The Government’s UFO Disclosure Timeline

Term: Disclosure: the moment a government officially tells the public what it knows about UFOs or non-human intelligence.

Term: AARO: the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office, the Pentagon office that collects and analyzes UAP reports since July 2022.

Term: PURSUE: the Presidential Unsealing and Reporting System for UAP Encounters, the government program and website (war.gov/ufo) that has released UAP files since May 2026.

The Government’s UFO Disclosure Timeline

The U.S. government studied UFOs openly in the late 1940s, ended its public program in 1969, and returned to the subject in stages from 2017 to 2026. As of September 21, 2026, the Pentagon has published six releases of UAP files through its PURSUE website. The government has not confirmed extraterrestrial life or technology.

1947 to 1969: The Air Force studies UFOs

1947. Pilot Kenneth Arnold reports nine fast objects near Mount Rainier in June, and the press coins the name flying saucer. In July the Roswell Army Air Field announces a recovered flying disc, and the Army then says it was a weather balloon. A 1994 Air Force report attributed the debris to Project Mogul, a secret balloon program.

1947 to 1949. The Air Force opens Project Sign, followed by Project Grudge, its first UFO studies.

March 1952. Project Blue Book begins under Captain Edward Ruppelt. In July, radar operators at Washington National Airport and Andrews Air Force Base track unknown objects on two consecutive weekends.

January 1953. The CIA convenes the Robertson Panel. It finds no direct threat and recommends a program to reduce public interest in UFO reports.

December 17, 1969. Blue Book closes, after a University of Colorado study led by Edward Condon concluded further UFO study was not warranted. The Air Force reports 12,618 cases, with 701 listed as unidentified.

1970 to 2016: A long gap

2009 to 2012. Congress funds a secret Defense Intelligence Agency program called AAWSAP, also known as AATIP, at the request of Senator Harry Reid. It receives $22 million in total. AARO’s later history notes there was about a 40-year gap in UAP investigation programs between Blue Book and this effort.

2017 to 2021: The subject reaches Congress

December 16, 2017. The New York Times reveals AATIP and publishes Navy video of a 2004 encounter off California, later called Tic Tac. It is the first widely reported sign that the Pentagon had funded UFO research.

March 2019. The Navy creates a standard system for pilots to report unidentified aerial phenomena. The Air Force adopts it in November 2020.

April 27, 2020. The Pentagon officially releases three Navy videos known as FLIR1, Gimbal, and GoFast.

August 2020. The Pentagon creates the UAP Task Force.

June 25, 2021. The Director of National Intelligence releases a preliminary assessment of 144 reports from 2004 to 2021. It explains one, a large deflating balloon, and leaves 143 unexplained. It notes 18 incidents with unusual flight characteristics.

2022 to 2024: Offices, hearings, and a weaker law

May 17, 2022. The House Intelligence subcommittee holds the first public congressional UAP hearing in about 50 years.

July 15, 2022. The Deputy Secretary of Defense establishes AARO, in response to the fiscal year 2022 defense bill.

December 2022. The fiscal year 2023 defense bill writes AARO into law and changes the term to unidentified anomalous phenomena. It also orders a review of the historical record back to 1945.

July 26, 2023. Former Air Force intelligence officer David Grusch testifies under oath before a House subcommittee. He says the U.S. runs a decades-old retrieval and reverse-engineering program and has recovered non-human biologics. He says he has not seen any of it himself and relied on interviews with more than 40 witnesses. The Pentagon says it has found no verifiable information supporting those claims. Navy pilots Ryan Graves and David Fravor also testify about their own encounters.

July 2023. Senators Chuck Schumer and Mike Rounds introduce the UAP Disclosure Act as an amendment to the defense bill. It is modeled on the law that opened the JFK assassination records. It would create a review board and allow the government to seize private UAP materials.

September 2023. NASA’s independent study team publishes its report. NASA says it found no evidence that UAP are extraterrestrial and calls for better data.

December 22, 2023. The president signs the fiscal year 2024 defense bill. In negotiations, Congress had removed the review board and the seizure power. The final law keeps a UAP Records Collection at the National Archives. A weaker version of the Disclosure Act became law. The full act did not.

March 8, 2024. AARO releases Volume 1 of its historical record report. It finds no evidence that the government has held or reverse-engineered extraterrestrial technology, and says claims of such programs trace largely to a small group of believers.

November 2024. AARO’s annual report counts 757 new reports for May 2023 to June 2024 and repeats that it has found no evidence of extraterrestrial beings, activity, or technology. AARO’s director testifies to a Senate subcommittee on November 19.

2025 to 2026: The file releases

April 24, 2025. The National Archives releases the first records in its UAP Records Collection.

September 9, 2025. A House Oversight task force holds a hearing with whistleblowers. A congressman plays a video, dated October 30, 2024, that he says shows a Hellfire missile hitting an object off Yemen without stopping it. The Pentagon declined to comment on the video.

February 2026. Former President Barack Obama says on a podcast that aliens are real, then clarifies that he saw no evidence of contact and meant that the odds of life elsewhere are good. On February 19, President Donald Trump directs the Pentagon and other agencies to identify and release files on aliens, UAP, and UFOs.

May 8, 2026. The Pentagon launches PURSUE and posts the first batch of 162 files at war.gov/ufo. They include videos, photographs, witness reports, and Apollo-era astronaut transcripts. The Pentagon calls them unresolved cases and says the public can draw its own conclusions. The files do not confirm extraterrestrial life.

May 22, June 12, July 10, August 7, and September 18, 2026. The Pentagon posts five more releases, mostly military video, reports from the FBI, CIA, NASA, and the Department of Energy, and historical records.

July 2026. AARO releases its fiscal year 2025 annual report. It counts 319 new reports, resolves 114, and holds 1,870 cases in total. It again finds no evidence that the government or any private group has recovered or exploited material from UAP.

What the timeline shows

The government has moved from public studies to denial to a formal, funded process. Congress, the Pentagon, and the White House now treat UAP as a real subject. The files released so far show that pilots, service members, and sensors report objects they cannot identify.

The timeline also shows what has not happened. No release has confirmed extraterrestrial life or technology. Skeptics say many released items were already public or look like camera artifacts, balloons, or debris. Advocates say the government still holds far more. Both statements can be true at once.

In my book Disclosure: They Are Not Extraterrestrials, I argue that official disclosure will not settle what these things are, and that Scripture tells us to test any explanation we are given. The book is available on Amazon. You can find more of my work at ckqbooks.com.

Sources

AARO Historical Record Report, Volume 1 (March 2024) and Fiscal Year 2024 and 2025 annual reports (aaro.mil). Office of the Director of National Intelligence, Preliminary Assessment: Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (2021). 50 U.S.C. 3373. Roll Call, March 8, 2024. DefenseScoop, November 19, 2024, and July 2026. NPR, July 27, 2023, and February 20, 2026. Stars and Stripes, May 8, 2026. Pentagon PURSUE website, war.gov/ufo.