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Paul Whipkey Pt. Two · The Path Went Chilly

0:30
Speaker 1: Welcome back to the Path Went Chile for part two
0:32
Speaker 1: of our series about the disappearance of Paul Whipkey. Robin,
0:36
Speaker 1: do you want to catch everyone up on what we
0:37
Speaker 1: talked about in our previous episode.
0:40
Speaker 2: Well, this case takes place all the way back in
0:42
Speaker 2: the nineteen fifties, involving First Lieutenant Paul Whipkey, who was
0:45
Speaker 2: with the Army and stationed at Fort Orton, California in
0:48
Speaker 2: nineteen fifty eight. He was considered to be an excellent
0:52
Speaker 2: soldier who had an exemplary record, but people noticed that
0:55
Speaker 2: his behavior started to change during the summer of nineteen
0:57
Speaker 2: fifty seven. As it turned out, he was a to
1:00
Speaker 2: an operation called Operation Plumb Bob, which involved atomic testing
1:05
Speaker 2: and then added desert. But in retrospect, it seemed apparent
1:08
Speaker 2: that he got bad radiation poisoning as he started suffering
1:11
Speaker 2: medical issues like all of his teeth falling out, getting
1:13
Speaker 2: skin blotches, and his attitude seemed to change and he
1:16
Speaker 2: started to display more erratic behavior. And then one day
1:20
Speaker 2: in July of nineteen fifty eight, Whicky left the base
1:23
Speaker 2: in order to say that he was going to get
1:25
Speaker 2: a drink in a nearby bar, but he never returned
1:27
Speaker 2: and was declared a wall, and they eventually found his
1:30
Speaker 2: abandoned car in Death Valley. The army pretty much decided
1:34
Speaker 2: that he had gone a wall, he was a deserter
1:36
Speaker 2: and wandered off into the desert and died of exposure,
1:39
Speaker 2: but they never found his body, and Whipkey's family noticed
1:42
Speaker 2: a lot of suspicious discrepancies to make them think that
1:45
Speaker 2: something was going on because they declared him a wall,
1:48
Speaker 2: and they removed all of his personal belongings from his
1:51
Speaker 2: barracks only two days after he originally went missing and
1:55
Speaker 2: pretty much completely closed the case. And some other people
1:58
Speaker 2: on base said that prior to disappearance, Whipkey had been
2:01
Speaker 2: speaking with a man dressed in civilian clothing who had
2:04
Speaker 2: gone on to the base, which made him suspect that
2:07
Speaker 2: he was being cruited for a top secret mission from
2:09
Speaker 2: the CIA, and they found out that before Whipkey's car
2:13
Speaker 2: was abandoned, he had checked into a motel that was
2:15
Speaker 2: one hundred miles away. So there's been speculation that he
2:19
Speaker 2: was sent off on a mission and his car was
2:21
Speaker 2: abandoned in the desert to stage's disappearance, and that he
2:24
Speaker 2: made have been killed in the line of duty, but
2:27
Speaker 2: the Army refused to reveal it because of natural security reasons.
2:31
Speaker 2: Decades later, Whiky's family succeeded at getting his classification change
2:36
Speaker 2: from deserter too killed in the line of duty, but
2:39
Speaker 2: unfortunately they did not offer any specific details why they
2:42
Speaker 2: did this or why they now suddenly believed that Whipkey
2:46
Speaker 2: died in the line of duty because they pretty much
2:48
Speaker 2: kipt all this information classified. And after all these years,
2:52
Speaker 2: it's still his family is still looking for answers about
2:54
Speaker 2: what actually happened to him and are hoping to recover
2:57
Speaker 2: his remains. So, like I mentioned in the intro and
2:59
Speaker 2: apart One, UNSAW Mysteries featured their fair share of segments
3:03
Speaker 2: about mysteries which took place in the military. They often
3:06
Speaker 2: had a major conspiracy theory by them, and I believe
3:10
Speaker 2: that almost none of the featured cases wound up being solved.
3:13
Speaker 2: I'm not saying that the military doesn't cover stuff up,
3:16
Speaker 2: but I do believe in many of these cases the
3:18
Speaker 2: allegations put forward by the victim's family were overblown, and
3:22
Speaker 2: the real explanation for what happened to them was probably
3:25
Speaker 2: far less clandestine than they made it out to be.
3:28
Speaker 2: I think The closest comparison you could make to the
3:30
Speaker 2: Paul Whipkey case was the unsaw Mystery segment about the
3:33
Speaker 2: disappearance of Army Private Justin Bergwinkle. Whipk and Bergwinkle had
3:38
Speaker 2: both been stationed at Fort Ord, and while there's no
3:40
Speaker 2: connection between the two cases since they took place thirty
3:43
Speaker 2: five years apart, there are some interesting parallels. Burgwinkle was
3:48
Speaker 2: transferred from ford Or to Fort Lewis and Washington State,
3:51
Speaker 2: but he wound up going a wall and vanishing without
3:54
Speaker 2: a trace in June and nineteen ninety three. Much like
3:57
Speaker 2: the Whipkey case, Bergwinkle's abandoned car would be this time
4:01
Speaker 2: at a motel near Fort Ord, and his keys and
4:04
Speaker 2: many of his personal possessions, including his military dog tags,
4:07
Speaker 2: were found inside. Burgwinkell's girlfriend would later recounted incident where
4:11
Speaker 2: he told her that dog tags were used to identify
4:14
Speaker 2: dead soldiers, so if she ever found his dog tags
4:17
Speaker 2: lying around somewhere, that meant he was dead. In the
4:20
Speaker 2: months prior to his disappearance, Burgwinkle had been exhibiting strange
4:23
Speaker 2: behavior and implying to his friends and family that he
4:26
Speaker 2: was recruited for some sort of secret mission. So when
4:29
Speaker 2: Bergwinkell went missing, this prompted his loved ones to push
4:32
Speaker 2: forward the theory that he was killed on this alleged
4:34
Speaker 2: mission and the military covered up his death and a
4:37
Speaker 2: band in his car. If you want to learn more
4:39
Speaker 2: about Bergwinkle's case, I covered it on episode number two
4:43
Speaker 2: eighty nine of The Trail Went Cold. But the alternate
4:45
Speaker 2: explanation is that he was suffering from delusions of brandeur.
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Speaker 2: So all of Bergwinkle's talk about a quote unquote secret
4:52
Speaker 2: mission was nothing more than a fantasy, and his disappearance
4:55
Speaker 2: was actually the result of a mental breakdown.
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Speaker 3: But remember there were also those two individuals who had
5:01
Speaker 3: come around that were from what they were alluding to,
5:04
Speaker 3: might be like the CIA or something like that, and
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Speaker 3: really trying to discuss something with both of those gentlemen,
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Speaker 3: isn't that right, Well, that's definitely the case in the
5:15
Speaker 3: Paul Whipkey case. The Justin Bergwinkle case is totally different,
5:18
Speaker 3: and I do have a feeling that he had some
5:20
Speaker 3: sort of mental breakdown because I don't think there was
5:23
Speaker 3: any evidence to suggest that he was recruited for a
5:26
Speaker 3: secret mission, because he kind of had an unremarkable service
5:29
Speaker 3: record while with Paul Whipkey, that's definitely a possibility because
5:33
Speaker 3: there's no other logical explanation for why these two men
5:36
Speaker 3: in civilian clothing would be visiting him on the army
5:39
Speaker 3: base so many times in order to speak to him.
