House Oversight Hearing on UAPs - July 26, 2023

MonkeeSage

Senior Member.
The House Oversight committee will be holding a hearing on UAPs on July 26, 2023.

Article:
The House Oversight Committee hearing on UAPs (Unidentified Aerial Phenomena)/UFOs (Unidentified Flying Objects) will take place on July 26, Reps. Anna Paulina Luna, R-Fla., and Tim Burchett, R-Tenn., confirmed to NewsNation.

Neither office confirmed any details beyond the date as of Monday, but some House Oversight Committee members are expected to hold a news conference Wednesday to take questions and provide more information about the hearing. Members Burchett and Luna have been driving the effort to arrange hearings on the topic.

The chair of the House Oversight Committee, Rep. James Comer, R-Ky., claimed he and other lawmakers were going to try to get a hearing on the topic later this month.


The list of people who will speak to the committee has not been revealed, or if the hearing with be open, but more details are expected at the press conference.

Based on statements from Burchett and Luna it appears this hearing is going to be more focused on UAP reports, possibly including testimony from pilots like Fravor and Graves and possibly others, and possibly rehashing old Project Blue Book events, rather than Grusch's more extraordinary claims. For example, Rep. Luna tweeted some of the materials she is preparing for the hearing, which appears to be mostly rehashed previous UAP events:


Source: https://twitter.com/realannapaulina/status/1681372845660569615


Luna_UAP_material.jpg


RESOURCES: (Moderator Edited)
 
Last edited by a moderator:
20230719_082122.jpg

Article:
From 1947 to 1969, a total of 12, 618 sightings were reported to Project BLUE BOOK. Of these 701 remain "Unidentified."

As a result of these investigations and studies and experience gained from investigating UFO reports since 1948, the conclusions of Project BLUE BOOK are: (1) no UFO reported, investigated, and evaluated by the Air Force has ever given any indication of threat to our national security;(2) there has been no evidence submitted to or discovered by the Air Force that sightings categorized as "unidentified" represent technological developments or principles beyond the range of present-day scientific knowledge; and(3) there has been no evidence indicating that sightings categorized as "unidentified" are extraterrestrial vehicles.

Periodically, it is erroneously stated that the remains of extraterrestrial visitors are or have been stored at Wright-Patterson AFB. There are not now nor ever have been, any extraterrestrial visitors or equipment on Wright-Patterson Air Force Base.


Article:
A year ago during the presidential campaign, Carter laughed off a report that he had seen a UFO one night in 1969 in southwest Georgia. He admitted seeing a light in the sky he could not identify but did not call it a UFO.

"A light appeared and disappeared in the sky," he told a reporter covering the campaign. "It go brighter and brighter . . . I have no idea what it was . . . I think it was a light beckoning me to run in the California primary."

In his 1973 reports to the UFO organizations, Carter said he sighted a UFO in October, 1969, before making a dinner speech in the Lions Club of Leary, Ga. Carter said he watched the UFO with 10 members of the Leary Lions Club for 10 to 12 minutes before it disappeared.

Carter described the UFO "at one time as bright as the moon." He said it changed color and brightness. He said it also changed size from slightly larger than a planet to the "apparent size of the moon."

"It seemed to more toward us from a distance, stopped and moved partially away," Carter said. "It returned, then departed. It came close . . . maybe 300 to 1,000 yards . . . moved away, came close and then moved away."

Carter said the object was "bluish at first, then reddish." He said it was "luminous, not solid."
 
Last edited:
Wow, they are basically just dumping r/ufos on Congress, this is ludicrous.

The bloody Batman balloon is there twice once with a caption indicating it is from a warship 'swarm' off the coast of Virginia and the other saying Oceana which is in Virgina.

I assume this means this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naval_Air_Station_Oceana

Do I see the green triangle / stars clip as well?

I think that top one is the security cam footage we showed was a plane..

Actually that one might be the Christmas searchlights one

https://www.metabunk.org/threads/se...onsin-flanders-family-christmas-lights.12811/
 
Last edited:
The bloody Batman balloon is there twice once with a caption indicating it is from a warship 'swarm' off the coast of Virginia and the other saying Oceana which is in Virgina.

