Lieutenant Colonel Joe C. Briley and Project Mogul, Again

 

I get so tired of having to repeat the same thing over and over. Those writing on various UFO related subjects just don’t bother to find the latest and best information available. They find what they want and go no further. Just the other day, in a 2021 publication, I read about Mac Brazel. It has been two decades or more since Tom Carey and Don Schmitt discovered that Mac Brazel was actually Mack Brazel. Trivial? Sure, but it’s not all that difficult to find the proper and current information.

As I was doing some research on Lieutenant Colonel Joe Briley, who, in 1947, was the Operations Officer for the 509^th Bomb Group, when I found a relatively new posting about him and the Roswell UFO crash. As I read the information, I saw that someone, in this case Patrick Gross, had reviewed the case and formed a number of conclusions based on his research.

At the bottom of the rather and complex posting, Gross wrote, “Joe Briley was probably a Lieutenant, not a Lieutenant Colonel, at the time of the incident, and was probably a Lieutenant Colonel when he retired from the Air Force.”

I don’t know why he would have thought this. If he had bothered to search out a page from the 1947 Yearbook that Walter Haut prepared in the summer of 1947, and which was published in November of that year, he would have seen a page devoted to “Staff Officers,” with a picture of Lieutenant Colonel Joe C. Briley listed as the Operations Officer. Copies of that picture are available on the Internet and can be found with little effort. And, of course, it proves that Briley, in 1947, was a Lieutenant Colonel.

The "Staff Officers" page from the 1947 Yearbook, as it appears
on the Internet.

From there we move to Project Mogul. There are some other speculations by Gross about the Mogul team visiting the Roswell Army Air Field. I’m going to ignore most of them because I covered this in depth in Roswell in the 21^st Century (which he apparently read). I will note, however, that those on the Mogul team, including Dr. Albert Crary, visited the base in June and July, 1947, as they recovered, or attempted to recover, the remains of their Mogul flights. On one occasion they stopped there to refuel the weapons carrier they were driving because it was issued to them by the military in Alamogordo. That simply means they could draw fuel from another base as needed. According to Crary, they had no trouble entering the base and drawing the fuel, not to mention that the remains of a Mogul flight were in the back of the weapons carrier, in plain view.

There is something else that should be pointed out. It is something that the supporters of the Mogul theory overlook, and that is that Flight No. 4, the culprit in all this, never flew. Crary’s diary, field notes and the typed transcript of those notes, all show that the flight had been cancelled due to clouds. By agreement, or CAA (FAA) regulation, they were not allowed to launch the arrays at night or in cloudy weather because the arrays were a hazard to aerial navigation. Charles Moore, who was on the Mogul team in 1947, reported that Flight No. 4 was actually launched at 2:30 or 3:00 a.m., in violation of those rules. And, if we believe Crary’s diary, it was then cancelled because of clouds after it was launched. At least that it what Moore would have us believe.

The real problem with Mogul is the misleading claim used by the Air Force and the skeptics. They say these launches were somehow so secret that those in New Mexico, meaning the men of the 509^th, wouldn’t have known about them. The problem here is that those same regulations that prohibited flights in the clouds and at night also required that NOTAMs (Notice to Airmen) be filed announcing the launches because of that threat to aerial navigation. Even if you wish to claim that those at Roswell wouldn’t have known about the flights from the Mogul team, they would have learned about them from the NOTAMs, which were provided to all civilian and military airfields.

Even worse for these arguments is that what was happening in New Mexico wasn’t highly classified. It wasn’t even classified at all. True, the ultimate purpose of Mogul was classified but the balloon flights in New Mexico were not. The equipment being used was off the shelf, meaning, of course, that the neoprene balloons and the rawin radar targets were nothing special, had not been created for Mogul, but had been adapted from other purposes like weather observations. In other words, weather stations around the country routinely launched these neoprene balloons and rawin radar targets in their observations of winds aloft conditions. The material was easily recognized by all sorts of people including farmers and ranchers who often found them in their fields.

In fact, the Mogul operation in New Mexico, was used in 1947 to cover the recovery of the material found by Mack Brazel. On July 10, 1947, in a number of newspapers, were pictures of the Mogul array, on the ground, and a description of the operation. In one of the photographs is a ladder, which I mention only because Charles Moore told me that he had bought the ladder with petty cash in Alamogordo.

