Dulce Base -- Linda Moulton Howe: The Filmmaker Doty Targeted
Dulce Base -- Linda Moulton Howe: The Filmmaker Doty Targeted
Biography
| Field | Detail |
|---|---|
| Full name | Linda Moulton Howe |
| Background | Television news journalist; documentary filmmaker; environmental reporter; Stanford University graduate |
| Key early work | "A Strange Harvest" (1980) -- an Emmy Award-winning documentary for CBS Denver affiliate KMGH-TV about cattle mutilations; the documentary was the first major broadcast investigation of the mutilation phenomenon |
| AFOSI targeting | 1983; approached by Richard Doty; offered access to classified UFO information; HBO documentary project killed as a result |
| Later career | Has continued investigating and reporting on UFO and paranormal topics; hosts "Earth Files" media platform; remains a significant figure in UFO journalism |
"A Strange Harvest" (1980)
Howe's Emmy-winning documentary was a serious journalistic investigation of the cattle mutilation phenomenon. It featured interviews with ranchers, veterinarians, law enforcement, and researchers. Its quality and the Emmy it won gave Howe significant credibility as an investigative journalist willing to take unconventional subjects seriously.
The documentary's success attracted attention from AFOSI. A journalist with national broadcast connections, an Emmy Award, and a demonstrated willingness to investigate classified-adjacent topics was exactly the kind of person the AFOSI operation would want to neutralize or redirect.
The 1983 AFOSI Contact
In April 1983, Richard Doty approached Linda Moulton Howe and invited her to Kirtland Air Force Base. At the meeting:
- Doty showed her what he presented as a genuine classified government document -- an alleged briefing paper for President Eisenhower describing crashed saucer recoveries and alien contact with the U.S. government
- Doty promised her access to footage of UFO landings at an Air Force base
- Doty promised her interviews with Air Force colonels who had met aliens
- Doty promised her the opportunity to meet or interview "EBE-3" -- a living alien being under government protection
Howe's documentary project, which was being funded by HBO, was based in part on the expectation that these promised materials would materialize. None of them did.
The HBO Documentary That Never Was
The specific operational success of Doty's approach to Howe: by promising exclusive classified access that never materialized, he occupied Howe's investigative attention and HBO's documentary funding in a waiting game for evidence that was never coming. After Doty's leads failed to materialize, HBO withdrew funding. The documentary was never made.
Whether this was Doty's intended outcome -- killing a potentially significant documentary about classified programs by stringing the filmmaker along -- or an incidental benefit of a broader operation is uncertain. The result was the same either way: a serious broadcast investigation of the cattle mutilation and government-UFO connection was prevented.
Howe's Assessment
Howe has given multiple accounts of the 1983 Kirtland meeting and its aftermath. Her consistent position: she believes the Eisenhower briefing document she was shown at Kirtland was genuine classified information, not a forgery. This position puts her at odds with the research consensus (that the document was a Doty fabrication) and reflects the enduring difficulty of the disinformation operation's design: targets who were shown convincing fake documents often continue to believe in those documents' authenticity even after learning about the broader disinformation campaign.
