1. The 'Rendlesham forest' affair. Ministry of Defence employee Nick Pope enters the fray.

2. The 'Alien Autopsy' footage: still 'alive and kicking'?

3. The 'Kewper' caper. Why latest claims of grand conspiracy fall at the first hurdle.

4. 'Area 51': an in-depth perspective from one of the secret US base's most experienced researchers.

5. Japanese 'fugo' balloons: recollections of the US government's successful cover-up.

6. UK Public Record Office releases details of 'Project 119L', a secret US Air Force spy balloon program based in Scotland.

7. AOL finds the mere mention of 'RAF Bentwaters' objectionable.

8. New material of interest on the World Wide Web.

[Editorial notes are in square brackets]

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As recently announced, an update on developments in the 'Rendlesham forest' case, summarised in a report entitled, 'Resolving Rendlesham: New Insights and Past Claims Examined', has now been published on my web site at -

http://www.ufoworld.co.uk/cover2.htm

The report is a follow-up to 'Rendlesham Unravelled', published in March, 1998 -

http://www.ufoworld.co.uk/cover.htm

This disclosed for the first time ever, the existence of the original witness statements and what they revealed. Although lengthy, it was published by French magazine, 'Phenomena' and the story featured in the local Suffolk newspaper, 'East Anglian Daily Times', on April 30, 1998 -

"Servicemen 'chased a lighthouse' admission"

http://www.ecn.co.uk/timeoff/e_ed_ufo_rendleshamchasinglighthouse.htm

The update covers a number of issues, including:

- A response to relevant points raised by author Jenny Randles in a recent magazine article

- A central witness, cited in Col. Halt's memo to the Ministry of Defence (MoD), refutes that he saw a 'craft' as claimed

- Published for the first time, Halt explains the reason why the dates in his memo to the MoD were mistaken

- His detailed explanation of the perspective which led him to believe the Orford Ness lighthouse was not the 'unusual light' witnessed and why Halt may inadvertently be proving the reverse

- Sightings of 'strange flashing red lights' within Rendlesham forest and how their origins have been proven

- Ian Ridpath's recent exhaustive explanation to MoD employee Nick Pope, of why the 'radiation readings' were of no consequence

- The Cosmos 749 Soviet satellite recovery theory and why it is baseless.

Photographs and detailed maps of the area are also provided.

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http://www.ufomind.com/ufo/updates/1998/aug/m28-006.shtml

"As many readers of this statement will be aware, I work for the Ministry of Defence, and between 1991 and 1994 was responsible for researching and investigating the UFO phenomenon for the British Government".

Nick was an 'Executive Officer', a standard and common Civil Service 'middle-management' grade between 'Clerical Officer' and 'Higher Executive Officer', working for Secretariat(Air Staff)2a, also known as Sec(AS)2a.

Clarifying the views which he held, Nick perhaps did this best in a letter dated 23 February 1996, sent to one of the UK's leading researchers, Paul Fuller, with permission to publish in Paul's excellent magazine 'The Crop Watcher' [issue 27]. Nick wrote:

"Dear Paul, Thank you for your letter dated 30 January, concerning the various comments that have been made about the status of some of my public statements about UFOs and crop circles.

I should make it abundantly clear that the views I am expressing are my own, and should not be taken as representing the official policy or views of the Ministry of Defence, the British Government, or any other agency. I made this point at the beginning of my New Hampshire MUFON [Mutual UFO Network] lecture last year, and there will be a similar disclaimer at the beginning of my book.

I think I can see where some confusion may have arisen. Before I gave my lecture, I submitted a copy of my text to Secretariat (Air Staff). They asked me to make a few changes, largely aimed at clarifying this distinction between my personal views and Departmental policy. This consultation may have been seen by some as implying a degree of official sanction. However, I think you can safely say that the Department as a whole does not share my views on UFOs and crop circles. Indeed, these views have made me very unpopular in certain quarters".

A belief that 'crop circles' are made by highly evolved extraterrestrials, whose formerly primitive corn-flattening skills have improved in parallel with their human counterparts, is a litmus test of any critical thinking.

