Secret Connections: LDS Church and the American Intelligence Community

Secret Connections: LDS Church and the American Intelligence Community

Today I wish to bring an interesting "conspiracy" to the fine people of ATS....one that involves religion, government, intelligence agencies and even some names known from other "conspiracies". There will be many twists and turns throughout this thread and I will do my best to put it all together in a coherent fashion.

Right from the start I wish to make it very clear that I am not bashing any religion, nor it's faithful. My intent is to bring information to your attention that I find interesting and provocative. Take it for what you will.

Let's begin by taking note of an important part of the Latter Day Saints Church philosophy:

The LDS Missionary Program

According to the LDS Church,

Jesus Christ's life was the perfect example of missionary work. During His ministry on earth, he taught the gospel at all times, in all places, and to all kinds of people.

It is this belief that inspires the missionary programs that has become an integral part of the church. Mormon.org states that there are 350 missions around the world with around 52,000 people helping spread the message of the church. Of course, to spread the word to people in other countries, one must learn to communicate with those people.

All prospective missionaries turn in applications to Church headquarters and they receive a call to a specific mission around the world. They spend a few weeks in a training center where some of them learn a new language and all of them rigorously study and practice teaching the gospel. Then they set off to their assigned locations and begin their service.

I think we can all agree that it takes a motivated, dedicated and intelligent person to learn new languages, all while studying the gospel in order to spread the word of Jesus Christ. Understandably, these sorts of young people can become comfortable in their foreign positions and the communities in which they live.

Many missionaries grow to love the areas in which they serve so much that they find it harder to come home after their missions are over than it was for them to leave in the first place. They return home as informed ambassadors of the nations and cultures where they served.

It's safe to say that these missionaries, upon returning home, possess a certain set of skills that the average American kid does not. They are motivated, faithful, intelligent, educated and "informed ambassadors of the nations and cultures where they served". Keep that in mind as we move on to the next section.

A Mormon-Intelligence Community Connection?

Now that we have established the "value" some of these missionaries may have, lets ask ourselves an important question. Who would be interested in the type of person that has all of the above qualities and could be considered "informed ambassadors of the nations and cultures where they served"?

The CIA, perhaps?

The following is a quote from Wallace Turner. He was a writer for the New York Times that had written articles on "corporate corruption" within the LDS church and other such issues. New York Times, Sep, 16th 1974

Many Mormon scholars work on contracts for the C.I.A

Here we have an intelligence agency that operates in many countries across the globe that would be in need of people that were intelligent, faithful, educated and were familiar with foreign languages and cultures. The LDS missionary program itself does all of the legwork to "groom" such an asset. But is there any reason to believe such a connection exists? This is where things get interesting.

The Robert Mullen Company was founded by, of course, Robert R. Mullen in 1952. It was a public relations firm based in DC that provided services for groups such as the American Automobile Association, American Bar Association and even the LDS Church. In 1971, the company was taken over by Robert Foster Bennett.

Bennett was a Republican Senator for Utah from 1993 to 2011 and was the grandson of Heber Grant, a former president of the LDS Church and Bennett's wife was the grand-daughter of a former LDS Church president. One year after Bennett took over at Mullen, the company was involved in a scandal that eventually led to the resignation of Nixon.....the Watergate Scandal. Howard Baker, a Senator and member of the Watergate Committee produced a report that stated the following:

The Mullen and Company has maintained a relationship with the Central Intelligence Agency since its incorporation in 1959. It provided cover for an agent in Europe and an agent in the Far East at the time of the Watergate break-in

Mixed in with the entire scandal was a man I'm sure many of you have heard of: E. Howard Hunt. Hunt was convicted and sentenced for his connection to the Watergate scandal, but is also well known for his possible role in the CIA involvement with the anti-Castro movement and the JFK assassination conspiracy. Hunt was also confirmed to have been an employee of the Robert Mullen Company....a firm that was ran by a Mormon and represented the LDS Church in DC.

Hunt had obtained a Covert Security Approval to handle the firm's affairs during Mullen's absence from Washington.

As we have seen so far, there is an "interesting" connection between the LDS Church and the CIA through many different people and associations, but is there a connection to any other intelligence agencies that are more current and relevant to our current state of affairs?

The NSA Connection

No conspiracy would be complete if we did not include the NSA. Now, we know that the NSA has built a massive date-collection center in Utah near Salt Lake city.

