I would love to have been a fly on the wall when personnel of the Office of Science and Technology Policy of the Executive Office of the President at the New Executive Office Building in Washington , D.C., discussed how to respond to a petition about disclosing data on UFOs. I suspect that nobody brought up the enormous amount of information available indicating that not only are aliens visiting, but the US and other government have been withholding information for many decades. The response certainly indicates intentional lying and misrepresentation or total ignorance.
The petition, prepared and submitted by Steve Bassett’s Paradigm Research Group, went like this:
“We, the undersigned strongly urge the President of the United States to formally acknowledge an extraterrestrial presence engaging the human race and immediately release into the public domain all files from all agencies and military services relevant to this phenomenon."
I, for one, was not one of more than 5000 persons signing the petition. My reason was straight forward. Having worked under security for 14 years and having researched the flying saucer phenomenon (certainly most UFOs are NOT alien flying saucers) for 53 years , I believe there is a very strong national security side to the question. I cannot see releasing technical data that could be of use to other countries also researching the phenomena and wanting to duplicate the extraordinary flying capabilities of the flying saucers… for military purposes
The response was issued by research assistant Phil Larson. He stated “The US government has no evidence that:
- [1] any life exists outside our planet or
- [2] that an extraterrestrial presence has contacted or engaged any member of the human race. In addition
- [3] there is no credible information to suggest that any evidence is being hidden from the public’s eye.” No indication is provided as to just what sources, if any, were evaluated. Furthermore, a real red herring was provided “There are a number of projects working toward the goal of understanding if life can or does exist off Earth”.. He then discusses SETI, The Kepler Spacecraft, the Mars Science Laboratory, Curiosity, soon to be launched to Mars. None of these have anything to do with the extraterrestrial presence here, the petition’s topic!! Why mention them?
Larson generously concedes that "the odds are pretty high that somewhere among the trillions and trillions of stars in the universe there is a planet other than ours that is home to life”. Odds cannot be determined when there is no data. He also foolishly states that ”the odds of making contact with any of them.. especially any intelligent ones- are extremely small given the distances involved”. To which distances is he referring, billions of light years to very distant galaxies?? Or 39.3 light years to Zeta Reticuli? Where is any data to support these totally baseless claims? Does he have travel schedules for civilizations outside Earth? Surely the astronomical community knows nothing about interstellar travel. More about evidence below, but let us first look at [3].
No credible information to suggest that any evidence is being hidden from the public? Is he really unaware of the many TOP SECRET UMBRA CIA UFO documents that have been released so heavily redacted that many pages say “Deny in Toto” or that many others are blacked out except for fewer than 8 words. Is he really unaware that because of a FOIA court case, the NSA has admitted finding 156 TOP SECRET UMBRA UFO documents. When finally released, one could read about 1 sentence per page with the rest being whited out. The excuse for redaction was that it is illegal to release sources and methods information. It is absurd to suggest that more than 95% of these UFO documents consisted of sources and methods information. Federal Court Judge Gerhard Gesell agreed the documents should not be released “The Public interest in disclosure is far outweighed by the potential danger to the security of the United States should this information be released” he wrote.
Is Larson really unaware of the following 1969 statement by USAF General Carroll Bolender asked to decide Project Blue Book’s future, “Reports of UFOs which could affect national security are made in accord with JANAP 146 or Air Force Manual 55-11 and are not part of the Blue Book system….Termination of Blue Book would leave no official federal office to receive reports of UFOs . However, as already stated, reports which could affect national security would continue to be handled through the standard Air Force procedures designed for this purpose”.. When BB was closed as a result of Bolender’s memo and for more than 40 years since, the public has been falsely told there was no government concern with UFOs. This was a flatout lie. As late as 2011 there were official regulations in place instructing military pilots how to reports UFOs.. . Where is all this data? No evidence being hidden???
Since 1969 the public has been told 1. “No UFO reported, investigated and evaluated by the Air Force has ever given any indication of threat to our national security.2. There has been no evidence submitted to or discovered by the Air Force that sightings categorized as unidentified represent technological developments or principles beyond the range of present-day scientific knowledge and 3. There has been no evidence that sightings categorized as ‘unidentified” are extraterrestrial vehicles”. Skillfully constructed lies and deception!! What if any other agency such as the navy, CIA, NSA, DIA, NRO, ONI, Majestic 12, etc had done the reporting, investigating, or evaluating? I worked on programs such as nuclear fusion propulsion for star travel (at great cost) way back in 1961). If there was no threat to National Security, why were military pilots officially ordered in 1952 to shoot down UFOs if they did not land when instructed to do so? Why did an AF general state that more than 300 jets had been scrambled?
