All language subtitles for Unidentified.Inside.Americas.UFO.Investigation.S02E01.UFOs.in.Combat.WEB.h264-TREVASKiSTV

- [Narrator] Everything we
know about UFOs is changing,

thanks to a team led

by former Pentagon UFO
Investigator Lue Elizondo.

- That is real,
whatever that is.

- [Narrator] And former

Top Intelligence
Official Chris Mellon.

- This is occurring, a
continuing phenomenon.

It's happening, it
continues to happen.

(dramatic music)

- [Narrator] They discovered
five unique characteristics

that UFOs have in common they
call the five observables,

and release
ground-breaking videos.

- [Narrator] That forced
the Navy to admit its pilots

were coming face-to-face
with unidentified objects.

- [Reporter] The US Navy made
a shocking admission today.

- [Journalist] Strange flying
objects caught on tape

by their own fighter
pilots are, in fact, UFOs.

- Something needs to be done.

- [Narrator] Now a new
wave of military witnesses

is coming out of the shadows.

- [Justin] I'd be lying if I
said I wasn't scared ----less.

- [Man] I've never talked
to anybody publicly

about this story.

- Certainly never
on TV, that's for sure.

- When you're told as a
soldier not to talk about it,

you don't talk about it.

- I've never seen
anything move like that.

Shape, size, speed is
clearly unidentifiable.

- [Narrator] The team is
united on a new mission:

connect the dots to reveal
the truth about UFOs.

- [Man] This thing
had no capability

like anything on Earth.

- [Narrator] And warn the world

about the dangers
they might represent.

- [Chris] Carl Sagan
once famously said,

"Extraordinary claims
require extraordinary proof."

He was absolutely right,
but now we have the proof.

(suspenseful music)

- [Narrator] In 2004, Navy
pilots on a training exercise

for the USS Nimitz reported
coming face-to-face

with a bizarre,
unidentified object.

Each pilot reported
the same thing:

the UFO had a smooth, oblong
shape resembling a Tic-Tac,

and maneuvered in ways
impossible to known aircraft.

Video of the Nimitz
incident shocked the world

when it was released,

but Lue Elizondo and
his team believed

that sighting is
not unprecedented.

New testimonies suggest UFOs
with similar characteristics

to Tic-Tacs have been seen in
nearly every American war zone

in the last 50 years.

- We have American
troops coming forward

and recording these
things in combat theaters.

The question is, why?

Is there an active interest
in us conducting the warfare,

or is there an interest
in the tools we use

to make war?

Conventional tools,
nuclear tools.

What is the connection?

- [Narrator] To investigate
how widespread

the sightings are, and what
threat they might represent,

Elizondo is meeting
with US combat veterans,

starting with one who served

on the front lines
in Afghanistan.

- [Lue] Tell me a little
bit about the situation,

what province were you
in, and what was it like?

- Well, we were in
Helmand province,

so we were in the hottest
part of the country.

The Taliban were getting
really thick in that area.

Suicide bombers
were always trying

to attack the main entry point,

whether they could drive up a
fuel tanker on the south side,

wherever they could
try to get in,

they were trying to get in.

- [Lue] So it was a tense time.

- Very tense, yeah.

- [Narrator] In March 2009,
President Obama had ordered

a massive increase in American
troops to fight the Taliban.

- 18, four up.

(gunshots firing)

- Got about six of
them moving back there.

- The troop surge
was just starting up.

We were that line of
defense between the Taliban

and the rest of our forces.

(bomb explodes)

- [Narrator] On
September 4, 2009,

Justin Doerfler was
assigned tower duty.

- You are the first,
last, only defense

for everybody in that
forward operating base.

You're the eyes, you're the
ears, and you're the weapon.

- [Narrator] What he sees
that night changes his life.

- We had done our
periodic scans.

All was quiet,

(aircraft whooshing)

and we hear what sounded
like an aircraft.

It was a clear night, the
stars were just out everywhere,

but we could not
find this aircraft.

We could hear it.

It sounded like it was
flying pretty high,

so I pull out the night vision,

and it records both night
vision and infrared.

- [Narrator] Infrared
cameras identify objects

using temperature differences
rather than ambient light,

allowing objects to be
seen in complete darkness.

- I look back up,
I see this jet,

and it was very high up there,

but I could definitely
see the heat.

It was probably around
500-600 miles an hour, maybe,

but the weirdest thing,

I thought at first it
was a shooting star.

This shooting star that cleared
almost the entire sky came

to a dead stop,
right at this jet.

