Showing posts with label 1974. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 1974. Show all posts

Wednesday, February 02, 2022

Mystery of 'UFO' That Crash Landed Dubbed the 'Welsh Roswell'

Mystery of 'UFO' That Crash Landed Dubbed the 'Welsh Roswell'

local search and rescue teams scrambled to the site ... no evidence of any wreckage was ever found.
      It was a cold, dark January night in 1974 when the ground shook and bright lights appeared in the sky above the Berwyn Mountains.

Dubbed 'the Welsh Roswell', after the notorious site in New
By Nathan Bevan
www.walesonline.co.uk
1-25-22
Mexico where an alien craft allegedly crash landed in the 1940s, the incident has remained shrouded in mystery ever since.

Tuesday, May 19, 2020

Robert Spencer Carr, The Aztec UFO Incident and Hangar 18

Robert Spencer Carr, The Aztec UFO Incident and Hangar 18
Carr seems like a minister as he speaks slowly and deliberately in a deep, lilting voice. And, in a way, he is a minister. He preaches an attitude of peace, good will and cooperation with "our friends from space.”
- Jane Baumann in the Clearwater Sun, Oct. 27, 1974


     Professor Robert Spencer Carr was the guest of a local radio show on Oct. 11, 1974 to promote the upcoming Flying Saucer Symposium by PSI Conferences in Tampa, Florida. During the interview, Carr made the shocking disclosure of the US government’s cover-up of the crash of a UFO in New Mexico. It created a media sensation that lasted for months in print and broadcast news. But who was Robert Spencer Carr?

Bob Carr was born March 26, 1909, and as brilliant youthful author published in prominent magazines, not only in pulps such as Weird Tales, but also mainstream slicks such as the
Curt Collins
By Curt Collins & Claude Falkstrom
thesaucersthattimeforgot.blogspot.com
5-29-20
Saturday Evening Post. His son, Timothy Spencer Carr, contributed a mini-bio to the Internet Speculative Fiction Database that fills in some of the blanks:
He was a child prodigy with published magazine articles at age 10, an international best-selling novel author at age 18 and a Hollywood screen writer at 20... he had 3 novels and at least a dozen short stories, mostly science fiction. Like many of his colleagues, he became a member of the USA Communist party during the 1930's. He actually lived in Russia from 1933 to 1938 (during the worst of Stalin's purges), where he became totally disenchanted with Communism. He returned to the US and renounced his party membership. He refused to testify against his former comrades during the HUAC witch-hunts of the 1950's.
Back in the US, Carr resumed his writing career, which included a substantial body of work during his four years as Director of Educational Research for Walt Disney Studios. He served in the Army during World War II, enlisting in 1944 and becoming a sergeant where he wrote lectures for officers to deliver to the troops. After that, he returned to the motion picture industry for several years, writing and producing educational films contracted by the State Department at the International Film Foundation. It was also during this period that Carr became interested in flying saucers.

Carr's Science Fiction Potpourri

Carr had a particular fondness for fantasy and science fiction, and his story about extraterrestrial visitors, “Morning Star,” was published in the December 6, 1947 issue of The Saturday Evening Post. In his author’s profile, Carr was described as “a devoted follower of the late Charles Fort, and a member of the Fortean Society,” and that he was a supporter in the possibility “that men from Mars—if not babes from Venus—already have visited the earth.” In Carr’s “Easter Eggs" (later retitled “The Invaders”) from the Sept. 24, 1949 edition of The Saturday Evening Post, two alien ovoid spaceships land, one actually on the White House lawn, the other in Moscow. It gives a hint of Carr’s thoughts on the advanced mental and psychic powers of extraterrestrials - and our potential to match them. Bette Pringle, a White House secretary, establishes communication:
“I caught a glimpse of something alive inside, about the size of a man, sitting at controls. He tried to talk to me… He seemed to speak inside my mind, not with words but with ideas. With pictures too, pictures no artist could paint.”
Carr and Ufology

1952 marked the end of Carr’s film work and his literary career, his “The Coming of the Little People,” published The Blue Book, for their November issue. However, in July of that year he wrote something memorable for the President of the United States. Little evidence of Carr’s early UFO-related activity survives, but researcher Larry Bryant found documentation of it. Bryant examined letters to President Harry S. Truman from the public on the subject of flying saucers, writing, “The collected letters – or at least that portion that somehow escaped referral to the Department of Defense for reply – now reside at the Truman Library in Independence, Mo. … A White House staffer synopsized each letter in a cross-reference log.”

Carr’s letter to the President was forwarded, but the remarks by the staff note:

–Robert Spencer Carr of Clearwater, Fla. (7/31/52)
“Writer encloses miscellaneous material relative to 'flying saucers’ – suggestions for contact. Respectfully referred to the Department of the Air Force for appropriate handling. Requests President’s comment re this. Threatens to publicize his letter if he does not receive an answer. Critical of the Pentagon. (consideration and appropriate handling.)”
Carr, During the 1965 Brooksville Investigation
Carr, During the 1965 Brooksville Investigation
During the 1950s, Carr otherwise was not active publicly in UFO activities, but he was a long-time member of the National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena (NICAP). The best period documentation of Carr’s NICAP role in a high-profile investigation into a 1965 UFO occupant encounter.

