Live Stream Version
In October of 2017, this counterintelligence officer and trained special agent by the name of Luis Elizondo, stepped out of the shadowed halls of the Pentagon and into the public spotlight. Whether he intended it or not, by doing so he would become an instant celebrity to UFO enthusiasts for saying something that would soon shake the entire world.
Luis Elizondo: “By far the most interesting effort I was involved with was the topic of advanced aerial threats. For nearly the last decade, I ran a sensitive aerospace threat identification program focusing on unidentified aerial technologies. It was in this position I learned that the phenomena is indeed real.”
Within minutes of speaking these words, The Black Vault used this once insider information to file numerous Freedom of Information Act requests to see what documents could be dug up. The idea was that in the eyes of the law — if this former government agent was talking about it – the documents may just be ripe for the pickin’ if one were to ask for them. So that’s exactly what I did.
This unfolding saga brought me hope that after more than 20 years of pushing for the truth, the veil of secrecy surrounding the UFO phenomenon might just be lifting once and for all – and things were drastically changing.
Evidence of that change was revealed just two months after Elizondo stepped foot on that stage. That is when the mainstream media covered Elizondo, and his story, was a viral sensation all over the world.
But as excitement exploded worldwide about this “Secret Pentagon UFO Study” known as the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program or AATIP; controversy had already begun to percolate inside The Black Vault about what was really going on.
Just three weeks prior to the NY Times running their now world-famous headline; the Pentagon told The Black Vault they had no records on any program that Elizondo had described. Not a single piece of evidence whatsoever.
A couple months after that; the Navy denied they gave anything to the AATIP program, despite what Elizondo had claimed.
And then just months after that; the Pentagon issued a statement that was the most damning of all. They claimed that Elizondo “had no assigned responsibilities” on the AATIP program that he had brought to light.
As the months, and years, passed since the initial headlines; The Black Vault became highly critical of Elizondo’s claims. That is not a popular stance to take, and as social media can easily prove, that type of stance can come with a little bit of heat!
But it wasn’t just Elizondo on the receiving end of criticism. The Pentagon and the entire U.S. government has had a history of covering up UFO data for decades; and it appeared that’s what they may have been doing again. But to what extent?
My guest today, is the man who started it all… Luis Elizondo himself. Despite The Black Vault’s criticism, and admittedly the nitpicking of every detail in order to find the absolute truth, Elizondo has agreed to step into the Vault and share his side of the story in a special one on one interview.
Stay tuned – you’re about to journey INSIDE THE BLACK VAULT.
Transcript
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
people, tip, contract, luis, government, program, solicitation, resigned, classified, pentagon, knew, bit, intelligence, information, point, sap, counterintelligence, aerospace, question, decision
SPEAKERS
Luis Elizondo, CNN News Anchor, John Greenewald, George Knapp
John Greenewald 00:10
In October of 2017, this counter intelligence officer and train Special Agent by the name of Luis Elizondo stepped out of the shadowed halls of the Pentagon and in to the public spotlight, whether he intended it or not. By doing so he would become an instant celebrity to UFO enthusiasts for saying something that would soon shake the entire world.
Luis Elizondo 00:34
For nearly the last decade, I ran a sensitive aerospace threat identification program, focusing on unidentified aerial technologies. It was in this position, I learned that the phenomenon is indeed real.
John Greenewald 00:49
Within minutes of speaking these words, the black vault use this once insider information to file numerous Freedom of Information Act requests to see what documents could be dug up. The idea was that in the eyes of the law, if this former government agent was talking about it, then the documents may just be right for the picking, if one were to ask for them. So that’s exactly what I did. This unfolding saga brought me hope that after more than 20 years of pushing for the truth, the veil of secrecy surrounding the UFO phenomenon might just be lifting once and for all, and things were drastically changing. Ever evidence of that change was revealed just two months after Elizondo stepped foot on that stage. That is when the mainstream media covered Elizondo, along with his story, and it became a viral sensation all over the world.
CNN News Anchor 01:45
Right now the former Pentagon military officials who ran the covert government program up until this last November, Luis Elizondo, we thank you so much for your time tonight
George Knapp 01:54
Until he stepped out on stage last October alongside rock star Tom DeLonge. And other former government insiders that most of the world had never heard of Luis Elizondo, which is how he liked it.
John Greenewald 02:09
But as excitement exploded worldwide about this secret Pentagon UFO study known as the advanced aerospace threat identification program, or a tip, controversy had already begun to percolate inside the black vault about what was really going on. Just three weeks prior to the New York Times running there now world famous headline, the Pentagon told the black vault they had no records on any program that Elizondo had described, not a single piece of evidence whatsoever. A couple months after that, the Navy denied they gave anything to the a tip program, despite what Elizondo had claimed. And then, just months after that, the Pentagon issued a statement that was the most damning of all. They claimed that Elizondo had no assigned responsibilities on the a tip program that he had brought into the spotlight. As the months and years passed since the initial headlines, the black vault became highly critical of Elizondo his claims. This is not a popular stance to take, and a social media can easily prove that type of stance can come with a little bit of heat. But it wasn’t just Elizondo on the receiving end of criticism. The Pentagon and the entire US government has had a history of covering up UFO data for decades. And it appeared that’s exactly what they may be doing again. But to what extent. My guest today is the man who started it all, Luis Elizondo himself. Despite the black vaults criticism, and admittedly the nitpicking of every single detail in order to find the Absolute Truth. Elizondo has agreed to step into the vault and share his side of the story in a special one on one interview. Stay tuned. You’re about to journey inside the black vault. That’s right everybody. As always, thank you so much for tuning in and making this your podcast or your live stream of choice. I’m your host john Greenwald, Jr. And to say that I am well beyond excited about the next hour or so. That would be an understatement. I’ve been looking forward to doing this with my guessed doing a sit down for quite some time now, I guess approaching probably about three years. And he has been nothing but gracious and a gentleman despite my high criticism and my skepticism about some things that have come out, I don’t want to waste any time I want to bring on to the show Mr. Luis Elizondo, I really on behalf of everybody watching and listening. Thank you for taking the time today to talk to all of us.
Luis Elizondo 05:28
Well, john, thank you, I appreciate it very much. You know, I certainly appreciate your audience as well. And I don’t say this frivolously. And I’ve told you this before privately, you have managed to do things in this this arena that very few other individuals have have ever been able to accomplish, particularly your working employer. You know, for those who may not know, for you a Freedom of Information Act was enacted in order to ensure transparency for the American public and to government workings, if you will, because in the past, there had been some some issues with that where the government may have overstepped its its authorities and as a result, so Congress enacts FOIA process, and I think there has probably never been anybody who has sat who has been as savvy in the FOIA process than you. So thank you also, for what you do, it’s sincerely appreciated. I know not just for folks like me, but on behalf of everybody out there. Your work over the past, well, past few decades really has been been pretty incredible.
John Greenewald 06:34
I really appreciate those kind words, and as my audience is already seeing, and I’ll say it again, despite that, that that skepticism from me, you have always been that that gentleman and a scholar, you’ve always been open to me. You’ve spoken to me on the telephone, and now you’re doing this. But But I want to return that respect to you. And I hope everybody realizes that I’ve tried to say that on social media, but also the fact that you’re here. And I want this as kind of a housekeeping note for those listening and watching. I asked all my guests this and all of them can attest to it. However, I did ask the same question to you, which was, is there anything you don’t want me to go into? And you have never once told me even though I’ve asked you quadruple check that through the last few months, as we’ve set this up, you’ve never once said, Nope, don’t go here. Nope, don’t go there, you’ve always said the same thing, which was, everything’s on the table. So My respect to you for that, and for being here. And let’s just kind of jump right right into it. What I want to do and how I structured This interview is, essentially take a chronological look at some of maybe some stuff that you’ve already talked about, but also filling in the holes, some questions may be a little bit sensitive, we might get into some areas where you go, sorry, john, I’m going to talk to you about that. And and, and so I’ll apologize in advance if I start pushing those buttons. But that’s who I am, I have to push them. So take me back to the beginning, if you could, on how you became involved in a tip and exactly how that came to be.
