No Shocker: CIA Docs show H.W.'s Oil Co Emerged w collaboration Covert CIA Officer

[mod mom]

found at Huff Po:

A Real News Exclusive
Bush Senior Early CIA Ties Revealed


By Russ Baker and Jonathan Z. Larsen | The Real News Project

January 8, 2007

NEW YORK--Newly released internal CIA documents assert that former president George Herbert Walker Bush's oil company emerged from a 1950's collaboration with a covert CIA officer.

Bush has long denied allegations that he had connections to the intelligence community prior to 1976, when he became Central Intelligence Agency director under President Gerald Ford. At the time, he described his appointment as a 'real shocker.'

But the freshly uncovered memos contend that Bush maintained a close personal and business relationship for decades with a CIA staff employee who, according to those CIA documents, was instrumental in the establishment of Bush's oil venture, Zapata, in the early 1950s, and who would later accompany Bush to Vietnam as a “cleared and witting commercial asset” of the agency.

According to a CIA internal memo dated November 29, 1975, Bush's original oil company, Zapata Petroleum, began in 1953 through joint efforts with Thomas J. Devine, a CIA staffer who had resigned his agency position that same year to go into private business. The '75 memo describes Devine as an “oil wild-catting associate of Mr. Bush.” The memo is attached to an earlier memo written in 1968, which lays out how Devine resumed work for the secret agency under commercial cover beginning in 1963.

-snip
http://realnews.org/rn/content/zapata.html

[Atman]

1. The BFEE is a pox on America

They are evil incarnate.

.

[mod mom]

2. Devine resumed work for the secret agency under commercial cover beginning in 1963

hmmh...1963? What big event happened in that year?

[formercia]

3. He just happened to be in Dallas too. n/t

[keepCAblue]

4. But doesn't **remember** where he was that day...

...or what he was doing.

conveeeeenient.

[Virginia Dare]

28. He had more than just a passing acquaintance with...

the Hinckley family as well. When something really fucked up happens in this country, can the Bush's be far behind?

[librechik]

14. that immediately caught my eye

in light of Poppy's recent breakdown, are we closer to establishing a connection?

[David Zephyr]

5. Yes, and Prescott's son, GHB, was in Dallas on Nov. 22, 1963

As was Prescott's puppet Richard Nixon.

[mod mom]

6. and why would the BFEE be interested in Kennedy? Cuba + $ perhaps?

KEVIN PHILLIPS: George H. Walker was a real piece of work. I mean, he was a buccaneer. He was sort of a Joe Kennedy, but with a social register type qualification. He got involved in the 1920's with a bunch of Cuban companies, because of his ties to Percy Rockefeller and the National City Bank. They handled a lot of investments in Cuba. He was a director during the 1920's of eight or nine Cuban companies. George H. Walker had ties to the -- investment ties that were independent, so he had invested in some of these companies. One of them turned out several -- several turned out to merge into something called West Indies Sugar. West Indies Sugar became one of the major American companies in Cuba, and George H. Walker Jr., the son of George H. Walker and Prescott, Bush's cousin was a director, held a family seat on West Indies Sugar. Now during the late 1950's, West Indies Sugar was based in the Indy province in Cuba. That's where the Castro insurgency was developing. Castro and his people sort of shook down West Indies Sugar. They used their trucks and hit them up for money and so forth. They were unhappy with the Castro movement. In 1959 or 1960, I forget which year, Castro's people nationalized West Indies Sugar, and at this time George H. W. Bush's uncle was Director of West Indies Sugar. The value of West Indies sugar had been about $50 million and it wound up being virtually peanuts. I don't know how much their stake was. I couldn't begin to guess. It may not have been nearly as much as one would suggest from the bigger numbers. They were an unhappy set of campers when West Indies Sugar went bye-bye.

