Date: Wed, 13 Dec 1995 17:24:14 EST
Reply-To: Terry Colvin <colvint@FHU.DISA.MIL>
Sender: Weird News Discussion List <TREPAN-D@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
From: Terry Colvin <colvint@FHU.DISA.MIL>
Subject: ISCNI*Flash -- Vol. 1, No. 18 -- December 1, 1995
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ISCNI*Flash -- Vol. 1, No. 18 -- December 1, 1995
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ISCNI*Flash is the twice-monthly electronic newsletter of ISCNI, The
Institute for the Study of Contact with Non-human Intelligence.
All readers are encouraged to visit ISCNI's new Home Page on the World Wide
Web, already rated among the top 5% of all sites on the Internet by Point
Survey, the leading online provider of Web site ratings and reviews. Our URL
is http://www.iscni.com
You're receiving this issue of ISCNI*Flash because you've subscribed via
email; or because you've visited ISCNI at AOL, or attended one of our public
events, or requested information via email; or because you've been
recommended by a friend; or because you show UFOs as an interest in your AOL
member profile; or because you're an ISCNI member. If you do not wish to
receive this newsletter again, please see the notice at the end of this
issue.
The subject matter of the ISCNI*Flash is inherently controversial, and the
views and opinions reported herein are not necessarily those of ISCNI or its
staff.
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Welcome to ISCNI*Flash. Highlights in this issue are:
o KARLA TURNER FIGHTING CANCER, APPEALS FOR AID
o DOCTOR PROBES "IMPLANTS" REPORTEDLY LEFT BY ALIENS
o AUTHOR KEITH THOMPSON FEATURED AT NEXT ISCNI CHAT
o PSYCHIC SPIES HAVE A HOME AT THE CIA
Columnist Jack Anderson On Remote Viewing
o PSYCHIC POWER REAL, BUT NOT GOOD FOR SPYING, CIA SAYS
o PUERTO RICO HYSTERIA OVER RUMORED BLOOD-SUCKING BEAST
o NEW 1996 CALENDAR FEATURES HIGH-QUALITY UFO PHOTOS
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KARLA TURNER FIGHTING CANCER, APPEALS FOR AID
Dr. Karla Turner, noted UFO abduction researcher, ISCNI faculty member and
author (INTO THE FRINGE, TAKEN and MASQUERADE OF ANGELS), is undergoing
treatment for a very serious form of cancer. Karla underwent surgery for
breast cancer earlier this year, then learned the cancer had spread to her
liver, which is usually fatal. On the advice of several physicians, Karla has
chosen a course of treatment that offers more chance of recovery than
traditional radiation or chemotherapy. The cost of this treatment is about
$1,400 per week. However, her medical insurance does not cover most of the
cost, and her personal finances are nearly exhausted.
A non-profit fund has been established to raise money to support Karla's
cancer treatment. The staff of ISCNI*Flash joins Karla's many other friends
and admirers in urging all our readers to assist Karla if possible. Donations
in any amount are greatly appreciated.
Please send your donation (check or money order) to the Karla Turner Fund;
c/o Boatmen's Bank, P.O. Box 1681, Little Rock, AR 72203-1681. Your donation
can be tax deductible if you request a letter of receipt from the Bank.
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DOCTOR PROBES "IMPLANTS" REPORTEDLY LEFT BY ALIENS
[ISCNI*Flash thanks Brian Zeiler for forwarding this story, which first
appeared in the "Cleveland Plain Dealer" on November 8, 1995.]
By Steve Chawkins
VENTURA, CA -- He didn't want his name used. He's a California surgeon and
he's scared of repercussions.
"I'd probably be ostracized, I'd be criticized, maybe I'd even lose my
license," he said. "People with credibility who put themselves forward in
this field could wind up dead, in jail or out of business."
He performed the operations anyway, before witnesses and a video camera. He
cut into the big toe of a woman and into the back of a man's hand. Both
believed they'd been abducted by aliens. From both, he extracted small
foreign objects with some unusual properties.
"No one has the answers," he said. "But we all know something's going on."
The doctor has been active in UFO groups for five years. Through them, he
met a Houston UFO researcher who sent the purported abductees here for
surgery last August.
