Still Sunny: Continued Investigations into the Gulf Breeze Six, Pt. 4

Former Intelligence Personnel Recollect Memories of Field Station Augsburg and the Six AWOL Soldiers

Nov 06, 2024

Read Pt. 1 of the original GB6 series here.

While it has been a while since the last look into the Gulf Breeze Six, the topic never leaves my mind completely, only taking a small nudge to get right back into it. In prior research, I have often found myself wondering what the atmosphere was like at the military installation they were stationed at and later went AWOL from: USASA Field Station Augsberg, a sensitive listening post managed by the National Security Agency and staffed by Army intelligence analysts. The work done at the station during the Cold War is, of course, mostly classified, so in many cases this exploration has had to lean on the testimony of the six soldiers involved in the story, claims that often strain belief or raise concerns about reliability. Specifically, Vance Davis has put forth stories about his superior officers being aware of shadowy UFO projects or ongoing spiritual warfare, covered most prominently in parts 10 and 11 of the original series. Here, Davis purported to send reports to “the Aquarius branch” of the NSA—hearkening back to the MJ-12 fiasco—and also “hand-delivered some (…) documents to a guy (he) was later told was the ‘real’ President of the United States,” implying that the shadow government was within arm’s reach.1 While the Army brushed them off as a small group of eccentrics when the AWOL incident occurred, an anonymous soldier stationed at Augsburg told the European edition of Stars & Stripes that there were more individuals connected with the group who were “upset because they didn't get invited” to go along with them.2 But was any of this true or were these claims more delusions, obfuscations, or shenanigans?

Luckily, within the comments to Jack Brewer’s excellent article on the Gulf Breeze Six from a few years ago, I noticed that an anonymous reply was left by someone who claimed to be SIGINT analyst at Augsburg at the same time as the GB6. “These guys and one gal were always a bit odd, but that(‘s) nothing when you are dealing with skilled technicians with high IQs,” they write. “Nobody ever suspected them of anything too weird, they all were into the Dungeons & Dragons type games, they talked about witchcraft and other things like that—but, again, that wouldn’t even make you bat an eyelash.”3 Indeed, this comment caught my attention because the documents from the INSCOM investigation (included in the appendix of Vance Davis’ Unbroken Promises) also mentions this D&D fascination, specifically in reference to GB6er Kris Perlock.4 The commenter continued:

When they went missing it caused a stir. The biggest worry amongst the command was that they had stolen information or were trying to defect. The rest of us figured that they’d gone to the Alps to join a hippie commune (…)! Once we found out what had really happened, we weren’t really surprised. Pretty sure that they dropped some acid and had some other chemical enhancement onboard. (…) They decided to go chase UFOs and try to make contact. All in all they were harmless. (…) When it’s all said and done(,) they just went a little bit goofy, went AWOL and ended up with a slap on the hand. It was a BIG embarrassment for INSCOM, the NSA and the Army. A bunch of us went through “Q&A” sessions with several alphabet agencies, everybody got to go through more lie detector tests, and they generally clamped down even more on security, (…) as if you could do much more in one of the biggest SCIFs outside of the U.S. (…)!5

As can be expected, the sudden disappearance of the group of soldiers left the station embarrassed and the personnel remaining had to bear the ramifications of the strange event. Mentioned here is the possibility of some sort of drug-induced mania, going so far as to say the group dropped acid when they boarded the plane to the U.S.—this moment in the GB6 saga was covered in part 6 of the original series. While none of the crew mention drugs as being a component in their experiences, the nature of their adventure immediately led the public to wonder. Even in Davis’ retelling the story, drug use would explain Beason’s intense paranoia, the general feeling of being followed, and the appearance and disappearance of a brilliantly blue-eyed woman onboard. However, the story may not be so simple: The anonymous commenter also mentions that “Eccleston had” the other five “under a spell,” emphasizing that “she was a truly odd bird.”6 While there is no elaboration on this point, it does fit in with the preponderance of hypnotism within the group, consistently performing self-hypnosis or practicing putting one another into trances—see part 4.

Being the inquisitive type, I put forward my email in a follow-up comment but never heard back from the original commenter. Instead, yet another individual who was formerly in military intelligence reached out and offered more clarity on what life was like at Field Station Augsburg. This person also gave their impressions of the Gulf Breeze Six, some of whom they knew fairly well in Germany, and others who they met during earlier training at Corry Station in Pensacola. While in Augsburg, this anonymous intelligence veteran was in the same barracks as William Setterberg and Michael Hueckstaedt who he recalled “were both good guys (…), a little dorky but nice enough.”7 Some of the other individuals in the GB6 made a less flattering impression:

Ken Beason was a strange cat—I can tell you that he attempted to hypnotize me one evening in the barracks—absolutely true. He was ineffective (…). Perlock was someone who I never liked at all. He was in one of our sister units. I didn't really know Eccleston all that well as she was a Staff Sergeant and (…) in a different company. Then there's Vance Davis. I don't even know where to begin with that guy. (…) Absolutely an incredibly bad bullshit artist of the highest order. Friendly guy, but like the other five he was a geek, but more severely. He told me once that he had written a song that was big on the radio at the time and then offered to buy me a hot dog with his royalties. He also claimed to have been on the Olympic Baseball Team. I've seen some of his ridiculous claims online about what we were doing in Augsburg, and it's utterly laughable in every way.8

Again, the group’s obsession with hypnosis comes to the fore, with some of them seemingly attempting to entrance other soldiers stationed at the base. What’s noteworthy here is that the source gets Eccleston’s rank correct as she was the only Sergeant in a sextet comprised of mostly Privates and Specialists. Some weirdness, however, is the fact that this anonymous contact recalled that Eccleston “left two little boys behind in Germany.”9 All other documents about the case indicate that Eccleston’s two children went with the group, more officially in an INSCOM memorandum produced during the investigation of the group.10 Then again, the source did not claim to know Eccleston well.

