I don't know much about this whole story (I'm not a UFO person) and am learning most of what I know about it from this video and this thread, but: the people saying that this video depicts an actual object rotating in the sky appear to be making the extraordinary claim here: the connection between the rotation and the camera system seems compelling. The horizon is moving as the camera/plane moves; the object is not moving. You can't refute that with "these are highly trained fighter pilots": the horizon is moving with the camera, the object isn't. Training's got nothing to do with it. The shape we're looking at is, in part, an artifact of the camera, unless the aliens are somehow reprogramming the camera to fuck with us.
> The shape we're looking at is, in part, an artifact of the camera, unless the aliens are somehow reprogramming the camera to fuck with us.
It's possible the IR glare is an intentional countermeasure produced by the craft. It might sound far-fetched, but the military can already jam some cameras already, and they apparently license this technology too:
The first time these craft were spotted on radar was during a Navy exercise where they were testing new radar equipment, and the craft were coming from the direction of San Clemente island (an island that is a Navy base). Here's a short video that talks about the radar sighting:
Sightings of these UFOs have only ever been mentioned by US forces.
Who knows what is going on, but if I had to make a guess and I considered all of this information, it seems likely that the "UFOs" are experimental US aircraft.
It would have to be a countermeasure that not only produces glare, but does so in a way that precisely tracks the orientation of the rotating camera on the F18. Again: an extraordinary claim; it's not impossible, but you'd need evidence to make it persuasive.
Just to be clear, I'm saying the object may be producing the IR as a countermeasure, I'm not suggesting that the countermeasure produces the rotation captured in the video -- the linked article suggests the rotation is an artifact of the tracking system. From the submitted article:
> what is being seen in the video is actually infrared glare that hides a hot object behind it and only rotates in the way it does because the camera rotates when tracking the target from left to right
