Vatican Bank

[Magda Hassan]

FTR #532 Interview with John Loftus

Posted by FTR ⋅ November 15, 2005

about Unholy Trinity and Intelligence Summit
Recorded November 6, 2005
REALAUDIO
In this interview with the heroic John Loftus, we revisit the subjects of the Vatican Bank and the Vatican’s long involvement with fascism. After discussing a summit that John is helping to arrange between members of the intelligence community and members of the general public to discuss the war on terror, the program focuses on John’s landmark book Unholy Trinity and a lawsuit he helped to file against the Vatican Bank for looting the wealth of Holocaust victims, aiding the escape of Nazi war criminals, and using the stolen money and the fugitives to wage covert operations during the Cold War. In Unholy Trinity, John (and his co-author Mark Aarons) document a long history of collusion between the Vatican and Nazi Germany, going back to the immediate aftermath of World War I. After investing millions of dollars in German (later Nazi) industry, the Vatican collaborated with U.S. corporate interests to safeguard the Nazi treasury, spiriting the wealth out of Europe after the War. This capital was recycled back to Germany in the 1950’s and was used to fund the so-called “German economic miracle”—that country’s economic revival. (Veteran listeners will recognize this concatenation’s position within the constellation of the Bormann flight-capital program.) Much of the program focuses on the Vatican’s “Ratlines”—the escape networks that were set up to help fugitive Nazis escape justice. Many of the most notorious Nazi war criminals escaped with the help of this network, which was operated with the knowledge and blessings of the highest officials of the Church.
Program Highlights Include: The decades-long collaboration between the Vatican and the powerful Wall Street law firm of Sullivan & Cromwell in protecting their mutual investment in Nazi industry; the history of US corporate investments in Nazi Germany; the involvement of Western (including American) intelligence agencies in the operation of the Ratlines; the role of Argentine dictator Juan Peron in the exodus of Nazi capital and fugitive war criminals from Europe; the role of the World Commerce Corporation in the flight of Nazi wealth from Europe after the war; the sheltering of some of the worst Nazi criminals in the Pope’s summer residence at Castelgandolfo; the continuing cover-up by the government of Argentina in that country’s conspiracy to aid fugitive Nazis; the continuing cover-up by Vatican related elements in Italy of the true extent of Church complicity in the escape of fugitive Nazis; the channeling of Vatican money to Hitler in 1919; the role of Popes Pius XII and Paul VI in the Vatican/Nazi conspiracy.
1. The broadcast begins with John’s discussion of a project with which he’s involved called “Intelligence Summit.” This is a meeting scheduled for Presidents’ Day Weekend in 2006 in Washington D.C. Bringing together elements of the intelligence communities of numerous countries, the gathering offers the opportunity for members of the working press and the general public to share information with these intelligence professionals, and vice versa. The only stipulation is that non-intelligence attendees cannot divulge the information that they learn there anywhere else. For more information, see: http://www.intelligencesummit.org.
2. The balance of the program consists of discussion and analysis of John’s book Unholy Trinity: The Vatican, The Nazis and the Swiss Banks (co-authored with Mark Aarons.) Before discussing the book, we noted the reinstatement of a lawsuit for which John was the intelligence adviser. Note that the lawsuit was reinstated by an American appellate court at the same time as Cardinal Ratzinger was appointed Pope. (For more about the Pope’s interesting background, see FTR#508.) “A federal appeals court stepped into the controversy over the Catholic Church’s relations with Nazi regimes during World War II on Monday, reinstating a lawsuit by Holocaust survivors against the Vatican Bank for allegedly profiting from property looted by the Ustasha puppet government in Croatia. . . .”
[URL="http://www.google.com/search?q=Court+Revives+Suit+Against+Vatican+Bank&sourceid=mozilla-search&start=0&start=0&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official"](“Court Revives Suit Against Vatican Bank” by Bob Egelko; San Francisco Chronicle; 4/19/2005; p. A6.)
