Directions to a treasure in New Mexico - $1 or best offer

[TaxLawyer]

My father in law worked at White Sands Missile Range and one of his coworkers gave him a copied set of written directions to a cache of gold bars and coins that are hidden there. Anyway, he was going to throw it away, but it occurred to me that someone in the world might actually be interested in buying it. As you may have guessed, I'm not a treasure hunter. If you want it, post your phone number in a reply and my father in law will call you with details.

 

Amazon Forum Fav 👍

A Handbook of Civil War Bullets and Cartridges - Grab it through Amazon!

[jeff of pa]

Let me say, I doubt anyone will Post their Phone Number
Here.

Also Isn't White sands Off limits & patrolled By armed guards,
being a Missile Base ?

also Why wasn't it Already Recovered ?

Sorry, for research purposes someone may be intrested.
But , Just asking what I think is Obvious.

Anyway Welcome to Tnet.

 

[TaxLawyer]

Thanks for the welcome Jeff.

WSMR is indeed a closed base. I was stationed there as a JAG officer from '97 to '99, so I was able to get a lot of inside scoop on the base and activities there. Obviously I cannot divulge anything that is privileged or classified, but I can certainly say that the general public has no idea what takes place there 99.9% of the time.

One of the biggest cases we had while I was stationed there was a lawsuit by the Ova Noss Foundation, which was suing the federal government for access to a cache of treasure that was hidden there. The treasure they were suing over could very well be the same one mentioned in the document I have, which mentions "20 mule loads of money (probably silver)". Although I never had access to the case files, I suspect strongly that the claim was valid. I know that we would simply have demanded and gotten a dismissal if there was nothing there, but this case occupied the better part of one lawyer's time for over two years. I don't know the amount we paid them, but the fact that we settled with them at all suggests strongly to me that the treasure was genuine.

My father in law is getting up in years and no longer works at the base, so his access to the treasure is limited. Before he retired, he suffered a fall from a roof, and broke his leg badly. After the doctors put a metal rod in his leg, he was out of commission as far as treasure hunting. The guy who gave him the map (Gallegos, son of the author of the document) was terminally ill and died not long after turning it over. The key to finding this treasure is to partner with one of the WSMR range riders. These guys ride around the base all day in their quads and keep an eye on everything. They have unfettered access to the base and the means to get to the accessible portions of the base. Most of the WSMR employees are bored and more than willing to engage in a little side work to supplement their government incomes. (Note: I am not commenting on the legality of such a plan, and I have no idea whether you would be able to make a claim, even if your partner finds the treasure. Responsibility for determining and obeying the relevant laws is on you).

I have no interest in going out and looking for this treasure. The fees I am able to earn as a tax attorney are enough treasure for me, especially considering that I don't have to battle the hot sun, snakes, cacti, etc, etc. I would have already thrown this thing away except that my father in law is 100% convinced that this treasure map is real and he would rather give it to another treasure hunter than let the feds stumble on the treasure and squander the money on melted ice for Katrina victims. There are a lot of other details about the directions, but I don't have time to list all of them, and anyone interested can just call and he will tell you all about it. If nobody here is interested, I am going to throw it away.

Anyone who is shy about putting their phone number on the board is welcome to list an e-mail address or just e-mail me at the address listed to the left.

 

[MiddenMonster]

The key to finding this treasure is to partner with one of the WSMR range riders. These guys ride around the base all day in their quads and keep an eye on everything. They have unfettered access to the base and the means to get to the accessible portions of the base. Most of the WSMR employees are bored and more than willing to engage in a little side work to supplement their government incomes. (Note: I am not commenting on the legality of such a plan, and I have no idea whether you would be able to make a claim, even if your partner finds the treasure. Responsibility for determining and obeying the relevant laws is on you).

