The Bilderberg Group

by Charles Overbeck

Matrix Editor

easterisle@parascope.com

The date is May 14, 1998. The attendees -- 120 representatives of the Western political, financial and corporate elite -- cruise through the untamed Scottish countryside in black limousines on their way to the swank Turnberry Hotel in Ayrshire. The discussions they will engage in, and the consensus they reach, will influence the course of Western civilization and the future of the entire planet. This meeting will take place behind closed doors in total secrecy, protected by a phalanx of armed guards.

The Bilderberg is about to get busy once again.

According to a Bilderberg Society press release, the 46th Bilderberg meeting was an informal discussion "to discuss the Atlantic relationship in a time of change. Among others the Conference will discuss NATO, Asian Crisis, EMU, Growing Military Disparity, Japan, Multilateral Organizations, Europe's social model, Turkey, EU/US Market Place [sic]."

Those who attend Bilderberg meetings do so in a private rather than official capacity. From former CIA director John Deutch to New Jersey Governor Christine Todd Whitman, each guest attendee is hand-picked by the Bilderberg's organizing committee to join in secret deliberations about the propagation of Western hegemony in the New World Order.

All Bilderberg discussions are conducted in absolute secrecy. To guarantee solitude, the Group customarily books an entire hotel in a secluded location. The hotel is protected by a tight security grid of heavily armed guards from the U.S. Secret Service, various European secret service agencies and the local police.

Although some reporters and many media owners are present at these meetings, you will hear nothing about the Bilderberg in the news. According to the Bilderberg's press release, "Participants have agreed not to give interviews to the press during the meeting. In contacts with the news media after the conference it is an established rule that no attribution should be made to individual participants of what was discussed during the meeting."

A source close to the Turnberry conference told The Scotsman: "I cannot comment officially on whether this is a conference of the Bilderberg group... This is a strictly private non-governmental conference, one of a series of such meetings. Their purpose is the discuss most informally and confidentially topics of current concern to the democracies of Europe and America."

Bilderberg proponents argue that this cloak of secrecy is vital to ensuring an honest and vigorous debate.

"Some of the delegates are politicians, but everyone is here privately," the Turnberry conference source told The Scotsman. "It inspires frothing at the mouth of conspiracy theories, but the purpose of the privacy is to allow delegates to have a frank and constructive debate and get to the heart of things knowing that they are not going to be reported."

Of course, this secrecy also guarantees that the vast majority of the world's citizenry is kept completely in the dark regarding Bilderberg deliberations, even though the consensus of the Group may affect national and international government and commerce.

The extremes to which the Bilderberg goes to achieve this level of secrecy raises serious suspicions about the Group's motives in the minds of many. Critics of the Bilderberg say:

The Group perceives itself as being supra-governmental. Indeed, Bilderberg founder Prince Bernhard himself once said, "It is difficult to re-educate people who have been brought up on nationalism to the idea of relinquishing part of their sovereignty to a supra-national body." (Alden Hatch, H. R. H. Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands: An Authorized Biography, G. G. Harrap & Co. [London], 1962.)

The Group coercively manipulates global finances and establishes rigid and binding monetary rates around the world.

The Group selects political figures whom the Bilderberg determines should become rulers, and targets those whom it wants removed from power.

Rather than pursuing an agenda which would work to solve global health, energy, environmental and agricultural problems, the Group pursues an agenda which guarantees the propagation of its own power and the enrichment of its members, at the expense of human rights and environmental degradation worldwide.

As Bilderberg critic Tony Gosling wrote, "One cannot help but be a little suspicious when priorities for the future of mankind are being considered, by those who have real influence over that future, in total secret."

Bilderberg media blackout

With the exception of special guest reporters, journalists are barred from Bilderberg meetings. The secret services of the United States and several European nations coordinate with local police to enforce a strict "no-go" area around Bilderberg venues such as the Turnberry Hotel in Scotland. Since the Group's first meeting in 1954, its security network has been specifically used to prevent reporters from sneaking into the forum.

Critics have suggested that the media have been slow to investigate and report on the Bilderberg because many corporate news executives and journalists are members of the Group. Like all other Bilderberg attendees, these individuals have agreed to remain silent about the meetings, in spite of their responsibilities as high-ranking members of the national and international media.

"Guests of the Bilderberg Society are bound by the same rules as members of the Bilderberg Society -- not to write about the proceedings," conservative columnist William F. Buckley wrote six months after attending the Bilderberg's 1975 meeting.

Some of the Bilderberg's past "guests" from the corporate media include:

News Corporation director Andrew Knight;

Reuters CEO Peter Job;

Henry Anatole Grunwald, former editor-in-chief of Time and Council on Foreign Relations member;

Mortimer B. Zuckerman, chairman and editor-in-chief of U.S. News and World Report, New York Daily News, and Atlantic Monthly, also a Council on Foreign Relations member;

Robert L. Bartley, vice president of the Wall Street Journal and member of both the Council on Foreign Relations and the Trilateral Commission;

Peter Robert Kann, Chairman and CEO of Dow Jones and Company, and member of the Council on Foreign Relations;

Katharine Graham, owner and chairwoman of the executive committee of the Washington Post, also a member of both the Council on Foreign Relations and the Trilateral Commission;

Jim Hoagland, associate editor, of the Washington Post;

New York Times editor and Council on Foreign Relations member Arthur Sulzberger;

Former Newsweek editor Osborn Eliot;

London Observer editor Will Hutton;

Canadian press baron Conrad Black;

Peter Jennings, anchor and senior editor of ABC's World News Tonight;

Lesley R. Stahl, CBS national affairs correspondent;

