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He has duped the American conservative movement and made it a tool in his evangelical drive to infiltrate the American political system and establish a one-world religious government February/March 1995 Issue By Ted Sampley U.S. Veteran Dispatch The owner of The Washington Times who claims he is the second Messiah and preaches that democracy is a flop that should be replaced by a religious one-world government has burrowed dangerously deep into the United States government and its intelligence agencies. In 1982, religious cult leader Rev. Sun Myung Moon, touting his own brand of anti-communism, exploited the aching hunger American conservatives have for outspoken alternatives to the "liberally biased media" and began publishing the zealously anti-communist Washington Times in the nation's capital. High profile conservatives finally had a counter to the "liberal pink" Washington Post and they were elated. Senators Jesse Helms (R-NC), John East (R-NC), Orrin Hatch (R-UT), Paul Laxalt (R-NV), and the Moral Majority's Jerry Falwell rushed to endorse the Times. Their endorsement helped Moon recruit an impressive array of former intelligence operatives and Reagan insiders to work for the "alternative" daily. President Ronald Reagan gave the Washington Times a public relations boost by stating publicly that he relied on the Times as his number one source of news. Moon, the charismatic Korean leader and founder of the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity (the Unification Church), further delighted the conservatives by funneling millions of dollars to a variety of predominately conservative religious and political leaders and their causes. The Unification Church quickly became known as the major conservative force in America. Moon became the mainstream leader of the conservative movement and his willingness to generously spread money around to cash strapped conservative groups was apparently sufficient reason to discourage questions about his motivations and the origin of his money. The Encyclopedia Americana reports Moon's church membership at only 30,000 worldwide. Yet, he has managed to construct a multibillion dollar corporate empire that continues to grow and always seems to have millions to spend. The Washington Times, which cost the Unification Church $250 million, has never made a profit. It continues to lose an estimated $35 million each year. In 1990, the Unification Church significantly broadened its media influence in the United States by spending millions more to assemble the largest independent broadcast news-gathering group in Washington. Moon's television group, Concept Communications, provides technical facilities and video footage of news events in Washington to domestic television stations and foreign broadcasters. Concept Communications supplies all of the film crews to Cable News Network's (CNN) Washington bureau and feeds news to Voice of America. MOONRISE OVER THE REPUBLICANS Moon has sought and won allies on many fronts. He is particularly fond of drawing former U.S. intelligence and military officers into his organizations, but his church's first choice has always been high-ranking Republicans, particularly the conservatives. His relationship with the Reagan administration is epitomized by his VIP seat at the first Reagan inaugural. Moon has masterfully used his hard line anti-communist campaigns, multi-million dollar business deals, and substantial political donations to blur his ultimate objective of a one-world government originating from a centralized religious power--ruled by Moon--under which his followers will purchase goods and services only from church sponsored manufacturers. He has cunningly accumulated an impressive support base of the world's business and political elite. Wealthy individuals, staunch conservative politicians, national religious leaders, and members of the U.S. intelligence community have been lured into the Unification Church's entanglement of religious non-profit groups and for-profit corporations. Just last year, Frank Carlucci, a former diplomat who was Ronald Reagan's defense secretary, was seen courting Moon at the Unification Church sponsored Second World Peace Conference in Seoul, Korea. Carlucci is chairman of Carlyle Group, a Washington-based investment bank which specializes in hiring high profile political players known for their policy expertise and political clout. James Baker, a former Secretary of State and President Bush's campaign handler, is a partner along with Richard Darman, Bush's former Budget Director, who is managing director and Colin Powell, former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. MOONISM TRANSCENDS BIOLOGY A close review of Moon's history reveals he is not a conservative religious leader. He claims that, in 1936 when he was 16, Jesus Christ appeared to him on a mountainside in Northwestern Korea and told him that God had chosen him for the mission of establishing the Kingdom of Heaven on Earth. From there he began developing his own brand of religion that combined Christianity with Confucianism, mysticism and anti-communism, as well as establishing himself as the second Messiah. Rev. Moon studied electrical engineering in Japan during World War II and, after the war, returned to Pyongyang, the capital of communist North Korea, where he set up his first church. There, according to reports, Moon involved his congregation in an unusual ritual known as "blood separation" during which female members of the church were required to have sex