From zombies to Jade Helm 15, some conspiracy theories just never die

Green Berets of the 7th Special Forces Group, driving light tactical all-terrain vehicles, conduct maneuvers on a gravel road in Fort Bliss, Texas, preparing for deployment in Afghanistan. (Photo: Spc. Steven Young/U.S. Army)

“We are not taking over anything,” an exasperated Pentagon spokesman assured reporters this week, in response to rumors that a military exercise planned this summer is actually an excuse to impose martial law on parts of seven Southwestern states. The eight-week exercise by the Army’s Special Operations Command, called Jade Helm 15, is actually aimed at training soldiers to fight in a variety of overseas terrain, but has been the subject of Internet conspiracy theories since it was first announced in March. These theories have been fueled by the release of a map labeling the states that would host the training as either “hostile,” “permissive,” uncertain (leaning hostile)” and “uncertain (leaning friendly).”

This map, released as a part of the Jade Helm training exercise, has sparked conspiracy theories about its purpose. (Photo: U.S. Army)

Particularly in Texas, by far the largest “hostile” area on the map, fears about Jade Helm’s real motives spread quickly, from the Internet fringe to the citizens of Bastrop County, to the presidential campaign trail — proliferating into bizarre theories involving empty Walmarts and Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) detention camps along the way. Gov. Greg Abbott legitimized those fears by recruiting the Texas State Guard to be his eyes and ears during the operation, in order to assure Texans that “their safety, constitutional rights, private property rights, and civil liberties will not be infringed.”

By Monday, the fire had reached the Pentagon, where spokesman Col. Steve Warren attempted to extinguish the conspiratorial conflagration.

“We are not taking over anything,” Warren told reporters.“This is training that we’ve coordinated in great detail with both state and local officials in the various states that we’ll be conducting it.”

Warren’s comments were in response to a question from reporters. They were not part of a coordinated conspiracy-theory containment strategy, because the Pentagon doesn’t have one, according to Defense Department public affairs officer Joe Sowers. “It is not in the mission of the Department of Defense to deal with conspiracy theories,” Sowers told Yahoo News.

Conspiracy theories are as old as time — or at least the Middle Ages, when the subjects were often religious minorities or heretics. But on the Internet’s online forums and social media, paranoia spreads farther and faster than ever before. In the United States, the most common target of such theories is the federal government, which has been accused of everything from using fluoride as a form of mind control to orchestrating the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

And while no government agency can possibly be expected to acknowledge every accusation the public lobs at it, some conspiracy theories, like those concerning Jade Helm, kick up enough dust to prompt an official response.

The Extraterrestrial Highway near Rachel, Nev., borders Area 51, the military base that has fueled countless conspiracy theories. (Photo: Laura Rauch/Associated Press)

UFOs and Area 51

One of the longest-running themes in popular American conspiracy theories is UFOs: what the government knows about them and what it isn’t telling us. At the center of such extraterrestrial speculation is Area 51, the mysterious Nevada Air Force base widely believed to be used to examine and store grounded extraterrestrial aircraft as well as the aliens themselves.

For decades, Area 51’s activities were top-secret, a factor that only fueled the conspiracy theories. But in 2013, the CIA finally acknowledged the base’s existence, releasing formerly classified documents detailing Area 51’s use as a test site for aerial surveillance programs.

While this disclosure seems to explain reports of UFO sightings near Area 51, it hardly succeeded in putting the extraterrestrial theories to rest. Fascination with Area 51 and aliens in general persist, from the annals of the Internet to Hollywood and the White House. This interview with a supposed retired Area 51 scientist before his death was widely circulated online about one year after the CIA revelation. A horror film set on the Nevada base comes out this month. And on his last day at the White House, outgoing Obama adviser John Podesta said his biggest regret of 2014 was “not securing the disclosure of the UFO files.”

