Steven Gaal Posted July 1, 2012 Share Posted July 1, 2012 (edited) Operation Gladio [bBC Timewatch, 1992] State-Sponsored Terrorism in Europe Uploaded by OcularPolitics on Dec 18, 2010 http://drey.orgfree.com Originally aired on BBC2 in 1992, Operation Gladio reveals Gladio, the secret state-sponsored terror network operating in Europe. This BBC series is about a far-right secret army, operated by the CIA and MI6 through NATO, which killed hundreds of innocent Europeans and attempted to blame the deaths on Baader Meinhof, Red Brigades and other left wing groups. Known as stay-behinds these armies were given access to military equipment which was supposed to be used for sabotage after a Soviet invasion. Instead it was used in massacres across mainland Europe as part of a CIA Strategy of Tension. Gladio killing sprees in Belgium and Italy were carried out for the purpose of frightening the national political classes into adopting U.S. policies. _____----------------------------------------------------____________ NATO/CIA/MI6 KILL HUNDREDS TO CHANGE POLITICAL OPINION in Operation Gladio ----- just like what is called the Secret Team in DOD/NSA/CIA did 911 to CHANGE POLITICAL OPINION for a proactive militant foreign policy of the Western powers against the world. ####################0###################### Gulf Of Tonkin NSA Declassified ============================================ They Were Shooting Flying Fish: the Gulf of Tonkin Incident Filed in: Guest Theorists, History, History, Politics, Timothy Chilman by Timothy Chilman The Tonkin Resolution allowed President Lyndon Johnson to deploy military assets to Vietnam Tonkin. On 10 August, 1964, the Southeast Asia (Gulf of Tonkin) Resolution was approved by the House of Representatives by 416 votes to nil after 40 minutes of debate, and the Senate by a vote of 88 to 2 after nine hours of debate. The resolution granted President Lyndon Baines Johnson the right to use military force without a declaration of war. Senators Morse and Gruening argued that the resolution was unconstitutional because the Founding Fathers allowed only Congress to initiate war. Early in 1965, the United States deployed significant ground, air, and naval forces to South Vietnam, and the United States became embroiled in the only war it ever lost. U.S. military advisers had been present in Vietnam since the late 1950s. When Johnson took office, there were only 16,000 U.S. troops in South Vietnam, but the Gulf of Tonkin resolution allowed this number to eventually increase to 550,000, who engaged in combat. The case for the Resolution was fraudulent. In early 1964, Johnson and his Secretary of Defense, Robert S. McNamara, had grown concerned that the Republic of (i.e. South) Vietnam was losing its fight with the Viet Cong (in full, Viet Nam Cong San, or Communist Party of Viet Nam). The American leaders decided to place military pressure on the North Vietnamese government of Ho Chi Minh which directed and supported the Viet Cong. Naval forces were to be used to compel Ho Chi Ming to cease supporting the Viet Cong. The navy of the Republic of Vietnam was covertly presented with several Norwegian-built fast patrol boats of the Tjeld-class. Crews were trained. Under the covert Operations Plan (OPLAN) 34-Alpha, these boats bombarded radar stations on North Vietnam’s coast and landed commandos to destroy military targets. Many missions failed due to lack of good intelligence. Hanoi complained of the raids to the International Control Commission, which had sought since 1954 to enforce the Geneva Agreements to achieve peace in Southeast Asia and where Vietnam had been divided. The United States denied involvement. Four year later, McNamara told Congress that U.S. vessels had indeed been connected to the incursions by South Vietnamese military elements. Washington instructed the Navy to concentrate more on the coast of North Vietnam with its long-standing Desoto patrols. These patrols used destroyers to collect signals intelligence (SIGINT) from North Vietnam, North Korea, China, and the Soviet Union from a position in international waters. In August 1964, the Sumner class destroyer USS Maddox (DD 731) of the Seventh Fleet, commanded by Captain John J. Herrick, traveled along the coast of North Vietnam to the Gulf of Tonkin, taking a particular interest in radar installations. Aboard were extra electronic equipment, and specialists from the Naval Security Group and National Security Agency. Shortly before, South Vietnamese patrol boats had bombarded targets south of Maddox’s patrol area. On August 1, a team of long-term agents was dispatched to North Vietnam, and promptly captured, which fate is thought to have befallen almost all agents. By August 1968, it was estimated that 500 of these men had been lost. That evening, as with the previous one, two groupings of CIA-inspired fighter-bombers flown by Thai soldiers-for-hire assaulted North Vietnamese border outposts. South Vietnamese patrol boats carried out clandestine raids on the islands of Hon Nieu and Hon Me, and it is probable that the North Vietnamese believed Maddox to be involved. The North Vietnamese navy was unable to intercept the fast patrol boats. A destroyer, however, is rather slower. The next day, local authorities acting independently of Hanoi ordered the deployment of three Soviet-built P-4 motor torpedo boats against the Maddox, which was then within international waters but had earlier been in an area to which North Vietnam claimed ownership. The boats ignored the three warning shows that Herrick ordered to be fired, and launched torpedoes which missed their targets. Only one bullet hit, a 14.5 millimeter machine gun round from a North Vietnamese deck gun, which lodged in the ship’s superstructure. More than 280 3” and 5” shells were fired from the Maddox, and some hit the attackers. Four F-8 Crusader jets from the USS Ticonderoga strafed the three boats, leaving one dead in the water and afire. Four North Vietnamese sailors were killed and six injured. One U.S. airplane was damaged. Maddox steamed toward the mouth of the Gulf, where friendly forces awaited. The President and his national security advisers were taken aback that Ho Chi Minh had reacted boldly instead of buckling to U.S. pressure. Admiral Thomas H. Moorer, commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet and Admiral Ulysses S. G. Sharp, commander of America’s forces in the Pacific, reinforced the Maddox with the destroyer USS Turner Joy (DD 951) and instructed that intelligence-gathering missions continue. The National Security Agency had warned that August 4 would see an attack. That afternoon, the warships reported visual and electronic indications of an attack by three or four fast craft far from shore. Torpedoes were heard but not seen. Aircraft were dispatched from the Ticonderoga to assist the two destroyers. Visibility was very poor due to low cloud and thunderstorms. One of the pilots was Squadron Commander, later Vice Admiral, James Stockdale, who later found fame as a prisoner of war and then as Ross Perot’s vice-presidential pick. His book, In Love and War, was released in 1984, where he recounted that from “the best seat in the house” he could see that the U.S. ships were engaging “phantom targets.” He said no patrol boats were present, just ”black water and American fire power.” While imprisoned, Stockdale worried that his interrogators would oblige him to divulge his knowledge of the second attack’s non-existence. In a second radio communication timed at 1:27A.M. in Washington, Captain Herrick said that after the action had been reviewed, many of the reported contacts appeared “doubtful.” Herrick put it down to “freak weather” affecting radar plus “overeager sonarmen.” He stated that there had been no visual sightings. The last line of his message suggested “complete evaluation” prior to further action. McNamara failed to inform Johnson of Herrick’s change of mind. In 1981, together with reporter Robert Scheer, Herrick re-examined the ship’s log, which led them to conclude that the initial torpedo report was unfounded. In 1999, retired CIA engineering specialist S. Eugene Poteat wrote that he was instructed in 1964 to determine whether this report showed a genuine torpedo attack. He asked for additional details of timings and weather, but received none. He eventually concluded that no attack had occurred. No physical evidence of an engagement was found. Nevertheless, U.S. officers and leaders allowed themselves to be convinced by incomplete intelligence that North Vietnamese boats had attacked the two ships. Johnson addressed the nation at 11:34 P.M. on the day of the “attack”, saying that “repeated acts of violence” against U.S. forces had to be met “not only with alert defense, but… a positive reply. That reply is being given as I speak tonight.” Days later, Johnson told an aide: “Hell, those dumb stupid sailors were just shooting at flying fish.” In 1965, he said, “For all I know, our Navy was shooting at whales out there.” Johnson’s speech was much admired by editorial writers. According to the NYT, Johnson had presented Americans with “somber facts.” At the same time, the Los Angeles Times implored its readers to appreciate that the North Vietnamese had escalated hostilities by attacking American ships in international waters. In retaliation, the President commanded that an attack be launched on August 5. Under Operation Pierce Arrow, aircraft from the USS Constellation and Ticonderoga destroyed an oil repository at Vinh and sank or damaged approximately 30 North Vietnamese naval vessels, in and out of port. The headline of the New York Times thundered that US planes had attacked North Vietnamese bases as “limited retaliation” for renewed raids by torpedo boats. The headline concluded: “Reds driven off.” The Washington Post rewarded Johnson with the headline: “American Planes Hit North Vietnam After Second Attack on Our Destroyers; Move Taken to Halt New Aggression.” Pilot Everett Alvarez was shot down during one of these air raids to become the first American POW of the war. He remained a guest of Hanoi for eight years. Johnson was able to appear firm yet not a warmonger, and his approval rating shot up from 42 percent to 72 percent. Less than three months later, he won his campaign for the presidency. Different news sources such as Newsweek, Time and Life ran articles about the Gulf of Tonkin incident. Time reported breathlessly: “Through the darkness, from the West and south… intruders boldly sped…” It said there had been a minimum of six attackers, which had fired on the U.S. destroyers. Robert McNamara said the Tonkin Incident offered “unequivocal proof” of an “unprovoked attack,” the bloody xxxx. McNamara told Congress there was “unequivocal proof” of a second “unprovoked attack” – less than 17 hours after 34-Alpha attacks on Cua Ron and Cap Vinh Son which benefited from the SIGINT the U.S. ships collected and were approved by Admiral Grant Sharp, Jr., CinCPAC in Honolulu, who was in direct contact with the White House. In 1972, Louis Tordella, then the NSA’s deputy director, revealed that decrypted North Vietnamese damage assessments which had been regarded as “unequivocal proof,” referred to the first, actual attack, and not the second, phantom one. In 2001, the NSA found that officers had deliberately distorted key intelligence to conceal their own mistakes: translation errors went uncorrected, intercept times were altered, and intelligence was selectively cited. 