Government/Military UFO's

Pythagorean

I notice that a lot of people associate UFO's with aliens. But these sighting need not be extraterrestrial.

Is there any evidence of the government or military experimenting with flying machines that would account for the plethora of sightings out there? If it isn't obvious, I never really studied UFO's before, so I may be stating the obvious.

waht

Neil Tyson has a nice take on the subject:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zfAzaDyae-k

Ivan Seeking

There is no doubt that everything from 747's to then classified B2 bombers and F117s account for many UFO reports.

Based on the results of studies like project Bluebook [USAF], perhaps 5% of all reports are apparent mysteries. That is also what drives the silliness to absurd levels, including esp many debunkings. It is easy to debunk the 90-95% that even ET-UFO advocates expect to be explainable in prosaic terms; or at least ignorable due to a lack of any compelling anecdotal evidence. The remaining 5% are what keep everyone interested [I would actually say it is more like 1%].

zoobyshoe

The legendary wreckage at Roswell was first claimed by the military to be a "flying saucer", but later they claimed that was a cover lie to hide the fact it was a high altitude balloon equipped with sensors to pick up Soviet Atom Bomb tests.

In recent times they have freely released footage of a big variety of unusual looking small drone aircraft which are designed mostly for surveillance.

If you were interested in researching it, Popular Science, or possibly Popular Mechanics had a cover story within the past ten years about a large, disk-shaped craft the government worked on for a while but then abandoned. It was nuclear powered and was designed to be able to get out of the atmosphere and into space. IIRC at least one working prototype was built and flown. I don't recall the specific problem they couldn't overcome, but it lead to the project being scrapped.

So, yes, there is some evidence of what you're asking about.

MrHayman

The US stopped building SR-71's, B-2, and F-117 or at least stopped developing them in the late 80's early 90's. However, the money has not stopped flowing into these departments or companies. So what are they building now?

Was not the recent UFO over Norway, finally admitted to be a Russian military experiment? How many failed experiments or otherwise, have not been admitted to?

MrHayman

I always found it humourous how the American people do not even know what their government is doing with billions of dollars of money, and yet they are one of the most indebted nations in the world.

The military just roles out a brand new B-2 one day and says, "We built this billion dollar stealth bomber, isn't it great. Sorry, we didn't tell you about it for the last 20 years."

Ivan Seeking

No such craft was ever built or flown; at least there is no evidence supporting such a claim.

MountieFan16

Mr. Hayman makes an excellent observation in that there are billions of dollars spent by our government and American people really don't know what it's being spent on. Unfortunately, I'm not convinced the elected officials in D.C. know either.

MotoH

Because if the American people know what skunkworks is building, then the enemy knows. I for one feel extremely secure knowing that things are being worked on to maintain air superiority over competing nations.

Ivan Seeking

What I find most compelling are official military UFO reports that are more than twenty years old, which is about all that one can gain access to anyway. We likely know what the limits of technology were at the time of any event reported.

In the old days, presumably, the classification of these documents occured primarily because it was possible that we were seeing advanced Soviet, or later, Chinese technology. The documents are then declassified upon request, through the Freedom of Information Act, when no national security issues are known to exist. One of my objections to the conspiracy theories is that in spite of claims that the government is hiding information, some of the best evidence for real UFOs [whatever that means] comes from the Government! Names, places, addresses, and other personal information, are often blacked out; sometimes with many pages of black ink. But details pertaining to the UFO itself, as reported, are often intact.

pallidin

And to add to what Ivan said, the FOIA releases became of special interest to "conspiracy theorist' when some or large areas where "blacked-out"

Well, years ago I asked a friend who was once very close to such things. He told me that the reason for most of the FOIA black-outs had nothing to do with extraterrestrial UFO's. Rather, the reason was to protect classified flight data of special US experimental aircraft(or missions) and/or secret radar stations/personnel.
Made sense to me then and does now.