WETA-TV president and CEO Sharon Percy Rockefeller;

William F. Buckley, Jr., editor-in-chief of the National Review, host of PBS's Firing Line and Council on Foreign Relations member;

Prominent political columnists Joseph Kraft, James Reston, Joseph Harsch, George Will, and Flora Lewis;

Donald C. Cook, former European diplomatic correspondent for the Los Angeles Times and Council on Foreign Relations member;

Albert J. Wohlstetter, Wall Street Journal correspondent and Council on Foreign Relations member;

Thomas L. Friedman, New York Times columnist and member of both the Council on Foreign Relations and the Trilateral Commission;

New York Times book critic Richard Bernstein;

Hedley Donovan, Henry Grunwald, and Ralph Davidson of Time;

Joseph C. Harsch, former NBC commentator and Council on Foreign Relations member;

Bill Moyers, executive director of Public Affairs TV and former Director of the Council on Foreign Relations;

Gerald Piel, former chairman of Scientific American and Council on Foreign Relations member;

William Kristol, editor and publisher of the British Weekly Standard magazine;

Toger Seidenfaden, editor in chief of Denmark's Politiken A/S.

Journalists and newspeople outside the Bilderberg's elite inner circle rarely pay much attention to the Group's activities, usually because they are unaware of them. In recent years, citizen media activists have had a small measure of success in getting the local media to cover Bilderberg meetings when they occur. These reports have little impact in the national and international media, but thanks to the Internet, detailed information from coverage by local and regional newspapers is now available to the public worldwide. Without this information, the report you are now reading could not have been written.

Although underground information activists have managed to pierce the local media bubbles and gather useful information about the Bilderberg's meetings, scrutiny of the Group in the establishment press is still verboten.

For example, there is the case of C. Gordon Tether, who for years wrote the prestigious and influential column "Lombard" for the London Financial Times. In his May 6, 1975 column, Tether wrote: "If the Bilderberg Group is not a conspiracy of some sort, it is conducted in such a way as to give a remarkably good imitation of one."

This would be Tether's last reference to the Bilderberg. He continued to write articles mentioning the Group, but editorial management barred every single one of them from publication. After battling this censorship for two years, Tether was finally dismissed by the Financial Times. It may be more than a mere coincidence that Max Henry Fisher, the Financial Times editor who quashed Tether's Bilderberg reports, was a member of the Trilateral Commission.

Freelance journalist Campbell Thomas also saw the ugly side of Bilderberg secrecy when he attempted to cover the 1998 conference for the Daily Mail. Thomas is a reporter with eight years' experience, and he happens to be a special constable as well. Like other journalists at the conference, Thomas remained outside the police security ring surrounding the Turnberry Hotel.

Hoping to get neighbors' reactions to the conference, Thomas entered a block of flats through an open door about 500 yards away. At the first door he knocked on, the young woman who answered informed Thomas that he was in the hotel's staff quarters, and that he should not be there. He left immediately.

A short while later, two Strathclyde Police officers approached Thomas and told him that he was being detained. Even though Thomas showed the policemen his special constable warrant card, he was handcuffed and kept in custody for eight hours. "I was treated in an appallingly heavy-handed way, like a common criminal," Thomas told the UK Press Gazette. "The holding cell I was put in was in a disgusting state, with excrement on every wall, and I was in that cell for the best part of five hours."

Thomas was then questioned and charged with a breach of the peace for putting the young woman he spoke to in a "state of fear and alarm," according to the UK Press Gazette. "I wasn't allowed to speak to my wife," Thomas said. "They took my shoes, my belt, my glasses, even the wedding ring off my finger. The whole thing was ridiculous."

Although Scottish prosecutors declined to proceed with the charge against Thomas, the event left him shaken and angry, and he has sought the advice of his union, the Chartered Institute of Journalists. CIoJ secretary Chris Underwood agreed that Thomas received "scandalous treatment," and said that the institute would back any action that Thomas decided to take.

Jim Bogusz reported similar harassment from the Strathclyde Police while gathering information on the Bilderberg's 1998 conference for his web site. Bogusz, who stood as a Referendum Party Candidate during the 1997 General Election, wrote:

"Security at Turnberry was very tight. Even though I had actually driven into the Police Compound informing them that I was there to register my protest and identifying myself, I was still later apprehended by two armed guards who requested my identification and personal details again. I expressed my concern at the extent of the security in view of the fact that police forces are allegedly under-funded. They refused to give details of how the security was being funded. I was pursued by four police motorcyclists when I went to the local Post Office to buy a newspaper and refreshment."

Bogusz attempted to obtain information from police headquarters on the source and amount of funding for the massive security effort. "They have replied saying that they cannot reveal any details about the funding of the security at Turnberry," Bogusz reported. "I challenged them that as a force which is accountable to the Public they are duty bound to reveal what resources are deployed on their activities.... It is very clear that we are having information unjustly withheld from us and that we must continue to insist on the disclosure of information which reveals in full the dealings of our Police Forces and our Elected Representatives.

The Strathclyde Police telephone number is 0141-532-2658.

The rock-hard wall of secrecy which encloses Bilderberg gatherings is more than an impediment to public knowledge; it is symbolic of the Group's aloof elitism towards the "great unwashed." We are simply not meant to be privy to their discussions. Those who cross the threshold get their knuckles sharply rapped. Like the Group's secrecy policies, the harassment and arrest of reporters who attempt to cover Bilderberg meetings raises justified suspicions about the organization's hidden discussions.

The Elite

According to founder Prince Bernhard, each Bilderberg attendee is "magically stripped of his office" upon entering the meeting, becoming "a simple citizen of his country for the duration of the conference."

