Ulius L. Amoss

Ulius L. Amoss

Ulius Louis Amoss was born in 1895. During the First World War he worked for the International Committee of the YMCA in Greece.

After the war Amoss set up an export business, Gramtrade International Corporation, of which he was president from 1936 to 1942. In 1942, the government took over the business when Amoss was ordered to report to the army. While in the Armed Forces, Amoss served as Director of the Balkan Desk for Information, and Deputy Chief of Staff, U.S. Ninth Air Force.

Amoss then joined the Office of Strategic Services (OSS). According to a recently declassified document, while Colonel Amoss was chief of station in Cairo, Egypt, he "recruited, trained and launched numerous teams of assassins that carried out hits on various targets all over North Africa, Southern Europe, Switzerland, Spain and Portugal." General William Donovan officially fired Amoss but in reality he was kept on the OSS payroll in an undercover capacity.

After the war he worked for Frank Wisner at the Central Intelligence Agency (Office of Policy Coordination). In 1948 Amoss established the International Services of Information (INFORM). This was a CIA "commercial cover" operation.

In 1961 Amoss recruited Robert Emmett Johnson. According to a CIA document: "At this time he (Johnson) was already in close touch with the various independent Cuban Exile anti-Communist groups in Miami and elsewhere."

Ulius Louis Amoss died on 9th February, 1961.

In February 1992, Louis Beam issued in his quarterly publication, The Seditionist, an appeal for a concept called "leaderless resistance," described as an alternative to the "leadership" structure in "underground" groups. In this alternative, activity is autonomous, organized around ideology rather than leaders. It is explained as a system for keeping secret the plans of terrorist assaults against the Government, known only to a few individuals in small leaderless cells in order to prevent leaks or infiltration. According to Beam, this idea was based on an article published by Robert K. Brown (USAR/CounterIntelligence Corps) in 1961.

Primary Sources

(1) Conservative and Libertarian Materials, University of Oregon (2004)

Amoss was dedicated to a career in espionage. He started with the war work of the International Committee of the YMCA in Greece, then set up an export business, Gramtrade International Corporation, of which he was president from 1936 to 1942. In 1942, the government took over the business when Amoss was ordered to report to the army. While in the Armed Forces, Amoss served as Director of the Balkan Desk for Information, and Deputy Chief of Staff, U.S. Ninth Air Force, among other positions. After his discharge in 1946, he formed the International Services of Information Foundation, Incorporated (ISI), a non-profit, privately owned and operated intelligence service whose purpose was to collect and disseminate information from overseas countries. He also formed the U.L. Amoss Syndicate in 1948, which in turn invested in other corporations. In 1954, Amoss discovered the hair restoring product Grecian Formula 16; Amoss sold his stock in the formula in 1957 after discovering it had undesirable side effects. Amoss also wrote articles for magazines and gave numerous speeches promoting ISI.

The papers include correspondence, manuscripts, speeches, espionage material, military material, and some printed matter. The manuscripts include material for an unwritten autobiography of Amoss, with the proposed title “Easier Said Than Done.”

(2) Gerry P. Hemming, International Education Forum (27th August, 2005)

Edwin Anderson Collins was murdered by Castro "fellow-travelers" upon their discovery of his identity, and just a few weeks after he was tasked to penetrate their "protest march" from Canada, down the east coast, and on to Havana, and GITMO. Steve Wilson and I identified his body at the Medical Examiner's morgue, and when I questioned an assistant there as to the severe lacerations, cuts and bruises on Eddy's face and scalp - he responded that: "This was most likely due to crabs and other critters munching on the corpse post-mortem!!"

Upon my questioning exactly how a corpse (in salt water) might continue to bleed, acquire bruises, and suffer contusions and edema after only 8 hours + in Biscayne Bay (400 yards off the docks of Dinner Key & City Hall) - police detectives Tony Fontana and Bill Cloy charged into the room demanding to know our purposes.

Eddy Collins was one of our best swimmers, as evidenced when he was blown overboard (sans UDT the same life jacket he is pictured wearing in the No Name Key pix) - along with Dickey Chappelle, Hargraves, and Felipe Vidal on a Cuba run during early 1964.

Wilson and I tracked down the now hiding boat crew a few days later, and with less than Abu-Ghraib measures, thoroughly "interviewed" them.

Their "official" story to the police was that Eddy was drunk and that he had dived overboard to recover a dinghy which had cast adrift that night. Despite witnesses ashore reporting screams beforehand - they had insisted that had he uttered one sound they could have turned the boat around, located and recovered him. (They admitted to the police that they had motored to the dock, and "immediately" called the police??) The live-aboard boaters and shrimpers who already knew Eddy over the years, wondered about the great discrepancies in timing, especially the police report (initial call) showing that this was made some 45 minutes after the boaters heard the screams and turned on their searchlights (evidenced in their official log books). They had asked the "hippies" what was going on only 5 minutes after the screams, and just after the "protestor" boat was being tied to the dock.

Eddy Collins had been recruited by FBI agents (MIA/FO), and John Evans of the "Johns Committee" (Red-Squad) in Tallahassee - to assist in monitoring the "peace marchers". The "Mounties" (R.C.M.P.) had inserted two assets into the group in Canada, and one of these had operated together with one of our guys, who, the year previous, had worked a joint CSS/RCMP/FBI operation involving Nicaraguans, Cubans, and other foreign nationals embarking on a mission to attend training camps inside Cuba.

This operation was assisted by Col. Arturo Espaillat, Robert Emmett Johnson, and leaders of the right-wing "R'assemblent Nationale" (FRN); who were battling with the Marxist FLQ in Montreal (Front D'Liberation Quebeqous).

However, our guy had suffered blown cover via a Johnson screw up, wasn't interested in the Op, and recommended Eddy in his stead.

(3) Louis Beam, Leaderless Resistance (February, 1992)

The concept of Leaderless Resistance was proposed by Col. Ulius Louis Amoss, who was the founder of International Service of Information Incorporated, located in Baltimore, Maryland. Col. Amoss died more than fifteen years ago, but during his life was a tireless opponent of communism, as well as a skilled Intelligence Officer. Col. Amoss first wrote of Leaderless Resistance on April 17, 1962. His theories of organization were primarily directed against the threat of eventual Communist take-over in the United States. The present writer, with the benefit of having lived many years beyond Col. Amoss, has taken his theories and expounded upon them. Col. Amoss feared the Communists. This author fears the federal government. Communism now represents a threat to no one in the United States, while federal tyranny represents a threat to everyone. The writer has joyfully lived long enough to see the dying breaths of communism, but may, unhappily, remain long enough to see the last grasps of freedom in America.