America's Secret Establishment

An Introduction to The Order of Skull and Bones (condensed edition)
-- by: Antony C. Sutton, 1986, source: Liberty House Press
MHP hypertext version for non-profit educational use only

3.3  Thesis: The Order Creates the Soviet Union

Financial and political support for the Bolsheviks

120 Broadway

In an earlier book, "Wall Street and the Bolshevik Revolution" [see text --ed], we presented major evidence of Wall Street assistance for the Bolshevik Revolution... This memorandum continues the story, but now links The Order to the earlier evidence of Wall Street involvement.

Revolutionary activity was centered at Equitable Trust Building, 120 Broadway [in New York]... The American International Corporation was located at 120 Broadway [and] the Bankers Club, where Wall Street bankers met for lunch, was at the very top of the building. It was in this plush club that plans were laid by William Boyce Thompson for Wall Street participation in the 1917 Russian Revolution.

Firms with links to The Order at or near 120 Broadway, New York in 1917:

Firms at 120 Broadway (the Equitable Trust building):

Edward H. Harriman (before his death)

American International Corporation

Federal Reserve Bank of New York

Bankers Club (top floor)

Thomas D. Thacher of Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett

Guggenheim Exploration

C.A.K. Martens of Weinberg & Posner (the first Soviet "ambassador")

Stone & Webster

General Electric

Sinclair Gulf Corp.

Guaranty Securities

Individual members of The Order at 120 Broadway:

George Webster Adams (1904)

Allen Wallace Ames (1918)

Philip Lyndon Dodge (1907)

Firms near 120 Broadway:

W.A. Harriman Company, 59 Broadway

J.P. Morgan Co., 23 Wall

William Boyce Thompson, 14 Wall

Stetson, Jennings & Russell, 15 Broad

Soviet Bureau, 110 W. 40th Street

Amos Pinchot, 60 Broadway

Guaranty Trust Company, 140 Broadway

Anglo-Russian Chamber of Commerce, 233 Broadway

The Order Pushes for Assistance to the Soviet Army

Fortunately we have a copy of the memorandum written by a member of The Order summarizing intentions for the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution. The memorandum was written by Thomas D. Thacher (1904), a partner in the Wall Street law firm of Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett. Thacher's address was 120 Broadway. Today [1983] this law firm...has the largest billing on Wall Street and has former Secretary of State Cyrus Vance (of Scroll & Key) as a partner.

In 1917, Thacher was in Russia with William Boyce Thompson's Red Cross Mission. After consultations in New York, Thacher was then sent to London to confer with Lord Northcliffe about the Bolshevik Revolution and then to Paris for similar talks with the French government.

The Thacher memorandum not only urges recognition of the barely surviving Soviet Government, which in early 1918 controlled only a very small portion of Russia, but also military assistance for the Soviet Army and intervention to keep the Japanese out of Siberia until the Bolsheviks could take over.

Here are the main sections from the Thacher memorandum:

"First of all...the Allies should discourage Japanese intervention in Siberia.

In the second place, the fullest assistance should be given to the Soviet Government in its efforts to organize a volunteer revolutionary army.

Thirdly, the Allied Governments should give their moral support to the Russian people in their efforts to work out their own political systems free from the domination of any foreign power...

Fourthly, until the time when open conflict shall result between the German Government and the Soviet Government of Russia there will be opportunity for peaceful commercial penetration by German agencies in Russia. So long as there is no open break, it will probably be impossible to entirely prevent such commerce. Steps should therefore be taken to impede, so far as possible, the transport of grain and raw materials to Germany from Russia."

-- U.S. State Department Decimal File, Microcopy 316, Roll 13, Frame 698

The reader should note in particular paragraph two... It was in fact the hidden policy adopted at the highest levels, in absolute secrecy, by the United States and to some extent by The Group (especially Milner) in Great Britain...

When President Woodrow Wilson sent U.S. troops to hold the Trans-Siberian railroad, secret instructions were given by Woodrow Wilson in person to General William S. Graves... A close reading of the available files shows that American intervention had little to do with anti-Bolshevik activity, as the Soviets, George Kennan and other writers maintain.

