Project Blue Book said they received many false UFO reports prompted by aircraft, balloons and the like, but also a lesser number from the category labelled as “Other,” which included: “missiles, reflections, mirages, searchlights, birds, kites, spurious radar indications, hoaxes, fireworks, and flares.” Kites. This is another scrapbook edition of STTF, and this time on the flying saucer-kite connection
Illustration is based on the famous 1966 “Swamp Gas” press conference with Blue Book consultant, Dr. J. Allen Hynek.
Sir Isaac Newton, UFO hoaxer.
As a boy, Isaac Newton was fascinated with John Bate’s 1634 Mysteries of Nature and Art, and
built contraptions described in it. According to Sam Kean, Newton, “also
built a lantern described therein, tied it to a kite, and flew it at night near
his home, a spectacle ‘which wonderfully affrighted all the neighboring inhabitants,’
he recalled.”
Clipping from Odd Fellow's Talisman and Literary Journal, Jan. 1878. Illustration from Mysteries
of Nature and Art.
Echoing Newton’s kite was one of the earliest hoaxes
of the flying saucer age, a prank by the boys of the Flying Kilroy Model Club
of Hayward, California. They flew a black kite at night with a silver disc
painted on it, with members pretending to be astonished onlookers.
Hayward Daily Review
(CA) July 12, 1947
The Saucers May Be Mine
Inventor Harold E. Dunn said he wondered if test flights of
his new silver conical kite were responsible for some of the early flying
saucer sightings. And he made sure to point out, by the way, they’d be on sale
soon at a retailer near you.
Amarillo Daily News, Aug. 1, 1947
Corpus-Christi Caller-Times,
Aug. 10, 1947
The Flying Discs vs the Flying Saucers
Jesse C. Donaldson’s invention of the “Wirl Wing
Controllable Flying Discs” was featured in Life magazine Dec. 1947, but
the complete name of the product was not given, and there was no reference to
flying saucers made.
1948 advertisement for the Wirl Wing from Sunday color
newspaper comics section.
The Los Angeles Times
April 30, 1948 Jesse C. Donaldson took Theodore S. Lundgren to court over the
virtually identical “the Flying Saucers” kite. The judge dismissed the case.
The Los Angeles Times May
6, 1948
Gremlins and Saucers from Above
Life magazine April18, 1949 called the Magikite, the kite had a bag/clip system
that could release a payload of aerial toys ranging from Army paratroopers and
gremlins to flying saucers.
A Fake and a Mistake from 1950
The Estherville Daily News April
5, 1950
William Allison was the inventor of a polymorphic kite that was spotted in Dayton, Ohio, not far from the Air Force’s saucer HQ at Wright Field.
The Times News
(Idaho) Oct. 8, 1950
Saucers to Build or Buy
Two of many 1950s saucer-related kites: Boy’s Life
magazine directions for a saucer-shaped kite, and the space-themed kite from Alox
which featured flying saucers.
The Captured UFO of 1967
In 1967 the US was still in the "Swamp Gas” wave of
flying saucer sighting, many of which were caused by hoaxes launched by kids,
such as small hot air balloons. Below is a case from Galesburg, Illinois found in the files of Project Blue Book.
Galesburg Register-Mail, March 14, 1967
One UFO
Case Solved
The mystery of one UFO in the Galesburg area was solved
Monday night. Guards at Butler Manufacturing Co. sighted it shortly before
midnight and began following it. They found a string and hauled in the UFO. It
was a red plastic kite with a flashlight bulb and two batteries. The wiring was
with rigged so that the swing of the kite which caused a bulb to flash.
Depending upon the direction of the kite, either a red or white light was seen.
Looking over the kite are Patrolman Edmund Watson, Capt. Eugene Smith and
Patrolman Earl Wilson.
Project Blue Book was delighted to have a captured kite as evidence that many flying saucers were just hoaxes, pranks, and cases of mistaken identity. Galesburg Police Department
report in Project Blue Book files.
Similar kite pranks continued at least into the 1970s.
Associated Press, Nov. 6, 1974
Back to the Forties
While not really a kite, rawin radar reflector targets
were kite-like structures, foil attached to balsa wood frame, carried aloft by balloons.
Hundreds of these were launched in military tests in the 1940s, and many of
them dropped from the sky and were found by civilians.
Madison Wisconsin State Journal, July 7, 1947
From 1947 on, this foil debris
was frequently mistaken for flying saucers, and some were featured quite
prominently in the news.
70 years ago, a letter launched the Air Force
investigation of an “Unidentified Aerial Object.”
Martin W. Peterson lived
in Cincinnati, Ohio, but held a seasonal job as a summer
school metal shop teacher in Warren, Minnesota. While there in 1948, his
friend Walter Sirek found a strange object embedded
in the ground behind Nish’s Tavern. It was a metal disc-like object with fins
like a rocket. When they examined it, they found it to be about two feet in diameter,
and the fins on either side of the jet or rocket exhaust port had scorch marks.
Peterson photographed Sirek holding the object
but did not report the discovery to the authorities.
