrax vaccine immunizations in 1990 by order of the Department of Defense on all Army troops who "might" be deployed to Iraq -- Bush's friends in the Pharmaceutical Industry profited mightily from that requirement -- even though it had not been through more than one (incomplete) trial.

Theoretically, the US would use oil sales from Iraq to pay for that war, but, in the end, the oil fields went under the control of other countries, and the US got not a cent!  On the other hand, US Defense contractors made fortunes.

Estimates by Reuters put the estimated total cost of the Iraq War at more than $5.6 Trillion.  
The war killed an estimated 150,000 Iraqi civilians, with unconfirmed estimates ranging up to 600,000, including security forces, insurgents, journalists, and humanitarian workers!  Bush demonstrated US power by publicly executing Saddam by hanging him, by the neck, until dead.
[Rumor has it that W faced that same sentence in Gitmo in December, 2018]

The social impact in Iraq included the reinvigoration of Islamic militants, reversal of women's rights, and a weakened an already precarious healthcare system.  The multi-billion reconstruction effort was regarded a failure as most of the monies spent on security was lost to waste or fraud.

Keep in mind that the basis of George W Bush's invasion of Iraq was based on his announcement that Saddam Hussein held "Weapons of Mass Destruction" [WMD] a claim discounted by Rick Francona who was/is an expert on the region and acted as General Schwartzkopf's personal Arabic interpreter and Intelligence Advisor.

Schwartzkopf, opposed by Dick Cheney later became critical of the rationale behind the war once he learned the "WMD" claim was fraudulent and handed in his retirement papers rather than remain on Active Duty.  No evidence was ever substantiated of WMDs in Iraq.

Our legacy in Iraq was, perhaps, to create the subsequent regional terrorist factions which represent our current global threat.

The Afghans were our closest allies in their battles against the Soviets, as we helped create and aided the Mujahiden; but, there were even allegations that the CIA created Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda, via Operation Cyclone, -- and then, once the Soviets were defeated, we abandoned our Afghan colleagues, allowing religious zealots to control the Taliban who were then dubbed terrorists; they're now our enemy because bin Laden was reportedly hiding out in Afghanistan.

In spite of the Special Operations assault on bin Laden's Pakistan hideout and his assassination, he has been repeatedly reported in sightings vacationing in the Caribbean with his family.

The faux assassination of bin Laden was conducted by Admiral McRaven's Special Operations units under the guise of Operation Neptune Spear as a public relations event for then-POTUS Obama.  McRaven reportedly was one of the flag rank officers who signed on to Obama's requirement that they agreed to fire on US Civilians if so ordered.

Contrary to all Intelligence protocols, bin Laden was killed and his [supposedly his] mutilated body was dumped in the ocean, sparking Muslim outrage throughout the world, and leaving professional Intelligence officers bewildered that he was not taken captive [he was unarmed] and interrogated to obtain his knowledge of regional and global terrorist groups.

Notably, SEAL Team Six, the lead on the bin Laden assault, later suffered 38 casualties, to include 15 participants of the bin Laden raid when their Chinook helicopter was shot down on August 6, 2011IN [Extortion 17] -- not long after members of the Team lampooned Obama as in Clint Eastwood's Empty Chair soliloquy.

Loading 38 SEALs aboard a chopper in a combat zone strains credulity, but, apparently, the orders came down from McRaven -- an officer we all respected until too many of these incidents surfaced, and he has recently become a highly vocal critic of President Trump.

The chopper was allegedly shot down by a Surface to Air [SAM/MANPAD]


But, why are we in Afghanistan now?

Most experts remain bewildered, other than the US now tacitly protects the poppy/heroin trade.


And, we learned that ISIS, our Enemy-du-Jour, has been led and funded by senior officers of our closest Mid-East Allies, apparently so we would have an officially recognized enemy.

Later, we learned that Benghazi was all about covering up Hillary's arms deals with ISIS and al Qaeda by overthrowing Qadafi and transferring the contents of Libyan armories to al Qaeda -- who just might be tempted use those weapons against US forces.


Of late, we received from an anonymous donor, the complete [unclassified] war-plan designed by [former General] Wesley Clark [Clinton's protege and commander of the Military raid on Waco] in which Clark planned a war between Ukraine and Russia, into which US forces would be inserted and engaged.
[It was difficult to determine who would have been the enemy in that war, but US engagement would guarantee profits for our Defense Contractors.]

In Central America, a grouping of 'banana republics" and a hotbed of corruption, the US built up the Southern Command [SouthCom] headquarters from a Military retirement vacationland to a highly energized and blossoming combat command, focused on defeating the communist threat to Nicaragua, which Jimmy Carter had turned over to the Sandinistas by pulling support from the "evil despot", Somoza - [a West Point graduate] and allowing communist Daniel Ortega to come to power and who then ushered in the Cubans and Soviets -- who presented The Threat.

We were assigned as the Special Intelligence Advisor to SouthCom, a thinly staffed regional headquarters which could respond to any regional crisis, and watched it mushroom into a bloated, top heavy bureaucracy which justified its existence by toppling our host and ally, Noriega with a massive invasion, built a huge Military force in Honduras and El Salvador, created a war zone in El Salvador, and essentially destabilized an entire sub-continent by becoming the common enemy of all, and a seeming ally of the Drug Cartels, thanks to Bush-1, Clinton, Bush-2, and Obama.

