Let's Sell These People a Piece of Blue Sky: Hubbard, Dianetics and Scientology (41 page)

The Scientologists then launched a campaign against
Galbraith, with little success; for example, telling newspaper men that he had
threatened that the CIA would sink the
Apollo
!

Meister received anonymous letters saying that his daughter
had made pornographic films, and that she had been a drug addict. Meister says
he continued to be harassed for six years. The harassment stopped around the
time of the FBI raids on the Guardian’s Office, in the summer of 1977.

If Susan Meister did commit suicide, several questions
remain. She had been aboard the
Apollo
for four months. During that
time, she sent consistently enthusiastic letters to her parents. To commit
suicide, she must have undergone a very rapid mood change. She must also have
lost her faith in the efficacy of Scientology. If this was so, what had caused
this sudden shift of opinion, and why didn’t she leave the
Apollo
?

Letters were censored before leaving the
Apollo
, and
the passports of those aboard were held by the Ethics Office. So perhaps she
was unable to write the truth of what she had discovered, and unable to leave
the ship. Perhaps there is no concrete evidence to show that Susan Meister’s
death was not suicide. But the whole affair is compounded by the events which
followed. By creating the Sea Org, and taking to the sea, Hubbard had
successfully put himself beyond the law. There was no coroner’s investigation
into the death. It is likely that a verdict at least of foul play would have
been returned if there had been such an investigation.

1.
   
This chapter derives from the sworn testimony of George Meister at the
Clearwater Hearings, in May 1982, and from a written account by Meister called
“Scientology said Susan was a suicide”. Details were confirmed in a letter from
Meister to the author (13 June 1986); in the author’s interview with Kenneth
Urquhart; and in the author’s correspondence with Amos Jessup.

Chapter twenty-two

“It is my intention that by the use of
professional PR tactics any opposition be not only dulled but permanently
eradicated ... If there will be a long-term threat, you are to immediately
evaluate and originate a black PR campaign to destroy the person’s repute and
to discredit them so thoroughly that they will be ostracized.”

—L.
Ron Hubbard

Susan Meister’s death had no effect upon the Sea Org’s
relationship with Morocco. The
Apollo
crew established a land base,
called the Tours Reception Center, in Morocco in 1971.
¹
They were
trying to get into the king’s favor, and started training Government officials,
including Moroccan Intelligence agents, in Scientology techniques. Officials
were put on the E-meter and Sec-Checked by French speaking Sea Org members. The
Hubbards moved ashore.
²

From his villa in Morocco, in March 1972, the Commodore explained
his 12-point “Governing Policy” for finance
³
Points A and J were the
same: “MAKE MONEY.” Point K was “MAKE MORE MONEY.” And the last point, L, was
“MAKE OTHER PEOPLE PRODUCE SO AS TO MAKE MONEY.” At last, an honest admission
of a major plank of Hubbard’s philosophy.

Hubbard also introduced the “Primary Rundown,” where a
student would “word-clear” 10 Hubbard lectures about study.
⁴
That
meant going through the definition of every word in the lectures in a non
“dinky” dictionary (to use Hubbard’s expression), and using the word in every
defined context until it was thoroughly understood. It was a gargantuan task.
The word “of,” for instance, has 15 definitions in the World Book Dictionary,
favored by Hubbard at the time. At the end of this arduous procedure, the
student allegedly became “super-literate.”

The South African Commission of Enquiry submitted its report
on Scientology in June 1972. It recommended that a Register for psychotherapists
be established, as had the Foster Report in Britain. It also recommended that
the practices of Disconnection, “public investigation” (i.e.
noisy
investigation), Security Checking, and the dissemination of “inaccurate,
untruthful and harmful information in regard to psychiatry,” should be
legislated against. The report added: “no positive purpose will be served by
the banning of Scientology as such.”
⁵
Neither this nor any other
legislative action was taken.

