It was at this time that Marwan also began, in a small way at first, organising
arms deals. By the time Nasser had died, Marwan had stashed several million
dollars into various European and off-shore banks. As it turned out Nasser’s
death was an advantage because a young, unsure and fledgling Sadat was desperate
to surround himself with key people he thought he could trust. Marwan would
obviously be a deadly enemy if he were not courted. As a result Marwan went from
roving diplomat to Minister Without Portfolio. That innocuous title hid an
awesome power. Marwan kept all his diplomatic privileges, but was now to get
into arms dealing in a very big way. His real power, however, came from the

umbrella which Sadat had created to use Marwan’s talents in many other ways.



He was, in effect, Chief of Staff for Information and Chairman of the Arab
Corporation for War Industries. These two posts alone would represent great and
lucrative power in Sadat’s Egypt. But then Sadat appointed him Head of the
Security Forces. This made him not only the ultimate supremo of the army and air
force, but also the civil and secret police. This was not only unprecedented,
but almost inconceivable. It was this man, don’t forget, who would ultimately
become a principal player against the Fayed family.



Between 1974 and 1978 Marwan masterminded a mass of arrests and created
sophisticated torture chambers, which reflected Sadat’s terrible fear of
assassination. Marwan played on this fear to consolidate his power. His name in
Cairo changed from the "Miracle Child" to "Dr. Death." as
wave after wave of legal terrorism swept the capitol. In his capacity under
Sadat, Marwan managed to stash no less than £340 million, mainly in London
where he was madly buying property. As head of the armed forces and Chairman of
the Arab Corporation for War Industries, he merely awarded himself all the arms
contracts and the millions rolled in. His lifestyle began to reflect his
new-found riches. He bought a luxury apartment in the "most expensive
street in the world" - No. 50 Avenue Foch in Paris (a stone’s throw from
Dodi’s apartment) where he had by then installed Muna. He festooned her with
the most expensive jewels from Cartier. He bought himself a private Falcon jet
to whisk him to and from Paris for dinner at Maxims. The penniless student had
become one of the richest men in the world, within a single decade.



Then the world stage changed as Sadat was being wooed towards Camp David. Marwan
quickly saw the writing on the wall, and fled to Paris. Sadat was furious and
immediately withdrew Marwan’s diplomatic status. It was resumed only days
after Sadat’s assassination. It is not known, but widely assumed, that Marwan
was the brains behind the assassination.



When his status was restored, Marwan left Muna in Paris and, with almost
unlimited funds and important contacts throughout the Arab world, he was ready
for his formidable assault on London.

He operated under the parent company, Cabra, and within a decade he would buy
and sell among much else (and sometimes as a broker for other Arabs), the
Playboy Club, Chelsea and Fulham football grounds (Fulham is now owned by
al-Fayed). He purchased significant sections of Mayfair, Bloomsbury and the West
End of London, including a theatre. If he had kept to property alone he could
have become a billionaire in his own right, but he met Adnan Khashoggi, whom he
had known in Saudi. Despite the fact that Adnan was al-Fayed’s former
brother-in-law and therefore an uncle of Dodi, Khashoggi did not seem to have
the slightest allegiance to the Fayeds. In turn, Khashoggi introduced Marwan to
the Muktoum brothers, of racehorse fame, who subsequently introduced him to Tiny
Rowland.



At that stage there was no reason at all why Marwan should have the slightest
personal animosity towards al-Fayed. But the Muktoums did - there had developed
almost a feudal war between them - and so did Tiny Rowland.



This feud between the Muktoums and al-Fayed remains a mystery to me and al-Fayed
is still evasive about it. It seems to be a family matter. It could be that the
Muktoums, through their strings of racehorses, enjoy a unique relationship with
the Queen. It could be because of old bad feelings between Dubai and Brunei. It
could be a purely Arab feud because of an early insult. It could be business. Or
arms trade, or simply because the Muktoums put in their lot with Fayed’s sworn
enemy, Tiny Rowland.



Suffice it to say that a strong working relationship between Rowland, Marwan,
the Muktoums, Gaddafi, and al-Dam would have made a formidable and powerful
cocktail which could have unleashed almost unlimited venom.



Through Marwan, they all set up Octagon which would mastermind the dirty tricks
against al-Fayed. As usual the actual ownership of Octagon would be shrouded in
a whole network of other companies which were mainly off-the-shelf and
non-operative.

