UFOs, a secret program, and an alleged cover up

Aliens have visited Earth, and their aircraft, technology, even their bodies, have been retrieved by governments around the world. Those are the claims of former United States Department of Defence intelligence officer, David Grusch.

Grusch made the claims in June 2023, in interviews with investigative reporters Leslie Kean and Ralph Blumenthal, and later Ross Coulthart.  His assertions were also supported by former Pentagon colleagues and fellow whistleblowers Christopher Mellon and Jonathan Grey*.

In July, Grusch subsequently repeated the claims under oath during the first Congress hearing into UFOs, offering to provide a list of people who have direct knowledge of a secret US Government crash retrieval program.

A team of bipartisan senators has now vowed to continue collecting testimony from other whistleblowers as a result. And those involved hope the investigation will shed light on the program, which has allegedly been operating in secret since the end of World War II.

So, will this finally bring an answer to the question: are we alone? 

UQ media studies expert Dr Adam Dodd has spent his career analysing how the UFO phenomenon is portrayed, and he is currently writing a book on the subject.

The book will examine UFOs as a communication problem, drawing from his training and graduate work in the field of cultural history, media studies, and science communication.

Dr Dodd believes Grusch's claims – if proven true – could at the very least change the way governments and the public deal with the UFO topic.

"Grusch's testimony has moved the public conversation about UFOs forward in some productive ways, and it will certainly be remembered as a significant turning point for decades by those invested in the UFO mystery," Dr Dodd said.

"If it succeeds in prompting further Congressional investigation, it might encourage more intelligence officials to come forward. Though, I'm not sure that Grusch's background in intelligence makes his testimony any more valuable than that previously provided by military aviators."

In 2017, the New York Times published information about 3 videos that were recorded by military aviators from the aircraft carriers USS Nimitz and USS Theodore Roosevelt in 2004, 2014 and 2015. The videos, titled 'FLIR', 'GIMBAL', and 'GOFAST' show cockpit footage of air force pilots interacting with unusually shaped, fast-moving aircraft.

Those videos were later confirmed by the Pentagon as genuinely unidentifiable – as was the existence of a secret program that had been set up to analyse them. This confirmation has become the basis for a new wave of conspiracy theories.

Grusch went one step further, however, and alleged he had seen classified documents that claimed the US had retrieved technology of "non-human origin" and had attempted to reverse engineer it. He also claimed that humans had engaged violently with UFOs and humans had been killed as a result.

Grusch's assertions echo those made by well-known UFO conspiracy theorist Bob Lazar, who claimed to have worked on a top-secret reverse engineering program at Area 51 in the 1980s. Lazar has since provided no evidence of his claims and his work and education history have been widely questioned.

While Grusch's credentials are not in dispute, he has similarly so far failed to provide proof.

Dr Dodd believes Grusch's Congressional testimony will go a long way towards determining whether he telling the truth.

"We will have to wait and see what, if anything, comes from it," Dr Dodd said.

"But the fact that Congress is seriously investigating his claims is itself a major development. 

"Grusch is trying to convince Congress that they have been unlawfully deprived of information about UFOs by the intelligence community, so what we might see playing out is a contest between Congress demanding the truth in a rarely bipartisan way, and the intelligence community refusing – or agreeing – to cooperate."

If the US Government's secret crash retrieval program is proven to be real, Dr Dodd believes it will change the course of history.

"As surreal as it seems, we should probably try to psychologically prepare ourselves for official confirmation of Grusch’s claims," Dr Dodd said.

"Now seems like a good time to have a public conversation about how that information would change us individually, socially, and globally."

Since Grusch came forward, Senator Marco Rubio – who is assisting the Congress investigation – said several other whistleblowers have contacted him about giving evidence.

In an interview with the New York Times following her exclusive story with Grusch, journalist Leslie Kean said rumours about the existence of a secret crash retrieval program have existed for years, but Grusch is the first Pentagon intelligence official to go on the record about it.

Grusch claimed several intelligence colleagues started to confide in him about the existence of a deeply covert retrieval program while he was working alongside the Pentagon's UFO analysis program between 2019 and 2022.

He said initially he did not believe the claims, but when he attempted to raise the matter with his superiors reprisals were made against him. That's when he decided to seek protection under the Department of Defence's whistleblower provisions, he said.

In July, US lawmakers began to push for legislation that would require declassification of reports related to UFOs, in a bid to make government agencies share more information on the topic.

Changes to the Intelligence Authorization Act were also put forward, including proposed measures to prohibit the secret retrieval and/or reverse-engineering of unidentified aerial phenomena.

Dr Dodd said Grusch had placed the UFO discussion into "unchartered territory". 

"Congress is responding to sworn testimony from intelligence officials about UFO retrievals, so I don’t feel able to form any expectations about how that process will develop," he said.

"What’s interesting, though, is that it seems to be a bipartisan issue, with Republicans and Democrats agreeing that action is needed."

Even once an investigation is complete, Dr Dodd said it may still take many years before the existence of another intelligent species is proven to exist. 

When asked what proof would be needed to convince the public at large, Dr Dodd said: "I don’t think it’s possible for the public as a whole to believe in anything – we can’t even get the public as a whole to believe that Earth is a sphere, that vaccines work, or that climate change is real.

"But in order for the majority of the public to believe that UFOs are intelligently controlled objects not made by humans, and that some of these objects have been retrieved by the US Government, I think a US presidential statement would be required."

*Jonathan Grey is an alias used by a current Pentagon intelligence official, according to Leslie Kean

Dr Adam Dodd teaches communication and media studies at the School of Communication and Arts, University of Queensland. His current research interests are focused on how language and media contribute to the social construction of ignorance.
Email: a.dodd@uq.edu.au