BREAKING: Brazil’s Defense Minister Says They’ve Had Alien Contact [Exclusive Interview]

24:29Alan Kardich is a spiritist from the 1850s who obviously had his whole taxonomy of non-corporeal beings, huge following in Brazil. And so it's an interesting place in that you have the traditional religious element, but you also have the openness to some of these phenomena. And so do you think UFOs, in your mind, do you think it's consistent with Catholicism? How do you think people in Brazil would react? Because in my experience, I almost think that it feels more natural and it feels like they're more open to the phenomena than in places even like the U.S. Jesse, the concern regarding this subject appears in a very indirect way.

25:18When I was really young, there was a book that was released here. It was super successful. Everyone read it. Chariots of the Gods. The Portuguese title would translate to, Were the Gods Astronauts? So, did they build the pyramids? And that ignited a wave of curiosity. Science fiction movies, movies about extraterrestrials, the possibility or not of the existence of extraterrestrial life. All of this raises a huge commotion, a lot of curiosity, especially when fiction addresses these ideas. So, it shows that people have a lot of interest and curiosity about the subject. And maybe even beyond interest and curiosity, it also reflects and reveals an existential concern.

26:11In other words, what are we in the world? Are we alone? What if we are not alone? How do you explain these other forms of life, these other beings? If we here were created in the image and likeness of God, if this was how man was created, are we ready for a different circumstance, another hypothesis? I believe that this has to be discussed with a lot of respect and a lot of caution. It's not something that can be subject of mere speculation. Unless we're talking about fiction, then it's absolutely fine. Movies, literature, talking about if gods were astronauts, about an alien aboard a spaceship, that's fiction.

27:05Science, however, has another level of responsibility. It can't treat the subject that way. There's a book by Carl Sagan, who was probably one of the greatest scientific exponents in the United States, called Demon Haunted World, in which he touches upon the amount of scientific ignorance of American society, of rulers, of statesmen. Ronald Reagan, for example, would rely on a card reader to make his decisions. Back then he would say that there was only one that had a background in science, which was the Prime Minister of the UK who had a degree in chemistry. So he would say that the average American was so ignorant, scientifically speaking, that they had the equivalent mentality of someone from the end of the 19th century.

27:54So these people would look at science from a great, great distance. Their worldview is explained by the presence of demons, and not by the presence of science. So that has to be taken into account, that situation. According to him, a survey was done with Americans asking them how they believed the dinosaurs had vanished. And 90 % of Americans would say, well, it's because they couldn't fit into Noah's Ark. And that's why they disappeared, because they were left out of Noah's Ark. So this issue has to be taken into account. And it's not exclusive to the U.S. It's all over the world.

28:41It's true. And that's a great book by Carl Sagan, The Demon Haunted World. Sagan's very interesting, though, because he also wrote the movie Contact, and the book played Pale Blue Dot. And so in his early diaries as a child, he speculates a lot about UFOs. He has clearly a wonder for, you know, the universe. And he talks about, you know, platonic objects, you know, things like higher dimensional space objects that, you know, like a tesseract that you would only see the shadow of if you were kind of on a lower plane. And so, you know, I go back and forth. I wonder what he actually believed about UFOs.

29:23And I know Nancy Reagan and probably Ronald Reagan had their astrologer. But maybe sometimes, you know, mystical ways of knowing are also, you know, valid too. You know, Baba Vanga would, you know, regularly advise world leaders. I believe Bolsonaro, who you've, you know, now have sort of a friendly relationship with, he, I think, has an astrologer as well. Yes. And there is a type of astrology which would turn to knowledge as well, which is Egyptian astrology. It's not the astrology that comes from horoscopes that you read in the newspaper. That's another thing. The astrology that was referred to in Egypt was based on the rigorous examination of the stars.

30:17It wasn't this mere poppycock made to sell these packages with astrology and horoscope issues that were sold with daily papers. There's another important book by Carl Sagan which, It's called, I'm not sure in English, but in Brazil it's called Billions and Billions. And he touches upon this issue with a lot of care and a lot of sensibility. And I believe that in this way, I believe that the care taken into how science should approach this subject has to do with taking into account the scientific knowledge of people. because you shouldn't really breed desperation or create panic. It's very easy to create panic.

31:06You know the Orson Welles story, the radio show. In other words, he created panic by simply telling a story that wasn't real. It was fake news. But since he was such a competent and efficient communicator, As Orson Welles was known for, he whipped up a panic on a news radio show. So I understand the caution and the prudence of science, because it's different from a mere opinion, from a piece of literature, a short story, a novel, a movie. When science makes a statement about a specific subject, there's a weight to it, which is not the same as what fiction authors write about.

32:02Very well said. I want to go kind of in chronological order. So we talked about Operation Prado, Calares in 1977. 1986, in May, you had 21 unidentified objects spotted in four different Brazilian states. You had six fighter jets that were dispatched from bases near Brasilia and Rio, and all of them were scrambled by these objects. And you have the Air Force making a very fascinating official statement on the whole thing, saying these were basically aircraft flying in ways that we technically don't understand. They were flying, you know, at extreme speeds and maneuverability. What do you know about that night in 1986?

32:48Yes, and in fact, the fighters that we had at the time were state of the art. The F-5 jets which were American, but also the Mirage fighters that came from a base close to Brasilia, the Anápolis Air Base, which was built very close to the capital of the country. And those jets flew from the base in Santa Cruz, in the state of Rio de Janeiro, and from the Annapolis Air Base in Goiás in the attempt to intercept the UFOs. But after that, other pilots in the Air Force reported very similar phenomena. And long after that, and in the 80s, there were many reports by pilots from the Air Force that were documented.

33:40One of them, for example, was a pilot that was flying from Chile to Brazil, flying a fighter jet. And he says that an object made its approach at a very high speed and that when he tried to approach it, the object took off, and this is documented, at a speed of 25 ,000 kilometers an hour, according to what the radar picked up. So the existence of the phenomena is undisputed. I sat down with José Manuel Fernandes, who worked for the Brazilian Air Force for 34 years and was an air traffic controller at São Paulo's Congonhas Airport on May 19, 1986.

34:28This was the same night as the mass sighting known as Brazil's Night of UFOs. Fernandez watched in real time as fighter jets scrambled to intercept these UFOs, only to be completely outmaneuvered and outmatched. So I relayed the information. I could see the fighter jet, the F-5 fighter jet. You know, reach supersonic speed to try and reach the object.

35:01But curiously enough, and I can assure you, that I speak the truth. Even though the F5 was moving at supersonic speed, as the fighter jet was in pursuit of the object, I could even see the tracks that were left by the fighter jet. You know, the object was just playing hide and seek. It would just show up and appear at a very distant point. So when the F5 would try to come closer, the object would just simply disappear and then just reappear further down.

35:58What's up for debate is what these phenomena are. That's what still has to be investigated, discussed, identified. And this could also be an effort that is more in the interest of science than the interest of defense. Because really, when it comes to the national defense of countries, this was never reported as a risk or threat, right? Or registered as such. The information that these objects would be trying to collect or capture really cannot be verified. However, in terms of threats or risks, or even damage for the defense of Brazil, the United States, England, Russia, there's no record that any of these phenomena resulted in damage for these countries.

36:57So therefore, from the point of view of national defense, it's a permanent reason of concern, but it's not really a risk. So much so that the concerns in Brazil in the area of defense have subsided. But what still remains is the question, the shadowy area, what hasn't been brought to light in terms of science. To this day, from a scientific point of view, there's more dark than light when it comes to these phenomena.

37:28You've mentioned some of these UFO cases in the context of advanced technology. Do you think that some of what we've experienced, maybe on this night, for example, in 1986, or some of these other Brazilian encounters, are not, in fact, you know, other beings, but they're our own advanced technology. Obviously, the United States has conducted military, you know, secret operations in Brazil since World War II. Jesse, it's very hard to believe that the United States commands the technology to produce objects that can move at 25 ,000 kilometers an hour. The US sacrificed a generation of their best pilots in trying to overtake the Russians during the space race.

38:23When Gagarin, Yuri Gagarin, took his first orbit trip, and the world was astonished, the US entered a situation of despair and panic because they were surpassed in an event that gave the Soviet Union international projection. Gagarin was received in New York and Sao Paulo as a celebrity, respected, cherished and admired around the world. To overcome this, an American author wrote a novel about this, they actually made a movie about it as well. They brought together the best pilots in America to an airbase. And the majority of them died trying to do it, because they didn't have the equipment, they didn't have the material.

39:07It couldn't resist a space flight. And the widows learned of the deaths of their husbands, of these very young pilots, because they didn't have the right material. If the US in fact had the material that would resist what was seen involving these objects, they wouldn't have sacrificed their own pilots. I'm not sure if it was Paul Kennedy, a writer, who described this in a very nice novel about… No, it was the same one who wrote A Bonfire of the Vanities. This one that wrote a book. Tom Wolfe wrote the right stuff. Exactamente. Tom Wolfe. Tom Wolfe wrote the novel about the sacrifice of these young pilots for America in the space race.

40:01So I don't think that it had anything to do with espionage on part of the US or even the Russians. They didn't have that material available with that degree of resistance that would endure that kind of speed. It would have melted by much slower speed than that. So that kind of explanation just isn't reasonable. Yeah. I mean, even in the 80s, the U.S. was just starting to build stealth craft. But even the rumors of the most advanced stealth craft was Mach 4, Mach 5, which is 3 ,000 to 4 ,000 miles per hour. So 25 ,000 is just orders of magnitude more advanced than anything that we had. Maybe you had some unmanned drone there, but I don't know.

