- As President Bush goes to Capitol Hill today to promulgate
his rationale for sending a few hundred thousand U.S. ground troops to
spill their blood in Iraq, political polls indicate an eerie public feeling
that the rush to war may also be serving to divert attention from scandals
at home.
-
- This, portending a certain prior acquaintance with the
modus operandus via recent military actions closely related to the nubile
dalliances of der Schlickmeister.
-
- Moreover, many members of Congress have followed in lockstep,
appearing on cable talk shows to debate the merits of Gulf War II. That
the inflaming of war passions has switched focus away from stock and pension
fraud, but also the unexplained and continued postponement of public investigative
hearings regarding unanswered questions surrounding the September 11 attacks
is quite apparent.
-
- The example of one of the most spiked stories of 1991-1992
reveals that the current burgeoning Bush bravado-inspired military advocacy
by certain Administration warmongers is only a variation upon the theme
of past unspoken agendas surrounding Iraq during the First Gulf War.
-
- This time around, however, polls show that U.S. citizens
are less trusting of those who may be surreptitiously placing foreign agendas
ahead of what is best for the United States.
-
- American mothers and fathers may also desire an instructive
look at how George W.'s father -- also a former president -- permitted
foreign government infusion of illegal cash to help influence public opinion
and support for war at the very same time that legislative and executive
branch decisions were being made to order military action in 1990-91.
-
- Since the findings received such sparse media coverage
during Gulf War I, Americans might want now to hear President George W.
Bush weigh in on the subject -- and whether foreign cash was used to dupe
the American people into the last war. The documented evidence is astonishingly
clear:
-
- ***********
-
- MANUFACTURING THE CONSENT OF THE GOVERNED
-
- According to an article by 20-year public relations expert
Jack O'Dwyer ("Hill & Knowlton [H&K] leads PR charge in behalf
of Kuwaiti cause," published in the January 1991 issue of O'Dwyer's
PR Services Report) the government of Kuwait funded as many as 20 public
relations, law, and lobby firms in its campaign to mobilize U.S. opinion
and force against Saddam Hussein.
-
- And according to O'Dwyer's Foreign Agents Registration
Act Report from October 1991, the White House allowed a private American
firm -- Hill & Knowlton -- to serve as the public relations mastermind
for the Kuwaiti campaign against Iraq. H&K's job was to sell the war
to Americans.
-
- H&K's activities alone could have been considered
the largest foreign-funded publicity operation ever designed to manipulate
American public opinion -- $11.9 million funneled to Citizens for a Free
Kuwait (CFK) by the Kuwaiti government.
-
- Even the controversial pre-invasion statements at a meeting
with Saddam Hussein by U.S. Ambassador to Iraq, April Glaspie, expressing
sympathy toward Iraq while pointing out that the president himself "had
his administration reject trade sanctions" might have to take a back
seat regarding war encouragement.
-
- Money, after all, does a lot of talking. [ And in this
case -- foreign money. ]
-
- According to John Stauber and Sheldon Rampton, writing
in the May-June 1996 edition of Blazing Tattles, the U.S. Foreign Agents
Registration Act should have exposed the use of foreign cash for propaganda
purposes to the American people; however, President George H. W. Bush's
Justice Department chose not to enforce the foreign-agents law.
-
- Thus, the foreign-funded PR cash-kitty was hidden from
the American people, even while Congress debated war participation. [ This
time around, we have even been told by Administration officials to expect
heavy casualties. ]
-
- Nine days after Iraq initiated the Gulf War, the Kuwaiti
government contracted Hill & Knowlton to represent Citizens for a Free
Kuwait.
-
- The January 1991 issue of O'Dwyer's FARA Report indicates
that the Bush Administration was closely tied to the Kuwaiti plan to manipulate
and sway U.S. public opinion toward sending troops into the Gulf.
-
- That issue of O'Dwyer's, published before the fighting
began, reported that "Craig L. Fuller, chief of staff to Bush when
he was vice president, has been on the Kuwaiti account at Hill & Knowlton
since the first day. He and (Bob) Dilenschneider at one point made a trip
to Saudi Arabia, observing the production of some 20 videotapes. ..."
