[Colonel Philip J. Corso's 1997 blockbuster book "The Day After Roswell" is viewed by many as a watershed event in the slow unraveling of official UFO secrecy. At first glance, Corso's military credentials seem to represent unimpeachable credibility. But there may be a darker, stranger side to the man that has not been widely acknowledged. The following text (edited for length) was written by noted investigator Martin Cannon (mcannon@thorin.instanet.com) and is reprinted with permission.]
Will the Real Phil Corso Stand Up?
A Fearless Scrutiny of an Odd Little Man
by Martin Cannon
Colonel Philip J. Corso, author of a new book about the Roswell UFO crash, has a history of disturbing ties to racists, fascist sympathizers and nutball theories. He had worked with Reinhard Gehlen (formerly Hitler's chief intelligence officer) and the BND in trying to set up terrorist operations within Eastern Europe. Washington considered such schemes risky in the nuclear age, so the plug was pulled. Corso soon counted himself among that coterie of military intelligence staffers who considered the CIA "soft" on communism, and most likely heavily infiltrated by the KGB.
Similar beliefs were held by Corso's ally, General Charles Willoughby, who had been Douglas MacArthur's intelligence chief. There's a lot of published material on and by Willoughby, all worth reading. In short, Willoughby was an anti-Semite and an extremist who saw the world in conspiratorial terms. His politics leaned so far to the extreme Right that one can only wonder why he served on the Allied side during World War II. (MacArthur once called him "My little fascist.")
When Corso left military intelligence in 1963, he became a key aide to [Senator] Strom Thurmond, who helped lead the pro-segregation crusades of the 1960s. But [Corso] did not sever his ties to Willoughby.
Corso also became a leading member of a bizarre organization called the "Shickshinny" Knights of Malta. This organization is apparently a rather ineffectual breakaway from the better-known Knights of Malta. (After Napoleon attacked the island of Malta, the story goes, a number of knights migrated to Russia and joined the Czar's "inner guard;" after the revolution, these staunch White Russians migrated to America -- many going to Shickshinny, Pennsylvania; hence the name.)
I've seen some literature from these "Knights." To me, they have always seemed more silly than sinister. But one fact deserves our respectful attention: At the time Corso joined the exclusive sect, its leader was one Colonel Charles Thourot Pichel. Pichel was an explicit, undeniable Nazi. During the Third Reich, he had begged Hitler's government for the job of representing Nazi political interests in the United States.
Willoughby had also joined the Shickshinny Knights at this time, and co-published with the organization a periodical called the "Foreign Intelligence Journal." This journal specialized in anti-Semitic theories and the kind of extremist "enemy-within" anti-Communist blather we associate with groups like the John Birch Society. Apparently, this rather odd group had become, in the early 1960s, something of a dumping-ground for military intelligence veterans who were so zealous they had come to consider the CIA hopelessly "pink."
The darling of Corso's "Knights" was a very strange man named Michael Goliniewsky, whose name pops up in most histories of the CIA "mole-hunts" of the 1960s. Goliniewsky was a high-ranking Polish intelligence officer who sympathized with the West and began feeding information to the CIA. Apparently, his info was rather good at first. The Soviets became suspicious of him, so he had to scuttle off to America quickly.
It soon became apparent to the saner CIA analysts that Goliniewsky was, to put the matter bluntly, out of his mind. He began to claim that he was no less a personage than Prince Alexi, the Czar's son and rightful heir. Goliniewsky never really explained how he ("Alexi")... somehow became a leader within the intelligence apparat of a Communist country. (You'd think Polish spooks would do a better background check.)
At any rate, Goliniewsky (like other defectors) caused much mischief by telling dark tales of KGB penetration of both the American and British intelligence services and governments... The CIA soon learned not to take Goliniewsky seriously. But his demented world-view fit right in with the ideas held by the Knights, Willoughby, Corso and Co. So these "Knights" became the chief propagandists for Goliniewsky in the United States. Goliniewsky used to publish a rag called "Double Eagle." It was filled with wild, quasi-fascistic conspiracy theories which usually had to do with occult powers driving the inexorable Communist drive to world domination.... And this was the man Philip Corso once thought possessed the key to understanding world events.
Is Corso your idea of a credible source on matters ufological? He certainly isn't mine!
[NOTE: While CNI News agrees that Corso's political affiliations and leanings may be distasteful, we do not necessarily agree that Cannon's findings discredit Corso as a potentially significant UFO witness.]
Original file name: CNI - Corso badness.final
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