The article below was written by Dana Allen -- and posted on the www.NewsRevolt.com Internet site back on 17 August 2001.
That website is no longer active, but fortunately I had a hard copy of it stashed away -- and I'm posting it again, as I want it available in the public domain for posterity reasons, considering what's unfolding on the world stage at the moment.
The latest was this news item from Zero Hedge late Sunday afternoon EST headlined "In "Major Policy Shift" Biden Authorizes Ukraine's Use of U.S. Missiles to Hit Targets Inside Russia" -- and linked here.
It has historical significance -- and I just wanted to make sure that it didn't get 'lost'...if you know what I mean. Here it is in its entirety -- and unedited...except for the fact that I added the "Gold & Oil" part to its headline. You'll find out why I did while you're reading it.
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Gold & Oil: How the Soviet Empire’s Fall Was Engineered -- Dana Allen
In March 1999 I was privileged to hear from John Browne, Margaret Thatcher's Foreign Policy Advisor the story of how a plan was developed to end the Soviet Empire. Before that story some background.
I have been a Silicon Valley software executive and entrepreneur most of my career having founded Sequoia Data, the first pure E-commerce company in 1987. Later I merged it to go public with TMS to form TMSSequoia. At the same time as an American I was concerned about news censorship in America and its effect on out country. As I investigated more stories I found out that outfits like CNN and CBS were heavily censoring stories if they endangered their political favorites.
So I helped people like Reed Irvine at Accuracy in Media and reporters like Chris Ruddy that were fighting the news censorship. In the summer of 1998 Chris founded NewsMax.com with my assistance and I became Chairman of NewsMax. It is now a well-known major Internet news service and has a major magazine as well. In March of 1999 we had a party in Palm Beach Florida. A supporter, Sofia Casey, the widow of the former CIA head Bill Casey, hosted it as she wanted to introduce us to investors in that area (we were raising money). I flew in for the event of about 50 people.
Sofia was an exceptionally graceful hostess. At the party she charmed everyone with her conversation and twinkly eyes. I remember thinking that Bill Casey, whom I have never met, was lucky to have a wife like Sofia. She has since passed on this year.
Chris Ruddy with his trademark public speaking skill started it off by introduced three people. First he introduced John Browne, who as mentioned already was Margaret Thatcher's Foreign Policy Advisor, then he introduced me as the Chairman of NewsMax and TMSSequoia, and then he introduced Former White House Chief of Staff General Alexander Haig. Sure enough I looked over and there was Al Haig. After that John Browne was given the floor to give a speech. The topic was how the Soviet Empire was toppled. John is an excellent public speaker, but what made his speech possibly the most fascinating I have ever heard is that it was so historic, intriguing and from an insider. John Browne had met with Gorbachev before Thatcher. He then set up the first meeting between Thatcher and Gorbachev. That started the ball rolling on Russia's new "openness" policy and Thatcher made her famous phrase "I can work with this man" after that meeting.
It is fairly well known that Ronald Reagan was a sincere Anti-Communist as was Thatcher. The depth of this was made apparent to me when I had lunch (also in 1999) with Michael Reagan, his son and a Talk Radio host. Michael told me that upon Ron losing the 76 primaries to Gerald Ford that Michael had tried to comfort his dad. Ron told Michael that he did not particularly care whether he became President or not, instead his disappointment was in regard to not being able to topple Communism and in particular being able to walk out of an arms negotiation with the Secretary General of the Soviet Union after telling him "nyet". This story from Michael Reagan dovetailed with what John Browne was to reveal in his talk.
Browne said that after Reagan came to office ties were established with Thatcher on the common goal of ending the evil of Soviet Communism. Eventually this movement grew to include America, England and the Pope.
Independent to Browne's talk other researchers have reported that the Pope having grown up under the National Socialist's of Hitler then the Soviet Communists in Poland was naturally an Anti-Communist from his personal experience. But he had an extra motive. In 1917 there were those girls in Portugal (Fatima) that said they received messages from the Virgin Mary. The Catholic Church has given official credence to their prophecies.
