The propaganda we pass off as news around the world - A British government-funded fake TV news service allows mild criticism of the US - all the better to support it By David Miller The Guardian 15 Feb 06 A succession of scandals in the US has revealed widespread government funding of PR agencies to produce "fake news". Actors take the place of journalists and the "news" is broadcast as if it were genuine. The same practice has been adopted in Iraq, where newspapers have been paid to insert copy. These stories have raised the usual eyebrows in the UK about the pitiful quality of US democracy. Things are better here, we imply. We have a prime minister who claimed in 2004 that "the values that drive our actions abroad are the same values of progress and justice that drive us at home". Yet in 2002 the government launched a littleknown television propaganda service that seems to mimic the US government's deceptive approach to fake news. The British Satellite News website says it is "a free television news and features service". It looks like an ordinary news website, though its lack of copyright protection might raise some questions in alert journalists. Broadcasters can put BSN material "directly into daily news programmes". In fact, BSN is provided by World Television, a company that also makes corporate videos and fake news clips for corporations such as GlaxoSmithKline, BP and Nestlé. It also produced Towards Freedom Television on behalf of the UK government. This was a propaganda programme broadcast in Iraq by US army psychological-operations teams from a specially adapted aircraft in 2003/04. World Television produces the fake news, but its efforts are entirely funded by the Foreign Office, which spent £340m on propaganda activities in the UK alone in 2001. A comprehensive post- 9/11 overhaul means that this figure has probably markedly increased since then. According to World Television, by November 2003 BSN "news" was being "used regularly by 14 of the 17 Middle East countries". "Over 400 stations around the world receive BSN stories," it claims. "185 are regular users of the stories, including broadcasters in Russia, Germany, Africa, Malaysia, Indonesia, Japan and Australia." The diet of "news" received by viewers of the service includes an endless pageant of government ministers and other official spokespeople. Recent headlines on Iraq refer to happy news such as "Prime minister in surprise visit to Iraq" (December 22 2005) or "Iraqi ambassador upbeat on elections" (December 14 2005). Often Chatham House provides the venue for policy discussions, as in: "The psychology of terror - experts meet" (December 23 2005). Questioning the occupation is out of the question, but some criticism of US policy is possible. In an extraordinary apologia for the British occupation of Iraq in 1920, the "suggested intro" reads: "This year is not the first time an outside power has sought to construct a modern, democratic, liberal state in Iraq. Britain tried to do the same in the 1920s". The benevolence of the US and the UK is simply assumed: "Today's USled coalition, like the imperial occupiers of 80 years ago, are trying to free Iraq's government and security services from corruption and abuse." But the clumsy strategy of the US is potentially "alienating a large section of the population". So the question arises of what "useful lessons could be drawn" from the British experience. In reality the 1920 occupation led immediately to a popular revolt that was ruthlessly suppressed. A puppet monarchy was imposed, which was neither "modern" nor "democratic" but was, as argued by the historian Mark Curtis, one of the least popular in Middle Eastern history. The BSN strategy seems to be to emphasise Britain's cultural diversity. Bulletins regularly highlight ethnicminority contributions to the UK and interview leading moderate Muslims. But it is possible to hear muted criticism of Israel. One item featured "A leading Israeli academic who has questioned both the wisdom and the effectiveness of the controversial 'separation fence'." A clue to the thinking behind this lies in a 2003 report for the Foreign Policy Centre (FPC) thinktank, coauthored by its then director Mark Leonard. He advised the Foreign Office on its Public Diplomacy Review in 2002 and was later appointed to the resulting Public Diplomacy Strategy Board, which directs Foreign Office propaganda strategy. Leonard wrote in 2002: "If a message will engender distrust simply because it is coming from a foreign government then the government should hide that fact as much as possible." The FPC report suggests the British government should not be afraid of "bloodying the Americans' noses" in its propaganda messages on Israel/Palestine. They must "ensure that the differences between UK and American positions and thinking are emphasised". The point is to tackle the perception that Britain "apishly follows every American lead" so the "usefulness" of "UK support for the US" is increased. This strategy of criticising the US, in order to support it better, conforms to Blair's wider Iraq strategy. It is clear from documents leaked over the past year (such as the Downing Street memo) that the plan was to use the UN as a device for gaining legitimacy for the invasion of Iraq. All this makes a mockery of Blair's claims to progressive values. Indeed it suggests that such claims are themselves cynical propaganda. David Miller is professor of sociology at Strathclyde University www.spinwatch.org Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006 Comment: Duuh! We've been saying all along that this is what is happening. Not only that, the pretended adversarial attitude between google and the US gov is also phoney.

Quick Rise for Purveyors of Propaganda in Iraq By DAVID S. CLOUD NY Times 15 Feb 06 WASHINGTON — Two years ago, Christian Bailey and Paige Craig were living in a half-renovated Washington group house, with a string of failed startup companies behind them. Mr. Bailey, a boyish-looking Briton, and Mr. Craig, a chain-smoking former Marine sergeant, then began winning multimillion-dollar contracts with the United States military to produce propaganda in Iraq. Now their company, Lincoln Group, works out of elegant offices along Pennsylvania Avenue and sponsors polo matches in Virginia horse country. Mr. Bailey recently bought a million-dollar Georgetown row house. Mr. Craig drives a Jaguar and shows up for interviews accompanied by his "director of security," a beefy bodyguard. The company's rise, though, has been built in part by exaggerated claims about its abilities and connections, according to interviews with more than a dozen current and former Lincoln Group employees and associates, and a review of company documents. In collecting government money, Lincoln has followed a blueprint taught to Mr. Bailey by Daniel S. Peña Sr., a retired American businessman who described Mr. Bailey as a protégé. Federal contracts in Washington can supply easy seed capital for a struggling entrepreneur, Mr. Peña says he advised a youthful Mr. Bailey in the mid-1990's when the two men started a short-lived technology company. "I told him, 'When in trouble, go to D.C.,' and the kid listened," Mr. Peña said. Mr. Bailey defends his company's record, saying, "Lincoln Group successfully executes challenging assignments." He added that "teams are created from the best available resources." Lincoln won its contracts after claiming to have partnerships with major media and advertising companies, former government officials with extensive Middle East experience, and ex-military officers with background in intelligence and psychological warfare, the documents show. But some of those companies and individuals say their associations were fleeting. Lincoln has also run into problems delivering on work for the military after its partnerships with more experienced firms fell apart, company documents and interviews indicate. The firm has continued to bid for new business from the Pentagon and has hired two Washington lobbying firms to promote itself on Capitol Hill and with the Bush administration. "They appear very professional on the surface, then you dig a little deeper and you find that they are pretty amateurish," said Jason Santamaria, a former Marine officer whom the company once described as a "strategic adviser." The company's work in Iraq, where Mr. Bailey and Mr. Craig visit from time to time to direct operations, is facing growing scrutiny. The Pentagon's inspector general last month opened an audit of Lincoln Group's contracts there, according to two Defense Department officials. A separate inquiry ordered by Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the top American commander in Iraq, after disclosures late last year that Lincoln Group paid Iraqi publications to run one-sided stories by American soldiers, has been completed but not made public, military officials said. A spokesman for General Casey, Lt. Col. Barry Johnson, declined to comment on Lincoln Group, citing the ongoing investigation. In interviews, Mr. Bailey, 30, and Mr. Craig, 31, said they had succeeded by anticipating the military's need for help communicating with and influencing the Iraqi public, just as the insurgency was building. "We saw that it was very hard for the U.S. to do that work," Mr. Bailey said. "They didn't do media and outreach very well. We had local offices in a tough environment where traditional U.S. contractors would not operate." He disputed suggestions that Lincoln had experienced difficulty delivering on work for the military, saying the firm had "successfully executed" more than 20 contracts from the Defense Department. Lincoln's roster of advisers and other businesses assisting it has continually changed, Mr. Craig said, because "our work in often hostile environments has occasionally proved to be too risky or challenging for some of our partners." Little in Mr. Bailey's background indicated he would end up doing propaganda work in Iraq. Born in Britain as Christian Jozefowicz, he changed his name when he graduated from Oxford University and moved to San Francisco during the late-1990's dot-com boom. There he founded or advised several companies and plunged into the Silicon Valley social scene, according to Mr. Bailey and several friends and former business associates. Among the companies were Express Action, a company that planned to develop an Internet service to calculate duties on overseas purchases, and Motion Power, which intended to invent a shoe that would generate its own electrical power to run portable consumer devices. "You would have been proud had you seen this 23-year-old kid pitching, with no product, no customers, no business plan," Mr. Bailey wrote in a letter to Mr. Peña, describing how he raised $15 million from investors for Express Action. Mr. Bailey later moved to New York and sought investors for an investment fund, according to documents filed with the National Futures Association. In 2003, he moved to Washington. Mr. Craig's path to the capital began when he dropped out of West Point to pursue, he says, his interests in business and national security. Enlisting in the Marines in 1995, he began working in military intelligence. He earned an undergraduate degree in information technology while stationed in Okinawa and Australia through the University of Maryland and a masters in business administration from National University, which runs academic programs on military bases. He left the Marines in 2000. By 2004, Mr. Bailey had moved into Mr. Craig's house near downtown Washington, and the two had formed the company that eventually became Lincoln Group. Their original goal was to make money exploiting Iraq's most obvious surplus — its shattered infrastructure. But those efforts faltered. A project to export scrap metal fell apart after the Iraqi government banned scrap exports in 2004, Mr. Bailey said. A pile of scrap metal, purchased with a loan from an Indonesian bank, has been sitting in Basra ever since, according to two ex-employees. Like several other former Lincoln workers, they asked to remain anonymous because they had signed confidentiality agreements with the company or still dealt with the firm. Lincoln also spent about $50,000 for two portable brick-making machines from Texas. The company had hoped to set up a brick plant near Mosul, where the demand for construction materials was vast, according to a presentation Mr. Bailey made to potential investors in Dubai. The machines, though, were principally designed for homeowners or small contractors. Lincoln would not comment on the project. Eventually, Lincoln began working with the American military, which was spending millions on contractors for a broad range of services. The firm rented a one-story house inside the Green Zone, the heavily fortified government compound in central Baghdad. Furnished with two sofas and a sheet of plywood that served as a desk, the house had a single telephone and an overloaded electrical outlet. Lincoln formed a partnership with The Rendon Group, a Washington company with close ties to the Bush administration, and won a $5 million Pentagon contract to help inform Iraqis about the American-led effort to defeat the insurgency and form a new government. One contract requirement was to get Iraqi publications to run articles written by the military, according to several ex-Lincoln employees. Rendon soon dropped out and Lincoln handled the contract alone. But the company had fewer than two dozen workers and little experience with public relations, according to several ex-employees. Problems arose from the start. In a 2004 briefing to the military, Lincoln conceded that it was "not yet fully staffed" and that "media monitoring software" required by the contract was "not ready." And the government did not provide that much work at first. The military's public affairs office produced only a few articles a day during that period, one Lincoln ex-employee said. A small State Department contract to assist small businesses had just been cancelled, he said, and the firm was having difficulty making its payroll. Lincoln lacked the armored vehicles or security guards employed by more established contractors. When venturing outside the Green Zone, employees would grab weapons and climb into one of two beat-up Proton sedans, which employees were told were chosen to blend in with dilapidated Iraqi vehicles on the streets. After winning a small contract from the Marines to do polling, the company hired Iraqis to go door-to-door in Anbar Province with questionnaires. To protect themselves from possible insurgent reprisals, they were told to say they were working for an Iraqi university, according to a former Lincoln employee. Last August, gunmen came to the home of one of the Iraqi workers, killing him and three others, according to an ex- employee. Mr. Bailey said it was not clear whether the killing was related to the polling, but the company decided to move a Lincoln office staffed by Iraqis in downtown Baghdad to a less noticeable location. Back in the United States, Mr. Bailey and Mr. Craig worked to drum up more business. In late 2004, Mr. Craig traveled to Fort Bragg, N.C., to meet with officers of the 18th Airborne Corps, which was preparing take over management of Lincoln's public affairs contract in Iraq, according to a former employee and company documents. Despite the problems with the existing work, Lincoln said it could assist the military in the more secretive realm of "information operations," according to a transcript of the briefing. Unlike public affairs work, information operations are meant to influence and help defeat foreign adversaries, using deception, if necessary. The briefing also touted the firm's "strategic advisers," including Mr. Santamaria, the former Marine officer, who received a master's degree from the Wharton business school and was co-author of a business book called "The Marine Corps Way." Mr. Santamaria said he reviewed several investment proposals for Lincoln during a two-week association in late 2004. But after becoming "concerned about their methods," he said, "I severed ties with them as quickly as I could." A Lincoln spokesman, William Dixon, said "it was a mistake" to include Mr. Santamaria's name in the December briefing because he was no longer affiliated with the company. Lincoln may simply have been following another principle taught by Mr. Peña. "How do you create an instant track record?" Mr. Peña says he told Mr. Bailey. "You joint-venture with someone who has a track record." Early last summer, military commanders made Lincoln Group the main civilian contractor for carrying out an aggressive propaganda campaign in Anbar Province, known as the Western Mission project. Over the next several months, the military transferred tens of millions of dollars to Lincoln for the project, records show. The company hired dozens of employees, including academics and former military personnel, as well as hundreds of contract workers in Iraq and elsewhere, a number that fluctuates by contract requirements, according to Mr. Dixon, the Lincoln spokesman. With the new duties came substantial new requirements, including producing television and radio ads, buying newspaper ads and placing many more articles in the Iraqi press. The military also approved paying Iraqi editors to run stories, according to ex-Lincoln employees. Lincoln also enlisted the New York advertising executive Jerry Della Femina, chairman of Della Femina Rothschild Jeary & Partners. Mr. Della Femina said he was introduced to Mr. Craig last spring by a Washington lobbyist. Mr. Della Femina said his firm "did a great deal of work" on advertising ideas for Lincoln to present to the military's Special Operations Command, which last summer was soliciting bids for contracts, potentially worth millions, for psychological operations. Lincoln listed Mr. Della Femina as a "creative director" in materials presented last spring at a meeting with Special Operations officers in Tampa. But Mr. Della Femina said his firm pulled out before executing any of the ideas. Three months after ending the collaboration, Mr. Della Femina said, he discovered that Lincoln's Web site listed him as one of its partners. "I was surprised that they had our name on their Web site in the first place," he said. After he asked that his name be removed, Mr. Craig said, "we honored his request within the week." By that time, Lincoln had already been notified by Special Operations Command that it and two other companies had been chosen to compete for work under the contract. Lincoln later told Special Operations Command that one of its principal subcontractors was Omnicom Group Inc. of New York, an advertising and marketing conglomerate. A proposal signed by Mr. Bailey in October said Lincoln "has exploited the extensive experience and expertise of the Omnicom Group." But Pat Sloan, an Omnicom spokeswoman, said she could find no evidence it has ever worked with Lincoln Group. "We're not aware of any relationship with Lincoln Group," she said. She noted that Omnicom had once owned 49 percent of Mr. Della Femina's agency but had sold the stake in early 2005. Michael J. Jeary, president of Mr. Della Femina's agency, said Lincoln's claim of Omnicom as a subcontractor was an "honest mistake" because he had never told the firm Omnicom had sold its minority stake. Although Lincoln Group's work in Iraq is now under scrutiny in two Pentagon investigations, the firm is hunting for more government work. Last month, Mr. Bailey attended a going-away reception at the Virginia condominium of a mid-level government employee on her way to a new job at the American Embassy in Baghdad. Her job: overseeing contracts. Copyright 2006The New York Times Company