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3. “ . . . The Ustasha took power in Croatia after the German invasion in 1941 and established death camps in which as many as 700,000 people, mostly Serbs, were killed, according to a U.S. government report cited by the court. A separate State Department report said Ustasha leaders found sanctuary in a papal institution in Rome after the war, with a treasury of over $80 million. The suit claims much of the money had been stolen from Serbs, Jews, Gypsies, Ukrainians and others under Ustasha domination and was kept in the Vatican Bank, where it was used in part to finance the relocation of Nazi fugitives. [Italics are Mr. Emory’s.] The plaintiffs—who seek class-action status on behalf of all those affected—want restitution of their losses and any profits gained by the bank. . . .” (Idem.)
4. After discussing John’s lawsuit, the program highlights Unholy Trinity. Barred from writing about the Vatican/Nazi/intelligence connections because of his high security clearances, John and associates recruited a young man of Croatian heritage, who spoke fluent Serbo-Croatian. Posing as a young Ustashi enthusiast, he was able to interview some of the surviving villains of the Vatican/Croatian/Nazi collaboration. Thinking him to be a kindred soul, they “spilled the beans” into a tape-recorded microphone. With the veil of secrecy having been thus breached, John received clearance to go ahead with the publication of his book.
5. Next, the program turns to discussion of the genesis of the Nazi/Vatican Bank connection, which is at the foundation of Loftus’ lawsuit. The story begins with the Webb/Pomerene act—a loophole in the American anti-trust legislation that legalizes the formation of cartels (international monopolies.) In possession of the tremendous wealth of the U.S. boom that began with World War I and continued through the 1920’s, the “Robber Barons” of the American power elite were free to network with their counterparts abroad (chiefly in Germany and Japan) in order to monopolize international world trade. “ . . . The 1920’s and early 1930’s were a profitable time for American investors in Germany. The break-up of the American cartels at the end of the nineteenth century, followed by Teddy Roosevelt’s ‘trust-busting’ legislation in the 1910’s, induced the early multinational corporations to seek a more friendly clime offshore. Germany not only permitted cartels and vertical monopolies, it encouraged them as a means to rebuild its industrial might after the devastation of World War I and the Versailles reparations.” (Unholy Trinity; p. 291.)
6. “Moreover, from the late 1920’s the German economy, although cash poor, was scientifically advanced. As the Weimar Republic began to disintegrate under the weight of internal chaos and external greed, German scientists, sponsored by German corporations, led the world in research in physics, chemistry, and biology. So esteemed was the German intellectual edge at the end of the 1920’s that American scientists who wished to make their mark would take their advanced degree at a German university.” (Idem.)
7. “Effectively, Germany had a virtual high-tech monopoly on advanced production techniques, rigidly reinforced through a system of worldwide patents that gave it a decided advantage. If the Du Pont Corporation, for example, wanted a license for chemical processes, it had to deal with Berlin.” (Idem.)
8. At the epicenter of the Nazi money/Vatican/Robber Baron connection is Sullivan & Cromwell, the powerful white-shoe law firm, whose best known partners were Allen and John Foster Dulles. (Under President Eisenhower, Allen Dulles became CIA director, while John Foster became Secretary of State.) As discussed in (among other programs) FTR#361, Allen Dulles handled the Bush family’s investments in Nazi Germany. “Sullivan & Cromwell’s American clients, in turn, had something that the Germans wanted badly: gold. Under the Versailles Treaty, Germany had to pay its reparations to the Allies in gold bullion. In 1924, Sullivan & Cromwell stepped into the breach with the ingenious Dawes Plan. In its simplest form, the Dulles brothers’ clients would loan gold to Germany, so that it could repay its reparations to France and Britain, which would then recycle the American gold to repay their war loans to America. It was a crazy merry-go-round, but it worked.” (Ibid.; pp. 291-292.)
