STRANGE COMPANY: Military Encounters with UFOs in World War II

by Keith Chester

In a startling feat of historical research, Keith Chester's STRANGE COMPANY details an aspect of World War II that has been shrouded in ignorance for more than sixty years. Chester reveals that as the war gripped the world for six years, military personnel reported seeing numerous highly unconventional aircraft in all theaters of operation. These objects had extraordinary flight performance capabilities, came in a variety of shapes, sizes, and colors, and were able to travel at extraordinary speeds and avoid radar detection. The author recounts the reactions by military commands, their viewpoints, and theories as they struggled to make sense of the observations. A scientific panel convened by the CIA eight years after the war admitted that these unconventional objects were of unknown origin.

"In this eye-opening, thoroughly researched book, bristling with surprising revelations," writes UFO historian Jerome Clark in the foreword to the book, "Keith Chester challenges decades of conventional wisdom about the UFO phenomenon."

It's time to drop the pretense that UFOs were a rare sight before 1947, when pilot Kenneth Arnold witnessed nine "flying saucers" over Washington State. While Arnold's sighting is regarded by many as the beginning of the UFO phenomenon, Strange Company illustrates just how pervasive the phenomenon was years earlier--before, during, and after World War II. "What this work suggests," says author Keith Chester, "is that while an immense twentieth century war was raging on Earth, someone, or something, from somewhere else, was watching us."

Keith Chester is an artist and filmmaker living in Bel Air, Maryland. After witnessing a daytime UFO in the mid-1960s, he became fascinated with the phenomenon. By the late 1980s, he was devoting considerable time to research on UFOs.

Genres: Nonfiction

316 pages, Paperback

First published May 30, 2007

Reviews

[Dan Pfeiffer · Rating 4 out of 5]

I appreciate good, well sourced, official documentation and this book provides plenty. 20% of it is footnotes from US, UK, Japanese and German military files. No conclusions or wild speculations are drawn. Just the facts as reported by military personnel.

[Maria · Rating 4 out of 5]

In STRANGE COMPANY, author Keith Chester examines the strange objects that soldiers and pilots saw during World War II. The objects appeared in Germany. Many pilots and soldiers saw them; the strange lights came in different sizes and colors. Sometimes the lights appeared for a few minutes and then faded out; other times the lights followed the plane for a brief period.

Later in the war, the lights appeared in Japan.

Military personnel and pilots tried to explain the strange lights, but in the end, they could only shrug their shoulders. One pilot nicknamed the lights "foo fighters," and the name stuck.

Although the lights never hurt anybody or damaged any aircraft, they were a huge mystery. Soldiers hoped that after the war, they'd discover what the lights were and, even more, who was responsible.

I thank the author for writing such an incredible book. These strange lights shouldn't become a forgotten memory. Were the lights an enemy? Were they an experiment? Were they truly from outer space? The author doesn't draw any conclusions.

To this day, the lights remain a mystery.

This book is not an action-packed thriller. It is a historical account of the strange appearance of these lights. I was never a history buff, but I appreciate this book. It lends another mysterious side to World War II, perhaps one that will never be explained.