The Aug. 20 article, "Super winds once carried balloon bombs," gave me an eerie flashback.

In the early '60s, I took a course at The University of New Mexico from the noted astronomer, Lincoln La Paz. During a debate, La Paz contended that we should be far more concerned about germ warfare than nuclear war.

One evening we entered class to see four or five many-starred generals at the front of the classroom with a movie screen behind them. They showed us black-and-white films of "dud" balloon bombs, including one discovered by the Canadian Mounties with a serial number in the 40,000s.

They claimed there had been a spate of UFO sighting across the country — all described as fiery balls. Their contention: The Japanese were testing the scope of the balloons. The bomb at the bottom was to destroy evidence.

Why? Again they claimed that the potato farms in Hiroshima and Nagasaki were growing anthrax to eventually be sent in the balloons hitting all four U.S. boundaries. Were that to happen, the entire population would be dead within three months. We still don't have a antidote for anthrax.

President Harry S Truman was informed and this was supposedly the real reason he ordered the bombings.

I tried several times to verify this to no avail. Your article again provoked my curiosity. I wonder if there is anyone out there who took this class and witnessed the same presentation. If this is in fact true, it would be quite a radical re-write of history.

Santa Fe native Carole Darr spent a career in Chicago as an ad executive. She retired early and returned home in 1999 to care for and enjoy her elderly family.