b38e8512   
   XPost: alt.alien.visitors, alt.alien.research, sci.skeptic   
   XPost: alt.conspiracy   
   From: GM@ga7rm5er.com   
      
   On Sat, 24 Sep 2011 23:07:00 -0700 (PDT), "Sir Arthur C.B.E.   
   Wholeflaffers A.S.A."  wrote:   
      
   >UFO Debunkers: A Dangerous "Cult" or Super Patriots?/ The History of   
   >UFO Debunking!   
   >   
   >     The standing joke among UFO circles is for every 200 UFO   
   >sightings, the Air Force can explain away 201.  The possibility that   
   >our Government might withhold or distort information about UFOs might   
   >seem farfetched, until you read the mountains of evidence compiled   
   >from the Government's own files.  Evidence that strongly suggests a   
   >cover-up.  The U.S. Military first started seeing UFOs in World War   
   >II, pilots called them "Foo Fighters."  We thought they were a German   
   >secret weapon, the German's thought they were ours.  An explosion of   
   >civilian sightings in 1947 caught the military by surprise.  Top   
   >secret investigations were begun.  A joint study by the FBI and Army   
   >concluded, "The flying saucer situation is not all imaginary,   
   >something is really flying around."  That report was kept secret until   
   >1976.   
   >   
   >     Most early UFO sightings were made by eyewitnesses and not   
   >radar.  In New Mexico, over a two year period, dozens of people   
   >reported seeing green fire-balls over sensitive military   
   >installations.  But when radar and cameras were dispatched to those   
   >installations, the fire-balls mysteriously shifted someplace else.  A   
   >1949 study by scientists at Los Alamos Lab stated, "The fireballs   
   >deserve serious consideration.".   
   >   
   >     Some have suggested that the saucer craze of the 1940's and   
   >1950's was a by-product of Cold War tensions and fears.  Both the U.S.   
   >and the U.S.S.R. conducted secret studies to find out if the other   
   >side was behind the UFOs, and both concluded early on that the   
   >capabilities of the flying discs seemed beyond human technology.  This   
   >secret report done in 1948 by the Air Force and Naval Intelligence is   
   >among the most fascinating of the UFO documents ever to surface   
   >because it wasn't suppose to exist.  A confidential memo at the end of   
   >the report ordered that all copies should be destroyed.  But one copy   
   >survived and was finally pried out of the Pentagon in 1985.  It's a   
   >study of more than 200 of the earliest UFO sightings, including one   
   >that occurred on June, 1947, near Lake Mead. The report notes that an   
   >Air Force pilot saw a formation of six UFOs, and the UFOs were some   
   >type of flying craft, not weather balloons or hallucinations.  The   
   >report made note of the fact that more than a few sighting reports   
   >were made by experienced personnel, and that the origin of flying   
   >saucers was not ascertainable.   
   >   
   >The Cold War with the Soviets and Communist countries was heating up.   
   >Strange craft were reported all over our skies, and the news media was   
   >critical of government's explanations. Many people thought the craft   
   >belonged to the Soviet Union or perhaps aliens bent on invasion. There   
   >was fear the Soviets could use UFO propaganda to discredit the US   
   >government. There was genuine concern that a national panic could   
   >occur. Whether UFOs were real or not, the situation made the president   
   >nervous and made the military and the various intelligence agencies   
   >look bad. Plenty of good reports were trickling out that a substantial   
   >number of military aircraft were crashing. Stories started to leak out   
   >that these aircraft were crashing while chasing UFOs. The crashes were   
   >explained as training accidents and mechanical failures, but the news   
   >media was starting to tie the two types of reports together.   
   >   
   >     The over-all effort to study saucers was called "Project Sign,"   
   >and the headquarters was located at Wright Field in Ohio.  In 1949,   
   >Sign personnel wrote a top-secret report, which concluded that, "UFOs   
   >were extra-terrestrial craft."  When the report made it to the desk of   
   >the Chief of Staff General Hoyt Vandeberg, he rejected it and ordered   
   >all copies burned.  This rejection from the top was in the view of   
   >many, the death knell for any objective study of UFOs.  A few weeks   
   >later Project Sign produced another final report stating that it's   
   >findings were "inconclusive."  That report was accepted and soon after   
   >Project Sign became Project Grudge.  Grudge evaluated reports on the   
   >premise that UFOs could not exist.  According to a later report by the   
   >Library of Congress, it was the job of Grudge to explain them all.   
   >Despite this slant, 23% of Grudge cases remained a mystery.  Grudge   
   >staffers decided these cases were physiologically motivated, the first   
   >official declaration that people who see UFOs are crazy.   
   >   
   >In 1952, there were more sightings than the five previous years   
   >combined, including the two infamous Washington D.C. incidents.  Yet   
   >another study was launched, Project Bluebook.  Bluebook today is   
   >notorious in UFO circles as a whitewash.  There is considerable   
   >evidence the project was far from objective.  The man appointed to   
   >head Bluebook, Captain Edward Ruppelt, said he was told in the very   
   >beginning that the 'powers that be' were anti-flying-saucer and to   
   >stay in favor, "it behooves one to follow suit."  Ruppelt later   
   >resigned from the military and wrote a book about what he says was the   
   >Bluebook cover-up and the reality of flying saucers.  The continued   
   >increase of UFO sightings was a source of great concern for the CIA   
   >and a new strategy was born: "UFO DEBUNKING."   
   >   
   >A group of CIA-connected scientists was assembled in secret to   
   >evaluate UFOs. CIA documents reveal that five members of the   
   >Scientific Advisory Panel, who were all well-known skeptics, were   
   >given several poor UFO cases to examine and came to the conclusion   
   >that "there was no evidence of a direct threat to national security in   
   >the objects sighted. Flying saucer reports were overloading emergency   
   >reporting channels with false information, clogging up communication   
   >lines, causing alarm, and realistically even if they were real there   
   >was little we could do about them."  Furthermore, the government was   
   >losing the confidence of the people. Our science and aircraft seemed   
   >to be confronted by far superior technology.   
   >   
   >The  "Robertson Panel" spent all of twelve hours in a round-table   
   >discussion, analyzing only about a handful of UFO cases.  The Panel   
   >concluded that, "UFOs are not a threat to national security...but   
   >continued reporting of UFOs is a threat."  Their recommendation: The   
   >Government should take immediate steps to strip UFOs of their "aura of   
   >mystery," through a program of public education.  The final report   
   >even used the term, "DEBUNKING."   
   >   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)