Creature From Jekyll Island by G. Edward полностью

the ideas and projects that they shared." The Bank of England provided Strong with an office and a private secretary during his visits,and the two men kept in close contact with each other through theweekly exchange of private cables. All of these meetings and communiques were kept in strict secrecy. When their frequent visitsdrew inquiries from the press,, the standard reply was that theywere just friends getting together for recreation or informal chats.

By 1926, the heads of the central banks of France and Germany wereoccasionally included in their meetings which, according toNorman's biographer, were "more secret than any ever held by o

Royal Arch Masons or by any Rosicrucian Order."

1. Quigley, Tragedy, p. 326.

2. Lester V. Chandler, Benjamin Strong, Central Banker (Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution, 1958, reprinted by Arno Press, A New York Times Company, 1978), p. 259.

3. John Hargrave, Montagu Norman (New York: Greystone Press, 1942), p. 108.

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THE LONDON CONNECTION 425

SECRET MEETING OF 1927

The culmination of these discussions took place at a secret meeting in 1927 at which it was agreed that the financial lifeblood of theAmerican people would be donated for a massive transfusion toGreat Britain. Galbraith sets the scene:

On July 1, 1927, the Mauretania arrived in New York with two notable passengers, Montagu Norman, G o v e r n o r of the B a n k of England, and Hjalmar Schacht, head of the German Reichsbank.... The secrecy covering the visit was extreme and to a degree ostentatious.

The names of neither of the great bankers appeared on the passenger list. Neither, on arriving, met with the press....

In New York the two men were joined by Charles Rist, the Deputy Governor of the Banque de France, and they went into conference with Benjamin Strong, the Governor of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York....

The principle, or in any case the ultimately important, subject of discussion was the persistently weak reserve position of the Bank of England. This, the bankers thought, could be helped if the Federal Reserve System would ease interest rates, encourage lending. Holders of gold would then seek the higher returns from keeping their metal in London. And, in time, higher prices in the United States would ease the competitive position of British industry and labor.1

Galbraith speaks with soft phrases to cushion a harsh reality.

What he is saying is that the purpose of the meeting was to finalizea plan whereby the Governor of the Federal Reserve System was todeliberately create inflation in the U.S. so that American priceswould rise, making U.S. goods less competitive in world marketsand causing American gold to move to the Bank of England. Governor Strong needed little convincing. That is precisely what he andNorman had planned to do all along and, in fact, he had alreadybegun to implement the plan. The purpose of inviting the Germansand the French to the meeting was to enlist their agreement to createinflation in their countries as well. Schacht and Rist would have nopart of it and left the meeting early, leaving Strong and Norman towork out the final details between them.