Atlantic Bridge (Germany)
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Not to be confused with The Atlantic Bridge, a similar British association
Atlantik-Brücke (English: Atlantic Bridge) is the most powerful US-German socio-political influence network, an association that include leading personalities from business, politics, the armed forces, science, the media and culture.
The members have dominated the leadership in every German party since its foundation, and all the chief editors and leading journalist in the German commercially-controlled media are members. [1][2]
In addition to decision-makers from these areas, who find a framework for confidential discussions at Atlantik-Brücke, the association also includes young executives who forge networks at the “Young Leaders” conferences.
It was designed from the start to tie Germany to the US leadership, especially by strenghtening support for NATO, and to further the interests of big corporations.
The chairman, retired Federal Minister Sigmar Gabriel , is a former SPD leader that is well connected to the business lobby.
Contents
Organization
Founded in Hamburg in 1952, it had its headquarters in the old capital Bonn between 1983 and 1999, and is now located in Berlin. The association organizes invitation-only conferences, seminars and colloquia[3]. Through various programs for "Young Leaders", military officers, leading journalists, central politicians and promising students, Atlantik-Brücke fosters strong social networks among current and future pro-US German leaders in business, media and politics.[4]
The Atlantic Bridge cooperates with CIA-close think-tanks like the Aspen Institute and German Marshall Fund, and the membership list has a significant overlap with Bilderberg-participants.
Members
The powerful network, in no way democratically legitimized, consist of people who only see the world from one perspective, from above; and who only know one type of appreciation, that of money and power. If someone wants to be part of the ruling establishment, they have to share this view. If the want to personally benefit from this network, be it an aspiring politician, journalist, civil servant or academic, they must be at the service of those to whom the world belongs.
The number of members is limited in order to preserve the exclusivity of the association, and is only partially public The list of members (see above) is members or associates collected from their own publications.
The Media
A large percentage of the members are journalists. This is certainly not a coincidence. The Atlantic Bridge is about who gets to control money an power, and it is important to sell this policy smoothly to the outside world.
It is particularly noticeable that a large number of correspondents who have been sent to the USA by their broadcasters and newspapers are on the list of members. Pretty much all of the correspondents are invited to join the Atlantic Bridge before starting their job in the United States. This networking effort makes sense; the AB's connections, especially to conservative politicians and think tanks in the states, are excellent.
String pullers such as Henry Kissinger, Madeleine Albright, Zbigniew Brzeziński and John Kornblum can open many doors in Washington. The reporting is influenced accordingly, and shows a picture of the United States as these elite politicians want European audiences to see it. Figuratively (and probably often literally), the CIA is at the table every time these journalists meet with American politicians, scientists or the military.
Politics
The largest group of members is politicians, While the number of representatives of the individual parties roughly corresponds to the representation in the German parliament, the Left party (Die Linke) is noticeably absent. The representatives that are members belong exclusively to the economic liberal wings of their parties, with strong pro-NATO views.
On the American side, the membership is a pleasant experience in empire mangagement.
Business
Whose interests are to be furthered, is clearly illustrated by another big group of members: managers, many of them from the financial industry, consultants from predatory consultancy companies that often operate worldwide, bankers, PR-companies and lobbyists; they all have only one interest, to defend and expand their privileges and their already huge possessions. Cite error: Closing </ref> missing for <ref> tag. Since 2005, the two organizations have each held their own Young Leaders conference.
- There are strategic partnerships with institutions such as the Munich Security Conference or the American Chamber of Commerce in Germany.[5]
- An annual expert meeting has been held in Berlin since 1990 with the US Army High Command in Europe, the US European Command.
Award named after CIA-director
Showing it close intelligence ties, from 1993 to 2008, the AB named its highest price [6] in honor of CIA-officer Vernon A. Walters, responsible for such regime changes as the 1973 coup in Chile.[7].
