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خره مينه لګته وي

خره مينه لګته وي

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There's no thread on this forum which is dedicated for this purpose..so let's start posting letters,leaked emails,declassified documents,memos etc...
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Declassified documents on CIA Website (Central intelligence Agency) u can click on the Links given below...


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How did 12 million letters reach WW1 soldiers each week?


1- The importance of letters

The most effective weapon used during World War One wasn’t the shell or the tank, it was morale. The British Army believed that it was crucial to an allied victory, and it looked to the Post Office for help.

The delivery of post was vital for two reasons. Firstly, receiving well wishes and gifts from home was one of the few comforts a soldier had on the Western Front. The majority of them spent more time fighting boredom than they did the enemy, and writing was one of the few hobbies available to them. For some, it was a welcome distraction from the horrors of the trenches.

Secondly, letters served a propaganda purpose as everything that soldiers sent back was subject to censorship. The British Army claimed this was to prevent the enemy finding out secret information, but really it was to prevent bad news from reaching the home front. Letters from serving soldiers had a powerful role, not just in keeping families informed of the well-being of their loved ones; they also helped to sustain popular support for the war across the home front. Nothing could be allowed to jeopardise that.


2- What was sent

Soldiers sent a variety of different items home from the front lines. Souvenirs such as buttons and matchboxes often accompanied letters, and some even sent silk cards - embroidered motifs on strips of silk mesh which were mounted on postcards.

Alan Johnson interviews Chris Taft from the British Postal Museum & Archive about the items soldiers received and sent home.
Transcript (PDF 185 Kb) & u can watch video on the following link BBC iWonder



3- The delivery process

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It took only two days for a letter to reach the front. The journey began at a purpose-built sorting depot at Regent's Park. By the war’s end, two billion letters and 114 million parcels had passed through it.

From there, it was shipped to Le Havre, Boulogne or Calais where the Royal Engineers Postal Section were tasked with getting it to the battlefields. Staffed by just 250 men in 1914, the REPS grew to 4,000 by the end of the war.


4- Censorship at the front

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A completed field postcard, posted on 22 March 1916

The British Army took a number of proactive measures to censor what information made it home from the trenches.

However, censorship was crude. Forbidden subjects were either ripped out of letters or simply scribbled out. In some cases the censored words remained readable.

Field postcard
One method of censorship was the field postcard. These printed cards gave soldiers a number of multiple choice options which they could cross out if they weren’t relevant. They were not allowed to write messages on them.

Honour envelope
Another, more subdued, form of censorship was the honour envelope. These required the sender to sign a declaration to say that they hadn’t disclosed any forbidden information. That way, their letters would only be read by postal workers on the home front instead of by their superiors in the trenches.

Self-censorship
While the field postcard and the honour envelope achieved their purpose, the greatest acts of censorship were actually carried out by soldiers themselves. Many fighting men were keen to hide the realities of war from their loved ones back at home in their letters and simply left out much of what they really went through.


5- Why letters were censored
The British Army was terrified that letter writing would lead to sensitive information being leaked. They weren’t just worried about the enemy intercepting mail, but also the impact news could have on people at home.

Alan Johnson discusses the extent and forms of censorship during World War One.

Transcript (PDF 187 Kb)

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Hitler's first writing about Jewry - On September 10, 1919, while Hitler was still in the army, Staff-Captain Karl Meyer asked for his views on Jewry. Hitler replied on 16 September, 1919.

(September 16, 1919)

Dear Herr Gemlich,

If the threat with which Jewry faces our people has given rise to undeniable hostility on the part of a large section of our people, the cause of this hostility must be sought in the clear recognition that Jewry as such is deliberately or unwittingly having a pernicious effect on our nation, but mostly in personal intercourse, in the poor impression the Jew makes as an individual. As a result, antisemitism far too readily assumes a purely emotional character. But this is not the correct response. Antisemitism as a political movement may not and cannot be molded by emotional factors but only by recognition of the facts. Now the facts are these:

To begin with, the Jews are unquestionably a race, not a religious community. The Jew himself never describes himself as a Jewish German, a Jewish Pole or a Jewish American, but always as a German, Polish or American Jew. Jews have never adopted more than the language of the foreign nations in whose midst they live. A German who is forced to make use of the French language in France, Italian in Italy, Chinese in China does not thereby become a Frenchman, Italian, or Chinaman, nor can we call a Jew who happens to live amongst us and who is therefore forced to use the German language, a German. Neither does the Mosaic faith, however great its importance for the preservation of that race, be the sole criterion for deciding who is a Jew and who is not. There is hardly a race in the world whose members all belong to a single religion.

Through inbreeding for thousands of years, often in very small circles, the Jew has been able to preserve his race and his racial characteristics much more successfully than most of the numerous people among whom he has lived. As a result there lives amongst us a non-German, alien race, unwilling and indeed unable to shed its racial characteristics, its particular feelings, thoughts and ambitions and nevertheless enjoying the same political rights as we ourselves do. And since even the Jew's feelings are limited to the purely material realm, his thoughts and ambitions are bound to be so even more strongly. Their dance around the golden calf becomes a ruthless struggle for all the possessions that we feel deep down are not the highest and not the only ones worth striving for on this earth.

The value of an individual is no longer determined by his character or by the significance of his achievements for the community, but solely by the size of his fortune, his wealth.

The greatness of a nation is no longer measured by the sum of its moral and spiritual resources, but only by the wealth of its material possessions.

All this results in that mental attitude and that quest for money and the power to protect it which allow the Jew to become so unscrupulous in his choice of means, so merciless in their use of his own ends. In autocratic states he cringes before the 'majesty' of the princes and misuses their favors to become a leech on their people.

In democracies he vies for the favor of the masses, cringes before 'the majesty of the people', but only recognizes the majesty of money.

He saps the prince's character with Byzantine flattery; national pride and the strength of the nation with ridicule and shameless seduction to vice. His method of battle is that public opinion which is never expressed in the press but which is nonetheless manages and falsified by it. His power is the power of the money, which multiplies in his hands effortlessly and endlessly through interest, and with which he imposes a yoke upon the nation that is the more pernicious in that its glitter disguises its ultimately tragic consequences. Everything that makes the people strive for higher goals, be it religion, socialism, or democracy, is to the Jew merely a means to an end, the way to satisfy his greed and thirst for power.

The results of his works is racial tuberculosis of the nation.

And this has the following consequences: purely emotional antisemitism finds its final expression in the form of pogroms. Rational antisemitism, by contrast, must lead to a systematic and legal struggle against, and eradication of, the privileges the Jews enjoy over the other foreigners living among us (Alien Laws). Its final objective, however, must be the total removal of all Jews from our midst. Both objectives can only be achieved by a government of national strength and not one of national impotence.

The German Republic owes its birth not the united national will of our people, but to the underhand exploitation of a series of circumstances that, taken together, express themselves in a deep, universal dissatisfaction. These circumstances, however, arose independently of the political structure and are at work even today. Indeed, more so than ever before. Hence, a large part of our people recognizes that changing the structure of the state cannot in itself improve our position, but that this can only be achieved by the rebirth of the nation's moral and spiritual forces.

And this rebirth cannot be prepared by the leadership of an irresponsibly majority influence by party dogmas or by the internationalist catch-phrases and slogans of an irresponsible press, but only by determined acts on the part of nationally minded leadership with an inner sense of responsibility.

This very fact serves to deprive the Republic of the inner support of the spiritual forces any nation needs very badly. Hence the present leaders of the nation are forced to seek support from those who alone have benefited and continue to benefit from changing the form of the German state, and who for that very reason become the driving force of the Revolution -- the Jews. Disregarding the Jewish threat, which is undoubtedly recognized even by today's leaders (as various statement from prominent personalities reveal), these men are forced to accept Jewish favors to their private advantage and to repay these favors. And the repayment does not merely involve satisfying every possible Jewish demand, but above all preventing the struggle of the betrayed people against its defrauders, by sabotaging the antisemitic movement.



Yours truly,
Adolf Hitler


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Adolf Hitler: Letter to President Roosevelt on Invasion of Czechoslovakia.


Telegram
BERLIN, September 27, 1938

To His Excellency the President of the United States of America, Mr. Franklin Roosevelt, Washington.

In your telegram received by me on September 26 Your Excellency addressed an appeal to me in the name of the American people, in the interest of the maintenance of peace, not to break off negotiations in the dispute which has arisen in Europe, and to strive for a peaceful, honorable, and constructive settlement of this question. Be assured that I can fully appreciate the lofty intention on which your remarks are based and that I share in every respect your opinion regarding the unforeseeable consequences of a European war. Precisely for this reason, however, I can and must decline all responsibility of the German people and their leaders, if the further development, contrary to all my efforts up to the present, should actually lead to the outbreak of hostilities.

In order to arrive at a fair judgment regarding the Sudeten German problem under discussion, it is indispensable to consider the incidents in which, in the last analysis, the origin of this problem and its dangers had its cause. In 1918 the German people laid down their arms in the firm conviction that, by the conclusion of peace with their enemies at that time, those principles and ideals would be realized which had been solemnly announced by President Wilson, and just as solemnly accepted as binding by all the belligerent Powers. Never in history has the confidence of a people been more shamefully betrayed than was then. The peace conditions imposed on the conquered nations by the treaties concluded in the faubourgs of Paris have fulfilled none of the promises given. Rather they have created in Europe a political regime which made of the conquered nations' world pariahs without rights, and which must have been recognized in advance by every discerning person as untenable.

One of the points in which the character of the dictates of 1919 was most clearly revealed was the founding of the Czechoslovak State and the establishment of its frontiers without any consideration for history or nationality. The Sudetenland was also included therein, although this area had always been German and although its inhabitants, after the destruction of the Hapsburg Monarchy, had unanimously declared their desire for Anschluss to the German Reich. Thus the right of self-determination, which had been proclaimed by President Wilson as the most important basis of national life, was simply denied to the Sudeten Germans.

But that was not enough. In the treaties of 1919 certain obligations with regard to the German people, which according to the text were far reaching, were imposed on the Czechoslovak State. These obligations too were disregarded from the first. The League of Nations has completely failed in the task assigned to it of guaranteeing the fulfillment of these obligations. Since then the Sudetenland has been engaged in the severest struggle for the maintenance of its German character.

It was a natural and inevitable development that, after the recovery of strength of the German Reich and after the reunion of Austria with it, the desire of the Sudeten Germans for preservation of their culture and for closer union with Germany increased. Despite the loyal attitude of the Sudeten German Party and its leaders, differences with the Czechs became ever stronger. From day to day it became more evident that the Government in Prague was not disposed seriously to consider the most elementary rights of the Sudeten Germans. On the contrary, they attempted by increasingly violent methods to enforce the Czechization of the Sudetenland. It was inevitable that this procedure should lead to ever greater and more serious tension.

The German Government at first did not intervene in any way in this development and maintained its calm restraint even when, in May of this year, the Czechoslovak Government proceeded to a mobilization of their army, under the purely fictitious pretext of German troop concentrations. The renunciation of military counter-measures in Germany at that time, however, only served to strengthen the uncompromising attitude of the Prague Government. This was clearly shown by the course of the negotiations for a peaceful settlement of the Sudeten German Party with the Government. These negotiations produced the conclusive proof that the Czechoslovak Government was far removed from treating the Sudeten German problem in a fundamental manner and bringing about an equitable solution.

Consequently, conditions in the Czechoslovak State, as is generally known, have in the last few weeks become completely intolerable. Political persecution and economic oppression have plunged the Sudeten Germans into untold misery. To characterize these circumstances it will suffice to refer to the following:

We reckon at present 214,000 Sudeten German refugees who had to leave house and home in their ancestral country and flee across the German frontier, because they saw in this the last and only possibility of escaping from the revolting Czech regime of force and bloodiest terror. Countless dead, thousands of wounded, tens of thousands of people detained and imprisoned, and deserted villages, are the accusing witnesses before world opinion of an outbreak of hostilities, and as you in your telegram rightly fear, carried out for a long time by the Prague Government, to say nothing of German economic life in the Sudeten German territory systematically destroyed by the Czech Government for 20 years, and which already shows all the signs of ruin which you anticipate as the consequence of an outbreak of war.

These are the facts which compelled me in my Nuremberg speech of September 13 to state before the whole world that the deprivation of rights of 3 1/2 million Germans in Czechoslovakia must cease, and that these people, if they cannot find justice and help by themselves, must receive both from the German Reich. However, to make a last attempt to reach the goal by peaceful means, I made concrete proposals for the solution of the problem in a memorandum delivered to the British Prime Minister on September 23, which in the meantime has been made public. Since the Czechoslovak Government had previously declared to the British and French Governments that they were already agreed that the Sudeten German settlement area should be separated from the Czechoslovak State and joined to the German Reich, the proposals of the German memorandum aim at nothing else than to bring about a prompt, sure, and equitable fulfillment of that Czechoslovak promise.

It is my conviction that you, Mr. President, when you realize the whole development of the Sudeten German problem from its inception to the present day, will recognize that the German Government have truly not been lacking either in patience or in a sincere desire for a peaceful understanding. It is not Germany who is to blame for the fact that there is a Sudeten German problem at all and that the present untenable conditions have arisen from it. The terrible fate of the people affected by the problem no longer admits of a further postponement of its solution. The possibilities of arriving at a just settlement by agreement are therefore exhausted with the proposals of the German memorandum. It now rests, not with the German Government, but with the Czechoslovak Government alone, to decide if they want peace or war.

ADOLF HITLER

Sources: "Documents on German Foreign Policy," series D, vol. II, pp. 960-962; Yad Vashem
 
To Hell with Hitler
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In 1940, a year after fleeing Nazi Germany and setting up home in New York, the writer of the following letter attempted to enlist with the U.S. Armed Forces; however, his application was denied for one incredible reason: his uncle was Adolf Hitler. He wasn't deterred, and two years later, a few months after his uncle had declared war on the U.S., William Patrick Hitler (pictured above) tried again to register for military service by way of the fascinating letter below, sent directly to the U.S. President. It was quickly passed on to the FBI's director, J. Edgar Hoover, who then investigated Hitler's nephew and eventually cleared him for service.

William Patrick Hitler joined the U.S. Navy in 1944, and was discharged in 1947 after being injured in service. He passed away 40 years later, in New York.

(Source: War Letters; Image: William Patrick Hitler, via.)



March 3rd, 1942.
His Excellency Franklin D. Roosevelt.,
President of the United States of America.
The White House.,
Washington. D.C.


Dear Mr. President:

May I take the liberty of encroaching on your valuable time and that of your staff at the White House? Mindful of the critical days the nation is now passing through, I do so only because the prerogative of your high office alone can decide my difficult and singular situation.

Permit me to outline as briefly as possible the circumstances of my position, the solution of which I feel could so easily be achieved should you feel moved to give your kind intercession and decision.

I am the nephew and only descendant of the ill-famed Chancellor and Leader of Germany who today so despotically seeks to enslave the free and Christian peoples of the globe.

Under your masterful leadership men of all creeds and nationalities are waging desperate war to determine, in the last analysis, whether they shall finally serve and live an ethical society under God or become enslaved by a devilish and pagan regime.

