is Nick Pope bulls---? let's discuss

a reply to: Arbitrageur

I don't have a problem with Nick Pope as much as the OP. It's taken him 20 years to become the minor media personality he is today. He saw a gap in the market while the X-Files was still at its 1990s peak, dubbing himself as Britain's Fox Mulder. He wrote a book or two and slowly worked his way to where he is today. He's never claimed to be a "whistle blower" in fact quite the opposite. He also doesn't promote complete crap like some other UFOtainment personalities I could mention. I'm sure Nick makes a nice living serving up soundbites on rolling 24 hour news channels and reading out the scripted lines for the likes of Ancient Aliens etc.

I do have a couple of problems with some of the things he's claimed though.

I'll start with Rendlesham.

1. Nick continually refuses to confirm or deny whether nuclear weapons were held at Woodbridge/Bentwaters (Twin RAF bases leased to the USAF during the Cold War).

He says this is due to his security oaths. However there is a declassified US military document (sorry I can't find it at the moment) that confirmed before the bases closed how many tactical nukes were held there. So it's not actually a secret.

However I can find Michael Portillo, former UK Secretary of State for Defence between July 1995 & May 1997 confirming that nuclear weapons were held at the bases though (see timestapped YT link below):

youtu.be...

Surely once the UK Secretary of Defence has said this it's no longer a secret? Like when President Obama mentioned Area 51.

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2. In the book "Encounter in Rendlesham Forest" Nick makes the claims :

We know that a UFO landed next to one of the most sensitive military installations in the NATO alliance......

We know that light beams from the UFO struck the ground just feet in front of the Deputy Base Commander and ....onto the base in particular, into the Weapons Storage Area....

We know that the UFO was tracked on radar...."

The evidence for a UFO actually landing is weak. Only one witness claims to have seen 'a craft'. The landing marks found next day are unimpressive. (Pictures can be found in the Rendlesham thread)

The light beam shining on the ground is based on the infamous 'Halt Tape' . It has been difficult to corroborate this with anyone else on the base except Monroe Nevels who was with Halt in the forest.

The radar tracks are elusive. There are people who've said they saw brief blips on radar. But there isn't any hard proof.
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3. NIck's other signature case is the 1993 'Cosford' UFO case. He often describes it as a huge and triangular shaped object that traversed across British airspace in 1993. It was sighted by multiple independent witnesses, including RAF personnel at two separate bases. He paints this as a still unsolved mystery.

There are two MoD documents referring to the case : DEFE 24-2086 and DEFE 24-1967.

The first one contains various documents and correspondence dealing with investigation into the case and witness statements. An excerpt from that In Nick Pope's own words

It seems that an unidentified object of unknown origin was operating in the UK Air Defence Region without being detected on radar; this would appear to be of considerable defence significance, and I recommend that we investigate further, within MOD or with the US authorities.

However Spanish ufologist Vicente-Juan Ballester Olmos investigated the case and provided information that points to a likely explanation. Information which is contained within the documents in large parts.

Earlier in the night (ie. 30th March 1993), the Russians launched a radio satellite into orbit. The rocket booster of the Cosmos 2238, as it was known, re-entered the earth’s atmosphere, breaking into pieces in the early hours of the 31st March 1993.

Astronomer Gary Anthony obtained a NASA data computer simulation of the trajectory of the decaying booster. Its path shows it would be easily visible whilst crossing the British Isles around the same time as the first sightings. It passed over the South West of Britain around 1.10 and 1.15 am. Correspondence also confirms that Nick Pope spoke to RAF Fylingdales who (eventually) confirmed a Russian rocket had re-entered the atmosphere around the relevant time with a margin of error of about an hour.

The lower altitude sightings seen at RAF Shawbury that occurred about an hour after the decay of the booster rockets were identified as a Welsh police helicopter following a stolen car down the A5. Snr. Ballester Olmos also contacted Nick Pope with an explanation for the sightings a year later enclosing copies of a NORAD statement and computer simulation showing the UFO as the booster rockets from the Russian Cosmos 2238 satellite.

In his reply (dated 6th April 1994) Nick Pope stated:

“I think it is clear that most of the UFO sightings that occurred on the night in question can be attributed to this event.”

