You might be aware of the trending meme that may prompt people to swarm Area 51 in Nevada later this week in quest of the mysterious US Air Force base's secrets.

The idea is ridiculous (and extremely dangerous) — the Air Force has warned that it will vigorously defend the facility — but the impulse is understandable. For decades, conspiracy theories about what is really going on at the site have run wild in the American imagination. Is it a location where the US government hides UFOs and aliens? Is it just a dull military base? And, if it's just a mundane military base, why is the US government so fixated on keeping everything about it hidden?

So, as we now know from declassified papers, the CIA took advantage of the misidentification. As a suitable cover for the covert facility, it allowed the UFO mythos to develop. The Nevada Test and Training Range, a sizable government tract of land roughly the size of Connecticut, includes Area 51. The small patch of land that encircles this dried-up lakebed is known as Area 51. Although the precise measurements have never been documented, you can make an educated guess based on the map. We are aware of what took on between the 1950s and 1970s, which was mostly work on sophisticated planes for surveillance. But what happened in the 1990s, 2000s, and most definitely ever since the War on Terror is where things get extremely murky.

Area 51 was the birthplace of CIA aerial espionage. It is where the U-2 spy plane was first built in the 1950s, and it is where the intelligence community has collaborated with military partners and others on espionage platforms.

It is also a location where members of the intelligence community, of which there are many, work on some of the Defense Department's most classified programmes.

The spy plane, the U-2, flew at 70,000 feet and 500 miles per hour. Consider how much effort it would take to create something like that — it was an extremely delicate plane. Pilots were killed while testing it.

However, it demonstrated to the powers that be that with this incredible amount of testing, radical technologies could be achieved.

Over the years, various rumours would surface, but the CIA was actively waging a massive deception and misinformation operation out of Area 51.

The 1950s, when the U-2 spy plane was infrequently observed, provide the best illustration. Basically, it appeared to be a flying cross that was really high in the sky. And individuals would write to their congressman and claim to have seen a UFO. Nothing soars to this altitude. In that regard, they were correct. No one was aware of anything actually flying that high.