Went above it, to this
side, below it, out front,

and it just sat there, and
the jet continued past it,

and this happened
a couple of times,

and so at that point, I'm
trying to wrap my head around,

how is this possible?

- [Lue] Okay, so let's
say here's the aircraft.

- Yep, so there's the aircraft.

Let's say it's coming
by, and out of nowhere,

this other thing just literally
cleared the entire sky

right up to it, went
above, to the other side,

down below, and then out front.

Now it sat there as like
you're doing, flew right by.

It goes right again,
right up to it.

- Do you even think that
the pilot was aware of it?

Did you see the pilot take
any type of evasive maneuvers?

- The pilot stayed
on a steady track.

This happened for just
a little bit longer,

and then it just
(imitates pop) up.

First thought in my head is:

How can someone pilot
something like that

without killing yourself?

- At the end of the day,

aircraft maneuver in
a predictable way,

because they are
subject to the same laws

of physics that everything
else is, and yet,

when you come across an
object that's moving in a way

that it shouldn't be,
an arrow being shot out

of a bow is gonna go straight.

You don't expect it to
do right angle turns,

and yet that's exactly what
these things are doing.

- [Narrator] The object Doerfler
is describing matches two

of Elizondo's five observables:
instantaneous acceleration,

where the ability to
go from a complete stop

to an incredibly
high rate of speed,

and hypersonic velocity, speeds
over 3700 miles per hour,

capabilities Elizondo
says he's cataloged

in numerous sightings, including
the 2004 Nimitz incident.

- I'm kind of pulling nose
to where he's gonna be,

and he's coming up.

He just rapidly
accelerates beyond anything

that I've ever seen.

Crosses my nose, and it's gone,

and I'm like, whoa.

- It was so unnerving, because
it was so unpredictable.

High-G, rapid velocity,
rapid acceleration,

so you were wondering:

How can I possibly fight this?

- Instant acceleration,
very, very fast velocities,

looks an awful lot like
a flying white Tic-Tac.

Are we talking about
the same thing here?

Sounds pretty similar to me.

(jets whooshing)

- [Narrator] While the Nimitz
Tic-Tac encounter happened

during a training exercise,
Doerfler's sighting occurred

in an active war zone.

To Elizondo's team
member Chris Mellon,

that raises troubling questions.

- The issue of the
source, the origin,

the intent of these
vehicles, or these craft,

is extremely pressing because
we don't think they're ours,

and therefore,
that raises a host

of rather alarming,
concerning questions.

Have we been
technologically leapfrogged?

Could it be the
Russians, or Chinese,

or someone else?

- [Narrator] Whatever he saw,

Doerfler chose not to
file an official report.

- I'm like, how
do you write this?

What do you say?

Are you gonna get locked up?

Are you gonna be made
fun of by your peers

for the duration of deployment?

- [Narrator] But
for Chris Mellon,

the sighting represents
a clear threat.

- [Chris] These aircraft,
these vehicles

are demonstrating capabilities
we do not possess.

It's difficult to imagine
a more urgent requirement

than to find out who is
operating these vehicles,

why they're here, what
their intentions are.

- [Narrator] Coming
up on Unidentified:

- This is the actual journal
that I had in Afghanistan.

I would do my daily
entries and logs in this.

- [Narrator] Army Specialist
Justin Doerfler has agreed

to divulge his account of
a Tic-Tac-like UFO he says

he witnessed while
serving in Afghanistan.

- The moment of log entry
was 11:56 in the morning.

I'd started it off with,
"Last night was fun.

"Something weird that
will confuse me for life."

- [Narrator] It's the first
time he's publicly shared

this diary entry.

- Friday, September 4, 2009.

"On my thermal scan,
I could see the heat

"from a plane flying
overhead in blackout mode.

"If it wasn't for
the thermal imaging,

"no one would see it,
not even night vision."

Ugh, this is gonna be weird.

"Okay, I don't believe
in UFOs or anything,

"but something flew off the
plane faster than a missile,

"then stopped, looped
over it so fast,

"then stopped, went around
it, then took off so fast.

"It had mach speeds
and a zig-zag pattern,

"then up and down
and stopped again."

- Doerfler was so
moved by what he saw.

He actually wrote in his
diary about the event,

and then had the Judge Advocate
General notarize his diary,

so nobody could accuse
him of forging these notes

after the fact.

- At the end of
that whole sentence,

I ended up putting,
"I'll forever wonder,"

and I tried to, I basically
suppressed that didn't happen.

It just can't happen.

That's not possible.

When you see something
that defies science,

and I am a person of faith,

but I would be lying if I said
that wasn't a faith shaker

at the time.

