We spent many nights pondering the question of what risk we were taking; what might the government do, or try to do, to us? Since that anonymous phone call, we’d had no indication that the government was trying to squelch our effort. In fact, though, they were gathering information to discredit our story.
Both at Sun Streak and at the Defense Intelligence Agency, it was well known that someone intended to expose the unit and its secret weapon. Sun Streak members had been warned not to talk to Mel and me; threats were made, investigations were under way, and meetings were hurriedly taking place in the Pentagon and at DIA. The higher-ups’ only question was how to crush us.
Because he was retired, Mel was not in much official danger: to take any action against him, the army would have to approach Congress for permission to bring him back on active duty. Only if Congress agreed to this could the army prepare to court-martial him or otherwise punish him. And Congress would demand to know why Mel should be reactivated; to explain, DIA would have to describe a top-secret psychic-warfare program two decades old, the existence of which was known to just five members of Congress. From an intelligence perspective, that was not the best option. Most “exotic” programs stay alive by limiting the number of people who know anything about them. No way was DIA going to approach Congress.
That left them to target me: I was on active duty, so I could be court-martialed quietly.
But at first Mel and I were convinced that nothing much would be done. Some administrative action might be taken against me; maybe there would be a letter of reprimand, maybe a warning to stop immediately. These repercussions I would welcome, because they offered the chance to force DIA to admit that Sun Streak existed. Once the agency did so, I could tell my general officer friends about my past and they’d probably stand by me, given my record and the potential of remote viewing. I was confident that they would protect me, or at least buy me time to pursue another route.
So we took Ingo Swann’s recommendation. He put us in touch with his literary agent, Sandra Martin—he told her, “If they aren’t killed for telling this story, then I’ll tell mine”—and she introduced us to an investigative journalist, Jim Marrs. Jim was the author of Crossfire: The Plot That Killed Kennedy, to which Oliver Stone bought the film rights for his 1991 movie JFK. Jim is a conscientious and modest man, who shared our fascination with remote viewing and with its potential to help mankind; he worked hard to pull our story together. We began with short visits and interviews, phone conversations, and fax exchanges. (I should mention that, to date, Jim’s book has not been published. This book, in case there’s any confusion, is entirely my own and was written after this time.)
Mel and I meanwhile remained oblivious to what was going on at DIA. I had no idea how quickly a soldier is cut from the fold when he breaks ranks.
It wasn’t long before our phones were tapped. Cassette tapes of my conversations with Marrs, Mel, Sandra, and anyone else I called from my home or office started showing up in the mail. For several weeks little cardboard packages or envelopes with no return address arrived at my parents’ house and at Debbie’s. (Thinking she might need them at some future date, Debbie saved the ones sent to her and put them in a safe place.) I couldn’t see the point of this harassment, and my first thought was that it was a prank, but it worried everyone sick. I’ve since heard that such mail campaigns are used to frighten an undesirable off a project—his terrified family members convince him to drop it and go away. My harassers, though, failed to understand that my family had seen me through a bullet to the head and knew me to talk with angels and be pursued by my personal demons. Having spent years coping with my travels in the ether, they didn’t back down.
My plans to go public with the remote-viewing story never interfered with my duties as an Army officer. When my time as an executive officer at Fort Bragg was up, I was named the division training officer—chief of G3 training was the official title. Being a training officer is extremely difficult, but I was blessed with the help of two of the best majors in the army: Bren Flannigan and Tony Tata. I had what army people call a suck job, but theirs were even more difficult. All of us put in long hard hours, trying to do in a week what most people do in a month, but Tony and Bren managed to shove two months’ work into their weekly rucksacks.
Just as I was getting a handle on my new responsibilities, Debbie called me at the office.
“I told you they would try to hurt us.” She was crying.
“What happened? Are the kids okay?”
“Someone broke in last night while we were home.”
“Is everyone all right?”
“Yes, but they ransacked your office—opened all of the cabinets, drawers, and files. The police are here now, taking a report. I called David Gould.” David, the friend who’d found me after my night on the lawn, was a police officer. “He’s here helping them. They’ve found a piece of a latex glove and some imprints in the dust on the shelves, where whoever it was pulled books out. Probably to look behind them for something.”
“Deb, let me talk to him.”
Dave was calm. “You had some visitors last night,” he said mildly. “Everybody’s okay. It looks like they were searching for something. Real pros, too—hardly left a scratch on the front door. Came in while everyone was sleeping, did their thing, and exited by the front door again. Bastards left it open, too. Just to let you know they were here.”
“I never thought they’d take it this far.”
“Do you want me to tell the investigating officer what you think this is all about?”
“I think we should, don’t you?”
“I guess it couldn’t hurt. Look, I’m going to tell him that we believe someone from the federal government is doing this without authorization. The officers should probably just fill out a normal report, though. If he writes certain things, it will prompt a certain response at headquarters, and I don’t think we want a federal investigation just yet. Let’s just make it a matter of record: he can put some subtle entry in the report about who the owner thinks may have done this. That okay?”