As for the statements about Vance Davis, while most laid forth by this anonymous individual is new material, some of it does relate to verifiable information. Davis purportedly said he was part of the Olympic baseball team, which as far as I can tell is not true. However, he did play for the Kountry Tyme Cubs at the Wichita, KS based National Baseball Congress tournament held in 1987—an event I am only familiar with because I am a former Kansan.11 (What is it with Kansas baseball players and the fringe?) Davis maintained this baseball hobby well into the 2000s, playing on a recreation 1870s team at Wichita’s Old Cowtown Museum that he also helped to organize.12 While Davis’ interest in baseball is undoubtedly cool, the claims of his unnamed former brigade associate raise serious questions about whether Davis has a habit of stretching the truth—with some facts perhaps sprinkled in. As the Gulf Breeze Six story has so often strained credulity, one wonders if the picture presented by the former fellow soldier is closer to the more accurate one. Oh, and of course you’re probably pondering what the big radio hit was that Davis purported to write. Thankfully the anonymous source remembered that it was “Fantasy” by Aldo Nova—a pretty good track honestly.

This second contact also provided a picture on what life at the base was like, remarking that because they “worked 24/7/365 ops on rotating shifts,” there was always “one platoon (…) on break (known as BMI—Break Means Intoxication) every night.” The lax atmosphere for those not on duty resulted in “legendary, occasionally perverse, and ubiquitous” pranks that “could often make Animal House look tame,” he remembered.13 Further: “It was actually a great time—take the worst frat house you've ever seen times ten—I’m not kidding. The ‘regular’ Army is a different world.”14 The GB6ers, on the other hand, were said to be “literal LARPers” who “did some kind of goofy medieval Nerf weapons crap”—undoubtedly classic equipment in the LARPing arsenal.15 With the fact that Dungeons & Dragons and live action role playing figure so prominently in the recollections of both respective anonymous former associates, the question must be asked: Was the sojourn stateside was a continuation of the fun and games? Did some members see going AWOL as a LARP while others did not? Was it all just bored soldiers occupying their time in a way that got out of hand? It should also be said that the Majestic 12 material, which featured somewhat prominently into the GB6’s beliefs, bears the hallmarks of live action role play or even alternate reality games (ARGs). At one point the complex tangle of UFO disinformation that constitutes MJ-12 was actually turned into an ARG video game, a milestone of its genre.16 The role play elements also reappear in the mythic quest that made up the plot of Ken Beason’s later novel The Incarnate, explored in part 2 of this follow-up series. Again, because there were six members, it becomes difficult to parse out individual beliefs. Maybe, as the second contact expressed, they were just bored and little geeky.

Of course, it is important to bear in mind that these interesting statements were made anonymously so it is impossible to get direct verification. Much of the work being done at the time is still classified, as anything to do with the NSA tends to be. For what it’s worth, both sources appear knowledgeable of not only the structure of the Army intelligence apparatus, but the structure of the groups at Augsburg, as well as, of course, corroborating details about the GB6 and their plight. While much of the information could be gleaned from prior publications online—including my own—it is worth noting that many of the details are new, they just fit in line with the characterization of the six soldiers formed through what little detail slipped through previously. The input of these two individuals not only adds a bit more texture to the broad picture I had developed of the six, but it also gives us an idea of how other soldiers at the base felt about the negative publicity the GB6 brought to Field Station Augsburg. The latter individual wanted to make clear that he “served with very good people in Augsburg, a special group of Americans doing a thankless, usually insanely boring job.” Further, he stressed that most of the 701st MI Brigade were “relentlessly professional when it came to (their) jobs” and he does not appreciate “the lies and profiteering of deserters tarnishing their service.”17 My thanks to both for speaking on the subject and breathing some life into this dormant, but certainly not concluded, research.

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Morton, Sean David and Vance Davis. The Gulf Breeze Prophecies. Self-published pamphlet, 1 October 1993. Page 37.

Associated Press. “6 AWOL soldiers say they aimed to kill Antichrist.” NW Florida Daily News, 20 July 1990. Carrion document, page 79.

Anonymous. Comment on “Revisiting the Gulf Breeze Six.” The UFO Trail. 6 November 2023. https://ufotrail.blogspot.com/2017/02/revisiting-gulf-breeze-six.html?showComment=1699328851284#c8796301950103206392.

Davis, Vance A. and Brian Blashaw. “Final Report of Investigation INSCOM (Intelligence Security Command).” Unbroken Promises: A True Story of Courage and Belief. Mesa: White Mesa Publishers, 1995. Page 221.

Ibid.

Anonymous email to author.

Ibid.

Davis, Vance A. and Brian Blashaw. “INSCOM Investigative Memorandum for Record. 18 July 1990” Unbroken Promises: A True Story of Courage and Belief. Mesa: White Mesa Publishers, 1995. Page 251.

MacKay, Bill. “Acquisition boost Kountry Time’s outlook.” The Wichita Eagle. 18 July 1987. https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-wichita-eagle/112451431/.

Rives, Bob. “Wichita’s own Field of Dreams.” The Active Age. 31 August 2021. https://theactiveage.com/wichitas-own-field-of-dreams/.

Anonymous email to author.

Ibid.

“The Forgotten ARG.” YouTube, uploaded by Atrocity Guide, 9 May 2019. Link. (Note that this documentary does get some details slightly wrong, such as MJ-12 originating from Art Bell’s Coast to Coast AM. In reality, it stemmed from a broad UFO disinformation campaign.)

Anonymous email to author.