The Robertson Panel report ('Durant report')
The written findings of the CIA's January 1953 science panel, known as the Durant report after F. C. Durant of Arthur D. Little, an associate member of the panel (the author's name is redacted in the CIA copy), and released in stages from 1966.
1953 CE · 38.90, -77.04 · status: official
The account
The report concluded that UFO reports showed no threat and no need to revise scientific concepts. It recommended debunking through mass media, and watching civilian UFO groups for possible subversive use. Its release fuelled accusations of a cover-up. The CIA copy (CIA-RDP81R00560R000100030027-0) is a 16 February 1953 memo to the Assistant Director for Scientific Intelligence. The author's name is redacted. Part II describes itself as comments 'inappropriate for inclusion in the formal report'. It shows that the panel disagreed: one member held that extraterrestrial artifacts, if real, would be 'of immediate and great concern'. The panel also rejected a link between radioactivity and UFO sightings at Palomar (1949) and Los Alamos (1950-51), blaming the instruments. The copy was declassified on 21 January 1975.
The sceptical view
Read in full, the report is a Cold War worry about clogged warning channels, not evidence of hidden knowledge.
Connections in the atlas
- The Robertson Panel report
- The Robertson Panel report
- The CIA's 1952 flying-saucer study (Chadwell memos)
- ▶ The government UFO files
- The Robertson Panel
- Washington D.C. flap