State Department UAP Cable 004, Ashgabat, Turkmenistan, November 5, 2004

This cable from the U.S. Embassy in Ashgabat, sent on 12 November 2004 under the subject “Turkmenistan, civil society and UFOs,” is about a civic group, not a sighting. It describes a meeting on 5 November between the embassy’s deputy chief of mission, the USAID director and the Union of Ufologists in Turkmenabat, in Lebap province. Its opening line is “Yes, UFOs.”

What the embassy learned

Founded to study life on other planets, the union had drifted into practical work. It was the first NGO registered after independence and the first to re-register under Turkmenistan’s restrictive 2003 NGO law. It had helped 187 small businesses register in the 1990s, distributed U.S.-funded aid to refugees from Tajikistan and Afghanistan, and was using an $8,532 grant to help other groups register. Most members said they had little or no interest in UFOs themselves. The union’s president said the military had consulted him about odd events in Turkmen airspace but that there had been no confirmed sightings.

The group credited its good relations with officials to the fact that “everyone is interested in UFOs.” It planned a newsletter, printing 999 copies to stay just under a licensing threshold.

The tone

The cable is unusually playful for a diplomatic report – it closes, “Crazy? Like a fox” – but its point is serious: in a closed state, an apolitical UFO club had become one of the most reliable channels for U.S. support to civil society.