9. “The attraction for Sullivan & Cromwell’s clients was that the Germans paid off the original American gold loans with stock in German corporations. Unlike the hyperinflated Deutsch mark, German stocks and bonds were far from worthless, as they were backed by the very patents and trade secrets that American industry so desperately sought. With the crash of 1929, the American economy went into the Great Depression, but simultaneously Sullivan & Cromwell’s clients poured billions into the German economy. For example, John Foster Dulles’s legal records show that he handled the transfer of $10 billion worth of gold in return for German bonds and investments. By some estimates, 70 percent of the money that went to rebuild the German economy after World War I came from Wall Street investors, most of whom sought the legal counsel of Sullivan & Cromwell. . . .” (Idem.)
10. “ . . . The secret strings of German investment were held by American lawyers sitting on the boards of German banks and corporations. Allen Dulles, for example, sat on the board of the Schroder Bank, with offices in London, New York, and Berlin. Ostensibly owned by a prominent German banking family, the real controllers were Sullivan & Cromwell’s clients. . . .” (Ibid.; p. 293.)
11. Next, the program highlights the genesis of the Vatican/Nazi money connection, which was central to the realization of the American/Nazi money-go-round. Archbishop Eugenio Pacelli (later Pope Pius XII) was the Papal Nuncio to Munich Germany. He gave Vatican money to Hitler in 1919 to fight communism in Germany. Following the Lateran Treaty of 1929 between the Vatican and Mussolini’s fascist government in Italy, the large financial windfall the Vatican obtained from Mussolini was invested in German heavy industry. (For more on the Vatican/Nazi money link, see RFA#’s 17-21, available from Spitfire.) “ . . . Sullivan & Cromwell’s clients were not the only foreign investors in Germany, nor were they the only ones to hedge their bets by making small donations to the infant Nazi party. Following the $26 million cash settlement with Mussolini over disputed lands in 1929, the Vatican invested nearly all the proceeds in German industry, but at least one small investment was made in the Nazis as well. The following incident was reported by an eyewitness, Sister Pascalina, a nun who was the personal aide (and devoted admirer) of the Papal Nuncio in Munich and the man who would become Pope Pius XII on the eve of World War II: ‘Hitler came one night to the holy residence of Archbishop Eugenio Pacelli (later Pius XII). All others in the household were asleep by then, except [Sister] Pascalina . . . . Hitler told Pacelli that he was out to check the spread of atheistic communism. . . . It did not come as a surprise to her, therefore, in light of Pacelli’s hatred of the Reds, to see the prelate present Hitler with a large cache of Church money to aid the rising revolutionary and his small struggling band of anti-communists.’ . . . .” (Ibid.; pp. 294-295.)
12. After taking power, Hitler passed laws rendering the Western industrialist/Nazi money links more opaque. This eventuality cemented the partnership between the Nazis, the Vatican and the U.S. money men—a connection that was to prove central to the postwar laundering of Nazi wealth, as well as its recycling back to drive the German “economic miracle” of the 1950’s. “ . . . It is no coincidence that the Swiss passed a law in 1934 making disclosure of Swiss bank accounts a crime. In the same year, Sullivan & Cromwell officially closed its Berlin office. From 1934, Switzerland was the center of the Dulles brothers’ operations. With so much of its own holdings tied up in Nazi Germany, the Vatican had little option but to adopt the same course.” (Ibid.; p. 295.)
13. The realization of the Vatican/Nazi/U.S. financial axis was completed with the implementation of the IOR—the Vatican Bank. “The Holy See devised a special shield to help protect it from the looming international conflict—its own financial institution, the Vatican Bank. This was the one monetary entity in the world that was completely immune from outside audits, protected by Vatican sovereignty, and with the added convenience of diplomatic immunity. During the War, the Dulles brothers and the Vatican were drawn into a symbiotic relationship: Sullivan & Cromwell’s investors needed the Vatican Bank to launder their profits under the watchful eyes of both the Nazis and their own governments, while the Vatican needed the Dulles brothers to protect its own investments in Hitler’s Germany. . . .” (Idem.)