No evidence being hidden? Then why did Secretary of the Air Force Donald Quarles make the following statement in a very widely distributed press release, on October 25, 1955, about a large study concerning UFOs. “On the basis of this study, we believe that no objects such as those popularly described as flying saucers have overflown the United States. I feel certain that even the Unknown 3% could have been explained as conventional phenomena or illusions if more complete observational data had been obtained.” That the 2 supposedly factual statements (3% Unknowns, incomplete observational data), are bald faced LIES is easily demonstrated. The data are compiled from “the study” whose title was NOT given in the Press Release (“Project Blue Book Special Report No. 14”,) and which was not distributed, though the press release got very wide coverage.
Nothing Hidden?? The Unknowns comprised 21.5% of the 3201 cases investigated by Battelle Memorial Institute (NOT 3%!!) whose identity was not given in the press release. Of great importance is that there was a separate category listed as Insufficient Information comprising 9.3% of the cases. By definition no case could be listed as an UNKNOWN if there was insufficient information despite Quarles’ lie.. . A statistical cross comparison between UNKNOWNS and Knowns showed that the probability that the UNKNOWNS were just missed knowns was less than 1%. It was also found that the better the quality of a sighting the MORE likely to be listed as an UNKNOWN. Nothing Hidden? Surely you are joking Mr. Larson.
There were also many lies in the 2 huge reports about Roswell. One ridiculous one was even blindly accepted by the NY Times and appeared on the front page of the Sunday edition above the fold. Reports of bodies associated with the Roswell case were supposedly the results of observations of crash test dummies dropped all over NM. Two very serious problems with this lie are that no dummies were dropped until 1953 (6 years after Roswell) and that all were 6’ tall, weighed 175 pounds (just Like pilots) and were in uniforms influencing drag and heating on the way down. There is no possible way even including time travel that they could have morphed into skinny creatures under 5’ tall with big heads and big eyes. Nothing Hidden???
Mr. Larson could have benefitted by consulting two other official US government reports besides “Blue Book Special Report 14”. “Symposium on Unidentified Flying Objects: Hearings before the Committee on Science and Astronautics, House of Representatives July 29, 1968”. This includes testimony from 12 scientists, all but one, myself, with PhDs. One finds multiple witness radar visual cases, sightings by astronomers and other scientists There was also the half million$ University of Colorado study (Usually called The Condon Report) done for the USAF. A special UFO subcommittee of the world’s largest group of Space scientists, the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, reported that 30% of the 117 cases studied in detail could not be identified. There was also the Japan Air Lines Flight 1628 case of Nov. 16,1986, which involved ground and air radar, and airborne witnesses. The FAA radar installation’s data was confiscated by the government. The object was twice the size of an aircraft carrier… Nothing Hidden, Mr. Larson?
Benefit might also be obtained by reviewing the extensive files of NARCAP (National Aviation Reporting Center on Anomalous Phenomena) which include loads of sightings by pilots. These are men entrusted to fly civilian and military aircraft carrying loads of people. Many outstanding cases are in Leslie Kean’s “UFOs: General, Pilots and Government Officials Go on the Record.” These cannot be Ignored.
Larson talks about evidence. One would think he would mention the literally thousands of physical trace cases from all over the world collected by researchers such as Ted Phillips. He says no contact with any member of the human race .Perhaps he should read “Captured! The Betty and Barney Hill UFO Experience”. A great deal of the testimony was obtained by psychiatrist Dr. Benjamin Simon. He had been a colonel in the army entrusted with directing a 3000 bed hospital treating shell shock war veterans. He was chosen by the army to star in their movie “Let There be Light” about his successful treatment of these early sufferers from PTSD. He had stated that the emotional intensity of the Hills as they relived portions of their abduction experience was every bit as emotional as that of his many military patients.
What we have here is a travesty against the public, the press, and those many witnesses who have come forth. There is a classic example of bait and switch. Try to redirect attention from aliens visiting (the subject of the petition along with concerns about cover-up) to hypothetical meaningless talk of what might be way out there for which there is no basis at all. If the discussion were in a court of law, Lawson would have to be convicted of perjury.
Stanton Friedman, nuclear physicist lecturer www.stantonfriedman.com fsphys@rogers.com
