by Michael C. Ruppert
September 2000
from
FromTheWilderness Website
|
The following story
appeared in the September, 2000 Special Edition of
'From
The Wilderness'.
|
"U.S. journalist Mike Ruppert, a former Los Angeles police officer who now runs a Web site that seeks to expose CIA covert operations, said he met with RCMP investigator McDade on Aug. 3 in L.A.Ruppert said the RCMP officer was anxious to see documents he received three years ago from a shadowy Green Beret named Bill Tyre [sic] detailing the sale of rigged Promis software to Canada."- The Toronto Star, September 4, 2000.
Only the legends of Excalibur, the sword
of invincible power, and the Holy Grail, the chalice from which
Christ took his wine at the Last Supper begin to approach the
mysterious aura that have evolved in the world of secret
intelligence around a computer software program named Promis.
Created in the 1970s by former
National Security Agency (NSA) programmer and engineer
Bill Hamilton, now President of Washington, D.C.'s
Inslaw
Corporation, PROMIS (Prosecutor's Management Information System)
crossed a threshold in the evolution of computer programming.
Working from either huge mainframe computer systems or smaller
networks powered by the progenitors of today's PCs, PROMIS, from its
first "test drive" a quarter century ago, was able to do one thing
that no other program had ever been able to do.
It was able to simultaneously read and
integrate any number of different computer programs or data bases
simultaneously, regardless of the language in which the original
programs had been written or the operating system or platforms on
which that data base was then currently installed.
In the mid 1970s, at least as far as computer programs were concerned, the "universal translator" of Star Trek had become a reality. And the realm of Star Trek is exactly where most of the major media would have the general public place the Promis story in their world views.
In the mid 1970s, at least as far as computer programs were concerned, the "universal translator" of Star Trek had become a reality. And the realm of Star Trek is exactly where most of the major media would have the general public place the Promis story in their world views.
But given the fact that the government of Canada
has just spent millions of dollars investigating whether or not a
special version of Promis, equipped with a so-called "back door" has
compromised its national security, one must concede that perhaps the
myths surrounding Promis and what has happened to it need to be
re-evaluated.
from
YouTube Website
|
|
Myths, by definition, cannot be solved, but facts can
be understood and integrated.
Only a very few people realize how big
the Promis story really is.
It is difficult to relegate Promis to the world of myth and fantasy when so many tangible things, like the recently acknowledged RCMP investigation make it real. Canadians are not known for being wildly emotional types given to sprees.
It is difficult to relegate Promis to the world of myth and fantasy when so many tangible things, like the recently acknowledged RCMP investigation make it real. Canadians are not known for being wildly emotional types given to sprees.
And one must also include the
previous findings of Congressional oversight committees and no less
than six obvious dead bodies ranging from investigative journalist
Danny Casolaro in 1991, to a government employee named Alan Standorf,
to British Publisher and lifelong Israeli agent Robert Maxwell also
in 1991, to retired Army CID investigator Bill McCoy in 1997, to a
father and son named Abernathy in a small northern California town
named Hercules.
The fact that commercial versions of Promis are now
available for sale directly from Inslaw belies the fact that some
major papers and news organizations instantly and laughably use the
epithet conspiracy theorist to stigmatize anyone who discusses it.
Fear may be the major obstacle or ingredient in the myth surrounding
modified and "enhanced" versions of Promis that keeps researchers
from fully pursuing leads rising in its wake.
I was validated in
this theory on September 23rd in a conversation with FTW
(From The Wilderness)
Contributing Editor Peter Dale Scott, Ph.D.
Scott, a Professor
Emeritus at UC Berkeley and noted author. Peter, upon hearing of the
details of my involvement, frankly told me that Promis frightened
him. Casolaro, who was found dead in a West Virginia motel room in
1991, had Scott's name (Scott is also a Canadian) in a list of
people to contact about his Promis findings.
He never got that far.
A close examination of the Promis saga actually leads to more than a dozen deaths which may well be why so many people avoid it. And many of those deaths share in common a pattern where, within 48 hours of death, bodies are cremated, residences are sanitized and all files disappear.
A close examination of the Promis saga actually leads to more than a dozen deaths which may well be why so many people avoid it. And many of those deaths share in common a pattern where, within 48 hours of death, bodies are cremated, residences are sanitized and all files disappear.
This was certainly the case with my friend Bill McCoy, a
legendary retired Army CID investigator who was also the principal
investigator for Hamilton in his quest to recover what may be
hundreds of millions in lost royalties and to reunite him with the
evolved progeny of his brain child.
Those progeny now have names
like SMART (Self Managing Artificial Reasoning Technology) and TECH.
I will never forget hearing of McCoy's death and his immediate
cremation and then trying to reconcile that with the number of times
he had told me, while sitting in his Fairfax Virginia home, that he
wanted to be buried next to his beloved wife in spite of the fact
that he was a Taoist.
I have tried to avoid becoming involved in Promis even though I have been in possession of documents and information about the case for more than six years. Reluctantly, as I realized that recent developments gave me a moral imperative to write, I gathered all of my scattered computer files connecting the case into one place. When assembled they totaled more than seven megabytes and that did not include maybe 500 printed pages of separate files.
In researching this story I found a starkly recurring theme. It appeared first in a recent statement I tape recorded from probably one of the three best informed open sources on the story in the world, William Tyree.
I have tried to avoid becoming involved in Promis even though I have been in possession of documents and information about the case for more than six years. Reluctantly, as I realized that recent developments gave me a moral imperative to write, I gathered all of my scattered computer files connecting the case into one place. When assembled they totaled more than seven megabytes and that did not include maybe 500 printed pages of separate files.
In researching this story I found a starkly recurring theme. It appeared first in a recent statement I tape recorded from probably one of the three best informed open sources on the story in the world, William Tyree.
I also came across the same theme, almost
verbatim, in a research paper that I discovered while following
leads from other sources.
Tyree is no stranger to FTW. A former US Army Green Beret, framed in 1979, he has been serving a life sentence for the murder of his wife Elaine outside of Fort Devens Massachusetts, then home of the 10th Special Forces Group. I have written of him in no less than six prior issues of FTW.
Tyree is no stranger to FTW. A former US Army Green Beret, framed in 1979, he has been serving a life sentence for the murder of his wife Elaine outside of Fort Devens Massachusetts, then home of the 10th Special Forces Group. I have written of him in no less than six prior issues of FTW.
He has, from his prison cell in Walpole
Massachusetts, been a central if little known figure in the Promis
case for many years, like a monk mysteriously possessed of
information that no one else could obtain. If the story is ever
fully told his role may be even more significant than anyone has
ever supposed.
The information from Tyree, recorded in a phone conversation on August 28, and the research work on "block-modeling" social research theory uncovered while researching other leads both describe the same unique position or vantage point from hypothetical and actual perspectives.
The information from Tyree, recorded in a phone conversation on August 28, and the research work on "block-modeling" social research theory uncovered while researching other leads both describe the same unique position or vantage point from hypothetical and actual perspectives.
Tyree described an actual physical point in space,
further out than ever thought possible and now used by US
satellites.
