#21 - Need to Know - "UFOlogy Must Die?" (09-14-22)
foreign this is need to know real talk about the reality of unidentified aerial phenomenon from Australia Ross coltart from the U.S Bryce zabel hello and welcome to need to know I'm Ross coultart from somewhere near Sydney Australia and in Los Angeles my co-host and colleague Bryce zavel you've been swatting it recently Bryce in the Emmy Awards I noticed lots of little glasses with umbrellas in them I mean if well thank you for that it's been a fun time you know here in Southern California we've been going through the extreme heat wave and it um and it's been something to to contend with right now for example it's so freaking hot and I'm in my own office right now with and the AC broke yesterday so there's just one thing after another but I wanted to say um you're so right the Emmy season has been upon us for the last 10 days and um as as you know and many of the listeners and viewers know I used to be the chairman of the TV Academy and I did not know at the time I ran for that position I became the first writer since Rod Serling to hold the the job I didn't know that you got lifetime tickets to to the Emmys so I've been going to the Emmys every year I go to the creative arts Emmys The Prime Time Emmys the parties and I don't want to complain uh it's great food good fun good entertainment good people but it's a lot but my the one thing I feel sorry for you about because I was in Los Angeles as you know only a few weeks ago is having to wear a penguin suit in that incredible Los Angeles feet if I was you I'd be wearing what some of the women have been wearing a nice Slinky little silk number uh well I don't think I would thank you for that however I don't think I would look as good in a slinky little silk number I'll tell you the one thing about the tuxedo what do you call that a penguin penguin yes okay well uh you're closer to Antarctica than I am so that would make sense I guess um I tell you when it's a black suit and it's 100 degrees out and you're you're walking through the heat at least nobody can see you sweat that much so it's it's got its advantages now the thing I I think it's actually pertinent that you ran the Emmys right because one of the things you learned was you were running the Emmys during the crisis in 911 weren't you the right 2001 Dreadful terrorist attack on America and you learned a fair bit didn't you about crisis and disclosure how to handle the prince I think all our days began uh either turning on the TV or listening to the radio or someone we know calling us and saying have you seen what's happening and then trying to find out what the town thought was appropriate to do about uh the situation and and that's really been the defining moment for us I thought it was an interest without a doubt it was the most interesting time in my life uh I got elected a couple of weeks before 9 11 hit and so the very first thing we had to do is cancel the Emmy switch rescheduled for September 16th so we did then we rescheduled them for October 7th and on that morning the U.S invaded Afghanistan and nobody wanted to come so we canceled them a second time and then we put them on the third time against the seventh game of an exciting World Series it was really something America strikes back if there were something to happen again do you see yourself canceling this again for good or no matter what happens this show will go on our plan on November 4th is to give the Emmys away one way or the other and so uh the show is going on and that's our plan and I guess if I have to show up on the stage and hand them out myself I'll do that Bryce I don't know if you're a baseball fan but uh you know you know that there's a risk here the World Series will be going on at that time if there is a seventh game needed between whichever teams are playing it'll happen on that same night it'll happen on Fox and you're going to be broadcast on CBS and those two programs could bump into each other how worried about that are you I'm not I'm not a CBS programmer but I'll tell you something thing Matt it seems to me that if what happens on November 4th Sunday night is that the World Series is broadcast live on one network and the Emmy Awards is broadcast Live on another Network that is a powerful symbol to all the world and especially to Americans here at home that things are going on the way they're supposed to be going on because things are still happening around here and so I would look at that as a good and positive thing instead of a negative but I do think it has some lessons about disclosure because it's uh an official act to sort of reach out and brief people I was sort of the briefer in Chief and and oddly because uh the Emmys sort of represented Hollywood people were looking for us to show that we got it and so we had to really calibrate our messages one of the things that I came away from very strongly I've always believed in transparency but I certainly believed in transparency when it comes to important issues people don't want to be messed with they don't care what the truth is exactly they may have preferences but they want to hear the truth and so we never we never tried to make it anything other than it was it was a serious situation we had snipers on the roof um but I'll tell you the one thing uh that also mattered which is kind of interesting is to get your message so that everybody gets on the same page quickly and so sometimes that involves just saying well what's the simplest way to say something so for example on the safety issue I started saying to people you'll be safer in your own bath you'll be safer at the Emmys than you will be in your own bathtub which was statistically true and I think the lessons for disclosure are uh you just get on with it uh you try to be honest with people you know it's not going to go perfect every day you're going to reassess the situation uh and yet the world has to go on and that's that's what I think is uh the message for a disclosure and I look forward when we do a new show that's all about disclosure there's some deeper lessons and we'll talk about some of those at that time it's funny though you know because one of the the best segue from what you've just said there about the need to be transparent and the need to be open is that frankly I think the Navy's decision to refuse John Greenwald of the Blackville the release of the other redacted videos the sorry the censored videos that are still being held inside government and inside the Pentagon these are videos that have been seen by members of Congress Senators Representatives which have been shown in private Skiffs private hearings and in a great bit of work John Greenwald from the Blackville tried to obtain those videos because they've been widely talked about they've been widely acknowledged and not un unlegitimately illegitimately you know the argument is if it was okay to release the go fast the Tic Tac and uh the gimbal yeah and they were fully unredacted when they released why can't they release the rest of them and the Pentagon the U.S Navy has come back with an excuse that frankly I think deserves a blowtorch it needs a Hypersonic missile basically because frankly I I just do not buy the explanation that uh for some reason the U.S Navy needs to protect sources methods capabilities um in order to you know if it releases these videos it would somehow compromise National Security and I think if you're talking about transparency if you're talking about the fact that people are now openly talking about the fact that there is a phenomenon that is not explicable that is not capable of explanation that cannot be prosaically explained that is doing weird things in our skies that is a threat to National Security and flight safety it's a very bad lesson for disclosure that the U.S Navy who I've previously been very kind to
