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September 1998
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Special Note: Thanks to Jon Rappoport and Dr. Eugene Mallove for their help (and patience) on this article.
March 23, 1997
The Cold Fusion Suppression
From the topic "Cold Fusion" in The Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, by E.D. Hirsch, Jr., Joseph F. Kett, & James Trefil
"If a scientist tells you that something can be done, he is probably right. If a scientist tells you that something can't be done, he is probably wrong."
Arthur C. Clarke
According to official history, Drs. Stanley Pons and Martin Fleischmann are an interesting footnote to the development of science. On March 23, 1989 (eight years and a day ago), at the University of Utah, they announced what amounted to the Holy Grail of science, a discovery, which, if true, would change the world more than any discovery before or since. Sadly, their claims were debunked by others and disproven, and it instead is a mere curiosity as to what the claims would have meant if only they were true.
The official story is, as usual, wrong.
Just as the Cultural Literacy Dictionary lists James Earl Ray as MLK's killer, Sirhan Sirhan as RFK's, and Lee Harvey Oswald as JFK's "alleged" and "apparent" assassin, there are frauds within the field of physical science. In truth, the history of modern science is filled with a level of deceit that would marvel anyone who had true fidelity to the faith of science, which, fortunately for the status quo, is a very decided minority. One such man is Dr. Eugene Mallove, a very respected scientist who has chosen to throw his reputation in the trash bin for the sake of his integrity. So far, there are few brave and conscientious objectors who have joined him in his crusade for the truth, but the numbers are growing, and when the masses of "scientists" realize the huge cash cow they are missing, they will quickly stumble their way to suck pathetically on the tit which is painfully swelling from lack of use. For you see, although the blowhards of the scientific establishment proclaim otherwise, cold fusion is alive and well, and soon it may be the common-place reality that long has only been fantasies of wide-eyed Utopians.
What is cold fusion? Good question. Basically, it is a phenomenon where ordinary hydrogen and a special form of it, known as deuterium (which, if it is in H(2)O at abundance, turns the substance into what is known as "heavy water"), are brought together with metals, in a process that produces excess heat beyond the limits of chemistry. That explains it scientifically, but how is it done and what does it all mean?
That is the stickler, and perhaps that is one reason why there has been such a suppression of the cold fusion story. The truth is, nobody really knows how to explain the amazing process, although there are a few theories floating around which are way too complicated for this article. As far as mainstream "science" is concerned, if there isn't an acceptable explanation for a certain physical process, the process can't exist, so it will be conveniently ignored, the facts tossed to the "Book of the Damned" where all the inconvenient truths are buried, all to protect those who desire their reality to be uncomplicated. To make matters worse, cold fusion experiments are difficult to reproduce, making it easy for those to doubt the whole field of research.
Although the process is still a definite mystery, cold fusion is being accomplished (at several hundred laboratories around the world), and the eventual effects of this reality are at least partially understood. With the energy production released through cold fusion, there would be a ridiculously cheap and plentiful source of power (i.e. water.) This would affect every single business and social activity that involved the usage of power, which basically amounts to everything. Overnight, the costs and squandering of resources to the problem of energy would drop close to zero. The costs of producing food, shelter, clothing, and all the other basic necessities would be minimal in comparison to what they are now, leading to (perhaps) the end of world hunger. Furthermore, as the power source is not ecologically damaging (unlike oil, coal, and present day nuclear energy), it would put to an end most of the environmental ravaging that has occurred in man's drive to "advancement". In a more fascinating usage of cold fusion, the cheap transformation of elements into one another will become practical and easy, fulfilling the longtime goal of the alchemist chemical wedding of creating gold and silver. And this is all before we even consider the tremendous implications this would have on psychology, philosophy, and religion. Perhaps the best way to sum up the effects of cold fusion is the common statement of those in the "scientific" community: whoever discovers cold fusion deserves not only a Nobel Prize for Chemistry and for Physics, but for Peace as well.
Pons and Fleischmann are owed quite a bit, in other words.
