February 24, 2017 • 57 mins
At the close of the Paris Peace Accords, the US and Vietnam agreed to return any POWs to their home country -- however, for decades after the close of the conflict, people in country reported seeing missing American soldiers, sometimes held by foreign officials, sometimes on their own in the jungle. So what happened to the hundreds of missing soldiers in the Vietnam War... and how much did the US government actually know about i99t?
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. M Hello,
(00:22):
and welcome back to the show. My name is Matt,
my name is known. They called me Ben and you're
you the most important part of this show, which is,
of course stuff they don't want you to know. Ladies
and gentlemen, if this is your first time listening, thank
you so much for dropping by. We we hope that
you come by later to then I have to clear
(00:44):
the air here. You did all of your intro with
your eyes covered but forcefully, sort of a pained expression
on your face. What was that about, I'm I'm good.
Are my eyes like back to regular? Almost? Oh? Do
they do that flippy things where they yeah, yeah? Are
you doing the reptilian stuff in the studio? I asked
you to do that. But we got pretty deep into
(01:05):
that Reptilian episode. We got a lot of a lot
of really interesting listener mail. Well, it came to a
point where we were all just thinking with a hive mind,
and I wonder if we should if we were on
the fence about whether we should have cut the part
where for like seventeen minutes we spoke in unison. Yeah,
I wonder if did you notice that? I just didn't
(01:26):
know what language it was. But today we are not
talking about lizard people. Today we were talking about, uh,
something something completely different as they used to see, perhaps
a Monty python. We are talking about what is popularly
known in the US as the Vietnam War. Um. If
(01:50):
you are someone who is Matt or nol or Eye's age,
then you likely have relatives, if you're in the U
S who have been involved in that conflict, and if
not an even at least seen platoon right, yes, or
any of the pieces of popular media that have come
out since the nineteen seventies. Sure, Rambo, First Blood, Apocalypse
(02:12):
Now which is my personal favorite, Forrest Gump, even Forrest
Gump even yes, and this, Um, So, the Vietnam War,
what what the U S usually refers to it as
is the American incursion with the idea of preventing the
rise of communism in Southeast Asia. That was the official
(02:35):
advertisement on the tin when it was sold to the
American public. Uh this later Uh this this later expanded
past Vietnam into Cambodia and Lao. This this war has
had a lastening and um a lasting and profound effect
(02:58):
both on the people of the US and the people
of Vietnam, as well as arguably the people of Russia
or the Soviet Union at the time, because it ended
up being a giant proxy war, right, yeah, exactly, And
the Vietnam Wars we consider it began in nineteen fifty five.
(03:18):
Direct US involvement officially ended with the signing of a
treaty called the Agreement on Ending the War and Restoring
Peace in Vietnam. A little yeah, it's it's a little undernose.
I guess they had to spell it out, you know. Uh.
And that was on January nine, seventy three. This document
(03:40):
is most often known as the Paris Peace Accords. The
war itself didn't end until seventy five with the fall
of Saigon. But what what did this agreement do? Well?
The agreement itself actually resulted in the release of five
ninety one American prisoners of war, of whom five sixty
(04:00):
six were military and twenty five were civilians. Um. In
addition to that, it established a framework for cooperation and
resolving the po w m I A related questions. So
prisoners of war and missing in action, and there were
there were quite a few questions about that. So yeah,
and because of this, from February nineteen seventy three to
(04:21):
April nineteen seventy three, Uncle Sam conducted what was called
Operation Homecoming, and this returned prisoners war to the United States.
It rescued five hundred and ninety one in total. So
as of twenty sixteen, around one thousand, six twenty one
Americans are still officially considered missing or unaccounted for for
(04:42):
some reason or another during this Vietnam conflict, the Vietnam War,
or whatever else it was called at the time. And
this may be a point where many many of us
are listening in the audience may be saying, wait, you
guys just sort of glossed over the Vietnam War. All
of a sudden, it's ended. This is not exactly about
(05:04):
the Vietnam War or the conflict in Southeast Asia. Because
the US has identified two hundred and nineties six individuals
as last known alive cases in all of Southeast Asia,
and following full investigations, by March of the Defense Department
confirmed the wartime death of two hundred and forty five
(05:26):
of these individuals too, there um to their official standards,
because this, friends is the official narrative. However, in the
decades since the withdrawal of US troops, numerous former military officials,
government officials, and members of the public believe that this country,
the United States of America, left service members behind in
(05:49):
Vietnam and Cambodia and in Laos and Cambodia. Allows as
particularly sticky subjects, as in many many cases, the US
was not supposed to be up there, and they were officially, um,
we're not there. And a lot of these people don't
just believe that they were left behind, you know, as in,
oh oops, we left a bunch of our servicemen behind. No,
(06:13):
they think it was done on purpose, and that the
US government has not only not been looking for these
missing soldiers, but actively obstructing any searches and covering up
the entire affair for the last forty odd years, right,
almost half a century. Double yikes, double yis why would
why would people think that this is an extraordinarily common
(06:37):
belief here in the US. And and we don't know
this is a very US specific topic, right, so we're
not sure, you know, how Australian listeners feel about this,
European listeners or listeners in uh, China or Vietnam and
specific around the world. So do right in and let
(06:58):
us know if you have heard of this before, which
is considered a miscarriage of justice by some and an
out and out conspiracy theory by others. So why on
earth would the government do something like that. Let's look
at sort of the evolution of this suspicions about remaining
(07:19):
service and then start almost immediately after the signing of
the Paris Peace Accords with we we're just going to
call him that because, as you pointed out, that name
is a it's a mouthful. Yeah. No, I like the
Paris piece of cords. That's got a nice ring to it.
The other one is just like, who's d LDR? Who
are we going to save some money on paper? Guys
(07:39):
like So this is right, You're right that things were
very tacky back man. Yeah, well there were longer names,
is what I'm saying for things. Um, yes, all it is.
It is true. This is a related point for anybody
who was not alive in nineteen seventy three, all names
(08:01):
were actually longer, every single one. The United States of
America was actually the United States of Cooperative Municipalities with
the intention to act in concert of America. COMMA named
after Amerigo Vespucci. Yes dot com. Yeah yeah, that's actually
(08:25):
where the internet comes from? Is that that name? Facts?
Ladies and gentlemen, these are facts, alternative facts. Perhaps we're
perhaps if this sounds crazier, this is the first time
you're hearing it, we invite you to check out our
earlier podcast on the Mandela Effect. So President Nixon at
(08:45):
the end of this he states that all the POW's
have been returned and now at the time, the US
listed two thousand six d forty six Americans as unaccounted for,
including about and fifty prisoners of war or missing an
action and roughly reported killed in action but the body
not recovered, which is, you know, in all seriousness, a
(09:10):
a profound tragedy, you know, because what happens to the
closure for those families, I would think not incredibly uncommon,
though maybe that's a high number, but you know, you're
in a war situation where bodies can be completely obliterated
by you know, explosions, where you're not going to have
any remains, but it's too difficult to retrieve them without
(09:34):
any commanding officer even knowing a general location absolutely or
you know, a general fate. That that's I mean, war
is one of the most brutal inventions of our society.
And you know, okay, arguably humans didn't invent it, because
it has been documented that other primates have large scale
(09:56):
UH conflicts or at least tribal level conflicts. But humans
have taken it to an insidious art form. And you're
you're absolutely right, it's it's odd to have such precise numbers.
And for people who are not familiar with this, the
Vietnam War from the us I had some of the
(10:18):
best documentation for war of its kind, so we are
able to know more of these numbers than we would know,
for instance, in World War two. Right, But Nolan is
absolutely right. People disappear in war, you know, and that's
(10:39):
the that's the question. So there's this there's this one
thing that that is kind of a a spark point.
It's the turn back now or or you know, delve
into the murky stuff that occurs when there's a very
low number of POW's returned from Laos and this causes
immediate concern because the pen of gone in secret meetings, right,
(11:02):
not really revealed to the public. I thought there would
be as many as forty or forty one prisoners held there,
um only if you have been known to be captured
for certain And a tiny, like a negligible amount of
people came back, like three or something, and the responsibility
for finding these missing soldiers fell to you're gonna You're
gonna like this one fell to the Defense Prisoner of
(11:25):
War slash Missing Personnel Office and the Joint po w
M I A accounting commands. Can we at least make
it a sexy acronym? I know, right, well, you will
be happy to know all that in the National Defense
Authorization Act combined to those two agencies into one, so
thank god, and along with one other thing. But yeah,
(11:51):
onto the end, yeah the ride the movie dot com.
So Then in the nineteen seventies and eighties, the the relatives,
the family and friends of all of these missing personnel
started getting agitated because as you do, uh, they started
becoming politically active, and they start requesting that the United
(12:12):
States reveal what steps they were taking, what steps they
took and continue to take to follow up on their
missing relatives and their loved ones like what kind of
intelligence do you have with regards to these missing and
action soldiers? Right, they started demanding accountability. And regardless of
what you personally believe in terms of politics or the
(12:36):
role of governments and state versus federal, local, what have you. Uh,
accountability should be key in any of these things. And
accountability goes both ways, you know what I mean, to
the citizen as well as to the institutions. So this,
this is a good move, and this is this move
is saying initially saying, just well, tell us what you're doing,
(13:01):
you know what I mean, shed some light on this process,
because these people could very well be alive. In some cases,
they just know when they were last seen alive and
it was years ago, right where was months ago? So
this is almost a black box for these relatives and
(13:21):
these loved ones. So initial inquiries revealed that important information
had not been pursued, and so many families and their
supporters asked for the public release of these records and
called for full investigation. So when we say important information
and not been pursued, we're saying stuff like um an
(13:42):
intelligence agency intercepts a radio transmission from Thailand that details
they the details they've cited um a work camp, you know,
with like eleven people who are clearly not Vietnamese, Cambodian
or Lovation, and that they're being held after the war
(14:03):
is something. But then the intelligence agency on the U
S I would say, well, that's Thailand, you know what
I mean, We're gonna trust this foreign intercept or whatever.
