Vignettes 1

USSR SADMS IN THE USA

Special Forces on both sides, (USA-USSR) prepared for nuclear conflict during the "cold-war" period following World War II, by dispersing caches of munitions throughout target areas. I was assigned to a Czech-team as an enlisted-man in the 77th Special Forces Group (Airborne). Part of our mission was to plan and coordinate cache-sites to be used after we infiltrated the area and began organizing and equipping indigenous guerrilla and underground forces. CIA moles arranged initial contacts with persons recruited to our cause. You may wonder who would have cause and inclination to help us? The Russians captured many German soldiers at the end of WWII. A fairly large number, including a member of my family from the Bavarian part of Germany, managed to be assimilated into the Czech population with no love for the Russians. Two former German soldiers, Larry Thorne, a captain in the SS from Finland, and a short stocky paratrooper were part of my FA-Team and more than capable of arranging unconventional operations using the existing German sub-culture that had survived in-place. On the other hand, the Soviets had swarms of Rosenbergs, movie stars and other liberal American Communist to help them prepare the USA to receive our Russian counterparts.

One of our chief weapons was a "suitcase" 5-10KT (equivalent to 5,000-10,000-tons of TNT) nuclear bomb classified as a SADM (Special Atomic Demolition Munition). Besides the blast, these dirty devices contaminate the area with deadly long-term radiation and can be set for failsafe detonation. Neither side ever admitted to having SADMs since they were outlawed by treaty. Our "suitcases" were carefully maintained and accounted for, but the same is not true of the former Soviet Union. Now that the wall is down, several high level USSR intelligence officials, including General Alexander Lebed, have confirmed the worse - out of 132 suitcase-nukes produced, only 48 remain in their inventory! Eighty-four Soviet suitcase SADMs are missing! They also confirm that numerous caches are hidden in America and other countries. No doubt, a number of SADMs are buried beneath U.S. soil. All of the caches are booby-trapped. The bombs may or may not have been set with a failsafe date for detonation.

Switzerland and Belgium forced the Soviets to reveal the location of their cache points, but Bill Clinton doesn’t want to rock Yeltsen’s political boat. Congressman Curt Weldon (R-PA), Chairman of the House Armed Services Sub-committee on Military Research and Development, confirms: "There is no doubt that the Soviets stored material in this country. The question is what and where." Our FBI seems more focused "Operation Megiddo" than on finding Russian weapons caches in America.

A KGB defector, Vasili Mitrokhin, provided information to British Intelligence that secret weapons stockpiles are scattered throughout the U.S. including upstate New York, California, Texas, Montana, and Minnesota. Colonel Stanislav Lunev, the highest ranking military spy ever to defect from Russia, has testified that the Soviet military developed elaborate plans for the use of hidden weapons upon the outset of war with the U.S. Prime targets were destruction of military bases, and assassination of the top U.S. leadership. Lunev also affirmed to Congress than suitcase-nukes were part of the package. COL Lunev went on to say that Russian military leaders continue to see a nuclear conflict between Russian and the United States as "inevitable."

Joe Felter

Joe Felter and I are veterans of the War in Heaven, and the Vietnam War. We are forever comrades, even though I’m sorry to report that Joe died alone in his Washington, D.C. home on September 13th. He was the smartest man I ever knew, having a gift of genius. I was never emotionally closer to another man. Before coming to earth, Joe and I made a pact to find and take care of each other - we did. Joe saved my life at least once, always gave me sagely advice and intervened numerous times on my behalf. All I could ever do for him was bear testimony of the Gospel and be his friend. Judy and I had only just left him when he died. Joe was found on the floor wrapped in my Vietnam poncho-liner. If only I had known, I would have been there to hold him as he returned to the Almighty.

I hadn’t seen Joe in eight-years, since he signed a affidavit in D.C., January 1989, and came to Las Vegas, September of the same year, to testify before a federal Grand Jury - against me. Joe’s dedication to me was on a supernatural level above and beyond any worldly-human act. Joe was a Washington, D.C. insider with contacts and contracts at the highest levels of the Executive and Legislative Branches. When Turkey was granted a technology transfer of our Air Defense Artillery System, Joe provided the hardware. Anything less than absolute loyalty at this Godfather strata pays the same penalty (figuratively) as within a top mafia family. Joe’s official statement follows page 392 in my book, CALLED TO SERVE. You will need a magnifying glass to read his testimony. Out of love for Joe I purposely reduced his words to fly-specs. He asked me to please write no more books of revelation. The Promise would have further distanced us, but now that my friend is dead, I prefer to believe he has nothing more to do with those who look like us but serve a different master.

