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The man who owned the flight
school that taught Mohamed Atta to fly got rich selling his insurance company,
we have learned, to the man who PAID “The Men Who Stare at Goats.”
Wally Hilliard’s links to American intelligence go back (at least) to November
of 1981, when his insurance company, Wisconsin Employer’s Group, was
bought out by
Myron Du Bain, a World War II OSS/CIA operative and the
Chairman of Fireman's Fund of San Francisco.
We discovered the
connection in a trip to Green Bay several years ago.
But only recently did we
learn that
Myron Du Bain’s life-long
ties to the CIA included two stints at the helm of the Stanford Research
Institute (SRI), famous for its classified research into psychic viewing. the
results of which are currently on display in “The Men Who Stare at Goats.”
Psychic Research with wartime applications
DuBain
became chairman of SRI International in 1985, at a crucial time when the U.S.
Defense Dept. was growing increasingly concerned with advances in psychic
research behind what was then called the “Iron Curtain.”
A January 10, 1984
headline
in the New York Times read “PENTAGON IS SAID TO FOCUS ON ESP
FOR WARTIME USE.”
“THE Pentagon has spent
millions of dollars, according to three new reports, on secret projects to
investigate extrasensory phenomena and to see if the sheer power of the
human mind can be harnessed to perform various acts of espionage and war -
penetrating secret files, for example, locating submarines or blowing up
guided missiles in mid-flight.
“Further, one of the
reports says concern about a psychic arms gap has reached as high as the
White House in at least one instance. In 1977, by this account, President
Carter ordered the Central Intelligence Agency to conduct a high-level
review of psychic research behind the Iron Curtain in an attempt to assess a
possible Soviet threat."
Columnist Jack Anderson followed the story
closely for years.
"U.S. intelligence
agencies won't talk about it, but they are rushing to catch up to the Soviet
Union in what one scientist called "The race for inner space--psychic
research."
White knight talking backwards... and out of the side of his
mouth
Du Bain’s
first stint
running SRI was also tumultuous.
As President of SRI during the late 60’s,
he faced regular protests over the institute's controversial military contracts, including
studies on chemical warfare and LSD.
The Stanford campus was up in
arms over SRI’s involvement in LSD experiments being conducted at the Veterans
Hospital in Redwood City (where author Ken Kesey first took LSD) resulting in Stanford University issuing a statement in 1970 cutting it’s ties
to the institute which bore its name.
"The
university outlawed secret research in 1969 and there is no evidence that
current faculty is involved," the statement said.
That wasn't the end of it, of
course. In 1977, the University admitted
a few
(seven) experiments done for the CIA, with quaint names like "Project Knockout."
Residents of
La Honda, CA who remember Kesey
have told interesting stories to researchers. One who lived there in the early '70s
worked for five years
testing
LSD
on monkeys in experiments commissioned by
SRI.
And writer
Robert Stone, who won a Wallace Stegner Fellowship to Stanford University, has
said, "The
Stanford Research
Institute was funding breakthrough research in circuitry at the same time as it
was producing CIA-funded lovely liberating drugs."
Myron, We Hardly Knew Ye
With
oilman Gordon Getty and Reagan Secretary of State George Shultz, DuBain founded
an exclusive private San Francisco supper club.
He was also influential at
the Pacific Institute, which kept former Bush Secretary of Defense Donald
Rumsfeld from starving while Clinton was President in the 90’s.
In addition to belonging to
the exclusive Bohemian Club, whose annual retreats provide grist for innumerable
conspiracy mills worldwide, Du Bain served as chairman of the United Way of the Bay Area,
a director of the San Francisco Opera, and a governor of the San Francisco
Symphony.
In a quote in his obituary,
former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, characterized as “Du Bain's longtime
friend,” calls him a man of "boundless optimism, tremendous buoyancy and
patriotism."
Du Bain’s importance in
American geo-politics was reflected in several early initiative in China with
which he was involved. Du Bain was into China before being into China was cool.
"Insurer, China Sign
Agreement" read a press release from May 14, 1980. "Fireman's Fund Insurance
Companies and the People's Insurance Company of China have established a
working business relationship and a joint commitment to "explore other areas
of mutual interest."
“The Stanford Research
Institute, a noted research organization of the United states, has been invited
to conduct a comprehensive study on the Hong Kong,” read a Chinese wire service
report from the early 1980’s. “A contract was signed here today by Myron Du
Bain, Chairman of the board of the U.S. institute, and Peter Wrangham, Executive
Director of the Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation.”
A portal into the abyss
Wally Hilliard’s connection
with Myron Du Bain may shed light on Hilliard’s curious metamorphosis
after retiring to Florida in 1996.
Hilliard went from being a wealthy Green Bay
WI insurance executive whose official corporate slogan was “Love God & Back the
Pack” to fronting for clandestine operations bearing the almost unmistakable
mark of the CIA.
His two flight schools
trained dozens of Arabs, several later made infamous for having killed thousands
in New York and Washington D.C., and others less well known but who are today
nonetheless considered terror suspects.
Hilliard also served duty as
the “paper” owner of record on FAA registrations for dozens of airplanes.
that some of them were used in
CIA renditions and international drug trafficking.
On
July 25, 2000, Wally Hilliard’s LearJet was surrounded by machine-gun-toting DEA
agents at Orlando Executive Airport. They found 43 lbs. of heroin aboard.
Although Hilliard claimed
innocence, saying the plane had been leased to others, DEA Agents testified that
Hilliard's planes made 39 weekly trips to Venezuela before being busted, and
Federal prosecutors argued Hilliard was not an “innocent owner,” and therefore
should get back the plane.
A federal judge agreed; and,
as court documents
show,
Hilliard
lost the LearJet in government
forfeiture
proceedings.
"Being connected means never having to say you're sorry."
Neither Hilliard nor his
business partner in American Jet Charters, who was also the pilot on the flight
that got busted, were ever charged with any crime. A third partner in the
venture, Venezuelan Edgar Valles-Diaz, did go to prison, however.
The list of individuals that Wallace J. Hilliard
is associated with who are involved in America's "Clandestine Services" and who
can fairly be described as "covert operatives" is a long one.
Another example is Farhad
Azima, who leased his plane to Ollie
North so he could go to Iran, was implicated in the
S & L scandal ( specifically Indian Springs S & L out of Kansas City), named in
the Lincoln Bedroom scandal, and has run CIA affiliated airlines going all the
way back to the 70's with Egyptian-American Air Transport.
He and Hilliard are partners
in a venture called
Spatialight. See an SEC filing here.
Almost eight years had passed since terrorists practiced
‘touch & go’s’ on the airport’s runways.
It is an open secret in aviation
circles in Southwest Florida that the two men who had had direct business
dealings with terrorist ringleader Mohamed Atta—Dutch national Rudi Dekkers and
American financier Wally Hilliard—have personal and business histories that cannot
withstand close scrutiny.
At least we're doing our part.
Stay tuned.
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