Whistleblower Tells Congress the US Is Concealing 'Multi-Decade' Program That Captures UFOs (apnews.com) 244
The U.S. is concealing a longstanding program that retrieves and reverse engineers unidentified flying objects, a former Air Force intelligence officer testified Wednesday to Congress. The Pentagon has denied his claims. Associated Press: Retired Maj. David Grusch's highly anticipated testimony before a House Oversight subcommittee was Congress' latest foray into the world of UAPs -- or "unidentified aerial phenomena," which is the official term the U.S. government uses instead of UFOs. While the study of mysterious aircraft or objects often evokes talk of aliens and "little green men," Democrats and Republicans in recent years have pushed for more research as a national security matter due to concerns that sightings observed by pilots may be tied to U.S. adversaries.
Grusch said he was asked in 2019 by the head of a government task force on UAPs to identify all highly classified programs relating to the task force's mission. At the time, Grusch was detailed to the National Reconnaissance Office, the agency that operates U.S. spy satellites. "I was informed in the course of my official duties of a multi-decade UAP crash retrieval and reverse engineering program to which I was denied access," he said. Asked whether the U.S. government had information about extraterrestrial life, Grusch said the U.S. likely has been aware of âoenon-humanâ activity since the 1930s. The Pentagon has denied Grusch's claims of a coverup. In a statement, Defense Department spokeswoman said investigators have not discovered "any verifiable information to substantiate claims that any programs regarding the possession or reverse-engineering of extraterrestrial materials have existed in the past or exist currently." The statement did not address UFOs that are not suspected of being extraterrestrial objects, AP reported.
Grusch said he was asked in 2019 by the head of a government task force on UAPs to identify all highly classified programs relating to the task force's mission. At the time, Grusch was detailed to the National Reconnaissance Office, the agency that operates U.S. spy satellites. "I was informed in the course of my official duties of a multi-decade UAP crash retrieval and reverse engineering program to which I was denied access," he said. Asked whether the U.S. government had information about extraterrestrial life, Grusch said the U.S. likely has been aware of âoenon-humanâ activity since the 1930s. The Pentagon has denied Grusch's claims of a coverup. In a statement, Defense Department spokeswoman said investigators have not discovered "any verifiable information to substantiate claims that any programs regarding the possession or reverse-engineering of extraterrestrial materials have existed in the past or exist currently." The statement did not address UFOs that are not suspected of being extraterrestrial objects, AP reported.
First alien to post! (Score:5, Funny)
:-)
Re: (Score:2)
LOL. I was trying to be funny. Why is moderated troll and flamebait?
No sense of humor here anymore?
This happens a lot lately; don't know why.
Re: (Score:3)
LOL. I was trying to be funny. Why is moderated troll and flamebait?
No sense of humor here anymore?
We had to get the nay-sayers to concentrate their fire, and down-mod posts as a way to make them feel better about themselves.
If we keep it up, they'll run out of mod points for the week.
Informed, but denied access? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Informed, but denied access? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
If I was an alien and and attempting to hide there would be a large random appearing meteor strike on any crash site once any vehicle was at risk of being salvaged by the natives. Leaving a big hole and very little useful evidence.
Re: (Score:3)
If I was an alien and and attempting to hide there would be a large random appearing meteor strike on any crash site
Because that wouldn't raise any questions whatsoever. Oh look! A meteor just happened to strike the exact spot we were trying to dig where we thought a UFO crashed. How unfortunate.
Re: (Score:2)
You are assuming the strike is not so quick after the crash that anything beyond a rumor of what it was came out. crash, and meteor under 20 minutes later, long before any good details would have gotten out.
Re: (Score:3)
Oh, and after 30 years by themselves in a spaceship, once the "astronaut" gets there, they're probably INSANE.
From re-watching Friends and Seinfeld 2400 times.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Those rectums won't probe themselves!
Re:Informed, but denied access? (Score:4, Insightful)
While this is BS, it's not hard to imagine a hypothetical where it makes sense.