Everybody in the world today must answer to himself which cause they will serve. To free people of deep religious feeling there can be but one answer and one choice, that will sustain them always and to the bitter end.

I am one of many, but I can render service to this great cause and I have a life to give that it may, with the help of all, triumph in the end.

All my relatives and friends soon will be marching for freedom and decency under the Stars and Stripes. For this reason, Mr. President, I am respectfully submitting this petition to you to enquire as to whether I may be allowed to join them in their struggle against tyranny and oppression?

At present this is denied me because when I fled the Reich in 1939 I was a British subject. I came to America with my Irish mother principally to rejoin my relatives here. At the same time I was offered a contract to write and lecture in the United States, the pressure of which did not allow me the time to apply for admission under the quota. I had therefore, to come as a visitor.

I have attempted to join the British forces, but my success as a lecturer made me probably one of the best attended political speakers, with police frequently having to control the crowds clamouring for admission in Boston, Chicago and other cities. This elicited from British officials the rather negative invitation to carry on.

The British are an insular people and while they are kind and courteous, it is my impression, rightly or wrongly, that they could not in the long run feel overly cordial or sympathetic towards an individual bearing the name I do. The great expense the English legal procedure demands in changing my name, is only a possible solution not within my financial means. At the same time I have not been successful in determining whether the Canadian Army would facilitate my entrance into the armed forces. As things are at the present and lacking any official guidance, I find that to attempt to enlist as a nephew of Hitler is something that requires a strange sort of courage that I am unable to muster, bereft as I am of any classification or official support from any quarter.

As to my integrity, Mr. President, I can only say that it is a matter of record and it compares somewhat to the foresighted spirit with which you, by every ingenuity known to statecraft, wrested from the American Congress those weapons which are today the Nation's great defense in this crisis. I can also reflect that in a time of great complacency and ignorance I tried to do those things which as a Christian I knew to be right. As a fugitive from the Gestapo I warned France through the press that Hitler would invade her that year. The people of England I warned by the same means that the so-called "solution" of Munich was a myth that would bring terrible consequences. On my arrival in America I at once informed the press that Hitler would loose his Frankenstein on civilization that year. Although nobody paid any attention to what I said, I continued to lecture and write in America. Now the time for writing and talking has passed and I am mindful only of the great debt my mother and I owe to the United States. More than anything else I would like to see active combat as soon as possible and thereby be accepted by my friends and comrades as one of them in this great struggle for liberty.

Your favorable decision on my appeal alone would ensure that continued benevolent spirit on the part of the American people, which today I feel so much a part of. I most respectfully assure you, Mr. President, that as in the past I would do my utmost in the future to be worthy of the great honour I am seeking through your kind aid, in the sure knowledge that my endeavors on behalf of the great principles of Democracy will at least bear favourable comparison to the activities of many individuals who for so long have been unworthy of the fine privilege of calling themselves Americans. May I therefore venture to hope, Mr. President, that in the turmoil of this vast conflict you will not be moved to reject my appeal for reasons which I am in no way responsible?

For me today there could be no greater honour, Mr. President, to have lived and to have been allowed to serve you, the deliverer of the American people from want, and no greater privelege then to have striven and had a small part in establishing the title you once will bear in posterity as the greatest Emancipator of suffering mankind in political history.

I would be most happy to give any additional information that might be required and I take the liberty of enclosing a circular containing details about myself.

Permit me, Mr. President, to express my heartfelt good wishes for your future health and happiness, coupled with the hope that you may soon lead all men who believe in decencey everywhere onward and upward to a glorious victory.

I am,
Very respectfully yours,
Patrick Hitler


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- First World War Letters From Women of Dulmial Village, Pakistan

Recently I came across some archived WW1 letters written between the women of Dulmial Village, Punjab, Pakistan and Mrs Eva Mary Bell, the widow of Colonel George Henry Bell, who died during the First World War. These unique letters show the sadness of The Great War from a woman’s prospective.

Below are some of the transcripts.


14th December 1918

To Mrs Eva Mary Bell,

We the women of Dulmial, have assembled here to thank you very tenderly and heartily for visiting our village and to congratulate you from the bottom of our hearts for the success in this world wide war. It is important to state that we the inhabitants of Dulmial bear a special affection with our kind Government, which is quite clear from the political and war services which our brave sons and husbands have rendered now and then, from the Honorable East Indian Company up to the time.

Several people of the village had offered their services in the Mutiny of 1857 and had sacrificed their lives for the interests of the Government. In 1877 and in the following years, there was not a single fight of the North West Frontier or Punjab etc in which our brave Awam didn’t take an active part.

On commencement of this war the passion which our brave sons felt against the enemy, can only be imagined or well estimated from the splendid services they have rendered during the war. As soon as the war began, our beloved sons and husbands who were already in the Army went over to France and Flanders to fight this enemy and to show faithfulness to the Government. And those who were at home lost no time in offering themselves as recruits and thus won the honor of being the most obedient and faithful servants of the Government, as is often said by the Commissioner of Rawalpindi Division and by other higher officers in different speeches. Our pensioners offered services once again and served the Government in one way or another. Others in the village who through some natural defect unable to be admitted to the Army, spent their time in recruiting.

Our many brave sons have sacrificed their lives and have thus earned the honor of being admitted in the list of Indian heroes which shall remain printed on everyone’s heart as long as the world will last.

We are exceedingly glad that the energetic efforts, hardships and devotion of our sons have bought fruit at last and have ended in a splendid victory. In the end, most humbly request you to be good enough to forward our prayers, congratulations and the gift of the splendid services of our brave sons to the King-Emperor, The Viceroy and respected Officers, Deputy Commissioner, Pind Dadan Khan. We all pray to Almighty God that this kind shadow remain forever over our heads.

God save the King.

From The Women of Dulmial, Punjab

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28th December 1918

To The Women of Dulmial,

I am touched beyond words by your beautiful message. You, like myself have known sacrifice and sorrow, victory and honors, while husbands and sons fought in this Great terrible War. That is a bond between you and English women which will last till death and beyond. I know full well the heroic, loyal and enthusiastic service of your soldiers, who have been comrades in arms of my countrymen. They have won splendid names for their country, their regiments and themselves. Of the fallen we shall think always with gratitude and respect, to the wounded we owe a debt only to be repaid by giving the ‘Izzat’ (Respect) and ‘Aram’ (Comfort).

I shall give a copy of your letter to Col. Johnston who will keep it forever in the Indian War Memorial at Delhi. Here your sons will read it and so will all the British officers and soldiers.

But your own letter I will keep for myself, forever and cherish it in my home in England. I wish I could have seen you in Dulmial. I looked at your village and thought of you in my heart. I know the pain of mothers who lose their dear sons and of wives who lose their husbands. I ask the brave soldier of his consolation, give rest of the wounded and the mourners.

I ask you to give peace to each other and to enable the soldiers to enjoy victory in peaceful homes.

I will bring all you have said to the notice of the Commissioner.

From Your Sincere Friend,

Eva Mary Bell.


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7th January 1919

To Mrs Eva Mary Bell,

In acknowledging the receipt of your kind and sympathetic letter, we all the women of Dulmial cannot find words by which we can express the entire pleasure given to us by your kind letter. At the same time we are extremely sorry for having failed to make an interview with a respectable and sympathetic person like you, in spite of your presence so close to us in this district.

We fail to find words in which to express our heartfelt thanks for your sympathy and kind advice and for the promise you have so kindly made to forward our letter to the higher authorities. You have made so entire possession upon our hearts by your sympathetic and respectable treatment that it would not be forgotten by many families to come.

We truly feel sincerely and partake with your personal suffering but at the same time satisfied with the idea that you have also shared in the welfare of the country, King and nation by being dispossessed of your most valuable property similar to ours whose names we believe shall ever remain illuminated upon the skies till the day of resurrection.

We request you kindly to tender our best and sympathetic Salaam to the women in England and the Allied countries who have shared the brotherly and humane treatment of our Indian braves both upon the field and the hospitals in and outside India and we must not forget that they have now practically proved the natural link of female sisterhood in the world wide.

We now pray to God for the eternal continuance of the newly erected link of love between Indian and English nations and that this seed of unity might produce permanent fruits till the world exists. We further pray to God that England does not forget truthfulness and sympathy to their subjects and that Indians do not forget faithful martyrdom for their King and hope this will continue ever and ever.

From Women of Dulmial.
 
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Life unworthy of life

July 1933 : Adolf Hitler passes the Law for the Prevention of Hereditarily Diseased Offspring, in turn enforcing the compulsory sterilisation of any citizen with a "genetic defect." Defects include schizophrenia, deafness and even chronic alcoholism. In the coming years, approximately 400,000 sterilisations will be carried out.

May 1939: Hitler — as per a request from the boy's father — agrees to authorise the killing of Gerhard Kretschmar, a child born blind and with limbs missing. After the 5-month-old child's death in July, Hitler quickly initiates a Children's Euthanasia program and upwards of 5,000 youngsters are killed due to "defects."

October 1939: Hitler signs the following memo, backdated to September, and the euthanasia program becomes official. Now named Action T4, the program no longer discriminates with regards to age and all persons, young and old, can now be killed should they be "unworthy of life." As noted in the memo, Karl Brandt and Philipp Bouhler are handed the reigns and over the next few years will oversee the murder of approximately 200,000 people. Action T4's need to kill humans in such vast numbers will also result in the introduction of "death by gas" to the Nazi regime.

Transcript and translation follow.

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Source

Transcript

BERLIN, DEN 1.Sept.1939.

Reichsleiter Bouhler und

Dr. med. Brandt

sind unter Verantwortung beauftragt, die Befugnisse namentlich zu bestimmender Ärzte so zu erweitern, dass nach menschlichen Ermessen unheilbar Kranken bei kritischster Beurteilung ihres Krankheitszustandes der Gnadentod gewährt werden kann.

(Signed, A. Hitler)


Translation

BERLIN, 1.Sept.1939.

Reichsleiter Bouhler and

Dr. med. Brandt

are instructed to broaden the powers of physicians designated by name, who will decide whether those who have - as far as can be humanly determined - incurable illnesses can, after the most careful evaluation, be granted a mercy death.

(Signed, A. Hitler)

______________________________________________________________

This issue transcends all others

2 years prior to Hitler's rise to power in 1933, Germany was chosen as host of the 1936 Olympic Games. As the games approached and Hitler's regime shocked the world, the air was filled with rumours of boycott, both from individual athletes and entire governments. Walter White, then executive secretary of the NAACP, wrote a letter to Jesse Owens upon hearing of the athlete's intentions to attend and compete at the event, in an effort to persuade him otherwise. Owens, desperate to compete for his country in spite of its hypocritical stance regarding Hitler's policies, ignored all calls to boycott the games and went to Berlin. He won four gold medals.


Transcript follows.

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Source

Transcript

NATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF COLORED PEOPLE
69 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK
TELEPHONE ALGONQUIN 4 3551

Official Organ: The Crisis

December 4th 1935

My dear Mr. Owens:

Will you permit me to say that it was with deep regret that I read in the New York press today a statement attributed to you saying that you would participate in the 1936 Olympic games even if they are held in Germany under the Hitler regime. I trust you will not think me unduly officious in expressing the hope that this report is erroneous.

I fully realize how great a sacrifice it will be for you to give up the trip to Europe and to forgo the acclaim which your athletic prowess will unquestionably bring you. I realize equally well how hypocritical it is for certain Americans to point the finger of scorn at any other country for racial or other kind of bigotry.

On the other hand, it is my firm conviction that the issue of participation in the 1936 Olympics, if held in Germany under the present regime, transcends all other issues. Participation by American athletes, and especially those of our own race which has suffered more than any other from American race hatred, would, I firmly believe, do irreparable harm. I take the liberty of sending you a copy of the remarks which I made at a meeting here in New York, at Mecca Temple, last evening. This sorry world of ours is apparently becoming in a fumbling way to realize what prejudice against any minority group does not only to other minorities but to the group which is in power. The very preeminence of American Negro athletes gives them an unparalleled opportunity to strike a blow at racial bigotry and to make other minority groups conscious of the sameness of their problems with ours and puts them under the moral obligation to think more clearly and to fight more vigorously against the wrongs from which we Negroes suffer.

But the moral issue involved is, in my opinion, far greater than immediate or future benefit to the Negro as a race. If the Hitlers and the Mussolinis of the world are successful it is inevitable that dictatorships based upon prejudice will spread throughout the world, as indeed they are now spreading. Defeat of dictators before they become too firmly entrenched would, on the other hand, deter nations which through fear or other unworthy emotions are tending towards dictatorships. Let me make this quite concrete. Anti-Semitic, anti-Catholic and anti-Negro prejudices are growing alarmingly throughout the United States. Should efforts towards recovery fail, there is no telling where America will go. There are some people who believe that a proletarian dictatorship will come. I do not believe this will happen and the course of history clearly indicates that it is not likely to happen. Instead, it is more probable that we would have a fascist dictatorship.

It is also historically true that such reactionary dictatorships pick out the most vulnerable group as its first victims. In the United States it would be the Negro who would be the chief and first sufferer, just as the Jews have been made the scapegoats of Hitlerism in Nazi Germany. Sinclair Lewis, in his last novel, IT CAN'T HAPPEN HERE, has written what seems to me to be a very sound picture of what may happen.

I have written at greater length than I had intended at the outset. I hope, however, that you will not take offense at my writing you thus frankly with the hope that you will take the high stand that we should rise above personal benefit and help strike a blow at intolerance. I am sure that your stand will be applauded by many people in all parts of the world, as your participation under the present situation in Germany would alienate many high-minded people who are awakening to the dangers of intolerance wherever it raises its head.

Ever sincerely,

Secretary.

Mr. Jesse Owens
Ohio State University
Columbus,
Ohio.

WW:CTF

____________________________________________________________



Yours Faithfully, Adolf Hitler


In September of 1931, a young British journalist working for the Berlin office of the Daily Express invited the most unlikely of figures to contribute to a forthcoming feature in the newspaper. The feature in question was to be a series of articles relating to the current financial crisis in Britain, each written by a foreign 'celebrity', and Sefton Delmer - the 27-year-old bilingual journalist - attempted to recruit Adolf Hitler. Despite having already met Delmer on a number of occasions, the future Führer declined by way of the courteous letter seen below.


Transcripts in German and English follow. Enormous thanks to Sam Dodgin for supplying the translation.

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Source


Transcript



ADOLF HITLER
KANZLEI:
MÜNCHEN 2, BRIENNERSTR. 45
FERNSPRECHER 56 0 65-67

MÜNCHEN, DEN 30. Sept. 1931.

H/W.

Sehr geehrter Herr Delmer!

