In article <bq0rqc$1kui$1@pencil.math.missouri.edu>, anon@mouse.com says...

FEMA - The Secret Government

By Harry V. Martin with research assistance from David Caul

Copyright FreeAmerica and Harry V. Martin, 1995

Some people have referred to it as the "secret government" of the
United States. It is not an elected body, it does not involve itself
in public disclosures, and it even has a quasi-secret budget in the
billions of dollars. This government organization has more power
than the President of the United States or the Congress, it has the
power to suspend laws, move entire populations, arrest and detain
citizens without a warrant and hold them without trial, it can seize
property, food supplies, transportation systems, and can suspend
the Constitution.

Not only is it the most powerful entity in the United States, but
it was not even created under Constitutional law by the Congress.
It was a product of a Presidential Executive Order. No, it is not
the U.S. military nor the Central Intelligence Agency, they are
subject to Congress. The organization is called FEMA, which stands
for the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Originally conceived
in the Richard Nixon Administration, it was refined by President
Jimmy Carter and given teeth in the Ronald Reagan and George Bush
Administrations.

FEMA had one original concept when it was created, to assure the
survivability of the United States government in the event of a
nuclear attack on this nation. It was also provided with the task
of being a federal coordinating body during times of domestic
disasters, such as earthquakes, floods and hurricanes. Its awesome
powers grow under the tutelage of people like Lt. Col. Oliver North
and General Richard Secord, the architects on the Iran-Contra scandal
and the looting of America's savings and loan institutions. FEMA
has even been given control of the State Defense Forces, a rag-tag,
often considered neo-Nazi, civilian army that will substitute for
the National Guard, if the Guard is called to duty overseas.

THE MOST POWERFUL ORGANIZATION IN THE UNITED STATES

Though it may be the most powerful organization in the United States,
few people know it even exists. But it has crept into our private
lives. Even mortgage papers contain FEMA's name in small print if
the property in question is near a flood plain. FEMA was deeply
involved in the Los Angeles riots and the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake
in the San Francisco Bay Area. Some of the black helicopter traffic
reported throughout the United States, but mainly in the West,
California, Washington, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas and Colorado,
are flown by FEMA personnel. FEMA has been given responsibility for
many new disasters including urban forest fires, home heating
emergencies, refugee situations, urban riots, and emergency planning
for nuclear and toxic incidents. In the West, it works in conjunction
with the Sixth Army.

FEMA was created in a series of Executive Orders. A Presidential
Executive Order, whether Constitutional or not, becomes law simply
by its publication in the Federal Registry. Congress is by-passed.
Executive Order Number 12148 created the Federal Emergency Management
Agency that is to interface with the Department of Defense for civil
defense planning and funding. An "emergency czar" was appointed.
FEMA has only spent about 6 percent of its budget on national
emergencies, the bulk of their funding has been used for the
construction of secret underground facilities to assure continuity
of government in case of a major emergency, foreign or domestic.
Executive Order Number 12656 appointed the National Security Council
as the principal body that should consider emergency powers. This
allows the government to increase domestic intelligence and
surveillance of U.S. citizens and would restrict the freedom of
movement within the United States and grant the government the right
to isolate large groups of civilians. The National Guard could be 
federalized to seal all borders and take control of U.S. air space
and all ports of entry.

Here are just a few Executive Orders associated with FEMA that would
suspend the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. These Executive
Orders have been on record for nearly 30 years and could be enacted
by the stroke of a Presidential pen:

* EXECUTIVE ORDER 10990 allows the government to take over all modes
of transportation and control of highways and seaports.

* EXECUTIVE ORDER 10995 allows the government to seize and control
the communication media.

* EXECUTIVE ORDER 10997 allows the government to take over all
electrical power, gas, petroleum, fuels and minerals.

* EXECUTIVE ORDER 10998 allows the government to take over all food
resources and farms.

