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- October 14, 1992
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- ALTERNATIVE 3
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- LESLIE WATKINS
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- FROM THE ANGLIA TELEVISION FILM
- ALTERNATIVE 3
- DEVISED BY DAVID AMBROSE AND
- CHRISTOPHER MILES
- WRITTEN BY DAVID AMBROSE
- DIRECTED BY CHRISTOPHER MILES
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- SPHERE BOOKS LIMITED
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- First published by
- Sphere Books Ltd. 1978
- 27 Wrights Lane, London W8 5TZ
- Original television script copyright by
- David Ambrose & Christopher Miles 1977
- Book version copyright Leslie Watkins 1978
- Reprinted 1979, 1980 (twice), 1987
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- This book is dedicated to Ann Clark, Robert Patterson and
- Brian Pendlebury - wherever they may be
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- This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not,
- by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or
- otherwise circulated without the publisher's prior consent in
- any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is
- published and without a similar condition including this
- condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser
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- Filmset in Photon Times
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- Printed and bound in Great Britain by
- Collins, Glasgow
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- STRANDS IN THE WEB...
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- The frighteningly erratic behaviour of the climate over the
- past few years...Unidentified Flying Object activity at an
- all-time peak...the continuing pollution and despoliation of
- planet Earth by overpopulation and industry...the mounting
- incidence of unexplained dissapearances of people in
- mysterious circumstances...horrendous new killing techniques
- including spontaneous combustion - used by government
- assassins against those who pose a threat to the security of
- an ultra-secret organization...terrifying advances in mind-
- control by agencies like the CIA and their use in creating a
- class of mindless human-robot slaves...astounding revelations
- of clandestine collaboration in space between the USA and the
- USSR over a period of decades...bizzare features observed on
- the Moon and Mars - but for some reason barely mentioned in
- the media...
-
- These and many other sinister features unearthed and examined
- by those investigating the horrific enigma of ALTERNATIVE 3
- are the strands in a web of conspiracy which could only exist
- in our age of terminal technology. Top journalist Leslie
- Watkins, making use of the research for the original TV
- expose - much of which was not incorporated into the
- programme itself for various reasons - and of material that
- has come to light subsequently, has written a book with the
- grip, pace and compulsion of a thriller. And with the grim
- bite of terrible truth - a truth which is sure to be denied
- by those who are themselves terrified that the most explosive
- secret in human history is about to blow up in their faces...
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- 3
- SECTION ONE
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- No newspaper has yet secured the truth behind the operation
- known as ALTERNATIVE 3. Investigations by journalists have
- been blocked - by governments on both sides of the Iron
- Curtain. America and Russia are ruthlessly obsessed with
- guarding their shared secret and this obsession, as we can
- now prove, has made them partners in murder.
-
- However, despite this intensive security, fragments of
- information have been made public. Often they are released
- inadvertently - by experts who do not appreciate their
- sinister significance - and these fragments, in isolation,
- mean little. But when jigsawed together they form a definite
- pattern - a pattern which appears to emphasise the enormity
- of this conspiracy of silence.
- On May 3, 1977, the Daily Mirror published this story:
-
- President Jimmy Carter has joined the ranks of UFO
- spotters. He sent in two written reports stating he had seen
- a flying saucer when he was the Governor of Georgia.
- The President has shrugged off the incident since then,
- perhaps fearing that electors might be wary of a flying
- saucer freak.
- But he was reported as saying after the "sighting":
- "I don't laugh at people any more when they say they've seen
- UFOs because I've seen one myself."
- Carter described his UFO like this: "Luminous, not
- solid, at first bluish, then reddish...it seemed to move
- towards us from a distance, stopped, then moved partially
- away."
-
- Carter filed two reports on the sighting in 1973, one to
- the International UFO Bureau and the other to the National
- Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena.
- Heydon Hewes, who directs the International UFO Bureau
- from his home in Oklahoma City, is making speeches praising
- the President's "open-mindedness."
- But during his presidential campaign last year Carter
- was cautious. He admitted he had seen a light in the sky but
- declined to call it a UFO.
- He joked: "I think it was a light beckoning me to run in
- the California primary election."
-
- Why this change in Carter's attitude? Because, by then,
- he had been briefed on Alternative 3?
- A 1966 Gallup Poll showed that five million Americans -
- including several highly experienced airline pilots - claimed
- to have seen Flying Saucers. Fighter pilot thomas Mantell
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-
- 4
- had already died while chasing one over Kentucky - his F.51
- aircraft having disintegrated in the violent wash of his
- quarry's engines. The U.S. Air Force, reluctantly bowing to
- mounting pressure, asked Dr. Edward Uhler Condon, a
- professor of astrophysics, to head an investigation team at
- Colorado University.
- Condon's budget was $500,000. Shortly before his report
- appeared in 1968, this story appeared in the London Evening
- Standard:
-
- The Condon study is making headlines - but for all the
- wrong reasons. It is losing some of its outstanding members,
- under circumstances which are mysterious to say the least.
- Sinister rumors are circulating...at least four key people
- have vanished from the Condon team without offering a
- satisfactory reason for their departure.
-
- The complete story behind the strange events in Colorado
- is hard to decipher. But a clue, at least, may be found in
- the recent statements of Dr. James McDonald, the senior
- physicist at the Institute of Atmospheric Physics at the
- University of Arizona and widely respected in his field.
- In a wary, but ominous, telephone conversation this week, Dr.
- McDonald told me that he is "most distressed."
-
-
- Condon's 1,485 - page report denied the existence of
- Flying Saucers and a panel of the American National Academy
- of Sciences endorsed the conclusion that "further extensive
- study probably cannot be justified."
- But, curiously, Condon's joint principal investigator,
- Dr. David Saunders, had not contributed a word to that
- report. And on January 11, 1969, the Daily Telegraph quoted
- Dr. Saunders as saying of the report: "It is inconceivable
- that it can be anything but a cold stew. No matter how long
- it is, what it includes, how it is said, or what it
- recommends, it will lack the essential element of
- credibility."
- Already there were wide-spread suspicions that the
- Condon investigation had been part of an official coverup,
- that the government knew the truth but was determined to keep
- it from the public. We now know that those suspicions were
- accurate. And that the secrecy was all because of
- Alternative 3.
- Only a few months after Dr. Saunders made his "cold
- stew" statement a journalist with the Columbus (Ohio)
- Dispatch embarrassed the National Aeronautics and Space
- Agency by photographing a strange craft - loooking exactly
- like a Flying Saucer - at the White Sands missle range in New
- Mexico.
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- At first no one at NASA would talk about this mysterious
- circular craft, 15 feet in diameter, which had been left in
- the "missile graveyard" - a section of the range where most
- experimental vehicles were eventually dumped.