This distance is made possible by Promis progeny so
evolved that they make the original software look primitive. The
social research, which included pioneering mathematical work -
apparently facilitating the creation of artificial intelligence -
postulated that a similar remote hypothetical position would
eliminate randomness from all human activity.
Everything would be
visible in terms of measurable and predictable patterns - the
ultimate big picture. Just one of the key web sites where I found
this information is located at
http //web.syr.edu/~bvmarten/socialnet.html.
One of FTW's guiding principles is our incessant drive to separate that which is important from that which is merely true. The purpose of this article is to provide leads and insights, some very concrete, for the continued investigation of the Promis saga.
One of FTW's guiding principles is our incessant drive to separate that which is important from that which is merely true. The purpose of this article is to provide leads and insights, some very concrete, for the continued investigation of the Promis saga.
While
we do not claim to be worthy of pulling Excalibur from the stone we
do hope to be divorced enough from egotistical motivations and
dreams of Pulitzers or glory to avoid being led into the trap that
has befallen so many seeking the Holy Grail. FTW believes that the
Promis story will only be solved by a group of people working
together selflessly for a greater good. Maybe there is legend here
after all.
Put simply, from the vantage point of a child actor in
1970s Burger King commercials, "It's too big to eat!"
What would you do if you possessed software that could think, understand every language in the world, that provided peep holes into everyone else's computer "dressing rooms," that could insert data into computers without people's knowledge, that could fill in blanks beyond human reasoning and also predict what people would do - before they did it? You would probably use it wouldn't you?
What would you do if you possessed software that could think, understand every language in the world, that provided peep holes into everyone else's computer "dressing rooms," that could insert data into computers without people's knowledge, that could fill in blanks beyond human reasoning and also predict what people would do - before they did it? You would probably use it wouldn't you?
But Promis is not a virus.
It has to be installed as a program on the
computer systems that you want to penetrate. Being as uniquely
powerful as it is this is usually not a problem. Once its power and
advantages are demonstrated, most corporations, banks or nations are
eager to be a part of the "exclusive" club that has it.
And, as is
becoming increasingly confirmed by sources connected to this story,
especially in the worldwide banking system, not having Promis - by
whatever name it is offered - can exclude you from participating in
the ever more complex world of money transfers and money laundering.
As an example, look at any of the symbols on the back of your ATM
card. Picture your bank refusing to accept the software that made it
possible to transfer funds from LA to St. Louis, or from St. Louis
to Rome.
The other thing to remember is that where mathematics has proved that every human being on the earth is connected to every other by only six degrees of separation, in covert operations the number shrinks to around three.
The other thing to remember is that where mathematics has proved that every human being on the earth is connected to every other by only six degrees of separation, in covert operations the number shrinks to around three.
In the Promis story it often shrinks to
two. It really is a small world.
The First Rip Off
Reagan confidant and overseer for domestic affairs from 1981 to 1985 Ed Meese loved Promis software. According to lawsuits and appeals filed by Hamilton, as well as the records of Congressional hearings, the FBI and dozens of news stories, the legend of Promis began in 1981-2.
After a series of demonstrations showing how well Promis
could integrate the computers of dozens of US attorneys offices
around the country, the Department of Justice (DoJ) ordered an
application of the software under a tightly controlled and limited
license.
From there, however, Meese, along with cronies D. Lowell
Jensen (also no stranger to FTW's pages) and Earl Brian allegedly
engaged in a conspiracy to steal the software, modify it to include
a "trap door" that would allow those who knew of it to access the
program in other computers, and then sell it overseas to foreign
intelligence agencies.
Hamilton began to smell a rat when agencies
from other countries, like Canada, started asking him for support
services in French when he had never made sales to Canada.
The Promis-managed data could be anything from financial records of banking institutions to compilations of various records used to track the movement of terrorists. That made the program a natural for Israel which, according to Hamilton and many other sources, was one of the first countries to acquire the bootlegged software from Meese and Company.
The Promis-managed data could be anything from financial records of banking institutions to compilations of various records used to track the movement of terrorists. That made the program a natural for Israel which, according to Hamilton and many other sources, was one of the first countries to acquire the bootlegged software from Meese and Company.
As voluminously described by Inslaw attorney, the
late Elliot Richardson, the Israeli Mossad under the direction of
Rafi Eitan, allegedly modified the software yet again and sold it
throughout the Middle East. It was Eitan, the legendary Mossad
captor of Adolph Eichmann, according to Hamilton, who had
masqueraded as an Israeli prosecutor to enter Inslaw's DC offices
years earlier and obtain a first hand demonstration of what the
Promis could do.
Not too many Arab nations would trust a friendly Mossad agent selling computer programs. So the Mossad provided their modified Promis to flamboyant British publishing magnate Robert Maxwell, a WWII Jewish resistance fighter who had assumed the Anglo name and British citizenship after the war.
Not too many Arab nations would trust a friendly Mossad agent selling computer programs. So the Mossad provided their modified Promis to flamboyant British publishing magnate Robert Maxwell, a WWII Jewish resistance fighter who had assumed the Anglo name and British citizenship after the war.
It was Maxwell, capable of traveling the world and with enormous marketing resources, who
became the sales agent for Promis and then sold it to, among others,
the Canadian government. Maxwell drowned mysteriously in late 1991,
not long after investigative reporter Danny Casolaro was "suicided"
in West Virginia. Maxwell may not have been the only one to send Promis north.
In the meantime, after winning some successes, including a resounding Congressional finding that he had been cheated, Bill Hamilton hit his own buzz saw in a series of moves by the Reagan and Bush Justice Departments and rigged court decisions intended to bankrupt him and force him out of business. He survived and fought on. In the meantime hundreds of millions of dollars in royalties and sales fees were going into the wrong pockets.
In the meantime, after winning some successes, including a resounding Congressional finding that he had been cheated, Bill Hamilton hit his own buzz saw in a series of moves by the Reagan and Bush Justice Departments and rigged court decisions intended to bankrupt him and force him out of business. He survived and fought on. In the meantime hundreds of millions of dollars in royalties and sales fees were going into the wrong pockets.
And, as was later
revealed from a number of directions, this initial tampering with
the software was far from the only game in town.
Both the CIA,
through GE Aerospace in Herndon Virginia (GAO Contract #82F624620),
the FBI and elements of the NSA were tinkering with Promis, not just
to modify it with a trap door, but to enhance it with artificial
intelligence or AI. It's worth it to note that GE Aerospace was
subsequently purchased by Martin-Marietta which then merged to
become Lockheed-Martin the largest defense and aerospace contractor
in the world. This will become important later on.
Confidential documents obtained by FTW indicate that much of the AI development was done at the Los Alamos National Laboratory and Sandia Labs using research from other US universities, including Harvard, Cal-Tech and the University of California. And it was not just Reagan Republicans who got their hands on it either.
Confidential documents obtained by FTW indicate that much of the AI development was done at the Los Alamos National Laboratory and Sandia Labs using research from other US universities, including Harvard, Cal-Tech and the University of California. And it was not just Reagan Republicans who got their hands on it either.