[As] reported by the New York Times:

VLADIVOSTOK PRO-AMERICAN

Revolutionist Staff Thanks Graves for Preserving Neutrality

VLADIVOSTOK, Feb 1. (Associated Press) -- Parades, street meetings and speechmaking marked the second day today of the city's complete liberation from Kolchak authority. Red flags fly on every Government building, many business houses and homes.

There is a pronounced pro-American feeling evident. In front of the American headquarters the revolutionary leaders mounted steps of buildings across the street, making speeches calling the Americans real friends, who at a critical time saved this present movement. The people insist upon an allied policy of no interference internationally in political affairs.

The General Staff of the new Government at Nikolak has telegraphed to the American commander, Major Gen. Graves, expressing its appreciation for efforts toward guaranteeing an allied policy of non-interference during the occupation of the city, also in aiding in a peaceful settlement of the local situation.

-- New York Times, February 15, 1920, 7:4

In fact, the United States took over and held the Siberian Railroad until the Soviets gained sufficient power to take it over. Both British and French military missions in Siberia recorded the extraordinary actions of the United States Army...

So far as aiding the Soviet Army is concerned, there are State Department records that show guns and ammunition were shipped to the Bolsheviks. And in 1919, while Trotsky was making anti-American speeches in public, he was also asking Ambassador Francis for American military inspection teams to train the new Soviet Army.

The Order Pushes for the Soviets in the United States

However, it was in Washington and London that The Order really aided the Soviets. The Order succeeded not only in preventing military actions against the Bolsheviks, but to so-muddy the policy waters that much needed vital raw materials and goods, ultimately even loans, were able to flow from the United States to the Soviets, in spite of a legal ban.

The following documents illustrate how members of The Order were able to encourage Soviet ambitions in the United States. While the Department of Justice was deporting so-called "Reds" to Russia, a much more potent force was at work WITHIN the U.S. Government to keep the fledgling Soviet Union intact.

Lusk Committee Exhibit #1543

November 22, 1918
Mr. Santeri Nourteva
Finnish Information Bureau
299 Broadway, City

Dear Mr. Nourteva:

Let me thank you for your very kind letter of November 1st; I apologize for not answering sooner.

I have read your bulletin on the barrage of lies, and I am, needless to say, heartily sympathetic with your view of the situation and with the work you are doing. One of the most sinister things at present is the fact that governments are going into the advertising business. The are organized so that they can make or wreck movements. I am sending you, under separate cover, a copy of a letter I have written, which I hope will interest you.

With kindest regards, I am
Sincerly yours,

Amos Pinchot

The letter above is from [member of The Order] Amos Pinchot (1897). His brother, conservationist Gifford Pinchot (1889) was also a member. Amos Pinchot was a founder of the American Civil Liberties Union and active in aiding the Soviets during the early days of the Bolshevik Revolution.

Who was Nourteva? This name was an alias for Alexander Nyberg, a Soviet representative in the United States. Nyberg worked for the Soviet Bureau (at first called the Finnish Information Bureau -- a cover name), along with Ludwig C.A.K. Martens, the first Soviet Ambassador and formerly a Vice President of Weinberg & Posner. The New York office of Weinberg & Posner was at -- 120 Broadway!

Nyberg's assistant was Kenneth Durant, an American newspaper man, later TASS [Soviet press agency] correspondent in the U.S. and one time aide to "Colonel" Edward House, mystery man of the Wilson administration.

Lusk Committee Exhibit #211

May 29, 1919
Hon. William Kent
U.S. Tariff Commission
Washington D.C.

Dear Billy:

This will introduce you to my friend, Professor Evans Clark, now associated with the Bureau of Information of the Russian Soviet Republic. He wants to talk with you about the recognition of Wolchak, the raising of the blockade, etc. and get your advice in regard to backing up the senators who would be apt to stand up and make a brave fight. Won't you do what you can for him.

