As he did over a decade earlier, Julian Assange ignored Scientology’s lawyer’s requests. A statement appeared on the WikiLeaks website, which said: ‘WikiLeaks will not comply with legally abusive requests from Scientology any more than WikiLeaks has complied with similar demands from Swiss banks, Russian offshore stem cell centers, former African Kleptocrats, or the Pentagon.’49
Andy Greenberg, author of This Machine Kills Secrets, called it ‘the most gratifying moment of WikiLeaks ascension’. Assange promised that several thousand additional Scientology materials would be leaked the following week. In the WikiLeaks statement Assange made sure to highlight the Church of Scientology’s history of censorship:
After reviewing documentation of Scientology’s endless assaults on journalists from TIME magazine and CNN, which spent over $3 million defending against just one of their suits, to investigative freelancers who have had publishers pulp their books rather than facing litigation costs, we have come to the conclusion that Scientology is not only an abusive cult, but that it aids and abets a general climate of Western media self-censorship.
If the west can not defend its cultural values of free speech and press freedoms against a criminal cult like Scientology, it can hardly lecture China and other state abusers of these same values. Such states are quick to proclaim their censorship regime is no mere matter of protecting cult profits, but rather of national security.50
The Church of the Scientology did not end up suing WikiLeaks. The secret documents remain online in perpetuity. It was another battle lost in Scientology’s war with the Internet. As Robert Vaughn Young predicted in 1995, the Internet was becoming Scientology’s Vietnam and ‘their only choice is to withdraw’.51
However, the Scientologists could not easily withdraw from the battle. Hubbard’s policy dictated that all critics must be attacked and destroyed. Retreat was never really an option. Hubbard was the Source of Scientology and his word was considered the incontrovertible truth. His pronouncements from the pre-Internet age about how to deal with critics boxed the Scientologists into a corner that would prevent them from adapting and moving with the times.
Scientology’s war with the Internet was a self-destructive act of colossal overreach committed by an inflexible organisation incapable of learning from its mistakes. Their lawyers threatened David Gerard and he set up a website. They raided Arnie Lerma and he became a permanent thorn in their side. They antagonised Julian Assange over six lines from OT VII and he ended up releasing 612 pages’ worth of all the OT levels.
In the same year Assange published thousands of pages of secret Scientology documents, an internal video of Tom Cruise praising the benefits of Scientology leaked onto the Internet. What did the Church of Scientology end up doing? It tried to enforce copyright laws and demanded that the clip be removed from YouTube. The action then triggered a force field of criticism, protest and troublemaking from the online activist group Anonymous, who like Assange and the members of the alt.religion.scientology community believe the Internet is a sacred place where freedom of expression should triumph.
In the end more people saw the Tom Cruise video because they wanted to know why Scientology wanted to censor it. Then the protest moved offline, with monthly rallies attracting thousands of protestors across the globe converging on Scientology organisations in major cities.
But would it have mattered whether they had fought the war online or simply had withdrawn as Robert Vaughn Young suggested? The Church of Scientology is essentially a cold war organisation based on command and control. As it collided with the anarchy of the Internet and communities of free speech advocates who would not cower to legal threats, it had no hope of keeping its secrets intact. Those secrets, if aired publicly, had the potential to cause reputational damage and undermine Scientology’s ability to recruit new members.
The secret OT levels, once published, were held up to ridicule in the media and popular culture, most prominently on the TV show South Park. Once Hubbard’s various claims about his war record, education and adventures were scrutinised, it undermined his and Scientology’s credibility. The horror stories of abuse and the tales of surveillance, black ops and enforced separations, once exposed, caused irreparable damage. But unlike an old newspaper report, these stories did not become tomorrow’s fish and chip wrappers. On the Internet they stayed there forever. If a potential new recruit googled Scientology they would be bombarded by the kinds of stories that Scientology used to be able to suppress. Would they really then have the nerve to take the leap of faith and sign up for Scientology’s initial course?
An American Religious Identification Survey from 1990 estimated there were 45,000 Scientologists in the US. By 2008, that figure had dropped to 25,000.52 Just like newspapers, the Church of Scientology had its business model carved up by the Internet. In October 1993, David Miscavige told the International Association of Scientologists that, ‘The war is over!’ The war with the taxman may have been done with, but Scientology’s war with the Internet was just beginning. It was a war Scientology hasn’t recovered from.
