Ben Rich
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Ben Rich (1925–1995) was an American aerospace engineer who served as director of Lockheed's Skunk Works from 1975 to 1991, succeeding Kelly Johnson to lead the development of the F-117 Nighthawk stealth fighter — and one of the most frequently cited figures in UAP disclosure research for statements he allegedly made in the final years of his life suggesting that reverse-engineered non-human technology was responsible for breakthroughs in classified aerospace programs.
Key statements
Rich's most frequently cited statement, attributed to a 1993 UCLA alumni dinner speech, was: "We already have the means to travel among the stars, but these technologies are locked up in black projects and it would take an act of God to ever get them out to benefit humanity... Anything you can imagine, we already know how to do." A second frequently cited quote: "We now have the technology to take ET home." Rich reportedly confirmed to multiple individuals in his final months (he died of cancer in January 1995) that the Skunk Works had developed propulsion systems based on non-conventional physics.
James Goodall testimony
Aviation historian and military aerospace researcher James Goodall was Rich's pen pal and confidant for twenty-five years. Steven Greer met Goodall in April 2021 at the twentieth anniversary of the Disclosure Project, held in Scottsdale, Arizona, where Goodall — then dying of esophageal cancer — recounted Rich's disclosures directly. Goodall confirmed that the "take ET home" statement was made directly to him as well as at the UCLA banquet: "He said that directly to me. He stated it in a banquet for aerospace engineers, I think they were grad students from UCLA. And he made a comment that we have the ability to take ET home." Goodall spent 75 years documenting Lockheed Skunk Works history, including a book signing at the Skunk Works facility itself, and his proximity to senior Skunk Works personnel gives particular weight to his account of Rich's disclosures.
Publication and documentation of statements
Len Kasten cites Rich's UCLA speech in The Secret History of Extraterrestrials as evidence of the suppression of advanced propulsion technology: "Ben R. Rich, the ex-president of the famous 'Skunk Works,' Lockheed-Martin's Advanced Development Programs (ADP) group, revealed the truth just before he died. In an alumni speech at the University of California, Los Angeles, in 1993, he said, 'We already have the means to travel among the stars, but these technologies are locked up in black projects and it would take an Act of God to ever get them out to benefit humanity... Anything you can imagine, we already know how to do.'"
Context
Rich's Skunk Works tenure included the development of the U-2 reconnaissance plane (under Johnson), SR-71 Blackbird, F-117 Nighthawk, and classified programs. The Skunk Works' proximity to Area 51 (operational testing) and its institutional role as the primary advanced aerospace development contractor placed it within the program infrastructure that Bob Lazar identifies as operating at S-4 and that David Grusch's testimony describes as the primary contractor vehicle for reverse engineering. Rich's final letter to artist and researcher John Andrews — in which he confirmed that UFOs are real and "work by using a non-conventional form of energy" — constitutes one of the few written first-hand disclosures by a senior aerospace industry figure about the existence of non-human propulsion technology. A separate published letter, in which a friend asked Rich directly whether UFOs were "ours or extraterrestrial," reportedly drew the written response: "they are both" — an explicit acknowledgment from the head of the premier aerospace engineering entity that both extraterrestrial and reverse-engineered human craft existed.
Deathbed hospital call
In a phone call to Rich in his hospital room in the final weeks of his life, James Goodall asked him directly to confirm or deny the existence of classified programs beyond the F-117 — and Rich confirmed it, telling Goodall: "We have things out in the desert that are 50 years beyond what you could possibly comprehend. If you've seen it on Star Trek, we've been there, done that, or decided it wasn't worth the effort." In a separate 2025 retelling, Greer specified that the conversation occurred "in '95, 1995... about a week before he died" and that Rich told Goodall: "Anything you can imagine. Anything you've seen on Star Trek? We've already done... at the Lockheed Skunk Works and it's out in the desert," specifically adding "not Area 51." The same account was relayed by Steven Greer, who cited Goodall directly: "Whatever you can imagine that you've seen on Star Trek, we've already done at the Lockheed Skunk Works. And it's not at Area 51. It's out in the desert underground."
In an April 2025 interview, Greer dialed Goodall live on air and Goodall confirmed the account directly: "He said, Jim, we have things out in the desert... that is 50 years beyond what you can comprehend... if you've seen movies like Star Trek or Star Wars, we've been there, done that, but decided it wasn't worth the effort."
Rich reportedly told a close associate that the public "must never be told the true reality of what's going on" in relation to UFOs and extraterrestrials because the truth was "unbelievable, too intense, too powerful, too dramatic, too frightening."
The F-117 and stealth origins
Jesse Michels described Rich's role in developing stealth in the context of the broader classified program lineage on The Joe Rogan Experience: Rich resurrected an obscure early 20th-century Russian mathematician named Pyotr Ufimtsev to develop the equations that minimized radar cross sections. The resulting triangular design — called the "Hopeless Diamond" — was the conceptual precursor to the F-117, and the F-117 itself, Michels argued, represents only the publicly visible surface of a program that extended far beyond stealth technology into non-conventional propulsion.