Luis Elizondo 08:07
Yeah, I’m gonna do that. And but before I do that, john, let me also offer one one, Mia Copeland apology also to you, and I’m not sure that, that we really ever had a chance to address this. But the bottom line is that years ago, you try, I tried to make myself as approachable as possible. And years ago, I know, several years ago, you tried to reach out and try to have a conversation with me. And unfortunately, that message never got to me. And I want to apologize, because I do. I do think we should have probably had this conversation three years ago, and probably through every year after that as well. And because that information never got to me. Unfortunately, we never gave you a reply or response that you deserved. And so I want to, I want to say here, and now I’m really, really sorry, we never had a chance to do this earlier. I think this conversation is a longtime company coming and I really do appreciate sincerely your patience. Thus far, I promise you it was not intentional on my part. I just never knew you had even inquired to speak with me until after you know, we actually talked the first time and you had said, Hey, Lou, I’ve been trying to get ahold of you for, you know, X amount of months. And, and I had no idea. So I want to apologize here, you know, on air, just so you know, that was never intention.
John Greenewald 09:27
Well, I appreciate that. No, you. Somebody taught me a long time ago. You don’t know what you don’t know. And there’s no need to apologize but accepted anyway. But I appreciate you pointing that out. Thank you.
Luis Elizondo 09:38
So back to at&t, how did I get involved? Let’s rewind the clock to about 2008. Now give you kind of the synopsis of how all this evolved. I was working prior to that at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. I was a senior intelligence officer working policy strategy, things like that. To be quite frankly, frank with you, the drive was killing me. I was living on Maryland’s Eastern Shore at the time, and you’re looking at a three hour commute one way. I love my job. I love the people, but the commute was killing me. So at the time, it was then Undersecretary of defense for intelligence, Jim Clapper was over at the usdi. And he was the undersecretary of defense for intelligence at the time, and a man I respected greatly. And I was given an opportunity to come back to God for about a year to to work some some new efforts, particularly in intelligence sharing, law enforcement, information integration. And so I came back very eager, because my, my daily commute was cut about half all of a sudden, and I had my little bit more of my life back. So I went back to God. And it was at that time, I was working in the National Capital Region, NCR region, where some people would come to my to my desk, we were working, I wasn’t in the Pentagon at the time, we were working at a remote location, but still connected to the Pentagon. And, you know, it’s kind of bizarre because like out of out of a movie. These two people I still remember today very clearly from what they were wearing, very nicely dressed. And I remember someone knocking on the door and Mr. Elizondo, there’s some people here to see you, which is not uncommon, you know, you, you’re always working issues, so you’re trying to fix things. So sure, bring them on. And they came in, and they said, hey, you’re you’re Luis Elizondo, and Yes. Can we talk to you? And I said, Sure. And one of them shut the door behind my door. Okay. This is probably not a good. You know, I often joke, you know, what did I do now? Right? I probably upset somebody. And they sat down. And they started to say, you know, hey, look, we are part of the intelligence community. We’re part of a program, we’re not going to tell you much about it. But do you mind telling us a little bit about yourself? And I probably was a little rude. I probably was a little bit standoffish. But I don’t particularly like talking about myself, especially if I don’t know who you are. And they start asking very pointed questions, specifically about you know, we hear that your your, your counter intelligence guy, we hear that you did some background, before you have some background, in advanced avionics and aerospace industry. Is that true? Yes. Do you mind sharing with us? I said, Well, I’ll share with you at the unclassified level, the type of systems I’ve worked on, but I’m really not comfortable going into any more detail. It’s a long story short, they agreed to to, they would come back and have another discussion with me. And so when they left, I ran some trap lines to find out that they were legit, they were part of a special program, but I didn’t have clearance into it. So I really didn’t know. But they really were who they said they were, they were part of a small organization. And I presumed that the time had something to do with aerospace. But I really didn’t know. And then a couple more trips, they came by we talked, got a little bit more comfortable. They got more comfortable with me, I certainly got more comfortable with them. And finally, they said we’d like to have you meet our director. And I said, Okay, sure, no problem. It might have been john, probably, seven or 10 days later, we had an appointment to go meet that I was hoping the director would come see me, I thought I was sufficiently senior enough where you know, you want to come see me, you can come see me instead of like, okay, be at this location at this time at this place. And don’t tell anybody, you’re coming. So again, a little bit unusual. I’m like, you know, I’m sorry, who are you? So I decided to go ahead and do it. And I told my deputy that time, hey, I’m going to go go to this meeting. I went to it. And it was an undisclosed location, and also the National Capital Region. look just like a normal office building, really, until you go inside. And then you realize that you have, you know, guards and whatnot, you’re like, Okay, this is probably a little bit more more sensitive. I remember going up the elevator up to the floor, and it looked like it looked like an office building you would see like on Wall Street, really, you know, cubicles all over the place, and people kind of making copies and doing work diligently on their computers. And there was just corner office kind of looked like that. Well, last, you know, the individual sitting back in there. And what struck me is that the individual was I don’t want to stereotype but if you would ever think of what a rocket scientist looks like. He was your quintessential rocket scientist glasses. You know, very, very lewd, appeared very astute and very, no nonsense. So I went I introduced myself should contain, hey, glad you’re here. He didn’t smile. He was just very serious. And he was mad. He looked at me, he was staring at me. I felt almost a little uncomfortable because I know he was assessing the hell out of me. And I was trying to assess him as well. But obviously, he probably knew a little bit more about me than I knew about him. Which is never really Good to go into a meeting like that, as an intelligence officer, you know, you’re kind of one, if you will know thy enemy, not saying he was my enemy by any stretch, but you know, you want one who you’re dealing with. And he introduced himself. And I’m sure at some point, his name will become become very public I have, I have a lot of respect for him. I’ve never mentioned his name. He’s asked me never to mention it. until he’s comfortable with with his name being out, so I won’t. But we talked, we had a very good candid conversation. And that’s when he asked me, I mean, started, he started with my background in, in aerospace and the type of technologies I’ve worked on. And you know, this is a guy who I really knew his stuff. And he was like, literally a rock literally, by definition, a rocket scientists, and probably one of the best ones that we had in the government. And that’s when, you know, he asked me said, what do you what do you think about? No, john, he looking straight in the face. And looking back, it was so weird, because I wasn’t sure if he was like, testing me, or if it was legit, but he said, What do you think about the topic of UFOs? Now coming from my world, you know, will to test somebody, we will use provocative statements sometimes, and then gauge their body language and, you know, micro behaviors and neuro linguistics to see if, you know, they’re prone to, you know, flights of fancy and things like that. And, but he wasn’t listening very serious. And they said, Well, I, I don’t really think about UFOs This is what you don’t think they’re real. I said, No, no, I didn’t say that. I just, I never really had the luxury to think about UFOs. You know, I’m not particularly a huge science fiction fan. I never really watched X Files or anything like that. And I’ve been so consumed with my work that when I’m not working at my home, and I’m a father, but those are really the only things I ever have time for work, and which didn’t involve anything at all involved in the photos clearly, and, and raising a family. So he said, Okay, that’s, that’s fair. And he said, but let me let me just caution you, to caution you at warning something to that effect, let me caution you that, don’t let your analytic bias get in the way. And he said, you’re gonna, you’re gonna see things that you may not, you may have a hard time reconciling. Now, at this point, I hadn’t even accepted it, I think hadn’t been offered even really a job, right? Yeah. I’m thinking to myself, are you? Are you just a pitcher, you offer me a job, or this just is just just advice for life, you know, to take with me and what the hell’s really going on here? So I’ve not ever had to know. But I’ve, you know, very, very fair point, right? I don’t really have an opinion yet on it. And then we agreed, have another conversation. But he said, Look, I’m looking for a counterintelligence guy. For those in your audience who may not know what really counterintelligence is, and a lot of people think they know what CIA CIA is, is really knowing what the enemy knows about you. Right? So so foreign intelligence collection is, is learning what the bad guys know, counterintelligence is knowing what the bad guys know about you. So if you think of a chessboard, if you are playing chess against an opponent, you know, foreign intelligence is knowing what their pieces can do on the chessboard and how they plan to move. Counter intelligence is knowing what they know about your pieces, right, and how you can move. So it’s yet another layer of playing chess to some degree, I guess, you know, not any better or worse in other forms of