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This diverse body of critics has included physicist James E. McDonald, noted astronomers J. Allen Hynek and Frank Drake, Major Donald E. Keyhoe, electrical engineer Norman Levine, and many other high-profile, credible individuals. But the overall result is that the conclusions of the Condon Report have allowed the U.S. military to go underground with their research concerning the alien-UFO phenomenon, while at the same time, the belief in the existence of alien-guided UFOs has been viewed with even more derision and skepticism. But, not everyone was fooled by the U.S. Government's deception. In a 1967 article, which we will discuss more at length in a moment, even Major Keyhoe himself had this to say regarding Project Blue Book, and the government's claim that it was no longer interested in the UFO phenomenon:

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"The fact is, the Air Force seems seriously concerned about UFOs and is still investigating them intensively. The Air Intelligence group that is charged with checking up on UFO reports (its code name is Project Blue Book) is still in existence and still active, despite protestations that the book is closed."

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After the Condon Committee released its findings concerning the UFO phenomenon, Dr. J. Allen Hynek lamented the negative effect that the Condon Report would have on serious research regarding said phenomenon, and stated:

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"[The Condon Report was] surely the kiss of death to any further investigation in the name of the quest for knowledge."

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In his 1972 book "The UFO Experience: A Scientific Inquiry", Hynek was also quite scathing of the Condon Report. Some of his remarks included the following:

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"The Condon Report settled nothing . . . singularly slanted . . . avoided mentioning that there was embedded within the bowels of the report a remaining mystery; that the committee had been unable to furnish adequate explanations for more than a quarter of the cases examined."

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Physicist James E. McDonald also expressed his objections to the Condon Report's conclusions. In a 1969 lecture he gave entitled "Science In Default", Mr. McDonald had this to say:

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"The Condon Report, released in January, 1968, after about two years of Air Force-supported study is, in my opinion, quite inadequate. The sheer bulk of the Report, and the inclusion of much that can only be viewed as 'scientific padding', cannot conceal from anyone who studies it closely the salient point that it represents an examination of only a tiny fraction of the most puzzling UFO reports of the past two decades, and that its level of scientific argumentation is wholly unsatisfactory. Furthermore, of the roughly 90 cases that it specifically confronts, over 30 are conceded to be unexplained. With so large a fraction of unexplained cases (out of a sample that is by no means limited only to the truly puzzling cases, but includes an objectionably large number of obviously trivial cases), it is far from clear how Dr. Condon felt justified in concluding that the study indicated 'that further extensive study of UFOs probably cannot be justified in the expectation that science will be advanced thereby.'"

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If you would like to learn more about the history, work and failures of the Condon Committee, I encourage you to visit the Wikipedia website. You will find a lot more detailed information there, as well as on other websites. I am just including some of the key facts concerning the Condon Report in this series, for the sake of brevity.

Major Keyhoe was not the only person associated with Project Blue Book, who dared to speak the truth. Albert M. Chop was at one time the U.S. Air Force's spokesman for Project Blue Book. He was also the deputy public relations director for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, or NASA. On one occasion, Mr. Chop stated:

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"I've been convinced for a long time that the flying saucers are real and interplanetary. In other words, we are being watched by beings from outer space."

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Project Blue Book was not the American Government's first attempt to find a plausible explanation for the UFOs which flew over American skies, as well as in the skies of other countries around the world. Following the widely-known UFO waves of 1947, in particular the Kenneth Arnold sightings in Washington State, and the Corona-Roswell incident in July of that same year, Air Force General, Nathan Twining, who again, we will discuss more at length in just a moment, ordered that a UFO study be initiated. This study was assigned the name of "Project Sign", and was based at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, located outside of Dayton, Ohio, U.S.A.

While years later, the Condon Report would claim that all UFO sightings had plausible explanations, Project Sign was really inconclusive. It should be noted, however, that according to Captain Edward J. Ruppelt, who about four years later would become the first director of Project Blue Book, Project Sign did in fact make some solid determinations. First of all, it arrived at the conclusion that "flying saucers" were actual spacecraft. Second, UFO technology was neither American, nor Russian, in nature. Third, UFOs were probably not of this world. They were of extraterrestrial origin.

