01x01 - Secret Pentagon Program

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♪ ♪

CHRISTOPHER K. MELLON:
November 2004,

off the coast
of Southern California,

the radar operators
on the USS Princeton

begin to see objects
coming essentially from space.

COMMANDER DAVE FRAVOR:
As I come up, I can see him as

he's crossing in front of me,
it starts to accelerate,

gets right on my nose
and disappears.

LT. COMMANDER ALEX DIETRICH:
This particular object

was not following
any of our rules.

Like, what the (bleep) is that?

Like, we're seeing something
for the first time.

We don't know if it's a threat.

We don't even know what it is.

FRAVOR:
We don't know
what we don't know.

SEN. HARRY REID:
These unidentified
flying phenomenon

or objects,
you know, I don't know
what they are.

But we've established one thing:
they exist.

MICHIO KAKU:
Our pilots have been seeing

these things for decades.

LESLIE KEAN:
Their sightings
go all the way back

to the '40s
and '50s and '60s.

MAN: We have a report

of an unidentified aircraft
south of the field.

REPORTER:
There have been
hundreds of sightings

in Westchester, Dutchess,
and Putnam Counties.

MARCO RUBIO:
Anything that
enters an airspace

that's not supposed
to be there is a threat.

SEN. KIRSTEN GILLIBRAND:
There's a lot of people

who feel very passionate
about this issue

and they just want people
to take it seriously,

as they should!

JEFF KRIPAL:
The military and the government

basically decided
on a policy of shaming.

KEAN:
The witnesses were very afraid
of being ridiculed.

FRANK MANNOR:
They think you're a nut,
tell you the truth.

That's just what
they figure you are.

HELENE COOPER:
We needed to remove the stigma.

REP. ANDRE CARSON:
Republicans are just as curious

as Democrats
when it comes to these matters.

KAKU:
It used to be that
the burden of proof

was on the true believer.

They saw something, prove it.

Now the burden of proof
has shifted to the government.

Now they have to prove

that they don't
come from perhaps

another universe beyond ours.

J. ALLEN HYNEK:
We get reports every night.

MAN 1: I don't know
what the hell it is.

MAN 2:
Looks like a rotating
light around it.

♪ ♪

NARRATOR:
Yes, it came from outer space

to fill the world
with terror.

To bring you
unforgettable suspense.

LUIS D. ELIZONDO:
When you hear the term "UFO,"

I think a lot of people

think of, uh, little green men

and Elvis on the mothership,

and tin foil hats.

NARRATOR:
Where did it come from?

ELIZONDO:
When in reality,

what we're talking about
are real objects

that are being encountered
over controlled U.S. airspace,

in some cases
very sensitive locations,

performing in ways that,
frankly, we can't understand.

GILLIBRAND: Honestly,
we have video footage of UAPs,

unidentified aerial phenomena.

MAN (on radio):

GILLIBRAND:
More and more things

that we can't identify.

(laughs) So we need
to know what it is.

That is necessary
for national security.

PILOT (on radio):
There's a whole fleet of them,
look on the ASA.

CARSON:
Might this be
from the Russians,

the Chinese government?
Or another hostile nation?

A non-state actor?

Or are these aircraft
otherworldly?

Are these beings from
another galaxy or universe?

These are questions that,
that have to be answered.

MELLON: I think the best
way to characterize it

is we're vulnerable.

It's a vulnerability.

And that vulnerability
could be exploited,

could be massively
exploited.

So, that has to be
a national security concern.

ELIZONDO:
We've been looking at this topic

for the last 70 years
as a country.

We have substantiated reports
of UAP activity

from at least World w*r II.

LT. GENERAL JOHN A. SAMFORD:
We have received and analyzed

between 1 and 2,000 reports

that have come to us
from all kinds of sources.

MELLON: You're not taught
this in history class,

but we had a phenomenal
series of UFO sightings

directly over the nation's
Capital in July 1952,

on two successive weekends.

SAMFORD:
Air Force interest
in this problem

has been due
to our feeling of an obligation

to identify anything in the air

that may have
the possibility of threat

or menace
to the United States.

ELIZONDO:
The American people
wanted answers.

And unfortunately the Air Force
chose to obfuscate.

LAWRENCE J. TACKER:
Our critics continually charge

that the United States Air Force

is withholding information
from the general public.