The patients didn't know each other. Neither had been aware of the objects he
or she carried. Neither bore any nearby scars or punctures. In both cases,
the objects came to light in X-rays for minor, unrelated injuries.
In decades of practice, the doctor said he'd never seen anything quite like
what he fished out.
The objects were encased in a thick, dark membrane. These weren't cysts, he
said. They were so tough, his scalpel couldn't cut them.
The object in the man was the size of a cantaloupe seed; one of the woman's
two was T-shaped. Both patients jerked back when the doctor touched the
objects -- an unusual reaction for people calmed by hypnosis and placed on
local anesthetics.
Back in Texas, the membranes were dried out and cut open, revealing tiny
highly magnetic pieces of a shiny black metal. Under ultraviolet light, they
glowed a brilliant green -- same as the "fingerprints" on the thighs and
backs of some who claim to have been abducted, the doctor said.
Strange items have been pulled from "abductees" before, but many somehow have
disappeared before independent scientists could examine them. The skeptics
remain skeptical.
"We haven't heard of anything that, without the shadow of a doubt, couldn't
have been made here on Earth," said Barry Karr, director of the Center for
Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal. "Let's see the
evidence."
Perhaps they will.
The objects are in Houston for electrical, chemical and microscopic analysis.
The patients who unwittingly carried them say they feel liberated. The
doctor figures he'll be called on to perform more operations before long.
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FACTOID: The latest Sharper Image catalog offers a replica of a Roswell alien
in plastic-encased horizontal chamber (sort of like a hyperbaric chamber, a
la Michael Jackson), for the tidy sum of
$1,695. Get yours quick, before they run out! [ISCNI*Flash thanks Kathi
Hennesey for this bizarre tidbit.]
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AUTHOR KEITH THOMPSON FEATURED AT NEXT ISCNI CHAT
On Monday, December 4, ISCNI's regularly scheduled weekly chat in the EUN
conference hall at America Online features special guest Keith Thompson for
the entire 90-minute session. The chat begins at 9pm Eastern (6pm Pacific)
and is open to all AOL members.
Keith Thompson is a former Senate staffer turned independent journalist, with
wide-ranging interests in politics, psychology, spirituality, creativity, and
what he calls 'the life of the culture.' He is the author of ANGELS AND
ALIENS: UFOS AND THE MYTHIC IMAGINATION (Ballantine, 1993), a book the San
Francisco Chronicle called "magnificent," and which earned him instant
respect among UFO researchers (Thompson emphasizes that he is NOT a UFO
researcher per se). His articles have appeared in Esquire, Common Boundary,
Utne Reader, New Age, Yoga Journal, and the San Francisco Chronicle. He
lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Asked what he wants to discuss during the ISCNI chat, he said, "Forty years
after the phrase 'flying saucer' entered the lexicon, UFOs continue to entice
us with their vivid ambivalence, shamelessly straddling the fence between
mind and matter, systematically frustrating the search for easy,
black-or-white answers. [During] this on-line conversation, [we'll] explore
how to interpret the phenomenon named 'UFO' at a time in our culture when
'reality' itself seems up for grabs. Leave your dogmatism at the door and
come prepared to ask new questions."
All Flash readers with AOL access are invited to take part in this
fascinating discussion with Keith Thompson, this coming Monday evening. To
reach the conference hall, use keyword EUN, then click Continuing Education,
then EUN Conference Hall.
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PSYCHIC SPIES HAVE A HOME AT THE CIA
By Jack Anderson and Michael Binstein
Copyright 1995, United Feature Syndicate, Inc.
WASHINGTON -- More than a decade after we first told the story, the Pentagon
continues to employ a highly classified team of "psychic spies," who use a
form of extrasensory perception to help gather intelligence in foreign
countries.
It was called "Project Grill Flame" when we first reported this strange story
in April 1984. Since then, the program has fought off several external and
internal threats to its existence, changing its name to Center Lane and
Sunstreak, among other appellations.
But it continues to exist, albeit in scaled-down form. It's also been moved
from its long-time headquarters at Fort Meade, Md., which gave the unit a
comfortable "hideout" because it was home to a much larger spy outfit -- the
National Security Agency.
The unit was launched in the early 1970s, when the CIA became concerned about
a "psychic gap" with the Soviets, who were heavily involved in investigating
psychic phenomena. The precursor of the current project, called "remote
viewing," was put together in part by two respected academics -- Harold
Puthoff, once with the NSA, and Russell Targ, associated with the Stanford
Research Institute in Menlo Park, Calif. For a time, in fact, SRI was under
contract to run the program for the CIA.
The group was first called "Project Scanate," which stood for "scan by
coordinate." Program managers recruited subjects who demonstrated psychic
abilities and placed them in darkened rooms, where they were given longitude
and latitude coordinates and asked what they "saw." The CIA and Pentagon soon
found that it could be a useful tool in the intelligence mix, though they
have never relied on it exclusively for intelligence gathering.
Its successes have won key converts inside and outside the intelligence
community:
-- One remote viewer described an airfield, complete with details including a
large gantry and crane at one end of the field. The CIA was impressed, but
critical. There was indeed an airfield at the given map coordinates -- the
Soviet Union's ultra-secret nuclear testing area at Semipalatinsk. But the
CIA knew of no gantry or cranes at the site. They were later stunned when the
next satellite photos revealed both the gantry and crane, which had recently
been moved there.
-- Another test involved a Soviet Tu-95 "Backfire" bomber, which the CIA knew
had crashed somewhere in Africa. They were eager to find it before the
Soviets did, so they could take photographs and perhaps purloin secret gear
from the wreckage. So one of the remote viewers was asked to locate the
downed bomber, which he allegedly did within several miles of the actual
wreckage.
-- In yet another instance, a remote-viewer was asked to focus on a KGB
colonel caught spying and being interrogated in South Africa. He "saw" that
the spy had been smuggling information using a pocket calculator modified
into a communications device, and that the South Africa assignment was his
last before returning to Russia. The "suggestion" to question him on this was
shared with South African intelligence, and it allegedly caused the spy to
break down and cooperate -- because of its accuracy.
-- Remote-viewers have been employed in most international crisis over the
last two decades. During the Gulf War, knowledgeable sources told our
associate Dale Van Atta, remote viewers fingered the secret location of
Iraq's Saddam Hussein, though this was never verified by conventional means.
The unit's two biggest congressional defenders -- Sen. Claiborne Pell,
D-R.I., and Rep. Charles Rose, D-N.C. -- have long since been convinced of
the program's effectiveness.
The Achilles heel of the project has been its misses -- which have raised the
ire of many critics over the years. Remote-viewers have produced as much bad
information as good, intelligence sources admit. But the program's defenders
say this is no different from the rest of the CIA, where human spies have
also been known to make major blunders.
"We were always able to survive," one of the remote-viewers told us, "when we
stuck to what we did best: just a guy (or a woman) sitting in a dark room, or
even a lit room, focusing on what was happening somewhere else.... There was
no shaking, no big trance, no spirit entities speaking in different voices,
nothing hoodoo voodoo. It seems to work enough times to make it valuable as a
'tip,' if you will, to where the CIA's folks, or our satellites, should be
looking."
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PSYCHIC POWER REAL, BUT NOT GOOD FOR SPYING, CIA SAYS
[Editor's Note: The CIA report cited below partially confirms information
presented in the preceding story and on ABC-TV's "NightLine" news program of
November 28, but appears to contradict claims that remote viewing has been
successfully used in sensitive intelligence gathering missions. ISCNI*Flash
sees no reason to believe the CIA would be entirely forthcoming in regard to
possible intelligence applications of remote viewing.]
By Jim Wolf
WASHINGTON (Reuter) -- Some people may have a paranormal ability to visualize
hidden or distant objects without actually seeing them, a CIA-commissioned
study made public Tuesday [Nov 28] reported.
But both the Central Intelligence Agency and the academic authors of the
study said that the possible extrasensory perception, called remote viewing,
had not been shown to be useful for intelligence gathering.
The study, by the American Institutes for Research, a private Washington
social science research firm, said "statistically significant" results had
been observed in laboratory experiments to test remote viewing.
The CIA commissioned the study at the request of the Senate Appropriations
Committee, keen to know whether more government research into parapsychology
was warranted to give U.S. spy
agencies an extra arrow in their quiver.