After the 1950 publication
of Donald Keyhoe’s book, The Flying Saucer Saucers Are Real, the
resulting publicity caused a friend to suggest to Peterson that he should
submit his evidence to the US government. In his letter dated June 19, 1950,
Peterson sent in a short letter reporting the saucer discovery:
Dear Sir:
I am anxious to know what this contraption is. It was
found with its point buried in the hard ground in my home town some time ago.
I have enclosed my return addressed envelope for an
answer and the snap shots.
Yours most
sincerely,
Martin
W. Peterson
Enclosed were four snapshots, which were
subsequently labeled exhibits A - D.
Only three of the four photos were collected in Air Force files, each with Sirek's face obscured.
The two versions found in published versions of Project Blue Book Records.
On the lower set we've superimposed Sirek's photo from Cosmopolitan.
The Air Force launched an extensive inquiry
that involved an analysis of the photographs object which included dispatching
agents from the Chicago Office of Special Investigations to check on the credibility
of Peterson and to interview him and any other witnesses.
National Press
The newspapers first got word of the story when Air Force
files were opened to columnist Bob Considine. As a result, Considine wrote a four-part series on flying saucers, and in the final installment prominently discussed the
Minnesota saucer, exposing it as a fake, apparently an unintentional hoax. The story as printed in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch
(Missouri) Nov. 19, 1950:
Hoax Aspect of Flying Saucer Story
Practical Jokers Keep Air Force Busy Solving Their
Fakes
Drew Pearson also mentioned the episode in his
nationally syndicated “Washington Merry-Go-Round” column on Nov. 25, 1950.
For Cosmopolitan magazine, January, 1951, Bob Considine repackaged his saucer series into a long article, “The disgraceful flying Saucer hoax.” The excerpt on the saucer rocket:
On June 19,
1950, the Air Materiel Command received a letter from one Martin W.
Peterson. Enclosed were four snapshots of a friend holding an odd object
with a saucerlike body. From its thin sides, there protruded what appeared to
be the tip of a spear and the fins and exhaust-pipe assembly of a miniature
V-2.
Peterson was located in Warren, Minnesota.
So was his friend, the saucer man — Walter Sirek, a gas-station
attendant. Sirek told the investigators that he had found the strange
device two years before, imbedded in the earth behind Nish’s Tavern, in
Warren. He had figured, he said, that it was the work of a local tinsmith
named Art Jensen. Jensen, when questioned, remembered putting something
of the sort together at the request of a Warren hardware man named Ted Heyen
and a radio repairman named Robert Schaeffer — as a gag entry in a local
newspaper “saucer contest.” An acetylene torch had been played over the
tail surfaces to give them the appearance of having been scorched by gases
escaping from the hauntingly familiar “engine” encased in the saucer.
Heyen and Schaeffer tired of their gadget after
a time and threw it away. Sirek found it. Peterson, visiting Sirek
shortly thereafter, took snapshots of Sirek holding the contraption — and two
years later sent them to the Air Materiel Command.
It took this particular investigative chain
reaction from June nineteenth to September twenty-seventh to run its
course. Agents had to be transported from Wright Field, Washington, and
elsewhere to the points of inquiry, fed, housed, and paid. The fruits of
their labors were a few apologies and the saucer — which had been made of the
lid of an automatic washing machine, a sawed-off curtain-rod spear, tin tail
assembly, and an “engine” composed of a disemboweled midget radio and an old
insecticide bomb.
More malicious gagsters have taken the trouble to buy and crudely assemble mounds of scrap steel and iron, burn the junk into an unrecognizable tangle, and report to the Air Force that a saucer had crashed and burned on their property. However plain the hoax, the Air Force often feels that it must take samples of the "wreckage" for study in its Wright Field laboratories or in other metallurgical centers.
And nothing can be done about such frauds. A man who pilfers a three-cent stamp from the Post Office Department can be fined and sent to a Federal prison. One who turns in a false alarm that routs out the local fire department on a Halloween night can also be jailed, as can a man who writes a check for a dollar when he has no bank funds to cover it. Yet the most callous and cynical saucer-hoaxers will continue to go scot free, with a cackle of delight, until a penal act is created to check such offenses.
Considine got one fact wrong. The Air Force’s analysis
of the object was based only on the photos, the object itself was never recovered.
The file notes than in light of the confession, “no attempt was made to locate
the ‘aerial object.’ …the large amount of junk at the city dump… is
periodically covered over by earth by a bulldozer.”
Walter Sirek and the “Unidentified Aerial Object.”
While this man-made saucer was not created for a hoax, it ended up sending the Air Force on a wild goose chase. Nevertheless, it provides a good example as to the kind of work put into saucer investigations, and reveals how much was often spent chasing so little.
For more details on the Air Force’s investigation, see
the file in Project Blue Book.
. . .
Trivia Across Time
Two familiar names coincidentally pop up in the story. Coast
to Coast hardware employed Ted Heyen, and his saucer building partner was a
radio repairman named Robert Schaeffer. In more recent years, Coast
to Coast A.M. is a radio show is broadcasting wild UFO stories, the sort which
are often debunked by skeptic Robert Sheaffer.
What did Dashiell Hammett have to do with flying
saucers? Nothing, but the characters he created are a different story. One of them is remarkably similar to the legend of the alien bodies record at Roswell, New Mexico.
