The lesson learned from The War of the Worlds radio broadcast was still fresh in the minds of many. No one was about to fall victim to the ridicule that surely awaited them should they buy into this flying saucer business. They were able to stand back and watch the results of those solid citizens who reported their sightings as honestly as they possibly could. The reward for their honesty was to lose their reputable standing in their community, their jobs, families and, should they persist, their lives.

Meanwhile, the Air Force built a facade in the guise of an honest effort to get to the bottom of this new craze, while cautioning the public to use logic and common sense.

No one seemed to realize that logic dictated that the highly trained, wellseasoned, high-ranking officers of the 509th certainly should have been able to tell the difference between a weather balloon and a flying disk. Logic should have raised questions as to their inability to distinguish adhesive tape with a floral design from indecipherable symbols engraved in wood. In retrospect, if the amazing properties reported in the foil and I-beams were experimental prototypes, they seemed to have perfected them back in 1947. Why then arent they in use today? Where does logic go when the stakes involve abandoning inherent dogma?

At the time, the 509th was the only base in America that housed our nuclear arsenal. If such incompetence abounded among the personnel charged with its care, it would have clearly been a matter of national security.

The policy of secrecy concerning such a paradigm-shattering revelation would have been understandable in 1947. Had a committee been instituted to access the problem and devise a method to break it to us gently within a reasonable amount of time, their original cover-up policy could have easily been forgiven. 56 years (as of this writing) cannot be justified as a reasonable amount of time.

A 1960 report by the Brookings Institute, "Proposed Studies on the Implications of Peaceful Space Activities for Human Affairs", was presented to the 82nd Congress on April 18, 1961. The report concluded that profound social consequences would result if ET contact were confirmed. In part, it concluded:

Anthropological files contain many examples of societies, sure of their place in the universe, which have disintegrated when they had to associate with previously unfamiliar societies espousing different ideas and different life ways. Others, that survive such an experience, usually did so by paying the price of changes in values and attitudes and behavior.

It has been speculated that, of all groups, scientists and engineers might be the most devastated by the discovery of relatively superior creatures since these professions are most clearly associated with the mastery of nature rather than the understanding and expression of man. Advanced understanding of nature might soon vitiate all our theories at the very least.

Likewise, an internal RAND document from 1968 predicted similar results. Worldwide panic was at the top of both of their lists. With this, it would seem that the powers-that-be had their answer and no further confirmation was necessary. Their deny and ridicule policy remained in place.

Today the general population has not only personally witnessed sufficient evidence in the area of anomalous aerial phenomena, but they realize that millions of credible witnesses worldwide could not all be delusional or liars.

In 1999, a Roper Poll was conducted and published by The National Institute for Discovery Science (NIDS). It proved to be a real eye-opener concerning the general publics attitude toward the subject specifically in the area of panic concerns.

When asked, If you personally believed an announcement that an advanced extraterrestrial life-form had been discovered, to what extent would it change your lifestyle? 69.51% felt that they could handle the news just fine.

The question was asked again in a slightly different form: If undeniable evidence of the existence of extraterrestrial life were confirmed, psychologically, how would you react? A resounding 79.63%, to varying degrees, felt they could handle the news just fine. Only 15.62% felt they would be seriously shaken and a mere 4.31% would be extremely distraught.

The most curious (if not ironic) finding was that, among the majority of those polled who felt they would have no problem accepting this revelation, 86.15% of them felt that, to varying degrees, the rest of the world would panic. Put another way, I could handle the news but nobody else could!

The most baffling statistic is the 15.41% of those polled, whom, in the face of undeniable evidence would not believe it anyway! It would appear that these are the followers of Dr. Edward Condon who headed the U.S. Air Forces study of unidentified flying objects from1966 - 1969. The brilliant Dr. Condon concluded his project with this not-so-brilliant statement: UFOs cannot exist. Therefore, any evidence to the contrary will not be considered.

I like to refer to these folks as the voluntarily blind.

Admittedly, the polls are one thing and reality may well be another. No one truly knows how he or she would react until the situation is staring them in the face. However, when the tally of public sentiment is taken into account, it becomes glaringly obvious that the majority of the population already accepts the fact (or at least the possibility) that a more highly advanced race of beings has been and is visiting this little island Earth. Furthermore, those same tallies indicate that a very small percentage would be panic-stricken by being confronted with official confirmation of it.

Is it possible, then, that world governments are withholding this information to protect this small, emotionally fragile percentile? Is it possible that world governments would withhold or disclose any information for the protection of such a small percentile? (Or any percentile, for that matter.) History demonstrates the improbability of this scenario.

Once again, logic dictates that to deny the world of the most important truths in the history of humankind, the stakes must be immeasurably higher.