“The US government has deliberately misled the public on the issue of UFOs for many years,” read the ITAR-TASS report. - This statement was made by the US CIA, which reported in its report that the leadership of the US Air Force carried out a disinformation campaign, being alarmed that an increasing number of people were witnessing the flights of American top-secret reconnaissance aircraft, mistaken by them for unidentified flying objects.
The CIA study said the Air Force was aware that most of the evidence for UFO sightings was based on the fact that someone was able to see the flights of high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft U-2 and SR-71. However, not wanting to either acknowledge top secret flights or refrain from public comment, the Air Force decided to submit false explanations to disguise.
Indeed, in the summer of 1997, all American newspapers came out with screaming headlines: "The CIA was afraid of plate hysteria", "Big lies and little green men." The headlines were based on an article by FDA official historian Gerald Hines, "The Role of the CIA in UFO Research, 1947-1990," published in the American intelligence journal Studies in Intelligence.
Newspapers were most interested in Hynes' statement that many of the UFO sightings were in fact sightings of secret reconnaissance aircraft.
“In November 1954, the CIA entered the world of advanced technology with the U-2 high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft project,” he wrote. “Working with Lockheed's Advanced Development Division in Burbank, California, known as the Skunk Plant, and Kelly Johnson, a distinguished aeronautical engineer, FDA tested an experimental high-altitude aircraft, the U-2, in August 1955. He could fly at an altitude of 20 km, while in the mid-50s most civil aircraft flew at altitudes between 3 and 7 km. Accordingly, as soon as the U-2 began test flights, civilian pilots and air traffic controllers began to report a significant increase in UFO sightings.
The first U-2s were silvery (later dyed black) and reflected the sun's rays, especially during sunrise or sunset. They often appeared to the observers below as flaming bodies. Researchers in the Air Force Project Blue Book, aware of the secret U-2 flights, tried to "explain" such observations by natural phenomena such as ice crystals in the air and temperature inversions. By contacting Project U-2 headquarters in Washington DC, Blue Book researchers were able to correlate many UFO sightings with U-2 flights. However, they were prudent enough not to reveal the true nature of these observations to the public.
More than half of the UFO reports from the late 1950s and throughout the 1960s were attributed to U-flights, according to a later estimate by CIA officials who worked on the U-2 and OXCART (SR-71, or Blackbird) aircraft projects. -2 over the United States. This is what led the BBC to make false, misleading statements to the public in order to calm the public and "cover up" a highly sensitive secret project of national importance. Despite the fact that these actions may have been justified, the lie added fuel to the controversy about "hiding the truth" …
The percentage of UFO sightings that the Air Force deemed unidentified fell to 5.9% in 1955 and 4% in 1956 …"
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If the US Air Force lied to everyone in order to hide the flights of spy planes from the people, then the chiefs in this machine of lies should have been the leaders of the Blue Book, the Air Force's UFO study.
Ufologist Mark Rodehaier met with retired Lieutenant Colonel Robert Friend, who headed the Blue Book from 1958 to 1963, in the midst of U-2 flights. The lieutenant colonel - the one who at one time, on someone's assignment, loaded Emenegger's ears with hard-to-remove noodles - was already at a respectable age, when lying somehow worse. Friend rarely watched TV and did not touch the newspapers, so the summer sensations passed on his ears.
“This is a complete lie,” he said after reading the passage you just read. He also added that after the start of U-2 flights, they did not receive more messages than usual.
Rodehaier asked if there were any cases where secret planes were mistaken for UFOs. “Yes, it happened a couple of times, but by no means regularly,” said Friend.
“In the late 1970s and 1980s, the FDA continued to take a little interest in UFOs and their sightings,” Hines went on to write. “While most scientists shied away from reports of flying saucers, some FDA officials and members of the intelligence community turned their interest in parapsychology and the psi phenomena associated with UFO sightings. CIA officials studied the UFO issue to determine what UFO sightings might tell them about the Soviets' rocket success, and also looked at the counterintelligence aspect of the problem … They worried that the Soviets and the KGB were using US citizens and UFO groups to get information programs for the development of American military equipment (for example, "Stealth" aircraft),and the vulnerability of the US air defense network to the invasion of foreign missiles disguised as UFOs …"
After a Russian rocket shot down a U-2 piloted by F. Powers, the Americans found a safer observation post - open space. Already in the summer of 1960, the CIA began to photograph the territory of the USSR with the help of the Discoveryr satellite. Then came the satellites "Midas", "Samos", "Key Hole", "Imeyus", "Ferret" and many, many others.