I assume this means this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naval_Air_Station_Oceana
To be explicit about this:

Detail from Luna's tweet:
20230719_132555.jpg


Batman balloon:
https://www.metabunk.org/threads/balloon-like-ufo-photo-from-the-debrief.11481/
View attachment 42264
View attachment 42266

https://www.metabunk.org/threads/sp...e-photos-from-an-f-18-via-mystery-wire.11692/
View attachment 43910

Maybe some U.S. citizen should inform Luna's staffers that, to informed circles, she's going to look like she doesn't know what she's talking about, if she presents these at the hearing.
 
Last edited:
I think that top one is the security cam footage we showed was a plane..

Actually that one might be the Christmas searchlights one

https://www.metabunk.org/threads/se...onsin-flanders-family-christmas-lights.12811/
Indeed it is.

From Luna's Tweet:
20230719_134516.jpg


From the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:
Article:
A line of light racing through the sky, spotted from I-43 near Greenfield
e57108d3-dbf3-4e96-bb3e-7577ba670774-ufo_chris.jpg


Chris Nowak's account on the Christmas Lights thread: https://www.metabunk.org/threads/se...ers-family-christmas-lights.12811/post-285461
The explanation is at the start of the thread, it's a programmed sequence of several spotlights shining at the clouds.
 
UAPs do have an impact on pilot training operations, so maybe the hearing will result in a ban on mylar balloons?
 
Mylar helium balloons should be controlled more in my opinion, balloons that escape or are intentionally released become non degradable litter somewhere else, I find them all the time when I am out hiking just stuck in a tree littering the place up, they are also a danger for livestock and wildlife and pollute our marine environments.
 
UAPs do have an impact on pilot training operations, so maybe the hearing will result in a ban on mylar balloons?
I don't understand why that clip has gotten so much play with the pro-ET crowd. The Nimitz encounter reported by Fravor and Dietrich in 2004 took place over the Southern California Offshore Range (SCORE) and disrupted their training exercise, so he could easily be talking about known events like that.

Edit: I don't mean to say the Nimitz report from Fravor is resolved/known as to cause, just that I have seen the clip presented, like in that tweet, as providing a statement about new unknown events.
 
Last edited:
Information on the hearing has been posted.

Article:
WHAT: Hearing titled "Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena: Implications on National Security, Public Safety, and Government Transparency."

DATE: Wednesday, July 26, 2023

TIME: 10:00 a.m. ET

LOCATION: 2154 Rayburn House Office Building

WITNESSES:
  • Ryan Graves, Executive Director, Americans for Safe Aerospace
  • Rt. Commander David Fravor, Former Commanding Officer, Black Aces Squadron, U.S. Navy
  • David Grusch, Former National Reconnaissance Officer Representative, Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena Task Force, Department of Defense

The hearing will be open to the public and press and will be livestreamed online at https://oversight.house.gov/. Press must be congressionally credentialed and must RSVP by emailing oversightgoppressrsvp@mail.house.gov by Tuesday, July 25 at 5:00pm.
 
Information on the hearing has been posted.

Article:
WHAT: Hearing titled "Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena: Implications on National Security, Public Safety, and Government Transparency."

DATE: Wednesday, July 26, 2023

TIME: 10:00 a.m. ET

LOCATION: 2154 Rayburn House Office Building

WITNESSES:
  • Ryan Graves, Executive Director, Americans for Safe Aerospace
  • Rt. Commander David Fravor, Former Commanding Officer, Black Aces Squadron, U.S. Navy
  • David Grusch, Former National Reconnaissance Officer Representative, Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena Task Force, Department of Defense

The hearing will be open to the public and press and will be livestreamed online at https://oversight.house.gov/. Press must be congressionally credentialed and must RSVP by emailing oversightgoppressrsvp@mail.house.gov by Tuesday, July 25 at 5:00pm.

This is disappointing. We're not going to learn anything new from Graves and Fravor. Their stories are already well known and widely circulated, and they themselves don't know much. I'm more interested in hearing if Grusch has more to say, but is there any reason to believe he can bring receipts this time, or are we just going to hear the same things we heard in his interview with Coulthart?

Overall, super disappointing.
 
This is disappointing. We're not going to learn anything new from Graves and Fravor. Their stories are already well known and widely circulated, and they themselves don't know much. I'm more interested in hearing if Grusch has more to say, but is there any reason to believe he can bring receipts this time, or are we just going to hear the same things we heard in his interview with Coulthart?

Overall, super disappointing.
so basically wash rinse repeat?
 
so basically wash rinse repeat?
The eternally dangling carrot is such a psychologically powerful and addictive thing. If I'm a skeptic and I feel disappointment when I read these names, I can only imagine how much more powerful it is for folks who believe this stuff. The promise of disclosure always being just out of reach must be maddening.
 
