gordon gray interview

[flowperson]

Here's a litttle something on the chronology of Gordon Gray's responsibilities during the Truman Administration. Not much specificity here as you would expect from someone who was deeply immersed in secret agendas, but nevertheless it gives us a flavor of how confusing it was to work under such circumstances.

Obviously, HST thought very highly of him. After reading this interview, Gray seems somewhat less sinister to me.

flow....

http://www.trumanlibrary.org/oralhist/gray.htm

[flowperson]

I obviously pushed a wrong button on this one somehow. This thread should be deleted and the post be added to the discussion of chapt.72.

flow....

[Elizabeth Helen Drake]

Thank you Flow for this. I got some " vibrations " off of this. what do you think.

"Then, just to follow that up, briefly (this takes us beyond the Truman period), when Eisenhower was elected he set up a committee which was given the euphemistic title of "The President's Committee on International Information Affairs" or something, headed up by--guess who again--Bill Jackson. I was on this committee, and we wrote a report which I think has never been fully declassified. A sanitized version was put out, but at that time the report recommended, and the President agreed, that the PSB be abolished, and the OCB, the Operations Coordinating Board, be created in its place. And the OCB then continued until President [John F.] Kennedy was elected, when he just swept away everything. The OCB was a very useful thing; and I think the PSB had been the necessary, although wobbly, precursor to the OCB. I think we couldn't have had an effective OCB without the experiences of

[57]

the PSB, but that may be rationalization. I guess that the PSB was the last job I did for President Truman,

MCKINZIE: Did you ever speak with him about the PSB?

GRAY: Oh, yes, and all I got was, "Do the best you can." He swore me in as Director of PSB and I've got a nice little picture of the swearing-in, among many others from him. He always wrote, "With thanks and appreciation to my friend Gordon Gray;" and then he wrote on the back of this picture something like this: (and I had that double-framed, also hanging in my office) "Gordon, if I had a thousand like you I’d be in clover, but thank God for giving me your services anyhow."

He keeps mentioning , over and over ... Bill Jackson ... whoever he was.... and then out of nowhere and I have the same silly sense for words that you do .... there comes the word .... you saw it too? WOBBLY.

All the inspiration I need to look harder at the operation ofthe PSB and then the OCB. Thanks Flow. It might be a dead end but its sure worth tracking down.

And I am reminded of something that Morgan said was one of Dr. Browns standard pieces of advice to him " Talk for an hour but don't say anything." Thats I think basically what we are seeing here. But it does put a good face on the man, better than just the other print that some of us have seen. Thanks again. Elizabeth

[twigsnapper]

And Gordon Grays last words were a telling hallmark of someone in the intelligence gathering world.

"I see time is passing and I don’t know what--I've given you very little opportunity to ask questions"

Precisely. twigsnapper

[kevin.b]

Chapel Hill and fraternity, is what I saw,
Everyone knows everyone else.
Better the devil you know?

Also in 44 in Luxembourg he was setting up a shortwave radio communications system to this country( U.S.A )
Kevin

[flowperson]

Hi Elizabeth...Yes I did notice the reference to "wobbly". My recollection is that was a commonly used term, mostly used by Brits around that time, for something going "off track" from that which had been intended or predicted. It was also used in reference to human behaviors which somehow deviated from the norm. Maybe we're reading too much into TTB's use of the term, but probably not. The man always knew just what he was looking at and for.

Bill Jackson was William Harding Jackson, a Congressman if I recall, who had some oversight over these types of HST operations.

Mr. Twigsnapper... Yes overwhelming and confusing the issues to be asked about. Poor Mr. McKenzie, eh?

However in this case, the PSB and similar seed groups that Gray was active in on behalf of HST beginning in 1947 bloomed later on into the "Project Mockingbird" operation started up under the auspices of the CIA's Frank Wisner. Mockingbird set nothing less than a goal of manufacturing and shaping U.S. and world opinion in the media to suit the CIA's agenda. It all sounds so familiar these days also.

A book probably needs to be written about Gray, but if anything, there'd probably be more rabbit holes to be explored than in TTB's life...Ugh !

Kevin..That's the devil as in "Blue Devil" me thinks. Another remarkable "coincidence" about your son attending Chapel Hill, eh?

I'll just bet those blue-eyed blonde Tar Heel cheerleader types really did go for your "hobbit" offspring. Such is life my friend.

flow....

[Trickfox]

And Gordon Grays last words were a telling hallmark of someone in the intelligence gathering world.