with him to cleanse themselves of Satan's influence. North Korean authorities arrested and jailed Moon, accusing him of bigotry and adultery. His followers, who believe he is the second Messiah, say he was punished for evangelical and anti-communist activities. Moon was finally liberated by United Nations' troops during the Korean War, after which he fled to South Korea and established the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity. Moonism transcends biology. Church members are considered the "True Family" and Moon and his wife are the "True Parents." Members, known as "Moonies," celebrate as birthdays the day they joined the Church. Moon's teachings warn church members that life on earth is a continuous battle between good and evil--where they are the Chosen People--and everyone outside of the "True Family," including their biological parents, may be agents of Satan. Anyone harboring doubts about Moon are allowing themselves to be part of the work of Satan. THE KCIA CONNECTION TO THE UNIFICATION CHURCH AND THE WASHINGTON TIMES In the late 1950s, Moon's message touched four English-speaking Korean Army officers, all of whom were to later become important church agents within the South Korean government. One was Han Sang Keuk, who became a personal assistant to Kim Jong Phil, the architect of the 1961 military coup that brought Park Chung Hee to power. After the coup, Kim Jong Phil founded the Korean Central Intelligence Agency (KCIA) as a means of establishing a political base for the Park Chung Hee regime. The second officer, Kim Sang In, joined the KCIA and became an interpreter for Kim Jong Phil. The third, Han Sang Kil, also reported to have links to the KCIA, became military attache at the South Korean Embassy in Washington, D.C. After leaving the service of the South Korean government, Han Sang Kil became Rev. Moon's personal secretary and tutor to his children. The fourth, Bo Hi Pak, who also joined the KCIA and served in Washington, later became one of Moon's two chief political lieutenants. Pak helps oversee the Unification movement's lobbying efforts and is president of the Unification Church-owned News World Communications (NWC) which is the parent company of The Washington Times. Kim Sang In is listed as executive Vice President of NWC. Moon's first missionaries arrived in the U.S. in 1959 and by the early 1960s he, with the help of the KCIA, had established a religious presence in the United States. Some reports claim the KCIA founder, Kim Jong Phil, had actually "organized" the Moon ministry into the Unification Church while he was KCIA director and had used the Unification Church as a political tool. By the time Moon entered the United States in 1971 he had already established a strong church presence in Japan and his missionaries had been operating in the United States for twelve years. Moon's organization became an intricate part of the World Anti-Communist League (WACL) allowing him political contacts and playing an important pivotal role in the development of his Unification Church. MOON MATES WITH THE JAPANESE MAFIA As a result of a 1967 meeting in Japan between Moon and Yoshio Kodama, the head of Japanese organized crime (known as Yakuza), Moon appointed one of Kodama's lieutenants head of the Unification Church in Japan. Soon after, young Yakuza gang members began receiving indoctrination in anti-communist ideology similar to what Moon's organization was already doing in Korea with government officials. The marriage between Moon and the Japanese mafia became an important front for the Unification Church, not only politically, but financially. Business analysts and others who follow the church's financial dealings say the big bucks with which Moon wheels and deals come from Japan. According to two former high officials of the Unification Church in Japan, approximately $800,000,000 was funneled into the United States from Japan during a nine year period, much of which was cash carried in the luggage of loyal disciples. Unification Church officials claim this enormous cash flow is a result of church volunteers selling flowers and the success of Happy World, Inc., a Church subsidiary in Japan whose holdings include businesses with more than one hundred different products or services. Suspicions about where Moon gets his money vary, with some Moonie-watchers claiming that some of the business enterprises are actually covers for drug trafficking. Others believe that because of Moon's close ties to the South Korean and U.S. governments much of the money originates from the KCIA and the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). MOONIE STRATEGY: MAKE FRIENDS IN THE CIA, FBI, AND POLICE FORCES From 1976 to 1978, the United States House of Representatives conducted its "Koreagate" investigations focusing on the covert South Korean government campaign of influence-peddling by giving American congressmen and senators gifts, all-expense-paid trips, bribes, and attempts to infiltrate congressional offices by the use of young female Moonie volunteers. Money to support the campaign, it was reported, had come from a secret account in the Korean Embassy in Washington, D.C. According to the Oct. 31, 1978 "Fraser Report," the result of the Koreagate investigation, chaired by Donald Fraser, D-Minn., Allen Tate Wood, a former "Moonie leader," testified that Rev. Moon told him "part of our strategy in the U.S. must be to make friends in the FBI, the CIA and police forces, the military and business community . . . as a means of entering the political arena, influencing foreign