My father is the Air Force captain talking between 15:42 - 15:45. He received his master's from Stanford in 1956. He was promoted to captain and set to Los Angeles. He'd go on to work on the Atlas, Corona, YF-12a/SR-71, MOL, and F-15. He retired a Full Colonel in 1979.
And I see you with a baby in the avatar, meaning that likely his integrity and prowess, some of those genes are coursing through humanity. This strengthens us all.
My uncle worked as an OIC in charge of various systems at Vandenberg in those early days. He left with me his tool box, lots of stories of when they worked to get new and existing Missiles to fly properly. Many 24 hour days were spent. Frayed nerves. Little or no time off was allowed. It was hard work. There were a few neat stories that survived the years. He once told me that they would hold a cigarette with a pair of needle nose pliers…light the cigarette and then walk into one of the white clouds of LOX (a good long distance away from any equipment or a rocket) and watch the cig quickly vanish into flames. Today that would never be allowed.
Of course, back then, LOX was the only missile fuel developed...and that was the key to the greatest handicap of those missiles, to include Thor: Their response time. Liquid oxygen-based rocket fuel was non-storable and very hazardous. It would take hours to prepare a missile for launch *after* a launch command was given, which gave the other side a chance for the element of surprise. The contemporary Soviet missiles suffered from the same handicap. Later, a storable liquid fuel was developed which gave the missiles that used it a better response time, though the hazard was still there (just think about the Titan-II that blew up in Arkansas in 1980, when a tech dropped a socket that breached the missile's fuel tank). At the same time, they developed solid propellants for other models of missiles (think Minuteman and the later Peacekeeper), which really served the purpose of improving response time and mitigating the preparation hazards. But I digress. Regarding Thor, from accounts and footage I had seen of that missile, it was dubious at best, marred with extreme difficulties in both its development and its deployment. When fired, there seemed to be a 50/50 chance of it blowing up *on the ground.*
I just read your comment and you know why they wouldn't allow something like that with the lox is because this country has turned into a bouch of pussy and whinps
@@aloysiusbelisarius9992 It was a V-2 clone test for American aerospace engineers, build us a better longer range V-2 and this is what they came up with. It was a good training program.
Yes you can see ICBMs thousands of miles down their launch trajectory, in the Twilight evening. For some reason lots of ICBMs were launched from Vandenberg, Ca. In the evening. It was mesmerizing!
Vandenburg is both far away from most of humanity and has a retrograde/polar arc. So… it fits many more of the launch conditions. Also… if a rocket fails. There’s only America from Cali to hawaii to pick up any high tech super classified stuff
Remember mid 1960s when they fired the atomic Canon vertically..just find out how high it would go it left a flourscent trail going up could be seen in Arizona where we were
Military projects now: Congress fights for 2 years After 5 years company says they need more money After 8 years congress says it's too expensive Project final finishes with 2 units produced Project is never put into mass production
We'd get better results if impeding nuclear holocaust and being the victim of an effective preemptive strike was on the table. Nowadays...no one's worried about that, they don't see it as credible or they have awesome bunkers and don't GAF.
It could be that the only projects we get to hear about are the failures. I'd like to think we have a handful of secret aircraft/weapon systems that have been developed in the last 10 years.
This missile was placed right on the Soviet border, in Turkey. This scared the hell out of the Soviets, and they retaliated by placing missiles in Cuba, and damn near started World War 3. A year after the Cuban Missile Crisis, the US removed the Thor (and Jupiter) missiles in Turkey. Only fair..and some say this was the agreement to end the Cuba crisis.
Yea I love how America always portrayed the soviets as the aggressors there, yet even as a commie hater like I am I don’t see how they couldn’t see how and why the soviets wouldn’t do something in retaliation.
So … the real cause of the Cuban missile crisis is clear. The Soviets were threatened but they cannot place the same threat in return to ensure there is a deterrent. 🙄
In reality it was not the “cuban” missile crisis, it was the Turkish missile crisis…. when we studied this incident in high school of course the fact of the atlas ICBMs in Turkey was never mentioned…
I will say this, I am always very bemused by the cartoons the US armed forces used to include in basically all of the these movies… especially loved the smarmy smirk that the drum-headed contractors head. Eisenhower would have been hopping mad at the military industrial complex smirks…
The same Eisenhower who created the MIC in the first place by centering US defense policy around nuclear weapons? The only reason he complained about the MIC in his farewell speech was because Kennedy and Johnson hammered him as soft on defense after Sputnik; he did it out of spite, not conviction.