40:53I think it's very hard to believe. So you would agree with the Air Force Minister Brigadier Octavio Julio Morea Lima's statement that these things, we detected them, they were what they were, and that the facts are what they are, and we don't know what they are. You would agree with that, that these are sort of genuine? I agree, absolutely, totally. We… we don't know what they are, what these phenomena are. We don't know what these objects are. And it's so hard to identify them, that science itself is unable to develop a theory on it. They can develop a theory about what they are not. They are not man-made.

41:34They cannot be man-made. Because in science the ability to build that kind of material at that level of resistance, there's no alloy that can resist that kind of procedure of these objects and these phenomena. No man-made object would be able to move at that speed. I mean, look, in the 40s, in the UK, and then in the 70s, in the 80s, what kind of material would resist 25 ,000 km an hour? Impossible. Not here, not in the US, not in Russia. Okay, but who else could have done it? Who was leading the special alloy production for rockets and spaceships were the U.S. and Russia. That's it. But not at that level of sophistication, no.

42:28Some of the patterns are just remarkable. You see 90 degree turns. So it's breaking Newton's laws, conservation of momentum. And Captain Viriato recorded this thing on radar. And he recorded it Mach 15 doing a zigzag pattern. if you were elected president or vice president, would you ever sort of look into this radar data and consider exposing some of this radar data and maybe the Super 8 footage from Kolaris to the public for broader research and study? I would rather look into all those reports to look at all the footage and talk and consult with those who are interested in the subject matter at hand.

43:18There is multilateral interest, we're not the only ones interested in it. There's probably this interest in identifying that phenomenon in the States, same in Russia, maybe in China as well, Germany or the UK. So I believe that this should be the object of a multilateral agreement among countries, with the inclusion of the two most important key elements, which are the fields of defense and of science, the world of science, perhaps an international conference to be responsible for that. a consultation with experts and scientists, physicists and experts in defense, so that the world can start looking into this with more transparency, more responsibility and more scientific curiosity, so that these phenomena are not just constrained to the world of fiction.

44:29Because fiction can explore very successfully the curiosity and humankind's existential concern as well. That's a beautiful vision and I hope that happens because there are all these patterns that start to develop if you deeply research this stuff. But I think a lot of the scientific community just looks away. They don't look at the patterns. And so one example is that, you know, the Amazon River Basin is 7 ,000 or 7 million square kilometers. And you have obviously outlets, rivers all over Brazil. And water is a very important part of the UFO phenomena. They often seem to go submerge into water, come out of water.

45:16their indigenous myths going back, you know, centuries about, you know, water people and that sort of thing. So it would be very interesting to develop an international coalition and have our best and brightest scientists from all different countries really in an unbiased way investigating this. Well, that's probably because when it comes to unknown phenomena in space, there really is no visible financial interest. Einstein got to the theory of relativity because there was a search by mankind to turn matter into energy. So you had capitalism and expansion, the system needed energy, which was scarce, but it was the main input for the development of capitalism.

46:13And scientists from all over the world were looking for a way to turn matter into energy. And the theory of relativity, Einstein's equation, which is comprised of energy equals mass times the speed of light squared, is basically to turn a small particle of matter into a large amount of energy. That is what led to the theory of relativity. It has nothing to do with the need of understanding and identifying these phenomena. There is no clear financial interest in that. If there were, perhaps the world would have mobilized academia, scientists. The United States spends over half of their budgets on military research.

47:10But this was never the focus of this investigation. So I think that once that comes up as a possibility, maybe then science will actually be interested, because now it's more of an existential issue, a curiosity. And unfortunately science is funded, but it's not funded by curiosity. It's got much more practical objectives and much more material drivers than scientific curiosity. However, governments can mobilize part of their science towards multilateral initiatives to first gather information. And once information has been compiled, to work out what's common and how to move forward. Perhaps nothing can be solved in a first conference on that topic, but you could establish a process to shine a light on a matter that, to this day, there's only been shadows.

48:28Yeah, well said.

48:56after that, and then you get the quantum revolution. And even with electromagnetism, Marconi, you know, was told that he was, you know, not a very good student and that he was crazy, that, you know, you'd never be able to send electromagnetic waves as far as he did. And so I think there's a lot of value actually in government spending on science that seems useless because that ends up being the most useful. It's the science that is the most existential, deals with the contemplation of reality itself. Exactly. Because science comes from experimentation. The steam engine has been around for 2000 years.

49:41Someone from Egypt, from Alexandria, realized that when he heated up water, steam created mechanical energy. But that remained as it was for 2000 years, until someone in the UK said, actually, that mechanical force, discovered by Heron from Alexandria, could actually move a steam loom. And then, Heron from Alexandria's steam engine became what drove the Industrial Revolution in England. And then, the Military Revolution. because then the UK created the steam engine and the British Navy ruled over China and then over the world. So this transition from experimental research and knowledge to technological knowledge and economic activity is a natural step.

50:36And humankind is familiar with it. Most probably, Einstein wasn't thinking about the atom bomb when he thought about turning matter into energy. But what happened was, just like the steam engine was turned into the steam gunboat, you see, matter, uranium, was transformed into the atom bomb, which was dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. But that's how science works, for better or worse. There's a small town in southern Brazil called Varginia. It has 130 ,000 people. And in January of 1996, something absolutely remarkable happens there. My friend is a documentarian. His name is James Fox. And he made a movie called Moment of Contact.

51:31and he's spoken to maybe 15 to 20 people between people who have seen beings and people who have seen the craft. He's triangulated the flight path and basically this cigar-shaped Tic Tac craft seemed to have some sort of puncture in it. Gas was coming out of the back. It crashed on something called the Maolini Farm. An ultralight pilot named Carlos DeSouza, who was also a geography teacher, held pieces of the craft in his hands

52:13It seemed to have bounced the rear end of the craft, which was completely destroyed. There were pieces everywhere. And the front of it, which was practically half of it, slid further and ran into a tree. That's literally what it did. It ran into a tree, hit the tree and stopped. Thinking he's looking at a blimp or some kind of experimental aircraft, Carlos's first thought is that there were people inside. So he rushed to the crash site to help. And that's where he realized this wasn't a normal crash. The very first thing that I observed and that really caught my attention was the smell. because at that moment what I was expecting was the smell of diesel fuel or kerosene or aircraft fuel.

53:05It's normally a very strong smell. And on the contrary, the smell that I felt at the crash site felt like ammonia. It was very strong. I don't know what was the fuel or the substance that was there, but it was a very strong smell, something different. And it began to burn my eyes. A military convoy then pulled up, and soldiers started to secure the area. Before they reached him, something on the ground caught his eye. Shiny pieces of metal from the wreckage. He picked it up. When he tried to crumple it, the material went back to its original shape. And a soldier, huge, really strong, probably two meters tall, really strong, came running, shouting, Get out of here!

53:54Get out of here! And just at that time, I could see quite a few pieces of debris on the ground, and I picked them up, and it was kind of curved. And then I was surprised to see how light it was. You know, aluminum foil that you use to wrap up chicken to roast, that you use normally in the kitchen? It was that kind of weight. It didn't weigh anything at all.

54:22And I thought, well, this is strange. All right. So I said, I'll keep it. And so I crunched it up. And so I made this kind of movement, you know, to put it in my pocket. And what happened was this foil or this sheet regained its shape. Sounds a lot like the Roswell crash material. Foil-like, weightless, and impossible to deform. Carlos wanted to keep it. But things took a turn when he was ordered to leave at gunpoint. And then that soldier arrived, took his rifle and started hitting me on the chest and saying, get out of here. And I started to question him, saying, no. There are people there who are going to need help.

55:07I'm going to help them. I'm a pilot, man. I know what they're going through. He took a step back, raised his gun, cocked it, and pointed it at my head. pointing at my head right here and said to me, I'm not asking. I'm giving you an order. If you don't leave, I'm going to blow your brains out. And he was later apprehended by some men in dark suits. The beings then ran off. Three women, who seemed very honest to me, saw the beings. It was red eyes, brown, with skin color. And it seems like one of the beings was also apprehended by the military by a guy named Marcos Shoresi, who was a soldier, and that he died due to a puncture wound from the being.

56:03And even Armando Fortunato, who did the autopsy, basically saw it was a bacterial that he had never seen before. And then all of these people at the hospital mentioned treating an ET being. There's a neurosurgeon, Italo Venturelli, who manages the whole chain of three hospitals, but regionalis, where they held this being. He was there and he was checking the work of a guy who stitched up and actually worked on, did some basic operating procedure on this being. So you get thing after thing after thing, this whole chain of custody of this being different witnesses. To me, it's the most interesting UFO case globally as far as documentation because it's from the 90s and a lot of these people are still alive.

56:53What do you think about this case? You know that that event created a celebrity in Brazil. Its name is the Varginha E.T. Nobody saw the Varginha E.T. but everyone knows about the E.T. By the way, this phenomenon the Varginha ET became a national phenomenon. In fact, sometimes people will kind of poke fun at it. They'll joke around about when someone becomes a celebrity or famous, they say that they're more famous than the Varginha ET. Now, even if the ET itself remains, shall we say, unseen, the phenomenon was documented. and also documented both by the military and in the field of health. The medical field, the testimonials, if not all of them, but most of them, are publicly well-known, disclosed.

