by Steven M. Greer, M.D.
Copyright 1996

Click here for the PDF version.

 

Can the government keep a secret?

A really big secret – the biggest of all time? When the peccadillos of every politician and government leader are prime time news, could the government hide from us the most astounding discovery in the history of the world – the existence of extraterrestrial life?

Well, yes – and no.

First, the concept of government must be redefined, because there exists the government of ‘we the people’, elected and appointed officials, public representatives, the executive, legislative and judicial branches, etc, etc, a la your standard junior high civics course.

But then, there is also the unacknowledged ‘government’: the ‘government’ of deep cover, deep black projects, contract agents and companies, and shadowy mid-level functionaries whose task it is to ensure that the government of ‘we the people’ knows little or nothing about the unacknowledged ‘government’.

The right hand does not know – or often want to know – what the left hand is doing….

But we’re getting a little ahead of ourselves now. First some background.

For nearly six years I have quietly researched how real secrecy is maintained, in the latter half of the twentieth century. What I have found is astonishing, and frankly unbelievable. What you are about to read is the truth – but I admit that I would not have believed it had someone told me this 3 years ago. You may want to read the rest of this article as if it were a fictional story. You may feel more comfortable looking at all of this from a distance. But let some part of you know that this is the truth.

This article is not about whether UFOs/ETs are real, or are visiting earth. Let’s get this out of the way first, since it is the easy part: UFOs are real; they are of extraterrestrial origin; they have been around for decades (if not centuries); there is no evidence that they are hostile; there is probably more than one type of life form visiting us; and aspects of the ‘government’ have known this for 50 years, at least.

The more difficult part of this subject is getting your mind around the fact that something this extraordinary is real, and yet remains somehow unreal, hidden, secret, enigmatic. That the official government – and the official keepers of truth in the media and science- have been deceived for this long is a tribute to the sophistication, depth, breadth and ubiquity of a secret program unparalleled in history.

Indeed, the story of how – and why – this deception has existed exceeds the extraterrestrial phenomenon itself in bizarreness, mystery and incredulity. In fact, it seems that the effectiveness of the secrecy is itself related to the stunning incredulity of the nature of the secrecy. Put another way, the whys, hows, and wherefores of these secret projects are so bizarre and unbelievable, that they provide their own best cover: no one would believe it even if they came upon it. It is absolutely over the top.

To be honest, my own first reaction to what you are about to read was, “yeah, right…”. But then confirmation after confirmation, and independent corroboration after independent corroboration convinced me of it. And then I was saying, “Oh God…”

Space here only permits me to share with you the highlights of 6 years of intense, behind-the -scenes research. Someday, I hope the entire story can be told, names and all, but for now allow me to paint for you a broad picture, and some of the details. This information comes from personal, private and exquisitely sensitive meetings and long discussions with very senior and relevant military, intelligence, political and private corporate sources. The search for truth regarding these secret projects has brought me to heads of state, royalty, CIA officials, NSA operatives, US and foreign military leaders, political leaders and high-tech corporate contractors. The process has been exhaustive, relentless and mind-blowing. Safety and prudence requires that I leave their names out of this for now; by the time you finish reading this, the reason will be obvious.

This phase in the CSETI project began in earnest in July of 1993, when a small group of military and civilian people involved with the UFO matter met at my request to discuss how to best liaison with the government and military. From an operational point of view, CSETI needed a senior point of contact (POC) within the chain of command who knew what we were doing to contact extraterrestrial civilizations. We wanted to ensure that our efforts were safe from intentional or unintentional military/intelligence/government interference. And we wanted to be clear that our effort should be regarded as a citizen’s-diplomacy effort and that a stand-down order should exist protecting us from any interference, in the US or abroad. In the previous year, CSETI had facilitated two near-landing events in England and Mexico, and we wanted to be sure, given these developments, that we could proceed with safety for both our teams and for the extraterrestrial visitors, whom we regard as our guests.

Over the following few months, members of our team had had discussions and briefings with a wide array of government, military, intelligence, political, international and private leaders around the world. What we learned seemed surreal, unimaginable and bizarre.

