"One Wintry Afternoon in February 1891, three men were engaged in earnest conversation in London. From that conversation were to flow consequences of the greatest importance to the British Empire and to the world as a whole. For these men were organizing a secret society that was, for more than fifty years, to be one of the most important forces in the formulation and execution of British imperial and foreign policy.
The three men who were thus engaged were already well known in England. The leader was Cecil Rhodes, fabulously wealthy empire builder and the most important person in South Africa. The second was William T. Stead, the famous, and probably also the most sensational, journalist of the day. The third was Reginald Baliol Brett, later known as Lord Esher, friend and confidant of Queen Victoria, and later to be the most influential advisor of King Edward VII and King George V.
The details of this important conversation will be examined later. At present we need only point out that the three drew up a plan of organization for their secret society and a list of original members. The plan for organization provided for an inner circle, to be known as "The Society of the Elect," and an outer circle, to be known as "The Association of Helpers." Within The Society of the Elect, the real power was to be exercised by the leader, and a "Junta of Three." The leader was to be Rhodes, and the Junta was to be Stead, Brett, and Alfred Milner. In accordance with this decision, Milner was added to the society by Stead shortly after the meeting we have described." [1]
Of the Secret Societies goals and methods of operation Quigley writes, "The goals which Rhodes and Milner sought and the methods by which they hoped to achieve them were so similar by 1902 that the two are almost indistinguishable. Both sought to unite the world, and above all the English-speaking world, in a federal structure around Britain. Both felt that this goal could best be achieved by a secret band of men united to one another by devotion to the common cause and by personal loyalty to one another. Both felt that this band should pursue its goal by secret political and economic influence behind the scenes and by the control of journalistic, educational, and propaganda agencies..." [2]
Between 1910-1915 the Secret Society evolved into an international group of co-conspirators called Round Table Groups set up in seven nations: Britain, South Africa, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, India, and the United States.
In 1920 the Secret Society evolved into the Institutes for International Affairs and the Council on Foreign Relations. Many of the founding fathers belonged America's first intelligence agency the INQUIRY.
Propaganda, is the effort to alter the picture to which men respond, to substitute one social pattern for another. Propaganda is used to create false reality worlds using sleight of mind. Psycho-political operations are propaganda campaigns. Strategic psycho-political operations focus propaganda at powerful individuals, or small groups of people capable of influencing public opinion or the government of a particular country. Tactical psycho-political operations focus propaganda at the masses by interference in specific events, their comments, and their appeals through mass communication media ( i.e. newspapers, radio, television, textbooks, educational material, art, entertainment, etc. ). Both forms of propaganda are used to manipulate public opinion to attain foreign policy goals in a given period. If the operations are designed to conceal both the operation and the sponsor the operation is clandestine. If the operations are designed only to conceal only the sponsor the operation is covert. [3]
The way the CFR works is clearly explained by the famous journalist Walter Lippmann. Lippmann was a member of America's first intelligence organization the INQUIRY, attended the Paris Peace Conference after World War I, and was a founding father of the Council on Foreign Relations.
Central to Lippmann's strategy of achieving government and international relations policy aims were large scale psycho-political operations aimed at the masses. The early work of Lippmann, and another leading pioneer in the field of psychological warfare, Harold Lasswell, were funded by the Rockefeller Foundation. Not coincidentally the governments national security campaigns usually overlapped the commercial ambitions of Council on Foreign Relations and Institute of International Affairs controlled industries. The Carnegie Corporation and Ford Foundation were principal secondary sources of large-scale communication research funding, operating in close coordination with government propaganda and intelligence programs.
Lippmann was the INQUIRY's secretary. Lippmann became the INQUIRY's chief propaganda and intelligence specialist, and then its director. Lippmann shaped psychological strategy during the war. After the war Lippmann played a major role in the integration of psycho-political operations and psychological strategy into the social sciences in the field of communications research. Lippmann's major works are "PUBLIC OPINION" (1922), and "THE PHANTOM PUBLIC (1925)." Both works investigate the impact of mass communication on society. Both works are based on Lippmann's INQUIRY experiences.
Chapter I, of Lippmann's book, PUBLIC OPINION is titled "The World Outside and the Pictures in Our Heads." Lippmann, writes,
"This then, will be the clue to our inquiry. We shall assume that what each man does is based not on direct and certain knowledge, but on pictures made by himself or given to him. If his atlas tells him that the world is flat he will not sail near what he believes to be the edge of our planet for fear of falling off. If his maps include a fountain of eternal youth, a Ponce de Leon will go in quest of it. If someone digs up yellow dirt that looks like gold, he will for a time act exactly as if he had found gold. The way in which the world is imagined determines at any particular moment what men will do. It does not determine what they will achieve. It determines their effort, their feelings, their hopes, not their accomplishments and results. The very men who most loudly proclaim their "materialism" and their contempt for "ideologues," the Marxian communists, place their entire hope on what? On the formulation by propaganda of a class-conscious group. But what is propaganda, if not the effort to alter the picture to which men respond, to substitute one social pattern for another? What is class consciousness but a way of realizing the world? National consciousness but another way? And Professor Giddings' consciousness of kind [ i.e. stereotypes ], but a process of believing that we recognize among the multitude certain ones marked as our kind?"[4]
Lippmann's conclusion is,
"I argue that representative government, either in what is ordinarily called politics, or in industry, cannot be worked successfully, no matter what the basis of election, unless there is an independent, expert organization for making the unseen facts intelligible to those who have to make the decisions...My conclusion is that public opinions must be organized for the press if they are to be sound, not by the press as is the case today. This organization I conceive to be in the first instance the task of a political science that has won its proper place as formulator, in advance of real decision, instead of apologist, critic, or reporter after the decision has been made..." [5]
Lippmann is advocating the creation of a totalitarian state. If one small group is permitted to control public opinion, that small group can use their power to benefit the aims of the group rather than the public at large. People's actions are strongly influenced by their knowledge base. People act on their beliefs. By corrupting a persons knowledge base you can manipulate their actions.