The
Apollo
sailed from Morocco to Portugal in
October, for repairs. Hubbard and a contingent of Sea Org members stayed
behind. Morocco was as close as Hubbard ever came to having the ear of a
government, but relations broke down. In the Scientology world, there is a
rumor that the upset had something to do with Moroccan Intelligence, which
does lend a certain mystique. A secret Guardian’s Office investigation revealed
a more prosaic error. In 1971, Hubbard had reintroduced Heavy Ethics, and
Scientologists continued to use the Ethics Conditions. For being persistently
late for their Scientology courses, members of the Moroccan Post Office were
assigned a condition of “Treason.” To the Moroccans, “Treason,” no matter how
much it was word-cleared, meant only one thing: execution. The Post Office officials
set themselves against the Scientologists, and won.
⁶
As a grim
footnote, the Moroccan official who had negotiated with the Scientologists was
later executed for treason. The contacts with Intelligence had actually been
with a faction which was to fail in a
coup d’état
.

The panic, starting with Hubbard’s typically exaggerated use
of a simple word, ended with an order for the Scientologists to quit Morocco,
in December 1972. Hubbard himself was given only 24 hours. He flew to Lisbon,
and then secretly on to New York. The French had instituted proceedings against
him for fraud, so he had to duck out of sight. He was being labeled undesirable
by more and more governments.
⁷

Meanwhile, in Spain, eight Scientologists had been arrested
for possession of chocolates laced with LSD. They were held in filthy cells for
four days, and interviewed by a US Drug Enforcement Agent. As it turned out the
chocolates did not contain LSD.
⁸

Two Sea Org members accompanied Hubbard to New York. The
three stayed in hiding for nine months. Hubbard was in poor health. Photographs
taken at the time show an overweight, disheveled man with a large growth on his
forehead. Despite his supposed resignation from management in 1966, Hubbard had
continued to control the affairs of his Church, usually on a daily basis. Now
he had only a single telex machine. His prolific Scientological output ground
almost to a halt. What little he wrote shows a preoccupation with his poor
physical condition. In July he published an exhaustive summary of approaches to
ill health. He also initiated the “Snow White Program,” directing his
Guardian’s Office to remove negative reports about Scientology from government
files, and track down their source. He was convinced of the conspiracy against
him, and had no qualms about breaking the law to achieve the “greatest good for
the greatest number,” meaning the greatest good for L. Ron Hubbard.
⁹

While Hubbard was in New York, the Australian states began
the process which eventually led to the repeal of their Scientology Prohibition
Acts.
¹⁰
The State of Victoria, which had started the Australian
crackdown, even gave the Church of the New Faith (aka Scientology)
tax-exemption.

In the US, the Food and Drug Administration was ordered to
return all the materials seized eight years earlier.
¹¹
The E-meters
were still adjudged to be mislabeled, which had been the real issue at stake.

Another secret bank account was opened for Hubbard under the
name United States Church of Scientology Trust. Hubbard was the sole trustee of
this Swiss account, and it received large donations from Scientology organizations
throughout the world.
¹²

In one of the few Bulletins issued during his stay in New
York, Hubbard wrote
¹³
:

The actual barrier in the society is the failure to practice
truth ... Scientology is the road to truth and he who would follow it must take
true steps.

Hubbard’s hypocrisy knew no bounds. In an issue originally
called “What Your Fees Buy” (“Fees” later became “Donations”), Hubbard
continued to insist that he did not benefit financially from Scientology, and
had donated $13½ million above and beyond the cost of his own research. He
claimed that he had not been paid for his lectures and had not even collected
author’s royalties on his books. Scientologists could take Hubbard’s word for
it that none of the money they paid to the Church went to him.
¹⁴

He continued to insist that he didn’t benefit financially
from Scientology...
¹⁴
“Independent of research costs, the 13½
million dollars that churches owed me for services rendered, the usual author’s
royalties, lectures, loans, things paid for out of my own pocket, I forgave and
never collected. As even the royalties of the first book were given for many
years to churches for their work, I didn’t even make anything out of that best
seller. So the donations you make for service do not go to me.”