Beginning at least as early as World War II, we found that certain officials in the US government knew that we were not alone, that there were advanced machines flying around in certain regions of the WWII conflict which were not ours, and not theirs. A medical colleague and friend, whose relative was a celebrated WWII pilot, has told me that this pilot was sent to Europe by the president to figure out what these so-called ‘foo’ fighters were. He reported back to the president that they were extraterrestrial spacecraft.

From there on, it gets more and more strange. A retired general, who later became right hand man to a certain CIA director, told me this: That as a military officer in 1946, he was responsible for writing ‘non-responsive’ letters regarding a series of day time sightings of UFOs over Idaho. He said people knew the UFOs were real, but soon a Cold War was on, and later a few hot wars ensued, and everyone was concerned with global thermonuclear war- so who had time to worry about these enigmatic but harmless ETs.

Who indeed.

Multiple new, independently corroborating witnesses told us of the crash and retrieval of ET spacecraft in 1947 in New Mexico and in 1948 in Kingman Arizona. Now THIS really got someone’s attention, and the name of the game was, henceforth, ADVANCED EXTRATERRESTRIAL TECHNOLOGY. How does it work; what can it be used for; how will they use it; what if the Soviets figure it out before we do; what if it leaks out and some new Hitler uses it to dominate the world; what if people panic when they learn of it; what….

And a million more questions, at the time all unanswered.

And thus was born the secret project of the millennium.

After all, at the time, we were working on the development of the hydrogen bomb – and our arch-enemy the Soviets were hot on our tail. What could be more destabilizing to an already fragile world order than the introduction of inter-stellar propulsion technology to a world of vacuum tubes and internal combustion engines? To say we were facing a quantum leap in technological capability is an understatement. And we wanted it safely for ourselves.

So, ‘National Security’ demanded that this entire matter be kept quiet at all costs. And no cost was spared in doing so.

But there was one very large and busy fly in this ointment: The ETs were flying, sometimes in formation, with thousands of witnesses, over the skies of America, and the rest of the world. Now, how do you hide that?

 

The mind hides it. In an Orwellian twist, it was found from past psychological warfare efforts during WWII that, indeed, if you tell a lie often enough, especially if told by ‘respected’ authority figures, the people will believe it. It appears that one of the masters of psychological warfare during WWII was put in charge of this in the late 1940s. General Walter Bedell Smith helped coordinate the psychological warfare components of this problem, and helped launch the big lie: UFOs, even though millions have seen them, do not exist.

For every sighting which made its way into public awareness, there would be official denial and, worse, ridicule of the event and the observers. Harvard Astronomer Donald Menzel was trotted out to tell the world that it was all hysteria, that UFOs were not real, that it was all poppycock.

So well into the 1950s, a relatively small group of people knew the truth, and kept the truth to themselves. When an event occurred which got the media’s attention, authority figures would deny and ridicule it. Since humans are generally insecure social creatures, and more like lemmings that we would like to admit, it became clear that if you wanted to avoid embarrassment, ridicule and social estrangement, you kept quiet about UFOs, even if you had seen one up close and personal. Add to this the active encouragement of wacky stories and bizarre tall tales within the civilian UFO subculture, aided by the naturally occurring level of crazies and crack-pots in society generally and, well, you get the picture. Any respectable person – and especially the ‘respectable’ media, scientists and political leaders- would have to view this as the ‘topic non grata’ to avoid.

(Having gone through what I have in the past 6 years, I really can’t say I blame them…)

But this is all very conventional stuff, really. The bizarre twists began in the 1950s, when a new model for covert projects evolved; a Frankenstein was created, but now it has gotten a will of its own, has gotten up off the table, breaking all restraints, and is moving around amongst us.

In late 1993 and into 1994, 1995 and 1996, from one meeting to another, a shocking truth emerged. Somehow on the way to the 90s, something awful had happened: The entire matter had been largely privatized, was 10 levels deep black and was operating outside the constitutional chain of command of the US or any other government. Now, I know what you are thinking – I thought the same at first – but hear me out.

Within a few months of that initial meeting in July of 1993, I and of the CIA, Congress, the Clinton Administration, the UN, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the military in England and elsewhere. Our initial logic was first to make the case to these folks that since the Cold War was over, a window of opportunity had opened through which a major disclosure on this matter could be made. The time had come to return this matter to the international community. Right? Wrong! Virtually without exception, leaders in the military, intelligence fields, politics and national security areas agreed that the time had come for the truth to be told.