- [Narrator] Some believe
Tic-Tac-like objects

are extraterrestrial,
but could there be

an earthly explanation?

Former Air Force
test craft engineer

and Aviation Week editor Bill
Scott suggests the objects

could be secret US technology.

- We learned clear
back in Kosovo days

that you couldn't rely
on just stealth alone,

but what if it
also had some kind

of a protection mechanism?

So we had decoys.

By the time the air campaign
started in Afghanistan,

there was a lot of new stuff
that was being tried

just to see how they work.

- [Narrator] Scott is describing
small jet-powered decoys

launched to fly
alongside a plane,

their heat signature used
to confuse enemy missiles.

- They started
calling them Angels.

They could fly
around these vehicles

in highly maneuverable ways.

That could give you some
strange visual effects

from guys on the ground,

because a lot of
maneuvers can trick you.

- [Narrator] While a
missile decoy might explain

what Justin Doerfler
witnessed in 2009,

can it account for
a similar object

seen nearly 30 years earlier?

To investigate, Elizondo
is meeting with a veteran

who claims to have seen a UFO

with Tic-Tac-like
characteristics

during the Vietnam War.

- [Lue] Mr. Boshears.

- [James] Hey.

- [Lue] How are you, sir?

Thank you very much for
your time and being here.

- My name is James Ray Boshears.

I was in the US Air
Force from 1968 to 1973.

I've never shared this story
with anyone except my wife

and close friends
that we've made.

- This is an Air
Force guy who decides

to fly the biggest
aircraft that we have,

which is the B-52
Stratofortress bomber.

(plane whistling)

- [Narrator] The
B-52 Stratofortress

is a long-range heavy
bomber that was the backbone

of the US Aerial
Campaign in Vietnam.

- I flew missions in
South Vietnam, Laos,

Cambodia, and North Vietnam.

I flew hundreds of missions.

Southeast Asia, I know
exactly it was 101 missions,

because you have to do
100 to get that patch.

Missions were going
off around the clock.

The enemy was trying
to take over areas,

and the B-52 turned
out to be one

of the most
advantageous bombers.

- Their job is to fly
a really long distance,

drop bombs, and come back.

It was 12 hours of
complete boredom

with about 30 minutes
of sheer terror.

(bombs exploding)

- [Narrator] June 1970.

James Boshears and his crew
are on their way back to Guam

after a bombing run,

when they notice an unidentified
object heading their way.

- I was in command
of the aircraft.

I was the co-pilot at that time,

and the navigator came
on the intercom to me

and said, "Co-pilot,
do you see a bogey

"at about 12 o'clock
and high above us?"

And I looked out the window,

and I couldn't see
anything right off the bat,

and then he said,

"Well, it's about 20
miles or so from us,

"and it's coming towards us."

All of a sudden, I saw a white
light, and it was up high,

and it just kept getting
bigger as it was getting closer

to us, but it never fluctuated.

It didn't flash.

I said, "Wake up the radar."

He came on the
intercom and said,

"Yeah, I've got a bogey
for you at 12 o'clock,

"and it's really high."

None of us had ever heard of
one of our aircraft being able

to go up higher
than 70,000 feet.

This was already
above 60,000 feet.

- [Narrator] Thousands
of feet up in his B-52,

James Boshears realizes
the rest of his crew

is also in awe of the object.

- And then the radar
navigator comes back and says,

"Holy smoke!

"This bogey just made
a sharp left turn."

I mean, at 5000-plus knots,

it made almost a
90-degree turn instantly.

And we're going,
"Nobody can do that,"

and he said, "It's
coming straight for us."

- [Narrator] The bright
light he says he witnessed

is similar to the
nighttime reports

of glowing white
Tic-Tac-like objects

during the 2004 USS Nimitz
event, and like those UFOs,

it displayed two of
Elizondo's five observables:

Instantaneous acceleration
and hypersonic velocity.

- A radar navigator
comes back and says,

"Pilot, he's
exceeded 6000 knots,

"and now he's made another
sharp turn to the north

"at 6000 knots," so the
radar navigator said,

"I'm turning on the camera."

He had a camera that
could snap pictures

of the radar screen,

so we had proof that
this thing was flying

at the speed that it was flying.

And he finally said,
"It's increasing altitude

"and it's over 6000
knots, climbing."

No transponder signals,
no squawking, no radio,

and then the light
just disappeared.

He said he lost him on radar

when the object reached
about 100,000 feet.

The command pilot told
the crew, he says,

"Hey, guys, well now
you've seen a UFO."

- [Narrator] Boshears
reported the incident

to Air Force
Intelligence Officers.

