[Senate Hearing 118-648]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 118-648
THE MISSION, ACTIVITIES, OVERSIGHT, AND
BUDGET OF THE ALL - DOMAIN ANOMALY
RESOLUTION OFFICE
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON
EMERGING THREATS AND CAPABILITIES
of the
COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
APRIL 19, 2023
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Armed Services
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available via: http://www.govinfo.gov
______
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
60-390 PDF WASHINGTON : 2025
COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
JACK REED, Rhode Island, Chairman
JEANNE SHAHEEN, New Hampshire ROGER F. WICKER, Mississippi
KIRSTEN E. GILLIBRAND, New York DEB FISCHER, Nebraska
RICHARD BLUMENTHAL, Connecticut TOM COTTON, Arkansas
MAZIE K. HIRONO, Hawaii MIKE ROUNDS, South Dakota
TIM KAINE, Virginia JONI ERNST, Iowa
ANGUS S. KING, Jr., Maine DAN SULLIVAN, Alaska
ELIZABETH WARREN, Massachusetts KEVIN CRAMER, North Dakota
GARY C. PETERS, Michigan RICK SCOTT, Florida
JOE MANCHIN III, West Virginia TOMMY TUBERVILLE, Alabama
TAMMY DUCKWORTH, Illinois MARKWAYNE MULLIN, Oklahoma
JACKY ROSEN, Nevada TED BUDD, North Carolina
MARK KELLY, Arizona ERIC SCHMITT, Missouri
Elizabeth L. King, Staff Director
John P. Keast, Minority Staff Director
___________
Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities
KIRSTEN E. GILLIBRAND, New York, Chairman
JEANNE SHAHEEN, New Hampshire JONI ERNST, Iowa
ELIZABETH WARREN, Massachusetts TOM COTTON, Arkansas
GARY C. PETERS, Michigan MARKWAYNE MULLIN, Oklahoma
JACKY ROSEN, Nevada TED BUDD, North Carolina
MARK KELLY, Arizona ERIC SCHMITT, Missouri
C O N T E N T S
___________
April 19, 2023
Page
The Mission, Activities, Oversight, and Budget of the All-Domain 1
Anomaly Resolution Office.
Members Statements
Statement of Senator Kirsten E. Gillibrand....................... 1
Statement of Senator Joni Ernst.................................. 3
Witness Statements
Dr. Sean M. Kirkpatrick, Director, All-Domain Anomaly Resolution 3
Office.
(iii)
THE MISSION, ACTIVITIES, OVERSIGHT, AND
BUDGET OF THE ALL - DOMAIN ANOMALY
RESOLUTION OFFICE
----------
Wednesday, April 19, 2023
United States Senate,
Subcommittee on Emerging
Threats and Capabilities,
Committee on Armed Services,
Washington, DC.
The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 11:08 a.m. in
room SR-232A, Russell Senate Office Building, Senator Kirsten
E. Gillibrand (Chairwoman of the Subcommittee) presiding.
Subcommittee Members present: Senators Gillibrand, Rosen,
and Ernst.
OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR KIRSTEN E. GILLIBRAND
Senator Gillibrand. The hearing will come to order.
I would first like to thank our witness, Dr. Sean
Kirkpatrick, for testifying here and in today's earlier closed
session, and for his long and distinguished career both in the
intelligence community and in the Department of Defense (DOD).
Dr. Kirkpatrick is the director of the All-Domain Anomaly
Resolution Office, or AARO. Congress established this office in
law to get to the bottom of the very serious problem of
unidentified anomalous phenomena, or UAP.
Dr. Kirkpatrick has a very difficult mission. While we have
made progress, there remains a stigma attached to these
phenomenon. There is a vast and complex citizen engagement and
there is also very challenging scientific and technical
hurdles.
We appreciate the willingness of Dr. Kirkpatrick to lean in
on this issue and the work that he has accomplished thus far,
and we look forward to both his opening statement and his
presentation of examples of the work AARO has done.
In late 2017, media reports surfaced about activities set
in motion by the late long-serving Majority Leader Senator
Harry Reid more than a decade ago. We learned that there was
strong evidence of advanced technology reflected in the
features and performance characteristics of many objects
observed by our highly trained servicemembers operating top-of-
the-line military equipment.
We learned that for at least the past 8 years, military
pilots frequently encountered unknown objects in controlled
airspace off both the East and West Coasts, across the
continental United States, in test and training areas and
ranges.
We do not know where they are--they come from, who made
them, or how they operate. As former Deputy Secretary of
Defense David Norquist observed, had any of these objects had
the label ``made in China,'' there would be an uproar in the
Government and media. There would be no stone unturned and no
effort spared to find out what we were dealing with.
We can look at the recent incursion of the unidentified PRC
high-altitude balloon as an example, and because of the UFO
stigma, the response has been irresponsibly anemic and slow.
Congress established AARO. We made it clear that we expect
vigorous action. We added very substantial initial funding for
the office. But despite our best efforts, the President's
budget for fiscal years 2023 and 2024 requested only enough
funding to defray the operating expenses of AARO.
It included almost no funds to sustain the critical
research and development necessary to support a serious
investigation. It took a letter to Secretary Austin from
Senator Rubio and me and 14 other senators to get the office
temporary relief for the current fiscal year.
In this hearing, I intend to probe a series of specific
issues. In the recent incidents where multiple objects were
shot down over North America, it seemed that Pentagon
leadership did not turn to AARO office to play a leading role
in advising the combatant commander.
We need to know whether this will continue. We need to know
whether the leadership in DOD will bring AARO into the
decisionmaking process in a visible way and we need to know
what role AARO will play in interagency coordination after the
NSC Working Group disbands.
In the Fiscal Year 2023 National Defense and Intelligence
Authorization Act Congress established a direct reporting chain
from the AARO director to the Deputy Secretary of Defense.
The role of the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense
for Intelligence and Security is limited to providing
administrative support. We need to know how this direction is
being implemented.
UAP are frequently observed flying in extremely high or
very low speeds and come in various sizes and shapes. During
the recent shoot downs over North America DOD disclosed that
filters on radar systems were adjusted to allow for detection
and tracking of diverse sets of objects for the first time.
While opening the aperture can overload the real-time analytic
process, we cannot keep turning a blind eye to surveillance
data that is critical to detecting and tracking UAP.
We need to know whether Dr. Kirkpatrick could achieve the
necessary control over sensor filters and the storage and
access to raw surveillance data to find UAP anomalies.
Finally, one of the tasks Congress set for AARO is serving
as an open door for witnesses of UAP events or participants in
Government activities related to UAPs to come forward securely
and disclose what they know without fear of retribution for any
possible violations of previously signed nondisclosure
agreements.
Congress mandated that AARO set up a publicly discoverable
and accessible process for safe disclosure. While we know that
AARO has already conducted a significant number of interviews,
many referred by Congress, we need to set up a public process,
and we need to know where that effort stands.
With that, I would like to turn to Senator Ernst for her
opening statement.
