John McCain

There will always be an Israel. The terrorist onslaught against her people represents not progress towards a refoundation of historic Palestine but a plunge into an abyss of moral decay perpetrated in the name of the Palestinian people by their own leaders. There will always be an Israel, because the Israeli people will defend their homeland against murderers who pose as martyrs, and will never accept justice imposed on them by leaders who send children to kill their children.

There will always be an Israel, strong and free, because Israel, and her supporters in this country, will never allow the depravity of her enemies to obscure the moral clarity that inspired her founding, 54 years ago last week, as the homeland of a people who understood evil long before Americans saw its more recent expression on September 11.

Terrorism is terrorism, whether in the form of professional killers who crash civilian aircraft into buildings or amateur murderers undistinguished by anything other than their willingness to take innocent lives.

A political solution to the conflict with the Palestinians is the best answer to Israeli insecurity, of course. But no moral nation--neither Israel nor America--can allow terrorists to chart the political course of its people. No freedom-loving nation can tolerate a terrorist state on its border. And no great nation can abandon the obligations of moral clarity for the convenience of situational ethics.

If we are serious about the values we in America and Israel live by, and the opportunities we would like all people in the Middle East to enjoy, we can allow terrorists no role in the political process.

Indeed, we must work to spread our values in the Middle East, first by opposing tyranny in the Arab world. The celebration of freedom in the streets of liberated Baghdad will serve as a counterpoint to the state-directed Arab media's distortion of the Palestinian conflict. It will be a reminder to other Arab tyrants that the United States is a natural ally of Arab people who aspire to freedom. Freeing Arabs from repression by tyrannical regimes is the priority of neither Yasser Arafat nor the dictators he counts as his allies. But bringing liberty's blessings to Arab peoples will do much more to improve their lives than will their jihad against Israel.

Unfortunately, when it comes to advocating freedom and opportunity in the Arab world, our values know few champions. In the monarchies and dictatorships of the Middle East, cynicism is the essence of statecraft. Americans find ourselves handicapped in our Middle East diplomacy by a native regard for moral clarity.

It is our fidelity to the values Arab leaders reject that makes it unmistakably clear to Americans who destroyed the peace process begun in Oslo. The authors of that disaster were the Palestinians themselves--and the Arab leaders who encouraged or accepted Yasser Arafat's rejection of the sweeping settlement offered by former Prime Minister Barak at Camp David, and provided rhetorical and material support for the ensuing intifada waged by suicide bombers.

I don't think our cultural differences with Arab states are so vast that a common recognition of what constitutes real peace and a just settlement is unattainable. I think Arab leaders know exactly what it will take to achieve real peace between Palestinians and Israelis, and that what they currently offer serves only to perpetuate the conflict.

Telethons and poems glorifying suicide bombers are not steps toward peace. Cash payments to the families of suicide bombers are not steps toward peace. Communiqués glorifying the murder of innocents are not steps toward peace. All of this is evil, pure and simple.

It is not peace, but fear of each other that motivates Arab dictators, and fear of their own populations, whose resentments toward Israel and America have been inflamed for generations to distract them from grievances against their own rulers for the economic and political inequities they are expected to endure permanently.

It is the unenlightened rule of Arab dictators, not the plight of the Palestinians, that condemns the Arab world to the civilizational crisis in which it finds itself. Which Middle Eastern nation grants its Arab citizens the most political freedom? Israel. Which countries' leaders have the blood of innocents on their hands but hear nothing about it from the Arab League? Iraq, Syria, and Sudan, for starters. Which country has the most egregious record of occupying another today? Syria, in Lebanon. In which countries do Palestinian refugees suffer without rights and the most basic freedoms? Other than Israel, only Jordan has treated these people with any dignity. Which nation in the region has matched its payments to the families of Palestinian murderers with money for health care, education, and other development in the territories? Not one.

How Arab leaders can abide their own hypocrisy is one question. Why they expect us to do so is a better one. Arab leaders recoil in mock indignation from any suggestion that they have a responsibility to discourage Palestinian treachery. Instead, they demand that the United States pressure the government of Israel into forsaking its obligation to defend its citizens from terrorism that Arab governments celebrate and support.

I'm also distressed that some of our European allies are dismissing Israel's legitimate security concerns. In some quarters, Jews are once again threatened with attacks on their institutions. We are witnessing once again the torching of European synagogues. All world leaders must condemn, in the strongest terms, such despicable behavior.

Israel has proved its willingness to risk its strategic interests by returning territories captured in war, and living cheek by jowl with a Palestinian state in exchange for peace and acceptance of Israel's right to exist by its Arab neighbors. Yasser Arafat and the Palestinian Authority he claims to lead insist on a settlement that would threaten the eventual extinction of a Jewish state in the Middle East, and accept and support murder as a means to achieve it. Official sponsorship of Palestinian terror is a self-induced mockery of the Palestinian leadership's moral authority, and that of its Nobel Peace Prize-winning chairman.

The Oslo peace process was premised on the notion that Israelis and Palestinians could live together. I believe it is now time to explore ways in which they can live apart. It is time to consider alternatives such as that proposed by former Prime Minister Barak--to erect a security barrier between the Israelis and the Palestinians. This is not to accept the hopelessness of a political solution, but to embrace the hope that Israel's people can live in safety until a Palestinian leadership truly committed to peace emerges from the chaos and despair inflicted on Palestinians for generations by leaders who lack the courage and compassion and wisdom to make a better life for their people.

Friends, I make no claim to wisdom on how to resolve the crisis in the Middle East. Like you, I look for guidance in the values we share with the only democracy in the region. I know this: no American leader should be expected to sell a false peace to our ally, consider Israel's right to self-defense less legitimate than ours, or insist that Israel negotiate a political settlement while terrorism remains the Palestinians' preferred bargaining tool.

The moral clarity you bring to American understanding of Israel's plight is the most effective antidote to the cynicism and hostility that parade as Arab diplomacy in the Middle East today. We will defeat terrorism against America, and we will stand with Israel as she fights the same enemy.

One of the great privileges of my life was the friendship that I developed with the late Sen. Henry "Scoop" Jackson. I got to know Scoop when I was the Navy liaison to the Senate in the late '70s. Scoop was and remains the model of what an American statesman should be. In 1979, I traveled to Israel with Scoop, where I knew he was considered a hero. I had no idea how great a hero he was until we landed in Tel Aviv. When we arrived, we were transferred to a bus big enough to accommodate our large delegation, as well as the U.S. Ambassador in Israel and several of his staff. About a hundred yards outside the airport, the bus was surrounded by a crowd of seven or eight hundred Israelis screaming for Jackson, waving signs that read "God Bless you, Scoop," "Senator Jackson, thank you," and dozens of other tributes. For a patriot like Scoop, their affection for him was nothing less than affection for America.

Scoop understood a deep truth. The bond between America and Israel is not just a strategic one, though that is important. Today, in the war against terror, we have no stronger ally than Israel. The more profound tie between our two countries, however, is a moral one. We are two democracies whose alliance is forged in our common values. To be proudly pro-American and pro-Israeli is not to hold conflicting loyalties. As Scoop understood, it is about defending the principles that both countries hold dear.

Setting the Record Straight

McCain, Israel and Torture

Senator John McCain, a former naval aviator who was tortured during his six-year captivity by the North Vietnamese Army (NVA), is, to his great credit, inserting an anti-torture clause into a senate bill, to the consternation of the Bushies. The following piece ran in the Jewish Telegraphic Agency Nov.7:

But is this borne out by the facts? Not so, according to the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI), which notes that despite improvements following the 1999 decision by the Israeli High Court of Justice to ban torture, because of a clause allowing for so-called "moderate physical pressure" in the case of "ticking bombs," it's still a problem in Israel:

The Public Committee Against Torture in Israel estimates that a considerable portion of all interrogees, if not most, had been exposed to interrogation methods which include "severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental." In other words these methods, as applied, cause, at least in their combination and accumulation over time, the level of gravity and cruelty that constitute torture as defined in international law.

