Operation Crossbow Sunday 15th May 2100
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: Mighty 8th land
Age: 75
Posts: 37
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Operation Crossbow
Maybe I'm being a tad cynical, but I got the impression that the programme was made by an independant company, with a view of selling it to the Americans viewing public, illustrating how it was that it was their PR that found the V1/V2 sites. Having said that, it was an interesting one hour's viewing, although as stated earlier, it was a pity that the early days of PR by Cotton, Longbottom and Heston were not touched upon, in the development of the PR system...
Dan Winterland,
That looks like some post-war US program - what is it?
WP
I agree with the previous poster - it did have a bit of US gloss on it although it was interesting to hear and see of US PR exploits in USAAF marked Spitfires. And that wheels-up landing. Ouch!
That looks like some post-war US program - what is it?
WP
I agree with the previous poster - it did have a bit of US gloss on it although it was interesting to hear and see of US PR exploits in USAAF marked Spitfires. And that wheels-up landing. Ouch!
I know nothing about it - except that it's at the French Air Force test centre at Istres Le Tube. I don't know who built the launch system or if it was used. To me it looks like a German solution to a problem. I suspect it was a response to the launch sites being bombed or over-run. All it would need is a bit of straight railway line to work. If you look, there are big rocket motors at the back, smaller retro rocket motors at the front - and the wings are obviously for stopping the trolley from getting airborne along with the V1. It's also fairly aerodynamic so it looks like it was supposed to get to launch speed.
I suppose I could have learned more if I had stopped at read the plaque - but I was in a vehicle full of thirsty aircrew on a vital mission to the pub - and I was taking a bit (lot!) of banter about being a spotter having got my camera out to take a picture of something aviation related.
I suppose I could have learned more if I had stopped at read the plaque - but I was in a vehicle full of thirsty aircrew on a vital mission to the pub - and I was taking a bit (lot!) of banter about being a spotter having got my camera out to take a picture of something aviation related.
Dan W - very interesting. I should have taken the time to do some analysis of the image!
The latest copy of the USAF 'Air Power History' has an article on the US guided missile programme during WWII - they reversed-engineered V1s and planned to deploy 500 missile per day against Germany. The US developed the JB-10 as a follow-on to the V1, and it appeared to have RATO/JATO launch assistance, similar, perhaps, to the Frog photo.
It was clear that the US also planeed to use both V1s and V2s agaist Japan; perhaps it was no coincidence that Werner von Braun, 'captured' at Oberammergau (site of current NATO School - and a former Messerschitt Desgin Buro) - was rapidly shipped back to the States, along with 500 technicians, to start work without delay. The US also 'forgot' about possible War Crimes charges agaisnt Von Braun and his gang of NAZI ideologues.
WP
The latest copy of the USAF 'Air Power History' has an article on the US guided missile programme during WWII - they reversed-engineered V1s and planned to deploy 500 missile per day against Germany. The US developed the JB-10 as a follow-on to the V1, and it appeared to have RATO/JATO launch assistance, similar, perhaps, to the Frog photo.
It was clear that the US also planeed to use both V1s and V2s agaist Japan; perhaps it was no coincidence that Werner von Braun, 'captured' at Oberammergau (site of current NATO School - and a former Messerschitt Desgin Buro) - was rapidly shipped back to the States, along with 500 technicians, to start work without delay. The US also 'forgot' about possible War Crimes charges agaisnt Von Braun and his gang of NAZI ideologues.
WP
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: Near the watter...
Age: 77
Posts: 251
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
I found this latest programme entertaining, at least...but I wish that, in a programme supposedly devoted to accurate photography, they hadn't indulged in the arty farty defocussing of the images towards the outside of the screen. Only the centre bit was properly visible in many shots...
I also waited in vain for a mention of Constance Babbington-Smith, Prof. Jones and others. Some of the 3D reconstructions were interesting, but you needed a pause function to see them in detail. As for Von Braun.... I've always considered him to have been a bit like the Vicar of Bray, serving whatever master came along. As long as they would enable him to fulfill his own ambition - to put a man on the moon. Nazis, Americans, all the same to him...it was the money for the rockets that he wanted!