As an attorney I would think that you would be in the forefront on commenting about the legality of such a plan. It is clearly illegal to trespass on government property and remove anything, even a cactus. I don't doubt that the range riders would like to supplement their income. But I seriously doubt that they would be willing to become accessories to facilitating a breach of base security for little more than a chance at recovering a treasure that they know they wouldn't be allowed to keep in the event that they did recover it. I'm not sure how anyone could smuggle 20 mule loads of silver off a military base, with or without the help of two security guards.

I would have already thrown this thing away except that my father in law is 100% convinced that this treasure map is real and he would rather give it to another treasure hunter than let the feds stumble on the treasure and squander the money on melted ice for Katrina victims. There are a lot of other details about the directions, but I don't have time to list all of them, and anyone interested can just call and he will tell you all about it. If nobody here is interested, I am going to throw it away.

Since your asking price is only $1 and you sound like you are willing to give it away for free, why not post it in this thread and let the silver chips fall where they may. Throwing it away guarantees you don't even make your dollar. But posting the directions here at least raises the possibility that if someone finds it they will slide a 5%-10% gratuity fee your way. You have nothing to lose, and as an attorney you know that there is no legal difference between posting it here and offering to sell/give it to someone via solicitation. At the very least, we can use the directions to determine and pull up the site on Terraserver or Google Earth in order to determine how tough it would be.

 

[Real de Tayopa Tropical Tramp]

Tally ho midden, If nothing else they can be added to History, enough has been lost already.

As the Indians in the jungles of Quntna Roo once told me "no-one has seen tomorows sun". so please do not destroy it, post it in here for posterity..



Tropical Tramp.

 

[TaxLawyer]

Ay yi yi! MiddenMonster - please don't get me wrong. I am most definitely NOT suggesting any illegal activity at all! What I am suggesting is that the treasure belongs to the person who found it, which I think was before the US government even made a claim to the land. The general rule with treasure trove is that "finders keepers" applies. The reason that the Ova Noss Foundation was able to get money out of the Feds (in my personal opinion) is because we were blocking them from coming to get what was rightfully theirs. At least that was their theory based on published reports and my discussions outside of work.

Like I said, there is a lot that I know and cannot comment on because it is classified or is a fact covered by the attorney client privilege. I just want to make that very clear because my professional license would be jeopardized if I were to engage in illegal or unethical behavior. Thanks for your response. Also thanks to all the people who responded via e-mail, especially DT who I talked to on the phone. Thanks for the good advice about the danger involved - I know all too well that you are correct.

RealdeTayopa and MiddenMonster - I like your thought about preserving it for history if nothing else. Based on the e-mails and phone calls we got today, there is obviously some serious interest in it. My father in law, showed me his file and it actually is pretty extensive. He has one or two maps that go along with the written description. The original of the description is in spanish, but the copy given to us has an english translation alongside. He also has some field notes from an FBI agent who went looking around on the base. He found a number of the important clues, but gave up before finding the endpoint. Apparently it is pretty desolate and spooky back in those canyons. Anyway, if anyone else is interested, e-mail me and I will have him get in touch.

Perhaps I will scan some of the documents and post redacted copies online for those who are interested.

Honestly I almost threw this thing away yesterday but he is so convinced it is real and so persistent that he hounded me into posting this message. I am going to help him create a user account so that I can get back to watching the Cowboys game.

 

[Zobex]

Thanks for the welcome Jeff.

WSMR is indeed a closed base. I was stationed there as a JAG officer from '97 to '99, so I was able to get a lot of inside scoop on the base and activities there. Obviously I cannot divulge anything that is privileged or classified, but I can certainly say that the general public has no idea what takes place there 99.9% of the time.

One of the biggest cases we had while I was stationed there was a lawsuit by the Ova Noss Foundation,

***************************************************

Anyone who is shy about putting their phone number on the board is welcome to list an e-mail address or just e-mail me at the address listed to the left.

Without going into any detail that would get me into even more trouble than I am with this current administration, I will say this.