As I see it, we are taking a (unreadable) Russia that will leave our, until now, mightily good reputation, badly damaged.

Hope to see you in Washington soon.

Faithfully yours, A.P. [Amos Pinchot]

[Note that both Pinchot and Kent were members of The Order]

Director of the Commercial Department in this Soviet Bureau was "Comrade Evans Clark". Clark later became Executive Director of the influential Twentieth Century Foundation, and [there] we find a member of The Order -- in this case, Charles Phelps Taft (1918), nephew of President and Chief Justice William Howard Taft (1878).

[Below] is a brief biography of "Comrade Evans Clark", issued by the Soviet Bureau in 1919 on his appointment as Assistant Director of the Commercial Department of the Bureau, with the task of establishing trade relations with the U.S. Note the Harvard and Princeton connections.

Lusk Committee Exhibit #1500

Bureau of Information on Soviet Russia
299 Broadway, Room 1812

Statement April 19th

Comrade Evans Clark has resigned his position as Director of the Bureau of Research of the Socialist Aldersanic Delegation in New York and has been appointed Assistant Director of the Commercial Department of the Bureau of the Representative of the Russian Socialist Federal Soviet Republic with headquarters at the World's Tower Building -- 110 West 40th Street.

Comrade Clark has been a member of the Socialist Party since 1911 and has taken an active part in the labor movement in the United States. He is a graduate of Amherst College, Harvard University and the Columbia Law School. He has been instructor of politics in Princeton University and was one of the organizers of the Intercollegiate Socialist Society of which he was the first President. Comrade Clark will assist Comrade Heller in the task of establishing trade relations between the United States and Soviet Russia.

How The Order Developed the Stagnant Soviet Union

Between 1917 and 1921, the Soviets pushed their control of Russia into Siberia and the Caucasus. As we have noted, the United States intervened in Siberia along the Trans-Siberian railroad. Histories of U.S. intervention by George Kennan and the Soviets maintain this was an anti-Soviet intervention. In fact, it was nothing of the kind...

The immediate problem facing the Soviets was to restore silent Russian factories. This needed raw materials, technical skills and working capital. The key to Russian reconstruction was the oil fields of the Caucasus... Baku, the most important field, was developed in the 1870s. In 1900 it was producing more crude oil than the United States, and in 1901 more than half of the total world crude output.

The Bolsheviks took over the Caucasus in 1920-21, but until 1923 oil field drilling almost ceased... The complete collapse after the Soviet takeover is clearly suggested by the statistics... Then, Serebrovsky, Chairman of Azneft (the Soviet oil production trust), put forward a program for recovery in a Pravda article. The plan for 1923 was to increase oil well drilling...[which] would require 35 rotary drills and 157 percussion drills. Serebrovsky pointed out that Azneft had no rotary drills, and that Russian enterprise could not supply them... He then announced:

"But just here American capital is going to support us. The American firm International Barnsdall Corporation has submitted a plan... Lack of equipment prevents us from increasing the production of the oil industry of Baku by ourselves. The American firm...will provide the equipment, start drilling in the oil fields, and organize the technical production of oil with deep pumps." (Pravda, September 21, 1922)

During the next few years International Barnsdall, together with the Lucey Manufacturing Company and other major foreign oil well equipment firms, fulfilled Serebrovsky's program. Massive imports of equipment came from the United States. International Barnsdall inaugurated the rotary drilling program, initiated Azneft drilling crews into its operational problems, and reorganized oil well pumping with deep well electrical pumps.

The first International Barnsdall concession was signed in October 1921, and was followed in September of 1922 by two further agreements... The U.S. State Department archives contain an intriguing quotation from Rykov, dated October 1922:

"The one comparatively bright spot in Russia is the petroleum industry, and this is due largely to the fact that a number of American workers have been brought into the oil fields to superintend their operation."

Who or what was International Barnsdall Corporation? The Chairman of International Barnsdall Corp. was Matthew C. Brush whom we previously identified as The Order's "front man". Guaranty Trust, Lee Higginson Company, and W.A. Harriman Co. owned Barnsdall Corporation, and International Barnsdall Corporation was owned 75% by the Barnsdall Corporation and 25% by H. Mason Day.

