Misplaced Pages

#618381

90-620: A derivative of the R-36 ICBM , and a member of the Tsyklon family, the Tsyklon-2 made its maiden flight on 6 August 1969, and conducted 106 flights, the last one occurring on 24 June 2006. It was the most reliable Soviet/Russian carrier rocket ever used, and launched more than 100 times having failed only once, and the second most reliable carrier rocket overall, behind the Atlas II that

180-675: A combination of warheads and massive amounts of countermeasures designed to defeat anti-missile systems ; it was announced by the Russian military as a response to the US Prompt Global Strike . In July 2023, North Korea fired a suspected intercontinental ballistic missile that landed short of Japanese waters. The launch follows North Korea's threat to retaliate against the US for alleged spy plane incursions. The following flight phases can be distinguished: ICBMs usually use

270-1138: A crucial role in the establishment of NASA and the success of the Apollo missions to the Moon. Operation Paperclip was part of a broader strategy by the US to harness German scientific talent in the face of emerging Cold War tensions, and ensuring this expertise did not fall into the hands of the Soviet Union or other nations. The operation's legacy has remained controversial in subsequent decades. In February 1945, Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force (SHAEF) set up T-Force , or Special Sections Subdivision, which grew to over 2,000 personnel by June. T-Force examined 5,000 German targets, seeking expertise in synthetic rubber and oil catalysts, new designs in armored equipment, V-2 (rocket) weapons, jet and rocket propelled aircraft, naval equipment, field radios, secret writing chemicals, aero medicine research, gliders, and "scientific and industrial personalities". When large numbers of German scientists began to be discovered by

360-542: A member in 2006. Other closely related members include Willy Ley (1976), a German-American science writer, and Hermann Oberth (1976), a German scientist who advised von Braun's rocket team in the U.S. from 1955 to 1958; neither Ley, nor Oberth moved to the US via the Operation Paperclip. Two lunar craters are named after Paperclip scientists: Debus after Kurt Debus , the first director of NASA's Kennedy Space Center , and von Braun . Dr. Adolf Busemann

450-400: A minimal independent nuclear deterrent entering its own cold war after an ideological split with the Soviet Union beginning in the early 1960s. After first testing a domestic built nuclear weapon in 1964, it went on to develop various warheads and missiles. Beginning in the early 1970s, the liquid fuelled DF-5 ICBM was developed and used as a satellite launch vehicle in 1975. The DF-5, with

540-664: A network of binary addition circuits that continually recalculate the missile's position. The inputs to the navigation circuit are set by a general-purpose computer according to a navigational input schedule loaded into the missile before launch. One particular weapon developed by the Soviet Union ;– the Fractional Orbital Bombardment System  – had a partial orbital trajectory, and unlike most ICBMs its target could not be deduced from its orbital flight path. It

630-633: A program to resettle the evacuees in the Third World , which the Germans referred to as General Walsh's Urwald-Programm ("jungle program"); but the program was not carried out. In 1948, the evacuees received settlements of 69.5 million Reichsmarks from the U.S., a settlement that soon became severely devalued during the currency reform that introduced the Deutsche Mark as the official currency of western Germany. John Gimbel concludes that

720-628: A range of 10,000 to 12,000 km (6,200 to 7,500 mi)—long enough to strike the Western United States and the Soviet Union—was silo deployed, with the first pair in service by 1981 and possibly twenty missiles in service by the late 1990s. China also deployed the JL-1 Medium-range ballistic missile with a reach of 1,700 kilometres (1,100 mi) aboard the ultimately unsuccessful Type 092 submarine . In 1991,

810-529: A ready state. Failure rates were very high throughout the early years of ICBM technology. Human spaceflight programs ( Vostok , Mercury , Voskhod , Gemini , etc.) served as a highly visible means of demonstrating confidence in reliability, with successes translating directly to national defense implications. The US was well behind the Soviets in the Space Race and so US President John F. Kennedy increased

900-474: A single missile to carry several warheads, each of which can strike a different target. The United States , Russia , China , France , India , the United Kingdom , Israel , and North Korea are the only countries known to have operational ICBMs. Pakistan is the only nuclear-armed state that does not possess ICBMs. Early ICBMs had limited precision , which made them suitable for use only against

990-479: A wealth of scientific talent and advanced research that had contributed to Germany's wartime technological advancements. The U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff officially established Operation Overcast (operations "Overcast" and "Paperclip" were related, and the terms are often used interchangeably) on July 20, 1945, with the dual aims of leveraging German expertise for the ongoing war effort against Japan and to bolster U.S. postwar military research. The operation, conducted by

