John Singlaub

John Kirk Singlaub (July 10, 1921 to January 29, 2022) was a United States Army major general who served in the Office of Strategic Services, the Central Intelligence Agency and the Army, commanded the Studies and Observation Group in the Vietnam War, and after leaving the Army in 1978 chaired the United States Council for World Freedom and the World Anti-Communist League, raised money for the Contras of Nicaragua during the congressional ban on aid, and arranged a 1985 weapons purchase for them, in contact with Oliver North and William J. Casey.¹²

Early life and the OSS, 1921-1945

Singlaub was born on his grandfather's homestead in what is now Independence, California, on July 10, 1921, grew up in the Sherman Oaks district of Los Angeles, and enrolled in the Army ROTC program at the University of California at Los Angeles.¹ He was commissioned a second lieutenant on January 14, 1943, and within ten months was assigned to the Office of Strategic Services; the Army's special operations history office gives November 1943 as the date of his recruitment.³⁴ In the summer of 1944 he led a three-man team that parachuted into the mountains of France to organize, train and lead French Resistance fighters; the Army history office names the unit as Jedburgh Team JAMES and gives August 11, 1944 as the date of the jump.³⁴ His case officer was William J. Casey, who offered him cyanide pills for use if captured; Singlaub was wounded in the face by sniper fire in a fight with a German garrison.¹ Asked about Casey in 1986, Singlaub said that Casey "has indicated approval and he has been encouraging" and introduced him to people who needed detailed information.²

On August 27, 1945, Singlaub led an eight-man OSS team by parachute onto Hainan Island to reach Allied prisoners of war; the Army history office names the operation the PIGEON mission and the prisoners Dutch and Australian, and the Washington Post obituary lists American, Australian and Dutch prisoners.¹⁴

China, Manchuria and Korea, 1945-1958

After the war he remained in China with the Strategic Services Unit, the OSS successor, reporting on the Chinese civil war.⁴ The Washington Post obituary places him at Mukden, in Manchuria, until the city fell to Chinese communist forces in 1948, and states that he headed CIA operations in postwar Manchuria; CBS in 1986 described him as a CIA officer stationed in China in 1949 who watched the country fall.¹² In 1950 he was an instructor at Fort Benning, where the Army history office says he helped establish the Ranger Training Center.⁴

During the Korean War he was detailed to the CIA to direct operations behind enemy lines and served as deputy chief of the CIA mission in Korea (the New York Times of October 14, 1986 dates the post to 1951) and later as an infantry battalion commander, for which he received the Silver Star.¹²⁵ CBS named his immediate superior as Richard Stilwell and a case officer under him as Nestor Sanchez, later the Pentagon's official in charge of Latin America, and Singlaub told the network that he had friends at the top levels of the CIA, State, the National Security Council and the Department of Defense.² He attended the Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth and completed his UCLA degree in political science in 1958.¹

Studies and Observation Group, 1966-1968

Singlaub told FBI agents in 2003 that he served as the general in charge of the Vietnam Special Operations Group for unconventional warfare from May 1966 through August 1968, a joint task force command; the Army history office gives the same years for his command of the Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, Studies and Observation Group (MACV-SOG).⁴⁶ CBS identified John Vessey as a colleague who ran missions into Laos in the same period.² In the 2003 interview he said that there were no sterile firearms on SOG helicopters and that men who later claimed secret SOG missions were "wanna-bes."⁶

