Flying Saucers from Outer Space

In his second UFOlogy book, Flying Saucers from Outer Space (1953), Donald Keyhoe revealed: "Since July, 1952, in a new investigation of the saucers, I have been privileged to cooperate with the Air Force . . . Scores of impressive sighting reports by service pilots have been cleared for me, with the conclusions of Air Technical Intelligence—some so incredible they would have been ridiculed two or three years ago."

1952 was the year a veritable UFO 'sighting wave' occurred throughout the United States.  Keyhoe explained that in August that year "the Air Force had changed its Sphinx-like attitude.  In the last six months I'd seen the most baffling cases in the ATIC's secret files.  At first I'd been suspicious of this sudden cooperation.  But I thought I knew the reason now . . ."

Keyhoe described his visits to the Pentagon, where Air Force press specialist Albert M. Chop provided him with Air Technical Intelligence Center reports.  On one occasion Keyhoe attended a screening of "the McLean film" of five glowing UFOs in the sky over Pascagoula, Mississippi.  An appendix of the book listed 51 instances of "Air Technical Intelligence UFO sightings and other information secured and cleared for me by Mr. Albert M. Chop, Air Force Press Desk."  The Air Force cooperation resulted with Keyhoe agreeing that he wouldn't use any Air Force case unless it was cleared.

Official statements of ridicule and denial along with intermittent disclosures that Kehoe thought correct about the mystifying aerial phenomena prompted him to observe, "It was small wonder that the American people were confused about the saucers."

After the last few months the reason for these contradictions was fairly clear.  The situation had changed several times.  Individual opinions had changed with it.  Some officials had retracted earlier statements—or their words had been offset by still other officials.

A UFO sighting that attracted wide attention on July 12 occurred in the city of Indianapolis.

It was Saturday night, and the streets and parks were crowded.  Suddenly a bright yellow glow appeared in the sky.  As startled citizens stared upward, a huge, oval-shaped machine raced out of the southeast and over the city.  Barely 5,000 feet high, it was seen by thousands of people as it streaked overhead, trailed by a fiery exhaust.

In two minutes police, airport, and newspaper switchboards were swamped with calls from frightened citizens.  Thousands more hastily spread the news to neighbors who missed the saucer.  For a while a panic seemed in the making.  Then, when the saucer did not return, the hysteria gradually died down.

Keyhoe's perception of "mass hysteria" seems an exaggeration and perhaps suggests the influence of some of his sources of information.  He reported that airline pilots confirmed the UFO they glimpsed during the Indianapolis sighting event was, as one pilot was quoted, "a controlled craft of some sort."

The numerous reports resulted in a "growing excitement" nationwide.

Some Defense officials, even a few Air Force officers who hadn't seen the evidence, believed most of the sightings were caused by the saucer hysteria.  But the Intelligence officers knew better.  Too many veteran pilots, both military and airline, were reporting identical discs, lights, and maneuvers.  Many reports from the general public had also been confirmed, though with tension increasing it did not seem wise to admit it.

Kehoe continuously stressed that debunking was necessary to stop 'the rising tide of fear" yet he also realized that the policy of secrecy was a significant cause for apprehension as there was no evidence that the UFOs constituted any form of  threat.  Kehoe reported that Director of Intelligence General Samford was ordered to hold a press conference. 

Since 1947, as General Samford knew, the Air Force had frequently tried to debunk the flying saucers.  Each time it had been more difficult.  How could it be done now, with any hope of success?

It was impossible to go back to the 1949 statement, which explained away all sightings.  For the Air Force was now on record that many were still unsolved.  The latest figure, given out by Captain Ruppelt, was 25 per cent; some Intelligence officers privately made it much higher.

Even admitting that 25 per cent were unsolved was misleading, for it evaded the basic facts.  Actually, the Air Force reports showed nearly 500 genuine saucer sightings.

