UFO Religions

Review of Leslie Kean’s UFOs

Leslie Kean, UFOs: Generals, Pilots, and Government Officials Go on the Record (Three Rivers Press, 2011).

I read Leslie Kean’s book a few months ago but haven’t gotten around to a review until now. Readers should not take that delay as a sign of my own reticence or the book’s quality. UFOs: Generals, Pilots, and Government Officials Go On the Record has earned a place on my (very) short list of books I’d recommend to anyone who is either new to the UFO subject, perhaps thinking it a waste of intellectual time, or those who want to read only serious material. In short, this was a very good read and worth the time invested.

As other reviewers have noted, the content of Kean’s book is restricted to the testimony and opinions of a select group of experienced pilots and high-ranking government officials and military brass whose positions put them at the forefront of official UFO investigations in their airspace. Several also have scientific backgrounds. In a nutshell, if one wanted to arbitrarily assemble a “dream team” of serious, technical witnesses to UFO phenomena, it would look a lot like the panoply of individuals featured in Kean’s book. Examples include Major General Wilfrid de Brouwer (tasked with the military investigation of the Belgian UFO wave of 1989 and 1990) and Captain Julio Miguel Guerra of the Portuguese Air Force, whose testimony of a harrowing experience chasing a UFO that ultimately (and literally) flew circles around his fighter jet in 1982. The episode was also witnessed by another pilot.

Due to the nature of the witnesses involved, Kean’s book is not propelled by speculation, weird theories of alien visitation, overly technical descriptions of UFO aerospace capabilities, or conspiracy theories. The recollections are mercifully void of breathless histrionics and New-Agey pablum about aliens so common in other UFO books. The book features highly credible people telling their stories, part of which involve the inner workings of how real government agencies pursue UFO investigations — collecting evidence and analyzing that evidence. The book is committed to factual reporting, something not surprising given Kean’s background as an investigative journalist.

Beyond the reports of the experiences of her star witnesses, Kean spends several chapters discussing the questions that naturally arise from such material. These chapters feature coherent discussion of the efforts to debunk the events in which the witnesses were involved. This is a strength of the book. The weak point of the book, in my view, is Kean’s chapter outlining an action plan that governments ought to follow if they are serious about investigating the phenomenon with a goal toward some sort of resolution. The points of the plan are, on the whole good ones, but Kean is naively optimistic, especially in respect to the current American administration. If Kean spent a tenth of the time looking at the faux transparency of the current administration, she’d temper her optimism. But that is a minor complaint.

Kean’s book is also a very good illustration of why I don’t think that the case for an ET presence is a slam dunk for the UFO phenomenon, even with this cadre of witnesses. That may sound odd. Time and again, those witnesses who come down on the side of the ET explanation do so on the basis of one, and only one, argument: the technology they have witnessed. Since these witnesses know of no analogy to the technology in their own military hardware, or that of other nations they have witnessed, they feel compelled to opt for the ET explanation. I find this understandable, but not coherent or compelling.

Ultimately, the technology argument requires omniscience of the witnesses. Those of us who listen to them and take them as truth-tellers (and I do) are required to believe that since they know of no human analogy for the technology, then none must exist. That is an argument from silence. That argument also cannot be used as proof for ETs since that would mean it seeks to prove something on the basis of what it is assuming. In other words, it is circular (“There must be aliens because the UFOs I’ve seen must be using alien and not human technology”). This is, bluntly, bogus logic. But it’s a genuine, natural response. I seek only to point out its ultimate inefficacy, not to criticize it for its own sake.  And that is where we are. We cannot know for sure (and neither can these witnesses) that if human technology of this sort existed, they would surely know about it. That’s just a guess, and one with a tiny bit of ego infused. We also cannot be sure that nations would share such technology if they had it with their allies. History is filled with such inconsistencies, as military-industrial complexes habitually want to maintain advantages.

So what does Kean’s book give us beyond lots of credible witness testimony? In sum, while it cannot prove the ET hypothesis, it at least informs the reader that, while an explanation for them is not immediately forthcoming and satisfactory, UFOs are demonstrably real and deserving of serious study.

Technorati Tags: government, Kean, military, pilots, science, UFOs

Another UFO Disclosure Petition

[UPDATE 12/3/2011: The WhiteHouse.gov site is now working.]

