There are 'concerning indicators' that UFO encounters could be US adversaries, Senate panel told
https://www.yahoo.com/news/concernin...231405865.html
Ryan Randazzo, Arizona Republic
Wed, April 19, 2023 at 9:37 PM CDT·6 min read
In this article
A top U.S. official is concerned that many of the unexplained encounters between military aircraft and unidentified flying objects his office is investigating could be adversaries such as China spying on the country, rather than wayward extraterrestrials.
The director of the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office updated the Senate Armed Services Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities on Wednesday about what his office has been doing since its creation last year.
“This is a hunt mission for what might somebody be doing in our backyard that we don’t know about,” AARO Director Sean M. Kirkpatrick said. “That is what we are doing.”
The special office was created last year to address national security threats from "objects of interest," including "anomalous, unidentified space, airborne, submerged and transmedium" ones.
Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., is a member of the subcommittee, and he questioned Kirkpatrick during a classified portion of Wednesday's meeting, according to his office. He previously chaired the committee and was involved in the creation of AARO last year. In the House, Rep. Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz., a member of that chamber's Armed Services Committee, was the driving force behind legislation to establish the office.
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The military and intelligence communities don’t use the term UFOs. They use UAP for “unidentified aerial phenomena.”
After breaching the traditional government secrecy around such events two years ago, U.S. intelligence officials now report several hundred such unexplained events under investigation, mostly involving U.S. pilots encountering mysterious objects, often involving detection on cameras, radar, thermal sensors and other advanced technology used by the military.
Kirkpatrick testified on Wednesday the office now has more than 650 unexplained cases, but was quick to note they weren't all suspected to be from out of this world.
A top U.S. official is concerned that many of the unexplained encounters between military aircraft and unidentified flying objects his office is investigating could be adversaries such as China spying on the country, rather than wayward extraterrestrials.
The director of the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office updated the Senate Armed Services Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities on Wednesday about what his office has been doing since its creation last year.
“This is a hunt mission for what might somebody be doing in our backyard that we don’t know about,” AARO Director Sean M. Kirkpatrick said. “That is what we are doing.”
The special office was created last year to address national security threats from "objects of interest," including "anomalous, unidentified space, airborne, submerged and transmedium" ones.
Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., is a member of the subcommittee, and he questioned Kirkpatrick during a classified portion of Wednesday's meeting, according to his office. He previously chaired the committee and was involved in the creation of AARO last year. In the House, Rep. Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz., a member of that chamber's Armed Services Committee, was the driving force behind legislation to establish the office.
UFOs: Why are there rumors about an unidentified object crash landing at Dreamy Draw Dam?
The military and intelligence communities don’t use the term UFOs. They use UAP for “unidentified aerial phenomena.”
After breaching the traditional government secrecy around such events two years ago, U.S. intelligence officials now report several hundred such unexplained events under investigation, mostly involving U.S. pilots encountering mysterious objects, often involving detection on cameras, radar, thermal sensors and other advanced technology used by the military.
Kirkpatrick testified on Wednesday the office now has more than 650 unexplained cases, but was quick to note they weren't all suspected to be from out of this world.
“In our research AARO has found no credible evidence thus far of extraterrestrial activity, off-world technology, or objects that defy the known laws of physics,” he said.
Global adversaries have some known capabilities that are beyond those of the U.S., he said, and some UAPs could be foreign aircraft with capabilities yet unknown to the U.S.
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Kirkpatrick has a doctorate in physics and more than two decades' experience working in places such as the Central Intelligence and Defense Intelligence agencies. Before his current role, he was chief scientist at DIA’s Missile and Space Intelligence Center.
Part of AARO's job is to be aware of the capabilities of countries such as China and Russia and what it would look like if they were able to accelerate those capabilities and use them against the U.S., he said.
"The adversary is not waiting. They are advancing, and they are advancing quickly. If I were to put on some of my old hats, I would tell you they are less risk-averse at technical advancement than we are. They are just willing to try things and see if it works," he said.
He said adversaries could be using unknown technologies against the U.S., resulting in UAPs.
“Are there capabilities that could be employed against us in both an ISR (intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance) and a weapons fashion? Absolutely," he said. "Do I have evidence that they are doing it in these cases? No, but I have concerning indicators.”
Sen. Mark Kelly has pushed for AARO funding
After the hearing, Kelly said emphasized the need for AARO.
“It’s critical to our national security that we dedicate the time and resources to understanding these and any future incidents and whether they represent leaps in technology by our adversaries," he said.
In February, Kelly co-signed a letter to the U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defense and Deputy Director of National Intelligence requesting a reallocation of funds to make up a shortfall in AARO's budget so that it could conduct the required scientific inquiries into UAPs.
Also signing were Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y. and Marco Rubio, R-Fla.
Kelly was among another group of senators that April 14 sent a similar letter to members of the Senate Defense Appropriations subcommittee seeking additional funding for AARO
"More needs to be done to address potential violations of U.S. airspace and threats to national security and we need to strengthen our capabilities in this space," the letter said.
The specific funding requests in both letters were classified.
Dr. Sean M. Kirkpatrick, director of the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office discusses his work Wednesday, April 19, before a Senate subcommittee.
U.S. opening up about close encounters
The intelligence community in the U.S. has been opening up in recent years about UAPs.
In a 2021 government
report, the national intelligence director said that of 144 unexplained reports since 2004, the intelligence community was only able to identify one with confidence. In that case, they said the object was a large, deflating balloon.
The rest of these encounters remained unexplained. The report concluded that “most of the UAP reported probably do represent physical objects given that a majority … were registered across multiple sensors, to include radar, infrared, electro-optical, weapon seekers, and visual observation.”
Kirkpatrick on Wednesday cautioned that not all of the now more than 650 UAP cases are equal in priority. His office is most interested in those that happened near sensitive military sites, and also those that have corresponding sensor data such as radar that can be examined.
For that reason, his office is unlikely to make a final determination on many of the reports anytime soon because they are not prioritizing events that, for example, involve nothing more than a pilot observation that happened in a location far from any sensitive locations.
"We cannot answer decades of questions about UAP all at once,” he said.
Whatever it is that Navy pilots and others are encountering, they represent a threat of collision if nothing else. Eleven incidents in the 2021 initial report involved near misses with aircraft, something senators questioned Kirkpatrick about Wednesday.
Kelly's office said the senator, a former fighter pilot and retired NASA astronaut, has spoken personally with pilots about incidents they witnessed, and on Wednesday discussed certain cases with Kirkpatrick that can only be addressed in a classified setting.
Kirkpatrick on Wednesday showed video clips of what AARO was investigating, similar to when Pentagon officials in May 2022
showed previously classified videos of unidentified objects encountered by U.S. military aircraft.
Kirkpatrick showed two declassified video clips from surveillance drones. One was of a round object flying in the Middle East, and the object remains unexplained. The other clip he showed was of an object that looked like an oval flying near U.S. aircraft in southeast Asia, which later was determined to be civilian aircraft.
"Learning that a UAP is not exotic in origin but is just quad copter or balloon leads to the question of who is operating that quad copter and to what purpose,” he said, discussing how the department hands off what it learns to other appropriate government agencies when the objects are identified.
“ARRO’s mission is to turn UAP into SEP, somebody else’s problem,” he said.
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Reach reporter Ryan Randazzo at ryan.randazzo@arizonarepublic. com or 602-444-4331. Follow him on Twitter @UtilityReporter.
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This article originally appeared on Arizona Re
There are 'concerning indicators' that UFO encounters could be US adversaries, Senate panel told
