{"id":225,"date":"2006-11-30T10:06:20","date_gmt":"2006-11-30T14:06:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/oddempire.org\/weblog\/?p=225"},"modified":"2017-11-29T11:52:30","modified_gmt":"2017-11-29T15:52:30","slug":"guest-column-by-g-pettingill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/2006\/11\/30\/guest-column-by-g-pettingill\/","title":{"rendered":"Guest column by G. Pettingill"},"content":{"rendered":"

Some comments on
\n The Testimony of Colonel Otis \u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c5\u201cMad Dog\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c2\u009d Retchner, USAF (Ret.)<\/a><\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.danielbrenton.com\/2006\/11\/27\/the-round-files\/<\/a><\/p>\n

There was a fascinating story over at Dan Brenton’s weblog <\/a>the other day. http:\/\/www.danielbrenton.com\/ Dan sends updates and comments to the Odd Emperor once and a while. Odd asked me to comment on this piece because, once, long ago I worked on equipment similar to that which is described in the story. I’ve actually been in similar situations as those portrayed in the story.<\/p>\n

The years I served in the US military I worked on some of the era’s most sophisticated tracking and search radar, I’\u201e\u00a2m well acquainted with how this equipment operates, it’s limitations and it’s strengths. I’m also very familiar with some of the myths surrounding military operations but, more on that later. I was once trained and indoctrinated in the prosecution of uncorrelated objects, meaning I was given instructions on how to deal with UFOs, that tale can wait as well.<\/p>\n

There were at least two USAF bases in Spain Mor Air Base, in Andalusia and Torrejon Air Force Base, in Madrid (which was turned back over to the Spanish Government in the 1990s.) There also seemed to be one in at Zaragosa Airforce Base<\/p>\n

It seems the US Air Force and the Spanish Government did establish several Spanish USAF bases in 1953. A US tactical wing could have been in Spain a year earlier, or this gentleman was in command before the wing was assigned overseas. However, I haven’t find any USAF officer by that name. (just from checking the usual sources, I haven’t bothered to do a complete search of PD records.)<\/p>\n

Anyway, according to the story.<\/p>\n

‘\u201cOn August 4, 1956, I was awakened from a sound sleep when my second in charge rang me to notify me that base security had been breached by an unidentified slow-moving aircraft, which radar had tracked moving north-northwest across the base. “<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I find it difficult to believe that a radar operator would have used the term \u201caircraft.”There are lots of things flying around that are not aircraft. The correct term is \u201cuncorrelated target” or bogey. Most radar operators (if they are experienced) won’t jump to conclusions. Certainly not if it’\u00a2s going to put the base on alert. It would also have been proper for the operator to relate what kind of aircraft. If they were sure it was an aircraft they probably had some idea what kind, how big etc.<\/p>\n

Now the witness’<\/p>\n

he was near the eastern perimeter when he said he ‘\u201cfelt like something was watching him’ and he looked up to see a pitch black section of sky suddenly filled with something that from his description sounded all the world like an oversized black Christmas tree that was trimmed with purple lights and stank of brimstone.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Strangely enough, this is not too far afield from a typical UFO sighting including the report of an odor.<\/p>\n

However, when was the last time you smelled a helicopter, even one that was hovering close by? It’s not out of the question but very unusual to say the least as anyone who’s been around aircraft can tell you. I know the aroma of jet fuel very well and it’s very rare indeed that I detect it from a flying aircraft. My point is, the brimstone odor report and the ‘\u201cI feel like someone is watching me’\u009d statement are classic UFO components. Certainly no aircraft as we know it!<\/p>\n

This thing passed overhead with its long axis parallel to the ground, maybe forty-five feet up and traveling at about fifteen knots*<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(*About seventeen miles per hour, far too slow for a conventional aircraft. MPH= K *1.1508) about the speed of a balloon drifting with the wind.<\/p>\n

Later, the wing commander sent a report of this incident to his higher-ups. That didn’t sound like a very good idea because’<\/p>\n

When the report made it to the top of the chain of command, the response came back down in the form of an ‘\u201ceyes only’ order to me which, reluctantly, I carried out: all personnel involved in the incident were instructed that they hadn\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00e2\u201e\u00a2t seen or heard a thing about it; that it had never happened; that it would be considered a treasonous act to say that it had;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I believe this happened pretty much as related. Except for one thing,’\u201cclassified eyes only”\u009d is pretty much meaningless in this context. There is no such thing as \u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c5\u201cClassified, Eyes only.\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c2\u009d You might have \u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c5\u201cSecret- eyes only\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c2\u009d document but the word \u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c5\u201cclassified\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c2\u009d is a declaration of a classification, not a classification itself. The word \u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c5\u201cclassified\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c2\u009d is allways followed by the level of classification.<\/p>\n