57:59We're talking about testimony from doctors like Dr. Italo Venturelli, a chief neurosurgeon from Hospital Regionale. By his own account, he showed up to work like it was any other day. His colleague, another neurosurgeon named Dr. Marcos Venesis, pulled him aside. At first, he showed Venturelli a tape, grainy footage of what looked like a small child with a deformity getting patched up after a procedure. But then Marcos Venesis insisted that Italo see his patient in person. He brings Italo into the room, where he came face to face with the being for four entire minutes. He was just lying there with a surgical drape, one hand in and the other out like this.

58:47Nothing here, and it's peaceful. The bed positioned upright, like we do for neurological patients. Eventually, the reality sunk in that this patient wasn't human. He had arms. He had a chest. Hal's wife asked if he had nipples. I didn't see nipples. I didn't see a nipple lying there like that. Neck, very small mouth. The eyes, like this, as if they were drops, like that. Lilac. And very peaceful. There was no suffering there, no suffering at all. There was no bad smell, no odor, no nervousness, nothing diabolical. A very angelic kind of being, totally at peace. It's hard to overstate how bizarre this must have been.

59:39A neurosurgeon walking into what should be an average day at work, only to find what looks like an alien creature lying in a hospital bed. It's not bleeding. It's not in pain. It's breathing normally. No problem. Everything's fine. The being looked at me. As I always say, it looked at me with a very beautiful look. Not a judgmental look. Not a look of fear. It had the look of someone who understands very well what is going on. But it was a different person, a different being. It wasn't human at all. It wasn't a case of human anomalies, it was a different being. I've been dealing with humans for 46 years, but back then, about 30 years ago, we knew how to tell when it was or wasn't a human.

1:00:33What's intriguing is that they didn't lead to the initiative, for example, of submitting those who witnessed the events, both in the medical and military fields, to be questioned, to help shine a light on that event and maybe lead to potential hypotheses about what was seen. about what was witnessed, what it meant, and the possible origins. No, they hid it under a rock, so to speak. The problem was treated with a lot of secrecy, and they didn't move forward with it. The possibility to clarify what happened never took place, except for the city of Varginha itself, which turned into a sort of reference, Touristically speaking, the town hall created a museum to acknowledge and value the phenomenon, to document it, and to give it a sense of permanence, to take it away from the world of fantasy and turn it into something, a phenomenon that was part of the town's history, the region's history, here in the south of Minas Gerais.

1:01:59By the way, the town is next door to international soccer superstar Pelé's hometown. It's close to Tres Corazones, where Pelé has a property. I've had the opportunity to go to Varginha and Tres Corazones. And in Varginha, the phenomenon is undisputed. There's no doubt about whether it happened or not. Now, officially, for example, health authorities, the Medical Federal Council, because there were physicians involved. They'd never get involved in the records or in the investigation of the event. And the armed forces were even more prudent, especially when it came to reasons that involve issues that have to do with national security.

1:02:47Not just defense, but national security, which is broader. Yeah, I mean, you had a base there, ESA, and it seemed like they were all kind of mobilized immediately when this crash occurred. There's actually an air traffic controller that also claimed that he said USAF, and he says the U.S. Air Force was involved. And then there's even a pilot in the United States that just testified before Congress. I'm sure you're aware that a lot of the witnesses came to the U.S. They actually came on my show and they also went to Washington, D.C. and they spoke with a bunch of Congress people. And you have a U.S.

1:03:25pilot now saying on record that basically there were missions that were now scrubbed from the record going on between, you know, CIA, Air Force and Virginia around that time in 1996. My name is Fred Claussen. I'm a retired U.S. Air Force bird colonel and fighter pilot. In order to secure a cargo plane, a specific protocol must be adhered to. The tasking would be sent to Air Mobility Command at Scott Air Force Base, Illinois, who has command authority over all U.S. Air Force cargo aircraft and refueling tankers. The paper trail has begun. So do you think that the U.S. is involved in a lot of these sort of UFO events and crashes in Brazil?

1:04:27The United States are involved in everything all over the world. The question should be, what isn't the U.S. involved in? It's obvious that events of that nature would immediately pique the interest of the United States. Because let's just work on the basis of the hypothesis that an unidentified object was in the reach of a government. That unidentified object would raise interest across many different ways. Because first, the object, what was it built from, what kind of material? You see, what was the technology that allowed that object to move at such a speed? What were the alloys that were used to build that material?

1:05:21What were the communication instruments? Or what was the fuel that was used in order to make that object move? All of that involves the interests of defense, of science, and obviously the US would definitely be concerned that such an object didn't fall in the wrong hands. So either we manage to find the object or the Russians will, the Soviets will. So it's a matter of national security, of national defense and also of science. because you could reveal a whole world of perspectives, of possibilities, in high-resistance alloys just based on one of such objects. I'm not saying that this is what happened.

1:06:19I'm just saying that there would be a natural interest. That interest wouldn't stop at metal. If you're truly trying to understand the craft's technology, You're also going to be interested in the craft's occupants. And in Brazil, there's a whole parallel story about that, with rumors that the Varginha creature was eventually transferred to U.S. custody. The story was he was taken, carried to Campinas, to a very famous pathologist, a friend of Dr. Armandus, Palhares, and that they then took it to Area 51. I don't know. That's what they say, right?

1:07:01There is a unit, an army battalion, in the town of Tres Corações, because the army there holds the oldest school in Brazil for the formation of sergeants. There's another sergeant school for the Air Force, but that one's in Guaratinguetá, in the state of São Paulo. So, in this base, this army base, there is a battalion, which has its hierarchy, they can mobilize, and it's very close to Vagina, maybe 30 kilometers away. So, obviously, the unit, or at least part of that unit, went to provide support to an operation that involved the presence and the existence of these phenomena. So, I've no doubt that there is an interest from the US.

1:07:57But whether that did take place and how, that is still shrouded in some mystery. And there is indeed close contact between the two defense departments, especially when that phenomenon took place. I mean, both Brazil's Defense Department and that of the US, I have no doubt about that. Because we have a history of cooperation when it comes to defense that dates back to the Second World War. There is a previous history with Germany, with France, but as of the Second World War, our biggest cooperation in the military and defense came to be with the United States. because in Italy, there was a Brazilian army division that fought alongside the American soldiers in Italy against the German forces.

1:08:54You were a defense minister under Dilma Rousseff in 2015-2016. Did you look into UFOs in that official capacity at all? No, we had other concerns. Inside of the Ministry of Defense, we have a classified area that is only shared by the minister or some experts. But it's more geared toward the area of intelligence. Because we have military intelligence, which pertains to the high command of the army, which has an extensive history. We have naval intelligence as well. I believe it works similarly in the US. and we have Air Force intelligence also. And we concentrate information in the intelligence department of the Ministry of Defense.

1:09:44And as with any other institution, we have classified data and information that cannot be made available. There is the concern regarding cybernetic threats because there is the possibility of attacks on the institution. by hackers, by people who want to eavesdrop and collect information, or simply eavesdrop, snoop, and release sensitive information. So, this is probably the area where the classified information is concentrated. And in Air Force Command, which is the institution that kept a closer eye and received reports with more frequency because they were conveyed both from military pilots and also civil aviation pilots that many times made the reports to control towers that are also supervised and controlled by the Air Force Command.

1:10:56So, the information, therefore, is concentrated in this area. Same goes for the army, because they also participated in some of these operations. So, the reports come from army officers. However, the discussion in society with regard to this agenda has decreased in importance in recent years. I'm not sure if it's only in Brazil, but at least in Brazil. We see that the discussion and the information regarding these phenomena has migrated to the civil sphere much more, rather than remaining only in the military sphere. You said that fundamentally you do think something happened in Virginia in 1996.

1:11:49When you hear the testimony of Italo Venturelli, He's this neurosurgeon. He manages a few hospitals. Seems like a very competent guy who's never made a penny off of his testimony. And he says he sat face to face with what he describes as an extraterrestrial being for four minutes. Do you believe him? Of course I believe him. Why wouldn't I? Believing that a phenomenon like this exists. Of course. Because these were phenomena that had the testimony of totally credible witnesses. Three girls had no reason to make up a vision or invent a creature just to testify about it. They couldn't and they had no reason to make it up between themselves.

1:12:42That they saw a different phenomenon or creature that hadn't made any appearances previously or had been witnessed. Same goes for the doctor and the military officers. They had no reason to make it up. One of them is Dr. Armando Fortunato. He's the forensic pathologist who performed an autopsy on the soldier, Marco Charisi. Marco, who is patrolling Virginia for the being while driving his vehicle, sees the being out of the corner of his eye. He tells his fellow soldier to stop the car. He jumps out, and he grabs the being in order to apprehend it and take it to the hospital.

1:13:32The infection he had is extremely rare. not impossible, but its virulence and severity caught Dr. Janini's attention. A scratch or some sort of contact with an extraterrestrial shouldn't be ruled out. That infection quickly turned lethal.

1:14:02After his death, his case landed on the desk of Dr. Fortunato, and the samples went to one of Brazil's most respected pathologists, Dr. João Jemini, owner of IPD Laboratory in Virginia. What they found lying in Marco's body in that autopsy was so disturbing that both men are We're still talking about it decades later. Dr. Giannini said recently, last year, that the bacteria found in the material examined in the laboratory is not common in our country, and that the bacteria was extremely virulent, and which are very progressive, deviating from the norm of everyday practice in Brazilian medicine.