intelligence. It’s just, it’s a very nice way of doing business from an intelligence perspective. So instead of looking for a counter intelligence guy, because we know that there are some foreign countries, foreign adversaries out there that probably know what we’re doing. And I need a good counterintelligence and security program, which, by the way, it’s not unusual. Anytime you have a sensitive program, you know, you you want to have, you want to have good security and counterintelligence expertise. It’s just, it’s just an extra layer of, if you will, insurance to have to protect your program. So it wasn’t unusual that I was that I was being asked to provide counterintelligence expertise, I wasn’t being asked to do anything with UFOs, per se, it was just to come in and provide, you know, the background that I already have just used that in this capacity. So ultimately, long story short, it was obviously the rest is history. No pun intended, I secure alcohol, I’ll accept the job. And it was at that point, through through various conversations afterwards, I began to realize that these guys are legit. They’re real. I mean, they have like real data. And the individuals at the started that were part of this effort, I knew from before, like people like help food off and whatnot that were, you know, they were kind of legends in their own time anyways. So I knew this was a serious legitimate effort, and then I began to see the documentation. From the Senate and Congress, and I really began to recognize that this was a full fledged program. But they really didn’t need counterintelligence expertise. They didn’t have anything. So they were kind of they were kind of vulnerable from that perspective. Yeah, I know, it’s probably a long winded explanation. No, that’s okay. Um, yeah, that’s,
John Greenewald 20:19
I mean, yeah, yeah. No, I appreciate it. Because I want the groundwork here. Now, in this next question, I want you to kind of clarify, you can do it quickly, if you could, the difference between what we learned of the advanced aerospace weapons. Now I’m drawn on that. Yeah, thank you the offset program and I get tongue tongue tied, versus the program that you joined, that you just described the advanced aerospace threat identification program or a tip. What was the difference between the two? Because this has been an area of much confusion not only by myself, but it seems like those that even worked on the program, which I’ll explain in
Luis Elizondo 20:58
a moment, absolutely not, not not only you, but I mean, honestly, probably to all of us, to some degree in the beginning. So in the in the, in the very beginning days, there was very little difference between all seven, eight, there really wasn’t a clear line distinction. There were there were focuses of the same effort. And what it was you had portions of all SAP, which of course, now know, Bigelow Aerospace was part of had some incredible scientists working at at the at the ranch facility. And by the way, other places, it wasn’t just the ranch.
John Greenewald 21:31
And it just jumps. Just to clarify, you’re talking about skinwalker Ranch. Okay, so so you’re, and this is another one, but since you brought it up, I’ll just ask it really quick. So so a tip or OS app are both operated on the grounds of skinwalker Ranch in Utah?
Luis Elizondo 21:50
I want to be clear, I don’t want to answer for Bob Bigelow, or the former director of the program, because those are probably nuances, you’d have to ask them, I will say that it didn’t involve the ranch, all SAP was that it was looking at looking at the phenomenon through through a very broad lens. And, you know, that’s, that’s what they were doing. And by the way, there was some pretty compelling data. And I’ll share with you that it was there was some fairly compelling data. Some of it was was a little bit disturbing, to be honest with you. But in 2009, a decision was really made to formally if you will, partition off that that part of the study involving the UAP phenomenon under a tip and the reason why is because we were getting data from all different sensor platforms that weren’t necessarily ranch related. These were, you know, of course, everybody knows Nimitz and all these other other cases. But, you know, you had, you know, strategic carrier groups out in, in, in certain ao ours, areas of operation, if you will, were where we were picking up UAP activity. And so we realized that there was a really a concerted need to, to focus on the topic of ua peas, from a nuts and bolts perspective. Now, let me caveat a lot of people when I say that they kind of retract and say, Yeah, but you can’t look at these from a nuts and bolts perspective, you have to, you know, look at this from this perspective and that perspective. And you know, that that could be absolutely right. But in the Department of Defense, we had to be able to, to do two things, and that’s qualified and quantify data. Otherwise, for us, it was useless. I’m not saying it is useless. I’m saying, for our purposes, and Department of Defense briefing, senior leadership, that unless I can qualify and quantify data, it’s it’s conjecture. There’s, there’s no there there, I can’t do anything with it. So. And there was enough sufficient data coming in where we could, I mean, we could say there were these many incidents occurring in this particular month, and these particular parts of the waters with these particular assets, you know, these are videos or pictures that were taken and radar information. So it helps you paint a compelling picture to leadership, an event that is occurring or events that are occurring. And so that decision really started to occur started to solidify 2009 and that’s why you see I think in the in Senator Reid’s now now infamous letter that came out everybody’s now knows about all way back in 2009. He then Deputy Secretary land that he wants to take this portion of eight tip that you actually see the advanced aerospace threat identification program become a formalized effort and put that into into SAP channels to protect it. Because we knew based upon the efforts that were going on with Aw, SAP, that you had two camps, you had some people that really supported the effort. And then you had some people that really didn’t support the effort. And by the way, this is just a loss at least All this before with how poodles program with Stargate and the remote viewing program that, you know, anytime the government was dealing with something that was maybe maybe a bit unconventional fringe, it would tend to be considered by some fringe, it ruffled a lot of feathers. And so, you know, the, I guess the solution, then the mindset was let’s, let’s take this program that’s kind of exposed, and let’s put it under this umbrella of sapper, we can protect it. And, you know, we can still continue to collect the information without fear of people on the outside not understanding what we’re doing, and having this knee jerk reaction to just shut it down. So that’s, that’s kind of how that all evolved. Gotcha.
John Greenewald 25:43
So then all SAP, from what it sounds like, was was completely different. A tip was branching off on just UAP investigations fair to say that
Luis Elizondo 25:54
I mean, from my perspective, I mean, I’m sure if you talk to people that were in all SAP that were still doing stump stuff in the a tip side of the house, and vice versa, they would probably tell you, it was more of a gray area, there wasn’t really a heart and the early days, and yet it was but in the early days, there wasn’t really a hard transition, or if you if you will have an event horizon. Yeah, separating the offset program and the a tip, there was kind of a blurry line there. That’s sometimes shifted, but by 2010, we were firmly by 2010. Nine, really, but 10. It was, there was no question about it. A tip was its own focus area,
John Greenewald 26:30
I want to ask you about the some of the public documentation, the verified information that has come out. And that is involving aos app. Now, I know that you didn’t lead aos app, and sometimes you don’t like to talk about it. But I do want to ask you something that also encompasses a tip, which is that public documentation has absolutely zero mention of paranormal UFOs uaps unidentified craft and so on that rather it was more of a forward looking program. At least that’s what the public bid solicitation stated. Where I have a very big question on this is that disconnect from what we know, to then bass getting the contract? It’s a UAP study. And then that bores out? A tip, and voila, we have the rest is is history? What What am I missing just by looking at that documentation? So
Luis Elizondo 27:25
what? That’s a great question. So anytime you look at any governmental solicitation, we call these service contracts elicitation. This goes out to the public sphere, right. And that means anybody and everybody can look at it to include Russians because the contract you’re spending american taxpayer dollars to do job XYZ. So even when you want to build a B two bomber, right? In Air Force contracts, you don’t put out a contract saying, Hey, we want somebody come up, build a super secret spell the space, stealth, you know, technology. Let me repeat that again. Sorry about that. Even when you’re doing the B two bomber, and you want to do a solicitation for someone to build you a super secret stealth bomber, right? You don’t you don’t in the solicitation that will never say that. It will say very nebulous, ambiguous language, because you don’t want to tip off to your foreign adversaries key technology that you’re trying to develop a bill. So it’s the same thing with this. When when the solicitation which by the way, for the record, I wasn’t part of Sure, yeah. But I can tell you from general perspective, how we do this. At the unclassified level, you’re going to see these solicitations always very generalized. And that is specifically because you don’t want to tip your hand unnecessarily to your foreign adversaries that you’re working on project ABC are doing. So that’s why you said I would I would I would challenge anybody in your audience to go ahead and look at other solicitations. You know, now we can look back and you know, look back 1015 years, look at some of those technologies back then that were really protecting whether it’s drone technology, right for to help us on the Global War on Terror. Those solicitations when you read those unclassified solicitations, almost read nothing like the classified portion of what the job really is you In fact, when you look at it, you’re gonna see, you know, I’ve read this solicitation six times, I still have no idea what it’s for.
