The “James McDonald Letters” to the UN

This article is like a short biography of Dr. James E. McDonald and his research into the UFO phenomenon. I would here by express my honor to this true man. James E McDonald worked in the 1950s and 1960s to raise the UFO issue in the scientific community as a serious problem. This article tries to documents his brave fight for justice and truth, and his untimely and mysterious end. James E McDonald was a scourge of the complacent ufologists of his day. He blasted not only the Air Force, Hynek, Menzel, Condon but anyone else doing a second-rate job in the UFO arena. He was a first-rate intellect and a world-famous atmospheric scientist, this last very important since UFOs are mainly reported in the atmosphere, not in outer space. This put the astronomers (Hynek & Menzel) on the spot when they tried to challenge McDonald. You see, he was *in* his field, *they* were *not*. This would often cause Menzel acute embarrassment. McDonald is a largely forgotten hero in the long and important battle to uncover the truth of the alien presence on Earth. He will NEVER be forgotten.

The “James McDonald Letters” to the UN

James McDonald, atmospheric physicist, leading UFO scientist in 1960’s– “UFOs: Extraterrestrial Probes”

“On the basis of an intensive study of the UFO problem, I believe that the extraterrestrial-origin hypothesis must now be given extremely serious scientific attention….

After a year of scrutiny of highly unconventional phenomena credibly reported from all parts of this country and [I believe] from most of the entire world, I have been driven to consider possibilities that I’d ordinarily not give a moment’s thought to in my own personal brand of orthodoxy. It is the UFO evidence that slowly forces the diligent UFO student to seriously consider the extraterrestrial hypothesis – evidence that I can only describe as extraordinary in its total nature….

All over the globe persons in all walks of life, representing a wide range of educational and cultural backgrounds, are reporting, often in the face of unpleasant ridicule, sightings of objects that appear to be completely real objects yet have characteristics that match nothing about which we have present knowledge….

Hoax, fraud, and fabrication account for a few but, in terms of percentage, negligible numbers of UFO sightings. Misinterpreted meteorological and astronomical observations and the like do account do account for lots of poor UFO reports, but experienced investigators learn to recognize these almost at a glance and dismiss them from further attention…

It is the detailed, close-range sightings by persons whose reliability cannot be brought into serious question that carry great weight. Pacing of aircraft and buzzing of cars by UFOs go on rather steadily. These cases so strongly suggest something vaguely resembling surveillance or reconnaissance that the student of the problem is forced to weigh the possibility that the UFOs are probes of some type engaged in something we would loosely call “observation.” There are many other categories of sightings suggesting the same tentative hypothesis. How can this be? There is, in my opinion, no sensible alternative to the utterly shocking hypothesis that the UFOs are extraterrestrial probes.

There is, in my opinion, no sensible alternative to the utterly shocking hypothesis that the UFOs are extraterrestrial probes.” James McDonald, Statement to House Subcommittee , 1968

“I have been studying now for about 2 years, on a rather intensive basis, the UFO problem. I have interviewed several hundred witnesses in selected cases, and I am astonished at what I have found. From time to time in the history of science, situations have arisen in which a problem of ultimately enormous importance went begging for adequate attention simply because that problem appeared to involve phenomena so far outside the current bounds of scientific knowledge that it was not even regarded as a legitimate subject of serious scientific concern. That is precisely the situation in which the UFO problem now lies. One of the principal results of my own recent intensive study of the UFO enigma is this: I have become convinced that the scientific community, not only in this country but throughout the world, has been casually ignoring as nonsense a matter of extraordinary scientific importance. The attention of your Committee can, and I hope will, aid greatly in correcting this situation. As you will note in the following, my own present opinion, based on two years of careful study, is that UFOs are probably extraterrestrial devices engaged in something that might very tentatively be termed “surveillance.”…

If the extraterrestrial hypothesis is proved correct (and I emphasize that the present evidence only points in that direction but cannot be said to constitute irrefutable proof), then clearly UFOs will become a top-priority scientific problem. I believe you might agree that, even if there were a slight chance of the correctness of that hypothesis, the UFOs would demand the most careful attention….

To both laymen and scientists, the impressive progress that science has made towards understanding our total environment prompts doubts that there could be machine-like objects of entirely unconventional nature moving through our atmosphere, hovering over automobiles, power installations, cities, and the like, yet all the while going unnoticed by our body scientific. Such suggestions are hard to take seriously, and I assure you that, until I had taken a close look at the evidence, I did not take them seriously. We have managed to so let our preconceptions block serious consideration of the possibility that some form of alien technology is operating within our midst that we have succeeded in simply ignoring the facts. And we scientists have ignored the pleas of groups like NICAP and APRO, who have for years been stressing the remarkable nature of the UFO evidence. Abroad, science has reacted in precisely this same manner, ignoring as nonsensical the report-material gathered by private groups operating outside the main channels of science. I understand this neglect all too well; I was just one more of those scientists who almost ignored those facts, just one more of those scientists who was rather sure that such a situation nearly could not exist, one more citizen rather sure that official statements must be basically meaningful on the non-existence of any substantial evidence for the reality of UFOs.

My own study of the UFO problem has convinced me that we must rapidly escalate serious scientific attention to this extraordinarily intriguing puzzle. ….

