Documents / FOIA release

roswell

Office of the Secretary of Defense · 993 pages · text from the file's own layer

The Roswell Report: Fact versus Fiction in the New Mexico Desert was published in 1995 by Headquarters United States Air Force. It was written in response to Representative Steven H. Schiff's request and a General Accounting Office audit, and it contains Col. Richard L. Weaver's report and 1st Lt. James McAndrew's synopsis, along with attachments, appendices and photographs. The report says researchers found no evidence of an extraterrestrial craft or crew. It concludes that the 1947 debris came from a Project MOGUL balloon train.

  • p. 19 …MOGUL; their job was to deliver nuclear weapons, not to detect them. The unusual combination of…
  • p. 36 …happened near Roswell may have involved nuclear weapons. This was a logical area of concern since…
  • p. 41 …to determine the state of Soviet nuclear weapons research. This was the early Cold War period…
  • p. 183 …that time where we either dropped a weapon or did something stupid, which we had to…
  • p. 201 …long range balloons; although not effective as weapons, they did initiate the long-range balloon research…
  • p. 213 …Charles Ziegler was working on the history of nuclear weapons detection capability. He had some letters…
  • p. 249 …Out PM with several NYU men by weapons carrier, but we never located it. Rocket postponed…
  • p. 251 …so I took a weapons carrier and drove up there. We were aggressively trying to recover…
  • p. 253 …We drove up in a weapons carrier to the Roswell Army Air Field, and tried to…
  • p. 264 …We civilians were driving weapons carriers to carry helium around, and to go into town to…
  • p. 273 …a book on the history of nuclear weapons detection. It figured, of course, that Project MOGUL…
  • p. 274 …I had considerable background in nuclear weapons detection, using devices that I had developed in the…
  • p. 326 …in the :world capable of delivering nuclear weapons. It now appears that the debris from MOGUL…
  • p. 401 …a.~tack:; -;;it"t st.~c!"et weapons. ' The moat prom1a1ne. .eJ"PC'• oi: li6tening etatlon…
  • p. 804 …Dec 13 Fri.Woody and I left Alamogordo Air Base in weapon carrier and scouted out…
  • p. 805 …went in borrowed weapon carrier. '.:oody and Jeff 7owler took other weapon carrier ::1~d collected…
  • p. 808 …Phil and Sal went out to Dona and Launching Sites with weapon carrier. Hoffman, DeTurk and…
  • p. 812 …May 19 Mon Reynolds and I left about 0745 in weapon carrier for Silver City. Arrived…
  • p. 813 …Edmondson and I left about 0845 in weapon carrier for Roswell. Arrived at Hagerman about 12…
  • p. 815 …Out pm with several NYU by weapon carrier but we never located it. Rocket postponed until…
apparatus and materials for the project, so if he said that it was debris from the project, rm sure
that's what it was. He was not concerned with a breach of security for the project.
Concerning the name Maj Pritchard, he may have worked for me but I don't recall him. I have no
knowledge of any counterintelligence. or intelligence persons on the project or associated with my
directorate at Watson or Cambridge Labs. When we took over the project, we were aware of the
sensitivity of the project-we were aware that we were working in the open-it was a weakness of
security because the activity could be obselved. I never obsCJVed any of the balloon "trains" but I
did see some of the early reflectors. Some of the reflectors were procured from sources out of
normal channels. Some of the contractors lined up were not quite in concert with typical Signal
Corps practices and procedures. Jack Peterson was vety energetic and could make procurement
actions take place. Ed Itsvan, who I believe actually arranged for production for some of the
reflectors, actually went to a toy manufacturer in New Yark city to get some. It was kind of a
standing joke. I remember that some of the prototype and preproduction targets had this pink or
pw-plish tape holding the material to the balsa beam. This tape had flowers and other designs on it.
The reflectors were probably made starting in late 1944 but I do not recall how long the
production run was. I do not recall any other specific attributes but they were geometrically and
structurally simple.
I am not part of any conspiracy to withhold information from either the US government or
American public. There is no classified information that I am withholding related to this inquiry
and I have never been threatened by US Government persons concerning refraining from talking
about this situation .
SIGNED:
~I
WITNESS(s):
Subscn'bed and sworn to before me, a
person authorized to administer oaths
this
~'l,ltlt day of June 1994 a~ , VA
~~~~USAF
MALJ

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FOIA release, from the osd collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is under it. 993 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.