Meet the new debunker. Same as the old debunker.
For more than a century, “debunk” has been used to describe the process that exposes “false or nonsensical claims or sentiments.” Pertaining to the UFO phenomena, debunking means assigning an “expert” to find an explanation for every major sighting or issue under examination.
The debunking exposition doesn’t have to be accurate or hold up under analysis. It only has to be sufficiently plausible to immediately raise doubt in a percentage of the message’s recipient population. That initial confusion becomes the kernel around which future propaganda can grow.
Debunkers are specialists in disinformation. Historically, they manipulate the mass media, and today social media, as well, to spread falsehood, lies and bad data to take the “un” out of unidentified. People hear and think: “weather balloon,” “planet Venus” and “swamp gas” often and repeatedly before the minds can ever proceed to even consider “unknown phenomena.”
Perhaps, as Winston Churchill said about truth in wartime, when it comes to UFOs, the debunkers have succeeded in cloaking the subject in a bodyguard of lies. After the phrase, “flying saucers,” who has considered interdimensional travel, parallel universes, or information gleaned from the quantum foam? Not many, going by those whom I’ve asked. Still, we must try and spread understanding about the phenomenon and its impact on humanity.
Cutting the ‘Un’ from ‘Unidentified’
Dr. Sean Kirkpatrick, PhD, may be the best UFO debunker since all-time UFO debunker Dr. Edward U. Condon, PhD, a distinguished physicist who ran and crashed the Colorado UFO Study in 1969, helping bury UFOs as a potential field of scientific study for 50 years.
Profiled previously in The Residium, Dr. Kirkpatrick, a distinguished materials and laser scientist, is the former head of AARO – the All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office at the Pentagon. There he worked to identify reports from domains of the air, in space and under the sea.
Before he was tasked by the Air Force to lead the Colorado University study of UFOs, Dr. Condon had been a pioneer in nuclear physics, participating in the Manhattan Project to develop the atomic bomb during World War II. He co-wrote the book on atomic spectra — the unique signature each element possesses when revealed by light. He also is reported to have helped design the re-entry vehicle for ICBM warheads.
Both Dr. Condon and Dr. Kirkpatrick were supported at various times in their careers with work for the US Government, at times in top secret capacities. A material happenstance, of course. What wasn’t co-incidental was their aim to denigrate publicly the reputations of individuals who report UFOs in order to shut down discussion of, and hence limit “belief in,” the reality of the UFO phenomena.
That is un-democratic. Citizens of the United States, on the whole, are a well-educated bunch who can think for themselves. That is why this is so disappointing to share: Debunking the UFO phenomena appears to remain an official policy of the US Government or significant elements therefrom.
Earlier this week, Dr. Kirkpatrick helped conjure a thunderstorm of disinformation by helping smear a good man, Capt. Robert L. Salas, USAF (Ret.) photographed below. Mr. Salas, a 7-year veteran of the United States Air Force and a graduate of the USAF Academy in Colorado Springs, witnessed the flight of 10 Minutemen I strategic ICBM missiles under his co-command taken off-line during a UFO encounter at Malmstrom Air Force Base in 1969. We detailed the incident in The Residium.
Here’s the debunking I’m talking about, from the pages of The Wall Street Journal, American flagship of media mogul Rupert Murdoch:
The Pentagon Disinformation that Fueled America's UFO Mythology
by Joel Schectman and Aruna Viswanatha
Wall Street Journal, June 6, 2025Excerpt...
The officers were told that the program they were joining, dubbed Yankee Blue, was part of an effort to reverse-engineer the technology on the craft. They were told never to mention it again. Kirkpatrick found the practice had begun decades before, and appeared to still continue. The defense secretary’s office sent a memo out across the the service in 2023 ordering the practice to stop immediately, but the damage was done.
Snip…
The official responded: “Ma’am, we know it went on for decades. We are talking about hundreds and hundreds of people. These men signed NDAs. They thought it was real,” an official said.
The photograph of Mr. Robert L. Salas that accompanied the article quoted above and continued below. Credit Maggie Shannon / Wall Street Journal.
A bunker in Montana
(Dr. Sean) Kirkpatrick investigated another mystery that stretched back 60 years.