The Orlando Sentinel from Orlando, Florida, September 26, 1965:
“A Public relations man from Pinellas County, Robert Carr, a member of NICAP,” told about the investigation of “the Brooksville incident in which a man testified that he spotted a landed unidentified craft with strange creatures walking around outside... Creatures three to four feet long have been reported... Carr also stressed that he does not believe any of the reports involving sightings of space creatures that he has investigated so far.” (Project Blue Book has a 109-page file on the Brooksville case, and on page 44, a clipping of the APRO Bulletin, which mentions Carr’s investigation.
Operation Lure
Operation Lure

1973 marked Carr’s next public UFO exposure, in a book by Major Donald E. Keyhoe. Carr was teaching classes in creative writing at the University of South Florida, but became more vocal about his position and beliefs about UFOs as he neared retirement. He’d written to President Truman in 1952 about contacting aliens, and twenty years on, Carr found someone interested in the idea. There was a plan, Operation Lure, which was the title of the ultimate chapter of Major Donald E. Keyhoe’s final book from 1973, Aliens from Space. According to Keyhoe, Operation Lure would be “The first planned meeting of aliens and humans could be the start of mutual adjustments, leading to great advances for our world.” It was the UFO equivalent of a duck blind, complete with decoys, “an isolated base with unusual structures and novel displays, designed to attract the UFO aliens' attention... three or more dummy UFOs, disc types with domes, built of aluminum... the decoy UFOs and the education buildings flood-lighted from dusk to dawn. It may be several days before there is any reaction, but there are solid reasons to believe the Lure will work.”

The architect of Operation Lure?
The basic idea was first suggested by a NICAP Special Adviser, Robert Spencer Carr, former Director of Educational Research, Walt Disney Studios, a specialist in visual-aid education who has served with the Army Orientation Service and has produced educational films for the State Department. Since the original suggestion, I have privately expanded the plan with aid from Carr, linguists, psychologists and experts in other fields.
Carr placed special emphasis on the need for the lure to have projected movie images on an outdoor screen, noting that there had been many UFOs attracted to drive-in theatres. Once friendly contact was established, Carr believed the aliens could begin sharing “the benefits they might bring us.”

With his name and plan published in Keyhoe’s book, Carr began exploiting it, using it as evidence of his expertise in the UFO topic. In January 1974, at the University of South Florida, Carr engaged a USF Astronomy professor on stage in a debate, “UFO - Believe It or Not.” It was during this debate that Carr made his first public claim about captured flying saucers. The Tampa Tribune, Jan. 16, 1974 reported:
One of the best-kept secrets of the United States Government is that in Hangar 18 at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base near Dayton, Ohio, there are two flying saucers of unknown origin, a University of South Florida instructor said yesterday.
Does The Air Force Have UFOs - The Tampa Tribune 1-16-1974
The Tampa Tribune, Jan. 16, 1974

Operation Lure to Establish ContactThis article on Carr’s debate seems to be the the first time Hangar 18 was named as the hiding place for UFO secrets, at least in print. If Carr wasn’t the first to name it, he certainly is responsible for making the name Hangar 18 famous. The story only was good only for some local news coverage at the time, but it exploded in the Fall with further disclosures.

Hangar 18 was just the opening of Carr’s message, though. The crashed saucer story was a teaser to demonstrate what the UFO cover-up was depriving us of, to highlight how much more we could learn from the aliens by using Operation Lure to establish contact. 

Dr. Carr’s Radio Disclosure

Robert Carr retired from the university in June 1974, and took up a new career as a UFO lecturer. PSI Conferences (PSI for Psychic, Spiritual and Intuition) hired him for the Tampa “Flying Saucer Conference,” and on Oct. 11, 1974, during a local radio show interview to promote it, Carr told his story of captured saucers again, but in far greater detail. This time, it made international news, and Carr was hounded by newspapers, radio and television reporters for more information. Local radio started the buzz with the Carr interview, and the Zodiac News Service (ZNS, provider of bizarre and offbeat stories to progressive radio stations, college, community and underground newspapers) helped broadcast the sensational news nationally.

It's Out of This World...
(ZNS) Professor Robert Carr, a former instructor at the University of South Florida, announced last week that the United States government has secretly captured a complete U.F.O. with 12 dead beings aboard. Now. Professor Carr is predicting that by December 15th - in about eight weeks the U.S. government will launch a carefully-engineered effort to prepare American for an announcement of the existence of extraterrestrial life. the professor created a minor sensation last week after stating in a Florida press conference that the Pentagon has recovered a perfect "flying saucer" that allegedly had crash-landed in the desert near Aztec, New Mexico, in 1948. Professor Carr says that his sources for the incredible story are three men directly connected to covering up or protecting the project—a biologist who examined the bodies; a security guard who protected the ship in a hangar at the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio; and a high ranking military officer who reportedly viewed the bodies of the 12 small beings while autopsies were conducted on them. The professor states that all his sources report that the 12 beings were apparently the victims of a decompression accident when the ship was punctured alter entering the Earth's atmosphere. All witnesses, he says, described the visitors as being exactly like small humans —three to four feet tall; white skinned; light haired; blue eyed; in perfect physical condition, but with highly-developed brains. The professor insists that the 12 bodies are still in "deep freeze" at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, and that the ship is being concealed in a hangar at the air base. Wright-Patterson Air Force officials flatly and unequivocally deny the entire account.
Albany Student Press, Oct. 29, 1974

Carr’s mission was to launch Operation Lure, but all most people heard was, “Wright-Patterson Field has in its possession a spacecraft… blah, blah, blah.” Many people hearing the news break on radio took it to be an explosive new disclosure, mistakenly thinking Carr was describing a recent UFO capture, not a story from 1948. Reporters were just interested in the saucer and bodies in Hangar 18, so the plan for peaceful contact was seldom mentioned. The press coverage of the story was huge, carried in newspapers across the US and Canada by syndicated newswires such as the Associated Press and United Press International.

Air Force Chills Tale of Frozen Space People - The Orlando Sentinel 10-12-1974
The Orlando Sentinel, Oct. 12, 1974

There was a great deal of excitement, and a fair amount of confusion. When newspapers reported the story the day after the interview, the story began to be challenged....

Sunday, April 14, 2019

UFO Crash Of 1940s Is Drawing Local Interest | UFO CHRONICLE – 1974



UFO Crash Of 1940s Is Drawing Local Interest - Lebanon Daily News 11-11-1974

      In 1948, a flying saucer crash-landed near Aztec, N.M, and the disabled craft along with the humanoid bodies discovered within were rushed into seclusion at Wright-Patterson Air Force
By Lebanon Daily News
11-11-1974
Base in Dayton, Ohio. At least this is the story which has been circulating the past 26 years, and has recently been revived.

