DID UFOs VISIT CYPRUS DURING THE EOKA CONFLICT AND BEYOND?

PETER ECKERSLEY reveals how he was prepared to battle 'aliens' in 1956

TILL NOW, my story has never been published, but more than 50 years on, there must be somebody still out there who knows the truth.

I had come back to Polemidia camp in my Bedford truck that August afternoon in 1956 and was told to park up near the M.T. office. A short while later, I saw the C.O. and the R.S.M. come out of the C.O' office in a hurry, carrying side arms. They went into the 2/ic's office.

Very soon afterwards everybody in camp - about 100 of us - was ordered to draw arms immediately. Then the rumors began to fly. Some one said RAF Akrotiri had phoned the regiment to standby as a UFO had been tracked by radar, traveling 12 miles across the Island, five miles higher than a Canberra bomber that held the high altitude record at the time.

Polemidia Camp.

Camp layout showing AFN building on the camp's perimeter.

The next rumor that came our way was that we had been ordered to arms because we were on the verge of attack, not from EOKA, but aliens from outer space.

I raised the matter with Provost Sergeant Carroll. He said nothing in reply, just tapped his nose. He made no effort to deny the rumor. We all waited nervously for what would happen next.

About 30 minutes later, a Champ raced towards the CO's office. On board were three Americans in civilian clothes from the American Forces Network's relay station located in a substantial, black-painted building on the edge of our camp. The station played the latest pop records from the United States. I think the shows were pre-recorded. We were convinced that the staff belonged to the CIA.

(Editor's note: AFN neither confirms or denies the existence of a station in Cyprus. If readers have additional information about this facility, please contact me.)

A US Navy rescue aircraft stationed at RAF Nicosia. There was a large American presence in Cyprus, but US military personnel wore civilian clothes. To avoid being mistaken for the British and be subjected to EOKA attacks, they dressed in 'very American clothes'!

The minutes ticked by. And we waited... and waited.

The hot August afternoon turned to evening. Then, without explanation, we were suddenly ordered to stand-down and told to forget everything about the day. It was not to be mentioned ever again, not even briefly in a letter home.

Later that month I was demobbed and returned to the UK, where I told a couple of mates about the incident, but they just laughed and put it down to me just trying to dramatize and add a bit of color to my military service. So I didn't raise the matter again, but it stayed with me and surfaced again when the news came a few years later that U-2 pilot Gary Powers had been shot down by a Russian missile while flying higher than12 miles above the Soviet Union in his spy-plane.

(Editor's Note: While the U-2 was at 67,000 feet on 1 May 1960, the Russians fired a volley of 14 SA-2 missiles, which exploded far below the spy-plane, but the shock wave caused the aircraft to break up. Powers ejected, landed and was captured. A Soviet Court found him guilty for crimes against the state. Two years into his term of imprisonment, he was released at the Glienicke Bridge in Berlin in exchange for Russian spy Rudolph Abel whom the CIA had arrested.)

More questions than answers

HAD A U-2 been over-flying Cyprus? Was this what our advanced radar systems at RAF Akrotiri tracked in August 1956? Or did I dream it all?

In 1980, I met an RAF technician who had been on radar watch at Akrotiri that afternoon. No, he said, I was not imagining the event. There had been a UFO above Cyprus. At last I felt vindicated. But whether it was an early model of the CIA's U-2 or a proverbial flying saucer we shall never know. Secrets like that belonged to those well above my pay grade.

David Carter writes:

TO PUT Peter Eckersley's story in context, we have to consider the events taking place in Cyprus in August 1956 - and the surrounding area - and then decide what his UFO may have been. The Suez Crisis was developing and Anglo-French forces were gathering to launch Operation Musketeer, the invasion of Egypt. Meanwhile, the United States was conducting covert aerial reconnaissance behind the Iron Curtain, using the newly developed U-2 spy-plane.

Spy-plane missions

The U-2, designed and manufactured by the Lockheed Corporation at its Burbank 'Skunkworks' in California was a top-secret project, code-name Aquatone. The US Government sanctioned it in 1954 on behalf of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and USAF, which, at the height of the Cold War, required a reconnaissance aircraft that could fly through the airspace behind the Iron Curtain without risk of being shot down.

The first test proto-type U-2 was completed in just 88 days and made its maiden flight in August 1955, with test pilot Tony LeVier at the controls.

These covert missions, known as Operation Overflight, would be authorized by President Dwight D Eisenhower after the USSR turned down his plan for both nations to have an 'Open Skies' policy for checking military installations as part of a confidence-building program.

