TBR News July 27, 2018
The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, Isaiah 40:3-8
Washington, D.C. July 27, 2018:” A 2016 secret FBI investigation into Israeli espionage agents in the Central Intelligence Agency is part of a major struggle between prominent Likudists in the CIA and the US security apparatus.
Ever since the Trump regime came to power there has been a fierce political and organizational war between the CIA Likudists and their militant American collaborators, on the one hand, and the professional military and intelligence apparatus, on the other.
This conflict has manifested itself in a series of major issues including the war in the Middle East, the rational for war, the relationship between Israel and the US, the strategy for empire, as well as tactical issues like the size of military force needed for colonial wars and the nature of colonial occupation.
From 9/11/2001 to the invasion of Iraq, the CIA Likudists and the civilian Neocons had the upper hand: they marginalized the CIA and established their own intelligence services to “cook the data”, they pushed through the doctrine of sequential wars, beginning with Afghanistan and Iraq and projecting wars with Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and other Muslim countries.
The CIA Zionists increased Israel’s power in the Middle East and promoted its expansionist colonization of Palestine, at the expense of US soldiers, budget busting expenditures and Pentagon objections.
The US military and security apparatus has retaliated. First by debunking Zionist lies about Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction, followed by a two-year investigation ofCIA Likudists passing documents to Israeli military intelligence and the secret police, the Mossad.
Israel has for decades subverted US foreign policy to serve its interests through the organized power of major Jewish organizations in the US.
What is new in the current CIA spy case is that rather than pressuring from the outside to secure favorable policies for Israel, the Israel loyalists are in top positions within the government making strategic decisions about US global policy and providing their Israeli handlers with secret documents pertaining to top level discussions in the White House on questions of war and peace.
Today the politics of CIA and AIPAC espionage is especially dangerous – because what is at stake is a new US and/or Israeli war on Iran which will ignite the entire Middle East.
Given the high level of structural collaboration and integration of US CIA Likudist agents and US Jewish organizations with the Israeli state, the boundaries of what are United States policies and interests and what are Israeli prerogatives and interests are blurred.
From the perspective of the CIA Zionists and their organized Jewish supporters, it is “natural” that the US spends billions to finance Israeli military power and territorial expansion. It is “natural” to transfer strategic documents from the CIA to the Israeli State.
As Haaretz states, “Why would Israel have to steal documents when they can find out whatever they want through official meetings?” The routinization of espionage via official consultations between Israeli and US Zionist officials became public knowledge throughout the executive branch.
Only it wasn’t called espionage, it was referred to as ‘exchanging intelligence’, only the Israelis sent ‘disinformation’ to the CIA Zionists to serve their interests while the latter passed on the real policies, positions and strategies of the US government.”
The Table of Contents
- U.S. immigrants’ reunification deadline passes, lawyers turn to deportations
- US struggles with family reunification as court deadline hits
- The Third Reich’s method of removing unwanted people
- Donald Trump denies knowing of Russia meeting and attacks Michael Cohen
- Conversations with the Crow
U.S. immigrants’ reunification deadline passes, lawyers turn to deportations
July 27, 2018
by Tom Hals
Reuters
A day after a court-ordered deadline for the U.S. government to reunite immigrant children and parents who had been separated by officials at the U.S.-Mexico border, rights activists will on Friday focus on helping families, together for the first time in weeks, facing deportation.
The parents and children were separated as part of U.S. President Donald Trump’s “zero tolerance” policy on illegal immigration. Many of them had crossed the border illegally, while others had sought asylum. By the time Trump ordered a halt to separations in June following weeks of outrage at home and abroad, about 2,500 children had been separated.
The U.S. government said this week that 900 face final orders of removal from the United States. The government said in a court filing on Thursday that it had reunited 1,442 children with their parents, although immigrant groups said the effort to meet a judge’s deadline was sometimes chaotic.
Attorneys will likely address in a court hearing on Friday how to reunite 711 children still separated from parents. More than half of the parents of those children are no longer in the United States, according to the government, and rights groups have said they appear to have been deported without their children.
On Friday, the American Civil Liberties Union, which brought the lawsuit that led to a judge’s reunification order, will argue in U.S. District Court in San Diego that families need a week after being reunited before being deported.
The rights group has said that parents need the time to consider their legal rights and those of their child, who the parent may decide to leave in the United States to separately pursue asylum.
“That’s a potentially life altering decision,” said ACLU attorney Lee Gelernt on a call with reporters on Thursday.
Government officials have said that they already give parents time to consider their options, and that parents have been notified of their legal rights and given contact information for an attorney.
U.S. Judge Dana Sabraw in San Diego ordered the government to reunite the children although his July 26 deadline did not apply to parents with a criminal background, or those who had been deported.
Many of those parents fled violence and persecution in their home country, usually El Salvador or Honduras, and may go into hiding when they return.
“Locating them will be a challenge,” said Michelle Brané, director of migrant rights and justice for the Women’s Refugee Commission on a conference call with reporters.
Reporting by Tom Hals in Wilmington, Del.,; Editing by Noeleen Walder and Grant McCool
US struggles with family reunification as court deadline hits
The US government has managed to reunite over 1,400 children with their parents after Donald Trump’s “zero tolerance” immigration policy saw the families separated on the border. But hundreds more remain in limbo.
July 26, 2018
DW
The US government failed to meet a court-ordered deadline on Thursday that called for children and parents who had been separated at the US-Mexico border to be reunified before 6:00 p.m. Eastern time (2200 UTC) on July 26.
In a filing with the California court that imposed the deadline, the Trump administration said that 1,820 children ages 5 and up had been released from detainment. However, only 1,442 of these children had been reunified with their families under Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody, while 378 others were released “in other appropriate circumstances.”
The filing also said that 711 children would not be reunified with their parents by the deadline because the adults were either not “eligible” or had been deported. The kids remain in the care of the Office of Refugee Resettlement.
Those ‘eligible’ reunited
The government filing described the reunification results as a success, stating that all “eligible” children and parents would be brought back together.
“The reunification plan outlined to the court… is proceeding, and is expected to result in the reunification of all class members found eligible for reunification at this time by the court’s July 26, 2018 deadline,” it read.
However, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the civil rights organization that brought the case before the California court, said the government was “picking and choosing” in its reunification process.
“We’re thrilled for the families who are finally reunited, but many more remain separated,” Lee Gelernt, deputy director of the ACLU’s Immigrants’ Rights Project, told DW in an emailed statement. “The Trump administration is trying to sweep them under the rug by unilaterally picking and choosing who is eligible for reunification. We will continue to hold the government accountable and get these families back together.”
The ACLU also said it would work to find all the parents who are no longer in the US but whose children are still there.
Starting in April, US authorities separated over 2,500 children from their parents at the border as part of Trump’s “zero tolerance” policy, which criminally prosecuted any undocumented individual caught crossing the border.
