17 Over Blackfriars -Updated 6/21/15

On the night of June 17th your humble researcher sat down to his laptop after a particularly miserable  day only to be confronted by the early reports concerning the shooting at the historic Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church located in Charleston, South Carolina. I was immediately confronted with a sickness in the pit of stomach that took several moments to clear. Upon regaining my senses, a peculiar thought popped into my mind: "The intellectual masturbation linking this shooting to Freemasonry is going to be off the chain, especially among the proponents of 'twilight language'."

While it took a full day for the posts to start appear, I can now at least say I was not disappointed in this regard. The remarks of famed "revisionist historian" (and likely fascist sympathizer) Michael A. Hoffman II were especially predictable. The longtime foe of the Judaic-Masonic-Communist conspiracy noted:

"Dylan Storm Roof was shown in the national media with a Confederate States of America license plate on June 18, the day which began with the breaking news that the US Supreme Court had upheld the ban on Confederate license plates by the state of Texas (as far as those plates being issued by the state itself). Coincidence? 

"Roof’s heinous killings occurred on the 33rd degree of north parallel latitude in Charleston, South Carolina, headquarters of the most powerful masonic body in the world, the Scottish Rite. Coincidence?

"Other news media have reported that Mr. Roof has in the past taken the psychotropic drug Xanax. (He was facing felony drug charges prior to the massacre he perpetrated). Was he drugged during his shooting spree? The Establishment media don't ask, and they also don’t ask why he wasn’t tested for drugs or alcohol being present in his system when he was apprehended. Many other youths who initiated massacres (Kip Kinkle and the Columbine High killers for example) were under the influence of a hypnotic pharmaceutical drug when they committed their crimes.

"The New York Times issued a graph yesterday purporting to show that Black people are the chief victims of hate crimes in the United States, but these statistics are cooked. It is very difficult to have black on white crime officially listed as a hate crime. Such crimes are too often dismissed as non-racial, random violence...

"The politically correct issues here are racism and gun control, and the suppressed issues are mind control pharmaceuticals and Manchurian candidates..."

Hoffman

Hoffman also makes heavy use of a Texas Freemasonic license plate in this post (as well as comments left on Loren Coleman's Twilight Language blog), seemingly implying that the access Texans have to Masonic license plates and not those sporting the stars and bars of the Confederacy somehow played somehow contributed to the shooter's rampage.

Other such revelations made by Hoffman is his erroneous claim that the shooter Dylan Storm Roof was abusing Xanax. In point of fact, Roof had been arrested for illegal possession of Suboxone back on February 28th, a point even the neo-con propaganda outlet known as World Net Daily got right. As a former psychology major and an individual who has spent his fair share of time around pill poppers (a largely unavoidable state of affairs for someone living in Florida), I have long been concerned about the pharmaceutical drugging of America. Hence, this is easily the most compelling point Hoffman makes, especially after recent studies have linked opioid-based painkiller use to higher rates of violence.

Suboxone, however, is designed to dull certain opioid receptor modulators, and thus has effects somewhat different that conventional opioid painkillers such as Xanax. This researcher has had extensive dealings with individuals whom have used Suboxone and did note the kind of radical shifts in behavior and mood that regular painkillers or anti-anxiety meds can produce. In point of fact, Suboxone seems to ease the motivations of its users. Major weight gain, for instance, is a side effect I have personally noticed and have seen reported online. Hence, I am not especially convinced that the drug itself could have been a catalyst (though it certainly could have contributed to the shooter's diseased mind). But obviously I am hardly an authority on such things (though neither are any number of online conspiracy theorists who will play up the prescription drug angle).

Racism has of course been widely downplayed by Hoffman and many conservative commentators despite the fact that the shooting took place a historically significant African American church, all the victims were black, and that the shooter published photos of himself on Facebook sporting the banners of Apartheid-era South Africa and Rhodesia on a black jacket as well as another one in which he is seen sitting on the hood of car with a Confederate flag on its license plate. Charleston, South Carolina may be a highly important city to Freemasonry, but it is also the city that played host to the first battle of the Civil War with the First Battle of Fort Sumter in 1861. And of course, the shooter has apparently acknowledged that the shooting was driven by a desire to spark a race war.

Mr. Roof sporting his Rhodesia and Apartheid-era South Africa patches while dressed in black

But clearly the Masonic conspiracy, and especially the fact that Masonic licenses plates are still available in Texas while the Confederate flag has been banned, is the main catalyst. Just keep telling yourself that.

