Monday, December 31, 2018

James Carrion, The Roswell Deception and the Press Release


This is a different post than I had planned. After reading James Carrion’s The Roswell Deception, I was planning to do a short article about one tiny aspect of it. It was something that seemed to undermine his premise, but as I was searching for additional information, the tone changed and I made a discovery or two that I thought important.

James Carrion. Photo copyright by
Kevin Randle
To bring everyone up to speed on this, let me say, “This isn’t a review of The Roswell Deception. It is an analysis of a single statement that seems to be at odds with the facts, but it is an important discrepancy.”

For those who haven’t read the book, Carrion proposes that the flying saucer craze of 1947 including the crash of something near Roswell was a grand deception. It had two purposes. One was to convince the Soviets that we, meaning the United States, had an airplane that was far superior than anything the Soviets had. Military strategists had learned during the Second World War that control of the air was an important part of winning the war on the ground.

The second was to either expose Soviet spies in the United States, or to gather through the use of deception, information that would help break the codes that the Soviet Union was using. In time of war, not to mention during time of peace, being aware of the other side’s strengths, weaknesses and worries would help in any sort of negotiations. Knowing the enemy’s goals in advance would help to blunt them and, by extension, improve our position in the world.

These were the reasons for creating the aerial deceptions and the activities designed to keep it going. Carrion believed that the Roswell crash, and more importantly, the stories around it were necessary for the deception.

With that in mind, he wrote, “Lieutenant Warren Haught [Walter Haut… I don’t know why he couldn’t get the name right] delivered two entirely different press releases to the local Associated and United Press outlets – a purposeful decision that will make sense later in the story.”

The most obvious problem is the assertion that there were two different press releases and that it was purposeful. There is no evidence to support the idea that there was any sort of purposeful decision here. The evidence suggests otherwise and here’s why.

Simply, I have found more than two versions of the press release. There was one version that appeared on the United Press wire service, one that appeared on the Associated Press service, and still another version that appeared in The Roswell Daily Record. Many of the newspapers printed their own versions, rewritten by their reporters or editors to fit their formats and style.

For those interested, George Walsh of radio station KSWS was the first to get his version of the press release on the AP news wire at 2:26 p.m. (MST). It said:

The many rumors regarding the flying disc became a reality yesterday when the intelligence office of the 509th Bomb Group of the Eighth Air Force, Roswell Army Air Field, was fortunate enough to gain possession of a disc through the cooperation of one of the local ranchers and the sheriff’s office of Chavez County.
The flying object landed on a ranch near Roswell sometime last week. Not having phone facilities, the rancher stored the disc until such time as he was able to contact the sheriff’s office, who in turn notified Major Jesse A. Marcel of the 509th Bomb Group Intelligence Office.
Action was immediately taken and the disc was picked up at the rancher’s home. It was inspected at the Roswell Army Air Field and subsequently loaned by Major Marcel to higher headquarters.
Frank Joyce, at radio station KGFL, followed about fifteen minutes later with the United Press version. It said:

KGFL Radio Station in the late 1940s.
The Intelligence office reports that it gained possession of the “Dis:” [sic] through the cooperation of a Roswell rancher and Sheriff George Wilson [sic] of Roswell.
The disc landed on a ranch near Roswell sometime last week. Not having phone facilities, the rancher, whose name has not yet been obtained, stored the disc until such time as he was able to contact the Roswell sheriff’s office.
The sheriff’s office notified a major of the 509th Intelligence Office.
Action was taken immediately and the disc was picked up at the rancher’s home and taken to the Roswell Air Base. Following examination, the disc was flown by intelligence officers in a superfortress (B-29) to an undisclosed “Higher Headquarters.”
The air base has refused to give details of construction of the disc or its appearance.
Residents near the ranch on which the disc was found reported seeing a strange blue light several days ago about three o’clock in the morning.
The last of the versions was published by the Roswell Daily Record. It is different than the other versions. It said:

The intelligence office of the 509th Bombardment group at Roswell Army Air Field announced at noon today, that the field has come into possession of a flying saucer.
According to information released by the department, over the authority of Maj. J. A. Marcel, intelligence officer, the disk was recovered on a ranch in the Roswell vicinity, after an unidentified rancher had notified Sheriff Geo. Wilcox, here, that he had found the instrument on his premises.
Major Marcel and a detail from his department went to the ranch and recovered the disk, it was stated.
After the intelligence office here had inspected the instrument it was flown to higher headquarters.
The intelligence office stated that no details of the saucer’s construction or its appearance had been revealed.
Articles in other newspapers, especially those on the west coast, offered variations of the press releases. The Oroville, California Mercury-Register, for example, reported, “Possession of a ‘flying disc’ was disclosed today by the intelligence office of the 509th bomb group of the Roswell army airbase.”

Walter Haut. Photo copyright
by Kevin Randle.
An analysis from all these sources show that the same information is the basis for all of them, but there are subtle differences. This happened, I believe, because Walter Haut phoned it in, so to speak. Haut told me, as he had many others, that he wasn’t sure if he had hand carried the press release to the four media outlets in Roswell or if he telephoned each of them and read it to them. That would account for the subtle differences, at least partially.

Art McQuiddy, who in 1947, was the editor of the Roswell’s Morning Dispatch told me (see UFO Crash at Roswell, pp. 70 – 71; Pflock, Roswell: Inconvenient Facts and the Will to Believe, p. 266), “I can remember quite a bit about what happened that day. It was about noon and Walter [Haut] brought in a press release… By the time Haut had gotten to me it hadn’t been ten minutes and the started ringing. I didn’t get off the hone until late afternoon.”

On the other hand, Karl Pflock in his book wrote (p. 244), “Among other things, they [teletype messages retained by Frank Joyce of the information communicated by the United Press] confirm Roswell AAF did not [emphasis in original] distribute a written press release on the Brazel discovery.”

Can we resolve this?

Yes. I think the answer is in the subtle differences found in each of the versions. Had Haut taken the press release into the various offices, then the content would be virtually the same. The big difference is with the version published in the Roswell Daily Record. It smacks of the local newspaper being familiar with the players, the locations, and the situation. Had they had a printed version of the
Roswell Daily Record. Photo copyright by
Kevin Randle.
press release, their version would have followed those others with, of course, the local modifications.

There is another aspect of this. As I was looking for copies of both the AP and the UP versions, I was struck by a thought. I had been given, by Frank Joyce, copies of the wire service copy from 1947. There were Joyce’s notes written on it. I wondered, if in the early 1990s, after we’d talked to Joyce, and Moore had talked to Joyce, if maybe, Joyce had cobbled this together. He would have been familiar with the style of the news wires in 1947, he had moved from Roswell radio station, KGFL, up to Albuquerque’s KOB. He knew Haut and the boys in Roswell, so there was a possibility that he had been able to create something in coordination with Haut and the others that none of us would challenge.

And, more importantly, Joyce had told us, that is Don Schmitt and me, that within the days, possibly hours of the original press release, the military had come by KGFL and swept the office for any paper or evidence of the crash. Given that we were hearing about military attempts to suppress the information from a number of people, that just seemed to be a part of the larger picture.

It wasn’t until recently that I had another thought on this. If the military had searched the radio station, why hadn’t they taken the teletype messages that Joyce had saved. If he had hidden that material, why wasn’t the press release with it? And, why was the military even bothering with this? The story was out and the press release, maybe not verbatim, but close enough to the original had already been circulated so that it was of no importance. We knew, pretty much, what it said.

Given all this, I believe that we can conclude that Haut didn’t visit each place, but used the telephone. Art McQuiddy might believe that Haut visited him, but he would be wrong about that. When I interviewed Jud Roberts about running into the military cordon of the area, he told me that there had been a blue staff car parked by the side of the road. In July 1947, the staff cars would have been green, given this was the Army. It wasn’t until after the Air Force became a separate service that the staff cars would have been painted blue. Was Roberts lying? No, he had just spent decades looking at Air Force blue cars. The point is that he might have actually remembered the staff car by the side of the road, but in his mind it was blue.

We can conclude, then, based on the evidence, based on Walter Haut’s vague memory, and the information printed in the newspapers, that there might have been a written press release that Haut read to the media sources over the telephone. However, if he was working from notes rather than a completed release, then we can see that there would have been other, subtle differences interjected in the press release.

As for the original reason to begin this rather esoteric look at that one paragraph that Carrion wrote, we conclude that Carrion was wrong as well. There weren’t two different press releases issued as a way of exposing Soviet spies or as a means of cracking Soviet codes. There was a single press release, delivered over the telephone that created the differences. And from that point, the newspapers updated, edited, and added to the press release meaning that there weren’t two versions, but many. On this point, Carrion’s theory about two press releases, fails.

64 comments:

  1. Carron's whole scenario is simply a rehashing of the plot of the novel Asterisk by Scottish author Campbell Armstrong which came out in the late 1970s.

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  2. Kevin:

    Yes I agree. There was no deception involved in the press release(s). I cannot see what James Carrion is getting at. He is simply making the whole affair more of a mystery than the ET writers have done for nearly 4 decades.

    The Arnold sighting furnished everything the USAF needed if it were genuinely out to show Russia "that the United States had an airplane that was far superior than anything the Soviets had". Dammit, the Arnold objects were said to be flying at 1700 mph! So what did the Roswell story add? Merely that some craft, of flimsy construction, had somehow 'crashed' in the desert! Hardly the sort of news that would frighten the Soviets.

    The word 'crash' was not even present in the press release(s) or in the press accounts. All that appeared was that some flimsy craft, made of sticks, fabric and glue had landed in the desert.

    Has Carrion bothered to look in the Soviet press to see if any mention was made of this un-newsworthy incident? And if it perchance did appear, why would it create the impression in Russia that the US possessed such a super-duper aerial craft?

    The issue of the press release(s) to fool the Soviets makes no sense whatever.

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  3. Thanks, Kevin, for your analysis. I pointed out the two major newswire press releases (AP and UP), but I never said it was limited to two versions. If the local Roswell newspaper acquired a different version, that does not detract from the premise of my theory.

    I think it is important that we first establish an evidentiary basis for arguing the Press Release events. As for evidentiary standards:

    1. Original documentation from that period should be considered prime
    2. Witness testimony contemporaneously recorded when the events occurred should be considered prime
    3. Witness testimony collected decades after the events should be considered suspect for many reasons

    Let me respond to some of your assertions based on the above:

    Your assertion: “An analysis from all these sources show that the same information is the basis for all of them..because Walter Haut phoned it in.”

    Haut wasn't sure if he hand-carried or phoned in the press releases, i.e. he didn't remember exactly what had happened. Your assertion therefore is based on assumption and cannot be established as fact.

    Your assertion: “Art McQuiddy, told me: “I can remember quite a bit about what happened that day.”

    On the one hand, Haut was honest in stating he didn’t remember, but McQuiddy was adamant he did remember. Yet, later in your assertions you cast doubt on McQuiddy’s recollection highlighting the problem with witness testimony that is not contemporaneously collected.