SECTION 10

#1732772060619

1080-551: Is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . ICBM An intercontinental ballistic missile ( ICBM ) is a ballistic missile with a range greater than 5,500 kilometres (3,400 mi), primarily designed for nuclear weapons delivery (delivering one or more thermonuclear warheads ). Conventional , chemical , and biological weapons can also be delivered with varying effectiveness, but have never been deployed on ICBMs. Most modern designs support multiple independently targetable reentry vehicle (MIRVs), allowing

1170-665: Is believed to have deployed a road mobile nuclear ICBM, the Jericho III , which entered service in 2008; an upgraded version is in development. India successfully test fired Agni V , with a strike range of more than 5,000 km (3,100 mi) on 19 April 2012, claiming entry into the ICBM club. The missile's actual range is speculated by foreign researchers to be up to 8,000 km (5,000 mi) with India having downplayed its capabilities to avoid causing concern to other countries. On 15 December 2022, first night trial of Agni-V

1260-844: Is known for developing rocket and space-flight technology, including the V-2 missile . In late 1932, he worked for the German army to develop new liquid propulsion -based missiles. He received a doctorate in physics in 1934 from the Friedrich-Wilhelms University of Berlin . He and his team then surrendered to the Allies at the end of World War II, shortly after Hitler's suicide in 1945. They were brought to America through Operation Paperclip and assimilated into NASA 's space program, where they worked on missile technology at Fort Bliss before transferring to Huntsville, Alabama . He became

1350-526: Is no rocket exhaust or other emissions to mark its position to defenders. The high speeds of the warheads make them difficult to intercept and allow for little warning, striking targets many thousands of kilometers away from the launch site (and due to the possible locations of the submarines: anywhere in the world) within approximately 30 minutes. Many authorities say that missiles also release aluminized balloons, electronic noisemakers, and other decoys intended to confuse interception devices and radars . As

1440-450: The Arrow missile in 1998, but it is mainly designed to intercept shorter-ranged theater ballistic missiles, not ICBMs. The Alaska-based United States national missile defense system attained initial operational capability in 2004. ICBMs can be deployed from multiple platforms: The last three kinds are mobile and therefore hard to detect prior to a missile launch. During storage, one of

1530-705: The Japanese war and to aid our postwar military research". The term "Overcast" was the name first given by the German scientists' family members for the housing camp where they were held in Bavaria . In late summer 1945, the JCS established the JIOA, a subcommittee of the Joint Intelligence Community, to directly oversee Operation Overcast and later Operation Paperclip. The JIOA representatives included

1620-565: The Joint Intelligence Objectives Agency (JIOA), was largely actioned by special agents of the U.S. Army 's Counterintelligence Corps (CIC). Many selected scientists were involved in the Nazi rocket program, aviation, or chemical/biological warfare. The Soviet Union conducted a similar program, called Operation Osoaviakhim , that emphasized many of the same fields of research. The operation, characterized by

1710-511: The LGM-30 Minuteman , Polaris and Skybolt . Modern ICBMs tend to be smaller than their ancestors, due to increased accuracy and smaller and lighter warheads, and use solid fuels, making them less useful as orbital launch vehicles. The Western view of the deployment of these systems was governed by the strategic theory of mutual assured destruction . In the 1950s and 1960s, development began on anti-ballistic missile systems by both

1800-775: The Lunar Roving Vehicle . However, the main projects from the Marshall Space Flight Center were the V-2 rocket and the Apollo missions. The V-2 rocket was developed in Germany at the Peenemünde military research center. Wernher von Braun was the director of Peenemünde and worked with a team of engineers, physicists, and chemists. The Nazis used the V-2 missile during World War II to attack Paris,

1890-518: The Office of Military Government, United States (OMGUS), which had jurisdiction over the western part of occupied Germany, held a conference to consider the status of the evacuees, the monetary claims that the evacuees had filed against the United States, and the "possible violation by the U.S. of laws of war or Rules of Land Warfare ". The OMGUS director of Intelligence Robert L. Walsh initiated

SECTION 20

#1732772060619

1980-498: The USSR /Russia preferred ICBM designs that use hypergolic liquid fuels, which can be stored at room temperature for more than a few years. Once the booster falls away, the remaining "bus" releases several warheads, each of which continues on its own unpowered ballistic trajectory , much like an artillery shell or cannonball. The warhead is encased in a cone-shaped reentry vehicle and is difficult to detect in this phase of flight as there