When we landed on the moon, even a medieval society could have secured the vehicle without too much trouble, if one had existed. It's not like a vehicle designed for scientific purposes is necessarily equipped with the military capabilities of the relevant society.
Re: (Score:2)
The difference being that we didn't expect to find sentient life on the Moon, while evidence of sentient life is present on most of the non-ocean surface of the Earth.
While I write "sentient life", I am sure some people might take issue with describing humans as "sentient".
Re: Informed, but denied access? (Score:3)
The analogy I think of is the Sentinelese near India.
India has probibited contact. But every so often, some asshole breaks the rules. Maybe itâ(TM)s a dipshit rolling in on a rubber raft to convert them to Christianity. Maybe itâ(TM)s a small group of lost fisherman. Maybe itâ(TM)s misguided capitalist. Sometimes helicopters fly over and observe them (against the law). Sometimes planes fly over and leave contrails.
Itâ(TM)s all a mystery to the Sentinelese. The rubber dinghy is as inexpli
Re:Informed, but denied access? (Score:5, Insightful)
Every time I see a Star Trek movie I am reminded of how little the public understands about how huge and empty the galaxy is. You apparently can't go to or come from anywhere in the galaxy without having to squeeze past Saturn.
The universe of the public imagination is tiny. In their mind the stars are the end point of a set of roughly equal sized jumps: from suborbital space, to orbit, to the Moon, to Mars, to the nearest star, but each step is enormously harder than the prior one, and the last one is a doozy. A civilization that could consider travling from Proxima Centuri b to indulge in some amateur proctology would be almost inconceivably more technologically capable than we are.
It's not that I can't imagine such a civilization existing. I'm just saying that what the general public sees as *relatively more plausible* (e.g., alien super-aircraft vs. glitches in optical sensors) is screwy. We've got as much prospect of reverse engineering an alien interstellar spacecraft as Agamemmnon would have had reverse engineering an F-35.
Re: (Score:3)
We've got as much prospect of reverse engineering an alien interstellar spacecraft as Agamemmnon would have had reverse engineering an F-35.
Advice to military recovery team:
Don't touch that "meteorite", it's PURE EVIL!
project KEEPYOURMOUTHSHUT (Score:2)
Re:project KEEPYOURMOUTHSHUT (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Informed, but denied access? (Score:5, Insightful)
"I was informed in the course of my official duties of a multi-decade UAP crash retrieval and reverse engineering program to which I was denied access"
Once more, another "I haven't personally seen aliens or crashed UFOs, but some un-named person assures me that they are real."
This is the prototypical urban legend set up: "I heard it from a friend who heard it from the guy it happened to.”
Just who was it who "informed" him of this program "to which he was denied access"? Why isn't that person being called to testify?
Yep - that's how control of highly classified material is managed.....
Re: Informed, but denied access? (Score:3)
The sad thing is the idiots on the committee are not intelligent enough to come to the same conclusion you did.
Re: (Score:3)
People are highly gullible. Although there have been times in the past where gullible people knew they were gullible and relied upon people with more intelligence or more facts to either be in charge or become advisors to those in charge. But we're not in one of those times, instead we elect the most gullible of those amongst us so that they can hold hearings where the chief witness is an idiot. We've already had these hearings, but the problem was that it did not provide the answer that the gullible ree
Re: (Score:2)
Guessing you have no experience in a highly classified environment then? This is exactly how special access programs work. They have a classification level and a special requirement for access, and then they have a lesser-classification code name and description.
This way they can broadly describe the work to people that need to fund them or provide them access to things (like their program sponsors or the contracts shop that needs to handle their purchases).
I.E. there might be a SAP for a weapons system. A
Re:Informed, but denied access? (Score:4, Insightful)
No it's not. I had TS/SBI clearance for several years and worked on several special access programs. Short story is that you don't "inform people" about programs they don't have access to. Any need to know by individuals who don't have access is strictly compartmentalized such that they're not able to infer the nature of the program.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Flowing down you are correct, but flowing up not so much, esp when it comes to oversight. You can have programs where the specifics are compartmentalized away but there is still a less restricted layer that can be presented to people who can make or break your funding.
While interesting - this person is saying he was given access to some "fact" that we are retreiving and reverse engineering captured alien spaceships.
Considering all things - that bit of information that we're doing this should be TS/SCI , possibly even higher level, because that is what the Whistleblower is saying that the guvmint is trying to hide from Americans.
Differential analysis - just like for all too many whistleblowers - (especially for one of the parties) there is an issue of credibility.
Re: (Score:2)
I would always put labels on my lunch reading "extraterrestrial DNA with thorium markers" so that the morons down the hall with security clearance didn't eat it (and then neither confirm nor deny that they ate it). Possibly this led to some of those dorks into believing that these actually were bits of alien flesh in ponzu sauce.
"I was informed.....I was denied access" (Score:2)
It's hearsay. What a let-down.
Let's assume the guy was telling the truth (Score:2)
If he actually was at one time read in to this compartment, he would be violating his classification agreement to say so in front of Congress.
SF 312 [gsa.gov]
Regardless if Congress compels the testimony, he goes to jail if he says anything.
Re:"I was informed.....I was denied access" (Score:5, Funny)
Why hasn't anyone here watched that fine documentary "Independence Day". All the *facts* are there for everyone to see.
There's no need to make stuff up -- Will Smith wouldn't lie and he will bitch-slap those aliens so hard you'd think they'd insulted his wife's hair-do.
Re: (Score:2)
"Watch the video and make up your own mind, sheeple!"
Re: (Score:2)
Sounds suspiciously like hazing the new guy at the NSA.
Re: (Score:2)
Maybe, but the committee Republicans think DoD is over-run with "woke" LBGQ. This is just another attempt to rake DoD over the coals and they found a willing doofus to support it.
Re: (Score:2)
The videos of US congress members going on about UFOs that are clearly stars, Jewish space lasers, and now alien bodies are pretty entertaining. I'm not sure it's a great strategy for discrediting anybody but themselves though.
Re: (Score:2)
This is dumb (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
Only in this latest congress do we start seeing all of this smokescreening about "UFO Coverups". Feels like pandering to the gullible to turn attention away from something else.
*Looks over at Dumb and Dumber, running for re-election*
What *snort* could have possibly *giggle* made you assume *laugh* THAT is a smokescreen...
Re: (Score:3)
> Only in this latest congress do we start seeing all of this smokescreening about "UFO Coverups".
That's not even a little bit true. Read the past two NDAA's.
Go back to Harry Reid if you want more information.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:This is dumb (Score:5, Insightful)
Note that this is a house committee which is controlled by the republican party. Which is also why you heard about this nonsense more when Trump was in power.
The republican party learned over the past 20-years they can freely court cranks and not be punished by the rest of their base.
Re:This is dumb (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Never underestimate the power of the idiot vote to propel you into office.
Re:This is dumb (Score:4, Insightful)
What? As opposed to adherents of the previous admin who whack off to any and all conspiracy theories?
UFO stuff would be a healthy diversion compared to their current obsessions.
The program exists (Score:5, Insightful)
And it isn't about aliens.
UFO = Unidentified Flying Object. If it's a physical thing and not an optical illusion or whatever, and it can be determined it's not American... it might be a foreign spy craft.
So yes, I would expect an American agency to have a clandestine program to capture and examine UFOs to determine who is doing the spying and what capabilities they have. It'd be crazy not to do so.
I'd also expect said agency to keep quiet about it so those foreign adversaries don't know how much the US knows about their operations. Again, it'd be crazy to be very public about it.
What it is not, is about Little Green Men, except possibly as a collision of interests between Democrats and Republicans wanting a political distraction, and the Republicans indulging conspiracy-heavy Trump cult.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2, Troll)
How soon until they start showing pictures of Hunter's dick, again? https://news.yahoo.com/mtg-sai... [yahoo.com]
Maybe they could blame covid on UFOs?
