Yet, in the foreword to Timothy Good’s remarkable book Above Top Secret: The Worldwide UFO Cover-up, Lord Hill-Norton, Admiral of the Fleet and British Chief of Defense Staff from 1971 to 1973, writes:
The evidence that there are objects which have been seen in our atmosphere, and even on terra firma, that cannot be accounted for either as manmade objects or as any physical force or effect known to our scientists seems to me to be over-whelming…A very large number of sightings have been vouched for by persons whose credentials seem to me unimpeachable. It is striking that so many have been trained observers, such as police officers and airline or military pilots…
In 1933 the 4th Swedish Flying Corps began an investigation of mysterious unmarked aircraft appearing over Scandinavia, and on April 30, 1934, Major-General Erik Reuterswaerd issued the following statement to the press:
Comparisons of these reports show that there can be no doubt about illegal air traffic over our secret military areas. There are many reports from reliable people which describe close observation of the enigmatic flier. And in every case, the same remark can be noted; no insignias or identifying marks are visible on the machines…The question is: Who or what are they, and why have they been invading our air territory?
In 1947 Professor Paul Santorini, a leading Greek scientist, was asked to investigate missiles flying over Greece. His research, however, was curtailed: “We soon established that they were not missiles. But, before we could do any more, the Army, after conferring with foreign officials, ordered the investigation stopped. Foreign scientists flew to Greece for secret talks with me.” (Emphasis added.)
The professor confirmed that a “world blanket of secrecy” surrounded the UFO question because, among other reasons, the authorities were unwilling to admit the existence of a force against which there was “no possibility of defense.”
From 1947 to 1952, the Air Technical Intelligence Center (ATIC) received approximately fifteen hundred official reports of sightings. Of these the Air Force carries twenty percent as unexplained:
Air Chief Marshal Lord Dowding, commander in chief of the RAF Fighter Command during the Battle of Britain in 1940 wrote:
More than 10,000 sightings have been reported, the majority of which cannot be accounted for by any “scientific explanation.” They have been tracked on radar screens…and the observed speeds have been as great as 9,000 miles an hour. …I am convinced that these objects do exist and that they are not manufactured by any nation on earth. [Emphasis added.] I can therefore see no alternative to accepting the theory that they come from an extraterrestrial source.
Recently, in Elmwood, Wisconsin, the entire town watched as flying saucers moved across their skies for several days.
General Lionel Max Chassin, who rose to the rank of Commanding General of the French Air Forces and served as General Air Defense Co-ordinator, Allied Air Forces, Central Europe (NATO), wrote:
That strange things have been seen is now beyond question…The number of thoughtful, intelligent, educated people in full possession of their faculties who have “seen something,” and described it grows every day.
Then there was the famous Roswell Incident in 1947. According to eyewitness reports, on the evening of July 2, a bright disk-shaped object was seen over Roswell, New Mexico. The following day, widely scattered wreckage was discovered by a local ranch manager and his two children. The authorities were alerted, and an official statement was released confirming that the wreckage of a flying disk had been recovered.
A second press statement was immediately issued stating that the wreckage was nothing more than the remains of a weather balloon, which was dutifully displayed at a press conference. Meanwhile, the real wreckage was reported to have been sent to Wright Field. The bodies were described by one witness as
like human but they were not humans. The heads were round, the eyes were small, and they had no hair. Their eyes were widely spaced. They were quite small by our standards and their heads were larger in proportion to their bodies. Their clothing seemed to be one-piece and grey in color. They seemed to be all males and there were a number of them…Military personnel took over and we were told to leave the area and not to talk to anyone about what we had seen.