Intell
Defeating the V-2Â Missiles
The story of the struggle against the threat of the German V-2, the first-ever ballistic missile, and to a lesser degree against the V-1, the first cruise missile, is the story of a chance discovery of unexplained German activity, the attempts to understand what the air photos signified, and the refusal of senior scientists to acknowledge new technology they were…
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The Origins of Aerial Reconnaissance II
Frederick Sidney Cotton Alarmed by the rise of Adolf Hitler and the advent of the Luftwaffe, the Royal Air Force pioneered covert, peacetime aerial reconnaissance in the late 1930s. British Squadron Leader Fred W. Winterbotham of the Air Ministry successfully convinced British and French officials of the need to reconnoiter…
Roman Empire – intelligence services
The Roman Empire was encircled on all sides by enemies, who might come by sea as well as land, and needed to be defended by elaborate fixed fortifications as well as mobile armies. At the height of their power, Rome’s rulers preferred active to passive defence and maintained strong striking…
The Cold War Intelligence Gathering
U-2 spy plane. Intelligence gathering became a permanent and major part of the national security apparatus during the Cold War, with large intelligence organizations operating at quasi-wartime levels on a continuous basis. Yet a massive expansion of American intelligence gathering did not appear likely when World War II ended. Pres.…
KH-11/CRYSTAL program
The KH-11/CRYSTAL program had progressed to the point where it would soon become America’s sole satellite imagery system. An image of a Communist Chinese jet bomber taken by an NRO KH-11 spacecraft flying at more than 200 miles altitude illustrates the reconnaissance capability of the 35,000 lb. spacecraft. The first…
U-2 over Cuba
U-2C spyplane: The total number of U-2s built is unknown but is around 100, of which a proportion was shot down. Major Rudolf Anderson’s plane was shot down over Banes, Cuba, in October 1962 by a Soviet launched SA-2 missile, and at least nine were destroyed by the Chinese. U-2…
The Polish Home Army on The Trail of the V1 and V2Â rockets
Part of a V-2 rocket recovered from the Bug River In early 1944, a V2 rocket crashed onto a muddy bank of the River Bug near the testing ground at Sarnacki not far from the village of Mezenin near Klimczyce. And remarkably, the V2 did not blow up. The Polish…