1:14:56And that he did not rule out, given the circumstances that had come to him, that the bacterium could be an alien bacterium. According to Dr. Armando, Marco's sister said that Marco had come into contact with the Varginia creature. And later, Dr. Gimini told filmmaker and friend of mine, James Fox, that he thought the bacteria had strange evolutionary characteristics. I think it was like the term used was never seen an advanced bacteria of this strain behave the way it did ever before or since. And even Cesario, who was working on him, it's like I threw the kitchen sink. It should have all the antibiotics I gave him should have saved his life, but it didn't do anything.

1:15:39Because I've never seen anything like it before or since either. So it was an adaptation or an evolution of a particular bacteria on Earth, but that they haven't seen on Earth that type of evolutions. It's the best way he described it to me, as a neophyte. So we're not talking about an unknown life form, but a native strain acting in a completely unfamiliar, unprecedented, almost upgraded way.

1:16:22We have pretty good testimony from a number of witnesses on the Brazilian side that the entities, the ET, went back to America, but we don't know what happened to the grant itself, as here any rulers of where the grant went. The information that's held by the Ministry of Defense is strictly classified. Therefore, it cannot be disclosed or released under any circumstances, unless there is an international agreement. I said that if the United States discloses its information, then we also have the right to do so. But that, of course, remains purely hypothetical. So if the Bar-Heinz incident didn't happen, then it wouldn't be classified.

1:17:13So that tells me... Oh, James, he already said on record, I know it happened. We just need to interpret what happened. The problem is not the existence or not of the phenomena. The issue is explaining, identifying precisely what happened. That's the object that poses itself naturally as a challenge. The phenomenon existed, it was there. The objects were there, the creature was seen. But what was it? And where did it come from? And why were they there? What did they want from us? I believe that this is what really is of scientific interest, so that we can begin to theorize about it. I know you're speaking very casually about the phenomenon being real, and then the fact that we don't know exactly what it is.

1:18:15I just want you to realize how historically unprecedented and amazing, in my opinion, it is that somebody of your caliber is saying that. Because really, until this year, politicians all over the world at civilian agencies like NASA or intelligence agencies like the CIA or even elected officials were professionally gaslighting and telling basically the public that this stuff is all fake. And so I think it's amazing to have a former defense minister, current presidential candidate, who is kind of the ideological backbone of a lot of modern Brazilian politics, say in such a kind of passe way, of course, UFOs are real.

1:19:01Look, I believe that it would be the first time in history that nation-states would start becoming interested in a non-existent event, you know, in something that is impossible. Why did the British Prime Minister organize a committee inside the Royal Air Force, inside the RAF, to study these phenomena? Why was there in the United States such dedication to the investigation of these phenomena? Why is it that in Brazil the Army and the Air Force created a unit to monitor these phenomena? Why have pilots of jet fighters formally educated and trained to deal with all types of airspace phenomena? reported on more than one occasion these phenomena in detail?

1:20:03Would they simply make up that they had an encounter with an object that moved at 25 ,000 km an hour? Why would they? Frankly, if they didn't make it up, if the physicians in the state of Pará or the doctors in the town of Varginha documented with their professional credentials, with their professional responsibilities. These phenomena, the people that were impacted by them. Why wouldn't you lend these people credibility? Now, this is but just a part of the issue. See? The testimonial, the witness and the existence of the phenomena. The other part, the other issue, is identifying the meaning behind them.

1:21:00This means that the inexistence of the phenomena can't be the answer to ignoring the science. Because this takes us back to a period, to the times of old, when humans didn't believe that in fact it was the Earth that revolved around the Sun. People didn't believe because they didn't know it yet. Many times the consequence of ignorance is the denial of that which you don't know. So, I merely attribute the denial of these phenomena to the inability to explain what they mean and what they represent. But all the testimonials cannot be challenged. And people with authority in life to provide testimony as we have around the world.

1:22:10Well, I think millions of Brazilians, you know, after hopefully this makes national headlines, will feel heard and will feel seen by their leaders around this topic. Because I think a lot of people have seen things in the sky. And in 1954, actually, in the Escola Superior de Guerra, you know, basically the National War College here, there was an Air Force captain, Oliveira. And he said, this phenomena is real. and he was very passionate about that. In the U.S. we have very many equivalents too. So I think a lot of people who've, we have a great researcher here, Pacacini, who was very deep on the Varginia case, he's filming.

1:22:52And a lot of these guys have felt very, probably unrepresented by their leaders. And so I think they'll be very, just feel very emotional and excited that somebody of your stature is sort of giving them that validation.

1:23:12I wasn't approached. They tried to kill me. Really? Yes, I was coming. One of those. What did they try to do? What they did, they shot me. Shot my car. This is researcher Vittorio Pacchini. For others, it might be easy to casually dismiss UFOs as a modern PSYOP. But he remembers when investigating a crash like Varginia could get you killed. One of those days, because I used to go back and forth, Tres Corazones City, Virginia City. Mama was living there. I used to stay with my mama. So you were well known as being the primary investigator of this, going back and forth. Yes, everybody. I was there.

1:23:51I went to the—I called the media to give the names who were involved, the militaries. I gave all the names, the operations. I was the one. There are videos all over the country, all over the world. right now about it. So everybody knew me. And the secret service, the intelligence service probably, was paying attention in all of us. One of those nights, I was coming back from Virginia to Três Corações to have dinner, my mama, relax, have a good night of sleep. In the middle of the way, a car behind me. I don't speed up, okay? I'm nice and easy listening to some Bocelli, okay? Laura Pausini, nice music.

1:24:43And then the car didn't pass me. I felt that a little strange. Kept going. All of a sudden, hit my bumper, okay? My back bumper. Twice. Okay, for the noise, I knew it was a shot. I stepped on the accelerator to give me distance. Okay, I got some distance from this car. I took distance so I could stop the car and abandon the car. Otherwise, I would be a rabbit running from the fox until a point that the fox would grab me. And I had a friend at that time with me all the time. It was my.357 Magnum. Okay? Nobody knew, but I was at that time the director of the Minas Gerais Shooting Federation. I had a lot of training with my.357 Magnum.

1:25:51So they were fucking with the wrong guy. Well, probably. So I stopped the car, got some distance, I abandoned the car and went behind the trees, hoping that they would quit that operation. It didn't work very well. I escaped. But the car came, a black car. But since the headlights were on, I could see somebody with an arm and a gun outside the window. and he shot twice again he missed my car I wasn't in the car but he missed because the first two shots hit my my bumper my back bumper but the other two shots they missed I didn't because when they passage I was behind a tree right next to my car But when they passed, and they missed the car, they passed.

1:26:49I fully discharged six times. And I also heard, I broke the windows and I hit the metal. Okay, I had a speed loader. I emptied the gun, got a speed loader. Once again, and six more. If you ask me if I killed somebody, I don't know. Because I didn't go there to check it out. because I was afraid they were waiting for me. So immediately I got back to my car and went back to Virginia to find a public phone and said, Mama, they tried again. Don't worry, I'm still here. I'll wait for the sunrise and I'll be back in Três Corações. Don't worry.

1:27:39The thing is, when it comes to politics, especially when the person holds office in the executive branch, they're driven by immediate events. You have to deal with practical problems, you have to solve practical demands, and that which demands no solution, because the solution doesn't involve a material economic interest, it's always sidelined or postponed. This means you have to entrust the investigation, the debate of these issues to the people who understand that there is an importance that goes beyond the material, the importance of science, the importance of shedding light on that which, for humanity, can expand horizons that are still unknown to them, or that they still don't master.

1:28:47and especially the world of politics and even the military, are driven by very immediate interests. Someone holds office and they remain there for two years, right? And two years is just enough time to pay some bills, to manage units, solve problems that pertain to human resources, that they'll eventually have under their command. And there's just not enough time to deal with goals and interests that aren't under their direct responsibility and other the attainment of the solution that is possible to be provided by him. So, this issue of investigating UFOs, objects, unidentified objects that appear here and there, is far removed from the demands of the authorities that tend to administrative issues and defense in governments.

1:29:53Well, you're right. Most political leaders aren't particularly academic or erudite. In the U.S., you had Woodrow Wilson, you know, in the early 20th century, who was president of Princeton. But since then, it's been very few and far between as far as, you know, people who are really well read and polymathic and kind of Renaissance, you know, type people. It seems like you are. You know, I know from your son, Pedro, that you have a library of over 6 ,000 books, many of which you've read personally. You've taken notes on. he said that he was writing his thesis and he was using your books to research the thesis and that you had sort of notes all throughout the books.

1:30:37And so I think that allows you to think more broadly about some of these nature of reality questions than people who are just trying to execute on functional tasks ahead of them. And it's in the vein of Plato who said that the king, or, you know, not calling you a king, but people who are leaders should be also philosophers and they should be sort of the most learned. And, you know, I feel like in modern politics that's kind of been divorced.

1:31:09Thought received its best contributions from those who dedicated themselves to abstract thought. Greek philosophers have lasted so long because they thought well beyond their everyday needs, well beyond their immediate concerns. Plato, Aristotle, even Arab philosophers, Jewish philosophers, the Romans, they were philosophers of abstraction, in other words, of general ideas. From general ideas they attempted to explain everyday phenomena. But modern politics has lost that ability. It's all about the immediate power struggle. The abstract plane has all but been dismissed. It's all about conquering immediate power, remaining in power, working to maintain power.