STATEMENT OF SENATOR JONI ERNST
Senator Ernst. Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you, Dr.
Kirkpatrick, for your testimony today. I will keep these
remarks very brief so that we have maximum time for your
briefing.
The recent downing of the Chinese surveillance balloon and
three other objects underscores the need for domain awareness.
Adversaries like China and Russia are working to hold United
States interests, including our Homeland, at risk. That is why
your testimony is so important and I so look forward to a
progress update on the establishment of your office.
As Members know, your office evolved from the Navy-led
Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force to the All-Domain
Anomalous Resolution Office known as AARO.
Dr. Kirkpatrick, your extensive background in science and
technology (S&T), research and development (R&D), and space
makes you well suited to discuss these emerging challenges.
My priority is that we understand the full range of threats
posed by our adversaries in all domains. That is what the joint
force needs to be prepared to fight and win in defense of our
Nation.
This Committee needs to know about Chinese or Russian
advanced technology programs to exploit our vulnerabilities. It
needs to know whether your office, along with the Intelligence
Community (IC), has detected potential Chinese or Russian
capabilities to surveil or attack us.
Finally, we need to ensure efficient interagency
coordination. Multiple elements of the DOD and IC own a piece
of this mission. To add value, AARO's efforts cannot be
redundant with others.
Thank you again. We look forward to your testimony.
Senator Gillibrand. Dr. Kirkpatrick, you can give your
testimony.
STATEMENT OF DR. SEAN M. KIRKPATRICK, DIRECTOR, ALL-DOMAIN
ANOMALY RESOLUTION OFFICE
Dr. Kirkpatrick. Thank you, Chairwoman Gillibrand, Ranking
Member Ernst, and distinguished Members of the Subcommittee. It
is a privilege to be here today to testify on the Defense's
efforts to address unidentified anomalous phenomena.
First, I want to thank Congress for its extensive and
continued partnership as the Department works to better
understand and respond to UAP in an effort to minimize
technical and intelligence surprise.
Unidentified objects in any domain pose potential risks to
safety and security, particularly from military personnel and
capabilities. Congress and DOD agree that UAP cannot remain
unexamined or unaddressed.
We are grateful for sustained congressional engagement on
this issue, which paved the way for the DOD's establishment of
the All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office in July of last year.
Though AARO is still a young office, the spotlight on UAP
in recent months underscores the importance of its work and the
need for UAP to be taken seriously as a matter of national
security.
All leadership that I have had the pleasure of working
with, whether DOD, IC, Department of Energy (DOE), civil,
scientific, or industrial view Congress as a critical partner
in this endeavor. AARO has accomplished much in the last 9
months since it was established. The AARO team of more than 3
dozen experts is organized around four functional areas:
operations, scientific research, integrated analysis, and
strategic communications.
In the 9 months since AARO's establishment, we have taken
important steps to involve and improve UAP data collection,
standardize the department's UAP internal reporting
requirements, and implement a framework for rigorous scientific
and intelligence analysis, allowing us to resolve cases in a
systematic and prioritized manner.
Meanwhile, consistent with legislative direction, AARO is
also carefully reviewing and researching the U.S. Government's
UAP-related historical record. AARO is leading a focused effort
to better characterize, understand, and attribute UAP with
priority given to UAP reports by DOD and IC personnel in or
near areas of national security importance.
DOD fully appreciates the eagerness from many quarters,
especially here in Congress and in the American public, to
quickly resolve every UAP encountered across the globe from the
distant past through today.
It is important to note, however, AARO is the culmination
of decades of DOD, intelligence community, and congressionally
directed efforts to successfully resolve UAP encountered first
and foremost by U.S. military personnel, specifically Navy and
Air Force pilots.
The law establishing AARO is ambitious and it will take
time to realize the full mission. We cannot answer decades of
questions about UAP all at once but we must begin somewhere.
While I assure you that AARO will follow scientific
evidence wherever it leads. I ask for your patience as DOD
first prioritizes the safety and security of our military
personnel and installations in all domains.
After all, UAP encountered first by highly capable DOD and
IC platforms featuring the Nation's most advanced sensors are
those UAP most likely to be resolved by my office, assuming the
data can be collected.
If AARO succeeds in first improving the ability of military
personnel to quickly and confidently resolve UAP they encounter
I believe that in time we will have greatly advanced the
capability of the entire U.S. Government, including its
civilian agencies, to resolve UAP.
However, it would be naive to believe that the resolution
of all UAP can be solely accomplished by the DOD and IC alone.
We will need to prioritize collection and leverage authorities
for monitoring all domains within the continental United
States.
AARO's ultimate success will require partnerships with the
interagency, industry partners, academia, and the scientific
community as well as the public.
AARO is partnering with the services, intelligence
community, DOE, as well as civil partners and across the U.S.
Government to tap into the resources of the interagency.
The UAP challenge is more an operational and scientific
issue than it is an intelligence issue. As such, we are working
with industry, academia, and the scientific community which
bring their own resources, ideas, and expertise to this
challenging problem set.
Robust collaboration and peer review across a broad range
of partners will promote greater objectivity and transparency
in the study of UAP.
I want to underscore today that only a very small
percentage of UAP reports display signatures that could
reasonably be described as anomalous. The majority of
unidentified objects reported to AARO demonstrate mundane
characteristics of balloons, unmanned aerial systems, clutter,
natural phenomena, or other readily explainable sources.
While a large number of cases in our holdings remain
technically unresolved, this is primarily due to a lack of data
associated with those cases. Without sufficient data we are
unable to reach defendable conclusions that meet the high
scientific standards we set for resolution, and I will not
close a case that I cannot defend the conclusions of.
I recognize that this answer is unsatisfying to those who,
in good faith, assume that what they see with their eyes, with
their cameras, and with their radars is incontrovertible
evidence of extraordinary characteristics and performance.
Yet, time and again, with sufficient scientific quality
data it is fact that UAP often but not always resolve into
readily explainable sources. Humans are subject to deception
and illusions, sensors to unexpected responses and malfunctions
and, in some cases, intentional interference. Getting to the
handful of cases that pass this level of scrutiny is the
mission of AARO.
That is not to say that UAP once resolved are no longer of
national security interest, however. On the contrary, learning
that a UAP is not of exotic origin but is instead just a
quadcopter or a balloon leads to the question of who is
operating that quadcopter and to what purpose. The answers to
those questions will inform potential national security or law
enforcement responses.
AARO is a member of the Department's support to the
administration's Tiger Team effort to deal with stratospheric
objects such as the PRC [People's Republic of China] high-
altitude balloon. When previously unknown objects are
successfully identified it is AARO's role to quickly and
efficiently hand off such readily explainable objects to the
intelligence, law enforcement, or operational safety
communities for further analysis and appropriate action.
In other words, AARO's mission is to turn UAP into SEP,
somebody else's problem. The U.S. Government, the DOD, and the
IC in particular have tremendous capabilities to deal with
those encountered objects.
