I have managed to name, relatively, only a few of the influential individuals who are members of the Council on Foreign Relations, or of affiliated agencies, and who also occupy key jobs in the executive branch of government, including the Presidency.
I have asserted that the objective of the invisible government is to convert America into a socialist nation and then make it a unit in a one-world socialist system.
The managers of the combine do not admit this, of course. They are "liberals" who say that the old "negative" kind of government we used to have is inadequate for this century. The liberals' "positive" foreign policy is said to be necessary for "world peace" and for meeting "America's responsibility" in the world. Their "positive" domestic policies are said to be necessary for the continued improvement and progress of our "free-enterprise" system.
But the "positive" foreign policy for peace has dragged us into so many international commitments (many of which are in direct conflict with each other: such as, our subsidizing national independence for former colonies of European powers, while we are also subsidizing the European powers trying to keep the colonies) that, if we continue in our present direction, we will inevitably find ourselves in perpetual war for perpetual peace–or we will surrender our freedom and national independence and become an out-voted province in a socialist one-world system.
The liberals' "positive" domestic policies always bring the federal government into the role of subsidizing and controlling the economic activities of the people; and that is the known highway to the total, tyrannical socialist state.
The Council on Foreign Relations is rapidly achieving its purpose. An obvious reason for its success: it is reaching the American public with its clever propaganda.
However much power the CFR combine may have inside the agencies of government; however extensive the reach of its propaganda through organizations designed to "educate" the public to acceptance of CFR ideas–the CFR needs to reach the mass audience of Americans who do not belong to, or attend the meetings of, or read material distributed by, the propaganda organizations. Council on Foreign Relations leaders are aware of this need, and they have met it.
In the 1957 Annual Report of the Committee for Economic Development (a major propaganda arm of the CFR), Gardner Cowles, then Chairman of CED's Information Committee, did a bit of boasting about how successful CED had been in communicating its ideas to the general public. Mr. Cowles said:
"The value of CED's research and recommendations is directly related to its ability to communicate them ... the organization's role as an agency that can influence private and public economic policies and decisions ... can be effective ... only to the extent that CED gets its ideas across to thinking people....
"During the year [1957], the Information Division [of CED] distributed 42 pamphlets having a total circulation of 545,585; issued 37 press releases and texts of statements; arranged 4 press conferences, 10 radio and television appearances, 12 speeches for Trustees, 3 magazine articles and the publication of 3 books.... In assessing the year, we are reminded again of the great debt we owe the nation's editors. Their regard for the objectivity and non-partisanship of CED's work is reflected in the exceptional attention they give to what CED has to say. The [CED] statement, 'Toward a Realistic Farm Policy,' for example not only received extended news treatment but was the subject of 362 editorials. The circulation represented in the editorials alone totaled 19,336,299."