Nick Pope and the MOD

#MOD #UFOTRUTHMAGAZINE #STATEMENT by Gary Heseltine with regard the ever changing status of Nick Pope & his beliefs!!

MORAL COURAGE IN UFOLOGY

Ordinarily I try to rise above some of the petty, nasty things some people say in the world of Ufology on Facebook. It’s always reminded me of children bickering in a playground but sometimes things are said that really do warrant a response.

This is one such occasion.

A few days ago Nick Pope verbally attacked me for seemingly ‘lacking’ the moral courage to deal with that bad, bad, bad person ….. Larry Warren.

Indeed, I was accused of almost endorsing ‘violence to women’ and that I should ‘strip’ LW of his ‘Courage in Ufology’ Award that UFO Truth Magazine gave him in September 2016.

Akin to being slapped across the face with a wet fish by Mr Bean I could not sleep for days…. not.

And then he did again today. See the attached screengrab. Classy Nick.

What leaps out at me is not what it says about me but what Nick Pope IN WRITING has stated in black and white that Larry Warren is a serial fraudster!

As far as I’m aware Larry has never been convicted in a court of law for fraud and that in my former police detective opinion is just about as clear a libel as you will ever see….

Anyone unfamiliar with all the personalities involved would almost certainly assume that Larry Warren must be a convicted fraudster based on the above comment.

It is a scandalous comment for anyone to make let alone someone who is supposedly a ‘respected UFO researcher and author’.

MOVING ON TO HIS COMMENTS ABOUT ME

So, on the second occasion of being ‘wet fished by Mr Bean’ I thought it was time to respond to these ‘accusations’.

But before I address these issues, which I do take seriously, I think it only right that if a person accuses me of ‘lacking moral courage’ then it is surely only fair that I should be given the opportunity to respond and ask such questions of moral courage to that of my accuser and for this opportunity Nick I want to thank you so very much. The phrase ‘gift horse’ comes to mind….

NICK POPE – IS HE A MAN OF ‘MORAL COURAGE’?

I first became aware of Nick Pope who had seemingly crossed from the dark side of the MOD to the legion of people, like me, had looked at the best evidence from around the world, and had concluded that some UFO reports did indeed involve extraterrestrials visiting planet Earth.

To announce his crossover to the ‘believers’ side he went on BBC2’s prestigious political programme ‘Newsnight’ to be interviewed by none other than John Snow (no, not that John Snow from Game of Thrones).

My god did that young man nail his colours to the mast ‘I believe that some UFOs are probably extraterrestrial’. Go that man….

For those who have followed Nick’s career and are in a state of shock by this statement here is the link to prove that he once really did say it on television….

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DJZ-4T9XXE

In it an actor reads sections from his then soon to be published book ‘Open Skies, Closed Minds’.

He is then interviewed by Snow personally and without hesitation states that in 1996 based on the evidence that some UFOs are extraterrestrial – no ifs or buts – unequivocal.

Please remember this interview and these words. Never again would he ever be quite so certain….

Is it not a fair question to wonder why not?

OPEN SKIES, CLOSED MINDS

Within UFO researcher ranks in the UK it has been known for many years that the draft of his first book was proofed by, I believe, Jenny Randles, the prolific UFO book author, and it contained a chapter about HIS ‘OWN ABDUCTION EXPERIENCE WHILST DRIVING HIS RED SPORTS CAR ON A COUNTRY ROAD WITH HIS THEN GIRLFRIEND!’

Mysteriously this chapter was removed from the final published version.

Now if we are talking about ‘moral courage’ then surely it begs the question that if he was an abductee then why was it removed?

Surely if it was a genuine experience then ‘morally’ he should have disclosed this important piece of information – if not then, then surely over the course of his now 20 plus year career in ufology. However, there has been only a deafening silence.

How many TV programmes has he appeared on talking about the abduction phenomena? Numerous.

How many radio shows, worldwide talking about the abduction phenomena? Numerous.

How many conferences, worldwide that have discussed the abduction phenomena? Numerous…… and still there was silence.

Nick, one has to wonder after all of these years why you have never mentioned this fact in your public life?

Could it be that the answer lies with not wanting to ACTUALLY hang your colours to the mast again after your 1996 entry point?