* EXECUTIVE ORDER 11000 allows the government to mobilize civilians
into work brigades under government supervision.

* EXECUTIVE ORDER 11001 allows the government to take over all
health, education and welfare functions.

* EXECUTIVE ORDER 11002 designates the Postmaster General to operate
a national registration of all persons.

* EXECUTIVE ORDER 11003 allows the government to take over all
airports and aircraft, including commercial aircraft.

* EXECUTIVE ORDER 11004 allows the Housing and Finance Authority
to relocate communities, build new housing with public funds,
designate areas to be abandoned, and establish new locations for
populations.

* EXECUTIVE ORDER 11005 allows the government to take over railroads,
inland waterways and public storage facilities.

* EXECUTIVE ORDER 11051 specifies the responsibility of the Office
of Emergency Planning and gives authorization to put all Executive
Orders into effect in times of increased international tensions and
economic or financial crisis.

* EXECUTIVE ORDER 11310 grants authority to the Department of Justice
to enforce the plans set out in Executive Orders, to institute
industrial support, to establish judicial and legislative liaison,
to control all aliens, to operate penal and correctional institutions,
and to advise and assist the President.

* EXECUTIVE ORDER 11049 assigns emergency preparedness function to
federal departments and agencies, consolidating 21 operative Executive
Orders issued over a fifteen year period.

* EXECUTIVE ORDER 11921 allows the Federal Emergency Preparedness
Agency to develop plans to establish control over the mechanisms
of production and distribution, of energy sources, wages, salaries,
credit and the flow of money in U.S. financial institution in any
undefined national emergency. It also provides that when a state
of emergency is declared by the President, Congress cannot review
the action for six months.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency has broad powers in every
aspect of the nation. General Frank Salzedo, chief of FEMA's Civil
Security Division stated in a 1983 conference that he saw FEMA's
role as a "new frontier in the protection of individual and
governmental leaders from assassination, and of civil and military
installations from sabotage and/or attack, as well as prevention
of dissident groups from gaining access to U.S. opinion, or a global
audience in times of crisis."

FEMA's powers were consolidated by President Carter to incorporate:

* the National Security Act of 1947, which allows for the strategic
relocation of industries, services, government and other essential
economic activities, and to rationalize the requirements for manpower,
resources and production facilities;

* the 1950 Defense Production Act, which gives the President sweeping
powers over all aspects of the economy;

* the Act of August 29, 1916, which authorizes the Secretary of the
Army, in time of war, to take possession of any transportation
system for transporting troops, material, or any other purpose
related to the emergency; and

* the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, which enables
the President to seize the property of a foreign country or national.

These powers were transferred to FEMA in a sweeping consolidation
in 1979.

HURRICANE ANDREW FOCUSED ATTENTION ON FEMA

FEMA's deceptive role really did not come to light with much of the
public until Hurricane Andrew smashed into the U.S. mainland. As
Russell R. Dynes, director of the Disaster Research Center of the
University of Delaware, wrote in The World and I, "...The eye of
the political storm hovered over the Federal Emergency Management
Agency. FEMA became a convenient target for criticism." Because
FEMA was accused of dropping the ball in Florida, the media and
Congress commenced to study this agency. What came out of the
critical look was that FEMA was spending 12 times more for "black
operations" than for disaster relief. It spent $1.3 billion building
secret bunkers throughout the United States in anticipation of
government disruption by foreign or domestic upheaval. Yet fewer
than 20 members of Congress , only members with top security
clearance, know of the $1.3 billion expenditure by FEMA for non-natural
disaster situations. These few Congressional leaders state that
FEMA has a "black curtain" around its operations. FEMA has worked
on National Security programs since 1979, and its predecessor, the
Federal Emergency Preparedness Agency, has secretly spent millions
of dollars before being merged into FEMA by President Carter in
1979.

