Lord Hill-Norton is a five-star Admiral and the former Head of the British Ministry of Defense who was kept in the dark about the UFO subject during his official capacities. In this short interview, he states that this subject has great significance and should no longer be denied and kept secret. He emphatically states, “…that there is a serious possibility that we are being visited — and have been visited for many years — by people from outer space, from other civilizations; that it behooves us to find out who they are, where they come from, and what they want. This should be the subject of rigorous scientific investigation, and not the subject of rubbishing by tabloid newspapers.”

I know a good bit about the Bentwaters incident. I’ve interviewed a number of the people who took part in it, and what I have decided after careful thought, is that there are only two explanations for what happened that night in Suffolk. The first is that the people concerned — including Colonel Halt, who was, at the time, the Deputy Commander of the Base, and a lot of his soldiers — claim that something from outside the Earth’s atmosphere landed at their air force base. They went and stood by it; they inspected it; they photographed it.

The following day they took tests on the ground where it had been and found radioactive traces; they reported this. Colonel Halt wrote a memorandum, which was sent to our Ministry of Defense. He has appeared on British television at least once, to my knowledge — possibly more often — in which he has repeated, effectively, what he said in that memorandum. What he said is what I have just described. That is one explanation — that it actually happened as Colonel Halt reported.

The other explanation is that it didn’t. In that case, one is bound to assume that Colonel Halt and all his men were hallucinating. My position is perfectly clear — either of those explanations is of the utmost defense interest. It has been reported and claimed — and I, myself, have raised it to ministers at the Defense Ministry in this country — that nothing they have been informed about regarding UFOs is of defense interest. Surely, to any sensible person, either of those explanations cannot fail to be of defense interest. That the Colonel of an American Air Force Base in Suffolk and his military men are hallucinating when there are nuclear-armed aircraft on the base — this must be of defense interest.

And, if indeed what he says took place, did take place — and why on Earth should he make it up — then, surely, the entry of a vehicle from outer space (and certainly not manmade) to a defense base in this country also cannot fail to be of defense interest. It simply isn’t any good for our ministers — and the Ministry of Defense in particular — to say that nothing took place that December night in Suffolk, or that it is not of defense interest. It simply isn’t true.

Since my name has become connected with UFO matters in quite a big way in this country, and in one or two other countries too, I have frequently been asked why a person of my background — a former Chief of the Defense Staff, a former Chairman of the NATO Military Committee — why I think there is a cover-up, or what the reasons may be for government’s wishing to cover up the facts about UFOs. A number of explanations have often been put forward. The most frequent, and perhaps the most plausible, is the government’s concern (which [is] primarily that of the United States, and that of my own country) over the public’s reaction if they [were] told the truth — which is that there are objects in our atmosphere which are technically miles in advance of anything that we can deploy, that we have no means of stopping them coming here, and that we have no defense against them, should they be hostile.

I believe governments fear that if they did disclose those facts, people would panic: people would rush about and jam switchboards like they did that famous day in New Jersey, when there was a spoof that the Martians [had] landed — people will go mad, and they will jump up and down. I don’t believe that at all — I’ve said so in print. I do not believe that people today, in the 21st century, are going to panic at that sort of information. After all, they have put up with the introduction of nuclear weapons and the destruction of two Japanese cities 50 years ago. They take as a matter of course that we can land vehicles on Mars — land to the precise instant, forecast years before. So why should they panic? They are much more interested in doing the pools or the lottery. They would shrug their shoulders and take it as a matter of course. Anyway, they don’t trust politicians, in my experience.

What I’d like to say is that there is a serious possibility that we are being visited — and have been visited for many years — by people from outer space, from other civilizations; that it behooves us to find out who they are, where they come from, and what they want. This should be the subject of rigorous scientific investigation, and not the subject of rubbishing by tabloid newspapers.

It seems to me that the Bentwaters incident is a classic case where an apparent intrusion into our airspace — and indeed, a landing in our country — occurred, which was witnessed by serious-minded people in the military — responsible people, doing a responsible job. And, Bentwaters is, in a sense, a benchmark for how not to deal with these matters in the future.