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Authors: Jon E. Lewis

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The Mammoth Book of Conspiracies

BOOK: The Mammoth Book of Conspiracies
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Jon E. Lewis is a historian and writer, whose books on history and military history are sold worldwide. He is also the editor of many
The Mammoth Book of
anthologies, including the best-selling
Cover-Ups
.

Other titles by Jon E. Lewis

 

The Mammoth Book of Antarctic Journeys

The Mammoth Book of Cover-Ups

The Mammoth Book of Native Americans

The Mammoth Book of How It Happened

The Mammoth Book of On the Edge

The Mammoth Book of Pirates

The Mammoth Book of True War Stories

The Mammoth Book of Wild Journeys

London: The Autobiography

Rome: The Autobiography

World War II: The Autobiography

Survivor: The Autobiography

SAS: The Autobiography

Spitfire: The Autobiography

Constable & Robinson Ltd
55–56 Russell Square
London WC1B 4HP
www.constablerobinson.com

First published in the UK by Robinson,
an imprint of Constable & Robinson Ltd, 2012

Copyright © J. Lewis-Stempel, 2012

The right of Jon E. Lewis to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs & Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

A copy of the British Library Cataloguing in Publication
Data is available from the British Library

UK ISBN: 978-1-84901-363-5 (paperback)
UK eISBN: 978-1-84901-730-5 (ebook)

1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

First published in the United States in 2012 by Running Press Book Publishers,
A Member of the Perseus Books Group

All rights reserved under the Pan-American and International Copyright Conventions

This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part, in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system now known or hereafter invented, without written permission from the publisher.

Books published by Running Press are available at special discounts for bulk purchases in the United States by corporations, institutions, and other organizations. For more information, please contact the Special Markets Department at the Perseus Books Group, 2300 Chestnut Street, Suite 200, Philadelphia, PA 19103, or call (800) 810-4145, ext. 5000, or e-mail
[email protected]
.

US ISBN: 978-0-7624-4271-3
US Library of Congress Control Number: 2011930502

9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Digit on the right indicates the number of this printing

Running Press Book Publishers
2300 Chestnut Street
Philadelphia, PA 19103-4371

Visit us on the web!
www.runningpress.com

Printed and bound in the UK

CONTENTS

 

Introduction

Apple

Area 51

Julian Assange

Aum Shinrikyo

Bavarian Illuminati

Bible Code

Big Brother: InfraGard and ECHELON

Osama bin Laden

Black Death

Cagoule

Fidel Castro

Cattle Mutilations

Le Cercle

CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research)

Chupacabra

Cloudbuster

Club of the Isles

Kurt Cobain

Codex Alimentarius

Committee of 300

CAN

Denver International Airport

The Dreyfus Affair

Dulce Base

Ebola

FEMA

Foo Fighters

Ford Pinto

Free Electricity

General Motors

Global Warming

Gulf War Syndrome

HAARP

Dag Hammarskjold

Heinrich Himmler

Holloman Air Force Base

Hurricane Katrina

Indian Ocean Tsunami

IRS

Israeli Bubblegum

Jack the Ripper

Michael Jackson

Dr David Kelly

John F. Kennedy

Kissinger Associates

KKK

Knights of Columbus

Knights of the Golden Circle

Abraham Lincoln

Lusitania

Paul McCartney

Mary Magdalene

Manchurian Candidate

Mantell Incident

Mayan Calendar

Nazca Lines

Nazi Gold

New Coke

New World Order

9/11

North American Union

Nostradamus

Barack Obama

October Surprise

The Octopus

Odessa/The Org

Operation Black Dog

Operation Northwoods

The Paladin Group

Peak Oil

Plum Island

Pope John Paul II

Princess Diana

Project Coast

Project Montauk

Project Paperclip

Propaganda Due (P2)

Reptilian Humanoids

SARS

William Shakespeare

The Shriners

Society of Jesus

Society of the Elect

Space Monolith

Space Shuttle Columbia

Stolen Elections

Dominique Strauss-Kahn

Subliminal Advertising

Synarchy

The Third Secret of Fátima

The Thule Society

The Tonkin Gulf Incident

Turin Shroud

Tuskegee Syphilis Study

Unit 731

USS
Cole

Vril Society

Water Control

Paul Wellstone

The White House Putsch

Harold Wilson

INTRODUCTION

 

These are, of course,
theories
. If they were proven beyond all doubt they would be conspiracy
facts
.

