BIG DREAM Hobby and Craft: The 200 Millisecond Mission: Inside the Secret CIA Plan to Steal Soviet Missile Data

Minggu, 25 Oktober 2020

The 200 Millisecond Mission: Inside the Secret CIA Plan to Steal Soviet Missile Data

The 200 Millisecond Mission: Inside the Secret CIA Plan to Steal Soviet Missile Data

During the height of the Vietnam War, the Soviet SA-2 missile ravaged U.S. air forces. This how the CIA, with a small fleet of suicide drones, defanged the enemy's most fearsome weapon.

By: David Hambling

On February 13, 1966, a high-altitude reconnaissance drone flew a top-secret mission over Vietnam. North Vietnamese air defense picked up the drone's disguised U-2 spy plane radar profile on its approach to Hanoi. In response, a Soviet-made SA-2 Guideline missile streaked towards the drone, turning it into a fireball of metal seconds later—the mission was over.

From all appearances, the small skirmish would've been a clear win for the North Vietnamese, but all was not what it seemed—this particular drone was created to be destroyed. This particular "SAM sniffer" wasn't there to take pictures. In the 200 milliseconds before its demise, the drone's electronics would hopefully record details of the missile's radar tracking, guidance systems, and its warhead fusing and transmit them before it was too late.

Under the codename United Effort, the CIA had planned and prepared for this mission for three years in the hopes of attaining data that no manned aircraft ever could. Several drones had tried to learn the SA-2's secrets—they all failed.

But this time, would it be different?

This is a free preview of Pop Mech Pro. Join now for less than $1 a week to read the rest of the story and more of Popular Mechanics' most in-depth, exclusive features.

JOIN NOW