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Roswell Declassified

John3 writes "Scotland may be the most popular UFO destination on the planet, but Roswell, New Mexico is the old favorite for government conspiracy buffs who believe the US government has been hiding proof of an alien spacecraft crash in 1947. Popular Mechanics has recently gained access to de-classified documents from the Roswell military base, and they contain no entries of unusual events or activity. I wonder if the release of these documents will deter the conspiracy theorists?"

4 of 467 comments (clear)

  1. Will it deter conspiracy "theorists" ? by Infonaut · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Uh.. no.

    Conspiracy theories are not really theories, in that they can never be disproved. The theory that the earth is flat can be disproved; the theory that aliens have infiltrated the highest levels of government can't be disproved.

    Conspiracy theory is a belief system, and as such is highly resistant to facts.

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    Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
  2. Fake by nEoN+nOoDlE · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Those de-classified reports are obviously fake. The real UFO documents will never be de-classified due humanity's inability to deal with Extra-Terrestrial life on this planet.

    Well, all personal conspiracy theories aside, why would this stop anyone from making up conspiracy theories? No one in their right mind would believe that the government would declassify documents that they feel could be damaging to themselves or the US public. Are they gonna declassify that they shot JFK (if they did) even 100 years from now? I think not.

    --
    Don't trust a bull's horn, a doberman's tooth, a runaway horse or me.
  3. Put your tin foil hats away, please by stwrtpj · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Rather than replying to a whole bunch of tin foil hat brigade posts, I'm going to combine what I know of the case into one post. In my younger and more foolish days, I was a UFO nut and soaked up every account of alien visitors. As I got older, I started looking at many of the facts of the case in a more objective light.

    The conclusion I have come to is that the Roswell case is a conglomeration of multiple accounts of unrelated occurences occuring over the span of ten years that were later cobbled together into a single, misinformed account.

    There is one very important fact that needs to be made clear about the entire Rosewell bru-ha-ha. A lot the publicity for it, namely the theory that an alien spacecraft crashed there, did not come about until well after the incident. In fact, it was not until as late as 1978 that alien bodies were ever associated with the incident.

    So, bearing this in mind, here are some of the little factoids about the case that appear to have perfectly logical explanations:

    • The little alien bodies - For some time durintg the late 1940s and early 1950s, the USAF conducted a series of tests which involved shoving anthropomorphic dummies out of planes from high altitude, usually to test parachute equipment. These dummies often wound up in people's farms. Not only did the USAF not cover this up, they encouraged people to report the location of these dummies, and even paid rewards for them. No coverup here. This is all documented.
    • The alleged bits of alien spacecraft scattered over the landscape - The oft-repeated refrain from the tinfoil hat brigade is that the government claimed that this was a weather balloon. This term is a misnomer, and was never used by the USAF. This term was invented later. At the time of the alleged crash, the USAF had just started Project Mogul, which involved the launching of several high altitude balloons for various scientific experiments, including the effect of cosmic rays on living tissue samples. In fact, the very first such balloon crashed at about the time that the supposed alien ship crash happened. Once again, this is all well-documented, including the locations where these dummies we retrieved.
    • The living alien at the hospital - Many accounts of the incident involve an actual living alien being escorted by USAF personnel. The figure is discribed as having the characteric large head of other supposed accounts of aliens. This is yet another case of an unrelated event being tied to Roswell. In 1959, a Captain Dan Fulgham received a nasty head injury that caused a massive hematoma. As a result, his face and head swelled to grotesque proportions. Even his own wife didn't recognize him at first. Documented. No coverup.

    Ok, this post is long enough. There are lots of other little factoids from the case (the so-called "Missing Nurse", the alleged "red-headed captain" that threatened people if the said anything, etc) that I could go into, but all of these facts can be found with a little investigation.

    But I can predict the responses now: "The government planted those other stories to throw us off the trail!" "They're feeding disinformation to us.!" Bull-fucking-shit. Check your history, people. The US government sucks at covering up anything of importance. Anything that remains classified now from that long ago, it's largely because no one considers the information important.

    Finally, here's another one for you: You say we recovered advanced alien tech. You say we recovered alien bodies. Then tell me: Where the hell is this technology? 56 years is a hell of a long time. We've gone from vaccuum-tube ENIAC that fills a room to a 2.6 gigahertz PC that sits in your lap. If we can't in that space of time figure out what made any alleged UFO from Roswell tick in that space of time, then either it never happened, or the government scientists are all idiots. And don't claim that things like stealth tech resulted from alien technology. Give humanity credit for be

    --
    Karma: Frotzed (mostly due to the Frobozz Magic Karma Company)
  4. Re:Right by StarTux · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Considering Clinton was unable to hide his affair and that the F117 was also known well enough about I doubt, very much doubt anything of this magnitude could be hidden. Heck, even the Chinese stole nuclear secrets.