2070-464: The cryogenic fuel liquid oxygen boiled off and caused ice formation, and therefore fueling the rocket was necessary before launch. This procedure was a source of significant operational delay and might allow the missiles to be destroyed by enemy counterparts before they could be used. To resolve this problem Nazi Germany invented the missile silo that protected the missile from Strategic Bombing and also hid fueling operations underground. Although

2160-778: The intellectual reparations owed to the US and the UK, valued at US$ 10 billion in patents and industrial processes. The NASA Distinguished Service Medal is the highest award which may be bestowed by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). After more than two decades of service and leadership in NASA, four Nazi members from Operation Paperclip were awarded the NASA Distinguished Service Medal in 1969: Kurt Debus , Eberhard Rees, Arthur Rudolph , and Wernher von Braun. Ernst Geissler

2250-409: The 32-metre-tall (105 ft) Unha-3 rocket. The United States claimed that the launch was in fact a way to test an ICBM. (See Timeline of first orbital launches by country .) In early July 2017, North Korea claimed for the first time to have tested successfully an ICBM capable of carrying a large thermonuclear warhead. In July 2014, China announced the development of its newest generation of ICBM,

2340-872: The A9/A10 rocket was tested a few times in January and February 1945. After the war, the US executed Operation Paperclip , which took von Braun and hundreds of other leading Nazi scientists to the United States to develop IRBMs , ICBMs, and launchers for the US Army. This technology was predicted by US General of the Army Hap Arnold , who wrote in 1943: Someday, not too distant, there can come streaking out of somewhere – we won't be able to hear it, it will come so fast – some kind of gadget with an explosive so powerful that one projectile will be able to wipe out completely this city of Washington. After World War II,

2430-598: The Allies (Hall 2022). In March 1946, a V-2 was test-fired in New Mexico, followed by the first launch of a captured V-2 in April of the same year. After months of adaptation, a V-2 missile was fired in White Sands Proving Ground, New Mexico that broke a record with an altitude of 116 miles (186.68 km). The V-2 rockets were used to test the effects of cosmic rays on fruit flies and seeds. They also took

2520-703: The American missile defense batteries in California and Alaska. New development of ICBM technology are ICBMs able to carry hypersonic glide vehicles as a payload such as RS-28 Sarmat . On 12 March 2024 India announced that it had joined a very limited group of countries, which are capable of firing multiple warheads on a single ICBM. The announcement came after successfully testing multiple independently targetable reentry vehicle (MIRV) technology. [REDACTED] Russia [REDACTED] Russia [REDACTED] Russia [REDACTED] Russia Russia,

2610-651: The Americans and Soviets. Such systems were restricted by the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty . The first successful ABM test was conducted by the Soviets in 1961, which later deployed a fully operational system defending Moscow in the 1970s (see Moscow ABM system ). The 1972 SALT treaty froze the number of ICBM launchers of both the Americans and the Soviets at existing levels and allowed new submarine -based SLBM launchers only if an equal number of land-based ICBM launchers were dismantled. Subsequent talks, called SALT II, were held from 1972 to 1979 and actually reduced

2700-472: The Americans and the Soviets started rocket research programs based on the V-2 and other German wartime designs. Each branch of the US military started its own programs, leading to considerable duplication of effort. In the Soviet Union, rocket research was centrally organized although several teams worked on different designs. The US initiated ICBM research in 1946 with the RTV-A-2 Hiroc project. This

2790-676: The Atlas. Due to the improvements in engine technology and guidance systems the Titan I overtook the Atlas. In the Soviet Union, early development was focused on missiles able to attack European targets. That changed in 1953, when Sergei Korolyov was directed to start development of a true ICBM able to deliver newly developed hydrogen bombs. Given steady funding throughout, the R-7 developed with some speed. The first launch took place on 15 May 1957 and led to an unintended crash 400 km (250 mi) from

Tsyklon-2 - Misplaced Pages Continue

2880-587: The Braunschweig Laboratory. He gave a speech in 1935 at the Volta Congress, an international meeting on the problems of high-speed aeronautics. At this conference, he presented his first theory of how the angle of sweep of a plane wing reduces drag at supersonic speed. After the war, he traveled to the United States to assist them with the war tensions with Russia, where he continued his work on his theory of wing sweep. Wernher von Braun

2970-580: The CIOS was responsible for scouting and kidnapping high-profile individuals to block technological advancements in nations hostile to the U.S. Much U.S. effort was focused on Saxony and Thuringia , which on July 1, 1945, would become part of the Soviet Occupation zone . Many German research facilities and personnel had been evacuated to these states, particularly from the Berlin area. Fearing that