The megaproject was completed in late-2013 at a cost of US$1.5 billion despite ongoing controversy over the NSA's involvement in the practice of mass surveillance in the United States. Prompted by the 2013 mass surveillance disclosures by ex-NSA contractor Edward Snowden, the Utah Data Center was hailed by The Wall Street Journal as a "symbol of the spy agency's surveillance prowess

It's not the scope of this thread to delve in to the activities of the NSA, but I think it's important to know who was contracted to build this massive data center. One of the main contractors involved in this project was Jacobsen Construction. Jacobsen construction is one of the largest general contracting firms in the United States and has constructed many LDS facilities.

What's interesting here is that the Founder of Jacobsen Construction was founded by Soren N. Jacobsen. Soren had a son named Ted. Ted was married to a woman named Florence Smith Jacobsen. Florence happens to be the grandaughter of Joseph F. Smith and Heber Grant. Joseph F. Smith was the son of Hyrum Smith and nephew of Joseph Smith Jr......founder of the Church of Latter Day Saints and the man that claimed to have had revelations from God, which led to the Book of Mormon. It's also important to note, as I pointed out previously, Robert Bennett was also a grandchild to Heber Grant, just like Florence Smith Jacobsen.

Very interesting indeed.

Conclusion

So now that I have laid-out all of this information for you, the reader, to digest, I must ask......do you see a potential conspiracy here? Is it possible that at the very top of the LDS Church lies a secret bond that ties the Mormons to the CIA, NSA, JFK and Watergate? Is the missionary program a training program for the US intelligence services and in return Mormon companies are granted high-dollar government contracts?

That is for you to decide. You have to take the information in this thread and come to a conclusion that you find appropriate.

I thank you for reading and hope we can have a productive conversation on a topic that is, as I said before, provocative and fascinating.

Missionary Work
Robert Mullen Co
Howard Hunt
Robert Bennett
Joseph F. Smith
Joseph Smith Jr.
NSA Data Center
NSA Article
NSA Website - Take the time to read the "2014 Status of the Utah Data Center" on the front page. You'll be glad that you did!
Jacobsen Construction
Florence Smith Jacobsen

You forgot to add the one odd ball task that mormons do, and that is collect family trees on everyone in a giant database of their own, just in case someone decides to convert to mormonism, they can convert the entire family tree. During the Olympics in Salt Lake City the FBI remarked about how clever their organization system was for all the people they had acquired in their database.

reply to post by CAPT PROTON


That is a very interesting aspect as well. This research began with an interest in the blood atonement issue within the Church, but I thought this was a more interesting angle.

On a side note:

Another contractor for the NSA data center, Turner Construction, is a subsidiary of Hochtief AG.

However, the company's reputation is tarnished by World War II, when it deployed forced labor on construction projects.[11] It built the Führerbunker in Berlin, the scene of Adolf Hitler's suicide, as well as Hitler's Berghof retreat and Wolf's Lair headquarters.

Turner was also involved in the clean-up of the Twin Tower debris and the OKC bombing in '95

Source
Source

reply to post by sheepslayer247


Man turner construction has its fingers in everything it seems like, their name should be very tarnished again after their suspicious involvement in 911.
Great thread man, really brings this together very nicely and makes the info easy to process. I think you are on to something here. Put a jacket on those kids and you got the MIB preaching religion

Superior thread! Howard Hughes, with his own CIA and national security connections, also surrounded himself with Mormons, a number of whom were intelligence operatives themselves. Some rabbit holes in all that bidness, too.

OP you forgot to include Mormons in the final frontier . . . space!

Space Religion: Mormonism and the Final Frontier
news.discovery.com...

Roger D. Launius, the curator of the Smithsonian's Planetary Exploration programs, paints a fascinating picture of Mormonism and space exploration in "A Western Mormon in Washington, D.C." In this work, which you can read right here, Launius profiles Dr. James C. Fletcher, who served as NASA administrator from 1971 to 1977 and from 1986 to 1989.

Fletcher was a highly influential figure in the history of space exploration (heck, we owe the shuttle program to him), and much of what made him tick came down to his Mormon heritage.

More of Roger D. Lanius' work here;
[www.academia.edu...)