The 1977 Korea recall and retirement

In May 1977, as chief of staff of United States forces in South Korea, Singlaub told a Washington Post reporter that Jimmy Carter's plan to withdraw ground troops would "lead to war"; he later said the interview had been off the record.¹ He was ordered to Washington, and at a news conference Carter said the general had committed "a very serious breach of the propriety that ought to exist among military officers after a policy has been made."¹ Singlaub told CBS that Defense Secretary Harold Brown had suggested he say he had been misquoted; CBS reported that Brown denied this.² The withdrawal plan was later dropped.³ Singlaub was reassigned as chief of staff of Army Forces Command at Fort McPherson, Georgia, criticized Carter again over the neutron bomb and the B-1A bomber, and, after a speech at Georgia Tech, left the Army in 1978 after 35 years; the New York Times wrote in 1986 that he was asked to resign.¹³ The CBS narration and the October 14, 1986 New York Times article date the Korea episode to 1979.²⁵ Senator Jesse Helms praised him; according to the journalist Peter Dale Scott, Ronald Reagan took up his cause in syndicated radio broadcasts, and in 1979 and 1980 Singlaub told Guatemala's president, Fernando Romeo Lucas Garcia, that Reagan if elected would aid anti-communist efforts in Central America.²⁷

The Council for World Freedom and the League

Singlaub started the United States Council for World Freedom, which Scott dates to a November 22, 1981 inauguration and which the Internal Revenue Service recognized in 1982 as a tax-exempt educational organization after a pledge that it would not supply matériel or funds to any revolutionary, counterrevolutionary or liberation movement.³⁷ CBS reported that Ku Cheng-kang, the League's founder, invited him in 1984 to become its director, and that the governments of Taiwan and South Korea created the League in 1954; the New York Times gave 1966 as the League's founding year and 1981 as the year Singlaub took over.²⁵ Singlaub said he had expelled the Mexican affiliate, the Tecos, and the Latin American Anti-Communist League; the Anti-Defamation League wrote that substantial progress had been made since 1981 in removing racists and anti-Semites, while the journalists Scott Anderson and Jon Lee Anderson, in the book Inside the League, argued that the League continued to harbor fascists, which Singlaub called "absolute nonsense."⁵ He was also involved with the Western Goals Foundation, a domestic intelligence group financed by Nelson Bunker Hunt.¹

The Council worked from a Phoenix office. Its executive director, Joyce Downey, said in 1986 that it had distributed 8,000 "freedom fighter kits" and supplied a helicopter, had raised about $600,000 that year, and had provided $10 million to $25 million in cash and in-kind aid over two years, with aid for the FDN routed through the New Orleans warehouse of Mario Calero.⁵ A previous executive director, Larry Tifverberg, resigned and said that people called every day "asking for guns, ammunition, everything."⁵ The Internal Revenue Service audited the Council's books.⁵ Singlaub told the Washington Post in March 1986 that "there is nothing illegal about banks sending money to overseas accounts" from which arms could then be bought.⁸ At the League's 1985 conference in Dallas, Ellen Garwood donated money to refit a medical helicopter (the New York Times gave $65,000 and CBS $67,000), and a letter from Reagan was read to the delegates.²³ An unnamed Administration source said in October 1986 that groups controlled by Singlaub were behind the cargo plane shot down over Nicaragua; the plane's surviving crewman was Eugene Hasenfus, and Singlaub denied involvement.⁵⁷ Singlaub told CBS: "And outside the country, we organized an effort to raise money to buy arms for them," and Senator John Kerry told the network that his activities violated the Neutrality Act.²

Solicitations in Taiwan and South Korea, 1984-1985

On December 4, 1984, North wrote Robert McFarlane in a memorandum titled "Assistance for the Nicaraguan Resistance," whose second part described Singlaub's efforts to obtain military aid for the contras in South Korea and Taiwan.⁹ On January 28, 1985, CIA officers in South Korea reported to headquarters that Singlaub had asked the governing political party to contribute $2 million to the contras and that the Koreans said some signal from the United States Government endorsing the request would be necessary.¹⁰ Clair George, the CIA operations director, telephoned North; North's notebook of February 4, 1985 records George saying the South Koreans were "increasingly inclined to contribute $2M" and needed a White House indication, and George also called on February 2 and 5.¹⁰ Alan Fiers recalled discussing Singlaub's solicitation of the Koreans with George, the upshot being that North should be called.¹⁰