40 years to the day after the supposed second attack, more documents were declassified showing that another part of McNamara’s “unequivocal proof” was an error: an NSA report described the August 2 attack as occurring on August 4. At the time, Daniel Ellsberg of Pentagon Papers fame was special assistant to John McNaughton, an Assistant Secretary of Defense. He said that his boss knew McNamara had lied. Congress was being lied to in order to allow war to be waged. He added: “I don’t look back on that situation with pride.” McNamara’s account was challenged when the Resolution was debated by the Senate. Senator Wayne Morse (D-Oregon) had already christened the conflict in Vietnam “Mr. Johnson’s war.” He said the Resolution was an aggressive move, and that to suggest the United States was not implicated in South Vietnamese bombardment of two islands was “kidding the world.” McNamara denied U.S. involvement in South Vietnamese operations, and said the DeSoto patrols did not support the 34-Alpha attacks. McNamara claimed the crew of Maddox were unaware of OPLAN 34-Alpha, but now acknowledges this to be false. In his book, Vietnam at War, retired Lt. General Phillip Davidson, once the U.S. Army’s intelligence chief in South Vietnam, said that Captain Herrick had commented that Maddox crew-members were highly concerned that 34-Alpha activities were endangering their ship. Davidson agreed with Herrick that this could have made the crew excessively nervous. While Herrick was a combat veteran, the rest of his crew had never seen combat. Congress overwhelmingly passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which allowed for the use of armed force to assist South Vietnam. Strangely, a very similar resolution was drafted three months earlier, when Johnson ran for president on a peace ticket: “We are not about to send American boys 9 or 10,000 miles away from home to do what Asian boys ought to be doing for themselves.” His opponent, Senator Barry Goldwater, favored an even stronger approach to Southeast Asia. It was suggested that Goldwater could lead the United States into nuclear war. Few who voted for the resolution knew the second attack was doubtful, that Maddox was engaged in an intelligence mission, or that Maddox’s operations and the 34-Alpha attacks were connected. In 1977, former Under-Secretary of State George Ball said in an interview with the British Broadcasting Corporation that: “Many of the people associated with the war…were looking for any excuse to initiate bombing.” He said the primary purpose of the Desoto Patrols was to provoke North Vietnam, whose response would in turn allow the United States to take stronger action. In 1995, McNamara visited Vo Nguyen Giap, the North Vietnamese military commander of the time. Giap acknowledged the August 2 attack on the Maddox, but said “absolutely nothing” occurred on August 4. McNamara agreed. Giap suggested the Desoto patrols were intended to provoke his country and provide an excuse to escalate the war. He is far from alone in this supposition. In a book released in 1995, it was admitted by McNamara that perhaps the United States had provoked a response from the North Vietnamese in the Gulf of Tonkin but that this was done innocently and that Johnson’s administration did not deliberately deceive Congress. In 1971, Senator Morse said that if the information then available had been around when the Resolution was debated, “the Tonkin Gulf Resolution would never have gotten out of Committee. And, if it had, it would never have passed…” In one of their more recent official histories, the North Vietnamese take responsibility for the first attack on Maddox, but not a second, calling it a fabrication to justify airstrikes. An older history claims responsibility for the second attack, but also claims that the North Vietnamese navy sank 353 U.S. naval vessels. This navy possessed around 60 torpedoes. The NSA delayed release of histories, chronologies, SIGINT reports, and interviews relating to the Gulf of Tonkin incident, fearing that uncomfortable comparisons would be made to the flawed intelligence employed to justify war in Iraq, when they went and did it all again. _________________________________________________________________ Bibliography “The Gulf of Tonkin.” Encyclopedia Britannica Online. n.d. 20 May 2011. <http://www.britannic...nchor=ref291142.> “30-Year Anniversary: Tonkin Gulf Lie Launched Vietnam War.” Rohan Academic. n.d. 20 May 2011. <http://www-rohan.sds...n/tonkinlie.htm.> “Chronology of American war in Vietnam.” BBC. 30 April 2000. 20 May 2011. <http://news.bbc.co.u...ific/731035.stm.> “Congress Backs President on Southeast Asia Moves; Khanh Sets State of Siege.” New York Times. n.d. 20 May 2011. “Gulf of Tonkin Incident.” Gulf of Tonkin Incident. n.d. 20 May 2011. <http://gulf-of-tonkin-incident.co.tv/.> “Gulf of Tonkin Incident.” Ohio History Central. n.d. 20 May 2011. <http://www.ohiohisto...ry.php?rec=1598.> “Gulf of Tonkin Resolution.” Encyclopedia Britannica Online. n.d. 20 May 2011.<http://www.britannic...nkin-Resolution.> “Gulf of Tonkin.” Gulf of Tonkin. n.d. 20 May 2011. <http://gulf-of-tonkin.co.tv/.> “LBJ Tapes on the Gulf of Tonkin Incident.” The National Security Archive. n.d. 20 May 2011. <http://www.gwu.edu/~...BB132/tapes.htm.> “New Light on Gulf of Tonkin.” University of Houston. n.d. 20 May 2011. <http://vi.uh.edu/pag.../08972_text.htm.> “Robert J. Hanyok: His NSC study on Tonkin Gulf Deception.” George Mason University. 31 October 2005. 20 May 2011.<http://hnn.us/roundu...ries/17620.html.> “The Gulf of Tonkin Incident, 40 Years Later.“ The National Security Archive. 4 August 2004. 20 May 2011. <http://militaryhisto...AEBB/NSAEBB132/.> “Tonkin Gulf Crisis, August 1964” Naval Historical Center. n.d. 20 May 2011. <http://www.history.n...qs/faq120-1.htm.> “Tonkin Gulf Intelligence ‘Skewed’ According to Official History and Intercepts.“ The National Security Archive. 1 December 2005. 20 May 2011. <http://www.gwu.edu/~...ess20051201.htm.> “Vietnam War – LBJ – Period: 1960s.” Digital History. n.d. 20 May 2011. <http://www.digitalhi...ay.cfm?HHID=618.> Davis, Kenneth C. “Gulf of Tonkin Resolution: a Somber History Lesson.” The Huffington Post. 7 August 2009. 20 May 2011. <http://www.huffingto...n_b_253722.html.> Edited July 2, 2012 by Steven Gaal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Len Colby Posted July 1, 2012 Share Posted July 1, 2012 Yawn, I doubt many people who read threads here were not previously aware of Gladio but it is unclear which incidents they were indeed responsible for. Nor will your claims about the GoT come as news to many (if any) here. The 1st attack definitely happened that is not disputed and the 2nd seems to have been fog of war rather than false flag. That said the Johnson seems to have known the truth and distorted to achieve its goals. Also since the US was an undeclared party to the war the incident(s) did NOT serve as a casus belli Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steven Gaal Posted July 1, 2012 Author Share Posted July 1, 2012 (edited) I doubt many people who read threads here were not previously aware of Gladio // END Colby ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Gee, Colby before said "IF" Galdio happened . May I politely say sir , you can not be taken seriously. However its good news to learn your becoming a solid (but nascent ), "false flag" man. ________________________________________________________________________________________ Also since the US was an undeclared party to the war the incident(s) did NOT serve as a casus belli // END Colby +++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Just dont understand you. The incidence(s) were the catalyst for change between covert action and going to war. ============================================= Wiki The outcome of these two incidents was the passage by Congress of the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which granted President Lyndon B. Johnson the authority to assist any Southeast Asian country whose government was considered to be jeopardized by "communist aggression". The resolution served as Johnson's legal justification for deploying U.S. conventional forces and the commencement of open warfare against North Vietnam. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Distortion of the event Evidence was still being sought on the night of August 4 when Johnson gave his address to the American public on the incident. Messages recorded that day indicate that neither President Johnson nor McNamara was certain of an attack.[28] Various news sources, including Time, Life and Newsweek, ran articles throughout August on the Tonkin Gulf incident.[29] Time reported: "Through the darkness, from the West and south…intruders boldly sped…at least six of them… they opened fire on the destroyers with automatic weapons, this time from as close as 2,000 yards."