The admissions by Joe in his statement hurt him professionally. Joe was trusted with his own fiefdom as President of Wedtec, a cozy company in New York City, established to accept exclusive non-competitive federal contracts generated by the White House and approved by Congress as a minority corporation. The workforce was composed of blacks and browns, but the board of directors was 100% blue-blood District of Criminal bureau-rat. To these "insiders" it wasn’t a criminal act since they, as the best and brightest, deserved such fruits in the face of public ignorance. None within this brotherhood could understand why I would not agree to join them. There was just one difference between us: I serve God and have His laws within my heart; whereas their allegiance was to profit at any cost. It was only when the spiritual link between Joe and me was strained that his inner-sense of right over-rode earthly ties and allowed him to do the right thing.

With far more intrigue than any Hollyweird movie, I had been tasked by the White House to infiltrate the jungle headquarters of the world’s greatest drug criminal in search of U.S. POWs. Finding no American prisoners, I returned instead with direct evidence of a criminal conspiracy far more heinous than defrauding the public. Using their positions of special trust and authority, bureaucrats, from the White House down, were over-dosing America to accumulate an ocean of unaccountable cash allowing the Executive to conduct global operations outside the knowledge and approval of Congress. While my return from Burma with this documentation received no media acclaim, it nevertheless established a subterranean fire within the heart of Americana for distrust of those for whom conflict is a business. As former Director of the CIA, and part of this cabal, it was right for President George Bush to issue his order to "Get Bo Gritz!" According to Scripture it is through drugs and war that Satan reaps a bitter harvest. Hesitate to accept what I’ve just revealed? Look at Bill Clinton. Tell me he isn’t awash in and filthy from illegal narcotics and the blood of global killing fields!

It was somewhat like the inquisition of Thomas Moore during the reign of Henry VIII. Joe was meant to be my Richard Rich. Having undergone a Classified Information Procedures Act hearing where White House associates urged me to "Cooperate, erase and forget" the drug information I brought back from the Golden Triangle, President George Bush ordered his U.S. Attorney, William Maddox, to "Get Bo Gritz." Immediately following my acquittal, a new Grand Jury was sequestered to indict me on more charges. Colonel Joe Felter and Major Charles Johnson were both called as key federal witnesses. When their testimony was over, the Grand Jury returned a "No True Bill" and Maddox was fired. Joe’s support for me burned his bridges in D.C.

We both fathered four children. Each one of the Felter-clan excelled. Blond-blue-eyed Lisa graduated from George Washington University, became a NYC model, married John Riggins (All-Pro running back), and today has her own daughter, Hannah. Tall, handsome Jody finished West Point, selected Special Forces, was further educated at Harvard, and is today a military attaché in the Philippines. Angelic Jocelyn and Steve are college grads and currently in graduate schools at Columbia and Berkley. I love the kids.

During the month of December 1970 at Leavenworth, a bully down the block repeatedly told them there was no Santa. They rushed to me for verification. I advised them to keep a sharp watch on Christmas morn. I spent Christmas Eve wrapping presents to be dropped by a parachute marked "Return To Santa." Dawn was below freezing with crusted snow. The Operations Chief at the Army Air Field could hardly open and believe his eyes as in the pre-dawn I banged on the icy door demanding a plane. An hour of pre-heat and countless turns of the prop finally thinned the oil and fired the engine. The overcast was just above the guard turrets at the federal prison as I buzzed the empty central yard. The Felter house was just to the south. A couple of roof-top passes finally brought a line of little Felters into the front yard. My problem was how to keep the plane, blue-side up, slow near stall, with flaps fully extended, while I kept the door open in the slipstream with my foot long enough to shove the gift-package and parachute out with both hands - over the house! It wasn’t pretty, but as I finally righted the bird and disappeared in the cloud-base, I could see the little ones romping around their special delivery. The bully stood alone, coldly watching from his own yard.

There is a military axiom: "Familiarity breeds contempt." Fraternization of officer with other ranks is against the Uniform Code of Military Justice. The premise is right: how can a young second-lieutenant lead men into close combat who know all his faults? As might be expected Special Forces does the opposite (no 2d Lts). Joe was distant from his family and they feared him. His method seemed to me to work - considering how hard each child worked to please him. I became first-born Lisa’s surrogate dad, and Jody’s friend.

