A set of slides showing supposed UFOs have been found amongst the mass of documents released by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden.

The three slides were included in a Powerpoint presentation prepared by the British spy agency GCHQ (aka Government Communications Headquarters) that contained 50 uncaptioned images.

The images have caused considerable speculation amongst conspiracy-theorists, UFOlogists, and followers of Mulder and Scully. 

Author of Haynes UFO Investigations Manual, Nigel Watson has said the photographs are old, well-known, and probably fakes.

“The presentation features three UFO pictures, on slides 35 to 37. The first is a black and white picture of a UFO over Redbud, Illinois, taken on 23 April 1950, the second a screenshot of a UFO video by Arturo Robles Gil filmed in Mexico and the third was taken on 01 August 2011 by a holidaymaker at Black Head, Trenarren near St. Austell, Cornwall.

“They have been explained respectively by sceptics as a hub cap thrown in the air, a deflated mylar balloon and an out-of-focus seagull taking a poo.”

 

 
Watson believes the slides are not conclusive proof of alien visitations, rather they are possible evidence of government agencies using the “fear” of UFOs for “mind control” purposes.

“Government agencies are still aware of the power of the belief in UFOs, and that they are willing to use the Internet to exploit these beliefs.

“Such deception can be used as a means of covering-up more mundane terrestrial activities (like the testing of secret aircraft or military exercises) or to undermine the credibility of UFOlogists.

“The overall point of the presentation is to discuss how the Internet and modern media can be used to discredit people and to spread deception. Unfortunately, there is no explanatory text with the UFO pictures, so we can only speculate about what point they were being used to make.”

In other words, the slides are more likely to be part of some form of misdirection used by GCHQ to distract from more important issues. For example, shall we say a government agency attempting to discredit Edward Snowden as reliable source of information?

Nah!

Then again, it all could be part of some geeky fanboy’s pet project for UFO Con.
 

 
On the whole, these are far more likely answers than some of the recent theories coming, for example, out of Iran’s “semi-official” Fars News agency, which according to the Washington Post claimed:

The United States government has been secretly run by a “shadow government” of space aliens since 1945. Yes, space aliens. The alien government is based out of Nevada and had previously run Nazi Germany. It adds, for timeliness, that the controversial NSA programs are actually a tool for the aliens to hide their presence on Earth and their secret agenda for global domination. This is all asserted as incontrovertible fact with no caveats.

 
For what little it’s worth, I believe all UFO can be explained as primarily human-made phenomena. I think it preposterous that alien intelligence would travel thousands of light years to anally probe some country bumpkin from Moosefart, Montana, whose IQ is lower than that of his livestock. I think most UFO phenomena is mere misdirection, aimed at keeping the public “Distracted from distraction by distraction.”

However, if you do think “Spooky” Fox Mulder is right, well you may be intrigued by the following.
 

Bonus: Edward Snowden German interview as repeated on BcFM Feb 7th, 2014 with Tony Gosling and Martin Summers.
 
Via Yahoo News