Many people still remember the words “Jonestown” or “Peoples Temple” as symbols of mass suicide by religious fanatics. To date no one has said that these people were political refugees from the USA who were killed in cold blood in the jungles of Guyana, South America by US special services. The world is now facing a proliferation of weapons of mass destruction due in part to the special services monstrous operation.
This story ties together the Jonestown murders and present day war on terror from an African-American perspective.
It’s power politics at its highest and lowest form: this agency has an annual budget of approximately $40 billion conducts a disproportionate number of clandestine operations in the Third World, and meets with the president first thing every morning with a classified report of clandestine operations and hot spots around the world.
Rarely investigated by elected officials and never questioned in a public forum by African-American representatives, this agency essentially operates above the law. The crux of this story is this agency’s experimentation and exploitation of the poor and voiceless.
The story unfolds through four highly controversial political events, revealing a link to many prominent politicians and government officials, past and present:
I . The assassination of JFK.
2. The kidnapping of Patty Hearst.
3. The death of over 900 Americans in Jonestown, Guyana.
4. The government killing of the MOVE people by bombing and destroying approximately 60 homes.
What makes the carnage in Guyana so different from other CIA crimes: its victims were not foreigners, they were American.
In spite of incontestable proof that the Jonestown commune had been deliberately destroyed, authorities in Washington don’t stir a finger to investigate. On the contrary, they go to great pains to put a lid on the whole thing.
The story ends with unexpected consequences when the African American people come together and create a fledging, non-violent movement that will emphasize independence. This generates international support. At the same time, it will force a debate on race not seen in this country since the Civil War.
Chapter Outline
Chapter I
Repatriation Refused – The Discovery
It was the end of the Korean War when American intelligence officials realize the North Koreans are anticipating a future war with the West and have successfully developed many futuristic WMDs. This story is based on three factors:
1) A highly toxic, odorless, colorless, chemical, when aerosolized, one drop touching skin or inhaled is fatal within seconds.
2) A psychological technique that allows the actual external control of an individual mind. The technique is so effective that the subject’s free will, thoughts and action can be programmed, to the point he will carry out any order and obey any command, including a suicide mission.
3) A biological agent similar to AIDS attacks immune system, remains in the body undetectable for years before the individual expires.
Our intelligence officials are fascinated with the new North Korean technology and see military potential in developing similar for our own use. Yet they are fearful many POWs would return home infected with an unknown disease or programmed through sophisticated mind control techniques and would act as spies or domestic troublemakers.
Army officials break a sacred rule of the military and decide to leave hundreds of sick POWs in the North Korean enemy hands. Nevertheless the CIA recognizes the necessity to produce similar or better technology. They rationalize in order to defend ourselves, the agency establishes a program for the future clandestine testing and use of biological, chemical and psychological weapons. The only problem they see is that the most realistic way to test the weapons would be to use them on unsuspecting people. To overcome the illegality of human experimentation, they must choose subjects who could not be traced back to the agency: those who would be powerless to seek a remedy if they ever found out what the agency had done to them. As a result, they choose prison inmates, the poor and the voiceless.
Chapter II
The Crime of the Century. “Why JFK Was Murdered?”
The 60’s was a tumultuous time and presaged the protest and destruction of the years to come. The decade begins as John F. Kennedy narrowly defeats Richard Nixon. The independent voices of Malcolm X and Martin Luther King are starting to echo through the Black community. Fidel Castro internationalizes the struggle for liberation during a trip to the U.N. and a visit to Harlem. Malcolm X is welcomed in the Mideast and Africa. During his first year in office, Kennedy fires the Director of the CIA, Allen Dulles, over the Bay of Pigs fiasco. He is also embroiled in a fierce battle (behind closed doors) with Israel over their efforts to build not just nuclear weapons, but also biological, psychological and chemical weapons of mass destruction. He threatens to cut financial support. He also battles the FBI over the Mafia influence in drug trafficking and casino operations in Cuba, as well as Civil Rights issues. This chapter will document little known facts about the Israeli Mossad connection to the murder and the possibility that a silent coup of the government has occurred at this time.
Chapter III
LBJ: The Whole World Is Watching
Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson serves remaining part of JFK’s term and one elected term during which the nation struggles with a huge increase in Civil Rights activism and Black Power militancy, the Tonkin Gulf incident, and the subsequent build-up of the Vietnam War. Drugs flow onto the campuses and inner city, U.S. policy toward Israel makes a 180 degree turn around. Israel wins the 1967 Six-Day War, the country struggles with the political assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy in 1968. The power of the CIA/military industrial complex/organized crime and domestic problems overwhelm Johnson. After one elected term he retires.