[30] Time stated that there was "no doubt in Sharp’s mind that the U.S. would now have to answer this attack", and that there was no debate or confusion within the administration regarding the incident.[30] ((GAAL/ Hows Colby's reliable sources doing ??? / end GAAL )) The use of the set of incidents as a pretext for escalation of U.S. involvement follows the issuance of public threats against North Vietnam, as well as calls from American politicians in favor of escalating the war.[31] On May 4, 1964, William Bundy called for the U.S. to "drive the Communists out of South Vietnam", even if that meant attacking both North Vietnam and Communist China.[31] Even so, the Johnson administration in the second half of 1964 focused on convincing the American public that there was no chance of war between North Vietnam and the U.S.[31] North Vietnamese General Giap suggested that the DESOTO patrol had been sent into the Gulf to provoke North Vietnam into giving an excuse for escalation of the war.[31] Various government officials and men aboard the Maddox have suggested similar theories.[31] American politicians and strategists had been planning provocative actions against North Vietnam for some time. George Ball told a British journalist after the war that "at that time…many people…were looking for any excuse to initiate bombing".[31] Provocative action against North Vietnam was considered after the August, 1964 incidents John McNaughton suggested in September 1964 that the U.S. prepare to take actions to provoke a North Vietnamese military reaction, including plans to use DESOTO patrols North. William Bundy’s paper dated September 8, 1964 suggested more DESOTO patrols as well.[31] +++++++++++++++++++++++++ 28 Wise, David (1973). The Politics of Lying: government deception, secrecy, and power. New York: Vintage Books. ISBN 0-394-47932-7. 29 Bradlee, Ben (29 April 1987). "Deceit and dishonesty - The first James Cameron Memorial Lecture". The Guardian (London). http://emperor's...ive/bradlee.htm. The Emperor's New Clothes. Web. 26 October 2009. 30^ a b "Action in Tonkin Gulf". Time. 14 August 1964. 31 http://www.time.com/...,897225,00.html. Retrieved 28 October 2009. 31^ abcdefg Moïse 1996. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++ ########################## ++++++++++++++++++++++++++ http://www.pnsr.org/.../3/interior.asp INTRODUCTION: On August 2, 1964, the USS Maddox was patrolling waters in the Gulf of Tonkin when three North Vietnamese vessels approached. Two days later, the Maddox reported that it again had been engaged by the North Vietnamese. These events set into motion direct U.S. military involvement in the Vietnamese civil war. On the morning of August 5, President Lyndon B. Johnson sent the Southeast Asia or Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, authorizing force as a response to the possible state of emergency, to Congress. Although reports from the Maddox appeared to catalyze the resolution, cabinet officials had been planning an incursion into Vietnam since the Kennedy administration. The language of the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution itself had been written months before the events in the gulf. After less than two days of debate, the resolution passed the Senate 88 to 2. It then passed 416 to 0 in the House. Vague language in Section 2 of the resolution enabled President Johnson to subsequently use the military authorization as a “blank check” to launch escalating attacks and ultimately full scale war against North Vietnam. +++++++++++++++ According to John Judge his mother , a secretary working under the Joint Chiefs of Staff, starting working on a war project with 50,000 deaths ( Vietnam War) on Nov. 26,1963. Her next work day. Golly makes ya think ,dont it ?????????????????????????? Edited July 2, 2012 by Steven Gaal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Len Colby Posted July 1, 2012 Share Posted July 1, 2012 I never said Gladio didn't happen I said "it is unclear which incidents they were indeed responsible for" As for the GoTI what I meant is that since the US was already a belligerent the incident did not justify further American involvement. . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steven Gaal Posted July 22, 2012 Author Share Posted July 22, 2012 (edited) I never said Gladio didn't happen I said "it is unclear which incidents they were indeed responsible for" As for the GoTI what I meant is that since the US was already a belligerent the incident did not justify further American involvement. . ============================================================ OK ,TO MAKE CLEAR TO YOU OF WHO REPONSIBLE FOR GLADIO . The nexus between terror propaganda and terrorism: Bremer and Jenkins By Kevin Ryan Posted on July 21, 2012 http://911blogger.co...mer-and-jenkins Operation Northwoods called “for a wave of violent terrorism to be launched in Washington, D.C., Miami, and elsewhere. People would be framed for bombings they did not commit; planes would be hijacked. [This would provide] the public and international backing they needed to launch their war.”[10] The signed documents are available today and because of this we know that high level U.S. government representatives conspire, on occasion, to commit crimes against the American people for the purpose of starting wars.[11] Although Operations Northwoods was rejected by President Kennedy, the plan becomes more interesting historically when one considers the ensuing activities of the members of the JCS who approved that plan. For example, JCS chaiman Lyman Leminitzer went directly from approving Operation Northwoods in 1962 to become Supreme Allied Commander in Europe (SACEUR), from 1963 to 1969, putting him in charge of NATO forces. According to author Daniele Ganser, the SACEUR ran an agency called the Clandestine Planning Committee (CPC) that was responsible for coordinating Operation Gladio.[12] Gladio was a well-coordinated covert campaign of terrorism directed by the U.S. and other Western governments against their own populations. Hundreds of innocent people were killed or maimed in terrorist attacks which were then blamed on leftist subversives or other political opponents. Italian General Paolo Inzerilli commanded the Italian forces of Gladio from 1974 to 1986 and he later said that “the omnipresent United States dominated the secret CPC that directed the secret war.”[13] » Edited July 22, 2012 by Steven Gaal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Len Colby Posted July 27, 2012 Share Posted July 27, 2012 Is Angol not your 1st language Mr. Gaal? Once again I said "it is unclear which incidents they [Gladio] were indeed responsible for" I never disputed who was responsible for Gladio. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steven Gaal Posted July 27, 2012 Author Share Posted July 27, 2012 (edited) Is Angol not your 1st language Mr. Gaal? Once again I said "it is unclear which incidents they [Gladio] were indeed responsible for" I never disputed who was responsible for Gladio. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Gee LEN GOOGLE ......... ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ ARTHUR E. ROWSE'S EXHAUSTIVE INVESTIGATION OF THE ORIGINS AND ACTIVITIES OF THE DECADES-LONG COVERT U.S. EFFORT TO INFLUENCE ITALIAN POLITICS MARKS THE FIRST COMPREHENSIVE LOOK AT "GLADIO" IN A U.S. PUBLICATION. ARTHUR E. ROWSE, FORMERLY ON THE STAFF OF THE WASHINGTON POST AND U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT IS AVAILABLE FOR INTERVIEWS. ((1996-Feb-23)) +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ http://www.mega.nu/ampp/gladio.html source www.worldmedia.com/caq/articles/gladio.html +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ ****************************************** GLADIO: THE SECRET U.S. WAR TO SUBVERT ITALIAN DEMOCRACY This January, Silvio Berlusconi rode onto the turbulent Italian political scene on a white charger. Voters had become disenchanted with long-time centrist leaders who were mired in massive corruption scandals. With crucial parliamentary elections only two months away and the likelihood that the left would win power for the first time since World War II, 1 the billionaire businessman entered the fray with a slate of right-wing candidates who had never held office. Helped by voter disgust and his own vast media and industrial holdings, Berlusconi's coalition won big, averting the anticipated leftist victory. His win lifted the right, including the neo-fascists, to new postwar heights. 2 Real change seemed unlikely, however, as Berlusconi repackaged the old politics with new names and slogans. Berlusconi himself was weaned on the system and owed much of his success to Bettino Craxi, a former Socialist prime minister who went on trial for corruption the day after the March election. It wasn't long before the right's ``clean hands'' were upstaged by arms raised in fascist salutes and cries of ``Il Duce.'' by Arthur E. Rowse ****************************************** While Berlusconi's rapid ascent took most observers by surprise, the stage was set for it by nearly 50 years of U.S. interference in Italian politics. In the name of fighting communism, the U.S. helped generate a level of political turmoil that sometimes approached civil war. U.S. agents and their Italian surrogates took control of key government agencies, at times reducing Italian democracy to little more than a proving ground for the CIA's and the White House's aggressive tactics. The undercover campaign, known as ``Gladio,'' for a double-edged Roman sword, was officially acknowledged for the first time in 1990, when it was finally closed down. THE DIMENSIONS OF GLADIO The Italian people had received many signs over the years that the centrist parties (the Christian Democrats and the Socialists) were promoted and to some degree controlled by Washington. But it was only when the Italian government officially admitted it in 1990 that the ruling coalition began to crumble, ready to be picked apart two years later by corruption scandals. The startling story of Gladio, which continues to make headlines in Europe, has barely been mentioned in the U.S., where