Problem is, they had no access to the truth, or the data, or the cases, or the technology or the deceased ET bodies in storage (yes we know where they are and it is not Wright Patterson Air Force Base any longer). Those who I thought would be in the loop were out, and the ones running the show were a strange combination of covert operatives and private corporate interests. From then on it was through the looking glass we go.

My ancestors fought in the American Revolution in North Carolina. They fought for the establishment of a constitutional, representative form of government; now I wondered what had happened to the constitution. Like a very bad dream, I kept hoping to awaken to find it was not true. How could I share this with others? Who would believe it? It was bad enough for a doctor in NC to maintain that we were being visited by advanced extraterrestrial life forms, but this?

I asked a friend who was on the staff of President Reagan’s National Security Council how this could be true. How could some of the most powerful people in the world – in government, in the military, the senior intelligence and national security areas – not only not know about this, but have NO ACCESS to this information? I asked him if we let the President know exactly who out there really does know about this and he called them into the Oval Office and said, “I am the President of the United States and I want you to tell me everything you know about this matter”, what would they do?

He laughed and said, “Steve, if they don’t want the President to know, they will simply lie to the president and say no such thing exists. It’s done all the time….” I was stunned by the cynicism of this, and by the clear breech in constitutional law.

Under the ruse of ‘plausible deniability’ to ‘protect’ senior government officials, this apparently is done in certain sensitive areas, and the UFO matter is the most sensitive of all.

In a meeting with a very senior leader in the intelligence community, whose position any one in the public would assume allowed him to know every bit of important secret information, I discovered that, even though this official knew the matter was real, that the UFOs were real, he had no access to either past or current information or projects dealing with the ET subject. Again, I was stunned.

Ditto for very senior Senate investigators with subpoena power and top secret clearance. Ditto for people at the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Ditto for senior UN people. Ditto for senior Ministry of Defense officials in Great Britain. Ditto for heads of state.

And so it went, on and on. No deception this; these meetings were arranged by personal, back-door contacts and friends. Ironically, these leaders were turning to us for information, analysis and, strangely, action, to get this secret mess fixed. My pointing out that I am only a country doctor from North Carolina, with a wife, four kids, a minivan and a golden retriever did not change this reality. So in my ‘spare’ time, I have done what I could.

UNACKNOWLEDGED SPECIAL ACCESS PROJECTS. USAPS. This term – concept, really – took some time to take hold. Call me naive, but I really believe in democracy and the constitution, the office of the president, the importance of a congress and so on. But such quaint notions at some point had to be assimilated in my mind and reconciled with this new reality: That the president, and congress and the courts and the UN and all the other world leaders exist. They worry about taxes, money, programs of this sort or another. But the really big stuff – leave them out of it. After all, these people come and go every 2 or 4 years. What they don’t know won’t hurt them; besides, we’re doing them a favor by keeping them innocent of any knowledge of these secret projects. At any rate, these projects are UNACKNOWLEDGED, and they don’t really exist at all….

In working with people on the inside of these projects, you must understand that I had to endure a very steep learning curve. Having never been in the military, the government or the intelligence field, this was all new to me. Please understand that I cannot betray the confidence of those who risked so much to share this information with me. People have been killed – and recently – for less, much less.

What is a USAP? It is a top secret, compartmentalized project requiring special access even for those with a top secret clearance, AND it is unacknowledged. This means that if someone -anyone- including your superiors, including the commander and chief, the president, asks you about it, you reply that no such project exists. You lie.

People in these USAPS are dead serious about keeping their project secret, and will do nearly anything to keep the story covered, and to keep both other officials and the public disinformed.

And the grand daddy of all USAPS is the UFO/ET matter.

Remember that a top secret Canadian document written by Wilbur Smith in 1950 stated that he had found that a secret US group was working on the UFO matter, including the technology behind the UFOs, and that this was the most secret undertaking in the US government, exceeding even the secrecy surrounding the development of the H-bomb.

Now imagine if you will, this project 50 years later. A lot of water has gone beneath the bridge. There has been 50 years and countless billions spent on various aspects of the project: reverse engineering extraterrestrial technology to figure out how it works; experiments with non-linear propulsion and communications systems; massive public disinformation efforts and the deceit of constitutionally elected and appointed officials and bodies; and more.