5:42
Speaker 3: And one of the things we talked about with him
5:44
Speaker 3: is that he did have an exemplary military career. So
5:47
Speaker 3: would he be someone that they'd seek out for a
5:49
Speaker 3: special mission. Yes, But on the other hand, he's also
5:53
Speaker 3: physically deteriorating to where you can notice it. His teeth
5:57
Speaker 3: are falling out, he's lost weight, there's other signs where
6:01
Speaker 3: maybe that leadership quality that he once had isn't as strong.
6:05
Speaker 3: So on one hand, if you look at his history, yes,
6:08
Speaker 3: he'd be somebody that maybe an organization like the CIA
6:12
Speaker 3: would be looking too higher. But when you look at
6:15
Speaker 3: who he is presently when they come, he'd be struggling
6:19
Speaker 3: with the effects of what we think is that radiation poisoning,
6:22
Speaker 3: And so at the time when they would come and
6:24
Speaker 3: he's physically deteriorated and mentally failing, would he still be
6:29
Speaker 3: someone that they'd want to recruit. That's what makes that
6:31
Speaker 3: kind of a bizarre angle. Historically, Yes, presently, probably not.
6:36
Speaker 1: But what if they were looking for somebody who they
6:40
Speaker 1: thought that the secret mission was likely to result in
6:43
Speaker 1: the death of the person participating, So they were looking
6:46
Speaker 1: for somebody that maybe didn't have a family, or given
6:50
Speaker 1: his current physical state in declining mental health, maybe they
6:54
Speaker 1: thought that he was somebody that they could like quote
6:56
Speaker 1: unquote sacrifice or something like that, because his future prognosis
7:02
Speaker 1: was pretty grim considering all the ailments that he was
7:05
Speaker 1: suffering from, and so they approached him for that reason,
7:09
Speaker 1: his past exemplary record and the fact that maybe they
7:13
Speaker 1: didn't put as much of a premium on his life
7:15
Speaker 1: given the state of his health at that time.
7:18
Speaker 2: That would make sense to me because he did not
7:20
Speaker 2: have a wife, he did not have any children, and
7:22
Speaker 2: he may have been told because of this radioactive followed,
7:25
Speaker 2: you are not going to live much longer, like you
7:27
Speaker 2: could die within the next few years, So why not
7:30
Speaker 2: go on this one final mission in which you will
7:32
Speaker 2: be sacrificing yourself, but you will be doing a great
7:34
Speaker 2: service for your country and protecting the greater good with
7:38
Speaker 2: your nobility.
7:39
Speaker 1: Kind of like a kamikaze pilot.
7:41
Speaker 2: Almost.
7:41
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, now, I'm sure you can see the numerous
7:46
Speaker 1: similarities between Bergwinkle's case and what happened to Paul Whitkey.
7:50
Speaker 1: Months before he went missing, Whipkey told his brother that
7:53
Speaker 1: he was going on an assignment where he would quote
7:55
Speaker 1: make a name for himself, and he was frequently seen
7:58
Speaker 1: having conversations with two men who may have been working
8:01
Speaker 1: for the CIA, So Whipkey's loved ones theorized that he
8:04
Speaker 1: was recruited for some sort of secret mission and might
8:07
Speaker 1: have been killed in the line of duty, prompting the
8:09
Speaker 1: military to abandon his car in the desert and fabricate
8:12
Speaker 1: a cover story that he simply wandered off and died
8:15
Speaker 1: after some sort of mental breakdown. Like Bergwinkle, Whitky had
8:19
Speaker 1: been exhibiting strange behavior prior to his disappearance, though there's
8:23
Speaker 1: actually an explanation for this, since Whitkey seemed to be
8:25
Speaker 1: suffering the events of being exposed to radioactive fallout during
8:29
Speaker 1: atomic testing at Camp Desert Rock, But this begs a question.
8:33
Speaker 1: If Whike was deteriorating both physically and mentally, then, as
8:37
Speaker 1: Ashley just asked, why would the CIA have considered him
8:40
Speaker 1: to be an ideal candidate for an important mission? This
8:43
Speaker 1: suggests a potential alternate explanation where Bifky's disappearance could have
8:47
Speaker 1: been orchestrated to cover up what happened to him during
8:50
Speaker 1: his work on Operation Plumbob. Well, there's no hard evidence
8:53
Speaker 1: that the military ever did anything shady in the Bergwinkle disappearance.
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Speaker 1: I do think there are enough suspicious details in Whitfkey's
9:00
Speaker 1: disappearance to suggest that something was covered up. In burg
9:03
Speaker 1: Winkle's case, we really only have his word that he
9:06
Speaker 1: was being recruited for a mission. But here we have
9:09
Speaker 1: multiple witnesses, including Whipkey's commanding officer, Lieutenant Colonel Charles Lewis,
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Speaker 1: who saw Whitfkey chatting with two men in civilian clothing
9:17
Speaker 1: on several occasions. Whitke apparently seemed nervous after he spoke
9:21
Speaker 1: to them and never disclosed in nature of their conversation,
9:24
Speaker 1: and it sounds like their presence at Camp Desert Rock
9:27
Speaker 1: was a bit out of the ordinary. Lewis was also
9:30
Speaker 1: claimed that whenever he tried to make inquiries into Whifkey's disappearance,
9:34
Speaker 1: he was told to quote let it go because the
9:36
Speaker 1: case was closed. One of the reasons is difficult to
9:39
Speaker 1: swallow the idea that berg Winkle was recruited for a
9:41
Speaker 1: secret mission is because well, he just didn't seem like
9:45
Speaker 1: a particularly remarkable candidate for something like that. At the
9:49
Speaker 1: time you went missing. Bergwinkle had served in the army
9:51
Speaker 1: for three years and never rose above the rank of private,
9:54
Speaker 1: and he'd just been assigned a kitchen duty. Whipkey, on
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Speaker 1: the other hand, was a skilled pilot with an ex
10:00
Speaker 1: excellent service record who'd recently been promoted to company commander.
10:04
Speaker 1: So I could possibly see the CIA being interested in
10:06
Speaker 1: someone like that. But like we mentioned earlier, due to
10:10
Speaker 1: the effects of the radioactive follow Wikey was starting to
10:13
Speaker 1: undergo personality changes and suffering from numerous health problems, which
10:17
Speaker 1: included the removal of all of his teeth. So you'd
10:20
Speaker 1: think that this might have given the government second thoughts
10:22
Speaker 1: about using Whisky on a secret mission. That's why it's
10:25
Speaker 1: possible that Whipkey's conversations with the two men may have
10:28
Speaker 1: actually been related to his involvement with the atomic testing,
10:32
Speaker 1: as they might have been monitoring Whipkey to see how
10:34
Speaker 1: his exposure to radiation was affecting him absolutely.
10:38
Speaker 3: And what's interesting is that his commanding officer said, you know,
10:41
Speaker 3: he had been selected as his leader and had always
10:44
Speaker 3: been this exemplary soldier, but that he was starting to
10:47
Speaker 3: really kind of become more introverted and anxious. It's possible
10:51
Speaker 3: that if the CIA had said, listen, your death is imminent.