    Your assertion: “Had Haut taken the press release into the various offices, then the content would be virtually the same.”

    You are making assumptions that the news outlets took liberties with changing a provided press because it was phoned in with no evidence to back that up.

    Your assertion: “I had been given, by Frank Joyce, copies of the wire service copy from 1947. There were Joyce’s notes written on it. I wondered, if maybe, Joyce had cobbled this together.”

    Here you throw aspersions on Joyce’s motives and actions without any proof of either.

    Your assertion: “Given all this, I believe that we can conclude that Haut didn’t visit each place, but used the telephone. Art McQuiddy might believe that Haut visited him, but he would be wrong about that.”

    I am sorry, but we cannot conclude anything based on your analysis as it is all based on witness testimony, some that you choose to believe and others you consider suspect. The one person who could lay this to rest was Haut and he couldn’t remember. There is no basis in fact for you to draw your conclusions, which are based on assumption and cherry-picking witness statements or their recollections and motives to fit your assumptions.

    Continued in next post (ran into a character limit)

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  4. OK, so let’s reframe this debate based on prime evidence:

    1. Newspaper accounts from 1947, citing Haut as the source – clearly show two or more distinct sets of details for the event.
    2. Haut’s copies of the wire service copy from 1947 with his notes. Despite your suspicions of Haut altering these copies, it is at least contemporaneous to the period.
    3. Whether Haut hand-delivered the press releases or called them in doesn’t really matter. What matters is how each news outlet printed their stories. To conclude that they took liberties in doing so has no basis in fact but in assumption. To conclude that the AP and UP press releases came from a single source has no basis in fact, but in assumption.
    4. Please analyze carefully the 1947 news article I am embedding below as it shows specifically how the AP put together their printed version. This is primary evidence.

    https://kvisit.com/QA/6KkB

    So, the bottom line, is this:

    1. Haut was the source for the news outlet stories printed (AP, UP, Roswell Daily Record).
    2. Each news outlet printed distinct details of the events.

    There is no evidence to establish what happened in between 1 and 2 other than conflicting witness testimony collected decades later that you readily agree is suspect from many different angles. Conclusions drawn based on assumption is just that – assumption - and your analysis is faulty from that perspective and does not detract from the theory my book is based on.

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  5. Correction: I meant to say Joyce and not Haut..

    2. Joyce’s copies of the wire service copy from 1947 with his notes. Despite your suspicions of Joyce altering these copies, it is at least contemporaneous to the period.

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  6. Kevin, I think it is time to publicly debated Mr. James Carrion motive in writing the book and beyond. Personally, I write the UFO critics and skeptics to read their conclusions and usually one side view of a story at large. For UFO's, sightings of, pictures and witnesses can always be viewed or questioned in a number of ways. In this matter of the PR stories, your version sounds perfectly reasonable. No one gets any story perfect every time. Worse every newspaper man or woman have egos big the moon and take the position I am right and you are not most of the time.News people are also pressed about word count and deadlines which can slightly alter a story. So taking a general nexus of the story makes sense to me and that is what you have do Kevin.

    For Mr. Carrion, I see him trying to replace on the national skeptic front a lead position that some in the press will ask for when there is a UFO question. This thrown was in the hands of the former NASA dude who claimed everything had a legit reason why a sighting or picture couldn't be a real UFO. This title of the number one skeptic of real UFO's is quite valuable and I am sure Mr. Carrion has thought about this. His problem in taking on this title is previously, he has no expertise. So he writes a skeptic's book to give him some credibility with some who don't better or don't want to know. They just are looking for a patsy to stick a microphone and camera in front and ask their opinions. Of course, in my book, the only thing worse are people got on the UFO TV shows that says everything is UFO related. So Mr. Carrion, good luck in your new career and I hope you make a ton of money.

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  7. In your article you mentioned the misspelling of Haut's name (Warren instead of Walter)...for many readers that is a minor point...but in fact it is an important point ... at least from a code breaking point of view ... Take for example the Roswell article I posted here: https://kvisit.com/QA/6qkB

    It has Haut's first name misspelled as Warren and also misspells Brazel's name as Brizzle.. Now those misspellings could have been benign...but from a code breaker's point of view, they are solid gold...If this newspaper was used as the basis for encoded Soviet communications, those misspelled names would provide additional clues to assist in the code breaking...

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  8. I think we should remind James Carrion that the WHOLE of the Roswell tale is based on interviews with witnesses, and descendants of these witnesses, between 30 and 50 years after the event. So on that basis is he saying that he has grave doubts over ANY of their testimony? I certainly share his doubts. It is not just a matter of the press release, but of EVERYTHING told to interviewers in the 1980s and 1990s.

    At the same time, I am not persuaded that his thesis, namely that the US was trying to show the Soviets that they possessed this remarkable and fantastic aerial vehicle, is valid at all. A flimsy timber & fabric object that couldn't stay aloft for long!

    Yes, after 72 years the ET theory is completely dotty, but is Carrion's thesis really any better?

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  9. Aside from the comments and rebuttals (which I am enjoying), one has to ask if this was indeed the “most momentous event in human history” (the discovery of life elsewhere visiting earth), why did Haut not remember any details about whether he phoned in or hand delivered his press release?

    It just seems that as history plays out, people recall EXACTLY what happened, what they did, and where they were when significant events happened (9/11, Pearl Harbor, Columbia Disaster, etc.).

    It’s as if Haut was implying he was going about this as just another mundane duty of little importance. To me this just indicates it WASN’T momentous but rather routine and easily forgotten.

    As for the “staged event” Carrion proposes, if this was intended to do several things including drawing out Soviet spies, then there should be some relevant archived FOIA documents indicating a SPIKE in suspected Soviet spy activity in July 1947.

    Espionage was actively monitored by evaluating short wave radio broadcasts (number stations) sending numeric codes. I’ve looked into this and US monitoring was very active at the time, yet no record of any Soviet spies being apprehended do to increased activity. In fact it’s so well documented that the evidence suggests NO unusual short wave broadcasts suspected as espionage at this time.

    So it seems that aspect of this hypothesis fails, or has not been well researched, as supporting evidence.

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  10. James -

    Thanks, Kevin, for your analysis. I pointed out the two major newswire press releases (AP and UP), but I never said it was limited to two versions. If the local Roswell newspaper acquired a different version, that does not detract from the premise of my theory.

    I say, “You implied that with your statement, ‘Lieutenant Warren Haught delivered two entirely different press releases to the local Associated and United Press outlets…’ that there were two press releases.”


    I think it is important that we first establish an evidentiary basis for arguing the Press Release events. As for evidentiary standards:

    1. Original documentation from that period should be considered prime
    2. Witness testimony contemporaneously recorded when the events occurred should be considered prime
    3. Witness testimony collected decades after the events should be considered suspect for many reasons

    I say “So far, we agree on this. Of course, the original documentation is best and witnesses who were interviewed at the time of the event are better than those interviewed decades later. However, psychological research does allow us to see that many such witnesses can remember the events with clarity. If we reject this concept, then historical research based on witness testimony gathered years after the event would be rejected. And yes, it is better if that sort of testimony is corroborated by documentation or by others. We can consider it suspect, but we shouldn’t reject it out of hand, not that you said that.”

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  11. Let me respond to some of your assertions based on the above:

    Your assertion: “An analysis from all these sources show that the same information is the basis for all of them..because Walter Haut phoned it in.”

    Haut wasn't sure if he hand-carried or phoned in the press releases, i.e. he didn't remember exactly what had happened. Your assertion therefore is based on assumption and cannot be established as fact.

    I say, “But I did say that in the posting… that Walter tried to have it both ways. He just wasn’t sure, so we must look for corroboration and other evidence. By the time I get to that statement, I have supplied some of that evidence. We read from the documents supplied by Frank Joyce that the Army gave a verbal announcement and that there was no text. This is another reason for saying that Haut phoned it in.
    I say, “… George Walsh broke the story after Haut read it to him over the telephone. See Pflock, p. 26 of his hardback book.”


    Your assertion: “Art McQuiddy, told me: “I can remember quite a bit about what happened that day.”

    On the one hand, Haut was honest in stating he didn’t remember, but McQuiddy was adamant he did remember. Yet, later in your assertions you cast doubt on McQuiddy’s recollection highlighting the problem with witness testimony that is not contemporaneously collected.

    I say, “Merely pointing out how this sometimes works… also, there is other evidence that Haut didn’t visit the news media but phoned it in.”


    Your assertion: “Had Haut taken the press release into the various offices, then the content would be virtually the same.”

    You are making assumptions that the news outlets took liberties with changing a provided press because it was phoned in with no evidence to back that up.

    I say, “I’m making that assumption based on the stories that appeared in numerous newspapers, some of which reported the information verbatim and some of which jumbled the information. And by the fact that he wouldn’t have three versions of it as he delivered it around Roswell. One document with the same information on it… unless he phoned it in and those others were scribbling notes.”

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  12. Your assertion: “I had been given, by Frank Joyce, copies of the wire service copy from 1947. There were Joyce’s notes written on it. I wondered, if maybe, Joyce had cobbled this together.”

    Here you throw aspersions on Joyce’s motives and actions without any proof of either.

    I say, “That’s a somewhat fair assessment. But I base it on the other testimonies from some of these guys who were making it up… Glenn Dennis, for example… and on Max Littell, who took some of the testimony provided by Jim Ragsdale, and then manipulated into another story, and all of whom knew one another and whose names all came from Walter Haut… or James Bond Johnson who provided an interesting tale backed up by the stories in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram but then that were radically altered by those with an agenda which had little to do with getting at the truth.”


    Your assertion: “Given all this, I believe that we can conclude that Haut didn’t visit each place, but used the telephone. Art McQuiddy might believe that Haut visited him, but he would be wrong about that.”

    I am sorry, but we cannot conclude anything based on your analysis as it is all based on witness testimony, some that you choose to believe and others you consider suspect. The one person who could lay this to rest was Haut and he couldn’t remember. There is no basis in fact for you to draw your conclusions, which are based on assumption and cherry-picking witness statements or their recollections and motives to fit your assumptions.

    I say, “Well, not exactly. There is documentation to back this up, as well as other witness testimony. My conclusion that McQuiddy was wrong is based on evidence that does not corroborate him. I didn’t include all of it in the posting.”

    OK, so let’s reframe this debate based on prime evidence:

    1. Newspaper accounts from 1947, citing Haut as the source – clearly show two or more distinct sets of details for the event.

    I say, “I don’t agree with this. They show what the editors of the wire services and the newspaper editors thought were the important points of the story coming from Roswell. All the details were there but the editors decided for themselves what was important. That’s not quite the same thing.”

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  13. 2. Joyce’s copies of the wire service copy from 1947 with his notes. Despite your suspicions of Joyce altering these copies, it is at least contemporaneous to the period.

    I say, “I made the appropriate changes here substituting Joyce for Haut as you noted… I will also say that I have not seen the originals, only the copies that Joyce supplied. Documents once removed are not quite as good as the originals and can lead to mistakes… and sometimes they have been altered. Many notorious forgeries have some mechanism to prevent examination of the original.”

