Forbes magazine interviews MUFON's Chief-Jan Harzan

A really interesting wide ranging interview on the subject of ufo's. Part one you can see here.

Mr. Harzan was asked about two compelling ufo cases. He first brought up Travis Walton and his et contact experience in Arizona:

JC: Give us two compelling UFO cases. JH: One of the best-documented cases of an extraterrestrial encounter is Travis Walton from Nov. 5, 1975, near Snowflake, AZ. Travis and six co-workers had just finished clearing brush in the mountains and were heading back to town when they encountered a glowing, silvery disc-shaped craft in the forest. Travis exited the cab of the truck they were in, and approached the craft. In doing so, he was struck by a beam of light knocking him to the ground unconscious. His buddies filled with fear high-tailed it out but returned a while later to find both Travis and the saucer gone. Five days passed when Travis suddenly reappeared to tell the story of where he had been. He reported being aboard a craft and seeing creatures that did not look human. All seven of the crew and Travis took, and passed, lie-detector tests regarding their ordeal.

He then brought up the famous Randlesham Forest incident from 1980 in the U.K.:

The second is known as the Rendlesham Forest case involving the U.S. military in Suffolk, England. Around 3 a.m. on Dec. 26, 1980, strange lights were reported by a security patrol near the east gate of RAF Woodbridge apparently descending into nearby Rendlesham Forest. Servicemen initially thought it was a downed aircraft but, upon entering the forest to investigate, they saw a strange glowing object, metallic in appearance, with colored lights. As they approached, it moved through the trees and left three impressions in the ground that were visible the next day. One of the servicemen, Sgt. Jim Penniston, later claimed to have encountered a "craft of unknown origin" and to have made detailed notes of its features, touched its "warm" surface and copied the numerous symbols that were on its body. The object flew away after their brief encounter.

He was also asked his opinion of Roswell:

JC: Roswell, NM - real or hoax? JH: Real. Get a copy of the video presentation of “Recollections of Roswell” filmed by MUFON member and well-known UFO researcher Stanton Friedman. It is interviews with some 30 survivors of Roswell, including first-hand witnesses, their spouses and their children. What they tell you will send chills up your spine. If you don’t believe something extraordinary happened after watching this video, then nothing will convince you. I can tell you this: It was no weather balloon.

In Part two of the interview which is here he talks further about ufo's and a tv show called "Hangar 1" which was well received.

He was asked if he thought we had reversed engineered a ufo:

JC: Do you think we have reverse-engineered a UFO? JH: Based on the research I have done, and the people I have talked to, including first-hand witnesses, absolutely yes! It would be one of the highest priorities of the military and intelligence community to get their hands on a flying saucer of extraterrestrial origin. One source that your readers can check is that of Colonel Corso. In his book, “The Day After Roswell” he talks about being in charge of the Foreign Technology Division at the Pentagon and being responsible for getting crashed saucer technology into the hands of the best in industry to figure out exactly what it was made of and how it worked. Another source is Bob Lazar who claims to have worked at S4 near Area 51 on reverse engineering captured ET craft. His story has been checked and rechecked by KLAS-TV news reporter George Knapp and seems to hold together. There are others who have come forward to share their stories, although as one might imagine our intelligence community does its best to attempt to discredit them.

He was asked about famous people who have seen ufo's:

JC: Who are some famous people who've said they have seen UFOs? JH: Well my two favorites are a President and one of our original seven Mercury astronauts: Jimmy Carter and Gordon Cooper. President Carter had his sighting while governor of Georgia in 1969 at a talk he was giving to the Lion’s Club. He and a dozen other people witnessed a strong blue light in the sky which he could not explain. The Governor was interviewed by a UFO investigator and his report was filed with his signature on it. One may see this report on the Internet by googling, “Jimmy Carter UFO report.” Based on personal experience with this UFO, Carter vowed in 1975 that if elected President he would make every file the U.S. Government had on UFOs available to the public. Of course, we know that never happened. Who stopped him? Isn’t the President the most powerful man in the world? The second and more interesting is two sightings astronaut Gordon Cooper had as an Air Force F86 Fighter pilot over Europe in 1951. where he actually chased a UFO. Later, as a Major at Edwards AFB in the late 1950s, a crew he was in charge of actually filmed a saucer-shaped craft descend at Edwards, extend landing gear and land. All of this was caught on motion picture film as well as in still photographs. If you ‘d like to know what happened to the film and photographs, read chapter 4 of Cooper's autobiography, “Leap of Faith.” Suffice it to say, this whole subject is tightly controlled by the intelligence community in concert with the U.S. military. In the words of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, “Who are those guys?” and what is it that they don’t want you and I to know?

a reply to: data5091

He then brought up the famous Randlesham Forest incident from 1980 in the U.K.:

This and the Travis were two of the most intriguing cases I've heard of.

