A Secretary of Defense and the M.I.B.

Within the field of Ufology there are longstanding rumors that the May 22, 1949 death of James Forrestal – the first U.S. Secretary of Defense – was linked to the UFO phenomenon. So the story goes, while suffering from severe depression and anxiety, and ultimately spiraling into a complete nervous breakdown (as a result of his exposure to what the U.S. Government knew about UFOs), Forrestal was on the verge of revealing his knowledge of an alien presence on Earth. The theory continues that powerful figures decided such a thing simply could not be allowed to occur. The result was that Forrestal had to go. And “go,” he certainly did: out of a window. In the early hours of May 22, Forrestal plunged to his death from the 16th floor of the Bethesda Naval Hospital. The big question is: was he pushed or did he jump?

Of course, there’s no hard proof in the public domain that Forrestal was briefed on the more sensational and top secret aspects of the UFO phenomenon. Although, logic dictates that he would have been briefed (at least to some degree), since he accepted the position of Secretary of Defense in 1947 – the year in which the flying saucer was “born” and when the military was indeed taking the mysterious matter very seriously. Even outside of Ufology, there are suspicions that Forrestal’s death was no suicide. But, that’s not the focus of this article. Rather, the focus is on something that happenedbefore Forrestal died and prior to his admittance to Bethesda on April 2, 1949.

Just a few days before he ended up in the naval hospital, Forrestal had a curious experience which had distinct Men in Black overtones attached to it. On the day in question, Forrestal received a visit from one of his friends, a man named Ferdinand Eberstadt, someone who was deeply concerned about Forrestal’s fragile and paranoid state of mind. Eberstadt (a lawyer, a banker, and the author of a historic 1945 document, “Task Force Report on National Security Organization”) was floored by what he saw when he arrived at Forrestal’s home. All of the curtains were closed. Forrestal told his friend – in hushed tones – that listening-devices were all over the house. Sinister characters were watching his every move. His life was in danger.

James Forrestal

To demonstrate this to Eberstadt, Forrestal carefully opened one of the blinds and pointed, knowingly, in the direction of a pair of shabbily-dressed men on the street-corner. “They” were a part of it, Forrestal assured Eberstadt. In no time at all, the doorbell to Forrestal’s home was heard ringing. The last thing Forrestal wanted to do was answer the door. Fortunately, one of his staff was on hand to do exactly that. A brief conversation took place, but which neither Forrestal nor Eberstadt were able to hear. The facts, however, quickly came to Forrestal from his houseboy.

According to what the two men were told, the visitor at the door was trying to generate support that would hopefully allow him to become postmaster in his hometown. Could he come in and speak with Forrestal and have him offer some help and advice? Due to Forrestal’s fraught state of mind, the man was sent packing. Eberstadt and Forrestal watched carefully as the man walked directly towards the two badly-dressed men thatalready had Forrestal in a state of turmoil. It was even more evidence of a conspiracy against him, Forrestal grimly concluded, when he saw the three clearly engaging in conversation.

Maybe the whole thing was blown out of proportion by a man descending into a collective state of paranoia, fear, and nervous collapse. Certainly, that’s what happened. But, it’s worth noting that this odd affair, which occurred during Eberstadt’s visit, has several Men in Back-themed parallels to it. First, the Men in Black are typically described as looking not quite right: they are extremely pale-skinned, they often have bulging eyes (hidden behind wraparound shades), and (very bizarrely) are at times described as wearing wigs and make-up. Forrestal’s visitor on the day in question was described by his staff as very odd-looking.

That the man tried to gain access to Forrestal’s home – by claiming to be seeking support for a potential job as a postmaster – mirrors the 1960s-era reports of MIBfinding ways into the homes of UFO witnesses by claiming to be military personnel or police officers. In the same time-frame, Women in Black were posing as census-takers and as gypsies. They were clearly neither. The MIB are often described as wearing clothes that are shabby, dirty, and which occasionally give off an odor like dirt. The two characters that the “odd-looking” man walked towards (and began speaking to) were badly dressed. And, of course, there’s the fact that the men amounted to a trio. Particularly in the 1950s and the 1960s, the MIB turned up in threes. See, for example, Albert Bender’s book, Flying Saucers and the Three Men.

