UFOS IN RUSSIA: WITNESS STATEMENTS AND X-FILES
Nikolay Subbotin
Director RUFORS
Unfortunately, if classified documents about UFOs actually exist, it is
highly problematic to obtain them in Russia. In fact, researchers today have
of just few official materials. At that, it is generally admitted that the
UFO question has been studied for a long time by the Russian Academy of
Sciences, the State Hydrometeorology Committee, and the Defense Ministry
(Yuly Platov and Boris Sokolov refer to this in the report ?History of
Soviet Studies of UFOs¦; Retired Colonel Boris Sokolov worked as a
coordinator for anomaly studies at the Soviet Defense Ministry and Academy
of Sciences during 1978 v 1989). Within the past two years, lots of
allegedly classified documents have appeared on the Internet, which talk
about the evacuation of some strange objects held under the KGB aegis.
However, it is unlikely that these documents are reliable.
I can say for sure that a 127-page record of anomalous events observed on
the territory of the former Soviet Union and in the Russian Federation,
which KGB Deputy chairman Sham had given to cosmonaut Popovich, is a
document that really exists. However, these documents only refer to events
that have occurred in the past; they don-t provide any information for us to
understand how seriously the KGB treated the UFO problem. Thus, the
situation is paradoxical: everybody knows that the situation is studied on
the governmental level, but there are no open documents revealing the
results of these investigations (certainly, except for the Platov-Sokolov
work). It is strange, because, if research is held, reports on the results
achieved must exist as well. Yuly Platov says that the government program
for UFO studies was launched in 1978 and continued till 1996 (there are some
facts confirming that this program still exists, but on a smaller scale).
This means that for eighteen years, money has been appropriated from the
state budget to pay wages, travel expenses, and so on to officials employed
in the program. It is likely that the research program was worth the
spending. It is unbelievable that the results of the program could be
expressed just in several sentences, the way it had been done by the authors
of the article: ?Results of the work done revealed that the majority of
phenomena that people ascribe to anomalous can be easily explained. They are
basically connected with the developing technical activity of humanity or
with uncommon natural phenomena. One of the most considerable results of the
investigation is not the identification of the majority of phenomena
observed by the people or an explanation of technical details of how they
occur, though the results achieved in this direction are certainly great.
The most astonishing thing is that, although people often describe contacts
with UFOs, the collections compiled by UFO scientists are rather impressive,
but the large-scale project that involved all necessary facilities reported
nothing at all about UFO landings, contacts with UFO pilots, or about people
kidnapped by UFO. This means that either the Soviet Union's territory was
banned for UFO visits for 13 years at least or the failure of the very
hypothesis of the extraterrestrial origin of UFOs. Any serious investigator
working on the UFO problem should at least take this result into
consideration.¦
I talked to a Strategic Missile Troops colonel who investigated the landing
of a UFO near a children's camp and the observation of two humanoids
conducting some tests near the camp. There is a document confirming the
UFO's landing in a village in the Russia-s Sverdlovsk region, contacts
established between the extraterrestrials and the villagers, and the results
of investigations held at the landing site. There are some more facts that
are quite reliable. That is why I disagree with the official statement made
by Platov and Sokolov, saying that no official reports about UFO landings
and no information about contacts with UFO pilots was done.
As for the USA, the situation with documents about UFOs is much better
there. According to US legislation, any American citizen can obtain copies
of unclassified documents issued by any governmental department. The Freedom
of Information Act came into effect in 1966. According to official FBI
statistics, over the past twenty years, the Bureau officials processed about
300,000 inquiries from US citizens and issued about 6 million pages of
unclassified documents. In 1975, when first personal computers appeared, the
documents were transferred to electronic media. The majority of unclassified
documents are currently available on the Internet. These are unclassified
documents belonging to the FBI, the Agency for National Security, the CIA,
the Air Force, and others that provide evidence of UFO landings, anomalous
events, responses of governmental services to reports of this kind, and
official reports of federal agents and other unique information. On the one
hand, it is nice that American researchers have wide access to information
of this kind. However, on the other hand, before declassification, all
documents are exposed to thorough censorship, and very often, very valuable
information is completely deleted from them.