So, I will ask you the direct question, “Nick, why was your abduction chapter removed from the final published version?”

For me there can only be two reasons why it was removed:

1. It could be seen as ‘too controversial’ at a time when it was not deemed acceptable in the mainstream?

2. Or that it was not true and perhaps had been made up to help sell the book?

Whether it be the former or the latter, this aspect of his past does not reflect well on Nick because if he really was an abductee then surely at some point in his career he could and should have come forward. After all, he was an extremely ‘high profile’ figure. Other, respected international researchers have come forward, people I respect like Robert Salas, like Suzanne Hansen from New Zealand, or AJ Gevaerd from Brazil who subsequently all had the necessary moral courage to come forward about their own abduction experiences.

No, despite you being an abductee you didn’t come forward to support them. Not much moral courage on display there Nick.

WHO AND WHAT IS NICK POPE?

I have always found Nick an affable fellow, indeed we have even shared an evening restaurant meal together and up until this point we have always been courteous to each other despite being very different people.

Now if I have something to say to someone I actually say it to their face, in person and so it was over the course of that meal that I told him very pleasantly of my theory that he was an MOD ‘plant’ within the UFO community.

Think about it, what would the MOD need to do to have someone immediately accepted into the heart of the worldwide researcher community?

Firstly, the person would have to have worked at the MOD UFO desk, for credibility, then he/she would have to make an announcement, ….. a big announcement, a BBC2 Newsnight announcement, to say that he now believed that some sightings were ET.

Well Nick did that and within a few weeks of that interview in 1996, his first book, Open Skies, Closed Minds’ hit the books stalls…..minus his abduction chapter.

‘It’s a miracle’ shouted the UFO Community, he’s now on our side, let’s book him for a conference, let’s invite everywhere to see what he has to say because he believes in ET!

In 1997 another book followed - The Uninvited….and guess what it was about? That thorny subject of alien abduction, oh my god, this is surely the point where would/could reveal all about his personal ‘abduction experience’.

Did he reveal all? To do so would have been a brave thing, to disclose all about the phenomena? What better opportunity for him to tell the world about his own experience.

Alas, not a word, not a hint, no, it was just another book to cement his place within the upper echelons of the worldwide UFO community who never quite saw him the way I did.

What moral leadership, what support he could have been for abductees who were struggling under the weight of ridicule from the mainstream. He could have been a hero, someone with such a high profile…… but nothing was forthcoming from Nick.

No, I don’t see much moral courage there either.

Perhaps it was his body language, perhaps it was my training as an advanced police interviewer of suspects and witnesses. He just wasn’t sincere for me.

The interesting thing about that meal and our conversation was that he listened, smiled and denied my suggestion but his body language painted a very different story.

Now, let’s talk now about some of my personal experiences with Nick over the years.

I remember three times being at Rendlesham Forest with Nick for various documentary shoots over the years and on two occasions it was with Colonel Halt.

I think the first one was the UFO Hunters programme about the RFI with Bill Birnes at the helm.

Towards the end of the filming, on a bright but bitterly cold day I was interviewed by Bill who asked me what I thought the incident involved and I said the collective evidence pointed to an ET event.

Then Col Halt was interviewed and he said something along the lines that whatever it was, it was under intelligent control (Incidentally this marked the first time I met Halt in December 2007).

Then it was Nicks turn, so Bill asks, “what do you think Nick?”, his reply went something like this, “it’s very interesting…. but I don’t know.”

On another occasion the three of us were filmed for a privately produced documentary that was never aired then on the 3rd occasion I was being interviewed at the edge of the forest for a programme and he was stood close by, just out of camera shot.

The director asked me straight, “Gary, what do you think it was?” My reply, “The evidence points to an ET event.”

I looked over at Nick, stood just feet away and he did what he does when he hears uncomfortable details…. he put his head down akin to Mr Bean and looked distinctly ill at ease. Why?

NICK POPE AND HIS INVOLVEMENT IN THE RFI

If I am right that Nick was a plant from the MOD into the upper echelons of the worldwide UFO community then you would think that he would get heavily involved in the RFI, I mean surely the MOD would need to have someone on the inside to help shape the way the media reported on the case in the UK and around the world.