The eternally dangling carrot is such a psychologically powerful and addictive thing. If I'm a skeptic and I feel disappointment when I read these names, I can only imagine how much more powerful it is for folks who believe this stuff. The promise of disclosure always being just out of reach must be maddening.
oh yeah they must feel pretty teased but by this time next year they will be filled with promise again by something and then the whole show will restart it's honestly depressing for us skeptics and the "true believers". smh
 
I don't understand why that clip has gotten so much play with the pro-ET crowd. The Nimitz encounter reported by Fravor and Dietrich in 2004 took place over the Southern California Offshore Range (SCORE) and disrupted their training exercise, so he could easily be talking about known events like that.

Edit: I don't mean to say the Nimitz report from Fravor is resolved/known as to cause, just that I have seen the clip presented, like in that tweet, as providing a statement about new unknown events.
I mean... some people on r/UFOs they think Obama being funny and joking around about aliens on a humorous night talk show is a smoking gun for a secret government alliance with mantid aliens, and say "blow the lid off this thing" way too often for it to be healthy. Confirmation bias affects everyone (even us scientists), and the more you believe, the bigger the effect will be.

That witness list does not look promising as far as providing the super-secret DoD reverse engineering project whistleblowers that Leslie Kean has promised us. Those are pretty standard UFO video guys.
 
Those are pretty standard UFO video guys.
Grusch is a bit different from the others. He is the one who sparked the excitement about reverse engineering, recovery of crashed vehicles, etc. But he didn't claim first-hand knowledge, so what can he say at the hearing? Will he name his sources? I guess he will plead confidentiality on the sources, and 'national security' on anything else.
 
This is disappointing. We're not going to learn anything new from Graves and Fravor. Their stories are already well known and widely circulated, and they themselves don't know much. I'm more interested in hearing if Grusch has more to say, but is there any reason to believe he can bring receipts this time, or are we just going to hear the same things we heard in his interview with Coulthart?

Overall, super disappointing.
Don't disagree with your observations, but what did you expect? Grusch to have named the names of those who he claims told him we had retrieved alien technology? Those people to have been subpoenaed by the committee, then asked under oath if they did tell Grusch what he claims?

Keep in mind Grusch says he was told these things he claims on the sly without having been read in to the programs/projects those individuals represented. If true, that in and of itself is a criminal offense. If asked under oath if they knowingly violated security regulations by providing Grusch information he was not accessed/had no need to know, they're either going to deny having done so or plead the 5th Amendment.
 
Transcript of the press conference is available from the following link. It's auto-generated for closed captions and has links that are meant to jump to the point in the video so pretty unreadable unless you copy/paste into a text editor.

https://www.c-span.org/video/?52946...Transcript&transcriptType=cc&transcriptQuery=

Highlights:

Burchett:

Talks up the experiences of Fravor and Graves and is upset they didn't get to testify previously at the previous UAP hearing.
External Quote:
Last year, the House Intelligence Committee held a hearing on UAPS. They brought in some Pentagon bureaucrats who only had two answers to the questions they were asked. I don't know or that's classified. This hearing is going to be different. We're going to have witnesses who can speak frankly to the public about their experiences.
Says they've had pushback on the hearing.
External Quote:
We've had a heck of a lot of pushback about this hearing. We've had members of Congress who fought us. We've had members of the intelligence community and also the Pentagon even NASA backed out on us. There are a lot of people who don't want this to come to light. I've even tried to introduce an amendment to the Federal Aviation Administration reauthorization bill and all that would do would require the Federal Aviation Administration to report UAP sightings by commercial pilots to Congress. The Intelligence, I was told the a uh the intelligence community shut it down.
In the Q&A section later when asked who blocked his FAA amendment, he seems to be basing it on rumor and basically says "do your own research" and goes into a conspiracy theory.
External Quote:
We're not really sure. I was told the intelligence community blocked it and then I was told that the intelligence committee blocked it and it depends on who you talk to. I think that's your all's jobs as reporters to find out what the hell is going on with this stuff because y'all need to start asking tough questions and, and you need to start looking at people's financial disclosures as well because the groups that probably have control of this obviously are, are, are well heeled in this.
He seems to conflate the existence of UAP with the existence of ET/NHI/whatever.
External Quote:
This is ridiculous, folks, they either they do exist or they don't exist. They keep telling us they don't exist but they block every opportunity for us to get a hold of the information to prove that they do exist.
Moskovitz:

Says it's about transparency and and having an answer for what UAP might be.
External Quote:
And it's just finally time the US government answer questions about what they know. And when did they know it, taxpayers are paying for programs that are keeping this information secret. They have a right to know where their dollars are going and, and with claims coming forward as technology is getting better, people are capturing things on their phones now, right? We we need to know whether these things are uh are they domestic uh are they foreign or are they, are they something else or do they not exist? And the government needs to have straight answers.
Luna:

Repeats the old line about so many credible witnesses can't be mistaken.
External Quote:
If this was a court case, the court would be compelled to take up the thousands of testimonies, images, videos and eyewitness accounts from doctors, pilots, scientists and active duty, service members, the status quo on the part of the US government has been to leave the American people in the dark regarding information of UAP.
She thinks the government is hiding information on UAP because of resistance they have encountered.
External Quote:
Representative Burchett and Representative Gates had attended an air Force base and we are blocked not only by the Pentagon but by the Department of the Air Force from seeing information, talking to witnesses and after much arm twisting, we got some of the information. But the fact is is that they answer to Congress and that the American people and any government entity that attempts to stonewall us is doing nothing in the vested interest of the American people. When I take a face value, the numerous road blocks that we've been presented with it leads me to believe that they are indeed hiding information.
Burlison:

Is skeptical and thinks transparency is the way to combat rumors and conspiracy.
External Quote:
I'll start out by saying that I'm a skeptic on a lot of stuff. Um I come from a computer science background and finance background, so I tend to err on the side of things that I can see and touch. Um, and I don't, I don't give to, into conspiracies, but too often the federal government works outside of the public eye and in conspiracies and rumors tend to flourish in places where the federal government is silent or not transparent.
He seems to be putting a lot of stock in Grusch's claims.
External Quote:
Like many Americans, I read David Grusch's story when it first came out and watched the TV Interviews. I was struck by the sheer amount of detail. So I was able to contact him and hear directly from him in a lengthy phone call interview. And after speaking with him, I was convinced that the American people deserve to hear from him directly.
The Q&A section is long and I don't feel like trying to parse the transcript, but basically the points above are just reiterated and elaborated on.
 
Last edited:
This is disappointing. We're not going to learn anything new from Graves and Fravor. Their stories are already well known and widely circulated, and they themselves don't know much. I'm more interested in hearing if Grusch has more to say, but is there any reason to believe he can bring receipts this time, or are we just going to hear the same things we heard in his interview with Coulthart?
Based on the witness list and statements Burchett and others have made, I feel like the goal with the hearing is to present to the public level-headed, highly-trained observers who "know what they saw" -- and that what they saw is beyond explanation -- and there is a precedent for such observations going back to Project Blue Book, which will bolster Grusch's claims, for which I don't expect any new evidence will be presented here. Maybe that is a cynical take, but not sure what else to make of it.
 
Don't disagree with your observations, but what did you expect? Grusch to have named the names of those who he claims told him we had retrieved alien technology? Those people to have been subpoenaed by the committee, then asked under oath if they did tell Grusch what he claims?

Keep in mind Grusch says he was told these things he claims on the sly without having been read in to the programs/projects those individuals represented. If true, that in and of itself is a criminal offense. If asked under oath if they knowingly violated security regulations by providing Grusch information he was not accessed/had no need to know, they're either going to deny having done so or plead the 5th Amendment.

Good point Duke. Grusch's basic story is that he was told these things in confidence or unofficially or around the water cooler. He was never read into any of this, because that's the point of his whistleblower complaint. He "heard" about this stuff, tried to look into it as part of UAPTF and was denied access, when he complained about the denials, his career was affected, so he filed a complaint.

It's always been hearsay from sources he can't reveal. His paly has been to get congress to compel his sources, or the programs his sources talked about, to come forward and coaberate his story.
 
It's always been hearsay from sources he can't reveal. His paly has been to get congress to compel his sources, or the programs his sources talked about, to come forward and corroborate his story.

This is indeed the crux of the matter.

And in the extremely unlikely event the congress would ever muster enough votes to subpoena the DoD to disclose any classified programs, it would most likely be firmly resisted with executive privilege (bold added).