A couple of days ago, I downloaded from the Internet documents on official
UFO research held by the CIA and the Agency for National Security. Being
extremely enthusiastic about it, I opened the first files but became
extremely disappointed when I saw just official headlines and stamps on
perfectly white sheets of paper. All the information concerning UFO
researche was completely deleted by censors. It is true that these documents
help to arrange events chronologically, to trace their origin, and to make
some definite conclusions. However, in the end, the documents provide
nothing more than information that already known to everyone.
Therefore, the situation concerning documents on governmental research
connected with UFOs is similar in Russia and the USA, with the only
differenc being that Russian researchers don-t have any documents at their
disposal, and Americans, although piled with heaps of documents on UFO
research, can-t derive any benifit from the documents. This is like the
X-Files, when Mulder seems to be very close to a clue, but a strange man in
a suit and a cigarette between his teeth comes and takes all the evidence
away. The only thing left for us is to sit and shed tears over the phrase:
THE TRUTH IS OUT THERE
What do journalists and military men say?
Here are the words of Eugeny Lutsenko taken from the archives of the RUFOS,
the Russian UFO station. ?When I was in the army during 1979-1981 (I served
in the air defense forces), a secret order and methodical recommendations
were in force then, which said what we were to do if a UFO appeared. We used
the instructions in our training with soldiers. Our military unit detached a
group for participation in UFO studies. There were places haunted by UFOs
almost every other night. I wasn-t in the group, as I was a regular soldier,
not a communist (which had been really important during that Soviet period)
and no first-class specialist. When the guys belonging to the group
returned, they said nothing at all, and we never asked, as we understood
that they had been ordered not to speak of the details of the operation.
However, when we were leaving the army, they told what they had seen during
the operation. They said they had seen UFOs several times, including
man-made objects looking very much like our technology. It was unbelievable
at that time, and now we can speak openly about it.¦
?The Soviet leadership also evinced great interest in UFOs. The US press
published information with reference to State Intelligence Department double
agent Yury Popov saying that the Central Intelligence Department in the
Soviet Army HQ issued a secret directive in 1952. The third paragraph of the
directive was the task of finding out whether the UFOs breaking the Soviet
air boundaries were secret foreign flying machines, actions specially
organized by imperialistic secret services, or piloted or not piloted
extraterrestrial objects researching the Earth or some unknown natural
events. However, the Soviet government was strenuously trying to veil its
interest in UFOs and even issued reports about ideological struggles against
rumors of flying objects and humanoids.¦ (Vitaly Shelepov, 68 UFO Above the
White House, or How Air Forces and the Navy Quarreled About UFO)
?It is not accidental that the secret laboratory for UFO studies was set up
in the 1960s and was connected with the target ground in Kapustin Yar. At
the end of June, 1971, servicemen observed a cigar-shaped black object that
flew 800 meters above the clouds near Kapustin Yar. The apparatus, which was
25 meters long and about 3 meters in diameter, had neither stabilizers,
wings, nor engines. Its speed was 150 km/h, and it moved absolutely
silently. The laboratory also studied antigravitation questions; it is quite
natural that nothing was reported about its achievements, if any were
actually made. In 1978, the Soviet Defense Ministry adopted a program called
?The Moscow Region Net." A military unit situated in the city of Mytishchi
in the Moscow region was picked as the center for data collection. Special
space troops were created in the Soviet Union to repulse attacks from the
space." (Alexander Dremin, Ufology secrets in the Soviet Army; published in
the 47th issue of Vozdushny Transport (Air Transport) of November 22, 2000).
?A special, extremely secret laboratory for collecting data and reports
about anomalous space events was created in the city of Mytishchi in the
Moscow region. The laboratory was set up on the premises of a military
institute. All kinds of the Soviet troops sent information about UFOs to the
laboratory. We had all kinds of specialist to be employed in cases when the
army, military technology, and armament was influence upon.¦ (An extract
from report delivered by Defense Ministry Expert Alexander Plaksin, on
Russia-s REN-TV television on October 8, 2000.)
Nikolay Subbotin
Director RUFORS
http://ufo.psu.ru
[This article was sent to me in June 2003 and somehow got overlooked. My apology to Nikolay.]
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