1. FOREIGN POLICY (5/15/02)
2. FOREIGN POLICY II (5/15/02)
3. FOREIGN POLICY III (5/15/02)
3. FOREIGN POLICY IV (5/15/02)

So far, except for charges of misfeasance and hints of malfeasance by former President Clinton, none of the so-called experts conducting U.S. foreign policy has been blamed for events leading to September 11, 2001. No one has been fired for any misdeeds, and the ex-president is busy trying to clean up his image, in addition to making speeches and writing for big bucks.

But our foreign policy direction always seems to enmesh us in armed conflicts (about 200 so far), major between nations or the hit-and-run variety of terrorists. The people involved in forming that policy direction should be held responsible for the outcome. .

Enemies of America didn't just surface overnight. We knew most of them, and they gave plenty of warnings of their intent. The CIA, FBI and all security agencies and foreign policy planners clearly were asleep at the switch when the Sept. 11 attack occurred. That's despite the denial testimony in February, 2002, given by CIA Director George Tenet. The policy makers also share some culpability in policies that emboldened the terrorists to embark on such a gigantic plan and gave them time to plan it by not heeding and responding to abundant warning signs.

Presidents are blamed for wars or credited for winning them regardless of whether they should rightly share either in the blame or the credit. As examples, Woodrow Wilson was lauded for winning World War I, which his policies led to, and his adamant stance also helped in losing the peace; indispensable FDR was re-elected to an unprecedented fourth term for his popularity during World War II in which his role is still being disputed; George Bush's ineptness both before and after the Gulf War has been well chronicled. So has Bill Clinton's appeasement policies in China and the Middle East.

But all of these presidents didn't act alone, of course. They had advisers who were tied in with the so-called British connection, which was the Milner or Rhodes groups of round tables that conducted British foreign policy and almost destroyed Western Civilization, according to Dr. Carroll Quigley (The Anglo-American Establishment). Wilson's chief adviser was Col. Edward Mandel House, a front for this group as well as the banking House of Rothschild.

The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), an offshoot of the British round table groups, has been involved in influencing foreign policy in the United States at least since the Roosevelt days and probably before. Because the CFR has been so heavily concentrated in high policy-making government posts for the past six or seven decades, it should be closely scrutinized.

But other organizations that overlap memberships with the CFR that are also involved with rungs on the elite government ladder should be mentioned briefly. They are the Trilateral Commission (TC), the Bilderbergs; The Order of Skull and Bones (The Order or Bones); Freemasonry; the Pilgrim Society, The Bohemian Club (San Francisco) and the Atlantic Council, whose goal is to replace the U.S. Constitution with a world constitution.

Of these groups, the Order is believed to have the most clout because of its closer ties to the tax-free money of the large foundations, according to Historian Antony Sutton. It's the same old direction - follow the money. The Bushes are members of the Order. Sutton, who did a study of the Order and wrote America's Secret Establishment, an Introduction to the Order of Skull & Bones, states: The Order ''…is a clear and obvious threat to the constitutional freedom in the United States. Its secrecy, power and use of influence is greater by far than…'' the other organizations mentioned.

CFR SATURATION

As noted, many members of the Order are also members of CFR. The elder George Bush is a good example. Although the CFR claims it doesn't have an agenda and is just another Washington think tank, it is more than that. It has saturated the government with its membership in high, policy-making positions for decades. If any other ideological group had so much representation in high government positions, there would be a national outcry. Yet little is said about it.

It is true, as the CFR points out in its promotional material, that members do disagree on certain points, but they are all liberals, most are one-worlders and support globalization and world organizations such as the United Nations and the World Trade Conference (WTC) at the expense of U.S. sovereignty. As an example, of differences among members Benjamin R. Barber, professor of political science at Rutgers University, takes issue with Samuel P. Huntington, former Harvard professor who wrote The Clash of Civilizations.

Barber labels Huntington one of the ''hyperbolic commentator(s)'' and claims he apes Osama bin Laden, ''who has called for precisely such a war'' (between democracy and Islam). Barber is not against globalism but wants it democratized for the benefit of all and claims ''…the current architecture of globalism builds anarchy, nihilism and violence.''

While Barber criticizes Huntington's work CFR member Henry Kissinger endorses it as ''…one of the most important books to have emerged since the end of the Cold War.'' Colin Powell and Donald Rumsfeld also differ in a dove-hawk policy manner, but they are both have CFR membership.