In an interview given to Clas Svahn, journalist and chairman of 'UFO Sweden', Nick elaborated on the Government's perceived importance of his position; "It was very difficult. The first thing to understand is - the whole job that I did had been really treated with no importance. It was absolutely a very limited resourced post. So it was just one person trying to do his best with a 300, or so, reports each year".

Nick now states, "While my involvement with the Rendlesham Forest case came long after the events concerned, I had an advantage over other researchers in that I was approaching the case from a unique angle, having access to the official government file on the incident, and being able to call upon official resources and expertise".

During an interview published in the July/August 1996 issue of 'UFO Magazine' (UK), he spoke about the departmental evidence:

"The standard line on Rendlesham Forest is that the incident was looked into, and nothing of defence significance was uncovered.

The challenge, as it were, to the department, is that we have never seen the analysis".

Asked, 'But many people want to know: who did this analysis? And on what basis did the Ministry conclude there was no threat?", he replied, "These are questions you might want to pose to Sec(AS)2a!".

Indeed, of the MoD's actions following receipt of Halt's memo, Nick stated, "My best assessment of what happened next is - absolutely nothing! The report was written on the 13th January and when it arrived at Whitehall, whoever was doing the job didn't have the faintest idea what to do with it, probably took one look at it and said, 'what am I supposed to do?'. I'm afraid to say it simply ended up in a file".

If he had never seen any documentation concerning the Ministry's analysis of the case and could only speculate what might have happened when Halt's memo was received back in 1981, perhaps Nick can clarify his justification for now claiming he had access to "the official government file on the incident".

Contrary to Nick's conjecture that Col Halt's memo "simply ended up in a file", is the information provided to myself last year by Gaynor South at Secretariat(Air Staff)2a1a. She wrote:

"You have questioned whether the Ministry of Defence thoroughly investigated the events which are alleged to have taken place at RAF Woodbridge/Rendlesham Forest. From Departmental records available for the period in question, we have established that all available information was looked at at the time by air defence experts who were satisfied that nothing had occurred to suggest that the UK Air Defence Region had been breached by unauthorised foreign military activity on the nights in question. In the absence of evidence corroborating Col Halt's memo, which was sent some two weeks after the events in 1980, and in the light of the Department's air defence remit, no action was then deemed necessary".

This seems to be a categorical assurance that "Departmental records available for the period in question" do exist and substantiate that Halt's report was investigated.

By Nick's previous admissions, the existence of any Ministry file was on a 'need to know' basis, and the facts seem to confirm he didn't have any.

It's appreciated that Nick writes, "James Easton and Ian Ridpath should be commended for highlighting some intriguing new material and for stimulating constructive debate on this case", however, we have to wonder if Nick has actually read that material.

If so, he should realise that the original witness statements recently uncovered have proven that the three US Air Force security police officers who first observed 'strange lights', pursued an unidentified light for some TWO MILES, before realising it was the 'beacon light' from a local landmark.

However, he says, "returning to the theory that all the UFO sightings were misidentifications of the Orford Ness lighthouse or the Shiplake [should be 'Shipwash'] Lightship, or even of stars, and that the indentations in the clearing were caused by burrowing rabbits! When I met Charles Halt he was dismissive of this, and confirmed that he and other witnesses were familiar with the lighthouse...".

This is obsolescent, overtaken by the recently published evidence and it's not clear why Nick references it. Similarly, he states:

"When seeking expert analysis on a case such as this, one really cannot obtain a more authoritative view than that of Admiral of the Fleet The Lord Hill-Norton, a former Chief of the Defence Staff and Chairman of the NATO Military Committee. With the greatest respect to the sceptics, Lord Hill-Norton is considerably better qualified to analyse an incident such as this".

Lord Hill-Norton might be better qualified if he had actually seen the original witness affidavits or any of the evidence now available. As he hasn't, to my knowledge, he is consequently infinitely less qualified and informed than I'm sure he would care to be.

Aside from which, Lord Hill-Norton's 'analysis' is effectively that either something physical occurred, or there were grave misperceptions and in either event, it was of defence significance.

No disagreement about that.

