Edgar Mitchell: "We Are Not Alone'

Former Apollo astronaut Edgar Mitchell, in a speech at the National Press Club on Monday, April 20^th, claimed that extra terrestrial life exists and that various governments, including the United States, are covering it up.

Edgar Mitchell made a similar claim almost a year ago during a radio interview in Great Britain. Edgar Mitchell, in his National Press Club speech, expounded on stories of an alleged UFO crash near a military base in Roswell, New Mexico in 1947. The alleged crash, denied by the Air Force, has entered into UFO lore and even popular culture as proof that not only do UFOs, which is to say space craft from other worlds visiting Earth exist, but there is a secret cover up. Edgar Mitchell comes from Roswell, New Mexico.

The idea of a secret government cover up of UFO visitations has become so pervasive that the idea has become part of the UFO mythology. The reason that governments would want to cover up UFO visitations varies from "avoiding public panic" to concealing some kind of politically explosive embarrassment.

Popular culture is rife with the theme of UFOs and the secret government cover up. The theme was used to good effect on the long running television show, the X Files, which depicted an FBI agent dedicated to finding proof of alien life beyond the Earth and revealing the secret government cover up, which seemed to involve collaboration of some sort of a planned alien invasion.

The notion of a secret government cover up of UFO visitations seems to fall down when one looks at motives. There would seem to be more incentive to let the public in on the secret than in concealing it.

Imagine what would happen if, at any time in our recent history, the President of the United States had come on network TV and announced, "My fellow Americans, we are not alone in the universe."

One almost certain effect is that the sky would be the limit for the budgets of not only NASA but military space programs. Even if there were an official government cover up of UFO visitations, that would be incentive enough for someone to leak the information to the media.

Government conspiracies are very hard to keep secret in any case, considering the number of people who have to be in on it. Whether its secret government cover ups of UFOs or the Kennedy Assassination, there are just too many people who have to be in on it for the conspiracy to work. Just ask the people in the Nixon administration who committed Watergate.

So, with respect to Edgar Mitchell, and American hero who walked on the Moon, one would have to respond to his claims with a little bit of skepticism.

Source: Former astronaut: Man not alone in universe, CNN, April 20th, 2009

Apollo Astronaut Edgar Mitchell Claims UFO Cover Up, Mark R. Whittington, Associated Content, July 24th, 2008