We just sit on it because it's not it doesn't
seem like it's pertinent to any major investigation you're doing,
right then right? And then also, you know, there's a
fair question like how do you discern the belogne from
(14:28):
the what's a better meat than Bologne? Thereso tereso, you know,
a good generous salami? Yeah, okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. How
do you separate the bologna from the thereso and good
genoa salami? It's tough. It's tough in the intelligence community. Yeah,
And you can't send people out to investigate every single one.
(14:50):
It's just not possible. I mean you can, you can
try your hardest, but it is a part of my
French here it is it can sometimes be a no
win situation. Well, it's like you get bogged down in
this idea that bureaucracy is inherently inefficient and massive and
you know, and a pain. And then he realized that
the only reason it exists is to manage the massive
(15:11):
and inefficient and painful, you know what I mean. So
it's like you can't really fault it every time for
not being able to be everything to everybody, right, and
and on that perspective too, it might be a damned
if you do, damned if you don't situation, because like,
think about it. So if okay, everybody listening, let's say
all of us are the CIA in the seventies and eighties. Congratulations,
(15:36):
were sorry, I had to find out this way. So
one of us gets one of us, one group of
us gets a report that says, all right, foreign radio
intercept has said that has identified you know, a dozen
people in a remote area being working in forced agriculture.
Then the question becomes as as we, already, being a
(15:57):
large organization, say like a, well, if we don't investigate this,
then there is a risk that we will have we
will have screwed. But if we do investigate this and
we don't find anything, then we will be roasted over
the coals for you know, frivolous government spending or something
(16:21):
or since you know, listeners, you and Matt Noel and
I are now part of this fictional CIA or Another
thing is if we delve into this, is it going
to interfere with other active operations that we have in
the area. Yeah. Well, and here here's the craziest part.
(16:41):
This idea that the government isn't doing everything it can
do to get the loved ones of these people back.
That is a polarizing concept, and that if you latch
onto that, let's say, as a politician in the public sector,
then you're you're going to get some votes from a
(17:01):
good number of people if you're championing this idea that
the government is not doing everything it can do, or
even like a faction of the government because of certain leanings,
maybe even you can kind of characterize it as a
political issue rather than just a matter of unmanageable situations.
You know. Well, and it doesn't even matter if you, uh,
(17:24):
the person running truly believes there, right, Yeah, unfortunately, I
mean that's the rule with a lot of political stuff,
you know. And and this is this is an issue that, um,
this is an issue that politicians have investigated or advocated
on any political strike. Ross Perow was very big into
(17:45):
um trying to discover the truth behind this and did
believe that there were people left behind an abandoned uh.
John Kerry, John McCain, George H. W. Bush like it.
It goes across the spectrum. And George W. Bush was
c I A at least for a time. Yes, is
anybody do you ever become not c I A. We've
(18:07):
had this discussion before. I think you're right. You are
always like at least in the club. I feel like
you have to be. You've got information if you've been
in the CIA that we we can't let you into
the wrong hands. It's like being the president. Maybe when
you the president and you're referred to as they don't
really call you the former president, do they? They call
you the president Mr? Presidents And yeah, yeah, people don't
(18:31):
call you Jimmy anymore. People don't happens to you. You're
you become someone else entirely in your mind, is not
your own. It's true. Man. And if you've seen those
before and after pictures of every president since the invention
of photography, as it will wear you down, especially the
black and white ones where the bags under the eyes
are so incredible, just like pools it's crazy. Man. Well, um,
(18:55):
while we're on this subject, we do have to examine
this because this didn't just stop in the in the seventies.
This didn't just stop, um like with a hard stop
and a couple of investigations. This we're on and on
and on, and they're tantalizing hints two different parts of
this story. And we're going to give you a few
(19:18):
after a word from our sponsors. Let's begin looking at
a few examples here. The first one comes from nineteen
seventy nine. The gentleman whose name is Bobby Garwood, Private
(19:39):
Bobby Garwood. He returned to the United States and seventy
nine after fourteen years living as a prisoner of war.
Now he says, he he says, claims that he was
one of many soldiers still being held in Vietnam and
several other countries in the Jason area, like you said,
Ben laos Uh, several others um So. The United States
(20:01):
denied these allegations, and furthermore, they claimed that Garwood was
actually a collaborator. He was in on the whole thing.
He wasn't a prisoner, that he went over the hill
and turned coat. Right. He was reportedly released in nineteen
seventy three with some other American POWs, but he did
not return to the United States until March twenty second,
nineteen seventy nine. During that time, he was listed as
(20:25):
either having volunteered or been forced into a work group
repairing a generator at a re education camp. Other reports
described him as working in Island Fortress or being a
driver and vehicle mechanic WHOA When he gets back in
seventy nine, over a period of eleven months, he faces
a general court martial at Camp Lejon, North Carolina, because
(20:47):
other Marines testified like other not just Marines, but other
service members testified seeing him in action with VC with Vietcong,
so he uh. He was found not guilty of desertion
or solicitation of U S troops in the field to
(21:07):
defect or maltreatment U. He was convicted in one of
communicating with the enemy and the assault of an American
pow at a camp and that violates the Uniform Code
of Military Justice. He was the court martial sentenced in
the reduction to a private forfeiture of all pay and allowances,
(21:28):
dishonorable discharge, but he was not confined. He appealed his
conviction was upheld. Robert Garwood says that he saw other
American POWs after nineteen seventy three, and he insists that
he himself had been a prisoner for fourteen years. Um
many of the POWs who claimed have seen him collaborated
(21:50):
with the enemy also feel he should not have been
court martial because that's the thing, you know, it's if
he is if he was imprisoned, and which is a
story that the American public will probably never know him
full if it was in prison, was he forced to
cooperate or did he choose to you know, it gets
(22:11):
it gets sticky, sou so according to this guy, and
according to the people who believe that there were purposefully
abandoned POWs or service members uh in in country after
seventy three, this guy has been silenced because he's telling
the truth. But to other people two critics of that belief,
(22:33):
he is trying to cover his own you know, cover
his own high courts, which at this point you can,
you can easily go down a rabbit hole of who
said what and what happened where, But the facts remain
he was not convicted of collaborating with the enemy. Then
(22:53):
we have an investigation led by John Kerry in Senator
carry Um was the head of a select committee investigation
into the intelligence services process UM searching for remaining POWs
in Vietnam. There were two former Defense secretaries, Melvin Laird
and James Schlessinger, who said the Nixon administration most definitely
(23:18):
knew that there were still POWs in Vietnam after the
close of Operation Homecoming. The investigation also revealed that thousands
of files from the n s A on missing soldiers
which were written during the war, were completely ignored by
intelligence services after the war. UM and then after two
(23:39):
years the Kerry Committee came to the conclusion that there
was no compelling evidence that any American soldiers were still
being held. Um not just in Vietnam, but in any
Southeast Asian countries felt that this was definitively the case.
Um and then a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist, Sydney Schauenberg,
accused the committe of assisting in a government cover up.
(24:03):
And I mean, if you kind of have a government
cover up, what better smoke screen for than a you know,
tireless investigation that supposedly puts all of these concerns too bad,
Just like Jeff k assassination. Just like the nine eleven Commission,
we got a way of something around for the public
to latch onto and say, oh no, no, it's fine.
See see see look at all this paper. These are
(24:25):
very long names. Yes, I know that sounds flippants, but
for people who were opponents of that investigation or thought
it was a cover up, this was It was exactly
the same kind of tactic, right, And it's very important
to say that what we're doing is exploring the different
(24:45):
views of this side. We're not casting aspersion on any
service member or any government official. We're just telling you
where these people stand on what they say and where
they disagree. And the people who said like that this
was a cover up, these were not fringe members of society,
you know, as an all said Politzer Prize winning journalists,
(25:07):
this became an increasingly common belief. It was a very
unpopular war. People were at people were at odds on
all sorts of levels, and distrust of the government was
very high. So of course it seems like something that
would happen, you know, and that one of the big
questions would be, well, what is the motivation? And so
(25:31):
when the official narrative came came down and you know
veterans like John Kerry veterans, right, John McCain, veterans, these
these um former military members who were serving in federal
government came back and said, you know, we gave it
our best shot, and we tried to figure out what
(25:53):
was going on, and this is what we found. Even then,
people wouldn't believe the whole story. They felt like this
was all spoken mirrors and this got another, um, I guess,
another dose of high octing conspiratorial fuel just uh like
(26:15):
during the during the investigation in the belief that they
were abandoned soldiers or remaining POW's got a new burst
of high acting conspiratorial fuel. At a summit June, Boris
Yeltson was talking to NBC News and this was reported
by the New York Times, and apparently he said that
(26:36):
some Americans captured during the Vietnam War were apparently transferred
from Hannoi to labor camps in the Soviet Union, and
he added that some of them may still be alive
at that time, possibly in psychiatric hospitals. Ladies and gentlemen,
we have a clip from that conversation. Yes, n want, Yes,
(26:57):
Mr Yelson For years that have been rooms in the
United States that American POWs from the Vietnam War would
transferred from Vietnam to the Soviet Union. Do you know
that to be true? Now archives have shown that it
is true. Some of them were transferred to the territory
of the former USSRUH, some were kept in labor games. Yeah,
(27:22):
we don't have a complete data, and we can only
surmise that some may still be alive. That is a
bomb drop right in the in the American public, in
the heart of the American consciousness, which that anatomy metaphor
doesn't check out. So don't think about it too much.
But we do want to say to have to have
(27:43):
a diplomat like there are at the time as the
Prime minister at the high level for an official Yeah,
to have have to say this was during glassmost so
kind of a peace offering to Um, I do want
to win everybody out there listening to know that we
had a very in depth conversation about who should do
the exit. That's why I was trying not to crack up.
(28:06):
But um you you guys would make great re enactors,
you know, you know, maybe maybe we should get into
re enactments. Oh Man at the end, Johnny dangerous strick. So, yes,
who would these soldiers have been? This is a strange thing.
