In July 1933, two mysterious men approached one of the most decorated soldiers in American history with what initially appeared to be a simple proposal. He didn’t know it at the time, but Major General Smedley Butler, whose prominent career mirrored the rise of the American Empire, was being recruited into a sordid plan to overthrow President Franklin Roosevelt, and bring fascism to the United States. In this episode, take a deep look at the rise and expansion of Imperial America, and the time we came within a hair’s breadth of losing democracy.

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Sources and Further Reading

Books

The Plot to Seize the White House, by Jules Archer: Link

Gangsters of Capitalism: Smedley Butler, the Marines, and the Making and Breaking of America’s Empire, by Jonathan Katz: Link

Maverick Marine: General Smedley D. Butler and the Contradictions of American Military History: Link

Websites

McKinley and the Spanish-American War: Link

The Signaling at Cuzco Well: Link

Marine Lieutenant Colonel Robert W. Huntington to Marine Colonel Charles Heywood, 6/17/1898: Link

Battle of Manila Bay, 1 May 1898: Link

Theodore Roosevelt, “The Strenuous Life” (10 April 1899): Link

Theodore Roosevelt: Confident Imperialist: Link

Review: Not so Benevolent Assimilation: The Philippine-American War: Link

McKinley's Benevolent Assimilation Proclamation: Link

The Insular Cases: A Comparative Historical Study of Puerto Rico, Hawai‘i, and the Philippines: Link

ASKS GEN. BUTLER TO EXPLAIN SPEECH; Secretary Adams Calls for a Full Report on His References to Nicaraguan Policy. NAVY OFFICIALS SILENT Stimson Also Refuses Comment on the General's Reputed Remarks at Pittsburgh Dec. 5.: Link

Mark Twain, To the Person Sitting in Darkness: Link

Gunboat USS Petrel: Link

Gunboat Callao: Link

The Opium Wars in China: Link

Yellow River Floods, Los Angeles Herald, Volume 26, Number 48, 17 November 1898: Link

Great Flood of the Huang-Ho River: Link

Wilhelm II: "Hun Speech" (1900): Link

Mahan, a “Place in the Sun,” and Germany's Quest for Sea Power: Link

The Liscum Bowl: Link

General Jacob H. Smith & the Philippine War’s Samar Campaign: Link

The Water Cure: Link

The Lobby- The Creation of the Panama Canal, 1870-1914: Link

Hepburn Suspects a Plot to Delay Building Canal: Link

Bunau-Varilla, Russia, and the Panama Canal: Link

The Strange Affair of the Taking of the Panama Canal Zone: Link

USS Nashville (PG 7) and the Building of the Panama Canal: Link

A Roundtable on John M. Thompson, Great Power Rising: Theodore Roosevelt and the Politics of U.S. Foreign Policy: Link

The New Japanese Treaty of Commerce and Navigation: Link

Gentlemen’s Agreement of 1907-1908: Link

Hemispheric Orientalism and the 1907 Pacific Coast Race Riots: Link

Museum of the City of San Francisco, Japanese and Korean Exclusion League- 1906: Link

Merchants, Mining, and Concessions on Nicaragua's Mosquito Coast: Reassessing the American Presence, 1893-1912: Link

American Policy in Nicaragua- Dawson Agreements—Brown Brothers Loan: Link

A Note on the Bryan-Chamorro Treaty and German Interest in a Nicaraguan Canal, 1914: Link

Riot at Cocoa Grove, Panama City, July 4, 1912: Link

The Wilson Administration and Panama, 1913-1921: Link

The Minister of the Netherlands to the Secretary of State- Determining Indemnities Owed to the United States by Panama: Link

CANAL IS OPENED BY WILSON'S FINGER; Gamboa Dike Blown Away as President in Washington Presses Button.: Link

