San_Antonio_Light

Fort Sam Houston at San Antonio, TX was Headquarters of the Fourth Army, responsible for military security in the region, including New Mexico. Gen. Ramey was commanding officer of the Eighth Army Air Force at Fort Worth. Military intelligence at these bases and elsewhere could hardly fail to notice the Circleville object being suggested as a solution to the flying disc sightings. By the next afternoon (July 8), Ramey was displaying a radar target in his office at Fort Worth and claiming it explained the Roswell crash. By July 9 the military was running a nation-wide debunking campaign and claiming that the radar targets were in widespread use and explained all the recent flying saucer reports. As Gen. Arthur Exon later remarked when interviewed, the weather balloon explanation for Roswell was "ready-made."