(Blogger's Note: Brad Sparks did what I had planned to do which was provide some information suggesting that Carrion's theory was not built on a solid foundation. He has been on this psy-op explanation for the 1947 UFO wave for a long time. This new aspect, published recently has some flaws, as Brad points out. Brad's analysis follows.)
James Carrion's latest blog posting claims he
now finally has "proof," "hard evidence," that US deception operations
fabricated the flying saucer flap of 1947 and launched the whole modern UFO era
in order to perpetrate a strategic deception on the USSR. We will leave aside
for now the basic questions of how major sightings at Muroc Field (future
Edwards AFB) Flight Test Center and by White Sands rocket scientists can be
explained by such a vast deception operation.
His "proof" is what is now his central figure
in the entire plot, a "Col." Carl Goldbranson, and an FBI memo of July 21, 1947,
released decades ago. But Carrion has so far failed to prove that Goldbranson
did anything more than ask the FBI to investigate a notorious character who
supposedly knew the origin of flying saucers and whose location and timing
supposedly coincided with certain incidents in early July 1947. That's what's
in the FBI memo.
And it's late in the game, long after the
1947 saucer flap ended on about July 10, with Goldbranson's response very slow
and lackadaisical for something supposed to be part of some hush-hush strategic
deception operation. Shouldn't Goldbranson have been doing "this" (whatever
"hands dirty" stuff it's supposed to be) before the flap, before, say Kenneth
Arnold?
Carrion apparently missed the fact that it
was the infamous Richard Shaver whose name got through the document censors in
one place of the FBI memo. Yes, the Richard Shaver of the lunatic Shaver
Mysteries, full of "deros" or "deranged robots" -- the so-called robots who were
not actually even robots (how deranged is that?!?) -- and Lemuria
tales.
Carrion has failed even to prove that
Goldbranson was continuing his wartime deception duties 2 years after the war,
in peacetime, in the face of his FBI memo placing Goldbranson in the wrong
agency (Army Intelligence), not on the deception staff (Joint
Chiefs).
But Goldbranson did not even ask the FBI to
perpetrate any deception! How is asking the FBI
to investigate someone amount to carrying out
a deception?? Does any of this deceive the Soviet intelligence
agencies? And into believing what? That a marginal character like Richard
Shaver of the Shaver Mystery stories and the "truth" about underground worlds
and Lemuria, was a credible bearer of intelligence about flying saucers being US
secret weapons?? The Kremlin halls would have been shaking with laughter at
such "capitalist" insanity.
Carrion charges that Goldbranson was "getting his
hands dirty in the UFO controversy of 1947" and "had no reason to be involved
unless he was actively promoting a deception plan." Again, how is asking the
FBI to investigate a crackpot amount to
"actively promoting a deception plan" against the USSR?? How is asking for
investigation a getting of one's "hands dirty"? Seems like a fair-minded
gathering of information, that's all.
At best, if Goldbranson was indeed working in some
deception activity, then this seems to be a cover-one's-bases effort to make
sure Shaver wasn't a Soviet deception against us through Shaver's
promotion of cuckoo saucer-like tales -- not a strategic deception but mere
harassing disinformation to keep our counterintelligence agencies busy chasing
after windmills.
Carrion
evidently has not figured out that Shaver's name and his location at "Lily Lake"
are apparently redacted from the FBI memo of July 21, 1947, cited by Carrion as
his bombshell "proof" that UFO's in 1947 were a US strategic deception against
the USSR. The "Shaver" name appears in one place Carrion seems to have
overlooked, which the FBI reviewers let slip through the censorship. If Carrion
does know it was Shaver, it is odd that he would withhold discussion of that
vital and discrediting point.
But the
claim (by anyone), regardless whether Carrion knew it was Shaver (that only
makes it worse), of having answers to the saucer mystery, made in a mysterious
anonymous telegram to the AAF (from Shaver's cohort Ray Palmer??), certainly
sounds like crank material.
In
another place in the redacted FBI memo, the same
paragraph naming Shaver (by accidental slipup of the censors), it states that
the two saucer (UFO) sightings on July 7, 1947, occurred "in the proximity of
[Lily Lake]" (I supplied the 9-space redacted text here).
So that,
plus the unsigned telegram to the AAF on July 5 naming [Shaver] at [Lily Lake,
McHenry, Illinois] as someone who knew the origin of flying saucers was
sufficient cause for Col. Carl Goldbranson to ask the FBI to "conduct some
investigation of Shaver" (reviewer slipped and left Shaver's name in
here). (My thanks to Isaac Koi for supplying the info about Shaver's residence
in 1947 at Lily Lake, McHenry, Illinois, and Mary Castner at CUFOS for
background info on the area.)
But Col.
Goldbranson is described by the FBI as with ARMY -- "Intelligence
Division of the War Department" -- NOT the AAF, and NOT the Joint Security
Control of the JCS (Joint Chiefs of Staff), in charge of deception planning and
possibly operations.
Did the
FBI get this wrong? Did the FBI Liaison Agent S. Wesley Reynolds who knew all
the top intelligence generals and officers in the military, CIG and State Dept
just not know who Col. Goldbranson was? Did Goldbranson lie to the FBI about who
he worked for? Maybe, but Carrion needs to prove it.
Right
now, Carrion has not even proved that his crucial proof, Goldbranson, even
worked on deception operations in 1947. Maybe he did, but no such proof is
given, it's just hinted at, and insinuated, Goldbranson "would" have been
perfect to "fill that billet." But did he?
Carrion
makes a crucial mistake in misreading Goldbranson's rank as of mid-1947 (his
source seems to say G was a Lt. Col. and not full Colonel until December 1948).
This means Carrion has the wrong guy on the wrong staff of Joint Security
Control even by his own argument.
FOOTNOTE: Carrion makes much out of a May 1947 charter for the postwar continuation of the Joint Security Control (JSC) group of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. First off, only the Special Section of the JSC conducts cover and deception planning and coordination according to the charter.The JSC charter states that only 2 AAF officers served on the entire staff of 10, and these were an AAF Colonel and a Lt Colonel. The AAF Colonel served on the Executive Section (admin) but did double-duty on the understaffed deception-op Special Section. But Goldbranson was a Lt Colonel and evidently not this guy, not this Colonel. The AAF Lt Colonel served on the Security Section doing security policies and declassifications of documents for historical purposes (almost FOIA-like!). If Goldbranson was there then he would have been this guy, the Lt Colonel, doing security work not deception ops. If I am wrong about this Carrion needs to prove it with specific documentation proving that Goldbranson really was on the deception Special Section and that he was even on the JSC at all in July 1947.
Carrion has some interesting and provocative ideas but unfortunately does
not prove his case, in fact does not even make a prima facie (on its
face) showing, one that appears to hold together at first glance.
The FBI memo is a killer by putting Goldbranson in a completely
different, wrong agency, right on the face of it, and he didn't catch that or
did but doesn't try to explain that (no doubt part of the whole "deception"
coverup, of course he might say). He needs direct evidence, not speculative
inference, and needs to make a tighter, more logical case. I am willing to
consider it and give it a fair hearing.
Brad Sparks
Brad Sparks
