A.D. After Disclosure

Letter from England: Synchronicity 2011

Call me a crank, but for many years now, I have been a watcher of sunsets and sunrises, a sky gazer in general, on this “pale blue dot” we call Earth, a “mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam," as Carl Sagan so beautifully and humbly immortalized our predicament. I was recently talking to a landscape photographer, and we both agreed it had to do with perspective, whether photographing or just gazing, of catching a moment, a zenith, the cusp before it turns. A kind of boundless immanence where nature, where life does not stop to catch its breath and goes on forever, into the inky phosphorus dark of imperial night, or the unconditional mystery and open promise of a new day.

These are the kinds of things I think about but the last six months have given me a new way to ponder because of two projects that seem to have "right place, right time" written all over them.

A.D. After Disclosure: The People’s Guide to Life After Contact

Richard Dolan and Bryce Zabel have some much more radical ideas on the question of UFOs, and the far ranging implications thereof for us on terra firma. Published in 2010, the book is a collaboration between an Oxford trained academic turned UFO researcher and historian, and a producer and writer who created the cult classic show Dark Skies, and former chair of the US Academy of Television Arts & Sciences. Dolan has spent the last decade writing and publishing volumes of his UFOs and the National Security State, which meticulously chronicle a history of UFOs and their cover-up that is still being written, in the real world and on the page. A modern archeology of declassified documents and witness testimony, of lives and careers that were made, and even buried because of the UFO, the conceptual rosetta stone to understanding this subterranean world being the historical formation and ascendant hegemony of the National Security State. ‘Like the “missing mass” astronomers are trying to locate in the far reaches of our universe, the UFO phenomena rests on an ocean of dark matter, deep secrets, and forgotton wars fought only in shadows,' writes Jacques Vallee in the foreword to Vol.1 of Richard’s history.

Dark Skies: History is a Lie

Mid-January 2011 saw, for the first time on DVD, the release of Dark Skies. Watching it, the first thing that struck me about it is just how good it really is. It was ahead of its time, and tragically cancelled just as it was beginning so promisingly. No wonder that some people speculated it was cancelled for political, i.e., conspiratorial reasons, owing to its themes, which cover crop circles, cattle mutilation, alien abduction, ancient astronauts, secret space programs, and many historical personalities woven into the script including the Kennedys, with every episode reminding that History Is a Lie, following John Loengard and partner Kimberly Sayers as they go on the run across America from Majestic 12 and the alien threat. Certainly, it is criminal, the treatment the series was handed, given how much work and clearly love was put into it. The show captures some of the optimism, idealism, wonder and terror of the 60’s. The beautiful, glowing cinematography brings to life the ambiance of the times, without gimmick but with plenty of novelty and dark humour, each episode flies by and each year rolls on, passing through the decade, through the heights and the depths, bittersweet and retrospective, archive footage blending seamlessly and kinetically with the story, the sci-fi with the historical.

The need you buried deep,
The secrets that you keep are at the ready,
Are you ready?

Foo Fighters, The Pretender  

In the Beginning...

One of my favorite scenes is from the pilot, where Captain Bach of Majestic 12 and his suit-and-tie adorned team of need-to-knows investigating a classic-style crop circle make a fly-over in a military helicopter of the field. It’s just charming. It captures such a quality of the mystery and wonder and even naivety that must have accompanied any such incidents, where now the phenomena proliferates multidimensionally on dorm posters and fridge magnets, but back then was a very new world to be discovered, studied and conquered. You can easily imagine it would have been just like this, back then, to those in the know.

Calling Roger Ebert...

Roger Ebert has been getting a lot of attention this week for his beautifully written essay titled, A Quintessence of Dust. In it, he features the graphic below -- created by NASA -- showing 1,235 planets we know to exist as well as the suns they orbit. 

