An elongated spot appears in a military image. The report says it moved from north toward northeast, but the operator couldn’t identify it.
A 2022 military image showed an elongated spot circled in red. The report described it moving from north toward northeast, but the operator couldn’t identify the phenomenon.
Single-page DoD prepublication and security review cover sheet for USCENTCOM's recommendation to AARO that imagery and a mission report be released as a Public Release (PR) product. The page identifies the recommendation as having been made by USCENTCOM Chief of Staff MG Richard A. Harrison on 8 Oct 25, references MDR case numbers 25-0094 through 25-0099 and JS-250710-TM8S, and is stamped CLEARED for Open Publication by the DoD Office of Prepublication and Security Review on Mar 10, 2026. The PDF text body itself contains no narrative incident details; per the war.gov manifest, this PR product accompanies a still image derived from a U.S. military system showing an unresolved UAP, paired with mission report DoW-UAP-D12.
"USCENTCOM MDR 25-0094 thru MDR 25-0099 / JS-250710-TM8S"
Why it matters: Mandatory Declassification Review (MDR) case-number range and Joint Staff tasker that ties this PR product to a series of related USCENTCOM declassification actions.
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"USCENTCOM Recommendation to AARO"
Why it matters: States the document's purpose: a USCENTCOM recommendation forwarded to the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office.
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"Recommendation by MG Richard A. Harrison USCENTCOM Chief of Staff"
Speaker: MG Richard A. Harrison
Why it matters: Names the senior officer who signed the recommendation.
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"Recommended on: 8 Oct 25"
Why it matters: Date the USCENTCOM recommendation was made.
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"CLEARED For Open Publication"
Why it matters: Prepublication review disposition stamp authorizing public release.
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"Department of Defense OFFICE OF PREPUBLICATION AND SECURITY REVIEW"
Why it matters: Identifies the DoD office that cleared the product.
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"Mar 10, 2026"
Why it matters: Date of the prepublication and security review clearance stamp.
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MG Richard A. Harrison
USCENTCOM Chief of Staff; recommender to AARO · USCENTCOM · Page 1
USCENTCOM (United States Central Command)
Department of War / Combatant Command · Page 1
DoD Office of Prepublication and Security Review
Department of Defense · Page 1
This is the cover/clearance page for a USCENTCOM Public Release (PR20) product recommended to AARO by MG Richard A. Harrison on 8 Oct 25 and cleared by DoD prepublication review on 10 Mar 2026, released 8 May 2026. PR20 belongs to a numbered DoW-UAP-PR series and is paired in the manifest with mission report DoW-UAP-D12. The MDR range 25-0094 thru 25-0099 likely covers six related PR/D items in the series — worth cross-referencing with other DoW-UAP-PR and DoW-UAP-D slugs that share this MDR range or the JS-250710-TM8S Joint Staff tasker. Note the manifest's location field (Iraq) conflicts with its title field (Kuwait); the PDF text itself does not state a country.
An elongated area of varying brightness in the upper-left part of the image, circled in red.
The record lists Iraq as the location, but its title refers to Kuwait. It does not explain the discrepancy.
An image from a U.S. military system shows an elongated spot in the upper-left corner. A red line circles it. The person who submitted the image added the line before sending it.
The report says the spot moved from north toward northeast, but the image is a single photograph. The operator who saw the phenomenon couldn’t identify it. That leaves a gap between the reported motion and what the image itself shows.
The official description says the spot appears as an elongated area of varying brightness, with light and dark areas. It lies in the upper-left quadrant of the image. Along the spot, the contrast grows stronger from the upper left toward the lower right.
That is all the description shows: a marked, elongated area with varying brightness. It gives no further details about a familiar shape or a specific object. The red line shows exactly which part of the image the submitter meant, but it doesn’t reveal what appears inside the marking.
The image came from a U.S. military system in 2022. An accompanying report described the phenomenon as moving from north toward northeast. The operator said they couldn’t identify it with certainty.
Because this is a single image, it contains no sequence showing the movement. The direction appears in the accompanying report; it isn’t motion that can be tracked in the image. That leaves two details: a report of movement and an unidentified spot circled in red.
It is unknown what appears in the image or what caused the variations in brightness, and the record offers no conventional explanation. It lists Iraq as the location, but its title refers to Kuwait. It does not explain the discrepancy, and parts of the record have been redacted.
A red line circles a spot no one could identify. What lies inside it remains an open question.