In contrast with the years 2000-2001, the years 2002-2003 saw a deterioration in the treatment of Palestinian detainees by the GSS:

Speech to the Plenary Session of the
American Israel Public Affairs Committee 2006 Annual Summit

What links Lieberman, McCain, Gingrich, Perle, Kristol, and Hoffa?
by NonNeocon Wednesday, Jul. 26, 2006 at 4:01 PM

http://pittsburgh.indymedia.org/news/2006/07/24299.php

Senators Joe Lieberman and John McCain aren't merely "hawkish"; as "Honorary Co-Chairmen" of a pre-Iraq-war spin machine called The Committee for the Liberation of Iraq, they were leading cheerleaders for a war that now threatens to mushroom out of all control--unless we remove the Liebermans, McCains, and their fellow war cheerleaders from our U.S. Congress.

_____________________________

Senators Joe Lieberman and John McCain aren't merely "hawkish."

In the fall of 2002, when the administration began its "marketing" campaign to sell the public on the "need" to attack Iraq, a group of mostly-neoconservative D.C. heavyweights created The Committee for the Liberation of Iraq (CLI) to help shape the sales pitch.

The Committee's Advisory Board was chaired by George Shultz, of San Francisco-based war contractor Bechtel fame.

The Advisory Board's "Honorary Co-Chairmen" were Joe Lieberman and John McCain.

And what an Advisory Board it was!

Members included Newt Gingrich (who's now busy marketing the Iraq war's pre-planned next phase, affectionately referred to as "World War 3"), James P. Hoffa (the Teamsters' top guy), former Senator Robert Kerrey, Robert Kagan (a founder of the neocon Project for the New American Century, or PNAC), William Kristol (head of PNAC, frequent commentator on Fox News, and Editor of the Rupert Murdoch-backed neocon "Weekly Standard" magazine), R. James Woolsey (former CIA head), Danielle Pletka (of the American Enterprise Institute, who's busy, busy, busy these days as an on-air cheerleader for Israel's activities in Lebanon), and Richard Perle (whose nickname, reportedly, is "The Prince of Darkness").

Given the current activities in Israel and Lebanon, Mr. Perle deserves special attention.

Perle was the lead author of a mid-1990s policy paper for the Israeli Prime Minister recommending that Israel preemptively remove Saddam Hussein from power, among other international objectives. This paper, "A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm," calls for "reestablishing the principle of preemption, rather than retaliation alone." It calls for "engaging Hizballah, Syria, and Iran, as the principal agents of aggression in Lebanon." It also recommends sweeping pro-privatization, pro-corporatist changes in Israel's economy, to help solve the Israeli economy's "large problem" created by 70 years of "Labor Zionism." It recommends ways Israel can market its new policies to the US public and Congress "by tapping into themes of American administrations during the Cold War which apply well to Israel." And it even makes special mention of Newt Gingrich.

(You can read the whole paper at http://www.iasps.org/strat1.htm; a few more quotes are attached below.)

But Lieberman's and McCain's role as war cheerleaders predates 2002 and the CLI. According to Lieberman's current campaign website, "Senator Lieberman served as lead Democratic cosponsor of the 1991 Gulf War Resolution. In 1998, he teamed up with Senator John McCain (R-AZ) to enact the Iraq Liberation Act, which stated that regime change in Iraq was U.S. policy. And in the fall of 2002, Senator Lieberman was a lead sponsor of a resolution authorizing the President to use force, if necessary, to disarm Saddam." (See http://lieberman.senate.gov/issues/security.cfm)

Sadly, you can't study the website of The Committee for the Liberation of Iraq, because once the long-sought Iraq war was underway, the website, http://www.liberationiraq.org, was removed from the Internet.

But the Internet Archive--"the wayback machine"--did preserve some of the Committee's web pages, including the Mission Statement page ( http://web.archive.org/web/20030211230634/http://www.liberationiraq.org/) and the Advisory Board page ( http://web.archive.org/web/20030211230634/http://www.liberationiraq.org/) and the Advisory Board page ( link to web.archive.org)

The Mission Statement says the Committee will "engage in educational and advocacy efforts to mobilize US and international support for policies aimed at ending the aggression of Saddam Hussein and freeing the Iraqi people from tyranny."

Ah, freedom!

The Washington Post's Peter Slevin offered a different take. In his article "New Group Aims to Drum Up Backing for Ouster," Slevin wrote "At a time when polls suggest declining enthusiasm for a U.S.-led military assault on Hussein, top officials will be urging opinion makers to focus on Hussein's actions in response to the United Nations resolution on weapons inspections--and on his past and present failings. They AIM TO REGAIN MOMENTUM and PREPARE THE POLITICAL GROUND FOR HIS FORCIBLE OUSTER, IF NECESSARY." (Washington Post, November 4, 2002, as quoted in the 2003 book "Weapons of Mass Deception: The Uses of Propaganda in Bush's War on Iraq" by Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber of The Center for Media & Democracy, http://www.prwatch.org. The quote is in a chapter titled "War is Sell," in a section titled "The Committee for the Invasion of Iraq.")

Rampton and Stauber's book is proof that word travels fast in the Internet age. It was in bookstores in mid-summer, 2003; it references news stories as recent as June or July, 2003; and it documents just how many lies were told--and how carefully orchestrated was the propaganda--in the months before "Shock and Awe" began. It's essential reading right now, as the same tactics are being used right now to drag the world into ever greater destruction and chaos.

So Lieberman and McCain and their neocon pals got the war they dreamed of.

Organizations much like the CLI are already in place to "market" war against Iran (see link to http://www.sourcewatch.org) and who knows how many other countries.

And if war is sell, history may show that Lieberman and McCain were truly "Salesmen of the Century."

(If you've had enough of the war and enough of the salesmen, consider volunteering for or donating to Lieberman's challengers in Connecticut and, when appropriate, to McCain's challengers in Arizona. The Connecticut Democratic primary is just a couple of weeks away, and Lieberman's challenger is Ned Lamont. Lamont's website is http://www.nedlamont.com/)

McCain: 'Proudly Pro-Israel' - Says Haaretz Article Left 'Serious Misimpressions'

By: Jason Maoz, Senior Editor Wednesday, May 17, 2006

John McCain reacted this morning to news of the North Korean nuclear tests by pushing the willfully hawkish, neoconservative position: America, he said, should buy itself a missile defense shield to protect itself from threats like this one. This is a position that one wing of conservatism has been backing since the Reagan administration, even though it makes even less sense than it used to: Such a missile shield would be unbearably expensive, it would probably be anachronistic in an age when the most urgent nuclear threats are likelier to come from a suitcase bomb than they are from a fleet of launched missiles, and most evidence suggests such a shield wouldn’t work anyway.

But there’s a more interesting question now begged by the Arizona Republican’s stance: Is John McCain, the current frontrunner for the Presidency in 2008, a hawkish neocon likely to push regime change? Or is he an ideologically more moderate figure, a realist with deep-seated skepticism about committing American troops overseas? What kind of president, in other words, would McCain be?

In a fascinating cover story in this week’s New Republic (subscription only), John Judis wrestles with the issue and winds up mostly making the case for McCain the neoconservative. It’s a convincing story, and terrifically well told. In Judis’s recounting, McCain came out of his experiences in Vietnam believing that the United States ought only to get involved in overseas conflicts when its national interests were clearly at stake and when it possessed overwhelming military force, a realist position. Judis believes McCain then underwent a slow evolution through the 1990s — watching with horror as American troops failed to prevent massacres in Bosnia in the late 1990s — and pushing Clinton to send troops on a humanitarian mission to Kosovo, a war in which he acknowledged no great American national interest was at stake.