As we'll
see shortly, Promis came to life years before the election of Ronald
Reagan.
It was also, according to Bill Tyree, an essential element
in the espionage conducted by Jonathan Pollard against not only the
US government but the Washington embassies of many nations targeted
by Israel's Mossad.
The Last Circle
For more than a year and half, members of the National Security Section of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) have been traveling through the US, often in the company of a savvy female homicide detective from the small California town of Hercules named Sue Todd.
Even now questions linger as to what the Canadians were
really after. But there is absolutely no question that while
surreptitiously in the U.S. the Mounties spent more time with author
and investigative reporter Cheri Seymour than with anyone else.
And
for good reason.
Seymour, under the pen name of Carol Marshall is the author of a meticulously researched e-book entitled The Last Circle. So meticulously researched and documented is the book that FTW's researcher "The Goddess" has fact checked it and found it flawless. Same with Bill Hamilton and the Mounties, who have also told me of its precision.
Seymour, under the pen name of Carol Marshall is the author of a meticulously researched e-book entitled The Last Circle. So meticulously researched and documented is the book that FTW's researcher "The Goddess" has fact checked it and found it flawless. Same with Bill Hamilton and the Mounties, who have also told me of its precision.
Anyone seeking to understand the Promis story must include this book as a part of their overall
research.
I first met Cheri in person this spring after she had contacted me via the Internet. I traveled to her home, some three hours outside of Los Angeles and viewed acres of documentation for a saga that started with drug related murders and police corruption around methamphetamine production in northern California in the 1980s.
I first met Cheri in person this spring after she had contacted me via the Internet. I traveled to her home, some three hours outside of Los Angeles and viewed acres of documentation for a saga that started with drug related murders and police corruption around methamphetamine production in northern California in the 1980s.
That
investigation later connected to politicians like Tony Coelho and
major corporations like MCA and eventually led to a shadowy
scientist named
Michael Riconosciuto.
Familiar names like Ted
Gunderson and relatively unknown names like Robert Booth Nichols
weave throughout this detailed epic that takes us to the Cabazon
Indian Reservation in the California Desert and into the deepest
recesses of the 1980s Reagan/Bush security apparatus.
Gunderson, a retired FBI Special Agent in Charge (SAC) from Los Angeles, and Nichols, a mysterious Los Angeles man, exposed through court documents obtained by Seymour as being a career CIA operative, connected with scientist/programmer, Riconosciuto in a sinister, yet now very well documented phase of Promis' development.
Gunderson, a retired FBI Special Agent in Charge (SAC) from Los Angeles, and Nichols, a mysterious Los Angeles man, exposed through court documents obtained by Seymour as being a career CIA operative, connected with scientist/programmer, Riconosciuto in a sinister, yet now very well documented phase of Promis' development.
In affidavits Riconosciuto claimed that one of the tasks he performed at the
Cabazon reservation was to install a back door in the version of
Promis that was sold to Canada. In August of this year the RCMP
investigators told both Seymour and me that they had traveled to the
reservation several times and had confirmed many details of
Seymour's research. They had also interviewed Riconosciuto on more
than one occasion.
As with everyone else I have ever met who has
spoken with him, both the Mounties and Seymour kept a reserved
distance from him and always,
"counted their fingers after every hand shake."
By using treaties between the U.S. Government and Native American
peoples that recognize Native American reservations as sovereign
nations, the CIA has long and frequently avoided statutory
prohibitions against operating inside the United States.
The
financial rewards for tribal nations have been significant and the
extra security afforded by tribal police in remote areas has been a
real blessing for covert operatives.
The Last Circle describes in
detail how Promis software was modified by Riconosciuto to allegedly
include the back door "eavesdropping" capability but also enhanced
with one form of AI and subsequently applied to the development of
new weapons systems including "ethnospecific" biowarfare compounds
capable of attacking specific races.
Riconosciuto, now serving time
in a Federal prison in Pennsylvania has a cell a very short distance
from fellow espionage inmates Edwin Wilson and Jonathan Pollard.
While his tale is critical to
understanding what has happened to Promis, the fact remains that
Riconosciuto has been out of the loop
and in legal trouble for eight years. He has been in a maximum
security prison for at least six. What was surprising was that in
1998 he contacted homicide detective Sue Todd in Hercules and told
her that the murder of a father and son, execution style, was
connected to the Promis story.
One connection was obvious.
Hercules
is a "company town" connected to a weapons manufacturer described in
Seymour's book that also connects to the Cabazon Indian Reservation.
The Three Bills
I lived in Washington, D.C. from August 1994 until late October of 1995.
It was during that time that I was a semi-regular visitor at
the Fairfax, Virginia home of Bill McCoy, a loveable sixty-something
giant, always adorned with a beret who complained ruthlessly about
what had happened to the United States since "The Damned Yankee
Army" had taken over.
Writers were "scribblers." People who thought
they knew something about covert operations without ever having seen
one were "spooky-groupies." "Mac," as we called him, had his
investigative fingers in almost everything but he was most involved
with Promis.
McCoy was a retired Chief Warrant Officer from the U.S.
Army's Criminal Investigation Division. He had broken some of the
biggest cases in Army history. It was Mac who first introduced me to
both Bill Tyree and to Bill Hamilton in 1994.
I recall scratching my
head as I would be sitting at Mac's dinner table when a call would
come in from Hamilton asking if there was any new information from
Tyree.
"Not yet, " McCoy would answer, "I'll call as soon as I get something."
"How," I asked, "could a guy in a maximum security prison like Walpole State Penitentiary in Massachusetts be getting information of such quality that someone like Hamilton would be calling urgently to see what had come in?""That," answered McCoy was the work of someone known only as "The Sergeant Major," and alternately as "His Eminence" who fed the information to Tyree, who in turn fed it to McCoy, who then passed it on to Hamilton.
Sometimes however, Tyree
and Hamilton communicated directly.
To this day the identity of the
Sergeant Major remains a mystery and the puzzle piece most pursued
by the RCMP when they visited me in August, 2000.
It was also not by coincidence then that, in the same winter of 94-95, McCoy revealed to me that he was using former Green Berets to conduct physical surveillance of the Washington, D.C. offices of Microsoft in connection with the Promis case.
It was also not by coincidence then that, in the same winter of 94-95, McCoy revealed to me that he was using former Green Berets to conduct physical surveillance of the Washington, D.C. offices of Microsoft in connection with the Promis case.
FTW (From The Wilderness) has, within the
last month, received information indicating that piracy of Microsoft
products at the GE Aerospace Herndon facility were likely tied to
larger objectives, possibly the total compromise of any Windows
based product. It is not by chance that most of the military and all
of the intelligence agencies in the U.S. now operate on Macintosh
systems.
In late 1996 Tyree mailed me a detailed set of diagrams and a lengthy narrative explaining the exact hows and whys of the murder of Danny Casolaro and an overall view of the Promis saga that is not only consistent with what is described by Seymour in The Last Circle but also provides many new details.