This is absolutely untrue.

We are not hiding anything.
We have nothing to hide.

ELIZONDO:
So in the early 1970s,

the government concluded
its investigation into UFOs.

As a result of that,
there was this quiet period.

This point where
the U.S. government

had washed
its hands of the topic.

That occurred for,
for several decades,

or at least that's what
we were led to believe.

But in fact, in 2008,

I was approached by a couple
representatives from a little,

small, obscure office
somewhere in, in the Pentagon.

That office was called
the Advance Aerospace Threat

Identification Program: AATIP.

The individuals asked me
if I would be part of an effort

which, quite literally,
looked at UFOs.

AATIP was the deliberate

and purposeful study of

Unidentified Aerial Vehicles

that were being encountered
in controlled U.S. air space.

People asked me,
"Well, why you, Luis?"

And as it was explained to me

was because of my,
my background.

I'm a career
counterintelligence
special agent.

Many of my assignments
were overseas,

initially in the Latin American,
uh, hemisphere,

and then later on,
after September 11th,

over in Afghanistan
and the Middle East.

I took an oath many,
many years ago

to defend this country
from all enemies,
foreign and domestic.

And that's why I accepted
the offer to join AATIP.

I approached this job
the same way

I did every other job
I ever had in intelligence.

The exact same methodologies

that we used
to hunt t*rrorists,

we were using to hunt UFOs.

The sources of information
that was collected

was primarily through
Department of Defense
and military assets.

Think of fighter aircraft and,
and military eyewitnesses.

We did not engage the public.

These pilots are,
are not only trained observers,

but they are some of the best
aircraft pilots on the planet

operating some of the most
sophisticated weapons systems

on the planet.

When they're telling you

that they are
encountering something

that they cannot describe,

that impacts
our national security

and our ability to respond
to a perceived threat.

And so when they are
encountering these objects

we have to take
their testimony seriously.

Imagine something
that had the ability

to fly in space,
under water,

and in our atmosphere
at 13,000 miles an hour, and,

and change directions
instantly.

We fly the SR-71
at 3,200 miles an hour.

If you wanted to take
a right-hand turn,

it would take you roughly

half the state of Ohio
to do it.

And yet what we are seeing
are objects

that can do 90-degree turns
instantly.

And we're not talking about
speeds of 3,200 miles an hour.

They've been clocked
at over 13,000.

The question arises:
How is that possible?

GILLIBRAND:
On the Armed Services
Committee,

the one thing
I did become aware of

that I was very concerned about

is that members
of our armed forces

have come forward
over many years

with reports of

Unidentified Aerial Phenomena
that they actually captured

and instead of that information
being well-received,

it's often been denigrated.

MELLON:
By and large,

most of the data
was not even filed,

or saved, or reported.

The information that was stored

did not go to
a central authority.

GILLIBRAND:
That's not acceptable.

And if we don't know
what it is,

it's not an appropriate
response to say, well then,

let's not look at it,
or let's not admit it's there.

And so I wanted
to look into this further.

DIRECTOR: So is that like
an adrenaline junkie,

is that what
you'd call yourself?

FRAVOR: I wouldn't say
I'm an adrenaline junkie,

but I like fast cars
and flying jets are pretty cool.

I think it's the greatest
job on the planet.

My name is David Fravor.

I'm a retired Navy Commander
Super Hornet pilot.

I flew for 18 years
for the United States Navy.

I'm, uh,
at the foot of the ladder...

July 1969,
I was with my mom

watching Neil Armstrong
walk on the moon.

MAN (on radio):
Both hands down,
about the fourth rung up.

And I was
fascinated with space

and my mom said they were
all former military pilots.

And about from that point on,

I had this goal
that I was gonna
fly tactical aircraft

somewhere in
the United States military.

I got some pilots
that I worry about.

'Cause, the first thing,
you don't want to lose anybody

and number two, the airplanes
are pretty expensive

and it's tax dollars.

In November of 2004,

we're gonna work
with the USS Princeton

and we were flying,
we're training our aircrew.

SOLDIER (on radio):
Stand by for word
from Commanding Officer.

FRAVOR:
As Alex was flying
the other plane,

The Princeton
came up and said, "Hey, sir,

we're gonna, we're gonna
hold on training today."

So he said, "Hey,
we have a real-world vector,"

and they turned us off
to the West.

