Who is In Control?

                                                                  by Bob Koford

Note: doc added 12/28

For many years our own military agencies have been aware that there are unknown objects traversing our skies. Occasionally they were even seen to land and possibly crash. Thousands of previously classified documents are housed in the National Archives that demonstrate this fact. Anyone can read them if they choose to. The problem is, people don’t really seem to want to read them. The “disclosure” so many people have been clamoring for has already occurred.

Though it is denied by authorities today, the files show us that the flying discs and Unconventional Aircraft have been treated as a National Security issue, especially by Army Intelligence.

                                                         Background

In WWI the Army’s Intelligence apparatus was spear-headed by the Office of the Assistant Chief of Staff/Intelligence. By WWII, that office was replaced by the War Department/Intelligence Division and the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) -which was supposed to have been a permanent, global Intelligence group. Before long, Army leaders realized that they needed a stronger actionary arm, to better get things done. To do this, they decided to resurrect the Office of the Assistant Chief of Staff/Intelligence (ACS/I). Inter-Service special groups, such as the Joint Intelligence Objectives Agency (JIOA), which over saw the Paperclip prisoner program, were under the control of the ACS/I. So was the General Staff’s Intelligence Group.

During the war, the Army Signal Corps housed the technical Intelligence offices which handled things like downed aircraft recoveries, interrogation of foreign enemy prisoners and other recoveries of items deemed to be of a technical Intelligence nature. These technical Intelligence units roamed and scoured the war theater for information. Many times, they were in competition with other Intelligence groups who were also after technical Intelligence information.

In 1946, the Central Intelligence Group (CIG) was formed. The Army’s Intelligence arm was not eager to share their vast inventory of sensitive Intelligence information with these untested newbies. The CIG’s Office of Special Operations (OSO) and the Army’s Office of Special Operations acted as the go-between, where information would be shared. Individuals such as OSS Operative Allen Dulles and certain Army Generals, were very suspicious of the CIG. By the time the National Security Act of 1947 was signed into law their suspicion grew even worse.

Army leaders desperately opposed the appointment of Rear Admiral Roscoe Hillenkoetter to the position of Director of the newly established CIA (formed with the signing of NSA1947). A Navy guy had already been chosen for the top position of the new post of Secretary of Defense: former Navy Secretary, Mr. James V. Forrestal. The Army did not feel good about the two top posts being occupied by individuals associated with the Navy Department. But President truman wanted Admiral Hillenkoetter, and he was eventually sworn in as DCIA (May 1947).

Even before this could happen, though, Army individuals, such as Director of Intelligence, General Chamberlin, were maneuvering in the background -attempting to thwart his appointment.

                                                   Things Get Tense

By the time Director Hillenkoetter left his position, in October, 1950, he was beside himself with grief and stress, which he said was brought about by folks such as Allen Dulles, James Angleton and others who were formerly associated with the OSS. They had apparently been part of an effort to keep the Admiral from certain important Intelligence compartments; such as Top Secret: METRIC and Top Secret: COSMIC. These were the two most sensitive Intelligence materials located within Army Intelligence at that time. Both of these compartmented Intelligence interests were shielded from all but a very small handfull of CIA personnel, and DCIA Hillenkoetter was constantly attempting to rectify this problem.

Between the years 1947 and 1950, the formerly secret files available to us demonstrate clearly the Admiral’s confusuion, disdain and anger over this effort to keep him out of the loop. METRIC and COSMIC Intelligence materials handling became a very hot issue for the Admiral. Eventually, by mid 1950 an agreement was reached with Army Intelligence, where a specific individual would be cleared, in the CIA, to be the Control Officer for the handling of METRIC and COSMIC materials. His name was R. Jack Smith and he would be the Top Secret Control Officer, to end the pattern of a CIA courier having to travel back and forth between CIA HQ and the Pentagon in order to handle this information.

Admiral Hillenkoetter was finally “partially” briefed on METRIC, just before he left office.

Today, if any interested party wants to know about METRIC and/or COSMIC, they will be directed to the official NATO website, where they will be told that these are simply items pertaining to the formation of NATO...and that currently, COSMIC is simply the higjhest level of classification at NATO. While this may be so, one has to wonder why, if thats the case, would they have to shield this information from the head of all Intelligence...the Director of the CIA? How does that make any sense at all?

