The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects | Page 9

the story was still fantastic. The object was

no jet airplane because there was no sound. It was not a searchlight
because there were none on the air base. It was not an automobile
spotlight because a spotlight will not produce the type of light the
sergeants described. As a double check, however, both men were
questioned on this point. They stated firmly that they had seen
hundreds of searchlights and spotlights playing on clouds, and that this
was not what they saw.
Beyond these limited possibilities the sergeants' UFO discourages
fruitful speculation. The object remains unidentified.
The UFO reports made by the two colonels and the two master
sergeants are typical of hundreds of other good UFO reports which
carry the verdict, "Conclusion unknown."
Some of these UFO reports have been publicized, but many have not.
Very little information pertaining to UFO's was withheld from the
press--if the press knew of the occurrence of specific sightings. Our
policy on releasing information was to answer only direct questions
from the press. If the press didn't know about a given UFO incident,
they naturally couldn't ask questions about it. Consequently such stories
were never released. In other instances, when the particulars of a UFO
sighting were released, they were only the bare facts about what was
reported. Any additional information that might have been developed
during later investigations and analyses was not released.
There is a great deal of interest in UFO's and the interest shows no
signs of diminishing. Since the first flying saucer skipped across the
sky in the summer of 1947, thousands of words on this subject have
appeared in every newspaper and most magazines in the United States.
During a six-month period in 1952 alone 148 of the nation's leading
newspapers carried a total of over 16,000 items about flying saucers.
During July 1952 reports of flying saucers sighted over Washington,
D.C., cheated the Democratic National Convention out of precious
headline space.
The subject of flying saucers, which has generated more unscientific

behavior than any other topic of modern times, has been debated at the
meetings of professional scientific societies, causing scientific tempers
to flare where unemotional objectivity is supposed to reign supreme.
Yet these thousands of written words and millions of spoken words--
all attesting to the general interest--have generated more heat than light.
Out of this avalanche of print and talk, the full, factual, true story of
UFO's has emerged only on rare occasions. The general public, for its
interest in UFO's, has been paid off in misinformation.
Many civilian groups must have sensed this, for while I was chief of
Project Blue Book I had dozens of requests to speak on the subject of
UFO's. These civilian requests had to be turned down because of
security regulations.
I did give many official briefings, however, behind closed doors, to
certain groups associated with the government--all of them upon
request.
The subject of UFO's was added to a regular series of intelligence
briefings given to students at the Air Force's Command and Staff
School, and to classes at the Air Force's Intelligence School.
I gave briefings to the technical staff at the Atomic Energy
Commission's Los Alamos laboratory, where the first atomic bomb was
built. The theater where this briefing took place wouldn't hold all of the
people who tried to get in, so the briefing was recorded and replayed
many times. The same thing happened at AEC's Sandia Base, near
Albuquerque.
Many groups in the Pentagon and the Office of Naval Research
requested UFO briefings. Civilian groups, made up of some of the
nation's top scientists and industrialists, and formed to study special
military problems, worked in a UFO briefing. Top Air Force
commanders were given periodic briefings.
Every briefing I gave was followed by a discussion that lasted
anywhere from one to four hours.

In addition to these, Project Blue Book published a classified monthly
report on UFO activity. Requests to be put on distribution for this
report were so numerous that the distribution had to be restricted to
major Air Force Command Headquarters.
This interest was not caused by any revolutionary information that was
revealed in the briefings or reports. It stemmed only from a desire to
get the facts about an interesting subject.
Many aspects of the UFO problem were covered in these official
briefings. I would give details of many of the better reports we received,
our conclusions about them, and how those conclusions were reached.
If we had identified a UFO, the audience was told how the
identification was made. If we concluded that the answer to a UFO
sighting was "Unknown," the audience learned why we were convinced
it was unknown.
Among the better sightings that were described fully to interested
government groups were: the complete story of the Lubbock Lights,
including