By 1999, in Judis’s telling, the transformation was complete. McCain was hiring prominent neoconservatives to work on his staff, was supporting the now-discredited Iraqi dissident Ahmad Chalabi, and soon became very prominent early advocate of regime change in Iraq and Iran positions which he defends staunchly to this day. In an interview that is recounted towards the end of the piece, Judis presses McCain to differentiate himself from the neoconservatives, or to concede that the war in Iraq was a mistake in conception and not just execution. McCain passes up the opportunity; of the neoconservatives he says “generally I agree with them and respect them enormously.” McCain backed regime change in Iran, and defended the Bush administration’s decision to go to war in Iraq.

Judis concludes that McCain’s instincts are basically neoconservative. But he includes this caveat: McCain, he says, has proven that he is willing to listen to objective evidence and change his mind. “It is true that little he said to me suggests he will alter his worldview,” Judis acknowledges, “but he has done so before. Perhaps he will again.”

That seems a bit too hopeful to me. Judis seems to want to distinguish between two errors that the neoconservatives have made in Iraq, and argue that though McCain may be susceptible to one, he is much less susceptible to the other. The first error was of ambition, to believe that less progressive corners of the world could be transformed into democracies by the application of military force. This, the article is pretty clear, is a theory that still has a great deal of currency for McCain. But there was a second error in the neoconservative project in Iraq, and that was its simple divorce from reality: The unwillingness of the Bush administration and their neoconservative allies to listen to the military planners who said we were sending too few troops, the State Department officials who said the necessary groundwork hadn’t been laid for a political transition, or to a thousand others. It’s this set of errors that Judis seems to want to suggest that McCain is unlikely to make; he is simply more clued into reality, more willing to listen to advisors, and less stubborn than Bush was.

Well, maybe. But the evidence in the piece cuts stronger the other way, and his insistence that the Iraq war was a worthy project suggest that he is perhaps more stubborn than Judis wants to admit. Not only has McCain consistently backed neoconservative positions over the last decade of his career, but he’s also brought in that movement’s leaders as his closest advisors. And if the best evidence he can muster is the speculation that McCain, having soured on one foreign policy ideology, might sour on a second, then I don’t think I share his confidence McCain will be returning to the realist camp any time soon.

This article appears in the Aug. 23, 2002 issue of Executive Intelligence Review.

On Oct. 15, 1982, President Ronald Reagan signed into law the Depository Institutions Deregulation and Monetary Control Act, otherwise known as "Garn-St Germain," after the principal Congressional sponsors. As a direct result of this disastrous deregulation legislation, within the span of a decade, a small tightly organized network of financial pirates—many with close ties to the Meyer Lansky National Crime Syndicate—would pull off the biggest heist in American history. By the early 1990s, the U.S. savings and loan industry (S&Ls)—once the backbone of the home mortgage industry and the preferred safe depository of household savings—was wiped out. Many of America's oldest industrial corporations were looted and left for dead, through hostile takeovers, engineered by junk bond financing. To untangle the S&L carnage, the Federal government created the Reconstruction Trust Corporation (RTC) and eventually shelled out $200-250 billion in taxpayers' money, to avert an even deeper collapse of the U.S. real estate and banking sectors.

A handful of the crooks—including Ivan Boesky, Michael Milken, and Charles Keating—were imprisoned for their roles in the looting scheme. Briefly, a few members of Congress were spotlighted and slapped on the wrists for their own profiteering and coverup efforts. But the full extent of this criminal looting of America was barely known, and today is largely forgotten. The biggest political beneficiary of the public's amnesia is John McCain. With the exception of Sen. Joseph Lieberman's (D-Conn.) own ties to hedge fund bandit Michael Steinhardt, no American politician is as beholden to organized crime as the senior Senator from Arizona and would-be 2004 "Bull Moose" spoiler candidate for the Presidency.

From 1981—the year before John McCain ran for U.S. Congress—until the early 1990s, the former Navy pilot was totally beholden to junk bond swindler Charles Keating for his political fortunes. When the S&L scandal exploded and Federal prosecutors were breathing down Keating's neck, it was McCain who tried to bully Federal regulators into backing off. While the affair became known as the "Keating Five" scandal, none of the other members of the Senate and House implicated in the ethics violations, were as closely tied to Keating as John McCain.

And Charles Keating was no "loan assassin." He was but one player in a larger organized crime apparatus that ran the $200 billion-plus rip-off, in what may have been the biggest actual RICO (racketeering) scheme ever.

Between 1959 and the late 1980s, Charles Keating was the business partner of Carl Lindner, the Cincinnati, Ohio-based financier who would be one of the central figures in the $200 billion S&L rip-off. In 1959, Lindner and Keating co-founded American Financial Corporation (AFC). Keating served as the mortgage and insurance company's general counsel, and later as vice president.

Between 1974 and 1976, Lindner and Keating engineered a series of stock purchases and mergers with some of the leading figures in the Lansky crime syndicate—who had followed the Bronfman family recipe, and gone from "rags, to rackets, to riches, to respectability."

In 1975, Lindner's AFC allied with Detroit financier Max Fisher, formerly of the murderous Purple Gang; Detroit real estate developer Alfred Taubman (a Fisher associate); and Paul and Seymour Milstein, to grab a 50% controlling interest in the United Fruit Company. Drug Enforcement Administration officials had confirmed to the authors of EIR's bestselling book Dope, Inc.: Britain's Opium War Against America, that United Fruit was a major force in the Latin American cocaine trade—a business that skyrocketed following the Lindner-Fisher, et al. takeover.

The Lindner group's takeover of United Fruit was only made possible by the mysterious death of the company's chairman and largest stockholder, Eli Black, on Feb. 3, 1975. Black fell to his death from the 44th floor of the Pan Am Building in New York City, in what was officially declared a suicide.

At the same time that Lindner, Fisher et. al. were grabbling United Fruit, Lindner's AFC simultaneously allied with a group of other Lansky-linked entities to establish a formidable pool of interlocking companies that would collectively form the core of the junk-bond raiders. By 1977, Lindner owned:

40% of Saul Steinberg's Reliance Insurance Company. Steinberg had gotten his start as a business partner of Britain's Lord Jacob Rothschild and later had extensive dealings with Kenneth Bialkin, the longtime Chairman of the Anti-Defamation League and a top New York City lawyer representing many junk bond pirates and corporate raiders of the 1980s.

40% of Meshulim Riklis' Rapid-American Corp., which at the time, owned Schenley Distilleries, Playtex International, Lerner Shops, and RKO-Stanley Warner Theaters. Riklis was an Israeli immigrant mobster and onetime British Mandate police informant, who had been bankrolled, from the 1950s, by Burton Joseph, a Minneapolis grain merchant and top ADL official. Riklis was so close to Israel's top mafia politician, Ariel Sharon, that he bought Sharon his Negev Desert ranch.

The largest minority share of Laurence and Robert Preston Tisch's Loew's Corp., the theater, hotel and real estate corporation that had also evolved out of the Prohibition-era Lansky move into Hollywood's motion picture industry. Laurence Tisch was later a founder, with Michael Steinhardt, of the secretive "Mega" group of some 50 billionaires, which today supports Ariel Sharon's war drive and the broader Clash of Civilizations.

10% of NVF, the holding company of Victor Posner, who had been the chief accountant for Meyer Lansky and the National Crime Syndicate.

