In just a few days from now, the 2018 Dulce Base UFO Conference will be held at Dulce, New Mexico. There will, of course, be a great deal of debate and conversation on the town’s legend: namely, that deep below Dulce’s Archuleta Mesa there exists a huge, fortified “alien base” where all sorts of horrific experimentation is undertaken on untold numbers of people. By who? By hostile aliens, that’s who. The stories range from the fairly down to earth to the downright paranoid. It should be noted, though, that in his 2005 book, Project Beta, Greg Bishop made a very persuasive case that much of the story was created/fabricated by (a) counterintelligence experts in the U.S. military and (b) those skilled in the field of creating and disseminating disinformation.

Back in the 1970s, Paul Bennewitz – who died in 2003, in Albuquerque, New Mexico – had his own company that stood adjacent to Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico. Its name was Thunder Scientific. On occasion, Bennewitz had seen – late at night and in the early hours of the morning – strange, unidentified objects flying over Kirtland Air Force Base and the nearby, huge Manzano Mountains. They could have been early drone-like craft. But, for Bennewitz they were alien craft.

Bennewitz’s head spun: he came to believe that aliens were in league with the U.S. Air Force, and that much of the secret program was run out of Kirtland. While one school of thought suggests that Bennewitz was indeed tracking the movements of UFOs in the skies over Kirtland, another suggests that Bennewitz had actually stumbled on tests of new and radical aircraft, and additional advanced technologies of a terrestrial kind. It’s this latter angle/theory that Greg Bishop addresses chiefly in his book.

In ingenious fashion – but from the perspective of Bennewitz, in terrible fashion – a plot was initiated to, in essence, give Bennewitz exactly what he wanted to hear. So, with that in mind, well-placed government agents, intelligence operatives, and experts in the fields of counterintelligence and disinformation, all fed Bennewitz fictitious tales of dangerous ETs, of thousands of people abducted and mind-controlled in slave-like fashion by the aliens, of terrible experiments undertaken on people held below the Dulce base, and of a looming confrontation between the human race and the deadly creatures from another galaxy.

With his mind and research diverted to Dulce – and, most importantly from the perspective of the government, away from the classified programs at Kirtland Air Force Base – Bennewitz became more and more paranoid and finally had a nervous collapse. He kept a low profile after that, his research largely over. But, the story isn’t quite over.

More than a decade before Bennewitz came to believe the awful rumors of Dulce were true, the U.S. Government alreadyhad a stake in the area and its surroundings. A contingent from the Atomic Energy Commission headed into town and set up what was called Project Gasbuggy. It was a sub-project of a much bigger project called Plowshare. The plan was to detonate – way below ground – a small nuclear device, as a means to try and extract natural gas. The operation went ahead on December 10, 1967 – and it worked well. The bomb was detonated at a depth of more than 4,000 feet.

Years later, certain figures in the UFO field suggested that the natural gas scenario was a cover for something else. You may already see where this is all going. There is an enduring belief within certain factions of Ufology that the nuke was actually used, by a panicked government, to try and wipe out the alien base and the extraterrestrials said to live deep within it. Even to this day it is illegal to dig in certain areas around Dulce, on the orders of the Atomic Energy Commission.

Moving on, from 1975 to 1979, the town of Dulce was hit by numerous cattle mutilations: black helicopters soared across the skies of town by night – and sometimes, and incredibly, in complete silence. Strange lights were seen flitting around Dulce’s huge Archuleta Mesa. Cows were found with organs removed and blood drained from their corpses. The incisions looked as if they were the work of lasers.

For those who might find all of this to be just too incredible, it’s worth noting that the FBI was heavily involved in the investigation of the mutilations at Dulce and has now placed its files on the mystery on their website, The Vault. It’s a file that reads like science-fiction (but it isn’t…)and that runs to more than 100 pages.  Many of the incidents were investigated by the late Police Officer Gabe Valdez of Espanola. The FBI summarized Valdez’ theories as follows:

QUOTE: “Information furnished to this office by Officer Valdez indicates that the animals are being shot with some type of paralyzing drug and the blood is being drawn from the animal after an injection of an anti-coagulant. It appears that in some instances the cattle’s legs have been broken and helicopters without any identifying numbers have reportedly been seen in the vicinity of these mutilations.

“Officer Valdez theorizes that clamps are being placed on the cow’s legs and they are being lifted by helicopter to some remote area where the mutilations are taking place and then the animal is returned to its original pasture. The mutilations primarily consist of removal of the tongue, the lymph gland, lower lip and the sexual organs of the animal.

