XPost: alt.ufo.reports, sci.skeptic, alt.survival
XPost: sac.politics
From: area18@cnn.com

Just before leaving his Defense Department job two months ago,
intelligence officer Luis Elizondo quietly arranged to secure
the release of three of the most unusual videos in the
Pentagon’s secret vaults: raw footage from encounters between
fighter jets and “anomalous aerial vehicles” — military jargon
for UFOs.

The videos, all taken from cockpit cameras, show pilots
struggling to lock their radars on oval-shaped vessels that, on
screen, look vaguely like giant flying Tic Tacs. The strange
aircraft — no claims are made about their possible origins or
makeup — appear to hover briefly before sprinting away at speeds
that elicit gasps and shouts from the pilots.

Elizondo, in an internal Pentagon memo requesting that the
videos be cleared for public viewing, argued that the images
could help educate pilots and improve aviation safety. But in
interviews, he said his ultimate intention was to shed light on
a little-known program Elizondo himself ran for seven years: a
low-key Defense Department operation to collect and analyze
reported UFO sightings.

The existence of the program, known as the Advanced Aviation
Threat Identification Program, was confirmed officially for the
first time Saturday by a Pentagon spokesman. The acknowledgment
came in response to media inquiries, which were generated in
part by a start-up company Elizondo has joined since retirement.
The private company specializes in promoting UFO research for
scientific and entertainment purposes.

Current and former Pentagon officials confirm that the Pentagon
program has been in existence since 2007 and was formed for the
purpose of collecting and analyzing a wide range of “anomalous
aerospace threats” ranging from advanced aircraft fielded by
traditional U.S. adversaries to commercial drones to possible
alien encounters. It is a rare instance of ongoing government
investigations into a UFO phenomenon that was the subject of
multiple official inquiries in the 1950s and 1960s.

Spending for the program totaled at least $22?million, according
to former Pentagon officials and documents seen by The
Washington Post, but the funding officially ended in 2012. “It
was determined that there were other, higher priority issues
that merited funding and it was in the best interest of the DOD
to make a change,” Pentagon spokesman Tom Crosson explained in a
statement.

But officials familiar with the initiative say the collection
effort continued as recently as last month. The program operated
jointly out of the Pentagon and, at least for a time, an
underground complex in Las Vegas managed by Bigelow Aerospace, a
defense contractor that builds modules for space stations. It
generated at least one report, a 490-page volume that describes
alleged UFO sightings in the United States and numerous foreign
countries over multiple decades.

Neither the Pentagon nor any of the program’s managers have
claimed conclusive proof of extraterrestrial visitors, but
Elizondo, citing accounts and data collected by his office over
a decade, argues that the videos and other evidence failed to
generate the kind of high-level attention he believes is
warranted. As part of his decision to leave the Pentagon, he not
only sought the release of videos but also penned a letter to
Defense Secretary Jim Mattis complaining that a potential
security threat was being ignored.

“Despite overwhelming evidence at both the classified and
unclassified levels, certain individuals in the [Defense]
Department remain staunchly opposed to further research on what
could be a tactical threat to our pilots, sailors and soldiers,
and perhaps even an existential threat to our national
security,” Elizondo said in the letter, a copy of which was
provided to The Post.

The first public revelations of the program came in a video
conference aired in October by To the Stars Academy of Arts and
Sciences, the firm Elizondo joined as a consultant after
retiring from his Pentagon job. The New York Times and Politico
reported the existence of the program on their websites
Saturday. The Washington Post conducted several confidential
interviews over two months with Elizondo and Christopher Mellon,
a former deputy assistant secretary of defense for intelligence
who also is an officer of the private firm.

Documents provided by the former officials included letters of
support by former Senate majority leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.),
a key backer of the initiative who helped secure funding for the
program and sought to ensure a high degree of secrecy. Elizondo
said knowledge of the program was limited, even within the
Pentagon itself. He said the program had multiple enemies at
senior levels of the department, from officials who were either
skeptical or ideologically opposed to AATIP’s mission.

“I was honored to serve at the DOD and took my mission of
exploring unexplained aerial phenomena quite seriously,”
Elizondo said. “In the end, however, I couldn’t carry out that
mission, because the department — which was understandably
overstretched — couldn’t give it the resources that the mounting
evidence deserved.”

It is difficult to draw conclusions about the nature of the
unidentified vessels from the videos alone. Experts generally
urged caution, explaining that reported UFO sightings often turn
out of have innocuous explanations.

A retired Navy pilot contacted by The Post who was involved in a
2004 encounter depicted in one of the videos confirmed that the
images accurately reflected his recollection of the events. The
pilot would only speak on the condition of anonymity.

Elizondo, a 22-year veteran of the department who has held top
security clearance and worked on secret counterintelligence
missions, said he chose to join the private venture because he
believed it was the best way to continue the work he was unable
to complete as a government employee.

“I left to find an environment where investigating these
phenomena is priority number one,” he said.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/head-of- pentagons-secret-ufo-office-sought-to-make-evidence- public/2017/12/16/90bcb7cc-e2b2-11e7-8679- a9728984779c_story.html?tid=pm_world_pop&utm_term=.3b6fcc253c7e

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* Origin: www.darkrealms.ca (1:229/2)