ANG Docs are Fake

Hank All-American | September 9, 2004 | Hank All-American

[Hank All-American]

Okay, guys and gals. As a former Air Force officer and special agent for the Air Force Office of Special Investigations (OSI), I have reviewed the documents released by CBS and can say with a high degree of confidence they are fake.

1--the month in a military date is always three letters. August is spelled out.

2--no one issues an "order" through a "memo." Maybe a letter, but nothing as informal as a "memo."

3--the signature (initials) of Lt. Col. Killian is clearly a cut-and-paste job. The last letter ("K") is cut off at the top, where two lines start to curve toward each other in a loop. Impossible to to do by hand. This signature was cut from another document and pasted or taped on the document.

4--No letterhead. Do you really think commanders typed out a the squadron on every letter? No. Letterhead was used.

5--No way there were superscripts back then. No way. Even if it was theoretically possible (which it wasn't), the national guard isn't exactly an early-adopter of technology. This ability wasn't even available at any price for several years.

Conclusion. I think they're fake. As a lawyer, I can also tell you this kind of thing is far more common than people think.

[ctdonath2]

Nevermind; links are on left side of http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/09/08/60II/main641984.shtml

[andy58-in-nh]

Just what are you insinuating here?

You better watch out....

[YaYa123]

Thanks for your reply. fingers crossed that it will turn out CBS got duped, but seems more likely to me, CBS might have been in on the fix. That's not farfetched considering the intentional misrepresentations and distortions of fact so common in the New York Times.

What bothers me most of all is CBS not being forced to disclose how this guy's personal files came into their possession. My husband is a retired COL, he's got tons of his military records and files in the basement, but CBS would have no way of getting them except from us. Why wouldn't CBS be forced to say, the guy's family gave them up? I want to know if CBS paid for the papers, when they got them, and who planned the timing of their release.

[YaYa123]

Thanks for your reply. fingers crossed that it will turn out CBS got duped, but seems more likely to me, CBS might have been in on the fix. That's not farfetched considering the intentional misrepresentations and distortions of fact so common in the New York Times.

What bothers me most of all is CBS not being forced to disclose how this guy's personal files came into their possession. My husband is a retired COL, he's got tons of his military records and files in the basement, but CBS would have no way of getting them except from us. Why wouldn't CBS be forced to say, the guy's family gave them up? I want to know if CBS paid for the papers, when they got them, and who planned the timing of their release.

[Cboldt]

IBM typewriter with proportional spacing was introduced in 1941.

IBM announces the Electromatic Model 04 electric typewriter, featuring the revolutionary concept of proportional spacing. By assigning varied rather than uniform spacing to different sized characters, the Type 4 recreated the appearance of a printed page, an effect that was further enhanced by a typewriter ribbon innovation that produced clearer, sharper words on the page. The proportional spacing feature became a staple of the IBM Executive series typewriters.

http://www-1.ibm.com/ibm/history/history/year_1941.html

On the Executive, you could optionally have removable type-bars. This is somewhat like later Smith-Corona portables which have removable type-slugs on the two outermost type-bars, with corresponding changeable keytop caps. In this case, though, it's the whole type-bar.

http://www.geocities.com/wbd641/TypeManuals2.html

[meyer]

They are too late, the records was proven forgeries on my fourm around 4am. tsk tsk why can't CBS first do a simple smell test before they report something?

I suspect that they did give it the smell test. I also suspect that they were hoping that nobody else would.

[dfwgator]

Hitler Diaries Redux.

[bondjamesbond]

Thanks, I was just on my way over there to pick that up...

If anybody reads this tomorrow, after they are gone, FReepmail me, and I'll FReep back the file.

Sorry about the bandwith hit, JimRob. Another sawbuck in the mail...

BTW, your last one went to the Swifties. Priorities, man...

[GoLightly]

:::grumble::: :::grumble::: :::grumble:::

Don't know how the military handled it, but I'd think the standard would be lower for a memo than on other documents.

For this private sector crappy typist, mistakes were a total do over & we're talking pitching out all carbon copies.