It was too early for him when Skycrash was published, the first book that properly looked at the incident, written by Dot Street, Brenda Butler and Jenny Randles.

Then that bad, bad, bad man Larry Warren published Left at East Gate in 1997 with co-author Peter Robbins. Whilst now wishing to distance himself faster than Usain Bolt can collect his gold medals here are some of Nick’s comments about the book then that featured on its sleeve.

“..Warren and Robbins have done an excellent job in blowing the lid off the case” …..then further on he says, “The book is meticulously researched…..”

Then in 2000 he really gets into the act by teaming up with Georgina Bruni, with You Can’t Tell the People and writing the foreword to the book and being heavily involved in the subsequent media promotion of it.

Then he decided to write his own book on the case - Encounter in Rendlesham Forest which was heavily trailed to tell the story of two of the principal witnesses of the incident, Jim Penniston and John Burroughs.

When I read the book I was surprised, if not a little shocked to find that only THREE chapters centred on Penniston and Burroughs out of the 21 I believe that were on offer with the rest being a re-hashing of known material.

Then it gets a bit murky because Peter Robbins took exception to many aspects of that book and felt so aggrieved that he wrote an E-book essentially challenging the book in its entirety.

Then Peter Robbins went further by publishing another book essentially challenging comments made by Colonel Halt about Larry Warren made during a lecture in Woodbridge.

And then finally we have ‘The Halt Perspective’, Colonel Halt’s new book with his take on the whole RFI and I believe that Nick wrote the foreword to that one as well.

So, if you stand back a little, don’t you find it a little odd that Nick has essentially been involved in every major publication bar the works by Peter Robbins and …. that bad, bad man, Larry Warren?

I do.

Finally, one more personal anecdote. Three or four years ago, we bumped into each other in Toronto, Canada for the filming of a UFO documentary series. I was in a bar at our hotel when he walked in so I bought him a drink. As we chatted at the bar he told me that after the filming he was going to spend the weekend with General Williams, yes that Gen Williams of RFI fame. Interestingly he told me that it would be his second visit to him. I said, Williams knows a lot more than he saying and he smiled and I said, Nick, you know a lot more about Rendlesham than you’ve ever let on and he smiled as he walked away.

I guess that pretty much shows up the difference between us. With me, what you see is what you get, with Nick it’s shadows and whispers and probably a handler’s agenda.

NICK POPE ON LIVE TELEVISON

Because of his involvement at the MOD UFO Desk it has afforded him literally dozens of opportunities on LIVE television to nail his beliefs to the mast. Certainly, no-one in Britain has ever had the number of opportunities on live television as Nick to say he believed that some UFOs were extraterrestrial.

Time and time again, “So Nick, you used to be at the MOD UFO Desk, are some UFOs extraterrestrial?

The answer was invariably always the same… Something along the lines of “Well, there are some fascinated cases, but I wouldn’t go that far….. etc, etc.

Time and time again. Yet he was so unequivocal on Newsnight in 1996. What changed Nick?

Now if he had had a genuine change of heart then that would have been ok but you’ve never said that. Nor have you ever given any kind of explanation for your seemingly always uncertain, vague answers.

Could it be that to make a career for yourself, that you couldn’t allow yourself to be pigeon-holed into a specific box i.e. ET believer. Perhaps by playing a fine tune you could get twice as many stories out there and make twice as much money. If not particularly ethical that makes sense.

NICK POPE THE JOURNALIST

In my now 15 years of public research there is almost a universal truth within the researcher field.

‘There is no money in ufology’ is a common phrase heard and its one that I subscribe too. Yes, some people sell a few books, get to travel but do they make any real money…. No. Believe it or not they don’t.

Only two people in this field appear to me to have made a lot of money.

Steven Greer, with is CE5 events in the desert, seem to be very popular and one Nick Pope, of whom I was told recently by a mainstream journalist that he was in fact now a millionaire. Now, if anyone knows me well they will know that I’ve never been motivated by money so there is no envy or jealousy from me. Well done Nick.

However, I have often wondered about his motives for some of his pieces. Remember this one….