What happens next would
only deepen the mystery.

Coming up on Unidentified:

- So the radar navigator said,
"I'm turning on the camera."

He had a camera that
could snap pictures

of the radar screen.

- [Narrator] B-52 pilot
James Boshears spotted

a Tic-Tac-like UFO
after a bombing run

during the height
of the Vietnam War.

He says his navigator was
able to capture photographs

of its flight path
on his radar screen,

but in their routine briefing

with Air Force Intelligence
Officers the next day,

something strange happened.

- We told them all about it,

and we wanted to know if
we could get some copies

of the pictures, and they said,

"Yeah, it shouldn't
be a problem.

"There's nothing out there."

The next morning, our radar
went back to get the pictures,

and when he got
there, they said,

"Oh, you can't
have any pictures.

"They've reclassified
them as top secret."

- So I'm in the process of
gathering some information

in order that I can initiate

a Freedom of Information Act
request to the US government.

- [Narrator]
Believing these photos

could provide
important evidence,

Elizondo and his team filed

a Freedom of
Information Act request,

but there's been
no response so far.

- Most of the time,

things remain classified
for up to 25 years.

I can't imagine why a photograph

of a radar scope taken back
in the 1960s would still,

after 50 years,
remain classified.

- [Narrator] Will the
missing photos reveal

the earliest known Tic-Tac?

Some theorize these
advanced craft

are merely secret
technology deployed

by the US or an adversary,

but could that explain
the incredible speed

and maneuverability Boshears
says his crew witnessed?

- When they encountered
this object somewhere

over the Pacific Ocean in 1970,

there was really only
two man-made objects

that could even fly at
hypersonic velocities,

and those were the
man-made rockets

that were putting
people in orbit,

and that was the X-15
experimental aircraft

rocket plane,

keeping in mind, a rocket
goes up into space.

It doesn't follow you
if you're in a B-52,

and the X-15 was a very
specific purpose-built vehicle

that was never flying
over the Pacific Ocean.

- [Narrator] Chris Mellon
believes the objects

could be spying on US
military technology.

- Bear in mind that those B-52s

that we employed
during the Vietnam War

to deliver
conventional ordnance,

their primary
function was this part

of the Strategic Air
Command's nuclear deterrent.

The potential adversary
would be very interested

in their capabilities,

not surprising that
the Russians or Chinese

would be interested
in collecting on them,

but it's hard to relate
that particular set

of observations with
any known capability

that either we or they possess.

- [Narrator] On the
trail of Tic-Tacs,

Elizondo is meeting with
another Vietnam veteran.

His testimony may
provide more insight

into UFOs reported
during that war.

- We're heading down to see

Lieutenant Commander
Brian Westin,

and meet with him in his home.

When one of these
individuals are sharing

with you an experience
they had in Vietnam,

that carries a lot of weight.

I think we need to listen
to what they have to say.

Hello, good sir!

- Hey, hey, how you doing?

Take some oranges

if you want 'em.
- I was just gonna say

I may take an orange or two.

- [Brian] There
you go, no problem.

- [Lue] First of all, I want
to thank you for your service.

- [Narrator] Lieutenant
Commander Brian Westin

is a highly decorated Navy pilot

who flew dangerous,
low-altitude bombing runs

over North Vietnam.

(jet whooshes)

Westin's A-6 Intruder was one
of the most advanced aircraft

of its time, able to
rain down 18,000 pounds

of munitions onto the enemy
under any weather condition.

(bombs exploding)

The unusual
high-performance aircraft

could have caught the
attention of foreign powers,

Russian, Chinese,
or something else.

- You were awarded one
of the highest honors

that the Navy has.

- [Narrator] In
the spring of 1966,

the pilot of Westin's
plane was wounded

by North Vietnamese ground fire,

and their aircraft crashed
into the Gulf of Tonkin.

For rescuing the wounded pilot
from shark-infested waters,

Westin was awarded the
prestigious Navy Cross Medal,

but while the harrowing
experience

nearly cost him his life,

it's an incident that took
place three weeks earlier

that has haunted
him for decades.

- Can you describe the
events leading up to,

with your pilot/co-pilot,
what you saw that day?

- That day was a mini-strike,

which was kind of in
between alpha strikes,

where you're really
intense and losing people.

We were going with
two A-4 Charlies,

and they're very slow,

and so we're just trucking over
to go to Ho Chi Minh Trail.

- [Narrator] April 6, 1966.

Westin's A-6 intruder
is accompanying

the slower A-4 Skyhawks on a
quick hit-and-run bombing raid,

when suddenly, he
notices something strange

off his right wing.

