About

Pentagon Confirms UFOs, also known as Pentagon Confirms Aliens, refers to the news in late April 2020 that the Pentagon formally released three declassified videos containing footage of “unidentified aerial phenomena” (UAP) recorded by U.S. Navy pilots in 2017. Following this confirmation, a series of memes spawned in its wake describing the news across social media platforms and sites, typically referencing the nonchalant reactions from most people online or further adding to the discussion surrounding 2020’s apocalyptic events with an impending alien invasion. Despite interpretations online, the Pentagon did not outright confirm the existence of extraterrestrials, merely UAPs.

Origin

On April 27th, 2020, the Pentagon^[1] officially released three declassified videos (featured below) showing U.S. Navy pilots encountering what they describe as “unidentified aerial phenomena,” which were captured by F/A-18 Super Hornets using the Raytheon AN/ASQ-228 Advanced Targeting Forward-Looking Infrared (ATFLIR) pod (a tracking system used by military aircraft). According to a press release on the Department of Defense^[2] website, they released the footage “to clear up any misconceptions by the public on whether or not the footage that has been circulating was real or whether or not there is more to the videos.” The three clips, one from November 2004 and the other two from January 2015, have previously circulated the internet as viral videos after unauthorized leaks in 2007 and 2017, but the D.O.D. has now confirmed these after determining they didn’t reveal any sensitive information. Included in these is the GIMBAL: First Recorded UAP Footage.

Spread

After the release, numerous media outlets began reporting on the event, and the news quickly began trending on a number of social media platforms where users referenced the Pentagon’s confirmation of UFOs in memes and online discussion. One such example, which has since been widely shared, was tweeted by Twitter^[3] user santiagomayer_ on April 27th, 2020. The tweet (seen below) received nearly 850,000 likes and 164,000 retweets.

Several then began replying to the above tweet with memes, including Twitter^[4] user vvloneee who replied with a video. This tweet (shown below) was viewed over 1.3 million times, liked 57,000 times and retweeted another 10,000 times.

Real footage from the inside the ufo pic.twitter.com/gUsbK0iEEI

— James (@vvloneee) April 27, 2020

Many Redditors also began memeing the event in the following days on a multitude of various subreddits. One meme, posted on April 28th, 2020, was uploaded by Redditor^[5] LunarColony to the r/memes sub. The meme (seen below) received over 36,000 upvotes and 300 comments.

On April 28th, 2020, Redditor^[6] ihazone also posted a meme about the news to the r/dankmemes sub. The post (shown below) was upvoted nearly 30,000 times and commented on 640 times.

On Instagram,^[7] memes referencing the news can also be seen. One such example was uploaded by user jaidaehall, who shared a video on April 28th, 2020, receiving nearly 150,000 views (seen below)

Several memes also appeared on Facebook throughout the following days. On April 28th, 2020, the Facebook^[8] page Dank ADHD Memes shared a post (shown below) to their newsfeed featuring the Distracted Boyfriend meme, which was liked almost 300 times, shared 260 times and commented on 30 times.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References