In November 2004, several U.S. Navy pilots stationed aboard the USS Nimitz encountered a Tic-Tac-shaped UFO darting and dashing over the Pacific Ocean in apparent defiance of the laws of physics. Navy officials dubbed the strange craft an "unidentified aerial phenomenon," but they have remained mum on what, exactly, that phenomenon could've been. Now, unsurprisingly to anyone who's ever considered making a hat out of tinfoil, the military has confirmed they know more than they're letting on.
In response to a recent Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, a spokesperson from the Navy's Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI) confirmed that the agency possesses several top-secret documents and at least one classified video pertaining to the 2004 UFO encounter, Vice reported.
According to the ONI spokesperson, these documents were either labeled "SECRET" or "TOP SECRET" by the agencies that provided them, and that sharing the information with the public "would cause exceptionally grave damage to the National Security of the United States."
These top-secret files included several "briefing slides" about the incident, provided to the ONI by an unnamed agency. (Because ONI officials did not classify the slides personally, they are unable to declassify them, the spokesperson added).
The ONI also admitted to possessing at least one video of unknown length, classified as "secret" by the Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR). ONI didn't reveal whether this footage is the same 1-minute video that was leaked online in 2007 and widely released by The New York Times in 2017. However, in November 2019, several naval officers who witnessed the incident aboard the Nimitz told Popular Mechanics that they had seen a much longer video of the encounter that was between 8 and 10 minutes long. These original recordings were promptly collected and erased by "unknown individuals" who arrived on the ship by helicopter shortly after the incident, one officer said.
Luis Elizondo, a former Pentagon staffer who helped make the Navy video public, told Vice that "people should not be surprised by the revelation that other videos exist and at greater length."
The FOIA request, submitted in October 2019 by an independent researcher, asked for access to any nonclassified records or portions of records regarding the 2004 UFO encounter. No additional documents were mentioned in the ONI's response besides the classified briefing and video.
KorgRue on January 14th, 2020 at 19:40 UTC »
I don't suspect that the "grave damage" would come by revealing "little green men", - but rather because the revelation would expose one of the following:
The capabilities/limitations of the US military optics and other tracking systems that were used to capture it That is was actually a top secret US military aircraft that they don't want the public and US adversaries to know the details of. That is was a top secret enemy aircraft that eluded US radar/tracking capabilities up until visual detectionRevealing that "Little green men" have visited Earth may cause some public concern, but it certainly would not cause "grave damage" to US National Security. It would just be a confirmation of what many people already accept as fact. As such, I don't think this is the case for the coverup in this instance.
Usual_Safety on January 14th, 2020 at 16:46 UTC »
Until they clarify I'm going with the assumption the military thinks it better to acknowledge UFO's than admit they have cutting edge tech.
GreenSalsa96 on January 14th, 2020 at 16:30 UTC »
If you read the story, it's more likely classified because the files contain / reveal the abilities of the optics / electronics that captured the "UFO".