- This thing just wafted over
the wing or right next to it.

I mean, it was within inches.

It was that close, and I was
gonna say, "Did you see that?"

I didn't even get the duh out.

What the F was that?

- [Lue] Right.

- And he banks the
airplane to the right,

and we look for the damn thing.

Nothing.

I mean, couldn't see the object,

couldn't see a contrail,
couldn't see a puff of smoke,

couldn't see nothing.

- So what I'm gonna ask
you to do if it's okay,

can you draw for me, 'cause--

- [Brian] I'm not
a very good drawer.

- That's okay.

Oh, you got it.

- Yeah.
- Okay, great.

- Kind of a ratio
of about like that,

just the size of a water heater.

Just as if you took a
humongous blob of mercury

and puffed it up into
that perfect shape,

shimmering, perfect
chromium, polysilver.

No windows, no wings, no
protuberances, no nothing.

- If somebody said,

"Well, it could be a Tic-Tac,"

I suppose it could have been

on the edge of a
Tic-Tac type thing.

- [Narrator] The UFO Westin
says he saw demonstrated another

of Elizondo's five
observables: anti-gravity.

That's the ability to move
without any obvious signs

of propulsion, and
it's a trait recorded

in multiple sightings
of Tic-Tacs.

- I mean, it's not flying,
that we know flying.

To me, it had to be, if it
is there, sitting there,

it doesn't just sit there.

There has to be some
way of controlling,

like magnetically or something.

- Yeah, some sort of

advanced physics.
- Some physics.

- [Narrator] Did Westin
witness a UFO similar

to what later pilots
compared to a Tic-Tac,

or can the strange metallic
object be explained

by military technology
of the time?

- I'd like to know
what the heck it was.

- [Lue] Yeah.

- And if it wasn't ours,

and it wasn't the Russians
or Chinese or North Koreans,

I'm convinced that
there's stuff out there

that people don't want
to come to grips with.

- You could throw out
some possibilities.

Very unlikely that it could
be a gravity-dropped bomb,

because they tend to
go down very quickly.

Pretty unlikely that it would
be a surface-to-air missile,

because pilots describe those
as flying telephone poles.

Fuel tanks would tend to
drop away very quickly,

and that pretty much
leaves it in the category

of we don't know.

- If this is indeed one of
our terrestrial adversaries,

there's great cause for concern

that we may have been
technologically leapfrogged.

They're also
demonstrating an interest

in our technology.

They seem to be very
uncannily interested

in our military capabilities,

so we have every reason to
be concerned about that.

- [Narrator] Coming
up on Unidentified.

- [Lue] We're putting
together the mosaic

with disparate pieces of data.

It's a bit like putting
together a jigsaw puzzle.

At first, you have all these
little pieces on the table,

but little by little,
the more pieces you have,

the more the picture
becomes in focus.

- [Narrator] Lue Elizondo
has just interviewed

a second Vietnam veteran
about a strange object

he saw in an active war zone,

but he needs to
gather more data.

- If we can establish the
things that they were seeing

back then in the past
from the Vietnam war

are indeed the same types
of vehicles being observed

and perhaps the same
type of technology

that we're seeing today.

Then maybe it'll help us
figure out what the things are

and where they're from.

- [Narrator] Today, he's
sitting down with a veteran

who witnessed a similar object

during the NATO bombing
of Kosovo in 1999.

- Mr. Tarr, I presume.
- Yes, Sir

- Hey how are you, sir?

- How are you?

- Thank you very much for coming
here and speaking with me.

I really appreciate it.

- My name is Derek Tarr.

I was a senior Airman
during the late 90s,

serving in the United
States Air Force.

This isn't the first time
I've ever told this story.

- [Narrator] Derek Tarr
was a boom operator

on an Air Force, KC-10.

Responsible for the
mid-air refueling

of NATO jets between
bombing runs.

- You got a lot of
pilots out there,

but you have very
few boom operators.

These individuals are
trained experts on all sorts

of allied NATO aircraft.

They know the difference
between an F/A-18 Hornet

between an F-117 night
fighter and F-16.

They know all these aircraft

because they see them
day in and day out.

- [Narrator] 0n
March 24th, 1999,

Tarr is on a refueling
mission over the Adriatic sea.

When suddenly he
sees a strange light.

- I was sitting in the boom
pod in the back of the KC-10,

just waiting for the next
set of receivers to arrive.

I had noticed a bright
light that was behind us,

slightly below our altitude.

Just kind of hung back,

didn't seem to make any
more forward progress

towards our aircraft.

That's when I kind
of started to wonder

what was going on.