John Greenewald 29:16
So ambiguous in general, and let me jump in there because I get a lot of heat for bringing this up. And I don’t think it’s as bad of an act, quote, unquote, accusation. I’m not accusing anybody, but I don’t think it’s as bad of a thing as people make it sound like when I posed this, but if there’s a classified portion of a bid solicitation, right, and you have that public setting, and then you have something behind the scenes that only cleared personnel can see when contractors come in. I’m with you on all of that. However, in kind of digging into that area, where I get myself into trouble from some people, is that Bigelow Aerospace, who obviously has a vested interest in this personal interest has invested a lot of his own money away from A tip and OS app and all that into the UAP phenomena. If he’s not right upfront, getting that classified description, he sees the public part they bid on it. What are the odds that that organization gets this contract to secretly? In a classified setting? Investigate uaps. And according to the Defense Intelligence Agency, he’s the only one out of every government contract IE that contract or that that could actually bid on this. He’s the only one. And that leads to a discussion about a sweetheart deal. I doubt you want to comment on that. But I bring it up just simply because that’s the disconnect that I still don’t understand. Because he can’t grab that classified portion of the solicitation, or correct me if I’m wrong, before he gets granted the contract.
Luis Elizondo 30:50
Right? Well, I can’t comment on it, because I wasn’t there. But I can come at it from the perspective of a couple things. So first of all, I do know, Mr. Bigelow personal. He’s an amazing human being anybody who who’s never had the chance to meet this guy. He really is an American hero. He has he has contributed more to this topic. Behind the scenes, I think that done just about anybody, certainly even more than certainly more than I have. So that’s the first thing. Second of all, I think if you look at aerospace, in general, look at Lockheed Martin, look at Boeing, look at Northrop Grumman and all these others. You know, there’s only certain companies that can build an F 22. Right. And at the end of the day, it’s up to two companies. I think you had Lockheed, and then you had, you know, the other guys that they wind up going with. You know, a lot of times there are contracts where you might tell somebody ahead of time, look, we’re gonna write this contract, you’re probably the only company that can do it. So just be advised that this contract may be coming out at some point. Because there’s only certain amount of certain certain companies that can do certain things you wouldn’t expect, for example, look at the early days when we had Jeep, I’m a Jeep guy, right. So I love old war, Jeeps, Korean War and World War Two jeeps. A lot of people don’t realize people look at a jeep and say, Oh, that was you know, that was a Jeep product. But there were a lot of companies that were making jeeps in the early days of World War Two, you had Ford making them. And then you had, of course, you know, the overland Jeep overland company, and you had some other organization that were bidding for a contract. And at the end of the day, it turned out to be only only two companies from my understanding that actually got the Jeep contract, and then later want to be just one, believe it or not. So it’s it’s a bit convoluted the way that contracting world works. It’s not perfect. But at the same time, I think there’s enough oversight. Now, when you look at how, how contracts are selected. They’re not selected by anybody who’s connected really to the contract or connected by an outside independent organization. And there’s a reason for that, because you have to be fair and unbiased. Now, I don’t know this to be true. But I’ve been told that apparently, Bigelow was the only one Bigelow, bass was the only one to actually bid for the contract. So, you know, naturally, if you only have one bidder, and they have the qualifications are probably at the contract. But I, unfortunately, like I said, that occurred before my time. Sure, I came in really in 2008, that that ship had sailed back in 2007. So I, I truly, honestly can’t tell you exactly how it went down. Only because I wasn’t there for
John Greenewald 33:37
I gotcha. Fair enough. During the a tip days, I want to talk a little bit about the the controversy. We’re about halfway through the interview, and I want to make sure that I give you ample time to address some of this. And that is the government’s reaction to you coming out, you resign, you come out, you become a part of to the stars Academy, you bring videos along with you. I’m going to combine like 700 of the questions that I have here for for, for time reasons. But I want to talk about that controversy. Let me ask first quickly, if I may, at what point you were resigned October 4 2017. If I remember correctly, you had submitted your your resignation letter. At what point did you meet Tom DeLonge and plan to join to the stars Academy and bring all of this information to light?
Luis Elizondo 34:29
Yeah, I had made a decision to leave actually, I’d spoke with my dear My dear colleague and friend Chris Mellon. And it was you know, it was a soul searching moment for me. And finally, I made the decision. I said, Look, you know, I I can’t fix this. On the inside. I can. This is a guy this is Secretary Mattis is a guy that I had been been in combat with, served with and just an amazing human being. And, and, you know, the bureaucracy unfortunately was such It just wasn’t getting the information to the right people. And so sometimes, you know, in a situation like that, you do what you have to do. And in order to fix the problem, I, I felt that I had to I had to leave the organization, because I knew they wouldn’t be able to stop, the one thing they couldn’t stop would be my resignation memo. And, by the way, let’s let’s not forget that almost a year later, to the day, Secretary Mattis did the same thing he resigned, right. So rather than cause problems inside the system, in the Department of Defense, you know, if if you can’t solve it, you need to get out of the way. And don’t don’t stay in a system that you don’t don’t agree with. If it’s if it’s really problematic, then resign. So the organization organization can continue doing what it’s supposed to do, and you don’t become, if you will, a friction point. That’s just kind of a code of honor we have in the department, it’s common, you see it in all the services, it’s just what happens. As far as meeting Tom DeLonge. It wasn’t till afterwards, actually, once I resigned, it’s when I was approached to say, hey, Lou, you know, there’s this little organization over here, led by some guy, some some rock star, which, for the record, when you’re when you’re a guy like me used to living in the shadows, that’s the last thing you want to do is ever be in any kind of spotlight or it’s just, it’s not our character, the way we operate. But what I realized that it was how and Steve justice and Chris mallet and Jim semi van onboard, whoa, now, those are people I do know, now don’t get me wrong. Tom’s a great guy. But I never knew the guy, you know, for that I’m being in the intelligence community, you know, I might been able to pick out a song, but had no idea who this guy was, and really didn’t pay attention to it. But when I saw who else was on, and you had the advisors like Dr. Norm Khan, and some of these other really big names that I had a chance to work with, while I was in the intelligence community. Whoa, now that’s, that’s significant. This guy may be a punk rocker, but he managed to get these folks together in the same room and support this cost. You know, that’s, that’s, that’s a hell of an accomplishment. You know, so I was like, wow, that’s, that’s really hard to say no to. Especially when you have those people on board, that, and there was a lot more people that were affiliated with ttsa. That’s not publicly known. But again, some some pretty significant people who had the honor and pleasure to serve with back in my day in military and Department of Defense, and later on in, in the intelligence community. So that was really for me, I had a conversation with my wife and said, Look, you know, what do you think and, you know, she says, Well, you know, these people and you know, do you trust them? And the answer is, you know, and statically Yes, I do. trust them with my life. So that was kind of an easy decision for me.
John Greenewald 37:56
So you had known Christopher Mellon prior to resigning. It sounds like you had a conversation with him but did not did not know anyone else. When it came to to the stars Academy until after he resigned. And it was it seems like no, I
Luis Elizondo 38:09
knew how put up I knew how it worked. For sure. He
John Greenewald 38:12
was part Yeah, and I’m sorry. backtrack. Did Then did you know that he tell you about to the stars.
