Pentagon Drops 40 New UFO Files and Big Gaps Remain

The Department of War published its fourth batch of UAP files on July 10 under the PURSUE program, and this release puts two agencies in the spotlight that had contributed little beyond background in earlier drops. According to the Pentagon’s official statement, the batch contains 40 files, of which 19 are videos, 14 are documents, three are images, and four are audio recordings, drawn from the War Department, NASA, the FBI, the CIA, and the Department of Energy. Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell confirmed that additional files will follow on a rolling basis.

The video drawing the most attention shows an object shaped like a six-pointed star, tracked over the Yellow Sea in 2025 by sensors under Indo-Pacific Command. Analysts note that star shapes like these are often refraction spikes created by the sensor itself, which raises the question of why the footage sits in a release of unresolved cases at all. Other files resist easy explanations. One 2019 Range Fouler Debrief, the Navy’s standard form for recording an unauthorized intrusion into controlled military airspace, describes an aviator who watched an object with flight characteristics unlike anything he had seen in 28 years flying for the Air Force and the Navy.

The Department of Energy contributed the full report on a September 2015 incident at the Pantex Plant near Amarillo, Texas, where America’s nuclear weapons are assembled. Site security, radar, and armed officers tracked a silent, diamond-shaped object at close range, and the facility went into lockdown. The CIA contribution may matter even more. Among the historical files is a record of the 1966 and 1967 deliberations of the Air Force Scientific Advisory Board committee that reviewed Project Blue Book, containing the CIA’s recommendation, one that traces back to the agency’s Robertson Panel in 1953, that national security agencies strip UFOs of their special status in order to reassure the public. Pretty much, a government panel recommended a deliberate public debunking effort, and the paper trail now sits on the Pentagon’s own website.

Representative Nancy Mace of the House Oversight Committee told NewsNation she has seen objects in a SCIF that she cannot discuss and that the American people deserve to see, while also noting one of the new videos looks like a cluster of balloons drifting with the wind. Researchers reviewing the release, per analysis referenced from Sundrive Research, point to three consistent gaps across the files, no flight data, no operator testimony, and no air traffic control records. And according to reporting from Forbes and EarthSky, one of the new clips was altered with AI by a user on X and went viral showing a high-speed maneuver that does not exist in the original Pentagon file. 

Sources

Department of War. (2026, July 10). Presidential Unsealing and Reporting System for UAP Encounters (PURSUE), Release 04. https://www.war.gov/ufo/?releaseDate=Release+04&release=04

NewsNation. (2026, July 11). Do the new Pentagon UFO files point to a cover-up? Dr. Phil thinks so | The Hill [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4AYZPx0too

NewsNation. (2026, July 11). UFO files: Nancy Mace says agencies may be HIDING files from Trump | On Balance [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1gUtHxeURw

The National Desk. (2026, July 11). New UFO files: ‘Green fireballs’ among other mysterious objects [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=il3eTpoeQWI