Everything on the White Sands range is now cataloged and or by 2002 removed. I do know that in the summer of 2002 the National Reconnaissance Office http://www.nro.gov/index.html was directed via the DIA to catalog all Japanese War Treasure on the island of Mindanao in the summer of 2002. There was a global program for data basing anything of value and Mindanao was targeted for that period of time, April 2002. At that time I was advised that should we have anything we wish to NOT get cataloged we should take precautions to take actions to hide it from being seen. Since the WS range is totally 3-dimensioned modeled, anything of any density resembling gold or silver is now cataloged. This is one of the sites the USG uses to test deep penetration satellite imaging so naturally the entire site is Zero Referenced prior to the deployment of dummy targets to test detection on.

It is the detection equipment and techniques that the, I will call criminal elements of, the DOD that is used to locate buried objects of value, specifically gold, silver and platinum.

The equipment is originally designed to send high speed particles into an area, sweep it, to find a "ping" back off. EG neutrons are sent out and any back bounce is watched for. Overtly it is designed to look for the bounce back from high density material, Uranium, Plutonium etc.. BUT the program was also written so that the USG could catalog any stock piled material in any foreign government so that the assets could be evaluated. High density materials such as war materials could be estimated to determine the extent of that nations ability to conduct warfare. BUT ALSO to evaluate the monetary stock piles of that foreign government to determine it's wealth. Wealth is also a part of warfare. The extent of it's precious metals directly affects it's ability to conduct warfare.

Now the hook to all of this is that it places into the hands of a very secret organization the ability the locate hidden gold silver and platinum deposits. War Treasure. Soooo that gives them the ability to generate a whole lot of Black Money that they are not accountable for. Gangster style. And so that is why the USG is now inserting itself into the Philippines.

Sooo, is there anything at WS that is now not fully discovered, a Snow Ball's chance.

In April 2002 I was advised to hide anything we could and was given these numbers. The penetration depth was 175 feet in hard rock and 250 feet in soft rock soil profile. I was further advised that should this not be practical then to build a shield over the target using interleaved layers of lead bars and soil so as to build a soft target both on the way in and on the bounce back for the high speed particles. The particles would be slowed down enough both ways so as not be able to return back to the satellite. Open air tunnels have no resistance so they do not add count to the shield. You will find that is why in Iraq and Iran the research and refinery facility's are now being built nearly 400 to 500 feet under ground. So, Bush has authorized 'nuclear drilling' weapons.

That is all a long way around to explain that, if this treasure is not greater than 250-300 feet under ground it may have been found. If it is in a tunnel, that tunnel no doubt by now is mapped.

Any attempt to even speak about or paper work plan any entrance onto or even speaking about WS now puts someone in peril to be cataloged as a National Security risk to the USG. Welcome to the Patriot Act.


Zobex

 

[cedarratt]

I'll offer up one wheat penny date and condition of my chooseing for it. PM me if your interested

 

[MiddenMonster]

Ay yi yi! MiddenMonster - please don't get me wrong. I am most definitely NOT suggesting any illegal activity at all! What I am suggesting is that the treasure belongs to the person who found it, which I think was before the US government even made a claim to the land.

I would think that there is a difference between the Ova Noss Foundation making a claim that can be adjudicated in a court, and someone using a treasure map to recover buried treasure on government property and claiming it is theirs because they found it. ONF may have had a valid claim, and the government paid them off to make it go away whether there was really treasure to be found or not. That doesn't mean that the government will permit someone whose only connection to the treasure is a map they bought prior to illegally trespassing. In fact, I would go so far as to say that the fed boys wouldn't even thank that person for making the government richer as they tossed that person in prison and confiscated the treasure.

The general rule with treasure trove is that "finders keepers" applies.

Are you saying that applies to treasure found on government land? That would be news to me.

The reason that the Ova Noss Foundation was able to get money out of the Feds (in my personal opinion) is because we were blocking them from coming to get what was rightfully theirs.

