"Fact or Faked" Concludes "Battle of LA" may have been UFO...

reply to post by karen61057


Semantics, really.

They "concluded" the possibility of it being a UFO was still feasible.

Originally posted by yeahright
Those Fact or Faked guys are overpaid. Sheesh, I need my own show: 'Mr Obvious presents the Unknown'

I'd watch it! But only if you have a "Stunt Professional" as part of your team, like the Fact or Faked team does. It's important to be ready to do some stunts where you're presenting the obviously unknown.

reply to post by K-PAX-PROT

There is no indication that the Navy "realized that the object(s) were actually hovering". That is a claim made by the OP.

is it to be believed that a trained and experienced military intelligence responsible for protecting American air space from attack at that time could NOT differentiate between a set of clouds/light configurations and a possible real physical object;Sorry but i am not buying that one;

The operators of the coastal defense were not well trained or experienced. They were underequipped and poorly trained. From The Army Air Forces in World War II

Equally serious was the problem of equipment. In a report filled with illuminating detail, the British expert found our seaward reconnaissance grossly inefficient because of the total lack of ASV equipment and because of the limited number of patrol aircraft of suitable range. The radar screen along the West Coast was based on too few stations, and the equipment itself had inherent defects which made it "gravely unsuitable." All radar experts were agreed that each set represented a compromise between a variety of demands, but the principal American radar was "unique in combining slow search with poor cover in elevation, with lack of all facilities for eight finding, and with a grave danger of plotting false tracks." Moreover, dependable employment of this radar had been made even more unlikely because of a mistake in the selection of sites for its installation. Personnel to operate the radars had not been carefully selected and were inadequate both in numbers and in training. The United States was found to have repeated an early error of Britain in failing to provide for the training of large numbers of skilled radar technicians.

www.ibiblio.org...

Two months after Pearl Harbor. Numerous false air raid alerts up and down the west coast. Elwood had been shelled by a Japanese submarine the night before. Yeah, I think mostly they were shooting at nothing (there was a weather balloon involved as well). It wouldn't be the first or last time a lot of firepower had been directed at nothing.

Here's an old thread I did on this, for those wanting some more info on the case:

www.abovetopsecret.com...

In all I've seen since, I'm still on the fence personally. I think there's good evidence for both explanations, and not enough to tip me one way or the other. While I understand the nerves, and shooting at nothing, it seems to me that it wouldn't have gone on SO long if there wasn't anything up there worth shooting.

reply to post by Phage


I'm still not buying the "war nerves" explanation of this.

Thousands of rounds of ammunition were expended on a brightly lit object in the sky that even stopped and posed for a picture, that's a bit different than popping off a few shots at a ghost. They saw something coming in on radar, but that is moot because it could be something or nothing at all... what's the point of having the radar then. I assume actually manning the radar counts at least somewhat for on the job training, we all know formal training doesn't cover a lot of the essentials to perform most any job.

reply to post by dtrock78


Not sure where the image you used came from, but it has pretty obviously been manipulated. I ran a TinyEye search for the image, and got 194 results. They range from movie posters to sci-fi blogs.

Very few of them actually show ANY actual object as your pic does.
The closest one to the pic you used in the OP is from a trailer from the movie of the same name where a blog author tries to "prove" they weren't actually alien spacecraft, but were "UFO's" from Hitler.
I think personally, even the edited photos we are seeing here aren't even realistic because the light that is the suppposed dome isn't even close to attached.

So sorry....this is a stretch of a stretch.

In my opinion JibbyJedi was right the other day: To The Cast Of SyFy's Fact Or Faked...

Personally, I think the image is just an anomaly. But, that isn't the point. The REAL evidence in this case is the witness testimony and FACTS of what happened (i.e. the US Military firing up at an unseen enemy for almost an hour)....concentrate on THAT, not the questionable photo used to sell newspapers.

An interesting tidbit, courtesy of FOIA....

