Leonidas.

This is coolbert:

Surprisingly [??], during the very last stages of World War Two [WW2], the German did employ suicide bombers. Personnel, aviators, dive bombing a target with the intent to destroy an enemy target of importance, knowing full well that such destruction would end their own life as well!

"I hereby voluntarily apply to be enrolled in the suicide group as part of a human glider-bomb. I fully understand that employment in this capacity will entail my own death."

This was the Leonidas Squadron.

"The Leonidas Squadron, formally known as 5th Staffel of Kampfgeschwader 200 . . . thirty-five pilots of the Leonidas Squadron flew suicide sorties against Soviet bridges over the river Oder with little noticeable effect." [during the Battle of Berlin - - 1945]

"It was named for Leonidas I, the king of Sparta who in 480 BC stopped the invading Persian army at the Battle of Thermopylae with 300 elite warriors who fought to the last man."

German authorities, those persons at the very top of the command echelon, were of mixed opinion regarding the use of suicide bombers. Some saying yea, some saying nay!

* "proposed by Otto Skorzeny and Hajo Herrmann."
* "supported by . . . Hanna Reitsch."
* "Himmler approved . . . and suggested using convicted criminals as pilots."
* "The Luftwaffe's High Command was unenthusiastic"
* "Erhard Milch turned the plan down as impractical"
* "Hermann Göring showed little interest."
* "Adolf Hitler was against the idea of self-sacrifice"

Hitler eventually reserved unto himself the final authority to release the suicide bomber for combat action, but with hesitation?

Comments:

* Suicide bombing as a weapon of war is A SIGN OF ABJECT DESPERATION MORE THAN ANYTHING ELSE? An indication by one of the antagonists that conventional tactics are not working and no longer suffice.

* The idea of Himmler to use convicted criminals as pilots for the suicide aircraft is absurd. Criminals as a class NEVER make good soldiers in any circumstance, many being latent cowards for the most part. To EVER expect criminal elements to volunteer for suicide missions is just totally unreasonable.

* The original intent was to use a MANNED version of the V-1 "doodlebug" as the suicide "aircraft" MANNED "doodlebugs" were more or less impossible to fly. Alternative "aircraft" such as glider/bombers also proved to be impractical?

* "On-paper" the idea of the suicide bomber has a lot of appeal? One man, one plane, one very large bomb, used against an absolutely critical enemy target, destroying same, can influence the entire course of a war? So goes the thinking?

* According to the experts [Anthony Beevor], the German use of suicide bombers during the Battle of Berlin produced results that were limited, temporary, and more or less meaningless? A gesture more than anything else. At that stage of the war, spring 1945, not a whole lot was going to work for the Germans anyhow?

coolbert.

Notional.

This is coolbert:

The Coast Guard stepped on it three days ago? A training exercise - - on 9/11 - - gone bad?

"Potomac panic: Coast Guard training exercise causes fear on 9-11 anniversary"

"WASHINGTON — It was a routine U.S. Coast Guard training exercise but it came on a day - and in a location - that touched off a brief panic in the U.S. capital on Friday, the eighth anniversary of the 9-11 terrorist attacks."

"the training exercise was run of the mill. . . but it was conducted with no advance word to the White House, the Secret Service, the media or other law enforcement agencies."

"The panic resulted from a civilian with a scanner intercepting communications on a Coast Guard channel during the exercise"

This particular news item was a topic for discussion on the local talk radio program this morning.

The U.S. Coast Guard, running a training exercise on the Potomac River, chasing a notional "bad guy", taking out the notional "bad guy" with notional "gun fire"! All this on 9/11, while commemorative ceremonies are being carried out nearby! Originally reported by CNN as a REAL incident with REAL gunfire [ten rounds reported fired!] occurring!

[the REAL gunfire was a Coast Guard Admiral saying over the radio: "Bang - Bang - Bang - Bang"]

An exercise being monitored on unsecured radio frequencies by a civilian using a commercial scanner, hearing what was thought to be a REAL-WORLD possible terrorist incident, NOT knowing it was an exercise.

There was a stir created over this "exercise" in that the public was not forewarned of the event! Panic, whatever was created, or more correctly concern, could have been averted if someone in authority had been alerted and the word passed down the line.