Monday, December 03, 2018

UFO Film, Shot Off of Catalina Examined By Experts | UFO CHRONICLE – 1974

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UFO Filmed Off of Catalina Examined By Experts (Pt 1) - San Diego Union 8-27-1974

UFO Filmed Off of Catalina Examined By Experts (Pt 2) - San Diego Union 8-27-1974

     Motion pictures of an Unidentified Flying Object (UFO) off Santa Catalina are being investigated by a local scientific group.
By San Diego Union
8-27-1974

J.F. Herr, a research psychologist and spokesman for the group, said the film is apparently the best UFO movie ever taken and may be an invaluable aid toward determining the true nature of such objects.

[...]

* Special Thanks To Jan Aldrich / Project 1947

See Also:

Underwater UFO incident Near Catalina | UFO CHRONICLE – 1982

Mysterious Flash of Light Caught on Camera Over San Diego Prompts Social Media Frenzy

Drury UFO Incident: Cold Case Review of Sighting & Film of Unidentified Flying Object

-click and or right click on image(s) above to enlarge-


After analysis performed by Dr. Robert Nathan of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California; he conluded that the object in the film was in fact an airplane.




REPORT YOUR UFO EXPERIENCE


Thursday, November 29, 2018

Multiple Witness Report UFO Humanoid | UFO CHRONICLE - 1974

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Multiple Witness Report UFO Humanoid - The Register 10-23-1974

[...]

     The three adults, watching the light, were startled to see a
By The Register
10-23-1974
red oval object, "bigger than a Volkswagen," rise to about 300 feet above the glowing ground.

At first hovering, it made a series of right angle turns before heading south toward Stuart, Va.

But the ground glow remained, so Plasters and Clifton decided to investigate. As they neared the area, they were puzzled by the absence of the farm animals: two horse, a steer, and three calves.

They had passed a small shed when Plasters caught site of movement ahead.

Arriving back at the spot where earlier they had seen the humanoid, Plasters and Clifton found burning debris. The light, the object, and the "man" had disappeared.

The men returned home and telephoned the local sheriff's office.

Several days later, independent civilian investigators searched the area. They discovered randomly blackened and charred bushes, fence posts, ground and twigs. Several tree tree limbs had also been broken.

Sunday, April 16, 2017

UFOs, The CIA and President Harry Truman

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UFOs, The CIA and President Harry Truman

Excerpt of Oral History Interview with Edward D. Lilly


By James R. Fuchs
2-28-1974

Subject: UFOs;
Date: 1948

     In this time period the UFO phenomenon was getting quite a bit of play in the press, radio, TV and from miscellaneous other sources. All manner of objects and things were being seen in the sky by people, including attempted UFO landings and UFO hoverings over isolated areas. There was even a report of seeing little men with big round heads getting in and out of a UFO. Well, the President, like any other citizen, is exposed to all these goings on, too.

In any case, I was called one afternoon to come to the Oval Office--the President wanted to see me. We talked about UFO reports and what might be the meaning for all these rather way-out reports of sightings, and the subject in general. The president said he hadn't give much serious thought to all these reports; but at the same time, he said, if there was any evidence of a strategic threat to the national security, the collection and evaluation of UFO data by Central Intelligence warranted more intense study and attention at the highest government level.

I was directed to report quarterly to the President after consulting with Central Intelligence people, as to whether or not any UFO incidents received by them could be considered as having any strategic threatening implications at all.

The report was to be made orally by me unless it was considered by intelligence to be so serious or alarming as to warrant a more detailed report in writing. During the four and one-half years in office there, all reports were made orally. Nothing of substance considered credible or threatening to the country was ever received from intelligence. Note: the Air Force had been charged by the Department of Defense with the collection and evaluation of UFO data from all sources such as the other services, the National Weather Service, and any other reliable source.

Wednesday, November 30, 2016

Radar Picked Up UFO Near Missile, During Test

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'Ghost Ships' Still Puzzle Experts at Missile Basa - Star Phoenix 7-17-1974

     ... Radar picked up an inverted saucer-shaped object to the right and above the descending nose cone and watched it cross the warhead's trajectory to a point which was below and to the left of it before the phantom disappeared.
Star Phoenix
7-17-1974

Saturday, April 02, 2016

Former CIA Insider’s Disclosures About UFOs: Why is This Link So Difficult to Post?

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Former CIA Insider’s Disclosures About UFOs: Why is This Link So Difficult to Post?

     Well, I initially thought that it had happened again. Every time I had tried to post a link to ex-CIA executive Victor Marchetti’s 1979 article about the agency’s “very sensitive activities” relating to UFOs, my posts disappeared into some as-yet unexplained black hole in cyberspace.

Most recently, when I tried to join the conversation at Roswell researcher Dr. Kevin Randle’s blog on the thread titled “Reports of the Roswell Crash before Jesse Marcel's Revelations”, Randle told me that he had not received my post. My comment follows here:

By Robert Hastings
The UFO Chronicles
4-1-16
Regarding reports of crashed UFOs prior to the re-emergence of the Roswell affair, as recounted by Jesse Marcel in 1978, I offer comments by former CIA executive Victor Marchetti, who left the agency in 1969 and wrote the best-selling exposé,The CIA and The Cult of Intelligencewhich laid bare some of the highly-illegal activities in which the agency engaged during the first two decades of its existence. [He wrote,]

‘During my years in the CIA, UFOs were not a subject of common discussion. But neither were they treated in a disdainful or derisive manner, especially not by the agency’s scientists. Instead, the topic was rarely discussed at internal meetings. It seemed to fall into the category of ‘very sensitive activities’...There were, however, rumors at high levels of the CIA…..rumors of unexplained sightings by qualified observers, of strange signals being received by the National Security Agency...and even of little gray men whose ships had crashed, or had been shot down, being kept ‘on ice’ by the Air Force at FTD (Foreign Technology Division) at Wright-Patterson AF Base in Dayton, Ohio.’