I also waited in vain for a mention of Constance Babbington-Smith, Prof. Jones and others. Some of the 3D reconstructions were interesting, but you needed a pause function to see them in detail. As for Von Braun.... I've always considered him to have been a bit like the Vicar of Bray, serving whatever master came along. As long as they would enable him to fulfill his own ambition - to put a man on the moon. Nazis, Americans, all the same to him...it was the money for the rockets that he wanted!
Join Date: Aug 2003
Location: Not a million miles from EGTF
Age: 68
Posts: 1,579
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
As for Von Braun.... I've always considered him to have been a bit like the Vicar of Bray, serving whatever master came along. As long as they would enable him to fulfill his own ambition - to put a man on the moon. Nazis, Americans, all the same to him...it was the money for the rockets that he wanted!
"We aim for the stars. But sometimes we hit London"
Gentleman Aviator
"We aim for the stars. But sometimes we hit London"
)There was a (fairly rubbish) film about W v B called "I Aim at the Stars", and some luvvable cockney wag had scrawled underneath on the poster "... but sometimes I hit London".
And in early Sputnik days, 'twas always said: "It's not that the Russians are better than the Americans, but the Russians' Germans are better than the Americans' Germans"
...But sometimes we hit London.
Strangely enough, I have a presentation that I use in my current appointment with pictures of Werhner Von Braun and of the A4 (=V2) and the Saturn V. I will have to add that quote!
Some might find that odd, the the few native English speakers will have a jolly good chuckle, although not so some 66 years ago...
Some might find that odd, the the few native English speakers will have a jolly good chuckle, although not so some 66 years ago...
..the Air Staff, were aware that something was going on at Peenemunde..
Join Date: Sep 2000
Location: The Road to Nowhere
Posts: 1,023
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
And for those interested in what happened to RAF Danesfield, Danesfield House is now a Hotel:
Danesfield House Hotel
Genuinely not an advertising attempt, apols if breaking the rules. The History page is relevant and they are aware of their past - I believe there are quite a few photos in and around the place for those who are interested.
A bit more of that Spitfire fly-past here:
STH
Danesfield House Hotel
Genuinely not an advertising attempt, apols if breaking the rules. The History page is relevant and they are aware of their past - I believe there are quite a few photos in and around the place for those who are interested.
A bit more of that Spitfire fly-past here:
STH
BBC's 'The Secret War' Series was made in the mid-to-late 1970's (1977 or 78, if memory serves), and was first released on VHS in 1988. R V Jones's book was published well after the series was boardcast (along with quite a good BBC book covering the subject with the same name), and it is one of the reasons Jones's book is called 'Most Secret War', as the BBC beat him in using it. The other title he would have liked to have used had also already been taken by Alfred Price's excellent histroy of Electronic Warfare, 'Instruments of Darkness'.
Join Date: Jan 2008
Location: Australia - South of where I'd like to be !
Age: 59
Posts: 4,261
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
A slight thread drift but to do with WWII and jets.
Nazi Germany could have been crushed 'in 3 years' if RAF hadn't rejected first jet fighter | Mail Online
Anyone know anymore or has it all been run before and is just trying to push the book coming out ?
Nazi Germany could have been crushed 'in 3 years' if RAF hadn't rejected first jet fighter | Mail Online
Anyone know anymore or has it all been run before and is just trying to push the book coming out ?
The V-2 that landed in Sweden,happened on the same day as the V-1 attacks on London started. That weapon actually caused the British to invest in a totally ineffective radio jammer counter measure against the V-2, because when we got the bits from Sweden, we found a radio command guidance system fitted to it (the standard V-2 used an inertial system) . The reason the Swedish round didn't use the normal guidance fit was because it was being used to test the command guidance system for the Wasserfall SAM.
None but a blockhead
Join Date: Nov 1999
Location: London, UK
Posts: 535
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
I'm quite fascinated by Dr R V Jones, and would dearly like to read a biography - there must be so much worth knowing. Some quite trivial - in Secret War, he's filmed wearing two watches, but nobody I've spoken to knows why.