A caller to the local radio talk show, a self-described FIRST RESPONDER, suggests that forewarning is not always the way to go. YOU DO NOT ALWAYS WANT TO ALERT THE GENERAL PUBLIC IN ADVANCE OF SUCH TRAINING EXERCISES!

The villains, the jihadi, are keenly interested in such "exercises", anti-terrorist in nature, and have agents of espionage [spies] that monitor and personally observe the exercises, as best they can. Want to know the who, what, when, where, why and how regarding the FIRST RESPONDERS! Such info is vital to the furtherance of those planning terrorist attacks in the U.S.

The intention of the jihadi when planning a terrorist attack is not only to kill and maim as many innocents as possible, but in addition to injure, kill, maim as many of the FIRST RESPONDERS, obstructing any and all rescue efforts to as great a degree as well!

The counter-terrorism authorities in the U.S. are aware of these spies and in a deliberate manner are NOT warning the public in advance so as to preclude jihadi observance and intelligence gathering?

[jihadi operatives personally observing training exercises of an anti-terrorist nature are no better than spies. The punishment for spies in wartime is ordinarily death, with all due speed! Merely observing the exercises with the intent to systematically glean information of whatever nature is espionage in wartime! Punishable by death!!]

coolbert.

Deal?

This is coolbert:

From the Sunday edition of the Chicago Tribune - - today:

"NATION & WORLD"

"BRITAIN"

"Report: Libyans trained"

"LONDON - - Some of Britain's' most elite soldiers have been training Libyan forces in counterterrorism, a newspaper said Saturday."

"The daily Telegraph said a contingent of four to 14 men from the Special Air Service, or SAS, was working with Col. Muammar Gaddafi's soldiers in Libya."

"The paper cited an unidentified SAS source as saying it was seen as part of the deal to release Lockerbie bomber Abdel Baset al-Megrahi."

Well, what else is there? Al-Megrahi is released over the protests of the U.S. The Scottish say it was strictly humanitarian, the release, then there are rumors of oil deals in the works, and NOW this?

I do recall several decades ago now, a number of renegade CIA officers and American Special Forces troopers allegedly trained the Libyans in guerrilla warfare and what can only be called terrorist techniques. When I say alleged, persons that were caught, such as Edwin Wilson, got max sentences of over fifty years in Marion, hard-core imprisonment.

NOW, the SAS of England, training the Libyans in counter-terrorism? What is this?

This SAS mission is part of much larger "package deal" worked out under the table with the "Colonel"? More is to follow, the likes of which will never even be apparent? [Ghaddafi at the time of the 1969 take-over in Libya was only of the rank of Captain, and the rank of Colonel was only a temporary position?]

I can well imagine too that any negotiations with Ghaddafi is like dealing with the ultimate rug salesman.

"I give you my special friend price. Three he-camels and two-she camels, one she-camel with kid, and in exchange you give me . . . !!" You fill in the blanks.

coolbert.

Rowers.

This is coolbert:

Here more on the Greek trireme. Most specifically, the ability of the oarsmen to propel those Greek warships as they were able to do so. IN A MANNER SUPERIOR TO WHAT A MODERN CAN DO ONLY WITH THE GREATEST EFFORT!!

Thanks to ScienceDaily:

"Fitness Has Fallen Since The Days Of Ancient Greece"

"We may not be as fit as the people of ancient Athens, despite all that modern diet and training can provide"

"the rowers of ancient Athens – around 500BC – would had to have been highly elite athletes, even by modern day standards."

Persons of that period - - ancient Greece - - and even into relatively modern times - - WERE TWICE AS STRONG POUND FOR POUND AS A MODERN INDIVIDUAL LIVING IN THE YEAR 2009!!

That this is so [the greater strength] is intuitive? People of that bygone era had to everything more or less in a manual manner, a manner usually requiring physical strength. These people led what is called a hardscrabble existence requiring just plain ordinary physical labor of a strenuous kind.

And there was a Darwinian selection process at work here too? Very few babies grew to adulthood! Of every dozen babies born, only about two would grow to become adults. Those persons surviving until age twenty-one were just of more stronger physiology and had an innate physical robustness about them?