North's February 6, 1985 memorandum to McFarlane stated that "as a consequence of GEN Singlaub's recent trip, both the Taiwanese and the South Koreans have indicated [to CIA field personnel] that they want to help in a 'big way,'" and that George had withheld dissemination of the offers and contacted North privately.¹⁰ A second memorandum of the same date from North to McFarlane, on a cable to Honduran President Roberto Suazo Cordova, states that the FDN needed approximately $2 million in near-term financing for rifles, ammunition and boots for new volunteers, notes that Singlaub would see North the next day, and recommends that McFarlane authorize North to proceed as indicated with Singlaub.¹¹ The Independent Counsel's report states that North arranged for Singlaub to meet South Korean officials in the United States.¹² In an October 7, 1985 written response to questions from Representative Lee Hamilton, McFarlane wrote that there was no official or unofficial relationship between the NSC staff and fund raising for the Nicaraguan opposition, "This includes the alleged relationship with General Singlaub"; the Independent Counsel's report lists the response among McFarlane's withholdings of information from Congress.⁹

In March 1987 Singlaub told the Washington Post that in late 1984 he had asked two foreign governments for $10 million each, had offered three options (a direct contribution, money for him to buy weapons, or a diversion through an overcharged arms deal), and had discussed the diversion idea with North in early 1985. Informed sources named the two governments as Taiwan and South Korea, and officials of both denied contributing or knowing of any solicitation. Singlaub described a planned Taiwanese purchase of 40 MK 37 torpedoes from Israel through a Washington consulting company for which he was an unpaid adviser, with Taiwan to pay about $10 million above Israel's price of $72 million to $75 million, and said he left each government an index card with the number of the contras' Panamanian bank account.¹³ An investigator told the Post that Taiwan's contribution came as surplus light arms, with the CIA station chief in Taiwan acting as a facilitator.¹³ The congressional report states that in early 1985, in connection with his solicitation of "Country 3," Singlaub suggested to that country's officials and to North that a portion of his proposed arms sales to it be diverted to the contras, and that during the summer of 1985 he worked without success through GeoMiliTech Consultants, "owned by Barbara Studley," on diverting part of a $75 million proposed sale of torpedoes to Country 3.¹⁴ The Post's account of the 40 MK 37 torpedoes does not name the consulting company, and the report does not name Taiwan as Country 3; the two accounts concern the same subject and price range.¹³

In May 1986 Singlaub travelled to the Far East again, to countries that the congressional report designates only by number, after telling Elliott Abrams that he wanted to know how the United States would send a "signal"; Singlaub testified that Abrams said he would send it, Abrams testified that he never agreed to, and Richard Melton, who was present at their conversations, supported Abrams. Before Singlaub met his contact in one country, Abrams told him to stop.¹⁵

The 1985 weapons purchase for the FDN

In March 1985 Singlaub met the FDN military commander, Enrique Bermudez, at FDN base camps, drew up a weapons list (AK-47 rifles, RPG-7 launchers, light machine guns and SA-7 missiles), and took it to North, who made "some additions and subtractions"; later that month Singlaub introduced Adolfo Calero to a European arms dealer whose AK-47 price Calero described as about half of what the FDN had been paying, a difference the congressional report partly attributes to Singlaub taking no commission.¹⁶ In early May Calero and Singlaub met Richard Secord in North's office about SA-7 missiles, and Secord was chosen for them because he would supply training; in mid-May Calero ordered other weapons through Singlaub's dealer. North's notes of May 17, 1985 list a "Singlaub deal" and 10,000 AK-47s and record an unsuccessful effort to dissuade Calero; North attributed to Casey a warning against a five-to-six-million-dollar transaction with a broker suspected of reverse technology transfer to the Eastern Bloc, and the dealer denied this to the committees. The arms arrived in Central America on July 8, 1985, and were the last order Calero placed with any dealer other than Secord.¹⁶