Article:
Executive privilege is the right of the president of the United States and other members of the executive branch to maintain confidential communications under certain circumstances within the executive branch and to resist some subpoenas and other oversight by the legislative and judicial branches of government in pursuit of particular information or personnel relating to those confidential communications. The right comes into effect when revealing the information would impair governmental functions.
 
Don't disagree with your observations, but what did you expect? Grusch to have named the names of those who he claims told him we had retrieved alien technology? Those people to have been subpoenaed by the committee, then asked under oath if they did tell Grusch what he claims?

Keep in mind Grusch says he was told these things he claims on the sly without having been read in to the programs/projects those individuals represented. If true, that in and of itself is a criminal offense. If asked under oath if they knowingly violated security regulations by providing Grusch information he was not accessed/had no need to know, they're either going to deny having done so or plead the 5th Amendment.

Well, not an expectation, but a desire or a wish that whoever these people are they'd come forward now given the provision in the 2023 National Defense Authorization Act stating that any person with relevant UAP information can inform Congress without retaliation, regardless of any previous non-disclosure agreements. Now would be the time to do so if they've got anything.
 
From Burchett:
They brought in some Pentagon bureaucrats who only had two answers to the questions they were asked. I don't know or that's classified.
That sounds like perfectly appropriate answers, but he wants only the answers that HE approves of. I'm not sure a country in which there are no classified subjects would be a safe place to live.
He seems to conflate the existence of UAP with the existence of ET/NHI/whatever:
This is ridiculous, folks, they either they do exist or they don't exist. They keep telling us they don't exist but they block every opportunity for us to get a hold of the information to prove that they do exist.
Once again, Burchett doesn't want honest answers, he just wants confirmation of a thing he has decided is true.

She (Luna) thinks the government is hiding information on UAP because of resistance they have encountered.
In other words, she thinks lack of evidence provides evidence for her pet theories.

I foresee no conclusions coming from this whole dog and pony show, just grandstanding and accusations.
 
I'm re-reading the article from The Debrief to clarify what it was that he alleged. The article says:

He said he reported to Congress on the existence of a decades-long "publicly unknown Cold War for recovered and exploited physical material – a competition with near-peer adversaries over the years to identify UAP crashes/landings and retrieve the material for exploitation/reverse engineering to garner asymmetric national defense advantages."
Beginning in 2022, Grusch provided Congress with hours of recorded classified information transcribed into hundreds of pages which included specific data about the materials recovery program. Congress has not been provided with any physical materials related to wreckage or other non-human objects.

Grusch's investigation was centered on extensive interviews with high-level intelligence officials, some of whom are directly involved with the program. He says the operation was illegally shielded from proper Congressional oversight and that he was targeted and harassed because of his investigation.

Grusch said that the craft recovery operations are ongoing at various levels of activity and that he knows the specific individuals, current and former, who are involved.

"Individuals on these UAP programs approached me in my official capacity and disclosed their concerns regarding a multitude of wrongdoings, such as illegal contracting against the Federal Acquisition Regulations and other criminality and the suppression of information across a qualified industrial base and academia," he stated.

Associates who vouched for Grusch said his information was highly sensitive, providing evidence that materials from objects of non-human origin are in the possession of highly secret black programs. Although locations, program names, and other specific data remain classified, the Inspector General and intelligence committee staff were provided with these details. Several current members of the recovery program spoke to the Inspector General's office and corroborated the information Grusch had provided for the classified complaint.

I'm more confused now than ever. First of all, what is the purpose of this hearing considering the fact that he allegedly reported to congress in 2022 and provided them with hours of recorded classified information? Why does congress need to do this hearing if presumably they already have transcripts of all that he already reported to them in 2022? Where is *that* information then?
 
I'm more confused now than ever. First of all, what is the purpose of this hearing considering the fact that he allegedly reported to congress in 2022 and provided them with hours of recorded classified information? Why does congress need to do this hearing if presumably they already have transcripts of all that he already reported to them in 2022? Where is *that* information then?
My impression is they want to end the 'overclassification' of the topic.
In this article John Greenewald wonders why videos of Russian jets engaging with Reaper drones and U2 spy planes engaging with chinese high altitude balloons are freely released to the public while UAP videos are withheld:
External Quote:

In April 2020, the Department of the Navy's " Security Classification Guide " formalized the secrecy around UAP. It deemed the facts about pilots' UAP sightings and the Navy's ongoing UAP investigations as "unclassified," but most UAP details were then defined as classified by the guide. Those facts remain entirely unknown to the public due to heavy redactions in the SCG, and it's this type of secrecy that contradicts government attempts to dismiss UAP as primarily drones or airborne clutter.