Mormons are all up in the top secret and black programs of this country. Their founders were made master Freemasons on sight and many of their practices bear strong similarities to masonry. With the strong association of masons and government it is really no surprise that a similar organization would be found to have similar ties to the government.

So good info OP.

Mormons are Cool
The most cosmic American religion
www.techgnosis.com...

Let us not forget Romney who has ties to black ops in Central America;

Romney's secrecy in business is detailed, and revealed; as well as his role as a drug money launderer for GHW Bush; his connection, through Bush, to CIA death squads in Central America; his role in 9-11; in the murder of US ambassador to Libya, Christopher Stevens; and the significance of his endorsement of and by Cheney.

-FBB

As I see it, the premise of this thread is: Does a "formal" relationship exist between elements of the US Government and an(y) institution of religion?

Please allow me to draw the thread's attention to this portion of Executive Order 12333 which pretty much precludes such a relationship.

reply to post by The GUT


Yes, im my research I ran across the shenanigans with Hughes and the church. Very interesting indeed. Perhaps that may become a future thread....or a collaborative project?

When i was a boy in the LDS church it was commonly stated that the US government would someday hang by the" thread of the priesthood "(Melchezedic, i assume)
Specifics of this prophetic utterance were never mentioned to me......but i can see where a great deal of mormon boys would be excellently suited to government servcie
Dont drink/smoke/do drugs/ drink coffee even....
At one time Utah boasted the highest voluntary enlistment in the US military.....lots of vets with security clearances there id bet.....
The Mormon Church may be an evil plot to overthrow the legal government for real......

reply to post by sheepslayer247


a small thing but the Mormon church was also involved in the spread of martial arts in America....

American Kenpo and it's founder Ed Parker ....who is a huge figure in American Martial Arts was Mormon and would not pass the torch to anyone that wasn't mormon. Every Kenpo dojo had bible verses hung in them and was part of belt advancement

As it pertains to this thread, the ties between Momonism and Freemasonry are pretty strong, even down to the symbols on their special underwear a good Mormon wears.

The whole story around the creation of Mormonism is fascinating. Joseph Smith was, among other things, a treasure hunter. Supposedly, an angel led him to the metal plates and over the course of time, he transcribed them into English. He didn't translate them - he used a scrying stone. He dropped the stone into a hat, stuck his face in the hat to block out light and, supposedly, the words that became the Book of Mormon appeared on the stone. 'Ol Joseph never made it to Utah, being lynched in Havasoo, Missourri along the way.

And then, of course and conveniently, once transcribed, the angel Maroni (I think it was Maroni) who showed Joseph where the plates were buried on the Hill Cumorah, took the plates back.

Also, for those that do not know, the Mormons claim that the Native Americans are a lost tribe of Israel. One branch of the 'lost tribe', the Lamanites, killed the members of the other branch, the Nephites. That, plus their rejection of the 'ol JC, caused God to curse them with dark skin and a degraded existence.

That's a hell of racist principal Mormons won't tell you about their religion - if you aren't pasty white, it's 'cause you pissed God off and he wants to punish you by making you 'not white' and a less pleasant existence.

I don't want to sidetrack the topic of the thread, but I am of the opinion that the funny business with the LDSs goes back to its inception, and I am not so certain that the pilgrimage from upstate New York, where Smith was from, wasn't a legitimate treasure hunt, that Joseph found something - not the Book of Mormon, but perhaps indications of pre-Columbus, transalantic visits.

I've touched on some pre-Columbus stuff and 'treasure' in a few posts in another thread that I need to get back to and reply: www.abovetopsecret.com...

reply to post by FriedBabelBroccoli


"Mormons are all up in the top secret and black programs of this country. Their founders were made master Freemasons on sight and many of their practices bear strong similarities to masonry. With the strong association of masons and government it is really no surprise that a similar organization would be found to have similar ties to the government."

Not exactly......... "The relationship between Mormonism and Freemasonry began early in the life of Mormon founder Joseph Smith, Jr., as his older brother and possibly his father were Freemasons while the family lived near Palmyra, New York. Nevertheless, in the late 1820s, the western New York region was swept with anti-Masonic fervor, and the Book of Mormon, a foundational religious book published by Smith in 1830, is generally considered to reflect that anti-Masonic sentiment by condemning what it portrays as oath-bound conspiratorial organizations.

