Note the books now FREE (just click the image to read. So copy, quote, as your desire but if you appreciate the work that went into it and what I try to do here then feel free to donate a Koha and help me fight the good fight. If you value my efforts give a little.

Pay 060901063281400 ANZ Moray Ben Vidgen t/a DEADLINE

List of my other works below

STATE SECRETS was published in 1999 by at the Howling at the Moon Publishing in 1999 by Ian Wishart one of the lead journalist in the Wine Box Inquiry – the first in depth examination of New Zealand’s role in the dirty world of global finance. It became an instant best seller and rose to number 2# on the New Zealand non fiction best seller market, This is despite what Scoop media called a “media black out” of the book by the major media outlets.

My Publisher at the time fumed in an open letter to TVNZ “If you think the allegations in Paradise 2, or State Secrets [written by a former New Zealand soldier, Ben Vidgen] are flaky, then have the courage to test your best researchers against myself and Ben Vidgen. “Give us an hour on Crossfire and let’s see who emerges unscathed ..” Oddly they never took up the challenge mores the pity. It would have made great TV.

My crime daring to write such heresy that New Zealand had major corruption issue. Gangs were accessing military stock piling weaponx and right wing supremacists and other militant groups were tapping into an arms market the police refused to admit existed to get weapons.

I dared warned of the rise of mass surveillance and the dangers of free trade, long before we had heard of the TPPA or Edward Snowden. You will be amazed at how many of the people I write about in this book twenty year ago have companies listed in the now published Consortium for International Investigative Journalism Paradise Papers data base. To be fair what I was to expect in a nation were the head of TVNZ, CEO Neil Robert got busted on the Auckland Harbour Bridge in 1995 with kilo of cocaine in the back of his legendary black Porsche and never did a day in jail.

My prognosis was this was in part because corruption in New Zealand began at the very top and partly because New Zealand’s disastrous decision to embrace neo-liberal (right wing) politics.

Something I believe Labour is still doing. Because the major parties National and Labour were and are so busy chasing the all mighty dollars, trading butter for oil for guns, they had lost sight of were Crown business should end and were big business should stop. In State Secrets I wrote that in the future we would be in deep trouble. Because the New Zealand authorities were unwillingness to investigate organised crime, money launder, because they ignored the warnings, concerning drug importation, white collar money laundering and organised crime from offshore parties (as given to them by US and Australian law enforcement agencies) and because the security service had a habit of looking the other way when those involved were linked to New Zealand security allies. It would lead to a New Zealand in which its armed gang and drug problem would spin out of control – ala Mexico. I fore cast accurately we would see increase destabilisation in the Pacific and the evolution of domestic terrorism, hate crimes, housing issue and a dive in the quality of our lives as the gap between rich and poor widened. Accountability and transparency would die.

I based my information on street sources (largely gained through my other double life working all aspects of the hospitality trade), whose material I then had vetted and tested by my own professional sources in New Zealand Customs, with whom I worked investigating jointly Russian mafia money laundering, the New Zealand military intelligence (were I worked on attachment in Counter intelligence and the Force Intelligence Group as a Royal New Zealand Artillery Intelligence Operator; a lowly gunner in the territorials but never the less where I got to watch, listen and talk to those with considerable experience and rank who would never have opened up to a journalist), New Zealand Police’s Organised Crime Units and New Zealand to academics.

Sources who I named and quote extensively, in addition to talking to other recognised experts, with supporting material researched from open public sources including media, archives and libraries. This included using the American government’s own open source material. Analyst which as far back as 1987 said New Zealand gangs would become a major issue, a source of destabilisation for New Zealand. It even had a name for them R.O.G.U.Es Racially Orientated Groups of Unemployed. A name the New Zealand Defence Force then used, as it began exercises this author attended, which mirrored the very military and counter terrorism script we began using since 2011. Exercise always held in lower socio-economic areas rich in natural resources. The same hot spot which designate heavy meth use today and where corporations now want to mine or drill – funny that.

State Secrets was not conventional journalism. It was not ‘he says she said’. Instead it drew on my first hand experience and my skills as a trained researcher analyst and investigator. All which I gained while studying a history and Political Science degree at Canterbury University (where I graduate in 1994), where I specialised in political violence and counter terrorism and where I focused in my final years on the history of Middle Eastern and Western European Terrorism [including state and security services sponsored] terrorism, for which I scored an A.

Following graduation and the end of my stint in the ‘SAS’ (Saturday and Sundays as the regular force call the TF), where my duties also included being a really shit signal operator, a very short stint as an infantry grunt, I then gained more skills as researcher.

This included working for Canterbury Universities history department, as an investigative researcher for S.A.F.E. (save Animal From Exploitation), a columnist for the Mountain Scene News Paper, a private researcher for Alan Jones at 2UE Radio [not a fun job], and a research officer for West Pac research division in Sydney Australia. This was all far less glamorous than it might sound (really) but it taught me to look at my subject material from many angles. Over all not a bad set of achievements for a dyslexic gromet (and a shitty typist to boot) who was told when he was fifteen by his English teacher that I would be lucky to get 5th form certificate (Thank you and fuck off Mr Graham).