many of its darkest chapters remain secret. The program in Italy was aimed at the threat that communists might mount an insurrection or gain a share of political power through the ballot box. An insurrection was unlikely, however, since nearly all posts in the bureaucracy were filled after the war by solidly anticommunist veterans of Mussolini's forces, with Allied approval. During the war, most Americans considered themselves heroes who freed Western Europe from its brutal Nazi and fascist rulers. It wasn't long after the American landings on Italian soil, however, that the white hats got sullied. While some OSS agents worked with antifascists to help lay the basis for Italian democracy, many of those higher up the ladder conspired with backers of Mussolini or the former king to impede it. 3 Although many European intelligence agencies have admitted participating, the CIA has denied any connection with Gladio. But enough information has emerged to show that the CIA sponsored and financed a large portion of the terrorism and disruption that plagued Italy for nearly half a century. Among other things, the U.S. government: Forged secret alliances with the Mafia and right-wing elements of the Vatican to prevent the left from playing any role in government; Recruited Mussolini's ex-police into paramilitary bands secretly financed and trained by the CIA, ostensibly to fight Soviets, but really to conduct terror attacks blamed on the left; Employed the gamut of psychological warfare tactics, including paying millions in slush funds to political parties, journalists, and other influential contacts to tilt parliamentary elections against the left; Created a secret service and a parallel government structure linked to the CIA whose ``assets'' attempted several times to overthrow the elected government; and Targeted Prime Minister Aldo Moro, who was later kidnapped and murdered under mysterious circumstances after offering to bring communists into the Cabinet. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- THE SECRET NATO COVER The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) provided international cover for Washington's postwar operations in Italy. A secret clause in the initial NATO agreement in 1949 required that before a nation could join, it must have already established a national security authority to fight communism through clandestine citizen cadres. This ``Stay Behind'' clause grew out of a secret committee set up at U.S. insistence in the Atlantic Pact, the forerunner of NATO. Each NATO member was also required to send delegates to semiannual meetings on the subject. 4 U.S. authority for such moves flowed in a steady stream of presidential directives transmitted through the National Security Council (NSC). In December 1950, the council gave the armed forces carte blanche to use ``appropriate'' military force even if the communists merely ``gain participation'' in government by legal means or ``threaten to achieve control...or the government ceases to evidence a determination to oppose communist internal or external threats.'' 5 The CIA helped the Italian police set up secret squadrons staffed in many cases with veterans of Mussolini's secret police. 6 The squadrons were trained for intensive espionage and counter-espionage, against communists and other perceived enemies of the status quo. The plan to use ``exceptional means'' was patterned after the highly militarized French intelligence service, the Suret Nationale, which was reportedly so tough on communists that many fled to other countries. 7 The newly organized intelligence agency, SIFAR, began operations in September 1949, under the supervision of an undercover American, Carmel Offie, nicknamed ``godfather'' by the Italians. 8 Interior Minister Mario Scelba headed the operation. At the same time, Scelba was directing a brutal repression, murdering hundreds of workers and peasants who sought improved conditions after the war. 9 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- OPERATION DEMAGNETIZE With the Italian secret service under control, the Americans then expanded it under the name Operation Demagnetize and tied it to an existing network of cadre in northern Italy. In 1951, the Italian secret service formally agreed to set up a clandestine organization within the military to coordinate with the northern cadres. In 1952, SIFAR received secret orders from Washington to adopt ``a series of political, paramilitary and psychological operations destined to diminish the power of the Italian Communist Party, its material resources, and its influence on government. This priority objective must be attained by all means.'' 10 Operation Demagnetize marked the institutional hardening of Gladio. A State Department historian characterized it as the ``strategy of stabilization,'' 11 although it could be more accurately described as one of destabilization. From the start, the offensive was secretly directed and funded by the U.S. government. In 1956, the arrangement was formalized in a written agreement, using the name ``Gladio'' for the first time. According to 1956 documents uncovered in Italy in 1990, Gladio was divided into independent cells coordinated from a CIA camp in Sardinia. These ``special forces'' included 40 main groups. Ten specialized in sabotage, six each in espionage, propaganda, evasion and escape tactics, and 12 in guerrilla activities. Another division handled the training of agents and commandos. These ``special forces'' had access to underground arms caches, which included hand guns, grenades, high-tech explosives, daggers, 60-millimeter mortars, 57-millimeter machine guns and precision rifles. 12 In 1956, Gen. Giovanni De Lorenzo was named to head SIFAR on the recommendation of U.S. Ambassador Claire Boothe Luce, the avidly anticommunist wife of the publisher of Time magazine. 13 A key player in Gladio was now in place. In 1962, the CIA helped place De Lorenzo at the head of the national police (carabinieri), while he retained effective control of the secret service. The general brought with him 17 lieutenants to begin purging insufficiently right-wing officers. It was the first step to a right-wing coup attempt, with U.S. military attaché Vernon Walters in the vanguard. In a memo to De Lorenzo the same year, Walters suggested types of intervention aimed at provoking a national crisis, including blocking a center-left coalition, creating schisms among the socialists, and funding forces favorable to the status quo. 14 Meanwhile, according to CIA files found in Rome in 1984, CIA station chief William Harvey began to recruit ``action teams'' based on a list of 2,000 men capable of throwing bombs, conducting attacks, and accompanying these actions with indispensable propaganda. 15 These teams had a chance to practice their skills in 1963 as part of an anti-union offensive. U.S.-trained gladiators dressed as police and civilians attacked construction workers peacefully demonstrating in Rome, leaving some 200 wounded and a large section of the city in shambles. The link to Gladio was made in later testimony by a former general in the secret service. 16 SIFAR Lt. Col. Renzo Rocca was also training a civil militia composed of ex-soldiers, parachutists and members of Junio Valerio ``Black Prince'' Borghese's paramilitary organization, Decima MAS (Tenth Torpedo Boat Squadron), for the pending coup. 17 President Antonio Segni reportedly knew of the plan, which was to conclude with the assassination of Prime Minister Aldo Moro, under fire for not being tough enough with the communists. 18 The long-planned takeover, known later as Plan Solo, fizzled in March 1964, when the key carabinieri involved remained in their barracks. As a subsequent inquiry moved to question Rocca about the coup attempt, he apparently killed himself, possibly to fulfill Gladio's oath of silence. After officials determined that state secrets were involved, three hamstrung inquiries failed to determine the guilty parties. 19 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- THE STRATEGY OF TENSION Despite the failure of Plan Solo, the CIA and the Italian right had largely succeeded in creating the clandestine structures envisioned in Operation Demagnetize. Now the plotters turned their attention to a renewed offensive against the left. To win intellectual support, the secret services set up a conference in Rome at the luxurious Parco dei Principi hotel in May 1965, for a ``study'' of ``revolutionary war.'' The choice of words was inadvertently revealing, since the conveners and invited participants were planning a real revolution, not just warning of an imaginary communist takeover. The meeting was essentially a reunion of fascists, right-wing journalists, and military personnel. ``The strategy of tension'' that emerged was designed to disrupt normality with terror attacks in order to create chaos and provoke a frightened public into accepting still more authoritarian government. 20 Several ``graduates'' of this exercise had long records of anticommunist actions and would later be implicated in some of Italy's worst massacres. One was journalist and secret agent Guido Giannettini. Four years earlier, he had conducted a seminar at the U.S. Naval Academy on ``The Techniques and Prospects of a Coup d'Etat in Europe.'' Another was notorious fascist Stefano Delle Chiaie, who had reportedly been recruited as a secret agent in 1960. He had organized his own armed band known as Avanguardia Nationale (AN), whose members had begun training in terror tactics in preparation for Plan Solo. 21 General De Lorenzo, whose SIFAR had now become SID, soon enlisted these and other confidants in a new Gladio project. They planned to create a secret parallel force alongside sensitive government offices to neutralize subversive elements not yet ``purified.'' Known as the Parallel SID, its tentacles reached into nearly every key institution of the Italian state. Gen.Vito Miceli, who later headed SID, said he set up the separate structure ``at the request of the Americans and NATO.'' 22 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- FRATERNAL BONDS Two ancient, mysterious, international fraternities kept the loosely-linked Gladio programs from flying apart. The Knights of Malta played a formative role after the war (see box), but the order of Freemasonry and its most notorious lodge in Italy, known as Propaganda Due (pronounced ``doo-ay'' ), or P-2, was far more influential. In the late 1960s, its ``Most Venerable Master'' was Licio Gelli, a Knight of Malta who fought for Franco with Mussolini's Black Shirts. At the end of World War II, Gelli faced execution by Italian partisans for his Nazi collaboration, but escaped by joining the U.S. Army Counter Intelligence Corps. 