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Fascinating History of WantToknow.info and PEERS

"I dove into intensive research and was amazed to come up with an astounding amount of reliable, verifiable information on 9/11 and a number of other major cover-ups which I previously would have dismissed as completely crazy. Seeing the vital importance of this easily verifiable information, I began to compile my findings to share with any and all interested. I wanted to make a difference and motivate others to get the word out."
   --  WantToKnow.info founder and former White House interpreter Fred Burks

Dear friends,

History of WantToKnow.info and PEERS.

WantToKnow.info and PEERS came into existence as the result of many unexpected turns of events. Though I established and built this website in 2003, until 2001 I was a debunker of major conspiracy theories. One of my housemates was a conspiracy theorist, and I used to quietly laugh at his paranoid thinking.

As a language interpreter for presidents and other top government officials around the world, I had been present at numerous secret meetings where the only people allowed were the top officials and their interpreters. There was no way my housemate knew more than me what was really going on.

I began my interpreting work with the U.S. Department of State in 1986 at age 28. How I ended up first interpreting for Bill Clinton in the White House in 1995 and eventually becoming the State Department's top Indonesian language interpreter is another fascinating story filled with little miracles which you can read about at this link.

What matters here is that until 2001, I did not see or hear anything which I felt supported the beliefs of my housemate and other conspiracy theorists that global politics is largely controlled by a relatively small group of power-hungry men who work in secret groups behind the global stage pulling the strings for their own benefit.

That dramatically shifted in July 2001, when a great friend sent me a life-changing video presentation of 22 highly respected individuals testifying at the prestigious Nation Press Club in Washington, DC. The powerful, reliable information in this astonishing video shook me to the core, as it revealed a major cover-up of UFOs. These high-level military and government officials sharing their personal experiences of the UFO cover-up could not all be lying.

By the end of this riveting video, my jaw was on the ground. I found myself shaking my head in utter amazement as I realized that the world was not what I had thought it was just two hours before! My understanding of reality was deeply shaken. I determined then and there to open to spiritual guidance and find out what was really going on. I explored on the Internet and elsewhere and quickly confirmed that what these respected leaders and officials were claiming was valid.

An intriguing side note is that not long before this, I had for the first time sent out a prayer for help in better understanding anything that might be hidden from me in my journey towards personal growth. Ever since age 19, my deepest intention in life has been to live in service to all people and to help transform our lives and world through love and empowerment. This prayer was a request to remove any remaining veils within myself so that I might be more effective in living in service to all.

The UFO video and other information which soon began flowing in torrents to me was a very clear and powerful answer to this prayer. As a result, my life was set on an entirely new path, which has ultimately led to me sharing this message with you. I started on a rich quest to discover what was really going on behind the scenes.

This unbelievable information caused me to have to completely reformulate my beliefs about how the world works. If there was a huge cover-up around UFOs going on for over 50 years involving key people at top levels, what else might be happening that is well hidden from the public?

I soon found that I had been much too hasty in dismissing what I had thought were the crazy conspiracy theories of my housemate and a few conspiracy-minded friends. And then, only six weeks after watching that life-changing video...

I watched in disbelief the graphic images on the TV screen as smoke poured out of a circular hole in the side of the Pentagon on the morning of 9/11. Only 45 minutes earlier, two planes had punctured the 110-story symbols of world trade in New York. With my stomach turning, I turned to my girlfriend and said, "There's something seriously wrong here."

In my interpreting work with the State Department, I had flown in military helicopters with top U.S. generals who boasted about our incredibly sophisticated radar facilities which can simultaneously track everything of significance in the skies over the U.S. from their control center at Cheyenne Mountain. One general bragged that our military could spot any unusual object anywhere in the country and within 10 minutes have a fighter jet on it to take action. What's more, the Pentagon's Strategic Defense Initiative was designed to detect high-speed missiles and shoot them down within minutes of launch.

So it was virtually impossible that on 9/11 a relatively slow moving passenger jet could penetrate our radar and other layers of defense to hit the highly fortified center of U.S. military operations, especially given that all systems were on high alert after two planes had already hit the World Trade Center towers over 30 minutes earlier. The fact that the Pentagon later refused to release any clear images from the many dozens of video recordings of this collision only confirmed my suspicion that something was seriously wrong here.

