Michael Hand of Nugan Hand found

[Peter Lemkin]

Nugan Hand: CIA Operation in Australia

[COLOR=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.54902)]Sep 2, 2014

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[COLOR=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.701961)]The following are excerpts from the book, Explosive Secrets of Covert CIA Companies, authored by Captain Rodney Stich

Nugan Hand: CIA Operation in Australia

A primary CIA money laundering operation in the Pacific area was Nugan Hand Bank, with headquarters in Sydney, Australia and branch offices throughout the Far East, Europe, and the United States. Nugan Hand Bank was incorporated in 1976 in the Cayman Islands, a popular money-laundering location.
Nugan Hand Bank was a replacement for the CIA's Mercantile Bank and Trust Company and Castle Bank & Trust, incorporated in Nassau, Bahamas. Nugan Hand had branch offices in Far East countries, laundering drug money from the Golden Triangle drug producing area.
Earlier, the IRS, unaware of the CIA connection, started to conduct an investigation of Castle Bank and Trust Company, which was then quickly halted, obviously by the CIA, which often operated outside the law.
Secondary functions for these covert CIA companies were arms sales and funding covert activities, such as undermining governments and funding assassination squads. Nugan Hand was comprised primarily of people with ties to the U.S. intelligence community. The primary partners were Francis Nugan, Michael Hand, and Maurice Bernard Houghton.
Vast amounts of money were hidden in assets and financial holdings throughout the world. Either to appear as a legitimate international investment operation, or to defraud people out of millions of dollars, Nugan Hand took deposits from individuals throughout the world. That money would be lost by these investors when the CIA's cover was blown.
When the cover for this CIA-related operation was blown, these funds were quickly moved to other CIA proprietaries, inflicting financial losses upon the investors and depositors. Many of the individuals putting money into the CIA's Nugan Hand Bank were military personnel, who eventually lost everything they deposited.
Exposing Fraud in CIA's Nugan Hand Bank
Nugan Hand's cover was blown on April 11, 1980, by a reporter for Target, a Hong Kong financial newsletter. This required the CIA to shut down the operation and destroy evidence of its CIA links. It was further exposed as a CIA operation in an Australian Government Report that explained why the CIA needed the large money moving capabilities of these covert cover operations.
A strained American and Australian relationship had existed since the 1970's when the government headed by Prime Minister Gough Whitman found that U.S. secret activities were taking place on bases in Australia. Although joint operations with Australia had been approved, those covert operations were a complete surprise to the government there.
Officials in the Labor Government were outraged upon learning that even their country's Foreign Ministry was unaware of these operations. One base was used as a key ground control station for satellites and an early warning system, code named Casino. It was used to serve as a link in the Defense Support Program against Russian ICBM Attack on the U.S., its sister station located in Colorado.
The station operated the Rhyolite spy satellite, used to monitor Russian and Chinese telemetry data used during missile tests, and other communication as well. The base includes a large transmission facility relaying data to intelligence centers in the United States.
Another Australian U.S. station was used to direct commands to nuclear submarines and naval groups in the western pacific. All this, plus the fact that Australia's government then learned that the CIA operations moved billions of dollars through its Nugan Hand Bank in Sydney to support clandestine operations world wide, including actions targeted against the Australian government itself, caused considerable anger toward the United States.
The Whitman government went public with much of this information, resulting in a stern warning from Washington against further CIA exposure. At the same time a spy working for TRW in California, whose job it was to monitor clandestine messages in what was known as the "Black Box," passed CIA secrets to the Russian KGB. This information showed how CIA funds were being used to influence labor unions in Australia against the Whitman Government.
Key names associated with Nugan Hand were Edwin Wilson, imprisoned later for selling plastic explosives to Libyas Muammar Qaddafi. Wilson was a CIA officer from the mid fifties to 1971, before he went covert through a cover known as the Navy Task Force 157.
According to the Australian Report, the task force was used in conjunction with Nugan Hand Bank, and along with other CIA agents supplied arms to Africa, including 3,000 weapons and 10 million rounds of ammunition. These were shipped from a U.S. Company in the United States to Task Force 157. It appeared that a spy ship might have been sold to Iran at about the same time. It was estimated that over 100 proprietary companies might have been tied to the Nugan Hand CIA operation.
Other CIA personnel included Theodore Shackley, second in command of all CIA covert activities. He was once the station chief in Laos during the Vietnam War and held key posts in Agency operations in Saigon before becoming the number two man at CIA headquarters in Langley.
