Hillenkoetter's 1960 call for hearings
From the UAP Encyclopedia, the open encyclopedia of UFO and UAP history · 🗓️ Event
Contents 7
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| Date | 22 June 1960 |
|---|---|
| People | Roscoe Hillenkoetter |
| Testimony | Shellenberger testimony, p. 63 |
| Year | 1960 in UFO history |
| Timeline | 1960 on the UAP Timeline |
| Sources | 6 |
In 1960 Vice Admiral Roscoe Hillenkoetter, the first Director of Central Intelligence, publicly criticised official secrecy about UFOs and called for open congressional hearings, saying that high-ranking Air Force officers were privately concerned about them.[1][2]
Hillenkoetter
Hillenkoetter (1897–1982) was a naval intelligence officer who was wounded at Pearl Harbor as executive officer of the battleship West Virginia and later commanded USS Missouri. He was Director of Central Intelligence from May 1947 to October 1950, and was criticised for the CIA's failure to anticipate the Soviet atomic test of 1949 and the outbreak of the Korean War. He retired as a vice admiral in 1957.[1]
NICAP and the 1960 statement
After retiring, Hillenkoetter joined the board of governors of the civilian group NICAP, lending it a prominent establishment name. In 1960, in a statement to Congress reported by The New York Times, he wrote that behind the scenes high-ranking Air Force officers were soberly concerned about UFOs, but that through official secrecy and ridicule the public was led to believe they were nonsense. He called for congressional hearings. NICAP also publicised an Air Force order from late 1959 telling commanders to take UFO reports seriously, which seemed to contradict public statements.[1][2][3]
Aftermath
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Hillenkoetter resigned from NICAP in February 1962 without publicly explaining why. His name later appeared on the disputed Majestic 12 documents as a member of the alleged secret committee, and his statements are often cited by believers in a cover-up.[1][4]
People and topics
- Central Intelligence Agency — The U.S. foreign intelligence agency, which has followed UFO reports since the 1940s.
- Roscoe Hillenkoetter — First Director of Central Intelligence (1947–50) and later NICAP board member; named in the disputed MJ-12 papers.
- Unidentified flying object — An object in the sky that can't be identified; the older term for UAP.
- NICAP — The leading U.S. civilian UFO group of the 1950s and 1960s.
- U.S. Air Force — The U.S. military service that ran the official UFO projects from 1947 to 1969.
- MJ-12 — Disputed documents describing a secret committee managing crashed saucers.
On the Timeline
- Ekuk, Alaska sighting (1960) (19 May 1960) — Alaska residents report a silver object hovering and dragging trash cans; the Air Force investigates.
- Ben Guerir guards' sighting (1960) (1960) — An airman in Morocco says glowing UAP prompted jet fighters to scramble.
See every 1960 event on the UAP Timeline →
References
- Roscoe H. Hillenkoetter — Wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org · archived copy
- "Ex-CIA chief wants UFO probe", Worcester Gazette (1 Jun 1960), via UFOpedia · ufopedia.pages.dev · archived copy
- "Air Force says UFOs are serious" (UPI, Feb 1960), CIA Reading Room · cia.gov · archived copy
- Majestic 12 — Wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org · archived copy
- NICAP — Wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org · archived copy
- cia.gov · cia.gov · archived copy
Further reading
- UFO documents — CIA Reading Room · cia.gov · archived copy
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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