I suspect that the reason this UFO was and remains such a mystery is that the U.S. government wants it that way not because it was of non-human origin, but because it was an
experimental Soviet combat spacecraft that accidentally crashed in Pennsylvania instead of in central Asia as its designers intended. Back in the mid 1960s, the USSR was in the process of developing a family of space combat vehicles based upon their then-new
Soyuz class spacecraft., and the re-entry capsule of a
Soyuz looks a lot like this UFO was supposed to have looked. Check the illustration of the
Soyuz re-entry capsule at the above link: it is acorn-shaped, about the right size, and was no doubt covered wth weird, alien (Russian!) writing!
I don't see any evidence to support the idea that this UFO was a spaceship from another world. My guess is that the Air Force realized the Russians had whiffed one, tracked this sucker as it fell and quickly recovered it for study, allowing the "alien UFO" legend to grow to divert media attention from the fact that we had a top-secret Soviet spacecraft in our possession.
allowing the "alien UFO" legend to grow to divert media attention from the fact
that we had a top-secret Soviet spacecraft in our possession. For what purpose?
Surely the Soviets knew they'd lost the thing, and that what we found was it.
The opposite argument would make more sense.
Allowing the Soviet spacecraft legend to grow to divert media attention from the fact
that we had a top-secret ET spacecraft in our possession.