(28:26):
And I followed up offline with some military sources to
ask about this, and it's people who would asked not
to be identified on the show. So the people I
spoke with believe that the US probably did leave some
people behind, but not not on purpose, like not as
(28:46):
a institutional thing. Like you don't get elected president and
then someone gives you an envelope and says, never ask
about these missing six people or something. What they said
happened is that anybody taken to the U s s R.
Who was captured would have to be a high value
intelligence agent of some sort, so maybe a company man
(29:08):
from the CIA, maybe military naval intelligence, because otherwise what
what would be the use of that expensive and dangerous transport,
you know, And they would probably take them by boat
instead of by plane, because if a boat goes down,
there's a lot less evidence than if a plane goes down.
I can imagine it being a an implanted agent, maybe
(29:31):
even so specifically was captured to be taken there if possible.
I know that sounds insane. It sounds like something even
that would never happen. But I can imagine it being
like something that happens a set up, turn coat of
some way, or you know what I mean, like a
double agent. Yeah, and it's it's tough to know. It's
(29:54):
tough to know where someone's real allegiances lie or if
they have real allegiances. Is that a double double cross?
Many crosses are being doubled there? Yeah, is the quadruple across,
triple across, the quadruple across. I guess it just depends
on when you want to stop or when they stopped
(30:15):
believing theoretically go on crossing indefinitely and just be like
the most this the most untrustworthy person. It can only last,
I think. I think eventually they're just getting get tired
of it, um, which would be very dangerous. But you know,
a lot of times these people, if so, we know
(30:36):
it's probably a small percentage of the missing people, but
of that small percentage went there, um, their lives very
well could have been a living hell, you know what
I mean, especially if they possess secrets that exist only
in their in their minds, the private secrets of one
of the world's great superpowers. That's a very dangerous collection
of thoughts to have ownership over, and because of questions
(31:01):
like this, right because Boris y Eelson admits that there
were people spirited away because they're continual or there they're
numerous radio intercepts saying oh, we've seen people living, or
there are people in country who say, oh, I've seen
this guy is not Vietnamese. Why is he living in
(31:22):
this cave, you know, with these ripped up clothes, And
also to a degree in cultural consciousness because of you know,
the stories of World War Two survivors, especially in the
Japanese army, who were living as though the war had
never ended, and in some cases didn't know it had.
Because of all these cases, it seems not impossible that
(31:45):
there could have been people left behind, whether purposely or accidentally,
or whether it's bonds anyone's control. But several of the
privately funded expeditions by veterans Love One survivors um several
of those expeditions got dogged by accusations of fraud. People
(32:08):
would say, well, the government, being this big, inefficient bureaucracy
is not going to be able to effectively do this,
or they don't care because what is one human life
and the great abattoir of geopolitics. So with the best
of intentions, people got together and said, we're going to
go find this and we're going to search either for
following up on evidence of living people or following up
(32:30):
on evidence of remains. And not in all cases, but
in many cases you would see stories of someone accepting
a bunch of money buying a boat and the boat
never left the dock in Thailand, and they were beguiling people,
They were conning them with the worst thing. It reminds
(32:53):
me of our conversation we had had before about people
who claimed to contact the dead on behalf of the living.
You know, are they are they just exploiting people sometimes
or do they really believe it? No, this is not
to say, ladies and gentlemen, that these missions were not genuine.
Many were, and there are people who claimed that they
that they found evidence of recent survivors. But just for perspective,
(33:20):
let's talk about a fairly recent hopes. That's right, the
John Hartley hoax. UM, in a documentary, portrayed a man
claiming to be the missing assumed dead soldier by the
name of John Hartley robertson Um and in the film,
this person met with surviving family members and convinced them
(33:44):
he was their relative. Later DNA test revealed that this
was not the case. And so this points to an
issue that potentially could have come from a lot of
these things that we're talking about is folks bilking relatives
supposed long lost relatives, whether out of money or support
(34:06):
in some way. UH. And nowadays, with you know, crowdsourcing, crowdfunding,
that's a lot easier to do than it used to be,
and it's also a lot easier to find potential marks
for this type of activity. If you want to know
more about that documentaries specifically about John Hartley. UH. It
is called Unclaimed. It's pretty great. I remember seeing trailer
(34:30):
for it not long ago and getting interested in it.
It's I think when I saw it um when it
came out, I would recommend it. It's a fascinating, intriguing
story that looks at what happens when family members are
given this chance to reconnect with someone who they think
is a long lost loved one, but then it turns
(34:52):
out to be a nightmare. And it's one of those
things too, where put yourself in the position of a
family member like that, where someone who for all intents
and purpose has been dead to you for years, you're
given what you see as a second chance. I mean,
who among us wouldn't maybe be a little blindsided by
that to to to to the point where maybe you
might not have your wits about you. It's a pretty
(35:15):
horrible thing to take advantage of someone's vulnerability like that. Well, guys,
I think one thing that plays in just about all
of this discussion is the myriad ways that in a
war zone situation, people can and will be ultimately left behind.
There's a lot of conditions, a lot of variables at play.
(35:37):
It's some scary stuff, um, and I think we should
talk about some of that stuff. But first let's take
a quick sponsor break. So, yes, you know what, you're right.
One thing is for sure, a lot of people ended
up missing. A lot of American soldiers ended up missing
(35:58):
during the Vietnam conflict, during the war um and for
very variety of reasons, a whole bunch of reasons. So
let's look at the most likely possibilities. One is that
some men were killed, They're killed in action, and then
their bodies are either burned or disposed of somehow by
(36:19):
the enemy by in this case of viet Cong, and
they will never be found ever, probably unless you know,
a big excavation occurs, uh in the jungle somewhere buried
in unmarked graves, right ye, buried, burned. I mean, they're
all kinds of reasons. Grilla forces often wouldn't have the
capability to transport a hostage or the desire, and this
(36:41):
this is why death is killed in action or KIA
is the most prominent possibility. Unfortunately, and even more unfortunately,
we can't know how many of these people still missing
are in fact, you know, expired or died in this way.
Another possibility is that they deserted. And there are very
(37:04):
strange stories here. Um. Some return to the United States
under false pretenses or false identities. So the Matt Frederick
who shipped off for comes back with the new identity,
which is what would your fake IDB Enrique Iglesias Jr.
(37:25):
LEA I like is a subtle I would just be
Steban Esteban. It's nice with the with the accent mark
over it. No, oh, there's a story to Esteban. No
within question mark sure, And I of course would be
(37:45):
Max Powers. Comma asked her not with the secret that's
you know, blends in. But some others escaped to nearby
countries like Australia, right, or a different neighboring country, or
went to Canada, and some indeed found homes inside Vietnam.
This means that there is a possibility, of very small possibility,
(38:08):
that some former soldiers living in Southeast Asia simply don't
want to be found. And we have to consider how
much time has passed now, right, so these people would
be on the older end of the human spectrum. There's
one example of how things kind of go off the
rails and this and that's a Vietnam era legend that
(38:31):
we learned about in the course of our research. It's
a place called Soul City. This rumor, this was rumored
to be a district in suburban Saigon that was the
domain of many US deserters, mainly African American, and that
they became a drug a drug empire essentially running heroin, racketeering, weapons, prostitution,
(38:55):
and it was an enclave. Officially, this has not been confirmed,
so we we can't speak. I don't I don't know
about you guys, but I was not in Vietnam. So
we can't speak to the veracity of that. If anyone
listening has firsthand experience or can confirm it, we would
(39:15):
like to hear about not just that, but other enclaves
if they were around yes, yes, and there's and and
also to what degree this stuff was true, was it
actually how big? Was it actually if it existed? Or
was it just a couple of people who were entrepreneurs.
And there's another. A lot of the reality here is unfortunate.
(39:39):
When Saigon fell on April nineteen seventy five, North Vietnamese
forces swept through the country and through other cities like wildfire,
and they did not take prisoners. Did they find deserters
probably most likely? Were they friendly to those deserters, probably not?
(40:00):
Uh is, So this would have ended some of those
some of those um communities, those you know, even more
secret communities. And this leads us to our conclusion. The
current US position is that there were no purposely abandoned soldiers,
(40:23):
and efforts to locate the remains of those who died
in country continue with full international support today, so support
from the Laoisian, Cambodian and Vietnam and Vietnamese government. Now
there's something to consider here. Guys, we haven't. We kind
of touched on, but not really. What about the missions
(40:44):
that only what how many people would know at the
top of the CIA if it was a secret mission
like compartmentalized intelligence. Yeah, I mean a handful of human
beings wouldn't know if there are secret missions going on.
And you can almost guarantee you that this was occurring
during wartime. There the CIA is going to be having
(41:06):
special operations that nobody knows about. The black black bag,
black black ops. And this doesn't have to just be um.
This doesn't just have to be the CIA's involvement. This
could also be naval and military intelligence right deep cover
(41:28):
stuff or deep incursions. And also, let's consider how many
other popular conspiracy theories this is touching on, which would
be what if some of those missions involved drug trafficking
to finance something illegal that needed plausible deniability. So we
(41:52):
were also talking off air. Um Noah, a marine who
now works in I T did not have experience in Vietnam,
but brought up a very interesting point that I had
not considered there. When I asked this marine about the likelihood,
I wanted to hear what service members thought of the
(42:14):
likelihood of purposefully abandoned po ws M a's and this
marine said that they totally believe it could happen, and
that we should also look into the current assets of
(42:34):
the U. S military around the world, estimated as to
be in one and thirty five countries in some capacity,
who are all sort of unnamed assets, you know, uh,
functioning and in g O or in a consular position.