Over the following year, I dove into intensive research and was amazed to come up with an astounding amount of reliable, verifiable information on 9/11, UFOs, and a number of other major cover-ups which I previously would have dismissed as completely crazy. Seeing the vital importance of this easily verifiable information, I began to compile my findings to share with any and all interested. I wanted to make a difference in our world and motivate others to get the word out.

I especially enjoyed summarizing some key, highly revealing books and essays by respected authors that were recommended to me by other researchers with whom I was now in collaboration. I knew these concise summaries would enable anyone interested to be able to digest the most powerful, relevant information without having to spend too much time. I made sure to include links to the original, reliable sources so that everyone could verify all of the information presented.

I did all of this while still working as the top Indonesian language interpreter of the U.S. Department of State. I even talked openly with my colleagues and boss about this work. I was well liked and trusted there, yet some told me to my face they didn't want to know any of this information, as it was too scary and upsetting. Yet a few were really interested, with some even secretly passing me privileged information to confirm my suspicions.

Fred Burks

Then in late 2002, I found myself involved in a top secret meeting in the home of Indonesian President Megawati Soekarnoputri, where I saw a small piece of the hidden manipulations unfold before my eyes. I kept quiet about what I witnessed until I finally resigned from my State Department work (as reported in the Washington Post) in late 2004 due to excessive secrecy demands.

Once I quit the State Department, I became a whistleblower on this incident and testified in an internationally watched terrorism trial on how government officials had repeatedly lied to the international press. My decisive testimony was covered by BBC and many other top media outlets, and even resulted in an article featuring me and my work on the front page of the Wall Street Journal in February 2005! I was thrilled that the article even mentioned WantToKnow.info and other websites I managed.

Not long after this testimony, I compiled a revealing webpage which gives brief descriptions of all the strange and revealing happenings I witnessed as a result of my work as a top interpreter, including the story of the above secret meeting.

One quite fascinating and somewhat unbelievable note is that even though I was interpreting for presidents, I was never required to sign a secrecy agreement with the U.S. government. Perhaps because of this and because I am very careful in my work to target negative behavior and not individuals, I have never been bothered or seriously threatened by anyone for my whistleblowing and for all that I've helped reveal over the Internet. In fact, I have quite a few supporters in government.

I first posted the best of all the information I had compiled on the website WantToKnow.info in February 2003. My web skills at the time were extremely limited. You can see a very early version of the website in all its simplicity at this link. Yet even though the web design was extremely crude and simple, readers found the information to be powerful and compiled in a way that made it easy to find what they were looking for. The website quickly became popular. By April of 2003, we were already getting an average of 400 visits a day.

The website soon put me in touch with a number of wonderful, brave researchers who shared reliable information they had gathered on various aspects of these cover-ups. As my international network of researchers and supporters grew and my web skills blossomed, I added lots more powerful information to the website. With the help of many volunteers and a few people I paid, I was able to eventually organize the information in a more effective way that was welcomed by readers worldwide.

Today WantToKnow.info averages over 1,000 visits a day and over the years has received more than 24 million visits from virtually every country on the planet, including even Antarctica and the Vatican! And the WantToKnow.info email list has about 15,000 subscribers.

At the same time I was developing WantToKnow.info, I felt it wouldn't be right to focus only on the dark, disturbing aspects of all that is going on in our world. So right along with WantToKnow.info, I developed several other websites focused on inspiring aspects of personal and global transformation. These websites, though not as popular as WantToKnow.info, also drew a lot of interest and support. I also added an inspiration section to WantToKnow.info and invited any who were feeling overwhelmed to spend time with the beautiful and motivational materials there.

As all of this information, both on major cover-ups and inspiration, was so important to building a better world for us all, I willingly used my own limited savings to finance all of the costs of starting and developing WantToKnow.info and the other websites. In 2005, I started getting the first donations for this work from people who felt compelled to provide support. One wealthy supporter said he would contribute more if we were able to obtain nonprofit status.

So I contacted several key supporters about this. In early 2006, we formed PEERS (Public Education and Empowerment Resource Service) as an umbrella nonprofit organization to manage WantToKnow.info and the other websites I had developed. We applied for and received official 501(c)(3) nonprofit status in just a few months and began drawing even more support. I was appointed by our new board of directors to be executive director of PEERS and manager of the PEERS websites, including WantToKnow.info.