The US militarized El Salvador, Honduras, and Costa Rica, and headquartered Army and Air Force bases in each country, and supported Panama's Noriega as a "benevolent despot", who profited by accepting payments from the KGB, the CIA, Army Intelligence, -- and the Chinese.

[We managed HUMINT programs in CentAm following a by-name request by the CIA DDO-LA [D Clarridge] and the former DCI [V Walters] to restructure both the CIA and the Military Intelligence HUMINT operations in Latin America]

Noriega was also a drug runner and arms dealer; but, then we created an intelligence program that revealed that Noriega was not just a tin-horn dictator, but masterminded a global network of hundreds of front companies through which he moved drugs, arms, and laundered money -- a sophisticated network CIA/Deep State coveted, so Noriega was declared evil, and the US invaded Panama, and the CIA took control of all the Noriega Front Companies to carry on their global, Black enterprises.

But, all that is hidden in the background, and Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria are sort of enemy strongholds, but, we're not sure who are the good guys, or the bad guys.

So, now, who will the US have to identify and combat "The "Threat"?
Afghanistan for another 10 or 15 years? or Syria, for another 10 years!

We have the highly skilled and specialized Special Forces [the Special Operations Commmand (SOCOM) designed for insertion into hostile zones to address "Terrorists".

We have a Cyber Command which theoretically can combat hacking by all our Cyber enemies, and even the Russians, if we can admit that the US targets the successor to the USSR
[the Cyber Command apparently includes Spookdblog as an enemy since they have bombarded our residences with impulse waves, hacked our cell-phones and texted Clapper's threats to us, along with excerpts of our highly classified Officer Evaluation Reports (OER)-- just to let us know they could do it.]

Notably, there are several other Unified Commands [AfriCom, SouthCom, Strategic Command, etc.,] which serve no purpose other than to create command slots for unnecessary generals and bureaucrats, and to fund NATO.

But, let's not forget the Defense contractors who provide that expensive support for our Military forces deployed in those regions. The massive expansion of our Military and Intelligence organizations under Bush and Obama have created a huge financial burden, and a bloated Military hierarchy unseen in the history of the US -- even at the peak of World War 2.

These Commands waste manpower and equipment, and create the scenarios for regional wars - usually backing the wrong elements; they augment their forces by deploying National Guard units from the US at great expense. It's time to rethink our Military from top to bottom.

Do we need to remain in Afghanistan or Syria?

Lots of senior Military officers will state adamantly that the US must live up to its commitments in both areas of operation [AO].  But, precisely what commitment is there?



1) Afghanistan: 
After 17 years, our accomplishments consist of:
   a) Trillions of dollars spent,
   b) Deployment of countless National Guard units in six month deployments barely long enough
        to familiarize them with the environment before coming under attack,
    c) Countless suicides during, and after deployments, abominable leadership, massive
        post-deployment illnesses,
    d) Assassination of US personnel by Afghan allies, and
    e) Absolutely no positive results other than protecting Poppy fields for local drug lords,
    f) Bad guys control most of the country and the Afghan Government [our Ally] controls
        a few acres
    g) Most Afghans regard us as their enemy



2) Syria:
We've only been engaged in Syria for seven years, since 2011, and here's a list of accomplishments:
   a) Roughly 500,00 people are dead
   b) Dozens of countries are involved
   c)  Many [exact number unknown] terrorist groups are involved -- on both sides
   d)  Syrian President Assad is backed by Iran and Russia [our current "enemies"] and Pakistan
   c)  Opposition to Assad includes
        (1) hundreds of "militias" from an estimated 85 countries,
        (2) Syrian Democratic Forces [Kurdish-led coalition of Arab and Kurdish Militias],
              (a) led by the Kurdish Worker's Party (PKK)
              (b) regarded by the US and the UK as a Terrorist group although the US provides
                   them air support against ISIS]
              (c) BUT, Turkey fights the Kurds fearing they will use a victory to declare an independent
                    state along the border
        (3) Miscellaneous Arabs, Sunnis, Christians, Druze, and Kurds],
        (4) Islamic extremists -- some of which have been declared terrorists,
              including the Syrian version of al Qaeda [armed by Hillary from Libyan
              military warehouses]
        (5) ISIS- supposedly local Islamic extremists, although manpower derives from a variety
              of countries including Canada, the US, Australia, Israel, the UK, Iraq, etc.
        (6) Official backing by outside nations includes the US, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Jordan, Turkey
       

Mr Trump has stated he will pull out of Syria, but, given the complexities listed above, he faces a great deal of opposition from Allies, the Democrats, the Pentagon, the GOP, and all those who anticipate profiting from the continuation of this conflict.

Essentially, Trump is removing his "Boots-On-The-Ground" units and still maintaining a protective shield by creating a "No-Fly-Zone" in the Northeast of Syria which is rich in Agriculture, Water, and Energy resources - the target of all the Bad Guys.