In his book, Jihad vs. McWorld, Barber calls terrorism ''a depraved version of globalization.'' He criticizes multinational corporations and the homogenization of global markets. Instead, he advocates creating a world in which ''the seduction of death (by terrorists) holds no allure because the bounties of life are accessible to everyone.'' Sounds like the utopia we've all been waiting for. But Barber appears to be right about one thing - the present architecture of globalism and foreign policy isn't working.

Barber's book is another in a series of studies blaming present unstable world conditions on world trade and globalization in which corporations, largely unfettered by sovereign boundaries or laws, are the main players. This globalization and trade-expansion-at-all-costs was supposed to end poverty and provoke world peace. The policy was and is supported by most CFR members whether they disagree in details or not.

The concept had its origins in the now-famous Bretton Woods, N. H., conference of 1944 under the aegis of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR). Out of the conference came the creation of the World Bank and International Monetary Funds (IMF) and the foundation for the later creation of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) from which sprung the World Trade Conference (WTO).

The ostensible purpose of Bretton Woods was to develop a framework for the global economy after World War II and to finance European and Asian reconstruction. But the former was accomplished mostly with tax dollars through the Marshall plan.

As for aiding the global economy, David C. Korten, former Harvard Business School professor, asserts in The Case Against the Global Economy: The Bretton Woods institutions (World Bank and IMF) ''…have inexorably empowered the super rich to lay claims to the world's wealth at the expense of the other people, other species, and the viability of the planet's ecosystem.''

In a new book When Corporations Rule the World, Korten is even more critical: ''If measured by contributions to improving the lives of the people or strengthening the institutions of democratic governance, the World Bank and the IMF have been disastrous failures…''

Barber is also critical of the institutions, which he said, ''…became instruments of the very private-sector interests they were meant to ''…keep in check.''

Remember that the CFR has supplied members to these organizations (as well as government) during all of the time of their existence.

The mainline press, publishing, foundations, financial institutions, bankers, senators and congressmen and corporations are also affiliated with CFR. Three justices of the Supreme Court - Sandra Day O,Connor, Steven G. Breyer and Ruth B. Ginsburg -- also are CFR members. Alan Greenspan, chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, is a member as was former member Alice Rivlin. The late Sen. Barry Goldwater wrote that ''Almost without exception the members of the CFR are united by a congeniality of birth, economic status, and educational background.'' He noted that every secretary of state since 1944, with the exception of James F. Byrnes, has been a member of the CFR. Byrnes, however, was closely associated with Bernard Baruch, a CFR supporter.

Space won't permit going too deeply into this background but just a look at the high-level members in two or three administrations should do it.

First Bush Administration: Brent Snowcroft; Dick Cheney, Colin Powell, Robert Gates, Dick Thornburgh, Nicholas Brady, Richard Darman, Lynn Martin, Michael Calhoun and, of course, Bush himself.

Clinton Administration: Anthony Lake, Warren Christopher, Madeleine Albright, Strobe Talbot, Laura Tyson, Robert Rubin, Lawrence H. Summers, who now heads Harvard University, Bruce Babbitt, Henry Cisneros, Donna Shalala, George Stephenopoulos, Samuel Berger and, of course, Clinton.

In the present Bush Administration CFR members include Powell, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Condoleezza Rice, Robert Zoellick, Elaine L. Chao, and Christie Whitman plus several other high-level assistants such as Paul D. Wolfowitz, No. 2 man at the Defense Department. Add to that George Tenet at CIA, a holdover from the Clinton Administration who Bush made a special effort to defend after the Sept. 11 attack. Clinton had wanted Anthony Lake for CIA but he had troubles that made Congressional approval doubtful. He, too, belonged to CFR as did John Deutch, who drew a pardon from Clinton for playing loose with the nation's top secrets.

President George W.Bush's name does not appear on the CFR membership rolls, but he clearly condones the organization and its members and, as mentioned, belongs to Skull & Bones, a closely related organization.
(CONTINUED)

By Richard C. Sizemore

From the lists of Council of Foreign Relations (CFR) members in the last few administrations and long before, it appears reasonable to assume that CFR membership is almost a prerequisite for a high policy-making government post. So, if these people decide the policy, then they have to take responsibility for it.

That includes the Gulf War, both for events leading to the war and the failure to depose Saddam Hussein and secure peace after the war; relations with China where China has written it's own ticket and built a threatening defense at U.S. expense plus bullying us in Southeast Asia that led to so little objection that appeasement is suggested; the Middle East policy and the coddling of some Arab nations because of dependence on oil, and, of course, the policies that emboldened terrorist leader Osama bin Laden and countries like Iran and Iraq to challenge U.S. hegemony.

