Part 1a 45:32 | Part 1b 44:53 | Part 1c 25:39
Part 2a 28:35 | Part 2b 45:26 | Part 2c 30:15 | Part 2d 45:56 | Part 2e 19:14 | Part 2f 25:26
Part 3a 27:35 | Part 3b 43:19 | Part 3c 45:11 | Part 3d 45:23 | Part 3e 16:43
Part 4a 21:25 | Part 4b 46:07 | Part 4c 21:10 | Part 4d 46:41 | Part 4e 41:50
Part 5a 43:44 | Part 5b 44:06 | Part 5c 44:38 | Part 5d 33:41
Part 6a 31:03 | Part 6b 17:11 | Part 6c 44:38 | Part 6d 44:13 | Part 6e 43:59 | Part 6f 32:19 | Part 6g 32:15
Part 7a 45:12 | Part 7b 41:32 | Part 7c 42:52 | Part 7d 44:59 | Part 7e 38:02 | Part 7f 31:40
Part 8a 40:25 | Part 8b 44:17 | Part 8c 9:13
Part 9a 46:26 | Part 9b 41:43 | Part 9c 45:47 | Part 9d 19:56
Part 10a 14:03 | Part 10b 45:57 | Part 10c 30:32 | Part 10d 45:51 | Part 10e 21:25
Part 11a 44:10 | Part 11b 43:38 | Part 11c 30:33 | Part 11d 45:18 | Part 11e 32:02 | Part 11f 44:24
Part 12a 13:24 | Part 12b 44:57 | Part 12c 42:52 | Part 12d 46:40 | Part 12e 46:22 | Part 12f 32:59
Part 13a 17:29 | Part 13b 45:18 | Part 13c 25:13 | Part 13d 45:18
Part 14a 45:36 | Part 14b 33:37 | Part 14c 46:31 | Part 14d 45:54 | Part 14e 17:45
(Original broadcast 1991–92)
This massive archive program merits serious consideration as a most revealing examination and explanation of the Cold War. The history of intellectual endeavor teaches that prevailing theories in the academic disciplines may be disproved and supplanted in time. Taken in combination with AFA 36, this work documents the working hypothesis that during the Cold War, German fascism and the Third Reich did not disappear as is commonly believed but rather survived underground and achieved a very real political and economic victory over the Allies.
In the aftermath of World War I, the German Nazis learned that anti-communism could be used to achieve strategic leverage over Germany’s prospective enemies such as Great Britain and the United States. The Third Reich utilized this stratagem to establish Fifth Column movements in countries they had targeted for conquest. Those movements were composed largely of sympathizers who viewed the Third Reich as a bulwark against communism. The Third Reich sought to escape the full consequences of military defeat in World War II by playing the anti-communist card again.
When it became clear that the armies of the Third Reich were going to be defeated, it opened secret negotiations with representatives from the Western Allies. Representatives on both sides belonged to the transatlantic financial and industrial fraternity that had actively supported fascism. The thrust of these negotiations was the establishment of The Christian West. Viewed by the Nazis as a vehicle for surviving military defeat, “The Christian West” involved a Hitler-less Reich joining with the U.S., Britain, France and other European nations in a transatlantic, pan-European anti-Soviet alliance. In fact, The Christian West became a reality only after the cessation of hostilities.
The de-Nazification of Germany was aborted. Although a few of the more obvious and obnoxious elements of Nazism were removed, Nazis were returned to power at virtually every level and in almost every capacity in the Federal Republic of Germany. A Hilter-less Reich then was incorporated into the anti-Soviet alliance the Third Reich’s leaders had envisioned: NATO.
One of the central elements in AFA 37, the Reinhard Gehlen spy organization functioned as a Trojan Horse vis-a-vis the United States. By deliberately exaggerating Soviet intentions and capabilities in order to alarm the United States, the Gehlen organization greatly exacerbated cold-war tensions and manipulated them to Germany’s advantage.
Perhaps the most important effect of the Gehlen organization was to introduce “rollback” or “liberation theory” into American strategic thinking. Rollback was a political wafare and covert operation strategy which had its genesis in the Third Reich Ostministerium headed by Alfred Rosenberg. This strategy entailed enlisting the aid of dissident Soviet ethnic minorities to overthrow the Soviet Union. In return, these minorities and their respective republics were to be granted nominal independence while serving as satellite states of “Greater Germany.”