3060-522: The Dongfeng-41 ( DF-41 ), which has a range of 12,000 kilometres (7,500 miles), capable of reaching the United States, and which analysts believe is capable of being outfitted with MIRV technology. Most countries in the early stages of developing ICBMs have used liquid propellants, with the known exceptions being the Indian Agni-V , the planned but cancelled South African RSA-4 ICBM, and

3150-694: The German government began recalling from combat a number of scientists, engineers, and technicians to work in research and development to bolster German defense for a protracted war with the USSR. The recall from frontline combat included 4,000 rocketeers returned to Peenemünde , in northeast coastal Germany. Overnight, Ph.D.s were liberated from KP duty , masters of science were recalled from orderly service, mathematicians were hauled out of bakeries, and precision mechanics ceased to be truck drivers. The Nazi government's recall of their now-useful intellectuals for scientific work first required identifying and locating

3240-926: The Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) in Huntsville, Alabama after taking control of the Development Operations Division from the Army's Redstone Arsenal . The Redstone Arsenal was led by the Army Ballistic Missile Agency . Wernher von Braun became the first director of the MSFC. The MSFC's development team was formed by American engineers from the Redstone Arsenal and 118 German migrants who came from Peenemünde through Operation Paperclip. Von Braun worked with Operation Paperclip to get scientists from his team to

3330-402: The Nazi affiliations of many recruits, and the ethics of assimilating individuals associated with war crimes into American society. The operation was not solely focused on rocketry; efforts were directed toward synthetic fuels, medicine, and other fields of research. Notable advances in aeronautics fostered rocket and space-flight technologies pivotal in the Space Race . The operation played

3420-711: The Ordnance Rocket Center, its facility for rocket research and development. On April 1, 1950, the Fort Bliss missile development operation, including von Braun and his team of over 130 Paperclip members, was transferred to Redstone Arsenal. In early 1950, legal U.S. residency for some of the Project Paperclip specialists was effected through the U.S. consulate in Ciudad Juárez , Chihuahua , Mexico; thus, German scientists legally entered

3510-797: The Osenberg List stuffed in a toilet; the list subsequently reached MI6 , who transmitted it to U.S. intelligence . Then U.S. Army Major Robert B. Staver, Chief of the Jet Propulsion Section of the Research and Intelligence Branch of the United States Army Ordnance Corps , used the Osenberg List to compile his list of German scientists to be captured and interrogated; Wernher von Braun , Germany's best rocket scientist, headed Major Staver's list. In Operation Overcast, Major Staver's original intent

3600-647: The Rocket Branch of the Research and Development Division of the U.S. Army's Ordnance Corps, offered initial one-year contracts to the rocket scientists; 127 of them accepted. In September 1945, the first group of seven rocket scientists (aerospace engineers) arrived at Fort Strong on Long Island in Boston harbor: Wernher von Braun , Erich W. Neubert, Theodor A. Poppel, William August Schulze , Eberhard Rees , Wilhelm Jungert, and Walter Schwidetzky. Beginning in late 1945, three rocket-scientist groups arrived in

3690-495: The Soviet takeover would limit U.S. ability to exploit German scientific and technical expertise, and not wanting the Soviet Union to benefit from it, the United States instigated an "evacuation operation" of scientific personnel from Saxony and Thuringia, issuing orders such as: On orders of Military Government you are to report with your family and baggage as much as you can carry tomorrow noon at 1300 hours (Friday, 22 June 1945) at

Tsyklon-2 - Misplaced Pages Continue

3780-459: The Soviet testing of their first thermonuclear weapon , but it was not until 1954 that the Atlas missile program was given the highest national priority. The Atlas A first flew on 11 June 1957; the flight lasted only about 24 seconds before the rocket exploded. The first successful flight of an Atlas missile to full range occurred 28 November 1958. The first armed version of the Atlas, the Atlas D,

3870-569: The Space Camp Hall of Fame (which began in 2007): Wernher von Braun (2007), Georg von Tiesenhausen (2007), and Oscar Holderer (2008). The New Mexico Museum of Space History includes the International Space Hall of Fame. Two Operation Paperclip members are members of the International Space Hall of Fame: Wernher von Braun (1976) and Ernst Steinhoff (1979). Hubertus Strughold was inducted in 1978 but removed as

3960-685: The United States and the Soviet Union agreed in the START I treaty to reduce their deployed ICBMs and attributed warheads. As of 2016 , all five of the nations with permanent seats on the United Nations Security Council have fully operational long-range ballistic missile systems; Russia, the United States, and China also have land-based ICBMs (the US missiles are silo-based, while China and Russia have both silo and road-mobile ( DF-31 , RT-2PM2 Topol-M missiles). Israel

