thedrifter
01-29-04, 05:21 AM
01-28-2004
Guest Column: A Belated Admission on ‘Project SHAD’
By Eric Longabardi
Over the past three years, Department of Defense officials have claimed that they were “investigating” the facts surrounding “Project Shad,” the Cold War-era chemical and biological experiments involving thousands of unwitting U.S. Navy sailors.
The internal DoD probe, coming after 40 years of Pentagon silence and denials on details of the still classified experiments since they took place in the 1960s, remains a work in progress.
The truth about Project SHAD and the Pentagon's denials were initially proven false by a series of CBS News investigative reports I produced, “Secret Germ Warfare Experiments?”, that began airing May 15, 2000. The reports were based on never-before seen internal Army SHAD reports and declassified films of the secret testing. In addition, the reports interviewed former sailors who were exposed to chemical and biological compounds while their ships were secretly targeted in “Project SHAD.”
I previously I wrote about Project SHAD in Defensewatch on Nov. 7, 2002 (“Sad Lessons from a Cold War Secret”).
Since September 2001, the Pentagon has released what it calls “fact sheets” and other limited information concerning the dozens of “Project SHAD” tests. So far, the DoD still refuses to acknowledge the use of “human test subjects” without informed consent and also continues to deny the existence of any “medically relevant” human exposure data collected during the program.
Last month, after four decades of obfuscation and denial, the DoD was dealt another serious blow to its credibility on the truth about “Project SHAD.” In a sworn deposition last Dec. 11 in Washington, D.C., former “Project SHAD” scientist Dr. J. Clifton Spendlove repeatedly reconfirmed under oath what had been documented and exposed by CBS News nearly four years ago.
A former Army scientist, Spendlove confirmed that his team had used unwitting human test subjects in the design and execution of the program. Spendlove himself preferred the term “human samplers,” apparently thinking so little of the Navy men used in his secret human testing that he referred to them oa one point as nothing more than mere “boat drivers.”
The deposition is part of an ongoing civil lawsuit filed against various DoD, Army and other officials on behalf of nearly two dozen former Navy sailors. The suit alleges that DoD, Army and VA officials have covered up and withheld information about the SHAD program in an attempt to shield the government from potential liability and public embarrassment.
But a simple confirmation is not sufficient.
The facts revealed to date show that the Army, which directed “Project SHAD,” had set out to use the sailors as “human test subjects” who were deliberately kept in the dark about it. Moreover, the project managers collected specific human exposure data from these unwitting human guinea pigs during the testing after they were exposed to a variety of biological and chemical compounds.
The purpose of the Pentagon’s recently concluded, and self-described “exhaustive review” was to provide the veterans involved in the program with all “medically relevant” information the VA and others could possible use to accurately access the potential medical harm done to the servicemen exposed.
Nearly 6,000 servicemen have been confirmed to have been involved in the program and were exposed to a wide variety of biological and chemical compounds while serving on ships at sea and elsewhere. The great majority of the test subjects were exposed without their informed consent or knowledge of what was going on at the time. A larger and still undetermined number of civilians were also exposed to many of the same materials as part of “Project SHAD.”
DoD and VA officials who testified in 2002 before Congress in series of hearings about what they said they knew about “Project SHAD” did little to clarify the record. DoD witnesses flat-out lied to Congress in 2002, either through direct action, negligence or incompetence. The misleading testimony included failure to provide details about the facts concerning “Project SHAD,” the use of “human test subjects” in particular, and the collection of human exposure data.
DoD and VA officials also gave misleading and false testimony about sailors falling ill at the time of exposure and failed to provide accurate details about the decades long history of the Army and DoD denying the program’s very existence along with stonewalling the release of any information about it.
Robert Bates, a key SHAD vet spotlighted in the 2000 CBS expose and a plaintiff in the federal lawsuit, finally received a disability claim denial letter from the VA in August 2002, two years after reopening his claim after learning the truth about “Project SHAD” from watching the CBS Reports. The letter told him that he had in fact been exposed to a bacterium called B-G while he was a participant in the SHAD program onboard the troop transport USS Navarro in 1963.
The VA letter also acknowledged that his service medical records documented that he had contracted pneumonia at the time of his exposure to the bacterium. The VA letter went on to state that this direct exposure could have caused his illness. However, the VA went on to deny Mr. Bate’s claim for service connected disability in relation to this or any serious illness he has in relation to his participation in “Project SHAD,” saying it was only “remotely possible” that this exposure was the reason for his illness.
Bates is still waiting for all the data collected during his unknowing use as a human test subject in “Project SHAD.” The DoD, Army and VA should quit playing games with the lives of America’s SHAD veterans and their families once and for all. Bates and the thousands of other Navy sailor like him who were tuned into human guinea pigs without their informed consent deserve all the facts about “Project SHAD.”