"I see time is passing and I don’t know what--I've given you very little opportunity to ask questions"

Precisely. twigsnapper

What an absolutely wonderful trick to deal with the media....

Just keep talking about anything but the subject that they want to ask you about. You can go around in circles introducing more and more interesting and provocative information until your guest becomes less and less concerned about asking those tricky questions that you cant possibly answer anyhow.

Sounds like that is exactly what happened to those people who were making inquiries on the Philadelphia experiment, and the Roswell crash.

Is that why we learned that EBEs enjoyed Strawberry Ice cream as their favorite earth food in that program (UFO coverup live)? Of course, that information is much more interesting than the frequency of their brain waves .

Trickfox

[Elizabeth Helen Drake]

Actually Paul, instead of moving this category, can we leave it just as it is? It strikes me that a discussion of someone named GRAY is a good spot to use as a platform for other discussions about activities and people who are not in the black world nor totally in the white ... but with interests and abilities that straddle both worlds, (as I am sure Mr. Gray was capable of doing). I think that there is probably much that we can learn from his career and his associations.

Short wave in 1944? Communications?

All these great alphabet soup organizations which seemed to spring to life and then disappear again ... but which had later associations with operations such as "Mockingbird"?

There are enough loose threads there to draw my full and undivided attention. So .... I think that we are going to need this category if its alright. Much to learn here. Elizabeth

[Paul S.]

Actually Paul, instead of moving this category, can we leave it just as it is?

The "Defying Gravity" section is ONLY for topics bearing chapter title headings. If I had that level of control, I'd be the only one who can create topics there. But I haven't figured out how to do that yet.

So I moved this thread to "General Discussion." I don't think anybody will have trouble finding it here.

--PS

[Paul S.]

...pesky acronyms...

. A sanitized version was put out, but at that time the report recommended, and the President agreed, that the PSB be abolished, and the OCB, the Operations Coordinating Board, be created in its place.

What was the "PSB" ?

--PS

[flowperson]

Hi Paul...Thanks for moving my boo-boo.

PSB ? You're gonna like this one, "Psychological Strategy Board". Why did the HST administration move so decisively to plot and manipulate psychological situations concerning public perceptions and opinions. And especially so right after the massive security reorganization of the Government in 1947?

Nukes, intercontinental bombers, and missles maybe. But I tend to see this as part of a wider reaction to craft crashes and weird experiences concerning the occupants. I'm still most closely tied to Vallee's viewpoint concerning psychotronic effects being a common feature of these sorts of encounters.

Looking at it this way, you could even say that The Day The Earth Stood Still was an early attempt to put the whole set of experiences more into the identifiable realm of human expperiences rather than into some fantastical scenario, even though that might have been more compatible with actual experiences.

Psychological Strategy Board
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The Psychological Strategy Board was a committee of the United States executive formed to coordinate and plan for psychological operations. It was formed on April 4, 1951, during the Truman administration. The board was composed of the Under Secretary of State, the Deputy Secretary of Defense, and the Director of Central Intelligence, or their designated representatives.[1] The board's first director was Gordon Gray, later National Security Advisor during the Eisenhower administration.

Under Eisenhower, the board became a purely coordinating body. The board's function was reviewed by the Jackson Committee, chaired by William Harding Jackson, set up to propose future United States Government information and psychological warfare programs. The committee concluded that the board had been established on the assumption that psychological strategy could be conducted separately from official policy and actions, an assumption the committee disagreed with.[2] It was abolished September 3, 1953 by Executive Order, with its responsibilities being transferred to the Operations Coordinating Board.


Operations Coordinating Board
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The Operations Coordinating Board was a committee of the United States Executive created in 1953 by President Eisenhower's Executive Order 10483. The board, which reported to the National Security Council was responsible for integrating the implementation of national security policies across several agencies.

The board's membership was to include the Under Secretary of State, who was to chair the board, the Deputy Secretary of Defense, the Director of the Foreign Operations Administration, the Director of Central Intelligence, and the President's Special Assistant for Psychological Warfare. Also authorized to attend were the President's Special Assistant for National Security Affairs and the Director of the United States Information Agency.

The creation of the board was a recommendation of the Jackson Committee, chaired by William Harding Jackson, set-up to propose future United States Government information and psychological warfare programs. The same committee recommended the existing Psychological Strategy Board be abolished.[1]

The Operations Coordinating Board was abolished by President Kennedy on February 19, 1961.