has basically uh decided to gag and censor then at the very least we need more explanation don't you agree uh well I I do a couple of thoughts uh on the issue of redaction uh I mean I it depends on how you Define redaction those first three videos that came out were awfully short I mean they're tiny tiny pieces of longer videos so in that sense I would argue they were redacted um we're certainly looking for let's put it this way one there's rumors of a 20 minute 23 minute video that's blowing Minds in the halls of Congress when people were showing it in Skiffs and so forth frankly one great video is going to change the entire game and I think the people in Washington who care about such things probably know that I was as shocked as you were to see the Navy on the wrong side of transparency because ever since we've been doing this podcast uh one thing has been clear it's been the air force that historically had to deal with the UFO issue and didn't do a good job of it because they kept denying it denying it denying it and now it looked like we were in for a new period of openness with the Navy and I was really welcoming that because they seem to have the best interests of transparency and and disclosure uh however they were going to do it so I'm a little disappointed I'm more than a little disappointed I think this is something that has to be fought I I I it's funny nick West took a swipe at me basically saying oh yes we need to roll over and meekly accept the assurances from the National Security establishment that you know there's a good National Security reason why we shouldn't heal these these uh these videos yeah I just think that's [ __ ] and I'm calling on that I I think it's time to start getting aggressive people need to start writing their Congressional Representatives they need to be shaking the cage because we're at a very very vulnerable time now we've got the Appropriations defense Appropriations legislation which has got the key sections in that bill that would allow whistleblowers to be deposed in hearings before the congress with protections and immunities to stop them from being bullied or threatened or prosecuted because they've breached their ndas revealing UFO UAP secrets so the Congress is debating that at the moment and as I know from my recent visit to America in Washington DC you know there are people in the Congress who are well disposed to ask hard questions and to get these issues answered but they're not going to keep that momentum going unless people rattle the cage and frankly I mean we we had those two dweebs from the intelligence Services back in May who came before the Congress and gave a complete wet his explanation that endeavored to suggest to the Congress that whatever these objects were don't you worry your tiny little heads about it they're probably Chinese drones and as you and I discussed in the last podcast that's a load of bollocks um you know there really is I think the beginning of an attempt by the Navy which I've previously been quite supportive of because a lot of the push for more openness and transparency on this issue has come from the US Navy but it is crushingly disappointing to see the U.S Navy's Representatives both in the Congress but also in their answers to John Greenwald giving an explanation that frankly is implausible if it was okay to release the Tic Tac the Gimbal and the go fast it's okay to at least consider releasing part some or all of the videos that are still before the Congress in Skiffs I think one thing we should clear up right away though is okay what if they do have those hearings but those hearings are private right what if those hearings are behind closed doors and are secure hearings I think a lot of people are very interested in public hearings they would like to know uh something and and also I am continually not happy with the idea that we Define the terms here as if we have to disclose everything at all at once what I think people are basically expecting the U.S government and other governments around the world on this globe to do is to confirm that this thing is real and we have to look into it and that they're going to start going through what they've got and share it with people people want to know what is happening we understand classification I think everybody can can realize that there are times when sources and methods for example are uh up in the air and and need to be protected in a very dangerous world but that doesn't mean you hide the essential confirmation that we're not alone if indeed the US government and other governments are convinced that we're not alone why they don't share that with us seems to be uh the thing that really Riles me so I I just wanted to pick your brain on this I know we both have our different sources what are your sources telling you about whether these are whether we're going to see public hearings in 2023 well the the feedback that I've got is very much that there is no plausible reason to not release some or all of these videos at least in a rejected form you know I mean sure by all means if you're filming from the the cockpit of an fa-18 fighter you don't want to show a potential adversary the uh the weapons read art or the systems reader that shows how well and at Fleur Imaging system can detect an object from 20 miles away appreciate you know you don't want to reveal probabilities and methods but I have a strong suspicion and unfortunately the Navy's conduct in this whole area is leading people to this perception whether it's true or not by gagging the release of any of these videos by putting a blanket refusal on the release of any of these videos all the US Navy is doing is fueling the perception that it is trying to conceal from the public that there is an extraordinary explanation for what these objects are I do not buy the sources capabilities and methods explanation the idea that it would breach National Security hence we have to stop the release of every single video I've spoken to Congressman senators and I've spoken to their staffers none of them have suggested to me that these videos cannot or should not be released let me just throw one thing in