Jon Ronson - The Men Who Stare at Goats

Jon Ronson

The Men Who Stare at Goats

2004

In 1979 a secret unit was established by the most gifted minds within the U.S. Army. Defying all known accepted military practiceand indeed, the laws of physicsthey believed that a soldier could adopt a cloak of invisibility, pass cleanly through walls, and, perhaps most chillingly, kill goats just by staring at them. Entrusted with defending America from all known adversaries, they were the First Earth Battalion. And they really werent joking. Whats more, theyre back and fighting the War on Terror. With first-hand access to the leading players in the story, Ronson traces the evolution of these bizarre activities over the past three decades and shows how they are alive today within the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and in postwar Iraq. Why are they blasting Iraqi prisoners of war with the theme tune to Barney the Purple Dinosaur? Why have 100 debleated goats been secretly placed inside the Special Forces Command Center at Fort Bragg, North Carolina? How was the U.S. military associated with the mysterious mass suicide of a strange cult from San Diego? The Men Who Stare at Goats answers these and many more questions. Ronsons Them: Adventures with Extremists, a highly acclaimed international bestseller, examined the paranoia at the fringes of hate-filled extremist movements around the globe. The Men Who Stare at Goats reveals extraordinaryand very nuttynational secrets at the core of George W. Bushs War on Terror.

T his is a true story. It is the summer of 1983. Major General Albert Stubblebine III is sitting behind his desk in Arlington, Virginia, and he is staring at his wall, upon which hang his numerous military awards. They detail a long and distinguished career. He is the US armys chief of intelligence, with 16,000 soldiers under his command. He controls the armys signals intelligence, their photographic and technical intelligence, their numerous covert counter-intelligence units and their secret military spying units, scattered throughout the world. He would be in charge of the prisoner-of-war interrogations too, except this is 1983, and the war is cold, not hot.

He looks past his awards to the wall itself. There is something he feels he needs to do even though the thought of it frightens him. He thinks about the choice he has to make. He can stay in his office or he can go into the next office. That is his choice. And he has made it.

He is going into the next office.

General Stubblebine looks a lot like Lee Marvin. In fact, it is widely rumoured throughout Military Intelligence that he is Lee Marvins identical twin. His face is craggy and unusually still,, like an aerial photograph of some mountainous terrain taken from one of his spy planes. His eyes, forever darting around and full of kindness, seem to do the work for his whole face.

In fact he is not related to Lee Marvin at all. He likes the rumour because mystique can be beneficial to a career in intelligence. His job is to assess the intelligence gathered by his soldiers and pass his evaluations on to the deputy director of the CIA and the Chief of Staff for the Army, who in turn pass it up to the White House. He commands soldiers in Panama, Japan, Hawaii and across Europe. His responsibilities being what they are, he knows he ought to have his own man at his side in case anything goes wrong during his journey into the next office.

Even so, he doesnt call for his assistant, Command Sergeant George Howell. This is something he feels he must do alone.

Am I ready? he thinks. Yes, I am ready.

He stands up, moves out from behind his desk and begins to walk.

I mean, he thinks to himself, what is the atom mostly made up of anyway? Space!

He quickens his pace.

What am I mostly made up of? he thinks. Atoms!

He is almost at a jog now.

What is the wall mostly made up of? he thinks.

Atoms! All I have to do is merge the spaces. The wall is an illusion. What is destiny? Am I destined to stay in this room? Ha, no!

Then General Stubblebine bangs his nose hard on the wall of his office.

Damn, he thinks.

General Stubblebine is confounded by his continual failure to walk through his wall. Whats wrong with him that he cant do it? Maybe there is simply too much in his in-tray for him to give it the requisite level of concentration. There is no doubt in his mind that the ability to pass through objects will one day be a common tool in the intelligence-gathering arsenal. And when that happens, well, is it too naive to believe it would herald the dawning of a world without war? Who would want to screw around with an army that could do that General Stubblebine, like many of his contemporaries, is still extremely bruised by his memories of Vietnam.

These powers are attainable, so the only question is, by whom? Who in the military is already geared towards this kind of thing? Which section of the army is trained to operate at the peak of their physical and mental capabilities?

And then the answer comes to him.

Special Forces!

This is why, in the late summer of 1983, General Stubblebine flies down to Fort Bragg in North Carolina.

Fort Bragg is vasta town guarded by armed soldiers, with a mall, a cinema, restaurants, golf courses, hotels, swimming pools, riding stables and accommodation for 45,000 soldiers and their families. The general drives past these places on his way to the Special Forces Command Centre. This is not the kind of thing you take into the mess hall. This is for Special Forces and nobody else. Still, hes afraid. What is he about to unleash?

In the Special Forces Command Centre, the general decides to start soft. Im coming down here with an idea, he begins. The Special Forces commanders nod.

If you have a unit operating outside the protection of mainline units, what happens if somebody gets hurt? he says. What happens if somebody gets wounded? How do you deal with that?

He surveys the blank faces around the room.

Psychic healing! he says.

There is a silence.

This is what were talking about, says the general, pointing to his head. If you use your mind to heal, you can probably come out with your whole team alive and intact. You wont have to leave anyone behind. He pauses, then adds, Protect the unit structure by hands-off and hands-on healing!

The Special Forces commanders dont look particularly interested in psychic healing.

OK, says General Stubblebine. The reception hes getting is really quite chilly. Wouldnt it be a neat idea if you could teach somebody to do this?

General Stubblebine rifles through his bag and produces, with a flourish, bent cutlery.

What if you could do this? says General Stubblebine. Would you be interested?

There is a silence.

General Stubblebine finds himself beginning to stammer a little. Theyre looking at me as if Im nuts, he thinks to himself. I am not presenting this correctly.

He glances anxiously at the clock.

Lets talk about time! he says. What would happen if time is not an instant? What if time has an X-axis, a Y-axis and a Z-axis? What if time is not a point but a space? At any particular time we can be anywhere in that space! Is the space confined to the ceiling of this room, or is the space twenty million miles? The general laughs. Physicists go nuts when I say this!

Silence. He tries again.

Animals! says General Stubblebine.

The Special Forces commanders glance at one another.

Stopping the hearts of animals, he continues. Bursting the hearts of animals. This is the idea Im coming in with. You have access to animals, right?

Uh, say Special Forces. Not really

General Stubblebines trip to Fort Bragg was a disaster. It still makes him blush to recall it. He ended up taking early retirement in 1984. Now, the official history of army intelligence, as outlined in their press-pack, basically skips the Stubblebine years, 1981-4, almost as if they didnt exist.