65_HS1-834228961_62-HQ-83894_Section_10
Section 10 of the FBI's 62-HQ-83894 file, September 1966 to June 1977, with letters about flying-saucer club publications, a 1967 complaint alleging impersonation of FBI agents, and a June 1977 White House science office inquiry into FBI handling of UFO reports.
Document Highlights
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Short overview
Section 10 (from serial 448) of the FBI’s flying saucer file 62-HQ-83894, covering September 1966 to June 1977: mostly citizens’ letters with the Bureau’s replies, flying saucer club and convention material, a few field office memoranda and, at the end, Air Force material on the closure of Project Blue Book and a 1977 White House inquiry.
Why this is interesting
The section shows the FBI’s settled position: replies signed by Hoover state again and again that UFO sightings are not within the FBI’s jurisdiction and forward letters to Air Force special investigations. Among the field reports are a 1967 Miami memo on a man who said that in 1944, after leaving Luftwaffe front service for a top secret test project, he had photographed a saucer-shaped, jet-powered aircraft, a Newark memo on a book manuscript alleging impersonation of FBI agents, anonymous-informant reports from Dallas in 1967, and bulky convention programs and the magazine “ufo contact.” An Air Force “UFO Fact Sheet” reports that the Secretary of the Air Force ended Project Blue Book on December 17, 1969, and gives its sighting totals for 1947–1969: 12,618 reports, 701 of them unidentified. In June 1977 the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy asked how the FBI handled UFO reports and was told that, absent investigative jurisdiction, they are referred to the Air Force without action by the Bureau.
Selected passages
- “matters pertaining to sightings of Unidentified Flying Objects or Flying Saucers are not within the jurisdiction of the FBI.”
- “He was also advised that the investigation of unidentified flying objects is not, and never has been, a matter within the investigative jurisdiction of the FBI.”
- “He stated that the U.S. Air Force had closed their investigation of these matters several years ago and currently does nothing but refer such information to appropriate local authorities.”