William Cooper
William Cooper
Milton William Cooper: UFO expert? Conspiracy theorist? Navy Intelligence operative? Controversial radio personality? Militia leader? Survivalist? Patriot? Fanatic? The most dangerous man in America?
William “Bill” Cooper (1943–2001) was a leading conspiracy advocate—a patriot, by his own definition—who was outspoken about the Constitution, the JFK assassination, the Trilateral Commission, the Bilderberg Group, the Illuminati, the New World Order, UFOs, and the One World Government.
Cooper’s intense research into information he “stumbled on,” along with his top-secret clearances in the military, fueled what he came to believe was his purpose. For over ten years he lectured and taught in every state in the nation, and worldwide, all the while creating as many ways and means as possible to keep his discoveries in the public eye. His drive to get the facts out, to “disseminate the truth” as he saw it, became his life mission.
Along the way, Cooper achieved international recognition as a radio personality with The Hour of the Time (or HOTT), a WBCQ worldwide shortwave radio program he founded and maintained for one hour Monday through Thursday nights. He often announced that the high risks he took in speaking out would be lessened by going public with as great an audience as possible. That way, he stated, if he ended up being “taken out permanently,” folks would have to suspect that he’d been a deliberate target to be silenced. The more people who heard his radio broadcasts, watched his video productions, listened to his tapes and lectures, or read any or all of his many publications, including newspapers, newsletters, and books, the better—even if it cost him his life. “Wake up, people, don’t believe me or anyone else, research it for yourself,” was his constant urging for his audience to check things out and make up their own minds.
Speaking incessantly about the overall plans of the secret One World Government, Cooper warned that any kind of registration, whether it involves products, social security, or gun control, is a method contrived to gather information on humans in order eventually to subjugate them. Further asserting that credit cards, driver’s licenses, bank accounts, and the like are all part of the overall design that will lead to the forthcoming cashless society, he passionately urged listeners to be aware that virtually all data—even medical—will be encoded into a mandatory computer chip or similar tracking device and implanted in each and every individual so that all citizens will be completely dependent upon and subject to the secret government. All monetary transactions, including income, purchases, and even taxes, will be coded through these chips, so that without one implanted, no one will be able to earn a living or to buy or sell anything.
Cooper maintained that if our society and every person in it acted honestly and with purity, such a Big Brother system might not be threatening; but because of the malicious intentions, desires, and greed of some elitists, the ultimate manipulation and total rule over the masses would be devastating.
Supplementing his lectures with documents, diagrams, and massive research, Cooper repeatedly drummed one of his most inflammatory arguments: that it is against the law to make people pay taxes. Citing the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution as proof that from its inception the United States of America has been a republic, he argued that it is illicit to declare it mandatory for citizens to pay taxes. This was one of his main causes and perhaps his most dangerous. “We Americans have blindly and dutifully submitted ourselves to this and it is wrong,” he would yell.
Reared in an air force family with the requisite moving from town to town and country to country, Cooper was educated in, lived in, or traveled in most of the major countries of the world and gained a broad perspective. In his adult years he achieved a proud service record in the military, holding many top-secret clearances, which would later prove to be instructional in ways he did not anticipate. He entered into the Strategic Air Command of the U.S. Air Force, where he held a secret clearance working on B-52 bombers, refueling aircraft and Minuteman missiles for a time, and received an honorable discharge. His dream of joining the navy had been thwarted earlier because of motion sickness. Having overcome that condition, after leaving the air force he did enlist in the navy, serving some of the most intense years of the Vietnam War in submarine duty. He also participated in harbor patrol and river security missions in Vietnam and was awarded medals for his heroism and leadership during combat.
Cooper was also on the intelligence briefing team for the commander in chief of the Pacific Fleet and was petty officer of the watch at the Command Center at Makalapa, Hawaii, where he held a Top Secret, Q, SI security clearance. Receiving an honorable discharge from the navy in 1975, he pursued additional education. Achieving an associate of science degree in photography and serving as executive director of Adelphi Business College, along with several other positions, he also was marketing coordinator for National Education and Software. These endeavors provided him with the background and skills he developed and used later in producing and marketing his own documentaries, when his real career became evident to him.
Cooper’s bold declarations and allegations served as a magnet for government authorities. Knowing this to be so, he always maintained that he’d rather go out in a blaze of glory than to maintain silence. Apparently sensing that a major confrontation was eminent, in March of 1999 Cooper sent his family out of the United States for their security. He remained in his Eagar, Arizona, home to continue his work, alone except for his “guard geese,” two dogs, one rooster, and one chicken. There, during a raid on his home by the Apache County Sheriff’s Department on November 5, 2001, Cooper was shot and killed.
One can always find differing reports of any given incident, and this one is no different. Several reports from the sheriff’s office claimed that the episode did not involve a planned SWAT raid on Cooper’s property but a simple “confrontation” between the police and Cooper that resulted in an exchange of gunfire. Also critically wounded was one of their own: Robert Martinez, an Apache County deputy. Other reports claim that the gunfire took place during an attempted arrest. Whatever the case, many of Cooper’s listeners and followers believe that the episode was simply the murder of one of the first men to expose the government for what it truly is. Although conceding that Cooper may not have been an easy man to get along with, these adherents hold a mounting belief that the authorities concealed evidence about the shootout, and claims along these lines have ever since served as provocative fodder for those screaming that his “murder” was itself a conspiracy—to silence Milton William Cooper for once and all.