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information, therefore, as exciting as it may be, has to be relegated to what reporters call "deep background." It may help inform how one views the issue, but not centrally. It can nudge us in a certain direction, or inspire future inquiries. It's all very intriguing, but always just out of reach. I am willing to take such sensitive information seriously when two or more credible, qualified sources report the same thing independently of each other —for example, when men from different branches of government who don't know each other, with years separating their statements, provide essentially the same reports. And concerning the question of a secret government research program on UFOs, this has occurred. A number of reliable sources have told me about their each conversations with high-level military contacts who say they are aware of a deeply hidden program for UFO research, one which is so closely guarded that even people at the highest levels of the military are denied access to it. Some of these independent accounts include names and specific details. Much case evidence over the years has also pointed to the plausibility of this kind of program, although it can't authoritatively be determined one way or the other. x ce Some of the anonymous sources I refer to include mainstream scientists, all Ph.D.s with impressive, lengthy resumes, some of whom have worked for the CIA or other intelligence agencies—an astrophysicist, a physicist, an astronomer, among others—and a NASA aerospace engineer. One military source, Commander Will Miller, U.S. Navy (Ret.), has gone on the record while keeping certain specifics confidential. He agreed to reply to a series of questions I presented to him in late 2009 about the question of government secrecy. Although still very active, Miller, who now lives in Florida, retired from active duty in 1994, the same year he was awarded the Department of Defense Meritorious Service Medal. As a naval officer and decorated Vietnam combat veteran, he had his own sighting from a Navy vessel while serving near Vietnam. He later became a senior Department of Defense command center operations action officer, a senior intelligence 1, 1 eo oN Ne. analyst, and a program manager for DoD future operations programs such as WWIII planning, nonlethal weapons systems, and future space systems. He was an advisor to U.S. Space Command and U.S. Southern Command and its international counterdrug operations, Joint Interagency Task Force East. As an expert in special contingency operations, Miller held a Top Secret clearance with Sensitive Compartmented Information (SCI) access, meaning he had access to sensitive information whose handling is restricted one step further than the Top Secret classification, including that which is related to topics and programs not publicly acknowledged. While an officer on active duty throughout the 1980s, Miller did not hide his interest in UFOs. "I was simply a concerned officer who studied the subject, looked at the facts, and talked to people in the military," he says. "People with personal knowledge would seek me out because they occurred. A number of reliable