John Simkin Posted December 21, 2004 Posted December 21, 2004 In the 1940s a group of right-wing politicians and businessmen in Texas joined what became known as the Suite 8F group. The name comes from the room in the Lamar Hotel in Houston where they held their meetings. Members of the group included Lyndon Johnson, George and Herman Brown (Brown & Root), Jesse H. Jones (multi-millionaire investor in a large number of organizations and chairman of the Reconstruction Finance Corporation), Gus Wortham (American General Insurance Company), Robert Kerr (Kerr-McGee Oil Industries), James Abercrombie (Cameron Iron Works), William Hobby (Governor of Texas), Richard Russell (chairman of the Committee of Manufactures, Committee on Armed Forces and Committee of Appropriations), Albert Thomas (chairman of the House Appropriations Committee) and John Connally (Governor of Texas). Political fixers and LBJ cronies, Alvin Wirtz and Ed Clark, were also members of 8F. After the war George and Herman Brown (of Brown & Root) joined with other members of 8F to form Texas Eastern Transmission Company. Johnson helped this organization to buy the government owned Big Inch and Little Big Inch pipelines. This gave them control of a considerable amount of the petroleum supply to the East. In fact, this group become involved in all the government contracts obtained by Brown and Root by LBJ. It was this group that was giving LBJ his orders before 1960. LBJ tried to publicly distance himself from this group when he became vice president. 8F had been opposed to LBJ becoming vice president as they thought it would reduce his power. How wrong they were. The group did extremely well under LBJ as president. For example, Project Mohole and the NASA’s Spacecraft Center in Houston. Albert Thomas played a key role in this success. The group also won the vast majority of government contracts granted during the Vietnam War. Suite 8F formed a new company called RMK-BRJ to obtain these contracts. This included Halliburton who took over Brown & Root in 1962. These contracts included building jet runways, dredging channels for ships, hospitals, prisons, communications facilities, and building American bases from Da Nang to Saigon. RMK-BRJ did 97% of the construction work in Vietnam. The other 3% went to local Vietnamese contractors. Between 1965 and 1972 Brown & Root (Halliburton) alone obtained revenues of $380 million from its work in Vietnam. Senator Abraham Ribicoff of Connecticut attempted to expose this scandal. He claimed that millions was being paid in kickbacks. An investigation by the General Accounting Office discovered that by 1967 RMK-BRJ had “lost” $120 million. However, GAO never managed to identify the people obtaining these kickbacks. Anti-war protesters decided that George Brown was the mastermind behind this corruption. Demonstrations against him took place everywhere Brown went. It got so bad that Brown advised LBJ to withdraw from Vietnam. Brown told LBJ that if he did not do this, the war would destroy both men. It did destroy LBJ but Brown survived the protests. LBJ’s resignation as president was a body blow to the Suite 8F group. However, they had made preparations and Connally had already got Richard Nixon involved with the group. He arranged for Nixon to meet fellow members at his ranch in Texas. This resulted in Connally becoming Secretary of the Treasury and Jesse H. Jones as Secretary of Commerce. However, they were not able to obtain the success that LBJ achieved in the 1950s and 1960s. The main reason for this was that LBJ was no longer able to control the chairmanship of the important Senate committees. The group was particularly hurt by the death of Albert Thomas (chairman of the House Appropriations Committee). The end of the Vietnam War resulted in a sharp decline in Halliburton's fortunes. In the 1980s it was unable to get very many government contracts and for a while it looked like the company would go out of business. Then they appointed Dick Cheney as Halliburton's CEO. He then adopted the policies that had been pioneered by Herman and George Brown. George Bush was Brown & Root's LBJ.
