An Introduction to the U.S. Government’s Suppression of Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena and Advanced Science
The Disinformation Series
This essay series examines and critiques the systematic use of disinformation, secrecy, and legislative mechanisms by the United States government to suppress knowledge of the reality of Non-Human Intelligence (NHI), Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena (UAP), and certain advanced scientific research/innovation. Drawing on declassified documents, congressional investigations, news sources, and recent whistleblower testimony, this paper explores how Executive Branch entities have used narrative control, over-classification, and legislative instruments to purposely obstruct public understanding and scientific progress concerning UAP and certain advanced sciences. Historical case studies, including official UAP investigations, Project Star Gate MKULTRA, COINTELPRO, Operation Mockingbird, are analyzed to illustrate a durable pattern of information suppression extending from the Cold War to the present. This paper further evaluates the role of Special Access Programs (SAPs), the UAP Security Classification Guide, and specific statutory frameworks such as the Atomic Energy Act and the Invention Secrecy Act to conceal potentially transformative technologies. Ultimately, the essay calls for urgent legislative and executive branch reforms to ensure transparency, restore public trust, and democratize access to paradigm-shifting scientific discoveries.
On July 26, 2023, retired U.S. Air Force Intelligence Officer David Grusch provided sworn testimony to the U.S. House Oversight Committee’s Subcommittee on National Security that the U.S. government is in present physical possession of non-human craft and biological evidence of a non-human intelligence (NHI).1
While speaking at the SALT iConnections New York conference on May 21, 2024, retired U.S. Army Colonel Karl Nell, a former member of the U.S. Department of Defense’s Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena Task Force (UAP Task Force), stated there is “zero doubt” that “Non-human intelligence exists. Non-human intelligence has been interacting with humanity, this interaction is not new, and it’s been ongoing, and there are unelected people in the government that are aware of that.”
Luis “Lue” Elizondo, a former senior leader of the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program (AATIP), a secretive Department of Defense unit that studied Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena (UAP), confirmed in his book, Imminent, released August 20, 2024, that non-human intelligence exists. Their craft is “not made by humans.”2
On May 1, 2025, Dr. Eric Davis, Ph.D., an astrophysicist who consulted with the DoD’s AATIP and UAP Task Force, informed members of Congress that the U.S. government and aerospace defense contractors have retrieved UAP.3
If these declarative statements, and more like them, are factual, they raise an urgent question: How has the U.S. government managed to conceal revelations of such strategic magnitude for decades, dating back at least to the post–World War II era?
Given its world-historical nature, the ability to conceal such information from the public over such a prolonged period is not likely due to a singular effort. It almost certainly must, instead, be the product of a complex, multi-pronged strategy. This paper will argue that both UAP and NHI are real and that disinformation has played a central role in the government’s concealment of these realities.
Unlike misinformation caused by human error, disinformation by the federal government is a deliberate and strategic distortion of facts systematically deployed to manipulate public perception, conceal sensitive information, and (often) preserve the power of those with institutional control. Evidence will show that the use of secrecy laws, narrative control, selective disclosure,4 media manipulation, and psychological operations has allowed the U.S. government to not only hide the truth about NHI, UAP, and reverse engineering programs but to discredit, stigmatize, and threaten those who attempt to expose these secrets.5
Historical examples, including MKULTRA’s unethical experiments on unsuspecting Americans, COINTELPRO’s targeting of constitutionally protected dissenters, and Operation Mockingbird’s unlawful and unconstitutional infiltration and distortion of American news sources reveal a government engaged in disinformation campaigns not to protect national security but to safeguard the private interests of unelected bureaucrats and conceal unlawful actions and misdeeds in direct contravention of democratic principles.
The Robertson Panel (1953)6 prescribed debunking UFO sightings through media ridicule, while Project Blue Book (1952–1969) was less of a scientific inquiry than a disinformation campaign designed to trivialize UAP reports. Even in the current era, this activity continues. The All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), established by Congress in 2022 and tasked with investigating the U.S. government’s involvement with UAP,7 willfully produced a misleading and incomplete historical report in 2024. That report was strategically pre-briefed to select media outlets to frame public perception, and key classified programs and credible whistleblower statements were intentionally omitted.8 These actions violate Executive Order 12333, which explicitly prohibits U.S. government agencies from engaging in covert disinformation campaigns to influence domestic political processes or public opinion.9 The evidence detailed in this essay reveals a systemic pattern of deception that spans multiple generations of U.S. government policy on UAP.