- But the Martin Marietta company of Denver, where it was
- built, acknowledged designing several models, some with ten
- and twelve engines.
- And a NASA official, faced with this information, said:
- "Actually the engineers used to call it "The Flying Saucer."
- That confirmed a statement made by Dr. Garry Henderson, a
- leading space research scientist: "All our astronauts have
- seen these objects but have been ordered not to discuss their
- findings with anyone."
- Otto Binder was a member of the NASA space team. He has
- stated that NASA "killed" significant segments of
- conversation between Mission Control and Apollo 11 - the
- space-craft which took Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong to the
- Moon - and that those segments were deleted from the official
- record: "Certain sources with their own VHF receiving
- facilities that by-passed NASA broadcast outlets claim there
- was a portion of Earth-Moon dialogue that was quickly cut off
- by the NASA monitoring staff."
- Binder added: "It was presumably when the two moon-
- walkers, Aldrin and Armstrong, were making the rounds some
- distance from the LEM that Armstrong clutched Aldrin's arm
- excitedly and exclaimed - "What was it? What the hell was
- it? That's all I want to know."
- Then, according to Binder, there was this exchange -
-
- MISSION CONTROL: What's there ? ... malfunction
- (garble) ... Mission Control calling Apollo 11...
- APOLLO 11: Theses babies were huge, sir...enormous....
- ...Oh, God you wouldn't believe it!...I'm telling
- you there are other space-craft out there...lined
- up on the far side of the crater edge...they're on
- the Moon watching us...
-
- NASA, understandably, has never confirmed Binder's story
- but Buzz Aldrin was soon complaining bitterly about the
- Agency having used him as a "traveling salesman." And two
- years after his Moon mission, following reported bouts of
- heavy drinking, he was admitted to hospital with "emotional
- depression."
-
- "Travelling salesman".... that's an odd choice of words,
- isn't it? What, in Aldrin's view, were the NASA authorities
- trying to sell? And to whom? Could it be that they were
- using him, and others like him, to sell their official
- version of the truth to ordinary people right across the
- world?
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- Was Aldrin's Moon walk one of those great spectaculars,
- presented with maximum publicity, to justify the billions
- being poured into space research? Was it part of the
- American - Russian cover for Alternative 3?
- All men who have travelled to the Moon have given
- indications of knowing about Alternative 3 - and of the
- reasons which precipitated it.
- In May, 1972, James Irwin - officially the sixth man to
- walk on the Moon - resigned to become a Baptist missionary.
- And he said then: "The flight made me a deeper religious
- person and more keenly aware of the fragile nature of our
- planet."
- Edgar Mitchell, who landed on the Moon with the Apollo
- 14 mission in February, 1971, also resigned in May, 1972 - to
- devote himself to parapsychology. Later, at the headquarters
- of his Institute for Noetic Sciences near San Francisco, he
- described looking at this world from the Moon: "I went into
- a very deep pathos, a kind of anguish. That incredibly
- beautiful planet that was Earth...a place no bigger than my
- thumb was my home...a blue and white jewel against a velvet
- black sky...was being killed off.: And on March 23, 1974, he
- was quoted in the Daily Express as saying that society had
- only three ways in which to go and that the third was "the
- most viable but most difficult alternative."
- Another of the Apollo Moon - walkers, Bob Grodin, was
- equally specific when interviewed by the Sceptre Television
- reporter on June 20, 1977: "You think they need all that
- crap down in Florida just to put two guys up there on a...on
- a bicycle? The hell they do! You know why they need us? So
- they've got a P.R. story for all that hardware they've been
- firing into space. We're nothing, man! Nothing!"
- On July 11, 1977, the Los Angeles Times came near to the
- heart of the matter - nearer than any other newspaper - when
- it published a remarkable interview with Dr. Gerard O'Neill.
- Dr. O'Neill is a Princeton professor who served, during a
- 1976 sabbatical, as Professor of Aerospace at the
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology and who gets nearly
- $500,000 each year in research grants from NASA. Here is a
- section from that article:
-
- The United Nations, he says, has conservatively
- estimated that the world's population, now more than 4
- billion people, will grow to about 6.5 billion by the year
- 2000. Today, he adds, about 30% of the worlds population is
- in developed nations. But, because most of the projected
- population growth will be in underdeveloped countries, that
- will drop to 22% by the end of the century. The world of
- 2000 will be poorer and hungrier than the world today, he
- says.
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- Dr. O'Neill also explained the problems caused by the
- earths 4,000 mile atmospheric layer but - presumably because
- the article was a comparatively short one - he was not quoted
- on the additional threat posed by the notorious "greenhouse"
- syndrom.
- His solution? He called it Island 3. And he added:
- "There's really no debate about the technology involved in
- doing it. That's been confirmed by NASA's top people."
- But Dr. O'Neill, a family man with tree children who
- likes to fly sailplanes in his spare time, did not realise
- that he was slightly off-target. He was right, of course,
- about the technology. But he knew nothing of the political
- ramifications and he would have been astounded to learn that
- NASA was feeding his research to the russians.
- Even eminent political specialists, as respected in
- their sphere as Dr. O'Neill is in his own, have been puzzled
- by an undercurrent they have detected in East -West
- relationships. Professor G. Gordin Broadbent, director of
- the independently - financed Institute of Political Studies
- in London and author of a major study of U.S. - Soviet
- diplocy since the 1950s, emphasised that fact on June 20,
- 1977, when he was interviewed on Sceptre Television: "On the
- broader issue of Soviet - U.S. relations, I must admit there
- is an element of mystery which troubles many people in my
- field." He Added: "What we're suggesting is that, at the
- very highest levels of East - West diplomacy, there has been
- operating a factor of which we know nothing. Now it could
- just be - and I stress the word "could" - that this unknown
- factor is some kind of massive but covert operation in space.
- But as for the reasons behind it...we are not in the business
- of speculation."
- Washington's acute discomfort over O'Neill's revelations
- through the Los Angeles Times can be assessed by the urgency
- with which a "suppression" Bill was rushed to the Statute
- Book. On July 27,1977 - only sixteen days after the
- publication of the O'Neill interview - columnist Jerry
- Campbell reported in the London Evening Standard that the
- Bill would become law that September. He wrote:
-
- It prohibits the publishing of an official report
- without permission, arguing that this obstructs the
- Government's control of its own information. That was
- precisely the charge brought against Daniel Ellsberg for
- giving the Pentagon papers to the New York Times.
- Most ominous of all, the Bill would make it a crime for
- any present or former civil servant to tell the Press of
- Government wrong - doing or pass on any news based on
- information "submitted to the Government in private."
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- Campbell pointed out that this final clause "has given
- serious pain to guardians of American Press freedom because
- it creates a brand new crime." Particularly as there was
- provision in the Bill for offending journalists to be sent to
- prison for up to six years.