Later, we were allowed to use sheets of correction stuff. You put the handy dandy sheet of correction film over your boo boo & retyped the same wrong character & then you could type in the correct char in it's place. Occasionally, your fingers would get in the way while you were holding the sheet of correction stuff in place, so you could end up with a letter typed onto your finger.

Here's the thing though, with the fancy machine used on these docs, the spacing is gaged different for different letters, so if the correct letter was a different width, you'd be back to doing complete do overs again.

It was cool when that Monkee's mom invented Liquid Paper & even better when that came in different colors, cuz you could correct all layers of your NCR paper multi-copy forms without leaving large swatches of glaring white, though you had to run all copies back through the typerwriter again, cuz the chemicals of the NCR paper didn't work through the Liquid Paper. :o)

Wannna hear about keeping the books back in the dark ages too? lol

[sinkspur]

Michael Medved has picked up the "forgery" story as well.

[YaYa123]

thanks for the clarification.

[Hank All-American]

If you will notice, I did not refer to proportional spacing as evidence of the spuriousness of the documents. It was the superscripting that I think is virtually conclusive.

[pnz1]

I took typing in the 80's so it was lift off tape and liquid paper for me. Either one was pretty obvious when you made a mistake. Even on photocopies. And there was no way I wouldn't have any typos!

[jrawk]

I don't know, maybe it has nothing to do with the originals and everything to do with the crappy USB scanner sitting next to the Production Assistants desk...

Regardless the burden of proof is on CBS.

But we should start with the question are those images of the actual documents, because those images are not accurate to the period, and would be fake.

-- l8s
-- jrawk

[meyer]

BTW, if you want to see these documents tomorrow, don't count on CBS keeping the PDF on their server. Back them up now...

Printed as well!

[Mark in the Old South]

Re: "1--the month in a military date is always three letters. August is spelled out."

I think they are fake as well but when I first joined the Navy in 1980 it was common practice to use 3 letters for month, it was not until later 2 digits were use. Since people did not always use them in the same order DD/MM/YY it was confusing sometimes. I do not know about the AF in the late 60's.

Re: "2--no one issues an "order" through a "memo." Maybe a letter, but nothing as informal as a "memo.""

You are right but this was alleged to be written by a Reserve Officer. I worked with Reserves for 20 years I love them but some of the officers were not very well trained in military procedures. I've seen them do stranger things and they were better in the 1990's then they were in the 1980's after the Reagan Administration sent so much time and effort beefing them up.

Re: "4--No letterhead. Do you really think commanders typed out a the squadron on every letter? No. Letterhead was used."

Memo's used to come in bundles you just tore one from the top and used it. They had no letterhead just some preprinted lines (From: and To: Subj:) and the word Memorandum all in blue print. There were short forms and long form memorandums.

You are correct about the rest. I think they are fake as well but it is best if we have our facts correct.

[GoLightly]

I'm a foot dragging convert here. I want an independant somebody to cert the actual doc used. As has been shown many times, anything electronic can be too easy to create/change.

[js1138]

It was the superscripting that I think is virtually conclusive.

Not conclusive and not even an issue. The ^th was simply a special character in the Times Roman type ball. This has been demonstrated over and over this afternoon. You are going to make FR look like a bunch of fools.

[ops33]

Also look at the format. There's no TO, SUBJECT, FROM. Also, date should be flush with left margin, not at right. Signature block is also wrong, should be something like John Smith, Capt, USAF, Commander. Also, letters contain no unit designator followed by office symbol. If the commander or the DO were writing him a letter to convey an order it would be FROM: XXX Fighter Interceptor Squadron/CC or /DO.

[Cboldt]

I did not refer to proportional spacing as evidence of the spuriousness of the documents. It was the superscripting that I think is virtually conclusive.

I am looking for "replacement" type-bars for the IBM Executive model typewriters. At least one poster here has expressed a clear recollection of a "superscript st" being on the keyboard. The typewriter is designed to take replacement characters to suit the office it is being used in, but I haven't seen a catalog of optional parts.