Yet another reason that black ops people didn't think much of JFK maybe

flow....

[Paul S.]

...second draft...

Looking at it this way, you could even say that The Day The Earth Stood Still was an early attempt to put the whole set of experiences more into the identifiable realm of human expperiences rather than into some fantastical scenario, even though that might have been more compatible with actual experiences.

Yeah, and I didn't even mention that Dr. Brown closed his office/lab (I think this was in LA in 1951) and took anybody he could find to see that movie. "Was one of his favorites," I think Linda has said.

Just another detail to get plugged in when I get to the re-write.

--PS

[Langley]

Here's a litttle something on the chronology of Gordon Gray's responsibilities during the Truman Administration. Not much specificity here as you would expect from someone who was deeply immersed in secret agendas, but nevertheless it gives us a flavor of how confusing it was to work under such circumstances.

Obviously, HST thought very highly of him. After reading this interview, Gray seems somewhat less sinister to me.

flow....

http://www.trumanlibrary.org/oralhist/gray.htm

For the record:

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/artic ... -1,00.html

Given the scenario at Los Alamos as we have previously discussed, ie that the spy ring wasnt fully identified, and given Oppies mystic turn, in the context of the time, well OK.


I guess.

[Elizabeth Helen Drake]

Langley,

Thankyou for that link, which I have just read and found fascinating.

I had to smile at this part:

Teller: I do not want to suggest any [disloyalty]. I know Dr. Oppenheimer as an intellectually most alert and a very complicated person, and I think it would be presumptuous and wrong on my part if I would try in any way to analyze his motives. But I have always assumed, and I now assume, that he is loyal to the United States. I believe this, and I shall believe it until I see very conclusive proof to the opposite.

Q: Do you or do you not believe that Dr. Oppenheimer is a security risk? A: In a great number of cases I have seen Dr. Oppenheimer act—I understood that Dr. Oppenheimer acted—in a way which for me was exceedingly hard to understand. I thoroughly disagreed with him in numerous issues, and his actions frankly appeared to me confused and complicated. To this extent I feel that I would like to see the vital interests of this country in hands which I understand better, and therefore trust more. In this very limited sense I would like to express a feeling that I would feel personally more secure if public matters would rest in other hands"

It seems that in this case too Dr. Teller was faced with a situation that he did not understand.

And I thought suddenly ... if your whole viewpoint was focused on anti communist/Russian idealogogies perhaps he could only see a threat ( or another operating entity in the situation) as either Communist or non Communist. Its another Either / Or situation. Perhaps there was something else ( another Group with a wildly different agenda) operating in the middle of all of this. Perhaps a Group that Oppenheimer knew about but could hardly mention. They say that his views became more and more "mystical". What did they mean by that directly?

Are we perhaps seeing the fingerprints of a Group that others did not even know was operating in their own sphere of influence? Hiding in plain sight Paul keeps saying.

And I am sorry to hark back to the old movie " Enigma" but do you remember the line at the end of the movie about the character Claire? Paraphrasing here .... "as long as she is out there she will be a sword over your head." They never explained in that movie who Claire represented. But she was definitely a free agent with her own agenda.

Elizabeth

[Langley]

Langley,

Thankyou for that link, which I have just read and found fascinating.

I had to smile at this part.......(break in quote)



Are we perhaps seeing the fingerprints of a Group that others did not even know was operating in their own sphere of influence? Hiding in plain sight Paul keeps saying.

And I am sorry to hark back to the old movie " Enigma" but do you remember the line at the end of the movie about the character Claire? Paraphrasing here .... "as long as she is out there she will be a sword over your head." They never explained in that movie who Claire represented. But she was definitely a free agent with her own agenda.

Elizabeth

Well thats interesting Elizabeth. Oppy would have been receptive to that Group. and vice versa. But there was stuff going on beneath the radar.

but this was going on at the same time and the AEC didnt want blabbers in its midst. http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m ... 83520/pg_1

And it could also explain in part perhaps why the FBI tracked Brown. Given his association with Shank, and the documented history of Pugwash movement.

I cant see Oppy staying quiet in that context. And thats the difficulty for me. for I think Gray was under the spell of the AEC. If Brown was upset at the Cesium thing, well imagine Oppy having security clearance for the H bomb which would have given him access to the Sunshine data. I dont think it was the Hbomb design they were worried about re Oppie but the fallout study. They wanted him off the field. Placed in the same basket as Spock, Pauling, and had Brown not had his back watched, him also.