1:32:14And anything that's not part of that is either dismissed or neglected, belittled. And it's not exclusive to Brazil. The same thing happens in the US, with a few exceptions. But the democratic world lives off of managing its deficiencies, its crises, the contestation and protests of politics, the loss of quality among public people. It's lost its ability to select in the US, which is the role model of democracy that the world looks up to with more interest. There used to be elections, but there used to also be selection parties used to select their candidates. There was a time the man who conquered the North Pole, Lindenburg, he used to be a celebrity, a well-known person.

1:33:20Had he been a candidate, he would have had 80-90 % of votes. But he made a very interesting remark to Nazi Germany. And the leaders of the Republican Party said, no, this could lead to conflict with Germany tomorrow. Our president cannot state such views. So he was sidelined in the convention of the Republican Party, specifically because there was, in addition to the elections, something previous, which was the selection. Politicians weren't just elected, they were selected also. There was a sort of committee, a senior group of people, more seasoned, who functioned as a sort of filter. And contemporary politics has lost the ability to filter.

1:34:12Democracy has become something very contradictory because an increasingly more open democracy is a possibility. But the quality of public people, unfortunately, has collapsed, especially from that point of view of knowledge, the ability to perceive the world, to consult science, to support public planning and public policies. That's what's happening all over the world. Yes. There's a great book called The Fall of Public Man, and it talks about how public life has become a panopticon prison. And there used to be a phrase called, you know, private vice public virtue, where a lot of people who we consider great leaders, you know, didn't have the most perfect backgrounds, but they were the man for their time, you know.

1:35:13And I think now today, you almost have this two-pronged thing where you have to have a perfect personal record. And so nobody would ever want to go into politics because you have to be this sort of jump through every hoop, start the perfect foundation here and virtue signal constantly. Or on the other side, you have reality TV stars and social media people because they've sort of grown up in that and they don't even care. And so you end up with a completely intellectually vapid landscape. And it sounds like you sort of resonate with that, but it's definitely the case in the U.S. And so it seems like you are, you know, an anachronism in many ways.

1:35:57You're a rarity in today's political world. Yes, that's true. The same thing happens here. Because you have, in politics, there are celebrities in politics, communicators, the TikTok phenomenon. These are people with a lot of engagement from an electorate that isn't very well-read, lacks education, and guide their decisions based on social media. It's based immediately on emotions, it's not based on information. The ability to move people is what drives the vote and therefore politics. And what starts to happen in the political world is this deficiency on part of the candidates. And what also begins to occur is a phenomenon that was called by an American theologian, the corruption of virtue.

1:36:59What's the corruption of virtue? The corruption of virtue is the use of virtuous causes for very non-virtuous objectives. So when you want to take oil from a different country, you don't say you want oil, you say you want democracy. So you bring down a government and you say that it was for democracy. Democracy is a virtuous cause, so people support it. But what you actually want is oil. And when you come to the Amazon and you say that you're going to defend the environment, people support that because the environment is a virtuous cause, an important one, a humanitarian cause. But it's not really about the environment.

1:37:41What's at stake is a different interest. maybe mineral resources, water, biodiversity, sources of energy, whatever is in the Amazon that is of interest to those people. So they resort to the environmental cause, because it's a virtuous agenda. So the corruption of virtue is very present today in politics, in geopolitics, in diplomacy, and all international relations and politics across countries. Yeah, absolutely. It's very hard to criticize an NGO, a non-profit, some sort of international organization that seems like it's here to help when in fact, you know, those can be used in sort of predatory ways to gain leverage and, you know, to deplete resources and to do all sorts of things.

1:38:41I mean, one kind of interesting phenomena that actually occurred today was just announced that the Vatican is working with Anthropic, which is this AI company in the Bay Area. And so you have this interesting idea of perhaps a religious organization weighing in on a technology and sort of, you know, attempting to possibly regulate it. Have you thought about this at all? Is this sort of, you know, at all interesting to you? I have thought about it, and I'm very worried about it, because three or four weeks ago, The Economist magazine, on the cover of The Economist, in their main news article, talked about the five main AI organization leaders and called them the new barons of global economy, the men who will replace oil tycoons, steel tycoons.

1:39:40These are the new tycoons. They hold a lot of power. So this article said that they have offered a study on the risk of finance being attacked by hackers in the US. And the study shows a huge vulnerability in the financial system. The US government is very concerned about that and asked them not to publicize the study. Because if it were to be made public, it would confirm to those interested in hacking the system what they were looking for. Because the study would show exactly where the vulnerabilities are in the financial system. But the economist was talking about the exponential increase in crime in the financial system that originates from AI.

1:40:38Artificial intelligence isn't exclusive to banks. It's also available to those who want to breach bank secrets. So what is the problem? The problem is, the US government only wants a small group of companies to have access to these AI studies. These companies argue that if this happens, China would be at an advantage because it would make available to all of their companies this information and knowledge. Therefore, Chinese companies would have an advantage over American SMEs, if only the major companies had access to it. The Israeli author Yuval Harari anticipated these concerns in his two books, Sapiens and Homo Deus.

1:41:33So, mankind is creating the ability to create life and to exterminate life. And artificial intelligence is creating. His book claims that mankind will create an AI that will be so powerful that it will want to replace the Homo sapiens. The Homo machina will want to replace the Homo sapiens. That theory, which 10 years ago might have been considered science fiction, is a real thing today. So the concern on part of the Vatican is valid. Their concern is valid because it'll involve international efforts. And there will be a dilemma between freedom and control. How do you strike a balance between these two needs?

1:42:34Because they're contradictory and antagonistic. Because if freedom, if you have full freedom, then there is no control. And if control doesn't have any limitations, then there is no freedom. So, this is a challenge that has to be shared by the whole world. And not only governments, but religious leaders as well. That must be the concern of the Vatican. No one is exempt from this situation. Speaking of extremely advanced technology, a documentary just came out of the United States, where you had a former CIA director, Brennan, and former director of national intelligence, James Clapper. And you had a whole host of intelligence officials, quoted people like David Grush, who is, you know, former National Geospatial Agency, a bunch of people down the line saying that the U.S.

1:43:33is not only involved in UFO research, but they have materials and they have saucers and crafts and hangers where they're working on reverse engineering these UFOs. And they have alien bodies as well that they've recovered alongside these crafts. Really remarkable statements. Do you believe those statements are true? I would need more information about this situation. But if unknown machinery or equipment that might provide access to material that human engineering hasn't been able to develop is in the grasp of United States authorities, that would require a level of knowledge that perhaps isn't available to us.

1:44:35Even if global science has made such progress, Carl Sagan himself used to say that when it comes to the Universe, human knowledge is still a grain of sand in the desert. It's a drop in the ocean. what we know compared to what's out there in the universe. So, first of all, I think science needs to be humble. It needs to acknowledge its limitations, or for lack of a better word, ignorance, scientific ignorance. And those who have dedicated themselves to learning more need to admit that there is still so much we don't know. And also need to admit that politics… Once Einstein was asked why man was able to take control of the atom but not stop the atom bomb.

1:45:35And this was his answer. Because politics is a much more complex science than physics. Politics is much more complex. So, we need to rebuild bridges between politics and science. Because politics, built on ignorance and lack of knowledge, can lead us to the worst catastrophes. So, science really needs, first and foremost, to acknowledge its own limitations, its own ignorance. and it needs to keep an eye on and charge the field of politics more scientific responsibility, because otherwise we could get to the point of no return in that relationship. And this field of artificial intelligence is precisely the most sensitive point of the situation.

1:46:42Why do you think UFO disclosure seems to be happening globally now? Do you have a take on why this whole topic has so much momentum over the last five or 10 years in a way that it hasn't had for a century? and, you know, the U.S., the Department of War is now dropping all of these documents. It has, you know, the Department of War has a specific website that has 500 million hits, more than the entire U.S. population. You have congressmen in the U.S. that take up the UFO issue that are seeing all sorts of amazing popularity because, you know, really people grab onto the issue. But do you have a sense of why now?

1:47:23What caught my attention was that the controversy came up recently because of a dialogue, let's call it a dialogue, between former President Obama and current President Donald Trump. So they had this dialogue. And I wonder, why would a former US President from a very recent period and the current who has so many responsibilities, so many tough issues to deal with. In fact, he missed out on his own son's wedding ceremony to monitor negotiations with Iran very closely and to open the Strait of Hormuz to put an end to the conflict. But he had time to have this controversy with President Obama. A former President of the United States also has a very busy schedule conferences, talks all over the world, not only in the US.

1:48:26So why would they waste time or spend time with a current president at a time when the world tends to underestimate, to treat in a belittling manner this issue and saying, oh, it's not important, it's not relevant at all, never happened, it doesn't exist. Why would two such important men start dealing with something that didn't exist, that supposedly has no relevance, no importance. Either something happened or something is about to happen, right? I don't know exactly what happened or what could happen. What I can say confidently and with certainty is that if the current President of the United States, who doesn't have the time to go to his own son's wedding, has the time to deal with this issue, I mean, to deal with the war with Iran, or relations with China.