The US can remove its primary units deployed by Obama, but tactically, can still respond, as needed from other Middle East areas, or,  from the US with Special Operations units and A-10 Warthogs, the close-air support aircraft Obama was intent on eliminating.

Assuming the reports of satellite enabled weaponry [Star Wars], bad guys [if accurately identified] could be targeted and blasted into oblivion in seconds using the Directed Energy Weapons developed back in the 1970s, or lasers developed during the 1960s, now significantly enhanced, with targeting via sophisticated technology developed since then.




In the ancient words of Walt Kelly's POGO,
"We have met the enemy, and he is US!"
Trump has an uphill battle to fix this.



Tuesday, March 14, 2017

CIA Interrogations - Enhanced, or Torture


Enhanced Interrogation:  AKA - TORTURE


We've noted the circulation of what purports to be a CIA public service announcement regarding the value of "Enhanced Interrogation" of "Terrorist Prisoners" which allegedly produced extraordinary and actionable Intelligence.
[We've attached an extract of this report at the bottom of this blog post.]

Much of the published information is true, but it was definitely not produced from enhanced interrogation, but rather via different sourcing, much of it from unclassified, open-source newspaper accounts.  So, you may discount the origin of the data.

We are very familiar with all forms of interrogation and have conducted hundreds of interrogations, both tactical and strategic in war zones and  special facilities, as well as CounterIntelligence interrogations to determine espionage threats..  

We never had a prisoner who couldn't be broken -- and turned, to include NVA Political Officers and hardened guerrilla fighters.  And they were tougher than Taliban. At no time did we ever have to use other than normal interrogation techniques, and at no time, did we ever have to use torture to obtain results.  Essentially, torture routinely gives false results and misleading information -- and bad intelligence.

Successful interrogations come from sophisticated conversations, rather than beating information out of a prisoner.  Most prisoners willingly provide as much information as is requested or demanded, and a professional interrogator is prepared with background and confirmed data to determine how truthful the subject is.  

Essentially, there are three forms of interrogation:

1)  Simple debriefing is for prisoners who have no resistance training.  They'll be happy to chatter away and disclose everything they know, and often, information they were unaware they have/had.  Handled properly, they can be enormously helpful.  In one case, a teenager, illiterate and fairly simple, provided the location of the master logistics center for the Spring Offensive - allowing us to capture it, and essentially ending that war, at least for a while.

2)  Professional interrogations, which require the interrogator to be  trained in psychology and who looks for nuances in the subject's eyes, facial movements, body moisture, voice rhythms, etc., to determine attempts to mislead the interrogator.  The interrogator begins with a number of folders on his/her desk, and accepts the prisoner who, through psychological manipulation, assumes and fears torture.  The folders contain parameters of verified information to answer key questions which can lead to new questions and sophisticated [though non-violent] techniques.  For the most part, the subject is unaware of the true objectives of the interrogation.

3)  Hostile interrogations are used to break down the  subject through disorientation, fear of the unknown, various forms of psychological techniques, and special manipulation techniques, augmented by input from HUMINT, IMINT, SIGINT, COMINT, ELINT, etc.  
Again, opening folders with information the subject believes was provided by other prisoners weakens his/her resistance.   Add in fear of being caught lying, and the fear of the unknown becomes far more effective than actual torture.  
[See Room 101 in the Orwell's book, 1984].  This process requires a great deal of sophistication and education on the part of the Interrogator, but, again, includes absolutely NO TORTURE.]

FITD [Forscom Intelligence Training Detachment] - the unit we formed at Ft Bragg [1976] trained all USFORSCOM [Forces Command] tactical units and strategic Reserve units in proper interrogation methods; we created SOPs and manuals, most of which were incorporated years later in TRADOC [Training & Doctrine Command]. 
FITD was later converted to the 111th MI Brigade which took over the mission.

[Notably, Enhanced Interrogation techniques were legalized, and added to the Army's Field Manual, though still regarded as extreme, and unnecessary for the most part]


Unfortunately, as we learned from many years of association with, and assignments to the CIA, their approach to interrogations was unique.  

Since they lacked professional interrogators, they would draw on the Military for both SpecOps and mundane things like interrogations.  Unfortunately, the CIA would secretly coordinate with the Pentagon for untrained Warm Bodies to conduct these ops, and they would frequently end up with unskilled Marines or Army Infantry troops unskilled in interrogation, but who learned their trade by watching TV programs like Jack Bauer's skill sets in 24, in which torture was routinely used -- with very poor results.  Although the Military had trained, linguistically skilled professional interrogators, the CIA would ignore them and frequently depend on local nationals who had knowledge of either psychology or interrogation skills.

The greatest issue we have with the CIA's "enhanced interrogation" technique is that other countries [hostile and friendly] follow our lead.  If the US does it, it must be OK.  Worse, our adversaries/enemies look at us as the penultimate bad guys reflected in their propaganda themes, and use those techniques when interrogating US soldiers.  We were briefly captive of the Pathet Lao in southern Laos near the end of the war and were not amused by these techniques, which included fairly crude attempts at torture, before we found a way to exit the situation.  Later, we were interrogating an NVA captain at one point and asked him why the NVA treated our soldiers so viciously when they were captured.  He was astonished at the question and admonished me, saying, 

"We simply imitate your atrocities. Why, your troops mutilate our troops!  Your newspaper - Stars & Stripes herald such actions of one of your colonels."