In 1967, Robert Salas, now 84, was an Air Force captain sitting in a walk-in closet-sized bunker, manning the controls of 10 nuclear missiles in Montana.
He was prepared to launch apocalyptic strikes should Soviet Russia ever attack first, and got a call around 8 p.m. one night from the guard station above. A glowing reddish-orange oval was hovering over the front gate, Salas told Kirkpatrick’s investigators. The guards had their rifles drawn, pointed at the oval object appearing to float above the gate. A horn sounded in the bunker, signaling a problem with the control system: All 10 missiles were disabled.
Salas soon learned a similar event occurred at other silos nearby. Were they under attack? Salas never got an answer. The next morning a helicopter was waiting to take Salas back to base. Once there he was ordered: Never discuss the incident.
Salas was one of five men interviewed by Kirkpatrick’s team who witnessed such events in the 1960s and ’70s. While sworn to secrecy, the men began sharing their stories in the ’90s in books and documentaries.
Kirkpatrick’s team dug into the story and discovered a terrestrial explanation. The barriers of concrete and steel surrounding America’s nuclear missiles were thick enough to give them a chance if hit first by a Soviet strike. But scientists at the time feared the intense storm of electromagnetic waves generated by a nuclear detonation might render the hardware needed to launch a counterstrike unusable.
To test this vulnerability, the Air Force developed an exotic electromagnetic generator that simulated this pulse of disruptive energy without the need to detonate a nuclear weapon.
When activated, this device, placed on a portable platform 60 feet above the facility, would gather power until it glowed, sometimes with a blinding orange light. It would then fire a burst of energy that could resemble lightning.
The electromagnetic pulses snaked down cables connected to the bunker where launch commanders like Salas sat, disrupting the guidance systems, disabling the weapons and haunting the men to this day.
But any public leak of the tests at the time would have allowed Russia to know that America’s nuclear arsenal could be disabled in a first strike. The witnesses were kept in the dark.
To this day Salas believes he was party to an intergalactic intervention to stop nuclear war which the government has tried to hide. He is half right. The experience left the octogenarian deeply skeptical of the U.S. military and its ability to tell the truth. “There is a gigantic coverup, not only by the Air Force, but every other federal agency that has cognizance of this subject,” he said in an interview with the Journal. “We were never briefed on the activities that were going on, the Air Force shut us out of any information.”
Concealing the truth from men like Salas and deliberate efforts to target the public with disinformation unleashed within the halls of the Pentagon itself a dangerous force, which would become almost unstoppable as decades passed. The paranoid mythology the U.S. military helped spread now has a hold over a growing number of its own senior officials who count themselves as believers.
The crisis grew to a boil over a piece of metal mailed to a late-night radio host in 1996, which the sender said they had been told was part of a crashed spaceship.
# # #
The Pentagon Disinformation that Fueled America's UFO Mythology
Illustration from The Wall Street Journal: “A model of an electromagnetic pulse testing site, shown in a 1978 Pentagon document.” Those familiar with the program say it was not operational, let alone under consideration, for testing at Mamstrom in 1967.
Just going by the small amount I know about strategic missiles and nuclear weaponry, from reading and discussion with more than a couple of former participants in uniform, there is no way on this good earth that the Air Force would ever secretly test the impact of an EMP pulse on a flight of on-alert strategic missiles. The missiles were deployed to be at the ready to defend the nation in case of nuclear attack by the former Soviet Union and China.
The ludicrous idea of testing a system that knocks them out while they are on strategic alert is only rivaled in my memory with the stunning USAF report of ultra-high altitude parachuting dummies explaining the reports of alien bodies taken from a crashed saucer at Roswell in 1947.
Better let Mr. Salas explain for himself. Here’s his Rebuttal to the Wall Street Journal, published in the Ojai Valley News. Note Capt. Salas was not asked about the issue brought up in the article, the debunking of a major example of the national security implications of the UFO phenomenon via a newly concocted EMP test:
Regarding the June 6 Wall Street Journal article, “America’s UFO Mythology,” by Joel Schectman and Aruna Viswanatha:
By Robert Salas, Special to the Ojai Valley News
Since my name was mentioned in this article (page 7) with respect to an incident I experienced while I was a Minuteman I (ICBM) missile launch officer, in command of a Launch Control Facility (LCF) in Montana, designated “Oscar 1” and false representations were made, I find it necessary to respond to those statements in the referenced article.
