In a stunning revelation, a newly reviewed Department of Defence (DoD) report confirms that the US military "intentionally promoted" UFO conspiracy theories, especially those tied to Area 51, to mask secret weapons testing during the Cold War. As per a report by The Wall Street Journal, the disclosures come from an extensive investigation by the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), a Pentagon unit established in 2022 to study decades of UFO-related claims.
According to the report, the Pentagon not only spread disinformation, including doctored images of flying saucers, but also misled eyewitnesses who had unknowingly witnessed classified military activities. One particularly striking case from the 1980s details how a retired Air Force colonel, under official orders, handed a Nevada bar owner fake UFO photographs to divert attention from top-secret F-117 Nighthawk stealth jet tests occurring nearby at Area 51.
Fake alien unit briefings fooled recruits for years
The AARO's investigation, led by its first director Sean Kirkpatrick, unearthed decades of deceptive practices within the Defence Department. Among the most bizarre findings was a long-standing tradition where new Air Force recruits were subjected to fake briefings about a fictional team called "Yankee Blue," allegedly responsible for investigating alien encounters. These elaborate pranks included strict gag orders, leading many recruits to believe the fabrications for years. The Pentagon only discontinued the practice in 2023.
While the motive behind such internal misinformation remains unclear, some speculate it served as a psychological loyalty test or an effort to confuse adversaries and internal personnel alike. In several cases, real incidents were also misrepresented. Former Air Force captain Robert Salas, for instance, claimed a UFO disabled 10 nuclear warheads in a Montana missile silo in 1967. The AARO team found that the incident was, in fact, part of an unsuccessful electromagnetic pulse (EMP) test. Rather than admit to vulnerabilities in national defence systems, the military chose to let witnesses believe a more mysterious explanation.
'Area 51 myths crafted to distract public and spies'
The AARO report also confirms that some of the most iconic UFO myths - including those surrounding Area 51 - were deliberately cultivated to mislead both the public and foreign intelligence services. This strategy also sheds light on why the Pentagon’s earlier transparency efforts failed to reveal the true origins of these long-standing stories. While the Department of Defence has acknowledged these findings, officials have stated that not all AARO data has been made public. However, they have pledged to release a second volume of the Historical Record Report later this year. "The department is committed to releasing a second volume of its Historical Record Report, to include AARO’s findings on reports of potential pranks and inauthentic materials,” the Pentagon said in a statement as per The Wall Street Journal.
UFO myths used to conceal stealth aircraft and mislead insiders
The long-standing alien UFO narrative served a strategic purpose—any time a strange aircraft was spotted, it was conveniently dismissed as an extraterrestrial sighting, effectively masking the existence of classified stealth aircraft under development. According to the report, numerous military personnel were deliberately misled into believing they were working on alien-related operations. Many were even made to sign non-disclosure agreements (NDAs), reinforcing the illusion and ensuring silence. As a result, several individuals within the government genuinely believed they were involved in top-secret extraterrestrial projects, when in fact, they were part of conventional but highly classified defence programmes.
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