Pentagon planted Area 51 UFO conspiracies to hide something else
What's the story
The United States military stoked UFO conspiracy theories, including those involving aliens at Area 51, to conceal classified weapons programs, according to a Wall Street Journal report.
A Department of Defense report revealed that in the 1980s, an Air Force colonel gave a bar owner near Area 51 fake photos of flying saucers.
This was part of an official mission to spread disinformation and divert attention from the testing of the first-ever stealth warplane, the F-117 Nighthawk.
Military tactics
Military kept technology hidden under pile of conspiracy theories
The report explained that the military's strategy during the Cold War was to keep its new technology hidden from the Soviet Union by burying it under a pile of conspiracy theories about Area 51.
This included disinformation campaigns and withholding information from witnesses who inadvertently observed classified military tests.
Sean Kirkpatrick, the first head of the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), was assigned by the government in 2022 to look into many different UFO ideas.
AARO findings
Culture of misinformation and internal pranks within the military
As his team investigated decades of records, notes, and messages across the Defense Department, the AARO uncovered a culture of misinformation and conspiracy theories that can be traced back to the Pentagon.
Among the findings were instances where Air Force officers hazed new recruits with fake briefings about a fictional unit called "Yankee Blue," which was supposedly involved in investigating alien spacecraft.
According to Kirkpatrick's team, the briefings came with a direct order not to reveal the facts to anyone.
Misleading witnesses
How eyewitnesses were misled about the Montana incident
The report also revealed that real eyewitnesses were misled about what they had seen.
For instance, former Air Force captain Robert Salas claimed to have witnessed a UFO over a Montana nuclear missile silo in 1967.
He was later ordered to remain silent about the incident.
Kirkpatrick's team discovered that Salas had actually witnessed an early electromagnetic pulse (EMP) test designed to see if US silos could withstand nuclear radiation and retaliate in case the Soviet Union ever attacked first.
UFO rumors
Follow-up report later this year
Officials decided it was best that no one knew the vulnerability's secret after the test failed. So, Salas and the other witnesses were purposely kept in the dark.
This explains why last year's Pentagon transparency report missed key details about these myths' origins.
The Department of Defense has admitted that not all AARO findings have been made public but promised a follow-up report later this year.