Dear Sirs,
This letter is to announce that I am embarking on a hunger strike effective Nov. 8, 1996. The purpose of the hunger strike is to protest the torture I have undergone here in the United States. Two years ago I could never have imagined that I would be tortured right here in the U.S. I especially could not have imagined that I would then have to mount a hunger strike to have my charges taken seriously.
I am a U.S. citizen, living in Charlottesville, Virginia. I am 33 years old. I have been affiliated with the University of Virginia -- as an instructor, student, and researcher -- for many years. My areas of research include target tracking, classification, neural networks, and other areas which have serious military applications, in addition to their non-military ones. I will not take more space here with my background. More information on my research, as well as some of my writings on Zen Buddhism and poems, can be found on my web page at http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~alb. Updated information on my hunger strike and more information about my situation can be found there as well.
Around January of 1995 I became the target of a harassment campaign. The incidents began when I started doing unclassified contract work that was ultimately for the Intelligence and Electronic Warfare Directorate. I know that people there knew what was going on early on. For this reason, and the level of technology involved, I accuse agents of the U.S. government of being at the very least complicit in my harassment and torture.
The technology of torture is much advanced now; that is a simple fact. To refuse to believe otherwise is simply wishful thinking. You may or may not already know about ``non-lethal weapons,'' directed energy, and other exotic technologies that can easily be used as high-tech torture implements. That some of these weapons can cause effects in people which mimic the symptoms of mental illness only increases the likelihood that these weapons will be abused. The sick rationale being that the psychiatric system will then unwittingly punish the victim should he protest. [The truly mentally ill are violated as well, by having their illnesses used as a ``cover.''] But I will not be deterred from speaking out.
My house was bugged. My electronic and U.S. mail was blatantly read. I was followed when I left the house. Both my phone lines rang several times a day, with the people on the other end always hanging up after 30 seconds or so. People showed up on the Usenet (Internet) news groups flaunting their knowledge of the intimate details of conversations and actions that had taken place in my ``private'' home the night before. They posted taunting poems about my ``private'' life, as well as death threats. They seemed, childishly, obsessed with anything involving sex. This continued for months.
They tried to keep me from posting to alt.zen, a newsgroup for discussions of Zen Buddhism. ``New'' people showed up on the newsgroup attacking me, and using information from my home to intimidate me. They would even parrot words right out of my mouth -- from my home -- to make it appear they had some idea what Zen Buddhism was. As though alt.zen were some subversive organization to be infiltrated and neutralized.
As if this ``traditional'' harassment campaign were not enough, I then began to experience symptoms that I now believe were caused by microwave or directed energy devices. Certain Usenet articles would even hint that this was being done to me as it happened. I lived in terror of even going to sleep inside my own home, for fear I would wake up -- again -- to find my brain being scrambled. Several times I even had to go and hide in my metal bathtub. This was not some silly Internet game.
As if this were still not enough, I now know that some sort of device has been used on me which allows others to hear both my speech and my subvocalized thoughts. I know this without a doubt. I could speculate on how it is done, whether by an implanted sensor device or by some other means, but I will not pretend to know the exact mechanism. I do not think there is even a term yet for this type of extreme violation -- this mind rape. Twenty four hours a day, for two years: When I am using the toilet, having sex, or even dreaming, my private thoughts are being raped. I cannot even begin to describe the horror of being tortured inside your own home this way, especially when your very own thoughts can be used or fed back to harm you, and nowhere is safe.
My home, family and person have been unspeakably violated. My religion has been defiled and my free exercise of it interfered with. My unpublished scientific research has been blatantly stolen, and any new research has been effectively halted. Virtually every right I ever thought I had has been trampled without even a hint of due process. Even my freedom of thought.
Perhaps due to the severity of what has been done to me (and some people with consciences), or perhaps in an attempt to publicly embarrass me, information has been leaking out. News organizations, including The Washington Post, have known the true story for some time (and from sources other than me). For reasons I do not understand, they have not seemed inclined to openly report the story. Perhaps due to unnamed sources, legal matters, a false idea of national security, or just the extreme nature of the atrocities that have been committed against me.
The more I learn about the history of covert intelligence abuses the less anomalous what has happened to me seems. Even the extent to which the press holds back the true story. As Americans we seem to want to pretend that intelligence agencies do really exist, and that they are not really arms of the government subject to the Bill of Rights or any treaties. If the entire government is not bound by the Bill of Rights we should stop teaching our children that, for example, they have the right to free speech and the free exercise of religion.
I have not been charged with or accused of any crime. I am not perfect and never claimed to be. I do not doubt that from close to two years of unconstitutional and immoral surveillance and torture one could find something ``wrong,'' out of context, or embarrassing I might have done or said. And I fully expect that this letter will lead to further attempts to smear me. But nothing compares to or justifies the horrors and experimentation my family has undergone, which can only be called crimes against humanity.
If nothing else I hope my actions will spur open discussions of these new technologies and their unfortunate applications as tools for political imprisonment and torture. Perhaps someone else can be saved from going through what I have.
It is only after much soul searching and failed attempts to obtain redress for, and an end to, the crimes against me that I now feel I must begin a hunger strike on Nov. 8, 1996. I call on the press to openly report what they know of abuses of this type, against me or other citizens. With regard to the appropriate offices of the U.S. government:
Sincerely, Allen L. Barker
P.S. It is a sad day when someone can cast standing up for the Bill of Rights -- in practice -- as unpatriotic, but I do not doubt that someone will try.