The Guaranty Trust interest was represented by Eugene W. Stetson (also a Vice President of Guaranty Trust), whose son, Eugene W. Stetson Jr., was initiated into The Order in 1934. The Lee Higginson interest was represented by Frederick Winthrop Allen (The Order, 1900). In brief, The Order controlled International Barnsdall Corporation.

The second potentially largest source of Soviet foreign exchange in the 1920s was the large Russian manganese deposits. In 1913, Tsarist Russia supplied 52% of world manganese, of which about 76 percent, or 1,000,000 tons, was mined from the Chiaturi deposits in the Caucasus. Production in 1920 was zero, and by 1924 had risen only to about 320,000 tons per year. The basic problem was:

"...that further development was seriously retarded by the primitive equipment, which was considered grossly inadequate even according to prewar standards."

The Soviets acquired modern mining and transportation facilities for their manganese deposits, acquired foreign exchange, and finally shattered American foreign policy concerning loans to the U.S.S.R., in a series of business agreements with W.A. Harriman Company and Guaranty Trust.

On July 12, 1925, a concession agreement was made between the W.A. Harriman Company of New York and the U.S.S.R. for exploitation of the Chiaturi manganese deposits and extensive introduction of modern mining and transportation menthods.

The Chairman of the Georgian Manganese Company, the Harriman operating company on the site in Russia, was none other than The Order's "front man" Matthew C. Brush.

The Order Too Powerful for State Department to Investigate

While The Order carried out its plans to develop [Soviet] Russia, the State Department could do nothing. Its bureaucrats sat in Washington D.C. like a bunch of mesmerized jackrabbits.

Firstly, in the 1920s loans to the Soviet Union were strictly against U.S. law... Public and government sentiment in the United States was overwhelmingly against the Soviets -- not least for the widespread atrocities committed in the name of the Revolution.

Secondly, the Harriman-Guaranty syndicate, which reflected The Order, did not inform the State Department of its plans. As the attached letter from Washington to the London Embassy describes, the first information of the Harriman manganese [concession] came from the American Embassy in London, which picked it up from London newspaper reports.

State Department letter to U.S. Embassy in London (861.637/1):

November 14, 1924
Ray Atherton, Esquire
Secretary, American Embassy, London

Dear Mr. Atherton:

Please accept my thanks for your letter of October 30, 1924, transmitting a clipping from the Times of October 28, giving an account of the Prime Minister's speech in which reference is made to a concession granted to Americans for the manganese ore in Russia, and enclosing a confidential memorandum respecting the nature of the concession.

I appreciate your courtesy and thoughtfulness in the matter. The memorandum transmitted by you embodies the first information received by the Department concerning the concession other than that which has appeared in the public press.

Sincerely yours,

Evan E. Young

In other words, Averell Harriman (1913) sneaked an illegal project past the U.S. Government... And this was the man who was later to become the U.S. Ambassador to Russia. A month or so later came a letter from Department of Commerce asking for confirmation and more information. Apparently, Harriman didn't bother to inform Commerce either.

Commerce Department letter to State Department (861.637/5):

Department of Commerce

January 23, 1925

Hon. William J. Carr
Assistant Secretary of State
Department of State
Washington D.C.

Dear Mr. Carr:

We have a copy of confidential despatch No. 2565 to the Secretary of State from Minister F.W.B. Coleman at Riga, Latvia, in regard to a conversation with a Mr. P.?. Friedlander on the subject of Russia.

On page 7 of this report there is a paragraph which reads as follows:

"Megraf is the Agent of the Imperial and Foreign Corporation, which represents its own Harriman and Stinnes interest in the matter of the Chiaturi Manganese Concession... It appears from Mr. Friedlander's account that they have pooled their interest and are presenting a united front."

