NCAS Presentation September 8, 2018
January 8, 1969, was a red-letter day for the Air Force. That was the date that we took possession of the University of Colorado’s “Scientific Study of Unidentified Flying Objects.”
The Condon Report, as it was popularly known, was the result of 18 months of intensive scientific inquiry into a phenomenon that plagued the Air Force for more than 20 years – UFOs or Flying Saucers. There I was at the Pentagon south parking loading dock with a hand truck to load 40 cartons containing 225 copies of the report.
I headed straight for Bert Goodwin’s office on the Pentagon’s 4th floor. Goodwin was a civilian attorney responsible for protecting the Air Force’s legal interests regarding the Condon Report. It was just after 3 p.m. as I wheeled into Goodwin’s office. No one in the Air Force had seen the report as yet. Bert and I had one hour to review the 3-volume, 1465-page report. Forty- two copies were to be made available to the Pentagon press corps at 4 p.m., embargoed for simultaneous release in Washington and Boulder, Colorado, at noon EST the next day. Goodwin and I were the first Air Force officials to lay eyes on the report. The Air Force had been scrupulous, almost paranoid, about taking pains to avoid seeing the Condon Report until it was ready for public release. As we quickly skimmed the report, it became obvious that Dr. Condon hadn’t found evidence of any little green men. I agreed with Goodwin when he said, “We couldn’t have done a better job had we written it ourselves.” What Goodwin meant by that remark is obvious to anyone remotely familiar with the history of the Air Force and UFOs. With the prestigious Condon Report in our favor, we could finally see a graceful exit from what has been called the most monumental military foul up since the Battle of the Bulge.
For the story of the Air Force and UFOs is essentially a tale of a credibility gap wider than the Grand Canyon. During its more than 20-year history of investigating so-called flying saucers, the Air Force had been accused of almost every conceivable sin and had been guilty of some: - Conspiring to conceal the truth about UFOs
- Officially concluding in 1948 that UFOs were really interplanetary space ships - Harboring the remains of a half dozen or so humanoid corpses in a morgue at Wright-Patterson AFB Let me go back a bit to the origins of the Condon study. In 1965, the Air Force finally recognized that UFOs were more of a PR problem than an intelligence matter. On September 28, then Air Force Director of Information Major General Ben LeBailly wrote to the Military Director of the Air Force Scientific Advisory Board asking for a review of Project Blue Book. Established in 1952, Blue Book documented 12,097 sightings and listed only 697 or about 5% as unidentified in its 20-plus years of existence. An ad hoc group of five distinguished scientists was formed, chaired by Dr. Brian O’Brien who received his Ph.D. from Yale. Carl Sagan, the famous astronomer from Cornell, was a panel member. The committee met on February 3, 1966, and released its report in March. The O’Brien Committee believed there was a need for scientific investigation of UFOs in more detail and depth. This recommendation ultimately led to the Air Force contract with the University of Colorado. Getting Dr. Condon to sign on wasn’t easy. He was busy updating his book on the theory of atomic spectra which, although written in 1935, remained the standard on the subject. Dr. Tom Ratchford of the Air Force Office of Scientific Research, hit him where he was vulnerable – his patriotism and vanity. Dr. Will Kellog of the National Center for Atmospheric Research helped Ratchford lure Condon. Kellog told Condon, “If you do it, people will believe it.” Recalling the meeting later, Condon said, “Flattery got him somewhere.”
A meeting between C.U. and AFOSR officials was held on August 10, 1966. The confab lasted all day and was fruitful in that there was sufficient faculty interest in the project for subsequent negotiations. On August 31st, AFOSR formally asked Colorado to undertake the study, assuring that scientists involved would have complete freedom.
The University accepted only on the condition that the study would be conducted as a normal scientific research project and free from Air Force control and made public.