Jack White Posted December 21, 2004 Posted December 21, 2004 John...this is very powerful information, often overlooked. Powers like this were behind 11-22. Jack
Ron Ecker Posted December 21, 2004 Posted December 21, 2004 John, This kind of info serves to remind us how big the conspiracy probably was. In his own country JFK had many powerful enemies, all of whom had their reasons to wish he were gone. What we should bear in mind is that there was one central figure who could bring them all together: the Vice President. The unbelievably corrupt LBJ, who had his own desperate reasons to get rid of JFK, knew the generals, he knew the contractors and oil men, he knew the intelligence agents, he knew gangsters, and he was a friend and neighbor of an FBI director without one redeeming quality. Who and what more were needed to pull off a completely safe coup d'etat? Ron
Greg Wagner Posted December 22, 2004 Posted December 22, 2004 Excellent information and it gets to a deeper issue: In what sense is America still a democracy? I'm sure most Americans would tell you that of course America is a democracy. I'm not so sure I would agree. Facism cloaked in the unassailable guise of national security seems closer to the truth these days. And of course when there are these alliances between our executive branch and large corporate interests, but no legislative branch or media to collar this alliance... well, I guess that's where we find ourselves today. In a very dangerous situation. I sometimes think that, for all the belly-aching that right-wingers do about the liberal "cultural elite" in Hollywood, they have actually been a great ally of the movement away from democracy. The political and social involvement that was so much more mainstream prior to the mid 70's has been replaced by the entertainment industry. Movies, TV, sports as an absession for most males (guilty), celebrities, MTV, etc. People are consumed by mass marketed entertainment. Most citizens today have very little interest in politics, social or ideological issues. And the folks in power? Well of course, they love that! Karl Marx said that "Religion is the opiate of the masses." Apparently, he wasn't a sports fan, because religion cannot hold a candle to today's all-encompassing entertainment industry as the "opiate of the masses." Sorry to get off on such a tangent. Excellent job pointing out how obvious a thread (in the form of Halliburton and KBR) runs from the days/issues of the assassination right up to today's occupiers of the throne. Would have been great to hear that publicized during the recent Presidential election.
Wim Dankbaar Posted December 22, 2004 Posted December 22, 2004 George Bush was Brown & Root's LBJ. -------------------------------- Wim is nodding in agreement
John Simkin Posted December 22, 2004 Author Posted December 22, 2004 There is another parallel between LBJ, Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney. LBJ was considered to be a progressive and honest politician in the early 1930s. It was the reason why Brown & Root refused to supply him with any money in the early part of his career. This only changed when LBJ met with Herman Brown in 1937. From then on LBJ followed the orders of the Suite 8F Group. In 1966 a young Illinois congressman began making speeches where he claimed that Brown & Root (Halliburton) had obtained Project Mohole because of political contributions made to LBJ. That congressman’s name was Donald Rumsfeld. For some reason, he decided to end his campaign against Halliburton and later became a friend of the company. In 1989 Dick Cheney became George H. W. Bush’s Secretary of Defense. He was a political and economic conservative who had been a strong opponent of government spending. In his first year of office, Cheney reduced military spending by $10 billion. Year after year, from 1989 to 1993, the military budget shrank under Cheney. This heralded serious problems for Halliburton. What did they do about it? They recruited Cheney as CEO. His views on military spending changed dramatically. Cheney also managed to persuade the government to spend this money via Halliburton, Over the next five years, with Ceney as CEO, Halliburton's government contracts totalled $2.3 billion. I believe that Lyndon Johnson, Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney were all “bought” by Brown & Root/Halliburton.
Greg Wagner Posted December 22, 2004 Posted December 22, 2004 There is another parallel between LBJ, Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney.LBJ was considered to be a progressive and honest politician in the early 1930s. It was the reason why Brown & Root refused to supply him with any money in the early part of his career. This only changed when LBJ met with Herman Brown in 1937. From then on LBJ followed the orders of the Suite 8F Group. In 1966 a young Illinois congressman began making speeches where he claimed that Brown & Root (Halliburton) had obtained Project Mohole because of political contributions made to LBJ. That congressman’s name was Donald Rumsfeld. For some reason, he decided to end his campaign against Halliburton and later became a friend of the company. In 1989 Dick Cheney became George H. W. Bush’s Secretary of Defense. He was a political and economic conservative who had been a strong opponent of government spending. In his first year of office, Cheney reduced military spending by $10 billion. Year after year, from 1989 to 1993, the military budget shrank under Cheney. This heralded serious problems for Halliburton. What did they do about it? They recruited Cheney as CEO. His views on military spending changed dramatically. Cheney also managed to persuade the government to spend this money via Halliburton, Over the next five years, with Ceney as CEO, Halliburton's government contracts totalled $2.3 billion. I believe that Lyndon Johnson, Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney were all “bought” by Brown & Root/Halliburton. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Below are a few interesting links. The first one is a listing and some biographical info of their current board of directors. Ray Hunt obviously sticks out. I also think it's interesting that Crandall is a member of the FAA management advisory committee and on the Pepsico board. Didn't Nixon claim that he was in Dallas on 11/22 attending a Pepsico board meeting that never took place? Does anyone know if Lamar Hunt, who owns the Kansas City Chiefs NFL team and the Columbus Crew MLS soccer team, is one of H.L. Hunt's sons? http://www.halliburton.com/about/board_of_dir.jsp http://www.larouchepub.com/other/2003/3037...ib_profile.html http://www.sullivan-county.com/w/halliburton.htm
Wim Dankbaar Posted December 22, 2004 Posted December 22, 2004 Does anyone know if Lamar Hunt, who owns the Kansas City Chiefs NFL team and the Columbus Crew MLS soccer team, is one of H.L. Hunt's sons? ----------------------- Yes he is. And if you want I can send John Simkin a few pictures of the Hunt brothers to post here.
