Another Copy of Majestic-12 Eisenhower Briefing Document Surfaces

Background:

In March of 1984 Jaimie Shandera received a roll of 35 mm film in the mail from an anonymous source.  This roll of film contained photographs of documents describing a top secret organization of 12 individuals who were responsible for investigating UFOs and reporting to the President.  The organization was named "Majestic 12" (MJ-12).  These first documents contained the "Eisenhower briefing document" which was used in November of 1952 to brief incoming President Eisenhower on the MJ-12 group.  Also a letter bearing President Harry Truman's signature authorizing the creation of Majestic 12 was found in this batch of documents.  These documents were kept "under wraps" until 1987 when they were released to the public for the first time.  Subsequent to the public release of these documents, many more Majestic 12 documents have surfaced.  For more details on Majestic 12 documents visit:

 http://www.majesticdocuments.com/.

The Majestic-12 (MJ-12) was a special group created under classified executive order by President Harry S. Truman on September 24, 1947.  Recommendations were made to President Truman to create the group by Secretary of Defense James Forrestal and Dr. Vannevar Bush, Chairman of the Joint Development and Research Board.  This group was created at the same time that other new Federal agencies were created (e.g., National Security Agency and the Central Intelligence Agency).  Also at this time the Army-Air Force was split up into separate military branches.  The MJ-12 group was tasked with reporting directly to the President regarding UFOs.  The goal of the group was to exploit everything that they could from recovered alien technology.  The group consisted of 12 members with a combination of top civilian scientists and high ranking military personnel.  In addition the first secretary of Defense (James Forrestal) was a member of the MJ-12 until his mysterious death in 1949.

Basically the Eisenhower briefing document talks about the role of the Majestic 12 group in investigating UFOs and controlling release of information to the public.  The document also discusses at length the Roswell UFO crash and recovery of alien bodies.  The document also references several attachments.  Only "attachment A" was included in the 35 mm release of the Eisenhower Briefing Document.  Attachment A was a copy of the memorandum from President Truman to Secretary Forrestal authorizing the creation of MJ-12.  The remainder of the referenced attachments were not included.

In November of 1997, I came into possession of a document that included four pages of the Eisenhower briefing document.  Initially I saw a faxed copy of the above documents.  However, the source of the documents (a co-worker) obtained the original documents from his grandfather (hereafter referred to as Mr. "H") from whom he originally received the documents.  Mr. H said that he had the documents for about 35 years.  This, coupled with the fact that the documents looked old (the paper was yellowed), led me to believe that the documents pre-dated the above release of documents and thereby could further corroborate that the Majestic documents could be authentic and not just the product of one "hoaxer."

Investigative Notes:

Subsequent to my receiving the above documents I consulted with a number of researchers who had experience with analysis of the documents received in 1984.  I originally consulted with Stanton Friedman.  Stanton had a brief phone interview with the original owner of the documents, but was unable to gain any further knowledge of their origin.  Early in 1998, I met Dr. Robert Wood at a UFO conference and discussed the documents with him.  He was interested so I mailed him the original documents.  Upon receipt of the documents, Dr. Wood's initial reaction is they had some significant differences from the 35 mm film copies.  Consequently Dr. Wood felt that the documents were probably not copied from the 35 mm film and therefore probably came from a different source.  

Document Analysis:

Subsequent to receipt of the documents, Dr. Wood sent the documents to Speckin Forensic Laboratories for detailed analysis.  After several months, Speckin completed the analysis and sent the results and the documents to Dr. Wood.  Dr. Wood sent me the lab analysis summary and we discussed the results.

The examination details of the lab analysis follow:

1. The left side of document 1 and right side of document 4 have an interlocking tear pattern.

2. The right side of document 1 and left side of document 4, have been cut/trimmed.

3. The printed characters are not completely reproduced and contain filled in portions of such letters as "e", "A", "a", "M", "f", and "w".

4. The print has smooth and clear edges with distinct void areas within some printed lines.

5. Document 1, document 2, and document 4 each contain a distorted printed line horizontally near the center; the distorted lines on 1 and 2, both on the same sheet of paper, do not align with each other as well as the distorted line on 1 and 4 do not align with each other. 

Based on the above results the lab has rendered the following opinions:

• Based on the microscopic physical match finding (#1), it is the lab's opinion that the questioned documents,  two sheets of paper containing reproduced documents one, two, three, and four, were connected at the torn sides and at one time were a single sheet of paper.

