The “objects” appear to have been water or water crystals, and were fairly close by, rather than being cryptic vehicles out over the horizon. And it turned out I’d seen the same “footage” (I don’t know what to call digital video, and I still call CDs albums, and albums are themselves a legacy of the 78 rpm era) on Sunday.
That said, the X-37 exists, and has been doing unexplained, unmanned, long-duration missions. There’s not a lot to that technology, and nothing hidden about it. Back when Ben Rich was still alive and at Lockheed, they were doing cryo-fueled vehicle research at high altitude, using some older stuff they’d mothballed in the late 1960s. That stuff was by kid standards ancient artifacts, but the performance made some eyes pop.
That research line (which was for building unmanned, high speed, very long range spy craft) was apparently abandoned again, perhaps due to his death in 1995, but as drone technology improved (and it’s been several gens at least since then) it probably would have been abandoned anyway.
The British spaceplane SSTO effort, “Skylon”, is building engines that owe a lot to the SR-71 engines. I don’t think they’re going to finish the job, nor do I think they can deliver a reliable working line of vehicles even if they succeed with their prototypes. My view is, a US company or more than one should partner with them, get ‘er done, and start the testing here, somewhere out west.
The alternative is, the Chinese do it.
That was with technology we already know about. I believe we have had a breakthrough in manned space travel that has yet to be revealed.