Here's the key concept to appreciate this: each planet is a black dot. Below the top row, you'll see our own sun over on the right side. The people who estimate such things are estimating that millions of such planets exist in our galaxy alone. Ebert's mind boggles at this and, of course, so does mine and probably yours, too.

I have a small bone to pick with Roger Ebert, however, even though I am a great admirer and have probably read several hundred of his film reviews. But, before I get to that, I want to invite you to feel some of the same wonder, mystery and curiosity that comes with this image. Take a few seconds now and look at it, and let it sink in. And, if you want to see it larger, just click on it and you'll see it on an even grander scale on your computer.

 

As I said, I love Roger Ebert and, as a fellow writer, I have to stand in awe of his skill and capacity. These traits have made him the most significant film reviewer of our time.

My bone to pick is that he appears to not understand the UFO situation and indirectly put down those of us who do. In the same week he wrote his essay about the worlds the Hubble is exposing us to, he also wrote this in his review of the new film, "Source Code."

"Source Code" is an ingenious thriller that comes billed as science fiction, although its science is preposterous. Does that matter, as long as everyone treats it with the greatest urgency? After all, space travel beyond the solar system is preposterous, and yet we couldn't do without "Star Trek." 

Ebert is saying that if you believe that it is possible to travel the galaxy and the universe that you believe in something that is preposterous. I say that very statement is preposterous.

I think Ebert is a smart enough man with, as he speaks about in his article, the curiosity it takes to consider these big questions and be on the leading edge of things. He could do the world a tremendous service, now that he is thinking about such things, if he would bring his game up on this subject.

OZUFO Summit: What Has Changed?

This weekend I attended my first UFO conference. It was also a first for the conference organizers in Lawrence, Kansas. Dubbed OZUFO Summit, it promised to be a high-level event by inviting some of the big names from UFO research and investigation.

The expressed goal of the conference was to bring together "variously experienced world-class authors, investigators, researchers, and speakers" to share a "sincere and urgent call for complete UFO Disclosure of the UFO-ET Reality." 

For those interested in UFOs, the names were noteworthy. Physicist and researcher Stanton Friedman and dogged investigator Donald Schmitt both spoke about their parallel investigations into Roswell — the Watergate of UFO cover-ups. Jesse Marcel, Jr. recounted the historic event from his childhood when his father (Jesse Marcel, Sr.) showed his family debris from the Roswell crash. And former airmen, Capt. Robert Salas and Col. Charles Halt, discussed their separate experiences while in the Air Force.

On the other hand, there were those whose connection to the UFO phenomenon was more personal. Kim Carlsberg discussed her abductions and how she had been used as part of an extraterrestrial cross-breeding program. Rosemary Ellen Guiley drew parallels between alien abduction stories and the folklore of the djinn (a.k.a. genies). And Butch Witkowski shared the results of his investigations into cattle — and human — mutilations.

With all these different voices to discuss the UFO phenomenon, one thing was notably missing: a consensus. When one thinks of a summit, one imagines high-ranking officials coming together to reach an accord. While the goal of government disclosure was the predominant theme of the conference, it did not seem to be shared by all. 

Can UFO Visitors Actually Be Time Travelers?

For what it's worth, the UFO field is buzzing about time travel, anticipating that it is the Next Big Thing in this unfolding story. 

At the recent IUFOC in Phoenix, for example, Bentwaters witness James Penniston re-told the story about how in September 1994 he allowed himself to be hypnotized to help him recall what happened in Rendlesham forest and what it might mean. In the session, Penniston stated that he received telepathic communication from a landed craft in the forest and that the craft’s occupants had come from Earth’s future to gather genetic material to help them survive.

When I heard this, I knew that sounded more than a little familiar to me. Then I saw a post today from UFO skeptic Ian Ridpath who offered the explanation that Penniston may have gotten the idea from a movie he'd seen that claimed the same thing and aired just ten months before his hypnosis.

I wrote that movie.