Dashiell Hammett is best known for his 1930
detective novel, The Maltese Falcon, which was later made into the
classic 1941 film starring Humphrey Bogart as Sam Spade. A few years later, The
Adventures of Sam Spade radio program that ran from 1946 - 1951. The
sponsor was Wildroot Cream-Oil, who also used Hammett’s character in a series
of single-page advertisementsin newspapers and magazines disguised as comic strips.
Although he had nothing to do with the ads, the comics were called, “Dashiell Hammett’s Adventures of Sam Spade,” and the March
19, 1950 episode was titled, “The Case of the Flying Saucer.”
Later the same year, another of Hammett’s
characters was drawn into an even bigger story, one about a captured flying
saucer and alien bodies - both dead and alive. But first, let’s skip ahead for a
moment to 1958.
The Thin Man
Hammett’s 1934 novel The Thin Man had
several movies based on the characters, Nick and Nora Charles, and was later
the basis for a television series on NBC from 1957–59, starring Peter Lawford
and Phyllis Kirk.
Opening credits to The Thin Man
Like with Hammett’s other characters, the series was
mostly detective stories, but once again, flying saucers entered the picture.
Episode 32 of season one was titled, “The Saucer People.” From a newspaper listing
from Aug. 29, 1958:
The Thin Man, starring Peter Lawford. Nick and
Nora Charles investigate“The Saucer People.” A scientist claims he has been
riding in a flying saucer – thereby hoping to devise a scheme for fleecing thousands
from their life savings.
Unfortunately, we were not able to locate a copy of the episode itself.
Secret Agent X-9 and the Captured Saucer of 1950
Along with artist Alex Raymond (the creator of Flash Gordon), Dashiell Hammett created the Secret Agent X-9 newspaper comic strip in 1934.
Hammett left the series after the first year, but it continued a successful run in the hands of other writers and artists until 1996. From 1945 to 1960, the series was written and drawn by Mel Graff, who finally gave X-9 a name, Phil Corrigan. In May to July 1950, Graff featured a story where X-9 was drawn into a sensational case involving a captured flying saucer and the aliens found inside.
STTF reader ISleepNow posted a video on YouTube titled, Secret Agent X-9 "The Day After Aztec," saying, “These panels of the Secret Agent X-9 comic strip… were originally published in May through June of 1950 making them the earliest significant flying saucer story as far as newspaper comic strips were concerned. But of greater concern was the possible truth lying behind them.”
X-9 was back to dealing with more traditional spy business, but later there were at least two other UFO episodes. In Sept. 1966 by Robert Lubbers (aka Bob Lewis), the strip below shows X-9 with "Tracking Control" monitoring a UFO’s
entry into the earth’s atmosphere.
In the hands of writer Archie Goodwin and artist Al Williamson, in 1978, the series featured another UFO storyline, with Corrigan investigating the abduction of the USA's top scientists.
The Stuff that Dreams are Made of
No, Dashiell Hammett didn’t write about saucers,
but his novel The Maltese Falcon was about a struggle over a
priceless relic that turned out to be a counterfeit. That’s something very
similar to the situation ufologists often find themselves in, and a bit like the ending of the HumphreyBogart movie version of Hammett's s novel.
A Robertson Panel of another sort, the Texas UFO mystery metal of 1947.
Leonard Robertson of Perryton, Texas, witnessed a UFO explode in late July 1947, and afterwards he was able to recover a large fragment of it. The incident occurred shortly after the flying disc story in Corona and Roswell, New Mexico, only about 250 miles away. The Texas news appeared on the front page of the Amarillo Daily News on August 6, 1947:
Perryton Man Displays Proof of Saucer Story
PERRYTON, Aug. 5 - Leonard Robertson, former Perryton city marshal and now with O. A. Schuster of the Perryton Gas Company, has proof that he really saw something flying through the air recently. Robertson just realized today that he might be in possession of a flying disk or something odd that flew through the air with the greatest of ease - until it exploded almost in his face. He took his find to Mr. Schuster and Sheriff W. H. Lance, but they haven't been able to help him. Here's Mr. Robertson's story: "I was riding my motorcycle south into Dumas - I believe it was July 25 - when something bright in the sky to my left attracted my attention. I pulled off the road and saw a strange object floating over a field about a mile away. It was kind of oval and looked to be about 15 or 20 feet in circumference. It looked something like a big bubble. "While I was watching it, the durned thing exploded. I saw pieces falling in all directions. I decided to see if I could find some of the pieces so I rode down a side road and walked into the field where I thought the thing fell. This is what I found." Mr. Robertson displayed a piece of what looked like aluminum, but was much lighter. It was about 30 inches long and 24 inches wide and slightly curved. There were two small holes in it and the center appeared to have been burned. Two of the edges showed where they had overlapped another piece. There was neither number nor name of any kind on the piece of material. Mr. Robertson plans to go back and see if he can find more evidence to back his saucer story.
Amarillo Daily News, Aug. 6, 1947
A photograph of the UFO debris taken by Sheriff W. H. Lance appeared in the follow up story on page 5 of the Aug. 9th paper:
Salvage From Mystery Blast
What is it? Leonard Robertson of Perryton discovered this strange object in a field near Dumas recently. He says it is part of a strange object he watched explode near where he was riding his motorcycle. The material is lighter than aluminum and it has two small holes and a burned spot in it. Mr Robertson said the object appeared to be globe-shaped. He couldn't find any other pieces.