-snip
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/01/12/1448237

[keepCAblue]

7. Zapata Off-Shore, H.W., Howard Hughes, Nixon and the CIA

Zapata Off-Shore, the oil company owned by future CIA director and U.S. president George H.W. Bush after he split it off from Zapata Oil partner Hugh Liedtke in 1954, had a drilling rig on the Cay Sal Bank in 1958. These islands had been leased to Richard Nixon supporter and CIA contractor Howard Hughes the previous year and were later used as a base for CIA raids on Cuba.

From http://electromagnet.us/dogspot/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=179

The connections between President Bush and Halliburton's Kellogg, Brown and Root are affirmed by

...business records of the Brown & Root firm and Brown Shipbuilding Co., relating in particular to building projects and joint ventures with other companies such as Zapata Offshore

...found in the executive files of George R. Brown at the Fondren Library of Rice University.

Zapata Offshore was founded by George Herbert Walker Bush in 1954, after a successful partnership in 1953 with Hugh and Bill Liedtke, funded by Brown Brothers Harriman, owned by business partners of Prescott Bush, our president's grandfather.
Zapata is connected numerous CIA intrigues in Latin America, including the overthow of a legally elected government in Guatemala that is indeed the prototype for CIA backed intervention. An historical outline is available at the Famous Texans website.

Prescott convinced his partners at the banking house of Brown Brothers Harriman among them Averell Harriman, a fellow Skull and Bones member-- to waive the firm's nepotism rule so George could work there. Uncle George Herbert Walker, Jr. offered him a job at G.H. Walker and Co., the private Wall Street banking firm founded by his father, Bush's maternal grandfather.

Instead of taking those two prospects, George opted for a third family tie. He met with Henry Neil Mallon, the president of Dresser Industries. Mallon offered George his first job at Dresser subsidiary International Derrick and Equipment Company (Ideco), in Odessa, Texas. Brown Brothers Harriman had underwritten Dresserís transition from a private company to a publicly traded one. Years later, George named a son after Mallon.

In 1953, Bush got money from Brown Brothers Harriman and, with partners Hugh and Bill Liedtke, formed Zapata Petroleum. By the late 1950s they were millionaires. Bush bought subsidiary Zapata Off-Shore from his partners and went into business on his own in 1954. By 1958, the new company was drilling on the Cay Sal Bank in the Eastern Gulf of Mexico. The islands (of the Cay Sal) had been leased to Nixon supporter and CIA contractor Howard Hughes the previous year and were later used as a base for CIA raids on Cuba. The CIA was using companies like Zapata to stage and supply secret missions attacking Fidel Castro's Cuban government in advance of the Bay of Pigs invasion. The CIA's codename for that invasion was Operation Zapata In 1981, all Securities and Exchange Commission filings for Zapata Off-Shore between 1960 and 1966 were destroyed. In other words, the year Bush became vice president, important records detailing his years at his drilling company disappeared. In 1969, Zapata bought the United Fruit Company of Boston, another company with strong CIA connections.

I find it surprising that the media has ignored Bush's connections to Halliburton which seem to run deeper and broader than those of the well paid former employee Dick Cheney.

David Roknich

[Octafish]

21. Corporate McPravda told to ignore Poppy's connections to Howard Hughes & Co.

That would point straight through to CIA work.
Wet work.
Wet work like Dallas.

The newly released CIA memos on Poppy and bidnissman Devine are brewing a scheißsturm für Poppy. CIA makes for lots of inside-trading avenues that would make Prescott blush. The trip to Vietnam raises many troubling questions. Money to be made off war through Big Oil and Big Construction. G

ee. Sounds vaguely familiar.

Couldn't happen to a nicer fellah.

PS: Excellent post, info and link, keepCAblue. Thank you!

[mdmc]

8. kicking

read later

[mod mom]

9. WOW read the comments @ Huff PO! The truth is coming out. No wonder

why HW was balling before an audience and making weird references to the Warren Commission at Ford's funeral! Link to comments:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2007/01/08/new-docs-evidence-george_n_38097.html

[mod mom]

11. Found at Huff Po: NSAM #263 drafted on Nov 21 (future Vietnam Policy)

I've never ready this tidbit here-anyone else?