Amazingly, this Earth-shaking news would never reach the ears of the American public. In fact, there's evidence that it was intentionally buried by Pentagon officials. According to one story floating on the Internet, Gen. Hoyt Vandenberg, who was the U.S. Air Force Chief of Staff during that time, ordered that the report be destroyed, because there was no physical proof to substantiate the report's conclusions. Vandenberg then had Project Sign discontinued. My guess is that the real reason why Vandenberg terminated Project Sign, wasn't because there was no physical proof, but rather because the Air Force was desperate to suppress the truth that Project Sign had in fact concluded that UFOs were probably the product of alien technology. Perhaps the US military was concerned that making such knowledge public might result in widespread panic; or maybe they had other motives.

If we accept the previous point as being true, then it makes it easier to understand why the next US Government-sponsored UFO study project, which was dubbed "Project Grudge", which lasted from late 1948 to the end of 1951, concluded that all UFOs had logical explanations; such as misidentifications, naturally-occurring phenomenon such as marsh gas, meteors, comets, etc. This was precisely what some of the Air Force top brass wanted to hear.

But not all USAF officials were content with the conclusions reached by Project Grudge. Thus, as we've already discussed, under the direction of Capt. Edward J. Ruppelt, Project Blue Book was initiated in early 1952.

As a point of reference, it was also in July of 1952 that the startling Washington, D.C. UFO waves occurred. This UFO flap was observed by a wide range of people in both a professional and non-professional capacity; including radar personnel at Andrews and Bolling Air Force Bases, the pilots of several Air Force F-94 interceptor jets, at least three Air Traffic Controllers, and a civilian pilot. This UFO event was heavily reported in the American news media, and in other countries as well. Publications carried all kinds of eye-popping, bold headlines, such as "'Saucer' Outran Jet, Pilot Reveals", "ET Armada Over Washington DC", "Saucers Swarm Capital", "Jets Chase D.C. Sky Ghosts", and "Aerial Whatzits Buzz D.C. Again!".

One man who has gone on record concerning the Washington, DC UFO flap of 1952, is Dr. Bruce Maccabee. A physicist employed by the U.S. Navy, and also a well-known researcher within UFO circles, Maccabee is convinced that the UFOs which flew over Washington, DC were solid objects, and not just the result of temperature inversion, as the Air Force had been insisting. Dr. Maccabbee stated:

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"They [the U.S. Air Force] proved in their own study that there wasn't enough temperature inversion to cause this effect. The Washington sightings cannot be explained as a radar mirage."

"And I think those solid objects were not made by us; and by us, I mean human beings."

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In the end, as concerned as they were about not knowing what the UFOs were, the Air Force brass took a rather confusing, neutral stand, and stated to the American news media:

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"We have no evidence they are flying saucers. Conversely, we have no evidence they are not flying saucers. We don't know what they are."

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However, the following afternoon, a Tuesday, even though no one, not even President Truman, had any idea what the objects were, the Air Force decided to pull a public relations stunt. Major General John Samford, who was the Air Force's Director of Intelligence at the time, called a press conference at the Pentagon. According to the memoirs of Edward J. Ruppelt, who, as you may recall, headed the newly-formed Project Blue Book, Samford rambled on for over an hour, offering an explanation, and the military's rebuttal, but never really saying anything substantial. In the end, some reporters left the conference convinced that the objects were not really alien spacecrafts, but merely the result of temperature inversion; and that is what they chose to print.

The Air Force's explanation certainly flies in the face of what other first-hand witnesses to the DC event were saying. Mr. Harry G. Barnes, who at the time headed the Air Traffic Controllers at the Washington National Airport, being the chief of the Civil Aeronautics Administration, also went on record and stated the following:

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"For six hours . . . there were at least ten unidentifiable objects moving above Washington. They were not ordinary aircraft."

"They acted like a bunch of small kids out playing. It was helter-skelter, as if directed by some innate curiosity. At times, they moved as a group or cluster, at other times as individuals."