This book, a companion to
The Mammoth Book of Cover-Ups
, is a guide to the weirdest, wackiest and the most dangerous conspiracy theories around. I have, hopefully, steered a path between the Scylla of outright scepticism and the Charybdis of wide-open gullibility, the latter constantly boosted by the Internet, a self-referring universe where one blogger’s claim becomes one researcher’s proof. As a measuring stick of a theory’s veracity, I have included an “ALERT” guide, with a 1 to 10 rating, with 1 being “No way, Jose” and 10 being “It’s a cert”. A small number of cases have appeared in
Cover-Ups
, but reappear here in the light of more and new information.

There are conspiracy theories that cross the edge of madness – David Icke’s “reptilian-humanoid takeover” and Vril-powered UFOs driven by Nazis come hurtling to mind – but there are plenty out there that raise real issues about the abuse of power by secretive groups of politicos, CEOs, medicos and military honchos. Everyone should sleep a little less easy and be a little more vigilant after reading about the US Army’s “Operation Northwoods” (which proposed false-flag terrorist outrages on the American people and the sticking of the blame on Cuba) and you may want to give the bio-research facility at Plum Island a wide, wide detour.

As they say: just because you are paranoid, it doesn’t mean that they aren’t out to get you …

Jon E. Lewis

APPLE

 

Ever wonder how two tech geeks like Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak made their billions?

Conspiracists know the answer. Jobs and Wozniak built the first Macintosh computer in a California garage and when it failed to raise interest they did a deal with the devil, selling their souls in exchange for success on earth. The proof was on the price tag of the first Mac: $666.66. The mark of the Beast. Rounding off the evidence is the Apple logo. There’s a bite taken out of the apple, the forbidden fruit.

Alternatively, Apple did a deal with Big Brother. Take a look at an iPhone. It plays, unknown to its owner, iSpy on you. A secret file stores latitude and longitude, complete with a dater. The file is unencrypted and is transferred to any device the iPhone syncs with. Thus anyone with access to the owner’s computer can track his or her movements. Invasion of privacy anyone? Apple’s snooping habit doesn’t end with the locator file. The “Hackintosh hacker” alleged that Apple has stuck a code into the iPhone that tracks keyboard use, so every time the user taps in information this is relayed to Apple HQ. The claim has never been verified but Apple’s appetite for gathering personal information is infamous; in 2010 the company applied for a patent (“Systems and Methods for Identifying Unauthorized Users of an Electronic Device”) that could record the heartbeat of iPhone users, as well as covertly photograph them and their surroundings. If Apple collects information, as sure as God made little green apples, law enforcement agencies will one day come calling to use it. All of which has made dark rooms full of pale conspiracy theorists wonder if Apple is not doing the CIA/FBI’s job for them.

Apple justified the patent application as a security measure to prevent thieves using stolen phones, but as the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EEF) watchdog pointed out the technology also enabled Apple to cut off customers who pimped (quite lawfully) their devices. Improper use would also be reported to the Orwellian sounding “proper authorities”. The EEF christened the patent “traitorware”. Apple’s inclination to control is almost as great as its inclination to spy. On prudishly deciding that cartoonist Mark Fiore’s NewsToons app was too satirical for its taste Apple rejected it. When Fiore won a Pulitzer though they installed the app. Never one to miss a commercial opportunity, Apple.

BOOK: The Mammoth Book of Conspiracies
4.08Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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