Joe was an incredibly powerful man in many ways. He deserves a place in Ripley’s Believe It Or Not for soloing an aircraft in less time than anyone except the Wright Brothers. While at Leavenworth, I taught 11 fledgling aviators to fly. Joe was in the group, but never flew. After the 10 soloed, Joe offered to host a party at his home on Saturday night. My Mom, Sam, was there on a business trip to Kansas City. She volunteered to tend bar and dispensed her own brand of Vodka Alexanders. It wasn’t long before we were all flying high in the clouds. A husband-wife pilot team, Jerry and Alicia Goodchild, chided Joe for being my best friend and not yet out of the nest. As Joe involuntarily sat down in the large wooden snack-bowl, he shot back that he would soon be going aloft alone. Sam made things much worse by betting Joe he wouldn’t solo before she got back from KC, Monday afternoon. There was no-way! While Joe had flow with me to fun places, he didn’t have even a second of actual flight instruction, but Joe was insistent.

After recovering from the Saturday bash, I met Joe, late Sunday afternoon at the airfield for intensive practice in take-offs and landings. Slightly less than two-hours into the lesson, Joe’s performance began dropping off - if he was going to fly alone, it had to be now! Normally, I would sign his Student Pilot’s License and send him aloft to hopefully return safely. In Joe’s case, I kept the license, promising, when he crashed and burned, to swallow his license and tell authorities that he had stolen the plane! Joe taxied for take-off while I monitored on a hand-held radio.

The pattern had been clear of other aircraft until Joe make his first turn crosswind. Two Army planes entered the downwind leg and the tower told Joe: "You are number three, continue downwind." Joe knew nothing of being "number three" and spent a long time searching the empty cabin for clues. My spirits sagged as Joe disappeared into the darkening horizon. Most new pilots have no idea where they are the first time up since things look different. Joe was an exception. In a few minutes I heard the distant drown of an engine that turned out to be a determined Joe Felter. Somehow he landed like a pro and flush with personal victory taxied over to give me a lift to the tie-down area.

As we progressed in the military, Joe and I were like two young lions. We might actually have been bulletproof! Best friends, yet completely opposite: Joe was the consummate smooth articulate polished staff officer, while I was the crude, rough, hand-to-gland field commander. I taught martial arts while Joe fashioned foreign policy. Both of us drank hard, lived fast, and made memories I won’t ever repent of. I can’t recall a time when we ever physically hurt anyone. We alternated creating situations that any one of would have ended our career. I was quick with my fists, but Joe was faster with words. I had a bad habit of shooting out street lights on the way home from Joe’s. This was non-habit forming in front of the Leavenworth Federal Prison. One night I ran out of ammo and went back to Joe’s for more. Other things happened which I would have literally buried, but Joe made sweet with his silver-tongue.

Somehow I was the honor grad, while Joe made the Commandant’s list. I was offered my choice of assignment and chose to return to Vietnam. Joe saved my life by talking me into a job with him on the Army General Staff. We went to grad school at The American University and served together in the Office of the Secretary of Defense. Once we decided to take a road trip and drove in his MGB without a top across the country and back, from D.C. to visit Sam in Tucson, Arizona. The sun bleached our jeans white and blistered my fair complexion, while Joe just got darker. There were countless other misadventures which are best untold. We were two young invincibles having fun.

Our paths divided when I went undercover to search for U.S. POWs and then re-converged with the Burma mission. Like Thomas Moore, I would not indorse what I felt in my heart was wrong. I wouldn’t cooperate with federal drug smuggling under any condition. Any friend of mine became an enemy of "the" government. I didn’t want to further harm my best friend. Joe and I didn’t speak until last Year at this time. Joe saw where I had taken a .45 slug in the chest. He called until he finally found me at Sheldon’s home in Texas, and invited me to come see him. I didn’t know Joe was alone and nearing death - he was two years my younger. While I look bad, I feel good.

As already stated, Joe was an exceptionally powerful man. I spent years harassing him about the dangers of smoking. One day, out of the blue, he looked at me and stated: "You see this cigarette? It’s my last!" He meant it. I was in awe, he quit cold turkey and never used tobacco again. After a brief respite, I started an anti-alcohol campaign. Some time later, Joe invited me to his new condo at Cabo San Lucas on the southern tip of the Baja. Sitting on the beach he challenged me to share an umbrella drink and reminded me about his will-power over smoking. He then went on to announce: "This is my last drink!" With Joe anything was possible - but as strong as he was, alcohol wouldn’t release its death grip!

During the period from my 1989 trial, and when Sheldon and I flew the Rocket to see Joe in October 1998, Joe fell endlessly off the wagon. In 1994, his family decided enough was enough and decided on a professional intervention. Not one of Joe’s many insider friends would join them (Sometimes silence is the worst testimony). Lisa wanted to involve me, but had lost contact. Deep in denial, Joe felt betrayed by Missy (his wife), his sons and daughters. The family following a counselor’s guidance was determined to make Joe choose between them and booze. When he refused to consider entering a rehabilitation program, Missy moved out with Jocelyn and Steve, while Lisa and Jody swore not to visit or speak to him. Joe bought a red Mustang, Indy 500 convertible and sought to ignore his loved ones, as his big-time friends began turning their back on him.