When these representatives of the Western establishment leave a Bilderberg meeting, however, they carry the Group's consensus with them. The high-powered Bilderberg debates are intended to build unity by resolving differences, and therefore certainly have a significant influence on attendees.

One also must note a significant overlap between the Bilderberg Group and other elitist think-tanks. Many members of the Group are also members of the Council on Foreign Relations, the Trilateral Commission, and other secretive supra-national planning forums. Topics on the Bilderberg's agenda have been smoothly integrated into discussions at G-8 meetings, at the World Economic Forum's annual conference in Davos, Switzerland, and at other global policy venues. The seeds of consensus from these various meetings are then carried home to national governments and corporate boardrooms.

The Bilderberg's advisory committee includes luminaries such as Chase-Manhattan chairman David Rockefeller; Henry Kissinger and Vernon E. Jordan, Jr., are listed among the Group's steering committee. Past attendees include President Clinton (who attended in 1991 just before entering the scene as a possible White House contender), World Bank president James Wolfensohn, U.S. Secretary of Defense William Perry, International Monetary Fund managing director Stanley Fischer, and Ford Motor Company president Alexander Trotman, to name just a few participants.

(See the 1998 Bilderberg attendee list and the "Media Blackout" section of this report for more info on the participants.)

Because Bilderberg debates are held in total secrecy, there is no way to definitively gauge how much impact these deliberations have on the participants' actions. While the Bilderberg portrays itself as a think-tank for perpetuating free democratic institutions, the Group's complete removal from any democratic process contradicts its purported motivations.

Although occasional leaks occur, Bilderberg members generally do their part to preserve the shroud of secrecy surrounding the Group's activities. When questioned, Bilderbergers offer vague responses with only the most basic and mundane details of their meetings.

A search of the British House of Parliament's "Commons Written Answers" revealed an interesting recent example of how Bilderberg attendees protect the Group's secrecy. On July 10, 1998, Conservative Party member Christopher Gill inquired: "To ask the Secretary of State for Defense what mode of transport he used to attend the recent Bilderberg meeting at Turnberry; and what was the cost to public funds." [46988]

Defense Secretary George Robertson responded: "I flew to Scotland on Friday 14 May in an aircraft of the RAF Communications Fleet, accompanied by the Secretary General of NATO, Snr. Solana. I left the following day in an Army helicopter for a further official engagement. The estimated value of the use of Departmental assets for these flights is £3,840."

On July 20, Liberal Democrat Party member Paul Keetch dug deeper into the matter, inquiring, "To ask the Secretary of State for Defense if he will make a statement on his attendance at the Bilderberg Conference in Ayrshire on 14 and 15 May." [49581]

Robertson offered little in his response: "I attended part of the Bilderberg Conference in Ayrshire last May to contribute to one of the discussions relevant to my Ministerial responsibilities."

Gill pressed the matter further on July 23, querying: "To ask the Secretary of State for Defense... if he will list the main topics discussed at the meeting and place copies of (a) the agenda and (b) the minutes of the meeting in the Library." [51550]

Robertson replied flatly: "I have no Ministerial responsibility for the agenda or production of a record of the Bilderberg meeting which I attended in May this year."

And there you have it. With no compelling level of public accountability, Robertson had no duty to elaborate. After all, Bilderberg attendees are "magically stripped of their office," as Prince Bernhard said, upon entering the meetings. This loophole allows attendees to deflect public scrutiny. It is also the quintessential example of how elite groups such as the Bilderberg deliberately and arrogantly elevate themselves beyond the reach of public scrutiny.

It is quite natural that such a secretive modus operandi would raise ominous clouds of suspicion among the Group's critics. As long as the actions of individual Bilderberg attendees have an impact on key issues of public policy, the public has a right to know how much influence this secretive organization actually exerts.

Take, for example, Kenneth W. Dam, an expert in American and foreign law at the University of Chicago Law School who has written extensively on international trade treaties such as GATT. Dam was the chairman of a private National Research Council committee appointed in 1994 to study national cryptographic policy. In 1996, Dam's committee issued a key report in the debate over cryptography, titled "Cryptography's Role in Securing the Information Society" (also known by its acronym, CRISIS). The report spurred significant shifts in Clinton administration policy. (Not long after the report was released, President Clinton signed Executive Order 13010, the notorious "Critical Infrastructure Protection" directive.) The report also drew a great deal of attention in the media.

The NRC report states in its introduction: "For most of history, cryptography -- the art and science of secret writing -- has belonged to governments concerned about protecting their own secrets and about asserting their prerogatives for access to information relevant to national security and public safety."

The report goes on to state: "In pursuing this study, the committee has adopted the position that some secrets are still legitimate in today's global environment, but that its role is to illuminate as much as possible without compromising those legitimate interests. Thus, the committee has tried to act as a surrogate for well-intentioned and well-meaning people who fear that the worst is hiding behind the wall of secrecy..."

What does all this have to do with the Bilderberg? Well, it just so happens that Kenneth Dam is a national representative of the Bilderberg Group, who attended the 1995, 1996 and 1997 meetings.

Now, before your heart stops beating, it should be noted that the report was well-received by many because of its fairly critical evaluation of key escrow encryption as proposed by the Clinton Administration. The report also advocated the widespread adoption of 56-bit DES encryption.

Dam's NRC committee "believed and stated that key escrow is a promising technology," but agreed with critics that key escrow was presently too vulnerable to safely implement. Therefore, Dam wrote in a University of Chicago Law School Paper, "we should proceed with all due caution and prudence in the development of key escrow mechanisms."

