Vince Houghton - Nuking the Moon - And Other Intelligence Schemes and Military Plots Left on the Drawing Board

These were just some of the recruits/volunteers for Project Washtub, a joint program run by the FBI and U.S. Air Force Office of Special Investigations (OSI) from 1951 to 1959. If World War III broke out, it was possible that the Soviets might try to invade the United States through Alaska. If this happened, the agents of Washtub would act as “stay-behinds” who would melt into the countryside and provide the U.S. government with intelligence on the Soviet occupation from backwoods hideouts. From time to time, they would be called upon to conduct covert operations against the Soviet occupiers—sabotage, small-unit paramilitary operations, exfiltration of downed pilots, and even lethal action (assassinations).

We now know a good deal about this program, even though it was one of the most secret projects of the Cold War. The majority of the Washtub documents were only declassified in 2014, and some are still heavily redacted, including about half of the roster of personnel. The biographies above are just some the people we know about. There were a total of eighty-nine stay-behind agents trained by FBI/OSI. I can only imagine the skill sets of those whose names are still too sensitive to release some sixty-five-plus years after the program began—some kind of Alaskan ninja we’ve never heard about, trained in kung fu, [2] I know ninja are Japanese. I also know kung fu is not. Play along. able to speak fifteen languages, control bears with his mind, and holds a PhD in Kodiak geology. Or maybe they are unstoppable killing machines who can’t be bargained with. Who can’t be reasoned with. They don’t feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And they absolutely will not stop, ever, until the Soviet occupiers are dead. And they all look like Schwarzenegger. Except for the super-cool ones who look like Robert Patrick.

But that’s just speculation. [3] But it’s true. I know it in my heart. Here’s what we know for sure:

The plan was developed by FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, and his former protégé, Air Force major general Joseph Carroll, the head of the Office of Special Investigations. The overall administration of the plan within Alaska was done by four government officials, two from FBI, and two from Air Force OSI. The FBI contingent would be composed of the Special Agent in Charge (SAC) and the Assistant Special Agent in Charge (ASAC) of the Anchorage office, while the director and deputy director, Office of Special Investigations, at the Alaskan Air Command would comprise the Air Force side. These administrators would be responsible for the overall selection of personnel, which was immensely important for the potential success of this operation.

It wasn’t just the quality of the personnel that was important, but the quantity. The Soviets were known for a policy of harsh treatment toward civilians in occupied territory. They immobilized or “liquidated” large numbers of civilians in areas under their control. Meaning the program was a numbers game: There’s no telling how many agents would survive the initial invasion. Thus it was essential to “create as many cells as the availability of proper personnel permits,” which meant, according to the documents, that Alaska should have one cell for every 5,000 people—this was considered “maximum saturation.” With a total population of 158,000 people in the territory in 1951 (compared to nearly 740,000 today), that meant around thirty cells.

Here’s how a cell would work:

It would have one principal—someone from the description of people listed above. (Not Schwarzenegger. Pete Snow and friends.) The principal himself would recruit five or six agents, and approximately thirty subagents (plus any informal informants as he could acquire). This would total about thirty-five people in each cell (not including informants).

My favorite part of the hundreds of released Washtub documents is a single paragraph, in which the designers of the proposed program describe, in excruciatingly specific detail, what traits the “typical” principal should exhibit. He is

a professional photographer in Anchorage; he has only one arm and it is felt that he would not benefit the enemy in any labor battalion; he is an amateur radio operator; he is a professional photographer; he is licensed as a hunting or fishing guide, and well versed in the art of survival; he is a pilot of small aircraft; he is reasonably intelligent, particularly crafty, and possessed of sufficient physical courage as is indicated by his offer to guide a party which was to have hunted Kodiak bear armed only with bow and arrow.

The best thing is in the next sentence, when, in perfect government official-speak understatement, the document calls this man “eminently satisfactory” as a principal. Satisfactory? Our one-armed photographer/radio operator/pilot/fishing guide/survivalist intelligent (or at least crafty) bear hunter is only “satisfactory”? But wait (you say), they called him “eminently” satisfactory. Great. They are saying he’s very, very okay.

In their defense, I overstated when I called him a bear hunter. The document only called him a bear hunting “guide.” I guess the Feds would have been really impressed if he was able to hunt using his one arm to fire his bow and arrows. Maybe within the redacted roster of principals there’s a one-legged whitewater kayaker/helicopter pilot/professional spelunker who wrangles harp seals in his spare time. We may never know what would actually impress our government.

What we do know about the program’s personnel is that women and indigenous people need not apply. I wasn’t being needlessly exclusive when imagining them to all look like Arnold. The reason for excluding women wasn’t explicit (it was the 1950s, so we can easily guess), but the documents do explain the rationale behind the hostility toward the native community (not that U.S. government hostility toward a native community should come as a surprise either). Principals or agents from the “Eskimo, Indian and Aleut groups in the Territory should be avoided in view of their propensities to drink to excess and their fundamental indifference to constituted governments and political philosophies. It is pointed out that their prime concern is with survival and their allegiance would easily shift to any power in control.”

Yes, let’s exclude the people who know this land better than anyone else on the basis of vitriolic stereotypes. The people who have survived in this inhospitable environment for hundreds of years. Who needs them?

The reality is the program took security very seriously. What appears in hindsight to be blatant racial bias was, at the time… well, blatant racial bias. But, in their minds, it stemmed from an absolute requirement to keep the operation from being compromised. The stakes were just too high.

Counterintelligence was paramount. The principal recruits would have no knowledge of other principals—they were trained separately, and under assumed names. None of the agents recruited by the principal would be aware of the others, so that the capture of one agent would not lead to a compromise of the whole cell. Subagents (those recruited by agents) would also be ignorant of fellow subagents, and wouldn’t even know there was a principal above their recruiter. The overriding concept was need to know. Keep things separate. Keep things secret.

Then you need training, since these are inexperienced civilians (albeit “eminently satisfactory” civilians). Each of the principals was scheduled to receive significant and comprehensive intelligence and paramilitary training. Most of this came from former OSS or CIA operatives, and other relevant government instructors. It included training in cover stories, pretexts, and deception (eight total hours of training); simple encoding and decoding of messages (ten hours); surreptitious photography and micro-photographs (twenty hours); surreptitious methods of entry (four hours); secret inks (two hours); essential information and methods of deduction (fifteen hours); methods of selection and training of subagents and informants (ten hours); methods of observation (four hours); communication, including telegraph, radio, and so on (twenty hours); methods of interviewing and interrogation (three hours); airdrop and pickup techniques, including recognition (eight hours); scouting, patrolling, map reading, and sketching (twenty hours); guerrilla techniques and close combat (twenty hours); Russian secret police techniques (eight to ten hours); demolition techniques (twenty hours); survival under Arctic conditions (summer and winter) (thirty hours); and piloting, maintenance, and concealment of light aircraft (designated agents only) (twenty hours).