Target: Orleans

Nine shooting incidents have occurred in Vermont's Northeast Kingdom in the last month. While the authorities remain in the dark as to the pattern behind the spree, is there an obvious link that connects the dots?

The shootings began on November 21st. They have included three Christian evangelical churches, specifically, the Grace Brethren Church of Coventry/Irasburg, the Assembly of God Church and Cornerstone Evangelical Church, both in Derby.

"It's disturbing, but we're not fearful," said the Rev. Scott Libby, pastor of the Grace Brethren Church, which was hit with 11 rounds.

The spree also targeted three homes, a vehicle, and then, on December 20th, the Vermont State Police barracks in Derby (hitting a display case). Most recently, a shooting occurred on December 22nd, at the Newport Country Club.

Seven of the shootings have occurred in Derby, with one each in Coventry and Newport. There have been no injuries, but lots of rattled nerves now exist in rural northern Vermont. The suspect or suspects remain at large.

Overtly, all the shootings seem to be aimed at symbolic auctoritas targets.

The Associated Press ran a national story on the Vermont shootings on Christmas Eve, December 24, at 2:25 PM EST.

All of the incidents have occurred in Orleans County, Vermont. It was in part of Orleans County where Gerald Bull infamously tested his giant guns.

In 1967, researcher and scientist (the so-called "supergun inventor") Gerald Bull constructed a laboratory for his Space Research Corporation (SRC) in Highwater, just north of Orleans County, Vermont's Canadian border. The property overlapped into the county in North Troy. His intent was to fire research packages into orbit using heavy artillery.

SRC was a corporation founded by Gerald Bull, after the budget for his research at Project HARP (for High Altitude Research Program, not to be confused with HAARP) for the United States and Canadian federal governments was cut in 1967, in order to commercialize the technology of long-range artillery. Project HARP's assets were then given to the newly formed SRC, the main facility of which straddled the U.S.-Canadian border between Highwater, Quebec, and North Troy, Vermont.

SRC's positive history was tied to selling ammo to Israel in 1973 for use in American-supplied artillery pieces. Bull was rewarded for the success of this program by a Congressional bill, sponsored by Senator Barry Goldwater, making him retroactively eligible for a decade of American citizenship and high-level American nuclear security clearance. With the change of administration in 1977, the US's policies on arms sales changed dramatically, and Bull ended up serving six months in a US jail in 1980. When he got out, he moved to Belgium.

Shown above is Dr. Gerald V. Bull. Image: M. Wade, Encyclopdia Astronautix, and Berliner-Ultrasonics. As Berliner notes, clearly with one of the 16" guns and, equally clearly, NOT in the Barbados!

Gerald Bull designed the Project Babylon "supergun" for the Iraqi government. Bull was assassinated, when shot five times in the back of the neck, by a gunman as Bull opened the door to his home in Brussels, Belgium, on March 22, 1990. Bull had been working on Scud missiles for the Iraqis.

Three theories as to the source of the assassin are most often mentioned: 1) Israeli Mossad; 2) Iranian Intelligence VEVAK; or 3) Iraqi agents of the Mukhabarat, under orders of the Iraqi president, Saddam Hussein, because Bull was no longer useful.