HIGH COST OF LOW PRICES

High Cost of Low Prices Supporting Information

Notes
1The starvation wages of Liberians helped make the US junk bond fiasco possible. Firestone invested in the Drexel Bank of Philadelphia in the 1960s and the bank was renamed Drexel Firestone. In 1973, the name changed again to Drexel Burnham Lambert. Drexel Burnham Lambert, because of illegal business practices, ceased to exist in 1990.2Diamond smuggling in Liberia was a source of funding for U.S.-listed terror groups. Journalist Douglas Farah reported the terrorist network involved in the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center trafficked diamonds in Liberia. He wrote that this was done with the approval of former Liberian President Charles Taylor. Mr. Farah noted the al-Qaida representatives came in at the end of 2000 and paid Taylor $100,000 for permission to buy diamonds and control the production for a set period of time. While diamond trafficking is common in Liberia, I wish to note that this incident may be manufactured by the US government as part of the information campaign to remove Charles Taylor.3Document No. 1: 1996 CIA Field Report (purportedly written by CIA Senior Intelligence Officer Larry Charters). "Our strategic interests, goals, and objectives in the sub-Sahara African region is (sic) still very vital, if not crucial. With the emergence of radical and leftist governments, such as Sudan, Libya, Somalia, Nigeria and Algeria, Liberia remains the most vital source of intelligence gathering whenever we utilize human intelligence resources.Liberia is still the nerve center of our African operations. It is a country where our operatives are not viewed with suspicion. The entry and exit strategy options for many of our covert operations including Black Ops remain intact.Despite Liberia's ongoing internecine conflict, American have seen a minimal casualty rate. Organized violence against our citizens, personnel, property or installations have been non-existent. More Americans were killed in major U.S. cities last week alone than have been killed in Liberia's seven year conflict.With its rich and immensely dense African forest, Liberia is a prime source for the training of Special Forces and Navy Seal teams in Black Ops and modern guerilla warfare. We still maintain a large number of Subs within and off the Liberian shores and the scaled down operation at the Omega Navigational Station continues to adequately serve our Atlantic and Mediterranean fleet.In terms of the May 30, 1997 elections, all transmissions from Capitol Hill and 1600 Penn seem to not favor any of the current candidates in Monrovia. Mr. Taylor is out of the question due to his double dealings with international shady figures, including his ties to Libya's Muammar Gaddafi. Mr. Matthews on the other hand is very inconsistent and unreliable. He is too close to many of the problems in the country. Mr. Tipoteh is a card-carrying Socialist. He is the type who will turn away from the U.S. and align with Socialist nations. Mr. Fahnbulleh is a very divisive figure with a narrow support base. He tends to be a sectionalist. He has close ties to China, Cuba, and other Socialist nations.Operatives are gathering up to the minute data on each of these individuals and other Presidential aspirants in Monrovia. In my follow-up report I will submit these findings.I believe we should infiltrate large Liberian organizations and groups in the U.S. such as the Union of Liberian Association in the Americas to see if they can identify and/or support a candidate here. According to classified reports, the U.S. opposes almost all of the standing politicians in the country. They are generally corruptible and short on vision. Should any one of them become elected, immediate action will be taken, including threats of a war crimes tribunal, to bring down the government.As you are aware, $15 billion have been allocated for Liberia's reconstruction. The House and Senate Select Committees on Intelligence and Foreign Affairs, as well as 1600 Penn, have established the conditions on which this money will be released. It clearly stipulates that no portion of this money should be released unless the Head of the new Government is acceptable to Langley.If, by the end of February 1997, the Station Chief at Mamba Point should indicate that the Liberians have not embraced a candidate who is not connected with widespread corruption and ethnic polarization, and should the political and military climate remain unpredictable, Phase II of "Operation Green Sand" will begin. This Class-3 destabilization campaign will render Liberia primed for complete external control within five years.Respectfully submitted.Larry Charters, Senior Intelligence Officer4Dave Dionisi's observations of life in Liberia are as current as his most recent trip in May 2007. The fact that the majority of the Liberian people live without running water or electricity speaks volumes for the poverty that still is present. This is one of the reasons Liberia is a fourth world country. To become a third world country, Liberia also needs capital for businesses to begin operations. The May trip included starting a tailor shop. This business was started for $2,000 and is locally owned and operated. Tailors are in demand because clothes are more expensive in Liberia than they are in the US.The children Dave works with at the Mission Honduras International orphanage in Liberia are making fantastic progress. Handful, the boy in the article photograph, is a top student and an excellent soccer player. The staff at the orphanage have worked hard and the living conditions have vastly improved. A visitor will have wonderful experiences and be changed for the better forever. Dave encourages people to visit the children and experience what, in a few words, is a 24.5 acre oasis of miracles that through education