there though also respond to what you just said earlier which is private hearings I also think that it's inevitable that there are going to be private hearings I I think that the first section of hearings would would have to be private um frankly I think it's important you know we do we do need to respect National Security concerns there does need if the implications of this are as awesome as we suspect they are then it does need to be discussed in private hearing but the notion that there won't after that be public hearings where a version of what's being said can be revealed for public analysis and scrutiny is absurd there it is absurd let me just the thing I was just gonna throw in there is I don't care about seeing the dials inside the fa-18 okay I'm not demanding my government disclosed with the cockpit of our super secret or top aircraft look like I want to see the craft that those dials are revealing and if they have images of craft I don't see how showing us the images of even just one of them and just saying yep here's an example of what we don't know where it comes from or what it is and we we're looking into it or if they have looked into it I'd like to know what they think about it interesting you we were talking about government here uh you know we do polls here at need to know once in a while on our on our Twitter feed and we just did one a few days ago where we asked people uh what person in the U.S Congress do they think has been the most effective on the UAP issue and we got over a thousand votes on this one Ross and it was kind of interesting it was a blowout there were they only give you four options for for in a Twitter poll so we could have put everybody in but we couldn't we had to pick four so we picked uh Kirsten gillibrand uh Timber Chet uh Marco Rubio and Andre Carson okay and it was a complete blowout gillibrand was 73 I mean that's like Landslide plus territory burchett was number two with 14 Rubio 10 and what's interesting to me is you were talking about that limp uh hearing that they had on May 17th of this year which was put together by Andre Carson for a while people were like hey man maybe he's the guy maybe he's the guy that's going to do this and he put together such a limp hearing he got three percent in our pool he suffered in this one so listen um I while I do agree with you um that we're gonna have to uh respect some security issues uh I hope that they rapidly get to the public hearings because people are ready to hear about that okay let's help Let's help our audience with the timetable for that because I know there's been discussion that the ndia the national uh defense authorizations act um might be passed or at least the sections pertaining to whistleblowers for the uaps issue might be passed earlier than we expected but I suspect it won't be nailed down until the end of December like it was last year the ndfa laws and that's the Appropriations for the defense department for the following year and I think it's almost inevitable from what people are telling me that we've still got the January six hearings dragging on uh we've got the upcoming midterm elections so I think there are a few distractions that are going to make it very hard for hearings of any substance to be held until sometime next year but I recognize respect that early next year you're going to start hearing about private hearings on the hill I mean I'm told they've already been quite a number of private hearings that have taken place inside the Congress in Secure rooms where certain senators and congression Congressional Representatives have already heard evidence particularly from military personnel and that is that's what's emboldened them to go harder okay we had a brief disruption because I had to put headphones on because of some technical issues but Bryce there's one other issue that I wanted to discuss with you which of course is the relevance of the month of October there's an issue coming up for Americans and the relevance of uaps in the next month October yeah October is a big month it could be a game changer let me explain uh when the National Defense authorization act that you were just talking about that has very powerful immunity and witness protection language in this year's version last year demanded that a yearly annual report on UAP be delivered no later than October 31st of every year um to me that means it'll come in on October 31st because the last one was due on June 25th and that's when it came in so they're going to take probably they're like a college student they're going to take all the time that they need to get that paper and then they're going to turn in at the last minute okay what could be in it well okay remember the last one said that these things are real uh we probably don't make them and we don't think Russia or China makes makes them so we're gonna have to advance from that let me back up here in the United States our midterms are happening uh on November 8th those are the midterm elections all of Congress Senate and House I mean a third of the Senate all the house many Governors everybody up for election so here's the thing about October uh there's a concept here in the United States about politics that there's of the October surprise which is some big news event that happens the month before the election and then affects the election well okay our midterm elections November 8th the the new report supposedly coming out October 31st man that is the ultimate possibility for an October surprise because if this new report does advance the conversation in any meaningful way from the last one then at least somebody's going to be talking about it what about these uh these Congress people that we just talked about uh you don't think gillibrand and and Burchette and Rubio and all are going to have uh things to say about it and Rubio by the way is in a really tough re-election battle in Florida so in the final week of of his campaign a guy who's been outspoken on the UAP issue is going to have a UAP report uh being dumped around the country so I mean I don't know what it's going to say but I know that it has the definite possibility of doing something that we just never see happen UFOs slash UAP almost never make it into the election and when they do it's an afterthought uh you know when Dennis kucenich ran for president admitted he saw UFO but he made fun of him that was it this is different this has the possibility of being perceived as a national security issue and as a national security issue it has reason for reporters and people in the media to talk to these politicians and say what's your take on this so I don't know I'm not saying we're going to have a blowout here I'm saying it's possible because we literally don't know what's going to be in that report but I'll say one final thought on it Ross it's going to tell people like you and me something because either it advances the conversation where that last one was or it retreats if it Retreats that is the best evidence possible that