Consider the failed policies of the Bush I presidency and the even worse policies of the Clinton Administration that followed. And remember both administrations were loaded with CFR advisers as well as members of the other sister organizations.

Before Bush I's inconsistent policy left Saddam Hussein believing the United States would not intervene if he attacked Kuwait, President Bush I held all the posts where the establishment has influence, including ambassador to the United Nations, chairman of the GOP; head of the CIA, and envoy to China. But his presence in China made no visible difference in its hard-line attitude, despite U.S. peace overtures of trade and access to U.S. technology. Bush was president during the Tiananmen Square massacre of 1989 but had little influence with the communist nation he and his advisers tried to befriend.

So, the Bush misjudgment of Saddam Hussein resulted in the Gulf War where he messed up the victory when he failed to go after the rogue dictator and left him free to do more mischief. Despite the loss of life and exposure of the men who fought the war to poison gas and chemicals, the job apparently will have to be done all over again.

Saddam is frightfully close to developing nuclear weapons, if he hasn't already, because of the failed policy of Bush followed by the timid policy of Bill Clinton who was preoccupied with a White House intern and the fallout from that. But the CFR affiliates like Brent Snowcroft and Dick Cheney (Bush) and Samuel Berger, Madeleine Albright, Strobe Talbot and George Tenet were all present and advising. George W.Bush is now threatening to invade Iraq, and critics may bring in avenging his father as a reason if his policy fails, just as some critics called Clinton's bombing of Iraq a wag-the-dog reaction during his impeachment troubles.

Top administrations officials like Colin Powell say there are no plans to invade Iraq and Tenet and other high-level administration officials are denying Iraq's involvement in a meeting in Prague connected to 9/11, despite Prague intelligence reports to the contrary.

If Bush does invade Iraq again, $5 will get you $10 he won't ask Congress for a declaration of war. And that may take us to the biggest conflict since World War II via executive order. Of the approximately 200 times the U.S. has used force, it has declared war only five times. So much for the Constitution. The five declared wars were: The Mexican War, the Spanish-American War; the War of 1812 and the two world wars.

CLINTON, IRAN AND OTHER MISCUES

Clinton's policies were so bad it is difficult to find a starting point. His appeasement policy with China, campaign donations from the same source, technology exports and wag-the-dog bombing of Iraq and feeble attempts at going after bin Laden are well known in addition to other miscues. But his foul-up in the Middle East hasn't received much attention.

It was the Clinton-CFR policy that got us evicted from Somalia and the African Horn. The intelligence cooperation of Iraq, Iran and bin Laden's terrorists helped bring this about. It also contributed to events that culminated in Sept. 11. Yossef Bodansky in bin Laden, the Man Who Declared War on America wrote that the victory in Somalia convinced bin Laden that the United States was, in his words, ''a paper tiger.''

In his efforts to leave a legacy by bringing peace to the Balkans and make the Dayton Accords successful, Clinton Administration policies betrayed a staunch ally in Egypt. In a secret deal with Islamist terrorists, Bodansky relates, Clinton was willing to tolerate the overthrow of the (Hosni) Mubarak government in Egypt if the terrorists would refrain from attacking U.S. forces in Bosnia-Herzegovina. He later betrayed that secret agreement as well.

Clinton looked the other way when Iran shipped weapons and even fighters to Muslin forces in Bosnia in violation of U. N. sanctions. Iran saw the United States as weak just as bin Laden did. Bodansky makes one startling observation: ''Virtually all major and spectacular terrorist strikes are state sponsored, and they are not hasty undertakings.'' Given the intelligence cooperation of bin Laden, Iran and Iraq and possibly other Islamic nations like Sudan, one wonders who actually abetted the radical leader in pulling off the New York strike.

Clinton is now distancing his administration from any blame for events leading up to 9/11and is in the throes of trying to recast his image. He has his former administration officials engaged in that task.

Even Al Gore, who tried hard to sever ties to Clinton during his run for the presidency, is now back on the speaking circuit and defending Clinton's conduct in the war on terrorism. He chose the CFR as the forum to launch his foreign policy position. After all, he's one of the CFR gang himself.

So are Clinton and Madeleine Albright who are now criticizing Bush's hard stance on north Korea, especially linking it with Iran and Iraq as an ''axis of evil.'' Incidentally, Clinton's lies led to his disbarment from the practice of law in Arkansas. Guess he can still practice foreign policy and maintain his CFR membership regardless of lying under oath.