1:49:22The President of the United States doesn't deal with more than two or three problems a day. It's impossible for them to deal with more than two or three problems a day that are key to the country. I know that. I worked very closely with presidents. I was a minister. I worked in political coordination. I was a political leader. I saw the President's diary. They delegate to ministers, and they use their secretaries from different departments. Science and technology, defense, state secretaries, they all have their own schedules. And the President chooses two or three issues to deal with every day.

1:50:00So, suddenly in the middle of all that, this subject emerges and re-emerges. the subject of unidentified objects, unidentified flying objects, within controversy between both the former and current head of state. Obviously, this requires anyone capable of rational thought to realize that something important might be said or revealed. What exactly? Only he knows. Yeah, and Obama sort of walked his statement back. He talked about Area 51 and alien beings underground there. But then you realize the documentary that got made that I was talking about, it's called Age of Disclosure. John Brennan was his CIA director and James Clapper was director of national intelligence.

1:51:01And then Obama has a production company where he's making a movie about the first abduction in the United States, Betty and Barney Hill in 1961. So he's definitely interested in the topic. Have you looked into those sorts of phenomena, like close encounters of the third kind where people meet beings face-to-face? There's one that's famous here, Antonio Villas-Boas. I don't know if you ever heard of this in the 60s, but there are many cases where people seem to interact with the beings and go up on the ships. Have you ever seen anything like that?

1:51:39No, I've only heard what I saw in the news. It's an expression that we use in Brazil too. There was a phenomenon, an event close to Uberaba in the state of Minas Gerais. This very well-known event involving a group of students who were on an excursion in the mountainous region of Minas Gerais. And one of the girls moved away from the group for a while and just vanished. And the investigations never came to a conclusion about what happened to her, this young girl. She was with this party, and the local press said that it was like a phenomenon of abduction. In other words, she disappeared due to a immaterial phenomena.

1:52:41And this is, of course, in the literature, but it's not part of my knowledge or domain, nor is it my role to make further considerations about it, this phenomena. You know, the final case I'll bring up is there's a Stanford professor named Gary Nolan. He's a famous professor in the U.S. And I guess there was a columnist here at O Globo. His name is Ibrahim Sued. And he was mailed a little piece of a UFO because this crash was seen by this fisherman on the beach in Ubatuba. Have you heard of this case in 1957?

1:53:25No, but they only got a part of it, of the object. They didn't get the whole thing. And that ended up with Ibrahim Svej, and he sent this part of the object to this scientist at Stanford in the United States. Yes, exactly. So this fisherman sees this thing zigzagging, flying in a sort of a pattern. It blows up on the beach and fragments fall out. He then mails this to Ibrahim Sued. He then mails it to Jacques Vallée, the French UFO researcher I mentioned earlier. Jacques Vallée is close with Gary Nolan, the Stanford professor. And he says, I want you to do mass spectrometry on it, test it. And so he tests it.

1:54:17What happened? Did they inform the spectrometry? Yes. He has it in his lab today. I've seen it actually myself. And it has 99.9 % magnesium, a level of purity in the magnesium that you would never find naturally on Earth. You only find magnesium with sort of alloys. So extremely interesting fact pattern.

1:54:41That's very strange. And even stranger is that science did not go any further. They didn't make any statements about what this could mean or about what it represents, scientifically speaking. Who could ever here among us build similar material or process a similar alloy? And why was this type of alloy built? What was the goal of this? These are the questions that science should be asking as an alternative.

1:55:21I agree. Speaking of controversies between present and former presidents in the United States, I think you are very interesting because you exist at the intersection between Lula and Bolsonaro. in many ways you're kind of the intellectual fabric between them. Obviously you worked with Lula. Now it seems like Bolsonaro is taking up some of your ideology. But very few people can be described as sort of a former socialist, communist, now nationalist. So you're sort of like this walking paradox. But I think you've remained consistent in some underlying ideology. How do you view your role now in Brazilian politics?

1:56:06And how do you think this next election is going to shake out? I've always been a nationalist. My origin is nationalism, earthbound nationalism, the countryman's nationalism. I was born in the countryside. I was born with the help of a midwife. I'm not sure how to translate it to English. I was educated in a rural school. Then I attended an agricultural school, technical agricultural school. And everything pointed to the importance of national history, domestic history, the national memory, national history as an explanation of who we are. Why are we a national community? Because we have a common history.

1:56:53And then I joined the Communist Party because we were under the military regime. I fought for freedom of speech, for amnesty, for the freedom of association, political association, and I spent a long time there, but I had always been a nationalist. And as I stood by these convictions, I saw that the world in the past 200 years has been guided by two types of nationalism. The nationalism that resulted in the independence of the United States, which was a struggle against colonial powers, American independence was a nationalist struggle. The independence of the countries in Portuguese dominated America and Brazil were nationalist struggles.

1:57:39The independence of the Spanish colonies in America was a nationalist struggle. So it was the nationalism of the emerging countries against the nationalism of the colonial empires. because Britain wanted colonies to maintain its own nationalism. And the same goes for Portugal and Spain. So recently, we saw a wave of national struggles in Africa. We're talking about the nationalist leaderships that fought for the independence of African nations, against France, England, Belgium, Portugal, who had African colonies. The struggle in Vietnam was a nationalist struggle, the defense of the country's unity, etc.

1:58:28And this is a contemporary struggle. You have a dominating nationalism against a defensive nationalism, democratic. Therefore, I always attempt to see the positive sides of both Lula and Bolsonaro, because no one votes on a party or a candidate because of their negative aspect. Every political leader, if you look closely at their biographies, solely focusing on the flaws of their private life, no one can escape. If you look at the private life of Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, you'll hardly look and say, no, they're perfect. What should be examined is their contribution to the development of the world.

1:59:23Hellenization, promoted by Alexander the Great, recognizing the importance of Greek culture. So that's the lens we should look through. Here in Brazil, why does Lula have so much prestige? Because he has a social concern, concern with the poor, with minimum wage. And this concern should be valued. People recognize this. It's not because he was charged with corruption, because of the Mensalão, Operation Car Wash. People don't vote for this. And why do they vote for Bolsonaro? Was it because he didn't deal with the pandemic the way the population wanted? Because he belittled the struggle and other important issues of the country?

2:00:06People don't vote because of that. people voted on Bolsonaro because they see in him the concern with the yellow and green, with the national symbols, concern with family values, which the left-wing many times see as something conservative. He values family, religious values, which are very important, especially for the poor. Bolsonaro values this. So I think that it's important to bring together that which, which from the population's viewpoint is important in both figures. Being concerned with the poor is important. Being concerned with Brazilian sovereignty is important. It's important to be concerned about national values, about family values, about religious values.

2:00:51So my nationalism is a democratic nationalism. So it's about reducing inequalities and appreciating democracy. And this is what I mean. I am not talking about the form of parliamentary democracy. I am talking about the ability of a country to establish dialogue, analyzing its conflicts and finding common solutions. Because we are united in our problems. Public safety is not a problem exclusively of the left or the right. The price of fuel doesn't have a left-wing or right-wing agenda. When you go to the gas station, you don't find a different price depending on which candidate you voted for. I think it's the same around the world.

2:01:41In the States, the gas price is the same for Democrats and Republicans alike. If a criminal is going to mug you, he's not going to ask, who did you vote for? Oh, you voted for him. No, he's going to rob you, period. So, if the problem unifies the country, so should the solution. I was a minister under Lula, I was Speaker of the House when he was President, I was government leader in Congress, and I worked alongside Bolsonaro for more than 20 years on the same Committee of Foreign Affairs and National Defense. We would travel together, we'd talk, of course, we had disagreements because I was from a left-wing party, and he was more conservative.

2:02:28So it's important to be able to disagree, but to also find common ground, common solutions. I was Speaker of the House from a left-wing party, and I was invited by the Speaker of the House in the United States, who was a Republican, to visit. I was very well received. We had an important agenda. We talked about Brazil, Venezuela, Bolivia, and I was welcomed by the Assistant Secretary of State for South American Affairs, and we became very close. After that he became Ambassador to Brazil, at the time I held office as a minister. So I think this is what it's about, Jesse. You have to hold on to your beliefs, but you should place the common interest, the national interest, dialogue, above everything else.

2:03:24You mentioned The Economist before. I used to read The Economist all the time. And in the kind of mid-2000s, you had a term that The Economist would always write about. BRIC, Brazil, Russia, India, China, the developing economy. And there was this narrative that all four of those countries were going to sort of overtake the developed world in a lot of ways. Lula obviously pulled a lot of Brazilians out of poverty, but you've had setbacks since the protests in 2013. And, you know, things haven't gone, I think, the way that in the mid-2000s one would have hoped aspirationally as a Brazilian. How do you get back to that momentum when it comes to GDP growth and future progress?

2:04:14Well, Brazil is a very rich country. But it's also a closed-off country, blocked. Institutionally speaking, in Brazil we have the largest mineral reserves in the world. China has so much rare earth because it's examined all of its territory. Brazil has much more rare earth than China across all of its territory. If you go to Guaraima in the north of Brazil, it's very difficult not to find rare earth. Even close to Varginha, in the south of Minas Gerais. You find an extreme density of rare earth. If you go to Goiás, in the center-west of the country, you will find high-density rare earth. The United States bought a single mine we had of rare earth for 14 billion reais.