10:55
Speaker 3: We need you to help us. That's kind of a somber,
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Speaker 3: kind of sobering concept, and so it's possible that that
11:01
Speaker 3: could have also affected his personality. But I think it's
11:04
Speaker 3: very interesting that you do have that dichotomy of would
11:08
Speaker 3: they look at his legacy and who he was and
11:13
Speaker 3: be okay with the state of his mental and physical health. Also,
11:17
Speaker 3: he told his brother he was going to make a
11:18
Speaker 3: name for himself, and if he was going out on
11:21
Speaker 3: the secret mission and was going to abandon his post,
11:24
Speaker 3: you're not making a name for yourself. You're actually disgracing
11:28
Speaker 3: your name because you're listed as a wall. And then
11:32
Speaker 3: it's that you wandered off into the desert due to
11:34
Speaker 3: a mental health breakdown. So it's interesting that he tells
11:37
Speaker 3: his brother, this could be my moment, I could be
11:40
Speaker 3: really making a name for myself, when in fact, for
11:44
Speaker 3: years his name was drug through the mud.
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Speaker 1: What if he meant make a name for himself within
11:49
Speaker 1: the intelligence community or within the CIA.
11:52
Speaker 3: Okay, that's true, very true.
11:54
Speaker 2: It's true. I mean he sounded like a very proud man,
11:56
Speaker 2: So I wonder would he go for that if he
11:58
Speaker 2: knew that, Well, you're going to do something heroic and
12:00
Speaker 2: sacrifice yourself for your country. But the rest of the
12:03
Speaker 2: world is going to think you're a deserter and abandon
12:05
Speaker 2: your post. But who knows. Maybe if they said, hey,
12:08
Speaker 2: the people in the intelligence community will think of you
12:10
Speaker 2: as a hero, maybe that was enough for him. But
12:13
Speaker 2: before we delve any further into this radiation angle, let's
12:16
Speaker 2: explore the circumstances of how he went missing. We know
12:19
Speaker 2: that Whipkey was last seen leaving ford Ord on July
12:22
Speaker 2: tenth and told his friends that he was planning to
12:25
Speaker 2: drive to Moderey to get a drink, but for whatever reason,
12:28
Speaker 2: he drove over three hundred miles to Mojave. And this
12:31
Speaker 2: part can be verified since his name was found in
12:34
Speaker 2: the guest registry of a local hotel and there was
12:36
Speaker 2: a receipt which showed that he had filled up his
12:38
Speaker 2: car with gas and mojave the following morning. When Whipkey
12:41
Speaker 2: failed to report back to ford Ord, he was declared
12:44
Speaker 2: a wall that same day. Now here's the main reason
12:47
Speaker 2: I believe that the Army was covering something up in
12:49
Speaker 2: this case. On the surface, the cover story they pushed
12:52
Speaker 2: forward does not seem that implausible. They believed that Whipkey
12:56
Speaker 2: was feeling overburned from the stress of being promoted to
12:58
Speaker 2: company commander, suffered some sort of mental breakdown, prompting him
13:02
Speaker 2: to drive to a remote spot and death Valley, where
13:05
Speaker 2: he subsequently wandered out into the desert and perished. I
13:08
Speaker 2: know that Whiki's family and friends always maintained that he
13:11
Speaker 2: was an excellent soldier and never would have deserted his post,
13:15
Speaker 2: but the effects of the radioactive followed were clearly causing
13:18
Speaker 2: him to deteriorate. However, the major red flag is that
13:22
Speaker 2: Whiki's personal belongings were immediately cleared out of his barracks
13:25
Speaker 2: and boxed up on July the eleventh, the same day
13:29
Speaker 2: he was declared a wall. The standard protocol in the
13:31
Speaker 2: military is that someone has to be a wall for
13:34
Speaker 2: at least thirty days before they are officially classified as
13:37
Speaker 2: a deserter, which is exactly what happened here. This is
13:40
Speaker 2: when you'd expect him to go through the procedure of
13:43
Speaker 2: boxing up the missing soldiers belongings and shipping them to
13:45
Speaker 2: his family. There is no reason to do this when
13:48
Speaker 2: a soldier with an otherwise exemplary record is missing for
13:51
Speaker 2: only one day, particularly when army regulations state that the
13:55
Speaker 2: soldiers next of kin or legal representative needs to be
13:59
Speaker 2: notified before or they go through the process of clearing
14:01
Speaker 2: out their belongings, which did not happen here. So how
14:05
Speaker 2: could the army have been so certain that Whipkey wasn't
14:08
Speaker 2: coming back at this point. There's no way they should
14:11
Speaker 2: have known. He was one hundreds of miles away.
14:13
Speaker 3: And what's really sad is that he had an amazing record.
14:16
Speaker 3: This is somebody who you actually, when you heard their missing,
14:20
Speaker 3: my brain would say what happened to him? It would
14:23
Speaker 3: scare me. It would make me very unsettled. Instead of
14:26
Speaker 3: the default, oh, he's a bandon his post. Nothing in
14:30
Speaker 3: his history shows that. Now had he been a problem soldier,
14:34
Speaker 3: had he had multiple marks on his record that were negative,
14:37
Speaker 3: I could see where the default would be. Okay, this
14:40
Speaker 3: guy has never committed to the military. This was his
14:43
Speaker 3: way to get away. Even then, a day doesn't give
14:46
Speaker 3: you enough time to know what happened. To him, But
14:49
Speaker 3: for whipkeys specifically, I would think there'd be that horror
14:52
Speaker 3: and worry way before you'd think.
14:55
Speaker 2: He went a wall.
14:56
Speaker 1: Can I ask you both a question regarding the method
15:00
Speaker 1: in which they're saying that he may have tried to
15:03
Speaker 1: end his own life. Are either of you familiar on
15:06
Speaker 1: the statistics of gun owners or those who have access
15:09
Speaker 1: to firearms. I would think like those in law enforcement
15:12
Speaker 1: I know have when they decide to end their own life,
15:15
Speaker 1: there's a hyperpensity towards using a firearm to do so.
15:20
Speaker 1: Is it the same with the military, Because going all
15:22
Speaker 1: the way to the Mohave Desert and just wandering off
15:25
Speaker 1: seems like an odd choice to end your own life
15:28
Speaker 1: when you have access to firearms, I.
15:30
Speaker 3: Would assume it's a higher rate of using a gun
15:34
Speaker 3: via this for the suicide. But because you're comfortable with
15:37
Speaker 3: that weapon and something you know how to operate, and
15:39
Speaker 3: you would know that you're a you're effective with that
15:42
Speaker 3: with that weapon. However, you're right when you talk about
15:46
Speaker 3: I wandered off into the desert. A lot of times
15:48
Speaker 3: people make sure that their body can be recovered so
15:51
Speaker 3: that their family has somebody to bury, and you don't
15:54
Speaker 3: have what this poor family is dealing with that missing
15:56
Speaker 3: person's category, and so that's odd.
16:00
Speaker 2: I know.
16:00
Speaker 3: Usually, you know, if you're in the state of mind
16:02
Speaker 3: where you're completing suicide or taking your own life, it's
16:06
Speaker 3: not always a rational mind that's happening at the time.
16:09
Speaker 3: But typically you do see where either a note tells
16:12
Speaker 3: you where their body can be discovered, or they make
16:15
Speaker 3: sure that their body is able to be found so
16:17
Speaker 3: that they can be buried. So that's an interesting fact too.
16:20
Speaker 2: So I guess the alternate explanation is that that if
16:22
Speaker 2: he didn't want his family to know he died by suicide,
16:25
Speaker 2: he could have done it in a manner which ensured
16:27
Speaker 2: it would never be found. I mean, how could he
16:29
Speaker 2: have even really known that if he was the one
16:31
Speaker 2: who drove the car there and wandered off, how could
16:33
Speaker 2: he even be certain that it would be found Because
16:35
Speaker 2: this was a very remote area, like many miles away
16:38
Speaker 2: from the nearest town. So maybe he was just hoping
16:41
Speaker 2: they'll just assume I was gone missing or something and
16:43
Speaker 2: never know what happened to me, and then they'll never
16:45
Speaker 2: find out that I die by suicide.
