Where is the Money Going

A peek inside the Black Budget.

By ABH Alexander

Over the years every American citizen has probably wondered how much of our taxpayer dollars are truly wasted. The late, great Senator William Proxmire legitimized these concerns with his famous Golden Fleece Awards for government programs, which go below the threshold of tolerance for idiocy.

Currently the Citizens Against Government Waste mention on their website www.cagw.org, in their 2006 Pig Book there are 9,963 projects in the 11 appropriations bills that constitute the discretionary portion of the federal budget for fiscal 2006, costing taxpayers $29 billion. In other worlds that is the approximate size of the pork barrel in Washington.

Another area we as citizens should not tolerate is how many of these valuable dollars are funneled into activities which may not be in the best interests of America, or worse yet be a part of a secretive agenda by those who are not elected.

Recently, with the hanging of Saddam Hussein and his exposure as a long time CIA asset some people began asking questions. While many people make knee jerk decisions about the opinions they hold this article will be addressing a rarely discussed issue which has much broader implications than one political party, one president, one hanging of another tyrannical CIA asset (remember Ferdinand Marcos? Manuel Noriega?)

In the beginning there was a budget for the Federal Government. Furthermore, our constitution guaranteed us we would be informed as to how they spent the money (see Article 1, Sec. 9. Clause 7).

If you've been paying more attention to the bread and circuses than the accelerating demise of the United States of America you may have missed the increasing erosion of what we truly know of government expenditures. In the intelligence community this unaccounted for funding is generally referred to as the "Black Budget".

Upon mounting a Google search there were a lot of matches but very few dealing with the Black Budget in particular. Amongst the information garnered was this interesting tidbit:

U.S. DEFENSE BUDGETS AND MILITARY SPENDING

Information, Documents, and Publications. Reference aid. Preliminary edition.

By George Caldwell, Senior Specialist in U.S. Government Documents

Serial & Government Publications Division Library of Congress March 1992

BLACK BUDGET. A popular term for that part of the military budget, which is

Classified. Some call it the "super-secret" part, classified even higher than "Top secret." Projects thus funded have been called "black programs." The official name is Special Access Required Projects, or Special Access Programs.

Only a few members of Congress have access to this information. Controversy has arisen over whether too much military information is hidden from Congress and the public. GAO has identified about 185 programs. Black Programs have been said to include the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI, or "Star Wars;") "stealth" planes and missiles; etc. The House Armed Services Committee said a major part of the funding was for two programs, the Stealth Bomber and the Advanced Cruise Missile, and that the "black" programs increased eightfold in 1981-1986. There is no authoritative total, but recent estimates for secret

military spending are $30 to $35 billion per year. Programs may appear in the DoD budget only as code names such as "Grass Blade," "Chalk Eagle," "Dark Eyes," "Guardian Bear," and "Sea Nymph." A recent book on the subject is Blank Check; the Pentagon's Black Budget, by Tim Weiner (UA25.5.W45 1990) 90-50291.

While doing further research on both the Black Budget and Tim Weiner's book Blank Check I attended one of those town hall meetings in 1992 with the then local representative, Democrat, Joan Kelly Horn, who was on the way to being replaced by her challenger, Republican Jim Talent, who in turn was replaced by Clare McKaskill in November 2006.

People certainly had questions for Mrs. Horn. Unfortunately, most of these questions centered on how this person or that person was having problems with government laws, regs, taxes etc. Comments at these affairs typically need to be fielded by a patient politician who acts more like a volcanic heating vent allowing those with a lot of hot gas to escape.

Upon being granted a moment to bring up my comment I immediately focused on a lesser-known problem, which affects everyone in one-way shape or form, the Black Budget. While Van Horn expressed some knowledge of it, it was clear she was not interested in going into the issue too deeply. It was also clear her knowledge of the matter was more superficial. Fortunately, she was interested enough to accept my invitation to review my personal condensed version of the only known book on the subject, Blank Check.

Her assistant was definitely shocked by the contents of the book and began to realize there was much to this government that was simply not available to John Q. Public. Some reasons are justified and others, well, you be the judge. First more about the contents of Blank Check.

What about Blank Check?

When Weiner first put out his book in 1990 he conservatively estimated the Black Budget to be in the neighborhood of 34 billion dollar a year. To put that in layman's terms that would have been equal to the budget for the entire state of California at that time. To put a more accurate dollar amount on the Black Budget I consulted contacts within the intelligence community itself and found that the dollars flowing off the table into countless covert ops, experiments, and who knows what else amounted to around 150 billion. In 2006 dollars we are likely well over that total.