Who if the if their cover gets blown, have to
(42:56):
provide their own exit strategy and they do not you know,
they do not exist? Um? Yeah, and would they? Would
those people be counted in those numbers? Right? That's that's
a crucial question. And then there's there's another question that
we kind of talked about h off air, which is
(43:18):
sort of motivation. Right, Well, I mean, I don't know
in all this, I've been wondering what you guys think
would be the most compelling reason that the US government
would a purposefully leave their own troops behind and then
be trying to cover up. I guess to cover up
is inherent in doing the bad thing. So maybe we
(43:38):
can skip too, But why what's to what end? But
we're talking six separate presidential administrations, right, and that's the
very definition of a of a conspiracy, or it could
just be deep state cover up. But why Matt, Yeah,
what's the motivation? That's I could I could imagine a
couple of things. So in the short term, in the
(43:59):
short game, if there's a desire for political leverage and
post war negotiations, then that could have occurred. But the
Paris Peace Accords had explicitly contained a framework for resolving
POW situations for the U. S side, then it's quite
possible that and there were things that would put that
(44:22):
would make Uncle Sam's hands too dirty, and then they
war crimes and that they cut they cut these people loose,
or they just didn't look into it very deeply. And
you know, we're talking a lot about We're talking a
lot about very murky, very questionable things on both sides,
(44:43):
especially if there are people who are alive, who are
who were held and rendered invisible to history. That's a
very dangerous thing. And it can happen wrisily than people think.
It's not just something that happened under the reign of Stalin.
It can happen today. Two people, um and two and
and honestly, for not just the black bag operative types
(45:08):
uh In in the U s Army. But for anyone
whom I have died or been captured or disappeared from
the official narrative history, to these unnamed heroic women and
men across the planet in every nation, we do hope
you and your loved ones find peace, because often these
people are used as pollens, and I think that could
(45:30):
be a motivation. Are you guys familiar with the my
Lime massacre? Unfortunately? Yeah, I mean so there was actually
a uh task force I guess you could say, established
the Vietnam War Crimes Working Group in the wake of
photographic evidence of what was thought to be a massacre
of women and children. Uh. It's the kind of thing
(45:51):
you see depicted in some of these films we're talking about,
like in a Platoon there's a sequence where some of
this goes down, and also in um uh Apocalypse now
um specifically Implatune though, But anyhow, uh, you know, and
the purpose of this group was to investigate emerging claims
(46:12):
of war crimes by US military during Vietnam. And you know,
if there was a reason to perhaps let some people
stay lost, maybe some folks saw some things and could
have corroborated some things and had some attacks of conscience
that would have maybe made Uncle Sam, as you said,
(46:34):
Ben have a little bit more blood on their hands
than they wanted. And politically, you know, that could have
been bad. It was a very unpopular war. We were
there for a very very long time, far longer than
we intended to be, and we lost a lot of people,
and you know, it was just a very unpopular place
to be and you know, there was a lot of
(46:54):
clean up that had to be done in order to
kind of wash our hands of some of that. And
you know, this kind of stuff, these kind of stories
not exactly helping with the pr narrative, right right, well said,
And to Matt's point, you know, this doesn't have to
be an entire government. This could be compartmentalized intelligence deep state.
(47:17):
You know, it's it's distressing, but at certain levels, at
certain institutions, it only takes a few people to keep
powerful secrets. So it's more again of a black box,
and we could be in a situation where hundreds of
thousands of people are doing their level best. Like the
(47:37):
Army has special branches that go out into that part
of the world every year with full cooperation to find remains,
and they find them. That's the thing they're they're still
finding bodies, but the question is that somebody else obstructed
and so do our presidents aware of it? Because UM
(47:58):
the Barack Obama administration also pressed for further cooperation investigating
entities am I A cases h during a during another summit.
So within recent years and at present, it seems some
probably did die in combat, some probably did dessert, and
(48:21):
some are probably living or have lived under assumed identity,
under assumed identities in somewhere in the world. Many of
those in that third group may have already died of
natural causes, living an entirely different life from the one
they left behind in the jungle. As for the prisoners,
(48:45):
no matter how much we go back and forth, we
may never know for sure. You can go and find
a wealth of live sightings and wealth of people insisting
they've done this. But Bobby Garwood was a controversial returning figure.
And uh the case that we mentioned earlier, the Hartley hoax,
(49:09):
it did turn out to be a hoax. The DNA
didn't match. UM have added fuel to both camps, the
people who believe that they were abandoned POWs and the
people who believe that there were not And so we
close our episode today, we want to hear from you
what is what in your experience is plausible here? Is it?
(49:31):
Is it possible that the US cut operation cut servicemen
and operator operators loose uh to preserve what was seen
as greater stability at the time. Is this conspiracy theory
that people are milking for political gain? Um? And yes,
we have not touched on any of the other Vietnam
(49:51):
related conspiracies. The legends of real life Colonel Kurtz is
allah heart of Darkness, Apocalypse now the effects of Agent
Orange and more so right to us and let us
know what we should cover. If you do want to
write to us, you can find us on Facebook where
we are Conspiracy Stuff, or on Twitter also conspiracy Stuff.
You can find us on Instagram Conspiracy Stuff Show. And
(50:15):
if you don't like that stuff, you can always send
us an email. Uh, but we'll we'll tell you how
to do that later. Yes. Yes, First it's time for
shut at Corner. Our first shout out comes from Carlton.
Carlton says, in your recent episode you mentioned G and
I have a quick and dirty way for pretty much
(50:37):
anyone to feel it. You say, yeah, so dirty. Thank you, Carlton. Uh.
Carlton says, First, you should sit upright or stand. Okay,
I'm gonna do this as I say it, all right,
with both feet pointed straight out forward at your shoulders length. Okay. Second,
you need to reach out your hands and palms facing
(50:58):
towards each other. So palms facing each other, hands out.
The elbow should be bent at about forty five degrees,
so there's ninety let's do Now. Your fingers should form
a claw pointed to each other. Then you close your eyes,
calm your breath, and slowly close the space in between
(51:20):
your hands, as if you're holding an imaginary apple sized sphere. Now,
if you're calm enough, you will feel that your fingertips
already felt pressure, but not because of direct contact. If
you reach this step, then you can move the entire
palm back and forth to experience an odd feeling similar
to the repellent force of two magnets. It almost sounds
(51:43):
like you're starting at kama maya or you know, a
fireball can style? Yeah, how do you can style? That's
really cool. It's interesting because it ties into the one
of the largely unacknowledged senses of the human body. Propri
RECEPTIONE write the sense of where your limbs are in
(52:04):
space when you're not looking at them. And I got
up and tried it. I think I'm gonna have to
do it when I'm not shotgunning so much coffee. Yeah,
and you know we're recording a podcast, but thank you, Carlton.
We have that now. Now you have that, you the
listener of this voice, and uh, let's all try it
together sometime or at least separately, and then come back
(52:25):
and yeah, let's try and write to us and let
us know. Everybody, give everybody, give Carlton's technique a shot
and let us know how it works out for you.
I'm going to try it some more later we're off air.
Our second shout out today comes from Andrew. Andrew says, Hi, guys,
I think that the I think the conspiracy that the
Russian version of nine eleven Russian apartment bombings was really
(52:49):
a false flag operation orchestrated by and for Putin. That's
Vladimir Putin to rise to power. And that would make
for a really great podcast and a timely when given
all the talk about Russia and Putin these days. Anyhow,
keep up the good work that is crazy. By the way,
I didn't know anything about this until Andrew wrote to us,
(53:10):
and I just did some quick searching on the subject
to see what it was all about. I'd never heard
of it. It's I think three separate cities that got bombed,
like four apartment complexes or more, all around the same time,
and it was all blamed on certain groups, and it
started groups. Yeah, and it started the church another checking
(53:31):
in conflict. And apparently it really it really did help
Rise putin too power or at least somewhat. I yeah,
we'll have to look into that. Finally, we have a
shout out from Philippa Philippa. Um either either one of
those not either one of the two, probably, but I'm
(53:53):
throwing them both out there just to cover my basis. Um,
my husband isn't what you'd call psychic, but his gut
feelings are correct. Well, that's what I would call psychic.
But that's pretty cool. Uh. He also has an annoying
habit of knowing what I'm going to say before I
say it, even if it's totally off topic, and he
can predict who he'll see that day. He works in
(54:16):
a record shop, and if he hasn't seen a regular
customer for a while. He'll usually know before he starts
work that they will come by that day. He also
has a ghost who follows him around. Yeah, that's what
it says here, a ghost who follows him around. And
numerous people have seen weird stuff happen when they've been
with him. Well, here's to keeping it, keeping it interesting,
(54:38):
keeping it fresh and weird in your relationship. Uh. It
sounds like an interesting guy. And I would love to
hear more if anyone has clairvoyant partners out there. Um,
much more than just finishing each other's sandwiches. We want
to hear about that kind of stuff, because I I
(54:59):
don't know anyone like that. I often, Um, I think
I know what my girlfriend's about to say, and uh,
and and stumble into trying to say it for her,
and she usually just shoots me a dirty look because
I'm wrong and it's rude. Yeah, it turns into you
trying to man splain something exactly her own thoughts. I'm
also interested to know, Philippa Philippa Philippa. I think I'm
(55:23):
also interested to know if your husband predicted that this
listener mail would be read out loud. Oh, I can
imagine it right now he wakes up, honey, turned on
the podcast box conspiracy talking about right now this moment.
(55:45):
That is not what Philip Philippa's husband sounds like. She
also but she says she's from rural southwest to England,
by the way, and she says there was a wart
charmer in her neighborhood in her town, wart charmer who
could charm the warts off you. Is that the same
as charming the pants off you? Exact same thing. That's
a pants charmer, I believe, not to split hairs or
(56:07):
pants or words. Well, this concludes our gosh, and this
concludes our episode today, but not hopefully knock on wood,
our show itself. We will be back next week. What
are we covering next week? Do we have a little
bit of a teaser we could give people? Well, next
(56:28):
week we're covering delicious, delicious yet deadly deadly sugar m Yes,
you're like, well now at first it's so, it's like, yes,
it's sickly sweet, and there is a conspiracy afoot, not
(56:49):
a theory. If you would like to know more, please
tune in and in the meantime, go easy on the
SODA's just in case you don't want anyone to be
listening to a hospital that was a dark way to
end it. All right, so right to us, we are
conspiracy at how stuff works dot com.
