Dr. Jacques F. Vallee was a senior researcher at the DARPA-funded Augmentation Research Center at SRI at the very beginning of the RV program initiated by Dr. Puthoff and Russell Targ in 1971. Given his long-standing interest in consciousness research, he became informally associated with the program and is credited by Ingo Swann for suggesting the approach that led to the coordinate remote viewing protocol. In the mid-eighties, Dr. Vallee was brought back to SRI as a consultant. He was cleared for Grill Flame, went through formal training with Ingo Swann, and contributed to the methodology research that Dr. Ed May later led at SAIC. His experience spans the entire life of the program and gives him a special position as an observer and commentator on the reality of remote viewing.
Dr. Vallee also has long been interested in the UFO phenomenon and has earned the reputation of being one of the most rigorous and credible researchers in the field. He was the model for the French scientist figure played by Francois Truffaut in Steven Speilberg's classic film "Close Encounters of the Third Kind."