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Best Evidence? (Read also Ancient Nuclear Reactor and Evidence of Ancient WMD's)
Are the Indian remains of Mohenjo
Daro and Harappa, their sudden abandonment and the apparent discovery of an
ancient site with a layer of radioactive ash the best available evidence
for the possibility that our ancient ancestors possessed a highly advanced
technology – which might have included atomic warfare?
Philip Coppens
Did an ancient advanced civilisation exist on Earth? The question is
very intriguing and the search for “evidence” to support a positive answer
has intrigued Mankind for many decades – if not centuries. Many
possibilities have been put forward, from outright statements that Atlantis
was a high tech civilisation, to the possibility that the Nazca lines might
be a prehistoric airport.
Rather than an accumulation of various items of evidence that is then
subjected to the possibility that it might be either alien or advanced, it
is more scientific – and perhaps better- to focus on the quest for the
“best evidence”: a single piece of evidence that in itself is the best
example to support a conclusion. In the search for an advanced ancient
civilisation, what would be this “best evidence”?
One possible item that
would classify as “best evidence” exists within the Indus River Valley, where towns such as Harappa and Mohenjo Daro flourished in
3000 BC. The question is why these cities were abandoned. And one answer
that has been put forward is that the ancient cities might have been
irradiated by an atomic blast. If true, it would be impossible to ignore
the conclusion that ancient civilisation possessed high technology.
The ruins of Harappa
The story begins when a
layer of radioactive ash was found in Rajasthan, India. It covered a three-square mile
area, ten miles west of Jodhpur. The research occurred after a
very high rate of birth defects and cancer was discovered in the area. The
levels of radiation registered so high on investigators’ gauges that the
Indian government cordoned off the region. Scientists then apparently
unearthed an ancient city where they found evidence of an atomic blast
dating back thousands of years: from 8,000 to 12,000 years. The blast was
said to have destroyed most of the buildings and probably a half-million
people.
Archeologist Francis Taylor stated that etchings in some nearby temples he
translated suggested that they prayed to be spared from the great light
that was coming to lay ruin to the city. “It’s so mind-boggling to imagine
that some civilization had nuclear technology before we did. The
radioactive ash adds credibility to the ancient Indian records that
describe atomic warfare.” When excavations of Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro reached the street level, they
discovered skeletons scattered about the cities, many holding hands and
sprawling in the streets as if some instant, horrible doom had taken place.
People were just lying, unburied, in the streets of the city. And these
skeletons are thousands of years old, even by traditional archaeological
standards. What could cause such a thing? Why did the bodies not decay or
get eaten by wild animals? Furthermore, there is no apparent cause of a
physically violent death. A. Gorbovsky, in Riddles of Ancient History, reported the discovery of
at least one human skeleton in this area with a level of radioactivity
approximately 50 times greater than it should have been due to natural
radiation. Furthermore, thousands of fused lumps, christened “black
stones”, have been found at Mohenjo-Daro. These appear to be fragments
of clay vessels that melted together in extreme heat.
Another curious sign of an ancient nuclear war in India is a giant crater near Bombay. The nearly circular
2,154-metre-diameter Lonar crater, located 400 kilometres northeast of Bombay and aged at less than 50,000
years old, could be related to nuclear warfare of antiquity. No trace of
any meteoric material, etc., has been found at the site or in the vicinity,
and this is the world’s only known “impact” crater in basalt. Indications
of great shock (from a pressure exceeding 600,000 atmospheres) and intense,
abrupt heat (indicated by basalt glass spherules) can be ascertained from
the site.
With the apparent
discovery of this radiated area, parallels were quick drawn to the
Mahabharata, the Indian epic. It reads:
... (it was) a single projectile
Charged with all the power of the Universe.
An incandescent column of smoke and flame
As bright as the thousand suns
Rose in all its splendour...
...it was an unknown
weapon,
An iron thunderbolt,
A gigantic messenger of death,
Which reduced to ashes
The entire race of the Vrishnis and the Andhakas.
...The corpses were so
burned
As to be unrecognisable.
The hair and nails fell out;
Pottery broke without apparent cause,
And the birds turned white.
After a few hours
All foodstuffs were infected...
....to escape from this fire
The soldiers threw themselves in streams
To wash themselves and their equipment.
Whereas the story of
the Mahabharata is indirect evidence, the other discoveries in India pose serious problems for those
trying to deny the possibility that this might indeed be evidence of
ancient atomic warfare. Whereas believing in the existence of Atlantis or a
highly advanced civilizations that might not have left any trace is one
thing, to suggest that our ancestors might have wiped themselves out along
the same lines we almost did, but only fifty years ago, is a major paradigm
shift. Some skeptics thus stated: “I am sick and tired of hearing this, and
I cannot find any debunks of this either. Anyone who can debunk this, or is
this really true?” That is indeed the question… and an important one. The
stakes are high, as one would expect when facing with the best evidence.
Lonar crater
So, let us discover
what might be the best evidence. The first question is whether a Francis
Taylor existed. There is a Francis Taylor, an American museum director, who
died in 1957. He was not an archaeologist. There is a “Franciscio Taylor”,
but he is not the above quoted Francis Taylor.
Not a good start. Sceptics have also wondered whether the ancient atomic
warfare is not a modern invention, to deflect attention from a serious –
modern – atomic contamination. In 1998, it was reported that an Indian
power stations had some major problems. One had an incident in which 2000
workers became exposed to excess radiation, 300 of which had to be
hospitalised.
Surendra Gadekar also investigated the conditions of villagers at
Rawatbhatta in Rajasthan and discovered gross radiation-related
deformities. We note that Rawatbhatta is in the same region as the
discovery of the “ancient warfare” site. But Gadekar did not find evidence
of ancient warfare, but evidence of modern negligence: wood that had been
used in the power plant, had then “somehow” made his way into society,
where it was subsequently used as wood for a fire. This in itself was a
minor incident, but could there have been more serious incidents, whereby
it was decided to deflect attention from the present to the ancient past?
We thus find that there no newspapers carried the story of the discovery.
The Indian archaeological authorities are not aware of the story. And there
is a government laboratory in Jodhpur, Rajasthan. Might something
have gone wrong in the latter?
The nuclear facility at
Rawatbhatta
With the above
objections, the case for the best evidence has become more controversial
than a clean-cut case. But in a case such as an ancient high tech
civilisation, this should not come as a surprise. Rome was not built in one
day, and arguing for or against the case of an ancient highly advanced
civilisation will not take any less time.
There should also not be a rush to judgment: the case for ancient warfare
in India is currently better than any
contradictory evidence. The bodies of Harappa and Mohenjo Daro remain a
mystery, whether or not the other radioactive site turns out to be modern
or ancient. The anomalous crater adds power to the possibility. Finally,
the fact that all these enigmas are within one general region (as opposed
to scattered across the world) adds further weight to the case… but then
this should be expected if we might consider this case to be the best
evidence.
The problem of the “best evidence” is often that it sounds too good to be
true. That is either because it is, or because it is indeed the “best
evidence”. And only careful analysis of the evidence will reveal what it
is…
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