I called up to my pilot on
the interphone to ask him

if we had more receivers
coming and said that

we did not have
anyone scheduled.

- [Narrator] Tarr say the
control center monitoring

the airspace, reported
all known aircraft

were accounted for.

- We started into a turn
and as I looked back,

I was just at a
bright white orb.

It was very bouncy
almost like a super ball,

very short, very succinct,
very sharp movements,

but extremely rapid.

The jostling or oscillations
that it was doing,

was certainly not
minute adjustments,

probably several hundred
feet up, down side to side.

Once I got to about our
eight o'clock position

that did a rapid climb and
just in the blink of an eye,

went straight up and it just
shot right up in the sky.

The fastest thing
I've ever seen.

- [Narrator] The UFO Tarr
claims the saw was spherical

instead of the oblong
shape of tic-tacs,

but it featured some of
the same five observables.

- [Tarr] We have hypersonic
velocities,

instantaneous acceleration,

and of course positive lift,

or in the vernacular
anti-gravity.

- [Narrator] Four new sightings
spending decades in Kosovo,

Afghanistan, and Vietnam.

U.S miliTarry eyewitnesses
reported single objects

in close proximity
to American planes.

And in the 2004 Nimitz encounter

where an entire carrier
strike group was present.

Radar operators reported
a fleet of objects.

- What Tarr saw, and what
the Nimitz folks had reported

back in 2004,

there were some commonalities

in the performance
of these things.

- [Narrator] The team
needs to gather more data

to address the biggest question,

are these the same objects?

And if so, what are they?

In the case of
Derrick Tarr sighting,

could the conflict
itself offer for a clue?

- Clearly when we engage Kosovo,
we're operating in fairly

close proximity to Russia
and it's opportunity for them

to collect intelligence on
these cutting edge aircraft

in the U S inventory,
including the stealth bomber.

- [Narrator] The B-2 stealth
bomber was first used

in combat in the Kosovo war.

At the time, it was America's
most advanced aircraft.

- So all of those
kinds of technologies

are very pertinent to
the Russian military

who are constantly preparing
for the eventuality

in which they may have to
engage the United States.

- [Tarr] The thought did cross
my mind that this certainly

could be a hostile.

- Where they really an
adversarial technology

that has managed to hoodwink
us and leapfrog ahead

of the United States
going back decades?

If that's the case then
I think we have a much,

much bigger problem on our hands

because that means there is
something inherently broken

with our national
security apparatus.

- I think, it very well could be

a significant national
security issue,

if we just kind of bury
our head in the sand

or look away, we're screwed.

- [Narrator] Coming
up on unidentified.

- [Narrator] Lue Elizondo
has returned from meeting

four American veterans who
claimed to have seen UFOs

similar to the tic-tac
witnessed by pilots

from the USS Nimitz in 2004.

Sightings in war zones,
dating back 50 years.

- The testimony that
we are seeing now

from these courageous
individuals,

I think it's beginning
to open the aperture

and what we're now realizing,
it wasn't just the USS Nimitz

and flying tic-tacs.

It goes all the way
back to Vietnam.

- [Narrator] For
Elizondo and his team,

serious questions remain about
the origin of these objects

and the threat they represent?

- The stunning and
concerning thing about

these unidentified
aerial phenomenon,

is they demonstrate
performance characteristics

that are far superior to
anything in the U.S inventory

at either a classified
or unclassified level.

- If it's not us
and it's not them,

then that means somebody else.

- [Narrator] Now he's meeting

with his team members,
Steve Justice.

One of the most respected
aviation experts

in the United States.

Justice was a director at
Lockheed Martin skunk works,

where he helped develop
some of America's

most advanced top
secret aircraft.

- I kind of want to run by
you some of these scenarios,

these experiences, if
you're okay with that.

- Yeah, yeah sure.

- [Narrator] Elizondo
wants Justice to explore

whether war time sightings
of tic-tac like objects

can be explained by
conventional technology.

- [Tarr] Once it got to our
eight o'clock position,

it did a rapid climb and
just in the blink of an eye,

went straight up and it just
shot right up in the sky,

- 1999, where were we
with our technology then

as far as objects that could
operate from 30,000 feet

and all of the sudden pop up to
80,000 feet and disappear?

- We don't have that
today, so I don't know

why we would have it,

you know, and in the 1990s

- In 1999, which
we did have lasers

- Oh, absolutely.

- Was it possible that someone
could have been shooting

a laser from the ground

- [Narrator] in the late 1990s,
the U.S had begun testing

a ground-based
chemical laser capable

of hitting objects in space.

- If there were a nighttime
and it were visible laser,

then you would see the beam.