The result of the UAP SCG being approved was that it locked down UAP information and made it incredibly difficult to obtain through legal channels. In one case I filed, the Navy denied every single video they had that they tagged as a UAP. The DOD claimed it didn't want to reveal the capabilities of sensitive sensor systems, yet time and time again , it would release video taken by the same or similar video imaging systems in instances not dealing with UAP. In other words, it was UAP they were going to great lengths to hide, not the sensitive systems that took the imagery.

In other examples, the U.S. Navy denied releasing UAP briefing videos , and the NRO heavily redacted a PowerPoint presentation about a 2021 UAP sighting of a "tic-tac," all thanks to the secrecy the UAP SCG mandated.
If they want to show the public that there is nothing behind the phenomenon, why not release the materials they have (and blur anything that might reveal sensor capabilities or other classified stuf, like they did with the 'orb video' that Kirkpatrick showed in the NASA meeting - they see them all over the world so they must have more footage than that).
 
In this article John Greenewald wonders why videos of Russian jets engaging with Reaper drones and U2 spy planes engaging with chinese high altitude balloons are freely released to the public while UAP videos are withheld

if all the UAP pics/vids are constantly debunked (which they are) so publicly, then airmen might become shy again about reporting them? The public might not know the names of airmen reporting these things, but their comrades do.
 
From @AR318307 's post #31 about Grusch:
External Quote:
Associates who vouched for Grusch said his information was highly sensitive, providing evidence that materials from objects of non-human origin are in the possession of highly secret black programs. Although locations, program names, and other specific data remain classified, the Inspector General and intelligence committee staff were provided with these details. Several current members of the recovery program spoke to the Inspector General's office and corroborated the information Grusch had provided for the classified complaint.
What I don't get is why Grusch is not in more trouble for (1) talking about classified subjects at work outside his security clearance, and (2) talking about them to the press after he left the department. Is the "whistleblower" status intended to be a blanket immunity, and if so, wouldn't that make it a thing more likely to be abused?
 
if all the UAP pics/vids are constantly debunked (which they are) so publicly, then airmen might become shy again about reporting them? The public might not know the names of airmen reporting these things, but their comrades do.
Some aspects may have been debunked, like the high speed in gofast or the sudden move in the tictac video. But I still haven't seen any evidence of ATFLIR glare caused by a distant jet, and the tictac in the video still looks convincingly like a tictac to me. No convincing explanation for Kirkpatrick's metallic orb video either.

So yes, some debunking has been irrefutable but other debunking can be disputed. I would like to see AARO engage publicly in these debates, and use whatever data they have. Why would any conclusion resulting from these kind of public debates be classified? The only one I can think of is secret technology of the US or its allies.
 
My impression is they want to end the 'overclassification' of the topic.
In this article John Greenewald wonders why videos of Russian jets engaging with Reaper drones and U2 spy planes engaging with chinese high altitude balloons are freely released to the public while UAP videos are withheld:
External Quote:

In April 2020, the Department of the Navy's " Security Classification Guide " formalized the secrecy around UAP. It deemed the facts about pilots' UAP sightings and the Navy's ongoing UAP investigations as "unclassified," but most UAP details were then defined as classified by the guide. Those facts remain entirely unknown to the public due to heavy redactions in the SCG, and it's this type of secrecy that contradicts government attempts to dismiss UAP as primarily drones or airborne clutter.

The result of the UAP SCG being approved was that it locked down UAP information and made it incredibly difficult to obtain through legal channels. In one case I filed, the Navy denied every single video they had that they tagged as a UAP. The DOD claimed it didn't want to reveal the capabilities of sensitive sensor systems, yet time and time again , it would release video taken by the same or similar video imaging systems in instances not dealing with UAP. In other words, it was UAP they were going to great lengths to hide, not the sensitive systems that took the imagery.