Greg Wagner Posted December 22, 2004 Posted December 22, 2004 Does anyone know if Lamar Hunt, who owns the Kansas City Chiefs NFL team and the Columbus Crew MLS soccer team, is one of H.L. Hunt's sons?----------------------- Yes he is. And if you want I can send John Simkin a few pictures of the Hunt brothers to post here. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> That would be great Wim. Thanks for the info.
Wim Dankbaar Posted December 23, 2004 Posted December 23, 2004 http://pro.corbis.com/default.aspx Go there and do a search for Hunt, you will find several, it will come up with 5 pages A search for Lamar Hunt narrows it down to Lamar only (5 pictures) Wim
Tim Carroll Posted December 23, 2004 Posted December 23, 2004 Does anyone know if Lamar Hunt, who owns the Kansas City Chiefs NFL team and the Columbus Crew MLS soccer team, is one of H.L. Hunt's sons?----------------------- Yes he is. And if you want I can send John Simkin a few pictures of the Hunt brothers to post here. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> That would be great Wim. Thanks for the info. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Lamar, Herbert, and Nelson Bunker Hunt
John Korienek Posted December 29, 2004 Posted December 29, 2004 In the 1940s a group of right-wing politicians and businessmen in Texas joined what became known as the Suite 8F group. The name comes from the room in the Lamar Hotel in Houston where they held their meetings. Members of the group included Lyndon Johnson, George and Herman Brown (Brown & Root), Jesse H. Jones (multi-millionaire investor in a large number of organizations and chairman of the Reconstruction Finance Corporation), Gus Wortham (American General Insurance Company), Robert Kerr (Kerr-McGee Oil Industries), James Abercrombie (Cameron Iron Works), William Hobby (Governor of Texas), Richard Russell (chairman of the Committee of Manufactures, Committee on Armed Forces and Committee of Appropriations), Albert Thomas (chairman of the House Appropriations Committee) and John Connally (Governor of Texas). Political fixers and LBJ cronies, Alvin Wirtz and Ed Clark, were also members of 8F. After the war George and Herman Brown (of Brown & Root) joined with other members of 8F to form Texas Eastern Transmission Company. Johnson helped this organization to buy the government owned Big Inch and Little Big Inch pipelines. This gave them control of a considerable amount of the petroleum supply to the East. In fact, this group become involved in all the government contracts obtained by Brown and Root by LBJ. It was this group that was giving LBJ his orders before 1960. LBJ tried to publicly distance himself from this group when he became vice president. 8F had been opposed to LBJ becoming vice president as they thought it would reduce his power. How wrong they were. The group did extremely well under LBJ as president. For example, Project Mohole and the NASA’s Spacecraft Center in Houston. Albert Thomas played a key role in this success. The group also won the vast majority of government contracts granted during the Vietnam War. Suite 8F formed a new company called RMK-BRJ to obtain these contracts. This included Halliburton who took over Brown & Root in 1962. These contracts included building jet runways, dredging channels for ships, hospitals, prisons, communications facilities, and building American bases from Da Nang to Saigon. RMK-BRJ did 97% of the construction work in Vietnam. The other 3% went to local Vietnamese contractors. Between 1965 and 1972 Brown & Root (Halliburton) alone obtained revenues of $380 million from its work in Vietnam. Senator Abraham Ribicoff of Connecticut attempted to expose this scandal. He claimed that millions was being paid in kickbacks. An investigation by the General Accounting Office discovered that by 1967 RMK-BRJ had “lost” $120 million. However, GAO never managed to identify the people obtaining these kickbacks. Anti-war protesters decided that George Brown was the mastermind behind this corruption. Demonstrations against him took place everywhere Brown went. It got so bad that Brown advised LBJ to withdraw from Vietnam. Brown told LBJ that if he did not do this, the war would destroy both men. It did destroy LBJ but Brown survived the protests. LBJ’s resignation as president was a body blow to the Suite 8F group. However, they had made preparations and Connally had already got Richard