Hatchet Hank Emerson
We were astonished, but placed a secure call to Saigon to a trusted friend at MACSOG who verified the torture and mutilation, and even shipped a copy of the Stars & Stripes which headlined this local hero, Lt Col Henry Emerson, thus affirming that we were, in fact, bad guys, leading to the torture of our own soldiers.  Such incidents continue today where we have fought.

We have enough enemies around the world now; we don't need more but we create enemies with the concept of torture.

In short, we do not support "enhanced" interrogation, a technique of negative value falsely touted by the CIA as a productive tool. We guarantee Enhanced Interrogation techniques will be/has been used against US PWs as a retaliatory measure.  

Ultimately, we are not labeling the US as the BAD GUY; but, we very much wish to see the CIA removed from such operations, particularly from controlling our Special Operations forces and Military Intelligence operations -- the actual trained Professionals in Military Operations and Human Intelligence programs!  


Below is an extract of the CIA's claim to intelligence production gained through, and which they claim justifies "Enhanced Interrogation".  
Keep in mind that virtually all of this information was 
published in the US News Media or on the Internet.


Thursday, October 13, 2016

Great American Ally Dies

King Bhumibol Adulyadej
Personified Thailand as The Land of the Free


We are saddened by the passing of one of history's great monarchs, an average guy, born in America, who was reluctant to take the crown following his brother's assassination many decades ago.

He was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts while his father was enrolled in the Public Health Program at Harvard University. His name translates to Strength of the LandIncomparable Power, and was in self-imposed exile to distance himself from the political turmoil in Thailand.  He had studied -- and partied in Europe, and was attending Harvard University as a music major, and played saxophone in a local band when he was notified he was the new King of Thailand.

King Ananda 


He was completely Americanized, spoke little of the Thai language, and was upset when four Thai Military officers showed up at his door to escort him back to Bangkok -- against his protests; his brother, King Ananda Mahidol, had been assassinated, and Thailand needed a King.



Once in Bangkok, newly-crowned King Bhumidol underwent an intense tutorial to learn to speak Thai and to adopt Thai cultural customs so he could play the royal role.


Thai Longboat   [Photo by Adrian Evans]


Once installed, he gradually became the leader the country needed, and, in the midst of another coup attempt, was smuggled out of the country by his American advisor and protector at the bottom of a long-boat.







He reestablished his position as national leader and developed rapport with a faction of patriotic Army officers who managed the affairs of the country and brought it stability; they overcame a series of coup attempts throughout the King's reign with the assistance of a unique intelligence system created by the King's OSS advisor to monitor his advisors - actual, and potential.

Over the decades, King Bhumibol became an astute student and knowledgeable of world affairs, and maintained a close alliance with the US, recognizing the threat that Communism posed.  He was especially concerned when the US abandoned Southeast Asia in 1975 at the direction of Henry Kissinger, leaving the region open to the fulfillment of the Domino Theory in which Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia fell to the Communists; Thailand remained the sole survivor as its Military was able to sustain its strength in spite of the withdrawal of US forces.

[Thailand's post-1975 survival resulted from a highly effective counter-insurgency effort by US Intelligence; Kissinger discounted the Domino Theory because Thailand did not fall -- although he had done his best to ensure that it would fall to the Communist Insurgency based in Laos and Cambodia.]

The King's closest advisor -- and guardian, during his reign was a former OSS officer who had earlier smuggled him out of the country during the coup attempt.  With that support, the King became a powerful arbiter of the political factions, and the country has been at relative peace for decades.




His son, the probably new King,
Maha Vajiralongkorn,
has his work cut out for him as he assumes the role of leader of a nation steeped in political turmoil, in the midst of Communist effort to assume power.

 We wish him well.

Tuesday, June 12, 2012

Watergate Revisited



The Watergate - Political Stage       (USG Photo)

We have made a few editorial updates to this 2012 post since it appears 
Mr Kissinger finally died in 2023 and continued to influence US foreign 
policy at the highest levels.  We had presumed he had been permanently
 removed from this arena, but apparently, some in the first Trump 
Administration regarded him as credible.  
We regarded him as the major representative of the DEEP STATE!

This blogpost is being republished since the Nixon years are back in the news, with the Deep State still trying to paint Nixon as a criminal.  Nixon's polities to end the Vietnam War and clean up the government
made him a target of the Deep State, continuing the prolonged coup to gain full control of the United States government starting with the assassination of JFK in 1963.  The thread brings together the maneuvering of the Deep State/CIA from 1962 until the present (2026

Click here for related story [Washington Post]


The Washington Post, losing readership faster than Mr Obama is losing his Democrat supporters, is revisiting Watergate, perhaps to distract voters from the gaffes, corruption, scandals, and Intelligence leaks of their beloved incumbent President.

Haldeman, Mardian, Parkinson, Ehrlichman, Mitchell

In this feature story, Woodward and Bernstein declare that Nixon was evil incarnate and, they were not only right in their coverage, they underestimated what a bad guy he really was!