- We subsequently discovered that a man called Harman
- -Leonard Harman - read that item in the newspaper and that
- later, in a certzin television executives' dining-room , he
- expressed regret that a similar Law had not been passed uears
- earlier by the British government. He was eating treacle
- tart with custard at the time and he reflected wistfully that
- he could then have insisted on such a Law being obeyed.
- That, when it came to Alternative 3, would have saved him
- from a great deal of trouble...
- He had chosen treacle tart, not because he particularly
- liked it, but because it was 2p cheaper than the chocolate
- sponge. That was typical of Harman.
- He was one of the people, as you may have learned
- already through the Press, who tried to interfere with the
- publication of this book. We will later be presenting some
- of the letters received by us from him and his lawyers -
- together with the replies from our legal advisers. We
- decided to print these letters in order to give you a
- thorough insight into our investigation for it is important
- to stress that we, like Professor Broadbent, are not in the
- "business of speculation."
- We are interested only in the facts. And it is
- intriguing to note the pattern of facts relating to
- astronaust who have been on Moon missions - and who have
- therefore been exposed to some of the surprises presented by
- Alternative 3. A number, undermined by the strain of being
- party to such a horrendous secret, suffered nervous or mental
- collapses. A high percentage sought sanctuary in excessive
- drinking or in extra marital affairs which destroyed what had
- been secure and successful marriages. Yet these were men
- originally picked from many thousands precisely because of
- their stability. Their training and experience, intelligence
- and physical fitness - all these, of course, were prime
- considerations in their selection. But the supremely
- important quality was their balanced temperament.
- It would need something stupendous, something almost
- unimaginable to most people, to flip such men into dramatic
- personality changes. That something, we have now estalished,
- was Alternative 3 and, perhaps more particularly, the
- nightmarish obscenities involved in the development and
- perfection of Alternative 3.
- We are not suggesting that the President of the United
- States has had personal knowledge of the terror and clinical
- cruelties which have been an integral part of the Operation,
- for that would make him directly responsible for murders and
- barbarous mutilations.
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- We are convinced , in fact, that this is not the case.
- The President and the Russian leader, together with their
- immediate subordinates, have been concerned only with the
- broad sweep of policy. They have acted in unison to ensure
- what they consider to be the best possible future for
- mankind. And the day - to - day details have been delegated
- to high-level professionals.
- These professionals, we have now established, have been
- classifying people selected for the Alternative 3 operation
- into two categories: those who are picked as individuals and
- those who merely form part of a "batch consignment." There
- have been several "batch consignments" and it is the
- treatment meted out to most of these men and women which
- provides the greatest cause for outrage.
- No matter how desperate the circumstances may be - and
- we reluctantly recognise that they are extremely desperate -
- no humane society could tolerate what has been done to the
- innocent and the gullible. That view, fortunately, was taken
- by one man who was recruited into the Alternative 3 team
- three years ago. He was, at first, highly enthusiastic and
- completely dedicated to the Operation. However, he became
- revolted by some of the atrocities involved. He did not
- consider that, even in the prevailing circumstances, they
- could be justified.
- Three days after the transmission of that sensational
- television documentary, his conscience finally goaded him
- into action. He knew the appalling risk he was taking, for
- he was aware of what had happened to others who had betrayed
- the secrets of Alternative 3, but he made telephone contact
- with television reporter Colin Benson - and offered to
- provide Benson with evidence of the most astounding nature.
- He was calling, he said, from abroad but he was prepared
- to travel to London. They met two days later. And he
- explained to Benson that copies of most orders and memoranda,
- together with transcripts prepared from tapes of Policy
- Committee meetings, were filed in triplicate -in Washington,
- Moscow and Geneva where Alternative 3 had its operational
- headquarters. The system had been instituted to ensure there
- was no misunderstanding between the principal partners. He
- occasionally had access to some of that material - although
- it was often weeks or even months old before he saw it - and
- he was willing to supply what he could to Benson. He wanted
- no money. He merely wanted to alert the public, to help stop
- the mass atrocities.
- Benson's immediate reaction, after he had assessed the
- value of this offer, was that Scepter should mount a follow -
- up program - one which would expose the horrors of
- Alternative 3 in far greater depth. He argued bitterly with
- his superiors at Sceptre but they were adamant. The company
- was already in serious trouble with the government and there
- was some doubt about whether its license would be renewed.
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- They refused to consider the possibility of doing another
- programme. They had officially disclaimed the Alternative 3
- documentary as a hoax and that was where the matter had to
- rest. Anyway, they pointed out, this character who'd come
- forward was probably a nut...
- If you saw the documentary, you will probably realise
- that Benson is a stubborn man. His friends say he is pig-
- obstinate. They also say he is a first-class investigative
- journalist.
- He was angry about this attempt to suppress the truth
- and that is why he agreed to co-operate in the preparation of
- this book. That co-operation has been invaluable.
- Through Benson we met the telephone caller who we now
- refer to as Trojan. And that meeting resulted in our
- acquiring documents, which we will be presenting, including
- transcripts of tapes made at the most secret rendezvous in
- the world - thirty five fathoms beneath the ice cap of the
- Arctic.
- For obvious reasons, we cannot reveal the identity of
- Trojan. Nor can we give any hint about his function or
- status in the operation. We are completely satisfied,
- however, that his credentials are authentic and that, in
- breaking his oath of silence, he is prompted by the most
- honourable of motives. He stands in relation to the
- Alternative 3 conspiracy in much the same position as the
- anonymous informant "deep Throat" occupied in the Watergate
- affair.
- Most of the "batch consignments' have been taken from
- the area known as the Bermuda Triangle but numerous other
- locations have also been used. On October 6, 1975, the Daily
- Telegraph gave prominence to this story:
-
- The disappearance in bizarre circumstances in
- the past two weeks of 20 people from small coastal
- communities in Oregon was being intensively
- investigated at the weekend amid reports of an
- imaginative fraud scheme involving a "flying
- saucer" and hints mass murder.
- Sheriff's officers at Newport, Oregon, said
- that the 20 individuals had vanished without trace
- after being told to give away all their
- possessions, including their children, so that they
- could be transported in a flying saucer "by UFO to
- a better life".
-
- Deputies under Mr. Ron Sutton, chief criminal
- investigator in surrounding Lincoln County, have traced the
- story back to a meeting on September 14 in a resort hotel,
- the Bayshore Inn at Waldport, Oregon.
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- Local police have received conflicting reports as to
- what occurred (at the meeting). But while it is clear that
- the speaker did not pretend to be from outer space, he told
- the audience how their souls could be "saved through a UFO".