In the wake of the PRC HAB [high-altitude balloon] event
the interagency is working to better integrate and share
information to address identifiable stratospheric objects but
that is not AARO's lane.
Meanwhile, for the few cases in all domains--space, air,
and sea--that do demonstrate potentially anomalous
characteristics AARO exists to help the DOD, IC, and
interagency resolve those anomalous cases.
In doing so, AARO is approaching these cases with the
highest level of objectivity and analytic rigor. This includes
physically testing and employing, modeling, and simulation to
validate our analyses and underlying theories, then peer
reviewing those results within the U.S. Government, industry
partners, and appropriately cleared academic institutions
before reaching any conclusions.
I should also State clearly for the record that in our
research AARO, has found no credible evidence thus far of
extraterrestrial activity, off-world technology, or objects
that defy the known laws of physics.
In the event sufficient scientific data wherever obtained
that a UAP encountered can only be explained by
extraterrestrial origin, we are committed to working with our
interagency partners at NASA to appropriately inform U.S.
Government's leadership of its findings.
For those few cases that have leaked to the public
previously and subsequently commented on by the U.S.
Government, I encourage those who hold alternative theories or
views to submit your research to credible peer-reviewed
scientific journals. AARO is working very hard to do the same.
That is how science works, not by blog or social media.
We know that there is tremendous public interest in UAP and
a desire for answers from AARO. By its very nature the UAP
challenge has for decades lent itself to mystery,
sensationalism, and even conspiracy.
For that reason, AARO remains committed to transparency,
accountability, and to sharing as much with the American public
as we can consistent with our obligation to protect not only
intelligence sources and methods but U.S. and allied
capabilities.
However, AARO's work will take time if we are committed to
do it right. It means adhering to the scientific method and the
highest standards of research integrity. It means being
methodical and scrupulous. It means withholding judgment in
favor of evidence.
It means following the data where it leads, wherever it
leads. It means establishing scientific peer-reviewed
theoretical underpinnings of observed data, and AARO is
committed to all of those standards.
I am proud of AARO's progress over the last 9 months. Much
remains to be done, but the hard work is underway.
Thank you for your continued support. Before we turn to
questions I am going to walk you through some of our analytical
trends in a couple of cases that we have prepared.
[Chart is shown.]
Dr. Kirkpatrick. One of the things that AARO does is high-
integrity analysis, as I have said. This chart represents the
trend analysis of all the cases in AARO's holdings to date.
What you will see on the left is a histogram of all of our
reported sightings as a function of altitude. Most of our
sightings occur in the 15,000-to 25,000-foot range, and that is
ultimately because that is where a lot of our aircraft are.
On the far right upper corner, you will see a breakout of
the morphologies of all of the UAP that are reported. Over
half, about 52 percent, of what has been reported to us are
round or spheres. The rest of those break out into all kinds of
different other shapes.
The gray box is, essentially, there is no data on what its
shape is. Either it was not reported or the sensor did not
collect it. The bottom map is a heat map of all reporting areas
across the globe that we have available to us.
What you will notice is that there is a heavy collection
bias both in altitude and in geographic location. That is where
all of our sensors exist. That is where our training ranges
are. That is where our operational ranges are. That is where
all of our platforms are.
In the middle, what we have done is reduce the most
typically reported UAP characteristics to these fields. Mostly
round, mostly one to four meters, white, silver, translucent,
metallic 10,000 to 30,000 feet with apparent velocities from
stationary to Mach two.
No thermal exhausts are usually detected. We get
intermittent radar returns, we get intermittent radio returns,
and we get intermittent thermal signatures. That is what we are
looking for and trying to understand what that is.
Next slide.
I am going to walk you through two cases that we have
declassified recently. This first one is an MQ-9 in the Middle
East, observing that blow up, which is an apparent spherical
object, via EO [electro-optical] sensors. Those are not IR
[infrared].
If you want to go ahead and click that and play it, you
will see it come through the top of the screen--there it goes--
and then the camera will slew to follow it. You will see it pop
in and out of the field of view there.
This is, essentially, all of the data we have associated
with this event from some years ago. It is going to be
virtually impossible to fully identify that just based off of
that video.
Now, what we can do and what we are doing is keeping that
as part of that group of 52 percent to see what are the
similarities, what are the trends across all these, do we see
these in a particular distribution, do they all behave the same
or not.
As we get more data, we will be able to go back and look at
these in a fuller context. How are we going to get more data?
We are working with the joint staff to issue guidance to all
the services and commands that will then establish what are the
reporting requirements, the timeliness, and all of the data
that is required to be delivered to us and retained from all
the associated sensors.
That, historically, has not been the case and it has been
happenstance that data has been collected.
Next slide.
This particular event, South Asia MQ-9 looking at another
MQ-9, and what is highlighted there in that red circle is an
object that flies through the screen. Unlike the previous one,
this one actually shows some really interesting things that
everyone thought was truly anomalous to start with.
First of all, it is a high-speed object that is flying in
the field of regard of two MQ-9s. Second, it appears to have
this trail behind it, which at first blush you would think that
looks like a propulsion trail.
In reality, if you want to play the first slide we will
show you what that looks like in real time, or first video. So
we are looking at that. There it goes. Why do you not play it
again and then pause it halfway through? Right there. All
right.
You might be able to see that trail there behind it. That
is actually not a real trail. That is a sensor artifact. Each
one of those little blobs is actually a representation of the
object as it is moving through, and later in the video as the
camera slews that trail actually follows the direction of the
camera, not the direction of the object.
We pulled these apart frame by frame. We were able to
demonstrate that that is essentially a readout overlap of the
image. It is a shadow image. It is not real.
Further, if you later follow this all the way to end it
starts to resolve itself into that blob that is in that picture
in the top right and if you squint it looks like an aircraft
because it actually turns out to be an aircraft. Go ahead and
put that on.
So you will see the tail sort of pop out there and so what
you are looking at is--this is in the infrared--this is the
heat signature off of the engines of a commuter aircraft that
happened to be flying in the vicinity of where those two MQ-9s
were at.
Why am I showing you this? The first one that I showed you,
we do not have resolved yet. That is an unresolved case we are
still studying. This one we can resolve. But this is the kind
of data that we have to work with and the type of analysis that
we have to do, which can be quite extensive when you have to
pull these apart frame by frame.
Further, we are now matching all of this with the models of
all of those imaging sensors so that I can say--I can recreate
this. I can actually show how the sensor is going to respond.
All of these sensors do not necessarily respond the way you
think they do, especially out in the world and in the field.
I believe that is all I have and I will open it up for your
questions.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Sean Kirkpatrick follows:]
Prepared Statement by Dr. Sean Kirkpatrick
Thank you, Chairwoman Gillibrand, Ranking Member Ernst, and
distinguished members of the Subcommittee and Congress. It is a
privilege to be here today to testify on the Department of Defense's
efforts to address Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena.
First, I want to thank Congress for its extensive and continued
partnership as the Department works to better understand and respond to
UAP in an effort to minimize technical an intelligence surprise.