The conclusions reached by Dam's private NRC committee were downright enlightened compared to the Clinton administration's proposed policy at the time, which included the dreaded Clipper Chip. However, the NRC committee's recommendations were not exactly a ringing endorsement of the citizen's rights in the information era. The committee concluded that although the concerns of civil libertarians were legitimate, the concerns of law enforcement and intelligence agencies were equally legitimate.

Perhaps it is a flawed or naive assumption to think that the rights of living citizens in a democratic government supersede the concerns of global trade and the National Security establishment. Yet one might argue that when the rights of the citizenry are compromised, national security is also compromised, if power is truly derived from the governed.

Regardless, Dam has, as a matter of record, influenced national debate over encryption in the United States, and he is also a key member of the Bilderberg. Those outside the Group's closed circle have no way to determine the exact significance of this connection. We can merely stab in the dark for clues. For instance, Dam comments rather cynically on the ineffectiveness of public committees, asserting that private committees such as his NRC group are more effective at producing realistic policy recommendations:

Surely there was not a single member who came out of that process with exactly the same views he came in with. In my view, committees cannot make convincing driving recommendations that will command respect if they merely meet to paper over their entering differences. Unfortunately, that is what happens in most public committees and study groups, and the result is, as Churchill put it, "a pudding."

("The Role of Private Groups in Public Policy: Cryptography and the National Research Council," by Kenneth W. Dam.)

Do we hear an echo of Dam's experiences with the Bilderberg in this statement? With no public access to Bilderberg deliberations, we have no way to be certain. Yet citizens' access to robust, secure encryption is a crucial issue in the information economy. It cuts deep to the core of individual autonomy in a technological society. Our level of control over our own personal data could easily become a litmus test for freedom in the 21st century. The Bilderberg has no right to covertly influence U.S. cryptography policy in any way, and if it is capable of doing so, we definitely have a right to know about it. If the Bilderberg network can exert such influence in total secrecy, then it is, quite literally, acting in the capacity of a "shadow world government."

Ironically, Dam touches on the issue of secret debates and restricted information in "The Role of Private Groups in Public Policy":

"In my view, the intelligence community delivered on its promise to tell us everything that was in any way relevant to our inquiry.... We concluded that we were able to say, based on this experience with the intelligence community, that it was not necessary to have access to classified information in order to make a judgment about the proper disposition of the public policy issues.... This conclusion lifted the fog that had obscured public discussion because, so often, the impression was left with outsiders that they were being told by government officials that "if you knew what we know you would agree with us."

New World Order for the people

The Bilderberg's 1998 meeting was held alongside the G8 summit from May 15-17 in Birmingham, England. Immediately afterwards, the World Trade Organization hosted its 50th anniversary celebrations in Geneva from May 18-20.

While the elite celebrated their domination of the world economy, an estimated 5,000 demonstrators took to the streets in Geneva to peacefully protest a free trade system which they blamed for increasing global poverty and financial instability. The demonstrators equated the cause of these problems with the WTO's efforts to lower trade barriers and usher in the exploitative free markets of the New World Order.

Following the march, enraged youths burned cars and broke store windows. According to police and eyewitnesses, these youths were "casseurs," or "smashers" -- agents provocateur who used the peaceful march as an excuse to go on a violent rampage. Masked youths reportedly hurled stones at cars and restaurants, at one point overturning a limousine belonging to a WTO envoy. After the demonstrators dispersed, these "casseurs" continued their rampage throughout the city, smashing more storefronts, looting a supermarket and hurling Molotov cocktails.

Police responded with a tear gas assault and tightened a barricade-and-barbed-wire blockade around Geneva's international sites, which would be visited by various world leaders the following week. Police in full riot gear stood ready to quell any further insurrections.

Meanwhile, in Prague, Czech Republic, a demonstration turned ugly which started out as a protest against the impact of multinational corporations on the environment. An estimated 2,000 radical youths took part in "Global Street Party 98." Many turned to violence to express their dissent, overturning a police car, throwing stones into two fast-food restaurants, and injuring 22 of the riot police called in to disperse the crowd.

Obviously, just because the global elite is shoving the New World Order down our throats doesn't mean we have to like it. The policies of the World Bank and the World Trade Organization are causing real harm to real people. It is not the elite who bear the burdens of globalization; those at the bottom of the pyramid carry its weight. "Informal" forums such as the Bilderberg Group may not literally decide and implement policy, but the ideas test-marketed at the Bilderberg are often sold wholesale to international organs which do create and implement policy.

"With such an array of the wealthy and powerful in the same place, these issues could be dealt with and decisions made that would bring hope and life to millions of poverty-stricken and dying people the world over," writes Bilderberg critic Tony Gosling, a volunteer land rights worker and former BBC Radio reporter. "But instead this time they were believed to be discussing ways to increase the groups secrecy, possibly by changing its name; fast tracking austerity measures and EMU; and extending the influence of the transnational corporations and banks over Western politicians."

"The unhappy result," Gosling writes, "is a picture of Western democracy subverted, with decision makers getting together not for reasons important to ordinary people -- social justice, common interest, and quality of life -- but to strengthen economic austerity and bring even more private gain for the world's political and corporate elite. Bilderbergers talk openly of centralizing power in their own interests, which leaves the man in the street ever further away from controlling his own destiny.

"So what vision, if any, is being pursued? We all have a right, indeed in an age of mass-starvation and with the continued threat of global destruction, a need to know."

But what is the best way to assert the rights of the world's citizenry in the New World Order? Among critics of global neo-colonialism, there is an ongoing debate over the actual significance of groups like the Bilderberg in the grand scheme of things.