"[W]hat was rightfully theirs" being the operative words here. I'd be interested in hearing the legal argument one would use in court to seek ownership of this treasure. For someone like me who has absolutely no prior connection to the treasure or those who were transporting it I can't think of any argument a court would accept that involved me teaming up with a couple of range riders to infiltrate government property to remove gold and/or silver. And I can't think of any government agency that would grant me permission to remove treasure from government property, even if the map and everything else was rock solid evidence of the treasure existing and in the location the map indicates. They would just deny me the permission and send some people to get it, leaving me out of the equation entirely. I'm all for finding the treasure. I just don't see how it can be done legally under any circumstances.

 

[TaxLawyer]

I think it could be done legally, but I'm not going to go into my theory of how that would be possible because of the reasons stated above. Suffice it to say that as a lawyer for the Army, I learned that there is more than one way to skin a cat, especially if politically connected people are involved. And we all know that the only thing separating the politically connected from the unconnected is ca$h donation$.

 

[Zobex]

The ONF positioned that they had a property (treasure) and it's lawful possession predated the WSMR. So, when the USG declared the area off limits to their access, the USG conducted an act of taking of property. That would make the USG liable to make compensation. The negotiation was, what is the value of the property. One way was to go dig it up. BUT, it had already been dug up and to allow the ONF to enter and fully investigate would permit them to determine the property had been stolen by other parties. Since the area was secured by the USG that would show the USG had in fact taken property and not disclosed it. Not to mention it had not been properly recorded what had been taken. Hot property. The final was there was a negotiation and both sides went away with non disclosures.

The map in question does not appear to create a possessed property but a speculation that may or maynot predate the USG creation of the WSMR and it has no legal or recored in public record or public domain, existence.

With such a thin claim of property, the USG would respond "National Security" and there exists limited rights in times of the war on terrorism (puke cough)


Zobex

 

[MiddenMonster]

The map in question does not appear to create a possessed property but a speculation that may or maynot predate the USG creation of the WSMR and it has no legal or recored in public record or public domain, existence.

That would be my concern, as well. Someone is taking on great risk in terms of legal liability and personal safety with no guarantee of a treasure actually being there or the prospect of keeping it should it be found. And as you said, the government may well have found this treasure using the high tech methods you described. On the other hand, if I were 100% certain treasure existed and knew where it was, the thought of sneaking in and getting it would definitely bounce around in my head for a long, long time. It would be unlikely that I would enter a military complex to snag it, but if this same treasure were on federal grazing land, or even in a national forest who knows what I would do. Private property and military property are pretty much the taboos for me, but other than that...

Your comments regarding the using of neutron scanning equipment also raises another question in my mind. If the government can actually do this without direct access to property it would be reasonable to conclude they could/would use it to scan property where there were rumors of buried treasure. If they detected it, they could invoke eminent domain, pay the land owner "fair market value" without disclosing the treasure info and snag it when they have ownership.

 

[MiddenMonster]

I think it could be done legally, but I'm not going to go into my theory of how that would be possible because of the reasons stated above. Suffice it to say that as a lawyer for the Army, I learned that there is more than one way to skin a cat, especially if politically connected people are involved. And we all know that the only thing separating the politically connected from the unconnected is ca$h donation$.

If your point is that it is possible to beat the government at their own game, I agree. But there is an old saying about never getting into a war of words with someone who buys ink by the barrel. In that same spirit I would say that it is just as unwise to get into a war over money with someone who prints the money in the first place. It would cost a fortune to do battle with the government over this treasure. And probably two fortunes if the attorney doing battle with the government didn't have the inside information you have.

 

[Zobex]

The map in question does not appear to create a possessed property but a speculation that may or maynot predate the USG creation of the WSMR and it has no legal or recored in public record or public domain, existence.