When I first spoke to Dr. Mallove on the phone, I was a bit skeptical of the whole claim, as it seemed too mind-blowing even for me to deem plausible. As he spoke, I had in my head the image of a guy tinkering in his garage on a nifty "cold fusion" device. (I can only imagine his view of what this "conspiracy theorist" was like on the other side of the phone.) He explained he was the chief science writer for MIT during the whole cold fusion frenzy, and was stunned by the deception that was involved in the reporting of the Pons-Fleischmann experiment. With degrees from MIT and Harvard, he certainly didn't sound like a crackpot, and spoke with a tone of reason and logic that I can only envy. He explained he had written a little book on the subject, and was the editor of a journal titled Infinite Energy. Judging this guy as a credible sounding source, I agreed to view his materials and pass it along to others after viewing and analyzing it.
Little did I know what I was in for.
The little book that Dr. Mallove wrote, Fire from Ice, was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize in 1991. According to Julian Schwinger, Nobel Laureate in Physics, "Eugene Mallove has produced a sorely needed, accessible overview of the cold fusion muddle. By sweeping away stubbornly held preconceptions, he bares the truth implicit in a provocative variety of experiments." Arthur C. Clarke (the author of 2001, which told the fantastic story of finding extra-terrestrial monuments in outer space and the eventual cover-up of it by the U.S. government, before any of those faces and pyramids were found on Mars that NASA and establishment science keeps ignoring) put it more bluntly: "Fire from Ice is the only good book on the subject." Infinite Energy, it turns out, opens its first issue with a little Clarke piece titled "Welcome to the Apocalypse?" It seems that if Dr. Mallove was a fraud, he had fooled some pretty heavy hitters, including John Wiley & Sons, his book publisher. Even Bob Dole, not normally known for his desire to break from the status quo and do something risky, chimed in, declaring Infinite Energy to be "on the leading edge" of reporting cold fusion technology developments.
These are the kind of endorsements that garage tinkerers can only dream of.
In the first issue of Infinite Energy (now in its third year of publication), Dr. Mallove declares, quite bluntly, "Now it is abundantly clear that (Pons' and Fleischmann's) widely denied discovery was but the 'tip of the iceberg'." He also states, "One of the most disputed anomalies in the history of science is inexorably heading toward acceptance by the scientific community." If perhaps you think it is just him who is stating this, peer-reviewed journals, including Physics Letters A, the Journal of Electroanalytical Chemistry, the Japanese Journal of Applied Physics, and Fusion Technology, as well as an August 1993 Popular Science cover story and the May/June 1994 MIT Technology Review have covered this well-kept secret (not to mention Good Morning America and Nightline and another write-up in The Economist.) In a later issue, Mallove proclaims, "Now, there are disbelievers only among the under-informed, those who accepted the anti-scientific propaganda of cold fusion's opponents, and members of the Flat Earth Society - the professional "skeptics" who actively wage war against cold fusion."
What could keep such a powerful truth silent? As Dr. Mallove first explained to me the situation, I, being my usually dark cynical self, stated, "You know, this story has to be littered with dead bodies." After all, the oil and nuclear power industries would be worthless overnight, and those are certainly two industries you don't mess with if you want to live a long life. To my disappointment, Dr. Mallove denied that was the case and stated that the real opponents came from the hot fusion industry, which is receiving major subsidies ($15 billion alone in the U.S. over the last four decades) that would soon disappear with the discovery of cold fusion, and from the academic scientific community itself. Perhaps the latter sounds strange (professors seem like rather tame bogeymen), but it isn't when one does a little study of history. When Galileo discovered what appeared to be mountains and other features on the moon (he was right), a "superior" belittled his discovery, as it defied the claims of Aristotle that the moon was a perfect sphere. The fellow "scientist" went so far as to refuse to look through the telescope, reaching instead to the bookshelf with Aristotle's "proof". More recently, when the Wright Brothers did their first famous flight on December 17, 1903, only six newspapers reported it. For the most part, the few reports from Kitty Hawk were disbelieved, for, as Jed Rothwell points out in issue # 9, "The issue was settled. A heavier-than-air flying machine was physically impossible. It was an absurdity, a gross violation of the laws of nature. This had been proved mathematically with "unassailable logic" by leading experts in physics, writing in distinguished journals and magazines." As the New York Globe would put it, "if there is any possibility that such an airship is within measurable distance of perfection any government could well afford to provide its inventor with unlimited resources and promise him a prize, in case of success, running into the millions." As Rothwell notes, "In other words, we shouldn't have a demonstration because we already know it doesn't work because there hasn't been a demonstration. A Catch 22!" It wasn't until 1908, when the Wright Brothers had their first big public demonstration of their flight (in the past, they had been somewhat secretive to "protect" the value of their discovery) that it finally became accepted that all these lurid claims from Kitty Hawk actually amounted to anything.
