Project Condign: the MoD's secret study of Unidentified Aerial Phenomena in the UK Air Defence Region

Project Condign began in 1996. DI55, a branch of the Defence Intelligence Staff, was reviewing how it handled reports of unidentified aerial phenomena. It turned to the files it already held. About 10,000 sighting reports, gathered by the Ministry of Defence.

The work ran for about two years under "low priority tasking". The code name was assigned "due to sensitivity". The finished report was classified SECRET UK EYES ONLY and distributed on 4 December 2000. Its author was never officially named. David Clarke later identified the author as Ron Haddow, a defence scientist DI55 treated as its in-house UFO expert.

The report distilled what witnesses had described. The most frequent shapes were "triangles, cigars and rectangles". Spheres, discs, ovals, pyramids and star-like points appeared too. Triangles were put at "at least 150ft", often up to 250m. Colours ran from red, orange and yellow to white, silver, blue, green, grey, black and pink.

Most moved without a sound. Some gave off a hum, a whine or a buzz. Sightings lasted seconds to minutes, though a few lasted hours. Near the ground, witnesses described "indecisive darting and bobbing motions". The report conceded that UAP "clearly can exhibit aerodynamic characteristics well beyond those of any known aircraft or missile".

"That UAP exist is indisputable." There was no evidence they were "hostile or under any type of control". Most sightings were misidentified aircraft and balloons. For the rest, the author proposed "supranormal meteorological phenomena", a Buoyant Plasma Formation related to ball lightning. Three charged bodies, the report suggested, could leave "a visual triangular void" between them. A black triangle.

Such fields might induce "perceptual alterations or hallucinations" in witnesses who genuinely believed what they reported. One case was named. "The well-reported Rendlesham Forest/Bentwaters event is an example where it might be postulated that several observers were probably exposed to UAP radiation for longer than normal UAP sighting periods." Aircrew were told not to try to out-manoeuvre a UAP during interception. Abroad, the report said, at least four pilots had been killed "chasing UFOs".

A Freedom of Information request came in September 2005. On 6 May 2006, Gary Anthony, David Clarke, Joe McGonagle and Andy Roberts told ufology discussion groups about the document. The next day the Executive Summary reached the BBC and the Sunday Times. The Ministry of Defence released the report on 15 May 2006. Nick Pope, a former MoD UFO desk officer, was reportedly authorised to brief the media.

Criticism followed. The plasma theory had never been peer reviewed. Patrick Gross argued it recycled ideas from Philip J. Klass and Michael Persinger without solid evidence. Magonia faulted the author for doing no first-hand investigation. Even the four who released it came to disagree about what it meant.

Clarke describes Condign as the end of Defence Intelligence interest in UFOs, a line that began with the 1951 Flying Saucer Working Party. The document had a stranger afterlife. In 2021, researcher Matthew Illsley was told the original had been "accidentally destroyed" during scanning. In summer 2023 the Ministry of Defence found a full unredacted copy. In June 2026 an anonymous requester received it.

The hidden pages held sketches of Aurora and a triangular TR3 "Black Manta". Analysts had taken secret aircraft seriously. Clarke finds "zero evidence" either type existed as a working aircraft. The originals now rest at The National Archives in Kew.