In its American incarnation, liberation theory called for “rolling back” communism out of Eastern Europe and the break-up of the Soviet Union into its constituent ethnic Republics. Lip-service was given to initiating democracy in the “liberated” countries. Liberation theory was projected into mainstream American political consciousness through the Crusade for Freedom. This enormous CIA domestic media campaign not only established liberation theory as a dominant element in American strategic thinking but also projected European fascists associated with the Gehlen milieu into positions of prominence within the powerful ethnic voting blocks in America.
The Gehlen imports combined with domestic reactionary elements to form a powerful fascistic and ultimately triumphant political engine referred to in AFA 37, as the “rollback” or “liberation milieu.”
AFA 37 traces the evolution of this milieu and its influence on international and domestic political affairs. The liberation milieu cemented its triumph in American politics through the assassination of President Kennedy. The program highlights the roles of Gehlen-related elements and intelligence agents associated with the petroleum industry in the JFK assassination. Particular emphasis is on George Bush’s connections to this milieu as well as the milieu’s relationship to the defense industry, military intelligence and corporate America.
AFA 37 analyzes the Reagan and Bush administrations as the realization of the goals of liberation theory as well as the fulfillment of National Security Counsel Number 68. NSC 68 was the blueprint for U.S. strategy during the Cold War. Heavily influenced by the work of the Gehlen organization, NSC 68 called for the destabilization of the U.S.S.R. through a massive military buildup by the U.S. The strategy sought to bankrupt the Soviet economy through an arms race and to promote agitation among the dissident Soviet ethnic groups by Gehlen-related intelligence elements. In addition, the document called for an accompanying propaganda blitz in the United States to convince the American people to support the military buildup as well as the suppression of political dissidents.
The Reagan and Bush administrations instituted the principles of NSC 68 and accomplished the aims of liberation theory. The realization of those goals also did enormous damage to the United States. The cost of bankrupting the Soviet Union, turned the United States into the world’s biggest debtor nation, severely damaged its infrastructure and crippled its competitive economic advantage internationally. In addition, the United States badly compromised its democratic institutions during the Cold War, possibly beyond repair.
AFA 37 hypothesizes that the realization of liberation theory primarily benefited Germany rather than the United States. Indeed, the recovery of Germany’s “lost territories” was the goal of Gehlen’s alliance with the western powers and was the raison d’etre for the Vertviebene groups. Founded by the SS and funded by the German government, the Vertriebene groups were part of the liberation milieu described above. Their activity has increased dramatically since the end of the Cold War. The BND, the current German government intelligence service and the final incarnation of the Gehlen organization, has been extremely active in the newly “liberated” territories where it has worked hand in glove with major German corporations and the various Nazi parties of Germany to realize Hitler’s goal of a “greater Germany.”
Looking Back from 1984
Whew!
I just finished listening to this huge volume of information, which has been on my I‑pod at work with me for weeks.
In this major-scale presentation Mr. Emory walks us through the U.S., German and other military and industrialist efforts to secure an enduring corporate state, devoid of the interests of the innocent humans involved.
While many aspects of this history are occasionally repeated from previous or related radio shows, they are all approached from different angles that coalesce into an understandable and well defined summary of the development of Fascism.
In the latter part of the show we transition from the distant past to current events (circa the early 1990’s) which have had great bearing well into our new century.
The program concludes with an excellent interview with a German anti-fascist researcher who has a clear view of the emerging power of the “new” Germany.
If you are interested in an “audio book” approach to learning about history, world events and how that affects our lives today, this is a series to listen to.
Well done, Mr. Emory!
@SWAMP–
Thanks for the kind words!
I worked SO HARD on AFA #37.
I was exhausted for several months afterward.
Best,
Dave
For those listeners to Dave Emory’s program that need a visual reference, the following link is a CIA document referencing a 19 November 1963 meeting with an unnamed CIA representative and Reinhard Gehlen.
If you skip down to page four of the report, it talks about how as early as 1942, Lt. Gen. Gehlen knew Nazi Germany was going to lose the Second World War on a conventional military level, but would win on an intellectual and financial level if an “Atlantic Alliance” was formed between a Hitlerless Germany, the United States and the Imperial powers of Great Britain!
