The most likely reason for bullshit around the UFO issue is to cover up secret aircraft:

https://www.military.com/history/why-first-us-jet-fighter-pi...

But that doesn’t mean looking into aliens is silly. The Fermi paradox is genuinely mysterious and one potential answer is “well actually, they are here…”

What is necessary is to just ignore all the crazy bullshit in the UFO field including all the new age wackos. Unfortunately even renaming it to UAP didn’t do the trick. There’s a whole grifter infrastructure here.

I don’t think you need to involve the CIA. There’s plenty of grassroots insanity here. If there is or was CIA involvement I’d suspect it was gorilla masks for secret aircraft.