FEMA has developed 300 sophisticated mobile units that are capable
of sustaining themselves for a month. The vehicles are located in
five areas of the United States. They have tremendous communication
systems and each contains a g

nerator that would provide power to

120 homes each, but have never been used for disaster relief.

FEMA's enormous powers can be triggered easily. In any form of
domestic or foreign problem, perceived and not always actual,
emergency powers can be enacted. The President of the United States
now has broader powers to declare martial law, which activates
FEMA's extraordinary powers. Martial law can be declared during
time of increased tension overseas, economic problems within the
United States, such as a depression, civil unrest, such as
demonstrations or scenes like the Los Angeles riots, and in a drug
crisis. These Presidential powers have increased with successive
Crime Bills, particularly the 1991 and 1993 Crime Bills, which
increase the power to suspend the rights guaranteed under the
Constitution and to seize property of those suspected of being drug
dealers, to individuals who participate in a public protest or
demonstration. Under emergency plans already in existence, the power
exists to suspend the Constitution and turn over the reigns of
government to FEMA and appointing military commanders to run state
and local governments. FEMA then would have the right to order the
detention of anyone whom there is reasonable ground to believe...will
engage in, or probably conspire with others to engage in acts of
espionage or sabotage. The plan also authorized the establishment
of concentration camps for detaining the accused, but no trial.

Three times since 1984, FEMA stood on the threshold of taking control
of the nation. Once under President Reagan in 1984, and twice under
President Bush in 1990 and 1992. But under those three scenarios,
there was not a sufficient crisis to warrant risking martial law.
Most experts on the subject of FEMA and Martial Law insisted that
a crisis has to appear dangerous enough for the people of the United
States before they would tolerate or accept complete government
takeover. The typical crisis needed would be threat of imminent
nuclear war, rioting in several U.S. cites simultaneously, a series
of national disasters that affect widespread danger to the populous,
massive terrorist attacks, a depression in which tens of millions
are unemployed and without financial resources, or a major environmental
disaster.

THREE TIMES FEMA STOOD BY READY FOR EMERGENCY

In April 1984, President Reagan signed Presidential Director Number
54 that allowed FEMA to engage in a secret national "readiness
exercise" under the code name of REX 84. The exercise was to test
FEMA's readiness to assume military authority in the event of a
"State of Domestic National Emergency" concurrent with the launching
of a direct United States military operation in Central America.
The plan called for the deputation of U.S. military and National
Guard units so that they could legally be used for domestic law
enforcement. These units would be assigned to conduct sweeps and
take into custody an estimated 400,000 undocumented Central American
immigrants in the United States. The immigrants would be interned
at 10 detention centers to be set up at military bases throughout
the country.

REX 84 was so highly guarded that special metal security doors were
placed on the fifth floor of the FEMA building in Washington, D.C.
Even long-standing employees of the Civil Defense of the Federal
Executive Department possessing the highest possible security
clearances were not being allowed through the newly installed metal
security doors. Only personnel wearing a special red Christian cross
or crucifix lapel pin were allowed into the premises. Lt. Col. North
was responsible for drawing up the emergency plan, which U.S.
Attorney General William French Smith opposed vehemently. The plan
called for the suspension of the Constitution, turning control of
the government over to FEMA, appointment of military commanders to
run state and local governments and the declaration of Martial Law.
The Presidential Executive Orders to support such a plan were already
in place. The plan also advocated the rounding up and transfer to
"assembly centers or relocation camps" of a least 21 million American
Negroes in the event of massive rioting or disorder, not unlike the
rounding up of the Jews in Nazi Germany in the 1930s.

The second known time that FEMA stood by was in 1990 when Desert
Storm was enacted. Prior to President Bush's invasion of Iraq, FEMA
began to draft new legislation to increase its already formidable
powers. One of the elements incorporated into the plan was to set
up operations within any state or locality without the prior
permission of local or state authorities. Such prior permission has
always been required in the past. Much of the mechanism being set
into place was in anticipation of the economic collapse of the
Western World. The war with Iraq may have been conceived as a ploy
to boost the bankrupt economy, but it only pushed the West into
deeper recession.