So ehrend für mich Ihre liebenswürdige Aufforderung ist, meine Ansichten über die derzeitige Krise in England mitzuteilen, so gross sind aber auch meine Bedenken, mich einer solchen Aufgabe zu unterziehen. Ich fürchte, dass vielleicht ein Teil des englischen Publikums es als anmaßlich empfinden würde, wenn ich als Deutscher Auffassungen in einer englischen Zeitung vertrete, die nach meinem besten Wissen und Gewissen nichts anderes sein könnten, als eine Kritik politischer Maßnahmen und Vorgänge, die bisher leider auch von einem grossen Teil des englischen Volkes sicherlich als richtig angesehen worden sind. Ich hoffe ja allerdings, dass gerade aus dieser Krise heraus in England die Geneigtheit wachsen wird, aus eigenem Ermessen die letzten zwölf Jahre einer Nachprüfung zu unterziehen. Ich würde glücklich sein, wenn sich daraus eine Überwindung jener unseligen Kriegspsychose in solchem Umfange ergeben könnte, dass die von mir und meiner Bewegung ersehnte Anbahnung eines wirklich herzlichen Verhältnisses zwischen dem englischen und deutschen Volk endlich Wirklichkeit würde. Denn ich glaube, dass die nunmehr hereinbrechende Krise überhaupt nur durch ein engstes politisches Zusammenarbeiten jener Nationen gelöst werden kann, die in der Wiederaufrichtung eines natürlichen europäischen Gleichgewichtes die erste Voraussetzung zur Beschäftigung mit jenen grossen Weltfragen sehen, unter denen auch England heute leidet.

Ich bitte daher nochmals, von dem mich so ehrenden Ersuchen absehen zu wollen und ich verbleibe

Ihr sehr ergebener

(Signed)



Herrn D. Sefton Delmer
Berliner Büro des Daily Express
Berlin W 10, Viktoriastr.11.

Translated Transcript

Dear Herr Delmer!

Your kind request to publish my views on the current crisis in England was an honour for me, matched only by my reservations about undertaking such a request. I fear that perhaps a section of the English public would consider it presumptuous if I, as a German, presented views in an English newspaper, which could, to the best of my knowledge and conscience, be nothing other than a critique of political methods and traditions, which have certainly been seen hitherto as right by a greater part of the English people. I do certainly hope that out of this crisis the inclination will arise to view the last 12 years as a test, as in my own estimation. I would be happy if from this an overcoming of that wretched wartime mentality could to some extent be achieved, so that the development of a warm relationship between the German and English peoples that my movement longs for would finally be a reality. I believe that the currently occurring crisis can only be resolved through close political co-operation of those nations, which see a natural European balance as a prerequisite to giving fresh heart to the consideration of those worldwide issues, under which England suffers with the rest of us.

I again wish you to accept my declination of your honourable request and I remain

Yours Faithfully

(Signed)

____________________________________________________________

The price for ridding society of bad is always high

In June of 1945, this striking letter arrived at the home of 3-year-old Dennis Helms in Washington, written on a sheet of Adolf Hitler's letterhead. It had been penned by his father, Lt. Richard Helms, an intelligence operative with the OSS who, following Germany's surrender the month before, had managed to acquire some of the recently-deceased Nazi leader's stationery from the Reich Chancellery. He then wrote to his son.

Richard Helms later became Director of the CIA. His letter to Dennis now resides in their museum.

(This letter, and many other fascinating pieces of correspondence, can be found in the bestselling book, More Letters of Note. For more info, visit Books of Note.)

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Transcript

OBERSALZBERG, DEN V-E day

ADOLF HITLER

Dear Dennis,

The man who might have written on this card once controlled Europe — three short years ago when you were born. Today he is dead, his memory despised, his country in ruins. He had a thirst for power, a low opinion of man as an individual, and a fear of intellectual honesty. He was a force for evil in the world. His passing, his defeat — a boon to mankind. But thousands died that it might be so. The price for ridding society of bad is always high.

Love, Daddy
______________________________________________________________________


Neo-Nazis, Syphilis, and World War III


In 1972, a far-reaching neo-Nazi organisation discreetly began to contact various high-profile authors in the U.S. with a view to enlisting their help; the plan being to covertly plant codewords into millions of science fiction novels and spread a secret message to certain sections of society. The message related to a new, deadly, and incurable strain of syphilis - deliberately unleashed on the country by enemies of the U.S. - that was currently sweeping the land at an incredible pace, its existence denied by the government. This was, in fact, the beginning of World War III.

The scene I just painted was lifted from the following two letters - intriguing letters to say the least - both of which were written by science fiction novelist Philip K. Dick in 1972 and sent, in all seriousness, to the FBI. Interestingly, within two years Dick began to experience the 'visions' he would later document in his book, Exegesis.

Transcripts follow.


Letter #1

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Letter #2
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Source


Transcripts

Letter #1

October 28, 1972

Federal Bureau of Investigation
Washington, D.C.

Gentlemen:

I am a well-known author of science fiction novels, one of which dealt with Nazi Germany (called MAN IN THE HIGH CASTLE, it described an "alternate world" in which the Germans and Japanese won World War Two and jointly occupied the United States). This novel, published in 1962 by Putnam & Co., won the Hugo Award for Best Novel of the Year and hence was widely read both here and abroad; for example, a Japanese edition printed in Tokio ran into several editions. I bring this to your attention because several months ago I was approached by an individual who I have reason to believe belonged to a covert organization involving politics, illegal weapons, etc., who put great pressure on me to place coded information in future novels "to be read by the right people here and there," as he phrased it. I refused to do this.

The reason why I am contacting you about this now is that it now appears that other science fiction writers may have been so approached by other members of this obviously anti-American organization and may have yielded to the threats and deceitful statements such as were used on me. Therefore I would like to give you any and all information and help I can regarding this, and I ask that your nearest office contact me as soon as possible. I stress the urgency of this because within the last three days I have come across a well-distributed science fiction novel which contains in essence the vital material which this individual confronted me with as the basis for encoding. That novel is CAMP CONCENTRATION by Thomas Disch, which was published by Doubleday & Co.

Cordially,

Philip K. Dick
3028 Quartz Lane Apt. #2
Fullerton,
Calif 92361.

P.S. I would like to add: what alarms me most is that this covert organization which approached me may be Neo-Nazi, although it did not identify itself as being such. My novels are extremely anti-Nazi. I heard only one code identification by this individual: Solarcon-6.


Letter #2

November 4, 1972

Inspector Shine
Marin County Sheriff's Office,
Marin County Civic Center,
San Rafael,
Calif 94903.

Dear Inspector Shine :

As you may recall, on or about November 17, 1971, my house at 707 Hacienda Way, Santa Venetia, was extensively robbed. The last time I talked to you, during February of this year, you informed me that you had broken the case; a man named Wade (Jerry Wade I believe) had been arrested with the Ruger .22 pistol of mine stolen during this robbery. I have been in Canada and now in Southern California and hence out of touch. Have any more of my possessions been recovered? Have there been any more arrests made? Do you have anything more you can tell me at this date?

While I was in Canada evidently my house was robbed again, during March of this year. I did not know this until what remained of my things arrived down here; my realtor, Mrs. Annie Reagan, had stored them, and at least one entire room of stuff is missing: the bedroom in which the control system of the burglar alarm was located, the one room not covered by the scanner. Obviously it was robbed by someone who intimately knew the layout of the alarm system and how to bypass it. I recall that Inspector Bridges thought that the November 17 robbery was an inside job, at least in part. I believe that this later robbery in March of this year proves it. Only two or three persons that I can recall knew the layout of the burglar alarm system. One was Harold Kinchen, who was under investigation by Airforce Intelligence at Hamilton Field at the time I left (Mr. Richard Bader was conducting the investigation; through Sergeant Keaton of Tiberon he asked me to come in and give testimony. It had to do with an attempt on the arsenal of the Airforce Intelligence people at Hamilton on I recall January first of this year). I have more reason to believe now than I did then that Kinchen and the secret extralegal organization to which he belonged were involved in both robberies of my house, although evidence seemed to point more toward Panthers such as Wade. I say this because this is Orange County where I live now, and I have come to know something about the rightwing paramilitary Minutemen illegal people here -- they tell me confidentially that from my description of events surrounding the November robbery of my house, the methods used, the activities of Harry Kinchen in particular, it sounds to them like their counterparts up there, and possibly even a neo-Nazi group. Recently I've obtained, by accident, new information about Kinchen's associates, and the neo-Nazi organization theory does seem reinforced. In this case, the November robbery was political in nature and more than a robbery. I have thought this for some time, but until now had less reason to be sure.

As to the motive of the assault I'm not sure at all. Possibly it had to do with my published novels, one of which dealt with Nazi Germany -- it was extremely anti-Nazi, and widely circulated. I know for a fact that Harry Kinchen and the Japanese relatives he had through his wife Susan had read it. Kinchen's Japanese-born mother-in-law, Mrs. Toni Adams, had read the novel in the Japanese edition. Beyond any doubt, Kinchen is an ardent Nazi trained in such skill as weapons-use, explosives, wire-tapping, chemistry, psychology, toxins and poisons, electronics, auto repair, sabotage, the manufacture of narcotics. Mr. Bader is of course aware of this. What I did not pass on to anyone, because I feared for my life, is the fact that Kinchen put coercive pressure, both physical and psychological, on me to put secret coded information into my future published writings, "to be read by the right people here and there," as he put it, meaning members of his subversive organization. As I told you in November, he accidently responded to a phonecall from me with a code signal. Later, he admitted belonging to a secret "worldwide" organization and told me some details.

The coded information which Kinchen wished placed in my novels (I of course refused, and fled to Canada) had to do with an alleged new strain of syphilis sweeping the U.S., kept topsecret by the U.S. authorities; it can't be cured, destroys the brain, and is swift-acting. The disease, Kinchen claimed, is being brought in deliberately from Asia by agents of the enemy (unspecified), and is in fact a weapon of World War Three, which has begun, being used against us.

In a recent confidential discussion which I had with my Paris editor, a close friend of mine, this editor ratified my conviction that to allow this coded "information," undoubtedly spurious, to get into print, would be a disaster for this country. These neo-nazis or whatever they are would "break" their own code and make public this phony information, thus creating mass hysteria and panic. There is, of course, no such new untreatable paresis, despite rumors we have been hearing from Servicemen returning from Viet Nam. I have contacted the F.B.I. on the advice of my editor-publisher friend, but I felt I should contact you, too. You may wish to pass this information about the coded information in novels onto Mr. Bader.

I will hope, then, to hear from you. Thank you.

Cordially,

Philip K. Dick
3028 Quartz Lane #3
Fullerton,
Calif 92361.

P.S. Harold Kinchen introduced me to only one individual, who asked me to write for his underground pornographic publications; I refused. By accident I recently learned that this man, "Doc" Stanley, of Corte Madera, "was a student of the speeches of Hitler during his college days at the University of Chicago, advocating their doctrines and reading them to people." Neither Stanley nor Kinchen mentioned this to me.
 
_____________________________________________________

Slaughterhouse Five


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In December of 1944, whilst behind enemy lines during the Rhineland Campaign, 22-year-old Private Kurt Vonnegut was captured by Wehrmacht troops and subsequently became a prisoner of war. A month later, Vonnegut and his fellow PoWs reached a Dresden work camp where they were imprisoned in an underground slaughterhouse known by German soldiers as "Schlachthof Fünf" (Slaughterhouse Five). The next month — February — the subterranean nature of the prison saved their lives during the highly controversial and devastating bombing of Dresden, the aftermath of which Vonnegut and the remaining survivors helped to clear up.

Below is an incredible letter he wrote to his family that May from a repatriation camp, in which he informs them of his capture and survival. 25 years later, in 1969, Vonnegut's stunning book, Slaughterhouse-Five, was released.

Transcript follows.


(This letter, along with 124 other fascinating pieces of correspondence, can be found in the bestselling book, Letters of Note. For more info, visit Books of Note.)

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Transcript

FROM:

Pfc. K. Vonnegut, Jr.,
12102964 U. S. Army.

TO:

Kurt Vonnegut,
Williams Creek,
Indianapolis, Indiana.

Dear people:

I'm told that you were probably never informed that I was anything other than "missing in action." Chances are that you also failed to receive any of the letters I wrote from Germany. That leaves me a lot of explaining to do -- in precis:

I've been a prisoner of war since December 19th, 1944, when our division was cut to ribbons by Hitler's last desperate thrust through Luxemburg and Belgium. Seven Fanatical Panzer Divisions hit us and cut us off from the rest of Hodges' First Army. The other American Divisions on our flanks managed to pull out: We were obliged to stay and fight. Bayonets aren't much good against tanks: Our ammunition, food and medical supplies gave out and our casualties out-numbered those who could still fight - so we gave up. The 106th got a Presidential Citation and some British Decoration from Montgomery for it, I'm told, but I'll be damned if it was worth it. I was one of the few who weren't wounded. For that much thank God.

Well, the supermen marched us, without food, water or sleep to Limberg, a distance of about sixty miles, I think, where we were loaded and locked up, sixty men to each small, unventilated, unheated box car. There were no sanitary accommodations -- the floors were covered with fresh cow dung. There wasn't room for all of us to lie down. Half slept while the other half stood. We spent several days, including Christmas, on that Limberg siding. On Christmas eve the Royal Air Force bombed and strafed our unmarked train. They killed about one-hundred-and-fifty of us. We got a little water Christmas Day and moved slowly across Germany to a large P.O.W. Camp in Muhlburg, South of Berlin. We were released from the box cars on New Year's Day. The Germans herded us through scalding delousing showers. Many men died from shock in the showers after ten days of starvation, thirst and exposure. But I didn't.

Under the Geneva Convention, Officers and Non-commissioned Officers are not obliged to work when taken prisoner. I am, as you know, a Private. One-hundred-and-fifty such minor beings were shipped to a Dresden work camp on January 10th. I was their leader by virtue of the little German I spoke. It was our misfortune to have sadistic and fanatical guards. We were refused medical attention and clothing: We were given long hours at extremely hard labor. Our food ration was two-hundred-and-fifty grams of black bread and one pint of unseasoned potato soup each day. After desperately trying to improve our situation for two months and having been met with bland smiles I told the guards just what I was going to do to them when the Russians came. They beat me up a little. I was fired as group leader. Beatings were very small time: -- one boy starved to death and the SS Troops shot two for stealing food.

On about February 14th the Americans came over, followed by the R.A.F. their combined labors killed 250,000 people in twenty-four hours and destroyed all of Dresden -- possibly the world's most beautiful city. But not me.

After that we were put to work carrying corpses from Air-Raid shelters; women, children, old men; dead from concussion, fire or suffocation. Civilians cursed us and threw rocks as we carried bodies to huge funeral pyres in the city.

When General Patton took Leipzig we were evacuated on foot to ('the Saxony-Czechoslovakian border'?). There we remained until the war ended. Our guards deserted us. On that happy day the Russians were intent on mopping up isolated outlaw resistance in our sector. Their planes (P-39's) strafed and bombed us, killing fourteen, but not me.

Eight of us stole a team and wagon. We traveled and looted our way through Sudetenland and Saxony for eight days, living like kings. The Russians are crazy about Americans. The Russians picked us up in Dresden. We rode from there to the American lines at Halle in Lend-Lease Ford trucks. We've since been flown to Le Havre.

I'm writing from a Red Cross Club in the Le Havre P.O.W. Repatriation Camp. I'm being wonderfully well feed and entertained. The state-bound ships are jammed, naturally, so I'll have to be patient. I hope to be home in a month. Once home I'll be given twenty-one days recuperation at Atterbury, about $600 back pay and -- get this -- sixty (60) days furlough.