Amarillo Daily News, Aug. 9, 1947
We could wish for a more detailed description of the fragment. "Lighter than aluminum," but rectangular and "slightly curved," does not sound like foil from a rawin target, or part of a balloon. Like Mac Brazel before him, Robertson didn't put much significance on the debris until he, "realized today that he might be in possession of a flying disk or something odd..." While it's possible that the report might have been a joke or a hoax, it seems unlikely that Robertson would target his employer and the local sheriff. Robertson’s report apparently went no farther than the local sheriff, and there is no mention of the incident in Project Blue Book files. There was no subsequent press on the UFO incident, and the debris truly can be said to have come from a saucer that time forgot. If there are any readers in the Amarillo area, we ask you to make inquiries to find out what became of this physical evidence.
In the aftermath of the disclosure of the Pentagon's Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program, (AATIP), a new UFO investigation was launched, the Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon Task Force. In July 2020, spokesperson Susan Gough issued a statement to the press describing its purpose:
"...to gain knowledge and insight into the nature and origins of UAPs, as well as their operations, capabilities, performance, and/or signatures. The mission of the task force will be to detect, analyze, catalog, consolidate, and exploit non-traditional aerospace vehicles/UAPs posing an operational threat to U.S. national security and avoid strategic surprise."
Exploit? Yes, and that mission began long ago.
From the moment flying saucers were first seen
in 1947 there’s been an effort to understand them and duplicate the reported
flight performance. There have been many independent efforts ranging from the
sincere to the fraudulent, but that’s not what his piece is about. This
is an examination primarily of US military sponsored efforts to study UFOs for
technological advancements.
When Kenneth Arnold spotted a formation of nine
unidentified flying objects in June of 1947, the notion that they had come from
outer space was not given much serious consideration. The main possibility
discussed was that the objects were new military aircraft, and since the US
wasn’t claiming them, the fear was that the saucers belonged to the Soviet
Union. If so, that meant the Russians had developed supersonic craft with great
range and unconventional maneuvers capable of outflying anything known to man.
The US military response to this was essentially, “If these things are real,
we’ve gotta figure ‘em out and learn how to fight ‘em.” The Cold War was on,
and if the Reds had saucers, we wanted some too. For this purpose, the US set
up an advanced aerospace threat identification program to study these alleged
enemy weapons systems.
The Air Force’s Air Technical Intelligence
Center was put on the job, and the nickname for it was Project Saucer, but
officially Project Sign, then later Grudge and Blue Book. “During World War II
the organization that was ATIC's forerunner, the Air Materiel Command's secret
’T-2,’ had developed highly effective means of wringing out every possible bit
of information about the technical aspects of enemy aircraft. ATIC knew these
methods, but how could this be applied to spaceships?” From The Report on
Unidentified Flying Objects by Edward J. Ruppelt, 1956
Spaceships were actually on a lot of people's
minds well before saucers entered the picture. Not only were some science fiction
writers also engineers, some scientists were in turn inspired by the fantasy. They were already reaching for the stars, but the saucers made
things an immediate non-abstract military problem.
"The Air Technical Intelligence Center is responsible for the prevention of technological surprise." From the Air Force Manual dated May 1953, AFM 200-3, Chapter 9, Page 3.
The Twining Memo and the Engineering Challenge
On September 23, 1947, Lieutenant General Nathan
F. Twining, the Air Materiel Command commander replied to Brigadier General
Schulgen’s request for Technical Intelligence Division's analysis of “flying
discs” to date. It’s chiefly remembered for Twining stating that “The phenomenon is something real and not visionary or
fictitious.“ Less attention has been given to his thoughts about how we could
build our own saucers:
“It is possible within the present U.S.
knowledge—provided extensive detailed development is undertaken—to construct a
piloted aircraft which has the general description of [a metallic flying disc]
which would be capable of an approximate range of 7000 miles at subsonic
speeds.”
Alfred Loedding
Circular aircraft had previously been flown to
varying degrees of success, though nothing that speedy, so it did seem
possible. One of the engineers brought in by Air Force’s Project Sign to study
the sucer puzzle was Alfred Loedding, who specialized in low aspect ratio
aircraft, such as flying wings, delta and swept-wing planes. The study looked
at previous craft and made extrapolations, but concluded that even though a
disc might be flown, no known power source could provide the control or
propulsion needed to mimic the UFOs. Loedding left the program early on, but
interestingly, he filed a patent for a saucer-like plane in 1948, however it
never went beyond the model stage. There were many subsequent projects over the
years that used a lenticular or disc-shaped platform due to the efficiency of
the form, but our focus is on the military tech based on performance, not just
the saucer shape.