It triggered a national and international outcry, leading Trump to reverse his policy.
California Judge Dana Sabraw then set Thursday as the deadline for all reunifications to take place.
Complications and difficult decisions
In the run-up to Thursday’s deadline, Trump officials had already qualified the reunification efforts along the lines of eligibility, with Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen stating on Tuesday that the government plans to “reunify all families that are suitable.”
But immigration activists described an inefficient, chaotic and at times misleading process.
Douglas Almendarez, a Honduran immigrant who returned home, told Reuters news agency that he had been informed by officials that returning to Honduras was the only way he would see his 11-year-old son again.
Some parents were deported while their children remain in US detention, and in cases when separated children and parents both remained in the US, they were often housed across the country from each other, complicating reunification efforts.
The government previously missed a deadline set by Judge Sabraw for July 10, which required all children under the age of five to be returned to their parents. US officials said 45 children were ineligible for reunification.
Some parents faced the choice of whether to return to their country of origin as a family or leave their children in the US to fight for asylum alone.
The Third Reich’s method of removing unwanted people
July 27, 2018
by Germar Rudolf
It is interesting to note that President Trump’s relative, a senior SS official, was involved in the “relocation” of German, Polish, Russian and Baltic Jews. Perhaps his current attitude towards Latin Americans, blacks and Muslims is an inherited tendency. Let us examine the Nazi method of dealing with that part of the population they did not like.
The Einsatzgruppen were part of the SS. They were created at the direction of Hitler and Himmler by Heydrich the Chief of the Security Police and SD, who was Himmler’s right hand man, and operated under the direct control of the RSHA, the Reich Security Main Office, one of the most important of the twelve main offices of the SS.
These units were considered para-military police units are were initially used to maintain internal order in acquired new territories, round up known enemies of the Reich and assist the military in rear area security.
The Einsatzgruppen were formed in the spring of 1938 with the incorporation of the German-speaking Sudetenland into the German Reich. They were also used in Austria and, after the outbreak of World War II in September, 1939, in conquered Polish territory
In anticipation of the assault on Russia, Hitler issued an order directing that the Security Police and the Security Service be called in to assist the army in breaking every means of resistance behind the fighting front. Thereafter, the Quartermaster General of the Army, General Wagner, representing Keitel, the Chief of the Supreme Command of the Wehrmacht, met Heydrich, Chief of the Security Police and Security Service. These two men reached an agreement concerning the activation, commitment, command, and jurisdiction of units of the Security Police and SD within the framework of the army. The Einsatzgruppen were to function in the rear operational areas in administrative subordination to the field armies, in order to carry out these tasks as directed by Heydrich and Himmler.
The normal strength of the Einsatzgruppen was from 600 to 800 men. The officer strength of the Einsatzgruppen was drawn from the SD, SS, Criminal Police (Kripo) and Gestapo. The enlisted forces were composed of the Waffen SS, the regular police, the Gestapo, and locally-recruited police. When occasion demanded, the Wehrmacht commanders would bolster the strength of the Einsatzgruppen with contingents of their own. The Einsatzgruppen were divided into Einsatzkommandos and Sonderkornmandos.
These subunits differed only in name. When a mission called for a very small task force, the Einsatz or Sonderkommandos were capable of further subdivision, called Teilkommando or splinter groups.
The activity of the Einsatzgruppen was not limited to the civilian population alone, but reached into prisoner-of-war camps. Captured Soviet soldiers were screened by Einsatzkommandos personnel in order to find and execute Soviet political commissars
The Einsatzgruppen were German special duty squads, composed primarily of SS and police personnel. The commanders and officers were also members of the Security Police and the Security Service. The units were directly subordinate to the Reich Security Main Office (Reichssicherheitshauptamt or RSHA) in Berlin and were to operate regionally in coordination with higher SS and police leaders. Ordered to follow the German army into the Soviet Union, the Einsatzgruppen were dependent upon the army for supplies and logistical support.
The chief of the RSHA, Reinhard Heydrich, instructed the Einsatzgruppe commanders to support Wehrmacht units in the rear areas of operation who were engaged in a growing partisan movement behind the front lines. These partisan groups were generally comprised of Russian civilians, Soviet military members and officials of the Soviet Communist Party and state apparatus.
As the German army advanced deep into Soviet territory, the Einsatzgruppen followed the troops. Supported by locally recruited police auxiliaries and other SS and German police units, the Einsatzgruppe personnel at first merely did police work behind the lines. In late July 1941, after the deployment of larger units of SS and police personnel in the occupied Soviet Union, these units, including the Einsatzgruppen, began more independent but still coordinated anti-partisan activities.
Four battalion-sized Einsatzgruppen and several police battalions were deployed in the occupied Soviet Union.
Einsatzgruppe A fanned out from East Prussia across Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia toward Leningrad. Its members were active in Kovno, Riga, and Vilna.
Einsatzgruppe A and the units under its command committed murders and other crimes which included, but were not limited to, the following :
During the period 22 June 1941 to 15 October 1941 in Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, and White Ruthenia, Einsatzgruppe A executed 118,430 Jews and 3,398 Communists.
On or about 4 July 1941 in the city of Riga, Sonderkommando la and Einsatzkommando 2, together with auxiliary police under their command, carried out pogroms in which all synagogues were destroyed and 400 Jews were executed.
During October 1941 in Estonia, Einsatzkommando la, together with Estonian units under their command, committed numerous executions pursuant to a program for the extermination of all Jewish males over sixteen except doctors and Jewish elders.
During the period 7 November 1941 to 11 November 1941 in Minsk, Sonderkommando1b executed 6,624 Jews.
During the period 22 June 1941 to 16 January 1942 in its operational areas, Einsatzkommando 2 executed 33,970 persons.
On 30 November 1941 in Riga, 20 men of Einsatzkommando 2 participated in the execution of 10,600 Jews.
During the period 22 June 1941 to 19 September 1941 in Lithuania, Einsatzkommando 3 executed 692 persons.
During the period 22 June 1941 to 10 August 1941 in the area of Kovno [Kaunas] and Riga, Einsatzgruppe A executed 29,000 persons.
During the period 2 October 1941 to 10 October 1941 in the vicinity of Krasnogvardeisk, Einsatzgruppe A executed 260 persons.
During the period 15 October 1941 to 23 October 1941 in the vicinity of Krasnogvardeisk, Einsatzgruppe A executed 156 persons.
During the period 24 October 1941 to 5 November 1941 in the vicinity of Krasnogvardeisk, Einsatzgruppe A executed 118 persons.
On 20 November 1941 in the vicinity of Krasnogvardeisk, Einsatzgruppe A executed 855 persons.
In about December 1941 in the ghetto in Vitebsk, units of Einsatzgruppe A executed 4,090 Jews.
On 22 December 1941 in Vilnyus [Vilna] , units of Einsatzgruppe A executed 402 persons including 385 Jews.
