Reply #13: Bush, LaRouche, IranContra.-from the Unauthorized Bio of George Bush>> [View All]

http://www.padrak.com/alt/BUSHBOOK_7.html#LaRouche

Bush, LaRouche and Iran-Contra

George Bush and his friends have repeatedly told political pundits that
America is "tired" and "bored" of hearing about the Iran-Contra affair.

Bush has taken a dim view of those who were not tired or bored, but fought him.

Oct. 6, 1986 was a fateful day in Washington. The secret government
apparatus learned that the Hasenfus plane had been shot down the day
before, and went scurrying about to protect its exposed parts. At the same
time, it sent about 400 heavily armed FBI agents, other federal, state and
local policemen storming into the Leesburg, Virginia, publishing offices
associated with the American dissident political leader Lyndon LaRouche,
Jr.

LaRouche and his political movement had certified their danger to the Bush
program. Six months before the raid, LaRouche associates Mark Fairchild and
Janice Hart had gained the Democratic nominations for Illinois lieutenant
governor and secretary of state; they won the primary elections after
denouncing the government-mafia joint coordination of the narcotics trade.
With this notoriety, LaRouche was certain to act in an even more
unpredictable and dangerous fashion as a presidential candidate in 1988.
LaRouche allies were at work throughout Latin America, promoting resistance
to the Anglo-Americans. The LaRouche-founded "Executive Intelligence
Review" had exposed U.S. government covert support for Khomeini's Iranians,
beginning in 1980.

More directly, the LaRouchites were fighting the Bush apparatus for its
money. Connecticut widow Barbara Newington, who had given Spitz Channell's
National Endowment for the Preservation of Liberty $1,735,578 out of its
total 1985 income of $3,360,990, / Note #9 / Note #0 was also contributing
substantial sums to LaRouche-related publishing efforts ... which were
exposing the Contras and their dope-pushing. Fundraiser Michael Billington
argued with Mrs. Newington, warning her not to give money to the
Bush-North-Spitz Channell gang.

Back on August 19, 1982, and on November 25, 1982, George Bush's old boss,
Henry A. Kissinger, had written to FBI Director William Webster, asking for
FBI action against "the LaRouche group." In promoting covert action against
LaRouche, Kissinger also got help from James Jesus Angleton, who had
retired as chief of counterintelligence for the CIA. After Yalie Angleton
got going in this anti-dissident work, he mused "Fancy that, now I've
become Kissinger's Rebbe." / Note #9 / Note #1

One week before the raid, an FBI secret memorandum described the LaRouche
political movement as "subversive," and claimed that its "policy positions
... dovetail nicely with Soviet propaganda and disinformation objectives."
/ Note #9 / Note #2

Three months after Spitz Channell's fraud confession, Vice President Bush
denounced LaRouche at an Iowa campaign rally: "I don't like the things
LaRouche does.... He's bilked people out of lots of money, and
misrepresented what causes money was going to. LaRouche is in a lot of
trouble, and deserves to be in a lot of trouble." / Note #9 / Note #3

LaRouche and several associates eventually went on trial in Boston, on a
variety of "fraud" charges -- neither "subversion" nor defunding the
Contras was in the indictments. Bush was now running hard for the
presidency.

Suddenly, in the midst of the primary elections, the LaRouche trial took a
threatening turn. On March 10, 1988, Federal Judge Robert E. Keeton ordered
a search of the indexes to Vice President George Bush's confidential files
to determine whether his spies had infiltrated LaRouche-affiliated
organizations.

Iran-Contra Special Prosecutor Lawrence Walsh had acquired, and turned over
to the LaRouche defense, in response to an FOIA request, a secret
memorandum found in Oliver North's safe. It was a mes sage from Gen.
Richard Secord to North, written May 5, 1986 -- four days after North had
met with George Bush and Felix Rodriguez to confirm that Rodriguez would
continue running guns to the Contras using Spitz Channell's payments to
Richard Secord. The memo, released in the Boston courtroom, said, "Lewis
has met with FBI and other agency reps and is apparently meeting again
today. Our Man here claims Lewis has collected info against LaRouche." /
Note #9 / Note #4

The government conceded that "our man here" in the memo was Bush Terrorism
Task Force member Oliver "Buck" Revell, the assistant director of the FBI.
"Lewis" -- "soldier of fortune" Fred Lewis -- together with Bush operatives
Gary Howard and Ron Tucker, had met later in May 1986, with C. Boyden Gray,
counsel to Vice President Bush. / Note #9 / Note #5

Howard and Tucker, deputy sheriffs from Bush-family-controlled Midland,
Texas, were couriers and bagmen for money transfers between the National
Security Council and private "counterterror" companies. They were also
professional sting artists. Howard and Tucker had sold 100 battle tanks to
a British arms dealer for shipment to Iran, and had taken his $1.6 million.
Then they turned him in to British authorities and claimed a huge reward. A
British jury, outraged at Howard and Tucker, threw out the criminal case in
late 1983.

The LaRouche defense contended, with the North memo and other declassified
documents, that the Bush apparatus had sent spies and provocateurs into the
LaRouche political movement in an attempt to wreck it.

Judge Keeton demanded that the Justice Department tell him why information
they withheld from the defense was now appearing in court in declassified
documents.

The government was not forthcoming, and in May 1988, the judge declared a
mistrial. The jury told the newspapers they would have voted for acquittal.

But Bush could not afford to quit. LaRouche and his associates were simply
indicted again, on new charges. This time they were brought to trial before
a judge who could be counted on.

Judge Albert V. Bryan, Jr. was the organizer, lawyer and banker of the
world's largest private weapons dealer, Interarms of Alexandria, Virginia.
As the new LaRouche trial began, the CIA-front firm that the judge had
founded controlled 90 percent of the world's official private weapons
traffic. Judge Bryan had personally arranged the financing of more than a
million weapons traded by Interarms between the CIA, Britain and Latin
America.

Agency for International Development trucks carried small arms, rifles,
machine guns and ammunition from Interarms in Alexandria for flights to
Cuba -- first for Castro's revolutionary forces. Then, Judge Bryan's
company, Interarms, provided guns for the anti-Castro initiatives of the
CIA Miami Station, for Rodriguez, Shackley, Posada Carriles, Howard Hunt,
Frank Sturgis, et al. When George Bush was CIA director, Albert V. Bryan's
company was the leading private supplier of weapons to the CIA. / Note #9 /
Note #6

In the LaRouche trial, Judge Bryan prohibited virtually all defense
initiatives. The jury foreman, Buster Horton, had top secret clearance for
government work with Oliver North and Oliver "Buck" Revell. LaRouche and
his associates were declared guilty.

On January 27, 1989 -- one week after George Bush became President -- Judge
Albert V. Bryan sentenced the 66-year-old dissident leader LaRouche to 15
years in prison. Michael Billington, who had tried to wreck the illicit
funding for the Contras, was jailed for three years with LaRouche; he was
later railroaded into a Virginia court and sentenced to another "77 years
in prison" for "fundraising fraud."