    3. Whether Haut hand-delivered the press releases or called them in doesn’t really matter. What matters is how each news outlet printed their stories. To conclude that they took liberties in doing so has no basis in fact but in assumption. To conclude that the AP and UP press releases came from a single source has no basis in fact, but in assumption.

    I say, “I disagree since we have multiple versions of the press releases regardless of the wire service used, not to mention the version from the Roswell Daily Record.”

    4. Please analyze carefully the 1947 news article I am embedding below as it shows specifically how the AP put together their printed version. This is primary evidence.

    https://kvisit.com/QA/6KkB

    I say, “Quote from that source in my book, Roswell in the 21st Century. It does not contradict me.”


    So, the bottom line, is this:

    1. Haut was the source for the news outlet stories printed (AP, UP, Roswell Daily Record).

    I say, “Yes.”


    2. Each news outlet printed distinct details of the events.

    I say, “Yes.”


    There is no evidence to establish what happened in between 1 and 2 other than conflicting witness testimony collected decades later that you readily agree is suspect from many different angles. Conclusions drawn based on assumption is just that – assumption - and your analysis is faulty from that perspective and does not detract from the theory my book is based on.

    I say, “And, of course, many stories vary from versions of the press releases as printed. We see the changes as reporters are getting involved, calling Roswell, calling Sheriff Wilcox, calling General Ramey, looking for Brazel and Marcel. By looking at the articles, Joyce’s teletypes, and reading what various witnesses said in 1947, are facts developed by the sources available.”

    2. Joyce’s copies of the wire service copy from 1947 with his notes. Despite your suspicions of Joyce altering these copies, it is at least contemporaneous to the period.

    I say, “Yes, it is… but then so are the newspaper reports that contain interviews with those involved. What has not been presented is any evidence that there were two distinct press releases that were ‘a purposeful decision.’ It is with this bold statement, made without sufficient evidence, with which I disagree.”

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  14. Brian -

    You are wrong. Psychological research shows that even with these historical events, that the memories formed at the time are often inaccurate. In 1986 when the Challenger exploded, Psychologist Ulric Neisser, who taught a Emory University, provided his students with a short questionnaire about it. Three years later he gave that same questionnaire to the students asking one additional question. He wanted to know how accurate they thought their memories were. He found that about a quarter of the students didn't have one memory that proved to be accurate. One student reported that he was home with his parents when he heard the news. The earlier questionnaire showed that he had been at college.

    Even when provided with the documentation that their memories were in error, one of the students said, "I still remember everything happening the way I told you. I can't help it."

    Before we get into a long debate about this, about a quarter of the student remembered the events accurately and the other 50 percent varied on the degree of accuracy. The point, I guest, is that it might not be all that surprising that Haut was unclear about phoning it in.

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  15. Kevin, sorry, but I don't buy it. You are drawing conclusions based on how you think things worked in newsrooms and with phoned in press releases back in 1947. And you cannot even establish definitely that Haut called in the press release ...

    The principal witness is Walter Haut and I agree with Brian, Haut should have remembered the momentous occasion of the 509th recovering a flying disk... or he should have at least remembered how the press release physically got to the radio stations and the Roswell Daily Record.

    One of your witnesses states Haut came to visit him and you discard that testimony so your contrived conclusions fit.

    You can't rely on witness memory to draw your conclusions (either as truthful or erroneous) while at the same time citing studies that show memories to be suspect.

    By the way, my book does not rely solely on the Roswell Press release to make its case, so I suggest a wider debate than cherry picking what you find contrived fault with... Like how the Roswell Gang can be traced back to the CBI theater of war and to the playwright of the Roswell Deception...or why the Casey/Vernon Baird case has a different AP and UP version of witness names... or how Project Seal was leaked to the press as a current Top Secret Project and associated with an airborne weapon when the project was killed off two years earlier...All of this is based on original historical documentation...not assumptions...

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  16. You said: "What has not been presented is any evidence that there were two distinct press releases that were ‘a purposeful decision.’ It is with this bold statement, made without sufficient evidence, with which I disagree.”

    My hypothesis is that it was a purposeful decision. You have not presented solid evidence to the contrary, so my hypothesis stands. Instead you counter with conclusions that have insufficient evidence based on unreliable witness testimony and based on how you believe news editors did their jobs in 1947.

    Your counterargument would be more plausible if you showed precedent, for example, if you showed an original press release that the AP and UP mangled to their own whims...

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  17. Brian, you said:

    "As for the “staged event” Carrion proposes, if this was intended to do several things including drawing out Soviet spies, then there should be some relevant archived FOIA documents indicating a SPIKE in suspected Soviet spy activity in July 1947."

    "Espionage was actively monitored by evaluating short wave radio broadcasts (number stations) sending numeric codes. I’ve looked into this and US monitoring was very active at the time, yet no record of any Soviet spies being apprehended do to increased activity. In fact it’s so well documented that the evidence suggests NO unusual short wave broadcasts suspected as espionage at this time."

    I think you are getting your timelines mixed up.

    From 1946 - 1947, Soviet agents did not use radio transmissions nor did Soviet diplomats. These were designated only for emergencies. Instead, they used encrypted communications over commercial telegraph. It is what made the Venona project possible. I have original FBI, ASA, and other documentation that clearly shows this and I can send you the links, although the links are already referenced in my book and freely accessible.

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  18. Kevin,

    You seem to be hung up on whether there was a single base press release from which all news stories originated or multiple distinct press releases. In reality, either scenario still fits within my deception hypothesis. As I stated repeatedly in my book, the modus operandi was saucer publicity -to get the Soviets to take newspaper articles and encrypt and transmit them urgently back to Moscow - something that had to be done by commercial telegraph in 1947. So in effect it doesn't really matter whether there was one or multiple press releases, the net effect would be the same. My book hypothesis does not hang by a thread on there having to be multiple press release versions... although until there is hard evidence to the contrary, I consider it still to be viable.

    Now how about we discuss the overall book?

    Regards,
    James

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  19. Kevin,

    Just curious if you agree with the following account?

    Around 9:00 a.m. a staff meeting is held. Colonel Blanchard orders First Lieutenant Walter Haut, the Roswell Army Air Base Public Information Officer, to issue a press release saying the Army had recovered the remains of a crashed flying disk.

    At 11:00 a.m. Haut delivers his press release to two local radio stations and two local newspapers. Frank Joyce, the manager of local radio station KGFL, recalls his discussion with Lt. Walter Haut when Haut delivered the press release:
     
    "Walter Haut came into the station sometime after I got this call. He handed me a news release printed on onionskin stationary and left immediately. I called him back at the base and said, "I suggest that you not release this type of story that says you have a flying saucer or flying disc." He said, "No, it' s OK, I have the OK from the C.O. (Commanding Officer, Col. Blanchard). I sent the release on the Western Union wire to the United Press Bureau."

    From



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  20. Also curious about your opinion on this:

    Walter Haut told me that standard procedure would have been for each news outlet to receive the same typed press release.  So the conundrum of the differing accounts remains.  Conceivably if Haut simply picked up the releases from Blanchard's office and had no hand in writing them, then he may have been unaware of  differences in the releases, if they existed.  Possibly we will never know the real reason for the different press accounts.

    From: http://roswellproof.homestead.com/RoswellSummary5.html

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  21. Klaus Fuchs – Atomic Spy

    https://www.atomicheritage.org/profile/klaus-fuchs

    “Fuchs became a British citizen in August 1942 and subsequently signed the Official Secrets Act, pledging not to pass state secrets related to national security and defense to foreign governments. Yet still sympathetic to the Communist cause, Fuchs shortly thereafter began providing Soviet GRU operatives with classified information on the progress of Britain’s atomic research and development project.

    In late 1943, Fuchs was part of a British delegation of scientists sent to Columbia University in New York to work on the Manhattan Project. In particular, he worked on developing the gaseous diffusion method of uranium enrichment. Seeking to continue receiving intelligence on the Anglo-American atomic bomb project, Harry Gold, [ www.atomicheritage.org/profile/harry-gold ] a KGB agent codenamed “Raymond”, contacted Fuchs in early 1944.

    MANHATTAN PROJECT ESPIONAGE

    Fuchs was transferred to Los Alamos in August 1944, where he worked in the Theoretical Division under Hans Bethe and Edward Teller. There, he calculated the approximate energy yield of an atomic explosion, and specialized in researching implosion methods, focusing in particular on the “Fat Man” implosion bomb. Additionally, he was present at the Trinity Test on July 16, 1945.

    Fuchs continued to spy on the Anglo-American atomic bomb project for the Soviet Union while at Los Alamos. His primary point of contact was Harry Gold, who served as a courier for a number of other spies at Los Alamos.

    In addition to providing Gold with secrets on the American atomic project, Fuchs also passed detailed information about the hydrogen bomb to the Soviet Union. Some experts estimate that Fuchs’ intelligence enabled the Soviets to develop and test their own atomic bomb one to two years earlier than otherwise expected.

    [ . . . ]

    It was not until 1949, four years after the end of the war, that decrypted cables from the United States Army Signal Intelligence Service (SIS)'s “Venona” project revealed Fuchs was a Soviet spy.

    Fuchs was arrested in January 1950 and charged with violating the Official Secrets Act. He admitted to spying for the USSR and was convicted of espionage in March. Fuchs was sentenced to 14 years in prison, of which he served 9. His testimony led to the arrest of Harry Gold, David Greenglass, and Julius and Ethel Rosenberg.”

    So, were the Allies completely in the dark that there was some kind of atomic espionage going on at Los Alamos, not that far from Alamogordo and Roswell? My guess is that the Allies had their own agents in the USSR who could monitor atomic progress, and thus gauge whether or not the Soviets were getting “outside” help. So, in contrast to the impetus that James puts on Roswell, I’d say that the primary goal of any intel operation, if that is what Roswell was, was trying to locate Red spies.

    Also note that the Canadian Wilbert Smith UFO memo “classified higher than the h-bomb” was issued just a few months after Fuchs’s arrest. Why would any Allied classified memo make a direct comparison of secrecy to another top secret project? The h-bomb had not even been exploded yet. But such a remark would very likely stir up interest of Red spies in Canada.

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  22. @ Carrion

    Espionage methods:

    James I’m aware of your service background and knowledge about coded Soviet communications.

    In part, my comment was based on a 2010 article stating that numbers stations on short wave radio are still used to this day (Russian, Cuban, and UK), mainly because if you do locate a spy’s transmitter, you have no idea who's tuning in across the hemisphere. Unlike coded telegraph transmissions, radio signals leave no fingerprint, no traceable connection, and no other hint as to where the recipient or sender might be.

    So it seems strange (to me) that the Soviets, who were astute regarding short wave transmission methods, would choose to use coded telegraph messages IMO.

    That’s a minor point though.

    My primary goal was to point out that IF an aspect of the Roswell exercise was to identify Soviet spies, or at least send them a bogus message, there should be some spike in Soviet transmissions (telegraph or short wave or both) in July 1947. I haven’t found any documents that suggest unusual activity in Soviet coded transmissions. Does your documentation indicate a spike?