Since then, however, Rowland and al-Fayed have, on the face of it, made their
peace and it seems very unlikely indeed that Rowland would now be interested in
any plot to actually kill Diana. Again, however, Rowland was a man possessed, to
whom the death of a Fayed would have been a great convenience. It would have
settled the ultimate score of revenge. I cannot trust a man who openly cavorts
with terrorism masterminded by Gaddafi. If he did so, which is provable, then
anything can be believed of him.



There was one other thing of enormous significance. Al-Fayed had a long-standing
relationship with the Sultan of Brunei and it was an accusation Rowland had made
to the DTI that the Fayed family were not of substance and had been
"sponsored" by the Sultan. Even on Arab oil standards, the Sultan is
preposterously rich, billed as the richest man in the world. This was an
allegation, of course, set up by Octagon.



At some stage in the past decade Marwan was trying to pull a confidence trick on
the Sultan, with a view of changing his allegiance to the Muktoum camp and away
from al-Fayed. Because of al-Fayed’s equally high level of intelligence, he
was able to spike this plot and in so doing he made an immediate and bitter
lifelong enemy of Marwan. The feud between the Muktoums and the Fayeds is more
mysterious. Octagon also employs the notorious al-Dam, controlled by Gaddafi. It
is a most unholy and dangerous alliance, and none of these players would care
one iota about Diana.



There is no doubt in my mind, that a plot by these people to kill al-Fayed
himself was highly probable and possible. When these plans were frustrated, it
is by no means inconceivable that they should go for his eldest son. It is very
much how the mind of Marwan and al-Dam would work. We are back in the Bedouin
tent. An eye for an eye. But this time there wasn’t even a nuance of Bedouin
diplomacy. We don’t positively know how the mind of Gaddafi really works, but
we do know that he has shown strains of eccentricity bordering on insanity, and
that because of his relationship with Tiny Rowland, he was firmly and
dangerously in the anti-Fayed camp. Even if he was not a direct conspirator, he
could have supplied the sophisticated intelligence equipment needed to carry out
an undetectable assassination. He would not have needed to finance it. Between
them, these would-be conspirators had more than enough funds to buy up anything
they needed. Also, Paris was very much home ground to Marwan and al-Dam. Marwan,
in the Avenue Foch, was almost a neighbour of Dodi off the Champs Elysées. Even
if the Muktoums were not in the conspiracy they would have been very pleased
with the death of Dodi.



None of the players in this particular scenario are amateurs. Marwan himself is
a former head of intelligence and terror squads, and al-Dam still is. Both have
irrefutable terrorist backgrounds and both have never given a toss for human
life.



As we go on later to examine the circumstances of the actual accident, it will
become obvious that this faction was entirely capable of carrying out such an
operation.



My main question is simple. How was a man like Marwan able, for two decades now,
to operate terrorist activity from the UK and France with complete impunity? It
is absolutely impossible that he could have evaded the interest of the
whole world’s intelligence services, including MI5, MI6, the CIA, Mossad, all
the Arab states, France, and, because of his strong connections with Rowland -
who had vast interests in Africa - most of Africa as well, without ever being
molested or restrained in any way. As a friend of Gaddafi, for example, he would
automatically have been an enemy of Israel. He faces immediate arrest in the US.
Why not in the UK? Why has the US not tried for extradition proceedings?



If ourselves and the al-Fayed team were easily able to identify him as an
organiser of terrorism, and as Top Secret files in, at the very least, the
Egyptian embassy in London were undoubtedly available to the CIA and MI6, how is
it that he has never been apprehended?

If CIA files in the US, concerning the connivance of two of their top agents in
terrorism, showed adequately enough that Marwan was involved in supplying arms
to terrorists (enough anyway to issue an arrest warrant), how come Britain and
France have seemingly never taken an interest? Tradeswind was fully covered in
inter-office CIA files and formed the basis of the agents’ prosecution. Why is
it still trading?



How was it that Gaddafi’s cousin and his brother - both infamous international
murderers - and Nasser’s former political henchman (Marwan), could move freely
in and out of London, Paris and Tripoli, when there were global sanctions
against Gaddafi? How was it, come to that, that despite the sanctions, Rowland
himself was able to openly launder money for the Gaddafi regime?

