Los Expedientes Secretos: El CESID, el control de las creencias y los fenómenos inexplicables
by Manuel Carballal. Ediciones Planeta. Madrid: 2001. 494 pg.

INEXPLICATA has been long overdue in reviewing what is probably the book the shuts the door on a great many "open" UFO/paranormal cases of the 20th century, and our very own contributing editor Manuel Carballal is responsible for this mammoth volume on the deceitful role played by the Spanish intelligence agency (CESID) in confusing and mystifying journalists and researchers alike when it comes to paranormal investigation.

Upon opening the cover, the reader can feel the warm ocean breeze as the author goes to Cuba to look into the links between the intelligence services and the religion of santería, whose undeniable attraction has been used as a means of collecting intelligence by the island nation's government. Carballal returns to his native Spain to examine the role played by psychics and sensitives, including a priest who uses the pendulum for divination. The author delves into the strange case of the Albacete mutilations and their link to the UMMO hoax, following a thread passes through Morocco's Yezidi cult and its bizarre rites. An important note should be made of the presence of Nazi SS physicians during the Albacete mutilations, who would be subsequently identified as "space-faring ummites."

But the Iberian peninsula appears not hold enough mysteries for Carballal, who visits far-flung Mongolia in search of further clues to the ties between intelligence agencies and the paranormal. Sharing a bottle of Mongolian vodka made from mare's milk, he interviews General Battsagan Tsiiregzen, who elaborated on one of the most important psy-ops missions in recent memory: the 1982 "apparition" of the Blessed Virgin over Havana, supposedly projected by a U.S. submarine. "As I was able to ascertain," writes Carballal, "many eyewitnesses experienced genuine emotional shock. A policeman who saw the apparition from the waterfront drew his pistol and opened fire against the apparition...the hapless officer was taken to a hospital and later received psychiatric treatment."

Even more shocking is the statement that Spain's CESID "abducted" beggars off the streets to subject them to experiments aimed at testing a drug geared toward immobilizing victims without affecting their vital functions...a drug to be employed against enemies of the state.

A brief review such as this cannot possibly do justice to the years of work and tens of thousands of miles that Manuel Carballal has put into Los Expedientes Secretos. Its nearly five hundred pages force the reader to realize that there are other more mundane forces at work in the study of the paranormal--forces that cleverly employ UFOs, abductions, and other phenomena for their own purposes.

INEXPLICATA gives Los Expedientes Secretos : * * * *