UFOs are now known as UAPs (Unidentified Aerial Phenomena) to make their serious reporting and study more palatable to the American government and scientific community. But whatever they’re called, there’s no doubt that people have been seeing things in the sky that defy explanation for as long as recorded history. Sightings spiked in the 1950s and 60s, though, which just happened to be the same era the United States and other countries started testing some very unconventional aircraft. But if this explains some sightings, what does that tell us about what kinds of next-gen technology the military might be developing today?

24/7 Wall St. Insights

• Some UFO reports over the past 70 years could be explained by people witnessing test flights of advanced U.S. military technology.
• The capabilities of recent UAPs describe startling technology far beyond anything we’ve seen so far. Could this indicate the U.S. or other countries are making exponential leaps in military technology?
• Also: Discover “The Next NVIDIA

Famous UAP Sightings:

• Battle of Los Angeles (1942): Anti-aircraft guns fired over 1,400 shells at an unidentified object approaching the city that was initially thought to be a Japanese attack.
• Roswell (1947): an alleged crashed “flying disc” was reported in New Mexico but claimed by the government to be parts of a high-altitude surveillance balloon.
• Rendlesham Forest (1980): U.S. Air Force personnel stationed in the UK witnessed a triangular metallic craft with strange symbols on it landing in the forest, leaving behind elevated radiation levels.
• Phoenix Lights (1997): thousands of people, including the state governor, observed a massive v-shaped object slowly moving over the capital.
• U.S. Navy Videos (2020): the Navy released videos of incidents in 2004 and 2015 in which pilots observed unidentified objects moving at extraordinary velocities and against strong winds with no resistance.

Ordinary Explanations For UAPs

While the attention of the general public tends to jump quickly to the conclusion that we are being visited by aliens, most UAPs can be explained in more prosaic ways:

• Unusual weather phenomena, such as ball lighting, earthquake lights, or city lights reflecting off of lenticular clouds.
• Instrument artifacts such as reflections, calibration problems, or mechanical defects that create an illusion of a real object.
• Civilian or military aircraft, including weather balloons, drones, flares released by aircraft in training exercises, or foreign military surveillance such as the infamous Chinese spy balloon that traversed the country before being shot down off the coast of Myrtle Beach, SC.
• Mass hysteria or other psychological factors in some of the people who allege sightings.
• Deliberate hoaxes as simple as teenage pranks or as calculating as efforts to promote or discredit popular beliefs or make money from videos and photos of a UAP sighting.

When & Where Have UAPs Been Reported?

While UAPs have been reported all over the world, by far most have been reported in the United States since the 1950s. They’ve often been reported around military bases, nuclear missile sites, and naval assets. All of this is what might be expected if some of the sightings reported were tests of advanced aircraft.

The Extraterrestrial Hypothesis

Popular media has so driven home the idea that UAPs are visitors from other worlds and that the government is covering up contact with them that it is difficult for true believers to consider other more likely explanations. At the same time it is true that in some cases, the prosaic explanations can be ruled out and there are credible professional witnesses, such as US military personnel, backed up by instrumentation that has recorded the objects.

The idea that these are spaceships flown by “little green men” makes UAP reports the butt of jokes, but also real questions about how and why alien civilizations would travel so far (and apparently crash so often!) Proponents of the extraterrestrial hypothesis have suggested these beings might not come from another place, but this place in another dimension or time. The idea is that there could be civilizations at higher spacial dimensions that are parallel with our space but invisible to us. Or these could be highly evolved human beings from the very remote future (say, 100,000 years CE) who have learned to time-travel and are studying their past (us).

Does the Government Have Crashed UAPs?

In July 2023, a former U.S. military intelligence officer named David Grusch testified before Congress that the United States has in its possession multiple crashed spacecraft and the remains of “non-human biologics.” He alleged that the government has been working for decades to reverse-engineer technology recovered from these craft and urged Congressional investigation into these allegations and greater transparency in the government.

Is it a Government Psyops Effort?

Just because a former government employee alleges something doesn’t make it true, however. It is possible the United States benefits from the extraterrestrial hypothesis as a form of psychological warfare against its enemies. As Grusch testified, the US was still reeling from Covid-19 and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was ongoing. There was considerable speculation about the possibility of Putin using tactical nuclear weapons in Ukraine. Releasing this type of information at that time might have served a dual purpose of distracting the American people from the government’s handling of the pandemic and making our enemies uncertain about what kind of secret futuristic tech we might break out against them if they go too far. 

