I posted a short blurb on the Realityuncovered forum about Mr. Taylor's comment. This resulted in a brief conversation between myself and James Carlson as to how Taylor's comment effected our on-going theory for Echo Flight's shut down. Both of us concluded that it helped in one fashion or another.
Earlier in the week Robert Hastings posted on the forum with the following:
Thank you for bringing Mr. Taylor's statement to everyone's attention, Tim.
So, according to one of his former USAF colleagues, Minuteman targeting officer Bob Jamison was talking about UFOs shutting down missiles at Malmstrom AFB, in 1967, while he was at Chanute AFB in the late 1960s--even though Taylor didn't take that seriously.
Gee, I'm confused. According to James Carlson, such claims didn't surface until the mid-1990s, when Bob Salas started making them up to help sell books on the topic.
Predictably, James tries to spin Taylor's statement, saying, "He seems to imply at the very least that Bob Jamison never discussed the incident in any context with UFOs as early as 1969, and that he may, in fact, have gone on the record that early with a complete denial insofar as the whole alien schtick is concerned."
Only Carlson could come up with that interpretation of Taylor's statement. Such is the smell of desperation.
Taylor actually says that Jamison's account was not well received: "The UFO part was, to my recollection, never taken seriously--either a practical joke, misunderstood comment or strictly secondhand hearsay."...
and:
As one will learn, the UFO aspect of the missile shutdown was not a joke or a secondhand account, as Taylor speculates. It was formally mentioned to Jamison and the assembled targeting teams at Malmstrom's MIMS hanger, both during their briefing and debriefing. I have no doubt that Jamison mentioned all of that to Taylor but that he has forgotten it with the passage of time. Or maybe his anti-UFO biases simply made him incapable of hearing what Jamison was telling the group of instructors.
So, in the usual Hastings fashion, first is the obligatory "trashing" of James Carlson. Those Axis II traits (Narcissism and Arrogance with a dash of Passive Aggressiveness) are hard for Hastings to suppress, but not to be unexpected.
Second, according to Robert, Mr. Taylor's comments are/were the product of a fading memory based on the passage of time, or...his anti-UFO biases has made him "incapable of hearing what Jamison was telling the group of instructors." Yet, we don't really know what Jamison told the group one way or another. So Hastings basically "shoots" the messenger because he perceives Taylor's comment as not conforming to his own point of view...cognitive ego centrism at its best. Ironically, Taylor never states whether he believes in UFOs, or not.
Hastings' handful of witnesses always seem to have cognitive clarity coupled with crystal clear memories, yet when someone in a position to provide counter information comes forward, even with a short blog comment, Hastings views the individual to be suffering from memory distortion due to the "passage of time." A rather paradoxical problem, one would think?
Here is Mr. Taylor's comments as posted on this blog:
Thanks for a most interesting report. I served with (then Capt.) Bob Jamison at Chanute AFB where we were both instructors in the Minutemnan Missile Maintenance Officer's Course. And I do recall occasional office discussion about a number of missiles suddenly going off Strategic Alert at Malmstrom. Electrical and electronic glitches in the Minuteman System were not all that unique- it was an extremely complex weapons system. The UFO part was, to my recollection, never taken seriously- either a practical joke, misunderstood comment or strictly secondhand hearsay. No one in our instructor group seriously thought extraterrestrials were behind this event. But the Air Force DID take EMP seriously. I was sent TDY to Boeing in 1969 for training on a new EMP detection system to be installed in each LCF. The training message was that ALL EMPs, not just those of a nuclear nature, were cause for concern. Grant Taylor Cabot, VT on Did UFOs Disable Minuteman Missiles at Malmstrom AFB in 1967?
Taylor never specifically says that Jamison talked about UFOs at Malmstrom. Its possible that it can be inferred that he did, but we don't know if any of the other instructors were at Malmstrom during the time period of the shutdowns and were the sources for the office discussions. Taylor never revealed what missile wing that he was assigned to prior to his stationing at Chanute. Wouldn't be important that he might have been assigned to Minot or FE Warren in the mid-1960s, being that he could shed some light on those "UFO" incursions?
Taylor states that there was occasional talk about missiles suddenly dropping off alert at Malmstrom and he provides the insightful qualifier that "electrical and electronic glitches" in the Minuteman system were not that unique. I might add that this has been a theme that I've talked about in numerous blog postings, so Taylor backs up my assertions. Things break, especially complex things such as an ICBM.
Taylor gives the impression that the UFO angle was discussed, but not taken seriously by the group of instructors. This easily follows my past assertions that UFO rumors were very rampant, but not taken seriously.
Mr. Taylor's thoughts tend to back up Eric Carlson's statements to Ryan Dube, in that the Echo shutdown was common knowledge and there was no attempt by the Air Force to suppress the incident. It was the talk of Great Falls, Mt and evidently was a subject of discussion on Chanute AFB, Il. some two years later.
Given Hastings', and others, claims that Echo Flight was a highly classified UFO event with Carlson and Figel forced to sign non-disclosure documents and coupled with an Air Force cover-up attempt, isn't it strange that a bunch of Air Force officers were freely discussing it at a SAC training school? This kind of defies common logic that the Malmstrom incident was a cover-up.
Lastly, Mr. Taylor touched on the issue of EMPs, yet it's glossed over by Hastings. EMPs were areas of interest. I mentioned this in my "Loggy Ebb" article detailing SAC's efforts to provide enhanced EMP protection for the Titan II ICBM complexes showing a correlation that Malmstrom' EMP noise pulse issue resulted in a SAC-wide review of potential vulnerabilities.
Overall, I had viewed Mr. Taylor's short comment as somewhat refreshing and revealing in its own right. I hope that other former AF members will feel free to post comments in the future.
Question for Robert: How many current/former Air Force members contacted you stating that they had never saw or heard of UFOs during their tour of duty?