- The hall had been reserved for a fee of $5 by a man and
- a woman who gave false names. Mr. Sutton said witnesses had
- described them as "fortyish, well groomed, straight types".
-
- The Telegraph said that "selected people would be
- prepared at a special camp in Colorado for life on another
- planet" and quoted Investigator Sutton as adding:
-
- "They were told they would have to give away
- everything, even their children. I'm checking a report
- of one family who supposedly gave away a 150-acre farm
- and three children.
- "We don't know if it's a fraud or whether these
- people migt be killed. There are all sorts of rumours,
- including some about human sacrifice and that this is
- sponsored by the (Charles) Manson family."
-
-
- Most of the missing 20 were described as being "hippy
- types" although there were some older people among them.
- People of this calibre, we have now discovered, have been
- what is known as "scientifically adjusted" to fit them for a
- new role as a slave species.
- There have been equally strange reports of animals -
- particularly farm animals - disappearing in large numbers.
- And occasionally it appears that aspects of the Alternative 3
- operation have been bungled, that attempts to lift "batch
- consignments" of humans or of animals have failed.
-
- On July 15, 1977, the Daily Mail - under a "Flying
- Saucer" headline - carried this story:
-
- Men in face masks, using metal detectors and a
- geiger counter, yesterday scoured a remote Dartmoor
- valley in a bid to solve a macabre mystery.
- All appeared to have died at about the same time,
- and many of the bones have been inexplicably shattered.
- To add to the riddle, their bodies decomposed to virtual
- skeletons within only 48 hours.
- Animal experts confess they are baffled by the
- deaths at Cherry Brook Valley near Postbridge.
- Yesterday's search was carried out by members of
- the Devon Unidentified Flying Objects center at Torquay
- who are trying to prove a link with outer space.
- They believe that flying saucers may have flown low
- over the area and created a vortex which hurled the
- ponies to their death.
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-
- 12
- Mr. John wyse, head of the four-man team, said: "If
- a spacecraft has been in the vicinity, there may still
- be detectable evidence. We wanted to see if there was
- any sign that the ponies had been shot but we have found
- nothing. This incident bears an uncanny resemblance to
- similar events reported in America."
-
-
- The Mail report concluded with a statement from an
- official representing The Dartmoor Livestock Protection
- Society and the Animal Defence Society: "Whatever happened
- was violent. We are keeping an open mind. I am fascinated
- by the UFO theory. There is no reason to reject that
- possibility since there is no other rational explanation."
- These, then, were typical of the threads which inspired
- the original television investigation. It needed one person,
- however, to show how they could be embroidered into a clear
- picture.
- Without the specialist guidance of that person the
- Sceptre television documentary could never have been produced
- - and Trojan would never have contacted Colin Benson. And it
- would have been years, possibly seven years or even longer,
- before ordinary peaple started to suspect the devastating
- truth about this planet on which we live.
- That person, of course, is the old man....
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- 13
- SECTION TWO
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- They realise now that they should have killed the old
- man. That would have been the logical course - to protect
- the secrecy of Alternative 3.
- It is curious, really, that they did not agree his death
- on that Thursday in February for, as we have stated, they do
- use murder. Of course, it is not called murder - not when it
- is done jointly by the governments of America and Russia. It
- is an Act of Expediency.
- Many Acts of Expediency are believed to have been
- ordered by the sixteen men, official representatives of the
- Pentagon and the Kremlin, who comprise the Policy Committee.
- Grotesque and apparently inexplicable slayings in various
- parts of the world - in Germany and Japan, Britain and
- Australis - are alleged to have been sanctioned by them.
- We have not been able to substantiate these suspicions
- and allegations so we merely record that an unknown number of
- people - including distinguished radio astronomer Sir William
- Ballantine - have been executed because of this astonishing
- agreement between the super-powers.
- Prominent politicians, including two in Britain, were
- among those who tried to prevent the publication of this
- book. They insisted that it is not necessary for you, and
- others like you, to be told the unpalatable facts. They
- argue that the events of the future are now inevitable, that
- there is nothing to be gained by prematurely unleashing fear.
- We concede that they are sincere in their views but we
- maintain that you ought to know. You have a right to know.
- Attempts were also made to neuter the television
- programme which first focused public attention on Alternative
- 3. Those attempts were partially successful. And, of
- course, after the programme was transmitted - when there was
- that spontaneous explosion of anxiety - Sceptre Television
- was forced to issue a formal denial. It had all been a hoax.
- That's what they were told to say. That's what they did say.
- Most people were then only too glad to be reassured.
- They wanted to be convinced that the programme had been
- devised as a joke, that it was merely an elaborate piece of
- escapist entertainment. It was more comfortable that way.
- In fact, the television researchers did uncover far more
- disturbing material than they were allowed to transmit. The
- censored information is now in our possession. And, as we
- have indicated, there was a great deal that Benson and the
- rest of the television team did not discover - not until it
- been screened.And they did not know, for example, that Sir
- William Ballantine's freakish death - not far from his base
- at
-
-
-
- 14
- Jodrell Bank - was mirrored by that of an aerospace professor
- called Peterson near Stanford University at Palo Alt,
- California. Nor did they know of the monthly conferences
- beneath the ice of the Arctic.
- Alternative 3 appears a preposterous conception -until
- one analyses the history of the so-called space-race. Right
- from the start the public have been allowed to know only what
- is considered appropriate for them to know. Many futuristic
- research developments - and the extent of information pooled
- between East and Weat -have been kept strictly classified.
- There was a small but typical example in 1951 when
- living creatures were hurtled into the stratosphere for the
- very first time. Or, at least, the public were eventually
- told it was for the first time. Four monkeys - code-named
- Albert 1,2,3 and 4 - were launched in a V2 rocket from White
- Sands, New Mexico.
- Remember White Sands? That's where the Columbus
- Dispatch man photographed that strange craft - the one which
- a NASA official grudgingly admitted was known as "The Flying
- Saucer".
- The monkeys were successfully brought back to earth.
- Three survived. One died, shortly afterwards, of heat
- prostration.
- Much later, when news did leak out, it was explained
- that Operation Albert had been kept secret for only one
- reason - to avert any possibility of animal-lovers staging a
- protest demonstration.
- Most people accepted the official story - that the four
- Alberts really had been this world's first travellers in
- space. But was that the truth?
- By 1951 the V2 rocket, a relic of World War II, had been
- superseded by far more sophisticated missiles. So would it
- be logical, or indeed practical, to use an obsolete vehicle
- for the first launch of living creatures?
- Is it not more feasible to argue that Operation Albert
- was no more that a subsidiary experiment which happened to
- slip through the security net? That the authorities were not
- too perturbed about having to confirm it - because it helped
- conceal the real and gigantic truth?
