UFO Hypothesis and Survival Questions: An NSA Employee's 1968 Draft
A 1968 draft monograph by an unnamed NSA employee took each main theory of UFOs, from hoax to alien visitors, and asked what it would mean for national survival. Its answer was that every theory demanded urgent study.
What this record is
This record is a seven-page typed draft titled “UFO Hypothesis and Survival Questions.” Each page is stamped DRAFT and carries a SECRET marking that has been struck through. “1968” is written by hand at the top of the first page, and the text contains handwritten edits and footnotes. The author’s name at the end is blacked out. NSA explained why in a sworn affidavit filed in the 1980 lawsuit Citizens Against UFO Secrecy v. NSA. The document was “prepared by an Agency employee” and “is not a COMINT report and contains no reference to SIGINT activities.” It was a draft monograph “located in an Agency file where it had been retained for historical reference purposes.” It had been released in full apart from “the name and organization of the preparer,” which was withheld under Public Law 86-36. The affidavit and the court’s ruling are covered on the CAUS v. NSA page.
What it says
The monograph sets out to “consider briefly some of the human survival implications suggested by the various principal hypothesis concerning the nature of the phenomena loosely categorized as U F O.” A footnote defines UFOs as flying, sailing or manoeuvring aerial objects, glowing or metallic, “somewhat circular or cigarish.”
It then goes through the hypotheses one at a time. All UFOs are hoaxes: the author rejects this because hoaxes are rare and local, while UFO reports are worldwide and come from reputable scientists. It cites Jacques Vallée’s Anatomy of a Phenomenon and an Air Force figure of 35 undetermined sightings in June to August 1953. All UFOs are hallucinations: the author points to cases where groups of witnesses and radar agreed, and argues that if the hypothesis were true it would mean an impairment of human judgement serious enough to need urgent study. All UFOs are natural phenomena: in that case, the author argues, air warning systems might not be able to tell an attack from a natural event. Objects coming over the Arctic from the direction of Russia could trigger false missile alerts. Many officers had developed a mental “blind spot” to UFO-like objects, which an enemy could exploit by building a replica to slip through. Some UFOs are secret earth projects: the author cites a lens-shaped re-entry vehicle reported in a September 1968 Evening Star article and a publicized Canadian “saucer” project, and warns of being intimidated by a new secret “doomsday” weapon.
The fifth hypothesis, that some UFOs are piloted by extraterrestrial intelligence, gets the longest treatment. A handwritten insertion notes that some scientists who had studied the subject did not dismiss it, and a footnote names James McDonald, J. Allen Hynek and Jacques Vallée. The author’s argument is historical: “If ‘they’ discover you, it is an old but hardly invalid rule of thumb, ‘they’ are your technological superiors.” Contact between unequal civilizations has usually ended badly for the weaker one. The author offers Japan’s response to the West as a model for survival, including national solidarity, tightly controlled contact and learning as fast as possible.
The draft ends with a plea for urgency instead of “the leisurely scientific approach.” If someone on a forest path shouts “rattler,” the author writes, you do not stop to speculate. The last page adds a reflection on how captivity dulls the survival instincts of chimpanzees, and asks whether modern civilization has done the same to people.
Context
The draft is an essay of opinion, not an intelligence finding. Its sources are popular books, NICAP compilations, press reports and the public debate of the late 1960s. It does not draw on any agency data, and the affidavit confirms it has no connection to SIGINT. Its interest lies in what it shows about the mood inside a technical agency in 1968, while the Air Force-funded Condon study was being completed and a year before Project Blue Book closed. At least one employee thought the subject was being handled too casually. A companion draft on the intelligence community’s “blind spot” argues along similar lines and is covered on its own page.
Status
An unofficial draft that does not represent NSA policy. It was released with the author’s name withheld by 1980, and it has been widely quoted since, sometimes as if it were an agency assessment. It reached the National Archives in 2025.
Sources
- National Archives catalog entry: https://catalog.archives.gov/id/596347951
- PDF of the record: https://catalog.archives.gov/medialz/electronic-records/rg-615/580103959/457UAP00033_released.pdf
- Series: Records from the National Security Agency Relating to Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena: https://catalog.archives.gov/id/580103959
- Affidavit of Eugene F. Yeates, CAUS v. NSA, 30 September 1980: https://catalog.archives.gov/id/596347887