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. M Hello,
(00:22):
and welcome back to the show. My name is Matt,
my name is known. They called me Ben and you're
you the most important part of this show, which is,
of course stuff they don't want you to know. Ladies
and gentlemen, if this is your first time listening, thank
you so much for dropping by. We we hope that
you come by later to then I have to clear
(00:44):
the air here. You did all of your intro with
your eyes covered but forcefully, sort of a pained expression
on your face. What was that about, I'm I'm good.
Are my eyes like back to regular? Almost? Oh? Do
they do that flippy things where they yeah, yeah? Are
you doing the reptilian stuff in the studio? I asked
you to do that. But we got pretty deep into
(01:05):
that Reptilian episode. We got a lot of a lot
of really interesting listener mail. Well, it came to a
point where we were all just thinking with a hive mind,
and I wonder if we should if we were on
the fence about whether we should have cut the part
where for like seventeen minutes we spoke in unison. Yeah,
I wonder if did you notice that? I just didn't
(01:26):
know what language it was. But today we are not
talking about lizard people. Today we were talking about, uh,
something something completely different as they used to see, perhaps
a Monty python. We are talking about what is popularly
known in the US as the Vietnam War. Um. If
(01:50):
you are someone who is Matt or nol or Eye's age,
then you likely have relatives, if you're in the U
S who have been involved in that conflict, and if
not an even at least seen platoon right, yes, or
any of the pieces of popular media that have come
out since the nineteen seventies. Sure, Rambo, First Blood, Apocalypse
(02:12):
Now which is my personal favorite, Forrest Gump, even Forrest
Gump even yes, and this, Um, So, the Vietnam War,
what what the U S usually refers to it as
is the American incursion with the idea of preventing the
rise of communism in Southeast Asia. That was the official
(02:35):
advertisement on the tin when it was sold to the
American public. Uh this later Uh this this later expanded
past Vietnam into Cambodia and Lao. This this war has
had a lastening and um a lasting and profound effect
(02:58):
both on the people of the US and the people
of Vietnam, as well as arguably the people of Russia
or the Soviet Union at the time, because it ended
up being a giant proxy war, right, yeah, exactly, And
the Vietnam Wars we consider it began in nineteen fifty five.
(03:18):
Direct US involvement officially ended with the signing of a
treaty called the Agreement on Ending the War and Restoring
Peace in Vietnam. A little yeah, it's it's a little undernose.
I guess they had to spell it out, you know. Uh.
And that was on January nine, seventy three. This document
(03:40):
is most often known as the Paris Peace Accords. The
war itself didn't end until seventy five with the fall
of Saigon. But what what did this agreement do? Well?
The agreement itself actually resulted in the release of five
ninety one American prisoners of war, of whom five sixty
(04:00):
six were military and twenty five were civilians. Um. In
addition to that, it established a framework for cooperation and
resolving the po w m I A related questions. So
prisoners of war and missing in action, and there were
there were quite a few questions about that. So yeah,
and because of this, from February nineteen seventy three to
(04:21):
April nineteen seventy three, Uncle Sam conducted what was called
Operation Homecoming, and this returned prisoners war to the United States.
It rescued five hundred and ninety one in total. So
as of twenty sixteen, around one thousand, six twenty one
Americans are still officially considered missing or unaccounted for for
(04:42):
some reason or another during this Vietnam conflict, the Vietnam War,
or whatever else it was called at the time. And
this may be a point where many many of us
are listening in the audience may be saying, wait, you
guys just sort of glossed over the Vietnam War. All
of a sudden, it's ended. This is not exactly about
(05:04):
the Vietnam War or the conflict in Southeast Asia. Because
the US has identified two hundred and nineties six individuals
as last known alive cases in all of Southeast Asia,
and following full investigations, by March of the Defense Department
confirmed the wartime death of two hundred and forty five
(05:26):
of these individuals too, there um to their official standards,
because this, friends is the official narrative. However, in the
decades since the withdrawal of US troops, numerous former military officials,
government officials, and members of the public believe that this country,
the United States of America, left service members behind in
(05:49):
Vietnam and Cambodia and in Laos and Cambodia. Allows as
particularly sticky subjects, as in many many cases, the US
was not supposed to be up there, and they were officially, um,
we're not there. And a lot of these people don't
just believe that they were left behind, you know, as in,
oh oops, we left a bunch of our servicemen behind. No,
(06:13):
they think it was done on purpose, and that the
US government has not only not been looking for these
missing soldiers, but actively obstructing any searches and covering up
the entire affair for the last forty odd years, right,
almost half a century. Double yikes, double yis why would
why would people think that this is an extraordinarily common
(06:37):
belief here in the US. And and we don't know
this is a very US specific topic, right, so we're
not sure, you know, how Australian listeners feel about this,
European listeners or listeners in uh, China or Vietnam and
specific around the world. So do right in and let
(06:58):
us know if you have heard of this before, which
is considered a miscarriage of justice by some and an
out and out conspiracy theory by others. So why on
earth would the government do something like that. Let's look
at sort of the evolution of this suspicions about remaining
(07:19):
service and then start almost immediately after the signing of
the Paris Peace Accords with we we're just going to
call him that because, as you pointed out, that name
is a it's a mouthful. Yeah. No, I like the
Paris piece of cords. That's got a nice ring to it.
The other one is just like, who's d LDR? Who
are we going to save some money on paper? Guys
(07:39):
like So this is right, You're right that things were
very tacky back man. Yeah, well there were longer names,
is what I'm saying for things. Um, yes, all it is.
It is true. This is a related point for anybody
who was not alive in nineteen seventy three, all names
(08:01):
were actually longer, every single one. The United States of
America was actually the United States of Cooperative Municipalities with
the intention to act in concert of America. COMMA named
after Amerigo Vespucci. Yes dot com. Yeah yeah, that's actually
(08:25):
where the internet comes from? Is that that name? Facts?
Ladies and gentlemen, these are facts, alternative facts. Perhaps we're
perhaps if this sounds crazier, this is the first time
you're hearing it, we invite you to check out our
earlier podcast on the Mandela Effect. So President Nixon at
(08:45):
the end of this he states that all the POW's
have been returned and now at the time, the US
listed two thousand six d forty six Americans as unaccounted for,
including about and fifty prisoners of war or missing an
action and roughly reported killed in action but the body
not recovered, which is, you know, in all seriousness, a
(09:10):
a profound tragedy, you know, because what happens to the
closure for those families, I would think not incredibly uncommon,
though maybe that's a high number, but you know, you're
in a war situation where bodies can be completely obliterated
by you know, explosions, where you're not going to have
any remains, but it's too difficult to retrieve them without
(09:34):
any commanding officer even knowing a general location absolutely or
you know, a general fate. That that's I mean, war
is one of the most brutal inventions of our society.
And you know, okay, arguably humans didn't invent it, because
it has been documented that other primates have large scale
(09:56):
UH conflicts or at least tribal level conflicts. But humans
have taken it to an insidious art form. And you're
you're absolutely right, it's it's odd to have such precise numbers.
And for people who are not familiar with this, the
Vietnam War from the us I had some of the
(10:18):
best documentation for war of its kind, so we are
able to know more of these numbers than we would know,
for instance, in World War two. Right, But Nolan is
absolutely right. People disappear in war, you know, and that's
(10:39):
the that's the question. So there's this there's this one
thing that that is kind of a a spark point.
It's the turn back now or or you know, delve
into the murky stuff that occurs when there's a very
low number of POW's returned from Laos and this causes
immediate concern because the pen of gone in secret meetings, right,
(11:02):
not really revealed to the public. I thought there would
be as many as forty or forty one prisoners held there,
um only if you have been known to be captured
for certain And a tiny, like a negligible amount of
people came back, like three or something, and the responsibility
for finding these missing soldiers fell to you're gonna You're
gonna like this one fell to the Defense Prisoner of
(11:25):
War slash Missing Personnel Office and the Joint po w
M I A accounting commands. Can we at least make
it a sexy acronym? I know, right, well, you will
be happy to know all that in the National Defense
Authorization Act combined to those two agencies into one, so
thank god, and along with one other thing. But yeah,
(11:51):
onto the end, yeah the ride the movie dot com.
So Then in the nineteen seventies and eighties, the the relatives,
the family and friends of all of these missing personnel
started getting agitated because as you do, uh, they started
becoming politically active, and they start requesting that the United
(12:12):
States reveal what steps they were taking, what steps they
took and continue to take to follow up on their
missing relatives and their loved ones like what kind of
intelligence do you have with regards to these missing and
action soldiers? Right, they started demanding accountability. And regardless of
what you personally believe in terms of politics or the
(12:36):
role of governments and state versus federal, local, what have you. Uh,
accountability should be key in any of these things. And
accountability goes both ways, you know what I mean, to
the citizen as well as to the institutions. So this,
this is a good move, and this is this move
is saying initially saying, just well, tell us what you're doing,
(13:01):
you know what I mean, shed some light on this process,
because these people could very well be alive. In some cases,
they just know when they were last seen alive and
it was years ago, right where was months ago? So
this is almost a black box for these relatives and
(13:21):
these loved ones. So initial inquiries revealed that important information
had not been pursued, and so many families and their
supporters asked for the public release of these records and
called for full investigation. So when we say important information
and not been pursued, we're saying stuff like um an
(13:42):
intelligence agency intercepts a radio transmission from Thailand that details
they the details they've cited um a work camp, you know,
with like eleven people who are clearly not Vietnamese, Cambodian
or Lovation, and that they're being held after the war
(14:03):
is something. But then the intelligence agency on the U
S I would say, well, that's Thailand, you know what
I mean, We're gonna trust this foreign intercept or whatever.