The views of the actual participants, especially Halt, on the fundamental revelations about the misidentified lighthouse, why that was never previously disclosed, or the many anomalies in later witness recollections, etc. would have been meaningful, rather than allusions to comments long since superseded by facts.

Again despite the new understandings published in 'Resolving Rendlesham', Nick brings up the evidence which most convinced him that there was some substance to the 'Rendlesham forest' affair, stating, "Then we have radiation readings which, irrespective of how high they were, just happened to peak where the trees were damaged and in the very centre of the indentations".

Trusting Nick means, 'irrespective of how small they were', Ian Ridpath tells me that having obtained a relevant opinion from the National Radiological Protection Board (NRPB), as detailed in 'Resolving Rendlesham', he has since advised Giles Cowling at DERA Radiation Protection Services (DRPS). Ian confirms:

"When informed by me of these additional facts, Giles Cowling of DRPS, Nick Pope's original source for the '10 times background' claim, changed his opinion. He wrote to me again on August 21, 'I share the NRPB view that the use of a high-range survey instruments to measure (accurately) environmental levels of radiation is somewhat questionable and this must throw some doubt on the validity of the data reported'."

I believe this issue can be finally laid to rest by analysing what was recorded on Col. Halt's microcassette. Using the hand-held recorder, he documented his team's investigation of the area where some believed 'ground indentations' had been found in the forest.

Extracting all of the readings, the location [L] is first given, followed by the Geiger counter measurement [M]:

[L] "approaching the area within about 25, 30 feet"

[M] "just minor clicks"

[L] at the 'impressions'

[M] "about third, fourth mark"

[L] "second pod indentation"

[M] "this one's dead"

[L] "the third one"

[M] "some residual - a little pulse"

[L] "center of the area"

[M] "best deflection of the needle I've seen yet"
"we're getting rad at half a millirem""up towards seven...just jumped up towards seven tenths"
"seven units, let's call it, on the point five scale"

[L] "getting in close to one pod"

[M] "up to two, three units deflection"
"still not going above three or four units"
"picking up more, though - more frequent"

[L] "on the tree...from on the side facing the suspected landing site"

[M] "four clicks max"

[L] the other side of the tree, facing away from the 'landing site'

[M] "there's no clicks whatsoever"
"...maybe one or two..."

[L] "some type of abrasion or something in the ground" [in the 'center'area]

[M] "we get a high radioactive reading... about, er... deflection of, er, two to three, maybe four, depending on the point of it"

[L] "heading about 110, 120 degrees from site out through to the clearing now"

[M] "still getting a reading on the meter, about two clicks" "needle's jumped, three to four clicks, getting stronger"

[L] "just crossed a creek"

[M] "getting three good clicks on the meter"

[L] "in the center of the [farmer's] field"

[M] "negative readings"

[L] "at the far side of the second farmer's field"

[M] "picking up slight readings, four or five clicks now, on the meter"

Was the far side of the farmer's field therefore much more 'radioactive' than the centre?

According to the levels being 'detected', it must have been.

At 'five clicks', the field was also more 'radioactive' there than the 'indentations' and more so even than the trees where Nick Pope believes the 'trace evidence' peaked, the highest reading for both being confirmed on tape as 'four clicks'.

His 'hot spot' in the centre of the 'indentations' produced "up towards seven" clicks, however, the farmer's field registered "four or five", a difference of, say, 'up to two' clicks, a minute variance between readings which were already so small as to be inconsequential.

I hope this finally dissuades Nick's persistence that the clicks on Sgt. Monroe Neville's Geiger counter were remotely significant, or as Nick once wrote, "the most tangible proof that something extraordinary happened there".

Otherwise, he is challenged to offer the requisite explanation why a farmer's field in rural England was only marginally less 'radioactive' than the purported nearby landing site of our extraterrestrial visitors.

Nick reminds us that, "as he explained on the 'Strange But True' documentary on the case, Halt stated, 'A lighthouse doesn't move through the forest; the lighthouse doesn't go up and down, it doesn't explode...".

Strictly, the program was named 'Strange But True?'. As learned Australian researcher John Stepkowski once reminded me, that question mark is important.

The lighthouse beacon and beam do of course move and perceptions of the former were known to be deceptive as viewed through the forest trees, especially when the observer was also in motion.

