There is no evidence to support claims that shadowy elements inside the U.S. government have made contact with alien life forms, have reverse-engineered extraterrestrial spaceships, or have systematically kept that information hidden from the American public for decades, according to a remarkable new Pentagon report issued Friday.
Whether the conclusions will be enough to satisfy skeptics of the official stance on what’s “out there” is another story.
The new report from the Defense Department’s All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) directly addressed some of the more far-reaching public claims made by former military personnel and other U.S. officials about alleged government contact with aliens. The 60-page study explains in detail the history of government research into “UAP,” or unidentified aerial phenomena. It specifically pushes back on charges that the Pentagon for years has known there are UFOs of extraterrestrial origin and has engaged in a highly secretive program to reverse-engineer their spaceships.
The study, which was delivered to lawmakers last week and released online Friday, comes just a few months after stunning public testimony before Congress in which former U.S. officials claimed knowledge of such highly classified programs.
In the report, the Pentagon said there is no evidence to back up those allegations.
“AARO found no empirical evidence for claims that the [U.S. government] and private companies have been reverse-engineering extraterrestrial technology. AARO determined, based on all information provided to date, that claims involving specific people, known locations, technological tests and documents allegedly involved in or related to the reverse-engineering of extraterrestrial technology, are inaccurate,” the report reads in part.
It also said there is no evidence that the government has encountered any UFOs that can be definitively described as “extraterrestrial technology.”
“All investigative efforts, at all levels of classification, concluded that most sightings were ordinary objects and phenomena and the result of misidentification,” the report says.
The report directly rebuts specific instances of alleged contact with alien craft or knowledge of UFO reverse-engineering programs, and Pentagon Pentagon Press Secretary Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder stressed in a statement the government did a lot of looking through the records before coming to its conclusions.
“In completing this report, AARO reviewed all official U.S government investigatory efforts since 1945, researched classified and unclassified archives, conducted dozens of interviews, and partnered with intelligence community and [Defense Department] officials responsible for controlled and special access program oversight, respectively,” Maj. Gen. Ryder said.
That the government would address such claims in a detailed, public forum would have been unthinkable just a few years ago.
In one example, officials said that “an interviewee claim that he witnessed what he believed to be the testing of extraterrestrial technology at a [government] facility almost certainly was an observation of an authentic, non-UAP-related technology test that strongly correlated in time, location and description provided in the interviewee’s account.”
In another instance, the government said it actually tested samples taken from an “alleged crashed off-world spacecraft” that were collected by a UFO research organization.
The sample, the Pentagon said, “is a manufactured, terrestrial alloy and does not represent off-world technology or possess any exceptional qualities. The sample is primarily composed of magnesium, zinc and bismuth with some other trace elements, such as lead. This assessment was based on its materials characterization.”
Push to probe
The report is the latest example of the Defense Department’s major public push to clear the air on reports of UFO sightings. In a survey released last fall, the government said U.S. military personnel and commercial pilots reported at least 291 UFO sightings since August 2022, with some of the craft exhibiting “high-speed travel,” “unusual maneuverability” and other strange characteristics.
Most of the reported sightings took place over U.S. military airspace, officials said. None of the incidents resulted in any injuries or “adverse health effects.”
“However, many reports from military witnesses do present potential safety-of-flight concerns and there are some cases where reported UAP have potentially exhibited one or more concerning performance characteristics such as high-speed travel or unusual maneuverability,” reads a portion of AARO report.
As of last April, the AARO said it had received a total of 801 UAP reports, though the actual number of sightings is believed to be much higher.
The Pentagon also has faced accusations of a massive cover-up, though officials strongly deny those claims.
Last July, former U.S. intelligence officer David Grusch told Congress under oath that he is aware of “a multi-decade UAP crash retrieval and reverse-engineering program.” He even suggested that the Pentagon has long been in possession of actual alien bodies.
Retired Gen. Mark A. Milley, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told The Washington Times shortly after that hearing that he is aware of no such programs.
“I can tell you … that as the chairman I have been briefed on several different occasions by the [Pentagon‘s] UAP office. And I have not seen anything that indicates to me about quote-unquote aliens, or that there’s some sort of cover-up program. I just haven’t seen it,” Gen. Milley said in the August interview, just weeks before his retirement.
Friday’s report tries to put to rest some of the most seemingly outlandish claims.
“AARO assesses that the inaccurate claim that the [government] is reverse-engineering extraterrestrial technology and is hiding it from Congress is, in large part, the result of circular reporting from a group of individuals who believe this to be the case, despite the lack of any evidence,” the report says.
But Maj. Gen. Ryder acknowledged that the question of visitors from other worlds will always remain an open one.
“AARO is committed to reaching conclusions based on verifiable evidence,” he said. “As AARO has said before, they will follow the evidence where it leads, wherever it leads.”
• Ben Wolfgang can be reached at bwolfgang@washingtontimes.com.