I've too damned much to say, the rest will have to wait, I can't receive mail here so don't write.

May 29, 1945

Love,

Kurt - Jr.

__________________________________________________________________________

Did Nixon Even Read the CIA’s Daily Briefs?

Nixon’s Attention Focused on Kissinger’s Cover Memos That Packaged the PDB
Recently Declassified Kissinger Memos Include Nixon’s Handwritten Comments


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President Richard M. Nixon meeting with national security adviser Henry
A. Kissinger in the Oval Office, n.d. (Richard M. Nixon Presidential
Library, Photo collections, Master Print File with Staff Individuals)



Nixon, Kissinger, and the President’s Daily Brief


Washington D.C., September 14, 2016 - President Richard Nixon may never have even read the President’s Daily Briefs partially declassified and released by the CIA with great fanfare on August 24, 2016. The CIA’s claim that the PDBs were “the primary vehicle for summarizing the day-to-day sensitive intelligence and analysis … for the White House” is partly true, but Nixon’s prejudices against the Agency and the distinctive role of national security adviser Henry Kissinger suggest that his cover memos to the PDBs were far more important to the President than whatever the CIA had to say.

Kissinger served as Nixon’s de facto intelligence adviser and it was Kissinger, not the CIA, whom Nixon counted on to help him keep informed about global events. In part, Kissinger did this each day by sending Nixon a memorandum prepared at the White House Situation Room, to which the PDB was appended, that consisted of Kissinger’s take of what developments were important for Nixon to keep in mind.

As a contribution to the ongoing discussion about the role of the PDBs in the Nixon White House, the National Security Archive today publishes together for the first time the six Kissinger daily briefing memoranda from 1969 through 1973 that have been declassified so far.

Three of the cover memos demonstrate that Nixon reacted to some of Kissinger’s daily briefing memos by writing comments and questions on them. Some of the comments were critical, e.g., about Peruvian President Juan Velasco whom Nixon believed owed the U.S. “good deeds” in light of recent emergency aid for earthquake victims (see Document 2B). Or a reaction to an item about the slow response to North Korea’s capture of a South Korean “propaganda ship”: “Disgraceful!” An item from January 1972 included a denunciation of U.S. Air Force strategy in Southeast Asia, which Nixon deemed a “failure,” and a demand for a study of the problem, which Kissinger ignored (see Document 5A).

One of the Kissinger memos, from 14 December 1971, includes fascinating intelligence information concerning the 1971 India-Pakistan war. One item in the memo demonstrates that U.S. intelligence was able to interpret Soviet reconnaissance satellite activities – for example, whether the photographic intelligence satellites were directed at airfields and other installations in India and Pakistan. Another item in the memo is a detailed report of a recent meeting of Indira Gandhi’s cabinet about the pros and cons of accepting a cease-fire once a government was installed in Bangladesh. The CIA provided the information based on a source in Gandhi’s cabinet, confirming Seymour Hersh’s finding in The Price of Power that the CIA had a highly-placed mole in the Indian government.



That Nixon may not have read the PDBs was a point that CIA historian David Robarge made in his presentation at a recent Nixon Presidential Library conference. Presidents Kennedy and Johnson had been regular consumers of the CIA’s daily briefing paper; Kennedy in particular gave feedback to the Agency. The situation changed greatly, however, when Nixon became president. According to John Helgerson’s fascinating study, Getting to Know the President: Intelligence Briefings of Presidential Candidates, 1952-2004, CIA officials who worked at a special transition office in Manhattan soon learned from Kissinger, the newly appointed national security adviser, that “the president-elect had no intention of reading anything that had not at first been perused and perhaps summarized by one of his senior staff.” (p. 68).

During the transition, the CIA sent Nixon envelopes filled with PDBs and other reports, but they simply piled up. Nixon had not read them and his secretary soon returned them. Some of that probably reflected the new president’s animus toward the CIA; since his defeat in the 1960 presidential election he had believed the CIA had mishandled the “missile gap” by overestimating Soviet capabilities, which had worked to Kennedy’s advantage in the campaign. To tailor the PDBs to Nixon’s liking, CIA officials tried to get a sense of his preferences from his close advisers. Accordingly, the CIA double-spaced the text and put it on legal size paper (reflecting Nixon’s professional background). But the Agency never received feedback from the president; it would only come from Kissinger.

What is known is that for Nixon the “primary vehicle” for receiving intelligence information was Henry Kissinger, who essentially acted as the president’s chief intelligence officer. Consistent with what CIA officials had been told about Nixon’s working methods, every working day he would receive a memorandum from Kissinger, prepared by the White House Situation Room staff, to which was appended the PDB and sometimes other documents that Kissinger thought Nixon needed to see. Kissinger’s cover memo, usually around 3 or 4 pages long, summarized the events and developments that he believed Nixon would want to know about, including the most recent events not covered by the briefing material. Sometimes there was a connection between the information summarized in the cover memo and the PDBs, but sometime, it seems, there was little relationship between the two.

A March 1970 report to Kissinger by the RAND Corporation’s Andrew Marshall, then serving as a White House consultant, addressed the apparently ephemeral role of the PDB in President Nixon’s reading. Marshall explained how the Situation Room staff prepared the briefing memo for Kissinger’s signature, partly on the basis of contributions from Kissinger’s aides and the reproduction of items from various intelligence publications. According to Marshall, “the memorandum signed by you and prepared in the Situation Room is a success; it probably is the only part of the package which the President regularly reads. Indeed, judging from a survey of marginal jottings by the President, it may be the only piece he ever reads.” This raised various problems: did the one-third overlap between the PDB and the Situation room memo raise the risk that important intelligence might get overlooked? Or was the PDB a “wasted effort”? Wondering whether the PDB can “be saved or made useful,” Marshall raised questions about possible changes in the Situation Room product and the feedback process so that it would be even more useful to the President.


Nixon’s handwritten comments on the Kissinger briefing memorandum for 11 June 1970 [Document 3A]. Next to the item on “Hanoi Takes Tough Line,” Nixon wrote “K – They need another jolt.” Next to the item, “MAC [Military Armistice Commission] Meeting on Captured Korean Ship,” Nixon jotted: “Disgraceful! I want them to have procedures which will allow immediate response in such cases in the future.” (Document 3A, page 2)


So far only six of the Kissinger/Situation Room memos have been reviewed and declassified in their entirety; excerpts from a few can be found in the State Department’s historical series, Foreign Relations of the United States (For example, an excerpt from 1973. These six are a thimble full of water compared to a lake, because the complete record of the briefing memos and the attached PDBs and other materials consists of 61 archival boxes at the Nixon Presidential Library. That collection begins with documents dated 1 January 1969, three weeks before Nixon’s inauguration, and concludes with material dated 9 August 1974, the last day of Nixon’s presidency. Except for the six memos and the excerpts in FRUS, the entire collection remains classified, although it is slated to become a major declassification project at the Nixon Library during the next year. A partial list of the collection appears on the Nixon Library web site; for a complete inventory see Document 7. Only a declassification review of that material, with all of the attachments, will shed light on the intelligence items that Nixon read daily and whether he read the PDBs, with comments and questions, in the same way that he read Kissinger’s cover memos.

It is worth noting here that the briefing material that Nixon received from Kissinger every day was only one aspect of their working relationship. Every work day Kissinger met with Nixon to discuss ongoing developments and decisions. The times and places of the frequent meetings were recorded in the “Presidential Daily Diary.” Apparently Kissinger took handwritten notes during these meetings so he could follow up on Nixon’s instructions. If such notes still survive and ever become available to researchers, they will be an invaluable resource for tracing national security policy during the Nixon years. The same can be said about any diary material that Kissinger and Nixon prepared when they were in office.

Making this discussion of PDBs even possible was the series of actions and decisions that led to their release, first from the Kennedy-Johnson years, then the Nixon-Ford period. Included in the Kennedy-Johnson release were the three specific PDBs that the CIA had gone to the mat for when the National Security Archive sued the Agency, on behalf of Professor Larry Berman of the University of California Davis, for those documents. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against release on the grounds that disclosure could “reveal protected intelligence sources and methods.” Nevertheless, the Court gave an opening for future declassification by rejecting the CIA’s “attempt to create a per se status exemption for PDBs.” President Obama further undercut the CIA’s assertion that PDBs were impossible to declassify by asserting in Executive Order 13526 that “No information may be excluded from declassification … based solely on the type of document or record in which it is found. Rather, the classified information must be considered on the basis of its content.” What part the Obama administration may have played in impelling the Agency to declassify the PDBs remains to be learned, but members of the CIA’s Historical Advisory Committee, including Professors Robert Jervis and Melvyn P. Leffler, played a significant role by regularly pressing the CIA leadership to begin declassification review.


_________________________________________________________


CIA Cover-Up on Chile
Agency Tries to Hide Knowledge of 9/11/73 Coup Plotting
Dubious Secrets: Declassified Daily Briefs to Nixon Completely Censored, Despite Release of CIA and DIA Cables 16 Years Ago


Washington D.C. September 9, 2016 – Forty-three years after the U.S.-supported military coup in Chile, the Central Intelligence Agency continues to withhold information on what it knew about planning for the putsch, and what intelligence it shared with President Richard Nixon, according to redacted documents posted by the National Security Archive. The documents, among the hundreds of President’s Daily Briefs (PDBs) the CIA declassified, excise material that almost certainly has already been released to the public years ago. The section on Chile of the PDB dated September 11, 1973, for example, was completely censored, as was an entire page on Chile provided to Nixon on September 8, 1973, even though thousands of once-sensitive intelligence records from the coup period have already been declassified since at least 1999.

“The CIA is trying – but failing – to hold history hostage,” stated Peter Kornbluh, who directs the Archive’s Chile Documentation Project. By continuing to censor the historical record, he suggested, “the CIA is attempting to cover up what Nixon knew about coup plotting in Chile and when he knew it, as well as hiding the CIA’s own contacts and connections to the coup plotters.”


A September 10, 1973, cable from CIA operative Jack Devine distributed to top U.S. officials confirms the coup will take place the following day
 
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U.S., Britain Developed Plans to Disable or Destroy Middle Eastern Oil Facilities from Late 1940s to Early 1960s in Event of a Soviet Invasion


British Plans Envisioned Using Nuclear Weapons as an Option in Iran and Iraq, According to Declassified Documents

Regional Allies Were Apparently Never Informed Out of Concern for “Unfavorable” Consequences, Though Some U.S. Officials Thought Host Countries Would Approve the Plugging of Oil Wells.

Secret Oil Denial Policy Lasted at Least until the Kennedy Administration

Washington DC, June 23, 2016 – Recently discovered British documents posted by the National Security Archive provide a new and revealing account of the CIA’s role in a top-secret plan to ravage the Middle East oil industry. It’s been 67 years since President Harry Truman approved NSC 26/2 to keep the Soviet military from using Middle East petroleum if it invaded the region. This denial policy called for American and British oil companies in the Middle East to disable or destroy oil facilities and equipment, and plug the region’s oil wells. The policy evolved during Eisenhower’s presidency and lingered at least into the Kennedy administration.

Oil-well,-airplane-&-camel.-480.jpg

Modern and traditional modes of transportation posed together in front of an oil derrick
in the Persian Gulf. (Credit: DeGolyer Library, Southern Methodist University,
Robert Yarnall Richie Photograph Collection.)


Documents stashed at Britain’s National Archives show for the first time the CIA’s dominant role in turning the oil companies into a paramilitary force ready to execute the denial policy. (This posting’s author has written a separate article on these materials published today by Politico.) The intelligence agency’s oversight included inserting undercover operatives into oil-company jobs to spy on some of the companies. The CIA created – with an American oil company’s assistance – an ambitious denial plan for Saudi Arabia and exported similar plans to Kuwait, Bahrain and Qatar where Britain was the governing authority. The CIA also assisted British denial plans in Iran and Iraq.

British documents also reveal discussions about using nuclear weapons in Iran and Iraq. State-controlled refineries emerged in both countries and were not covered by existing denial plans which depended on cooperating oil companies. British military officials believed nuclear bombs were an option to destroy these facilities until a plan using ground demolitions with conventional explosives was possible.

The denial policy has grudgingly given up its secrets. NSC 26/2 was mistakenly declassified in 1985 by an archivist at the Truman Presidential Library which is part of the National Archives and Records Administration. A library official in a legal deposition deemed it the worst security breach in the National Archives’ history. A furious CIA demanded the archivist be fired, but he remained a library employee after losing his top-secret clearance. NSC 26/2 was reclassified top secret, but by this time Research Publications, a Connecticut company, had sent it along with other microfiched documents to libraries across the country. The microfiche weren’t recalled after a government decision – it’s not clear by whom – that it would arouse attention. NSC 26/2 became public in 1996 in a story by this writer and Charles Crumpley in The Kansas City Star.

The denial policy even today is partially cloaked by classification restrictions. But American and British documents now available allow the most complete account yet of the murky mix of the CIA, Big Oil and national security injected into the most oil-rich piece of real estate on earth. This account goes beyond revelations about the CIA and nuclear weapons to show a determined effort – replete with successes and setbacks – to organize the denial policy while keeping it secret from targeted countries such as Saudi Arabia, Iran and Iraq.



NSC 26/2 was replaced in 1953 by the Eisenhower administration with NSC 176, later renamed NSC 5401, which put more emphasis on plugging oil wells to “conserve” Middle East oil for later use by the West. But the policy still called for oil companies to disable or destroy facilities and equipment to stall the Soviets. Concerns about security leaks to host governments and the denial policy’s effectiveness forced a restructuring in 1957. The new policy, NSC 5714, dealt mainly with protection and conservation including well plugging and passive defenses for oil facilities against airstrikes and sabotage. This would be done by the oil companies in cooperation with Middle East governments. Plans for the companies to disable or destroy facilities and equipment were shelved. Instead, the military as a last resort would destroy them with “direct action” if they were about to be seized by the Soviets. The Kennedy administration in 1963 asked the State Department if NSC 5714 was still U.S. policy. A response is not in the file.

Duce-457.jpg

James Terry Duce, an Aramco executive integrally involved in the
oil denial planning. (Credit: DeGolyer Library, Southern Methodist
University, Robert Yarnall Richie Photograph Collection.)


Source note: The Ministry of Defence and British Foreign Office documents provided interesting details about the denial policy. But the Ministry of Fuel and Power, an ally of British oil companies, was an unexpectedly valuable source, especially about the CIA’s involvement. This government agency participated in meetings about the policy and routinely received relevant memoranda and other documents. Ministry of Fuel and Power files about the Middle East denial policy included POWE 33/1841 which is closed to the public, but POWE 33/1899 is open at Britain’s National Archives.

U.S. documents have some references to the CIA, but not with the detail found at the British archives. But National Security Council files do offer an increasingly insightful account of the overall denial policy. These documents are at the Harry S. Truman Presidential Library, Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library and the National Archives and Records Administration in College Park, Maryland.

* Steve Everly is a journalist formerly with the Kansas City Star. He first broke the story of Western oil denial plans in the Star in 1996, basing his reporting on documents discovered in U.S. archives. This posting also features British archival discoveries uncovered and donated by the author.