On 1 February 1942 in Loknya, units of Einsatzgruppe A executed the 38 gypsies and Jews remaining there.On 2 and 3 March 1942 in Minsk, units of Einsatzgruppe A excecuted 3,412 Jews.
On 2 and 3 March 1942 in Baranovichi, units of Einsatzgruppe A executed 2,007 Jews.
On 17 March 1942 in Ilya, east of Vileika, units of Einsatzgruppe A executed 520 Jews.
On or about 7 April 1942 in Kovno and Olita, Lithuania, units of Einsatzgruppe A executed 44 persons.
During the period 10 April 1942 to 24 April 1942 in Latvia, units of Einsatzgruppe A executed 1,272 persons, including 983 Jews, 204 Communists and 71 gypsies.
Totals: 217,560 executed including 147,451 Jews executed
Einsatzgruppe B set out from Warsaw in occupied Poland, and moved east through Belorussia towards Smolensk. Its members operated in Grodno, Minsk, Brest-Litovsk, Slonim, Gomel, and Mogilev, among other places.
In about July 1941 in the city of Minsk, units of Einsatzgruppe B executed 1,050 Jews, political officials, “Asiatics” and others.
During the period 22 June 1941 to 14 November 1941 in the vicinity of Minsk and Smolensk, Einsatzgruppe B executed 45,467 persons.
On 15 October 1941 in Mogilev, units of Einsatzgruppe B executed 83 “Asiatics.”
On 19 October 1941 in Mogilev, units of Einsatzgruppe B participated in the execution of 3,726 Jews.
On 23 October 1941 in the vicinity of Mogilev, units of Einsatzgruppe B executed 279 Jews.
During the period 22 June 1941 to 14 November 1941 in its operational areas, Sonderkommando 7a executed 1,517 persons.
In September or October 1941 in Sadrudubs, Sonderkommando 7a executed 272 Jews.
During the period 6 March 1942 to 30 March 1942 in the vicinity of Klintsy, Sonderkommando 7a executed 1,585 Jews and 45 gypsies.
During the period 22 June 1941 to 14 November 1941 in its operational areas, Sonderkommando 7b executed 1,822 persons.
During the period from September to October 1941 in Rechitsa, White Ruthenia, Sonderkommando 7b executed 216 Jews.
During the period 6 March 1942 to 30 March 1942 in the vicinity of Bryansk, Sonderkommando 7b executed 82 persons, including 27 Jews.
During the period 22 June 1941 to 14 November 1941 in its operational areas, Einsatzkommando 8 executed 28,219 persons.
In September or October 1941 in the area of Shklov, Einsatzkommando 8 executed 627 Jews and 812 other persons.
In September or October 1941 in Mogilev, Einsatzkommando 8 participated in the execution of 113 Jews.
In September or October 1941 in Krupka, Einsatzkommando 8 executed 912 Jews.
In September or October 1941 in Sholopaniche, Einsatzkommando 8 executed 822 Jews.
During the period 6 March 1942 to 30 March 1942 in the vicinity of Mogilev, Einsatzkommando 8 executed 1,609 persons, including 1,551 Jews and 33 gypsies.
On 8 October 1941 in the ghetto of Vitebsk, Einsatzkommando 9 began executing Jews and by 25 October 1941, 3,000 Jews had been executed.
During the period 6 March 1942 to 30 March 1942 in the vicinity of Vitebsk, Einsatzkommando 9 a executed 273 persons, including 170 Jews.
During the period 22 June 1941 to 14 November 1941 in its operational areas, the group staff of Einsatzgruppe B and the Vorkommando Moscow executed 2,457 persons.
During the period 22 June 1941 to 20 August 1941 in the vicinity of Smolensk, the group staff of Einsatzgruppe B and the Vorkommando Moscow executed 144 persons.
In September or October 1941 in Tatarsk, the group staff of Einsatzgruppe B and the Vorkommando Moscow executed all male Jews.
During the period 6 March to 30 March 1942 in the vicinity of Roslavl, Vorkommando Moscow executed 52 persons.
During the period 6 March 1942 to 30 March 1942 in the vicinity of Smolensk, Trupp Smolensk executed 60 persons, including 18 Jews.
Totals: 95,244 executed including 12,406 Jews executed
Einsatzgruppe C began operations from the Krakow area and headed across the Ukraine towards Kiev and Donetsk, in the areas of Lvov, Tarnopol, Zolochev, Kremenets, Kharkov, and Kiev.
During the period 22 June 1941 to 3 November 1941 in the vicinity of Zhitomir, Novo Ukrainka and Kiev, Einsatzgruppe C executed more than 75,000 Jews.
On 19 September 1941 in Zhitomir, Einsatzgruppe C executed 3,145 Jews and confiscated their clothing and valuables.
During the period 22 June 1941 to 29 July 1941 in the vicinity of Zhitomir, Sonderkommando 4a executed 2,531 persons.
During the period 22 June 1941 to 12 October 1941 in its operational areas, Sonderkommando 4a executed more than 51,000 persons.
During the period from 2’7 June to 29 June 1941 in the vicinity of Sokal and Lutsk, Sonderkommando 4a executed 300 Jews and 317 Communists.
In July or August 1941 in Fastov, Sonderkommando 4a executed all the Jews between the ages of 12 and 60.
In September or October 1941 in the vicinity of Vyrna and Dederev, Sonderkommando 4a executed 32 gypsies.
On 29 and 30 September 1941 in Kiev, Einsatzkommando 4a, together with the group staff and police units, executed 33,771 Jews and confiscated their clothing and valuables.
On 8 October 1941 in Jagotin, Sonderkommando executed 126 Jews.
On 23 November 1941 in Poltava, Sonderkommando executed 1,638 Jews.
In about July 1941 in Tarnopol, Sonderkommando executed 180 Jews.
During the period from 13 September to 26 September 1941 in the vicinity of Kremenchug, Sonderkommando 4b executed 125 Jews and 103 political officials.
During the period 4 October 1941 to 10 October 1941 in Poltava, Sonderkommando 4b executed 186 persons.
From about 11 October 1941 to 30 October 1941 in the vicinity of Poltava, Sonderkommando 4b executed 595 persons.
During the period 14 January 1942 to 12 February 1942 in the vicinity of Kiev, Sonderkommando 4b executed 861 persons, including 139 Jews and 649 political officials.
During the period from February 1942 to March 1942 in the vicinity of Artemovsk, Sonderkommando 4b executed 1,317 persons, including 1,224 Jews and 63 “political activists.”
During the period from 22 June 1941 to 10 November 1941 in its operational areas, Einsatzkommando 5 executed 29,644 persons.
During July or August 1941 in Berdichev, Einsatzkommando 5 executed 74 Jews.
During the period 7 September 1941 to 5 October 1941 in the vicinity of Berdichev, Einsatzkommando 5 executed 8,800 Jews and 207 political officials.