“Satellite imagery has been banned by the United States for years without extensive retouching to obscure the astonishingly high resolution of American photographic equipment and thus mislead Soviet specialists,” wrote John Barron in his book KGB Today. - The Soviets camouflaged their intercontinental missiles under the chimneys of chemical and other enterprises. To this end, they painted the nose cones of these rockets so that from above they looked like pipe holes … The cameras installed on the KG-11 satellite could not be fooled by such a pitiful trick: they even fixed peeling paint flakes on these nose cones."
But what then flew in the American sky? According to the Krasnoyarsk physicist Pavel Poluyan, the Americans were armed with not only traditional aircraft, but also reconnaissance discoplanes.
“The boom with aliens, which we forcibly experienced at the beginning of perestroika, is nothing more than an action by the CIA to destabilize public consciousness,” he said in an interview with Komsomolskaya Pravda. - These were completely earthly machines … In such a machine, the oscillations of the wings of the hull are not smooth and rare, but very short and fast … At a high frequency of oscillations of the hull, air ionization occurs. That is why “UFOs”, especially at night, appear in a luminous form. In fact, the electricity generated around the case is used in turn to power the device itself and to keep the machine running.
This became, of course, an ingenious solution of the secret designers. The machine turned out to be outwardly effective, but its use went along a narrow focus. It is not suitable for carrying passengers. Cannot carry a large load. And in the military sense it turned out to be incapable of fighting: how to fire from it? The recoil of bullets will knock the balance of vibrations Only direction: reconnaissance targets. Transfer of spies, functions of psychological properties …
The first plate was launched in the late 40s. At first, our people bought into the fairy tale about "aliens", but then they came up with it. And somewhere in the late 60s, such devices appeared in our country."
In another interview, Pavel Poluyan clarified:
“As the flying machines" saucers "turned out to be ineffective … It is no coincidence that in the 40-50s, when these vehicles were actively tested, there were many UFO disasters. In fact, the "jerk" is a disposable machine. The crew, in addition, inflicted enormous damage on the supervibration and high-frequency electromagnetic field. The pilots were forced to put on protective suits, which were mistaken by unwitting witnesses for alien spacesuits. In short, jerks turned out to be unsuitable for widespread use, but very convenient for secret missions, such as reconnaissance."
In fact, it was not at all like that. And much more interesting …
In 1947, when the words "flying saucer" first appeared, the American military was interested in an interesting question: are they not their own particularly secret planes? A declassified FBI document titled "Flying Discs" dated August 19, 1947 states:
“Mr. [deleted] subsequently discussed this topic with a colonel [deleted] from the intelligence unit of the War Department. The colonel [crossed out] stated that he had already discussed it with General Chamberlain. The Colonel [deleted] told Mr. [deleted] that he had received assurances from General Chamberlain and General Todd that the Army was not conducting any experiments with anything that in any way could be mistaken for a flying disc.”
Soon, the US Air Force officially assured FBI Director Edgar Hoover that there was no secret project to create American "saucers". In a letter dated September 5, General Schulgen reported:
“In response to the verbal request of your co-worker, Mr. C. W. Reynolds, we inform you that a full acquaintance with the research activities of the Air Force has shown that we do not have any project, work on which would cause phenomena similar to those associated with flying discs”.
At the meeting of "representatives of intelligence services in the zone of the 4th army" it was emphasized: "The country is not aware of scientific experiments that could cause such phenomena."