It goes to,
"Oh, real world.

Maybe we're going to intercept
some drug runners."

DIETRICH:
We were flying in a tactical

combat spread formation,
two aircraft.

Each aircraft had two aircrew.

As the radar hits
on the USS Princeton ,

scopes start to march
towards each other.

They get so close that
they can't differentiate them,

and that's called
a merge plot.

And a merge plot is when

you would expect to merge
with this other aircraft,

and if you're
in a combat situation,

that's obviously
a very tense moment.

(indistinct radio chatter)

FRAVOR:
So, when you do that,

you start looking outside,
so we're kinda doing this...

looking around to see
where it's at

because it's somewhere
around you and you don't know.

And I looked down,
I go, "What is that?!"

Close your eyes and imagine
a long cylindrical white object

with rounded ends,
roughly 40 feet long,

that looked like
a giant Tic Tac.

It was white, pure white,
it had no windows,

no wings,
no visual signs of propulsion.

And this thing was
going like this...

And I, I describe it as like
if you put a ping pong ball

and it was
bouncing off a wall.

DIETRICH:
This particular object

was not following
any of our rules.

It didn't have a turn radius
that we would expect.

It didn't have a period
to accelerate and decelerate.

It just seemed to zip
so quickly that it was again

really disorienting,
really confusing for us.

RICKI STERN: David said
it was the "WTF moment."

DIETRICH:
Yeah. (laughs) Yeah.

There were definitely
some "WTFs" on the radio.

(laughs)

Not in a scared way but like,

"What the (bleep) is that?"

Like, we're seeing something
for the first time.

FRAVOR:
You know, some people go
"what is that" and they run.

And then some people say
"what is that"

and they're curious and they
want to get closer and closer.

I wanted to get closer
and see what it was.

DIETRICH:
My lead,
Commander David Fravor,

he says "I'm in,"

which means that he's engaging
with this thing.

FRAVOR:
We're going around,

we get to about
the 12 o'clock position

and this thing is
still pointing north-south.

The Tic Tac goes...

and turns and starts coming up.

So, now it's mirroring me.

Whatever it was,
was aware that we were there.

And as I come up, I can see him
as he's crossing in front of me,

it starts to accelerate,

gets right on my nose
and disappears.

For something to come off
the surface of the ocean

like it was moving around,
to be able to just accelerate,

to match my speed
and then to rapidly go away,

we do not possess
that technology.

COMMANDER CHAD UNDERWOOD:
Dave Fravor was
my commanding officer.

Dave had his encounter.

He comes back and lands
on the carrier

and goes
"I'm a little weirded out."

Uh, we were out there,
and we saw this object.

"I need you to go out
to this sector of airspace

and try to find it."

He's been flying
his entire career,

over 20 years.

When he says
something like that,

I take it seriously.

FRAVOR: Chad decided,
"If there's any way possible,

if I can get this thing
on video, I'm gonna do it."

DIETRICH:
I think it's a testament
to Chad Underwood

and his pilot,
their experience,
their expertise,

their, their technical acumen
that they were able to launch

and find it
and bring back FLIR footage.

UNDERWOOD:
You can see we just
jumped to infrared,

target is now white
against a black background.

It's the same picture, it's just
a different kind of polarity.

I told my pilot I'm like,
"Hey, I'm going to go into

"every single
field of view, zoom, TV...

and just try to bring back
as much footage."

So we pop the tapes in
and take a look

and every single eyeball
in the room

was just like
wide-open like, "whoa."

How do I describe this
to someone

who's gonna be,
you know, skeptical

and, and there was kind of
that stigma of like

"Alright, you saw an alien."

I'm like, "I didn't say
I saw an alien."

All I can tell you is
that I couldn't describe it.

ELIZONDO:
There's a lot more
videos there.

What we're seeing
on g*n-camera footage

is being validated and verified
by eyewitness testimony,

which is also being further
substantiated by radar data.

My intent was
to have this information

presented to
the Secretary of Defense

so he could make
an informed decision.

There are aspects
of this phenomenon

that definitely belong within
the national security arena.

Especially if these objects
were over controlled
U.S. airspace.

That's inherent
government business.

The boss needed
to see the data,

and unfortunately

that information was
not permitted to get to him.