The engineering, effort, pace of advances that went in to producing items like these was awesome. Despite that, I find the matter of fact and almost nonchalant way that the deployment of weapons that would almost certainly end humanity as we know it is talked about in this 'cartoon' to be bone chilling.
Looking at the world from the northern poles makes us and eurasia seem a lot closer than I thought we were….. oceans apart is what I always thought about eurasia. It almost looks like we’re one country from this point of view. Awesome documentary.
amazing. The map at the beginning explains the launches well. If you don't see the projection on a map, you think it crosses the entire Atlantic when it passes over Canada.
I have some general question about all these fantastic material. Who was it made for once? Who had to know all this by watching the movies except everyone already involved? Or was is documentation for the future? And, when did all this become approved to release? Are they still making these kinds of movies with todays military project for some educational or other purposes? Cheers
No we have a new program for education Joe BlowMe not our president and Obama the lying cheating scumbaggery yes folks this is what treasonous evil-doers look like. And by their actions all should know their crimes.
The expression "one-of" (not one-off) is a product of that time; the engineer draws something and sends the print down to the shop with a note reading, "make me one of these and we'll see if fits."
The W49 warhead for the Thor, Atlas, Jupiter, and Titan I ballistic missiles was a W28 Y1 warhead (B28 nuclear bomb) with internal power systems removed. This had a yield between 1.1 and 1.4 mt.
They did it in only 50 days! And in less than 3 years it was operational overseas. Amazing. The optimism and can do attitude...we desperately need it back.
My father whom, as a person, was an assxxole... worked on Thor in the RAF and served during the Cuban missile crisis in Driffield east Yorkshire. He told stories of how they constantly kept the state of the missile ready for launch during the said crisis. I was ten months old at the time and therefore if it had gone hot... would have been a dead baby.
Cool video! Great information. I had always heard about the Thor being a dud - but it had its own successes. Then it was sacrificed for 'world peace' during the Cuban Missile Crisis. I didn't know that the IRBM, ICBM, SRBM's each coincided with the various types of aircraft used for nuclear deterrence. Thanks for posting this.
Those Thor missiles based in the UK would have been duds if the Cuban missile crisis hadn't ended when it did as the UK was running out of liquid oxygen.
@@neiloflongbeck5705 by the fall of 1962, Atlas was fully deployed, so I'm not sure that the inability to launch all the floors would have made much difference if war had started worldwide.
2 years and 9 months, this is how long it took to develop a ballistic missile from idea to industry. No computers, no 3D printers, only paper and wooden models. But with the use of a completely new untested cryogenic fuel technology. Presently, this is how long it would take to develop this rejected reserve tank, provided that it was a development version.
I've watched documentaries on all this stuff my whole life. My biological father was an Air Force pilot. I spent from 1984 to 1992 around Edwards Air Force Base. Our biological father worked at Edwards Air Force Base and Groom Lake aka Area 51. Growing up in the shadows of the Above Top Secret Clearance world gave me a great life.
It depends a lot on how high priority a project is. In the 1950's developing new nuclear delivery systems was at the top of the priority list for the US. In the 2020's, the covid vaccine was urgent, which is why it was also developed in a very short time.
Imagine if human beings were smart enough to invest in peace rather than war. It is always the other countries fault, yet we have never been without war for thousands of years!
"The first generation of Thor missiles were rushed into service, and design mistakes resulted in a 24% launch failure rate. The competing Jupiter missile saw more use, but both were quickly eclipsed by the Air Force's long range ICBM program, which could be fired from US soil. *By 1959, with the Atlas rocket well on its way to operational status, both Thor and Jupiter programs became obsolete as delivery vehicles*, yet continued to be built and deployed until 1963 for political reasons and to maintain aerospace industry employment. The missile's lasting legacy continued as the Thor and later Delta families of space launch vehicles used boosters derived from the initial Thor missile, and continued on into the 21st century"
I saw lots of Thor ICBMs launched at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California in the early 1960s as a 11\12 year old! Interesting in only a few minutes they were thousands of miles down range over the Pacific ocean and could Still be seen.
