Believing is not Seeing

“There is only one cause of unhappiness: the false beliefs you have in your head, beliefs so widely spread, so commonly held, that it never occurs to you to question them.”  Anthony De Mello

              BREAK AWAY MAN

By: Steve Erdmann

A similar article can be found at https://ufospotlight.org/2021/11/12/i-cant-believe-my-eyes/

It is always refreshing when trained and thoroughly experienced investigators suggest fresh and overlooked avenues of a scientific phenomenon. Dr. John B. Alexander has done that with his ideas of a “step back process” to study precognitive sentient phenomena (PSP), of which UFOs are certainly a part, but only a part, of an all-encompassing and “anfractuous” phenomenon “beyond current comprehension”.

Dr. John B. Alexander, author of The Warrior’s Edge, speaks as a Green Beret combat veteran, a retired Colonel – U.S Army Project Manager at Los Alamos National Laboratory, NATO studies of nonlethal weapons, the National Research Council, Council on Foreign Relations, a consultant to the National Intelligence Council, the CIA, the U.S Special Operations Command, and the Army Science Board (UFOS: Myths, Conspiracies, and Realities, St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York 10010, 2011, $25.99. 305 pages).

Alexander “DE myths” at the same time he supports the reality of the phenomena.  One of the major fallacies, he says, is that the government is in the “know” and THEY are out to cover up the facts. To the contrary, Alexander set up an Advanced Theoretical Physics Project (ATP) to try and discover if such an “inner sanctum” group exists. Alexander queried many very high-security, high-level personnel:  they all assumed THEY existed but no one knew who THEY were.

“The ultimate answer appears to be that nobody does have that responsibility,” says Alexander. “While this notion runs counter to all of the conspiracy theorists’ proclamations, that was the bottom line.”

The other myth he contends with, aside from THEY, is that surely the government must be expending large amounts of “black budget money” to study UFOs, crashed or otherwise; and it largely has to do with The Budget and priorities.

“As big as the DOD budget is, it remains the aforementioned zero-sum game, meaning for every project that gains funding, another must lose theirs,” says Alexander.  “Interdepartmental, as well as intradepartmental, battles over funding are vicious and played by the most ruthless, merciless bastards on the planet.”

The DOD is run by Program Objective Memorandum or POM.

Department of Defense and other government programs are “a continual process in which programs are constantly being evaluated with a myriad of comptroller vultures waiting to pounce on any perceived programmatic weakness,” says Alexander.  “Just note that most research and development programs, as well training funds, have taken tremendous cuts and are constantly under scrutiny as bill payers (sources from which funds can be transferred to other projects).” 

Funds are usually already dedicated to some current project and hawkish eyes plan theft on various levels; even Black Projects are not exempt from oversight: They have Technical Review Committees and bodies that determine what gets funded or not.

“With highly classified programs, there are fewer legislators involved in the process,” says Alexander, “but they are there.” The Department of Defense (DOD) fits under the Executive Branch, and everything comes together to the President of the United States, (even with his aides) “over everything: just because a program is Black does not allow underlings to determine the validity of reporting acquired information.”

MAKES NO SENSE

U.S government agencies usually run out of money long before they run out of projects with validated requirements.  When extralegal or clandestine means to move funds are attempted there are catastrophic results; huge cross-jurisdictional issues, resulting in Congressional and criminal investigations of misapplication of funds. Even “flexions” (powerful players who move seamlessly from opposing positions of power) are not agile enough to operate above all the sectors.  I am reminded of the eventual exposure of the BCCI banking scandal; as well as the Mafia-CIA associations in the 1960s; others.

‘When you consider the number of people who would have had access to critical information over a period of more than a half a century,” says Alexander, “the resulting silence on UFO matters does not make sense.”

Worse yet, when key individuals “express a personal interest in UFOs”, and they are mistakenly to mean their organizations accept responsibility or involvement in studying the phenomena – which they don’t have.

The truth of the matter is, says Alexander, that the government has never been able to get anything right – including UFO investigation. Just look at the mess they’ve made of things such as bungling secrecy, war, money, and other responsibilities on down the years.

