Giovanni Montini
 Giovanni Montini    ( cleric) | ||||||||||||
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| Born | 1897-09-26 Concesio, Brescia, Kingdom of Italy | |||||||||||
| Died | 1978-08-06 (Age 80) Castel Gandolfo, Italy | |||||||||||
| Alma mater | Pontifical Ecclesiastical Academy | |||||||||||
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Giovanni Montini was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 21 June 1963 to his death in 1978, where he ruled as Pope Paul VI.
Activities
On April 15, 1943, the OSS was charged with implementing plans for the Allied invasion of Sicily. The Joint Staff Planners for the US Joint Chiefs of Staff had drafted a report titled Special Military Plan for Psychological Warfare in Sicily that recommended the "Establishment of contact and communication with the leaders of separatist nuclei, disaffected workers, and clandestine radical groups, e.g., the Mafia, and giving them every possible aid." The report was approved by the Joint Chiefs of Staff in Washington and the order to make the Mafia connection was dispatched to Donovan. Earl Brennan, the OSS director in Italy, reached out to Monsignor Giovanni Montini, the Vatican Undersecretary of State, for help in locating opponents to the fascist regime in Sicily. Montini suggested that Brennan reach out to Calogero "Don Calo" Vizzini, the capo di tutti capi of the Vizzini/Agostino crime family, who had been imprisoned by Mussolini[1].
In 1952, a letter marked with a church stamp, former SS-general Otto Skorzeny praised the future Pope Paul VI, then deputy of foreign affairs for the Vatican, for helping fund, harbor, and give safe passage Nazi refugees living in Francoist Spain.[2] In 2011, newly uncovered documents went up for auction and contained, among other items, proof that beginning in September 1950, while then deputy of foreign affairs for the Vatican, Montini worked with former Nazis and members of the Spanish military in planning for a mercenary style army to operate in case of a war with the Soviet Union.[3]
According to Paul M Williams in his book Operation Gladio Unholy alliance, to aid in the process of washing the billions from the heroin trade, the CIA worked in tandem with Henry Manfredi, who established the Federal Bureau of Narcotics (FBN)'s first overseas operation in Rome in 1951. Manfredi had established close ties to Monsignor Giovanni Battista Montini, then the Vatican undersecretary of state. Through Montini, the FBN arranged to divert the flow of cash, at first through the Merrill Lynch Brokerage House and, eventually, through a host of parochial banks in Italy, before it finally arrived at the IOR[4]
Former CIA agent Victor Marchetti later testified: "In the 1950s and the 1960s the CIA gave economic support to many activities promoted by the Catholic Church, from orphanages to missions. Millions of dollars each year were given to a great number of bishops and monsignors. One of them was Cardinal Giovanni Battista Montini."[5][6]
When John XXIII died of stomach cancer on June 3, 1963, the CIA under John McCone became intent upon influencing the outcome of the conclave so that another "pink pope" would not ascend to the throne of St. Peter. The Agency's favored candidate was Cardinal Giovanni Battista Montini, the former Bishop of Milan. Montini was an ardent supporter of Catholic Gladio. The relationship between Montini and the US Intelligence community was so close that his ascendancy to the See of St. Peter may have been rigged. Time correspondent Roland Flamini uncovered evidence that showed CIA officials were able to confirm the election of Montini in advance of a puff of white smoke emanating from the chimney of the Sistine Chapel and expressed their pleasure that the conclave had proceeded according to plan.[7]
Homosexuality
In April 1976, an article in the weekly Italian magazine Tempo recounted the statements of the former French diplomat and writer Roger Peyrefitte, who denounced the hypocrisy of Paul VI on the issue of homosexuality. The writer says that he has information from people of the high Italian nobility that when he was archbishop of Milan, Paul VI had a homosexual affair with a young film actor, whose name he says he knows[8]. Paul Hofmann, Rome correspondent for the New York Times, takes up these assertions and gives the name of the Italian actor Paolo Carlini[9]. For his part, Franco Bellegrandi, a member of the Pontifical Noble Guard, affirms that Paul VI, then archbishop of Milan, was arrested by the local police during one of his nocturnal visits, that under his pontificate employees were dismissed to make way for his favorites, and reaffirms the allegation that the actorhad free access to the papal apartments.[10]
References
- ↑ https://www.academia.edu/96241415/Paul_M_Williams_Operation_Gladio_Unholy_alliance chapter 2
- ↑ https://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/washington-whispers/2011/12/02/revealed-post-world-war-ii-secret-nazi-vatican-army
- ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20210129111053/https://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/washington-whispers/2011/12/02/revealed-post-world-war-ii-secret-nazi-vatican-army
- ↑ https://www.academia.edu/96241415/Paul_M_Williams_Operation_Gladio_Unholy_alliance chapter 2
- ↑ David Yallop, In God's Name: An Investigation into the Murder of Pope John Paul I (New York: Bantam Books, 1984), p. 108.
- ↑ https://www.academia.edu/96241415/Paul_M_Williams_Operation_Gladio_Unholy_alliance
- ↑ Roland Flamini, Pope, Premier, and President: The Cold War Summit That Never Was (New York: Macmillan, 1980), pp. 186–89. quoted in Paul_M_Williams_Operation_Gladio_Unholy_alliance
- ↑ Roger Peyrefitte, « Mea culpa? Ma fatemi il santo piacere », Tempo, avril 1976.
- ↑ Paul Hofmann, A Slightly Wicked View of the Holy See, 1984, p. 151.
- ↑ Atila Sinke Guimarães, Vatican II, Homosexuality & Pedophilia, 2004, pp. 159-162.