Perhaps the perversion of logic seems shocking, but it's pretty much par for the course for the history of modern "science". The sad truth is, the institution of science, in its attempt to create itself, used the most popular organization at the time (and its sometime opponent) as an example of how to organize itself, the corrupt and authoritarian Roman Catholic Church. Given its unsound choice for a role model, there should be little surprise that mainstream science is, for the most part, rigid, dogmatic, close-minded, and ruthless to any who step out of line. It is also, like the Vatican, very easily bribed, which explains how, as it was viciously attacking cold fusion and its proponents, the scientific establishment was mum about the bogus pseudo-science involved in the "Star Wars" program, a fraudulent money racket for the military-industrial complex and it's very willing R&D collaborators.
Leading the charge against cold-fusion was John Huizenga, co-chair of the Panel on Cold Fusion for the U.S. Department of Energy. While at his post, he prematurely ejaculated a report that condemned the tests of Pons-Fleischmann and others. He would later write a book on the subject, titled Cold Fusion: Scientific Fiasco of the Century. Also attacking the cold fusion experiments were Frank Close, in his Too Hot to Handle, which accused Pons and Fleischmann of ethical violations, and "journalist" Gary Taubes, who alleged in both the publication Science, and in his book Bad Science that a Texas A & M cold fusion experiment was the result of fraudulent spiking. Needless to say, all three men had written what were essentially hit pieces that were riddled with errors and half-truths, screeds that would have done Joe McGinniss or Gerald Posner proud.
Of course, this is where the conspiracy angle comes in, and it certainly has an appeal to it. The histories of Close and Taubes have been investigated very little, but it is true that Huizenga was essentially a mouthpiece for the DOE. And, as anybody who studies the ugly truths behind politics knows, the DOE is basically owned and operated by the oil and nuclear industries. Maybe they didn't order hitmen to whack Pons and Fleischmann: they didn't have to. Using "independent" journalists as their fronts, they easily mocked and discredited those who rocked the halls of science. Perhaps I'm reading too much in this. Then again, another book, posing as being neutral on the subject of cold fusion, A Dialogue on Chemically Induced Nuclear Effects - A Guide for the Perplexed About Cold Fusion, written by Nate Hoffman, makes, according to Jed Rothwell, "factual errors that might easily have been avoided. Some of his mistakes are mind-boggling... The focus of the book is wrong. It covers a few backwater aspects of cold fusion. It describes a handful of unimportant, botched experiments while it ignores the real work... Hoffman does not discuss any experiments in which excess heat was observed. He censors them out, he pretends they do not exist. This eliminates most of the literature... The censorship of anything relating to heat is carried to absurd extremes." The book, incidentally, was published by the American Nuclear Society, with support from the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI).
Dr. Fleischmann himself, in an Infinite Energy interview, brings up the dreaded "c" word. On recent breakthroughs in cold fusion, he stated "I think what is going to happen is that a lot of this work will disappear behind closed doors." When asked why, he replied, "Three hundred trillion dollars." On Frank Close, he comments, "I think he has been manipulated." He later states, "regarding Huizenga, Close, Morrison, I feel that if you really could penetrate behind the smokescreen you'd find that other people have been manipulating them." A quick mention of the Jason Society (a collection of scientists who work closely with the military-industrial complex on defense projects and nefarious "black budget" technology) followed, as well as the possible involvement of them in the cold fusion suppression, statements that were unsurprisingly not followed up on by the interviewer.