Calero testified in deposition that his three main sources were Ron Martin, Secord and Singlaub, that he felt best with Singlaub and had "blind trust" in him, and that Singlaub told him North had said to stay away because of his high profile. Committee counsel put the first payments for shipments arranged by Singlaub at $2 million on April 26, 1985 and $3.3 million in May.¹⁷ The Washington Post reported in 1987 that Singlaub helped the contras buy $5.3 million of East Bloc weapons shipped through Honduras.¹³ A letter from the Washington lawyer Thomas Green to the committees compared the Singlaub and Secord shipments, giving Singlaub's as 348 tons with about $300,000 charged for shipping.¹⁸ Singlaub testified in 1987 that the delivery went from Poland to Honduras, that Swiss banks handled the transfers, and that North had cleared the items and given him rules after checking with "someone in the Justice Department," who was not identified.¹⁹

Eden Pastora, 1986

In March 1986 Singlaub travelled to Costa Rica, met Eden Pastora and negotiated an agreement with him, purportedly on behalf of the United States. The Independent Counsel's report states that word of the agreement briefly gave Pastora the advantage in the competition among the Newly Aligned Commanders; Fiers cabled that Singlaub's actions did not reflect a new posture toward Pastora, and a UNO/FARN commander and two other commanders threatened to march back to the Costa Rican border if the arms they had been promised did not arrive.²⁰ A Miami Herald clipping in Singlaub's FBI file reports him announcing in Costa Rica that he had come to persuade Pastora to visit Washington and saying that United States officials wanted Pastora to play a role like that of Charles de Gaulle in the French resistance.⁶ Calero testified that people in Washington were upset about Singlaub's involvement in the Pastora matter, so the FDN sent nothing to Pastora, and that Singlaub had also gone to a meeting with a group of former national guardsmen.¹⁷

GeoMiliTech Consultants Corp.

Singlaub signed correspondence as "Consultant" of GeoMiliTech Consultants Corp., the Washington company of Barbara Studley, at 1919 Pennsylvania Avenue NW. Among the exhibits to the deposition of Daniel O. Graham is a letter on the company's letterhead addressed "Dear Bill" to Casey at the CIA and signed by Singlaub as "Major General, U.S. Army (RET)" and "Consultant," which committee counsel dated to August 1986. It encloses a list of hardware quoted July 28, 1986, including 10,000 AKMS rifles at 185 each, 60 12.7mm machine guns and 20 twin-mount 14.5mm machine guns, and the list is marked "NO EUC REQUIRED." The letter states that the list was developed in conjunction with a member of the NSC, that funds from Congress would not be available until after September, and that a bank in Switzerland would accept a letter of credit from Casey's bank and lend for six to twelve months.²¹ Committee counsel stated in the Graham deposition that Robert Schweitzer, a lieutenant general, was hired by the company in late August or early September 1986, was interviewed by Singlaub, and met North with Singlaub on or about December 2, 1986.²¹

A memorandum prepared by Studley, found in North's safe, proposed a "conduit" through which Soviet weapons and technology would be supplied to "Freedom Fighters" without "the consent or awareness of the Department of State or Congress." The congressional report calls it the Singlaub-Studley plan, states that Singlaub presented it to North and Casey in 1985 and that North acknowledged receiving it and dismissed its significance, and quotes George Shultz saying at the hearings that it was "a piece of junk."²² Singlaub told the 1987 hearings that Studley showed him the memorandum and that he thought it a good plan; Senator Paul Sarbanes called it a "plan to get around the constitutional system," and Singlaub testified that he set up a December 1985 meeting between Casey and Studley.¹⁹ Graham testified that he arranged a meeting at Langley between Studley and Casey toward the end of 1985, with only the three of them present.²¹

A memorandum from Studley to North dated October 30, 1985 reports the questioning of an arms agent identified as "W" about a shipment that left on June 20, 1985, and a visit by a man named Mario Dellamico, described as working for the arms dealer Ron Martin, who offered Martin's arms for the contras and handed over a copy of Studley's packing list; it ends: "General John K. Singlaub has been advised of this information."²¹