The subject of the Chiaturi Manganese concession is of great interest to the American Mineral Industry and its control by an American concern will have a notable effect on the steel industry of this country. For this reason, we are interested in obtaining the most reliable information possible on this subject and therefore request that you obtain for us, if possible, confirmation of the above report. We would like to know something more as to the reliability of Mr. Friedlander's statements and any further facts in this case that are procurable.

Very truly yours,

R.C. Miller, Liason Officer

The U.S. Government was not informed by W.A. Harriman or Guaranty Trust that they intended to invest $4 million developing Soviet manganese deposits. Yet this was clearly illegal and a move with obvious strategic consequences for the U.S... The truly extraordinary point is that the U.S. Government was not able to pursue an investigation.

We reproduce a memorandum from Evan E. Young in Division of Eastern European Affairs to Assistant Secretary of State Carr. Note this is a memorandum at the upper levels of the State Department... Carr scribbles on the bottom "I defer to your judgement upon this". The distinct impression is that some behind the scenes power was not to be challenged.

State Department internal memorandum (861.637/5):

Department of State
Division of East European Affairs

January 29, 1925

Dear Mr. Carr:

With respect to the attached letter from Mr. Miller, Liason Officer with the Department of Commerce, there are certain and very definite reasons why I consider it very unwise for the Department to initiate any investigation with respect to the reported manganese concession. I shall be glad to explain these reasons to you orally if you so desire.

Evan E. Young

The Order Makes Its Own Law

The Order kept a hold on every non-government strategic position related to the Soviet Union. Nothing appears to have escaped their attention. For example, the Anglo-Russian Chamber of Commerce was created in 1920 to promote trade with Russia...

The Chairman of its Executive Committee, the key post in the Chamber, was held by Samuel R. Bertron (The Order, 1885), a Vice President of Guaranty Trust and formerly a member of the 1917 Root Mission to Russia. Elihu Root, Chairman of the Mission, was of course the personal attorney to William Collins Whitney (1863), one of the key members of The Order.

The letter [below] from Bertron's Anglo-Russian Chamber of Commerce to [the] State Department is noteworthy because it asks the question: "What date trading in Russian credits was prohibited in the United States by Federal authorities?". This means that The Order was well aware in 1921 that "credits" to the U.S.S.R. were illegal and indeed were not made legal until President Roosevelt took office in 1933.

Letter from American-Russian Chamber of Commerce to State Department:

The American-Russian Chamber of Commerce

July 1st, 1921

State Department
Russian Division
Washington D.C.

Gentlemen:

Can you give us answers to the following questions?

1. What date the following banks in Russia were taken over by the Soviet Government:

• Banque International de Commerce, Petrograd
• Banque Russe Poure le Commerce Etranger, Petrograd
• Bank de Commerce De Volga Kama, Petrograd
• Bank de Commerce De L'A Zoff?on, Petrograd

2. What date trading in Russian credits was prohibited in the United States by Federal authorities.

Any assistance you may be able to render in the matter will be greatly appreciated.

Yours very truly,

Evelyn Hyde Siegel, Secretary

However, illegal or not within 18 months of this Bertron letter, Guaranty Trust established more than trading in Russian credits. Guaranty Trust made a joint banking agreement with the Soviets and installed a Guaranty Trust Vice President, Max May, as director in charge of the foreign division of this Soviet bank, the Ruskombank.

In brief, while the U.S. public was being assured by the U.S. Government that the Soviets were dastardly murderers, while "Reds" were being deported back to Russia by the Department of Justice, while every politician (almost without exception) was assuring the American public that the United States would have no relations with the Soviets -- while this barrage of lies was aimed at a gullible public, behind the scenes the Guaranty Trust Company was actually running a division of a Soviet bank! And American troops were being cheered by Soviet revolutionaries for helping protect the Revolution.

That, dear readers, is why governments need censorship. That's why even 50 years after some events, it is almost impossible for independent researchers (not the bootlickers) to get key documents declassified.

The Order's Law Firms

New York establishment law firms, several founded by members of The Order, have close links to banks and specifically those operational vehicles for revolution already cited.

