---
aliases:
  - Richard S. Cesaro
  - R. S. Cesaro
category: "Scientists & Researchers"
tags:
  - Person
  - Researcher
summary: "Under Cesaro's direction, scientists with Johns Hopkins University's Applied Physics Laboratory constructed an elaborate facility inside the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research."
relations:
  - type: employed_by
    with: "[[DARPA|Advanced Research Projects Agency]]"
    start: 1967
    role: "Advanced Sensors office (acting director in September 1967)"
    fn: 2
updated: 2026-10-08
---

Richard S. Cesaro was a scientist at the [[DARPA|Advanced Research Projects Agency]] (ARPA) and was in charge of [[Project Pandora]], a classified program initiated by the [[Pentagon]] to duplicate the effects of the [[Moscow Signal]]. The Moscow Signal was a series of microwave beams aimed at the [[U.S. Embassy in Moscow]] by the [[Soviet Union]], believed to be an [[Electromagnetic Weapons|electromagnetic weapon]] designed to adversely affect the behavior of embassy personnel[^1].

A declassified ARPA memorandum of September 27, 1967, ARPA-AS-TS-67-20, on Project BIZARRE, addressed to the Director of Defense Research and Engineering, is signed by Cesaro as acting director of Advanced Sensors. It refers to Top Secret memoranda of the Deputy Director, Advanced Sensors, of December 15, 1966 and June 28, 1967 on Projects PANDORA and BIZARRE, and to an Air Force Avionics Laboratory memorandum of August 15, 1967 addressed to "Mr. Cesaro." It reports that the latest embassy power levels "were always below 50 microwatts/cm2 (. 05 mw/cm2)," and states that "The ARPA test results have demonstrated the feasibility of causing adverse biological effects on the central nervous system of primates."[^2]

Under Cesaro's direction, scientists with [[Johns Hopkins University]]'s Applied Physics Laboratory constructed an elaborate facility inside the [[Walter Reed Army Institute of Research]]. There, in an anechoic chamber, primates were irradiated with microwave beams with a power density similar to that of the Moscow Signal[^1].

Within a few months of beaming the signal at the monkeys, Cesaro became convinced of its harmful nature, concluding that it adversely affected the internal organs of primates, including the brain. He later stated, "In our experiments we did some remarkable things. And there was no question in my mind that you can get into the brain with microwaves." It was later determined that the microwave beam produced [[Alzheimer's Disease]][^1].

Cesaro vehemently disagreed with those who insisted the Moscow Signal was harmless, such as [[Samuel Koslov]]. Based on the evidence that the electromagnetic beam could penetrate the human nervous system, Cesaro argued that it was necessary to determine exactly what kind of weapon this was and "whether the Soviets have special insight into the effects and use of athermal radiation on man"[^1].

In 1969, the [[Department of Defense]] quietly expanded ARPA's Project Pandora to include "the human," with highly classified studies code-named Big Boy and Project Bizarre projecting microwave beams at unwitting sailors stationed in the Philadelphia Naval Yard[^1].

### Footnotes

[^1]: Jacobsen, Annie. *Phenomena: The Secret History of the U.S. Government's Investigations into Extrasensory Perception and Psychokinesis*. Little, Brown and Company, 2017.
[^2]: ARPA memorandum ARPA-AS-TS-67-20, "Project BIZARRE," September 27, 1967, signed Richard S. Cesaro, Acting Director, Advanced Sensors, declassified copy, National Security Archive. https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/sites/default/files/documents/rhwvuj-tzy4b/08.pdf