Yes, this was published in 1979, in the May issue of the now-defunct Second Look magazine—well after Marcel’s disclosures—but, again, Marchetti had resigned from the CIA some ten years earlier, therefore, the rumors he had heard had to have been circulating prior to that time.

I will also note that Marchetti’s use of the word ‘rumors’ results from his own non-involvement in the ‘very sensitive activities’ CIA had in play relating to the UFO phenomenon. Consequently, whatever information Marchetti was privy to derived from informal and probably unauthorized conversations he had with others at CIA headquarters.

But if accounts of crashed UFOs and alien bodies in cold storage were indeed discussed at ‘high levels’ within the agency, one might reasonably infer that those stories were being taken seriously.
Again, Randle initially told me that he never received this post via the normal Google Blogger route and was only able to post my comment after I sent a back-up in the body of an email to him. Today, however, he told me that he had eventually located the post. So, in this instance, the difficulties I have had posting Marchetti’s revelations in the past do not seem to apply.

Nevertheless, the issues I described at the beginning of this article did in fact occur—which prompted my sending the back-up message to Randle in the first place. A year or so ago, when I tried to post Marchetti’s exposé at journalist Billy Cox’ UFO blog, I was unable to do so. Although my posting effort was seemingly uneventful, he never received it. After Billy indicated as much, I tried again, but the second attempt met the same fate. Cox subsequently tried to post my comments himself, to his own blog, after I sent them to him in an email. He later told me that he had encountered the same unexplained and unprecedented problem. He eventually ended up posting the full text of Marchetti’s article in a follow-up piece.

In any case, the key point here is that former high-level CIA insider Victor Marchetti’s important revelations about the agency’s “very sensitive activities” relating to UFOs—decades after it had supposedly lost interest in the phenomenon—deserve widespread public attention. Therefore, I am asking persons reading this piece to forward the Cox article containing Marchetti’s disclosures to as many UFO and social media websites as possible.

Thursday, June 25, 2015

John Lennon UFO Sketch is 'a Fake?'

John Lennon UFO Sketch

By Steve Bagnall
www.dailypost.co.uk
6-24-15
But Berwyn Mountains flying saucer investigator Russ Kellett insists the drawing of an encounter Lennon had with a flying saucer in New York is genuine
     The former girlfriend of John Lennon is reported to have claimed a rare drawing of a UFO by the Beatles legend, acquired by an expert on one of North Wales’ greatest mysteries, is a fake.

Russ Kellett, is known for investigating the 1974 UFO Berwyn Mountains incident involving theories of an extraterrestrial craft crashing in the area.

Mr Kellett said a few months ago he bought Lennon’s sketch of an encounter he had with a flying saucer in New York - the same year as the North Wales incident.

However May Pang, who was with Lennon at the time of their alleged UFO sighting in New York, has reportedly told the online magazine examiner.com it is a fake. . . .

Saturday, June 20, 2015

John Lennon UFO link to Extraterrestrial Berwyn Mountains Mystery

John Lennon’s sketch of UFO he witnessed over New York 8-23-1974

By Steve Bagnall
www.dailypost.co.uk
6-19-15


Russ Kellett said he now owns sketch Lennon created after 1974 UFO sighting

    A leading expert on one of North Wales’s greatest UFO mysteries claims to own a rare sketch John Lennon created to record an alien encounter he allegedly experienced in America.

Russ Kellett, is known for investigating the 1974 UFO Berwyn Mountains incident involving theories of an extraterrestrial craft crashing in the area.

Mr Kellett said a few months ago he bought Lennon’s sketch of an encounter he had with a flying saucer in New York - the same year as the North Wales incident.

Lennon, whose first wife Cynthia died earlier this year and once lived in Ruthin, was said to have made a number of drawings following the sighting. . . .

Monday, March 02, 2015

Ex-CIA Official Says Stories of Crashed UFOs and Little Gray Men “on Ice” Discussed at a High-Level

Ex-CIA Official Says Stories of Crashed UFOs and Little Gray Men “on Ice” Discussed at a High-Level

By Robert Hastings
www.ufohastings.com
2-28-15

     First, this article has absolutely nothing to do with the bogus claims currently being made by the promoters of the so-called Roswell Slides, which allegedly show the body of a dead alien. (I predict that this latest, regrettable chapter in ufological history will implode in the near future.)

No, my title refers to a far more credible revelation. Although Victor Marchetti, the former Special Assistant to CIA Director Richard Helms, first published intriguing information relating to high-level discussion of recovered UFOs and dead aliens in 1979, in an article published in Second Look magazine, most people are completely unaware of it.

Indeed, an online search for the piece, titled “How the CIA Views the UFO Phenomenon”, yields very few results. While the Internet provides access to vast numbers of UFO-related documents, books, articles and blogs, one of the most important pieces ever written on the topic, authored by a knowledgeable government insider, has been almost completely overlooked.

Interestingly, when I attempted to post Marchetti’s informed disclosures at a popular blog operated by journalist Billy Cox, my comments and link to the article disappeared into the cybervoid. Repeated attempts met the same fate and, when I subsequently asked Cox to post them for me, he encountered the same problem.

Cox later told me, “I managed to get your post on my blog just now, but it took some doing. When I tried to do it normally, by putting your name and email address in the cue fields, it simply wouldn’t post; I kept getting a message saying it had already been posted, which obviously it had not. And of course when I try to reply to your messages lately, it bounces back as undeliverable. I wound up having to publish it under my name, then going in behind the post and replacing my name/address with yours. Very strange, Robert.”

I told Cox one might argue that efforts had been undertaken, by an unknown party, to block Marchetti’s revelations from being made more accessible online. Lest this charge seem too paranoid, I added that I had often had to endure such anomalies when attempting to communicate with my ex-military sources regarding their involvement in UFO incidents at nuclear weapons sites.