That would be my concern, as well. Someone is taking on great risk in terms of legal liability and personal safety with no guarantee of a treasure actually being there or the prospect of keeping it should it be found. And as you said, the government may well have found this treasure using the high tech methods you described. On the other hand, if I were 100% certain treasure existed and knew where it was, the thought of sneaking in and getting it would definitely bounce around in my head for a long, long time. It would be unlikely that I would enter a military complex to snag it, but if this same treasure were on federal grazing land, or even in a national forest who knows what I would do. Private property and military property are pretty much the taboos for me, but other than that...

Your comments regarding the using of neutron scanning equipment also raises another question in my mind. If the government can actually do this without direct access to property it would be reasonable to conclude they could/would use it to scan property where there were rumors of buried treasure. If they detected it, they could invoke eminent domain, pay the land owner "fair market value" without disclosing the treasure info and snag it when they have ownership.

Invoking eminent domain, isn't that what the Gov. did when the nationalized gold in the USA in the 1930's.

Since it is already USG land, they are the owners if it is found after they took over the site. If found before the site and not extracted, then there can be a claim of private ownership.

Yes, they are searching globally the worlds stock piles of metal that is of interest. As I said, the Philippines has been cataloged, so I am told by the Boys out San Diego in charge of Asia.

There is a MAJOR tunnel complex that runs the width of Manila, over 150 down in bed rock and it is dry. There is a massive railroad system inside it but the Japs ran a "rip-cord" explosive system in it in 1945 and it is near totally collapses. The tracks and Chambers are all there and dry but the excavation would require several years and a governments involvement. A lot of cool hardware there but the chambers are at the end.

Zobex

 

[TaxLawyer]

Normally, I would agree with that sentiment. Why anyone would risk their life trying to find anything out in the desert is beyond me. However, I have examined enough of the original documents to know that the treasure does indeed exist. Current estimates of the value exceed $70,000,000,000 because of the recent spike in gold. Numerous people (at least half a dozen, possibly as many as thirty have emerged from the caves with samples of the cache over the last 400 years, so it is almost certainly not a fake. However, none have ever emerged with the treasure because either a) they didn’t get out alive, b) couldn’t get back alive, c) fell victim to the greed of various friends or family (most common), or d) failed to get adequate political support for the expedition.

Even the redacted versions of FOIA documents that we were providing to the plaintiffs back in the late 90’s were replete with detail and affidavits from the soldiers involved. I’m sure you can imagine the content of the unredacted copies.

At any rate, your advice regarding the value of the map is probably valid for your average Joe. Certainly it would be extremely foolhardy for anyone to try and enter the base without permission, and even then you would be very ill-advised to prospect the site without being well informed, supplied, and guided. My father in law has composed quite a research file on the treasure dating back to when he was a security guard at the base.

Again, thanks to the many folks that have contacted me by PM with queries. If I haven’t responded yet, I will soon. Thanks especially to our friend who provided the summary of his own research. To the guy who asked about partnering on a book, please call back, My mother in law accidentally discarded your number.

 

[MiddenMonster]

Normally, I would agree with that sentiment. Why anyone would risk their life trying to find anything out in the desert is beyond me. However, I have examined enough of the original documents to know that the treasure does indeed exist. Current estimates of the value exceed $70,000,000,000 because of the recent spike in gold.

Then this really puzzles me, and raises one giant question in my mind. If it's not a typo, you're saying this treasure is in excess of $70 billion. If that's true, I can't imagine the government letting it go unrecovered for more than 1 day. We're talking about a fortune that exceeds the wealth of Bill Gates. Something that is a sizable percent of the budget deficit. The yearly interest alone is enough to make the government drool. And if the government has already paid off the ONF, what would stop them from using the same documents to which you have access and recovering it?

 

[cedarratt]

This isn't the Victorio Peak feasco is it?