8% of Gulf & Western, the debt-pyramided conglomerate run by Charles Bludhorn, which owned Paramount Pictures, Simon and Schuster Publishers, Esquire magazine and extensive properties in the Dominican Republic.

19% of Charter Oil, the Florida-based company partly owned by Armand Hammer. Charter was at the center of the late 1970s "Billygate" scandal, implicating President Jimmy Carter's brother with Libyan dictator Muammar Qadaffi and Italian Propaganda-2 Freemasonic Lodge gangster Michele Papa. Over the years, this group of companies' ill-gotten money created and funded 70 separate pro-Israel political actions committees—all part of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee money-machine, earmarked to buy members of the U.S. Congress.

As Lindner and Keating were forging their corporate alliances with Steinberg, Tisch, Fisher, Riklis, and Posner, two of the leading Anglo-American financial groups—JP Morgan and the banking and brokerage empire of Baron Edmund de Rothschild—were sealing their own alliance. These top bankers transformed the relatively small investment bank/brokerage house of Drexel Harriman Ripley, during the 1970s, into Drexel Burnham Lambert.

Baron Edmund de Rothschild personified the intersection of the overworld of high finance with the underworld. Between the 1950s and the 1970s, the Geneva-based Rothschild had bankrolled the careers of Purple Gang tough Max Fisher; pyramid swindler Bernie Cornfeld of Investors Overseas Services (IOS) infamy; pioneer drug-money launderer Robert Vesco; and hedge fund pirate George Soros.

The newly built Drexel Burnham dispatched hotshot bond trader Michael Milken to their newly established Beverly Hills, California office.

Then the screws of usury were tightened on the whole economy. In 1979, Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker began driving interest rates up over 20%, gutting America's productive agro-industrial sector, and the stage was set for the looting and carnage. The passage of Garn-St Germain in 1982, after interest rates had soared past the 20% mark, was the final step.

The Securities and Exchange Commission slapped a $1.4 million fine on Charles Keating for his role in his and Lindner's AFC in the late 1970s. Keating then formally left Lindner's employ. The split was in name only. Keating bought AFC subsidiary American Continental Homes, which he later parlayed into American Continental Corp.—with funding from Lindner. In 1979, Keating moved to Arizona. Two years later, he was introduced to John McCain, and he immediately began bankrolling McCain's political career. In this, Keating joined McCain's new father-in-law and other major financial backer, beer distributor Jim Hensley, a pivotal figure within the Kemper Marley-run Southwest crime syndicate. (The political smoke had not yet cleared from the 1976 gangland bombing that had killed investigative reporter Don Bolles, over his probe into the Marley/Hensley ties to the mafia's Emprise company.)

In 1983, Keating bought the Irvine, California-based Lincoln Savings and Loan, which had $2.2 billion in deposits. By 1987, Lincoln's deposits had soared to $4.2 billion—largely through brokered deposits, referred to in the industry as "hot money." These are short-term deposits, placed by large institutions like pension funds and insurance companies, seeking high-yield but secured "parking lots" for their funds. Prior to Garn-St Germain, S&Ls could only hold 5% brokered deposits. In connection with Garn-St Germain, all restrictions were lifted.

Once the Milken scheme was under way, Drexel floated high-risk, high-yield corporate bonds—the cash used by the "monsters" to buy up corporate America, and then asset-strip and sell off the carcasses to meet the payment schedules on the high-interest bearing bonds. S&Ls like Keating's Lincoln, and corporations like the Riklis, Posner, Steinberg, and Tisch enterprises, were both the purchasers and the generators of the Milken-brokered junk. By the time the bottom fell out of this vast Ponzi scheme, Keating alone had palmed off $250 million in now-worthless junk bonds to 20,000 Lincoln customers; thousands of elderly depositors were wiped out.

The total cost of the Lincoln bailout was between $2.2 and 3 billion in taxpayers' money. At least $110,000 of that money had gone directly to the campaign coffers of John McCain, according to FEC records.

Keating and Hensley first put John McCain up for the House of Representatives in 1982.

Charles Keating and his family and employees made 40 donations, including at least 12 of $1,000 each, to the McCain campaign. Keating's American Continental company political action committee had only two beneficiaries in the 1982 campaign—$5,000 to McCain, and $2,500 to Sen. Jake Garn (R-Utay). The Garn-St Germain bill was the license to steal; McCain was to drive the getaway car.

In February 1984, Keating assumed formal ownership of Lincoln Savings, formerly a bank servicing many minority people. In April 1984, Keating attended the "Predators' Ball"—the annual junk-bond gangsters' strategy and celebration session in Los Angeles.

Billions of dollars were now flowing out of and through Lincoln, through Keating, to Lindner and his co-conspirators at Drexel Burnham. Over $134 million also went to Keating's partner, Sir James Goldsmith, notorious corporate blackmailer and backer of the Central American "Contras," alongside Carl Lindner's United Fruit Company. The Keating loot helped Sir James fund his brother Teddy Goldsmith, sponsor of Jacobin "anti-globalization" anarchist demonstrators whose real target is the nation-state.

McCain's second Congressional race in 1984 was a Keating extravaganza. There were at least 32 individual contributions of $1,000 each from Keating family members and employees. Of this, $4,000 came from Brad Boland and his wife; Boland was John McCain's former staff driver, who had been selected by Keating's staff to date and marry Keating's daughter Elaine.

Another nine $1,000 contributions to the McCain campaign came from crooked Atlanta lawyer Lee J. Henkel and his partners and spouses. Henkel would soon go to center stage in a spectacular Keating/McCain attempt to sabotage U.S. government oversight of the S&Ls.

As the Arizona Republic reported (Oct. 8, 1989), "the McCains—sometimes with their daughter and baby sitter—made at least nine trips at Keating's expense from August 1984 to August 1986, aboard either Keating's American Continental Corporation jet or chartered planes and helicopters owned by (Lansky-originated) Resorts International. Three of the trips were for vacations at Keating's luxurious retreat in the Bahamas."

Ed Gray, chairman of the Federal Home Loan Bank Board (FHLBB), appalled at the plundering of the S&Ls, called for re-regulation and the end of brokered deposits.

Gray's attention was first called to the Keating scheme in particular, when Gray saw that Alan Greenspan, then a big-name economist for J.P. Morgan, was being paid by Keating ($30-40,000, in fact) to lobby and lie about how honest and sound Keating was in running Lincoln Savings and Loan; this was two years before Greenspan was appointed Federal Reserve chairman.

Keating now demanded that Gray be fired and/or blocked. He got Representative McCain and three Senators to write to Gray, to delay new rules that would cut off Lincoln's looting.

On Jan. 31, 1985, Gray got the Bank Board to roll back the limit on speculative non-home-mortgage investments by S&Ls to 10% of their assets. Keating responded by falsifying his records to make speculations look like permitted loans. Tension was rising; would McCain's benefactor keep getting away with it?

In 1986, John McCain ran for Senate. At least 45 individual contributions of $1,000 for that campaign appear in Federal records for individuals identified with the Keating organization. Meanwhile, in April 1986, mob-appointed beer distributor Jim Hensley and his daughter Cindy, John McCain's wife, invested $359,100 and became the main owners in a Keating-run shopping center.

In a personal letter to John McCain, July 31, 1986, Charles Keating asked McCain for action against Ed Gray, calling Gray's FHLBB a "mad dog."

Then: double pay dirt! On Nov. 4, 1986, Keating's man, John McCain, was elected to the Senate. Three days later, Lee J. Henkel, Keating's agent and McCain's backer, was appointed by President Reagan to the Federal Home Loan Bank Board, upon the insistence of Keating's politicians. Henkel's purpose was to overpower Gray on the Board. At his first Board meeting, Dec. 18, 1986, Henkel proposed a plan to raise the direct investment (speculation) limit for Lincoln savings bank alone! On the same day, Keating's Arizona firm transferred $3.7 million to Henkel's blind trust. Henkel withdrew $250,000 cash the next day.