So, on October 7, 1966, the news of the Colorado contract was announced by the Pentagon. Condon appointed Assistant Dean Robert Low of the Colorado University graduate school as his project coordinator. It was a memo written by Low on August 9, 1966, that turned up later in Look Magazine that almost scuttled the entire project. The article, “Flying Saucer Fiasco,” by John Fuller, hit the newsstands on May 14, 1968. Low’s memo read in part:
“The trick would be, I think, to describe the project so that, to the public, it would appear a totally objective study, but, to the scientific community (it) would present the image of a group of nonbelievers trying their best to be objective but having an almost zero expectation of finding a saucer.” Needless to say, Low was not thinking public relations when he wrote that memo. It caused a minor flap on the Pentagon’s E-Ring complete with frantic calls between Air Force Secretary Harold Brown and Condon. The result was a statement by Low that in essence said there was no plot to produce a negative study result. “My concern,” he wrote, “was the University of Colorado and its standing in the university world … attitudes that the scientific community would have toward the university if it undertook the study.”
Meanwhile, I prepared a statement attributed to Secretary Brown to the effect that although the Air Force had not as yet seen the Condon Report, we had no reason to believe that Dr. Condon and the University of Colorado would not live up to the requirements of the contract. Condon went on the grant several press interviews, then wisely cut them off. Once, in Corning, N.Y., he gave a speech that kidded the subject. He told me, “Well, that’s as bad as if a Supreme Court judge would have kidded cases before him. It’s just not done. I shouldn’t have done it.” His remarks were subsequently reported in the Elmira, N.Y. newspaper. We were cautious not to advise Dr. Condon on the public affairs aspects, but we were happy to learn that he would no longer discuss his study while it was still underway.
Condon’s investigative phase ended June 1, 1968, and the task of preparing the final report began. We set a meeting for September 30th at the university to discuss the many factors involved in making the Condon report public. The Air Force team included staff officers from AFOSR and the Air Force General Counsel. I represented the Secretary of the Air Force/Office of Information, or SAFOI. We met with Dr. Condon; T.E. Manning, vice president for Academic Affairs; and Scott Tyler, the university’s public information officer.
Condon told us the report was being edited by journalist Daniel S. Gillmor and would be ready by October 31st. He asked whether the report should be sent to the Air Force for transmittal to the National Academy of Science. I suggested it would be more prudent for C.U. to deliver just enough copies directly to the NAS and hold the remainder under lock and key until the NAS review was completed. Condon agreed. Manning informed us that the university had accepted in principle an offer from Bantam Books to publish the report in a paperback version. This was news to us. He mentioned that Bantam was arranging for Walter Sullivan, science editor of the New York Times, to write the introduction.
I questioned whether Bantam and Sullivan were to get advance copies of the report. Manning assured us they would not receive their copies until the report had been delivered to the Air Force. Apparently, Bantam was set to turn out copies within 80 hours after receiving the report. Although somewhat unorthodox, the idea of Bantam publishing a paperback appealed to us. We wanted to be sure the report would be widely distributed at a reasonable cost. We later learned that a Government Publishing Office version would take months to reprint at a minimum cost of $5 a copy versus $1.95 for the Bantam version.
The University of Colorado turned over its final report to the National Academy of Sciences on November 15, 1968. Meanwhile, we waited anxiously. Our contract with C.U. called for only 225 copies of the report – a woefully inadequate number in my opinion. Unfortunately, Public Affairs was not consulted when the contract was drawn up. We were faced with several problems: How should we determine press distribution? Should the Air Force hold a press conference without Dr. Condon who declined to hold one himself? These questions raised others: How soon after receipt should we release the report? How should we release it? By early December, DoD was pressing us for our plans on how the report should be released. I met with Major General William Garland, the Air Force Director of Information, to discuss options. In brief, 50 copies were to be set aside for the press: three read-only copies in our office; three copies in our New York, Chicago and Los Angeles field offices; a copy each at the University of Colorado and at Project Blue Book at Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio; and 42 copies for the Pentagon press corps. Shortly after New Year’s Day 1969, Dr. Condon called Air Force Secretary Brown to voice his concern over the amount of time the National Academy of Science was taking to review his report. Brown called Frederick Seitz, NAS president, and learned that the panel, chaired by Yale University’s Gerald M. Clemence, was finalizing it work. We could expect the NAS review on January 8, 1969. As I said at the outset of my remarks, we were a happy group of campers on January 8th. Not only did Condon come to the same basic conclusions about UFOs as did the Air Force, but the NAS gave the Condon Report straight “A’s.”