Originally dubbed the CL-282, the U-2's shape resembled a huge glider - its wingspan was 80ft. with a body length of almost 63ft. and a height of 15.756ft. Although sub-sonic with a maximum speed of 475mph, what made the U-2 unique was its range of 7,000miles and capability of flying higher than 12miles, well above the reach of any known fighter aircraft and missiles.

Deployment at RAF Lakenheath

AFTER A series of test flights in Nevada, the first two U-2s were dismantled, crated and flown by C-124s to RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk on 30 April 1956.

Crated U-2 parts waiting reassembly.

With the aircraft came 100 support staff, including pilots and ground crews. They were known as Detachment A. The squadron commander and logistical support came from USAF, while the CIA provided the operations officer, pilots, and mission planners. The British Government, headed by Prime Minister Anthony Eden, had given approval for this deployment.

Twenty-one days later, the first U-2 took to the skies from the Lakenheath base, although it did not enter Communist airspace.

The first spying mission over the Soviet Union was launched from a USAF facility in West Germany on 4 July - American Independence Day.

USAF F-15s fly over the East Anglian countryside from RAF Lakenheath in 2008.

U-2s spy on Operation Musketeer

BY AUGUST 1956, more U-2s had rolled off the Lockheed production line and there were sufficient trained pilots and ground staff to create Detachment B, which established itself at Incirlik AB on the south coast of Turkey as the '2nd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron'.

The buildings at Incirlik, Turkey, that housed the U-2s. It should be noted that the north coast of Cyprus is only 40 miles away.

Rapturous crowds support President Nasser's decision to nationalize the Suez Canal in 1956.

Following the nationalization of the Suez Canal by Colonel Nasser on 26 July, operational missions by U-2s over the USSR were briefly suspended to concentrate on the eastern Mediterranean, where tension was mounting as Britain, France and Israel prepared to invade Egypt, despite US opposition. In Malta and in Cyprus, Anglo-French forces assembled for what became known as Operation Musketeer.

A U-2 pilot's cockpit view from above the eastern Mediterranean. The curvature of the earth can be seen. Gary Powers was one of the U-2 pilots who reconnoitered the British, French and Israeli military preparations in the area, in particular Cyprus. Other flights gathered data on counter-moves taking place in Syria, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and the Lebanon.

CIA documents prove that on 27 October, a U-2 flying from Wiesbaden, Germany, photographed the British bases in Cyprus. Its high resolution photographs revealed large numbers of British and French bombers and transport planes parked beside the runways. Concentrations of troops and equipment were also revealed.

Another U-2 flying from Incirlik airbase in Turkey detected a squadron of French fighter-bombers parked at an Israeli airfield.

(Editor's Note: All references to CIA and other intelligence documents are taken from declassified materials of the period available in the CIA's Freedom of Information Act Electronic Reading Room at http://www.foia.cia.gov).

U-2 flights in addition provided President Eisenhower and the US State Department with detailed photographs of the British and French bombers attacks on Egyptian airfields, navy activity and the movements of ground troops. That information helped the Americans to thwart the Anglo-French mission, force an early ceasefire and bring about the downfall of Prime Minister Eden.

RAF flies U-2s

A 'mobile' chase car follows a landing U-2 reconnaissance aircraft to assist the pilot with altitude and position calls as he lands. Mobiles carry U-2 pilots who assist pilots during taxi, takeoff and landing.

LATER BRITAIN became an active participant in the U-2 program. In May 1958, four RAF pilots were sent to Laughlin AFB, Texas, for U-2 flight training. They were John McArthur, Michael Bradley, David Dowling and Christopher Walker, who was killed on 8 July when his aircraft crashed.

CIA hides U-2s in UFO reports

THE EARLY U-2s were silver and reflected the sun's rays, especially at sunrise and sunset, and often appeared as fiery objects to people below, giving rise to reports that they were UFOs - alien spacecraft - a notion encouraged by the CIA to deflect attention from their true nature.

An Associated Press report from Washington, datelined 3 August 1997, says: 'With growing hysteria over alleged UFO sightings in the 1950s, the Air Force repeatedly concocted false cover stories to hide the fact that their super-secret spy planes had been spotted, an Intelligence study says.

'Historian Gerald K. Haines writes in the spring issue of Studies of Intelligence, an unclassified CIA journal, that the Air Force, responding to alleged UFO sightings during the Cold War years, frequently provided explanations that were untrue...

'Over half of all UFO reports from the late 1950s through the 1960s were accounted for by manned reconnaissance flights (namely the U-2),' Haines claims. 'While perhaps justified, this deception added fuel to the later conspiracy theories and the cover-up controversy regarding the existence of UFOs.'

Later U-2s were painted black. Many carried NASA markings to suggest they were not spy-planes.