16:48
Speaker 1: And if we're going to be conspiratorial, do we actually
16:51
Speaker 1: know that he ever went to Mojave, or was there
16:53
Speaker 1: somebody posing as him who's signing in at this hotel
16:57
Speaker 1: and they've got this kind of paper trail for it,
17:00
Speaker 1: or do they have some kind of surveillance footage of him.
17:04
Speaker 2: I don't think so because this was nineteen fifty eight, so.
17:06
Speaker 1: I, oh, obviously not then, yeah.
17:08
Speaker 2: No, definitely not. But they all they have really is
17:11
Speaker 2: the signature in the book. I don't think there are
17:13
Speaker 2: any witnesses who could verify we saw him there, So yeah,
17:16
Speaker 2: that's an interesting point. It could have been someone else
17:18
Speaker 2: signing his own name there in order to create like
17:21
Speaker 2: a fake paper trail.
17:22
Speaker 3: And abandoning his car, because then it gets very complicated
17:26
Speaker 3: for anyone who's investigating the death. He's three hundred miles away,
17:30
Speaker 3: so there's really not a relevant group of eyewitnesses or
17:33
Speaker 3: anybody that could identify if someone other than Whipkey was
17:37
Speaker 3: the one driving the car. You find the car and
17:40
Speaker 3: you know it's in the midst of a deserted area,
17:43
Speaker 3: and it's just a lot easier than had they abandoned
17:45
Speaker 3: the car, let's say, five miles from the military base.
17:49
Speaker 1: The theory the Paul's brother Karl Whipkey pushed forward is
17:52
Speaker 1: the Paul drove to Mahave and checked into White's motel
17:55
Speaker 1: in order to meet up with the people who recruited
17:57
Speaker 1: him for a secret mission. Army then held onto Paul's
18:01
Speaker 1: car while he was flown to another section of the
18:03
Speaker 1: world for his mission, such as Asia. But something happened
18:06
Speaker 1: which ensured that Paul was never coming back, so the
18:09
Speaker 1: Army decided to abandon his car in an isolated section
18:12
Speaker 1: of Death Valley and fabricated cover story about him wandering
18:15
Speaker 1: out into the desert. After all, Death Valley is one
18:18
Speaker 1: of the hottest places on Earth and such a desolate
18:21
Speaker 1: location that it wouldn't be hard to imagine being unable
18:24
Speaker 1: to find Whipkey's body there. One of the key points
18:27
Speaker 1: used to support this theory was the eyewitness sighting from
18:29
Speaker 1: a rancher who claimed he saw Whipkey's red and white
18:32
Speaker 1: Chevrolet being driven through Death Valley by a man in
18:35
Speaker 1: a military uniform. This sighting took place four weeks after
18:39
Speaker 1: Whipkey originally went missing, so if he really did see
18:41
Speaker 1: Whifkey's car, this raises a lot of questions. I know
18:45
Speaker 1: the Whipki was wearing civilian clothes when he left Ford ORed.
18:48
Speaker 1: But even if by chance, Whikey was the driver seen
18:51
Speaker 1: wearing the military uniform, where was he during the previous
18:55
Speaker 1: four weeks he was missing? Of course, I'm sure there
18:58
Speaker 1: was a lot of red and white Chevrolets being driven
19:00
Speaker 1: around back in nineteen fifty eight, So I guess the
19:02
Speaker 1: alternate explanation is that the rancher did not actually see
19:05
Speaker 1: Whipkey's car. But if the sighting is legitimate, I find
19:09
Speaker 1: the timing to be interesting. Since the Chevrolet was seen
19:12
Speaker 1: around the approximate time period, the thirty day window had passed,
19:15
Speaker 1: which allowed Whipkey's status to be reclassified from a wall
19:19
Speaker 1: to deserter. The presence of cigarette butts outside the abandoned
19:22
Speaker 1: vehicle is also an intriguing clue. Unless whipk just suddenly
19:26
Speaker 1: decided to take up smoking prior to his disappearance, this
19:30
Speaker 1: suggests that someone else was with the Chevrolet when it
19:32
Speaker 1: was abandoned. This is quite reminiscent of another famous missing
19:36
Speaker 1: person's case, the disappearance of Ray Greekar, where cigarette ash
19:40
Speaker 1: was found inside his abandoned car, even though he attested smoking.
19:45
Speaker 3: It's really interesting when you look at this that the
19:47
Speaker 3: Chevrolet going by in a man in uniform. If he
19:50
Speaker 3: left in civilian clothes but was going to meet with
19:53
Speaker 3: the CIA, then I could see him having his uniform
19:56
Speaker 3: with him, so that it was a more professional meeting
19:59
Speaker 3: when he's in his military attire. But like you said,
20:03
Speaker 3: this is four weeks later, and so do we know
20:07
Speaker 3: if there was another military base nearby that would have
20:10
Speaker 3: you know, there'd obviously be multiple soldiers who could in
20:13
Speaker 3: fact be driving just a red and white Chevy, so
20:16
Speaker 3: it could be more coincident.
20:17
Speaker 2: All I know that Mojave was near another military base.
20:22
Speaker 2: Let me just check which one it was. Oh yeah,
20:23
Speaker 2: I was located near Edwards Air Force Base, so it
20:26
Speaker 2: is possible. I guess that Whipkey could have gone there
20:29
Speaker 2: and got another military uniform or maybe changed into his uniform,
20:33
Speaker 2: or who knows, maybe it was just another soldier who actually,
20:36
Speaker 2: by coincidence, drove a similar car and was going through
20:39
Speaker 2: dressed in uniform at that time. So when Paul's case
20:42
Speaker 2: was finally heard by the Army Board of Correction to
20:45
Speaker 2: Military Records nearly twenty four years later, it was pretty
20:48
Speaker 2: much a good news bad news situation for his family.
20:51
Speaker 2: The good news was that he would no longer be
20:53
Speaker 2: class as a deserter. The bad news was that he
20:56
Speaker 2: was reclassified as having died the line of duty, but
20:58
Speaker 2: there was no additional excitation. I can certainly understand if
21:02
Speaker 2: the Army had to keep certain details classified, But the
21:05
Speaker 2: last time Whipkey was seen alive he was leaving Fort
21:08
Speaker 2: orton civilian clothes in order to supposedly get a drink,
21:11
Speaker 2: So whatever happened, it's unclear how this would qualify as
21:15
Speaker 2: died in the line of duty, especially when you consider
21:18
Speaker 2: that his body was never found and there was no
21:20
Speaker 2: concrete evidence that he was actually dead. But this ruling
21:23
Speaker 2: could be interpreted in a number of different ways. If
21:26
Speaker 2: Whipkey really did suffer some sort of mental breakdown, drove
21:29
Speaker 2: out into the desert, and wandered off, then this could
21:32
Speaker 2: have been the result of the after effects of radio
21:34
Speaker 2: Act followed. Since Whipkey was exposed to radiation because he
21:38
Speaker 2: was assigned to be an observation pilot an Operation Plump Bob,
21:41
Speaker 2: and this assignment involved him being placed in harm's way,
21:44
Speaker 2: then I guess this could technically be classified as died
21:47
Speaker 2: in the line of duty. Here's some additional information about
21:51
Speaker 2: Operation Plumbob, which took place at Camp Desert Rock and
21:54
Speaker 2: is considered to be the most controversial nuclear testing series
21:58
Speaker 2: in the history of the United States. Twenty seven of
22:00
Speaker 2: the twenty nine explosions set off during this operation produced
22:04
Speaker 2: nuclear yield, and over sixteen thousand servicemen were involved in
22:07
Speaker 2: the exercises, as well as twelve hundred test pigs who
22:10
Speaker 2: were subject to experimentation. Of course, at the time Whiki
22:14
Speaker 2: went missing, the details of Operation Plumbob were classified, and
22:18
Speaker 2: Whipkey's family only found out about his involvement when an
22:21
Speaker 2: assignment sheet was mistakenly included with his personal bellowings. But
22:25
Speaker 2: as the years went on, the operation became the subject
22:28
Speaker 2: of much criticism since enormous amounts of radiation were released
22:31
Speaker 2: into the atmosphere during the testing, and its estimated that
22:35
Speaker 2: around three thousand servicemen were exposed to dangerously high levels.