Take the example of Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett which in the 1920s was located at 120 Broadway, New York. The firm was founded by Thomas Thacher (1871) in 1884. His son Thomas Day Thacher (1904) worked for the family law firm after leaving Yale and initiation into The Order.

The younger Thomas Thacher went to work for Henry L. Stimson (1888), a very active member of The Order discussed in Volume One of this series. About this time Thacher, who wrote The Order's statement on the Bolshevik Revolution, became friendly with both Felix Frankfurter and Raymond Robins. According to extensive documentation in the Lusk Committee files, both Frankfurter and Robins were of considerable assistance to the Soviets.

Another link between the 1917 Revolution and Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett is through the daughter of Thomas Anthony Thacher (1935) who married William Kent (1887) who we have linked to member Amos Pinchot in the case of intervention on behalf of the Soviets in Washington D.C.

Thomas D. Thacher (1904) was a member of the Red Cross Mission [to Russia] with Alan Wardwell, son of Thomas Wardwell, Standard Oil Treasurer and a partner in another Wall Street law firm, Stetson, Jennings & Russell. Eugene Stetson Jr., for example is in The Order (1934).

Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett represented the Soviet State Bank in the U.S. and was the vehicle used by The Order to inform State Department of activities that might otherwise be blocked by low level bureaucrats following the government rule book.

For example, in 1927, Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett informed the U.S. Government that the Soviets were in the process of substantially increasing deposits in the U.S. This increase was in preparation for the enourmous outlays to be channeled to a few favored U.S. firms to build the Soviet First Five Year Plan.

Letter from Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett to the State Department:

Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett
120 Broadway
New York

July 21, 1927

Dept. of State
Hon. R.E. Olds
Under-Secretary of State
Washington D.C.

Sir:

The State Bank of the U.S.S.R., although, as we are informed, its whole capital is owned by the Treasury Department (People's Commissariat of Finance) of the Soviet Government, is not itself the Soviet Government but a juridical entity, incorporated in November 1921 by edict of the Soviet Government, and capable of suing and being sued as an individual in the Soviet courts.

This Bank already has large sums on deposit in various banks in this country.

In view of the growing trade between companies in this country and the U.S.S.R. and the desire of the latter to increase this trade, the Bank would like to increase its deposits with banks in this country. Before advising the Bank to increase its deposits in the amounts it desires, we should like, if it is consistent for you to so favor us, to receive an expression of your opinion as to the traditional attitude of our Government with respect to such deposits.

As a practical matter, if we understand your views correctly, it seems to us there can be no reason why the Bank should not so increase its deposits notwithstanding our Government has not recognized the U.S.S.R.

Very respectfully yours,

Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett

What the Politicians Told American Citizens

All this Soviet-building activity recorded in the Lusk Committee and State Department files was carefully concealed from the American public. What the public was told can only be described as a pack of lies, from beginning to end.

[Take for example an] excerpt from a statement entitled "Foreign Relations" by the Honorable Frank B. Kellogg, Secretary of State, published by the Republican National Committee, Bulletin No. 5, 1928. Among the falsehoods promoted by Secretary Kellogg is the following:

"...the Government of the United States has maintained the position that it would be both futile and unwise to enter into relations with the Soviet Government."

In fact, at this very time the United States, with implicit government approval, was involved in planning the First Five Year Plan in Russia. The planning work was done actively by American firms. (This story has been described in my "Western Technology and Soviet Economic Development", published by the Hoover Institution at Stanford University).

Construction of the Soviet dialectic arm continued throughout the 1930s up to World War II. In 1941, W.A. Harriman (1913) was appointed Lend Lease Administrator to assure the flow of United States technology and products to the Soviet Union. Examination of Lend Lease records show that U.S. law was violated. The law required military goods only to be shipped. In fact, industrial equipment in extraordinary amounts was also shipped, [along with] Treasury Department currency plates so that the Soviets could freely print U.S. dollars[!]

In brief, the creation of the Soviet Union stems from The Order. The early survival of the Soviet Union stems from The Order. The development of the Soviet Union stems from The Order. But above all, this story has been concealed from the American public by politicians.