Meanwhile, Alex Jones, the proverbial Venerable Grand Master of conspiratorial right, has remarked that he does not detect evidence of a false flag operation. Raw Story reports:

"Jones said on Thursday that the shooting, which resulted in the deaths of nine people at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, did not feel like a 'false flag' attack to him because of the lack of what he called 'talking points' from the media. He also said that the suspect, 21-year-old Dylan Roof, 'looks like the textbook-case lunatic.' "

Jones

In point of fact, the shooting certainly bares traces of a textbook Operation Gladio attack. That Jones would not point this out is hardly surprising, however. Despite ample evidence of the program's existence, Operation Gladio is rarely addressed by the conspiratorial right in America. There is a reason for this, as shall be noted in a moment. But first, a bit about Gladio:

"Operation Gladio was first made public in August 1990, when then-Prime Minister Giulio Anderotti admitted its existence to the Italian Parliamentary Committee on Terrorism. To this day much about Gladio remains mysterious. It seems that planning for the operation began to take place in 1951... Gladio was incorporated into Office 'R' of SIFAR in 1956. On paper, Gladio was a NATO-backed 'Stay Behind' operation: Any Soviet attack on Italy would encounter a pre-established resistance network, a militarily-trained underground with access to secret arms caches hidden across the country. To implement Gladio, SIFAR established a sabotage training school in Sardinia in 1954. Technically, Gladio was made up of two principal branches: 40 S/B (Stay Behind) units trained in guerrilla warfare, and five rapid deployment units with names like Alpine Star, Sea Star, Rhododendron, and Azalea. American-supplied weapons, including hand grenades, sniper rifles, and explosives were also buried in 139 hiding spots.

"The Italian government claimed initially that Gladio was part of a general agreement with NATO. NATO, however, officially denied any involvement. Revelations that Gladio-type organizations existed in non-NATO nations like Austria, Spain, and Switzerland further eroded the NATO cover story. Gladio really seems to have been what its name means: a double-edged sword to be used against the Soviets and any element inside Italy, from either left or the right, that might try to take Italy out of NATO. Gladio also served as the backdrop for the 'strategy of tension,' which repeatedly destabilized Italian politics with bombings and other terror attacks. Popular fear of terrorism, from either the 'left' or 'right,' could then be used to justify a suspension of constitutional law or even, in a worst-case scenario, a military-backed Pinochet-like 'white coup' to insure Italy's continued allegiance to the West."

(Dreamer of the Day, Kevin Coogan. pg. 332)

a patch used by Italian Gladio "Gladiators"

A few points need to be clarified. While Gladio was in theory an equal opportunity operation that targeted the Left and Right as the climate dictated, the Italian deep state went out of its way to implicate leftists in terror plots while down playing the threat from right wing extremists. In point of fact, neo-fascist organizations such as Ordine Nuovo and Avanguardia Nazionale were routinely recruited to both infiltrate the Left and carry out terror attacks to implicate them. This researcher has already chronicled such developments in his examination of the kidnap and murder of Italian states Aldo Moro (addressed here, here and here) as well the role neo-fascist played in the terror bombings (noted before here) that rocked Italy during the period known as the "Years of Lead."

Moro during his alleged kidnapping by the Communist Red Brigades

Nor was Gladio restricted to Italy or even Western Europe. It was in fact an international operation with Gladio being simply the Italian component. In South America it was known as Operation Condor while a similar operation was conducted during the Vietnam War known as the Phoenix Program. Amongst all these operations a reoccurring pattern emerges: acts of terrorism in various forms that are blamed on the Left and used to shock the population at large.

For years the international umbrella organization that directed Gladio was known as the World Anti-Communist League (WACL). The WACL brought together a curious assortment of US military and intelligence officers, international drug and arms traffickers, various Third World dictators and religious extremists of various stripes and the inevitable unreconstructed Nazi war criminals. Much more on the WACL and its links to terrorism can be found here. Its ties to Gladio have been addressed in brief here.