We just sit on it because it's not it doesn't
seem like it's pertinent to any major investigation you're doing,
right then right? And then also, you know, there's a
fair question like how do you discern the belogne from
(14:28):
the what's a better meat than Bologne? Thereso tereso, you know,
a good generous salami? Yeah, okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. How
do you separate the bologna from the thereso and good
genoa salami? It's tough. It's tough in the intelligence community. Yeah,
And you can't send people out to investigate every single one.
(14:50):
It's just not possible. I mean you can, you can
try your hardest, but it is a part of my
French here it is it can sometimes be a no
win situation. Well, it's like you get bogged down in
this idea that bureaucracy is inherently inefficient and massive and
you know, and a pain. And then he realized that
the only reason it exists is to manage the massive
(15:11):
and inefficient and painful, you know what I mean. So
it's like you can't really fault it every time for
not being able to be everything to everybody, right, and
and on that perspective too, it might be a damned
if you do, damned if you don't situation, because like,
think about it. So if okay, everybody listening, let's say
all of us are the CIA in the seventies and eighties. Congratulations,
(15:36):
were sorry, I had to find out this way. So
one of us gets one of us, one group of
us gets a report that says, all right, foreign radio
intercept has said that has identified you know, a dozen
people in a remote area being working in forced agriculture.
Then the question becomes as as we, already, being a
(15:57):
large organization, say like a, well, if we don't investigate this,
then there is a risk that we will have we
will have screwed. But if we do investigate this and
we don't find anything, then we will be roasted over
the coals for you know, frivolous government spending or something
(16:21):
or since you know, listeners, you and Matt Noel and
I are now part of this fictional CIA or Another
thing is if we delve into this, is it going
to interfere with other active operations that we have in
the area. Yeah. Well, and here here's the craziest part.
(16:41):
This idea that the government isn't doing everything it can
do to get the loved ones of these people back.
That is a polarizing concept, and that if you latch
onto that, let's say, as a politician in the public sector,
then you're you're going to get some votes from a
(17:01):
good number of people if you're championing this idea that
the government is not doing everything it can do, or
even like a faction of the government because of certain leanings,
maybe even you can kind of characterize it as a
political issue rather than just a matter of unmanageable situations.
You know. Well, and it doesn't even matter if you, uh,
(17:24):
the person running truly believes there, right, Yeah, unfortunately, I
mean that's the rule with a lot of political stuff,
you know. And and this is this is an issue that, um,
this is an issue that politicians have investigated or advocated
on any political strike. Ross Perow was very big into
(17:45):
um trying to discover the truth behind this and did
believe that there were people left behind an abandoned uh.
John Kerry, John McCain, George H. W. Bush like it.
It goes across the spectrum. And George W. Bush was
c I A at least for a time. Yes, is
anybody do you ever become not c I A. We've
(18:07):
had this discussion before. I think you're right. You are
always like at least in the club. I feel like
you have to be. You've got information if you've been
in the CIA that we we can't let you into
the wrong hands. It's like being the president. Maybe when
you the president and you're referred to as they don't
really call you the former president, do they? They call
you the president Mr? Presidents And yeah, yeah, people don't
(18:31):
call you Jimmy anymore. People don't happens to you. You're
you become someone else entirely in your mind, is not
your own. It's true. Man. And if you've seen those
before and after pictures of every president since the invention
of photography, as it will wear you down, especially the
black and white ones where the bags under the eyes
are so incredible, just like pools it's crazy. Man. Well, um,
(18:55):
while we're on this subject, we do have to examine
this because this didn't just stop in the in the seventies.
This didn't just stop, um like with a hard stop
and a couple of investigations. This we're on and on
and on, and they're tantalizing hints two different parts of
this story. And we're going to give you a few
(19:18):
after a word from our sponsors. Let's begin looking at
a few examples here. The first one comes from nineteen
seventy nine. The gentleman whose name is Bobby Garwood, Private
(19:39):
Bobby Garwood. He returned to the United States and seventy
nine after fourteen years living as a prisoner of war.
Now he says, he he says, claims that he was
one of many soldiers still being held in Vietnam and
several other countries in the Jason area, like you said,
Ben laos Uh, several others um So. The United States
(20:01):
denied these allegations, and furthermore, they claimed that Garwood was
actually a collaborator. He was in on the whole thing.
He wasn't a prisoner, that he went over the hill
and turned coat. Right. He was reportedly released in nineteen
seventy three with some other American POWs, but he did
not return to the United States until March twenty second,
nineteen seventy nine. During that time, he was listed as
(20:25):
either having volunteered or been forced into a work group
repairing a generator at a re education camp. Other reports
described him as working in Island Fortress or being a
driver and vehicle mechanic WHOA When he gets back in
seventy nine, over a period of eleven months, he faces
a general court martial at Camp Lejon, North Carolina, because
(20:47):
other Marines testified like other not just Marines, but other
service members testified seeing him in action with VC with Vietcong,
so he uh. He was found not guilty of desertion
or solicitation of U S troops in the field to
(21:07):
defect or maltreatment U. He was convicted in one of
communicating with the enemy and the assault of an American
pow at a camp and that violates the Uniform Code
of Military Justice. He was the court martial sentenced in
the reduction to a private forfeiture of all pay and allowances,
(21:28):
dishonorable discharge, but he was not confined. He appealed his
conviction was upheld. Robert Garwood says that he saw other
American POWs after nineteen seventy three, and he insists that
he himself had been a prisoner for fourteen years. Um
many of the POWs who claimed have seen him collaborated
(21:50):
with the enemy also feel he should not have been
court martial because that's the thing, you know, it's if
he is if he was imprisoned, and which is a
story that the American public will probably never know him
full if it was in prison, was he forced to
cooperate or did he choose to you know, it gets
(22:11):
it gets sticky, sou so according to this guy, and
according to the people who believe that there were purposefully
abandoned POWs or service members uh in in country after
seventy three, this guy has been silenced because he's telling
the truth. But to other people two critics of that belief,
(22:33):
he is trying to cover his own you know, cover
his own high courts, which at this point you can,
you can easily go down a rabbit hole of who
said what and what happened where, But the facts remain
he was not convicted of collaborating with the enemy. Then
(22:53):
we have an investigation led by John Kerry in Senator
carry Um was the head of a select committee investigation
into the intelligence services process UM searching for remaining POWs
in Vietnam. There were two former Defense secretaries, Melvin Laird
and James Schlessinger, who said the Nixon administration most definitely
(23:18):
knew that there were still POWs in Vietnam after the
close of Operation Homecoming. The investigation also revealed that thousands
of files from the n s A on missing soldiers
which were written during the war, were completely ignored by
intelligence services after the war. UM and then after two
(23:39):
years the Kerry Committee came to the conclusion that there
was no compelling evidence that any American soldiers were still
being held. Um not just in Vietnam, but in any
Southeast Asian countries felt that this was definitively the case.
Um and then a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist, Sydney Schauenberg,
accused the committe of assisting in a government cover up.
(24:03):
And I mean, if you kind of have a government
cover up, what better smoke screen for than a you know,
tireless investigation that supposedly puts all of these concerns too bad,
Just like Jeff k assassination. Just like the nine eleven Commission,
we got a way of something around for the public
to latch onto and say, oh no, no, it's fine.
See see see look at all this paper. These are
(24:25):
very long names. Yes, I know that sounds flippants, but
for people who were opponents of that investigation or thought
it was a cover up, this was It was exactly
the same kind of tactic, right, And it's very important
to say that what we're doing is exploring the different
(24:45):
views of this side. We're not casting aspersion on any
service member or any government official. We're just telling you
where these people stand on what they say and where
they disagree. And the people who said like that this
was a cover up, these were not fringe members of society,
you know, as an all said Politzer Prize winning journalists,
(25:07):
this became an increasingly common belief. It was a very
unpopular war. People were at people were at odds on
all sorts of levels, and distrust of the government was
very high. So of course it seems like something that
would happen, you know, and that one of the big
questions would be, well, what is the motivation? And so
(25:31):
when the official narrative came came down and you know
veterans like John Kerry veterans, right, John McCain, veterans, these
these um former military members who were serving in federal
government came back and said, you know, we gave it
our best shot, and we tried to figure out what
(25:53):
was going on, and this is what we found. Even then,
people wouldn't believe the whole story. They felt like this
was all spoken mirrors and this got another, um, I guess,
another dose of high octing conspiratorial fuel just uh like
(26:15):
during the during the investigation in the belief that they
were abandoned soldiers or remaining POW's got a new burst
of high acting conspiratorial fuel. At a summit June, Boris
Yeltson was talking to NBC News and this was reported
by the New York Times, and apparently he said that
(26:36):
some Americans captured during the Vietnam War were apparently transferred
from Hannoi to labor camps in the Soviet Union, and
he added that some of them may still be alive
at that time, possibly in psychiatric hospitals. Ladies and gentlemen,
we have a clip from that conversation. Yes, n want, Yes,
(26:57):
Mr Yelson For years that have been rooms in the
United States that American POWs from the Vietnam War would
transferred from Vietnam to the Soviet Union. Do you know
that to be true? Now archives have shown that it
is true. Some of them were transferred to the territory
of the former USSRUH, some were kept in labor games. Yeah,
(27:22):
we don't have a complete data, and we can only
surmise that some may still be alive. That is a
bomb drop right in the in the American public, in
the heart of the American consciousness, which that anatomy metaphor
doesn't check out. So don't think about it too much.
But we do want to say to have to have
(27:43):
a diplomat like there are at the time as the
Prime minister at the high level for an official Yeah,
to have have to say this was during glassmost so
kind of a peace offering to Um, I do want
to win everybody out there listening to know that we
had a very in depth conversation about who should do
the exit. That's why I was trying not to crack up.
(28:06):
But um you you guys would make great re enactors,
you know, you know, maybe maybe we should get into
re enactments. Oh Man at the end, Johnny dangerous strick. So, yes,
who would these soldiers have been? This is a strange thing.