14. The program sets forth the manner in which Allen Dulles, the Vatican and the Third Reich helped recycle the Nazi wealth from Europe to Argentina, and then back to Germany. (For more on how this relationship worked, as well as how this concatenation fits into the context of the Bormann flight capital program and Underground Reich, see FTR#’s 504, 508. Some of the actual documents proving the Dulles and Bush family collaboration with the postwar Nazi/Argentine money axis are available at: http://www.debatecomics.org/BushFamilyFortune/. For more about the Bormann flight capital program see: http://www.spitfirelist.com/f305.html.) “ . . . Few who watch the film Evita would recognize that the Peron family of Argentina worked directly with the Croatian Ustashi to establish a pipeline from the Vatican Bank. As recounted earlier in this book, Ante Pavelic himself, the Croatian Nazi leader, moved to Buenos Aires and became a ‘security adviser’ to the Perons. Laundered through the ‘untraceable’ Vatican Bank, the Nazi treasure moved from Switzerland to South America. There the stolen funds were invested in a number of Argentine businesses whose lawyer was, of course, Allen Dulles.” (Ibid.; p. 300.)
15. Among the vehicles used in the Vatican-assisted Nazi flight capital was the World Commerce Corporation. Featuring former OSS chief William Donovan and former British head of intelligence for North American William Stephenson, this organization epitomized the synthesis of business and espionage. For more about the WCC, see—among other programs—FTR#’s 504, 508. “As the final act of the money laundering, Dulles created the World Commerce Corporation to revive trade between Argentina and West Germany. On its board were such notables as William Donovan of US intelligence, and William Stephenson of British intelligence. During the 1950’s, much of the stolen proceeds were laundered back to Germany for the great economic revival of West Germany.” (Idem.)
16. “In the end, the money went back to the original German companies and their Western investors. It is not Swiss bank accounts that we should be tracing; it is the stock ownership of the Swiss banks. There lies the last and perhaps the ugliest secret of World War II. And therein lies the major culpability of the Vatican in the relations with Hitler’s Germany: without the Vatican’s investments in the Third Reich there could not have been the motive to provide the means to smuggle the Nazis’ plundered loot from Switzerland through the Vatican Bank. . . .” (Idem.)
17. Next, the program turns to the subject of the “Ratlines”—the Vatican Nazi-smuggling effort conducted in conjunction with elements of Western (and U.S.) intelligence. Some of the most important Nazis escaped via the Vatican network, including Adolph Eichmann, the supervisor of the extermination of the Jews. In addition to Pius XII himself, Cardinal Montini (later Pope Paul VI), Bishop Alois Hudal and Father Kunoslav Draganovic oversaw the networks. One of the principal Nazi figures in setting up the Ratlines was Walter Rauff, who devised the mobile gas chambers during the war. Rauff, in turn, worked with SS officer Friedrich Schwendt, who oversaw Operation Bernhard and Operation Wendig (“Window”), the forging of British pound notes in order to destroy the British war economy and finance the Ratlines. (For more about the Ratlines, see RFA#17, available from Spitfire. The Ratlines are also discussed in FTR#’s 504, 508, 529. The roles of Pius XII [Eugenio Pacelli] and Montini [later and better known as Pope Paul VI] are discussed in these For The Record shows as well.) “ . . . Following the collapse of Mussolini’s regime in September 1943, Rauff was dispatched to northern Italy where he served with the SS in the region around Genoa, Turin and Milan. Once again, his assignment was the extermination of the Jewish population. It was during this period that Hudal made contact with this notorious mass murderer. The genesis of Hudal’s and Rauff’s friendship is something of a mystery. Alfred Jarschel, a former Nazi Youth leader, claims that Rauff first met Hudal in the spring of 1943, when Deputy Fuhrer Martin Bormann sent him to Rome for six months without any apparent mission. This was at a time when the Reich desperately needed senior officers of Rauff’s experience and caliber as the war’s outcome still hung in the balance. Jarschel believes ‘that the first contacts with the Vatican were established during those months, which were to lead eventually to the setting up of Hudal’s escape network.’” (Ibid.; pp. 33-34.)