On 22 and 23 September 1941 in Uman, Einsatzkommando 5 executed 1,412 Jews.
During the period 20 October 1941 to 26 October 1941 in the vicinity of Kiev, Einsatzkommando 5 executed 4,372 Jews and 36 political officials.
During the period from 23 November 1941 to 30 November 1941 in the vicinity of Rovno, Einsatzkommando executed 2,615 Jews and 64 political officials.
During the period from 12 January 1942 to 24 January 1942 in the vicinity of Kiev, Einsatzkommando 5 executed about 8,000 Jews and 104 political officials.
During the period from 24 November 1941 to 30 November 1941 in the vicinity of Dnepropetrovsk, Einsatzkommando 6 executed 226 Jews and 19 political officials.
From about 10 January 1942 to 6 February 1942 in the vicinity of Stalino, Einsatzkommando 6 executed about 149 Jews and 173 political officials.
In about February 1942 in the vicinity of Stalino, Einsatzkommando 6 executed 493 persons, including 80 “political activists” and 369 Jews.
Totals: 216,860 executed including 141,101 Jews executed
Einsatzgruppe D operated in southern Ukraine, operating in the areas of Nikolayev, Kherson, Simferopol, Sevastopol, and Feodosiya
During the period from 22 June 1941 to July 1943, Einsatzgruppe D, in the area of southern Russia, executed more than 90,000 persons.
On 15 July 1941 in the vicinity of Beltsy, Sonderkommando 10a executed 45 persons, including the Counsel of Jewish Elders.
In July 1941 in the vicinity of Chernovitsy, Sonderkommando 10b executed 16 Communists and 682 Jews.
During the period 22 June 1941 to 7 August 1941 in the vicinity of Kichinev, Einsatzkommando lla executed 551 Jews.
In about July 1941 in Tighina, Einsatzkommando llb executed 151 Jews.
In about December 1941 in the vicinity of Simferopol, Einsatzkommando l1b executed over 700 persons.
During the period from 22 June 1941 to 23 August 1941 in Babchinzy, Einsatzkommando 12 executed 94 Jews.
During the period 15 July 1941 to 30 July 1941 in the vicinity of Khotin, Einsatzgruppe D executed 150 Jews and Communists.
During the period 19 August 1941 to 15 September 1941 in the vicinity of Nikolaev, Einsatzgruppe D executed 8,890 Jews and Communists.
During the period 16 September 1941 to 30 September 1941 in the vicinity of Nikolacv and Kherson, Einsatzgruppe D executed 22,467 Jews.
During the period 1 October 1941 to 15 October 1941 in the area east of the Dnepr, Einsatzgruppe D executed 4,891 Jews and 46 Communists.
During the period 15 January 1942 to 31 January 1942 within its operational areas, Einsatzgruppe D executed 3,601 persons, including 3,286 Jews and 152 Communists.
During the period 1 February 1942 to 15 February 1942 20 10 within its operational areas, Einsatzgruppe D executed 1, 451 persons, including 920 Jews and 468 Communists.
During the period 16 February 1942 to 28 February 1942 within its operational areas, Einsatzgruppe D executed 1,515 persons, including 729 Jews, 271 Communists and 421 gypsies and other persons.
During the period 1 March 1942 to 15 March 1942 within its operational areas, Einsatzgruppe D executed 2,010 persons, including 678 Jews, 359 Communists, and 810 gypsies and other persons.
During the period 15 March 1942 to 30 March 1942 within its operational areas, Einsatzgruppe D executed 1,501 persons, including 588 Jews, 405 Communists, and 261 gypsies and other persons.
Totals 133,824 executed including 35,034 Jews executed
Grand total: 663,488 executed including 335,993 Jews executed
(Including total deaths in Lithuania listed below of 137,346)
800,834 total recorded Einsatzgruppen executions in the Eastern areas
The Official View of the Einsatzgruppen
From the mid-1300’s, Jews had begun to concentrate in a large strip of eastern European territory known as the “Pale of the Settlement.” By 1900, there were, perhaps, as many as 7 million Jews living in this area bounded by Germany on the east, the Baltic sea on the north, the Black Sea on the south and the Dnieper River in Russia on the east. The Jewish population of Poland in 1939 was about 3.3 million with an additional 2.1 million in the occupied Russian provinces. There were also heavy concentrations of Jews in Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia to the north and Hungary and the Slavic states to the south.
Antisemitism had long been evident in Poland. Jews were not considered Poles and, as in Nazi Germany, were defined as a race. It appears that, until 1939, Poland saw its destiny as tied to Germany’s and its policies toward Jews mirrored those of Germany — forced emigration.
This was all to change with the Nazi invasion of Poland on September 1, 1939. The consequences of this invasion were disastrous for Poland as a nation and, especially for Poland’s Jewish population.
Immediately following the invasion, Himmler was appointed to take measures to strengthen German ethnicity in the occupied territories and to create lebensraum, or living space for German citizens. To this end, Himmler created special task forces within the SS, the Einsatzgruppen, and placed them under the command of Reinhard Heydrich. On September, 21, 1939, Heydrich instructed those under his command to observe a distinction between the “final aim,” which would take some time and “the steps necessary for reaching it which can be applied more or less at once.” The Einsatzgruppen became “mobile killing units” charged with liquidating all political enemies of the Reich. Heydrich issued the following instructions:
21.September.1939
Berlin
To Chiefs of all Einsatzgruppen of the Security Police
Subject: Jewish Question in Occupied Territory
I refer to the conference held in Berlin today, and again point o that the planned total measures (i.e., the final aim) are to be kept strictly secret.
Distinction must be made between:
1.the final aim (which will require extended periods of time)
and
2.the stages leading to the fulfillment of this final aim (which will be carried out in short periods).
It is obvious that the tasks ahead cannot be laid down from here in full detail. The instructions and directives below must serve also for the purpose of urging chiefs of the Einsatzgruppen to give practical consideration to [the problems involved.]
For the time being, the first prerequisite for the final aim is the concentration of the Jews from the countryside into the larger cities.
Initially, the weapon of the Einsatzgruppen was the gun and the “action groups” served as mobile firing squads to eliminate anyone who appeared to be a political threat to the regime: communists, political dissidents, Polish government officials who did not line up with the invaders. There is little question that a significant number of Jews were in the list of victims; however, the apparent purpose, initially, was political.
