UFOs - Leslie Kean [80]
Most significant was the incredible DIA evaluation of Mooy’s descriptive narrative, written by Air Force Major Colonel Roland Evans on October 12, 1976. It states:
An outstanding report: this case is a classic which meets all the criteria necessary for a valid study of UFO phenomena.
The object was seen by multiple witnesses from different locations (i.e., Shemiran, Mehrebad and the dry lake bed) and viewpoints (both airborne and from the ground).
The credibility of many of the witnesses was high (an Air Force General, qualified aircrews and experienced tower operators).
Visual sightings were confirmed by radar.
Similar electromagnetic effects (EME) were reported by three separate aircraft.
There were physiological effects on some crew members (i.e., loss of night vision due to the brightness of the object).
An inordinate amount of maneuverability was displayed by the UFOs.14
The evaluation indicates that the reliability of the information was “confirmed by other sources” and its value was High (defined as “unique, timely and of major significance”). It was used, or planned for use, as “current intelligence.” This intelligence information of high value, of major significance, concerning an outstanding UFO report that justified further study of the phenomenon, was filed as such—even though U.S. government disinterest in UFOs, and outright dismissal of sightings, was the public pattern repeated in so many cases in America, and even though it had told the public in 1969 that UFOs were of no concern.
Four years later, our government also filed a report on the Peruvian incident involving Oscar Santa María. A Department of Defense (DoD)/Joint Chiefs of Staff “info report” was distributed to almost as many agencies as the Iran report. Titled “UFO Sighted in Peru,”15 the June 1980 document was prepared by Colonel Norman H. Runge, who states that his source was an “officer in the Peruvian Air Force who observed the event … source has reported reliably in the past.” Santa María does not know the name of that officer, was not interviewed by any American, and clearly remembers that no U.S. officials were present during his briefing. “We were very careful about guarding our own sensitive operations and military procedures,” he explained in one of our telephone interviews from his home in Peru.
Unfortunately, the DoD report provides the wrong date for the Peruvian encounter: May 9, 1980, rather than April 11. Santa María believes that the information was distorted, and some of the data imprecise, because the report was not filed until two months after the incident. There were apparently delays as the communication made its way through various channels to the Americans.
The document reports that a UFO was observed over the base, and the Air Commander scrambled an SU-22. “The FAP [Peruvian Air Force] tried to intercept and destroy the UFO, but without success,” it states. The pilot “intercepted the vehicle and fired upon it at very close range without causing any apparent damage. The pilot tried to make a second pass on the vehicle, but the UFO out-ran the SU-22.”
I find it interesting that the term “vehicle” was used consistently and interchangeably with “UFO” throughout this U.S. government document; usually the term “object” is the official choice, leaving wider room for a range of possible explanations. A “vehicle” is something constructed for the purpose of transporting people or things. This one, which remains of unknown origin, was inexplicably unaffected by large shells fired at very close range. Assuming it was a vehicle of unknown origin, as stated, with a capacity that no man-made vehicle has, the concept of “vehicle” then becomes a provocative one, coming from an Air Force colonel. What was it transporting, and why? There seems to have been no problem with an official acknowledgment of the existence of an actual UFO, ten years after the close of Project Blue Book, as long as the document was classified. In this case, a U.S. Air Force colonel acknowledges the existence of an actual UFO