Now available historical evidence proves the Condon Report (1969), commissioned by the U.S. Air Force under the guise of an independent scientific evaluation, was structured from the outset to discredit UAP research. Internal documentation later revealed that the report’s negative conclusions were predetermined before the study began.10 This deliberate framing mirrors the tactics used by the AARO in its 2024 report, reinforcing the conclusion that official UAP inquiries across decades have functioned not as genuine investigations, but as insidious public relations efforts to neutralize public interest and congressional oversight.
The suppression of NHI and UAP is not an isolated or unique irregularity but part of a broader historical strategy of concealing and actively suppressing scientific breakthroughs and technological advancements. For example, the confiscation of Nikola Tesla’s research by the Office of the Alien Property Custodian following his death in 1943 is an early, dramatic example of how potentially transformative scientific discoveries, especially those related to energy, electricity distribution, and propulsion, have been seized and classified. More recently, whistleblower David Grusch testified under oath before Congress in 2023 that the U.S. government has engaged in covert UAP crash retrieval and reverse engineering programs,11 allegations which the AARO’s then-director, Dr. Sean Kirkpatrick, swiftly dismissed despite similar statements by former intelligence officials and military personnel dating back decades, including Edward J. Ruppelt, a captain in the U.S. Air Force who served as the director of Project Grudge and later Project Blue Book.12
The tactic of excessive classification is exhibited by the UAP Security Classification Guide, produced in April 2020 by the Department of Defense’s Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon Task Force (UAPTF). It prohibits the public release of any and all UAP-related videos and images, regardless of whether such information constitutes a meaningful threat to national security.13
In addition to leveraging disinformation and over-classification, the executive branch has relied on legislative frameworks to institutionalize secrecy and restrict access to many breakthrough scientific technologies. The Atomic Energy Act of 194614 and the Invention Secrecy Act of 1951 have long been misused to classify patents and scientific discoveries related to energy, propulsion, and aerospace technologies, some of which, if declassified, could potentially revolutionize entire industries. These laws, which originated at the start of the Cold War ostensibly to protect genuine national security, e.g., safeguard nuclear secrets from the Soviet Union, now stifle progress by serving as instruments of scientific suppression.
Even now, thousands of patents remain under secrecy orders, including inventions related to novel energy production/distribution and propulsion systems.15 These classified patents represent an untapped reservoir of scientific advancement that could address societal needs. Indeed, elements within the executive branch are fond of classifying entire fields of math and physics. Marc Andreessen, a co-founder of the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, recently alleged that White House officials asserted they were fully prepared to classify mathematical areas of artificial intelligence (AI).16 This practice has led to the effective halting of advancement in fields deemed to touch on national security.
The need for systemic reform is urgent, and legislative vehicles are available. For example, the proposed UAP Disclosure Act of 2023 (UAPDA), initially introduced by Senators Chuck Schumer (D-NY), a liberal, and Mike Rounds (R-SD), a conservative, in July 2023 as an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2024, sought to establish an independent UAP Records Review Board modeled after the successful JFK Assassination Records Review Board. The UAPDA would mandate the controlled and responsible release of government-held NHI and UAP records, limit the arbitrary classification of such information, and ensure public access to historically significant information.
Equally necessary is the passage of enhanced UAP whistleblower protections, such as those proposed by the New Paradigm Institute.17 Meanwhile, the Intelligence Community Whistleblower Protection Act of 1998 offers some safeguards in its amended form, but it does not protect individuals from disclosing information about deeply buried SAPs18 or reverse engineering efforts related to UAP.
This essay will demonstrate that the historical record is clear: the U.S. government has consistently engaged in disinformation and suppression to control narratives related to UAP and other unconventional sciences. The parallels among Project Blue Book, the Robertson Panel, and the AARO’s 2024 report highlight an ongoing game plan to stigmatize, discredit, and withhold information that could transform society and redefine our understanding of the universe.
This series will:
Examine the historical record of government disinformation campaigns, demonstrating how past efforts to suppress political dissent, control media narratives, and stifle scientific research provide a blueprint for understanding modern UAP secrecy.
Establish clear parallels between past and present suppression efforts, demonstrating how the tactics used in COINTELPRO, MKULTRA, Operation Mockingbird, and the Project Star Gate are still in effect today.
Advocate for urgent policy reforms to modernize secrecy laws, expand congressional oversight, and ensure that scientific progress serves the public rather than an entrenched national security state.
The question is no longer whether the U.S. government has historically engaged in disinformation campaigns and deployed similar tactics to hide the reality of NHI/UAP. The question is how long these tactics will continue to be tolerated before the public demands complete transparency and accountability.
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1 U.S. Congress, House of Representatives, Committee on Oversight and Accountability. Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena: Implications on National Security, Public Safety, and Government Transparency. 118th Congress, 1st session, July 26, 2023. Testimony of David Grusch.
