RUSSIAN JETS translated from Ost Minus West=Null
In 1948, only three years after the end of WWII, Russia shocked the free
world by demonstrating a fully new Red Airforce, which includes,
 New transonic jet fighters
 Intercontinental ballistic missiles
 Short range guided missiles
Start of the development of this technology began October 1946 as mile long bounty
trains from Germany arrive loaded with aircraft, machine tools, complete aerospace
factories including design offices, gas turbines and aerospace scientists. The trains deliver
everything to Podberesje located about 100 miles north of Moscow. In preparation for
this supply, the Russians had large assembly and offices buildings constructed for the
captured German goods and “Specialists” which would teach and work for them for
many years.
The new Russian factories are loaded with a complete inventory of the Junkers Co., the
Siebel Co., the Heinkel Co. from Oranienburg and the Messerschmitt Co. from Wiener
Neustadt, Germany. Convoys of trucks from the American lend lease program arrive
laden with machines shops, models, instruments and complete laboratories, design
offices, components, airframe assemblies. Complete German aircraft from jet fighters,
rocket aircraft and jet bombers and the aircraft of tomorrow are included.
On the 27th of August 1939, the first jet aircraft, designed by Günther, the He-178 had
flown successfully. Two years later the first British jet, the Gloster E28/39 with a Frank
Whittle engine flew. In 1945, Günther found himself in the American sector in
Landsberg. He offered to work for the Americans. However, the Chief Designer of the
Heinkel Aircraft Co. was turned down and called an imposter. Günther had no choice but
to work for the Russians where he designed a number of aircraft including the MiG 15.
Others, such as Prof. Benz, were also taken to Moscow in a DC3, which had been copied
and built by the Soviets. From there, the two scientists were driven to Podberesje where
the most modern German design offices with desks, drafting tables and drawings, exactly
as they had been removed from Germany, awaited them. Here Günther meets his old
friends and they start to work for the Soviets. Soon new aircraft are riveted together. The
aircraft are transported by barges along the Volga River to the Toplistan Airport. The
new German DFS-346, the first supersonic (Mach 2) aircraft is ready for test flights.
Felix Kracht and Eberhard Meyer in Germany had designed this aircraft at the DFS. The
German scientists were surprised when a B-29 landed. This aircraft had been designed
and built in America and had made an emergency landing in Wladiwostok in 1944 and
had been confiscated by the Russians and never returned to the dismay of the US. The
large bomber is now used to carry the DFS-346 under its wing to 32,000 feet from where
it is launched. From there the DFS-346 will climb to 98,000 feet. After take off, the B-29
climbs, making large circles, to 32,000 feet until only a small spot is visible. On the
ground the German engineers watch instruments and control the first flight. Ziese, the
German test pilot, disconnects from the mother ship and drops away from the B-29. Both
Walter rocket motors ignite. Above in the blue sky over the Kremlin, the fist supersonic
flight is made with a speed of 1100 kilometers per hour or 688 mph (Mach 1.02 at 32,000
feet). However, vibrations in the airframe cause Ziese to terminate the flight and land. A
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couple of days later, Ziese is pleasantly surprised as 20,000 Rubels are given to him by
the Russians for his successful flight and in breaking the sound barrier.
The Soviets have watched the German “Specialists” closely and they believe they can
now continue on their own. Unknown to the German’s, they copy the supersonic DFS346 and build their own model, which incorporates all the modifications that, the
Germans had made since 1945 in Saale, Germany and since 1946 in Podberesje, Russia.
However none of the test flights are a success. The Russians had designed their own
aircraft release system. On the first flight, the Soviet DFS-346 collides with the B-29,
killing the pilot. The second aircraft meets a similar fate. However, luckily the pilot
manages to get out and come down on a parachute. Sadly, the Soviets realize that they are
still dependent on the German “Specialists.” By the end of 1947, the German’s in Russia
had designed some of the most modern jets, which would surprise the West.
In the aircraft assembly halls of Podberesje, prototypes of the new jets, including the
“Wunderjet” are taking shape. In Kuibyschew, at the same time, new gas turbine engine
designs are being developed and tested by a German-Austrian team. These engines were
improvements over the German Junkers Jumo 004, BMW 003 and the British “Nene” gas
turbines which the Soviets had no knowledge of before 1945. The Russians had
purchased 55 gas turbine engines from the Rolls Royce Co.; 25 Nene and 30 Dervient
engines after the war.
Designer
Junkers
Junkers
BMW
Rolls-Royce Co.
Rolls-Royce Co.
Gas turbine engines of the USSR
Type
Russian copy
Kuibyschew)
Jumo 004
RD-10
Jumo 012
BMW 003
RD-20
Nene
RD-45f
Devrient
RD-500
(in Used on
MiG-9, Yak-17
MiG-15, H-28
Yak-23
At Nikolowaskoje, in the hands of German pilots, the “Wunderjet” that Siegfried
Guenther had designed was being fully tested. After the tests, these jets and 100’s of
Russian engineers, designers and mechanics that had learned from the Germans
disappeared. The rumor has spread among the Germans that Moscow had given the order
to start mass production of the “Wunderjet.” Only a few Russian experts knew what was
going on. The first occasional appearance to Westerners of the “Wunderjet” occurred in
1948 and its existence was officially demonstrated on the 1st of May in 1949 at a military
parade when 50 MiG-15s zoomed by so fast that Western observers did not have time to
pull out their cameras for pictures. On the 1st of November 1950, pilots in a squadron of
American fighters over the Yalu River in Korea are shocked as suddenly MiG-15’s fly
through their formation at speeds much greater then they. The Americans are alarmed
since the MiG-15 outperforms their F-84 and F-80 “Shooting Star.” One week later, the
US orders the F-86 “Sabre” under the command of Smith to Korea. In a record time of 40
hrs, the F-86’s are flown from the US mainland to Korea.