OPEN ADMISSIONS

Surprisingly, the governments have disclosed from time to time, as individuals, that UFOs are real (as one example, Alexander cites Colonel General Igor Maitsev’s, Chief of Staff of the Soviet Air Dense Forces statement of March, 1990: “Skeptics and believers both can take this as official confirmation of the existence of UFOs”).  Generals, Presidents, Congressmen have stated their belief in the reality of UFOs.  What governments have not  been willing to do is to endorse a bogus theory or unequivocally uphold subjective and private fantasies.

“The probability of an all-out invasion by hostile extraterrestrials may rank in Hollywood, but it is deemed as an extraordinarily low probability by officials who would be responsible for organizing a human response,” says Alexander, “It is in this content that the role of the U.S government‘s involvement is studying UFOs should be examined.”

Instead, Alexander is impressed by “The Trickster” actions of PSP and the Catch-22 involved, which officials run away from and can’t handle, or they are somehow “held back.”

Alexander, however, doesn’t skimp on sensational PSP cases: one is the Cash-Landrum case; another is the March 16, 1967, Maelstrom Air Force Base case; the Robert Salas case; the December,1980 Royal Air Force at Bent waters, United Kingdom case; the Skin walker-ranch-Utah-Bigelow case; and many others. Unfortunately, the public (especially UFO ‘believers’) assumes the government has a deep interest in UFOs just because anomalies are reported.  Alexander says this is not true: “Large institutions are very bureaucratic in nature.”

Many officials are heavily restrained by ridicule to their careers if they spoke assertively on UFOs. Likewise, Alexander says: “There is no credible evidence that reverse-engineered ARV exist (Alien Reproduction Vehicles from UFO crashes).” THEY supposedly have captured the secrets of limitless energy at very low cost—which come under the ownership of the American people—and solve most of the “massive socio-economic problems” facing mankind.  This hasn’t  happened.

Apparently, as well, according to Alexander, Ben Rich of the super-secret Skunk Works, denies his previous alleged comments about ETs and Black Projects.

MENTAL PROBLEMS OF DEBUNKERS AND BELIEVERS

(“Irrational thinking will never be overcome by empirical evidence.” Jon Stewart, host of The Daily Show on Comedy Central.)

Particularly interesting is Alexander’s comments on skeptics and their psychological problems. Alexander lists cases of Precognitive Sentient Phenomena – some very startling and striking – and many suggesting that the extraterrestrial hypothesis is too limited.  The skeptics, he says, are not geared to study PSP because of mental defects:

“Nor is it likely that any amount of evidence would persuade them to change their minds.  While I consider myself to be rather skeptical of many claims, with good reason, they would better be classified as debunkers. The basic premise is that these anomalous events can’t be true, therefore they aren’t. If they cannot disprove the anomaly, they assume that the prosaic, commonplace answer has not yet been found – but they are equally confident that none exists.  Facts are not of consequence, just inconvenient details and often ignored.”

Alexander says such “debunkers” suffer from a mental disorder of sorts which he calls cerebral centrism, “a typical American position in which we believe that we are smarter than everyone else.”  Some believe that 99 percent of everything science will learn has already been discovered.  UFOs are usually reduced to ‘flares’ and ‘astronomical bodies.’

The debunkers reply on discussing weak cases, and their extrapolating to the whole field.  Debunkers believe in the impossibility of these events; however, as Hal Puthoff notes and Alexander says. “….they are not sufficiently skeptical to question the views – ones that often do not fit the facts of the situation – that are aligned with their own mythology.”  Fear, atheism, hostility towards religion, animus about new horizons in physics are known threads in the psychopathology of debunkers.

FRAUD AND PHANTASMAGORIA

The ‘flip side’ of this aberration-coin is just as frightening, if not more so.  Alexander acknowledges that a larger percentage of the population has elements of mental illness, particularly various forms of schizoid illness and schizophrenia.

“The fantasies associated with UFO phenomena are boundless…created an exotic tapestry…important downside for serious research…outrageous tales provide fodder for ad hominem attacks…having serious mental health problems is far greater than generally imagined…” (Pages 267-268)

The last two mentioned factors alone can be an epidemic that has scared away serious interest by the government and led to ventures like the riddance of the UFO Project by the Air Force and the creation of the Condon UFO Committee – as well as the continual avoidance by the public.  What do you do with blatantly uncontrollable phantasmagoria; and what about the accompanying fraud?