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
Seems like a weird reversal to me.
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
> There doesn't need to be a conspiracy, the republicans have a majority and control the committee.
Go ahead and only listen to the Democrat members' questions and answers then.
They were all really good.
Their bipartisanship was fantastic and much better than yours. Level up!
Re: (Score:2)
aliens stole my wallet! (Score:3)
"Come along, we're going on a little ride. We'll stop by your bank's ATM on the way to Sirius VII."
Re: aliens stole my wallet! (Score:2)
Don't forget sleep paralysis
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Whoa, man, that shit got right on top of you. You look like you're about to explode. You took too much, man! You took too much too much!
Re: (Score:3)
Quoting Calvin and Hobbs,
The sure sign of intelligence out there is that they have not tried to contact us !
Re: (Score:3)
I grew up in a remote rural area. My guess would be a combination of alcoholism, inbreeding and boredom.
Re: (Score:2)
I dunno, those UFOs could also be alien (I hope I don't alienate any xenophiles by suggesting that).
Historically, the word alien has been used in a way that is now often considered disparaging and offensive: to refer to a person who was born in one country and now lives in another country without having become a citizen.
Alien and its more general synonym foreigner are now often considered disparaging and offensive due to being used in a way that’s intended to otherize a person—mark them as different and unwelcome. Such use is typically attributed to xenophobia, racism, and anti-immigrant stances.
This sense of alien is found in legal terms like resident alien and illegal alien. General and legal use of these terms has decreased in recent years, but they are still in use in many cases.
Relatedly, many object to the word illegal in illegal alien and illegal immigrant due to its implication that a person’s very existence can be illegal.
There are other common uses of the word alien that are not considered offensive, but that are also based on the idea of something being unfamiliar or from an entirely different place.
Alien can be used as an adjective to describe something as entirely unfamiliar, as in It was the first time he had returned in many years, and the place now seemed alien to him. The word foreign can be used in the same way.
Re: (Score:2)
What it is not, is about Little Green Men
From the hearing.
"Q: Does U.S. government have information about extraterrestrial life?" A: "The U.S. likely has been aware of “non-human” activity since the 1930s."
Continuing on with your comment.
except possibly as a collision of interests between Democrats and Republicans wanting a political distraction, and the Republicans indulging conspiracy-heavy Trump cult.
Well yes. Republicans literally have no policy at this point, so little green men it is!
But point of order. The program is about whatever the group at the helm wants it to be about seeing how it lacks Congressional oversight. And I think a lot of people believe Trump is an outlier and the reality is he's just the most visible. There absolutely is someone or someones in this group that is making it about little green men with some others in the group givin
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
From the hearing.
"Q: Does U.S. government have information about extraterrestrial life?" A: "The U.S. likely has been aware of "non-human" activity since the 1930s."
I think humans have been aware of non-human activity since the time humans first existed. There are animals, plants, etc..
Re: (Score:2)
And it isn't about aliens.
UFO = Unidentified Flying Object. If it's a physical thing and not an optical illusion or whatever, and it can be determined it's not American... it might be a foreign spy craft.
So yes, I would expect an American agency to have a clandestine program to capture and examine UFOs to determine who is doing the spying and what capabilities they have. It'd be crazy not to do so.
I'd also expect said agency to keep quiet about it so those foreign adversaries don't know how much the US knows about their operations. Again, it'd be crazy to be very public about it.
What it is not, is about Little Green Men, except possibly as a collision of interests between Democrats and Republicans wanting a political distraction, and the Republicans indulging conspiracy-heavy Trump cult.
Pretty insightful right before the partisan junk.
UFO (Unidentified Flying Object) / UAP (Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon) is exactly that: not (yet) identified. Could be a prototype of some aircraft the reporter doesn't know about; could be an extraterrestrial spacecraft. Some UAP may end up being ball lightning. We don't know, and our military needs to identify it and assess the risk. Has the military actually captured or recovered a UFO? I doubt they'd tell civilians one way or the other. Just imagine the
Re:The program exists (Score:5, Insightful)
Unfortunately it is about aliens. There was even a "whistleblower" earlier this year that said the gov is literally coving up alien spacecraft and even recovered bodies.
