Unidentified: Inside America's UFO Investigation
From the UAP Encyclopedia, the open encyclopedia of UFO and UAP history · 🎬 Book or film
Contents 6
| Type | Book, film or media |
|---|---|
| Also known as | Unidentified (TV series) |
Unidentified: Inside America's UFO Investigation is a History channel documentary series first broadcast on 31 May 2019. It follows Luis Elizondo, who says he directed the Pentagon's Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program (AATIP), and his colleagues at Tom DeLonge's company To The Stars Academy of Arts and Science (TTSA) as they reinvestigate military UFO cases.[1][2] Announced as a six-part limited series, it was renewed for a second season in September 2019 after the U.S. Navy confirmed that clips it featured were authentic footage of unexplained aerial objects.[1][2] Fans praised the credibility of its cast. Critics noted that it was made by the company its stars worked for, and that the Pentagon said it could find no record of Elizondo's role in AATIP.[2][3]
Background
Elizondo, a former military counterintelligence officer, resigned from the Defense Department in October 2017. He said he had been frustrated that the government was not taking UFOs, which he considered a national security threat, seriously enough. That same month DeLonge, the former Blink-182 guitarist, launched TTSA with Elizondo among its members.[1][2] In December 2017 The New York Times, followed by Politico and The Washington Post, revealed AATIP. The series was meant to give an inside view of AATIP's investigations and TTSA's later work.[2] TTSA had raised more than $2 million from investors. It was first promoted as a research company exploring the "outer edges of science," but its Securities and Exchange Commission filing listed it as a "Motion Picture & Video Tape Production" business.[3]
Content
Besides Elizondo, the series features:[1][2][3]
- Christopher Mellon. A former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Intelligence under Presidents Clinton and George W. Bush, he served as TTSA's national security affairs adviser.
- Steve Justice. A former program director for advanced systems at Lockheed Martin's Skunk Works.
- Tom DeLonge. The executive producer, who also appears on screen. Investigative journalist Anthony Lappe was another executive producer.
- Commentators. Politico's defense editor Bryan Bender and Las Vegas journalist George Knapp also appear.
The first episode opens on the 2017 Times headline. It reviews the November 2004 encounters by the USS Nimitz strike group, in which Commander David Fravor described a white, 40-foot "Tic Tac" object. It includes the first account by Fravor's wingmate, a pilot who had not spoken publicly before and was filmed in shadow to stay anonymous.[2][3] Other featured incidents:
- The Pentagon videos. The Pentagon UFO videos.[1]
- Italy. The Canneto di Caronia fires in Sicily (season 1, episode 6, "The Revelation").[1]
- Black triangles. Black triangle sightings (season 2, episode 2, "The Triangle Mystery").[1]
- Rendlesham. A preview promised a look at the 1980 Rendlesham Forest case, and Elizondo promised further unreleased AATIP cases.[2]
Lappe said the series had filmed Mellon and Elizondo behind the scenes during the year the Navy introduced new UFO reporting procedures, which they considered "a huge victory."[2]
Reception
Den of Geek's reviewer said that, unlike many UFO reality shows, it stood out for "the credibility of the show's investigators and witnesses." The reviewer had shared fans' fear that it might become another Ancient Aliens, but said the first episode laid those fears to rest.[2] Leslie Kean, co-author of the 2017 Times story, presented the revelations as disclosure itself: "Elizondo confirmed that UFOs are real; they exist, and they have been officially documented."[1] DeLonge has described himself as "the military's chosen vessel for UFO disclosure."[1][3]
The Intercept's criticism
Writing in The Intercept on 1 June 2019, the day after the premiere, a reporter argued that "there is no discernible evidence" Elizondo had ever worked for a government UFO program, let alone led one.[3]
- The Pentagon's statement. Pentagon spokesperson Christopher Sherwood confirmed that AATIP had studied unidentified aerial phenomena, but said "Mr. Elizondo had no responsibilities with regard to the AATIP program" while at the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence. Sherwood said he could not confirm the 2017 statement by spokeswoman Dana White to Politico that Elizondo ran the program.
- TTSA's account. This contradicted a TTSA spokesperson's account to UFO researcher John Greenewald that Elizondo took over AATIP in 2010. Elizondo had shared performance reviews and his resignation letter with reporters, but nothing linking him to AATIP, and the letter did not mention the program.
- Undisclosed ties. The reporter said coverage of the series glossed over the ties between DeLonge, Elizondo, Mellon and others. A Fox & Friends interview with Mellon did not mention that he worked for the company that made the show.
- Knapp's shares. Knapp, a vocal defender of the group who appears in the first episode, had bought 400 shares in TTSA in 2018. Knapp said he had made this public and told his employer, and that the shares had since been placed in a trust for charity.
- The Times's reporting. Times reporter Helene Cooper had said on The Daily podcast that Elizondo seemed "completely credible," though doubts crept in later. She decided the key question was whether the program was real.
The UFO researcher Tim McMillan is quoted as having come to doubt Elizondo's involvement in any government UFO program.[3] See also The Black Vault.
Notes on the earlier version of this article
- Elizondo's role. The earlier version described Elizondo as someone "who says he ran" AATIP. The Wikipedia account states that he directed the program, while the 2019 Pentagon statement reported by The Intercept says he had no AATIP responsibilities in his office. Both are given here.[1][3]
References
- Unidentified: Inside America's UFO Investigation — Wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org · archived copy
- "Unidentified Review: History Series Takes UFOs to a New Level of Credibility", Den of Geek (2019) · denofgeek.com · archived copy
- "UFO Expert May Not Have Worked for Shadowy Pentagon Program", The Intercept (1 June 2019) · theintercept.com · archived copy
Facts in this article are drawn in part from the Wikipedia article “Unidentified: Inside America's UFO Investigation”, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.
This page was last edited on 31 October 2026. Articles are written in our own words from the sources listed under References; disputed claims are attributed to the people who made them.
No discussion yet.