The ‘North American Union,’ ‘NAFTA superhighway,’ and ‘Amero’ currency

In 2006, fresh from the success of his New York Times best-seller, “Unfit for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry,” commentator and renowned conspiracy theorist Jerome Corsi wrote a column for the conservative website Human Events about what he called the Bush administration’s secret plan to build a “NAFTA SuperHighway, four football-fields-wide, through the heart of the U.S. along Interstate 35, from the Mexican border at Laredo, Tex., to the Canadian border north of Duluth, Minn.” The NAFTA superhighway, Corsi claimed, was a “key piece of the coming ‘North American Union,’” Bush’s larger purported scheme to “abrogate U.S. sovereignty” and allow “free, unimpeded movement of people across open borders with Mexico and Canada.”

Corsi’s basis for the “North American Union” theory was the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America, a dialogue launched between Bush, Mexican President Vicente Fox and Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin in Waco, Texas, in 2005 — the goal of which was promoting economic- and security-related cooperation between the three countries.

The Security and Prosperity Partnership was a real thing that really happened. The “North American Union” was not. Nor was the NAFTA superhighway, or the “Amero,” the coming North American currency Corsi also predicted.  The fear Corsi’s conspiracies caused, however, was very real. So much so that Republican Rep. Virgil Goode of Virginia introduced a bill in the House resolving that the United States should neither construct a NAFTA superhighway nor join with Mexico and Canada in a North American Union.

In July 2007, Republican presidential candidates were faced with questions from constituents about the supposed superhighway. While Ron Paul had been a vocal opponent of the continental transportation network, Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani both said they’d never heard of such a proposal. A New York Times blogpost about the superhighway concerns on the campaign trail noted that federal officials denied the plan’s existence and said that “the notion of a federal project for a behemoth highway bisecting the heart of the country and erasing America’s borders is an urban legend that has spread widely on the Internet and talk radio.”

Former Vice President Dick Cheney also apparently denied Corsi’s superhighway claims in a letter to a private citizen, although his denial was virtually unreported by anyone other than Corsi himself, who disputed Cheney’s comments in a column at World Net Daily.

A UH-60 Black Hawk takes off from the University of Kansas in Lawrence, Kansas, as part of an ROTC exercise. (Photo: Orlin Wagner/Associated Press)

Black helicopters and the New World Order

Before the North American Union, there was the New World Order, the elite global government believed to rule the world. One of the many modern claims stemming from the sprawling New World Order theory is that the NWO spies on average citizens with autonomous robot black helicopters.

Black helicopters have caused panic in cities like Dallas, Miami, and Chicago in recent years, even after assurances from the city and military officials that the helicopters are simply part of “realistic urban training” for military personnel preparing for nighttime operations overseas.

As recently as last week, the sight of what looked like a black helicopter flying over a mine near Grants Pass, Ore., was enough to round up a group of armed local militia members prepared for what they perceived was a stand-off with government agents. It turned out that the aircraft, a privately owned helicopter, was not affiliated with the government at all.

The ‘zombie apocalypse’

Government officials often only acknowledge conspiracy theories as a means of cracking down on misinformation. But in 2011, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention used one to its advantage. Seizing on the public fascination with zombies, the CDC launched a disaster-preparedness campaign in the guise of a tongue-in-cheek “zombie preparedness” campaign.

The creative push, which included creepy zombie-themed posters and even a graphic novella, quickly became one of the CDC’s most effective campaigns.

“If you are generally well equipped to deal with a zombie apocalypse, you will be prepared for a hurricane, pandemic, earthquake or terrorist attack,” Assistant Surgeon General Ali Khan, MD, director of the Office of Public Health Preparedness and Response, told Forbes in 2014.

The CDC certainly didn’t put an end to the zombie phenomenon, but the government’s serious denials didn’t squelch the Area 51, NAFTA superhighway, or Jade Helm conspiracy theories, either.

This week, Texas Gov. Abbott defended his decision to call in the State Guard to monitor Jade Helm, telling reporters at a prayer breakfast in North Austin on Monday, “We are playing a pivotal role of government, and that is to provide information to people who have questions.”

It appears even when the government does attempt to set the record straight, some conspiracy theories just won’t die.