Luis Elizondo 38:19
Before you it was Jim semi van. Who, who actually said hey, why don’t you consider jumping on board with us? If I we met up Don’t hold me to it. But and we were going back three years now. I’m pretty certain it was Jim who who actually was one to offer me a position,
John Greenewald 38:38
pre resignation or post just for chronological post
Luis Elizondo 38:41
post post.
John Greenewald 38:43
I gotcha. So you
Luis Elizondo 38:44
Yeah, cuz I think they knew that I was gonna wind up working at I gotta be careful, though. I don’t want to put a plug in for it. I was gonna wind up working, you know, at a probably at a supermarket, just to just to pay my bills afterwards. Because, you know, even though I had left the department, I’m not the age of retirement yet. I can’t collect my pension. So you know, I still I still needed employment.
John Greenewald 39:08
Gotcha. Okay. So you joined to the stars Academy. It all seems to happen pretty quick after you had resigned because a couple of weeks go by and you’re on so very fast. Yeah, it was very fast. Sounds like it. So and you brought with you a couple videos. I want to focus in on that now. And then we’ll we’ll get more to the do.
Luis Elizondo 39:26
Just to be clear, I didn’t actually bring those videos. That wasn’t me. I did not I facilitated the process of getting them releasable through Department of Defense channels, but I didn’t actually bring them that was somebody else.
John Greenewald 39:40
Okay, so you would file the paperwork, obviously, that
Luis Elizondo 39:43
yes. Okay. Good. And, and by the way, with after having a long discussion with my team, because I was a senior guy, I’m the one who had to request it, but it was a mutual decision that we would go with. So the initial intent, john was to have a unclassified repository because that was my experience before when I’ve worked in department events is really setting up these special enclaves, where you could share a very sensitive national level intelligence via what we call a terror line. And getting that information down to a level could be consumable by by anybody out there. That’s, you know, local law enforcement, state authorities, anybody like that? That’s, that’s actionable information. But it was super classified. So you have to come up with a mechanism where people who don’t necessarily have security clearance can access really, really classified information. So there’s a mechanism to do that. So that kind of was my forte for some time. So we wanted to build an unclassified repository where information could be put on that was not super, super, super sensitive. There wasn’t any like, classified metadata, or call signs or locational information. But we could create this database that allowed other people from the outside to look at this and say, oh, because we didn’t we really, we went through analysis after analysis, and we were still coming up with a goose egg. We had no idea what the hell the things were. We were hoping that maybe some other people say, yeah, you know what, we picked that up too, and, and maybe some some state authorities and you know, Kansas said, Yeah, actually, we’ve been seeing these things over our nuclear facilities, or just as an example, let’s say just Kansas, a nuclear facility where I got to give you this example,
John Greenewald 41:22
a lot of people are going to read into that and go in Kansas nuclear.
Luis Elizondo 41:26
Right. That’s what I’m saying. It’s anecdotal. anecdotal. Yeah,
John Greenewald 41:29
there’s gonna be blogs about this in about an hour. So
Luis Elizondo 41:34
I know God, I promise you, I don’t really mean can’t ya say? compensation. But my point being is that we’re trying to create a an enclave that allowed us to share this information that came from US government sources, to a broader audience in industry, the, you know, the big boys, Boeing’s of the world and the Raytheon’s and try to get more people into the conversation because we really had no idea what we were dealing with, and and even the folks that we’re working with, and other agencies, were scratching your head. I mean, to the point where I remember one meeting, john, we we, we did such mental gymnastics, trying to come up with there was one particular video I won’t go into detail, but it was so so incredible that we were doing these mental gymnastics trying to come up with a what if scenario, what technology? would this have to be to be able to do this? Yeah. And it was one of being so preposterous, so so ridiculously over the top, we all just kind of looked at ourselves and said, All right, that’s, there’s no way that that was, you know, that could be what it is. So that was, again, a long, probably a much longer winded response that you were looking for, but that Oh, no,
John Greenewald 42:49
you mentioned a video. Lou, can you tell me what video that was?
Luis Elizondo 42:56
The ones that we got released? Yes.
John Greenewald 42:58
So it was one of the ones that you came up with the explanation not to step on you.
Luis Elizondo 43:03
Oh, oh, unfortunately. Can I?
John Greenewald 43:07
I knew I’d get let her know if I didn’t try
Luis Elizondo 43:09
no longer the US government now. Yeah, I, I I have to be careful. Those those, you know, I want to be be very clear that. You know, the, it’s US government’s business to determine what is releasable and not not mine? Okay. I gotcha. And anything that I may have been then exposed to back in a tip I really, until the government is gives the green light. I just, I just,
John Greenewald 43:36
I just had to push on that one. You mentioned. I had to I had to go. So let me ask you, one of the few sensitive questions that that I talked about in the beginning, and that is the paperwork that came out through FOIA. I went after those documents, as you know, we’ve talked about this privately. But I went after those documents for those listening and watching that aren’t aware and found the emails that you were sharing back and forth with what is called Doppler and that is the arm that essentially will authorize either public use or essentially them declassifying something or something’s unclassified and clearing it for release, and so on. Just kind of quickly summarize it. Those documents come out in the form that had already leaked in part had come out. But that was kind of re verified on an official level. And the way you would describe the videos is what what really kind of intrigues me in a way that is a big fat question mark. And that is that you described the FLIR, the gimbal, and the go fast as balloons, drones and UAS is and what kind of confuses me about that is Doppler is cleared at the top secret level. So they’ve got the, you know, J, which protocols to send them to, let’s say top secret data, and they review it. They can say Nope, you can’t use this whatsoever. But they have those channels. I’ve heard but I want to ask from you because I don’t think I I’ve ever asked you this part before, I’ve only heard from others through, you know, third hand info, that you felt that you couldn’t inform them properly. But again, I want to ask you this, why were the videos described in that way if they would be cleared at the top secret level?
Luis Elizondo 45:20
Sure. So if you look at the way dogs are worked, you’re actually supposed to do the request at the unclassified level. So there’s several God instructions and direct actions, instructions, and manuals, and then there’s some some brochures on how you’re supposed to request something for publication of meaning that can be disseminated out. And that is through an unclassified document. 1910. And when you ask Dr. They say please send it to us unclassified level. So we had just gotten over the this this awful situation with Wikileaks, where we knew for analysis adversaries were hacking our systems. That’s a fact that’s, that’s that’s not conjecture. And the US government acknowledged that. And then, of course, you had insider threats where you had I don’t want to get political here. But there’s, you know, whether you’re for or against folks like like, private Manning, that that took some very sensitive information and released in an unauthorized manner. So because we were dealing with something that was so sensitive, and there was so few people that were read onto the program, and I couldn’t even brief my boss at the time about this, this program. I couldn’t very well, brief doctor who’s two and three degrees removed from my own chain of command. And mentioned the word UFO. So, the UAS, we had coined for unidentified aerial systems, some say unmanned aerial systems, but literally a UAS is an unmanned or system that’s not manned by a human being. So that’s, that’s actually a legitimate term that we could use without saying UFO or UAP. Knowing that the OCA, the original classification authority, who adopts would have to go back to anyways, right to get the approval was read onto the program, and knew exactly what this was about. So So, you know, a lot of people say, well, was that disingenuous? We’re trying to mislead? No, no, no, everybody was about everybody knew what we were talking about. But it was a way that we could protect this from having some sort of what we call an inadvertent disclosure, this information getting out to somebody who wasn’t read on. And all of a sudden now the whole department is aware of what’s going on. So that’s, that’s how that’s how that if you will that process, gotcha occur.
