posted on Jun, 17 2004 @ 07:24 AM
The Robertson
Panel, 1952-53
On 4 December
1952, the Intelligence Advisory Committee (IAC) took up the issue of
UFOs. (26) Amory,
as acting chairman, presented DCI Smith's request to the committee that
it informally discuss the subject of UFOs. Chadwell then briefly reviewed
the situation and the active program of the ATIC relating to UFOs. The
committee agreed that the DCI should "enlist the services of selected
scientists to review and appraise the available evidence in the light
of pertinent scientific theories" and draft an NSCID on the subject. (27) Maj.
Gen. John A. Samford, Director of Air Force Intelligence, offered full
cooperation. (28)
At the
same time, Chadwell looked into British efforts in this area. He learned
the British also were active in studying the UFO phenomena. An eminent
British scientist, R. V. Jones, headed a standing committee created
in June 1951 on flying saucers. Jones' and his committee's conclusions
on UFOs were similar to those of Agency officials: the sightings were
not enemy aircraft but misrepresentations of natural phenomena. The
British noted, however, that during a recent air show RAF pilots and
senior military officials had observed a "perfect flying saucer." Given
the press response, according to the officer, Jones was having a most
difficult time trying to correct public opinion regarding UFOs. The
public was convinced they were real. (29)
In January
1953, Chadwell and H. P. Robertson, a noted physicist from the California
Institute of Technology, put together a distinguished panel of nonmilitary
scientists to study the UFO issue. It included Robertson as chairman;
Samuel A. Goudsmit, a nuclear physicist from the Brookhaven National
Laboratories; Luis Alvarez, a high-energy physicist; Thornton Page,
the deputy director of the Johns Hopkins Operations Research Office
and an expert on radar and electronics; and Lloyd Berkner, a director
of the Brookhaven National Laboratories and a specialist in geophysics. (30)
The charge
to the panel was to review the available evidence on UFOs and to consider
the possible dangers of the phenomena to US national security. The panel
met from 14 to 17 January 1953. It reviewed Air Force data on UFO case
histories and, after spending 12 hours studying the phenomena, declared
that reasonable explanations could be suggested for most, if not all,
sightings. For example, after reviewing motion-picture film taken of
a UFO sighting near Tremonton, Utah, on 2 July 1952 and one near Great
Falls, Montana, on 15 August 1950, the panel concluded that the images
on the Tremonton film were caused by sunlight reflecting off seagulls
and that the images at Great Falls were sunlight reflecting off the
surface of two Air Force interceptors. (31)
The panel
concluded unanimously that there was no evidence of a direct threat
to national security in the UFO sightings. Nor could the panel find
any evidence that the objects sighted might be extraterrestrials. It
did find that continued emphasis on UFO reporting might threaten "the
orderly functioning" of the government by clogging the channels of communication
with irrelevant reports and by inducing "hysterical mass behavior" harmful
to constituted authority. The panel also worried that potential enemies
contemplating an attack on the United States might exploit the UFO phenomena
and use them to disrupt US air defenses. (32)
To meet
these problems, the panel recommended that the National Security Council
debunk UFO reports and institute a policy of public education to reassure
the public of the lack of evidence behind UFOs. It suggested using the
mass media, advertising, business clubs, schools, and even the Disney
corporation to get the message across. Reporting at the height of McCarthyism,
the panel also recommended that such private UFO groups as the Civilian
Flying Saucer Investigators in Los Angeles and the Aerial Phenomena
Research Organization in Wisconsin be monitored for subversive activities. (33)
The Robertson
panel's conclusions were strikingly similar to those of the earlier
Air Force project reports on SIGN and GRUDGE and to those of the CIA's
own OSI Study Group. All investigative groups found that UFO reports
indicated no direct threat to national security and no evidence of visits
by extraterrestrials.
Following
the Robertson panel findings, the Agency abandoned efforts to draft
an NSCID on UFOs. (34) The
Scientific Advisory Panel on UFOs (the Robertson panel) submitted its
report to the IAC, the Secretary of Defense, the Director of the Federal
Civil Defense Administration, and the Chairman of the National Security
Resources Board. CIA officials said no further consideration of the
subject appeared warranted, although they continued to monitor sightings
in the interest of national security. Philip Strong and Fred Durant
from OSI also briefed the Office of National Estimates on the findings. (35) CIA
officials wanted knowledge of any Agency interest in the subject of
flying saucers carefully restricted, noting not only that the Robertson
panel report was classified but also that any mention of CIA sponsorship
of the panel was forbidden. This attitude would later cause the Agency
major problems relating to its credibility. (36)
The 1950s:
Fading CIA Interest in UFOs
After the
report of the Robertson panel, Agency officials put the entire issue
of UFOs on the back burner. In May 1953, Chadwell transferred chief
responsibility for keeping abreast of UFOs to OSI's Physics and Electronic
Division, while the Applied Science Division continued to provide any
necessary support. (37) Todos
M. Odarenko, chief of the Physics and Electronics Division, did not
want to take on the problem, contending that it would require too much
of his division's analytic and clerical time. Given the findings of
the Robertson panel, he proposed to consider the project "inactive"
and to devote only one analyst part-time and a file clerk to maintain
a reference file of the activities of the Air Force and other agencies
on UFOs. Neither the Navy nor the Army showed much interest in UFOs,
according to Odarenko. (38)
A nonbeliever
in UFOs, Odarenko sought to have his division relieved of the responsibility
for monitoring UFO reports. In 1955, for example, he recommended that
the entire project be terminated because no new information concerning
UFOs had surfaced. Besides, he argued, his division was facing a serious
budget reduction and could not spare the resources. (39) Chadwell
and other Agency officials, however, continued to worry about UFOs.
Of special concern were overseas reports of UFO sightings and claims
that German engineers held by the Soviets were developing a "flying
saucer" as a future weapon of war. (40)
To most
US political and military leaders, the Soviet Union by the mid-1950s
had become a dangerous opponent. Soviet progress in nuclear weapons
and guided missiles was particularly alarming. In the summer of 1949,
the USSR had detonated an atomic bomb. In August 1953, only nine months
after the United States tested a hydrogen bomb, the Soviets detonated
one. In the spring of 1953, a top secret RAND Corporation study also
pointed out the vulnerability of SAC bases to a surprise attack by Soviet
long-range bombers. Concern over the danger of a Soviet attack on the
United States continued to grow, and UFO sightings added to the uneasiness
of US policymakers.
Mounting
reports of UFOs over eastern Europe and Afghanistan also prompted concern
that the Soviets were making rapid progress in this area. CIA officials
knew that the British and Canadians were already experimenting with
"flying saucers." Project Y was a Canadian-British-US developmental
operation to produce a nonconventional flying-saucer-type aircraft,
and Agency officials feared the Soviets were testing similar devices. (41)
Adding
to the concern was a flying saucer sighting by US Senator Richard Russell
and his party while traveling on a train in the USSR in October 1955.
After extensive interviews of Russell and his group, however, CIA officials
concluded that Russell's sighting did not support the theory that the
Soviets had developed saucerlike or unconventional aircraft. Herbert
Scoville, Jr., the Assistant Director of OSI, wrote that the objects
observed probably were normal jet aircraft in a steep climb. (42)
Wilton
E. Lexow, head of the CIA's Applied Sciences Division, was also skeptical.
He questioned why the Soviets were continuing to develop conventional-type
aircraft if they had a "flying saucer." (43) Scoville
asked Lexow to assume responsibility for fully assessing the capabilities
and limitations of nonconventional aircraft and to maintain the OSI
central file on the subject of UFOs.