Shackley had been involved in the covert actions against Cuba's Fidel Castro. They ranged from trying to hire the Mafia to assassinate the Cuban dictator to such extremes as plans to feed him altered chemicals that could cause his beard to fall out. Theodore Shackley had a reputation within the spy agency as a ruthless man who would go to extremes to accomplish his goals. While stationed in Saigon as CIA Chief, a Special Forces unit asked their CIA liaison officer what they should do with a double agent they discovered. Shackley ordered him killed, as he had done to an estimated 250 political prisoners in Laos. According to the Australian Report, Shackley was a key figure in the Nugan Hand operations.
Another CIA agent was Donald Beazley, who was president of Nugan Hand Banking Group International. He later became president of City Bank in Miami. Beazley, according to the Australian Report, played an important part in the purchase of London Capital Securities Ltd. a.k.a. Stonehouse Bank. All were tied to A.P.I. Distributors of Houston, Texas, and helped Wilson sell 20 tons of plastic explosives to Qaddafi. Thomas Clines was also tied to Shackley and was a highly ranked CIA veteran of over 30 years. Beazley purchased the London Bank for $300,000 in travelers checks bought by Bernard Maurice Houghton, a Nugan Hand executive in Australia and a veteran CIA agent.
Another figure Major General Richard Secord, later of Iran-Contra fame, having just left his post as Secretary to Casper Weinberger, introduced Houghton to Shackley and Clines. Houghton ran Nugan Hand operations in Saudi Arabia, collecting large deposits in cash that were converted to traveler's checks and taken out of the country. The Australian Report estimated it at approximately $10 million dollars. Some checks were later tied to the London Bank purchase.
The Australian report tied Nugan Hand Bank to Lt. Gen. Leroy Manor, Chief of the Pacific Command in the Philippines, and Edwin Black, a former high-ranking intelligence officer and assistant Army Chief of Staff. Both men served as Nugan Hand Bank Presidents. Gen. Black maintained ties with Bishop Baldwin Rewald Dilling*ham and Wong after the fall of Nugan Hand Bank. In addition Walter McDonald, former Deputy Director of the CIA, became a business consultant to Nugan Hand.
General Black, who with his ties to both Nugan Hand and Rewalds operation in Hawaii, was an officer in the OSS (Office of Strategic Services) forerunner of the CIA. He was chief aide to Allen Dulles, the CIA Director, under Presidents Eisenhower and Kennedy. He also worked closely with Richard Helms, who became CIA Director.
Australia's complaints that the U.S. Intelligence community refused to cooperate in their investigation fell on deaf ears. The Report also said the CIA lied repeatedly to them. Admiral Bobby Ray Inman, former Deputy Director of CIA, stated on at least two occasions that any additional investigation by Australia would result in exposure of "a range of dirty tricks against foreign governments."
Most interesting was the comparison between Frank Nugan and Ronald Rewald, both relatively unknowns who in a short period of time became recognized as international financial and banking experts. Neither had prior banking experience, both in their mid-thirties and both had strong family relationships. Frank Nugan claimed that over a billion dollars a year ran through his bank. He, like Rewald, was portrayed as a whiz kid of the business world. Michael Hand, Frank Nugan's business partner, had grown up in the poor side of the Bronx, recruited early and worked for the CIA on a contract basis. Rewald was also recruited and worked for the CIA early on as an agent before becoming disgruntled with the spy agency.
According to the Australian Report, Shackley and Hand had a longstanding relationship. The report finally concluded that it could not say why or who killed Frank Nugan. Michael Hand was smuggled out of Australia by CIA operatives after Nugan's death, and fled the country before he could answer any investigators questions.
CIA Proprietary
According to Victor Marchetti, a former CIA agent and author of The CIA and the Cult of Intelligence, there are basically three types of CIA operations. One, known as a Proprietary, a concern that has been designed by the CIA to provide some type of needed service. The proprietary was wholly owned by the CIA itself, but was disguised to appear to the public as a privately owned business.
The CIA hires, and can fire, the heads of proprietaries, although for all practical purposes the proprietary conducts its own financial affairs with a minimum of oversight from Langley. If a proprietary were in need of funds for some reason, such as expansion, it would request funds from the CIA. Therefore, a proprietary tends to take on a life of its own. Several have grown too big and too independent to be either controlled or dissolved by CIA headquarters. Nugan Hand, most likely was also a proprietary, although some might consider it an "independent".
CIA "Front"
A second kind of CIA operation, Marchetti pointed out, was a simple front. A front is an organization whose purported business is a sham and is kept in place solely to provide a cover for covert CIA activities and involved agents.
Independent Asset
The cover of the third kind, Marchetti explained, is literally an independent organization that is closely allied to the CIA, not only ideologically, but also with many former or present CIA people working for it or running it. The organization has mutual goals with the CIA. An example cited by Marchetti was Interarms Company, the World's largest private arms dealer. It was run mostly overseas. Nugan Hand may have been more of this third kind than a proprietary.