In November 1993,the first original film for the Sci-Fi Channel (now SyFy) was produced from my screenplay, Official Denial. Although it was about the UFO cover-up and was the first piece I wrote that invoked Majestic-12, it contained a twist ending in which the question turned out to be not where the aliens were from, but when they were from. The Others were not alien after all: they were ourselves. Having bred diversity from their DNA in order to survive an environmental collapse, they had returned backward in time to save us, and thus to save themselves. The abduction of certain people was part of a protocol to follow specific bloodlines that were important in DNA development and ancestry. Later, I followed that "Bloodlines" theory up in Dark Skies as well, as that was the title of our final episode.

For those who aren't familiar with him, James Penniston was an Air Force Staff Sergeant at a joint U.S. Air Force and Royal Air Force base at Bentwaters in the UK. On December 26, 1980, he was sent to investigate strange lights in the forest. What he and others found was a triangular craft that he examined at close range and for an extended period. This has become one of the best documented UFO sightings in history, referred to as the Rendlesham Forest Incident.

My film was released on video in May 1994, only a few months before Penniston’s hypnosis. As Ridpath interprets it, "The similarities between the film and Penniston’s story are striking. Of course, we have no evidence that Penniston actually saw this film, so it could simply be coincidence."

A Theory About John B. Alexander

What is the deal with John B. Alexander?

He's been catapulted to the forefront of the UFO community with the publication of his book, UFOs: Myths, Conspiracies, and Realities. In this book and his four-hour appearance on Coast-to-Coast AM with George Knapp and his Wednesday speech before the International UFO Congress (IUFOC) in Phoenix, Alexander makes what can be described as a "nuanced" argument about UFOs.

His argument as best as I can summarize it is that UFOs are real in that he agrees they are probably not something from our conventional technology and experience. Yet, he argues, there really is no cover-up in that the U.S. government is not hiding any big secret, doesn't investigate them, has no "control group."

I'm having a hard time with that one. If they weren't real, then I could understand maintaining a hands-off approach. But if they are real, then it would seem completely and totally irresponsible to not take an interest in them, particularly since they have a prima facie impact on national security.

So what's going on?

First off, listening to Alexander, he seems knowledgeable and sincere. But as a network correspondent and then investigative journalist prior to my screenwriting career, I have been told lies straight to my face by people who seem knowledgeable and sincere.

I think, for the time being, John Alexander goes in my "gray basket" (to borrow the term from Stanton Friedman) that includes Colonel Philip Corso, Dan Burisch and Bob Lazar.

Skeptical as I am of Alexander for the moment, I've been equally skeptical of others who twist and turn everything to fit their own biases and interpretations -- something that is rampant in ufology over time. I want to keep faith with the journalistic principles I learned back in college and on-the-job over the years -- but we all know journalists don't believe in UFOs so I've had to grow beyond some of that conditioning, too. These days I'm a screenwriter and dramatist and part of that job is to think about the the sub-text of things, the story-behind-the-story. This is where that kind of thinking now leads me:

John Alexander has had a relatively distinguished career in the military. He knows people and he knows people who know people. He did, as he describes in this book and his interviews, go on a hunt of official government circles looking for the "control group." He's talked to (or at least says he has) many people with big jobs and big names.

He tries to say that there has already been Disclosure because Ronald Reagan and Jimmy Carter admitted seeing UFOs. In this worldview, Project Blue Book was not a conspiratorial diversion, albeit understaffed and underfunded, but just a public relations ploy, period. According to Alexander, it's all been on the up-and-up since then as well, it's just that nobody in government really wants to get their hands dirty on this subject. I'm sorry, but that one, arguing that we have had Disclosure, I'm just not buying. As Rich Dolan and I define it in our book, Disclosure is the process begun with the official acknowledgement of humankind's contact with intelligent beings from some place that isn't here. No such thing has happened. Besides, if they're real, and you work in national security, you investigate, period.

As I see it, there are three options.

{reviews} Bruce Maccabee on John Alexander - Disclose What?

