that by reading this book, doing your own research, and many hours of contemplation, you will succeed in filling in at least some of these gaps.
A special thank you goes to my old friend Arnold Banerjee, who reviewed the English version of this book. Your support is well-appreciated!
Bad Homburg, June 2021
Marcel Polte
1 THE UFO PHENOMENON
»It is an intelligence that provides enough evidence that something profoundly important is at work, but it does not offer the kinds of proof that would satisfy an exclusively empirical, rationalistic way of knowing. It is for us to embrace the reality of the phenomenon and to take a step toward appreciating that we live in a universe different from the one in which we have been taught to believe.«2
Prof. John E. Mack, 1994
UFOS IN THE MEDIA
Once upon a time there was a UFO. Nobody liked it, nobody wanted it … one mocked it, one chased it away, one even denied its existence. But it kept coming back. People became curious and some of them began to ask questions. The kings didn’t like that at all and forbid them to talk about the mysterious UFO. With all sorts of tricks they tried to distract their subjects from it. They invented new, even more fantastic stories and threw the worst UFO rebels into a dark dungeon, because something had to be prevented at all costs. This one thing that frightened them more than enemy armies and violent storms that devastated the land: It must never happen that the people questioned their royal power … because there was possibly something out there that even the kings could not explain and was superior to them.
In this or a similar way, childlike language could be used to describe how governments and the media have dealt with the UFO phenomenon over the last seventy years … until December 2017. When UFOs were mentioned in the media before that date, it was usually not a serious coverage. The reports often resembled a satirical pamphlet. The structure of those reports often followed a typical pattern. To create a certain entertainment value, a mysterious UFO sighting was first described. With narcissistic satisfaction, a (correct or false) scientific explanation was then presented, ranging from illuminated drones, comets, flares, satellites, LED balloons to the planets Jupiter and Venus. And if there was no conventional explanation available, the end of the story could still be kept open with a mocking undertone (»maybe it was the famous little green men …«). In any case, there was no doubt for the reader or viewer that any thought of an extraterrestrial background of such sightings is absolutely ridiculous and unacceptable. UFOs don’t exist. That’s it. And there can’t be any UFOs because media has (almost) never reported a »real« UFO sighting. So why should this change all of a sudden …
It is indeed true that most sightings of mysterious lights in the sky can be easily explained. After all, human perception and the human mind can very easily be deceived. Thus, the flickering light of the planet Jupiter behind a moving cloud cover at night is quickly perceived as an object that seems to be moving in the sky while radiating strongly. Such dubious »sightings« are not worth reporting at all. The fact that this happened nevertheless reinforced the view among the population that »real« UFOs do not exist. If we assume, as will be shown below, that not only UFOs but non-human intelligent beings indeed exist, this makes such reporting – to put it mildly – extremely questionable. Finally, according to its mandate, the press should be interested in providing the public with facts. This is all the more true when the facts are as exceptional as they are significant for mankind.
EVIDENCE
It really does not take any investigative journalistic talent or even scientific training to realize that the evidence for unusual flying objects in our skies is simply overwhelming (even before the campaign started in December 2017). This book is not aiming at proving the reality of the UFO phenomenon.
Since the U.S. mainstream media, in the meanwhile, have accepted the existence of UFOs there is no need for that. Furthermore, anyone can convince themselves of this fact by means of freely accessible, serious sources. The reader can find a conscientious compilation of important UFO cases on the internet at www.das-ufo-phaenomen.de (German internet page but mostly English documents and documentaries); further evidence is available at https://siriusdisclosure.com/evidence/ for example.
For his or her own research I would like to give the reader a little help in the form of the following facts. They are all worth a closer look and should have been part of our common knowledge for a long time – just like other important political or historical events. But even most journalists who write about the topic are not familiar with these things. One must therefore ask oneself how serious reporting on the UFO topic is (was) possible on such a deficient information basis. Why don’t you test yourself to see if you’re aware of some of the most important facts about the UFO phenomenon?
1. Are you aware that many countries (including France, the United Kingdom and the United States) maintain or (officially) maintained UFO investigation authorities?
2. Are you aware that since about the middle of the last century there have been dozens of well-documented UFO cases in which military and/or civilian witnesses have visually observed objects with extremely unusual flight characteristics, while at the same time they were detected on airborne and/or ground radar?
3. Are you aware that on 13 March 1997, hundreds of witnesses in the vicinity of Phoenix, Arizona, saw an aircraft carrier-sized object floating slowly and silently in the sky, and that the then Governor of Arizona, Five Symington III, admitted about ten years later having observed this object at close range – although he had ridiculed the subject at a press conference in 1997?
4. Are you aware that between 1989 and 1992 thousands of Belgians were observing unusual flying objects over their country and that the Belgian military was unable to find an explanation for the phenomenon after an intensive investigation into the incidents, including the use of fighter jets in order to intercept the UFOs?
5. Are you aware that UFOs have been sighted several times near nuclear installations of the U.S. military and that precarious malfunctions of the missile launch facilities occurred during these sightings?
6. Are you aware that in 1999, high-ranking French military officials and scientists published an investigation report on the UFO phenomenon (UFOs and Defense: What Should We Prepare For? the so-called COMETA-Report) which comes to the conclusion that the so-called extraterrestrial hypothesis is the most likely explanation for the UFO phenomenon?
7. Are you aware that in 2001, at a Disclosure Project press conference at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. more than a dozen former military and government officials and pilots publicly testified about their UFO sightings and further knowledge of the phenomenon?
I can only advise everyone to do their own research on the questions listed above, which make up only a fraction of the total material.
Of course, you should always be skeptical, especially when doing research on the internet, as it is often difficult or impossible to check the reliability of the source. Documents that can be accessed directly at official government sites, or recordings of press conferences and interviews with prominent witnesses, such as Arizona’s ex-governor Five Symington, are particularly helpful.
The
