On orders from Donald Trump, the Pentagon has released the first footage and documents on UFOs / UAPs (unexplained aerial phenomena). Roughly 160 files, 28 videos, 14 images - from the US military, civilian and astronaut archive. And the most intriguing item: one video shows an object over the Aegean Sea.

„Based on the enormous public interest, I will order the Secretary of War to release all documents," Trump said. It's a political decision with certain side motives - when you have trouble with domestic public sentiment over Iran, and you want to redirect the press to „another topic," a quality UFO file is a good pick. That's a cynical read. It's not entirely groundless.

What did the Pentagon actually release? A video from 2022 from the Middle East shows an oval object moving across the sky at high speed, marked as „possibly a missile" - with no definitive explanation. Footage from Apollo 11, 12 and 17 shows unusual light sources, flickering lights, and unknown particles around the spacecraft. A report from 1957 describes a large circular object lifting off the ground.

The Aegean Sea case is from 2023: a UAP making „multiple 90-degree turns" at around 130 km/h, according to the military report. That's the kind of manoeuvre no known aircraft can perform - not with a live crew on board. That's why it's interesting.

But as the analyst Ljupčo Dimitrovski stresses on Panoptikum: „The difference is enormous. Science begins where mystery is treated as a question, not as a finished answer. 'Unidentified' does not mean 'proven extraterrestrial.'" Right. Old Apollo photographs can contain reflections, film defects, damage, cosmic radiation, processing artefacts - all things that look „unidentified" without further context.

For readers in our region, this is entertainment. And that's all. The Balkans have their own UFO stories - footage from Šar Mountain in the 80s, witness reports from Kumanovo in the 90s. Will they ever get a „Pentagon file"? Probably not. Because the Pentagon file is also that - proof that certain states pour endless money into defending against the unknown. And we, for now - we trample our own celestial mysteries underfoot.