(28:26):
And I followed up offline with some military sources to
ask about this, and it's people who would asked not
to be identified on the show. So the people I
spoke with believe that the US probably did leave some
people behind, but not not on purpose, like not as
(28:46):
a institutional thing. Like you don't get elected president and
then someone gives you an envelope and says, never ask
about these missing six people or something. What they said
happened is that anybody taken to the U s s R.
Who was captured would have to be a high value
intelligence agent of some sort, so maybe a company man
(29:08):
from the CIA, maybe military naval intelligence, because otherwise what
what would be the use of that expensive and dangerous transport,
you know, And they would probably take them by boat
instead of by plane, because if a boat goes down,
there's a lot less evidence than if a plane goes down.
I can imagine it being a an implanted agent, maybe
(29:31):
even so specifically was captured to be taken there if possible.
I know that sounds insane. It sounds like something even
that would never happen. But I can imagine it being
like something that happens a set up, turn coat of
some way, or you know what I mean, like a
double agent. Yeah, and it's it's tough to know. It's
(29:54):
tough to know where someone's real allegiances lie or if
they have real allegiances. Is that a double double cross?
Many crosses are being doubled there? Yeah, is the quadruple across,
triple across, the quadruple across. I guess it just depends
on when you want to stop or when they stopped
(30:15):
believing theoretically go on crossing indefinitely and just be like
the most this the most untrustworthy person. It can only last,
I think. I think eventually they're just getting get tired
of it, um, which would be very dangerous. But you know,
a lot of times these people, if so, we know
(30:36):
it's probably a small percentage of the missing people, but
of that small percentage went there, um, their lives very
well could have been a living hell, you know what
I mean, especially if they possess secrets that exist only
in their in their minds, the private secrets of one
of the world's great superpowers. That's a very dangerous collection
of thoughts to have ownership over, and because of questions
(31:01):
like this, right because Boris y Eelson admits that there
were people spirited away because they're continual or there they're
numerous radio intercepts saying oh, we've seen people living, or
there are people in country who say, oh, I've seen
this guy is not Vietnamese. Why is he living in
(31:22):
this cave, you know, with these ripped up clothes, And
also to a degree in cultural consciousness because of you know,
the stories of World War Two survivors, especially in the
Japanese army, who were living as though the war had
never ended, and in some cases didn't know it had.
Because of all these cases, it seems not impossible that
(31:45):
there could have been people left behind, whether purposely or accidentally,
or whether it's bonds anyone's control. But several of the
privately funded expeditions by veterans Love One survivors um several
of those expeditions got dogged by accusations of fraud. People
(32:08):
would say, well, the government, being this big, inefficient bureaucracy
is not going to be able to effectively do this,
or they don't care because what is one human life
and the great abattoir of geopolitics. So with the best
of intentions, people got together and said, we're going to
go find this and we're going to search either for
following up on evidence of living people or following up
(32:30):
on evidence of remains. And not in all cases, but
in many cases you would see stories of someone accepting
a bunch of money buying a boat and the boat
never left the dock in Thailand, and they were beguiling people,
They were conning them with the worst thing. It reminds
(32:53):
me of our conversation we had had before about people
who claimed to contact the dead on behalf of the living.
You know, are they are they just exploiting people sometimes
or do they really believe it? No, this is not
to say, ladies and gentlemen, that these missions were not genuine.
Many were, and there are people who claimed that they
that they found evidence of recent survivors. But just for perspective,
(33:20):
let's talk about a fairly recent hopes. That's right, the
John Hartley hoax. UM, in a documentary, portrayed a man
claiming to be the missing assumed dead soldier by the
name of John Hartley robertson Um and in the film,
this person met with surviving family members and convinced them
(33:44):
he was their relative. Later DNA test revealed that this
was not the case. And so this points to an
issue that potentially could have come from a lot of
these things that we're talking about is folks bilking relatives
supposed long lost relatives, whether out of money or support
(34:06):
in some way. UH. And nowadays, with you know, crowdsourcing, crowdfunding,
that's a lot easier to do than it used to be,
and it's also a lot easier to find potential marks
for this type of activity. If you want to know
more about that documentaries specifically about John Hartley. UH. It
is called Unclaimed. It's pretty great. I remember seeing trailer
(34:30):
for it not long ago and getting interested in it.
It's I think when I saw it um when it
came out, I would recommend it. It's a fascinating, intriguing
story that looks at what happens when family members are
given this chance to reconnect with someone who they think
is a long lost loved one, but then it turns
(34:52):
out to be a nightmare. And it's one of those
things too, where put yourself in the position of a
family member like that, where someone who for all intents
and purpose has been dead to you for years, you're
given what you see as a second chance. I mean,
who among us wouldn't maybe be a little blindsided by
that to to to to the point where maybe you
might not have your wits about you. It's a pretty
(35:15):
horrible thing to take advantage of someone's vulnerability like that. Well, guys,
I think one thing that plays in just about all
of this discussion is the myriad ways that in a
war zone situation, people can and will be ultimately left behind.
There's a lot of conditions, a lot of variables at play.
(35:37):
It's some scary stuff, um, and I think we should
talk about some of that stuff. But first let's take
a quick sponsor break. So, yes, you know what, you're right.
One thing is for sure, a lot of people ended
up missing. A lot of American soldiers ended up missing
(35:58):
during the Vietnam conflict, during the war um and for
very variety of reasons, a whole bunch of reasons. So
let's look at the most likely possibilities. One is that
some men were killed, They're killed in action, and then
their bodies are either burned or disposed of somehow by
(36:19):
the enemy by in this case of viet Cong, and
they will never be found ever, probably unless you know,
a big excavation occurs, uh in the jungle somewhere buried
in unmarked graves, right ye, buried, burned. I mean, they're
all kinds of reasons. Grilla forces often wouldn't have the
capability to transport a hostage or the desire, and this
(36:41):
this is why death is killed in action or KIA
is the most prominent possibility. Unfortunately, and even more unfortunately,
we can't know how many of these people still missing
are in fact, you know, expired or died in this way.
Another possibility is that they deserted. And there are very
(37:04):
strange stories here. Um. Some return to the United States
under false pretenses or false identities. So the Matt Frederick
who shipped off for comes back with the new identity,
which is what would your fake IDB Enrique Iglesias Jr.
(37:25):
LEA I like is a subtle I would just be
Steban Esteban. It's nice with the with the accent mark
over it. No, oh, there's a story to Esteban. No
within question mark sure, And I of course would be
(37:45):
Max Powers. Comma asked her not with the secret that's
you know, blends in. But some others escaped to nearby
countries like Australia, right, or a different neighboring country, or
went to Canada, and some indeed found homes inside Vietnam.
This means that there is a possibility, of very small possibility,
(38:08):
that some former soldiers living in Southeast Asia simply don't
want to be found. And we have to consider how
much time has passed now, right, so these people would
be on the older end of the human spectrum. There's
one example of how things kind of go off the
rails and this and that's a Vietnam era legend that
(38:31):
we learned about in the course of our research. It's
a place called Soul City. This rumor, this was rumored
to be a district in suburban Saigon that was the
domain of many US deserters, mainly African American, and that
they became a drug a drug empire essentially running heroin, racketeering, weapons, prostitution,
(38:55):
and it was an enclave. Officially, this has not been confirmed,
so we we can't speak. I don't I don't know
about you guys, but I was not in Vietnam. So
we can't speak to the veracity of that. If anyone
listening has firsthand experience or can confirm it, we would
(39:15):
like to hear about not just that, but other enclaves
if they were around yes, yes, and there's and and
also to what degree this stuff was true, was it
actually how big? Was it actually if it existed? Or
was it just a couple of people who were entrepreneurs.
And there's another. A lot of the reality here is unfortunate.
(39:39):
When Saigon fell on April nineteen seventy five, North Vietnamese
forces swept through the country and through other cities like wildfire,
and they did not take prisoners. Did they find deserters
probably most likely? Were they friendly to those deserters, probably not?
(40:00):
Uh is, So this would have ended some of those
some of those um communities, those you know, even more
secret communities. And this leads us to our conclusion. The
current US position is that there were no purposely abandoned soldiers,
(40:23):
and efforts to locate the remains of those who died
in country continue with full international support today, so support
from the Laoisian, Cambodian and Vietnam and Vietnamese government. Now
there's something to consider here. Guys, we haven't. We kind
of touched on, but not really. What about the missions
(40:44):
that only what how many people would know at the
top of the CIA if it was a secret mission
like compartmentalized intelligence. Yeah, I mean a handful of human
beings wouldn't know if there are secret missions going on.
And you can almost guarantee you that this was occurring
during wartime. There the CIA is going to be having
(41:06):
special operations that nobody knows about. The black black bag,
black black ops. And this doesn't have to just be um.
This doesn't just have to be the CIA's involvement. This
could also be naval and military intelligence right deep cover
(41:28):
stuff or deep incursions. And also, let's consider how many
other popular conspiracy theories this is touching on, which would
be what if some of those missions involved drug trafficking
to finance something illegal that needed plausible deniability. So we
(41:52):
were also talking off air. Um Noah, a marine who
now works in I T did not have experience in Vietnam,
but brought up a very interesting point that I had
not considered there. When I asked this marine about the likelihood,
I wanted to hear what service members thought of the
(42:14):
likelihood of purposefully abandoned po ws M a's and this
marine said that they totally believe it could happen, and
that we should also look into the current assets of
(42:34):
the U. S military around the world, estimated as to
be in one and thirty five countries in some capacity,
who are all sort of unnamed assets, you know, uh,
functioning and in g O or in a consular position.