2:05:122.5 billion dollars. We could have 200 of these mines authorized, but everything is blocked. Oil extraction, potassium, gold extraction. So it's important to lift these restrictions in mining, in agriculture, in cattle raising. Brazil is the largest basin of protein and grains in the world. Brazil is the largest frontier of energy in the world. We could increase our hydroelectric power generation two-fold if we set up five or six plants in the Amazon. There's no railway system in Brazil, no waterway system. China has been building 50 ,000 kilometers of railways and has been doing this for 15 years.

2:05:59And Brazil doesn't have a single train connecting its two largest cities, Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo. There isn't a single train connecting the federal capital, the capital of Brazil, to any other city in the country. So the country needs to change. The United States connected the Atlantic and the Pacific in the mid-19th century. Railways across the country. To this day, we have not been able to reach the Pacific Ocean by rail. So Brazil is a country that's blocked, that needs to be unblocked, unrestricted, so that we can create a sovereign rare earth fund, issue bonds for rare earth, and even receive royalties for rare earth.

2:06:42And in very little time, Brazil can become a prosperous country with very good growth rates, as long as these restrictions are lifted. But for that, you need public policies, not only economic policies. Hmm. There are rumors now, and I guess I want to ask you, the Christian democracy party seems to have come up with something around expelling you. And so what do you have to say about that controversy? I know you reject the idea. And then on the backs of that, people are now saying that you might be throwing your hat in with Bolsonaro. And so I want to ask you, are you going to be running alongside Bolsonaro?

2:07:25No, I'm going to remain a pre-candidate. The leader of the party invited another pre-candidate who hasn't said anything thus far. But they looked into his performance and his polls were very low. So I'm keeping my pre-candidacy on my agenda because my pre-candidacy isn't just about the elections. I need to communicate my agenda to Brazil to bring back the development of this country. The agenda of national value, national defense, national science, national technology, national diplomacy, infrastructure, employment, increasing income. especially for lower-income people living on minimum wage, who can't live with dignity.

2:08:23That is my agenda. National unity. I don't want a fragmented country. You can win an election with a polarized country, but you will never govern a polarized country. You'll be wasting energy. and you need to gather energy, creativity and enthusiasm of people around hope. What do I mean by hope? Economic development leads to hope.

2:08:54Development leads to discipline. When people see the possibility of doing better in life, they study. They look to become more qualified, to go and look for a better job, for their lives. And when there is no development, when there is no hope that, as I said, leads to discipline, what you get instead is despair. And despair is the road to perdition, especially among the young. That's what drug trafficking in the Amazon is all about. It's an alternative for young people who don't have an economic alternative. They live off government aid. A very large part of the population in the Amazon depends on government aid because there is no economic activity there.

2:09:44So we need to pick that up again across the country. We need to bring the country together around shared objectives. In the 19th century, Brazil became independent as a monarchy. And that monarchy protected the unity of the country, because republics would have segmented Brazil. So we had a monarchy that brought the country together. But there were still civil wars, local leaders who wanted their own republics. The emperor, at a certain point, invited the most important of those leaders and said, I want to have an administration that will reconcile people. I want to have a ministry that will reconcile both parties.

2:10:35I want you to have an administration with both parties. So, there is a huge division in Brazil now. It's almost like a cyber-civil war. It's a war in social media. It's online, but it's civil war. There's a lot of hatred, a lot of intolerance. We need to put an end to that, so that this country's energy can go towards building something. Of course, there will be lots of disagreement on many points. But will we only have disagreements? Is there nothing that brings Brazilians together? What unites Brazil? What brings us together? Business owners, workers, the middle class, academics, the military, religion.

2:11:19For the country to get back to growing, we need to decrease inequality. We need to place value on education. I think we can bring this country together. A country that places value on democracy. Democracy is the ability to talk. Ok, you think you're left-wing, you think you're right-wing, but the country is above that. Citizens are not left or right-wing. They want a solution to their problems. They want to be able to pay their bills at the end of the month, to pay for groceries, to make rent, to pay for their car, their children's school, the pharmacy. That's what they care about. They don't care if an administration is left or right wing.

2:11:59They want an administration that can solve their problems. Can we offer them this administration? So, let's see, you're in favor of two people of the same sex being able to get married, and you're against it. Okay, let's talk about it. Okay, you think that there is racism in this country? Fine, let's talk about it. But that cannot be above the common shared interest. I believe that this is the political solution. The economic solution is to unblock the country. The political solution is to unite the country around everything that can bring people together. Unite people. Have you studied other success stories when it comes to governance over the last 70 years?

2:12:46places like Singapore with Lee Kuan Yew or Taiwan, you know, Chiang Kai-shek, where you have massive growth. And do you think like a certain industry can be what reboots growth here in Brazil? You mentioned rare earths. Obviously, that's a key area of contest between the U.S. and China, specifically when it comes to refinement. Is that it? Or do you have other ideas for how Brazil really gets back to high-growth territory? I do have an interesting example in the United States, which was Lincoln's choice. Lincoln's choice as the Republican Party candidate at a convention when he wasn't the strongest candidate.

2:13:32There were two governors who opposed each other, I believe, that were much stronger candidates than Lincoln was. But the conflict between these two suitors made Lincoln become the consensus solution. He was a lawyer who'd lost an election to the Senate. That was described in the book and there is a film about his story, Lincoln's story. And what he did after he was elected was he asked his competitors to rule with him. And he gave the State Department to one, the Treasury to the other. The key positions were given to those who were competing against him in that convention. So the United States does have that example of unity and of dispute.

2:14:23For example, what happened with the independence movement. There were key differences between the leaders who paved the way for the independence of the United States. I just read Alexander Hamilton's biography and he talks about those differences. But they were addressed because of a shared interest, a common interest. And the whole world is like that. If you look at any transformation process in the world, there are always conflicts, disputes, but there's also unity. And unity should protect what is in the interest of the country. Brazil has plenty of opportunities to have relations with both the US and with China.

2:15:14But here they want to pick a side. Either we're paired with the US and we're going to stick with the Republican Party agenda, and the other side with the Democratic Party, either with the US or with China. Why does Brazil have to make that choice? Between the US or China, Brazil should choose Brazil. Why is that? Because we have a very powerful bond with the US. They were the first country in the world to recognize our independence. Our emperor was the first foreign head of state to visit the United States. The first trip of a US Secretary of State abroad was to Brazil. So we have a long-standing relationship.

2:16:04Culturally we're very close. Every Brazilian with a certain degree of education is very fond of American literature. Walt Whitman dedicated a poem to Brazil's proclamation of independence. A poem dedicated to both constellations. We have a constellation on the Brazilian flag and there is a constellation on the US flag. And that was celebrated by the greatest poet in the United States. We always had the habit of keeping up with the literature of the United States, reading, for example, Mark Twain, Jack London, American poets, and more recent literature. We all admire literature from the 30s, the 40s, all of this American movies.

2:17:01But of course, we also have our differences. Why? Because the US is a powerhouse with geopolitical interests around the world. And here too. So, we were recognized by the US as an independent country. And the following year, there was a rebellion, a successionist rebellion in the Northeast. And the US supported that. When the leader of the succession was killed, an American citizen was also killed, who was encouraging the separation in Brazil. And the emperor reacted violently with a lot of repression. And that created a huge diplomatic standoff, because the US government, the embassy and the consulate tried to put a stop to it.

2:17:49In 1964, we had a coup in this country with support of the US. But right after that, the military cut relations with the US because of the nuclear program and the space program. In the Second World War, our main agreement was made with the United States. We gave the busiest airspace to the U.S., which is in the Northeast. We provided rubber to the Allies. There couldn't have been a war without rubber. They needed steel, oil and rubber. You can't build a warship, a plane or a tank without rubber. Japan took the rubber from the English in Asia. Roosevelt, President Roosevelt, came to Brazil twice.

2:18:31Once to Rio to meet with Vargas and to Rio Grande do Norte. Vargas never left Brazil to travel to the US, but Roosevelt came here twice. And he came specifically to ask for rubber and an airbase. Also because Germany had a plan to invade the northeast of Brazil, to stop support from leaving Brazil to go to the Allies in Asia and Africa. So we've always stood together, fought together, differences, disputes and unity. And we should remain united in the interests that we share. We shouldn't do anything to go against the United States. And we shouldn't accept anything from the United States that goes against our interests.

2:19:18It's like having a draw. Okay, what are our shared interests? Here, we are committed… This is what I said when I was the Speaker of the House, when I visited the US. We are committed to putting our best effort into fighting drug trafficking. That is what we'll do. And secondly, putting our best effort into making sure that there are no terrorist bases on our border or in our country. And we will not accept US military bases in South America, because that's going to create a difficult situation. One country is going to want an American base, another one is going to want a Russian base, another one is going to want a Chinese base, and it's going to be a mess.

2:20:04So we should have good relations with the US and with China. China doesn't fund any NGOs here. They have their interests here. food security, rare earth, infrastructure, energy, those are Chinese interests. Brazil sends more than a third of its exports to China. So Brazil must also have a relationship with China that respects Brazilian sovereignty. And the same with the US. Whatever is beneficial to Brazil and to China and is a shared interest, we should do. There's a lot that Brazil can do, both with the US and with China. Brazil has everything the world needs. Food security, we have it. Energy security, we also have it.

2:20:51Mineral, strategic mineral resources like rare earth, we have it. Biodiversity for the economy of the future, we have it. What are we missing? We just need to choose in accordance with what fate has given us. That's what we need. Yeah, that's a beautiful vision. I want to switch back to UFOs briefly and say that actually Brazil is very forward on this subject. As of 2009, there was an ordinance called 551-GC3. And basically any military branch that sees a UFO, they are mandated to give that information to the Central Aerospace Defense Command. And so I want to ask, did you ever look into that in 2015?