But Gray's allies moved ahead with plans to seize Lincoln Savings, and in March 1987, Keating asked his kept politicians for direct political help to stave off the regulators. All accounts of these events show John McCain to be worried stiff over the outcome, and evidently aware that he is acting as a criminal. Keating met with a nervous McCain, they had a stormy scene, and Keating called in his chips. On April 2, 1987, FHLBB Chairman Ed Gray met with the new Senator McCain, and three Democratic Senators, Dennis DeConcini (Ariz.), Alan Cranston (Calif.), and John Glenn (Ohio).

The Arizona Republic later wrote, "The meeting had a clandestine air. Gray came alone. None of the senators brought their aides." Gray was asked to withdraw regulations so as to aid Keating's S&L. He refused. Within a few days, Lee Henkel resigned in disgrace from the FHLBB; his ties to Keating had been leaked to the press.

But a second meeting took place one week after the first. There were McCain and the other three Senators, plus Don Riegle (D-Mich.), and more regulators. According to notes made by William Black, deputy director of the Federal Savings and Loan Insurance Corp., a frantic McCain started this second meeting with the comment: "One of our jobs as elected officials is to help constituents in a proper fashion. ACC [owner of Lincoln S&L] is a big employer and important to the local economy. I wouldn't want any special favors for them.... I don't want any part of our conversation to be improper."

Black told reporters, "McCain was the weirdest. They [the Senators] were all different in their own way. McCain was always Hamlet ... wringing his hands about what to do."

Rather than submit to the political blackmail of elected officials demanding favors for nation-wrecking bandits, the regulators played their trump card, informing McCain and the others that the Justice Department had just been directed to start criminal prosecution against Keating's operation. A shaken McCain left the room, and, it is claimed, never spoke to his moneybags Keating again.

Seized in 1989, Lincoln Savings involved the biggest Federal bank fraud case ever. An Arizona Republic reporter (Sept. 29, 1989) asked McCain about his ties to Keating. McCain replied, "You're a liar.... That's the spouse's involvement, you idiot. You do understand English, don't you?." When reporters probed further on the Hensley-Keating investment tie, McCain retorted, "It's up to you to find that out, kids." And, referring to his days as a prisoner of war, McCain said, "Even the Vietnamese didn't question my ethics."

Charles Keating was sentenced to ten years in prison for fraud, and served five. Lee Henkel was barred from dealing with banks. Lee Fishbein, Keating-Lindner attorney/co-conspirator, Anti-Defamation League official, and heavy contributor to McCain's campaigns, was banned from ever having any dealings with banks or any other financial institution.

But the Senate Ethics Committee, considering the "Keating Five" Senators, gave McCain merely a rebuke for exercising "poor judgment" in trying to bend Federal regulators. McCain went on in the same orbit, minus one of the stars. In each of his later Senate campaigns, 1992 and 1998, McCain received at least $3,000 in contributions from Dope, Inc. godfather Carl Lindner; McCain got into some bad odor around Scottsdale, Arizona, in the late 1990s, for pushing officials to give in to a Lindner land scam.

Today's "McCain the Reformer" is an image crafted by media backers allied to the Tisches, and the old Wall Street-gangster axis.

Crimes and Treason:
Israel's Deliberate Attack on the U.S.S. Liberty (1967)
Script by Victor Thorn

June 8th, 1967 was a clear, sunny day with unlimited visibility. It was such a nice day that as the U.S.S. Liberty floated in international waters 14 miles north of the Sinai Peninsula, sailors were sunbathing on the spy ship’s deck.

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But all wasn’t as tranquil as the sunny day would convey, for June 8th also marked the 4th day of the 6-Day War, which involved Israel, Egypt, Syria and Jordan.

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Monitoring this situation was the U.S.S. Liberty, a World War II freighter that had been converted into a spy vessel by the NSA – the National Security Agency. In fact, the Liberty was the most sophisticated and identifiable intelligence ship in the world at the time with dozens of large antennae, state of the art electronic intercept equipment, moon bounce satellite dishes, massive aerials, plus a TRSSCOM system that sent real-time messages to the Pentagon. The Liberty also flew a large 5x8 foot American flag, was freshly painted with large white numbers and letters on its bow and hull, and contained no offensive weaponry except for four 50 caliber machine guns for defensive purposes.

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These details are important to keep in mind, because at 8:00 am, as the Liberty floated in international waters at less than 5 knots – with a 5x8 foot American flag furling in the wind – a squadron of Israeli jets circled the ship at least a dozen times. These reconnaissance planes flew at such low levels – as close as 200 feet – that the sailors aboard the Liberty actually waved to the Israeli pilots. And, as we will show later in this documentary, those commanding these Israeli jets not only I.D.’d this ship as being of American origin, they also positively I.D.’d it as being the U.S.S. Liberty.

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Despite being fully aware of its status, at 2:00 in the afternoon, three unmarked Israeli Mystere and Mirage III fighter jets pummeled the Liberty with rockets and cannon fire. These bombers initially went after the ship’s antennae and electronics dishes, in the process filling the American flag full of holes. As sailors fled for cover, Liberty crewmen hoisted a new, even larger 7x13 foot flag into the air. But this new, even larger flag didn’t stop the Israeli onslaught as they sprayed the Liberty with napalm – the highly incendiary substance burning the sailor’s flesh.

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While this unprovoked act of war was taking place, radio operators aboard the Liberty tried to signal for help. But their SOS distress messages were not heard because the Israeli’s had deliberately jammed all five of the Liberty’s emergency radio channels – a phenomenon that shows quite clearly that the interfering party was aware of their target beforehand and had previously zeroed in on it, for to jam a stranger’s radio in such a rapid manner is virtually impossible.

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Unable to get help, the U.S.S. Liberty, with eight sailors already dead and 100 wounded, including Commander William McGonagle, was a sitting duck for the Israeli’s who, at 2:24 pm, sent in three torpedo boats loaded with thousands of pounds of explosives. With their target already in flames, the Israeli’s bombed the Liberty with shells, quickly killing 25 more men.

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As firefighters and medical personnel tried to put out fires and save their ship and crew, they were repeatedly machine gunned by Israeli aircraft. By 3:15 pm, after it was apparent that the Israeli’s didn’t want to leave a single man alive, the crew abandoned ship. But as the surviving crewmen fled for their lives, Israeli warships, at close range, sprayed those rafts aboard the ship with gunfire, along with those carrying the wounded that had already been lowered into the water. It was a sickening display of brutality and savage inhumanity – a total lack of regard for human life. The Israeli’s wanted NO survivors.

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When word eventually reached the White House, President Lyndon Baines Johnson assumed that it was the Egyptians attacking our ship, so he immediately dispatched air support which would have reached the Liberty in 40 minutes. But then, when LBJ discovered that it was, in fact, the Israeli’s who were attacking our vessel, he immediately called off the rescue.

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In other words, Phantom jets already en route from the Sixth Fleet were ordered to turn around and return to their point of origin. Try to let the seriousness of this situation sink in for a moment. Navy fighters launched from the aircraft carriers U.S.S. Saratoga and U.S.S. America were recalled by the White House!

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But the blame doesn’t stop there. Defense Secretary Robert McNamara and National Security Advisor Walt Rostow at first ordered instantaneous retaliation, but upon discovering that the attack originated from Israel’s Haifa Base, McNamara called off the exercise. In fact, it was reported later that Robert McNamara was so irate when discovering that Liberty radio men contacted the U.S.S. America that he barked, “Tell the Sixth Fleet to get those aircraft back immediately.” Due to this traitorous behavior, the U.S.S. Liberty had to wait 16 hours after the attacks stopped before they were rescued by our military forces. It is the ONLY instance in American naval history that a rescue mission was aborted while an American ship was under attack.