“Much mystery has surrounded these mutilations, but according to witnesses they give the appearance of being very professionally done with a surgical instrument, and according to Valdez, as the years progress, each surgical procedure appears to be more professional. Officer Valdez has advised that in no instance, to his knowledge, are these carcasses ever attacked by predator or scavenger animals, although there are tracks which would indicate that coyotes have been circling the carcass from a distance. Special Agent Putman then informed the Director of the outcome of Valdez’s run-ins with officials.

“He also advised that he has requested Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory to conduct investigation for him but until just recently has always been advised that the mutilations were done by predatory animals. Officer Valdez stated that just recently he has been told by two assistants at Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory that they were able to determine the type of tranquilizer and blood anti-coagulant that have been utilized.” END OF QUOTE

Putman then demonstrated to headquarters the astonishing scale of the mutilation puzzle, according to Valdez: “Officer Valdez stated that Colorado probably has the most mutilations occurring within their State and that over the past four years approximately 30 have occurred in New Mexico. He stated that of these 330, 15 have occurred on Indian Reservations but he did know that many mutilations have gone unreported which have occurred on the Indian reservations because the Indians, particularly in the Pueblos, are extremely superstitious and will not even allow officers in to investigate in some instances. Officer Valdez stated since the outset of these mutilations there have been an estimated 8,000 animals mutilated which would place the loss at approximately $1,000,000.”

So, where do things stand with the “Dulce Base?” Well, I’ll tell you. Today, there are a lot of rumors, not one of which has ever provided hard, undeniable proof that such an underground installation really exists. But, that the area has been a hotbed of very weird activity of the “mute” kind (and particularly in the 1970s), and that underground detonations occurred in the area, certainly makes it understandable why Dulce and its surroundings are interesting to ufologists. Unfortunately, for those who are absolutely sure that such a facility does exist below Dulce, “interesting” is about as good as it gets, right now. Unless you know better…

Science fiction is full of tales of malevolent alien races who invade Earth in an attempt to enslave, annihilate, or assimilate the human race. In most of these, ragtag bands of human survivors band together to bravely fight off these invaders and reclaim our home planet through sheer bravery and a little help from Bill Pullman.

While it’s nice to imagine that the indelible human spirit might be able to save us from extraterrestrial conquerors, the fact is that if any hypothetical alien races are advanced enough to launch a large-scale invasion on Earth, we’re probably boned from them start. Luckily, we may have a bargaining chip that we could use to bribe our way out of becoming pets for unfathomably terrifying alien masters: our own DNA.

That sobering idea was proposed this month by Daniel Helman, professor of Labor Relations and Trade Unions at Ton Duc Thang University in Vietnam. Helman gave a presentation at the International Space Development Conference in Los Angeles arguing that since any advanced alien race would view our technology and commodities as inferior, our genetic material might be the most valuable thing we have to trade for our lives.  “Our environment is unique, hence the genetics of all the organisms here and in the solar system are unique,” Helman argues.

Trading our own DNA would also ensure that the human race, even in test tube form, would survive any natural or man-made catastrophes which might render our planet lifeless. Helman also notes that viewing DNA as a tradable commodity in this way also serves as a “utilitarian reason to promote biodiversity” here on Earth. If there are such things as intergalactic zoosfilled with wondrous creatures from every corner of the universe – another popular theme in science fiction – the DNA of all of the other lifeforms here on Earth might be valuable as well.

Ah, the little critters of nature. They don’t know that they’re ugly.

Still, the idea isn’t sitting well among other academics who study potential human-alien interactions. Some argue that trading our DNA could make us vulnerable to genetically engineered weaponized diseases specific to our genetic code, or even make human life on Earth expendable in the eyes of superior alien races who might be able to clone new races of better humans elsewhere.

What would Bill Pullman do?

When we watch sci-fi products like Independence Day or The X-Files, we do so with the expectation that flying saucers and aliens are on the cards. Sometimes, however, UFOs show up in the movies and TV shows you’d least expect. I used to watch quite a bit of The West Wing, which ran on HBO between 1999 and 2006. And when I say, “quite a bit,” I mean I’ve seen every episode of all seven seasons at least twice (hey, it’s addictive). I was struck when watching this White House-set political drama that, among its serious thematic preoccupations of domestic and foreign policy, the subject of UFOs was occasionally and somewhat jarringly thrown into the mix.