The WACL also had its tendrils in the United States. As was noted before here, it had ties to the Aryan Nations in the 1980s through a Canadian affiliate. During this time the Aryan Nations was playing host to the terror outfit known as The Order as well Frazier Glen Miller, who was recently arrested for shooting up a Jewish synagogue. The Aryan Nations was also in contact with Colonel William Porter Gale, a "former" military intelligence officer who created the Posse Comitatus, which much of the modern Patriot movement derives its ideology from. More information on Gale can be found here while the links to the Order and the Aryan Nations to a broader, US-backed international fascist network, can be found here.

the emblem of The Order

Thus, Jones and his ilk do well to not address Gladio as a compelling argument can be made that the neo-Nazi and Patriot movements in these United States are essentially the US component of this network.

That being said, there is no evidence as yet that Dylan Storm Roof had ties to this broader network. But consider: Stormfront, the premier US neo-Nazi website, has been linked to over 100 murders in its day. The forums of this website attract a host of angry and disillusioned young men, more than few already pre-disposed to violence. A well trained psychological warfare specialists for the FBI, CIA or military intelligence (most likely) would find any number of compelling subjects herein that could be pushed over the edge without much prodding. Their work would be even easier if some of these young men were pill poppers, an increasingly regular character trait amongst the kids.

the logo of Stormfront

While I have no evidence whatever that this is what happened, it is at least as plausible as any number of other theories making the rounds.

Before wrapping up, I can't resist in throwing in my own twist in on the Masonic conspiracy theories making the rounds concerning Roof. Easily the most credible evidence of some type of modern Masonic conspiracy emerged in the form of Italy's Propaganda Due (P2) Masonic lodge. As I've noted before in an ongoing series, P2 was linked extensively to terrorism and drug and arms trafficking in both Italy and abroad. But as noted before, it was hardly a regular or mainline Masonic lodge. A thorough examination of the actual forces behind P2 will soon be forth coming on this blog.

Easily the most famous event linked to P2 was the bizarre, ritualistic death of financier Roberto Calvi. Here are a few details:

"... The last hours of Calvi's life were spent in the Chelsea Cloisters, frantically working the telephone. The by-now ex-chairman of Banco Ambrosiano was clearly facing an imminent deadline. Sometime during the evening of the 17th June, he stepped out in his usual expensive top had and favorite hand-made loafers. He was next seen suspended from an orange rope strung from builders' scaffolding beneath Blackfriars Bridge. As even the uninitiated generally know, orange is the keynote colour the Masonic Craft. Calvi's body was loaded with ballast, about forty kilos of stones stuffed into his pockets and bizarrely, his trouser flies. His calves' leather wallet contained £10,000 in sterling, Swiss francs, and Italian lira notes. His expensive though unwaterproofed Swiss watch stopped at just before 2 a.m., the point at which it was dipped in the water by the rising river tide. After 2:30 am, the level of the water would  not have been sufficiently high to reach Calvi 's wrist.

"That suicide would demand amazing agility for an overweight sixty-two-year-old man suffering from poor eyesight and pronounced vertigo. In a statement of doubtless unintended irony, Superintendent John White of the London river police declared: 'The long and the short of it is that we do not know how he came to be at the end of that rope.' The scene of the crime was drenched with mystical significance. The bridge lies in the area of London where the black-capped Dominican friars establish themselves in the mid-1300s. Black is the colour most often associated with fascism."

(Gladio: NATO'S Dagger at the Heart of Europe, Richard Cottrell, pgs. 232-233)

Calvi's dead body

Black is course the color Dylan Storm Roof has been shown wearing most commonly since the shooting emerged. Indeed, he seems to have spent a fair amount of his time in the months leading up to the shooting dressed entirely in black. But of course, this may not have been a reference to fascism.

The date of the church shooting is more curious, however: June 17, 2015. Roberto Calvi was murdered on June 17, 1982. This is thirty-three years to the day of Calvi's murder. The number thirty-three is of course highly significant in Freemasonry in part because thirty-three is the highest grade in the Scottish Rite, which has its headquarters in Charleston, South Carolina.

But P2 was not part of the Scottish rite and hardly a mainline Masonic lodge. They referred to themselves as "Black Friars" in their meetings and the implications of this are quite eye opening. This blog will soon consider these implications at length. Stay tuned.

UPDATE 6/21/15:

Reports are now coming in that Roof's ideology was heavily influenced by the website for the Council of Conservative Citizens. This far right organization is part of the peculiar legacy of Colonel Wickliffe Preston Draper, a military intelligence officer hailing from a phenomenally wealthy New England whom dedicated a considerable amount of his fortune advancing a far right nationalist agenda. Much more information can be found on the Colonel and the host of intrigues he was involved in here.

the Colonel