Manfred Gale

Manfred Gale, of the Army staff at the Pentagon (office symbol DAMA-ZD, under the Deputy Chief of Staff for Research, Development and Acquisition), chaired the Grill Flame Scientific Evaluation Committee, appointed after "in June 1979 it was suggested by Dr. LaBerge, then Under Secretary of the Army, that a Scientific Evaluation Committee be appointed to review the Army's parapsychological activities." He "organized" the committee and invited its members, "carefully screened to avoid any persons with preconceived notions for or against the subject under investigation," and kept "a collection of all such documents" in his office. Its report of December 1979 found that remote-viewing research "thus far have not proved the existence of the phenomena," that "sole dependence on SRI-like protocols to resolve the RV issue will not be fruitful," and, by five votes to three, that INSCOM's operational work could continue under oversight.¹

The Defense Department's Grill Flame committee under Jack Vorona of DIA heard on November 27, 1979, that the report "had not been completed," one member "questioned the substantive expertise of the Gale Committee," and the group asked to see it "prior to it being given to any other party or group." Gale briefed it on January 10, 1980: "Mr. Gale's briefing was not received favorably by the Grill Flame group. There were many substantive reservations based upon errors in both facts and analysis. The report was, in the view of the group, misleading and inadequate." Major William Stoner, the committee's own coordinator, wrote after Gale's briefing of January 14 that Gale "has, in briefing the report here and elsewhere, done a great deal of verbalizing (shading) issues, personal opinion, 'faction,' and general guesswork not contained anywhere in the report. Some of it is just plain misleading"; that his claim of having "rejected two people who had pronounced tendencies to be nonobjective" was false as to Ray Hyman, "rejected not because of any action by Gale, but because of a protest memo from MG Thompson to Dr LaBerge"; that "the Gale report is big, but weak"; and that Gale, "selling the report around the Pentagon," "should be thanked by the DoD Steering Committee and allowed or told to quietly go his way." On January 25, 1980, Gale asked Stoner to distribute 27 copies of the report, with LaBerge's "official copy by Monday, 28 Jan."²

Gale's Army title was "Advisor for RDA Analysis, ODCSRDA." On August 8, 1979, the Under Secretary's military assistant wrote that "the Under Secretary would like you to brief" Ruth Davis and a Mr. Nealsen "with the same informal briefing that you gave him," that Nealsen "will also ask that you brief Admiral Murphy in the same way," and that "Dr. LaBerge discussed your proposed change in test design with USAMSAA. They are taking action to implement the proposal at this time." A month earlier his office had been told that Harry Snyder "has been asked in place of Dr. Hyman." Lieutenant Colonel Murray Watt's message of November 1979 from Fort Meade recorded that "Mr Manfred Gale (Team Chief) assured LTC Watt that INSCOM would be provided with a copy of the team's report when it was finalized," and that his office was "anxious to see their recommendations concerning our program in particular and the DoD program as a whole."⁹⁰³