Proprietaries are dangerous because they are hard to control and relatively easy to expose. Proprietaries are all used to provide covers, to launder money, and to serve as "cut outs" for highly clandestine operations. This means a direct link to the CIA and a problem for "plausible deniabili*ty." A paper trail to CIA headquarters at Langley almost always remains, no matter how much is shredded or hidden away, or how many lies are told by the Agency or government officials.
Francis Nugan was one of the most visible players in the Nugan Hand operation. He was an alcoholic with a reputation for talking too much, a trait that threatened to expose the CIA's role in the operation. Assassins killed Nugan,[1] leaving his body in a car alongside a lonely road outside of Sydney, Australia. A bolt-action rifle was found alongside the body, and the scene was made to look like a suicide.
An unspent bullet remained in the firing chamber of the bolt-action rifle. For an unspent bullet to be in the chamber after firing the shot that was instantly fatal, someone, other than Nugan, had to manually operate the bolt handle. Nugan obviously did not do this. The bullet had killed Nugan instantly, blowing away much of his skull and scattering it throughout the car. There were no fingerprints on the gun, indicating that whoever fired the fatal bullet wiped the fingerprints from the rifle.
The only identification on Nugan's body was a calling card apparently overlooked by the killers, belonging to William Colby, former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, with a meeting date written on the back. Colby was legal counsel for Nugan Hand. He also had connections to the Wall Street law firm of Reid & Priest, suggesting that this firm was a front for the CIA or a CIA proprietary.
After Nugan's death, the CIA removed the funds from the various Nugan Hand offices and laundered them into other CIA operations. Misinformation commenced immediately, denying that the CIA had any connection to the rogue bank, despite the many intelligence agency officers in the operation.
Before Australian authorities started an investigation, Michael Hand disappeared, along with most of the Nugan Hand records. Although the media reported that Hand had disappeared, leaving no trace, two of my CIA sources had been in contact with him after he fled Australia. Hand secretly surfaced in Iran, followed by his participation in CIA Central America drug trafficking.
Hand disappeared as Australian authorities sought to question him about Nugan's death, the Nugan Hand Bank operation, and the disappearance of approximately one billion dollars from the bank. Hand first went to Thailand under CIA cover and then showed up in Florida and the Caribbean area. One of my deep-cover CIA contacts, Trenton Parker, told how he and Hand had worked together in the early 1980s. Parker's CIA faction was interested in discovering Hand's operation, and Parker met Hand in Jamaica on February 2, 1980. They then worked together on Operation Interlink and Operation Anacondor. Parker's CIA activities are detailed in my Defrauding America book.
Parker said that Hand and Vice President George Bush were in frequent contact after Bush became vice president, and while Australian authorities were searching for Hand. Parker stated that CIA Director William Casey frequently met with Hand in Panama in the early 1980s concerning arms sales and drug trafficking.
Parker stated that he and Hand took over one of the drug trafficking operations for the CIA in Central and South America. He said that Hand's experience in developing the Golden Triangle drug operations for the CIA made him useful in expanding the drug operations from Central and South America into the United States.
Like most CIA-related operations, Nugan Hand Bank relied upon a pattern of fraud and deception. Large amounts of currency were moved in and out of various countries, including Australia and the Golden Triangle areas.
Michael Hand was a Green Beret and a colonel in the U.S. Army, assigned to the CIA. Earlier, Hand was handling the CIA's drug business and laundered the money from the Golden Triangle area of Asia. In the 1960s, the CIA transferred Hand from the Golden Triangle assignment to Teheran, where he set up the secret police for the Shah of Iran. (I was an airline captain flying into and out of Iran, and residing in Iran, at approximately that same time, flying Muslim pilgrims to the holy cities of Mecca and Medina during the Hajj.)
The Nugan Hand affair received considerable media attention in Australia, but the mainstream media in the United States said virtually nothing about the CIA operation and its implications. Australian authorities conducted numerous investigations, but in their final report they whitewashed the Nugan Hand affair. The CIA had an ongoing relationship with Australia's Security Intelligence Organization (ASIO), which probably played a role in the cover-up of Nugan Hand.
One of Nugan Hand's CIA assets who suffered a fate similar to Nugan was John Fredericks; he and his bodyguard were killed (July 28, 1991) in Australia.
Staffed by the CIA
Most of the management personnel of Nugan Hand Bank were intelligence community personnel. When Nugan Hand shut down, most of them moved to other CIA operations. These players, with a long CIA and military intelligence background, moved into other covert activities.
Covert CIA Companies Staffed by Military and Other Insiders
Most covert CIA companies have been staffed at higher levels by former military and other government personnel, but mostly military. They are either retired personnel, or sheep-dipped from their prior positions. The various worldwide offices of Nugan Hand Bank had the following personnel:

• Adm. Earl Yates, chief of U.S. strategic planning for Asia and the Pacific. He was president of Nugan Hand Bank. Yates had been command*er of the aircraft carrier, John F. Kennedy. He retired (or was sheep-dipped), from the Navy in 1974 and became president of Nugan Hand Bank in 1977.
  
  
• Michael Jon Hand, CIA operative, former Green Beret, vice-chairman and part owner of Nugan Hand Bank.
  
  
• Gen. Edwin F. Black ran Nugan Hand's Hawaii office.
  
  
• Paul Helliwell was a CIA asset heavily involved in drug money laundering.
  
  
• Gen. Earle Cocke, Jr., ran the Nugan Hand Washington office and headed the American Legion.
  
  
• Wil*liam Colby, retired Director of CIA, was the lawyer for Nugan Hand Bank.
  
  
• Dale Holmgren headed flight services for several CIA airlines and ran Nugan Hand's Taiwan office.
  
  
• Robert Jantzen, CIA station chief in Thailand, was Nugan Hand's officer in Thailand.
  
  
• Gen. Leroy Manor, chief of staff for U.S. Pacific Com*mand, ran Nugan Hand's Philippine office.
  
  
• Walter Macdonald, former deputy director of CIA for economic research, was a consultant to Nugan Hand.
  
  
• Theodore G. Shackley, top clandestine officer at the CIA, had numerous dealings with Nugan Hand.
  
  
• Gordon (Billy) Young, CIA asset, represented Nugan Hand in the Golden Triangle drug zone of Southeast Asia.
  
  
• George Farris was a military intelli*gence specialist working in the Hong Kong office of Nugan Hand.
  
  
• Guy Pauker was an advisor to Henry Kissinger.
  
  
• Edwin Wilson, a CIA operative, had fre*quent dealings with Nugan Hand Bank.
  
  
• Thomas Clines, a CIA operative and deputy to Major General Richard Secord in the Iran-Contra arms network, had frequent dealings with Nugan Hand. After Nugan was killed, and before Australian authorities started investigating the bank, Clines rescued Houghton from Australia.
  