18. “The time was fast approaching when it would be needed. By early 1944 when the Allies landed in Sicily, even Hudal could see that Hitler’s ‘Thousand Year Reich’ was doomed. As long as the Nazi Armies were winning, he had proudly driven around Rome with a ‘Greater Germany’ flag on his car; but when the Allies arrived in the Italian capital in June of 1944, Hudal ‘was the first to change it—suddenly his flag was Austrian.’” (Ibid.; p. 34.)
19. “ . . . There were many dramatic changes in the Vatican as well, one of which may have played a crucial role in the development of Hudal’s escape network. In August 1944, Cardinal Maglione died. Pius XII decided not to appoint a new Secretary of State, reassuming personal responsibility for foreign policy. From that time, Monsignors Tardini and Montini worked directly for the Pope. Ladislas Farago claimed in his controversial book, Aftermath, that this decision ‘was Hudal’s entrée to the highest echelon of the Holy See.’ Farago argues that Hudal had been on the outs with Maglione, relying on infrequent contact with the Pope himself to influence Vatican policy. But now he ‘acquired a friend in the Secretariat of State.’” (Idem.)
20. “Maglione’s death suddenly left Giovanni Montini in charge of Pontifical Assistance to refugees, opening the door for Hudal’s plans. Farago claims that it was Montini who allowed Hudal access to Vatican passports and other identity and travel documents, which he then used to aid his Nazi friends. At the same time Hudal allegedly developed good contacts with another important Vatican bureau under Montini’s control. This was the Pontifical Commission for Assistance, which was concerned with work among refugees. One of its major roles was issuing travel documents to legitimate refugees. Finally, Farago alleged that Montini gave Hudal access to Caritas International, a Catholic charity which paid living and traveling expenses to help genuine refugees. . . .There is some circumstantial evidence in the American diplomatic records to support the claim that Montini was deliberately aiding Hudal’s Nazi-smuggling. . . .” (Ibid.; pp. 34-35.)
21. “ . . . In fact, Dragonovic was widely known among Western intelligence operatives as the ‘Balkan grey eminence.’ This was a standing joke among both American and British officers, in whose circles Draganovic moved freely. This was also confirmed by Simcic, who was certain that Draganovic had direct contact with British, American and Italian intelligence. The former British officer was also emphatic that ‘you can almost talk about interlocking directorships between Western intelligence and the Vatican at this period.’” (Ibid.; p. 114.)
22. “It is no coincidence that Rauff’s ‘Mr. Dulles’ later became Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, or that James Jesus Angleton became head of CIA Counter Intelligence. Throughout Angleton’s career he retained exclusive control over American intelligence liaison with the Vatican. Whatever the American motive, it is incontestable that Rauff was released from custody and returned to his flat in Milan.” (Ibid.; p. 39.)
23. “According to the French publication Cercle Noir, Rauff made contact with Archbishop Siri of Genoa, and immediately went to work for the Vatican in establishing a Nazi-smuggling system. Apart from his high level American and Vatican contacts, Rauff’s main contribution to Hudal’s smuggling system may have been financial. The man who once can the mobile gas truck program now became a money launderer, with the help of Frederico Schwendt, Rauff’s former SS colleague. Schwendt is considered among the greatest counterfeiters in history, having forged millions of banknotes during the war as part of an SS operation codenamed Wendig.” (Idem.)
24. “The original intention was to undermine and possibly destroy the Allied economies, but as the war was drawing to a close, Schwendt laundered the counterfeit money through various banks for the first Nazi escape network. Wiesenthal claims that Schwendt turned the proceeds over to his old comrade, Walter Rauff.” (Idem.)
25. “However Jarschel has a slightly different version. He claims that Hudal contacted Rauff in July 1945, asking him to come to Rome for a secret meeting. This proved impossible, so Hudal suggested that Rauff travel instead to Genoa and contact the newly appointed and strongly anti-Communist Archbishop Siri, another key player in the Nazi-smuggling operation. Rauff went to Genoa and was received by one of Siri’s private secretaries. Jarschel alleges that he was given a sizeable sum of money and a Red Cross passport with a valid visa for Syria. He then returned to Milan and established the escape network.” (Idem.)