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In all, the Israeli attack on America’s U.S.S. Liberty – a ship that sat almost motionless in the water with NO offensive weaponry while sailors sunbathed on its deck – lasted for two full hours, equaling the length of Japan’s infamous attack on Pearl Harbor. 821 holes were found in the ship resulting from aircraft rockets, cannon fire, and torpedo blasts, while over 3,000 holes from Israel’s machine gun fire were also counted.

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Far more tragically, the Israeli’s killed 34 Americans that fateful day, wounded 171 more, and instigated the worst U.S. naval losses since World War II. And even though U.S. Secretary of State Dean Rusk and Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Thomas Moorer called this attack deliberate, to this day not one guilty party in Israel or the U.S. has been brought to justice.

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Let us make one thing perfectly clear before we proceed. What occurred on June 8th, 1967 was an unmitigated WAR CRIME perpetrated by the nation of Israel against the United States. To make this event even more appalling, Israel continues to lie about it to this day; and even has the audacity to place the impetus of blame on us. A case in point is Brigadier General Yiftah Spector, who flew a Mirage III fighter jet code named “Kursa” and was the first pilot to reach the U.S.S. Liberty. He said, and these are his exact words, “As far as I know, the mistake was of the U.S.S. Liberty for being there in the first place.”

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But this is only the first of many cowardly lies told by the Israelis to cover their tracks, for now, many years later it has been proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that radio operators in Spain, Lebanon, and Germany heard the Israeli pilots report that they were indeed witnessing an American ship. This revelation was confirmed by U.S. Ambassador Dwight Porter, who had access to radio monitors at the U.S. Embassy in Lebanon.

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The evidence is even more damning when we learn that Israel had been monitoring the Liberty for a full six month before the attack, while a CIA observer at the Tel Aviv U.S. Embassy revealed that Israeli leaders had already decided on June 7th – a day before the attacks – to sink the U.S.S. Liberty if it came into what they considered “the war zone” – i.e. international waters.

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If you find all of this hard to swallow, then consider what Major Seth Mintz, who was in the Tel Aviv war room during the attacks, said. “Every person in that room knew without a doubt that it was an American ship and that it was the U.S.S. Liberty. There were many comments about the markings, about the extra large U.S. flag. There was never any discussion about the ship not being American. But General Dayan ordered the attack anyway. We Israelis were guilty of an outrage.” (Source – Jim Taylor in the American Free Press, August 4, 2003)

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We will get to Moshe Dayan’s role in this sordid affair a little later, but first let’s weigh in with what senior Israeli pilot Evan Toni told Congressman Pete McCloskey. He said that while on air patrol that day, he immediately recognized the U.S.S. Liberty, informed headquarters of its status, and was told to ignore the American flag and attack. When he refused and returned to base, he was arrested on the spot for refusing to follow orders. Another pilot confirmed this report, stating that orders came directly from IDF – the Israeli Defense Force – to attack the Liberty, and when he said that he saw an American flag, they once again told him to “attack it.”

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But the Israeli’s continued to tell lie after lie following the attacks, the first being that there had been only ONE aircraft involved in the attack, and that the Liberty was sailing at high speed. But please remember that the Liberty was floating at only 5 knots and that when it was dragged into port at Valleta, Malta it was filled with 821 rocket and cannon fire holes, plus over 3,000 machine gun blasts.

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The Israeli’s also lied by saying that they mistook the Liberty for an Egyptian ship – the El Quseir. But let’s examine this obviously fabricated tale. First of all, there were no Egyptian naval exercises that day. Secondly, the Liberty was twice the El Quseir’s length, four-times its weight, and had a totally different appearance. Thirdly, Egyptian ships have their numbers painted in black and in Arabic, while U.S. ships paint their letters in white and in the English language. Finally, our life rafts clearly had U.S. Navy written on them. Any member of the Israeli Defense Force would be familiar with such distinctions, and to say otherwise is a bald-faced lie.

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But the evidence doesn’t end there. Unbeknownst to the Israeli’s, on June 8th, 1967 the U.S. Navy had a top-secret EC-121 intelligence aircraft flying overhead the U.S.S. Liberty that recorded the entire affair. When the IDF discovered the whereabouts of this surveillance plane, they gave orders to shoot it from the sky! Think about the completely savage disregard for American lives displayed by the Israeli’s. Luckily the EC-121 evaded the Israeli missiles or we would have had even more casualties that day.

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With all of this information in mind, the most obvious question is: who ordered these attacks on the Liberty? The answer, quite simply, is Israeli Defense Minister General Moshe Dayan, who served under Prime Minister Levi Eshkol. This explosive news has been confirmed by many different sources, including a CIA report which states uncategorically: “Dayan personally ordered the attack on the ship, and that one of his generals adamantly opposed the action, saying, ‘This is pure murder’.” But Moshe Dayan, in addition to being a cold-blooded murderer, was also a liar, for he said that he commanded the Israeli Air Force to cease and desist as soon as they saw U.S. lettering on the Liberty. But the fact of the matter is quite different: they kept firing well beyond that point, and only quit when hearing that American aircraft were on their way to rescue the ship. Moshe Dayan is, ladies and gentlemen, a truly despicable human being, and should go down in the annals of history as a war criminal on par with any Nazi butcher.

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In the aftermath of Israel’s lies and heinous behavior, Senator Barry Goldwater and Adlai Stevenson both called for full investigations, while a secret 1976 Naval Board of Inquiry report concluded that Israel’s attack upon the Liberty had been deliberate. In addition, a recent Independent Commission of Inquiry declared that Israel had committed “an act of war” against the U.S. Captain Ward Boston, in a signed affidavit, even went so far as to say that Lyndon Johnson and Robert McNamara told those heading a Navy inquiry to “conclude that the attack was a case of mistaken identity despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary.”

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Yet to this day, similar to the terrorist attacks on 9-11, no one has been held accountable, no one has stood up to take responsibility, and none of the guilty parties have been brought to justice. Why? What were LBJ and Robert McNamara trying to cover-up?

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By law, Lyndon Johnson knew that he had to order an investigation of this attack. But he was mortally afraid that the public would learn about his orders NOT save the Liberty by calling back aircraft that were already en route to rescue our ship. Johnson’s actions were so unforgivable that he actually uttered at one point, “I don’t care how many Americans are attacked; I will not attack our friend and ally, Israel.” You know the old saying: with friends like that, who needs enemies?

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Anyone who has read Michael Collins Piper’s Final Judgment already knows what a lackey and subservient boot-licker LBJ was to the nation of Israel; while a report in the Spotlight newspaper on November 21, 1977 pointed out that CIA counter-intelligence chief James J. Angleton also helped Israel in orchestrating this attack. In the end, LBJ brought in the ultimate Washington D.C. fixer – and later BCCI bank fraud criminal – Clark Clifford to help smooth over this mess, then pawned-off the investigation to a spineless Navy Admiral named John S. McCain Jr., father of current Arizona senator and one-time presidential candidate John McCain.

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Since the U.S.S. Liberty was attacked by Israel on June 8th, 1967 there have been 13 quote-unquote “official” hearings into this matter, but not once has a surviving Liberty crewman been allowed to testify. Not only that, the first hearing presided over by John McCain Jr. was held in secret, the press was barred from attendance, and every soldier and NSA agent aboard the ship was told they would be court-martialed if they ever testified before any commission. The government’s cover-up was so heavy-handed that military officers even imprisoned certain sailors against their will in psychiatric wards, drugged them, and threatened them with electroshock to keep them from speaking.