    @ Kevin

    Yes I’m aware of the memory studies you cited. However there’s a difference between memories of active participants (Haut) and inactive participants (students). My point was that Haut was an active PARTICIPANT in this event, while the students surveyed were merely asked what they recalled as people having no role in the events they were being asked to recall.

    What I’m saying is people who have actively participated in some momentous event generally recall EXACTLY (or specifically) the details of their actions in that event. So no, most of the students aren’t going to recall events correctly because they weren’t active participants.

    But age has a way of blurring memory so perhaps by the time you spoke to Haut his story was already forgotten or simply replaced with details created by an active imagination.

    Haut’s sealed death bed confession states he saw an alien, but as important as this event was to him and all of mankind, the man who “broke the story” to the entire world couldn’t recall exactly how he did it. Seems rather odd.

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  23. Isn't it possible that the press release was merely a case of a spade being called a spade? If we base our argument on the fact that the military really didn't know what the flying discs were (at that point) and also didn't believe they constituted a threat (which judging by their reaction to the Arnold sighting, they didn't), perhaps Haut released the info because the information he received at first indicated it was a flying disk and he didn't see any issue with releasing this information.

    Then, when he received word from Wright-Patterson that it wasn't and/or received an update the wreckage he withdrew the initial and released the weather balloon story (that it might have been Mogul or some other classified project is probably irrelevant for this argument).

    The whole thing strikes me more of "egg on the face" embarrassment at what happened than any real coverup or deception.

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  24. CDA wrote,

    "Yes, after 72 years the ET theory is completely dotty, but is Carrion's thesis really any better?"

    CDA, I think Carrion's thesis is intriguing and in support I would recommend a few books that discuss the strange (albeit interesting and ultimately sad) case of a man named Paul Bennowitz. It was an active Air Force OSI and NSA disinformation campaign against this man that resulted in some of the most outlandish aspects of the ETH which arose in the 80s (underground alien bases, aliens in captivity, etc). Since, this deception campaign has become public, some researchers are focusing more on the intelligence links to the UFO phenomena and questioning them.

    That said, the problem with Carrion's book is that he does not present any solid evidence for an intentional deception in the late 1940s. It is basically based on intrigue...questionable news releases, officials being in interesting places...there is a word for these types of arguments, but it eludes me at the moment.

    Still, I keep an open mind as I do believe there was a definite mystery going on then.



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  25. Adam S. said: "That said, the problem with Carrion's book is that he does not present any solid evidence for an intentional deception in the late 1940s."

    Yes, I do show solid and unimpeachable evidence of deception. The Leech-Snodgrass weapon and Project Seal.

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  26. Brian said: "My primary goal was to point out that IF an aspect of the Roswell exercise was to identify Soviet spies, or at least send them a bogus message, there should be some spike in Soviet transmissions (telegraph or short wave or both) in July 1947. I haven’t found any documents that suggest unusual activity in Soviet coded transmissions. Does your documentation indicate a spike?"

    To answer the question, it is necessary to distinguish between incoming and outgoing communication. The Soviets could have been transmitting messages to their agents via shortwave radio (incoming comms), but that is not what I reference in my book.

    I am referencing outgoing communication between Soviet Intelligence/Soviet Military Intelligence (MGB-KGB and GRU) and Moscow Central (outgoing comms). These outgoing comms were not sent via radio but exclusively by commercial telegraph and you will find very little in the NSA records on the number of messages that Operation Shamrock passed to the Army Security Agency (ASA) and the Navy's OP-20-G, the predecessor military agencies to the NSA. We have VENONA project message count but that is just the number of messages the ASA worked on and does not reflect the total count intercepted. It also does not reflect OP-20-Gs message count which is unknown, not to mention that OP-20-Gs post war code breaking efforts are obfuscated. IT was at the Navy's OP-20-G HQ at Nebraska Avenue in DC that the Joint Counterintelligence Center was formed in April 1947 - manned by the CIG, Army and Navy counterintel codebreakers.

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  27. @ Carrion

    Thanks for your response on code transmissions.

    It’s unfortunate that any such records are ill retrievable, permanently destroyed or classified. I feel your hypothesis would benefit from official documentation that demonstrates Soviet espionage activity saw a dramatic spike during Roswell, thus yielding (at least some) proof that an aspect of the hypothetical “covert mission” was to monitor and identify Soviet agents.

    Likewise shouldn’t there be documentation (as in Project Seal) that demonstrates the significant ramp-up and planning time necessary to pull off a fake saucer crash?

    Obviously there must be a document trail somewhere, but of course there isn’t and we’ve never seen a hint of any such a plan discussed within larger deception programs or counter intelligence related communications.

    In regards to your comment,

    “Yes, I do show solid and unimpeachable evidence of deception. The Leech-Snodgrass weapon and Project Seal.”

    Yes of course, but that evidence supports those initiatives and not a fake Roswell saucer crash. So obviously we know deception and counter intelligence was at work in 1947 (we should all be aware of that), but again nothing discussing a strategy of planting a fake story about an alien crash.

    I think without a direct link to that kind of operation, we can only speculate that Roswell MIGHT have been one of those clandestine operations, but there isn’t any direct tie to these other projects.

    Do you see my point?

    For example, I’ve proposed more than once that Roswell might have been one of the deeply classified projects involving methods to disperse radioactive elements over the Soviet Union via high altitude balloons. We know such discussions were had, but we have no documents actually proving this was what happened.

    It’s a good hypothesis, but not one that is supported by any documentation.

    In some ways, what you propose is simply the flip side of Annie Jacobsen’s story that Roswell was a Soviet initiated counter intelligence ploy to cause panic in the US.

    Do you see what I mean?

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  28. James Carrion said,

    "Yes, I do show solid and unimpeachable evidence of deception. The Leech-Snodgrass weapon and Project Seal."

    I respect that argument Mr. Carrion. The thing is, it is a common MO for counter-intelligence officers to take a legitimate project name and then release a different purpose for it. The LS weapon and Project Seal do seem to show this MO of intentional deception...but I don't know how strongly these projects tie to the flying discs which appeared later.

    There was also a news article released in 1946 about a Circular Airplane being developed in San Francisco. This wasn't anything being developed by the military if I remember correctly. Was this also part of an intentional deception campaign? Or just one more bizarre piece to an already bizarre puzzle.

    Regardless though, I still find your argument interesting and it certainly wouldn't surprise me if it turned out to be an answer.














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  29. James Carrion said, "I am referencing outgoing communication between Soviet Intelligence/Soviet Military Intelligence (MGB-KGB and GRU) and Moscow Central (outgoing comms). These outgoing comms were not sent via radio but exclusively by commercial telegraph and you will find very little in the NSA records on the number of messages that Operation Shamrock passed to the Army Security Agency (ASA) and the Navy's OP-20-G, the predecessor military agencies to the NSA. We have VENONA project message count but that is just the number of messages the ASA worked on and does not reflect the total count intercepted. It also does not reflect OP-20-Gs message count which is unknown, not to mention that OP-20-Gs post war code breaking efforts are obfuscated. IT was at the Navy's OP-20-G HQ at Nebraska Avenue in DC that the Joint Counterintelligence Center was formed in April 1947 - manned by the CIG, Army and Navy counterintel codebreakers."

    Mr. Carrion, out of curiosity, how closely were the British SIS working with the ASA during the time in question. Could they have also intercepted these comms and if so would they have communicated it back to the ASA?



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  30. Good morning

    Could I ask a few questions?

    Whilst I have no problem with the idea that intelligence services run deception operations and that 'marked cards' in documents are a commonly used counter-intelligence technique, it seems quite a stretch to go from those general observations to suggesting that the 1947 wave (and presumably much of what followed) was set up as a deception operation with associated CI operations.

    1) Is there a single document from official sources that could relate to this? It would be quite a large operation involving significant numbers of personnel, resources and technical development and testing of the devices. Operational deployment would be quite a task given the pace of operations necessary in the summer of 1947 across a wide geographical area.
    2) Why would such an operation create the impression of small, fast and highly manoeuvrable devices (i.e. short range interceptor like) rather than large and slow (strategic bomber like) in most reports?
    3)Why create a pattern of observations that is totally inconsistent with test flights of a new bomber prototype (multiple observations over populated areas and near civil or military air traffic etc. as well as some from sensitive areas).
    4) I am not sure why we are discussing public press releases in terms of possible 'marked cards'. The basic idea of that type of operation is to put a subtle error into one or more versions of a classified document that is accessible to a relatively small group of people. If the error then turns up somewhere else it helps narrow down the possible sources. I don't see why press releases would be useful in this regard as, by definition, they are public and widely disseminated.
    5) Why carry it all on so long - still with no trace of documentation or credible witnesses? By the 1950s the possible psy-ops issues of UFOs against the American public where quite high in officials' minds (Robertson Panel etc.).

    All in all I just don't see the evidence, but very happy to consider any you may be able to reference.

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  31. Kevin:

    Amazing that people are, even after 72 years, still trying to link the Roswell case with Soviet espionage, project VENONA, the KGB, Klaus Fuchs, the various US intelligence agencies and goodness knows what else.

    Maybe it is simpler to believe Roswell really was an ET event than have all this excessive extra baggage thrown in.

    Or am I as confused as you are?

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  32. Brian said:

    "It’s unfortunate that any such records are ill retrievable, permanently destroyed or classified. I feel your hypothesis would benefit from official documentation that demonstrates Soviet espionage activity saw a dramatic spike during Roswell, thus yielding (at least some) proof that an aspect of the hypothetical “covert mission” was to monitor and identify Soviet agents."

    We need no further proof than spy hunting taking center stage in 1947 by the fact that the chief counterintelligence Army and Navy officers and the Central Intelligence group's former X-2 personnel got together in April 1947 to form the Joint Counterintelligence Center (JCIC) under the cover of OP-32-Y1 (Office of Naval Intelligence - Codebreakers) and their primary modus operandi was to use codebreaking as their counterintelligence source. This is not rumor or conspiracy, this is admitted fact from the CIG's succcessor, the CIA. Today we know that the Army Security Agency was hunting spies under the Venona project, but we have no details on the spy hunting successes of the JCIC. Those classified records reside at the CIA and over two years after submitting a FOIA request for those records, I have yet to get a response.

    Likewise shouldn’t there be documentation (as in Project Seal) that demonstrates the significant ramp-up and planning time necessary to pull off a fake saucer crash?

    If we had declassified documentation, a hundred Cold War historians would have latched on to them and written a history. If there was a deception, the still classified records of Joint Security Control and Plans and Ops, would be were those records reside. Jack Brewer has outstanding FOIA requests for those records.

    Obviously there must be a document trail somewhere, but of course there isn’t and we’ve never seen a hint of any such a plan discussed within larger deception programs or counter intelligence related communications.

