UFOs in Wartime: What They Didn't Want You To Know Read online

  By the time the war was over two and a half years later, more than 2,000 of these Portuguese soldiers had been killed, 5,000 had been wounded and another 6,000 had been taken prisoner.

  * * *

  Coincidentally — or not — shortly after Portugal grudgingly went to war, three children from a small rural village about 60 miles north of Lisbon claimed to be visited by an angel.

  This heavenly body appeared to them three times just outside the village of Fátima, telling them he was the Guardian Angel of Portugal. He urged them to pray for peace and prepare themselves for an even more fantastic vision sometime in the future.

  About a year later, on May 13, 1917, the same three children were tending sheep in a small grove near their village when they claimed they saw a vision of the Virgin Mary. This apparition also urged them to pray for peace and an end to all war, promising to appear to them on the thirteenth of every month for the next six months.

  Though the children had agreed among themselves to keep the incident a secret, word soon leaked out. A month later, on the thirteenth of June, about seventy people were in attendance in the small grove — but only the three children claimed to see the apparition. The number of spectators tripled for the July visitation, during which the apparition gave the three children a gloomy prediction of a world endlessly wracked with war and suffering.

  The August visitation was delayed a bit when a local civil administrator, part of Portugal’s solidly antireligious government, had the three children put in jail. Threats to the children to recant didn’t work, though. They stood by their story, which only served to spread word of their visions even farther.

  Though the August visitation took place six days later than prophesied and only in front of the children, there were 30,000 people on hand in the grove on September 13. As historians point out, this was an enormous crowd for rural Portugal.

  But it was nothing compared to the October 13 vision. On that morning, 70,000 people were on hand! And many of them saw a truly amazing sight.

  * * *

  That day, October 13, dawned cloudy and rainy. But just before the time the apparition was expected, the precipitation suddenly stopped. Most of the clouds parted, leaving only a thin layer to cover the sun, just enough so it could be seen without hurting the eyes.

  One of the children urged those gathered to look at the sun, and at this point, thousands in the crowd saw the sun begin to rotate and change colors. Many others saw it almost fall to the earth, coming so close it dried their rain-soaked clothes. Others saw it zigzagging. Some reports say the sun’s bizarre movements were seen by people up to 40 miles away.

  As fantastic as these reports were, a number of newspaper reporters were in the crowd — and even they swore these things happened.

  One of these journalists was Avelino de Almeida, a reporter for Portugal’s most influential newspaper, O Sé-culo. The newspaper was progovernment, meaning it was staunchly anticlerical. Still, in a generally accepted translation, Almeida reported the following: “Before the astonished eyes of the crowd, whose aspect was biblical as they stood bare-headed, eagerly searching the sky, the sun trembled, made sudden incredible movements outside all cosmic laws. The sun ‘danced’ according to the typical expression of the people.”

  A physician named Dr. Domingos Pinto Coelho was also on hand. Writing for a newspaper called Ordem, he reported: “The sun, at one moment surrounded with scarlet flame, at another aureoled in yellow and deep purple, seemed to be in an exceeding fast and whirling movement, at times appearing to be loosened from the sky and to be approaching the earth, strongly radiating heat.”

  A third reporter, representing the Lisbon newspaper O Dia, wrote: “The silver sun, enveloped in the same gauzy grey light, was seen to whirl and turn in the circle of broken clouds… The light turned a beautiful blue, as if it had come through the stained-glass windows of a cathedral, and spread itself over the people who knelt with outstretched hands. People wept and prayed with uncovered heads, in the presence of a miracle they had awaited. The seconds seemed like hours, so vivid were they.”

  So what really happened at Fátima?

  As many ufologists have suggested, the answer may lie in subtracting the element of religion from the episode. Though the Portuguese government was virulently antireligious, the country’s population itself was overwhelmingly Catholic. Had these events happened in a place that was decidedly more secular, with a citizenry more diverse in its religious beliefs, the story might read differently.