Whether or not you are “into” UFOs, this book could rock your world!

Dr. Alexander’s blockbuster book -- UFOs: Myths, Conspiracies, and Realities -- is based on his many years of searching the top levels of government and military to find “the” group in charge of UFO information.  The negative result of his search shakes the foundations of the widely held belief that there has been a government conspiracy to cover up important UFO information related to UFO crashes and interactions with aliens.  This book could also rock your world if you are a nonbeliever because Dr. Alexander has cited some strong evidence that “UFOs are real.”  He also provides reality checks on some commonly held beliefs related to UFOs,  reverse engineering of alien technology, human-alien interactions, what has been done by the governments of other countries, animal mutilations, agriglyphs (“crop circles”) and military abductions. Anyone seriously interested in studying the UFO phenomenon should read this book.

I recall the first time we met.  It was way back in August, 1986, at the Naval Surface Weapons Center, a large Navy research facility at White Oak, Maryland (closed in 1996) where I worked on Navy physics research.  He had called me at work several days earlier and said he wanted to talk about UFOs.  He briefly described himself and what he wanted to talk about but, other than that, I knew nothing about him except that he was an Army Colonel who had a Top Secret Clearance with “tickets.”  I thought it strange, but only a little strange, that an army colonel would want to talk about UFOs because I had discovered during my previous years with the Navy that, in virtually every military organization or defense laboratory I had visited, there was one or more people interested in the subject.  

I was not surprised that he wanted to talk to me in particular because I was working for the Navy and my UFO research into important sightings (unrelated to my Navy research work)  was well known in the UFO community (e.g. McMinnville, Oregon, 1950 photos, Gemini 11 astronaut photos, New Zealand sightings of December, 1978).  Also, it had long been known that there had been, over the years, sightings by Navy personnel, including the March, 1952 sighting by the pilot and co-pilot of Navy Secretary Dan Kimball’s aircraft while they were flying over the Pacific.  Kimball ordered a Navy study to begin after he got the “run around” from the Air Force.  (Exactly how long this study lasted is not known.).  Because of all of this Dr. Alexander probably wondered if I knew of a secret Navy group keeping track UFO phenomenology.

Bruce Maccabee holds a PhD in Physics from the American University. He has been active in UFO research since late 1960s when he joined the National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena (NICAP) and was active in research and investigation for NICAP until its demise in 1980. He became a member of MUFON in 1975 and was subequently appointed to the position of state Director for Maryland, a position he still holds. In 1979, he was instrumental in establishing the Fund for UFO Research and presently serves on the National Board of the Fund. 

I met him at the security office and, since this was an unclassified discussion, I escorted him directly to the dining hall and we got our food and sat down to eat and chat.  He began by saying that he had spent several years trying to discover what government organization, either civilian or military, was in charge of, or controlled, UFO-related information and research.  As I expected, he wanted to know if I had any evidence that the Navy studied UFOs.

At this point I probably looked at him with a blank stare because I knew that many people previously had tried to find out what the government was doing and had come up empty handed.  The Air Force had been the publicly known lead agency for government UFO research for many years (Project Blue Book) but had abandoned all such research (they said!) in 1969.  Since then numerous government or military organizations had been suspected of secretly controlling access to UFO-related information and continuing UFO research, including the Central Intelligence Agency, the Defense Intelligence Agency, the National Security Agency, Air Force Intelligence, etc., but no one had been able to specifically identify which organization, government or civilian, had the responsibility for continuing secret UFO research (and the associated cover up of UFO data and any hardware, as from the supposed Roswell crash). 

Dark Skies and the Unified Conspiracy Theory

When Dark Skies debuted on NBC in the fall of 1996, it was almost 50 years after the infamous Roswell UFO Incident. The report that a UFO had crashed in New Mexico — and the subsequent cover-up of the story — is a watershed moment for the UFO community and those who believe it began a campaign of misinformation by the U.S. government.

