Nathan Twining
Lieutenant General Nathan F. Twining was a senior United States Air Force officer whose assertion that flying discs were "real and not visionary or fictitious" led directly to the creation of Project Sign, the Air Force's first official UFO investigation program. Twining's statement was made in a letter to Air Force Commanding General George Shugen and represented the highest-level Air Force acknowledgment of the UFO phenomenon's physical reality during the late 1940s.
| Role | Lieutenant General, United States Air Force |
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Creation of Project Sign
Twining's definitive assertion about the reality of flying discs provided the institutional mandate for establishing Project Sign in 1948. The program was tasked with systematically investigating UFO reports, and all Project Sign reports were required to be sent to the Army and Navy Research and Development Board, the USAF Scientific Advisory Board, and the Atomic Energy Commission — indicating the high-level concern and multi-agency interest in the phenomenon at the time.
This institutional framework established by Twining's directive represented a significant moment in official governmental engagement with UFOs, treating them as a legitimate subject of military intelligence and scientific analysis rather than dismissing them as misidentifications or hoaxes.