113th CIC Detachment Investigates Mysterious Object in Midwest (OCT 1948)

Official Statements

• U.S. Army Intelligence Center of Excellence, November 13: “In October 1948, one of the field offices of the 113th Counter Intelligence Corps (CIC) Detachment was called upon to investigate a “flying saucer” found in a local farmer’s field. This brief - and humorous - incident was one of the many duties performed by the unit during its early history.”

• U.S. Army Intelligence Center of Excellence, November 13: “The 113th CIC Detachment was activated in Chicago, Illinois, on May 20, 1946, as part of a reorganization of Army counterintelligence elements within the United States. Originally attached to the Sixth Service Command, the unit was reassigned to the Fifth Army area, where it was responsible for background investigations of Army military and civilian personnel and general counterintelligence support. It had multiple field offices across the Midwest, from Michigan and Indiana to Wyoming and Colorado. In 1948, the 113th CIC Detachment received a Meritorious Unit Commendation.”

• U.S. Army Intelligence Center of Excellence, November 13: “In October of that year, an unusual request for assistance was received by one of its field offices. A farmer had discovered in his field a circular metal blade affixed with “a mysterious object which, to anyone with imagination, could have been a part of a rocket projectile.” A brief investigation found the “flying saucer” to be a disc harrow onto which another local farmer had welded a World War II bazooka shell to create noise for a wedding celebration.”

• U.S. Army Intelligence Center of Excellence, November 13: “The device had simply fallen out of his truck while traveling through the field. Throughout 1949, the 113th CIC Detachment sought to more actively support security programs across the Fifth Army area, whose intelligence and security officers were reported to be “largely untrained and had such a multiplicity of duties that security was neglected.”

• U.S. Army Intelligence Center of Excellence, November 13: “In response, the detachment began developing training courses for these officers and sought to become more involved in security surveys and inspections of Fifth Army installations with the hope of adopting “a more positive attitude in the matter of security than merely carrying out our routine background investigations, important as these are and will continue to be.”

• U.S. Army Intelligence Center of Excellence, November 13: “After being allotted into the Regular Army in 1950, the unit went through several redesignations: the 113th CIC Group in 1957, 113th Intelligence Corps Group in 1961, and 113th MI Group in 1966. It was inactivated at Fort Sheridan, Illinois, in December 1971 during another reorganization of Army counterintelligence activities within the United States in the early 1970s. On Oct. 16, 1983, the unit was consolidated with the 207th Military Intelligence (MI) Detachment to create Headquarters and Headquarters Detachment, 207th MI Group.”

• U.S. Army Intelligence Center of Excellence, November 13: “Two years later, this became the 207th MI Brigade. In late 1990, the unit deployed to Saudi Arabia during Operation Desert Shield/Desert Storm. The brigade supplied VII Corps with critical intelligence as it prepared for the ground war in Kuwait, and its numerous subordinate units, manned and unmanned aerial systems, and counterintelligence assets continued providing intelligence and surveillance during the VII Corps’ successful ground campaign in late February 1991. At the conclusion of the Gulf War, the unit returned to Germany where it was inactivated in January 1992.”

• U.S. Army Intelligence Center of Excellence, November 13: “On Mar. 16, 2016, almost seventy years after the 113th CIC Detachment was first established, Headquarters and Headquarters Company, 207th MI Brigade (Theater) was activated in Italy as the first theater MI brigade, providing intelligence collection and exploitation across the entire African continent. Today, it works to identify and neutralize trans-national and trans-regional threats, promote stability, build regional partnerships, and maintain intelligence readiness in support of U.S. Army Southern European Task Force, Africa and U.S. Africa Command.”

• U.S. Army Intelligence Center of Excellence, November 13: “Article by Erin E. Thompson, USAICoE Staff Historian. New issues of This Week in MI History are published each week. To report story errors, ask questions, request previous articles, or be added to our distribution list, please contact: TR-ICoE-Command-Historian@army.mil.”