The US government is hiding the existence of “intact and partially intact” alien craft, a former intelligence officer claims.

David Grusch is speaking out after he says he broke ranks to provide classified information to the US Congress, information he says was deliberately withheld from them.

36-year-old Grusch, a decorated combat veteran of the US war in Afghanisation, told The Debrief that he became aware of efforts to hide the existence of these craft while working with the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) and the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), serving first as the NRO’s representative to the Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force and then as the NGA’s co-lead for UAP analysis and representative to the task force.

The task force has hit the headlines repeatedly since the US appeared to be taking a more open approach to claims of visits by alien craft. Public hearings have been held in Washington and video from US military released that showed encounters with Unexplained Anomalous Phenomena (UAP), formerly known as UFOs (Unidentified Flying Objects).

But Grusch claims the whole truth is not being told.

The former high-ranking intelligence officer told The Debrief that the US government, its allies and defence contractors have been retrieving partial and fully intact vehicles for decades.

Grusch says analysis found the retrieved objects are “of exotic origin (non-human intelligence, whether extraterrestrial or unknown origin) based on the vehicle morphologies and material science testing and the possession of unique atomic arrangements and radiological signatures.”

He went further still in an exclusive interview with NewsNation, indicating that alien pilots had also been recovered with crashed craft.

“As fantastical as that sounds, it’s true,” Grusch claimed.

Grusch did not provide documentary evidence of his claims, which were cleared for publication by the Pentagon in April.

He said he had suffered retaliation by government officials after going to Congress with the information that the retrieval programme had been carried out for years in secret.

Grusch’s claims were backed by Jonathan Grey, a serving US intelligence official at the National Air and Space Intelligence Center (NASIC).

Grey confirmed the existence of “exotic materials” to The Debrief, adding: “We are not alone.”

“The non-human intelligence phenomenon is real. We are not alone,” he said, adding that it was a “global phenomenon”.

Karl E. Nell, a recently retired Colonel in the US Army who worked alongside Grusch at the UAP Task Force said his former colleague was “beyond reproach.

“His assertion concerning the existence of a terrestrial arms race occurring sub-rosa over the past eighty years focused on reverse engineering technologies of unknown origin is fundamentally correct, as is the indisputable realisation that at least some of these technologies of unknown origin derive from non-human intelligence,” Nell told The Debrief.

While the specific details of Grusch’s complaint remain sealed due to the highly classified information it includes, Grusch assured NewsNation he was telling the truth.

“I am for real,” he said. “I am sitting here at great personal risk and obvious professional risk by talking to you today.”