TOP SECRET

Top Secret

Top Secret, For Your Eyes Only, Classified, “I can tell you, but then I’d have to kill you.”, “This message will self destruct in 5 seconds.”

If you want to tell a good spy story you have to use those phrases in some way shape or form. A lot of people think Classified or Top Secret is just a way for the government to hide all of the crazy evil stuff that they do. Some believe everything that the government tells them and that things are Top Secret for our own good. Honestly the truth nine times out of ten, it’s in between. The beauty of Classified things is sometimes, they become De-Classfied, and that is where things start to get interesting. 

I can tell you, but then I’d have to kill you

I love the origins of phrases and words. So I of course asked myself, “Where did the phrase I can tell you, but then I’d have to kill you” come from? It seems that you can add this phrase to the Mandela Effect list as well because everyone thinks it came from one place but the truth is slightly complicated. 

Just a brief definition of the Mandela Effect. “It is a collective misremembering of a fact or event. Various theories have been proposed to explain what causes it, some more sensible than others.” It’s named after Nelson Mandela because there is apparently a “collective misremembering” that he died in a South African prison in the 1980’s. If you’re being smug right now thinking “how could anyone think Nelson Mandela died in prison?” There is a humbling list of Mandela Effect things that I promise will make you feel dumb. For example a lot of people remember being taught that Eli Whitney, the inventor of the cotton gin was African American. This however is not true at all, Eli Whitney was white. How about Shaquille O’Neil starred in a movie called “Shazaam”, where he played an incompetent genie? Nope Sinbad played the title role in that movie. Is it spelt “Fruit Loops” or “Froot Loops”? The internet cant seem to decide on that one. How many people grew up reading “The Bernstein Bears”? Well if you did you were in fact reading “The Bernstain Bears”. There are dozens of examples of the Mandela Effect, maybe its ALL a government conspiracy?!?

Anyway, back the the origin of “I can tell you, but then I’d have to kill you”. Everyone believes that phrase comes from the novel “The Hounds of Baskervilles” by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The problem is that it’s not in the book, at all. It was said in an old Sherlock Holmes TV series. 

1950’s TV Series

Sherlock: I never did ask, Dr. Franklyn. What is it exactly that you do here?

Doctor: Oh, Mr. Holmes, I would love to tell you, but then, of course, I'd have to kill you. 

Sherlock: That would be tremendously ambitious of you.

Its Classified

This week I will be talking about classified government operations and programs that have been recently declassified or exposed by other means. Im gonna take a deep dive into the history of the Manhattan Project. Learn about Alan Turing and the Enigma machine. How a Magician helped Europe take on the Third Reich. Finally some terrifying and actually amusing stories of the Cold War. The bottom line is that sometimes the truth much more interesting than the myth.