Friday, July 27, 2007

The Bombshell Truth About Tal Brooke and His Connection to the U.S. Information Agency and CIA



©2004LisaDeWitt

Christian fundamentalist Tal Brooke was the first person to make lurid accusations against the famous Indian holy man, Sathya Sai Baba in his book, Lord of the Air. In the first of several revised incarnations Lord of the Air was published under his legal name, Robert Taliaferro Brooke, by Lion Publishing in 1976. The cover description in Lord of the Air reads, "As a student Tal Brooke had sought truth in the teachings of Timothy Leary, in psychoanalysis, in mysticism and TM..." The 1990 edition again titled Lord of the Air, then retitled Avatar of Night in 1999, was published by Harvest House Publishers-a Christian owned publishing company. Just two years earlier, in 1988, former CIA Director and then U.S. Vice President, George H. W. Bush chose Harvest House Publishers to print and market his autobiography, Man of Integrity. There was a photo of Bush Sr. with the Harvest House owner, Bob Hawkins Sr. on the company website until this article was published and that page has since been removed. The archived link is posted below in the reference section. You may have to re-enter the link into the archive.org. wayback machine to see the page.

In another twist, Tal Brooke admits to taking LSD and being involved with a group called the Neo-American Church (new members received five peyote buttons and a membership card). The Neo-American Church was a pro-LSD organization founded by Arthur Kleps, a follower of LSD guru
Timothy Leary
. Kleps was alleged to be anti-semitic, first by the Dutch police who expelled him from the Netherlands and later a church associate who was so disturbed by Klep's fascist ideology he separated his Colorado-based Neo-American Church from Kleps. This should probably come as no surprise given the name of Klep's organization.

Tal Brooke, who graduated from the
1963 Class of George Mason High School in Falls Church, Virginia, has also used the alias Tai Brooke. Brooke writes very little about
his family in Avatar of Night, other than to say
his father was an American diplomat in London and an
atheist. In the preface of a book titled
Harvest co-written with Chuck Smith, Brooke also wrote, "I grew up in an atheistic home." In a later interview with Dan Wooding on Brooke's Spiritual Counterfeits website he revises his father's belief system to agnostic. In his mother's obituary on the savannahnow.com website, Tal Brooke's father's name is listed as Edgar Duffield Brooke. According to a National Security Files memorandum from the Kennedy Library, Edgar D. Brooke was appointed Director of Media Content for the U.S. Information Agency (USIA) by Edward R. Murrow in 1961. This bombshell evidence, which Tal Brooke has failed to reveal, shows Brooke's father was in charge of the worldwide distribution of propaganda during one of the U.S.'s most racist periods in history. Famous civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. would be assassinated in 1968 and in 1971 it would be revealed there was a COINTEL program to discredit blacks and other worldwide organizations considered to be a threat to the U.S. agenda.

This information regarding Brooke's father opens the question as to Tal Brooke's true purpose in going to India in the late sixties. When Tal Brooke left India after two years, he alleges he had just canceled the publication of his pro-Sai Baba book and feared retaliation. Brooke opines in his book
(1990 Harvest House edition),"What the enemy might do I had long ago anticipated, was trump up a civil offense charge against me that would be enough to incarcerate me for years."
In a conversation with an inspector, Brooke further opines, "Listen to me. I came here on a diplomatic passport. Do you think I came here to do anything other than my intended mission of inquiry?" Since a person with a diplomatic passport has diplomatic immunity, Brooke's fear doesn't make sense. The only way Brooke could most likely lose his diplomatic immunity is if he had been found to be a spy.

So the question is, why was Brooke traveling under a diplomatic passport and why was Brooke so afraid of being held even though he had a diplomatic passport? What was his intended mission of inquiry? Was he a spy?

This would certainly explain why Prime Minister Vajpayee and two former Chief Justices of the Supreme Court of India have signed a public statement declaring the allegations against Sathya Sai Baba to be concocted and malicious.


REFERENCES:

PRIME MINISTER VAJPAYEE'S LETTER


UNITED STATES SENATE FINAL REPORT OF THE SELECT COMMITTEE TO STUDY GOVERNMENTAL OPERATIONS WITH RESPECT TO INTELLIGENCE ACTIVITIES


SPIES ON CAMPUS


MAN OF INTEGRITY BY HARVEST HOUSE PUBLISHERS


HARVEST HOUSE PUBLISHERS


NEO-AMERICAN CHURCH


NEO-AMERICAN CHURCH BIBLE


DAN WOODING INTERVIEWS TAL BROOKE


NATIONAL SECURITY FILES MEMORANDUM

121. Memorandum From the Director of the U.S. Information Agency (Murrow) to U.S. Information Agency Staff/1/ Washington, April 22, 1961. /1/Source: Kennedy Library, National Security Files, Departments and Agencies Series, USIA, Box 290. No classification marking. Two copies of this memorandum were provided to McGeorge Bundy under cover of a memorandum from Frederic Bundy of USIA, April 27. (Ibid.) If USIA is to have maximum effectiveness as the psychological instrument of U.S. foreign policy, our media output must be more responsive to policy direction and emphasis, and faster and more flexible than heretofore. This requires the closest coordination of all media efforts. I have asked IOP to undertake this responsibility and have appointed Mr. Edgar
D. Brooke, a senior Career Foreign Service Officer, as Director of Media Content. He reports directly to the Deputy Director of Policy and Plans. Specifically, our purposes are:
1. To define the themes which media should convey and the subjects they should cover in their world-wide output, and to establish priorities among them.
2. To synthesize Area requirements for media output to best meet overall field needs.
3. To organize detailed programming of media efforts on behalf of priority themes to assure desired emphasis and appropriate division of responsibility.
4. To assure policy control of media output through continuing review. Procedures:
1. Themes and Subjects
a. IOP, in consultation with the Areas, shall develop a definitive list of themes to be conveyed and subjects to be covered in world-wide output, and shall recommend to the Director which themes and subjects should be given priority.
b. IOP, working with the Areas and IRI, shall keep abreast of U.S. policy developments, field needs, and attitudes of key audiences, and shall revise the Agency's themes, subjects and priorities accordingly.
c. IOP shall provide the media with these approved lists of priority themes and subjects, and policy guidance on their handling.
2. Planning and Programming
a. The media shall periodically provide IOP with their plans for production and acquisition of major items for world-wide use. ("Major items" shall be defined by IOP in consultation with the media.) IOP shall continuously review these plans to assure conformity with current national policy and Agency priorities.
b. IOP shall organize joint planning by the media to assure that world-wide output supports priority themes and that there is appropriate division of responsibility among the media for each theme.
3. Policy Control
a. In production of major items, the media shall provide drafts, scripts, or rough-cuts to IOP for policy review in time to permit changes if necessary.
b. IOP shall spot-check other output to assure conformity with policy.
4. Applicability
a. These procedures shall apply primarily to media output intended for more than one Area. Present procedures for servicing individual posts and for guidance covering output for a single geographic area are not altered by this memorandum. b. The present fast news guidance procedures are not altered by this memorandum.
There is no intention to interpose a barrier between media chiefs and my deputies and myself. Rather, we seek to insure that all media are used with maximum effectiveness and that they are consistently and immediately responsive to policy decisions by the Government and program decisions of this Agency.
In this effort I ask your unstinting cooperation. Edward R. Murrow









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