Saturday, September 20, 2008

~ ~ ~ Will Israel Save the World? ~ ~ ~

DO NOT READ THIS PUBLICATION IF YOU MAY BE OFFENDED BY INFORMATION THAT CONFLICTS WITH YOUR ESTABLISHED THOUGHTS, EDUCATION, RELIGION, CULTURE; OR ARE NOT RECEPTIVE TO OLD TRUTHS THAT ARE EXPRESSED IN NEW WAYS.

~ ~ ~ Will Israel Save the World? ~ ~ ~

Presented by Charles H. Clever

Para español, seleccionar aqui: www.revealed.org/israel.htm

Chapter 4


IMPORTANT EVENTS

In setting the foundation for this chapter, let us first recall that the "unfolded" numeric prophecies of Daniel 12, which were sealed for over 2,500 years, authenticate the historical time of Christ's first coming, His abolishment of the sanctuary service, and the establishment of the Abomination of Desolation. Furthermore, it identifies the timing of the great controversy between good and evil--the final eradication of sin from God's universe. The Great Mathematician also gave Daniel another numeric prophecy encoded several centuries before Christ. This little-known and greatly misunderstood prophecy, among things, accurately identifies the time for the close of Israel’s probation.

You were told you would learn old truths expressed in new ways, and this "old truth" was understood by those who wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls before the birth of Christ. Catholic bishops also used this code in vain to convince a contingency of Jewish rabbis that Jesus was the Messiah and the Jews prohibited its study:
"Daniel has elucidated to us the knowledge of the end times. However, since they are secret, the wise (rabbis) have barred the calculation of the days of Messiah's coming so that the untutored populace will not be led astray when they see that the End Times have already come but there is no sign of the Messiah" (12th Century, Rabbi Moses Ben Maimonides: Igeret Teiman, Chapter 3 p.24).

Because Protestants used this “code” to prove the Catholic Church “Anti-christ”, as we did in Chapter Two, these important principles are now suppressed by Catholic leadership and shifted to some imagined event in the future.
Yet God placed these timed prophecies in the Bible to be understood, and if you can accept these facts that are so important to your salvation, read on in a humble spirit of prayer because they accurately predict the year of Christ's baptism and wilderness temptation, identifying the start of His earthly ministry as the "last Adam" (1 Corinthians 15:45). Furthermore, they declare the exact year of His crucifixion and Yom Kippur, which is the time of the investigative judgment in heaven. This tangible information builds faith in those needing spiritual strength; and yes, these prophecies also date the end of the Jewish dispensation


Many today erroneously speculate that the nation of Israel will accept Jesus as their Savior in the near future and convert the world to Christianity and commence 1,000 years of world peace. This, they say, is Israel's "second chance" to finally introduce the crucified Savior to mankind. In reality, this will be a fatal delusion for humanity because it prepares them to receive Satan, as he must impersonate God by ruling in Israel before Christ's long waited "rescue mission."

Our destiny depends on significant choices we make--decisions that ultimately determine our fate forever. Personally, I feel completely inadequate to handle language in an efficient manner to impress readers with vital truths found in the Bible. Attempting to develop journalistic skills, I took English classes and enrolled for a few brief semesters as a student on a college newspaper staff. Still, I am far from a proficient journalist. So my prayer is that human weakness will be perfected in His divine strength and, in addition to reading this document, that you also seek deeper understanding from Him through prayer while you personally research these important issues in His Word. To begin the topic of Israel's probation, let us first mention Jesus' use of an Old Testament prophecy of seventy times seven.


THERE IS A LIMIT TO FORGIVENESS

Perhaps you have observed someone anxious to teach a valid truth. They may ask a question while really wanting to give the correct answer. We have done this very thing in the chapter heading: "Will Israel Save the World?" Peter used a similar tactic in conversation with Jesus: "How often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? Until seven times?" In their day Jewish rabbis limited the act of forgiveness to three offenses. Peter wanted to be especially correct and was extra generous--he extended the forgiveness to seven times. Jesus used this as an opportunity to introduce to Peter another topic of much greater importance, as you will see, the close of probation for Israel. To Peter's statement Jesus replied, Not "until seven times, but until seventy times seven" (Matthew 18:21-22).

Seven is the number of perfection, the number of completeness, the number scattered 463 times within 391 verses of the Bible from Genesis' seven-day week to the seven vials of Revelation, containing the seven last plagues. And Jesus multiplies Peter's forgiveness of seven by 70, totaling 490 times (Ibid.).
How often we hear sermons magnifying God's forgiveness: "Have mercy upon me, O God, according to your loving kindness: according to the multitude of Your tender mercies blot out my transgressions" (Psalms 51:1). Yes, "there is forgiveness with You" (Psalm 130:4). By looking at God's great love displayed at Calvary, we may rightly emphasize God's forgiveness if we do not forget His promised judgments against transgressors. Jesus emphasized the importance of making decisions immediately, and did not say that forgiveness would have no boundaries--no finality.

Jesus spoke repeatedly of the close of probation, even saying that it would be more tolerable for the nations previously destroyed by God's wrath than for those who rejected His truths (Matthew 10:15; 11:22; Luke 10:12, 14). And He admonished His disciples to stamp the dust from their feet of the towns that refused to hear His messages of mercy (Luke 6:11). Probation can close for nations and it can close for individuals who despise greater truths of God. It closed for Lucifer and his angels, for Noah's generation; and let us not forget the prophet Samuel's words to the passive priest who neglected to restrain his children: "And therefore I have sworn concerning the house of Eli, that the iniquity of Eli's house will not be purged with sacrifice nor offering forever" (1 Samuel 3:14). Displayed by instantaneous death, judgment closed very swiftly for Ananias and Sapphira, "So a great fear came upon all the church and upon all who heard these things" (Acts 5:1-11). The Northern kingdom of Israel lost their commission and was forever banished to Assyrian captivity: "Therefore the Lord was very angry with Israel, and removed them out of his sight: there was none left but the tribe of Judah.... For He rent Israel from the house of David" (I Kings 17: 18, 21). Isaiah also conveys this same concept concerning Jerusalem: "Surely for this iniquity there will be no atonement for you, even to your death" (Isaiah 22:14).

Now, please understand this fact: I do not believe, nor want you to even suspect that there is forgiveness from God limited to seventy times seven. Were that true, we would all be lost. Thank God for His patience, how often each of us must humbly kneel at Jesus' feet asking for forgiveness after He allows circumstances to reveal to us another character defect. In reality, Jesus is borrowing seventy sevens from the Old Testament where the finality of God's use of Israel to fulfill His divine purpose is predicted--their last chance--the close of probation for that nation.


490 YEARS OF PROBATION

Many have forgotten or do not correctly understand this Old Testament occurrence of seventy times seven. But before we explore this, let me mention a noteworthy observation: Ignorance of the fulfillment of a prediction promotes irrational applications. To prevent irrational application of a prophecy that has already fulfilled, let us turn to the ninth chapter of Daniel.
To take this chapter in context, we must recall that Israel's probation was closed during Daniel's lifetime for a period of 70 years. This 70-year sentence started at the time of Jeremiah's prediction when Judah was overthrown and God's people were carried away as captives to Babylon (Jeremiah 25:11-12). Several decades later, in the first year of Darius (538 B.C.), Daniel read the scriptures and understood that the seventy years of captivity were almost fulfilled. He offered a prayer that occupies 16 verses. In this prayer, Daniel acknowledges the sins of his nation, the validity of God's judgments, and the goodness of God. Daniel finishes his appeal with these words: "O Lord, hear! O Lord, forgive! O Lord, listen and act! Do not delay for Your own sake, my God, for Your city and Your people are called by Your name" (Daniel 9:19).
Daniel is pleading for another chance and asks God to re-establish His people in Palestine, and to rebuild the city and temple that lay in ruins--another chance to fulfill Israel's original commission--to bring in everlasting righteousness, to be a blessing to the Gentiles, to make the house of God a place of prayer for all people. God hears Daniel's prayer and sends an answer.

Gabriel, who stands in the presence of God, flies swiftly and arrives about the time of the evening sacrifice. He itemizes several events to fulfill within a specific time frame: "I have now come forth to give you skill to understand" (Ibid. 9:22). "SEVENTY WEEKS [literally seventy sevens, or 70 X 7] are determined for your people and for your holy city, to finish transgression, to make an end of sins, to make reconciliation for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the Most Holy" (verse 24). You may recall that Ezekiel 4:6 and Numbers 14:34 establish the principle that a prophetic day equals literal years. So, Israel's probation would not be limited to the brief time of seventy times seven days, which is less than two years (70 X 7 = 490 days), but to a full 490 years. Also, it would not be proper for God to start the timing of the 490 years while Israel was still struggling in captivity. It must commence when they were fully re-established as a nation with rights of autonomy by self-government, where they can legally "restore and rebuild Jerusalem."

Gabriel then tells when to start this "last chance:" "Know therefore and understand that from the going forth of the command to restore and build Jerusalem..." (verse 25). Ezra and Nehemiah list three main "commands." The first is 537 B.C., to rebuild the temple (Ezra 1:1-4). The second, 519 B.C., eighteen years later to strengthen the first decree to rebuild the temple (Ezra 6:1-12). And the third, 457 B.C., to restore self-government to the Jewish nation under Persian lordship (Ezra 7:11-26). Since the third decree of 457 B.C. established governmental autonomy with Israel's own "magistrates and judges", they would have the right to legislate as needed to "restore and build Jerusalem" (Ezra 7:25, 26). Therefore, 457 B.C. is the correct starting point of Israel's 490 year "last chance."

We might ask the question: "Just how did Israel fare during this probationary period?" Not very good, as we will soon discover. The first 69 weeks (483 years) of the 70 week (490 years) prophecy was to reach to Jesus, the Messiah: "Until the Messiah the Prince, seven weeks and sixty-two weeks (7 + 62 = 69); the street and the wall [of Jerusalem] will be built again, even in troublesome times" (Daniel 9:25). If you read Nehemiah 4, it tells some of the problems encountered when rebuilding the walls, but what about the 69 weeks to the Messiah? Let us calculate the time to the Messiah, remembering that we must add one year for transition between B.C. and A.D. because there is no year zero in chronological time.


JESUS' BAPTISM AND CRUCIFIXION FORETOLD

Sixty-nine prophetic weeks is 483 literal years (69 X 7 = 483). The year of Israel's autonomy, 457 B.C. is subtracted from the decreed 483 years, and adding one transitional year, leaves 27 A.D., the year of the baptism of Christ, "the Messiah the Prince." Using negative numbers for B.C., we can calculate: ( - 457 + 483 + 1 = 27 A.D.). According to Luke 3:1,2, 21, 22, Jesus was baptized in that very year--"the fifteenth year of Tiberius," which began in the fall of 27 A.D. This prophecy has LITERALLY FULFILLED. But there is more:

We have mentioned that Jesus said there is forgiveness of seventy times seven (490) and Daniel also conveys this thought for Israel. From Daniel, we observed that the 483 years of this 490 year prediction of time reached to Christ's baptism. There was still SEVEN YEARS OF PROBATION LEFT FOR ISRAEL to complete the 490 years (490 - 483 = 7). Jesus sent out His twelve disciples with this commission: "Go not into the way of the GENTILES, and into any city of the SAMARITANS enter not: But go rather to the LOST SHEEP OF ISRAEL" (Matthew 10:5, 6). Probation would not finish for Israel until AFTER this seven year period.

Now, let us discover the fulfillment of another prediction recorded in Daniel 9. Remember that seven and sixty-two weeks reached to the Messiah. In verse 26 we are told: "And after the sixty-two weeks [sometime after Christ's baptism in 27 A.D.] Messiah will be cut off [killed], but not for Himself [for us]; and the people [troops] of the prince [of the Roman emperor] will destroy the city [Jerusalem] and the sanctuary [the prince, Titus did this in the siege of 70 A.D.]. The end of it will be with [like] a flood, and till the end of the war, DESOLATIONS are determined" (Daniel 9: 26). We need only mention a few conflicts: Masada, the Roman Coliseum, marauding Ottomans, and the "crusades" that vainly attempted to recover Jerusalem for Jesus. Nor the bombings and assassinations that are today carried out against the nation whose leaders said to Pilate: 'We have no king but Caesar", and "His blood be on us, and on our children" (John 19:15; Matthew 27:25). And of whom our Savior and God pronounced this decree: "Behold, your house is left unto you DESOLATE" (Matthew 23:38).

