Thursday, April 28, 2005

Hillenkoetter to Menzel - "No MJ-12"



Here's a conundrum for the MJ-12 proponents - if Vice Admiral Roscoe Hillenkoetter (above) and Dr. Donald Menzel were members of MJ-12, or any other group designed for a similar purpose, why would Hillenkoetter write Menzel the following private letter on September 19, 1963 (as Hillenkoetter dated it)?

"Dear Dr. Menzel:

Please accept my deepest apologies for the delay in answering your letter of 2 August, as well as the acknowledgment of the receipt of your book. I was away for some time during the summer and the Navy Department forwarded your letter to my home where I was a long time receiving it.

Thank you very much for your book. To my mind, it was very well done and I enjoyed it and found it of great interest. I should say that you have effectively put to rest all surmises about flying saucers being from 'outer space.' You have done a thorough and praiseworthy job.

As I told you at the last 'Ends of the Earth', I resigned from NICAP about twenty months ago feeling that it had degenerated from an organization honestly trying to find out something definite about possible unknowns, into a body bickering about personalities. The Air Force, too, could have helped by not being so secretive.

At all events, you have done a fine job and I am very grateful you were so kind as to send me your book.

Again with kind thanks and the hope of seeing you at the next 'Ends of the Earth', please believe me.

Most cordially,

[Signed]

R. H. Hillenkoetter
Vice Admiral, U.S.N. (Ret.)"

A couple of questions in particular:

1. Hillenkoetter singled out the Air Force as being "so secretive" - why make this statement if he was "in" on the secret, either as one-time director of the CIA, or as a member of MJ-12?

2. Hillenkoetter, in giving his reason for leaving NICAP, stated that it was no longer interested in finding out the truth behind the "possible unknowns" - if he knew already the truth as a member of MJ-12, why would he care?

3. If Menzel and Hillenkoetter were both on MJ-12, wouldn't Menzel know Hillenkoetter's home address, and have sent the book there, rather than sending it to the Navy (Hillenkoetter was retired, after all) to forward on to Hillenkoetter?

Now, conspiracy types and MJ-12 stalwarts will no doubt look at this letter and conclude that it was all some sort of code - that this was just part of the elaborate cover-up.

But does this make sense, particularly when this was a private letter, that neither the author nor the recipient would have expected to see the light of day?

Of course not.

Paul Kimball

2 comments:

RRRGroup said...

But Paul, let us suppose that Hillenkoeter and even Menzel were MJ-12 members, and privy to what Mj-12 indicates: crashed saucers and visitations by alien beings.

Would that necessarily clarify what the real unknowns were, or what the ultimate UFO truth is?

The telling statement is how NICAP became a bickering organization, fraught with egotists, which I address elsewhere here at your blog.

Of course Hillenkoeter doesn't seem like or act like a guy who was in on something as profound as alien visitation.

But, Menzel, good "soldier" that he was, that's another matter. And Menzel may well have been part of a secret government (the Invisible College?) in on the best UFO evidence available.

(And I'll have more to write about Menzel at our blog, upcoming.)

Rich Reynolds

Paul Kimball said...

Rich:

I look forward to anything you come up with re: Dapper Don Menzel and his Double Life.

As for Hilly, Donny and MJ-12, just another bullet in the chamber.

Paul

P.S. Ufologists have egos? Good lord, stop the presses! Headline - "Ufologists Humans After All"