 

[canmandan]

This comes from the White Sands Missle Range website The story was also told on an old Unsolved Mysteries epsiode

heres the link

http://www.wsmr.army.mil/pao/VictorioPeak/vipt6.htm

"According to the Ova Noss Family Partnership, getting into the Victorio Peak cavern where Doc Noss supposedly found a king's ransom in gold and treasure may not be as difficult as originally thought.
On a videotape produced by the partnership, Lambert Dolphin, the group's geophysicist, says he has identified a large cavern under the northwest side of the peak and it may be accessible by digging a modest tunnel into the peak. He theorizes there may have been an opening down on the side of the peak long ago which allowed people hiding the treasure to simply walk into the room.

In May Dolphin used a new ground penetrating radar to make images of the peak's interior. He says the radar is 20 times more powerful than the one used in 1977 when he tested the mountain during Operation Goldfinder. After hundreds of readings from different angles, he says he has a definite picture of the room and it turns out to be 200 feet below the old Gaddis tunnel which was completed in 1963.

He says this makes sense because the family has always claimed Doc went down, by his own estimate, 300 to 400 feet into the peak. The Gaddis tunnel is 200 feet below the chimney opening on top of the peak.

Dolphin says this puts the room under the bioherm limestone reef material in the peak. A bioherm is a mass of limestone formed by organisms. He says the layer below the reef is soft shale which has probably eroded out leaving a room with crumbling walls and a very hard ceiling. He feels Noss could have entered the peak on top, worked his way to the diorite dike and its fissure and followed it down to the room.

On the tape Dolphin concludes all this is good news for the partnership and its backers. First of all, he has proof there is a cavern of some sort. Second, its location should eliminate the need for long and costly tunnels. Third, he says, "I doubt that anybody has been in that cavern since Doc Noss was there."

He goes on to assure backers that most of the gold is still there by saying, "If any artifacts or gold have been removed in recent years, these are probably secondary deposits and I would suspect not the main deposit."

Not only is this good news for hopeful backers it seems to say the Army really didn't steal the gold as "Unsolved Mysteries" and others have accused.

The tape's narrator then asks if all this work is worth it. He goes on to say that Doc Noss reported seeing more than 16,000 bars of gold in the cavern. This is total gross weight of 640,000 pounds (works out to be 40 lbs. per bar) which turns out to be 384,000 pounds of gold if each bar is only 60 percent gold. He then multiples that out at $350 per ounce and gets a value of $2,150,000,000. That's right, more than two billion dollars. Enough said.

In addition to letting the Army off the hook for stealing the gold, the tape admits the Gaddis Mining Company work at Victorio Peak in 1963 was done under contract to Ova Noss as well as the state of New Mexico. In the past many Noss supporters have said Ova was never allowed into the missile range to search for her "personal property." Now the partnership admits she was allowed in and says she was not allowed "adequate time" to recover her property---Gaddis Mining was on site 60 days in the 1963 search.

Another interesting aspect of the tape is its tone. Most of the time it is fairly straight forward. But when discussing the history of their project, the narrator makes it sound as if the Army demanded the partnership get Congress to approve the venture. The narrator states they got the Congressional support and it is now law that the partnership is authorized to dig at Victorio Peak.

In reality, the partnership was told by the Army it could not dig unless it could directly reimburse the Army for required support. It turns out this requires Congressional intervention and they were directed to seek the necessary action on the Hill. If the Army was not concerned about reimbursement, it would not require an act of Congress to approve the permit.

The rider on the 1990 Appropriations Bill says, "The Secretary of the Army may, subject to such terms and conditions as the Secretary considers appropriate to protect the interests of the United States, issue a revocable license to the Ova Noss Family Partnership...." The operative words in that sentence are "may" and "revocable." The secretary is certainly not directed to allow the search.

The key to the section follows and states that, "The Secretary of the Army shall require the Ova Noss Family Partnership to reimburse the Department of Army...." and that "Reimbursements for such costs shall be credited to the Department of the Army appropriation from which the costs were paid." This allows the partnership to reimburse WSMR directly for support costs.