The former president and Albright maintain they had the ''potential of a verifiable agreement'' with North Korea to stop the export of missile technology on the table when they left office. Albright also said the United States needed Iran's help in dealing with Afghanistan . Apparently she thinks appeasement is all right with Iran because that's exactly what the Clinton Administration did in dealing with that rogue state.

At this writing North Korean leader Kim Jong-il is allegedly trying to get Clinton to play a mediating role in relations with the United States. Former President, Jimmy Carter played that role in trying to arrange a summit between the leaders of North and South Korea. Carter, as mentioned, is now intruding into policy in Cuba and the Middle East. That's all we need. Two ex-presidents, whose foreign policies were a disasters, meddling in world affairs.

As for Iran, the Bush Administration claims that from the caves in Afghanistan they came up with more evidence linking Iran to advanced weapons exports. This evidence was available, however, from the beginning of the Bush Administration and well before, not only from U.S. intelligence but also from several written works. Just one book bin Laden, the Man who Declared War on America by Yossef Bodansky, a former consultant to the State and Defense Departments, would have sufficed.

In any event, the CFR-laden Bush Administration is now taking a harder stance toward Iran as well as Iraq and North Korea and that's good whatever the reason. Appeasement with these outlaw states will not work any better than it will with Communist China, which was left out of the evil axis, As was Yasir Arafat and the PLO. There is little doubt that China is just as involved in the export of nuclear technology as the other axis states, although it may not be as directly involved with bin Laden and Al-Qaeda as the other countries.

And how about Russia another nation left off of the ''axis of evil'' list? It may not be on the list, but it is building a nuclear reactor in Iran, which is on the list and considering a tentative request from North Korea, also on the list for a similar nuclear plant. Russian diplomats also have cautioned the United states against invading Iraq. When Bush had Vladimir Putin visit his ranch in Crawford, Tex., he said something about seeking deep into Putin's soul. Let's hope he looks a little deeper next time with a polished soul scope.

The president also gave Crown Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia a guided tour of the ranch in the spring of '02. He said the meeting helped build a 'strong personal bond'' with the prince. Looking into potential adversaries' souls and building personal bonds seems to be Bush's forte in Crawford. Presumably, it doesn't work as well at the White House or Camp David. But in all the bond-building, we must not forget that Prince Abdullah's hands are not spotless in his dealings with the Islamic terrorists, or the evil axis, or his ideological bent for that matter.

His knowledge of the Khobar Towers bombing in 1996 in which 19 Americans were killed in a bombing in which bin Laden was involved is well documented. In his attempts to avert the removal of the House of al-Saud from power from factions within as well as bin Laden, the regime of de-facto Prince Abdullah (sometimes spelled Abdallah) cooperated with Iran, refused to have bin Laden turned over, and was second only to Pakistan in support of the Taliban, and Saudi Arabia under his leadership whitewashed the Khobar bombings.

Not only have the Saudi's failed to provide the U.S. key information about Sept. 11, they have not even provided us with a copy of their findings about the Khobar bombing, although they shared the information with Iran, according to Bodansky, who adds:

''Prince Abdallah (or Abdullah) is a devout Islamist and a staunch supporter of the ulema's (supreme religious authority) political power. He is also a staunch supporter of pan-Arab and pan-Islamic causes, including worldwide jihads, and moreover is anti-Western and mistrustful of the United States.''

On the visit of the Prince to Texas, pundits observed that the protection of the House of al-Saud and the marketing of oil were uppermost in the Abdullah's priorities in that order. This, they said, would influence his decision is supporting or opposing an U.S. invasion of Iraq. If Saddam Hussein were to be deposed by someone favorable to the United States, the vast oil reserves would become available in competition with Saudi Arabia, which would not then be able to dictate oil prices. So, Prince Abdullah has more than a perfunctory interest to oppose a U.S. invasion of Iraq.

Another fact that can't be overlooked is the close ties to the Bush's with the House of al-Saud who it protected during the Gulf War. Whether that played any part in contributions to the Bush presidential library from Saudi Arabia and Kuwait is open to question. We do know the Bush's owe most of their financial success to oil and must wonder how this influences policy since the administration is heavily-stacked with high-level executives from the oil patch.

U.S. dependence on oil, gives the prince a persuasive bargaining chip.
(CONTINUED

An essay

By Richard C. Sizemore

The axis labeling and tough talk that added up to what is referred to as the ''Bush Doctrine'' since Sept. 11 has dissipated by leaving out nations that ought to be in and ignoring actions by nations that go contrary to the doctrine.

It's beginning to resemble the old adage, ''Hear no evil, see not evil'' as the administration walks a tight line in dealing with some rogue nations.

