# Why is UFO related stuff classified? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [December 17, 2017, 1:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704 "2017-12-17T13:10:47Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Si\_Amigo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/si_amigo/32/2877_2.png) [@Si\_Amigo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Si_Amigo)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2024, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704/41 "2024-11-17T17:35:19Z")
> [@dolphinboy](#): > > Is it lawful for the president to talk about classified secrets publicly? If caught doing so is the only punishment available impeachment? This was basically Trumps whole argument in the Florida case, as POTUS he can talk about anything he wants, that he had the final say and authority about what gets classified. Which is pretty much true, as the POTUS is the head of the government. And I think we are 1000% the SCOTUS would confirm this position. The issue there was that he claimed he could declassify shoe boxes full of docments with hidden mind power, instead of going through existing procedures, putting our spies and sources at risk. If I were spy, source or a little green man from Mars I would be very upset and nervous right now. ---
**Author:** ![Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/marvin_the_martian/32/2898_2.png) [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marvin_the_Martian)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2024, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704/42 "2024-11-17T17:58:58Z")
> [@Si\_Amigo](#): > > little green man from Mars I would be very upset and nervous right now You rang? I’m not nervous at all. As a matter of fact I’m thinking of trying the Earth-shattering kaboom thing again just to put you poor creatures out of your misery. Plus we’re not green at all, we’re really orange. Figure it out. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2024, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704/43 "2024-11-17T18:18:44Z")
> [@dolphinboy](#): > > 1 Is there anything that is so secret that not even the president can be told about it? Ostensibly, no. The President, as Chief Executive and Commander-in-Chief of the military, is the ultimate classification authority. That authority is almost exclusively delegated down to other agencies and people but if the President wants to declassify some piece of intelligence or a covert operation they absolutely have that authority, and there is no legal authority to withhold any intelligence or operational plans from the President or his designated executives (i.e. Secretaries of Defense, State, Energy, et cetera). > [@dolphinboy](#): > > 2 Is there a secrets briefing that US Presidents get when the first get into office where government classified secretes are revealed, or is that information provide to the president on a need-to-know basis, assuming the president asks about them? There is a high level briefing that presidential candidates get in order to prepare them for office, and then a more extensive set of detailed briefings about current threats and active operations that the President-Elect (and, at their discretion, the Vice-President-Elect) receives even before being inaugurated. The details of active operations and developing intelligence are provided on a “need-to-know” basis just because there is such a surfeit of classified information that it would overwhelm anyone to try to absorb it all, and most operational-level information at the detail program level isn’t actually all that interesting or useful to the President in making decisions. > [@dolphinboy](#): > > 3 Is it lawful for the president to talk about classified secrets publicly? If caught doing so is the only punishment available impeachment? See above; the sitting President can declassify and discuss any classified information at their discretion. Impeachment and removal is the only remedy for a President who breaks operational security or puts US servicepeople and agents in harm’s way for doing so since it is an ‘official act’ for which the President enjoys comprehensive immunity. _Former_ Presidents do not have this authority or enjoy indemnification although they are often consulted by the sitting President on matters pertaining to their previous experience in office. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2024, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704/44 "2024-11-17T19:57:34Z")
Of course, it’s not humanly possible for any one person to know all of the classified information in the US (there’s just too much of it), so it’s not like new Presidents are given a big info dump of all the secrets when they take office. If the President asks about something, they’re going to get an answer, but there are doubtless plenty of things that the President has never asked about, either because the answer was boring, they decided they’d rather not know, or simply because it never even occurred to them to ask. And even if they do ask, if the person they’re asking doesn’t know either, then they’re still not going to get an answer (though they might get “You might try asking so-and-so instead”). So in that sense, there can be things that are secret even from the President. ---
**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2024, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704/45 "2024-11-17T20:01:37Z")
The intelligence community has long been sluggish about declassifying material that no longer needs to be protected. They’ve acknowledged and addressed the problem. I know several retirees who came back at lower grades as declassification authorities. But it’s a labor intensive process, and it’s not exactly urgent compared to other matters. I suspect that some UFO-related info still being classified is affected by this. ---