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As mentioned earlier, the first U.S.S. Liberty hearings were overseen by Admiral John S. McCain Jr., who was the European Commander-in-Chief of the U.S. Navy, and were subsequently carried out by Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Thomas Moorer. Despite the seriousness of these attacks, Admiral McCain only gave his investigators one week to gather evidence.

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But Admiral McCain’s loathsome behavior didn’t end there, for he is quoted as telling those sailors who went against the official party line, “Shut up; we don’t want to hear that. If you ever tell the truth you’ll be court-martialed and spend the rest of your life in a military prison at Fort Leavenworth.”

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Even more peculiar, it was later discovered that on June 6th, 1967 – two days before the Liberty’s attack – the Joint Chiefs of Staff sent Admiral McCain an urgent message telling him to move the Liberty at least a 100 miles off the Gaza Coast. John McCain Jr. never forwarded this message. Why?

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To implicate himself even further, Admiral McCain’s instructions to Rear Admiral Kidd before the hearings were twofold: limit their damage to the Pentagon, and – get this – protect Israel’s reputation! As an aside, I have to ask one question: whatever happened to bringing the guilty parties to justice? With these ground rules firmly in place, even though Admirals Moorer and Kidd believed with certainty that Israel’s attack on the Liberty was deliberate – and that the Israeli pilots involved, as well as their superiors, knew it was an American ship – they still ruled it a case of mistaken identity.

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Admiral McCain ultimately approved these conclusions even though Captain Merlin Staring, a Navy legal officer, said the 700-page report was flawed, incomplete, and contrary to the evidence. Worse, when Newsweek magazine ran an expose’ on the Liberty, Admiral McCain was enraged; so much so that he placed every surviving crewman under a gag order.

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Years later, Arizona Senator John McCain penned a biography entitled Faith of My Fathers. On the book jacket it said, “John McCain learned about life and honor from his grandfather and father, both four-star admirals in the U.S. Navy. This is a memoir about their lives, their heroism, and the ways that sons are shaped and enriched by their fathers.” Senator McCain, I ask you now, what kind of honor is found in betraying your country? What kind of honor is found in selling-out the lives of those sailors who died aboard the U.S.S. Liberty? And Senator McCain, what kind of heroism is shaped from covering-up this matter for over 35 years? I think the only kind of honor and heroism that you – an influential U.S. Senator - can display right now is by immediately re-opening this investigation and shining the bright light of justice on those guilty parties who acted so reprehensibly and were responsible for this tragic, sickening event.

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At this point, the utmost question on everyone’s mind should be: what were Israel’s motives in attacking the U.S.S. Liberty? We will provide those answers in a moment, but first, please remember that the Israeli leaders at that time only “admitted their mistake” after Lyndon Johnson made a half-hearted threat to cut off their undeniable lifeblood – U.S. financial aid. Only then did they come up with their cock-n-bull story that the attacks were due to “mistaken identity.”

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So, what were Israel’s motives? First and foremost, Israel attacked the U.S.S. Liberty in a blatant Pearl Harbor fashion; then absolutely tried to leave NO SURVIVORS and no trace of responsibility because they wanted to blame it on the Egyptians, thus drawing America into the Six Day War on Israel’s side. By turning U.S. sentiment against the Arab world, we would thus feel justified in invading the Middle East. Such a scenario is pertinent even today, especially in light of the many Israeli ties to the 9-11 terrorist attacks, our perpetual war in the Gulf, and the fact that Israel’s primary objective has been, and always will be, the primacy of the Jewish state.

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Secondly, Israeli Ambassador Avraham Harmon assured President Lyndon Johnson that Israel would not attack Syria during their Six Day War. But the Israeli’s had already amassed troops along the West Bank and the Golan Heights, and were primed for further invasions. But with the U.S.S. Liberty positioned off the Sinai Peninsula, it would be readily able to send back reports that Israel had indeed lied and violated their agreement. Thus, similar to their Pearl Harbor-style attack on the Egyptians (who still had their fighter jets parked on the runway) to begin the Six Day War, the Israeli’s could only engage in a similar attack on Syria after they Pearl Harbored the U.S.S. Liberty and removed it from the picture.

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Lastly, on the very day that the Liberty was sunk, the Israeli Defense Force, specifically Ariel “Bulldozer” Sharon, who was the commander of an armored division, was in the process of slaughtering and executing at least a thousand Egyptian and Palestinian prisoners of war, then burying them beneath the sands of the Sinai Desert. Israeli army officers admitted to this massacre years later – a clear and undeniable example of another war crime committed by the nation of Israel. Tragically, Ariel Sharon’s inhumane behavior hasn’t changed much since then, as can be seen from the way America’s Rachel Corrie was BULLDOZED to death by the Israeli military in 2003.

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In the end, we must ask ourselves: why does the nation of Israel hold such a diabolical, hypnotic sway over the United States? After bombing the U.S.S. Liberty on June 8th, 1967, were the Israeli leaders apologetic for their heinous actions? No. Instead, they called the sailors who tried to reveal the truth anti-Semitic Israel haters.

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Even worse, why is our own government acting in the same way? If ANY other country in the world would have acted in a similar fashion and committed this act of war, we would have retaliated with a vengeance. This can be seen from Lyndon Johnson’s initial reaction when he thought Egyptian forces had attacked the Liberty. He immediately dispatched fighter planes to bomb the hell out of them and rescue our ship. But upon discovering that in fact Israel was the guilty party, he called back our jets and allowed the Liberty to be further pummeled.

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Ladies and gentlemen, this was an indisputable act of treason committed by Lyndon Johnson and Robert McNamara, and the subsequent kangaroo court cover-up hearings conducted by John McCain Jr. were clearly an obstruction of justice to the utmost degree. With that in mind, we need to ask ourselves another question: why is the U.S. government more concerned with covering for the Israelis, especially after they had been caught red-handed bombing the U.S.S. Liberty, than they are in getting justice for the families of those who were brutally killed? Plus, why weren’t the guilty Israeli’s brought to trial and convicted of war crimes? Finally, why hasn’t the Israeli government been publicly told in no uncertain terms to never ever again kill an American citizen?

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Even more sickening is the case of a Wisconsin town that wanted to re-name its public library in honor of the U.S.S. Liberty. But instead of applauding this patriotic effort, pro-Israeli action groups campaigned to label this town anti-Semitic, while the U.S. government demanded that no Navy personnel was allowed to attend the ceremony. What truly despicable behavior.

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Another point we would like to discuss is: after Israel blatantly betrayed America by attacking the Liberty, how much financial aid did we cut off to them? The answer: none. Not a red cent. Also, did you know that even though Israel is the world’s 16th wealthiest nation, and even though it only accounts for one-tenth of one-percent of the world’s total population, they still receive over 1/3 of all U.S. foreign aid? In fact, in 1997 alone, the total amount of U.S. grants and loan guarantees to Israel, plus the interest costs associated with these payments, came to a whopping 8.7 billion dollars! That means we’re giving them nearly $24 million a day – every day. And when we say give, we mean precisely that, for our U.S. Congress has forgiven every single loan ever made to Israel and laid the entire cost of the principal and the interest in the laps of the American taxpayer. Worse, in 2002, a year of great economic peril in the U.S. where millions of our workers were losing jobs and the deficit was soaring through the roof, Israel had the audacity to ask for another $14 billion in annual aid. That comes to us giving them over $38 million a day. Folks, something is seriously wrong with this picture, and we need to start taking action to correct it.

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In our opinion, the first step in regard to the U.S.S. Liberty is to expose the following men for their part in the attack and cover-up: Moshe Dayan, Lyndon Johnson, Robert McNamara, John S. McCain Jr., and Ariel Sharon. These individuals are war criminals, traitors, and are guilty of either betrayal or treason. The pages of history should remember and recount their barbaric behavior.