Add to this active disinformation – the hoaxing or simulation of false ET events, to deceive the public and serve as decoys, thus taking peoples’ attention away from the real action. Abductions. Mutilations. Hybrid babies floating in space and in underground bases. Secret pacts between one-world -government forces and the sinister aliens. And so forth ad nauseam.

Tragically, the tabloid media, book publishers, the UFO subculture/industry and the general public eat this stuff up by the gallon measure.

Not only does this nonsense serve as effective decoys to the unfunded and unprofessional civilian UFO subculture, it creates the patina of craziness and tawdriness needed to keep ‘respectable’ scientists, mainstream media and public officials silent. It keeps the whole matter safely off their radar screens.

From the mid 1940s to the mid to late 1950s, as these matters go, this secret group was somewhat conventional. A number of officials in the Truman and Eisenhower administrations knew about it and were involved. It was genuinely felt to be imperative to the national security that this matter be kept quiet for a while. And I believe they were acting in good faith, and within the reasonable limits of our constitutional democracy.

But apparently sometime in the mid to late Eisenhower years, a pattern developed where those who legally should be in the loop were shoved out. We have more than one corroborating source that this was the case in the late Eisenhower years and the Kennedy Administration.

First hand witnesses have told us that Eisenhower was furious that he was being kept in the dark about a number of important aspects of the UFO/ET matter. He had seen the ET spacecraft and bodies, and yet he found that extraordinary projects were under way, and he was out of the loop. Is it any wonder then that, notwithstanding the fact that he was a 5 star general and conservative Republican, he warned of the “military-industrial complex” in his last address to the nation as president? People forget that it was this 5 star general – and not Abby Hoffman – who coined the term military- industrial complex, first warning us of the dangers of its excesses. Why? Because he had seen those excesses up close and personal.

Fast forward to June of 1963. Kennedy is flying to Berlin to deliver his famous speech proclaiming “I am a Berliner”. On board Air Force One is a military man who relates the following: Kennedy, on the long flight, at one point began discussing the UFO matter with this military officer. He admitted that he knew the UFOs were real, had seen the evidence, but then astonished the officer by stating that “the whole matter is out of my hands, and I don’t know why…”. Kennedy said that he wanted the truth to come out, but that he couldn’t do it. And this is the President of the United States, the Commander in Chief of the armed forces, stating that the matter is out of his hands, and he doesn’t know why. I wonder if he found out before he was killed later that year.

Eisenhower, Kennedy, Clinton Administration figures, military leaders, intelligence leaders, foreign leaders. All out of the loop. But all know its real. What is going on?

USAPS is only part of the story. The smaller part. Remember Eisenhower warning of the military-industrial complex? Operative word: industrial, private, privatized. In discussing this matter with a former head of the Ministry of Defense in Great Britain in July of 1995, I found that he was similarly kept out of the loop. We found once again that the really secret stuff was kept from even a man who was head of MI5 and the MoD. The answer existed in part with USAPS, but more largely with private contract entities.

The US government builds almost nothing (thank goodness…). The B2 Stealth bomber is not built by the US government, but FOR the US government by private industry. And private industry keeps secrets even better than USAPS. It makes sense: after all these years no body knows the formula for Coca Cola. Not even the President of the United States can get it. The formula is secret, and private.

Now if you will, combine the proprietary power of private secrets with a combined liaison with USAPS and you build a covert fortress which is virtually impenetrable. Because if you try to get at it through the private sector, it is protected by proprietary privilege. And if you try to get to it through the public sector – government – it is hidden in USAPS, and the ‘government’ as you and I ordinarily think of it is clueless.

And from personal experience I can tell you that if you inform the leaders of this, they will hold their heads in their hands and say, as I once did, “Oh my God…” So, what is the essential profile of this covert operation? Below is my current assessment, based on the degree of penetration and research as of the spring of 1996:

Last code name related to me by reliable sources: PI-40

Meaning of code name: Unknown

Description: PI-40 is a quasi-governmental, USAPS related, quasi-private entity operating internationally/transnationally. The majority of operations are centered in private industrial ‘work for others’ contract projects related to the understanding and application of advanced extraterrestrial technologies. Related compartmentalized units, which are also USAPS, are involved in disinformation, public deception, active disinformation, so-called abductions and mutilations, reconnaissance and UFO tracking, space-based weapons systems, and specialized liaison groups (for example to media, political leaders, the scientific community, the corporate world etc). Think of this entity as a hybrid between government USAPS and private industry.