Time can heal and time can erode. Sadly, in the Felter-case, time destroyed what appeared in photos with Washington’s mighty chiefs to be a model family. Joe used his superior intellect to help everyone he knew and worked with, except his direct family. He orchestrated success for his bosses from the Army Chief of Staff to the Secretary of Defense, but berated Lisa, intimidated Missy, and placed the others under great stress.

Relationships are like a blind man feeling an elephant. Joe and I couldn’t have gotten along better, but Missy divorced him. I was happy to speak to Lisa after such a long time. She handled the arrangements for Joe’s burial in Arlington’s National Cemetery. I was greatly distressed to hear Lisa tell me that to her, Joe was like the little man behind the curtain in the Wizard of Oz, a failure. I learned a long time ago that excessive "levels of expectation" can turn major victories into total defeats. Joe demanded so much from his own that they looked upon him as a god, and were angered and dismayed when he proved to be slightly less. I know Lisa loved her dad. As a teen-ager, Lisa more than once asked me where and how would she ever be able to find a "real-man?" She found what she saw in us in a one-time hell raising Riggins. Missy went on to specialize in acupuncture. Joe lost his fortune to miscreants who, filling the gap of his missing family, were there to help him, but at a considerable cost - all they could take.

Joe sounded good on the telephone as he repeated his encouragement for me to spend time with him. Still leaking from three holes in my chest, Sheldon and I left Dallas for D.C. I noticed the frail man by the wing, but I didn’t recognize him as the Joe I had known. His skin was deeply jaundiced; I could wrap my hand completely around his arm! Joe needed help walking. A sponging cowboy had driven his car to pick us up.

Joe was overjoyed to see us. We had a great time - just like in the good old-daze. I left, knowing the earthly distance between us had not wedged us apart spiritually. When the Conn-court compelled me to move to New England, I decided it was a good chance to visit Joe. As described in the August CFA Newsletter, Judy and I drove to D.C. Joe’s color was much better, but he was feeble and needed help getting around. Another maximum-zero had moved into his main guestroom. This final sponge turned out to be a neighborhood boy, turned man, thrown out of the house by his dad for drunkenness. While there to drive Joe and keep him fed, he extracted a deadly price. Doctors had assured Joe that his next drink would be fatal - apparently it was! Joe was found dead on the floor (for three days) with an empty rum bottle by his chair.

Arlington National Cemetery is filling up. For entry today you must have been awarded a Silver Star Medal for Gallantry. Joe had no combat valor awards, but rules are made to be bent when a host of four-star generals (Commander-in-Chief Special Operations Command, Wayne Downing and CG Forces Command, Volney Warner) cut through the red-tape. I earned my tiny piece of Arlington, but unless I was laid to rest next to my friend (which won‘t happen), I’ll settle for something less, even though it was nice to see Generals Downing and Warner again.

Joe’s body had to be put in storage until they could schedule his funeral with full military honors. The Old Guard (3d Infantry) was waiting in dress-blues with a full band, company of infantry, six-horse drawn caisson, and the riderless Blackjack with backward boots. The priest hadn’t known Joe and wasted our time babbling in generic terms during the Mass. At the grave-site a 21-gun salute was fired, Taps was played and the guard presented Lisa with the casket-flag. Jody was given a brief moment to choke out a few words about his dad before being cut off.

Islamics don’t believe Jesus Christ was nailed to the cross - that would have been unfair. Instead, they think it was Judas who died - a much more just conclusion. In Joe’s case, it would have be better had Missy, after being a faithful, if not loyal, Army wife and good mother, could return to live out her life in the home she abandoned. Unfortunately, as Joe’s millions drained away, he stopped paying life insurance premiums, double mortgaged the house, refinanced the Mustang, and maxed out his credit cards. The Will is missing along with any papers relating to the Mexico condo. The many boxes full of certificates, diplomas, awards, et al, are meaningless without Joe. Incredibly, within one heart beat all that a man was suddenly becomes worthless. Maybe it’s right that Missy live in a rented efficiency for not being there to care for her ailing husband, but still it’s sad that Jocelyn and Steven now have no home. I didn’t look back as Judy and I drove west out of D.C. on I-66. My only reason for ever being there was no more and I won’t likely return.

You may think I have written far too much about Joe, but there are so many lessons for us all in his life and death, I pray you will read my words again, with learning in mind, so Joe might help you, as I know he would want to do. Of one thing I am certain; I’ll see Joe again at a time when we both will be like we were only eternally better! Won’t you join us? I’m working hard on The Promise which is designed to tell you exactly what I mean.

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