IMO, if I was Travis I would sh*t gold if that had happened to me

Thanks for this thread!

a reply to: slapjacks

there are so many intriguing cases! I could add the Betty and Barney Hill incident, the Cash/Landrum incident from Texas, and of course Roswell, which I also believe was a real ufo.

a reply to: data5091

We should not take it as a given that MUFON believes in alien ships. They should by now, but they won't because that would lead to far more probing questions of how long have they been interacting with humans, why they are here, their intentions, and to what extent has the US already integrated such technology into space defense which would included further exploration of the Moon and even Mars?

I expect to see a very quick disclaimer from MUFON about his comments. The folks looking over the shoulder of this civilian watchdog outfit of UFO investigations will not be happy unless they are ready to start manning up to the whole entire story and this interview was part of the setup.

My two favorite UFO cases are the Pascagoula Hickson-Parker Abduction and the Nellis AFB UFO.

Neither of these offer any solid evidence that they had anything to do with "aliens."

Harzan lost me with Roswell, then he went on to endorse Corso and Lazar. I thought "Hangar 1" was a horrible distortion, but no, it was right in line with what Harzan thinks is real.

originally posted by: CardDown
Harzan lost me with Roswell, then he went on to endorse Corso and Lazar. I thought "Hangar 1" was a horrible distortion, but no, it was right in line with what Harzan thinks is real.

Yes it's very disappointing though not too surprising.

One Mufon member who is scientifically oriented was hoping Harzan would clean up some of the non-scientific mess at MUFON and steer it in the right direction, but it looks like that's not going to happen as your comments suggest:

MUFON, Science and Deception

Antonio Paris is the founder and director of Aerial Phenomena Investigations (API), an organization aiming to revive ufology and bring more science to the subject....

“As is the case with any enterprise, organizational change is critical to survival. MUFON today, in my opinion, is struggling with an identity crisis. If MUFON hopes to remain relevant in the UFO community, I sincerely hope Mr. Jan Harzan can revive MUFON back to the organization it was decades ago.

“After two years at MUFON, I quickly realized several problems that can be easily fixed by Mr. Harzan. The first and most important mission for Mr. Harzan is to ensure MUFON recalibrate its compass. After attending dozens of MUFON conferences nationally, for example, it is clear that MUFON has been inundated with topics that have nothing to do with Ufology – it is intoxicated with conspiracy theories, hoaxes, junk science, new age claptrap and a level of sensationalism that would make The National Enquirer envious. His first goal, therefore, should be to drain the swamp of all this garbage and bring the science back to the subject.

I think MUFON has been off the rails for a long time now and their directors are part of the problem in lacking a scientific focus in their approach. They probably need someone more along the lines of Antonio Paris running the organization with more of a focus on science.

With so many interesting cases to refer to, it's sad that MUFON still likes to highlight 'celebrity UFO' stories that boost the self-esteem of other UFO witnesses but are very shaky evidence for extraordinary events. The Jimmy Carter story suffers from the unmentioned fact that the form he filled out four years afterwards had the wrong location and the wrong date -- and when a non-MUFON expert determined the correct information, a number of prosaic sky stimuli popped up [one of which Carter has endorsed as the likely explanation]. The Cooper story is a sad but all too typical exploitation of a fading hero's honor which papers over the embarrassing fact that three independent investigators who checked the Edwards 'landing story' determined the landing story was all in Cooper's late-in-life tall tale telling imagination and was at variance with every other more-direct witness, with contemporary press accounts, and with the Blue Book file of the case [which did NOT vanish, it's always been available freely]. Inability to disentangle itself from such evidentiary sloppiness remains the major stumbling block for 'UFO studies', which is a pity since the theories aren't impossible and since valuable data could well be buried unrecognizably among the reports.