people are trying to put the genie back in the bottle okay but there's one positive bit of light that came out and this was in an addendum to the intelligence authorization act for the fiscal year 2023 and Congress has made two quite astonishing claims in that legislation the first is quote cross domain transmedium threats to the United States national security are expanding exponentially that's a big claim and the second is that Congress is now distinguishing between UFOs uaps that are human in origin and those that are not quote temporary non-attributed objects or those that are positively identified as man-made after analysis will be passed to appropriate offices and should not be considered under the definition as unidentified Aerospace undersea phenomena the document says now that's really quite important I know it sounds as dry as dust but it's very very oh wait I don't I mean it depends on uh it depends on who you are whether it's dry as does I want to explain uh one thing about our show on our show we try we we want to be everything to everybody I guess we want to be a show that if you know something about this topic you can still enjoy watching us and and joining in on the conversation but if you're just coming to it we want to be able to help bring people into it so what I want to point out about what Ross just said is we didn't make this stuff up folks this is from the U.S government in their uh and our
representatives in their official works and I just have to say this again I hope I get it right correct me if I'm wrong cross domain transmedium threats are expanding exponentially so break that down Let's cross domain what does cross domain mean and God means going from water to Sea well that's transmedia that's transmedium right from space to Atmosphere to see is that also have you picked it up cross domain yeah maybe because I'm told they're seeing these things now in the Middle East as well see that's what I thought that's what okay so let's just break this down cross domain probably means where they're being seen in in terms of uh okay transmedium means from space to Atmosphere to Ocean or from Ocean to Atmosphere things that we don't really build craft to do and then threats expanding exponentially I mean damn it that is some serious talk from people that got elected to go to Washington DC and and make laws and they're now talking about openly and at the very least we should just underline this and put it in bold and italics it didn't used to be this way for the last 75 years basically or at least yeah 75 years the US government when it spoke officially about UFOs was to act like there wasn't a lot going on and that uh people that saw them or reported them and might add a little screw loose there they're not saying that anymore things have changed they sure have you know it's funny because I mean I I guess the takeaway from that is that essentially Congress now seems to be specifically distinguishing between objects that are human made and objects that aren't yeah oh no that was the other part of it it's like yeah and and it also appears to be contemplating the possibility that these objects are constructed but they are not built by humans well let me put it this way if you're creating precise language for to go into a law and you're not worried about things that aren't human you don't really have to make a big declaration about things that are made by humans and things that aren't I mean that's a distinction I don't tend to make in my everyday conversation with people so when you see that in there you have to at least tell yourself that was said for a reason hey yeah go ahead go ahead there's a guy there's a guy a really good article actually by the way advice that I would refer people to and they were following up very much on groundbreaking work that was done by the UFO researcher Doug Johnson but in in the course of that Vice article there's a quote from marikamp who was an Obama DOD official and he's quoted as a saying that the implications of these new bits of law are this implies that members of the Senate intelligence committee believe on a unanimous bipartisan basis that some UFOs have non-human Origins after all why would Congress establish and task a powerful new office with investigating non-man-made UFOs if such objects did not exist I I it blows my mind so that's the thing if 2023 isn't a big year coming up I don't know why it's not I mean the things are all set up and teed up and and I know you have some thoughts about it I wanted to just drop one other poll that we took because I find this stuff kind of interesting I'm not saying our polls describe all of America or all of the world there are they're a slice of UFO activists uh that we get a chance to look at on Twitter we asked them recently in a second poll did they think 2023 was going to be Sizzle or fizzle when it came to UAP disclosure and openness and here's what's interesting we have an almost dead heat about 40 percent uh for people who think it's going to be sizzling and lots of things are going to be popping and 40 percent say it's going to be a fizzle and it's not going to amount to anything like it ought to and about 20 undecided now what that tells me Ross that I find fascinating is even among the UAP slash UFO crowd who knows about these things they are evenly and deeply divided on whether they think things are going in the right direction or the wrong direction and I find that interesting because we're all looking at the same set of facts right I mean the we all we all read these articles we listen to our you know people's podcasts we hang on the words of people from DC and yet we have an a complete split down the middle about whether it's going to be a big year or not so much and meanwhile UFO Twitter starts to self-immolate and tear itself apart I've I think this is one thing we need to talk about yes we do go ahead and take it just the incredible goings-on on UFO Twitter at the moment where for some reason people have eaten a bit too much red meat and decided to take a swipe at Lou Elizondo in particular um let me give you my take if you like on what's going on I want you to hold for just one second though just one second let's set this thing up about Lou Alexander because again not everyone knows everything about everything blue Elizondo is the person who ran the UFO group for the United States until 2017 and he resigned to try to take his story to the public and he's been a lightning rod of controversy but he's also been the guy that was on 60 Minutes and about oh 10 000 podcasts expressing his opinions about things and he's he's been enormously controversial so we can't really say he's just crossed the threshold into controversy he's very controversial so having set that up he also had a hell of a week so take it away sure I'm not going to single out individuals because it's pointless because I don't frankly I don't want to buy into the the nastiness and the infighting but uh the thing that I think a lot of people have