Let's Sell These People a Piece of Blue Sky: Hubbard, Dianetics and Scientology (35 page)

31.
 
Hubbard, Modern
Management Technology Defined; Clearwater Sun 7 February 1986; also interview
with former Sea Project and Sea Org executives.

32.
 
CSC
v. Armstrong, vol.1, pp.2006-7

33.
 
In
March 1967, CSC v. Armstrong, exhibit 500-5Z, vol.12, p.2021.

34.
 
LRH
Executive Directive 5 NY, 294 WW, 10 April 1967.

35.
 
CSC
v. Armstrong, exhibit 500-5E, vol.12, pp.1997-8 & vol.16, p.2616.

36.
 
Author
interview with former St. Hill executive.

Chapter nineteen

“In all the broad Universe there is no
other hope for Man than ourselves.”

—L. Ron
Hubbard,
Ron’s Journal
, 1967

“Ethics” were tightening up in the Scientology world. Since
the mid-1960s the Orgs have been managed on a strict system. Staff members add
up points to measure their production. For an Auditor this is the number of
“Well Done Auditing Hours”; for a Letter Registrar, letters in and out. Some
jobs are less readily reduced statistics: Even students doing Scientology
courses keep “stats,” where every word checked, every page read, every minute
of tape heard, every “clay demo” and every “check-out” has a point value. The
stats are graphed, from the income of an Organization, down to the number of toilets
cleaned.

Staff members are assigned an Ethics Condition every week in
accordance with their stats. A slight upward trend on the graph is called
Normal, while a level graph, or a slight downtrend, is Emergency. From top to
bottom the Conditions are Power, Affluence, Normal, Emergency, Danger,
Non-Existence, Liability, Doubt, Enemy, Treason, and Confusion. For each Ethics
Condition, there is a “formula,” through the application of which the
individual's stat is supposed to rise.
¹

Hubbard insisted that his Ethics system should also be
applied to “wogs” (non-Scientologists). In Saint Hill this quickly went from
the vaguely to the utterly ridiculous. A local caterer who ran a mobile canteen
was put into a condition of Liability in part for running out of apple pie.
When he failed to apply the Liability formula, he was declared Suppressive,
which meant that Scientologists could not communicate with him, let alone buy
his replenished stocks of apple pie.
²

By autumn 1967, Hubbard was living in a villa on Las Palmas,
adding the final touches to the OT3 Course, and putting the Sea Organization
(as the Sea Project had become) through its paces. On Las Palmas he tested out
his “Awards and Penalties” for Ethics Conditions on the Sea Org. The penalties
for lower Conditions included deprivation of sleep for a set time (often
several days), and the assignment of physical labor. Hubbard boasted in a
September Policy Letter that penalties in the Sea Org were “much worse” than
those for the other Scientology Orgs. The milder non-Sea Org penalty for
Non-Existence required that an offender “Must wear old clothes. May not bathe.
Women must not wear make-up or have hair-do's. Men may not shave. No lunch hour
is given and such persons are expected not to leave the premises. Lowest pay
with no bonuses.”
³
Pay was pitiably low in Scientology Organizations
anyway.

On September 20, Hubbard spoke of his new Sea Org, and the release
of OT3, in a lecture taped in Las Palmas. Scientologists call this lecture “RJ
67” for “Ron's Journal 1967.” Hubbard called the third Operating Thetan level
“the Wall of Fire.” OT3 concerned an incident which he said occurred “on this
planet, and on the other 75 planets which form this Confederacy, 75 million
years ago.” Hubbard claimed that exposure to OT3 is fatal to the uninitiated:

“The material involved in this sector is so vicious that it is
carefully arranged to kill anyone if he discovers the exact truth of it ... I
am very sure that I was the first one that ever did live through any attempt to
attain that material.”

Hubbard claimed he had broken a knee, an arm, and his back
during the course of his research. He attributed this to the tremendous
increase in “OT power” he achieved doing OT3, making accidental damage to his
body all too easy. While he was certainly accident-prone at times (a
characteristic of those surrounded by Suppressives, according to Hubbard), the
cause was not necessarily paranormal. The evidence does not support these
claims of injury.

In RJ 67, Hubbard spoke of an international conspiracy to
destroy Scientology. From the early days Hubbard had felt that a group of
“vested interests” was trying to keep both Dianetics and Scientology down.
Hubbard's major targets had been the medical and psychiatric professions.