There is more, emphasizing the most tragic parts of this seven-year "last chance"--the 70th week of Daniel's prophecy. "And he [the Messiah] will confirm the covenant with many for one week [seven prophetic years]: and in the midst of the week he will cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease, and for the over spreading of abominations he will make it DESOLATE, even until the consummation, and that determined will be poured upon the DESOLATE." Notice that three different verses emphasize the abolishment of the sacrificial system (Daniel 9:27; 11:31; 12:11). Jesus confirmed His Father's covenant (agreement) with Israel for that prophetic week--SEVEN FINAL YEARS. The first half of this seven-year period was fulfilled by Jesus Himself.

The New Testament records Jesus' attendance at four Passovers. The first was six months after his baptism in the fall of 27 A.D., and He was crucified three years later at the fourth in 31 A.D. Thus, three and one-half years after His baptism, Jesus would "cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease" becoming the "lamb of God, which takes away the sins of the world" (John 1:29).
You will recall that in Chapter one, we discovered that two events occurred at the time of Christ (7740). (1) The daily sacrifice was taken away, and (2) the Abomination of Desolation was established. These predictions were literally and fully fulfilled. But in the "midst of the week", that last seven-year period, Jesus died; there remains three and one-half more years for Israel's final probationary period; then, they would become the DESOLATE.


ISRAEL'S LAST CHANCE

Matthew records Jesus' instructions to the disciples: "Go rather to the LOST SHEEP OF ISRAEL." After Christ's death the Jewish nation would still have three and one-half years to study the scriptures--to discover the predictions in the Old Testament of the Messiah's birth, suffering, and murder. Probation had not closed for the "lost sheep", and they were offered a new covenant--the indwelling Spirit of Christ their LORD (Jeremiah 31:31-33). If they refused all this evidence, they would be like the flourishing fig tree that in all appearance professed to be productive, but in actuality was barren. Jesus spoke these words to that pretentious tree: "Let no fruit grow on you after this FOR EVER. And presently the fig tree withered away" (Matthew 21:19).
That wilted fig tree is an object lesson to all believers who pretend holiness yet, like Israel of old, are destitute of true godliness as manifested from God working out His noble qualities in their lives.

The rest of the story is well known. Jesus preached to Israel for the final three and one-half years by His Holy Spirit poured upon the church. Judaism, the religion established by God and Moses, rejected the teachings of Jesus and His disciples. While the Pharisees were furiously stoning Steven to death for his testimony of Jesus, there was a young man holding their coats and consenting to this atrocity. He was named for a famous king of Israel, Saul, but on the road to Damascus he met the great I AM. Jesus said concerning Saul: "He is a chosen vessel for Me, to bear My name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel" (Acts 9:15). Not only was Saul (Paul) chosen to spread the gospel to the nations, but a persecution arose after Steven's death, and the church was "scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria..." (Acts 8:1).
Thus, Israel's allotted probation of 490 years, including the last week of seven years, terminated in A.D. 34 as converts spread the Good News about Jesus to the rest of the world: ( - 457 + 483 + 7 + 1 = 34 A.D.). This work was confirmed by God's bestowal upon the Gentiles of His Holy Spirit. Jesus' statement to the Samaritan woman found fulfillment: "The hour comes when you will... not worship the Father at Jerusalem..., but the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth..." ( John 4:21, 23). Paul was fully aware of Israel's rejection and said to the "chief of the Jews": "Therefore let it be known that salvation of God has been sent to the Gentiles, and they will hear it!" (Acts 28:17, 28).

An important thought for your consideration is, If judgment was totally closed for the nation of Israel three and one-half years after they delivered their Messiah to the Gentiles for crucifixion (Matthew 20:19; Mark 10:33,34), then God's commission to teach the world belongs to spiritual Israel (Matthew 28:19,20). It belongs to you and me, to individuals of every nationality who believe in Jesus. "And if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise" (Galatians 3:29). Soon, His chosen from all nations will ascend to heaven and dwell in the Holy City, and 1,000 years in the future they will ultimately inherit the earth (Psalm 37:11; Matthew 5:5). The promise is: "Blessed are those [from every country] who do His commandments, that they may have the right to the tree of life, and may enter through the gates into the city. But outside are [the ashes of] dogs and sorcerers and sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters, and whoever loves and practices a lie" (Revelation 22: 14-15). Malachi 4:3 refers to the ashes of the destroyed wicked: "And you will tread down the wicked; for they will be ashes under the soles of your feet in the day that I will do this says the LORD of hosts." And those suffering this destruction will be individuals and nations for whom probation had closed, those who rejected essential truths.

Were you able to understand these "timed" prophecies? Some people have a better comprehension of mathematics than others. And a few individuals might have to receive them by faith, knowing that God is not a man and He cannot lie (Titus 1:2). These prophecies are truth, and God intended them to be understood. To me, they are fun, and enhance my faith in God's dealings with humanity. It was mathematical calculations of these prophecies that first convinced me that there was an all-knowing God that controlled our destinies, and persuaded me that we are living at the end of time. Because Daniel's numeric prophecies were "sealed until the time of the end" (Daniel 12:9), I could pray without presumption for understanding. And now, if you are not completely fatigued, there is one more number that God would have us understand, Daniel's longest numeric prophecy.


THE BEGINNING OF JUDGMENT FORETOLD

This prophecy stretches across history 2,300 years to affect our existence today. Because it is very significant for our time, we will briefly study it. And I can assure you, it is quite easy to understand.

First, you must realize that all of the annual festivals that Israel was commanded to keep in the Old Testament were symbolic of occurrences that must literally fulfill in history. Because God's 10 commandment law is as eternal as God Himself, its weekly Sabbath is not symbolic, but the other holy days are. For example, Israel annually killed a Passover lamb in commemoration of the lamb whose blood saved them from the plague of death in Egypt. But this drama, called the Passover, literally fulfilled when Jesus, the Lamb of God, was slain on the very Passover that fell on what we call "Good Friday." Jesus very literally shed His blood for humanity (Isaiah 53: 8). Another annual festival that must likewise fulfill was the Day of Atonement. The actions in this drama reveal the necessary judgment to legally cleanse the sins from our innocent Sin Bearer that we gave Him through confession and repentance. These will finally be transferred to Satan in the judgment. The father of lies ultimately receives responsibility for all sin. Satan's wandering on this desolate planet for 1,000 years is also symbolized in this drama when Israel annually "let him go for a scapegoat into the wilderness" (Leviticus 16:10).

Jesus spoke of this judgment, in fact you might have even quoted His words before: "But I say unto you, That every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment" (Matthew 12:36). It is also predicted in Revelation, "for the hour of His judgment is come..." (Revelation 14: 7). This judgment takes place before Jesus returns, as all heaven must determine that you are safe to entrust with eternal life in a sinless universe. Please understand that there is no excuse for known sin. If one continues in sin while professing Christianity, "there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins" because they "crucify again for themselves the Son of God..." and have "insulted the Spirit of grace" (Hebrews 9:6; 10:26, 29). Jesus has made every provision for our salvation, and God accepts no excuses. While maintaining a humble spirit, all of our unbecoming behavior must be confessed to Him who is "faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us of all unrighteousness" (1 John 1:9).


COURT IS NOW IN SESSION
Before we discuss the date for the commencement of this judgment, we need to look from another prospective.
First, we can get a clue to its timing from Daniel's chapter seven. In the latter part of the reign of the Abomination of Desolation, which we discussed in chapter one and two, verse nine says: "I watched until thrones were put in place, and the Ancient of Days [God the Father] was seated...." Verse 10 continues, "A thousand times ten thousand stood before Him. The COURT was seated, and THE BOOKS OPENED.
Read this chapter in its entirety to realize that this judgment scene is taking place in heaven near the close of the Roman System's rule because Daniel's view switches from heaven to earth: "I watched THEN [while also viewing the judgment scene in heaven] because of the sound of the pompous words which the horn [Antichrist] was speaking; I watched till the beast [Roman System] was slain and its body destroyed and given to the burning flame" (verse 11). We have discussed previously how the Roman System must be attacked under the fifth plague. But there is a total of seven plagues, two more remain; therefore, when Rome is attacked, the controversy must continue a little longer as Satin himself makes his debut and pretends to recover us from great calamity. "I [Daniel] beheld until the beast was slain, and his body destroyed, and given to the burning flame" (Daniel 7:11). Be alert for this future event--when Rome is assaulted, know for certain that Satan's debut and Armageddon will follow.

ROME'S RULE IS TERMINATED

Daniel gives us a little more information as he continues in verse 12: "As for the rest of the beasts [governments previously controlled by Rome], they had their dominion taken away [no rulers or dictators, but ultimately Satan's attempted rule], yet their lives were prolonged for a season and a time" (Daniel 7:12). You will recall that when the Roman System has outlived its usefulness to Satan, then it is cast aside. After that, Lucifer takes earth's throne briefly.
At this time we do not fully understand the exact duration of the season and time of Daniel seven. This period allows for the unclean spirits to deceive the nations and Satan to rule. It is the time between Rome's fall and the destruction of this world in Armageddon. This is Daniel's last numeric prophecy for our time, and it computes literally to a year (time) and, the length of a season, which has three months. This is 450 days under the Hebrew calendar, or 15 months. Using the day-for-a-year scenario, it equals 450 years (15 X 30 = 450). It is highly unlikely that this figure applies, so let us use our "end of the days" key of "one-day-equals-six-days from Genesis 2:4. By multiplying the 450 days by SIX, it totals 2,700 days (450 X 6 = 2,700), or seven and one-half years, (2700 / 360 = 7.5). This is a more realistic figure, but we just do not know. This is a wait-and-see event because some predictions are only understood after they have fulfilled, as Christ said: "Now I tell you before it comes, that, when it is comes to pass, you may believe that I am [he]" (John 13:19).
Therefore, you must watch for and be alert to this fact: After Rome's exaltation (healed wound--Revelation 13:3), and demise (Daniel 7:11; Revelation 16: 10,11), we still have the "unclean spirits" of the sixth plague described in Revelation 16, verses 12 through 16. Satan works wisely in this deception. Like frogs appearing after a season of hibernation, these are undoubtedly "miracle working" demons in human form who announce the alleged arrival of Christ—one might even profess to be Mary, the mother of Jesus. These spirits of devils will entreat earth's leadership to accept Satan's impending rule. This will fasten them in his final deception and urge them on to unite with him in the final struggle against God's saints. These spirits will, in fact, lead the people to their final destruction in the last plague of Armageddon (Revelation 16:16-21).
What a scoundrel! Satan knew that he was a doomed angel when he was evicted from heaven. Still, his evil work continues as he does everything in his power to keep you from inheriting paradise, the utopia from where he was banished. This will require extreme patience, but the saints know that when Satan is killed and our planet destroyed in Armageddon, then Jesus will be arriving on His rescue mission and take them to the "mansions" in heaven (John 14:1-4). This final event, the coming of Christ, is discussed in the next chapter.
We have, of necessity, deviated from the 2,300 day prophecy; so let us now return to the discussion of Daniel's longest timed prophecy that reaches to the beginning of judgment (Daniel 8:14).


THE YEAR OF JUDGMENT'S BEGINNING

When Gabriel assigned 70 weeks probation to the Jewish nation, this period was literally "cut off" from the much longer period of time, the 2,300 days which were mentioned "at the beginning of the vision" (Daniel 9:21). If you recall, Gabriel told Daniel in the second vision: "70 weeks are determined for your people...." The Hebrew word for determined is chatak, and forms of this word can mean taken, take away, or cut off. Ten years earlier Daniel had the first vision of 2,300 days (prophetic years--Ezekiel 4:6; Numbers 14:34), and even though the holy beings did not tell Daniel the starting date at that time, they said: "That which was told is true; therefore seal up the vision, for it refers to many days in the future" (Daniel 8:14, 26)

We already discussed Israel's starting date of 457 B.C. which reached 490 years to 34 A.D. Now, let us calculate the remaining years after Israel's probation closed. If we subtract "cut off" Israel's 490 years of probation that terminated in 34 A.D., from 2,300 years, that leaves 1,810 years (2,300 - 490 = 1,810) This period of 1,810 years continues after 34 A.D. reaching to 1844 (34 + 1,810 = 1844 A.D.). An equally effective way to calculate this is to use our starting date, the year of Israel's autonomy under Persian lordship, 457 B.C. Using negative numbers to express the years before Christ, 2,300 years is added, leaving 1843 A.D., and adding one transitional year totals 1844 ( - 457 + 2,300 + 1 = 1844 A.D.).