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The first step in bringing closure to this situation would be for current Arizona Senator John McCain to hold public, full-disclosure hearings to set the record straight instead of sidling up to the Israeli government and covering up these sordid actions. Senator McCain, as an influential U.S. Senator, you have the resources to accomplish this feat, and until you right the numerous wrongs committed against the Liberty on June 8, 1967, we feel you are one-in-the-same as the above-mentioned men.

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To begin this process, we are reminded of some very powerful words spoken by Admiral Thomas Moorer, who said that to get at the truth, Congress must first overcome its fear of the pro-Israeli lobby. We can’t think of any truer words.

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The mission of the Liberty Foundation is to raise donations in order to purchase newspaper space to tell the USS Liberty story. The USS Liberty Veterans Association (LVA) has tried for over 37 years to expose the true story of the deliberate Israeli attack on the USS Liberty to the American people through books, news media, movies, and letters to the President of the United States and congressmen. While we have encountered politicians and news media personnel who were willing to help, they have been unable to interest their superiors or others in supporting our cause. Many people believe it is just too politically risky or politically incorrect to confront the Israeli lobbyists and support groups. Please read on.

The Israelis do not want the truth to be told. It is obvious that they fear that America may be less of a supportive ally if the truth were known. The truth of their deeds and the Johnson Administration needs to be fully investigated. Congress has never officially investigated the attack and so the attack continues to be a cover-up of the worse magnitude. We believe the operational plans were FRONTLET 615 and Operation Cyanide. We have discovered that the USS Liberty was part of these plans. These documents should be declassified immediately and released to the American public for historic analytical purposes. The complicity of the Israelis and the Johnson Administration in starting the Six Day War alarmed the Soviet Union. The United States and the Soviet Union came closer to a nuclear confrontation than any other incident in history including the Cuban Missile crises. When the Soviets discovered that the U.S. was planning to enter the war militarily, they challenged President Johnson with a nuclear confrontation and President Johnson wisely backed down from any further military activities.

Note: Everything written heretofore and the remaining details are accurate and can be proven by corroborated individual witness testimony, logical deduction, and documentation.

On June 8, 1967, the Israeli Defense Forces murdered 34 Americans on the high seas (31 sailors, 2 marines, and a NSA civilian). Out of a total compliment of 294 men, 70% of the crew became casualties as 172 were wounded in addition to the 34 killed.

For 6 hours the morning before the attack, the ship was subjected to intense scrutiny by Israeli photo-reconnaissance aircraft flying as low as 200 feet. The USS Liberty had traditional American markings on her bow (GTR-5) and stern (USS LIBERTY) flying a large American Flag, which stood out in the breeze, and sailing in international waters on a clear and sunny day. The ship was a WWII victory hull cargo ship modified to monitor and record ambient radio transmission and lightly armed with four 50 caliber machine guns.

The Israelis began the attack with 3 fighter jets which strafed, rocketed, and bombed the Liberty. This was followed with 3 torpedo boats that fired 30mm canons and torpedoes. Since the Liberty was a virtually unarmed vessel and not a military threat, at no time did the torpedo boats request the Liberty to surrender as did the North Koreans regarding the USS Pueblo in 1968. Responding to our SOS which was about 15 minutes into the Israeli attack, the USS Saratoga launched conventionally armed fighter aircraft to assist the USS Liberty and the USS America launched nuclear armed jet aircraft to bomb Cairo. Why Cairo? Our SOS did not identify the attacker at the time as the identity of the attacker was unknown. Within minutes after the launch, the White House recalled all aircraft abandoning the USS Liberty subjecting us to an additional 2 hours of an Israeli turkey shoot. In disbelief, RADM Geis, Sixth Fleet Carrier Division Commander, challenged the order (as was his right and responsibility in this situation). Unbelievably, the White House again reaffirmed the order to recall all aircraft despite our plea for help. Israelis destroyed one of the most advanced intelligence ships.

The Liberty was riddled with 821 holes, sustained 2 napalm bombs, and a torpedo blowing a 22 by 39 foot hole in her starboard side killing 25 of the 34 murdered. Miraculously, the Liberty refused to sink and was able to get underway under her own power. The Israelis were observed machine gunning 3 life rafts. It was obvious to the Liberty crew that survivors were not to be taken. When hostilities ceased, helicopters were observed overhead with Israeli commandos at the ready to finish us off. Fortuitously, the Israelis picked up an invalid message that U.S. help was on the way. Israel was reluctantly forced to terminate its ongoing attack. Ironically help did not arrive until 18 hours after the attack when the Liberty was only 15 minutes away from USS Saratoga and USS America fighter jets.

The US Naval official inquiry was deliberately falsified to compliment the Israeli story (as testified by retired Navy Lawyer, Captain Ward Boston). Details acquired were either changed or dropped so that the Israeli version which became public was that the attack was a tragic mistake. The orders to falsify came directly from President Johnson for political reasons. The survivors of the USS Liberty were told never to talk about the incident under penalty of fine and/or imprisonment. Military orders that followed were in line with the White House which was not to indicate on any monuments and the like that Israel was the attacker. The USS Liberty skipper, Captain William McGonagle was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for his actions to keep the ship afloat and operational. His award was given to him not by President Johnson at the White House. There is no other explanation to believe other than the President did not want to jeopardize the Jewish vote in an upcoming presidential election. The Captain’s medal was presented to him by the Secretary of the Navy at a low level Washington Navy Yard ceremony.

What a crime it would be for historical reasons if the US Government continues to lie about details of the Six Day War. In the end, truth always wins out. What a shame for elected officials who will not stand up to be counted. For the sake of our fallen 34 shipmates, we will not give up. God bless America and may God give our officials the grace and courage to do the right thing and initiate a proper Congressional investigation.

After reading this article, if your American spirit is challenged, please write a tax deductible check or money order to the USS Liberty Veterans Association (LVA) so that we can continue to purchase additional newspaper space in other parts of the country. Anyone who donates $100 or more will receive a free BBC film Dead in the Water DVD or VCR tape (your choice). It is the goal of the Liberty Foundation to publish this article in newspapers all over the country. This is the sole purpose of the funds. In addition, you should write to the President of the United States and your congressmen requesting an official investigation. If enough citizens demand to know the truth, the pressure may be too great for our distracters to stop us. Make no mistake, our society will be the winners when the complete truth of the attack on the USS Liberty and the Six Day War (June 67) are fully understood. Please help!

Please mail your donations to:
USS Liberty Veterans Association
4994 Lower Roswell Road, Suite 33
Marietta, GA 30067

Book: Assault on The Liberty; author, James Ennes, Jr.
Book: Operation Cyanide; author, Peter Hounam
Book: Body of Secrets; author, James Bamford
Film: Dead in the Water; BBC Films
Film: History Undercover, Cover Up: Attack on the USS Liberty, The History Channel
Film: Loss of Liberty; Howard Films
Web Site: www.ussliberty.org
Web Site: www.usslibertyinquiry.com
Web Site: www.home.cfl.rr.com/gidusko/liberty
Web Site: www.tdradio.net (archives: Jim Ennes, Ernie Gallo, and crew member
Web Site: www.wingtv.net
List: Over 30 prominent US Officials, Admirals, and authors who believe the attack was deliberate. Among them are: Admiral Thomas Moorer (former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff), Richard Helms (former CIA Director), and Dean Rusk (former Secretary of State). A complete list will be provided upon request to ernie7900@aol.com.

If you have any questions or comments, you can contact us at the above address or by email to ernie7900@aol.com.

Sincerely,