Hill Air Force Base officials made a curious decision last week and announced it in a peculiar way.
They confirmed in part some allegations by whistle-blower Bob Church - former collections specialist at the base's museum - that some incomplete Genie missiles, a partial laser-guided "smart bomb" and two jet engines had been stolen from the museum.Then they said that was old news to them (if not the public) and such cases had been closed in 1990. They added that undisclosed people had been given undisclosed discipline. They then announced they would probe no further into his allegations, saying they found nothing in them worthy of more investigation.
So part of his story checked out, but the Air Force still saw nothing that would make it want to look harder into allegations that museum weapon systems and other items have disappeared in recent years and possibly headed into the black market.
That comes even after the Deseret News revealed earlier this year that a Pentagon probe had found at least 3,800 items ranging from airplanes to missiles, bombs and ammunition were missing (and some were stolen) from other Air Force museums.
But that Air Force Audit Agency report had said it could find nothing missing from Hill - but complained it found that Hill had failed to add to central inventories at least 914 items, which could make thefts there harder to discover.
When the Deseret News reported that, Church called and said the audit agency report whitewashed the situation at Hill - and said he had previously reported missing items there ranging from a cargo plane to missiles.
When the Deseret News asked Hill officials about Church's allegations, they said an investigation had been launched. Six weeks later, it is over. And Church isn't happy.
Even though a statement by Hill said officials interviewed "Church to obtain as much information as possible about his allegations," Church said that amounted to a mostly one-sided conversation in an hour or so meeting where officials told him they found nothing to his claims, but he says they gave scant details about why. And he says they wouldn't say who had been disciplined or how for thefts that had been confirmed.
One of his allegations was that a C-131 cargo plane was taken from the museum without permission in 1990. He said when he sought paperwork authorizing it, he was told that it was part of a secret operation and he would be given no such paperwork.
But officials said they located such authorizing paperwork at Air Force Museum System headquarters. A copy shows it authorized a trade of that plane plus two other C-131s at other museums to an individual named Darryl G. Green-amyer for a Soviet MiG-21.
Church said that is still curious. If it were a straightforward deal, why wasn't he shown the paper-work at the time? And he questions how Greenamyer came to own the Soviet fighter - and said the deal seems to possibly have the black-market sort of connections he fears.
Church also says the Air Force apparently didn't look hard at an allegation that several other smart bombs disappeared from the museum after he left - and that he was never able to add them to inventories because of resistance from others.
Adding another twist to the story was how the base announced it would investigate no more. It did that in a way to apparently take a slap at the Deseret News for its coverage of the issue.
It simply faxed a copy of a statement about that to the Deseret News Washington bureau on a Friday night after business hours - when no one was there. Meanwhile, it gave the information to another Utah newspaper, allowing it to run the information first about a story the Deseret News had uncovered.
Base officials have complained through the years that Deseret News probes have given it unnecessary black eyes, and they have asserted the newspaper is biased.
But playing such games also raises questions about whether the image-conscious base is playing games with Church, too. It seems that since other museums had problems with theft, and since some of Church's allegations about similar problems at Hill checked out, the base would want to investigate others exceptionally well.
Church says it didn't - and game-playing and giving less than full explanations about the decision don't help Hill's credibility.