- There is abundant evidence that by 1951 the super powers
- were far more advanced in space technology than they have
- ever admitted. Much of that evidence has been supplied by
- experienced pilots. By men like Captain Laurence W.
- Vinther...
- At 8:30 p.m. on January 20, 1951, Captain Vinther -then
- with Mid-Continent Airlines - was ordered by the controller
- at Sious City Airport to investigate a "very bright light"
- above the field.
- He and his co-pilot, James F. Bachmeier, took off in a
- DC3 and headed for the source of the light.
-
-
-
- 15
- Suddenly the light dived towards them at great speed and
- passed about 200 feet above them. Then they discovered that
- it had reversed direction, apparently in a split second, and
- was flying parallel to the airliner. It was a clear moonlit
- night and both men could clearly see that the light was
- emanating from a cigar-shaped object bigger than a B-29.
- Eventually the strange craft lost altitude, passed under the
- DC3 and disappeared.
- Two months later, on March 15, thousands of people in
- New Delhi were startled by a strange object, high in the sky,
- which appeared to be circling the city. One witness was
- George Franklin Floate, chief engineer with the Delhi Flying
- Club, who described "a bullet-nosed, cigar-shaped object
- about 100 feet long with a ring of flames at the end". Two
- Indian Air Force jets were sent up to intercept. But the
- object suddenly surged upwards at a "phenomenal speeds' and
- vanished into the hieghts.
- So, despite all official denials, sufficient advances
- had been made by 1951 to provide the basis for planning
- Alternative 3.
- By the mid-Seventies there were so many rumours about
- covert information-swapping between East and West - with men
- like Professor Broadbent becoming progressively more curious
- - that the American-Russian "rivals" staged a masterpiece of
- camouflage. They would show the world, quite openly, how
- they were prepared to co-operate in space! The result was
- seen in July, 1975: the first admitted International Space
- Transfer. Television cameras showed the docking of a Soyuz
- spacecraft with and Apollo - and the crews jubilantly
- exchanging food and symbolic halves of medals.
- Leonid Brezhnev sent this message to the united
- spacemen: "Your successful docking confirms the correctness
- of technical solutions that were worked out and realised in
- co-operation by Soviet and American scientists, designers and
- cosmonauts. One can say that Soyuz-Apollo is a prototype of
- future international orbiltal stations."
- Gerald Ford expressed the hope that this "tremendous
- demonstration of co-operation" would set the pattern for
- "what we have to do in the future to make it a better world".
- And at his home near Boston, Massachusetts, former Apollo man
- Bob Grodin switched off his television set in disgust.
- Grodin's comment was more succinct than that of either
- leader. He said: "How they've got the bloody neck!" Then
- he poured himself another tumbler of bourbon.
- Grodin had cause to be bitter that day. Bitter and also
- cynically amused. There'd been no television coverage, no
- glory of any sort, when he'd done the identical maneuver -140
- miles above the clouds - on April 20, 1969. He's shaken
- hands up there with the Russians and laughed at their bad
- jokes - exactly like Tom Stafford had just been doing - but
- there'd been none of this celebrity crap about that
- operation.
-
- 16
- It was crazy...the way they were kidding people by making it
- all seem such a big deal! Christ! It hadn't been a big deal
- even when he'd done it. There'd been all the others before
- him...
- We now know,in fact, that this American-Russian docking
- technique was successfully pioneered in the late Fifties -
- with specially-designed submarines in the black depths of the
- North Atlantic. It was pioneered specifically because of
- Alternative 3. Because of the need for the ultimate in
- security. The system made it possible for men who were
- officially enemies, who played the charade of distrusting
- each other in public, to travel separately and discreetly to
- meetings far below the waves.
-
-
- Thursday, February 3, 1977. A landmark. A Policy
- Committee meeting infiltrated, via the transcript, for the
- first time by Trojan. Information about earlier meetings,
- held in a variety of locations, still not available.
- Complete transcript obviously filed in separately-secured
- sections. Sensible precaution. And frustrating. Trojan
- obtained only small section. Enough to confirm murder
- conspiracy. Major break-through.
- The venue: the wardroom of a modified Permit nuclear
- submarine. Thirty-five fathoms beneath ice of Arctic.
- Permit subs "seek out and destroy enemy". So American tax-
- payers are told. Cold War concepts are readily accepted.
- They distract from real truth...
- No names on transcript. No names, apparently, ever
- used. Only nationalities and numbers. Eight Russians -
- listed as R ONE through to R EIGHT - and eight Americans.
- Procedure shown by subsequent transcripts - A EIGHT and
- R EIGHT alternate monthly as chairmen.
- February 3. Chairman: A EIGHT. Transcript section
- starts:
-
- A FIVE: You're kill-crazy...you know that?...
- absolutely kill-crazy...
- A TWO: No...the guys right...that old man is
- dangerous...
- R SIX: I am reminding you that it was agreed...right
- from the start it was agreed...that expediencies would
- be kept to a minimum...
- A TWO: And the old man, friend, is right there inside
- that minimum...the way he talks...he'll blow the whole
- goddam thing...
- R ONE: Who do you suppose ever listens to him? Eh?...
- nobody...that's who listens. Come...he knows
- nothing...not after all these years.
- Theories...that's all he's got...theories and
- memories...
-
-
- 17
- A FIVE: That just says it, dosen't it? Here we are
- wasting time and wetting ourselves because of
- theories that are twenty years old...Jeez!...if we
- start spreading expediencies so low because...
- R FOUR: The theories have not changed so much in twenty
- years and in my considered opinion...
- A FIVE: ...so low because of a semi-senile and
- garrulous old man...
- A EIGHT: He's not semi-senile...he's not even that old
- ...I heard him lecture last year at Cambridge and,
- you take my word, he's certainly not semi-senile...
- What,precisely, has he been saying?
- A TWO: About getting air out of the soil..about how
- the ice is melting...people at that university...
- they're beginning to listen to him...
- A FIVE: That's no more, for Chrissakes, than he was
- saying in Alabama back in 1957...hell, I was right
- there at Huntsville when he said it...
- R FOUR: The Huntsville Conference was like this
- meeting...the discussions there were not for
- outsiders and...
- A FIVE: Yes...but not many people took him seriously
- even then...and now that he"s over the hill...
- R FOUR: It is still a serious breach of security...
- it is dangerous and it could start a panic among
- the masses...
- A FIVE: So all right!...Kill him! He's a harmless
- and doddering old has-been but if it makes you
- feel better...go ahead and kill him...
- A EIGHT: Expediencies aren"t to make us feel better...
- and our friend here was right...we have agreed to
- restrict them to the minimum...anything else against
- this man?
- A TWO: Yeah...the real bad news...I hear he"s been
- dropping hints...nothing specific but oblique hints
- about the big bang...about the earth-air thing
- being cracked
- R SIX: But it is not possible for him to be knowing
- that...