The press conference was held on July 29, 1952.  Keyhoe reported: "By 4 o'clock the room was packed with top correspondents, wire-service men, and commentators.  I hadn't seen a bigger turn-out since the A-bomb story broke."  He commented about Samford, "His shrewd, pleasant face showed no hint of concern—it was not for nothing that he was Director of Air Force Intelligence . . . For the next hour or so they would be sitting on a powder keg.  Two simple questions would light the fuse.  All they could do was pray that nobody thought to ask them."  The following is Kehoe's description of Samford's opening remarks.

"The Air Force feels a very definite obligation to identify and analyze things that happen in the air that may have in them menace to the United States and, because of that feeling of obligation and our pursuit of that interest, since 1947, we have an activity that was known one time as Project Saucer (press name for Project Sign) and now, as part of another more stable and integrated organization, have undertaken to analyze between a thousand and two thousand reports dealing with this area.  And out of that mass of reports that we've received we've been able to take things which were originally unidentified and dispose of them to our satisfaction in terms of bulk where we came to the conclusion that these things were either friendly aircraft erroneously recognized or reported, hoaxes—quite a few of those—electronic and meteorological phenomena of one sort or another, light aberrations, and many other things.

"However, there have remained a percentage of the total, in the order of 20 per cent of the reports, that have come from credible observers of relatively incredible things.  And because of those things not being possible for us to move along and associate with the kind of things that we've found can be associated with the bulk of these reports, we keep on being concerned about them.

"However, I'd like to say that the difficulty of disposing of these reports is largely based upon the lack of any standard measurement or any ability to measure these things which have been reported briefly by some, more elaborately by others, but with no measuring devices that can convert the thing or idea or the phenomenon into something that becomes manageable as material for the kind of analysis that we know.

"Our real interest in this project is not one of intellectual curiosity, but is in trying to establish and appraise the possibility of a menace to the United States.  And we can say, as of now, that there has been no pattern that reveals anything remotely like purpose or remotely like consistency that we can in any way associate with any menace in the United States."

Kehoe noted, "After mentioning reports of strange aerial objects back in biblical times, Samford threw the conference open for questions."  Questions about radar brought responses about flocks of ducks and temperature inversions.  Samford's following commentary included:

"I think that the highest probability is that these are phenomena associated with the intellectual and scientific interests that we are on the road to learn more about, but that there is nothing in them that is associated with materials or vehicles or missiles that are directed against the United States."


"For many years, the field of spiritualism had these same things in which completely competent creditable observers reported incredible things.  I don't mean to say this is that sort of thing, but it's an explanation of our inability to explain."

After reflecting about the press conference, Kehoe articulated his conclusions. 

I was positive now it had been a cover-up, forced on the Air Intelligence men by the July crisis.  Obviously they had acted for the good of the country, and I suddenly realized what an ordeal it must have been.

But all of this could have been avoided if the Air Force back in the earlier stages, had taken the American people into its confidence.


. . . gradually Americans would have accepted the facts, even the possibility of a saucer attack—just as we now have accepted the danger of A-bomb attack.

Such a step would have ended all ridicule.  Scientists would have felt less squeamish about aiding Project Sign, and Congress would have granted funds for an all-out investigation.  Instead, secrecy had built up the mystery, and with it public fear.

In one of his conversations with Chop, Kehoe was told about an incident in South Carolina that had been cleared for him to report:

"We want you to emphasize the fact that our pilots aren't shooting at these things.  We've been catching hell from all over the country."  Chop showed me some telegrams and letters.  "They even wire the President, 'In the name of God, don't shoot at the saucers.'  So anything you can do—"

"Sure, I'll include that," I said.

The events chronicled by Kehoe make it obvious that Air Force complicity resulted with articles he wrote that were expressly based on the data provided to him.  The advantages here for Air Force officials were not fully recognized by Kehoe, who showed consistent naivete about this aspect of his circumstances.  The following is the quoted conversation after a paragraph of commentary from Major General Ramey was handed him.

"Anything else you want in the story?" I asked Chop.

"No," he said.  "All we ask is for you to try to see the Air Force problem and give a fair picture."  He paused, then went on in a casual tone, "If you think of any other angles, when you finish this piece, come on back in.  We'll give you whatever we can."