Front page of the Alamogordo News for July 10, 1947. The pictures are of
the Mogul team and their project. The ladder in the center pictures is
the one that Charles Moore bought in Alamogordo.

Finally, there is a criticism that the whole transcripts of the interviews with Briley hadn’t been published. In a point that is labeled, “What he allegedly said,” there were quotes, but not the whole thing, suggesting that the quotes were cherry-picked to provide evidence for a specific point of view. While it is true that I haven’t published the transcripts, there is nothing in them that hasn’t been accurately related and by reading the whole transcripts, the conclusions don’t change. But the truth is that there is no allegedly said about it. This is what he said in the context of my interviews with him.

These are just a few of the problems with that analysis of what Joe Briley said. We move from deciding that he hadn’t been a Lieutenant Colonel in 1947, with no reason to suspect that and evidence to the contrary to the assumption that the quotes attributed to him haven’t been fully revealed. There is no reason to assume that they haven’t been honestly reported, other than a desire to reduce the importance of what he said. Had there been some evidence to show that the information has been manipulated, that would be one thing. But to assume that because Gross hadn’t seen the whole transcripts or notes from the interviews that there is missing information is another. The quotes that I have attributed to him are accurate and in context and I know because I conducted the interviews. Everything else suggested by Gross is speculation without evidence.

The Project Mogul Double Standard

Here’s an interesting question that is generated by the recent discussions of Delbert Newhouse and his UFO footage. There are those on the skeptical side of the fence who reject his close up description of objects that were gunmetal-colored disks because that description doesn’t appear in the written record until nearly two years after the fact. One debunker seemed to be outraged that I had mentioned that this was what Newhouse told me because I didn’t talk to him until 1976. Of course, I was merely pointing out that I had talked to him and that this description of the UFOs had come from him rather than a survey of the literature, which, of course, makes that first-hand testimony regardless of when gathered.

The theory among the debunkers is that Newhouse embellished his sighing to make it more interesting for some obscure personal reasons. Maybe he didn’t want to be identified as a Navy officer who couldn’t identify sea gulls when he saw them. Maybe he was embarrassed by the identification made by those who apparently never bothered to interview him and only believed what they read in the Project Blue Book files. Maybe Newhouse wanted to increase the importance of his sighting.

Yes, we all understand that memories are often flawed and that they can be unconsciously embellished over time in a process that is known as confabulation. That means simply that the mind has filled in details that might not have been observed. The witness is not lying in the classical sense, is not aware that he or she is not relating reality, and truly believes what he or she says about the situation.

So, what does this have to do with Project Mogul and double standards?

Well, there are those on the skeptical side of the fence who believe that a Project Mogul array fell near Roswell, was partially recovered by Mack Brazel, and that is what caused all the fuss about a crashed alien spacecraft. Ironically, and ignored by those same skeptics is the theory that is refuted by the written records made at the time. Never mind that because Charles Moore, one of the engineers who worked on Project Mogul told us all that he remembered that flight, that it was the first successful balloon flight in New Mexico, and the reason for the delay in identifying it was because Project Mogul was so highly classified that he hadn’t heard the name until Robert Todd told him in 1992 (we, of course, know that the name appeared in the records made at the time in 1946 and 1947 which is one of the first indications that Moore might not be relating reality to us).

To flog this dead horse, I will repeat what we all know. According to the written record Mogul Flight No. 4 was cancelled. There is no equivocation about it. The flight was cancelled, which should be the end of the story… but no, Albert Crary’s diary, the written record and part of the source material, mentions that a cluster of balloons was flown on the date in question. This is Flight No. 4. We know this because Moore told us so fifty years after the fact and his memory, which is in conflict with the written record, is acceptable, while Newhouse’s memory is not.

Charles Moore, who knew exactly what that cluster of balloons was, told everyone that this was actually Flight No. 4. And although the Mogul flights were not scheduled before dawn in June 1947, Flight No. 4 was launched, not at dawn, but around 3:00 in the morning, according to Moore. Why? Because a weather front went through Alamogordo about dawn and the weather data from it suggest that the balloon trajectory would have not been toward the Brazel ranch. However, if it was launched about 3:00, then the winds aloft data can be used to predict a path toward Corona, New Mexico and the Brazel ranch.

