Do We Believe in U.F.O.s? That’s the Wrong Question
Reporting on the Pentagon program that’s investigating unidentified flying objects is not about belief. It’s about a vigilant search for facts.
By Ralph Blumenthal and Leslie Kean
We were part of The New York Times’s team (with the Washington correspondent Helene Cooper) that broke the story of the Pentagon’s long-secret unit investigating unidentified flying objects, the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program, in December 2017.
Since then, we have reported on Navy pilots’ close encounters with U.F.O.s, and last week, on the current revamped program, the Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon Task Force and its official briefings — ongoing for more than a decade — for intelligence officials, aerospace executives and Congressional staff on reported U.F.O. crashes and retrieved materials.
We’re often asked by well-meaning associates and readers, “Do you believe in U.F.O.s?” The question sets us aback as being inappropriately personal. Times reporters are particularly averse to revealing opinions that could imply possible reporting bias.
But in this case we have no problem responding, “No, we don’tbelieve in U.F.O.s.”
As we see it, their existence, or nonexistence, is not a matter of belief.