I bring this up is for two reasons:

1. this same time period (between 1947 and 1950) brought us several reported flying saucer landings/crash stories. It wasn’t just Roswell and Aztec, but other supposed incidents occurred as well. Many of these are discussed in the official files I have already mentioned, which anyone can read for themselves.

2. The CIA files I obtained show clearly that COSMIC existed prior to the formation of NATO.

I am to believe that the individuals meeting secretly to discuss the coming joint protection plan for Europe, which became NATO, would be kept from the Director of Central Intelligence? Another thing to take note of is that the original programs were Top Secret: METRIC and Top Secret: COSMIC, but the NATO version is referred to as COSMIC secret. -the third teir of Secret, Top Secret and COSMIC secret...not the same.

from the CIA's on-line library

                             Unconventional Aircraft Investigation Teams

When the newly formed United States Air Force’s official flying disc program (Project SIGN) began, on 22 January 1948 (coincidentally on the anniversary of the creation of the CIG), the Army’s Unconventional Aircraft program already existed. Certain of the individuals working at the Air Technical Intelligence Center, at Wright Field, such as Colonel Howard McCoy, had been investigating sightings of strange air objects during the war, for the Chief Signals Officer of the Army Signal Corps.

The Army General Staff’s Intelligence Group (not to be confused with the Joint Intelligence Group -JIG) worked with SIGN personnel via the Zone of the Interior, Intelligence Division. This fact is proven beyond all doubt via the so-called Blue Book files. 

This doc downloaded from the National Archives

I would posit that the ZI Intelligence Group was not just working with SIGN, but actually was over-seeing their progress. This is because the General Staff’s Office of the Assistant Chief of Staff/Intelligence was the overseer of the whole UFO program. In fact, the Air Force was to later also create an Office of the Assistant Chief of Staff/Intelligence to liase with the Army’s Intelligence group.

If one reviews Air Force Regulation 200-2 this can also be “fact-checked”.

In 1947, the Air Force’s Office of the ACS/I was headquarted at 4^th Air Force HQ at Hamilton Field, Novato, California. It was there that they housed and maintained the catalogues of potential enemy and unknown missile photographs. In the early documents it can be seen that this base worked with the FBI and the Army CIC and the Navy to investigate the disc sightings. In fact, it was Hamilton Field that sent the two CIC Officers to Washington to check on the Maury Island incident. The 4th AF/ADC filing code for reports was 1201-I, but the over-all Unconventional Aircraft filing code for the General Staff was 452.1.

On 25 March 1948, three months after SIGN’s incception, 452.1 was given an added security feature, which was a Top Secret Control code of A-1917. This occurred via the publication of an official Letter of Instruction (LOI) for reporting “Unconventional Aircraft, including the so-called Flying Discs” from the Army General Staff’s Intelligence Group, which was under the command of Colonel Ryley F. Ennis. As noted before, the Intelligence Group was controlled by the General Staff’s office of the Assistant Chief of Staff/Intelligence. For several years after, this LOI was referred to in the official UFO files as being the authority for reporting incidents relating to sightings of Unconventional Aircraft by military personnel. Though updated LOIs would later be published, 452.1 with Control A-1917 did not change.

                                                    Crash Stories Erupt

In late September, 1949, a well known at the time actor, Bruce Cabot, was playing golf with one Silas Newton, at a prestegious golf club. During the course of their day, Mr. Newton informed Mr. Cabot about at least one disc crash or landing. Newton even claimed to have metal parts from this craft, as well as some type of radio device. After their game was finished, Mr. Cabot promptly phoned the FBI, and told them the whole story. After I read this in the Blue Book files, I pondered why Cabot felt the need to “rat out” Silas Newton? After a cursory look into Mr. Cabot, I found that he had been with the Army Air Corps during the war, and was found guilty of being part of a conspiracy to steal gold. He spent the final years of the conflict in Federal prison. Could he have siezed this moment, at the golf course, to somehow make amends to Uncle Sam...to clean up his bad reputation? It could explain his actions. Otherwise, why bother reporting Newton to anyone? Who cares if some nut job is telling saucer stories? Unless, of course, Cabot was fully aware of the Army’s stance on NOT discussing the Flying Discs, as it was a National Security issue to the Army’s top brass, even while the Air Force was publically ridiculing the topic. Whether Newton or Cabot was aware of the fact, reports of landings and crashing of flying saucers were actally occurring at that same moment in time.