This may sound like a fine distinction but it is important because contrary to what the partnership implies, there was no law passed which directs the Army to allow them onto WSMR. I can see that this would be an important point to the partnership and its various supporters and financial backers. If there was such a law, their position and efforts would be more secure, especially in dealing with the missile range.

As of the end of Fiscal Year 1990, White Sands has collected just over $122,000 for range support from the partnership. This includes such things as security, scheduling, helicopter support, archaeological work and photography.

As far as the actual search is concerned, it could begin soon. The range has received comments from the various state and federal agencies which are required to review the environmental assessment. The comments are being addressed by the author of the document and should be ready for final review and public comment soon.

Once the license is signed logistical work will begin in the Hembrillo Basin. For instance, the road must be improved, telephone lines laid to the peak and trailers placed for support personnel.

Whether the press will be allowed in to observe remains to be seen.

---Interlaced with the historical information in these articles are statements of personal opinion by the author, Jim Eckles, which are not necessarily the official position of White Sands Missile Range or the U.S. Army---

Next Part 7; Previous Part 5"

out

dan

 

[TaxLawyer]

This is the Victorio Peak fiasco. We used to laugh about that on the base because the reported sites weren't even part of Victorio Peak, but were located in caverns some distance from he peak. Trespassers would regularly sneak on to the base and start digging into the side of the peak with little or no direction. Frequently they would get arrested, but some died in the desert.

Midden, the estimate of $70 Billion is relatively conservative. An article in Freedom Magazine in 1986 estimated the treasure at $30 Billion, and that was when gold was only $350 per ounce. Now it's over $600. Not to mention the historical significance of the jewels and royal vestments located in the caverns. When we got sued by F. Lee Bailey in the mid seventies, they estimated the value at $225 Billion, which I think is clearly preposterous. Nothing over $150 Billion in 1975 dollars is reasonable given the labor needed to cache that much gold in the hillside. But 225 billion 1975 Dollars are worth $1,245,201,426,798 in 2005 dollars using the nominal GDP per capita as a standard. That's 1 trillion 245 bill 201 mill etc, etc.

As to why the government hasn't gone after it, that is a very important piece of the puzzle and there are a lot of reasons. First, it is simply very physically difficult to get to the lowest caverns without removing tons and tons of rock that collapsed into the caverns after being blasted. Second, the area is so incredibly desolate that little survives. Third, the greed that strikes men when they view stacks of gold lined up like logs results in betrayal and self interested behavior. Why doesn't the government legalize drugs? The tax income from that move could erase the national debt. I have my own theories, but so does everybody.

 

[MiddenMonster]

Nothing over $150 Billion in 1975 dollars is reasonable given the labor needed to cache that much gold in the hillside.

The higher the value the more likely it is that the government would invest the resources to retrieve it.

As to why the government hasn't gone after it, that is a very important piece of the puzzle and there are a lot of reasons. First, it is simply very physically difficult to get to the lowest caverns without removing tons and tons of rock that collapsed into the caverns after being blasted. Second, the area is so incredibly desolate that little survives.

I can't buy that. The same government that built the Panama Canal and chiseled out Cheyenne Mountain and put men on the moon can't get gold out of a mountain?

Third, the greed that strikes men when they view stacks of gold lined up like logs results in betrayal and self interested behavior. Why doesn't the government legalize drugs? The tax income from that move could erase the national debt. I have my own theories, but so does everybody.

Those are two seperate issues. The government and military have recovered lost treasure before. They've also caught and dealt with military personnel who had sticky fingers. It's on a military base, under military guard. Security shouldn't be a problem everything is tallied at first contact and at every transitional point down the line until it is safely secured in whatever vault it ends up. As for the drugs, there are all kinds of competing political pressures that keep them illegal. I'm a states rights guy, so I don't believe the federal government has the right to legalize or prohibit the non-interstate aspect of drug policy. But you are correct in that drugs are a cache that would have immense economic impact on the deficit and debt.