“Yeah. Thanks for being there, Dave.”
Debbie came back on the line. “What were they looking for?”
“Probably the documents Mel and I have, about the unit. I think they want to catch us with them, for the court-martial if there is one. They also want to scare us, to make us feel unsafe and violated.”
“It’s working. It’s working really well, David.”
“I’ll come up this weekend, if it’s okay with you.”
“I know the children would love to see you, and so would I.”
My commanding officer frowned on my leaving for the weekend, but my family had been violated and I was going to see them whether he liked it or not. I dropped off a leave form and drove away from headquarters after the weekly staff meeting in the commanding general’s office.
Just off the installation, I spotted a dark blue sedan several cars behind mine. Normally I would never have noticed, but I happened to see the car just before I pulled in to the shop on post. It must have registered subconsciously, or maybe the angel was sending me a message. And when I came out of the store I saw the blue car again, parked alone several rows away. As I was leaving the parking lot of the mini mart my eyes met the driver’s; he quickly turned his head.
It was getting dark, and I lost the blue car in the headlights of everything behind me. It could have been following me when I hit Interstate 95 and headed north, but I wouldn’t have known. At first I was amused at the idea that DIA had nothing better to do than follow me, but just past the turnoff to Raleigh, North Carolina, my right rear tire exploded and I swerved out of control at seventy-five miles an hour. I was in the far left lane and the blowout sent me onto the grass median. I swerved in the soft soil and climbed back onto the highway, trying to hold the car steady while I slowed to a stop on the left shoulder. I was in a sweat and my heart was pounding. The car shook violently every time a truck or car blew past me in the l
eft lane; I needed to get across to the right shoulder. When the road finally cleared, I wobbled across the asphalt and stopped.
While I was fumbling with the jack a freelance tow truck pulled up behind me and honked. I was still shaky from all the stunt driving, and I must have jumped a foot.
“Let me give ya a hand,” said the driver. He moved me out of the way and began twisting the nuts off the wheel. When he’d gotten the tire off he turned it around to inspect in his headlights. “This ain’t a blowout. This here tire’s been cut to blow.” He pointed.
“What do you mean, ‘cut to blow’?”
“What I mean is, somebody cut this here tire so it would blow when you got to driving fast. Look, see this?” He pointed to a rectangular cut on the inside wall of the tire. “They make a cut here, not all the way through, but just enough that when you get going, say, fifty or sixty miles an hour, that spinning tire throws this piece here outward—tears it—and your tire does this.” He tugged at the ragged edges of the tire. “She explodes!”
When he’d finished changing the tire I paid him, threw the blown tire into the back of the Jeep, and crawled under the car with a flashlight. The other tires were intact. I spent the rest of the six-hour drive trying to figure out who’d cut my tire and planning what I’d do if I ever caught them.
It had been four months since my last visit to my family; the long stays at Fort Bragg were taking their toll. I took Michael to one of his hockey games in Baltimore, where I stood alone watching him play and mulling over events. There wasn’t a second of my life that wasn’t preoccupied with remote viewing, or our book, or the attacks.
Two men in suits stood in the warming room, peering at me from behind the glass doors. I looked at them briefly out of the corner of my eye, trying not to let them know that I’d spotted them. They were definitely watching me; they never took their eyes off me. Still not looking at them, I walked toward the warming room, thinking I might be able to grab a cup of coffee and scope them out, maybe even ask them what the hell they were up to. But as I opened the door, the two men retreated, slipping out the front door. After a few seconds I followed. They were strolling toward their car, looking back over their shoulders every few seconds. One of them was wearing a pair of military low quarter shoes. He fumbled with the keys, trying to open the car door, while his partner looked everywhere but at me. They climbed into their gray late-model Chrysler and sped off.
Things were certainly heating up. I knew I had to go on the record about remote viewing before whoever was behind the surveillance and sabotage escalated things any further.
Soon after my weekend with the family, Mel, Jim Marrs, and I met with Sandra Martin in New York City to work on the book. Over dinner I described some of the events that had taken place. I’d kept Mel briefed, but otherwise I’d mentioned them only in passing before now.
Mel was looking worn. “I think they’re after us with the influencing,” he announced.
Jim and Sandra didn’t know what he was talking about, but I did. “What makes you think that?”
“I can feel them working away at me. You know how it is—you get that itchy, jumpy feeling inside, as if someone’s dragging their fingernails across your blackboard.”
Sandra shivered in her seat. “Really? They can do that, and you can tell when?”
Jim started taking notes.
“It’s something you learn in the program,” I said. “You know how it feels when someone stands way too close to you at a party? You know that uneasy and oppressive sensation you get? That’s how it feels when someone is in your space from a distance as well. It’s no different. You get the same sensation, and it drives you crazy until you figure out what it is.”