been doing is picking out inconsistencies or uh issues that need to be checked with Elizondo particularly about the status of the work that he was doing for the pentagon's UAP investigation program uh either under the moniker atip aatip or orsap aawsap um basically there's no doubt because Harry Reid the senator has no before he passed put it into a letter Lou did run some kind of UFO UAP investigation program in the Pentagon but there's a section of UFO Twitter that is tearing itself apart ascribing all manner of sinister motives to Elizondo because he's basically made claims that the Pentagon disputes I know is Susan Goff the Pentagon PR woman has on occasion disputed Louis zondo's claims to be the the head of atip or the director of atip and more importantly I I actually think there's one inconsistency that I do think Lou needs to explain and I suspect at some stage he will which is in his various tweets he has asserted that he never had anything to do with orsap which is the apparently the real name for the the program that was farmed up by the DIA to Bob Bigelow's bass uh Bigelow Aerospace company to do the UAP and indeed paranormal investigations that they all did but frankly there is an inconsistency because Lou in his Inspector General complaint and a few people have quite legitimately pointed this out he has uh said that um he's acknowledged that he did have something to do with orsap and that um you know he was connected to warsap so there's a there's a contradiction there that he needs to explain now a lot of people have seized on that and other inconsistencies and lose a cad and they've also seized on the fact that he's a a counterintelligence agent a counterintelligence officer to suggest that What's Happening Here is that he's essentially some dark agent of the U.S government pushing a threat agenda to justify military expenditure to justify a huge amount of money going to space force now my personal take on this is yes we should always be skeptical when somebody who still has by the way a national security classification with compartmentalized security clearances we should always be skeptical when somebody is purporting to be a whistleblower but yet still enjoys their security classification and it's good to be skeptical I would hope that Lou would hope that we're skeptical but I think for people to immediately seize on those inconsistencies and start character assassinating him and suggesting that he's some kind of dark Voldemort Lord who's coordinating a disinformation campaign against UFO Twitter against the whole push for transparency and that we're all being manipulated in some kind of dark counter-intelligence operation show me the evidence and I don't see the evidence from what's being presented what's your take well we can't call them Voldemort Voldemort because that's the guy who cannot be named and if the one name everybody seems to know is Lou Elizondo he is synonymous with sort of a current UFO uh discussion here's what I find odd about this thing if the knock on Lou Elizondo is currently that well because he works for space force as a consultant or whatever he's doing for them if that proves that he is a tool of the government then that would mean somebody in government has pushed him out and said okay Lou we want you to go on those 10 000 podcasts in 60 minutes and we want you to tell everybody that UFOs are real and that uh we've got great evidence of them and that we think there's been crash wreckage and everything else find that well I mean okay let's say that that's actually true well then that means the government is pushing a disclosure agenda and they're doing it in their own way but but they are pushing it so I find that a little odd now I will say though that anybody who's in the public in public life uh it knows that they're going to be looked at and looked into um I I heard a podcast with uh John Greenwald the other day uh where he was taking the complaint that Lou Elizondo had filed with the Inspector General and going over a redacted version of it listen I thought his he was a calm and fair presence uh going through and I think it's perfectly okay I mean maybe Lou Alexander should go on his show and talk about it maybe you should come back on here and we'll talk about it uh what do I think though I find the guy to be fairly compelling I find him to sound like a guy that's uh pretty much knows what he's talking about and uh I also at the same time though find that he's reached the end of his rope he's a little thin skin these days about the the attacks and I don't blame him because you and I have talked about it too people say bad things about either of us when they see watch one of these things they leave a bad comment it does kind of get under your skin and it makes you angry and Lou has has fired back a few times which I think is totally his right to do it um it is interesting though that he literally wrote an article for Liberation times last week that was called um I he I think it was like YouTube now here's what's funny about it because on that same day I I literally heard from Lou's wife that um they had watched a video that you and I had had produced for this channel that was called oddly enough a profane rant about modern ufology and they thought it was very funny and uh first of all that made my day that you Elizondo was watching this thing but um if people want to see that and get a sense of the frustration level some people have had with ufology go to need to know dot today which is our website and it's posted on there on the main page and you can you can also look at that but I don't know Ross I want to ask you the same question though I mean at the end of the day you know you've talked to many thousands of people in your career I've talked to many thousands myself and I remember uh thinking to myself quite often that it made me a pretty good judge a character that I could look at a person and and hear what they said and I'd been lied to my face to by experts over my journalistic career I'm sure you have too so you talk to Lou Elizondo man-to-man eye to eye what's your take because Lou is a spook a trained counterintelligence officer doesn't make me innately skeptical of everything he says um one of the difficulties that I have as a journalist and I'm sure you have the same issue is a lot of the perception that I have of Louis zondo is colored by what I know privately from people who've spoken to me in either the defense or the intelligence Community or in the Congress and I can tell you he's held an extremely high regard nobody is telling me that we should have a disbelief of what he says because there are and there are as John greenwald's pointed out there are inconsistencies that Lou needs to explain about why he said different things about whether or not he had a role with warsap but frankly do you hang a guy on the evidence of a few inconsistencies in documents I don't no and one of the things that one of the things that I'm used to as a journalist is I talk to