Currency Intel Updates

Refer from below --- It seem MOST folks don't take seriously the Nesara site. Let's hope THEY are most in-the-know!  

John's Response --- Yea --- and I know exactly the type that don't take it seriously. They think this is all made up BS. Well folks, there is over 12,000 postings for several years left on this blog for you all to do your own research.  My role is to awaken you all, yours is to do your homework and use your GOD bless brain.  John MacHaffie

Date: Tue, 26 Mar 2013 13:29:21 -0700
From

 USE BCC WHEN FORWARDING TO OTHERS TO KEEP EVERYONE'S
EMAIL ADDRESS PRIVATE. THANKS.

Sent: Tuesday, March 26, 2013 1:23:02 PM
Don't know if the "news" put out by Nesara folks can be trusted ... if the blockage
mentioned is real, we have to assume a BIG infusion of cash into the USA would
be detrimental to the agenda of Obama and his handlers - or the PTB.   Let's hope
the "good guys" trying to restore Constitutional law and banking (minus the Fed)
get the upper hand here.

It seem MOST folks don't take seriously the Nesara site. Let's hope THEY are
most in-the-know!
More evidence our media (even Fox) are highly censored and controlled ... still
no mention of Assad's assassination, despite it being widely reported in the ME,
France, Israel and by the BBC, seen across Europe.

M
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(Shoot4thestars) At the top of Nesara blogspot today:  OBAMA PUPPET MASTERS ARE BLOCKING RV …..CONTINUED AND ONGOING RV BLOCKAGE BY OBAMA'S PUPPET MASTERS. STILL NO RV AND NO PP DELIVERIES. CHINESE EXTREMELY UPSET!

[drl] Well i guess this was a no brainer that al-Maliki has only ONE choice to play by the rules or RUN !!!! There is a ton of additional security presence in Baghdad and also at and around the embassy still after Kerry left and im expecting something MAJOR today or tomorrow. Hopefully my guys are right and this is the last Tuesday we ride this long and bumpy ride and that we will be at the banks on next Monday the 1st of April.
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3-26-2013  Intel Guru SteveI    Referencing Wife in the Know post dated 3-25-2013:   I absolutely agree with this post...it is accurate by all of our sources, so I can safely say, it is what it is and spot on. Their numbers and ours are within a penny. I am more confident more so every day. You all saw the article saying they are going to start spending money first part of April, so in my opinion, this is as good as it gets.
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Dr. M.J.Randy: My research indicates that the following currencies are very good investments:
Vietnam Dong...Malaysian Ringg.. Colombia Peso..Philippine Peso..Chinese Yuan..Kazakhstani Tenge..Peruvian Nuevo..The above list is pursuant to information provided by the following countries by credit rating services. I used Standard & Poor's, Fitch, Moody's and Dagong which is China's rating service.All of which not only give the country's credit rating but also provide the country's outlook.
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[Capt Ron] I notice today that the Dutch chairman of the Eurozone has said that savings accounts of all EU peeps are liable to being raided if that is necessary to preserve the Euro. ...  so if there wasn't a reason to be paranoid about your Euro a few days ago, there certainly is now.  Too bad the Europeans can't do what we do here in the United Socialist States of America....  need mo money? no problem. just print it.  lend it to yourself. let the inflation take hold 'some other day'. presto chango.   meanwhile, bask in the glory of all the votes your borrowed money gets you from the electorate here. all you need is an uninformed electorate and you've got it made.
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From Monday night chat .......

Intel Guru Poppy3  am i excited???  yes very. can i share the information i have been delivered...no.  would i like to yes but guys they could be wrong...ALL I CAN SAY IS THAT I AM NOT THE ONLY ONE THAT IS EXCITED TODAY...  NOW LISTEN TO ME ALL THIS CAN BE VERY WRONG BUT THIS IS HOW CONFIDENT I AM IN THE PEOPLE THAT I KNOW PERSONALLY AND WHAT THEY HAVE SHARED WITH ME. IF I AM WRONG THEN IT IS ONE MORE MISTAKEN LEAD FROM IRAQ BASED ON THEIR LIES NOT MINE OR MY SOURCE, USE YOUR OWN JUDGEMENT. POPPY3   ...