I don’t recall the exact details but it was during a certain Olympic Games a few years ago, that he put out a big ‘news’ story about a potential ‘alien invasion’ scenario for which he was publicly taken to task by, none other than Richard Dolan, the respected ufologist, when his ‘news piece’ actually turned out to be just a story to ‘promote’ a computer game about ‘alien invasion’ and therefore it was not an actual ‘news’ piece at all.

If you can do that Nick with a clear conscience, then good luck to you. Personally. I couldn’t do that. Incidentally, I probably could have sold my Rendlesham film script for a lot of money had I been willing to compromise my integrity and turn it into ‘Independence Day’ but I refused on several occasions when this was suggested to me.

THE CITIZENS HEARINGS, WASHINGTON D.C. 2013

Finally, in 2013 at the Citizen’s Hearings in Washington DC, at the National Press Club, one by one all of the principal witnesses and researchers, myself included, said that they believed that there was clear evidence that some UFOs were extraterrestrial in origin….

Everyone said that unequivocally apart just one person…. You Nick.

I kind of knew what you were going to say when you were asked for your specific opinion.

I deliberately filmed his response. See my personal clip which I’ve uploaded to Youtube.

This is word for word what he had to say in answer to the Congressman’s question which I’ve also included,

Congressman: “But now I’m interested, not in the official MOD position because I know how it all works and as you say and in your own words the UK acts like a lapdog to the United States, so here’s what I’m asking you. What’s your opinion based on all that stuff you’ve had access to, is there an ET origin to what has obviously been accurate sightings of real UFOs, now having sighted a UFO is not the same as saying it’s an ET component. I want to know your opinion based on all that stuff you’ve investigated?”

NICK POPE: “I THINK SIR I WOULD SAY THAT THE EVIDENCE DOESN’T GO QUITE FAR ENOUGH FOR ME TO SAY PERSONALLY THAT I’M ABSOLUTELY SURE WE ARE BEING VISITED BUT I CERTAINLY THINK IT IS COMPELLING ENOUGH THAT IT IS A POSSIBILITY… IT’S A FANCY WAY OF SAYING I DON’T KNOW, I APOLOGISE.”

That was your chance to finally tell the world what you said so unequivocally in 1996 when you began your career, that you believed that some UFOs were extraterrestrial in origin but you totally bottled it, or perhaps at such a prestigious event, your handler’s made you follow the MOD party line….?

Why didn’t you mention your abduction experience? If you were an abductee then you knew first hand that it was real.

Why didn’t you say that in 1996 I believed it was ET but I’ve changed my mind?

No Nick, you did what you pretty much always do i.e. say absolutely nothing of value.

TIME FOR ME TO ADDRESS SOME ISSUES

As a former police officer, I cannot and will never condone threats made by anyone towards men or women.

I have told this to Larry Warren personally and in no uncertain terms. Some of the things he has said in recent months are totally unacceptable and inappropriate. I therefore had no choice to tell inform him over the Xmas period that this comments meant he could no longer be co-host of the Magazine Conference in 2017 or in the future. He accepted what I said with good grace and totally understood my position.

In reality, David Young was the ONLY PERSON, as a subscriber to the magazine who directly asked me for my opinion on this matter. As a subscriber it was a legitimate question and one to which I gave him an answer.

Now, contrary to the lynch mob fraternity I don’t spend all of my time on FB and I asked him to keep my reply private, because it was actually a private matter between I, as the editor and he as the subscriber.

However, I soon realised that this was clearly not going to be good enough for everyone to salivate over so I told David that he could release what I had said.

As for the belief in some quarters that LW’s actions in recent months should see him stripped of his ‘Courage in Ufology’ Award then I have this to say.

The award was given to two recipients at the conference, Travis Walton, who has dealt with his own experience admirably for 41 years and Larry got his award for being the original RFI witness whistleblower in 1983 and his roughly 10 years where he was essentially ALONE as the face of the case in the worldwide media.

Now I ask any REASONABLE person - What has his recent foolish comments/behaviour got to do with that in that particular TIME FRAME i.e. 1983-93?

Answer – NOTHING WHATSOEVER!

Therefore, being an entirely unrelated event I can see no grounds whatsoever for ‘stripping’ him of the award and in my humble opinion, like Travis Walton, Larry Warren was and is entirely justified in retaining the said award.

GARY HESELTINE Editor, UFO Truth Magazine