  Massive Cover-Up of the CIA Operation
  

Many people holding check-and-balance responsibilities covered up for the Nugan Hand scheme. These checks and balances included the oversight agencies in Australia; the Reserve Bank in Australia that had responsibilities over Nugan Hand; Citicorp, which traded securities with Nugan Hand; taxing authorities in Australia, who were familiar with Nugan Hand's operation; the accounting firm that certified the Nugan Hand records; U.S. Consul General in Australia who knew of the CIA operation; the Premier of Australia, who had offices adjacent to Nugan Hand; Irving Trust Company, the correspondent bank for Nugan Hand in the United States; Corporate Affairs Commission in Australia that stonewalled requests for information; prominent Australian lawyers who worked closely with Nugan Hand; Australian Department of Commerce, who had considerable information about Nugan Hand's activities; Australian intelligence agencies that worked with U.S. intelligence agencies, and who knew about the rogue operations, and others.
After Nugan's body was found, intense activities were initiated to destroy evidence linking Nugan Hand Bank to the CIA. Retired three-star U.S. General Leroy J. Manor (formerly chief of staff for all U.S. forces in Asia and the Pacific), who had been head of Nugan Hand's Philippine office, tried to have the wire services block the reporting of Nugan's death. Recently retired Rear Admiral Earl P. Yates (formerly chief of staff for strategic planning for U.S. forces in the Pacific and Asia) flew to Australia to direct the shredding of documents. Yates was president of Nugan Hand, and lived near CIA headquarters at Langley, Virginia. Michael Hand joined in the shredding. Maurice Houghton and his lawyer, Michael Moloney, also arrived. Hand threatened lower-level employees, stating if Maloney's orders to sanitize the files before the law arrived weren't followed, "terrible things would happen; your wives would be cut up and returned to you in bits and pieces." (Wall Street Journal, August 24, 1982.)
Two in a series of Wall Street Journal articles (August 25 and 26, 1982) described Nugan Hand Bank as a drug and arms-related operation, staffed by CIA and military personnel. The articles stated in part:
Nugan Hand bank was deeply involved in moving funds about the world for big international heroin dealers...U.S. servicemen are big losers in failure of Nugan Hand Bank.
Australia's Royal Commission on Drugs found so much evidence of drug and drug-money trafficking by the CIA operation that it recommended a separate Royal Commission be appointed just for the bank's operations. But Australia's intelligence agency, ASIO, blocked an investigation, reflecting the common practice of intelligence agencies protecting each other rather than their own country. U.S. officials stymied every attempt by Australian authorities to obtain information about Nugan Hand Bank.
During its investigation, the Royal Commission found that drugs were flown into a landing strip by former Air America pilot K.L. "Bud" King and Michael Hand. The strip was on a real estate development promoted by U.S. singer Pat Boone and financed by wealthy shipping magnate D.K. Ludwig. King, who also worked for the Boone-Ludwig project, whose testimony could have been very damaging to Nugan Hand and U.S. officials, died mysteriously in a fall.
Australian authorities connected Nugan Hand not only to drug and arms transactions, but also to contract murders, of which there were several associated with Nugan Hand's demise.
Australian lawyer John Aston and his law firm were found to represent Nugan Hand and various drug traffickers, and the law office was used as a drop point for money to be secretly deposited and moved by Nugan Hand.
The Australian investigations left no doubt that Nugan Hand management was heavily involved with drug dealers, including Khun Sa, the Golden Triangles biggest opium producer.
Pattern of Lies
One of the most pervasive traits of CIA-related companies is the lying by government officials, including those at the CIA, the State Department, the Defense Department, and elsewhere in government. Throughout these pages, in scandal after scandal, government officials "assured" the public that government officials were not involved. And the public swallows these denials, hook, line and sinker. U.S. officials "assured" Australia's prime minister, Malcolm Fraser, that the United States had no connections to Nugan Hand Bank. These "assurances," given routinely to Americans by their government, were, of course, lies. Vice President George Bush, while visiting Australia, also gave his assurances that the CIA wasn't involved with Nugan Hand Bank.
In Australia, the CIA worked secretly with ASIO to topple Australia's Labor government led by Prime Minister Gough Whitlam.
Hand's death, and the sudden publicity focused on Nugan Hand Bank, caused its liquidation in April 1980. With its demise, the CIA company concentrating on arms and drug sales and money laundering had to be replaced with another company. That company is described in following chapters.
Nugan Hand Bank and the Sultan of Brunei
Nugan Hand bank conducted extensive banking business for the Sultan of Brunei, who was one of the richest individuals in the world. In one instance, the Sultan of Brunei provided $10 million for the Enterprise subversion of Nicaragua. Oliver North, National Security Council staff member, gave the wrong account number in a Swiss bank and the $10 million ended up in someone else's bank account.
Among Firms Tied to Covert CIA Companies