What? Yes, you would be able to see them for quite some distance, but not that far. Even at the altitude of the ISS, you still wouldn't be able to see one at 1,000 miles down-range; never mind thousands of miles.
You should look it up. The US Air Force listed the maximum speed for the original Thor that was listed at over 11,000 mph! iCBMs are incredibly fast. Currently, ICBMs lunched from the continental US can hit Moscow in about 25 minutes.
@@uberkloden yes and no: since there’s no shortage of fake entirely conceptual money on demand, for all sorts of elite agendas, I can only conclude that the elite WANT vast numbers of folks in poverty.
They designed this thing in 7 weeks. With parallel bars, T-squares, clutch pencils, and slide rules. Not only that, but these engineers were contemporaneous with the guys who did Gemini and Apollo. They left a legacy that’s hard to follow.
Mutually Assured Destruction was such an upbeat topic back in the day, it's like they are talking about it over breakfast cereal with the kids. I'm waiting for Walt Disney to chime in on explosive yields.
I've a older brother and he's been in college for about 18 years and for all that couldn't understand the word ballistic, he kept thinking it mend self guided instead of it being like a bullet or artillery shell and follows a simple arch pattern, he kept thinking it had to have some fancy computer to fly
It's sad, to think of the absolutely amazing advances we made in the early and mid 1900's, with machines that not only performed incredibly well, but many STILL do today, and most were invented and made in just months, while today, it takes YEARS if not decades to produce machines that barely work more than a few years without requiring rebuilding or replacing, cost overruns are damn near required, and the final product often doesn't even meet the original requirements!!
In fairness the tech then vs now is entirely different. Let’s just take the missile systems. In the 50’s and 60’s accuracy was measured in miles, today it’s measured in meters. Yes old mechanical systems lasted however they are only so good.
You see the failures because they make the tabloid front pages (and most of them are fabricated, in any case). You don't hear about the successes because "US Air Force continues to improve technology you'd never be able to understand on time and on budget" doesn't generate clicks.
@@jamesharding3459 probably because the Air Force hasn't completed ANY technological advance on time or anywhere close to on budget since the 70's. Hell, that almost certainly WOULD make headlines. As for advances we couldn't understand, you must be speaking for yourself.
The launch facility areas still exist in Great Britain, no buildings just the concrete runways from the where storage shed locations too the launch location pad and exhaust trenches. Appears they had multiple missiles at each individual site.
Wow, the differences in thinking back then compared to now. This is sort of horrifying when you really get down to thinking what these missiles were designed to do!!
The introduction gives a terrific exposition of how the US and its allies had the USSR completely encircled and vulnerable to nuclear attack from nearly any point of the compass. It's instructive to remember that until the USSR launched Sputnik they had no credible way of hitting the continental US. Even after that, the number of Soviet ICBMs available was miniscule. The Cold War in the US in the 1950s was a massive beat up.
You are a fool, what about the forced annexation of half of the European countries Russia held at end of WW2, Russians enslaved war ravaged countries. You think the hate and suspicion of Russia is a fantasy? And now Putins doing it again!
This video is calling these missiles a deterrent. At the time our major cities also had a DEFENSE system against Russian bombers.Nike and Nike Ajax. Seems there was a lag between development of offense missiles and the needed defensive missiles. “Star Wars”? You may find scattered remnants of Nike sites around some cities. Cleveland for example has a large concrete Block House that housed computers that were part of this defensive system. The military personnel barracks are still visible on the property.
Interesting the Douglas company was notified on Dec 23, 1955 and it signs the contract 5 days later. Pretty quick turnaround. No stuffing around there.
The current fastest ICBM is the USA LGM-30 Minuteman. The US Air Force lists its speed at over 17, 000 mph. Yep many times the speed of sound. Thats why ICBMs can travel intercontinental distances in minutes, not hours.
Interesting, nobody mentions the b-58, sure it's from '59? On the other side, "Titan missile"? Wasnt Titan not operational fron 62 onwards? I am confused & have to do some reading, I'm more than probable wrong...
Few people in North America would have known what meant. All nuclear weapons were designated with a alpha numerical code name warhead for a missed was designated with a w l. Free fall bombs with a B designated followed with a serial number that applies to the development order of the device.