  An otherworldly visitor contacts three children, telling them to prepare for another even more important cosmic visitor. This second visitor appears to them, as promised, on the same day of the month, for half a year. On the sixth and final visit, a massive crowd witnesses a colorful silver disk dancing across the sky, giving off sparks, coming so close to them, its heat can dry their clothes.

  With a few tweaks, this description sounds not unlike many UFO reports — leading some to claim that the whole episode was actually one massive UFO sighting over a small country that was suffering relatively large casualties in a war it didn’t want to fight in the first place.

  Further proof may be found in claims that UFOs are still reported frequently around Fátima today.

  3

  The Ghost Fliers

  It was one night in late November 1933 that residents across the expansive Västerbotten region of Sweden first realized something very unusual was making its way through their skies.

  That night, an aircraft had been spotted twisting a path through Västerbotten’s rugged mountain valleys. Flying almost suicidally low, with powerful searchlights hanging from its fuselage and its loud engine noise disrupting the Arctic landscape, the aircraft seemed to be heading westward, in the direction of Norway.

  This was strange because in 1933 airplanes were still something of a novelty in this frozen, desolate part of the world. The few people who lived there might see an aircraft but once every few months, if that. So when this mystery craft appeared from nowhere, exhibiting such bizarre behavior as it flew across the 200-mile width of Västerbotten, the populace was very much mystified.

  Local authorities were baffled, too. Late November in Västerbotten means the dead of winter and, this close to the North Pole, the middle of a long six-month night. Plus the region was battered by snowstorms almost daily, was frightfully cold, and blizzards were commonplace. Why would anyone be flying around up there if they didn’t have to — and doing so in such a weird manner?

  The mystery only deepened the next day when the authorities confirmed no border patrol planes or customs aircraft had been in the air the previous night. There were no military bases anywhere nearby, so the plane did not belong to the Swedish air force. The only explanation left was that airborne liquor smugglers were moving their wares from one location to another.

  But then the next night it happened again. A mystery airplane was spotted for a second time flying over Västerbotten, its searchlights blazing, its engines roaring. The night after that, more mysterious aircraft were reported over the region — and the following night brought even more. But now reports of strange planes were coming from other parts of extreme northern Sweden — and within a week, people were hearing and seeing the mysterious aircraft not just over northern Sweden, but over Norway and Finland as well.

  Thus began one of the strangest chapters in UFO history: the case of the Scandinavian ghost fliers.

  * * *

  The first person to get a really close look at one of the mystery planes was Olov Hedlund of Sorsele, Sweden.

  Up to this point, the phantom aircraft had been spotted mostly from afar — shadows against the dark sky, as one witness had called them. The noise of their engines and the glow of their spotlights had attracted most of the attention.

  But according to an article published in UFO-Sweden News, on New Year’s Eve, just hours before 1934 was about to begin, Hedlund heard something going over his house. He looked outside to see a large airp
lane reflected in the moonlight. It was painted dull gray with no identification numbers or country insignia. Oddly, it was equipped with pontoons.

  The ghostly craft was flying at about 1,200 feet, Hedlund said. Once it had passed over his house, it began circling a nearby railroad station, its engines making a huge racket. It did this for some time before finally veering off toward some railroad tracks and, almost as if it were following them, eventually disappeared to the north. Little did anyone know this sort of weird behavior would soon be repeated many times over.

  The sightings continued throughout January 1934; there were more than two dozen reports of ghost fliers in those four weeks — and more frequently, the mysterious aircraft were observed doing very odd things.

  The ghost planes were almost always seen displaying powerful searchlights. Many times, they were spotted, their beacons illuminated, circling a village, a railroad station or a mountaintop, bathing it in light.

  The ghost planes were also somehow able to fly in all kinds of weather, including blizzards, conditions that would keep all other aircraft on the ground. And there were definitely more than just one aircraft. On some days, ghost fliers were reported in parts of southern and northern Sweden simultaneously.

