NATO science grants and anti-gravity claim
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Contents 9
NATO science grants and anti-gravity claim
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| Claim | NATO began supporting anti-gravity research through its science grants in 1958 |
|---|---|
| Source of claim | Anonymous UAP timeline in Michael Shellenberger's 2024 House testimony, p. 60 |
| Programme | NATO Science Programme (1958); Science for Peace and Security since 2006 |
| First Science Committee chair | Norman F. Ramsey |
| Status | Unverified; no NATO document found |
| Date | 1958 |
| Topics | Propulsion & physics (topic) |
| Testimony | Shellenberger testimony, p. 60 |
| Year | 1958 in UFO history |
| Timeline | 1958 on the UAP Timeline |
| Sources | 7 |
The NATO science grants and anti-gravity claim is an entry in an anonymous timeline of UAP-related events. The timeline was included in the journalist Michael Shellenberger's written testimony to the House Oversight Committee in November 2024. The entry says that in 1958 NATO began supporting anti-gravity research through the grant mechanisms of what is now its Science for Peace and Security (SPS) programme, and that this support continues "to this day".[3] NATO did found a civil science programme in 1958, and it still awards grants.[1][4] However, the NATO web page the timeline cites no longer exists, and no NATO document found for this article mentions anti-gravity.[2]
The claim
- The timeline lists the claim under 1958, on page 60, as a single sentence. Its only source is a NATO web page,
nato.int/cps/en/natolive/87260.htm.[3] - That address, and the same page number under NATO's newer
natohqpath, both now return "not found". A search index still lists thenatohqversion as last updated on 7 June 2019, but its contents could not be read for this article. Its subject is therefore unknown. Judging from the timeline's own wording, it was probably NATO's general description of its SPS grant mechanisms.[2] - The entry offers no grant title, recipient or amount, and does not say what kind of "anti-gravity research" was funded.[3]
NATO's science programme
- NATO's science programme came out of the recommendations of the Committee on Non-Military Cooperation, the "Three Wise Men", one of whom was the Canadian foreign minister Lester Pearson. Their report said progress in science and technology could decide the security of nations and their place in world affairs.[4][5]
- On 29 March 1958, a few months after the launch of Sputnik 1, the North Atlantic Council in Paris announced a NATO Science Committee and the post of Science Advisor to the Secretary General. The Harvard physicist Norman F. Ramsey, a Manhattan Project veteran who later won the 1989 Nobel Prize in Physics for work that underlies atomic clocks, became the committee's first chairman. A main goal was to train scientists in NATO countries, encourage exchanges, build networks and get more return from research spending.[4]
- The committee set up three support schemes almost at once: Advanced Study Institutes, Collaborative Research Grants and Science Fellowships. Their aim was training young scientists and engineers, and they emphasised cooperation, high scientific quality and quick response to new developments.[5]
- From the early 1990s scientists from NATO's partner countries became eligible, and from 1999 support went mainly to collaborations between partner-country and NATO-country scientists.[5] The programme took its current name, Science for Peace and Security, in 2006. NATO says more than 20 scientists who were involved in the programme have won Nobel Prizes.[1][4]
What SPS funds today
- SPS supports non-military cooperation on security-related science. Each activity must involve at least one partner in a NATO member state and one in an eligible partner country. Its four grant types are multi-year research and development projects, Advanced Research Workshops, Advanced Training Courses and Advanced Study Institutes, announced through calls for proposals up to three times a year.[1]
- Its priority list, revised in April 2024, covers:
- environment and climate security;
- innovation and emerging disruptive technologies;
- chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear and explosive hazards;
- hybrid threats;
- critical undersea infrastructure;
- threats from Russia;
- human and social aspects of security.
- Typical projects include:
- an autonomous-drone competition;
- a plan to reroute internet traffic through space if undersea cables are attacked;
- the DEXTER system for remotely detecting explosives and firearms in public places;
- demining robots;
- monitoring pollutants in rivers of the South Caucasus;
- disposal of toxic Cold War rocket-fuel oxidiser in Central Asia.
- NATO's 2018 booklet for the programme's 60th anniversary lists its present focus as security-related civil science, including counter-terrorism, cyber defence, and women, peace and security, with about 150 projects, workshops and training courses then under way. It does not mention gravity research.[4]
Anti-gravity in the 1950s
- The claim fits a period when anti-gravity was fashionable. The businessman Roger Babson had founded the Gravity Research Foundation in 1948 to look for ways to reduce gravity's effects. Over time it moved from trying to control gravity to simply understanding it.[6]
- Research on Thomas Townsend Brown's high-voltage "electrogravitic" devices was popular in the mid-1950s. At one point the Glenn L. Martin Company advertised for scientists "interested in gravity", but interest declined quickly afterwards. Physicists attributed the force from Brown's devices to ion wind, not anti-gravity.[7]
- Later tests found no thrust in a vacuum: by R. L. Talley for the U.S. Air Force in 1990, and by Martin Tajmar's group in 2004 and 2024.[6]
- The earlier version of this article said NATO had funded "meetings and fellowships in fundamental physics" in the late 1950s and that gravitational research "was attracting money from many sources at the time". The first point is broadly supported by the fellowship and Advanced Study Institute schemes described above, though no specific physics award was identified. The second is supported here only for the private and industry interest just described.[5][6][7]
Context in the timeline
- On the same page, the timeline's next 1958 entry describes a U.S. Air Force intelligence study group, headed by Stefan Possony, that reviewed a book by the former German officer Rudolf Lusar claiming Nazi Germany had built "flying saucers". The timeline notes that the author Nick Cook found mixed corroboration for Lusar's claims.[3]
- The NATO entry belongs to the timeline's wider theme of government interest in exotic propulsion, but it gives no evidence of its own.[3]
Assessment
- The founding date, 1958, is correct, and the programme does still award grants through the mechanisms the timeline names.[4][5]
- No grant list, report or NATO publication read here shows that NATO funded research aimed at anti-gravity, either in 1958 or later. The single page the claim rests on has been taken down. That part of the claim remains unverified.[1][2][4]
People and topics
- Anti-gravity — The idea of cancelling or controlling gravity for propulsion.
On the Timeline
- Man in Space Soonest (1958) — The Air Force's pre-NASA 'Man-In-Space-Soonest' program funds a Lockheed spacecraft, later cancelled.
- Rudolf Lusar and the Nazi disc claims (1958) — An Air Force intelligence group analyzes a German author's claims about Nazi flying discs.
See every 1958 event on the UAP Timeline →
References
- NATO Science for Peace and Security — Wikipedia · en.wikipedia.com · archived copy
- nato.int · nato.int · archived copy
- Michael Shellenberger, written testimony to the House Oversight Committee (13 November 2024), p. 60 · oversight.house.gov
- NATO, "SPS 60th Anniversary" event booklet (29 November 2018) · nato-brussels.mfa.gov.rs
- "Sullivan appointed to NATO science panel", University of Illinois News Bureau (history of the NATO Science Program) · news.illinois.edu
- Anti-gravity — Wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org
- Thomas Townsend Brown — Wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org
Facts in this article are drawn in part from the Wikipedia articles “Anti-gravity”, “Thomas Townsend Brown”, “Anti-gravity”, “Thomas Townsend Brown”, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.
This page was last edited on 29 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.
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