The Priory of Sion Part 4: My Way

 

Plantard, in context

The indisputable facts about Plantard are that in the 1940s, he was involved with Catholic youth movements, and that in 1956, he picked up another “social cause”, creating the Priory of Sion, allegedly linked with social housing projects and benefits, but largely based upon and inspired by his prior Alpha Galates.
It is indeed a far cry from being the “Grandmaster” of an esoteric or secret society with roots in Jerusalem. But it doesn’t make it less interesting. If anything, it makes it more interesting, for by sticking to the known facts, certain insights can be gleaned that paint a very intruiging picture of why and in what context Plantard was doing the things he did.

The European Youth Campaign

Youth movements were a social preoccupation of the first half of the 20th century. They were very important to the likes of Hitler and Stalin, but they had an equally important role to play in the West. After World War II, they were often seen as perfect recruiting or training grounds for upcoming politicians.

What happened to youth movements before, during and after the Second World War is an often neglected field of study, but though less popular, its history is well-documented. And it is here that we need to look to find details of the framework in which Plantard was operating.
In 1947, the Soviet-funded international youth movement, the World Federation of Democratic Youth (WFDY) was racked by the division that went with the Cold War. The WFDY soon began to splinter, leaving the right wing and social democrats with no natural home. To fill the void, the British National Council of Social Service, chaired by Sir George Haynes, agreed to organise a preparatory committee, chaired by Haynes, to launch a complementary youth body. Equally, European federalists had plans for a major youth campaign, but the financial means were not at hand and the realisation of the project was, initially, ‘indefinitely postponed’.
In a rare instance of not showing its usual greed, substantial British government funds were made available for a conference to be held in mid-1948. Three-quarters of the £12,000 budget was covered by government departments, including £3,000 from a bogus Prime Minister’s ‘South African Aid to Britain Fund’, which appears to have been a cover for funds from the Secret Vote. Covert funding was also received from the French government.
The success of the conference resulted in the creation of the World Assembly of Youth (WAY), with headquarters in Paris.

Captain Way

We note that 1948 sits in between Plantard’s Vaincre/Alpha Galates and his 1956 Priory of Sion. For a man who was interested and involved in youth movements, the creation of this “World Assembly of Youth”, headquartered in Paris, must have been an important event. Furthermore, the movement became known as WAY, and we note that it is this word that Plantard will also use in some of his “gray political dealings” which he was to become involved with… in Paris.

But there is more. In ca.1954, the CIA began covert financing of the international student movement. To aid the right, MI6 and the CIA helped organise and fund WAY. As these had headquarters in Paris, it is likely the money had to find its way (pun intended) to Paris too.

Right of Way

In origin, WAY’s membership was quite broad and included a number of left-wing socialists with no alignment to Moscow. However, it was not long before the right asserted itself in the organisation, turning the student movement into an acceptable stamping ground for those wanting to make their name in preparation for parliamentary politics. Woodrow Wyatt described WAY as “an organisation which does extremely valuable propaganda for the free world, without looking like a propaganda organisation”. This, of course, was also precisely why the CIA (and MI6) were pouring money into it.
How well-entrenched WAY was in daily politics is highlighted in this overview: a Friends of WAY Society included Conservative Prime Minister Sir Anthony Eden, ex-Labour Prime Minister Clement Atlee, Viscount Chandos (ex-colonial secretary) and Lord Mountbatten’s wife Edwina. CIA officer Joseph Burkholder-Smith revealed that 10 (the CIA division that handled front groups) was in liaison with MI6 on all its world-wide front operations, in WAY in particular, and that the CIA were manipulating WAY student leaders. This means that the leaders of WAY, and the youth movements in general, were handled if not handheld by the CIA – whether they knew it, or not. During the 1950s, WAY’s European Youth Campaign received over £1,300,000 of CIA money, the largest proportion of which nevertheless went to the British affiliate.

Unite, unite Europe

A United Europe was clearly a vision of Plantard’s 1940 vision, as expressed in the issues of Vaincre. And in the 1950s, a New York-based group called the American Committee on United Europe, whose leadership included General Bill Donovan, wartime head of the OSS (the fore-runner of the CIA), George Marshall, the US Secretary of State, and Allen Dulles, then Director of the CIA.
This high-powered CIA-funded pressure group financed the so-called European Movement, headed by Joseph Retinger, who promoted select gatherings of European and American politicians, businessmen, aristocrats, top civil servants and military leaders. It is also a group that would later inspire Prince Bernhard to create the Bilderberg group, which is now known to have equally been set up with CIA funding.

In 2000, declassified American government documents showed that the US intelligence community funded and directed the European federalist movement. One memorandum, dated July 26, 1950, gave instructions for a campaign to promote a fully fledged European parliament. It was signed by Gen. William J. Donovan, head of the American wartime Office of Strategic Services, precursor of the CIA. The vice chairman was Allen Dulles. The board included Walter Bedell Smith, the CIA’s first director, and a roster of ex-OSS figures and officials who moved in and out of the CIA.
The documents again showed that ACUE financed the European Movement, the most important federalist organization in the post-war years. In 1958, for example, it provided 53.5 per cent of the movement’s funds. Most interestingly, these documents again confirmed that the European Youth Campaign, an arm of the European Movement, was wholly funded and controlled by Washington.