It must be stressed that none of this proves James Forrestal was murdered because of what he knew about the UFO phenomenon (or even because he may have been on the verge of revealing his knowledge to the world). It must be said, however, that the day in question was a very weird one. And not just for Forrestal, but also for Eberstadt. Even he had to admit it was all a bit odd. And, it’s worth noting the words of Dennis Stacy – a long-time and well-respected figure in Ufology, and who runs Anomalist Books with Patrick Huyghe. Of that MIB-like affair, Stacy observed in a 1993 article for Flying Saucer Review magazine titled “Forrestal’s Fall: Did He Jump, or Was He Pushed?” that “…the whole thing has the appearance of a one-act play staged for Forrestal’s ‘benefit.'”

Notably, Stacy added that the affair “begins to smack of orchestration aimed at unsettling an already unstable Forrestal.” Thought-provoking words, indeed.

 TAGS: Dennis Stacy, James Forrestal, Men in Black, ufo

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UFOs: How Do We Study An Ever-Changing Phenomenon?

To the UFO advocate, the notion that unidentified flying objects could be anything but physical, tangible aircraft would seem laughable. And yet, among the many questions we face in our study of the phenomenon, one is particularly troubling: if the UFO subject represents a single, consistent “alien” phenomenon, then why has it changed so frequently over the decades?

This question was paraphrased to me recently during a correspondence with Jason Bradley, a skeptically-minded colleague of mine. “You have discussed the idea that maybe abduction stories share some similarities between some of the other rash of paranormal claims, like the cult terror in the 70’s and 80’s,” Jason said. “I have always maintained that something glaring about the UFO phenomena is that it’s always followed patterns. Saucers to cigars, cigars to triangles, triangles to lights and so on. I’ve always found this concept interesting, and can’t think of a moment when it’s been addressed. To me this is one of those situations that belies a possible cultural and meme like experience. Ultimately tracking those patterns may help us understand where the psychological component plays into this.”

Mirroring Jason’s ideas presented above, in the past I have similarly discussed the notion that certain trends do appear to emerge, especially within memes presented in UFO literature. However, it is difficult to argue that any definite or distinct lineage emerges from these; in other words, the idea of “saucers to cigars, cigars to triangles,” and the like may not be the most accurate representation of the UFO phenomenon as it has progressed over the years. Nonetheless, there are periods of change that begin appear when looking a bit further back, which thus help to place the “modern” UFO phenomenon of the last few decades into a broader cultural context.

For instance, beginning in the 1890s we can note the prevalence of reports that involve “mystery airships”, which began to appear in many American newspapers (there are, however, similar stories that appeared elsewhere, including parts of South America, as well as Australia, around this same time). Modern UFO historians view the airship craze as a sort of “cultural predecessor” to the modern UFO phenomenon, and it is indeed interesting to note the way that such “UFOs” didn’t appear to resemble saucers, cigars, or triangles of any sort; they represented aircraft that were remarkably similar to those appearing in fiction at that time, namely the work of authors like Jules Verne. Similar to such books and stories, the prevailing theories about the origins of the mystery airships had involved some intrepid inventor who, according to many rumors, was believed to be based somewhere in California, and had managed to construct an impressive new flying machine, which he kept secret from the public. 

Not to be entirely dismissive of the purported “airships” of the 1800s, my article “Airships in the 1800s: An Odd History of Aerial Phenomena” discusses a number of crude airships that were, as a matter of historical fact, actually built in California throughout the later 1800s. The most compelling of them all was (or rather, would have been) that built by a Dr. Charles Abbot Smith of San Francisco, an inventor who had garnered a large amount of publicity for his airship operation beginning in early 1896. It remains unclear whether Smith’s airship was ever able to fly, although historians Timothy Parrot and Michael Busby have been among those who have argued for the existence, and successful flight, of such a craft.