The doctrine was enunciated by Bush when he told Congress in September, 2001 that ''Any nation that continues to harbor or support terrorism will be regarded by the United States as a hostile regime.'' Developments since that time and the U.S. reaction to them have led some pundits, including Frank Rich of The New York Times to declare that the doctrine is now defunct.

.In a ''war update'' in April, 2002, Bush again mentioned the ''axis of evil'' but this time without being specific about the countries that comprise it. He alluded to successes in Afghanistan and warned that terrorists are still on the loose and ''still want to hit us.'' He warned that nations like Iraq and others of the ''axis of evil'' variety will not be allowed to team up ''with an al Qaeda organization, and try to hold us hostage and it's just not going to happen,'' he asserted.

The administration elaborated on rogue states in May 02 when Undersecretary of State John Bolton accused Libya, Syria and Cuba of pursuing weapons of mass destruction. Bolton also said China and Russia were the largest shippers of such weapons. So, the plot seems to thicken.

We'll stay tuned on China policy in which the CFR has been greatly involved in both Republican and Democrat administrations. At present China is again saber-rattling about Formosa and is accused by China-watchers of delivering dangerous materials to the evil axis even on the day the World Trade Center was leveled by terrorists supported by this group.

The question is, where were all the CFR Clinton advisers during the foreign policy goofs during his administration, some of which carried over into the Bush watch? George Tenet, whom Bush was eager to defend after Sept. 11, is busy now defending his agency and himself against charges of incompetence.

And the CFR itself is voluntarily offering commentary from a host of ''experts,'' some former government officials, to ''hard-working'' newsmen in search of news and background. Surely the newsmen, many of whom are CFR members themselves, know they are getting the establishment view.

Clinton is writing a book and can be expected to have a favorable spin on these events. After all, he is still working on his legacy. He apparently is the only one who doesn't know he's already left one. And like the poem (Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam) that he quoted during his impeachment apology:

The Moving Finger writes, and having writ,
Moves on: nor all your piety nor wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a line
Nor all your tears wash out a word of it

It is obvious that when Clinton was issuing his one-a-day apologies during his impeachment ordeal that he did not understand the background of the poem. He said it was given to him by a friend. The poem, translated by Edward Fitzgerald, an English poet, was a satire on the religion of Islam that was spreading rapidly during the lifetime of the author, Omar Khayyam, a tentmaker, astronomer, mathematician, and poet. As an example of the atheistic tenor of the poem one verse should suffice:

Some for the glories of this world; and some
Sigh for the prophet's paradise to come;
Ah, take the cash, and let the credit go,
Nor heed the rumble of a distant drum!

There were concerns among some at the time that the militant Islamists might declare a fatwa (religious order, or in Mafia parlance contract) against Clinton as the Ayatollah Khomeini did against British author Salman Rushdie.

In any event it is a good example why lawyers like Clinton should be required to study ethics or the humanities before specializing. By contrast, hear what a moderate scholar of Islam, Khalid Duran, has to say about the radical Islamists as quoted by Stephen Emerson in American Jihad:

''The odd thing about Islamic fundamentalism is that it's always had its strongest appeal among engineers. Everything is precise and mathematical. They don't study what we call ' the humanities. But efforts to recruit students in the humanities have met with little success, Duran said. Emerson quotes him as adding: ''Having an education in literature or sociology seems to inoculate you against the appeals of fundamentalism.''

Bush is aiding Clinton in his image-building efforts by giving him a role in foreign policy. He chose him to head a U.S. delegation to East Timor's independence celebration in mid-May 02. Also in the delegation were a couple of other CFR members -- Richard C. Holbrooke, former United Nations envoy, and James Kelly, assistant secretary of state for East Asia and the Pacific.

Is there any way to get these politicians retired? Haven't we suffered enough of Bill Clinton who should have been impeached? He can't even practice law in his home state because of being a liar, but he can be involved in American foreign policy just by being a member of the CFR and the political class.

Shame on bush who already helped Clinton as well as his father, George H. Bush, when he restricted access to presidential papers. He may not have heard the last on either of these arbitrary decisions.

CFR AND MEDIA AID

It didn't take long for the Council on Foreign Relations to swing into action following Sept. 11. It offered media aid as quick as the government response to the terrorist attack. It adds credence to critics' charges and historical writings that its purpose is to sway the government and public opinion to its agenda, although it professes not to have one.

For poor working reporters it offered ''experts'' and background information leading up the terrorist attacks. No mention of the role CFR policies might have played in U.S. foreign policy was included, however. It claims to be just another of your average ''think tanks.''