Chapter IV
Nixon and the Birth of America’s War Against Terrorism. “For want of a nail, a shoe is lost. For want of a shoe, a horse is lost. For want of a horse, a war is lost.”
After the worst race riots in nation’s history, Richard Nixon is elected on a law and order platform. As Johnson before him, he struggles with an increasingly unpopular domestic situation and a foreign war. But unlike JFK, RFK or LBJ, Nixon is prepared to play ball with a powerful unelected government. Intelligence officials inform him they have a plan that will solve his problems. First, we have created an anti-war group we call the Weather Underground which will knock black power out of headlines; second, we will “Vietnamize” the war, by training the South Vietnam army to take over the fighting, then simply declare victory, and bring the troops home. Third, they inform him they have successfully tested a mind control technique in a lab setting but now need approval for a field test. Their plan is designed to designed to restore faith in his government. Because they intended to use a certain segment of our society, that’s well suited for this purpose. It will be done with such sophistication and deception, most of America will applaud his government for the action, never suspecting illegal behavior. Some aspects of the plans may be unlawful, the agency admits, still Nixon likes what he’s hearing: the idea that they can program an individual and externally control his thoughts, actions and free will, captures the president’s imagination. Cautioning them only about keeping everything secret, Nixon allows them to proceed. Thus, “America’s War on Terrorism” is reborn.
Meanwhile, behind the walls at the Vacaville Correctional Medical Facility in California, the CIA is operating a Behavior Modification Unit called “The Black Cultural Association”. Our fall guy, Donald Defreeze alias Cinque has joined. This sets the stage for the kidnapping of Patty Hearst and Nixon’s Watergate dilemma.
Shortly after Nixon is sworn in for his second term, while Watergate is still rumbling as disquieting rumors, newspaper heiress Patricia Hearst is kidnapped. We are led to believe Donald Defreeze, a 29-year-old African-American, ninth grade dropout and three time loser, has escaped from a maximum security prison, remains free over a year with no visible means of support and becomes the leader of an all white group of middle class, highly educated men and women. The media names this gang the Symbionese Liberation Army and gives our escapee the name of Field Marshall General Cinque,” America’s First Black General on the Side of “Revolution.” Soon, the whole nation is involved with Patty’s fate, the nice, rich, white princess is being held hostage by the mean, black prison escapee. We watch the evening news as she seemingly joins her kidnappers as a bank robber. Later, she disappears while the LA police have Donald DeFreeze/Cinque pinned down in a burning house resulting in his and several of his followers’ deaths. A few months later, as Watergate spins out of control, Nixon is forced to resign, stating a seldom-mentioned quote as his rationale: “The nation couldn’t take their president ‘in the dock,’” being questioned by his political enemies and forced to testify about a highly secret, illegal, domestic operation, particularly when these acts have large racial overtones.
Chapter V
Ford/Rockefeller – “The Pardon” That Could Not Wait.
Ford becomes the only unelected president in our history and immediately pardons Nixon, thereby ending any serious investigations. Ford then attempts to get the people to elect him to a full term. His opponent is Jimmy Carter, a little known southern governor and peanut farmer. To the surprise of the experts, whites and blacks join together and elect a sincere politician, a man who doesn’t mind putting on work clothes, picking up a hammer and helping someone less fortunate to build a home.
Chapter VI
Carter/Mondale.
Carter is driven out of office by the tactics of an invisible government. Highlighted is the shocking untold story of the Jonestown, Guyana tragedy. Other issues play out before the American public: first gas lines in nation’s history, double digit interest rates, drugs flood inner cities, the first MOVE confrontation. His term ends with a CIA-controlled Iran hostage situation.
Chapter VII
“Without Test — All Weapons Unproven.” The Testing of a Powerful Aerosolized Chemical WMD.
Why do so many government agencies (FBI, IRS, FCC, CIA, ATF, Postal Service, State Department, Social Security Administration, Customs, Secret Service, Interpol, etc.) put pressure on the people of Jonestown? They are the idealistic, the old, the tired and the infirm. Some are educated, some are not. Some come from affluent suburbs, some from tough, inner cities ghettos. All are seeking a new start. The majority is black. A third are children from welfare families and another third are elderly who left black churches to follow a white man who spoke strongly for self-determination and independence and against racism. Together, they are over 1,000 strong, living in a successful agricultural community in Guyana.