For instance, in Montana, at Hegben Lake, Forest Rangers had witnessed a group of saucers fly over them, with two or three of them appearing to land or crash in the forest or even into the Lake. A major search was made by Intelligence personnel, but they reportedly found nothing. Even still, they had conducted quite a thorough search, which included dragging the Lake bottom. Other incidents were reported, such as a military pilot witnessing some type of unconventional “object” nearly colliding with his plane, as the object dove down from someplace above, at a very high velocity. This silver cylinder was headed towards impacting with the earth. Did it actually crash? That part is missing from the files.

There are actually many reports like these in the files.

                                        Closing Down Projecct 10073

On 4 January 1950, classified memos were making the rounds in Project 10073: GRUDGE, pertaining to it’s closure as a “special” project. These memorandums discussed the prospect of the flying disc problem becoming absorbed into normal Intelligence activities. Of course, we can all ponder the question : if there is no such things as flying saucers, why would sightings of them be absorbed into the normal Intelligence channels?

On the same day, 4 January 1950, a science fiction writer, well known by local science fiction fandom for the day, had his newest article published in Arthur Rapp’s Fanzine: SPACEWARP. In it, Wilkie Conner writes about having contacts which informed him about a saucer recovery in Mexico. The date given for this incident was 4 October 1949. Mr. Conner claimed that several individuals associated with the recovery program were upset, because the Air Force was shutting down the saucer investigation, and they felt angry about it.

see: https://fanac.org/FANAC_Inc/index.html

These people felt compelled to come forward, secretly, to inform the public. Well, Mr. Conner’s sources were definitely correct about the program being shut down. If they weren’t legit, how could they know that?

Two days later, on 6 January 1950, a Kansas City newspaper published a slightly different story about a saucer recovery. The Wyandotten Echo presented, to their readers, a well-known to them local auto dealer, Rudy Fick. Mr Fick related a story to them about an individual Rudy called “Mr. Coulter”, who was an engineer associated with the Ford Motor Company. Mr. Coulter claimed to have been shown two saucers being held at a secret facility, and he had pieces of metal (similar to Mr. Newton) from at least one of these craft. Supposedly, he gave some of these pieces to the manager of the Ford dealership where they were located, in Denver, Colorado. He was to send them to the Dearborn plant for analysis.

Before anymore is said on this point, let me point out to the reader that, at that time, the Dearborn Michigan plant and its labs, were connected to the Central Intelligence Agency. If anything had actually been sent there, it is very unlikely that anyone would ever see these items again, nor get any true and honest response from them about authenticity. The rival newspaper to the “Echo” was the Kansas City Star. They were asked if they were aware of the story, and they said, “yes,” but that it was too wild to print. Mr. Coulter, in the mean time, was contacted for comment, but he refused, saying that he had been contacted and been warned to keep quiet. He was quoted as saying his, “lips were sealed”.

Though they said they would not get involved in such an outlandish tale, the Kansas City Star published their own article, debunking the whole story. In their article, they introduce us to George Koehler, whom they said was actuall the real Mr. Coulter. It was a mix up, and that was all. Koehler was an advertising sales agent for a radio station. Also, according to this article, the whole saucer tale had been a joke cooked up by Mr. Fick. The problem is, if you recall, Mr. Coulter said his lips were sealed and at no time did Rudy Fick disclose Mr. Coulter’s first name to anyone. Also, Mr. Coulter was said to have been an engineer, not a radio add salesman.

The Wyandotte Echo published a follow-on article on the 21^st. In this article, they lambasted the “Star” for lying and accused them of out right plagerism. 

Thanks to Frank Warren, publisher of the ufochronicles website, for being able to get access to this article  www.theufochronicles.com 

It was too late. From this point on, the story that began with Rudy Fick and The Wyandotte Echo article were erased from history. Soon it became the hoax, perpetrated by two “con men” and both Wilkie Conner and Rudy Fick are swept entirely under the rug. As for Project 10073, it quietly continued, and morphed into Project: BLUEBOOK. I thought they were closing it down as a “special” project?