Peoples Global Action Secretariat Sergio Hernandez recently wrote, "If international capitalism would exist only because of the Trilateral Commission, all what you would need would be applying the "final solution" to the Rockefellers, Rothschilds and similar capitalists (funny enough, many of them Jew or Mason) and that would be all. Unfortunately things are not so easy, as we know, but anti-corporate-rule activism often seems to convey this message.... It is neither the Bilderberg nor the Trilaterals that can impose patents on life almost all over the world." (Hernandez stated that his personal opinions do not speak for the opinions of Peoples Global Action.)

Tony Gosling, who views secretive elite groups as a powerful forces in global politics, noted, "Nationalism is certainly not an alternative, but it is only one of the voices that criticize the world elites. Nationalism is equally narrow minded as globalization. International solidarity around a charter of human and environmental rights -- such as access to culture through radio and TV, and the right to land -- seems like a common sense way forward."

Norio Hayakawa, webmaster of the online magazine Groomwatch and outspoken critic of the Bilderberg and other elitist groups, made a lot of sense in a recent Internet post: "We can turn things around by learning to fight smart using the system our forefathers gave us that has held us for so long. Violence is not the answer: unity, dedication and commitment are our weapons."

Well said, Norio. Our own government has not completely slipped out of our grasp, and people are starting to figure it out. In 1997, bipartisan protectionist forces in Congress scored a major victory by denying President Clinton's request for "fast-track authority" to negotiate global trade agreements. Resistance is still possible. But progress is a neglected issue.

The New World Order is happening; nothing will stop it at this point. But we can still influence it. There is nothing to stop us from creating a "Bilderberg for the People" to address the issues that the global elite ignore. We can still assert our rights, and expand them in ways we may never have conceived of before. And while the future may at times seem uncertain, just think of how boring it would be if you already knew how it would all turn out. We've got to at least give the global puppetmasters a run for their money, right?

Origins

After World War II, the east/west schism between the forces of communism and capitalism solidified into the Cold War. According to a report entered into the Congressional Record by Bilderberg attendee Senator Jacob Javits in 1964, "The countries of the Western World felt the need for closer collaboration to protect their moral and ethical values, their democratic institutions, and their independence against the growing Communist threat."

This "collaboration" would soon focus on one key objective: to ensure that the United States, Canada and Western Europe maintained oligarchic control of a global system of export-based capitalism.

According to Bilderberg founder Prince Bernhard:

"If we could all agree beforehand in principle it would result, without doubt, not in Utopia, but in an extremely strong and healthy Europe. This in turn would bring the United States into the economic community. It would encourage a great deal of free trade throughout the world.

"Now, the more free trade you have the more difficult you will make it for the new countries of Africa and Asia to set up an autarchy and live in economic isolation, to adopt trade barriers and quotas which after a hundred years or more we are finding out don't pay. From sheer necessity these people will have to join in free trade. And once you get that you can help an underdeveloped county much more easily than if there are a hundred and fifty thousand restrictions. Also it would be easier for them -- their national pride -- to accept help. That to my mind is the best possible guaranty against Communist influence."

(Alden Hatch, H. R. H. Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands: An Authorized Biography, G. G. Harrap & Co. [London], 1962.)

The Bilderberg Group was actually the brainchild of Joseph Retinger, an American whose high-profile career brought him into contact with many high-ranking military and political leaders worldwide. Retinger had a dream: to unite the world in peace -- a peace brokered by powerful supra-national organizations which he believed would be less susceptible to the to the short-term ideological whims of national governments.

Economics were a secondary matter, as far as Retinger was concerned. Retinger believed that multinational organizations could create and enforce unity between nations by dictating and enforcing consistent and effective economic and military policies.

In his Congressional Record report, Senator Javits wrote: "In 1952 [Retinger] approached H.R.H. Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands with the suggestion of informal and unofficial meetings to discuss the problems facing the Atlantic community. Others in Europe wholeheartedly supported the idea, and proposals were submitted to American friends to join in the undertaking. A number of Americans, including C.D. Jackson, the late General Walter Bedell Smith, and the late John Coleman, agreed to cooperate."

(C.D. Jackson was a prominent member of the Council on Foreign Relations, another secretive think-tank whose members are drawn from the American political and economic elite. Like the Bilderberg Group, the CFR meets behind closed doors, and although many working journalists fill the group's ranks, deliberations and records are kept secret from the public. At the time of the Bilderberg's founding, General Smith was director of the CIA.)

Once Retinger had successfully drummed up a strong showing of interest, the first meeting was organized under Prince Bernhard's aegis. According to Senator Javits' Congressional Record report, "The first meeting that brought Americans and Europeans together took place under the chairmanship of Prince Bernhard at the Bilderberg Hotel in Oosterbeek, Holland, from May 29 to May 31, 1954. Ever since, the meetings have been called Bilderberg meetings."

According to Senator Javits, who attended the Bilderberg's 1964 meeting in Williamsburg, Virginia, "Bilderberg meetings are held at irregular intervals but have taken place once or twice a year since 1954. All the early conferences were held in Europe, but a meeting is now held on this side of the Atlantic every few years to provide a convenient opportunity for American and Canadian participants to attend."

Bilderberg attendees represent the elite establishment of every Western nation: bankers, industrialists, politicians, CEOs of transnational corporations, European monarchs, chancellors, presidents, prime ministers, key ambassadors, ministers of finance, secretaries of state, representatives of the World Bank, the World Trade Organization and the International Monetary Fund, media executives, and military leaders. Each meeting typically consists of 120 delegates. Approximately two thirds of the attendees are from Europe, and the rest come from North America.