OK, if you're a conservative you are likely saying, these guys need secrecy and as a long as its used correctly, no problem. The liberals are likely decrying the secret use and how it could be better put to provide health care and schools in some other country.

This problem is clearly not defined by which side of political spectrum or party you prefer as this unaccounted for funding is run mostly by those who are also in some way shape or form unelected and have very little light shed on any of their activities.

What was apparent is that due to the everyday stress and strain of spending about 80-90% of their time running for re election, most politicians have only the vaguest idea of how the Black Budget might affect their lives, this country and how we deal with the rest of the world. The lack of accountability here only adds to the bottom line of what disappears and what gets corrupted.

First a quick primer on what Weiner learned in his investigation. After interviewing a financial analyst for the Air Force, Tom Amilie about the Stealth bomber project and the reason for other "black" programs; Amilie replied, "One, you re doing something that should be genuinely secret. There are only a few of those and the Stealth ain't one of them. Two, you are doing something so damn stupid that you don't want anybody to know. Three, you want to rip the money bag open and get out the shovel because there is no accountability whatsoever."

After investigating years of the Defense Department budgets and requests Wiener concluded, "The budget request the Pentagon submits to Congress is a cover story."

Remember the story about the $600 toilet seat or $90 dollar hammers purchased by the Pentagon? Some of that money goes to the Black Budget, some goes to pad the pockets of those in high places responsible for overseeing the production of the goods and that might leave about 20-35% of the total for the actual order.

Another venue for the creation of Black Budget funding is through drug and arms dealing around the world. A courageous reporter, Gary Webb, exposed the CIA connection with drug and arms dealing in South Los Angeles in the 90's in a series written for the San Jose Mercury News and later a book, Dark Alliance. Both efforts drew heavy debunking efforts from those in the media either influenced or directly enlisted to keep Webb in his place. To raise money for clandestine efforts not approved of by Congress, the intelligence community often relies on a variety of financial scams, drugs, war profiteering and costly defense contracts to create this deep Black Budget.

So where does this money go?

While there are some projects, experiments, underground bases that may never receive any scrutiny we do know about a few.

It is widely accepted that both the CIA and the British MI6 collaborated on the 1953 coup in Iran, which kicked out Mohammed Mossedegh. Time Magazine had made Mossedegh their Magazine's "Man of the Year" (this was before Time decided to avoid all controversy as they did in 2006 with their Person of the Year "You"). The man known to many as the Shah of Iran was placed in power and provided favorable leadership for both the USA and UK until he was booted out by a radical element lead by the Ayatollah Khomeini in 1978. This element has continued to grow and today we have an even greater problem as the result of our failures at that time.

Other uses of covert funding likely include that coup in the Congo in 1960. Another use of secret funding may have been detailed by William Colby, a former Deputy Director of the CIA in Vietnam from 1962-67. There was a counter insurgency program called "Phoenix". Basically a headhunting effort made to assassinate Viet Cong leaders, sympathizers and anyone else in the way. The result, about 20,000 killed. Colby later wrote of his expertise in the book, Skeletons as the Family Jewels.

In one chapter, Activities Directed Against US Citizens Colby details how the CIA tapped phones, bugged bedrooms and combed through tax returns and office files late at night. Colby also mentioned mind control experiments on unwitting human guinea pigs and assassination plots. Still today, many of those who discuss CIA activities claim they are following their charter of not performing any domestic operations that was supposed to be the territory of the FBI. The reality is that it was a territory they violated whenever they were so moved and they usually moved often and quietly.

In January 1975 the late President Gerald Ford appointed a commission to look into this mess. This inquiring group included then Vice-President Nelson Rockefeller and ex-Governor Ronald Reagan.

During the two-year investigation Colby spoke, in spite of requests from Rockefeller to keep his mouth shut. Colby was later fired and the new CIA head would be George H.W. Bush, who held the position for about a year in 1976.

Another area of suspicion centers on secret underground government bases like Area 51 near Las Vegas, Nevada.

Anyone who follows the trail of evidence surrounding the UFO enigma can come to one logical conclusion, the government knows a lot more than they are saying about these objects. The testimony of Bob Lazar, reported by KLAS-TV in Las Vegas as a Physicist working at Area 51 in the 90's only fueled speculation as to what was really going on at Area 51. Lazar described several disc shaped craft, experiments and a mountain of information he was privy to indicating technology being experimented on did not originate with humankind. If the government is back engineering science gleaned from crashed or shot down alien spacecraft, we are no doubt making some powerful enemies. Even if they came in peace there are enough trigger-happy paranoid military heads that would automatically want to convert any peaceful alien efforts into pieces.