Hmmm...I wonder what spooked them?

                             Spaatz’s May Trip

On 2 May 1948, soon to be retired Chief of Staff/US Air Force General Spaatz landed at Northolt Airport, in Britain, for a “visit” with several heads of staffs.

The General “took the opportunity” to discuss issues of mutual defense, against Russian aggression and expansion. According to an article from the Cincinnati Enquirer, his arrival came 48 hours after “...Defense Ministers and Chiefs of Staff of Britain, France, Belgium, Holland and Luxembourg appointed a sort of super-general staff to prepare a joint defense against any surprise Soviet attack.” It was part of the continuing plan for mutual assurance that became NATO.

Less than two months prior to this meeting of the minds, 25 March 1948, was the day it appears that the hornet’s nest had been disturbed. As I have begun to demonstrate this fact using this blog, it was the day General Spaatz declared the 24 hour-a-day air defense emergency. According to The Emerging Shield [by Kenneth Schaffel, 1953-1988, for the Office of Air Force History] General Spaatz’s air defense emergency lasted until early April. The rescinding of the emergency was apparently one of the first actions taken by the new Chief of Staff, General Vandenberg. What ever caused General Spaatz to order a 24-hour-a-day air defense emergency on 25 March 1948 had to have been an important topic of interest during this global defense meeting, of the early stages of NATO.

The article goes on to say, Spaatz will fly to the American occupation zone of Germany later this week. This is where most of the tension was projected by the Soviets during the “March War Scare.” The article goes on: ...The western union was also believed to have figured in conversation held by Myron C. Taylor, President Truman’s special representative at the Vatican, and British officials. Taylor left yesterday for Paris.”

                 The Cincinnati Enquirer, May 4, 1948, Page 24. via Newspapers.com (https://cincinnati.newspapers.com/article/the-cincinnati-enquirer-25marchspaatz/175874646/ : accessed July 23, 2025), clip page for 25_March_Spaatz by user bobkoford

According to the paper published in International Affairs in 1983: The Pentagon negotiations March 1948: the launching of the North Atlantic Treaty, by Cees Wiebes and Bert Zeeman (studied political science at the Department of International Relations and International Law, FSW-A, University of Amsterdam), According to official NATO historiography, the negotiations that led to the signing of the North Atlantic Treaty started on 6 July 1948 in Washington. ³ However, for a few years it has been known that negotiations on a security treaty between the United States and West European nations Had already been conducted before that date. 

Those negotiations     took place at the end of March 1948 in utmost secrecy between the Untied States, the United Kingdom and Canada at the Pentagon in Washington. One of the participants in those secret deliberations refers to ‘the crucial (and secret) “Pentagon” talks in March 1948 during which the North Atlantic Treaty was effectively conceived’ ⁴

3 See NATO Facts and Figures (Brussels: NATO Information Service, 1981, page 21

4 Lord Gladwyn, review of Escott Reid, Time of Fear and hope, in International Journal, Winter 1977/78, Vol. 33, No. 1, Page 248

                                                             TDEW-UFO

           By Bob Koford_2016

As a result of these investigations and studies and experience gained from investigating UFO reports since 1948, the conclusions of Project BLUE BOOK are:(1) no UFO reported, investigated, and evaluated by the Air Force has ever given any indication of threat to our national security;(2) there has been no evidence submitted to or discovered by the Air Force that sightings categorized as "unidentified" represent technological developments or principles beyond the range of present-day scientific knowledge; and(3) there has been no evidence indicating that sightings categorized as "unidentified" are extraterrestrial vehicles. – from the National Archives page on project BLUE BOOK

Since before the start of World War II, factions within the military were investigating unknown aerial phenomena, of different types.¹ These investigations continued during and after the conflict.² In the late forties, the “official” UFO program was known as Project SIGN. In this blog writer’s opinion, the name has some roots in its connections with the Army Signal Corps, and the laboratory at Fort Monmouth, New Jersey. The important fact, though, is that the program existed.

