Mysterious drones, 'loose nukes,' and baseless viral takes

There is a worldwide epidemic of people without the slightest ability to reason and think rationally.

Social media is ablaze with speculation about the apparent mysterious drones flying over New Jersey and elsewhere in the U.S., with some coming to truly bombastic conclusions to explain the situation.

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One such commentator, a Kansas resident named John Ferguson, who runs a company named Saxon Unmanned, submitted an explosively viral take on the drone incidents. His video, originally uploaded to TikTok, received hundreds of millions of views across several platforms after it was shared by Joe Rogan, Shawn Ryan, and several other popular commentators. Because of that, it was picked up by lots of media outlets.

I’ll upload it independently below so that you can follow along with me:

After watching the video, I came away shocked and appalled.

Shocked and appalled that so many people would buy into this laughably inconsistent and entirely unsourced narrative of events.

There is a worldwide epidemic of people without the slightest ability to reason and think rationally.

Let me share my thought process with you.

Ferguson begins by establishing his credibility. He runs a company in Kansas called Saxon Unmanned, which, on its webpage, claims to be a “leading solutions provider for unmanned and autonomous remote system technologies for the government, energy, infrastructure, agriculture, and private industry.” Now, after a quick search, it became unclear if Ferguson had any contracts with the government. And he runs a very small shop, with most sites listing him as having fewer than five employees. Nonetheless, he established some semblance of credibility because this is his bread and butter.

Now, he gets right into the meat, which is his claim that there is a missing nuclear “warhead” in the United States.

Wow! That’s a big statement.

Some background: There have long been general concerns about "loose nukes" during the post-Soviet period (a 40-year-old issue), but there is no evidence of his claim that “80 nukes” went missing from Ukraine. He also brings up the notion that this is some kind of ploy to hook us into war with Russia, further complicating everything. For people who can reason, Ferguson’s loose speculation and politicization of what should be a major national security issue should light up major red flags in your head.

It gets even more flimsy.

Ferguson then claims he spoke to "a gentleman" (who does not get a name. RED FLAG) with access to high levels of government. This “gentleman” has told Ferguson, Ferguson says, that the government ignores him. Ferguson says that the “gentleman” has "physically touched" a warhead leftover from Ukraine and that the nuke is being shipped (?) from Ukraine to the United States.

Now, the story is a total mess. Ferguson doesn’t even have first-hand knowledge. And his source remains unnamed.

Bonus info: There are no nuclear warheads in Ukraine, so the geopolitically astute would poke more holes in the story right away. Ukraine agreed to dissolve its nuclear program over 30 years ago.

To recap, Ferguson has no first-hand information. He is unaware that Ukraine doesn’t have any nukes. And we have to trust him that his source is not your local conspiratorial pharmacy tech at CVS.

And speaking of "warheads," Mr Ferguson is constantly referring to the apparent missing weapon in this fashion. The warhead is the part that contains the explosive mechanism. However, a warhead needs to be mounted on a delivery system to work. Is the delivery system also part of this apparent Ukrainian or Biden plot to throw America into a war with Russia?

Ferguson continues the brain cell eliminator that is his TikTok tale. To back up his scorching hot takes, he baselessly claims nukes went missing a few years ago in Colorado, and they were traveling on a major highway and that drones were looking for the nukes. He does nothing to substantiate this claim.

The self-proclaimed drone expert then pivots to the idea that drones have "no reason to be in the air at night" unless you're doing military recon work. Again, it’s a completely silly and irrational take. Drones are accessible to anyone with $100 in their bank account. And let me tell you, as someone from New Jersey, we love to troll people for no reason.

The screed is not over. The Kansas man declares that drones have "special sensors that can detect radioactive material." But so do other devices that are more useful than drones. If a nuke was missing in Jersey, you better believe that they wouldn’t just be flying around drones at night, and only at night, with the hopes of recovering the material.

Ferguson then brings us back to "this gentleman" who says a rogue nuke warhead "left Europe, and now it's gone" into the continental United States. If only we knew the identity of this all-knowing “gentleman.”

So, based on this conspiracy, he concludes that the drones are "trying to smell something" on the ground, aka, the rogue nuke that somehow found its way to America and got lost in Jersey.

Again, I came away stunned that so many people believe the absolute nonsense coming out of this man's mouth. His credibility is suspect. His “evidence” is non-existent. He has no first-hand knowledge. All of the information he is supposedly relaying is sourced to an anonymous "gentleman."

“But Jordan, what is your take on the mysterious drones?”

I’m not sure, but I sure as heck know that there’s nothing credible about the “loose nuke in Jersey” case.

It’s time to make America rational again.