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And The Lion Cried

Wednesday, March 27, 2013 9:27

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(Before It's News)

AND THE LION CRIED

“I
was born in Salzburg Austria on July 1, 1942 unto Elizabeth Maria
Weissel/Esterhaszy and Karl Gunther Russbacher. My mother was the heir to the
Esterhaszy estates. My father was of noble descent. He was known as the Lion of
Salzburg.”

By
GUNTHER K. RUSSBACHER, Admiral, USN

Written June 11, 1992

Edited by Rayelan Allan
Russbacher

The day was drawing to a
close while the noise of the prison began to be unbearable. It seemed as if all
the animals wanted to talk and yell at the very same time. The evening meal,
consisting of burned pinto beans, dried out corn and spagetti sauce with unknown
meat was considered the fare of the day.

The noise of the young
men housed in the maximum security (protective custody unit) section of the
Missouri state penetentiary reached the usual levels as inmates taunted each
other back and forth through-out the large housing structure, commonly referred
to as the cell house of the Ozarks. The unit houses about 320 men – all of whom
have either requested protective custody, were ordered into protective custody
by and through order of the court or prison administration, or they were forced
to ‘check in’ for their own protection due to inccurance of gambling debts, or
that they,failed to pay their prison pusher for drugs. Many of them cannot keep
their mouths shut when it comes to the telling of tales about other inmates.
Snitches, as they are called are by far in the overall majority.

Lastly, there is another
group of men who are forced to live under these deplorable living conditions.
These men have committed no overt acts against other inmates, but rather and
moreso, pose a significant threat to the safety and security of the prison.
They are the ones who have kept their honor, respect and dignity, even at the
cost of incurring the severe wrath of the people running the institution. They
are the ones who take freedom seriously– even to the point of attempting
escape from custody. Many of them should not have been jailed or imprisoned at
all. They represent the failings of a society with little or no social
conscience. They dream of fredom; taste the freedom as they watch the numerous
television programs avail-able to them. They, who are commdemned to this place
of higher learning feel not only lost, but also completely forgotten. It is a
hell on earth. Hope, eternal hope, is the commodity panhandled by Bible toting
fundementalist preachers, whose only goal is to ‘rack up’ another one for the
Lord.

Yet there are these men
who hold their heads high; find honor and dignity along with a little righteous
pride, in all their little daily affairs. It is to these men that I tend to
gravitate. These are the men, although few in numbers, who will stand by you
when the going gets tough. Among all the scum which calls this place home,
there is a man, who by virtue of his demeanor does not meet proper cri-teria,
and does not fit in among the scum. I am proud to consider him friend. Maybe we
are both so called misfits, and deserving the hell we live in. I can only hope
not; hope that there is an end to all the shit and pain, and that we will be
restored to our families, who even though suffering the same, or far worse
pain, stand beside and be-hind us. Although we come from somewhat different
worlds – he from the east coast, and I from the west, we share the same low
opinion of most of our fellow prisoners. Tony, as I shall call him, is a man,
and always there with a good word, or willing to help when prfound trouble
finds my cell door. We share the same dreams; dreams of wives, children, and
better times. We too long for Mr. Bushs’ ‘kinder gentler nation’, knowing full
well that such dreams can never be realized. I as well as Tony, were in the
wrong place, at the wrong time. And that

As the noise abates and
everyone begins to settle down for another evening of doing nothing, all
thoughts turn inward – to the family I left behind. They are the ones who
really suffer.

I have ceased counting
days according to the calendar. I count the days remaining until I am permitted
the use of the telephone. I count the hours, days, weeks and months until I may
see my wife again. All my waking hours are occupied by thinking about my
friend, lover, wife and very best friend.

The days move with
precission slowness, knowing that I wait for each and every sundown; the coming
of night. Although I have received a twenty-one year sentence for alleged
investment fraud, there is no release date in sight for me and for my wife and
children. Although they are not imprisioned, they too aren’t free. The stigma
attached to having a husband and father in prison has served to ostrasize them
from any form of normal life. For they are the family of a political prisoner.
A man whom president Bush considers a most severe threat. A threat not merely
to the national security of these United States, but also a serious threat to
the re-election chances for the current president. I have the dubious honor of
being a member of the national security establishment. Now, the very Agency
which I have served for all my adult life, has not only turned against me, but
has threatened to destroy my very family.

My troubles didn’t begin
a few months or even a few years ago. It doesn’t take a great deal of
intellegence to know when, where and how all these problems began. Born to
Austrian parents during the middle of WW II, was enough to bring my first years
of life into conflict.