Flashback: So, just who is Christian Bailey? By Andrew Buncombe 17 December 2005 UK Independent A 30-year-old Oxford graduate with no public relations experience was the recipient of a $100m (£56m) contract from Donald Rumsfeld's Department of Defence for buying space in Iraqi newspapers to place deliberately one-sided stories written by US "psy-ops" troops, at a time when the chaos of Iraq makes genuine journalism all but impossible and when journalists risk their lives on a daily basis to report the truth. The office building situated at 1420 K Street NW has nothing obvious to commend it other than its prime location. Just a couple of streets from the north-west gates of the White House, it sits in the heart of lobbying land - the K Street corridor that represents one of the most crucial centres of power, influence and money in the United States. This grey building, neighboured to one side by an off-licence and to the other by a travel agent, is home to the Lincoln Group, a previously little-known "business intelligence" company headed by a heretofore little known young Briton, Christian Bailey, an Oxford graduate and consummate net worker. He is at the centre of a mounting storm of controversy surrounding the Bush administration's covert propaganda war in Iraq. It was recently revealed that Bailey's company was the recipient of a $100m (£56m) contract from Donald Rumsfeld's Department of Defence for buying space in Iraqi newspapers to place deliberately one-sided stories written by US "psy-ops" troops, at a time when the chaos of Iraq makes genuine journalism all but impossible and when journalists risk their lives on a daily basis to report the truth. As part of the project - in which the US military hid its involvement - Lincoln Group staff paid Iraqi journalists to write similarly misleading stories about US forces and the Iraqi government that ignored anything negative about the occupation. One headline read: "Iraqis Insist on Living Despite Terrorism." The revelations have created a furore. President Bush is said to be "very troubled" by the news, while on Capitol Hill members of both the Senate and House armed services committees demanded inquiries. The Pentagon said it would launch an immediate investigation. Much is unclear about the Lincoln Group, its youthful executive vice-president and his string of previous companies that have left only the faintest paper trail. Indeed, Christian Bailey may not be his real name: a number of student associates said at some point during his four years that he changed his name from Yusefovich - an unlikely surname for someone called Christian. The Independent has been unable to confirm this. Yet the details known about Bailey and the contract his company won provide a remarkable insight into the way influence and power operate in Washington. Just two years after arriving here, Bailey, 30, who has a penchant for socialising, has apparently developed contacts both within the Republican establishment and the world of private intelligence. Senator John Warner, the Republican chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said of the false news operation: "I remain gravely concerned about the situation." Since the controversy broke Bailey has kept a low-profile and has offered just the fewest public words about his organisation and what it does. (He failed to respond to requests for an interview.) It also appears a number of internet references linking him to the Republicans can no longer be found. Yet it is clear the Lincoln Group and its contract with the Joint Psychological Operations Support Element, part of the Pentagon's Special Operations Command, is inextricably linked with Bailey. He apparently named the company and its various offshoots after Lincoln College, Oxford, from which he graduated in 1997 with an MA in economics and management. Many observers have been surprised Bailey, from Surrey, has been awarded such a sizable contract, give that he appears to have no experience in public relations. Indeed, since he moved to the US in the late 1990s, he has spent much of his time in private finance, working in hedge funds in San Francisco and New York. It appears he has been especially interested in new technology markets. A brief biography presented by the organisers of a conference held earlier this year in Dubai at which Bailey was listed as a speaker, said he had worked in Palo Alto, California, "where he advised portfolio companies and identified, evaluated and developed emerging technology investments". The Briton has always enjoyed a reputation for business. Several Oxford associates said it was rumoured that the popular student kept two computers in his room to monitor the stock markets. Bailey has said he founded and sold two companies while an undergraduate. "He was quite enterprising, I believe," said Graham De'ath, of Winchester, who was in the same year. Kate Smurthwaite, who is now a stand-up comic but shared a flat with Bailey in his third year, told The Independent that the young entrepreneur hired a personal assistant to work for him in his student digs as he ran an operation selling self-help advice on cassettes. He also had a reputation as a hard-working networker. While in New York he became treasurer of the Oxonian Society, a club for graduates of Oxford and other universities, which invites high-profile figures to speak. He was involved in at least one charity fundraising effort with other hedge-funders. Perhaps of more significance, Bailey became the co-chairman of the New York chapter of Lead21, a networking group for young Republicans. At least a dozen of its members have gone on to work for either the Bush administration, Congress or the Governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger. During a Lead21 trip to the Republican National Convention in New York last autumn, Bailey said of his colleagues to one reporter: "These are going to be the big supporters, the big donors, to the Republican Party in five years." According to other members, Bailey was very popular. Auren Hoffman, chair of Lead21 and chairman of the Stonebrick Group, a San Francisco-based consulting firm, said Bailey was a good friend. "Christian is a terrific guy personally. Everyone I know that has ever met him instantly likes him. He is very likeable and charming. Very intelligent. Very interesting." When he moved to Washington, his reputation as a networker continued. He often hosted parties at home and mixed with a set of young, up-and-coming journalists and congressional staffers. He enjoyed a reputation as a good cook, a welcoming host and for making cappuccinos with a machine in his kitchen. He also enjoyed flying: Federal Aviation Administration records show that he is qualified to fly aeroplanes and helicopters. How and when did Bailey make the switch from hedge funds to private intelligence and PR? One clue is provided by the Alternative Investment News newsletter of 1 March 2003, just weeks before the invasion of Iraq. It reported Bailey's hedge fund, Lincoln Asset Management Group, had launched a buyout fund to start buying companies in the defence and security industries. Bailey said he had obtained commitments of $100m from six institutional investors, whom he declined to name. Apparently with an eye to the preparations for war being made in the deserts of northern Kuwait, he added: "[The] timing is extremely good to look at defence companies." Shortly afterwards, a subsidiary called Lincoln Alliance Corp was established, offering what it called "tailored intelligence services [for] government clients faced with critical intelligence challenges". By last autumn Bailey had formed another Lincoln subsidiary, called Iraqex, which seems to have formed a partnership with another American PR firm called Rendon, famous in Washington for having promoted Ahmed Chalabi and his Iraqi National Congress. At some point Bailey also went into business with Paige Craig, 31, a former US Marine who served in Iraq and elsewhere. [Bailey and Craig are flatmates in a fashionable part of Washington, close to U Street. The flat is just yards away from Café Saint- Ex, popular with young professionals.] In September, Iraqex won a $6m Pentagon contract to design and execute "an aggressive advertising and PR campaign that will accurately inform the Iraqi people of the Coalition's goals and gain their support". It appears one project was an attempt to persuade the Iraqi and US public that Iraqi troops played a vital role in last year's effort to clear Fallujah. A strategy document obtained by ABC News revealed the Lincoln Group was seeking to promote the "strength, integrity and reliability of Iraqi forces during the fight for Falujah". In reality, most assessments suggest the small number of Iraqi troops present were minimally involved. But the real breakthrough came this summer when Bailey's company, having again changed its name to the Lincoln Group, secured a $100m contract for information and psychological operations. Part of the contract was for placing "faux" news stories in some of the 200 Iraqi-owned newspapers that now exist. Pentagon officials have said that, while not factually incorrect, these stories only presented one side of the story and would not include anything negative about the occupation. It was reported this week that the $10Om was part of a larger $300m "stealth PR effort" in a number of countries around the world. One PR consultant with experience of the private-intelligence sector, said: "Doctrinally, this is all part of what the military calls information superiority. It is part of the plan for what they call, rather upsettingly, full-spectrum dominance. The truth is that it is just propaganda. And there has always been propaganda in a war. And this is a war, so ... thus runs the thinking." According to reports from former Lincoln employees, their main task was to take news dispatches, called storyboards, which had been written by specially trained psy-ops troops, have them translated into Arabic and then distribute them to the newspapers. They would also deal directly with members of the Iraqi media through something called the Baghdad Press Club, a group of journalists who were paid to write and publish positive stories. Typically, Lincoln paid newspapers between $40 and $2,000 to run the articles as either news or adverts. To help it carry out its work, Bailey and Craig - the latter is apparently responsible for most of the Iraq-based end of the business - have reached out to some of the foremost specialists in security and intelligence. Among "advisers" listed on their website is Andrew Garfield, a former British military-intelligence officer and specialist in psychological warfare who has advised the Ministry of Defence. In an e-mail to The Guardian Garfield confirmed his collaboration with Lincoln but gave no details. Another adviser is Colin Rees Mason, who two years ago received an OBE for his service as a lieutenant-colonel in the Territorial Army, and who for almost 20 years has been a consultant to the Centre for Operational Research and Defence Analysis, a subsidiary of BAE Systems. The Lincoln Group also has Republican links. Among lobbyists registered to represent it are Charles Black, an adviser to Presidents Ronald Reagan and George Bush Sr and Marlin "Buzz" Hefti, who served as a director at the Pentagon. Lincoln Group also lists as a partner the Virginia-based private intelligence group WCV3 Security. Last year that company's executive vice-president took unpaid leave to produce Stolen Honour: Wounds That Never Heal, a film that, at a critical time in the presidential election campaign, condemned the Democrat John Kerry and questioned his version of events in Vietnam. Despite the concern on Capitol Hill about the placing of false stories in foreign media outlets - a practice that dates back to the Cold War - it is unknown what will be the outcome of the Pentagon's investigation. It is also unclear how the controversy has affected the ability of the Lincoln Group or Bailey to fulfil its contract. In a statement the company said: "Lincoln Group has consistently worked with the Iraqi media to promote truthful reporting across Iraq. We counter the lies, intimidation, and pure evil of terror with factual stories that highlight the heroism and sacrifice of the Iraqi people and their struggle for freedom and security."

Flashback: Godalming geek made millions running the Pentagon's propaganda war in Iraq The Times December 24, 2005 By Patrick Foster and Tim Reid in Washington IT WAS astounding enough for Washington’s political elite: last month they discovered that the man at the heart of a scandal over the planting of US propaganda in Iraqi newspapers was a dapper but unknown 30-year-old Oxford graduate who had somehow managed to land a $100 million Pentagon contract. What is even more remarkable however, after an investigation by The Times, is that just ten years ago Christian Bailey, whose US company is under investigation for planting fake news stories in Iraqi newspapers, was a nerdy, socially awkward English school-leaver called Jozefowicz. The transformation of the geeky but ambitious Christian Jozefowicz, who just a few years ago was growing up in a modest terraced house in Godalming, Surrey, to the charming, baby-faced multimillionaire Christian Bailey now rubbing shoulders with some of the most powerful figures in Washington — and who next year will probably face questions on Capitol Hill about his company — is one of the more extraordinary stories to have emerged from the Iraq war. This month it was revealed that Mr Bailey’s US company, the Lincoln Group, was the recipient of a Pentagon contract to help to fight the information war in Iraq. It then emerged that the company was paying Iraqi journalists to plant optimistic news “stories” in Iraqi papers that had been written by the US military. Interference with the press touches a raw nerve in America. The fake stories revelation provoked a furore among Republicans and Democrats. President Bush said he was “very troubled” by it. Donald Rumsfeld, the US Defence Secretary, has promised a Pentagon investigation. Congress plans hearings into the scandal. The journey from the Royal Grammar School, Guildford, which Mr Bailey left in 1994, to the heart of K Street in Washington, the centre of money and influence in the US capital, has been remarkably rapid. Today he has a reputation in Washington for being a socialite with links to influential Republicans. He is a helicopter and aircraft pilot and his home is in a fashionable area. Through a Lincoln Group spokesman, Mr Bailey answered questions from The Times to help to explain how, at just 30, he landed the Pentagon as an important client. He was born Christian Martin Jozefowicz on November 28, 1975, in Kingston upon Thames, to Jerzy and Anne Jozefowicz. His father, a Polish architect, died in April 1998. His mother, who has since reverted to her maiden name of Seifert, was born in West Germany. The family lived in East Molesey, southwest London, before moving to Godalming, Surrey. Mr Bailey’s Royal Grammar School contemporaries recall a business-obsessed, “geeky” individual with few friends. “He was a nerd at school,” one told The Times. Another described him as a “school joke” who told everyone he was going to be a millionaire. He was the first at school to have a mobile phone and was interested in early versions of the personal computer. He founded a Young Enterprise company, Chameleon, which led to his selection as one of the top six Young Enterprise participants in Britain. His school yearbook records Christian Jozefowicz as “Mr Business himself” and that he was elected vice-president of the International Student Forum, a business gathering in the US. In 1994 he won a place at Lincoln College, Oxford, where he read economics and management. He kept computers in his room, thought for monitoring the stock markets. In his third year at Oxford he hired an assistant to help him to run his first proper company, Linck Ltd, which sold self-help tapes. In 1998, he changed his name to Bailey. “Following his father’s death, Bailey assumed the name for family reasons, something which children commonly do,” a Lincoln Group spokesman said. In the late 1990s he moved to San Francisco to try his hand as a dotcom entrepreneur, and then to New York, where he became treasurer of the Oxonion Society, a club for intellectual Anglophiles. He became co-chairman of a networking group for young Republicans. With his Republican contacts growing, Mr Bailey moved to Washington, where he spotted a golden business opportunity: the looming war in Iraq. He formed a partnership with Paige Craig, a former US Marine who served in Iraq. In early 2003, just before the invasion, Mr Bailey formed a Lincoln subsidiary, the Lincoln Alliance Corp, offering “tailored intelligence services [for] government clients faced with intelligence challenges”. He also formed another subsidiary, Iraqex, which won a $6 million Pentagon contract to launch “an aggressive advertising and PR campaign that will accurately inform the Iraqi people of the c oalition’s goals and gain their support”. The big breakthrough came in June this year when the Pentagon awarded the Lincoln Group a contract worth up to $100 million over five years to support the US military’s “joint psychological operations”, known as “psyops”. Lincoln group defended the planting of stories and the company has emphasised that none of them were factually incorrect. “By not speaking through the local media, the coalition would allow a vacuum for rumours and untruths perpetrated by the insurgents’ thuggery and threats,” a spokesman said. LIFE AND WORK November 28, 1975: Born Christian Jozefowicz, Kingston upon Thames 1987-94: Attends the fee-paying Royal Grammar School, Guildford 1993-94: Listed on electoral roll as Christian Jozefowicz-Seifert 1994-97: Obtains a 2:1 in economics and management from Lincoln College, Oxford. While at university, runs Linck Ltd. October 1998: Founds Linck Corporate Finance under the name of Christian Bailey. Fails to declare previous surname or other directorship 1999: Moves to America 2003: Co-founds Lincoln Group, now subject to investigation into planting of US military propaganda in Iraqi newspapers

Flashback: Jack Idema Case: Shredding Propaganda: Mariah Blake/Tin Soldier cao's blog I have read this over numerous times and I just have to laugh at what passes for "journalism" these days. I thought I'd start picking apart the inflammatory lies of "Tin Soldier" by Mariah Blake from Columbia Journalism Review–you know, just for kicks. Again, her piece is going to be in bold type because I’ll be quoting from other articles and sources to punctuate certain points. Let's begin by acknowledging up front that Zalmay Khalilzad was an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Columbia University from 1979-1986, which might explain quite a bit about this piece to begin with. Dr. Zalmay Khalilzad was confirmed on June 16, 2005 and sworn in on June 22, 2005 as U.S. Ambassador to Iraq. Dr. Khalilzad was U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan from 2003 to 2005 and also served as Special Presidential Envoy to Afghanistan. Before becoming Ambassador to Afghanistan, he served at the National Security Council as Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Islamic Outreach and Southwest Asia Initiatives, and prior to that as Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Southwest Asia, Near East, and North African Affairs. He also has been a Special Presidential Envoy and Ambassador at Large for the Free Iraqis. Dr. Khalilzad headed the Bush-Cheney transition team for the Department of Defense and has been a Counselor to Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld. Between 1993 and 1999, Dr. Khalilzad was Director of the Strategy, Doctrine and Force Structure program for RAND's Project Air Force. While with RAND, he founded the Center for Middle Eastern Studies. Between 1991 and 1992, Dr. Khalilzad served as Assistant Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Planning. Then-Secretary of Defense Cheney awarded Dr. Khalilzad the Department of Defense medal for outstanding public service. Dr. Khalilzad also served as a senior political scientist at RAND and an associate professor at the University of California at San Diego in 1989 and 1991. From 1985 to 1989 at the Department of State, Dr. Khalilzad served as Special Advisor to the Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs working policy issues, advising on the Iran-Iraq war and the Soviet war in Afghanistan. From 1979 to 1986, Dr. Khalilzad was an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Columbia University. Dr. Khalilzad received his bachelor's and master's degree from the American University of Beirut, Lebanon. He went on to earn a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. Dr. Khalilzad is the author of more than 200 books, articles, studies, and reports. His work has been translated in many languages including Arabic, Chinese, German, Japanese, and Turkish. Ok, now for some fun. In April, 2004, a former US Special Forces Soldier named Jonathan Keith Idema started shopping a sizzling story to the media. Is that so? So in those few sentences you have set the stage and have pinned him as some sort of of a con man "shopping a sizzling story"… He claimed terrorists in Afghanistan planned to use bomb-laden taxicabs to kill key US and Afghan officials, and that he himself intended to thwart the attack. So he if I'm to swallow what you're saying here, I'm to follow the assumption that Jack had a crystal ball and planned all this out head of time? Where is your proof that he was saying this before the fact or are we to accept what you're saying merely at face value? That's the problem with so much of this, the statements are made but no verfiable facts are offered so we're just supposed to blindly believe and go along with it. Shortly thereafter, he's headed to Afghanistan, where he spent the next two months conducting a series of raids with his team, which he called Task Force Saber 7. By late June, he claimed to have captured the plotters, and started trying to clinch a deal with television networks by offering them "direct access" to one of the terrorists who, he said, had agreed to tell all. hmmm. My recollection of these early events are that Idema was in Afghanistan in 2001, before these events and it was reported by your buddies in the AP. You know, Nahrin Earthquake (where he was depicted as a hero), Anaconda (where he was depicted as a hero), etc. But all that aside, here's the true story in a nutshell: Gulumsaki was nabbed getting off a bus, and was caught red-handed with a letter from his brother at Gitmo in his pocket. The real news is what all of that intelligence led to. And contrary to news reports and blogging frauds, CBS had a representative present who was recording everything in addition to Caraballo. You see, CBS originally had an interest in this story. They were interested in reporting on how Idema's methods were different than those demonstrated by the idiots at Abu Grhaib. In essence, their intention was to report that Abu Ghraib was the exception and not the rule. In exchange for footage and access, Idema wanted a minimum of $250,000 and prominent play. He asked that ABC send Peter Jennings or Cristopher Cuomo to cover the story. Ultimately ABC turned the story down, as did CNN, a CBS spokesperson, Kelli Edwards, says the network "never seriously considered" it, although Idema was regularly e-mailing Dan Rather's office and in June, the network sent two employees to Idema's Kabul headquarters to pick up the sample tape. That's interesting, because