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Howard Cocklin was one of several Air Traffic Controllers working on the glass-enclosed top floor of the Washington National Airport control tower that night in July of 1952. Even though so many years have passed, he remains convinced that what he saw in the sky was a real UFO. He states:

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"I saw it on the screen and out the window. It was a whitish-blue object; not a light; a solid form; an object; a saucer-shaped object."

". . . round with no distinguishing marks such as wings or a nose or a tail . . . like a saucer."

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That same night, Captain S.C. "Casey" Pierman, an experienced pilot with seventeen years of experience under his belt, was conducting Capital Air Flight 807 from Washington, D.C. to Detroit. During a fourteen minute period, he observed a total of six objects streak across the night sky at an incredibly high rate of speed. He described them as ". . . like falling stars without tails".

At this time, I should mention that there were two major UFO waves over Washington, DC in July, 1952. The first of these, which we have been discussing, occurred on the night of July 19th; and the second one occurred a week later on the night of July 26th. In addition to these primary UFO waves, other secondary sightings also occurred in the general vicinity of Washington, D.C., from about July 13th to July 29th. These secondary sightings, which were observed by both civilians, and by government and military personnel, involved one or a few UFOs, whereas the larger UFO flaps involved as many as eight to twelve objects in a single sighting.

One of the U.S. Air Force pilots who flew a F-94 interceptor jet on the night of July 26th was William Patterson. He tried to pursue one of the strange objects, but it was to no avail. In describing his unusual experience, he later related to the investigators:

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"I tried to make contact with the bogies below 1,000 feet. I was at my maximum speed but . . . I ceased chasing them because I saw no chance of overtaking them."

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As you can imagine, Captain Ruppelt and other serious members of Project Blue Book were both flabbergasted and disappointed by the silly yarn that Major General John Samford had spun that day at the Pentagon. Aside from the unanswered question of what really flew over Washington, DC during those weeks in July of 1952, what really intrigues me, and undoubtedly many others as well, is that in his 1956 memoir, "The Report On Unidentified Flying Objects", Captain Ruppelt shares a very interesting incident which occurred just a few days prior to the first UFO wave over Washington. According to Ruppelt, he interviewed a government scientist, whom he doesn't identify, who made a rather startling prediction. In his own words, Captain Ruppelt wrote:

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"Within the next few days," the unidentified scientist said, banging his hand on his desk for emphasis, "you're going to have the granddaddy of all UFO sightings. The sighting will occur in Washington or New York -- probably Washington."

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How could anyone possibly have predicted what was about to happen? Personally, I can only think of a few possibilities. First, the Washington UFO waves were man-made events; which means that someone in-the-know decided to give Capt. Ruppelt advanced warning of what was going to occur. Second, the UFO waves of 1952 were actually a natural phenomenon, such as a predictable meteor shower, and thus a scientist, such as an astronomer, could have given Ruppelt forewarning of the same. Third, the UFO waves were real, and had been spotted in space by an astronomer who then informed Ruppelt of their impending arrival. Fourth, the informer was either a human who was in direct contact with the UFOs, and thus had prior knowledge of their arrival in a few days time, or else the informer was in fact an alien himself. Which one do you believe; or is there possibly another explanation?

Over the decades, a considerable number of pilots and air traffic controllers have witnessed strange happenings in the sky. However, the general public usually doesn't hear about them; because like JAL's Captain Terauchi, these people are afraid that they might be ridiculed; or worse yet, they may even be suspended from their jobs if they decide to talk. As one California air traffic controller stated in testimony to the National UFO Reporting Center, in a letter dated the 20th of February, 1997:

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"In my [only] six years at the Center, I have personally been part of three bizarre encounters, non-military and non-civilian. I'm just one of 15,000 controllers, too, so there *have* to be many more that go unreported."

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However, now and then, a few of these people will take the chance and step forward, and share what they have seen or experienced. Captain John Baldwin, a former military and commercial pilot, was a witness to some of the strange UFO happenings of July, 1952. He stated:

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"The object seemed to back away from us and change shape. It was perfectly round and still at first. Then it seemed to back away from us and change shape. It became flat, gained speed and then disappeared quickly."