- So what technologies
can you talk about

that the enemy might've
had in the late 90s?

- The only things I know of

were all very
conventional things.

I don't know of anything
that was exotic.

- [Narrator] Elizondo also
wants to know what Justice

thinks about a
nighttime sighting

10 years later by Justin
Doerfler in Afghanistan.

- This thing from a dead stop
going straight, straight,

it only moved at straight lines.

- [Narrator] aviation
expert, Bill Scott.

Theorize the objects could
be anti-missile decoys,

but Afghanistan also
saw a new generation

of unmanned aerial
vehicles or UAVs,

could it have been one of them?

- This was kind of
the place where UAVs

really got their
traction, but I don't know

of any UAVs that do that.

Maneuver like that?

Yes, but not at those speeds.

- [Narrator] Elizondo
has one more sighting

he wants Steve
Justice to look at.

One that's also
confounded the experts,

the bizarre metallic
object that appeared

to be hovering in the sky.

As Brian Westerns,
A-6 intruder flew by

more than five decades
earlier over North Vietnam.

- Probably about
three feet in diameter

and maybe five or
eight feet long.

This thing just wafted over
the wing or right next to it.

I mean, it was within inches.

- [Narrator] Could it
have in artillery shell

visible from Western's
low flying A-6?

- [Lue] think of a tic-tac
with a flat end on the back.

- Artillery shells that are
fired off of battleships

are relatively blunt.

- I've seen one fired
five shell from Paladins.

- If you know what you're
looking for, you can see him.

You know I'll admit, I
can't explain low altitude.

Typically shells are
arcing through the air.

He said it was
just sitting there,

so I can't explain that.

- Color, let's go into color.

- Sil- the silver chrome?

- Like mercury?

- Yeah, I can't
really explain that.

- And what about if
it's not going up

an object coming
down like some sort

of reconnaissance balloon.

- The closest thing to the
shape that you've described

is a napalm canister, to be
perfectly honest with you.

But napalm was also dropped
from relatively low altitudes

who were drawn from
tree top levels.

- What other
considerations then,

should we be looking at here?

- This falls into that
un identified category.

You know, there's just
some of these things

that can't be explained.

- [Narrator] David Clarke is
an investigative journalist,

who combed through the
British national archives,

studying military UFO sightings.

- Pilots, however
highly trained they are,

are human beings.

- [Narrator] He believes
that many of these sightings

can be attributed
to the fog of war.

- Particularly in wartime,
where you're on edge.

Every time you go out,
you don't know whether

you're gonna return,
you're going without sleep.

Some of the pilots
actually admitted this,

that maybe they saw
quite ordinary things

and thought there was
something extraordinary.

- [Narrator] Others disagree
and say, the heat of battle

can make service members
better observers.

- I think you have to
look at these reports

on a case by case basis, and
the data that's available.

I don't think you can paint
with a broad brush and say,

oh, that's just the fog of war.

- If anything, your senses
are raised during that

because of the heightened
sense of awareness,

they saw something they
might not have normally seen.

I think that's a benefit
to us, not a liability

- [Narrator] For the veterans
who remembered these events

as if they were yesterday,
there's no question

- For something to
be in your airspace

without any form that
you can recognize.

No wings, no engine, no exhaust

and it's like, well it
shouldn't have been there

but what do you do
when it is there?

And somebody said, well
really wasn't there.

Well, all I can say
is it was there.

I saw it clearly,
Bill saw it clearly.

It was startling

- [Narrator] Coming
up on unidentified,

- [Narrator] Lue Elizondo
has been investigating

a pattern of sightings
of tic-tac like UFOs

in America's war zones.

Could they be a threat
to national security?

Today he's briefing the team,

Tom DeLonge, Chris
Mellon and Steve Justice

on what he's found.

- When I was in ATIP,

we really focused
primarily looking

at the USS Nimitz
incident and forward.

I was shocked to learn that
some of the same observables

that we noticed were
precisely the same observables

that were being reported
even back in the 1960s,

- [Narrator] Elizondo details,
Derek Tarrr's UFO sighting

during the Kosovo
conflict in 1999,

which displayed some
of those observables.

- It starts to maneuver
in a very peculiar manner.

Something that we now know
from the Nimitz event,

the tic-tac event,

basically this weird type
of 90 degree, right turns.

- [Steve] The ricochet
kind of thing.

- [Lue] Like a ping pong,
right like a ricochet.

- [Narrator] The team
finds clear similarities

between the UFO seen
during recent conflicts

and the object observed
by us Navy pilots in 2004.