In 2007, we began developing several heart and mind expanding online courses. Using enlightening written materials, awesome video documentaries, heart-opening exercises, powerful quotes, inspiring images and photos, and lots more compiled from the best of the Internet, these free courses weave both the cover-up and inspirational materials into a beautiful tapestry.

The engaging online lessons gradually lead participants down the rabbit hole of deception and open them to powerful material which inspires them to make a difference and play a key role in transforming our lives and world. The fascinating story of the development of these online courses and how they have helped to transform many people's lives is available here. For just a few of the many rich messages of appreciation we've received for these courses, click here. Three people have even emailed to say one of our courses helped to save their lives.

The development and management of both the websites and the online courses was often far beyond my own still developing Internet skills. We used all of our donations to pay a few key people with technical know how to do what needed to be done. As donations were not sufficient and I had some money, I even donated over $30,000 of my own savings to make all of this happen.

By the time I resigned from the State Department in 2004, I had put away nearly $200,000 towards my retirement. I had an additional $40,000 or so in savings. My interpreting work was part-time and on a contractual basis with no benefits, as was the part-time nursing work from which I resigned in 2003, so I had been putting away money every year in order to be able to retire some day.

Once I realized that this work was my life's mission, I decided this was far more important than my retirement. So I essentially gave myself a grant of my own retirement money to make all of this happen. I hoped that eventually we might make enough donations in order pay me for the 50 to 60 hours a week I was devoting to all of this work.

For the first years, all donations we received went to cover the various expenses involved, and to pay those helping me to develop the websites. Only in 2010, after seven years of volunteering full time for all of this did PEERS finally receive enough donations to compensate me at a modest rate of $1,000 a month for all my work. In the following years, thanks to the generous support of our many readers and subscribers, this amount was gradually increased so that I was eventually able to support myself and sustain this great work. Thanks to a large donation, in 2022 we were finally able to hire the wonderful and capable Amber Yang full time to gradually take over my work as I eventually stepped back into a more advisory role.

Once I resigned from both my work as a nurse and State Department interpreter in 2004, I chose to live very simply. I was renting a room in a house with five other housemates. I gave up my health insurance, and sold my old pickup truck (I got around on bike and motorcycle), so that I could live on less than $2,000 a month and make my remaining savings last longer. I feel very blessed that even with my very simple lifestyle, I still fully enjoyed life and loved this great work of helping people to awaken to the deeper realities of our world and to join in the exciting work of transformation.

To me, none of this has felt like a sacrifice. The PEERS websites I founded have been a work of great love and passion for me. I am thrilled with how many people's lives this work has touched and even transformed in many different ways. We receive wonderful emails of appreciation every week. I love living in service to all of us, so this has been a most rich and profound journey for me. It feels so good to be following my purpose and doing something meaningful with my life.

What a wild, strange and fascinating trip it has been! And it has been a great joy and pleasure to share all that I have learned with all of you, and to connect with so many people who are deeply dedicated to transforming our world. Knowing about all of the amazing, inspiring movements of transformation which are blossoming around the world, I have no doubt that we are making a big difference.

Even though we may be in for some rough times ahead, I am incredibly optimistic about our future. If you are interested in a concise, inspiring summary I've written discussing my views on the big picture of all that is going on in our world and beyond, and why I am so optimistic, click here. I have no doubt that together, we are transforming our world.

With deep gratitude and very best wishes,
Fred Burks for PEERS and WantToKnow.info

Note: For an inspiring essay I wrote titled "A White House Insider's Journey Down The Rabbit Hole and Back to Magnificence," click here. I also ask you to sincerely consider the value of this important work. We really need your support to continue to grow and expand. Every little bit helps. Please donate to help us make even more of a difference. And whether or not you donate, I'm grateful for your willingness to even explore this material.

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Explore the mind and heart expanding websites managed by the nonprofit PEERS network:
www.peerservice.org - PEERS websites: Spreading inspiration, education, & empowerment
www.momentoflove.org - Every person in the world has a heart
www.personalgrowthcourses.net - Dynamic online courses powerfully expand your horizons
www.WantToKnow.info - Reliable, verifiable information on major cover-ups
www.weboflove.org - Strengthening the Web of Love that interconnects us all

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