The prediction in Daniel 8:14 says: "For two thousand and three hundred days, then the sanctuary shall be cleansed." The word "cleansed" is the Hebrew word tsadaq. This word literally means: to be made righteous, be just, justified, or vindicated. It is only by revealing everything that happened in the rebellion in heaven and on earth that God's name can be cleared of Satan's accusations. Therefore, the judgment that started in heaven, in addition to determining everyone's eternal destiny, is really a process of vindicating God before the entire universe; His sanctuary is cleansed of sins that have been transferred there by our prayers. And by looking at the evidence of the first part of this history (490 years) that fulfilled at the time of Christ by His baptism and crucifixion, then trusting in God's faithfulness, we can know for certain that judgment started in heaven in the year 1844. This event will continue until the books are closed, humanity's probation closes, and the decree from heaven is made: "He that is unjust, let him be unjust still: and he that is filthy, let him be filthy still... (Revelation 22: 11).

These figures do not set a date for Christ's coming. They only tell us that we are living in the time of history when heaven determines who will participate in the resurrection of righteousness or be left behind to perish. This judging is of those who call on the name of Jesus: "For the time [is come] that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if [it] first [begins] at us, what shall the end [be] of them that obey not the gospel of God?" (1 Peter 4:17) And, of course, as surely as Lucifer deceived God's noble angels, there will be false teachers who discredit these facts with simple words like "fatalist, doomsayer, and alarmist." When they can not refute the Biblical truths presented, they often belittle or defame the character of those bearing God's last-day message of warning. And know for a certain that "there will come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts, and saying, 'Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation'" (Peter 3:3,4). But Bible chronology has accurately fulfilled, and we are certainly living near the close of humanities probation.


Perhaps the following chart will help you understand these important dates. The 490 years end in A.D. 34, and the 2,300 days reach to A.D. 1844.
49 years
434 years
3½ years
Calvary
3½ years
1810-years
457 B.C.


The Decree
to Restore
Jerusalem

408 B.C.


Restoration
of
Jerusalem

A.D. 27


Baptism
of Jesus
Christ

A.D. 31


The
Crucifixion of
Jesus Christ.

A.D. 34


The Stoning of Steven,
Paul chosen as Disciple, and theGospel to the Gentiles

Remaining


Years to the
beginning of God's
Judgment in
A.D. 1844.

As the chart above shows, Israel's last chance, the 490 years of probation, terminated with the martyrdom of Stephen. Saul was then chosen as the Apostle to the Gentiles. Add the remaining 1810 years to this date of 34 A.D. and you have 1844, the time for judgment to begin.

IRRATIONAL APPLICATIONS
A young Christian, who we will call Jerry, was excited about his newly found faith and with great zeal studied the scriptures. "I've been reading the Bible, Charles," Jerry enthusiastically said, "and I think California will have a prominent part in the closing events of history."


I knew that Jerry was making a mistake that has been unfortunately repeated by others. Not knowing history, or trusting in publications by charismatic authors, people make erroneous applications to prophecy. I did not ask Jerry where he got his theory from. And Jerry's face was somewhat embarrassed as I explained that just because California or Russia has a bear imprinted on their flags, it does not mean that the bear in Daniel (chapter 7:5) applies to them. Then I explained to Jerry that to enforce truths and prevent erroneous applications, God repeatedly used different symbols throughout the Bible to describe the same nations, and the bear was actually the ancient nation of Persia that overthrew the Babylonian kingdom. California and Russia have enough internal problems without assuming Israel's "real estate" conflict.
Although Jerry was wrong about California, "Christians" must share their responsibility in causing Armageddon.

There are studies of chapters nine of Revelation by learned men, like Sir Isaac Newton and the German reformer, Marin Luther, showing they understood the Islamic encroachment upon Christian nations were described in Bible prophecy.

The great political battle of August 11, 1840 against the Islamic supremacy of the Ottoman Empire in Turkey by an alliance of four Christian nations was calculated and published before the conflict by the Christian researcher, Josiah Litch. Using the day/year “key”, he added the timed prophecies in Revelation 9: 5 and 15, starting with the Islamic invasion in Nicomedia on July 22, 1299. Exactly as he predicted, that political battle for the survival of Constanople (August 11, 1840) highlighted the fall of the Ottoman Empire, thus fulfilling Revelation 9:1-19 and Daniel 11:45. No longer a threat, those nations they once ruled, including Jerusalem with the mosque Islamics built (Daniel 11:45), will be destroyed in the great battle of Armageddon (Revelation 16:16; the Josiah Litch article is posted at: www.revelado.org/josiahlitch.htm).
One commentator indicates that God allowed Islamic terrorism and supremacy during the Spiritual Dark Ages to counter the effects of religious perversion by Christians (Uriah Smith, Daniel and Revelation, Review and Herald Publishing, chapter titles: "The Moslems Invade Europe" and "The Fall of Constanople in 1453"). Smith aptly observes:

The hordes of Saracens and Turks were let loose as a scourge and punishment upon apostate [unfaithful] Christendom. Men suffered the punishment but learned no lesson from it. Ibid, p. 517, 1944 edition.

Although the Reformation advanced some truths like justification by faith, today "believers" have stagnated in this era of doctrinal complacency while blindly claiming the blessings God only promises the obedient.
Ignorant of the holiness and perfection of heaven, they have adopted customs of the world in an attempt to bring converts to the church and appease the unsanctified. Like the past coalition between bishops and kings, or Pharisees and Romans, they have also formed an alliance with legislators to enforce church tradition while living in transgression; the majority of Christendom still does not exalt all of God's law, and violating one commandment incurs the guilt of breaking all ten (James 2: 10).
Uniting on the few doctrines they hold in common, Protestant churches no longer "protest" Rome's fallacies, and may apologetically call themselves "evangelical." Church leaders, who have never ascended to the third heaven, make void the testimony of the prophets who have. They presumptuously abandon God's patriarchal system by allowing their helper and servant, to occupy church positions reserved for men (Genesis 2:18,20; 3:16). Although the Apostle Paul reminds us of God's original injunction, that women must remain subordinate because they "sinned first", females often usurp the authority of bishops, sit at the head of church councils, baptize, and serve the implements of communion (1 Timothy 2:9-14; 1 Corinthians 14:34,35). Under the false banner of love, the "Saints" do not think God condemns their fornication and sexual perversion; and some "shepherds" often beg money from the impoverished "flock" that they may live extravagantly. Abuse of tobacco and alcohol is often endorsed by the saints. Men encourage women by smiling in admiration at their exposed cleavage, thighs, and gem studded abdomens, that declare these ladies immodest. Jewelry, tattoos, body piercing, paint, and other implements of exhibitism, are excused. Emotionalism is considered evidence of sanctification as "baptized" gutter-music excites congregations in gyrations of ecstasy. Media addicts, with distorted morals, find church boring and expect entertainment in the holy sanctuary. Supernatural tenants of spiritualism are attributed to God, and the Sabbath, explicitly blessed by Elohim, is defamed. These "instruments of unrighteousness" twist the epistles, "as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction" (Romans 6:13; 2 Peter 3:16). And, while claiming the Holy Spirit's presence and "the love of Jesus", the deluded again "crucify their Savior" by slandering the humble minority who perceive the sacredness of heaven and voice alarm against church corruption.
Regardless of their noble intention, enthusiasm, or sincerity, God does not accept their offerings of "strange fire": "To obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams; for rebellion is like the sin of witchcraft and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry"; yes, "Babylon has fallen... and is become the habitation of devils..." (Leviticus 10:1,2;1 Samuel 15:22,23; Revelation 14:8; 18:2). Such blasphemies surpass the corruptions of the medieval church, and God will by "no means, clear the guilty"; were heaven inhabited with such professors of godliness, it would not be heavenly but a suburb of hell (Exodus 34:7; Hebrews 10:26-31). Similar to Israel's scribes and priests of old, Christianity has "fallen" and the world does not listen to the truth.
Couple these facts with latter-day predictions to see that the world can not be saved, and peace will never be within the grasp of world leaders because sin is excused, even enforced, by the very organizations that should illuminate the world with God's righteousness.
Other than a brief pause in military conflict under false promises of peace and tranquility during Satan's attempted rule, the Bible indicates that friction between Eastern Mediterranean nations will climax in the world-destroying battle of Armageddon, and the unconverted, calling themselves Christians, must also suffer the consequences of God's final judgments upon the world.


ARMAGEDDON IS SUICIDAL SELF-DESTRUCTION

Armageddon may be interpreted "the mountain of Gideon." And the battle of Gideon in Judges 7:20-22 symbolizes the final battle where the enemies of God destroy themselves: "And the three hundred blew the trumpets, and the LORD set every man's sword against his fellow, even throughout all the host..." (verse 22). Observe this fact: Gideon was fighting Midianites, who were Ishmaelites, the ancestors of Arabian nations and Mohammed (Ibid. 8:26,24).

Since September 11, 2001, the world has focused attention on a global dilemma, apparently caused by independent groups working for a common goal against Israel and Christian countries. Although their devastating attacks contaminate food supplies and depopulate civilizations with biological, chemical, nuclear, and other fearsome weapons, the forceful conversion of the world to their extreme religious views will not be achieved. Therefore, an alliance of governments will cause Armageddon--Ezekiel 38 plainly identifies collaborating nations surrounding the eastern half of the Mediterranean Sea, not terrorists acting independently, as the assembly in the final conflict centering in Israel.


Many times, as recorded in the Old Testament, God has used nearby nations to punish the unfaithfulness of Israel. For example, the prophet Elijah anointed Hazael to be king over Syria: "And it shall come to pass, that him who escapes the sword of Hazael shall Jehu slay: and him that escapes from the sword of Jehu shall Elisha slay" (1 Kings 19:15-17).
Some Bibles contain maps showing the original names of ancient territories occupied by Noah's descendants, and several of these are mentioned in Ezekiel 38. One may compare those tribal names with modern maps to identify their location today. They cluster about Turkey and include Iran and Palestine, circling around the Mediterranean Sea and ending at Libya in North Africa. Although once predominately Christian nations, because of church compromises they have, one might say, gone into Babylonian captivity. Today these Islamic countries oppose Israel's solvency such that it is only by the restraining hand of God that we have not already experienced the suicidal self-destruction of Armageddon, when humanity destroys the earth (Revelation 7:3; 11:18). These predictions have a very literal applications, and "the powers [leaders] of earth will marshal their forces for the last great battle"--the battle of Armageddon" (Revelation 16:16).

Now, let me repeat an earlier statement: Ignorance of a fulfilled prediction promotes irrational applications. Because the previous prediction of Israel's 490 years of probation very accurately fulfilled three and one-half years after the crucifixion of Jesus, as well as the Gospel commission being given to the Gentiles, there is no validity in the popular application of that prediction to the future resurrection (rapture), tribulation, antichrist, or millennium of peace. Furthermore, there is no substance to the theory that Israel will accept the Gospel commission at this time and convert the world to obey the New Testament, including all ten of God's commandments.
Jesus DID NOT say that Israel would have another chance. Instead, He predicted: "And they [Israel] will fall by the edge of the sword, and will be led away captive into all nations: and Jerusalem will be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled. And there will be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring; Men's hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven will be shaken. And then they will see the Son of man coming in clouds with power and great glory. And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption [resurrection] draws near" (Luke 21:24-28).
While this planet is convulsing, at that instant, Jesus is awakening the dead saints for their journey to heaven: "In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we will be changed" (1 Corinthians 15:52). This does not sound like Israel has preached the gospel and saved the world for Christ's literal 1,000-year reign; and to teach otherwise will prove fatal for many, with eternal consequences.


THE COMING OF ANTICHRIST

The resurrection to heaven will have been preceded by Lucifer's infamous counterfeit of Christ's expected rule. If any religious organization, "an angel from heaven", or anyone claiming divine knowledge, declares the arrival of the Messiah, they are wrong--it is actually Satan (Galatians 1;8). Immediately after the fall of the Roman System, and before Satan's arrival and his destruction in the battle of Armageddon, "three unclean spirits" will suddenly appear--just "like frogs" awakened from hibernation (Revelation 16:13). With lying wonders they will deceive humanity by preparing the way for Satan's arrival--this is his greatest hoax. Do not believe them! We need to be concerned! Lucifer's coming is an overwhelming delusion that will "deceive the very elect, were it so possible" (Matthew 24:24).