Now listen up during my dinner two other sources and confirmed almost verbatum what i had already recieved last evening. So now i am more confident than ever this is our week??? At least it is the best week in the last 6 years i have been locked into this thing.

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LIST OF CURRENCIES SUPPOSEDLY IN THE COMING "FIRST" BASKET
(Some are said to be DE-valuing, not increasing.)

VEF = Venezuelan Bolivar (already devalued)
BOB = Bolivian Boliviano (already devalued)

COP = Colombia Peso
IQD = Iraqi Dinar
CNY = Chinese Yuan

KZT = Kazakhstani Tenge
LBP = Lebanese Pound
JOD = Jordanian dinar

SOS = Somali Shilling
SCR = Seychelles Rupee
STD = Sao Tomean Dodras

TND = Tunisian Dollar
SYP = Syrian Pound
TZS = Tanzanian Shilling

MYR = Malaysian Ringg
AED = United Arab Emirates Dirham
PEN = Peruvian Nuevo

PHP = Philippine Peso
QAR = Qatari Rial
NAD = Namibian Dollar

MZN = Euro
NGN = Nigerian Naira
OMR = Omani Rial
VND = Vietnam Dong

Liberals Rip NRA.... As They Lose Gun Control Battle

Liberals Rip NRA....

As They Lose Gun Control Battle

 

Filed under 2nd Amendment, Gun Control, LIberalism, Media

LAST RESISTANCE....

Thomas Sowell said: “If people in the media cannot decide whether they are in the business of reporting news or manufacturing propaganda, it is all the more important that the public understand that difference, and choose their news sources accordingly.” In every person, there is inherent bias. That is a fact. These biases are rooted in our culture, our upbringing, and even our religious beliefs. To have bias is not wrong, but simply natural. I don’t even mind bias in news commentary, so long as it is well defined. What I do mind is the Liberal media spewing hateful rhetoric, simply because they do not like someone.
On MSNBC’s News Nation, Politico reporter Lois Romano called the head of the NRA “a tired old white guy that is clinging on to something of the past.” Wayne LaPierre has been in the news numerous times since the shooting in Connecticut. He has been a steadfast defender of the right to bear arms; standing firmly in the face of the Liberal media’s attacks on guns.On a recent episode of Meet The Press, LaPierre brought up a salient point regarding gun violence in Chicago. He said:
“Let me hold up a mirror right now to the whole national news media and the White House…Do you know where Chicago ranks in terms of enforcement of the federal gun laws? Out of 90 jurisdictions in the country, they ranked 90th…Why doesn’t NBC News start with: ‘Shocking news on Chicago. Of all the jurisdictions in the country, Chicago’s dead last on enforcement of the federal gun laws?’”
Following that statement, David Gregory asked Mr. LaPierre if he believed that those Chicago criminals should be made felons. In response, LaPierre said: “Absolutely.”Liberals like Gregory and Romano hate when people like Wayne LaPierre dissect and dismantle their pathetic arguments; so they try to trap Conservatives in a web of semantics. They hate guns, and if you stand in front of them, defending our Constitutional right to arms, they will scratch your eyes out. The attacks vary from person to person, but they all emerge from the same place: rage. Sometimes, Conservatives are marked as evil or dangerous; sometimes they are simply dismissed in the way Romano dismissed LaPierre. When Liberals fail to trap Conservatives, they resort to phase two: personal insults.
However, what is most interesting is not the rage or the insults, but where they come from. One might imagine that Liberal anti-gun rage would stem from a place of concern; for our children, and our general safety. One might imagine that it is a righteous anger. That is not the case. The rage is triggered from the act of defiance on the part of the Conservative.
Statistics and studies have shown that extreme gun restrictions prove fruitless, because those who want to kill will always find a way; whether with guns or something else. Those in the Liberal media know this, and they know that Chicago has some of the strictest gun laws in the country. These facts and statistics don’t fit within the Liberal narrative, so when people like LaPierre dare to defy that narrative, rage is triggered.
You can always tell when a Liberal is losing an argument, because they start attacking the messenger, rather than the message. This is just what Lois Romano did. By trying to demean LaPierre, she revealed her hand.
The Liberals are losing the argument on gun control. The facts are not on their side, and they are running scared. Prepare for more indignant rage, insults, and demeaning commentary as the battle continues. The Liberal establishment fights dirty, and they will not go down without a fit of extraordinary rage. But we have the truth; and the truth sets us free.