They're here. They're hostile. 

Set in the 1960s during the administration of President John F. Kennedy, the series revolves around a young idealist named John Loengard (Eric Close). A fresh recruit to the congressional offices on Capitol Hill, Loengard is tasked with auditing certain government programs. This leads Loengard to investigate Project Blue Book, the Air Force study of UFOs. 

After interviewing UFO abductees Betty and Barney Hill, Loengard encounters Captain Bach (J.T. Walsh) and the men of Majestic — a top-secret organization that has been fighting a hidden war against aliens since the Roswell Incident in 1947.

Kevin Wohler writes about film and television for FilmGuru.Net. In addition to being a fan of Dark Skies, he created one of the show's first fan websites, Dark Skies Over Kansas. He's still waiting for a second season of the show so he can find out why the Hive created disco. 

Together with his girlfriend Kim Sayers (Megan Ward), Loengard eventually turns over evidence of this cover-up — and Majestic — to President Kennedy. Soon after, Kennedy is assassinated, pushing Loengard and Sayers to run from Majestic and find the truth.

To say that Dark Skies was an ambitious undertaking would be a major understatement. Co-creators Bryce Zabel and Brent Friedman took 50 years of UFO mythology and wove it into American history. 

History as we know it is a lie.

Each episode of Dark Skies not only tackles a new piece of UFO mythology, but also places it in time with an important historical event. Whether the Beatles performing on The Ed Sullivan Show in February 1964 or the death of three civil rights workers in Mississippi in June of that year, Dark Skies ties its stories to the events of that decade.

But our knowledge of history is a lie — as Loengard repeatedly reminds us in the show's opening. 

The stories in Dark Skies are not merely set in the '60s, they become an underlying cause to the events of the decade. The UFO mythology takes on a historical tone, and the alien conspiracy is woven into the fabric of history. The turbulent decade becomes a metaphor for the fear, anger and frustration of the UFO movement. And it's not without controversy.

"Thoughtful Scenarios... Refreshing Wake-Up Call"

There's a new review up on Amazon from Randall Sherman of Nevada City, California that we want to pass on. He's also picking up -- as other commentators have -- on the book's approach to not spend time trying to prove that UFOs are real to skeptics but to instead focus on how the world might change after we all know the truth. Here is his comment in full:

This is a terrific book. I'm immensely impressed by the quality of writing, thinking and exploratory nature on a subject that will clearly have a profound impact on our planet in the very near future. 

I'm so delighted to read an expose on the subject that simply accepts UFO reality and then moves forward. Long ago I took this position and decided that arguing against skeptics and debunkers was futile and non-productive. After listening to all the noise it was clear that it was no longer useful to try and convince those who cannot accept the overwhelming evidence presented over the last 60 years. It is simply passé in today's discussion among intelligent people. 

If you agree even a little bit, then you will find this book tremendously stimulating in terms our future world. Dolan's solid historical credentials and Zabel's terrific story-boarding make a combination that produces a very enlightening book. Just as good is the engaging review of the best evidence concerning background and plausible scenarios. I found myself wanting to rush forward throughout the book, yet needing to take rests in reading to absorb all the implications. 

This book utilizes one in one my most favorite exercises of logical discussion, the `thought experiment' which was popular with Einstein and even before with Galileo (it has extended into fields such as philosophy, math, history, political science, economics, law, cognitive psychology and even marketing). Generally, it involves prefactual speculation on possible future outcomes such as "What will be the outcome if event E occurs?" Think tank operatives employ this technique extensively and it has shown to be profitable in business/science (et al) and in this book. 

I've often performed my own thought experiment about extra-terrestrial biological entities as to why they would appear in our solar system. As such, it seems entirely plausible that they would search out a habitable and beautiful, resource-rich planet, which unfortunately is occupied by a frequently hostile civilization. Therein the story begins. AD gives consideration to some very thoughtful scenarios that will possibly unfold. What a gift to benefit from the forethought. 