So how to explain the perceived exploding light.

The answer may be that it just never happened.

In an interview with American journalist Salley Rayl, published in the April 1994 issue of OMNI magazine, Halt recalled:

"All of a sudden, directly to the east, we saw an unusual red, sun-like light-oval shaped, glowing, with a black center - 10 to 15 feet off the ground, moving through the trees. Beyond the clearing was barbed wire fence, farmer's field, house, and barn. The animals were making a lot of noise.

We ran toward the light up to the fence. It shot over the field and then moved in a 20 to 30 degree horizontal arc. Strangely, it appeared to be dripping what looked like molten steel out of a crucible, as if gravity were some how pulling it down. Suddenly, it exploded - not a loud bang, just booompf - and broke into five white objects that scattered in the sky".

It's an anecdote he has since repeated, however, the recollection is not supported by what was actually recorded on his microcassette at the time:

"OK, we're looking at the thing, we're probably about two to three hundred yards away. It looks like an eye winking at you. Still moving from side to side. And when you put the Starscope [image intensifier] on it, it sorta has a hollow center, a dark center, it's like a pupil of an eye looking at you, winking.

And it flashes so bright to the Starscope that it almost burns your eye". [Recording stops]

[Recording continues] "We've passed the farmer's house and are crossing the next field and now we have multiple sightings of up to five lights with a similar shape and all but they seem to be steady now rather than a pulsating or glow with a red flash".

No 'exploding' light mentioned - surely something Halt would have committed to tape - and there's now up to five lights visible, with no remarks about five white objects having dissipated.

A further indication that these lights may be the same five which Halt later remembered as having come from an 'exploding' light, is that he doesn't seem to have mentioned the 'multiple sightings of up to five lights with a similar shape' in any subsequent account, only the five lights which he remembers as having dispersed.

Author Jenny Randles, who has researched the 'Rendlesham forest' case since the story first broke, theorises that these particular 'lights' may simply have been stars.

Those who remain convinced that the 'pulsing light' was evidence of a 'higher intelligence' have to rationalise why it 'blew up' and also explain why, if it had done so, Halt later recorded:

"We're at the far side of the second farmer's field and made sighting again about 110 degrees. This looks like it's clear off to the coast. It's right on the horizon. Moves about a bit and flashes from time to time. Still steady or red in color".

This subsequent sighting is also seemingly never mentioned by Halt in the story of the detonating light.

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We still await any proven basis to Philip Mantle's allegations that the 'tent footage' component was a hoax, filmed in the UK.

A comprehensive and factually correct account of the extraordinary 'alien autopsy' story and a full explanation of the 'tent footage' and it's connection, can be found at -

http://www.ufoworld.co.uk/autopsy.htm

I spoke to Ray Santilli recently and enquired, "Philip Mantle had seen a copy of the 'tent footage' which was 'crystal clear' and which would possibly have allowed the persons shown to be identified. Could this be made available to assist with resolving the entire issue?

"He explained, "What Philip saw was the film I got back from the studio. It was never very clear but OK".

Asked, "Isn't it possible to determine the providence of the 'tent footage' video, simply by comparing the images against those on the claimed 'archive' 16mm film?", he responded, "Yes, but I do not have the film any longer".

I also queried the current status of the unseen footage and the 'cameraman':

"You have given the occasional indication that the 'first autopsy' footage, i.e., the film which has never been broadcast in public and which apparently Volker Spielberg [a German business associate] effectively owns, would some day be released.

Can you say what the overall situation is now with regard to the unseen footage and the 'cameraman?'"

"I am sorry but it hasn't changed", he confirmed.

Theresa Carlson's impeccable and dedicated image analysis supports conclusions that the film is exceptional special effects (SFX) work.

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http://www.ufomind.com/ufo/updates/1998/aug/m10-008.shtml

[EBE = 'Extraterrestrial Biological Entity']

Linda claims, "This testimony from a former US Army Signal Corps and CIA officer is the latest to confirm that the US government and military are withholding the facts about extraterrestrial craft and biological entities".

