Paul Bennewitz / AFOSI Disinformation Affair.
documentedgovernment_studyMajestic 12 & Disinfo
Early-1980s AFOSI disinformation campaign (via Doty) against physicist Paul Bennewitz near Kirtland AFB; source of the earliest 'MJ Twelve' reference.
Bennewitz, a physicist who recorded signals and lights near Kirtland AFB, was fed fabricated alien-conspiracy material by AFOSI agent Richard Doty, driving him to a breakdown. The operation, detailed by Sparks/Greenwood and the film Mirage Men, produced the 1981 document containing the first 'MJ Twelve' reference. It is the documented seedbed of the MJ-12 mythology and the core case that MJ-12 began as government disinformation.