Who if the if their cover gets blown, have to
(42:56):
provide their own exit strategy and they do not you know,
they do not exist? Um? Yeah, and would they? Would
those people be counted in those numbers? Right? That's that's
a crucial question. And then there's there's another question that
we kind of talked about h off air, which is
(43:18):
sort of motivation. Right, Well, I mean, I don't know
in all this, I've been wondering what you guys think
would be the most compelling reason that the US government
would a purposefully leave their own troops behind and then
be trying to cover up. I guess to cover up
is inherent in doing the bad thing. So maybe we
(43:38):
can skip too, But why what's to what end? But
we're talking six separate presidential administrations, right, and that's the
very definition of a of a conspiracy, or it could
just be deep state cover up. But why Matt, Yeah,
what's the motivation? That's I could I could imagine a
couple of things. So in the short term, in the
(43:59):
short game, if there's a desire for political leverage and
post war negotiations, then that could have occurred. But the
Paris Peace Accords had explicitly contained a framework for resolving
POW situations for the U. S side, then it's quite
possible that and there were things that would put that
(44:22):
would make Uncle Sam's hands too dirty, and then they
war crimes and that they cut they cut these people loose,
or they just didn't look into it very deeply. And
you know, we're talking a lot about We're talking a
lot about very murky, very questionable things on both sides,
(44:43):
especially if there are people who are alive, who are
who were held and rendered invisible to history. That's a
very dangerous thing. And it can happen wrisily than people think.
It's not just something that happened under the reign of Stalin.
It can happen today. Two people, um and two and
and honestly, for not just the black bag operative types
(45:08):
uh In in the U s Army. But for anyone
whom I have died or been captured or disappeared from
the official narrative history, to these unnamed heroic women and
men across the planet in every nation, we do hope
you and your loved ones find peace, because often these
people are used as pollens, and I think that could
(45:30):
be a motivation. Are you guys familiar with the my
Lime massacre? Unfortunately? Yeah, I mean so there was actually
a uh task force I guess you could say, established
the Vietnam War Crimes Working Group in the wake of
photographic evidence of what was thought to be a massacre
of women and children. Uh. It's the kind of thing
(45:51):
you see depicted in some of these films we're talking about,
like in a Platoon there's a sequence where some of
this goes down, and also in um uh Apocalypse now
um specifically Implatune though, But anyhow, uh, you know, and
the purpose of this group was to investigate emerging claims
(46:12):
of war crimes by US military during Vietnam. And you know,
if there was a reason to perhaps let some people
stay lost, maybe some folks saw some things and could
have corroborated some things and had some attacks of conscience
that would have maybe made Uncle Sam, as you said,
(46:34):
Ben have a little bit more blood on their hands
than they wanted. And politically, you know, that could have
been bad. It was a very unpopular war. We were
there for a very very long time, far longer than
we intended to be, and we lost a lot of people,
and you know, it was just a very unpopular place
to be and you know, there was a lot of
(46:54):
clean up that had to be done in order to
kind of wash our hands of some of that. And
you know, this kind of stuff, these kind of stories
not exactly helping with the pr narrative, right right, well said,
And to Matt's point, you know, this doesn't have to
be an entire government. This could be compartmentalized intelligence deep state.
(47:17):
You know, it's it's distressing, but at certain levels, at
certain institutions, it only takes a few people to keep
powerful secrets. So it's more again of a black box,
and we could be in a situation where hundreds of
thousands of people are doing their level best. Like the
(47:37):
Army has special branches that go out into that part
of the world every year with full cooperation to find remains,
and they find them. That's the thing they're they're still
finding bodies, but the question is that somebody else obstructed
and so do our presidents aware of it? Because UM
(47:58):
the Barack Obama administration also pressed for further cooperation investigating
entities am I A cases h during a during another summit.
So within recent years and at present, it seems some
probably did die in combat, some probably did dessert, and
(48:21):
some are probably living or have lived under assumed identity,
under assumed identities in somewhere in the world. Many of
those in that third group may have already died of
natural causes, living an entirely different life from the one
they left behind in the jungle. As for the prisoners,
(48:45):
no matter how much we go back and forth, we
may never know for sure. You can go and find
a wealth of live sightings and wealth of people insisting
they've done this. But Bobby Garwood was a controversial returning figure.
And uh the case that we mentioned earlier, the Hartley hoax,
(49:09):
it did turn out to be a hoax. The DNA
didn't match. UM have added fuel to both camps, the
people who believe that they were abandoned POWs and the
people who believe that there were not And so we
close our episode today, we want to hear from you
what is what in your experience is plausible here? Is it?
(49:31):
Is it possible that the US cut operation cut servicemen
and operator operators loose uh to preserve what was seen
as greater stability at the time. Is this conspiracy theory
that people are milking for political gain? Um? And yes,
we have not touched on any of the other Vietnam
(49:51):
related conspiracies. The legends of real life Colonel Kurtz is
allah heart of Darkness, Apocalypse now the effects of Agent
Orange and more so right to us and let us
know what we should cover. If you do want to
write to us, you can find us on Facebook where
we are Conspiracy Stuff, or on Twitter also conspiracy Stuff.
You can find us on Instagram Conspiracy Stuff Show. And
(50:15):
if you don't like that stuff, you can always send
us an email. Uh, but we'll we'll tell you how
to do that later. Yes. Yes, First it's time for
shut at Corner. Our first shout out comes from Carlton.
Carlton says, in your recent episode you mentioned G and
I have a quick and dirty way for pretty much
(50:37):
anyone to feel it. You say, yeah, so dirty. Thank you, Carlton. Uh.
Carlton says, First, you should sit upright or stand. Okay,
I'm gonna do this as I say it, all right,
with both feet pointed straight out forward at your shoulders length. Okay. Second,
you need to reach out your hands and palms facing
(50:58):
towards each other. So palms facing each other, hands out.
The elbow should be bent at about forty five degrees,
so there's ninety let's do Now. Your fingers should form
a claw pointed to each other. Then you close your eyes,
calm your breath, and slowly close the space in between
(51:20):
your hands, as if you're holding an imaginary apple sized sphere. Now,
if you're calm enough, you will feel that your fingertips
already felt pressure, but not because of direct contact. If
you reach this step, then you can move the entire
palm back and forth to experience an odd feeling similar
to the repellent force of two magnets. It almost sounds
(51:43):
like you're starting at kama maya or you know, a
fireball can style? Yeah, how do you can style? That's
really cool. It's interesting because it ties into the one
of the largely unacknowledged senses of the human body. Propri
RECEPTIONE write the sense of where your limbs are in
(52:04):
space when you're not looking at them. And I got
up and tried it. I think I'm gonna have to
do it when I'm not shotgunning so much coffee. Yeah,
and you know we're recording a podcast, but thank you, Carlton.
We have that now. Now you have that, you the
listener of this voice, and uh, let's all try it
together sometime or at least separately, and then come back
(52:25):
and yeah, let's try and write to us and let
us know. Everybody, give everybody, give Carlton's technique a shot
and let us know how it works out for you.
I'm going to try it some more later we're off air.
Our second shout out today comes from Andrew. Andrew says, Hi, guys,
I think that the I think the conspiracy that the
Russian version of nine eleven Russian apartment bombings was really
(52:49):
a false flag operation orchestrated by and for Putin. That's
Vladimir Putin to rise to power. And that would make
for a really great podcast and a timely when given
all the talk about Russia and Putin these days. Anyhow,
keep up the good work that is crazy. By the way,
I didn't know anything about this until Andrew wrote to us,
(53:10):
and I just did some quick searching on the subject
to see what it was all about. I'd never heard
of it. It's I think three separate cities that got bombed,
like four apartment complexes or more, all around the same time,
and it was all blamed on certain groups, and it
started groups. Yeah, and it started the church another checking
(53:31):
in conflict. And apparently it really it really did help
Rise putin too power or at least somewhat. I yeah,
we'll have to look into that. Finally, we have a
shout out from Philippa Philippa. Um either either one of
those not either one of the two, probably, but I'm
(53:53):
throwing them both out there just to cover my basis. Um,
my husband isn't what you'd call psychic, but his gut
feelings are correct. Well, that's what I would call psychic.
But that's pretty cool. Uh. He also has an annoying
habit of knowing what I'm going to say before I
say it, even if it's totally off topic, and he
can predict who he'll see that day. He works in
(54:16):
a record shop, and if he hasn't seen a regular
customer for a while. He'll usually know before he starts
work that they will come by that day. He also
has a ghost who follows him around. Yeah, that's what
it says here, a ghost who follows him around. And
numerous people have seen weird stuff happen when they've been
with him. Well, here's to keeping it, keeping it interesting,
(54:38):
keeping it fresh and weird in your relationship. Uh. It
sounds like an interesting guy. And I would love to
hear more if anyone has clairvoyant partners out there. Um,
much more than just finishing each other's sandwiches. We want
to hear about that kind of stuff, because I I
(54:59):
don't know anyone like that. I often, Um, I think
I know what my girlfriend's about to say, and uh,
and and stumble into trying to say it for her,
and she usually just shoots me a dirty look because
I'm wrong and it's rude. Yeah, it turns into you
trying to man splain something exactly her own thoughts. I'm
also interested to know, Philippa Philippa Philippa. I think I'm
(55:23):
also interested to know if your husband predicted that this
listener mail would be read out loud. Oh, I can
imagine it right now he wakes up, honey, turned on
the podcast box conspiracy talking about right now this moment.
(55:45):
That is not what Philip Philippa's husband sounds like. She
also but she says she's from rural southwest to England,
by the way, and she says there was a wart
charmer in her neighborhood in her town, wart charmer who
could charm the warts off you. Is that the same
as charming the pants off you? Exact same thing. That's
a pants charmer, I believe, not to split hairs or
(56:07):
pants or words. Well, this concludes our gosh, and this
concludes our episode today, but not hopefully knock on wood,
our show itself. We will be back next week. What
are we covering next week? Do we have a little
bit of a teaser we could give people? Well, next
(56:28):
week we're covering delicious, delicious yet deadly deadly sugar m Yes,
you're like, well now at first it's so, it's like, yes,
it's sickly sweet, and there is a conspiracy afoot, not
(56:49):
a theory. If you would like to know more, please
tune in and in the meantime, go easy on the
SODA's just in case you don't want anyone to be
listening to a hospital that was a dark way to
end it. All right, so right to us, we are
conspiracy at how stuff works dot com.
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