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- SPECIAL RELEASE:
- MSF REACTS TO CSICOP
- DEBUNKING OF MJ-12
-
- ParaNet Alpha 0826 -- The Moore-Shandera-Friedman Research Project
- (MSF) is valiantly battling back against charges that the Majestic-12
- documents, released by the team in April, are fraudulent. The charges were
- raised in a press release issued by CSICOP on August 20th [MJ12.SR], in
- which arch-skeptic Phil Klass called the documents "clumsy counterfeits,"
- and cited a letter from the National Archives [MJ12DOC6.UFO] which raised
- doubts about the authenticity of a key piece of corroborative evidence,
- the so-called Cutler-to-Twining memo of July 14, 1954 [MJ12DOC3.UFO].
-
- In an attempt to provide the opportunity for MSF to answer the objec-
- tions raised in the press release, ParaNet has talked with all three mem-
- bers of the MSF team: William L. Moore of Burbank, CA, UFO investigator
- and co-author of "The Philadelphia Experiment" and "The Roswell Incident"
- (the latter detailing a UFO crash in 1947 which stands to be confirmed if
- the MJ-12 documents are real); Jaime Shandera of North Hollywood, CA, an
- independent television producer who had little to do with UFOs until team-
- ing up with Moore in 1981; and Stanton T. Friedman of New Brunswick, Cana-
- da, a nuclear physicist and UFO lecturer.
- All three members of the team agreed that nothing brought out by Klass in the release conclusively showed Majestic-12 to be a hoax; i
- n fact none of the members seemed to acknowledge that any damage was done whatsoever.
- Below are some of the objections raised by Klass, and selected ans-
- wers given by the team members.
-
- o Item: Robert Cutler was in Europe at the time the Cutler-to-Twining Memo
- was allegedly written.
-
- Friedman: "That's a stupid argument. The memo wasn't signed by
- Cutler. [But] he gave his people instructions to keep the ball
- rolling while he was gone.
- "We have two other memos from Cutler to Twining, which we've
- gotten at the Library of Congress, one is signed and the other
- isn't. The one that's not signed has an `/s/' indicating where the
- original was signed."
-
- Moore: "The absence of a signature on the document is consistent
- with the fact that Cutler was overseas when it was written. If the
- document had been signed, then we would have reason to worry.
-
- o Item: The lack of the characteristic "Eagle" watermark found on all of
- Cutler's memoranda stationery.
-
- Friedman: "But how many? They didn't have at the Eisenhower Library
- OR the National Archives, these two Cutler memoranda that we found
- at the Library of Congress! Absence of evidence is not evidence for
- absence."
-
- o Item: The lack of a Top-Secret registration number on the document.
-
- Friedman: "Neither of the other documents we got from the Library of
- Congress had registration numbers, either."
-
- Moore: "NONE of the Top-Secret Cutler memoranda we have seen have
- registration numbers."
-
-
- o Item: The presence of typewriter key impressions through the back of the
- document indicates it was typed as an original, not as a carbon.
-
- Moore: "This just shows that [Klass] has not done a shred of
- original research. He couldn't have looked at the original. If he
- had, he would have seen that the paper is definitely old, and the
- ink on the paper is blue.
-
- Friedman: "I have trouble with that. The ink is blue. Who uses blue
- typewriter ribbons?"
-
- o Item: The use of the security classification "Top Secret - Restricted,"
- which did not come into use by the NSC until at least a decade later.
-
- Friedman: "Well, that's what these guys are saying, but I don't even
- know that that's true. `Restricted' can mean `nobody else sees.'
- Also, in that same year of '54, the Atomic Energy Act brought in the
- use of `Secret-Restricted Data' when you're dealing with anything
- nuclear...and Twining obviously thought there was a nuclear
- connection with UFOs because in a 1947 memo he said all the data
- should go to the AEC and the Nuclear Energy Propulsion Applications
- Project."
-
- o Item: The Sept. 24, 1947 letter from Pres. Truman to Secy. Forrestal is
- not consistent in format with other Truman letters to Cabinet members.
-
- Moore: "Nonsense. We have a letter from a Congressional historian
- that says that the form and style ARE consistent."
-
- o Item: The Truman letter was created by "superimposing a spurious message
- on a photocopy of an authentic Truman letter."
-
- Shandera: "The 35mm film we have of the [Truman] document is very
- clear, its a very good photo. If anything like that had been done,
- it would easily show up."
-
- Moore: "He's dreaming. The evidence is just the opposite. If you
- look at the document on the film, there are some areas where a
- different color ink was probably used, probably red, which contrast
- highly with the rest of the document. If this were a [composite
- photocopy], there wouldn't be this much contrast."
-
-
- In the CSICOP press release, and previously in other media, Klass
- has said that he has invited Moore and his associates to "join in his own
- efforts" to get to the bottom of the MJ-12 scenario. Moore claims that
- Klass "has never extended such an invitation to any one of us."
-
- Moore says that more information on MJ-12 will be released "toward
- the end of September," including a point-by-point response to the
- objections raised by Klass in the release. As usual, ParaNet will be the
- first computer-based media in the world to carry the story as it unfolds.