The first combat between a MiG-15 and an F-86 takes place on the 17th of December.
Flying in the F-86, Ltd. Bruce H. Hinton downs the MiG. Five days later, high above the
Yalu River, six more MiGs are shot down in a dog fight. The US pilots are better than the
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Russians since above 30,000 feet, at which altitude the dogfights take place; the MiG-15
outperforms the F-86 in speed and in climb rate. The MiG engines develop more thrust at
this altitude and the MiG-15 is much lighter since it has less systems.
Something else is strange. Nobody can explain why the MiGs look almost identical to
America’s most advanced jet fighter, the F-86. To identify friend from foe, over the
radio, US pilots call “rock your wings!” Everything that does not rock its wings is a MiG.
“Life” magazine runs an article. “In the summer of 1945,” explains Life correspondent
Frank Campion, “two items arrive at North American Aviation (NAA) in Los Angeles,
from Air Force intelligence. One item is a wing of a German Me 262 and the other a
German secret report on the advantages of swept wings on jet aircraft.” R.T. Jones who
helped perform all the wind tunnel testing on the F-86 at NASA Ames, interpreted this
data and convinced NAA to sweep the wings of the F-86. Its predecessor the XP-86 had
straight wings and no one wanted to change them. “The leading edge slats of the Me 262
and many other parts were used directly on the F-86. The wing sweep is what made the
F-86 great.” The Russians had read the same reports. An article by Russian designer,
Gurewitsch, appears in Aero-Digest where he states “as I designed the MiG-15.” The
letter G is MiG is for his name. Contrary to the Life article, he makes no mention of
where the shape or form of the MiG comes from. “I close my description in which I
repeat, my contributions were insignificant and many others deserve credit. We are now
concentrating our efforts on the next generation of aircraft which will show the USSR’s
superiority to the glory of Stalin.”
A glance at the German press articles would have made things clear. In an interview with
Prof. Ernst Heinkel, as he saw the photos of a MiG, he states, “that’s Günther’s airplane
which we drew up in 1945 in my design office and which we would have built had not
the war ended.”
The Soviet designer “Mikojan” had as little to do with the MiG design as Tupolov had to
do with the design of the Tu-70 or Tu-4 which were exact copies of the US long range
bomber, the B-29, produced in Russia.
In Korea, the US propeller driven bombers are so threatened by the near supersonic
Russian MiG-15s that daylight bombing raids are cancelled. Only night raids are
conducted. However for the press, General Hoyt S. Vandenberg states that the US
Strategic bombers can deliver a bomb anyplace in the world and that the US has bigger
bombers, the B-36, which can fly faster, carry a higher bomb load and has more
armament than the B-29 or any other aircraft that the Moscow government can put into
the air within the next couple of years. This was a serious illusion!
Behind the Iron Curtain, the next generation of bombers was being developed by Dr.
Runolt Baade, who had been captured on the 22nd of October in 1946. Baade had been
Chief Designer at Junkers in Dessau, Germany. Since that time has was busy designing
the Tu-104 and Tu-114 (NATO code name “Bison” and “Bear”). He did such a good job
that he was given an honorary title of “Professor” in Russia. These were the largest
transports and bombers in the world. Tupolov had little to do with the selection of the
swept wings and the all-metal design or construction of these planes. The NK-12M
12,000 hp turboprop engines for these aircraft were developed by Dr. Ferdinand Brandner
and his team of German and Austrians who were also taken from Germany to Russia. See
Life Between Fronts by Ferdinand Brandner available from Scientists and Friends.
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Letter from Heinz G. Struck-Huntsville, AL
"The Jet Age" (Translation from East + West = Null). Among others the article talks
about Siegfried Günther, Chief designer of Heinkel during the second World War. When
Günther came back from Russia around 1950, Ernst Heinkel contacted him and offered
him again the chief designers job in his remaining company in Stuttgart-Zuffenhausen. At
that time, after 1952, Heinkel had garnered a development contract for a transonic fighter
for the Egyptians. I was privileged to work from January 1955 on as an aerodynamicist in
the Truckenbrodt group with Günther. He was a rather shy and unpretentious man, which
might explain the rather odd answer of the Americans when he approached them for a
Job in America. When it came to airplanes, however, he was not shy at all, but defended
his position with well thought out arguments.
In the article he was credited with the design of the MiG 15, the first Russian supersonic
fighter (M= 1.3). Asked about this, Günther never denied it nor confirmed it, but he
described the method, under which the Germans worked on the little island in the Wolga
river. As I recalled it, he explained it this way: "We obtained a certain precisely described
assignment. In close supervision the Russians followed our work until at a certain time
they collected all the results which were obtained so far and they gave us an other
assignment, which might not have any connection to the previous one." The Russians did
this, repatriation of the Germans in mind, to prevent them from coming to a coherent
picture of what the Russians were doing. That was about the gist of the conversation we
had. Günther worked on the MiG 15 and related problems, but he did not supervise the
construction of the plane on the drawing board. Brandner was more involved in the
design of the NK-12M, since the Russians had little experience in these machines. By the
way this Turboprop monster had a horse power restriction of 12,000 shaft HP (Torque
Governor) up to 11 Km altitude, from there it was unrestricted and from there it fell off
with the air density to higher altitudes. I came across this fact, when I calculated the
Performance of the TU 114 (Bear) back in 1960 for a German aircraft magazine.
At the Heinkel Factory I also met Prof. Thalau, who came with Prof. Tank from
Argentina and Prof. Ruden. I was about to hire on with Tank for his Indian adventure in
Bangalore, but circumstances prevented it in the end, because my American exploits
began to materialize.
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