They obviously want to relive the glory of their singular, if orchestrated, investigative reporting.

But, was it a real event, or a Byzantine black op?






Apparently, neither reporter ever realized that Watergate was a Kabuki Drama, and that they were merely performers being guided by a highly skilled group of Intelligence officers, with the plot orchestrated by the greatest spook of all:  Vernon Walters, the invisible Director of Central Intelligence.


So, if Watergate was a political orchestration, what was the real purpose, and why go through such a convoluted process?

In short:
The goal was to dislodge Henry Kissinger, perhaps the greatest threat to US national security in the 20th Century.

To understand this goal, a background scenario is necessary:
[we'll keep it as short as possible]

Nixon felt his place in history was to normalize relations with China.

He brought Kissinger, the Little Professor, on board based on Henry's academic credentials, his membership in the Council on Foreign Relations, staff consulting with the NSC, and, he was a protege of Nelson Rockefeller [who had his own ambitions for the White House]; Henry played the part of pontificating intellectual to Nixon's naivete and ambition. 

Kissinger was Nixon's well-connected political Einstein.  Nixon gave Kissinger free rein, and chose not to challenge his unilateral decisions in pursuing Nixon's China Policy -- even though Kissinger's personal decisions and actions were systematically undercutting the US Military and destroying US intelligence operations around the world - as part of the Deep State.

Nixon dreamed of open relations with the People's Republic of China to

1) Neutralize the PRC as a US potential adversary
2) Enhance the PRC as a USSR potential adversary
3) Create a viable trading partner for US goods and
     services benefiting both countries




The vulnerability of the process was that Nixon turned over the negotiations for these goals to Kissinger, whose reputation and ego far exceeded his actual capacity.

Vice President Ford accurately pegged him as a pretentious little twit with a phony accent [Kissinger's brother, a cab driver, spoke harsh Brooklynese]; Pentagon and State Department officials regarded him as a loose and dangerous cannon.  But, Nixon backed him, which gave him all the power he needed to get things done, no matter what the cost. 

And, Kissinger used his position to block access to Nixon, and to impose "Presidential Directives" on all elements of the Intelligence and Military Communities -- without the knowledge of Nixon.

Kissinger launched his personal diplomatic campaign in 1970, at the height of the Viet Nam War, to open discussions with China, bypassing -- but not unmonitored by -- the CIA and the State Department.  Kissinger chose not to use existing CIA or State Department contacts, assets or special resources to initiate discussions, but fumbled around trying to connect via "friends of friends" at foreign embassies -- thus becoming the laughing stock of international diplomatic circles. 

His amateurish maneuvers squandered a century of State Department inroads and expertise, and CIA's direct linkage to Mao's inner circle which dated back to a World War II OSS operation
[Operation Dixie Cup -- in which US officers advised both Mao and Chiang figuring the US would be pals with whomever ended up in power].  

[As luck would have it, the OSS officer's son [Willis H Bird, an Army Intelligence agent], was recruited as the escort and interpreter for Kissinger and Nixon during the historic visit to China in 1972.]

Henry, you are indeed a naive simpleton!
China had mastered diplomacy over a millennium and was light years ahead of Kissinger.

Eventually, Zhou en Lai, tiring of Kissinger's clumsy and amateurish efforts at diplomacy, contacted him and re-opened discussions -- in which Taiwan was deemed an expendable ally, and Viet Nam and all of Southeast Asia was declared by Kissinger [in a subsequent letter to Zhou]  to be "of no further interest to the United States". 

Kissinger, not a skilled diplomatic negotiator, but apparently feeling he was the reincarnation of Machiavelli, gave away the farm and got nothing more in return than what Zhou was already willing to offer for free.  Zhou wanted revenue from international commerce, and normalizing relations with the US would serve that purpose.

Recently released National Archive documents recorded Kissinger's unilateral concessions to Zhou on 22 June 1972:

In Kissinger's words:
"... the US respects its Hanoi enemy as a 'permanent factor' and probably 'the strongest entity in the region'.  And, we have no interest in destroying it or even defeating it."
[underline added for emphasis]

Note:  
This was well over a year before Congress, via the Case-Church Amendment, declared the end to US Military involvement in Viet Nam, Laos, and Cambodia in August 1973 --  and nearly three years before Saigon was turned over to North Viet Nam in 1975.

In the interim, more than 1,000 US troops were killed -- fighting and dying for no purpose. 

[Particularly annoying was my brief status as a POW in Laos during August 1973 -- well after Henry had sold out the US Military to the Chinese.]

Zhou would have been perfectly content to simply open trade relations with the US.
Had Kissinger consulted the CIA or the State Department, he would have learned the PRC commercial link with the West had been thriving for years via Hong Kong.  Zhou, of course, could not pass up the opportunity to exploit Kissinger's obeisance, extracting as many concessions from Kissinger as he could, and enjoying every minute of the charade.

All of these negotiations were monitored by US Intelligence -- to the great frustration of Richard Helms [DCI] and William Rogers [Secretary of State].

