THE TRILATERAL COMMISSION

THE TRILATERAL COMMISSION

What the Trilaterals truly intend is the creation of a worldwide economic power superior to the political government of the nation-states involved.

Rule By Secrecy (part 2)

MODERN SECRET SOCIETIES

By the early 1970s, thanks to burgeoning communications technology, many Americans were becoming more aware of secretive organizations such as the Council on Foreign Relations. Former CFR chairman David Rockefeller, apparently in an effort to deflect public attention from CFR activities, instigated the creation of a more public offshoot organization: the Trilateral Commission.

Both the commission and its predecessor, the CFR, are held out by conspiracy researchers as the epitome of covert organizations which may be guiding public policy in directions opposite to those either in the best interest of or desired by the public.

The concept of the Trilateral Commission was originally brought to Rockefeller by Zbigniew Brzezinski, then head of the Russian Studies Department at Columbia University. While at the Brookings Institu- tion, Brzezinski had been researching the need for closer cooperation between the trilateral nations of Furope, North America, and Asia.

In 1970, Brzezinski wrote in foreign Affairs, a CFR publication, “A new and broader approach is needed—creation of a community of the developed nations which can effectively address itself to the larger con- cerns confronting mankind. … A council representing the United States, Western Europe, and Japan, with regular meetings of the heads of gov- ernments as well as some small standing machinery, would be a good

Later that year, he published a book entitled Between Two Ages: America’s Role in the Technetronic Era. Within those pages, Brzezinski spelled out his vision for the future.

He prophetically foresaw a society “… that is shaped culturally, psychologically, socially, and economically by the impact of technology and electronics—particularly in the area of computers and communication.” Brzezinski’s visions would raise the suspicions of those opposed to his consolidation of world political and economic power. Declaring “National sovereignty is no longer a viable concept,” he predicted “movement toward a larger community by the developing nations . . . through a variety of indirect ties and already developing limitations on national sovereignty.” He foresaw this larger community being funded by “a global taxation system.”

In explaining that a cooperative hub, such as the Trilateral Commission, might set the stage for future consolidation, he reasoned, “Though the objective of shaping a community of developed nations is less ambitious than the goal of world government, it is more attainable.”

Brzezinski’s hope for a global society did not exclude nations then under the rule of Marxism, which he described as “a further vital and creative stage in the maturing of man’s universal vision” and “a victory of the external man over the inner, passive man, and a victory of reason over belief.”

Brzezinski’s plan for a commission of trilateral nations was first pre- sented during a meeting of the ultrasecret Bilderberg group in April 1972, in the small Belgian town of Knokke-Heist. Reception to Brzezinski’s proposal reportedly was enthusiastic. At that time interna- tional financiers were concerned over Nixon’s devaluation of the dollar, surcharges on imports, and budding detente with China, all of which were causing relations with Japan to deteriorate. In addition, energy problems were growing in response to price increases by the Organiza- tion of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).

With rhe blessing of the Bilderbergers and the CFR, the Trilateral Com- mission began organizing on July 23-24, 1972, at the 3,500-acre Rocke- feller estate at Pocantico Hills, a subdivision of Tarrytown, New York. Participants in this private meeting included Rockefeller, Brzezinski, Brookings Institution director of foreign policy studies Henry Owen, McGeorge Bundy, Robert Bowie, C. Fred Bergsren, Bayless Manning, Karl Carstens, Guido Colonna di Paliano, Francois Duchene, Rene Foch, Max Kohnstamm, Kiichi Miyazawa, Saburo Ikita, and Tadashi Yamamoto. Apparently these founders were selected by Rockefeller and Brzezinski.

The Trilateral Commission officially was founded on July 1, 1973, with David Rockefeller as chairman. Brzezinski was named founding

North American director. North American members included Georgia governor jimmy Carter, congressman John B. Anderson (another presi- dential candidate), and Time, Inc. editor-in-chief Hedley Donovan, For- eign founding members included the late Reginald Maudling, Lord Eric Roll, Economist editor Alistair Burnet, FIAT president Giovanni Agnelli, and French vice president of the Commission of European Communities Raymond Barre. The total exclusive membership remains about three hundred persons.

According to the commission’s official yearly publication, Triaiogue, “The Trilateral Commission was formed in 1973 by private citizens of Western Europe, Japan, and North America to foster closer cooperation among these three regions on common problems.” Skeptical conspiracy authors saw “closer cooperation” as more like “collusion” of the multi- national bankers and corporate elite with an eye toward one-world government.

The Trilateral Commission has headquarters in New York, Paris, and Tokyo. An executive committee of thirty-five members administers the commission, which meets roughly every nine months rotating between the three regions.