- A TWO: Mabey he doesn"t know...not know for sure...
- but he's sure done some figuring
- A ONE: You're saying he"s guessed...right? That's what
- you"re saying
- R ONE: So it is as I said...theories and memories and
- now guesses! We sentence an old man to death because
- of his guesses? That is how you Americans wish us to
- work?
- A EIGHT: Let's cut the East-West stuff...we're a team
- here, remember, and we've got a hell of an agenda to
- get through and we've spent quite long enough on this
- Englishman. So let's vote...Those for expediency?
-
-
- 18
- Uh,huh...And against?...Well, that's it...he goes
- on living. For a while, at least. But I suggest we
- keep tabs...agreed?...Right then...Now Ballantine
- and this character Harry Carmell...looks to me like
- there's no room for question about either of them.
- R SEVEN: This Harry Carmell...we are certain that he
- has stolen that circuit from NASA?
- A EIGHT: Positive certain. And heads, I can promise you
- have rolled at Huston. We also know that he's
- somewhere in England...probably London...so if he
- should link up again with Ballantine...
- R SEVEN: I think we are all aware of what could happen
- if he should link up again with Ballantine...
- A TWO: Especially with Ballantine's contacts in Fleet
- Street...
- R SEVEN: How was it possible for a man like Carmell to
- get out of America...?
- A EIGHT: Don't tell me...I can say it for you...he'd
- never have got out of Russia that easily...but there
- it is...our people goofed and now it's down to us...
- R SEVEN: As you say then, there is no room for
- question...both of them have got to be expediencies.
- A EIGHT: All agreed?...Good...I suggest a couple of hot
- jobs...coroners always play them quiet...
- R SEVEN: But first, presumably, we'll have to find
- Carmell...
- A EIGHT: We'll find him...Londons not that big a town
- and he'll soon be needing his shots.
- A THREE: How hooked is he?
- A EIGHT: Hooked enough...Now what about Peterson? Same
- deal?
- R FOUR: We've all seen the earlier report on Peterson..
- what is the latest assessment?
- A EIGHT: He's getting more and more paranoiac about
- the batch consignments...
- R FOUR: You mean the scientific adjustments?
- A EIGHT: Yeah...the scientific adjustments...he's
- running off at the mouth about ethics...that sort of
- crap...
- A TWO: Ethics! What the hell do some of these guys
- think we're all at? Jesus! We're smack in the middle
- of the most vital exercise ever mounted...with the
- survival of the whole human race swinging on it...
- and they bleat about ethics...
- A EIGHT: That surgery bit...it really got to him...
- A FIVE: They should never have told him...he didn't
- need to know that...look, we owe Peterson...he's
- done good work...couldn't we just get him committed?
- A TWO: No way...much too risky...he'd squeal his
- bloody head off.
-
-
-
- 19
- A EIGHT: I endorse that. I'm sorry because I like the
- guy...but there's no choice. Anyone against an
- expediency for Peterson?...okay...that's carried...
- now for God's sake let's get down to the big
- problem...this stepping-up of the supplies-shuttle.
- Any word from Geneva?
-
-
- That was where the transcript section ended. Three
- murders, quite clearly, had been agreed. No matter what they
- chose to call them, they were still talking about murder.
- But scientific adjustments? A great deal had already been
- published in the Western Press about strange experiments
- being conducted on inmates - chiefly dissidents and political
- prisoners - at the Dnepropetrovsk Mental Hospital in the
- Ukraine. They were barbaric, these experiments, but they had
- been known about and talked about for years. To push this
- Peterson to such agony of mind - to push him into risking and
- forfeiting his life - that surely had to be something new.
- Trojan, by that time, had supplied us with information
- about that "something new" - for it was precisely that
- something which had decided him to make his dangerous break
- and talk to Benson. But he had nothing in writing. Nothing
- to document or substantiate his claims. We decided they were
- worth investigating but that it would be irresponsible merely
- to assume their accuracy.
- We sought help from contacts in Washington. Contacts
- with influence in Senate and Congressional committees. And
- we were surprised by the speed with which those contacts
- achieved results. They didn't manage to bring the full story
- into the open, not at that stage, but they did make it
- possible for the public to see a glimmering of the truth.
- On August 3, 1977, The London Evening News carried this
- story:
-
- Human "guinea pigs" have been used by the CIA in
- experiments to control behaviour and sexual activity.
- The American intelligence agency also considered
- hiring a magician for another secret program on
- mind control.
- The experiments over the past 20 years are revealed
- in documents which were thought to have been destroyed,
- but which have now been released after pressure from
- United States senate and congressional committees.
- The attempts to change sex patterns and other behaviour
- involved using drugs on schizophrenic as well as
- normal people. Hallucinatory drugs like LSD were used
- on students.
- Another heavily censored document shows that a top
- magician was considered for work on mind control.
-
-
-
- 20
- The give-away word was "prestidigitation" - sleight of
- hand - which appeared in a 1953 memo written by Sidney
- Gottlier, then chief of the CIA's chemical division.
-
-
- That story, we are convinced, would never have appeared
- if it had not been for the information supplied by
- Trojan. The "guinea-pig" facts would have remained as secret
- as the rest of the Alternative 3 operation.
- The following day - August 4 - other newspapers
- developed the story. Ann Morrow, filing from Washington,
- wrote in the Daily Telegraph:
-
- Some of the more chilling details of the way the
- Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) tried to control
- individual behavior by using drugs on willing and
- unwilling human "guinea pigs" were disclosed
- yesterday by its director, Mr. Stansfield Turner.
- In a large wood-pannelled room, Mr. Turner, who
- likes to be known by his rank of Admiral, told the
- Senate's Intelligence Committee and Human Resources
- Sub-committee on Health that such tests were abhorrent
- to him.
- He admitted that the tests were carried out in
- "safe houses" in San Francisco and New York where
- unwitting sexual psychopaths were subjected to
- experiments and attempts were made to change sexual
- conduct and other forms of human behavior.
- At least 185 private scientists and 80 research
- institutions, including universities, were involved.
-
- Mr. Turner went on to say that one man had killed
- himself - by leaping from an hotel window in New York City -
- after he had "unknowingly " been used in a "CIA - sponsored
- experiment:. The report continued:
-
- Senator Edward Kennedy asked some incisive
- questions, but like other members of the Senate
- Committee found it difficult to keep a straight face
- when asking about the CIA's operations "Midnight" and
- "Climax".
- Questioning two former CIA employees about the
- experiments which began in the 1950s and ended in
- 1973, Senator Kennedy read out a bizarre list of
- accessories for the "safe houses" in San Francisco and
- New York where prostitutes organized.
