Gore's
security problems date back even further and are more
serious than Clinton's. Gore began his relationship with
his father's close friend and employer, Armand Hammer,
when he was a small boy.
Hammer, a Soviet paymaster and super-spy, went into
the bull-breeding business with Gore Sr., placing the
Tennessee senator on his payroll in 1950 when Gore was
still in Congress. In return for Hammer's generosity, Gore
Sr. bailed his mentor, a stock swindler and art forger, out
of his frequent brushes with the law. He also attempted to
convince several U.S presidential administrations to cut
deals that favored Hammer and his Russian masters.
Hammer further rewarded the senator's efforts with an
insider deal consisting of thousands of shares of Hooker
Chemical Co. stock, which Hammer's Occidental
Petroleum was about to acquire. Hooker made things
like fertilizers and metal-coating chemicals.
One of Hooker's plants was located on Grand Island,
N.Y., which disposed of its waste and other harmful
byproducts into an adjacent waterway called the "Love
Canal."
"Al Gore [who currently controls his late father's stock in
the company] takes credit for helping cure the 'Love
Canal' pollution. He should! He helped cause it!" said
Dan Schaitberger, a former Hooker employee.
Hammer made Gore Sr. executive vice president of
Occidental Petroleum after Bill Brock soundly defeated
Gore in his reelection bid in 1970. And Hammer
subsequently named Gore to a similar position in Island
Creek Coal Co. after Gore managed to get the fuel
company out of a long-term contract with the Tennessee
Valley Authority and to substitute another contract much
more favorable to Island Creek. The former senator also
helped paper over a number of toxic waste spills by the
company.
Hammer also showered his favors on Albert Jr., helping
underwrite his successful run for Congress in 1976 as
well as all of his subsequent races. During young Gore's
abortive 1988 presidential bid, Hammer unsuccessfully
attempted to persuade Democrat Sen. Paul Simon of
Illinois to drop out of his home-state's primary in favor of
Gore. Hammer promised Simon a cabinet position in the
Gore administration if he did. Shocked, Simon remained
in the primary and trounced Gore.
Gore accompanied Hammer to Moscow where Hammer
received a peace prize from an international group of
anti-nuclear scientists. Gore later praised Hammer at a
reception in New York for his "patriotism."
But as bad as Gore's compromise with Hammer was, it
was even worse with former Russian premier Viktor
Chernomyrdin. The two served on a joint commission
that was supposed to smooth out relations between the
U.S. and Russia. The commission was also supposed to
come to the assistance of American businessmen who
were threatened with death or beaten by members of the
Russian mafia. But as WorldNetDaily has reported, Gore
and his staff largely ignored pleas of Americans who
were subjected to such brutal treatment.
Between 1993 and 1999, billions of dollars of foreign aid
intended to help ordinary Russians was instead diverted
to the pockets of high-ranking officials who ruled Russia
and members of the Russian mob, or siphoned off and
deposited in offshore bank accounts to be laundered.
It has also recently come to light that, in 1995, Gore and
Chernomyrdin signed a secret deal for Russia to build a
nuclear reactor for Iran. This deal, which has been widely
reported, also specified that Russia could sell a
diesel-powered submarine, T-72 tanks and other arms to
Iran. Arms sent to Iran from Russia since the early 1990s
include advanced Kilo-class submarines, torpedoes,
anti-ship mines, and hundreds of tanks and armored
personnel carriers.
"How in the world can this country trust a man like Al
Gore who owes his personal fortune to a fully recruited
Soviet agent, Armand Hammer?" Michael Waller asked.
"Al Gore Jr. grew up with a Soviet agent, and if he
(Gore) were to be nominated as an assistant secretary for
some department, he couldn't be nominated, because he
is a security risk," he added.
In her forthcoming book, "The Betrayal of Liberty,"
veteran journalist Anne Williamson recounts an encounter
she had with Moscow's assistant chief of the KGB during
Christmas of 1994. Williamson, an expert on
Soviet-Russian affairs who has written for the Wall Street
Journal and the New York Times, asked the security
official whether it was true the KGB had picked up the
tab for Gore Jr.'s room service orders at the high-toned
Fairfax Hotel in Washington (where he spent his
formative years) and his Harvard tuition.
"After a thoughtful pause, the man responded, 'He's not
our first Harvard graduate, of course, but I do believe
he's our first St. Albans' (a Washington prep school)
boy,'" Williamson wrote.
As bad security risks as Waller and Timmerman believe
Clinton and Gore are, they have another prize candidate,
Strobe Talbott, the State Department's number two man
and Clinton's Oxford roommate. Talbott made his
journalistic bones by tagging along with a well-known
KGB agent named Victor Louis. Louis leaked Nikita
Khruschev's diaries and insisted that Talbott, a young
employee in Time's Moscow bureau, go along with the
deal. Talbott thus became a member of the magazine's
inner circle.
Timmerman testified last year to the House International
Relations Committee that Talbott's support of Russia and
Boris Yeltsin was unwavering and uncritical in the face of
mounting evidence of organized corruption. He also said
that Iran's Shahad and Kosar missile programs would not
exist without Talbott. The Shahad-3 missiles are now
deployed in southwestern Iran and are capable of
targeting Israel with nuclear, chemical or biological
warheads.
The editor of Middle East Defense News, Timmerman
said, "Despite having detailed intelligence on Russia's
involvement with the Iranian missile programs, the U.S.
government failed to press the Russians in any meaningful
or effective way. And the official who played the greatest
role in this disaster was Deputy Secretary of State Strobe
Talbott. If we had intervened with the Russians when the
Israelis first came to us in late 1996, the Shahab missile
would never have been tested successfully two years
later."
Timmerman, Waller and other Russia intelligence experts
interviewed by WND, while not labeling Clinton, Gore
and Talbot out-and-out agents, accused the trio of being
unduly influenced by Russia and her policies.
"It's not a healthy situation, and I hope the country has
enough sense to avoid something like this in the future,"
Waller said.
Related stories:
Gore condoned Russian mafia?
CIA official: Gore compromised by secret past
Gore's, Talbott's Red Russian roots
Related column:
Chernomyrdin bucks Bushwhack
Charles C. Thompson II, a network news veteran and
former producer of both ABC's "20/20" and CBS's
"60 Minutes," is the author of "A Glimpse of Hell:
The Explosion on the U.S.S. Iowa and Its Cover-Up."
An experienced print journalist, Tony Hays' recent
20-part series on narcotics trafficking received an
award from the Tennessee Press Association. |
