The Family Jewels: Nothing New Under the Sun
Legal Defense & Research Trust
P.O. Box 7487
Ocean Park, Maine 04063
Website: Barbara Hartwell vs. CIA
http://barbarahartwell.blogspot.com/
by David Robarge
For more than 30 years, the Family Jewels have clouded the C.I.A.'s reputation, even though most of their contents have long been known from official reports and ad hoc disclosures. William Colby -- who oversaw the compilation of the Jewels while serving as the agency's operations chief and director-designate -- is the source of some durable misconceptions about them. In his memoir, Honorable Men (p. 340), Colby says that the Jewels consist of "693 pages of possible violations of, or at least questionable activities in regard to, the C.I.A.'s legislative charter"; that among the contents are "bizarre and tragic cases wherein the Agency experimented with mind-control drugs"; and that accompanying them was "a separate and even more secret annex" that "summarized a 1967 survey of C.I.A.'s involvement in assassination attempts or plans against Castro, Lumumba and Trujillo."
These misstatements were repeated at least in part in several widely read works, including Thomas Powers's The Man Who Kept the Secrets, John Ranelagh's The Agency, G.J.A. O'Toole's Encyclopedia of American Intelligence and Espionage, and Norman Polmar and Thomas Allen's Spy Book. Less informed observers also have suggested that the Jewels include details about political and paramilitary covert actions and definitive proof that the C.I.A.'s controversial counterintelligence chief, James Angleton, was the mastermind behind the domestic spying program called MHCHAOS.
[BH: "Durable misconceptions"? "Misstatements"? This is just fancy double-talk for the purpose of denying the truth. How about some facts for a change....
Fact: Mind control drugs were indeed administered --most despicably, to children, under the auspices of MK Ultra.
I was one of those children. At various times, while still under the 'legal age' of 18, I was given drugs without my knowledge and/or consent. These drugs included (but were not limited to) librium; laudanum; scapolomine; LSD (including 'STP', a very potent and toxic hallucinogen).
In 1968, at the age of seventeen (17) a rogue CIA operative administered STP to me by injection. I became violently ill and nearly died from it, and was hospitalized at Bellevue in New York City. Had my father not taken measures to ensure my release (they tried to hold me for 'observation'); and had he not instructed me precisely as to how to protect myself, survive the ordeal and how to deal with hospital personnel, I don't know what kind of further extreme damage might have resulted. This is just one example of 'unintended consequences' when arrogant rogue operatives start freelancing and toying with people's lives, just for the hell of it.
Later, during young adulthood, under the auspices of MK Ultra, I was prescribed various drugs by CIA psychiatrists, one of whom was a handler who first trained me in the use of hypnosis. Some of the drugs were used to wipe my memory; others to 'contain' me so that I could be utilized for their purposes. I won't go into further detail, except to say that drugging a person against her will, for the purpose of exploiting her talents, is one of the most despicable abuses which can be perpetrated.
I was also drugged periodically without my knowledge or consent up until the time I finally broke out of CIA in 1994. On certain occasions, I was hit with an aerosol to knock me out, then abducted for 'hostile interrogation'. The last such incident took place in 1994, the year I finally broke out of CIA. This, after battling my handlers for years; after refusing to comply; after refusing missions and turning down contracts. I just wanted out, and through the grace of God, I finally succeeded.
CIA is like Krazy-glue: Just try getting unstuck from them, and see what your life will become. Any former CIA (and there ARE some of us) who have managed to accomplish such a task, and live to tell about it, can attest to the truth of my statements about the modus operandi of CIA.
Fact: Under MK Ultra, Frank Olsen was surreptitiously dosed with LSD, then murdered by CIA.
Fact: An assassination plot (one of many, as documented by former contract agents of CIA) against Fidel Castro was spawned by CIA in 1969, using a Special Forces operative, Reds Helmey.
Helmey hijacked a plane to Cuba, was tried and found innocent on grounds of "temporary insanity". Insanity? Or CIA mind control?
The case received lots of publicity in 1969-70, but then, like most such cases, seemed to fade from public view.
