UFOs - Leslie Kean [160]
JOSÉ CARLOS PEREIRA is a Brazilian four-star Brigadier General, now retired. He was a commander of several air bases in Brazil and commander of the Brazilian Air Force Academy. In 1999, he became a commander of the Brazilian Airspace Defense Command, known as COMDABRA. From 2001 to 2005, he served as General Commander of Air Force Operations, which required his supervision of thirteen generals and 27,000 subordinates. In 2006, after retiring from the Air Force, Brigadier General Pereira was appointed President of the Brazilian Airport Infrastructure Agency, the government agency responsible for airport management, from which he has now retired.
JOHN PODESTA was the White House Chief of Staff to President William J. Clinton. He also served in the president’s cabinet and as a principal on the National Security Council. Most recently, he was a co-chair of President Obama’s transition team, for which he coordinated the priorities of the incoming administration’s agenda, oversaw the development of its policies, and spearheaded its appointments of major cabinet secretaries and political appointees. Since 2003, he has been the President and CEO of the Center for American Progress, a leading organization in the development of and advocacy for progressive policy. Podesta is the author of The Power of Progress: How America’s Progressives Can (Once Again) Save Our Economy, Our Climate, and Our Country.
NICK POPE worked for the British Ministry of Defence for twenty-one years, from 1985 to 2006. His career involved postings to policy, operations, personnel, finance, and security divisions. During the first Gulf War he was recruited into the Joint Operations Center, where he worked in the Air Force Operations Room as a watchkeeper/briefer. From 1991 to 1994, Pope’s primary duty was to investigate reports of unidentified flying objects and assess whether any sightings were of defense interest. Various promotions followed, and his last posting was to the Directorate of Defence Security. Now retired, Nick Pope works as a freelance journalist and broadcaster.
RICARDO BERMÚDEZ SANHUEZA is a retired General for the Chilean Air Force who served as Chilean Air Attaché in London and was Chief Commander of the Air Force’s Southern Area. He was also Director of the Technical School of Aeronautics. In 1998, he co-founded the Committee for the Study of Anomalous Aerial Phenomena (CEFAA), a branch of the General Administration of Civil Aeronautics, Chile’s FAA, to study aviation incidents involving anomalous aerial phenomena. He was appointed first President of the CEFAA and served until 2002. In January 2010, he was reinstated as Director of the CEFAA and now works full-time investigating UFO incidents involving civil or military aeronautic personnel.
FIFE SYMINGTON III was the Republican Governor of Arizona from 1991 to 1997. He was also Chairman of the Western Governors’ Association. A decorated Air Force veteran of the war in Southeast Asia, Symington is a cousin of the late Stuart Symington, Democratic Senator from Missouri. After leaving office, Mr. Symington co-founded the Arizona Culinary Institute and the Symington Group, a strategic, political, and business consulting company. In 2007, he and his partners founded the Independent Energy Group of Arizona, which specializes in the development of commercial solar arrays. A long-time pilot, he frequently flies his twin-engine Beechcraft Baron plane between his two homes in Phoenix and Santa Barbara, California.
JEAN-JACQUES VELASCO was an engineer at the French National Center for Space Studies (Centre Nationale d’Études Spatiales, CNES), specializing in satellite research. In 1977, he joined a new French team formed to study unidentified aerospace