I make the assertion that a person of the period [ancient Greece] would be pound for pound TWICE as strong as a modern! I base this upon empirical data from a surprising source. Re-creations of old time American farm settlements usually include an ice house. A structure having a double outer wall the gap between the two walls filled with sawdust. Ice "mined" from a pond in winter and placed in the ice house remaining frozen and intact for an entire summer, regardless of temperature. IT IS KNOWN FOR A FACT THAT FARMERS FROM OVER A HUNDRED YEARS AGO COULD MANHANDLE WITHOUT PROBLEM ONE HUNDRED FIFTY [150] POUND BLOCKS OF ICE , contrasting markedly with modern folks who can at best handle only seventy to eighty [80] pound blocks of ice in the same manner.

I would think that only among the American Amish people would you find TODAY folks that have the strength to perform as would an oarsman aboard and ancient Greek trireme?

"The trireme used in Dr Rossiter’s research, Olympias, was built in the 1980's . . . It is now housed in a museum in Piraeus."

Research, physiological readings, taken on those rowers, English oarsmen, university "crew" who are trained and very fit athletes, experienced and accomplished oarsmen in their own right. Even such persons found it hard to duplicate the feats of the ancients?

Those ancient Greek oarsmen, manning a trireme, too, had "equipment" that could be used to advantage? "Gear" consisting of leather cushions?

"Trireme oarsmen used leather cushions to slide over the seats, which allowed them to use their leg strength as a modern oarsman does with a sliding seat."

The ancients in many instance were able to "accomplish" what today a modern human can "do" only with the greatest of difficulty?

coolbert.

Trireme.

This is coolbert:

From another blog entry: "This replica is an American enterprise? Normally the British are very good at this stuff. Recreating old designs and determining feasibility of ancient concepts. The Greek trireme or Mr. Babbage's computational machine, for instance."

Let me elaborate!

"Sir Charles Willink, Bt, classical scholar and teacher, was born on September 10, 1929. He died on March 10, 2009, aged 79"

Here from the English TimesOnline, the obituary of Sir Charles Willink. But much more than an obituary.

"Sir Charles Willink was a scholar, a classicist and a schoolmaster. He was one of the visionaries who in 1975 launched the project of reconstructing a Greek trireme, the warship from which ancient Athens ruled the seas".



"The trireme (in Greek trieres) was the ship that built the Athenian Empire . . . With it the small Athenian fleet drove the great Persian armada of Xerxes from the Mediterranean at the Battle of Salamis in 480BC. But how the trireme worked was a mystery"

"no one knew how the trireme worked, or believed that it could have been rowed as fast as its ancient spinners alleged"

NOT only saved the Greeks from invasion and defeat with the naval victory over the Persians at Salamis, but warships that allowed the ancient Greeks to "project power" over the entire eastern half of the Mediterranean.

And the question, the mystery of HOW the trireme "worked" was primarily as to the positioning of the rowers, the oarsmen, how they worked in synchronicity to propel the ship forward. The trireme relied ONLY [?] upon the muscle power of the rowers during combat? FREEMEN at the oars, not slaves!

The inspiring force behind the re-construction of the Greek trireme was Sir Charles! With money donated by the Greek government, the English did succeed in constructing an actual floating, working replica, English university "crew" [oarsmen] at the oars.

And the ship did work and famously so.

This too:

"On an Athenian trireme of the Classical period there were 170 oarsmen, ten marines, four archers and sixteen sailors, including the helmsman, making a total of 200"

The ancients understood very well the need for combined arms. Even on warships. Had a contingent of sailors [exclusive of the rowers], marines, and archers. When closing on an enemy vessel, would first RAM, the archers picking off enemy sailors, crew, commanders, and the marines boarding the enemy ship to create as much mayhem as possible - - guarding their own vessel against potential enemy boarders. Oarsmen were strictly for propulsion - - not involved in the fighting!!

Re-creations of this type are normally within the strict purview of the English? The Britishers do so love things with ancient lineage. And have the necessary eccentrics, experts, "boffins", "dotty-types" that are very talented and learned and can do this sort of stuff well?

coolbert.

Luft.

This is coolbert:

Here with more very interesting German aircraft designs from the era of the Second World War [WW2].

Thanks to the web site Luft46.

There was a ferment of aircraft design in Germany during WW2. As necessitated by the needs of the Luftwaffe, all sorts of odd and unusual experimental aircraft were on the drawing boards, existed in the minds of the aeronautical engineers, or were built as demonstrational concepts!