Since 1942, the US Navy has tried unsuccessfully to refine the XF5U discplane, better known as the "Flying Flapjack". It was the most common aircraft, albeit an unusual shape, propelled by two propellers on the leading edge of the fuselage. At that time, the "Flying Pancake" was the only aircraft that even slightly resembled a "flying saucer". Although Mechanics Illustrated promised its readers “a breakthrough to a new frontier in the history of aviation” and that the new aircraft would “cut through the sky at a speed never before achieved by man,” the aviation pancake turned out to be a lump. The XF5U had such disgusting flying qualities that it never really flew. The military knew this very well.
In a letter from the Chief of the Air Force Main Technical Directorate, Nathan Twining, dated September 23, 1947, it is said that "… the scientific and technological potential of the United States allows, subject to intensive and systematic development, to create a manned aircraft" that would "in general terms" correspond to the appearance of a UFO, but " … with a range of up to seven thousand miles at subsonic speeds. " Moreover, even to create such an imitation of a UFO "… any activities … would be extremely expensive, and at the expense of current projects, and therefore, if instructed to do so, it is necessary to establish a new project, independent of the existing ones."
If all the varieties of discoplanes were then only on paper, what flew over the United States?
On October 1, 1951, a report by the Pentagon's Budget Office, which funded theoretical studies to simulate UFOs, said: “It is possible to create a new type of vertical takeoff and landing jet aircraft, possibly using an air cushion. It will be able to reach speeds of 1,500 knots (more than three speeds of sound) and have a range of 15,000 miles.
The latest data show that a turbojet flying disc can be created by the efforts of the Western world within five years, starting today. Although there are no flight prototypes available today, experimental efforts are being made in this direction. Such a machine can have excellent capabilities in the use of its weapons and will be invulnerable to modern air defense systems."
In October 1955, as you already know, D. Quarles officially announced the program of creating an "avrocar" - the AVRO discoplan. The sensation spread all over the world. Even our magazines in 1956 paid a lot of attention to the Avrocar.
“The plane uses the same jet engine for vertical takeoff, horizontal flight and landing,” wrote the Tekhnika-Molodyozhi magazine. - The movement of powerful air jets through the holes along the special adjustable bulkheads reliably holds the disc in the required position during horizontal flight."
"Silver Bug" (that was the codename for the project to create "Avrocar") in 1955 issued a special memorandum for the intelligence services, which described the "plates" being developed within its framework. The largest of them was supposed to weigh more than 10 tons and, using powerful jet engines, take off to an altitude of 12 kilometers in 1 minute 45 seconds. The discoplan's height ceiling was supposed to reach 26 kilometers, and the speed was 3.48 times the speed of sound.
However, these parameters turned out to be just good wishes. Both prototypes of "Avrocar", despite the boastful statements, during the tests barely got off the ground and were extremely unstable. The forces of the jet engine were enough only to create an air cushion under them, and the "saucer" helplessly jumped a few meters from the ground. The aircraft designers did not take into account that the gas jet, repeatedly turning and passing through the flaps and flaps, loses a lot of energy. It was also not possible to install additional engines: scientists calculated that the "saucer" would be hopelessly overloaded.
On June 24, 1960, the contract with the Canadians was terminated.
One of the declassified US Air Force documents states:
“From 1958 onwards, the aircraft laboratory had many doubts about the feasibility of the project. Based on various tests, the laboratory noted that, in all likelihood, the Avrocar will not be able to develop supersonic speed in flight. A few months later, the same lab said the project was initially impracticable. Nevertheless, the work on the project turned out to be very, very useful in many ways. Were identified previously unknown serious problems in the mechanics of aircraft, aircraft engine, aerodynamics and flight factors."
One of the memorandums asked the intelligence officers to see if the Russians were working on similar projects.
The fear that "flying saucers" might turn out to be a Russian miracle weapon did not let the Americans go for many years. Professor Billing, who studied the psychological side of UFOlogy, wrote: “The West, feeling itself psychologically strong, ascribed to Russia even greater, almost magical powers. Many then believed that the USSR had invented a secret weapon - a "flying saucer" or an airplane that could move with great speed and perform incredible maneuvers contrary to the laws of gravity."
If the incident near Alat was indeed organized by the KGB, in 1955 the USSR took advantage of this fear.
Mikhail Gershtein