4050-741: The United States for duty at Fort Bliss , Texas, and at White Sands Proving Grounds , New Mexico , as "War Department Special Employees". In 1946, the United States Bureau of Mines employed seven German synthetic fuel scientists at a Fischer–Tropsch chemical plant in Louisiana , Missouri . On June 1, 1949, the Chief of Ordnance of the United States Army designated Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Alabama , as

4140-423: The United States from Latin America. Between 1945 and 1952, the United States Air Force sponsored the largest number of Paperclip scientists, importing 260 men, of whom 36 returned to Germany, and one, Walter Schreiber , emigrated to Argentina. The United States Army Signal Corps employed 24 specialists—including the physicists Georg Goubau , Gunter Guttwein, Georg Hass, Horst Kedesdy, and Kurt Lehovec ;

4230-473: The United States held some of Germany's best minds for three years, therefore depriving the German recovery of their expertise. In May 1945, the U.S. Navy "received in custody" Herbert A. Wagner , the inventor of the Hs 293 missile; for two years, he first worked at the Special Devices Center, at Castle Gould and at Hempstead House, Long Island, New York; in 1947, he moved to the Naval Air Station Point Mugu . In August 1945, Colonel Holger Toftoy , head of

4320-886: The United States, China, North Korea, India and Israel are the only countries currently known to possess land-based ICBMs. The United States currently operates 405 ICBMs in three USAF bases. The only model deployed is LGM-30G Minuteman-III . All previous USAF Minuteman II missiles were destroyed in accordance with START II , and their launch silos have been sealed or sold to the public. The powerful MIRV-capable Peacekeeper missiles were phased out in 2005. The Russian Strategic Rocket Forces have 286 ICBMs able to deliver 958 nuclear warheads: 46 silo-based R-36M2 (SS-18) , 30 silo-based UR-100N (SS-19), 36 mobile RT-2PM "Topol" (SS-25) , 60 silo-based RT-2UTTH "Topol M" (SS-27) , 18 mobile RT-2UTTH "Topol M" (SS-27) , 84 mobile RS-24 "Yars" (SS-29), and 12 silo-based RS-24 "Yars" (SS-29). Operation Paperclip Operation Paperclip

4410-499: The United States. They began work at Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas in September 1945, and most of the team had arrived by 1946. Von Braun and his team worked as consultants for the military until 1950 when they began transferring to Huntsville. Originally, the center focused on weaponry and further development of the V-2 rocket line but later became one of NASA's main development centers for space flight project. The team also worked on missions that related to Moon landing missions, such as

4500-436: The V-2 rocket. After capturing them, the Allies initially housed them and their families in Landshut , Bavaria, in southern Germany. Beginning on July 19, 1945, the U.S. Joint Chiefs managed the captured ARC rocketeers under Operation Overcast. However, when the "Camp Overcast" name of the scientists' quarters became locally known, the program was renamed Operation Paperclip in November 1945. Despite these attempts at secrecy,

4590-420: The additional warheads; hence, most ABM system proposals have been judged to be impractical. The first operational ABM systems were deployed in the United States during the 1970s. The Safeguard ABM facility, located in North Dakota, was operational from 1975 to 1976. The Soviets deployed their ABM-1 Galosh system around Moscow in the 1970s, which remains in service. Israel deployed a national ABM system based on

SECTION 50

#1732772060619

4680-486: The advancing Allied forces in late April 1945, the Special Sections Subdivision set up the Enemy Personnel Exploitation Section to manage and interrogate them. The Enemy Personnel Exploitation Section established a detention center, Camp Dustbin , first near Paris and later in Kransberg Castle outside Frankfurt. The U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) established the first secret recruitment program, called Operation Overcast, on July 20, 1945, initially "to assist in shortening

4770-414: The army's director of intelligence, the chief of naval intelligence, the assistant chief of Air Staff-2 (air force intelligence), and a representative from the State Department . In November 1945, Operation Overcast was renamed Operation Paperclip by Ordnance Corps officers, who would attach a paperclip to the folders of those rocket experts whom they wished to employ in the United States. The project

4860-439: The director of the Marshall Space Flight Center in 1960. Von Braun is also a controversial figure for his involvement with the Nazi party and the slave labor involved in developing the V-2 rocket in Germany before it began to be developed in the United States. He became a member of the Nazi party in 1937 and was made a junior SS officer in 1940. In July 1960, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) established

4950-426: The east closer to the American forces, to avoid the advancing Soviet army. A project to halt the research was codenamed "Project Safehaven"; it was not initially targeted against the Soviet Union but addressed the concern that German scientists might emigrate and continue their research in countries that had remained neutral during the war. To avoid the complications involved with the emigration of German scientists,