PI-40 consists primarily of mid-level USAPS-related military and intelligence operatives, USAPS or black units within certain high-tech corporate entities, and select liaisons within the international policy analysis community, certain religious groups, the scientific community and the media, among others. The identities of some of these entities and individuals are known to us, though most remain unidentified.

Approximately 1/3 to 1/2 or those comprising the decision-making body of PI-40 are now in favor of a public disclosure of some type on this matter; these are, in general, the younger members who have less complicity in past excesses. The remaining members are opposed or ambivalent regarding a near-term disclosure.

Actual policy and decision-making seems to rest predominantly at this time in the private, civilian sector, as opposed to USAP-related military and intelligence officials, though some information indicates that there is significant relative autonomy in certain areas of operations. It is our current assessment that a rising degree of debate exists within PI-40 regarding certain covert operations and the advisability of a disclosure.

Many compartmentalized operations within ‘black’ or USAPS projects are structured so that those working on the task may be unaware that it is UFO/ET related. For example, some aspects of the so-called ‘Star Wars’ effort, or SDI, are intended to target extraterrestrial spacecraft which come into close proximity to earth, but the vast majority of scientists and workers in the SDI program are unaware of this.

We have learned from three separate, corroborating sources that since the early 1990s, at least 2 extraterrestrial spacecraft have been targeted and destroyed by experimental space-based weapons systems.

The vast majority of political leaders, including White House officials, military leaders, congressional leaders, UN leaders and other world leaders are not routinely briefed on this matter. When and if inquiries are made, they are told nothing about the operations, nor is the existence of any operation confirmed to them. In general the nature of this covert entity ensures that such leaders do not even know to whom such inquiries should be addressed. International cooperation exists to a wide extent, though some witnesses state that certain countries, particularly China, have aggressively pursued somewhat independent agendas.

Major bases of operations, apart from widely diversified private sites, include Edwards Air Force Base in California, Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada, particularly S4 and adjacent facilities, Los Alamos New Mexico, Fort Huachuca Arizona (Army Intelligence Headquarters), the Redstone Arsenal in Alabama, and a relatively new, expanding underground facility accessible only by air in a remote area of Utah, among others. Additional facilities and operations centers exist in a number of other countries, including the United Kingdom, Australia, and Russia. Numerous agencies have deep cover, black, USAPS related units involved with these operations, including the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), the National Security Agency (NSA), the CIA, the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), the Air Force Office of Special Investigations (AFOSI), Naval Intelligence, Army Intelligence, Air Force Intelligence, the FBI, and others. An even more extensive list of private, civilian and corporate entities have significant involvement. The majority of scientific, technical and advanced technology operations are centered in the civilian industrial and research firms. Significant – and lethal – security is provided by private contractors.

The majority of personnel as well as the leadership of most if not all of these agencies and private groups are uninvolved and unaware of these compartmentalized, unacknowledged operations. For this reason, sweeping accusations related to any particular agency or corporate entity are wholly unwarranted. ‘Plausible deniability ‘ exists at many levels. Moreover, specialization and compartmentalization allows a number of operations to exist without those involved knowing that their task is related to the UFO/ET subject.

Both positive inducements to cooperate and penalties for violating secrecy are extraordinary. A senior military source has related to us that at least 10,000 people have received $1 million or more each to ensure their cooperation, over the past few decades. Regarding penalties, we know of more than one credible case where individuals have had their families threatened should they break the code of silence, and we have learned of two recent alleged ‘suicides’ at a private contract industrial firm which occurred after the victims began to violate secrecy on a reverse-engineering project related to ET technology.

Funding: A senior congressional investigator has privately related to us that ‘black budget’ funds apparently are used for this and similar operations, which are USAPS. This ‘black budget’ involves conservatively $10 billion, and may exceed $80 billion per year. The amount dedicated to the UFO/ET operation specifically is unknown at this time. Additionally, significant funds are derived from overseas sources and private and institutional sources. Amounts deriving from these activities are also unknown by us.