*From the 'thumbnail' I was thinking this would have something to do with the 'HARP' development of 'rifled-bore missile launching' or specialized 'nuke artillery' fired from a 105 barrel or perhaps something larger* _________ *If I remember right that was scrapped when it was found a 'nuke' had very little effect on tanks and artillery and conventional weapons worked just as well or better on a 'mass of troops & vehicles*
The Minuteman missiles are now series3. If you want to believe the capabilities have reduced because it makes you feel better, you just do that! If needed they will fly. 1 missile with 4 reentry warheads minimum. Submarines carry half of US nuclear arsenal if you believe releases.
Dateline WOULD NEVER have cinematography like they once did. They would literally go into frenzy of WOKENESS if they presented themselves in 2023 like they did during the 50’s. Ah when you were proud for your country & we’re allowed to be so. God Bless America.
Today “The new look in research and development” for the Air Force, is “transgender awareness, sensitivity and integration.” A “capable”… “fighting force” for the future…. God save us all.
- The "new look" as you put it, is implemented because now *A. I.* is doing more & more of the relevant work & man is relegated more & more to just being window dressing. - In today's *Push-Button* war even a wheelchair bound, mentally defective individual, with no training, can press a button to ingauge an intercontinental thermonuclear weapon.____, So why can't a physically unfit soldier with severe gender issues? - And so, man gradually cascades down to historic irrelevantcy, evermore so full of himself. With *A. I.* becoming the new *T-Rex* of the modern world! - And what of man, you ask??? > He's becoming; *The New Chicken.* ( the Dinosaur's relative )......💥
Life gets hard when you get old huh, the unfamiliar becomes more of the enemy or the problem and yet the only issues that arise come from you. You just wish you could have kept up with all of it instead of aging ungracefully
How can a ballistic missile be used for "Defense"? It seems an entirely "Offensive" weapon, despite the narrator's constant referring to "Defense"... especially when one starts moving them very close to one's opponents...
and all those program management lessons have been forgotten. They've now been doing "preliminary work" on a replacement for the Minuteman 3 for over a decade and still there aren't even blueprints, just powerpoint presentations.
It will be difficult to make a missle that's cheaper to maintain, faster to launch, or more accurate than the solid fueled Minute Man III. Incremental upgrades to replacement missles seems more likely. But yes, studies are a necessary evil. The early ICBM-IRBM systems had to go up quick, we were trailing the Soviets in ICBM technology. Minute Man on the other hand, is a mature system, replacing 60+ years of evolution would not be easy, maybe not practical. However, other defense contractors would love to get funded for the job.
No Russian Commie Rockets 🚀 or propaganda driving us to take good enough. Now instead of a military threat the have “useful idiots” dropping Kremlin propaganda straight from our TV sets & until 2021 from the Whitehouse. Disgusting 🤮
That is because this is a completely different topic. The Thor was the first of its kind that the US developed, they _had_ to make a crash program -- which, if you will recall, failed over a dozen tests consecutively. The Minuteman is a mature system with decades of iterative development. Replacing it will be a matter of research into what areas even can be improved upon and deciding how. Consider a simplified example: The first airfoil was revolutionary and simple because it was the first: A simple flat plane at an angle. A wing on a modern aircraft will be subject to calculations to determine the behavior at every single point on it, at every conceivable speed and pressure it will encounter in flight. Is it any surprise, then, that the first can be made by a craftsman in his garage in a day and the second will take years of study by trained engineers?
@@jamesharding3459 The problem with Minuteman is that it can't be upgraded further, it's running out of of time before it's impossible to operate safely if at all (solid rocket motors and everything else has a shelf life, at some point they become more expensive to maintain than replacing the entire unit, and that point is probably long past), they're not going to be able to penetrate enemy defenses which have been massively improved since the 1970s when the Minuteman was put into service, etc. etc. I've worked on such dated systems (though not defense related) myself, and that's the hard reality of them. What's also a hard reality is that quite often it's politically impossible to get funding for replacing them, but quite possible to get 10 times that amount of funding per year to keep them going for another year by patching and polishing things so they at least look good on paper.
Bummer the funds could have been spent on 1955-1958 chevys all of them trucks and cars instead a short minded temporary missle system was built we already had titan not sure the logic oh well