According to RJ 67, the attack on Scientology had achieved
epic proportions. It was vital for the Conspiracy which dominated the affairs
of the world to crush Scientology. Hubbard claimed that his wife, the Guardian,
had unearthed the highest level of the Conspiracy, the 10 or a dozen men who
determined the fate of Earth: “they are members of the Bank of England, and
other higher financial circles. They own and control newspaper chains and they
are oddly enough directors in all the mental health groups in the world.”
Newspaper baron Cecil King was one of the 10 (or 12). Hubbard also claimed that
the then Prime Minister of Britain, Harold Wilson, was controlled by these men,
as were many other heads of state.

Hubbard ended RJ 67 with a message of hope: “From here on
the world will change. But if it changes at all, and if it recovers, it will be
because of the Scientologist, it will be because of the Organization ... In all
the broad Universe there is no other hope for Man than ourselves.”

A larger vessel had been purchased, and sailed with an
inexperienced crew to meet Hubbard at Las Palmas. The
Avon River
was a
414-ton trawler. Her first voyage, from Hull, was reported in the British press
after her non-Scientologist Captain's return. Captain John Jones and the chief
engineer were the only professional sailors aboard. Jones called it the
strangest trip of his life
⁴
:

My crew were sixteen men and four women Scientologists, who
wouldn't know a trawler from a tramcar. But they intended to sail this tub
4,000 miles in accordance with the Org Book. I was instructed not to use any
electrical equipment apart from the lights, radio and direction finder. We had
radar and other advanced equipment which I was not allowed to use. I was told
it was all in the Org Book which was to be obeyed without question. We tried
these methods. Getting out of Hull we bumped the dock. Then, using the Org Book
navigation system based on radio beams from the BBC and other stations, we got
down off Lowestoft before the navigator admitted he was lost. I stuck to my watch
and sextant, so at least I knew where we were.

Possibly this novel method of navigation, depending solely
on radio, harked back to Hubbard's 1940 Alaska Radio Experimental Expedition.

On Las Palmas, the crew of the
Avon River
became
guinea pigs for Hubbard's most advanced “research” into Ethics, or Heavy Ethics
as it came to be known. New lower Ethics Conditions were issued, each with a
series of steps. The individual assigned a low Condition was expected to work
through the Ethics Formulas progressing up through the Conditions. The poor
woman who assisted Ron in his research into the Condition of Liability had to
wear a gray rag, to show her deficiency to her colleagues. In the Condition of
Doubt, she walked around with a black mark on her cheek and a large, oily chain
about her wrist.

The
Avon River's
radio operator was ordered by
Hubbard to remain awake until a new radio had arrived and been fitted on the
bridge. The radio arrived after five days, the operator having complied with
the “Commodore's” order.
⁵
Hubbard seemed obsessed with sleep deprivation.
It was one of the accusations made against him by Sara Northrup 16 years before
in her divorce complaint.

At about this time, one of the Sea Org crew jovially
suggested that their six-month contract be extended to a billion years. Hubbard
adopted the suggestion with gusto, and Sea Org members still sign a billion
year contract, boasting the motto “We Come Back,” life after life.

On October 6, new Formulas were issued for the Ethics
Conditions. The Liability Formula contained the alarming order to “Deliver an effective
blow to the enemies of the group one has been pretending to be part of despite
personal danger.” The invitation was obvious. The step remains a part of the
Liability Formula, and any Scientologist assigned Liability (which happens
frequently) must comply with it. The original Treason formula was
shorter-lived, and included: “1. Deliver a paralyzing blow to the enemies of
the group one has worked against and betrayed. 2. Perform a self-damaging act
that furthers the purposes and or objectives of the group one has betrayed.”
⁶
This Formula was abandoned a year later.

Twelve days later, Hubbard issued “Penalties for Lower
Conditions” which included
⁷
: “LIABILITY - Suspension of Pay and a
dirty grey rag on left arm and day and night confinement to org premises.