Kissinger offered all of SEA to the PRC

Among the needless concessions, Kissinger agreed to not only turn over Southeast Asia [including Thailand, Malaysia, Cambodia, Singapore] to Communism, he also agreed to shut down all US Covert intelligence operations 
-- to include agent nets throughout the region which had been accurately reporting on military and political issues since World War II.

At the time, we had fully functional and reporting agent nets throughout Indo-China, to include penetration operations throughout the North Vietnamese Army, agents inside the Chinese training camps in Burma, and penetrations into the mainland Chinese training camps which fed the insurgency in Thailand and Malaysia. 

In February 1974, Kissinger directed that all such operations would cease immediately {by order of the president - an order not created by Nixon}; he ordered all Intelligence operational personnel immediately from the region. 


He used the Church Committee directives as his justification, but those required only that the Intelligence Committees be briefed on the existence of such operations -- not that they be terminated; termination was Kissinger's unilateral decision!

CIA's Guerrillas [a Group Mobile]
Not only did Kissinger close down all these highly productive clandestine and covert operations, he did so with the startling proviso that there would be no attempts to maintain any sort of contact or means of reconstructing the nets in the future -- by  "Order of the President" 
[an edict of which Nixon was unaware].

Such actions were unheard of in the history of diplomacy and espionage, and they put the US at a major political and military disadvantage both in the region as well as on a global basis -- from which the US has never recovered.


No country unilaterally gives up its intelligence advantage and can expect to survive. 

Among the consequences were the loss of all intelligence feeds on insurgent operations emanating from China targeting Thailand and Malaysia, Singapore, and the Philippines,
as well as the loss of continuous reporting on American POWs held in Laos, Cambodia, and Viet Nam after the Viet Nam War.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the world, Kissinger became Nixon's personal ambassador to the Shah of Iran, with the objective of manipulating the world oil market -- and its pricing, and increasing Israel's stature in the region, thus upsetting the Arab world and undermining Middle East regional stability.

The Shah, pre-Carter

Kissinger again by-passed both the State Department and CIA in his manipulations, and, pandering to the Shah,  shut down all US unilateral intelligence operations in Iran, exposing US operations, methods and sources, and forcing the CIA to work solely in bilateral operations with Savak -- Iran's Intelligence organization known for its brutality.

By shutting down the CIA in Iran, and curtailing all negative reporting on Iran from other US intelligence organizations, the US became isolated and singular in its ignorance of the growing revolutionary forces within, and without.

Aside from alienating the Intelligence Community, Kissinger cut a deal with the Shah by posing no objection to the Shah's abruptly doubling the price of a barrel [BBL] of oil.  In Kissinger's words to Iranian diplomat Ardeshir Zahedi
"Tell the Shah 'you can push [us] as much as you want [on oil prices]".
[Kissinger later claimed this concept was all Nixon's idea, when it was, in fact, his own version of foreign policy to influence Middle East oil flow, and to protect Israel.]

The US had no clue about the Ayatollah's political power
-- thanks to Kissinger




Thus, the growing popularity of the Ayatollah Khomeini in Iran went virtually unnoticed and unreported, and Khomeini's international support was downplayed - by Savak, which filtered all US reporting on Iran. 






The result:
 
The US was the only country surprised by the overthrow of the Shah and the Revolution which brought in the Ayatollah, changing the balance of power forever in the Middle East, and opening the door to political power for radical Muslim Mullahs and radical Islamists -- a political dilemma which may lead to a global war. 

The unforeseen consequence of this diplomatic blunder was the displacement of the Shah, who would then be replaced by Saudi Arabia as the dominant force in the Middle East. 

[Jimmy Carter, after promising the Shah a US Safehaven, would later covertly offer to return the Shah to Iran for trial in exchange for release of US hostages; interestingly, Noriega wire-tapped Carter's negotiations with the Iranians, alerted the Shah, and offered him safety in Panama. (that's another story)]

The Director of Central Intelligence [and CIA] {DCI}, Richard Helms, was by-passed by Kissinger, who succeeded in excluding Helms from the National Security Council and access to the Oval Office.  A series of leaks -- believed to be via Kissinger -- regarding CIA activities and operations, made their way to the Media - resulting in Media-hyped scandals leading to a series of Congressional investigations. 

To help maneuver Helms out of the way, Kissinger brought in as Deputy DCI (DDCI), Vernon Walters, the affable Military Attache' in Paris who had smuggled Kissinger into Paris for his secret meetings with North Vietnamese officials; in the absence of Helms, Walters became the acting DCI.  As DDCI, Walters could manage the CIA while Helms was distracted by Kissinger's political intrigue.

Kissinger assumed the position of Secretary of State after forcing the resignation of the highly skilled diplomat, William Rogers.  The Intelligence Community recognized that Kissinger's elevated status would give him unprecedented power to destroy intelligence and subvert National Security.  He had succeeded in displacing both the Director of Central Intelligence as well as the Secretary of State, thus becoming Nixon's principal foreign policy advisor and his only link to the international community.

Ultimately, the Church Committee established Congressional oversight over CIA's operations, severely restricting the capabilities of the US Intelligence Community -- albeit with only a few positive reforms.  

