Conspiracies Declassified

by Brian Dunning

  [The] charge by the Department of Defense was to process 5,000 bodies that had received a single bullet wound to the head, and these were mostly males . . . . The data about these individuals was entered into a Pentagon computer. And then reportedly the bodies were dumped in the swamp in Louisiana . . . . I have verification from insiders, who wish to remain anonymous, at the Red Cross, that this is true.

  Why McKinney felt the Red Cross would be involved in such an operation was not convincingly argued.

  In 2005, a Halliburton subsidiary won a $385 million construction contract that required them to be ready to construct temporary facilities for disaster evacuees or large numbers of immigrants following an emergency. Conspiracy theorist Peter Dale Scott wrote that these “detention centers could be used to detain American citizens if the Bush administration were to declare martial law.” In addition, there are many online “patriot” and “militia” websites that list the FEMA prison camps that have been identified so far. Any Internet search for “FEMA prison camp locations” returns a treasure trove of locations inside the United States. Every former World War II POW and Japanese-American internment camp is described as being “renovated,” as is every former military base. A site in Colorado is claimed to be staffed and ready to hold 400,000 people; 20,000 at Fort Chaffee in Arkansas; 15,000 in Oakdale, California; and 35,000 at Fort Dix in New Jersey. Some 800 entries are claimed by nearly all such lists. (Not a single photograph or piece of evidence is ever provided, however.)

  The Explanation

  The fact that law-abiding Japanese Americans were rounded up and interned during World War II, combined with the existence of actual laws permitting the government to do such a thing again, gives the FEMA prison camps conspiracy theory a unique hint of plausibility. However, it seems improbable. The Civil Liberties Act of 1988, which authorized reparations to the Japanese survivors, recognized and certified that such internment was unjustified. Times change. We should not expect something like that to recur any more than we should expect slavery to be reintroduced. In addition, the internment of Japanese Americans was not done under any of the laws cited by conspiracy theorists as justification for the alleged FEMA plans, but by a special wartime executive order. It took an active world war to persuade President Roosevelt to depart so far from civil liberties.

  Strictly speaking, the president and Congress have the same powers today that allowed the Japanese-American internments, and have the same powers that allowed the National Guard to intervene in major historical riots. But that’s a far cry from supposing that every Halliburton contract means the illuminati are out to get you.

  And what about all those locations that conspiracy theorists have identified as FEMA camps? Each, at least that anyone has been interested in looking at, has been child’s play to debunk. For example, one location in Alaska is said to have a capacity of two million people, but Alaska’s entire population is only about a third of that. Another supposed location described by theorists as a “fully staffed full gassing/cremating death camp with airstrip, dedicated to the termination of all on FEMA’s red/blue list under martial law” that was recently inspected by “high-level Illuminati Luciferians” (whatever those are) is just a long-abandoned and overgrown airstrip in the middle of nowhere in the Mojave Desert. And most of these “camps” are just empty spots on the map, home to nothing more than someone’s Internet-fueled delusion.

  FEMA, by the way, can only react to a disaster when a governor declares a state of emergency. Assuming that most state governors do not wish for their citizens to be rounded up into federal extermination camps, it seems that FEMA may not have been the most logical choice for the conspiracy theorists to dream up.

  Skeptoid ® Says . . .

  The US government has domestically called in the military to quell rebellions before. Four thousand National Guardsmen were called in to help suppress the 1965 Watts riots in Los Angeles, and 3,000 for the 1967 Newark riots. Nearly 13,000 military were needed to quell the 1967 Detroit riots, which included the 82nd and 101st Airborne Divisions. The Los Angeles riots of 1992 involved 3,500 soldiers of the 7th Infantry and 1st Marine Division in addition to 10,000 National Guardsmen.

  The Branch DavidianAssault

  * * *

  Date: 1993

  Location: Waco, Texas

  The Conspirators: US Attorney General Janet Reno, President Bill Clinton, FBI, ATF, and the Texas and Alabama National Guards

  The Victims: Seventy-six Branch Davidian cult members

  * * *

  The Theory

  On April 19, 1993, troops assaulted the Branch Davidian cult compound in Waco, Texas, that had been refusing to surrender to arrest warrants for two months. All inside died, mostly by fire. Conspiracy theorists claim that during the assault, the FBI intentionally started the fire in order to destroy the compound and kill everyone—including the children. Some other theories put forth in a series of low-budget documentary films and books include claims that the fire was started either by flame-throwing armored vehicles or by incendiary grenades fired into the flimsy wooden buildings. Many of those inside were found to have died by gunfire, so the conspiracy theory states that the FBI and National Guard fired into the burning buildings to make sure everyone died.

  The Truth

  Evidence proves the Branch Davidians had rigged their entire complex with firebombs, which they set off themselves when the assault began, in the belief that purification by fire would transcend them to heaven.