A major point of Condon’s report that jumped out at us is the statement: “The continuance of Project Blue Book is of dubious value.”
The NAS review stated, among other findings, that “On the basis of present day knowledge, the least likely explanation of UFOs is the hypothesis of extraterrestrial visitations by intelligent beings.”
Press reaction to the Condon Report was, for the most part, what we had hoped for. For example, the now-defunct Washington News, which reported the Washington National Airport incident in near-hysterical terms in 1952, editorialized in its January 18, 1969, edition:
“Dedicated disciples of the ‘little green men from Mars’ school no doubt will find the Condon Report represents another diabolical plot to suppress the truth. “But most Americans will find the report something less than a surprise.
“Apart from wasting time, continuing study would waste taxpayer money.”
The Pentagon bureaucracy grinds on at a snail’s pace. It was in early March 1969 that a meeting was held in the Pentagon to discuss the future of Project Blue Book.
From the moment the meeting opened, there was no doubt that Blue Book was finished. There was considerable debate, however, on such details as obtaining the approvals of the Air Force Chief of Staff and the Secretary of the Air Force, and where to store the project’s records and files. We were also concerned with what we should tell people when they observe a UFO. If the Air Force was no longer interested, who was?
The question of a new home for Project Blue Book’s records was more complex than it would seem. The key was finding a location that was accessible yet not too inviting. Among others, the Federal Records Repository near Washington; the National Archives; the Smithsonian; and the Air Force Museum at Wright-Patterson AFB were considered. We finally decided on the Air Force Archives at Maxwell AFB, Alabama.
The Blue Book records remained there for a number of years until they were eventually moved to the National Archives. We then went on to develop guidance to Base Commanders and Information Officers as to what to tell people who call with a UFO report. We advised Commanders that should they receive a UFO report, they should conduct at their discretion a minimum local investigation. If unable to identify the source of the sighting, they should refer the caller to the local police. The cops loved us. It took almost the entire year of 1969 before were ready to approach the Air Force Chief of Staff and the Secretary of the Air Force for approval to terminate Project Blue Book.
On December 16, 1969, after the Chief, General John D. Ryan, concurred, Brig. Gen. Henry Hogan – who succeeded General Garland as Air Force Director of Information in July 1969 – briefed Secretary Robert C. Seamans. Seamans had replaced Brown in February 1969. The next day, December 17, 1969 – the 66th anniversary of the Wright Brothers first flight, by the way – in a press release I wrote, we announced to the world that Project Blue Book was no more.
By way of closing, I want to tell you in brief about my interview of Dr. Condon on February 15, 1972. Courtesy of the Air Force, I was attending the University of Denver in pursuit of my master’s degree in Mass Communications. I chose as the topic for my thesis: “The UFO Phenomenon: A Study in Public Relations.” When I called Condon to ask for an interview, he was most reluctant to talk about the subject. However, he finally said, “OK, come on out.”
He called the authors of sensationalized UFO books “A bunch of frauds... They started writing exaggerated science fiction sort of things.” Speaking of Dr. J. Allen Hynek, who was a UFO consultant to the Air Force and is to be the lead character in the History Channel’s “Project Blue Book” TV series this winter, Condon said, “You should have fired Hynek very early in the game.” Hynek, by the way, was something of an enigma to the Air Force. He was hired in 1948, but as time went on, he was used less and less. The Air Force claimed he had become a confirmed believer in the extraterrestrial hypothesis. The Air Force let his contract quietly expire some months before the termination of Project Blue Book in December 1969. I had been sure Hynek’s dismissal would be picked up by the media as an indication of the Air Force’s intention. Surprisingly it was not. Condon called the time doing the study “Two years of tremendous strain and wasted time.” I asked him if he knew then what he knows now, would he have taken on the study. He said, “Certainly not. I wish I hadn’t. It was just a moment of aberration.”
He closed the interview with an anecdote. Someone once said to him, “What would happen if you’d really see a flying saucer?” He replied with a chuckle, “I’d get out a revised edition of the study.”