    Yes, there is a document trail and it is still classified. I am not sure what "larger deception programs or counterintel" your are referring to. Any deception perpetrated during 1946 - 1947 is as discrete in nature and scope as those perpetrated during WW2. If classified, there are no leaks. Just like there were no leaks of WW2 deception for decades later when those records were declassified. Then someone like Thaddeus Holt researched the original declassified records and wrote his amazing book "The Deceivers". No Cold War historian disputes that WW2 deception took place now that the records are declassified. No Cold War historian can write a 1947 deception history if the records are still classified.

    Yes of course, but that evidence supports those initiatives and not a fake Roswell saucer crash. So obviously we know deception and counter intelligence was at work in 1947 (we should all be aware of that), but again nothing discussing a strategy of planting a fake story about an alien crash.

    I never said the deception script was to plant a story of an alien saucer crash. Any ET tie in to Roswell comes much later by ET proponents. The 1947 deception script was to get the Soviets to believe that saucers were a secret new weapon .. hence the tie to in to the Leech-Snodgrass weapon - something "greater than the atomic bomb" that was an airborne weapon.

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  33. Adam S. said:

    "I respect that argument Mr. Carrion. The thing is, it is a common MO for counter-intelligence officers to take a legitimate project name and then release a different purpose for it. The LS weapon and Project Seal do seem to show this MO of intentional deception...but I don't know how strongly these projects tie to the flying discs which appeared later."

    Then you need to read the original newspaper articles on the Leech-Snodgrass weapon and compare what was said in 1947 to the declassified Project Seal report from the 1950s. I don't know what you mean by common MO as that has nothing to do with Leech-Snodgrass. It is very simple. Two scientists worked on Project Seal, a real Top Secret WW2 project. Project Seal was killed off in 1945 per the declassified project report (declassified in the 1950s). In 1947, the "project" (not called by its name) and the names of the scientists working on it was leaked to the press as being a super weapon greater than the atomic bomb and possibly an airborne object. The two scientists who worked on the dead project from 1945 spoke with reporters in 1947 and promoted it as an ongoing project in 1947, even though they new it was a dead project and had nothing to do with an airborne weapon. It is that cut and dry. Documented deception of a non-existent airborne super weapon in mid-June 1947 and then two weeks later we have Kenneth Arnold's sighting. You can do the math.

    There was also a news article released in 1946 about a Circular Airplane being developed in San Francisco. This wasn't anything being developed by the military if I remember correctly. Was this also part of an intentional deception campaign? Or just one more bizarre piece to an already bizarre puzzle.

    Source please.

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  34. Adam S. said:

    "Mr. Carrion, out of curiosity, how closely were the British SIS working with the ASA during the time in question. Could they have also intercepted these comms and if so would they have communicated it back to the ASA?"

    The British codebreaking organization during WW2 was known as the Government Code and Cypher school (GCCS) before it became GCHQ. The Brits worked hand in hand with the ASA on the Venona project and they shared both raw traffic and collateral information. There is no record of GCHQ working with the JCIC in 1947. Probably a good thing considering how compromised British MI-6 was by the Soviet Cambridge spies like Kim Philby.

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  35. Anthony said.

    "Whilst I have no problem with the idea that intelligence services run deception operations and that 'marked cards' in documents are a commonly used counter-intelligence technique..."

    There is a difference between 'marked cards' as you call it which is a counterintel canary trap and what I reference in my book. My book focuses on the closed loop use of planted news stories in the press to assist codebreakers with breaking Soviet codes. In cryptography this is known as a chosen plaintext attack. Please read my free book Anachronism and specifically the chapters on the Venona project and code breaking to understand how this worked in 1947. I will give you the abridged version here:

    Step 1: Generate extreme Soviet anxiety that you have a new weapon of war when they still don't have the A=Bomb.
    Step 2: Generate as many new stories as possible that could be related to this new weapon
    Step 3: Wait for the Soviets to urgently transmit these news stories (encrypted) back to Moscow Center using the only transmission method at their disposal in 1947 - via commercial telegraph
    Step 4: Operation Shamrock delivers to the ASA and OP-20-G copies of these encrypted Soviet telegrams
    Step 5: Since you know what the Soviets were sending back to Moscow - i.e. you planted that information in the press - use it to help rebuild Soviet code books.
    Step 6: Use the recovered code book to break messages that were not planted but could yield actionable intelligence


    1) Is there a single document from official sources that could relate to this? It would be quite a large operation involving significant numbers of personnel, resources and technical development and testing of the devices.

    No, the operation is still classified. For precedent, the Manhattan Project built entire cities without either the public or even Truman when Vice President knowing of the project's existence. As for scale, yes, it would be a large operation, and expensive, but far less expensive than the alternative - a third world war.

    2) Why would such an operation create the impression of small, fast and highly manoeuvrable devices (i.e. short range interceptor like) rather than large and slow (strategic bomber like) in most reports?

    Speed and range - objects that could potentially travel at twice the then established speed record and with incredible range. Stalin already was obsessed with creating a Soviet weapon of equivalent speed and range along the lines of the Eugen Sanger superbomber. Make Stalin believe the Americans had beat him to the punch.

    3)Why create a pattern of observations that is totally inconsistent with test flights of a new bomber prototype (multiple observations over populated areas and near civil or military air traffic etc. as well as some from sensitive areas).

    We didn't want the Soviets to believe we had built a new generational bomber but a weapon of the type Stalin craved.

    4) I am not sure why we are discussing public press releases in terms of possible 'marked cards'.

    Already answered above. My hypothesis has nothing to do with 'marked cards'.

    5) Why carry it all on so long - still with no trace of documentation or credible witnesses? By the 1950s the possible psy-ops issues of UFOs against the American public where quite high in officials' minds (Robertson Panel etc.).

    Good question. They should have revealed it to the public soon after. Instead they chose to keep it secret and to continue to use it perhaps for other goals. Perhaps part of the non-disclosure is also based on how many historical figures will have their reputations tarnished for having created a myth and lying to the public.


    All in all I just don't see the evidence, but very happy to consider any you may be able to reference.

    Read both my books. Read the original source documentation. I show who, what, why, how and precedent. It is a far more plausible hypothesis than aliens crash landing in 1947.

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  36. James Carrion wrote,

    “Then you need to read the original newspaper articles on the Leech-Snodgrass weapon and compare what was said in 1947 to the declassified Project Seal report from the 1950s. I don't know what you mean by common MO as that has nothing to do with Leech-Snodgrass. It is very simple. Two scientists worked on Project Seal, a real Top Secret WW2 project. Project Seal was killed off in 1945 per the declassified project report (declassified in the 1950s). In 1947, the "project" (not called by its name) and the names of the scientists working on it was leaked to the press as being a super weapon greater than the atomic bomb and possibly an airborne object. The two scientists who worked on the dead project from 1945 spoke with reporters in 1947 and promoted it as an ongoing project in 1947, even though they new it was a dead project and had nothing to do with an airborne weapon. It is that cut and dry. Documented deception of a non-existent airborne super weapon in mid-June 1947 and then two weeks later we have Kenneth Arnold's sighting. You can do the math."

    Again, I see your argument, but I still think this is a speculative link. The project was POSSIBLY an aircraft and it was still promoted in 1947. Fine. But, all this says is there was still an interest in touting it as an ongoing project in 1947. Possibly an aircraft? Maybe to keep the Soviets guessing to its purpose…or maybe even there was even an actual classified aircraft that it was tentatively tied to. We just can’t tell conclusively from the documentation provided.

    I think there needs to be something more concrete. A memo or correspondence which actually correlates the two. You know, “ Great work on Project Seal, the flight over Washington was reported by that Pilot”……you know, something along those lines.



    “We didn't want the Soviets to believe we had built a new generational bomber but a weapon of the type Stalin craved.”

    I guess I’m a little confused on something. In your book, you imply Arnold was more impressed with the objects lack of tail and that he might have misjudged the objects speed, which were ordinary aircraft. Afterwards, he was genuinely plussed with the military’s lack of response. In other words, to put it bluntly, he was a mark (not in on it).

    But then he perfectly describes the Sanger Bomber’s motion for his sighting. Were there any other crafts that could replicate this motion? If not, it would seem that the possibilities are more likely a) he was in on this deception or at least was told what to say, in which case why follow up at all with the military or b) he actually saw a craft that resembled the Sanger Crafts motion, in which case why would there be a need for deception as this would mean we already HAD the craft (or something similar) anyway.


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  37. Adam S. said:

    "Maybe to keep the Soviets guessing to its purpose…or maybe even there was even an actual classified aircraft that it was tentatively tied to. We just can’t tell conclusively from the documentation provided."

    Then you haven't read the original documentation. Project Seal was a real Top Secret WW2 Project that was a joint effort between New Zealand and the United States. The goal of the project was to prove that an artificial tsunami could be created via underwater explosive charges.

    1. The project had nothing to do with an aircraft.
    2. One of the two project scientists (Leech) was an expert in aerodynamics - hence the Press speculation that it was an airborne object. It would have been for this specific reason that Seal was chosen as the project to disclose - allowing the press to make the leap - and Soviet intelligence analysts in turn - to an airborne weapon.
    3. There was zero reason to disclose to the press a Top Secret WW2 project that was already dead but still highly classified and promote it as a current ongoing project more significant that the atomic bomb, other than to deceive.

    Adam S. said: "I think there needs to be something more concrete. A memo or correspondence which actually correlates the two. You know, “ Great work on Project Seal, the flight over Washington was reported by that Pilot”……you know, something along those lines."

    Everyone wants a smoking gun, i.e. "show me the document that states that Project Seal was used as part of the Roswell Deception to promote a U.S. aerial super weapon." Again, if such a document existed, I could read about this deception in a hundred Cold War books at Barnes and Noble. If such a document exists, then it is still highly classified. That does not prevent the formation of a hypothesis to explain the events of 1947 as strategic deception. The problem with trying to discuss this hypothesis with a layperson is that they have a difficult time conceptualizing the nature of strategic deception. If you want to consider that my hypothesis has a basis, then you need to understand the deception precedent set in WW2. Read Deception 101 and The Deceivers. They will open your eyes to a realm of possibilities and how deep human deception can go when a war (hot or cold) is being waged.

    Adam S. said: "But then he perfectly describes the Sanger Bomber’s motion for his sighting. Were there any other crafts that could replicate this motion? If not, it would seem that the possibilities are more likely a) he was in on this deception or at least was told what to say, in which case why follow up at all with the military or b) he actually saw a craft that resembled the Sanger Crafts motion, in which case why would there be a need for deception as this would mean we already HAD the craft (or something similar) anyway."

    How about option c. Arnold was influenced into describing the crafts motion. If you closely study Arnold, you will find as I pointed out in my book, that he was honest to a fault, but extremely susceptible to suggestion. This is very apparent as you read about his interactions with others and specifically with David N. Johnson, who I believe played a major deception role in influencing Arnold. Johnson was no innocent bystander - and this is conclusively proven in the chapters of my book on the Maury Island incident - where there is original documentation showing him actively meddling in Arnold's investigation.