A description of Lucifer is found in Ezekiel 28: "Every precious stone is your covering" [nine different beautiful gem stones are described in verse 13]. Lucifer's "coat of many colors" exceeds the brilliance of the most dazzling Hollywood superstar or Disneyland's electric light parade. "The workmanship of your timbrels and pipes was prepared for you on the day you were created" (Ibid.). Notice the plural description; Lucifer has multiple voice boxes and wind pipes. This allows him to speak and sing in a multi-toned melodious manner. And counterfeiting Christ, he will match the description found in Revelation: "His head and His hair were white like wool, as white as snow, and His eyes like a flame of fire; His feet were like fine brass, as if refined in a furnace, and his voice as the sound of many waters" (Ibid. 1:13, 14). Lucifer will probably display counterfeit pierce marks--do not be fooled!
If earth was visited by a majestic creature with these properties, and he proclaimed himself the long awaited messiah and assumed the throne of David in Israel, would not the majority of Israel proclaim him their savior? And Christians, atheists; in fact, the entire world, would fall at Lucifer's feet and proclaim: "Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, and he will save us: this is the LORD; we have waited for him, we will be glad and rejoice in his salvation?" (Isaiah 25:9). This deception will occur even though he is advocating a change in God's eternal ten-commandment law. With words sweeter than honey, Satan is attempting to persuade all humanity to sin and that is how you will know he is the long-expected impostor.


LUCIFER'S GREATEST DECEPTION

What an overwhelming deception. Jesus warned us of this with these words recorded in Matthew 24: 24: "For there will arise false Christs, and false prophets, and will show great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they will deceive the very elect." And how much greater the deception when "He himself [Satan] sits in the temple of God, showing himself to be God" (2 Thessalonians. 2:4).
No matter how beautiful and soft spoken Lucifer is, his true nature will eventually show through. How long he deceives the nations is not known for certain. We obviously can not use the numeric prophecies of Daniel 9:24 to apply to Satan because they have already fulfilled in Christ. But one thing is indisputable: Satan's hatred for God's law and of those who keep His commandments--this was his overruling passion with the twelve disciples, Jesus, and the early church that faithfully respected and kept God's law. Just offering a pinch of incense to Caesar could have saved many from public execution in the Coliseum but God’s faithful saints chose martyrdom over transgression.
Now Lucifer focuses his attention on the remnant that remains loyal to God's law: "Woe to the inhabiters of the earth and of the sea! for the devil is come down unto you, having great wrath, because he knows that he has but a short time"; "and the dragon [Satan] was wroth with the woman [the church], and he went to make war with the rest of her offspring, who keep the commandments of God and have the testimony of Jesus Christ" (Rev. 12:12, 17).
Then Lucifer will heal those he has previously afflicted with disease. He does not have the power to create live cells, so he deludes with illusions and by withdrawing his hellish power; meanwhile, he promises his unwary subjects something even he does not possess--eternal life--"You shall not surely die", he says to transgressors (Genesis 3:4). Because many have believed his lies about a premature resurrection or rapture of the dead to heaven, his fallen angels will openly do what they have done in séances--impersonate friends, relatives and statesmen, resurrected from the grave or returned from heaven. Only a few saints will withstand his extreme deceptions (Revelation 12:9) .
Satan has invested much effort in promoting the idea that God's law is changeable. For nearly 2,000 years he has successfully used Christians to exalt Sunday, his counterfeit Sabbath. Satan will announce himself as the risen Savior, and ask mankind to worship him every Sunday, a weekly reminder of his alleged sacrifice for humanity. How easy it will be for those who have lightly regarded the binding claims of God's law to accept Lucifer's great lie and honor his substitution. Satan's vain promise to Jesus is repeated: "If you therefore will worship me, all shall be yours" (Luke 4:7).
He who desired the highest position in heaven will establish himself as supreme monarch of the world government--economic stability and world peace is promised and widely welcomed (Isaiah 14: 13). "Jesus is beginning His millennial reign," the multitudes will proclaim, as Satan pronounces blessings upon transgressors who have received the mark of the beast. These are the very ones that scripture declares will soon perish with him in the seventh plague of Armageddon (Revelation 14:9-11). Meanwhile, laws protecting religious freedom will be annulled and the compulsory worship of Lucifer mandated. Does this sound like Israel will preach the Gospel and save the world, or is it the greatest deception ever? There is sufficient evidence in the Bible to keep every sincere Christian from being deceived. To be saved, we must place a complete trust in God's Word and reply: "Get behind me, Satan: for it is written..." (Luke 4: 4, 8, 10).


WE ARE DESTROYED IN ARMAGEDDON BY OUR OWN WRONG CHOICES

Lucifer can not help himself and will eventually act like the devil. With indescribable horror, the inhabitants of the world realize they were misled into believing Israel's endorsement of Satan, but humanities probation has closed and it is too late to repent. Knowing they have lost eternal life, truly, "the nations were angry..." and the wicked are destroyed in the final great battle of Armageddon while attempting to eliminate this blight from the world (Revelation 11:18). This is Satan's first death, and is mentioned in 2 Thessalonians 2: 8: "And then will that Wicked be revealed, who the Lord will consume with the spirit of his mouth, and will destroy with the brightness of his coming."
From similar texts, one should understand that Christ's coming is a rescue mission and that he does not actively destroy the wicked until the second resurrection of the wicked 1,000 years later. To understand this, let us consider the words "consume with the spirit of His mouth, and will destroy with the brightness of His coming" (2 Thessalonians 2:8).
What actually proceeds from His mouth? In Revelation we are told that a sharp sword is proceeding from His mouth and smites the nations. This two-edged sword is nothing other than the Word of God, the Old and New Testaments, the standard that cannot be broken (Ephesians 6:17; Hebrews 4:12). And His righteous commandments are also likened to a light: "For the commandment [is] a lamp; and the law [is] light" (Proverbs 6:23 ) "His brightness was like the light; He had rays flashing from His hand [from pierce marks--John 20:27] And there His power was Hidden." "You went forth for the salvation of your people, For salvation with your anointed" (Habakkuk 3:4, 13). By rejecting God's standard of righteousness, His law, and not availing themselves to His salvation, the wicked are self-condemned. Through their own neglect, they have, one might say, destroyed themselves (Hosea 3:9), and are abandoned to suffer destruction in the final holocaust.
Christ says: "He that rejects me, and receives not my words, has one that judges him: the Word that I have spoken, the same [the Word] will judge him in the last day" (John 12:48). These people are justly condemned who received the Mark of the Beast and did not receive a love of the truth that they might be saved (2 Thessalonians. 2:12). Therefore, "the same will drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he will be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb" (Revelation 14:10). When the nations are angry (the battle of Armageddon) and Jesus and all the host of heaven come to harvest this planet, only those who have received a "love of the truth" can be rescued. The wicked are abandoned to suffer the consequences of rejecting God's righteous commandments which they could have fulfilled through the indwelling love of God.


REMAIN FAITHFUL TO THE END

The nation of Israel will probably become knowledgeable of Jesus' great sacrifice, but they will ultimately introduce Satan as the savior of our world. Through tangible evidence of Christ's existence by scriptural discoveries, like the SIX-day code we found in Genesis and God's fourth commandment, or archaeological evidence, they may come to an intellectual belief in Jesus as the Messiah and His atoning sacrifice, but like the Roman System, they are presently disqualified from God's plan to bless our world. As the history of earth closes, Israel will not be used by God to fulfill the true Gospel commission and if anything, they will introduce Satan as the world’s savior and falsely proclaim the anticipated millennium of peace on earth.
In order to be found among the faithful, you must make right choices to trust and serve Jesus unflinchingly, regardless of intimidation by peers or society. God imparted necessary strength to the ancient martyrs, and although you may be a doubting Thomas or a cursing Peter today, that same power will be given as needed. Others have trodden the narrow path of rejection and affliction that our Savior walked--we can too! God is ready to give His faithful followers unflinching vitality and 20/20 perception, just for the asking, so you will be prepared and not falter or be caught unaware at His coming.
Therefore, my friends let us be careful to not irrationally apply fulfilled scriptures to unfulfilled conjecture. The great deceiver has power to twist the Bible to suit His purpose. Let us reply with the same words of our Example when tempted by Satan: "It is written, Man will not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God'" (Matthew 4:4).
Isaiah speaks of the redeemed with the following words: "Who among us will dwell with the devouring fire? Who among us will dwell with everlasting burnings? He that walks righteously, and speaks uprightly; he that despises the gain of oppressions, that shakes his hands from holding of bribes, that stops his ears from hearing of blood [fictional dramas, debasing video games...?], and shuts his eyes from seeing evil [obscenity, worldly television...?], He will dwell on high: his place of defense will be the munitions of rocks: bread will be given him; his waters will be sure…. “Your eyes will SEE THE KING IN HIS BEAUTY: THEY WILL BEHOLD THE LAND [heaven] THAT IS VERY FAR [light years] AWAY" (Isaiah 33: 14-17).

Be very patient! Palestine is not to be restored for another 1,000 years. When Jesus returns in the near future, it is to take us to those mansions on high (John 14:1-4). Jesus is very close to each of us, and is well able to deliver as He has promised. Place you weakness in His strength, and trust Him unflinchingly. Blessed is he that WAITS and attains to the "8010" [80th century from creation--1,000 years in the future]" (Daniel 12:12). It does not appear that the nation of Israel will save the world at this time of history. "And I will sow [bind] her unto me in the earth; and I will have mercy upon her that had not obtained mercy; and I will say to them which were not my people [not Israelites], You are my people; and they will say, You are my God" (Hosea 2:23).


U. S. and International Copyrights, © 1998 and 2005 by Charles H. Clever,. All rights reserved

~~ The Olympics of Eternity ~~

~ ~ The Olympics of Eternity ~~

Destiny uncertain in eternity's great race, two captains call plays to control the pace.
One captain is certain he can never win, yet prompts his team to loose with him.
The other Captain's victory is sure, "the wise shall understand" His prize endures.
He runs with His players, encouraging their win, imparting His might and strength within.
So choose your captain, a medallion to hold, one is an illusion, the other pure gold. --

Charles H. Clever

Friday, September 19, 2008

America in Prophecy




America In Prophecy


At this point another symbol is introduced. Says the prophet: "I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth; and he had two horns like a lamb." Verse 11. Both the appearance of this beast and the manner of its rise indicate that the nation which it represents is unlike those presented under the preceding symbols. The great kingdoms that have ruled the world were presented to the prophet Daniel as beasts of prey, rising when "the four winds of the heaven strove upon the great sea." Daniel 7:2. In Revelation 17 an angel explained that waters represent "peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues." Revelation 17:15. Winds are a symbol of strife. The four winds of heaven striving upon the great sea represent the terrible scenes of conquest and revolution by which kingdoms have attained to power.

But the beast with lamblike horns was seen "coming up out of the earth." Instead of overthrowing other powers to establish itself, the nation thus represented must arise in territory preciously unoccupied and grow up gradually and peacefully. It could not, then, arise among the crowded and struggling nationalities of the Old World--that turbulent sea of "peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues." It must be sought in the Western Continent.

What nation of the New World was in 1798 rising into power, giving promise of strength and greatness, and attracting the attention of the world? The application of the symbol admits of no question. One nation, and only one, meets the specifications of this prophecy; it points unmistakably to the United States of America. Again and again the thought, almost the exact words, of the sacred writer has been unconsciously employed by the orator and the historian in describing the rise and growth of this nation. The beast was seen "coming up out of the earth;" and, according to the translators, the word here rendered "coming up" literally signifies "to grow or spring up as a plant." And, as we have seen, the nation must arise in territory previously unoccupied. A prominent writer, describing the rise of the United States, speaks of "the mystery of her coming forth from vacancy," and says: "Like a silent seed we grew into empire."--G. A. Townsend, The New World Compared With the Old, page 462. A European journal in 1850 spoke of the United States as a wonderful empire, which was "emerging," and "amid the silence of the earth daily adding to its power and pride." --The Dublin Nation. Edward Everett, in an oration on the Pilgrim founders of this nation, said: "Did they look for a retired spot, inoffensive for its obscurity, and safe in its remoteness, where the little church of Leyden might enjoy the freedom of conscience? Behold the mighty regions over which, in peaceful conquest, . . . they have borne the banners of the cross!"--Speech delivered at Plymouth, Massachusetts, Dec. 22, 1824, page 11.