Nixon involved with the group. He arranged for Nixon to meet fellow members at his ranch in Texas. This resulted in Connally becoming Secretary of the Treasury and Jesse H. Jones as Secretary of Commerce. However, they were not able to obtain the success that LBJ achieved in the 1950s and 1960s. The main reason for this was that LBJ was no longer able to control the chairmanship of the important Senate committees. The group was particularly hurt by the death of Albert Thomas (chairman of the House Appropriations Committee). The end of the Vietnam War resulted in a sharp decline in Halliburton's fortunes. In the 1980s it was unable to get very many government contracts and for a while it looked like the company would go out of business. Then they appointed Dick Cheney as Halliburton's CEO. He then adopted the policies that had been pioneered by Herman and George Brown. George Bush was Brown & Root's LBJ. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> John, A very perceptive post. However, if you are going to continue this line of reasoning I think it will be necessary, eventually, to try and determine whether the Texas connection or the Eastern Establishment had the real or final power in the U.S. during the post-war period. I believe personally that these two groups are not so separate as some believe, but were actually in cahoots and were actively involved in the assassination. Can't prove it though. JK
Dawn Meredith Posted December 30, 2004 Posted December 30, 2004 In the 1940s a group of right-wing politicians and businessmen in Texas joined what became known as the Suite 8F group. The name comes from the room in the Lamar Hotel in Houston where they held their meetings. Members of the group included Lyndon Johnson, George and Herman Brown (Brown & Root), Jesse H. Jones (multi-millionaire investor in a large number of organizations and chairman of the Reconstruction Finance Corporation), Gus Wortham (American General Insurance Company), Robert Kerr (Kerr-McGee Oil Industries), James Abercrombie (Cameron Iron Works), William Hobby (Governor of Texas), Richard Russell (chairman of the Committee of Manufactures, Committee on Armed Forces and Committee of Appropriations), Albert Thomas (chairman of the House Appropriations Committee) and John Connally (Governor of Texas). Political fixers and LBJ cronies, Alvin Wirtz and Ed Clark, were also members of 8F. After the war George and Herman Brown (of Brown & Root) joined with other members of 8F to form Texas Eastern Transmission Company. Johnson helped this organization to buy the government owned Big Inch and Little Big Inch pipelines. This gave them control of a considerable amount of the petroleum supply to the East. In fact, this group become involved in all the government contracts obtained by Brown and Root by LBJ. It was this group that was giving LBJ his orders before 1960. LBJ tried to publicly distance himself from this group when he became vice president. 8F had been opposed to LBJ becoming vice president as they thought it would reduce his power. How wrong they were. The group did extremely well under LBJ as president. For example, Project Mohole and the NASA’s Spacecraft Center in Houston. Albert Thomas played a key role in this success. The group also won the vast majority of government contracts granted during the Vietnam War. Suite 8F formed a new company called RMK-BRJ to obtain these contracts. This included Halliburton who took over Brown & Root in 1962. These contracts included building jet runways, dredging channels for ships, hospitals, prisons, communications facilities, and building American bases from Da Nang to Saigon. RMK-BRJ did 97% of the construction work in Vietnam. The other 3% went to local Vietnamese contractors. Between 1965 and 1972 Brown & Root (Halliburton) alone obtained revenues of $380 million from its work in Vietnam. Senator Abraham Ribicoff of Connecticut attempted to expose this scandal. He claimed that millions was being paid in kickbacks. An investigation by the General Accounting Office discovered that by 1967 RMK-BRJ had “lost” $120 million. However, GAO never managed to identify the people obtaining these kickbacks. Anti-war protesters decided that George Brown was the mastermind behind this corruption. Demonstrations against him took place everywhere Brown went. It got so bad that Brown advised LBJ to withdraw from Vietnam. Brown told LBJ that if he did