The documentation from the New York University balloon project shows that the first successful flight in New Mexico was Flight No. 5. But Moore claimed that Flight No. 4 was just as successful; they just didn’t record it. If it was as successful, then why not record it and tout it as the first successful flight in New Mexico? Why not report the data collected rather than leave it out of the record altogether. Why would Crary say the flight had been cancelled if it had actually flown and was successful?

Because a cluster of balloons was just that… a cluster of balloons. We know from later entries what that means. When flights were cancelled, they sometimes conducted experiments using some of the balloons and equipment. So, Flight No. 4 was not launched in the dark, which would have violated the CAA regulations under which they operated, and was cancelled because of clouds at dawn, which was demanded by the CAA. If it was cancelled at dawn, then how could it be launched some three hours earlier at 3:00?

Let’s also remember that Moore had originally calculated the launch time as about 5:00 a.m. because that was dawn in New Mexico in July 1947, and Flight No. 5 was launched just after 5:00 the next day. That was, of course, before the winds aloft data ruled out the dawn launch. And, explain how it would make sense to say that the flight was cancelled but it was launched before the clouds became an issue… well, obviously this is true because that is what Charles Moore remembered fifty years after the fact and his memories of those long ago events are not flawed.

Oh, so we don’t get lost in arguments over source material, in his 1995 paper, Moore calculated the launch time as about 5:00 but in the Benson, Saler, Zieler, and Moore book, ironically called UFO Crash at Roswell: Genesis of a Modern Myth, on page 102, he changes the time. What we have here is clear evidence of Moore changing the times, not based on newer and better evidence, but on his memory to prove his own theory... or maybe I should say his alleged memory because there is no documentation to support the earlier launch.

The documentation available from that time also tells us that the CAA governed the launch of these Mogul balloon trains because they were some 600 or so feet long and would be a threat to aerial navigation. They couldn’t be launched when there were clouds to hide them and they couldn’t be launched at night because pilots wouldn’t be able to see them. The rules and regulations in place in 1947 are clear and the documentation is clear on those points.

True, in July, as they worked the project and the length of the arrays was reduced considerably, these factors were altered, but in June, they were in place. They couldn’t launch at night and they couldn’t launch because of clouds, so Flight No. 4 was cancelled. Until Moore said otherwise and we can believe him because it is true that he would never embellish his self-proclaimed place in history as the man who launched the Roswell wreck.

Here’s another interesting side note. There was a discussion about NOTAMs, which are Notices to Airmen about information that would be important for aviation safety. The launches of these arrays required a NOTAM to be filed, but Moore said that no NOTAM had been filed for Flight No. 4 because they expected it to remain over restricted airspace on the Alamogordo (White Sands Proving Ground) ranges until it was above normal aviation operating altitudes or something around 30,000 feet. The questions are: why would he remember that, and why should we believe him?

I could go on, but is there a point? We know, based on the records that Flight No. 4 was cancelled and that the cluster of balloons does not a Mogul array make. We know that the flight did not fly at 3:00 in the morning, but had it been launched then, it would have been noted as being launched then and there wouldn’t be the note that it had been cancelled. We know what the cluster was, based on other entries, and Moore had to know that as well but just made contradictory statements about it anyway. (In 1995, Moore acknowledged that a valid interpretation of Crary’s diary was that Flight No. 4 was cancelled.)

I say that if you reject Newhouse because his later statements about the length of his movie disagree with the documentation made within weeks of his shooting it, then Moore’s statements about Mogul Flight No. 4 can be rejected because they are in conflict with the written record. I really don’t see any difference here. In both cases we have statements made after the fact, years after the fact, which are contradicted by information gathered at the time.

I just want to see the same standards applied to both sides of the coin. But I will say this in defense of Newhouse. I don’t believe (please note the qualification here) Newhouse was consciously changing his story and there is some evidence to back that up. For example, only about 40 seconds of his movie was released, meaning that some 35 seconds are not readily available. I think he believed he was telling the truth… Moore knew what he was doing and deliberately misled us all in his attempt to be the man who launched the Roswell case. What I don’t understand is how anyone looking at the facts can believe that Moore and Mogul had anything to do with Roswell. Remember, that doesn’t prove it was alien, only that this particular explanation has failed… based on the documentation and not on the fifty year old memories of one man

Mogul and NOTAMs

I’ve grown tired of this NOTAM game but have to wonder why the skeptics just don’t attempt to answer the question themselves… and why do they demand that I answer their questions when they continue to ignore mine? What is this double standard where all things skeptical are accepted without critical thought but anything that might suggest an answer they don’t like is attacked?