Interestingly, if one weighs the actual historical basis of the “airship craze” of the 1890s against the modern UFO era beginning in 1947, there is little similarity to be found. The most credible among the classic airship stories, ranging from inventors who actually did succeed in building crude airships, to the more far-out tales of aircraft actually observed in the sky, still seem to deal with a very earthly technology. Yes, there were some fanciful newspaper accounts that tell of the operators aboard these craft being “visitors from space”, but these were the likely concoctions of area “liars clubs”, or the occasional journalist writing on a day when legitimate news was lacking (such hoaxes were especially common during this period, and among the most famous were two penned by none other than Mark Twain).

These tales of “airships”, however, when compared with the flying saucers that would emerge after the Second World War, indeed seemed to be the stuff of very different worlds. And despite this, the early reports of “saucers” often bore little or no resemblance to any kind of disc-shaped craft at all, as I noted here of Kenneth Arnold’s famous encounter from the summer of 1947. In truth, reports of “cigar-shaped” objects preceded the era of saucers by at least a year, with the numerous reports of cigars and torpedo-like objects referred to as “ghost rockets” which purportedly swarmed the skies above Scandinavia in the summer of 1946. Similar American reports, such as that described by Captain Jack Puckett of Strategic Air Command in the summer of 1946, also predated Arnold’s sighting by several months.

Throughout the 1950s, 60s, 70s, and 80s, UFOs would appear to take every shape imaginable: some were discs, while others were rounded spheres or eggs; some were cylinders, some shaped like footballs, and some were literally described as resembling “floating houses”. By the late 80s or early 90s, reports began to emerge of odd triangle-shaped aircraft that behaved, if anything, more like blimps; like their predecessors in the 1890s, these objects first appeared mostly over California, with subsequent reports occurring in numerous other locales. In particular a “wave” of triangle-shaped UFOs were reportedly seen over Belgium during the early 1990s.

Many have opined that these modern “triangles”, rather than being some exotic alien craft, are likely to be a variety of stealth aircraft employed by the U.S. military. The benefit of a large aircraft of this sort might include the large amount of material stock or rations it could transport over a long distance in a single stop; however, the size might also be attributable, more simply, to the amount of lift required to get an object like that off the ground, again presuming that they are something akin to blimps or dirigibles.

Coming back to the notion of “trends” that emerge in UFO literature, while it may be debatable whether there are indeed “patterns” that can be attributed with any conclusiveness, it would indeed be appropriate to note the apparent changes the phenomenon seems to have undergone in decades past. Close encounters with UFO occupants were, throughout the 1950s, largely comprised of credulous-sounding occurrences espoused by individuals who, along with retelling their encounters, were equally interested in promoting their involvement in the burgeoning UFO field, and capitalizing on it if possible. Hence, stories like that of George Adamski and his meetings with “Orthon” described, rather mundanely, encounters with an “alien” that was indistinguishable from any other man… apart from his telepathic powers, and unique mode of transportation through space. However, by the early 1970s, stories of UFO contact experiences were beginning to take on a much darker tone: the abductees now told of encounters with diminutive, emotionless humanoids, replete with bug-like eyes and other insect-like features, who were focused almost solely on brief examinations of their captives.

By the 1990s, the bulk of UFO related books focused on the apparent occupants of these presumed spacecraft, as featured in the written work of authors like Budd Hopkins and others. However, today those operating within the field of UFO studies have seemed to shift focus back toward the objects themselves, rather than having such preoccupation with “beings” seen in relation to UFO encounters. And yet, even the reports of objects seen in the skies have seemingly diminished; this decline in noteworthy UFO reports is, as I have observed elsewhere, interesting for a number of reasons. It has also led a number of commentators (including those found here, here,here, and here) to believe the field of UFO research may “changing” to such an extent that it is literally dying altogether.

