Ben Rich was certainly in a position to know. He had the education to know. He had the security clearances to know. You are insisting he was a liar. That's not very logical.
Qx had a physics professor in his BA program who had some associates who were into highly secret stuff. He was circumspect but it was clear that the physics taught in university was not entirely the same physics that some black project physicists worked with. And that was about 1967-1968.
And, you state you don't know, because you rely on Qx, someone I don't know, who asserts that he knew a guy who knew some guys who......
4th hand hearsay is not evidence.