The US military has a long and glorious history of dangerous experimentation. In 'Angels Don't Play This HAARP', authors Jeane Manning and Nick Begich argue that the High-frequency Active Auroral Research Project, known as HAARP is the latest and most dangerous experiment of all. Though the government denies that the experiment is either dangerous or directly associated with the military, the authors provide plenty of evidence that it is both dangerous and part of a particle-beam weapons project left over from Star Wars. It is most simply explained as an attempt to heat parts of the upper atmosphere and "see what happens". While the authors sometimes undermine themselves with science fictional speculation, the basic kernels of information on HAARP are indeed every bit as alarming as the authors wish them to be.

The tendency towards SF speculation emerges early and nearly defeats the authors before they start, when in the preface to the book, one Patrick Flanagan claims that "I invented an electronic telepathy machine 37 years ago that has been called Neurophone".

But once the authors start talking about HAARP itself, the facts seem more grounded in a reality we are all familiar with. The facts are brief and alarming. Atlantic Richfield was looking for customer for all the energy in its Alaskan natural gas fields. In HAARP, it found that customer, and it bought the company and the patents of one Bernard Eastlund, who had the idea that heating the ionosphere could lead to controllable global communication disruptions, weather modifications, and even mind control. Eastlund's patents cite the work of the venerable Nikolai Tesla, and there is some evidence he was there first. ARCO eventually sold the HAARP technology and patents to Raytheon. Raytheon is a huge defense contractor, which has been buying a number of defense-oriented companies. The latest Raytheon buyout was Texas Instruments defense technologies division.

All of this is in the public record, and given the content of the patents, it is rather alarming. HAARP could easily tear a hole in the ionosphere that might never go away. The authors remind us of Enrico Fermi's fear that the first nuclear detonation might set off a chain reaction that would boil away the earth's atmosphere. They also recount the story of the Army's thankfully aborted plan to create a new harbor in Alaska with six underground nuclear detonations. There's no doubt that boiling the ionosphere sounds like something that should be done under strict supervision, if at all, yet the military is engaged in that very pursuit at this minute under no supervision whatsoever. The recent discovery of 'sprites' and other upper-atmosphere phenomena associated with lightning suggests that we have a lot learn about how the thin film that protects this planet works.

The authors also discuss the use of this technology for purposes of mind control. By creating a 'mirror' of superheated gas in the upper atmosphere, Extremely Low Frequency (ELF) waves can be bounced against the mirror. ELF, the authors contend, can be used as a sort of carrier wave for mind-control frequencies. While some of the studies they cite seem quite believable, they rapidly veer back into SF-style speculation with the Neurophone back in the spotlight as the center of a government conspiracy.

Although the book is full of interesting, informative and alarming facts, the impact is lessened by a peculiar presentation. The narrative is written as if the authors themselves were characters, in the third person instead of the first person. This is both confusing and off-putting, creating an unnecessary distance between the readers and the facts. Of course, they don't even refer to themselves as writers, but rather 'compilers'. They also have a penchant for repeating the basic facts concerning Eastlund, ARCO and Raytheon, giving the impression that they don't have much else to say.

This is certainly not the case. The authors never bother to mention the spiritual predecessor of HAARP, HARP. HARP --High Altitude Research Project -- was the series of experiments run by the brilliant but greedy Gerald Bull, who, when the US pulled the plug on his program, went on to develop the 'Supergun' for Iraq. The bulk of the evidence they gather and present in this book is convincing and frightening. While God may not play dice with the Universe, man, and the US military in particular, seem more than willing to do so. Unfortunately, this is a game we can only lose once.