What makes the carnage in Guyana so different from other CIA crimes–its victims were not foreigners, they were American.
In spite of incontestable proof that Jonestown commune had been deliberately destroyed, authorities in Washington don’t stir a finger to investigate. On the contrary, they go to great pains to put a lid on the whole thing.
Was it the press conference called by Jim Jones a month before the killings to announce they are preparing a lawsuit against the FBI, the State Department, the CIA, and other government agencies and intend to subpoena all records to uncover “the conspiracy against it”?
Was it the Peoples Temple threat to defect to our Cold War enemy, contacts made to Cuba and North Korea, and frequent cordial meetings at the Russian Embassy in Georgetown, Guyana? At the height of the Cold War, would the defection of over 1,000 mostly poor and black prove too embarrassing for the US?
Was it Russia’s decision that the group has some value and their promise to airlift out the entire group if an emergency occurred? Why did three members leave the Jonestown camp hours before the killing, heading for the Russian Embassy, with suitcases filled with approximately $2 million in cash?
Was it the murder of three newsmen and a Congressman at the airstrip, which results in the media suspecting anyone who does not condemn Jonestown? The media label the residents as cultists, maniacs, kooks, and fanatics, setting the falsehood in concrete. Nooks appear less that two weeks after the killings, newspaper reports are totally biased, and highly edited tapes are broadcast on National Public Radio.
Why did the “elected representatives” of the people, the American congressmen, clam up after one of their own was riddled with bullets on a mission he was carrying out at the request of Congress?
Why is the much vaunted American press which claims to publish everything worthy of publication and had an excellent chance to prove its mettle, silent?
Over 900 mysterious deaths take place, yet the government goes to great lengths to avoid any forensic examinations. Bodies are left on the ground in the heat and rain, decomposing for four days. Secretary of State Cyrus Vance orders all the bodies to be buried on the spot in a mass grave. The government of Guyana refuses. When the corpses are returned to the United States, they are deposited on the East Coast, three thousand miles away from their families on the West Coast. The government orders the bodies embalmed with stronger-than-normal embalming fluids, “without autopsies,” thereby destroying any remaining evidence as to the cause of death. Why does the U.S. try so hard to hide the manner and cause of death?
Prior to the killings, Jonestown was a very successful agricultural community supporting hundreds of farm animals. Never-published photos clearly show large farm animals laid out dead, next to the humans. In the first few days following the deaths, no one is allowed into the camp except U.S. military personnel and aircraft. Is this time used to remove dead farm animals? Once allowed inside the camp, eyewitnesses report only a few animals found – all dead – a monkey, two dogs, and a puppy still in the arms of a dead man. Did these animals die from drinking the so-called “kool-aid”? What happened to the other farm animals? Could a chemical weapon of mass destruction (WMD) been tested here similar to what we claim Saddam Hussein used against his people?
Chapter VIII
Reagan/Bush. Drugs/Contra/MOVE – Straight out of the CIA’s playbook.
Reagan’s first act in office pardons Mark Felt (Deep Throat). For 15 years, the Federal government wages a campaign to characterize MOVE, a group of poorly-educated, marginalized, mostly African-American men, women and children as some type of sophisticated international terrorist organization.
Philadelphia, Mother’s Day, May 13th, 1985. As seven children and six adults huddled inside a small row house, the government drops a high explosive bomb. The blast kills six of the children and five adults and destroys over 60 well-kept homes in the surrounding neighborhood. Federal government officials prevent the city fire department from putting out the fire that results. Government is attempting to destroy evidence that MOVE people were scapegoats, this vulnerable group of US citizens were being used as guinea pigs. Officials are testing, measuring and recording the effects of a very futuristic weapon on this group. The weapon in this case, again, is a psychological technique so effective, the subject’s free will, thoughts and actions can be programmed to the point they will carry out any order, including suicide.
The story ends when an unexpected, and unforeseen idea springs to life. The African-American community begins a fledgling non-violent movement emphasizing independence. The agenda of the movement doesn’t seek reparation or separation, wins over many supporters from both races, nationally and internationally opening a debate on the issue of America’s racial attitude, not seen since civil war.
(Richard Williams lives in Durham, North Carolina. He can be reached at rich4113@aim.com.)