In late 1996 Tyree mailed me a detailed set of diagrams and a lengthy narrative explaining the exact hows and whys of the murder of Danny Casolaro and an overall view of the Promis saga that is not only consistent with what is described by Seymour in The Last Circle but also provides many new details.
Asked about Mike Riconosciuto
for this story Tyree would say only that,
"He's very good at what he does. There are very, very few who can touch him, maybe 200 in the whole world. Riconosciuto's in a class all by himself."
Those
documents, as later described to me by RCMP Investigator Sean McDade,
proved to be "Awesome and right on the money."
The essence of those documents was that, not only had the Republicans under Meese exploited the software, but that the Democrats had also seen its potential and moved years earlier.
The essence of those documents was that, not only had the Republicans under Meese exploited the software, but that the Democrats had also seen its potential and moved years earlier.
Nowhere was this connection more clearly exposed than in
understanding the relationship between three classmates from the
U.S. Naval Academy:
The Tyree
diagrams laid out in detail how Promis, after improvement with AI,
had allegedly been mated with the software of Jackson Stephens' firm
Systematics. In the late seventies and early eighties,
Systematics
handled some 60-70% of all electronic banking transactions in the
U.S.
The goal, according to the diagrams which laid out
(subsequently verified) relationships between Stephens,
Worthen
Bank, the
Lippo Group and the drug/intelligence
bank BCCI was to
penetrate every banking system in the world.
This "cabal" could then
use Promis both to predict and to influence the movement of
financial markets worldwide.
Stephens, truly bipartisan in his
approach to profits, has been a lifelong supporter of George Bush
and he was, at the same time, the source of the $3 million loan that
rescued a faltering Clinton Campaign in early 1992.
There is a great
photograph of Stephens with a younger George "W" Bush in the
excellent BCCI history,
False Profits.
In the fall of 1997, Bill McCoy, having recently gone off of his heart medication was found dead in his favorite chair. In the days and weeks before he had been advised by Tyree that a Pakistani hit man, on an Israeli contract had been in the states seeking to fulfill a hit on McCoy. There had been other hints that someone closer to McCoy might do the job.
In the fall of 1997, Bill McCoy, having recently gone off of his heart medication was found dead in his favorite chair. In the days and weeks before he had been advised by Tyree that a Pakistani hit man, on an Israeli contract had been in the states seeking to fulfill a hit on McCoy. There had been other hints that someone closer to McCoy might do the job.
Tyree recently told FTW that just
before his death, he had given McCoy information on "Elbit" flash
memory chips, allegedly designed at Kir Yat-Gat south of Tel Aviv.
The unique feature of the Elbit chips was that they worked on
ambient electricity in a computer. In other words, they worked when
the computer was turned off.
When combined with another newly
developed chip, the "Petrie," which was capable of storing up to six
months worth of key strokes, it was now possible to burst transmit
all of a computer's activity in the middle of the night to a nearby
receiver - say in a passing truck or even a low flying SIGINT
(Signals Intelligence) satellite.
According to Tyree this was the
methodology used by Jonathan Pollard and the Israeli Mossad to
compromise many foreign embassies in Washington.
Within 48 hours of his death Bill McCoy had been cremated and in less than four days all of Mac's furniture, records and personal belongings had been removed from his home by his son, a full Colonel in the Army.
Within 48 hours of his death Bill McCoy had been cremated and in less than four days all of Mac's furniture, records and personal belongings had been removed from his home by his son, a full Colonel in the Army.
The house had been sanitized and repainted and, aside
from the Zen garden in the back yard, there was no trace that McCoy
had ever lived there.
Harvard and HUD
Former Assistant Secretary of Housing, Catherine Austin Fitts has had about as much ink in FTW as anyone else.
A feisty, innovative
thinker she has seen raging success as a Managing Director of the
Wall Street investment bank Dillon Read and she has been "nuked"
into near poverty after devising software strategies seeking to
optimize financial data and returns for the US taxpayer.
While
acting as a HUD (United States Department of Housing and
Urban Development) consultant in 1996, selling defaulted HUD Mortgages
into the private market through her own investment bank, Hamilton
Securities (no relation), she achieved unheard of taxpayer returns
of around 90 cents on the dollar.
In doing so she ran afoul of an
entrenched Washington financial power structure feeding uncompetitively at the HUD trough.
Last month we described how Fitts devised a data optimization method using hand coding by residents of a HUD Housing project in Washington to produce Promis-like results. She successfully "mapped" the flow of HUD money and was about to create proprietary software that would make the job easier. That software would have integrated billions of pieces of disorganized HUD financial data.
Last month we described how Fitts devised a data optimization method using hand coding by residents of a HUD Housing project in Washington to produce Promis-like results. She successfully "mapped" the flow of HUD money and was about to create proprietary software that would make the job easier. That software would have integrated billions of pieces of disorganized HUD financial data.
Suddenly, in
August 1996, DoJ and HUD Inspector's General investigations started
that seized her computers and resulted in a four-year blatantly
illegal campaign to crush everything she stood for. No charges were
ever brought, Fitts, her money and her data are still viciously
separated.
One of the empires Fitts threatened was that of the Harvard Endowment.
One of the empires Fitts threatened was that of the Harvard Endowment.
The Harvard Endowment is not really a benevolent
university fund but an aggressive investment predator with $19
billion in assets, some from HUD subsidized housing. Harvard also
has a number of other investments in high tech defense operations
and had a big hand in investing George W Bush's lackluster firm Harken Energy.
"W" has a Harvard MBA. Fitts' chief nemesis at
Harvard, Herbert "Pug" Winokur, head of
Capricorn Investments, and
member of the board of the Harvard Endowment is also a PhD
mathematician from Harvard where the mathematical breakthroughs that
gave rise to Artificial Intelligence using block-modeling research
were discovered.
In the 60s Winokur had done social science research
for the Department of Defense on causes of inner city unrest in the
wake of the 1967 Detroit riots.
The pioneering research at Harvard that allegedly gave rise to the Artificial Intelligence installed in Promis later moved north.
The pioneering research at Harvard that allegedly gave rise to the Artificial Intelligence installed in Promis later moved north.
According to a
Harvard website,
"Much of the effort of the Harvard group - no longer based solely at Harvard - was centered on the International Network for Social Network Analysis (INSNA) at Toronto..."
Things grew more suspicious
as Fitts' research disclosed that Winokur, through Capricorn
Investments, had a decisive role in the 1980s management of the
intelligence/government outsourcing mega-firm DynCorp, of Reston,
VA. Winokur served as DynCorp CEO from 1989 to 1997.
DynCorp handles
everything for Uncle Sam from aircraft maintenance, to sheep-dipping
of combat troops into private assault forces in Colombia, to the
financial management of HUD records, to the maintenance of computer
security at government facilities. One of DynCorp's most interesting
contracts is with the DoJ for the financial management of assets
seized in the drug war.
DynCorp also counts among its shareholders
former CIA Director James Woolsey.
Pug Winokur made
DynCorp what it
is today and he still sits on the board.