23 In the 1950s, he was recruited by SIFAR. After some years of self-imposed exile in Argentine fascist circles,24 he saw his calling in Italy as a Mason. Quickly rising to its top post, he began fraternizing in 1969 with Gen. Alexander Haig, then assistant to Henry Kissinger, President Nixon's national security chief. Gelli became the main intermediary between the CIA and SID's De Lorenzo, also a Mason and Knight. Gelli's first order from the White House was reportedly to recruit 400 more top Italian and NATO officials. 25 To help ferret out dissidents, Gelli and De Lorenzo began compiling personal dossiers on thousands of people, including legislators and clerics. 26 Within a few years, scandal erupted when an inquiry found 157,000 such files in SID, all available to the Ministers of Defense and Interior. 27 Parliament ordered 34,000 files burned, but by then the CIA had obtained duplicates for its archives. 28 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Provocateurs on the Right In 1968, the Americans started formal commando training for the gladiators at the clandestine Sardinian ``NATO'' base. Within a few years, 4,000 graduates had been placed in strategic posts. At least 139 arms caches, including some at carabinieri barracks, were at their disposal. 29 To induce young men to join such a risky venture, the CIA paid high salaries and promised that if they were killed, their children would be educated at U.S. expense. 30 Tensions began to reach critical mass that same year. While dissidents took to the streets all over the world, in Italy, takeovers of universities and strikes for higher wages and pensions were overshadowed by a series of bloody political crimes. The number of terrorist acts reached 147 in 1968, rising to 398 the next year, and to an incredible peak of 2,498 in 1978 before tapering off, largely because of a new law encouraging informers ( penitenti ). 31 Until 1974, the indiscriminate bombers of the right constituted the main force behind political violence. The first major explosion occurred in 1969 in Milan's Piazza Fontana; it killed 18 people and injured 90. In this and numerous other massacres, anarchists proved handy scapegoats for fascist provocateurs seeking to blame the left. Responding to a phone tip after the Milan massacre, police arrested 150 alleged anarchists and even put some on trial. But two years later, new evidence led to the indictment of several neofascists and SID officers. Three innocent anarchists were convicted, but later absolved, while those responsible for the attack emerged unpunished by Italian justice. 32 Conclusive Gladio links to political violence were found after a plane exploded in flight near Venice in November 1973. Venetian judge Carlo Mastelloni determined that the Argo-16 aircraft was used to shuttle trainees and munitions between the U.S. base in Sardinia and Gladio sites in northeast Italy.33 The apogee of right-wing terror came in 1974 with two massacres. One, a bombing at an antifascist rally in Brescia, killed eight and injured 102. The other was an explosion on the Italicus train near Bologna, killing 12 and wounding 105. At this point, President Giovanni Leone, with little exaggeration, summed up the situation: "With 10,000 armed civilians running around, as usual, I'm president of xxxx." 34 At Brescia, the initial call to police also blamed anarchists, but the malefactor later turned out to be a secret agent in the Parallel SID. 35 A similar connection was also alleged in the Italicus case. Two fascists who were eventually convicted were members of a clandestine police group called the Black Dragons, according to the left-wing paper, Lotta Continua. 36 Their sentences were also overturned. Although in these and other cases, many leftists were arrested and tried, fascists or neofascists were often the culprits, in league with Gladio groups and the Italian secret services. Reflecting the degree to which these forces controlled the government through the Parallel SID, nearly all the rightists implicated in these atrocities were later freed. By 1974, right-wing terror began to be answered by the armed left, which favored carefully targeted hit-and-run attacks over the right's indiscriminate bombings. For the next six years, leftist militants, especially the Red Brigades, responded with a vengeance, accounting for far more acts of political violence than the right. 37 For several years, Italy plunged into a virtual civil war. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- PLOTTING COUPS D'ETAT Meanwhile, groups of right-wingers were busy planning more takeovers of the elected government, with the active encouragement of U.S. officials. A seminal document was the 1970 132-page order on ``stability operations'' in ``host'' countries, published as Supplement B of the U.S. Army's Field Manual 30-31. Taking its cue from earlier NSC and CIA papers, the manual explained that if a country is not sufficiently anticommunist, ``serious attention must be given to possible modifications of the structure.'' If that country does not react with adequate ``vigor,'' the document continues, ``groups acting under U.S. Army intelligence control should be used to launch violent or nonviolent actions according to the nature of the case.'' 38 With such incendiary suggestions and thousands of U.S.-trained guerrillas ready, the fascists again attempted to take over the government by force in 1970. This time, the instigator was the ``Black Prince'' Borghese. Fifty men under the command of Stefano Delle Chiaie seized the Interior Ministry in Rome after being let in at night by an aide to political police head Federico D'Amato. But the operation was aborted when Borghese received a mysterious phone call later attributed to General Vito Miceli, the military intelligence chief. The plotters were not arrested; instead, they left with 180 stolen machine guns. 39 News of the attack remained secret until an informer tipped the press three months later. By then, the culprits had escaped to Spain. Although the ringleaders were convicted in 1975, the verdict was overturned on appeal. All but one of the machine guns were returned earlier. 40 It was in this atmosphere that the U.S. decided to make another all-out effort to block the communists from gaining strength in the 1972 elections. According to the Pike Report, the CIA disbursed $10 million to 21 candidates, mostly Christian Democrats. 41 That amount did not include $800,000 that Ambassador Graham Martin, going around the CIA, obtained through Henry Kissinger at the White House for General Miceli. 42 Miceli would later face charges for the Borghese coup attempt but, fitting the pattern, he was cleared. Police foiled another attempted coup that same year. They found hit lists and other documents exposing some 20 subversive groups forming the Parallel SID structure. Roberto Cavallaro, a fascist trade unionist, was implicated, as were highly placed generals, who said they got approval from NATO and U.S. officials. In later testimony, Cavallaro said the group was set up to restore order after any trouble arose. ``When these troubles do not erupt [by themselves],'' he said, ``they are contrived by the far right.'' Gen. Miceli was arrested, but the courts eventually freed him, declaring that there had been no insurrection. 43 Still another right-wing attempt to overthrow the government was set for 1974, reportedly with the imprimatur of both the CIA and NATO. Its leader was Edgardo Sogno, one of Italy's most decorated resistance fighters, who had formed a Gladio-style group after the war. Sogno, who had gained many influential American friends while working at the Italian embassy in Washington during the 1960s, was later arrested, but he, too, was eventually cleared. 44 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- GLADIO UNRAVELS A triple murder at Peteano near Venice in May 1972 turned out to be pivotal in exposing Gladio. The crime occurred when three carabinieri, in response to an anonymous phone call, went to check out a suspicious car. When one of them opened the hood, all three were blown to bits by a boobytrap bomb. 45 An anonymous call two days later implicated the Red Brigades, the most active of the left's revolutionary groups. The police immediately rounded up 200 alleged communists, thieves and pimps for questioning, but no charges were brought. Ten years later, a courageous Venetian magistrate, Felice Casson, reopened the long-dormant case only to learn that there had been no police investigation at the scene. Despite receiving a false analysis from a secret service bomb expert and confronting numerous obstructions and delays, the judge traced the explosives to a militant outfit called New Order and to one of its active members, Vincenzo Vinciguerra. He promptly confessed and was sentenced to life, the only right-wing bomber ever locked up. 46 Vinciguerra refused to implicate others, but described the coverup: "The carabinieri, the Ministry of Interior, the Customs and Excise police, the civilian and military secret services all knew the truth behind the attack, that I was responsible and all this within 20 days. So they decided, for totally political reasons, to cover it up. 47" As for his motive, the fascist true believer Vinciguerra said his misdeed was ``an act of revolt against the manipulation'' of neofascism since 1945 by the whole Gladio-based parallel structure. 