    What astounds me is that Johnson's role as meddler has been in front of Ufologists for many years and they have ignored his role - just as they have ignored many other red flags that show deception not alien visitation.

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  38. Seems to me the Arnold sighting could in no way be mistaken for the Silbervogel by anyone familiar with Sänger's concept.


    The Silbervogel [by Eugen Sänger and Irene Bredt in the late 1930s] was intended to fly long distances in a series of short hops. The aircraft was to have begun its mission propelled along a 3 km (2 mi) long rail track by a large rocket-powered sled to about 1,930 km/h (1,200 mph). Once airborne, it was to fire its own rocket engine and continue to climb to an altitude of 145 km (90 mi), at which point it would be travelling at about 21,800 km/h (13,500 mph). It would then gradually descend into the stratosphere, where the increasing air density would generate lift against the flat underside of the aircraft, eventually causing it to "bounce" and gain altitude again, where this pattern would be repeated.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silbervogel

    The top of the stratosphere occurs at an altitude of 50 km (31 miles).

    The bottom of the stratosphere is around 10 km (6.2 miles or about 33,000 feet) above the ground at middle latitudes.

    https://scied.ucar.edu/shortcontent/stratosphere-overview

    Arnold reported the objects he saw FAR too low to be considered anything like the Sänger bomber -- at 10,000 feet or lower -- which is 20,000 feet below the lowest level of the stratosphere. And they were far too slow. So, I don't see any way how Arnold's sighting would be considered by the USSR to be a prototype Sänger bomber.

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  39. A point that is significant.
    I never heard of Roswell before the mid Eighties.
    I read and looked at a great many things about UFO's. Paperbacks about The Devil's Triangle, Ancient Astronauts, generally strange events. I looked at comic book series about UFO's such as those put out by Gold Key and Dell. I watched televisions series like “Project U.F.O.” I heard of Kenneth Arnold, Project Sign, Project Blue Book, Project Grudge, Lonny Zamora, The Flatwoods Monster, Betty and Barney Hill, the Mantell Incident, the Lubbock Lights, “Foo Fighters”. In none of that, though, did I see or hear anything about Roswell, New Mexico! It can be said that it sounds for all the world like a “false flag” operation, engineered history to catch the imagination of unthinking UFO enthusiasts and lead them away from the truth. I should mention that I first heard of Area 51 at around that time, too.
    And this doesn't seem to be the only such case.
    At Christmas, so many now bring up the “Yes, Virginia” letter. But, although it was supposedly written in the later 1800's, I see no reference to it in any book or movie or such before the 1960's. I have looked through “treasuries” and collections of poems, stories, songs about Christmas going back to the 1920's. I've seen many movies concerning Christmas. In what I saw of “The Man Who Came To Dinner”, “Christmas In Connecticut”, “Holiday Inn”, “The Bishop's Wife”, I saw no reference. I never heard of it being on any Perry Como or Andy Williams Christmas specials. It looks very much as if the “Yes, Virginia” letter is also manufactured “history”.
    Add such things, too, as the “Miracle of Fatima”. The story there always gets more complicated and, at least to an extent, stranger. The “secrets” supposedly given to the children were never mentioned in early renditions. Now, they saw an angel appeared to the children the day before the first apparition and told them it would occur, and even that, a year before, an angel appeared to the children and the parish priest and participated in a Mass in the woods with them.
    And there doesn't seem a single biography show on television that doesn't include material not seen before, or that doesn't fail to include material seen before.
    It's a very good question how much of anything provided generally, anymore, can be trusted.

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  40. julianpenrod -

    Just because you heard nothing about Roswell prior to the 1980s doesn't meant that there were no references to it. The first thing you must understand is that Scully's Behind the Flying Saucers was revealed to be a hoax by J.P. Cahn in the early 1950s and most of those researching UFOs rejected, out of hand, any tale that referred to a saucer crash. Len Stringfield reversed that and told, in his 1978 MUFON Symposium presentation of Jesse Marcel's story of a UFO crash.

    That isn't the first reference, however. Frank Edwards, in his 1966 book, Flying Saucers - Serious Business, reported on the Roswell crash, even mentioning the town. He got nearly every fact wrong, but he did report it in his book.

    In some of those earlier mentions, the writer believed that the Roswell crash to be a hoax, but that doesn't change the fact that it was discussed.

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  41. William Strathman:

    "Seems to me the Arnold sighting could in no way be mistaken for the Silbervogel by anyone familiar with Sänger's concept."

    The only person who the deceivers needed to convince was Stalin as he was obsessed with Sanger's weapon. So let's paint the picture:

    1. Unknown high speed aerial objects being seen all over the United States in 1947 (alluding to incredible range as well).
    2. A CalTech scientist leaking to the press that the objects used jet propelled assistance similar to what the Sanger weapon used
    3. A described motion similar to the Sanger weapon

    As I pointed out in my book, once you find your deception target's prejudicial triggers, you don't need to provide exact data to get them to swallow a deception. Their prejudice will make them ignore red flags and fill in gaps to reach their preconceived beliefs.

    Case in point, the 2016 U.S. Presidential election - all of the social media ads that the Russians were paying for didn't need to make any logical sense, they pressed the prejudicial buttons of many Americans who were "deceived" into voting for the candidate Russia wanted.

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  42. James Carrion wrote:

    “Everyone wants a smoking gun, i.e. "show me the document that states that Project Seal was used as part of the Roswell Deception to promote a U.S. aerial super weapon." Again, if such a document existed, I could read about this deception in a hundred Cold War books at Barnes and Noble. If such a document exists, then it is still highly classified. That does not prevent the formation of a hypothesis to explain the events of 1947 as strategic deception. The problem with trying to discuss this hypothesis with a layperson is that they have a difficult time conceptualizing the nature of strategic deception. If you want to consider that my hypothesis has a basis, then you need to understand the deception precedent set in WW2. Read Deception 101 and The Deceivers. They will open your eyes to a realm of possibilities and how deep human deception can go when a war (hot or cold) is being waged.”

    Well, the idea of deception in warfare was first quoted by Sun Tzu and probably goes all the way back to when Homo sapiens were first throwing rocks and spears against each other. As I have stated, I don’t have any issue with the hypothesis your presenting, I just don’t think the evidence that we currently have firmly supports it. I can tell you’re passionate about it, I just am not convinced.

    Is it more believable than ET craft flying around…yes, it is. But, is it more probable than two other theories about that summer:

    1) There was an experimental craft or crafts or missiles (probably radio controlled) flying around which were actually being witnessed by citizens. OR
    2) A case of war nerves and/or common misidentifications, which includes the Arnold sighting.

    That said, there IS some data which make me wonder if you are on to something, For instance:

    1) The document where the Army tells the FBI it was throwing discs out of an airplane. Operationally, I just can’t think of any reason for them to be doing this other than maybe some form of Chaff or radar testing, but I have never heard of a Chaff test being conducted with “discs”. So, what were they doing???

    2) In “Alfred Loedding & The Great Flying Saucer Wave of 1947”, the authors plot all the reported sightings from that summer on a map of the United States. The sightings are plotted for the week that they occur. For the majority of the Summer, these points are fairly distributed over the continental US, except for a week or two during the end of June where they strongly cluster around the Pacific Northwest. And, I emphasize…. almost ALL of the points are just in that geographic area during that week or two.
    - There are several possible explanations for this of course. But, it could also show if the “deception planners” did create a honeypot. Just a thought anyway.



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  43. Julianpenrod:

    The Roswell story only became 'big news' in 1980 when Bill Moore and Charles Berlitz published their book THE ROSWELL INCIDENT. This came a year after the same authors published THE PHILADELPHIA EXPERIMENT which, so to speak, set them up as writers of sensational books. Hence THE ROSWELL INCIDENT was a big best seller. Kevin is right that there were earlier mentions of Roswell, but these were trivial by comparison with the book. Stringfield's 1978 MUFON Symposium effort was only a brief account of it among numerous 'crashed saucer' tales he presented at that symposium. Stringfield had spoken on the phone to Marcel a few weeks after Stan Friedman had, and had learned more or less the same story.

    It was following the Berlitz-Moore book that others began their own investigations of Roswell, and the total number of writers on it now probably exceeds 50. I couldn't possibly name them all. Hence an insignificant event became, after 1980, a world-wide sensation. Radio, TV and the movie industry picked it up and all hell broke loose. Meanwhile the scientific world stuck up two fingers at it all and carried on as usual.

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  44. Mr. Carrion's proposal, that the 1947 UFO wave was a deception operation staged by US intelligence services, runs counter to ALL the documentary evidence we now have access to regarding the response of the US military and intelligence communities to the UFO phenomena in that time period. The documentary record clearly indicates sober concern and reflects the development of the internal debate and policy position in that time period.

    No serious student of the history of that time period could possibly take Mr Carrion's suggestion seriously.

    In itself this proposal is just yet another piece of the annoying nonsense that gets in the way of a serious discussion of this subject on a par with contactees, the Roswell Slides etc. etc. etc. On its own it is perhaps relatively trivial as it is so clearly wrong serious students of the subjects will quickly discount it.

    Somewhat more concerning, however, is that it fits into an wider vulnerability in out society for a proportion of the population to be taken in by persuasively presented nonsense...particularly when the nonsense is mixed in with a certain amount of actual factual information (even if irrelevant, as in this case) and in an entertaining style. That is however a much wider issue for out society and we aren't go to sort it out here, and this particular example is clearly a symptom rather than a cause.

    The whole subject of UFOS is largely an offshoot of the entertainment industry and has been for many years, with a small number of honourable exceptions. Caveat emptor!



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  45. Anthony Mugan said:

    "Mr. Carrion's proposal, that the 1947 UFO wave was a deception operation staged by US intelligence services, runs counter to ALL the documentary evidence we now have access to regarding the response of the US military and intelligence communities to the UFO phenomena in that time period. The documentary record clearly indicates sober concern and reflects the development of the internal debate and policy position in that time period."

    No it doesn't. I have shown in the book that the responses of the high US military brass to the widespread aerial incursions over the United States in 1947 during heightened tensions with Soviet Russia, to be completely out of character. Lower ranked staff discussed this odd response among themselves and with their FBI liaison. What is your explanation for this lack of defensive response? Your documentation please.

    Anthony Mugan said:
    No serious student of the history of that time period could possibly take Mr Carrion's suggestion seriously.

    Serious student? Do you mean Ufologist? Professional Debunker? Sociologist? Cold War historian? Intelligence Historian? I have no illusions of changing the minds of die hard believers or die hard UFO skeptics, but instead of those who have have the critical reasoning skills to reject your summary dismissal that has no basis and will take the time to not only read the book but the underlying documentation.

    Anthony Mugan said:
    "In itself this proposal is just yet another piece of the annoying nonsense that gets in the way of a serious discussion of this subject on a par with contactees, the Roswell Slides etc. etc. etc. On its own it is perhaps relatively trivial as it is so clearly wrong serious students of the subjects will quickly discount it."