In other examples, the U.S. Navy denied releasing UAP briefing videos , and the NRO heavily redacted a PowerPoint presentation about a 2021 UAP sighting of a "tic-tac," all thanks to the secrecy the UAP SCG mandated.
If they want to show the public that there is nothing behind the phenomenon, why not release the materials they have (and blur anything that might reveal sensor capabilities or other classified stuf, like they did with the 'orb video' that Kirkpatrick showed in the NASA meeting - they see them all over the world so they must have more footage than that).
One explanation that comes to mind that possibly explains classifying UAP videos but not the fighters engaging with drones and balloon videos is that presumably UAP videos that have yet to be explained remain classified out of concern that what they're looking at is possibly foreign technology that they've yet to identify. For security reasons, you don't want the enemy to know how much *you* know about them, their technology, or their capabilities. Sometimes it's advantageous to not disclose how much information we know about, for example, a foreign adversary's fighter jets and their capabilities. Feigning ignorance can lead to overconfidence by an enemy for instance.

But similarly, if, say, China has some type of technology deployed that we don't know about and gets labeled a "UAP" when spotted, and upon analysis of the footage of said UAP the task force is unable go identify what it is (either because of lack of data or just inability to recognize what they're looking at), it would not be good to advertise to foreign adversaries that the US can't figure out what they're looking at. If some of these things are spy drones for example, and the US declassifies videos of them with the conclusion "we still can't tell what these are", such declassification may lead the foreign adversary (China in this scenario) to continue using said drones in the same way they have been with the knowledge that the US is still unaware of what they are.

So not only do you not want to advertise to the enemy what you know, but you also do not want to advertise what you *don't* know just in case the things you can't identify do in fact belong to an enemy power.

This then might explain why there has been a policy of over classification. If you can't tell what something is, you're not going to advertise that fact. You keep your mouth shut in the hopes of eventually figuring it out.

The outside world perceives that secrecy as evidence for something bigger, but that's the price you pay for not letting the world know the extent of what you know.
 
Last edited:
The result of the UAP SCG being approved was that it locked down UAP information and made it incredibly difficult to obtain through legal channels. In one case I filed, the Navy denied every single video they had that they tagged as a UAP. The DOD claimed it didn't want to reveal the capabilities of sensitive sensor systems, yet time and time again , it would release video taken by the same or similar video imaging systems in instances not dealing with UAP. In other words, it was UAP they were going to great lengths to hide, not the sensitive systems that took the imagery.

Regarding the bolded bit:

(1) How would Greenewald know the instances not dealing with UAP have used the same or similar video imaging system if the Navy denied him access to the UAP videos? Is he a clairvoyant?

(2) I work in a Western defence establishment. In our secrecy protocol, whenever we classify anything and are asked about it, we are never to offer any specific reasons for the classification (such as 'sensitive sensor systems') for the obvious reason that any such specifics would say too much and defeat the very purpose of classifying the capability in the first place. All classifications are legally required to be based on a consideration of national interest, which remains the only (and the non-scoopworthy) reason for the classification we offer if ever asked.

(3) For us, there's a big difference between a classified capability with particular classified specs (say an imaging system) and 'similar' capabilities with whatever specs they have. Generally it's the exact specifics of a capability, geographic location, mission, function, task, role, troop strength and personnel that need to be classified the most. Something that's vaguely similar might not have the critical specs that would require classification. Even if it's a piece of technology from the same manufacturer and represents a similar model available for, say, commercial usage.

(4) Although it's not the way we operate, I can imagine some service branches of some militaries may try to draw attention away from classified technologies accidentally featuring in a UAP video (as 'the UAP' itself) by claiming the video is classified and non-releasable due to 'sensitive sensors systems'.
 
Some aspects may have been debunked, like the high speed in gofast or the sudden move in the tictac video. But I still haven't seen any evidence of ATFLIR glare caused by a distant jet, and the tictac in the video still looks convincingly like a tictac to me. No convincing explanation for Kirkpatrick's metallic orb video either.

So yes, some debunking has been irrefutable but other debunking can be disputed. I would like to see AARO engage publicly in these debates, and use whatever data they have. Why would any conclusion resulting from these kind of public debates be classified? The only one I can think of is secret technology of the US or its allies.
Why do we even use the term "debunk" for such videos?
*Explained* would be a better term for it. A video like that shows something that appears anomalous at first sight, and it requires some work and sometimes experiments to recreate what we see on screen in order to figure out what we're looking at. Once we've figured out a likely explanation, the video should be referred to as "explained

If I catch something weird on my home's Nest camera and I can't figure out what it is, so I post it here or reddit for help, and after some back and forth someone who figures it out, we wouldn't call my video "Debunked", we'd just say we've explained it. Why not the same for UAP videos for which a satisfactory explanation has been found?
 
Back
Top