Unidentified objects in any domain pose potential risks to safety and
security, particularly for military personnel and capabilities.
Congress and DOD agree that UAP cannot remain unexamined or
unaddressed.
We are grateful for sustained congressional engagement on this
issue, which paved the way for DOD's establishment of the All-domain
Anomaly Resolution Office in July of last year. Though AARO is still a
young office, the spotlight on UAP in recent months underscores the
importance of its work and the need for UAP to be taken seriously as a
matter of national security. All leadership that I've had the pleasure
of working with, whether DOD, IC, DOE, Civil, Scientific or Industrial,
view Congress as a critical partner in this endeavor.
AARO has accomplished much in the 9 months since it was
established. The AARO team of more than three dozen experts is
organized around four functional areas: operations, scientific
research, integrated analysis, and strategic communications. In the 9-
months since AARO's establishment, we have taken important steps to
improve UAP data collection, standardize the Department's UAP internal
reporting requirements, and implement a framework for rigorous
scientific and intelligence analysis, resolving cases in a systematic
and prioritized manner. Meanwhile, consistent with legislative
direction, AARO is also carefully reviewing and researching the U.S.
Government's UAP-related historical record.
AARO is leading a focused effort to better characterize,
understand, and attribute UAP, with priority given to UAP reports by
DOD and IC personnel in or near areas of national security importance.
DOD fully appreciates the eagerness from many quarters, including here
in Congress and in the American public, to quickly resolve every UAP
encountered across the globe, from the distant past through today.
It is important to note, however, that AARO is the culmination of
decades of DOD, Intelligence Community, and congressionally directed
efforts to successfully resolve UAP encountered first and foremost by
U.S. military personnel, specifically Navy and Air Force pilots.
The law establishing AARO is ambitious, and it will take time to
realize the full mission. We cannot answer decades of questions about
UAP all at once, but we must begin somewhere. While I assure you that
AARO will follow scientific evidence wherever it leads, I ask for your
patience as DOD first prioritizes the safety and security of our
military personnel and installations, in all domains.
After all, UAP encountered first by highly capable DOD and IC
platforms, featuring the Nation's most advanced sensors, are those UAP
most likely to be successfully resolved by my office assuming data can
be collected. If AARO succeeds in first improving the ability of
military personnel to quickly and confidently resolve UAP that they
encounter, I believe that in time we will have greatly advanced the
capability of the entire U.S. Government, including its civilian
agencies, to resolve UAP. However, it would be naive to believe that
the resolution of all UAP can be solely accomplished by the DOD and IC
alone. We will need to prioritize collection and leverage authorities
for monitoring all domains within the continental United States. AARO's
ultimate success will require partnerships with the interagency,
industry, academia, the scientific community, and the public.
AARO is partnering with the Services, Intelligence Community, DOE
and across the U.S. Government to tap into the resources of the
interagency. The UAP challenge is more an operational and scientific
issue than an intelligence issue. As such, we are also working with
industry, academia, and the scientific community, which bring their own
resources, ideas, and expertise to this challenging problem set. Robust
collaboration and peer-review across a broad range of partners will
promote greater objectivity and transparency in the study of UAP.
I want to underscore today that only a very small percentage of UAP
reports display signatures that could reasonably be described as
`anomalous.' The majority of unidentified objects reported to AARO
demonstrate mundane characteristics of balloons, unmanned aerial
systems, clutter, natural phenomena, or other readily explainable
sources. While a large number of cases in our holdings remain
technically unresolved, this is primarily due to a lack of data
associated with these cases. Without sufficient data, we are unable to
reach defendable conclusions that meet the high scientific standards we
set for resolution, and I will not close a case that we cannot defend
the conclusions of.
I recognize that this answer is unsatisfying to those who in good
faith assume that what they see with their eyes, with their cameras, or
with their radars is incontrovertible evidence of extraordinary
characteristics and performance. Yet, time and again, with sufficient
scientific-quality data, it is fact that UAP often, but not always,
resolve into readily explainable sources. Humans are subject to
deception and illusions, sensors to unexpected responses and
malfunctions, and in some cases intentional interference. Getting to
the handful of cases that pass this level of scrutiny is the mission of
AARO.
That is not to say that UAP once resolved are no longer of national
security interest, however. On the contrary, learning that a UAP isn't
of exotic origin but is instead ``just a quadcopter'' leads to the
question of who is operating that quadcopter, and to what purpose. The
answers to those questions will inform potential national security or
law enforcement responses.
AARO is a member of the Department's support to the
Administration's ``Tiger Team'' effort to deal with stratospheric
objects such as the PRC High Altitude Balloon. When previously unknown
objects are successfully identified, it is AARO's role to quickly and
efficiently hand off such readily explainable objects to the
Intelligence or Law Enforcement Communities for further analysis and
appropriate action. The U.S. Government--and DOD and the IC in
particular--has tremendous capabilities to deal with those encountered
objects. In the wake of the PRC HAB event, the interagency is working
to better integrate and share information to address identifiable
stratospheric objects, but that is not AARO's lane.
Meanwhile, for the few cases in all domains that do demonstrate
potentially anomalous characteristics, AARO exists to help the DOD, IC,
and interagency resolve those anomalous cases. In doing so, AARO is
approaching these cases with the highest level of objectivity and
analytic rigor. This includes physically testing and employing modeling
and simulation to validate our analyses and underlying theories, then
peer reviewing the results within the U.S. Government, industry
partners, and with appropriately cleared academic institutions before
reaching any conclusions.
I should also State clearly for the record that in our research
AARO has found no credible evidence thus far of extraterrestrial
activity, off-world technology, or objects that defy the known laws of
physics. In the event sufficient scientific data were ever obtained
that a UAP encountered can only be explained by extraterrestrial
origin, we are committed to working with our interagency partners at
NASA to appropriately inform the U.S. Government's leadership of its
findings. For those few cases that have been leaked to the public
previously, and subsequently commented on by the U.S. Government, I
encourage those who hold alternative theories or views to submit your
research to credible peer-reviewed scientific journals. AARO is working
to do the same. That is how science works, not by blog or social media.
We know that there is tremendous public interest in UAP and a
desire for answers from AARO. By its very nature, the UAP challenge has
for decades lent itself to mystery, sensationalism, and even
conspiracy. For that reason, AARO remains committed to transparency,
accountability, and to sharing as much with the American public as we
can, consistent with our obligation to protect intelligence sources and
methods and U.S. and Allied capabilities. However, AARO's work will
take time if we are committed to doing it right. It means adhering to
the scientific method and the highest standards of research integrity.
It means being methodical and scrupulous. It means withholding judgment
in favor of evidence. It means following the data where it leads,
wherever it leads. It means establishing scientific, peer reviewed
theoretical underpinnings of observed data. AARO is committed to those
standards.
I am proud of AARO's progress over the last 9 months. Much remains
to be done, but the hard work is under way.
Thank you for your continued support, and I look forward to your
questions.
Senator Gillibrand. Thank you so much, Dr. Kirkpatrick.