CIA to be given full access to all bank accounts

This info may cause people to convert their foreign currencies a few per month perhaps.
===-===

Exclusive story from Reuters  - The next method in fighting terror
Source: http://economicrisis.com/obama-to-grant-cia-full-access-to-your-bank-accounts/1876

Obama Draws Up Plans To Grant Spy Agencies Complete Access To Financial Data On Every American.

- - - - plans to give all U.S. spy agencies full access to a massive database that contains financial data on American citizens and others who bank in the country, according to a Treasury Department document seen by Reuters.

The proposed plan represents a major step by U.S. intelligence agencies to spot and track down terrorist networks and crime syndicates by bringing together financial databanks, criminal records and military intelligence.

The plan, which legal experts say is permissible under U.S. law, is nonetheless likely to trigger intense criticism from privacy advocates.
===-===-===

Source - Reuters
- - - - - Financial institutions that operate in the United States are required by law to file reports of "suspicious customer activity," such as large money transfers or unusually structured bank accounts, to Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN).

The Federal Bureau of Investigation already has full access to the database. However, intelligence agencies, such as the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Agency, currently have to make case-by-case requests for information to FinCEN.

The Treasury plan would give spy agencies the ability to analyze more raw financial data than they have ever had before, helping them look for patterns that could reveal attack plots or criminal schemes.

The planning document, dated March 4, shows that the proposal is still in its early stages of development, and it is not known when implementation might begin.

Financial institutions file more than 15 million "suspicious activity reports" every year, according to Treasury. Banks, for instance, are required to report all personal cash transactions exceeding $10,000, as well as suspected incidents of money laundering, loan fraud, computer hacking or counterfeiting.

"For these reports to be of value in detecting money laundering, they must be accessible to law enforcement, counter-terrorism agencies, financial regulators, and the intelligence community," said the Treasury planning document.

A Treasury spokesperson said U.S. law permits FinCEN to share information with intelligence agencies to help detect and thwart threats to national security, provided they adhere to safeguards outlined in the Bank Secrecy Act. "Law enforcement and intelligence community members with access to this information are bound by these safeguards," the spokesperson said in a statement.

Some privacy watchdogs expressed concern about the plan when Reuters outlined it to them.

A move like the FinCEN proposal "raises concerns as to whether people could find their information in a file as a potential terrorist suspect without having the appropriate predicate for that and find themselves potentially falsely accused," said Sharon Bradford Franklin, senior counsel for the Rule of Law Program at the Constitution Project, a non-profit watchdog group.

Despite these concerns, legal experts emphasize that this sharing of data is permissible under U.S. law. Specifically, banks’ suspicious activity reporting requirements are dictated by a combination of the Bank Secrecy Act and the USA PATRIOT Act, which offer some privacy safeguards.

National security experts also maintain that a robust system for sharing criminal, financial and intelligence data among agencies will improve their ability to identify those who plan attacks on the United States.

"It’s a war on money, war on corruption, on politically exposed persons, anti-money laundering, organized crime," said Amit Kumar, who advised the United Nations on Taliban sanctions and is a fellow at the Democratic think tank Center for National Policy.

SUSPICIOUS ACTIVITY

The Treasury document outlines a proposal to link the FinCEN database with a computer network used by U.S. defense and law enforcement agencies to share classified information called the Joint Worldwide Intelligence Communications System.

The plan calls for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence – set up after 9/11 to foster greater collaboration among intelligence agencies – to work with Treasury. The Office of the Director of National Intelligence declined to comment.