By 1949, the second incarnation of the known UFO program was called GRUDGE. This writer took notice of the coincidence of the letters _DGE, in the name, because in air defense parlance, it stands for Defensive Ground Environment,³ a term which describes a ground-based, monitoring system, such as RADAR. Sometimes they are combined with AAC weapons. General Vandenberg had also been quoted in the press using the term “global rocket”.⁴ Consequently, the phrase: Global Rocket Unknowns Defensive Ground Environment was proposed to be the actual meaning, treating it as an Anagram. This fits very well with what they were doing, because both GRUDGE and the third version of the program, Project BLUE BOOK, were parts of a very ambitious air defense plan that became Air Defense Command’s: The BLUE BOOK Plan for Air Defense of 1952. This was its actual name, in full.⁵

When we see and hear information from former heads of the Aerial Phenomenon Branch at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base (Quintanilla and Friend), we are not seeing and hearing from or about the actual heads of the over-all UFO program! This isn’t to say that then Major Hector Quintanilla or Colonel Robert Friend didn’t have important jobs, it is just that they were not the top of the chain of Command, in the UFO world, as we have been led to believe.

An example of this can clearly be shown by examining the events taking place, behind the scenes, in 1966. The Air Force’s Scientific Advisory Board had issued its recommendations.⁶ It suggested bringing in top notch scientific personnel to evaluate some of the best incidents. Eventually this is where the Colorado University’s “Condon Committee” came into the UFO picture.

In the mid-nineteen sixties, the actual “over-all head of the UFO program” resided with the office of the Deputy Chief of Staff/ Research and Development. ⁷ That person was Lt. General James Ferguson.⁸ This is the same General Ferguson who had been the first head of Weapons System 117L development, in the early to mid-nineteen fifties (WS-117L was first requested, by official recommendation, in 1951).⁹ WS-117L was a broad undertaking, whose main goal was to achieve total global and outer-space awareness. It had given us the CORONA “spy-satellite” system, among many other satellite system developments.

The other UFO program was located within a weapons and engineering program, which consisted of a Commander, a Vice-Commander, an Assistant for Staff Support and a Scientific Advisor.¹⁰ While the Aerial Phenomenon Branch gathered UFO data, this other group concentrated their efforts on monitoring and designing weapon systems. All of these worked out of Headquarters, Air Force Systems Command, in the office of Technical Defense and Engineering (TDE).¹¹

Within TDE resided a sub-department, known as the office of Technical Defense, Engineering and Weapons (TDEW), which is the office that the Commander and his team worked out of (TDEW-UFO), and it was all located within the Foreign Technology Division (FTD) at Wright-Patterson AFB.¹² The Commander of the UFO weapons program was Colonel Raymond S. Sleeper. His official title was: Deputy Chief of Staff/Foreign Technology.¹³

The immediate question that came into this blog-writer’s mind, after finding this information, and reading it: If UFOs don’t exist, or pose a threat to National Security, why would we need to develop any type of, what appears to be some sort of UFO Defense program?

Colonel Sleeper, still being the Commander of the “UFO Defense” Program, conducted a briefing for General Garland, now head of AF Information, on 7 July 1967.¹⁴ Could the date of the briefing have been secretly chosen because it was the 20th-year anniversary of the “Roswell Clean-Up”? We obviously could not know that, but it is interesting to ponder. At any rate, one interesting feature in the briefing was the fact that Colonel Sleeper stressed, “…fifty million Americans now believe in the existence of the phenomenon…”. Because of this fact, he felt that the “…Air Force respond to this anchored public attitude by: announcing and maintaining a scientific investigation program for UFOs; keeping the public well informed at all times; and initiating positive programs in such scientific areas as extraterrestrial communications.”¹⁵

In todays world, if someone were to mention extraterrestrial communications, it would be assumed they were talking about satellite communications. This is not what Commander Sleeper was referring to, and General Garland’s reply came on August 2. “Dear Ray:”, it began. “…I have thought about the problem many times since your briefing here. I am more convinced than ever that a positive program in extraterrestrial life or communications studies should not be tied to the UFO problem.”¹⁶

Well of course it shouldn’t. They had spent all that time, during the previous investigations, declaring to the public that Flying Discs -let alone extraterrestrial beings -were the things of fantasy. Note, if you will, the reference is to the UFO “problem”. It is always a “problem” to them. The Intelligence portion of the UFO programs were subject to scrutiny, which just can’t be. And besides, how could they now admit they were indeed, or might be, dealing with something extraterrestrial in nature? Logically speaking, why would Colonel Sleeper even bring it up in the first place? General Garland went on, “…I realize Condon must address this subject, but this is different from conducting active research.”