REVISIONISM

One added aspect is that of revisionism and obliteration of history:

• For example, Alexander and Hal Puthoff have determined the mystical MJ-12 documents have originated in a real “Continuity of Government” (COG) plan created under President Eisenhower in the early post-World War II days, to prevent nuclear decapitation of the U.S government. The creation of the National Security Act, the National Security Council, and the Central Intelligence Agency emerged almost simultaneously, close to September 18, 1947, and near the MJ-12 date of September 24, 1947. The COG plan also created “hardened secret underground bases” and other “hidden subterranean facilities.”  The barebones description of MJ-12 dovetails with a “dearth of written substantiation” of the COG. UFO enthusiasts doctored such classified documents and weaved a tale of extraterrestrial cover, and the UFO community further took the myth to all-time heights.

• A local St. Louis UFO Study Group does the same historical “revisionism” recreation, playing with facts and dates, even subtlety using innuendo for added distortion. The Study Group was basically “kicked off” in earliest meetings in the first few months of Winter/Spring 1967 under the tutorship and direction of UFO authority John Schuessler, at the time, an engineer at McDonnell-Douglas Aircraft, and St. Louis A.P.R.O and N.I.C.A.P members (including August Hearst, Arthur Epstein, Ray Nelke, Cliff Palmberg, Richard Phillips, David Schroth, for a few) who sent out press and news releases and had public announcements in local newspapers, including Walt Andrus’ Skylook Magazine.  After a few years, and newer members, the group decided to incorporate under Missouri law in 1971. Much later, narcissistic, and biased members, wishing to bolster their standing in the UFO community and hide these earliest facts, stated that they somehow heralded the creation of the Study Group and that the Study Group was created near their membership times:

• A likewise situation would be that President Obama or President Clinton, and their “administrations,” claimed that the true beginnings of the Republic and Confederacy of the United States began with them, and not mention the earliest sparks of origin in William Penn, Paul Revere, Thomas Jefferson, Benedict Arnold, George Washington, Patrick Henry, Daniel Dulany, John Page, Richard Henry Lee, William Randolph, Peyton Randolph, Betsy Ross, John Berry, Gilbert Mutier, John Marshall and many others who lit the fires of America. Or, claim that Constantine in 328 A.D, by dedicating the Basilica of St. Peter – or possibly Pope Gregory –  as the first, true and real beginnings of the Christian Church, avoiding, hiding and failing to mention the original twelve disciples including Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Judas, Peter, Thomas some 300 odd years earlier.

The revisionist’s goal is narcissism, ego-satiation, and fantasy: not full and true history (Alexander spends considerable time analyzing Philip Corso’s tale on Roswell as one example of possible historical embellishment).

(Steve Erdmann has prepared a large volume of material on the original creation of the Study Group available for the first time and purchasable at the given below address at the cost of $30.00 a volume)

QUESTIONING CONCLUSIONS

(“You cannot depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus” Mark Twain.)

John Alexander is to be commended for his attempts to bring added insight, with a seasoning of common sense, to the topic of UFOs and PSPs, though one can still wonder about some of his conclusions.  For example, if PSPs have cases of unfriendly, even destructive, happenings (such as physical damage, like radiation burns, animal mutilations), how can people in government keep saying “there is no threat”?  And if UFO stories and PSP phenomena are so awash in mental illness and hoaxing, what would asking the public to get into a reporting frenzy invite (page 270): would we not be inundated with a flood of liars?  Should we not first contend with these blockages before rather than as we venture ahead? It is hoped that Alexander will address these topics further.

“Based on credible witnesses and backed by Physical evidence, I conclude that UFO observations are manifestations of issues that are anfractuous and beyond current comprehension,” concludes Alexander. “The extraterrestrial hypothesis is but one possibility, and probably not the best fit with the facts…we must beware of the Puzzle Paradox that plagues the field with UFOs we are still collecting various disparate pieces…contumacious puzzle.”

Those wishing to contact Steve Erdmann may reach him at independenterdmann@gmail.com

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Steve Erdmann – Independent Investigative Journalist

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