Anyway it offered 40 experts who would be available to reporters who wanted to call. Here's how the agency advertised its willingness to help these reporters who could have gotten the background on their own from any good book store or library.

Council experts are available for interviews and in-depth analysis on terrorism,
homeland security, political and military intelligence, national security, the Middle East, ,
international law, U.S. defense policy, military strategy, border control, financial crises
international economics.

The old CFR covers it all, and obviously the reporters who rely on it get ''expert'' and not biased opinions from the 40 experts including: Leslie H. Gelb, president for foreign relations; Richard Holbrooke, former U.N. ambassador, former senators George Mitchell and Warren Rudman; and Morton H. Halperin, former National Security Council assistant. Of coure, Lisa Shields and Marie Strauss, director and deputy director of communications, respectively, were also standing by with ready answers.

The Washington Post , whose late owner Katherine Graham belonged to the CFR as well as the super-secret Bilderbergers, informed: ''Those in a twist over the increasingly-complex story of the war on terrorism can straighten themselves out on the Council on Foreign Relations' newly launched (site) www.terrorismanswers.com. That ought to tell us something about where the Post as well as other liberal rags are getting much of their ''unbiased'' information.

For those who might be concerned that the CFR won't be around to aid reporters and disseminate unadulterated information or propaganda in the future, there is no cause for worry. In its 2001 annual report it announced one of its goals ''will be to train the next generation of foreign policy 'experts' (quotes are mine), who should then be able to tackle foreign policy problems that encompass an important economic dimension.'' To achieve this goal, the CFR has a joint undertaking with Columbia University.

Incidentally, its senior fellow in international economics, Jagdish N. Bhagwati, is writing a book ''that seeks to demonstrate that globalization's harshest critics are wrong. It hopes to prove that freeing trade is socially benign. Bhagwati has his work cut out for him getting the facts to back the premise he is apparently going in with.

OTHER DISASTROUS DECISIONS

As bad as he was, Clinton was not the only president with CFR and liberal interventionist advisers who made disastrous foreign policy decisions that still haunt the United States.

That includes Woodrow Wilson and the invalid president, indispensable Franklin Roosevelt, and Harry Truman, who fancied himself as a historian, all of whom already have been mentioned. Truman was influenced by the British whose spies were feeding Russia and China information during the Korean War. He settled for a no-win war while the British spies and the Russian leaders at the United Nations fed information to a Chinese general who opposed MacArthur in Korea.

Given-'em-hell Harry, who needed the Jewish vote to beat John Dewey in 1948, rushed to aid the bleeding-heart British who carved out a nation for Israel in the heart of hostile Arab territory. Other sites for a Jewish home were being considered at the time, but the Jews wanted this location even though it did not include the holy sites it claimed it had a right to in a covenant with God. You know the rest of the story, as Paul Harvey would say.

Then there was John Kennedy, the flamboyant womanizer, who gave the go-ahead for Allen Dulles' Bay of Pigs fiasco and the start of the Vietnam intervention that was escalated into a full disastrous war by Lyndon B. Johnson. Kennedy also had to meet eyeball-to-eyeball with Nikita Krrushchev, who judged him weak and tested him to the brink of nuclear war in the Cuban missile crisis.

Dick Nixon opened up a can of worms in China so we could start sending that communist nation our latest technology while abandoning Taiwan, our staunch ally. Smiling Jimmy Carter humiliated the nation in dealing with Iran and the hostages. He's now getting involved in Cuba and the Middle East with his foreign policy ''expertise.'' Carter is a product of David Rockefeller and Zbigniew Brzezinski who formed the Trilateral Commission and helped the little known Georgia governor to gain the White House. After leaving office in 1993, Carter expressed disdain for the State Department's decision to place Sudan on the list of countries supporting terrorism. Sudan was open to world-wide terrorists and even sponsored al Qaeda.

We all remember George Bush, the elder, and the mistakes he made in Iraq both going in and getting out and the heavy loss of life and resources there in a war won on the field and lost by bungling. Although the collapse of the Soviet Union happened on Bush's watch as did the Tiananmen Square massacre, Bush was as surprised about the Russian cave-in as was the general public, and can take no credit for it. Chalk most of the credit for the Soviet defeat to Ronald Reagan.

As for Tiananmen Square, Bush who was former ambassador to China, had absolutely no sway with the Communist leaders in influencing a more moderate policy.

