Paul Watson and the “truth" both alien to one another

Paul Watson and the “truth” 

both alien to one another

Paul Watson one of the founding members of Greenpeace and later established the group Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, authored a book in 1993 titled “Earthforce.”  On page 43 he wrote:

“If you do not know an answer, a fact, or a statistic, then simply follow the example of an American President and do as Ronald Reagan did---make it up on the spot and deliver the information confidently and without hesitation.”   

In essence when he wrote “make it up” he was condoning being unfaithful to the truth, tell a lie, be a liar.  Over the past twenty-four years Mr. Watson did not lie when advocating telling a lie because he has left a reckless trail of lies and deceits.   

In 2009 Mr. Ady Gil of Los Angeles, California spent over one million dollars of his own money to purchase a “wave-piercing trimaran” named Earthrace.   After the purchase was renamed MY Ady Gil and chartered to Paul Watson’s Sea Shepherd for one dollar a year.

Mr. Watson used the vessel in their Southern Ocean campaign he named Operation Waltzing Matilda to harass the Japanese Whalers during the 2009 / 2010 whaling season.  During this campaign the MY Ady Gil collided with the Japanese vessel MV Shonan Maru No. 2.

As a result of this collision the tip of the MY Ady Gil was severed making the vessel inoperative.  Sea Shepherd’s vessel MY Bob Barker started to tow the damaged MY Ady Gil when according to the organization the tow-line snapped and Mr. Ady Gil’s damaged vessel was lost at sea and thought to have sunk. 

Some nine months later Peter Bethune who was the captain of the MY Ady Gil wrote Mr. Ady Gil the following email in part:

“Ady: There is something you should know. I was ordered by Paul and Chuck to scuttle the Ady Gil after she was rammed. I am so sorry for this. It has been dragging me down for months. Today I am coming cleanabout it. … It was a gross error in judgement on my part to do the biddingof Paul and Chuck….”

The email caused Mr. Gil to investigate further and initiate a legal action against Sea Shepherd and Paul Watson for damages, and the abandoning of his vessel. 

The parties involved agreed to resolve the legal action through an arbitration tribunal.  At its conclusion Mr. Ady Gil was awarded a monetary judgement.  The telling part of the tribunal was the numerous references to Paul Watson and Sea Shepherds reprehensible and deceitful behavior in the 83 page document outlining the judgement.  (Link to the full pdf document below this article.)  Here are some examples:

Page 6, the piracy of Sea Shepherd:

As noted, SSCS describes its work against Japanese whaling as involving “direct-action tactics.” The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has described SSCS’s activities differently, terming them “violent acts for private ends, the very embodiment of piracy.”

Page 19, Paul Watson being truth challenged:

“For example, and as discussed further below, the Arbitrator found Mr. Watson’s testimony regarding certain events to be highly evasive, internally contradictory, or at odds with his own prior written statements, and in certain areas simply lacking the basic indicia of genuineness that instinctively inspires confidence and trust.”      

Page 39, conflicting claims by Paul Watson:

“By contrast, Paul Watson’s position on this issue has shifted numerous times. In his deposition, he denied being aware at any point in time that seacocks on the Ady Gil hadbeen opened, thereby flooding the engine compartment.104 He invoked the Whale Wars video segment in which he was recorded as telling Mr. Swift that the decision what to do with the Ady Gil was entirely Mr. Bethune’s to make: “It’s Pete’s boat; it’s Pete’s decision.”105 Mr. Watson claimed that this segment was recorded prior to the decision to abandon the vessel, and not taped after the fact as others claimed (discussed further below).

This denial directly contradicted Mr. Watson’s own prior rendition of events. In October 2010, after Pete Bethune offered to forgo his claim for US$500,000 from SSCS if Paul Watson would take a lie detector test answering the question, “did you ask Chuck/Pete to sink the Ady Gil,” Paul Watson responded by email. At that time, he acknowledged that the scuttling occurred on his orders, but attempted to justify it as necessary to minimize anavigational hazard once it became clear that the tow could not continue.”

Page 40, once again Paul Watson’s honesty is suspect:

“The Arbitrator concludes that Mr. Watson’s testimony on this point was not credible. It was inconsistent internally, with his own prior writings, and with the testimony of two other witnesses. His demeanor was evasive. It was accompanied by other assertions that were not believable, such as the insistence in his deposition that Pete Bethune was reporting at the time of the accident to Mr. Gil,114 whom the evidence clearly demonstrated (as discussed further below) was largely disconnected from the events unfolding half a world away.”

Page 42, MY Ady Gil scuttled on orders from Watson:

“The Arbitrator notes that this conclusion — that the Ady Gil was deliberately scuttled and that this scuttling occurred on the orders of Paul Watson for SSCS…..”

Page 48, further notes on the purposeful scuttling of the MY Ady Gil by Sea Shepherd:

“The Arbitrator concludes that this desire to maximize media attention ultimately led to the decision both to abandon tow efforts and to actively scuttle the Ady Gil, albeit in a shroud of secrecy. It also led those in the know to double-down on the lie, by staging for the Animal Planet film crew a false discussion of options followed by a purportedly spontaneous decision, made after the real decision (and the scuttling of the Ady Gil) both already had occurred.141 As Mr. Swift explained, the various statements he was recorded on television as making, regarding the failure of the tow and the need to cut the Ady Gil loose…….”

The Arbitration Tribunal document is an indictment on Sea Shepherd and Paul Watson’s honesty.  It is a legal document outlining the reprehensible behavior by the self-proclaimed captain and his organization.  Consider this:  Mr. Ady Gil contributed over one-million dollars to assist Sea Shepherd / Paul Watson, and look how he was lied to and deceived.  If Mr. Gil was treated this way, how does this organization and pretend captain treat or regard those who donate $25.00 or $100.00? 

Reading the document one will discover the lies were told to members of their organization and those who cough up the money to keep them afloat.  Please formulated your own conclusion based on the above and the pdf below.

Pdf of the arbitration decision:

http://www.ady.com/Award-Final_Award-Kalicki.pdf