Killian documents controversy

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The Killian memos are documents which were allegedly written in 1972 and 1973 by Lieutenant Colonel Jerry B. Killian (who died in 1984), which the CBS News organization used as the basis for a 60 Minutes segment in September 2004, claiming that President George W. Bush disobeyed orders while in the Texas Air National Guard (TANG), and had undue influence exerted on his behalf to improve his record. Some experts feel that these documents are very forgeries; others do not. No consensus on authenticity has been reached. See also George W. Bush military service controversy.

Initial skepticism

A few hours after the release of the 60 Minutes II segment, a discussion began on Free Republic, a right-wing Internet forum. This quickly spread to various weblogs that the copies of these memos from the CBS News website displayed characteristics inconsistent with being produced by 1972 typewriter technology. These claims quickly found their way into the mainstream press, and the following night CBS News gave a firm rebuttal. The initial skepticism appeared in the following posts on Free Republic:

"TankerKC," 19 minutes after the broadcast began: "[The documents are] not in the style that we used when I came into the USAF...Can we get a copy of those memos?"
"Buckhead," responded less than four hours later: "Howlin, every single one of these memos to file is in a proportionally spaced font, probably Palatino or Times New Roman. In 1972 people used typewriters for this sort of thing, and typewriters used monospaced fonts... I am saying these documents are forgeries, run through a copier for 15 generations to make them look old. This should be pursued aggressively."

Various rightist discussion groups and Internet blogs quickly picked on the story, while left-wing blogs vigorously defended the authenticity of the memos. Blogger Markos Moulitsas Zuniga of the Daily Kos, the largest left-wing blog on the Internet, wrote in a preface to his rebuttal of the allegations:

"As everyone on the planet no doubt knows by now, the hard-right of the freeper contingent ... discovered that if you used the same typeface, you could make documents that looked almost -- but not exactly -- like the TANG documents discovered by CBS News."[1]

Typographical questions

Proportional fonts

The majority of typewriters available in 1972 used fixed width fonts. Typewriters with proportional fonts were first introduced in 1941, mass-produced from 1948 onwards, and were extremely popular and in widespread use by 1972.

The only known typewriters available in 1972 with proportional font support and a similar (though not exact)[2] match to the font some claim was used in the memos (11-point Press Roman vs. 12-point Times New Roman) is the IBM Selectric Composer. The IBM Executive supported a single proportional font that is very different from the Selectric Composer font that most closely matches the font some belive is used in the memos; however, the actual font used is almost impossible to identify, and various fonts supported by the Selectric and the Executive are likely candidates.

Bill Glennon, a technology consultant in New York City who worked for IBM repairing typewriters from 1973 to 1985, says experts making the claim that typewriters were incapable of producing the memos "are full of crap. They just don't know." He says there were IBM machines capable of producing the spacing, and a customized key — the likes of which he says were not unusual — that created the superscript th (discussed below). [3] However, Thomas Phinney of Adobe Systems, one of the pioneering companies in the desktop publishing industry, has said the memos could not have been produced with IBM typewriters, including the Selectric and Executive models, due to differences in font width. [4]

The Selectric Composer cost $3,600 to $4,400 in 1973 dollars ($16,000 to $22,000 in 2004 dollars). Second hand ones were available for around $150 [5]. While the Executive was more affordable, all known genuine documents from Bush's ANG base were typed using the more typical fixed width fonts commonly associated with typewriters.

Sophisticated spacing

Some argue that the Killian memos display kerning, a sophisticated character spacing that is ubiquitous with word-processing documents and virtually unknown in 1972. Technically, Microsoft Word does not perform true kerning by default, but the TrueType engine used by Windows supports something called "hinting" or pseudo-kerning, which is not implemented on mechanical typewriters.

Word wrapping

Because a typewriter does not have the ability to know what the user is going to type next, it is up to the typist to decide when to move the carriage to the next line. Often, a typist will use hyphenation to split a word between two lines on a syllable boundary, while computer word processors (and Microsoft Word in particular) do not do this by default. The lines in the memos are split along word boundaries at the exact location where Microsoft Word would have split them.

Superscripted THs

The Killian Memos display superscripted TH characters in a smaller font on numbers (such as 111th) that are generated automatically by Microsoft Word but some claim would be very difficult to create using 1972 typewriter technology.

Dan Rather has pointed out several documents of unquestioned authenticity in the Bush records have apparently superscripted 'th' characters interspersed throughout. However, these are not technically superscripts, since they are not raised above the level of the normal text, like an actual superscript would be. The Killian memos show signs of true superscripts.