CHAPTER 18
CRUISE AND KIDMAN
IT STARTED WITH THE kind of excess that only Sea Org slave labour can provide. When David Miscavige heard that Tom Cruise had an unfulfilled fantasy of running through a field of wildflowers with Nicole Kidman, Scientology’s leader decided to make it happen.
It was the American summer of 1990. A few months earlier, Kidman and Cruise had hooked up on Days of Thunder. Things can move fast when you’re on the set of a film about a stock car racer. Cruise began the shoot married to Mimi Rogers and ended it in the arms of his young co-star. In the delirious early weeks of their relationship Kidman agreed to shack up with Cruise in one of the strangest places imaginable.
At the base of the San Jacinto Mountains in California lies Scientology’s secretive 500-acre compound known as International Base. Referred to more commonly as ‘Gold’ or ‘Int’ it houses hundreds of Sea Org members. Around 20 of them were assigned to work through one crazy night to make the movie star’s field of flowers fantasy come true.
As harsh rain pelted down, a platoon of commandeered Sea Org members tore up a large section of the compound’s highly manicured lawn. The grass was carefully cut and rolled up before being transplanted onto pallets. Drenched to the bone, the workers pushed through till dawn, ploughing the field by spotlight to have it ready to be fertilised and seeded over the weekend.
Sea Org member and ex-marine Andre Tabayoyon estimated the project cost tens of thousands of dollars.1 It was money ploughed into the dust. The wildflowers did not blossom in the way Miscavige anticipated. Some shot up as tall green stalks, others wilted in the harsh desert sun. Weeds sprang up and overtook what was left of the wildflowers. ‘Miscavige inspected the project and didn’t like it,’ said Tabayoyon. ‘So the whole meadow was ploughed up, destroyed, reploughed and sown with plain grass.’2 Cruise and Kidman never got to run through that field of flowers.
What began with dreams of fields of flowers would end with wiretaps and marital sabotage. Nicole Kidman would find out what it was like to be both the beneficiary and the victim of David Miscavige’s obsession with Tom Cruise. In the beginning Scientology’s leader had actively encouraged their relationship, but before long the Australian actress came to be seen as the greatest threat to Scientology’s greatest asset.
At the beginning of 1990, Nicole Kidman proved useful to the Church of Scientology. Miscavige had a problem with Cruise’s wife Mimi Rogers and the brand of Scientology that she preached. Rogers had introduced Cruise to Scientology in 1986.3 Her father, Phil Spickler, had worked with L. Ron Hubbard at the Founding Church of Scientology in Washington, DC, and set up a Scientology mission in the Bay area of San Francisco.
Up until 1982, around a hundred Scientology missions operated in the US.4 In October that year, David Miscavige called all the franchise owners into a meeting at the San Francisco Hilton. From 9 pm to 2 am the mission holders were lectured and hara
ngued by Miscavige and his other young Sea Org cohorts. They were accused of withholding money from the Church of Scientology and, according to then mission holder Bent Corydon, were lined up and had their photos taken mugshot style while being forced to confess to ‘crimes’.5
Phil Spickler and other mission holders left Scientology around this time, disillusioned by the direction the organisation was heading. While Miscavige was thrilled when Spickler’s son-in-law first came to Int Base in 1989, there were concerns about his connections. At that time, in Scientology terms, Spickler was considered a ‘squirrel’, someone who practised Scientology outside of its formal structure and it was assumed his daughter followed suit. Cruise received his first auditing at the Enhancement Center in Sherman Oaks, a mission set up by Mimi Rogers and her former husband, Jim.6 The pair sold it when they divorced, but Mimi continued to visit with her friend Kirstie Alley. Cruise needed to be separated from the squirrels.
Tom Cruise first saw Nicole Kidman on the big screen in her breakthrough film Dead Calm. Kidman played the role of Rae Ingram, the young wife of a navy officer who is trapped on a yacht in the middle of the Pacific Ocean with a sociopath played by Billy Zane. Kidman’s character fights off her attacker with a combination of prescription drugs and a harpoon gun. The young actress shone in the role. The Washington Post’s movie critic Rita Kempley described her character as an ‘Amazon for the ’90s’.7
Tom Cruise was mesmerised by Kidman’s performance. The actor was preparing to shoot Days of Thunder and convinced the producers to cast the 21-year-old in the role of Dr Claire Lewicki, a neurosurgeon who falls in love with Cruise’s character, an up-and-coming stock car driver named Cole Trickle.