"And he had two horns like a lamb." The lamblike horns indicate youth, innocence, and gentleness, fitly representing the character of the United States when presented to the prophet as "coming up" in 1798. Among the Christian exiles who first fled to America and sought an asylum from royal oppression and priestly intolerance were many who determined to establish a government upon the broad foundation of civil and religious liberty. Their views found place in the Declaration of Independence, which sets forth the great truth that "all men are created equal" and endowed with the inalienable right to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." And the Constitution guarantees to the people the right of self-government, providing that representatives elected by the popular vote shall enact and administer the laws. Freedom of religious faith was also granted, every man being permitted to worship God according to the dictates of his conscience. Republicanism and Protestantism became the fundamental principles of the nation. These principles are the secret of its power and prosperity. The oppressed and downtrodden throughout Christendom have turned to this land with interest and hope. Millions have sought its shores, and the United States has risen to a place among the most powerful nations of the earth.

But the beast with lamblike horns "spake as a dragon. And he exerciseth all the power of the first beast before him, and causeth the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed; . . . saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image to the beast, which had the wound by a sword, and did live." Revelation 13:11-14.

The lamblike horns and dragon voice of the symbol point to a striking contradiction between the professions and the practice of the nation thus represented. The "speaking" of the nation is the action of its legislative and judicial authorities. By such action it will give the lie to those liberal and peaceful principles which it has put forth as the foundation of its policy. The prediction that it will speak "as a dragon" and exercise "all the power of the first beast" plainly foretells a development of the spirit of intolerance and persecution that was manifested by the nations represented by the dragon and the leopardlike beast. And the statement that the beast with two horns "causeth the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast" indicates that the authority of this nation is to be exercised in enforcing some observance which shall be an act of homage to the papacy.

Such action would be directly contrary to the principles of this government, to the genius of its free institutions, to the direct and solemn avowals of the Declaration of Independence, and to the Constitution. The founders of the nation wisely sought to guard against the employment of secular power on the part of the church, with its inevitable result-- intolerance and persecution. The Constitution provides that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," and that "no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office of public trust under the United States." Only in flagrant violation of these safeguards to the nation's liberty, can any religious observance be enforced by civil authority. But the inconsistency of such action is no greater than is represented in the symbol. It is the beast with lamblike horns--in profession pure, gentle, and harmless--that speaks as a dragon.

"Saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image to the beast." Here is clearly presented a form of government in which the legislative power rests with the people, a most striking evidence that the United States is the nation denoted in the prophecy.

But what is the "image to the beast"? and how is it to be formed? The image is made by the two-horned beast, and is an image to the beast. It is also called an image of the beast. Then to learn what the image is like and how it is to be formed we must study the characteristics of the beast itself--the papacy.

When the early church became corrupted by departing from the simplicity of the gospel and accepting heathen rites and customs, she lost the Spirit and power of God; and in order to control the consciences of the people, she sought the support of the secular power. The result was the papacy, a church that controlled the power of the state and employed it to further her own ends, especially for the punishment of "heresy." In order for the United States to form an image of the beast, the religious power must so control the civil government that the authority of the state will also be employed by the church to accomplish her own ends.

Whenever the church has obtained secular power, she has employed it to punish dissent from her doctrines. Protestant churches that have followed in the steps of Rome by forming alliance with worldly powers have manifested a similar desire to restrict liberty of conscience. An example of this is given in the long-continued persecution of dissenters by the Church of England. During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, thousands of nonconformist ministers were forced to flee from their churches, and many, both of pastors and people, were subjected to fine, imprisonment, torture, and martyrdom.

It was apostasy that led the early church to seek the aid of the civil government, and this prepared the way for the development of the papacy--the beast. Said Paul: "There" shall "come a falling away, . . . and that man of sin be revealed." 2 Thessalonians 2:3. So apostasy in the church will prepare the way for the image to the beast.

The Bible declares that before the coming of the Lord there will exist a state of religious declension similar to that in the first centuries. "In the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof." 2 Timothy 3:1-5. "Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils." 1 Timothy 4:1. Satan will work "with all power and signs and lying wonders, and with all deceivableness of unrighteousness." And all that "received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved," will be left to accept "strong delusion, that they should believe a lie." 2 Thessalonians 2:9-11. When this state of ungodliness shall be reached, the same results will follow as in the first centuries.

The wide diversity of belief in the Protestant churches is regarded by many as decisive proof that no effort to secure a forced uniformity can ever be made. But there has been for years, in churches of the Protestant faith, a strong and growing sentiment in favor of a union based upon common points of doctrine. To secure such a union, the discussion of subjects upon which all were not agreed--however important they might be from a Bible standpoint--must necessarily be waived.

Charles Beecher, in a sermon in the year 1846, declared that the ministry of "the evangelical Protestant denominations" is "not only formed all the way up under a tremendous pressure of merely human fear, but they live, and move, and breathe in a state of things radically corrupt, and appealing every hour to every baser element of their nature to hush up the truth, and bow the knee to the power of apostasy. Was not this the way things went with Rome? Are we not living her life over again? And what do we see just ahead? Another general council! A world's convention! Evangelical alliance, and universal creed!"--Sermon on "The Bible a Sufficient Creed," delivered at Fort Wayne, Indiana, Feb. 22, 1846. When this shall be gained, then, in the effort to secure complete uniformity, it will be only a step to the resort to force.








The Mark of a False Religion
"When religion is good, it will take care of itself. When it is not able to take care of itself, and God does not see fit to take care of it, so that it has to appeal to the civil power for support, it is evidence to my mind that its cause is a bad one."

Benjamin Franklin, Statesman, Inventor, Author, Letter to Dr. Price.
Learn about the Mark of the Beast


When the leading churches of the United States, uniting upon such points of doctrine as are held by them in common, shall influence the state to enforce their decrees and to sustain their institutions, then Protestant America will have formed an image of the Roman hierarchy, and the infliction of civil penalties upon dissenters will inevitably result.

The beast with two horns "causeth [commands] all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: and that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name." Revelation 13:16, 17. The third angel's warning is: "If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, the same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God." "The beast" mentioned in this message, whose worship is enforced by the two-horned beast, is the first, or leopardlike beast of Revelation 13--the papacy. The "image to the beast" represents that form of apostate Protestantism which will be developed when the Protestant churches shall seek the aid of the civil power for the enforcement of their dogmas. The "mark of the beast" still remains to be defined.

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Market declines won't affect Adventist Church's investment strategy, leaders say


Adventist Church associate treasurer Roy Ryan fields questions from leaders at the church's headquarters September 18. [photo: Megan Brauner/ANN]


Market declines won't affect Adventist Church's investment strategy, leaders say
But economy could affect tithe



September 18, 2008 Silver Spring, Maryland, United States

Ansel Oliver/ANN



Seventh-day Adventist Church finance officers say they are not currently considering a change in investment strategy in light of recent economic declines, a move they say is "prudent" considering their long-term focus.

As major U.S. investment banks fold during a global credit crunch resulting largely from a slump in the U.S. housing market, church officials plan to continue a 20- to 30-year outlook for managing the world church's retirement fund investments. The church's ministry and ability to launch new initiatives would be most affected by any decrease in tithes and offerings, said Roy Ryan, associate treasurer and investment manager for the Adventist world church.

"We're monitoring the situation," Ryan said. "While it is fair to say that the budget being prepared for recommendation to Annual Council next month is not aggressive, we do feel that it preserves the ability of the church to move forward with its mission."

He later told some 80 church leaders during a regularly scheduled leadership meeting at the world church's headquarters on September 18 that the economy could be in "uncharted territory." The U.S. government has spent about $600 billion in the last few weeks to prop up financial institutions.

"A widely held view is that the housing market has to stabilize and that just hasn't happened at this point," Ryan told church leaders. Until then, he said the church would continue its current investment strategy.

"We feel the portfolios of the church's investments are prudently invested," Ryan said.

Church Treasurer Robert Lemon told church leaders he thought the market would recover as it has after previous downturns, albeit not as quickly.

"I'm fearful that after this particular drop -- because it has such wide underpinning on housing and the availability of credit -- the market will be slower to come back," Lemon said.

Church President Jan Paulsen encouraged church leaders, saying "None of us is a prophet ... but the Lord said, 'Do not worry about tomorrow.' That to me is a very fundamental statement. It's not light-hearted.

"We'll move forward in obedience to the Lord and do the best we can in mission," Paulsen said.
Source: Adventist News Network
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Thursday, September 18, 2008

A.I.G. Part II

August 14, 2001

HOSTAGES: A Multi-Part FTW Special Investigation

  • Medellin Cartel Cofounder, Carlos Lehder: A Free Man in Gov't. Charade?, -- "Wife" of Drug Lord Speaks
  • American International Group, Arkansas, ADFA, Contras, Goldman Sachs, Carlos Lehder and Coral Reinsurance
  • Exposing CIA Covert Operations

A.I.G.

[Part Two of a Multi-Part Series]

by

Michael C. Ruppert

[© Copyright 2001, Michael C. Ruppert and From the Wilderness Publications.

[EDITORIAL NOTE - From The Wilderness is a sole proprietorship and dba. It is written and edited by one person; Me. I do almost all of the research. Therefore, in the following story, for both legal reasons and for better reading I have decided to use the personal pronouns "I" and "me" instead of standard editorial references in the third person.]

----------

This series is dedicated to Mark Swaney of the Ozark Gazette for his intellectual courage and tenacity; to John McGlaughlin, the straightest and toughest man who ever honestly carried a badge; to Celerino Castillo III, with a heart bigger than his beloved Texas; to all the young men and women, mostly minorities, who are serving up to life in prison for crimes that don't remotely compare to those of Carlos Lehder; and to all the innocents in Colombia who stand at the brink of the next Vietnam War.

------------

There are mounting holes in the story of a woman, Coral Talavera Baca (henceforth referred to by her maiden name Talavera), who has claimed to be the wife of Medellin Cartel co-founder, Carlos Lehder, deepening the mystery about relationships between her, Lehder himself, the insurance giant American International Group (AIG), and the Central Intelligence Agency. These new discrepancies, including her prior confirmation of the authenticity of documents now suspected of being forged, have raised the possibility that the U.S. Government, in partnership with AIG, has been deliberately planting false information in the press to support the woman's claims about Lehder's reported freedom and activities. Talavera has been simultaneously described as either Staff Counsel for AIG's in house San Francisco law firm or as its office manager.

In Part I of this series we reported that other journalists, who have asked not to be identified, had received the same documents we continue to examine here. Some of those documents purport to be official reports from the U.S. Treasury and U.S. Attorney's offices. As FTW moves deeper into its multi-part investigation - inspired by revelations of possible 1987-92 drug money laundering involving AIG, Goldman Sachs and the Arkansas Development Financial Authority (ADFA) - attention now focuses on Talavera's employer, AIG. These events increased my interest in the 1987 founding of Coral Reinsurance (Coral Re) by AIG, Goldman Sachs (whose then Vice Chairman Robert Rubin served as Treasury Secretary in the Clinton Administration) and ADFA. Lehder, arrested in 1987, was allowed to keep almost $3 billion in assets in a move severely criticized by Merkle. Where did that money go? Was it hidden it in a major insurance company with cash flows large enough to conceal it? This question, more than any other, except establishing Lehder's current status, prompted me to begin this investigation.

What is known about the firm which employs Talavera, who is not a lawyer, and permits her to represent herself as "Staff Counsel" for its San Francisco legal office while simultaneously representing herself as the wife of a one-time cocaine cartel head? On June 22, just two days after I had lunch with her and confirmed that I was writing a story, a receptionist at Brown and Boland, AIG's San Francisco in-house counsel, told me and others that Talavera had fled her employment and gone to Cuba. Yet the firm, located in the AIG building and using AIG e-mail addresses, is currently announcing in new, dated voice mail messages, that she is still the office manager.