On a regular, routine basis,

I was brought up
to the Secretary's suite,

and I was briefing
his direct reports.

But they wouldn't bring it
to his attention.

And I suspect they were trying
to save him from embarrassment,

because if someone
in the media said,

"Were you ever
briefed on UFOs?"
he'd have to say yes.

And so after
several failed attempts

to brief
the Secretary of Defense,

I chose to resign.

Sometimes, if you
want to help the system,

you have to leave
the very system to do it,

and that's what
I chose to do.

My resignation, it wasn't easy.

It was probably the most
difficult on my family.

I had given up
a successful career.

But it's kind of
a code of ethic
with us in government

that if you can't
fix a problem internally

then you leave, which is
ultimately what I had to do.

ZACH:
Leslie interview take one, mark!

KEAN:
My name is Leslie Kean

and I'm an investigative
journalist

and I've been reporting on UFOs
for about 21 years.

In the fall of 2017,

I got a call
from a source of mine,

Chris Mellon, a former
Under Secretary of Defense,

who was very
interested in UFOs

and he invited me to a secret
meeting in Washington DC.

And I eventually
learned that the purpose

was for me to meet the former
head of an official program

within the Department of Defense
which was studying UFOs,

and had been doing
so for 10 years.

I met Luis Elizondo the day

after he resigned
from the secret program.

So this was unbelievable to me.

There was a program,

and I was actually about
to meet the person

who headed up that program.

It was a big deal.

It was the biggest moment
of my career as a journalist.

These are original copies

from the original negative
of the-- probably the most...

When I first started
writing about UFOs in 2000,

I was working at
a public radio station
in Berkeley, California.

And, suddenly,
this colleague from France

sent me a report
in the mail.

The report was called
the COMETA Report

and I had the only exclusive
English translation.

What it was was a 90-page
study of official UFO cases

put together by French
military officials, generals,

an admiral,
the chief of police.

What really stunned me
when I read it,
was their conclusion.

What they said was that
the extraterrestrial hypothesis

was the most valid, rational,
and logical explanation

for the UFO cases
that they studied.

So, I thought this was a huge
story and I thought to myself,

"What if the equivalent level
of officials in America

said something like that?"

Wouldn't that
be front-page news,

wouldn't that go
all over the world?

And then I pitched
a story to the Boston Globe ,

and in May of 2000,
that story came out.

The response was huge
within the UFO world,

but what I was surprised
about was that

there wasn't more response
outside of the people

who already cared
about this topic.

And so my goal
in writing about UFOs

has been mainly to bring
information forward

to the public.

But, beyond that,
it's to motivate our government

to pay attention.

ELIZONDO:
I commend the media
for tackling this

because they're, they're putting
a lot at risk as well,

reporting on this topic.

KEAN:
Pilots are in a position

to provide very useful
information to scientists...

ELIZONDO:
That's how we have
a comprehensive conversation

with the American people.

KEAN: I did not walk away
from that meeting

with Luis Elizondo
carrying anything with me.

I was shown
three videos of UFOs.

And these were official
Department of Defense videos

that were, without question,
unexplained objects.

MAN (on radio):

MAN (on radio):
Oh, okay.

ELIZONDO:
She ran through the videos,

and she asked me,
are these authentic?

And I said, "I can tell you
that the videos are authentic."

And the only reason

why I'm telling you this is
because they're unclassified.

I facilitated the review
process for them

through the Department
of Defense.

KEAN: Two of them had
audiotapes of the pilots

exclaiming about what they
were seeing and their shock

and their awe
and everything else.

MAN (on radio):

KEAN: This was just
absolutely stunning to me,

because there have been
no official videos of UFOs

released-- I don't think ever,
but certainly not for,

since way back
in the '50s or '60s.

And they were official.
That's the thing.

They weren't just somebody out
with a cellphone taking a video.

MAN (on radio):

ELIZONDO: When you hear
the pilots' reaction to,

to these encounters,
it's very compelling.

PILOT: (on radio):
There's a whole fleet of them.
Look on the ASA!

My gosh!

ELIZONDO:
They're obviously startled,

they're obviously
encountering something

that they can't explain
and we need to figure out

what we collectively
are gonna do about it.

And that's why I resigned
from the Department of Defense.

KEAN: Luis Elizondo's
letter of resignation

that he wrote for
the Secretary of Defense,

I think that might have
just knocked me out

almost more
than anything else.