More than 25,000 financial firms – including banks, securities dealers, casinos, and money and wire transfer agencies – routinely file "suspicious activity reports" to FinCEN. The requirements for filing are so strict that banks often over-report, so they cannot be accused of failing to disclose activity that later proves questionable. This over-reporting raises the possibility that the financial details of ordinary citizens could wind up in the hands of spy agencies.

Stephen Vladeck, a professor at American University’s Washington College of Law, said privacy advocates have already been pushing back against the increased data-sharing activities between government agencies that followed the September 11 attacks.

"One of the real pushes from the civil liberties community has been to move away from collection restrictions on the front end and put more limits on what the government can do once it has the information," he said.

Michael German, senior policy counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union, said that U.S. officials had floated a similar scheme to pool such data a decade ago, but that funding for the plan was later withdrawn by Congress.

He said one of the problematic aspects of the plan is that there is "wiggle room" on how the information will be used. In the past, the National CounterTerrorism Center, which is supposed to ensure that critical threat information is shared among various agencies, was obliged to "promptly identify and purge any innocent U.S. person information."

But the guidelines were subsequently loosened so that "not only can they keep the data for a number of years, but they can continue to use it," German said.

Once spy agencies get such data, German said, "it’s in a black hole. Time and again, we have evidence, unfortunately well after the fact, that somebody’s civil rights have been violated, that the intelligence community simply ignores the rules."

Source: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/03/13/us-usa-banks-spying-idUSBRE92C12720130313

===-===

Related Stories now circulating March 2013 (Use search engine to find)

Cyber threats against U.S. ‘ramping up,’

U.S. to let spy agencies scour Americans’ finances

Grant CIA FULL Access To Your Bank Accounts

Drones Will Target Conservative Americans

Obama Says You Have No Right to Banking Privacy

Draws Up Plans To Grant Spy Agencies Complete Access To Financial Data On Every American

Commerce Secretary Nominee: Billionaire ‘Penny’ Pritzker

　

　

OUTDOOR CHANNEL PULLS PRODUCTION FROM COLORADO DUE TO CO. SENATE BETRAYING 2ND RIGHTS!

OUTDOOR  CHANNEL PULLS PRODUCTION FROM COLORADO DUE TO CO. SENATE BETRAYING 2ND  RIGHTS! PLEASE  SHARE FAR AND WIDE! From: Michael Bane Date: Tue, Mar 5, 2013 at 4:09 PM Subject: OUTDOOR CHANNEL Pulls Productions from Colorado To: Steve King Dear Senator King; I met you yesterday after the so-called  "public hearings" on the antigun bills; as I mentioned, I am an Executive  Producer for OUTDOOR CHANNEL. I currently have four series in production,  including GUN STORIES, the top show on OC, with several additional series in  development. My series focus on guns, hunting, shooting and the  outdoors. This morning I met with my three  Producers, and we made the decision that if these antigun bills become law, we  will be moving all of our production OUT of Colorado. We have already  cancelled a scheduled filming session for late this month. Obviously, part of  this is due to our own commitment to the right to keep and bear arms, but it  also reflects 3 lawyers' opinions that these laws are so poorly drafted and so  designed to trap otherwise legal citizens into a crime (one of our attorneys  referred to them as "flypaper laws") that it is simply too dangerous for us to  film here. I can give you chapter and verse on the  legal implications if you need, but suffice to say that the first legal  opinion was so scary we went out and got two others. Al three attorneys  agreed. We are relatively small potatoes in  television, but our relocation of production will cost Colorado a little less  than a million dollars in 2013. Secondly, we have proudly promoted  Colorado in our productions (and have been moving more and more production  into the state); now we will do exactly the opposite. What does this mean for  Colorado? The community of television producers is a small one. Last week I  had lunch with a major network producer who was looking to locate his new  reality series in Colorado. That producer is also a shooter, and the new  reality series will now be based out of Phoenix. That lunch cost Colorado over  a million in economic impact. Thirdly, according to numbers I received  from the National Shooting Sports Foundation (for whom I used to work)  yesterday, hunting had an almost $800,000,000 impact on Colorado in 2012,  driving as many as 8330 jobs. Next month I will be in Texas meeting with most           of the top outdoor/hunting producers, and the Number One agenda item will be  Colorado. Already, hunting organizations and statewide hunting clubs around  the country are pulling out of Colorado, and we expect this trend to  accelerate rapidly. The message we will take to our viewers  and listeners is that these proposed laws are so dangerous to hunters and any  other person, be she a fisherman or a skier who brings a handgun into the  state for self-defense, that we cannot recommend hunting, fishing or visiting  Colorado. We reach millions of people, and, quite frankly, we have a  credibility that Colorado government officials can no longer match. Colorado  Division of Wildlife is already running ads trying to bring more out-of-state  hunters to Colorado...in light of the flood of negative publicity about these  proposed laws, I can assure you those ads will fail. We estimate that as many as one-quarter  to one-third of out-of-state hunters will desert Colorado in the next 18-24  months, which will quite frankly be a disaster for the hunting industry in  Colorado and have a devastating effect on our western and northern communities  (certainly citieslike  Grand Junction). This is not a "boycott" in the  traditional sense of a centralized, organized operation; rather, it is more of  a grassroots decision on where shooters, hunters and other sportsmen are  willing to spend their money. Look at the collapse of the Eastern Sports and  Outdoor Show in February. That venerable multimillion dollar trade show chose  to ban modern sporting rifles and standard capacity magazines, and within  three weeks it collapsed as all vendors and sponsors pulled out. Colorado is going to pay a huge price for  laws that will do nothing. Thank you, sir, for your support. Best. Michael Bane OUTDOOR  CHANNEL mbane@outdoorchannel.com