FTW has also conducted an extensive investigation into AIG and its predecessors, including the C. V. Starr Insurance Companies, revealing deep connections to US intelligence dating back to the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) in World War II. These connections include documented CIA operatives connected to drug smuggling from Southeast Asia and a current board member, Frank Wisner, Jr., whose father was a key figure in the creation of the CIA. History, as well as AIG's current operations, suggest that these relationships continue unabated today.

These connections may go a long way toward explaining the behavior of Talavera, a woman whose education, work experience and history apparently do not qualify her to manage a legal office which, according to AIG spokesman Michael Murphy, specializes in the international operations of a company operating in 130 countries and with year 2000 revenues of $46 billion.

While the mystery deepens about the woman claiming to be his wife, the key question as to whether or not Lehder is free remains unanswered.

In Part I of this series I reported that through a number of vehicles including correspondence, e-mails, a telephone listing in the name of Carlos Lehder, tape recorded conversations and in-person statements Coral Talavera had represented to a number of people, including a retired DEA agent, me and others that she was the wife of Medellin Cartel co-founder Carlos Lehder. In an on-the-record interview and a legally tape recorded conversation she has also vouched for the authenticity of documents that have either been shown to be forged or are now seriously suspected of being forged. She additionally made it clear that Lehder was out of prison, working for the United States government and directly connected to the CIA and the U.S. Treasury. This scenario was circumstantially, but well supported by statements from a number of credible sources, including reporters, Congresswoman Maxine Waters and Lehder's prosecutor (former U.S. Attorney Robert Merkle). Their independent statements gave credibility to many of Talavera's assertions. And suspicion or belief has been widespread that Lehder is, in fact, free -- regardless of Talavera's actions. All this is in spite of the fact that Lehder has been officially serving 55 non-parolable years in prison after giving testimony of questionable value in the 1990 trial of former Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega. Noriega's prosecutor, Robert Mueller, who put Lehder on the stand, has just recently been confirmed to head the FBI.

During a lunch meeting with Talavera on June 20 of this year, she went on the record with me stating that she had worked for AIG since 1994 and that she also owned a currently existing company named Capital Investment Group, Ltd. (CIG) in the Bahamas. She had earlier written me, speaking for Lehder, stating that neither she nor Lehder had any connection to Coral Re. In a 1999 tape recorded conversation she had discussed her marriage to Lehder and e-mail notifications allegedly sent by him introducing her as his wife. My investigation since that time has proven all of these assertions, and many others allegedly made to colleagues or social contacts, are lies at worst, or seriously suspect, at best.

One of the critical documents discussed in Part I of this series was a U.S. Treasury "Report of Investigation," the authenticity of which I had been unable to ascertain despite repeated contacts with Treasury. Since publication of Part I have received communication from "Kincaid," a confidential legal source, who has obtained an evaluation of that document from Lehder's current legal team, that the document is not authentic. This was the same document that, at the June 20 lunch meeting, Talavera went on the record to evaluate, line by line, and state was a real document that had been filed in a court case that she would not disclose to me.

The purpose of this portion of the on the record interview was to clarify Talavera's relationship with a Bahamian investment company known as Capital Investment Group, Ltd.

Although Bahamian law provides great secrecy for corporations, I was able to learn in late July that CIG in the Bahamas was "not listed" on government records. Through a confidential source with Caribbean banking connections, I was told that a banking official offered four possible explanations for CIG's "lack of registry." They include: the company was never formed; the company failed to pay dues; the file was lost; and, the file was lost intentionally at the request of the Prime Minister or the Attorney General. Coincidentally, the largest single shareholder in AIG, the Starr International Company (SICO), owning 13.62% of AIG stock, is also headquartered in the Bahamas.

Information, developed while looking further into Talavera's background now casts suspicion on the 1999 reported birth of a son, allegedly fathered by Lehder, as well as her employment history, education and qualifications to manage a legal office. So, with the exception of the statement that neither she nor Carlos Lehder had anything to do with the founding of Coral Re, almost all of Talavera's statements regarding her history have been shown to be false. This now calls the Coral Re denial into question as well.

All of this begs the question as to why AIG would protect and employ a woman engaged in these and other behaviors and with a history that could only damage the company's reputation. The one fact of Coral Talavera's life that has not been called into question by any of the sources I have contacted is that Coral knew and had a relationship with Carlos Lehder in the 1980s. The suspicions of many that Lehder is free have not yet been allayed. So these disturbing developments also drive home the importance of a question that the US government still has not answered. Where is Carlos Lehder and what motive could the government -- or AIG -- have for wanting some people to believe, or know, that he is free? If I am so patently wrong in what I have reported in this investigation, including the publication of the tape- recorded conversation wherein Talavera openly talks about Lehder's freedom and says that she is his wife, why doesn't the government just deny it, produce Lehder, discredit Talavera and state that the rest is pure bunk? Is there a legend -- a cover story -- that the CIA and AIG are trying to protect for the benefit of unknown third parties in other parts of the world?

Why would AIG spokesman Michael Murphy have stated, after speaking with me and learning of Talavera's representations regarding Lehder, that he mentioned them briefly to her but did not pursue them because he, "didn't want to pry"?

Deconstructing Coral

Coral Talavera's life has improved dramatically since 1995, the year that she provided San Jose Mercury News reporter Gary Webb with documents including federal grand jury transcripts that started an investigation which subsequently established, through government records and a CIA Inspector General report, that the CIA was a hands-on player in the drug trade during the Contra war years of 1982-88. According to records filed in a protracted and contentious 1994 divorce case involving a previous husband -- which I obtained from the court -- Talavera was working as a legal secretary for the Oakland law firm of Hanna, Brophy et al. Her salary was approximately $26,000 per year and, according to a spokesperson for the firm which I also visited recently, she was employed there for two years until February, 1994. Hanna, Brophy specializes in Workman's Compensation defense of insurance companies in California.

Confidential sources familiar with Talavera led me to another law firm, Schmit, Morris, Bitner and Schmit where she reportedly worked throughout 1995 and into 1996, also as a secretary. Representatives of that firm refused to disclose any information unless I presented written authorization from Talavera for them to do so. Schmit, Morris is also a law firm exclusively devoted to Workman's Compensation defense. It may be a single-client firm representing AIG which may explain Talavera's "promotion" to the in-house firm but I have been unable to confirm this.

Briefs and petitions filed in Talavera's divorce also indicate that she was the mother of one female child whose paternity was ultimately questioned and later verified as being of Talavera's then husband. In a dispute over the property settlement it was alleged that she had stolen the seal of a notary public and forged a deed giving her sole title to a piece of real estate that was later judged to be community property. This fact lends credibility to allegations made by a number of people, who asked not to be identified, that she was the likely source of the forged documents. Those include forged newspaper stories and magazine articles, alleged memoranda from an unspecified U.S. Attorney's Office, a faked custom printed invitation to a birthday party allegedly sent by Lehder, photographic surveillance reports (including one purporting to be of her newborn son, Carlo), and the Treasury report which was described as "consistent with similar reports" by a source familiar with Lehder's case. [Some of these documents are posted on the FTW web site at www.copvcia.com. ]

It was also alleged in the divorce settlement that Talavera had deliberately placed the name of someone other than the real father, her then husband, on the birth certificate of her daughter. Even though she told me, during a 1998 unsolicited phone call, initiated by her, that she was going to have a child by Lehder, people who knew her during the period state that she was never pregnant. As Talavera's story fell apart I checked birth records in two Bay Area counties and found no recorded births listing Talavera as the mother aside from the 1992 birth of her one known daughter. Yet, in the 1999 taped conversation with Castillo, Talavera specifically referred to a purported news story entitled Beauty and the Beast which described a society function which Talavera and Lehder allegedly attended in 1999, "just three days after the birth of her son." During the conversation with Castillo, Talavera did not dispute this reporting about the birth. Instead she went to lengths to castigate the mean-spirited people who had written the story for calling Lehder, her husband, a beast. Asked by Castillo what paper had written the story Talavera stated on the tape, "Aw, who the hell knows?"

One document that seems beyond Talavera's ken, however, is a completely rewritten and re-typeset article from the August, 2000 issue of Architectural Digest, in which the 1,000 word story about the Ixtapa, Mexico home of a Levi Strauss executive was completely rewritten with copy about the new home of Mr. and Mrs. Carlos Lehder. In numerous conversations and in written correspondence I found Talavera to be a good communicator, at times very good, but her writing did not reach the style and skill of the professional journalist who had to rewrite the story and make the copy fit exactly into the same photograph-filled layout before faxing it to me. Indeed, there is nothing in Talavera's educational or employment background, that I have found, to indicate such skill. In fact, her statements to colleagues about her education also reveal more glaring holes in her story.

Acting again on information from confidential sources who have worked with Talavera, I learned that she had allegedly told people that she had BA and MBA degrees from St. Mary's college in the Bay Area. Lacking the ability to quote these sources by name I cannot confirm whether she made the representations or not. However, a check with the registrar at St. Mary's has revealed that she earned a BA in Liberal Arts in 1988 but has subsequently earned no advanced degrees of any kind. The registrar's office also stated that Talavera was currently enrolled in a graduate program but that it is not an MBA program.

All of these revelations prompted me to recontact Coral's "former" employer on August 3 to see what I could learn about her employment at AIG. It was then that I heard the voice messages informing me that she was still there. These messages, recorded within the last three weeks by senior attorneys Robert Brown and Larry Kloenhamer, both specifically refer callers to Office Manager Coral Talavera if the caller needs immediate assistance. A switchboard operator also confirmed Talavera's current status with AIG. Another interesting fact is that, on his current resume with the California State Bar Association, Robert Brown states that he is a Vietnam-era veteran of U.S. Army Special Forces. There is abundant evidence linking Special Forces to covert CIA operations and drug smuggling during the Vietnam War.

Credible sources with longstanding legal and business experience are perplexed to explain Talavera's apparent meteoric professional rise between 1992 and 1996. Asked about the transition from legal secretary at a Workman's Comp defense firm to office manager for the firm handling some of AIG's international operations, a legal expert with more than 20 years of experience in a variety of law offices summed up general reactions to Talavera's rise saying, "It's unprecedented."

The question as to what AIG knew and when it knew it gets stickier with the fact that, in no less than ten e-mail messages to me, Talavera had a signature block reading, "Coral Talavera, AIG Staff Counsel, 121 Spear Street, Suite 410, San Francisco, CA 94105. [An example of this can be viewed on my web site at www.copvcia.com]. The legal expert told me that this practice would be illegal in the state of Florida. A spokeswoman for the California State Bar Association told me on August 5 that the use of the term was, at best, misleading. She referred me to the San Francisco County District Attorney's office which subsequently stated that the action could be a violation of California's Business and Professions Code. Although Talavera was quick to point out in a number of conversations that she was not an attorney, the use of the term in official correspondence, might give AIG's overseas clients a different impression.

I have left three messages at AIG's law offices in San Francisco seeking clarification. At press time no calls have been returned. The current voice mail messages refer to Talavera as the "office manager."

So what is known then about the firm which employs Talavera and permits her to represent herself as Staff Counsel for its San Francisco legal office while simultaneously representing herself as the wife of a one-time cocaine cartel head?

Is it possible that AIG's CEO Hank Greenberg, a legendary stickler for detail and hands-on manager, would permit such activity, including the representation about owning an offshore investment company that might compete with AIG? In a June interview, AIG spokesman Michael Murphy, head of AIG operations in the Bahamas and reported to be Greenberg's right-hand man said, "Whenever there's the slightest hint of anything improper or of misuse of funds, [AIG CEO Hank] Greenberg is the first guy to lead the posse and clean house." I placed one follow-up call to Murphy's office for further clarification but it was not returned.

I was able to locate two sources in the insurance industry who were familiar with AIG and ask them if Talavera could be doing all this without Greenberg's knowledge. One response was short and direct, "The possibility that this is going on without Greenberg knowing is less than zero."

The second source was a bit more diplomatic. "M.R. Greenberg is a legendary leader. All current and former AIG employees know he is not only a visionary but a detail oriented person on all aspects of the firm's business activities worldwide. The General Counsel of AIG, Ernest Patrikis, was the senior legal officer of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, and given the scrutiny AIG is subject to, it would surprise me if Mr. Greenberg was not aware. Sometimes, however, in a big company things slip by, but when he becomes aware, the situation is addressed quickly."