Can you just give us some raw numbers of how many UAPs you
have analyzed? How many have been resolved, and sort of in what
buckets and then how many are still left to be resolved? Just
an update from your January public report where it was 366 or
something and about 150 were balloons and about two dozen were
drones. Just give us an update if you have one.
Dr. Kirkpatrick. Sure. As of this week we are tracking
over--a total of 650 cases. Now, the report in January
basically said about half of the ones at that time, about 150,
were balloon--were likely balloon like or something like that.
That does not mean they are resolved.
Senator Gillibrand. Oh, I see.
Dr. Kirkpatrick. Okay. Let me walk everyone through what
our analytic process looks like.
We have, essentially, a five-step process. We get our cases
in with all the data. We create a case for that event. My team
does a preliminary scrub of all of those cases as they come in
to sort out, do we have any information that says this is in
one of those likely categories--it is likely a balloon--a bird,
it is likely some other object, or we do not know.
Then, we prioritize those based off of where they are. Are
they attached to a national security area? Does it show some
anomalous phenomenology that is of interest? If it is just a
spherical thing that is floating around with the wind and it
has no payload on it, that is going to be less important than
something that has a payload on it, which will be less
important than something that is maneuvering.
There is sort of a hierarchy of just binning the priorities
because we cannot do all of them at once. Once we do that and
we prioritize them, we take that package of data in that case,
and I have set up two teams. Think of this as a red team, blue
team, or competitive analysis.
I have an intelligence community team made up of
intelligence analysts and I have an science and technology
(S&T) team made up of scientists and engineers and the people
that actually build a lot of these sensors, or physicists,
because if you are a physicist, you can do anything--but they
are not associated with the intel community. They are not intel
officers. They look at this through the lens of the sensor of
what the data says.
We give that package to both teams. The intelligence
community is going to look at it through the lens of the
intelligence record and what they assess and their intel
tradecraft, which they have very specific rules and regulations
on how they do that.
The scientific community, technical community, is going to
look at it through the lens of what is the data telling me,
what is the sensor doing, what would I expect a sensor response
to be, and back that out.
Those two groups give us their answers. We then adjudicate.
If they agree, then I am more likely to close that case if they
agree on what it is. If they disagree, we will have an
adjudication. We will bring them together. We will take a look
at the differences. We will adjudicate why do you say one thing
and you say another.
We will then come to a case--a recommendation. That will
get written up by my team. That then goes to a senior technical
advisory group, which is outside of all of those people made up
of senior technical folks and intel analysts and operators from
retired, out of the community, and they essentially peer review
what that case recommendation is.
They write their recommendations. That comes back to me. I
review it, we make a determination, and I will sign off one way
or the other and then that will go out as the case
determination.
Once we have an approved web portal to hang the
unclassified stuff, we would downgrade and declassify things
and put it out there.
In the meantime, we are putting a lot of these on our
classified web portal where we can then collaborate with the
rest of the community so they can see what is going on.
In a nutshell, that is the process. Because of that, that
takes time. Of those over 650, we have prioritized about half
of them to be of anomalous interesting value. Now we have to go
through those and go, how much do I have actual data for,
because if all I have is an operator report that says ``I saw
X, Y, or Z, my assessment is A, B, or C,'' that is not really
sufficient.
That is a good place to start, but I have to have data. I
have to have radar data. I have to have EO data. I have to have
thermal data. I have to have overhead data, and we need to look
at all that.
Now, from a big picture perspective, that is all still very
valuable data and we are looking at applying a lot of things--
new tools, analytic tools, like natural language processing. I
can go across all of those reports and look for commonalities.
How many of them are being described as round spherical
objects that are maneuvering? How many of them are not
maneuvering? How many of them seem to have a plume to it or
note? That is also going to be very valuable to give us more of
a global picture and a trends analysis of what are we seeing
and help us get to the determination.
To go back to your question, ma'am, this next quarterly
report will be coming out here pretty soon. Our next annual
report you all have given us--moved it up to June, July--we are
going to be having that done about that timeframe and we will
be combining a whole number of reports into that one.
I think we are currently sitting at around--if I remember
correctly, we are around 20 to 30-ish are about halfway through
that analytic process. A handful of them have made it all the
way out to the other side, gone through peer review. We have
got case closure reports done and signed.
We are going to get faster as we get more people on board
and we get more of the community tools to automate some of the
analysis that has to be done.
Senator Gillibrand. Thank you, Dr. Kirkpatrick.
Senator Ernst?
Senator Ernst. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Dr. Kirkpatrick, the Office of the Director of National
Intelligence (ODNI) annual threat assessment states that
China's space activities are designed to erode United States
influence across military, technological, economic, and
diplomatic spheres.
Likewise, Russia will remain a key space competitor. In the
course of your work, have you become aware of any Chinese or
Russian technical advancements to surveil or attack United
States interests?
Dr. Kirkpatrick. That is a great question. Part of what we
have to do as we go through these, especially the ones that
show signatures of advanced technical capabilities, is
determine if there is a foreign nexus. That is really hard if
what we observe does not have a Chinese or Russian flag on the
side of it.
Now, I think it is prudent to say of the cases that are
showing some sort of advanced technical signature of which we
are talking single percentages of the entire population of
cases we have. I am concerned about what that nexus is and I
have indicators that some are related to foreign capabilities.
We have to investigate that with our IC partners, and as we
get evidence to support that, that gets then handed off to the
appropriate IC agency to investigate. Again, it becomes an SEP
at that point.
Senator Ernst. Yes, somebody else's problem.
Dr. Kirkpatrick. Right.
Senator Ernst. Very good. Thank you. Yes.
Is it possible that the Chinese or Russian advanced
technologies could be causing some of these anomalous
behaviors? You said there seems to be some indicators. For us
today, could you describe a potential threat that might exist
out there if they are of foreign nexus?
Dr. Kirkpatrick. Sure. In order to do this research
appropriately we have to also be cognizant of what is the
state-of-the-art in development across the S&T community. What
are the
Defense Advanced Research Project Agencies (DARPAs) of the
world doing? What is the horizon scanning of emerging
technologies appropriate to this subcommittee?
What is happening out there, and if somebody could
accelerate that capability, how would that manifest itself and
what would it look like, and do those signatures match what we
are seeing?
There are emerging capabilities out there that in many
instances Russia and China--well, China in particular, are on
par or ahead of us in some areas.
Previously, I used to be the Defense Department's
intelligence officer for science and technical intelligence.
Our job was to look for ``what does all that look like?'' And
then my last several years, of course, in Space Command doing
space.
The adversary is not waiting. They are advancing and they
are advancing quickly. If I were to put on some of my old hats,
I would tell you they are less risk averse at technical
advancement than we are. They are just willing to try things
and see if it works.
Are there capabilities that could be employed against us in
both and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR)
and a weapons fashion? Absolutely. Do I have evidence that they
are doing it in these cases? No, but I have concerning
indicators.
