Like many great UFO researchers, Grant Cameron's journey began in the skies.
Grant Cameron's new book is more than just an eye-witness account. (Handout)
After an abundance of UFO sightings in Manitoba in 1975 laid the groundwork for Cameron's foray into the field, and his latest book "Charlie Red Star: True Reports Of One Of North America's Biggest UFO Sightings" brings his career to back to where it all started. Cameron, a former Leeds Conference International UFO Researcher Of The Year and UFO Conference Researcher Of The Year, recently talked to Punk rock and UFOs about his new book, his controversial comments on Tom DeLonge and UFO research in general.
Q: Let's talk about your new book about "Charlie Red Star." Why is this an important story to tell outside of Canada?
CAMERON: "The story actually didn’t just happen in Canada. Most of the story was told about Southern Manitoba where I lived, but at the same time there were scores of sightings that happened in the same period in Minnesota and Wisconsin. There was one town in Wisconsin that had so many sighting the CIA sent two agents there to investigate. In the 1975, while we were dealing with poles of reports there were UFOs reported in the nuclear weapon storage areas (where the nuclear weapons were stored) in most of the USAF bases along the Canadian border. The ones we know about were Loring on the Maine border with Canada, Wurtsmith AFB on the Michigan Canadian border, Minot near the North Dakota Canadian border, and Malmstrom near the Montana/Canadian border.
Most importantly, after three decades one of the key things that may have caused the UFO sightings in Southern Manitoba may have been because of 100 new nuclear installed in Nekoma North Dakota to destroy incoming Soviet ICBMs. When the nukes were taken out in late 1975,the UFOs went away and the main town involved, called Carman, has had no major sightings since."
Q: Speaking of Canada, how is Paul Hellyer viewed by non-Ufologists/ Canadian citizens there?
CAMERON: "Most Canadians would not really know who he is, as he is not really public outside the UFO community. He has not been in the government for 50 years. Most Canadians (and Americans for that matter) know generally about UFOs, but do not know the major players, or key research areas in the field. Even last year, Hellyer told a key story about a major person in the Canadian government who made a death bed confession to Hellyer. No media that I know of carried the story, and therefore no one in the public would know about this major development."
Q: On your blog, you have a fascinating look at disclosure and "acclimation." Why do those in charge think "acclimation" is the way to go, and didn't this already begin in the 1960s when the government encouraged Hollywood to make UFO movies post Roswell?
CAMERON: "Acclimatization began prior to 1944 when Secretary of State (Cordell) Hull leaked that the government had recovered bodies, and in 1947 when the first key UFO witness Kenneth Arnold was given two 8 x 11 photos of daylight discs and told clearly that they were real. The disclosure of the story, minus the classified aspects such as the consciousness connection, and the aspects that can be used for weapons."
Q: If what you said about Tom DeLonge's upcoming announcement is true, does this further play into the idea of acclimation and does it accelerate it?
CAMERON: "Absolutely possible. All discussion moves the issue forward. It would be like articles and movies that discusses civil rights, drugs, gay rights issues. Whether the article or movie is good or bad the issue moves forward. When it is common knowledge that high level officials were talking to him and he was at Area 51, it will tone down the belief that the whole subject is nonsense. Those who are feeding Tom know that you cannot kill the story, so you have to manage how it comes out. The same thing happens in Hollywood where CIA and defense both have liaisons who interact with people doing movies."
Q: Speaking of DeLonge, where did you get that information/ details regarding what he plans to launch soon? A lot of people in UFO community are curious to the sources.
CAMERON: "I have received my information from an experiencer who was going to be a part of the DeLonge mega project. The CIA had requested that Bledsoe’s story be a part of it. In the end, he pulled out to do his own arrangement to tell his story. The two men are still friends. Here is a souvenir he has:
(Photo from Grant Cameron)
Q: .You mentioned in the same interview that there are those who believe aliens are good, and others believe they are a threat. Is this division on purpose to help divide the community or is it just a case of various conflicting views?
CAMERON: " The way I interpret this difference in belief comes from the belief or disbelief in separation. People who believe in evil aliens believe in separation – good vs bad. The idea is that on earth there are good and bad races, and therefore this will be the same in outer space. Those who do not believe in evil aliens will maintain there are no evil races that must be eliminated. In this theory, everything is individual. There will be good and bad in all races. Therefore, there are no races of aliens who live to be evil, where all the children are evil, and there is no good. There will be situations where military individual (say those who are advising DeLonge) will promote evil aliens. That is because the military always needs an enemy and will see all non-Americans as competition or enemies. Most of the disagreements on this issue come from internal beliefs rather than outside forces in my opinion."
-By MIKE DAMANTE