Pine Gap
 This facility is located in the Australian out-back, and is one of a number of NSA bases located world-wide within the UKUSA network. Pine Gap is very remote, and seems to have a multitude of functions attached to it. It has been linked to the UFO phenomenon by a number of researchers, and appears to have been the source of the 'beam' that appeared on the famous STS 48 footage, causing the anomalous objects, caught on the Space Shuttle's video camera, to veer off in a multitude of directions. This has caused some researchers to speculate that Pine Gap is home to ground-based 'Star Wars' weaponry, capable of a first-strike against UFOs, or foreign satellites in a low Earth orbit. Timothy Good has written about Pine Gap on several occasions: "Located twelve miles from Alice Springs in Australia's Northern Territory, Pine Gap is a highly secret communications base run by the National Security Agency. Ostensibly a "Joint Defence Space Research Facility" sponsored by both American and Australian defence departments, Pine Gap serves principally as a downlink for geosynchronous SIGINT (signals Intelligence) satellites." (1) Mr Good continues in "Alien Base":"It was established by the Central Intelligence Agency in 1966 and is run jointly by the CIA and the NSA. According to one American observer: "The Australians have accorded the [Pine Gap] facility remarkable hospitality. People and cargo routinely fly in and out, entering and exiting without the burden of customs or immigration checks. The place enjoys almost extra-territorial status." (2) It is clear that the Americans control this massive facility on foreign soil. This would not be surprising, given the historic arrangement undertaken by the signatories of the UKUSA agreement. Australia appears to be a junior partner of a signals intelligence-gathering operation that is dominated by America and Britain. The odd thing about Pine Gap is its placement. Where the British spy-base, GCHQ, is located on the outskirts of the English town of Cheltenham (and is currently subject to a high profile lb600 million redevelopment), Pine Gap's remoteness is almost akin to Area 51 in Nevada. It's little wonder, then, that rumours abound about UFO research and development at this facility. It's low profile might very well be due to the sensitivity of American operations being carried out on Australian soil. It is well known, for instance, that GCHQ and Menwith Hill in England have a strong American presence, but this is acceptable here in Britain because of the 'special relationship' between our two countries, especially with respect to sharing Intelligence information. Would the Australian public at large be quite so sympathetic to an overt American presence in the Northern Territories? It seems unlikely, especially considering the historical legacy of Britain's atomic bomb tests in the Fifties. Even so, there may be some truth to the rumours of UFOs and space weaponry at Pine Gap, the evidence for which continues to grow.