With Helms disgraced by the flood of leaks about the CIA, Kissinger persuaded Nixon to demote Helms and reassign him in 1973 as Ambassador to Iran -- where Kissinger, as Secretary of State, could control him.  
[Kissinger had also ordered the termination in Iran of all HUMINT and NSA operations, removing all early indicators of the growing influence of the Ayatollah whose rise to political and religious ascendency would disrupt Iranian stability and eventually would force the Shah to abdicate]

That left a gap in CIA leadership - filled by LTG Vernon Walters.

This was the basis for the Watergate Conspiracy, which was already well underway.

Kissinger was completely insulated since he could, and did, as Nixon's Gatekeeper, limit access to the President, so any attempt by anyone outside the White House to persuade Nixon of Henry's destructive actions would be short-stopped, and the messenger would be terminated.  

The Washington Leadership [political, Intelligence, and Military, all recognized that Kissinger was succeeding in an ultimate power-grab in which he would control the State Department, CIA, and the Oval Office - manipulating Nixon.  And, the only way to neutralize Kissinger was to dislodge Nixon.

Vernon Walters
[Meet the REAL Deep Throat]


Walters was one of the most respected officers in the Military as well as in the Intelligence Community,  having been a key operative in the OSS during WW2, and notable for creating operations which remain classified even today.

[NOTE: I worked for General Walters (directly and indirectly at the State Department) while he was President Reagan's Ambassador at Large. He was a major force in later helping me to create the Defense Clandestine Service.]

Kissinger presumed Walters to be an ally since Walters commiserated with Kissinger on CIA problems.  Once installed as acting DCI, Walters was accepted at the Oval Office, and the White House advisors liked and admired him because of his jocularity and intellect. 


Hoover
Beloved by No-One


Coincidentally, J Edgar Hoover died, conveniently (he had been in excellent health but succumbed to a Breitbart-style heart stoppage), a month before the break-in, thus he was unavailable to lead an FBI investigation into the Watergate event.

At the suggestion of Helms' Deputy Director, Nixon appointed L Patrick Gray, an inexperienced DOJ lawyer, by-passing Mark Felt [who would later  be dubbed (mistakenly) as Deep Throat].  



As acting Director [DCI] of all US Intelligence agencies, Walters ensured that the FBI was kept out of any meaningful investigative role in Watergate; instead, he personally provided a programmed feed to the FBI's new Director Gray. 

What no one realized was that Walters was orchestrating the entire Watergate debacle with Washington Post Editor, including the leaks to Bob Woodward, and even to Mark Felt.

The anomalies of the scandal, though crystal clear to Intelligence officers, never got in the way of the Washington Post reporting - orchestrated by Walters, and Ed Bradley, the Managing Editor of The Washington Post.

[Note:  Much later, Woodward (hyping his book) appeared as a guest speaker at the National Press Club (where I co-chaired the National Journalism Awards).  I took the opportunity to introduce myself while he paraded around with the guests; so I took the opportunity to ask him if he continued his relationship with Vernon Walters after the Watergate Sting was concluded.  Oddly, his face turned bright red and he stormed out of the Press Club, and I did not receive an answer to my question.] 

The Event [aka: The Sting]:

On 17 June 1972, five men were arrested for breaking and entering the Democratic National Committee Headquarters at the Watergate complex. 

    a.  They were discovered after a well-meaning but inept building security guard found the
         door to the office repeatedly propped open with tape -- which he removed, each time
         re-locking the door, and each time, the tape was replaced and propped open again
         -- guaranteeing their discovery.

    b.  Cash found on the burglars was somehow connected by the FBI to a GOP Reelection
         Committee Slush Fund. 
        [Interesting forensics there, even for today's experts and technology.]

    c.  The burglars' expertise included senior career intelligence officers notable for their
         experience in second story Black Ops, to include weapons, demolitions, surreptitious entry,
         PsyOps, special security, money laundering, espionage, and assassinations.
         
[Why were highly skilled, senior level intelligence operatives involved in a simple break-in?]
         
         These guys were all highly experienced spooks, e.g.,
     
        (1) G Gordon Liddy, a former FBI agent, directed "The Plumbers"
               to break in to the DNC Watergate office.
G Gordon Liddy
         (2) James McCord had been an FBI security expert and
               also headed CIA security;  
         (3) Frank Sturgis, with 30 years experience, had served as
               a Marine in WWII, operating behind enemy lines. He ran
               covert operations in Communist Berlin, and infiltrated
               Fidel Castro's inner circle.
        (4)  Bernard Barker, was a veteran of Operation 40,
               the Bay of Pigs, and Cuban Secret Police.

   d.  Nixon commented, upon learning of the event:
       "It sounded preposterous.   
       The whole thing made so little sense.  Why in such a
       blundering way?  Anyone who knew anything about 
       politics would know that a national committee headquarters 
       was a useless place place to go for inside information. 
       The whole thing was so senseless and  bungled that it 
       almost looked like some kind of set-up."

Cub Reporters 
Breaking News
  e.  Two Washington Post cub reporters, Woodward and Bernstein, just happened to be assigned to Night Court to witness the five burglars being charged.  