Deconstructing AIG

The seemingly mundane insurance business is, in fact, one of the primary weapons of intelligence gathering around the world. And the founder of AIG, Cornelius Starr, was an architect of its use in World War II. Consider these

quotes from a September 22, 2000 story by Los Angeles Times reporter Mark Fritz entitled, "The Secret (Insurance) Agent Men."

"COLLEGE PARK, Md.ÑThey knew which factories to burn, which bridges to blow up, which cargo ships could be sunk in good conscience. They had pothole counts for roads used for invasion and head counts for city blocks marked for incineration.

"They werenÕt just secret agents. They were secret insurance agents. These undercover underwriters gave their World War II spymasters access to a global industry that both bankrolled and, ultimately, helped bring down Adolf HitlerÕs Third Reich.

"Newly declassified U.S. intelligence files tell the remarkable story of the ultra-secret Insurance Intelligence Unit, a component of the Office of Strategic Services, a forerunner of the CIA, and its elite counterintelligence branch X-2.

"Though rarely numbering more than a half dozen agents, the unit gathered intelligence on the enemyÕs insurance industry, Nazi insurance titans and suspected collaborators in the insurance business. But, more significantly, the unit mined standard insurance records for blueprints of bomb plants, timetables of tide changes and thousands of other details about targets, from a brewery in Bangkok to a candy company in Bergedorf. 'They used insurance information as a weapon of war,' said Greg Bradsher, a historian and National Archives expert on the declassified records. That insurance information was critical to Allied strategists, who were seeking to cripple the enemyÕs industrial base and batter morale by burning citiesÉ

"Germany had 45% of the worldwide wholesale insurance industry before the war began and managed to actually expand its business as it conquered continental Europe. As wholesalers, or 'reinsurers,' these companies covered other insurers against a catastrophic loss that could wipe out a single company. In the process, the wholesaler learned everything about the lives and property they were reinsuring [emphasis, mine]É

"The men behind the insurance unit were OSS head William "Wild Bill" Donovan and California-born insurance magnate Cornelius V. Starr. Starr had started out selling insurance to Chinese in Shanghai in 1919 and, over the next 50 years, would build what is now American International Group, one of the biggest insurance companies in the world. He was forced to move his operation to New York in 1939, when Japan invaded China. In the early years of the war, the German insurance industry expanded its business as it conquered continental Europe. Nazi insurance brokers who traveled with combat troops during invasions also scoured local insurance files for strategic dataÉ"

On the special value of reinsurance as a vehicle for intelligence gathering Fritz wrote:

"Such convoluted business dealings were traced largely through the work of Ernest Stiefel, a member of the intelligence unit who diagrammed the way insurance companies pooled their risks, invested in and insured each other and, as a result, willfully or witlessly shared data about nations at war. 'Stiefel mapped the entire system, said [Timothy] Naftali, a historian at the University of VirginiaÕs Miller Center of Public Affairs. "Each time I take a piece of your risk, youÕve got to give me information. I am not going to reinsure your company unless you give me all the documents. ThatÕs great intelligence informationÉ"

Later in the story Fritz confirmed the value of reinsurance as a vehicle for money laundering:

"With the Axis defeat imminent, U.S. intelligence officials focused greater attention on ways the Nazis would try to use insurance to hide and launder their assets so they could be used to rebuild the war machine..."

And how did Starr benefit from his service? Fritz writes:

"Starr sent insurance agents into Asia and Europe even before the bombs stopped falling and built what eventually became AIG, which today has its world headquarters in the same downtown New York building where the tiny OSS unit toiled in the deepest secrecy.

Starr died in 1968, but his empire endures. AIG is the biggest foreign insurance company in Japan. More than a third of its $40 billion in revenue last year came from the Far East theater that Starr helped carpet bomb and liberate.

"In The Shadow Warriors: OSS and the Origins of the CIA (Basic Books, 1983) author Bradley F. Smith shed more light on Cornelius Starr and the OSS.

"It [a secret intelligence operation in China] was formed in April 1942, when [Bill] Donovan persuaded British insurance magnate C.V. Starr to let C.O.I. (Covert Operations Intelligence) use his commercial and insurance connections in occupied China and Formosa to create a deep cover intelligence network. Although the State Department was nervous about the operation, Donovan went ahead and, with the cooperation of the U.S. Army, bypassed the diplomats in operating the communications system. Starr's people handled their own internal communication, then turned over their intelligence findings to [General Richard] Stillwell's headquarters for dispatch to the U.S. Starr, who was residing in the U.S. at the time, provided these services to the Allied cause. Later Starr became disgusted with what he considered Donovan's inefficiency and transferred his services to the British S.I.S. But the Starr-Donovan connection worked in China at least until the winter of 1943-44.

"The establishment of the Starr intelligence network, an operation so secret that it even escaped the attention of Chiang's [Kai Shek] security police (and of historians heretofore), was a major accomplishment for an intelligence operation barely six months old" [p.133]

Drug Connections

The War Conspiracy (Bobbs-Merrill, 1972) by Peter Dale Scott, Ph.D. of UC Berkeley is a book few Americans have seen. The compelling and meticulously documented history of the creation of the Vietnam War was rushed from bookstores and shelves almost as soon as it was published. Scott, author of Deep Politics and the Assassination of JFK, The Iran-Contra Connection and Cocaine Politics is an expert on the interface between covert operations and the international drug trade. In Chapter Six of The War Conspiracy, entitled "Opium, the China Lobby, and the CIA," Scott traces the connections between drug trafficking in Southeast Asia and American intelligence operations. There are detailed references to C.V. Starr and connections with some figures, like CIA veteran Paul Helliwell, who have been irrevocably and blatantly tied to the drug trade. Those connections also lead directly into the so-called "China Lobby" and firms identified as either CIA proprietaries or "affiliates" such as Sea Supply, Inc. (run by Helliwell), Civil Air Transport (CAT), a CIA proprietary, Civil Air Transport Co., Ltd. (CATCL) -- a separate firm not owned by but affiliated with the CIA through CAT-- and Air America, an evolution of Civil Air Transport. In 1957 the Airdale Corporation which owned 100 per cent of Air America changed its name to Pacific Corp. In 1976 CIA General Counsel Lawrence Houston testified before the Senate's Church Committee looking into intelligence abuses about CIA Air operations. When asked what the one single holding company, above all others, was at the top of CIA proprietary and contract air operations, he identified Pacific Corporation. According to published reports, Houston also testified that the CIA also had interests in investment and insurance companies.

Pacific Corp -- which one source has told me is currently insured by AIG -- and the CIA have, in the 1990s, been connected with the "laundering" of some 28 C-130 military transport aircraft into the hands of private, forest fire, air tanker contractors in the U.S. Subsequently, many of those C-130s turned up all over the world. Some were directly involved in drug trafficking and one in particular, operated by Aero-Postale de Mexico, was seized with a billion dollars in cocaine aboard in Mexico City in 1996. [See FTW, Vol I, No 10 - Dec, 1998]

A key figure in the post-war operations was lawyer Tommy Corcoran, a legendary "fixer" in the Roosevelt Administration, who went on to represent Nationalist Chinese financial interests after the Communists took power in 1949. Corcoran and Helliwell worked closely together in Asia. One of the critical and well-documented U.S. responses to the Communist takeover was to fund remnants of the Chinese Nationalist army -- who had fled into Burma, Thailand and Laos -- with opium. Much of that money, along with the drugs, found its way into the U.S. As noted by writers like the late Jonathan Kwitny of The Wall Street Journal in The Crimes of Patriots (Penguin, 1987) and by Professor Alfred McCoy of the University of Wisconsin in The Politics of Heroin (1972, 1991, Lawrence Hill Books), Helliwell paid the troops using five-pound "sticky" bars of heroin. Helliwell later went on to head Castle Bank and Trust in Florida and the Bahamas and then was heavily involved with The Nugan Hand Bank in Australia and the U.S. Both banks have been heavily linked in official investigations to both drug trafficking and money laundering while also moving money for the CIA.

In The War Conspiracy Scott writes:

"For it is a striking fact that the law firm of Tommy Corcoran, the Washington lawyer for CATCL and [China Lobbyist] T.V. Soong, had its own links to the interlocking worlds of the China Lobby and of organized crime. His partner W.S. Youngman joined the board of U.S. Life and other insurance companies, controlled by C.V. Starr (OSS China) with the help of Philippine and other Asian capital. Youngman's fellow-directors of Starr's companies have included John S. Woodbridge of Pan Am, Francis F. Randolph of J. and W. Seligman, W. Palmer Dixon of Loeb Rhoades, Charles Edison of the postwar China Lobby, and Alfred B. Jones of the Nationalist Chinese government's registered agency, the Universal Trading Corporation. The [Senate] McClellan Committee heard that in 1950 U.S. Life [later part of AIG] (with Edison as a director) and a much smaller company (Union Casualty of New York) were allotted a major Teamsters insurance contract, after a lower bid from a larger and safer company had been rejected, [Jimmy] Hoffa was accused by a fellow trustee, testifying under oath before another committee, of intervening on behalf of US Life and Union Casualty, whose agents were Hoffa's close business associates Paul and Allen DorfmanÉ

"We find the same network linking CIA proprietaries, war lobbies, and organized crime, when we turn our attention from CAT to the other identified supporter of opium activities, Sea Supply, Inc. Sea Supply, Inc. was organized in Miami, Florida, where its counsel, Paul E. Helliwell, doubled after 1951 as the counsel for C.V. Starr insurance interests, and also as the Thai consul in Miami..."

The historical connections to CIA covert or proprietary air operations are interesting in light of the fact that AIG proudly announces in its 2000 annual report that with 494 full-sized jets -- 89 of which it manages itself -- it owns "the world's most modern fleet of aircraft." AIG customers include major airlines and a number of air transport companies. AIG also reported that in 2000 it leased additional aircraft "to a number of established customers" in South America.

CIA proprietary ownership or interest in companies is very difficult to detect. But, it has been proven by writers like Scott and many other researchers who combed through the paperwork that surfaced during the Iran-Contra scandals of the 1980s, where Air America assets were laundered into companies like Southern Air Transport and Evergreen Air. The single largest stockholder in AIG, the Starr International Company (SICO), holds 13.62% of AIG stock. Aside from knowing that Maurice Greenberg owns 21.86% of SICO (source, SEC) we may never be able to find out who, or what, owns the rest.

They Even Put It In Writing

In September 1997 a group of business and labor executives* reviewed and made recommendations on the use of sanctions by the President of the United States to influence world events. One of those executives was Oackley Johnson of AIG. The group, called the Sanctions Working Group (SWG) of the Department of State's Advisory Committee on International Economic Policy, having completed its review of the way the White House has imposed sanctions on foreign governments, completed a detailed report which was sent to the State Department by the Committee head, Michael Gadbaw of General Electric. The advisory panel called for massive revisions in the way sanctions were selected and imposed in foreign affairs to punish or induce foreign governments to behave the way the U.S. wants.

Approval of the recommendations was unanimous from the business community and opposition was unanimous and acerbic from organized labor representatives who sent their dissent separately to the State Department. The report, they said, cared about nothing but the financial interests of major U.S. Corporations.

As an Appendix to the report, which was found at http://www.usaengage.org/studies.html, Footnote 4 following Tab 5 listed valid U.S. foreign policy objectives. It states: This report addresses sanctions undertaken pursuant to laws or regulations that authorize or mandate unilateral economic sanctions in order to achieve a foreign policy objective.

"The foreign policy objectives may include the transition to democracy, opposing terrorism or support of terrorist activities, sanctioning drug production and transit or trafficking, supporting human and worker rights and religious freedom, opposing proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and protecting the environment."

The language "support of terrorist activities" is ambiguous. It could mean that the U.S. would punish those who support terrorist activities or that it might support terrorist activities itself. The drug trafficking language also catches the panel on the horns of a dilemma. As defined in the American Heritage dictionary, to sanction something means to "grant authoritative permission or approval." A secondary meaning means "to punish." In government documents and reports, especially those laying out or recommending policy, every word is reviewed dozens of times. Lawyers and decision makers sign off on every aspect. Drafts usually circulate for weeks before final approval. This language may mean exactly what it says. And if there is ambiguity then it must have been intended.

