by Charles Lear
As more and more researchers are coming to the conclusion that “the government” is as clueless about UFOs as the rest of us, it’s easy to forget how crazy things got in UFOlogy in the later part of the 20th century. There’s a cast of characters floating around the internet in old videos who told some scary stories. Their dark tales seemed to confirm people’s worst fears about our government, shadowy organizations and aliens. There were some wild claims made by people who had impressive backgrounds that included military service and work with intelligence organizations. Their credentials seemed to have absolved them of the need to back up their claims with proof in the minds of many and the noise they made is still clouding the signal today.
On January 1, 1986, Jim Speiser created a forum called, “ParaNet” within a Bulletin Board System devoted to the paranormal called, “The Other Side.” The purpose was to bring UFO believers, skeptics and those undecided together for an intelligent exchange of ideas and offer access to information. It was here, in 1987, that a newcomer to UFOlogy, John Lear, had a file in the form of a press release posted containing the statement that, “The United States Government has been in business with little gray extraterrestrials for about 20 years.” He referenced MJ-12, crashes in New Mexico at Roswell and Aztec, and stated that MJ-12 had made a deal with ETs. The terms of the agreement were that the ETs would provide technology in exchange for a governmental laissez faire policy when it came to abductions and cattle mutilations. According to Lear, the mutilations and abductions were for the purposes of feeding and breeding. Cattle parts and human parts were mixed in vats at an underground base in Dulce, NM to extract “an enzyme or hormonal secretion” that the ETs absorbed for sustenance. When not used as foodstuff, human females were impregnated and the resulting crossbred offspring were taken. Lear went on to state that, in 1979, there was an “altercation of sorts” where 66 soldiers were killed trying to free “our people” who had become trapped in the facility after learning its secrets.
Of particular interest is that Lear accuses researcher William Moore of being a government agent working for MJ-12 when he had, in fact, worked with Air Force Office of Special Investigation agent, Richard Doty as part of a disinformation operation. Moore was promised inside information in exchange for his cooperation.
Lear’s background was that he was the son of Lear Jet designer, Bill Lear, was an accomplished aviator and had flown missions for the “CIA and other government agencies.” A message from the ParaNet administrator preceding Lear’s file stated that while the information had not been verified, Lear’s identity had been and that he was in a position to be able to receive such information.
The claims made by Lear had their roots in a “report” known as, “Project Beta”, written by researcher, Paul Bennewitz. Bennewitz had developed his conclusions while being targeted by the AFOSI and NSA in a disinformation campaign executed in part by Moore and Doty. Bennewitz was fed false information about there being an alien base in Dulce. This was in order to divert his attention away from his surveillance of Kirtland Air Force Base where, he believed, he was observing alien activity. While many people questioned Lear’s claims, William Cooper, a former naval petty officer who claimed to have worked in Naval Intelligence, posted his own statement on ParaNet, that included descriptions of projects involving aliens and their craft. He listed the projects by name and described them in a detached, matter-of-fact manner. Significantly, he stated that MJ-12 was merely a group of scattered scientific advisors and that the controlling group was the Majestic Agency for Joint Intelligence or “MAJI.” Cooper also accused Moore, who was directly involved in the public release of alleged MJ-12 documents, of changing some of them and forging most of them. Most likely, the forger was actually Doty. Cooper’s post served to corroborate Lear’s story and the two became friends.
As Lear and Cooper hit the lecture circuit, they found that the combination of UFOs and dark conspiracy tales appealed to a wider audience than UFOs on their own. Cooper’s audiences began to include right-wing militia members and those dedicated to fighting the “New World Order” allegedly controlled by the a wide range of secret societies. Cooper moved away from UFOs and aliens and told his audiences that he’d been fed false information about them to distract his attention away from the One-World Government. Lear, meanwhile, became friends with fellow Las Vegas resident, Bob Lazar, who took him out into the Nevada desert to watch a scheduled test flight of what Lazar claimed was an alien craft. Lazar said he had been back engineering recovered vehicles in a secret facility near Area 51 called S-4. When Lear saw a light appear and move around in the sky at the time Lazar said it would, this seemed to confirm Lazar’s claim. Lazar went public with his story and another military base containing alien secrets was added to the list.
Lear’s claims became increasingly outrageous and included stargates, alien structures on the Moon and Mars and huge alien ships mining the rings of Saturn. By this time the UFO community had become divided between those who felt that aliens were benevolent and those who felt they were hostile. With reports of intrusive abductions on the rise, aliens were looking less and less friendly. Then came a British ex-football player, David Icke. Icke, after confirming that he was the son of God before a BBC television audience, settled into a routine of lecturing and writing about his belief that the world’s governments had been infiltrated by bloodthirsty shape-shifting reptilians. His lectures were similar to Cooper’s earlier lectures in that they combined secret society conspiracy theories with extraterrestrials. The difference is that Icke became a multi-millionaire through his endeavors while Cooper ended up being killed in a shootout with Arizona law enforcement. They were attempting to arrest Cooper on charges of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon during disputes with local residents.
A man who continued the Dulce base story was Phil Schneider. Schneider started lecturing to survivalist groups around 1994. He claimed to have been a geological engineer who worked on secret, underground military base construction projects. Schneider told his audiences that he was one of three survivors of a firefight between the military and aliens in 1979. In a variation of Lear’s claim, he said this occurred after he accidentally broke through into an alien base at Dulce. Videos of Schneider’s lectures can be found on the internet where he shows off scars on his torso and missing fingers as proof. Proof of his work with the government is not available, however. He was found dead two years after beginning his lectures with a catheter knotted around his neck in what was determined to be a suicide. Dulce researcher and New Mexico State Policeman, Gabe Valdez, supported this conclusion.
More people came forward claiming to have inside information on Dulce. Others appeared on the scene claiming to have worked with crash retrieval teams. Meanwhile, stories around the Roswell incident became more elaborate as crash locations and alien body counts increased. The UFO community became increasingly distrustful of the government, distrustful of each other, and more and more paranoid, as did the rest of the world. In 1997, Art Bell, late night paranormal radio host, received a call that captured the mood of the day. The caller’s voice was desperate sounding and quavering and he identified himself as a former employee of Area 51. He told Bell that there were “extra-dimensional” beings who’d infiltrated “a lot of aspects of the military” including Area 51. He said there were disasters coming that the government knew about. Despite their knowledge they weren’t moving people to safety because they wanted major population centers wiped out in order to have a more controllable populace. The caller began sobbing and the station mysteriously went off the air. When it came back on, Bell expressed his bafflement to a new caller who replied, “Government?”
As we headed into the 21st century, we got a second President Bush and the conspiracy theories around that family have them tied into everything from the Illuminati to MJ-12. The UFO Dark Side seems to have hit its peak during that administration and then tapered off. Maybe it’s just this writer’s point of view, but the conversations now heard on podcasts and radio shows seem to center more around enjoyment of the mystery and less around solving it. Since the mystery is now over seventy years old, that’s probably a wiser approach. It’s certainly better for the blood pressure.