The article, on page 8, states that Mr. Sean Kirkpatrick’s team of the All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) “…discovered a terrestrial explanation” of what occurred. It further states that a large electromagnetic generator, requiring heavy concrete supports and 60-foot posts supporting a platform was constructed near the front gate of the Oscar 1 LCF where it would fire a high-voltage burst of energy, creating an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) to determine any vulnerabilities to our equipment and missiles.
It further states: “When activated, this device, placed on a portable platform 60 feet above the facility, would gather power until it glowed, sometimes with a blinding orange light. It would then fire a burst of energy that could resemble lightning. The electromagnetic pulses snaked down cables connected to the bunker where launch commanders like Salas sat, disrupting the guidance systems, disabling the weapons and haunting the men to this day. But any public leak of the test at the time would have allowed Russia to know that America’s nuclear arsenal could be disabled in a first strike. The witnesses were kept in the dark.”
My response to this fantasy is as follows:
1. I gave an over two-hour presentation to two members of the AARO team, on Feb. 15, 2023. At the end of my presentation, I asked them if they were going to contact the U.S. Air Force to verify the factual events as I represented them. They replied that they would not be doing so because of the lack of cooperation from USAF. They never informed me that they had discovered some “terrestrial explanation” to my incident as stated above.
2. The U.S. Air Force was certainly aware of the potential damage as a result of EMP from a nearby nuclear explosion and I and my co-author James Klotz wrote about this subject in our book, “Faded Giant” (pages 27-32). In addition, we listed references to EMP studies (pages 33-34). With supporting statements from members of the Boeing investigative team, we concluded that EMP testing was not the cause of the missile shutdowns. If this had been the case, it surely would have been reflected in the historical documents and communications with investigators we received from that period.
3. All Minuteman crew members had high-security clearances. We had detailed briefings, both classified and unclassified, on any activities in the field that could impact the status of our missile readiness each time we were sent out on Alert duties. In the three years I was assigned as a missile launch officer at Malmstrom AFB, I was never briefed about any EMP testing on operational missiles.
4. It would have been irresponsible and unthinkable for the USAF to jeopardize the operational status of these weapons by doing such tests as they were, in part, the basis of our strategic national security, and especially since this time period was during the “Cold War” and we were engaged in the Vietnam War, and we had a near nuclear war during the Cuban missile crisis only a few years earlier.
5. As stated above, the EMP generator equipment would have involved a prolonged installation process in plain sight of our security team at ground level of our LCF. Those activities would have been reported to us in the underground Launch Control Center (LCC) since we were in command of the facility. Our topside personnel never reported to us any such activity.
6. During our incident, our Flight Security Controller expressed extreme fear when reporting to me an object hovering just above the front gate of our LCF. In fact, all the security personnel were very frightened as we later learned. If there had been some sort of authorized test going on, they would not have experienced such fear.
7. During our incident, our status panel showed an indication of possible incursion into two launch facilities (LF), the location of missiles. Security teams were sent to those sites to investigate but as they approached them, they reported seeing the same type of object hovering above those missiles. They again were so frightened to see them, they requested to go no farther and return to the LCF.
8. Mr. Ray Fowler was a manager of Electrical Systems for the Minuteman I missile systems during the period of the Echo and Oscar flight incidents. He worked for Sylvania Corp., which was the contractor for those systems. Fowler had employees stationed at Malmstrom during this period who reported to him details of those incidents, including the reports of UFO activity. According to his affidavit, there was no report to him about conducting EMP testing at the operational sites where missiles were disabled.
9. One of the documents we received from our FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) request was a Telex from Strategic Air Command (SAC) to various Minuteman bases, The original classification of that telex was SECRET. The subject was Loss of Strategic Alert, Echo Flight, Malmstrom AFB and dated March 17, 1967. In the body of this telex, it stated: “The fact that no apparent reason for the loss of ten missiles can be readily identified is cause for grave concern to this headquarters. We must have an in-depth analysis to determine cause and corrective action and we must know as quickly as possible what the impact is to the fleet, if any.” Such a statement would not have been made by SAC headquarters if the shutdowns had resulted from EMP testing!