In August 1973, yet another new corporation was formed, once
again with the sole purpose of siphoning funds to Hubbard. Hubbard was to prove
yet again that in matters of taxation the man with the “most imagination” wins,
and Hubbard had a very vivid imagination. The Religious Research Foundation was
incorporated in Liberia.
¹⁵
Non-US students paid the RRF for their
courses on the Flagship,
¹⁶
so in real terms the corporation which
ran the ship was not being paid, and the money was going straight into an
account controlled by Hubbard. The Scientology Church was again billed
retroactively for earlier services rendered. This was the second time the
Church had paid Hubbard for these services: retroactive billing was the
function of the “LRH Good Will Account” in the late 1960s.
¹⁷
The
Church paid for the third time in 1982. Millions of dollars paid in good faith
by Scientologists for the further dissemination of their beliefs went straight
into Hubbard’s personal accounts, and were used to keep him in luxury, with a million
dollar camera collection
¹⁸
silk shirts tailored in Savile Row, and a
large personal retinue at his beck and call.

Hubbard rejoined the
Apollo
at Lisbon in September
1973.
¹⁹
He had complained about the dust aboard the flagship
²⁰
so the crew spent three months crawling through the ventilation shafts of the
ship cleaning them with toothbrushes
²¹
while the
Apollo
sailed between Portuguese and Spanish ports.

In November, the
Apollo
was in Tenerife. Hubbard went
for a joy-ride into the hills on one of his motorbikes. The bike skidded on a
hairpin bend, hurling the Commodore onto the gravel. He was badly hurt, but
somehow managed to walk back to the ship. He refused a doctor, and his medical
orderly, Jim Dincalci, was surprised at his demands for painkillers. Hubbard
turned on him, and said “You’re trying to kill me.” Kima Douglas took
Dincalci’s place. She thinks Hubbard had broken an arm and three ribs, but
could not get close enough to find out. With Hubbard strapped into his chair,
the
Apollo
put to sea, encountering a Force 5 gale. The Commodore
screamed in agony, and the screaming did not stop for six weeks.
²²

In Kima’s words: “He was revolting to be with - a sick,
crotchety, pissed-off old man, extremely antagonistic to everything and
everyone. His wife was often in tears and he’d scream at her at the top of his
lungs, ‘Get out of here!’ Nothing was right. He’d throw his food across the
room with his good arm; I’d often see plates splat against the bulkhead ... He
absolutely refused to see another doctor. He said they were all fools and would
only make him worse. The truth was that he was terrified of doctors and that’s
why everyone had to be put through such hell.”

While on the mend, Hubbard introduced his latest innovation
in Ethics Technology: the “Rehabilitation Project Force.” This became
Scientology’s equivalent to imprisonment, with more than a tinge of the Chinese
Ideological Re-education Center.
²³
In theory the RPF deals with Sea
Org members who consistently fail to make good. They are put on “MEST work,”
which is to say physical labor, and spend several hours each day confessing
their overts (transgressions), and revealing their Evil Purposes.

Life in the Sea Org was already fairly grueling, but the
Rehabilitation Project Force went several steps further. Gerry Armstrong, who
spent over two years on the RPF, has given this description
²⁴
:

It was essentially a prison to which crew who were
considered non-producers, security risks, or just wanted to leave the Sea Org,
were assigned. Hubbard’s RPF policies established the conditions. RPF members
were segregated and not allowed to communicate to anyone else. They had their
own spaces and were not allowed in normal crew areas of the ship. They ate
after normal crew had eaten, and only whatever was left over from the crew
meal. Their berthing was the worst on board, in a roach-infested, filthy and
unventilated cargo hold. They wore black boiler suits, even in the hottest
weather. They were required to run everywhere. Discipline was harsh and
bizarre, with running laps of the ship assigned for the slightest infraction
like failing to address a senior with “Sir.” Work was hard and the schedule
rigid with seven hours sleep time from lights out to lights on, short meal
breaks, no liberties and no free time...

When one young woman ordered into the RPF took the
assignment too lightly, Hubbard created the RPF’s RPF and assigned her to it,
an even more degrading experience, cut off even from the RPF, kept under guard,
forced to clean the ship’s bilges, and allowed even less sleep.