Nick Pope on UFOs
Here’s a link to a good, new interview with former British Ministry of Defense employee, Nick Pope. Between 1991 and 1994, Nick was tasked with handling UFO reports for a department of the MoD known then as the Secretariat of the Air Staff.
In 1996, Nick’s book Open Skies, Closes Minds was published and told the story of his time in the division and the cases that came across his desk.
I used to see Nick quite regularly back in the 90s at gigs and TV shoots across the UK, and he always struck me as an honest, open sort who told it as it was: yes, he believed that a small percentage of UFOs were extraterrestrial in origin; however, he did not think that the MoD was hiding firm evidence of an other-worldly presence. Rather, he believed, the MoD had a lot of reports (some significant, some less so) but nothing tangible that could be held up as definitive proof.
Needless to say, in some quarters Nick was portrayed as a British Fox Mulder, determined to get to the truth about what was known about the UFO issue at an official level; while others in ufology saw him as a real-life equivalent of The X-Files‘ “Cigarette Smoking Man” - a sinister character who was part of some high-level cover-up to distort the real picture.
Well, I have to say that personally I am of the opinion that certain, small elements of the world of British officialdom do know more about the UFO issue than Nick suspects; however, I still maintain that Nick was out of the loop with respect to any truly guarded, big secrets. In other words, he is telling it how he sees it.
I had many debates with Nick about this (and usually over a beer or several) when I was researching and writing my books A Covert Agenda and Cosmic Crashes and they were all cordial and illuminating - even though we often agreed to disagree on things.
Nick’s no longer with the MoD now, and his UFO work for the official world ceased in 1994; however, he played (and continues to play) a significant role in British ufology and did succeed in bringing the issue to a wider audience in the wake of the publication of Open Skies.
People may not agree with everything Nick says (and on the cover-up issue, I personally don’t - to a degree, anyway), but I have a sneaking suspicion that had Nick not entered the ufological arena back in the mid-90s, the subject would not have gained the interest (and particularly the media interest) that it did in those X-Files-dominated years.
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Oct 11 2007 
October 11th, 2007 at 1:27 pm
Very interesting interview.
Ok, so Pope thinks the British MoD doesn’t have any “smoking gun” hiding in some hangar. But what does he think about OTHER government, the americans or the russians for example? Does he think the yanks know more than what they tell us?
Was he in contact with people from other governments during his years of UFO analysis? Personnel or officials from USAF bases located in english territory perhaps?
And, BTW, why did he arrive to that particular job in the first place? Was that some kind of reward, or a sentence? Because from what I understand, he didn’t seem too thrill in the beginning about reviewing files about flying discs and little green men, Was that a stepping up or a sliding down in his career inside the MoD?
October 11th, 2007 at 2:42 pm
RPJ:
Around 1998 I interviewed Nick Pope about his investigation of a “Flying Triangle” style report that he had investigated in 1993.
He told me he approached Belgian authorities to get their opinions, as the Belgians had experienced a wave of Triangle events in 1989 and 1990.
He also told me an approach was made to US authorities who claimed no knowledge of the FT in terms of them being classified aircraft. But Nick P did say to me that the Americans kind of turned the question around and asked their own questions about the FTS - as a result of their own reports on US soil!
So he did liaise with people in overseas governments, at least. But that’s about the extent of my knowledge on his liaison with overseas nations.
I think he got the job basically because they tend to rotate people in and out of the various Secretariat offices to give them experience, and that was Nick’s office. i would stress that the UFO work only amounted to about 15 per cent of his weekly work.
It wasn’t a “UFO Office” as such. It was an office of the MoD that happened to spend a small amount of time looking at UFO reports in addition to its standard defence work.
October 11th, 2007 at 3:35 pm
I would stress that the UFO work only amounted to about 15 per cent of his weekly work.
Now that’s something worth mentioning, since most people (including me!) would have the impression that he investigated UFOs on a 24/7 basis.
October 11th, 2007 at 3:43 pm
RPJ:
No, that’s the thing that so many people in ufology dont realize - that the British Ministry of Defence has *never* had a UFO project like the US Projects Sign, Grudge, and Blue Book.
It was just a case of MoD civil servants looking at UFO reports that largely were sent in by mail from the general public.
And for the most part, none of the staff at that office ever left the office to investigate cases.
In other words, there was nothing like going out to locations, getting photos, interviewing witnesses in person, etc.