On the set, Kidman and Cruise fell in love.8 David Miscavige had by now assigned Greg Wilhere to be Cruise’s auditor and point man. Wilhere was the same Scientology executive who had tried to get Terri Gamboa back into the fold. According to Marty Rathbun, Miscavige used Wilhere to encourage Cruise to cheat on his Scientologist wife. ‘It just shows you how twisted and corrupted Scientology is,’ Rathbun told journalist Tony Ortega. ‘Why would Scientology want to promote Tom’s promiscuity? Because Mimi was connected to her father, Phil Spickler, and Miscavige wanted to own Tom outright.’9
After Days of Thunder wrapped in May 1990, Mimi Rogers demanded she be given access to Scientology’s version of marriage counselling. The process took around a week, but went nowhere. With Miscavige determined to undermine the marriage of his new star recruit, the sessions were doomed to fail.
Mimi Rogers got confirmation her marriage was over when Marty Rathbun paid her a visit. Accompanied by Sherman Lenske, a former personal lawyer to L. Ron Hubbard, Rathbun arrived carrying divorce papers. The involvement of both men was significant.
Like Harvey Keitel’s character ‘The Wolf’ in Pulp Fiction, Marty Rathbun solved intractable problems at short notice. He would hunt down Scientologists who had escaped, crush critics through intimidation, and break the most formidable of foes. He played a key role in Scientology’s most famous victory – getting the Internal Revenue Service to roll over and grant the Church of Scientology tax-free status. Rathbun used any means at his disposal including lawsuits, multiple Freedom of Information requests and by putting tax officials under surveillance.
Rathbun and Lenske’s visit to Mimi Rogers was designed to intimidate. The actress already knew just how ruthless Miscavige could be through his attack on the Scientology mission holders. It was clear to Rogers what she had to do. She signed the divorce papers and quit the Church of Scientology soon after.
By meddling in Cruise’s private life, Miscavige had solved one problem, but created another. Scientology’s golden boy was now making plans to marry Kidman. The Australian actress was the daughter of the prominent Sydney psychologist and author Dr Antony Kidman. In Scientology, psychologists are considered ‘Suppressive Persons’ – what Scientologists consider to be antisocial personalities who will cause harm to the organisation. As the daughter of a psychologist, Kidman was what Hubbard called a ‘Potential Trouble Source’.
According to Marty Rathbun, Miscavige asked Greg Wilhere to try and undermine Cruise’s new relationship in his next auditing session. Rathbun says Miscavige screamed at Wilhere, ‘He thinks this Nicole thing is for real! You son of a bitch, you better start planting a seed!’10
Wilhere carried out orders, but the move backfired. Cruise was besotted with Kidman and angrily reported back to Miscavige what Wilhere had done. In an act of confected outrage, Miscavige demoted Wilhere from his position as Inspector General of the Religious Technology Center – a role that was effectively second in command in Scientology’s hierarchy. ‘Miscavige was bragging to Tom that he’d busted him down,’ says Rathbun.11 Miscavige would now have to bend over backwards to please Tom and Nicole.
John Brousseau had a unique vantage point from which to witness the campaign to lock Hollywood’s hottest couple into Miscavige’s brand of Scientology. A former personal chauffeur to L. Ron Hubbard, Brousseau had got to know Miscavige when the pair worked as cameramen on training films for Hubbard in the late 1970s. The men became brothers-in-law when Miscavige married Shelly Barnett, the sister of Brousseau’s first wife, Clarisse. After Cruise got into Scientology, Miscavige assigned Brousseau to help lay out the red carpet for his star recruit.
