By Julia Duin
©2001 The Washington Times
©2001 The Washington Times
The U.S. government has been covering up evidence of extraterrestrial visits for more than 50 years, an array of 20 retired Air Force, Federal Aviation Administration and intelligence officers said Wednesday. They demanded Congress hold hearings on what they say is long-standing secret U.S. involvement with UFOs and extraterrestrials.
Calling it the "greatest secret of the 20th century," the officials, who termed themselves "witnesses" of UFO-related events, described a series of military investigations they said they saw: crashes of alien spacecraft, bodies of alien beings, secret government documents, even James Bond-style "erasures" of people who knew too much.
"The individuals who have these sightings range from airline pilots and military pilots to police officers, some of the people your lives depend on, on a daily basis," retired Air Force Lt. Col. Charles Brown **told a roomful of skeptical reporters. [** Charles Brown - Marker 40:15 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buNCOlB-HeM&list=PLxpYawT00V40XgkYg-YY3S0lpmgKtZtYD&index=5]
"They are very reputable, dependable people," he said. "The field is filled with hoaxes and scams," said Dr. Steven Greer, director of the Disclosure Project, which had gathered the witnesses. "But it doesn't mean all of it is."[ U.F.O DISCLOSURE PROJECT -FULL VERSION]
The 20 witnesses, he said, were a fraction of the 400 people who are willing to testify under oath and under congressional immunity about a secretive portion of the government they say has gone out of control.
UFOs have long fascinated Americans, including several U.S. presidents. Webster L. Hubbell, a former associate attorney general under President Clinton, has described in an autobiography his unsuccessful quest to determine government involvement in the topic. John Callahan, a former FAA division chief of accidents and investigations, said he was directed by CIA officers to cover up a Nov. 18, 1986, incident involving a UFO and a Japanese airliner near Anchorage, Alaska.