It is not surprising that the question of who funds this group has arisen. Commission spokesmen stress that the group does not receive any government funding. A report in 1978 showed that commission funding from mid-1976 to mid-1979 was $1,180,000, much of which came from tax-exempt foundations such as the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, which in 1977 alone put up $120,000. Donations also came from the Ford Foundation, the Lilly Endowment, the German Marshall Fund and corporations such as Time, Bechtel, Exxon, General Motors, Wells-Fargo, and Texas Instruments.

In addition to its newsletter, Triaiogue, the commission has regularly issued a number of “Task Force Reports” or “Triangle Papers” which arc publicly available. “For years, conspiracy-oriented newsletters of the Right and Left have been peddling Trilateral ‘secrets’ which were obtained directly from the Commission!” snickered journalist and Trilateral Com- mission researcher Robert Eringer. It is obvious to most researchers that, as these papers are available to the public, they don’t contain any true inner “secrets”.

One such paper, entitled The Crisis of Democracy, was published by the commission in 1975. One of its authors, Harvard political scientist

Samuel P. Huntington, avowed that America needed “a greater degree of moderation in democracy.” He argued that democratic institutions were incapable of responding to crises such as the Three Mile Island nuclear accident or the Cuban refugee boatlift operation. The paper suggested that leaders with “expertise, seniority, experience and special talents” were needed to “override the claims of democracy.”

Just a few examples indicate that those espousing Trilateralist policies often end up implementing those same policies in the government. Three years after his paper was published, Huntington was named coordinator of security planning for Carter’s National Security Council. In this capacity, Huntington prepared Presidential Review Memorandum 32, which led to the 1979 presidential order creating the Federal Emergency Management Agency, a civilian organization with the power to take totalitarian control of government functions in the evenr of a national “emergency.”

Yale University economist Richard Cooper headed the commission’s task force on monetary policy, which recommended selling official gold reserves to private markets. Cooper became undersecretary of state for economic affairs, presiding as the International Monetary Fund sold” a portion of its gold.

Trilateralist John Sawhill authored an early commission report, Energy: Managing the Transition, which made recommendations on how to manage a movement to higher-cost energy. Carter appointed Sawhill deputy secretary of the Department of Energy. C. Fred Bergsten aided in the preparation of a commission report called The Reform of International Institutions, then went on to become assistant secretary of the treasury for international affairs.

“Many of the original members of the Trilateral Commission are now in positions of power where they are able ro implement policy recom- mendations of the Commission; recommendations that they, themselves, prepared on behalf of the Commission,” noted journalist Eringer. “It is for this reason that the Commission has acquired a reputation for being the Shadow Government of the West.”

“The Trilateral Commission’s tentacles have reached so far afield in the political and economic sphete that it has heen described by some as a cabal of powerful men out to control the world by creating a superna- tional community dominated by the multinational corporations,” wrote researcher Laurie K. Strand in a piece entitled “Who’s in charge—Six Possible Contenders” for the People’s Almanac #3.

Even U.S. News & World Report took note of the commission’s globalist agenda, reporting, “The Trilateralists make no bones about this: They recruit only people interested in promoting closer international cooperation. .. .”

Researchers Anthony C. Sutton and Patrick M. Wood in their book Trilateral Over Washington voiced suspicions of the group and offered this view of its inception. “The Trilateral Commission was founded by the persistent maneuvering of David Rockefeller and Zbigniew Brzezinski. Rockefeller, [then] chairman of the ultrapowerful Chase Manhattan Bank, a director of many major multinational corporations and ‘endow- ment funds’ has long been a central figure in the mysterious Council on Foreign Relations. Brzezinski, a brilliant prognosticator of one-world idealism, has been a professor at Columbia University and the author of sev- eral books that have served as ‘policy guidelines’ for the CFR. Brzezinski served as the (Trilateral) commission’s executive director from its inception in 1973 until late 1976 when he was appointed by President Carter as assistant to the president for national security affairs.”

It was Brzezinski who recruited Carter for the Trilateral Commission in 1973. In fact, during President Jimmy Carter’s administration, so much Trilateral material was made public that considerable debate ensued within the news media.

Even the Establishment-oriented Washington Post pondered in early 1977, “But here is the unsettling thing about the Trilateral Commission. The President-elect (Carter) is a member. So is Vice-President-elect Walter F. Mondale. So are the new secretaries of State, Defense and Treasury, Cyrus R. Vance, Harold Brown and W. Michael Blumenthal. So is Zbigniew Brzezinski, who is a former Trilateral director and Carter’s national security advisor, also a bunch of others who will make foreign policy for America in the next four years.”

Sutton and Wood commented, “If you are trying to calculate the odds of three virtually unknown men (Carter, Mondale, and Brzezinski), out of over 60 (Trilateral) commissioners from the U.S., capturing the three most powerful positions in the land, don’t bother. Your calculations will be meaningless.”