Al-Fayed’s painstakingly-constructed files have now been widely circulated to
the whole gamut of the "Middle-Establishment" - the police, MP’s,
newspapers and so on. Our own observations, fully backed by huge and authentic
documentation, have been published in full (the whole series eventually ran to
30,000 words). This means that for at least ten years now there has been widely
published material on Marwan and Co.’s covert activities. No one has ever so
much as questioned him officially. The media also have steered ominously clear,
despite much hectoring from the Fayed camp. Yet even with our own slender
resources, often working on a shoestring budget with a largely inexperienced
staff, we were able to supply irrefutable evidence that Ashraf Marwan was a
complete undesirable to these shores.



The fact is that it is so very inexplicable that one can really only come to one
conclusion: That Ashraf Marwan, must have been so useful to the
Super-Establishment (in particular the secret agencies and the Foreign Office)
that it was prudent and expedient of them to either turn a blind eye - or to use
him for their own ends.



Being a trained espionage agent himself, Marwan would have been very well placed
to play both sides against the other for his own gain and protection. If nothing
else he has been a supreme survivor in a very murky world.



It is established fairly generally that professional espionage agencies are well
versed in using their supposed enemies as agent provocateur in
sophisticated political games. (Just look at the CIA’s involvement with the
drug cartels of Columbia). By using the Marwan set-up they could have closely
monitored Gaddafi’s thinking and motives; Abu Nidal’s terrorist intentions
(among others); plots against the Camp David accord; arms dealing generally; the
Egyptian political scene - and, come to that, the French; had a close link to
the Muktoums, and therefore Dubai; kept a wary eye on Tiny Rowland; and, to
boot, almost incidentally, al-Fayed.



Cold journalistic logic brings one to the inevitable conclusion that Ashraf
Marwan made the most perfect double agent for nearly all of the Mid-eastern and
Western espionage agencies. It simply stands to reason. And the strong
circumstantial evidence is that Marwan could not possibly have moved
freely in London or Paris (in the particular activities he was known to be
engaged in) unless he enjoyed absolute immunity, or, at the very least, official
protection. I simply defy anyone to argue against this.



It is possible that the files produced by the Fayed PR and investigative machine
were biased against the Rowland machine - in fact, there is little question -
but his profiles on Octagon and Marwan were all irrefutably documented. Our own
completely independent investigation tied in almost exactly with the conclusions
of his high-powered and well-financed team.



As such, if there was a well-organised Libyan-based plot to do harm to the
Fayeds, then Mossad and the British security agencies simply had to know
about it. One can only conjecture that if they had blown Marwan, they would have
blown the cover of one of their most valuable double agents.



http://www.scallywag.org/

---

Hill & Knowlton and the CIA.

   

                           Public Relationships:

                       Hill & Knowlton, Robert Gray,

                                and the CIA

                                      

                             by Johan Carlisle © 

   From the Spring 1993 issue of CAQ (Number44)

                                      

   [INLINE] Public relations and lobbying firms are part of the revolving

   door between government and business that President Clinton has vowed

   to close. It is not clear how he will accomplish this goal when so

   many of his top appointees, including Ron Brown and Howard Paster, are

   "business as usual" Washington insiders. Ron Brown, who was a lobbyist

   and attorney for Haiti's "BabyDoc"Duvalier, is Clinton's Secretary of

   Commerce. Paster, former head of Hill and Knowlton 's Washington

   office, directed the confirmation process during the transition period

   and is now Director of Intergovernmental Affairs for the White House.

   After managing PR for the Gulf War, Hill and Knowlton executive Lauri

   J. Fitz-Pegado became director of public liaison for the inauguration.

   

   The door swings both ways. Thomas Hoog, who served on Clinton's

   transition team, has replaced Paster as head of H&K's Washington

   office.

   

   Hill and Knowlton is one of the world 's largest and most influential

   corporations. As such, its virtually unregulated status, its

   longstanding connections to intelligence agencies, its role in shaping

   policy, and its close relationship to the Clinton administration

   deserve careful scrutiny. 