Keyhoe estimated that the statements of General Samford at the press conference "had branded the saucers as phenomena with no mass"; however, the temperature inversion theory was contradicted by some reports and Keyhoe noticed other contradictory incidents.

It was a curious situation.  The officers and civilian officials involved in UFO policy decisions were divided, roughly, into three main groups.  The first, which I'll call Group A, believed that sighting reports should be made public to prepare the country for the final solution—whatever it proved to be.  Most of the men in this group had seen all the evidence and were convinced the saucers were machines superior to any known aircraft.  The other two groups believed in silence, but for different reasons.  Those in the B group also had seen the evidence, believed the saucers were real, but feared the effect of a public admission.  Group C was made up of hardheaded nonbelievers.  Most of them had never troubled to examine the ATIC evidence; the few who had, flatly refused to believe it.

Since the first part of '52, Group A  had urged that ATIC files be opened to the press.  At first the two "silence" groups stubbornly resisted.  But there was one argument that carried weight.  The Soviet might suddenly claim that the saucers were Russian weapons.  With the country ignorant of the facts, many Americans might believe the lie, increasing the chance of nation-wide stampedes if the Russians made a sneak attack.

Reluctantly the "silence" men gave ground.  The first result had been the Life and Look articles, written with ATIC aid.  Then the July crisis arose, forcing Intelligence to debunk the saucers.  When the danger of a panic was over, Group A began to fight again, pointing to the July hysteria as proof for their case.

At this time, by sheer good luck, I had gone to the Pentagon and made my offer.  By then the Menzel theory had served its purpose; some Intelligence officers felt it should not be allowed to stand as the official answer.  Believing that I would give a fair picture of the Air Force problem, Intelligence had released the facts which wrecked the inversion story.

One source of information for Kehoe was the engineer in charge of the first Canadian flying saucer project, Wilbur B. Smith.  Kehoe also found compelling a paragraph from Life On Other Worlds (1940) by H. Spencer Jones:

It is conceivable, for instance, that we could have beings, the cells of whose bodies contained silicon, instead of the carbon which is an essential constituent of our cells and of all other living cells on the Earth; and that, because of this essential difference between the constitution of these cells and the cells of which animal and plant life on the Earth are built up, they might be able to exist at temperatures so high that no terrestrial types of life could survive.

An Air Force propaganda campaign is chronicled in an incident that began when Chop presented Keyhoe with a script formulating a potential alien invasion of Earth on the condition that the article's author W.C. Odell's Air Force Intelligence connection and rank of colonel be concealed.  The script was intended for magazine publication but True aviation editor John DuBarry responded: "Without Odell's rank, we'd be accused of printing a scare story . . ."  Keyhoe acknowledged, "After what DuBarry had said, I decided not to show the script to any other editors.  There was too much mystery about it."

Another development was Kehoe learning about the decision not to make public Warrant Officer Delbert C. Newhouse's film showing several saucers maneuvering near Tremonton, Utah.

Anger over the decision, I found, went far beyond Air Force Intelligence.  Next day I received an unsigned note on plain paper, urging me to tell the Utah film story.  I recognized the handwriting of a Defense official who knew I was writing a book.  Like Al, he asked me not to blast the entire Air Force.

In his final conversation with Albert M. Chop chronicled in the book,  Keyhoe was given a carbon of letter that constituted "our official answer to a letter from your book publishers."  The letter stated:

The back cover jacket of Flying Saucers from Outer Space featured Chop's letter.  A brief biographical profile of Chop may be read at nicap.org.

The letter was a culminating event of Albert M. Chop's Pentagon job as he resigned his Air Force Press Desk position, having explained to Kehoe: "This hasn't anything to do with the saucers . . . I'm going out to California—I've been wanting to get into private industry."

It has been six decades since Flying Saucers from Outer Space was published.  Officials now working in positions of authority concerning UFO data have the opportunity of either contributing to the advancement of human knowledge or, instead, being obeisant to secrecy policies that no longer can be rationalized as they were during the 1950s.