2:21:40And if you were elected president now, would you look into this? This ordinance has the objective, naturally, of concentrating information and the ability to make decisions regarding the behavior and actions surrounding these events in the Air Force, which is the right institution to adopt mechanisms to act, because they have what is required. It shouldn't be the Navy or the Army or the intelligence service. The first action should be taken by the Air Force, naturally. And today, in the world, there is a change going on. There is no longer just one Air Force. They've been turned into aerospace forces.

2:22:42Speaking of which, military attaches, when I was Minister of Defense, wouldn't introduce themselves as air force attaches. You have the navy attaché, you have the army attaché, and there was the aerospace forces attaché. Brazil still hasn't adopted that nomenclature, But it will have to because with the militarization of aerospace, or the possibility of the militarization of aerospace, we're not just talking about air defense, we're talking about aerospace defense. And as such, it's going to have to deal with predictable phenomena, known phenomena, but also unpredictable, unknown phenomena. It's not a choice, it's a given.

2:23:38Either you prepare for that, or you cannot fulfill your duties, your mission in the defense of space and in the defense of aerospace. This is the correct and up-to-date nomenclature. You mentioned rare earths being present near Varginia. Which rare earths specifically? Which rare earth minerals? It's rare earth and strategic minerals that are found in the south of Minas Gerais. It's a quadrangle that goes from Poços de Caldas to the municipality of Andradas. There you can find the important presence of exploration of these minerals. Also in the area of Minas Gerais, which is known as the Minas Triangle, you can find niobium, which is very important in the fabrication of high-resistance alloys for aerospace applications.

2:24:55And the information from the geological reports about the presence of these minerals in the region of Varginha points to rare earth of very high density and very high quality that supersedes anything that has been explored in the world today. Very close to Minas Gerais, we have Poços de Caldas City. Around that area, it's plenty of Iranian. And they process Iranian to make the yellow cake. The yellow cake is the last stage of Iranian. before you turn it into plutonium. Or enriched uranium. Yes, right next to Virginia, for example. But it's not only uranium. There's a lot of rare elements, okay, in the whole Minas Gerais state.

2:25:52And when people ask us, why Minas Gerais? Well, the answer for us is quite obvious because there's a lot of rare elements. You can find all of them, most all of them, of the periodic table of the chemical elements. You will find in Minas Gerais, and you'll find many caves. We have more than 4 ,000 different caves around Minas Gerais, the States, with all these minerals. For us, there's a close relationship between the UFO phenomenon and those rare elements, minerals in the whole state, because it's incredible. It's the center of the UFO event in Brazil, although all over the country, we have many accounts, but in Minas Gerais is the center.

2:26:42It seems like UFOs often show up around areas with rare earths. Sometimes they're uranium mines and, you know, rare minerals and elements that you wouldn't find elsewhere and kind of geomagnetic anomalies. present. And this is throughout, you know, there's a famous case of 61 schoolchildren in Rua, Zimbabwe, seeing a UFO land and a being coming out, and it's right next to a uranium mine. And that's very, very common. Well, according to legend, the territory, which today is the state of Horaima on the border of Guyana and Venezuela, is very rich in rare earth and strategic minerals. So, it is believed that when these American satellites that can perform these scannings searching for minerals all over the planet, when they cross over the state of Horaima, the signal is so strong from the presence of rare earth that the satellite shakes violently, almost to the point of dropping, because of the vast presence of rare earth in Horaima.

2:27:56So, Brazil, here's the thing, it's all under indigenous reservations. Wherever there's minerals and rare earth, there has been demarcation campaigns on the part of NGOs on indigenous land. And if it's indigenous land, you can't explore in it, touch it, it's frozen, so to speak, and it can't be used for economic purposes. But there's a lot of that in Brazil. You have that presence in the north, for example. You have very important mineral reserves. And this is because when the mineral deposits were formed on the planet, This happened during the period that geologists denominate the Precambrian era.

2:28:45And these deposits are not made up of only one type of mineral. They are what you call associated minerals. So much so that in Brazil these reserves are called national reserves. So you take the mineral that has the highest presence, for example, copper. But it's copper and associated minerals. Because with copper you have gold, you have tungsten, a variety of other minerals that can be found with a very high density. And Brazil? One time in the Institut de France, in France, talking to a physicist, he had a map of minerals in the Brazilian Amazon. So I asked, how did you make this map? And he said, we didn't make this map in Brazil, we made it in Africa.

2:29:30Because, you know, at that time, the two continents were joined together. You didn't have the Atlantic Ocean separating the two. So African reserves were developed at the same time as the Brazilian reserves. So if we take into consideration that they had a greater presence, the French, in Africa, which is on the same parallel of the Amazon, we'll have the same in the Amazon as well. So I said, very interesting. So whenever Brazil decides to explore these minerals, these French companies will already have this information available.

2:30:11I want to end on a more fun note, which is you are a big football fan, and we're here in Sao Paulo where you have the Team Palmeiras, which you are as deep on the history of as, honestly, anyone. You've written actually like a book about this 1945 trophy that you found that was covered in dust. Some legends like Roberto Carlos and Cafu have come through this organization. I want to ask you, it's on everybody's minds right now. In this most recent World Cup, Neymar is being called back. The once kind of wunderkind, legendary football player is obviously very controversial, and he's being called up to be on the Brazilian national team.

2:30:54Do you have an opinion on that? Look, one has to understand what soccer means to Brazil. Soccer is much more than a sport. Soccer is a phenomenon that challenges sociologists, historians. Why is soccer so dear to Brazilians? Why is it so beloved? Even for people who can't go to stadiums to watch games, because they're poor, they can't pay for tickets. But they love soccer, the teams. In my view, it's because soccer was the first way of rising up the social ladder for poorer people. At a time when the country gave no opportunity for a young black man, miscegenated, mulatto, from the impoverished outskirts, because he couldn't make it to university.

2:31:48There was no economy that would give him the opportunity to become middle class, for example. He was condemned to poverty, condemned to scarcity. And then along came soccer, which promoted and gave the young black man, mulatto, poor, for the first time in history, validation, admiration, respect. So when the first young black man had a position in society, it was through soccer. And poor people came to see in soccer this virtue of being a democratic sport. A sport that really opened up opportunities for those who didn't have any. So people embraced the sport, it became a national phenomenon. Unique.

2:32:39The teams in Brazil are not restricted to states or cities like they are in Spain. The team is from Barcelona or Madrid or Catalonia, or the team is from Castilla or Basque Country or Galicia. Not here. Here the teams are national institutions. And people identify with the sport of soccer because of these virtues. It was the first institution that promoted the young black man, that recognized his talent, his capacity. Only a young man from the middle class could receive this kind of recognition. Soccer created this opportunity. And it became the sport of the workers, of the downtrodden, of the immigrants, of the Italians, for example, who created Balmieras.

2:33:31The Italians suffered a lot of discrimination here by the old elites of the country. So they created these teams, the rail workers. The rail workers went and created their own teams. So I myself, as a very young man still living in the countryside of Alagoas, started supporting Palmeiras, because next to Santos, which had Pelé, and Botafogo, which had Garrincha, it was one of the country's best teams. And in 1951, or rather in 1945, there was a classic match between Corinthians and Palmeiras in São Paulo to raise funds for the Communist Party campaign. So I wrote a book called The Red Game. And why were they raising funds for the Communist Party?

2:34:22It was a recognition of the role of the Soviet Union in the Second World War, the effort of the Allies. The Communist Party mobilized people to go and fight the Nazis and Nazi Germany. So there was this recognition. The team managers were not a part of the Party. They merely wanted to pay this tribute and raise funds for the Party. In 1951 there was a championship that was organized by FIFA with all the big teams from Europe. and Palmeiras participated in this tournament and won. So they asked FIFA to recognize this as the first Club World Cup. And some time passed with FIFA hesitating to make a decision, and when the World Cup was finally held in Brazil, it was Palmeiras' centennial year.

2:35:18So FIFA brought together a committee meeting, and finally they recognized this title. But above all, I have a deep admiration, a deep appreciation for the role soccer played in Brazil as an institution of social change, of validation of poor people, validation of the dispossessed, and of promoting the unification of the country. It is truly a national passion. And Neymar is Brazil's most recent idol. He can still play in this World Cup. And we have high hopes that he's going to be in good physical condition and that he can fulfill such an important role in the team and that Brazil can keep its status as the country that participated in the most World Cups and that won the most.

2:36:22Well, there you go. I'm sure the whole country is waiting to see what happens. And you answered that in a way that is kind of worthy of how religious the following is of Brazilian football. So thank you so much for your time, Mr. Ribello, Minister Ribello. This has been an honor for me, and I really appreciate just how forward thinking you are on a topic that most politicians aren't really able to speak eloquently about. So it means a lot. And hopefully this is just the start, and maybe you get elected, and this is the beginning of a much longer conversation. Thank you so much for the visit, for interviewing me.

2:37:08And I hope that you can take from Brazil, in addition to information, a good impression of our country, our history, our culture, our cuisine. And that when you go back to the United States, you'll feel the urge to come back as soon as possible to Brazil. Thank you very much.

2:37:34Thank you.

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