From all this, it is easy to conclude that Peter Eckersley and the others in Cyprus, who stood by in August 1956 to repel an alien invasion from outer space, were, in fact, caught up in a U-2 overflight of the Island of which the British authorities were not informed.

It may also explain why Americans, in civilian clothes, were rushed to RAF Akrotiri from either the AFN station or US NAVFAC Nicosia - the monitoring station at Yerolakkos, northwest of the capital - possibly to explain 'the happening'.

After Turkey invaded Cyprus in July 1974, the U-2 aircraft moved to RAF Akrotiri until Turco-American relations were restored.

A U-2 starts its take-off run at RAF Akrotiri. This photograph was taken by a UN police officer in Cyprus.

A U-2 at RAF Akrotiri takes to the skies to monitor military activity in the Middle East.

Cyprus attracts UFOs

WHILE CYPRUS has known connections with the U-2 spy-planes, the Island also has a long history of UFO sightings, unrelated to the U-2s. One of the earliest recorded reports came from two off-duty US servicemen in 1950, long before the first U-2 flight. They claimed to have spotted a 'small, round, bright object flying fast, straight and level for 15 to 20 seconds across Nicosia'.

Troodos encounter of a third kind

But the most interesting encounter of a third kind involved Corporal Tom Clarke, when he was stationed at Dhekelia with the Royal Corps of Transport in 1973. His detailed account appeared in the UFO Monthly under a 'world exclusive' headline.

Corporal Tom Clarke

This is Corporal Tom Clarke's story in his own words as it appears in the magazine:

'I was selected to be a member of an eight man patrol consisting of six soldiers, one sergeant and one officer. We were given an area, in and around the mountain area of the island and we were to mount a watch and report an operation.

'We had all settled in for the night in location. Everyone mentioned how clear the night was and on the millions of stars and things that could be seen.

'Sentries were posted, and the rest of us hunkered down for whatever sleep we could get.

'We were all awoken at about 02.00 by a brilliant, but not dazzling bluish bright light. At first we all thought it must be a helicopter looking for us or something else.

'What happened next is hard to explain. There was no explosion but we were all hit by what I can only describe as a shock wave that knocked us all flat to the floor! The light just disappeared or went out.

'We all took up a defensive position, believing we were under attack, and I remember being very afraid. We all must have laid there for what seemed like hours, in total silence, waiting to see what was going to happen next, we could see nothing.

The Men in Black

'The first sound I heard was the sergeant on the radio reporting what had happened and asking for instructions on what to do.

'The officer with us took over the radio and after a short while he and the sergeant briefed us and told us that he and the sergeant were to go forward and carry out a recce of the area where we believed an accident of some kind had taken place.

'We were all told that we were to stay in situ whilst they went out and had a look.

'After about an hour the two arrived back, they said there had been what looked like a crash of some kind and they had radioed the information to base before coming back to us and that we were to stay put as recovery and manpower was on its way and we were to help in securing the area and retrieving any wreckage.

'Helicopters arrived and people in black clothing where seen getting out and unloading stores from them. We were only allowed on the site when all the large pieces had been lifted off the area under slung loads, our job, then we were told to comb the area for anything we thought might belong to the crash site and if anything was found it was to be placed in what looked like large industrial waste bins.

'After what seemed like hours a halt was called and we were all lined up and told that under no circumstances were we to talk about what we had been doing and that we were forbidden to take anything from the site under threat of Courts Martial and that we were all to be searched and that we had to give a declaration to the fact that we had not removed anything

Two suspected UFOs photographed over Cyprus in 2007.

'Tell no one'

'We were then all taken from the area by helicopter and flown to Alexander Barracks in Dhekelia and taken to the cookhouse. What looked like voting booths had been set up to one side. We were then all interviewed separately. I was asked to describe exactly what I had seen and done and was warned again not to discuss with anyone the events that had occurred.

'After our individual interviews we were all gathered together and told that we were never to divulge anything we had seen or done that day because if we did as serving members of the armed forces we could be tried for treason and shot!

'All six of us were then split into different troops and platoons.

'I never saw our Platoon Commander or the Sergeant again.

This is the first time I have talked about these events all those years ago. I don't think I believe in flying saucers or little green men from Mars but I do have an open mind.'

Asked to comment, a UK Ministry of Defense spokesman said the authorities had 'no knowledge of any UFO crash in Cyprus', and added: 'The MoD examines reports solely to establish whether UK airspace may have been compromised by hostile or unauthorized military activity. Unless there is evidence of a potential threat, there is no attempt to identify the nature of each sighting reported.' Nevertheless, like Tom Clarke, the ministry remained 'open minded'.

(Editor's Note: If there any BSW readers who can add to or help clarify Peter Eckersley and Tom Clarke's stories of their UFO encounters in Cyprus, I would welcome hearing from you.)

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