ObamaCare Imploding

Once again the fools in DC have screwed the people. Please read and pay strict attention to the highlighted areas. Nancy Pelosi did say the highlighted portion. I heard it with my own ears.

Okay folks, I know you think the C-Span Channel that broadcasts all those Congressional hearings is boring, but, really, you should have been around to watch the Senate Finance Committee's hearing Wednesday on the Affordable Health Care Insurance Oversight. Folks, you haven't seen so many faces of misery since you watched Les Miserables for three and a half hours...and they were all Democrats. And one of them, Senator Max Baucus, was the primary sponsor of Obamacare in the Senate! Now, try to follow me here because this gets pretty complicated. (It seems that Nancy Pelosi was right; you have to pass Obamacare to find out what's in it...and the Democrats are now learning what the Republicans warned them about. It's an unworkable mess that is throwing millions of Americans off the health care rolls!) Okay, apparently, tens of thousands of American employers began throwing workers off their health care plans and opting to pay the much lower federal fine for not offering health care for their workers. Thousands more are even now converting their full time workers to part time workers by limiting working hours per week to less than 30, in compliance with Obamacare rules. (Remember when Paul Ryan and the Republicans predicted employers would do this? Remember when Democrats were warned that employers would move to save operating expenses by moving their entire work force into federal healthcare exchanges?) Now, these workers who have lost their health care benefits are busy trying to sign up for state health care exchanges. (There are internet sites available if your state has agreed to sign up to Obamacare). However, when these American workers, soon to be without employee provided health care, go to the Health Exchange to sign up, they are finding they are not qualified! It seems that during the signup process, applicants are required to fill in various income and benefit data, which then flows over to IRS computers who then are to spit out what your premium costs will be and how much federal tax credits you'll receive in order to receive subsidies to help you afford health care premiums that are as much as 30% more than you were paying under your employers plan! Big Problem! The IRS is only allowing somewhere around 9% subsidy support for Obamacare Health care Exchange premiums that are priced so much higher than thternoon. Senatoring under his employer plan! (Surprise, Surprise! Remember Republicans warning that forcing working Americans to pay for the 30 million tit suckers who pay nothing for their health care under Medicaid would drive the premiums of working Americans higher?) Second Big Problem! The IRS computers won't mate up with the Health Care Exchange computers because the IRS computer system is obsolete! So when workers try to sign up for Obamacare the IRS and the Health Exchanges are telling applicants to go to hell! And so fireworks really broke out at the Finance Committee hearings on Obamacare yesterday afternoon. Senator Max Baucus, (Dem), said.."how could this happen? I'm hearing from my constituents that they and their families have been left out in the cold and are without health care because the Exchanges are not accepting them!". Quote from Senator Bill Nelson, (Dem), Florida "my constituents are not going to be happy to hear this administration failed to implement the necessary changes to accommodate health care applicants...someone has to pay for this!" Similar outrage was professed by Senator Ron Wyden (Dem) from Oregon. Sadly, Obama Program Director for the Health care Affordability Act was on hand to lend testimony. All he could seem to do was sympathize with his Democratic buddies, saying that maybe the problems could be ironed out by the end of 2014 but could offer no ideas about how that could be done. An Update! This morning a Harvard economics professor came on CNBC and announced that, according to a federal study his group just completed, the Health and Human Services Secretary is going to be forced to come back to this same committee, hat in hand, and request $700 billion dollars more be allocated to Obamacare just to pay for those automatically covered under current federal programs. Also, sadly, the Wall Street Journal reported that, in addition to the 30 million Americans not currently covered under Obamacare, we can expect tens of millions more who will be left in the "no health care Twilight Zone"; those who were doing just fine with their employee health care plan until Obamacare was implemented this year. And many of those who were working 40 hour weeks will find themselves deemed "part time employees" working less than 30 hours per week and unable to afford Obama's premiums even if they could get through the application process. And, as usual, while the working poor, and the rapidly declining middle class will be out in the cold without any health care, the Medicaid/Welfare tit-suckers have no worry. They are covered by that $700 billion dollar pot of gold Kathleen Sebelius, Secretary of Health and Human Services will be demanding from Congress soon! Sad. Damned Sad. Lest we forget --- today, like every other day, over 90 million, LAW ABIDING, AMERICAN GUN OWNERS , have murdered no one.