Conspiracy or not, there has been a suppression, and the good news is, at least in Dr. Mallove's view, the lies covering the field of cold fusion are soon going to end. The smell of money is too great for the blind to not notice. The Japanese government's very powerful Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI), along with the Ministry of Education and its National Institute for Fusion Science, as well as the New Energy Development Organization (NEDO) has led the way, helping to form a consortium of major Japanese corporations (Toyota being perhaps the most devoted) called "The New Hydrogen Energy Panel" (NHEP) to advance cold fusion research. Annual expenditure on cold fusion research in Japan is estimated to be about $100 million, an amount that will dramatically rise as technological devices emerge. This should not be surprising to any student of geo-politics: Japan, heavy on cash and short of natural resources, is consumed with a desire to avoid its reliance on foreign fuel sources.
Despite this, Dr. Mallove doubts that the Japanese will be able to become the kingpins of the cold fusion field, as, unsurprisingly, they are showing their often noted lack of innovation in their work in the field. Instead, despite the intentional suppression and ridicule of cold fusion by the DOE, he sees the U.S., led by venture capitalists and that can-do American spirit, being the eventual lords of the new power empires. Leading the way was ENECO, a Salt Lake City corporation that acquired world-wide licensing rights to the University of Utah's cold fusion patents. Another company is the Clean Energy Technologies, Inc. (CETI), who has showed so much promise that Motorola, who is very interested in the field, offered to buy them out. Even the EPRI has jumped into the act, though I, knowing the dark history of utility companies, remain thoroughly skeptical just what their involvement is all about.
Dr. Mallove may be right. One thing is certain: this is an issue that is hardly going to disappear. Last year's Chain Reaction, directed by The Fugitive helmsman Andrew Davis and starring Keanu Reeves (free energy and suppression of truth I can believe, but Keanu Reeves as a nuclear physicist?) dealt with the subject indirectly, and the upcoming The Saint, starring ex-Batman Val Kilmer and Oscar nominee Elizabeth Shue and produced by Robert Evans (of Roy Radin hit and Son of Sam slayings fame - but that's another conspiracy) is more precisely about the cold fusion story, going so far as to hire Mallove as a technical consultant for the film. With such entertainment pieces behind it, one has to wonder how long the lid can be kept on the truth of cold fusion.
The amazing thing is that despite it all, Dr. Mallove remains a stunningly conventional man. He didn't become a rebel by a desire to buck the system, he became one because his sense of ethics left him no other choice. That a man of his stature could even contemplate such a move is remarkable; that he actually followed through is worthy of applause. In the end, I suppose Dr. Mallove would be happy to return to the scientific establishment that he was once part of: all they have to do is stop their lying on a very important subject. (I wouldn't hold my breath.)
In fact, any radical stances he takes is a direct result of the eye-opening experience he has had with the cold fusion story. In an editorial, titled "Is New Physics Needed?", he states, "If 'Physics' had made such a catastrophically wrong assessment of the data for excess energy and nuclear products in low energy reactions, what else has it gotten wrong?" Good question. In recent issues, Infinite Energy has widened its scope due to such important questions, covering things such as AquaFuel, Anti-Gravity devices, and the incredible Joseph Newman's Energy Machines. More dubiously, they have also reported (with skepticism) on the "Herbal petrol" invention of Ramar Pillai, which supposedly turned water into a petrol-like fuel by mixing it with a mysterious herb. It now appears that Mr. Pillai is actually a magician that duped a bunch of high level "scientists" by secretly adding oil to his process (although, considering the level of lies in the cold fusion story, I am not ready to close the door on this one either.) In any case, this open-minded level of inquiry is applaudable, and is a model that any who follow any fields should be so dedicated to match.
As for the future of cold fusion, I am not sure where it is headed. Despite Dr. Mallove's sincere and rational enthusiasm, I am doubtful if it will ever add up to what is promised. Of course, I may be biased in my opinion. Quite simply, I have way too much invested in cynical apathy to actually get excited about anything that makes me hopeful. In fact, as much as the oil and power companies stand to lose if cold fusion becomes a reality, I stand to lose perhaps even more. After all, how can I expect to profiteer of the misery and corruption of society if suddenly we are transformed into a utopia of near limitless abundance? Yes, for my own selfish sake, I hope that Dr. Mallove is wrong, and that the search for cold fusion is effectively squashed by the powers that be.
Still, I do have one piece of advice for Drs. Pons and Fleischmann:
Keep three places on your awards shelf for some richly deserved medals. Just in case.