By 1941, however, the focus and function of the Einsatzgruppen had changed significantly. With the initiation of Operation Barbarossa, Germany’s assault on the Soviet Union, the mobile killing units operated over a wide area of Eastern Europe from the Baltic to the Black Sea. There were four main divisions of the Einsatzgruppen — Groups A, B, C and D. These groups, all under Heydrich’s general command, operated just behind the advancing German troops eliminating “undesirables: political “criminals,” Polish governmental officials, gypsies and, mostly, Jews. Jews were rounded up in every village, transported to a wooded area, or a ravine (either natural or constructed by Jewish labor). They (men, women and children) were stripped, shot and buried. Sachar provides a description of one of the most brutal mass “exterminations” — at a ravine named “Babi Yar,” near the Ukrainian city of Kiev:
“Kiev … contained a Jewish population of 175,000 on the eve of the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941. The Nazi forces captured the city in mid-September; within less than a fortnight, on the 29th. and 30th., nearly 34,000 Jews of the ghetto were brought to a suburban ravine known as Babi Yar, near the Jewish Cemetery, where men, women, and children were systematically machine-gunned in a two-day orgy of execution. In subsequent months, most of the remaining population was exterminated.
This, the most appalling massacre of the war, is often alluded to as a prime example of utter Jewish helplessness in the face of disaster. But even the few desperate attempts, almost completely futile, to strike back served as a reminder that the difference between resistance and submission depended very largely upon who was in possession of the arms that back up the will to do or die. The Jews in their thousands, with such pathetic belongings as they could carry, were herded into barbed-wire areas at the top of the ravine, guarded by Ukrainian collaborators. There they were stripped of their clothes and beaten, then led in irregular squads down the side of the ravine.
The first groups were forced to lie on the ground, face down, and were machine-gunned by the Germans who kept up a steady volley. The riddled bodies were covered with thin layers of earth and the next groups were ordered to lie over them, to be similarly dispatched. To carry out the murder of 34,000 human beings in the space of two days could not assure that all the victims had died. Hence there were a few who survived and, though badly wounded, managed to crawl from under the corpses and seek a hiding place. After the main massacre, the site was converted into a more permanent camp to which thousands of victims from other parts of the Ukraine could be sent for extermination. It became known as the Syrets camp, taking its name from a nearby Kiew neighborhood. Several hundred selected prisoners were quartered there — carpenters, shoemakers, tailors, and other artisans — to serve the needs of the SS men and the Ukrainian guards. They were usually killed within a few weeks and replaced by others who continued their duties. In charge of the administration and ultimate killing was Paul von Radomski, who seemed to crave a reputation for outdoing his sadist colleagues in other camps.”
Donald Trump denies knowing of Russia meeting and attacks Michael Cohen
- President issues volley of tweets after explosive CNN report
- Trump attacks former lawyer’s use of Clinton-linked counsel
July 27, 2018
by Martin Pengelly in New York and David Smith in Washington
The Guardian
Donald Trump responded on Friday to bombshell reports that his former lawyer Michael Cohen says Trump knew of and approved a meeting between his son and aides with Russians promising dirt on Hillary Clinton.
The president denied knowing of the meeting and questioned Cohen’s motives and connections, writing: “He even retained Bill and Crooked Hillary’s lawyer. Gee, I wonder if they helped him make the choice!”
The lawyer referred to is Lanny Davis, Cohen’s counsel who defended Bill Clinton during his impeachment in the late 1990s.
Trump’s son Donald Trump Jr, son-in-law Jared Kushner and campaign chair Paul Manafort met at Trump Tower on 9 June 2016 with a group including the Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya, having been told she was offering sensitive information about Clinton from the Russian government.
On Thursday, citing an unnamed source, CNN reported that Cohen said he was present when Donald Jr told his father about the Russians’ offer to meet and that Trump approved it. NBC said it had independently verified the report.
On Friday, the president first tweeted a familiar complaint, that “the ridiculous news that the highly conflicted Robert Mueller and his gang of 13 Angry Democrats obviously cannot find Collusion”.
Mueller is a Republican appointed by a Republican, deputy attorney general Rod Rosenstein. According to public information, 13 of Mueller’s investigators have registered as Democrats and nine have donated to Democrats.
“The only Collusion with Russia was with the Democrats,” Trump added, without presenting evidence. He then referenced a New York Times report that Mueller, the special counsel, is examining his Twitter feed as part of his investigation of potential obstruction of justice.
“The rigged Witch Hunt continues!” he added. “How stupid and unfair to our Country….And so the Fake News doesn’t waste my time with dumb questions, NO,….
“…..I did NOT know of the meeting with my son, Don jr. Sounds to me like someone is trying to make up stories in order to get himself out of an unrelated jam (Taxi cabs maybe?). He even retained Bill and Crooked Hillary’s lawyer. Gee, I wonder if they helped him make the choice!”
Cohen’s investment in New York taxi medallions, which have been hit by the rise of Uber and other car services, has been widely reported.
Trump, his son, his lawyers and other officials have repeatedly claimed the Trump Tower meeting did not produce any “dirt” on Clinton and the future president did not know about it until details were revealed in July 2017. The president told reporters onboard Air Force One then: “I only heard about it two or three days ago.”
Trump’s role in the production of a misleading statement about the meeting is reportedly part of Mueller’s investigation.
On Thursday night Trump’s current lawyer, former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, mounted a counterattack.
“It would have to be people in the room with the president that can corroborate Cohen, which there won’t be because it didn’t happen,” he told CNN. “And then it becomes a credibility contest between two or three witnesses who say one thing and Cohen who says another.”
He added: “He’s been lying all week, he’s been lying for years” – a comment potentially damaging to Trump since Cohen was working for him during those years. Cohen has also seen his home and premises raided by the FBI over his role in payments to women who claim affairs with Trump – affairs Trump denies. Whether or not Cohen will “flip” and turn against Trump has been the subject of mounting speculation.
Trump’s knowledge or otherwise of the June 2016 Trump Tower meeting is a key issue in Mueller’s investigation into Russian election interference and links between Trump aides and Russia.
Steve Bannon, Trump’s former chief strategist, famously told the author Michael Wolff he thought the meeting was “treasonous, or unpatriotic, or bad shit”.
“The chance that Don Jr did not walk these jumos up to his father’s office on the 26th floor,” Bannon added, “is zero.”
The meeting was brokered by a British music promoter, Rob Goldstone, who told Trump Jr he had “official documents and information that would incriminate Hillary and her dealings with Russia and would be very useful to your father”.
Goldstone added: “This is obviously very high level and sensitive information but is part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr Trump … I can also send this info to your father.”
Trump Jr responded: “I love it.” He has since contended that no meaningful information was offered and the meeting focused on adoptions of Russian children.
The Associated Press reported on Thursday that Veselnitskaya “worked more closely with senior Russian government officials than she previously let on”.
Mueller has indicted 31 individuals including 12 Russian intelligence agents for hacking Democratic networks. Trump has repeatedly denounced the investigation but was widely criticised for appearing to side with Vladimir Putin over his own intelligence agencies in Helsinki earlier this month.
Conversations with the Crow
On October 8th, 2000, Robert Trumbull Crowley, once a leader of the CIA’s Clandestine Operations Division, died in a Washington hospital of heart failure and the end effects of Alzheimer’s Disease. Before the late Assistant Director Crowley was cold, Joseph Trento, a writer of light-weight books on the CIA, descended on Crowley’s widow at her town house on Cathedral Hill Drive in Washington and hauled away over fifty boxes of Crowley’s CIA files.