Source : MoD - DEFE 24/1967/1

Despite that Nick leaves his on the record conclusion out of interviews on paranormal TV and radio shows.

a reply to: mirageman

hey my friend, the only question that I have that seems to go unanswered is if the Rendlesham incident did NOT happen, why would so many high ranking military officers put their careers in jeopardy and fabricate such an amazingly complex situation? I mean yes maybe not all the "t" are crossed and all the "i's" dotted in such a large sighting such as this, and maybe they all couldn't possibly be so in a sighting/incdient of such magnitude, but I just don't think they were seeking publicity or fame, add to this the ufo reporting stigma so common with the military/government type sightings and they would be aware of this. I think something did happen, something was seen that couldn't all be explained, but some type of a ufo sighting incident did happen.

a reply to: data5091
I'm not saying they didn't see any lights, I'm sure they did and that's well documented.

What is not well documented is any kind of landing, and all the evidence for a so-called landing site does more to convince me there was no landing, including Halt's own tape where he saw the "landing marks" and made some comment about the small and unimpressive marks they were looking at. If Halt was so unimpressed why should we be impressed? He was there! So were the police, who were also unimpressed, and thought the marks could have been made by an animal. Halt's tape clearly shows the radiation readings were insignificant.

So regardless of what the lights were, I still haven't seen any good evidence of a landing, and it's Nick Pope blowing that very poor "landing" evidence out of proportion that causes me to downgrade his credibility.

If that evidence was enough to convince Halt of a landing then I have a very low opinion of his cognitive abilities or credibility, whichever is lacking to cause him to draw such an unwarranted conclusion. There are other problems with Halt. What is one of the most important facts to report about a UFO sighting? The date and time, yet Halt was either confused and got the date wrong, or some have questioned whether he could be part of a conspiracy to obfuscate the incident by intentionally reporting the wrong date in his memo to the MOD.

a reply to: mirageman
Thanks for that post. I agree it's more evidence Nick Pope isn't being completely honest with us.

a reply to: data5091

Something happened for sure.

But as this thread is about Nick Pope I was commenting specifically on his assertions 'that we know'. Because he can't prove them. So obviously we don't know.

We know that a UFO landed next to one of the most sensitive military installations in the NATO alliance......

Well actually no we don't and he can't prove a UFO landed.

We know that the UFO was tracked on radar....

Again this has never been proven and Nick can't provide hard evidence. Anything he does have is anecdotal.

Nick Pope also requested that certain MoD files relating to him be withheld and there is an interesting little spat that has been going on between Nick and Dr. David Clarke for many years. See : drdavidclarke.co.uk...

a reply to: mirageman


Your skepticism reaches a little too far on this one--Rendlesham is pretty solid as UFO cases go

Not perfect, but what is.

Nick Pope, I don’t begrudge the guy but he is one of the blandest UFO researchers there are.


In the Alien Con conference he’s referenced as a journalist--now that’s a stretch.

But what would you expect from something called Alien con

a reply to: markymint

The military and the government to a lesser extent are highly compartmentalized, especially with things of a serious nature, such as unidentifiable incursions into our air space, U honestly don't think Nick would've ever been privy to the kind of knowledge you'd like him to divulge, very few people would be, it's why within reason we have to say alleged knowledge... Nick would agree with me on that I'm sure.

I mean, for all we know UFOs literally might not be of significance to our nation or a national threat. They, the powers that be might never have lied. For all we know they could be ours or some kind of phenomena we know about but must keep secret. Imagine if these "foo fighters" are a by-product of nuclear energy... I guess they could be aliens too and the government are in cahoots with them. Either way a person like Nick wouldn't be privy to such information, nobody in the public eye would be. It's the genuine opposite of clandestinity.

The biggest problem with having a sighting is the association of oneself to the experience, if anything I dare say that Nick is one ahead than most if he ever has a sighting. It's hard to disassociate from a sighting, after all it's a very personal experience. I respect the fact he works so diligently whilst working on the subject, it's a trait I've tried to foster myself.

Because if I ever find out the truth I'll be running into town to tell everybody, I'll be laughed at like everybody else though... Unless I can prove it, emotions in this field appeal to nobody, I used to think the debunkers had an agenda too.

They too just want the truth, what's acceptable as truth comes with stringent measures and irrefutable evidence. We all should accept that.

a reply to: mirageman

Very interesting link, thanks for posting.

How ironic that after 52,000 documents have been disclosed the only files now being permanently with-held are those written by his superiors at the Ministry of Defence. The reason these  papers are being with-held is because they contain information about Nick Pope’s “conversion” to UFO believer that followed his alien abduction experience in Florida in 1991. This happened shortly before he joined the ‘UFO desk’ when he claims he had little or no interest in the subject.

Figured I'd post this bit within the link, that's news to me and very interesting.

a reply to: markymint

Insincere little twat of a man... because $$$

Ive known about hime since the 90's, completely insincere
money scoundral.