Donald Keyhoe quoted “the chief design engineer
of a major aircraft manufacturing company” in his article and book, The Flying Saucers are Real:
“Certainly the flying saucers are possible,” he
said. “Give me enough money and I’ll build you one. It might have
to be a model because the fuel would be a problem. ...they may be powered
by atomic energy… or by some other fuel or natural force that our research
hasn’t yet discovered. But the circular airfoil is quite feasible. It
wouldn’t have the stability of the conventional airplane, but it would have
enormous maneuverability — it could rise vertically, hover, descend vertically,
and fly at extremely high speed, with the proper power. Don’t take my
word for it. Check with other engineers."
Other engineers were on the job. The New
International Year Book: A Compendium Of The World's Progress For The Year 1950,reported: “Rumors and reports of ‘flying saucers’ were rampant throughout
the year of 1950… One thing accomplished by these stories, though, was that
they prompted considerable research along the lines of new airframe types with
more lift and less parasitic drag. Among the new developments which were
accomplished during 1950 in connection with military aviation research was that
of a new lightweight titanium alloy, as strong as high-strength steel and only
half as heavy, for use in new jet planes.”
Saucers prompted developments in other areas as
well. Since an early hypothesis was that saucers were remotely controlled
unmanned probes or missiles, it likely reinforced the importance of testing in
this area. An unmanned aerial vehicle could fly faster, higher and farther
without the burden of supporting a human pilot. White Sands Proving Ground was working on the “development of a tactical supersonic missile
with the remote control and which would intercept flying aircraft at speeds up
to 700 mph at altitude between 8000 and 60,000 feet.”
If nothing else, the threat of flying saucers
pushed the US military to develop faster planes and better radar to detect
them. The saucer’s provided other inspiration, the stealthy low
profile, reconnaissance capabilities and vertical take off and landing.
As for the propulsion, considerable effort went into attempts to develop
nuclear energy and anti-gravity as power sources for flight. On another front,
saucers awakened the worry of the vulnerability of an attack from outside the
atmosphere, so that made space exploration a national priority.
Lockheed and Flying Saucers
Clarence "Kelly" Johnson of Lockheed’s
serious UFO interest can be documented
going back at least as far as 1949. He was their chief research engineer and
wrote the Air Force on behalf of one of his employees who’d witnessed two
flying discs. Evidence suggests that his interest in saucers played a role in
aerospace research and development.
In the early 1950s - Lockheed’s Nathan C. Price
designed a VTOL saucer, and applied for a patent in Jan. 1953. While never developed, he described it as a supersonic aircraft
“designed not only for vertical ascent and descent to facilitate landing and
taking off at small fields or landing areas but also for long range flight at a
Mach number of, say, 4, and at altitudes in the region of 100,000 ft.”
Kelly Johnson went on to develop the U-2 spy
plane for the CIA, which (though exaggerated) was responsible for generating
many UFO reports. For more on Kelly Johnson, Lockheed and flying saucers, see The Lockheed UFO Case by Joel Carpenter. (We have a bit more on Lockheed later on.)
Government Contractors Studied Saucer Tech
According to author Donald E. Keyhoe, following
a Sept. 24, 1959 incident near Redmond, Oregon, where a UFO exhibited
gravity-defying maneuvers, Air Force “headquarters persuaded scientists,
aerospace companies and technical laboratories to set up anti-gravity projects,
many of them under secret contracts. ...In 1965, forty-six unclassified
G-projects were confirmed to me by the Scientific Information Exchange of the
Smithsonian Institution. Of the forty-six, thirty-three were AF-controlled. The
Navy had three; the Army, one; the Atomic Energy Commission one; NASA, two, and
the National Science Foundation, six. In addition, there were at least
twenty-five secret contracts which could not be listed.” (Aliens from Space,
1973)
Engineering interests went back much earlier
than that, and several prominent figures in the aerospace industry were
involved.
The Douglas Aircraft Company conducted a study
of "Unconventional Propulsion Schemes/Systems" for the US Air Force’s
ATIC from 1954-55, headed by Dr. Wolfgang B. Klemperer. Exactly how the
research was used is unknown. For further information, see: Documents located from that 1955 "secret" UAP study by Douglas Aircraft Company by Keith Basterfield.
Aviation executive and inventor William P. Lear
announced his belief in the existence of flying saucers in 1955, stating that
he believed they originate from outer space and “serious efforts are now in
progress to prove the existence of anti-gravitational forces..."
“Guided missile… or flying saucer, AC is ready now!”
AC/General Motors ad, Air Force Magazine, May 1956.
Douglas Aircraft Corporation had an independent
study that is well documented. From 1967 - 1969, Robert Wood and a small group
of engineers at Douglas Aircraft took UFOs seriously and studied them in
detail, with a view to developing a new method of propulsion.
Throughout the 1950s the media continued to speculate that flying saucers were a secret weapon of the US military, but
officials regularly denied it. The Air Force was doubtful that anyone else had
them, but they were a little worried. Project Blue Book’sCapt. Ruppelt wrote in 1952:
“It should be stressed that USAF intelligence
has no indication that any foreign nation has a super-weapon capable of flying
anywhere in the world it will, nor that craft from outer space are coming near
our planet earth. It would be foolish, however, to say that either is
impossible, no matter how highly improbable it may sound. Fifteen years ago,
the atomic bomb was highly improbable.”
There were efforts in the US and abroad, though.
