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UFOs and the
CIA: Anatomy
of a Cover-Up
Reg A. Davidson
The modern age of UFO phenomena began on a July afternoon in 1947
when private pilot Kenneth Arnold reported nine unidentifiable silvery,
crescent-shaped objects that skimmed through the sky at an incredible rate
of speed.
Their motion, Arnold said, reminded him of "a saucer skipping over
water." A news reporter took up Arnold's description and the phrase "flying
saucers" soon became imprinted on the collective consciousness.
When strange objects continued to be reported by competent witnesses,
the U.S. authorities began investigating the phenomenon. The task fell
under the auspices of the United States Air Force, but few were aware that
the CIA took an interest in the strange phenomena soon after the first
reports of "flying saucers" emerged.
The Air Force was actually in a state of near panic due to the wave of
sightings. UFOs were reported over Maxwell Air Force base in Alabama,
(hen, to the horror of the top military brass, over the White Sands Proving
Ground—right in the middle of their atom bomb territory. General Nathan
Twining, commander of the Air Material Command, wrote to the commanding
general of the Army-Air Force stating that the phenomenon
was something real, that it was not "visionary or fictitious," and that the
objects were disc-shaped, as large as aircraft, and controlled.
The press latched onto the reports and sensationalized stories of alien
invasion gripped the population. The press and the Government were demanding
answers. The Air Force, worried that the whole situation was getting
out of hand, tried to quell public angst by ordering a full investigation.
On December 30, 1947, Major General L. C. Craigie ordered the establishment
of Project Sign at what became known as Wright-Patterson Air
Force Base in Dayton, Ohio. Operating under auspices of the Air Material
Command's Technical Intelligence Division, Project Sign was directed
"to collect, collate, evaluate and distribute to interested government agen-