Senator Ernst. Thank you. I appreciate that, and that is
why it is so important that you are working with the
intelligence community as well because you have the science,
the data background, but you also need to know from various
sources what adversaries may be working on, correct?
Okay. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you, Madam
Chair.
Senator Gillibrand. Senator Rosen?
Senator Rosen. Well, thank you, Chair Gillibrand, Ranking
Member Ernst. This is a really important hearing.
I would like to thank you, Dr. Kirkpatrick, for your
service to the country, and, as a former systems analyst
myself, I really appreciate your flowchart, the description of
the process, and particularly the trends analysis, going
forward, how that is going to help us and you talked about
language, the large LLMs--the large language models of
artificial intelligence. That is really going to help us in the
hunt forward, predictive analysis, I think, to some of your
point what we worry about.
I want to focus on Nevada because I want to talk about the
impact of UAPs on aviation safety. When it comes to
unidentified aerial phenomenal, one of my first concerns is
really about the safety of Nevada's military aviator.
We have airmen stationed at Nellis Air Force Base, naval
aviators flying at Naval Air Station Fallon, and servicemembers
from across the world training at the Nevada test and training
range. I know you know all this.
Unfortunately, the existence of advanced UAPs in the U.S.
airspace and over U.S. military installations is not a new
phenomenon. The Navy has officially acknowledged that between
2004 and 2021, 11 near misses occurred involving UAPs that
required pilot action and followup reports.
As a result, in 2019, the Navy established a protocol for
pilots to report on their dangerous encounters. Could you speak
to any ongoing efforts within DOD to ensure the safety of our
aviators with a potential UAP encounter, what is your
relationship with NORTHCOM, NORAD, SPACECOM when it comes to
this immediate real-time response and how--they are there right
there in the moment, right?
Dr. Kirkpatrick. Absolutely. That is a great question.
Let me start with my relationship with the commands are
very good. I just came back from sitting down with General
VanHerck and all the all the J staff out at NORTHCOM a couple
weeks ago, talking through exactly what we need to do to help
them get their arms around this.
We are also working very closely with the Joint Staff, and
the Joint Staff has just been very outstanding in helping work
through policy and guidance issues to the forces and to the
services. I would like to just make sure that we message back
to all of the operators the importance of their reporting and
the fact that you are about to get a bunch of new requirements
that we are issuing through the Joint Staff on all of the data
that we are going to need you to save and report back to us.
It is invaluable and we are working to try to take the most
advantage of that to learn what it is that we are trying to
mitigate.
To get directly to your question, the first thing that we
are doing is normalizing our reporting. We are standardizing
our reporting and the requirements associated with that.
Guidance from the Joint Staff, I think, goes out maybe this
week, maybe next week, that we have been working with them for
some months that does exactly what I just said. It gives them
timelines. It gives them requirements. It gives them ``here is
all the data you have to have, and you have got to retain it.''
The next thing that comes after that is a plan ord that
will go out to the commands for mitigation and response. So
there is a couple of things that we have to do.
One, I need to work with the commands and with the IC and
outside of our DOD and IC partners to extend our collection
posture targeted at some of these key areas that you saw on
that heat map that have a lot of activity so that we can turn
on extra collection when an operator sees something.
Part of this is generating as a response function in what
we call a tactic technique and procedure for an operator when
he sees something, calls back to the operations floor. They can
turn on additional collection. What does that collection look
like? How do I bring all that together so I can get more data
on what is that thing?
Senator Rosen. Can I ask really quickly----
Dr. Kirkpatrick. Sure.
Senator Rosen.--do you have the authorities you need to
extend your collection posture between agencies or branches of
the military? That seems to me to maybe be a sticking point. I
know my time is just about up.
I would love to followup about your risk management
methodologies for some of these. But do you need any
authorities that you do not have to get the data you need?
Dr. Kirkpatrick. There are some authorities that we need.
We currently are operating under title 10 authorities, but we
have good relationships across the other agencies. Having
additional authorities for collection tasking, counter-
intelligence----
Senator Rosen. That is something----
Mr. Kirkpatrick.--those are all things that would be
helpful, yes.
Senator Rosen. Thank you.
Senator Gillibrand. To followup, Dr. Kirkpatrick, will you
help us write that language so we can put it in the defense
bill this year so that we know what authorities you need?
Dr. Kirkpatrick. We can do that.
Senator Gillibrand. Thank you.
We are going to start a second round. If you want to stay
you can ask another round. I have at least three more
questions.
Senator Rosen. I have about a million more questions.
Senator Gillibrand. Do you want to go right now, in case
you have to leave?
Senator Rosen. I feel like I do.
Senator Gillibrand. Yes, go ahead.
Senator Rosen. If you could do that, that would be great. I
am going to stay on the drones issue because, obviously, of the
Air Force Base. We talked about those in--the last category is
the Chinese spy balloon. It did cross through the United States
airspace, shot down by a Sidewinder missile fired from an F-22.
Sidewinders costs us close to half a million dollars each.
Given the cost of these missiles, the cost per flight, all of
these other things, like I said, a followup from the
authorities or methodologies to data collection. They can help
us in other ways.
How do you think we can develop a sustainable, affordable
response to UAPs where we need to that definitely violate our
airspace every chance that they can get because they are
adversaries. They want this information.
What do you think some cost effective measures might be
that we can get what we need out of that or take them down,
whatever the appropriate measure is? Let us put it that way.
Dr. Kirkpatrick. That is actually wrapped into the plan ord
that we are working with Joint Staff to send out. What do the
commands need from both a capabilities perspective for kinetic
and nonkinetic engagements, what are the response functions of
the particular wings or Navy, what have you, and then what
authorities do they need?
One of the challenges that we have seen is there is an
authorities issues with the owners, operators of those ranges
that they need to work through and we are working that with the
Joint Staff and the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD).
Big picture, we need to do all that. If you want to get
down to the specifics for--there are nonkinetic options to
engage pretty much everything whether it is electronic warfare,
whether it is laser technologies----
Senator Rosen. That is where this data----
Dr. Kirkpatrick. That is right.
Senator Rosen. Having the good data collection, predictive
analytics, you can----
Dr. Kirkpatrick. Correct. Inform----
Senator Rosen.--possibly make some assumptions on
possibilities.
Dr. Kirkpatrick. That is right, and we will inform
recommendations back to the Department on here is what could
work, here is what we have seen work, here is what does not
work.
Senator Rosen. Thank you so much. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Appreciate it.
Senator Gillibrand. Thank you very much.
I just want to just talk a little bit about your logistics,
who you report to, how that is going, whether you need
different reporting lines.
By congressional legislation, your office is
administratively located with the Office of the Under Secretary
of Defense for Intelligence Security (OUSD(I&S)), but you are
not substantively subordinate to the Under Secretary.
Rather, you are a direct report to the Deputy Secretary.
Are you taking direction directly from the Deputy Secretary?
Are you able to meet and brief the Deputy Secretary? Is the
office of OUSD(I&S) working with you to have the right
framework?