U.S. ambassador plots against Mexican president, Feb. 16, 1913: Link

Henry Lane Wilson and the Overthrow of Madero: Link

El Porfiriato (1877-1911): Link

The structural evolution of the Golden Lane, Tampico embayment, Mexico: Link

Oil and Revolution in Mexico- Chapter 2: The Great Mexican Oil Boom: Link

Mr. De In Mexico: Link

Address to a Joint Session of Congress on the Tampico Incident: Link

April 20, 1914: Message Regarding Tampico Incident: Link

TWE Remembers: The Tampico Incident: Link

The Banana Wars: United States Intervention in the Caribbean, 1898–1934: Link

'Take Veracruz at Once'- USNI: Link

The Battle of Veracruz and the Medal of Honor: Link

How the U.S. Came to Dominate Haiti: Seizing the Gold: Link

Invade Haiti, Wall Street Urged. The U.S. Obliged.: Link

'The Greatest Heist In History': How Haiti Was Forced To Pay Reparations For Freedom: Link

How the U.S. Came to Dominate Haiti: Military Occupation: Link

HAITI, SMEDLEY BUTLER, AND THE RISE OF AMERICAN EMPIRE: Link

Freedom and Sovereignty: Notes on 1826 Haitian Rural Code: Link

The U.S. Occupation of Haiti, 1915-1934: Link

Americans and Chinese Communists, 1927–1945: A Persuading Encounter: Link

1927: 'China Marines' in Shanghai (photo): Link

Smedley D. Butler and Prohibition Enforcement in Philadelphia, 1924-1925: Link

The Machine, the Mayor, and the Marine:The Battle over Prohibition in Philadelphia, 1924–1925: Link

General Butler Cleans Up: Link

BUTLER NEAR BLOWS WITH A MAGISTRATE; Former Wants Philadelphia Ritz-Carlten Patrons to Tell About Liquor Seizure.: Link

An Alternative to Kuomintang—Communist Collaboration: Sun Yat-sen and Hong Kong, January–June 1923: Link

The Nationalist Party in Power: Unification of China Under Kuomintang Programs: Link

The Birth of Communist Party and Soviet Constitution between China and Hungary: Link

Soviet Diplomacy and the First United Front in China: Link

Before and After the May Fourth Movement: Link

Principles and Profits: Standard Oil Responds to Chinese Nationalism, 1925-1927: Link

SS PRESIDENT MCKINLEY Painting: Link

December 7, 1929, Buffalo Courier-Express, Author Asks for Senate Quiz of Butler's Speech; Sinclair Lewis says general confirmed charges against marines in Haiti, Nicaragua: Link

A Mussolini Alfa Romeo Mystery: Link

Interview with E.Z. Dimitman, June 23, 1982: Link

Bonus Army- Oregon Encyclopedia: Link

Walter W. Waters, Commander of the Bonus Expeditionary Force: Link

Fox Movietone News Collection- Butler addresses demonstration--outtakes: Link

Smedley Butler’s fiery speech to World War I veterans is still relevant today: Link

Bonus Expeditionary Forces March on Washington- National Park Service: Link

Zangara's Attempted Assassination of Franklin D. Roosevelt: Link

Roosevelt's Gold Program: Link

War Is A Racket (1935) Full Text: Link

The American Legion 15th National Convention: official program, 1933: Link

He Put the Funds in Our Foundation: How Robert Sterling Clark Got His Money: Link

“Every Citizen a Sentinel! Every Home a Sentry Box!” The Sentinels of the Republic and the Gendered Origins of Free-Market Conservatism: Link

Gerald L. K. Smith: Minister of Hate: Link

The National Committee to Uphold Constitutional Government, 1937-1941: Link

The Nye Revelations: Link

FDR and the Nye Committee: A Reassessment: Link

Frantz Fanon, Concerning Violence: Link

On April 5, 1976, the richest man in the world died of medical neglect on board a jet bound for Houston. At the time of his death, Howard Hughes had not been seen in public for nearly twenty years. With a massive fortune that enabled his worsening mental disorders, Hughes, once famous the world over, receded from the public eye, and for the last decades of his life, ruled a vast and often unsuccessful business empire confined entirely to his bed. In time the expansive and opaque system that Hughes engineered to ensure his own isolation grew out of his own control, and as he sat in his penthouse, seeing only seven people in fifteen years, an army of self serving executives made decisions on his affairs entirely without his knowledge. While Hughes seemed to lose money on every transaction, he made a lot of his employees and their friends very wealthy. This story is a tragedy- the tale of a man who was both created and destroyed thanks to his proximity to great wealth, culminating in his own death in conditions so deplorable his corpse had to be identified via fingerprint by the FBI. In his 70 years, Howard Hughes can certainly be said to have left a colorful mark on American history. This is that story.