In juxtaposition, Harvard and HUD differ in one striking respect according to Fitts. The Harvard Endowment has enjoyed wildly uncharacteristic above market tax-free returns for the last decade, (33% in 1999), while HUD, in the same year, was compelled to do a "manual adjustments" to reconcile a $59 billion shortfall between its accounts and the U.S. Treasury account. [This is not a typographical error].
In juxtaposition, Harvard and HUD differ in one striking respect according to Fitts. The Harvard Endowment has enjoyed wildly uncharacteristic above market tax-free returns for the last decade, (33% in 1999), while HUD, in the same year, was compelled to do a "manual adjustments" to reconcile a $59 billion shortfall between its accounts and the U.S. Treasury account. [This is not a typographical error].
Where did all that money go? $59 billion in an
election year is a staggering amount of money. Why is no one
screaming? HUD's explanation is that it was loading a new accounting
system that did not work and then did not bother to balance its
checkbook for over a year.
I was not surprised when Bill Hamilton confirmed to both Fitts and to me that Winokur's DynCorp had played a role in the evolution of Promis in the 1980s.
I was not surprised when Bill Hamilton confirmed to both Fitts and to me that Winokur's DynCorp had played a role in the evolution of Promis in the 1980s.
One other surprise was to come out of Fitts'
investigations that had months earlier led her to conclude that she
was up against Promis-related interests. On the very day that DoJ
and HUD shut her down she was discussing software development with a
Canadian firm that is at the heart of the Canadian space program,
Geomatics.
The
term Geomatics applies to a related group of sciences
- all involving satellite imagery - used to develop geographic
information systems, global positioning systems and remote sensing
from space that can actually determine the locations of natural
resources such as oil, precious metals and other commodities.
Apparently centered in Canada, the Geomatics industry offers consulting services throughout the world in English, German, Russian, French, Arabic, Spanish and Chinese.
Apparently centered in Canada, the Geomatics industry offers consulting services throughout the world in English, German, Russian, French, Arabic, Spanish and Chinese.
Geomatics technology,
launched aboard Canadian satellites via US, European or Japanese
boosters can help developing or industrialized nations inventory and
manage all of their natural resources. There are also several
Geomatics related companies in the U.S. including one not far from
the Johnson Space center in Houston.
This situation is custom made for enhanced Promis software with back-door technology. What better way to map and inventory all of the world's resources than by making each client nation pay for the work. By providing the client nation Promis-based software it would then be possible to compile a global data base of every marketable natural resource. And it would not be necessary to even touch the resources because commodities and futures markets exist for all of them.
This situation is custom made for enhanced Promis software with back-door technology. What better way to map and inventory all of the world's resources than by making each client nation pay for the work. By providing the client nation Promis-based software it would then be possible to compile a global data base of every marketable natural resource. And it would not be necessary to even touch the resources because commodities and futures markets exist for all of them.
An AI enhanced, Promis-based program would then be the perfect
set up to make billions of dollars in profits by watching and
manipulating the world's political climate to trade in, let's say
Tungsten futures. Such a worldwide database would be even more
valuable if there were, for example, a sudden surge in the price of
gold or platinum.
Bill Hamilton readily agreed that this was an ideal situation for the application of Promis technology. In furthering our research on Geomatics we discovered that almost everywhere Geomatics technology went we also found Lockheed-Martin.
Bill Hamilton readily agreed that this was an ideal situation for the application of Promis technology. In furthering our research on Geomatics we discovered that almost everywhere Geomatics technology went we also found Lockheed-Martin.
Enter The Mounties
Thanks to a strong push in my direction from Cheri Seymour, the Mounties and Hercules PD Homicide Detective Sue Todd arrived at my door on August 3rd.
They had already consumed most of the FTW web
site and were well familiar with my writings. I had let them know,
through Cheri, that I did have information on Promis from Bill Tyree
and that I would be happy to share it. Before getting into details
we all went out for lunch at a nearby Chinese restaurant.
In setting basic outlines for our conversations that day I indicated that, as a journalist, I viewed our discussions as off-the-record. I took no notes and did not tape record any of the discussion. I am recounting the events now only after corresponding with McDade and advising him of my intention to write. He responded and did not object. I took the same position with Detective Todd. I warned the Mounties and Todd at the outset that a sudden termination of their investigations was likely and that they would all become expendable.
In setting basic outlines for our conversations that day I indicated that, as a journalist, I viewed our discussions as off-the-record. I took no notes and did not tape record any of the discussion. I am recounting the events now only after corresponding with McDade and advising him of my intention to write. He responded and did not object. I took the same position with Detective Todd. I warned the Mounties and Todd at the outset that a sudden termination of their investigations was likely and that they would all become expendable.
It happened to me once.
Over lunch the Mounties were quite candid about the fact that the RCMP had Promis software and that it even went by the name Promis. I think they may have also mentioned the name PIRS which is an acknowledged system in the RCMP network. They stated that they had been given their version of Promis by the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service (CSIS).
CSIS was an intelligence breakaway from the Mounties in 1984, intended to be a pure [sic] intelligence agency. It was created largely with the expertise and assistance of the CIA.
Over lunch the Mounties were quite candid about the fact that the RCMP had Promis software and that it even went by the name Promis. I think they may have also mentioned the name PIRS which is an acknowledged system in the RCMP network. They stated that they had been given their version of Promis by the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service (CSIS).
CSIS was an intelligence breakaway from the Mounties in 1984, intended to be a pure [sic] intelligence agency. It was created largely with the expertise and assistance of the CIA.
All of us
understood two things about that arrangement and we discussed them
openly.
The chief concern of the Mounties,
clearly, was to ascertain whether or not their version of Promis was
one that was compromised.
McDade also described in detail how he
knew that supposedly secure RCMP communications equipment had been
compromised by the NSA.
The Mounties acknowledged regular meetings
with Cheri Seymour but evinced none of the interest she said that
they had previously shown in the Mossad. With me their single-minded
focus was Bill Tyree and where and how he obtained his information.
Sue Todd, confirmed for me suspicions that there was an unspoken alliance between the RCMP investigators and the FBI. She said that during the course of her three years of efforts to solve the double murder in Hercules, she had routinely visited FBI offices and enjoyed access to FBI files relative to both the Promis investigation and anything connected to her victims.
Sue Todd, confirmed for me suspicions that there was an unspoken alliance between the RCMP investigators and the FBI. She said that during the course of her three years of efforts to solve the double murder in Hercules, she had routinely visited FBI offices and enjoyed access to FBI files relative to both the Promis investigation and anything connected to her victims.
That
information was obviously being shared with the Mounties and that
implied the blessings of the FBI. In short, a domestic law
enforcement officer was sharing information with agents of a foreign
government. In some cases that could provoke espionage charges but
in this case it was apparently sanctioned.
The Hercules murder
victims had no apparent connection to Promis software in any way
except for the fact that Riconosciuto had possessed knowledge about
the murders which he had provided to Todd from prison.
The Hercules
Armament Corporation, featured in
The Last Circle, was an obvious
link. I also noted that the father in Todd's case had been a
computer engineer with passions for both geological research and
hypnosis and no other visible connections to the Promis story.
