From: Joe McGonagle <joe.mcgonagle.nul>
Date: Tue, 26 Sep 2006 20:23:18 +0100
Fwd Date: Tue, 26 Sep 2006 17:38:59 -0400
Subject: Re: How The MoD Hid The Hunt For UFOs - McGonagle


>From: Nick Pope <nick.nul>
>To: <ufoupdates.nul>
>Date: Tue, 26 Sep 2006 06:56:41 +0100
>Subject: Re: How The MoD Hid The Hunt For UFOs

<snip>

>Files available at the National Archives and documents released
>under the Freedom of Information Act certainly show that the MOD
>policy was to play down the subject of UFOs. I certainly
>couldn't talk about the involvement of the Defence Intelligence
>Staff and my liaison with them on UFO investigations until the
>MOD had released documents confirming this. But none of this
>implies a cover-up or conspiracy in quite the way certain
>British ufologists imply.


Hello Nick, List,

Unfortunately, the main points were lost in the body of the
Guardian article, though some of them are present. For example:

'But the note continues: "This is not to say that the
investigation is not taken seriously. The branches have their
own methods - and [the public UFO desk] has no 'need to know'
about them - but we are aware that DI55 for example sometimes
makes extensive inquiries.'

This was in paragraph 10 of a 16 paragraph, 4 pages long minute
from S4(Air) to the Assistant Permanent Secretary for the Under-
Secretary of State for the RAF, which was also copied to the
Deputy Director of Headquarters Security for the MoD.

Significantly, it explicitly states that branches other than
S4(Air) (most likely including DI55) had their own methods of
UFO investigation, about which S4(Air) had no need to know. It
then goes on to say that DI55 sometimes make extensive enquiries
- it doesn't say what the nature of these enquiries are, but
could for instance include interviewing witnesses directly, or
visiting the location of a report (possibly even under the guise
of another branch of the RAF, or as civilian investigators).
Whatever they did, S4(Air) had no "need to know" - just as in
2000, Sec(AS) had no "need to know" about Condign, even though
Sec(AS)2a was the focal point for UFO investigation as far as
the public were concerned.

Immediately after the sentence quoted above, the paragraph
continues:

"It is undesirable that even a hint of this should become public
and we are currently consulting the [Air Historical Branch] on
ways of expurgating the official records against the time when
they qualify for disclosure [at the Public Records Office]."

This is also interesting. It is not explicit what means were
under consideration with which to achieve covering-up DI55's
role. It may be that they hoped to use the Public Records Act to
retain any reference to DI55 beyond 30 years, or were they
considering altering the records to make it look as though DI55
did not participate in UFO matters at all? Furthermore, did they
largely achieve their objective of removing references to DI55
from the official record, and we have just been fortunate to
uncover the few surviving records?

The above indicates something far more serious than simply
"playing down" the UFO topic.

>I gave an insider's view on this story to BBC World Service
yesterday in a radio interview and worked with the Daily Express
on a UFO feature in today's paper.

Yes, I listened to that and found it hilarious. The BBC
interviewer was asking questions about DI55, and you were
answering the questions as if they were asking about Sec(AS)2a!
I'm not sure if the interviewer thought that "the UFO Project"
was "run by" DI55, and therefore thought that you worked for
DI55, or if you were unaware that the questions were about
DI55's role and not Sec(AS)2a's role? I'll post a transcript
after I send this post. Your comments in the Daily Express
article seemed largely irrelevant to the documents (obtained by
Andy Roberts) which were the theme of the article, whereas Dave
Clarke's comments in the same article were right on the nail.


Regards,

Joe