Hillenkoetter letter of 24 September 1947
From the UAP Encyclopedia, the open encyclopedia of UFO and UAP history · 🗓️ Event
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| Attributed to | Rear Admiral Roscoe H. Hillenkoetter, first Director of Central Intelligence |
|---|---|
| Alleged content | Names Air Force and Navy intelligence units as leads on recovered objects |
| Circulates with | The disputed "Majestic 12" (MJ-12) papers |
| Why the date matters | MJ-12 papers claim Truman created the Majestic group by executive order on 24 September 1947 |
| Genuine record that week | Twining's letter of 23 September 1947; Hillenkoetter's daily log noting "certain papers" taken to the White House on 24 September |
| Status | No verified copy in official archives |
| Date | 24 September 1947 |
| People | Roscoe Hillenkoetter, Nathan Twining, Harry S. Truman |
| Testimony | Shellenberger testimony, p. 39 |
| Year | 1947 in UFO history |
| Timeline | 1947 on the UAP Timeline |
| Sources | 6 |
The "Hillenkoetter letter of 24 September 1947" is a letter attributed to Rear Admiral Roscoe Hillenkoetter, the first Director of Central Intelligence. It is said to name Air Force and Navy intelligence units as the leads on recovered objects.[1] It circulates with the disputed Majestic 12, or MJ-12, papers, and no verified copy has been found in official archives.[1][3] Its date is the day on which the MJ-12 papers say President Truman created the Majestic group.[1] In early 2026 attention turned to genuine entries in Hillenkoetter's daily log for that week, which record "certain papers" being taken to the White House.[4]
The MJ-12 date
The date 24 September 1947 is central to MJ-12 lore:[1]
- The film. In December 1984 Jaime Shandera received an anonymous roll of undeveloped film. It held images of a "Truman–Forrestal memo" dated 24 September 1947, authorising Defense Secretary James Forrestal and Vannevar Bush to proceed with "Operation Majestic-12".
- The briefing document. The same roll held the "Eisenhower Briefing Document", dated 18 November 1952, which presented MJ-12 as a group overseeing recovered craft.
- The FBI. In 1988 the FBI investigated a copy. After the Air Force Office of Special Investigations said no such committee had ever been authorised or formed, it declared the document "completely bogus".
- The flaws. The papers used a date format found in the ufologist William Moore's personal notes but not in government documents of the time. The Truman signature on the memo was a photocopy of one from an October 1947 letter to Vannevar Bush.
Other MJ-12 items echo genuine documents. One supposed Hillenkoetter memo to Truman, dated 17 February 1948, was modelled on a letter from George Marshall to Roosevelt.[1] The FBI's own Vault page on Majestic 12 refused automated access.[3]
The genuine record
The genuine documents of those days centre on the Air Force's response to the 1947 disc wave:[2][5]
- 23 September 1947. Lieutenant General Nathan Twining of Air Materiel Command wrote to Brigadier General George Schulgen in the Pentagon. He judged the phenomenon "something real and not visionary or fictitious" and recommended a formal study.
- The denials. Earlier, the Army Air Forces' research chief had reported "no project with the characteristics similar to those which have been associated with the Flying Discs". Army sources told the FBI the same, and Keyhoe was later told no Navy project existed.
- 30 December 1947. Major General Laurence C. Craigie directed Wright Field to set up Project Sign. It became a special project in the Technical Analysis section of Air Materiel Command's intelligence division, T-2.
In these records, it was Air Force intelligence, not the CIA or the Navy, that took the lead.[2][5]
Hillenkoetter's log
In early 2026, entries from Hillenkoetter's 1947 daily log were publicised as possible support for MJ-12. As reported by International Business Times:[4]
- 23 September. The log noted instructions to deliver a paper: "Paper for White House [is] to be in by 9:00am."
- 24 September. "Director went to White House to discuss certain papers."
- Later. Entries mention twelve copies of the papers being prepared, plus one for Rear Admiral Sidney Souers. Hillenkoetter also postponed internal CIA meetings to coordinate with Forrestal.
The article argued that the precise timing, the phrase "certain papers" and the twelve copies pointed to "a compartmented programme" and a precursor of MJ-12. It also cited "Shadow GHQ" files at Princeton University as showing similar activity a month later.[4]
Interpretation
Supporters of a crash-retrieval cover-up read the log as a clue, noting the coincidence of the twelve copies.[4] Sceptics note several problems:[1][4]
- No discs. As quoted, the entries do not mention discs at all.
- Other business. "Certain papers" could refer to any of the many security matters of September 1947, the month the National Security Act took effect and the CIA was created.
- Inference only. The link to MJ-12 rests on inference, and the MJ-12 papers that supply the date are themselves established forgeries.
A timeline of UFOs and intelligence by George M. Eberhart is also among the sources, but it refused automated access.[6]
Status
The Hillenkoetter letter, like the rest of the Majestic papers, has no verified government origin.[1][3] The genuine records of September 1947 show the Air Force, through Twining and Schulgen, moving towards an official study of the discs. They do not show a secret committee or recovered objects.[2][5]
People and topics
- Central Intelligence Agency — The U.S. foreign intelligence agency, which has followed UFO reports since the 1940s.
- U.S. Air Force — The U.S. military service that ran the official UFO projects from 1947 to 1969.
- U.S. Navy — The U.S. naval service, whose pilots reported the UAP encounters revealed in 2017.
- Roscoe Hillenkoetter — First Director of Central Intelligence (1947–50) and later NICAP board member; named in the disputed MJ-12 papers.
- MJ-12 — Disputed documents describing a secret committee managing crashed saucers.
- Nathan Twining — Commander of Air Materiel Command who wrote the 1947 memo calling the flying discs "something real".
- Crash retrieval — The alleged recovery of crashed non-human craft by governments.
- Harry S. Truman — 33rd U.S. president (1945–53), in office during the first flying disc wave and the start of official UFO studies.
- Federal Bureau of Investigation — The U.S. federal police agency, which helped check flying disc reports from 1947 to 1950.
On the Timeline
- Twining memo (1947) (23 September 1947) — Gen. Nathan Twining writes that the flying discs are real and could be a secret U.S. or Soviet project.
- Selman Graves and the Paradise Valley crash claim (October 1947) — Pilot Selman Graves says he saw a crashed craft and two humanoid bodies recovered in Paradise Valley, Arizona.
See every 1947 event on the UAP Timeline →
Further reading
- UFO documents — CIA Reading Room · cia.gov · archived copy
References
- Majestic 12 — Wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org · archived copy
- Michael Swords, "Project Sign and the Estimate of the Situation", NICAP · nicap.org · archived copy
- "Majestic 12", FBI Vault · vault.fbi.gov · archived copy
- "CIA boss's 1947 diary sparks UFO speculation as 'certain papers' sent to White House emerge", IBTimes UK (Jan 2026) · ibtimes.co.uk · archived copy
- Condon Report, Appendix S — Project 1947 · project1947.com · archived copy
- academia.edu · academia.edu · archived copy
Facts in this article are drawn in part from the Wikipedia article “Majestic 12”, 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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