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59 It is also a possibility that the original purpose of a phony briefing paper has been made obsolete by events subsequent to its creation. It could be hanging in midair without any purpose or any way to get rid of it without causing major embarrass- ment to possibly innocent parties. Given the powerful content of the briefing paper, it became imperative to establish its genuineness or falsity as firmly as possible. It was to this purpose that in the summer of 1988 the Fund for UFO Research, Inc., embarked upon a successful cam- paign to raise $16,000 to support the proposal from Stanton Friedman to investigate the Majestic-12 documents (by then there were more than one), with the goal of establishing their basic nature. Analyzing the primary document presented Friedman with several major problems, some of which were the result of his inability to work with the original document. Only a photo- graphic copy was available, and so there was no way to test the paper, the ink or any other physical characteristic. To com- pound the problem, Moore and Shandera were unwilling to make the photographic negatives of the document available for study, though it is doubtful that much could have been learned from them. The starting point had to be the best possible copy of the prints made from the negatives—a third-generation version of the original, unfortunately. But the content of the paper could be read with ease, and so this was the closest approximation of original evidence that could be acquired. The format of the briefing paper got considerable attention. Was it reasonable for the time (1952) and for such a high-level document allegedly prepared for the White House? Were there any serious discrepancies from known practices? Was it the sort of thing that might be expected to have been created under the circumstances? In a letter to private UFO enthusiast Lee Graham, former CIA official Richard Bissell, who headed up the U-2 and Bay of Pigs operations, said: "The document certainly looks authen- tic. On the basis of the material you have sent me, I personally MAJESTIC-12