As we copied Tyree's papers and went through other materials the next day I was aware that the Canadians expressed special interest in Jackson Stephens and anything having to do with the manipulation of financial markets. They asked for copies of news reports I had showing that General Wesley Clark, the recently retired NATO Commander, has just gone to work for Stephens, Inc. in Little Rock Arkansas.
As we copied Tyree's papers and went through other materials the next day I was aware that the Canadians expressed special interest in Jackson Stephens and anything having to do with the manipulation of financial markets. They asked for copies of news reports I had showing that General Wesley Clark, the recently retired NATO Commander, has just gone to work for Stephens, Inc. in Little Rock Arkansas.
I also provided documents showing that Stephens' financial
firm Alltel, heir to Systematics, was moving heavily into the
mortgage market. As the Mounties repeatedly pressed for information
on the identity of the Sergeant Major I referred them to Tyree
directly through his attorney Ray Kohlman and to Tyree's closest
friend, the daughter of CIA bagman and paymaster Albert Carone, Dee
Ferdinand. [For more on Carone visit the FTW web site].
McDade did eventually contact Ferdinand by phone and shortly thereafter one of the most bizarre twists in the whole story took place.
About a week after meeting the Mounties I heard back from Sean that the Tyree documents and flow charts from 1996 had been right on the money. A special recurring theme in those documents that meshes with Seymour's research is the fact that modified versions of Promis software with both artificial intelligence and trap doors were being smuggled out of Los Alamos nuclear labs in containers labeled as radioactive waste.
McDade did eventually contact Ferdinand by phone and shortly thereafter one of the most bizarre twists in the whole story took place.
About a week after meeting the Mounties I heard back from Sean that the Tyree documents and flow charts from 1996 had been right on the money. A special recurring theme in those documents that meshes with Seymour's research is the fact that modified versions of Promis software with both artificial intelligence and trap doors were being smuggled out of Los Alamos nuclear labs in containers labeled as radioactive waste.
According to Tyree and other sources, after an
Indian reservation, the safest place in the world that no one will
ever break into is a nuclear waste dump. This also applies to
containers in transit between countries. The radioactive warning
label guarantees unmolested movement of virtually anything.
Promis
software is apparently no exception.
Bill Casey and Al Carone from the Grave
Albert Vincent Carone has also been covered exhaustively in FTW, both in the newsletter and on the web site.
A retired NYPD
Detective, also a made-member of the Genovese crime family, Carone
spent his entire working career as a CIA operative. (FTW has special
reports on both Bill Tyree and Al Carone available from the web site
or at the end of this newsletter).
For more than 25 years before his
mysterious death in 1990, Al Carone served as a bagman and liaison
between George Bush, CIA Director Bill Casey, Oliver North, Richard
Nixon and many other prominent figures including Robert Vesco,
Manuel Noriega and Ferdinand Marcos.
The Carone-Tyree connection,
covered in detail in the Sept. 1998 issue (Vol. I, No.7) goes back
to operations in the mid 1970s when Tyree, serving with the Special
Forces, engaged in CIA directed missions for which Carone was the
paymaster.
Carone's death from "chemical toxicity of unknown etiology" in 1990 resulted in the sanitizing of all of his military and NYPD records as well as the theft and disappearance of nearly ten million dollars in bank accounts, insurance policies and investments. Virtually overnight, almost every record of Carone disappeared leaving his daughter and her family nearly bankrupt under the burden of tens of thousands of dollars in medical bills.
Carone's death from "chemical toxicity of unknown etiology" in 1990 resulted in the sanitizing of all of his military and NYPD records as well as the theft and disappearance of nearly ten million dollars in bank accounts, insurance policies and investments. Virtually overnight, almost every record of Carone disappeared leaving his daughter and her family nearly bankrupt under the burden of tens of thousands of dollars in medical bills.
In 1996, Carone's daughter,
Dee Ferdinand, discovered that Tyree and Carone had known each other
and that Tyree could prove instrumental in helping to restore
Carone's lost fortune. Ferdinand filed suit in U.S. District Court
this spring seeking to recover pensions, insurance policies and
benefits in a case which has no known connection to Promis.
I have
known Ferdinand and her family for more than seven years. Never once
has she mentioned a connection between her father and Promis
although she was well familiar with the case from Tyree and
conversations with Bill Hamilton. I had referred the Mounties to her
because of my belief that she could possibly help identify Tyree's
source, the Sergeant Major.
On August 10th, exactly one week after the Mounties came to see me, the DoJ mailed Ferdinand a response to her suit seeking dismissal. Included in the paperwork was a bizarre document, now in FTW's possession, that, by the account of both Ferdinand and her lawyer, had absolutely nothing to do with her case. The document in question was a March 29, 1986 Declaration from CIA Director William Casey, a close friend of the Carone family.
On August 10th, exactly one week after the Mounties came to see me, the DoJ mailed Ferdinand a response to her suit seeking dismissal. Included in the paperwork was a bizarre document, now in FTW's possession, that, by the account of both Ferdinand and her lawyer, had absolutely nothing to do with her case. The document in question was a March 29, 1986 Declaration from CIA Director William Casey, a close friend of the Carone family.
Paragraph 6 of that document
(prepared for another case) stated,
"Two of the documents responsive to Plaintiffs' Request No 1, specifically the one-page letter dated 28 March 1979 and a one-page letter dated 8 January 1980, have been released in the same excised form as they were previously released by the Government of Canada. I independently and formally assert the state secrets privilege for the information excised from these two documents."
Dee Ferdinand called me immediately. The letter had nothing to do
with her suit. It mentioned Canada. Canada was not even mentioned in
her suit.
"What was going on?" she asked."It's blackmail," I answered. "CIA, which is monitoring everything the Canadians do, everything I do, everything you do, knows that I will tell the Mounties of these letters."
McDade didn't grasp the concept at
first. He was a straight-ahead street cop. But I had been through
something similar when serving as the press spokesman for the Perot
Presidential campaign in 1992.
I explained it to Sean,
"Sean, you and I are just the messengers. But I guarantee that at some level of your government the CIA's reference to these letters will scare people to death. It is a reminder that CIA has them."
A week later McDade told me that the dates were indeed significant -
very significant. That's all he would say.
FTW has what may be a possible explanation for the dates in question. The President and CIA Director on these dates the letters were written were Jimmy Carter and Stansfield Turner.
FTW has what may be a possible explanation for the dates in question. The President and CIA Director on these dates the letters were written were Jimmy Carter and Stansfield Turner.
Aside from the
then recent Russian invasion of Afghanistan, a saga in which the
Canadian government played a minor role, the largest drama on the
world scene was the overthrow of the Shah of Iran in January 1979,
the rise of the Ayatollah Khomeini and the seizure of the U.S.
Embassy in Teheran later that year. The Canadian government and the
CIA worked very closely in Iran, the Canadian Embassy even housing
some CIA personnel who had escaped the crowds of students.
But that
kind of assistance is not something to hide. Another explanation was
needed to explain shock waves in Ottawa.
Recently, a source using a code name known to FTW has surfaced with information relating to Promis. In his communiqués he describes the use of Promis software by the Bush family to loot the secret bank accounts of Manuel Noriega and Ferdinand Marcos.