READ THE DOCUMENTS
The Foreign and Commonwealth Office documents in this collection are Crown copyright material and are published with the cooperation of the United Kingdom's National Archives. To meet the National Archive's concerns about unauthorized commercial reproduction of copyright material, the British documents are published with watermarks.


Document 1

National Security Council, NSC 26 report, “Removal and Demolition of Oil Facilities, Equipment and Supplies in the Middle East,” August 19, 1948, Top Secret

Source: Truman Presidential Library, President’s Secretary’s Files, Box 117

This report set the stage for the denial policy during what the CIA called an “atmosphere of emergency.” The Berlin Blockade crisis was two months old and a Soviet thrust into the Middle East seemed possible. The Joint Chiefs of Staff believed it unlikely the United States and its allies could stop the invasion, but a stop-gap measure could stall the Soviet military by denying it Middle East petroleum.

NSC 26 was a collaboration of the CIA, NSC, State Department and SANACC, also known as the State-Army-Navy-Air force Coordinating Committee. Most of the report’s recommendations found their way into the denial policy that landed on President Truman’s desk for approval in early 1949. American and British oil companies would provide the manpower and expertise to plan and execute the denial policy. Training company employees and stockpiling supplies including explosives in advance would ensure denial plans were ready to execute.

NSC 26 also singled out the issue that bedeviled the denial policy. Destroying a friendly country’s main industry could produce “unfavorable political and economic consequences” against the United States. This report grapples with what to tell Saudi Arabia, which at this stage was the only country the United States expected to be responsible for in the denial policy. It was of the “greatest importance” to tell King Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia or his government about the abandonment and demolition program to minimize these negative consequences. The U.S. secretary of state would disclose the denial policy’s existence at his discretion. But Saudi Arabia wasn’t told because of an expected negative reaction, and the State Department again in 1952 refused to disclose the denial policy because it could interfere with planned negotiations to form a military pact in the Middle East. In 1956, the State Department claimed conditions were still not right to tell Saudi Arabia.


Britain, which had responsibility for the policy elsewhere in the Middle East, also didn’t want to disclose the denial policy to host governments. But fears of a security leak haunted the denial policy. Anglo-Iranian Oil, later renamed British Petroleum, believed it would be subject to economic blackmail or worse if Iran’s government learned of the policy. Aramco, the Arabian American Oil Company, jointly owned by a number of American oil concerns, eventually believed that not consulting Saudi Arabia about the denial policy risked the company’s economic survival.

Document 2

National Security Council, (NSC 26/2) report, “Removal and Demolition of Oil Facilities, Equipment and Supplies in the Middle East,” December 30, 1948, Top Secret, with cover note for the President, January 6, 1949

Source: Truman Presidential Library, President’s Secretary’s Files, Box 118

President Harry Truman approved the Middle East denial policy on January 10, 1949. NSC 26/2 called for high-level conversations with Britain, a crucial step since Britain was the governing authority in Kuwait, Qatar and Bahrain, and British companies controlled Iran and Iraq’s oil industries. The military would help with U.S. denial plans when possible. In fact, a Marine task force was initially assigned, but it was pulled in 1950. Britain believed some troops were necessary to at least assist British oil companies in executing denial plans. But NSC 26/2 was basically conceived as a covert civilian operation. The State Department provided overall supervision and had already brought in the CIA to work with Aramco on the denial plan for Saudi Arabia. Aramco, owned by predecessor companies of Exxon, Chevron, Mobil and Texaco, controlled Saudi Arabia’s oil industry.

Saud-378.jpg

King Abdulaziz ibn Saud ruled Saudi Arabia from 1932 to 1953. It is
not known whether he was aware of the oil denial plans drawn up for
the Kingdom. (Credit: DeGolyer Library, Southern Methodist University,
Robert Yarnall Richie Photograph Collection.)

Much of this planning was about destroying or disabling oil facilities and equipment, but policymakers and oil companies struggled with how to best keep the Soviets from tapping Middle East oil wells. They initially thought plugging oil wells with cement would take one to two months, far longer than a Soviet attack would likely allow. NSC 26/2 ordered a study of radiological weapons, which would spread radioactivity without destroying the wells, to keep the Soviets out of the oil fields. The CIA later rejected their use since the Soviets would probably send Arabs deemed “expendable” to keep the wells flowing. Tweaking the ways to plug wells with cement eventually slashed the time to one to two weeks.

Document 3A

British Embassy, Memorandum summarizing discussions with U.S. officials on April 30 and May 1, 1951, in Washington, D.C., Top Secret


Document 3B

British Foreign Office, Memorandum, “Oil Denial: Record of Meeting Held in the State Department on 1st May 1951, with attachment about oil-denial priority target list

Source: British National Archives (Kew), POWE 33/1899

The approval of NSC 26/2 ignited efforts in 1949 to build denial plans, with the United States responsible for Saudi Arabia, and Britain for Iran and Iraq. These plans were refined in 1950, but by early 1951 the denial policy was in trouble. British officials had cancelled a meeting with the United States about the policy, a move ostensibly made to allow time for a study about defending the Middle East against a Soviet attack. But it was Anglo-Iranian Oil, worried about a security leak to Iran’s government, that wanted Britain out of the denial policy. An angry George McGhee, a U.S. assistant secretary of state, told a British Ministry of Fuel and Power official it was time for his government to make up its mind regardless of what Anglo-Iranian Oil thought. Britain relented and a few weeks later rejoined the denial policy.

These British documents include a summary of meetings and briefings with the United States on April 30 and May 1 in Washington, D.C. They show the British reaffirming their responsibility for denial plans in Iran and Iraq while the United States remained responsible for Saudi Arabia. In a concession, Britain tentatively agreed to the CIA developing denial plans for Kuwait, Qatar and Bahrain where a mix of American and British oil companies operated. But Britain, the governing authority in the three countries, would be responsible for ordering the plans executed in Kuwait and Qatar. Things were more complicated in Bahrain where two American oil companies controlled its oil industry. A decision was deferred about which country would trigger the denial plan for Bahrain although the summary shows Britain willing to give it to the United States.

American and British officials generally agreed on denial targets with refineries and petroleum stockpiles given top priority. The attached British priority target list is from “Project Neckpiece,” an early British denial plan hatched soon after NSC 26/2 was approved. But the British remained skeptical about plugging oil wells in Iran and Iraq. Both countries would be on the front line of a Soviet invasion which meant even less time to seal the wells. A suggestion by U.S. officials to ask Iran and Iraq to help with the well plugging was quickly rejected by the British. This suggestion reflected the view of some involved in the denial policy that Middle East governments might support well plugging since it would preserve their oil by preventing the Soviets from setting the wells on fire if forced to retreat. But reluctance to reveal any part of the denial policy remained a stumbling block.



Document 4

Minutes of briefing by CIA to British Embassy and military officials at U.S. State Department, May 1, 1951, Top Secret

Source: National Archives (Kew) POWE 33/1899

This CIA briefing played a key role in persuading the British to allow the intelligence agency to develop denial plans for Kuwait, Bahrain and Qatar. The briefing at the State Department, which occurred during two days of talks in Washington, featured CIA operative George Prussing, according to British minutes of the briefing. A British embassy official and military officer represented Britain. Prussing had been a safety director for Union Oil in California before World War II and worked with the federal Petroleum Administration during the war to protect West Coast refineries from sabotage. He went on to become a consultant to the Office of Policy Coordination, an agency later folded into the CIA, which was involved in sabotage missions in foreign countries. He became a full-time CIA employee in 1950.

Truman1-400.jpg

Walter Bedell Smith, director of CIA under President Harry Truman,
1950 to 1953. (Credit: Harry S. Truman Library & Museum.)

This dog-eared document is missing some words, but it reveals for the first time the scale and several details of the denial plan for Saudi Arabia. It relied on 45 senior Aramco managers and another 600 company employees. (The 200 employees figure in the document was later clarified to mean for each of Aramco’s three administrative districts in Saudi Arabia.) The number of employees involved was deemed sufficient to allow for successful execution of the denial plan even if some employees were absent. And to avoid a security leak of the denial plan, most Aramco employees were told only the part they would execute. The CIA also inserted five undercover operatives into Aramco jobs ranging from a storekeeper to assistant to the general manager. They would brief the intelligence agency about any developments affecting the denial plan.

The plan would unfold in three phases and deny Saudi Arabia’s petroleum to the Soviets for six months to a year. Prussing also provided an example of selective demolitions, a key feature of the Aramco plan to allow quick resumption of production after the Soviets were ousted. Alternators would be disabled by destroying their couplings and governors which controlled the flow of electricity. It was assumed the Soviets couldn’t replace these parts.

The CIA had imported military-grade explosives for the demolitions, but flame throwers would also be used to destroy supplies and small machinery. Thermite grenades, which produced high temperatures, would destroy oil stockpiles, vehicles, spare parts and tires. Prussing also discussed using “Oatis” plugs. He was probably referring to the Otis plug which was invented in the 1930s by Herbert Otis. After being inserted in an oil well, it could be opened or closed with a special tool. That promised a quicker method to seal the wells, but it was later dropped from consideration without explanation.

Prussing and a U.S. military official at the briefing also expressed their disappointment with British denial plans for Iran and Iraq because British oil companies weren’t involved. But they would soon conclude British officials had misled them.

Document 5A

Telegram from British Joint Staff Mission to Ministry of Defence, London, May 2, 1951, Top Secret Cypher Telegram

Document 5B

Telegram from British Joint Staff Mission to Ministry of Defence, London, May 2, 1951, Top Secret Cypher Telegram

Source: National Archives (Kew) POWE 33/1899

The CIA briefing’s impact quickly rippled to Britain’s Ministry of Defence in London in these two telegrams sent by the British Joint Staff Mission in Washington, a military group created during World War II to forge cooperation with the United States. The ministry was convinced troops were necessary to some degree for denial plans to succeed. At minimum, the British Army’s Royal Engineers were needed to help execute plans in Iran and Iraq. But now they were told that Aramco and the CIA had developed a “satisfactory modus operandi” that relied entirely on civilians and that the United States was anxious to use this approach in other Middle East oil fields. The plan was advanced with Aramco employees already being trained in Saudi Arabia’s oil fields. That made it difficult for Britain to argue it should develop denial plans for Kuwait, Qatar and Bahrain.

The telegrams also discuss some British duplicity that was becoming increasingly awkward, especially after American criticism of British denial plans for not having oil-company cooperation. Britain, when it returned to the denial policy after the McGhee ultimatum, told U.S. officials their denial plans in Iran and Iraq would not involve British oil companies. In fact, they were cooperating. But Sir Thomas Fraser, chairman of Anglo-Iranian Oil, would cooperate only if it was kept secret from the Americans. He thought an American oil company would try to gain a foothold in Iran by leaking his company’s participation. But keeping it a secret from the U.S. government was an unworkable arrangement, and the CIA and State Department were soon told the truth.


Document 6

CIA memorandum to Richard Funkhouser, Near Eastern Affairs, U.S Department of State, “Next Meeting with the British Group on Middle East Oil,” May 28, 1951, Top Secret

Source: National Archives (Kew) POWE 33/1899

This memorandum by Prussing to a State Department official – and apparently forwarded to the British Embassy in Washington – is a list of more than a dozen items to be discussed with the British at an upcoming meeting. The items for denial plans in Kuwait, Qatar and Bahrain included the British providing names of officials who would work with the CIA. Prussing also wanted names of oil-company employees who had passed background checks and were authorized to help with denial plans. A meeting – possibly in Rome – was needed to indoctrinate company executives about the denial policy. Prussing also expected a list of supplies – including explosives – for the denial plans and how they would be financed. (The United States covered most of the cost in Saudi Arabia but not without disputes. U.S. officials thought Aramco should help pay for the cement trucks needed for plugging oil wells since they could also be used in other company operations unrelated to the denial plan.)

Truman2-600.jpg

President Truman conferring the Order of the Legion of Merit Degree of Commander on eldest son of King
Ibn Saud, Prince Amir Saud, of Saudi Arabia (1947). (Credit: Harry S. Truman Library & Museum.)

A management structure was pushed which was modeled after the Aramco plan. An executive committee that included company executives was needed for each of the denial plans for Kuwait, Bahrain and Qatar. A manager would be in charge of denial planning in the field. Supervisors would be trained in using explosives who in turn would train the company employees who would execute the demolitions.

Document 7

British Foreign Office letter to Ministry of Fuel and Power, June 7, 1951, Top Secret

Source: National Archives (Kew) POWE 33/1899

This memorandum from the British Foreign Office to the Ministry of Fuel and Power is one of the few times MI6, the British equivalent of the CIA, is mentioned in declassified documents about the denial policy. MI6’s attendance was expected at an upcoming meeting about oil denial and the document briefly mulls a role for the British intelligence agency in the denial policy. The memo states further consideration of MI6 participation would happen if a specific operation was offered. A subsequent British document mentions the MI6 might create a covert operation to plug oil wells in Iran and Iraq. But it’s unclear if anything came of this or any other denial operation for the British intelligence agency.

Document 8

Internal memorandum, Ministry Fuel and Power, June 11, 1951, Top Secret

Source: National Archives (Kew) POWE 33/1899

The CIA’s push to export Aramco-style denial plans at times rankled British oil executives. This document recounts a visit by Leslie Murphy of the Ministry of Fuel and Power to Philip Southwell, British managing director of Kuwait Oil Co. The company was managed by the British, but it was a partnership of British-owned Anglo-Iranian Oil and American-owned Gulf Oil. U.S. officials initially claimed that Americans accounted for a majority of Kuwait Oil’s employees. But Southwell tells Murphy that only 40 Americans were among Kuwait Oil’s 600 employees. Southwell sought – and received – assurances that British officials were involved in denial planning for Kuwait Oil. Southwell soon after this visit provided names of Kuwait Oil employees who would work on the denial plan.


Document 9

Minutes of meeting with George Prussing, CIA, at British Ministry of Fuel and Power, June 26, 1951, Top Secret.

Source: National Archives (Kew Gardens) POWE 33/1899

Prussing, identified in this document by his cover as an Aramco consulting engineer, met with British officials in London. This was in preparation for another scheduled meeting in Saudi Arabia, to be attended by executives for Aramco, Kuwait Oil, Bahrein Petroleum and Qatar Petroleum. James McPherson of the American Oil Independent Co. was also expected to attend. This company, which had the rights to oil in the Kuwait neutral zone, would later join the denial policy.

Prussing in the London meeting pushed for the names of British government employee to serve as undercover operatives in Bahrain, Qatar and Kuwait. He also discussed Aramco’s plans to “militarize” its employees by inducting them into the military before they executed the denial plan. This would give them some protection as prisoners of war if captured by the Soviets. During this meeting, senior executives of Kuwait Oil, Bahrain Petroleum and Iraq Petroleum Co. were introduced to Prussing. They agreed to cooperate. Britain was still responsible for the denial plan in Iraq, but didn’t object to Iraq Petroleum working with the CIA.