Twenty years later State Secrets has stood the test of time and being vindicated on virtually every account it raises.

I’m still dyslexic and a shitty typist, so if your first love is the English language close your eyes and walk away – you’ll save us both a lot of grief.

Yet if you want to read a book, crammed with in depth research, written twenty years ago and see if the signs were on the wall click the image above and crack on.

Yours Sincerely Ben Vidgen.

https://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/GE0004/S00004/howling-at-the-tube.htm

Other Books: (Which when I get the chance I’ll turn into ebooks and post here include;

STATE SECRETS II Sold Out.
Coasting Otago Out of Print

DEADLINE MAGAZINE ANNUAL SUBSCRIPTION $60 nongst – includes postage anywhere in NZ email: mediadownunder@gmail includes 3 copies sent three times a year.
Sample: https://www.scribd.com/document/83027362/Deadline-2921

Ben’s New Zealand Welcome to The Real Middle Earth – Travel Book Sold Out.

“Author Ben Vidgen’s describes his new book Ben’s New Zealand: The Real Middle Earth as “Lonely Planet meets Hitcher Hikers Guide to the Galaxy, with a dash of Louie Theroux World on the side, sprinkled with just a hint of Cooking Confidential as a condiment which provides flavouring”

https://www.eventfinda.co.nz/2016/bens-new-zealand-welcome-to-the-real-middle-earth/dunedin
https://issuu.com/raglanchronicle/docs/july-31-2014
https://www.stuff.co.nz/travel/kiwi-traveller/78564965/quirky-new-zealand-guidebook-to-hit-shelves

Article’s and interview by Ben on top of Terrorism

1. State of Terror (Nexus Magazine 95/96) this piece has now being translated now into about a half dozen languages) Focus on rise of Neo Nazi or right wing terror and the role of US funding in Islamic terrorism. Sadly it pay for only will find a copy and put free copy here when find it soon.

Ben. C. Vidgen, “A State of Terror”, www.nexusmagazine.com

“Since the final days of World War II, the totalitarian seekers have made use of people’s hatred by establishing a clandestine Fascist network…Through a combination of individuals, government-endorsed death squads, influential religion-based secret societies and even governments, the freedom and willpower of the people are being destroyed. Terrorism has become the new means by which the old strategy of divide and conquer is being implemented on a global scale.”

This article is cited in following texts ; Afghanistan: The Genesis of the Final Crusade – Google Books ResultAbid Ullah Jan – 2006 – ‎Afghan War, 2001- Page 33

American Shadow (Pemerintahan Bayangan AS)– SUMBER REFERENSI American State Terrorism / A Critical Review of the Objectives ofU.S. Foreign Policy in the Post Worldwar II Period BBC.

CIA – Godfather of Global Terrorism China Daily
https://bbs.chinadaily.com.cn/forum.php?mod=viewthread&tid=634564&extra=page%3D7%26filter%3Dspecialtype%26specialtype%3Dpoll%26specialtype%3Dpoll

Guerra alla libertà. Il ruolo dell’amministrazione Bush nell’attacco dell’11 . (Guerill Liberty role Bush administration 911) Page 39

International Socialist Review Web ExclusiveAfghanistan, the Taliban and the United States: The Role of Human Rights In Western Foreign Policy https://isreview.org/issues/20/ahmed_afghanistan.shtml

& Gets a bloody good review here which is always nice

https://www.jopatti.com/blog/points-of-no-return

2. Investigate Magazine
http://www.investigatemagazine.com/pacific_jihad_OCT2000.htm
PACIFIC JIHAD One of the world’s most-wanted terrorists has visited New Zealand without being arrested by security authorities here, despite his involvement in attacks that have killed or injured more than 900 people. BEN VIDGEN and IAN WISHART report: October 2000 were we write of the plot to use civilian aircraft and target building in the USA we had no idea how close to the money we were.

3.

https://www.patreon.com/posts/christchurch-ben-26154798

4 War on drugs was failure State Secrets Review VJM
http://vjmpublishing.nz/?p=368

5. Corporate Media and 1080 Ben Vidgen VS Newshub.
https://www.mediacouncil.org.nz/rulings/ben-vigden-against-newshub

6. Stuff talks to be about Waihopai US growing space presence in Aotearoa
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/110184004/annual-waihopai-spy-base-protest-takes-aim-at-donald-trump

7. Stuff talk to about New Zealand Constitutionalism and the TPPA.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/71856106/finlayson-theory-about-impact-of-removing-union-jack-from-flag-moderately-nuts

https://books.google.co.nz/books?id=OHk2DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA189&lpg=PA189&dq=”ben+vidgen”+tppa&source=bl&ots=K-SvWUvczg&sig=ACfU3U1VoCMfm2Z3idzR_Gmcad1HPEShqA&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi-ydOR7KPnAhXGbn0KHQIODFcQ6AEwCXoECAkQAQ#v=onepage&q=”ben%20vidgen”%20tppa&f=false