22:39
Speaker 2: In fact, a survey was performed in nineteen eighty which
22:42
Speaker 2: showed that there were elevated rates of leukemia among the servicemen.
22:46
Speaker 2: We mentioned earlier that one of the tests Whikey was
22:48
Speaker 2: involved with as an observation pilot produced a forty four
22:51
Speaker 2: kiloton blast. By comparison, the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and
22:56
Speaker 2: Nagasaki were only fifteen and twenty kilotons respectively. In nineteen ninety,
23:01
Speaker 2: Congress passed the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act, so a number
23:05
Speaker 2: of servicemen who suffered health consequences because of their work
23:09
Speaker 2: on Operation Plumbbob were compensated by the government.
23:12
Speaker 3: So I can easily see the reclassification being exactly what
23:15
Speaker 3: you said, Robin, that listen, no matter what happened to him,
23:18
Speaker 3: if he wandered off because of a mental health deficit
23:22
Speaker 3: or some kind of issue that was going on at
23:25
Speaker 3: the time, that the military says, listen, we contributed to that.
23:29
Speaker 3: We put him in a scenario where he is at
23:33
Speaker 3: this testing site, and we know that it was physically
23:36
Speaker 3: debilitating him, that he was truly physically breaking down, and
23:40
Speaker 3: that there's a record of him mentally also having issues
23:44
Speaker 3: at least his personality changing in those types of observations.
23:48
Speaker 3: So I would think that accountability of saying, whatever happened,
23:52
Speaker 3: we contributed to a behavior change could easily be why
23:56
Speaker 3: they said killed and the line of duty.
23:59
Speaker 1: But how did they know that he wasn't coming back
24:02
Speaker 1: and they packed up his stuff in a day.
24:04
Speaker 2: That is true, Like there's no way he unless he
24:07
Speaker 2: told them he was going somewhere. He gave off some
24:09
Speaker 2: implication that I'm going to drive into the desert and
24:11
Speaker 2: I'm going to complete suicide. There really shouldn't have been
24:13
Speaker 2: any reason for them to pack up his belongings, like
24:16
Speaker 2: they should have followed regulations, waited at least thirty days,
24:19
Speaker 2: and at least given him a chance to come back
24:21
Speaker 2: and explain himself, given his records. But it could be
24:24
Speaker 2: a thing where like maybe they were asking him to
24:27
Speaker 2: visit them at Edwards Air Force Base because they wanted
24:29
Speaker 2: to study him to look at like the after effects
24:31
Speaker 2: he was suffering from radiation, or or like Jules says,
24:34
Speaker 2: maybe they were sending him off on a secret mission
24:36
Speaker 2: where he would have to sacrifice his life and they
24:38
Speaker 2: knew he wouldn't be coming back. But it does seem
24:41
Speaker 2: like the Army knew more a lot more than they
24:43
Speaker 2: were letting on, which is why they reclassified to died
24:46
Speaker 2: in the line of duty, but they just didn't want
24:48
Speaker 2: to give the specifics to his family.
24:51
Speaker 1: It's also suspicious when people are inquiring about it within
24:54
Speaker 1: the military and they're being told to drop it because
24:57
Speaker 1: the case is closed exactly if.
25:00
Speaker 2: You're a call. Lieutenant Colonel Charles Lewis the guy who
25:02
Speaker 2: kept inquiring and was told that he testified on Whipkey's
25:06
Speaker 2: behalf at this hearing in the eighties where they reclassified
25:09
Speaker 2: his death, and then he said, all of a sudden,
25:10
Speaker 2: the irs hit me with a massive tax on it,
25:13
Speaker 2: so it seemed like they were punishing me for daring
25:15
Speaker 2: to stick my nose into this business.
25:18
Speaker 1: Ashley, do you think that would be like a huge deal.
25:20
Speaker 1: I mean, you've got the experience with your dad being
25:22
Speaker 1: a marine, and you know, being a professor at the
25:25
Speaker 1: citadel for somebody you do step out of line and
25:28
Speaker 1: to advocate for this person who's missing, and it seems
25:33
Speaker 1: like the military's covering something up. Would that be looked
25:35
Speaker 1: on unfavorably?
25:37
Speaker 3: Well, it's not about Yeah, it's not about even if
25:40
Speaker 3: they were covering it up or not. It's when you
25:42
Speaker 3: are a subordinate and you go above rank and you
25:45
Speaker 3: actually don't follow the chain of command, there's big backlash
25:49
Speaker 3: and you're supposed to go to your commanding officer or
25:52
Speaker 3: whoever's above you and discuss the issue with them, and
25:56
Speaker 3: if it needs to be taken higher, they'll take it
25:58
Speaker 3: higher or help you take it higher. But to skip
26:00
Speaker 3: over a rank or to go around somebody is a
26:03
Speaker 3: huge issue. You see that in a lot of military
26:07
Speaker 3: police types of organizations. But yes, it'd be huge if
26:11
Speaker 3: you have someone who is told to keep their mouth
26:13
Speaker 3: shut and they wouldn't keep their mouth shut. That's a problem.
26:17
Speaker 3: You didn't listen to the command I gave you. Now,
26:19
Speaker 3: whether they're covering something up or not, I don't think
26:21
Speaker 3: that's what would make everybody frustrated. It's that you're not
26:25
Speaker 3: following rank, that you're not going through the proper chain
26:28
Speaker 3: of command to get the issue discussed. You were told
26:30
Speaker 3: by your commanding officer to hush then be quiet.
26:34
Speaker 1: When you look at the circumstances, it just seems far
26:37
Speaker 1: more plausible to me that wiki's disappearance was somehow related
26:40
Speaker 1: to atomic testing rather than anything to do with the
26:43
Speaker 1: secret mission. But there are still a few things which
26:46
Speaker 1: don't make much sense. I suppose this would be a
26:48
Speaker 1: good time to discuss the potential mystery within a mystery
26:52
Speaker 1: involving the death of First Lieutenant Charles Guess. As you recall,
26:56
Speaker 1: Guest was one of Whipkey's closest friends at Fort Ord,
26:58
Speaker 1: and the plane Guests was flying went missing only twelve
27:01
Speaker 1: days after Wiki disappeared. Before the wreckage was discovered in
27:05
Speaker 1: Inno National Forest over one year later. There isn't much
27:08
Speaker 1: information out there about Guests and what we do know
27:11
Speaker 1: that he had been assigned to Camp Desert Rock alongside Whipkey.