spies and defense officials all the time it's my job and often they spin you I mean I I can remember member right back at the time of the Iraq War there were people in Australia's defense intelligence establishment who were genuinely concerned that we were going to war on some very specious evidence and a lot of that evidence was coming through Australia you know we were quite heavily involved in helping our American Ally and I wish I wish I'd picked up more on what those people were indicating but it just seemed so Fringe and there seemed such certainty that there was a legitimate reason to evade invade Iraq and we were misled and so disinformation does happen it does and Lou is an interesting case because one there's really just two possibilities one is he is exactly what he said he was he he ran the program he got fed up he left so he could really be a truth teller all right in which case then he's saying some pretty astounding things as the truth that he had to tell by leaving government or option two he still got relations with governor government and this truth that he's telling is one that they want him to tell which is also supremely strange so what I'm sure I'm sure there is affection and I know this I know that there is affection in the defense and intelligence Community who are right behind blue yeah the quest the question is which faction will dominate and and Brian Bender made this point this week that a lot of people who don't understand who don't report on National Security and defense they tend to see the National Security establishment as one big amorphous blob yeah the real the reality is that the defense and intelligence establishment is as snipey and as [ __ ] as UFO Twitter they're all shafting each other all of these agencies the NSA the CIA the DIA they're all trying to undo each other the whole time they spend more time like in my my career when I wasn't working for Australia's 60 minutes but I was working for other programs in the same network we would do our little best to screw them over and make it as difficult as possible for them you know there's a rivalry that takes place in organizations and I think this is happening in National Security and defense and so I'm not surprised at all that there are people inside the National Security establishment who who are telling uh commentators that you know you should be skeptical about what Elizondo is saying but I think we should actually look at what's happened in the last five six years since the very first inklings that there was beginning to be a degree of transparency and disclosure look at how far we have come since 2017. oh it's it's it's astonishing you know I was thinking as you were saying that though I go well we've responded about Lou Elizondo and we've just done five minutes on that we should actually respond to what he had to say right the content of what he said was ufology must die right okay now everyone who knows Lou thinks he's a pretty hail fellow well met most of the time right so he's not Lord Voldemort yet there he is saying ufology Must Die well here's my take on ufology Must Die first of all you got to Define your terms what exactly is ufology if it's just people that are interested in UFOs and uh and talk to each other on social media I don't think that can die or should die because I'm part of it and I don't think I should lose my rights to speak so I'm not a hundred and ten percent sure of what Lou thinks he's suggesting be done and I was wondering if you have a different take on on his way of looking at it I think Alexander could have been clearer in the medium story The Liberation time story that he wrote I don't think he expressed it very well I think the broad sentiment that he was expressing if I can Endeavor to read between the lines on what he's saying is that there is a tendency on UFO Twitter to get obsessed with minutiae and lose sight of the big picture it's becoming very very unpleasant I I actually endorse what elizondo's sentiments are which is that it's time for and I think this is what he meant I think what he's referring to is that it's time for the field of UAP research to go beyond The Fringe yes time there are people who purport to speak as The Gatekeepers for what people should think and say about the phenomenon and frankly their time is over this is this is a moment where the mainstream media needs to start engaging where people like you and I can start taking an interest and I think generally it's not a question of establishment media taking over and you know we'll we'll look at this and give you our assessment it's where good thorough rigorous objective scientific analysis needs to come in we need to look at data we need to actually properly assess sightings reports there needs to be an attempt to collate information in a responsible and serious way one of the problems that that I'm really worried about at the moment is at the very time when Congress is basically deciding whether or not it runs with this ball you've got UFO Twitter behaving like a bunch of frat kids fighting each other over over you know who gets the credit and who gets the glory I think frankly it's a combined effort and and people need to stop sniping and bitching well lose stop stop worrying about the minutiae and focus on the broad picture okay but uh I I just don't want anyone to get the impression that you know this is some kind of elitist thing I I'm not saying and I know you're not saying hey you know we're responsible people so we should get to come and talk about it I think this is a big picture story that affects everybody on the planet everybody has a right to talk about it now what's frustrating and I wish would stop is when it gets personal personal attacks never seem to advance the cause of knowledge they cut they Advance the cause of emotion and right now we need to get on the same team I mean I think one of the things that we should clearly all be thinking about and that probably this is the essence of what he was just saying is look if there is another intelligence or intelligences out there that are watching us or paying attention to us or interacting with us that makes all of us a little more uh in common than we thought we're all human beings and we should behave as if we like each other a little bit more that should go across the board we you know it's like my mom used to say when I would fight with my brother you guys need to be nicer to each other and I think that that's probably true um one thing I did want to bridge to because I know we're running out of time here Ross we have little housekeeping work that you and I need to do what people need to understand is there's a great hour and 18 minute video that was made with your folks at Channel 7 in Australia with their production help and uh I think right now on YouTube it's close to 800 000 views and on its way to a million so I think you and I are both deeply uh thankful to channel 7 for their assistance in doing that and also thankful to all the people that that