The Bilderberg Group - Why so secret?
Every year since 1954, a small network of rich and powerful people have held a discussion meeting about the state of the trans-Atlantic alliance and the problems facing Europe and the US. Organised by a steering committee of two people from each of about 18 countries, the Bilderberg Group (named after the Dutch hotel in which it held its first meeting) brings together about 120 leading business people and politicians.
The chairman of the secretive - he prefers the word private - Bilderberg Group is 73-year-old Viscount Etienne Davignon, corporate director and former European Commissioner. In his office, on a private floor above the Brussels office of the Suez conglomerate lined with political cartoons of himself, he tells us what he thought of allegations that Bilderberg is a global conspiracy secretly ruling the world. "It is unavoidable and it doesn't matter," he says. "There will always be people who believe in conspiracies but things happen in a much more incoherent fashion."
Bilderberg meetings often feature future political leaders shortly before they become household names. Bill Clinton went in 1991 while still governor of Arkansas, Tony Blair was there two years later while still an opposition MP. All the recent presidents of the European Commission attended Bilderberg meetings before they were appointed. This has led to accusations that the group pushes its favoured politicians into high office. But Viscount Davignon says his steering committee are simply excellent talent spotters. The steering committee "does its best assessment of who are the bright new boys or girls in the beginning phase of their career who would like to get known."
"It's not a total accident, but it's not a forecast and if they go places it's not because of Bilderberg, it's because of themselves," Viscount Davignon says.
But its critics say Bilderberg's selection process gives an extra boost to aspiring politicians whose views are friendly to big business. None of this, however, is easy to prove - or disprove.
According to a variety of sources, the following presidential candidates are either members of one of the group or have strong ties: Hillary Rodham Clinton, Rudy Giuliani, Mitt Romney, Barack Obama, John McCain, John Edwards, Fred Thompson, Joe Biden, Chris Dodd and Bill Richardson. Mike Huckabee, though not a member, spoke to the CFR in September. Since then, his political star has risen to the point that he has become a top-tier candidate. So often throughout recent history it has been the case.
Ever since Democrat Adlai Stevenson challenged Republican Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1952 and 1956, the odds have significantly favored those with membership in the elite groups.
In 1960, both John F. Kennedy and Richard M. Nixon were members.
Not surprising that John F. Kennedy made a speech in 1961 about the worries he had in regards to secret societies, two years before his assassination and many claim the reason for his assassination;
• I want to talk about our common responsibilities in the face of a common danger. The events of recent weeks may have helped to illuminate that challenge for some; but the dimensions of its threat have loomed large on the horizon for many years. Whatever our hopes may be for the future--for reducing this threat or living with it--there is no escaping either the gravity or the totality of its challenge to our survival and to our security--a challenge that confronts us in unaccustomed ways in every sphere of human activity.
• This deadly challenge imposes upon our society two requirements of direct concern both to the press and to the President--two requirements that may seem almost contradictory in tone, but which must be reconciled and fulfilled if we are to meet this national peril. I refer, first, to the need for a far greater public information; and, second, to the need for far greater official secrecy.
• The very word "secrecy" is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are as a people inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths and to secret proceedings. We decided long ago that the dangers of excessive and unwarranted concealment of pertinent facts far outweighed the dangers which are cited to justify it. Even today, there is little value in opposing the threat of a closed society by imitating its arbitrary restrictions. Even today, there is little value in insuring the survival of our nation if our traditions do not survive with it. And there is very grave danger that an announced need for increased security will be seized upon by those anxious to expand its meaning to the very limits of official censorship and concealment. That I do not intend to permit to the extent that it is in my control. And no official of my Administration, whether his rank is high or low, civilian or military, should interpret my words here tonight as an excuse to censor the news, to stifle dissent, to cover up our mistakes or to withhold from the press and the public the facts they deserve to know.
• We are opposed around the world by a monolithic and ruthless conspiracy. That relies on primarily on covet means for expanding its fear of influence. On infiltration instead of invasion. On subversion instead of elections. On intimidation instead of free choice, on guerillas by night instead of armies by day. It is a system which has conscripted, vast human and material resources into the building of a tightly nit highly efficient machine that combines military, diplomatic, intelligence, economic, scientific, and political operations. Its preparations are concealed, not published. Its mistakes are buried, not headlined. Its dissenters are silenced not praised. No expenditure is questioned, no rumor is printed, no secret is revealed.