Makin Island

To all, an the MEN who were there.

Makin Island

This is an awesome peice of History

PLEASE WATCH THIS & PASS IT ON.......

Makin Island THIS IS ONE OF THOSE GESTURES FOR WHICH THERE ARE FEW WORDS. Click below!http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=C6f_FvZpm3g

To all, an the MEN who were there. Makin Island This is an awesome peice of History PLEASE WATCH THIS & PASS IT ON....... Makin Island THIS IS ONE OF THOSE GESTURES FOR WHICH THERE ARE FEW WORDS.

Marines and Truth

One day, while a retired Marine was cutting a branch of a tree above a river, his axe fell into the river. When he cried out, the Lord appeared and asked, "Why are you crying?" The Marine replied that his axe had fallen into water, and he needed the axe to make his living. The Lord went down into the water and reappeared with a golden axe. "Is this your axe?" the Lord asked. The Marine replied, "No." The Lord again went down and came up with a silver axe. "Is this your axe?" the Lord asked. Again, the Marine replied, "No." The Lord went down again and came up with an iron axe. "Is this your axe?"the Lord asked. The Marine replied, "Yes." The Lord was pleased with the Marine honesty and gave him all three axes to keep, and the Marine went home happy.  Sometime later the Marine was walking with his wife along the riverbank, and his wife fell into the river. When he cried out, the Lord again appeared and asked him, "Why are you crying?" "Oh Lord, my wife has fallen into the water!" The Lord went down into the water and came up with KateUpton.  "Is this your wife?" the Lord asked.  "Yes," cried the Marine. The Lord was furious. "You lied! That is an untruth!"  The Marine replied, "Oh, forgive me, my Lord. It is a misunderstanding. You see, if I had said 'no' to Kate Upton, You would have come up with Faith Hill. Then if I said 'no' to her, you would have come up with my wife. Had I then said 'yes,' you would have given me all three. Lord, I am a poor old man, and am not able to take care of all three wives in a way that they should be, so THAT'S why I said yes to Kate Upton." The moral of this story is: Whenever a Marine lies, it is for a good and honorable reason, and for the benefit of others. That's my story, and I'm sticking to it!

