The official AHF Cold War quiz thread

[Ironmachine]

It's the U.S. Navy, after all...

[Wilhelm_Klave]

Thanks, Waleed.
This not-very-clear picture is the only known photo of a scandalous incident in a Navy. What happened?

question.jpg

In July 1975, Connelly D. Stevenson commander of USS Finback permitted a 23 year old go-go dancer to dance topless onboard the sub, probably to raise morale. Some newspapers also reported that he gave the dancer a goodbye kiss. Word got out and he got dismissed.

Unless I'm mistaken and the US Navy had multiple strip-scandals in its nuclear fleet.

[Polar bear]

hi, all,

is this Cold war quiz thread cold, too ?

greetings, the pb

[Ironmachine]

Oh, I haven't noticed that Wilhelm_Klave had given the correct answer to my question...
Over to him, even if somewhat late!

[Robb]

Hi Wilhelm,

Would you like to post a question for us?
regards Robb

[Marcus]

What was Operation Plainfare?

/Marcus

[Helmut0815]

What was Operation Plainfare?

It was the british contribution to the Berlin airlift.

regards


Helmut

[Marcus]

Correct, the question is yours.

/Marcus

[Helmut0815]

In the fifties the US launched a project for a nuclear superweapon, a nightmare so bizarre and insane that it could have come directly from Dr. Strangeloves brain.
What was the name of this project, cancelled in 1964?


regards


Helmut

[Mark V]

In the fifties the US launched a project for a nuclear superweapon, a nightmare so bizarre and insane that it could have come directly from Dr. Strangeloves brain.
What was the name of this project, cancelled in 1964?

Project Pluto / Vought SLAM

http://www.voughtaircraft.com/heritage/ ... /slam.html

An nuclear ramjet powered supersonic cruise missile that spewed radioactive fallout from tailpipe, and followed preprogrammed course to eject multiple thermonuclear warheads along its route. When all bombs were ejected it could had been programmed to fly around in circles in densely populated enemy heartland, like days, spewing radionuclides, and in the end of reactor lifetime to dive to some city turning it inhabitable wasteland for thousands of years.

Americans did not find large enough testing range for it, and so program was dumped. Whole span of Pacific Ocean was too small and densely populated area for peacetime testing of Pluto .

Maybe some USAAF generals thought that it was also bit overkill - remember these were the guys who build SAC air armada, stated that Titan II could carry 50Mt warhead if needed, and wanted whole Midwest US drilled with Minuteman silos, lamenting the puny 1000 missile McNamara program....So you needed some REAL horror to make them flinch

Few nuclear ramjet engine prototypes were fired for couple seconds in Nevada test site, the engine being rolled in rail tracks to its permanent nuclear waste bunker immediately after test....

Dr. Strangelove would had LOVED that weapon !


Regards

[Helmut0815]

Dr. Strangelove would had LOVED that weapon !

Indeed! You're right, it is project Pluto: http://www.merkle.com/pluto/pluto.html

Next question is yours.

regards

Helmut

[Mark V]

Agena target vehicle was the star of Gemini space program, serving as docking target while developing procedures and training for Apollo programs space vehicle dockings.

But it was not the job that Agena vehicle was designed for ?


Regards

[Waleed Y. Majeed]

Developed by Lockheed initially for the canceled WS-117L reconnaissance satellite program...?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RM-81_Agena


waleed

[Mark V]

OK. I accept that.

Agena was an workhorse of early US photo-recce satellite program. It was full fledged spacecraft with 3-axis controllability. Basically Americans just strapped the current evolution of camera and film return system to Agena, and had an photo-recce satellite.

Your turn.

Regards

[Aufklarung]

Hi

After 10+ months; I'm stepping in!

Name that plane.

regards
A