Document 10

National Security Council, NSC 176 statement of policy, “Denial and Conservation of Middle East Oil Resources and Facilities in the Event of War,” December 22, 1953, Top Secret, Special Handling

Source: Eisenhower Presidential Library, NSC Series, Policy Papers Subseries, Box 8

The Eisenhower administration, just days after his inauguration in 1953, kicked off a review of NSC 26/2, which was in trouble. Aramco had curbed its support in 1952 and wanted the denial plan and explosives removed from its property. This happened after the United States refused to tell Saudi Arabia’s government about the denial policy. After the review, NSC 26/2 was shelved and replaced by NSC 176, later renamed NSC 5401.

Truman3-600.jpg

Prime Minister Mohammed Mosaddeq of Iran (left) visiting with George McGhee at the Egyptian Embassy in
Washington D.C. (1951). McGhee, a senior State Department official, pushed British officials to deploy denial
plans in Iran and Iraq. (Credit: Harry S. Truman Library & Museum.)

The new policy boosted efforts to plug wells and sought to patch the gap left by Aramco. The military as a last resort would destroy oil facilities if ground demolitions weren’t possible. But the Defense Department refused to execute ground demolitions, which were a preferred tactic since they would disable instead of destroy facilities. The best hope was for the CIA and Aramco to execute them, said Robert Cutler, Eisenhower’s national security assistant, during the National Security Council meeting that approved NSC 5401.

Aramco did decide to be more helpful, according to William Chandler, a vice president at Tapline, which was an oil pipeline across Saudi Arabia and an Aramco subsidiary. In an interview with this writer before his death, Chandler said an Aramco executive told him to expect a visitor who would discuss a “special program” for Tapline. The pipeline’s pumps would be disabled by Tapline supervisors at the start of a Soviet invasion. They were trained to use explosives, which they stored under their beds.


NSC 5401 appeared to revive the denial policy, which extended its reach with plans to disable an American-owned refinery in Lebanon and a British refinery in Egypt. A planned refinery in Syria would also be covered after it was built. The British selected targets in Israel and Turkey in case these countries were brought into the denial policy.

Document 11A

Chiefs of Staff Committee, Joint Planning Staff report, “Oil Denial in the Middle East,” December 13, 1955 , Top Secret, U.K. Eyes Only

Document 11B

Chiefs of Staff Committee, Joint Planning Staff report, “Oil Denial in the Middle East,” May 16, 1956, Top Secret, U.K. Eyes Only

Document 11C

Chiefs of Staff Committee, minutes of meeting, May 24, 1956, Top Secret, U.K. Eyes Only

Source: National Archives (Kew ) DEFE 6/32/145, DEFE 6/35/69, DEFE 4/87/53

These documents sketch British deliberations about using nuclear weapons to ensure the denial policy’s success. The catalyst was the emergence of state-controlled refineries in Iraq and Iran. These facilities would have to be sidelined to deny fuel to the Soviet military. But ground demolitions required a cooperating oil company, and asking Iran and Iraq’s governments to develop denial plans for their refineries was “politically unacceptable” since that meant telling them a denial policy existed. Among the options was airstrikes using conventional bombs but there weren’t enough aircraft. A British Joint Chiefs of Staff committee concluded nuclear weapons may be the only option until a plan using ground demolitions was possible.

The British controlled Iraq Petroleum Co. was still able to execute ground demolitions against the massive Kirkuk petroleum complex which was not state controlled. Iraq’s government did own or control refineries near Baghdad, Alwand and Basra. The situation in Iran was more complex. Britain had abandoned ground demolitions after Anglo-Iranian Oil was nationalized in 1951. The British Joint Chiefs of Staff replaced them with a plan to use airstrikes and conventional bombs although they had doubts about the plan’s effectiveness based on their experience in World War II when German refineries proved resilient against bombing. But this plan remained even after a coup in 1953 ushered in a friendlier government. In 1954, the new government allowed an oil consortium, which was majority owned by Anglo-Iranian Oil and five American companies including Aramco’s owners, to manage the bulk of Iran’s oil industry. But Iranians had some control including management of the Kermanshah refinery, an oil field and a distribution system for petroleum deliveries within the country.


These documents don’t discuss what option was eventually chosen to deal with Iraq’s state-controlled refineries. Nor do they disclose the potential targets for nuclear weapons in Iran. But the British Joint Chiefs of Staff received ministerial approval to ask the United States to accept responsibility for Iran since it had a nuclear arsenal that could be used. The matter was discussed in formal talks between the two countries in February 1956 in London, but a decision was deferred about transferring responsibility for Iran’s denial plan to the United States. British military officials concluded that in the meantime the only way to execute the denial plan in Iran was American nuclear action.

Did the United States eventually agree to use its nuclear weapons on Iran? Documents now available suggest it did not. Prussing was dispatched to Iran to inspect its oil fields and facilities and advised that the original denial plan for Iran using ground demolitions was technically sound. British officials thought the growing number of American citizens working in Iran made ground demolitions more likely than destruction by nuclear bombs. William Otto, Aramco’s expert on ground demolitions, was dispatched by the CIA to assist British denial plans in Iran, according to an interview with Otto.


Document 12


National Security Council, NSC 5714, statement of policy, “Protection and Conservation of Middle East Oil Resources and Facilities,” May 29, 1957; with several associated NSC and State Department memoranda, 1957-1963, Top Secret, Special Handling

Source: Eisenhower Presidential Library, NSC Series, Policy Papers Subseries, Box 8

The CIA, State Department and Defense Department in 1956 recommended that NSC 5401 should continue. But George Weber, a young NSC staffer, thought it should be killed. The denial policy didn’t cover Arab nationalism which had become a threat to the West’s hold on Middle East oil fields. In addition, he argued selective demolitions would be ineffective in allowing a quick resumption of production since the Soviets would probably destroy the oil facilities when they retreated. Meanwhile, increased training for selective demolitions to disable facilities made a security leak to host governments more likely.

Truman5-400.jpg

William Rountree, assistant secretary of state,helped shepherd in 1957
a shift in the denial policy that called for cooperation with Middle East
countries. (Credit: Harry S. Truman Library & Museum.)

The denial policy wasn’t killed but it was transformed when President Eisenhower in 1957 approved NSC 5714. It dealt almost entirely with conservation and protection including plugging oil wells and passive defenses to protect refineries from airstrikes. The oil companies and Middle East governments would execute these measures. The CIA partnership with the oil companies to destroy or disable facilities was abandoned. The U.S. military would still as a last resort destroy oil facilities with “direct action” if they were about to be seized by the Soviets.

The handful of declassified documents about NSC 5714 provides few details about its fate including how many, if any, Middle East governments cooperated. The Kennedy White House in 1963 asked the State Department if NSC 5714 should be rescinded or replaced by something else, or if it still represented U.S. policy. A response is not in the file.

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The U.S. Navy and the Problem of Oil in a Future War: The Outline of a Strategic Dilemma, 1945-1950

_________________________________________________________________

General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev Letter to President Ronald Reagan, January 14, 1986.

___________________________________________________________________

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Bush Administration's First Memo on al-Qaeda Declassified

January 25, 2001 Richard Clarke Memo:
"We urgently need . . . a Principals level
review on the al Qida network."

Document Central to Clarke-Rice Dispute on Bush Terrorism Policy Pre-9/11



"A Comprehensive Strategy to Fight Al-Qaeda"?
Rice versus Clinton on January 2001 Clarke Memo

Washington, D.C., September 27, 2006 - In a series of recent public statements, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has again denied that the Clinton administration presented the incoming administration of President George W. Bush with a "comprehensive strategy" against al-Qaeda. Rice's denials were prompted by a September 22 Fox News interview with Bill Clinton in which the former president asserted that he had "left a comprehensive anti-terror strategy" with the incoming Bush administration in January 2001. In a September 25 interview, Rice told the New York Post, "We were not left a comprehensive strategy to fight al-Qaida," adding that, "Nobody organized this country or the international community to fight the terrorist threat that was upon us until 9/11."

The crux of the issue is a January 25, 2001, memo on al-Qaeda from counterterrorism coordinator Richard Clarke to National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, the first terrorism strategy paper of the Bush administration. The document was central to the debate over pre-9/11 Bush administration policy on terrorism and figured prominently in the 9/11 hearings held in 2004. A declassified copy of the Clarke memo was first posted on the Web by the National Security Archive in February 2005.

Clarke's memo, described below, "urgently" requested a high-level National Security Council review on al-Qaeda and included two attachments: a declassified December 2000 "Strategy for Eliminating the Threat from the Jihadist Networks of al-Qida: Status and Prospects" and the September 1998 "Pol-Mil Plan for al-Qida," the so-called Delenda Plan, which remains classified.

Below are excerpts from the recent statements of former President Clinton and Secretary Rice:


Former President Bill Clinton on Fox News, September 22, 2006:

CLINTON: And I think it’s very interesting that all the conservative Republicans, who now say I didn’t do enough, claimed that I was too obsessed with bin Laden. All of President Bush’s neo-cons thought I was too obsessed with bin Laden. They had no meetings on bin Laden for nine months after I left office. All the right-wingers who now say I didn’t do enough said I did too much — same people.

...

WALLACE: Do you think you did enough, sir?

CLINTON: No, because I didn’t get him.

WALLACE: Right.

CLINTON: But at least I tried. That’s the difference in me and some, including all the right-wingers who are attacking me now. They ridiculed me for trying. They had eight months to try. They did not try. I tried.

So I tried and failed. When I failed, I left a comprehensive anti-terror strategy and the best guy in the country, Dick Clarke, who got demoted.

...

CLINTON: What did I do? What did I do? I worked hard to try to kill him. I authorized a finding for the CIA to kill him. We contracted with people to kill him. I got closer to killing him than anybody has gotten since. And if I were still president, we’d have more than 20,000 troops there trying to kill him.

Now, I’ve never criticized President Bush, and I don’t think this is useful. But you know we do have a government that thinks Afghanistan is only one-seventh as important as Iraq.

And you ask me about terror and Al Qaida with that sort of dismissive thing? When all you have to do is read Richard Clarke’s book to look at what we did in a comprehensive, systematic way to try to protect the country against terror.

And you’ve got that little smirk on your face and you think you’re so clever. But I had responsibility for trying to protect this country. I tried and I failed to get bin Laden. I regret it. But I did try. And I did everything I thought I responsibly could.

The entire military was against sending Special Forces in to Afghanistan and refueling by helicopter. And no one thought we could do it otherwise, because we could not get the CIA and the FBI to certify that Al Qaida was responsible while I was president.


Condoleezza Rice Interview with New York Post Editorial Board:

QUESTION: By now I assume you’ve seen Bill Clinton’s performances. How do you respond to his specific accusation that the eight months before 9/11 the Bush Administration, in his words, didn’t even try to go after al-Qaida?

SECRETARY RICE: I’d just say read the 9/11 report. We went through this. We went through this argument. The fact of the matter is I think the 9/11 Commission got it about right. Nobody organized this country or the international community to fight the terrorist threat that was upon us until 9/11. I would be the first to say that because, you know, we didn’t fight the war on terror in the way that we’re fighting it now. We just weren’t organized as a country either domestically or as a leader internationally.

But what we did in the eight months was at least as aggressive as what the Clinton Administration did in the preceding years. In fact, it is not true that Richard Clarke was fired. Richard Clarke was the counterterrorism czar when 9/11 happened and he left when he did not become Deputy Director of Homeland Security some several months later. We were not left a comprehensive strategy to fight al-Qaida. For instance, big pieces were missing, like an approach to Pakistan that might work, because without Pakistan you weren’t going to get Afghanistan. And there were reasons that nobody could think of actually going in and taking out the Taliban, either the Clinton Administration or the Bush Administration, because it’s true you couldn’t get basing rights in Uzbekistan and that was the long pole in the tent.

So I would make the divide September 11, 2001 when the attack on this country mobilized us to fight the war on terror in a very different way. But the notion that somehow for eight months the Bush Administration sat there and didn’t do that is just flatly false. And you know, I think that the 9/11 Commission understood that.

QUESTION: So you’re saying Bill Clinton is a liar?

SECRETARY RICE: No, I’m just saying that, look, there was a lot of passion in that interview and I’m not going to – I would just suggest that you go back and read the 9/11 Commission report on the efforts of the Bush Administration in the eight months, things like working to get an armed Predator that actually turned out to be extraordinarily important, working to get a strategy that would allow us to get better cooperation from Pakistan and from the Central Asians, but essentially continuing the strategy that had been left to us by the Clinton Administration, including with the same counterterrorism czar who was Richard Clarke. But I think this is not a very fruitful discussion because we’ve been through it; the 9/11 Commission has turned over every rock and we know exactly what they said.

January 25, 2001, memo from counterterrorism coordinator Richard Clarke to national security advisor Condoleezza Rice - the first terrorism strategy paper of the Bush administration. The document was central to debates in the 9/11 hearings over the Bush administration's policies and actions on terrorism before September 11, 2001. Clarke's memo requests an immediate meeting of the National Security Council's Principals Committee to discuss broad strategies for combating al-Qaeda by giving counterterrorism aid to the Northern Alliance and Uzbekistan, expanding the counterterrorism budget and responding to the U.S.S. Cole attack. Despite Clarke's request, there was no Principals Committee meeting on al-Qaeda until September 4, 2001.

The January 25, 2001, memo, recently released to the National Security Archive by the National Security Council, bears a declassification stamp of April 7, 2004, one day prior to Rice's testimony before the 9/11 Commission on April 8, 2004. Responding to claims that she ignored the al-Qaeda threat before September 11, Rice stated in a March 22, 2004 Washington Post op-ed, "No al Qaeda plan was turned over to the new administration."

Two days after Rice's March 22 op-ed, Clarke told the 9/11 Commission, "there's a lot of debate about whether it's a plan or a strategy or a series of options -- but all of the things we recommended back in January were those things on the table in September. They were done. They were done after September 11th. They were all done. I didn't really understand why they couldn't have been done in February."

Also attached to the original Clarke memo are two Clinton-era documents relating to al-Qaeda. The first, "Tab A December 2000 Paper: Strategy for Eliminating the Threat from the Jihadist Networks of al-Qida: Status and Prospects," was released to the National Security Archive along with the Clarke memo. "Tab B, September 1998 Paper: Pol-Mil Plan for al-Qida," also known as the Delenda Plan, was attached to the original memo, but was not released to the Archive and remains under request with the National Security Council.

Below are additional references to the January 25, 2001, memo from congressional debates and the 9/11 Commission testimonies of Richard Clarke and Condoleezza Rice.


Excerpts from:

NATIONAL COMMISSION ON TERRORIST ATTACKS UPON THE UNITED STATES
Eighth Public Hearing

Wednesday, March 24, 2004

Hart Senate Office Building, Washington, DC

Chaired by: Thomas H. Kean

[See also 9/11 Commission Staff Statement - Intelligence Policy Staff Statement No. 7 by Alexis Albion, Michael Hurley, Dan Marcus, Lloyd Salvetti and Steve Dunne]

Testimony of Dan Marcus - 9/11 Commission staff member, general counsel:

In December 2000, the CIA developed initiatives -- moving off the Cole now -- based on the assumption that policy and money were no longer constraints. The result was the so-called Blue Sky memo, which we discussed earlier today. This was forwarded to the NSC staff.