• Based on findings #1, #2 and the 8 1/4 inch width of the questioned documents, it is the lab's opinion that documents one, two, three, and four were probably prepared as part of a booklet-like file or folder.

• Based on findings #3 and #4 the lab is of the opinion that the questioned documents are probably the product of a type of Offset Lithography Printing.

• Based on finding #3 it is the lab's opinion that the parents of documents one, two, three, and four which were used to make the printing plate(s), were more than one generation copy removed from the original documents.

• Based on finding #5 the lab is of the opinion that the copies of documents one, two, and four that were to used to prepare the printing plate(s) were folded in half, top to bottom, prior to making the plate(s).

• Based on finding #5, the lab's opinion is that the parents of documents one, two, and four were separate individual pages instead of back to back documents as represented in the two questioned documents.

Summary:

Document analysis is a complex and difficult task.  Also compounding this analysis is the fact that the owner of the documents cannot recall who that he received them from.  We can make some deductions based on the limited information that we have:

• These documents have significant differences from the documents received on 35 mm film

  1. No "three hole punch" present. (See comparison analysis between two sets of documents.)
  
  2. Were on a single sheet of paper (double sided) - The 35 mm documents pages were all separated.
  
  3. Were received from a separate source.
  
  4. Did not have page numbers.  (The 35 mm copies each had page numbers on upper and lower right.) (See comparison analysis of page numbers between one page of each document set.)
  
  5. The font appears to be clearer on the 35 mm copies.  Some of the font characters were "filled in" (see #3 under lab examination above). 
  
  6. Only four pages were received in the documents received from Mr.  "H".  The 35 mm film documents totaled eight pages (including cover sheet and 1947 memo from President Truman to Secretary of Defense James Forrestal authorizing the creation of the Majestic-12 group.

• Source of documents

1. The 35 mm documents were received in 1984 by Jamie Shandera on 35 mm film and the envelope was postmarked in Albuquerque, MN.   The documents that I received were received by Mr. H in 1987 in San Ysidro (near Los Angeles, CA).

2. The source of the second set of documents is unknown, but according to Mr. H, he received them from a person who was quite eager to get rid of them. He said that the person was a complete stranger.

3.  Mr. H. recalled an article in the Los Angeles Times about extraterrestrials.  He said that he received the documents around this time.  (A check of the 1987 archives of the Los Angeles Times shows that several articles about UFOs were written throughout the year.  Therefore it will be very difficult to determine what article that Mr. H. was referring to.)

Conclusion:

Based on the comparison the two sets of MJ-12 Eisenhower briefing documents it appears that the documents were reproduced from the same source, but were copied at different times.  The comparison suggests that the documents received by Mr. H were farther removed from the originals than the 35 mm copies because of the distorted fonts.  Also the Mr. H documents were quite "yellowed" indicating that the paper was quite old.  This is quite dramatic considering that Mr. H kept the documents sealed in a manila envelope.  I also don't believe that Mr. H. received these documents as copies from the 35 mm film because he has not ever attended any UFO presentations nor had contact with people in the UFO field.  (It is a still a mystery on who gave him the documents.)

I believe that these documents received by Mr. "H" did not come from a redistribution of the 35 mm copies that were received by Jamie Shandera in 1984.  The reasons are obvious:

• Absence of three holes in left margin

• Absence of page numbers

• Differences in font (some retouching noted in lab analysis).

• Copies had been cut apart from one copy.

• Mr. "H" had never attended any UFO presentations

I believe that this evidence provides more corroboration that the Eisenhower briefing documents are real and not hoaxed.

Additional Notes:

This investigation like most investigations is not complete.  We had planned to do some additional forensic analysis on the documents received from Mr. H to ascertain the type of ink that was used.  Unfortunately the documents have been misplaced.  If the documents are not found we will obviously be unable to perform this test.  The ink test could have provided an additional tool to estimate when the documents were copied.  In addition we also plan to pore through the archives of the Los Angeles Times for articles related to extraterrestrials and UFOs.  This could better pinpoint the date when Mr. H received the documents.  The age of the documents is the key in this investigation because provides more evidence that the two sets of documents were released at different times.  The fact that we used copies rather than originals later in the analysis does weaken our argument somewhat.  However, the gross comparisons between the documents above could be reliably accomplished by comparison of copies.

Acknowledgments:

Special thanks to Dr. Robert Wood who devoted considerable time and resources to achieve analysis of these documents. 

Suggested Readings:

Top Secret/ Majic - Stanton Friedman

The Majestic Documents - Dr. Robert M.Wood and Ryan S. Wood