UFO congressional listening to was ‘insulting’ to U.S. staff, prime Pentagon official says

WASHINGTON — A prime Pentagon official has attacked this week’s broadly watched congressional listening to on UFOs, calling the claims “insulting” to staff who’re investigating sightings and accusing a key witness of not cooperating with the official U.S. authorities investigation.

Dr. Sean Kirkpatrick’s letter, printed on his private LinkedIn web page and circulated Friday throughout social media, criticizes a lot of the testimony from a retired Air Force intelligence officer that energized believers in extraterrestrial life and produced headlines around the globe.

Retired Air Force Maj. David Grusch testified Wednesday that the U.S. has hid what he referred to as a “multi-decade” program to gather and reverse-engineer “UAPs,” or unidentified aerial phenomena, the official authorities time period for UFOs.

Part of what the U.S. has recovered, Grusch testified, have been non-human “biologics,” which he mentioned he had not seen however had discovered about from “people with direct knowledge of the program.”

A profession intelligence officer, Kirkpatrick was named a yr in the past to steer the Pentagon’s All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office, or AARO, which was supposed to centralize investigations into UAPs. The Pentagon and U.S. intelligence businesses have been pushed by Congress lately to higher examine studies of units flying at uncommon speeds or trajectories as a nationwide safety concern.

Kirkpatrick wrote the letter Thursday and the Defense Department confirmed Friday that he posted it in a private capability. Kirkpatrick didn’t return messages searching for remark.

He writes partly, “I cannot let yesterday’s hearing pass without sharing how insulting it was to the officers of the Department of Defense and Intelligence Community who chose to join AARO, many with not unreasonable anxieties about the career risks this would entail.”

“They are truth-seekers, as am I,” Kirkpatrick mentioned. “But you certainly would not get that impression from yesterday’s hearing.”

In a separate assertion, Pentagon spokeswoman Sue Gough denied different allegations made by Grusch and different witnesses earlier than a House Oversight subcommittee.

The Pentagon “has no information that any individual has been harmed or killed as a result of providing information” about UFO objects, Gough mentioned. Nor has the Pentagon found “any verifiable information to substantiate claims that any programs regarding the possession or reverse-engineering of extraterrestrial materials have existed in the past or exist currently.”

Kirkpatrick wrote, “AARO has yet to find any credible evidence to support the allegations of any reverse engineering program for non-human technology.”

He had briefed reporters in December that the Pentagon was investigating “several hundreds” of latest studies following a push to have pilots and others come ahead with any sightings.

Kirkpatrick wrote in his letter that allegations of “retaliation, to include physical assault and hints of murder, are extraordinarily serious, which is why law enforcement is a critical member of the AARO team, specifically to address and take swift action should anyone come forward with such claims.”

“Yet, contrary to assertions made in the hearing, the central source of those allegations has refused to speak with AARO,” Kirkpatrick mentioned. He didn’t explicitly identify Grusch, who alleged he confronted retaliation and declined to reply when a congressman requested him if anybody had been murdered to cover details about UFOs.