Many years later, Reds Helmey wrote an autobiographical book, The Lemon Dance: Tell Fidel El Rojo is Coming, which describes this incident as well as his experiences as a soldier in Special Forces and as his dealings with elusive CIA personnel who hovered around him and made periodic appearances in his life.
Reds sent me an autographed copy of his book and contacted me by e-mail after having read my reports on CIA black ops (including MK Ultra mind control operations) on various Internet sites.
Here's the inscription Reds wrote to me:
To Barbara,
Truth should be the first thing found and hope the last thing lost--
Your Friend
Bobby "Reds" Helmey
God Bless America!
January, 2003
Reds approached me wanting information to help him make sense of what had happened to him, specifically in connection with his dealings with CIA. He wanted to be debriefed by a professional, namely myself. Why me? Because he recognized the truth (some of which he had personally experienced) contained in my reports on CIA and military black ops.
Reds also asked me to be a "tactical advisor" on a film (based on his book) about the true story of his involvement in the Castro assassination plot. I spoke at length with Reds, as well as with the Hollywood producer, who after hearing my personal stories about CIA (which he said made his jaw drop) also wanted my involvement in the film project. He even expressed interest in making a film about my experiences. I told him this would 'not be allowed' to happen.
Unfortunately (and just as I predicted) CIA stepped in (like they always do) and prevented me from being involved in the film project. I was also unable to assist Reds Helmey, though I very much wanted to.
Over the years, since leaving CIA, I have worked with quite a number of ex-military/intelligence people to help them understand what really happened to them; and to help them in retrieving lost memories, especially when they had "missing time", as a result of their memories being 'wiped' by drugs, hypnosis, psychotronic technology, mind control programming or all of same. I never took money for this work, I helped only because I care and because I want to stop the abuses of military and intelligence people by their own government.
Fact: Ex-CIA operative Gene "Chip" Tatum was tasked with the assassination of Ross Perot by George H.W. Bush.
In 1997, I first met Chip Tatum, when we were both speakers at the Global Sciences Congress in Denver, Colorado. Subsequently, I had the opportunity to discuss many issues with Mr. Tatum, related to CIA black operations in which we were both involved.
Chip Tatum publicly admitted to having been (among other things) an assassin for CIA. Specifically, he admitted to me personally to having carried out no less than 17 assassinations during his CIA career, spanning twenty-five (25) years.
What's more, Chip gave me a copy of the original letter re the "neutralization" of Ross Perot, signed by George H.W. Bush.
I had intended to publish this letter on my former website, in 2000. However, it, along with other documents, was stolen from my home in a break-in while I was travelling. During the same 'black bag job', the perps dismantled my computer, leaving it for me to find as a "calling card" upon returning home.
A second copy of the document was similarly stolen during a break-in at the home of my (then) webmaster in New York City. His apartment was completely tossed and trashed. The perps piled much of his equipment in the bathtub under water; destroyed his computer, after stealing the files, and stole all the documents I had given him for publication. Their finishing touch was to scatter dozens of copies of a flyer, Barbara Hartwell, CIA black ops survivor, promoting my website all over his apartment. Their message was crystal clear: Stay away from Barbara Hartwell --or else.
However, the document was also given to others and has since been published on several websites. Here is a copy. I can attest that this copy is exactly the same in wording, having seen the original and committed it to memory.]
GEORGE HERBERT WALKER BUSH ORDERS THE NEUTRALIZATION OF ROSS PEROT
D. G. Chip Tatum Codename: Pegasus
You are hereby ordered into service of the United States Government.
It has been determined that Independent Presidential Candidate Ross Perot, has illegally obtained documents which are of vital concern to the security of the United States and selected allies of the United States.
It has therefore been determined by Finding of the National Security Council, That these documents must be recovered. Due to this determination, you are authorized to use whatever means necessary to recover said documents and insure that this criminal is brought to justice.
You are authorized to exceed existing regulations and FTM's to accomplish this mission. If loss of life occurs as a result of the performance of your duties, you shall be exempt and protected from prosecution.