The reported testimony misses little in encompassing contemporary 'UFO' lore - 'reverse engineering' of 'flying saucers', an alien kept in captivity at 'Area 51', the nefarious CIA/FBI/etc. 'cover-up', the 'Roswell alien autopsy', people being abducted by aliens, 'cattle mutilations' and 'particle beam weapons' being used to shoot down passing ET spaceships.

The aliens were, understandably, somewhat miffed about the latter and destroyed a US aircraft base with 'death rays'.

By any standards of far-fetched tales, this is pretty good going.

Many of those with an interest in the subject of 'UFOs' and a rational dialogue on the possibilities of evidence for contact by any cosmic neighbours, even if only considered to be theoretical, have been dismayed by the publication of accusations such as these, always devoid of tangible evidence or provenance and which plague aspirations that the subject matter will ever be viewed as worthy of scientific credence.

Arguably the champion of tall-tales was William (Bill) Cooper and it's perhaps appropriate, if not a little bizarre, that Linda gives her 'informant' the pseudonym of 'Kewper'.

The imprisoned alien almost inevitably communicated 'telepathically', with 'Kewper' recalling of their captors, "They said they definitely weren't hearing a thing through their ears and that the voice they heard more or less was right in the mind itself. They could put their fingers in their ears and they would still hear the being. One tried that; he plugged both ears to see if he could still hear the being, and he could".

'Kewper' also claims that in 1958 he visited 'Area 51' and saw an entity which was identical to the current archetypal depiction of an alien. He states, "Most of the time they referred to the one out there as a 'grey'.

One can only surmise how the 'creature' was known as a 'grey', when that terminology had yet to be invented.

Asked by Linda to describe his experience at Area 51, 'Kewper' replied:

"We were out there for a meeting of all the CIA people around this country and over towards the Far East and so on, and we had the meeting there at Area 51.

[...]

They took us down about 10 miles away, something of that nature, and stopped at the first special area. And they took us into the area there, and they had U-2s and also the SR-71 Blackbirds I believe they were flying them at that time".

The SR-71 wasn't in fact deployed at Groom Lake until 1967 and in 1958 even it's look-alike predecessor, the A-12, was several years away from making an appearance there.

Linda asks, "More than 50 years after the 1947 Roswell incident, a major question is: What do the United States, England, Australia other American ally government insiders and, according to Kewper, even Russia know which sustains the Orwellian policy of silence and denial in which lies are ordered to become official truth?...as written so strongly in SOM1-01, the Majestic12 Group Special Operations Manual of April 1954...".

The 'Special Operations Manual' or 'SOM-1', was yet another anonymously mailed document, which could easily have been produced on a home computer set-up.

Historical researcher Jan Aldrich has comprehensively demonstrated that the 'SOM-1' documents are evidently phoney, citing over 50 reasons why -

Special Operations Manual 1-01 - Parts 1 - 4

http://www.ufomind.com/ufo/updates/1996/dec/m18-001.shtml http://www.ufomind.com/ufo/updates/1996/dec/m18-003.shtml http://www.ufomind.com/ufo/updates/1996/dec/m18-008.shtml http://www.ufomind.com/ufo/updates/1996/dec/m19-004.shtml

Perhaps the most obvious clue is that the documents, supposedly dating from 1954, refer to the Groom Lake base as 'Area 51', a name by which it is now commonly known. However, it wasn't apparently designated as 'Area 51' until at least 1958, as Dave Bethke explains:

"Watertown Strip, Paradise Ranch, Dreamland, The Box, Detachment 3. Why so many names, where did they come from, and how did this name game start?

During World War II, this rectangular plot of land with extreme security had no name. It was just a small part of the Army Air Force bombing and gunnery range that covered much of southern Nevada and was regularly bombed and strafed by pilots training out of Nellis Army Air Field. There was an emergency landing field, still visible today on satellite photos, just east of Groom dry lake. Its stayed that way into the 1950's, even as the Atomic Energy Commission was developing the Atomic Proving Grounds in an area of the Nellis range to the south-west of Groom Lake. But all that changed in 1955 when the CIA wanted a spy plane to make flights over the U.S.S.R. and awarded a contract to Lockheed's Advanced Development Projects, better known as the Skunk Works, to build the plane which later would be designated the U-2. It was top secret, and as such needed a top secret facility for flight test.

