GOVERNMENT STILL INVOLVED IN ESP-IONAGE
Document Type:
Collection:
Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST):
CIA-RDP90-00965R000100120052-4
Release Decision:
RIFPUB
Original Classification:
K
Document Page Count:
1
Document Creation Date:
December 22, 2016
Document Release Date:
January 10, 2012
Sequence Number:
52
Case Number:
Publication Date:
August 12, 1985
Content Type:
OPEN SOURCE
File:
Attachment | Size |
---|---|
![]() | 66.34 KB |
Body:
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/01/10: CIA-RDP90-00965R000100120052-4
ARTICLE Al
ON PAGE
WASHINGTON POST
12 August 1985
~ IACK ANDERSON and DALE VAN ATTA ~
Government Still Involved in ESP-ionage
A decade ago, an American agent penetrated a
previously unknown, top-secret Soviet
military base in the Urals. The spy described
the base in minute detail, according to a Central
Intelligence Agency report.
He charted railways, machine shops and
laboratories. He even reported that "an unusual
proportion of women" were working at the facility.
James Bond should be so successful. Unlike his
fictional counterpart, this agent was not
particularly bold or dashing. He didn't parachute
deep into Soviet territory or even slip across the
Iron Curtain under cover of darkness.
In fact, America's agent was Patrick Price, a
bulky, balding ex-police commissioner from
Burbank, Calif.-the spawning grounds of some of
Hollywood's most successful spy movies. During
the entire mission, he never left the comfort of the
Stanford Research Institute laboratory in Menlo
Park, Calif.
Price, who has since died, was a self-proclaimed
psychic. His amazing "mission" was part of a series
of tests sponsored by the CIA. The purpose was to
determine if people who claim unusual powers of
telepathy could describe scenes in faraway places.
Before dismissing this as hallucinogenic hokum,
the taxpayers should know that our government
has spent-and continues to spend-millions of
dollars on this hush-hush research. It began with
the CIA's 'Project Scanate" in the early 1970s, and
has become the Defense Intelligence Agency's
"Project Grill Flame."
But the same Stanford Research Institute
physicist has been in charge all these years: former
FLAMM
National Security Agency employe Harold Puthoff.
The government uses Puthoff as the Santa Claus
for psychic research; funds are channeled through
him to other research institutes.
Puthoff refuses to speak about the project. And
Stanford Research Institute's doors have rarely
been opened to invite skeptical examiners into the
secret sanctums. But several sources close to the
mind-expanding study claim solid successes.
The most striking occurred when one of the
institute's top psychics, given only the geographical
coordinates, described the Semipalatinsk nuclear
facility in Soviet Central Asia in detail that was only
confirmed afterward by satellite spy photos. The
psychic also described equipment resembling
accelerators and electron injectors kept in an
underground cavern at the facility, which has since
been reported as a "directed energy" facility.
The CIA smelled fraud, though, when he talked
about giant steel spheres at the location that, they
knew, could not possibly stand the stress associated
with laser and particle-beam research.
Once again, in the years that followed, the CIA
found to its chagrin that the psychic was right: The
Soviets had developed a process of "flux welding,"
which could hold the spheres together during the
military research.
Is all this ESP-ionage a boondoggle, or has the
government-sponsored team stumbled on to
something?
The stamp of secrecy keeps us from knowing for
sure. Unless, of course, we choose to sit back in a
chair, close our eyes, and imagine ourselves into
the privacy of Grill Flame Central.
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/01/10: CIA-RDP90-00965R000100120052-4