"One, the saucers don't exist. They're caused by mistakes, hysteria,
and so on. Two, they're Russian guided missiles. Three, they're
American guided missiles. Four, the whole thing is a hoax, a
psychological-warfare trick."

"You mean a trick of ours?" said Purdy.

"Sure, to make the Soviets think we could reach them with a guided
missile. But I don't think that's the answer--I just listed it as a
possibility."

DuBarry considered this thoughtfully.

"In the first place, you'd have to bring thousands of people into the
scheme, so the disks would be reported often enough to get publicity.
You'd have to have some kind of device, maybe something launched from
highflying bombers, to give the rumors substance. They'd

{p. 51}

certainly do a better job than this, to put it over. And it wouldn't
explain the world-wide sightings. Also, Captain Mantell wouldn't kill
himself just to carry out an official hoax."

"John's right," said Purdy. "Anyway, it's too ponderous. It would leak
like a sieve, and the dumbest Soviet agent would see through it."

He looked back at my list. "Cross off Number One, There's too much
competent testimony, beside the obvious fact that something's being