    Here you cite again "serious students". Please quantity who you speak of and if you count yourself as one of those serious students. While you are at it, please provide the following:

    - Your professional line of work
    - Amount of time you have spent in a Government archive searching for UFO related data
    - What qualifies you as a serious student of this subject?
    - Who else you count as a serious student?

    Anthony Mugan said:
    "Somewhat more concerning, however, is that it fits into an wider vulnerability in out society for a proportion of the population to be taken in by persuasively presented nonsense...particularly when the nonsense is mixed in with a certain amount of actual factual information (even if irrelevant, as in this case) and in an entertaining style. That is however a much wider issue for out society and we aren't go to sort it out here, and this particular example is clearly a symptom rather than a cause."

    Persuasively presented nonsense? Is that the same as "alternative facts"? Our society is not vulnerable to logically presented and documented evidence. It is vulnerable to:
    - Those who spout data as if it is factual but have no supporting evidence
    - Those who promote knowingly false narratives as fact
    - Those who sensationalize events and perpetuate mysteries
    - Those who ignore data - I document many instances in my book of important data that Ufologists and debunkers have ignored for years because it doesn't fit their pet theories

    Anthony Mugan said:
    "The whole subject of UFOS is largely an offshoot of the entertainment industry and has been for many years, with a small number of honourable exceptions. Caveat emptor!"
    "
    And who would those honorable exceptions be that hold the gold standard for you? Please list them. Would love to see who your heroes are on this subject.

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  46. When I spoke of "no reference" to Roswell, I was speaking in the sense of there being no widespread mention of the subject in any of the wide range of areas I looked to, There could have been largely unacknowledged, unnoticed mentionings in a few venues, but, in general, no recognition that the event even took place. Even in material by individuals who covered the subject of UFO's very determinedly. And, the fact is, that is eminently suspicious! Since when is there any case concerning UFO's that did not get great attention from, among others, enthusiasts, aficionados, buffs? Frankly, it sounds strange, if not suspicious, that anything even approaching a story of a crashed UFO would take thirty years of more to become a major point of discussion in ufology.

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  47. I thought I would paste some of the news articles Mr. Carrion collected on Project Seal, just for ease of access for everyone. I'm quoting these out of his archived MUFON Symposium I found on the net, so please Mr. Carrion add to these if there are any updates...

    http://scilib.ucsd.edu/sio/hist/Carrion_New%20Avenues.pdf

    Now, before I paste the news articles, I want to emphasize that Project Seal was an attempt to create a Tsunami Bomb (yep, seriously!). The declassifed report can be found on scrib if anyone is interested.

    https://www.scribd.com/document/143591182/The-Final-Report-of-Project-Seal-1950

    I emphasize Tsunami Bomb because I feel the real purpose of the project is what is hinted at in the articles below and that the link to the "Flying Discs" is tenuous.

    Apologies for any formatting errors. Also, this will be spread across two comments due to the character limit on blogger....

    June 13, 1947 - Amarillo Daily News:
    " Science Tries for New Weapon Matching Atom Bomb in Power”
    The weapon did not reach the stage of practical application during the war, but work still
    is being pursued in the strictest secrecy by scientists in the United States, Britain and
    New Zealand. No hint of the details of the weapon has been revealed but it is stated that
    one means of application would have some similarity to one method of using the atomic
    bomb. The project was to have been carried out in Florida but was moved to New Zealand and
    Pacific areas owing to the fears of espionage. Leech was selected to lead the research
    because he had previously done work distantly related. He had a team of 170 American
    and New Zealand experts, most of whom were given no idea of the ultimate objective, for
    security reasons."

    June 14, 1947 - Alton Evening Telegraph:
    “U.S. Scientist Backs Secret Weapon Tale”
    The Herald Tribune quotes a 39-year old American scientist it said shared in the
    development of the secret Anglo-American weapon reported from New Zealand as
    saying that the weapon exists and that first reports although exaggerated, are substantially
    true. The scientist, James Marion Snodgrass of Cincinnati, is further quoted as saying that
    the weapon was not connected in any way with the atom bomb and that it was not a
    biological weapon.
    Existence of the weapon first was reported by Prof. T. D. J Leech of New Zealand. Later
    dispatches mentioned a Prof. J. M Snodgrass of the University of California as a coworker.
    Original reports said the secret weapon outrivaled the atom bomb. The Herald Tribune
    says it reached Snodgrass in Cincinnati and quoted him as saying that he worked on the
    229 weapon in New Zealand and that he believed it to be a weapon of tremendous importance.
    "But farther than that he would not go," the paper says. "He would not discuss its nature
    or whether it was for use against personnel or vessels."
    The Herald Tribune quotes Snodgrass as saying the Navy holds all reports on it
    "although he recalled having spoken to Dr. Vannevar Bush, wartime scientific leader
    about it."

    June 14, 1947 - Charleston Daily Gazette
    "Radiation May be Factor in Latest Secret Weapon”
    There is one clue in the reports of the secret Anglo-American weapon said to outrival the
    atom bomb as credited today to Prof. T. D. J. Leech in New Zealand. That clue points to
    a ray or radiation of some sort. The sentence reads "One means of application would have
    some similarity to one method of using the atomic bomb."

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  48. June 14, 1947 - Indiana Evening Gazette
    “New Weapon May Be Airborne”
    Miller said Leech in both aerodynamic and hydrodynamics had made a great contribution
    to the work of Sydney University’s Civil Engineering Department before he went to New
    Zealand in 1939.
    In Auckland today, Professor Leech said he was ―surprised‖ to hear that a London
    newspaper headline had stated that the atomic bomb had been rendered obsolete, but
    made no further comment.

    June 14, 1947 - Daily Inter Lake
    "Snodgrass gave the only hint as to the nature of the weapon as he disclosed its
    development started after American forces landed on Tarawa Island in the Pacific. He
    turned to a reporter and said: ―remember there was heavy loss of life." The newsmen
    asked if the weapon had anything to do with the casualties or some military problem
    encountered on the Island and Snodgrass replied: "Could be."
    Snodgrass who is chief engineer of the motion picture sound division at the DaytonACME CO., a Cincinnati consultant engineering firm, said he joined British and New
    Zealand scientists in the development of the weapon while he was a civilian attached to
    the National Defense Research Council. Prof. Leech headed the project, he added.
    He said the weapon was conceived by the British although United States naval officers
    were not enthusiastic the British pressed the work, first on an obscure Pacific Islands."

    ---

    So, there you go. I could see a bait here, but the language: Pacific Islands, Coastal Regions, rival the atom bomb in power (like one would excpect from a Tsunami Bomb). These just strike me as in-line with the actual project...not the "flying discs" which were reported a little later.

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  49. Anthony Mugan & James Carrion:

    There are no 'heroes' in ufology. There are plenty of suckers but certainly no heroes. If there were, the UK heroes would by now have either got knighthoods or damehoods. Similar honors exist in the US, surely? No such honors have been given, to my knowledge. One day, maybe (and it is a very big 'maybe') someone will be officially honoured "for services to ufology".

    In the meantime I suggest Mr Carrion produces the documentation that undoubtedly exists (if he is right) for his great thesis that the 1947 wave was all part of a grand deception by the US against the Soviets. Remember: each successive day & week that passes without this documentation appearing reduces even further the probability that he is right. But yes, he may STILL have a minute chance of being correct in his conjecture. The ETHers also have a minute chance of being right, but after 72 years it is getting VERY close to absolute zero.

    But that's what ufology is all about, isn't it?

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  50. Adam S. said:

    "I emphasize Tsunami Bomb because I feel the real purpose of the project is what is hinted at in the articles below and that the link to the "Flying Discs" is tenuous."

    Here's an article that makes the connection:

    Alton Evening Telegraph - June 14, 1947

    Savant Hints Weapon is Rocket Bomb Type
    Sydney, Australia - (AP) Professor W. A. Miller of the Sydney university civil engineering department Saturday said a new secret weapon mentioned in Auckland, N.Z. reports "might be in the nature of an airborne missile such as the German rocket bomb."

    Miller emphasize to reporters however, that he himself had received no indication of the nature of the project and that he mad the comment only because he knew Prof. David James Leech, Auckland to have "an expert knowledge of and enthusiasm for aerodynamics."

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  51. cda says:

    "In the meantime I suggest Mr Carrion produces the documentation that undoubtedly exists (if he is right) for his great thesis that the 1947 wave was all part of a grand deception by the US against the Soviets. Remember: each successive day & week that passes without this documentation appearing reduces even further the probability that he is right."

    It appears you don't have a clue how historical research works and your comment about each passing day reducing the possibility of my hypothesis being viable is ludicrous. Start with the nature of the data - it is security classified. If the U.S. Government blanket declassified ALL classified data from 1945 - 1948, then it would be a simple matter of spending enough time in Government archives reviewing the declassified data to be able to either substantiate or eliminate the hypothesis. That is not the reality.

    You can sit in your pessimist armchair and pontificate and make demands but that does not change the nature of the issue. Imagine if I took the same position on any number of once classified operations that we only learned about decades later after declassification took place.

    For example, if I had written a book in 1947 about the WW2 Ghost Army, claiming the U.S. practiced strategic deception during WW2, but could cite no official documentation to back up the hypothesis, because that data was still classified...historians would have ignored the book, and others would wring their hands and cry "conspiracy".

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  52. The idea that the Russians would encrypt publicly available newspaper articles is simply ludicrous. Every embassy has people whose job it is to read newspapers. It's not a secret.

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  53. Val Miller said:

    "The idea that the Russians would encrypt publicly available newspaper articles is simply ludicrous. Every embassy has people whose job it is to read newspapers. It's not a secret."

    I feel like I am wasting my time here when folks post comments who obviously haven't bothered to read the book.

    If Val had bothered to read the book, than he would have found out that:

    1. The media was a source of open intelligence for the Russians in 1947

    2. If the media reported something of intelligence value, Russian intelligence agents in the U.S. had very limited ways of sending that information back to Moscow. They could either send a human back which would take days, send it in the diplomatic pouch which would take days or send it via encrypted commercial telegraph which would take minutes.

    3. The nature of the 1947 flying saucer stories were close to Stalin's heart as he didn't see an ET signature but a secret American weapon, so stories of that nature would be required to be urgently sent back to Moscow - hence the encrypted telegraph - and the codebreaking goals of the deception.

    Please have the courtesy before posting of first reading the book that I spent 10 years researching and hundreds of hours writing and have offered free of charge. It is the least you can do.

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  54. @ Adam S.

    I’m not aware of any “circular aircraft” being developed in San Francisco in 1947. As Mr. Carrion states...do you have a “source”? That might be interesting to examine. However it may not mean much of anything either.