Recently, a source using a code name known to FTW has surfaced with information relating to Promis. In his communiqués he describes the use of Promis software by the Bush family to loot the secret bank accounts of Manuel Noriega and Ferdinand Marcos.
Promis is able to
do this because funds can be transferred out of accounts without a
trace.
Remember the trap door?
The rule of thumb here is that
crooks, especially CIA sponsored crooks, don't usually go to the
cops when somebody steals their stolen money. From my personal
experience in the era, and direct exposure to two members of the
Iranian Royal family, both before and after the overthrow, I am
acutely aware that the Shah, then perhaps the richest man in the
world, was actually targeted by the CIA. His downfall was no
accident.
Once worth more than $20 billion, the Shah ended his life
a refugee in Egypt. Many of his billions disappeared and the family
was very upset about it.
Could the financial power of Promis have been turned loose first through Canada when Carter was President in the US? The Shah did a lot of banking in Canada. We may never know the answer. But if the downfalls of wealthy US supported dictators Noriega and Marcos are any indication the answer is likely, yes. And the Shah was wealthier than both of them put together.
Could the financial power of Promis have been turned loose first through Canada when Carter was President in the US? The Shah did a lot of banking in Canada. We may never know the answer. But if the downfalls of wealthy US supported dictators Noriega and Marcos are any indication the answer is likely, yes. And the Shah was wealthier than both of them put together.
Where'd all that money go?
Headlines
On August 25th the Toronto Star broke what was to become a series of stories by Valerie Lawson and Allan Thompson.
The cat was out of the
bag. Various figures known to have direct connections to Riconosciuto had been virtually dogging the Mounties' every move as
they traveled in the US. One even contacted me just days after the
Mounties left LA.
It was a story that could not be kept under wraps
forever. Most of the Star story was accurate. It was going to be
difficult for the RCMP to move quietly now.
A Reuters story the same
day closed with the following paragraphs,
"Canada's national counterintelligence agency said in a June report that friendly nations were making concerted efforts to steal sensitive technology and information.
"The Canadian Security Intelligence Service said outsiders were particularly interested in aerospace, biotechnology, chemicals, communications, information technology, mining and metallurgy, nuclear energy, oil and gas, and the environment."
That was Geomatics, at the heart of Canada's space program, Canada's flagship
space technology. I checked the Star story. There had been no
mention of high tech or space related issues.
What did Reuters know?
In mid September, after receiving confidential source documents
related to the case telling me that one version of Promis, modified
in Canada was handled through the Canadian firm I.P. Sharp, I got an
answer.
A quick search on the web revealed that Sharp, a well
documented component of the case, had been bought by a Reuters
company in the early 90s. Hamilton later told me that he had heard
that Reuters possibly had the Promis software. That would explain
how they knew about the aerospace connection.
Michael Dobbs of The Washington Post called and asked what I knew. I confirmed that I had met with the Mounties but didn't know much else other than giving them the Tyree flow charts. The Post was never going to tell the truth.
Michael Dobbs of The Washington Post called and asked what I knew. I confirmed that I had met with the Mounties but didn't know much else other than giving them the Tyree flow charts. The Post was never going to tell the truth.
Their business was keeping secrets, not
revealing them. The Mounties had made waves.
On August 28 the phone rang and it was a collect call from Tyree.
On August 28 the phone rang and it was a collect call from Tyree.
"Get a tape recorder and turn it on," he said.
Over the course of
the next half an hour Tyree, obviously reading from detailed and
copious notes, named individuals and companies dealing with Promis
software and its progeny. The tape was specific down to naming
specific engineers in military and private corporations doing Promis
research.
Tyree described specific Congressional committees that had
been infiltrated with "enhanced" Promis.
Tyree described how Promis
progeny, having inspired four new computer languages had made
possible the positioning of satellites so far out in space that they
were untouchable. At the same time the progeny had improved video
quality to the point where the same satellite could focus on a
single human hair. The ultimate big picture.
Promis progeny had also evolved to the point where neural pads could be attached to plugs in the back of the human head and thought could be translated into electrical impulses that would be equally capable of flying a plane or wire transferring money.
Promis progeny had also evolved to the point where neural pads could be attached to plugs in the back of the human head and thought could be translated into electrical impulses that would be equally capable of flying a plane or wire transferring money.
Names like Sandia,
Cal-Tech, Micron, Tech University of Graz, Oded Leventer and Massimo
Grimaldi rolled from his lips as he tore through the pages of notes.
Data, such as satellite reconnaissance, could also now be downloaded
from a satellite directly into a human brain. The evolution of the
artificial intelligence had progressed to a point where animal
behavior and thought were being decoded. Mechanical humans were
being tested.
Animals were being controlled by computer.
Billy saved Canada for last.
Billy saved Canada for last.
"Here's how we fuck Canada," he started.
He was laughing as he facetiously
described what was coming as some sort of bizarre payback for the
War of 1812.
Then, placing the evolutions of Promis in context with
the Canadian story Tyree asked a question as to why one would really
now need to go to all the trouble of monitoring all of a foreign
country's intelligence operations.
"There's an easier way to get what I want," he said. "I access their banks. I access their banks and I know who does what and who's getting ready to do what," he said.
He described how Canada had been
provided with modified Promis software which Canada then modified,
or thought they had modified, again to eliminate the trap door.
That
software turned loose in the financial and scientific communities
then became Canada's means of believing that they were securing the
trap door information from the entities to whom they provided their
versions of Promis. But, unknown, to the Canadians the Elbit chips
in the systems bypassed the trap doors and permitted the
transmission of data when everyone thought the computers were turned
off and secure.
Tyree did not explain how the chips
physically got into the Canadian computers.
"This," Tyree said "is how you cripple everything Canada does that you don't like. And if you want proof I offer you the fact that we toppled the government of Australia in 1980.""[Prime Minister] Gough Whitlam and Nugan Hand [Bank]," I answered.
Tyree affirmed.
The Labor Government of
Whitlam had been suddenly unseated after making nationalistic noise
and questioning the role of US intelligence agencies in Australian
affairs.
The issue of a coming feud between the dollar and the Euro came up. I suggested that rapidly vanishing support in South America and Europe both were threatening the military operations of "Plan Colombia" and the economic boost it would give the US economy.
The issue of a coming feud between the dollar and the Euro came up. I suggested that rapidly vanishing support in South America and Europe both were threatening the military operations of "Plan Colombia" and the economic boost it would give the US economy.
Tyree
jumped in,
"If I can put Canada in line and show the Eurodollar, the 'Eurotrash' what I have already done to my neighbor, whom I value to some degree - remember, these are not nice people - these are financial thugs at their worst. So what they are going to do is sit down discreetly and say, 'Look, this is what we did to Canada. Now, would you like us to do this to the European market as well?'Mike, they're not going to think twice about it. A weapon is only good if someone knows what its capability is. Prior to using the atomic bomb it was irrelevant."
He continued,
"They refer to it as the Nagasaki Syndrome."