Meals On Wheels

"Be vewy, vewy quiet ..... I'm hunting meals-on-wheels! Shhhhhh!!"

Don't you just love this picture?

Five Men Agree To Stand Directly Under An Exploding Nuclear Bomb

by ROBERT KRULWICH

July 17, 201210:45 AM

Updated July 18, 2012: We have added an update to this post, which you can find below the original. Click here to read about what happened to the men.

---

They weren't crazy. They weren't being punished. All but one volunteered to do this (which makes it all the more astonishing).

Enlarge image

Atom Central/YouTube

On July 19, 1957, five Air Force officers and one photographer stood together on a patch of ground about 65 miles northwest of Las Vegas. They'd marked the spot "Ground Zero. Population 5" on a hand-lettered sign hammered into the soft ground right next to them.

As we watch, directly overhead, two F-89 jets roar into view, and one of them shoots off a nuclear missile carrying an atomic warhead.

They wait. There is a countdown; 18,500 feet above them, the missile is detonated and blows up. Which means, these men intentionally stood directly underneath an exploding 2-kiloton nuclear bomb. One of them, at the key moment (he's wearing sunglasses), looks up. You have to see this to believe it.

Atom Central/YouTube

Who are these guys? And why is the narrator joyously shouting, "It happened! The mounds are vibrating. It is tremendous! Directly above our heads! Aaah!"

This footage comes from our government's archives. It was shot by the U.S. Air Force (at the behest of Col. Arthur B. "Barney" Oldfield, public information officer for the Continental Air Defense Command in Colorado Springs) to demonstrate the relative safety of a low-grade nuclear exchange in the atmosphere. Two colonels, two majors and a fifth officer agreed to stand right below the blast. Only the cameraman, George Yoshitake, didn't volunteer.

The country was just beginning to worry about nuclear fallout, and the Air Force wanted to reassure people that it was OK to use atomic weapons to counter similar weapons being developed in Russia. (They didn't win this argument.)

More Krulwich Wonders...

If You Are Hit By Two Atomic Bombs, Should You Have Kids?

The Silence

Watching this film, there are many things to wonder (and worry) about, but one of the stranger moments is how the bomb bursts in complete silence. We see a sudden white flash. It makes the soldiers flinch. Then there's a pause, a pregnant quiet that lasts for a beat, then another and then — there's a roar. ("There it is! The ground wave!"), after which the sky above seems to go black and the air turns to fire.

Basic physics explains the pause. Because light travels quicker than sound, you see light first, you hear sound later. In most movies (even in government-released atomic bomb blast films), the sound is artificially time shifted to make the flash and the sound appear simultaneous.

'A Long, Thundering Growl'

But that's not what it's like if you are actually there. Science historian Alex Wellerstein has found an undoctored and deeply frightening recording — which he just posted on Restricted Data; The Nuclear Secrecy Blog.

He got it, he says, from "a Russian correspondent" who was searching the U.S. National Archives. (Why not? Our past is open to all.) The Russian found a recording of an American atomic test in 1953, which shows an enormous flash of white, so white it blanks out the entire sky, then thick clouds of ash (or maybe dirt?) tumble up, a fireball appears — all of this in total quiet. Thirty seconds pass. And then, says Wellerstein,

Put on some headphones and listen to it all the way through — it's much more intimate than any other test film I've seen. You get a much better sense of what these things must have been like, on the ground, as an observer, than from your standard montage of blasts. Murmurs in anticipation; the slow countdown over a megaphone; the reaction at the flash of the bomb; and finally — a sharp bang, followed by a long, thundering growl. That's the sound of the bomb.

It's a sound you would never want to hear in real life, but this a safe way to eavesdrop. Just one warning: For the first two minutes of this video, nothing happens, nothing I could hear, anyway. Then there's a countdown, and at 2:24 from the top ... the bomb bursts; at 2:54 the blast hits.