LYNDON B. JOHNSON JOHN F. KENNEDY

and the

GREAT AMERICAN COUP D'ETAT

by L. Fletcher Prouty

On Nov 22, 1963, Lyndon B. Johnson became President of the United States of America.

On that same date, President John F. Kennedy was assassinated at Dealey Plaza in Dallas, Texas.

On Nov 26, 1963, President Johnson signed a National Security Action Memorandum #273, the highest level national security document, as guidance for future Vietnam plans and policy. This brief directive most significantly initiated changes reversing Kennedy's Vietnam policy of NSAM #263, Oct 11, 1963. Kennedy had decreed then that "the bulk of U.S. personnel would be out of Vietnam by the end of 1965."

Strangely, this NSAM #273, which began the change in Kennedy's policy toward Vietnam, was drafted on Nov 21, 1963...the day before Kennedy died. It was not Kennedy's policy. He would not have requested it, and would not have signed it. Why would it have been drafted for his signature on the day before he died; and why would it have been given to Johnson so quickly? Johnson had not asked for it. On Nov 21, 1963 Johnson had no expectation whatsoever of being President on Nov 26th.

http://www.prouty.org/johnson.html



Vietnam War: The Documents - 15

National Security Action Memorandum 273 -- Draft



According to Kennedy assassination conspiracists, NSAM 273 maked a radical change in U.S. policy as compared to NSAM 263. NSAM 263 was supposedly a document that showed John Kennedy's resolve to extract the U.S. from Vietnam, while NSAM 273 is a document that signalled Lyndon Johnson's resolve to commit the U.S. to a massive intervention.
This theory is the backbone of Oliver Stone's movie JFK.
Thus it is important to compare this draft document to NSAM 263, and then to compare it to the version of NSAM 273 that Lydon Johnson approved. Was there really a change in policy here?
Note that this memo is dated the day before Kennedy was assassinated, and "the President" here is JFK.

http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/viet15.htm
11/21/63
DRAFT
TOP SECRET
NATIONAL SECURITY ACTION MEMORANDUM NO. 273
The President has reviewed the discussions of South Vietnam which occurred in Honolulu, and has discussed the matter further with Ambassador Lodge. He directs that the following guidance be issued to all concerned:
1. It remains the central object of the United States in South Vietnam to assist the people and Government of that country to win their contest against the externally directed and supported Communist conspiracy. The test of all decisions and U. S. actions in this area should be the effectiveness of their contribution to this purpose.
2. The objectives of the United States with respect to the withdrawal of U. S. military personnel remain as stated in the White House statement of October 2, 1963.
3. It is a major interest of the United States Government that the present provisional government of South Vietnam should be assisted in consolidating itself and in holding and developing increased public support. All U.S. officers should conduct themselves with this objective in view.
4. It is of the highest importance that the United States Government avoid either the appearance or the reality of public recrimination from one part of it against another, and the President expects that all senior officers of the Government will take energetic steps to insure that they and their subordinates go out of their way to maintain and to defend the unity of the United States Government both here and in the field.
More specifically, the President approves the following lines of action developed in the discussions of the Honolulu meeting of November 20. The office or offices of the Government to which central responsibility is assigned is indicated in each case.
5. We should concentrate our own efforts, and insofar as possible we should persuade the Government of South Vietnam to concentrate its efforts, on the critical situation in the Mekong Delta. This concentration should include not only military but political, economic, social, educational and informational effort. We should seek to turn the tide not only of battle but of belief, and we should seek to increase not only our control of land but the productivity of this area wherever the proceeds can be held for the advantage of anti-Communist forces.
(Action: The whole country team under the direct supervision of the Ambassador.)
6. Programs of military and economic assistance should be maintained at such levels that their magnitude and effectiveness in the eyes of the Vietnamese Government do not fall below the levels sustained by the United States in the time of the Diem Government. This does not exclude arrangements for economy on the MAP account with respect to accounting for ammunition, or any other readjustments which are possible as between MAP and other U. S. defense resources. Special attention should be given to the expansion of the import distribution and effective use of fertilizer for the Delta.
(Action: AID and DOD as appropriate. )
7. With respect to action against North Vietnam, there should be a detailed plan for the development of additional Government of Vietnam resources, especially for sea-going activity, and such planning should indicate the time and investment necessary to achieve a wholly new level of effectiveness in this field of action.
(Action: DOD, and CIA. )
8. With respect to Laos, a plan should be a developed for military operations up to a line up to 50 kilometers inside Laos, together with political plans for minimizing the international hazards of such an enter- prise. Since it is agreed that operational responsibility for such undertakings should pass from CAS to MACV, this plan should provide an alternative method of political liaison for such operations, since their timing and character can have an intimate relation to the fluctuating situation in Laos.
(Action: State, DOD, and CIA.)
9. It was agreed in Honolulu that the situation in Cambodia is of the first importance for South Vietnam, and it is therefore urgent that we should lose no opportunity to exercise a favorable influence upon that country. In particular, measures should be undertaken to satisfy ourselves completely that recent charges from Cambodia are groundless, and we should put ourselves in a position to offer to the Cambodian a full opportunity to satisfy themselves on this same point.
(Action: State.)
10. In connection with paragraphs 7 and 8 above, it is desired that we should develop as strong and persuasive a case as possible to demonstrate to the world the degree to which the Viet Cong is controlled, sustained and supplied from Hanoi, through Laos and other channels. In short, we need a more contemporary version of the Jorden Report, as powerful and complete as possible.
(Action: Department of State with other agencies as necessary.)
McGeorge Bundy

