Before leaving, Keyhoe decided to check into a UFO report he received from a lead by Delmar Fahrney. The story concerned a navy pilot named George Brent. While flying a navy transport plane near Newfoundland, Brent and his crew got a close-up view of a “huge flying disc with a glow around the rim.” They believed it to be “well over” three hundred feet in diameter and at least thirty feet thick at the center. They saw a reflecting surface, apparently smooth metal. After a rapid approach and near collision, the crew saw the object for another ten seconds before it zoomed away. Air force intelligence officers interrogated Brent and the entire crew; he was later shown secret photos of UFOs, one of which portrayed a disc like the one he saw. Brent was also interviewed at Wright-Patterson AFB, although no one there would answer any of his questions. This account was undated but occurred (according to one of Keyhoe’s sources) “some time back.”
Seeing more ammunition for a congressional investigation, Keyhoe sought to get more detail on this case. He contacted a former navy man—using the pseudonym of Jack Morton—and asked Morton to find out where Brent was currently stationed. Morton believed the navy had flagged Brent’s file, which meant that personnel would refuse requests for information and report any queries. Despite this, for some reason, Morton thought he could get the information for Keyhoe. Several days passed with no word from Morton. Keyhoe finally reached him after repeated calls to his house. “That navy call,” said Morton, “raised hell.” Less than an hour after his inquiry, he said, two CIA agents were at his door and gave him “the third degree.” They demanded to know who wanted Brent’s address and why. Morton ended up telling the CIA agents everything about the congressional plan, including Hillenkoetter’s role. “For heaven’s sake,” Morton told Keyhoe, “don’t try to call or see me again.”
Keyhoe did not get the chance to see Hillenkoetter. Immediately after the incident with Morton, Keyhoe received a letter from Hillenkoetter which announced his resignation from NICAP and stated that he decided not to proceed with any UFO investigation or announcement. The air force, said Hillenkoetter, was doing all it could. Keyhoe knew Hillenkoetter, his former Annapolis classmate, well. Hillenkoetter had been “absolutely convinced” that the UFO cover-up should be exposed. “The only answer,” decided Keyhoe, “was persuasion at a very high level.” It is hard to credit any other interpretation. The only question is why would Hillenkoetter be pressured, and what means were used. The more benign interpretations are that Hillenkoetter’s statements were of “considerable embarrassment” to the CIA. In the context of clear indications of pressure on Ruppelt, it appears that embarrassment was only the beginning of the problem. As far as the manner used, we can only say that it seems unlikely that Hillenkoetter would have backed down following a mere request.161
SUMMARY
For five years, despite some hopeful moments, NICAP had tried and failed to deliver the goods. In 1962, a congressional hearing on UFOs was as far away as ever. Keyhoe, who early on had predicted a NICAP membership of 100,000, could not seem to get it much past 5,000, and the organization was in financial straits from the beginning. On the other side, the air force, CIA, NSA, and other intelligence organizations involved in UFOs had enormous reserves of money, secrecy, and power. NICAP had given it a good effort but was out of its depth and sinking slowly but surely.
UFOs themselves continued to appear in the late 1950s and early 1960s, but with much less frequency than in previous years. Clearly, this helped the secrecy, but was also to some extent the result of secrecy. We simply do not know how many sightings were recorded through unofficial channels. That said, the period was a quiet one but saw steady numbers of up-close sightings and the development of something new: claims by credible individuals to have been abducted by aliens. In the early 1960s, almost no one took these seriously, but the phenomenon had begun nonetheless.
Also, the handling of this problem appears to have gone deeper underground. There are many indications of various “unofficial” dealings with the UFO problem, well beyond the authority of ATIC and Blue Book. The NSA and CIA certainly fit in here, but so do air force programs like Moon Dust.
Finally, there appears little doubt that
Chapter 7