An essay

By Richard C. Sizemore

In the conduct of foreign policy, CFR advisers in the first Bush, Clinton and second Bush administrations already have been mentioned. Members of the organization also saturated the Carter Administration.

In addition to Vice President Walter Mondale, we had Zbigniew Brzezinski, national security adviser; Cyrus Vance, secretary of state; Harold Brown, secretary of defense, Stanfield Turner, CIA director,; W. Michael Blumenthal, secretary of the Treasury; Henry Kissiner, presidential advisor and Nixon Administration holdover; James Schlesinger, secretary of energy and Joseph Califano, secretary of health, education and welfare, to name the top ones.

Even Ronald Reagan, not a CFR member himself, had his CFR advisors, most notable Casper Weinberger at defense and George Shultz at state, both from the Bechtel Corporation. Bush I later pardoned Weinberger for his Iran Contra affair involvement. In addition, there was George Bush, the vice preaident; William Casey, CIA director; Donald T. Regan, treasury secretary, and Murray L. Weidenbaum and William E. Brock III, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers and trade representative, respectively.

Although all these government advisors belonged to the CFR, some also belonged to the Order of Skull and Bones to which President Bush and his father hold memberships. Advisers out of that group include Winston Lord, Clinton China ''expert,'' McGeorge Bundy, Johnson's security advisor; George Bush I, CIA and Chinese and U. N. ambassador before becoming president; W. Averell Harriman, ambassador to Russia, to name a few.

The order of Skull & Bones, according to historian Antony Sutton, has more clout than other overlapping organizations like the CFR and Trilateral Commission because it has closer ties to tax-free foundations that control the money. But Sutton cautions:

The Order '''has created wars and revolutions, they have ransacked the public treasuries, they have oppressed, they have pillaged, they have lied.'' He adds: ''The order has penetrated or has been the dominant influence in sufficient policy research and opinion making organizations that it determines the basic direction of American society.''

So much for those who run the country and foreign policy. But what security groups are to blame for the lapses that led to Sept. 11? Obviously, there is enough blame to go around, including the totally worthless Immigration Service, which is a joke, and which Congress is revamping.

FBI AND CIA

But the big two very costly security protectors, the FBI and the CIA clearly were not doing their jobs. Even FBI insiders will attest to that. The case of FBI Special Agent Robert Hanssen spying for Russia for two decades is a prime example of that. Former FBI and CIA Director William Webster told Congress the Hanssen case was ''possibly the worst intelligence disaster in U.S. history.'' Webster also criticized the FBI for relaxing security by easing access to highly sensitive information on the bureau's computerized records system.

Incidentally, Webster is a member of the CFR. Name a CIA director past or present that didn't belong to that organization so heavily involved in foreign policy.

Another FBI official, Oliver (Buck) Revell told the Dallas Press Club in the fall of 2001: ''Why didn't we know about September 11? We were deaf, dumb, and blind. We were asleep at the switch.'' Revell, the FBI's former counter-terrorism chief blamed federal officials and the American public for failure to assess the terrorism threat seriously enough.

In addition, Filipino authorities reported that they shared information with the FBI in 1995 that Middle Eastern pilots were training at U..S. flight schools and that one planned to bomb a federal building. The Filipino authorities got the information from interrogations of two Middle Eastern men who were arrested after a chemical fire at a Manila apartment tipped officials to a terrorist plot linked to Osama bin Laden's network, according to a story from the Associated Press.

Just what the FBI knew of terrorist plans before Sept. 11 and how it handled the information is a heated subject on Capitol Hill where investigations are underway. It has been revealed that the FBI was monitoring a group of Middle Eastern men at an Arizona aviation school at least two months before Sept. 11 and that has raised the antennas of some lawmakers.

A veteran CIA field agent, Robert Baer, has published a book See No Evil in which he is critical of the agency for not hiring spy agents in the field as well as people with the necessary language skills to penetrate militant Islamic groups. One of the chief criticisms of the CIA has been its heavy reliance on technology at the expense of human intelligence.

But CIA Director Tenet denies this and about every other criticism of the agency and quoted Margaret Thatcher in defending the agency against September 11: ''We must be perfect while the terrorists just have to be lucky,'' Thatcher once said. That shouldn't suffice for an excuse against the New York and Pentagon bombings.

The New York Post called for Tenet's resignation and asked in an editorial: ''Isn't anybody going to be held responsible for 9/11?'' Apparently not. President Bush was eager to support Tenet who NewYork Times columnist Bill Safire characterized as ''as a likable, patriotic bureaucrat who has President Bush's trust as he works through Brent Snowcroft (former Bush One aid and CFR member) to seize total control of all U.S. intelligence.''