Needs to piss off/go away

He hasnt really added anything to the game, he narrates some shows and is at least somewhat knowledgeable about the subject. Are you saying they should get someone easier on the eyes like Lucy Pinder(no objections btw) to take his place?

IMO this is a waisted thread, I know the forum isnt terribly busy, but a more interesting inquisition would have been about a real researcher like George Knapp, Jacques Vallée, Kevin Randle, Bill Chalker, Leslie Kean, Richard Dolan, or Donald Keyhoe.

No idea why you decided to take a shot at Nick Pope...

a reply to: Willtell

Your skepticism reaches a little too far on this one--Rendlesham is pretty solid as UFO cases go

Not perfect, but what is.

I was making, what I consider, minor points. We don't know a UFO landed for certain and there are no radar records. That is all you should read into it. I was being very specific as to Nick's choice of words.

Generally I think Nick comes over as rather bland because he doesn't tend to tell stories that are exciting, but are really sci-fi, like Corey Goode. He's not really an avid researcher and, as demonstrated earlier in the thread, he was merely a 'junior desk officer' at the MoD. This role meant dealing with enquiries from the public about 'unexplained' aerial phenomenon. So in essence he's just a face on TV and a voice on radio shows with few very few interesting anecdotes in his locker. Cosford, Rendlesham, Condign. That's it.

However in America he likes to cultivate his image as Britain's Fox Mulder.... or Commander Pope of SHADO.

a reply to: mirageman

Omg. I love the picture!

No idea why you decided to take a shot at Nick Pope...

I explained in an earlier post (granted deep within a long rant). I'm British. I don't really follow the American "UFOlogists" (basically 95% of them). He worked for the MoD. The MoD are evasive. They operate over the land I live in. They likely silence radar operators. I study the British phenomena, not the worldwide one so much, and Nick Pope "oversaw" the british phenomena (puh, yeah right) so should have a clear understanding of it, really, but he doesn't. He never discusses fastwalkers, the REAL stuff. Always the pantomime cases like Rendlesham and "jets chasing a UFO". He personifies "obfuscation" to quite an extent, if he wants to be associated with the X Files well I associate him with "Deceive Inveigle Obfuscate" (episode Teliko). And here in the UK, every, and I mean EVERY SINGLE printed article about UFOs features a mind-numbing quote from Nick Pope. So if he wants to persistently make statements to me and the nation, he should expect someone or some people or a mass of people, to pick that apart.

But you guys are right, he's a journalist. That says absolutely nothing about ones UFO knowledge and that says it all about Nick Pope really.

If you feel the American ones are worth discussing, start a thread. I might learn something. But I always have an eye closely on Nick Pope, none of the others, which is "why". So now you have an idea I wouldn't know if this forum is slow or not, I have plenty of other things to be doing than loitering around this joint regularly anymore. But that said it's not like Greer and a bunch of the others don't get plenty of air-time here on a regular basis. I mean # who wants to hear the name Tom Delonges again for the next 100 years??

Hahaha the only withheld documents are his work records, typical!! I'm glad others are somewhat skeptical though. I mean that's proof enough for me really, kind of legitimises at least some of my disdain. Though I wonder if that "abduction" thing is misinterpreted? It makes out that Nick himself was abducted but is it not that he simply studied some of the abduction claims at the time? Anyway thanks for the interesting replies!

a reply to: markymint

Lets be honest all the ufo brigade of so called experts are deluded we have had some on here doing ask me anything none of the information given amounted to more than brain farts with the same old ufo BS repeated yet again.

Over the last few years the evidence of possible ufo's has got worse although the tech to record images & video has got better.

When you see members on here that have saw an object or light in the sky, then say I don't know if it was a satellite or a meteor two objects which would are totally different in motion and appearance you know most people can be easily swayed into thinking Mog from Zog.

a reply to: markymint

I gave up on Pope when the Sun newspaper published a blurry image of a seagull and called it an UFO. Pope was asked for a quote and replied "It may be one of the most important UFO photo's ever taken".....

Nick Pope is going to Russia

a reply to: BenGee101


Yes - the dreaded "Blurd".

a reply to: BenGee101

Do post it.

a reply to: Baablacksheep



Bear in mind that the image was captured at the seaside.

That's one brutal post OP.

You’re defiantly entitled to your opinion, not knocking you for that, but I think your comments are very unfair. Your post wasn’t a critique of his work, which is obviously fair game, but more of you personally raking him over the coals.


a reply to: markymint