Many people seem to put a lot of weight on the military classification system, some seem to think that the system is a license for military people to lie. That it\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00e2\u201e\u00a2s evil and should be done away with. As a matter of fact, classification systems are not licenses to lie or to deceive people. They are systems to control information in organizations where the control of information can literally mean life or death. \u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c2\u00a6 for billions of people\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c2\u00a6 for you and I this very second.<\/p>\n

\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c5\u201cA government is responsible for the survival of the nation and its people. To ensure that survival, a government must sometimes stringently control certain information that (1) gives the nation a significant advantage over adversaries or (2) prevents adversaries from having an advantage that could significantly damage the nation. Governments protect that special information by classifying it; that is, by giving it a special designation, such as \u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c5\u201cSecret,\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c2\u009d and then restricting access to it (e.g., by need-to-know requirements and physical security measures).\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c2\u009d http:\/\/www.fas.org\/sgp\/library\/quist\/index.html<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This is pretty cut and dried. It\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00e2\u201e\u00a2s is to be expected that a government agency designed for conflict (like a military arm) will have and hold secrets. No military organization can survive (or really exists) without it. Today, everything is classified! Try finding out exactly how many plastic forks are used daily on a US aircraft carrier, you will discover that even this seemingly innocent information will have some kind of classification stamped on it.<\/p>\n

Today, the lowest level is \u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c5\u201cunclassified.\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c2\u009d \u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c5\u201cConfidential\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c2\u009d is the next level.\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c2\u009d followed \u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c5\u201csecret\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c2\u009d and \u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c5\u201ctop secret.\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c2\u009d To my knowledge (and I could be wrong.) there really are no classifications above \u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c5\u201ctop secret.\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c2\u009d<\/p>\n

Your retired military person for whatever reason did not give the classification of his order (BTW, when you muster out it’s still illegal to divulge classified material as he well knows.) I suspect the order was indeed, Top Secret. If the order was for his eyes only and I suspect (unless he has a screw loose) he will not divulge to you exactly what the message said or why to this day. Any order like that is probably no more than a ‘\u201cplease don’t send any more of this stuff OK? command.<\/p>\n

Now as to why the USAF asked him to in a sense shut the hell up about the incident? First of all, there was really nothing to go on. Radar operators routinely see stuff that they cannot immediately identify. Back in the day,\u009d an operator would be looking at raw returns in a mountain of ground and air clutter. What they saw (in all probability) was a large, sharp edged return that was moving slowly over the base with the prevailing wind.<\/p>\n

We don’\u00a2t know what the weather was like that night, I’d be willing to bet it was cloudy-rainy with a 10-15 knot surface wind. If so the target was almost certainly a cloud.<\/p>\n

It is quite possible for clouds to reflect radar. If you want proof I suggest you go over to NOAA or your favorite weather page. Radar reflects off of anything, even air. We turn the receivers down to make air and clouds (even flocks of birds) transparent to the receiving equipment.<\/p>\n

There is no fundamental difference between the radars used today and the ones they used in the 1950s (other than a lack of vacuum tubes today and MUCH better computers.) Nowadays it’s very rare for an operator to even look at raw data like they did back in the 1950s. Radar targets are automatically \u201crecognized”depending on the type of radar set that is being used (weather radars for example reject aircraft while aircraft tracking radar rejects clouds.) There was probably no such equipment between the radar operator and the raw data that night, just an attenuation knob and a certain amount of training.<\/p>\n

They probably were using a PPI display (that’s the round one with the radial-sweeping trace.) I doubt that they had 3D sets or Doppler tracking equipment. If they did, it\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00e2\u201e\u00a2s quite possible that they not only saw the trace on the search radar but they could have actually locked onto it although this story doesn” mention it. I actually have locked on to clouds with Doppler targeting radar designed for aircraft.<\/p>\n

Depending on the conditions, a cloud might have enough ice, water vapor or rain to stand out from the rest and look very peculiar. Radar people call these clouds stuffed with rocks. They can look quite striking, a slow moving-huge blip that looks perfectly solid. I’ve seen these fool people more than once.<\/p>\n