But the study, dated Sept. 29 and made public by the CIA after it was cited
by ABC News, found that remote viewing had not been shown to help in
collecting secrets for national security purposes.
Quoting unidentified "users" of images generated by supposed remote viewers,
the study's authors said the material had never provided data "sufficiently
valuable or compelling so that action was taken as a result" by U.S.
officials.
David Christian, a CIA spokesman, said the spy agency, like the authors of
the report, had concluded that no further official U.S. research into remote
viewing was warranted.
"We think the intelligence community shouldn't pursue research on this and
that it is best left to the private sector," he said.
Christian said the CIA had carried out research into remote viewing in the
1970s but had determined it to be unpromising and dropped the idea.
The CIA program, codenamed "Stargate," was initiated in response to concerns
about a "psychic gap" with the old Soviet Union, according to Jessica Utts, a
University of California, Davis, statistics professor who worked on the
CIA-commissioned study.
ABC News reported [on Nov 28] that the CIA and other U.S. intelligence
outfits had hired supposed remote viewers "to spy on hundreds of political
and military targets," including the holding of 52 American hostages for 444
days in Iran after the embassy takeover in November, 1979.
ABC said people claiming to be capable of remote viewing also had been hired
by U.S. spy agencies to pinpoint downed U.S. and Soviet aircraft, as well as
to communicate with submerged submarines.
Christian declined to discuss examples of CIA use of so-called psychic
spying, but said most of its research in the 1970s was "experimental." The
Defense Intelligence Agency, which coordinates military intelligence, had no
comment.
Utts, who specializes in evaluating parapsychology research, said the data
she reviewed for the CIA study had produced the most credible evidence to
date that humans were capable of paranormal psychic feats. "At this stage,
using the standards applied to any other area of science, the case for
psychic functioning has been scientifically proven," she said in a telephone
interview.
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FACTOID: On the November 24 episode of FOX-TV's "X-Files," Agent Mulder told
Agent Scully that the "Alien Autopsy" film footage, also shown on FOX, was
fraudulent. Whew. That should settle it!
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PUERTO RICO HYSTERIA OVER RUMORED BLOOD-SUCKING BEAST
Copyright 1995 by Reuters
Nov 19, 1995
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (Reuter) -- This Caribbean island is in an uproar over
reports of a mysterious blood-sucking beast, which is said to rip the organs
from its animal victims and is terrorizing rural residents.
But the government of this U.S. territory of 3.6 million people insists the
animals died of natural causes and is urging residents not to fall into mass
hysteria over local media reports.
The beast, known in Spanish as "Chupacabras" or Goat Sucker, is blamed in the
deaths of dozens of turkeys, rabbits, goats, cats, dogs and even horses and
cows, according to police.
"People here are frightened," said Mayor Jose Soto of Canovanas, a city of
40,000 people near San Juan. "It sucks the blood from dogs, cats and horses.
It opens the skin of rabbits and goats and steals their organs."
Goat Sucker attacks are reported daily on morning news radio reports and in
El Vocero, the island's largest circulation newspaper, which is known for its
gruesome crime photos,
blood-red headlines and tales of UFO landings.
In the latest report of a Goat Sucker attack, the beast was said to rip open
the bedroom window of a house in the north-central city of Caguas, destroy a
stuffed teddy bear, and leave a puddle of slime and a piece of rancid white
meat on the window sill.
The home owner, Santa Ramos Reyes, told police the Goat Sucker had hairy arms
and huge red eyes. According to El Vocero, Caguas police dusted the window
sill for prints but could not get an impression.
In another attack in Caguas, the Goat Sucker purportedly swooped into a
junkyard early one morning and killed five sheep, four geese and a turkey.
"It came about seven o'clock in the morning," Junker Correa employee Carlos
de Jesus told Reuters. "It just showed up and -- poof -- it vanished."
In Canovanas, the Goat Sucker has struck 35 times in the past three months,
Mayor Soto claimed. Every Sunday afternoon, the mayor dons military-style
fatigues and leads a patrol of Canovanas residents on a hunt for the Goat
Sucker. "This is a very serious problem," the mayor said. "We must catch this
beast."
