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Archive Gallery: PopSci Spies on the Soviet Union

Posted 1.14.11 at 11:14 am 2 Comments

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Russian Speedsters: November 1951

Chalmers "Slick" Goodlin, famed aviator and the first person to operate a X-1 supersonic rocket plane in powered flight, acknowledged that the Soviet Union acquired a "juicy prize" when they recruited a horde of Nazi aircraft industry resources following the end of World War II. For this article on the Russians' secret weapons, Goodlin gave Popular Science three exclusive drawings of Russian aircraft. These plans came courtesy of a private source in Europe, who claimed that these planes were capable of sustained supersonic flight.

Futuristic features, such as the ability to fly at double the speed of sound, figured heavily into these planes. The plane pictured left, which improved on Kurt Tank's Ta-283 Focke-Wulf design, supposedly had an engine in its tail.

Read the full story in "Is Russia Building These Speedsters?"

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Read the article: Archive Gallery: PopSci Spies on the Soviet Union

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2 Comments

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Surge64

01/15/11 at 12:52 am

Atomic Plane FTW!
Comment #1!

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kreigly999

01/23/11 at 8:39 am

Craigsl. Speed
I think we always knew that the only reason the soviet Union was considered a superpower was because of their military. It was never a secret as to the living conditions of the soviet people and the total disregard for the environment from a pollution standpoint.
The best thing we can say about the Soviets and Stalin in particular is that he was not a suicidal maniac bent on world domination or world wide destruction such as was Hitler's mind set.
It's too bad Mr. Gorbachev could not save the Union from collapsing and instituted a democratic system truly devoted to peace. We are still stuck with a Russia with their finger on the nuclear trigger and willing to build reactor's for rogue nations like Iran for hard currency. Their are more millionaires per capita in Moscow than any where else on the planet. Putin is still a hard line communist/nationalist willing to blackmail and bully neighboring states to further his goals.

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