TREASON - ... a black mark on left cheek ... ENEMY - SP
Order. Fair Game. May be deprived of property or injured by any means by any
Scientologist without any discipline of the Scientologist. May be tricked, sued
or lied to or destroyed [punctuation sic]”

In November, the Hubbard Explorational Company bought the
Royal
Scotsman
, which for some years had been an Irish Channel cattle ferry, and
weighed in at 3,280 tons
⁸
, eight times the tonnage of the
Avon
River
. The new owners requested permission from the Board of Trade to
re-register the ship as a “pleasure yacht,”
⁹
with clearance for a voyage
to Gibraltar. They were advised that considerable modifications would be
necessary under the “Safety of Life at Sea Convention” (SOLAS) of 1960.

A few days later, having docked the
Royal Scotsman
in
Southampton, the owners requested registration as a “whaling ship.” Permission
was refused, and a detention order put on the vessel, preventing her from leaving
port.
⁹

Reporters were given a handout which said Hubbard had
already undertaken successful survey work in the English Channel, and was resuming
his work. The earlier survey was allegedly for oil and gas on the sea floor.
Yet another Hubbard expedition that failed to materialize.
¹⁰

Seeing the failure of his subordinates to extricate the
Scotsman from Southampton, Hubbard decided to take command, and flew from Las
Palmas with a 20-man crew. The
Royal Scotsman
was hastily re-registered
under the flag of Sierra Leone. However, the name was misspelled, and the ship
became the Royal “Scotman.”
¹¹

Permission was requested for a single voyage to Brest, where
the necessary repairs would be made. Permission was granted on November 28
¹²
and the
Royal Scotman
sailed. The ship followed in the tradition of the
Avon
River
, and ran into fenders in the inner harbor. There were heavy storms in
the English Channel, and the ship nearly foundered off Brest. Hubbard ordered
her to sail to Gibraltar, where the
Avon River
was waiting. There was a
heavy storm, and the hydraulic steering and the main compass were inoperative.
One generator was out of action, and there were women and children aboard, but
Gibraltar resolutely refused the Scotman entry. Eventually, emergency steering
was rigged up, and the Scotman was steered from the aft docking bridge on directions
from the main bridge via walkie-talkie. Finally the ship was allowed to dock at
Ibiza, in the Spanish Balearic Islands.
¹³

The ship travelled from port to port for several weeks
before settling to overwinter at Valencia, in Spain. A non-Scientologist crew
member said of Hubbard: “He called himself commodore and had four different
types of peaked caps ... He told me he thought I was a reporter.”
¹⁴

This “wog” started the voyage as ship's carpenter, but by
being “upstat” ended it as Chief Officer. During the short voyage he had a
brush with Ethics. He was put in a Condition of Doubt for “defying an order,
encouraging desertion, tolerating mutinous meetings, and attempting to suborn
the Chief Engineer.” The boatswain was put into a Condition of Enemy for
“undermining the Spanish crew, habitual drunkenness, holding nightly and
morning meetings, and derogating Scientology.”

On New Year's Day 1968, Hubbard incorporated the “Operation and
Transport Corporation Ltda [sic],” through the Panamanian consulate in
Valencia.
¹⁵
OTC took over from the Hubbard Explorational Company as
Hubbard's principal channel for extracting money from Scientology. He owned 98
of the 100 issued shares. Hubbard created a network of corporations the sheer
complexity of which has daunted most tax investigators. The
Royal Scotman
was re-registered under the Panamanian flag, though she continued to sail under
that of Sierra Leone.
¹⁶

A glamorous picture of life at sea was presented to
Scientologists the world over, and, when the stringent Scientology
qualifications for Sea Org membership were abandoned, its ranks swelled.
Largely with people completely unskilled in the nautical arts.
¹⁷

Sea Org members wore pseudo-naval uniforms, and were
assigned naval ranks, from the lowly “Swamper” to Hubbard's own “Commodore.”
The uniforms and ranks remain, in the largely landbound Sea Org.

In January 1968, Hubbard released OT levels 4 to 6. OT4 was
supposed to proof the individual (or “Pre-OT”) against future “implanting.”
Hubbard wheeled out the Clearing Course Implant list, and had his devotees
“mock-up” and “erase” the implants yet again. OT 5 and 6 consisted of drills to
be done “exterior from the body.” Those who audited these levels usually admit
later that their “exterior,” or out-of-the-body, experience was entirely
subjective. A few claim they could do exactly what the materials required, but
offer no proof. Curiously, much of the highly secret material on levels 5 and 6
came from Hubbard's book The Creation of Human Ability first published in the
mid-1950s.