Police have declined to participate in the hunt, but do investigate each
reported animal slaying. "As soon as the beast attacks a person, we will get
involved," said a Canovanas police spokeswoman.
Skeptics blame the attacks on wild monkeys. A colony of aggressive monkeys
has been attacking livestock and raiding crops for years in Puerto Rico. But
Mayor Soto doesn't buy that explanation. "Monkeys don't suck blood. They
don't steal organs," Soto said.
The Puerto Rico Agriculture Department dispatched a veterinarian to
investigate, then announced that the animals had all died under normal
circumstances. Further, none of the animals had been bled dry, agriculture
department officials said in a statement released to the media.
"Citizens are urged to not fall into collective hysteria... about the alleged
Goat Sucker," the statement said.
Canovanas resident Jose Resto said he saw the Goat Sucker one afternoon in
his back yard when it came out of the brush and attacked and bit the family
dog. "I think it belongs to the monkey family, but it isn't a monkey
exactly," Resto said. "It ran like a monkey and was about four feet tall, but
it didn't have a tail."
Interest in the purported sightings of the beast is so high that a major San
Juan television station, WKAQ-TV, planned to broadcast an hour-long news
program about the Goat Sucker.
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BOOKS AND VIDEOS
by Linda Moulton Howe Productions
can now be ordered by toll-free phone.
Please call: 800-707-9993
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NEW 1996 CALENDAR FEATURES HIGH-QUALITY UFO PHOTOS
Christine Stevens Cox, daughter of veteran UFO researcher and photo-archivist
Wendelle Stevens, has announced publication of a 1996 calendar with 13 full
color UFO photographs enlarged to 9-1/2 x 11 size.
"This is the only UFO calendar in the world," Stevens claims. "The enlarged
photographs are printed on 100# finished art paper for matting and framing by
those so inclined. They make an excellent gallery of real UFO photographs."
Of particular interest to those who might wish to reproduce such photos,
Stevens said: "They can be rephotographed for different-sized prints or
slides for talks and presentations."
Concerning the quality of the images, Stevens said, "Because they are
laser-scanned and enlarged, they often appear even sharper than the
originals. All of the photographs shown in this [calendar] remain completely
untreated in any way -- except to scan them
for color separation for printing. We have even left all the original flaws,
marks, water spots and dirt on the images copied in the interest of
authenticity. Nothing has been altered to improve
the pictures."
Most of the photos in the calendar are clear daylight shots taken within the
past five years. The photos come from Mexico, Canada, Puerto Rico and the
United States. [ISCNI*Flash editor has previewed the new calendar but cannot
verify the authenticity of any of these photos.]
Wendelle Stevens began issuing an annual UFO calendar in 1990, with different
photos in each edition. According to his daughter, only a few of the 1990
edition are still available, at $20.00. Calendars from 1991, 1992 and 1993
can be purchased for $15.00 each. Calendars from 1994 and 1995, as well as
the new 1996 edition, cost $9.95.
To order these calendars, send check or money order to:
UFO Books - Chris Cox
P.O. Box 1053
514 First St.
Florence, AZ 85232
For single-calendar orders, add $1.50 to cover postage and handling. For
postage on multiple-calendar orders, call (520) 868-4273 for further
information.
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CLOSING REMINDERS:
* All AOL members, please join us for a fascinating live chat with author
Keith Thompson in the EUN Conference Hall on Monday, December 4, starting at
9pm Eastern, 6pm Pacific time.
* All Flash readers: Be sure to visit ISCNI's new site on the World Wide Web.
Remember the address: http://www.iscni.com
* If you're on IRC, please plan to join in ISCNI's live IRC chats in channel
#ISCNI on Saturdays, December 2, 9 and 16.
Thanks for reading the ISCNI*Flash!
Michael Lindemann
Editor
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NOTE: Like the Flash? Please let us know of other people who'd like to
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To SUBSCRIBE to ISCNI*Flash, send email to ISCNI@aol.com and request free
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Except as otherwise noted, the entire text of ISCNI*Flash is copyright 1995
by ISCNI, Inc. Permission granted to reproduce and redistribute on the
condition that the entire text is included without alteration or omission.
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