Idema didn't talk to anyone but CBS about this. It was Caraballo who had a relationship with ABC and nobody talked with CNN. And to be sure, there is so much more to CBS's involvement in this story! CBS wanted to confirm reports that Idema and his team had captured the brother-in-law of bin Laden's chief of security and the terrorists responsible for the murder of Canadian ISAF Corporal Jamie Brendan Murphy. Corporal Murphy had been murdered in a bombing on Darlaman Road in Kabul on January 27, 2004. Once CBS confirmed this, they saw it as an important story against the war on terror. Idema told CBS that approval for the story would have to be obtained by the Department of Defense before he could discuss his relationship with Bagram or Task Force 180. Idema told CBS that any story should focus on the United Front Military Forces' continued efforts to combat Al Qaeda and why Massoud's UFMF needed continued American supported in their counter terrorist operations. CBS's bureau chief, with the approval of Andrew Hayward and others, were inside Sabre 7's compound during the period when several terrorists were in custody an awaiting transfer to Bagram. CBS's Michael Brandenberg was at the compound on numerous occasions, and even spoke directly with Osama Bin Laden's chief of security's brother in law. CBS said they wanted to show how co-opting a terrorist accomplished more than humiliation by untrained interrogators. Idema allowed CBS to transmit interrogation video back to the US from the CBS Kabul office. Idema, who was paying an Emmy Award-winning cameraman to document his activities, even distributed a sample tape of himself arresting people and interrogating hooded suspects. In one scene he is shown blocking a road and emptying passing vehicles. "Put your fucking hands up or I'll blow your fucking brains out," he screams at a group of men who have shuffled bewilderedly off a bus and are standing with their flimsy tunics whipping in the wind. Jack did not pay Caraballo to be a cameraman in Afghanistan. My sources tell me that Jack did not even want to bring Caraballo, or any journalist, and the Army asked him to bring three different journalists, all of which Jack turned down. Wow, Mariah, pretty dramatic screenplay you're writing there. I wonder why you completely turned around on this. You didn't mention how impressed you were with Idema and how you were talking about how great Idema was after viewing those tapes. Jack dictated a legal contract and within a day or so, there was a response from Columbia Journalism review that it didn't meet with their "objective" hoity-toity "truth telling" standards. HA! And that they would not comply. AND, they contacted Polaris images to get the same photographs licensed for use that Stacy Sullivan had used (if I'm not mistaken) ILLEGALLY in HER hit piece. So someone is trying to cover for Stacy Sullivan's putting her neck out there on this one. The clip where their robes were 'whipping in the wind" (if I'm not mistaken) was the one where Ghulamsaki was caught red-handed with the Red Cross letter from his brother at Gitmo in his pocket as he got off a bus. The only reason that Idema and his men got the guy was because they had excellent intelligence on where he would be and when. Some guys claim they just drive around and see what happens. Idema isn't one of those. These captured terrorists were working with and/or for; Osama bin Laden, al-Qaida, Gulbideen Hekmatyar, Hezb-i-Islami, and the Taliban. Specifically, these terrorists had participated in, supported, and/or personally conducted terrorist bomb attacks against foreign and domestic persons in Afghanistan. A prime target of these terrorists was U.S. military forces at Bagram Airbase north of Kabul in Afghanistan. In fact, the American FBI later confirmed Task Force Saber/7's intelligence reports that several of the terrorists were going to drive fuel trucks into Bagram and explode them into U.S. military barracks in a terrorist bomb attack similar to the bombing of the U.S. Marine Barracks in Beirut in 1983 in which 244 U.S. Marines were killed. Using a rare incendiary explosive to detonate fuel tanks on the gas trucks entering Bagram daily, and taxis, the terrorists expected to kill more than 500 American soldiers, two ministers, and two ambassadors in at least five separate coordinated attacks. These same terrorists had already made at least one attempt on the Defence Minister, and two failed attempts on the 3rd Corps commander, General Attiquallah Lodeen, a close friend and trusted ally of the United States and a candidate for Parliament. Several of the captured terrorists were directly involved in the killing of Canadian Lance Corporal Jamie Murphy on January 27, 2004 in Kabul, the killing and wounding of election and aid workers in Nangahar and other provinces in Afghanistan, the attack of NATO ISAF forces in Kabul, and were currently planning and coordinating the assassinations of several of Karzai's key political opponents in the Jamiat Party, including his Minister of Defense, Minister of Education, several Corps Commanders (former Northern Alliance Generals), and at least two Afghan Ambassadors (in Delhi and London) who supported the U.S. War on Terror. The Minister of Education, Yunis Qanooni, was the lead opponent to Karzai in Afghanistan's new election under the Bonn Agreement, and was a prime target of the terrorists, along with Marshall Fahim, the Minister of Defence, and General Rashid Dostum. All of the terrorists had been arrested by Task Force Saber/7 with either actual explosives, detonators, bomb parts, and/or bomb plans in their possession, as well as documents and correspondence proving their links and association with the Taliban, Hezb-i-Islami, and al-Qaida, including handwritten maps and diagrams of a past bomb attack on General Lodeen, a Shabnama "night letter" calling for a jihad against Americans authored by none other than Mullah Omar himself, and in the case of a terrorist named Ghulamsaki a coded Red Cross letter from his brother (Mohammed Asef), an al-Qaida detainee in Cuba. Additionally, one of the terrorist's taxis tested positive for explosives by German ISAF bomb teams. The physical evidence against the terrorists was irrefutable, conclusive, and backed-up by incriminating videotaped statements, undercover surveillance, informants, and extraordinary physical evidence. Comment: What Cao doesn't seem to be able to grok is that this is the clue to the real reason Jack Idema was cut loose to dangle in the wind, and then "Swiftboated" when he complained about it. It is obvious that the "Al-Quaeda Terrorists" that Jack Idema was capturing were CIA ASSETS! The U.S. did not want their assets captured! They wanted them to continue to attack the U.S. forces, they wanted them to continue to act as "bogeymen" to scare the American people. And most of all, they did not want it discovered that Osama was dead and there was NO connection between him and Iraq. Without this key understanding, poor Cao simply has no explanation for his rant. Yes, he see's what happened, but he doesn't understand what is really going on. It appears that Idema still hadn't sold the taxicab story by July 5, when his situation took a turn for the worse. The Afghan police raided his headquarters and discovered eight prisoners, some of them tethered to chairs in a back room, which was littered with bloody cloth. The men told reporters that they had been starved, beaten, doused with scalding water, and forced to languish for days in their own feces. Give me a break. The red cross reports showed absolutely no evidence of torture except for one guy–some abrasions on his ankle because the flexicuffs were on too tight, and he was struggling to get out of them. No pictures emerged of the "bloody cloth", either. And do you think if there were pictures of actual torture that the media wouldn't have had a field day broadcasting them? As far as I recall, the actual complaint was that he wasn't allowed to take a PISS for 12 hours, and that violated Islamic law. That's a little bit different than languishing "for days in their own feces". All of the other things were later done to Jack and his men at Saderat after they were taken into custody on July 6. Of course, there was one picture that was put up at ABC Australia that showed Jack stitching up the terrorist Sherajan. Someone wrote that what he was doing in that picture was some weird kind of Nazi torture technique of removing brain tissue or some garbage. Actually, people at Bagram said he had fixed up that wound rather well and it was healing nicely. So those reports of Jack "torturing innocent Afghans" is so far off the mark it's breathtaking. Sharajan was also captured in May, long before the events that led up to their arrest on July 6. CBS' Michael Brandenburg was at the compound on numerous occasions, and witnessed the interrogation of Al Qaeda terrorists at the compound. Idema allowed CBS' representative to watch the interrogation of Corporal Murphy's killers, and view each of the terrorists in custody. Brandenburg was also allowed to speak directly with the brother-in-law of Bin Laden's Chief of Security, who was cooperating fully and willingly. CBS employees saw the methods of interrogation, the physical condition of the terrorist, and the conditions of the terrorists' detention, and knew that no torture was occuring. They didn't, of course, admit this after Idema's arrest because that would have indicated they were present and knew how Idema was conducting the questioning of the terrorists. So instead of telling the truth, they withheld information and proof that these men were innocent of the charges, and instead, put out the same lies the others were reporting. Afghan authorities determined that none of the detainees had links to terrorism and set them free. Idema, on the other hand, was arrested, along with two other Americans (the cameraman and a former soldier) and four Afghans, and charged with running an unauthorized prison and torturing inmates. After a cursory trial, he was sentence to serve ten years. (This case is on appeal.) Yes, the taliban kangaroo court allowed the terrorists to go free, and in August, there was a bombing at Bagram. Yeah. No links to terrorism. Ghulumsaki was one of the perpetrators in that bombing. The taliban judge (in the first trial), the former soviet communist interpreter and all the rest–didn't follow any of the rules of law…and later, the two main guys who were touting the story of abuse (Jalili and Mashal) resigned their posts (to save face) and ran off because they were exposed as the Taliban. Judge Sidiq was exposed as the taliban, linked to Hekmatyar (a buddy of Bin Laden's). There was a vast difference in the terrorist interrogations done by Idema and the experienced intelligence agents working with him as compared to the young interrogators at Abu Ghraib and other locations. CBS' Bureau Chief said Heyward wanted to compare Idema's effective interrogation techniques with the poor techniques used at Abu Ghraib. CBS said they wanted to show how co-opting a terrorist accomplished more than humiliation by untrained interrogators. Idema allowed CBS to transmit interrogation video back to the US from the CBS Kabul office. Just a few hours after Michael Brandenburg left for the last time, Idema was arrested by anti-UFMF forces, at the request of Interior Minister Ahmad Ali Jalali (exposed later as Taliban or officially "former" Taliban) of "running a torture chamber", "torturing innocent Afghans", and other illegal conduct. Three other false claims by Jalali were that Idema had "innocent Afghans hung from the ceiling in his basement", that the terrorists were being "abused, tortured and starved" and that Idema and his men were "rounding up innocent Muslims with long beards" (only 3 of 11 had long beards). CBS and other news networks piled on and reported Jalali's false claims and similar false allegations by Jalali's spokesman Lutfullah Mashal. Ahmad Ali Jalali was a former Voice of America radio news translator in Washington, DC. Jalali, a vehemently anti-UFMF (Northern Alliance) Pashtun from the south, is alleged to have had a prior relationship with CBS News and Fox News. CBS News had also worked with Lutfullah Mashal in the past. Mashal was a former translator for journalists during the 2001/2002 war and had close connections with the Taliban. Idema had warned both CBS and FOX about Mashal's Taliban connections in 2001 and 2002, yet they still employed Mashal and worked with him during that time. Interestingly enough, since these events have taken place, Mashal and Jalali "resigned". Don't these so-called journalists realize how transparent their attempts are at this fakery and fraudulent news reporting? Note how several of these pieces have come out where they use the same terms, and the same so-called "sources" and "experts" who have turned out to be complete lying frauds. It's like a handful of journalists are using a handful of lying sources, and writing the same lies to cover for each other while destroying the reputation of someone who's a legend in SF Ops and deserves much better than this. After what he did–I think he deserves at least a medal! And instead, he got imprisonment and torture with FBI agents laughing in the hallway. Something is terribly wrong with this picture. For all its outlandish twists, the saga of the taxicab plot was not extraordinary for Idema, who over the years had fed the press a variety of sensational material that seemed to shed light on the shadowy world of secret soldiers, spies and assassins. This time the story never ran, but Idema had been a key source for numerous questionable stories that did. A self-proclaimed terror-fighter who has served time for fraud, Idema took a willing media by storm, glorifying his own exploits, padding his bank account, and providing dubious information to the American public. Oh that one is rich. Painting Idema with the same brush as assassins and spies really indicates to me that you don't understand the job of a Green Beret, or the work of special forces. Or who we're fighting, or war in general. It didn't seem to me that the AP had any problem with his record before this, when he single-handedly rescued 300 women and children after the earthquake in Nahrin. Take a look at the archived articles here. What this seems to boil down to, Ms. Blake, is media whores talk the line that sells papers. Even if it's a lie. What happened to journalists doing RESEARCH for a piece –and providing factual information? Idema may have made some money over the years, but he has also spent much of his own money–to the point where he's virtually homeless–to fight terrorism and help the people in Afghanistan. But of course telling the truth about the man isn't as juicy as telling lies that portray him as a 'rogue bounty hunter'. I'm not sure about that, really…I'd rather see the real story told…and unfortunately I'm only seeing it because of my own research. What a sad commentary about the media! In January 2002, Idema sold CBS sensational footage, which he called the "VideoX" tapes, that purported to show an Al Qaeda training camp in action. The tapes became the centerpiece of the bombshell 60 Minutes II piece, "Heart of Darkness", reported by Dan Rather and touted as "the most intimate look yet at how the world's deadliest terrorist organizaton trains its recruits." Idema also sold video stills to a number of press outlets, including the Boston Globe. MSNBC, ABC, NBC, the BBC, and others later replayed the tapes. Questions are now emerging about their authenticity, some of which were detailed in a piece by Stacy Sullivan in New York magazine in October. Boy you apologists are really quick to stroke each other off, aren't you? Gotta love that one. There are no "questions about their authenticity" except those in the media, like you, who are trying to perpetrate this fraud on the public. And it would also seem that Stacy Sullivan, up until this point, was hanging out there all alone with that ridiculous piece "Operation Desert Fraud" –so someone at the Columbia Journalism Review had to come in and "rescue" her by printing the identical false accusations, using the same questionable lying fraudulent sources! Here's Peter Bergen's response to those lies. Last October, New York magazine raised the possibility that the Al Qaeda videotapes Idema supplied to 60 Minutes II were faked, a seemingly plausible scenario given Idema's previous fraud conviction. But when I visited the town of Mir Bacha Kot, about a half-hour north of Kabul, Deputy Police Chief Mohammed Araf told me that Arabs had indeed used the town as a military base under the Taliban, and the buildings in Mir Bacha Kot match those on the Idema-supplied tapes. A journalist from a leading U.S. media organization who evaluated the tapes told me he had no doubt they were authentic but passed on them only because Idema was demanding tens of thousands of dollars for them. Now consider that what Bergen is saying about Idema asking tens of thousands of dollars for those tapes is true (I don't believe it for a second.). What do you suppose is the dollar value of the lengths to which he had to go to get that footage? Or the personal sacrifice that he and his family have made in order for him to do this difficult work? Is money any compensation? Probably not. Do you realize that Idema doesn't have very much at all at present, and do you know the reasons why? Idema hasn't asked for a dime from any journalist for those tapes. But even if he had–he's virtually homeless because he's been using his own money to fight this war on terror, and to help the Afghan people. To me, the claim that he's in this for a buck is disingenuous at best. As a matter of fact, it also seems to me as though it's the people on the other side who are trying to make a buck off him while he's in prison and can't defend himself. Idema also served as an expert military commentator on Fox News and was a lead character in Robin Moore's best-selling book "The Hunt for Bin Laden", which was supposed to chronicle the exploits of U.S. Special Forces in Afghanistan. And he fielded hundreds of interviews with major newspapers, television networks, and radio stations, which seem to take his swaggering claims–that he was an active-duty Green Beret in Afghanistan, an undercover spy, an explosives expert, and a key player in the hunt for Osama bin Laden–at face value. He IS all of those things. And for your all of your elitist bluster, you've missed one key point about being a Green Beret. Being a Green Beret is something you earn through your training and courses you've taken. It's an honorary award that President Kennedy began to bestow on SF operatives. IT NEVER GOES AWAY. From Wikipedia: Their official motto is De opresso liber ("To liberate the oppressed"). The Green Beret was originally unauthorized for wear by the U.S. Army. It was legitimized by President John F. Kennedy who encouraged the wearing of the beret by the Special Forces. Preparing for an October 12, 1961 visit to the Special Warfare Center at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, the President sent word to the center's commander, Brigadier General William P. Yarborough, for all Special Forces soldiers to wear the beret as part of the event. The President felt that since they had a special mission, Special Forces should have something to set them apart from the rest. In 1962, he called the Green Beret "a symbol of excellence, a badge of courage, a mark of distinction in the fight for freedom." The Green Beret is an AWARD. All other headgear and uniforms are issued when you are assigned to a unit. Dr.'s are not called former doctors, Rangers are not called former Rangers, nor are SEALs called former SEALs, because these are awards which have specific requirements, such as graduating specific schools. I've never seen any article declaring that Idema is active military–to the contrary; he's a Green Beret, and a specialist in several areas as was described in this post. C'mon, Miss Blake, do your homework. Well actually if you'd done your homework, this piece would have turned out very differently, that is obvious. Idema used the platform the media provided to spread dubious information, much of it with curcial implications for national security and foreign policy. For example, he claimed to have uncovered a plot to assassinate Bill Clinton; that Bin Laden was dead, and that the Taliban was poisoning the food that the United States was air dropping to feed hungry Afghans. (In fact, people were getting sick from eating the dessicant packed with the food.) Oh that's interesting, Miss Blake. The Guardian reported on this in 1998 and is it a coincidence that Jack Idema isn't mentioned in the article??? I don't ever quote the Guardian because it's a socialist rag, but listen to this: Counter-terrorism and intelligence sources say Ramzi Yousef, who was convicted of the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Centre in New York, was due to carry out the killing in Manila. He allegedly told FBI agents escorting him to New York for his bombing trial that he planned to kill Mr Clinton by blowing up his motorcade with a missile or explosives, but gave up because the security was so tight. Yousef, it is reported, did not say Mr Bin Laden was behind the plot. But one of his co-defendants, Walk Khan Amin Shah, once a senior aide to Mr Bin Laden, allegedly said the order had come from the Saudi millionaire, who now lives in Afghanistan. Would those counter terrorism sources be Jack Idema? They don't name their source of that information in the article by name. BTW, the only place I can find the information about Jack claiming the Taliban was poisoning the people