I believe that the scientific community has been seriously misinformed for twenty years about the potential importance of UFOs. The possibility that the Earth might be under surveillance by some high civilization in command of a technology far beyond ours must not be overlooked in weighing the UFO problem. I am one of those who lean strongly towards the extraterrestrial hypothesis. I arrived at that point by a process of elimination of other alternative hypotheses, not by arguments based on what I would call “irrefutable proof.” I am convinced that the recurrent observations by reliable citizens here and abroad over the past twenty years cannot be brushed aside as nonsense, but rather need to be taken extremely seriously as evidence that some phenomenon is going on which we simply do not understand.”

James McDonald, letter to Mr. U. Thant, Secretary General of the United Nations, June 1967

“I believe that it is necessary to take into very serious account the assumption that these strange objects constitute some sort of extraterrestrial probes. Before I had undertaken a personal study of the problem, I was willing to grant credit to such an assumption. After one year of intensive study, I must still regard it only as an assumption, but I must stress that my research strongly pushes me to admit that this assumption is the only acceptable one as for now if one wants to account for the utterly amazing number of observations at low altitude and short distance which are now recorded in the whole world and which relate to objects that have the appearance of machines.

To the numerous serious investigators of the UFO problem, it appears conceivable that something in the nature of a global surveillance by UFOs has been underway in recent years. If this view is correct, then our present ignorance of the purpose and plan of such surveillance must be urgently replaced by maximal understanding of what is going on… The present ignorance, the present neglect and the present mocking remarks, all constitute regrettable features of our collective attitudes with regard to what can be, for all the people of the world, an affair of utter importance. During twenty years, there was a persisting and intriguing flood of reports, coming from countries located in all the parts of the world, relating to what we finally called the unidentified flying objects (UFOS). In all these reports, whatever their geographical origin, the nature of the reported objects appears to be primarily similar.

During the last twelve months spent, I pursued an intensive examination of the scientific aspects of the UFO problem, dealing with reports originating within the limits of the United States. After I interviewed the key witnesses to dozen important cases distributed over the whole 1947-1967 period; after having studied, with personal of the U.S. Air Force, official methods of investigation; and after having personally checked a great number of other sources of information, I concluded that, far from being a stupid problem, the problem of the UFOS is a problem of an extraordinary scientific interest.

My own studies led me to reject the opinion according to which they are only natural atmospheric phenomena or misinterpreted astronomical phenomena; in this respect a number of official explanations are almost absurdly erroneous. It is not possible anymore to explain all these observations with assumptions calling upon the products of a technology of avant-garde or experimental secret craft, with assumptions of mystification, fraud or trickery, or with psychological assumptions. Each one of these assumptions intervenes indeed in a great number of cases, but there still remains an astonishing number of other reports, submitted by observers highly worthy of faith during the two last decades, which cannot receive such a satisfactory explanation. I believe that this vast residue of reports, which amounts now to hundreds and perhaps thousands of cases, requires the attention of the most eminent scientists of the world.

It is my present opinion, based on what I believe to be a sufficient scientific examination of excluding mutually assumptions, that the most probable assumption to account for the phenomenon of the UFOS is that these are a certain type of monitoring space probes, of extraterrestrial origin.”

James McDonald, “Are UFOs Extraterrestrial Surveillance Craft?”, talk give at American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, 1968.

“If there were even a slim possibility that the Earth were under extraterrestrial surveillance in any form, that would be a matter of the greatest scientific importance, warranting the most rigorous investigation.  In fact, the evidence that seems to point to the conclusion that UFOs could be such devices is far from negligible; yet because of the history for the official and scientific response to the earlier UFO reports, we continue to see mainly neglect or ridicule on this intriguing question.

After examining around a thousand UFO reports and directly interviewing several hundred witnesses in selected UFO cases of outstanding interest, and after weighing alternative hypotheses, I find myself driven steadily further toward the position that the extraterrestrial hypothesis is, of course, not original with me; it has been urged for many years by persons knowledgeable with respect to the UFO problem, who spoke from outside scientific circles.   Our collective failure to examine scientific aspects of the UFO problem will, I fear, be held against the scientific community when the full dimensions of the UFO evidence come to be recognized.

The type of UFO reports that are most intriguing, and point most directly to an extraterrestrial hypothesis, are close-range sightings of machine-like objects of unconventional nature and unconventional performance characteristics, seen at low altitudes, and sometimes even on the ground.  The general public is entirely unaware of the large number of such reports that are coming from credible witnesses because ridicule and scoffing have made most witnesses reluctant to report openly such unusual incidents.  When one starts searching for such cases, their numbers are quite astonishing.  Also, such sightings appear to be occurring all over the globe.

The sooner we take a serious new stance and confront the UFO question with adequate scientific talent and staffing, the less embarrassing will be the ultimate admission that we have been overlooking a problem of potentially enormous scientific importance to humanity.”

Full FBI file of Dr. James E McDonald Here

Read more about James E McDonald:

James McDonald was a top atmospheric physicist. His official title was “Senior Physicist” at the Institute of Atmospheric Physics (IAP) at the University of Arizona in Tucson. McDonald was unique. He had quietly studied UFO sightings in and around the Tucson area for eight full years before he decided to go public with his interest. He was fully aware that “going public” might bring controversy and scorn upon his head from scientific colleagues who had never studied the UFO phenomenon and who accepted the government’s “explanation” of the problem as the final word.

The main thrust of his research was to convince other scientists of the necessity for Science to accept the UFO phenomenon as an appropriate, and even urgent, field of study. He wrote many papers on the subject, many of which were based on various classic and current sightings which he had studied in depth with an open mind.

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James E McDonald was a HERO and he payed the price they demand…

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