[...]

During this time the land was part of the Nellis Range. No special security was in place, other than that of the Nellis Range and the close proximity to exploding atomic devices. There was an area of restricted airspace over the Nevada Test Site and it included a 5 by 9 miles area over Groom Lake.

That changed in 1958 when an area 6 by 10 miles in size was withdrawn from public use and reserved for the use of the Atomic Energy Commission. In keeping with its pattern of numbering the areas of the Nevada Test Site, the area was called, 'Area 51'".

The truth is out there, but so are boundless make-believe stories, some of them absolute whoppers.

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http://www.serve.com/mahood/finis.htm

Also defining detective work at its finest, is Tom's gripping story of the quest for a legendary crash site, although not of the alien spacecraft variety. 'The Hunt for 928', a chronicle of Tom's search for the final resting place of an A-12, is at -

http://www.serve.com/mahood/a-12/

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To prevent the Japanese gauging how successful the launches were, the offensive was kept secret from the American public.

Professor Jack Sidener from the Chinese University in Hong Kong, recently wrote to tell me:

"Came across your note re Fu-Go balloons on the web, and can add some info. My dad was civil defense chief in the town of Rio Vista, about 40 miles inland from San Francisco. He's gone now, but a few years ago he recollected that in the month of July (1944?45?) there was an average of 9 fires per day around Rio Vista, which means 270 incendiary bombs dropped in one month. We used to watch them from Main Street, little white dots overhead, sometimes a couple of airplanes apparently snagging them in nets and hauling them out to sea. My dad and the police said they were balloon spiders; one piece of a shot balloon which dropped into the Sacramento River very visibly was said to be a 'publicity stunt' - part of the amazingly successful repression of the facts about their success".

If these statistics are relatively accurate, they appear to indicate a substantially higher success rate than I've seen acknowledged.

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Disclosures from the Public Record Office confirmed details of 'Project 119L', a secret US Air Force program using the Royal Naval Air Station at Evanton, in the north of Scotland, to launch spy balloons.

The 'Daily Telegraph' carried an article with accompanying photograph and at the time of writing, this can still be seen on their web site at -

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/et?ac=000116192758126&rtmo=VxFP51Zx&atmo=99999999&P4_FOLLOW_ON=/98/8/10/npro10.html&pg=/et/98/8/10/npro10.html (This URL should be entered as a single line)

Co-incidentally, the article's author Ben Fenton, was one of the journalists who expressed an interest in 'Rendlesham Unravelled' and we had a lengthy conversation about those same defence implications that Lord Hill-Norton was concerned with.

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Searching the members directory and using the enquiry 'RAF Bentwaters', will provoke the warning, "You have asked to search for word(s) that violate AOL's Terms of Service".

Puzzled by this reaction to an ostensibly straight-forward query, due process of elimination showed 'Bentwaters' to be the offending word.

Further elimination of the possibilities proved that the objectionable search item was the combination of the letters t..w..a..t.

AOL are aware of the eccentric predicament.

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'The Armchair Ufologist' -

http://www.magonia.demon.co.uk/armchair/au3.html

Andy Roberts provides an irreverent and highly informative view of the 'UFO' scene in the UK.

'How to Prove You're an Alien' -

http://www.omnimag.com/archives/open_book/quest/index.html

Space writer Jim Oberg discusses the 'Quest for Evidence'

'Take the ET Challenge', at -

http://www.omnimag.com/open_book/et_test/index.html

"Let's face it --anyone can claim to be an alien.

But how can we put such claims to the test?"

In a follow-up article, Oberg suggests some telling questions.

The 'N-FILES'

http://www.ecn.co.uk/timeoff/NFilesIndex.htm

The 'Eastern Counties Network' looks at some local legends, as also featured in 'Fortean Times' magazine.

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Jenny Randles responds to 'Resolving Rendlesham...".

Socorro '64 - were the landed 'UFO' and 'entities' witnessed in this 'classic' sighting simply a hot-air balloon and its crew? In search of the evidence.

Anomalous 'triangular aircraft' - exclusive interview.

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