Alien Lore No. 33: Gordon Cooper On Astronaut UFO Sightings

There is a fairly widespread belief that American astronauts witnessed, on more than one occasion, UFOs in space. One name often associated with these tales is that of Major Gordon Cooper, who was apparently a believer, but also tried to clear up a lot of the wacko information.

Cooper was interviewed by the magazine OMNI in March, 1980:

OMNI: What about the repeated allegations that the astronauts saw
many UFOs?

COOPER: It got so bad that there were deliberately falsified tapes of communications with the astronauts, where UFO material was simply edited in. To my knowledge, the only astronaut on any of the Mercury, Gemini, or Apollo missions who ever saw anything that might have been a UFO was Jim McDivitt, but he didn't get enough pictures to prove anything substantial. That's the only case, in spite of all the stories you hear.

OMNI: Didn't you go after some UFOs as an air force pilot in Germany in the 1950s?

COOPER: Yes, several days in a row we sighted groups of metallic, saucer-shaped vehicles at great altitudes over the base, and we tried to get close to them, but they were able to change direction faster than our fighters. I do believe UFOs exists and that the truly unexplained ones are from some other technologically advanced civilization. From my association with aircraft and spacecraft, I think I have a pretty good idea of what everyone on this planet has and their performance capabilities, and I'm sure some of the UFOs at least are not from anywhere on Earth.

OMNI: Aren't you concerned about the reaction of people who may read this?

COOPER: I've always been honest about my views on this subject. Because the astronauts have been so badly misquoted by irresponsible journalists, it's up to each of us to say what he believes in. I'm engaged in a lawsuit against people who used my name for a commercial venture, quoting me to the effect that I'm dedicated to forcing the government to tell the truth about UFOs. I never said that at all. If any UFO information is being suppressed, it's certainly not in the U.S. Air Force, because I was at a high enough level to know about it.
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