ALTERNATIVE MEDIA CENSORSHIP: SPONSORED BY CIA's FORD FOUNDATION?
by bob feldman

Part 7:

FORD FOUNDATION, THE CIA & U.S. ESTABLISHMENT CONSPIRACY--part 1

In her book THE CULTURAL COLD WAR, Frances Stoner Saunders recalled how the
Ford Foundation collaborated with the CIA in the past--on behalf of the
Ultra-Rich families of the U.S. Establishment's power elite--to perpetuate a
globalized corporate economic system which denies political, economic and
cultural freedom and equality to the majority of humanity:

"Incorporated in 1936, the Ford Foundation was the tax-exempt cream of the
vast Ford fortune...The foundation had a record of close involvement in
covert actions in Europe, working closely with Marshall Plan and CIA
officials on specific projects...On 21 January 1953, Allen Dulles, insecure
about his future in the CIA under the newly elected Eisenhower, had met his
friend David Rockefeller for lunch. Rockefeller hinted heavily that if
Dulles decided to leave the Agency, he could reasonably expect to be invited
to become president of the Ford Foundation. Dulles need not have feared for
his future...Allen Dulles was to become Director of Central Intelligence.

"The new president of the Ford Foundation was announced shortly after. He
was John McCloy...By the time he came to the Ford Foundation, he had been
Assistant Secretary of War, president of the World Bank...In 1953 he also
became chairman of the Rockefellers' Chase Manhattan Bank, and chairman of
the Council on Froeign Relations. After John F. Kennedy's assassination, he
was a Warren Commission appointee...McCloy took a pragmatic view of the
CIA's inevitable interest in the Ford Foundation when he assumed its
presidency. Addressing the concerns of some of the foundation's executives,
who felt that its reputation for integrity and independence was being
undermined by involvement with the CIA, McCloy argued that if they failed to
cooperate, the CIA would simply penetrate the foundation quietly by
recruiting or inserting staff at lower levels. McCloy's answer to this
problem was to create an administrative unit within the Ford Foundation
specifically to deal with the CIA. Headed by McCloy and two foundation
officers, this three-man committee had to be consulted every time the Agency
wanted to use the foundation, either as a pass-through, or as cover. `They
would check in with this particular committee, and if it was felt that this
was a reasonable thing and would not be against the foundation's long-term
interests, then the project would be passed along to the internal staff and
other foundation officers (without them) knowing the origins of the
proposal,' explained McCloy's biographer, Kai Bird.

"With this arrangement in place, the Ford Foundation became officially
engaged as one of those organizations the CIA was able to mobilize for
political warfare...The foundation's archives reveal a raft of joint
projects. The East European Fund, a CIA front in which George Kennan played
a prominent role, got most of its money from the Ford Foundation...The
foundation gave $500,000 to Bill Casey's International Rescue Committee [of
which NATION editor Vanden Heuvel's father was also an official], and
substantial grants to another CIA front, the World Assembly of Youth. It
was also one of the single largest donors to the Council on Foreign
Relations, an independent think-tank which exerted enormous influence on
American foreign policy, and which operated (and continues to operate)
according to strict confidentiality rules which include a twenty-five-year
embargo on the release of its records...

"McGeorge Bundy, became president of the Ford Foundation in 1966 (coming
straight from his job as Special Assistant to the President in Charge of
National Security, which meant, among other things, monitoring the
CIA)...The Congress for Cultural Freedom...was one of Ford Foundation's
largest grantees, receiving $7 million by the early 1960s..."

THE CULTURAL COLD WAR book also recalled how the money from the J.M. Kaplan
family (some of which has been thrown towards Pacifica/DEMOCRACY NOW in
recent years) was used in the past by the CIA: "In 1956...J.M. Kaplan,
president of the Welch Grape Juice Company, and president and treasurer of
the Kaplan Foundation (assets: $14 million), wrote to Allen Dulles offering
his services...Dulles subsequently arranged for a CIA `representative' to
make an appointment with Kaplan. The Kaplan Foundation could soon be
counted as an asset, a reliable `pass-through' for secret funds earmarked
for CIA projects, amongst them the Congress for Cultural Freedom, and an
institute headed by veteran socialist and chairman of the American Committee
for Cultural Freedom, Norman Thomas.