27:15
Speaker 1: It's unclear if he was also suffering any after effects
27:18
Speaker 1: of radioactive fallout. On the surface, it does seem like
27:21
Speaker 1: Guess's death was nothing more than a tragic accident, but
27:24
Speaker 1: it is eye opening that this occurred so soon after
27:27
Speaker 1: Whik went missing. The one detail which has made people
27:30
Speaker 1: believe that there might be something more to guess the
27:32
Speaker 1: story is that the serial number found on the wreckage
27:35
Speaker 1: was apparently different than the serial number for the plane
27:38
Speaker 1: he took off in. That is certainly weird, but it
27:40
Speaker 1: is possible that the discrepancy in the serial numbers might
27:43
Speaker 1: simply be the result of a clerical error. I mean,
27:46
Speaker 1: it would be one thing if you think that someone
27:48
Speaker 1: sabotaged Guess's plane and caused it to crash, But how
27:52
Speaker 1: do you fabricate a crash with a completely different plane
27:54
Speaker 1: with a different serial number. If the whole thing was stage,
27:59
Speaker 1: then what happened to the original plane guests had been
28:01
Speaker 1: flying well, I can believe if the Army might have
28:04
Speaker 1: fabricated Whitfkey's disappearance by leaving his car in the middle
28:07
Speaker 1: of the desert, doing so with a plane just seems
28:09
Speaker 1: to be way too convoluted. So it's possible that the
28:12
Speaker 1: whole side story with Guests is nothing more than a
28:15
Speaker 1: red herring, and it's just a tragic coincidence that his
28:18
Speaker 1: death took place during the same month that Wiki disappeared. Overall,
28:22
Speaker 1: the idea that Wikey was recruited for a secret government
28:25
Speaker 1: mission is pure speculation, aside from the conversation he had
28:29
Speaker 1: with his brother Karl, where he said that he was
28:31
Speaker 1: going on in an assignment where he would quote make a
28:33
Speaker 1: name for himself. But this conversation took place in January
28:37
Speaker 1: nineteen fifty eight, six months before he went missing. It
28:40
Speaker 1: is possible that Witke really was in Lyne to receive
28:42
Speaker 1: an assignment like that at some point, but because of
28:45
Speaker 1: his physical and mental deterioration from the radioactive follow he
28:49
Speaker 1: was ultimately pulled from this assignment and it had no
28:51
Speaker 1: bearing on his disappearance.
28:53
Speaker 3: What we do know, is that if he was actually
28:56
Speaker 3: in line for a promotion or a special mission or
29:00
Speaker 3: something where he thought he was going to quote make
29:02
Speaker 3: a name for himself, if because of his deteriorating health
29:07
Speaker 3: that was pulled away from him, that could increase the
29:10
Speaker 3: likelihood that he did have a mental breakdown, or he
29:14
Speaker 3: did have a episode of mental health breakdown, and that
29:19
Speaker 3: suicide or abandoning his post could have become an option.
29:22
Speaker 3: I mean, at that point, could that have triggered the
29:25
Speaker 3: distress that he was feeling. If that is what actually happened.
29:28
Speaker 2: To him, that is possible that maybe just the idea
29:32
Speaker 2: of him trying to go on this secret mission while
29:34
Speaker 2: he was suffering from these health issues and he really
29:37
Speaker 2: didn't have anybody to talk to about this because this
29:40
Speaker 2: was the fifties and people will were far less open
29:42
Speaker 2: about talking about mental health struggles. So I guess it
29:45
Speaker 2: is possible that that just added to his stress and
29:48
Speaker 2: that by the time July came around, he had just
29:51
Speaker 2: suffered a complete breakdown, and that's why he decided to
29:53
Speaker 2: leave the base and possibly drive hundreds of miles away,
29:57
Speaker 2: even if he wasn't involved in some sort of mission.
30:00
Speaker 2: Do you know, for certain that Whipki still made a
30:01
Speaker 2: lengthy drive from ford Or to Mohave and checked into
30:04
Speaker 2: White's motel, So is it possible that he could have
30:07
Speaker 2: been meeting someone there. While Whipkey was seen having numerous
30:10
Speaker 2: conversations with two men at Camp Desert Rock who appeared
30:13
Speaker 2: to be government agents, and while he never revealed what
30:16
Speaker 2: they talked about, he usually seemed nervous after they spoke.
30:19
Speaker 2: One theory which has been pushed forward is that Whikey
30:22
Speaker 2: may have witnessed something he should have while he was
30:24
Speaker 2: assigned to Camp Desert Rock, such as experiments involving radioactive
30:28
Speaker 2: testing on humans. But it's also possible that he was
30:31
Speaker 2: being extensively questioned about the effects he was suffering, and
30:35
Speaker 2: perhaps this is the reason he went a wall and
30:37
Speaker 2: traveled to Mojave to meet someone. The fact that Whikey's
30:40
Speaker 2: belongs removed from his barracks the day after he left
30:43
Speaker 2: ford Ord indicates to me that someone in power knew
30:46
Speaker 2: he wasn't coming back there, at least not in the
30:49
Speaker 2: near future. Now, I'm not suggesting that Wikkey met up
30:52
Speaker 2: with someone who murdered him to cover up the fact
30:55
Speaker 2: that he had been exposed to radioactive followed. I think
30:58
Speaker 2: an alternate explanation is that he was taken somewhere to
31:01
Speaker 2: receive treatment but ultimately succumbed to his illness. The Army
31:05
Speaker 2: may have been worried about a potential backlash once it
31:07
Speaker 2: got out that a number of servicemen were put in
31:09
Speaker 2: harm's way during their work on Operation Plumbbob, so they
31:12
Speaker 2: got rid of Whipky's body, abandoned his car and death valley,
31:16
Speaker 2: and came up with a cover story which involved him
31:18
Speaker 2: being a deserter who had a mental breakdown and wandered
31:21
Speaker 2: off to his death and the desert heat. Technically, the
31:24
Speaker 2: reclassification that Whiky died in the line of duty may
31:28
Speaker 2: have been correct, but they cannot reveal the exact circumstances
31:31
Speaker 2: of what happened during his Unsolved Mysteries interview. Carl Whipkey
31:35
Speaker 2: stated that if Paul had been killed in the line
31:37
Speaker 2: of duty on some sort of secret assignment while serving
31:40
Speaker 2: his country, their family could accept that. But there's a
31:43
Speaker 2: big difference between dying for your country and dying because
31:46
Speaker 2: your country gave you an assignment where you were irresponsibly
31:49
Speaker 2: exposed to lethal levels of radiation. Now I'm not saying that.
31:53
Speaker 2: I'm entirely convinced that the Army stage Paul's disappearance to
31:56
Speaker 2: cover up his involvement in Operation Plumbbob. We now know
32:00
Speaker 2: that thousands of other servicemen were exposed to radioactive follow
32:03
Speaker 2: during that operation and many other operations just like it
32:06
Speaker 2: during this time period. It's not like the government could
32:09
Speaker 2: cover up every single one of these incidents. So what
32:12
Speaker 2: exactly made Paul's case stand out? I really would be
32:15
Speaker 2: interested to know how many other servicemen were experiencing the
32:18
Speaker 2: same symptoms as Whipkey during this time period. Did many
32:22
Speaker 2: of them get warts and black moles and need to
32:24
Speaker 2: have all their teeth removed? Or was his just a
32:26
Speaker 2: unique case.
