Ultra-fast spyjets and space missiles -- but no aliens? Awww! That's the conclusion of one of author who just released a dishy and definitive tome on Area 51. Over at NPR's Fresh Air:

Journalist Annie Jacobsen tells Fresh Air's Terry Gross that the site has remained classified for many years — not because of aliens or spaceships, but because the government once used the site for top-secret nuclear testing and weapons development.

In Area 51: An Uncensored History of America's Top Secret Military Base, Jacobsen details how several agencies — including the Atomic Energy Commission, the Department of Defense and the CIA — once used the site to conduct controversial and secretive research on aircraft and pilot-related projects, including planes that traveled three times faster than the speed of sound and nuclear-propelled, space-based missile launch systems.