By Charles Lear
As the internet was becoming more and more a part of everyone’s daily life, the mood of UFOlogy was becoming more and more paranoid. Growing numbers of people were reporting abductions and animal mutilations and the idea that our Earth based governments were collaborating with alien races was gaining acceptance beyond just a small fringe element of society. Little green men became little grey men (and large reptilians) and they were, reportedly, not very friendly. All of these elements converged in dark tales told about an area located in New Mexico. That area is near the town of Dulce and its history of strange activity goes back well before the internet.
Even before the alleged alien activity, Dulce was the location of some unusual human activity. In 1967, someone had the bright idea to recover natural gas trapped underneath Dulce by setting off a nuclear device 4000 feet below the surface. The operation was named, “Project Gasbuggy” and was an early attempt at fracking. Unfortunately, when one sets off a nuclear device near natural gas, the gas becomes too radioactive to be usable.
In the 1970’s, the Dulce area was hit with a wave of reported cattle mutilations with accompanying black helicopters and strange lights. New Mexico State Police officer, Gabe Valdez, investigated many of the reports and became obsessed with the mystery for over 30 years. By 2005, Valdez had become convinced that the mutilations were the result of human researchers but, by that time, many had come to believe quite the opposite. From its beginning in early 1980’s, a story had grown that there was a secret underground base near Dulce under a formation called Archuleta Mesa. This base was reportedly populated by aliens conducting nightmarish experiments on humans as well as cattle. This story is still believed by many people today.
The journey from mysterious cattle mutilations to underground dwelling evil aliens started with a meeting between Gabe Valdez and Albuquerque business owner, Paul Bennewitz. Bennewitz had a master’s degree in physics and his company, Thunder Scientific, specialized in temperature and humidity controls. The facility was located right next Kirtland AFB in Albuquerque and Bennewitz had a relationship with the military due to contracts his company had with various branches. Bennewitz had an avid interest in UFOs and started seeing them over various areas of Kirtland. He set up visual and electronic surveillance equipment that was quite elaborate thanks to his skills in electronics and started to collect evidence. Armed with pictures of mystery lights and objects and tapes of intercepted strange radio signals, Bennewitz contacted the Air Force and, in1980, a meeting was set up for him to present his evidence and concerns that the base was being infiltrated by hostile aliens.
Kirtland AFB is occupied by around 160 different government agencies, including the National Security Agency. The people who listened to Bennewitz were far less concerned about the aliens than they were about the fact that he had sophisticated surveillance equipment trained on them during the height of the cold war. Subsequently, Bennewitz ended up under surveillance by several agencies. The N.S.A. encouraged Bennewitz to apply for a grant and he received $75,000 from them, which essentially made him an employee who could be closely monitored. His belief in aliens was encouraged and he was provided with software that would purportedly decode the signals he was recording. According to Greg Bishop, in his 2005 book, “Project Beta” it was designed in a way that the signals would seem to be alien messages. The Air Force Office of Special Investigation took a more direct approach and assigned officers to do what was necessary to divert Bennewitz’ attention away from the base. One officer, Richard Doty, developed a close relationship with Bennewitz and took advantage of his trust in order to feed him false information. Bennewitz had suspected that there was an alien base in Dulce and Doty happily confirmed this as it was 200 miles north of Kirtland and would keep Bennewitz occupied far away from the base.
Bennewitz met Gabe Valdez at a 1979 conference put together by New Mexico state and local officials to discuss the cattle mutilation mystery. They became friends and Valdez showed Bennewitz the various spots around Dulce where mutilated cattle had been found. He also brought him to areas where they were able to witness strange lights. It was this that caused Bennewitz to suspect there was an underground base there and Doty encouraged his belief by flying him up to the area by helicopter. As they flew over, Doty pointed out “evidence” that he later claimed he’d planted, though that was disputed by Valdez. Valdez’ son, Greg Valdez, reiterated this in his 2013 book, “Dulce Base.” During this same period, operations were underway to infiltrate private UFO research groups due to concerns that they were being used by spies to gather intelligence on secret military projects. Richard Doty, along with other A.F.O.S.I officers, recruited researcher William Moore to provide them with insight into various groups and researchers in exchange for classified information on UFOs. Moore, who is best known for being a coauthor along with Charles Berlitz of the 1980 book, “The Roswell Incident”, agreed to the deal and, because of this, was put into contact with Bennewitz. Moore and Doty encouraged Bennewitz’ increasingly paranoid beliefs and Bennewitz did his best to alert the UFO community and high level government officials (including sending a letter to President Reagan) that there was a impending alien takeover on the horizon. Bennewitz eventually had a breakdown that landed him in a psychiatric institution for a while and Moore admitted his involvement with Doty at a 1989 Mutual UFO Network convention, which resulted in him leaving the community.
Despite the revelation from Moore and the assertions of Gabe and Greg Valdez that there was no alien base at Dulce, people continued to believe otherwise. Prominent researchers and speakers, such as John Lear and Bill English had spoken at length about hostile aliens and government deals and Dulce was at the center of their arguments. Taking up from them and first speaking before survivalist groups in the mid 1990s was a man named Phil Schneider. Schneider claimed to have been a geological engineer at Dulce, employed by the military to help create an underground base for humans in 1979. According to him, he and his team broke through to a pre-existing alien base and a firefight ensued. This scenario was first described in a testimony by a Thomas Castello, who claimed to have been head of security at Dulce. Documents, photos and video were supposedly smuggled out by Castello and held by trusted confidants. They became known as the “Dulce Papers” and a description of them was released in 1987. Schneider claimed he was wounded by an alien weapon and he showed his audiences that he was missing fingers and had a chest wound as a result. Because Schneider’s lectures made their way onto the internet, which was then becoming a burgeoning source of information and entertainment, the alien base at Dulce became firmly implanted as part of the UFO and alien mythos. In January of 1996, Schneider was found dead in his home in Oregon, sitting in a chair with a rubber catheter wrapped around his neck and knotted in the front. An autopsy was performed and it was determined that he’d committed suicide, a conclusion that Gabe Valdez agreed with after examining the report. Regardless of the many flaws in Schneider’s story, because he died shortly after beginning his talks as a whistleblower, he is held up by some as a martyred patriot.
There were some genuinely strange reports in the midst of all the noise that are worth noting. In 1987 A.F.O.S.I. documents were presented by researchers at The Ice Documents Press Conference at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. Among the documents was a complaint form filled out by Doty that described UFO sightings in August and September, 1980 by base personnel at Kirtland AFB. Disc shaped objects were reported to have landed in alarmed security areas and radios were said not to function while they were present. In Bennewitz’ home, Bennewitz, Moore and Doty all reported seeing softball-sized, transparent orbs. Doty thought they might have originated from the N.S.A. but was informed that this was not the case. Valdez, in addition to showing Bennewitz mutilation and UFO spots, showed him a bluish “spook light” that hovered over an area graveyard. Valdez had previously shut off the town power supply to make sure it wasn’t reflected light from somewhere much to the irritation of locals who were watching a championship fight at the time. Moore also reported seeing the light with Valdez and that it went out as they approached it. So, there have been weird goings on at both Kirtland and Dulce. How paranoid one gets about it really depends upon belief.