“How can you protect yourself from it?” Sandra asked. “Or can you?”
Mel replied. “You can. You create an energy ball and surround yourself with it. You give it a reflective surface, and that bounces the probes back out into the ether. The only problem is, I forget to do it sometimes and they get in. Then it’s like trying to rid your basement of mice—it’s a lot harder once they get in.”
“Do they stay forever?” Jim asked.
“No, they have to break it off just like we do. It’s just another viewer doing it, probably working at the unit.”
Sandra and Jim told us they’d been followed by mysterious figures who had photographed them and slipped into crowds. “Well,” I said softly, “it looks as if we’re all under attack in some way. You should obviously assume your phone is tapped. You shouldn’t be alone anywhere, either. Try to stay with other people as much as you can, at least until the book comes out and this all blows over.”
“I don’t think it’s going to blow over,” Mel said. “I think they’re going to try and ride us into the ground.” He looked at me. “You much more than us. There’s not much they can legally do to the rest of us, but you’re dog meat.”
“I’m beginning to sense that,” I said.
In order to fight back and to protect my family, I needed to know what my opponents were capable of. At my request, Sandra set up a meeting for me with one of her clients who had expert knowledge of the CIA and its surveillance techniques.
“You’re a target,” the expert told me, “and because of your active-duty status, you’re a sitting duck; that’s all there is to it.”
“What are they trying to do, just scare me? Just scare my family?”
“That’s exactly what they want to do for now: scare the hell out of you. And force you into doing things you or your family wouldn’t ordinarily do. You’re going to have to keep your wits about you and watch your back.”
“But why my family?”
“Because your family’s the only thing that matters to you. If they can undermine your family, they’ve got you. You need to understand, this is only the beginning. If scare tactics don’t work, they’ll start taking more drastic measures. And you’re an easy target—a recluse, living apart from your family, traveling alone. My advice to you is, get a vest and wear it. You need to be alert, my friend, every minute of every day. Don’t get drunk. Don’t be anywhere alone for long.”
All I could do was swallow.
A few weeks later, I was called in to see my commanding officer at Fort Bragg.
The chief was standing in his doorway, his lips pressed together and his demeanor like an undertaker’s. “Would you come in here, please?”
I walked into his office to find an army prosecutor.
“Major Morehouse, I have brought you here to inform you that certain serious allegations have been made against you: adultery, communicating a threat, larceny of government property, and multiple counts of conduct unbecoming an officer. You are to report to the Criminal Investigation Division tomorrow morning at 0800 hours for questioning. Do you have any questions?”
“Sir? What’s this all about?”
“Do you have any questions, Major Morehouse?”
“Yes, sir. What is the meaning of this? I haven’t done anything of that nature. Who is making these allegations?”
“That’s none of your business!” snapped the prosecutor, brittle-faced.
As soon as I was dismissed I found myself a representative—an army defense lawyer.
“I called the prosecutor’s office to see what was going on,” he said. He took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, looking at his notes. “Are you aware of what’s happening, Major Morehouse?”
I shook my head. I found it difficult even to focus on him.
“Well, you were told what the allegations are. It appears that someone”—he named a civilian woman I knew from around the base—“has sworn a complaint against you. Do you know her?”
“Yes. What is her complaint against me, and why would she be doing this?”
“Well, I certainly don’t know why, but her complaint is that you verbally threatened her with physical violence. She also claims that you were sexually involved with her for three months.”
“I knew her. In fact, you
could say we had a relationship of sorts. I’ve spent the last four years of my life alone. Sometimes you just want to talk to another person, you know, someone who doesn’t have to shave his face.”
He laughed.
“I poured my heart out to this woman. She was a good listener, too—kind and caring.” I shook my head disbelievingly. “I told her everything about what was going on with me, everything—Debbie, the kids, the nightmares. I thought I knew her. I thought I could trust her. I guess you never really know anybody, do you?”
“Okay. Do you know of any reason why she might be making these allegations?”
My eyes shot with anger. “I believe I just asked you that question.”
“What about the larceny charge? The prosecutor has alleged that you stole an army computer and gave it to this woman.”
“I gave her a computer for her work. It was an old Commodore, worthless; my wife and I decided that we didn’t need it anymore, and we agreed to help her out. She’s even talked to Deb on the phone. After all, we were both separated. I don’t understand this at all.”
He glanced at his notes again. “Well, the computer cited in the charges is a Zenith laptop, and it has a military serial number.”
“That laptop is hand-receipted to me; I own it. I have the documentation. I did give it to her, but only so she could take it in for repair.”
“They’re claiming that you gave it to her.”
“I did give her a computer—the Commodore. Her brother is a computer repairman; she agreed to take the Zenith to him for repair and then return it to me with his bill. The video card in it was burned out.”
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