George Bush
[BH: Chip Tatum refused to carry out the mission. He told me that Bush (who, in addition to Colby, had been one of Tatum's direct handlers) threatened that he would be "toast" if he failed to comply.
Chip in fact did refuse to comply. He said he refused to assassinate an American citizen. Chip, naturally, became a target, but created his own "insurance policy" by secretly taping conversations between Raymond "Buddy" Young (a Clinton minion) and a Mossad operative named Mike Harari, while serving as a helicopter pilot. For details, and the rest of the story (at least what has been published) run a search using "Chip Tatum" and "Pegasus."
Chip was subsequently arrested, tried and convicted of "treason". He spent two years in a federal prison for his "crimes". After his release from prison, he went public on radio, TV and on the lecture circuit.
The last time I saw Chip Tatum was at a conference in Daytona Beach, Florida, February, 1998. At that time he told me he was leaving the country for good. He had advised me to leave as well, if I valued my life.
Since that time, numerous rumors have circulated about Chip Tatum. A body washed up on the beach in Costa Rica, which some claimed was Chip Tatum. Some (former insiders) have told me he took money from GHW Bush to disappear. Others (also former insiders) have claimed they heard from him, as late as 2002.
I have no reason to trust the sources of any of these reports on the whereabouts and fate of Chip Tatum.
I don't know what happened to Chip Tatum, or whether he is dead or alive. I suspect he is no longer among the living, considering some of what he exposed (including re Iran-Contra, CIA drug-running, and POW-MIA issues) revealing the true nature of the criminal activities of CIA.
And the two examples given here of CIA assassination plots to which I have been made privy by the principals, the intended "hit men", are ones that failed. What about the many assassination plots that succeeded?
I have personal knowledge of a number of such assassinations, including of relatives, family friends and former colleagues.
Now, after all this, here's CIA's version of the truth:
"C.I.A. has never carried out a political assassination, nor has it induced, employed or suggested one which occurred."
If you believe this, I guess you'll believe anything.]
The release of the Jewels should end much of the mythology about them. For starters, the compendium is not a 693-page catalogue of crime and immorality. Repetitive reports, duplicate documents, blank pages, file dividers, cover sheets, distribution lists and news clippings comprise approximately 30 percent of the total. Among the remaining 500 or so pages of substance, except for an account of the use of Mafioso Johnny Roselli in a plot to kill Castro (12-16) -- of note is that the director of central intelligence at the time, Allen Dulles, approved it -- there are only passing references to already disclosed assassination plots and drug-testing programs and next to nothing of importance about purely foreign operations.
That may disappoint some expectant readers but should not be surprising because the whole point of an order by James Schlesinger, a later director of central intelligence, that produced the Jewels was to get information about activities that possibly violated the C.I.A.'s charter. Consequently, the collection is nearly all about activities involving American citizens or occurring inside the United States -- most of the latter, as an Agency officer noted, "completely innocent, although subject to misconstrual" in the political atmosphere of 1973 (36) -- and includes much about agency contact with the White House "Plumbers," the Watergate break-in perpetrators, and now-obscure characters such as the fugitive financier Robert Vesco. The hypersensitivity about anything that could be interpreted as having domestic political implications -- or perhaps simply the bureaucratic instinct for self-protection -- may explain the inclusion of the lengthy set of mundane documents about a small C.I.A. expenditure for postal services on behalf of the White House (83-104), and a memo about the Office of Logistics disposing of the National Security Council's classified trash (324).
[BH:For anyone to proclaim that the collection is "completely innocent, though subject to miscontrual", is but another example of the utter arrogance which permeates the mind-set of the "loyal Americans" at CIA.]
Although put together haphazardly, the Jewels can be divided into several categories: dealings with Watergate-related figures, liaison with government agencies, administrative and support activities, collection operations, security investigations and counterintelligence programs. Pages 5 to37 probably will attract the most initial attention because they concern a list of activities specifically identified as "Family Jewels," but the unredacted items will be familiar to students of the Rockefeller Commission and Church Committee reports. The entry on the K.G.B. defector Yuri Nosenko (23-24) fails to mention that he was treated so harshly because of suspicions that he was hiding Soviet involvement in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. In the remaining several hundred pages can be found occasional stray new details about well-worn stories.