YouTube

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A Postscript: What Happened To The Guys In The Bomb Video?

By ROBERT KRULWICH & ALEX WELLERSTEIN

A lot of you wrote in to ask what happened to the five men in the blog post above, who, in 1957 stood under an exploding atomic bomb. Did they get cancer? Did they suffer later on? Are they still with us?

We checked, of course. I did find a list of the people who were in the film.

• Col. Sidney Bruce
• Lt. Col. Frank P. Ball
• Maj. Norman "Bodie" Bodinger
• Maj. John Hughes
• Don Lutrel
• George Yoshitake (the cameraman, not seen)

Googling through the list, we quickly discovered (as did many of you) that George Yoshitake, the cameraman, was alive, at least as of two years ago. In 2010, he was interviewed in the New York Times and talked about his fellow cameramen who took pictures of atomic bombs. "Quite a few have died from cancer," he told reporter Bill Broad. "No doubt it was related to the testing." Yoshitake's nephew also wrote in and didn't mention his uncle's passing, so I'm guessing that he's now 84 years old and still with us.

As for the others, that's trickier. It's hard to know if a match in names is a real match and I didn't want to make an awkward mistake. I turned to my sleuth friend, science historian Alex Wellerstein (now at the American Institute of Physics) for help here. He told me "Military folks who have died can be found in the Department of Veteran's Affairs Gravesite Locator — and since we think all the video guys were Army and all World War II veterans, we might find some matches.

Alex looked, and here's what he found:

• Col. Sidney C. Bruce — died in 2005 (age 86)
• Lt. Col. Frank P. Ball — died in 2003 (age 83)
• Maj. John Hughes — very common name, but I'm guessing he is Maj. John W. Hughes II (born 1919, same as the above) — died in 1990 (age 71)
• Maj. Norman Bodinger — unclear (not listed in the database), he may still be alive?
• Don Lutrel — I think this is a misspelling of "Luttrell." There is a Donald D. Luttrell in the DVA database, US Army CPL, born 1924, died 1987 (age 63). Seems like a possibility.

If any of you reading think we've messed up, and someone we call dead is alive or alive is dead, please write me immediately. But this is our best effort.

Then there's the matter of perspective. It's a mistake, I think, to focus on six people as if they represent everyone who was exposed to bomb radiation. As Alex said in an email to me, it's more complicated than that.

...lots of people associated with Nevada Test Site operations got cancer over the years, some $150 million has been paid out in compensation to 2,000+ "onsite participants" of nuclear testing, under the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act.

The thing is, in that particular explosion, those guys would have been in a pretty safe position. The bomb itself was a small one (by nuclear standards — 2 kilotons) and it was way, way above their heads. They weren't in a zone to be too affected by the immediate radiation. The bomb was small enough and high enough that it wouldn't have sucked up dust to produce much fallout. The remaining cloud would have been full of (nasty) fission products, but it would have been extremely hot and most of it would have stayed aloft until it cooled down, by which point it probably would have been spread more diffusely.

At least the folks in the films volunteered to be there (George excepted) and were given some pre-film training (not terribly useful, but still). That was not the case for a little community downwind from the Nevada Test Site, a place called St. George, Utah.

The folks in St. George were repeatedly hit by uninvited fallout. Alex wrote me that in 1953, one test, codenamed "Harry" actually deposited quite a lot of fallout on St. George, to the point where residents were forced to stay inside for many hours, and prohibited from washing their cars until they became less radioactive.

Over the years, says Alex, the U.S. government has paid some $813 million to more than 16,000 "downwinders" to compensate them for illnesses presumably connected to the bomb testing program. So it is clear that tests like these — often done to demonstrate the safety of nuclear weapons in the atmosphere — were not safe at all.

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Some of you may have noticed the nuclear missile video says the explosion took place 10,000 feet above our group of soldiers. Apparently, the video is wrong. The Natural Resources Defense Council checked the numbers and says the explosion, part of Operation PLUMBBOB, was actually at 18,500 feet. The second explosion can be found in its original form in the National Archives here.