This is part of what we know at this time. Obviously, there are more questions than answers here, and what is unknown exceeds what is known. Nevertheless, we have, I believe, made significant and historic advances in understanding how this entity operates. I have presented this general assessment to a number of important military, political and policy institute figures, and was surprised that it was regarded as quite accurate and in agreement with independent assessments arrived at separately by them.

But the larger question is why? As in life in general, the whats, whos and hows are always easier than the whys. Why the continued secrecy and deception?

I am reluctant to go too much further out on this limb, because here we get into questions related to ultimate motive and purpose, which is always a rather squishy area, ill-defined in the best of cases. And this, I am afraid, is no ordinary matter, and the emotions, motives and purpose behind such extraordinary and high-stakes actions are likely complex and dissonant. Indeed, such motives are likely a very mixed bag, ranging from the initially noble and well-intentioned, to the depraved.

Sen. Barry Goldwater told me in 1994 that the secrecy surrounding the ET subject was “a damn mistake then and a damn mistake now…”. I am inclined to agree with the senator here, but the drive for secrecy was not and is not altogether rooted in stupidity. Rather, I see it rooted in fear and a lack of trust.

While I generally dislike psycho-babble, I believe the psychology of all of this is important. It is my belief that secrecy, especially extreme secrecy of this degree, is always a symptom of illness. If you have secrets in your family, it is a sickness, born out of fear, insecurity and distrust. This, I feel, can be extended to communities, companies, and societies. Ultimately, the drive for secrecy is a symptom of a deeper malaise derived from a fundamental lack of trust, and an abundance of fear and insecurity.

In the case of UFOs/ET, the early days of the 1940s and 1950s were, I sense, a time of fear bordering on panic. We had just emerged from a devastating world war, and unleashed the horror of nuclear weapons. The USSR was expanding its empire, and arming itself to the teeth with bigger and deadlier nuclear weapons. And they were beating us in the race into space.

Now along come extraterrestrial spacecraft, which are retrieved along with deceased (and one living) life form. Panic. Fear. Confusion. Countless unanswered questions arise, all tinged with fear.

Why are they here? How will the public react? How can we secure their technology – and keep it from our mortal enemies? How can we tell the people that the most powerful air force in the world cannot control its airspace? What will happen to religious belief? To the Economic order? To Political stability? To the keepers of current technology? To….

It is my opinion that the early days of secrecy were predictable, even understandable, and possibly even justifiable.

But as the decades rolled by, and especially with the end of the Cold War, fear alone does not fully explain the secrecy. After all, 1996 is not 1946 – we have been to space, landed on the moon, detected planets around other star systems, found the building blocks of life in far-away space, and about 50% of the population believe the UFOs are real. And the Soviet empire has collapsed.

I believe two other significant factors are at play now: Greed and control, and the inertia of decades of secrecy. Greed and control are easily understood: Imagine being involved with a project unraveling and then applying advanced extraterrestrial technology. The power and economic impact – and thus value – of such technology exceeds the combined significance of the internal combustion engine, electricity, the computer chip and all forms of telecommunications. We are talking about the technology of the next millennium. You think the computer/information age revolution is big? Fasten your seat belts, because down the road – sooner or later – will be the non-linear, zero point technological revolutions based on advanced ET technologies.

No wonder the corporate, military-industrial complex interest and secrecy exceeds even that of the government related USAPS. The formula for Coca Cola has nothing on this.

The bureaucratic inertia of large secret operations is yet another matter. After decades of operations, and of lies, public deceptions and worse, how does such a group unravel all the webs it has weaved? There is a certain addictive allure to secret power for some types of people; they are charged by having and knowing secrets. And there is the specter of a sort of cosmic Watergate, with all manner of people calling for this head or that. It becomes easier to maintain the status quo, something all bureaucracies are adept at doing.