  The Backstory

  The history of how the Branch Davidian complex came to be is an interesting and colorful one, but it ended with cult leader David Koresh barricaded inside the sprawling compound of wooden buildings with about a hundred followers, including men, women, and children. Some had lived at the compound for three generations. The men had all turned their wives and daughters over to Koresh, and he was “married” to many of them. His wives were as young as twelve.

  Koresh and other cult members had a large arsenal and numerous firearms violations, so the ATF (the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives) executed a search warrant in February of 1993 to seize illegal automatic weapons. A gunfight ensued in which four ATF agents and six Davidians died. The FBI took over and, together with the Texas and Alabama National Guards, surrounded the complex in a stalemate that was to last for two months.

  US Attorney General Janet Reno and President Bill Clinton favored waiting out the Davidians, as they believed this was the best strategy to avoid loss of life. But upon receiving a report that children inside were being beaten, they ordered the compound assaulted with tear gas on April 19, in hopes of ending the siege with non-lethal weapons.

  The combat engineer vehicles (CEVs) broke down the walls as soldiers fired tear gas. Simultaneously, fires broke out throughout the compound, and it quickly became an inferno. Automatic gunfire was heard from inside the compound. When all was said and done, some seventy-six people who remained inside were all dead, including Koresh and twenty-five children. Most of the children had been shot or stabbed to death, as had some of the other Davidians.

  Many in the public were outraged, and the belief that the FBI had started the fire began to spread. Conspiracy theorist Linda Thompson made a video called Waco: The Big Lie, which made specific claims that the government started the fire using a combination of incendiary grenades and flamethrowers mounted to the CEVs. Other films followed. A few years after the assault, surveys found that 61 percent of Americans believed that the FBI started the fires, either accidentally or deliberately.

  The Explanation

  Under intense public pressure from a population who increasingly believed the FBI deliberately executed the Davidians, Janet Reno ordered a full investigation. The findings are known as the Danforth Report, and it was published in 2000.

  A crucial finding of the report was that the Branch Davidians’ religious beliefs compelled them all to die. This information came from the cult members themselves, a few of whom ran fro
m the fire and were captured or were arrested in town. The Davidians were going to kill themselves one way or another, preferably by fire, to purify themselves and transcend to heaven. They had even planned a mass murder at a local McDonald’s in order to all be killed by responding police officers. These people had violent death on their minds, and they were absolutely committed to it. There is virtually nothing that the government could have done differently that would have saved them; they never wanted to be saved.

  Accordingly, the FBI found that the Davidians had rigged the entire complex with firebombs consisting of hay and camping fuel. When the FBI sent in food in the weeks before the assault, it included milk cartons that were bugged, so they had hours of tape recordings of the Davidians placing and charging the firebombs.

  Thompson’s claims of a “flame-throwing tank” were also investigated. There was never any such thing. The only weapon used by the CEVs was a Mark V liquid insertion system, which is a CO2-powered squirt gun capable of shooting tear gas about 50 feet. No fire broke out in the areas where the CEVs were. But not only did the report prove that there weren’t flamethrowers attached to the CEVs, it also provided an explanation for why this was even claimed in the first place:

  The FBI FLIR tapes showed rapid “flashes” on and around the complex and the vehicles. These flashes were solar reflections off of certain types of debris, including glass, that was strewn around the complex.

  The report also found a total lack of evidence that incendiary grenades were used, or that any National Guardsmen or FBI agents fired any sort of weapons into the compound. The evidence was unanimous that the Davidians started all the fires and killed themselves and each other.

  All of this said, the government is not blameless for the events at Waco. The report that said children inside the complex were being beaten was found to be false, as no evidence of beatings was ever discovered. No one was prosecuted for the false report, because no one was found who could be proven to be at fault.

  The Danforth Report also found that for six years, the FBI failed to report that three XM651E1 pyrotechnic tear gas rounds had been fired. Although these rounds were fired at a concrete structure far removed from the wooden buildings, and despite the fact that these rounds have been proven to not start fires, the FBI probably covered up their use to avoid charges that they had started the fire. This cover-up can easily be considered criminal withholding of evidence.

  Finally, the government unfairly pinned blame on two scapegoats, the ATF agents in charge of the initial raid in February. They were fired with the explanation that they should have been aware that the Davidians were prepared to violently repel the raid. The excuse is thin, because from everything that was learned about the Davidians, they all planned to die inside the complex no matter what. There is little the ATF agents could have done that would have saved the lives of the Davidians who died in the raid.

  At its core, the government’s actions at Waco were an effort to rescue children whose lives were under immediate threat. The FBI had ample information that the Branch Davidians all intended to die for religious reasons, and that turned the siege into a rescue effort. In the weeks before the final assault on the compound, the FBI even went so far as to “purchase” children from Koresh by giving him time on the radio to preach. Ultimately, twenty-one children were saved in this manner. The only government conspiracy on that day was one of desperation to rescue children from the darkest depths of delusional extremism.

  Skeptoid ® Says . . .