32:28
Speaker 3: I also would want to know is if he is
32:30
Speaker 3: giving information about this classified mission to someone, let's say
32:35
Speaker 3: in the CIA, and he's actually quote ratting on the military,
32:41
Speaker 3: could that have increased his risk of being targeted for
32:44
Speaker 3: you know, needing to be eliminated. But it is really dramatic,
32:48
Speaker 3: like a motion picture ot of Hollywood. If you think
32:51
Speaker 3: that this guy is amazing, stellar serviceman that he is
32:56
Speaker 3: going to be going behind the scenes to yosh share
33:00
Speaker 3: secrets with another government agency. A lot of me, it
33:04
Speaker 3: feels like he would have stood by the military and said, listen,
33:06
Speaker 3: I signed up to serve my country, and whatever the
33:09
Speaker 3: effects are, the effects are, And I don't know that
33:12
Speaker 3: he would go and share information given how important the
33:16
Speaker 3: military was to him.
33:17
Speaker 2: I don't know.
33:18
Speaker 3: It's a really interesting stance. But if you think about
33:21
Speaker 3: them trying to cover up, like you said, there's thousands
33:23
Speaker 3: of men who were exposed to these kinds of dangers,
33:26
Speaker 3: and so are they going to eliminate thousands of men
33:28
Speaker 3: with these big old conspiracies. I wouldn't think so, and
33:32
Speaker 3: so I don't know. It just seems very far fetched.
33:34
Speaker 3: But also because of these meetings, and because of who
33:38
Speaker 3: these two men are, it raises a question who was
33:42
Speaker 3: he meeting, where was he going, What was the point
33:45
Speaker 3: of that trip, because he said one thing and clearly
33:48
Speaker 3: did something completely different.
33:50
Speaker 1: So to piggyback off what you just said, Robin, I
33:53
Speaker 1: think it's possible that these two men, like perhaps the
33:56
Speaker 1: military is freaking out about all of these deitarious effects
34:01
Speaker 1: of Operation plumbob on these military servicemen and maybe women.
34:05
Speaker 1: I don't know how many there were time, or if
34:07
Speaker 1: women were really even involved. In the military in the fifties.
34:10
Speaker 1: I have no idea, but regardless, what if they were
34:14
Speaker 1: freaking out and they had these experimental types of treatment,
34:18
Speaker 1: and so these two guys who were posing his military
34:20
Speaker 1: intelligence but were thought to be CIA, were coming and
34:23
Speaker 1: trying to entice Paul to take part in these experimental
34:27
Speaker 1: procedures or treatments that they thought maybe could offset some
34:31
Speaker 1: of the effects. And like Robin said, perhaps he succumbed
34:34
Speaker 1: to his injuries from the fallout while he was trying
34:38
Speaker 1: to get or receiving this treatment. And initially they had
34:42
Speaker 1: to come up with some kind of cover story, like
34:44
Speaker 1: when he went into the facility. So that's why they
34:47
Speaker 1: staged the whole Death Valley thing and the car, and
34:51
Speaker 1: it was part of the whole plan because that would
34:54
Speaker 1: explain why they would jump into actions so quickly with
34:56
Speaker 1: packing up his stuff and not abide by army or
35:00
Speaker 1: military regulations in waiting the amount of time that they're
35:04
Speaker 1: supposed to wait. They seem very sure that he wasn't
35:07
Speaker 1: coming back.
35:08
Speaker 2: Yeah, that is a good point. And if you're talking
35:10
Speaker 2: about experimental treatment, they made a figure he's going to
35:13
Speaker 2: have a prolonged stay in this other facility. While he's
35:16
Speaker 2: getting the treatment. So we're just going to get his
35:18
Speaker 2: personal belongings at Fort Ord and transport him over there.
35:21
Speaker 2: But of course he wound up dying, and of course
35:23
Speaker 2: that's when they decided to give his belongings back to
35:26
Speaker 2: his family and they had to orchestrate this cover story.
35:29
Speaker 2: But yeah, if they were freaking out because these men
35:31
Speaker 2: were getting sick and suffering these after effects for radiation
35:34
Speaker 2: and they wanted to try some treatment, Paul would be
35:37
Speaker 2: a good candidate because he had an excellent record and
35:40
Speaker 2: he did not have a wife or children, so he
35:43
Speaker 2: would be someone who would not care about being away
35:45
Speaker 2: from his family for a long period of time to
35:47
Speaker 2: undergo this treatment. So they might have thought, hey, if
35:50
Speaker 2: we're going to try it out on someone, you're probably
35:51
Speaker 2: our best shot.
35:53
Speaker 1: Now. The Unsolved Mystery segment lean more towards the angle
35:57
Speaker 1: that Whipy went missing on a secret government mission, and
36:00
Speaker 1: while they definitely acknowledged the issues with the atomic testing,
36:03
Speaker 1: they kind of downplayed the idea that it was the
36:05
Speaker 1: reason for his disappearance. The ironic thing is that the
36:09
Speaker 1: Radiation Exposure Compensation Act was officially signed into law on
36:12
Speaker 1: October fifteenth, nineteen ninety, less than six months before the
36:16
Speaker 1: Unsolved Mysteries episode aired. If Wiki was still alive at
36:20
Speaker 1: the time, he would have been eligible for at least
36:22
Speaker 1: seventy five thousand dollars in compensation because of his participation
36:26
Speaker 1: in atmospheric nuclear weapons tests.
36:29
Speaker 2: It was no longer a big secret that many of
36:31
Speaker 2: the servicemen who worked on Operation Plump Bob had their
36:33
Speaker 2: health needlessly endangered. So I'd like to think that if
36:36
Speaker 2: this was the real reason behind Whipki's disappearance, the government
36:40
Speaker 2: could have had the decency to finally reveal the truth
36:42
Speaker 2: to his family. Whatever angle you lean towards, this is
36:45
Speaker 2: still a very bizarre story, and I believe it's one
36:48
Speaker 2: of the few Unsolved Mysteries military themed stories in which
36:51
Speaker 2: the armed forces likely did take steps to cover up
36:54
Speaker 2: someone's death, though their actual motive for doing so is
36:57
Speaker 2: still unclear. After all this time, I don't think we'll
37:00
Speaker 2: ever know the full truth about what happened, But if,
37:03
Speaker 2: by chance, you happen to have any information about the
37:05
Speaker 2: Unsolved disappearance of Lieutenant Paul Whitkey, please contact the appropriate authorities.
37:11
Speaker 2: Jules Ashley any final thoughts on this case.
37:14
Speaker 3: This one has so many different angles that could have happened. Right,
37:17
Speaker 3: we know that he was struggling physically, and it's possible
37:20
Speaker 3: that his mental health was also fading because of this
37:22
Speaker 3: radiation exposure, and so could he have gotten news that
37:26
Speaker 3: he couldn't get a promotion. Could he be depressed that
37:29
Speaker 3: his health is feeling. Could he simply have just had
37:31
Speaker 3: a mental break and wandered off and disappeared, Yes, he
37:35
Speaker 3: very well could have. Is it possible that he is
37:39
Speaker 3: being recruited for something bigger? I think back in the
37:41
Speaker 3: fifties you would have had an even better chance at
37:43
Speaker 3: the time to have these darker, kind of crazier missions
37:47
Speaker 3: going on because you had less oversight and less technology
37:50
Speaker 3: and things to watch people. But it seems a little crazy,
37:55
Speaker 3: a little far fetched. But you did have an incredible
37:58
Speaker 3: serviceman who was telling his brother, I'm about to make
38:01
Speaker 3: a name for myself. Something BIG's about to happen. And
38:04
Speaker 3: you did have very bizarre behavior by the military after
38:07
Speaker 3: his disappearance that literally they just pack this stuff up
38:11
Speaker 3: immediately and don't even try to see where he is
38:14
Speaker 3: or assume he might come back. This is one of
38:17
Speaker 3: your best servicemen, and you just assume he's a wall
38:21
Speaker 3: and call it quits. It's tragic that the family waited
38:25
Speaker 3: so long to get his name cleared. A wall's a
38:29
Speaker 3: horrific mark on your record. You're a deserter of the military.