The bloodthirsty genocide called the “Cold War” was hatched in the mind of an unrepentant Nazi and later the CIA’s Chief of Russian intelligence, Reinhard Gehlen.
The following CIA document proves everything Dave Emory talked about in his stellar Radio Free America #37 program is factual:
https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/docs/GEHLEN%2C%20REINHARD%20%20%20VOL.%204_0013.pdf
It’s official. Taylor Swift won Super Bowl LVIII in a crushing victory. Well, Swift and the NFL. And maybe the private-equity industry. There was no shortage big winners this year, including, obviously, the owner of the Kansas City Chiefs, Clark Hunt.
But as we’ve also seen, the Chiefs victory didn’t come without controversy. Albeit very silly controversy revolving around some sort of conspiracy between Swift, the Pentagon, and Joe Biden to rig the Super Bowl and create the perfect opportunity for Swift to endorse Biden in the 2024 election. The kind of conspiracy theory that completely ignores the extreme right-wing orientation of the Hunt dynasty and Clark Hunt’s own conservative politics.
And despite the lack of any Swift endorsement during the game, the conspiracy theory appears to live on thanks, in part, to some well-executed trolling by Biden. So with the Swift/NFL conspiracy theory continuing to linger on, perhaps it’s a good opportunity to take a look back at the fascinating history involving Jack Ruby and Lamar Hunt, Clark’s father and the son of H.L. Hunt.
And as we saw in AFA#37 Part 2c, Lamar Hunt has a genuinely remarkable tangential connection to the JFK assassination. For starters, there was the fact that Lamar Hunt’s name was found in a notebook possessed by Jack Ruby. But then there’s the curious story of Connie Trammell, the recent college graduate who Ruby had gotten to know the prior year. It turns out Ruby drove Trammell to a job interview with Lamar Hunt at Mercantile National Bank shortly before JFK’s assassination.
Now, as AFA#37 part 2c goes on to describe, when this story about Ruby, Trammell, and Hunt was first revealed, it was stated that this job interview happened just one day before the assassination. That was, in turn, interesting timing given the reports that Eugene Hale Brading (aka Jim Braden) was also at the bank that day. Being a figure with ties to organized crime who was arrested on the third floor of the Texas School Book Depository shortly after Kennedy was shot, the fact that Ruby and Braden were apparently both at the bank at the same time is the kind of detail that raised even more questions about the nature Trammell’s interview with Hunt.
But as we’re going to see, Trammell herself issued a major correction to that whole story in a November 22, 2013, article in the Texarkana Gazette. According to Trammell, the interview with Lamar Hunt didn’t happen the day before the assassination. It happened the day of the assassination and she was in the middle of that interview with Hunt when it happened. Yep, according to Trammell (now, Trammell Penny), the Warren Commission was simply incorrect about that date.
Now, while it’s not clear if Eugene Hale Brading/Jim Braden visit to was also on the day of the assassination given this update from Trammell, there’s plenty of other additional details provided by Trammell that suggests Braden’s visit may indeed have been at the same time Ruby drove her to the interview, along with raising all sorts of other questions.
According to Trammell, she first met Ruby back in October of 1962, while she was still a student at the University of Texas, Austin. It all started while Trammell was attending a “High Noon” college advertising club junket in Dallas. As Trammell describes it, “we all said, ‘Let’s go across the street to the Carousel Club,’ ” and that’s how they ended up in Jack Ruby’s night club. Connie was there with a date, but when she got up to use the restroom, a man started following her. That man was Jack Ruby, who apparently didn’t waste any time in offering Trammell a job as a stripper. It’s the kind of anecdote that raises the question as to how many women Ruby approached in his own nightclub about being strippers. Like was this a thing Ruby normally did to attractive female patrons of his club?
Trammell declined the offer to become a stripper, but still gave Ruby her college dorm phone number. Ruby apparently called her weekly. It was so much that her dorm roommates gave her the nickname Candy Barr, the name of an infamous stripper who worked at Ruby’s club at the time. After graduating with a degree in public relations, Trammell moved to the Dallas area.