Once Trento had his new find secure in his house in Front Royal, Virginia, he called a well-known Washington fix lawyer with the news of his success in securing what the CIA had always considered to be a potential major embarrassment.
Three months before, on July 20th of that year, retired Marine Corps colonel William R. Corson, and an associate of Crowley, died of emphysema and lung cancer at a hospital in Bethesda, Md.
After Corson’s death, Trento and the well-known Washington fix-lawyer went to Corson’s bank, got into his safe deposit box and removed a manuscript entitled ‘Zipper.’ This manuscript, which dealt with Crowley’s involvement in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, vanished into a CIA burn-bag and the matter was considered to be closed forever.
The small group of CIA officials gathered at Trento’s house to search through the Crowley papers, looking for documents that must not become public. A few were found but, to their consternation, a significant number of files Crowley was known to have had in his possession had simply vanished.
When published material concerning the CIA’s actions against Kennedy became public in 2002, it was discovered to the CIA’s horror, that the missing documents had been sent by an increasingly erratic Crowley to another person and these missing papers included devastating material on the CIA’s activities in South East Asia to include drug running, money laundering and the maintenance of the notorious ‘Regional Interrogation Centers’ in Viet Nam and, worse still, the Zipper files proving the CIA’s active organization of the assassination of President John Kennedy.
A massive, preemptive disinformation campaign was readied, using government-friendly bloggers, CIA-paid “historians” and others, in the event that anything from this file ever surfaced. The best-laid plans often go astray and in this case, one of the compliant historians, a former government librarian who fancied himself a serious writer, began to tell his friends about the CIA plan to kill Kennedy and eventually, word of this began to leak out into the outside world.
The originals had vanished and an extensive search was conducted by the FBI and CIA operatives but without success. Crowley’s survivors, his aged wife and son, were interviewed extensively by the FBI and instructed to minimize any discussion of highly damaging CIA files that Crowley had, illegally, removed from Langley when he retired. Crowley had been a close friend of James Jesus Angleton, the CIA’s notorious head of Counterintelligence. When Angleton was sacked by DCI William Colby in December of 1974, Crowley and Angleton conspired to secretly remove Angleton’s most sensitive secret files out of the agency. Crowley did the same thing right before his own retirement, secretly removing thousands of pages of classified information that covered his entire agency career.
Known as “The Crow” within the agency, Robert T. Crowley joined the CIA at its inception and spent his entire career in the Directorate of Plans, also know as the “Department of Dirty Tricks.”
Crowley was one of the tallest man ever to work at the CIA. Born in 1924 and raised in Chicago, Crowley grew to six and a half feet when he entered the U.S. Military Academy at West Point in N.Y. as a cadet in 1943 in the class of 1946. He never graduated, having enlisted in the Army, serving in the Pacific during World War II. He retired from the Army Reserve in 1986 as a lieutenant colonel. According to a book he authored with his friend and colleague, William Corson, Crowley’s career included service in Military Intelligence and Naval Intelligence, before joining the CIA at its inception in 1947. His entire career at the agency was spent within the Directorate of Plans in covert operations. Before his retirement, Bob Crowley became assistant deputy director for operations, the second-in-command in the Clandestine Directorate of Operations.
One of Crowley’s first major assignments within the agency was to assist in the recruitment and management of prominent World War II Nazis, especially those with advanced intelligence experience. One of the CIA’s major recruitment coups was Heinrich Mueller, once head of Hitler’s Gestapo who had fled to Switzerland after the collapse of the Third Reich and worked as an anti-Communist expert for Masson of Swiss counterintelligence. Mueller was initially hired by Colonel James Critchfield of the CIA, who was running the Gehlen Organization out of Pullach in southern Germany. Crowley eventually came to despise Critchfield but the colonel was totally unaware of this, to his later dismay.
Crowley’s real expertise within the agency was the Soviet KGB. One of his main jobs throughout his career was acting as the agency liaison with corporations like ITT, which the CIA often used as fronts for moving large amounts of cash off their books. He was deeply involved in the efforts by the U.S. to overthrow the democratically elected government of Salvador Allende in Chile, which eventually got him into legal problems with regard to investigations of the U.S. government’s grand jury where he has perjured himself in an agency cover-up
After his retirement, Crowley began to search for someone who might be able to write a competent history of his career. His first choice fell on British author John Costello (author of Ten Days to Destiny, The Pacific War and other works) but, discovering that Costello was a very aggressive homosexual, he dropped him and tentatively turned to Joseph Trento who had assisted Crowley and William Corson in writing a book on the KGB. When Crowley discovered that Trento had an ambiguous and probably cooperative relationship with the CIA, he began to distrust him and continued his search for an author.
Bob Crowley first contacted Gregory Douglas in 1993 when he found out from John Costello that Douglas was about to publish his first book on Heinrich Mueller, the former head of the Gestapo who had become a secret, long-time asset to the CIA. Crowley contacted Douglas and they began a series of long and often very informative telephone conversations that lasted for four years. In 1996, Crowley told Douglas that he believed him to be the person that should ultimately tell Crowley’s story but only after Crowley’s death. Douglas, for his part, became so entranced with some of the material that Crowley began to share with him that he secretly began to record their conversations, later transcribing them word for word, planning to incorporate some, or all, of the material in later publications.
In 1998, when Crowley was slated to go into the hospital for exploratory surgery, he had his son, Greg, ship two large foot lockers of documents to Douglas in Wisconsin with the caveat that they were not to be opened until after Crowley’s death. These documents, totaled an astonishing 15,000 pages of CIA classified files involving many covert operations, both foreign and domestic, during the Cold War.
After Crowley’s death and Trento’s raid on the Crowley files, huge gaps were subsequently discovered by horrified CIA officials and when Crowley’s friends mentioned Gregory Douglas, it was discovered that Crowley’s son had shipped two large boxes to Douglas. No one knew their contents but because Douglas was viewed as an uncontrollable loose cannon who had done considerable damage to the CIA’s reputation by his on-going publication of the history of Gestapo-Müller, they bent every effort both to identify the missing files and make some effort to retrieve them before Douglas made any use of them.
He has.
Conversation No. 2
Date: Friday, February 9, 1996
Commenced: 9:11 AM (CST)
Concluded: 9:38 AM (CST)
GD: Robert.
RTC: Good morning, Gregory. How are you doing today?
GD: Functioning. Yourself?
RTC: Good days, bad days. I have to be careful in the bathroom because I sometimes lose my balance.
GD: Put in some grab irons.
RTC: Better said than done. I have some advice for you Gregory. Don’t get old.
GD: Do I have a choice?
RTC: We know the alternative. Have you heard back from your publisher?