Looking back, an interesting trend that does emerge, rather than being related to memes present elsewhere within the field of UFOlogy, is the apparent similarity between UFO abduction cases and other, unrelated phenomena. Namely, the descriptions of hallucinatory environments described by psychedelic “experiencers”, such as those featured in the written work of researchers like Rick Strassman, M.D., come to mind. In equal measure, we find such similarities in the Satanic ritual abuse panics of the 1980s, in which horrific torture and memories of abuse are recovered through hypnosis; again, the similarities emerge in more recent claims of “super-soldiers” who argue that their memories, recovered through hypnosis, seem to indicate their secret work as a government operative, memories of which were suppressed by utilizing advanced mind control technologies.

If we look further back in the last century, hypnotic regressions have similarly facilitated belief that some may have experienced encounters with highly advanced technologies and alien environments in other ways: namely through perceived “past lives”, during which the experiencers claim to remember lives in places like the lost city of Atlantis, asdescribed by Edgar Cayce, among others.

What can be made of all this, and how might our recognition of these apparent changes or “trends” help us to reevaluate some areas of the modern study of UFOs? Perhaps, at the heart of the matter, it is still a question of how the human mind perceives UFOs, and what beliefs — whether or not founded in reality — may be built around valid observations of strange aerial objects that are collected over time.

To conclude with a final anecdote, it was the late Fortean researcher John Keel who had often reminded us that “belief is the enemy”. Much as Keel suggested, perhaps it is our belief in UFOs that informs us the most about the subject… rather than what the phenomenon itself may actually represent.

 TAGS: Kenneth Arnold, mystery airship, ufo

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US General Tells Troops To Be Ready For Little Green Men

 … you’ll be dealing with little green men …

That’s Army Chief of Staff General Mark Milley speaking to young military officers at the recent 100th anniversary of the ROTC program at Norwich University in Vermont. That’s right, he’s warning his future troops they will be facing “little green men.” Aliens? Martians? What does General Milley know that we don’t … yet?

General Milley warning about “little green men”

General Milley has been in the U.S. Army since 1980, served in command positions in eight divisions and Special Forces around the world and was appointed as the 39th Chief of Staff of the Army in 2015, so he should know what he’s talking about. But little green men? Shouldn’t he at least use a more military term like Miniature Jungle-Camouflaged Non-Earth Combatants?

The phrase “little green men” as a descriptor of scary beings dates back to the 12th century legend of the Green Children of Woolpit, a young brother and sister who allegedly had green skin, spoke a strange language and ate only beans (their green color could have been a dietary deficiency, although being around kids who ate only beans probably turned others green too).

As a term for extraterrestrials, folklore researcher Chris Aubeck found an article in an 1899 edition of the Atlanta Constitution referring to a little, green-skinned alien from the planet Hurrah. Edgar Rice Burroughs made what appears to be the first science fiction references to “green men of Mars” and “green Martian women” in his 1912 novel, A Princess of Mars. Aubeck also found mentions of little green men from Mars in the Daily Kennebec (Maine) Journal in 1908 and in an Italian report about a crashed spaceship a few years later. The term has since been popularized by everything from sci-fi to movies to I Love Lucy and The Flintstones.

But the U.S. Army? Maybe we should blame Russia, Ukraine, their respective medias and the conflict in Crimea for General Milley’s usage of the term. According to the BBC, after Russia took over Crimea in 2014, there were reports of armed men in solid green uniforms who were not part of the Russian army or any another known unit. They turned out to be local “self-defense groups” who bought their uniforms at military surplus stores. The Crimean locals and a Russian newspaper called them “little green men.”

Are these the “little green men” General Milley was warning about?

Was General Milley referring to covert soldiers in unidentifiable green uniforms fighting for a cause that may not be readily discernible as being friendly or the enemy?

Perhaps the new soldiers would prefer to deal with little green Martians instead.

 TAGS: alien, aliens, Crimea, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Extraterrestrials, Green Children of Woolpit, little green men, Martian, military, Russia, Russian military, ufo, UFO crash, Woolpit

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