Lippmann presents a graphic view of what a society controlled by an "independent, expert organization" would become. It is presented as a preface to his book, contained in a quote from the Republic of Plato, Book Seven,
"Behold! human beings living in a sort of underground den, which has a mouth open towards the light and reaching all across the den; they have been here from their childhood, and have their legs and necks chained so that they cannot move, and can only see before them; for the chains are arranged in such a manner as to prevent them from turning round their heads. At a distance above and behind them the light of a fire is blazing, and between the fire and the prisoners there is a raised way; and you will see, if you look, a low wall built along the way, like the screen which marionette players have before them, over which they show the puppets.
I see, he said.
And do you see, I said, men passing along the wall carrying vessels, which appear over the wall; also figures of men and animals, made of wood and stone and various materials; and some of the prisoners, as you would expect, are talking, and some of them are silent.
This is a strange image, he said, and they are strange prisoners.
Like ourselves, I replied; and they see only their own shadows, or the shadows of one another, which the fire throws on the opposite wall of the cave?
True, he said: how could they see anything but the shadows if the were never allowed to move their heads?
And of the objects which are being carried in like manner they would see only the shadows?
Yes, he said.
And if they were able to talk with one another, would they not suppose that they were naming what was actually before them?" [6]
A society controlled by a "independent, expert organization," arranging chains of bondage from childhood by corrupting the societies knowledge base, and deciding what shadows to project on the wall, would be a society of prisoners that couldn't use their heads to act in their own best interest. They would become a society of slaves living in a realm of fear.
The Council on Foreign Relations is the "independent, expert organization" Lippmann is advocating.
roundtable
[1] Quigley, Carroll (1910-1977), The Anglo-American Establishment, From Rhodes to Cliveden, 1981, Books In Focus, NY, NY pg. 3 [ Quigley footnotes this information to W. T. Stead, The Last Will and Testament of Cecil Rhodes (London, 1902); Sir Francis Wylie's three articles in the American Oxonian (April 1944), XXXI, 65-69; (July 1944), XXXI, 129-138; and (January 1945), XXXII, 1-11; F. Aydelotte, The American Rhodes Scholars (Princeton, 1946); and the biographies and memoirs of the men mentioned.
[2] Quigley, Carroll (1910-1977), The Anglo-American Establishment, From Rhodes to Cliveden, 1981, Books In Focus, NY, NY pg.49 [ Quigley footnotes Cecil Headlam, ed., The Milner Papers, 1897-1905 (2 vols. London, 1931-1933), II, 412-413; the unpublished material is at New College, Oxford, in Milner papers, XXXVIII, ii, 200]
[3] Pollock, Daniel C Project Director & Editors De Mclaurin,Ronald, Rosenthal, Carl F., Skillings, Sarah A., The Art and Science of Psychological Operations: Case Studies of Military Application Volume One, Pamphlet No. 725-7-2, DA Pam 525-7-2, Headquarters Department of the Army Washington, DC, 1 April 1976 Vol 2 pg 825 - Ways and Means of US Ideological Expansion, By A. Valyuzhenich, bio lists him as a soviet analyst; no further information available -- the article was printed in International Affairs (Moscow) magazine February 1971, pp. 63-68;
[4] Lippmann, Walter PUBLIC OPINION, Harcourt, Brace and Co., NY, 1922 pgs 25-26
[5] Lippmann, Walter PUBLIC OPINION, Harcourt, Brace and Co., NY, 1922 pg 31-32
[6] Lippmann, Walter PUBLIC OPINION, Harcourt, Brace and Co., NY, 1922,
unnumbered page following dedication to Faye Lippmann and proceeding Table
of Contents pg ix, translation credited to Jowett
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Title-50 War and National Defense § 783 states - "It shall be unlawful
for any person knowingly to combine,
conspire, or agree with any other person to perform any act which would
substantially contribute to the
establishment within the United States of a totalitarian dictatorship,
the direction and control of which is to be
vested in, or exercised by or under the domination of control of, any
foreign government."
The Council on Foreign Relations are in violation of Title-50 War and
National Defense § 783. The Council
on Foreign Relations has unlawfully and knowingly combined, conspired,
and agreed to substantially
contribute to the establishment of one world order under the totalitarian
dictatorship, the direction and the
control of members of Council on Foreign Relations, the Royal Institute
of International Affairs, and
members of their branch organizations in various nations throughout
the world. That is totalitarianism on a
global scale.