is on the websites which are stupid enough to have spread around your bullshit article. Ted Kavanau tells me that the dessicant story is actually quite different than you describe. Actually, if you'd bothered to check, it was document in several places. In Jon Lee Anderson's "The Lion's Grave": His first mission was to provide ground assistance to the air drops of U.S. humanitarian aid rations. He had also conducted an investigation into the rumors circulating among Afghans that the rations were poisoned. "I found out who did it," Jack said, "and it was not Al Qaeda or the Taliban. And there wasn't any poison. The people were eating the desiccant" –the preservative drying agent—"that comes in little packets in each ration pack. It says "Do Not Eat" in English, French, Spanish and Chinese. But not in Farsi or Pashto. They thought it was spices! So there were some severe injuries and several presumed deaths. One guy who died ate the Handi Wipes, the desiccant—everything. These people, I mean they don't even have napkins, how do they know what a Handi Wipe is? I gather he thought it smelled good, so he ate it." Other people had become ill, Jack found, because many of the ration packs had exploded on impact, and the food inside had been exposed and become contaminated. Jack said that he wrote a report that was sent to DOD, and about a week later the problems were sorted out. And in Hunt for Bin Laden. Even though they had six DZs (drop zones) mapped and ready to receive food drops, the Air Force continued to drop the food packs blind, suing what was referred to as "flutter method," an untested procedure where the HDRs were simply dumped out of the back of cargo planes. Idema was not happy with the way food drops were being conducted and started firing off messages to his friends at Fort Benning, Fort Bragg, and the Pentagon. While he waited for a response he started collecting airdropped food packs. Recovering some from the mountains and the desert floor, he paid the Afghans $5 each out of his own pocket so they could purchase rice instead. The Afghans had claims the HDRs were making them ill. Once Idema had a selection of HDR samples from across northeastern Afghanistan, the investigation quickly took an unexpected turn. The packs had desiccant in them, a drying agent and moisture retardant that was packaged in small paper pouches and looked just like Afghan medicine or the spice packets in Russian noodles. Afghans started eating the desiccant. Sick Afghans started eating even more, thinking the U.S. was kindly dropping medicine. Idema's civilian team fired off a report that Afghans were getting sick from desiccant. One village even claimed a man had died. (HDRs were printed in English, French, German and Spanish, nonexistent languages in remote Afghan villages. Eventually the Air Force started dropping cartoon leaflets that explained how to eat the food.) Colin Powell received a copy of the team's email and wanted answers. Natick Labs in Massachusetts initiatially denied the report and told the Pentagon and Powell that there was no desiccant in the HDRs. Washington believed them. The message returned to Idema's team from "higher up" said the team was wrong, their intel was bad, and they were basically out in left field and unreliable. Pissed off, Idema went back to the drawing board. Twenty-four hours later he was emailing digital pictures of desiccant packs via INMARSAT. In the process he discovered something far worse. The HDRs had been packed in Texas, Indiana, and South Carolina at low altitudes. They had been dropped at altitudes far exceeding ten thousand feet. The sealed packs expanded in the air, and then hit the ground at terminal velocity, exploding the sealed food inside and causing slight tears in the other protective plastic wrapper. Exposed to the rugge Aghan terrain and harsh elements, the food inside rapidly spoiled and became contaminated. Digital pictures were transmitted through INMARSAT to Fort Benning's Battle Lab. Idema got word that Donald Rumsfeld had demanded answers from Natick. The following day the team was excstatic, a Natick official admitted the presence of desiccant and the more important contamination problem, stating that government contrators had violated DoD (Department of Defense) product specifications. Yeah, here's a "rogue" warrior criminal guy who a) doesn't care about the Afghan people and b) has no contacts in Washington. Give me a break. Idema never told anyone that the Taliban was poisoning the food that the Americans were dropping into Afghanistan as humanitarian aid to starving people. You could easily speculate that the American government itself started to talk that way–in the beginning when they were denying that desiccants were in the food. Here's an SF Operator comment [thanks, Dan]: I would like to add that ANYONE that doubts your facts can contact ANY member of TIGER 03 (JSOTF Codename for ODA 595- 5th Special Forces Group (ABN), Fort Campbell, KY). If you check the early October 2001 Reports from the DOD, I think you will find that it was the DOD PAO and an ASD who stated at a PRESS CONFERENCE that THEY believed the Taliban was poisoning the airdrops in Northern Afghanistan (I was already in the ISOFAC preparing to deploy when we were briefed on it). During the press conference the DOD was defending dropping food and not bombs on Northern Afghanistan, which was of course the RIGHT thing to do because these people were, and are still, our allies, even if the American State Department has now deserted them and has us working with the new ANA (a joke of a Keystone Cop army). Jack Idema went into Northern Afghanistan with a primary mission to find out who WAS poisoning the food drops and to get more food drops to the Northern Alliance and get the right kind of food landing on actual drop zones instead of USAF "blind drops." This was secretly coordinated by the DAT at both the American and Afghan Embassies in Dushanbe, Tajikistan. Jack Idema found out the real cause of the poisoning and HDR problems. Idema FIXED the problem single handily, through initiative, ingenuity, and pure guts. Make no mistake about it, four of the men on my team currently here in Afghanistan know for absolute fact that Jack Idema's version of the HDR story is true. Kavanau called the Pentagon and they denied these packets were packed in that food. PLUS, there were several reporters who claimed they broke the dessicant story FIRST and were pissed that Idema picked it up as though it were his. That's the only problem here–Idema never said the Taliban was poisoning the food. That's utter BS, but it goes along with the rest of the BS flavor of this piece. I can pick holes in every single paragraph of this thing… I'm going to stop at the piece de resistance…just a few more to go…This next one is priceless… Idema's career as a media personality reached its peak during the final breathless weeks of the run-up to the war in Iraq. Much of the information he provided during that period echoed the Bush administration's hotly contested rationale for the war. He told MSNBC that the link between Iraq and Al Qaeda was "common knowledge" on the ground in Afghanistan, and claimed in an interview with WNYC radio's Leonard Lopate that "Iraq has been involved in supporting Al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations with money, with equipment, with technology, with weapons of mass destruction." He told other wide-eyed journalists that there was ample evidence linking "Iraq, Iran, and Saudi Arabia to Al Qaeda and to the attacks on September 11," and professed to have firsthand knowledge of nuclear weapons being smuggled from Russia to all three members of the "axis of evil"–Iraq, Iran and North Korea. Few in the media questioned Idema's claims, much to the alarm of some who knew him. This is too much, . The "rationale for the war" is not, nor has it ever been "hotly contested". An neither is the Saddam/Iraq/Al Qaeda/Bin Laden Connection. Only where the myth plays dramatically–in the no-account clueless world of the media. Comment: And here, Cao loses the thread that would lead him to the truth again: the Complicity of the U.S. government in the 9-11 attacks and the subsequent use of those events to initiate an illegal war against Iraq. There is no Saddam/Iraq/Al Qaeda/Bin Laden connection. What familiar about all of this is how FDR was demonized in the press for the war with the nazis. At the time, Joe Kennedy tried to talk him out of it; saying that Hitler had it "in the bag". Clare Boothe Luce was the wife of Time Magazine Founder Harry Luce, and she was also a playright. Clare Boothe Luce said that FDR "lied us into war" with the nazis. So this is all eerily familiar. And as usual, the leftists are on the wrong side of history. Because as it's been pointed out before, they've been wrong about every single conflict we've ever been engaged in. Comment: Poor Cao! He cannot see the forest for the trees! He sees what was done to his hero, Jack Idema, but he can't let go of his "I'm an Amurrikan and Amurrika is always good and right" brainwashing. It is, indeed true, that FDR lied America into WW II. Fact is, it was the so-called "Leftists" that the Nazi's were really after. It's no different today with Bush and the Neocons - Fascists vs. the Left, and poor Cao has bought the propaganda. It is also interesting that Cao then goes on to quote from Richard Miniter's book, written to support the Neocon lies, in his arguments agains Mariah Blake, who has also written her flame piece about Jack Idema to support the Neocon lies. Note in Democracynow's inteview how Boykin, a Neocon general, cuts Idema loose when the whole Neocon gang closes ranks against Idema. But Cao apparently can't see that these are all parts of the same elephant. Cao next struggles with this very issue, but is still unable to see the answer. Oh yeah. I forgot. Journalism isn't about reporting facts, it's about spinning the news according to the party line. IN this case, it's about furthering "no wmd", "Bush lied, men died", etc.. So the party line on Idema was to paint him as a "rogue warrior", a backyard "paintball" enthusiast who had fantasies of 007, but who was really a criminal. I think that about sums it up. Comment: Cao conveniently forgets that it was journalists that were "spinning the news according to the party line that there WERE WMDs in Iraq. Now, because there are journalists questioning this, he accuses them of "spinning the news according to the party line" of NO WMDs. It never occurs to him that the truth is not always found by deciding that everything is Black or White. What's more, you can't have it both ways at once. Blake's piece demonizes one of the greatest patriots of our time; Jack Idema. I'm pretty sick of this, and I'd like to see just one large pundit–just one big blogger to pick up this story–because right now, all "news outlets" are pretty sad in my estimation–as perveyors of truth, as far as reporting anything at home or abroad accurately, fairly, or taking the best interests of our national security at heart. "The media saw this outfitted, gregarious, apparently knowing guy, and they didn't check him out," says Ed Artis, chairman and founder of the humanitarian organization Knightsbridge International, who met Idema in Afghanistan in late 2001 and later tried to warn the government and media organizations that Idema was misrepresenting himself. "They ran story after story that furthered the cachet of a self-serving, self-aggrandizing criminal." Whew. Put your boots on, and pull up your pantlegs. Let's take a look at this last paragraph. Who exactly is Ed Artis? Since I've taken up this story, people are coming out of the woodwork who are surprised he hasn't gotten people killed, surprised he hasn't gotten himself killed, and more importantly, are anxious to see the truth be told. Knightsbridge International is a supposed "humanitarian" organization that is supposedly doing good deeds. You can read about Artis' and Laws' exploits at several websites online. They talk about how Knightsbridge is a cross between Mother Teresa and Indiana Jones. If that doesn't make you roll your eyes back into their sockets, Artis' talks about being a Knight of Malta, that sounds impressive, doesn't it? But the fact is- Americans don't have Knights of anything. There are no American knights –except for the Knights of Malta, which you can join if you pay them $5,000. There are some definite similarities that I can see between Knightsbridge and George Galloway's Miriam Appeal. Artis has reportedly taken money people thought they were paying for humanitarian work to hire photojournalists to record his exploits on film. Artis, according to my sources, has a $400,000 or so home in California, which he had quick-claimed deeded to his wife in order to avoid problems with litigation. Miriam Appeal, which was originally put together to supposedly cure a little Iraqi child of leukemia, is still collecting funds, long after the little girl was cured, paying for, in part, Galloway's lavish lifestyle. The Global Coalition to End Human Trafficking NOW has some interesting things going on, not the least of which is an investigation for charity fraud. Curiously, Christine Dolan started up another organization in order to continue defrauding people out of their money, called The International Humanitarian Campaign Against the Exploitation of Children. Dolan's group claims connection with Knightsbridge. In addition to that, Ed Artis has claimed -under oath–that the medals he has worn to formal events (like at an event at West Point, for example)–are fake. During 1994, Artis scammed his way into a war zone and hitched a ride on a C-130, claimed he was "Airborne" so he could get to the capital, broke in and stole documents. He certainly isn't all that he claims to be, and you'd wonder why he'd want to steal documents and what he'd possibly be using them for? Another member of the smear Jack cabal said Artis "has helped more people than you can imagine'. Yeah, I wonder what the definition of "helped" is. Refusing to give the food you've stashed for your flabby self to starving people because all you're really looking for is pictures and movies taken of yourself "rescuing them"? Endangering a man by telling the media about his dangerous (and secret) mission, the times of the flights, etc., in order to brag that "mercs" would meet him at the airport? Supposed "Knights of Malta" who had "vowed" to "help" and would join him at New Orelans, New York, Brusssels, Kanshasa, Goma–who never showed up? But were hungry to get their hands on bloody machetes off the battlefield and sell them at a high price? Reminds me of the stories of him in Afghanistan–buying black turbans and smearing them with chicken blood and dirt, in order to claim he'd taken them off dead Taliban or Al Qaeda and turn around and sell them. What kind of sick minds come up with this stuff? Sure, it's sounds heroic to go to third world countries and provide any manner of relief–set yourself up as a "knight" which appeals to the elitists and opens their pocketbooks. Buy yourself a PHD from a papermill and claim you're a "doctor"–But it's also disgusting when the entire reputation–all the medals, the fake vatican passport, etc., are entirely fraudulent. When he went to Africa, he was taken into a combat zone and promising everyone he ran across, apparently not aware how dangerous things were, that he could get them a vatican passport. And from what I gather they didn't look real–they looked childish. He has (over the years) somehow managed to avoid getting people killed–which is something the people he's dealt with in places like Afghanistan still wonder at. Someone that clueless-that determined to pay for photojournalists to film him handing out blankets–and willing to re-shoot it–much like John Kerry–so he could get the best footage–is who the real man is. A man who gets almost a sexual pleasure out of self-promotion, and has a laundry list of fake exploits he's willing to wave in your face. He is Walter Mitty in the flesh. In just the first little more than a page–there are lies in every single paragraph of this piece! There is something wrong with this picture. Idema's U.S. office is tucked inside a hulking brick warehouse in Fayetteville, North Carolina–home to Fort Bragg, America's largest military base and command center for the U.S. Army Special Operations. There's little to distinguish the building from its industrial surroundings except the dark-tinted windows, and the red "Restricted Access" plaque that clings to the front door. Inside, the cavernous space is cluttered with evidence of Idema's Afghan mission: crumpled boxes of medical supplies, a lime-green presentation board bearing an organizational chart for Al Qaeda, a massive topographical map of Afghanistan. Movie posters of scowling, leather-clad action heroes plaster the surrounding walls, including a particular large one from Men in Black over Idema's desk. It shows two movie stars clutching super-sized guns and reads, "Protecting the Earth from the Scum of the Universe". The decore reflects Idema's decades-long quest to fashion himself an action hero. He joined the army in 1975 and qualified for the Special Forces, but his performance was often lacking. In an evaluation report dated July 7, 1977, Captain John D. Carlson described him as "without a doubt the most unmotivated, unprofessional, immature enlisted man that I have ever known." In reality, John D. Carlson was a 26-year old captain who was an ROTC guy who spent a year or so in the army and got out…where is he now? And where did that "evaluation report" come from? And who really wrote it? There is no such "evluation report". John D. Carlson doesn't exist anymore and what's a certifiable fact is–John D. Carlson was a guy who might have SAID that, but he didn't write it in any report. If he did, I'd sure like to see it, because I'm certain that it was one of those fakeries made up by a certain "Colonel" who's been very good at contacting the media and feeding them fake military documents to discredit Idema. Carlson wasn't even in a position to "evaluate" Idema. In 1978 he transferred to a reserve unit where he served until 1981, when he was relieved of his duties, in part for his irrationality and tendency toward violence. His military records indicate that he never saw combat. Too bad you haven't seen his DD214A. ... Here again, we have a case where just about every line is manufactured by the Smear Jack Cabal or just complete garbage, so I'm going to wrap it up right here. Comment: Now things are getting VERY interesting. As it happens, in response to the mention of Artis above, an anonymous poster added a comment to Cao's blog: This is the best we have ever seen on Artis and his gang including Christine Dolan. But you know the old saying, scratch a conman, find a politician underneath. Seems that Charlie Black of BKSH who has a substantial piece of the $300 million Lincoln Group psyops contract for Iraq was involved with both Artis and Dolan through the questionnable child trafficking organization. In fact Black was the chairman. Mianstream media won't touch this will a ten foot pole though. Federal court docs are at: www.kronzer.org/dolan2.pdf Where have we seen Charles Black before??? It just so happens that we met him while digging around about Simon Gray, owner of Abovetopsecret.com. Seems that Charles Black is a lobbyist for Christian Bailey's outfit, the psyops gang that just got the $100 K contract from the Pentagon. Here's the scoop on Bailey from Laura's Blog: I'm still amused at the idea that "Simon Gray" of AboveTopSecret.com is obviously a Brit "specializing" in American conspiracies . It seems that this is not exactly an isolated case. In recent times the Pentagon's contract with another Brit, for the purposes of spreading disinformation, came to the attention of the mainstream media. Let's look at the strange case of "Christian Bailey.": So, just who is Christian Bailey? A 30-year-old Oxford graduate with no public relations experience was the recipient of a $100m (£56m) contract from Donald Rumsfeld's Department of Defence for buying space in Iraqi newspapers to place deliberately one-sided stories written by US "psy-ops" troops, at a time when the chaos of Iraq makes genuine journalism all but impossible and when journalists risk their lives on a daily basis to report the truth. [LKJ: Deliberately ONE SIDED STORIES? Shades of AboveTopSecret!] The office building situated at 1420 K Street NW has nothing obvious to commend it other than its prime location. Just a couple of streets from the north-west gates of the White House, it sits in the heart of lobbying land - the K Street corridor that represents one of the most crucial centres of power, influence and money in the United States. This grey building, neighboured to one side by an off-licence and to the other by a travel agent, is home to the Lincoln Group, a previously little-known "business intelligence" company headed by a heretofore little known young Briton, Christian Bailey, an Oxford graduate and consummate net worker. He is at the centre of a mounting storm of controversy surrounding the Bush administration's covert propaganda war in Iraq. [LKJ: It will be very useful to have read the links to the "Let'sRoll9-11 discussion board given above to see the connection between AboveTopSecret.com and the covert propaganda war in Iraq. VERY interesting connections those folks found!] It was recently revealed that Bailey's company was the recipient of a $100m (£56m) contract from Donald Rumsfeld's Department of Defence for buying space in Iraqi newspapers to place deliberately one-sided stories written by US "psy-ops" troops, at a time when the chaos