would watch it now that was also an adjunct to the one hour uh documentary that you did that has so far aired only in Australia so there are a lot of things out there that each one of us has something that people have sort of glommed on to that we need to explain a little bit more so I thought I would ask you about your issue and then you can interview me about my issue and we can try to set the record straight okay now not everyone saw uh the bets ball piece that was in the one hour documentary so I think you probably do need to give a quick explanation of it but the main thing people want to know is they felt uh they feel a little at Sea that the we discussed this and we we went to a guy's house to see this uh device but we have not actually updated anybody yet on how it's getting tested so maybe you can sort of tell us a little bit about what it is and when we might expect information from the uh testing that Dr Gary Nolan was leading the charge on sure okay just to explain to our viewers and listeners in a documentary that I made for channel 7 Australia which you can view uh I think a lot of people have ripped it off and put it on on the web if you find it but essentially we we went to Texas I I decided it was time one of the things that I have copped a lot in the last few years from people is that in my book and also in the films that I've made I've never addressed people who purport to be victims of abduction encounters with non-human entities frankly I've never known quite what to do with it and we heard about a guy in Texas called Jim marlin who purported to be an abductee and he still does by the way I find him a highly interesting and credible and lovely bloke and he also claims to be in possession of an object that he believes is of non-human manufacture and it's uh very interesting because the metallic sphere that he's in possession of bears an uncanny resemblance to what are known as bits balls which are these metallic objects that were discovered by people in and around the United States and since the 1970s in fact I've received calls from people all over the world who've seen some of these spheres and a couple of people are actually in possession of them now in terms of where we're at with the testing basically we took scrapings off the sphere and took those to Professor Gary Nolan at Stanford University Gary's still doing his tests and he has a day job which he has to do uh we're not in a position to be able to pay an enormous amount of money for the kind of testing that needs to be done so we have to wait for the laboratory results to come in from Gary and as we promised in the story we will publish those results if and when we get them the good news that I've heard from Gary this week is we've been very worried about how you X-ray how you scan a solid metallic object like this and we have now apparently found a person who is willing to scan this object with a proper industrial x-ray machine so we may be able to look inside it and get some idea of the contents of the object one of the difficulties that I hadn't actually contemplated is that when you go to an industrial X-ray place and ask them to x-ray something they want to know what's inside it that's interesting and since we don't know what's inside it we can't guarantee to them that the x-rays won't interfere with what's inside it so you're saying that that's a good question that's why we're coming to you yeah yeah but I mean a lot of people have given have given me stick for basically even giving credit to the idea that there might be something anomalous about this and just to explain we're not saying that no what we are doing is we're giving we're doing what what frankly Louis zondo is arguing we should all be doing objectively assessing the data and essentially what are you suggesting are you suggesting that we should just stick our heads in the sand and ignore this issue no I think for us though I mean can I just finish this point yeah I'm sorry yeah John Mack wrote a book about abductions he wrote a book John Mack from Harvard University Professor Harvard wrote a book about abductions and Ralph blumenthal's done a follow-up biography on John Mack recently and even Harvard University was forced to accept that it was legitimate for John Mack as a scientist to investigate the abduction phenomenon that's all we're doing and the interesting thing to me about the Marlin case the sphere the purported bit sphere from Texas is that he is claiming not only to be someone who's had encounters with extraterrestrial or non-human entities he's also claiming to be in possession of a sphere that is he believes of non-human origin Let's test it we don't lose anything or gain anything by testing it more we might gain something if it turns out to be alien technology but you know I'm skeptical and what I'm doing is I'm indulging that Curiosity and frankly if people want to give us a bollocksing for doing scientific text testing and trying to be objective about it then [ __ ] them I don't give a shout I really don't I mean this is this is what we should be doing uh you know the the reality is um and it's funny because you know there's this kind of mockery that takes place oh gosh Ross is engaging with Brazos and who believes this phenomenon is real it doesn't mean I do no I mean and and and and and what what the what the people what the critics don't understand is this is what we've got to start doing and frankly this is what we will start doing when you have an American government that is at this very moment acknowledging the possibility that the explanation for this phenomenon is extraterres industrial or alien when that possibility is being openly canvassed by former directors of the intelligence agencies I think the Director of National Intelligence Avril Haynes anything is possible so yes bugger you we will be looking at this and you know and frankly if people do if people want to take us on about that then stuff then I don't know rat's ass Ross you've just opened up a whole new cult art here this is uh fascinating to me look you're going to get a lot less uh [ __ ] for the bets ball story than I will for from people who say why won't Bryce let Ross talk so uh okay so I'm sure I'll get more comments than you listen here's what I just want to say about what what you just said besides my admiration for your Artful use of profanity um and that would be what is this all about um you know is there already a party line about what is acceptable or unacceptable to say about UFOs I think there can't be since nobody knows exactly what they represent so yeah we are going to pursue things and uh we'll try to do them as legitimately as we can but the one promise that we're where we're trying to be a little bit different is we're saying if we raise something we're not going to let it just die we're going to report back to you all right so as Ross has just said at some point Gary uh Nolan is going to get back to Ross about this and Ross is going to get back to you people who