48 Casson eventually found enough incriminating evidence to implicate the highest officials of the land. In what was the first such request to an Italian president, Casson demanded explanations from President Francesco Cossiga. But Casson didn't stop there; he also demanded that other officials come clean. In October 1990, under pressure from Casson, Prime Minister Giulio Andreotti ended 30 years of denials and described Gladio in detail. He added that all prime ministers had been aware of Gladio, though some later denied it. 49 Suddenly, Italians saw clues to many mysteries, including the unexplained death of Pope John Paul I in 1978. Author David Yallop lists Gelli as a suspect in that case, saying that he, ``for all practical purposes, ran Italy at the time.'' 50 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- MEMENTO MORO Perhaps the most shocking political crime of the 1970s was the kidnapping and murder of Prime Minister Aldo Moro and five of his aides in 1978. The abduction occurred as Moro was on his way to submit a plan to strengthen Italian political stability by bringing communists into the government. Earlier versions of the plan had sent U.S. officials into a tizzy. Four years before his death, on a visit to the U.S. as foreign minister, Moro was reportedly read the riot act by Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and later by an unnamed intelligence official. In testimony during the inquiry into his murder, Moro's widow summed up their ominous words: ``You must abandon your policy of bringing all the political forces in your country into direct collaboration...or you will pay dearly for it.'' 51 Moro was so shaken by the threats, according to an aide, that he became ill the next day and cut short his U.S. visit, saying he was through with politics. 52 But U.S. pressure continued; Senator Henry Jackson (D-Wash.) issued a similar warning two years later in an interview in Italy. 53 Shortly before his kidnapping, Moro wrote an article replying to his U.S. critics, but decided not to publish it. 54 While being held captive for 55 days, Moro pleaded repeatedly with his fellow Christian Democrats to accept a ransom offer to exchange imprisoned Red Brigade members for his freedom. But they refused, to the delight of Allied officials who wanted the Italians to play hardball. In a letter found later, Moro predicted: ``My death will fall like a curse on all Christian Democrats, and it will initiate a disastrous and unstoppable collapse of all the party apparatus.'' 55 During Moro's captivity, police unbelievably claimed to have questioned millions of people and searched thousands of dwellings. But the initial judge investigating the case, Luciano Infelisi, said he had no police at his disposal. ``I ran the investigation with a single typist, without even a telephone in the room.'' He added that he received no useful information from the secret services during the time. 56 Other investigating magistrates suggested in 1985 that one reason for the inaction was that all the key officers involved were members of P-2 and were therefore acting at the behest of Gelli and the CIA. 57 Although the government eventually arrested and convicted several Red Brigade members, many in the press and parliament continue to ask whether SID arranged the kidnapping after receiving orders from higher up. Suspicions naturally turned toward the U.S., particularly Henry Kissinger, though he denied any role in the crime. In Gladio and the Mafia, Washington had the perfect apparatus for doing such a deed without leaving a trace. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- PENETRATING THE RED BRIGADES That the Red Brigades had been thoroughly infiltrated for years by both the CIA and the Italian secret services is no longer contested. The purpose of the operation was to encourage violence from extremist sectors of the left in order to discredit the left as a whole. The Red Brigades were a perfect foil. With unflinching radicalism, they considered the Italian Communist Party too moderate and Moro's opening too compromising. The Red Brigades worked closely with the Hyperion Language School in Paris, with some members not realizing it had CIA ties. The school had been founded by three pseudo-revolutionary Italians, one of whom, Corrado Simioni, had worked for the CIA at Radio Free Europe. 58 Another, Duccio Berio, has admitted passing information about Italian leftist groups to SID. 59 Hyperion opened an office in Italy shortly before the kidnapping and closed it a few months later. An Italian police report said Hyperion may be ``the most important CIA office in Europe.'' 60 Mario Moretti, one of those who handled arms deals and the Paris connection for the Red Brigades, managed to avoid arrest in the Moro case for three years even though he personally handled the kidnapping. 61 Venice magistrate Carlo Mastelloni concluded in 1984 that the Red Brigades had for years received arms from the PLO. 62 Mastelloni wrote that ``the de facto secret service level accord between the USA and the PLO was considered relevant to the present investigation into the ... relationship between the Red Brigades organization and the PLO.'' 63 One Gladio scholar, Phillip Willan, concludes that ``the arms deal between the PLO and the Red Brigades formed part of the secret accord between the PLO and the CIA.'' 64 His research indicates that the alleged deal between the CIA and the PLO occurred in 1976, a year after the U.S. promised Israel that it would have no political contacts with the PLO. At the time of the Moro kidnapping, several leaders of the Brigades were in prison, having been turned in by a double agent after they kidnapped a judge. According to journalist Gianni Cipriani, one of those arrested was carrying phone numbers and personal notes leading to a high official of SID, who had boasted openly of having agents inside the Red Brigades. Other intriguing finds included the discovery in the Brigade offices of a printing press which had previously belonged to SID and ballistics tests showing more than half of the 92 bullets at the kidnapping scene were similar to those in Gladio stocks. 65 Several people have noted the unlikelihood of the Red Brigades pulling off such a smooth, military-style kidnapping in the center of Rome. Alberto Franceschini, a jailed member of the Brigades, said, ``I never thought my comrades outside had the capacity to carry out a complex military operation. ... We remembered ourselves as an organization formed by inexperienced young lads.'' 66 Two days after the crime, one secret service officer told the press that the perpetrators appeared to have had special commando training. 67 When letters written by Moro were found later in a Red Brigades site in Milan, investigators hoped they would reveal key evidence. But Francesco Biscioni, who studied Moro's responses to his captors' questions, concluded that important sections had been excised when they were transcribed. Nonetheless, in one uncensored passage, Moro worried about how Andreotti's ``smooth relationships with his colleagues of the CIA'' would affect his fate. 68 The two people with the most knowledge of Moro's letters were murdered. The Carabiniere general in charge of anti-terrorism, Carlo Alberto Della Chiesa, was transferred to Sicily and killed Mafia-style in 1982, a few months after raising questions about the missing letters. 69 Maverick journalist Mino Pecorelli was assassinated on a Rome street in 1979 just a month after reporting that he had obtained a list of 56 fascists betrayed to the police by Gelli. 70 Thomas Buscetta, a Mafia informer under witness protection in the U.S., accused Andreotti of ordering both killings for fear of being exposed. 71 But an inquiry by his political peers last year found no reason to prosecute the prime minister. Della Chiesa and Pecorelli were only two of numerous witnesses and potential witnesses murdered before they could be questioned by judges untainted by links to Gladio. 72 President Cossiga, the interior minister when Moro died, told BBC: ``Aldo Moro's death still weighs heavily on the Christian Democrats as does the decision I came to, which turned my hair white, to practically sacrifice Moro to save the Republic.'' 73 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Edited July 27, 2012 by Steven Gaal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Len Colby Posted July 28, 2012 Share Posted July 28, 2012 He attributes several attacks to "fascists" but only a few directly to security services, unfortunately the page does NOT include his source notes thus it isn't possible to verify his claims. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steven Gaal Posted July 28, 2012 Author Share Posted July 28, 2012 He attributes several attacks to "fascists" but only a few directly to security services, unfortunately the page does NOT include his source notes thus it isn't possible to verify his claims. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ For a few bucks you can get the source notes. Arthur E. Rowse, GLADIO: THE SECRET U.S. WAR TO SUBVERT ITALIAN DEMOCRACY. Covert Action Quarterly: December 1994 HERES one for free http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9556 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Len Colby Posted July 28, 2012 Share Posted July 28, 2012 To tie the US/Gladio to Italian attacks both depend largely on the claims of Gen. Gianadelio Maletti but he only said that the US and Italians knew of upcoming attacks and failed to stop them rather than they were directly responsible, he did say this till 2000, decades after the facts in question. He is a questionable source. According to his Wiki bio he was fired in 1975 and was arrested in 1976 for trying help an fascist terrorist escape from prison. http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=it&u=http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gianadelio_Maletti&prev=/search%3Fq%3DGianadelio%2BMaletti%26hl%3Den%26rlz%3D1C1FDUM_enUS493US493%26prmd%3Dimvns&sa=X&ei=inkUUO7fD4v2mAWHo4H4Aw&ved=0CGUQ7gEwAA thus it is especially surprising Menashe failed Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steven Gaal Posted August 2, 2012 Author Share Posted August 2, 2012 (edited) ((General Gianadelio Maletti took over part of SID that covered up for Bureau of Confidential Affairs that worked for NATO's Gladio and he also participated with the fascists who layed false blame on the left. Maletti was an insider,thus his limited hangout,decreases his credibilty,but this does not negate the truth that NATO via intermediaries killed hundreds for political gain.Gaal)) ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ see http://secretsandbom...adelio-maletti/ ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ So who was ultimately responsible for the Piazza Fontana massacre? And if D’Amato controlled Delle Chiaie, is it conceivable that he was unaware of the latter’s part in the bombings in Rome on 12 December 1969? The idea that D’Amato was implicated is anything but a fantasy, given that the Bureau of Confidential Affairs stepped in to protect the activities of the Freda-Ventura group. ....... .......In its strategy of chasing political wild geese and conjuring up false evidence or mounting provocations, the Bureau of Confidential Affairs had a sound ally, but one with whom it had serious differences, as happens in the world of espionage. That partner occupied the Palazzo Barachini, the headquarters of the SID......General Vito Miceli held the top job at the SID on 18 October 1970, having taken over from Admiral Eugenio Henke who went on to become army chief of staff. In June 1971 General Gianadelio Maletti arrived to take over D Bureau at the SID — its most sensitive department — from Colonel Federico Gasca Queirazza..... ......When a discernable fascist lead surfaced in connection with the Piazza Fontana massacre and it become increasingly less concealable, the new bosses of the Italian secret services played their role well as misleaders and provocateurs. First they came up with false documents, which they fed to the judges in dribs and drabs...In March 1973, Giovanni Ventura was in Monza prison being questioned by the Milan judges Gerardo D’Ambrosio and Emilio Alessandrini. Ventura was looking for a way out and was beginning to confess. ((AND IMPLICATE MALETTI,Gaal)) The easiest solution was an escape, something Maletti left to Giannettini to organise. Delfo Zorzi told Carlo Digilio to help Giannettini arrange Ventura’s escape: “Arrange for him to escape. Otherwise Ventura is going to talk.” ((BUT HE GOT CAUGHT,Gaal )) But it did not begin immediately. It was not until 27 January 1975 that proceedings opened, proceedings that would find the anarchists — Pietro Valpreda, Emilio Bagnoli, Emilio, Roberto Gargamelli, Ivo Della Savia and Enrici Di Cola; Valpreda’s relations — Maddalena Valpreda, Ele Lovati, Rachele Torri and Olimpia Torri — in the dock beside the indescribable Mario Merlino, the Nazi-fascists: Franco Freda, Giovanni Ventura, Stefano Delle Chiaie, Marco Pozzan and Piero Loredan di Volpato del Montello; fascists working for the secret services: Guido Giannettini and Stefano Serpieri, and SID officers: Gianadelio Maletti, Antonio Labruna and Gaetano Tanzilli. ++++++++++++++++ .....Soon afterwards, Maletti’s men faced even more taxing missions because their involvement in the 12 December 1969 bombings; lots of other terrorist activities were about to emerge into the harsh light of day... ++++++++++++++++ ((The corrupt and confused Italian Court System kept lowering Maletti sentence and reopened the trial and ending the evidentiary action in confusion via liability.The Parliamentary report with additional jounalist interviews shapes the correct historical record,NOT the Italian Courts. Gaal)) Edited August 2, 2012 by Steven Gaal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steven Gaal Posted December 14, 2012 Author Share Posted December 14, 2012 German Gladio redux: Neo-Nazi murder scandal engulfs Merkel’s government By Richard Cottrell Contributing writer for End the Lie http://endthelie.com/2012/07/10/german-gladio-redux-neo-nazi-murder-scandal-engulfs-merkels-government/#axzz2F2gHOL54 Germany’s equivalent of the FBI, together with the national police force (BKA), is gripped by the biggest scandal to strike these services since the Baader-Meinhof crisis thirty years ago. The chief of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV, internal intelligence) has resigned in a strange case that once again points to security agencies stirring synthetic violence for political ends. In short, the vintage stripe of NATO’s Gladio secret army operation (see my new book below for more). The departure of 62-year-old Heinz Fromm as Germany’s domestic spy chief is no more than a token gesture. He’ll be replaced safely enough by an identical clone. Names change, ingrained habits don’t. That is the long-running story of BfV, as we will discover in a moment. What is indisputable is that a string of murders committed by an alleged gang of neo-Nazis were allowed to go undetected for thirteen years. A serious charge, of course, but a far larger one is the admission that government agents had been planted within the ranks of a known terror organization on the highest orders, but did nothing to apprehend the culprits. Herr Fromm has gone quietly amid the usual mutterings that “a complete re-think” is needed on the failures of the security services. This is simply humbug. He knew perfectly well that BfV underlings destroyed all incriminating files which pointed to official condolence of a death squad operating on German soil, specifically to erase contaminating evidence of an inside job. The now infamous Operation Rennsteig was apparently a sting operation that planted eight informers inside the a neo-Nazi group calling itself the Thüringer Heimatschutz (meaning, “Thuringian Homeland Protection” or, ironically enough, “Thuringian Homeland Security”). The operation – conducted in Germany’s smallest state, located in the central belt of the country – extended over six years, from 1997 to 2003. An outcrop of this same cell calling itself the ‘National Socialist Underground’ is blamed for the murder of eight Turkish shop owners and a ninth, a Greek, as well as a policewoman, in a reign of terror played out over thirteen years. Other victims were injured by homemade explosive devices. Now that the whitewash windmill is working at full tilt, we hear the same dreary excuses that “no one could have known” when in fact the national intelligence operation and their cohorts in the police force knew all along who was responsible for the killings. One high-profile head offered up on a silver platter is no compensation for deaths of innocents which were undoubtedly intended to provoke and inflame the mood of Germany’s huge Turkish gastarbeiter (guest worker) community, which accounts for roughly 5% of the total population. The Turkish community leader Kenan Kolat could not be blamed for describing the intelligence authorities as in “hopeless shambles.” “Our faith in the German security services has dropped to nearly zero,” he said, adding that the scandal demonstrated clearly that “the state and certain organs of the state are blind to the extreme right.” The political overtones to the case are certainly far more serious than the German media presently admits. Last year the Turkish premier Recep Tayyip Erdogan personally expressed his concerns to Reich Chancellor Angela Merkel concerning the unsolved murders of Turks. Erdogan pointed specifically at “neo-Nazis” (relying on his own well-tuned eyes and ears in Berlin) but he also inferred that the police were not really trying to track down the criminals. Now we know why. The smoking gun is the revelation that four key files were destroyed on November 11, 2011, supposedly out of some bureaucratic tidying up because the time limit for retaining personal data had passed. While this certainly fits the mindset of grinding German bureaucracy, it is more than a coincidence that the files went to the shredder on precisely the same day that a connection was “established” between the neo-Nazi group and the shop-keeper murders. The case was exposed to the daylight when two members of the NSU were found dead, one supposedly having shot his comrade before killing himself. A third female member of the band turned herself in. Thus the incriminating fingerprints of the police and the intelligence agency were quietly expunged from the affair, or so it was clearly intended. The office also destroyed at least four files on its informants within the neo-Nazi group which bore strong links to the terror group. This case looks very much like the tip of a towering iceberg of conspiracy, deception and thorough-going incompetence. While only three figures could be firmly connected with the murders and the Constitution Office, it emerges that a much bigger deal was shaping up out of sight. The BfV was also responsible for recruiting 73 “military age personnel” on behalf of their colleagues in the Military Counter-Intelligence Service (known as MAD). What was the purpose of this exclusive legion unless it was further operations charged with infiltrating and steering terrorist cells? The Bild newspaper said the shredded files named the 73 obviously under-cover agents infiltrating the far right scene. Two of them were the NSU members who were later found dead. There has never been a better illustration of German Gladio redux, bearing in mind that BfV was always among the core management organizations of Gladio activities stretching back to the origins of NATO’s secret army in Germany. BfV has rarely known a quiet moment since its incorporation in 1950. It was immediately flooded with veteran Nazis recruited by Hitler’s legendary Eastern Front spy chief General Reinhard Gehlen. Gehlen himself was the chosen pick of US authorities to become chief of BND, the exterior intelligence service. BfV picked up the overspill from this lush river of Nazis. Of BfV – and indeed the full gamut of German security services – it can truly said that neo-Fascism came with the milk. In one famous episode, BfV’s first chief, Otto John, a legendary survivor of the 1944 Hitler bomb plot, suddenly decamped to the GDR in 1954 for motives which have never been satisfactorily explained. John insisted he was kidnapped by the KGB but it is far more likely he was involved in the “red on black game” played between the two German states. He was convicted of treason but went to his grave strongly protesting