The (UFO) Aviary
In the early 1980s, Bill Moore and his research partner Jamie Shandera began conversations with government intelligence and counterintelligence personnel in order to force release of UFO-related information. There have been many accusations and misplaced suspicions about this period. Rumors have become “fact,” and facts have been twisted by deeply-held beliefs into stories that bear little resemblance to what was actually happening.
Moore, for his part, agreed to watch and report on trends and beliefs in the UFO research community in order to keep officials updated on issues that related to possible leaks of information that had anything to do with secret and black budget-type technology and intelligence-gathering. He did other things too, such as keeping a watch on suspected foreign nationals posing as UFO researchers, and acting as a cut-out (a neutral party acting as a go-between) for passing messages between agencies and intelligence operatives.
Shandera has been virtually ignored by ufological history. He may have wanted it that way. As I wrote in my book Project Beta, it was later revealed to Moore that his partner was not a newbie in the world of intelligence operations. He may even have engaged in a little reporting on Moore. Shandera had been called in to provide expert testimony in a court-martial trial (possibly in relation to an intel operation) during the Vietnam conflict.
In return for their participation, they were shown and given various UFO documents, some (or maybe many) of which were either faked or dead-ends. Ther have been accusations of fakery on the part of Moore and Shandera, but these have not yet been proven.
As their network of government and former government contacts grew, the duo came up with a system to enable them to talk about the various personalities on the phone or in public, without having to refer to them by name. In spite of what you may have heard or read about what they decided to call “The Aviary,” the group was never an officially sanctioned gang of spies, insiders and scientists. The members may have taken to their names with good humor and perhaps even enthusiasm, but no official imprimatur was ever used or assumed.
For reasons only known to them, Moore and Shandera decided to use the avian metaphor. As far as I have been able to determine, these men were:
Dr. Hal Puthoff
Dale Graff
Dr. Kit Green
Col. John Alexander
Captain Robert Collins
Sgt. Richard Doty
Col. (?) Ernie Kellerstrauss
Not as certain:
Dr. Bruce Maccabee
C.B. Scott Jones
More info on these people can be viewed on a page at the Reality Uncovered site, although there are some minor errors.
The man known as “Falcon” remains unidentified, although I have a pretty good idea who he was (he died in 2002.) Presently, I am trying to determine if any of these men knew of his existence and the fact that he was the invisible puppeteer at the top of the disinfo game played with UFO researchers throughout the 1980s. Some of them undoubtedly did, but not all. Falcon preferred it that way. There have of course been accusations that Richard Doty was “Falcon,” but this stems from his appearance on the UFO Coverup Live! show in 1989, as well as a statement to researcher Linda Howe.
Next: What drew these people together and what were they up to?
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Mar 07 2008 
March 7th, 2008 at 8:48 am
Fascinating. I read “Project Beta,” and some of these other names are familiar, but not all.
Keep it coming…
March 8th, 2008 at 5:05 am
This is where the things get extremely tricky. Any information that the US intelligence services dispenses has to be taken with a massive lump of salt. They scammed Paul Bennewitz to the point of breakdown and likely took several years off the man’s life for no great intelligence gain or coup. Each agency seems more interested in turf protection than actually intelligence gathering or protection. I’m not really sure if ‘The Aviary’ should be looked upon as beneficial to the UFO research subject or as a group, harmful and counterproductive. Most certainly, specific individuals within The Aviary used the UFO research community for their own self promotion with little regard for the collateral damage it would cause to both the field or individual researchers .
March 8th, 2008 at 7:17 am
Thanks for this Greg.
I’ve been intrigued by The Aviary for a while since someone passed me a link or two like this:
http://www.drboylan.com/aviary2.html
What you say makes a lot of sense and I’m looking forward to updates.
I’ve mentioned them in passing quite a few times and things that intrigue me are:
* The odd combination of military intelligence, non-lethal weapons technology and an interest in strangeness (UFOs as well as odder aspects).
* The presence of a lot of these characters in the NIDS - including Jacques Vallee, who might seem out of place but he has had a lot of intriguing military connections and was involved with the SRI and Uri Geller.
So a very odd murky corner indeed and given Bill Moore’s involvement we shouldn’t rule out that, in some way, this is another layer of misdirection.
March 8th, 2008 at 10:18 pm
disowned,
I have learned a few more things about the group since the book was published, which are mentioned in this post and the next one coming on Monday.
March 8th, 2008 at 10:22 pm
crg,
What I was am trying to do in these posts is clarify what I feel were the underlying reasons for the group’s existence, which is for the most part separate from any disinfo that was produced by some of its members.
I sort of look on the Aviary as a kind of UFO research group at a different level, which happened to be involved in plying stories for civilians and agents posing as UFO researchers in order to pursue various counterintelligence operations.
March 8th, 2008 at 10:29 pm
Emperor,
See my comments to crgintx and stay tuned for part 2. The NIDS connection intrigues me, but mostly because the aims of the group (re: more study of UFOs and the paranormal) seem to have been continued in another format, but without the intel trappings, probably.
I don’t see how Moore’s involvement is indicative of “another layer of misdirection.” I think many people give him too much credit as far as the aims of the Aviary group are concerned.
March 9th, 2008 at 4:00 pm
It seems the higher one gets up the M.I.C. ladder the more disinfo one gets tangled up in. Reading those bio descripts at Reality Uncovered just seems like more rumors piled on rumors. It makes for fun reading to be sure — kind of like Brad Steiger’s mention of military plasma weapons in one of his UFO books. The book constantly argues the military needs to be ready to battle the aliens (who must have much more advanced technology) and then mentions the military technology necessary to do such battle (all secret projects that he some how finds out about without referencing sources) — never really pointing out the obvious.
I met a mathematician recently who worked on encryption at Sandia Labs in the 1990s. He stated how indeed there was much compartmentalization, leaving him in the dark of his coworkers’ projects. The real tripper is that No One is in control and the truth is neither out there nor inside anywhere.
March 10th, 2008 at 11:24 am
How about a post on who all the members of Vallee’s “Invisible College” were.