The UFO issue features peripherally in a number of episodes spread across several seasons. Predictably, the tone of The West Wing’s UFO discussions is light-hearted, and the scenes in question rely on genre stereotypes, particularly the nerdy and obsessive UFO enthusiast, played in the show by Sam Lloyd in the role of Bob Engler. In one episode, in a meeting with Deputy White House Communications Director Sam Seaborn (Rob Lowe), Engler, a dweebish employee of US Space Command, insists that a fresh UFO tracking report be presented immediately to the President on the grounds of national security. Seaborn swiftly and disparagingly dismisses his request: “No… because the President will either yell at me or laugh at me…” Seaborn then goes on to imply that Engler should seek therapy. Still, the UFO info that Engler imparts to Seaborn quietly rattles the cocksure White House staffer. It is only at the end of the episode that Seaborn’s fears are allayed when Martin Sheen’s heroic President Bartlett casually reveals to his staff in the Oval Office that NORAD had tracked not a flying saucer that day but merely a piece of soviet space junk.

In further episodes, we get casually dismissive references to the government “covering-up aliens in New Mexico,” and to the apparently alarming percentage of young Americans who believe in UFOs. In one episode, Bob Engler of US Space Command makes a return appearance, insisting to Sam Seaborn that the government is storing an alien spacecraft in the bullion depository at Fort Knox. You get the idea. And now, thanks to the time and effort of UFO researcher Giuliano Marinkovic, you can view all the West Wing UFO references in one handy video compilation.

It is always of interest to me how the UFO topic is presented in “non-UFO” products, i.e., “serious” dramas, or products outside the worlds of sci-fi and fantasy. In our “real” world—the world of official culture—UFOs have yet to be formally acknowledged as an ontological reality with serious scientific and political implications. This is reflected in most real-world-set movies and TV shows, in which UFOs are the stuff of casual banter, and belief in them is a useful signifier of a character’s mental state.

Perhaps, in the not too distant future, as we learn more about the phenomenon, Hollywood will see fit to more thoughtfully incorporate the UFO subject into its non-genre products. Until then, we’ll have to continue to make do with throw-away lines about little green men, tinfoil hats, and deep-frozen aliens at Fort Knox.

When we watch sci-fi products like Independence Day or The X-Files, we do so with the expectation that flying saucers and aliens are on the cards. Sometimes, however, UFOs show up in the movies and TV shows you’d least expect. I used to watch quite a bit of The West Wing, which ran on HBO between 1999 and 2006. And when I say, “quite a bit,” I mean I’ve seen every episode of all seven seasons at least twice (hey, it’s addictive). I was struck when watching this White House-set political drama that, among its serious thematic preoccupations of domestic and foreign policy, the subject of UFOs was occasionally and somewhat jarringly thrown into the mix.

The UFO issue features peripherally in a number of episodes spread across several seasons. Predictably, the tone of The West Wing’s UFO discussions is light-hearted, and the scenes in question rely on genre stereotypes, particularly the nerdy and obsessive UFO enthusiast, played in the show by Sam Lloyd in the role of Bob Engler. In one episode, in a meeting with Deputy White House Communications Director Sam Seaborn (Rob Lowe), Engler, a dweebish employee of US Space Command, insists that a fresh UFO tracking report be presented immediately to the President on the grounds of national security. Seaborn swiftly and disparagingly dismisses his request: “No… because the President will either yell at me or laugh at me…” Seaborn then goes on to imply that Engler should seek therapy. Still, the UFO info that Engler imparts to Seaborn quietly rattles the cocksure White House staffer. It is only at the end of the episode that Seaborn’s fears are allayed when Martin Sheen’s heroic President Bartlett casually reveals to his staff in the Oval Office that NORAD had tracked not a flying saucer that day but merely a piece of soviet space junk.

In further episodes, we get casually dismissive references to the government “covering-up aliens in New Mexico,” and to the apparently alarming percentage of young Americans who believe in UFOs. In one episode, Bob Engler of US Space Command makes a return appearance, insisting to Sam Seaborn that the government is storing an alien spacecraft in the bullion depository at Fort Knox. You get the idea. And now, thanks to the time and effort of UFO researcher Giuliano Marinkovic, you can view all the West Wing UFO references in one handy video compilation.

It is always of interest to me how the UFO topic is presented in “non-UFO” products, i.e., “serious” dramas, or products outside the worlds of sci-fi and fantasy. In our “real” world—the world of official culture—UFOs have yet to be formally acknowledged as an ontological reality with serious scientific and political implications. This is reflected in most real-world-set movies and TV shows, in which UFOs are the stuff of casual banter, and belief in them is a useful signifier of a character’s mental state.

Perhaps, in the not too distant future, as we learn more about the phenomenon, Hollywood will see fit to more thoughtfully incorporate the UFO subject into its non-genre products. Until then, we’ll have to continue to make do with throw-away lines about little green men, tinfoil hats, and deep-frozen aliens at Fort Knox.