Everyone seems to want in on the Pentagon’s budget bonanza, the most recent being a group that believes our skies are being penetrated by aircraft that can only be called alien.
A Toledo-born naval fighter pilot who saw an unidentifiable object that looked like a Tic Tac in the sky over the Pacific Ocean is telling his story now, 14 years later.
VIDEO: Declassified military footage of UFO
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Retired Navy Cmdr. David Fravor’s tale, backed up with some video and his recorded observations, is providing momentum for those who think the government should investigate these sightings more aggressively.
Commander Fravor’s mysterious encounter occurred on Nov. 14, 2004, when he and another pilot were on a training mission 140 miles southwest of San Diego. What he saw from his fighter jet was a white pill-shaped object about the size of a bus hovering and flying with no obvious means of propulsion or lift. When he flew in for a closer look the object sped away like a bullet.
Some think that what Commander Fravor saw was a high-tech invention of the Russians or Chinese. By now, one would think the existence of such a fantastic machine would be known.
Commander Fravor thinks it came from another world.
Though he has a commendable sense of humor on this subject, Commander Fravor, a decorated 24-year naval aviator, is dead serious about what he saw. And his career compels us to treat his observations with respect.
Several retired Pentagon intelligence officers have been calling for the Pentagon to restart the Advanced Aviation Threat Identification Program, which tracked UFOs at a cost of $22 million from 2007 to 2012. Christopher K. Mellon, a former deputy assistant secretary of defense for intelligence in the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations, is urging the government to analyze reports of unidentified aerial phenomena. He frames it as a national security matter, not a science-fiction fancy.
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The impulse to spend the Pentagon’s money is coming from every corner. Even President Donald Trump suggested the Pentagon pony up $30 billion to help build a wall on the southern border to protect American land space from aliens crossing over illegally from Mexico.
Yet Pentagon leaders should not dismiss sightings of unexplained objects by members of the military. People like Mr. Mellon are primarily calling for the sharing of information from various services and agencies, in order to avoid the “stovepiping” that afflicts government bureaucracies. The level of funding required would be a flyspeck in the military budget, not an endless boondoggle. “The truth may ultimately prove benign,” says Mr. Mellon, “but why leave it to chance?”
First Published April 8, 2018, 9:30 p.m.