The accounting firm of Price Waterhouse audited the books of Nugan Hand for several years, and gave it a clean bill of health, thereby covering up for the CIA activities. That same firm audited the books of other covert CIA companies, covering up for financial irregularities, and provided the same clean bill of health.
Citibank and Its Many Ties to Covert CIA Activities
Over the years as covert CIA operatives described their activities to me, several stated that they had ties with, or their superiors obtained for them positions with Citibank. Many years ago one of my first major CIA connections, Gunther Russbacher, described his placement with Citibank. More recently, a former FBI agent, Richard Taus,[2] described to me how military and covert operation officials provided him a position with Citibank after he left the Army and a after returning from a covert trip to Central America and before being hired by the FBI.
Filling Covert CIA Companies With Military Personnel
The CIA staffed many of its covert CIA companies with former military personnel. (Or military personnel sheep-dipped into the company position.) This was especially evident in the covert CIA companies described within these pages, starting with Nugan Hand Bank.
Far Eastern Economic Review had the headline, "A Former Admiral Commands Our Private Bank," and described the role played by Adm. Earl Yates. The article stated in part:
When Admiral Yates exchanged the gold stripes of an admiral for the pin stripes of a banker, he brought added strength to Nugan Hand International Private Bankers. He brought the experience of a man who administered the office that controls a powerful navy. He brought the executive experience of a man that controlled the careers of tens of thousands of men.
Another of the high military personnel with Nugan Hand was General Leroy J. Manor. (He had been involved with Marcos in negotiating a ten-year lease for the Clark Air Force Base in the Philippines. Manor was part of the team investigating the failed rescue of the 52 American hostages in Iran.)
General Edwin F. Black was another military officer who was sheep-dipped into covert CIA operations. Black headed the Nugan Hand office in Honolulu. He was also a key person in the Pacific Forum, a Honolulu-based organization in the 1970s.[3]
Gen. Black[4] was quoted in a series of articles appearing in the Wall Street Journal as being involved in the Nugan Hand Bank. He operated the Nugan Hand office in Honolulu, until the bank folded in 1980. As will be seen shortly, Black would then shift from the CIA's Nugan Hand Bank to another bank based in Honolulu that had branches in the same Far East locations as the former Nugan Hand Bank.
Nugan Hand Ties to Major Banking Figures in U.S.
The Washington, D.C. office of Nugan Hand was headed by former Brig. Gen. Erle Cocke, Jr., who, along with former Admiral Earl Yates, was listed in papers filed with the U.S. Secretary of the Treasury as the principal offices for Nugan Hand in the nation's capital. The purpose of the filing was to register the Washington, D.C. office of the Nugan Hand bank. In his position with Nugan Hand Bank, Cocke received a monthly salary and other perks. Cocke had an office in Washington, D.C., and Bernie Houghton used it for carrying out Nugan Hand business.
Cocke[5] also operated the public relations, lobbying, and consulting firm of Cocke and Phillips that had its offices in Washington, D.C.
It was believed that Cocke and Phillips International, of which Cocke and Gen. Eugene Phillips were the principals, was and is a covert off-the-books CIA company. That company had connections to Nugan Hand Bank and to another covert CIA company, Associated Traders Corporation.
A lawsuit filed in the late 1980s against Associated Traders Corporation caused CIA Director William Webster to seek a court order placing a secrecy lid on the case. Syndicated columnist Jack Anderson, in a series of articles, accused Associated Traders Corporation of various CIA activities, involving military weapon sales and money laundering. Cocke was alleged to be involved in that company.
Project Hammer and Brigadier General Cocke
Cocke was heavily involved with highly secret project called Project Hammer, a covert and complex money-moving operation involving banks throughout the world. In April 2000, shortly before he died of pancreatic cancer, Cooke gave a sworn deposition stating many facts about Project Hammer and his involvement in CIA and complex financial operations.
Cocke testified that Project Hammer was started by some unknown people in high government positions, that much of the money was diverted into covert activities, and that it was started as a secret program to repatriate dollar assets from several prior decades, starting with World War II. This also involved much of the gold bullion hidden in the Philippines by the Japanese during World War II. Cocke testified:
It was mainly to bring monies back to the United States from all types of activities, both legitimately and illegitimately. Not that they were in the smuggling business per se, but they were all in the arms business; they were all retracing dollars of one description or another that had accumulated all through the 40s and 50s. And that probably is as broad a definition as I can give you. All kinds of nationalities were involved, and all kinds of people became involved.
Cocke was asked if various agents of the U.S. government were involved, to which Cocke replied:
Yes. Obviously the CIA, the FBI, the national security agencies of all types, and the Pentagon in the broadest sense; and the Treasury, Federal Reserve. Nobody got out of the act; everybody wanted to get in the act.
