Garbage-absolute garbage. There's so many issues with this book, that I can't possibly recommend to any sensible individual read and BELIEVE the nonsense in this book. Just like others that have read this book, I was intrigued that a seemingly well credential career military intelligence man would speak out in such detail as to what may have happened with the Roswell crash. I first heard about "The Day After" when I watched an interview with Canada's former secretary of defense, Paul Hellyer, who spoke glowingly about the details that Col. Corso covered. I consider myself very open minded on the topic of extra terrestrial existence, and enjoy hearing the input on potential individuals in the know. I do believe there's something to the Roswell incident that has yet to be public, and somewhat yearn to hear from a credible individual what the truth actually was. But this book provides no CREDIBLE answers, and quite frankly, was more frustrating than insightful. Col. Corso insults the reader's intelligence, expecting us to believe one tall tale after another, while patting himself on the back over and over again by taking credit for stuff that he had no business taking credit for. With that said, let's break down the details.
Broadly speaking, I have two majors issues with this book-first, the grandiose claims that Corso makes that again, I feel insulted by the fact that he'd even expect us to believe- and two, the fact his story telling is incomplete and he fails to elaborate on his beliefs that extra terrestrials are in fact hostile (and I know everyone that read this book has to agree that he completely left this part unanswered). So let's unpack the details:
First of all-I'm calling complete BS on the claim that HE started the fervor that became the Cuban Missile Crisis in October 1962. Are you kidding me????? Because you were apparently the only patriotic person in Washington that felt compelled to force Jack Kennedy's hand in the matter? That whole even was well documented, and it was a fact that Kennedy didn't try and turn tail and run to his Martha's Vineyard sanctuary. He stayed in Washington and faced the issue head on. The fact that Corso wanted the reader to believe he was the lone patriot that wouldn't stand for those Communists putting missiles in our back yard. Complete and utter nonsense. So this is the first major dent in his credibility.
Secondly, it's completely unfathomable that a career military man with no advanced schooling in any particular sciences (he referenced a bachelor's degree of engineering was the extent of his schooling) would be able to see the potential of a handful of the most important technological inventions of the 20th century over the course of ONE year, all from looking over his stupid "nut file" (and can someone please explain why he kept on referring to it as a "nut file"???). Really Corso, you expect us to believe that it took you ONE night of going over the Roswell files that you were able to come up with recommendations on what would later become the technology behind night vision goggles, laser technology in ALL of its many facets, dehydrated food, computer chips and bullet proof Kevlar vests? Do you realize how many scientific disciplines all of those items encompass? No one individual can look at all of those apparent Roswell crash items and overnight come up with recommendations that would set the course for the creation of these items. Again, complete and utter nonsense that insults the reader's intelligence. I know he kept on referencing this "brain trust" (i.e., the MJ 12 scientists), but he explicitly took credit for the shepherding of these items through Army R&D.
Now there's many more smaller items that I can sit and poke and argue that Corso is outright telling a tall tale, however I'll move on to my second major issue with his book which is the lack of completeness in his telling of this grandiose tale. This to me was the BIGGEST question mark in the book-the underlying thesis, as I read it, was that the American military through the capture of an alien space craft at Roswell, built new technologies that we as American's leveraged not only against our Cold War enemies the Soviet Union, but also the more sinister and highly dangerous extra terrestrials that terrorize our skies. But he never once clearly explained how we could deem these extra terrestrials hostile. Corso kind of eluded to the reasoning behind such an assumption lied in the fact that these extra terrestrials simply didn't land and say "hello, we're here!" and instead chose to test the boundaries of our defense capabilities. Reading chapter after chapter (and my assumption was chapter 7, titled "Hostile Intentions and the Other Cold War" would get to it) I expected Corso to cut to the chase and explain that we had clear proof that these extra terrestrials' intentions were in fact hostile. Yet he never once clearly established that. The logic, according to Corso, behind ALL of our military advancements in the second half of the 20th century had some underlying intention to protect ourselves against these hostile extra terrestrials. But again, he didn't explain how the American military came to that conclusion. Yet when our military supposedly had a small victory in 1974 with the successful shoot down of a UFO, he goes into ZERO detail. Don't bring it up if you don't know the details behind it!!!! Additionally, over half of the book is a history lesson on the underlying technologies that he so humbly took credit for throughout the book. I felt that it was a lot of filler without giving us a complete understanding of this narrative.
And let's not also forget the all important detail that senator Strom Thurmand-the senator who unwittingly provided his endorsement of the book by providing the foreword for the book-later rescinded the use of his foreword when he found out what the book was actually about. That to me says a lot about the credibility of this story.
I guess this now begs the question why make such a story up? Who the hell really knows. An old man who wanted to try and make himself sound more important than he really was before he passed on? It sounded like he already had an interesting career-maybe it just wasn't enough for him? Again, who the hell really knows, all I know is that this book read like fiction, and 99% of it was complete and utter nonsense. And you can tell. The simple fact of the matter is this-any writer that lacks humility in his writing can already be difficult to believe. Any writer that lacks humility when writing on topics that are of a highly skeptical nature are almost impossible to believe. I wanted to give Col. Corso the benefit of a doubt when approaching this book, but at the end of the day I felt like I was duped into reading a science fiction novel. Don't waste your time.
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Mike
Complete NONSENSE
Reviewed in the United States on September 8, 2018Verified Purchase
NerdySportsGuy
Thought Provoking, Intriguing and a great read for even the biggest skeptics
Reviewed in the United States on October 5, 2016Verified Purchase
Doctor No
What a great read! A different take on the 1947 Roswell crash!
Reviewed in the United States on April 24, 2018Verified Purchase
Top reviews from other countries
Pegasus
Roswell a military contribution.
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 28, 2019Verified Purchase
Amazon Customer
Do you believe politicians, or military?
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 26, 2017Verified Purchase
A. Mather
Excellent
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 17, 2017Verified Purchase
Jack Varley
I (Want To) Believe
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 22, 2021Verified Purchase
GSJF
I,I,,me me mine..Or, the memoirs of a man only capable of seeing things used mainly as weapons
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on May 14, 2021Verified Purchase