- I think this fits the
same category as the reports

on these coasts
and the tic-tacs.

- [Narrator] In each case,
they believe the tic-tacs

were displaying
capabilities, not consistent

with known technology
of U.S or otherwise,

but there's one last piece
of the puzzle to consider.

- Gentlemen, I'd
like to introduce you

to a friend of mine.

- Oh, hey.

- [Lue] This is Lieutenant
commander, Brian Western retired

- [Narrator]
Elizondo has invited

retired Lieutenant
commander, Brian Weston

to meet the team
and discuss the UFO

he saw over North
Vietnam in 1966.

- This individual happens
to not only be a Patriot,

but frankly in my opinion,

a war hero during the
early days of Vietnam,

he encountered a pretty
remarkable event.

- What I saw didn't
make any sense

in the context of the time.

- Here, we have something that
is not unlike the description

of the tick-tack and other
things that we reported on.

And you have this
instantaneous acceleration

and even low observability.

And this is going back to 1966.

- Was it flying the opposite
direction or something,

or you pass it potentially?

- Did not see it coming.

All I saw was right there,
which is just wafted by

- Wow.

- This thing wasn't there,
it got there somehow.

If it wasn't propulsing,
like I'm used to, or a jet

or a rocket or
something, no wings.

I mean, there's about
only one thing left

as far as I can see
as anti-gravity.

And if we had that and
people knew about it,

how they could sit on it
would be absolutely beyond me.

- When we develop a game
changing technology,

it's not uncommon that
we feel that during times

of conflict, right?

I can't imagine given our
conflict in Afghanistan

and Iraq, and
Kosovo, and Vietnam,

that we have managed to sit
on a game changing technology,

putting pilot's lives in
danger this entire time.

For more than a
damn near 60 years.

We just sit on
technology that long,

even with nuclear
technology we use it,

we implement it.

- [Steve] We don't necessarily
use it.

- Okay, so let's elaborate.

- It would be a strict case
where we would use that.

- But they're not a secret.

- We use them every
day for deterrence.

- So I'm going to
take the other side

of the devil's advocate thing.

So unlike nuclear weapons,

which do represent
a big deterrent,

if you were to talk about
this, would it be a deterrent?

No, if anything it would
just draw curiosity.

So if it represented a
game changing capability,

would you not tend to sit on
it, and hold it down tight?

- Yes, but I wouldn't
be then flying it.

- I get that.

- If you keep it locked in a
warehouse and nobody sees it.

You do not fly that
thing within inches

of a fully combat capable,

A-6 over North Vietnam.

- If your talking about whether
this thing was some secret

U.S. weapons program, heck no.

- [Narrator] For now the team
can't definitively conclude

that the UFOs reported
during the Vietnam war match

those seen in more
recent conflicts,

but one thing is certain.

- Would you live through
what you survived?

What you did is amazing.

- [Tom] With a lot
of sacrifice too.

- Incredible.

- I mean, is's burned
into my memory.

- [Narrator] So to is
their ongoing mission.

The need to keep investigating
the strange objects

in the sky and determine
what they might be.

- Took me a decade.

I stayed in the shadows.

I now know I wasn't alone.

And I'm telling you guys,
you're not alone either.

The conversation's open
and it's not going away.

- I don't think that calculus
has changed since Vietnam

or frankly from world war
II, or frankly from the 1900s

or frankly from the civil war,

or frankly from 2000
years ago in Rome.

And I think the time has
come that we opened our eyes

when we finally addressed
what the hell is going on.

- [Narrator] This
season on unidentified.

The team scours, the globe
uncovering UFO hotspots.

- Are they seeing the same thing

in the sky is that we are?

Oscar Santamario
was given the order.

If it isn't ours,
shoot it down.

- [Narrator] And
hunts for answers

to the biggest UFO mysteries.

- It was a perfect black
equal lateral triangle.

- [Pilot] Chase back at you, ha!

- [Narrator] Revealing
never before seeing videos.

- [Narrator] Never
before heard stories,

- They were there scoping
out our capabilities.

- It's as if it's never left,
that changed everything.

- [Narrator] And stunning
revelations about

the most famous UFO encounters.

- And out of nowhere, this
object drops out from the sky

at an incredible speed.

- Un halo brillante.

What? That for me was
a drop the mic moment.

- [Narrator] What is
flying in our skies.

- They definitely
weren't planes,

they had different
lights and just no rhyme

or reason to where
they were flying.

- Something was coming
up underneath me,

unverifiable, unidentifiable
but undeniable.

- If one of these did
hit one of our airplanes,

most likely would kill
everybody on board.

(intense music)