"The use of philanthropic foundations was the most convenient way to pass
large sums of money to Agency projects without alerting the recipients to
their source. By the mid-1950s, the CIA's intrusion into the foundation
field was massive. Although figures are not available for this period, the
general counsel of a 1952 Congress committee appointed to investigate US
foundations concluded that `An unparalleled amount of power is concentrated
increasingly in the hands of an interlocking and self-perpetuating group.
Unlike the power of corporate management, it is unchecked by stockholders;
unlike the power of government, it is unchecked by the people; unlike the
power of the churches, it is unchecked by any firmly established canons of
value.' In 1976, a Select Committee appointed to investigate US
intelligence activities reported on the CIA's penetration of the foundation
field by the mid-1960s: during 1963-6, of the 700 grants over $10,000 given
by 164 foundations, at least 108 involved partial or complete CIA funding.
More importantly, CIA funding was involved in nearly half the grants made by
these 164 foundations in the field of international activities during the
same period.

"`Bona fide' foundations such as Ford, Rockefeller and Carnegie were
considered `the best and most plausible kind of funding cover.' A CIA study
of 1966 argued that this technique was `particularly effective for
democratically run membership organizations, which need to assure their own
unwitting members and collaborators, as well as their hostile critics, that
they have genuine, respectable, private sources of income.' Certainly, it
allowed the CIA to fund`a seemingly limitless range of covert action
programs affecting youth groups, labor unions, universities, publishing
houses, and other private institutions from the early 1950s."

Among the liberal-left Establishment anti-war folks sponsored by the Ford
Foundation during the 1960s was a former head of the CIA-subsidized National
Student Association [NSA] named Allard Lownestein (who was assassinated
under mysterious circumstances in 1980 by Dennis Sweeney). According to the
1985 book THE PIED PIPER: ALLARD K. LOWENSTEIN AND THE LIBERAL DREAM by
Richard Cummings: "Students followed Lowenstein in his quest for a just and
peaceful world. But they did not know that his deep sense of patriotism and
intense anti-Communism led him to work for the CIA in Africa and Spain and
to inform on suspected Communists in the civil rights movement...In
1962...according to sources with background in intelligence work, he was
formally recruited by the Central Intelligence Agency. Although the
author's attempts to obtain Lowenstein's CIA file under the Freedom of
Information-Privacy Act from the CIA and from his lawyer Gary Bellow proved
unavailing, other evidence overwhelmingly supports these
sources...Lowenstein's work in the CIA involved southern Africa, and because
Franco supported Portugal and South Africa, it also involved Spain, where
Lowenstein worked with the anti-Communist left opposed to
Franco...Lowenstein came to believe that his greatest enemies were to his
left...

"According to sources, Lowenstein was separated from the CIA sometime in
1967 (the sources say Lowenstein `was in the agency from 1962 to
1967')...During 1975, Lowenstein became deeply involved in the politics of
Portugal because of his relationship with Portugese Socialist Mario Soares,
who was foreign minister at a period when the Portugese revolution was
pushing increasingly leftward. Involving Lowenstein was his friend Frank
Carlucci, who served as U.S. ambassador to Portugal from 1975 to 1978 and
then as Jimmy Carter's deputy director of the CIA...

"To further supplement his income, Lowenstein was to work for the Ford
Foundation, a consultancy having been arranged for him by a
friend...Lowenstein's job with the Ford Foundation, which, according to his
diary, included a $2,500 fee, all expenses, and freedom to decide when and
where he would work (an NSA grant had been approved as well), enabled him to
fly to various campuses, study the causes of the unrest, and prepare a
report. He particularly focused on Berkeley where President Martin Meyerson
attempted to use Lowenstein as a peacemaker...A new generation of student
leaders was now openly challenging authority in more extreme ways than
Lowenstein had...Their rebellion was growing beyond the confines of the
liberal National Student Association, which Lowenstein had continued to
monitor. It was taking dangerous and unpredictable forms...On April 1,
1965, Paul Ylvisaker, the director of the Ford Foundation project on campus
unrest, wrote to Lowenstein: `This will confirm the arrangements made with
Mr. John Ehle for you to serve as a consultant to the Foundation for a
maximum of five days between April 1 and 9 to explore the possibility of
involving youth and student groups in community action programs. We
understand you will make brief visits in institutions in North Carolina,
Massachusetts, California and New York.

"`The Foundation will provide a daily fee of $50 and reimbursement for
first-class round-trip air transportation to your destinations. Enclosed
you will find expense report forms and certificates of time worked, which we
would appreciate your filling out, signing and returning to us. Please send
your transportation stubs and hotel bills, and receipts for expenses of $25
or more.'"

