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Summary

We talk about a truly unique moment in US History, when the Army asked a Lt. Colonel to travel the country and bring the teachings of the New Age movement into their ranks in the hopes of increasing recruitment numbers for the newly all volunteer Army. They also hoped to gain an advantage over the Russian Army using insight from the Human Potential movement to create New Age Supersoldiers.

Source List

https://archive.org/details/FirstEarthBattalionManual

https://web.archive.org/web/20170621013752/http://www.arcturus.org/field_manual.pdf

Ronson, Jon. The Men Who Stare At Goats

https://www.youtube.com/user/jimchannon

Image from The 1st Earth Battalion Field Manual by Jim Channon — Image from *The 1st Earth Battalion Field Manual* by Jim Channon

Ep 47 The 1st Earth Operations Battalion

Intro

Operations Manual initially written specifically for the military in 1979, but published as a revised book in 1982. We have the 1982 version.
wearethemutants.com “We Are the Mutants” Magazine

The Story

How the New Age and Human Potential Movements of the Long Seventies influenced the US Military for decades, leading to the investigation of psychic powers and non-lethal weaponry. The psychic baggage of losing the Vietnam War affected the US Military in some very weird ways.
Task Force Delta
- This is not the famous “Delta Force” group but this “Delta” refers to the difference in human potential and growth between the Soviet and US soldier or military, as opposed to technological difference.
- The recruiting problem of the now all-volunteer army. How to appeal to young people in the “Age of Aquarius?”
INSCOM (United States Army Intelligence and Security Command), formed by Brigadier General William Rolya on January 1st, 1977 out of the various Army Intelligence Units with no central command
1981 Major General Albert Stubblebine III, made US Army Chief of Intelligence thought he could walk through walls
- West Point Grad
- Master’s degree in Chemical Engineering
- Introduced to the 1st Earth Battalion Training Manual by Colonel John Alexander
- “Draw Down Days” of US Military with budgets being slashed, teaching soldiers to walk through walls seemed a cost effective pursuit
- “And so it was that Jim Channon’s madcap vision, triggered by his postcombat depression, found its way into the highest levels of the United States military.” (Ronson, 70)
- For the most part the Army as a whole ignored Channon’s idea’s but they managed to engage the spook network and corporate America
- 1983 has meeting with Special Forces Command at Fort Bragg, North Carolina about psychic warriors, but they already had research in the works
Jim Channon
- SRI connection? Changing Images of Man? What’s the real story here?
- Changing Images of Man study takes place 1974. Published as book 1982.
- A 1988 Washington Post article by Sally Squires says:
- The split between technological R&D and Human Potential R&D
- Blending of the “New-Age/Human Potential” movements into US Army training in search of a super soldier, a “Warrior Monk.”
- Channon
  - US Army infantry officer from 1962-1982
  - Two tours in Vietnam as a commissioned officer (65-66, 70-71) with 173 Airborne Brigade
  - Tasked in 1977 to investigate the New Age community in the US and offer a solution to Task Force Delta
  - After leaving the military in 1982 he became a “Organizational Transformation Consultant” for businesses, called by Fortune the “first corporate Shaman.”

The 1st Earth Battalion Operations Manual

Differences between the original 1979 report and the 1982 book
- The Vision (the New Image of the Soldier/Military)
- Changing Values
  - The Warrior Monk
  - The Third Wave
    - 1980 Alvin Toeffler book, sequel to 1970’s Future Shock
    - Details the transition from Industrial to Information Society
      - Direct “Changing Images of Man” link
    - Warrior Monks would then be Supra-National Information Warriors of the Third Wave
- Personal Evolution
- The Earth Battalion Satellite
  - The Earth Battalion would parachute in between armies while the satellite broadcast video to the world, and if the armies wanted to pursue aggression the would would watch the Earth Battalion be slaughtered.
- The Warrior Net
  - basically the internet, or US Military GPS/Communications
- Neuro-Linguistic Programming
- SAMURAI acronym

“The First Earth Battalion is structured as an Information Network
- Predictive
- Ethical Combat
- predictive
  - New Media technology slide quote
- Evolutionary Teamwork
- Decentralized networks
  - Far more than just army organizational structure, it’s community outreach and activism. It’s transformational.
  - “Symbol Linking”
  - The “Monomyth” different but the same
  - “Stripping Away Structure”
    - McKenna… “Culture is Not Your Friend.”
  - the “Two New Age Characters”
  - “New criteria for victory”
  - “War in the mass media age”
  - “Strategy of Phased Pressure”
  - “Soft Combat Principles”
- Earthwork
- “The Natural Guard”
  - “Etc”

Where It Led the Military

Dr. Jim Hardt and his portable brain training machine
- realigned alpha waves, boosted IQ by 12 points and spirituality levels to that of a Zen Master. Two people connected at once could read each other’s minds.
Colonel John Alexander, commander of only real 1st Earth Battalion, inventor of sticky foam weapon used in Somalia in 1995
- Introduction of non-lethal weaponry like bean bag rounds into arsenal, which later filtered down into Police Departments
- Special advisor to “The Pentagon, the CIA, the Los Alamos National Laboratory, and NATO. He is also one of Al Gore’s oldest friends.” (Ronson, 52)
Guy Savelli
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zKGx-HWIvU
- Guy Savelli’s Kun Tao
- Guy Savelli’s Dance and Martial Arts School
- Kun Tao
- Colonel Alexander calls him in 1983 to train special forces soldiers at Fr. Bragg. They’d discontinued this kind of training after Echanis was run over by a jeep in 1978. (Ronson, 61)