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didn't have the technology we have now to intercept their ships, but by using new satellite surveillance techniques we believed we'd be able to pick up the signatures of an alien presence on the face of our planet. If we made it too difficult for them to set up shop with bases on Earth, military intelligence planners speculated, maybe they would simply go away. This was another example of how Cold War strategy was utilized for the dual purpose of trying to surveil extraterrestrial activity under the cover of surveilling Soviet activity. However, throughout the 1960s, critical projects were started at the Foreign Technology desk to protect vital command and control systems, including the hardening of communications and defense computer circuitry by burying components sensitive to electromagnetic pulses, the same kind of energy generated after a nuclear explosion as well as by the EBE spacecraft. In fact, so important was our research into the effects of the electromagnetic pulse, or EMP, that ever since the late 1950s the Department of Defense has been simulating EMP to determine how to protect the circuitry in its planes, tanks, missiles, and ships from being disabled by it. EMP generators were established at a number of facilities around the country, including the Harry Diamond Laboratories in Philadelphia, Maryland, for the army and the EMP Empress | and II simulators for the navy in the middle of Chesapeake Bay and another one at China lake in California. The air force set up EMP simulators at Kirkland Air Force Base in New Mexico and the army additional facilities at White Sands, New Mexico, and at the Redstone arsenal in Alabama. We also initiated the crash development of night vision equipment to enable our troops to see at night the same way the EBEs did, finally enabling us to get a footing, if not an equal footing, with the aliens so that we could force them to some kind of stale mate. It was only then that we began to realize what their intentions were and the startling secrets about their existence on this planet. It was night vision that was on my mind today as | was zipped through the sentry post at the main gate and very quickly buzzed into the development laboratories wing at Fort Belvoir by an army specialist 4 who seemed surprised that | wasn't in uniform. "Colonel Corso, " Dr. Paul Fredericks, technology development consultant to the night vision section at Fort Belvoir, said as he extended his hand and walked me over to what must have been his prized tobacco colored leather chair. It was way oversized for his small office and was obviously his favorite seat. | was duly appreciative of the honor and courtesy he was according me. "General Trudeau told me you were bringing us some remarkable information about one of the projects we have in development here. " "| hope it's helpful to you, Dr. Fredericks, "| began. "I'm not a physicist, but | think we have something that might speed up the research time line and show some new possibilities. " "Anything that could help, Colonel, " he said as | opened up my briefcase and began to spread out what | had. "Anything at all." "Of course, General Trudeau has been in touch with Don and the whole development team here, "Dr. Fredericks continued as he watched me open the night vision file that I'd taken out of my briefcase. "And I'm aware of the nature of the material you've got. It's not something we wanted to talk about over the phone. " "| appreciate your being discreet about this, Dr. Fredericks, "| said. "If you think what I'm about to show you can help you in the development process, it's yours to use. But the arrangement will be that everything is originated here at Fort Belvoir. All R&D will do will be to provide the budget necessary to fund this development. You use your own sources to manufacture the product and take all the credit for the process. " "Once you tell me you can use what I've brought and we get you the budget you require, "| began, "this conversation never took place and you will take my name off your appointment schedule. " "Now you really do have my interest, " he said with just the edge of a bemused sarcasm in his voice as if he'd been down this road many times before. "What did you bring in that briefcase that's so secret?" 56 CHAPTER 10 The U2 Program and Project Corona : Spies in Space "And this conversation?" Dr. Fredericks asked.