By the 1840s, however, Smith and several prominent Mormons had become Freemasons and founded a lodge in Nauvoo, Illinois, in March 1842. Soon after joining Freemasonry, Smith introduced a new temple "Endowment" ceremony including a number of symbolic elements that were essentially identical with their analogues within Freemasonry. Smith remained a Freemason until his death; however, later Mormon leaders distanced themselves from Freemasonry. In modern times, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), the predominant Mormon organization, holds no position for or against the compatibility of Masonry with LDS Church doctrine."
Wiki

reply to post by sheepslayer247


Sorry, but I do not see a conspiracy in this.

First, one could easily attribute the Jesuits, The Peace Corp, or even U.N. employees into the same relative class as the LDS kids.

Second, I'd bet the farm that if one delved into every character involved with Watergate we would find every single one would be affiliated with some group. Be it another church, a bowling league, a corporation. No one is completely isolated from other groups, especially spooks who need covers and groups to merge with, create legends with...so on.

Third, Utah isn't exactly a big state. Many, many people there are intermarried, connected or know each other.

Fourth, NSA? How about the weapons grade plutonium stored there? May as well toss that one in too.

Having said that, nothing is impossible...just improbable and therefore not worth much time...other than to point out the fact that the data you put forth is no more important than any other "possibility".

reply to post by nwtrucker


Fair enough.

Can you connect the UN, the Peace corp and other organizations, as I have with the LDS Church, to key government conspiracies and actions? In fact, one of the companies that built the NSA mega-center also built the UN building.

Interesting, put together very well!
I'll have to study the links in the next post.

I've never heard of Jacobsen contracting. A lot of these construction companies are linked, owning others on the silent plan.

Mormon church-owned company buys huge swath of Florida land
By Kevin Spear, Orlando Sentinel

The Mormon church stands to own nearly 2 percent of Florida by completing a deal to buy most of the real estate of the St. Joe Co. for more than a half-billion dollars. The megapurchase was announced jointly Thursday by a corporate representative of church, which owns the nearly 295,000-acre Deseret Ranches in Central Florida, and by the real-estate and timber business, which has built several communities along the Panhandle coast.

Orl ando sentinel

nwtrucker
reply to post by sheepslayer247

 

First, one could easily attribute the Jesuits, The Peace Corp, or even U.N. employees into the same relative class as the LDS kids.

Not the Peace Corps. There are prohibitions on employment ... that work both ways ... with that organization. Pardon my laziness in not providing specific reference. The employment applications of both the government and the Peace Corp are very specific in this regard. If you've been 'tainted' by one you are forever excluded from the other ... unless, of course, you lie.

Oil companies being connected might be worth looking into as well. Start will RDS Shell Oil . New roads need oil in the Tarmac and they negotiate deals. The roads use gravel most likely from LaFarge, the biggest aggregate cement company in the world. New buildings need cement.

Who is KF Jacobsen? They're a sister company with LaFarge in Portland.

By the way Hilary Clinton is or was on board of directors of LaFarge. Connected with the gulf war , Bush family and Katrina disaster

The Mormon church has been involved big business for generations, and their company holdings are pretty vast. They own a large percentage of media, construction, education, banks, universities, railways, food production industry....it's kind of scary when you look at how much of America they 'own and control.
I have provided just one link; I hope it works! ( I don't have a lot of luck linking things-hehe.)

www.exmormon.org...

Last year the church 'canneries' began closing, and information on why has been hard to come by. It makes no sense, and my spidey senses are still on high alert.

My mother joined the Moron church, and after her death I found papers 'registering' myself, my children, and every family member she could get information on with the church. She loved taking trips to Utah and going to their 'library'.

It doesn't give me a sense of security to know they have my pertinent data. Seems like a fine line between believers and spies.

I was just a kid when I learned they owned Union Pacific Railway, and C&H Sugar. It struck me as odd then, and it's odd now. They appear to use religion for a front for things that may be nefarious, is my way of thinking.

I have nothing against anyone's choice of beliefs, but the 'hidden agenda' is what I tend to see with ALL organized religious institutions.

reply to post by sheepslayer247


In order to provide a more comprehensive perspective, you may want to add this information to your research project. It seems the National Security Agency (NSA) may indeed have ties with extreme fundamentalist groups. Brother Nathanael provides sobering insight into some of these right-wing religious fanatics.