Wikipedia says his papers are in the library of Churchill College, Cambridge, so there's a job for someone.
I did have the immense honour of meeting Ralph Benjamin, GCHQ's chief scientist from 1971 to 1982, recently, and he knew and worked with "Reggie Jones". According to sources familiar with the man, he was regarded as perhaps being a bit too ready to assume credit for work that could perhaps be regarded as more of a team effort, but that perception is hardly unknown in that or other lines of business. Especially when someone has achieved a degree of fame.
The book Most Secret War came about because as he neared retirement at Aberdeen, he realised that he was going to lose his grace-and-favour house and, given that the BBC and others were already uncorking the genie, decided to write himself somewhere worth retiring to. I'm glad he did; it's an invaluable record of events.
Can also highly recommend Reflections On Intelligence, the book he wrote as a follow-up to Most Secret War. It's more a collection of papers and addenda, on his post-war experiences, on the various aspects of operational intelligence, things he learned as a result of correspondence after MSW was published, and a detailed account of how he discovered the author of the Oslo Report post-war. That alone is worth the (by now pricey) cost of tracking down the book - it involves, inter alia, the chance meeting of two pneumatically-powered yellow toy rubber monkeys on the table of the Staff Captain on the Mauritania, without which the trail would have gone cold before it started.
Wikipedia says his papers are in the library of Churchill College, Cambridge, so there's a job for someone.
I did have the immense honour of meeting Ralph Benjamin, GCHQ's chief scientist from 1971 to 1982, recently, and he knew and worked with "Reggie Jones". According to sources familiar with the man, he was regarded as perhaps being a bit too ready to assume credit for work that could perhaps be regarded as more of a team effort, but that perception is hardly unknown in that or other lines of business. Especially when someone has achieved a degree of fame.
The book Most Secret War came about because as he neared retirement at Aberdeen, he realised that he was going to lose his grace-and-favour house and, given that the BBC and others were already uncorking the genie, decided to write himself somewhere worth retiring to. I'm glad he did; it's an invaluable record of events.
Can also highly recommend Reflections On Intelligence, the book he wrote as a follow-up to Most Secret War. It's more a collection of papers and addenda, on his post-war experiences, on the various aspects of operational intelligence, things he learned as a result of correspondence after MSW was published, and a detailed account of how he discovered the author of the Oslo Report post-war. That alone is worth the (by now pricey) cost of tracking down the book - it involves, inter alia, the chance meeting of two pneumatically-powered yellow toy rubber monkeys on the table of the Staff Captain on the Mauritania, without which the trail would have gone cold before it started.
According to his obituary in the Telegraph, Jones was a bit of a self-promotor and seen by the likes of Tizard and Cherwell as a bit precocious. Nonetheless, if he hadn't be so bold (eg confronting Churchill) a whole range of threats would have been ignored until it was too late.
I wasn't aware his papers were at Churchill; I found references to him in post war papers in the CIA archives (University of Maryland)- relating to the appointment of a Sciad to Malaya in c1951.
I wasn't aware his papers were at Churchill; I found references to him in post war papers in the CIA archives (University of Maryland)- relating to the appointment of a Sciad to Malaya in c1951.
Join Date: May 2010
Location: Ireland
Posts: 5
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Most Secret War by R.V.Jones ISBN 978-0-141-04282-4 Penguin Military History
The hut was non magnetic and vital to setting the bomb's heading correctly. RVJ has lots on V-1 and V-2 intelligence etc.
He mentions Mosquito PR almost as often as Spitfire PR sorties.
I don't think that the role played by photographic reconnaissance in general, and aircrew in particular, gets the recognition it deserves.
I think it was very scanty on the history of PR, and did not mention anything of R V Jones, The Oslo reort, Constance Babbington-Smith, or Adrian Warburton and Tony Hill (Bruenaval pictures) or as previous poster states the Mosquito squadrons.
Very American orientated, almost as if the RAF did not undertake any reconnaissance at all.
Regards
Air pig.
Very American orientated, almost as if the RAF did not undertake any reconnaissance at all.
Regards
Air pig.