And remember what Sherlock Holmes said about the dog that didn’t bark… but more on that later.

Anyway, take, for example, the Phil Klass diatribe against Bob Jacobs. Jacobs made a suggestion that he had been involved in a UFO case now known as the Big Sur UFO Sighting, and in the course of the discussion mentioned a paper about some aspect of it. He cited it properly, and provided Klass with all the information needed for Klass to access the paper himself but that’s not what Klass wanted. He wanted Jacobs to copy the paper and send the copy to him. Jacobs refused because, according to Jacobs, he didn’t like the tone of Klass’ letter to him. So, Klass sent a letter to Jacobs’ bosses making all sorts of allegations. We’ve explored all that before (see this blog on September 11, 2011), but the point is how Klass seemed to believe that Jacobs owed him the paper.

And now we have a similar situation about the requirements of NOTAMs for the Mogul flights. Make no mistake; this flap over NOTAMs is another red herring by the skeptical side. They demand that I supply them with NOTAMs for Mogul Flights No. 5 and 6. But it really makes no difference what those NOTAMs might have said because the issue is the NOTAM for Flight No. 4 and not those for other, later flights. What did Flight No. 4’s NOTAM say or not say is irrelevant since there was no NOTAM issued for it.

A quick review… according to the documentation available, the CAA (which was the forerunner of the FAA) required a NOTAM, an announcement about the Mogul flights because these long trains of balloons, rawin radar targets and other equipment could reach 600 feet long. If these balloon arrays drifted into the clouds, then aircraft could conceivably fly into them causing an accident. Flight crews had to know what was out there and the NOTAMs were a way of telling them that these flying monstrosities were one of those aerial hazards they might encounter (and yes, I used the word monstrosities on purpose to annoy some of you).

I wanted to see what the Mogul team had to say about the balloon arrays and how they were described in the NOTAMs. I have since learned that these arrays were not all constructed of the same components, something you wouldn’t know just by looking at the skeptical arguments (and something that I’ll explore in a later post). Documentation showed that the arrays sometimes differed from one another in significant ways and that in some cases there were no rawin targets included at all. Flight No. 5 had no rawin radar targets, the configuration for Flight No. 7 had no long string of balloons one above the next but clusters of balloons and Flight No. 10 (July 5,1947) used a polyethylene balloon as a lifter rather than the smaller neoprene balloons.

But I digress…

So, I spent about a year and a half chasing the NOTAMs, using the Internet, telephone and the snail mail. I contacted regional offices and the FAA in Washington, D.C. asking if NOTAMs had been archived at some point and where that archive might be. I expected to find little or nothing because NOTAMs aren’t of great historical significance, and the information in them is quite perishable. They might tell you a runway was closed for repairs or a lighting system was down at an airport. When the situation changed a new NOTAM would be issued sort of cancelling the last, or the NOTAM would expire and the document tossed away.

I found no repository. The only place I haven’t heard much from is the FAA office in El Paso where the Mogul NOTAMs were issued, other than to learn they don’t have anything obvious available. There might be something filed away somewhere, or at one of the regional airports around El Paso, or more likely, some airport around Alamogordo might have a file laying around with something in it… though I doubt it.

So now that I tire of the game of ignoring the skeptics about this, I reveal the answer they so patiently have demanded (did you notice the disconnect here, patiently demanded… can you actually do that?)

Even though it is a red herring and of no importance, I reveal that I learned there is no repository and apparently are no records of the NOTAMs for the Mogul flights.

And now for the dog that didn’t bark…

How do I know that there was no NOTAM for Flight No. 4? Charles Moore, in a letter dated August 10, 1995 and sent to New Mexico Representative Steven Schiff, told us. He wrote, “Since we launched from just within the restricted air space associated with the White Sands Proving ground and expected the balloons to rise high above the civil air space, we did not notify the CAA in El Paso.”

Now why in the world would Moore write such a thing as Schiff began his investigation? What would be his motivation? What does it say about the mythical Flight No. 4?

I’ll let you all ponder that, but I think the answer is fairly obvious. I’ll simply ask, “Why bring it up at all?”