A former Defense Department official in the Reagan administration, Frank Gaffney, criticized Tenet for telling Congress that the 9/11 attacks didn't represent a failure of the U.S. intelligence agencies. ''How could you describe it as anything other than a failure?'' Gaffney asked in a radio interview. He also criticized the CIA for its reliance on high-tech information gathering devices rather than developing more human ground contacts.

Another incident involving Tenet and the CIA as well as the Justice Department is an on-going controversy between Bill Safire, New York Times columnist, and the parties mentioned over Iraq's possible involvement in the 9/11 strike. Czech intelligence alleges that Mohamed Atta, the suicide hijacker, visited the Iraqi Embassy in Prague a year ago before the 9/11 attack.

Safire claims the U.S. agencies want to discredit the story, and have planted their side of the story with Washington journalists, despite Czech intelligence, which stood by its assertion that the meeting was held. If it was that would make Iraq a party to the 9/11 strike, and that would call for a U.S. military response and end the dickering over weapons inspections. Safire sides with Czech intelligence and maintains the high CIA and Justice officials are misleading Washington reporters who have bought their position.

SUMMING UP

Now we know most of the players who have been running the show for the past few score years, and we know that they must be smarter than the founding fathers, including George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, who advised against entangling alliances and interventionist policies. We have become entangled in just about every conflict around the globe since World Wars I and II. Even Winston Churchill questioned why we got into World War I, and historians are still not agreed as tp the cause of it.

But as Congressman Ron Paul points out ''The interventionist approach that has dominated American foreign policy has produced an unmitigated series of disasters. From Korea to Vietnam to Kosovo to the Middle East. American military and economic intervention has made numerous conflicts worse, not better.''

The CFR and Skull & Bones boys running the show argue times have changed and the advice of the founding fathers no longer are operative. If we accept this argument, Paul points out, ''what other principles from that era (Revolutionary days) should we discard?

The fact is we have become entangled by giving priority to the interests of multi-national corporations, elite bankers, the entertainment industry in the march toward globalism and so-called ''free'' trade with little regard for the cultures where we intrude. We have made enemies world-wide, not only in the Islamic countries where the fanatics use terrorism to vent their hatred.

Policy-makers should have understood from the bombings in Saudi Arabia and the World Trade Center the first time as well as others, the hostility of the militant Islamists and their resolve against the United States.

The CFR and the Skull boys should know that appeasement policies haven't worked in China and won't work elsewhere. All the CFR has to do is look at the policies of the Rhodes and Milner groups in Britain from which their organization sprung to know their policies would not work.

They should realize that trade at any cost is not the panacea for poverty or peace. The record proves that. They should know that who ever even with tongue in cheek coined globalony to describe globalism was no dummy, just as Washington and Jefferson, who advised against global entanglements, were not.

International trade treaties and other unconstitutional agreements have cost the United States a ton of sovereignty, although all the presidents involved have sworn to uphold the Constitution. Bush is not trying, as Clinton did before him, to bypass Congress on trade decisions by having Congress give him its constitutional trade responsibilities.

Congress already has delegated much of its constitutional power in the form of unconstitutional agencies like the Federal Reserve Board and the regulatory agencies scattered all over Washington, to name a couple of examples. So, any new loss of its constitutional powers will not be surprising. Our forefathers gave us three and not two branches of government, but Congress continues to delegate its powers to the executive branch and fails to correct Supreme Court decisions against legislation it enacted.

Most members of Congress didn't read and don't even know now what's in the convoluted world trade bill, and they won't know much about the new authority sought by Bush that would surely deplete U.S. sovereignty and more of the people's constitutional rights.

The main presidential decision in recent memory that has favored U.S. sovereignty is Bush's decision to renounce the Clinton Administration's signing of a treaty to create an international court. The tribunal, which will begin operations next year anyway, is designed to prosecute war crimes. The Bush Administration contends the court has the potential to expose U.S. soldiers and officials to capricious and mischievous prosecutions.

U.S. foreign policy at least since World War II has been disastrous for the most part. Maybe it's not time to turn it over to Southern red necks, or the Keystone Cops or Moe and Curly, but they couldn't do much worse. We could stand a change, and the organizations that have been involved may be a good place to start.

It's no surprise that an elite class has emerged in this country to rule and set policy. That's been going on all over the world from the beginning of recorded history and probably before. But the people who formed the policy and got us into this mess should be held responsible. So far, no one claims responsibility, and no one has been held accountable while all involved are busy protecting their turf.