SECRET

February 26, 1942.

OCS 21347-86

MENORANDUM FOR THE PRESIDENT:

The following is the information we have from GHQ
at this mement regarding the air alarm over Los Angeles of
yesterday morning:

"From details available at this hour:

1. Unidentified airplanes, other then American
Army or Navy planes, were probably over Los Angeles, and
were fired on by elements of the 37th CA Brigade ( AA )
between 3:12 and 4:15 AM. These units expended 1430
rounds of ammunition.

2. As many as fifteen airplanes may have
been involved, flying at various speeds from what is
officially reported as being very slow to as much
as 200 MPH and at elevations from 9000 to 18000 feet.

3. No bombs were dropped.

4. No casualties among our troops.

5. No planes were shot down.

6. No American Army or Navy planes were in action.

Investigation continuing. It seems reasonable to conclude
that if unidentified airplanes were involved they may have
been from commercial sources, operated by enemy agents for
purposes of spreeding alarm, disclosing location of antiair-
craft positions, and slowing production through blackout.
Such conclusion is supported by varying speed of operation and
the fact that no bombs were dropped.

Gen. George C. Marshall

Chief Of Staff

edit on 16-11-2011 by Gazrok because: (no reason given)

reply to post by Gazrok


I agree Gazrok...but I also think it's easily explainable.
The military was on high alert and was already very very jumpy from Pearl Harbor. A single gunner thinks he sees something....we have already had evidence there were radar hits offshore...and starts firing. The other however many jumpy gunners all start firing, light light up the area, there is commotion and chaos and before you know it there's enough lead flying to be able to walk across the sky.

It's like asking the excited cop why he shot a suspect 31 times who pointed a gun at him.
His answer.....cause I ran out of bullets.

reply to post by Gazrok


But that get's absolutely no where.

Asking the military about anything related to UFOs is like asking Ma and Pa about where babies come from, you might get some cockamamie story about a stork only to find out the ugly truth years later.

I guess we'll never know what that was.

reply to post by webpirate


Yes, but firing blindly for almost an hour? Seems just a bit much....

To another member, no, I'm not suggesting asking the military. I just edited to include their version of events soon after it happened. No, I'm just saying that focusing on the photo is not where it's at in this case...

reply to post by Gazrok


The Navy agreed. It was anxiety. These were not combat hardened troops at this point. And this was a possible attack on the US homeland.

Within hours of the end of the air raid, Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox held a press conference, saying the entire incident was a false alarm due to anxiety and "war nerves". Knox's comments were followed by statements from the Army the next day[6] that reflected General George C. Marshall's belief that the incident might have been caused by commercial airplanes used as a psychological warfare campaign to generate panic.

Source

Communication wasn't as good then as it is now either. I would have been harder to get everyone to stop firing from wherever their guns were across the city.

Somebody should be tracking down evidence leading to the identification of the saboteurs and Fifth Columnists who were probably flying their squadrons of private planes out of secret airstrips in the desert (or even Mexico), and creating all kinds of havoc/identifying the locations of the anti-aircraft batteries around the L.A. area. It would be interesting to see evidence that such a thing even existed.

Maybe somebody has some old photos of airplanes and buildings used by these foreign spies, or maybe some archival footage of some two-fisted G-Men, Commander Cody or Spy Smasher socking them around a little.

reply to post by webpirate


@ Webpirate

You are right, there are many, many different versions of this photo, I tried to find the most recent one that the LA Times claimed was closest to the original.

In terms of Fact or Faked, that thread was pretty funny. And yes, I agree their scripted impromptu "Oh wait a second, I've seen this video before folks" is pretty cheesy, but I bet it would be unwatchable if they were actually all watching random ones for the first time, talking over each other.

The one thing I will add to this topic, however, (and I'm paraphrasing the General in the official report here) is the fact that the soldiers were chastised for wasting their ammo and shooting at an object that couldnt have possibly been an airplane due to its speed.