Dr. Kirkpatrick. OUSD(I&S) and the--I currently report to
OUSD(I&S) until they come up with the plan for how they are
going to implement legislation.
DOD and DNI are working through that now. I would have to
refer you back to OUSD(I&S) on what their plan is.
Senator Gillibrand. Do I need to update your reporting
structure in the next defense bill or is this something that
you think will work its way out or does it need further
clarity?
Dr. Kirkpatrick. I think they are planning on coming back
to you with an answer on what that plan is, and I think at
t]hat time that will inform what you want to do.
Senator Gillibrand. Okay. Thank you.
As you know, Dr. Kirkpatrick, Congress has mandated that
your office establish a discoverable and accessible electronic
method for potential witnesses of UAP incidents and potential
participants in Government UAP-related activities to contact
your office and tell their stories.
Congress also set up a process whereby people are subject
to nondisclosure agreements (NDAs) preventing them from
disclosing what they may have witnessed or participated in
could tell you what they know without risk of retribution or
violation of their NDAs.
Have you submitted a public-facing website product for
approval to your superiors, and how long has it been under
review?
Dr. Kirkpatrick. I have. We submitted the first version of
that before Christmas.
Senator Gillibrand. Do you have an estimate from them when
they will respond and when you will have feedback on that?
Dr. Kirkpatrick. No, I do not.
Senator Gillibrand. Okay. We will author a letter asking
for that timely response to your superiors.
When do you expect that you will establish a public-facing
discoverable and access portal for people to use to contact
your office as the law requires?
Dr. Kirkpatrick. I would like to, first, say thank you all
very much for referring the witnesses that you have thus far to
us. I appreciate that. We have brought in nearly 2 dozen so
far. It has been very helpful.
I would ask that you continue to do that until we have an
approved plan. We have a multi-phased approach for doing that
that we have been socializing and have submitted for approval
sometime. Once that happens, then we should be able to push all
that out and get this a little more automated.
Senator Gillibrand. Great.
Dr. Kirkpatrick. What I would ask, though, is as you all
continue to refer to us and refer witnesses to us I would
appreciate if you do that. Please try to prioritize the ones
that you want to do because we do have a small research staff
dealing with that.
Senator Gillibrand. Thank you. Do you have any plans for
public engagement that you want to share now that you think it
is important that the public knows what the plan is?
Dr. Kirkpatrick. We have a number of public engagement
recommendations, according to our strategic plan. All of those
have been submitted for approval. They have to be approved by
OUSD(I&S). We are waiting for approval to go do that.
Senator Gillibrand. Okay. I will follow up on that.
My last question is about the integration of department's
UAP operations, research, analysis, and strategic
communications. During the recent UAP incidents over North
America it did not appear that you were allowed to play that
role.
Do you agree that the public perception is generally that
you and your office did not appear to play a major role in the
Department's response to the detection of objects over North
America?
What can you tell us that is going on behind the scenes
from your perspective, and in the after action assessment
process, is there awareness that there is a need to operate
differently in the future and a commitment to doing so?
Dr. Kirkpatrick. When the objects were first detected, I
got called by Joint Staff leadership to come in late one night
to review events as they were unfolding and to give them an
assessment based on what we knew at that time.
I did that. I worked with the director of Joint Staff, the
J2 and the J3 that night and over the couple of following days
on what are the types of things that we are tracking from an
unidentified object perspective, what data bases do we use
those sorts of things for known objects, known tracking.
Beyond that, the response I would have to refer you back to
the White House for the decision on how they did the response.
We did not play a role in what you would respond other than
that initial advice on what we are seeing and how we are seeing
it.
Senator Gillibrand. Thank you.
Senator Ernst?
Senator Ernst. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Dr. Kirkpatrick, I know that your office has gotten a lot
of attention recently and, of course, any new agency there
tends to be a push to increase size and funding. We want to
make sure that you are able to meet your goals.
What I also need to ensure is that we are not duplicating
or replicating existing functions and creating redundancy
within DOD and the interagency.
What steps are you taking right now to make sure that your
particular office and function is unique to any of the other
agencies that might be involved in these types of cases?
Dr. Kirkpatrick. Yes, that is a great question.
I would like to lay down--here is my mission and my goal
and my vision here. The vision at some point in the future, you
should not need an AARO.
If I am successful in what I am doing, we should be able to
normalize everything that we are doing into existing processes,
functions, agencies, and organizations and make that part of
their mission and their role.
Right now, the niche that we form is really going after the
unknowns. I think you articulated it early on, this is a hunt
mission for what might somebody be doing in our backyard that
we do not know about.
Well, that is what we are doing, but at some point we
should be able to normalize that. That is why it is so
important the work we are doing with Joint Staff to normalize
that into DOD policy and guidance.
We are bringing in all of our interagency partners. So NASA
is providing a liaison for us. I have FBI liaison. I have OSI
liaison. I have service liaisons. Half of my staff come from
the IC. Half of my staff come from other scientific and
technical backgrounds. I have DOE.
What we are trying to do is ensure, again, as I make UAP
into SEP they get handed off to the people that that is their
mission to go do, so that we are not duplicating that.
I am not going to go chase the Chinese high-altitude
balloon, for example. That is not my job. It is not an unknown
and it is not anomalous anymore. Now it goes over to them.
Senator Ernst. Very good. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Senator Gillibrand. Thank you.
I want to just followup on the filters for surveillance.
Outside observers have speculated that DOD sets filters on
certain sensors to eliminate objects that are moving really
fast or slow, because what we are looking for militarily are
conventional aircraft and missiles. UAP that does not fit into
these programs would thereby be weeded out and never noticed.
This speculation was proven to be true during the UAP
incidents over North America where DOD publicly acknowledged
that we were able to start seeing these UAPs only when we
opened up these filters.
Obviously, our military operators cannot be overloaded with
objects that are not conventional aircraft or missiles. Can you
nonetheless make sure that the raw data is being captured and
subsequently processed so that your office knows what is really
out there, and is that going to cost money? Will you expect to
pay for that money out of AARO's budget?
Dr. Kirkpatrick. One of the key tenets that we are trying
to do in our science plan is understand what those signatures
are. We get all the raw, for example, radar data prior to the
scrubbing and filtering to allow it to enter into our weapon
systems and our detection systems.
We are now taking all that data and cross correlating it to
what pilots are saying they are seeing or other observations
from other operators.
What that allows us to do is then see if there are any
signatures in that data that I can pull out, generate what we
will call automatic target recognition algorithms that allow us
to then use that signature associated with a observed UAP
whatever that UAP may be.
We will then make those recommendations of what those
changes should be back to the Department. The Deputy Secretary
asked me last October to make those recommendations, what
changes do we need to make to radars, to platforms, to
detection systems and algorithms, to pull on those algorithms
and make those changes. That is going to take some time.
That is where the research and development comes in. It is
not instantaneous. I will not say a lot of the things that fall
outside of the ranges of those filters have been identified by
people in the loop and you cannot have people in the loop all
the time. It is just not cost effective.