From 2015 onward, their highest price is named after former CIA-director George HW Bush.[8]
Young Leaders
The two Atlantik-Brücke Young Leaders conferences receive more than 500 applications per year, from which 120 Young Leaders are chosen by the steering commitee. Sixty young leaders are chosen for the German-American Conference (30 Americans and 30 Germans) and sixty are chosen for the European Conference. As of 2011, the German-American Young Leaders Conference has been running for 33 years.
The Young Leaders Program initiated by Atlantik-Brücke represents the oldest and largest program dedicated to identifying and nurturing relationships among the future custodians of the transatlantic partnership. Since the first Young Leaders Conference was held in 1973, over 1,500 Europeans and Americans have attended one of thirty-two German-American Young Leaders Conferences or ten European Young Leaders Conferences, a 10-day international young leader exchange.
Alumni of these prestigious gatherings remain in contact with each other both informally and through regional discussion groups and biennial alumni conferences that had been held under the auspices of Atlantik-Brücke. On January 1, 2011 Atlantik-Brücke established the independent organization "Atlantik Forum e.V. – the Young Leaders Alumni of Atlantik-Brücke" to more effectively facilitate and manage all these activities.
Prominent Young Leaders alumni
Christian Wulff, Former Federal President of Germany
Thomas de Maizière, Former Federal Minister of Interior
Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg, Former Federal Minister of Defense
Michael Otto, Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Otto Group
Jürgen Großmann, Chairman of the Managing Board of RWE
Thomas Enders, President and CEO of Airbus Industries
Paul-Bernhard Kallen, Chairman of the Board of Hubert Burda Media Holding
Hans-Gert Pöttering, Former President of the European Parliament
Charles Schumer, Senior U.S. Senator from New York
Cem Özdemir, Chairman of Alliance 90/The Greens
Edelgard Bulmahn Member of Parliament; Former Federal Minister of Education and Research
Michael Vassiliadis, Chairman of the Board of IG BCE – Mining, Chemical and Energy Industrial Union
Wolfgang Ischinger, Former German Ambassador to the United States
Richard Burt, Former United States Ambassador to Germany
Silvana Koch-Mehrin, Vice President of the European Parliament
Craig Kennedy, President of the German Marshall Fund of the United States
Kai Diekmann, Editor-in-Chief of BILD Zeitung
Katja Gloger, Editor-at-large, STERN Magazin
Joshua Bolten, Former White House Chief of Staff, President George W. Bush
History
Eric M. Warburg (founder of the firm currently known as Warburg Pincus) was one of the founders of Atlantik-Brücke, together with legendary editor Marion Gräfin Dönhoff, Chancellor of Germany Helmut Schmidt and other citizens of Hamburg. In those Cold War times, the U.S. was looking for influence on Germany. The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) probably gave the idea for founding the Atlantik-Brücke; Eric M. Warburg was a friend and consultant for John J. McCloy, Chairman of the Council on Foreign Relations and President of the World Bank. The Atlantik-Brücke is the German counterpart for the U.S. based American Council on Germany (members include US diplomats Richard Holbrooke and Henry Kissinger).