John Greenewald 47:42
Okay. So one of the other things on the the same form was your intended use. Now, for those just tuning in or maybe missed the part earlier in the show, you had said you did not bring these videos out? Somebody else did. So I want to make sure that I repeat that. But internally, the paperwork showed that you only intended this for internal government use only not in
Luis Elizondo 48:03
corrected initially correct initially. That’s what we were, we wanted to create a an internal enclave unclassified. So you know, the public, could we put industry partners, because that’s broad enough, where if you’re working with the United States government, in any type of capacity, you could be labeled as a type of industry partner. So whether you’re local law enforcement, or your FAA, or you’re one of the services or, you know, whoever, if you’re working in some sort of kind of official capacity, we wanted to get people who had a had certain expertise, open the aperture so we could get more scientists, more people to look at this data and help us try to figure it out. And
John Greenewald 48:43
that was what you internally called the community of interest REITs or COI, which,
Luis Elizondo 48:49
which was Yeah,
John Greenewald 48:50
I’ve always once those emails kind of revealed themselves through FOIA. I was always intrigued by that, because that sounds like wow, why didn’t they do this prior? So you know, I’ve as Yeah, one would think right. So that in, by the way, I’ve gone after, I think I may have told you privately, but trying to find more information, if any, is there that they take that idea? Because from what I’ve seen, when you look at these types, there’s a
Luis Elizondo 49:12
lot more info john?
John Greenewald 49:14
Well, that plugging away That’s right. That’s what I’m, that’s what I’m going for. So, so but at very admirable intention there. But again, I just wanted to ask, according to the do D anyway, that those videos had to adhere to what was on that what they call the DD Form 1910, which we didn’t label it yet. But the DD Form 1910 was, again for that that private, US government use only and when Christopher Mellon had come out recently, he had said that he supplied those videos to the New York Times. Then in the James Fox has great documentary getting rave reviews around the world. James, I’ve known for a very long time. So quick shout out to him. Make sure you watch his new documentary called Yeah,
Luis Elizondo 49:56
he did a fantastic job. He really did.
John Greenewald 49:58
Yeah, he’s he’s a he’s a Great human being, I know how much blood sweat and tears went into that just from knowing him personally. So my kudos to him. But in that Christopher Mellon came out and said somebody didn’t name them. But somebody bent the rules. That was, what his wording was. Which I want to juxtapose that with how we were shown the videos from to the stars Academy. I don’t expect you to speak for to the stars. I’m not asking you to, but I do want to ask about what they called the chain of custody, because that’s another one of those disconnects where paperwork says internal use only cleared for that, then we see the videos, and they were kind of advertised at Well, not kind of they were advertised as going through the declassification process through God. And they had Chain of Custody documentation. And that has always confused me because that, for me anyway, I found the do D Chain of Custody forums and stuff like that. It just wouldn’t apply. Is that accurate? So what is that show?
Luis Elizondo 51:01
study? You know, I can’t speak for Chris Mellon. And quite frankly, I’ve never asked Chris I don’t want to know, you know, there’s a just a plausible deniability is sometimes a good thing. But out of respect to Chris, I, I’ve never asked him this source. And I don’t really plan to to be honest with you. That’s between Chris and whoever he talked to, you know, the, how ttsa wound up putting them forward? I will tell you, if you were to ask me, you know, I, I probably would have been more hesitant to do that. But, you know, it happened. And it happened without me knowing that really what do
John Greenewald 51:45
you had no idea that they that they were going to release those videos?
Luis Elizondo 51:50
Not until the New York Times article. Yeah. That was not I was not, I was not aware.
John Greenewald 52:02
Were you aware they had them? If I can ask that.
Luis Elizondo 52:10
Now, actually, let me think. JOHN, I don’t recall I really don’t i don’t think because I remember being very surprised. Because the intent originally was for a community of interest and unclassified. But for official use only, if you will, community of interest. And I didn’t, I wasn’t the one who provided them. So I really don’t know what ttsa was thinking you probably want to talk to them as you know, I no longer publicly affiliated with with ttsa. They’re, they’re great people. Tom’s great guy, you know, it was Yeah, they’ll talk. But I can’t speak for teachers,
John Greenewald 52:54
I got you know, I and I understand that and respect that. And and I want to actually ask you about that. But I do want to make sure I have enough time to ask you this kind of round of questions, which is the do Dee’s reaction to all of this that after you resigned after these videos came out in the way that you did, which you’ve already outlined? Obviously, internally, this created kind of a riff we can see Oh, yeah.
Luis Elizondo 53:19
Oh, hey, listen, life was very uncomfortable for Lou Elizondo for a long time, I would imagine. It was, well, first of all, you had the problem. Most people didn’t know the program is real. So they thought blue went deep sex, he went blue went crazy. And then as I started to unfold internally, they’re like, Oh, crap, this program was real. And, you know, we never got briefed on it. Because Lou was going to the much higher levels with this program. Then they got some some people in there, well, to two camps, one said, oh, wow, you know what? Yeah, we better we better not treat them so harshly. Because he had very, very senior people in the loop. He was actually doing his job. Then you had another faction of people say, Well, he still should have told me, so let’s burn him to the ground. Let’s launch an investigation. Let’s pull his security clearance. And let’s, you know, let’s do everything we can to blow up his credibility. And there are still some pockets of those that are those individuals that exist. I think that’s probably why you see, you know, despite the senator and all these people coming up saying, Yeah, it was real and yeah, we would push the guy running it and all these now obvious things that people look back and say, well, that’s obvious back then. It wasn’t Yeah. And there were people there were factions in the in the d. o. t, that were not very happy with me. And those are the same factions that are still influencing some of your FOIA process, where you know, something exists, but they come back saying, Man, nothing to see here. Yeah, and you might have to try three or four times before you finally get something and you’re like, you know, what the heck hockey puck I’m now believe. I’m only getting this when I requested. Did you know two years ago? Yeah. During a tough spot, and I don’t want to disparage the DMV, because I do think I don’t think we can hold accountable a few people there for for that dysfunction and blame the entire department because because the Department of Defense is very, very good at what it does. The Acting Secretary right now is a fantastic human being the guys is a national hero, I won’t go into details, because you may be watching this, but but the guy was there in the early days of Afghanistan, I mean, super, super key person. And, and that is representative of most of the Department of Defense. They’re good people that want to do a good job for the American people. The problem is, you get some bureaucrats in there and people that are, are political. And, you know, there, there becomes an issue about ego. And just because I wasn’t told about something, therefore, it must not exist. Well, that’s not necessarily so. And it wasn’t up to me to tell because when you look at that 2009 memo from the Senate, the access list to that program was super, super small. I can’t just go out and brief somebody, I know the authority to do that, again, trouble. So that created a lot of a lot of challenges for me. And, you know, I often tell people say, Well, why don’t you just back then say A, B, and C? Well, because I made a promise to certain people. And I wasn’t going to, to violate that trust, I knew damn well, getting into this, that this was going to be an uphill battle, I had probably a 5% chance of mission success, which isn’t very good. Those are not good odds. Don’t go to Vegas with those odds. But I had a heart to heart with my team members. And we in order for this, for this topic to to finally get the light that it deserved. Someone had to step out. And that’s someone I being a military guy had to be me, I was a senior guy. So and let me ask
John Greenewald 57:04
you, this, focusing in on the do D what I call they took a shot at you. And I apologize if that phrasing is not appropriate. But essentially, you know, they took a shot at your credibility. And they’re challenging you as a person as a dedicated military, then later civilian employee of the Department of Defense, they are by name, taking this credibility shot at you. And I will admit, when that story broke, I was surprised it despite my again that that criticism, which you have not shied away from that you’ve always spoken to me about. And I want to point out again, for those who missed it in the beginning how admirable that is to you because you’re not afraid of these questions. Nor were you privately when we chatted on the phone or through email. But when they did that, I just kind of like took a step back and like, Okay, I’m not this isn’t about Lewis Elizondo, for me. This is about what is the truth behind what I believe is this active UFO cover up. After they did that? This let’s zero in on the spokespeople because they did that we don’t have to name names or make accusations. But sure, you know, the spokespeople did this. And they took that essential shot. Why? Why don’t you take a shot back and just say, look, here is the irrefutable proof. And let me just quickly preface why I’m asking that is that I’ve seen that there are a very, and this is posted posted publicly, a small list of people that include a couple journalists and at one UFO what I would call like a UFO blogger, in particular, that have made reference to you showing them documentation or what they call irrefutable proof that you are who you say you are. Now, I’m not challenging that. I believe that they saw something. Let me just quickly ask yes or no. Is that classified information?
