ufo - UFOs at close sight: ACUFO catalog - Case of Peenemünde, Germany, in the Autumn of 1943

In their 2002 book “Out of the Shadows“, Dr. David Clarke and Andy Roberts explained that by the end of 1943, the British Air Ministry's intelligence officers were totally perplexed both by the sheer number of foo-fighter reports being received and the apparent lack of aggression displayed by the phenomena.

They tell that Michael Bentine, Intelligence officer of in the Royal Air Force Bomber Command in the winter of 1943-1944, said in a 1992 interview that he had debriefed a Polish bomber unit based in England, who claimed that silver-blue balls appeared near their wing on six missions in the autumn of 1943, tailing the planes as they raided the Nazi secret weapons base at Peenemunde.

The crews told Bentine it must be a new weapon, and Bentine enquired, “But what did it do to you?”, to which the crews replied “Nothing,” so, Bentine pointed out: “Well, it was not a very effective weapon, was it?”

In 1989, and in 2005, the British ufologist Jenny Randles told how she had learned this information from Michael Bentine, as she interviewed him once at the BBC in Leeds, after he had appeared on a show there, and once in 1975 in a BBC late-night radio show they made together in Manchester.

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Jenny Randles recalled how she interviewed TV personality Michael Bentine who described himlsef in biography listings a writer, actor, comedian and parapsychologist. Randles sais that of all the TV celebrities she had met, he was the one who most openly acknowledges the paranormal in his life, from a standpoint of personal experiences but also by his extensive understanding and knowledge. She found he was very genuine and of friendly nature, with "an exceptional comprehension of parapsychology, the serious study of strange phenomena", "one of the most astute of Britain's thinkers and researchers in this subject."

She interviewed Bentine twice, once at the BBC in Leeds, after he had appeared on a show there, and once in 1975 in a BBC late-night radio show they made together in Manchester.

Randles told of Bentine's experience during World War II. He was then an intelligence officer in command of a Polish unit of bomber pilots conducting raids from Britain, and he came into close contact with UFOs. His crew returned from a raid on Peenemunde and described strange balls of pulsating light that were floating beside them.

They believed them to be some sort of weapon, so Michael Bentine debriefed the airmen and asked, 'What did they do to you?' They said, 'Nothing', so he said (chuckling), 'It's not a very effective weapon, is it?'

Later he found that the Americans were investigating stories from their own bomber crews during late 1944 and into 1945, and called the things "foo fighters" from a U. S. comic strip where "foo" meant "fire".

Randles said he had since had other experiences of glowing things in the sky and developed a personal interest, so that he once played the "UFO expert" to Patrick Moore's UFO disbeliever on an edition of Moore's long-running BBC TV show "The Sky at Night" when the topic was debated; "Bentine argued persuasively in favour of the existence of the phenomenon."

The authors explain that "by now" [end of 1943] the British Air Ministry's intelligence officers were totally perplexed both by the sheer number of foo-fighter reports being received and the apparent lack of aggression displayed by the phenomena.

“When I was an intelligence officer in Bomber Command in the winter of 1943-44, I debriefed several crews about some lights that had attacked them when they were over the Baltic. They fired at the lights, which didn't shoot back. These lights didn't seem to do anything, just pulse and go round. We put it down to fatigue, but later, after I had sent the reports in, an American G2 intelligence officer told us that their day bombers saw lights in the sky - “foo-fighters” he called them.”

The authors say that in another interview, in 1992, Bentine told that he debriefed a Polish bomber unit based in England, who claimed that silver-blue balls appeared near their wing on six missions in the autumn of 1943, tailing the planes as they raided the Nazi secret weapons base at Peenemunde.

The crews told Bentine it must be a new weapon, and Bentine enquired, “But what did it do to you?” The crews replied “Nothing,” so, Bentine pointed out: “Well, it was not a very effective weapon, was it?”

Date:	Autumn 1943
Time:	?
Duration:	?
First known report date:	1992
Reporting delay:	Hours, decades.