**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2024, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704/46 "2024-11-17T20:12:46Z")
Related anecdote: while in college in the mid-1980s, I attended an after-hours lecture by one of my professors which was advertised as being about the work of Tesla, who wasn’t nearly as well known as he is today. After the professor gave a different lecture which made no mention of Tesla, I went to his office and asked him why. He haltingly replied that the U.S. Army had asked him not to talk about Tesla’s work. At the time, I took that as evidence that Tesla really was a supenatural-level genius, whose work was still state-of-the-art fifty years after his death. After 34 years in the IC, I realize it was probably just over-classified. Probably true of UFOs too. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2024, 8:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704/47 "2024-11-17T20:39:43Z")
Was your professor working for the U.S. Army or DOD (I know many who have)? If not, how would he know or care what inventions are classified? ---
**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2024, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704/48 "2024-11-17T20:41:15Z")
He worked for the DOD in the 1960s. ---
**Author:** ![Lucas\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lucas_jackson/32/303_2.png) [@Lucas\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lucas_Jackson)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2024, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704/49 "2024-11-18T00:45:10Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > If we were in contact with alien races Trump would have blurted it out on January 20th, 2017. The fact that there was a Trump presidency and nothing came out is the greatest proof that there have never been any visitors from space. Quoted for truth. ---
**Author:** ![Lucas\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lucas_jackson/32/303_2.png) [@Lucas\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lucas_Jackson)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2024, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704/50 "2024-11-18T01:28:31Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > I won’t completely rule out the possibility that aliens exist and are capable of traveling to (or sending probes to) Earth. Nor do I. Something I feel kind of queers the perception is the popularity of the Fermi “paradox”. My personal opinion is there is no paradox. From what I read, it’s predicted on the idea that the entire galaxy could be colonized in less than ten million years, and given the age of the universe it has had time to happen many times over. An idea I feel is preposterous. There are way too many impediments, the main one being the vast distances. I do however feel that it’s quite possible that there are other civilizations out there but they suffer the same restrictions as us. ---
**Author:** ![markn\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f9ae1b/32.png) [@markn\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/markn_1)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2024, 2:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704/51 "2024-11-18T02:31:36Z")
Vast distances can be overcome by vast time. Even travelling at the pokey speed of already existing human-built rockets (the Parker Solar Probe at about 100 mi/sec), you could travel across the entire diameter of the galaxy in less than 200 million years. In the time that the Earth has existed, you could have made that trip more than 20 times. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2024, 2:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704/52 "2024-11-18T02:40:04Z")
> [@Lucas\_Jackson](#): > > There are way too many impediments, the main one being the vast distances. That’s why it takes tens of millions of years. But that’s a blink of an eye, compared to the ages of stars. ---
**Author:** ![Francis\_Vaughan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/francis_vaughan/32/3093_2.png) [@Francis\_Vaughan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Francis_Vaughan)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2024, 4:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704/53 "2024-11-18T04:30:00Z")
And we have pretty good evidence that stars do occasionally visit every odd hundred thousand years or so. So no real mystery. If you live astronomical lengths of time astronomical distances are not a problem. Stars are pretty immune to interstellar hazards as well. So our sun’s friends drop by every now and again, sink a few cold ones, stir up a few comets, and mozy on to visit some of the neighbours. > **[Scholz's Star](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scholz%27s_Star)** > > Scholz's Star /ˈʃoʊlz(əz)/ (WISE designation WISE 0720−0846 or fully WISE J072003.20−084651.2) is a dim binary stellar system 22 light-years (6.8 parsecs) from the Sun in the constellation Monoceros near the galactic plane. It was discovered in 2013 by astronomer Ralf-Dieter Scholz. In 2015, Eric Mamajek and collaborators reported that the system passed through the Solar System's Oort cloud roughly 70,000 years ago, and dubbed it Scholz's Star. > The primary is a red dwarf with a stellar classific... ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2024, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704/54 "2024-11-18T04:40:25Z")
What’s the IC? Years ago, I had a pen pal who had been in the military, and said that when she saw a Harrier jet, she knew instantly that before it was declassified, it accounted for a large percentage of “UFO” sightings near military bases. (She also told a story about driving from Terre Haute to Indianapolis one late May weekend at dusk, and saw a large cigar-shaped object hovering off in the distance. She and her friend, terrified, pulled over and ducked in the ditch, at which time said object lit up and revealed itself to be the Goodyear Blimp. Embarrassed, they got back in the car and continued on their trip.) ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2024, 1:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704/55 "2024-11-18T13:15:26Z")