By 1952, the Central Intelligence Agency realized there was the potential to
use flying saucers as a psychological weapon of some sort. Manipulating the enemy into a state of confusion
may have been what they had in mind, and one way to do that was to make UFOs
appear on enemy radar. By the early 1960s, the CIA’s Project Palladium was capable of creating ghost radar targets to distract the enemy
and provide cover for flights of spy planes.
As for physical flying saucers, there were
plans. Air Force Regulation No. 200-2, Aug. 18, 1954 stated their UFO objectives, including:
“Air Force interest in unidentified flying
objects is twofold: First as a possible threat to the security of the United
States and its forces, and secondly, to determine technical aspects involved.
...Technical. ...To measure scientific advances, the Air Force must be
informed on experimentation and development of new air vehicles ...The
possibility exists that an air vehicle of revolutionary configuration may be
developed."
Air Force Intelligence Digest, Dec. 1954 carried the article, "The Flying Disc,”
discussing the possible development of: “New type of jet aircraft, powered by a
turbine larger than any now in use, is expected to take off, land vertically,
and be able to hover. It may cruise at 1,500 knots and have a range of 15,000
nautical miles.” It also gave readers something to worry about:
“One of the big questions now facing the United
States is this: What are the Soviets doing in the disc-aircraft field? ...If
the Soviets now have such an aircraft in operational use, would the United
States air defense system be able to detect, identify, intercept and destroy a
bomber or reconnaissance aircraft moving at a 1,500 knot clip at an altitude of
65,000 feet?”
On Oct. 25, 1955, Air Force secretary Donald A.
Quarles announced that the public should prepare to see a “new phenomenon in
our skies,” man-made objects that could resemble flying saucers.
The News-Herald (Franklin, Pennsylvania) Oct. 26, 1955
Forged on Earth
John Frost of Canada had been developing a
saucer-shaped craft, and the US decided they wanted it. A summary from the Wired
story, “A Saucer From Mars? Nope, Canada” by Charles
Mandel:
“In 1952, Frost began work on the saucer,
showing prototypes in 1953... Among the visitors who saw the first scale
model... was Lt. Gen. Donald Putt, head of the research and development command
of the United States Air Force. Putt gained NASA's approval to start
development of a saucer prototype, providing $2 million to $3 million annually.
...This early saucer, partly funded by the CIA and known as Project Silver
Bug... In the late 1950s, during testing, one of the engines misfired, leading
to a complete evacuation of the testing facility.”
Overlapping Silver Bug was another saucer
project in 1957. The US Continental Army Command (CONARC) wanted Frost to build
a “flying jeep.” It became known as the Arocar. From A History of Army Aviation,1950-1962, section, Flying
Saucer:
In 1957, “a letter was sent to the Chief of
Research and Development, Department of the Army, on 22 October, stating CONARC
interest in the flying saucer concept and requesting initiation of a
feasibility study of a ‘manned flying saucer.’ The Chief of Research and
Development replied on 21 November, advising that he had reviewed a current Air
Force project with AVRO Aircraft, Ltd., of Canada, which was similar to the
Aircrafts Armaments proposal and which appeared promising. … a successful
flying saucer concept could revolutionize the Army's aircraft development and
vehicle program and might be capable of reducing the Army's inventory of
aircraft and vehicles to a minimum.”
The US Army produced the television series The Big Picture from 1950 to 1967. The 1960 episode, "A Sharper Sword and Stronger Shield," which looked to a saucer-shaped armored craft to replace helicopters on the battlefield.
The Big Picture: "A Sharper Sword and Stronger Shield"
The benefits of developing saucer-like craft
were discussed in The Ground-Cushion Phenomenon: Hearings before the Committee on Science and Astronautics: U.S.
House of Representatives, Eighty-sixth Congress, 1959.
The actual development of the Army saucer project fell far short of expectations. Seth B. Anderson wrote, “[NASA's Ames Research
Center at Moffett Field, California] was involved in wind-tunnel and flight
tests of an 18-foot-diameter circular platform vertical takeoff and landing
(VTOL) aircraft built by the Canadian Avro Aircraft firm in the 1960s. ...In
retrospect, the configuration was unquestionably ahead of its time. Certainly,
it had inherent stealth features that would help defy radar detection. However,
with three turbojets and a large high-speed fan, it could be heard long before being
seen. ...Although appealing in an aesthetic sense, it had poor overall
performance potential... In essence, it turned out to be a low-performance
ground-effect machine capable of leaping over 10-foot ditches with comparative
ease.” He did concede that later fly-by wire technology could have solved some
of its stability problems, though.
In 1959, the CIA wanted a spy plane, and they
wanted it to be as swift and stealthy as as a flying saucer.
Eyes in the Sky: Eisenhower, the CIA, and Cold War Aerial Espionage by Dino A. Brugioni, 2010.
Robert Widmer was asked about his work designing
a replacement for the U-2 in the 1999 documentary, Billion Dollar Secret, 1999. In late 1957, Bob Widmer was the head of design at what
was then General Dynamics, Convair Division, working on a program called
FISH—short for First Invisible Super Hustler, to develop the B-58B, a
fast-flying spy plane for the CIA, competing against Lockheed. Widmer described
what they were asked to do:
“We had a program called the Super Hustler. The CIA came here and visited me one day and they said, wasn't
there something I could do with this technology, so we tried to come up with an
airplane that was as near as possible to a saucer... and we did... that's the
Fish… but it really wasn't [saucer-shaped], it was as close as we could get it.