26. “Perhaps the truth is somewhere in between: Rauff probably used Siri’s money to augment the proceeds from the counterfeit laundering operation. Jarschel and Cercle Noir both agree that over the next four years some of the most wanted Nazi war criminals passed from Rauff in Milan, to Bishop Hudal at the Anima in Rome and then on to Archbishop Siri in Genoa. Here they boarded ships and left for new lives in South America. . . .” (Ibid.; pp. 39-40.)
27. One of the most heinous Nazis who escaped with the help of the Vatican was Ante Pavelic, head of the brutal Croatian Ustashi government in World War II. Before fleeing to Argentina (where he became an aide to Juan Peron), Pavelic was actually physically sheltered in Castelgandolfo, the Pope’s summer residence. “. . . From a very confidential source, American intelligence had discovered in May 1946 that the Poglavnik was living ‘close to Rome in a building which is under the jurisdiction of the Vatican.’ This was soon after Pavelic had first arrived in Rome from Austria, and it is now known that the Poglavnik, like Ferenc Vajta, actually took refuge at Castelgandolfo, where the Pope’s summer residence is located. It seems that many Nazis gravitated to Castelgandolfo, for Pavelic was housed with a former Minister in the Nazi Romanian government. [Italics are Mr. Emory’s.]” (Ibid.; p. 78.)
28. Next, the program sets forth documentation of the veracity of the plaintiffs’ charges in the aforementioned lawsuit against the Vatican Bank. The Vatican “ratlines”—the Church’s Nazi escape networks—were presided over by Bishop Alois Hudal and Father Draganovic (the “Golden Priest”). Draganovic helped to spirit the Ustashi plunder out of Yugoslavia as well. In the immediate aftermath of the war, the Ustashi loot was used, in part, to finance a guerilla war against the Yugoslavian regime. These reconstructed Ustashis were termed “Krizari”—Crusaders. The Krizari campaign was administered by British intelligence, which assisted the Vatican with the exodus of the Ustashi plunder. Again, the “Pavelic” referred to in the following passage was Ante Pavelic, the Fuhrer of the Ustacha regime, who became a trusted adviser to Argentine dictator Juan Peron after the war. “ . . . With the help of Catholic priests, Pavelic had begun to transfer large quantities of gold and currency to Switzerland in early 1944. Some of the treasure had been taken to Italy by British Lieutenant Colonel Jonson to finance the Krizari forces. Another portion went to Rome with Draganovic and also ended up financing the terrorist network.” (Ibid.; p. 132.)
29. “But over 2,400 kilos of gold and other valuables still remained secreted in Berne. It was supposed to be used to ‘aid refugees of the Catholic religion’, but was really earmarked for the Ustashi’s clandestine operations. Although the Allies had temporarily prevented them from gaining access to these funds, by early 1948 the time had come to use the Church to retrieve the loot.” (Idem.)
30. “In Berne, Rozman’s Ustashi friends were engaged in wholesale fraud, using the black market to convert the gold into dollars, and later, into Austrian schillings. ‘Aid to the refugees is accounted for at the official rate of exchange for dollars,’ the American officers noted, adding that ‘malpractices have been carried on (officially, the dollar is worth 10 schillings; on the black market, 100 to 150). According to reliable information: ‘Rozman is going to Berne to take care of these finances. The money is in a Swiss bank, and he plans to have most of it sent through to Italy and from there to the Ustashis in [the] Argentine.’” (Ibid.; pp. 132-133.)
31. “A short time later Rozman duly arrived in Berne, accompanied by Bishop Ivan Saric, the ‘hangman’ of Sarajevo. By the end of May 1948, Rozman had apparently carried out this money laundering operation for the Ustashi, for the visited the U.S. Consulate in Zurich and was given a ‘non-quota immigration visa as a minister of religion.’ He then traveled to the United States and settled in Cleveland, Ohio. The circle was now almost complete. Pavelic’s stolen ‘treasure’ had been tracked down through close monitoring of the movements and activities of the quisling Bishop of Ljubljana. . . .” (Ibid.; p. 133.)
