The "King Alfred Plan" is a fictional

CIA The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian intelligence agency, foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gat ...

-led scheme supporting an international effort to eliminate

people of African descent The African diaspora is the worldwide collection of communities descended from native Africans or people from Africa, predominantly in the Americas. The term most commonly refers to the descendants of the West and Central Africans who were e ...

, invented by author John A. Williams in his novel ''The Man Who Cried I Am.'' Williams described it as a government plan to deal with the threat of a

black Black is a color which results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without hue, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness. Black and white have o ...

uprising in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

by cordoning off black people into concentration camps in the event of a major racial incident.

1967 novel

The King Alfred Plan first appeared in Williams' 1967 novel, ''The Man Who Cried I Am'', an account of the life and death of Richard Wright. In the afterword to later editions, Williams compares the King Alfred Plan to intelligence programs devised by

J. Edgar Hoover John Edgar Hoover (January 1, 1895 – May 2, 1972) was an American law enforcement administrator who served as the first Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). He was appointed director of the Bureau of Investigation ...

in the 1960s to monitor the movements of black

militant The English word ''militant'' is both an adjective and a noun, and it is generally used to mean vigorously active, combative and/or aggressive, especially in support of a cause, as in "militant reformers". It comes from the 15th century Latin " ...

s. It also bears similarities to rumors in the early 1950s surrounding the McCarran Act, an

anti-Communist Anti-communism is Political movement, political and Ideology, ideological opposition to communism. Organized anti-communism developed after the 1917 October Revolution in the Russian Empire, and it reached global dimensions during the Cold War, w ...

law, in which political subversives were to be rounded up and placed in concentrations camps during a

national emergency A state of emergency is a situation in which a government is empowered to be able to put through policies that it would normally not be permitted to do, for the safety and protection of its citizens. A government can declare such a state du ...

. When his novel was first published, Williams photocopied portions of the book detailing the King Alfred Plan and left copies in subway car seats around

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

.Boyd, Herbert. "The man and the plan: conspiracy theories and paranoia in our culture", ''Black Issues Book Review'', March-April 2002.
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Cultural dissemination

As a result, word of the King Alfred Plan spread throughout the black community. The truth of its existence was often assumed to be unchallenged. Performer and musician

Gil Scott-Heron Gilbert Scott-Heron (April 1, 1949 – May 27, 2011) was an American Jazz poetry, jazz poet, singer, musician, and author, known primarily for his work as a spoken-word performer in the 1970s and 1980s. His collaborative efforts with musician ...

created the song "King Alfred Plan," included on his 1972 album ''Free Will'', that takes the Plan at face value. Jim Jones, head of the 'apostolic socialist'

People's Temple The Peoples Temple of the Disciples of Christ, originally Peoples Temple Full Gospel Church and commonly shortened to Peoples Temple, was an American new religious organization which existed between 1954 and 1978. Founded in Indianapolis, In ...

, discussed the Plan at length in numerous recordings of his rant-style speeches both in the United States and in the Jonestown community in

Guyana Guyana ( or ), officially the Cooperative Republic of Guyana, is a country on the northern mainland of South America. Guyana is an indigenous word which means "Land of Many Waters". The capital city is Georgetown. Guyana is bordered by the ...

, treating it as completely genuine. In an interview with ''

Jet Jet, Jets, or The Jet(s) may refer to: Aerospace * Jet aircraft, an aircraft propelled by jet engines ** Jet airliner ** Jet engine ** Jet fuel * Jet Airways, an Indian airline * Wind Jet (ICAO: JET), an Italian airline * Journey to Enceladus a ...

'' Williams explained that he developed the idea when thinking about the question "What would any administration do in a situation when a large segment of the population was discontented and tearing down the neighborhood . . . threatening the order and the established regime?"

References

External links

*{{cite magazine , last=Emre , first=Merve , title=How a Fictional Racist Plot Made the Headlines and Revealed an American Truth , url=https://www.newyorker.com/books/second-read/how-a-fictional-racist-plot-made-the-headlines-and-revealed-an-american-truth , magazine=The New Yorker , accessdate=August 14, 2018 , date=December 31, 2017 Fictional elements introduced in 1967 Anti-black racism in the United States Conspiracy theories in the United States Death conspiracy theories Conspiracy theories involving race and ethnicity Central Intelligence Agency Jonestown