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"My unit's orders were to carpet bomb the valley. I didn't ask why, but the commanding officer said a guerilla army had infiltrated the base and killed some civilians. As far as I knew, no one was allowed in the valley except for military personnel and D.O.D., but when I flew over I could see there were fires going and people on horses; but my orders were to carpet bomb, which I did."
-- USAF Lieutenant Colonel Charles Henderson May, as dictated to R.N. Ellen Stone, Fairfax Military Hospital, Virginia, March 14th 2003
B MOVIES
There is a record that Drs. Travis and Mabel Mountjoy met with film director Enoch Jeffries in the spring of 1972 at his studios north of Burbank. The purpose of that meeting -- between 17-year-old astrophysicists and a low-budget filmmaker -- was never recorded by Jeffries Studios' receptionist, but his crew and a selection of actors he had worked with in the past left for a shoot in the desert suddenly one afternoon in April 1974. Jeffries -- an early contemporary of indie-cinema giants Russ Meyer and Roger Corman, and one of cinema's earliest African-American directors -- was known to be under investigation for violating certain federal laws while making films, which has led some to hypothesize that he had been coerced by the government into participating in what would be known as Operation EMU. One of his actors, Francine Dean (pictured above in Jeffries' motion picture "Jungles of Mars," courtesy of the Enoch Jeffries Estate) had recently been charged with tax evasion, which would explain her need to participate in an experiment that may or may not have offered immunity for past offenses. Where they all went and what service they performed is not clear. But according to the Colonel Byron L. Copping (see quote here) in the Air Force's official statement on EMU, "it is factual that NASA had intended to produce simulated environments for astronaut trainees, knowing or unknowing, using performance artists and props in a reasonable manner, but there is no record they did so on this date, at this place or in this fashion."
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