From Fox News:
In the shadow of the Cold War, while America raced to outpace the Soviet Union in military innovation, the Pentagon turned to an unexpected tactic: alien conspiracy theories.
A newly revealed Department of Defense review shows that the U.S. military deliberately spread UFO rumors—including staged photos and false briefings—to protect classified weapons programs. The practice wasn’t just passive denial or silence. In some cases, it was policy. One such incident, first uncovered by the Wall Street Journal, involves an Air Force colonel who, in the 1980s, handed fake photos of flying saucers to a bar owner near the top-secret Area 51 base in Nevada. The colonel, now retired, later admitted to investigators that he was acting under official orders to deflect attention away from the then-classified F-117 Nighthawk stealth fighter.