The CIA UFO Papers by Dan Wright

Author:Dan Wright
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: MUFON

McDonald on the Attack

Also on October 7, the Arizona Republic ran an article titled “UFO Hush Blamed on CIA Men.” Atmospheric physicist James McDonald had told an audience of University of Arizona students and faculty that he reluctantly accepted the ET theory of UFOs as the “least unacceptable explanation.” He added that the sighting patterns suggested peaceful reconnaissance, while rejecting time travel, ESP, hoaxes, hallucinations, secret aircraft, and natural phenomena as overall explanations. He called the Air Force claim of explaining 95 percent of reports grossly exaggerated, that it was closer to 50 percent.

McDonald declared that the CIA orchestrated an Air Force debunking effort, its written order attached to the 1953 Robertson Panel Report he had reviewed at Wright-Patterson AFB, where UFO reports were stored. When he later requested an unsanitized copy of the panel report, the CIA reclassified it off limits. He said the CIA believed less official recognition would diminish public interest and reduce sighting reports. The Agency, he added, favored surveilling civilian groups (for example APRO) for possible subversion. He blamed the Air Force for a regulation criminalizing contact by airmen with civilian research groups, which resulted in official silence regarding pilot sightings, radar returns, and detection from space.17

The New York Times had an entirely different take on the commotion, concentrating on the local scene. The University of Colorado Project would be conducted on the Boulder campus, but USAF investigative teams would visit communities where prominent sightings were reported. Earlier, the Air Force had addressed the problem with one officer, one sergeant, and a secretary. Project Blue Book was now to notify the Condon group of any new cases that would “merit special investigation.” UC would provide specialists in the physical sciences and psychology who would be “solely responsible for the conclusions drawn.” Classified military and space surveillance data and certain psychiatric evaluations of UFO witnesses would not be made public. To counter potential public ridicule, witness anonymity would be offered. In contrast to this weighty assignment, in the early 1950s Condon himself had twice been denied a secrecy clearance.18

The next day the Baltimore Sun added its two cents: University of Arizona physicist James McDonald claimed the CIA ordered the Air Force to debunk UFO accounts, a policy he said throttled any scientific investigation. Now the Air Force announced a research grant to the University of Colorado to evaluate UFO reports. McDonald said he discovered the CIA debunking instruction—and directive not to disclose the Agency's role—while researching the Robertson Panel Report at Wright-Patterson AFB. Major Hector Quintanilla, successor as Project Blue Book chief, said the Report's aim was only to “remove the aura of danger from UFO sightings.”19

So, under the tutelage of Major Quintanilla, the Robertson Report's snarky critique of the “aura of mystery” surrounding UFO reports was itself sanitized, evolving into an “aura of danger” in need of elimination.

The Chicago Daily News concentrated on the fallacies of Blue Book's so-called investigations: James McDonald, the U of Arizona atmospheric physicist, said he believed some UFOs have to come from beyond Earth, “operated or controlled in some way by thinking beings.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.