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numerous listeners with its all-too-realistic dramatization of an invasion by Martian spaceships, presented as if it were a live, unfolding news report. People actually fled their New Jersey homes - the site of the alleged invasion—and many others were convinced that the Earth was indeed 1 “4 +404 ean) 1 1 1 : : 1 something inexplicably terrifying. Those impacted by this would have a harder time trusting future reports of unidentified flying objects, and in this sense, a self-imposed discomfort with UFO reports was reinforced at the very outset. But in those early years and into the 1950s, we were in our infancy when dealing with the possible meanings of the UFO phenomenon. Military and intelligence agencies were preoccupied with the task of trying to discern what these things might be in the context of the Cold War. The U.S. Air Force coped with public concerns by trying its best to explain away all UFOs, and if it couldn't, by pretending that it could. This incipient denial, bolstered by the 1953 Robertson Panel and then strengthened by the 1968 Condon report, has become even more entrenched over time. Perhaps as we learned more about UFOs after the close of Project Blue Book, gaining a clearer picture of at least their characteristics and behavior, we progressively had more reason to be worried about their threatening aspects. When J. Allen Hynek battled the problem of the taboo in the 1980s, he noted that officials had "a powerful desire to do nothing." [1] But he also added ominously that "history has shown that in time the dam breaks, sometimes cataclysmically." [2] At this point, we have the option of encouraging the dam to break— slowly and methodically, rather than cataclysmically, if possible. We must recognize that the potential dangers of acknowledging and investigating UFOs are real. The fears are understandable, and even justified; and yes, the repercussions could be socially destabilizing. But no matter how this enigma is eventually resolved, the American political establishment is monopolizing any decision making for the time being. Official bodies within other countries have obviouslv not been 10 toa ee ee + of 4 overcome by projected fears, nor do they think that any risks inherent in discovery justify ignoring UFOs. They are already moving forward, and I suspect most of these officials believe it is more dangerous to ignore UFOs than it is to confront them. The majority of the American public, as shown by various polls, already recognize the reality of UFOs, and they don't appear to be traumatized about it. Rather, they seem to want to know more. For the benefit of the political establishment, I believe that bringing any and all fears to consciousness is our only choice. When we decide, as a society, to honestly deal with UFOs, we will be entering into a large-scale "therapeutic" process that will diminish, or even ultimately extinguish, the power of the forces sustaining the taboo. By finally shedding light on these dynamics, we will disarm them. This is perhaps the only way for all of us to under attack and we all would die. The broadcast tapped into an entirely different kind of fear than Americans had ever encountered before,