    There certainly were circular aircraft in prototype stage prior to 1947 and during WWII. I’m not certain any of them would’ve intimidated the Soviets. There are others (many on paper) but here’s a sampling of flown examples predating the Roswell event:

    Arup S-2: 1934-36 (U.S.). This plane looks “saucer shaped” in flight. It was even called a “flying wing” before anything else was.
    https://youtu.be/_XrSFVDa3mY

    Flying Flounder: 1939-42 (U.S.). Eschelman built design which also flew.
    https://youtu.be/Fr5HwRyk020

    Arthur Sack’s AS-6: 1939-45 (Germany). Built and flown but interestingly isn’t any different than the above despite the hype of “Nazi super weapons”.
    http://discaircraft.greyfalcon.us/ARTHUR%20SACK%20A.htm

    My thoughts (and likely your’s) are the Soviets were not so much concerned about how the aircraft looked but what its capabilities were — specifically if it could drop an atomic bomb over Russian targets from a safe launching point in North America.

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  55. @ James Carrion

    Just to clarify, what you’re saying is that you’ve never heard back from the CIA regarding multiple FOIA requests, correct? Nothing, not even a form letter denying you access?

    Of course we’re all aware of the shenanigans played with the FOIA process and they’re well documented.

    But if I take your meaning correctly, you haven’t followed up with their public records office in two years?

    Obviously they are compelled to give a reason for any delays — complexity, too broad a scope, change in personnel, lost, misplaced, not understood, exemptions, etc.

    You may never get the information, but they are legally obligated to minimally tell you where your request stands.

    What did they tell you?

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  56. All -

    The idea of tailless aircraft goes back to about 1909. The idea of flying wings goes back to the 1930s at least. The Horten Brothers attempted to create a good flying model and had many designs of them. The point is that here, in June, 1947, there is no evidence that any were flying in the northwestern United States. The Flying Flapjack of Navy design only flew on the east coast according to some of the documentation... but the point is, it was not flying over the northwest on June 24 and there weren't nine of them. Just thought I would mention this.

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  57. Despite all the back-and-forth, I do feel Mr. Carrion’s hypothesis has some merit. I don’t say that flippantly.

    I’m not finished digesting the whole thing, but to understand it you really have to watch some YouTube videos, his presentations and interviews, and actually read his entire manuscript.

    No, it doesn’t fully explain every last detail to everyones’ satisfaction, and yes there is a heavy reliance on classified materials that can’t be accessed to produce a definitive “smoking gun”.

    But is he correct? I don’t know. But he’s made at least a few very valid points based on his research.

    Perhaps most interesting to me is that his thesis seems to irritate both ET’ers and skeptics alike. People just hate it.

    But maybe that’s a good thing.

    In truth, after 70+ years of ongoing debate would either side be capable of recognizing the real explanation for Roswell even if it were presented to them as plainly as possible?

    I wonder.

    For me there are a few legitimate take-always worth noting:

    — In 1947 both Soviet and US authorities were desperate to not only develop technological wonder weapons but also to intimidate one another in a game of one up man ship.

    — Captured German weapons and proposed designs fueled interest in intercontinental missiles and super aircraft that could quickly and easily deliver a surprise attack when strategic bombers were not yet capable of doing so.

    — Most US Army Air Corps offices associated with research and technology were also charged with carrying out counter-intelligence which no doubt they did despite those efforts remaining classified to this day.

    While unprovable, Mr. Carrion has also presented some very plausible suppositions which for me carry high probability:

    — That the USAAF engaged in hoaxing saucer sightings at the same time they also sought to debunk them. Perhaps not in joint unison or coordination, but clearly with an intent to influence the general public and possibly the Soviets.

    — That such a hoax makes the perfect platform for delivering a strategic deception aimed at influencing the Soviets to ponder if the US was testing advanced aircraft capable of reaching Russian targets with an atomic bomb.

    — That a “disc” shaped aircraft, or one that consists of a single solid wing as Arnold claimed, would imply use of radical designs reminiscent of those captured from Germany just two years prior.

    — That Arnold’s sighting is far more complex than previously thought, and that the USAAF may have targeted that area for purposeful counter-intelligence operations aimed at influencing the Soviets via the general public.

    — The DC5 Arnold spotted was likely a C54 involved in some aspect of the saucer flight he witnessed. This may have been for observation, reconnaissance, monitoring, or even conducting the hoax via unmanned radio controlled drone.

    — That Arnold’s story changed with his ongoing frustration with the Army’s refusal to actually give any response, and that the Army frequently denied they were testing such weapons while conducting counter intelligence operations to influence people that they were.

    — That Arnold seemed the perfect patsy, was easily influenced, and simply the perfect medium one could hope for if attempting such a deception.

    The fact that witnesses on the ground claimed to have seen individual and clustered saucers flying in formation soon after an aircraft flew overhead, that USAAF aircraft were seen tossing out stringed together saucers at altitudes between 5,000 and 10,000 feet while at the same time denying saucers exist (or if they do, pose no threat) makes perfect sense.

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  58. Brian B said:

    "Just to clarify, what you’re saying is that you’ve never heard back from the CIA regarding multiple FOIA requests, correct? Nothing, not even a form letter denying you access?"

    I submitted an initial FOIA request for the records of the Joint Counterintelligence Center (JCIC) to the CIA and the response that came back was "The National Archives has those records." I checked at the National Archives and they do not.

    I sent a second FOIA request and this time extended the dates of the request to 1950 as the JCIC was moved to CIA in 1948. That is the request I am still expecting a formal response to.

    "But if I take your meaning correctly, you haven’t followed up with their public records office in two years?"

    My second FOIA request was sent in November 2016 and I sent up a follow up letter in July 2017. There is also a hotline you can call for status which I have. Each time the response has been "We are working on it." I am at the point of seeking legal representation since the CIA has been dragging their feet on this.

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  59. Re FOIA requests... As James mentioned above, I submitted a request in late 2016 for several items, including Joint Security Control (JSC) files on deception operations (The request came as a result of reading James' work). I initially received a negative response on the grounds that specific file names were required. I appealed the ruling, citing the mention of such files in declassified documents, and requesting consideration be given to how researchers would obtain the files other than simply ask for them. My last status update on the appeal indicated work might begin on it in mid to late 2018.

    For a variety of reasons I'm unfortunately not overly optimistic the appeal will bear the files I seek. I'm considering a few other options, including submitting additional requests which supply FOIA officers with even more documentation of the existence of JSC deception files.. I also think requests on Joint Counterintelligence Center files could be useful.

    I find the agencies tasked to design and conduct deception ops during both war time and peace time (as documented by James) quite interesting. That's the case for me regardless of what may or may not have taken place at Roswell during the time in question, but it would seem to me, given the 1946-47 date correlations, people with UFO interests would find this worthy of a look prior to dismissing out of hand. If nothing else, it's historically relevant.

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  60. I am inclined to consider Roswell a limited CI operation.
    I am not inclinded to see Arnold's sighting and report as a CI operation.

    From Arnold’s letter to General Twining -- pp 67–75 of James's book.

    “I flew directly toward Mt. Rainier after reaching an altitude of about 9,500 feet, which is the approximate elevation of the high plateau from which Mt. Rainier rises. I had made one sweep of this high plateau to the westward, searching all of the various ridges for this marine ship and flew to the west down and near the ridge side of the canyon where Ashford, Washington, is located.

    Unable to see anything that looked like the lost ship, I made a 360 degree turn to the right and above the little city of Mineral, starting again toward Mt. Rainier. I climbed back up to an altitude of approximately 9,200 feet.


    [So Arnold is flying around all over the place in a very small private a/c.]

    'The air was so smooth that day that it was a real pleasure flying and, as most pilots do when the air is smooth and they are flying at a higher altitude, I trimmed out my airplane in the direction of Yakima, Washington, which was almost directly east of my position and simply sat in my plane observing the sky and the terrain.

    There was a DC-4 to the left and to the rear of me approximately fifteen miles distance, and I should judge, at 14,000-foot elevation.

    [Hard for me to imagine that a DC-4 (?C-54?) crew are going to be able to visually locate a small private plane 15 miles away to pull off a Counter Intel operation. Or does James think they were just randomly trolling for unsuspecting pilots?]

    [ . . . ]

    These [unidentified] objects being quite far away, I was unable for a few seconds to make out their shape or their formation. Very shortly they approached Mt. Rainier, and I observed their outline against the snow quite plainly.

    I observed them quite plainly, and I estimate my distance from them, which was almost at right angles, to be between twenty to twenty-five miles. I knew they must be very large to observe their shape at that distance, even on as clear a day as it was that Tuesday.

    [If I'm not mistaken, 20 miles is well into BVR, or beyond visual range, for current considerations of fighter pilot visual acuity -- "A beyond-visual-range missile (BVR) is an air-to-air missile (BVRAAM) that is capable of engaging at ranges of 20 nmi (37 km) or beyond." Wiki. Lots of other questions then arise.]

    [ . . . ]

    My pilot's license is 333487. I fly a Callair airplane; it is a three-place single engine land ship that is designed and manufactured at Afton, Wyoming as an extremely high performance, high altitude airplane that was made for mountain work. [Interesting that Arnold gives a very clear plug for the private a/c he is flying, see below.] The national certificate of my plane is 33355

    /s/ Kenneth Arnold, Box 587, Boise, Idaho

    ================
    CallAir Aircraft museum

    http://callairmuseum.org/A-3.html

    “Ken Arnold made flying saucers famous. He first saw them from the cabin of a CallAir A-3! On June 24, 1947 Arnold was flying near Mt. Rainier when he witnessed a series of reflections that came from saucer-shaped objects flying in the distance. Others later made “corroborative sightings.” Since then both Arnold and the CallAir have enjoyed lasting fame.

    Maybe instead of CI, Arnold was just doing a little spectacular advertising for Call Air.

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  61. This is probably the biggest reach and miss for a Roswell explaination I have seen, so far. Completely wrong for so many reasons.

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  62. Ben Moss said:

    "This is probably the biggest reach and miss for a Roswell explanation I have seen, so far. Completely wrong for so many reasons."

    You have provided no justification for your statement. Cite your "many reasons" so they can be discussed/refuted.

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  63. I posted about this a long time ago and it has never been addressed. That is that the press release - ANY version of the press release is WRONG.

    It is not factual. It is not what happened according to the witnesses.

    The PR says that a "disc landed", a disc "was recovered" and so forth. Brazzel and Marcell, who were there both say that it was wreckage, little pieces of foil, sticks (metal or otherwise), rubber, paper, etc. You could collect it and put it in the trunk of your car. That according to the newspaper accounts at the time and interviews through the years.

    A long time ago I realized that something was very wrong with Haut's PR, if in fact he talked to Marcell about what he saw (as far as I know Haut did not talk with Brazzel).

    I have always suspected that Haut was making it up. Maybe he just wanted to give the papers something to print but didn't realize it would "go viral" as we say today. I have my doubts that Blanchard read the PR and approved it - unless he did not talk to Marcell first - because Marcell would NOT have told him they had a disc or most of one. Could it be that Blanchard was going on vacation and didn't read the PR? But that still does not answer why it is not true to what Brazzel and Marcell saw.

    If Carrion is right in his theory then you could say the reason why the PR talked about a whole disc when there was none was to "fool" the Soviets. But would Haut go to his grave without saying that he "juiced up" the PR as part of a intelligence operation? I guess so if it is still classified...

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