("Quid coniuratio est?")
INTERVIEW WITH DEBRA VON TRAPP -- JUNE 26, 1995 I spoke by phone with Debra von Trapp in the early evening of June 26, 1995. What follows is an abbreviated transcript of that interview. The entire interview will appear in the August 1995 issue of the Conspiracy Nation Newsletter (see info below).
By way of introduction, Debra von Trapp was featured on a recent segment of the NBC Dateline "News" program. Said segment dealt with alternative, non-official views as to who was behind the tragic Oklahoma City bombing. Ms. von Trapp claims to have inside knowledge as to who was actually behind the bombing and why it was done.
Note that, as always, I neither necessarily agree nor disagree with either all or parts of the following.
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CONSPIRACY NATION:
How are things developing these days? Your interview with Sherman
Skolnick was well-received, at least in some quarters. What's
been the upshot of it?
DEBRA VON TRAPP:
Well just the exposure and people, I think, attempting harder to
get some answers regarding what's going on in Oklahoma City.
Because it's notable that the mainstream media has virtually
buried this story. There's hardly any coverage on the west
coast of it. And really, the only reason we're hearing anything
about it right now is because of Stephen Jones bringing Tim
McVeigh forward to do his interview with Newsweek and with CNN.
Otherwise, the FBI has virtually remained silent on it up to this
point because their story has fallen apart.
What I expect is, people come to understand that the FBI will not be successful with their cover story: there will be no evidence to connect McVeigh; that, forensically, it will be concluded that there was no "Ryder truck" or "fertilizer bomb" in front of the building. And, in fact, forensically, it will be proven that there were multiple devices inside the building.
CONSPIRACY NATION:
Do you see... Supposedly, there's some kind of deadline coming
up, on Wednesday [June 28th], with a looming trade war with Japan
where they're gonna be having these huge duties on Japanese
luxury cars. I don't know how to ask this, but is that like a
"bubble" floating to the surface? I mean, you've got all this
stuff going on beneath the surface. And you have a "bubble" that
floats to the surface, that everybody can see: suddenly, there's
this tension between Japan and the United States, where there's a
looming trade war.
DEBRA VON TRAPP:
The trade war was looming back on September 28th! And my
communication with Mondale and the American Embassy in Tokyo was
September 27th. And essentially, this went off-the-table and
became a behind-the-scenes negotiation between the Japanese and
the American government.
I see it happening two ways: either to simply, quietly go off- the-table again, or conversely, the Japanese will accept the sanctions -- and they have good reason to do so. It allows them to gracefully exit from a situation that has been extremely uncomfortable for them already. The Japanese government is losing a tremendous amount of money. And the Japanese companies that are actually manufacturing luxury cars here have been operating at a loss.
Clinton actually handed them a graceful way out, a way to save face, if, in fact, they accept the sanctions. Because then it gives them an excuse to gracefully exit the market. They can be looked on as not being the "bad guys" by suddenly pulling the plug on the financial dealerships and the people that are employed in that part of the industry that will be affected here. And, at the same time, they now have already begun (which they have failed to discuss publicly) to re-tool the same manufacturing facilities that have been manufacturing the luxury vehicles, are now being re-tooled (and have been, for months past) to manufacture cars in the under $35,000 class.
Therefore, they've been given a graceful way to exit, re- introduce the cars being manufactured at these same facilities at a lower price point, and they [the sanctions on Japanese luxury cars] won't have any effect, essentially. Because they won't be taking a loss on luxury cars; they'll be increasing the sales of mid-sized and mid-priced cars and, on the other hand, they gain the advantage of having the U.S. look like they've done something terrible to the Japanese!
CONSPIRACY NATION:
That's an interesting analysis.
DEBRA VON TRAPP:
It's a very well-documented fact that, when you look at the
numbers, and you look at the manufacturing facilities, that those
two events have been taking place: that they have lost heavily
on the luxury car markups, and additionally, that for months
prior to the sanctions they had already started re-tooling to
manufacture mid-priced cars.
It's something that the mainstream media, that is covering the trade sanctions, has not bothered to tell the American public about.
CONSPIRACY NATION:
Well, they're pretty much of a disaster. And speaking of them, I
saw you on Dateline, I guess it would have been last week. And
I sat down with the starting sense that, "Well... Whatever they
say, don't trust them." And with that as the groundwork, I wasn't
too bothered by a lot of the slanted things that I felt they
did on the show. And yet, a lot of truth was able to get through;
where they couldn't censor you totally. They were able to get,
allow you to "say your say". But then they, you know, kind of
"did their thing" on it.
DEBRA VON TRAPP:
They didn't accurately represent what I'd said at all! They took
a few moments of a clip of me, out of about a two-and-a-half hour
interview, and completely misrepresented what I said to them.
They contacted me. I never contacted them. They came to me and told me that they were doing a piece on the Oklahoma bombing and were interviewing people that had factual information to offer regarding it.
[...to be continued...]
I encourage distribution of "Conspiracy Nation."
Coming to you from Illinois -- "The Land of Skolnick"