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The plans, which included backing new political groups and encouraging debate about problems in the political system, are contained in newly released internal documents from Philip Morris.
They also recommended building relationships with politicians, the union movement and the ACTU, as well as putting "pressure on selected" members of the Anti-Cancer Council of Victoria's board.
The 1992 documents suggested that political attacks on the Ministerial Council on Drug Strategy (MCDS) be encouraged, and the community and politicians urged to focus on illicit drugs.
Another plan was to "support or create groups concerned with the usurpation of political power by bureaucracy," and to work with other groups to investigate launching an organisation devoted to marketing freedoms and free speech.
The documents have been released by anti-smoking groups after being posted recently on the Internet by the American parent company as part of a settlement in the United States.
A spokesman for the Federal Minister for Health, Dr Wooldridge, said elements of the strategy were "very disturbing".
"Any suggestion of a political attack on the MCDS or of financing fringe political movements would be of concern to all Australians," he said. "I think people could be entitled to now ask Philip Morris whether any of their money has been used to support the gun lobby."
He said he was not aware of any evidence linking the company with the gun lobby in Australia, but that the two interests had joined in the US to fight "intrusive" government. The corporate communications manager for Philip Morris in Australia, Ms Nerida White, said it was "absurd" to suggest a link between the tobacco industry and gun lobby: "There are no connections of that nature that I'm aware of."
The document says it aims to "create sufficient counterforces in Australian political life that the anti's [smoking movements] lose their ability to regulate at will" and to "take advantage of the political shifts in Australia which reflect its severe economic problems and a growing sense that political leadership is not doing what it should be."
The chairman of the Victorian Anti-Cancer Council's executive committee, Dr Brian Fleming, said the "ruthless" conduct of tobacco companies had been exposed. "The documents clearly show that the tobacco companies are prepared to stop at nothing."
The release of the documents follows recent controversy over sponsorship of a Liberal Party Federal Convention dinner by Philip Morris. The Liberal Party rejected criticisms on the grounds that Philip Morris was not just a tobacco company.
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