Extract of member list
Below is a selection from the member list of the Atlantik Brücke:
Philip D. Murphy, former US/Ambassador to Germany
Henry Kissinger, former US/Secretary of State
Josef Ackermann, former CEO of Deutsche Bank, Germany
Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg, former Secretary of Defence of Germany
Helmut Kohl, former Chancellor of Germany
Helmut Schmidt, former Chancellor of Germany
Rupert Stadler, former chairman of Audi AG
Torsten Oltmanns, Global Marketing Director at Roland Berger Strategy Consultants
Joachim Gauck, former President of Germany
Angela Merkel, Chancellor of Germany
Members of the Board
Chairman
Former Federal Minister Sigmar Gabriel, MdB (SPD), Deutscher Bundestag, Berlin Vice-Chairmen
Professor Dr. Michael Hüther, Director and Member of the Presidium, German Economic Institute, Cologne
Former Federal Minister Dr. Norbert Röttgen, MdB (CDU/CSU), Berlin Treasurer
Professor Dr. Andreas Dombret, Former Member, Executive Board of Deutsche Bundesbank, Columbia University, New York Executive Director
Dr. [David Deissner]]
Members of the Board
[1] Angelika Gifford, TUI AG, ProSiebenSat1 Media SE und Rothschild & Co., Munich
Reiner Hoffmann, German Federation of Trade Unions (DGB), Berlin
Ambassador Wolfgang Ischinger, Munich Security Conference (MSC), Munich
Alexander Graf Lambsdorff, MdB (FDP), Deutscher Bundestag, Berlin
Parliamentary State Secretary Christian Lange, MdB (SPD), Federal Ministry of Justice and Consumer Protection, Berlin
Eveline Metzen, American Chamber of Commerce in Germany e.V., Frankfurt am Main
James von Moltke, Deutsche Bank AG, Frankfurt am Main
Omid Nouripour, MdB (Bündnis 90/ Die Grünen), Deutscher Bundestag, Berlin
Julie Linn Teigland, Ernst & Young GmbH, Mannheim
Anahita Thoms, Baker & McKenzie, Düsseldorf
Friederike von Tiesenhausen Cave, Bloomberg L.P., London
Karsten Uhlmann, Frankfurter Brauhaus GmbH, Frankfurt (Oder)
Dr. Nagila Warburg, Warburg Archive Foundation, Hamburg
Dr. Michael Werz, Center for American Progress, Washington, DC
Ute Wolf, Evonik Industries AG, Essen
Related Quotation
| Page | Quote | Author | Date |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lars Hinrichs | “Without my networks I would be nothing” | Lars Hinrichs | 27 February 2021 |
Known members
106 of the 454 of the members already have pages here:
| Member | Description |
|---|---|
| Josef Ackermann | Chairman of Deutsche Bank, G30, Bilderberg Steering Committee |
| Otto Wolff von Amerongen | Bilderberg Advisory Committee member, deep politician |
| Peter Ammon | German diplomat, Atlantik-Brücke, MSC |
| Ali Aslan | Spooky journalist, Georgetown University, many deep state ties |
| Evan Bayh | US lawyer, lobbyist, and politician |
| Kurt Becker | German editor-in-chief and government spokesman. Attended Bilderberg/1967 and Bilderberg/1975. Member of Atlantik-Brücke. |
| Arnold Bergstraesser | German political scientist who headed some deep state groups in the 1950s and 1960s |
| Christoph Bertram | German journalist with a heavy Bilderberg habit |
| James Bindenagel | US Chargé d'affaires to Germany from 1996 to 1997, |
| Kurt Birrenbach | 7 Bilderbergs, West German politician |
| Hans Karl von Borries | |
| Philip Breedlove | Supreme Allied Commander Europe |
| Birgit Breuel | German politician, 6 times Bilderberger. Became president of the Treuhandanstalt, the state-organized looting of former East German assets, after the assassination of her predecessor Detlev Rohwedder |
| Myron Brilliant | Bridge between the business world and the intelligence-connected organizations. Also lobbyist for free trade agreements. |
| Elmar Brok | lobbyist and European parliament politician, MSC regular |
| Zbigniew Brzezinski | A central US Deep politician, Cercle, Bilderberg, ... |
| Richard Burt | US Deep state operative who took part in the discussion about "terrorism" at the 1986 Bilderberg. Founded Diligence |
| Kai Diekmann | Deep state connected German editor. 2001-2015 chief editor of Bild Zeitung, Europe's biggest newspaper. |