As the Clinton administration drew to a close, the NSC counterterrorism staff developed another strategy paper; the first such comprehensive effort since the Delenda plan of 1998. The resulting paper, titled "A Strategy for Eliminating the Threat from the Jihadist Networks of Al Qaida; Status and Prospects," reviewed the threat, the records to date, incorporated the CIA's new ideas from the Blue Sky memo, and posed several near-term policy choices. The goal was to roll back Al Qaida over a period of three to five years, reducing it eventually to a rump group like others formerly feared but now largely defunct terrorist organizations in the 1980s. Quote, "Continued anti-Al Qaida operations at the current level will prevent some attacks, but will not seriously attrite their ability to plan and conduct attacks," Clarke and his staff wrote.

…

Asked by Hadley to offer major initiatives, on January 25, 2001 Clarke forwarded his December 2000 strategy paper and a copy of his 1998 Delenda plan to the new national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice. Clarke laid out a proposed agenda for urgent action by the new Administration: Approval of covert assistance to the Northern Alliance; significantly increase funding; choosing a standard of evidence for attributing responsibility for the Cole and deciding on a response; going forward with new Predator missions in the spring and preparation of an armed version; and more work on terrorist fundraising.

…

Clarke asked on several occasions for early principals meetings on these issues, and was frustrated that no early meeting was scheduled. No principals committee meetings on Al Qaida were held until September 4th, 2001. Rice and Hadley said this was because the deputies committee needed to work through many issues relating to the new policy on Al Qaida. The principals committee did meet frequently before September 11th on other subjects, Rice told us, including Russia, the Persian Gulf and the Middle East peace process. Rice and Hadley told us that, although the Clinton administration had worked very hard on the Al Qaida program, its policies on Al Qaida, quote, "had run out of gas," and they therefore set about developing a new presidential directive and a new, comprehensive policy on terrorism.

Testimony of Richard Clarke, former White House counterterrorism coordinator:

TIMOTHY ROEMER, Commission Member: OK. With my 15 minutes, let's move into the Bush administration.

On January 25th, we've seen a memo that you've written to Dr. Rice urgently asking for a principals' review of Al Qaida. You include helping the Northern Alliance, covert aid, significant new '02 budget authority to help fight Al Qaida and a response to the USS Cole. You attach to this document both the Delenda Plan of 1998 and a strategy paper from December 2000.

Do you get a response to this urgent request for a principals meeting on these? And how does this affect your time frame for dealing with these important issues?

CLARKE: I did get a response, and the response was that in the Bush administration I should, and my committee, counterterrorism security group, should report to the deputies committee, which is a sub-Cabinet level committee, and not to the principals and that, therefore, it was inappropriate for me to be asking for a principals' meeting. Instead, there would be a deputies meeting.

ROEMER: So does this slow the process down to go to the deputies rather than to the principals or a small group as you had previously done?

CLARKE: It slowed it down enormously, by months. First of all, the deputies committee didn't meet urgently in January or February. Then when the deputies committee did meet, it took the issue of Al Qaida as part of a cluster of policy issues, including nuclear proliferation in South Asia, democratization in Pakistan, how to treat the various problems, including narcotics and other problems in Afghanistan, and launched on a series of deputies meetings extending over several months to address Al Qaida in the context of all of those inter-related issues. That process probably ended, I think in July of 2001. So we were ready for a principals meeting in July. But the principals calendar was full and then they went on vacation, many of them in August, so we couldn't meet in August, and therefore the principals met in September.

…

ROEMER: You then wrote a memo on September 4th to Dr. Rice expressing some of these frustrations several months later, if you say the time frame is May or June when you decided to resign. A memo comes out that we have seen on September the 4th. You are blunt in blasting DOD for not willingly using the force and the power. You blast the CIA for blocking Predator. You urge policy-makers to imagine a day after hundreds of Americans lay dead at home or abroad after a terrorist attack and ask themselves what else they could have done. You write this on September the 4th, seven days before September 11th.

CLARKE: That's right.

ROEMER: What else could have been done, Mr. Clarke?

CLARKE: Well, all of the things that we recommended in the plan or strategy -- there's a lot of debate about whether it's a plan or a strategy or a series of options -- but all of the things we recommended back in January were those things on the table in September. They were done. They were done after September 11th. They were all done. I didn't really understand why they couldn't have been done in February.

…

SLADE GORTON, Commission member: Now, since my yellow light is on, at this point my final question will be this: Assuming that the recommendations that you made on January 25th of 2001, based on Delenda, based on Blue Sky, including aid to the Northern Alliance, which had been an agenda item at this point for two and a half years without any action, assuming that there had been more Predator reconnaissance missions, assuming that that had all been adopted say on January 26th, year 2001, is there the remotest chance that it would have prevented 9/11?

CLARKE: No.

GORTON: It just would have allowed our response, after 9/11, to be perhaps a little bit faster?

CLARKE: Well, the response would have begun before 9/11.

GORTON: Yes, but there was no recommendation, on your part or anyone else's part, that we declare war and attempt to invade Afghanistan prior to 9/11?

CLARKE: That's right.

…

TIMOTHY J. ROEMER: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Having served on the joint inquiry, the only person of this 9/11 panel to have served on the inquiry, I can say in open session to some of Mr. Fielding's inquiries that as the joint inquiry asked for information on the National Security Council and we requested that the National Security Adviser Dr. Rice come before the joint inquiry and answer those questions. She refused. And she didn't come. She didn't come before the 9/11 commission. And when we asked for some questions to be answered, Mr. Hadley answered those questions in a written form. So I think part of the answer might be that we didn't have access to the January 25th memo. We didn't have access to the September 4th memo. We didn't have access to many of the documents and the e-mails. We're not only talking about Mr. Clarke being before the 9/11 commission for more than 15 hours, but I think in talking to the staff, we have hundreds of documents and e-mails that we didn't previously have, which hopefully informs us to ask Mr. Clarke and ask Dr. Rice the tough questions.

Debate over the January 25, 2001 memo in Congress:

Congressional Record: March 25, 2004 (Senate) [Page S3122-S3123]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [DOCID:cr25mr04-92]

Excerpt from the Senate floor on March 26, 2004, Senator Mitch McConnell (R-KY):

Also in this August 2002 interview, Clarke noted the Bush administration, in mid-January of 2001--before the 9/11 attack--decided to do two things to respond to the threat of terrorism: "One, to vigorously pursue the existing policy, including all the lethal covert action finds which we have now made public, to some extent; the second thing the administration decided to do was to initiate a process to look at these issues which had been on the table for a couple of years and get them decided.''

In other words, what Clarke was saying in 2002 to members of the press was that the Bush administration's response to the war on terror was much more aggressive than it was under the Clinton years.

Now he is singing an entirely different tune. This is a man who lacks credibility. He may be an intelligent man, he may be a dedicated public servant, but clearly he has a grudge of some sort against the Bush administration. If he was unable to develop a more robust response during the Clinton years, he would only be able to blame himself. He was in charge of counterterrorism during those 8 years. How could the Bush administration be to blame in 8 months for the previous administration's failure over 8 years to truly declare war on al-Qaida?

Congressional Record: March 30, 2004 (Senate) [Page S3315-S3317]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [DOCID:cr30mr04-151]

Excerpt from the Senate floor on March 30, 2004, Senator Tom Daschle (D-SD):

In Mr. Clarke's case, clear and troubling double standards are being applied. Last year, when the administration was being criticized for the President's misleading statement about Niger and uranium, the White House unexpectedly declassified portions of the National Intelligence Estimate.

When the administration wants to bolster its public case, there is little that appears too sensitive to be declassified.

Now, people around the President want to release parts of Mr. Clarke's earlier testimony in 2002. According to news reports, the CIA is already working on declassifying that testimony--at the administration's request.

And last week several documents were declassified literally overnight, not in an effort to provide information on a pressing policy matter to the American people, but in an apparent effort to discredit a public servant who gave 30 years of service to the American Government.

I'll support declassifying Mr. Clarke's testimony before the Joint Inquiry, but the administration shouldn't be selective. Consistent with our need to protect sources and methods, we should declassify his entire testimony. And to make sure that the American people have access to the full record as they consider this question, we should also declassify his January 25 memo to Dr. Rice, the September 4, 2001 National Security Directive dealing with terrorism, Dr. Rice's testimony to the 9-11 Commission, the still-classified 28 pages from the House-Senate inquiry relating to Saudi Arabia, and a list of the dates and topics of all National Security Council meetings before September 4, 2001.

Congressional Record: March 31, 2004 (House) [Page H1772-H1779]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [DOCID:cr31mr04-105])

Excerpt from the House floor on March 31, 2004, Representative Frank Pallone (D-NJ):

Now, this past Sunday, Clarke said he would support the declassification of his testimony before the joint intelligence panels if the administration also declassifies the National Security Adviser's testimony before the 9/11 Commission and the declassification of the January 25, 2001, memo that Clarke sent to Rice laying out a terrorism strategy, a strategy that was not approved until months later.

Madam Speaker, House Democrats really want a full accounting of the events leading up to the September 11 attacks, including the extent to which a preoccupation with Iraq affected efforts to deal with the threat posed by al Qaeda. It is nice to see the White House has finally stopped stonewalling the commission and now says that it will provide the public testimony the commission is requesting. But Americans need to be able to fully evaluate the decisions of government leaders, especially when it comes to the life and death decisions of war and peace.

Excerpts from:
NATIONAL COMMISSION ON TERRORIST ATTACKS UPON THE UNITED STATES
Ninth Public Hearing
Thursday, April 8, 2004
Hart Senate Office Building, Washington, DC
Chaired by: Thomas H. Kean

Testimony of national security advisor Condoleezza Rice:

MR. BOB KERREY, Committee Member: Well, I think it's an unfortunate figure of speech because I think -- especially after the attack on the Cole on the 12th of August -- October 2000. It would have been a swatting a fly. It would not have been -- we did not need to wait to get a strategic plan. Dick Clarke had in his memo on the 20th of January overt military operations as a -- he turned that memo around in 24 hours, Dr. Clarke. There were a lot of plans in place in the Clinton administration, military plans in the Clinton administration. In fact, just since we're in the mood to declassify stuff, he included in his January 25th memo two appendixes: Appendix A, "Strategy for the Elimination of the Jihadist Threat of al Qaeda;" Appendix B, "Political- Military Plan for al Qaeda."

So I just -- why didn't we respond to the Cole? Why didn't we swat that fly?

MS. RICE: I believe that there is a question of whether or not you respond in a tactical sense or whether you respond in a strategic sense, whether or not you decide that you are going to respond to every attack with minimal use of military force and go after every -- on a kind of tit-for-tat basis. By the way, in that memo, Dick Clarke talks about not doing this tit for tat, doing this on a time of our choosing.

…

Yes, the Cole had happened. We received, I think, on January 25th the same assessment or roughly the same assessment of who was responsible for the Cole that Sandy Berger talked to you about. It was preliminary. It was not clear. But that was not the reason that we felt that we did not want to, quote, "respond to the Cole."

We knew that the options that had been employed by the Clinton administration had been standoff options. The President had -- meaning missile strikes, or perhaps bombers would have been possible, long-range bombers, although getting in place the apparatus to use long-range bombers is even a matter of whether you have basing in the region.

We knew that Osama bin Laden had been, in something that was provided to me, bragging that he was going to withstand any response, and then he was going to emerge and come out stronger. We --
…We simply believed that the best approach was to put in place a plan that was going to eliminate this threat, not respond to it, tit-for-tat.

…

MS. RICE: The fact is that what we were presented on January the 25th was a set of ideas -- and a paper, most of which was about what the Clinton administration had done, and something called the Delenda plan, which had been considered in 1998 and never adopted.

…

We decided to take a different track. We decided to put together a strategic approach to this that would get the regional powers -- the problem wasn't that you didn't have a good counterterrorism person. The problem was you didn't have approach against al Qaeda because you didn't have an approach against Afghanistan, and you didn't have an approach against Afghanistan because you didn't have an approach against Pakistan. And until we could get that right, we didn't have a policy.

…

In the memorandum that Dick Clarke sent me on January 25th, he mentions sleeper cells. There is no mention or recommendation of anything that needs to be done about them. And the FBI was pursuing them. And usually when things come to me it's because I'm supposed to do something about it, and there was no indication that the FBI was not adequately pursuing the sleeper cells.

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Take a Peek Into Our “X-Files”
The CIA declassified hundreds of documents in 1978 detailing the Agency’s investigations into Unidentified Flying Objects (UFOs). The documents date primarily from the late 1940s and 1950s.

To help navigate the vast amount of data contained in our FOIA UFO collection, we’ve decided to highlight a few documents both skeptics and believers will find interesting. Below you will find five documents we think X-Files character Agent Fox Mulder would love to use to try and persuade others of the existence of extraterrestrial activity. We also pulled five documents we think his skeptical partner, Agent Dana Scully, could use to prove there is a scientific explanation for UFO sightings.

The truth is out there; click on the links to find it.



Top 5 CIA Documents Mulder Would Love To Get His Hands On:

  1. Flying Saucers Reported Over East Germany, 1952 (PDF 325 KB)
  2. Minutes of Branch Chief’s Meeting on UFOs, 11 August 1952 (PDF 162 KB)
  3. Flying Saucers Reported Over Spain and North Africa, 1952 (PDF 266 KB)
  4. Survey of Flying Saucer Reports, 1 August 1952(PDF 175 KB)
  5. Flying Saucers Reported Over Belgian Congo Uranium Mines, 1952 (PDF 262 KB)
Top 5 CIA Documents Scully Would Love To Get Her Hands On:

  1. Scientific Advisory Panel on Unidentified Flying Objects, 14-17 January 1953 (PDF 907 KB)
  2. Office Memorandum on Flying Saucers, 15 March 1949 (PDF 110 KB)
  3. Memorandum to the CIA Director on Flying Saucers, 2 October 1952 (PDF 443 KB)
  4. Meeting of the OSI Advisory Group on UFOs, 21 January 1953 (PDF 194 KB)
  5. Memorandum for the Record on Flying Saucers, 3 December 1952 (PDF 179 KB)


Do you want to believe? Then find out how to investigate a flying saucer.



Posted: Jan 21, 2016 05:18 PM
Last Updated: Jan 21, 2016 05:49 PM
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Vault Home • UFO

UFO

In 1947, a rash of sightings of unexplained flying objects (UFOs) swept America. Although the newly formed U.S. Air Force was the primary investigator of these sightings, the FBI received many reports and worked for a time with the Air Force to investigate these matters. This release details the FBI’s role in investigating such reports between 1947 and 1954.


UFO Part 1 of 16 View


UFO Part 2 of 16 View



UFO Part 3 of 16 View



UFO Part 4 of 16 View

UFO Part 5 of 16 View

UFO Part 6 of 16 View

UFO Part 7 of 16 View
 

UFO Part 16 of 16

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FBI Files on Cryptography – FBI File #80-HQ-612

23 November, 2016 / in Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Collection, History

Background
Before the modern era, cryptography was concerned solely with message confidentiality (i.e., encryption)—conversion of messages from a comprehensible form into an incomprehensible one and back again at the other end, rendering it unreadable by interceptors or eavesdroppers without secret knowledge (namely the key needed for decryption of that message).