- In his flat Bostonian accent he reeled off,
- straight - faced: "Rather elaborate dressing table,
- black velveteen skirt, one French Can - Can dancer's
- picture, three Toulouse Lautrec etchings, two - way
-
-
-
- 21
- mirrors and recording equipment." Then he admitted
- that this was the lighter side of the operation.
- Mr. John Gittinger, who was with the CIA for 26
- years, trembled and put a handkerchief to his eyes.
- He just nodded in agreement.
-
-
- The Times, as you can check for yourself in any good
- reference library, carried a similar story from Washington
- that day. It described documents taken from CIA files and
- added:
-
- Batches of the documents have been made
- available to reporters in Washington under the
- Freedom of Information Act, which guarantees the
- public access to Government papers. They are
- nearly all heavily censored.
-
-
- That's the give - away - there in that last line.
- Nearly all heavily censored. Alternative 3, right from its
- conception in the Fifties, has always been considered exempt
- from the Freedom of Information Act. And it is no
- coincidence that these controversial experiments also started
- - as is now openly admitted - in the Fifties.
- The editors of these newspapers had no way of knowing
- that their stories, disturbing as they were, had a direct
- connection with Alternative 3. Nor that they had secured
- only a fraction of the truth about those CIA experiments.
- Information obtained from the complete experiments was
- pooled with that gained at the Dnepropetrovsk Mental
- Hospital. It was pooled so that factory - production methods
- could be developed to manufacture a slave species.
- Remember that curious statement made by criminal
- investigator Ron Sutton in October, 1975 - after the
- disappearance of the "batch consignment" from Oregon?
- "They were told they would have to give away everything,
- even their children. I'm checking a report of one family
- who supposedly gave away a 150 - acre farm and three
- children." That's what he said. And now those words fit
- into perspective.
- In the days before the American Civil War slaves had no
- right to a family, no right to keep their own children, and
- they had no property. They WERE property. That horrifying
- philosophy, we can now prove, has been adopted by the space
- slave - masters of the Seventies.
- Alternative 3 needs regular consignments of slaves. It
- needs them to labour for the key people. For people like Dr.
- Ann Clark.
-
-
-
-
- 22
- Three people unwittingly inspired that television
- documentary and, although they would be dismayed to realize
- it, they helped alert the world to the horrors of Alternative
- 3.
- Dr. Ann Clark is a research scientist specializing in
- solar energy. Brian Pendlebury, a former RAF man, is an
- electronics expert. Robert Patterson is a senior lecturer in
- mathematics - or, rather, he was until the time of his
- disappearance. Today, almost certainly, Patterson no longer
- teaches mathematics but is working full - time for
- Alternative 3.
- So these people, then, were the catalyst for the entire
- investigation. That is why, although we have never met them,
- we have dedicated this book to them.
- Ann Clark, a raven - haired and attractive woman who was
- just nudging thirty, made her big decision towards the end of
- 1975. She would never have made it - although her pride
- stopped her admitting as much on television - if her fiance'
- had not unexpectedly broken their engagement.
- Her future had seemed all set. She'd intended to
- soldier on despite all the frustrations, at the research
- laboratory in Norwich until they got married. And then,
- probably, until their first child was born. Conditions at
- the laboratory were, as she'd often said, "pretty grotty" but
- she was prepared to tolerate them. After all, it wasn't
- going to be for too long...
- Then Malcolm had shattered her with his news. He'd been
- astonishingly casual about it. Quite unlike the Malcolm
- she'd thought she'd known. He'd just told her, brutally,
- that their engagement was a mistake, that he didn't "want to
- get tied down." And then, only four weeks later, she's heard
- he was talking about marrying some girl called Maureen...
- Suddenly the laboratory, and everything about it, had
- seemed intolerably depressing. Squalid and almost sordid.
- All the authorities admitted that their research was
- important. Particularly with the energy shortage and the
- climbing cost of oil. But apparently it wasn't important
- enough to have money poured into it.
- Experimental projects often took three times as long as
- they should because of equipment which was makeshift and, in
- some cases, almost obsolete. Certain projects could not even
- be started. "Maybe in the next financial year but, at the
- moment, there's no budget available." That was a stock
- answer from the administrators. And Ann Clark became
- progressively more frustrated.
- She wanted, now, to throw herself harder than ever into
- her research, to immerse herself in it completely, but she
- was increasingly aware that - like the others - she was not
- being allowed to make full use of her training. She's never
- have felt so strongly if it hadn't been for Malcolm and his
- plan for marrying this Maureen...that's what really decided
- her to start a new life.
-
- 23
- Plenty of others were doing the same that year. They
- were getting out of Britain, heading for the big - money jobs
- in Europe and in the Middle East. And in America. They were
- doubling their salaries and picking up bonus perks like
- company cars and lavish homes. They were also being offered
- far better conditions in which to work.
- The Brain Drain. That's what it's called. And it is an
- accurate label. In the twelve years up to December, 1975 -
- the month Ann Clark reached her decision - nearly 4 million
- people had evacuated from the United Kingdom. More than a
- third of them were from the professional and managerial
- levels of British society.
- One of the department heads at Norwich had left for
- a top post in America at the beginning of that year and, as
- his occasional letters had shown, he had not regretted the
- move. His only regret, in fact, was that he'd not made it
- years earlier. Ann Clark decided to write to him.
- To her amazement, he telephoned her from California as
- soon as he got the letter. There'd be no problem at all, he
- told her. Not with her ability and experience. She was
- exactly the type they needed and, if she wanted, he could
- certainly get her fixed with the right job.
- If she wanted! She'd never imagined it could possibly
- be that easy. Excitement surged through her as she listened.
- Apparently there was a man in London who was recruiting
- scientists for the company in California and if she cared to
- contact this man...
- She jotted down the name and address of the man in
- London, together with his telephone number. "I'll get in
- touch with him today," she said. I can't tell you how
- grateful...
- "Let me call him first," he interrupted. "I'll put him
- in the picture about you."
- "Thank you," she said. "Thank you very much indeed."
- She met the man in London the following day and it was
- all settled within an hour. She drafted her resignation on
- the train back to Norwich.
- That was the week, as we will explain later, that she
- was first contacted by Sceptre Television. And, at first,
- she was more than happy to talk to them about her plans. She
- didn't mention Malcolm, of course, because the viewers didn't
- need to know about him. However, it was important, she felt,
- for people to be told exactly why scientists were flocking
- away from Britain. She was flattered, in fact, to be given
- the opportunity and she told herself that, by speaking out,
- she might help get conditions improved for those she was
- leaving...
- Now we reach a mystery which we still have not
- completely resolved. The information we have fitted together
- has come from Ann Clark's friends and colleagues in Norwich.
- It almost provides an answer...but it also leaves questions.
