
              Conspiracy Nation -- Vol. 6  Num. 73
             ======================================
                    ("Quid coniuratio est?")
 
 
-----------------------------------------------------------------
 
ST. PETER'S BANKER
==================
(*St. Peter's Banker*, by Luigi DiFonzo. New York: Franklin 
Watts, 1983. ISBN: 0-531-09889-3)
 
They're all here, all the characters you've come to know and 
love: Bishop Paul Marcinkus, Michele Sindona, the Vatican Bank, 
the infamous freemason lodge P-2 (Propaganda Due) -- all those 
who must have caused a younger Sherman Skolnick's eyes to open 
wide in amazement as he read on, late into the night.
 
You may have some trouble, though, in getting hold of this book: 
I did. Your best bet would be the library.
 
After reading *St. Peter's Banker* I have to confess that much of 
it was a bit deep for me. It goes into a lot of financial mumbo 
jumbo that I, not being at all knowledgeable about subtleties of 
banking sleight-of-hand, just had to read through hoping that 
some of it might be registering with my mind. Someone having 
good-to-excellent financial knowledge would understand the book 
better.
 
My overall impression of the book is that it may well be a "hack 
job": paid for by Sindona family funds as damage control on the 
reputation of Michele Sindona. It reminded me in a way of the 
biography of Meyer Lansky, *Little Man* (by Robert Lacey. New 
York: Little, Brown and Company, 1991.) After reading *Little 
Man* I put it down half thinking that, "You know, that Meyer 
Lansky wasn't such a bad guy." Same with *St. Peter's Banker*: 
you read it and wonder what all the fuss was about; after reading 
it, you do not feel unsympathetic toward Sindona.
 
I can't help thinking, as also with the Lansky book, that there 
is a lot more going on here that is being passed over, that this 
Sindona may have been a very devil. But you don't get that here. 
And, it seems, you will look in vain for other books on Sindona, 
his connection to the Vatican Bank, and his connection to the 
collapse in the U.S. of the Franklin Bank. I feel that this 
subject deserves to have had a hundred books written about it, 
giving other perspectives than that apparently pre-approved by 
the Sindona family. As it is, just try finding a copy of even 
this one book to read.
 
Michele Eugenio Sindona was born into an impoverished Sicilian 
family on May 8, 1920. His grandfather had been a prominent, 
wealthy Sicilian but Sindona's father gambled away the family 
fortune. Michele studied hard and became an *avvocato*, 
apparently a sort of lawyer in Italy. According to the book, he 
was a Nietzchean genius who studied the intricacies of financing 
and became a sought-after and acknowledged expert in this area. 
Eventually he succeeded in becoming *Mercator Senesis Romanam 
Curiam sequens* -- the pope's banker.
 
What is so bad about being the pope's banker? One thing is the 
alleged Mafia connections between that notorious society and the 
Vatican. Italian politics after World War II pitted the Christian 
Democrats against the Communists. Naturally, the Catholic Church 
had to support the Christian Democrats because the Communists are 
anti-God. "The Vatican's fear was clear: communism posed a threat 
to its religious, political, and economic strength."
 
"Politics makes strange bedfellows," the saying goes. In a 1947 
election in Sicily, the Communists captured much of the 
parliament. "Determined to regain control of the island, the 
Christian Democrats turned to the Mafia for help. In return for 
the right to appoint mafiosi as leading members of the party, the 
Mafia agreed to teach the communists a lesson."
 
  In behalf of democracy, the Mafia enlisted as their agent 
  Salvatore Giuliano. He and his cousin Gaspere Pisciotta led 
  their men into Portella della Ginestra. Without prejudice, 
  they shot and killed a dozen people and wounded more than 
  fifty others. New elections were held, and the Christian 
  Democratic party won a resounding victory. Later, at the 
  orders of the Mafia, Pisciotta murdered Salvatore Giuliano. 
  At his trial, Gaspere Pisciotta said of the massacre, "We 
  were a single body: bandits, police, and Mafia, like the 
  Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost." Ultimately, this "black 
  trinity" would give birth to a more powerful group known as 
  the High Mafia, or the political Mafia. For from that time 
  forward the right wing of the Christian Democratic party 
  would be dominated by Mafia-connected politicians, a fate 
  that not only would lead to the corruption of Italian 
  politics and the infiltration of industry and banking by 
  well-educated Mafia-connected men like Michele Sindona but 
  would also lead to the contamination of the Holy See.
 
