Sightings slowed down in September, but also spread to new places. Reliable witnesses continued to see cigar-shaped objects with flames projecting from the tail, traveling at the speed of a normal or slow airplane, and giving off little noise except for an occasional slight whistling. In France on September 6, two luminous globes were seen flying in a straight line. The witnesses said the objects were not a shooting star or plane. That same day, a photograph of one of the Swedish ghost rockets was published in the
The objects appeared over Greece. Projectiles were seen over Macedonia and Salonika, and one appeared to fall into the sea, according to Greek Prime Minister Tsaldaris. Living in Greece was Dr. Paul Santorini, a physicist of world renown: he had helped to develop radar, fuses for the atomic bomb, and the Nike missile guidance system. According to a statement Santorini made in 1967, the Greek government was seriously alarmed by the presence of the ghost rockets over its territory, initially believing them to be Russian missiles. He claimed that the Greek army supplied him with a team of engineers to investigate the problem. The team’s conclusion: the ghost rockets were neither Russian nor missiles. Before long, U.S. military officials pressured the Greek army commanders into silence. In Santorini’s words, “before we could do any more, the Army, after conferring with foreign officials, ordered the investigation stopped.” Santorini himself was closely questioned by U.S. scientists from Washington. He later reaffirmed this statement to UFO researcher Raymond Fowler.29
Back in Sweden, on October 10, the Swedish defense staff officially announced its failure to explain the ghost rockets. After four months of inquiring into approximately one thousand ghost rocket reports—a number much smaller than the actual total of sightings—they said that 80 percent were some form of “celestial phenomena” such as meteors. The rest had clear, unambiguous evidence that could not be explained as natural phenomena, nor as Swedish aircraft, nor imagination on the part of the observer. At least two hundred of the “rockets” were tracked on radar, and these were definitely not the V-type missiles used by the Germans during the war. Beyond that, the Swedes gave no clues as to what they believed the objects to be.30
The Soviets repeatedly denied they had been behind the ghost rocket sightings. Of course, the denial would be expected whatever the truth of the matter, but no evidence linking the ghost rockets to the Soviets has ever emerged.
So ended the ghost rocket mystery, except for one addendum. On December 1, 1946, a Swedish report that remained classified until 1983 noted that
approximately one hundred impacts have been reported, together with fragments from thirty of these. All have been investigated by the Defense Research Institution. It has been impossible to make certain that any of the objects originated as parts of projectiles or rockets; they have generally been attributed to other sources.
The committee admitted it failed to learn the nature of the rockets.31 Thus, the mystery did not so much conclude as stall out.
DEUTSCHLAND ÜBER ALLIES
There is nothing to show that the ghost rockets sprung from Soviet or German technology. Still, over the years, a few people have continued to speculate that UFOs resulted from Nazi war technology.32 The theory is based on frail evidence, loose interpretation of known facts, and a great deal of speculation. The Germans had been working on some advanced aviation technology. Their V-1 and V-2 rockets are well known. Indeed, one of those crashed in Sweden in 1944, which let the secret out in the first place. They experimented with a disc-shaped airframe, although it led to no breakthroughs, and even developed the first rocket-powered fighter plane, the Me-163, which was effective but limited in supply. Less can be said for the famed Horten flying wing design, which never made it to production (more on this later). This German technology cannot account for the vast numbers of UFO reports, nor for the reported characteristics of the observed objects.
Still, there are connections between Nazi scientists and UFOs. Not only were Nazi scientists involved in the cutting edge of American aviation and propulsion technology in the years after 1945, but many of them worked at installations that became indelibly associated with UFOs, such as Wright-Patterson Air Force Base and White Sands Proving Ground. The project that brought these scientists, engineers, and spies into the United States became known as Paperclip. It was an exceptionally well-orchestrated web of propaganda and lies that hid their Nazi past. Military intelligence even succeeded in bringing the press on board for assistance.
