For all those who had
asked, yes, I have seen the Canadian letter that George Knapp and Jeremy
Corbell talked about. Yes, it is interesting, but not necessarily for the
reasons some have suggested. And while it is interesting, it doesn’t, exactly,
validate the information shared by David Grusch but does suggest an interest in
the topic of UFO crashes by a Canadian government official.
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| George Knapp |
Oh, and while some have
questioned the authenticity of the letter, it is real.
In the last several
weeks, we have been bombarded by UFO stories, NASA committee meetings and
Senate hearings. Although nothing of real substance came from the meetings,
hearings and now this letter, it does suggest a change in attitude. The letter
does not confirm what David Crush was saying, but it does demonstrate a new
interest in the topic at the higher levels of various governments. No longer
are we subjected to the tongue-in-the-cheek snide comments by educated people
who are too sophisticated to believe that UFOs might represent an alien
technology. Now, we see those educated people wondering if the information
leaking might not have an undercurrent of legitimacy. Just maybe this is
something that should be watched.
I see from the various
Internet discussions I have with colleagues around the world, that all this
demands a cautious approach. We don’t want to be overly enthusiastic about the
information without having the opportunity to vet that information. We need
sources and documents to do that.
There is one point in
the Canadian Letter that I haven’t seen addressed anywhere and that refers to a
1950 interest in the topic. A Manitoba member of Parliament, Larry Maguire,
wrote to the Canadian Minister of Defence, concerning the new or renewed
interest in what is now called UAPs. The sentence that caught my eye said, “As
Minister of National Defence, you may not be aware Defence Research and
Development Canada (DRDC) has participated in efforts to analyze UAP [UFO],
which is publicly traceable to circa 1950.”
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| Larry Maguire |
It was the 1950 date
that drew my attention because that seems to relate to what has become known as
the Sarbacher episode. According to William Steinman, he received a copy of an
interview between Robert I. Sarbacher and Wilbert B. Smith that was conducted
on September 15, 1950. The interview notes apparently were made by Lieutenant
Colonel Bremer:
Smith: I am doing some work on the
collapse of the earth’s magnetic field as a source of energy, and I think our
work may have a bearing on the flying saucers.
Sarbacher: What do you want to
know?
Smith: I have read Scully’s book [Behind
the Flying Saucers] on the saucers and I would like to know how much of it
is true.
Sarbacher: The facts reported in
the book are substantially true.
Smith: Then the saucers exist?
Sarbacher: Yes, they exist.
Smith: Do they operate as Scully
suggests on magnetic principles?
Sarbacher: We have not been able to
duplicate their performance.
Smith: Do they come from some other
planet?
Sarbacher: All we know is, we
didn’t make them, and it’s pretty certain they didn’t originate on earth.
Smith: I understand the whole
subject of saucers is classified.
Sarbacher: Yes, it is classified
two points higher than the H-bomb. In fact it is the most highly classified
subject in the U.S. Government at the present time.
Smith: May I ask the reason for the
classification?
Sarbacher: You may ask, but I can’t
tell you.
There was a final note
that said the interview was written from memory but he, and I don’t know which
he it was, though I suspect it was Lieutenant Colonel Bremer who “tried to keep
it as nearly verbatum [sic] as possible.”
Steinman contacted
Sarbacher about the conversation. Sarbacher confirmed that the interview had
taken place. Steinman followed up with additional questions, which Sarbacher
answered. On November 29, 1983, Sarbacher sent a letter to Steinman. The
pertinent parts of that letter follow:
Relating to my own experiences
regarding recovered flying saucers, I had no association with any of the people
involved in the recovery [Steinman had supplied a list of names who were
alleged members of MJ-12] and have no knowledge regarding the dates of
recovery.
I did receive some official reports
when I was in my office at the Pentagon but all those were left there as at the
time, we were never supposed to take them out of the office.
About the only thing I remember at
this time is that certain material reported to have come from flying saucer
crashes were extremely light and tough.
I will note here that
this exchange took place in 1983, after the publication of The Roswell
Incident, but the idea of UFO crashes was not wide spread in the general
public and I have no way of knowing if Sarbacher was familiar with the story.
It was only after 1990 that the Roswell information exploded.
However, and relevant
to the discussion is information reported by others. According to Dr. Bruce
Maccabee and Jerry Clark, Sarbacher was “ignorant of UFO history.” They
reported that he didn’t even know what Project Blue Book was, which suggests
that Sarbacher had not been contaminated by all the reporting about the Roswell
crash.
Sarbacher, in that same
letter, wrote, “I remember in talking with some of the people at the office
that I got the impression these ‘aliens’ were constructed like certain insects
we have observed on earth, wherein because of the low mass the inertial forces
involved in operation of these instruments would be quite low.”
This story received
widespread coverage in the UFO community. Both Stan Friedman and Jerry Clark
contacted Sarbacher and he confirmed the accuracy of what Steinman had reported,
meaning that the notes and conclusions were accurate, but the information might
be considered speculative. It was also noted that Sarbacher’s information was
all second hand. He had read reports, he had talked with people involved but he
had seen nothing himself.
There is one other
important point. Sarbacher had been a member of the Research and Development
Board, where some of the UFO information had been discussed. T. Scott Crain
interviewed Fred A. Darwin who had served as the executive director of the
board. Darwin told Crain:
Bob Sarbacher… had virtually no
connection with the activities of the Research and Development Board… I got Bob
appointed to membership on the Guidance and Control Panel. After a couple of
months, the Chairman requested his replacement; he never came to the meetings.
This does not, of
course, negate what Sarbacher had written to Steinman and told others. It only
suggests that his information about the flying saucer crashes falls into the
category of hearsay rather than observation.
I believe that the
reference in Maguire’s letter was to this information, the Canadian connection
to it and a desire to ensure that proper authorities in Canada were aware of
some of the UFO history.
What this letter tells
me is that Maguire was concerned about Canadian involvement in the renewed
interest in UFOs, and that he wanted to alert the Defence Minister about it, in
case he wasn’t current on UFO history.
While the letter does
mention the renewed interest in UFOs, and the US Congress interest in the
topic, it says nothing about the reliability of David Grusch’s information.
And, if he was referring to the 1950 information, I suspect he was, then this
does little to validate that data. We are left right where we began, which is
without public corroboration of Grusch’s claims. It is just another instant of
second-hand stories that seem to provide important clues about UFOs and it does
suggest where some of the information that Grusch talks about originated. It
just is not the smoking gun that we need.