   

   In Turkey, "in July 1991, the same month President George Bush made an

   official visit there, the body of human rights worker Vedat Aydin was

   found along a road. His skull was fractured, his legs were broken, and

   his body was riddled by more than a dozen bullet wounds. He had been

   taken from his home by several armed men who identified themselves as

   police officers. No one was charged with his murder." De- spite

   hundreds of such "credible reports" acknowledged by the State

   Department, documenting use of "high-pressure cold water hoses,

   electric shocks, beating of the genitalia, and hanging by the arms,"

   Turkey reaps the benefits of U.S. friendship and Most Favored Nation

   status. "Last year Turkey received more than $800 million in U.S. aid,

   and spent more than $3.8 million on Washington lobbyists to keep that

   money flowing." Turkey paid for U.S. tolerance of torture with its

   cooperative role in NATO, and its support for Operation Desert Storm;

   it bought its relatively benign public image with cold cash. Turkey's

   favorite Washington public relations and lobbying firm is Hill and

   Knowlton (H&K), to which it paid $1,200,000 from November 1990 to May

   1992. Other chronic human rights abusers, such as China, Peru, Israel,

   Egypt, and Indonesia, also retained Hill and Knowlton to the tune of

   $14 million in 1991-92. Hill and Knowlton has also represented the

   infamously repressive Duvalier regime in Haiti.

   

   On October 10, 1990, as the Bush administration stepped up war

   preparations against Iraq, H&K, on behalf of the Kuwaiti government,

   presented 15-year-old "Nayirah" before the House Human Rights Caucus.

   Passed off as an ordinary Kuwaiti with firsthand knowledge of

   atrocities committed by the Iraqi army, she testified tearfully before

   Congress:

   

   "I volunteered at the al-Addan hospital...[where] I saw the Iraqi

   soldiers come into the hospital with guns, and go into the room where

   15 babies were in incubators. They took the babies out of the

   incubators, took the incubators, and left the babies on the cold floor

   to die."

   

   Supposedly fearing reprisals against her family, Nayirah did not

   reveal her last name to the press or Congress. Nor did this apparently

   disinterested witness mention that she was the daughter of Sheikh Saud

   Nasir al-Sabah, Kuwait's ambassador to the U.S. As Americans were

   being prepared for war, her story- which turned out to be impossible

   to corroborate -became the centerpiece of a finely tuned public

   relations campaign orches- trated by H&K and coordi- nated with the

   White House on behalf of the government of Kuwait and its front group,

   Citizens for a Free Kuwait.

   

   In May 1991, CFK was folded into the Washington-based Kuwait-America

   Foundation. CFK had sprung into action on August 2, the day Iraq

   invaded Kuwait. By August 10, it had hired H&K, the preeminent U.S.

   public relations firm. CFK reported to the Justice Department receipts

   of $17,861 from 78 individual U.S. and Canadian contributors and $11.8

   million from the Kuwaiti government. Of those "do- nations," H&K got

   nearly $10.8 million to wage one of the largest, most effective public

   relations campaigns in history.

   

   From the streets to the newsrooms, according to author John MacArthur,

   that money created a benign facade for Kuwait's image:

   

     "The H&K team, headed by former U.S. Information Agency officer

     Lauri J. Fitz-Pegado, organized a Kuwait Information Day on 20

     college campuses on September 12. On Sunday, September 23, churches

     nationwide observed a national day of prayer for Kuwait. The next

     day, 13 state governors declared a national Free Kuwait Day. H&K

     distributed tens of thousands of Free Kuwait bumper stickers and

     T-shirts, as well as thousands of media kits extolling the alleged

     virtues of Kuwaiti society and history. Fitz-Pegado's crack press

     agents put together media events featuring Kuwaiti "resistance

     fighters" and businessmen and arranged meetings with newspaper

     editorial boards. H&K's Lew Allison, a former CBS and NBC News

     producer, created 24 video news releases from the Middle East, some

     of which purported to depict life in Kuwait under the Iraqi boot.

     The Wirthlin Group was engaged by H&K to study TV audience reaction

     to statements on the Gulf crisis by President Bush and Kuwaiti

     officials. "

     

   All this PR activity helped "educate" Americans about Kuwait-a

   totalitarian country with a terrible human rights record and no rights

   for women. Meanwhile, the incubator babies atrocity story inflamed

   public opinion against Iraq and swung the U.S. Congress in favor of

   war in the Gulf.

   

   This free market approach to manufacturing public perception raises

   the issue of:

   

     whether there is something fundamentally wrong when a foreign

     government can pay a powerful, well-connected lobbying and public

     relations firm millions of dollars to convince the American people

     and the American government to support a war halfway around the

     world. In another age this activity would have caused an explosion

     of outrage. But something has changed in Washington. Boundaries no

     longer exist.

     

   One boundary which has been blurred beyond recognition is that between

   "propaganda"-which conjures up unpleasant images of Goebbels-like

   fascists-and "public relations," a respectable white collar

   profession. Taking full advantage of the revolving door, these

   lobbyists and spinmeisters glide through Congress, the White House,

   and the major media editorial offices. Their routine manipulations--

   like those of their brown shirted predecessors--corrode democracy and

   government policy. H&K's highly paid agents of influence, such as Vice

   President Bush's chief of staff Craig Fuller, and Democratic power

   broker Frank Mankiewicz, have run campaigns against abortion for the

   Catholic Church, represented the Church of Scientology, and the

   Moonies. They have made sure that gasoline taxes have been kept low

   for the American Petroleum Institute; handled flack for Three Mile

   Island's near-catastrophe; and mishandled the apple growers' assertion

   that Alar was safe. They meddle in our political life at every turn

   and apparently are never held accountable. Not only do these PR firms

   act as foreign propaganda agents, but they work closely with U.S. and

   foreign intelligence agencies, making covert operations even harder to

   control.

   

   In the 1930s, Edward Bernays, the "father of public relations,"

   convinced corporate America that changing the public's opinion--using

   PR techniques--about troublesome social movements such as socialism

   and labor unions, was more effective than hiring goons to club people.

   Since then, PR has evolved into an increasingly refined art form of

   manipulation on behalf of whoever has the large amounts of money

   required to pay for it. In 1991, the top 50 U.S.-based PR firms billed

   over $1,700,000,000 in fees. Top firms like Hill and Know- lton charge

   up to $350 per hour.

   

   PR firms manipulate public and congressional opinion and government

   policy through media campaigns, congressional hearings, and lobbying.

   They have the ability and the funds to conduct sophisticated research

   for their clients and, using inside information, to advise them about

   policy decisions. They are positioned to sell their clients access and

   introductions to gov- ernment officials, including those in

   intelligence agencies. Robert Keith Gray, head of Hill and Knowlton's

   Washington office for three decades, used to brag about checking major

   decisions personally with CIA director William Casey, whom he

   considered a close personal friend.

   

   One of the most important ways public relations firms influence what

   we think is through the massive distribution of press releases to

   newspapers and TV newsrooms. One study found that 40 percent of the

   news content in a typical U.S. newspaper originated with public

   relations press releases, story memos, or suggestions. The Columbia

   Journalism Review, which scrutinized a typical issue of the Wall

   Street Journal, found that more than half the Journal's news stories

   "were based solely on press releases." Although the releases were

   reprinted "almost verbatim or in para- phrase," with little additional

   reporting, many articles were attributed to "a Wall Street Journal

   staff reporter."

   

   While some PR campaigns are aimed at the general pub- lic, others

   target leadership, either to persuade them or to provide them with

   political cover. On November 27, 1990, just two days before the U.N.

   Security Council was to vote on the use of military force against

   Iraq, while the U.S. was extorting, bullying, and buying U.N.

   cooperation, Kuwait was trying to win hearts, minds, and tear ducts.

   "Walls of the [U.N.] Council chamber were covered with oversized color

   photographs of Kuwaitis of all ages who reportedly had been killed or

   tortured by Iraqis. ...A videotape showed Iraqi soldiers apparently

   firing on unarmed demonstrators, and witnesses who had escaped from

   Kuwait related tales of horror. A Kuwaiti spokesman was on hand to

   insist that his nation had been `an oasis of peaceful harmony' before

   Iraq mounted its invasion." This propaganda extravaganza was

   orchestrated by Hill and Knowlton for the government of Kuwait. With

   few exceptions, the event was reported as news by the media, and two

   days later the Security Council voted to authorize military force

   against Iraq.