innocence. The triumvirate of BfV, BND and the national police authorities stand accused of constantly under-stating or ignoring neo-Right fundamentalism in Germany, fending off Turkish premier Erdogan’s claims of New-Nazi violence as wide of the mark because the shop murders were written off as “criminally inspired burglaries.” Two more prize heads are set to roll. One of these belongs to Jeorg Zierke, head of the Bundeskriminalamt national police for the past twelve years. He says he’ll be “looking into” the failures at BfV. More likely, he will be contemplating his retirement papers. Another is that of the hapless Interior Minister Hans-Pieter Friedrich, who seems to have quietly dozed in his office since he got the job in March last year. In response to public clamor he responded that he simply “could not imagine” wild neo-Nazi fanatics running around Germany with evil intent when every visitor to a large German city will read the warning scrawled on any vacant wall in no time at all. Of course ministers usually get to see what their hirelings select for them. But it is hard to see what the minister responsible for all Germany’s police security agencies can now do now, in the wake of Rennsteig-gate, other than resign in disgrace forthwith. There are two important backdrops to this story. One is the growing angst among Germans at the growing throng of foreigners in their midst, almost 16 million of non-ethnic descent. The ethnic birth rate is frozen while immigrants cheerfully procreate. This is the taboo subject that Germans are reluctant to discuss, while aiming salvoes at lazy Greeks – who in fact work for longer hours and for much less pay than Germans. The second is the hangover of the Rote Armee Fraktion (the Red Army Faction generally better known as the Baader-Meinhof gang). This has left an indelible impression on German security services that the threat to internal stability in Germany arises from the Left (plus of course Islamic militants) instead of Far Right extremists. Rennsteig-gate supplies one important clue that leopards don’t change their spots. The RAF years were characterized by synthetic violence over-lying the urban guerilla protest movements. Of these Baader-Meinhof are inscribed on the tablets of history while the far larger and more violent Revolutionary Cells never yielded a single important captive in twenty years of operations against the state. Now that we see synthetic terrorism is back in fashion, we gain a far clearer image of who was actually conducting operations behind the scenes during the “years of lead” in Germany. Richard Cottrell is a writer, journalist and former European MP (Conservative). His new book Gladio: NATO’s Dagger At The Heart Of Europe is now available from Progressive Press. You may order it using the link below (or by clicking here – Gladio, NATO’s Dagger at the Heart of Europe: The Pentagon-Nazi-Mafia Terror Axis): More at EndtheLie.com - http://EndtheLie.com/2012/07/10/german-gladio-redux-neo-nazi-murder-scandal-engulfs-merkels-government/#ixzz2F2gyWUTz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Len Colby Posted December 16, 2012 Share Posted December 16, 2012 Accounts I've read tell a very different story http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-17137736 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-18674873 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steven Gaal Posted April 11, 2013 Author Share Posted April 11, 2013 (edited) Bilderberg Behind Terrorist Attacks: Italian Supreme Court President Drops Bombshell! http://www.fromthetrenchesworldreport.com/bilderberg-behind-terrorist-attacks-italian-supreme-court-president-drops-bombshell/40735/ Posted on April 11, 2013 by # 1 NWO Hatr Before It’s News – by Live Free or Die Shocking information coming out of Italy today confirms much of what the so-called ‘Conspiracy Theorists’ have known for a long time, there is a secretive ‘Big Brother’ body behind much of the violence in Europe (and America!) including terrorist attacks and assassination attempts as well. This ‘shocking’ story is brought to us by Paul Joseph Watson and Infowars; the following testimony alone should give everyone a cause for alarm: “You had to attack civilians, the people, women, children, innocent people, unknown people far removed from any political game,” Vinciguerra explained in sworn testimony. “The reason was quite simple. They were supposed to force these people, the Italian public, to turn to the state to ask for greater security. This is the political logic that lies behind all the massacres and the bombings which remain unpunished, because the state cannot convict itself or declare itself responsible for what happened,” he added. This story from Paul Joseph Watson and Infowars confirms much of the knowledge already known by millions of Americans, Bilderberg (and their agents of terror) are one evil group and they MUST be held accountable for their crimes against humanity. Paul Joseph Watson Infowars.com April 11, 2013 Honorary President of the Supreme Court of Italy and former Senior Investigative Judge Ferdinando Imposimato, the man who prosecuted the case involving the assassination attempt against Pope John Paul II, has sensationally accused the Bilderberg Group of being behind terrorist attacks in Europe. In an interview with the ArticoloTre website, Imposimato, who was also involved in the case involving the kidnapping and murder of former Italian Prime Minister Aldo Moro, said that he “found a document that left me appalled” implicating the Bilderberg Group in conspiring with the far right organization Ordine Nuovo to commit terror attacks. Speaking of unsolved murders in Italy and the document in his possession, Imposimato stated, “When it comes to slaughter it also speaks of the Bilderberg Group. I believe this document. I did some tests and I can say that behind the strategy of tension and the slaughters there is also the Bilderberg group, a sort of Big Brother is over, maneuvering, using terrorists and Masons.” Anyone who thinks that this ‘reign of terror’ by Bilderberg and their secretive groups is over only needs to watch the Infowars.com video below, which explains Operation Gladio and how the Cold War ‘black op’ continues today. http://beforeitsnews.com/international/2013/04/bilderberg-behind-terrorist-attacks-italian-supreme-court-president-drops-bombshell-2455434.html Edited April 11, 2013 by Steven Gaal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Len Colby Posted April 12, 2013 Share Posted April 12, 2013 Bilderberg Behind Terrorist Attacks: Italian Supreme Court President Drops Bombshell! http://www.fromthetr...ombshell/40735/ Posted on April 11, 2013 by # 1 NWO Hatr Before It’s News – by Live Free or Die Shocking information coming out of Italy today confirms much of what the so-called ‘Conspiracy Theorists’ have known for a long time, there is a secretive ‘Big Brother’ body behind much of the violence in Europe (and America!) including terrorist attacks and assassination attempts as well. This ‘shocking’ story is brought to us by Paul Joseph Watson and Infowars; the following testimony alone should give everyone a cause for alarm: “You had to attack civilians, the people, women, children, innocent people, unknown people far removed from any political game,” Vinciguerra explained in sworn testimony. “The reason was quite simple. They were supposed to force these people, the Italian public, to turn to the state to ask for greater security. This is the political logic that lies behind all the massacres and the bombings which remain unpunished, because the state cannot convict itself or declare itself responsible for what happened,” he added. This story from Paul Joseph Watson and Infowars confirms much of the knowledge already known by millions of Americans, Bilderberg (and their agents of terror) are one evil group and they MUST be held accountable for their crimes against humanity Yet another highly credible source. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vincenzo_Vinciguerra . Paul Joseph Watson Infowars.com April 11, 2013 Honorary President of the Supreme Court of Italy and former Senior Investigative Judge Ferdinando Imposimato, the man who prosecuted the case involving the assassination attempt against Pope John Paul II, has sensationally accused the Bilderberg Group of being behind terrorist attacks in Europe. In an interview with the ArticoloTre website, Imposimato, who was also involved in the case involving the kidnapping and murder of former Italian Prime Minister Aldo Moro, said that he “found a document that left me appalled” implicating the Bilderberg Group in conspiring with the far right organization Ordine Nuovo to commit terror attacks. Speaking of unsolved murders in Italy and the document in his possession, Imposimato stated, “When it comes to slaughter it also speaks of the Bilderberg Group. I believe this document. I did some tests and I can say that behind the strategy of tension and the slaughters there is also the Bilderberg group, a sort of Big Brother is over, maneuvering, using terrorists and Masons.” Anyone who thinks that this ‘reign of terror’ by Bilderberg and their secretive groups is over only needs to watch the Infowars.com video below, which explains Operation Gladio and how the Cold War ‘black op’ continues today. http://beforeitsnews.com/international/2013/04/bilderberg-behind-terrorist-attacks-italian-supreme-court-president-drops-bombshell-2455434.html Yet for some odd reason he seems not to have produced the supposed document let alone the 'test' results. This is not the first time the judge made claims on the basis of a supposed document he could not produce*. He just turned 77 thus perhaps illustrating that old dogs really can’t learn new tricks. One also has to wonder if dementia is setting in. Reagan started to be afflicted with the disease at around 73 according to his son** and was POTUS rather than retired. * http://www.berluscastop.it/__artic/econ_en3.htm ** http://voices.washingtonpost.com/political-bookworm/2011/01/president_reagan_suffered_from.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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