• It requires a change in outlook, a change in tactics, a change in missions--by the government, by the people, by every businessman or labor leader, and by every newspaper. For we are opposed around the world by a monolithic and ruthless conspiracy that relies primarily on covert means for expanding its sphere of influence--on infiltration instead of invasion, on subversion instead of elections, on intimidation instead of free choice, on guerrillas by night instead of armies by day. It is a system which has conscripted vast human and material resources into the building of a tightly knit, highly efficient machine that combines military, diplomatic, intelligence, economic, scientific and political operations.
• Its preparations are concealed, not published. Its mistakes are buried, not headlined. Its dissenters are silenced, not praised. No expenditure is questioned, no rumor is printed, no secret is revealed. It conducts the Cold War, in short, with a war-time discipline no democracy would ever hope or wish to match.
• Nevertheless, every democracy recognizes the necessary restraints of national security--and the question remains whether those restraints need to be more strictly observed if we are to oppose this kind of attack as well as outright invasion.
• And so it is to the printing press--to the recorder of man's deeds, the keeper of his conscience, the courier of his news--that we look for strength and assistance, confident that with your help man will be what he was born to be: free and independent.
Observers like Will Hutton argue that such private networks have both good and bad sides. They are unaccountable to voters but, at the same time, they do keep the international system functioning. And there are limits to their power - a point which Bilderberg chairman was keen to stress, "When people say this is a secret government of the world I say that if we were a secret government of the world we should be bloody ashamed of ourselves." Following the recent announcement of a €750bn EU bailout fund, the EC head and Bilderberg darling José Manuel Barroso announced details of the plan for further European integration. “Europe has dealt with the immediate emergency but we must also show we are serious about the more fundamental reforms needed.
Another Bilderberg kingpin, EU president Herman van Rompuy, reiterated Barroso’s statements, telling the media that “We can’t have a monetary union without some form of economic and – er – political union.” Mervyn King, the governor of the Bank of England echoed these sentiments yesterday, telling the media that he believes the European Union will not survive unless financial power is centralized and a federal fiscal union is formed. “I do not want to comment on a particular measure by a particular country, but I do want to suggest that within the Euro Area it’s become very clear that there is a need for a fiscal union to make the Monetary Union work.” King stated in a press conference at the BOE.
A former journalist, Mr Gosling runs a campaign against the group from his home in Bristol, UK. "My main problem is the secrecy. When so many people with so much power get together in one place I think we are owed an explanation of what is going on. Mr Gosling seizes on a quote from Will Hutton, the British economist and a former Bilderberg delegate, who likened it to the annual WEF gathering where "the consensus established is the backdrop against which policy is made worldwide".
"One of the first places I heard about the determination of US forces to attack Iraq was from leaks that came out of the 2002 Bilderberg meeting," says Mr Gosling
Many conspiracy theorists believe this leak involved several ideas on various false flag operations including the later publicly revealed false flag operation involving flying a UN painted plane over Iraq in hope that the Iraqi's would shoot it down justifying an invasion, this idea was later exchanged for another one involving weapons of mass destruction, possibly because the Iraqi's didn't shoot.
But "privacy, rather than secrecy", is key to such a meeting says Financial Times journalist Martin Wolf, who has been invited several times in a non-reporting role.
Informal and private networks like Bilderberg have helped to oil the wheels of global politics and globalisation for the past half a century. In the eyes of critics they have undermined democracy, but their supporters believe they are crucial to modern democracy's success. And so long as business and politics remain mutually dependent, they will continue to thrive.
In other words, European nation states are literally signing over their economic independence to a vastly empowered centralized system under the threat of economic obliteration.
For many years critics have warned that the EU has been slowly morphing into a federal superstate governed by unelected powerbrokers, who have increasingly sought to undermine the national sovereignty of member states. There can be no doubt that this latest proposal represents such a move.
What will the people of the member nations gain from this mass centralized union? They will simply see more of their earnings and their savings siphoned off to Brussels to prop up a failing paper currency they had never asked for in the first place. It will also mean their national vote counts for even less as unelected foreign bureaucrats are provided vastly more influence on the national economic policies of their governments.
This is a classic case of problem, reaction, solution – the very same European powerbrokers that brought us a major crisis, via enforced destabilizing monetary integration, are now offering up the final piece of the jigsaw, full integration as a means of stabilization, a new world order.