Luis Elizondo 59:02
It’s not classified. No, but understand that I’m not going to give up the identities of other individuals just to save my skin. I’ve never been really I’m not that guy. What I could have I could have settled this three years ago. And you know, there when you talk to Senator Reid himself, that for the record, he’s telling you, yeah, Lou is the guy running the program. When you talk to how put off who was working for me? Who’s clearly part of it. Yeah, I worked for Lou. I mean, these are I don’t need to go toe to toe and get into a mudslinging contest with the Pentagon when they’ve already flipped flopped on the position six times. Firstly came out said yeah, he was real about UFOs. And Lou ran it. Then they came back and said, Well, no, he wasn’t about UFOs. Then they said, Well, he was about UFOs. But he didn’t run it. I mean, it’s, if you look at the track record, and I know, I know, you’ve seen this over and over again. Sure. You know, my position has been consistent and I’ve been backed up by by everybody that needs to back me up. This isn’t about Lewis It’s not about me if I make it about Lou Elizondo, then we take away from the progress we’ve made. Look how far we’ve come in three years. In just three years. JOHN, we have now the videos coming out that were official government videos never before release the acknowledgement that they’re real, the acknowledgement that they are some sort of unidentified aerial phenomenon, the establishment of a UAP Task Force Congress being briefed at the classified levels. By the way, if you don’t think I was part of that program, How the hell do you think ever made it on the hill to brief people? I mean, it’s, it’s at this point, it’s kind of silly I know and I don’t need to rehash all this because if you go for half an hour a laundry list of laundry lists the bottom line john, it’s not about me. I don’t really care what people think about me never have never will. This is about this is about this, this incredible movement for for transparency and real meaningful disclosure. Yeah, I mean, that’s what’s more important me going up and saying, hey, look at me and I’m you know, gonna go ahead and, and make the government look silly now, because we still need to work with the government. If I did that, then we run the chance of just to just so I can go ahead and quote unquote, prove who I am, which I don’t need to prove anybody don’t really give a damn what Sure. Yeah, I guess just to prove that I risk now putting my guys that are still there in the program, where now all of a sudden, it gets shut down because it becomes too hot of a topic. Yeah. Now the Pentagon’s getting sued by Lou Elizondo, now there’s defamation, Karen and others this, nobody wants to touch that hot potato. Nobody does. So and by the way to come out and say, Here’s document 12345. It’s not classified, but it’s legit of what it is, with with there’s people on those emails that are still engaged in those efforts. And I can’t compromise them. I won’t do it. I never have I never will. So until those people come out, which at some point, I’m sure they will, then people come under documents, and oh, wow, look at that, that isn’t that interesting. But until that occurs, I’m not I’m not going to do it just to say face. I’m not that guy never happened. I’m not going to come out there and say that, because this isn’t about Lou never has been about blue. And this is why I try to tell people, you know, people say well lose. Now the face of these UFOs I’m not the face. Look in the mirror, you’re the face. It’s everybody out there in your audience. They’re the face of this. I just happened to be one of the tools in the tool bag, like Chris Mellon and other people. But this is this is a long game we are. You know, I hate to say we’re in a running gun battle here. But this is this is a long war. Not a short word. This isn’t about instant gratification. This isn’t about, you know, Lou going up there and making the Department of Defense looks stupid. They’ve already had they’ve already put themselves in that box. I don’t need to help them with that. Yeah, you know, in fact, what they need is a solution. So they can continue to tackle this problem without people coming in and getting mad at because that’s, that’s really what they need. And if I do anything to poke the bear, all it’s going to do is, is make the situation worse, when really we’re trying to help find a solution. I got, by the way, if it’s at my expense, I’ll take it, john, I’m okay with it. If the cost of us getting this far in three years, if people say man, loose full of it, you know what? Fine, I’ll take it, because enough people know exactly who I am. And what I did. And by the way, this story is still unfolding. It’s just not over. So there’s a lot more to this narrative that when comes out, people are gonna go. Wow, okay, that’s interesting. I had no idea
John Greenewald 1:03:33
what I only have a couple minutes left, I again, appreciate your time. And I want to work this in if my audience has heard me talk about these types of issues a lot. passing it to you. If there’s one thing that I haven’t covered, but you want to talk about or say, or a message or anything, what would that be?
Luis Elizondo 1:03:59
You know, boy, let me let me say this. I believe as dysfunctional as our family of UFO enthusiasts are, whether it’s UFO, Twitter or UAP, research group, etc, etc. We have achieved this together. And yes, even the naysayers, even those contrarians, even those skeptics, we need you. We need them all. come on board because this is a conversation that affects all of us. And no one owns the narrative. I’m not out pushing the book. I’m not just anybody who wants to have a conversation with we can have a conversation. We are achieving this together. And that is the success here. It’s not that john Greenwald is doing the foil or Lou Elizondo is out there, doing TV shows or anybody else. It’s everything. Buddy doing what they do best in this sphere that is creating this moment in time that we have never seen the likes before. We need it and it’s okay. I don’t mind if I have haters. That’s okay. If that’s the cost of doing business. And that’s the cost of doing business, the truth has nothing to fear. So I would encourage people to to know that, that the second success we are seeing right now is a result of all of our contributions, not just one person. And, and I think everybody plays a vital role in this. You know, we would not be where we are today, john, if you hadn’t done and are doing the things you’re doing, from your perspective, that by the way, nobody’s as good as doing it as you are. Just like, there are certain things that I can do because of my access to to help happen and Chris Mellon and and yes, even everybody on out there in the in the UAP, Twitter world, they’re making a difference there. They’re campaigning, the look at Marco Rubio when he just came out and said not too long ago. That’s because people are telling him, it’s okay to have this conversation. We want to know, it’s interesting, right? We’re not going to talk about Elvis on the mothership anymore in tinfoil hats. This is a serious topic that deserves serious attention. And, and whether you realize it or not, john, people begin to look at you. And if you want to know what the face of disclosure looks like, you’re looking at it. It’s it’s, I’m looking at it right now, you’re part of that people out there, like, you know, the I gotta be careful. I don’t want to plug any particular people out there. But there’s a there’s a huge sea of of advocates out there in social media that are writing the congressman writing the government they’re doing they’re learning from you. I mean, how amazing is that? Right? People are now learning from john Greenwald’s playbook and FOIA. And it’s working. I mean, it’s at some point, you know, you can’t stop the tidal wave. So I would, I guess my, my final thought on this would be, don’t stop doing what you’re doing. You know, you don’t have to be in anyone’s camp. Just keep doing what you’re doing. And then I would also say, beware of those selling the snake oil, beware of those who are telling you about these preconceived narratives that they have in their mind, and are saying, Don’t pay attention to those guys. That’s the real threat, when someone tells you don’t listen to that person. That’s the real threat. I encourage you, you know what, listen to anybody and everybody you want to listen to, and then make up your own mind. That’s my word of advice to anybody out there who wants to know about this topic? And by the way, no, there is no expert out there. I don’t care who you are what you say, I was in it for 10 years working for the US government, and I’m not an expert. So that would be my advice to people. And by the way, when they say, well, do you’re pushing the threat narrative? No, I’m not pushing a narrative that they could be a threat if they want it to be because we don’t have enough information. That’s what I’ve always maintained. And if you think it’s fear mongering, well, then fine. I mean, if you think you have some sort of special relationship with a UFO, and, you know, you want to charge people money, so they can have a, you know, close encounter, you know, while you’re paying pilots to drop flares, okay, fine. I don’t know, do whatever you want. I just, I think I think we need to, I think we need to have a conversation where everybody has a voice. And we stop trying to mute each other. I think that’s the real danger
John Greenewald 1:08:29
of the great words. And by the way, the threat potential narrative. I have agreed since day one with you guys that ttsa as a whole, obviously has dealt with that a lot. I’ve done FOIA requests upon FOIA requests on that, but that threat potential, it’s very real. I don’t know why people are afraid of the T word. I know I’m out of time. If I could ask you just one more question. Yeah, absolutely. Because I want you to have the opportunity to respond, because this is all kind of unfolding right now. As you mentioned, you’ve decided to as you put it, not be affiliated with ttsa. Although you still have high respect for them. I’ve been kind of waiting. I’ve reached out to them unrelated to the show, but reached out to them to get like some type of, you know, risk response press release. Are they informing their investors only because I know my listeners and watchers want to be updated on that. So can I ask you just kind of a two parter here. Is there a reason why you’ve decided to not be affiliated anymore? And the second part which is the most important to me, is where does that leave off on the credo agreement with the US Army where you guys are taking pieces of uaps that you have collected over the last couple of years? created legend? We
Luis Elizondo 1:09:46
don’t know let you get there. Actually. I just want to be fair, but let’s, let’s have you out that you know, we really don’t know we want to just make we’re doing our due diligence. We’re
John Greenewald 1:09:57
trying to find out gotcha and and thank you for that and So you’ve got these these alleged pieces of UAP that you’re going to have analyzed through this army agreement you’re listed on there, you’re the main contact, I forget what the exact wording was, and the agreements Been a while. So that’s my last question to you is, why did you choose to leave them? Where does that leave us with that crater agreement? And was there anything that transpired thus far? Yep.