Lt. Col. Jerry Killian's former secretary, Marian Carr Knox, who worked from 1956 to 1979 at Ellington Air Force Base in Houston, recalls that during her time at the Guard, she used a mechanical Olympia typewriter, which did have a special "th" key. It was replaced by an IBM Selectric in the early 1970s. She claims that the memos are not real, as the typeface does not match either of the two typewriters and that she would have remembered typing them.[6]

Centered headers

Centering headers using a proportional font is very difficult using typewriting equipment. In addition, two of the memos, dated May 4 and August 1, 1972, feature a three-line centered heading which aligns exactly, not only between the two memos (dated three months apart), but also with a comparison document created using the auto-centering feature of Microsoft Word.[7]

Smart quotes

Another feature of Microsoft Word is the automatic translation of apostrophes in English contractions. While typewriters of that era generally only supported a single kind of apostrophe (') and a single kind of quotation mark ("), computer word processors also have the ability to display curved quotation marks like the kind used in typesetting. An example from the Killian memo is the word "I’m", which would have been rendered as "I'm" on a typewriter or computer word processor without this feature. Microsoft Word also automatically converts double quotation marks, so "this" becomes “this”. Double quotation marks are not used in any of the Killian memos. (You may have to enlarge the font size of your browser or print this page in order to see the difference between the two kinds of apostrophes.)

This jpeg image is a 1954 ad for an IBM Executive typewriter that clearly shows the ability of that machine to produce smart quotes. However, many analysts have disqualified the IBM Executive on other grounds, particularly the typeface and spacing differences (see above).

Allegedly reproducable using modern technology

Some critics claim that the memo could be duplicated identically with the default settings in Microsoft Word 2003 [8], while others dispute this, noting among other indiscrepancies letters and words in the original which are not aligned properly [9] and variations in boldness of letters. [10] The discrepancies could have been introduced by a combination of FAX transmission (CBS apparently does not possess the original documents), repeated photocopying (a technique often used by forgers to give the appearance of age), and/or Photoshop manipulation, but it seems unlikely that a forger would go to such lengths whilst having used MS Word's default settings. Using a custom computer algorithm to find the best alignment between the scanned memo and the Word version shows an exact overlay, demonstrating how the low fidelity of the CBS documents can give the appearance of differences between individual letters in the two versions due to the random "thickening" introduced during the FAXing and/or photocopying process.[11] However, the same low fidelty also aids the appearance of an exact overlay, as the re-sizing of the CBS documents obscures details.

Some claim that this screenshot of an Word document is an exact replica. Others point to discrepancies such as the inconsistent baseline in the original and the divergent locations of the 'th' supercript.[12] In response, the creator of the screenshot printed the Word document to a PDF and obtained a much closer match to the superscript, but not to the baseline irregularities.[13] In Microsoft Word, the 'th' superscript is drawn in a different location on the screen than it is when printed. Another experiment showed that faxing, scanning, and copying a Word document creates random baseline irregularities.[14] CBS is not known to have faxed the memo in question (although the copies shown by some other news organizations had a CBS News fax header on them), but the person who provided the document certainly might have.

Inability to reproduce using contemporary technology

Thus far, no one has reproduced the exact typography, spacing and layout of the Killian memos using 1972 technology.

Other issues

In addition to the typographical concerns, other issues have been raised regarding the content and formatting of the memos.

Skepticism from Killian's family

Jerry Killian's wife and son argue that their father never used typewriting equipment and would have written these memos by hand. The family has also stated that Killian was not known for keeping personal memos. They also state that Jerry Killian was very pleased with George Bush's performance in his TANG unit.

Mention of influence by retired officer

An officer, Walter Staudt, cited in the memo dated August 18, 1973 as exerting pressure on officers to "sugar coat" their evaluations of Bush, had in fact retired from the service in March of 1972. Another officer, Earl W. Lively (now 76), who at the time was the commanding officer at the Austin TANG facility was quoted in the Washington Times as saying, "They're forged as hell."

Improper formatting

According to U.S. Air Force practice of the 1970s, the memo dated "04 May 1972" should have had the date formatted as "4 May 72". Months were abbreviated to three characters, leading zeros were not used, and only the last two digits of the year were used up until the year 2000. In this memo, other discrepancies include:[15]