It was always the ideal... sort of the goal that we used.”
The plane was a low-profile, delta-shaped wing
design, and in some respects resembled the F-117 built two decades later. The
plane that won the competition was ultimately the Lockheed-built A-12 Oxcart.
It was tested at Area 51, and the necessary secrecy resulted in many new UFO legends.
Lockheed’s Kelly Johnson and his successor Ben
Rich both had an interest in saucers. In the 1970s, when developing stealth
aircraft, its engineers considered disc-shaped designs. In his 1994 book, Skunk
Works, Ben Rich wrote, "Several of our aerodynamics experts, including
Dick Cantrell, seriously thought that maybe we would do better trying to build
an actual flying saucer. The shape itself was the ultimate in low
observability. The problem was finding ways to make a saucer fly.” The
technology available resulted in the multi-facetted arrowhead-shaped F-117
Nighthawk. Once again, Lockheed’s spy plane test flights generated a number of
UFO reports in the southwest.
Unmanned Flying Objects
Flying saucers were once suspected to be
unmanned surveillance devices from other planets here to spy on us from afar.
Part of the rationale behind that is that not only were some of the saucers
were seemingly too small to contain inhabitants, but the extreme maneuvers they
performed would kill anyone inside from the G-forces generated. Attempts to
duplicate saucer performance also faced that problem even with the limits of
conventional technology. In recent years, that’s not so much a problem since
pilots are often no longer necessary, and free of that baggage, these devices
come close to duplicating the feats of flying saucers.
Often referred to as “drones” remotely piloted
aircraft are most commonly referred to as unmanned aerial systems (UAS) today.
They’ve had a long history, but even in their adolescence the technology was
capable of outperforming manned flight. On May 10, 1972, John C. Smith,
commanding officer of the Top Gun school, as RADAR operator and chief tactician
joined three other combat veterans in F-4 Phantom fighters versus a Teledyne
Ryan Firebee remotely piloted vehicle (RPV) controlled by Cmdr John Pitzen, and
Al Donaldson, who manned the remote control station. New Scientist, Aug. 10,
1972described the outcome:
“The unmanned fighter, operating with only half
the projected capability of future RPVs, executed 6g turns without loss of
altitude, evaded Sparrow and Sidewinder missiles fired by the Phantom, and
scored several simulated ‘kills’ against the manned aircraft.”
Technology has made huge advances since that
1972 Firbee test, and today’s UAS are manufactured in a variety platforms
carrying sensors to weapons systems, and capable of covering great distances
and operating at high altitude for extended periods.
The champ in long endurance flight and altitude
is the Pentagon's X-37B, which is a bit like an unmanned Space Shuttle. Setting
a new record, the OTV-5 landed at Cape Canaveral in October 2019 after spending 780 days in space.
What is its
military mission? Popular Mechanics reported it conducted “seemingly
mundane orbital experiments for the Air Force Research Lab... testing
‘experimental electronics... in the long duration space environment.’ Later,
observers of the X-37B program discovered it also quietly released three satellites...
Their purpose remains unknown.”
Saucer Weapons Systems Tests
Electromagnetic interference has been reported
in saucer sightings since the early days, most famously associated with the
Levelland, Texas, case in 1957 where several automobile engines were reported
to have been killed in the presence of a massive UFO. James T. Westwood has an
interesting background encompassing electronic warfare, unmanned aerial
vehicles, cryptology and was a Sovietologist working as a military intelligence
consultant.
Westwood also had an interest in UFOs, and wrote
several articles, including, “Why do the Lights Go Out?” in UFO Magazine,
May/June 1994, which examined, electrical failures related to UFOs, but he also
looked at microwave radiation as a weapon to produce similar effects:
“Military uses of the microwave region include:
radars of many types, missile weapons control systems, navigation and
electronic warfare (EW) applications that include jamming, electronic deception
and passive intercept.”
Westwood went on to state: “Since about 1980,
the overall intent of military uses of the microwave region (whether of pulsed
or continuous waveforms) has been for both traditional and exotic forms of
electronic warfare. ...actual lethal burning (heat ‘frying’) of electronic
systems; functional jamming of radar and communication receivers and spoofing
of electronic systems at long ranges. Such techniques and devices exist and are
tested against surrogate ‘enemy’ systems for subsequent use in combat.”
“Since about 1980…” That’s when a certain Army
Lt. colonel started raising eyebrows.
John B. Alexander, UFOs, and Next Generation
Weapons Systems
While the Star Trek reference might lead
you to believe UFOs were discussed, John B. Alexander’s "The New Mental Battlefield:Beam Me Up Spock," in
Military Review, Dec. 1980, was about how psychotronic weapons could be
developed by studying the paranormal. He discussed the remote viewing studies
of Russell Targ and Harold Puthoff and their potential military applications.