So what was it? I can understand the occassional AA "oh $hit" outburst at something, but sustained for that long a time? I've never heard of another instance such as that for that length of time.

Originally posted by yeahright
Has it been identified? No. Then it was a UFO.

The object that started the shooting was indeed identified by the very people that launched it. That's when the shooting started, right after the balloons were launched, so they either started the shooting or it's the world's biggest coincidence. The meteorologist unit actually said that the gunners were shooting at the balloon they just launched:
www.abovetopsecret.com...

It was a weather balloon with a candlelight attached to it. There were two balloons launched, one from the 203rd headquarters on the Sawtelle Veterans Hospital grounds in Westwood and the other from Battery D, located on the Douglas Aircraft plant site in Santa Monica

Regarding the Fact or faked episode, I thought using a 0.50 caliber gun was an inaccurate reproduction of the 3.0 inch shells that were actually used which look like this:

framework.latimes.com...
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/f53bb51314d9.jpg[/atsimg]
Compare that to these .50 caliber rounds:

alteriw.net...


...they are completely different weapon systems and I don't see how anyone can seriously imply any realistic comparison between them. I think it's one of the worst "tests" they've ever done on that show.

reply to post by Arbitrageur



Many of the US' AA batteries were in fact .50 cals that were attached together in groups of 4.

And even those seemed to do the trick on the show!

reply to post by dtrock78

The explosions shown in the famous photo are from 3 inch shells.

Also, what was the altitude of the balloon in the fact or faked test? 25,000 feet or higher? Nope.

This 50cal WWII Antiaircraft gun had very limited range, and it doesn't appear it could have reached the balloon:

www.antiaircraft.org...

For close-in antiaircraft protection, the Army utilized the standard .50 caliber Browning M2 machine gun in either a water-cooled configuration or in a heavy barrel (HB) air-cooled version. ...

.50 Caliber Browning M2 Machine Gun Facts

Muzzle Velocity: 2,900 feet/second (M2 ammo); 2,800 feet/second (M1 ammo)

Breech: Automatic (must be cocked before first firing)

Maximum Rate of Fire: 600 rounds/minute (450 rounds/minute for HB guns)

Elevation Limits: +10º to 90º (depending on mount used)

Recoil Type: Spring

Fire Control: Individual Tracer

Maximum Effective Slant Range: 600 yards

Maximum Effective Horizontal Range: 1,800 yards

Maximum Effective Vertical Range: 1,700 yards

1700 yard maximum effective vertical range to fire at balloons that routinely went above 8000 yards high?

It's not even close, which is why the fact or faked episode was such a failure.

reply to post by Arbitrageur



Correct, they are. My point was, the 0.50 cals could take down the blimp, so I dont see why the larger shells wouldnt.

And I dont believe the beams of light are converging on an object close to 5 miles in the air based on the photo. It looks much lower given the angles at which the lights on the ridge are positioned.

Originally posted by dtrock78
Tell me you cant clearly see the outline of an object within them. Each one of those exploding artillery flaks (the surrounding white dots) throw off a spray of shrapnel that would've ripped apart any airborne blimp/zeppelin within seconds.

You can see a saucer type shape in that version. However, it is not really visible in the original version.

The Battle of L.A., 1942 [updated] Posted By: Scott Harrison

I still think there may have been something anomalous in the skies above LA. However, the picture is not the proof.

You will find Me, Arbitrageur and a few other members debating this here. It's a good thread in my opinion as it highlights some key differences in how poeple can LEGITIMATELY interpret the same evidence in more than one way.

Revisiting "The Battle of Los Angeles": 70 years of cover-up

reply to post by dtrock78


This is a good show; saw this episode a long time ago. The reports are really interesting to say the least. The picture is interesting too; I like how they attempted to even recreate the "artifact" in the film and could not. Something was definitely in the skies that night.