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Two years earlier, in 1950, Captain Willis T. Sperry, a pilot with American Airlines, shared this UFO encounter which had been experienced by himself and his companions:

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"Three of us, Gates, Flight Engineer Robert Arnholt (also a pilot) and I all got a good look at it. Silhouetted against the moon, it appeared to be the shape of a torpedo or submarine, except that there were no protruding fins or external structure of any kind. It appeared to be a perfectly streamlined object of a dark metallic color, but at night it could have been pink or any other color and looked the same."

"In comparing the speed of this object with jet aircraft, (which I have observed many times at close range), I would say without a doubt that the speed of the object was far beyond the limits of any known aircraft speeds that we know. In comparison, the speed was fantastic."

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In 1966, an unnamed pilot of American Airlines Flight 387, which was on a flight from St. Louis to Los Angeles, made the following comments while passing over Farmington, New Mexico, at an altitude of 33,000 feet:

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"I have never seen anything like it before. Other planes in the area have also seen it, nor can they identify it."

"Please look off the left wingtip if you want to see a flying saucer."

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Ulf Christiansson -- not the founding member of the Swedish rock group "Jerusalem" -- was a former World War II fighter pilot for the British Royal Air Force. Later, he became a commercial pilot in his home country of Sweden. In 1958, Christiansson and his engineer had an encounter with an unusual object which sped by their craft, as they flew in the skies over southern Sweden. In describing their UFO encounter, Christiansson said:

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"This object was completely symmetric and I would say it had a spherical appearance, in a way. It was metallic white and left no vapour trail as it went by just above the clouds."

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Many people consider Project Blue Book to have been the most honest, and the most earnest attempt, to discover the truth behind the UFO phenomenon. This was due in large part to the fact that a number of very high-level, serious-minded people, including generals, were involved with it, as well as noted astronomer, Dr. J. Allen Hynek. While Hynek was initially a vocal skeptic, after seeing some of the evidence, even he was later forced to re-evaluate his position concerning UFOs. As a matter of historical record, it was during the period that Project Blue Book was active, that the commonly-used acronym U.F.O., or "Unidentified Flying Object", was assigned to the strange aerial objects which had previously been referred to as "flying discs" or "flying saucers".

Sadly, as I mentioned earlier, in spite of the intentions of some of the more honorable men who were involved with Project Blue Book, just like its predecessors, Project Blue Book was destined to be destroyed by powerful forces within the U.S. Government, who apparently did not want the truth concerning UFOs to come to light. While we have discussed the Condon Report, the demise of Project Blue Book started much earlier than the late 1960's when the Condon Report was released. In 1952, following the much-publicized Washington, DC UFO wave, the C.I.A. established a study panel comprised of individuals from a variety of fields, including physicists, engineers and meteorologists. Dr. J. Allen Hynek was also on the panel. The panel was headed by Dr. H. P. Robertson, a physicist from the California Institute of Technology, and was thus referred to as the Robertson Panel. This panel first convened in January of 1953.

Some critics assert that by any account, the Robertson Panel was a complete sham, just like Project Grudge before it, and the Condon Report which would follow it years later. Even though Captain Ruppelt, Dr. Hynek, and other serious-minded individuals presented some of the most convincing evidence which had been collected to date by Project Blue Book, after investing only twelve hours to study more than six years of UFO data, the Robertson Panel determined that the majority of UFO sightings could be attributed to logical and normal explanations. Concerning the small percentage of UFO cases that remained unexplained, the Robertson Panel stated that further investigation would resolve those cases in a normal fashion as well, but that no more time or effort should be invested in them. In short, the government should just stop wasting time investigating UFO sightings.

However, to add injury to insult, the Robertson Panel also recommended that the U.S. Air Force embark on a campaign to purposely de-emphasize the importance of the UFO phenomenon. The panel specifically suggested that the Air Force adopt a policy to shape public opinion by debunking UFOs via the mass media. The Robertson Panel also encouraged the USAF to ridicule anyone who professed the belief that UFOs were of extraterrestrial origin. Furthermore, civilian UFO research groups were vilified, and targeted as potential subversives. Some people are convinced that the Air Force has continued to implement some of these same tactics, even in our current day. Not only that, but in spite of the FOIA -- Freedom of Information Act -- it is still very difficult to obtain any truly meaningful UFO-related data from the U.S. Government. So much information is either missing from the files, or censored with black ink, that what is left does not tell us very much at all.