I wish this was some sort of distraction from bigger conspiracy, but I think congress and certain gov officials are just genuinely morons.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Never in history have those in power willingly offered greater transparency. This sudden coordinated effort from the places of power to ostensibly *find out the truth for the American public* is deeply suspect. Is there a similar effort to unredact those last few pages in the 9/11 report? How about showing us the physical evidence that ties Ukrainians to the Nord Stream pipeline explosion? No? Then, I can't trust that this thrust towards transparency is genuine. Something else is afoot.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
> What it is not, is about Little Green Men
If you're right these guys are going to jail for a very long time, including perhaps the ICIG himself for a massive conspiracy.
They are specifically calling it "non-human intelligence" including recovered biologics in crashes, recovered from 1935 onward.
They're also specifically not saying extraterrestrials.
But perhaps you know more than these men do. If so please clue us in.
Re: (Score:3)
Look, i want to believe and all, but i just can't. Its always a hoax. Present physical evidence. I am not really going to accept anything less than that.
People can say any shit they want to anyone about anything. Ignoring all reasons it could be fake, the simplest answer to explain what this guy is saying, is not alien coverup. All it needs, is to have a motivation that we do not know.
I'm not saying its not aliens,
But its not aliens.
Re: (Score:2)
Half the people say "UFO" with the meaning you're using- it's unidentified and it appears to be flying. The other half are specifically referring to spacecraft. It's impossible to talk about either case when the two groups don't have a common language and neither is likely to change their meaning.
I
Hazing the newbie (Score:3, Funny)
"I was informed in the course of my official duties of a multi-decade UAP crash retrieval and reverse engineering program to which I was denied access,"
This sounds remarkably like the NRO equivalent of sending the gullible newbie to the stores for some tartan paint and three yards of Whitworth thread.
Re: (Score:2)
... and then they handed him a bag and kindly invited him to participate in that evening's snipe hunt!
Re: Hazing the newbie (Score:2)
In my technical photography days, we sent the younguns down to the pro photo store for a box of Newton Rings.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
In the Marine Corps air wing we sent new guys around to different squadron hangars to see if any of them had some extra pneumatic fluid or NATOPS ID 10 T forms laying around we could have. We always seemed to run short on those two items. When noobs would show up at our squadron looking for the items we would would send them to the hangar next door stating we just ran out.
Re: (Score:2)
sending the gullible newbie to the stores for some tartan paint and three yards of Whitworth thread.
Back in my day it was a bag of sparks for the grinder and a long stand.
("I've been standing here for ages!", "You asked for a long stand didn't you...?")
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
That's because it's been a long time since I was a newbie, gullible or otherwise.
For example, my Slashdot account is now 25 years old...
Highly Competent Governments (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
The thought is that they're watching our military activities, which would explain why they spend more than 2% of their time over the U.S.
Note that this would tend to indicate "they" are another nation-state, not an extraterrestrial species. An alien with the tech to get here doesn't need a blow-by-blow update on our tech level (unless they're waiting for a trigger, but then they only need watch for the triggers). A direct competitor that is only slightly ahead of or behind the U.S. technologically has a muc
What kinda UFOs are they catching (Score:3)
If its capturing an enemy aircraft they haven't seen, I except that. It is the military. Part of the job. Impressive that can catch them midair.
loony cranks have always existed, (Score:2, Insightful)
inside the military or outside.
what hasn't always existed is cell phones with HD cameras in everyone's pockets. Super weird how that invention has had zero effect on the frequency of CLAIMS of UFOs, but also zero effect on the number of credible photos or videos of UFOs.
giving press to these ding dongs is just encouraging other conspiracy ding dongs to believe them.
DOS attack over the nutwork (Score:3)
If there really are true honest witnesses, they'd be swamped by "reports" from nuts anyhow.