are listening and uh and that's the way it's supposed to be so I guess now Russ you have to turn the tables and I've got to do my Mia culpa okay so let's talk about this Ian the story that you and I have put to air on seven spotlights digital channel which anybody can access by going on YouTube and putting in seven Spotlight UFOs you'll find the one hour 20 minute story from you and I in which we interview your old colleague and good friend Brent Friedman who was the co-producer of dark skies and in the course of your Dark Skies launch you you guys both told this extraordinary story about how these two Intelligence Officers men who purported to be from the Department of Navy intelligence came to your home at first and then to your Dark Skies production office and yeah at one stage the guy wrote on a napkin what he described preposterously as the secrets of the universe sound light and frequency now everyone including me my friend wants to know what happened to the napkin okay and you know partly um that documentary uh that Ross is referring to again if you just can remember need to know dot today it's there you can go there need to know dot today and you can watch it uh the one thing about that is Rawson because this thing was made so quickly Ross and I did not have Final Cut on on how to uh edit the what actually finally aired and so as a consequence that little detail did slip by and believe me if you look at the comments a lot of people were saying okay man you you talked about this show us so I'm gonna tell you that but let me just back up very quickly here's what happened it's December it's 1996 NBC is putting a show on called Dark Skies I'm having a party at my house 200 people a guy shows up at the house says he's from the office Office of Naval intelligence talks to me my partner Brent Friedman and another producer Brad Markowitz and and Brent's wife and uh tells us that they want to help us with our show to get things right okay well with you can hear Brent's version in my version in that documentary at the end of this thing though the guy asked for a piece of paper I remembered it as a napkin Brent remembered it as getting a piece of paper from his wife off their checkbook uh you know that's what memory is sometimes those but anyway the guy takes a piece of paper and he starts writing on it and he says um why don't you keep this for a few years and this may make more sense then and he holds up this thing that looks like a mathematical formula and he and we said what is that and he said secret of the universe I don't remember him saying Secrets I thought he said secret but see that's what I'm saying he said secret of the universe sound light and frequency all right so everybody's saying great show us the equation okay so here is my best explanation of that when this happened um I was again hosting a party out in my backyard I didn't take possession of this piece of paper Brent did Brent took it with him um he went back to where he was living and he put it in his safe deposit box as instructed and to be honest with you uh I saw it with my own eyes so did Brad so did Brent so that his wife a couple other people but you know the way life works is you get you got a family you got a job you start paying attention to that Dark Skies got canceled Brent and I moved on um over the years I would ask him about it he would say yeah it's safe and secure and a few years ago I just said you know enough I want to see it I'm tired of this please take a digital photo and send it to me I want to see it and uh I really put my own friendship with Brent on the line I demanded to see it and so he went looking for it and then he he looked in this safe deposit box and it wasn't there and then he remembered that he had taken it out of his safe deposit box when they changed Banks or something and he'd taken it home so I said look man you got to find it because you know it's it's a quarter of a century it's time for us to tell this story so Brent has been looking for it and has not yet found it it frustrates me as much as you Ross as much as anybody who's watching uh that documentary uh all I can tell you is um if I have to go up to Brent's house myself and go through it or get the FBI to go to his house you know they're not going to do that but if I had to go look for it myself I will do it because I just think you realize this is going to sport a whole new conspiracy theory for us that the the Men in Black the the Navy intelligence guys rifled the house and opened the safety deposit box and took the napkin and I know it's all been a massive cover-up I I mean you're adamant you're adamant that this document was real oh no formula that he wrote was real um doubt in my mind I was there I saw him write it I saw what it looked like I think that the thing that's hard for people uh to accept is that you would do you would get something like this and you wouldn't instantly go well this is super important I better hold on to it but you have to understand that you know Brandon and I were producing a show we moved on but at the same time we thought well we'll put it in a safe place and someday later we'll address it because we weren't sure these guys were who they said they were so if they were putting us on we thought why are we going to waste precious time looking into it look there's one more bit of laundry before we go that I want to deal with which is um I'm gratified and and the flattered and humbled by the response that both you and I are getting from our audience all around the world um I at the moment though am overwhelmed and quite emotionally and mentally exhausted from the volume of emails and messages that I'm receiving I tried to add them up the other day on the multiple platforms that I use but I've got somewhere between 35 to 40 000 unopened emails and messages the volume of information coming in the door is frankly enormous and I I wish you and I had the resources to be able to investigate it as much as we'd like Bryce because it's quite exciting I mean there's some astonishing information some astonishing informants coming forward and all I would plead for is I'm gratified that people are contacting me but please be patient I've got some people who are furious with me because I haven't been able to respond to them and they don't appear to understand I'm just one guy doing this on the back of an oily rag you know literally on the back of an envelope right mixing my metaphors there I don't have the resources I don't have a pay great stuff you and I aren't getting paid for doing this by the way we're doing this as a public service and and frankly I think we would like to talk to our audience about the fact that we'd like to become more professional we'd like to upgrade what we do wouldn't we yeah I mean I I think that is a great Point first of all I feel your pain uh 37 you know when I get a hundred behind a hundred I'm like okay I I'm just deleting them all because I I gotta I gotta
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