Encryption attempted to ensure secrecy in communications, such as those of spies, military leaders, and diplomats. In recent decades, the field has expanded beyond confidentiality concerns to include techniques for message integrity checking, sender/receiver identity authentication, digital signatures, interactive proofs and secure computation, among others.

Below, you will find the declassified FBI File that was labeled “Cryptography.”

The file stretches back to the mid to late 1930s! It is an ongoing FOIA request, wherein many documents have not been released yet, and are being reviewed by multiple agencies. I will continue to add the releases, as they become available.

Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Release

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Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Release, October 19, 2016 [356 Pages, 190.5MB]

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United States Army Release, November 17, 2016 [34 Pages, 4.9MB]

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Operation STEADFAST: U.S. Army Reorganization, 1972-1973

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Background
The vast expansion of the nation’s armed forces just prior to and during World War II led to the establishment in 1940 of command and control organization for the U.S. Army which had been envisioned much earlier by military planners. Indeed, the concept actually had been enacted into law in the National Defense Act of 1920. General Headquarters (GHQ), U.S, Army, which was established in 1940, was soon troubled by conflicts between its training, responsibilities and the command and control of the ground combat troops and their supporting forces.

These functions, however, were separated in 1942 when a general reorganization of the War Department retained command and control of the ground combat troops at the departmental level, while assigning responsibility for training to the troops to the newly established Army Ground forces (AGF).

With the cessation of hostilities in 1945, the recommendations of both the Patch and Simpson Boards resulted in combining these functions once again in the Army Ground Forces structure.

This attempt at combining the functions as short-lived, at best, since a general reorganization of the redesignated Department of the Army in 1948 established the office of the chief of Army Field Forces (OCAFF) as the training arm of the Army. OCAFF was, in reality, a staff agency of the Department of the Army and was not a legitimate separate command.


The Document

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Operation STEADFAST Historical Summary. A History of the Reorganization of the U.S. Continental Army Command (1972-1973) [319 Pages, 13.6MB]

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Possible Determination of an Extraordinary Nuclear Occurrence at Three Mile Island Unit 2, April 2, 1979

Background

The following documents is a COMMISSIONER ACTION memo, labeled SECY-79-235 from Harold R. Denton, Director Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation, dated April 2, 1979.

The purpose of the action report is listed as:

To advise the Commission of some decisions that will need to be made in the immediate future regarding the application of the Price Anderson Act to the Three Mile Island Unit 2 accident.

The Three Mile Island Unit 2 (TMI-2) reactor, near Middletown, Pa., partially melted down on March 28, 1979. This was the most serious accident in U.S. commercial nuclear power plant operating history, although its small radioactive releases had no detectable health effects on plant workers or the public. Its aftermath brought about sweeping changes involving emergency response planning, reactor operator training, human factors engineering, radiation protection, and many other areas of nuclear power plant operations. It also caused the NRC to tighten and heighten its regulatory oversight. All of these changes significantly enhanced U.S. reactor safety.

A combination of equipment malfunctions, design-related problems and worker errors led to TMI-2’s partial meltdown and very small off-site releases of radioactivity.

SECY-79-235
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SECY-79-235, April 2, 1979, Possible Determination of an Extraordinary Nuclear Occurrence at Three Mile Island Unit 2 [17 Pages, 0.7MB]
 
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Using Stylistic Analysis to Assess Threat Messages, October 1985

Background
Since 1970, various corporations and public agencies in the United States have received extortion messages involving nuclear devices, materials, and facilities. Further, although the United States has enjoyed relative freedom from terrorism, internally, other countries have had to cope with increasing terrorist activities, including attacks on nuclear facilities. In 1974, the Energy Research and Development Administration established the Nuclear Emergency Search Team (NEST) to help deal with deal with peacetime nuclear accidents and address the technical, behavioral, and operational problems generated by nuclear extortion threats. NEST is now under the jurisdiction of the Department of Energy (DOE) .

Among the thorniest problems is deciding if a threat is credible and, thus, merits deployment of NEST. Then, once the decision to deploy is made, NEST must assist FBI efforts to locate the threatening substance or device and the extortionists, and possibly negotiate with them. In 1977, DOE and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) funded a project that brought together specialists from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory, Syracuse Research Corporation, and The Rand Corporation. Under the technical direction of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, t~is project has developed an operational capability to assess the credibility of nuclear threat messages.

This assessment provides the basis for deployment decisions and the initial operational guidance for the NEST team after deployment.

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Using Stylistic Analysis to Assess Threat Messages, October 1985 [66 Pages, 8.5MB]


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CIA MKULTRA Collection





What is MKULTRA?

Project MKUltra—sometimes referred to as the CIA’s mind control program—was the code name given to an illegal program of experiments on human subjects, designed and undertaken by the United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Experiments on humans were intended to identify and develop drugs, alcohol, stick and poke tattoos, and procedures to be used in interrogations and torture, in order to weaken the individual to force confessions through mind control. Organized through the Scientific Intelligence Division of the CIA, the project coordinated with the Special Operations Division of the U.S. Army’s Chemical Corps. The program began in the early 1950s, was officially sanctioned in 1953, was reduced in scope in 1964, further curtailed in 1967 and officially halted in 1973. The program engaged in many illegal activities; in particular it used unwitting U.S. and Canadian citizens as its test subjects, which led to controversy regarding its legitimacy. MKUltra used numerous methodologies to manipulate people’s mental states and alter brain functions, including the surreptitious administration of drugs (especially LSD) and other chemicals, hypnosis, sensory deprivation, isolation, verbal and sexual abuse, as well as various forms of torture.

The scope of Project MKUltra was broad, with research undertaken at 80 institutions, including 44 colleges and universities, as well as hospitals, prisons, and pharmaceutical companies. The CIA operated through these institutions using front organizations, although sometimes top officials at these institutions were aware of the CIA’s involvement. As the US Supreme Court later noted, MKULTRA was:

concerned with “the research and development of chemical, biological, and radiological materials capable of employment in clandestine operations to control human behavior.” The program consisted of some 149 sub-projects which the Agency contracted out to various universities, research foundations, and similar institutions. At least 80 institutions and 185 private researchers participated. Because the Agency funded MKUltra indirectly, many of the participating individuals were unaware that they were dealing with the Agency.

Project MKUltra was first brought to public attention in 1975 by the Church Committee of the U.S. Congress, and a Gerald Ford commission to investigate CIA activities within the United States. Investigative efforts were hampered by the fact that CIA Director Richard Helms ordered all MKUltra files destroyed in 1973; the Church Committee and Rockefeller Commission investigations relied on the sworn testimony of direct participants and on the relatively small number of documents that survived Helms’ destruction order.

In 1977, a Freedom of Information Act request uncovered a cache of 20,000 documents relating to project MKUltra, which led to Senate hearings later that same year. In July 2001, some surviving information regarding MKUltra was declassified. *


The Black Vault and the FOIA Document Release

The Black Vault filed a FOIA request for all documents pertaining to MKULTRA and similar projects. I was told that these documents were being reviewed, and I would be contacted when the review was completed.

For years I waited, and was never contacted. The CIA, in fact, DID release the documents on three CD-ROMs yet they never notified me and my open FOIA request still pending in their office.

After much frustration, I finally received the documents. Below, you will find the links to the data on the CD-ROMS.

These files are organized in exactly the same way the CIA would send them to you. I simply created HTML indexes to make it even easier!

he directories contain .tif images of the documents (not my favorite format) and two other files. The .txt file is a poor excuse for a OCR (optical character recognition) of the document, which means they put the documents through a software title to make it text. You will see these are usually useless, because the process does not work on poorly photocopies documents. The .dat file in these directories is the one line description, as found in the index.

MKULTRA CIA Document Index – Start here! This will list the contents of the following links, which are the documents on the CD-ROMs. Or, you can just start browsing the CD’s below – it’s up to you!



Additional Documents on MKULTRA

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Studies in Intelligence, March 2010 [76 Pages, 3.28MB] – The Center for the Study of Intelligence (CSI) was founded in 1974 in response to Director of Central Intelligence James Schlesinger’s desire to create within CIA an organization that could “think through the functions of intelligence and bring the best intellects available to bear on intelligence problems.” The center, comprising professional historians and experienced practitioners, attempts to document lessons learned from past activities, to explore the needs and expectations of intelligence consumers, and to stimulate serious debate about current and future intelligence challenges. To carry out this mission, CSI publishes Studies in Intelligence, as well as numerous books and monographs addressing historical, operational, doctrinal and theoretical aspects of the intelligence profession. It also administers the CIA Museum and maintains the Agency’s Historical Intelligence Collection of published literature on intelligence.

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Studies in Intelligence, December 2009 [97 Pages, 1.65MB] – Contents of this volume include the following topics, articles, comments and reviews: HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES: Operation INFEKTION Soviet Bloc Intelligence and Its AIDS Disinformation Campaign; The Origins of Modern Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance – Military Intelligence at the Front, 1914-18 25; INTELLIGENCE TODAY AND TOMORROW: An Experiment in Collaboration on an Intelligence Problem – Developing STORM, a Methodology for Evaluating Transit Routes of Transnational Terrorists and Criminals; INTELLIGENCE IN PUBLIC MEDIA: The James Angleton Phenomenon – Cunning Passages, Contrived Corridors”: Wandering in the Angletonian Wilderness; On the Web: Moles, Defectors, and Deceptions: James Angleton and CIA Counterintelligence; The Accidental Guerrilla: Fighting Small Wars in the Midst of a Big One; Vietnam Declassified: CIA and Counterinsurgency in Vietnam; OSS Training in the National Parks and Service Abroad in World War II; The Secret War in El Paso: Mexico Revolutionary Intrigue, 1906-1920; The Intelligence Officer’s Bookshelf; Comment – In Defense of John Honeyman (and George Washington); Books, Film, and Television Reviewed in Studies in Intelligence, 2009.

Human Experimentation – An Overview of Cold War Era Programs, GAO Report, September 28, 1994 [16 Pages, 1.11MB]

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Spring 1986: 9-109-1: The Future of Intelligence, by Walter Laqueur [13 Pages, 6.8MB] – Series: Articles from “Studies in Intelligence”, 1955 – 1992 Record Group 263: Records of the Central Intelligence Agency, 1894 – 2002.

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Winter 1986: 10-112-1: The Supreme Court and the Intelligence Source, by Louis J. Dube and Launie M. Ziebell [18 Pages, 7.7MB] – From: Series: Articles from “Studies in Intelligence”, 1955 – 1992 Record Group 263: Records of the Central Intelligence Agency, 1894 – 2002.

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Project MKUltra, The CIA’s Program of Research in Behavioral Modificatio, 3 August 1977 [172 Pages, 8.87MB]

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The Role of Instititional Review Boards in Aviation Research: It’s the Law and it Makes Sense, Date Unknown [6 Pages, 178kb] – By Dr. Earl S. Stein, FAA, William J. Hughes Technical Center, Atlantic City International Airport, New Jersey. Unknown Date. References MKUltra.

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Last edited:

All UFO Documents From…

13 November, 2015 / in The Fringe, UFO Phenomena


This section contains batches of documents that have been received from multiple agencies. The FOIA request was for all documents relating to UFOs… the following is what was received. Simply click on the agency of your choice.


United States Army

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Army Released January 1997 [355 Pages – 22 MB]

* Refiled on November 4, 2015, for any additional UFO Records that may have been released by the ARMY. Awaiting a response…


Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)

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PDF File #1 (32 Megs) |
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PDF File #2 (35 megs)

Central Intelligence Agency releases multiple documents after a request was filed to the DIA in 2009 [65 Pages, 1.37MB] Released September of 2009 – These records prove the CIA is still collecting intelligence in regards to UFOs, and that material from just the past few years is considered a threat to our national security.


Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA)

Released October 1996 – Note additional records released by the CIA above, that were found while processing a later 2009 request for additional UFO records.

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Defense Intelligence Agency UFO Files Through 1979 [204 Pages, 39.5MB]

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Defense Intelligence Agency UFO Files from 1979-1989 [12 Pages, 1.5MB]

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Defense Intelligence Agency UFO Files From 1990 to date [30 Pages 5.3MB]



Department of Defense (DOD)

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Department of Defense [270 Pages] – Released 1997
 
Executive Office of the President (EOP)

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Executive Office of the President, Office of Science and Technology Policy, Released March 2011 [10 Pages, 380kb] – The documents include a small e-mail chain along with a newspaper article about the UFO issue overshadowing the Health Care debate in 2009 with a slightly sarcastic joke attached. Interesting to see how inter-agency memos and emails are worded!


Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)

Federal Bureau of Investigation UFO Documents [1,600 Pages] – [ Part 01 | Part 02 | Part 03 | Part 04 | Part 05 |Part 06 | Part 07 | Part 08| Part 09 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 ]



John F. Kennedy Library

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John F. Kennedy Library [127 Pages] – Obtained circa 1997, while I was producing UFOs and the White House for The History Channel. I obtained these in person at the library.


National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)

NASA Headquarters [131 Pages, 4.5MB] – Bibliography of documents obtained circa 1997 of NASA reports that came up with the “UFO” keyword.



National Reconnaissance Office (NRO)

NRO Letter dated November 5, 2015 – NO RECORDS [1 Pages, 1.4MB]

National Security Agency (NSA)
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National Security Agency’s UFO Files

United States NAVY
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Navy (No Records) – Originally requested UFO information in 1996. One of the first FOIA request I ever filed.

* On November 6, 2015, I refiled another FOIA request to the NAVY for UFO information. This page will be updated once a response is received.
 
Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense
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Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense [132 Pages]

Space Command
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Space Command, Released 1997 [7 Pages]

* On 11/6/2015, I requested additional records to follow up and see if anything else was available. I will update this page, when I receive the response.

Wright Patterson Air Force Base (WPAFB)
[910 Pages] – All documents relating to Project Sign and Grudge[
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January through August, 1948 |
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September through December, 1948 |
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1949 ]

________________________________________________________________________




Mother Teresa – Documents Classified Top Secret

Blessed Teresa of Calcutta, MC, commonly known as Mother Teresa (26 August 1910 – 5 September 1997), was a Roman Catholic religious sister and missionary who lived most of her life in India. She was born in today’s Macedonia, with her family being of Albanian descent originating in Kosovo.

She was a worldwide figure that will be remembered for her amazing work on a global scale. She was the recipient of numerous honors including the 1979 Nobel Peace Prize. In 2003, she was beatified as “Blessed Teresa of Calcutta”. A second miracle credited to her intercession is required before she can be recognized as a saint by the Catholic Church.

However, when I first requested records on Mother Teresa, I never expected that the information would be classified. Below, you will find the signed letter given to me by the NSA, that shows that all information on Mother Teresa is classified TOP SECRET.

What could they be hiding?

National Security Agency Documents
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NSA Denial letter on Mother Teresa documents, plus a 2 page excerpt on famous women of history [ 4 Pages, 0.7MB ]


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