| Successor | Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force |
|---|---|
| Formation | 2007 |
| Dissolved | 2012 |
| Type | United States governmental study |
| Legal status | Secret program, formally disbanded |
| Purpose | Study ofunidentified flying objects |
| Budget | $22 million over 5 years |
TheAdvanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program (AATIP)[1] was an unclassified but unpublicized investigatory effort funded by theUnited States Government to studyunidentified flying objects (UFOs) or unexplained aerial phenomena (UAP).[2] The program was first made public on December 16, 2017. The program began in 2007, with funding of $22 million over the five years until the available appropriations were ended in 2012.[3][4][5] The program began in the U.S.Defense Intelligence Agency.[6]
According to theDepartment of Defense, the AATIP ended in 2012 after five years, however reporting suggested that U.S. government programs to investigate UFOs continued.[7] This was confirmed in June 2020 with the acknowledgement of a similar military program, the unclassified but previously unreportedUnidentified Aerial Phenomenon Task Force.[8]
Initiated by thenSenate Majority LeaderHarry Reid (D-Nevada)[9] as the Advanced Aerospace Weapon Systems Applications Program (AAWSAP) to studyunexplained aerial phenomena (UAP) at the urging of Reid's friend, Nevada billionaire and governmental contractorRobert Bigelow,[10] and with support from the late senatorsTed Stevens (R-Alaska) andDaniel Inouye (D-Hawaii), the program began in the DIA in 2007 and was budgeted $22 million over its five years of operation.[3][4]
TheUnited States Air Force facility known as “Area 51” is located in Reid's home state of Nevada. In the 1970s, after revived interest in the "1947 Roswell UFO incident", “Area 51” was rumored byufologists andconspiracy theorists to be the US government's storage location for the crashed alien craft for study.[11]
When interviewed in the aftermath of publicity surrounding the AATIP, Reid expressed pride in his accomplishment, and was quoted as saying "I think it's one of the good things I did in my congressional service. I've done something that no one has done before."[3][5] Reid explained the reasoning behind his sponsorship of the program by saying "I’m interested in science, and in helping the American public understand what the hell is going on" and stated that "hundreds and hundreds of papers" have been available since the program was completed and that "Most all of it, 80 percent at least, is public" adding "I wanted it public, it was made public, and you guys have not even looked at it."[5]
A 2009 letter by Reid was published byKLAS-TV investigative journalistsGeorge Knapp and Matt Adams, where the Senator states that AATIP has made "much progress" and recommends the creation of aspecial access program for specific parts of AATIP.[12]
AATIP, through a contract awarded toBigelow Aerospace Advanced Space Studies (BAASS), has generated a 494-page report that documents alleged worldwideUFO sightings over several decades.[13][14] This "Ten Month Report" has not been released to the public but focuses on reports, plans and extensive analysis of unexplained aerial phenomena.[13] According to one former BAASS contractor, the BAASS report was only a sample of the materials provided to theDefense Intelligence Agency as "monthly reports were being sent to the Pentagon, in addition to annual program updates, that were all about UAP or anomalous phenomena.”[13] The program also funded and published 38 studies.[13][15][16] Those theoretical studies cover a range of advanced, exotic, and theoretical aerospace topics, ranging from "Detection and High Resolution Tracking of Vehicles atHypersonic Velocities" to "Warp Drive,Dark Energy, and the Manipulation ofExtra Dimensions."[13][16][17]
Among the information that has been released by the program are "several short videos of military jets encountering something they couldn't identify".[18] The release of those videos were part of a campaign byLuis Elizondo, then working forTo The Stars Academy of Arts & Science, who said that he wanted to shed light on the program.[3][4][14][19][20] The Navy confirmed the authenticity of the videos stating only that they depict what they consider to be "unidentified aerial phenomena".[21][22][23] Susan Gough, aPentagon spokeswoman, confirmed that the three videos were made by naval aviators and that they are "part of a larger issue of an increased number of training range incursions by unidentified aerial phenomena in recent years.”[24]
While theDefense Department stated that AATIP was terminated in 2012, after acknowledgement of the program in 2017 the exact status of AATIP and its alleged termination remained unclear.[25] Elizondo claimed that, while the effort's government funding ended in 2012, the program continued with support from Navy and CIA officials even after his resignation.[3] Reports in 2020 confirmed Elizondo's statement, along with reporting the existence of the U.S. government's successor to AATIP.[8]
In 2020, the Pentagon acknowledged the existence of a program similar to the AATIP called theUnidentified Aerial Phenomenon Task Force (UAPTF). The unclassified, but previously unacknowledged, program was made public during a June 2020 hearing of theSenate Select Committee on Intelligence.[8][26][27] The program has been giving classified briefings to congressional committees and aerospace executives for over a decade. Former Senator Reid stated in reference to the successor program, “It is extremely important that information about the discovery of physical materials or retrieved craft come out.”