[keepCAblue]

13. naive

"On Nov 21, 1963 Johnson had no expectation whatsoever of being President on Nov 26th."


Or did he?

[elehhhhna]

23. It's easy to have your paperwork ready when you know the future.

Sorta like BushII and the Patriot Act

[frylock]

10. zapata was nothing more than a cia front

[leftofthedial]

12. the ultra-right wing has always dominated the national intelligence

community

"virgins" don't become Director of Central Intelligence.

[133724]

15. So we the people own bush's empire?????

since it was developed with gov't money?????

[Initech]

16. I swear that Bush Sr. is one shady individual.

He's probably got more skeletons in his closet than the rest of the country combined. :scared:

[donco]

18. Here’s a few more skeletons.

"In 1979, Bushs first business, Arbusto Energy, obtained financing from James Bath, a Houstonian and close family friend. One of many investors, Bath gave Bush $50,000 for a 5 percent stake in Arbusto. At the time, Bath was the sole U.S. business representative for Salem bin Laden, head of the wealthy Saudi Arabian family and a brother (one of 17) to Osama bin Laden. It has long been suspected, but never proven, that the Arbusto money came directly from Salem bin Laden. In a statement issued shortly after the September 11 attacks, the White House vehemently denied the connection, insisting that Bath invested his own money, not Salem bin Ladens. , Bush at first denied ever knowing Bath, then acknowledged his stake in Arbusto and that he was aware Bath represented Saudi interests. , Bath has extensive ties, both to the bin Laden family the scandal-ridden Bank of Commerce and Credit International (who have gone on to fund Osama bin Laden. BCCI defrauded depositors of $10 billion during the 80s in what has been called the largest bank fraud in world financial history by former Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article3332.htm

[Initech]

20. So Bush directly funded bin Laden?

Man, bin Laden must have missed a payment then.

[SpiralHawk]

25. George AWOL Bush and the bin Ladens are on intimate terms

[newyawker99]

27. Hi donco!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[Octafish]

17. Smirko -- when he was in the Texas ANG -- bragged Poppy was CIA...

The source is the widow of another Texas ANG flyer.
Her source?
Her LATE husband and his LATE boss.

Here's the story:

Fear of Flying

A Duval County woman says nerves ended W's National Guard service in Texas

By: Susan Cooper Eastman

According to Janet Linke, a Jacksonville resident and artist, Bush's flying career was permanently disabled by a crippling fear of flying.