So, you see the mentioning of things extraterrestrial was not a reference to satellite communications, it was a reference to actual extraterrestrials. Colonel Sleeper was following the internal recommendations that led to General Garland’s briefing, such as “…keeping the public well informed at all times.” As we now understand, this never was accomplished. Instead, the Colorado study, under Edward Condon, recommended the closing down of the UFO program, and stripping the subject of its “aura of mystery.”

In General Garland’s reply to Colonel Sleeper, he stated that he felt that a “positive” program wouldn’t be a good idea. He didn’t just think that we shouldn’t connect the subject of extraterrestrials with the UFOs, he was opposed to promoting a “positive” program regarding extraterrestrial life itself. Colonel Sleeper would have been the person in a position to know quite a bit about Flying Saucers. Not only was he aware of them, he was proposing to the General that the UFO program be responsible for this positive extraterrestrial education program.

Therefore, the right approach, of course, was to separate the two subjects, at all costs!

This, they accomplished thoroughly.

_____________________________________________

An afterthought:

As an experiment, only meant in fun, just for comparison, let us see what the declaration, from the Archive’s page, printed at the beginning of this paper, reads like when the negative parts are inverted:

“As a result of these investigations and studies and experience gained from investigating UFO reports since 1948, the conclusions of Project BLUE BOOK are:(1) Certain UFOs reported, investigated, and evaluated by the Air Force have given indication of threat to our national security;(2) there has been evidence submitted to and/or discovered by the Air Force that sightings categorized as "unidentified" represent technological developments or principles beyond the range of present-day scientific knowledge; and(3) there have been certain pieces of evidence that indicates that sightings categorized as "unidentified" are extraterrestrial vehicles.”

Sure, the above “redo” might be a slight bit over-the-top, but General Garland and Colonel Sleeper, most definitely, appeared to be discussing how to broach the extraterrestrial subject. This occurred only a few years before the “UFO Program” was terminated as a special project, in 1969.

It doesn’t seem reasonable to view this evidence, and not admit that it indeed appears to be a case of, for a brief, rare moment in time, lightly discussing a matter that would soon be over-the-top-secret once again.

There are no extraterrestrials… -right?

Notes

1 UFOs and Government-A Historical Inquiry, by Michael Swords, et. al. ©2012 by the UFO History Group; Strange Company©2007 by Keith Chester; The Government UFO Files,by Kevin D. Randle©2014 Visible Ink Press

2 Ibid; The Nation Archives holdings on Project: Blue Book

3 The Closed World by Paul N. Edwards ©1996 Massachusetts Institute of Technology; The Emerging Shield, by Kenneth Schaffel, for the Office of Air Force History

4 The Washington Post, June 1952, located in the “Project Blue Book files”; “…with the present world unrest we cannot afford to be complacent...Our job is to detect any weapon that might be used against the United States. In the future a weapon that was 'probably a meteor' may prove to be a global rocket.”

5 The Emerging Shield, by Kenneth Schaffel, for the Office of Air Force History

6 TDE/UFO Office, file copy, 28 July 1967, Letter to Brig. General William C. Garland, Deputy Director of Information, from Colonel Raymond S. Sleeper, Commander, TDEW/UFO

7 Reply from, Department of the Air Force, Headquarters, Air Force Systems Command, Andrews AFB, Washington, D. C., Reply to, Attention of, SCFA, 2 June 1966, Scientific Panel Investigation on UFO, “To: FTD (TDG), The Deputy Chief of Staff, Research and Development, has notified Systems Command of his assumption of the Office of Primary Responsibility for Unidentified Flying Objects (UFO).”

