CounterPunch Exclusives

CounterPunch Exclusives

Not Much to See: The Release of the UFO Files

Photo by Albert Antony

These are always occasions of anticipation and even celebration for the tinfoil hatters and those keen to spot the internal plot, the thriving fifth column and anything that could risk being seen as ordinary.  The human mind is obsessed by the need for a rounded explanation.  In place of that arises a form of mysticism, even superstition.  What cannot be explained must be otherworldly.  Few better tests for this proposition can be found in the discussion about unidentified objects of aeronautical import.

May saw the release of two tranches of records (May 8 and May 22) on Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena (UAPs), a distinctly more cautious term for what is known in the popular vernacular as Unidentified Flying Objects (UFOs).  This was done at the insistence of President Donald Trump, who claimed on Truth Social in February that “tremendous interest” had been shown in the matter, undisguised code for revealing his own keenness in the matter.

The quotidian, the banal, the prosaic – these are terms no UAP pundit or card-carrying follower wants to know.  But the reality remains that the files, as with previous declassified material, can often be put down to the explicable, even if a shade of doubt exists over sightings, photography and film.  The Pentagon states that the archived materials document “unresolved cases, meaning the government is unable to make a definitive determination on the nature of the observed phenomena.”

The best some commentators can do about the unusual material is to suggest that “something” is taking place, which is as non-committal as you can get.  What is interesting in these file drops is the signal change of heart in the........

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