  • The terminology "MEMORANDUM FOR" was never used in the 1970s.
  • The abbreviations in this letter are incorrectly formatted, in that a period is used after military rank (1st Lt.). According to the Air Force style manual, periods are not used in military rank abbreviations.
  • The abbreviation for Fighter Interceptor Squadron (FIS) includes periods after each capital letter. Again, periods are not used.
  • In paragraph 1, the phrase "not later than" is spelled out, followed by (NLT). NLT was, and is, a widely recognized abbreviation for "not later than" throughout all military services, so the inclusion of "not later than" was not a generally accepted practice and completely unnecessary in a letter from one military member to another.
  • According to an ex-Guard commander, retired Col. Bobby W. Hodges, the Guard never used the abbreviation "grp" for "group" or "OETR" for an officer evaluation review, as in the CBS documents. The correct terminology, he said, is "gp" and "OER."[16]
  • Lieutenant Colonel Killian's signature element is incorrect for letters prepared in the 1970s. This letter uses a three-line signature element, which was normally not used. Three-line signature elements were almost the exclusive domain of colonels and generals in organizations well above the squadron level.
  • Finally, the signature element is placed far to the right, instead of being left justified. The placement of the signature element to the right was not used or directed by Air Force standards until almost 20 years after the date of this letter.

Paper size

In 1921, two different committees decided on standard paper sizes for the United States. A group called the Permanent Conference on Printing established the 8" by 10½" size as the general U.S. government letterhead standard, while a Committee on the Simplification of Paper Sizes came up with the more familiar 8½" by 11" size now known as US Letter. The U.S. military used the smaller size up until the early 1980s. So a low-quality photocopy of the memos might have shown thin vertical lines or some other indication of the smaller paper size in a photocopy of the memos if they had been typed on the 8" by 10½" paper.[17]

CBS' "smoking gun"

CBS authenticated their documents with General Robert "Bobby" Hodges, a former officer at the Texas Air National Guard. Hodges agreed with CBS' assessment that the documents were real. However, the authentication was performed via telephone. Once Hodges was able to view the documents for himself and had heard of claims of forgery by Killian's wife and son, he stated that they had been falsified. Hodges also claims that when CBS interviewed him, he thought the memos were handwritten, not typed. ([18] New York Times, September 12, 2004)

Inconsistency with Killian's earlier memos

The memos released by CBS appear to be inconsistent with earlier memorandums, written by Killian, and released by the Department of Defense. According to the Washington Post on September 14, 2004, "The analysis shows that half a dozen Killian memos released earlier by the military were written with a standard typewriter using different formatting techniques from those characteristic of computer-generated documents. CBS's Killian memos bear numerous signs that are more consistent with modern-day word-processing programs, particularly Microsoft Word..."

In fact, on September 14, 2004, Marian Carr Knox stated that the memos were not written by Killian[19]. Knox was a secretary at Ellington Air Force from 1956 to 1979 that typed up documents for Killian.

Independent experts

The vast majority of independent document authentication experts contacted by the major news media and bloggers have indicated a strong likelyhood that the Killian memos are forgeries constructed with the use of modern word processing software and printer technology, with the memos "aged" using multiple generations of copying to blur the characters. Several are "certain" that the documents are fraudulent.

Many analysts have said that they were not concerned with whether or not it was hypothetically possible to duplicate one or even a few of the typographic features with 1973 technology, but whether it was likely that all of them would have matched, at least as closely as the Microsoft Word samples, using a single typewriter that could plausibly have been in use at a remote national guard base in 1973 (and apparently wasn't used to type any other memos from that base). Several people with experience in operating either the IBM Executive or the Selectric Composer have said that they were much more complicated to operate than a regular typewriter and therefore were reserved for important correspondence within the companies where they had worked.

To some, the case seemed so obvious that they have suggested that the documents were more likely forged by the Bush camp to embarrass their opponents, the argument being that someone wanting to create plausible forgeries would likely have used an actual old-style typewriter. Others would suggest that these documents could easily have been produced on the equipment used by the National Guard at that time (although they have not demonstrated how), making it unlikely for them to be forgeries. A third group suspects that the memos are forgeries, produced by the Bush camp, not to embarrass their opponents but to distract from the more tangible evidence that Bush allegedly disobeyed orders and was allegedly AWOL. And there's a fourth group that believes that the Kerry camp or someone with sympathy for the Kerry camp created these documents to get the news media attention off of the Swiftboat ads and bring the focus of their attention to Bush's activities during Vietnam.

On September 14, 2004, it was reported that Frank Abagnale Jr., the forger whose story was told in the movie Catch Me If You Can, had been following the story and believed the documents to be fake, though he has not yet been able to examine physical copies. He stated, "if my forgeries looked as bad as the CBS documents, it would have been Catch Me In Two Days." Abagnale has been used by the Federal Bureau of Investigation to catch other forgers, and to testify against them in their trials.

Quote

106 [degrees] in the Valley...I was sweating like Dan Rather checking for forged documents.
—Jay Leno, September 10, 2004, on The Tonight Show

The memos

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