is permanently breaking the cycle of poverty.The new US Africa Command base is being built in Careysburg. The orphanage site Dave helped select three years earlier is also in Lower Careysburg (the town is Blacktown). The fact that the US military selected this location for a major military installation is uncanny.5Since 2003, 15,000 U.N. peacekeepers have helped Liberia go from a war-torn hell to a peaceful democracy. The U.N. peacekeeping success story in Liberia is nothing short of miraculous and the 92 peacekeepers that died were honored in May.6The entire 1996 CIA Field Report is available above in footnote number 3 and is also published in a book by Lester Hyman. The book, United States Policy Towards Liberia 1822 to 2003, has the full text on pages 46 and 47. The leaked Field Report was submitted to the CIA by Mr. Hyman which states the letter is not genuine. The CIA statement means little as it is standard policy for the CIA to distance itself from leaked documents. The declassification process means an accurate answer from the CIA is not possible until after the document is no longer classified. What supports the authenticity of this leaked classified document is the chilling descriptions of what actually happened after 1996.In 2003, Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD) were firing 82-millimeter mortars in Monrovia. The mortars were produced in the US and came into the country from Guinea. Guinea is a recipient of US military aid so the facts suggest the CIA orchestrated these weapon transfers. To highlight this point, in late June, LURD troops ran out of ammunition and abandoned their offensive in Monrovia. Three weeks later, they were resupplied with US manufactured weapons. Their subsequent assault led to many casualties. A U.N. panel of experts investigated the use of 82 millimeter mortars and found a link between Guinea and LURD. The U.N. experts reported a mining company made suspicious flights into Guinea and this is likely linked to how LURD received weapons by sea and land. 7Firestone, in a business agreement some Liberians see as theft going back to 1926, paid 6 cents an acre for 1 million acres of coastal land. The most recent revision of the Firestone agreement occurred in 2005 (see http://www.firestonenaturalrubber.com/index.asp?id=faq for the official Firestone version of why the latest agreement was needed). As part of the 2005 agreement, Firestone now leases 121,000 acres or approximately 200 square miles.Liberia has had plantations well before Firestone came to the country in part because Liberia was established by the American Colonization Society to return former slaves and free-born people to Africa. In 1819, the US Congress allocated $100,000 to establish Liberia. In 1847 Liberia became an independent state. In the years that followed Liberians enjoyed 133 years of peace although slavery continued throughout the 20th century. Slavery was technically abolished in Liberia in the late 1930's but in 2005 the International Labor Rights Fund (ILRF) filed a lawsuit charging that thousands of Liberian workers were exploited in "virtual slavery" at the Bridgestone's Firestone rubber plantation (see http://www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=12860). The plantation workers are at the mercy of the Firestone for everything from food to lodging. In the past, a quick way to be assassinated in Liberia was to try to unionize the workers. Firestone also sprayed the rubber trees with Difolatan to increase latex production even though it is a known carcinogen. In 2005, a report by the Save My Future Foundation called “Firestone: The Mark of Slavery” asserted the company still uses child labor. As a result of negative international attention, Firestone improved pay and living conditions although workers still do not having running water or electricity. A rubber tree tapper is generally paid paid less than $200 a month and can produce three or four tons of latex per month or $3,000 for Firestone. While working at Firestone is one of the better jobs available in Liberia, a five day work week instead of a six day work week would dramatically increase the living standards for over 6,000 employees.Natural rubber is about 10% of a modern tire. For this reason, rubber from Liberia is still supplied to Bridgestone Firestone North American Tire, LLC. The Firestone Natural Rubber Company supplies latex to specialty compounders and manufacturers of medical components, carpet backing, adhesives, and coatings. According to Firestone, "Liberia has the world's largest rubber estate and the demand for natural rubber continues to grow. In 1926 the world used 547,000 long tons. World consumption is now more than 8.2 million long tons. The gigantic increase has been due primarily to the growth of the automotive industry around the world. But rubber is more than a necessary commodity for the transportation industry. It is also vital to the electrical industry, communications and medicine. It is in great demand for more than 40,000 products used by people all over the world."In 1988 Bridgestone Corporation purchased Firestone Tire & Rubber Company. The name Bridgestone meaning “stone bridge” was likely influenced by the already existing Firestone and because of fear in Japan that Americans would not respond well to a foreign company. It is the largest tire manufacturer in the world.Firestone has the potential to be a major force for positive change in Liberia. Letters to Firestone's Natural Rubber Company President Dan Adomitis do make a difference. His efforts to help the people are a dramatic change from decades of Firestone practices that resulted in "virtual slavery."8In 1948, in the early days of the CIA, an innovative Liberian ship-registry program was headquartered on Park Avenue in New York City. As CIA operations increased in Virginia, the program