The third scenario for FEMA came with the Los Angeles riots after
the Rodney King brutality verdict. Had the rioting spread to other
cities, FEMA would have been empowered to step in. As it was, major
rioting only occurred in the Los Angeles area, thus preventing a
pretext for a FEMA response.

On July 5, 1987, the Miami Herald published reports on FEMA's new
goals. The goal was to suspend the Constitution in the event of a
national crisis, such as nuclear war, violent and widespread internal
dissent, or national opposition to a U.S. military invasion abroad.
Lt. Col. North was the architect. National Security Directive Number
52 issued in August 1982, pertains to the "Use of National Guard
Troops to Quell Disturbances."

The crux of the problem is that FEMA has the power to turn the
United States into a police state in time of a real crisis or a
manufactured crisis. Lt. Col. North virtually established the
apparatus for dictatorship. Only the criticism of the Attorney
General prevented the plans from being adopted. But intelligence
reports indicate that FEMA has a folder with 22 Executive Orders
for the President to sign in case of an emergency. It is believed
those Executive Orders contain the framework of North's concepts,
delayed by criticism but never truly abandoned.

The crisis, as the government now see it, is civil unrest. For
generations, the government was concerned with nuclear war, but the
violent and disruptive demonstrations that surrounded the Vietnam
War era prompted President Nixon to change the direction of emergency
powers from war time to times of domestic unrest. Diana Raynolds,
program director of the Edward R. Murrow Center, summed up the
dangers of FEMA today and the public reaction to Martial Law in a
drug crisis: "It was James Madison's worst nightmare that a righteous
faction would someday be strong enough to sweep away the Constitutional
restraints designed by the framers to prevent the tyranny of
centralized power, excessive privilege, an arbitrary governmental
authority over the individual. These restraints, the balancing and
checking of powers among branches and layers of government, and the
civil guarantees, would be the first casualties in a drug-induced
national security state with Reagan's Civil Emergency Preparedness
unleashed. Nevertheless, there would be those who would welcome NSC
(National Security Council) into the drug fray, believing that
increasing state police powers to emergency levels is the only way
left to fight American's enemy within. In the short run, a national
security state would probably be a relief to those whose personal
security and quality of life has been diminished by drugs or drug
related crime. And, as the general public watches the progression
of institutional chaos and social decay, they too may be willing
to pay the ultimate price, one drug free America for 200 years of
democracy."

The first targets in any FEMA emergency would be Hispanics and
Blacks, the FEMA orders call for them to be rounded up and detained.
Tax protesters, demonstrators against government military intervention
outside U.S. borders, and people who maintain weapons in their homes
are also targets. Operation Trojan Horse is a program designed to
learn the identity of potential opponents to martial law. The program
lures potential protesters into public forums, conducted by a "hero"
of the people who advocates survival training. The list of names
gathered at such meetings and rallies are computerized and then
targeted in case of an emergency.

The most shining example of America to the world has been its
peaceful transition of government from one administration to another.
Despite crises of great magnitude, the United States has maintained
its freedom and liberty. This nation now stands on the threshold
of rule by non-elected people asserting non-Constitutional powers.
Even Congress cannot review a Martial Law action until six months
after it has been declared. For the first time in American history,
the reigns of government would not be transferred from one elected
element to another, but the Constitution, itself, can be suspended.

The scenarios established to trigger FEMA into action are generally
found in the society today, economic collapse, civil unrest, drug
problems, terrorist attacks, and protests against American intervention
in a foreign country. All these premises exist, it could only be a
matter of time in which one of these triggers the entire emergency
necessary to bring FEMA into action, and then it may be too late,
because under the FEMA plan, there is no contingency by which
Constitutional power is restored.