Anchorage Daily News, Dermot Cole, May 14, 2014
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| Antennas for the newly completed High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program (HAARP) is seen near Gakona, Alaska on Wednesday, June 27, 2007. The world's most advanced high-energy radio physics experiment was declared fully operational in a Wednesday afternoon ribbon-cutting ceremony. (AP Photo/Mark Farmer) |
FAIRBANKS
-- The U.S. Air Force gave official notice to Congress Wednesday that it
intends to dismantle the $300 million High Frequency Active Auroral Research
Program in Gakona this summer.
The
shutdown of HAARP, a project created by the late Sen. Ted Stevens when he
wielded great control over the U.S. defense budget, will start after a final
research experiment takes place in mid-June, the Air Force said in a letter to
Congress Tuesday.
The
University of Alaska has expressed interest in taking over the research site,
which is off the Tok Cutoff in an area where black spruce was cleared a
quarter-century ago for the Air Force backscatter radar project that was never
completed. But the school has not volunteered to pay $5 million a year to run
HAARP.
Responding
to questions from Sen. Lisa Murkowski during a Senate hearing Wednesday, David
Walker, deputy assistant secretary of the Air Force for science, technology and
engineering, said this is "not an area that we have any need for in the
future" and it would not be a good use of Air Force research funds to keep
HAARP going. "We're moving on to other ways of managing the ionosphere,
which the HAARP was really designed to do," he said. "To inject
energy into the ionosphere to be able to actually control it. But that work has
been completed."
Comments of
that sort have given rise to endless conspiracy theories, portraying HAARP as a
superweapon capable of mind control or weather control, with enough juice to
trigger hurricanes, tornadoes and earthquakes.
Scientists
say all of that is nonsense, and that the degree of ionosphere control possible
through HAARP is akin to controlling the Pacific Ocean by tossing a rock into
it.
Built at a
cost of more than $290 million, the site has 180 antennas on 30 acres that are
used to direct energy into the ionosphere, which is 55 miles to 370 miles above
the Earth, and monitor changes in the flow of charged particles. Stevens was
the godfather of HAARP, which he helped start two decades ago with annual
earmarks slipped into the defense budget.
At the
hearing on defense research and innovation, featuring six representatives of
the Pentagon, no one said HAARP has a future in the defense budget.
Walker said
the Air Force has maintained the site for several years and the last project is
one by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). Once completed,
the site will close.
DARPA
Director Arati Prabhakar said, "The 'P' in DARPA is projects. We're not in
the business of doing the same thing forever, so very naturally as we conclude
that work, we're going to move on. It's not an ongoing need for DARPA despite
the fact that we had actually gotten some good value out of that infrastructure
in the past."
Walker said
the Air Force would like to remove critical equipment this summer to avoid the
expense of winterization.
Alan
Shaffer, assistant secretary of defense for research and engineering, said
HAARP is a "world-class facility," but the department does not need
it anymore.
"With
all the other issues and problems and challenges facing the department at this
time, we just don't see that that investment, over a long-term period, is where
we would prioritize our investment," said Shaffer.
"No
one else wants to step up to the bill, ma'am," Shaffer said to Murkowski.
On another
topic, Murkowski asked Shaffer about small modular nuclear reactors for remote
areas. She said, for example, Eielson Air Force Base could benefit from
"reliable energy security that nuclear power can provide."
Shaffer
said the "sticker shock" of an initial $1 billion investment for a
small nuclear reactor is a huge obstacle.
Related Article:
"... In An Hour
with an Angel in Aug. of 2013, Archangel Michael and I had this exchange on the
subject.
Steve
Beckow: XX would like to know if HAARP has been deactivated.
Archangel
Michael: Yes, it has. (2) ...."
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