Furthermore, my attempts over the years to post those individuals’ disclosures at various blogs had frequently encountered the same sort of disconnects. Nevertheless, some of those dramatic revelations—involving UFOs shutting down American nuclear missiles—were livestreamed by CNN during my 2010 press conference in Washington D.C.:


In any case, Marchetti’s lengthy article contains important information about the CIA’s secret involvement, as well as its self-proclaimed non-involvement, with the UFO phenomenon. He writes, “I do know that the CIA and U.S. Government have been concerned over the UFO phenomenon for many years and that their attempts, both past and recent, to discount the significance of the phenomenon and to explain away the apparent lack of official interest in it have all the earmarkings of a classic intelligence cover-up.”

To give you a sense of the author’s importance, the agency once took Marchetti all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, to attempt to stop the publication of his tome, The CIA and the Cult of Intelligence, which subsequently became a best-seller in 1974. The disenchanted agency man had resigned from the CIA in 1969; his book was an unprecedented, historic exposé of his former employer’s numerous illegal activities—including spying on Americans, something forbidden by its charter—many of which were later investigated by Congress.

In short, Marchetti was especially dangerous to CIA simply because he knew so much about its operations, legal or not, and was willing to divulge them to the world as a hoped-for partial antidote.

While this same informed-observer status and careful, thoughtful analysis underpins Marchetti’s revelations about the agency’s relationship to UFOs, it must be remembered that CIA’s approach to all subjects is the use of compartmentalization, whereby any given individual’s knowledge is usually limited to one small part of a project or operation, to keep an overall understanding of the situation restricted to a very few high-level managers. The same was/is true with UFOs and, therefore, Marchetti can only report on what he personally knew, given that he was not involved with the agency’s apparent UFO projects/operations and had no need-to-know about them.

Nevertheless, his published comments are noteworthy. He writes:
During my years in the CIA, UFOs were not a subject of common discussion. But neither were they treated in a disdainful or derisive manner, especially not by the agency’s scientists. Instead, the topic was rarely discussed at internal meetings. It seemed to fall into the category of ‘very sensitive activities’...People simply did not talk about the UFO phenomenon.

There were, however, rumors at high levels of the CIA—rumors of...little gray men whose ships had crashed, or had been shot down, being kept ‘on ice’ by the Air Force at FTD (the Foreign Technology Division) at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio.1
Please note that Marchetti used the word “rumors”. Again, this is the result of his own non-involvement in whatever “very sensitive activities” CIA had going on relating to the UFO phenomenon. Consequently, whatever information Marchetti was privy to resulted from informal and undoubtedly unauthorized chitchat he had encountered in the corridors of CIA headquarters.

But if stories of crashed UFOs and the bodies of the crews being kept in cold storage were being discussed at “high levels” within the agency, one can infer that those rumors were taken seriously. One might also speculate that information about all of this had been secured by CIA agents, probably by spying on the U.S. Air Force.

One important aspect of Marchetti’s revelation is the timing of the discussion at CIA. Marchetti resigned in 1969, nearly a decade prior to the seminal disclosures by retired U.S. Army counterintelligence officer Jesse Marcel who, during a television interview in 1978, divulged that he had held in his hands wreckage from a craft “not of this Earth” that had crashed northwest of Roswell Army Air Field in July 1947.

Confirmation of this event originates with another credible person, USAF Brigadier General Arthur E. Exon, who has stated for the record that one or more plane-loads of that wreckage did indeed arrive at Wright Field (later renamed Wright-Patterson Air Force Base) shortly thereafter and was subjected to intense analysis by aeronautical engineers. During an audiotaped interview with Roswell researcher Dr. Kevin D. Randle, in 1990, Exon said:
...They knew they had something new in their hands. The metal and material was unknown to [everyone] I talked to. Whatever they found, I never heard what the [analytical] results were. A couple of guys thought it might be Russian, but the overall consensus was that the pieces were from space. Everyone from the White House on down knew that what we had found was not of this world within 24 hours of our finding it…Roswell was the recovery of a craft from space.2
All of Exon’s published comments regarding the matter may be read at roswellproof.homestead.com/exon.html.

A number of UFO debunkers have claimed that the Roswell UFO crash story is a “modern myth” that originated as a result of public fascination with the writings of Stanton Friedman, Bill Moore, and others in the 1979-80 time-frame, which incorporated Marcel’s candid remarks about his involvement in the discovery of the mysterious wreckage in 1947.

However, in light of Marchetti’s revelations, this simply cannot be true. Given his resignation from CIA in 1969, he had to have heard those high level “rumors” about crashed UFOs and dead aliens stored at Wright-Patterson prior to that time.

In his article, Marchetti theorizes that the primary reason underlying the U.S. government’s refusal to acknowledge the reality of UFOs, if indeed the craft are piloted by alien beings, results from its fear that existing power structures would be fundamentally undermined by such an admission. He writes:
...the U.S. Government, in collusion with other national powers of the Earth, is determined to keep this information from the general public. The purpose of the international conspiracy is to maintain a workable stability among the nations of the world and for them, in turn, to retain institutional control over their respective populations. Thus, for these governments to admit there are beings from outer space attempting to contact us, beings with mentalities and technological capabilities obviously far superior to ours, could, once fully perceived by the average person, erode the foundations of the Earth's traditional power structure. Political and legal systems, religions, economic and social institutions could all soon become meaningless in the mind of the public. The national oligarchical establishments, even civilization as we know it, could collapse into anarchy. Such extreme conclusions are not necessarily valid, but they probably accurately reflect the fears of the "ruling class" of the major nations, whose leaders (particularly those in the intelligence business) have always advocated excessive governmental secrecy as being necessary to preserve "national security." The real reason for such secrecy is, of course, to keep the public uninformed, misinformed, and, therefore, malleable.3
Given that so much information, misinformation, disinformation, speculation, and general bullshit about UFOs is available on the Internet, one must of necessity carefully choose which material to ingest. Marchetti’s unique, informed, credible perspective should be added to the short list of must-reads.