He explained why he
was resigning this job,

and it had to do
with his understanding

that UFOs were
a national security concern.

To see that written down,

and the courage that
it took for him to do that,

it was just incredible.

ELIZONDO: In order to
understand why I resigned,

I think you have to go back
to where I came from.

I come from,
on my father's side,

uh, Cuban immigrants.

That's meaningful for me

because this country offered
my family opportunities

that nobody else would,

and so from a very young age,
I've always wanted to,

to serve the, the country
that gave my family so much.

You know, ironically, I left
the Department of Defense

out of loyalty, not disloyalty.

I left
the Department of Defense

to finish the very mission

they gave me
in the first place.

After reporting
all these years on UFOs,

there was nothing
that came close

to the power
of that particular meeting.

Once I realized
this was a big story,

I teamed up with my colleague
Ralph Blumenthal

who was a freelance reporter
for the New York Times,

and he pitched it
to the head editor.

I had never reported
for the New York Times before,

so I didn't know
what would happen

but that's where I felt
this story should go.

The public has a right to know
about what we're learning

about this
extraordinary phenomenon.

COOPER: I think it was
sometime in the fall of 2017,

my boss, who's
the Washington Bureau Chief,

walked up to my desk and said,
"Do you wanna write about UFOs?"

And we both sort of laughed
and she said

Leslie Kean had information
about a secret Pentagon program.

And that was easily,
to me, fascinating.

There's no way I don't
want to write about it.

I'm Helene Cooper.

I'm the Pentagon Correspondent
for the New York Times.

I've been with the paper
since 2004.

You can always tell
a Pentagon reporter

'cause we like to say that's
the best beat in Washington.

You're on aircraft carriers,
you're on fighter jets.

I've been on bombers.
I've been on the B1 and the B2.

You're on naval destroyers
in the South China Sea.

You're never bored.

KEAN:
Once Helene Cooper
was on board,

we set up a meeting up
with Luis Elizondo,

the former head
of the Pentagon Program.

COOPER:
We met up at a hotel

somewhere near Capitol Hill.

It started in the afternoon
and ended up in the evening.

ELIZONDO: She made it
very clear that she was,

she was writing this story.

I was a little bit,
to be completely forthcoming,

a little intimidated.

When the New York Times
comes knocking,

that'll get your attention
pretty quickly.

COOPER: He had stacks
of papers and information.

ELIZONDO:
I think they were trying
to get me to confirm,

you know, who was
the sponsor of the program.

COOPER: He told us
that Senator Harry Reid

had put money
in the Pentagon budget

to fund this program.

Leslie, Ralph, and I
all thought that
Harry Reid would deny

that he had put
the money in there.

This was black money,

it was kind of off the books
and so all I wanted

was to nail the fact
that the Pentagon had a UFO,

secret UFO program.
That's all I needed to do.

I'm not trying
to prove that they're UFOs,

I'm not trying to prove
that anybody's visited.

I just wanted to interview
the people

who were involved
in this program

and put them
on the record.

Going to interview
Senator Reid

was a big deal.

We needed him to acknowledge

that he put the money
into the program.

KEAN:
If we didn't have Harry Reid,

we might not have a story.
He was that important.

RALPH BLUMENTHAL:
We didn't know

whether he'd be willing
to go on the record

because this was a very sketchy
field to begin with.

JOHN PODESTA:
You know, most people thought

if you're a senior person
in the government,

it's kind of a career-ender
(laughs)

to say that the government
should actually take seriously

the prospect that unidentified
aerial phenomena might be,

in fact, UFOs.

COOPER:
And so, I flew to Las Vegas

to meet with Senator Reid.

He, like, has this

huge suite of offices
at the Bellagio.

This was gonna be it,
this is my one shot.

And I walked in to talk to him
and he was completely open.

REID: These unidentified
flying phenomenon or objects,

you know, I don't know
what they are.

But we've established one thing:
they exist.

COOPER: In that moment,
you're sitting there
as a reporter.

And your blood
is sort of pounding

because you're
getting the goods.

I was so excited,
it's like I'm writing it down,

and I can't believe
he's telling me this stuff.

REID:
My name is Harry Reid.

I served in the United States
Congress from 1982 to 2017.