not do this, the war would destroy both men. It did destroy LBJ but Brown survived the protests. LBJ’s resignation as president was a body blow to the Suite 8F group. However, they had made preparations and Connally had already got Richard Nixon involved with the group. He arranged for Nixon to meet fellow members at his ranch in Texas. This resulted in Connally becoming Secretary of the Treasury and Jesse H. Jones as Secretary of Commerce. However, they were not able to obtain the success that LBJ achieved in the 1950s and 1960s. The main reason for this was that LBJ was no longer able to control the chairmanship of the important Senate committees. The group was particularly hurt by the death of Albert Thomas (chairman of the House Appropriations Committee). The end of the Vietnam War resulted in a sharp decline in Halliburton's fortunes. In the 1980s it was unable to get very many government contracts and for a while it looked like the company would go out of business. Then they appointed Dick Cheney as Halliburton's CEO. He then adopted the policies that had been pioneered by Herman and George Brown. George Bush was Brown & Root's LBJ. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> John, A very perceptive post. However, if you are going to continue this line of reasoning I think it will be necessary, eventually, to try and determine whether the Texas connection or the Eastern Establishment had the real or final power in the U.S. during the post-war period. I believe personally that these two groups are not so separate as some believe, but were actually in cahoots and were actively involved in the assassination. Can't prove it though. JK <{POST_SNAPBACK}> ________________________________ Great research and thread. Important connecting of the dots. Shows how it is still one conspiracy, ongoing. But far worse now. Like Jack White said, 9--11, and two wars. What next??? Scary to try to imagine. Hard to know for sure re Eastern Establishment vs. Tx., but I still find Carl Oglesby's work- (Yankee and Cowboy War, Conspiracies From Dallas to Watergate)- instructive here. Meaning that it was the Cowboys. Just my own opinion. Sure wish Tim Carroll and Wim could add their opinions to this. Tim really knows his stuff and was doing a masterful job of updating Carl's ideas and thinking. I really miss his insights and powerful writing. Also Wim was great on the Bush 41 and related issues there. Dawn
Shanet Clark Posted January 3, 2005 Posted January 3, 2005 (edited) Happy New Year Dawn and John John and I were discussing Pierre Bourdieu's views on class. I think sociology is useful in understanding the mindset of these players. The Politics and Economics are important, but people see themselves as being in a certain class. The entitlement, the arrogance, willful blindness, ingrained coarseness... this is the habitus, the mental landscape of the COWBOY. [Re:Carl Oglesby THE COWBOY VERSUS YANKEE WAR] Secrecy, an priviness and sense of authority over illegal and clandestine operations, the ability to change and shape the facts and records... these powers lead to a new and alien group, a class of people set apart, overly willing to use, enjoy, deny the reality of and yet revel in the use of violence. Of course JFK 11/22/63, Vietnam War and today's Gulf War and the Global War on Terror (sic) are linked, via these Ford Presidency era political players. CHENEY, WOLFOWITZ, PERLE, RUMSFELD, BUSH fils form a sociological habitus or separated class based mindset. Merged with TEXACO, HALLIBURTON and the PENTAGON'S private corporate and revolving door interests. Bush Rumsfeld and CHeney are the activists that emerged to rule the USA after the fall of the counterweight, the Soviet Union. Far more radically activist than Reagan, Nixon or Eisenhower, The present regime is the proximate and functioning heir to the illegal operations, plans and programs exposed on these historical threads....... Edited January 3, 2005 by Shanet Clark
Robert Charles-Dunne Posted January 4, 2005 Posted January 4, 2005 There may be a more direct and tangible relationship between Halliburton and Dealey Plaza than just 'deep politics' speculation. Page 769 of CD 1322 [a list of Jack Ruby's personal effects] includes the following: "WYLLIE RAUL Haliburton [sic] Oil Company Duncan, Oklahoma" Does the name "Raul" [or Raoul] ring any bells with anyone?
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