Flash forward to the day of the assassination, and Trammell claims that Ruby called her up that morning and again asked if she had an interest in stripping at his club. Keep in mind she’s a recent college graduate at this point, which Ruby must have known. Trammell again declined the stripper job offer and also explained that she had a job interview to go to at Mercantile National Bank at 11 am, but didn’t have a car to get there. Ruby told her that he would be happy to pick her up and take her there, and that it wouldn’t be an inconvenience since he had business of his own to take care of there. Might that business at the bank have been a meeting with Jim Braden?
Also keep in mind that the timing of that all doesn’t necessarily preclude Braden both meeting with Ruby at Mercantile National Bank around 11 am and later getting arrested by police at the Texas School Book Depository when Kennedy was shot at 12:30 pm. Which is part of what makes that date ‘mistake’ by the Warren Commission so interesting. Based on Trammell’s correction published on the 50th anniversary, Braden may have met with Ruby at Hunt’s bank roughly an hour and a half before he was arrested just floors below were Lee Harvey Oswald was working during the assassination.
But it gets weirder: during their drive to the bank, Ruby asks Trammell how she managed to get an interview with Lamar Hunt. Trammell explains that she simply called up Hunt’s home and spoke to a maid who gave her a “straight line” to Hunt’s office. Is that how Lamar Hunt’s maids normally operated? Again, keep in mind Lamar Hunt’s name was found in one of Rudy’s notebooks. They knew seem to have known each other. Did Ruby by chance tell Hunt about Trammell?
And why did Trammell call Hunt about a job in the first place? Well, she says read in the newspaper about Hunt owning a bowling alley that he was converting into a teenagers club. She apparently thought it would be a good opportunity for her to use her public relations skill she just got a degree in. Did she get the job? Nope. Beyond that, Hunt said he had no plans for any person to work for him in the public relations department for the club.
So Connie Trammell called Hunt’s home and spoke to a maid who gave her a straight line to Hunt’s office. This was all for a job for which there was no help wanted ad. And that all somehow ended up in a job interview during which Hunt explained that he had no plans on hiring anyone for a public relations position. It’s a strange story on the surface, not even factor in that this interview just happened to be during the assassination. The kind of strange story that makes Hunt’s name in Ruby’s notebook all the more interesting.
Trammell also mentions how Ruby didn’t just give her a ride to the bank. He parked the car and escorted her inside the bank to the bank’s elevator, but didn’t accompany her upstairs. That’s reportedly the last time she saw Ruby, who was presumably planning to go about his “business” at the bank that day he mentioned to her earlier. Again, did this “business” happen to include a meeting with Braden?
After the interview, Trammell went to a steak house for a date with a friend. That was when she learned about the assassination. She later took the bus home.
The article ends with Trammell expressing regret over not visiting Ruby in a jail cell to write her book. As she puts it, “He would have told me anything I wanted to know.” Which, again, raises questions about how close the two actually were. Because she seemed to think they were close enough that he would have shared anything with her, which sounds like a lot more than just an acquaintance. Then again, given what we know about what Ruby was trying to tell investigators, it’s not like he wasn’t in a talkative mood.
So that’s a pretty fascinating update we got just over a decade ago about this extremely interesting chapter of the JFK assassination. A chapter made all the more fascinating (amusingly fascinating) with the new Swift/NFL/Pentagon conspiracy silliness. As Trammell described in this report from a decade ago, the “Warren Commission came up with the idea I was getting money to give to Ruby for shooting Oswald...I can see how they would get that idea. I knew Jack Ruby. Then the day the President was shot, I was interviewing at the same time with Lamar Hunt at the bank. Ruby gives me a ride to the bank and two days later, Ruby kills Oswald”:
““The Warren Commission came up with the idea I was getting money to give to Ruby for shooting Oswald,” she said.”
Was Connie Trammell Penny (then just Connie Trammell) operating as a kind of bagman for the conspiracy to kill Kennedy? That’s apparently the scenario the Warren Commission investigated during her interview with the Commission on July 9, 1964:
It all started in October 1962, when Trammell, then a student at the University of Texas in Austin, was attending a “High Noon” advertising club junket in Dallas. As Trammell describes it, “we all said, ‘Let’s go across the street to the Carousel Club,’ ” and that’s how they ended up in Jack Ruby’s night club and Connie first met Ruby, who didn’t waste any time in offering Trammell a job as a stripper. It’s the kind of anecdote that raises the question as to how many women Ruby approached in his own nightclub about being strippers. Like was this a thing Ruby normally did to attractive female patrons of his club?