  Sometimes the ghost planes were even seen flying in formations. According to a series of articles written by the great UFO researcher John Keel for Flying Saucer Review, one resident of northern Sweden watched a trio of the aerial phantoms, aligned in a perfect triangle formation, fly past his house almost every night for three weeks. And the ghost planes were frequently spotted with pontoons, even though they were flying over an Arctic terrain in frigid winter weather, with little access to open water.

  One truly bizarre antic of the ghost fliers was to sometimes turn off their engines while circling a village. In many cases, the residents would be outside looking up at the strange visitor and would hear the plane’s engines suddenly stop, only to restart again a few seconds later.

  * * *

  The Swedish military, as well as the militaries of Norway and Finland, took all this very seriously. The combined Scandinavian air forces were in the skies every night, determined to find the ghost planes.

  But though the three countries tried to concentrate their flights where sightings were being reported and were in constant contact with authorities on the ground, their searches always came up empty — at the cost of six Swedish air force planes that crashed during these search missions. And even though the ghost planes were observed flying fairly consistent flight paths at fairly consistent times of day, none of them was ever intercepted, or even spotted by the patrolling warplanes.

  * * *

  What were the ghost fliers?

  Often in cases like this, it’s easier to talk about what they were not.

  While the reason for ghost fliers’ bizarre activities remained unknown, there were theories about where they’d come from. Many people thought they were spy planes sent by Nazi Germany, just a few hundred miles to the south. One hypothesis said these spy planes were being launched from a top secret German aircraft carrier hidden somewhere in the Arctic Sea.

  But this idea is flawed. Nazi Germany never had an operational aircraft carrier — and while it’s not impossible that a German cruiser equipped to launch and retrieve floatplanes could have secluded itself in the frigid waters, operating aircraft from a ship at sea is difficult, even in the present day. Doing it in the Arctic, with its ice storms, high winds and impenetrable blizzards, would be a hugely complex and dangerous thing to do.

  But even if the Germans were able to launch a dozen or more aircraft at sea, at night, in brutal subpolar conditions, doing it every day for what turned out to be many months would have been a titanic, grueling and expensive undertaking. And no matter how successful it was, eventually this mothership would have to sail back home and get resupplied and refueled, causing a huge gap in sightings of the ghost fliers. Yet no such gap exists.

  Moreover, any secret vessel capable of launching and retrieving as many as a couple dozen planes would need a crew of at least several hundred men, probably many more. Yet none of these people, nor any of the phantom pilots themselves, ever came forward before, during or after World War II to confess that they’d been part of this massive ghost flier operation.

  Could the ghost fliers have been operating from a secret land base, perhaps in Germany, or maybe even in Russia? This, too, is unlikely. While the technology at the time might have allowed one or two planes from Russia or Germany to make one or two of these mysterious flights, harsh weather takes a toll on aircraft no matter what era they’re from. Back in 1933, most airplanes were still made of canvas and wood and many had open cockpits. They were not known for durability, and they were certainly not built to fly in severe Arctic conditions, night after night, for weeks on end.

  And if they were spy planes, what could they possibly have been looking for? The Arctic Circle region of Scandinavia is so isolated that even now it can barely boast more than one person per square mile. There is nothing there but snow, mountains and ice. Why undertake a massive spying operation over the same swath of territory, frequently using the same flight patterns, for weeks?

  As for the aircraft of the time period, again, very few of them had the range, the fuel capacity, the navigational equipment or, again, the structural integrity needed to make these flights. Certainly no German or Russian planes of that era had these capabilities, nor did they, or any other country, have any aircraft that fit eyewitnesses’ descriptions of large multiengine airplanes (one witness reported counting eight engines) equipped with pontoons.