Former Ford Foundation Consultant Lowenstein's friend, Carlucci, later
became the Secretary of Defense under Reagan and has been a top executive at
the Bush II White House and Ford Foundation Board of Trustees-linked Carlyle
Assets firm in recent years. In her 1982 book ROOTED IN SECRECY: THE
CLANDESTINE ELEMENT IN AUSTRALIAN POLITICS by Joan Coxsedge noted that "the
Ford Foundation" also "took over the funding of the Congress for Cultural
Freedom after its CIA cover was blown in 1966."

Eric Chester's book COVERT NETWORKS: PROGRESSIVES, THE INTERNATIONAL RESCUE
COMMITTEE AND THE CIA also contains some information about how the Ford
Foundation has historically worked with the CIA:

"The Ford Foundation...maintained a close and continuing relationship with
the intelligence community throughout the most confrontational years of the
Cold War.

"In particular, the Foundation established in 1951 a subsidiary affiliate,
the East European Fund, which disbursed its considerable resources to
projects oriented toward political exiles from the Soviet Union. Over the
next few years, the Foundation and its affiliated fund worked closely with
other organizations within the covert network, including the International
Rescue Committee...

"The New York office was headed by Bernard Gladieux...After shifting to the
Ford Foundation in 1950, Gladieux remained a committed proponent of
psychological warfare programs targeted at the Soviet bloc countries. He
continued to maintain contacts with high officials in the Agency; while an
officer of the Foundation, he also `served in a consultant and liaison
capacity with the Central Intelligence Agency involving certain highly
sensitive matters.' Soon after being appointed director of Central
Intelligence in February 1953, Allen Dulles reassured Gladieux that he had
been kept `fully-advised of recent developments' and that he wanted `to work
closely with' Gladieux in the future.

"Within the New York office, John Howard had primary responsibility for
screening overseas grant proposals. This meant that Howard was a key
liasion between the Foundation and the CIA...

"[On March 5, 1958] Don Price...an associate director of the Foundation,
wrote Matthew Baird of the CIA to set up a discussion on `potential ideas
for future action.' Joining Price would be John Howard, still a central
figure in the oversight of overseas programs. Baird responded by inviting
Price and Howard to a meeting at CIA headquarters with `40 or 50 Agency
representatives' from the Clandestine Services Division. The agenda would
feature a presentation by Price and Howard in which they would `discuss
informally those programs of the Foundation' that they felt would `be of
general interest to the Agency.' Afterward, the Ford Foundation officials
would meet with smaller groups of CIA staff to discuss specific projects.

"The CIA and the Ford Foundation maintained close relations throughout the
1950s and into the 1960s...

"Although the full extent of the Ford Foundation's cooperation with the CIA
over the last three decades cannot be determined as long as the relevant
files remain closed or unavailable, it is clear that the Foundation worked
closely with the intelligence community on several sensitive operations
during the 1950s..."

According to Chester's 1995 COVERT NETWORKS book, a Ford Foundation grant of
$150,000 was apparently used during the 1950s to subsidize the activity of a
right-wing anti-communist paramilitary group, the "Fighting Group" in East
Germany: "The Ford Foundation was interested in funding the activities of
the Fighting Group from the start...Having approached top Agency officials,
Howard and Gladieux, of the New York office, concluded that `CIA officials
were unanimous in their view that Foundation support of the Fighting Group
would be most helpful...Fighting Group commandos blew up a railroad bridge
near Berlin just before an express train coming from Warsaw was due to pass
over it...A bridge over a canal was damaged with explosives..."

The same book also noted how the IRC board member that NATION editor Vanden
Heuvel's father apparently worked for, William Donovan, apparently also
intervened in 1950s German domestic politics: "The [International Rescue]
Committee established a special Redefection Commission in February 1956,
with William Donovan, IRC board member...as chair...Donovan and the rest of
the commission immediately embarked on an inspection tour of West German and
France...Donovan was utilizing the trip as a cover for a covert mission to
provide funds for cooperative politicians...While visiting West Berlin,
Donovan arranged to have couriers give [former West German Chancellor Willy]
Brandt one hundred thousand Deutschmarks in cash at a clandestine rendevous.
The cash drop, worth twenty-five thousand dollars at the time, was employed
by Brandt to strengthen his position within the Social Democratic Party."

end of part 1

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