Part of our budget is working through what does that look
like and then making those recommendations back to the big
program offices for them to put into--changes in acquisition.
Senator Gillibrand. My last question is about the academic
community. Can you give us an update on how you collaborate
with the academic community and how the independent study being
done by NASA complements AARO's work?
Dr. Kirkpatrick. Sure.
Two questions, so I will try to make it quick. In 1979,
Carl Sagan said extraordinary claims require extraordinary
evidence. I would go one step further and I would say
extraordinary claims require not only extraordinary evidence
but extraordinary science and so how do you do that?
You do that with the scientific method. As AARO is
developing and implementing its science plan, it has to do so
grounded in a solid foundation of scientific theory across the
entire range of hypotheses that have been presented for what
UAP are.
That range spans adversary breakthrough technology, on one
hand, known objects and phenomena in the middle, all the way to
the extreme theories of extraterrestrials.
All of that has physics-based signatures associated with
it, whether it is theoretical from the academic community known
from things like hypersonic weapons or adversary breakthrough
technologies, as we have talked about before, or the known
objects that we have to go measure.
The idea is across that entire range, you have to come up
with peer-reviewed scientific basis for all of it. The academic
community plays a very big role on one end of the spectrum, the
intelligence community on the other end of the spectrum, and
then measurement in the middle.
Once I have those signatures identified in validated peer-
reviewed documents, then I have something to point to for all
that data because all that data is going to match one of those
signatures, and then I can go, ``well, it is that and not that
or it is that,'' and that helps us go through all that.
Where NASA comes in, and the study that they are doing,
which I am supporting, is really looking at the unclassified
data sources that might be used to augment our classified data
sources to understand if there is a signature there we can pull
on. Very similar to the radars but civil capability.
For example, we have a lot of climate science satellites,
for example, that look at Earth. Lots of them. How many of
those is the data valuable in seeing these kinds of objects?
The challenge in that is those platforms do not necessarily
have the resolution you need.
If you remember the slide I put up there with the trends,
the size of the objects we are looking for are typically
reported to be 1 to 4 meters.
The resolution of many of the climate science civil
satellites is much larger than that, which means you would have
a hard time picking out something that is smaller than a pixel
on the imagery on the data.
That is not to say all of it is not useful, and there are
ways of pulling through that data and going through. That is
what NASA is focused on right now is what is--what are some
other data sources that could be used.
In addition, things like open source and crowd sourcing of
data--we are exploring public-private partnerships, ma'am, as
you know--we have talked about it in the past--to look at is
there a way to smartly crowd source additional data that might
be useful to augment some of my classified sources and what
does that look like and how would we do it so that we are not
overwhelmed by everybody who wants to take a picture of
everything.
Senator Gillibrand. Thank you.
Is there anything else you would like to tell the Committee
before we close, or do you have another round?
Senator Ernst. No.
Senator Gillibrand. Yes. Do you have anything else you
would like to tell the Committee before we close?
Dr. Kirkpatrick. Thank you very much for allowing us to
come and share a little bit of insight into what AARO is up to
and what we are doing.
I hope to be able to share a whole lot more in the future.
We have a lot of work to do. If you do not hear from me outside
it is because we have got a lot of work to do.
Senator Gillibrand. Thank you so much, Dr. Kirkpatrick.
Thank you for the hearing.
Dr. Kirkpatrick. Thank you.
Audience Member: Excuse me. I drove 600 miles to come here.
I presented a book to David Spergel, who I know is associated
with the gentleman here. I do not have flying saucers. We just
saw the first one. They had no explanation for it. I would like
to provide the evidence for it. It is on my video, as well as
ancient evidence of cave drawings that look identical to that
disc.
What that would tell us is what [inaudible] and the
corporal has been saying. Assuming that they are coming here is
the assumption. A terrible thing to do. If we can prove that
they have always existed, then they are not changing in model,
size, appearance, then it would answer the question of these
people in the sky have always [inaudible].
I have had to struggle trying to get the evidence we saved,
and I did contact Neil deGrasse Tyson and he informed me with
an email, which I put in my book and about these crafts. I find
them and film them and send them to everybody I can.
He told me to literally take them to the proper authorities
and that I could get my evidence looked at and that is what I
am doing today. I drove all the way from Ohio, Mr. Kirkpatrick.
Senator Gillibrand. Dr. Kirkpatrick is the perfect person
to give your evidence to----
Audience Member: Yes, I appreciate it.
Senator Gillibrand. Eventually, we will have a website
where you could just submit it and not have to go 600 miles.
Today, since you are here, please submit your evidence to Dr.
Kirkpatrick and if you have copies we will take your copies.
Audience Member: I have footage. I have grown up in
Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Audience Member: Same here.
Audience Member: I have on my phone three different
examples of glowing dots flying in circles or going over Sandia
Labs and Kirkland Air Force Base.
Senator Gillibrand. Yes. Yes.
Audience Member: They have come down frequently and
consistently and loiter over our advanced weapons and
manufacturing industry, monitor it using advanced means like
the----
Senator Gillibrand. Yes. We are very interested in that
data.
Audience Member: The vehicles tend to be about 10 meters in
size and the data that Dr. Kirkpatrick gave about the
signatures of 1 to 3 gigahertz is the propulsion field
interacting with the water in the atmosphere.
The higher gigahertz range comes from the effects of the
propulsion field reducing the initial mass of the craft so they
can do these outstanding maneuvers of [inaudible] degrees or
rotating and flying off at hypersonic velocity.
There is knowledge within the weapons industry. More people
need to come forward. We need to pull up engineers out of
Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, and allow them the freedom to speak
and stop the secrecy. Thank you for hearing me.
Senator Gillibrand. My office can be a clearinghouse for
this information.
Audience Member. Yes, Ms. Gillibrand. I have got video of
it.
Senator Gillibrand. If you want to submit to me the names
and the people that you want, Dr. Kirkpatrick has contacts. I
can do that, and any video that you want to give us, eventually
we will have a platform so this can be done automatically. But
I could [inaudible] and give it to Dr. Kirkpatrick. If you have
it on a DVD----
Audience Member. I want to thank you.
Senator Gillibrand.--to get it to him directly.
Audience Member. I am a marine, so my hearing is a little
blunt. If I could leave this with you----
Senator Gillibrand. Yes.
Audience Member.--and somebody can give it to Dr.
Kirkpatrick would be great.
Senator Gillibrand. Yes.
Audience Member. That is my whole point. I just leave it on
this desk?
Senator Gillibrand. Yes. Yes. I will take it----
Audience Member. I appreciate it. Thank you so much for
looking into it.
Senator Gillibrand. Do you have a card? We have to give our
business cards to the Chair. The first draft and then
[inaudible] are you done with it?
Staff. Sure.
Senator Gillibrand. Yes. Why don't you take it since you
are actually going to--I am going to give it to Dr. Kirkpatrick
and then [inaudible].
[Whereupon, at 12:08 p.m., the Subcommittee adjourned.]
[all]