ARRO's Annual Report on UAPs (UFOS)

 

In what was breaking news yesterday but today is just a reminder of the past, we learn that the required Annual Report on UAPs has been released into the public arena. It is only eleven pages long with many of those eleven pages only partially filled. There are no redactions because this is the unclassified version that tells us little or nothing about the sightings but does tell us more than we need to know about the mechanics of this new investigation.

The Executive Summary is four paragraphs that do not fill the page. It tells us that, added to the 144 reports gathered over the last 17 years and were mentioned in the first public report, there were 247 new sightings added to that list. There were also another 119 that “were either since discovered or reported after the preliminary assessment period.” That made for a grand total of 510, as of August 30 of last year. They note that additional information will be found in the classified version of the report.

Both the AARO and the ODNI (Office, Director National Intelligence) suggested that the increase in UAP reports (UFOs) was due, in part, to a better understanding of the possible threat of UAPs as either a hazard to aerial navigation or adversary collection methods. Or, in other words, they’re not thinking in terms of alien visitation but in terrestrial intervention.

After a long paragraph that it filled with acronyms there is a final paragraph that reinforces the idea that UAPs (UFOs) continue to penetrate restricted air space, which leads back to threats to aerial navigation and intelligence collection by our adversaries in the world… or, what amounts to a repeat of the second paragraph.

The third page (page one is a table of contents) is “Scope and Assumptions,” which establishes reporting requirements, who is responsible for what and a list of government organizations that lists the agencies involved that includes intelligence agencies, the various branches of the military, NASA, the FAA and NOAA.

The assumptions are that there are multiple factors for seeing UAP (UFOs), that the reports are from the “observer’s accurate recollection of the event and/or sensors that generally operate correctly… AARO acknowledge that a select number of UAP [UFO] incidents may be attributable to sensor irregularities or variances…”

An example of a sensor irregularity.

The fourth page is devoted to “Governmental Changes to Manage UAP [UFO] Issues.” This is more government boilerplate providing information about who will do what and how it will be done. It tells us nothing about the sightings or the investigations, just who will coordinate with whom and lots of alphabet agencies mentioned.

Page five is “Continued Reporting and Robust Analysis Are Providing Better Fidelity on UAP [UFO] Events, but many Cases Remain Unresolved.” While this promises some interesting information, it is just more numbers about the reports, which were provided in the Executive Summary. It does tell us about AARO’s initial “analysis and characterization of 366 newly identified reports” that left 171 that were said to be uncharacteristic and unattributed UAP reports which is a way of saying that they were currently unidentified. Of those 366 reports, 26 were unmanned Aircraft or UAVs, 163 were balloons or balloon-like entities, their word and not mine, and 6 were clutter meaning birds or weather or other such things.

They finish that section by mentioning, once again the possible hazard of collision that would require operators to adjust flight patterns “in response to their [UAP] presences in the airspace, operating outside of air traffic control standards.” This means that pilots might have maneuver to avoid hitting one of these UAPs (UFOs).

In the summary (which covers about half a page), they again noted that the UAP (UFO) continue to represent a hazard to flight safety and pose a possible adversary collection threat. AARO has been established as the DoD focal point for UAP (UFO) reports and coordinated efforts among the various government agencies have resulted in increased data sets. In other words, it seems like a high school student who was told to write an eleven-page theme and used repetition to reach the required length and to make statements that look impressive but say nothing.

However, we have no details on the reports, what investigative methods were used, and that the numbers were often repeated. They report on 510 reports, they mention 366 reports that were gathered in addition and that 119 reports were not included in the assessment period. And they have explained, to their satisfaction, 195 of the reports.

There were three appendices, that included Key Terms, the ARRO Establishment of Office and Duties, and telling us that an Annual Report is due on October 31 of each year until 2026.

In other words, there wasn’t much in the report that provided any insight into what was happening or how the investigations were conducted, size of the operation or any description of the UFO sightings made. Just numbers reported and governmental boilerplate that clarified nothing and a seemed suggestion that there was an increase in UFO sightings when in reality it was merely an increase in reporting. As I mentioned, the next scheduled report is on October 31. You can see the whole report here:

https://www.dni.gov/files/ODNI/documents/assessments/Unclassified-2022-Annual-Report-UAP.pdf

I will note that we are seeing more mainstream media reporting of UFO sightings and we see a change in attitude of those in the media. No longer are UFO reports met with scorn, but with a wait and see attitude. However, most of those reporters know little or nothing about the UFO field and accept with little or no questioning of the source and their proclamations. Although there is an overall improvement in the reporting by the media, there is still a gap between what it true, what is perceived and what the government would like us to believe.

We’ll have to wait to see if anything new comes out of this renewed interest in UFOs, or if it will degenerate to the point it reached when the Condon Committee conducted what was allegedly a scientific investigation. We’re still in the phase I think of as Twining 2.0 where there seems to be an interest in investigation rather than explanation. It will be interesting to see when we reach Robertson 2.0, which is the debunking feature.

The real point is that there is nothing in this new report that tells us about the sightings. We are given numbers and a list of agencies and a schedule for reports. We expect that some sightings, maybe most, will have mundane explanations but we have no details at all. In the past, with Project Blue Book and other investigations, we saw how the data were manipulated to obtain a specific result. Here we see the beginnings of that same sort of manipulation. We have a mystery and then we find a solution to convince people there was  no mystery. That is right out of the Robertson Panel Playbook. We need more than eleven short pages that include a table of contents and a list of definitions. We need an avenue to the truth.