I was born and raised
in Searchlight, Nevada.

Which is about 55 miles
here from Las Vegas.

During the time
that I grew up there,

it was a-- mines were gone

and the number-one business
was prostitution.

So, that's the atmosphere
I was raised in.

I can still remember
looking up at the sky

just wondering
what it was all about.

And I always,
always have remembered that.

BLUMENTHAL:
Harry Reid really stood out

because he was one of
the few members of Congress

who were willing to talk
about this issue.

And he had also gotten secret
funds to start this program.

It was a modest amount,
$22 million,

which is a drop in the bucket
of the Pentagon Budget,

but it was the first
significant amount of money

to be dedicated
to this issue of UFOs.

REID:
Well, it's interesting,

you know, my staff,
they said in so many words

"Senator, don't get
involved in this.
This is too weird.

It's not gonna
help your career."

MAN:
Ooh, that is so strange.

PODESTA: It didn't tend
to be a topic that,

that members of the House
or members of the Senate

or people in senior positions
in the executive branch

wanted to embrace.

REID:
But I was determined to learn

more about this
and so in spite of

the admonitions for me
to stay the hell away from it,

I went ahead and did it.

CARSON:
Well, God bless Senator Reid.

He was certainly someone
I looked up to and admired.

People want their leaders
and representatives to be bold

and if you're unwilling
to be bold,

then why are you in office?

REID: And as I look back
over my involvement in this,

I think,
"What if we hadn't done this?

Where would we be?"

Without the work that we did,
we would be nowhere.

From a scientific standpoint,

technological standpoint,
security of this nation--

these are the reasons we have
to continue looking into this.

MAN (on radio):
Look at that thing!
It's rotating!

COOPER: At the end
of the interview

with Senator Reid,

I walked out of the Bellagio

and there's a bridge
from the Bellagio over the Strip

to whatever's on the other side,
and it's a pedestrian bridge.

And I called
Leslie and Ralph,

and they were on the phone
with Luis,

so we're in this
four-way phone call

and I was like,
"He confirmed everything."

KEAN:
Harry Reid had never spoken out

before about this program,

so this was like
the first moment

in which he came out
on the topic.

And that was a big deal.

COOPER:
We were ecstatic because,

that moment,
we knew we had it.

It's like, no matter what
happens next, we have the story.

The lead-up
to the actual publication

of the story on December 17th
was torturous.

Our editors were
constantly saying

make sure we put
skeptics in there,

we put people
challenging this notion.

This caution by our editors

was starting to, naturally,
get on our nerves.

It's like,
run the story already!

We've like dotted
every possible "i" we can dot.

And we knew at this time

that Politico was chasing
the story as well.

It's Saturday morning,
they still haven't
posted the story.

I think it's 11 or 12
and we're hearing from Luis

and from other people
that Politico's about to post

and I am on the phone
with the guy

who's the Saturday
editor going,

"Publish just,
publish already!"

And he's,
he's tinkering around

with "what kind of headline
do we want?" (laughs)

It's just like
"Publish! Publish!"

And he finally
posted the story.

The story is up and I'm like
"Thank God, it's up."

I put my phone in my pocketbook,
I go into Costco,

and I'm buying I don't know
what-- tenderloin for Christmas.

And, I'm in there
for about an hour

and I come back out and my phone
is like, has blown up.

REPORTER 1:
In a striking exposé
published over the weekend,

the New York Times
revealed the existence...

REPORTER 2:
...has confirmed
the existence...

REPORTER 3:
...of the Advanced Aerospace

threat Identification Program.

COOPER:
People were calling me

and there were like texts

and it was just like,
the response was huge.

KEAN:
It was a firestorm.

REPORTER 4:
Tens of millions
of dollars for the project

were pushed through...

KEAN:
It was all over the place.

REPORTER 5:
...unveiled the existence

of a real life
X-Files Department.

KEAN:
It was all over the world.

(reporters speaking
Scandinavian)

(reporters speaking French)

KEAN:
It just went like wildfire.

It was a huge deal.

DIRECTOR:
Why do you think it attracted
so much attention?

KEAN:
I think one of the main reasons

it attracted
so much attention

was because of those
two videos that we included.

MAN (on radio):
They're all going
against the wind.

The wind is
120 knots to the west.

Look at that thing, dude!

