Ufology

[Phil H]

There are so many "flase leads" in the Roswell material.

The mortician (Glen someone) changed his story several times and named a nurse for whom no real identity could be found in the records.

But it was Jesse Marcel who was among the key factors that led me to dismiss the whole sad saga. An image has been built of him through books and TV films which is at odds with a man who falsified (and I use the term advisedly) almost every part of his military career, including claiming to have been at one time a key Presidential aide. not true.

Finally,where "evidence" is cited - the "log book" kept by sky-watching nuns is never pictured, the entry never shown or even transcripted. It is just referred to. Not good enough.

And one could cite many more similar cases.

Phil H

[Jonathan H]

The so-called Roswell Incident, which like Dr. Tumblety for 'Ripperology' appeared in no secondary UFO sources whatsoever until much later (a really Z-grade book in 1980 by the author-creator of the Bermuda Triangle hoax), is a fusion of several strands.

One is of course the Top Secret Porject Mogul, who lost one of their ballsoon trains testing for any Soviet nuclear tests.

The second is the bitterness of the unreliable witness Jesse Marcel who made up all sorts of stuff about his failed military career -- though, to be fair, he never stooped to bodies-of-little-aliens found among the 'wreckage'.

The third strand is the Crashed-Saucer hoax of 1950 involving two con man --who were convicted -- and who hustled Frank Scully to create the fun, trashy and enormously influential 'Behind the Falying Saucers' best seller. This book, though set near the town of Aztec rather than Roswell, nevertheless provided the mythos with a crashed spaceship and dead aliens and a full scale military/governmental cover-up.

I believe that Marcel's account, by the time he told it to Stanton Friedman in 1977, was contaminated by exposure to the Aztec hoax, to put it kindly.

That it was allegedly a crashed 'saucer' is a dead giveaway of course; for that shape was only created by a journalsitic error about the Kenneth Arnold sighting of June 1947. Therefore anything supposedly saucer shaped is an hoax or a mistake.

The aliens in the tall tales told of aliens only since 1980 -- about Roswell but inspred by the later Aztec hoax -- resemble the make-up and costumes conceived for the excellent 1975 movie 'The UFO Incident', a look which was codified in pop culture by 'Close Encounerts of the Third Kind' two years later (the earlier TV movie is much better in my opinion), rather than what Betty Hill originally claimed: the aliens were not that small, had hair and long noses.

[Scorpio]

All i can surmise at the moment is that an unusual sighting prompted the original incident; but the second incident, with Colonel Halt present, represents a change in the nature of the whole affair . After the News of the World article, the whole thing snowballs.

[Phil H]

Then, if I interpret what you say aright, we pretty well agree.
Something did happen, say at Rendlesham, but not UFO-related??

I wouldn't disagree that Mac Brazel found something on the ranch near Roswell, and it was hush-hush. But I have seen nothing that makes me think it was a UFO.

Phil H

[Scorpio]

The kernel of truth that i mentioned need not be extraterrestrial in origin.
I regard the official explanation, remains of MOGUL apparatus, as the wild seed cast on fertile ground.

[Phil H]

So what is the kernel of truth about Roswell and on which specific witness(es) or piece of evidence do you place reliance?

[Scorpio]

A mythology like the Rendlesham case will undoubtedly attract unreliable types, and some decent witnesses may become less so,within time, conciously or unconciously; but a kernel of truth lies within and can still remain. I believe this to be true of the Rendlesham case, as it is of Roswell.

[Phil H]

We need to demand just as much proof for the claim "I hoaxed a UFO" as we do for the claim "I saw a UFO."

Why?

Frankly, a statement like that REEKS of "conspiracy theory". I assume you are suggesting that Governments are covering things up by pretending its all hoaxes of "weather balloons"?

Where do you stand on crop circles btw?

Phil H

[Phil H]

kensei

I have looked into the Rendlesham Forest case in some depth - I found nothing that convinced me that - while something may have happened, it was about extra-terrestrials. It could have been an accident with some top secret aircraft for instance. I am certain that many of the UFO sightings in the Uk over the years were of US "stealth" aircraft being used against UK air defences (with or without British knowledge) before the revolutionary design of those planes were public knowledge.

To me the great difficulty is in finding any testimony that stacks up.

With Roswell, around the time of the anniversary in the mid-90s, I got hold of all the in-print books I could. I then set out to find any statements that agreed - my rule of thumb was if I could find two books that said the same thing, i would record that as a "fact". Result? I found not a single fact.