To include a variety of Vertical Takeoff and Landing [VTOL] aircraft. Such as:

1. Weserflug P.1003/1.



This VTOL (Vertical Takeoff and Landing) aircraft project's design, by Weserflug, dates from 1938. A TILT-ROTOR aircraft far ahead of it's time.

"Although this was a very novel idea for an aircraft at this time, the concept never left the drawing board. A very similar design was later built by the United States as the Boeing V-22 Osprey, and began testing in 1989. Even today, the tilt-rotor concept is proving troublesome"

Absolutely. This design, the original first devised in 1938, greatly resembles the Osprey. or does the Osprey resemble the Weserflug P.1003/1? Which is it? Note that the Osprey merely rotates the engine and propeller. The Weserflug design rotates the engine, propeller, and wing!

The Osprey has done a deployment to Iraq and came back with flying colors? There has been so much controversy regarding the entire concept and now battlefield usage of this tilt-rotor aircraft! it all went well in Iraq? If it had not, you would have heard about it a long time ago?

2. Focke-Wulf Fw Triebflugel.



"This Focke-Wulf VTOL (Vertical Take Off and Landing) fighter/interceptor was designed in September 1944. The three untapered wings rotated around the fuselage and had a gradually decreasing pitch towards the wingtips, thus acting like a giant propeller. At the end of each wing was a Pabst ramjet"

This would have had to be seen to be believed. The THREE WINGS ROTATED AROUND THE FUSELAGE, EACH WING POWERED BY A RAMJET MOUNTED ON THE WING-TIP! An aircraft best described as a "tail sitter"! "It would take off and land sitting on its tail, flying horizontally like a conventional aircraft."

Again, we have the case of the Triebflugel resembling the post-WW2 American Pogo, or is it the other way around?

Both the tilt-rotor and "tail sitter" concepts were too far ahead of their time and just so unpractical that they never got off the drawing board?

A ferment of German aircraft design without results that were meaningful? Concepts, especially the Triebflugel, that were so ahead of their time or so impractical that the effort of man-hours and developmental resources was poorly spent? The reader must decide for themselves!

coolbert.

Horten.

This is coolbert:

"It can fly master - - it can fly!!"

"‘1,000, 1,000, 1,000’ requirements – one that could carry 1,000kg over 1,000km flying at 1,000km/h." - - H. Goering.

"Hitler's stealth bomber: How the Nazis were first to design a plane to beat radar"

"With its smooth and elegant lines, this could be a prototype for some future successor to the stealth bomber. But this flying wing was actually designed by the Nazis 30 years before the Americans successfully developed radar-invisible technology. Now an engineering team has reconstructed the Horten Ho 2-29 from blueprints, with startling results."



Many decades after the end of the war [Second World War] - - "Northrop-Grumman (the defence firm behind the B-2) [has] built a full size replica of a Horten Ho 2-29."

A German secret weapon of World War Two [WW2]! A full size [but non-flying] replica has been built.

The flying-wing concept that ONLY has recently come into fruition with the advent of multiple computers that are ABSOLUTELY needed to control the inherently unstable flying-wing design.

The German designed this plane NOT ONLY with aerodynamic efficiency in mind, but also incorporating "radar-beating" technology into the mix as well. The term "stealth" as moderns understand it would not have been used at the time.

"The most important innovation was Reimar Horten’s idea to coat it in a mix of charcoal dust and wood glue."

The center-pod of the Horten was made of metals, as was of course the jet engines. The remainder of the plane WAS MADE OF WOOD, and coated with the non-radar-reflective substance consisting of the charcoal dust and wood glue?

Comments:

* Modern flying-wings must have a host of computers on-board to monitor and adjust for the inherent instability of flying-wing design type aircraft. Such designs are inherently unstable and beyond the ability of a human pilot to control. The Horten was not actually piloted [this replica cannot fly either] and only was towed aloft behind a glider during trial flights!

* Modern stealth aircraft rely upon a combination of materials, non-radar-reflecting and computer designed airfoil and fuselage surfaces that are shaped in a manner to diffuse radar waves so that return echoes are minimized.

* NO stealth aircraft is totally invisible to radar. BUT are MUCH LESS VISIBLE, shortening the reaction time by which air defense ground and air units have to respond to threats.

This replica is an American enterprise? Normally the British are very good at this stuff. Recreating old designs and determining feasibility of ancient concepts. The Greek trireme or Mr. Babbage's computational machine, for instance.

coolbert.