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Sources and Further Reading

Books

Howard Hughes: His Life and Madness: Link

Howard, the Amazing Mr. Hughes: Link

Hughes: The Private Diaries, Memos and Letters: Link

Howard Hughes: Power, Paranoia, and Palace Intrigue, Revised and Expanded: Link

Websites

Howard Hughes Lives: Link

A Peek Into the Mind of Howard Hughes: Link

This Day in Aviation History, April 17, 1944: Link

Howard Hughes Memo Disclosed In Controversy Over Gift to Nixon: Link

The Secret Memos of Howard Hughes: Link

Thomas Quits Post As Chief of T.W.A.; Charles S. Thomas Resigns Post As Trans-World Airlines Chief: Link

Hughes’ Neighbor Fed Up, Leaves Hotel in London: Link

Hughes and 4 Associates Indicted in Air West Case: Link

Hughes Estate Agrees to Pay Airline's Stockholders $30 Million: Link

Prize-Winning 'Muckraker' Jack Anderson Dies: Link

SUSPECT GIVES UP IN HUGHES THEFT: Link

Howard Hughes at the End: Contradictions in Accounts: Link

Jury Divvies Howard Hughes' Fortune After an Heir Raid in Texas Court: Link

Music

Howard Hughes’ Blues, performed by John Hartford: Link

On June 5, 1968, Robert Kennedy was gunned down in the back room of a hotel kitchen just minutes after it seemed he had secured the 1968 Democratic nomination for President. The man changed with, and sentenced to death for, Kennedy’s murder was a 24 year old Palestinian American named Sirhan Sirhan. From the very beginning, it was clear that something was wrong with official story. In this episode, we dive deep and reexamine the evidence of the case to determine who really killed Robert Kennedy.

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Sources and Further Reading

Who Killed Robert Kennedy? | Al Jazeera World: Link

The Second Gun: Link

June 5, 1968: Robert F. Kennedy's last speech: Link

The Bobby Kennedy assassination tape: Were 13 shots fired or only 8?: Link

Pease, Lisa. A Lie Too Big to Fail: The Real History of the Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy. United States: Feral House, (n.d.).

Did L.A. police and prosecutors bungle the Bobby Kennedy assassination?: Link

New Evidence Implicates CIA, LAPD, FBI and Mafia as Plotters in Elaborate “Hit” Plan to Prevent RFK From Ever Reaching White House: Link

New evidence challenges official picture of Kennedy shooting: Link

RFK Assassination Witness Denies Recanting ‘Polka Dot Dress’ Story: Link

Man gets 8-year sentence on weapons charge: Link

The Robert Kennedy Assassination: Link

How did a shootout between two undercover cops on an LA freeway in 1997 lead to the discovery, and subsequent coverup, of one of the largest and most sinister networks of police crime and corruption in modern American History? Learn about Kevin Gaines, Suge Knight, Versace shirts, bank robberies, drug dealer cops, the Rampart Scandal, and more in this episode of Hidden History.

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Sources and Further Reading

PBS, Rampart Scandal Timeline: Link

PBS, The Outcome Of Rampart Scandal Investigations: Link

The Murder of the Notorious B.I.G.: Link

Cop Shoot Cop: Link

4 Officers Back Tales of Parties After Shootings: Link

Rafael Perez’s Statement to the court: Link

Mugshots: Rafael Perez - LAPD's Notorius Cop: Link

LAPD Detective Frank Lyga on Killing Police Officer Kevin Gaines: Link

Ex-LAPD Officer Sentenced in Bank of America Robbery - Los Angeles Times: Link

Ex-LAPD Officer Is Stabbed in Prison - Los Angeles Times: Link

2nd-Oldest Barracks in U.S. Closes : Marines Won't Be Defending Maine Anymore - Los Angeles Times: Link

A Brief History of the Consent Decree: Link

What happens when your home is built on top of 20,000 tons of toxic chemical and radioactive waste? What about the park? The playground? Your child’s school? These questions were all too real for the residents of one sleepy Niagara Falls suburb, little they know they were in the fight of their lives. Learn more about the Love Canal disaster in this week’s episode.