GD: He’s too patient with me, I must say. He wants to see something about flying saucers but I have a diary entry for Müller that covers this subject and I want to put it in there. His cousin was involved in the Roswell business and Roger actually saw one of the American ones out at Moffitt Field once. Actually climbed up on it.
RTC: Oh the hysteria of it all.
GD: I remember very clearly. At least three sightings a week. I created one of them at least.
RTC: How so?
GD: Oh we made a fake saucer out of balsa and silver paper, mounted two pulse jets at the rear and set it up for radio control.
RTC: Did you put little green men in it?
GD: No. The pilot area was covered with a plastic salad bowl upside down, but it really wasn’t very big. We took it down to the beach on a really hot day in July and flew it from one cliff to another. Right past a beach full of fat people getting sunburns. It was a distance of…oh say about 1000 feet give or take. To me, it wasn’t realistic but we put some noisemakers inside the jet pipes and it made a shitawful noise. High whistling and farting noises. Anyway, I was on one headland and my friend was on the other. We flew it fairly slowly in a straight line and believe me, the beach was packed. Right at the surf level but about 300 feet up in the air. God, you never heard so much shrieking and yelling in your life.
RTC: You always seem to have such a bizarre sense of humor, Gregory. Do you still do things like that?
GD: No. At my age, people get stuck into nut houses doing that but at the time, I did enjoy it. I remember once we carved the dorsal fin of a Great White out of a Styrofoam boogie board, mounted an underwater motor at the base with the control antenna running up to the top. Jesus, it was a huge fin at that. And of course we painted it up right. That was about the time that ‘Jaws’ came out. And this time we took it down to an even bigger beach…..do you know the California coast by any chance? I could be more specific
RTC: No, not really. Go on.
GD: It was the Fourth of July and hot as shit and the beach and the surf were jammed with intercity types. There was a pier that ran out well past the surf at the northern end of the beach so we took a rented rowboat with the fake fin and the radio control equipment and rowed right under this pier. It was a big pier with a road on it and all kinds of shops along the sides so there was certainly room under it. Anyway, we put the fin in the water, turned on the motor and aimed it towards the beach. It was a little hard to direct what with the surf and all but with a few tries, we got it fine. Ran it towards the beach and then paralleled it just out past the surf line. Jesus H. Christ, Robert, you couldn’t imagine the havoc. Screaming we could hear under the pier and everyone stampeded out of the water. We ran it back and forth a few times and then headed out to where a bunch of twits were fishing and again panic reigned supreme. Little outboard jobbies fleeing in terror in all directions. I mean given the size of the fin, what was supposed to be underneath it must have been the size of the Titanic. We saw a Coast Guard boat coming so we just aimed it out to sea and opened it up. Lost the whole rig but I didn’t feel like trying to get it back. If we’d been bagged, I would have got at least ten years out of it. But probably for contaminating the beach. I’ll bet there were six inches of shit floating in the surf.
RTC: Your escapades always entertain me, Gregory. But what do you know about real saucers? I don’t mean toys.
GD: The Germans developed one during the war and flew it. That I do know. Habermohl, Meithe and some wop.
RTC: Yes, true enough. And after the war we got the plans and one of the engineers. The Russians got a prototype and another scientist.
GD: Bender tells me the one he saw at Moffitt was made in Canada.
RTC: Yes, by the A.V. Roe Company. Called it AVRO.
GD: He said they had used it as a high altitude recon craft and it had USAF marking on it.
RTC: They let him see it?
GD: Been out of service for some time and he had some friend in the Navy who got him in.
RTC: Well, those were the legit ones. There really were others, you know.
GD: Russian?
RTC: No. We have no idea where they came from. Radar picked up flights around the moon that never came from down here. And the Roswell business was true enough. That’s where we got transistors, you know. But the sightings came at a sensitive time. The Korean War, the Cold War and so on. Great national fears. Remember the Orson Wells program?
GD: On Halloween of ’38. Mercury Theater radio show. I heard it as a kid. Of course I read Wells’ book and knew it was just a show.
RTC: A lot of others did not, believe me. It caused an enormous national panic. Hundreds dead, people killing themselves and their children, fleeing into the countryside and so on. I’m, surprised they didn’t lynch Orson. But he infuriated old Hearst with his movie….
GD: Citizen Kane.
RTC: Right and old Hearst blackballed Orson and ruined his career. But because of the huge flap over this, Truman decided to keep serious accounts about the sightings out of the papers and they minimized it and made fun of the whole thing. But they were real enough.
GD: Given the huge number of systems out there, from a mathematical point of view, there isn’t any question superior entities do exist. Why would they bother with our planet? To watch the pink monkeys running around killing each other? Investigate Elvis concerts?
RTC: Well, most of the legit sightings came around the period when they were all testing A-Bombs so maybe that got the little green men interested.
GD: Did the Company have anything to do with all of this?
RTC: No. We had the U-2 business but not the saucers. The real ones. They were strictly military. No weapons but did carry cameras. These were used in various places because they were impossible to intercept but not as stable a camera platform as the U-2. The Russians knew all about these and when the strangers showed up, they thought they were ours and we thought they were theirs. We had several secret conferences about these at the time to try to clarify this.
GD: Any authentic reports of landings or abduction of humans?
RTC: Not that I remember. Mostly what we could call recon passes. The Roswell one was a fluke. Lightning was supposed to have hit one of their ships and brought it down. Don’t forget that Roswell was in a very sensitive military area at the time.
GD: Did they recover bodies?
RTC: As I understand it, they did but I can’t give you any more than that. What did Müller have to say about these?
GD: That they were both domestic and from somewhere unknown. I’ll include this passage when I do the journals or diaries.
RTC: Journals sounds more authoritative. Diaries sounds like something a little girl keeps about her pets or boyfriends.
GD: I think you’re right.
RTC: When are they coming out?
GD: They’re in German and the handwriting is terrible. And his wife is terrified that I’ll somehow identify her or the children. I won’t but she is not sure of that. Some of your friends will not be happy when this comes out but so what?
RTC: So what. And after that? After the journals?
GD: I don’t know. Any ideas?
RTC: Well, we can always think about the Kennedy killing. I can give you some material on that that could produce a best seller.
GD: For example?
RTC: Now, Gregory, everything in its own good time. First things first. Finish up with the Müller business and then on to other things. One of these days, we’ll have to jerk Jim Critchfield’s chain a little. I can’t stand that man. His wife, Lois, used to work for me and when we were shortening staff, I got her a job with Jim but we both wish I hadn’t. Jim is a first class asshole and a sadist of sorts. I think we can do a number on him as they say.
GD: Well, if you want to off him, I’m not your man. I’ve truly done in a few in my life but I prefer the typewriter to the gun. I do have an Irish friend who is a hit man but only political. He worked for your people in Ireland. He led the team that did Mountbatten in ’79.
RTC: Oh, I know about that. They caught one man.