The Miami Herald reported in June 1987 that GeoMiliTech listed Singlaub as an adviser.²³ Byron wrote that the company's "board of advisers" in the mid-1980s included Singlaub and retired Lt. Gen. Dan Graham; Graham testified in 1987 that he was never an adviser or director of the company.²¹²⁴

Hearings and the Christic Institute suit

Singlaub was one of about 30 defendants in the civil suit brought by two journalists injured in the May 30, 1984 La Penca bombing at a press conference held by Pastora in Costa Rica.⁵ An FBI report of an interview in Miami on May 23, 1989, with the interviewee's name withheld, summarizes the amended complaint as accusing Singlaub and others of conspiring to supply money for explosives and arms through businesses including the Orca Supply Company and CSF Investments Ltd., of a December 1984 plan to kill Pastora, and of smuggling cocaine into the United States between September 1983 and the date of the complaint. The report also states that Judge James L. King ordered summary judgment for the defendants on June 23, 1988, finding the plaintiffs' allegations "based upon unsubstantiated rumor and speculation from unidentified sources with no first hand knowledge," and that Singlaub had told Congress he arranged for weapons from an Eastern bloc country to reach the contras through an intermediary, an act the report calls not a violation of the Boland Amendment.⁶ The Washington Post obituary states that the suit, brought by the Christic Institute, was resolved in Singlaub's favor in 1992 and that Singlaub was never the subject of a criminal investigation.¹ An FBI agent, an assistant United States attorney and a Customs agent interviewed Singlaub on June 12, 1987 at the Miami Airport Marriott; the content is withheld in the released file.⁶

Robert Gates told the Senate intelligence committee on October 8, 1986 that CIA officials had tried to avoid learning about private funding: "Somebody will say something about Singlaub or something like, we will say I don't want to hear anything about it." The Independent Counsel wrote that, to the extent Gates spoke for others in the CIA, this was wrong, and recorded Gates's grand jury testimony that he had heard rumors that North had put contra leaders in touch with Secord and Singlaub.²⁵

Durrani-case deposition, 1991

In August 1991 defense counsel for Arif Durrani took the depositions of Studley and Singlaub in Washington. The United States Attorney's Office in Bridgeport wrote on September 9, 1991 that neither witness had any knowledge of Durrani or his claims or any known involvement in or knowledge of the "Iran" portion of the Iran-Contra affair, and that both had met Manuel Pires only within the last two years.²⁶ Christopher Byron wrote in December 1991 that Studley denied in her deposition that she knew Durrani.²⁴

The Philippines, 1987

Singlaub opened an office in the Philippines to search for a treasure of gold bullion, telling the Los Angeles Times he intended to use the gold to finance anti-communist insurgencies in Southeast Asia; he abandoned the effort after local newspaper reports described it as a cover for mercenary training.¹ On September 17, 1987 the FBI's Honolulu office sent a teletype to headquarters captioned "Neutrality Matter, Philippines," from a source whose reliability had not been established, and asked headquarters to contact the Independent Counsel or the Front Door Task Force and to obtain background on the National Defense Council Foundation and the United States Council for World Freedom; the released file withholds the source and the body of the report.⁶ Graham testified in 1987 that his last conversation with Singlaub, in February, concerned "his problems with his activities in the Philippines."²¹

Later years

Singlaub's memoir, Hazardous Duty, written with Malcolm McConnell, appeared in 1991; it calls North a "gullible dupe" and describes the arms dealers as motivated by "profit, not patriotism."¹ He married Joan Lafferty in 1992, chaired the OSS Society, and died at his home in Franklin, Tennessee, on January 29, 2022, aged 100.¹

Claims from Ari Ben-Menashe

Ari Ben-Menashe describes a 1985 contra deal brokered through GeoMiliTech and itemized at $3,242,000 paid to the Ora Group, against $5 million that he says GeoMiliTech's books showed received from the American side.²⁷ The Hartford Courant reported in 1992 a private $5 million shipment of Soviet-bloc arms arranged by Singlaub and Studley in the summer of 1985, and did not mention Ora.¹⁹