Bilderberg debates go unreported, and any consensus reached is unknown to those outside the Group. Records of the meetings are reportedly kept, but are held in secret as "strictly confidential." Furthermore, according to Alden Hatch's book H. R. H. Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands: An Authorized Biography, there is an "unwritten rule that anybody who has ever been to a Bilderberg Conference should be able to feel that he can, in a private capacity, call on any former member he has met. To this end a list of names and addresses is maintained to which all participants have access. This makes possible an expanding continuation of association for people who might not otherwise have met."

Security is always extremely tight at Bilderberg meetings. According to H. R. H. Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands, at the first meeting in 1954:

There was absolutely no publicity. The hotel was ringed by security guards, so that not a single journalist got within a mile of the place. The participants were pledged not to repeat publicly what was said in the discussions. Every person present -- Prime Ministers, Foreign Ministers, leaders of political parties, heads of great banks and industrial companies, and representatives of such international organizations as the European Coal and Steel Community, as well as academicians -- was magically stripped of his office as he entered the door, and became a simple citizen of his country for the duration of the conference. Thus everybody could and did say what he really thought without fear of international, political, or financial repercussions.

Thus the Bilderberg Group was born in secrecy. And secrecy breeds suspicion. If the Bilderberg's purposes are truly benevolent, the Group could stand to be a little more open about its activities. It is little surprise that people often react with "frothing conspiracy theories" to the Bilderberg's general attitude of aloof secrecy, protected by armed guards.

Puppeters

In its curt public statements, the Bilderberg attempts to present itself as an informal forum intended to foster "better understanding of the forces and trends affecting Western nations."

Charles Muller, an administrator of American Friends of the Bilderberg, Incorporated, wrote to author Robert Eringer, "Bilderberg is a high-ranking and flexible international forum in which opposing viewpoints can be brought closer together and mutual understanding furthered."

Sounds harmless enough. Bilderberg proponents assert that the Group has no actual governing power of its own, and therefore is incapable of directly influencing global events. In the real world, however, such assertions are laughable. Even its members concede that Bilderberg debates do have a global impact on political, economic and military policies.

"No policy is made here; it is all talk, some of it banal and platitudinous," said London Observer editor Will Hutton, who attended the 1997 Bilderberg meeting. "But the consensus established is the backdrop against which policy is made worldwide."

These policies are often profound developments on the global political and economic scene. Bilderberg attendee Jack Sheinkman, chairman of the Amalgamated Bank in the United States, told The Scotsman, "in some cases [Bilderberg] discussions do have an impact.... The idea of a common European currency was discussed before it became policy, as did the establishment of U.S.-China diplomatic relations before Richard Nixon became involved."

According to H. R. H. Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands: An Authorized Biography:

When asked for an example of a Bilderberg accomplishment [former U.S. ambassador to West Germany] George McGhee said, "I believe you could say the Treaty of Rome, which brought the Common Market into being, was nurtured at these meetings and aided by the main stream of our discussions there. Prince Bernhard is a great catalyst."

Critics have also charged that the Bilderberg laid the foundations for a European "Round Table" group of 45 business magnates which was established in 1981 to influence events in the European Union.

Retired academic and Bilderberg researcher Andrew Lockhart Walker told The Scotsman, "Bilderberg did all the groundwork for the group which is running Europe behind the scenes. They've had a backroom boy role for a very long time."

But if the Bilderberg is able to harness dramatic shifts in global politics and economics, one would expect to hear some mention of the Group in the media. The World Economic Forum at Davos, for instance, receives extensive media coverage every year. So why the Bilderberg blackout?

The Bilderbergs, Council on Foreign Relations, and Trilateral Commission

From: http://www.4rie.com/

The brief descriptions of the major Elite organizations, the Bilderbergs (BB), Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), and Trilateral Commission (TC), were intended to be brief. For more details, refer to my companion book, They Don’t Dare Let Us Tell the People (soon to be released). The fundamental differences between these three Elite secret organizations are:

1. The BB members are largely from Western Europe, Turkey, Greece, the Scandinavian countries, the US, and Canada.

2. The CFR members were originally from the New York City area, but later expanded to include Washington, DC, and then the rest of the US.

3. The TC members come from all the same above areas, but in this case the Japanese were included because of their dominance of the banking industry. (The largest banks in the world are in Japan.)

4. The BB’s are the most secretive of the three. When they meet, they clear out all the guests, and employees in the buildings in which they are to meet, they completely debug all the rooms, bring in their own cooks, waiters, housekeepers, heavily armed security guards, etc., and do not allow "outsiders" anywhere near the meeting place just before, during, and immediately after they meet. In Recent meetings, the security forces were told to "shoot to kill", if anyone tried to get near, or to break into their meetings. They claim that there are no written records taken of their discussions, but "The American Free Press" (formerly "The Spotlight") has occasionally acquired very detailed documents that prove otherwise. The attendees are required to maintain complete and absolute secrecy regarding and after these deliberations. Liberty Lobby’s crack investigative reporters on "The American Free Press" have positioned a mole within the BB that somehow acquires a copy of the invitation list, and often a copy of the agenda, but have never penetrated the actual meetings (to date). Each time that they have met on US soil, the meetings were held on Rockefeller owned property.

The object of the formation of these organizations is to enlist key political and economic leaders around the world, in order to gain their assistance in dominating the entire world.

