Dimensions: A Casebook of Alien Contact - Above Top Secret

measure. But the phenomenon does appear to have a real effect. And a peculiar feature of thismechanism is that it affects equally those who "believe" and those who oppose its reality in aphysical sense.For the time being, the observation can be made that it is possible to make large sections of anypopulation believe in the existence of supernatural races, in the possibility of flying machines, inthe plurality of inhabited worlds, by exposing them to a few carefully engineered scenes the detailsof which are adapted to the culture and symbols of a particular time and place.Could the meetings with UFO entities be designed to control our beliefs? Consider their changingcharacter. In the United States, they appear as science fiction monsters. In South America, they aresanguinary and quick to get into a fight. In France, they behave like rational, Cartesian, peacelovingtourists. The Irish Gentry, if we believe its spokesmen, was an aristocratic race organizedsomewhat like a religious-military order. The airship pilots were strongly induvidualistic characterswith all the features of the American farmer.Now consider the following case, which illustrates the same point. The date is October 23, 1954,and the place is near Tripoli, Libya. About 3:00 A.M. an Italian farmer saw a flying craft land a fewdozen yards from him. It was shaped like an egg laid horizontally. The upper half was transparentand flooded with very white light; the lower half appeared to be metallic. The fore part had two sideports; the central part had an external ladder. The hind part had two vertically disposed wheels, oneabove the other, and two cylindrical protruding tubes. While descending, the craft made a noisesimilar to that of a compressor "like those used for inflating car tires." No propeller was visible. Thefuselage was surrounded by two antennae, one behind the other, and bore a kind of undercarriagewith six wheels (two pairs in the fore part of the craft, one pair behind). The machine was about sixyards long and three yards wide. Inside it were six men in yellowish coveralls wearing gas masks.One of them took his mask off in order to blow into a sort of tube. His face appeared to be that of anormal human being.When the witness got close to the object and put a hand on the ladder, a strong electric shock threwhim to the ground. One of the occupants made gestures as if to warn him, for his sake, to keep awayfrom the craft. Another occupant pulled out a wheel and again put it back where it formerly was.Then, pushing a button, he caused a kind of half-container to cover the wheels. Inside the cockpit, akind of radio set, complete with wires and operated by a man with earphones, was visible. All sixpilots were busy on their instrument panels.The incident lasted about twenty minutes. The object silently took off and reached an altitude offifty yards. Then it went east at a dizzying speed.The imprints left by the undercarriage's wheels on the soft ground have been photographed. Theyresembled those of normal rubber wheels. Their length was only about two feet.If it were possible to make three-dimensional holograms with mass, and to project them throughtime, I would say this is what the farmer saw. And with that theory we would explain many of theapparitions. In numerous UFO cases and in some religious miracles, the beings appeared as threedimensionalimages whose feet did not actually touch the ground. But what about the other physicalactions, such as the electric shocks?As we read the account of the Libyan landing case, it is tempting to assume that the farmer, far fromwitnessing by chance the maneuvers of interplanetary visitors, was deliberately exposed to a scenedesigned to be recorded by him and transmitted to us: hence, the gas masks, the instrument panels,and the radio set "complete with wires."The same is true with the following Italian case, which took place in Abbiate Buazzone, nearVarese, on April 24, 1950:At about 10:00 P.M. Bruno Facchini heard and saw sparks which he attributed to a storm,but he soon discovered a dark mass hovering between a pole and a tree two hundred yardsfrom his house. A man dressed in tight-fitting clothes and wearing a helmet appeared to bemaking repairs. There were three other figures working around the huge craft. This workbeing over, a trap through which light had been shining was closed, and the thing took off.