Every statement either changed over time, the informant was discredited, or there was no precise data - times, or dates. It was all vague. Most books disagree even on basic times and places.

My conclusion - that it is for those who believe that extra-terrestrials are visiting earth to produce real evidence of that.

I have spoken to locals who believe in "Nessie" but I have yet to see any SOLID evidence of his/her existence. It becomes even more unbelievable in this era of digital cameras and cameras in phones. Has the monster become camera shy?

On balance, I think UFOs are the modern equivalent of ghosts and sightings of the devil - and most likely related to real events being perceived incorrectly or misinterpreted.

I wish that was not the case, but after much hard thought, that is the conclusion I have reached.

Phil H

[Jonathan H]

No we don't, Kensei, because extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence and there's nothing. just what people claim they saw and felt and were told to shut up about. They offer nothing else and it's not even the start of being enough to measure, to verify or to analyse.

I beg you to check out this site, pick any chapter:

http://home.comcast.net/~tprinty/UFO/UFO.htm

[kensei]

Like the Ripper 'Diary', and Roswell, and Big Foot, and Nessie, it's an hoax.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/insideout/east/...ham_ufos.shtml

Only one of those four things is a hoax, and I'm very conscious of what website this is in saying that. (The Ripper Diary.)

This hoax claim shows quite a bit of ignorance of the full scope of the Bentwaters (Rendlesham Forest) case. The night of Halt's experience was preceeded by another night on which two soldiers approached a landed UFO after seeing strange lights in the woods. One of them even touched it and took note of an unknown type of writing it had on its surface before it rose back up and disappeared. Later examination of the site found indentations left in the ground by the craft and tree branches broken off by its descent through the forest canopy. Furthermore, on the night of Halt's observations, while he and company were out in the woods, things were going on back at the base involving a craft hovering directly over the nuclear missile silos and shining some kind of beam down on them. Electronic lighting devices called light-alls the soldiers brought in to try and aid them in their investigations were mysteriously malfunctioning. If you study the case in depth there is just point after point that are incredibly compelling.

But nope, once some guy claims that he caused the whole thing by shining a flashlight into the sky, the public at large just says, "Oh, that's it then."

An incredible claim is made, and skeptics put it under the microscope and pick it apart in minute detail to try and demonstrate why it must be a hoax. But when an admission of a hoax is made, those same skeptics just immediately go, "There, you see?" without a fraction of the same kind of scrutiny. We need to demand just as much proof for the claim "I hoaxed a UFO" as we do for the claim "I saw a UFO."

[Jonathan H]

Like the Ripper 'Diary', and Roswell, and Big Foot, and Nessie, it's an hoax.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/insideout/east/series3/rendlesham_ufos.shtml

[sdreid]

I don't know a lot about about the case but I believe I saw it on Unsolved Mysteries.

[Scorpio]

The Witnesses 1

One of the most notorious UFO cases occured at Rendlesham Forest, Suffolk, England in 1980. One witness,of many invoved in the case, is Charles Halt.
How does Halt perform as a witness?.
Certain circumstances seem to stand in his favour: Charles Halt was the deputy commander of the airforce base; he was a high ranking career Officer, most unlikely to threaten his career with hoaxes. Halt did not make the original claims, but acted upon the evidence of others. Halt did not seek any form of gratification; the case was not divulged untill three years later by the the News of the World tabloid, with details provided by a man called Larry Warren, who was a former security policeman at the airbase.
But what about the reliability and validity of the evidence provided?. Halt made an audio tape of the incident; he mentions flashing red lights moving through the trees, pieces of a small UFO ' shooting off ', and of light beams projected at there feet. Audio recordings are reliable enough;they provide a excellent evidence of men walking around the woods in the middle of the night: branches scraping against clothes and equipment and farm animal noises. Audio recordings are hardly conclusive; there are serious validity issues here.
Is there any concensus between reports of those present with Halt at the time; after so much time and opportunity to be influenced by each others oft stated evidence in the public domain, that the question seems to be not worth the asking.
Is anyone well acquanted with the case; perhaps you can offer some insight.

[martin wilson]

It's been a long time since I read it but the Fortean Times used to be a good source of information for anyone interested in Ufo's.
Like Ripper investigation there are serious ufologists who go back to primary sources and a lot of the classic cases have been reinvestigated,and of course various explanations and theories put forward.
As I say,it's been a long time,but from memory,unless you are Stephen Fry,you might find a good dictionary comes in handy,those guys never used one syllable when 15 would do.
All the best.