Included in his sworn testimony was that Citibank was the main bank involved, especially the New York and Athens offices, with many other banks acting as correspondent to Citibank, and that Citibank was the disbursing bank.
The Trail of the Japanese Gold in the Philippines
Although it is a book-length story by itself, I make brief reference to a small part of the intrigue. During World War II the invading Japanese armies looted the gold from the countries they invaded, and much of the gold was hidden throughout the Philippines. Santa Romana was with the OSS in the Philippines during this time and discovered where some of the gold was buried, which he then obtained and put it into various financial institutions. Romana gave his attorney, Ferdinand Marcos (before Marcos became president of the Philippines) a limited power of attorney over his affairs while Romana was out of the country. Marcos allegedly manipulated the power of attorney and acquired rights to the gold. Romana died shortly after.
His widow, Luz, eventually remarried, marrying Jim Brown, and Brown then sought to reacquire the gold for Luz. I met Jim Brown while he and Luz were staying at a hotel in Concord, California during the late 1990s. He provided me with hundreds of documents showing the complex transfer of the gold bullion, some of which was acquired by the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) and the CIA and deposited in Citibank. In one way or another, some of this gold bullion became part of Project Hammer.
Additional Information Concerning General Cocke
During 2005 I received several e-mails from a person who worked with General Cocke before Cocke's death in 2000. He confirmed some of the statements I made in Defrauding America and Disavow.
The person, who was still in covert activities, identified himself only as "Clark." The following are some of the statements he made in his emails to me:
I have attached a copy of my credential which were authorized by General Cocke. There were only seven of us and we were known as the seven deadly sins. We were his best-kept secret. This card was issued a few months before he passed away in April of 2000.
Cocke had a Special Operations Team that was formed in the early 80s. This team was not part of the government per se. It was made up of ex-military guys such as myself. If the General wanted something done that had to be kept secret from everyone, he called on what he called "his Team." I was the Team Commander so I knew most of what went on.
Most everything that went on with General Cocke was highly secret. I knew he had secret meetings with many of the presidents.
Cocke was one of the most powerful and feared men in Washington, D.C. Although he was behind the scenes, he was calling the shots. He did a lot of secret banking all over the world for the government and died a very wealthy man His father was the one who created Bank of America.
Cocke would provide me with passports from other countries as well as U.S. passports under different names. He and several others ran everything. Admiral Turned and two other Generals, one army and the other Air Force, were all part of the group that was headed by Cocke. The General and his group needed his own people with no influence from the outside; therefore he formed a Special Operations Team, which was sometimes just called "The Team." Basically, the Team didn't exist to anyone other than Cocke and his group and I'm not sure how much the group even knew about us. If we showed up somewhere, the story was we were never there and we don't exist. Just like Area 51 a few years ago.
It was not part of the Special Operations Command and was basically an entity of its own made up of ex-military personnel. His reasoning for using ex-military guys was, if something went wrong they could deny our existence completely and prove we were not on military payroll. I had to sign a secrecy agreement with Cocke and I still keep those secrets.
I was in charge of the team for Cocke and still have the team together. Some of the members have changed, but the team still exists. Shortly before the General passed away, he told me to keep the team intact because we would be called upon again to continue working for different government agencies to serve our country.
Cocke would provide me with appointments with other governments as Trade Attaché or Ambassador at Large or military attaché that would allow me to move freely in and out of other countries using diplomatic passports, therefore never showing an exit stamp on my U.S. passport.
When I would ask, "Who do I say I work for if questioned," his response was, "When it's not convenient for you to say you work for CIA then you say D.O.D., When it's not convenient to say you work for D.O.D., and then say CIA, but you always work for me and I will keep you out of trouble."
Anything and everything we did was secret and clandestine. Nothing was ever over.
Hope this is helpful to you.
Thank you again for your response. It is a pleasure knowing you are providing the American people with the truth. Everything I have been seen written by you is truth.
God Bless You,
Clark.
In a May 28, 2005 e-mail:
All I can tell you about those operations is, I secretly worked for General Cocke Jr. from 1972 until 2002. I do know, what your book says, is true.
God bless you,
Clark
In another e-mail:
I don't think it's very safe to talk about most of the things I am aware of. I am fully aware of how easy it is for the government to make people disappear when they don't like what you are saying. My understanding is that the only reason you are 82 is because if they made you disappear it would add credibility to your books, which would make people realize you are telling the truth. So for you, your books are like an insurance policy.
I am presently working with a member of the president's roundtable, John P. Curry, ex-military, ex-Company. He was also a secret advisor to four presidents and at one time almost killed General Westmoreland with his bare hands. John is around 70 years old. I'm sure if you ask your company contacts about John Curry you will get many stories. John and I have formed a partnership and we are working on several secret projects now.
Clark
In response to my comments about one of my contacts, Steve Crittenden, who had described to me having recently flown loads of gold from the Philippines to the United States, Clark responded:
I did many of those trips to Manila, negotiating deals to bring back C-130s and C-131s with gold bars. Most of them went back to Atlanta or a private airstrip in Florida, the last one of those trips was a couple of years ago because it was after the death of General Cocke, and I was very concerned about doing the trip with new people involved, especially ones I had never met or worked with. On one of the trips I got into a hand-to-hand situation and I was cut on my left leg all the way to the bone about 11 inches long. It was not pretty and I also took a bullet in my left knee on one other occasion.
In another email:
I can tell you from the days of JFK, Erle Cocke was responsible for setting up ways to hide large amounts of money all over the globe. This money belonged to Senators, congressmen, and high ranking White House officials up to and including the President during each changing administration, up to the time of the General's death in April of 2000. Which means, the General worked for every president from JFK to GW Bush to find ways to hide and launder money for the government or government agencies such as the CIA.
There was a Navy Captain and also Admiral Stansfield Turner, ex CIA director, who were close to the General and often had lunch or dinner with him to discuss business. Meetings were often held at the Mayflower hotel.
He also was the key negotiator who set up the ownership of the HSBC bank[6]by the CIA among other well-known world banks. The Special Operations Team, known as the SDS (Seven Deadly Sins) were there to escort documents, currency, bank instruments and gold on behalf of the General. Our other function was to eliminate any person or entity that threatened the success of the mission by any means necessary.
According to the General, everything he did was sanctioned by the White House, which is why he could and did provide us with many different passports and identities. The General would set us up with diplomatic appointments for other countries, which would allow us to move freely throughout the world, allowing us to carry or ship just about anything from one country to another under diplomatic protection.
When I received the appointment to Gambia as Ambassador-At-Large and Trade attaché, it was the General who wrote the letter of recommendation. Also, when I was appointed Consul General for another African country, it was the General who pushed my papers through at the State Department.
From what I have been told by the General, he would orchestrate the secret ownership of world banks. He told me the public perception of ownership is one thing but the reality of who really owns or controls the bank is something else. When the General died in April of 2000 he was one of the owners of Bank of America and worth millions.
The above statements are true to the best of my recollection. If you have specific questions, feel free to ask. If I can answer them, I will. I will not go against the CIA. As you well know, they will end my life.
Clark
In a February 27, 2006, e-mail:
One of the things that General Cocke told me he helped set up was a secret wing at Leavenworth. If the government wants you out of the way, a team will extract you from your home and you will be taken directly to Leavenworth where you are put in front of a panel of four Naval officers who will read you the charges against you.
If you piss off the wrong person, your life as you know it will be over. I would be very careful about what you say regarding the CIA; that is very dangerous ground. They have unlimited funding and work outside the law as you well know. I personally believe the country is beyond repair at this point.
I wish you well,
Clark.

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[1] January 27, 1980.

[2] I describe Taus' experiences in Defrauding America and also the book, The FBI, CIA, the Mob, and Treachery.

[3] Gen. Edwin Black commanded the deployment of army troops in Vietnam in the early days of the Vietnam War. He died in 1985 after he was shown as being involved in another covert CIA company in Honolulu.

[4] Black was in the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) during World War II, and then became part of the CIA.

[5] Cocke served as national commander of the American Legion during the last 1940s and early 1950s, a director at Delta Airlines, and operated the Nugan Hand office in Washington, D.C.

[6] HSBC Bank has over 100 million customers in 79 countries, with branches in the United States, Asia, China, Brazil, and Hong Kong. It was originally an Asian bank until it took over the Midland Bank in the United Kingdom in 1992.




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