2 Elizondo, Luis. “Imminent: Inside the Pentagon's Hunt for UFOs: Former Head of the Department of Defense’s Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program.” HarperCollins. 2024.
3 Statement by Dr. Eric Davis, PhD. Understanding UAP: Science, National Security & Innovation. UAP Disclosure Fund. Sponsored by the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. May 1, 2025.
4 For example, on June 25, 2021, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence provided to Congress its “Preliminary Assessment: Unidentified Aerial Phenomena,” which for the first time admitted UAP are
real phenomena, but it did not acknowledge the existence of NHI.
5 “There’s a sophisticated disinformation campaign targeting the US populace, which is extremely unethical and immoral, and it’s totally frightening.” “UFO Whistleblower David Grusch: ‘We are not alone,’” NewsNation, April 2, 2025
6 From the “Report of Meetings of Scientific Advisory Panel of Unidentified Flying Objects”: “The Panel’s concept of a borad [sic] educational program integrating efforts of all concerned agencies was that it should have two major aims: training and ‘debunking’…The ‘debunking’ aim would result in reduction in public interest in ‘flying saucers’ which evoke a strong psychological reaction. This education could be accomplished by mass media such as television, motion pictures, and popular articles.”
7 The ‘‘James M. Inhofe National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2023’’ (NDAA) established the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO). The NDAA mandated AARO to provide Congress with a “written report detailing the historical record of the United States Government relating to” UAP, including “a compilation and itemization of the key historical record of the involvement of the intelligence community” and “any efforts to obfuscate, manipulate public opinion, hide, or otherwise provide incorrect unclassified or classified information” regarding UAP.
8 Mellon, Christopher Mellon. “The Pentagon’s New UAP Report is Seriously Flawed.” The Debrief, April 12, 2024.
9 Executive Order 12333, first signed on December 4, 1981, and updated on December 29, 2009, by then-President Barack Obama, explicitly prohibits covert actions “intended to influence United States political processes, public opinion, policies, or media.”
10 “The overview shows that most case studies were conducted by junior staff, the senior staff took little part, and the director took no part, in these investigations. The analysis of evidence by categories shows that there are substantial and significant differences between the findings of the project staff and those that the director attributes to the project. Although both the director and the staff are cautious in stating conclusions, the staff tend to emphasize challenging cases and unanswered questions, whereas the director emphasizes the difficulty of further study and the probability that there is no scientific knowledge to be gained.” Sturrock, Peter A. “An Analysis of the Condon Report on the Colorado UFO Project.” Journal of Scientific Exploration Vol. 1, No. 1 (1987): 75–100.
11 “I was informed, in the course of my official duties, of a multi-decade UAP crash retrieval and reverse engineering program to which I was denied access to those additional read-on’s.” U.S. Congress, House of Representatives, Committee on Oversight and Accountability. Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena: Implications on National Security, Public Safety, and Government Transparency. 118th Congress, 1st session, July 26, 2023. Testimony of David Grusch.
12 Ruppelt, Edward J. “The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects.” Doubleday & Company, Inc. 1956.
13 The UAP Security Classification Guide is a document produced in April 2020 by the Office of Naval Intelligence, Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon Task Force (UAPTF). The Classification Guide mandates extreme secrecy and the classification of virtually all UAP data, including any visual evidence of UAP.
14 Note, the Schumer-Rounds “Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena Disclosure Act of 2024 (UAPDA)” amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2024 stated under Findings, Declarations, and Purposes: “Legislation is necessary because credible evidence and testimony indicates that Federal Government unidentified anomalous phenomena records exist that have not been declassified or subject to mandatory declassification review…due in part to exemptions under the Atomic Energy Act of 1954 (42 U.S.C. 2011 et seq.), as well as an over-broad interpretation of ‘transclassified foreign nuclear information’, which is also exempt from mandatory declassification, thereby preventing public disclosure under existing provisions of law.”
15 “At the end of fiscal year 2024, there were 6,471 secrecy orders in effect.” Invention Secrecy. Project on Government Secrecy, Federation of American Scientists.
16 Andreessen, Marc. “Trump vs. Biden: Tech Policy.” a16z Podcast, July 16, 2024.
17 Note: the author of this paper is the Public Relations Manager & Policy Liaison for the New Paradigm Institute.
18 Special Access Program: “Any program established under Executive Order 12356 or the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, as amended, that imposes additional controls governing access to classified information involved with such programs beyond those required by normal management and safeguarding practices. These additional controls may include, but are not limited to, access approval, adjudication or investigative requirements, special designation of officials authorized to determine a need-to-know, or special lists of persons determined to have a need-to-know.” Special Access Program (SAP), Directives Program, Office of Management, U.S. Department of Energy.