Richard Sauder's book called Underground Bases and Tunnels dug up details of elaborate construction all over the world going on hundreds or thousands of feet below. The general public in the meantime is lulled to sleep by American Idol, dancing movie stars, sports and the latest scandal.

As to who is behind the decisions on what is spent and where, since the money is unaccounted for by Congressional standards we should probably not be looking for ANY elected official to stand up and be accountable for this money. Those in the business of spin will certainly mouth the words of accountability and perhaps new committees will be appointed. Rest assured America, whatever secrets are being manufactured or experiments on whatever unwitting members of the population occur, you will probably know very little about it. However, every once in awhile someone has to mention something about the Black Budget, just to maintain some credibility.

Who else is talking about the Black Budget or a Shadow Government?

Usually the media treats this subject lightly if at all. On December 18, 2006 on CSPAN Steven Aftergood the Director of the Project on Government Secrecy actually mentioned the black budget, proclaiming, "The black budget is now at least 45 billion and a percentage of the secrets that are illegal are in the single digits or less, this is to camouflage intelligence activities.

Unfortunately, in the nearly one hour of air time, that is the most revealing item Aftergood would mention as he sounded very supportive of the political changes in Congress. In particular another new committee being put together by Nancy Pelosi to account for intelligence spending and to combat the perceived fractured nature of intelligence. This is standard operating procedure to demonstrate political worthiness by creating a committe, an investigation, appointing someone to do something. The reality, very rarely does it amount to anything except another way to spend taxpayer dollars.

Since CSPAN allows call-ins to the show a question came up about the existing electronic eavesdropping the National Security Agency (NSA) has been doing since 1994 (under the code name: Project Echelon). Aftergood displayed his true colors when he admitted he had heard something about it, but really doesn't know anything about it.

From time to time someone in government or a well respected person from the private sector finally speaks up. A few examples follow:

Senator Daniel Inouye of Hawaii once remarked, "There exists a shadowy Government with its own Air Force, its own Navy, its own fundraising mechanism, and the ability to pursue its own ideas of the national interest, free from all checks and balances, and free from the law itself."

Senator Inouye's quote can be traced to the Disclosure Project which is given brief mention on wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Inouye. Inouye's has never demonstrated a lack of courage in either his political or distinguished military service. He was part of the Nisei 442 Regimental Combat Team in WWII and his decoration includes this nations highest merit, the Medal of Honor.

It is clear Senator Inouye is talking about the problem and what can create a bigger problem for all of us, both now and certainly in the future.

A voice that has been mostly silence today is that of ex-Senator James Traficant, who is serving time. Traficant unleashed volumes of information about such activities before he was convicted of racketeering and corruption in 2002 and is now serving jail time. (For those who want to find out more his current address is provided: Traficant today
James Traficant, age 61, is now incarcerated at the Allenwood Federal Corrections Institution. Registered as Inmate Number 31213-060, he is scheduled for release on July 17, 2009. Persons wishing to write to Mr. Traficant should address their letters to:

Mr. James Traficant #31213-060
F.C.I. Allenwood P.O. Box 1500
White Deer, Pennsylvania 17887
Phone: 570-547-1990

Possible alternative solutions

As long as people strive to remain uninformed the only thing that is certain is that the situation will worsen. Those who cooperate with this shadow government are rewarded, those who do not are broke down, debunked or sometimes find themselves with a very shortened life span.

As long as the rewards and notoriety go to the wrong people, you can expect nothing to change. The whistleblowers, those who create new options for society like the electric car in California that was killed with a mix of regulations and GM's help, along with writers and producers of well documented informational material on the latest scam befalling our citizens need to be brought into the spotlight more.

With less taxation, people can spend more time discovering what is important to all of us, not just the next paycheck. As long as our noses are kept on the grindstone making that mortgage payment, making that car note and taking a quick vacation somewhere for just a week or so, this shadow government will continue to thrive.

It is up to each and every one of us to force ourselves to take an hour or two to talk about these issues that matter. Issues which are often not given any mainstream press attention. Do not be shy about talking about it with others in the family, unless of course they give a clear indication that this might overload their circuits (more evidence of conditioning). Be careful with such information, wield it carefully, thoughtfully and try to bring people into the light of awareness and concern for our future. It does not take everybody to push a stone uphill, only the dedicated few.

Perhaps Woodrow Wilson said it best in 1912. Everybody knows that corruption thrives in secret places and avoids public places and we believe it a fair presumption that secrecy means impropriety".

Those who listen today might still be able to save this country for tomorrow.

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