Question: Why were the aliens abducting people and why did they bring them back?
Question: If the government/military went through so much trouble keeping the aliens' visit at Devil's Tower a secret (the supposed nerve gas spill), then how would they expect all the "returnees" to stay quiet about their experience (some had been gone for decades)?
Answer: First, the returnees would have been detained and interrogated about what happened to them. Second, the government would threaten to throw them into a C.I.A. black site if they talked. Third, most would realise if they did talk, it would cause worldwide panic.
Question: When the tanker ship is discovered in the middle of the Gobi desert they are led to it by - seemingly - Mongolian herdsmen on camel-back; the camels seem to be dromedaries, not bactrians as should be in that region. Are they Bactrian or Dromedary camels?
Answer: It wasn't definitively answered, but it appears the aliens took people in order to learn more about humans. It's unclear if all those who were returned had originally gone willingly, but the intent was not to keep them indefinitely or harm them, and they were returned to Earth, albeit many decades later. At the end, after the aliens had made contact, a new group of humans, including Roy, went with them voluntarily.
raywest ★