KEAN:
I mean, there's nothing
like watching

a video of a UFO for people.

BLUMENTHAL: Those videos
garnered tremendous views,

among the most-watched videos
the Times had ever put up.

COOPER:
So the response was, was huge,

but that was when
I started to realize

just how intense the people
who care about this are,

and just also how equally
intense the skeptics are.

NEIL DEGRASSE-TYSON:
I'm content saying,
that's mysterious.

I don't know,
maybe it's a glitch in the,
in the hardware.

And if you're going to say,
"No, it's not a glitch
in the hardware,"

are you really sure?

MAN (on radio):

SETH SHOSTAK:
For the navy videos,

there are in fact
explanations

that involve nothing more
complex than commercial aircraft

or balloons
or things like that.

It doesn't mean they're
necessarily alien craft.

I think that the assumption

that we're being visited
fails on the evidence of it.

But it's not that
it's impossible.

It's just from
my point of view so difficult

to go from one star system
to another.

I think that it's unlikely
these are alien craft.

DEGRASSE-TYSON:
The universe brims
with mysteries.

And we so want many
of those mysteries

to be a light in the sky
you don't understand,

gee, I want that
to be aliens visiting us.

But for a skeptical scientist,

that would probably be
the last explanation.

KEAN: The skeptics had
two major points of focus

after our story came out.

One of them was on the videos

because they didn't
necessarily believe

that those videos showed some
kind of anomalous object.

They thought
they could be explained.

The second point
is the skepticism

about these being
extraterrestrial craft

which personally to me is,
is a sort of a disconnect

because we, we're not saying
that they're extraterrestrial.

We're just saying
we can't explain them.

ELIZONDO: Now, I don't mind
someone being skeptical.

I think healthy skepticism
is important.

In the same weird sort of way,

skeptics are really
no different than believers.

They're just on the opposite
end of the argument.

At the end of the day,

data is what is going
to determine

the validity of something.

DERRICK PITTS:
Well, if humanity
wants to understand

what is causing
this phenomenon,

then we need to do
real scientific study

and that means we need
to collect data.

We need to analyze
that data and understand

how it might be possible
for that phenomenon

to fit within
the laws of physics.

ELIZONDO:
Now watch the way
this thing starts to turn.

PITTS:
But we can't speculate
about what it is.

We can't just imagine
what it is.

ELIZONDO:
You're looking between 20
and 25,000 feet in altitude

and this thing, when it
turns sideways, doesn't go down.

PITTS:
We need real, hard data.

UNDERWOOD:
This 99.9 and range 99,

uh, those are indications
that my radar

is receiving jamming cues.

PITTS:
It's possible
that these objects

represent a threat
to the United States.

MELLON:
It's behaving in strange ways.

It has an aura around it.

PITTS:
Then we need to know

exactly what they are,

so that we can
respond accordingly.

And so, I think it's extremely
important for us

to understand
unidentified aerial phenomenon.

KEAN:
After the New York Times story

was blasted out on the internet
on a Saturday,

the story ended up
on the front page

of the Sunday New York Times.

And then it was
a whole inside page

when you opened it up,
so it was a long piece.

During all the years
I'd covered UFOs,

I had access
to some newspapers,

but they weren't at the caliber
of the New York Times.

And so to see
a story on the front page
of that newspaper

just meant everything to me.

STERN: Did you know it was
going to be on the front page?

ELIZONDO:
No (laughs).

No, I did not know

it was gonna be
on the front page.

It was, um...

wow, looking back,
it's a little pr--

I haven't thought about that
in a long time.

Uh, it was profound.

KEAN:
Not only had
the New York Times

rarely covered
UFOs at all,

and when they had, they were
usually kind of ridiculing it.

PODESTA: It's really
the fodder more for late night

talk shows than it is
for front-page reporting.

JIMMY KIMMEL: We are back
with President Bush.

Did you go
through the secret files,

the UFO documents?

(laughter)

GEORGE W. BUSH:
I'm not telling you nothin'.

(laughter)

BARACK OBAMA:
When it comes to aliens,

there's some things
I just can't tell you on-air.

JAMES CORDON:
But you'll tell us off-air?

Great! (laughter)

PODESTA:
But the New York Times piece,

it kinda opened up that
you could treat this seriously.

FRAVOR:
What it did is it removed

a lot of the stigma that was
attached to the UFO world.