“The Name is Plantard. Pierre Plantard”?

So here we have Pierre Plantard: a man into youth movements, into a united Europe since his teenage years – an active teenager at that. Then, in the 1950s, he continues very much on this path, and – most interestingly – largely disappears into a black hole, before emerging from it and first researching, then promoting such French mysteries as Gisors and Rennes-le-Château.
It is testimony from his wife and other anecdotal material that reveals he was involved in politics, at national French level, using the pseudonym WAY, which just happens to be the same abbreviation that the European youth movement, sponsored by the CIA, was using.
Let us note that all of his teenage interests, and specifically his willingness to put his thinking into action, would have marked Plantard as a man who could greatly help “the cause”. Though there is no direct evidence, we note that the type of evidence we would be looking for, would be a document that identifies a French citizen as a CIA asset. These files are simply impossible to come by, in this, and all other cases, where researchers have to tried prove someone was a CIA foreign asset. As such, we will merely put it forward as a possibility, and provide further circumstantial evidence – if only to see where it goes.

Germany

Hans Moltke

In the fifth issue of Vaincre, dated January 21, 1943, one can read: “It is therefore with total confidence that I depart to perform my mission; for while not deluding myself about the perils I run in discharging my duty, I know that until my last breath my watchword will consist in recognition of Alpha and fidelity to its chief.” The interesting fact is that this statement is ascribed to Hans von Moltke, one of the leaders of the so-called Kreisau Circle, the civilian wing of the German Resistance to Hitler.
Observers have noted that both Alpha Galates and the Kreisau Circle had a major focus on youth movements and on mobilizing the resources of European youth – and the creation of a United States of Europe.
It were from such circles that soon after the war, operations such as Gladio – the European stay-behind networks – were created, which were meant to fight against the Communist invaders, if such invasion were to occur. These networks were financed by the CIA and MI6 and operated by NATO intelligence, which normally bypassed the governments and intelligence agencies of the countries in which they had operatives. This was, of course, a precaution, in case, during an invasion, the files of the national intelligence agencies were compromised, and the stay-behind activists thus exposed.

The Arma Christi – or Arma CIA?

It is dangerous to link two unconfirmed reports together, but sometimes, in the shadowy world of intelligence, that is precisely what needs to happen to arrive at the truth. Note then, that it is Karl Hammer-Kaatee who argues that in the late 1940s, early 1950s, the CIA, and Donovan specifically, had an interest in the story of Rennes-le-Château, and apparently had a man on the ground: Tom R. He soon disappeared – allegedly faking his own death. From ca. 1954, the CIA began to fund youth movements in France, at a time when it was also running the stay-behind networks across Europe.

Bill Donovan

Did it, at that time (if not before), come across one Pierre Plantard (likely as part of its everyday activities in monitoring who in the youth movement should do what, how, etc.), and did someone decide to have a special task for him? Was he, for example, asked or offered to take over from Tom R? Did he become the new man on the ground? If not steered by the CIA, it is definitely what Plantard did on his own: in 1956, he founded the Priory of Sion, then began to hang out in Rennes-le-Château, before, in the 1960s, blowing up the story by creating a totally invented story, which he linked with his Priory of Sion.
Just like Tom R. supposedly hung out with Noel Corbu and the Villa Bethania, new documents published by Jean-Luc Chaumeil (if genuine) show that Plantard and Corbu met and knew each other much earlier, and much better than previously believed.

Fast forward

Fast forward to the early 1960s – skipping over the Dossiers Secrets – we find that Plantard is working with Philippe de Chérisey on the promotion of his “Priory of Sion”. As Guy Patton was able to confirm – and Jean-Luc Chaumeil confirmed to the author as well – de Chérisey was best friends with Sean O’Driscoll, head of the intelligence division of NATO in Paris. He even made him godfather to one of his children. Even if de Chérisey’s friendship with O’Driscoll was just that, it nevertheless makes it clear that NATO Intelligence – which ran the stay-behind networks – had an inside track into what was going on with Rennes-le-Château and the Priory of Sion. Coincidence, or design?

Line-up

If we put all three things together, we note there is a demonstrable link between the Priory of Sion, de Chérisey and the world of American intelligence in the 1970s.
De Chérisey was best friends with the head of NATO Intelligence in Paris.
There is the claim by Karl Hammer-Kaatee that in late 1940s, early 1950s, the heads of US intelligence were involved with Rennes-le-Château, via Tom R., their man who in the early 1950s disappeared.
There is circumstantial evidence that Plantard was entangled with CIA initiatives in Europe in the early 1950s. Was he later/soon reassigned to work on the Rennes-le-Château case, taking over from Tom R.?
Three coincidences, or three “sightings” of an underground movement that occasionally rises out of the shadowy waters, into the realm of documentary evidence?

Filip Coppens