of Iraq makes genuine journalism all but impossible and when journalists risk their lives on a daily basis to report the truth. [LKJ: Deliberately ONE SIDED STORIES? Shades of AboveTopSecret! And we notice how vigorously they tried to place those stories on our own site! Does this mean that CatHerder is "psy-ops"?] As part of the project - in which the US military hid its involvement - Lincoln Group staff paid Iraqi journalists to write similarly misleading stories about US forces and the Iraqi government that ignored anything negative about the occupation. One headline read: "Iraqis Insist on Living Despite Terrorism." The revelations have created a furore. President Bush is said to be "very troubled" by the news, while on Capitol Hill members of both the Senate and House armed services committees demanded inquiries. The Pentagon said it would launch an immediate investigation. Much is unclear about the Lincoln Group, its youthful executive vice-president and his string of previous companies that have left only the faintest paper trail. Indeed, Christian Bailey may not be his real name: a number of student associates said at some point during his four years that he changed his name from Yusefovich - an unlikely surname for someone called Christian. [LKJ: Shades of Simon Gray and AboveTopSecret.com!] The Independent has been unable to confirm this. Yet the details known about Bailey and the contract his company won provide a remarkable insight into the way influence and power operate in Washington. Just two years after arriving here, Bailey, 30, who has a penchant for socialising, has apparently developed contacts both within the Republican establishment and the world of private intelligence. [LKJ: Shades of Simon Gray and AboveTopSecret.com!] Senator John Warner, the Republican chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said of the false news operation: "I remain gravely concerned about the situation." Since the controversy broke Bailey has kept a low-profile and has offered just the fewest public words about his organisation and what it does. (He failed to respond to requests for an interview.) It also appears a number of internet references linking him to the Republicans can no longer be found. [LKJ: Shades of Simon Gray and AboveTopSecret.com!] Yet it is clear the Lincoln Group and its contract with the Joint Psychological Operations Support Element, part of the Pentagon's Special Operations Command, is inextricably linked with Bailey. He apparently named the company and its various offshoots after Lincoln College, Oxford, from which he graduated in 1997 with an MA in economics and management. [abovetopsecret.com was registered in 1997] [LKJ: Shades of Simon Gray and AboveTopSecret.com! Registered in 1997... ] Many observers have been surprised Bailey, from Surrey, has been awarded such a sizable contract, give that he appears to have no experience in public relations. Indeed, since he moved to the US in the late 1990s, he has spent much of his time in private finance, working in hedge funds in San Francisco and New York. [LKJ: Shades of Simon Gray and AboveTopSecret.com! See webarchive history of the website.] It appears he has been especially interested in new technology markets. A brief biography presented by the organisers of a conference held earlier this year in Dubai at which Bailey was listed as a speaker, said he had worked in Palo Alto, California, "where he advised portfolio companies and identified, evaluated and developed emerging technology investments". [LKJ: Shades of Simon Gray and his sorta UK and sorta California address...] The Briton has always enjoyed a reputation for business. Several Oxford associates said it was rumoured that the popular student kept two computers in his room to monitor the stock markets. Bailey has said he founded and sold two companies while an undergraduate. "He was quite enterprising, I believe," said Graham De'ath, of Winchester, who was in the same year. [LKJ: Shades of Simon Gray and AboveTopSecret.com and his "make $100s surfing the net scams!] Kate Smurthwaite, who is now a stand-up comic but shared a flat with Bailey in his third year, told The Independent that the young entrepreneur hired a personal assistant to work for him in his student digs as he ran an operation selling self-help advice on cassettes. [Shades of Simon Gray and AboveTopSecret.com and his "make $100s surfing the net scams!] He also had a reputation as a hard-working networker. While in New York he became treasurer of the Oxonian Society, a club for graduates of Oxford and other universities, which invites high-profile figures to speak. He was involved in at least one charity fundraising effort with other hedge-funders. Perhaps of more significance, Bailey became the co-chairman of the New York chapter of Lead21, a networking group for young Republicans. At least a dozen of its members have gone on to work for either the Bush administration, Congress or the Governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger. [LKJ: Shades of Simon Gray and AboveTopSecret.com!] During a Lead21 trip to the Republican National Convention in New York last autumn, Bailey said of his colleagues to one reporter: "These are going to be the big supporters, the big donors, to the Republican Party in five years." According to other members, Bailey was very popular. Auren Hoffman, chair of Lead21 and chairman of the Stonebrick Group, a San Francisco-based consulting firm, said Bailey was a good friend. "Christian is a terrific guy personally. Everyone I know that has ever met him instantly likes him. He is very likeable and charming. Very intelligent. Very interesting." [LKJ: Shades of psychopathy!] When he moved to Washington, his reputation as a networker continued. He often hosted parties at home and mixed with a set of young, up-and-coming journalists and congressional staffers. He enjoyed a reputation as a good cook, a welcoming host and for making cappuccinos with a machine in his kitchen. He also enjoyed flying: Federal Aviation Administration records show that he is qualified to fly aeroplanes and helicopters. [LKJ: Sounding more and more like Simon Gray and AboveTopSecret.com] How and when did Bailey make the switch from hedge funds to private intelligence and PR? One clue is provided by the Alternative Investment News newsletter of 1 March 2003, just weeks before the invasion of Iraq. It reported Bailey's hedge fund, Lincoln Asset Management Group, had launched a buyout fund to start buying companies in the defence and security industries. Bailey said he had obtained commitments of $100m from six institutional investors, whom he declined to name. Apparently with an eye to the preparations for war being made in the deserts of northern Kuwait, he added: "[The] timing is extremely good to look at defence companies." Shortly afterwards, a subsidiary called Lincoln Alliance Corp was established, offering what it called "tailored intelligence services [for] government clients faced with critical intelligence challenges". By last autumn Bailey had formed another Lincoln subsidiary, called Iraqex, which seems to have formed a partnership with another American PR firm called Rendon, famous in Washington for having promoted Ahmed Chalabi and his Iraqi National Congress. [LKJ: DO take a look at the links to the "Let'sRoll9-11 discussion board given above to see the connection between AboveTopSecret.com and the covert propaganda war in Iraq. VERY interesting connections those folks found!] At some point Bailey also went into business with Paige Craig, 31, a former US Marine who served in Iraq and elsewhere. [Bailey and Craig are flatmates in a fashionable part of Washington, close to U Street. The flat is just yards away from Café Saint- Ex, popular with young professionals.] [LKJ: Hmmm.... wonder if Paige Craig and CatHerder are one and the same???] In September, Iraqex won a $6m Pentagon contract to design and execute "an aggressive advertising and PR campaign that will accurately inform the Iraqi people of the Coalition's goals and gain their support". It appears one project was an attempt to persuade the Iraqi and US public that Iraqi troops played a vital role in last year's effort to clear Fallujah. A strategy document obtained by ABC News revealed the Lincoln Group was seeking to promote the "strength, integrity and reliability of Iraqi forces during the fight for Falujah". In reality, most assessments suggest the small number of Iraqi troops present were minimally involved.v But the real breakthrough came this summer when Bailey's company, having again changed its name to the Lincoln Group, secured a $100m contract for information and psychological operations. Part of the contract was for placing "faux" news stories in some of the 200 Iraqi-owned newspapers that now exist. [LKJ: Sounding more and more like AboveTopSecret.com all the time!] Pentagon officials have said that, while not factually incorrect, these stories only presented one side of the story and would not include anything negative about the occupation. It was reported this week that the $10Om was part of a larger $300m "stealth PR effort" in a number of countries around the world. Comment: Do read the entire piece above which includes extensive SOtT commentary and supplemental information that is explosive!

Flashback: COINTELPRO Updates: Above Top Secret Forum Laura Knight-Jadczyk 07 January 2006 One thing that is abundantly clear is that AboveTopSecret.com is COINTELPRO, pure and simple. Perhaps many of the members and even moderators are unaware of this, and are sincere seekers of truth. It is for such individuals, unaware and unused to the wiles of the pathocracy that the previous posts have been written. In conclusion, even though much of what I have conjectured is unprovable, and we note that the Guardian article comments on the "lack of paper trail" left by Bailey, the few data bits I have found, along with the timeline and "knowing the nature of the beast," I reckon I'll put my money on Christian Bailey and his gang being the "Simon Gray" behind "AboveTopSecret.com". Things have been pretty interesting around here in the past week. Seems that Joe Quinn's critique of the Above Top Secret forum posting about the 757 that did NOT hit the Pentagon has hit a nerve. The first indication that we had that something was up was the fact that the Signs of The Times site statistics had a bit of a surge. Now we keep a pretty good eye on our site statistics because we like to know what subjects really interest our readers. So when there is a surge, we know we are doing our job. This is most particularly true with the publication of the Pentagon Strike video: obviously, so many people "resonated" to the facts presented in this video that the current number of viewers is approacing 600 million. Yes, that's right: 600 MILLION. It will soon be one of the most widely disseminated items ever to be published on the internet. For the "Powers That Be," that's a problem. The result of this statistical analysis is the fact that we KNOW that hundreds of millions of people do NOT believe that a 757 hit the Pentagon. They would not be avidly sharing the Pentagon Strike video with their family, friends, acquaintances, to the extent that they have done so if they were not trying to use it as a way of communicating something that is difficult to put into words, not to mention dangerous considering the Fascist takeover of America by Bush and the Neocons. Enter: Above Top Secret Forum. Well, actually, we hadn't really paid too much attention to the ATS forum until it became almost a daily event for someone to send us, or post to our modest discussion forum, the link to this ATS post by "CatHerder." (Gee, even the name of the poster gives a COINTELPRO impression; imagine someone trying to herd cats?! That's probably how the PTB view people - a bunch of disorderly cats that need to be herded in a particular direction.) We didn't know that the ATS forum moderators had made thinly veiled negative references to our own work in their manipulative posts as we show in the Frozen Fish analysis. We ambled over to ATS to read the article and recognized it immediately for what it was: a slick, manipulative piece of journalism designed to take in individuals who are easily bamboozled. After the first time or two that the link was posted to our forum, then people began to try to post the entire article. We rejected it a dozen times or more simply because it was what it was: disinformation. The fact is, we are in the news publishing business because we intend it as a teaching tool, and we try to check material for validity and to weed out as many lies as possible so our readers don't have to waste a lot of their valuable time reading garbage. Unlike sites such as Rense.com and others, which publish just about anything indiscriminately, we DO try to publish responsibly. If we utilize mainstream articles that we suspect are "agenda slanted," we try to add comments pointing out the obvious, or at least publish such an article juxtaposed against another that makes clear the agenda. We also use flashbacks to remind readers that a current article may be saying something exactly the opposite of what was said a few weeks, months, or even years ago. In short, our idea is to help readers learn to think, to spot the deceptions, and to develop or refine their own internal BS meters. At the same time, as noted, we DO keep a close eye on our statistics so that we know what items interest the greatest number of people which then prompts us to do more research on those items so as to bring to our readers more material that will satisfy that desire for information. As I said, we hadn't really paid a lot of attention to the ATS people up to the point in time when a cadre of what we think of as COINTELPRO "floaters" repeatedly tried to force us to publish the ATS CatHerder piece on our own website. Based on our assessment of the piece, it would have been the same thing as publishing - and giving credibility to - disinformation. We simply weren't going to do it - without commentary as we do when we publish any piece that we consider to be "agenda directed." The problem was, it was such a long and slippery piece that it needed quite a bit of writing just to deal with the nonsense presented as "logic." We didn't have the time or the inclination. Yet, over time, the questions from sincere readers kept coming in and made us aware that the ATS article was obviously an item that our readers wanted us to address. In the end, that was exactly what we did: we published it with commentary. I rather think that if we had published it as a regular news piece on the Signs of The Times daily pages with NO comment, what happened next would not have happened. But first, let me mention that we did get a lot of positive feedback on the article from readers, including several entries to our discussion forum, one of which really made us laugh: I want a bumper sticker and a t-shirt that reads.... "Evidence That a Frozen Fish Didn't Impact the Pentagon on 9/11 and Neither Did a Boeing 757" We just may see what we can do about that! I expect that such an item would sell in the millions based on the popularity of the Pentagon Strike video dissemination stats! Now, off to the side, I was, at that moment in time, coincidentally, involved in a discussion with a couple of well-known Anti-war activists about my previous blog post: How to Spot COINTELPRO Agents . I had written to these people in a private email on Jan 3rd: I have been thinking about a lot of things over the past few days and decided to make an experimental post to my blog. It was an interesting exercise because re-reading and re-thinking always leads to new understanding. One of the things that stood out for me in the section about Rick Ross and his "cult awareness network" was this from the Cletus Nelson piece I included (published on The Lew Rockwell site): "Evidence suggests that these unsubstantiated claims which continue to shade our perception of the events at Mt. Carmel can be attributed to a small cadre of para-political "watchdog" groups. "... in the lucrative realm of public policy activism lurk a number of pro- government advocacy groups whose very existence rests upon the notion that cult activities, political extremism or some other unnamed evil constitutes a dangerous threat to state power. "In order to identify the alleged thought criminals in our midst, operatives aligned with these private surveillance networks infiltrate unconventional spiritual or religious movements, maintain files on American citizens, and work closely with both media and law enforcement to target individuals and organizations whose beliefs run counter to establishmentarian beliefs. "In essence, these ersatz defenders of human rights act as de facto spokesmen for our emergent surveillance society. It’s COINTELPRO redux, only this time with help from a network of dubious, yet-well compensated agents." Even though I already *knew* that it was so at some level, I hadn't really given much conscious thought to the fact that so-called "watchdog groups" that rant "cult, cult, cult" [or a Boeing 757 hit the Pentagon] are evidently aligned with the National Security State as this article suggests. In short, any group or individual who goes around with the kinds of rants that Weidner, Bridges (and his buddy Storm Bear Williams and gang)do, are clearly "operatives" that work closely with media and law enforcement to target individuals and organizations whose beliefs run counter to the state sanctioned Mind Control System. We have to learn how to sort the true from the false. Nobody was greener than I was back in summer 2001 when it all began... and if it hadn't been for the C's, I would already be toast. But I learned a lot while skirting the edges of disaster and one of the things that has stood me in good stead is a little hint from Gurdjieff: "A decent man will behave decently even if he thinks that he has been treated unjustly or wrongly. But many people in such circumstances show a side of their nature which otherwise they would never show. And at times it is a necessary means for exposing a man's nature. So long as you are good to a man he is good to you. But what will he be like if you scratch him a little?" When dealing with COINTELPRO, you don't even have to treat someone unjustly or wrongly, generally just disagreeing with them will do. Or doing something they don't want you to do. Just small "scratches" usually sort people out. The very next thing that happened - within hours of writing the above - was that we received an email from Above Top Secret as follows: Mark - mark@abovetopsecret.com From : USA wrote : I am disgusted by your accusation that AboveTopSecret.com, LLP is a "Government funded damage control outlet" I ask that you retract that lie. My partners and I have spent the last several years building that site and have NEVER received a nickel from ANY government, never been asked to do ANYTHING for or by ANY government and NEVER WILL. The fact we attract logical members who present THIER analysis and ask that other members treat them with COURTEOUSNESS and keep the discussion at an ADULT level sans flames and rediculous off topic commentary does NOT make us anything more or less than what we are. The number ONE destination on the internet to FREELY Deny Ignorance. It is truly SAD that when a site allows ALL sides of an issue to be heard people like YOU who believe hook line and sinker there is a conspiracy where there may or may not be one, feel the need to falsely accuse us of being crooked. It makes me SICK and SAD for you. You obviously haven't read the THOUSANDS of posts that actually SUPPORT your perspective on our site, no that would be too much work wouldn't it? Much easier to cast a negative light upon our site in the hopes of getting yourself some attention isn't it? Thoroughly disappointed in and DISGUSTED with YOU. Springer... Partner, AboveTopSecret.com, LLP I forwarded the email to the group of Anti-war activists I was discussing COINTELPRO with along with the following comments: ...here is a perfect example of the principle I mentioned last night: how a person behaves when you "scratch" him a little. "A decent man will behave decently even if he thinks that he has been treated unjustly or wrongly. But many people in such circumstances show a side of their nature which otherwise they would never show. And at times it is a necessary means for exposing a man's nature. So long as you are good to a man he is good to you. But what will he be like if you scratch him a little?" Yes, we have read the posts that supported the conspiracy view of 9/11 on their site, but we also read their own posts where they worked very hard to make those who supported the insider complicity argument feel stupid. This [email from AboveTopSecret reveals the same kind of outrage that comes from people like Vinnie and Jay and the gang... they are "outraged" and "sick and sad" for us and so on and so forth. Smoke and mirrors. And of course, we are "invited" to feel guilty by accusing us of us "casting a negative light" in order to "get attention." What "Mark" is most exercised about seems to be the suggestion that Above Top Secret is a "government funded damage control outlet." Methinks he protests too much. Now, what would have happened if he had written to me and said: "Hey, I read your piece and even though we disagree on the subject, I would like to object to being labeled a disinfo source. I set up the site for the same reasons you have your site: to find the truth. I just don't see any evidence of what you are saying... " etc etc... But, since he is not there to argue the evidence, but rather to promote the lies, he can't do that. And people like that only know one way to function: to seek to destroy the other views by ridicule, shaming, playing guilt cards, aggressive insults, etc. Even if they try to mask their behavior by platitudes about being adult and courteous, they belie it by their own words. In other words, they know the words, but not the music. They are blind to their own lack of courtesy to the truth. Or, they are disinfo... My money is on the latter. Ark responded to Mark/Springer of AboveTopSecret as follows: To: mark@abovetopsecret.com Date sent: Wed, 04 Jan 2006 08:10:18 +0100 Subject: Re: Your false accusation On 4 Jan 2006 at 0:08, mark@abovetopsecret.com wrote: > You obviously haven't read the THOUSANDS of posts that actually SUPPORT your > perspective on our site, no that would be too much work wouldn't it? > > Much easier to cast a negative light upon our site in the hopes of getting > yourself some attention isn't it? > > Thoroughly disappointed in and DISGUSTED with YOU. Well, if you are welcoming posts supporting our perspective, than you should be also happy (rather than disapointed and disgusted) that there is another view supporting our perspective - namely OUR view. Regards, ark ################################################## Dr Arkadiusz Jadczyk http://quantumfuture.net/quantum_future/homepage.htm Somebody must have been reading our minds, or at least, they saw the glitch and hurried to smooth it over. The next day, an email came from another AboveTopSecret "partner" - to Ark's private email address rather than the site address. Obviously, he got this from Mark/Springer, above. To: Arkadiusz Jadczyk Subject: Your 9/11 article on your website... Send reply to: From: "SkepticOverlord" Date sent: Thu, 5 Jan 2006 07:56:16 -0600 Greetings... It has come to our attention that your article here: http://www.sott.net/signs/Above_Top_Secret_article.htm Is in violation of our clearly stated Creative Commons Deed, linked here: http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/cc.php?tid=79655&pid=816414 You have developed a derivative work (your content, integrated with our content) for commercial purposes (to promote the sale of a book.) This is in clear violation of our stated license. The concept of "fair use" does not apply in this case since your current utilization of our material is in clear violation of our stated use rights. However, in the interest of balanced debate on this subject, we do not necessarily desire the material to be removed from your site. We would be happy to see it to remain if you would kindly make the following changes: 1) Comply with the "BY:" attribute of our Creative Commons Deed (proper link and attribution). 