Who is The Ashtar Command?

The Ashtar Command is a concept rooted in the UFO contactee movement of the early 1950s and has since evolved into one of the most elaborate mythologies within New Age and extraterrestrial belief systems. According to its followers, the Ashtar Command is an interstellar spiritual organization or extraterrestrial fleet operating under divine authority. Its mission is to oversee the Earth and humanity’s spiritual evolution, maintain cosmic peace, and aid in the eventual ascension of mankind into higher dimensions of consciousness. The group is said to be composed of highly advanced, benevolent beings who serve what is often described as a universal source or divine will.

At the heart of the Ashtar Command mythology is a figure known as Ashtar Sheran. Described as a radiant, tall humanoid with golden hair and piercing blue eyes, Ashtar Sheran is often portrayed as a Christ-like figure from a higher civilization—frequently claimed to be from the star system Alpha Centauri or aligned with the Pleiades. The first alleged contact with Ashtar came in 1952, when George Van Tassel, an American aviator and mystic, reported receiving telepathic messages from him. Van Tassel, who operated a facility near Giant Rock in the Mojave Desert, claimed that Ashtar warned humanity about the dangers of nuclear war and offered guidance on spiritual development. Van Tassel also channeled messages from other extraterrestrial entities and began hosting large annual UFO conventions that attracted thousands.

Over the years, a number of other individuals claimed contact with Ashtar and the Command through various forms of channeling—most commonly automatic writing, trance mediumship, or direct telepathy. These included people like Tuella (Thelma B. Terrill), who in the 1980s published "Project World Evacuation," a book that claimed the Ashtar Command was preparing a global evacuation plan in case of catastrophic Earth events. The book suggested that millions of spacecraft were on standby to remove spiritually evolved humans from the planet if necessary, a scenario bearing strong similarities to rapture theology from Christian eschatology, but reinterpreted through a cosmic lens.

The Ashtar Command is usually described as a highly organized spiritual-military fleet, operating under the larger umbrella of the Galactic Federation or Confederation, a supposed alliance of benevolent extraterrestrial civilizations. They are said to be here to counterbalance negative extraterrestrial forces, such as the reptilian Draconians or the so-called Archonic entities, which some believers claim are responsible for war, oppression, and the suppression of human spiritual evolution. According to many channeled messages, the Command operates just outside our visible spectrum, in a higher vibrational frequency or fourth/fifth dimension, making their ships invisible to most people.

Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, the Ashtar Command became increasingly associated with New Age teachings, often merging elements of Theosophy, Gnosticism, Eastern mysticism, and cosmic spiritual warfare. The messages received from Ashtar and other Command representatives often focus on universal love, inner awakening, the illusion of duality, and the importance of preparing for Earth’s “ascension”—a kind of planetary shift into a higher frequency reality. These messages are frequently apocalyptic or transformational in nature, urging humans to abandon materialism, end warfare, and live in harmony with each other and the planet.

Multiple people over the decades have claimed to be ambassadors or channels for Ashtar Sheran and his associates. For example, in the 1990s, a man named Robert Short claimed that the Ashtar Command was in constant telepathic contact with selected human operatives. Another individual, named Bashar (channeled by Darryl Anka), while not directly part of the Ashtar network, echoed similar themes of extraterrestrial spiritual guidance and cosmic intervention. These themes have since proliferated across online communities, social media platforms, and YouTube channels, where thousands of people claim to have had contact experiences or receive messages from Ashtar Command beings. Some even report being abducted and taken aboard spacecraft for spiritual instruction rather than invasive experimentation, as in more traditional alien abduction narratives.

There have also been prophecies associated with the Ashtar Command, including predictions of mass landings or disclosure events that never occurred. One of the most infamous took place in 1977, when a British television broadcast from Southern England was hijacked by a voice claiming to be "Vrillon," a representative of the Ashtar Galactic Command. The voice urged humanity to abandon weapons of evil and embrace peace, warning of a coming period of cosmic reckoning. The interruption lasted several minutes and remains officially unexplained, though it is widely believed to have been a sophisticated prank.

Despite repeated failed prophecies, the belief in the Ashtar Command endures, particularly among those drawn to New Age spirituality, ufology, and cosmic consciousness narratives. It serves not only as a mythos about benevolent extraterrestrial guardianship but also as a modern spiritual cosmology that blends sci-fi aesthetics with esoteric religious ideas. For some, Ashtar is a literal being piloting a spacecraft; for others, he is an archetype of divine order, appearing in dreams, meditations, and visions as a symbol of universal guidance.

While mainstream science and academia dismiss the Ashtar Command as a pseudoscientific or mythological phenomenon with no empirical evidence, its persistence reflects a deeper cultural longing—for saviors from the sky, for cosmic justice, and for an explanation that transcends the perceived failings of earthly institutions. Whether viewed as sincere religious experience, psychological projection, or modern mythology, the Ashtar Command remains one of the most complex and enduring belief systems in the world of UFO spirituality.