The materials studied by AATIP have been the subject of classifiedcongressional hearings aimed at understanding and identifying the potential threat to the safety and security of aviators.[28][29][13] The Navy has confirmed that, in response to inquiries by members of Congress, they have provided a series of briefings by seniornaval intelligence officials as well as testimony from "aviators who reported hazards to aviation safety".[30] The contents of those briefings are classified, but SenatorMark Warner, the vice chairman of theSenate Intelligence Committee, who participated in one of those briefings, released a statement requesting further research into "unexplained interference in the air" that could pose safety concerns for naval pilots.[28] According toPopular Mechanics, Senate Intelligence Committee Brigadier General Richard Stapp, Director of the DoD Special Access Program Central Office, testified the mysterious objects being encountered by the military were not related to secret U.S. technology.[13] PresidentDonald Trump has also been briefed on the issue[29][28] and has stated "I did have one very brief meeting on it. But people are saying they're seeing UFOs. Do I believe it? Not particularly."[31][32]
Mick West, a science writer and skeptical investigator, suggests the public availability and confirmation of rigorous empirical studies by AATIP could change the entire UFO dynamic: “It would be fantastic if there was some good evidence of something new to science. So far there isn’t”.[13] Several researchers includingBenjamin Radford andRobert Sheaffer have pointed out that mundane explanations such as the misidentification of distant jets or ordinary contrails are probably behind the incidents reported.[18] Astrophysicist Leon Golub has stated that those reports have a number of possible explanations such as "bugs in the code for the imaging and display systems, atmospheric effects and reflections, neurological overload from multiple inputs during high-speed flight."[20] In a similar vein, physicistDon Lincoln pointed out that while the pilots of those reports may have thought they saw what they believed to be an "unidentified flying object", since far more plausible explanations exist, he proposed that "what these pilots were seeing is something with a more ordinary explanation, whether it be an instrumental glitch or some other unexplained artifact."[33]
On January 16, 2019, the DIA released a list of 38 research titles pursued by the program in response to aFreedom of Information Act (FOIA) request bySteven Aftergood, director of theFederation of American Scientists’ Project on Government Secrecy.[15][16][17][34] One such research topic,“TraversableWormholes,Stargates, andNegative Energy,” was led by Eric W. Davis of EarthTech International Inc, which was founded byHarold Puthoff, who was formerly involved inProject Stargate.[35] Another project called “Invisibility Cloaking” was headed by German scientistUlf Leonhardt, a professor at theWeizmann Institute of Science in Israel.[36] Yet another title,“Warp Drive,Dark Energy, and the Manipulation ofExtra Dimensions,” was attributed to theoretical physicist Richard Obousy, director of the nonprofit Icarus Interstellar.[37] One of those papers was released to the public byPopular Mechanics on February 14, 2020.[13] The paper in question, titled "Clinical Medical Acute & Subacute Field Effects on Human Dermal & Neurological Tissues", was written by Christopher “Kit” Green, formerly a CIA agent, forensic clinician and neuroscientist, who described it as "focused on forensically assessing accounts of injuries that could have resulted from claimed encounters withUAP".[13]
In June 2019, former Senator Reid defended the legacy of the AATIP, saying "When I was contacted by the New York Times, they said they wanted to do a story on UFOs and the money you got, the $22 million. And I said I am happy to do that story, as long as we are not talking about little green men. If you want to talk about science, I'm all in. And that is how I looked at this."[38]
Although the program was not named specifically, Elizondo was quoted inThe Huffington Post in late October 2017.[39] Several days earlier, Elizondo announced his involvement in founding an aerospace, science, paranormal and entertainment company calledTo the Stars Academy for Arts and Science.[40]
AATIP came to a broader public attention on 16 December 2017 – in three news stories – inThe Washington Post,Politico andThe New York Times:
On 22 May 2019, Pentagon spokesman Christopher Sherwood finally confirmed to theNew York Post that the program "did pursue research and investigation into unidentified aerial phenomena," dispelling rumors that the program only focused on theoretical physics.[42]
On 26 May 2019,The New York Times reported that US Navy pilots fully briefed AATIP about encounters they had with unexplained objects during the summer of 2014 to March 2015 while flying at high altitudes off the East Coast of the United States.[20] Nonetheless, presidentDonald Trump, who said he had a short briefing on AATIP, said he is skeptical of Navy sightings of UFOs.[31]
On 1 June 2019,The Intercept published an article with an excerpt from an email obtained via FOIA request. The excerpt called into question Elizondo's position at AATIP. Yes, AATIP existed, and it “did pursue research and investigation into unidentified aerial phenomena,” Pentagon spokesperson Christopher Sherwood confirmed. However, he added: “Elizondo had no responsibilities with regard to the AATIP program while he worked for OUSDI [the Office of Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence], up until the time he resigned effective 10/4/2017.”To the Stars has attempted to dispute this with an email: “The program was initially run out of the Defense Intelligence Agency but when Lue took it over in 2010 as Director, he ran it out of the Office for the Secretary of Defense (OSD) under the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence (USDI).”[43]
A February 2020Popular Mechanics article by UFO investigative writer and retired police lieutenant Tim McMillan said thatBigelow Aerospace Advanced Space Studies (BAASS) was contracted under the auspices of the AATIP program to study UFO reports and purported paranormal phenomena. According to Steven Aftergood, Director for the Federation of American Scientists Project on Government Secrecy, the AAWSAP contract "sounds like it was a good deal for the contractor. But it would be hard to argue that either the military or the public got their money’s worth."[13]
On July 23, 2020,The New York Times reported that while former Senator Harry Reid "believed that crashes of objects of unknown origin may have occurred and that retrieved materials should be studied; he did not say that crashes had occurred and that retrieved materials had been studied secretly for decades."[8][44] News reports also repeated a claim made by Eric W. Davis, a former employee ofHarold E. Puthoff (co-founder of UFO-promoting companyTo the Stars) that an "off-world vehicle" might be in the possession of the US government.[45][46]
...Robert Bigelow, the billionaire founder of an aerospace company. Bigelow has spoken about his belief in UFOs visiting the United States as well as the existence of aliens.
TheDepartment of Defense funded research under its Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program. Of the 38 reference documents, several have been publicly released viaFOIA requests or leaked:
| Preceded by | US military projects investigating the UFO phenomenon | Succeeded by |
