The Bilderberg Group (1954)

In his "Memoirs" (2002), David Rockefeller has written that "Bilderberg meetings must induce apocalyptic visions of omnipotent international bankers plotting with unscrupulous government officials to impose cunning schemes on an ignorant and unsuspecting world" (Rockefeller, pp. 410-1).

Bankers like the Rockefellers and their associates may not be omnipotent, but they certainly are very powerful and influential. As to plotting with unscrupulous government officials to impose their cunning schemes on the world, that's exactly what they are doing. The Bilderberg Group itself is a good example.

According to those involved in its creation, including David Rockefeller himself, the Bilderberg Group was the brainchild of Joseph Retinger, a London-based Polish Socialist and close collaborator of the Fabian Society.

Retinger had been in charge of co-ordinating the foreign ministers of various European governments-in-exile stationed in London during World War II. After the war, he was a leading figure in various semi-secret organisations working for a united Europe, such as the Independent League for European Co-operation (ILEC) and the European League for Economic Co-operation (ELEC).

The unification of Europe was also a key objective of U.S. foreign policy as evident from numerous statements by U.S. leaders like President John F. Kennedy in his "Declaration of Interdependence" speech of 1962 (Monnet, p. 467).

It is also evident from statements by British leaders like Labour Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin, a Fabian Society member, who pointed out in the House of Commons that America's Economic Cooperation Authority(ECA) was very keen on the economic and political unification of Europe.

The ECA was the agency in charge of administering financial aid to Europe as part of the European Recovery Plan a.k.a. "Marshall Plan" (1948-52). The Plan itself had been instigated by Deputy-Secretary of State for Economic Affairs William Clayton and the ECA was headed by Economic Cooperation Administrator Paul G Hoffman.

Both Clayton and Hoffman were members of the Rockefeller-dominated Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) and founders of the U.S. Committee for Economic Development (CED) in 1942 (Smoot, p. 52). It follows that the Marshall Plan and the unification of Europe which was stipulated as a precondition for Marshall Aid, were instigated and engineered by the international bankers who, according to David Rockefeller, do not plot cunning schemes with unscrupulous politicians.

Retinger aside, it was these very same international bankers and politicians who in 1954 set up the Bilderberg Group to co-ordinate American and European business and political interests with a view to creating a united Europe - primarily as a market for US business, but also as a step towards world government.

Among those involved on the U.S. side were:

• David and Nelson Rockefeller
• Joseph E. Johnson, a director of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) and president of the Rockefeller-controlled Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
• Dean Rusk, CFR director, director of the Rockefeller Foundation, Bilderberg co-chairman and (from 1961) Democrat Secretary of State (Kennedy admin)
• CFR members (and Rockefeller lawyers) John Foster Dulles and Allen W Dulles

David Rockefeller himself was a leading figure in the Senior Advisory Group at Bilderberg meetings.

[David Rockefeller was Vice President of the CFR from 1950-70, and Chairman from 1970-85. For more on the CFR, see "Final Warning" by David Rivera (1994) and "The Invisible Government" by Dan Smoot (1962) --ed]

The British side was led by Denis Healey and Hugh Gaitskell of the Fabian Society executive committee. Healey, who had also been involved in setting up the Socialist International, was also member and later chairman of the Fabian International Bureau Advisory Committee as well as Chatham House (RIIA) councillor. His token "Conservative" colleague on the Bilderberg steering committee was Reginald ("Reggie") Maudling, Churchill's Economic Secretary to the Treasury, who had been a key supporter of Labour's nationalisation programme.

In addition to leading Fabians like Healey and Gaitskell, the Fabian Society was also influential through Continental members like the Frenchman Guy Mollet, Vice-President of the Fabian-controlled Socialist International, leader of the French Section of the Workers' International (later Socialist) Party (SFIO) who later became Prime Minister of France, and his assistant Jacques Piette of the SFIO executive committee.

Other business interests represented on the Bilderberg steering committee from the 1960s were the French, Swiss and British Rothschild families. In fact, Rothschild associates were present from the start in the person of Bilderberg chairman, Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands, who was a major shareholder in the oil giant Royal Dutch/Shell which was co-owned by the Rothschilds (Callaghan, pp. 205-6; de Villemarest, vol. 2., pp. 14-5 ff.; Healey, pp. 195-6; Rockefeller, pp. 410-12).

Although David Rockefeller claims that the Bilderberg Group discusses important issues "without reaching consensus", the fact remains that Bilderberg meetings played a pivotal role in the development of internationalist projects like the 1957 Treaty of Rome which created the European Economic Community (EEC) a.k.a. "Common Market" (Aldrich, p. 216).

Trilateral Commission (1973)

Of course, important though it may be, Bilderberg is not at the very top of the international power structure working for world domination behind the scenes. That place is reserved for other semi-secret organisations like the Council on Foreign Relations and the Trilateral Commission, founded in 1973 by David Rockefeller.

[David Rockefeller was Chairman of the Trilateral Commission until 1991. For more on the TC, see "Final Warning" by David Rivera (1994) --ed]

Among the Trilateral's members, we find the same constellation of interests as in the Bilderberg Group. Early members included:

• Denis Healey of the Fabian Society and Chatham House (RIIA)
• Sir Reay Geddes, director of Shell Transport and Trading (ST&T), the U.K. branch of Royal Dutch/Shell
• Baron Edmond de Rothschild , director of Edmond de Rothschild Banque, Paris
• Baron Leon Lambert, cousin of the French Rothschilds, head of Groupe (later Banque) Bruxelles Lambert, and personal friend of David Rockefeller
• and, of course, David Rockefeller and associates (Sklar, 1980).

Fabian Society members like R. H. Tawney, John Maynard Keynes, Philip Noel-Baker and Walter Lippmann were also involved in the creation of Chatham House a.k.a. Royal Institute of Foreign Affairs (RIIA) -- of which the LSE is an institutional member -- and its sister organisation, the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR). As in the case of Bilderberg, these Fabians were acting as agents and collaborators of financial interests represented by the Astor, Morgan, Rockefeller and Schiff groups (Ratiu, 132-8, 163-4).