SNIP...

Linke’s husband was admitted to the Texas Guard in the summer of 1972 to replace Bush. President Bush has said that he stopped flying fighter jets because the Alabama Guard unit didn’t have jets, and he wanted the transfer to Alabama in order to work on a political campaign. But Linke says she heard a different story from her husband and Bush’s squad commander, the late Lt. Col. Jerry Killian. Shortly after her husband joined the Texas unit, Linke says, the couple discussed Bush’s service with Killian at a social event.

Contrary to some news reports that suggest Killian admired Bush, Linke says the officer didn’t have much use for the young lieutenant. He mentioned that Bush appeared to have a drinking problem, she recalls, but he was most offended by another incapacity: his fear of flying. According to Linke, Killian said Bush was grounded in his fourth year of flying after he became incapable of flying or properly landing a plane.

“He was mucking up bad, Killian told us,” Linke says. “He just became afraid to fly.”

SNIP...

For Linke, W’s military service has become a very personal flashpoint. Linke’s husband died while serving in the Texas Guard in 1973 after drinking at the officer’s club. He nodded off at the wheel, drove into a lake and drowned. Linke was 27 years old with a 3-year-old son. She didn’t know much about who W was then; his family was not on the national radar. “We were told his father was a very wealthy Texan with CIA connections.”

CONTINUED...

Original source gone. Back-up here:

http://www.legitgov.org/essay_eastman_bush_fear_of_flying_in_guard_092304.html

Gee. People heard Smirko brag Poppy was CIA in 1972. That means Poppy lied in 75 when testifying before the Senate for his confirmation hearing for DCI. If he knew this discrepancy, Sen. Frank Church probably would've asked why, especially seeing how the FBI places Bush -- evidently a longtime CIA man -- in Dallas on 22 November 1963.

Thanks, Mod Mom. These days are full of old news.

[mod mom]

19. Do you think we are possibly on the verge of something-noting poppy's recent

tears and then weird commentary? I was shocked to see info posted at Huff Po and even more shcked to read the comments posted there.

Thank you so much, Octafish, for all of your infomative posts. I have learned so much and passed the knowledge on to others. I have to say that prior to witnessing the '04 theft in Ohio and then having media et al tell us move along-you didn't see anything, I didn't pay too much attention to what was going on behind the scenes. DU, and especially your threads, have been so helpful in putting pieces together.

Peace,

mod mom

[Octafish]

22. Devine and Poppy working together may be the Standard Model...

...a legitimate looking fellah on the outside, investing in stuff from his job at Train, Cabot and Associates, while Poppy heads to Vietnam (and later China and Saudi Arabia) where he can provide "intelligence" for proprietary American interests. Howard Hughes comes to mind in the story, as do other Big Oil, Wall Street, Eugenics-lubbing NAZI types like the bin Ladens.

In the present day, we saw what happened to Randy "Duke" Cunningham. He had some wild parties with current-day CIA top dogs like Kyle "Dusty" Foggo and Brent Wilkes. Gee. Even Operation 40 Porter Goss had to resign.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/politics/cunningham/20060304-9999-1n4foggo.html

Do we have a chance?



Hell yes, we have a damn good chance.

Thanks to you and those documents you posted are a great start on getting the Truth out, mod mom.

[SpiralHawk]

24. Corrupt republicon cronies -- screwing America

Why do the Bushes get away with so much crime and treason against America?

The corporate media has a lot to anwer for...

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

26. Operation Zapata

http://demopedia.democraticunderground.com/index.php/Operation_Zapata

[Virginia Dare]

29. I look forward to the day...

when the Bush family takes it's proper place in infamy. I really hope and pray that the truth comes out one day, hopefully before old Poppy kicks, but sadly, that is rather improbable.

[BlackVelvet04]

30. I'm not sure I understand how this is ties with the CIA.....

"began in 1953 through joint efforts with Thomas J. Devine, a CIA staffer who had resigned his agency position that same year to go into private business."

Am I missing something?