2) Alter the HTML file name so that it does not contain our site name. 3) Alter the images directory so that it does not contain our site name. 4) Remove the text link at the bottom that promotes the sale of a book in context with your article (the banner link at the left for the same book can certainly remain since it is not in context with the text of your article). Thank you in advance for your consideration and cooperation. Bill, aka "SkepticOverlord" Community and Technology Director Partner in AboveTopSecret.com, LLP Since there was already clear identification of the author and source of the article in the first paragraph of our article, including an ACTIVE LINK to same, it seemed to us that the primary issue that AboveTopSecret had with us was the naming of the file and images folder on our website. Anyone familiar with our website knows that there are thousands of files, most of which are named after the subject matter they contain, which is the easiest way for us (or anyone) to keep track of them. If we want to find a file and make a correction, addition, or whatever, that's how we find it in the list. Now why, we asked ourselves, would AboveTopSecret be concerned about the name of the file and the name of the images folder on our website? There was only one obvious answer: they were concerned about search engines, that a search engine would display a link to our damning analysis of their Pro-government agenda among the returns given to anyone searching for "Above Top Secret." In short, they wanted to "own" the phrase and to monopolize the views of readers. Not a very good example of their claimed desire to present "all sides of a question," now is it? So, Ark replied: To: skepticoverlord Subject: Re: Your 9/11 Article Date sent: Thu, 05 Jan 2006 18:14:36 +0100 On 5 Jan 2006 at 14:16, skepticoverlord@abovetopsecret.com wrote: > It has come to our attention that your article here: > http://www.sott.net/signs/Above_Top_Secret_article.htm > > Is in violation of our clearly stated Creative Commons Deed, linked here: > > http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/cc.php?tid=79655&pid=816414 > Hi, Sorry to say, but what you say does not make any sense whatsoever. Can you explain? Do you mean that it is your policy to be a governement agency? Or what? Regards, ark Skeptic Overlord was fast on the draw. He responded: From: "SkepticOverlord" Copies to: simon.gray@.... Date sent: Thu, 5 Jan 2006 11:54:17 -0600 For now I'll ignore the insult and try to remain cordial. From our vantage point, the manner in which you presented the content of your article here: http://www.sott.net/signs/Above_Top_Secret_article.htm Appears to be designed to capitalize on our content both for commercial purposes (the selling of a book) and user confusion (file and directory names "above_top_secret"). For now, we're hoping to assume that non-compliance with our Creative Commons License (http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/cc.php?tid=79655&pid=816414 ) is accidental. And that no malicious intent is behind using our unique site name in the naming conventions of your content. (More information on creative commons here: http://creativecommons.org/ ) The non-compliance is related to two issues: 1) Your author, Joe Quinn, and has developed a derivative work based on our material. This is not allowed under the terms of the linked CC deed. 2) Our content is used in conjunction with solicitation for the sale of a book titled, "9/11: The Ultimate Truth". This is also a violation of the terms in our linked CC deed. The CC deed link is provided at the bottom of every piece of content on our site, and clearly provides information on how our material can be reused. In addition, including our site name as a part of the naming system for the HTML file and subdirectories is indicative of potential malicious intent to confuse web surfers and search engines. We hope this is accidental. We believe our request for changes to be in the spirit of collaborative debate on these important issues. Rather than insist our content be removed (which is within our rights under the clearly stated usage guidelines), we're asking for the following: 1) Comply with the "BY:" attribute of our Creative Commons Deed (proper link and attribution). 2) Alter the HTML file name so that it does not contain our site name. 3) Alter the images directory so that it does not contain our site name. 4)Remove the text link at the bottom that promotes the sale of a book in context with your article (the banner link at the left for the same book can certainly remain since it is not in context with the text of your article). Thank you. "SkepticOverlord" Community and Technology Director Partner in AboveTopSecret.com, LLP So, we were right: there it was, explicitly stated: "including our site name as a part of the naming system for the HTML file and subdirectories is indicative of potential malicious intent to confuse web surfers and search engines. We hope this is accidental." The rest was just nonsense. They apparently do NOT wish for any alternative view of what they are promoting to be available. Control of search engine results is solely what they are after. That suggests some serious COINTELPRO thinking has gone into the website AboveTopSecret, especially in terms of vectoring websearches and seekers of information. Ark was curious about these two approaches, the "good cop, bad cop" routine. So, he wrote back to "Skeptic Overlord," (geez, that "handle" is sure suggestive too!) Notice also that a CC of the above email has been sent to a "Simon Gray." Hmmmm.... Who is Simon Gray? We'll get to that soon enough... From: Arkadiusz Jadczyk To: Subject: Re: Your 9/11 Article Date sent: Thu, 05 Jan 2006 19:20:21 +0100 > For now I'll ignore the insult and try to remain cordial. Hi, Does that mean that you do not agree with the Mark (mark@abovetopsecret.com ) who wrote to us: "Much easier to cast a negative light upon our site in the hopes of getting yourself some attention isn't it? Thoroughly disappointed in and DISGUSTED with YOU." I undestand from his letter that he (or you?) was not happy with our criticism, but he did not provide any argument why our tentative conclusion was incorrect. Now you seem to provide arguments that our tentative conclusion was correct, right? So, if I am correct, in a sense you are arguing with mark@abovetopsecret.com. Can't you guys solve these problems within your institution? Regards, ark Skeptic Overlord replied: From: "SkepticOverlord" Copies to: simon.gray@... Date sent: Thu, 5 Jan 2006 12:41:10 -0600 I'm not aware of what Mark had sent you. However, is has no bearing on the reality that your article violates our published usage rights. In my position as Community Director, I have no desire to debate which point of view is more valid or not, only to resolve the issues I've outlined in both of my emails. Pleased indicate your intent specific to the concerns I've communicated. Thank you. Ark forwarded the comments of Mark/Springer to Skeptic Overlord who then responded: From: "Arkadiusz Jadczyk" To: "SkepticOverlord" Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2006 06:01 PM Subject: Your 9/11 Article > I'm not aware of what Mark had sent you. OK, Here it is: [Mark/Springer's email snipped] And here is what I wrote back to him: "Well, if you are welcoming posts supporting our perspective, than you should be also happy (rather than disapointed and disgusted) that there is another view supporting our perspective - namely OUR view." I still keep the same attitude. Only through an open discussion and analyzing all the available data there is any hope of ever getting to the truth. Kind regards, ark One thing that was becoming abundantly clear was that AboveTopSecret.com was NOT the least bit interested in really searching for the truth of anything. So far, their only issues were commercial and suppressing competing information. We next received an email from another individual who wrote: Date sent: 5 Jan 2006 18:23:38 -0000 To: Arkadiusz Jadczyk From: ......@yahoo.com Subject: ATS catherder article rebuttal ......@yahoo.com From : USA : California wrote : I was wondering if you would please comply with ATS's terms of service and creative commons license so that we can discuss your debunking article of Catherder's Pentagon plane crash article. I am not a government agent and neither is Skeptic's Overlord of AboveTopSecret. I am just a normal human being that is wanting a fair argument on what really happened at the pentagon and using your article to discuss the controversy at ATS will help a lot, but we can only use your website if you comply with ATS's rules. thank you, ....... Well, since we had, as far as we knew, from the beginning, complied with the standard legal requirements of Fair Use for criticism and analysis, (including source and link), it seemed that the AboveTopSecret forum Overlords were putting pressure on members of their own forum to put pressure on us so the members could discuss our analysis of CatHerder's disinfo piece in the forum that claimed to be willing to discuss all sides of an issue! Ark decided to see if he find out what was really going on: To: skepticoverlord Date sent: Thu, 05 Jan 2006 20:26:10 +0100 Subject: Re: Your 9/11 Article On 5 Jan 2006 at 13:05, SkepticOverlord wrote: > As requested, please focus on the issues I've itemed in my emails. > > Thanks. Hi, Just a while ago I got the following: [.......'s message, quoted above, snipped] Can you tell me who is "......"? Or is it you in disguise? The IP suggest the second conjecture... ark At the same time, we decided, in the spirit of cooperation, to see if we could come to an agreement. Ark wrote the following: From: Arkadiusz Jadczyk To: skepticoverlord, mark ......@yahoo.com Subject: Re: Your 9/11 Article Date sent: Thu, 05 Jan 2006 21:13:44 +0100 Hi, here is the more technical part: On 5 Jan 2006, at 11:54, SkepticOverlord wrote: > > >From our vantage point, the manner in which you presented the content of > >your article here: > http://www.sott.net/signs/Above_Top_Secret_article.htm > Appears to be designed to capitalize on our content both for commercial > purposes (the selling of a book) and user confusion (file and directory names > "above_top_secret"). The intent of the article is self-evident: education and, to some extent, parody. > > For now, we're hoping to assume that non-compliance with our Creative Commons > License ( http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/cc.php?tid=79655&pid=816414 ) > is accidental. And that no malicious intent is behind using our unique site > name in the naming conventions of your content. "Above Top Secret" is a common phrase, long in use. > > (More information on creative commons here: http://creativecommons.org/ ) > > The non-compliance is related to two issues: > 1) Your author, Joe Quinn, and has developed a derivative work based on our > material. This is not allowed under the terms of the linked CC deed. Joe Quinn's work is not "derivative." It is transformative commentary and parody. In a 1994 case, the Supreme Court emphasized Transformative in Character as being a primary indicator of fair use. * Has the material been transformed by adding new expression or meaning? * Was value added to the original by creating new information, new aesthetics, new insights and understandings? In a parody, for example, the parodist transforms the original by holding it up to ridicule. Purposes such as scholarship, research or education may also qualify as transformative. All of these apply in this instance. 2) Our > content is used in conjunction with solicitation for the sale of a book > titled, "9/11: The Ultimate Truth". This is also a violation of the terms in > our linked CC deed. It is not a violation of copyright law as defined above. > > The CC deed link is provided at the bottom of every piece of content on our > site, and clearly provides information on how our material can be reused. Thanks. We'll stick with standard copyright law. > > In addition, including our site name as a part of the naming system for the > HTML file and subdirectories is indicative of potential malicious intent to > confuse web surfers and search engines. We hope this is accidental. From our point of view, it is the simplest way to identify the file in the many thousands of files on our website(s). > > We believe our request for changes to be in the spirit of collaborative > debate on these important issues. Rather than insist our content be removed > (which is within our rights under the clearly stated usage guidelines), we're > asking for the following: 1) Comply with the "BY:" attribute of our Creative > Commons Deed (proper link and attribution). As soon as the webmaster returns from Ireland, we'll have him make the requested changes. 2) Alter the HTML file name so > that it does not contain our site name. Sorry, but that is not possible. As noted above, it is the easiest way to identify the file among the many thousands of files on our website(s). 3) Alter the images directory so that > it does not contain our site name. Sorry, but that is not possible. As noted above, it is the easiest way to identify the files among the many thousands of files on our website(s). 4) Remove the text link at the bottom that > promotes the sale of a book in context with your article (the banner link at > the left for the same book can certainly remain since it is not in context > with the text of your article). In the spirit of cooperation, we will agree to this request. Regards, ark The only response was the following: To: Arkadiusz Jadczyk Subject: Re: Your 9/11 Article From: "SkepticOverlord" Date sent: Thu, 5 Jan 2006 21:40:13 -0600 Please confirm if this is your correct mailing address: Laura Jadczyk Dluga 40 m3 Castenau Barbarens, 32450 FR (Obtained from the public domain record) Thank you. Now, let's come back to the question: Who is Simon Gray??? Frankly, until this little tempest in a teapot, we had never heard of the guy. As it happens, a little investigation produces the following WhoIs information about AboveTopSecret.com: Registrant: Gray, Simon 1 Sackville Close Swindon, Wiltshire SN3 3EJ UK Domain Name: ABOVETOPSECRET.COM Administrative Contact, Technical Contact: Gray, Simon simon.gray@abovetopsecret.com 1 Sackville Close Swindon, Wiltshire SN3 3EJ UK +44 1793 486619 fax: 999 999 9999 Record expires on 19-May-2013. Record created on 18-May-1997. Database last updated on 6-Jan-2006 08:22:18 EST. Domain servers in listed order: NS4.DNSMADEEASY.COM 216.88.44.132 NS3.DNSMADEEASY.COM 64.246.42.123 NS2.DNSMADEEASY.COM 66.80.146.131 NS1.DNSMADEEASY.COM 69.10.137.166 NS0.DNSMADEEASY.COM 66.80.146.130 What is MOST interesting is that the information on this WhoIs entry was updated on 6 January 2006. Wonder what triggered that? I also wondered what it said before January 6, 2006? At first we thought that the "database" meant just the general website database, and that it was, perhaps, just generally "updated" according to some schedule and this meant nothing. So, we did some experiments with our own WhoIs data to see what the results would be. Sure enough, it is when the "client" themselves go to the database to add, subtract, correct, or change information that it is recorded as an "update." Next I found an interesting post on a discussion forum named BELOWTopSecret.com (thread name: ABOVETOPSECRET.COM CIA)as follows: I did a trace route on http://www.abovetopsecret.com/, the Node Name is listed and maintained by the government. IP Address 213.206.128 213.206.129 213.206.130 Node Name Gov-bb21-lan-14 Gov-bb22-lan-15 Gov-bb23-lan-16 Location Langley, Virginia MS 60 Network Used whois.nic.mil (for military network information) It was difficult to get the IP Address, It was spoofed and looped over 9 times. Anyway Langley, Virginia is where the CIA headquarters is. I?m more than concerned. The discussion on that board is interesting because we notice "Springer" there and a general "ha ha that was a great joke" attitude about the above quoted "find." Looking further, we discover the raw whois output for belowtopsecret.com: Registrant: Gray, Simon 1 Sackville Close Swindon, Wiltshire SN3 3EJ UK Domain Name: BELOWTOPSECRET.COM Administrative Contact: Gray, Simon simon.gray@abovetopsecret.com 1 Sackville Close Swindon, Wiltshire SN3 3EJ UK +44 1793 486619 fax: 999 999 9999 Technical Contact: Network Solutions, LLC. customerservice@networksolutions.com 13200 Woodland Park Drive Herndon, VA 20171-3025 US 1-888-642-9675 fax: 571-434-4620 Record expires on 21-Oct-2013. Record created on 21-Oct-2003. Database last updated on 7-Jan-2006 06:48:53 EST. Domain servers in listed order: NS3.DNSMADEEASY.COM 64.246.42.123 NS4.DNSMADEEASY.COM 216.88.44.132 NS2.DNSMADEEASY.COM 66.80.146.131 NS1.DNSMADEEASY.COM 69.10.137.166 NS0.DNSMADEEASY.COM 66.80.146.130 Again we notice that the WhoIs database was updated just today, January 7, 2006. Seems that the issue of whether or not AboveTopSecret may be COINTELPRO has provoked a flurry of "updating" activity. Again we wonder: Who is Simon Gray? On the AboveTopSecret website you will find the following: ATS Weekly: Edition 001 July 19, 2005 A Word From Our FounderThis is a fantastic time for AboveTopSecret.com. Over the past few years we have seen tremendous growth in many ways, most notably in terms of the sheer amount of people who visit the ATS websites. These people have formed together into a collective virtual community, and together have expanded the wealth of information on our website to nearly a quarter of a million accessible pages, making us one of the most highly regarded websites of our genre. Moderator's Musings When thinking about what to write here, the first thing I thought about was how much I personally appreciate ATS. So this little article is a BIG thank you to everyone that makes ATS what it is. Thanks to Simon for creating ATS. Thanks to SkepticOverlord for the continued work to improve and protect the site. Thanks to the Staff who do a wonderful job keeping the quality of input here the best on the Net. [...] From the Front Office Welcome to the first edition of the newly tooled and re-imagined ATS newsletter. Just twelve days ago one of your board adminstrators, William One Sac, thought it might be a good idea to resurrect Simon's old email newsletter. It ended up being such a good (and obvious) idea, several people worked diligently behind the scenes to make sure it happened in a way everyone could be proud of. And for members of the AboveTopSecret.com discussion board community, there's a great deal to be proud of. Interestingly, a search on google for Simon Gray brings up the following result: Who besides Simon Gray and the 'Bildebergers' can you source regarding US concentration camps stowing & drugging 2 million americans? & tell us Simon's credentials? TIA Registrant: Gray, Simon (ABOVETOPSECRET-DOM) 1 Sackville Close Walnut Creek, CA 94596 Domain Name: abovetopsecret.com Administrative Contact, Technical Contact: Gray, Simon (SG2699) simon@ABOVETOPSECRET.COM 1 Sackville