-
- Before this November's election, trusting voters might
want the White House press pool to query Craig Fuller's role and relationship
to George W. Bush regarding meetings and/or communications with his father,
President Bush, concerning the funding of the foreign public relations
campaign against Iraq, since Fuller and George W. had served President
Bush 41 as key confidants.
-
- USA Today reported on Sept. 8, 1998, that "George
W. Bush was an advisor to (his father) President George H.W. Bush from
1987 to 1992." Given that fact, it seems only natural that at some
point, voters will want to know if this Congress [ and the next one ] will
also allow foreign entities to secretly infuse cash into the United States
to achieve certain military ends -- as apparently happened during the first
Bush Administration.
-
- **************
-
- THE ART OF SELLING A WAR
-
- Prior to U.S. Gulf War hostilities, according to Arthur
E. Rowse in his May 1991 piece in The Progressive, "Flacking for the
Emir," the Rendon Group received a retainer of $100,000 per month
for media work, and Neill & Co. received $50,000 per month for lobbying
Congress.
-
- Congress listened to the foreign cash-remunerated lobbyists,
voted for war, then unashamedly kissed the boys and girls goodbye as they
went off to Iraq's hot sands to face Saddam but also an undiscovered "disease"
called Gulf War Syndrome.
-
- As for Hill & Knowlton, according to O'Dwyer, H&K
vice-chairman Frank Mankiewicz, former press secretary and advisor to Robert
F. Kennedy and George McGovern, arranged hundreds of meetings, briefings,
calls, and mailings directed toward the editors of daily newspapers and
other media outlets.
-
- O'Dwyer was so awed by the rapid and expansive work of
H&K on behalf of Citizens for a Free Kuwait, he noted in his January
1991 FARA Report that:
-
- "Hill & Knowlton ... has assumed a role in world
affairs unprecedented for a PR firm. H&K has employed a stunning variety
of opinion-forming devices and techniques to help keep U.S. opinion on
the side of the Kuwaitis. ... The techniques range from full-scale press
conferences showing torture and other abuses by the Iraqis to the distribution
of tens of thousands of 'Free Kuwait' T-shirts and bumper stickers at college
campuses across the U.S." [ All paid for with foreign cash from the
Middle East ]
-
- Rowse also reported that U.S. Department of Justice documents
show that fully 119 H&K executives in 12 offices across the U.S. were
overseeing the Kuwait PR effort in the U.S., and the firm's report to the
Justice Department listed activities which included arranging media interviews
for visiting Kuwaitis and observances such as National Free Kuwait Day,
National Prayer Day For Kuwait and National Student Information Day.
-
- Also listed were public rallies organized by H&K
along with releasing hostageletters to the media, distributing news releases
and information kits, contacting politicians at all levels and even producing
a nightly radio show in Arabic from Saudi Arabia.
-
- Hill & Knowlton produced dozens of "video news
releases" at a cost of well over half a million dollars which resulted
in tens of millions of dollars worth of free air time as TV news directors
broadcasted the videos, while rarely (if ever) noting the Kuwaiti public
relations firm as the source of the footage.
-
- As Martin A. Lee and Norman Solomon note in their book,
"Unreliable Sources: A Guide to Detecting Bias in New Media,"
U.S. citizens assumed they were watching American-reported journalism --
not the efforts of Bush administration advisors and Kuwaiti-hired American
PR firms.
-
- John R. MacArthur's book, "Second Front: Censorship
and Propaganda in the Gulf War," even reported that a secret Pentagon
memo outlined a plan to constrain and control journalists. But Congress
has never sought the memo.
-
- A massive baby sitting operation ensured that no truly
independent or uncensored reporting reached back to the U.S. public. "News
media representatives will be escorted at all times," the memo stated.
"Repeat, at all times."
-
- After the Gulf War ended, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
(CBC) produced an Emmy award-winning TV documentary concerning Kuwait's
use of cash to promote military action entitled, "To Sell a War."