The other differences, and similarities are covered in the following brief descriptions:

Bilderbergs Conspiracy (BB)

From: http://www.4rie.com/

John J. McCloy (former Chairman of the CFR, and Chairman of Chase Manhattan Bank) used his position as coordinator of information for the US government to build the framework of what was to become the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), created in 1941-1942 era, headed by Bill Donovan. During 1947, the OSS was rolled into a new group called the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) by the 1947 National Security Act, which made the activities of the CIA immune from all civil, and criminal laws. In 1950 General Walter Bedel Smith became Director of the CIA. The CIA helped organize, and sponsored the formation, and operation of the Bilderberg Conferences. There is little doubt that the CIA sponsored the formation of the Bilderbergs, and continue to do so, to this day.

Kai Bird’s excellent account in "The Chairman, John J. McCoy, The Making of the American Establishment", states:

"In late 1952, Retinger went to America to try the idea out on his American contacts. Among others, he saw such old friends as Averell Harriman, David Rockefeller, and Bedel Smith, then director of the CIA. After Retinger explained his proposal, Smith said, ‘Why the hell didn’t you come to me in the first place?’ He quickly referred Retinger to C. D. Jackson, who was about to become Eisenhower’s special assistant for psychological warfare. It took a while for Jackson to organize the American wing of the group, but finally, in May 1954, the first conference was held in the Hotel de Bilderberg, a secluded hotel in Holland, near the German border. Prince Bernhard, and Retinger drew up the list of invitees from the European countries, while Jackson controlled the American list."

Prince Bernhard, of The Netherlands, became the first Chairman, and served in this post until scandal forced him to resign in 1974. Dr. Retinger became the first Secretary, and remained so until his death.

Liberty Lobby, Inc., 300 Independence Ave., SE, Washington, DC 20003, publishes a weekly newspaper titled "The American Free Press". At my request, they sent me a reprint of a summary of Bilderberg information, titled Spotlight on the Bilderbergers, Irresponsible Power, published mid-June, 1975. Page 6 of this document states:

"The Congressional Record - US Senate, April 11, 1964, states: (Speaking) - Mr. (Jacob) Javits - Mr. President, the 13th in a series of Bilderberg meetings on international affairs, in which I participated, was held in Williamsburg, VA, on March 20, 21, and 22. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record a background paper entitled ‘The Bilderberg Meetings.’

The Bilderberg Meetings

The idea of the Bilderberg meetings originated in the early fifties. Changes had taken place on the international politician and economic scene after World War II. The countries of the Western World felt the need for closer collaboration to protect their moral and ethical values, their democratic institutions, and their independence against the growing Communist threat. The Marshall plan and NATO were examples of collective efforts of Western countries to join hands in economic and military matters after World War II. In the early 1950’s, a number of people on both sides of the Atlantic sought a means of bringing together leading citizens, not necessarily connected with government, for informal discussions of problems facing the Atlantic community. Such meetings, they felt, would create a better understanding of the forces, and trends affecting Western nations, in particular. They believed that direct exchanges could help to clear up differences, and misunderstandings that might weaken the West.

One of the men who saw the need for such discussions was the late (Dr.) Joseph H. (Heironymus) Retinger (as a matter of interest, the name Heironymus is literally translated to be "MEMBER OF THE OCCULT"). In 1952, he approached His Royal Highness, Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands, with the suggestion of informal and unofficial meetings to discuss the problems facing the Atlantic community. Others in Europe wholeheartedly supported the idea, and proposals were submitted to American friends to join in the undertaking. A number of Americans, including C. D. Jackson, the late General Walter Bedel Smith, and the late John Coleman, agreed to cooperate. (Very reliable information from a former CIA member now reveals that the CIA financed Dr. Retinger's efforts to convince Prince Bernhard to form this group that was later to be called the Bilderbergs. This is confirmed by the fact that General Walter Bedel Smith was the CIA director from 1950 to 1953, so, is it surprising that he would agree to join this group?)

The first meeting that brought Americans and Europeans together took place under the chairmanship of Prince Bernhard at the Bilderberg Hotel in Oosterbeek, Holland, from May 29 to May 31, 1954. Ever since, the meetings have been called Bilderberg meetings.

No Strict Rules of Procedure

From the outset, it was the intentions of the Bilderberg founders, and participants that no strict rules of procedure govern the meetings. Every effort was made to create a relaxed, informal atmosphere conducive to free, and frank discussions. Bilderberg is in no sense a policy-making body. No conclusions are reached. There is no voting, and no resolutions are passed. The meetings are off-the-record. Only the participants themselves may attend the meetings.

Participants

It was obvious from the first that the success of the meetings would depend primarily on the level of the participants. Leading figures from many fields - industry, labor, education, government, etc. - are invited, who, through their special knowledge or experience, can help to further Bilderberg objectives. Representatives of governments attend in a personal, and not an official capacity. An attempt is made to include participants representing many political parties, and points of view. American participation has included Members of Congress of both parties.

Over the years, Bilderberg participants have come from the NATO countries, Switzerland, Sweden, Austria, and Finland, and have included prominent individuals such as Dean Rusk, Christian A. Herter, Maurice Faure, Franz-Josef Strauss, Amitore Fanfani, Panayotis Pipinelis, Reginald Maudling, the late Hugh Gaitskell, Omer Becu, Guy Mollet, the late Michael Ross, Herman Abs, C. L. Sulzberger, Joseph Harsch, and T. M. Terkelsen. Individuals with international responsibilities have also participated, among them being Gen. Alfred Gruenther, Lord Ismay, Eugene Black, Gen. Lyman Lemnitzer, Paul-Henry Spaak, and the late Per Jacobsson. `

The Meetings

Bilderberg meetings are held at irregular intervals, but have taken place once or twice a year since 1954. All the early conferences were held in Europe, but a meeting is now held on this side of the Atlantic every few years to provide a convenient opportunity for American, and Canadian participants to attend."