Brousseau spent 32 years in the Sea Org working predominantly at International Base. He was one of those guys who could turn his hand to anything. He worked as an automotive technician, a cabinetmaker and a construction manager overseeing many of Miscavige’s personal building projects. When impressing Tom Cruise became Miscavige’s most important project, Brousseau was at the ready. ‘I was the guy who did all the fancy stuff for Tom,’ he says, ‘whether it was painting his motorcycles, building limousines or million-dollar motorhomes, and helping make his aircraft hangar in Burbank look better than anybody else’s.’12
Tom and Nicole were moving into Int Base so they could both study Scientology full-time. This meant Scientology’s international headquarters would soon harbour a ‘Potential Trouble Source’ and its gun new recruit would soon have a ‘Suppressive Person’ as his father-in-law. Brousseau says Miscavige had to do whatever it took to please Cruise. ‘You can imagine the dynamic drive Tom has about his newfound woman,’ he says. ‘You just can’t get in between the two of them, you’ve gotta go with the flow and let’s see if we can get her on our side too. Nicole was part of the whole TC package.’13
Brousseau was a key part of the team overseeing the preparation for Tom and Nicole’s arrival at Int Base. ‘A huge amount of work was done,’ he says. ‘Probably millions of man hours went into it. I am talking hundreds of staff working 12–16 hour days, renovating buildings, painting, laying sods, getting ready for their arrival.’14
A VIP bungalow was custom built for Cruise near the golf course on the base.15 A private gymnasium was fitted out so he and Miscavige could pump iron together. A tennis court was laid out with a special form of rubber coating.16 There was a private rose garden, Sea Org valets on call and a personal chef at the ready to prepare whatever meal Tom and Nicole felt like. A special course room was set up to help fast-track the pair through Scientology’s upper-level courses.
It was an incongruous scene. As Miscavige made sure the Hollywood treatment was laid out for Tom and Nicole, the Sea Org staff surrounding them were doing 16-hour days in the desert heat, for just US$50 a week. Sinar Parman, who was assigned to be the couple’s personal chef, remembers sudden outbreaks of conspicuous consumption amid the extreme austerity of Sea Org life. ‘A silver Mercedes 500SL convertible was delivered to the Int Base as a present to Nicole,’ Parman says. ‘The Motorpool guys then had to take care of it, keeping it spotless in their garage facilities.’17
Motorbikes were bought for Cruise and Kidman so they could ride around the base.18 ‘She would hang on in the back of the seat with her long hair flying,’ recalls Parman. ‘Cruise used the bike to get from his VIP suite to the
Star of California (pool and entertainment area) where he would hang around and eat and lounge around, making phone calls etc. in between his auditing and courses.’19
According to Marty Rathbun the couple stayed at Int Base for around two to three months.20 In that time Nicole Kidman had a meteoric rise up Scientology’s bridge, going higher than some Scientologists do in a lifetime. Kidman rose to Operating Thetan Level II (OT II). She was now just one level away from learning about the evil galactic overlord Xenu, his spacecraft and the exploding volcanoes.
As Scientology’s worldwide quality control man for auditing at the time, Bruce Hines was responsible for evaluating Kidman’s sessions. ‘She was given kid glove one-on-one treatment all the way,’ says Hines. ‘No-one, during the time I was involved, has ever got the service – the extra perks and everything that Tom and Nicole got when they were there. There were several Sea Org members, almost full-time getting them through all the steps.’21
Kidman, the ‘Potential Trouble Source’, was about to be well and truly welcomed into the Scientology family. On Christmas Eve 1990, Tom and Nicole were married in a rented cabin outside the resort town of Telluride, Colorado. It was the full Scientology extravaganza. Cruise’s auditor Ray Mithoff officiated, Miscavige was the best man and the Sea Org supplied free labour. Italian pastry chef Pinuccio Tisi made the wedding cake, his Sea Org colleague Sinar Parman cooked for the wedding party.
Cruise and Kidman were the beneficiaries of Sea Org servitude at the expense of the hundreds of workers toiling away inside Scientology’s desert compound. With Parman away, immense pressure was put on those working inside the kitchen. ‘This left only 3 cooks at Gold (Int Base) to cook for 800 people three times a day,’ said Andre Tabayoyon.22
Sinar Parman had to reach into his own pocket for the privilege of catering the wedding. He says the Church of Scientology backed down on a promise to pay him extra for feeding the wedding guests. In the end Parman was only paid his US$50-a-week Sea Org wage. When he tried to claim wedding-related expenses he had put on his credit card he was told he would have to pay them off himself.23 In a statement, Scientology’s lawyer Patrick George said, ‘The allegations attributed to Sinar Parman are denied.’24
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