        1) Interestingly, Woodward had recently been released from US Naval Intelligence as a junior officer)

       (2) Oddly, the intelligence operatives, who had lived both covert and clandestine existences and were completely used to subterfuge, cover identities, arrests, torture, and lying their way out of similar situations, immediately blurted out in Night Court that they worked for the CIA. 

      (3) Standard procedure in this type of situation would have been a quick phone call, a release in anonymity -- and then to disappear forever.

      (4) Instead, trained, experienced professional spooks spilled their guts in front of two cub reporters, without any prompting, much less an inquiry by the judge.

     (5)  The only conclusion, from an intelligence perspective, is that these Plumbers had purposely made a series of highly visible blunders and left a paper trail that a Cub Scout/Reporter could have followed, creating a highly visible story for them to report.

[But, that would not have eliminated Kissinger, and fortunately, 
the naive Woodward and Bernstein were artfully manipulated by Walters and Bradlee.]

Spookdblog debriefing
"WaPo Editor" Ben Bradlee 

at the National Press Club
Thus, the bait was set, Woodward and Bernstein ran with it, Ben Bradlee blessed it [in collusion with Walters] and the story grew legs.

[Bradlee was well acquainted with the Intelligence Community and despised Kissinger, and was only too happy to assist.]

Each time the story got stale, our erstwhile reporters were fed some new tidbits and leads by Bradlee, who was fed by Walters - who would then meet covertly with reporter Woodward. [Bradlee told me he regarded Woodward and Bernstein as Useful Idiots.



Meanwhile Congressmen and Senators were urged into outrage and action, until finally, Nixon was forced to resign.

[As a sidelight, the Impeachment investigation included Hillary Clinton's Obstruction of Justice in which she concealed exculpatory evidence from Chief Counsel Zeifman; so, it seems her political corruption record goes back to Watergate]

Kissinger, a Deep State/Shadow Government operative, who had managed the demise of a number of developing countries for the Deep State, was the intended target of this scheme, nimbly exited the Oval Office "Conspiracy Group" to the safety of the Seventh Floor of the State Department, where he could claim ignorance of the alleged plot and crime.

Although Kissinger escaped removal from White House power, his true power base, Nixon, was neutralized.  In the final analysis, the Deep State/Shadow Government succeeded in removing both Kissinger and Nixon, and replacing Nixon with Ford, who was a willing stooge for the Deep State and the Shadow Government.  

Even so, Kissinger continued to influence foreign policy, but he was not afforded special status by President Ford, who made it a point to regard Kissinger as nothing more than a bothersome popinjay.  Kissinger also found himself exiled from the National Security Council.

Such events, once set in motion, are subject to the Law of Unintended Consequences.

The CIA was not spared its dismantling and the gutting of the Directorate of Clandestine Services, first by Kissinger, and then by his successor and protege, Zbigniew Brzesinski; and finally, Carter's DCI, Stansfield Turner, who delivered the coup de grace by firing 800 Clandestine Service operatives, world-wide.  By the time Reagan took office, the US Human Intelligence capability had been virtually destroyed.

Footnote: 

There are those who believe that Nelson Rockefeller played a role in manipulating the situation to dislodge Nixon and open a path through which he could take to the Oval Office [i.e., as Vice President].  There may be some truth to that premise, but, Ford did not win re-election, closing that door to Rockefeller, who later died unexpectedly of "heart stoppage"-- perhaps of the Breitbart Syndrome.

Predictably, Kissinger continued to pontificate on foreign policy and influences the Media, though most experienced policy-makers regard him as a buffoon.  At the first hint of an international crisis, he was been known to show up at local TV stations, demanding that they interview him.  Many now ignore him.  

[Update: unfortunately, he apparently has advocates in the Trump Administration, which throws us into a panic!]

Kissinger's legacy:
1)  The Domino Theory  fulfilled, to include the Communization of Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia 
      -- notably the Killing Fields leaving millions of dead and suffering in Cambodia.
2)  Following Kissinger's removal of US Military and all Intelligence operations in Asia, 
     he sent a letter to Chou en Lai, advising the US would not object if China were to 
     "expand its influence into Southeast Asia", Chinese troops invaded northern Thailand in 1975 
     from Laos [but were defeated by troops from Thailand, Taiwan, and Burma].  
2)  Middle East turmoil immersed in Muslim extremism which is spreading throughout the 
     Middle East and Muslim countries around the world.
3)  Destruction of the US strategic capability in clandestine and covert Human Intelligence

     eliminating predictive intelligence in the Middle East and the Far East.  
Grigori Rasputin
[Reincarnated as Kissiinger?]

4) There are those who speculate that Kissinger is the reincarnation of 
Grigori Rasputin, the confidant of the Tsarist family, and acting "Tsar"with Empress Alexandra while Emperor Nicholas was leading his Military in World War 1.  

    Rasputin was loathed by all [except the Empress]; 
    he essentially disrupted and destroyed the Tsarist government,
    leading to the Bolshevik [communist] overthrow of the
    Romanov dynasty. [Bolsheviks were also active in the US].

    Comparisons of Kissinger with Rasputin seem quite accurate
    in that both manipulated their way into the most senior levels
    of power and influenced the erosion of both power structures.






The KGB could not have been more effective in 
destroying the US Intelligence capability
 if they had hired Kissinger themselves