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Sources and Further Reading

Making Love Canal: Link

Love Canal & Lois Gibbs 35 Years Later: Link

ABC News Close-Up: The Killing Ground (1979): Link

Residents say Love Canal chemicals continue to make them sick: Link

A history of the Love Canal disaster, 1893 to 1998: Link

There’s No Love Lost for Entrepreneur Who Envisioned Model City: Link

The International Boundary Water Treaty: Link

Love Canal - Public Health Time Bomb: Link

Love Canal: A Special Report to the Governor & Legislature: April 1981: Link

Lawsuits: Love Canal still oozes 35 years later: Link

On February 29, 2004, American troops landed in Haiti to depose the country’s first democratically elected president. Who was Jean-Bertrand Aristide, why was he overthrown by two (2) US-backed coups, and what role does it play in the context of greater US-Haiti relations?

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Sources and Further Reading

Lest we forget the Ottawa Initiative on Haiti: Link

New documents detail how Canada helped plan 2004 coup d’état in Haiti: Link

The other regime change: Link

A Haitian Leader of Paramilitaries Was Paid by C.I.A.: Link

Reparation day: Link

An Interview with Jean-Bertrand Aristide: Link

U.S. is Still Undermining Haiti: Link

Bush’s man for Cuba author of the Haitian disaster: Link

Haiti Human Rights Investigation: November 11-21, 2004: Link

The 2004 coup d’état in Haiti: Canada’s legacy: Link

Aristide says U.S. deposed him in 'coup d'etat': Link

Aristide accuses U.S. of forcing his ouster: Link

In Haiti: Link

An Interview with Robert Fatton: Link

25 Years After 'Operation Uphold Democracy,' Experts Say the Oft-Forgotten U.S. Military Intervention Still Shapes Life in Haiti: Link

You’ve seen it- a black flag bearing the silhouette of a forlorn prisoner, emblazoned with the letters POW MIA. The enduring myth of the missing Vietnam POWs, symbolized by this flag, is a conspiracy theory that has persisted into the current day, but its roots can be traced back to the political schemes of Richard Nixon. What’s the story behind the POW MIA flag and the right wing mass movement that inspired it?

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Sources and Further Reading

The Enduring Cult of the Vietnam ‘Missing in Action’: Link

The Story Behind the POW/MIA Flag: Link

The Myth of the Lost POWs: Link

Prisoners of hope : exploiting the POW/MIA myth in America: Link

The Vietnam myth that gave us all those ‘Rambo’ movies: Link

Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency: Link

Review: Nixon as Madman: Link

VIETNAM: The Other Prisoners: Link

Americans Missing In Southeast Asia, Final Report: Link

Colonel Gritz's Dubious Mission: Link

On July 16, 1976, the worst nuclear accident in American history- the second worst in the world- took place at a uranium mill in Navajo Nation. 94,000,000 gallons of nuclear sludge, and over 1000 tons of uranium tailings rushed into the Puerco River when an dam failed at the United Nuclear Corporation’s Church Rock Mine. Though the disaster poisoned thousands of Navajo people in the surrounding areas, contaminating hundreds of square miles with cancer causing radioactive waste, the victims were given $2000 each and left to die. UNC would go on to clean up just 1% of the spill, and to this day 85% of the radiation remains. What was the Church Rock Mill disaster, and why have you probably never heard of it?

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Sources and Further Reading

Navajos Battle for Environmental Justice, Church Rock Spill: Link

Forgotten nuclear accident in Church Rock: Link

Remembering the largest radioactive spill in U.S. history: Link

Church Rock, America’s Forgotten Nuclear Disaster, Is Still Poisoning Navajo Lands 40 Years Later: Link

On Poisoned Ground: Link

Navajo Nation: Cleaning Up Abandoned Uranium Mines: Link

Uranium Processing: Link

A Brief History of: The Church Rock Uranium Mill Disaster (Short Documentary): Link

How the US poisoned Navajo Nation: Link

UNC Resources At Odds With New Mexico Over Uranium: Link

Northeast Church Rock Mine: Link

On November 10, 1995, the government of Nigeria, at the urging of Royal Dutch Shell, executed nine environmental and indigenous rights activists known as the Ogoni 9. They had fought nonviolently to protect their ancestral home: a 400 square mile area of the Niger River Delta known as Ogoniland, which had been turned into hell on earth by decades of oil extraction. Who were the Ogoni 9, how did they fight back, and has there been any justice for these terrible crimes?