It was apparently during that initial visit to Ruby’s club when Ruby got Connie’s telephone number for her Austin dorm room. And he called weekly. So much that the other dorm residents nicknamed her Candy Barr after one of Ruby’s infamous strippers. Then, after graduating, she moves to Dallas. These are the kinds of details that would suggest Trammell and Ruby were more than just passing acquaintances. But that’s the story we got. A story that suggests Connie and Jack and A LOT of phone conversations. It’s not clear how long these conversations were or what they talked about. But he kept calling and she didn’t indicate feeling at all harassed about it:
And then we get to the amazing coincidences from the day of the assassination, starting with the coincidence that the Warren Commission apparently got the dates wrong. According to the Commission report, Trammell had a job interview with Lamar Hunt — founder of the Kansas City Chiefs and son of H.L. Hunt — at the Mercantile Bank on November 21, 1963. But it was actually November 22. It’s a pretty remarkable mistake:
But Trammell didn’t go to that interview with Lamar Hunt on her own. Instead, we are told that Ruby just happened to call Trammell that morning, again asking her if she would come work as a stripper. But Trammell explained how she had an interview scheduled that day, although not car to get there. Ruby agrees to pick her up and take her to the bank, explaining he has business at the bank. Again, we have to ask: was Ruby meeting Jim Braden there (putting Braden’s And when Ruby asks her how she got an appoint with Hunt, she explained that she called his house and talked to a maid who gave her a “straight line” to Hunt’s office, which itself is a pretty remarkable claim. Did Lamar Hunt have a habit of accepting interview requests from people who just randomly call his house?
So what prompted Trammell to call Lamar Hunt’s home about a job opening? Well, we are told she read about Hunt’s plans to convert a bowling alley into a teenagers club and she apparently felt like this could be a good opportunity for her to use her degree in public relations. And yet, she wasn’t hired and Hunt apparently said he had no plans to hire anyone in a public relations role for the planned club. So Trammell called Hunt’s home in the hopes of getting an interview for a job she didn’t know existed, and Hunt agreed to give her this interview even though he had no plans to hire anyone for public relations at for the club. It’s a strange set of circumstances:
But of all the remarkable coincidence about this story, the most remarkable is the fact that the interview went from from 11 am to 1 pm. It was, of course, 12:30 PM when Kennedy was shot. Adding to the strangeness is that Ruby went into the bank with Trammell and accompanied her to the elevator and we are told this is the last time Trammell saw Ruby. Now, assuming it’s true that she didn’t see Ruby after the interview, that would preclude the scenario the Warren Commission apparently investigated where she was acting as a middleman to deliver some sort of payment from Hunt to Ruby. But at the same time, it’s hard not to notice how this interview gave Ruby an excuse to be at Hunt’s bank on the day of the assassination. And let’s also not forget who else had an office at the Mercantile Bank: H.L. Hunt, Lamar’s dad. Ruby claimed he had business at the bank, after all. Are there any records of Ruby conducting business at the bank that day?
So if Ruby drove her to the bank, how did she get home? Well, it sounds like she went to the Majestic Streak House for a date with a friend after the interview. She later took the bus home:
Finally, note the lamentations we hear from Trammell at the end: regret that she didn’t visit Ruby in a jail cell to write her book. As she describes it, “He would have told me anything I wanted to know.” Which, again, raises the question of just how close were these two?
Connie Trammell Penny died in 2017, so this article is probably about as up-to-date an accounting of her experiences as we’re going to get at this point. It’s unclear why she waited until the 50th anniversary of the assassination to have the major correction on the date of her interview with Lamar Hunt. But at least we got that correction.
A correction for a mistake that she asserted the Warren Commission made. Not her. She wasn’t claiming to have initially misstated the day of the interview to Warren Commission investigators. She was claiming the Warren Commission made the mistake. Which raising one more lingering question about this story: was that a mistake? Or a ‘mistake’? Because if we’re looking at a ‘mistake’ by the Warren Commission here, odds are there’s A LOT more under this rock. A pre-Swift rock, so it remains to be seen if anyone will care.