Luis Elizondo 1:10:20
So I, again, I people are gonna get mad at me for saying this, I can’t speak for ttsa can only speak for myself. What I have mentioned before is that ttsa is a company and they owe their investors a results, right. She’s all good companies should do the storage of investment. Where my expertise lies, specifically me and reselling. shondo is not necessarily in the entertainment division, which is where ttsa does a lot of its focus areas on and for me, my skill sets are probably better used in a different capacity. So that decision was made. My, again, all my friends at ttsa I love them dearly, great people, great human beings. But, you know, this is battlefields evolve. battlefields change, they’re not static, right? They’re an evolving situation. And sometimes you have to move troops around the battlefield, in order to, to, to to win the battle, right? That’s not uncommon. You don’t just sit there in rank and file and just march forward, you have to adapt with the environment and the situation as its evolving. And that’s very much what what I’m doing this is, again, a long game, let me remind people that, you know, we have achieved a lot in three years, but I think if we want to achieve more in the next three years, we have to adapt, we have to adapt, we have to continue moving the ball forward, and sometimes look at a football game, right? The quarterback doesn’t do the same thing every time. The quarterbacks got to change plays, otherwise, you know that the guys know what you’re doing, and then they figure you out and you lose the game. So you got to you got to you can’t ever take for granted the battlespace that we’re operating in. And I say battle spaces. Again, people say, oh, there’s a threat narrative again. No, no, that’s just the way I talk. I’m a military guy. Right? So I look at everything as a military style campaign or an intelligence campaign. Right? It’s a multi pronged, it’s it’s a multi dimensional battle space. I tell people, you know, there’s several ways you can look at the battle space, some people look at battle space, like the game Connect for some people look at the battle space like checkers, some people look at the battle space, like three dimensional chess. And that’s kind of the way I think, you know, we need to look at this, this, this is no different. This is a very complex, highly evolving topic where we’re learning every day more and more and more. So we have to maintain our our momentum by always adapting to to the environment, anticipating not just the environment of tomorrow, but the environment next week, next month, next year. So we can stay ahead.
John Greenewald 1:13:09
When you ask me another question I didn’t want Will you stay connected with that crater agreement? Or are you essentially out of that out?
Luis Elizondo 1:13:17
Well, okay. So, again, as it relates to ttsa, I can’t speak about that, I can tell you that we’re always looking for opportunities for new partnerships, right? This being perfect example, you and I are having this conversation. This is a partnership. This is this is what it is, you know, whether you like me or hate me, or I like you or hate you or whatever. We’re working with each other because you realize, I’m sorry,
John Greenewald 1:13:42
I said you hate me. No, no, no, no.
Luis Elizondo 1:13:46
I’m just saying I’m just general terms. Either way, you know, whether we like or hate each other. No, actually, for the record, actually, I like it. But that’s inconsequential. Doesn’t matter if I like you. That’s my point. The point is that we each have a role to play and and we we need each other if we want to continue to push the ball down, down the field, just like we need everybody else right now, on social media in this in this crazy grassroots effort. We need to call UFO Twitter, right or, or the UAP research enclave? I mean, it’s working. It’s working. Again, I can tell you don’t look now but you’re achieving what you what you’re setting out to do. So I think people shouldn’t be surprised that by continue to, to engage certain elements of the US government for the purposes of research, that that that’s probably a no brainer. I think most people should if they see that, that shouldn’t be a surprise.
John Greenewald 1:14:41
Well, look, I can ask you questions all day, I’m down to 6437 left to go. My guess is we’re probably not you know, in a position to ask them all right now. So tell you what, I hope that after this last hour or so that you will come back that that you will continue this conversation with me because I hope that you’ve realized not only through this last hour, but obviously we’ve shared a lot of conversations privately. You know, and I hope you know where I’m coming from. And you started with an apology to me, and I want to end it with one to you. I caught myself by critiquing the story that was coming out, then starting to shift towards it being personal, not by intent, but it came off that way. And for you, I apologize. I’ve already done it privately. But I want to do it publicly.
Luis Elizondo 1:15:34
No worries, no worries. Where this is, we’re in this together, man. And and this is something that I think, you know, my concern for you My biggest concern, I told you this privately, just having me on your show, I’m concerned that there going to be some of your your followers fans. You know, folks, your associates, that may criticize you for this. They may say, oh, you’re drinking the Kool Aid. Oh, you know, you’re, you’re falling for misinformation for Lou, I hope that’s not the case for you. I really hope that by doing having this conversation together, people realize on both sides that, you know, we we can work together, we should be working together. I hope this doesn’t have any negative impacts for you. If anybody out there is listening, and they think that this is some sort of scheme you and I came up with. It’s not what you see is what you get. This is very frank. JOHN Did not you did not load me with any questions beforehand. Everything you’ve asked me, you’ve asked me without me knowing ahead of time. So hopefully people see that level of transparency. And, you know, maybe we can show them that, you know, we all can work together.
John Greenewald 1:16:46
Yeah, we should be working. And I hope that this serves as an example of that. You’ve been so gracious with your time I blew through the agreed amount. So I appreciate your willingness to take a little bit more time with me. You’re welcome back anytime you know my number, you know, my email, please know,
Luis Elizondo 1:17:01
you got mine. So I think people know Just give me a call give me give me a couple days head notice because I do have a honey do list I have to stay on top of but I’m happy to have a conversation anytime. Absolutely been my honor and pleasure. And I really appreciate it. By the way. Thank you for what you do. I’m telling you you are and I’ve told people this privately I told him publicly. There is only one john Greenwald that can do what that does what you do. It’s it’s amazing what you’ve been able to achieve and accomplish using the government system against itself. That takes a high degree of savvy and sophistication that not everybody really understands and appreciates. But, you know, I see it with you and you play a vital role. So thank you for what you do.
John Greenewald 1:17:45
Well, I appreciate that. I always love ruffling feathers wherever those feathers may lie. So thank you for that.
Luis Elizondo 1:17:51
And you’re really good at it. Thanks.
John Greenewald 1:17:53
I appreciate that. And thanks again for your time and your graciousness, and thank you all for listening and or watching this is John Greenewald, Jr signing off. We’ll see you next time.
Follow The Black Vault on Social Media:
