Scientology's Fanatical Military

I spent many hours with Steve, describing my 20-year experiences within the cult’s fanatical, militant and secretive inner circle, an organization run on paramilitary lines that uses both physical and tortuous mental restraint to control its people.

We were discussing the University of Warwick, England lecturer Gordon Melton’s ‘expertise’ - read whitewash, published circa 2001/2002 - on an aspect of the Sea Organization. They run their own prison, or "re-education" camps, which are, in theory, not that different from the Cambodian Khmer Rouge system described graphically in David Putnam’s 1982 film The Killing Fields.

The Scientology version is described as the RPF - Rehabilitation Project Force - and one can be assigned to this at the whim of a certain cadre, Hubbard’s personal staff, or by an internal kangaroo court called a Committee of Evidence.

I don’t know if you ever read Melton’s piece, but if you did, you will see that it reads like the RPF is a happy 'boy-scouts camping' adventure with a dose of Trappist meditative theory thrown in for good measure. I happened to be around when this whole Melton scam was being put together; I know all the prisoners he interviewed; I know them very well and I know the real conditions they lived under.

The two weeks or so running up to Melton's '"free access" interview with the RPF, a select number were moved to another location, while the most "upstat" were all treated like kings, fed, briefed, drilled, given little or no work details and loads of sleep (sleep is normally rationed in this operation, deprivation thereof is part of the program to break the spirit of the prisoner).