To help you to fully grasp how intent the U.S. Government was on clamping down on all UFO leaks by military personnel, consider that in December of 1953, Joint Army-Navy-Air Force Regulation 146 was put into effect. This regulation made it a crime for any military personnel to discuss classified UFO reports with unauthorized persons. Violators faced up to two years in prison, and/or fines of up to $10,000. Now, that is getting serious! But there is an odd paradox here. If UFOs don't really exist, as the government claims, then why would the military go to such extremes to keep everyone quiet? It just doesn't make sense, does it; unless . . .

Joint Army-Navy-Air Force Regulation 146 was only one of a number of restrictive steps which were taken to squash the public's interest in UFOs, and to chastise those who would dare to contradict the mandates of the U.S. military. While Project Blue Book continued to exist, at least as far as the American public was concerned, the truth of the matter, is that following the recommendations of the Robertson Panel, and in the years leading up to its demise after the release of the Condon Report, Project Blue Book became less and less of a real UFO investigative entity. By the time that Project Blue Book was shut down, it had lost all credibility in the eyes of many serious UFO researchers, and it had become the object of severe criticism, including widespread accusations of being a U.S. Government cover-up operation.

As new military procedures and policies continued to strip Project Blue Book of its investigative power, important UFO sightings where siphoned to the recently-formed 4602nd Air Intelligence Squadron of the Air Defense Command. In short, Project Blue Book became another intentional sham to deceive the American public into thinking that the US Government was doing its duty to seriously investigate UFO sightings; while in reality, Uncle Sam never released any significant info to the American public.

Even though certain people like Captain Ruppelt, Dr. Hynek, Major Robert J. Friend, et al, made some attempts to return Project Blue Book to its more productive days, they failed. Each new director was more anti-UFO than the previous one. Clearly, some powerful forces within the government wanted to put a tight lid on the entire UFO affair, and they were quite successful. If you are wondering exactly what were the final conclusions of Project Blue Book after so many years of researching the true nature of UFOs, consider this list:

1. A mild form of mass hysteria.

2. Individuals who fabricate such reports to perpetrate a hoax or seek publicity.

3. Psychopathological persons.

4. Misidentification of various conventional objects.

While I can certainly agree with that list, nevertheless, I still find it rather amazing, that in spite of the evidence, and so many testimonies from highly credible individuals, in its final days, the Project Blue Book staff was not willing to consider that perhaps a small percentage of UFO sightings might actually be true extraterrestrial vehicles from other planets. I am not saying that they are, or were, from other worlds; but to totally dismiss this possibility in light of the evidence, does seem rather close-minded in my view. Even as a Bible-believing Christian, I do not totally reject the possibility; because as I have said before, I really don't know what God may or may not have created, in other parts of the Universe. Perhaps that is one of the many mysteries He has left for us to figure out on our own.

If what Project Blue Book states is true, then I suppose the people who witnessed the mind-boggling Battle of Los Angeles on February 25, 1942, must have all been suffering from mass hysteria. Countless people watched that day as the military fired shell after shell at a huge disc which hung silently in the sky over the suburbs of Los Angeles. Despite attempts by the Army to bring the strange craft down -- many people insist that the strange object suffered a lot of direct hits from the Army's 37th Coast Artillery Brigade -- there was no detectable damage to the UFO, and it eventually went on its way.

I suppose that Kenneth Arnold, who was a trained pilot, also let his imagination get the better of him when he saw nine disc-shaped craft flying in formation near Mount Rainier in Washington State. And how do we explain the many UFOs which flew across Washington, D.C. in 1952, or the many people who witnessed first-hand the Roswell event of July, 1947? Were all of these people having hallucinations, or is the U.S. Government lying through its teeth?

Please go to part thirteen for the continuation of this series.

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