MountieFan16

Ladies and Gents,

Let me say at the beginning, I'm not wearing a hat made out of tinfoil. I find it interesting that the debunkers say there is no such thing as ET's; without even listening to what others have reported. Considering that some very intelligent and qualified individuals has said that we are being visited by other "beings" from other worlds. As an example the following astronauts have said that ET's are real. To wit:
- Buzz Aldrin
- Gordon Cooper
- Edgar Mitchell
- Neil Armstrong

The non-astronaut individuals that I personally respect are:
- Former Governor Simington of Arizona (the Phoenix Lights)
- Former President Jimmy Carter
- Former Canadian Defence Minister Paul Hellyer
- General Wil De Brouwer of the Belgian Air Force

And lastly read the newly declassified materials from the British MOD, Sweden, Mexico, Belgium, Brazil, and France. Check out COMETA, which was a study financed by the French government. All except our government - why you may ask? Go to YouTube and watch President Esinhower's farewell speech at the end of his term in office - where he warns about the military-industrial complex. Draw your own conclusions - AFTER you check out the materials I've identified above. If you remain a skeptic, God Bless you. (Oh, BTW, the Catholic Church as released a communication that we (they) have to accept the "probability" that ET's do exist. Check out "Fastwalkers" on the net and watch what the "Head Exorcist" from the Roman Catholic Church has to say about ET's.

Now, I plan on putting my tinfoil hat back on and go star/UFO gaze.


[/U]

Ivan Seeking

Your post is far too vague - no references, much less qualified references - and not all of the information is correct. For example, Buzz Aldrin specifically denies making any such statement. Nor did Armstrong ever said such a thing; at least not that I've ever seen in a good reference. Also, for the Catholic church to admit to the possiblity of ET is not the same as claiming that ET is flying UFOs. And even if they did, it wouldn't count as evidence for anything.

It does no good to argue for credibility while making bogus or marginal claims. If you wish to present evidence, even anecdotal evidence, a source is needed; and I don't mean some fringe UFO site. Also, appeals to authority have no value. Not only does a report from Jimmy Carter prove nothing, but the report was a UFO report, not an ET report. He has never said it was ET.

Ivan Seeking

There was a rather famous sighting of two flying saucers by the then powerful Senator Russell, back in the 1950's, while he was travelling through the old Soviet Union. For a number of years the official CIA report could be read, but Russell's name, dates, and references to the Soviet Union, were blacked out. Nothing was done to hide information about what he allegedly saw, rather the trip itself was a secret, so information about him was omitted. Later, it was possible to read the report entirely without the black ink.

The report is linked in the Napster. He claimed that two UFOs took off near the train, in clear view, while it was in transit.

pallidin

To paraphase, I once heard "...to dominate the air is to dominate the battlefield."

Given that, most of the so-called UFO's are actually various governmental(US and otherwise) experimental attack/reconnaissance aircraft.

Garth

I was immensely impressed at the 1996 Farnborough International Air Show when for the first time a B-2 Spirit Stealth bomber was exhibited, the 'Spirit of Washington' made two flybys, giving the impression of a real leap in technology over other aircraft.

It had arrived a few minutes early and I saw it flying a circuit on the horizon before closing for the flypast. If I had not been expecting its arrival I could have sworn I had seen a UFO. (Literally as the U stands for 'unidentified'!)

Garth

Ivan Seeking

Really? I see no evidence for that. Some UFOs are certainly experimental and even known aircrafts, but to say "most" UFOs are explained by this is pretty tough to defend. For starters, there are plenty of reports resulting from mundane objects such as balloons, flares, and lenticular clouds, not to mention things like ball lightning, earthlights, gaseous fireballs, and meteors. Beyond that, there is a class of reports that seem to be inexplicable, which is why the subject of UFOs attracts some serious people. Some of the most interesting, apparently credible reports [such as official military reports], would seem to suggest that there are still a few mysteries to be solved.