Country:	Germany
State/Department:
City or place:	Peenemünde

Number of alleged witnesses:	Several.
Number of known witnesses:	?
Number of named witnesses:	0

Reporting channel:	Witness Intelligence debriefing, debriefing officer interview.
Visibility conditions:	Probably by night.
UFO observed:	Yes.
UFO arrival observed:	?
UFO departure observed:	?
UFO action:	Follow.
Witnesses action:	?
Photographs:	No.
Sketch(s) by witness(es):	No.
Sketch(es) approved by witness(es):	No.
Witness(es) feelings:	?
Witnesses interpretation:	New German weapon.

Sensors:	[X] Visual: Several. [ ] Airborne radar: [ ] Directional ground radar: [ ] Height finder ground radar: [ ] Photo: [ ] Film/video: [ ] EM Effects: [ ] Failures: [ ] Damages:
Hynek:	?
Armed / unarmed:	Armed, machine guns.
Reliability 1-3:	1
Strangeness 1-3:	2
ACUFO:	Insufficient information.

[...] consider the following eye-opening revelation from British UFO investigator Jenny Randles: “UK comedian Michael Bentine, then an intelligence officer supervising the free Polish forces, told me of the debriefing he carried out in late 1944 on an aircrew who had seen the lights during raids at the secret V-rocket base at Peenemunde and the intense interest in them shown by U.S. intelligence staff. Despite feeling they were dangerous, no crewman ever described a single harmful effect caused by them.”

I have met a few witnesses who were directly involved in the foo fighter situation. One of these was Michael Bentine, who became well known in Britain as a comedian (part of the group of young wits that inspired the later Monty Python era on radio and early TV, and went by the name of “The Goons.”)

During the war Bentine was an intelligence officer who had the job of debriefing the crews that returned to the UK from free Polish bombing missions on the German rocket plant at Peenemunde. It was they who told him of these strange lights in what were some of the very first sightings.

Bentine, describing to me his reactions, illustrates well how the mindset of human beings is always shaped by the circumstances that we face. His first question, of course, should have been what these lights were. But this was not phrased in the context of scientific endeavor, despite his personal scientific training. Yes, he briefly considered and dismissed the standard options, such as St Elmo's Fire or similar atmospheric electrical discharges that might cause weird glows to form near aircraft. But his concern was principally whether these lights were targeting the bombers, and whether that meant that they were weapons, presumably developed by the Nazis.

As with his colleagues, Bentine phrased his questions to the puzzled witnesses entirely from the framework dictated by this presumption. What did the lights do, he asked? Nothing, was the mystified reply. So they were not much use as a weapon then, was his relieved conclusion.

This did not help to solve the riddles posed by the foo fighter sightings, as Bentine well knew. But he had a very specific remit: to assess them as a threat. And once it was clear that they were not a threat, then it was really no longer important to the war effort to know what else they might be.

As he told me years later, they are probably what we now call UFOs. But unless UFOs were interfering with the aim to defeat the Nazis, then they were not a priority.

This might seem almost absurd, given our personal interest in UFOs, but it is perfectly reasonable if we put ourselves into the context of 1944.

The author says that the late “Goon Show” star Michael Bentine, who served as an intelligence officer in RAF Bomber Command during 1943-1944, said in a 1992 interview that he had been debriefing several crews who had seen unidentified lights in the sky during raids on the Baltic coast. Bentine said that they fired at the lights but the lights did not shoot back. He said the lights did not seem to do anything, just pulse and go round, so that the intelligence discard them as caused by “fatigue”. But later, after Bentine had sent the reports in, an American G2 Intelligence Officer told that their bombers also saw lights in the sky and called then “foo-fighters”.

The author says that Bentine also told how he debriefed a Polish bomber unit based in England, who claimed that silver-blue balls appeared near their wing on six missions during the autumn of 1943; the balls tailed the planes as they raided the Nazi V-weapons base at Peenemunde. The crews told Bentine it must be a new weapon. 'But what did it do to you?' Bentine inquired. 'Nothing,' they replied. Bentine then pointed out: 'Well it was not a very effective weapon, was it?'.

Dr. Clarke comments that “Bentine's last statement accurately sums up the conclusions reached by the Air Ministry and USAAF during their study of these phenomena. Whatever the foo-fighters were, they did not appear to pose a threat to aircraft.”