The whole purpose of From The Wilderness is to teach the world that it is a specific intent of Wall Street and the U.S. government to give authoritative permission and approval to the drug trade to ensure that drug profits -- the money -- comes back under the control of the people who sanctioned the trade to begin with. Is that what Coral Talavera is doing at AIG? I e-mailed Oackley Johnson at AIG and asked him to comment on the report. At press time he has not responded. I have also solicited (again) comment from AIG Corporate offices on the content of this story. Also no response. But I hope to have something from them for Part III in September.

AIG has also been connected, albeit indirectly, to a major money laundering case. As the insurance carrier for the Bank of New York (BoNY) they are defending BoNY in a suit filed this year by BoNY shareholders charging mismanagement of the bank. That suit arose from revelations (See FTW Vol II, No.7, 9/99) in the major media that BoNY had been involved in laundering between $7 and $10 billion in criminal money out of Russia during the 1990s under its Chairman, Thomas Renyi. A credible source has told me, but I have not been able to confirm it, that AIG also insures the U.S. Department of Justice which was charged with investigating BoNY and which decided not to file criminal charges in 1999.

Perhaps no one knows more about your life, not even your immediate family, than the various companies who insure you. Your health, finances, work history, medical records, driving habits and almost every other aspect of your life is recorded in insurance files and records. Is this necessarily something you want available to the CIA or any part of the government? Remember that the CIA doesn't operate under the law or respect privacy. What happens then when a giant like AIG winds up insuring parts of the government or major businesses that violate your rights or break the law?



- Members of the Sanctions Working Group of the State Department's Advisory Committee on International Economic Policy: -- Mark Anderson, AFL-CIO * Harvey Bale, Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Assoc. * Steven Beckman, United Auto Workers * Seddik Belyamani, Boeing * Fred Bergsten, Institute for International Economics * Thomas Block, Chase Manhattan Bank * Carol Brookins, World Perspectives * Anthony Corso, Mobil *Greg Farmer, Northern Telecom * Isaiah Frank, Johns Hopkins (SAIS) * Don Fuqua, Aerospace Industries Association * R. Michael Gadbaw, General Electric * R. Harkin, United Technologies * Robert Hormats, Goldman, Sachs International * Nancie Johnson, DuPont * Oackley Johnson, AIG * Robert Johnson, Phelps Dodge & Morenci * Dale Jones, Halliburton * Robert Kapp, US-China Business Council * Frank Kittredge, National Foreign Trade Council * Mary Lou Lackey, Motorola * T. Lee, AFL-CIO *Charles Levy - Wilmer, Cutler and Pickering *Clement Malin, Texaco * Rebecca Mark, Enron Development *Joel Messing, Cigna *Robert Niemeth, Pfizer * G. Staley, Toys R Us * Roger Swanson, US-Japan Business Council * Sandra Taylor, Eastman Kodak * Robert Vastine, Coalition of Service Industries * Alan Wolff, Dewey Ballantine *

AIG Highlights

  • AIG has the largest market capitalization (total value of all shares) of any insurance or financial services organization on the NYSE -- $198.4 billion in 2000. It has operations in 130 countries.
  • Ranked #7 on Forbes Super 100 list of companies. After GE, Citigroup, BankAmerica, Exxon, IBM and Ford.

  • The largest U.S. underwriter of commercial and industrial insurance.

  • Operates AIG Financial Services Group, which sells investments, international asset management and "advisory" services.

  • The largest seller of retirement annuities in the U.S. through its acquisitions of SunAmerica and American General in 1999 and 2001 respectively.

  • AIG is licensed to operate banks in three countries, including the US (1999) and also issues credit cards.

History

  • Originally formed as the Asia Life/C. V. Starr Companies in the 1930s by founder Cornelius Starr who served with the OSS during World War II. The Starr corporation shared the same office building as OSS headquarters in New York, and functioned as an intelligence conduit on shipping, manufacturing and industrial bombing targets in Asia and Germany throughout WW II. [The Los Angeles Times, Sept. 22, 2000]
  • Early business centered primarily in China and Asia. Starr interests centered in Asia and Panama.
  • 1951 - Changed name to American Life Insurance Company (ALICO).
  • Acquired major U.S. insurance companies in the 1950s and 60s.
  • 1967 - Incorporated as American International Group (AIG).

  • 1969 - First public offering.

  • First western insurance company to create joint ventures with Hungary, Poland and Romania in the 1960s.

  • In 1980 established joint venture with the People's Insurance Company of China.

  • First insurance company licensed to do business on its own in Japan (1952), Mainland China (1990), and Vietnam (2000).

  • Member and staunch supporter of the World Trade Organization. During 1997 WTO negotiations, AIG collaborated directly with Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin to negotiate Asian financial, investment and trade agreements covering 102 countries, which one report described as bullying and marked by "messages back and forth from Geneva to Washington, andÉ reports, between the US Treasury and American International Group." [Third World Economics, No. 175, 16-31, 12/97].

  • During the 1990s involved with U.S. investment in Russia (overseen by Goldman Sachs and The Harvard Endowment) through Brunswick Brokerage. Secured a $300 million OPIC (Overseas Private Investment Corporation) guarantee for a Russian investment fund. [Paul Likoudis, Editor, The Wanderer.]

  • AIG has "joint venture" interests in Latin America through ZonaFinanciera with Citibank which in May 2001 purchased Mexico's Banamex and will be placing reported drug money launderer and trafficker Roberto Hernandez on its board of directors.

  • AIG insures more than half of the major US airports.

  • The world's "market leader" in leasing and remarketing of advanced technology commercial jet aircraft - "the most modern fleet of aircraft in the world. " With 2000 revenues of $2.44 billion AIG owns a fleet of 494 jets, 89 of which it "manages" itself. Clients include airlines in U.S., Canada, Europe, Asia, the Middle East and South America where, in 2000, it leased, "additional aircraft to a number of established customers."

Maurice "Hank" Greenberg, 75 -- Chairman and CEO of American International Group (AIG)

  • WWII, Served with US Army Signal Corps and Army Rangers
  • LL.B., New York Law School, 1950
  • Korean War, Investigated reported massacres at POW camps run by UN/US personnel
  • Elected AIG President in 1962, CEO in 1967 and Chairman in 1989.
  • Former Chairman and Director of the New York Federal Reserve Bank.
  • Forbes 111th richest man in the world (More than $4 billion net worth)
  • Vice Chairman, Council on Foreign Relations
  • Vice Chairman, Center for Strategic and International Studies
  • Member, Board of Directors, New York Stock Exchange
  • Member, Trilateral Commission
  • Member, The Bilderberger Group
  • Chairman, The Nixon Center
  • Chairman, U.S.-China Business Council
  • Chairman, The Starr Foundation
  • Accompanied President George Bush on his trade mission to China in 1992
  • Major contributor to The Heritage Foundation
  • Name floated by Senator Arlen Specter to become CIA director in 1995 (Reported in U.S. News and World Report - 2/20/95)

AIG Board's Board of Directors as Reported to the SEC

  • M. BERNARD AIDINOFF -- SENIOR COUNSEL, SULLIVAN & CROMWELL (Attorneys). Director since 1984 -- Age 72. [NOTE: Sullivan and Cromwell is the legal firm that was home to Eisenhower Secretary of State John Foster Dulles and his brother Allen Dulles, who was a key OSS leader during WWII and who served as CIA Director under Presidents Eisenhower and Kennedy.]
  • ELI BROAD -- CHAIRMAN, SUNAMERICA INC (a wholly-owned subsidiary of AIG). Director since 1999 -- Age 67.
  • PEI-YUAN CHIA -- RETIRED VICE CHAIRMAN, CITICORP AND CITIBANK, N.A. Director since 1996 -- Age 62.
  • MARSHALL A. COHEN -- COUNSEL, CASSELS BROCK & BLACKWELL (Barristers and Solicitors); FORMER PRESIDENT AND CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER, THE MOLSON COMPANIES LIMITED. Director since 1992 -- Age 66.
  • BARBER B. CONABLE, JR. -- RETIRED; FORMER PRESIDENT, WORLD BANK, AND FORMER MEMBER, UNITED STATES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES. Director since 1991 -- Age 78.
  • MARTIN S. FELDSTEIN -- PROFESSOR OF ECONOMICS, HARVARD UNIVERSITY; PRESIDENT AND CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER, NATIONAL BUREAU OF ECONOMIC RESEARCH (Nonprofit Economic Research Center), Director HCA and TRW. Director since 1987 -- Age 61.
  • ELLEN V. FUTTER -- PRESIDENT, AMERICAN MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY Director, Bristol-Myers Squibb Company Consolidated Edison, Inc. (also serves as Trustee of Consolidated Edison Company of New York, Inc.), J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. Director since 1999 -- Age 51.
  • MAURICE R. GREENBERG -- CHAIRMAN AND CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER, AIG, Director, Transatlantic Holdings, Inc. ('Transatlantic'), which is owned 60.0 percent by AIG. Also serves as Chairman of Transatlantic, a director, President and Chief Executive Officer of C.V. Starr & Co., Inc. ('Starr'), and a director of Starr International Company, Inc. ('SICO') and International Lease Finance Corporation ('ILFC'); Starr and SICO are private holding companies (see 'Ownership of Certain Securities'); ILFC is a wholly-owned subsidiary of AIG. Director since 1967 -- Age 75.
  • CARLA A. HILLS -- CHAIRMAN AND CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER, HILLS & COMPANY; FORMER UNITED STATES TRADE REPRESENTATIVE. (Hills & Company provides international investment, trade and risk advisory services). Director, AOL Time Warner Inc., Chevron Corporation, Lucent Technologies Inc. Director since 1993 -- Age 67.
  • FRANK J. HOENEMEYER -- FINANCIAL CONSULTANT; RETIRED VICE CHAIRMAN, PRUDENTIAL INSURANCE COMPANY OF AMERICA. Director, Carey Fiduciary Advisors, Inc. Cincinnati, Inc. Director since 1985 -- Age 81.
  • RICHARD C. HOLBROOKE -- FORMER UNITED STATES AMBASSADOR TO THE UNITED NATIONS; FORMER VICE CHAIRMAN, CREDIT SUISSE, FIRST BOSTON. Elected February 7, 2001 -- Age 59.
  • EDWARD E. MATTHEWS -- VICE CHAIRMAN -- INVESTMENTS AND FINANCIAL SERVICES, AIG. Director, Transatlantic. Also serves as a director of Starr, SICO and ILFC, -- Director since 1973 -- Age 69.
  • HOWARD I. SMITH -- EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT AND CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICER, AIG. Director, Transatlantic, 21st Century Insurance Group ('21st Century'), which is owned 62.8 percent by AIG. Also serves as a director of Starr, SICO and ILFC -- Director since 1997 -- Age 56.
  • THOMAS R. TIZZIO -- SENIOR VICE CHAIRMAN -- GENERAL INSURANCE, AIG. Director, Transatlantic. Also serves as a director of Starr and SICO. -- Director since 1986 -- Age 63.
  • EDMUND S.W. TSE -- VICE CHAIRMAN -- LIFE INSURANCE, AIG. Also serves as a director of Starr and SICO. -- Director since 1996 -- Age 63.
  • JAY S. WINTROB -- PRESIDENT AND CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER, SUNAMERICA. Director, Anchor National Life Insurance Company and First SunAmerica Life Insurance Company, wholly-owned subsidiaries of AIG. Also serves as a director of Starr and SICO -- Director since 1999 -- Age 44.
  • FRANK G. WISNER -- VICE CHAIRMAN -- EXTERNAL AFFAIRS, AIG. Director, EOG Resources, Inc. -- Director since 1997 -- Age 62. [NOTE: Wisner is the son of former CIA deputy Director, Frank Wisner, Sr. who was present at the creation of the CIA. As head of the Office of Policy Coordination, the forerunner of the CIA's Directorate of Operations. Wisner, Sr. once boasted, "I can play the media like a mighty Wurlitzer." In a 35 year career with the State department, Wisner, Jr. served as U.S. Ambassador to India, the Philippines, Egypt and Zambia.]
  • FRANK G. ZARB -- CHAIRMAN, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF SECURITIES DEALERS, INC. AND THE NASDAQ STOCK MARKET, INC. -- Elected February 7, 2001 -- Age 66
  • AIG is a client of Henry Kissinger and Associates. Kissinger is the Chairman of AIG's International Advisory Board.

[© Copyright 2001, Michael C. Ruppert and From the Wilderness Publications.

Source: www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ciadrugs/index.html