Caison Best

Military Background

Caison Best is a decorated United States Army officer and West Point graduate who served at the senior intelligence level. He is a trained Army Ranger and Special Forces officer who commanded an intelligence detachment of 65 personnel with the 10th Special Forces Group. By the time of his UAP sighting in 2022, Best held the rank of Senior Intelligence Officer (civilian GS equivalent to military Colonel), reflecting his expertise and leadership in military intelligence operations.

The Cheyenne Mountain Sighting (February 2022)

In early February 2022, Best was en route to an intelligence meeting near Cheyenne Mountain Complex in Colorado Springs—home to NORAD's underground command center—when he and his four-person Army Intelligence team witnessed an extraordinary phenomenon. Directly above the mountain, they observed a massive, stationary object approximately 300 feet in length with a perfectly elliptical shape. The craft was described as creamy white in color with an opalescent, faintly translucent quality and shifting geometric panels. The object remained motionless in clear daylight conditions for several minutes before vanishing.

Best's description evoked technological sophistication: "Like an AirPod case from thousands of years in the future," he later characterized the craft's appearance to media. The sighting's proximity to NORAD, the observation by multiple trained military personnel, and Best's unimpeachable credentials made it one of the most significant U.S. military witness accounts on record.

Official Investigation and Skepticism

Following standard procedure, the sighting was reported through military channels and investigated. Official investigators concluded with "low confidence" that the phenomenon might be explained by backscattering of sunlight or other atmospheric effects. Best and his team firmly disputed these explanations, noting the conditions were clear and the object's behavior did not match known atmospheric phenomena.

Skeptics, including UFO debunker Mick West, questioned the absence of corroborating civilian reports: given the object's alleged size and position, approximately 200,000 Denver-area residents should have had a clear line of sight. No other civilian reports emerged, leading some analysts to question the account's veracity.

2025 Public Disclosure

Best remained silent about the encounter for three years, likely constrained by military classification and chain-of-command protocols. In September 2025, following the intensifying climate of official UAP transparency—catalyzed by David Grusch's 2023 congressional testimony and the Pentagon's establishment of AARO—Best came forward with detailed, on-the-record interviews. His disclosure coincided with renewed government focus on declassifying UAP encounters and building a high-confidence witness database.

Best's willingness to publicly disclose despite potential career and security implications demonstrated the mounting pressure on credible military witnesses to step forward during the disclosure era.