After describing in some detail how the financial powers-that-be had
gutted American manufacturing productivity through globalization he
described a strategy intended to halt any move by the Euro to
overshadow the dollar or even compete with it.
It was pure economic
hostage taking and Canada would be the object lesson. Then,
chillingly, he described something familiar to any military
strategist.
The penetration and looting of HUD
(United States Department of Housing and Urban Development) was the test bed, the
proving ground, the "White Sands" of the Promis economic Atom bomb.
Once the CIA and the economic powers-that-be had proven that, over a
period of years, they could infiltrate and loot $59 billion dollars
from HUD, they knew that they could do it anywhere.
Said Tyree,
"Then they knew they had what it took to go abroad and create mayhem. It was planned twenty years ago."
It took several days to reach Sean McDade who had been on vacation.
I played the Tyree tape for him over an open phone line into RCMP
headquarters. He asked me to make a physical copy right away and
send it to him.
After he had had time to listen to it he cautioned
me against sending it anywhere else. I told him that as long as his
investigation was active that I would do nothing more than make the
standard copies I make of any sensitive documents as a precaution. I
could tell that the tape had rattled him.
Though I had known from
the start that the large and energetic Mountie, whom I believed to
be a dedicated an honest man, would never be allowed to ride his
case out to the end, I still had hopes.
But in my heart I knew that
Tyree was right. In all the years he had been feeding me information
I had never known him to be wrong and, apparently, neither had Bill
Hamilton. I did not send a copy of the tape to Hamilton because I
knew how difficult and potentially dangerous McDade's job was going
to be now that the press had exposed him.
Having been a cop in
dangerous political, CIA infested waters I knew what it was like to
not know who you could trust.
If keeping the tape quiet would give the Mounties and edge I would do it - but only as long as they had a case.
If keeping the tape quiet would give the Mounties and edge I would do it - but only as long as they had a case.
Sudden Death
Then it was over.
On September 16th the Toronto Star announced that the RCMP had suddenly closed its Promis investigation with the flat disclaimer that it did not have and never did have any version of Bill Hamilton's software.
That was as shocking a statement as it was
absurd.
"The only way that you can identify Promis," said a perplexed Bill Hamilton, "is to compare the code. Sean McDade said that he was not an engineer and couldn't read code so how did he know?"
Hamilton was as emphatic as I was that McDade had said that RCMP (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) had Promis.
So was Cheri Seymour. I offered a fleeting hope
that the Mounties were playing a game, saying that they had
terminated the investigation to shake some of the incessant probing
that had been taking place around McDade's every move.
I was finally convinced when McDade e-mailed me and said that it was his view that the Mounties did not have any version of Promis and that he had no objections if I decided to write a story. I then agreed with Seymour that, whether they had said so or not, both the Mounties and Sue Todd had left enough visible footprints that it was their intention for us to go public. It might be the only protection they had.
As I had predicted from the start, they had come too close to bigger issues and been shut down ruthlessly. I called Sue Todd who lamented that she was marking her three year homicide investigation, "Closed by the press."
I was finally convinced when McDade e-mailed me and said that it was his view that the Mounties did not have any version of Promis and that he had no objections if I decided to write a story. I then agreed with Seymour that, whether they had said so or not, both the Mounties and Sue Todd had left enough visible footprints that it was their intention for us to go public. It might be the only protection they had.
As I had predicted from the start, they had come too close to bigger issues and been shut down ruthlessly. I called Sue Todd who lamented that she was marking her three year homicide investigation, "Closed by the press."
Even though she was convincing I had the feeling that
she was playing back a rehearsed script. I told her that I was not
satisfied with the statements that there was no Promis in the RCMP.
I recalled our lunchtime conversation of August 3rd.
She agreed with
me that the RCMP mission was to determine whether or not RCMP Promis
was a stolen or compromised version. She knew that they had it. So
did I.
I e-mailed McDade one last time saying that I was going to
write it like I remembered it.
He never got back to me.
Bill Hamilton added one last twist when he told me in a conversation that the Mounties claimed to have developed their software on their own. That, he said, was nonsense because the Mounties did not have that kind of sophistication or ability. He thought that the RCMP program had been specially prepared FBI. That would explain the role of retired FBI agent Ted Gunderson.
Bill Hamilton added one last twist when he told me in a conversation that the Mounties claimed to have developed their software on their own. That, he said, was nonsense because the Mounties did not have that kind of sophistication or ability. He thought that the RCMP program had been specially prepared FBI. That would explain the role of retired FBI agent Ted Gunderson.
Though I didn't tell him at the
time I knew that he had obtained that information from Bill Tyree.
And Bill Tyree and his provider, the Sergeant Major, are two people
that Bill Hamilton and I both have learned to respect.
Diplomacy
Just three days after the Toronto Star announced the abrupt termination of the RCMP investigation the Canada based International Network on Disarmament and Globalization (INDG) posted an electronic bulletin on a speech by former Canadian Ambassador to the US.
In an
address the night before, less than 48 hours after the termination
of the RCMP investigation, Derek Burney, current President of CAE, a
Canadian firm manufacturing flight simulators, criticized the U.S.
aerospace industry for being overly-protectionist under the guise of
national security.
In addressing the Aerospace Industries
Association of Canada, according to large stories that appeared in
CP (Canadian Press) and Toronto's Globe and Mail, Burney was
characterized as sounding unusually tough in his criticism of
American policy that was freezing Canadian firms out of aerospace
contracts.
Both stories were ambivalent in that they alternately
made Burney sound critical of the U.S. while championing Canadian
interests and at the same time weak as he noted that Mexico stood
poised under NAFTA to replace Canada as the U.S.'s number one
trading partner.
The CP story made two telling observations. It quoted Burney as saying that Canada needed to do more to,
The CP story made two telling observations. It quoted Burney as saying that Canada needed to do more to,
"preserve and enhance its access to the American market."
Then it closed it's story on
Burney's speech, advocating a compromise agreement between the US
and Canada, by saying that Burney's position,
"risks being perceived here at home as a sellout or worse."
A close examination of Burney's remarks, published in the INDG
bulletin revealed something more like an obsequious surrender rather
than a mere sellout.
While there were a few tough-talking paragraphs
that saved Canadian face, the essence of the speech was that Burney
believed that American defense firms, the largest of which is
Lockheed-Martin, were poised to transfer the bulk of their contracts
to companies in Mexico.
Citing Canada's dependence upon access to
American avionics and "databases," Burney painted a picture that
seemingly left Canada over a barrel. Without access to American
technology the Canadian aerospace industry could not function.
Buried deep in the text of Burney's speech we found the following paragraph which is, we believe, the best place to end this story.
Buried deep in the text of Burney's speech we found the following paragraph which is, we believe, the best place to end this story.
"That does not mean that we have to agree with everything Washington does or says or do things exactly as the Americans do. On the contrary, one of the advantages of being a good neighbor and close ally is that we can speak freely and forthrightly to the Americans - provided we have a solid case and are seeking to influence their position and not simply capture a quick headline.And, never forget, it is always more effective to be frank in private.Otherwise your motive can be somewhat suspect."
No comments:
Post a Comment