Navy FOIA Bombshell as Secret UFO Program AATIP Resurfaces in Classified 2022 Pentagon Briefing With Mystery Guests

For years the Pentagon insisted its secret UFO study programme quietly ended in 2012. But newly released Navy records obtained through the Freedom of Information Act have reignited the mystery.

The documents reveal that a classified briefing about the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program, or AATIP, took place in March 2022 at a secure military facility in Washington.

How a Secret UFO Programme First Began

AATIP first emerged publicly in 2017 when reports revealed that the United States Department of Defense had quietly funded a programme to study unidentified aerial phenomena, commonly called UFOs. The initiative began in 2007 under the Defence Intelligence Agency and received about 22 million dollars in funding.

The effort was strongly supported by former Nevada senator Harry Reid, who believed unusual aerial encounters reported by military personnel deserved serious investigation. The programme focused on incidents involving aircraft and objects performing manoeuvres that appeared to defy known technology.

Many of these encounters involved Navy pilots who reported observing mysterious craft moving at extreme speeds or changing direction in ways conventional aircraft could not achieve. The best known example is the famous 'Tic Tac' incident involving the USS Nimitz carrier strike group in 2004.

The programme was reportedly run by counterintelligence officer Luis Elizondo, who later resigned from the Pentagon in 2017 and became a public figure in the push for greater transparency on UFO investigations.

Although the Department of Defense later acknowledged AATIP existed, officials maintained the programme had a limited scope and was closed years earlier.

What FOIA Emails Reveal About the 2022 Briefing

The newly released Navy records tell a more complicated story. Two separate FOIA requests submitted nearly a year apart both produced the same responsive document. It was a chain of emails arranging a 23 March 2022 briefing covering AATIP and another Pentagon office called the Airborne Object Identification and Management Synchronisation Group, known as AOIMSG.

The event was divided into three sessions. One was unclassified and scheduled to last about 50 to 55 minutes followed by a short question session. Two other presentations were classified at the TS SCI level, meaning Top Secret Sensitive Compartmented Information.

Those classified discussions took place inside a secure facility known as a SCIF located in Roosevelt Hall at the National War College on the Fort McNair campus in Washington.

Perhaps the most striking detail in the released records is that the original invitation email was labelled as coming from a non Department of Defense source. This suggests the briefing was arranged through communication between government officials and at least one outside individual or organisation.

However the identities of the participants remain hidden. All names and contact details were removed from the documents under FOIA privacy rules.

Redacted Names Hint at Possible Key Figures

Although the released documents conceal the names involved, the structure of the FOIA requests provides clues.

One request specifically searched for emails sent to or from Brennan P McKernan, who has previously been reported as a director connected to the Pentagon's UAP task force. Another request required the keyword 'Elizondo' and sought communications involving Luis Elizondo as a private citizen.

The fact that the email chain was considered responsive to both searches strongly suggests those names appear somewhere within the redacted header fields such as the sender or recipient lines.

This does not prove either individual attended the briefing. But it indicates that their names were at least mentioned in connection with the planning or communication surrounding the event.

All identifying information was removed under FOIA exemption rules protecting personal privacy.

Why the Briefing Raises New Questions About AATIP

The March 2022 presentation is notable because it took place years after AATIP was officially said to have ended.

The briefing itself was described as an 'AATIP AOIMSG Presentation,' suggesting that the earlier programme was being discussed alongside its successor office. AOIMSG was established in 2021 to coordinate the Pentagon's approach to unidentified airborne objects.

The presentation reportedly included discussion of congressional reports and multiple 'Tic Tac' incidents. That wording is significant because public attention has largely focused on a single encounter involving the USS Nimitz. The use of the plural term suggests that other similar events may have been examined during the classified briefing.

While the released emails do not confirm who attended or what information was presented behind closed doors, they show that AATIP remained part of official discussions within secure military settings.