As for psychotronic weapons, he also saw much potential, saying, “with
development, these weapons would be able to induce illness or death at little
or no risk to the operator. Range may be a present problem, but this will
probably be overcome if it has not been already.” As an example, he cited work
by the Soviets, who have “examined the effects
of electromagnetic radiation on humans and have
applied those techniques against the US Embassy in Moscow.”
In the years since, Col. Alexander has become
heavily involved with the UFO community and says he’s been interested in the
topic all his life. His hobby has an influence on his business which is chiefly
the development of non-lethal weapons. Col. Alexander probably knows more about
military projects relating to UFOs than anyone else on earth - or anywhere
else.
In his 2011 book, UFOs: Myths, Conspiracies,
and Realities, Alexander described how in 1984 he began working on a
project called New Thrust to coordinate next generation weapons systems, and it
led to him meeting Dr. Ron Blackburn of Lockheed’s Skunk Works. Their common
interests led them to form an informal UFO study, the Advanced Theoretical
Physics Working Group. JacquesVallee described the ATP assembly in Forbidden
Science - Volume III , 2016. He wrote that the key meetings took place
under US Department of Energy supervision on May 20-25, 1985:
“… participants were Samuel Finch, Oke Shannon
and John Kink of Los Alamos National Laboratory; Bill Wilkinson from CIA;
Howell McConnell from NSA... Hal Puthoff and Jack Houck; Ed Speakman of INSCOM
(Army Intelligence); Bill Souder and Bob Wood of McDonnell Douglas; Jake
Stewart of the Undersecretary of Defense for Research and Engineering; Bert
Stubblebine of BDM; Ron Blackburn, Milt Janzen and Don Keuble of Lockheed;
Ralph Freeman, Gary Bright, radiologist Paul Tyler, Ed Dames and Lt. Col. Mike
Neery."
ATP members included Ed Dames, Jack Houck, Bob Wood, Hal Puthoff and John Alexander.
Alexander stated that one of ATP’s goals was to:
“Study of the UFO data could provide a potential for a leap in technology. This
would not require access to a craft, but could be derived from scientific
examination of the reports determining the theoretical physics required to
achieve such results.”
Through Dr. Blackburn, Alexander met Lockheed’s
Ben Rich (but he didn’t join ADP). “My several contacts with Rich spanned
nearly a decade... Of course our mutual interests covered far more than UFOs
and included work on advanced aviation concepts for military purposes.” He went
on to say: “Rich was extremely attentive to what we presented to him about
UFOs... In fact, he had a shopping list of technologies that he wanted to get
his hands on. The top priority was propulsion, but other technologies were of
interest including navigation and the means for disappearing from radar.”
Modern Government UFO Contracts
Dr. Alexander’s ATP dissolved in 1988 since no
agency wanted to fund it project as an official government project. However,
that didn’t exactly mean the end, as Alexander and many of the members remained
interested in the UFO topic and moved on Robert Bigelow’s National
Institute for Discovery Science (NIDS) from 1995 to 2004.
Beginning in 2007, NIDS was
replaced by Bigelow Aerospace Advanced Space Studies (BAASS), with Hal Puthoff
and some of the team remaining either directly or as subcontractors. BAASS was
contracted by the US Defense Intelligence Agency’s Advanced Aerospace Weapon
System Applications Program (AAWSAP) for the stated goal:
“The objective of this program
is to understand the physics and engineering of these [advanced aerospace
weapon system] applications as they apply to the foreign threat out to the
far-term, i.e., from now through the year 2050.” The program contract directe
that, “The contractor shall complete advanced aerospace weapon system technical
studies” on 12 topics, such as propulsion, power generation, materials,
configuration, structure and directed-energy weapons.
Bigelow conducted UFO studies
under the AAWSAP contract using the cover story that their work was for “the
goal of BAASS achieving breakthroughs in commercial technology.”
AAWSAP became known as AATIP,
for Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program, Bigelow’s contract with
the DIA ended, and then the program officially folded in 2012. Luis Elizondo
was a participant in AATIP, and insists it continued as a portfolio when he
resigned in 2017.
Elizondo left to join the
company created by Tom DeLonge, To The Stars Academy of Arts and Science,
co-founded with Hal Puthoff and Jim Semivan. TTSA’s organization boasts many
ex-government figures, from former contractors to military intelligence agents.
Luis Elizondo, according to the Washington Post, “chose to join the private venture because he believed it
was the best way to continue the work he was unable to complete as a government
employee.”
Part of that work was in
military systems applications, and the TTSA press release of Oct. 17, 2019
announced their work with the
US Army: “...a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA) with the
U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command to advance TTSA's materiel
and technology innovations in order to develop enhanced capabilities for Army
ground vehicles,” but the CRADA title is: “Novel & Emerging Technology Exploitation.” TTSA’s CRADA FAQ explains their position
about possibly becoming a defense contractor.
The US military’s basic goals
remain consistent over the decades, and it seems they are still trying to
duplicate flying saucer characteristics and performance. The players may
change, but the game remains the same.
We’ll close with some thoughts
on the flying saucer threat from 1947, by aviation pioneer Orville Wright.
The Dayton Herald, July 8, 1947.
.
. .
For
Further Reading
The above article barely scratches the surface
on the possibly military saucer-related aircraft projects, which also includes
many other platforms from circular wing aircraft to anti-gravity projects.
