Minutes of the First Meeting of the Committee Set Up to Deal with "Flying Saucers" Sightings, 24 April 1952

DRB,
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Chairman:

Members:

Secretary:

For the benefit of those who were not present at the general meeting held on April 22nd, the Chairman opened the meeting with a brief resume of dicussions leading to the formation of this Committee and the terms of reference. He then tabled three books by Kehoe, Scully and Heard dealing with Flying Saucers sightings as worthy study as they give a fairly useful summary of the most important publically recorded sightings. These can be used in addition to newspaper reports.

S/L Bing tabled a report by the the RCAF relative to the USAF project of Flying Saucers. This report is to be duplicated by the RCAF and copies passed to the Secretary for distribution to the Committee members.

The question of the security classification of the work of the committee was then discussed. It was agreed that CONFIDENTIAL was sufficient, but that members should be cleared to SECRET to facilitate any exchange of information from international sources.

The Chairman stated that it would probably be better to divorce this work from the questionable title of "Flying Saucers", and thought that some name entirely without meaning such as "Project Theta" should be adopted. The Committee agreed in principle to this suggestion, with the exception that the project name is not to be used during exchange of information of an international character. Such "exchanges" are to be effected through established channels only. There being no further suggestions acceptable, the name "Project Theta" was adopted, subject to investigation by the Secretary as to the validity of the use and possible duplication of the name.

The possibility of obtaining U.S. data on a reciprocal basis was considered desirable and the Secretary was instructed to have a formal approach to this effect made through the DRB Member in Washington.

Consideration was given to the interrogation form presently in use by the RCAF. After discussion, it was agreed that the form should immediately be revised with accompanying instructions for its use. The revised form (copy attached) was drawn up and copies are to be distributed by the Secretary prior to the next meeting. The preparation of the instructions was divided among the members as follows:

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All Members to contribute to items 12, 13 and 18.

The Committee agreed to meet again on May 6th to finalize the interrogation form and pertinent instructions.