Unidentified: The UFO Phenomenon

About the Author

This site's own Robert Salas key-figures entry and companion Essential Reading article on Faded Giant already document his March 1967 Oscar Flight service and decades of public testimony, including the September 27, 2010 National Press Club press conference organized by Robert Hastings. This article notes this 2014 book was written after roughly fifteen years of public advocacy following that 2010 event, positioning it as a later-career synthesis and disclosure-advocacy statement rather than a second primary-source account of his own case.

This article's research traced a specific publishing arc worth noting: Salas first self-published a shorter, 162-page version of this book via CreateSpace in 2013, which New Page Books then expanded and re-released as this 239-page trade paperback in September 2014. In 2023, following the post-2017 mainstreaming of UAP disclosure and congressional hearings, the book was substantially revised and republished by Permuted Press (a Simon & Schuster imprint) under a new title, UAPs and the Nuclear Puzzle, adding a new foreword by journalist Leslie Kean alongside Friedman's original.

Historical Context & Origins

This article directly confirmed the book's chapter structure via its Internet Archive catalog record: "A Nation of Secrets," "Faded Giant, Revisited," "Extreme Secrecy," "The UFO Cabal," "The UFO Phenomena," "The Stories of Others," "A Strange Love of Nukes," "ET and Me," and "The Last Country." Only the second chapter directly retells the Malmstrom case, and per an independent review this article located, does so explicitly as a recap for readers new to the story rather than as new research.

This article's research located a detailed, named review by Peter Robbins (TheUFOChronicles.com, September 2014), which confirms the book opens with roughly 25 pages of nuclear-weapons history, develops a broader "UFO Cabal" government-secrecy argument, discusses other military UFO cases including the 1980 RAF Bentwaters incident, and contains an extended section on the abduction phenomenon that includes Salas's own separate account of a 1985 personal experience in Manhattan Beach -- material this article found no indication appears in Faded Giant. Robbins explicitly contrasts the two books, noting Faded Giant was heavier on primary declassified documents (more than 90 pages of them) while this book takes what he calls "a broader philosophical approach" to government secrecy and disclosure.

Core Arguments & Key Concepts

The book's central argument, consistent across publisher and retailer descriptions this article reviewed, holds that a systemic pattern of government secrecy -- including specific criticism of the Air Force's 1969 public denials and the University of Colorado's Condon Report, which Salas argues omitted known missile-shutdown incidents from its published findings -- has concealed a genuine UFO phenomenon with real national-security dimensions, particularly around nuclear weapons.

This article treats that argument as Salas's own stated advocacy position, consistent with the later-career, disclosure-focused phase this site's existing citation blurb already identifies, rather than as new primary-source evidence about the Malmstrom case specifically -- the book's evidentiary weight for that case rests on Faded Giant's own more document-heavy treatment.

Key Cases & Evidence Discussed

This site's own Malmstrom AFB (1967) case file documents the Oscar Flight shutdown, the 2010 and 2021 National Press Club testimony, and the ongoing dispute with skeptic James Carlson in far greater depth than this book's single recap chapter provides. Readers wanting the complete case record should consult that case file and this site's companion article on Faded Giant directly.

Critical Reception & Controversies

As of this article's research (August 2026), the book holds an aggregate rating of roughly 3.7 out of 5 on Goodreads from a modest base of approximately 50 ratings -- a reception this article found comparable to, not meaningfully stronger or weaker than, Faded Giant's own similarly modest Goodreads footprint. This article was not able to independently verify a specific current Amazon rating due to repeated fetch failures, and reports that gap honestly rather than citing an unconfirmed number.

This article directly located a substantive named review by Peter Robbins, who called it "one of the best UFO books I've read in years," alongside back-cover blurbs from Thomas J. Carey (co-author of Witness to Roswell) and Donald R. Schmitt praising Salas's persistence and background, and a pull quote attributed to Fortean Times calling it "a sober yet heartfelt narrative which dares you to dismiss it without due consideration." This article was not able to independently verify the Fortean Times quote against the original review text and reports it as retailer-supplied back-cover copy.

Influence & Legacy

The book's clearest legacy is its own subsequent revision: the 2023 Permuted Press/Simon & Schuster edition, UAPs and the Nuclear Puzzle, updated the material for the post-2017 UAP disclosure era and added a foreword by Leslie Kean, a leading mainstream disclosure journalist -- a real institutional upgrade this article found no comparable event for in Faded Giant's own publishing history.

Set alongside this site's own Malmstrom AFB case file and companion article on Faded Giant, this book documents a distinct, later phase of Salas's public career -- from single-witness case testimony toward broader disclosure advocacy -- rather than adding new primary-source material to the Malmstrom case record itself.

The Book

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