Hat tip to Silver Screen Saucers for alerting me to a new disclosure petition regarding ending UFO secrecy. The short petition was authored by Rich Dolan and Bruce Zabel. (NOTE: I tried to sign the petition just now, but the White House website for accepting such petitions was down; please give it a try, though).

Readers know how I feel about such efforts. Completely worthwhile to try, but basically useless, especially given the current administration, which is hardly interested in transparency (e.g., Fast and Furious, Solyndra, Americans on assassination lists, etc., etc.). But I don’t think any administration would ever tell the complete truth about the UFO issue. Since my view is that all this is likely linked to projects that grew out of Nazi science (Paperclip) that involved human experimentation (and was and is useful misdirection), it ain’t going to happen. And if it’s extraterrestrial, you can double-down on that. But why not ask?  It can’t hurt to try.

Technorati Tags: disclosure, dolan, petition, zabel

White House Responds to Petition on UFO Disclosure

Back in September I blogged about the grass roots effort spearheaded by the Paradigm Research Group to petition the White House to ‘fess up about “an extraterrestrial presence engaging the human race.” (Here’s a description of the petition at the Open Minds website.) I noted at the time that, though I think the truth should be told, I was ambivalent about the effort. That ambivalence has now been validated by the White House’s response: “We don’t know anything and know of no proof for ET visitation.”

Can you see the irony and humor in this?

What exactly did the petitioners think they were going to get in the way of an answer?  I’m guessing for many the optimism stemmed from the misguided belief that the Obama administration was a transparent one. If you believe that, you might be interested in some of Harold Camping’s new calculations for the rapture. But to be fair, no government is going to put forth this sort of information (if they had it) unless it served them politically (or, to be slightly more cynical, unless it was an important cog in some larger end game scenario of the federal powers that be and the military-industrial complex). It’s just naive to believe the federal government would be forthcoming about this (and a whole host of other things).

The irony is that, now that this administration has given the same answer as all the others in the past — including those that the disclosure crowd loved to hate (Bush, Rumsfeld, etc., etc.) — are they going to believe that President Obama has indeed been forthright and so the issue is finally settled … or are they going to turn on the administration, arguing it’s just as sinister and clandestine as the previous one?  The former is a double-dose of naivete; the latter shows just how misguided the whole idea was in the first place.

I can hardly wait for someone to “decode” the response and milk more conspiracy out of this.

Technorati Tags: disclosure, Obama, petition, response, UFOs

UFO Eschatological-Global Warming Bunk

UFO Mystic reports that, according to a former Air Force officer who’s pushing his new book, a massive UFO revelation will occur tomorrow over the world’s leading cities. The revelation must happen now, lest we run out of timing to save the planet from man-made global warming. I’ve put it on my Google Calendar so I don’t miss it.

Whence comes this important revelation? You may be surprised:  the AF officer got from the aliens (called the “Transcenders” [or was it the Transformers?]  mediated of course “through the services of a world renowned channeler.” To quote Howard Dean, yyyeeeaaaahhhhhh!!

But of course our officer and author drew upon “his military experience with the UFO phenomenon dating back to WW2, and later, with NORAD and his subsequent life-long association with a senior NORAD intelligence officer who provided him a wealth of historical data relating to NORAD’s experience with the UFO/alien reality which has never been revealed to the public.”

Could I just say something?

Please, all of you reading this, remember this post the next time some nutcase UFO researcher touts a witness or visionary who has Air Force credentials. Wearing the Air Force uniform does not insulate the wearer from being a witless crank. Most of you know I’m very pro-U.S. military, and this guy brings shame to the uniform. Channeled BS — AGAIN–coming from the UFO “research” community.And I guess his book was written before the exposure of global warming as pseudo-science. Maybe it was a rogue alien race, locked in a deadly struggle with the “Transcenders,” trying to make it only look like global warming stands on fabricated, skewered science.  Hmmm.

Oh, and one other thing. Next time some UFO enthusiast promoting the idea that spiritual approaches to the UFO/alien question are hopelessly naive and not based on rational inquiry, send them this link.

Technorati Tags: disclosure, global warming, UFOs

Video for U.S. Air Force UFO Conference

The good people at the Authentic UFOs blog have taken the press conference video and broken into You-Tube sized portions here.  It’s an hour or so – enjoy!

Technorati Tags: air force, press club, press conference, UFOs