Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Emblems from the Pentagon's Black World


If you're part of a super-secret, clandestine, covert military unit, it seems like you wouldn't want to advertise it.

Turns out, some "black ops" personnel do. They come up with cryptic designs — images like dragons wrapped around the earth or naked women riding killer whales — to put on patches that commemorate their missions. What they mean and the details of the missions are almost impossible to figure out.

Trevor Paglen collects these military black ops patches in a new art and history book, I Could Tell You But Then You Would Have to Be Destroyed by Me.

For more information visit http://www.paglen.com/tellyou/index.htm

The Bryant Park Project, NPR, January 14, 2008