Now the witness– we know almost nothing of him. He’s an Airman (about an E3) What was his capacity on the base? What was he doing on the perimeter so late at night? Was he on watch? Was he coming back from liberty? Had he been drinking?<\/p>\n

There is no way to determine any of this. All we have is a blank statement that “\u201cI saw an unusual object that smelled like sulfur.\u009d Coincidentally we have a radar operator saying that they have an unknown aircraft and a grumpy-sleepy wing commander.<\/p>\n

Is that enough to have generated a bogus UFO encounter?<\/p>\n

Absolutely! Would the airman have related the account without being asked? Perhaps he was on watch, asleep and dreaming when the phone rang. He answers the phone half awake. One of his superior demands that he to relate any unusual occurrences. The airman blurts out that he saw something just before the call, which in reality was a dream.<\/p>\n

He’s going to stick with the story too, especially before a grumpy wing commander, or he’\u00a2s going admit he was sleeping on watch? Probably get court-marshaled and drummed out? What would you do?<\/p>\n

The wing commander sends in a report (probably following regs.) His superiors react by saying\u201cshut the hell up about that!”\u00c2\u009d Why? Because even investigating something like this would call a lot of people in question.<\/p>\n

Believe it or not, the Air Force is not in the business of chasing UFOs. The Air Force is in the business of hurting the enemy, setting fire to their aircraft and their cities. Strange stories of wild looking aircraft and odd radar traces might not fall under this mission.<\/p>\n

Your retired officer’s superiors had two choices, investigate something that on the surface sounded bogus or, just forget the whole thing.<\/p>\n

It looks like they opted to forget it.<\/p>\n

If they investigated? Was the airman on watch and awake? Is the radar staff well trained enough to determine a real aircraft from a meteorological? The base commander? Is he competently leading his men in this high profile location? Do we really need to be investigating this stupid shit (I’\u00a2m sorry but that’s exactly how MY superiors would have looked at it.)<\/p>\n

Now I’m not saying that the event was completely bogus. The Airman did sight a UFO. The radar people probably didn’t see anything significant at least, according to the way this story is related. Since radar can (and does) reflect off of things that are not aircraft all the time I strongly suspect that they were simply mistaken.<\/p>\n

It”old-man was shaken out of a deep sleep for and you must tell the old-man something or else! The old-man shoots off a twixt of his interrupted night to HIS old-man, I can only imagine what Colonel Otis \u201cMad Dog\u009d higher ups might have said<\/p>\n

The Place — (US European command HQ- Up the chain of command.)
\nThe time, August 5th, 1956, 08:34
\nHoncho= Mad Dog’s CO.
\nNumbnuts= Honcho’s adjunct.<\/p>\n

(Numbnuts) \u201cSir, did you see that report from Morn- it was on your desk this morning\u201c<\/p>\n

(Honcho) ” Yes I saw it–you tell what his name..Retchman TO put a lid on it.”<\/p>\n

(Numbnuts) \u201cSir?”<\/p>\n

(Honcho)\u201cStow it! Put it where the sun don’t shine! That’s all we f$%^ing need,\u00a0 flying saucers!<\/p>\n

(Numbnuts) \u201cUm-it was bad smelling Christmass trees sir- and they had a radar trace-\u201c<\/p>\n

(Honcho) “yah sure-sure! you can tell them where they can cram their radar trace! If it aint got red stars on the dorsal fins, I don’t want to hear about it ‘ if it DO have red stars, I want you to shoot it down – CLEAR?<\/p>\n

(Numbnuts) “Perfectly clear sir!”<\/p>\n

And the rest as we say — is history.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Some comments on The Testimony of Colonel Otis \u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c5\u201cMad Dog\u00c3\u00a2\u00e2\u201a\u00ac\u00c2\u009d Retchner, USAF (Ret.) http:\/\/www.danielbrenton.com\/2006\/11\/27\/the-round-files\/ There was a fascinating story over at Dan Brenton’s weblog the other day. http:\/\/www.danielbrenton.com\/ Dan sends updates and comments to the Odd Emperor once and a … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","WB4WB4WP_MODE":"","WB4WP_PAGE_SCRIPTS":"","WB4WP_PAGE_STYLES":"","WB4WP_PAGE_FONTS":"","WB4WP_PAGE_HEADER":"","WB4WP_PAGE_FOOTER":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-225","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=225"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3148,"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225\/revisions\/3148"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=225"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=225"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=225"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}