The Report on Unidentified Flying ObjectsRuppelt, Edward J.
History
The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects
Ruppelt, Edward J.
Unidentified flying objects
NICAP got off to a fast start. Dues were pegged at $7.50 a year,
which included a subscription to the very interesting magazine _The_
_UFO_ _Investigator_, and the operation went into high gear.
With such names as Fahrney, Wedemeyer, Hillenkoetter, Del Valle and
Knowles for prestige, and Keyhoe for intrigue, saucer fans all over
the United States packaged up their seven-fifty and mailed it to
headquarters. Each, in turn, became a "listening post" and an
"investigator."
Keyhoe set up a Panel of Special Advisors, all saucer fans, to
"impartially evaluate" the UFO reports ferreted out by the "listening
posts," based on facts uncovered by the "investigators."
Even though the "leading scientists" Fahrney mentioned in his
statement never materialized NICAP was cocked, primed, and ready.
To get things off to a gala start Keyhoe, as director of NICAP,
wrote to the Air Force and set out NICAP's Eight Point Plan. In
essence this plan suggested (some say demanded) that the Air Force
let NICAP ride herd on Project Blue Book.
First of all, NICAP wanted its Panel of Special Advisors to review
and concur with all of the conclusions on the thousands of UFO
reports that the Air Force had in its files.
This went over like a worm in the punch bowl.
First of all, the Air Force didn't feel it was necessary to review
its files. Secondly, they knew NICAP. If every balloon, planet,
airplane, and bird that caused a UFO report hadn't been captured and
a signed confession wrung out, the UFO would be a visitor from outer
space.
The Air Force decided to ignore NICAP.
But NICAP wouldn't be ignored. They bombarded everyone from the
Secretary of the Air Force on down with telephone calls, telegrams
and letters.
Still the Air Force remained silent.
Then NICAP headquarters called in the troops and members from all
corners of the nation cut loose. The barrage of mail broke the log
jam and just enough information to constitute an answer dribbled out
of the Office of the Secretary of the Air Force.
But this didn't satisfy Keyhoe or his UFO hungry NICAPions. They
wanted blood and that blood had to taste like spaceships or they
wouldn't be happy. The cudgel they picked up next was powerful.
The Air Force had said that there was nothing classified about
Project Blue Book yet NICAP hadn't seen every blessed scrap of paper
in the Air Force UFO files. This was unwarranted censorship!
While Congress was right in the middle of such important and crucial
problems as foreign policy, atomic disarmament, racketeering,
integration and a dozen and one other problems, NICAP began to
bedevil every senator and representative who was polite enough to
listen.
It's the squeaky wheel that gets the grease and in November 1957,
the United States Senate Committee on Government Operations began an
inquiry concerning UFO's.
I gave my testimony and so did others who had been associated with
Project Blue Book.
A few weeks later the inquiry was dropped.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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