And even now there is fear. Not just fear of being exposed in the age of Watergate, this -gate and that-gate, but a rather xenophobic and primitive fear of the unknown. Who are these humanoids, why are they here; how dare they enter our airspace without our permission! Humanity has a long tradition of fearing – and hating – that which is different, unknown, from elsewhere. Witness the still-rampant racial, ethnic, religious, and nationalistic prejudice and hatred which ravage the world of humanity. There is an almost ingrained xenophobic response to the unknown and that which is different. And it is certain that the ETs are more different from us than, say, Protestants are from Catholics in Ireland.

I once asked a physicist involved with military and intelligence operations related to UFOs why we were attempting to destroy these spacecraft with advanced space-based weapons. He immediately became agitated and said, “Those cowboys running this thing are so arrogant, so out of control, that they view any entry by a UFO into our air space as an offense worthy of a hostile response. And they are going to get us into an inter-planetary conflict if we are not careful…” And so it goes. Fear. Fear of the unknown. Greed and control. Institutional Inertia. These are a few of what I see as the current animating forces driving the continue secrecy of PI-40.

But where to from here? How to transform this situation from extreme secrecy to disclosure?

There is an old Chinese proverb which says, “Unless we change directions, we are likely to end up where we are going.” How true. And where we are going in this area is immensely dangerous. Extreme secrecy, especially on something this far-reaching and important, undermines democracy, subverts the constitution, concentrates enormous technological power in the hands of the unelected few and puts the entire planet in harms way. This must end.

CSETI Project Starlight has been working for nearly 3 years to collect evidence, identify current and former government, military, intelligence and corporate witnesses, and brief various world leaders. Much has been accomplished, with no paid staff, no significant funding and the dedication and volunteer efforts of a persistent team. But much remains to be done. Here is a partial list: In June of 1995, we convened a meeting of important military and government witnesses from the US and Russia, and we all signed a letter asking President Clinton to issue an executive order permitting such witnesses to speak without penalty or retribution. I suggest that the Administration, in cooperation with Congress, sponsor open hearings where these witnesses, who now number over 2 dozen, could openly testify to what they know about the UFO/ET matter. This would constitute a definitive disclosure, I assure you. In this regard, you can help in two ways: 1) Write the President and ask that he issue an executive order permitting these witnesses to safely come forward, and at the same time write your Senator and Congressman and request that they sponsor open hearings where these witnesses may speak. 2) Contact me immediately if you or someone you know may be a current or former government, military or corporate witness. We have protective measures in place, and the more witnesses we have, the stronger the case – and the greater the margin of safety for all concerned. Please help us if you can.

The international community and the United Nations should similarly hold open hearings on this matter. We have witnesses from all over the world, and ideally, an international disclosure and evidence gathering effort should begin immediately.

The world community should not sit by passively, thus abdicating responsibility to secret operations. CSETI has for 5 years been involved in a citizen’s diplomacy effort, and made significant breakthroughs in developing protocols to contact these extraterrestrial visitors. Rather than passively watching this as some distant ‘phenomenon’, we should attempt to establish communication with these life forms, and begin the early stages of an open inter-planetary relationship. If you are interested in learning more about how you can be involved in such a research and diplomacy effort, contact us.

Lastly, we must be prepared to forgive. There is nothing to be gained by calling for severe retribution for those involved with either current or past secrecy. Many may have felt they were doing the right thing at the time, and even currently. We do not need a cosmic Watergate, and we must collectively renounce it. We should be willing to look to the moment and to the future, and forgive the past. There is precedent for this: In the early days of the Clinton Administration, there were sweeping disclosures about past excesses and crazy experiments within the Department of Energy, and the former Atomic Energy Commission. We learned of plutonium being put on the oatmeal of kids in orphanages, of deliberate radiation releases in populated areas to see ‘what would happen’, and so forth. This truth came out, and the world did not end. Nobody had to go to jail. The government did not collapse, and the sky did not fall. Let us move forward, with some real compassion and forgiveness, and begin the next century anew.

Ultimately, if the people will lead, the leaders will follow. Courage, vision and perseverance are needed to transform this situation, and create a time of openness, trust and to lay the foundation for both global and inter-planetary peace. If our leaders currently lack this courage and vision, then we must manifest it for them. The stakes are too high to look the other way while our future is stolen from us. The future of life on earth, and our place in the cosmos, are at risk. Together, let us work to secure it, for our children and our children’s children.

Steven M. Greer M.D.