5040-458: The end of the war, particularly from the Berlin area. The USSR then relocated more than 2,200 Nazi specialists and their families—more than 6,000 people—with Operation Osoaviakhim during one night on October 22, 1946. In a secret directive circulated on September 3, 1946, President Truman officially approved Operation Paperclip and expanded it to include 1,000 German scientists under "temporary, limited military custody". News media revealed

5130-434: The field of astronautics by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA). For their service, three Operation Paperclip members were awarded the Goddard Astronautics Award: Wernher von Braun (1961), Hans von Ohain (1966), and Krafft Arnold Ehricke (1984). The U.S. Space & Rocket Center in Huntsville, Alabama, owns and operates the U.S. Space Camp . Several Operation Paperclip members are members of

5220-415: The largest targets , such as cities. They were seen as a "safe" basing option, one that would keep the deterrent force close to home where it would be difficult to attack. Attacks against military targets (especially hardened ones) demanded the use of a more precise, crewed bomber . Second- and third-generation designs (such as the LGM-118 Peacekeeper ) dramatically improved accuracy to the point where even

5310-430: The later part of World War II, Germany was at a logistical disadvantage, having failed to conquer the USSR with Operation Barbarossa (June–December 1941), and its drive for the Caucasus (June 1942 – February 1943). The failed conquest had depleted German resources, and its military–industrial complex was unprepared to defend the Greater Germanic Reich against the Red Army's westward counterattack. By early 1943,

5400-522: The most important features of the missile is its serviceability. One of the key features of the first computer-controlled ICBM, the Minuteman missile , was that it could quickly and easily use its computer to test itself. After launch, a booster pushes the missile and then falls away. Most modern boosters are Solid-propellant rocket motors , which can be stored easily for long periods of time. Early missiles used liquid-fueled rocket motors . Many liquid-fueled ICBMs could not be kept fueled at all times as

5490-665: The nearby detonation of friendly warheads), one neutron-resistant material developed for this purpose in the UK is three-dimensional quartz phenolic . Circular error probable is crucial, because halving the circular error probable decreases the needed warhead energy by a factor of four . Accuracy is limited by the accuracy of the navigation system and the available geodetic information. Strategic missile systems are thought to use custom integrated circuits designed to calculate navigational differential equations thousands to millions of FLOPS in order to reduce navigational errors caused by calculation alone. These circuits are usually

SECTION 60

#1732772060619

5580-484: The now in service Israeli Jericho III . The RS-28 Sarmat (Russian: РС-28 Сармат; NATO reporting name : SATAN 2), is a Russian liquid-fueled , MIRV -equipped, super-heavy thermonuclear armed intercontinental ballistic missile in development by the Makeyev Rocket Design Bureau from 2009, intended to replace the previous R-36 missile . Its large payload would allow for up to 10 heavy warheads or 15 lighter ones or up to 24 hypersonic glide vehicles Yu-74 , or

5670-474: The nuclear warhead reenters the Earth's atmosphere, its high speed causes compression of the air, leading to a dramatic rise in temperature which would destroy it, if it were not shielded in some way. In one design, warhead components are contained within an aluminium honeycomb substructure , sheathed in a pyrolytic carbon - epoxy synthetic resin composite material heat shield. Warheads are also often radiation-hardened (to protect against nuclear armed ABMs or

5760-411: The number of nuclear warheads held by the US and Soviets. SALT II was never ratified by the US Senate , but its terms were honored by both sides until 1986, when the Reagan administration "withdrew" after it had accused the Soviets of violating the pact. In the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan launched the Strategic Defense Initiative as well as the MX and Midgetman ICBM programs. China developed

5850-447: The physical chemists Rudolf Brill, Ernst Baars  [ de ] , and Eberhard Both; the geophysicist Helmut Weickmann; the optician Gerhard Schwesinger; and the engineers Eduard Gerber, Richard Guenther, and Hans Ziegler . In 1959, 94 Operation Paperclip men went to the United States, including Friedwardt Winterberg and Friedrich Wigand. Overall, through its operations to 1990, Operation Paperclip imported 1,600 men as part of

5940-424: The port of Antwerp, and Great Britain, among many other targets. Roughly five thousand people died in these attacks. The location of V-2 production moved to Mittelwerk in Nordhausen after a British raid on Peenemünde on August 17, 1943. Mittelwerk was supplemented with slave labor from Dora, a nearby concentration camp. Production of the V-2 missile moved to the United States after Wernher von Braun surrendered to