Unfortunately, this book will be mainly read by UFO-enthusiasts, yet it deserves wider dissemination. It is a book for all people - researchers, sci-fi thinkers, government secretives, citizens and sociologists who want to be prepared for the next stage of cooperation with our star-neighbors. Forewarned is forearmed. AD is a refreshing wake-up call for those of us in the know and those who want to contemplate the profound implications of such change. 

If you agree, or if you want to comment further, you can read give a thumb's up to any of the comments on Amazon or make your own. We appreciate the feedback and the on-going discussion.

"Most Thrilling Book on the Subject I've Yet Read"

We've said from the beginning that there must have been 10,000 books written about UFOs, all trying to prove they are real, and that our book is not one of them. Now comes Eric Wargo of Washington, D.C. to pick up on that theme in a comment about A.D. After Disclosure just posted on the Amazon review page where he explains what A.D. is and isn't clearly and concisely. Here is his comment in full:

When I first heard Richard Dolan was working on a project called "A.D. After Disclosure," I was in shock and disbelief. How could he put off completing Volume III of UFOs and the National Security State? The first two volumes in that trilogy are indeed pretty much the definitive books on the evidence for UFOs, and I've been waiting with bated breath for the third, which promises to be just as earthshattering. But A.D. arrived from Amazon two days ago, and well, okay, I forgive him. With the other reviewers here, I think this is the best -- and honestly the most thrilling -- book on the subject I've yet read. 

I have been waiting for a serious book about UFOs that just goes ahead and takes for granted the reality of the phenomenon and moves forward from there. Once you've looked at the evidence compiled and presented by serious UFO researchers -- and there are now plenty of sources for this evidence (not just Dolan's previous works, also Leslie Kean's new book, James Fox's documentaries, Jacques Vallee's many great books, etc.) -- there's no longer any doubt that UFOs are real, so why not just proceed on that assumption? This is, to my knowledge, the first book by a serious UFO researcher that does that. 

Reading A.D., I realized how basically defensive most books and documentaries on UFOs have been -- and really, have had to be -- up until now. They have had to try and convince you by showing you evidence, or at least persuade you to maintain an open mind. The confidence Dolan and his coauthor Bryce Zabel project is a refreshing step forward. They no longer need to persuade. They are able, at this point, to address their readers as a community of intelligent people whose minds are already well open to the reality and significance of the subject, and are ready, as I said, to proceed. Proceed to where? That's what this book is about. Read it. 

If you agree, or if you want to comment further, you can read give a thumb's up to Eric's comment here on the Amazon page, it's a gesture of thanks, and it moves it toward the top of the reviews. Other readers of the book are encouraged to leave their own reviews at Amazon and to leave comments.

"Highly Collectible and Valued"

Readers are starting to voice their opinions of the book now that they've had it in their hands for a few days. Joe Buchman of Park City, Utah, for example, just posted this unsolicited comment about A.D. After Disclosure on the Amazon review page:

This is, by far, the best book I've read on the subject of UFOs. Not only reasoned speculation about the impact of the open revelation of an ET presence on Earth, but also the best-of-the-best evidence of their past interactions with humanity. 

I'm looking forward to giving copies of this book to family members and friends, and to the discussions which will follow. 

I don't know if I'll live through a post-Disclosure world, but I am looking forward, one day, to knowing how accurate Richard Dolan and Bryce Zabel were. If I don't live that long, then I'm confident my children or grandchildren (who will be getting copies of this book from me in the years to come) . . . will. 

By that time I expect this book, especially in its first edition, will be recognized as among the most valuable pre-Disclosure contributions to the field . . . and be very highly collectible and valued. 

You can read give a thumb's up to Joseph's comment here on the Amazon page, it's a gesture of thanks, and it moves it toward the top of the reviews. Other readers of the book are encouraged to leave their own reviews at Amazon and to leave comments.