Speaking in front of some students from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, Seymour Hersh blew a few minds when he declared the Joint Chiefs of Staff were basically controlled by Opus Dei and the Knights of Malta, two societies that hold considerable power inside the Catholic Church.
Not only that, Hersh also claimed they were trading custom-made coins with each other (an old tradition with the Malta Knights, it seems) and the coins indicated they viewed their mission in Iraq as essentially a spiritual one to turn “mosques into cathedrals.” In other words, welcome to the Crusades!

President John F. Kennedy meets with the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Photograph includes: (L-R) United States Marine Corps. General David Shoup; United States Army General Earle Wheeler; United States Air Force General Curtis LeMay, President Kennedy; Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Maxwell Taylor; United States Admiral George Anderson. West Wing Lawn, White House, Washington, D.C.
Please credit: Robert Knudsen/John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston.
One thing you notice right away with most so-called conspiracy research sites: they seem to have big agendas and a major piece of the puzzle is usually missing. Some are obviously Christian-based, and many of those don’t mention Malta Knights, Opus Dei or the Vatican.
Others seem to focus exclusively on the Rothschilds and basically “blame the jews,” ignoring the fact that the Rothschilds are part of a network of royal families and they have worked closely over the years with both the Vatican bank and the Rockefellers.
During the last year of his life, John Kennedy was seriously concerned the Joint Chiefs were going to overthrow him and assume power. In fact, the film “Seven Days in May” was not some wild fantasy, it represented very real concerns that forces inside the Pentagon were stage-managing political events for their own secret purposes.
The Malta Knights have been around since 1048 and currently have around 13,000 members worldwide. Originally headquartered in Jerusalem, the order was forced to move several times before landing at their current headquarters in Rome. Originally you had to be a member of nobility to join, and the upper ranks are probably still dominated by members of various royal families of Europe. In the modern era, Malta Knights have mostly been chosen from North America. They have long printed their own stamps and coins, and the current Malta coins are undoubtedly what Seymour was referring to as being very much in vogue and being passed around the upper ranks of the Pentagon.
According to the book “Blackwater,” Joseph Schmitz, former inspector general for the Pentagon who went to work for that sinister private company, lists his membership in the Malta Knights on his official biography. So are we fighting another Crusade or what? Rest assured, the Malta Knights have long functioned as an intelligence-gathering tool for the Vatican under the cloak of being a harmless charity. They played a major role in Operation Paperclip, which moved Nazi war criminals to safety so they could continue their work under new employers. And the Malta Knights seem to have forged a strong relationship with Israel and the neocons who took over the government under Bush II to foment the current wars in the Middle East.
Unfortunately, there’s a rabid form of Christian fundamentalism rapidly assuming power inside our military and its end-game seems to be to bring about a world war between Arabs on one side and Christians and Jews on the other. And don’t forget the real main purpose of war has pretty much remained the same throughout much of history: making profit. The average military-industrial corporation makes over ten times the profit during war they can hope to reap during peacetime. And if the war can be justified as a religious crusade, so much the better.
Even more important, Seymour Hersh is an intelligence operative and working the dialectical divide for counterintelligence operations. So whenever he reveals anything at all, it’s always a limited hangout.