| Klaus von Dohnányi | Attended two Bilderbergs in the 1970s. Mayor of Hamburg in the 1980s. |
| Hans-Lothar Domröse | Senior German Army officer. He is believed to have visited Le Cercle in 1983. |
| Marion Dönhoff | Spooky German journalist |
| Mathias Döpfner | CEO of mightiest media group in Germany and Europe, Axel Springer SE, member of the Bilderberg Steering Committee and other transatlantic networks, most notably Atlantik-Brücke. Became billionaire after receiving gift from elderly widow. |
| Thomas Ebeling | Single Bilderberg German businessman - tobacco, Pepsi, Novartis pharmaceuticals, media executive. Member of Atlantik-Brücke. |
| Tom Enders | Atlantik-Brücke, American Council on Germany/Young Leaders, Bilderberg/Steering committee, Munich Security Conference/Advisory Council ... |
| Fritz Erler | SPD Deputy chair. Attended all Bilderberg meetings from 1955 September to his death in 1967, aged 53 |
| Gotthard von Falkenhausen | German banker |
| Klaus-Dieter Frankenberger | Transatlantic German editor |
| Chrystia Freeland | "A bit of a living parody of everything wrong with the detached technocratic neoliberal order" |
| Michael Froman | Serial WEF meeting visitor with many other SDS connections |
| Ralf Fücks | German politician married to Marieluise Beck of the German cluster of the Integrity Initiative |
| Sigmar Gabriel | German deep state operative, Atlantik-Brücke Chairman since 2019 |
| Joachim Gauck | President of Germany 2012-2017 |
| Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg | Born with silver spoon as scion of the zu Guttenberg family, but blew his political career in 2011 after academic plagiarism was discovered. Since then has stayed in spooky think-tanks. |
| Katrin Göring-Eckardt | Warmongering German Green politician |
| Jane Harman | Ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee and caught her coordinating with an Israeli agent. |
| Lars Hinrichs | German entrepreneur and WEF Young Global Leader 2008. "Without networks I would be nothing". |
| Christiane Hoffmann | Berlin correspondent for Der Spiegel who then became government spokesperson. |
| David Ignatius | Attender of spooky "security" conferences |
| Wolfgang Ischinger | Spooky German diplomat. Chaired the Munich Security Conference |
| Josef Joffe | Publisher-editor of Die Zeit |
| Max Warburg Jr. | Grandson of Max Warburg Sr., MSC regular, banker |
| Udo van Kampen | Journalist, Atlantik-Brücke member, visited the Brussels Forum 2007-2009 |
| Frederick Kempe | Spook and deep state actor |
| Craig Kennedy | president of the German Marshall Fund in the period 1996-2014 |
| Walther Kiep | Politician, financial fraudster, perjurer, attended 4 Bilderbergs from 1974 to 1980 |
| Kurt Georg Kiesinger | Five early Bilderbergs, German Chancellor. Possible tool of the BND |
| Robert Kimmitt | US deep state functionary, CFR, Bilderberg etc. Facebook's "Lead Independent Director" since March 2020 |
| Henry Kissinger | US deep politician, 40+ Bilderbergs, Nobel peace prize, war criminal |
| Eckart von Klaeden | Triple Bilderberg German politician |
| Karl Klasen | Deutsche Bank, Atlantik-Brücke... |
| ... further results | |
References
- ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFvQuZBxh-Q
- ↑ http://spiegelkabinett-blog.blogspot.com/2013/03/journalisten-der-atlantikbrucke-in.html?m=1
- ↑ http://www.transatlanticperspectives.org/entry.php?rec=133
- ↑ http://spiegelkabinett-blog.blogspot.com/2014/01/das-netzwerk-der-atlantikbrucke.html
- ↑ http://web.archive.org/web/20181004232906/http://www.atlantik-bruecke.org/ueber-uns/interview-mit-friedrich-merz/
- ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20110212154114/http://www.atlantik-bruecke.org/programme/preisverleihungen/vernon-a-walters-award/
- ↑ https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol46no1/article01.html
- ↑ https://www.atlantik-bruecke.org/george-h-w-bush-erhaelt-preis-der-atlantik-bruecke/