Carter administration Trilateral also included Ambassadors Andrew Young, Gerard Smith, Richard Gardner, and Elliot Richardson, White House economic aide Henry Owen, Deputy Secretary of State Warren Christopher, Director Paul Warnke of the Arms Control and Disarma-

merit Agency, Undersecretaries of State Richard Cooper for economic affairs and Lucy Benson for security assistance, Undersecretary of the Treasury Anthony Solomon, Robert Bowie of the CIA, and Assistant Sec- retary of State Richard Holbrooke.

Lest anyone think that the Trilateral Commission was simply some organ of the Democratic Party, U.S. News & World Report in 1978 listed prominent Republicans who were members. These included former Sec- retaries Henry Kissinger of State, William Coleman of Transportation, Carla Hills of Housing and Urban Development, Peter Peterson of Com- merce, and Caspet Weinberger of Health, Education, and Welfare.

Also listed were ex-Energy administrator John Sawhill, ex-CIA Direc- tor and future President George Bush, ex-Deputy Secretaries of State Robert Ingersoll and Charles Robinson, ex-Deputy Defense Secretary David Packard, former Environmental Protection Agency administrator Russell E. Train, Ambassadors William Scanton to the United Nations and Anne Armstrong to Britain, and members of Congress John Ander- son, William Brock, William Cohen, Barber Conable, John Danforth, and Robert Taft, Jr., and Marina Whitman, former member of the Council of Economic Advisors.

Provoking additional concern among conspiracy researchers was Pres- ident Carter’s selection of banker Paul Volcker to head America’s powerful central bank, the Federal Reserve. Reportedly appointed on instruc- tions from David Rockefeller, Volcker had been the North American chairman of the Trilateral Commission as well as a member of those other secret groups, the Council on Foreign Relations and the Bilderbergers. He was replaced as chairman of the Federal Reserve during the Reagan administration by current chairman Alan Greenspan, also a member of the Trilateral Commission, the CFR, and the Bilderbergers.

It is easy to see why so many people believed that U.S. Government policy was being directed from these Rockefeller-dominated organizations.

Despite having been written nearly twenty years ago, the words of Sutton and Wood ring true today for many average Americans concerned over the state of the nation and suspicious of a superelite trying to gain world control. They wrote, “By Biblical standards, the United States most certainly deserves judgment—perversion runs amok, child abuse is common, greed and avarice are the passwords to success and morals have rotted. If we are about to be thrown into the pits of the dark ages, the most logical catalyst, or motivator on the horizon is the Trilateral Commission.”

Former senator and presidential candidate Barry Goldwater echoed the fears of many when he wrote, “What the Trilaterals truly intend is the creation of a worldwide economic power superior to the political government of the nation-states involved. As managers and creators of the system they will rule the world.”

Such, criticism prompted David Rockefeller to defend the commission in a 1980 edition of the Wall Street journal. “Far from being a coterie of international conspirators with designs on covertly ruling the world, the Trilateral Commission is, in reality, a group of concerned citizens interested in fostering greater understanding and cooperation among international allies.. ..”

But some criticism came from within the Carter administration itself. Secretary of State Edmund Muskie charged that Brzezinski was making foreign policy rather than coordinating it. William Sullivan, who had heen U.S. ambassador to Iran, accused Brzezinski of sabotaging U.S. efforts to ease relations with Iran following the departure of the Shah. “By November 1978, Brzezinski began to make his own policy and establish his own embassy in Iran,” complained Sullivan.

It was accusations such as these that prompted sudden concern in Washington over secret and semisecret organizations. Columnist Nicholas von Hoffman noted, “Brzezinski has long spooked those who worry about the Trilateral Commission, that Rockefeller-inspired group of globally minded big shots from the major industrial powers. For countless Americans of both a rightward and a leftward persuasion, the commission, which tried to influence governments’ trade and diplomatic policies, is a worrisome conspiracy.”

Concern spilled over into veterans organizations. In 1980, the American Legion national convention passed Resolution 773, which called for a congressional investigation of the Trilateral Commission and its predecessor the Council on Foreign Relations. The following year a similar res- olution was approved by the Veterans of Foreign Wars (WW).

Congressman Larry McDonald introduced these resolutions in the House of Representatives but nothing came of it. McDonald, who as national chairman of the John Birch Society was a vocal critic of these secret societies, died in the still controversial downing of Korean Air- lines 007 on Septemher 1, 1983.

During the 1980 presidential campaigns, Republican candidate Ronald Reagan went on the record blasting the nineteen Trilateral in the Carter administration—including Carter himself, who wrote that his association with the commission was “a splendid learning opportunity”—and vowed to investigate the group if elected. While competing with George Bush for the nomination, Reagan lambasted Bash’s membership in both the Trilateral Commission and the CFR and pledged not to allow Bush a position in a Reagan government.

