Sources Open Eye 2 did finally appear, well worth the wait, containing a splendidly eclectic mixture of articles, at least two of which will be of lasting importance. The first is a long account by Phil Chamberlain of the assault on Mr and Mrs Anthony Verney by what are now being called frequency weapons, i.e. what I have been calling electro-magnetic weapons. The second is the extracts from the 1974 diary of Peter Cadogan which describe his contacts with G.K. Young during the period when Young was machinating against the Labour Government with his Unison Committee for Action. PO Box 3069, London SW9 8LU; single issues (including postage) U.K. 1.60; U.S. $4.00, Europe 2.00.
Undercover, the British glossy magazine devoted to ‘cover ups, espionage, covert action’ duly folded after five issues. Which was two more than I expected. There just is no general interest in these fields in this country, even if it is done well; and I haven’t talked to anyone who thought Undercover was done well.
Not unlike Undercover are Back Channels and Paranoia. Back Channels — a great title — describes itself as ‘a quarterly magazine of both historical and modern espionage, assassination and conspiracies’ and I have the first issue, from 1991. This contains a number of potentially interesting articles — ‘FDR’s spies’, ‘JFK and the French Connection’, ‘Top Hat and Fedora’ — for example, which are not treated in enough detail. Maybe things have changed since this issue. A sample copy for $5 from PO Box 9, Franklin Park, NJ 08823-0009, USA.
I have issue 2 of Paranoia, The Conspiracy Reader, which began this year. This is very nicely produced, 24 pages with a glossy cover and illustrations, but the material is distinctly patchy. So issue 2 carries a much reprinted 1986 article by U.S. conspiracy theorist John Judge on the Jonestown massacre (which I might start to take seriously if it had some credible sources attached to it — which is true of most of Judge’s stuff); a report on a recent JFK assassination conference; an interview with the AIDS theorist Alan Cantwell, and some shorter pieces on the Waco siege, the Danny Casolaro story, and the death of the British MI6 agent Ian Spiro. A $5.00 bill should elicit a sample copy from Paranoia, PO Box 3570, Cranston, RI 02910, USA. (Subs outside the U.S. $24.00 for 4 issues but if Lobster or Covert Action is your thing, I would try one first.)
Both Back Channels and Paranoia seem to me to betray that fear of appearing academic. Is the reading public really so allergic to documentation?
A new issue of Flatland, number 10, appeared in October. Flatland is an occasional combination mail order catalogue and magazine. This one is titled ‘Alien Nation’ and contains articles on Reich, Quigley, the assassination of Martin Luther King, an interview with ‘Bo’ Gritz (who is more impressive than I expected) — and a reprint of Daniel Brandt’s piece from Lobster 24. In the catalogue sections you can find everything from UFO fringe weirdness like Matrix 1, 2 and 3, to the script for Guy deBord’s last movie, a new supplier of orgone boxes in California using Reich’s original designs, nanotechnology, assassinations, parapolitics etc etc. Flatland is 64 pages and costs $4.00 in the U.S., $5.00 elsewhere.
While we are out here at the weirder end of things, Fact Sheet Five, the ultimate U.S. ‘zine’ catalogue, has reappeared and is now in new hands. The new 112 page version is slightly smoother than the previous one, better organised but with slightly fewer entries. But still a thing of wonder for students of the world of small presses. A sample copy is $6.00 from PO Box 17099, San Francisco CA 94117-0099. USA.
Trotwatch is only tangentially relevant to Lobster’s nominal field of interest, but it is such a wonderful thing I must plug it. Trotwatch, ‘an anarchist commentary on the life of the left’ makes fun of the British Trotskyist groups. It announces in what passes for its editorial: ‘Trotwatch reserves the right to humiliate any variant of leftie orthodoxy it sees fit.’ For example, the back page of issue 1 is headed ‘Trotskyist world rocked to foundations as Gerry Healy found alive’; and there’s this, on the front cover: ‘Workers Power: Stern-faced Trotskyists in unashamed backing for proportional representation shock!’; or the Gerry Healy Memorial ‘Crimes Against the Class’ Awards. If you don’t find this funny, don’t waste your money. All this plus some serious — and apparently reliable — material on the various Trot groups, all for £1.00 (in the U.K.), from TW, Box NDF, 72 Radford Rd., Hyson Green, Nottingham NG7.
Shot by both sides: a response to paranoia and disinformation, by Paul Cox
Cox was in the BNP when young, changed his mind and has since been researching the British right for a book. He contacted Gerry Gable at Searchlight who offered to swop information (tried to recruit him). Cox declined the offer. Gable then used Searchlight to brand him a fascist etc. This produced trouble for Cox at work from the left readership of the magazine. Hence the title. In other words, this is a rather interesting case study of Searchlight’s methods and ideology from the viewpoint of one of its victims.
12, A4 pages, word processed, this is available from the author for £0.50 at 20 Tilbury Terrace, Leeds LS11 0DA.