(The "Holy See" means, in other words, the Vatican.)
 
We have here a situation not unlike here in the U.S.A., where 
"our" CIA has and does turn to and link with criminal elements, 
ostensibly to "fight communism" or "promote democracy" or 
whatever. From such marriages a President Bill Clinton can be 
born.
 
*St. Peter's Banker* also gives info on "P-2", a.k.a. "Propaganda 
Due" (pronounced PROP-a-gan-da DOO-ay). P-2 originated in the 
early 1800s as a secret society called the Carbonari. The 
Carbonari were similar to the Freemasons, but were more serious 
about their political beliefs. "The presence of mafiosi among the 
Carbonari guaranteed that violators of *omerta*, the Sicilian 
code of silence, would meet death by mutilation."
 
Licio Gelli, friendly to Benito Mussolini, Juan Peron of 
Argentina, and having fought with the fascist Italian Blackshirt 
division during the Spanish Civil War in the late 1930s, found 
himself eventually "grand master" of P-2.
 
  As grand master of P-2, Licio Gelli turned the lodge into 
  the most powerful, political, and violent secret 
  organization in Italy. Important Italian generals, 
  magistrates, and businessmen became members of P-2, which 
  Gelli severed from the hierarchy of Freemasonry. According 
  to a former U.S. intelligence officer who until recently was 
  stationed in Italy where he became friendly with Gelli, P-2 
  under Gelli's command became "an underground state within a 
  state."
 
(I may be mistaken, but I seem to recall that Gelli attended 
Ronald Reagan's inauguration and the accompanying ball in 1981.)
 
  ...beneath the structure of [Italy's] official government 
  there exists another more potent government, which serves 
  the special interests of its members and financial 
  supporters. Still deeper below, another government operates 
  in complete darkness. It has been called the Mafia, the High 
  Mafia, and Propaganda Due [DOO-ay]. Italians have 
  surrendered to it, some by watching without opposition, 
  others by not caring, and still others by using it.
 
 
Sindona became a P-2 Freemason. As such, he had powerful 
connections. So too we have Sindona, in 1969, rising to the 
supreme position of banker to the Vatican. He was at a peak of 
power. The poor Sicilian lad now had wealth -- hundreds of 
millions of dollars -- prestige, and great influence.
 
But the Italian left had their own evil genius, Enrico Cuccia, 
head of Mediobanca, Italy's government-owned financial 
institution. He and Sindona seem to have had a smouldering 
hatred, glowing quietly like hot coals, between them. Add to that 
a vengeful Judas, Carlo Bordoni, who struck back (with the help 
of his cunning wife, Virginia Cornelio Bordoni) traitorously at 
Sindona for mistreatment -- perceived or real -- and we have the 
downfall of Michele Sindona.
 
In the end, the great banker Sindona is reduced to a cringing 
neurotic, cooking up increasingly wild plots against his enemies, 
and pursued as a criminal in connection with his intricate and 
esoteric financial deals. He gets a twenty-seven-and-a-half year 
prison sentence and (as of 1983) is serving it at a medium- 
security federal correctional facility in Otisville, New York.
 
-----------------------------------------------------------------
     I encourage distribution of "Conspiracy Nation."
-----------------------------------------------------------------
If you would like "Conspiracy Nation" sent to your e-mail 
address, send a message in the form "subscribe cn-l My Name" to 
listproc@cornell.edu          (Note: that is "CN-L" *not* "CN-1")
-----------------------------------------------------------------
  For information on how to receive the new Conspiracy Nation 
  Newsletter, send an e-mail message to bigred@shout.net
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Want to know more about Whitewater, Oklahoma City bombing, etc? 
(1) telnet prairienet.org (2) logon as "visitor" (3) go citcom
-----------------------------------------------------------------
          See also: ftp.shout.net  pub/users/bigred
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Aperi os tuum muto, et causis omnium filiorum qui pertranseunt.
Aperi os tuum, decerne quod justum est, et judica inopem et 
  pauperem.                    -- Liber Proverbiorum  XXXI: 8-9 
 
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
O what fine thought we had because we thought    | bigred@shout.net
That the worst rogues and rascals had died out.  | Illinois,
  -- W.B. Yeats, "Nineteen Hundred And Nineteen" | I'm your boy.
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