1943

Autumn

A Polish bomber unit based in England claims that silver-blue balls of fire appeared near their wing on six missions when they raided the Nazi V-1 weapons plant in Peenemünde, Germany. RAF intelligence officer Michael Bentine debriefs them later and asks, “But what did it do to you?” They reply, “Nothing.” Bentine points out, “Well it was not a very effective weapon, was it?”

(UFOFiles2, p. 20; David Clarke and Andy Roberts, “The Foo Fighters: The RAF Experience,” The Real UFO Project, January 2003)

Aircraft information:

The nature of the mission implies that the aircraft involved must have been British night bombers, the possibilities being the Avro Lancaster Mk. I and III, the Handley Page Halifax Mk. III, the Vickers Wellington.

Discussion:

Wikipedia sources list 1 bombing mission against Peenemünde in 1943: on August 18, 1943. But beware: this is not exactly true; this was only the date of “Operation Hydra” against Peenemünde, and many raids were to follow after this date, the whole operation being called “Operation Crossbow.”

The raids were combined between British Royal Air Force (RAF) and Eighth Air Force of the U.S. Army. Usually, the RAF conducted the night mission, and the USAAF were arriving the next day to follow with a daytime attack. The mission was mostly successful at destroying the German research facility, delaying their progress on developing their rockets, but not stopping it entirely of course.

Over 8000 Polish airmen served in the RAF in WWII. I listed several Polish squadrons in the RAF Bomber command that were active in 1943: 300 301 304 305:

No. 300 Polish Bomber Squadron “Masovia” RAF Faldingworth (Avro Lancaster Mk. I and III)
No. 301 Polish Bomber Squadron “Pomerania” RAF Faldingworth (Handley Page Halifax Mk. III)
No. 305 Polish Bomber Squadron “Greater Poland” Lasham (de Havilland Mosquito F.B. Mk VI) (Peenemünde certainly out of range)
No. 304 Polish Bomber Squadron “Silesia” RAF Chivenor (Vickers Wellington Mk. XIV)

Unfortunately, I have not yet succeeded in proving or disproving that a Polish Bomber Squadron was involved in a bombing raid on Peenemünde in the autumn of 1943.

Michael Bentine (1922-1996) (photo below) descended from a prominent Peruvian family and was educated at Eton. He had originally intended to become an engineer and scientist, but when World War II intervened, Bentine requested specifically Bomber Command, served as an officer in the RAF operations section of British Intelligence at Wickenby. After the war, he abandoned science and engineering in favor of comedy and script-writing, forming the madcap comedy duo “Sherwood and Forest” with his friend Tony Sherwood. (See goonshow.org)

Peenemünde was the German military secret base to test new weapons such as the Messerschmitt Me-163 Komet, the V1 then V2 rockets, etc. The Allies “Operation Crossbow” aimed at bombing the facilities.

None of the German weapons developed there fits a description such as “silver-blue balls” appearing near the bombers wings, “tailing” the bombers.

However, the data is insufficient and it cannot be excluded that officer Bentine, in 1992, did not exactly separate one incident he heard of from other incidents in the description he gave. Therefore it would not be very sensible to claim that these discs were this or that.

Evaluation:

Sources references:

* = Source is available to me.
? = Source I am told about but could not get so far. Help needed.

Main author:	Patrick Gross
Contributors:	None
Reviewers:	None
Editor:	Patrick Gross

Version:	Create/changed by:	Date:	Description:
0.1	Patrick Gross	October 2, 2023	Creation, [dcr1], [dce1], [get1].
1.0	Patrick Gross	October 2, 2023	First published.
1.1	Patrick Gross	February 1, 2024	Addition [jrs2]. In the Summary, addition of the paragraph "In 2005..."
1.1	Patrick Gross	July 21, 2024	Addition [jrs1]. In the Summary, "In 2005, the British ufologist Jenny Randles also told she had learned the same information from Michael Bentine." changed to "In 1989, and in 2005, the British ufologist Jenny Randles told how she had learned this information from Michael Bentine, as she interviewed him once at the BBC in Leeds, after he had appeared on a show there, and once in 1975 in a BBC late-night radio show they made together in Manchester."

ACUFO:

Peenemünde, Germany, in the Autumn of 1943:

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