-
- Amazingly, the CBC show featured an interview with H&K-contracted
pollster, Wirthlin Group executive Dee Alsop, who stated right on camera
that Wirthlin's job was "to identify the messages that really resonate
emotionally with the American people."
-
- Will the son employ the same techniques as the father?
-
- Both Arthur Rowse and Jack O'Dwyer reported in May and
October of 1991 in previously cited articles immediately following the
war, that Sam Zakhem, a former U.S. ambassador to the oil-rich gulf state
of Bahrain, funneled another $7.7 million in advertising and lobbying dollars
through two front groups: Coalition for Americans at Risk (a former front
group for the contras in Nicaragua) and Freedom Task Force.
-
- Curiously, congressional legislators who should have
known, never questioned why the White House allowed foreign cash to help
persuade American citizens to be willing to send their offspring to war
in the Middle East.
-
- The two also reported that Coalition for Americans at
Risk prepared and placed TV and newspaper ads, and had 50 speakers available
for pro-war rallies and publicity events; however, neither related the
source of the foreign money laundered through the two organizations. The
American people fell for it -- hook, line, and sinker.
-
- ******************
-
- BEATING AROUND THE BUSH
-
- During the time period surrounding the Gulf War, George
W. Bush had dual roles as presidential advisor and also oil executive/director
of Harken Energy Corporation, where it was reported in the company's proxy
statement filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission and various
news sources that he was Harken's second largest non-institutional shareholder.
-
- [ President Bush's GOP "Team 100" contributors,
political acquaintances, and friends also maintained substantial positions
in Harken -- not to mention a Saudi sheikh recently sued by 9/11 victim
families who served with George W. on the Harken Board. ] [ Bin
Laden's Brother-in-Law Had Close Ties To Bush ]
-
- George W. Bush's dual-role is important because Harken
had acquired potentially lucrative drilling rights to offshore oil and
gas reserves in Bahrain -- a small Arab island emirate off the coast of
Saudi Arabia and about 200 miles southeast of Kuwait -- just seven months
prior to the Iraqi invasion.
-
- And while George W.'s advisory role regarding his father
may not have had anything to do with the $20 million spent by Kuwait and
sources connected to Bahrain with whom both George W. and presidential
contributors had a business relationship, Americans who care about the
fate of their sons and daughters may not want foreign governments and purse
strings to influence the U.S. population regarding war decisions about
to be made this Fall.
-
- The facts indicate that millions of dollars were spent
by foreign interests during the Bush administration to influence U.S. participation
in the Gulf War; moreover, presidential advisor George W. Bush and contributor-friends
of both Bushes had substantial Harken Energy stock holdings during this
time period.
-
- [ A side note: The American people may also want to know
more about the large contracts awarded to U.S. firms to extinguish Kuwaiti
oil well fires and for oil field reconstruction -- and who benefited financially.
]
-
- However, in the final analysis, Congress will be looking
at the polling numbers of U.S. citizens, especially those of military age
and their parents, before they take a final vote.
-
- But hiring PR firms with foreign cash? Shelling out millions
to inflame patriotic passions while high-level and presidential-family
financial interests are on the line? Is this any way to run a war? Will
Americans let it happen again?
-
- ***
-
- Supplementary research was contributed by Robin Smith.
Portions of this piece previously appeared in a 12-28-99 WorldNetDaily.com
story by Tom Flocco.
-
- Copyright (c) 2002 by Thomas Flocco.
-
- * Tom Flocco is an independent investigative journalist
who has written for Scoop.co.nz, AmericanFreePress.net, WorldNetDaily.com,
FromTheWilderness.com, NewsMax.com, NarcoNews.com, and JudicialWatch.org.
Contact: TomFlocco@cs.com
-
- * http://www.americanfreepress.net
- The Uncensored National Weekly Newspaper Published On Capitol Hill. 1433
Pennsylvania Avenue SE. Washington D.C.20003. Order Line: 1-888-699-6397
for print subscriptions and more investigative stories.
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