also expanded to Reston, Virginia. The cover story was the program needed to be run in the US because corruption in Liberia prevented it from being run there. This program was conceived for Liberia by the American government and generated enough money, approximately $24 million each year, to allow the US to manage Liberia as a colony.Former US Secretary of State Edward Stettinius played a key role in organizing the ship-registry program with Liberian President William V.S. Tubman. The group established the Registered Agent Office in New York City to register ships and corporations under the Liberian flag. On March 11, 1949 the first commercial vessel, called World Peace and chartered to the Getty Oil Company, was registered. When Stettinius died in 1950, the ownership of Liberian Services and its affiliates passed to the International Bank (IB) of Washington, DC. IB had intelligence connections and was developed through the efforts of General George Olmsted. The registry was contracted out to The International Trust Company. Over the following four decades, the easy registration system made Liberia the number one registry in the world. Liberia's government was the first to contract out its administration of a shipping registry to a private company. During the war, Liberia depended heavily on the maritime funds, accounting for some 70% of government revenue. Due to the war in Liberia in the 1990s, Liberia fell to second place -- after Panama -- after Panama and Honduras began "open registry" programs. After the the civil war of 1990, International Registries, Inc., (as Liberian Services had become) entered into an agreement with the Republic of the Marshall Islands, to develop a new maritime program. International Registries, Inc. (IRI) was formed in 1990 as the parent corporation for its affiliates and in 1993 IRI became a privately held company owned and operated by its senior employees. When Charles Taylor took over the government, he upset the US government by signing a new contract for the program with Liberian International Ship & Corporate Registry (LISCR).9In February 2007 the new Africa Command was announced by the Bush administration. Soon after this announcement, Liberia was selected. The new Africa Command military base is being built near the orphanage where I work. As I see it, the location was selected for three reasons. The first is a rapid deployment team with Blackhawk helicopters can deploy to the protect the intelligence assets at the US Embassy in about 15 minutes. The second is the location provides excellent protection of the Firestone Corporation headquarters plantation. The third is the location is well suited to exploit the oil that has been discovered off the coast of Liberia. On April 18, 2007, Liberian Defense Minister Brownie Samukai and the Deputy Commander of the US European Command, General William Ward, signed the agreement to make Liberia the headquarters of the new Africa Command. General Ward described the agreement as a "foundation for future assistance" and $200 million dollars is scheduled to reform Liberia's security. The US taxpayer funds, roughly the amount needed to provide clean drinking water for the entire country, will be used for weapons and equipping a 2,000 strong new Armed Forces of Liberia.The Bush administration was so happy about Liberia’s agreement to accept the US Africa Command that within days of the Africa Command announcement the administration forgave Liberia’s $391 million debt. Secretary of State Rice said the United States will also work with other donors, such as the World Bank, the African Development Bank, and the International Monetary Fund, to help resolve Liberia's debt to those international institutions. She said neither the Liberian people nor their current leadership deserved to shoulder the nearly $4 billion of international debt run up under the dictatorships of Samuel Doe and Charles Taylor. What she did not say is much of this debt was acquired during Ronald Reagan’s reign and was used to support a brutal and corrupt dictator named Samuel Doe.10See footnotes 3 and 6. The significance of the name Operation Green Sand in the CIA Field Report is likely a reference to a “green field.” In the business world, starting a new company from scratch is referred to as a green field startup. Since the CIA’s main station faces the sand at a place called Mamba Point, this may explain the significance of Operation Green Sand. Operation names are also generated randomly so until this information is declassified, it will remain a mystery.

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David Dionisi is a former US army intelligence officer and business executive. He is the author of American Hiroshima (http://www.americanhiroshima.info).

David Dionisi, the author, has held significant management positions with Fortune 500 companies such as MetLife and Prudential. He has also served as a Senior Vice President for an Internet company and has started small businesses in the United States and internationally.
Prior to working in corporate America, he served the country as an Army intelligence officer. His business and military experiences over the last 24 years are complemented by an extensive background as an international volunteer worker in Asia, Central America, Europe and Africa.
His formal education includes a MBA from the University of San Francisco, a B.S. from the University of Lowell (Magna Cum Laude), financial consulting certifications (ChFC and CLU) from the American College, and honor/distinguished graduate commendations from numerous military specialty training programs (e.g., Air Force Telecommunications School, Army Officer Candidate School and Intelligence Officer School).
In addition to American Hiroshima, he is the author of Perfect Money Planning which was published in three editions from 1991 to 1995.