  In the crowd of onlookers who watched the Branch Davidian complex burn to the ground was a young man named Timothy McVeigh, who, exactly two years to the day later, became a mass murderer himself when he blew up the Oklahoma City Federal Building.

  Chemtrails

  * * *

  Date: 1996–Present

  Location: Worldwide, but primarily the United States

  The Conspirators: Airlines, unknown government agencies

  The Victims: Unsuspecting citizens

  * * *

  The Theory

  When you look up in the sky and see an airliner leaving a condensation trail—commonly called a contrail—you’re probably not alarmed and recognize it as a normal phenomenon. But if you’re a conspiracy theorist you may take a different view, supposing the trail to be explainable only as some poisonous or otherwise harmful gas or drug being sprayed by the airplane in order to hurt the people below. They call it a chemtrail, a combination of the words chemical and contrail.

  Some believers insist that the chemtrail is made up of a psychoactive drug meant to damage the intelligence of the population to keep them more susceptible to government abuses. Others believe it is an ongoing weather modification scheme, perhaps to combat global warming, that is done without any regard to its impact on people’s health or the environment.

  The Truth

  The contrails you see behind airliners are normal and unavoidable condensation created by the plane burning hydrocarbon fuel in certain high-altitude conditions. No chemtrails are needed to explain them.

  The Backstory

  Although contrails have been familiar since the 1930s when planes first started going high enough, conspiracy theorists had never paid much attention to them until 1996, when a panel of US Air Force officers presented a paper entitled “Weather As a Force Modifier: Owning the Weather in 2025.” Without going into how it might be accomplished, this report muses on how a hypothetical ability to control the weather could be useful in battle situations. Storms, floods, or droughts could be sent to the enemy. Favorable conditions could be orchestrated for our own troops. Space weather—conditions in the Earth’s magnetosphere that can impact radio transmissions and electronics—could be used to interfere with enemy communications. Fog could be created or removed on either side for a tactical advantage. And so on, and so on. Although the paper was speculative and did not presume the existence of any such technologies, conspiracy theorists took it to mean that the US government is absolutely able to do all of these things. The precise genesis of the legend isn’t clear, but somehow the idea got started that this weaponization of weather was to be accomplished using chemicals sprayed from innocent-looking airliners.

  Global warming was also coming into the public’s attention about that time, and the Internet chemtrail community quickly made the connection. As CO2 emissions continue to saturate the atmosphere, and the resulting greenhouse effect continues to add heat to the Earth’s climate systems, governments are growing increasingly concerned about strategic effects from sea-level change, sea ice, and other impacts. Conspiracy theorists have thus (rightly) assumed that governments would like very much to do something about it, and (wrongly) assumed that whenever they see a contrail from a jet, it’s likely to be some secret effort to somehow reduce global warming—perhaps an aircraft spraying something to alter the atmosphere’s chemistry.

  Eventually, the Internet chemtrail community broadened its scope to include drugging of the population. They believe that if the people can be dumbed down, they can be more easily controlled. Internet trolls began writing elaborate stories, claiming to be airline executives or maintenance engineers coming forward to reveal secret modifications to airliners, including vast chemical tanks hidden on board. Photographs have been attached to the stories appearing to show airliners with gutted interiors, their seats replaced with rows of tanks to hold liquids.

  This conspiracy theory was significantly reinforced when the Space Preservation Act of 2001, which banned weapons in space, was presented to the US House of Representatives. The bill included a long list of speculative future “exotic weapons systems,” and on this list was chemtrails. It also listed other ideas, purely science fiction, such as plasma weapons and tectonic weapons—basically, anything and everything these particular senators speculated might eventually exist, based on whatever Star Trek episodes they’d seen. Nevertheless, conspiracy theorists took it as proof that these systems all exist today.

  Skeptoid ® Says .
. .

  Additional chemtrail conspiracy theories were discussed in a 2014 paper from The Geographical Journal, which took a look at the contents of twenty popular websites that promote the chemtrail conspiracy theory. These theories were mostly profit motivated, including that weather modification could alter agriculture and other industries and allow futures markets to be manipulated; warming polar regions could allow improved access for Big Oil; crop poisons were being sprayed by the prominent agricultural company Monsanto to kill all crop varieties grown from seeds sold by any other producer; engineered disease organisms were being introduced worldwide to create new outbreaks in order to generate massive profits for Big Pharma; and population control for just about any nefarious purpose you want to think up.

  The Explanation

  The main problem with all the chemtrail beliefs is that, under common conditions, airplanes are always going to produce contrails. Burning hydrocarbon fuels, such as jet fuel, produces water at about the same volume as fuel burned. Thus, an airplane is always spraying water into the atmosphere as it flies. At altitudes above 25,000 feet and temperatures below −40º (both Celsius and Fahrenheit, as −40º is where the scales happen to intersect), the saturation point is exceeded, and the water condenses into a visible cloud, which we call a contrail. This is a fact of simple physics, and there is no need to introduce the spraying of a mysterious chemical to explain it.