38:33
Speaker 3: That's something that Whipki was so proud to do, is
38:36
Speaker 3: to serve his country. And so there's such beauty in
38:39
Speaker 3: him being changed from a deserter to killed in a
38:43
Speaker 3: line of action or dying in the line of duty.
38:46
Speaker 3: Dying and you know, as a result of his duty
38:49
Speaker 3: to the military, because he's not a deserter. So that's
38:52
Speaker 3: a blessing. But then, like you said, there's zero answers
38:55
Speaker 3: for his family. They're just left wondering what happened to
38:58
Speaker 3: our family member who we love, and we just don't
39:02
Speaker 3: have any answers. And I think the lack of details
39:04
Speaker 3: that the military was willing to give them and the
39:07
Speaker 3: way that they kind of eluded the family adds to
39:12
Speaker 3: the grief and trauma of that death. Be straightforward with us,
39:15
Speaker 3: allow us to ask questions, answer those questions, and maybe
39:18
Speaker 3: there would be that less assumption that there's a conspiracy
39:21
Speaker 3: going on and more likelihood to say, Okay, we trust
39:24
Speaker 3: what you're telling us. It's just an overall bizarre and
39:28
Speaker 3: really sad case because at the end of the day,
39:29
Speaker 3: Lieutenant Paul Whipkey served our country, which is an amazing,
39:33
Speaker 3: amazing position that he did for our country, and no
39:36
Speaker 3: one was able to lay him to rest with full honors.
39:39
Speaker 3: It's a very sad end of the story.
39:42
Speaker 1: My heart breaks for all of the victims involved in
39:46
Speaker 1: Operation Plumb Bob and the rates of leukemia and all
39:50
Speaker 1: of the cancers, and Paul, poor Paul, with having to
39:53
Speaker 1: have his teeth removed and experiencing the black moles and
39:56
Speaker 1: the worts. It's just the feeling is fisceral, just thinking
40:01
Speaker 1: about what he experienced in these other people experienced, and
40:05
Speaker 1: to think in the nineteen nineties he would have had
40:08
Speaker 1: access to seventy five thousand dollars. How do you put
40:11
Speaker 1: a price on your teeth? Basically, I don't know if
40:15
Speaker 1: they brought it or they disintegrated, what happened to the
40:18
Speaker 1: rest of the bones in his body, what would happen
40:21
Speaker 1: to his skin by then had he lived. It's just
40:25
Speaker 1: atrocious to think that that is the number that they
40:28
Speaker 1: put on it. And I know that all types of
40:30
Speaker 1: cases like this, any type of personal injury cases they
40:34
Speaker 1: have to come up with a number, or anytime where
40:36
Speaker 1: a big corporation is poisoning the water supply, they need
40:40
Speaker 1: to have a number for what type of harm has
40:43
Speaker 1: been inflicted upon the individuals, And the number seventy five thousand,
40:48
Speaker 1: it just doesn't seem to cover it for me. At
40:51
Speaker 1: least they got some kind of compensation those who lived
40:53
Speaker 1: to that point, But to think of how it impacted
40:57
Speaker 1: their lives and the lives of their loved ones, and
40:59
Speaker 1: it still the future from so many of them, Pail
41:02
Speaker 1: Whipkey included. I don't know what happened here, but I
41:05
Speaker 1: do believe that the government was involved in the cover up.
41:08
Speaker 1: I think that a likely explanation could have been what
41:11
Speaker 1: we just talked about, with them having this experimental treatment
41:15
Speaker 1: that they wanted to try on Whipkey, and that could
41:17
Speaker 1: explain the cover up because the secret mission would make
41:21
Speaker 1: sense to me as well. But if his mental health
41:23
Speaker 1: was failing, would they really want to entrust an important
41:26
Speaker 1: secret mission to somebody who may not have been able
41:30
Speaker 1: to carry it out to the level that they needed.
41:33
Speaker 1: So at the end of the day, this is a
41:36
Speaker 1: really mysterious case, but it's such a tragic one, and
41:40
Speaker 1: I feel so deeply for all of those who are
41:43
Speaker 1: involved in any type of atomic testing.
41:46
Speaker 2: Yeah. I still remember watching this on Unsolved Mysteries back
41:49
Speaker 2: on the day, and I mentioned that they did a
41:51
Speaker 2: lot of these conspiracy theme military cases where servicemen would
41:54
Speaker 2: go missing or die under strange circumstances. And most of
41:58
Speaker 2: the time I genuinely believe that a lot of these
42:01
Speaker 2: victims were suffering from mental health issues and that they
42:04
Speaker 2: weren't part of some massive government conspiracy and weren't being
42:07
Speaker 2: recruited to work on a secret mission. But Paul Whipkey
42:10
Speaker 2: is one of the exceptions. I mean, I do believe
42:13
Speaker 2: he was suffering from mental health issues, but that was
42:15
Speaker 2: probably the fault of the Army for subjecting him to
42:18
Speaker 2: the radiation tests in Operation Plumbbob. And when you heard
42:23
Speaker 2: about his physical health challenges like having his teeth pulled out,
42:26
Speaker 2: then you can understand why his personality completely changed before
42:30
Speaker 2: he went missing. And I really don't know what happened
42:33
Speaker 2: to him. I don't know why the Army would make
42:36
Speaker 2: him disappear, if he really went on a secret mission,
42:39
Speaker 2: or if this was all done to cover up Operation Plumbbob.
42:42
Speaker 2: Or maybe give him some experimental treatment. But I don't
42:45
Speaker 2: think this is just a simple story of him driving
42:48
Speaker 2: over one hundreds of miles away out into Death Valley
42:50
Speaker 2: and wandering out into the desert and dying. And even
42:53
Speaker 2: if that is what happened, I still don't think that
42:55
Speaker 2: the Army told the whole truth of what happened to
42:58
Speaker 2: Whipky's family. And when they had that hearing in the
43:01
Speaker 2: nineteen eighties about how they were changing his classification from
43:04
Speaker 2: deserter to died in the line of duty, I'm sure
43:07
Speaker 2: it felt like a victory, but it also felt like
43:09
Speaker 2: a bittersweet one for the Whipki family because he was
43:13
Speaker 2: no longer classified as a deserter. But at the same time,
43:16
Speaker 2: they still didn't have any answers about what happened, and
43:18
Speaker 2: there were still a lot of pints that the Army
43:21
Speaker 2: was covering up the truth about what happened. And I
43:24
Speaker 2: still remember Carl Whipkey's lines that if our if my
43:27
Speaker 2: brother died in service to his country doing something heroic,
43:31
Speaker 2: then we're okay with that. Just tell us the truth
43:33
Speaker 2: about what happened. And even if he did die as
43:36
Speaker 2: the result of negligence of being exposed radiation poisoning. At
43:39
Speaker 2: least be transparent about it and let us know so
43:42
Speaker 2: that we know that our brother didn't do a disservice
43:44
Speaker 2: by abandoning his post or anything like that, and that
43:48
Speaker 2: his disappearance was not his fault. So yeah, it's been many,
43:52
Speaker 2: many years since Paul Whipke went missing. We're probably never
43:55
Speaker 2: going to learn the full truth about what happened, but
43:57
Speaker 2: it is still an interesting and tragic story.
44:00
Speaker 1: Think about Robin, do you want to tell us a
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44:05
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