What they said is less well reported than the event. They said they heard that a great evil would appear in Russia and would fight against the Church and almost win. Well about six months later the Communists did come to power in Russia and did later murder millions in its quest to stamp out Christianity. Other part of the prophecy was that the Pope would be shot (which he was in 1981 by the Communists) and that the Russian Communist atheists would fall. It was apparently believed by Pope John Paul II that the timing of that would likely fall in his term. It has been reported that he felt it was his mission to help make this happen. The official Vatican site for this prophecy is linked here.
So the players and their motivation were in place. Browne said the key individuals in this were President Reagan, Bill Casey of the CIA, Thatcher, Browne and the Pope. Reagan thought differently than previous presidents and the State Department, who thought just containing and living with the Soviets was the best policy. Reagan wanted to actively topple them.
The participants on this mission came up with the following plan. Instead of a bloody war, the Soviets could be bankrupted into surrender. America would first build up our military inducing the Soviets to try and keep up with us and thus spend more and at the same time we would figure out ways to reduce their foreign exchange income.
As part of the buildup America started the "Star Wars" defense program. Star Wars frightened the Soviets because technology wise they were inferior to the U.S. and knew it. Thus the KGB mounted a propaganda offensive to try and get the U.S. to drop it, and received assistance from many in our establishment media wittingly or not.
Next we applied pressure. For the first time land was reclaimed from Communists (in Grenada) a psychological blow. Then the U.S. backed the freedom fighters in Nicaragua and Afghanistan, which required massive spending by the Soviets to contend with. It also put them on notice that we would no longer concede countries they had mostly gained control of.
Then just as Reagan had told his son he would in 1976, he walked out of the Iceland arms negotiations with Gorbachev. The American press at the time said it was a disaster for Reagan. The Soviets after their fall admitted it was a turning point in the battle and a brilliant move by Reagan. Of course the American Establishment Press always said an arms race could not be won, until after it was won.
The Pope applied moral pressure especially on his visit to Poland. That was a key event in changing the psychology in Eastern Europe. Great Britain assisted in diplomacy, intelligence and military spending.
Remember the 2nd prong in bankrupting the Soviets, reducing their Foreign Exchange income? The first step on that was to determine where the Soviets income mostly came from. It turned out to be Oil and Gold. Then Browne said that this is where the CIA came in, they in a very sophisticated manner went around the world and manipulated markets to drive down the price of both Oil and Gold. Remember where Oil and Gold were when Reagan took over? They were in the neighborhood of $30 a barrel and $500 an ounce. Both fell dramatically under Reagan. As Browne made this and other points I would look across the patio and look at Mrs. Casey and Al Haig and both would be nodding in agreement with Browne's points.
The conclusion of the speech was that it worked, and the Soviets ran out of money and fell.
There are people who believe that the American government is today manipulating the price of gold downward for their own purposes. I do not know if this is true, however I do know they have the capability to do so as they did it in the 1980s to bankrupt the Soviets. In that case I applaud what they did, it was in our countries best interest, it freed millions from Communist slavery and it may have saved millions of lives in future wars that were prevented.
It is encouraging to know that a huge problem that went unsolved for 70 years was solved when one person with the assistance of others decided for the first time to tackle it proactively. A lesson for all of us when someone says a problem is too big to tackle.
Dana Allen
President
American Media Revolution
www.NewsRevolt.com [no longer active]
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The above essay prompted me to undertake what turned into 2-year odyssey, with the end result being my first major commentary on the Internet back in late 2002 headlined "When Irish Eyes Are Smiling: The Story of Canada's Gold?"
My writing skills and style have improved greatly since then...at least I'd like to think they have. If I'd written it today, it would have been done a bit differently -- and with somewhat less hyperbole. Some of the text on this website is obscured by the right side-bar -- and there's nothing I can do about that. This is not the website it was originally posted on, but it's all I could find using the Goggle search engine. A lot of the charts and photos have vanished -- and a lot of the links are inactive as well...like for the Dana Allen piece above.
It's very long...but it's something else that I didn't wish to see disappear...especially considering what's going on in the world now 20+ years later...starting with the rise like the proverbial Phoenix of the new Mother Russia under Vladimir Putin...the resurrection of gold as a Tier 1 asset with the BIS -- and the ongoing rush to gold by the world's central banks et al.
The link to that is here.
NOTE: I have the complete text-only version of this available -- and if interested, contact me and I'll send it to you.
Ed
About the author