6030-429: The press interviewed several of the scientists later that year. Early on, the United States created the Combined Intelligence Objectives Subcommittee (CIOS). This provided the information on targets for the T-Forces that went in and targeted scientific, military, and industrial installations (and their employees) for their know-how. Initial priorities were advanced technology, such as infrared , that could be used in

6120-505: The program as early as December 1946. On April 26, 1946, the Joint Chiefs of Staff issued directive JCS 1067/14 to General Eisenhower instructing that he "preserve from destruction and take under your control records, plans, books, documents, papers, files and scientific, industrial and other information and data belonging to ... German organizations engaged in military research"; and that, excepting war-criminals , German scientists be detained for intelligence purposes as required. In

6210-517: The recruitment of German specialists and their families, relocated more than 6000 experts to the US. It has been valued at US$ 10 billion in patents and industrial processes. Recruits included such notable figures as Wernher von Braun , a leading rocket-technology scientist. Those recruited were instrumental in the development of the U.S. space program and military technology during the Cold War . Despite its contributions to American scientific advances, Operation Paperclip has been controversial because of

6300-562: The scientists were gathered as a part of Operation Overcast, but most were transported to villages in the countryside where there were neither research facilities nor work; they were provided with stipends, and required to report twice weekly to police headquarters to prevent them from leaving. The Joint Chiefs of Staff directive on research and teaching stated that technicians and scientists should be released "only after all interested agencies were satisfied that all desired intelligence information had been obtained from them". On November 5, 1947,

6390-444: The scientists, engineers, and technicians, then ascertaining their political and ideological reliability. Werner Osenberg  [ de ] , the engineer-scientist heading the Wehrforschungsgemeinschaft (Defense Research Association), recorded the names of the politically cleared men to the Osenberg List, thus reinstating them to scientific work. In March 1945, at Bonn University , a Polish laboratory technician found pieces of

6480-469: The site. The first successful test followed on 21 August 1957; the R-7 flew over 6,000 km (3,700 mi) and became the world's first ICBM. The first strategic-missile unit became operational on 9 February 1959 at Plesetsk in north-west Russia. It was the same R-7 launch vehicle that placed the first artificial satellite in space, Sputnik , on 4 October 1957. The first human spaceflight in history

6570-477: The smallest point targets can be successfully attacked. ICBMs are differentiated by having greater range and speed than other ballistic missiles: intermediate-range ballistic missiles (IRBMs), medium-range ballistic missiles (MRBMs), short-range ballistic missiles (SRBMs) and tactical ballistic missiles . The first practical design for an ICBM grew out of Nazi Germany 's V-2 rocket program. The liquid-fueled V-2, designed by Wernher von Braun and his team,

6660-434: The stakes with the Apollo program , which used Saturn rocket technology that had been funded by President Dwight D. Eisenhower . These early ICBMs also formed the basis of many space launch systems. Examples include R-7 , Atlas , Redstone , Titan , and Proton , which was derived from the earlier ICBMs but never deployed as an ICBM. The Eisenhower administration supported the development of solid-fueled missiles such as

6750-880: The town square in Bitterfeld . There is no need to bring winter clothing. Easily carried possessions, such as family documents, jewelry, and the like should be taken along. You will be transported by motor vehicle to the nearest railway station. From there you will travel on to the West. Please tell the bearer of this letter how large your family is. By 1947, this evacuation operation had netted an estimated 1,800 technicians and scientists and 3,700 family members. Those with special skills or knowledge were taken to detention and interrogation centers, such as one code-named " Dustbin " (located first at Chesnay , near Versailles and then moved to Kransberg Castle outside Frankfurt ) to be held and interrogated, in some cases for months. A few of

6840-428: The trajectory which optimizes range for a given amount of payload (the minimum-energy trajectory ); an alternative is a depressed trajectory , which allows less payload, shorter flight time, and has a much lower apogee. Modern ICBMs typically carry multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles ( MIRVs ), each of which carries a separate nuclear warhead , allowing a single missile to hit multiple targets. MIRV

6930-549: The war against Japan; finding out what technology had been passed on to Japan; and finally to halt research elsewhere. Von Braun and more than a thousand of his colleagues decided to surrender to Americans in 1945. One of the engineers later recalled their options: "We despise the French, we are mortally afraid of the Soviets, we do not believe the British can afford us. So that leaves the Americans." On June 20, 1945, they moved from

7020-510: Was a secret United States intelligence program in which more than 1,600 German scientists, engineers, and technicians were taken from former Nazi Germany to the U.S. for government employment after the end of World War II in Europe , between 1945 and 1959; several were former members of the Nazi Party . The effort began in earnest in 1945, as the Allies advanced into Germany and discovered