policy and ultimately of establishing absolute dominion over the American people." The "Fraser Report" clearly exposed the ties between the Unification Church and the KCIA, concluding that the church often acted as a virtual foreign policy extension of the Korean government. Moon, the report said, with his loyal cadres and financial resources, was able to initiate operations that the Park Chung Hee regime could never have attempted. One such example was the "Young Ladies" campaign. Moon had told his disciples, "You can restore America and at the same time help Korea to be restored. So now we have to make bases in fifty states. We also have to restore Senators. So, Master will assign three young ladies to each Senator. The Senators are archangels, so restoration will have to be done through Eve. So we need three hundred young ladies. To restore the Senators you must first make the aides your friends, particularly secretaries . . . By doing so you can save America." The "Young Ladies" campaign was put into effect in the mid-1970s with female disciples "directed to 'hang around' the offices and volunteer to take on extra work. When the workload became especially heavy, their offers would be accepted. Employment would then follow, either with the office or through a well-placed recommendation. The favored offices would be those who dealt in legislation that could touch Moon, either in an investigatory or regulatory way. The objects would be leaks, and influence." At the disclosure of these revelations, Bo Hi Pak made an appearance before the subcommittee. He made an emotional defense of the church and attacked the committee's chairman Rep. Fraser. "I cannot help but believe," the tearful-eyed Bo Hi Pak said, "that you are being used as an instrument of the devil. Yes, instrument of the devil, I said it. Who else would want to destroy a man of God." In the end, Moon's disciples, with the help of sympathetic journalists, extracted their revenge on Rep. Fraser. They charged that Rep. Fraser was an agent of the KGB. He was narrowly defeated in the 1978 Minnesota Senatorial election. The Moonies were elated. "Mr. Fraser's defeat was due to more than political fortune. It was an act of God," they crowed. The question is, what effect did Moon's lobbying and influence peddling within the U.S. government have on President Clinton's decision to betray America's missing in action by normalizing trade relations with Vietnam? Moon's involvement in "Koreagate" was soon forgotten after he scored a priceless political victory by launching The Washington Times in 1982. The Times is the centerpiece in Moon's campaign of influence-peddling. It provides a direct pipeline into key policy-makers in Washington, giving Moon a legitimate voice and a powerful weapon in his crusade to establish a global theocracy with the "new Messiah" as its ruler. EVEN MESSIAHS MUST PAY TAXES Two years after he gave birth to The Washington Times, Moon was sent to Danbury Federal Prison to serve an 18 month sentence for conspiracy to file false tax returns, to obstruct justice, and to commit perjury. Moon's disciples claimed that he was unfairly prosecuted due to racial and religious intolerance on the part of the U.S. government, but Moon's willful violation of the law made criminal prosecution of the second Messiah inevitable. Tax lawyers and accountants had warned Moon's representatives, in 1973, to keep his personal assets separate from those of the Unification Church. Moon ignored that advice and personally directed the preparation of his returns. Moon's accountants forged and backdated ledgers to hide his assets within the churches. The prosecution proved, among other things, that the paper on which Moon falsified his 1973 records was not even manufactured until 1974. Moon's defense on appeal--known as the "Messiah defense"--claimed that because his followers believe he is "potentially the new Messiah," the "embodiment" of the church, he is, thus, exempt from personal income tax. The court held that even Messiahs are not exempt from taxes, that they have a status as an individual, distinct from the church, and that freedom of religion is "subordinate to the criminal laws of the country." The court further ruled that to allow otherwise would be to permit church leaders to stand above the law. The Moonie organization moved quickly to use the disaster of Moon's imprisonment to benefit the Unification Church's public image. Moonie disciples orchestrated a nationwide campaign for "religious freedom." From all across the political spectrum, people and organizations, including the American Civil Liberties Union, rushed to offer their support for Moon because they believed he was singled out and mistreated by the judicial system. The Moon organization skillfully exploited those sentiments and later successfully turned the campaign into a strategy furthering the Moonist agenda. "Father went to Danbury as the leader of the Unification Church, but when he comes out he must be the leader of the Free World," a Unification Church leader told fellow Moonies. It worked. Moon served thirteen months and was released from jail with a stronger church and following than when he entered. HIDDEN THOUGHTS OF THE MESSIAH MADE PUBLIC Moon's hidden motives are exposed when some of his secret speeches, heavily cloaked in rhetoric, are made public by dissidents. In 1973 Moon declared, "We must have an automatic theocracy to rule the world. So we cannot separate the political field from the religious . . . Separation between religion and politics is what Satan likes