-
-
- 24
- Shortly after the Sceptre Television film unit arrived
- at the laboratory in January, 1976, for the first of a series
- of interviews - Ann Clark was visited there by a strange
- American. He'd made no appointment but just turned up and
- they assumed he was connected, in some way, with her new job.
- The American talked to her, privately, for a long time and
- afterwards she seemed upset. She refused to say what he'd
- wanted or what they'd discussed but she was obviously
- extremely upset.
- That American, we have now established, went to her flat
- that evening and stayed for three hours` And after that
- evening her attitude to those around her, and to the Sceptre
- Television people, changed in the most extraordinary manner.
- She did her work as conscientiously as ever but she was oddly
- withdrawn. She refused to be drawn into any conversations.
- It was as if she had brought a shutter down all around
- herself.
- There was also something else. One of her colleagues,
- an elderly man, told us: "I started noticing that she was
- sometimes looking at me - and at others - with a funny sort
- of expression in her eyes. It was almost as if, for some
- reason or other, she felt sorry for us. All a bit odd...
- All VERY odd. Dr. Ann Clark left Norwich in a self -
- drive hired car on February 22, 1976. She left without
- working out her notice because, as she explained, the
- Americans were in a hurry to have her. So she became part of
- the Brain Drain. But she has still not joined that company
- in California.
-
- Brian Pendlebury was thirty - three when he became part
- of the Brain Drain in July, 1974. His principal reason for
- leaving was that he disliked the climate, particularly the
- climate in Manchester. He was very much a sun person.
- Since leaving university, with a degree in electronics,
- he'd acquired a taste for travel as a special - projects
- officer with the RAF.
- The Air Force had shown him the world. It had also
- shown him that he wasn't' the type to settle down in any hum-
- drum routine. Certainly not in Manchester.
- Five months after leaving the service he applied for a
- job with a major electronics firm in Sydney, Australia. And,
- to the acute disappointment of his parents, he got it.
- They were, they now admit, disappointed for a selfish
- but very understandable reason. He was their only child and
- they absolutely adored him - having scrimped to get him
- through university and been so proud over his success - and
- for years they'd seen so very little of him. They had hoped
- that now he would live at home, for a year or so, at least.
- His mother also had this cosy vision of Brian marrying some
- nice sensible Lancashire girl and of herself becoming a
- doting grandmother.
-
-
- 25
- "Maybe we can work out some compromise," he'd made up
- his mind. He did promise, however, that he'd keep closely in
- touch. He'd write regularly and he'd send lots of
- photographs. Yes, he knew that he'd said all that
- before...but this time he really would.
- He kept that promise. He kept it for five months after
- leaving Manchester. Every week they got a letter with news
- of his life in Australia. The job, it seemed, was going fine
- and he was really enjoying himself there. They also got
- photographs: Brian surfing...Brian with friends at a
- nightclub...Brian in front of Sydney Harbor bridge. That
- bridge picture was a particularly good one. They had it
- framed and they put it on the mantelpiece.
- So everything was fine, absolutely fine, except for some
- disconcerting facts.
- Brian Pendlebury did not live at the address shown on
- his letters. The company for which he claimed to be working
- insist they have never heard of him. The truth, as far as we
- can establish it, is that Pendlebury never got to Australia.
-
- Britain's system of taxation was a favorite hate subject
- with forty-two-year-old Robert Patterson. And, as a
- mathematician, he always had the latest facts to justify his
- anger.
- His friends at the University of St. Andrews, where he
- was a senior lecturer, had become accustomed to a regular
- bombardment of figures:
- "Do you realize that in Germany the most a man has to
- pay on the topslice of his taxable earnings is only 56 per
- cent! And in America...now that's a country where they
- really appreciate the value of incentive...in America it's
- only 50 per cent!"
- Every one of his sentences, when he was talking tax,
- seemed to finish with a fiery exclamation mark.
- "But what's it here in Britain? You ask me that and
- I'll tell you! Eighty - three per cent...that's what it is
- here...83 per cent! And you wonder why people here aren't
- interested in working harder!"
- This sort of conversation - with Patterson supplying all
- the questions and answers - could go on indefinitely without
- anyone else saying a word. It was a hangover from his
- lecture - room technique and it made him quite intolerably
- boring.
- Many people at the university were rather relieved when
- he eventually announced that he was going to follow his own
- advice. He and his wife Eileen were getting out of Britain.
- They were taking their two children off to a fresh start in
- America.
-
-
-
-
-
- 26
- He was unusually reticent about what he was going to do in
- America, saying no more than that he'd been "invited on an
- interesting project". It seemed obvious, despite his
- evasiveness, that he'd accepted some really plum post in
- America. And at the university, they weren't surprised, for
- he was recognized as one of the most brilliant mathematicians
- in Britain. It was a pity that he was also such a bore.
- Patterson broke his news at the beginning of February,
- 1976, and a paragraph appeared in the Guardian.
- One of the researchers at Sceptre Television - the one
- who'd organized the initial interview with Ann Clark - saw
- the paragraph and immediately contacted Patterson. He was
- offering Patterson the best platform he'd ever had to air his
- views on taxation for the program Science Report was
- networked right across the country.
- "Thank you for the invitation ," said Patterson.
- "Normally I'd love to take it up but I've got a time problem.
- We're flying at the end of next week and there's so much I've
- got to do...
- "We wouldn't need all that much of your time," persisted
- the researcher. He'd had trouble enough finding the right
- people and he wasn't going to let a prize like Robert
- Patterson slip away too easily. "We could send a reporter
- and film unit up to Scotland and do it, perhaps, at the
- university or at your home." Harman, he knew, would probably
- squeal about the cost of sending a unit all that way from
- London - just for one interview - but let him bloody squeal.
- They couldn't expect to hold a network slot without
- spending a few bob. Anyway, he thought, Chris Clements
- could fight that out with Harman. That's what producers were
- for. His job was to get the right people and he was damned
- well doing it. "It wouldn't take long, Mr. Patterson," he
- said. "And we could do it almost any time to suit you."
- Patterson hesitated. "How about next Tuesday morning?"
- he said.
- "Fine. What time?"
- "Eleven o'clock?"
- "Right. And where?"
- "It would be more convenient here at my house."
- "Then your house it is, Mr. Patterson. We'll be there
- at eleven. And thank you."
- Colin Benson, now co-operating with us, was the TV
- reporter who went to Patterson's home on that Tuesday
- morning. He found the house locked and obviously empty. The
- Pattersons, according to neighbors, had driven off in a hurry
- at lunchtime on the Saturday.
- If you watched that particular edition of Science
- Report, you will probably recall that the family's car was
- later found abandoned in London. But the Pattersons -
- Robert, Eileen, sixteen - year - old Julian and fourteen -
- year - old Kate - have not been seen since.
-
-
- 27