32. “William Gowen and his CIC colleagues had started to unravel Britain’s role in the Krizari’s operations during their hunt for Ante Pavelic in 1947. As already discussed, they soon discovered that the Vatican was sheltering Pavelic, with the connivance of the British Secret Intelligence Service. In the course of establishing this, Gowen also confirmed sensational claims made by Ferenc Vajta. It will be recalled that the American’s Hungarian Nazi contact had told him that SIS was behind the military and political revival of the Ustashi.” (Ibid.; p. 122.)
33. “Gowen investigated the Krizari’s finances and soon uncovered the unsavory truth: their money came partly from the ‘treasure’ which ‘Pavelic’s henchmen’ had carried out of Croatia. According to Gowen, the Ustashi had fled with a large number of truckloads of this stolen booty. When the British SIS apprehended Pavelic in Austria in may 1945, they also picked up some of his loot. Gowen believed that the following story of what really happened was ‘closest to the truth’: ‘British Lt. Colonel Jonson was placed in charge of two (2) trucks laden with the supposed property of the Catholic Church in the British Zone of Austria. These two (2) trucks, accompanied by a number of priests and the British officer, then entered Italy and went to an unknown destination.’” (Ibid.; p. 123.)
34. “Major Stephen Clissold confirmed that two such Ustashi ‘treasure trucks’ had indeed reached Austria. Not surprisingly, Clissold did not mention the British role in removing them to Italy, claiming instead that they ‘were deposited in the safe-keeping of a monastery,’ but Gowen was certain that the British were now using it to finance ‘the Croat resistance movement in Yugoslavia. The resistance forces . . . go by the name of Krizari (Crusaders) . . . Radio contact is maintained by means of a field radio operated by Vrancic, a former Pavelic minister located in the British Zone of Austria. The Ustashia courier service within the Austrian Zones is believed aided by the Roman Catholic Church in Austria. The Cardinal of Graz is known to be on close terms with . . . Professor Draganovic, Krunoslav, known Pavelic contact in Rome.’” (Idem.)
35. “Yet again, Western intelligence found that Father Draganovic was at the center of the Ustashi’s clandestine activities. Indeed, he was widely known in Western intelligence and émigré circles as ‘the golden priest’ because he controlled a large part of the stolen treasure. Although Colonel Jonson had taken away two truckloads in 1945, this was only a fraction of Pavelic’s loot.” (Idem.)
36. “Four hundred kilos of gold, worth millions of dollars, and a considerable amount of foreign currency had been secreted at Wolfsberg, where it was under the control of former Ustashi Minister, Lovro Susic. Draganovic discovered this from senior Ustashi officials during his visit to Austria in mid-1945. They were apparently determined to maintain some independence from the British, who they feared would seize the gold, so they asked Draganovic to save it. The priest was only too willing to oblige, for he contacted Susic and with his agreement took forty kilos of gold bars to Rome, concealed in two packing cases. There is no doubt about Draganovic’s close connections with the Ustashi hierarchy in this money laundering scheme. . . .” (Ibid.; pp. 123-124.)
37. Another of the Croatian war criminals who benefited from the Ratline was Srecko Rover. In the 1990’s, Rover returned to Croatia to become an adviser to the “new” Croatian government in its atrocities committed against Serbs and Bosnian Muslims. (For more about the Croatian Ustashis and their influence on the “new” Croatian government, see—among other programs, FTR#48.) “It is no coincidence that Pavelic’s lieutenant Srecko Rover—whose roles in the brutal atrocities in and around Sarajevo during World War II and in the British intelligence terrorist networks of the late 1940’s are documented in Chapter Six of this book—has given Tudjman’s government specialist advice on how to conduct a good massacre. Nor is it a coincidence that Rover, and his Ustashi comrades who were smuggled down the Vatican Ratlines to Argentina, America, Canada, Australia, and Britain, trained a new generation of Western-educated Croatian war criminals who left their adopted countries to slaughter Serbs and Muslims in the 1990’s Balkans wars.” (Ibid.; p. xvi.)