References:

1. Marchetti, Victor, "How The CIA Views The UFO Phenomenon", Second Look, Vol. 1, No. 7, May 1979

2. Randle, Dr. Kevin D., Roswell UFO Crash Update: Exploring the Military Cover-up of the Century, Inner Light - Global Communications, February 1995

3. Marchetti, Victor, "How The CIA Views The UFO Phenomenon", Second Look, Vol. 1, No. 7, May 1979

Sunday, February 22, 2015

How the CIA Views the UFO Phenomenon

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How the CIA Views the UFO Phenomenon

Retro Friday: a blast from the past


By Billy Cox
De Void
2-20-15

Victor Marchetti
Whistleblower Victor Marchetti charged the 'Clandestine Services' branch of the CIA with responsibility for keeping tabs on global UFO events/CREDIT: phil-mershon.blogspot.com
Before blowing the whistle on America's illegal covert Cold War activities, Victor Marchetti was a 14-year CIA veteran ultimately promoted to executive assistant to The Agency's Deputy Director. After resigning in 1969, he wrote two exposes -- 1971's The Rope Dancer, and The CIA and the Cult of Intelligence in 1974. The latter, which the federal government attempted to ban from publication, was among the many slings and arrows contributing to the formation of the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence hearings in 1975.

In 1979, Marchetti stoked yet another controversy by providing a rare if not largely speculative glimpse into the mindset of The Agency's uneasy relationship with The Great Taboo. Titled "How the CIA Views the UFO Phenomenon," Marchetti's magazine piece took a cautious approach. "The topic was rarely discussed at internal meetings," he wrote. "It seemed to fall into the category of 'very sensitive activities,' e.g., drug and mind-control operations, domestic spying, and other illegal actions. People simply did not talk about the UFO phenomenon."

Thanks to an assist from UFOs and Nukes author Robert Hastings, De Void is posting the article in its entirely. It's a lengthy piece -- you probably won't have time to read it at your work desk. But it's worth your time to see how little has changed, even with nearly 36 years worth of additional data, the collapse of the USSR, and allegations of buried UFO material from yet another former CIA operator three years ago.


How the CIA Views the UFO Phenomenon


By Victor Marchetti
SECOND LOOK
Vol. 1, No. 7
May 1979
     There are many myths, few facts, and much speculation about what the CIA knows of the UFO phenomenon. These, combined with the public's distrust of the clandestine agency, have led to a strong popular belief that the CIA is at the center of a government-wide conspiracy to cover-up the truth about UFOs. It usually follows that the cover-up is designed to keep us ignorant, or at least confused and doubtful, about contacts or visitations by intelligent beings from outer space. Thus, if we only knew what the CIA knows, and is covering up, we would be better able to understand and deal with aliens. And that would be a good thing. I do not know from my own firsthand experience if there are UFOs. I have never seen one. Nor have I seen conclusive, empirical, or physical evidence that they really exist. But, I do know that the CIA and U.S. Government have been concerned over the UFO phenomenon for many years and that their attempts, both past and recent, to discount the significance of the phenomenon and to explain away the apparent lack of official interest in it have all the earmarkings of a classic intelligence cover-up. My theory is that we have, indeed, been contacted--perhaps even visited-- by extraterrestrial beings, and that the U.S. Government, in collusion with other national powers of the Earth, is determined to keep this information from the general public. The purpose of the international conspiracy is to maintain a workable stability among the nations of the world and for them, in turn, to retain institutional control over their respective populations. Thus, for these governments to admit there are beings from outer space attempting to contact us, beings with mentalities and technological capabilities obviously far superior to ours, could, once fully perceived by the average person, erode the foundations of the Earth's traditional power structure. Political and legal systems, religions, economic and social institutions could all soon become meaningless in the mind of the public. The national oligarchical establishments, even civilization as we know it, could collapse into anarchy. Such extreme conclusions are not necessarily valid, but they probably accurately reflect the fears of the “ruling class” of the major nations, whose leaders (particularly those in the intelligence business) have always advocated excessive governmental secrecy as being necessary to preserve "national security." The real reason for such secrecy is, of course, to keep the public uninformed, misinformed, and, therefore, malleable. During my years in the CIA, UFOs were not a subject of common discussion. But neither were they treated in a disdainful or derisive manner, especially not by the agency's scientists. Instead, the topic was rarely discussed at internal meetings. It seemed to fall into the category of “very sensitive activities”, e.g., drug and mind-control operations, domestic spying, and other illegal actions. People simply did not talk about the UFO phenomenon. There were, however, rumors at high levels of the CIA.....rumors of unexplained sightings by qualified observers, of strange signals being received by the National Security Agency (the US Government's electronic intercept and communications intelligence collector), and even of little gray men whose ships had crashed, or had been shot down, being kept "on ice" by the Air Force at FTD (Foreign Technology Division) at Wright- Patterson AF Base in Dayton, Ohio. And there was the odd case of the lady from Maine who, while in a hypnotic trance, had allegedly communicated with a starship. Most of these rumors, I found to be unimpressive—except for the strange signals from outer space being received by NSA. Perhaps that was because I had once been an NSA officer. Or perhaps it was because I had frequent contact