Yet during the Republican national convention a strange series of events took place.

While Reagan was a shoe-in as the presidential candidate, the vice presidency was the object of a contentious fight. In midweek, national media commentators suddenly began talking about a “dream ticket” to be composed of President Reagan and Vice President (and former president) Ger- ald Ford. Pressure began building for this concept, which would have cre- ated a shared presidency and, hence, divided power. It was even suggested that since Ford bad been president he should choose half of the Reagan cabinet.

Faced with the prospect of presiding over half a government, Reagan rushed to the convention floor late at night and announced, “I know that I am breaking with precedent to come here tonight, and I assure you at this late hour I’m not going to give you my acceptance address tonight. But in watching the television at the hotel and seeing the rumors that were going around and the gossip that was taking place here let me as simply as I can straighten out and bring this to a conclusion. It is true that a number of Republican leaders felt that a proper ticket would have included the former president of the United States, Gerald Ford, as second place on the ticket. I then believed that because of all the talk and how something might be growing through the night that it was time for me to advance the schedule a little bit. I have asked and I am recommending to this convention that tomorrow when the session reconvenes that George Bush be nominated for vice president.”

Reagan never again uttered a word against the commission or the CFR. Following his election, Reagan’s fifty-nine-member transition team was composed of twenty-eight CFR members, ten members of the elite Bilderberg group, and at least ten Trilaterals. He even appointed prominent CFR members to three of the nation’s most sensitive offices: Secretary of State Alexander Haig, Secretary of Defense Casper Wein- berger, and Secretary of the Treasury Donald Regan. Additionally, he named Bush’s campaign manager, James A. Baker III, who then served as chairman of the Reagan-Bush campaign committee, as his chief of staff. Baker is a fourth-generation member of a family long connected to Rockefeller oil interests.

Then little more than two months after taking office, President Reagan was struck by an assassin’s bullet which, but for a quarter of an inch, would have propelled Bush into the Oval Office seven years before his time. Oddly enough, the brother of the would-be assassin, John W. Hinckley, had scheduled dinner with Bush’s son Neil the very night Reagan was shot. Hinckley’s Texas oilman father and George Bush were longtime friends. It should also be noted that Bush’s name—including his then little-publicized nickname “Poppy”—along with his address and phone number were found in the personal notebook of oil geologist George DeMohrenschildt, the last known close friend of Lee Harvey Oswald. The existence of a 1963 FBI report mentioning a “George Bush of the CIA” in connection with reactions of the U.S. Cuban community to the JFK assas- sination drew media attention during the 1992 election. Many researchers view these seemingly small, unconnected, and little-reported details as col- lectively pushing the notion of coincidence to the breaking point.

The undeniable ties connecting America’s leadership to the CFR and the Trilateral Commission—along with the fact that globalist banker David Rockefeller was a leading luminary in both groups—has prompted much anxiety among conspiracy writers on both the Left and Right.

“If the Council on Foreign Relations can be said to he a spawning ground for the concepts of one-world idealism, the Trilateral Commission is the ‘task force’ assembled to assault the beachheads,” wrote authors Sutton and Wood in 1979. “Already the commission has placed irs members in the top posts the U.S. has to offer.”

Texe Marrs (no known relation to this author), president of Living Truth Publishers in Austin, Texas, has warned, “The Trilateral Commission is a group with the goal of hastening the era of World Government and promoting an international economy controlled behind the scenes by the Secret Brotherhood (the Illuminati).” The late senator Barry Goldwater was just as cautionary. In his 1979 book, With No Apologies, Goldwater warned, “David Rockefeller’s newest international cabal [the Tri- lateral Commission] is intended to be the vehicle for multinational consolidation of the commercial and banking interests by seizing control of the political government of the United States.”

Such allegations resulted in a 1981 commentary by Washington Post

writers normally disinterested in any conspiracy theory. They at last acknowledged the Trilateral presence by sarcastically writing, “Remem- ber those dreaded three-sided Trilateralists, the international conspira- tors headed by David Rockefeller who were going to take over the world? Jimmy Carter was one. George Bush used to be one too and it cost him dearly in his campaign last year against Ronald Reagan.

“Well, guess who’s coming to the White House. Guess who invited them. Guess who will lead the delegation. Right. The Trilateralists are coming. President Reagan has asked them to come. They will be led by David Rockefeller. The Trilateralists have landed and the conspiracy theorists no doubt will be dose behind,” they sneered.

Despite public denials, the Trilateral Commission certainly counts as a secret society as its meetings are not open to public scrutiny. And it most certainly represents an extension of the even more secretive Council on Foreign Relations, as all eight North American representa- tives to the founding meeting of the Trilateral Commission, were CFR members.

Jim Marrs
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