President Donald Trump’s administration published a new set of declassified U.S. government records on unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAPs) on Friday, releasing videos, diplomatic cables, and astronaut testimony spanning decades. The documents, posted to a retro-styled Pentagon website, represent the latest phase of a declassification effort that Congress mandated in 2022, but which Trump accelerated after teasing a major document release months ago. “Whereas previous Administrations have failed to be transparent on this subject, with these new Documents and Videos, the people can decide for themselves,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
The material includes a 1994 State Department cable from the U.S. Embassy in Tajikistan. It details how a Tajik pilot and three Americans saw a brightly lit UAP over Kazakhstan that was “making 90 degree turns, doing corkscrews and maneuvering in circles at great rates of speed.” A separate 2023 military report from the Aegean Sea described a UAP flying just above the ocean and making “multiple 90-degree turns at an estimated 80 mph.”
The tranche also features a 1969 debriefing of the Apollo 11 crew. Astronaut Buzz Aldrin recalled seeing an object close to the moon he described as “sizeable” and a “fairly bright light source” the crew suspected might be a laser. A NASA photograph from the 1972 Apollo 17 mission showing three dots in a triangular formation was included, with the Pentagon noting a new preliminary analysis suggested the anomaly could be a “physical object.”
More than 20 video files captured by military sensors from locations including Syria, Japan, and North America were published. They range from fast-moving specks to a football-shaped object over the East China Sea in 2022. The most recent video, from January 1 of this year, appears to show two circular lights flying against a dark backdrop in North America. A written report from a service member in the Middle East described an object “shaped as a bouncy ball” that maintained a speed of 483 mph for at least seven minutes over Syria in 2023 before being determined benign.
Not everyone welcomed the unfiltered release. Sean Kirkpatrick, the former director of the Pentagon’s All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office, said one widely shared 2013 video likely showed nothing more than a hot jet engine producing a diffraction pattern. He said there is “nothing unexpected” in the release and warned it will “only serve to fuel more speculation, conspiracy and arm-chair pseudoscience.” A 2024 Pentagon report found no evidence the U.S. government had ever confirmed a sighting of alien technology, a conclusion left unchanged by the new files.
Congressional Republicans who have pressed for greater disclosure praised the move but signaled more is coming. Rep. Tim Burchett, R-Tenn., thanked Trump for “keeping his word” and added, “transparency won’t all happen at once.” Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, R-Fla., said 46 videos identified by whistleblowers will be released later. The Sol Foundation, a UAP research group, called for legislation to force a “thorough” review of classified records, with executive director Peter Skafish and retired Rear Adm. Tim Gallaudet arguing that more steps are needed to end “decades of secrecy.”