The Spotlight reports that the Bilderberg meetings are highly secret, and are held at random times each year, and rarely at the same location, for security reasons. The responsibility for security for these meetings is in the hands of the government of the country in which the meetings are held. They must supply military security, secret service, national and local police, and private security personnel to protect the privacy and safety of these very powerful international Elite members who are not required to conform to regulations that private citizens are subject-to, such as customs searches, visa requirements, or public notice of their meetings. When they meet, no "outsiders" are allowed in or near the building. They bring their own cooks, waiters, telephone operators, housekeepers, and bodyguards.

The Bilderberg membership is made up of Kings, Queens, Princes, Chancellors, Prime Ministers, Presidents, Ambassadors, Secretaries of State, Wall Street investors, international bankers, news media executives, and wealthy industrialist. Their meetings are by "invitation only", and no "outsiders" in the news media are allowed, except by special invitation. However, the news media are always present at these meetings such as: Peter Jennings (BB, Anchor & Senior Editor of ABC News, World News Tonight), Joseph C. Harsch (BB, CFR, former Commentator for NBC, Inc.), Bill D. Moyers (BB, Executive Director of Public Affairs TV, Inc., former Director of the CFR), William F. Buckley, Jr. (BB, CFR, Editor-in-Chief of National Review, and host of PBS’s Firing Line), Gerald Piel (BB, CFR, former Chairman of Scientific America, Inc.), Henry Anatole Grunwald (BB, CFR, former Editor-in-Chief of Time, Inc.), Mortimer B. Zuckerman (BB, CFR, Chairman & Editor-in-Chief of the US News, and World Report, New York Daily News, and Atlantic Monthly), Robert L. Bartley (BB, CFR, TC, Vice President of the Wall Street Journal), Peter Robert Kann (BB, CFR, Chairman & CEO of Dow Jones & Company, and husband of Karen E. House, CFR), William Kristol (BB, Editor & Publisher of the new The Weekly Standard magazine), Donald (Don) C. Cook (BB, CFR, former European Diplomatic Correspondent for the Los Angeles Times), Robert Leroy Bartley (BB, CFR, TC, Vice President of the Wall Street Journal), Albert J. Wohlstetter (BB, CFR, writer for the Wall Street Journal), Thomas L. Friedman (BB, CFR, TC, Columnist for the New York Times), and the "Queen" of the Elite - (deceased) Katharine Graham (BB, CFR, TC, Owner, and Chairwoman of the Executive Committee of the Washington Post). The 1998 meeting included Leslie Stahl, of CBS’ 60 Minutes. Even though the media moguls attend these secret meetings, they do not file reports about the Elite Bilderberg activities during their meetings.

The security measures taken by the Bilderberg Conferences are clearly illustrated in an article appearing in The Spotlight, which stated:

EXCLUSIVE TO THE SPOTLIGHT

By James P. Tucker, JR.

Bilderberg is scheduled to meet June 3-6 (1999) at the Caesar Park Penha Longa in Sintra, Portugal. Sintra is a remote resort, about 40 miles from Lisbon. Information about the secret meeting was provided by an agent inside Bilderberg.

Of all the media in the world, only THE SPOTLIGHT, has tracked the Bilderbergers every year and reported on their secret meeting where vital questions and issues are decided which effect every person in the world. American and European financiers, manufacturers, media moguls and politicians meet at remote luxury resorts, allow only "loyal staff" to remain on the job, empty the establishment of all others, employ platoons of police, military and their own private security to seal themselves off. They have tried to keep the meetings secret for 45 years.

But this year following extensive SPOTLIGHT-generated publicity last year in Scotland, and earlier in Germany, Scandinavia, Georgia, and Canada, Bilderberg is taking more extreme steps, its agent confided.

Instead of closing down the Penha Longa to all outsiders one day before the meeting starts on June 2, Bilderberg has ordered the resort shut down a full 48 hours before the internationalist confab.

In addition, Bilderberg will pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to reimburse the Portuguese government for deploying military forces to guard their privacy and for helicopters to seek out intruders.

All Bilderberg participants, their staff members and resort employees will wear photo identification tags that look much like state drivers' licenses. They will have separate colors to identify the wearer as a participant, staff, or employee. A computer chip "fingerprint" will assure the identity of the card's wearer. ‘Any intruders are to manhandled-cuffed, jailed, or if resisting or fleeing, shot,’ the agent said.

Bilderbergers are greatly disturbed over the growing public knowledge of their control of the world and of resistance to their schemes for a global government as nationalism grows around the world.

Bilderberg was instrumental in tearing down Jean-Marie Le Pen, who founded France's National Front. The French-first party has stunned the Establishment by regularly capturing 15 percent of the vote in that nation.

Expecting recession, Bilderberg feared Le Pen and "nationalists" from other countries would interfere with their "free trade" goals as they fight to protect their domestic industries from exploitation by the global cabal.

Because Bilderberg shares common goals with the Trilateral Commission, the agenda that emerged in Washington (SPOTLIGHT, March 29, 1999) will be major topics in Portugal, too.

This includes a "Globalization summit" called for by Peter D. Sutherland, head of Goldman Sachs International. Sutherland attended the Bilderberg meeting in Scotland last May and is expected in Portugal.

Sutherland is expected to again call for "Supranational institutions to manage the global economy while denouncing nations that "cling tenaciously to their separate identities" while calling for "sharing sovereignty"

In a related topic, there could be renewed calls for the UN to be able to directly tax all people. In the past, Bilderberg has proposed a UN levy on International travel and on the oil at the wellhead, so all who travel or drive will be taxed.

SPOTLIGHT, VOLUME 24, No. 14, Page 3, April, 1999