38. Next, the program turned to an invitation that John Loftus received to attend an event in Argentina, supposedly to help shed light on Nazi war criminals and their exodus to Argentina. This occurred in the immediate aftermath of Loftus’s role in aiding the discovery and extradition of Nazi war criminal Eric Priebke, the perpetrator of the Adreatine Caves massacre in Rome during World War II. Priebke was among the Nazis who benefitted from the Ratline. (For more about Priebke, see FTR#6.)“ . . . Suddenly, John Loftus, one of the authors of this book, received an invitation from the Menem government to come to Buenos Aires to address an International Seminar on anti-Semitism. It did not take long to discover why: the Argentine government wanted him to talk about Nazis in America., to take the sting away from the Nazis in Argentina. The conference turned out to be a public relations effort to gloss over the dark side of Juan and Evita Peron’s role in providing Argentine visas to the Vatican to smuggle Nazis out of Europe, which we document later in this book. Several speakers minimized the presence of Nazis in Argentina, defended the Perons, and praised President Menem for his courageous decision to open Argentina’s immigration files for inspection.” (Ibid.; p. xiii.)
39. Note that the Menem government continued to mask the truth about the extent of Nazi involvement with Argentina. Note, also, that Priebke continued to be sheltered by powerful elements, who did not want the truth about the Ratlines and the complicity of those who participated to emerge. “ . . . As this book shows, Juan and Evita Peron had welcomed some of the worst Nazi mass murderers of World War II, including Ante Pavelic, the leader of the ‘independent’ state of Croatia. Pavelic and nearly the entire cabinet of his bloody Ustashi government had emigrated via the Vatican to Buenos Aires, where Peron promptly made Pavelic one of his senior ‘security advisers.’ Even the carefully presented facts did move the Menem government. Months passed, and it seemed that Priebke would suffer little more than ‘protective’ custody under the benevolent eye of the Argentinians. Eventually, however, they had to hand Priebke over in the wake of an almost unprecedented international campaign.” (Ibid.; pp. xiii-xiv.)
40. “Several of our intelligence sources warned us that Priebke was still being protected. He knew too much about the Vatican’s Ratlines to Argentina to ever be permitted to stand trial. Amazingly, the Italian military tribunal acquitted Priebke on a technicality. The people of Rome dimmed the lights of the city in protest. The next morning, Priebke was rearrested. The Supreme Court of Italy ruled that he must stand trial in a civil court. But to our dismay, Priebke received only a five-year sentence, roughly equivalent to a week in jail for every person he had murdered in the Adreatine caves.” (Ibid.; p. xiv.)
41. “As we were to discover, Priebke was indeed protected by charitable forces. Priebke knew too much about the Vatican’s Ratlines, and did not even serve his time in a prison, but lived comfortably for many months under ‘house arrest’ in a Catholic monastery. In March 1998, the Italian military tribunal again considered his case, and this time decided to jail him for life. By this time Priebke had been moved to a hospital located, ironically enough, in the Jewish quarter of Rome. As we write in April 1998 it seems unlikely that Priebke will serve more than a few symbolic days of his ‘life sentence’ in a prison.” (Idem.)
42. Next the program reviewed some of the information about the Crusade For Freedom and the complicity of high ranking GOP officials in aiding the relocation of Nazis to the United States. For more about this, see—among other programs—FTR#465.
43. The program also reviewed the CIA’s sponsorship of the Muslim Brotherhood, the Arab Nazi collaborators. The show also reviewed the GOP/Muslim Brotherhood/Bank Al Taqwa connection. For more about this, see—among other programs—FTR#’s 454, 473, 514, 515.



http://spitfirelist.com/for-the-record/f...hn-loftus/