  * * *

  Interestingly, the ghost fliers had a lot in common with a previous unexplained phenomena: the scareships of 1909.

  Both the ghost fliers and the scareships seemed to make use of technologies that were before their time. Both were known for using powerful searchlights. Both were seen by hundreds of witnesses. Both were believed to be spy craft, but in neither case did they make any attempt to conceal themselves — again, one does not conduct spy missions with searchlights.

  The ghost fliers share something else with the scareships. The phantom airships showed up in 1909—five years before World War I broke out. The ghost fliers were first seen up close in 1934—five years before World War II broke out.

  Added altogether, what does it mean?

  Or does it mean anything at all?

  PART THREE

  World War II

  4

  UFO Over Los Angeles

  In the early morning hours of February 25, 1942, the city of Los Angeles was attacked by UFOs.

  That might sound like the opening of a science fiction book or the first line from a movie script, but it actually happened — in front of one million witnesses.

  Though lacking both the etherealness of the 1909 scareships and the inscrutable motives of the Scandinavian ghost fliers, at least one very large UFO appeared over Los Angeles at 3 A.M. that February morning, bathed in searchlights, bombarded by hundreds of artillery shells — and seen by at least half of the city’s two million residents.

  This sudden grand appearance triggered a citywide panic that wound up killing six people on the ground and causing millions of dollars in damage. But because Pearl Harbor had been bombed just two months before, many assumed the object was an enemy aircraft and that the continental United States was under attack, not by otherworldly visitors, but by the Japanese. That’s why the UFO implications of the story did not get a very large play and why still today many Americans have no idea it even occurred.

  * * *

  What happened exactly?

  Told many times in many places, with a particularly good account found on Rense.com, the story actually begins on February 24. U.S. naval intelligence had issued a warning during the day that a Japanese attack on Los Angeles could be expected within the next ten hours. The city was already tense. A large number of flares had been reported around the area’s numerous defense plants tha
t night. Blinking lights had been spotted, too. An alert was called around 7 P.M., only to be cancelled a few hours later.

  But then, early on the morning of the twenty-fifth, radar picked up an unidentified target 120 miles west of LA, heading toward the city. Antiaircraft batteries were alerted at 2:15 A.M. and told to be ready to fire.

  Radar placed the approaching target so close to the coast that at 2:21 A.M. the region’s controller ordered a blackout. At 2:25 A.M., air raid sirens began blaring across Los Angeles, waking its two million residents. Antiaircraft batteries, many of them set in rings around those LA defense plants, trained their weapons skyward.

  At 2:43 A.M. planes were reported over Long Beach. A few minutes later a coast artillery officer spotted about two dozen aircraft over Los Angeles itself. At 3:06 A.M., antiaircraft batteries all around the city began firing, and in the words of the U.S. Air Force’s own history of the incident, “the air over Los Angeles erupted like a volcano.”

  Something was flying over LA. But what?

  Different people saw different things. Included in the one million eyewitnesses were several newspaper reporters. Editor Peter Jenkins of the Los Angeles Herald-Examiner wrote that he saw a V formation of about twenty-five aircraft go overhead moving in the direction of Long Beach.

  A reporter from the Los Angeles Herald Express saw the same objects. He insisted that several antiaircraft shells had struck one of them, and he was astonished the object was not shot down. Reporter Bill Henry of the Los Angeles Times confirmed that there seemed to be a number of direct hits on this particular object, but with no apparent effect.

  Quoted in Beyond Earth, Man’s Contact with UFOs, by Ralph Blum, who witnessed the incident as a young child, Long Beach police chief J. H. McClelland said: “I watched what was described as the second wave of planes from the roof of the Long Beach City Hall. An experienced Navy observer with powerful binoculars was with me and counted nine planes in the cone of the searchlight. He said they were silver in color. They passed from one battery of searchlights to another, and under fire from the antiaircraft guns, flew from the direction of Redondo Beach… toward Santa Ana.”