Now, instead of looking
at it as a joke,

we can start looking
at these objects

from a scientific standpoint.

DIETRICH:
We can gather the information,

we can gather the data
and then have experts

who are qualified, analyze
it in a systematic way.

And so that's why
I think it's important

to destigmatize the issue.

REID: One reason
that article was so compelling

and so good is that it was
just very factual

based on scientific evidence

and I think that was
the beginning of the,

having the American people

and probably the world
take a look at this,

these areas of
Unidentified Flying Objects

more intensely
than they had before.

KEAN:
So the New York Times article

generated a lot
of questions among people.

"Whoa," you know?

They're studying these objects

and we don't know
what they are?

Where, where's all
the intelligence data?

How come we didn't
know anything?

And they demonstrate technology
that we don't seem to have?

And we didn't even
know about this?

PITTS: There's no doubt
that there are objects

that are seen
that behave in ways

that are not natural
for this planet

or for this environment.

This is a phenomenon
we do not yet understand.

There's nothing wrong with us
not understanding it,

there are many things
in the Universe

that we do
not understand.

But it asks us, to investigate,
to learn more,

just as we'd wanna learn more
about any of the stars

or galaxies
we see in the Universe.

Any of the new creatures
we find

at the bottom of our oceans
here on this planet,

we wanna learn
more about this too.

MELLON:
My hope is that

we will use
the U.S. intelligence community

to solve this mystery
once and for all,

to find out, where
are they coming from?

Who's behind them?
What is the agenda?

We have the means
and the capability to do that

if we set our minds
to it as a nation.

PITTS:
Unfortunately,

the government has been
pretty secretive

about providing hard data
to better understand

what this phenomenon
might be.

So, right now, what we still
have is a lot of speculation,

a lot of "what ifs,"
and no hard information.

KEAN: The biggest question
that remains for me is,

what else do they have
inside the government?

What do they actually
know about UFOs?

And why can't more be released
to the public?

ELIZONDO:
And this is a, a big question

because we spent so long

obfuscating the truth
about this topic,

that we've somewhat backed
ourselves into a corner,

a corner for over 70 years.

REPORTER: Mr. Secretary,
there have been charges

that the Air Force for reasons
best known to the Air Force

is hiding something
in the UFO field.

What is that, if anything?

ELIZONDO:
And I do not think

this is a conversation
like fine wine

where the longer
we keep a cork on it,
the better it gets.

I think this is a conversation
more like rotten vegetables

in the refrigerator,

and the longer
we don't address it,

the more it's gonna
start to smell.

TACKER:
There is nothing
in Air Force files

that come to a conclusion

that spaceships
have visited the Earth.

COOPER: I assume
that the secrecy is just because

that is what they do
in the government.

There's so many programs

going on in that building
that they don't talk about.

You know,
they classify everything.

It just adds to
the mysteriousness of it.

GILLIBRAND:
We should never be afraid
of what we don't know.

That is an absurd reaction.

UNDERWOOD:
The target is 3 degrees

to the left of my nose

and it's 5 degrees
below my nose.

GILLIBRAND: Not knowing is
where you start your inquiry.

DIETRICH:
So, we were operating in
and around these waters,

off the coast.

GILLIBRAND: It doesn't mean
it's where you end your inquiry.

And that's where I think
the U.S. Military,

if they haven't been
doing the work, is mistaken.

WITNESS 1:
Oh, my God!

WITNESS 2:
Don't look like no plane!

Don't look like no helicopter.
What the (bleep) is it?

MARK ROD: UFO sightings burst
into the news in 1947.

KEAN : These sightings
have continued ever since.

MAN 1:
The Air Force made the effort

to clear the air
about the phenomenon.

MAN 2:
There's nothing to hide at all.

MELLON: I was stunned that
we didn't have the integrity

to pursue this.

ROD: The U.S. government
closed its study of UFOs.

KEAN: And so the work
fell into the hands

of civilian groups.

HYNEK: UFO reports
not only exist but persist.

MAN 3:
I mean, it's a definite UFO.

KEAN: The government
owes it to this country

to investigate sightings
of extraordinary objects.

MAN 4: It covered
the whole entire sky.

CARSON: People want to know,
is this otherworldly?

KAKU: This could be
one of the biggest events
in all of human history.