by UFO History Buff & Author, Charles Lear
“Truth.” That’s a word that has been deeply associated with ufology thanks to “The X-Files” and apparently the “truth” is what U.F.O. researchers are looking for. But what truth is it? Is it the whole truth as in a unifying explanation for all strange phenomena or just proof of alien visitation? Do we want it from the “Government” or do we want to find it on our own through research and maybe, actually experiencing something ourselves?
Many researchers believe that the U.S. Military is in possession of alien craft and bodies. Some also believe that, sometime in the past, certain elected representatives or those appointed by elected representatives to be part of our governing body, made a deal with extraterrestrials that allowed them to harvest our reproductive cells, livestock and pet soft tissue and perform experiments in exchange for advanced technology. All this makes for a good tale but we have yet to see any irrefutable evidence despite over 70 years (!) of searching.
If you are a researcher who has gone down this path, I salute you and I feel your pain. Research in this area is treacherous and the main nemesis is disinformation.
Disinformation is real and was brought into the spotlight by a tragic case involving William Moore, a well-known researcher, Richard Doty, a self-professed disinformation agent with the Air Force Office of Special Investigations and a man named Paul Bennewitz, an investigator with the Arial Phenomena Research Organization. William Moore is credited with bringing the Roswell case back into the public’s awareness with, “The Roswell Incident”, a book published in 1980 co-authored with Charles Berlitz. Famed ufologist, Stanton Friedman, actually did the bulk of the research and witness interviews but the publishing company, feeling Berlitz’s name would sell more books, insisted he write the final draft from Moore and Friedman’s notes. Friedman would get caught up in another tangle of intrigue but we’ll come to that later. It was because of this book that Doty contacted Moore and promised him information about UFOs that he claimed the government wanted dispersed to the public. In exchange, Moore was to observe and report on certain fellow ufologists.
William Moore jolted the UFO community in 1989 when, at a Las Vegas Mufon convention, he admitted to his arrangement with Doty and his involvement in a disinformation operation that was led by Doty. The operation was directed against Paul Bennewitz, who had contacted Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque, New Mexico to alert them that he had detected alien activity in restricted areas there. It was determined that Bennewitz had equipment capable of receiving strategically sensitive signals from the base and in 1981, Doty with the help of Moore, set about convincing Bennewitz that the aliens were real and that there was an underground alien base in Dulce, New Mexico. The operation, according to Doty who has given several interviews on the subject, involved feeding Bennewitz false information, flying him over Dulce while pointing out planted structural “evidence” of a base and breaking into his house to move his furniture around and throw him off balance. The operation seemed to have been successful as Bennewitz ended up in a mental hospital. It also started a mythos around Dulce that took on a life of its own.
What does the Air Force have to say regarding its official sanction of Doty’s actions? In 2013, Alejandro Rojas, who covers UFO news on Martin’s show and runs the Opeminds.tv website, wrote a letter to the Air Force asking for a response to Doty’s allegations and, although he was able to obtain documents related to the case via Freedom of Information Act requests the allegations were never addressed.
The next phase of Moore’s involvement with Doty involves the infamous “MJ-12” documents, which seemed to substantiate the Roswell crashed saucer retrieval story based, until then, only on witness testimony. This is a long and convoluted tale, which I’ll try to sum up briefly. In 1984, television producer Jaime Shandera, called Moore to tell him he had received a roll of 35 mm film in a plain brown envelope. It had an Albequerque postmark which implicates Doty as the sender. They developed the film and there were two documents, one of which was seven pages long seeming to be an Eisenhower briefing. Friedman had worked with Moore and Shandera on a UFO documentary in 1980 (I’ve searched and can’t find a title) and the three of them set out to substantiate the document’s authenticity. I give Stanton Friedman the benefit of the doubt in stating that I believe he, at least, was sincere in his research.
The public was made aware of the document in 1988 through a live television broadcast, “UFO Cover-Up Live”, seen in the United States and Russia (!) hosted by Mike Farrell. The show included two “government insiders” presented in shadow with disguised voices, one of which was none other than Richard Doty according to researcher Don Schmitt who also got caught up in the intrigue. Since then the documents have been convincingly discredited and William Moore ended up leaving the UFO field after his speech at the Mufon conference. Stanton Friedman managed to survive as a researcher and has only recently retired. Interestingly, Don Schmitt almost went down himself through involvement with “alien” photos that turned out to be a mummy in a museum.
Accepting that there are actual disinformation operations aimed at the UFO community, what is the purpose? The C.I.A. had early concerns about UFO sightings, which can be found here https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/97unclass/ufo.html
These concerns were summed up in 1953 by the Robertson Panel charged to look into the problem. One of their conclusions was that UFO reporting might clog communication channels and give the Russians an opportunity to exploit the problem. They recommended that the National Security Council make an effort to debunk the subject and “educate” the public.
Does this mean the purpose of disinformation has remained the same all these years for all agencies of the Department of Defense? I’m sure there have been all sorts of tactics and objectives. I’ll add my own wrinkle. What would be better than to convince your opponents that you actually possessed alien technology and were back engineering it? This would explain the Bob Lazar case, which involves just that. This might explain the airing of “UFO Cover-up Live” in Russia. What do you think? Not sure what to think? Hmm…
So, what’s a researcher to do? My advice is to stop waiting for answers from the “government” and find them yourself. Look for hotspots, interview witnesses, and more than anything, try to experience the phenomenon first hand. The “truth” is only found when all doubt is extinguished and one changes from believing to knowing. Will that truth be an explanation? I doubt we’ll ever have one. The truth, for me, is that weird exists and that’s all I really need. Disclosure? That means the mystery is over and who really wants that.