most." Moon said, "In the ideal world centered upon God, everyone will speak Korean, so no interpreter will be necessary." He said under his economic system, "Even in Japan and Germany, the people will not buy products from their own country, but will buy according to centralized instructions." In 1985, according to a tape smuggled out by the dissidents, the "new Messiah" told his British followers that his goal was "the natural subjugation of the American government and population." Moon said, in January 1986, referring to himself, "The time will come when even a presidential candidate will need Father's endorsement in order to succeed . . . Without knowing it, even President Reagan is being guided by Father." The list of former high-ranking U.S. officials politically and financially linked to the new "Messiah's" empire goes on and on. Richard Allen, national security advisor in the Reagan White House, has been linked by a 1990 Moonie document which included Allen in at least seven of Rev. Moon's "business opportunities" around the world--multimillion dollar projects that promised 100 percent return on investment. Ray Cline, a former CIA deputy director, Maj. Gen. Daniel O. Graham, a retired head of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), Joseph Churba, a former DIA employee and retired Gen. E. David Woellner have all been leaders in Rev. Moon's anti-communist organizations. Max Hugel, a former deputy director of the CIA who spearheaded President Reagan's New Hampshire campaign in 1980, is a business partner of Jonathan S. Park, the son of Rev. Moon's top U.S. deputy, Bo Hi Pak. Hugel and Park have acquired the largest independent broadcast news-gathering group in the nation's capital. They jointly own the Washington Television Center office building at 650 Massachusetts Ave., which has been assessed at $55,100,000. The largest tenant in the building is the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms (BATF). MOONIE ECLIPSE In 1990, at the time when communist regimes were crumbling around the globe, Moon and his Unification Church apparently had a eclipse of ideology and began trying to establish a business foothold in Russia, China, North Korea, and Vietnam. In defending "Father's" overtures to the communists, Moonie leader Tom Ward said Unification Church politics have been "misunderstood." "We were never an organization on the extreme Right," said Ward, a former Marxist student in Paris, who was converted by Moon in 1972. Moon met with the Soviet Union's Mikhail Gorbachev in 1990 and presented him with a gift of $1 million from the Moon organization to Various Soviet "charities." Moon explained his new found friendship with Moscow to Moscow News, "The Soviet Union will be the center of God's providence in the next century. Fortunately the Soviet Union has avoided some of the evils of the Western society . . . I clearly envision a moral renaissance for the Soviet Union that will dramatically affect the entire world. One of my greatest goals is to catalyze that renaissance." In the summer of 1991, Moon, with the help of allies in the Bush Administration, violated the U.S.-imposed trade embargo against Vietnam and ordered two of his companies-- the Korea-based Sea Yong International, and the Japanese firm, Saeilo Machinery Japan--to join a partnership with the Vietnam's Communist Party to form Mekong Corp. Moon originally invested over $36 million in Mekong which is building cars and trucks in Saigon and Hanoi. The Communist Party retains a 30 percent interest in Mekong. In December of that year, Moon traveled to North Korea and met with that country's communist dictator, Kim Il Sung, and reportedly signed a contract to invest billions in the North Korean economy. The Foreign Assets Control Regulations, authorized under the federal Trading With the Enemy Act, forbid U.S. citizens and permanent resident aliens from doing business with the government of Vietnam and North Korea. As a permanent resident alien of the United States, Moon violated those laws. Federal agents ignored the "new Messiah's" violations of U.S. law and have refused to prosecute. Most of Moon's conservative allies still refuse to accept media reports that Moon sees himself as the son of God and that he preaches that democracy is a flop which should be replaced by a one-world government. Soon after Moon went through his dramatic ideological metamorphosis from staunch anti-communist to his new conviction of love the communists for God and profit, the U.S. government began changing U.S. policies pertaining to communist Vietnam and by 1992, it was legal for U.S. companies to enter Vietnam and open their offices. On Feb. 3, 1994, President Bill Clinton established normalized trade relations with Vietnam despite the protests by the two major POW/MIA family organizations, all the major veterans organizations, and the belief held by 80 percent of the American people that Vietnam is still holding American prisoners of war. It is no secret that Moon wanted the U.S.-imposed trade embargo against Vietnam lifted because it was hurting Vietnam's economy and, in turn, the ability of its citizens to afford Moon's cars and trucks. The question is, what effect did Moon's lobbying and influence peddling within the U.S. government have on President Clinton's decision to betray America's missing in action by normalizing trade relations with Vietnam? If the extent of Moon's success in buying influence and power from within the U.S. government is ever exposed, it will be one of the scariest scandals our democracy has ever witnessed. |