GD: The man who planted the bomb on the boat but not my friend. A very interesting story.
RTC: Are you planning to use it? He’s still alive I take it?
GD: Oh yes, and doing fine in the private sector. And, most important, a very good friend. If I do anything, I’ll talk to him first. It’s not only OK but a real duty to fuck your enemies but never your friends.
RTC: Well, in time I can tell you our part in that one but let’s wait awhile. Every day is not Christmas, is it?
GD: That would be nice. Christmas every day. By the way, I read in the Post that it was so cold in DC the other day that a Senator was seen with his hands in his own pockets.
RTC: (Laughs)
GD: Did I ever tell you the one about the man who asked his girl friend to put her hands into his pocket? No?
RTC: Not that I recall.
GD: Anyway, she said ‘I feel silly doing this,” and he said, “If you put them any further down, you’ll feel nuts.”
RTC: Gregory, so soon after breakfast. Don’t you know any refined jokes?
GD: Limericks?
RTC: God no. The last time you got off on those we were an hour on the phone and Emily wondered why I was laughing so much. You must know thousands of them. How can you remember so much?
GD: It’s a curse, believe me.
RTC: Bill said you have a phenomenal memory.
GD: I can remember everything but dates and figures. No pre-natal memories.
RTC: The shrinks are useless, Gregory. We hired weird people like Cameron and you would be astonished at the pure crap they peddled on everyone.
GD: You know, I think most of them went into the game because they started reading up on their own psychosis and went on from there. Freud used to bang his sister when he wasn’t smoking Yen Shee….
RTC: You mean opium?
GD: Yes. Coleridge loved it too but Xanadu is all he had to show for it. Oh, I was digging into the Elmali business. The Greek coins. Now there’s a funny story for you. The Bulgarians forged up thousands of the rarest old Greek coins and sold them to the sucker brigades for millions. Cash for operations. Like the Stasi doing the Hitler Diaries.
RTC: You were into that one, weren’t you?
GD: I did all the detail work for Wolfgang and let Connie Kujau do the writing. Old Billy Price gave them a million dollars for the Hitler diary I turned out. I mean I did the research and Connie did the writing. Now that would make a nice book.
RTC: Was if profitable for you?
GD: Oh God, yes. Very. They still can’t account for millions of marks. But I really enjoyed watching the phonies and experts like Irving and Trevor-Roper get shit on their bibs. God, such a frenzied drive to get their names into print. Irving is such a brainless fuck that I can’t believe it. One of these days, Dave will really start believing his own lies and then he’ll get caught. ‘Irving’s been in hiding since early last fall when his picture first appeared on the Post Office wall.’
RTC: Costello admired him.
GD: Don’t forget, I met Costello. If he admired Irving, Irving must have a huge cock.
RTC: Now, now, I liked Costello.
GD: Brittle and vituperative without a reason or an excuse. I didn”t have much use for him but he was a better writer than Irving.
RTC: I’ll agree. But John tried.
GD: What an epitaph!
RTC: Do I detect professional jealousy here, Gregory?
GD: No. You know how Costello died, don’t you?
RTC: There is somewhat of a mystery about that. There is a story going around that the Russians did him because he had discovered something sinister on his last trip to Moscow. What have you heard?
GD: John died of AIDS on a flight from Spain to Miami. Found him dead in his seat.
RTC: Gregory, come now. Where did you get that canard?
GD: It’s not a canard. Miami is in Dade County, Florida. When someone dies like that, the local coroner gets the body and has to do a post on it. I used to do posts so I have some knowledge. Anyway, I called the coroner’s office there, talked shop with a technician and got him to pull the initial death certificate and the final report. Costello had a raging lung infection only caused by HIV and died from it. Not open to debate at all. Since these are public records, I sent my new friend the money and he got official copies and sent them off to me. When I told Kimmel and Bruce Lee about this, Lee was very irate and, true to form, Kimmel refused to believe me. I can understand why Kimmel was negative because I can never be right but Lee’s reaction was interesting. And, of course, Tom has a penchant for young men. He made a very strong pass at the son of a Swedish farmer I know. He likes to teach basketball to the small ones. Playing doctor is more like it. If the Russians ever find out about his secret lusts, they will bag him for sure. I wonder if they already have?
RTC: Why speculate?
GD: I’m a curious person, Robert. Why did the dog not bark in the night? Lee told me sinister forces got Costello and poisoned him with shellfish. The official autopsy report shows differently. I sent him a copy of the reports and he was not happy.
RTC: Regardless of the truth of this, Costello was a very competent historian, don’t you think?
GD: Costello alive didn’t particularly impress me. I talked with him in Reno, as you know, for about three hours and I’ve had more enlightening conversations with the hairlip who grooms my dogs.
RTC: How are your dogs?
GD: Being dogs. Actually, Robert, I am a firm believer in Frederick the Great’s sentiment. He said that the more he saw of people, the more he loved his dogs. I told Tom Kimmel that and he got huffy about it.
RTC: Tom is a decent sort, although your comments about nice young men are not a surprise. We used to call Tommy the Arrow Shirt Kid, but I agree he’s conventional.
GD: How can you be a good intelligence officer and be conventional? I’m not at all conventional and you yourself said I would have been your best agent. Or were you just flattering me?
RTC: You have talent.
GD: Ah, my Russian friends have said the same thing but we don’t need to discuss that aspect, do we?
RTC: That might be interesting.
GD: Not to the author of the ‘New KGB.’ You did write that, correct?
RTC: We had some help from Joe Trento.
GD: I wouldn’t admit that to anyone. You should have used my literary abilities. Trento is of the mistaken impression that he’s important and articulate.
RTC: We didn’t know you then but you probably would have done a much better job at that.
GD: Truth pressed to earth will rise again.
RTC: That’s….?
GD: Mary Baker Eddy. Actually, it’s Latin. I could give it to you in Latin but what the hell? Oh, well, another day and another fifteen cents. How’re your family?
RTC: Doing fine, thank you for asking. And yours?
GD: My evil sister is still alive but all the rest of them have gone off to play cards with Jesus. If it’s true that when you die you have a great burst of glowing light and then you get to meet all your dead relatives, I think I’ll try to postpone the inevitable and find some place where they aren’t. Like Monaco.
RTC: Sam Cummings and Monaco. Do you know about Sam?
GD: A Limey who ran Interarmco and sold to the wrong people. That’s a no-no for one of your people. And safe in Monaco. Sometime I’ll talk to you about Jimmy Atwood and his Merex gun operation but not now.
RTC: Always promises. I’m going to have to cut this short Gregory because I have to do a little maintenance work upstairs and Emily keeps reminding me about this in a nice way. If you talk to Bill, ask him to call me, would you? His wife is not doing too well and it’s hard to get a hold of him.
GD: Of course. And be good.
RTC: At my age, there isn’t much reason not to.
(Concluded at 9:38AM CST)