7110-432: Was a three-stage effort with the ICBM development not starting until the third stage. However, funding was cut in 1948 after only three partially successful launches of the second stage design, that was used to test variations of the V-2 design. With overwhelming air superiority and truly intercontinental bombers, the newly formed US Air Force did not take the problem of ICBM development seriously. Things changed in 1953 with

7200-518: Was accomplished on a derivative of R-7, Vostok , on 12 April 1961 , by Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin . A heavily modernized version of the R-7 is still used as the launch vehicle for the Soviet/Russian Soyuz spacecraft , marking more than 60 years of operational history of Sergei Korolyov 's original rocket design. The R-7 and Atlas each required a large launch facility, making them vulnerable to attack, and could not be kept in

7290-534: Was an outgrowth of the rapidly shrinking size and weight of modern warheads and the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaties ( SALT I and SALT II ), which imposed limitations on the number of launch vehicles. It has also proved to be an "easy answer" to proposed deployments of anti-ballistic missile (ABM) systems: It is far less expensive to add more warheads to an existing missile system than to build an ABM system capable of shooting down

7380-577: Was awarded the medal in 1973. The Department of Defense Distinguished Civilian Service Award is the highest civilian award given by the United States Department of Defense . After two decades of service, Nazi member from Operation Paperclip Siegfried Knemeyer was awarded the Department of Defense Distinguished Civilian Service Award in 1966. The Goddard Astronautics Award is the highest honor bestowed for notable achievements in

7470-780: Was born in Lubeck, Germany, in 1902. He graduated from the Carolo Wilhelmina Technical University in Braunschweig and received a Ph.D. in engineering in 1924. In 1925, the Max-Planck Institute invited him to become an official aeronautical research scientist, and in 1930, he became a professor at Georgia Augusta University in Goettingen. Busemann spent many years working for the German government, most notably directing research at

7560-418: Was declared operational in January 1959 at Vandenberg, although it had not yet flown. The first test flight was carried out on 9 July 1959, and the missile was accepted for service on 1 September. The Titan I was another US multistage ICBM, with a successful launch February 5, 1959, with Titan I A3. Unlike the Atlas, the Titan I was a two-stage missile, rather than three. The Titan was larger, yet lighter, than

7650-416: Was decommissioned in compliance with arms control agreements, which address the maximum range of ICBMs and prohibit orbital or fractional-orbital weapons. However, according to reports, Russia is working on the new Sarmat ICBM which leverages Fractional Orbital Bombardment concepts to use a Southern polar approach instead of flying over the northern polar regions. Using that approach, it is theorized, avoids

7740-613: Was launched only 63 times. Along with other R-36 family member Tsyklon-3 , the Tsyklon-2 was retired in favor of new-generation and all-Russian carrier rockets, such as the Angara and Soyuz-2. Like the Tsyklon-3, the Tsyklon-2 was derived from the R-36 Scarp ICBM. However, it did not have a third stage, like the Tsyklon-3 did, also it was slightly shorter and had a lower weight mass when fueled. This rocketry article

7830-459: Was not initially targeted against the Soviet Union; rather the concern was that German scientists might emigrate and continue their research in countries that remained neutral during the war. Much U.S. effort was focused on Saxony and Thuringia , which on July 1, 1945, became part of the Soviet occupation zone . Many German research facilities and personnel had been evacuated to these states before

7920-491: Was only to interview the scientists, but what he learned changed the operation's purpose. On May 22, 1945, he transmitted to the U.S. Department of War Colonel Joel Holmes' telegram urging the evacuation to America of 100 of the 400 German scientists in his custody, as most "important for [the] Pacific war " effort. Most of the Osenberg List engineers worked at the Baltic coast German Army Research Center Peenemünde , developing

8010-408: Was successfully carried out by SFC from Abdul Kalam Island, Odisha. The missile is now 20 percent lighter because the use of composite materials rather than steel material. The range has been increased to 7,000 km. By 2012 there was speculation by some intelligence agencies that North Korea is developing an ICBM. North Korea successfully put a satellite into space on 12 December 2012 using

8100-470: Was then widely used by Nazi Germany from mid-1944 until March 1945 to bomb British and Belgian cities, particularly Antwerp and London. Under Projekt Amerika, von Braun's team developed the A9/10 ICBM, intended for use in bombing New York and other American cities. Initially intended to be guided by radio, it was changed to be a piloted craft after the failure of Operation Elster . The second stage of

#618381