10. Per the SAC request, Boeing established an investigative team. It was headed by Mr. Robert Kaminski, who had been charged with running the Minuteman troubleshooting team. He contacted me shortly after I went public about my incident. He wrote a long letter, in which he stated, “The team met with me to report their findings and it was decided that the final report would have nothing significant in it to explain what happened at E-Flight. … there was no technical explanation that could explain the event.” (see pages 25-26 of “Faded Giant”). There was no mention of any EMP testing with respect to this or any other incident.
11. The two Boeing engineers, requested by name in the SAC telex, Rigert and Dutton, confirmed in the Wing History Report that electrical power problems were ruled out as a possible cause.
12. According to the Department of Energy (DOE), there was no nuclear testing conducted on March 16 or March 24 that could have been a source of EMP.
13. There were multiple reports of UFO sightings near and over Malmstrom AFB on the evening of March 24, 1967, as stated in a report by the base operations officer.
14. Other witnesses to those and other sightings could be available to testify under improved witness protection assurances.
I, and other witnesses are available, and willing to testify under oath, as to the truth of the above statements.
I am sending this rebuttal to the Wall Street Journal and ask that they publish it and respond to the rebuttal statements as listed above.
— Robert L. Salas of Ojai is a retired Air Force captain.
Mr. Matthew Ford, host of the podcast, “Good Trouble,” brought up this subject Tuesday. Here’s his program, “The UFO Coverage No One is Talking About,” including his outstanding interview with Mr. Salas, taped before he wrote the response above.
Certainly, it is critically important to keep military secrets. However, when it comes to UFOs, it’s more than keeping the truth of the matter from the nation’s adversaries and economic competitors. It is a matter of democracy and the right of the people to know what is behind a phenomenon that is making a real impact on the nation and humanity.
The truth is, by lying about UFO witnesses and the events they reported, debunkers not only denigrate people and their reputations merely for expressing their fundamental right of freedom of speech — smearing witnesses undermines the right of “We the People” to know about the mysterious UFO phenomenon that appears over our homes, schools and places of work, play and worship, as well as in the waters of this blue sphere, our planet earth. Going by the record, the UFO phenomenon has done so for thousands of years and continues to do so in the present day.
Officially and covertly denying information about UFOs from scientists reviewing the question goes back to the Robertson Panel in 1953-1954. Named after physicist Dr. Howard P. Robertson, PhD, who headed the panel of five prominent scientists charged with reviewing the Air Force’s UFO files.
In January 1953, (H. Marshall) Chadwell and H. P. Robertson, a noted physicist from the California Institute of Technology, put together a distinguished panel of nonmilitary scientists to study the UFO issue. It included Robertson as chairman; Samuel A. Goudsmit, a nuclear physicist from the Brookhaven National Laboratories; Luis Alvarez, a high-energy physicist; Thornton Page, the deputy director of the Johns Hopkins Operations Research Office and an expert on radar and electronics; and Lloyd Berkner, a director of the Brookhaven National Laboratories and a specialist in geophysics. (30)
Unfortunately, the Robertson Panel received a censored view of data and never learned vital information about the UFO phenomenon, matching previous USAF study pronouncements: “All investigative groups found that UFO reports indicated no direct threat to national security and no evidence of visits by extraterrestrials.”
Years later, a government communication was found that revealed the official policy of limiting the information presented to the Robertson Panel for review. The practitioners and history were chronicled by Dr. J. Allen Hynek, PhD, and Dr. Jacques Vallee, PhD, in a document they call, “The Pentacle Memorandum.”
Close up of the Trent UFO photographs, detailed in The Residium.
One final point: As one proudly named Bunker (an old English surname descended from a French emissary named “Bon Coeur” or “Good Heart” — the same family came to the Colony of New Hampshire and later fought to defend Bunker Hill for independence — and in every war since the Revolution to help keep our freedom — I would like to set the record straight about why it’s important to learn, understand and share the truth about UFO phenomenon:
As citizens of the United States, We the People have the right to know what is the true nature of the UFO phenomenon. Vision demands Truth to recognize where we are, what the true nature of our situation is, what we want to do about it, and where we want to go as a nation and as a planet. Free people demand and deserve no less.