8 United States Air Force Statistical Digest, Fiscal Year 1967, Twenty Second Edition, R. J. Pugh, Colonel, USAF, Director of Administrative Services, OPR: AFADSAC. Distribution: M

9 SECRET, General Background – WS-117L, “…the concept of the Advanced Reconnaissance System, is a result of studies conducted at the RAND Corporation…”

10 Author’s Files, Memo Routing Slip, COMMANDER, - 1 VICE COMMANDER 2, ASST FOR STAFF SUPPORT 2, CHIEF SCIENTIST 2, SCIENTIFIC ADVISOR, TDE 2, TDEW UFO

11 Nation Archives, Blue Book holdings, Air Technical Intelligence Center background

12 Ibid

13 Reply from, Department of the Air Force, Headquarters, Air Force Systems Command, Andrews AFB, Washington, D. C., Reply to, Attention of, SCFA, 2 June 1966, Scientific Panel Investigation on UFO, signature, “…Raymond S. Sleeper, Colonel, USAF, DCS/Foreign Technology”

14 Letter to Brig. General William C, Garland, Deputy Director of Information, 28 July 1967, “Our 7 July 1967 briefing to you and members of your staff…”

15 Ibid

16 Department of the Air Force, Washington 20330, Office of the Secretary, August 2, 1967, “Dear Ray…I think we are a long way from getting a handle on this (UFO/public affairs) problem…research in this area should be accomplished by an entirely unrelated activity.”

   CIA confirmed: no bombers on 25 March 1948 

As you can see from "Air Information Report" from August, they were very aware of aircraft movement. Manufacturing informational awareness was also high on their list of priorities.

According to this report, the CIA was aware of bomber training missions from Moscow to Vladivostok and back again on 13 and 14 March, and then on 15 and 16 March. Nothing for 25 March...or even the 23rd or 24th.

                                    25 March 1948 and Enemy Subs

Another facet to the alarming reports being given to the Armed Services Committee, on 25 March 1948, dealt with reports of "enemy submarines" being spotted off the coast of the U. S. Only one of the witnesses actually claimed to see a periscope, but even that isn't entirely for certain.

The Cincinnati Enquirer, March 28, 1948, Page  1. via Newspapers.com (https://cincinnati.newspapers.com/article/the-cincinnati-enquirer-navyflierssear/85143691/ : accessed July 8, 2025), clip page for Navy_Fliers_search_for_sub by user bobkoford

A few days later the story evolved into accusations of a friendly fire incident connected to the sub sightings.

It is hard to know what this was all about, but it is just one more item to add to 25 March 1948.

                                                   The CIA Act of 1948

[new doc added 7/11 and 7/25]

Secretary of Defense James Forrestal pleaded before the Armed Services Committee that day of 25 March 1948. Part of his alarming report to them dealt with the need to re-vamp and upgrade of the official orders and authorizations for the Central Intelligence Agency. House of Representatives Bill 5871 and Senate Bill 2306 were known, collectively, as the CIA Act of 1948. 

In these modern times, it is still common to see this little bit of history ignored...even by the Company, itself. Instead, we may discuss anything else, such as the CIA Act of April 1949, but not 25 March 1948 and the CIA Act of 1948. Why is that? You can find it if you search hard enough, but it is more generally ignored. 

Congress asked for a detailed reason for the need, and the next day, on the 26th, Deputy Director of the CIA, Brig. General Wright produced a response.

Source: CIA FOIA On-Line Reading Room

The key issue was a provision authorizing the CIA to conduct operations in which the funds and operators (be it financial, industrial or government)could be kept completely a secret. In other words, they didn't even need to report it through standard Top Secret Control procedures. It is almost as if something happened on that Thursday morning that put some in the Intelligence Community, be it Army, Navy, Air Force or other, in a position where they could not say what they were doing or what it cost or who was used in the operation. Instead, we get the CIA Act of 1948. 

Here is the internal memo that General Wright penned having to do with the reasons for the 25 March upgrade. 

All I can verify so far is that it pertains to this non disclosure aspect of certain highly sensitive operations and their financing, as confirmed by later memos from the 30th.

This memo, from 2 April, sheds the most light on the Deputy Director's 25 March memo.

                               26 March 1948 / Psyops URGENT

[Edited:] What eventually would evolve into the psychological strategy board met to discuss a matter of urgency on 25 March, the same day General Spaatz declared a 24 hour-a-day air emergency...the same day they passed the CIA Act of 1948, that you rarely ever hear of (instead you will see the CIA Act of 1949...April).