   

   THE INTELLIGENCE CONNECTION The government's use of PR firms in

   general, and Hill and Knowlton in particular, goes beyond ethically

   dubious opinion manipulation. It includes potentially illegal proxy

   spying operations for intelligence agencies. "H&K recruited students

   to attend teach-ins and demonstrations on college campuses at the

   height of the Vietnam War, and to file agent-like reports on what they

   learned," according to author Susan Trento. "The purpose was for H&K

   to tell its clients that it had the ability to spot new trends in the

   activist movement, especially regarding environmental issues." Richard

   Cheney (no relation to former Secretary of Defense Cheney), head of

   H&K's New York office, denied this allegation. He said that H&K

   recommends that its clients hire private investigative agencies to

   conduct surveillance and intelligence work. But, Cheney admitted, "in

   such a large organization you never know if there's not some sneak

   operation going on."

   

   Former CIA official Robert T. Crowley, the Agency's long-time liaison

   with corporations, sees it differently. "Hill and Knowlton's overseas

   offices," he acknowledged, "were perfect `cover' for the

   ever-expanding CIA. Unlike other cover jobs, being a public relations

   specialist did not require technical training for CIA officers." The

   CIA, Crowley admitted, used its H&K connections "to put out press

   releases and make media contacts to further its positions. ...H&K

   employees at the small Washington office and elsewhere, distributed

   this material through CIA assets working in the United States news

   media." Since the CIA is prohibited from disseminating propaganda

   inside the U.S., this type of "blowback"- which former CIA officer

   John Stockwell and other researchers have often traced to the

   Agency-is illegal. While the use of U.S. media by the CIA has a long

   and well-documented history, the covert involvement of PR firms may be

   news to many. According to Trento:

   

     "Reporters were paid by the CIA, sometimes without their media

     employers' knowledge, to get the material in print or on the air.

     But other news organizations ordered their employees to cooperate

     with the CIA, including the San Diego-based Copley News Service.

     But Copley was not alone, and the CIA had `tamed' reporters and

     editors in scores of newspaper and broadcast outlets across the

     country. To avoid direct relationships with the media, the CIA

     recruited individuals in public relations firms like H&K to act as

     middlemen for what the CIA wanted to distribute.

     

   This close association and dependence upon the intelligence community

   by reporters has created a unique situation which has shielded PR

   executives and firms from closer scrutiny by the media and Congress.

   According to Trento, "These longstanding H&K intelligence ties and

   CIA-linked reporters' fears that Gray might know about them might

   partially explain why Gray has escaped close media examination, even

   though he was questioned about his or his associates' roles in one

   major scandal after another during his long Washington career."

   

   Over the years, Hill and Knowlton and Robert Gray have been implicated

   in the BCCI scandal, the October Surprise, the House page sex and drug

   scandal, Debategate, Koreagate, and Iran-Contra. In October 1988,

   three days after the Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI)

   was indicted by a federal grand jury for conspiring with the Medellin

   Cartel to launder $32,000,000 in illicit drug profits, the bank hired

   H&K to manage the scandal. Robert Gray also served on the board of

   directors of First American Bank, the Washington D.C. bank run by

   Clark Clifford (now facing federal charges) and owned by BCCI. Gray

   was close to, and helped in various ways, top Reagan officials. When

   Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger's son needed a job, Gray hired

   him for $2,000 a month. "And when Gray's clients needed something from

   the Pentagon, Gray and Co. went right to the top." Gray also helped

   Attorney General Ed Meese's wife, Ursula, get a lucrative job with a

   foundation which was created by a wealthy Texas client, solely to

   employ her.

   

   ROBERT KEITH GRAY- PRIVATE SPOOK? Robert Keith Gray, who set up Hill

   and Knowlton's important Washington, D.C. office and ran it for most

   of the time between 1961 and 1992, has had numerous contacts in the

   national and international intelligence community. The list of his

   personal and professional associates includes Edwin Wilson, William

   Casey, Tongsun Park (Korean CIA), Rev. Sun Myung Moon, Anna Chennault

   (Gray was a board member of World Airways aka Flying Tigers), Neil

   Livingstone, Ro- bert Owen, and Oliver North.

   

     "Most of the International Division [of Gray & Co.] clients," said

     Susan Trento, "were right-wing governments tied closely to the

     intelligence community or businessmen with the same associations."