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Nigeria: Ogoni 9 activists remembered 25 years on: Link

Remembering Nigeria’s Ogoni 9, Murdered for Their Organizing Against Shell: Link

Nigeria: Shell complicit in the arbitrary executions of Ogoni Nine as writ served in Dutch court: Link

Dutch court will hear widows' case against Shell over deaths of Ogoni Nine: Link

The Case Against Shell: The Hanging of Ken Saro-Wiwa: Link

The final Trial of Ken Saro-Wiwa: Link

Faces Of Africa Ken Saro-Wiwa: All For My People: Link

Long-term effects of oil spills in Bodo, Nigeria: Link

Ken Saro-Wiwa / Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People: Link

Cleaning up Nigerian oil pollution could take 30 years, cost billions – UN: Link

Ogoni Bill of Rights: Link

Ken Saro-Wiwa trial proceedings to resume without adequate legal defense: Link

THE KEN SARO-WIWA TRIAL: A JUDICIAL TRAVESTY THAT MADE NIGERIA A COMMONWEALTH PARIAH: Link

It took five tries to hang Saro-Wiwa: Link

Ken-Saro Wiwa Killer Judge Becomes Acting Chief Judge Of Nigeria: Link

In August 1996, investigative reporter Gary Webb published a series of three articles that shined light on a vast network of international cocaine smuggling that had both caused to crack epidemic, and was sanctioned by the CIA. Though his reporting was meticulous and factual, major newspapers engaged in a massive campaign to discredit him and his work, culminating in Webb’s blacklisting from journalism followed by a tragic end. How was the CIA involved in the crack trade, what was Dark Alliance, and why was it suppressed? Find out in this episode.

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Sources and Further Reading

Say Hello to Rick Ross: Link

Dark Alliance, Part I, America's 'crack' plague has roots in Nicaragua war: Link

Dark Alliance, Part II, Shadowy origins of 'crack' epidemic: Link

Dark Alliance, Part III, War on drugs has unequal impact on black Americans: Link

How the CIA Watched Over the Destruction of Gary Webb: Link

CIA-Contra Crack Cocaine Controversy, Chapter 2, Part I: Link

CIA Reading Room, Managing a Nightmare: CIA Public Affairs and the Drug Conspiracy Story: Link

Gary Webb: In His Own Words (2002) | CIA Cocaine Dark Alliance: Link

Freeway Rick Ross Interview About CIA Involvement: Link

Written in Pain: Link

Episode 121: From 1945 to 1959, the United States brought 1600 Nazi scientists to America in order to leverage their knowledge against the Soviets. Many were unrepentant war criminals who had played active roles in the slave trade and the Holocaust almost all were given American citizenship and died peacefully as free men. How did this secret Nazi rescue program impact our modern world? How did the American government whitewash its role? (Hint: it’s anti-Communism)

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Patreon: Link

Shirts and more: Link

Sources and Further Reading

Annie Jacobsen, "Operation Paperclip": Link

Secret Agenda: The United States Government, Nazi Scientists, and Project Paperclip, 1945 to 1990: Link

U.S. coverup of Nazi scientists: Link

Alsos, Samuel A. Goudsmit: Link

Fighting Justice at Dachau: U.S. War Crimes Trial Policies and Cold War Politics in the Concentration Camp Trial of 'Nordhausen-Dora', 1947: Link

United States Army Investigation and Trial Records of War Criminals United Stales of America r. Kurt Andrae et al. (and Related Cases) April 27, 1945-June 11, 1958: Link

Remembering the Space Age, Chapter 5: Creating a Memory of the German Rocket Program for the Cold War: Link

Dr. Theodor H. Benzinger, 94, Inventor of the Ear Thermometer: Link

A Scientist's Nazi-Era Past Haunts Prestigious Space Prize: Link

How 2 Pro-Nazi Nobelists Attacked Einstein’s "Jewish Science" [Excerpt]: Link

Combined Intelligence Objectives Sub-Committee (CIOS) Reports, 1944 - 1945: Link

Wernher von Braun, the SS, and Concentration Camp Labor: Questions of Moral, Political, and Criminal Responsibility: Link

Thalidomide’s Secret Past: The Link with Nazi Germany: Link