Pentagon officials are still "mystified" by objects with advanced technology reported flying over military installations and critical infrastructure, with the purpose and origin of the craft raising national security concerns, according to a former analyst with the U.S. Department of State's Bureau of International Security and Nonproliferation.
"Notably, the objects are impervious to electronic jamming efforts, indicating that they are not off-the-shelf hobbyist drones," the analyst, Marik von Rennenkampff, wrote in an opinion piece Tuesday for The Hill.
"On their face, these incidents pose an alarming intelligence and espionage risk. In the most brazen incidents in recent years, the unknown craft displayed bright flashing lights as they hovered over sensitive facilities and assets."
He noted that two recently retired four-star Air Force generals, as well as the Air Force commander who oversees air space defense, admitted that "drones" loitering over military assets remain mysterious.
"[The] Pentagon and the national security advisers are still mystified" by the repeated incursions," Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., who chairs the Senate Armed Services Committee, told "60 Minutes."
"Such conspicuous tactics are the opposite of basic intelligence collection tradecraft, which calls for stealth," wrote von Rennenkampff. "Once exposed, any foreign surveillance operation is not only at risk of compromise, but of sparking a major geopolitical crisis."
He added that dozens of unknown, brightly illuminated objects hovered and "flew with complete impunity" over a critical Air Force base for 17 nights in 2023, and that there was a "series of audacious incursions" over U.S. military bases in the United Kingdom last year.
Witnesses reported dozens of craft hovering over the bases, but they evaded detection and counter-drone systems, said von Rennenkampff.
The mysterious flying craft also used flight dynamics that "surpass any known technologies," including in 2019, with objects swarmed U.S. Navy warships off the coast of southern California.
These enigmatic craft also demonstrate baffling flight dynamics that surpass any known technologies. For several months in 2019, for example, objects with bright flashing lights swarmed some of the Navy's most advanced warships off the coast of southern California, often well over 100 miles offshore.
In publicly available footage, the crew of the USS Omaha watched on an infrared video display a spherical object moving against strong winds, and sailors on the ship's deck recorded multiple objects hovering over the Omaha.
"How can a spherical object move against strong winds and descend, in a seemingly controlled manner, into the ocean?" writes von Rennenkampff. "How — and why — did groups of these craft put on such strange displays in full view of Navy ships?"
Law enforcement officials have also observed "swarm" dynamics in rural Ohio, Indiana, and Wyoming.
Mercer County, Ohio, Sheriff Doug Timmerman, who saw the craft, said "drones" reported to his department were the size of "picnic tables or hot tubs" and that they moved at speeds of up to 80 miles per hours, and some of them occurred in locations where farms were battling bird flu outbreaks.
"This is something that Congress has to take up," Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine said after the incidents.
The governors of Virginia, Wyoming, and Louisiana expressed frustration with President Donald Trump about the ongoing incidents during his governors' roundtable in January, as some of the incidents occurred near nuclear power plants.
"By flying so openly over sensitive sites while demonstrating seemingly extraordinary technology, an unknown actor is sending a stark message," said von Rennenkampff. "But until these mysterious objects are identified, the exact nature of that message remains elusive."
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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