Close Swindon Wilts SN3 3EJ UK (01793) 486619 Record expires on 19-May-2001. Record created on 18-May-1997. Database last updated on 24-Aug-2002 12:09:13 EDT. Domain servers in listed order: NS.LIQUIDWEB.COM 64.91.224.2 NS1.LIQUIDWEB.COM 64.91.228.2 Did you notice that Sackville Close is now partly in California and partly in UK? How interesting! Well, we are not going to criticize anyone for fudging on their home address. Considering the kinds of attacks that we have experienced in this "business," we don't hold it against anyone for wanting to protect themselves from lunatics. Figuring out just who Simon Gray is has actually been turned into a promotional enterprise at AboveTopSecret.com. It looks like they are trying to create a legend. (Which reminds me that their own material is presented in the context of a huge commercial enterprise that is obviously focused on making money!) WIN 10,000 POINTS! "Who is Simon Gray?" William posted on 26-8-2003 at 09:50 PM Now that we have a nice shiny new points system... let's have some fun! Who is Simon Gray? What does he do? What does he look like? What are his hobbies? What does he eat? Does he shave? Perhaps he fancies a certain kind of ladies under-arm deodorant? These are the burning questions that have tormented the denizens of Above Top Secret for years-on-end. Well, now is your chance to add the fiction that has become legend that will become myth. Help us paint the complex tapestry of the person known as, "Simon Gray" so that the legend may become larger than life... nay, larger than the planet... nay, larger than the solar system! Post your best prose. Find your best photos. Describe your best "Simon Gray". The winner, as judged by forum staff, will receive 10,000 bright shiny new points directly from the ATS mint. These points are good for any merchandise in the ATS store and may not be redeemed for ladies under-arm deodorant. Well, AboveTopSecret.com begins to look like a dramatically STAGED "experiment." And I use the word "staged" deliberately. Have a look here: Deja vu, all over again 2005 has been a year of the sequel, the remake and the revival - and no bad thing for all that Mark Lawson Friday December 30, 2005 The Guardian Was 2005 the year when art ran out of ideas? December always encourages retrospection but looking back at the culture of the last 12 months constantly involves a double jump as every new idea seems to have an old one behind it. [...] A similar generosity is possible towards the number of repeats in theatre this year. These were not lazy restagings but exuberant rediscoveries, including an improbable pair of Schiller hits (Don Carlos and Mary Stuart), little-known Ibsens (Pillars of the Community) and John Osbornes (Epitaph for George Dillon), and a neglected Simon Gray (Otherwise Engaged.) All of these productions imbued the word "revival" with an almost medical meaning. Is the Simon Gray of AboveTopSecret.com the playwright, Simon Gray? Before discarding that as a possibility, I thought I would pull on that thread a bit. Encyclopedia Brittanica tells us: Simon Gray born Oct. 21, 1936, Hayling Island, Hampshire, Eng. [...] British dramatist whose plays, often set in academia, are noted for their challenging storylines, witty, literary dialogue, and complex characterizations. Gray alternately lived in Canada and England, attending Westminster School in London; Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada (B.A., 1957); and Trinity College, Cambridge (B.A., 1961). While working as a university lecturer in both countries, he wrote satiric novels and farcical plays for stage and television. His first stage play was Wise Child (1968), which features a criminal transvestite. Gray's first international success was Butley (1971; filmed 1974), a play about a petulant university professor whose venomous wit masks an inner emptiness. Similarly, Otherwise Engaged (1975) concerns a sardonic publisher who strives to isolate himself but is prevented from doing so by a series of dramatic interruptions. Quartermaine's Terms (1981) is the sadly comic story of a gentle, ineffectual English teacher. Among Gray's other plays are Spoiled (1971), The Rear Column (1978), The Common Pursuit (1984), Hidden Laughter (1990), Cell Mates (1995), Fat Chance (1995), and Simply Disconnected (1996). As I pursued the thread, I came to the idea that the playwright, Simon Gray, is NOT the "Simon Gray" of AboveTopSecret - unless he is having a good laugh at everyone's expense. See also: Disgruntled drollery, Saturday March 5, 2005, The Guardian, a review of The Smoking Diaries, by Simon Gray. Then there are excerpts from a review of the play mentioned in the above quoted Guardian article. So much for Simon Gray, the playwright. He lives in London, as one source mentions, not Sackville Close. Problem is, NO Simon Gray lives in Sackville Close that I could discover. One of our researchers who lives in UK wrote: There is a thread here that might add to what you have so far: I found it from searching against the postcode, as the address just sounded weird to me. I worked in Swindon for about six years and as far as I remember the area where Sackville Close is, comprises mostly old Victorian terraced houses in a none too inspiring part of the town. If you lived there and had any money you would probably use it to move somewhere else! The link goes to the Let's Roll 9-11 discussion board where the topic is: Above top secret, is it Dis info? Apparently, others have been asking similar questions for some time now and the details given at the above link are quite revealing. We find tracks of AboveTopSecret's Simon Gray rather early on the web: Topic in alt.magick.sex Simon Gray Jul 6 1999, 8:00 am Newsgroups: alt.magick.sex From: "Simon Gray" Date: 1999/07/06 Subject: GREAT WEBSITE www.abovetopsecret.com !!! Under "free.uk.info" we find another: Newsgroups: free.uk.ufo From: "Above Top Secret" Date: 2000/03/22 Subject: www. Above Top Secret .com - The UK's ultimate website for US conspiracies http://www.AboveTopSecret.com This is the UK's ultimate conspiracy website for those interested in Area 51, secret government projects, aircraft programs including a very detailed Aurora page, agencies, and even hacking information. Multi-award winning information. -- Simon Gray - Webmaster/Researcher of www.AboveTopSecret.com E-Mail - s...@abovetopsecret.com And so on. If you go to the above links, you can click "find messages by this author" and you will get 184 returns, among which are the following: Movies http://www.hotmoviez.com -- Simon Gray - Webmaster/Founder of http://www.AboveTopSecret. com E-Mail - s...@abovetopsecret.com Get Paid For Nothing! ... alt.2600.hackerz - Jul 13 2000, 8:10 pm by Above Top Secret - 6 messages - 6 authors Cheat AllAdvantage If you're interested in getting paid for NOTHING, then check out http://paid4surf.abovetopsecret.com alt.2600.hackerz - Jul 13 2000, 10:53 am by Above Top Secret - 3 messages - 3 authors Make $100s surfing the net!!! How would you like to earn $100sa month by surfing the internet? A brilliantly simple form of income that requires no effort at all. ... alt.best.of.internet - Apr 1 2000, 7:21 am by Above Top Secret - 1 message - 1 author Earn $100s surfing the web!!! How would you like to earn $100sa month by surfing the internet? A brilliantly simple form of income that requires no effort at all. ... alt.make.money - Apr 1 2000, 6:27 am by Above Top Secret - 2 messages - 2 authors Make money surfing the net!!! How would you like to earn $100sa month by surfing the internet? A brilliantly simple form of income that requires no effort at all. ... free.uk.ufo - Mar 31 2000, 9:01 pm by Above Top Secret - 1 message - 1 author www. Above Top Secret .com - The UK's ultimate website for US ... http://www.AboveTopSecret.com This is the UK's ultimate conspiracy website for those interested in Area 51, secret government projects, aircraft programs ... free.uk.ufo - Mar 23 2000, 3:27 am by Above Top Secret - 1 message - 1 author www. Above Top Secret .com Check out this website for information about Area 51, UFOs, secret facilities, organisations, government projects, the New World Order, and more. ... alt.paranet.ufo - Mar 21 2000, 3:43 pm by Above Top Secret - 1 message - 1 author MYSTERIOUS CALIFORNIA TEST FACILITIES McDonnell Douglas "Llano" Facility Lockheed "Hellendale" Facility Northrop "Tejon Ranch" Facility www.abovetopsecret.com/southcal.html alt.alien - Jul 26 1999, 5:07 am by Simon Gray - 1 message - 1 author MYSTERIOUS TEST LOCATIONS McDonnell Douglas "Llano" Facility Lockheed "Hellendale" Facility Northrop "Tejon Ranch" Facility www.abovetopsecret.com/southcal.html alt.alien.wanderers - Jul 25 1999, 5:07 pm by Simon Gray - 1 message - 1 author 29 PROTOTYPE STEALTH AIRCRAFT BLACK PROJECTS , SECRET UNDERGROUND DULCE FACILITY , 29 PROTOTYPE STEALTH PLANES , ALIEN/GOVERNMENT COLLABORATION http://www.abovetopsecret.com/lecture.html alt.alien.wanderers - Jul 22 1999, 3:56 pm by Simon Gray - 1 message - 1 author ET Exposure Law (page now updated) www.abovetopsecret.com/etlaw.html !!! alt.alien.visitors - Jul 9 1999, 5:29 am by Simon Gray - 2 messages - 2 authors AURORA in detail !!!!! The following website has been updated an incredible amount, including an Aurora page with an amazing amount of detail !!! www.abovetopsecret.com !!! alt.conspiracy.area51 - Jul 8 1999, 9:20 pm by Simon Gray - 1 message - 1 author GREAT WEBSITE www.abovetopsecret.com !!! alt.magick.sex - Jul 7 1999, 3:05 am by Simon Gray - 1 message - 1 author COOL WEBSITE www.abovetopsecret.com , now hugely updated !!! -- Simon Gray - Webmaster www.AboveTopSecret.com alt.alien.visitors - Jul 7 1999, 2:07 am by Simon Gray - 1 message - 1 author AREA 51 and RELATED PAGES go to www.abovetopsecret.com alt.conspiracy.black.helicopters - Jun 21 1999, 2:18 am by Simon Gray - 1 message - 1 author COOL WEBSITE www.abovetopsecret.com has some cool information which may be of interest !!! alt.fans.chat2 - Jun 16 1999, 11:10 am by Simon Gray - 1 message - 1 author COOL WEBSITE www.abovetopsecret.com is a very interesting site. Why not check it out! alt.sport.air-guns - Jun 15 1999, 5:56 am by Simon Gray - 1 message - 1 author COOL WEBSITE Great website at www.abovetopsecret.com ! ! ! alt.sport.table-tennis - Jun 15 1999, 1:13 am by Simon Gray - 1 message - 1 author COOL WEBSITE www.abovetopsecret.com ! ! ! alt.sport.horse-racing - Jun 15 1999, 12:41 am by Simon Gray - 1 message - 1 author COOL WEBSITE www.abovetopsecret.com !!! alt.sport.darts - Jun 14 1999, 4:14 pm by Simon Gray - 1 message - 1 author I leave it to the reader to draw their own conclusion about whether or not AboveTopSecret was setting itself up as a money making venture, or to be a "vacuum cleaner" operation. Of course, the two objectives are not mutually exclusive! One thing is certain, this "Simon Gray" was way too busy and energetic to be the playwright. Whoever it was, it looks like he's out to make a million bux one way or the other. This frenzied promotional activity for the past 7 years or so will become quite interesting when we consider "Christian Bailey," (coming up) so keep it in mind. I would also suggest that the reader go to the webarchive and go back over the history of AboveTopSecret.com and notice that it was quite obviously set up to draw in alternative researchers from the very beginning. Why? Obvious answer is to vector ideas. Re-read my post on COINTELPRO. I'm still amused at the idea that "Simon Gray" of AboveTopSecret.com is obviously a Brit "specializing" in American conspiracies . It seems that this is not exactly an isolated case. In recent times the Pentagon's contract with another Brit, for the purposes of spreading disinformation, came to the attention of the mainstream media. Let's look at the strange case of "Christian Bailey.": So, just who is Christian Bailey? A 30-year-old Oxford graduate with no public relations experience was the recipient of a $100m (£56m) contract from Donald Rumsfeld's Department of Defence for buying space in Iraqi newspapers to place deliberately one-sided stories written by US "psy-ops" troops, at a time when the chaos of Iraq makes genuine journalism all but impossible and when journalists risk their lives on a daily basis to report the truth. [Deliberatly ONE SIDED STORIES? Shades of AboveTopSecret!] The office building situated at 1420 K Street NW has nothing obvious to commend it other than its prime location. Just a couple of streets from the north-west gates of the White House, it sits in the heart of lobbying land - the K Street corridor that represents one of the most crucial centres of power, influence and money in the United States. This grey building, neighboured to one side by an off-licence and to the other by a travel agent, is home to the Lincoln Group, a previously little-known "business intelligence" company headed by a heretofore little known young Briton, Christian Bailey, an Oxford graduate and consummate net worker. He is at the centre of a mounting storm of controversy surrounding the Bush administration's covert propaganda war in Iraq. [It will be very useful to have read the links to the "Let'sRoll9-11 discussion board given above to see the connection between AboveTopSecret.com and the covert propaganda war in Iraq. VERY interesting connections those folks found!] It was recently revealed that Bailey's company was the recipient of a $100m (£56m) contract from Donald Rumsfeld's Department of Defence for buying space in Iraqi newspapers to place deliberately one-sided stories written by US "psy-ops" troops, at a time when the chaos of Iraq makes genuine journalism all but impossible and when journalists risk their lives on a daily basis to report the truth. [Deliberatly ONE SIDED STORIES? Shades of AboveTopSecret! And we notice how vigorously they tried to place those stories on our own site! Does this mean that CatHerder is "psy-ops"?] As part of the project - in which the US military hid its involvement - Lincoln Group staff paid Iraqi journalists to write similarly misleading stories about US forces and the Iraqi government that ignored anything negative about the occupation. One headline read: "Iraqis Insist on Living Despite Terrorism." The revelations have created a furore. President Bush is said to be "very troubled" by the news, while on Capitol Hill members of both the Senate and House armed services committees demanded inquiries. The Pentagon said it would launch an immediate investigation. Much is unclear about the Lincoln Group, its youthful executive vice-president and his string of previous companies that have left only the faintest paper trail. Indeed, Christian Bailey may not be his real name: a number of student associates said at some point during his four years that he changed his name from Yusefovich - an unlikely surname for someone called Christian. [Shades of Simon Gray and AboveTopSecret.com!] The Independent has been unable to confirm this. Yet the details known about Bailey and the contract his company won provide a remarkable insight into the way influence and power operate in Washington. Just two years after arriving here, Bailey, 30, who has a penchant for socialising, has apparently developed contacts both within the Republican establishment and the world of private intelligence. [Shades of Simon Gray and AboveTopSecret.com!] Senator John Warner, the Republican chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said of the false news operation: "I remain gravely concerned about the situation." Since the controversy broke Bailey has kept a low-profile and has offered just the fewest public words about his organisation and what it does. (He failed to respond to requests for an interview.) It also appears a number of internet references linking him to the Republicans can no longer be found. [Shades of Simon Gray and AboveTopSecret.com!] Yet it is clear the Lincoln Group and its contract with the Joint Psychological Operations Support Element, part of the Pentagon's Special Operations Command, is inextricably linked with Bailey. He apparently named the company and its various offshoots after Lincoln College, Oxford, from which he graduated in 1997 with an MA in economics and management. [abovetopsecret.com was registered in 1997] [Shades of Simon Gray and AboveTopSecret.com! Registered in 1997... ] Many observers have been surprised Bailey, from Surrey, has been awarded such a sizable contract, give that he appears to have no experience in public relations. Indeed, since he moved to the US in the late 1990s, he has spent much of his time in private finance, working in hedge funds in San Francisco and New York. [Shades of Simon Gray and AboveTopSecret.com! See webarchive history of the website.] It appears he has been especially interested in new technology markets. A brief biography presented by the organisers of a conference held earlier this year in Dubai at which Bailey was listed as a speaker, said he had worked in Palo Alto, California, "where he advised portfolio companies and identified, evaluated and developed emerging technology investments". [Shades of Simon Gray and his sorta UK and sorta California address...] The Briton has always enjoyed a reputation for business. Several Oxford associates said it was rumoured that the popular student kept two computers in his room to monitor the stock markets. Bailey has said he founded and sold two companies while an undergraduate. "He was quite enterprising, I believe," said Graham De'ath, of Winchester, who was in the same year. [Shades of Simon Gray and AboveTopSecret.com and his "make $100s surfing the net scams!] Kate Smurthwaite, who is now a stand-up comic but shared a flat with Bailey in his third year, told The Independent that the young entrepreneur hired a personal assistant to work for him in his student digs as he ran an operation selling self-help advice on cassettes. [Shades of Simon Gray and AboveTopSecret.com and his "make $100s surfing the net scams!] He also had a reputation as a hard-working networker. While in New York he became treasurer of the Oxonian Society, a club for graduates of Oxford and other universities, which invites high-profile figures to speak. He was involved in at least one charity fundraising effort with other hedge-funders. Perhaps of more significance, Bailey became the co-chairman of the New York chapter of Lead21, a networking group for young Republicans. At least a dozen of its members have gone on to work for either the Bush administration, Congress or the Governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger. [Shades of Simon Gray and AboveTopSecret.com!] During a Lead21 trip to the Republican National Convention in New York last autumn, Bailey said of his colleagues to one reporter: "These are going to be the big supporters, the big donors, to the Republican Party in five years." According to other members, Bailey was very popular. Auren Hoffman, chair of Lead21 and chairman of the Stonebrick Group, a San Francisco-based consulting firm, said Bailey was a good friend. "Christian is a terrific guy personally. Everyone I know that has ever met him instantly likes him. He is very likeable and charming. Very intelligent. Very interesting." [Shades of psychopathy!] When he moved to Washington, his reputation as a networker continued. He often hosted parties at home and mixed with a set of young, up-and-coming journalists and congressional staffers. He enjoyed a reputation as a good cook, a welcoming host and for making cappuccinos with a machine in his kitchen. He also enjoyed flying: Federal Aviation Administration records show that he is qualified to fly aeroplanes and helicopters. [Sounding more and more like Simon Gray and AboveTopSecret.com] How and when did Bailey make the switch from hedge funds to private intelligence and PR? One clue is provided by the Alternative Investment News newsletter of 1 March 2003, just weeks before the invasion of Iraq. It reported Bailey's hedge fund, Lincoln Asset Management Group, had launched a buyout fund to start buying companies in the defence and security industries. Bailey said he had obtained commitments of $100m from six institutional investors, whom he declined to name. Apparently with an eye to the preparations for war being made in the deserts of northern Kuwait, he added: "[The] timing is extremely good to look at defence companies." Shortly afterwards, a subsidiary called Lincoln Alliance Corp was established, offering what it called "tailored intelligence services [for] government clients faced with critical intelligence challenges". By last autumn Bailey had formed another Lincoln subsidiary, called Iraqex, which seems to have formed a partnership with another American PR firm called Rendon, famous in Washington for having promoted Ahmed Chalabi and his Iraqi National Congress. [DO take a look at the links to the "Let'sRoll9-11 discussion board given above to see the connection between AboveTopSecret.com and the covert propaganda war in Iraq. VERY interesting connections those folks found!] At some point Bailey also went into business with Paige Craig, 31, a former US Marine who served in Iraq and elsewhere. [Bailey and Craig are flatmates in a fashionable part of Washington, close to U Street. The flat is just yards away from Café Saint- Ex, popular with young professionals.] [Hmmm.... wonder if Paige Craig and CatHerder are one and the same???] In September, Iraqex won a $6m Pentagon contract to design and execute "an aggressive advertising and PR campaign that will accurately inform the Iraqi people of the Coalition's goals and gain their support". It appears one project was an attempt to persuade the Iraqi and US public that Iraqi troops played a vital role in last year's effort to clear Fallujah.

