Area 51 — Area 51 and the CIA: The Declassification of 2013

Area 51 — Area 51 and the CIA: The Declassification of 2013

The FOIA Request That Changed Everything

In 2005, historian Jeffrey T. Richelson of the National Security Archive at George Washington University filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the CIA seeking the official history of the U-2 and OXCART programs. Eight years later, on June 25, 2013, the CIA released the resulting document.

The 407-page history, titled The Central Intelligence Agency and Overhead Reconnaissance: The U-2 and OXCART Programs, 1954–1974, made history: it was the first official U.S. government document to use the designation "Area 51" in an unclassified context and to explicitly confirm the facility's existence and location.

What Was Acknowledged

Element	Acknowledged in 2013 Release
Groom Lake facility exists	Yes
Official designation "Area 51"	Yes — named explicitly
U-2 program (Project AQUATONE)	Yes — fully described
A-12 OXCART program	Yes — fully described
UFO reports caused by U-2/OXCART	Yes — explicitly stated
CIA role in managing UFO narrative	Yes — acknowledged implicitly
Specific OXCART aircraft details	Yes
Personnel and contractor identities	Partially (some redacted)
Post-1974 activities	No — document ends in 1974
Current programs	No — classified
Any extraterrestrial content	No

The 407-Page Document

The CIA history is a thorough, professionally written institutional history covering:

• The strategic context that drove the U-2 program
• The site selection process for Groom Lake
• Technical details of the U-2 and A-12 aircraft
• Operational deployment and specific missions
• The Gary Powers shootdown and its aftermath
• The transition from CIA to Air Force management
• The UFO sighting problem and how it was handled
• Personnel management and the commuter workforce

The document is available through the National Security Archive website and through the CIA's own reading room. It is the foundational reference document for any serious discussion of Area 51's documented history.

What Was Not Acknowledged

The 2013 release was significant but deliberately limited:

• The document covers 1954–1974 only; four decades of subsequent activity remain classified
• No extraterrestrial content is referenced or denied
• Current programs are entirely outside the document's scope
• Personnel involved in post-1974 programs are not identified
• The question of what current activities at Groom Lake involve is not addressed

This limitation — a thorough disclosure of fifty-year-old programs while current activities remain entirely classified — is consistent with the pattern of managing disclosure to acknowledge old secrets while protecting current ones.

Presidential Acknowledgment

On December 8, 2013 — less than six months after the CIA release — President Barack Obama became the first U.S. president to use the phrase "Area 51" publicly. He did so at the 36th Annual Kennedy Center Honors while honoring actress Shirley MacLaine, who has been a vocal advocate for UFO disclosure. Obama's use of the phrase was in the context of a joke, but the symbolism of the moment — the President of the United States publicly acknowledging Area 51 — was historic.