with that agency while serving with the CIA, and the little I learned of the signals was treated with extreme caution even by SIGINT standards. But let us assume that there have been contacts by intelligent beings from beyond the Earth. How would the CIA and US Government respond to such a phenomenon? The first order of business would be to determine whether UFOs were secret weapons of the Soviet Union or some other foreign nation. The task of coordinating this program would be given to the CIA because it is the President's personal intelligence organization and the nation's only non- departmental, or independent, intelligence component. As such, it is charged, among other things, with performing "services of common concern" which relate to "intelligence affecting the national security." However, the military intelligence services, NSA, and other agencies and departments would also participate in the collection and analytical efforts under the program. If it were concluded that UFOs were not of terrestrial origin but, rather, vehicles from outer space, the next step would be to assess their weaponry capabilities and the intentions of the aliens controlling the ships. At this point, the CIA and US Government, aware that the phenomenon was of a worldwide nature, would seek cooperation in the investigation from the Earth's other technically advanced nations, such as the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and even the USSR. The CIA would function as the US Government's agent, just as the KGB would be the USSR's, MI-6 would be the UK's, and so on. These agencies, in addition to specializing in secrecy and deceit, are quite accustomed to cooperating with each other on matters of mutual interest. Cooperation in the intelligence business is not restricted to allies. There are times when the CIA and KGB have found it advantageous to work together. One example is the production and publication of Khrushchev Remembers, the "memoirs" of the former Soviet leader--a ruse on the public which is actively being continued to this day. Furthermore, both the CIA and KGB sometimes "declare," i.e. identify, their officers to each other in order to facilitate the smooth functioning of clandestine intelligence activities. Even the famous U-2 program was conducted with mutual understanding --until the Soviets shot down Francis Gary Powers. According to the Chief of the CIA's Clandestine Services it was an example of two hostile governments collaborating to keep operations secret from general public of both nations. "Unfortunately, there aren't enough of these situations," he said. But before full cooperation on the UFO phenomena was achieved, there might be a period of suspicion and perhaps competition, each government hoping to gain some advantage over the others through the use of aliens and their superior scientific knowledge. It would soon, however, become apparent to all the nations involved that this was not feasible and that the UFO phenomenon was a common problem. Thus, cooperation, secret cooperation, would become a fact. Later, after further study, if it were judged that UFOs were harmless, perhaps even unarmed, vehicles from outer space controlled by aliens seeking merely to observe the Earth and its peculiar inhabitants....like so many galactic Jane Goodall's studying chimps in their native environment....and, therefore, presented no direct, hostile threat to the Earth's power structure, then another collective decision would have to be made. Should the public be told the full and true story of the phenomenon ? It is unlikely, for the reasons mentioned earlier, that any government aware of the UFO facts would deem it necessary or wise to inform its people of the truth. Governments prefer an ignorant and gullible public because an unknowing public is much more easily manipulated. In fact, that is one of the major reasons for so much governmental secrecy and official disinformation. Once the international cover-up had been decided, the CIA and US Government would act pretty much the way they have with regard to the UFO phenomenon. There would be a prestigious scientific group (the Robertson Panel) convened to declare that UFOs were no threat to the national security. The fact that the panel's conclusions were not immediately made public is of no great consequence. Here, the primary consideration would be to turn off the speculation brewing among the military, bureaucrats, and other secondary levels (including the US Congress) of the governmental apparatus. The information would eventually filter down to the news media and public. But, because of the intensity of public curiosity, a formal investigation (Project Blue Book) would be launched, after a couple of false starts. And when public interest continued to build, another scientific panel (the Condon Group) was assembled to assure us that there were no such things as UFOs. With that accomplished the US Government--the Earth's spokesman on the issue--could call off all further official investigations, slamming the lid of secrecy on the problem. But despite governmental proclamations, the sightings--often by astronauts, professional pilots, and even prospective presidents--have continued. Public pressure is again building for an honest, authoritative explanation of UFOs. Of all the evidence that exist with regard to UFOs, the single, most impressive item (to my mind) is the Jimmy Carter experience. One night in Georgia in 1973, the man who was destined to become the President of the US and his son, Jeff, saw what they believed to be a UFO. Three years later when campaigning for the presidency , Carter promised to make "every piece of information the country has about UFOs available to the public." He never fulfilled that pledge. Nor has he ever again spoken out publicly on the subject. Meanwhile, his White House staff has parried all queries on the matter and both his Director of NASA, Robert Frosch, and Secretary of Defense Harold Brown, have officially dismissed the UFO phenomenon as nothing more than something that exists only in the public's imagination. This sequence of events can mean only one of three things. What Jimmy Carter saw in 1973 was:

• A) a reflection of a physical event which has since been explained to him:

• B) the testing of a secret weapon to which he is now privy, but for reasons of "national security" it is still a secret: or

• C) a UFO.
If what President Carter saw falls into category "a," there is no reason why he could not publicly say so. As presidents go, he has been relatively humble and honest on other matters of personal embarrassment. If it falls into category "b," there is again no reason why he should not admit to the fact. There is no way that such a weapon system could possibly still be a secret from the Soviets. But if what he saw was a UFO--and there is a secret international agreement among the great powers to withhold this information from the people--then Mr. Carter would act exactly the way he has. He is neither smart enough nor tough enough to override the pressures of the Establishment. Thus, the CIA would be called upon once again. This time to release to the public all the information it has regarding the UFO phenomenon.....after, of course, the usual and long ritualistic procedures of litigation under the Freedom of Information Act. We can safely assume, however, that the CIA would not disclose everything it knows or that it would reveal any data it believes would not advance the UFO cover-up. The CIA, like other intelligence organization, has little respect for the public's right to know. It is an attitude they all consistently display. Ironically, however, among the vast body of circumstantial evidence pointing to the existence of UFOs or contacts from outer space, the FOIA documents recently provided by the CIA have done more to make the public suspect there is an official conspiracy than any of the recent sightings or reports of encounters. In fact, the entire FOIA exercise has the same aroma of the agency's previous messy efforts to hide its involvement in drugs and mind-control operations, both prime examples of a successful intelligence cover-up. The CIA, under the scrutiny of Congress, admitted only to experiments and a few operational indiscretions which occurred mostly in the 1950's and 60's. There was little or no disclosure of the full operational use of drugs and mind control techniques. The stratagem employed by the agency was, as it is known in the business, a "limited hangout," i.e., admitting to a few past errors then declaring the program has ended and, therefore, there is nothing else to tell. With that, all investigations come to a halt. The FOIA/UFO exercise is stained with the same telltale spottiness. Furthermore, the conduct and conclusions of the Robertson Panel (1953) and the Colorado Group (1969) are suspiciously similar to those concerning another great mystery--the JFK assassination. The findings of the Warren Commission in 1964 and, for all practical purposes, those of the House Select Committee on Assassinations (1978/9) differ from the UFO studies only in that the former sought to promote a "lone nut killer" hypothesis while the latter offered a "multiple nut believer" explanation. Regardless of its shortcomings, the recently released CIA information does, however, tell us something...perhaps more than the government thinks. From the very beginning in 1947, the CIA closely monitored UFO reports on a worldwide basis. Although most of the FOIA documents indicate only a routine interest in the problem which was handled largely by the Foreign Broadcast Information Service. Foreign Documents Division, and the Domestic Contact Service--all innocuous, non-clandestine collection units--they also disclose by inference a standing requirement of the Directorate of Science and Technology for gathering UFO data. This, in turn, indicates other collection components, namely the Clandestine Services, the CIA's main directorate, was tasked with providing information from all over the world on the UFO phenomenon. However, few such reports were released--and that implies a cover-up ! By 1953, the US Government, acting through the CIA and using the vehicle of the Robertson Panel, had clearly decided to cap the persistent public rumors of UFO sightings and extraterrestrial contacts. The panel concluded that UFOs were not a direct or hostile threat to national security but that continued emphasis of the phenomenon could clog the communication channels of the establishment or cultivate a morbid national psychology which enemy propaganda might exploit. For good measure, the panel recommended that the public should be "educated" to recognize real hostile actions against the nation and the UFOs be stripped of their "mysterious aura." Very nifty. The tone and timing of the Robertson Panel were almost perfect. In early 1953, the nation was preoccupied with the Korean War in particular and the Cold War in general. Stalin was not yet dead. There were almost daily confrontations with Communists somewhere in the world. A new terror weapon had just been introduced into the arms race--the hydrogen bomb. General Curtis LeMay of the Strategic Air Command was warning of the "bomber gap." And Senator Joe McCarthy was scaring the bejesus out of everybody in Washington, including the CIA. Furthermore, there was no self-respecting accredited scientist prepared to risk his reputation by challenging the government's position on UFOs. Thus, the Robertson Panel provided an excellent opportunity to sweep the phenomenon under the rug of official secrecy. There is one other thing about the Robertson Panel that has always puzzled me. Nowhere in its report does the panel deny the existence of UFOs. The panel only addresses the question of UFOs as a "possible threat to national security" and concludes there is no direct evidence indicating such a threat. Could it be that the evidence showed that UFOs did exist, but the data revealed that the extraterrestrial contacts were of a benign nature, i.e., there were no "foreign artifacts capable of hostile acts" and, therefore no "direct physical threat to national security?" After the Robertson Panel, there was a curious development. The CIA, according to the FOIA documents, apparently faded into the background. The Air Force assumed responsibility for the UFO problem and initiated a series of reviews culminating in Project Blue Book and the Condon's Colorado Study. But the CIA continued "unofficially" to follow developments concerning the phenomenon...and to display an uneasy, overly cautious, even defensive attitude toward outside curiosity about its UFO work. In fact, during the preparation of the Condon Panel's report, the CIA reacted so skittishly in providing aid to the panel that one can only wonder if the agency was attempting to hide something from the Air Force.....not an unusual occurrence in the inter-tribal relations of the US intelligence community. The performance is reminiscent of how the CIA responded to the first public revelations that it was deeply involved in illegal drug and domestic spying operations. In December 1969, the findings of the Condon Panel were made public by the Department of Defense. Again, it was concluded that UFOs were no threat to national security, and we were given the added assurance that those sightings (roughly one-half of one percent) categorized as "unidentified" evidenced no technical capabilities beyond our scientific knowledge. A rather odd commentary. In addition, the panel stated there was no evidence that UFO sightings (not contacts or signals) represented extraterrestrial visitations. A flat statement that was supported by no empirical evidence.....only the panel's opinion. Were the panelists again begging the question? With the release of the Condon Report, Project Blue Book was canceled, and the Air Force, like the CIA , seemed to drop out of the UFO business. The timing of the Condon Report, like that of the Robertson Panel, was, to say the least, interesting. We were fighting--and losing--a war in Vietnam. There was severe domestic turmoil caused by the civil rights and peace movements. Again, the nation was not, at the time, much concerned with UFOs. Perhaps that is why the government opted for a flat denial. It was another excellent chance to stop all the speculation about UFOs and to further sweep the phenomenon under the rug of official secrecy. But ten years have gone by since the Air Force allegedly closed its UFO shop and more than fifteen years since the CIA claims to have lost interest in the subject. The sightings and contacts, however, continue --not only by questionable sources. Even the President of the United States thinks he saw a UFO. Thus, we are left with five possible conclusions.
ONE: The US Government is trying to keep certain super weapon systems secret from the Soviets. In this age of advanced electronic, photographic, and other intelligence sensors, when the testing of a new system begins by any nation, the other participants in the geopolitical game soon learn of it.

TWO: The US Government, in cooperation with its allies, is playing a game with such rivals as the USSR, trying to confuse them with false reports of UFOs. The state of the art in intelligence collection and analysis, as well as science, precludes the possibility of such a ruse.

THREE: The US and its allies are attempting to keep UFOs a secret from the USSR. The Soviets, however, are as astute in space science as we are. If we know about UFOs, so do they...and so do all the technically advanced nations.

FOUR: There are no UFOs, nor have there ever been any contacts from outer space. However, the amount of circumstantial evidence to the contrary (including indications that our planet may have been visited in the distant past by extraterrestrials) argues against this conclusion--or at least for further study of the UFO phenomenon. FIVE: There are UFOs or there have been contacts--if only signals --from outer space, but the evidence reveals the aliens are interested only in observing us. They have no hostile intentions and are no direct threat to any nation. But public knowledge of these facts could become a threat. If the existence of UFOs were to be officially confirmed, a chain reaction could be initiated that would result in the collapse of the Earth's present power structure. Thus, a secret international understanding--a conspiracy -- has been agreed to by the world powers to keep the public ignorant of and confused about contacts or visitations from beyond Earth.
Victor Marchetti was the executive assistant to the Deputy Director of the CIA and is the co-author of "The CIA and the Cult of Intelligence," the only book ever censored by the US Government prior to publication up to 1979. He lives in suburban Washington D.C.