Extraordinary UAP Abilities

Of all the different types of features reported in UAP sightings, these are some of the most common. If any of the sightings that showed these capabilities are tests of new military technology, it would indicate breakthroughs that are far more advanced than anyone could have imagined.

• Hovering or flying without wings or rotors.
• Unusual shapes like spheres, triangles, or disks.
• Hypersonic speeds without causing sonic booms or vapor trails.
• Extreme maneuverability: able to stop or sharply change direction instantaneously.
• No visible or audible means of propulsion.
• Difficult to observe, photograph, or track clearly and consistently.
• Able to move between space, the atmosphere, and water without a perceptible change in performance.

Next up, some examples of military aviation technology that might easily have been mistaken for UAPs.

1. The V-173/XF5U-1 “Flying Pancake” (1942)

These light, maneuverable fighters didn’t require long runways, so they were ideal for aircraft carriers. They had an unusual disc-shaped wing structure. A prototype was tested in 1942 and an improved version in 1945, but it was cancelled in 1947 in favor of jet-powered aircraft.

2. Project Mogul (1947-1949)

This was a surveillance program that started in 1947 using high altitude balloons to monitor acoustic waves from Soviet nuclear tests. According to the U.S. government, a crash of one of the Mogul systems was the source of the Roswell crash debris.

3. U-2 Dragon Lady (1954)

The U-2 was a high-altitude spy plane that flew at 70,000 feet, out of the range of anti-aircraft guns in the 1950s. Its unconventional design, altitude, and speed may have contributed to some UFO reports of that era.

4. The VZ-9AV Avrocar (1958)

The Avrocar was a flying disk funded by the U.S. Army and Air Force and developed in Canada in the 1950s and 60s. It was intended as a multipurpose military craft with vertical takeoff and landing capabilities. It was powered by three turbojet engines that allowed it to hover over difficult terrain. It was cancelled in the 1960s due to performance issues like instability, severe vibration, and an inability to hover for more than just a short time. Anyone catching a glimpse of this literal flying saucer could be forgiven for reporting they had seen a literal flying saucer!

5. Oxcart/A-12/SR-71 (1958)

Unofficially called the “Blackbird,” this long-ranged advanced reconnaissance aircraft flew from 1966-1998. Its unusual shape and capabilities and the high-altitude vapor trails it left were unknown to people in the early years it was being tested.

6. F-117A Nighthawk Stealth Fighter (1975)

The US Air Force F-117A Nighthawk Stealth Fighter has an innovative shape and stealth radar-evading capabilities that made it not just impressive, but frightening to anyone who might have caught an unexpected glimpse of one as it was being tested in the 1980s.

7. B-2 Spirit Bomber (1980)

The B-2 Spirit stealth bomber has a futuristic “flying wing” design and a dark color that conceals its shape against the night sky. Seen during the day, it looks startlingly alien, as if it should not even be able to fly. It’s easy to see how it would inspire some UAP reports by citizens.

8. UAVs (drones) (1980s-present)

• 5. RQ-170 Sentinel

UAVs, or Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, are more commonly known as drones. Developed and tested starting in the 1980s, drones were designed for surveillance and reconnaissance, stealth, and remote strike capabilities. Drones are becoming quite common and are currently being used extensively in the Russia-Ukraine war. They come in a wide variety of shapes and sizes, and new experimental ones are being devised all the time. This makes them a frequent object of UAP reports.

9. B-21 Raider (2015)

The B-21 Raider is a new aircraft still in the development phase. It is a 6th-generation long-range strike bomber designed to evade radar and penetrate enemy anti-aircraft defenses to deliver conventional or nuclear payloads. Seen edge-on, its design resembles a combination of a saucer and a flying wing. It will be a replacement for the Air Force’s current fleet of B-2 Spirit bombers. This video provides more details and demonstrates the plane in flight.

Fascinating Either Way

Of course, if UAPs are travelers from another planet, dimension, or time, that’s both extraordinarily exciting and disturbing. But they are interesting no matter what their explanation. Mass hysteria, strange weather, or unknown physical principles? Nice! Let’s figure that out. But if they turn out to be advanced aviation tests, they suggest the world may be on the verge of seeing technology that up until now we’ve seen only in science fiction!

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