In the context of Seymour Hersh's famous exposé about the Jewels in The New York Times on Dec. 22, 1974 -- in an article headlined "Huge C.I.A. Operation Reported in U.S. Against Antiwar Forces, Other Dissidents in Nixon Years" -- the long set of documents about C.I.A.'s involvement with United States Government activities targeting American dissidents suspected of receiving foreign assistance to help them disrupt the presidential nominating conventions in 1972 (549-74) is worth mentioning. Not only is Angleton's hand not prominent, but the extent to which MHCHAOS and related programs concentrated on the foreign angle becomes clear. As the records show, no evidence of anything more than political and moral support was ever found. The C.I.A. History Staff's recently declassified study of Richard Helms as director of central intelligence, available on the agency's public Web site in the F.O.I.A. reading room, has a thorough discussion of MHCHAOS based on materials other than the Jewels.
The Jewels close with two groups of documents that convey the tenor of the times. One series (634-58) deals with a leak about agency technical assistance to a suburban Washington police department. It was a good news story -- the C.I.A.-supplied device might have prevented a cop killing -- but a revelation of that sort could not be countenanced in 1973, and the incident was reported. Documents 659 to 693 involve an exchange between Colby and the Parade Magazine editor Lloyd Shearer over a charge in Shearer's publication that the agency "uses political assassination as a weapon," citing the Phoenix program in Vietnam. Colby, who managed Phoenix, replied that "C.I.A. has never carried out a political assassination, nor has it induced, employed or suggested one which occurred." Based on what is known about the agency's assassination planning and Phoenix, that carefully crafted answer was not only accurate, but an exemplar of the lawyerly intellect that Colby would put to good use during the Congressional investigations of 1975-76, when his policy of controlled disclosure may have saved the C.I.A. from dissolution. These final records -- several of them in Colby's own hand -- make an unintentionally fitting conclusion to the Jewels collection, the product of a process he orchestrated as a damage control exercise but which almost proved to be the agency's undoing.
Due to his current employment as the C.I.A.'s chief historian, the material in this post was reviewed by agency officials before publication.
[BH: Yes, indeed, I'm sure agency officials reviewed it well. And made damn sure to redact anything containing a grain of truth.]
CIA COMMUNITY VALUES?
CIA Vision, Mission & Values
Vision
One Agency. One Community. An Agency unmatched in its core capabilities, functioning as one team, fully integrated into the Intelligence Community.
[BH: Your "community" vision needs a serious overhaul. How about incorporating some genuine moral values, like a respect for human life? Your "core capabilities" may have been unmatched in the past by most (except by Mossad); I won't argue with you on that point. Why not use them to bring some truth and light into the world?
And why are you so threatened by those of us who have refused to be team players, because were not willing to compromise our principles to carry out your dirty work? Most of us were either driven out by your "team" or left in disgust. Then, we are persecuted unto the death.]
Mission
We are the nation’s first line of defense. We accomplish what others cannot accomplish and go where others cannot go. We carry out our mission by:
Core Values
"I toiled wholeheartedly in the vineyards because it was fun, fun, fun.....Where else could a red-blooded American boy lie, kill, cheat, steal, rape and pillage with the sanction and blessing of the all-highest?"
Indeed, where else? Where else, but in America, the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave. Home of the Criminally Insane Agency.]
You may have heard about the Central Intelligence Agency. But, do you know what we really do and how we do it? The people of the CIA do very important work. They help keep our country safe. They give our leaders information so they can make good decisions. And they take pride in their important jobs.
We have a lot of different jobs here. We have analysts, doctors, lawyers, scientists, geographers, and librarians, to name just a few.
Look through our pages and you will learn all about us. If you read carefully, you can become a CIA expert. We also have some fun stories and games for you.
posted by Curriculum Vitae at
Friday, July 13, 2007
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