Flashback: Abovetopsecret: Ethics and Google Bombs Laura Knight-Jadczyk 24 January 2006 Despite its claims about ETHICS, the bottom line is that Abovetopsecret.com is its own Google Bomb. ATS is an example of everything self-serving in our current reality - it is a microcosm of the Free market system, of corrupt government, democracy, business, almost everything that is wrong with this reality; all this is expressed in how abovetopsecret.com operates. If the site is not directly handled by COINTELPRO, if the Abovetopsecret.com "Amigos" are not conscious COINTELPRO agents, then they are by default; it serves the same purpose because the infection of pathological elements reigns supreme there. The 3 Amigos (Owners) manipulate everything about this site. They have figured out a way to manipulate google (that is why they put a thread link called "CoIntelPro" in the banner of every thread page, to push any search results for cointelpro and abovetopsecret deep into the google search pages behind them). They do much behind closed doors but they show their arrogance freely throughout the site. They push their rules right and left, but they, as owners and moderators break them freely and regularly, seemingly as they please. In short, it is all one giant marketing manipulation and the owners do not give a flip about the members or what is actually produced as a public consumable, so as long as it serves what is obviously their targeted purpose : To suck in more members to post which creates more indexed pages, to attract more readers, to vector their thinking and make money, and around and around it goes. It is rather amazing how the entire thing is designed and how most posters there haven't got a clue. I know I said "nuff said" about abovetopsecret.com, but so many people have been writing to me to ask for more information that I will try to answer some of the questions by way of publishing a post I received recently. I have changed the text slightly to remove any identifiers of the individual who wrote it. Hi Laura, I have gathered a bunch of information for analysis and have archived it. For now, I'll just give a general report of my observations about AboveTopSecret.com First of all, from what I can see these ATS guys think a lot of themselves. They are trying to twist the Flying Fish article into a legal and ethical issue, claiming that the main purpose of the article is for commercial use to promote the 911 book on SOTT and that this is not ETHICAL. Additionally, they accuse SOTT of using the article, using blogs or whatever, to "google bomb." So, let's get into it. First of all, a careful review of the site indicates that the entire abovetopsecret.com operation is a marketing campaign. The question is: what are they really marketing? I'll come to that. The fact is, abovetopsecret.com is one of the most revolting sites I have ever seen for advertising and commercialism and annoyances. It seems they have one set of rules for themselves, and an entirely different set of rules for everyone else. Better yet, they think that THEY get to make up the rules! They can be as commercial as they want; they can build articles and compilations out of the authentic work of other people, and then they claim ownership rights! In many cases, when they do this, their use of other people's material really adds no new or original content. The cherry on this cake is that they then demand that no one can use the material they have aggregated by the labor of others if the site is commercial like them, or uses advertising like them; you get the picture. As I said, their big push in the last couple of weeks is to brainwash their members and Netizens that this is all about ETHICS. It would be hilarious if I just heard the story as a joke, but it is for real and seeing the behavior and what passes for logical thinking over there is like studying a disease. And FYI, there is no AboveTopSecret.com, LLP. It is bogus, Simon Gray says so in a post on ATS. All money goes to Simon or SkepticOverlord. Simon Gray posted on 19-6-2004 at 08:59 PM I am the owner of this site. It is not part of a company, limited, incorporated or otherwise. I am a sole practitioner with colleagues throughout the world who help operate AboveTopSecret.com. All monetary payments which maintain the continued service of our server are made to myself or SkepticOverlord. This is through funding created by advertising campaigns. You could carry out a business search but it would prove pointless. Myself and SkepticOverlord own the numerous domain names among the ATS universe. It is not a necessity to become a limited company to operate such a community as ours.... So much for “ethics” and legality. Wonder if the tax authorities where these guys live know that they think they can run an operation this size without having a legally incorporated or registered business? That's one ethics issue. Another is that THEY can use everybody else’s work to make money but demand that nothing from their site can be used on any site that has any commercial or even non-profit commercial interests! Sounds about ethical to me. Not! More interesting than that, however, is the fact that their license insists that anyone quoting anything from their site must credit a misleading, fictitious company name and second, that crediting must be done to non-legal entities such as internet monikers!! Another observation: In the past couple of weeks, the 3 Amigos have been in high gear, dumping threads, changing threads, getting pissed at their members for not joining the "Pentagon - Fine Focus" thread and generally employing all kinds of obvious psychological manipulation tactics. They are propagandizing hard and heavy to their members about Ethics, even doing podcasts on Ethics! Go figure! Now, a few items about this so-called “ethical issue” - what they consider “copyright infringement.” A couple years ago the licensing displayed on the sit was Copyright. Then they joined up with Creative Commons: Attribution, No Commercial, No Derivative. What they have changed since the publication of the Flying Fish article is that now you don't have to point to the exact Post ID in the URI link, you only have to point to the first page of the thread. They still demand that you give thread name, member name, say ATS are owners, blah, blah.. The way abovetopsecret.com is attempting to use Creative Commons seems to be a clear abuse of the intent or spirit of the licensing. It looks to me as if it is all part of one single devious plan: to swamp Google and other search engines with as many ATS pages and as many ATS links as possible. For example, what they demand of anyone who quotes anything from their site to do is that for every single post you have to mention Above Top Secret twice, you have to give the named title of the thread, the name of the person posting and then the URL. This means that if I wanted to quote just one page of a discussion with say 15 posters on it, I would have to say Above Top Secret 30 times, and provide 30 linkable URL's . That is 15 links and 30 mentions of their name for the search engines to hit. It is free advertising. It is designed to force anyone who wants to quote threads or discussions to do advertising for AboveTopSecret. There are some interesting corollary questions. One of these is: how the Commercial for-profit, mega-billion dollar search engine Google can be allowed to display their information in search results without displaying any CC information or licensing? One might think that abovetopsecret.com’s – and every other website, for that matter - content certainly helps Google earn money. Are search engines implicitly exempt? In any event, studying this Creative Commons issue has raised this question: search engines get the use of everyone's material scot-free. Getting back to ATS: My overview indicates that everything abovetopsecret.com - including their "ethical" use of Creative Commons - does is designed explicitly to spam the search engines. They rant on and on about fair use, but – and this is the thing that smells bad about this Creative Commons thing - if copyright laws work, and copyright contains fair use clauses already, then Creative Commons is just making things a mess. As Creative Commons is worded, the owner can list their 'requirements' for attribution. Who determines what is fair and reasonable in what an owner is allowed to require? Bottom line is, none of it is legal. It is simply a tool for intimidation. Another very disturbing thing about abovetopsecret.com’s Creative Commons “requirements” is the Non-Commercial clause. ATS says: "Noncommercial. You may not use this work for commercial purposes. This includes display on any website that contains advertising, accepts member donations, or any other form of monetary compensation." That is almost like saying that only THEY have the right to sell anything and collect any money! A site that has adsense for charitable donations is also excluded, though I am sure they wouldn't try to intimidate such a site if that site posted something that they agreed with. Bottom line is, they assert that no one – except them - can do anything commercial at all. You can’t advertise your grandmother's potholders; you cannot accept member donations; if a charity has member donations link, NIX. But that is not even the best part. The best part is the last part "or any other form of monetary compensation". What in the heck is that? How broad and how vague is that? Contributing your time to a charitable organization can in some cases be considered as a charitable tax deduction under certain guidelines and in those cases it is considered a form of monetary compensation (because you get a tax benefit). This is a form of monetary compensation. They could use that last phrase to attempt to intimidate just about anyone they wanted, most especially if that other individual or site published something they didn’t agree with. So on the one side, abovetopsecret.com uses their CC “requirements” to require the spreading of their name and links throughout the Internet and on the other side, they leave the Non-commercial clause so ambiguous that they could try to use it to intimidate anyone, anytime, for any reason they wanted. And obviously, they are arrogant enough to think they can get away with this stuff. My impression is that the abovetopsecret.com gang is downright psychotic. I am flabbergasted at what they say officially on the site and what they are actually doing with the site that can be uncovered by anyone with a modicum of technical skills and a little time. They talk out both sides of their mouths at once and it is plainly visible to anyone with, as Laura says, two neurons firing. But they also have a group of Renfield types (see Dracula) who strut around like “Cool Cats”, swallowing whole almost everything the owners and admins feed them. Now, as I said, abovetopsecret.com has been its own “google bomb” from its inception. What is even more curious, based on a bit of data collecting and analysis is that google seems to actually HELP them. Things that ATS does, if other sites did them, they would be penalized by the search engines if not entirely erased. That is an interesting observation all by itself and will require more data collection over a period of time. But for the moment, let me try to explain what I mean: It seems that the SEO (Search Engine Optimization) rules don't apply to AboveTopSecret. Not only do they have adverts posted to Google groups but also all over the Internet in bookmark resources, business directories, you name it. Their very own Forum Tagging system should act against them, but instead, for abovetopsecret.com, it only seems to help put more searchable hits into google! They have changed servers 4 times in three years which is a big negative according to search engine criteria. They have content cached under IPS and domain names. There are plausible explanations for many of these things (website owners change servers, websites have mirrors, etc.), but the enormity of it all put together with the obvious favors that google bestows upon them is significant. Every action the owners take for what Simon calls "User Experience" is actually designed for one reason and one reason only, and that is to fill Google and search engines with pages and pages and pages. By utilizing the psychological dependency that they have induced in their members, (it's almost cult like!) they get free labor to accomplish any marketing strategies that they come up with. They go on and on about poor ATS and how well-meaning and benevolent they are and have been and want to be, so now everyone must come out and show the world all the great work they do by putting the greatest threads in this new thread. Then, like robots, everyone comes obeys. In fact, that is what their whole COINTELPRO thread is about: it is designed to shove SOTT out of the search results, lure people to their site, and then present them with this great advertising page where they can slurp up more money. What is sick is observing that the owners clearly know what they are doing. They know how they can manipulate the members to do whatever they want to accomplish as a business and marketing strategy. They know what they are doing in a fully conscious and evil way, from how they create and manage threads, to how they manipulate and use the forum members as tools to create more pages which are indexed in google, which in turn, by “thread targeting”, they seek to attract more users to control, who they manipulate to create more indexed pages, to get more people, to make more money, and around it goes. Their thread management as stated by Simon Gray, is designed for the same purpose as everything else - pages. Pages and pages and more pages. It's also obvious that they don't really care what is in the pages. Content is not the issue as it is to SOTT. The ATS directive is - PAGES. If a thread is not going anywhere - kill it. Get people to look at something else. If a thread is steaming along and gets too long, find a way to split it up into additional threads (many people get pissed off) so as to make more PAGES; add features to the site touting them as 'User Experience", when it is really just for pages for the search engines and that is all it is. It is obviously a full time job. No wonder the Amigos hide behind Monikers. If anybody found out where they really live and checked on them in their own towns, it might be very interesting. Not all the members appear to be fooled, but most of them are so into it psychologically that they could never see it if it was put right before them. As I mentioned, it is more like a cult than an internet discussion. Only thing is, the members don't even realize that. There is no "teaching" nothing to really "believe in," but most definitely, Simon Gray is being subtly promoted as some kind of cultic object of adulation. For example: To build prestige in self and allegiance to Simon, for abovetopsecret.com, the point system has been created. The Point System is used for reward and Punishment. They have contests to earn points and reinforce their self worth within the forum community. If Simon or the other owners approve, they get points. If they don't approve, they lose points. Can you imagine it? An internet discussion where people are lining up like little children in nursery school to get gold star stickers? Recently, in early January, ATS turned on a new feature they call member tags. Member tags immediately added 37,000 pages to Google. Coincidentally, this was right after the publication of Joe Quinn's article on SOTT, Dec. 31st. What we notice about these 37,000 pages is that they are worthless as far as I can tell. No content. All the tag pages are basically just another form of indexing and advertising thread names. So they added 37,000 pages to Google with thousands of words, all pointing just to a set of intermediate pages listing thread names in categorizations (whether meaningful or not). It looks as if they may have hundreds of thousands of pages in Google that all they are different presentations of index pages whose endpoint are all the same threads and posts. They self-reference voluminously. They may have ten pages or more all pointing to the same thread link, each one just sorted a different way. And the members think it is all real cool, but they haven't got a clue (most of them anyway). The owners currently are rewarding points for creating new member tags all the time. They have a another new feature recently that lists last threads posted in by user. Click on a member name now and you get another type of index page all pointing to the same end points again! These things do not have to be indexed by Google and other search engines - it's basically search engine spam. The webmaster could be ETHICAL and use robots.txt to prevent all the garbage from getting into Google, but it appears to be all a part of the ATS marketing strategy. And Google does not seem to penalize them one bit for having 10 or 20 or 30 or more self-referencing pages all with the same internal endpoints! Figure that one out! Just one user on their forum that does a moderate amount of posting can generate dozens of pages in Google just by their presence because of all the auto-generating self-referencing indexes created by their system. Some may even call this clever. I am sure many of their members would think so. It just builds pride in those members who are being manipulated (reminds me of the Nazis and their “pride building” programs) and if the owners arrogance could possibly go any higher, I am sure they would be proud of all their cleverness that they think no one can see, especially their utilization of the free labor. Bottom line is, it is not ETHICAL. No part of it. Abovetopsecret.com is quite simply using its members as a free labor force to do work for them: Get more pages in Google which will draw more people to the site which will increase the labor force which will create more pages to get more people, to make more money. Despite its claims about ETHICS, the bottom line is that Abovetopsecret.com is its own Google Bomb. ATS is an example of everything self-serving in our current reality - it is a microcosm of the Free market system, of corrupt government, democracy, business, almost everything that is wrong with this reality; all this is expressed in how abovetopsecret.com operates. If the site is not directly handled by COINTELPRO, if the Abovetopsecret.com "Amigos" are not conscious COINTELPRO agents, then they are by default; it serves the same purpose because the infection of pathological elements reigns supreme there. The 3 Amigos (Owners) manipulate everything about this site. They have figured out a way to manipulate google (that is why they put a thread link called "CoIntelPro" in the banner of every thread page, to push any search results for cointelpro and abovetopsecret deep into the google search pages behind them). They do much behind closed doors but they show their arrogance freely throughout the site. They push their rules right and left, but they, as owners and moderators break them freely and regularly, seemingly as they please. In short, it is all one giant marketing manipulation and the owners do not give a flip about the members or what is actually produced as a public consumable, so as long as it serves what is obviously their targeted purpose : To suck in more members to post which creates more indexed pages, to attract more readers, to vector their thinking and make money, and around and around it goes. It is rather amazing how the entire thing is designed and how most posters there haven't got a clue.

Flashback: Iraqi clerics are paid to spin for US By Andrew Buncombe in Washington 03 January 2006 A company headed by a young British businessman at the centre of a controversy over the Pentagon's information war in Iraq has been making payments to Islamic clerics in exchange for advice on how to target Sunnis with pro-American propaganda. Since early last year the Lincoln Group - set up by Christian Bailey, an Oxford graduate - has been consulting Sunni clerics on how to write messages that would persuade Sunnis to participate in national elections and oppose the insurgency. Three or four have been retained by the company to advise US troops preparing "positive spin messages" as part of a propaganda campaign. Lincoln Group secured a contract worth more than $100m to place stories written by US troops in Iraqi newspapers and make cash payments to Iraqi journalists to write similarly uncritical stories for their newspapers.