Eric Longabardi is an award-winning independent TV producer and investigative journalist based in Los Angeles. He can be reached at bagcam@pacbell.net.
http://www.sftt.org/cgi-bin/csNews/csNews.cgi?database=DefenseWatch.db&command=viewone&op=t&id=347&rnd=917.036319326288
Sempers,
Roger
:marine:
Guest Column: A Belated Admission on ‘Project SHAD’
By Eric Longabardi
Over the past three years, Department of Defense officials have claimed that they were “investigating” the facts surrounding “Project Shad,” the Cold War-era chemical and biological experiments involving thousands of unwitting U.S. Navy sailors.
The internal DoD probe, coming after 40 years of Pentagon silence and denials on details of the still classified experiments since they took place in the 1960s, remains a work in progress.
The truth about Project SHAD and the Pentagon's denials were initially proven false by a series of CBS News investigative reports I produced, “Secret Germ Warfare Experiments?”, that began airing May 15, 2000. The reports were based on never-before seen internal Army SHAD reports and declassified films of the secret testing. In addition, the reports interviewed former sailors who were exposed to chemical and biological compounds while their ships were secretly targeted in “Project SHAD.”
I previously I wrote about Project SHAD in Defensewatch on Nov. 7, 2002 (“Sad Lessons from a Cold War Secret”).
Since September 2001, the Pentagon has released what it calls “fact sheets” and other limited information concerning the dozens of “Project SHAD” tests. So far, the DoD still refuses to acknowledge the use of “human test subjects” without informed consent and also continues to deny the existence of any “medically relevant” human exposure data collected during the program.
Last month, after four decades of obfuscation and denial, the DoD was dealt another serious blow to its credibility on the truth about “Project SHAD.” In a sworn deposition last Dec. 11 in Washington, D.C., former “Project SHAD” scientist Dr. J. Clifton Spendlove repeatedly reconfirmed under oath what had been documented and exposed by CBS News nearly four years ago.
A former Army scientist, Spendlove confirmed that his team had used unwitting human test subjects in the design and execution of the program. Spendlove himself preferred the term “human samplers,” apparently thinking so little of the Navy men used in his secret human testing that he referred to them oa one point as nothing more than mere “boat drivers.”
The deposition is part of an ongoing civil lawsuit filed against various DoD, Army and other officials on behalf of nearly two dozen former Navy sailors. The suit alleges that DoD, Army and VA officials have covered up and withheld information about the SHAD program in an attempt to shield the government from potential liability and public embarrassment.
But a simple confirmation is not sufficient.
The facts revealed to date show that the Army, which directed “Project SHAD,” had set out to use the sailors as “human test subjects” who were deliberately kept in the dark about it. Moreover, the project managers collected specific human exposure data from these unwitting human guinea pigs during the testing after they were exposed to a variety of biological and chemical compounds.
The purpose of the Pentagon’s recently concluded, and self-described “exhaustive review” was to provide the veterans involved in the program with all “medically relevant” information the VA and others could possible use to accurately access the potential medical harm done to the servicemen exposed.
Nearly 6,000 servicemen have been confirmed to have been involved in the program and were exposed to a wide variety of biological and chemical compounds while serving on ships at sea and elsewhere. The great majority of the test subjects were exposed without their informed consent or knowledge of what was going on at the time. A larger and still undetermined number of civilians were also exposed to many of the same materials as part of “Project SHAD.”
DoD and VA officials who testified in 2002 before Congress in series of hearings about what they said they knew about “Project SHAD” did little to clarify the record. DoD witnesses flat-out lied to Congress in 2002, either through direct action, negligence or incompetence. The misleading testimony included failure to provide details about the facts concerning “Project SHAD,” the use of “human test subjects” in particular, and the collection of human exposure data.
DoD and VA officials also gave misleading and false testimony about sailors falling ill at the time of exposure and failed to provide accurate details about the decades long history of the Army and DoD denying the program’s very existence along with stonewalling the release of any information about it.
Robert Bates, a key SHAD vet spotlighted in the 2000 CBS expose and a plaintiff in the federal lawsuit, finally received a disability claim denial letter from the VA in August 2002, two years after reopening his claim after learning the truth about “Project SHAD” from watching the CBS Reports. The letter told him that he had in fact been exposed to a bacterium called B-G while he was a participant in the SHAD program onboard the troop transport USS Navarro in 1963.
The VA letter also acknowledged that his service medical records documented that he had contracted pneumonia at the time of his exposure to the bacterium. The VA letter went on to state that this direct exposure could have caused his illness. However, the VA went on to deny Mr. Bate’s claim for service connected disability in relation to this or any serious illness he has in relation to his participation in “Project SHAD,” saying it was only “remotely possible” that this exposure was the reason for his illness.
Bates is still waiting for all the data collected during his unknowing use as a human test subject in “Project SHAD.” The DoD, Army and VA should quit playing games with the lives of America’s SHAD veterans and their families once and for all. Bates and the thousands of other Navy sailor like him who were tuned into human guinea pigs without their informed consent deserve all the facts about “Project SHAD.”
Eric Longabardi is an award-winning independent TV producer and investigative journalist based in Los Angeles. He can be reached at bagcam@pacbell.net.
http://www.sftt.org/cgi-bin/csNews/csNews.cgi?database=DefenseWatch.db&command=viewone&op=t&id=347&rnd=917.036319326288
Sempers,
Roger
:marine: