Exclusive interview with Gordon Cooper blows lid off 50-year cover-up
National Enquirer
January 14, 1997
Space hero Gordon Cooper, one of the original "Right Stuff" astronauts, says he knows that UFOs exist because he's SEEN them!
In a world exclusive interview, Cooper has broken his silence to become the first astronaut to speak openly about alien spacecraft. He says there's been a massive government cover-up of UFOs for nearly 50 years and insists the American public has a right to know the truth.
"I know other astronauts share my feelings," declared Cooper, 69, who went into space aboard a Mercury craft in 1963 and on a Gemini craft two years later.
"And we know the government is sitting on hard evidence of UFOs!"
Cooper said he first encountered UFOs as a military pilot in Germany in the early 1950s, when unidentified craft were spotted over an air base.
"We thought they could have been Russian we regularly had MiG-15s overflying our base. We scrambled our Sabre jets to intercept and got to our ceiling of 45,000 feet . . . and they were still way above us traveling faster than we were.
"We thought they could have been Russian we regularly had MiG-15s overflying our base. We scrambled our Sabre jets to intercept and got to our ceiling of 45,000 feet . . . and they were still way above us traveling faster than we were.
"These vehicles were in formation like a fighter group, but they were metallic silver and saucer-shaped. Believe me, they weren't like any MiGs I'd seen before! They had to be UFOs."
In 1957, Cooper was one of an elite band of test pilots at Edwards Air Force Base in California, in charge of several advanced projects, including the installation of a precision landing system.
"I had a camera crew filming the installation when they spotted a saucer. They filmed it as it flew overhead, then hovered, extended three legs as landing gear, and slowly came down to land on a dry lake bed!
"These guys were all pro cameramen, so the picture quality was very good.
"The camera crew managed to get within 20 or 30 yards of it, filming all the time. It was a classic saucer, shiny silver and smooth, about 30 feet across. It was pretty clear it was an alien craft.
"As they approached closer it took off."
When his camera crew handed over the film, Cooper followed standard procedure and contacted Washington to report the UFO and "all heck broke loose," he said.
"After a while a high-ranking officer said when the film was developed I was to put it in a pouch and send it to Washington.
"He didn't say anything about me not looking at the film. That's what I did when it came back from the lab and it was all there just like the camera crew reported."
When the Air Force later started Operation Blue Book to collate UFO evidence and reports, Cooper says he mentioned the film evidence.
"But the film was never found supposedly. Blue Book was strictly a cover-up anyway."
Cooper revealed he's convinced an alien craft crashed at Roswell, N. Mex., in 1947 and aliens were discovered in the wreckage.
"I had a good friend at Roswell, a fellow officer. He had to be careful about what he said. But it sure wasn't a weather balloon, like the Air Force cover story. He made it clear to me what crashed was a craft of alien origin, and members of the crew were recovered."
Why has the government kept its UFO secrets for so many years?
"It started in World War 2, when the government didn't want people to know about UFO reports in case they panicked," said Cooper. "They would have been fearful it was superior enemy technology that we had no defense against.
"Then it got worse in the Cold War for the same reason.
"So they told one untruth, they had to tell another to cover that one, then another, then another . . . it just snowballed.
"And right now I'm convinced a lot of very embarrassed government officials are sitting there in Washington trying to figure a way to bring the truth out. They know it's got to come out one day, and I'm sure it will.
"America has a right to know!"
JOHN COOKE