     

   In 1965, with Gray's help, Tongsun Park, had formed the George Town

   Club in Washington. According to Trento:

   

   Park put up the money and, with introductions from Gray and others,

   recruited "founders" for the club like the late Marine Gen. Graves

   Erskine, who had an active intelligence career. Anna Chennault became

   a force in the club. Others followed, and most, like Gray, had the

   same conservative political outlook, connections to the intelligence

   world, or `congressional overtones.' Gray's ties to right-wing Asians

   like Chennault and Park had deep roots. Gray had been critical of

   Eisenhower [when he was appointments secretary for Eisenhower] for

   never being partisan enough. Perhaps that is why Gray embraced

   wholeheartedly the powers behind the China Lobby. One reason Gray was

   attached to the lobby was that they had long been behind the funding

   of Richard Nixon's various campaigns.

   

   Tongsun Park was an "agent of influence," trained by the Korean

   intelligence agency, which was created by and is widely regarded as a

   subsidiary of the CIA. The George Town Club has served as a discrete

   meeting place where right-wing foreign intelligence agents can

   socialize and conduct business with U.S. government officials.

   

   Robert Gray has also been linked with former CIA and naval

   intelligence agent Edwin Wilson, although Gray denies it. In 1971,

   Wilson left the CIA and set up a series of new front companies for a

   secret Navy operation-Task Force 157. Wilson says that Robert Gray

   "was on the Board [of Directors]. We had an agreement that anything

   that H&K didn't want, they would throw to me so that I could make some

   money out of it, and Bob and I would share that."

   

   THE GRAY AREA BEHIND HILL & KNOWLTON Gray's connection to Iran-Contra

   has never been fully examined. Notably, the Tower Commission, Reagan's

   official 1986 investigation, all but ignored it. In 1983, Texas

   Senator John Tower had declined to seek reelection thinking he had a

   deal with Reagan to become Secretary of Defense. After Weinberger

   decided to stay on in the second Reagan term, Tower found himself

   without a job. In 1986, his friend Robert Gray offered him a position

   on the board of directors of Gray and Co. Shortly thereafter, Tower

   was asked to head the presidential inquiry. Not suprisingly, the Tower

   Commission kept Gray and Co. out of the investigation, in spite of the

   facts that several key players in the scandal had worked for Gray and

   Co., and Gray's Madrid office was suspected of involvement in the

   secret arms shipments to Iran.

   

   Despite large gaps in the official inquiry, it has been established

   that Robert Owen, Oliver North's messenger and bagman, worked for Gray

   and Co. after leaving then-Senator Dan Quayle's staff in 1983. Owen

   worked primarily with Neil Livingstone, a mysterious figure who claims

   to be a mover and shaker in the intelligence world but who is

   described as a "groupie." Livingstone worked with Ed Wilson, Air

   Panama, and as a front man for business activities sponsored by the

   CIA and Israeli intelligence. Owen and Livingstone traveled frequently

   to Central America to meet with the Contras in 1984. An interesting

   footnote to Iran-Contra is that in 1986, Saudi Arabian arms broker

   Adnan Khashoggi hired Hill and Knowlton and Gray and Co. to milk

   maximum publicity out of his major donation to a $20.5 million sports

   center, named after him, at American University.

   

   THE FOURTH BRANCH OF GOVERNMENT The pattern of influence peddling and

   insider abuse is clear. The potential for real reform is less obvious.

   Despite his stated intention to restrict the influence of lobbyists

   and PR manipulation, Clinton's reforms are viewed with cynical

   amusement by those in the know. Although newly restricted from

   directly lobbying their former agencies, retiring government officials

   can simply take jobs with PR firms, sit at their desks, and instruct

   others to say "Ron, or Howard, sent me." Nor does the updated Foreign

   Agents Registration Act have real teeth. The act-legislated in 1938

   when U.S. PR firms were discovered working as propagandists and

   lobbyists for Nazi Germany-is rarely enforced. While it requires

   agents of governments to register, it omits requirements for agents of

   foreign corporations, who often serve the same interests.

   

   And if loopholes for lobbying are comfortably large, public relations

   activities remain totally unregulated and unscrutinized by any

   government agency. Given the power and scope of PR firms, their track

   records of manipulation, their collusion with intelligence agencies,

   and their disregard for the human rights records and corporate

   misdeeds of many of their clients, this lack of oversight endangers

   democracy. Careful regulation, stringent reporting requirements, and

   government and citizen oversight are essential first steps in

   preventing these giant transnationals from functioning as a virtual

   fourth branch of government.

     

---