Classic Essays

The Diamond Monopoly

Ernest_Oppenheimerby Lewis Dunahy

SINCE 1888 the De Beers company has held a virtual monopoly on the diamond business. Initially Cecil Rhodes, a Gentile, had total control of the firm. In 1893 he contracted to sell De Beers’ entire production of diamonds to a syndicate of ten London firms. All ten firms were owned by Jewish merchants and interconnected by marriage and family ties. But the Jews’ involvement with diamonds is hardly new. (ILLUSTRATION: Ernest Oppenheimer)

Until the early 1900s, almost all diamonds came from India. The Jews had contacts in every country along the diamond caravan route, which were other Jews of course. And so they were able to move India’s diamonds. The Jews were moneylenders and moneychangers and diamonds merely represented another form of money.

By 1800 the Jews controlled virtually the entire world diamond traffic. South African diamond mines were discovered in the eighteen-sixties, which was about the time that the diamond supply from India was exhausted.

Cecil Rhodes
Cecil Rhodes

Ernest Oppenheimer was an aggressive young Jew who worked in one of the ten firms mentioned above. In 1902 he moved to South Africa to run Dunkelsbuhler’s small buying office in Kimberley. He was in many ways the true international Jew. He was born in Germany, held British citizenship, was loyal to his fellow Jews, and lived in South Africa.

By 1910 his goal was to establish an international monopoly on diamonds so that prices could be raised. Diamonds were being discovered in other parts of southern Africa and those mines must be brought into the monopoly.

Through a series of clever manipulations, and with the intervention of the Jewish banker Lord Rothschild, Oppenheimer became chairman of the board of De Beers in 1929. Oppenheimer was knighted and became Sir Ernest Oppenheimer.

Prior to Oppenheimer, Cecil Rhodes had run De Beers, which he had founded. Rhodes had seen the diamond monopoly as a means of extending the British power and influence. However, Ernest Oppenheimer saw it as a means to amass personal power and fortune. Oppenheimer made the diamond monopoly an international business that owed its allegiance to no single government.

Today diamonds, still under control of the Oppenheimer family monopoly, flow from the cutting centers in Europe and Israel to the main consumer markets in the United States and Japan. The diamond business is an almost exclusively a Jewish enterprise, with Jews occupying positions as diamond cutters, brokers, bankers, jewelry manufacturers, distributors, wholesalers and even diamond buyers for retail establishments.

Not only is the pipeline, from mine to final retail store, a Jewish monopoly, but also, virtually all the Jews are closely connected through family ties or longstanding business relationships.

In 2001 De Beers, which had been a publicly traded firm, went private when the Oppenheimer family and their related businesses purchased the stock they did not already own. Nicky Oppenheimer is the Chairman. He said just before he took the firm private, “This deal could be said to be incestuous, but it had to be done independently; and Rothschilds is determined it should be done properly.”

Thus the diamond monopoly today is not only controlled by the Oppenheimers, but also, De Beers is now a private firm operating behind closed doors and answering to no outside investors or security regulators.

Diamonds are Forever

diamond-life-07-01-1957-111-M5
One of many lavish ads by De Beers promoting diamonds

Today people associate diamond rings and other diamond jewelry with marriage and love. This association is largely an artificial creation by the diamond monopoly.

Giving diamond rings for engagements in America started in the 1890s. But these were not expensive rings. Starting in 1938 the Oppenheimer monopoly, De Beers, started promoting diamonds as inseparable from courtship and married life.

The most powerful tool that the Jews had was Hollywood. Scenes were inserted into movies showing couples in love picking diamond rings or of the male presenting a ring while proposing.

Commercials for diamonds were run in movie theaters to influence young dating couples. For decades these commercials not only ran at many theaters, but also, they were the only commercials that most of those theaters showed. Like the newsreel they became an expected part of the theater’s program.

The advertising slogan of the monopoly was “Diamonds are Forever,”and a second Hollywood-promoted slogan, “Diamonds are a Girl’s Best Friend,” was popularized later.

The Jews control of newspapers and magazines gave them another powerful propaganda tool. Mention of diamond rings was planted in the society pages. The size of diamonds that celebrities presented to their women suddenly became a newsworthy item. In addition pictures of celebrity women showed them wearing large diamonds.

Within three years diamond sales were up 55% in the U.S.

The monopoly even sent lecturers to speak at high schools all across the U.S. counseling young women about diamond engagement rings.

The diamond tycoons have even sought to make us all feel like we are experts on buying diamonds by teaching us the 4 C’s of diamonds: color, clarity, carat weight, and cut.

The diamond monopoly did the same thing in the Japanese market starting in 1968. At that time less than 5 percent of women getting married in Japan received a diamond engagement ring. By 1972 it was 27%; by 1978 it was 50%; and by 1981 fully 60%. In thirteen years, Japan became the second largest market for diamond engagement rings.

Diamonds are only one example of how the Jews have artificially increased demand for consumer goods. Next time you see someone with ostentatious jewelry or clothing, think of her as just a sheep that was fleeced.

Cecil Rhodes

Barney Barnato
Barney Barnato

While Ernest Oppenheimer felt no allegiance to any particular country, Cecil Rhodes saw the diamond monopoly as a means of extending British power and influence.

Rhodes and his brother first went to South Africa in 1870. In 1871 they staked a diamond mine claim in the newly opened Kimberley fields, and in 1880, Cecil Rhodes formed the De Beers Mining Company.

In 1888 Barney Barnato (a Jew, real name Barney Isaacs) maneuvered Rhodes into a position where Rhodes was forced to consolidate his holdings with the large holdings of Barnato. The new firm, known as De Beers Consolidated Mines, essentially had a monopoly on diamonds.

Rhodes became the virtual dictator of Cape Colony in 1890. He restricted voting to literate persons thereby reducing the vote from Blacks.

A somewhat jingoistic British patriot, Cecil Rhodes sided with the English against the Blacks and Boers.

Rhodesia was named after him. He gave away virtually his entire fortune.

The Oppenheimers, in sharp contrast, hold onto their fortune and train each generation of Oppenheimers to manage the business for their own profit and for the good of the Jewish tribe.

* * *

Source: Free Speech magazine, October 2002

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