The Missing "Scientists"

Via the New York Post (which also carried the diagram above):

The deaths or disappearances of 11 top US scientists and researchers is a matter of urgent national importance, a member of the House Oversight Committee insisted Friday.

Rep. Eric Burlison (R-Mo.) said his office had already been eyeing some of the “too coincidental” disappearances a year before President Trump told reporters Thursday that he had ordered an investigation.

The lawmaker argued the fate of the scientists is almost “certainly” linked to the access some had to classified aerospace, defense and UFO information — and may involve bad actors from China, Russia or Iran.

Why stop there? I'd be looking at the Men in Black. According to Chrome AI Mode:

The Men in Black urban myth has existed for nearly 80 years, tracing its roots back to the "Summer of the Saucers" in 1947.

The legend evolved through several key stages:

First Appearance (1947): The myth began with the Maury Island incident on June 21, 1947. Witness Harold Dahl claimed that the morning after he saw six doughnut-shaped aircraft over Puget Sound, a man in a dark suit met him at a local diner and warned him not to speak of the event.

And on through the Men in Black film franchise:

Mainstream Media (1990s–Present): The myth was reimagined as a heroic secret organization in the 1990 comic book series by Lowell Cunningham, which later inspired the 1997 Men in Black film starring Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones.

The current fascination with this subject seems to have begun with the disappearance of retired General William N McCasland, whose overall career is covered here. However, he retired in 2013, at age 55, so at minimum, he would be 13 years out of the loop. Leaving everything else aside, why would any bad actor, Chinese, Russian, Iranian, man in black, or space alien, see the need to eliminate some guy who was 13 years out of the loop?

Now, I'll grant that a competent thriller writer could cook up some sort of explanation -- he'd stumbled on some big deal secret, the men in black told him he'd better retire, but his conscience kept bothering him, and he was about to reveal it 13 years later -- but outside fiction, you've got to apply a reasonability check to any such explanation. It's too complicated, when any number of simpler explanations would work.

While we don't know why someone on such a high-level career path would have taken early retirement, one explanation could be health issues. In addition, 68 is by no means too young for Alzheimer's, and one symptom of Alzheimer's is wandering off:

Alzheimer’s disease causes people to lose their ability to recognize familiar places and faces. It’s common for a person living with dementia to wander or become lost or confused about their location, and it can happen at any stage of the disease. Six in 10 people living with dementia will wander at least once; many do so repeatedly. Although common, wandering can be dangerous — even life-threatening — and the stress of this risk weighs heavily on caregivers and family.

I'm not claiming this is definitely the explanation, but it's one factor that needs to be ruled out before we bring in any sort of bad actors. While Rep Burlison says Gen McCasland tried to contact him twice about UAPs (or something like that) the Post link says

Investigators claimed McCasland had experienced “mental fog” before disappearing from his home in Albuquerque, NM.

Another issue is that these cases involve 11 people out of 2.1 million civilian and military aerospace workers. We're talking about a very small number of these, in highly diverse roles at scattered locations, some deceased, some missing, over a two-year period. And the actual connections between some on the chart above are tenuous: For instance, Monica Jacinto-Reza disappeared in Southern California while hiking on June 22, 2025, while apparently employed by a contractor for the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

However, she is said to be connected with Gen McCasland because from 2011 to 2013, he was Commander of the Air Force Research Laboratory, Wright-Patterson AFB. But Jacinto-Reza was working forJPL in Pasadena, not Wright-Patterson, and she disappeared in 2025, long after McCasland retired in 2013. In addition,

Reza was hiking [with] "male and female companion[s] from her yoga group," which blends "physical yoga practice with spiritual and philosophical elements, including astrology and traditional Vedic teachings from ancient India." According to LA Mag, "Reza and her male companion oddly began running on the terrain, which is uncommon given how steep and uneven it is."

The man "confirmed Reza was behind him, reportedly running, when he eventually called out to her and received no response," LA Mag added.

No Russians, Chinese, Iranians, men in black, or space aliens appear to be involved, but if I were a homicide detective, I'd sure be talking to her male companion on that hike.

Actually, in my tech career, I was in and out of that industry, especially working for contractors in data security. I know some of the agencies mentioned, like the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and people who've phased in and out of there. I would say on the whole that the level of work done at such places, and the caliber of people employed, either directly or via contractors, are both highly overrated in the public mind. On one hand, the level of waste, fraud, and abuse is pretty much what you'd expect among government-funded entities.

On the other, the 80-20 rule applies as much as it does anywhere else: 20% of the people do 80% of the work, and among the 80%, you'll find folks engrossed in stuff like yoga, astrology, and traditional vedic teachings. Just sayin'. Even if these people disappeared or passed away under mysterious circumstances, this doesn't mean that any of them was involved in doing important work, and several have titles like "researcher' and "administrative assistant".

So this is just one side issue in the whole UFO-UAP boondoggle -- and a boondoggle it all is.