If I were hired by ET to cover up their visibility boo boo's, rather than try to hush witnesses, it would be easier just to encourage nut-cases so that they flood the in-boxes with riff-raff.
I'm living proof that aliens have arrived on earth (Score:2)
Just ask my kids!
This isn't helping (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't fucking care if it's cover, it's a fucking lie. You are not elected nor paid to lie to us. Yet here you are, doing it again.
Re: (Score:2)
USA a crash zone ? (Score:2)
If they were that intelligent they would have been watching the news/observing the planet FIRST and they would have come to the conclusion there were far safer places to land than the USA.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
No wonder the Republicans are after them
Bugger the wall...let's build a sky dome...a big beautiful sky dome.
Re: (Score:2)
But if that's true,,,, (Score:3)
Where is the advanced technology stolen from these craft? Where's the jet packs? Transporters? Flying cars? Energy weapons? Does the military suck that badly at reverse engineering stuff?
The F35 (Score:2)
Clearly it's got some of that alien tech. The latter also picked the worst time to develop a fault.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Heh. Something that might actually make an interesting seed for a story is people reverse engineering alien technology and discovering we are closer to the limits than people imagine, and thus while better it can't actually do any of the magical things people hope is possible... so alien tech being a glimpse into the limits of the future.
True for the most part, but the fact that they're here at all shows that there are at least some things they're very much better at.
Re: (Score:2)
Where is the advanced technology stolen from these craft? Where's the jet packs? Transporters? Flying cars? Energy weapons? Does the military suck that badly at reverse engineering stuff?
Well, I don't know about the jetpacks, but I do remember a disinformation campaign back around 2000. Captain Sisko time traveled to get on TV with a commercial for IBM, ranting about the lack of flying cars. Then he presumabbly got beamed back to his starship and did the slingshot maneuver to get back to the 23d century.
It all gets pretty confusing, but if you thinkabout itL the bottom line is that it's not aliens. It's US from the future who are coming back to recover crashed time-traveling craft, and take
Re: (Score:2)
That makes sense.
Truth or consequences (Score:2)
UFO, Aliens and Trump. (Score:4, Insightful)
And Trump took home some nuclear secrets and Iran war plans but did not take home these UFO / alien stuff? Come on!
If it was real, Trump would have waved the evidence in front of some random dinner guest to impress them.
Lots of ill-informed comments here .... wow .... (Score:3, Interesting)
This is one situation where the discussion over on Reddit in forums like r/UFOS is vastly superior to the wise-cracks getting made here on Slashdot.
For starters, the people here claiming it's some sort of Republican-driven diversion? Wow.... really? Regardless of the validity of it in the end, it's clear this was a very bipartisan effort to get to the bottom of the issue. Today's hearings, if you bothered to watch them, were probably the best example I can recall in at least 10 years of both sides of the political fence being cordial and cooperative. (I think there was ONE exception with an older woman trying to waste time complaining about the handling of the Chinese spy balloons, rather than contributing anything constructive to the discussion.)
And interestingly, as much I can't stand the woman? AOC really kept this thing on track, in the sense she kept all of her questioning focused on the real reason most of this matters; the money/funding. Whether or not there are "little green men" anyone found or dissected? The big concern here is that the military industrial complex seems to be funneling a whole lot of money to secret projects. (EG. They claim $5 billion was spent to build the latest stealth bomber, but maybe it was really a $3 billion project, with the other $2 billion conveniently diverted to other things.)
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
And now lets come back to reality, if somebody is capable physically cross universe, do you really think they would talk to insane Americans who only dream about Space Wars and all that shit to expand into infinite void of the space.
No, you would come to inflame those war passions, sow distrust and chaos, and confiscate any science/tech that would eventually lead to interstellar implications. Wiping out the humans and their ecosystem might be risking some valuable potential. But breeding a civilation of war-morons might be extremely useful, as long as you can control them.
A variant of the Dark Forest resolution to the Fermi Paradox.
Anyway, I assure you that it was Venus you saw last night.