> [@nearwildheaven](#): > > and said that when she saw a Harrier jet, she knew instantly that before it was declassified, it accounted for a large percentage of “UFO” sightings near military bases. That seems rather implausible. Not your story about your friend’s statement, but rather her statement itself. Both the original UK Harrier and the subsequent US-developed variant were never classified. And was a relatively limited production airplane that would be a commonplace at the bases where it lived, and simply never seen at all the others. Except at airshows. Where it was a big hit wherever it went. > [@Francis\_Vaughan](#): > > And we have pretty good evidence that stars do occasionally visit every odd hundred thousand years or so. Wow. I’d never heard of that. Thanks for the info. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2024, 4:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704/56 "2024-11-18T16:35:58Z")
> [@nearwildheaven](#): > > What’s the IC? I understood it to mean he or she meant the (United Stated) Intelligence Community, which comprises a bunch of federal intelligence agencies (so DIA, NSA, CIA, Army intelligence, etc. are all associated). ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2024, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704/57 "2024-11-18T16:44:42Z")
> [@HeyHomie](#): > > revealing that to the general public is almost certainly going to cause widespread panic. Not after 50 years of Star Trek\*, etc. People can handle it. Except for certain religions, who will be upset to find they re no longer the center of the universe. > [@Hari\_Seldon](#): > > Trump has promised to declassify it all. Might be interesting. But I doubt it. Carter promised to release all the UFO information. And he never did. Either that means there is actually nothing, or once he learned what the Truth was, he agreed it had to remain classified. \*Now I wonder; Does Starfleet keep certain things from the general public, to prevent a panic? The Galaxy barrier, Q, the Talosians, the Borg, the Mirror universe, time travel, the availability of posychic powers with a simple injection, that the greek gods were real, the existence of a machine that can reliably shift consciousnesses between bodies, Nagilum… ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2024, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704/58 "2024-11-18T18:14:28Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > > [@HeyHomie](#): > > > > revealing that to the general public is almost certainly going to cause widespread panic. > > Not after 50 years of Star Trek\*, etc. People can handle it. I’m w @HeyHomie on this. If aliens showed up humanity would utterly lose its collective shit. Take the craziest SovCit, the craziest CT adherent, and the craziest Faux News / trumper you know and combine them. That’d be the average human a week after the reveal. And that’s assuming the aliens start out nice, not planet-cidal. ---
**Author:** ![Lucas\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lucas_jackson/32/303_2.png) [@Lucas\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lucas_Jackson)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2024, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704/59 "2024-11-18T18:39:18Z")
> [@markn\_1](#): > > Vast distances can be overcome by vast time. Even travelling at the pokey speed of already existing human-built rockets (the Parker Solar Probe at about 100 mi/sec), you could travel across the entire diameter of the galaxy in less than 200 million years. In the time that the Earth has existed, you could have made that trip more than 20 times. > [@Chronos](#): > > That’s why it takes tens of millions of years. But that’s a blink of an eye, compared to the ages of stars. Those are just formulae. It doesn’t take into account the logistics of getting humans (or aliens) that far. Ten million years is the blink of an eye to stars, but not to functioning spacecraft and certainly not to humans. > [@](#): > > Even travelling at the pokey speed of already existing human-built rockets (the Parker Solar Probe at about 100 mi/sec), you could travel across the entire diameter of the galaxy in less than 200 million years To get to of the closest exoplanet we know of (and it’s probably not habitable for numerous reasons), Proxima Centauri b, at Parker Solar Probe speeds would take over 7000 years. That would require a [Generation Ship](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-with-with-dead-bodies-on-generation-ships/985514). ([or Wiki](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generation_ship)) You’re talking about 80 generations. We are not even close to having the wherewithal to accomplish that. We can barely make cars that last 50 years much less 10 million years. That’s a lot to ask of a machine with working parts and especially if there is no place to get replacements. But suppose we we did build one and got there, then what? It’s certainly not going to be habitable. How do we fix that? Depending on whom you talk to, terraforming Mars could take anywhere from **50 years to 100 million years** to complete. It’s already similar to Earth and it’s right next door. Without resources nearby, terraforming exoplanets is virtually impossible. And they might not have a fuel source available. Sending out spaceships with beings, getting them to another planet, terraforming it, building the infrastructure to build more spaceships is best left for science fiction. Colonizing the galaxy in ten ten million years works _in theory_ - not in practice. The oft used comparison to Columbus and early explorers colonizing the globe is not applicable to colonizing space. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2024, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704/60 "2024-11-18T19:09:23Z")
Not for beings that live ~100 Earth years at best. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-ufo-related-stuff-classified/804704.md?page=4)