I was born in Salzburg
Austria on July 1, 1942 unto Elizabeth Maria Weissel/Esterhaszy and Karl
Gunther Russbacher. My mother was the heir to the Esterhaszy estates. My father
was of noble descent. He was known as the Lion of Salzburg. It must also be noted
that my father did serve in the SS Division Das Reich during WWII. At the end
of the war rather than taking my father prisoner, he was permitted egress to
England. There he was approached by the OSS and offered a position with the
United States Intellegence Services. He accepted the posting and we began to
prepare for immigration to this country. It was only later in life that I found
out that we weren’t the only family exiled from Austria. A number of relatives
had also fallen to the hammer of WWII, and the phobia which ensued from
Germany’s loss of the war. I offer also that the position proffered to my
father was basically the very same type of position he had occupied and
executed during the years of WWII. In otherwords, the United States Government wanted
my father to come to this country and assist in restructuring of the soon to be
born Central Intellegence Agency.

We arrived in this
country on December 10, 1954, at the port of Newark, New Jersey. My father had
already been to the States a number of times, as early as 1948. As the CIA was
formed and launched into life, we were already known as the Austrian family who
was brought over to secure the freedoms of democracy against the global
communist threat. No one made reference to my father having fought on the wrong
side of the.war. William (Wild Bill) Donovan made sure that his nucleus of
operatives and case officers would not be held accountable for the many
atrocities perpetrated, by the Germans, during the war.

The evening sun was
slowly making its way across the dry hot dessert. Night time was only about
four hours away. Soon another Nevada scorcher would be behind us. My parents
laughingly turned to each other and my father said, “Don’t worry Lisl, the
boy can handle it much better than the adults. After all, didn’t you notice him
chasing the dog up and down the mountain, during the deep heat of the
afternoon?”

My mother Lisl turned
toward him almost whispering under her breath, “You know that I’ll have to
return to Dallas soon. Gunther will have to come back with me. I know that you
would prefer to keep the boy with you, but remember, that you and I can’t
really be seen together anymore.”

With tears in her eyes
she rose and began to cross to the living room door.

“I want us to be
together more than anything in the world. We managed to survive the terror of
the war together only to be told, that we must come to the United States as
total strangers. What right do they have to so torment us and continue to
destroy our lives? At this rate Karl, it would have been better to remain in
Austria and take our chances with the Allies.”

Tears were trickeling
down her smooth and unmared skin, causing rivulets of tears that turned into
rivers of sorrow. She was my mother. The lady Esterhaszy/Russbacher; immigrant
to this godforsaken hellhole of desert wasteland. She continued her virtual
stream of tears as she began to pack her overnight bag.

This torment was not new
to me. I all too well remember what transpired in Salzburg and Vienna. I might
have been very young, but no one can ever say that I was very dumb. I remember
that night. They brought word to mother that we had to leave the country. I
remembered sneaking around on top of the stairs as the 5 men told my mother
that we were being exiled from Austria because we not only cause a political
embarrassment but also that Austria would no longer tolerate any member of the
so called ruling family to remain in country.

Because I was a child I
labored under many emotions. I would lose all my friends and relatives. There
would be no one for me to turn to other than mother. I knew that father served
in the SS Division Das Reich, and that he was considered a dead war criminal.
Far too well the memory of the death notice of my father was burned into my
mind. Although merely age three, it did remain imprinted in my mind. The
Austrian officer, the American, the Englishman, Frenchman and Russian Colonel,
calmly told mother that father had died in battle during the last big push of
the war. Saddened by my loss, I began to withdraw from all activities my mother
attempted to organize for me. The memory of father was all too recent.

That was the way it went
for quite some time. Mother, was told she had a great deal of time before she
would be required to pack up the house and leave. We left Vienna and returned
to our comfortable estate in Salzburg. One day, after playing in the brook
Glan, I arrived at the house as a staff car drove up. What great suprise… a
person looking just like my father exited the olive drab staff car. I looked
closer and screamed at the top of my.little lungs….”Father … You have
come home to me.” The stately gentleman reached down and took me into his
large arms.

I was in seventh heaven.
My father had come home. He had not died. Only later did I find out why such
deceptive ploy was put into use. The Americans had offered my father a job and
a new life in the United States of America. For me it was enough that my father
was home. I was sworn to secrecy. From that moment on I was prohibited from writing
or talking to any of our many relatives in Vienna. As far as all the others
were concerned, my father was dead… fallen in battle.

I had become a
conspirator. To what …. I surely had no idea! I did what I had been sworn to.
I never again mentioned the name of my father for fear that I would compromise
his life. I loved him, not only because he was the Lion of Salzburg, but
because he was my honored father. True to Austria and Austrian tradition, I
never referred to my father as dad, pop, or even daddy. For me he was Mr.
(Herr) Father. It was a title I honored. All the other buergers called my
father Herr Baron. I didn’t know what that meant or dealt with. I was happy to
have him home with me.