Corso's Controversy With Senator Thurmond

From: "Michael J. Poirier" 
Date: Fri, 06 Jun 1997 12:13:09 -0700
Subject: Corso's Controversy With Senator Thurmond

From: Stig_Agermose@online.pol.dk (Stig Agermose)
Date: Fri, 6 Jun 1997
Subject: Corso's Controversy With Senator Thurmond

Here ia a clipping from  AP on the Corso-Thurmond controversy:

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Thurmond Disowns UFO Book

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) Sen. Strom Thurmond says he regrets writing the
foreword to a new book that says aliens from a crashed spaceship
provided the technology that allowed the United States to win the Cold
War.

"The Day After Roswell," by former Thurmond aide and retired Army
intelligence officer Philip J. Corso, goes on sale next week.

The book focuses on the supposed crash of an unidentified flying object
in the New Mexico desert near Roswell in 1947.

Corso, assisted by William J. Birnes, writes that the government
confiscated the craft and from it gleaned secrets that led to advances
such as laser technology, fiber optics, night-vision capabilities and
the microchip.

Thurmond, chairman of the Senate Armed Forces Committee and the
nation's longest-serving senator, signed on to write the foreword in
early 1997 because he was told it was to be autobiographical, his
office said.

The book was to have been a memoir by Corso entitled "I Walked with
Giants: My Career in Military Intelligence," Thurmond staffers said.

In the foreward, Thurmond praised Corso as a person of integrity "with
many interesting stories to share with individuals interested in
military history, espionage and the workings of our government." He
didn't mention of the aliens, The New York Times reported today.

The senator said he regrets his connection to the book because it
appears to bolster claims of a government conspiracy.

"I know of no such `cover-up' and do not believe one existed," he said
in a statement.

Thurmond's deputy press secretary, John DeCrosta, said today that to
the best of his knowledge neither the senator nor his staff knew of the
book's content until Tuesday, when a reporter called inquiring about
it.

Liz Hartman, a spokeswoman for Pocket Books, said Thurmond's office
received information about the book before it was finished.

"We stand behind the book," she said.

The book dispute hung over Thurmond on Wednesday at the Washington
ceremony where the South Carolina Republican received the Pentagon's
highest civilian honor. "No American has done more for America's
security than Sen. Strom Thurmond," Defense Secretary William Cohen
said.