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During Cold War, CIA Plucked Soviet Submarine from Ocean Floor Using Giant Claw

smithsonianmag.com

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Re: During Cold War, CIA Plucked Soviet Submarine from Ocean Floor Using Giant Claw

#11

Post by naval-gazer »

cm2187 wrote: post #5

There is a very interesting documentary on this expedition. One of the guys mentioned that when the grabber arm broke, they could see on their monitors an ICBM slipping through one of the tubes, heading down the bottom. Everyone in the room braced for the impact with the ocean floor...

There are two possibilities:

1. it's practical impossibility to make unarmed nuclear warhead to explode spontaneously. The worst thing that can happen is conventional explosion that spreads the contents into the sea.

2. it's ancient fission bomb designs where water getting inside the warhead slows down neutrons and starts the chain reaction.

I'm 99.9 percent sure than no ICBM ever had the #2 types. Only bombers had them few decades. Even if there were, putting one into a sub would be the definition of insanity. One mistake and Murmansk is gone seems too risky even for Soviets.

Re: During Cold War, CIA Plucked Soviet Submarine from Ocean Floor Using Giant Claw

#13

Post by ethbro »

cm2187 wrote: post #5

There is a very interesting documentary on this expedition. One of the guys mentioned that when the grabber arm broke, they could see on their monitors an ICBM slipping through one of the tubes, heading down the bottom. Everyone in the room braced for the impact with the ocean floor...

There's a documentary called Azorian (was Prime streaming for awhile) that's decent. It had a fair amount of technical detail about the apparatus & failure.

Re: During Cold War, CIA Plucked Soviet Submarine from Ocean Floor Using Giant Claw

#14

Post by jacquesm »

Udik wrote: post #9
cameldrv wrote: post #8

Possibly the coolest and most spooky Cold War artifact: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aJAJUJ41PBI It's the video on board the Glomar Explorer of a burial at sea ceremony of Soviet sailors found in the half of the submarine they managed to bring to the surface. Supposedly this was Top Secret until a copy was given to Yeltsin in 1991 or so.

I don't find it very spooky. Moving though, considering it's a solemn burial of the bodies of enemy soldiers. And if really it was top-secret, it's not even propaganda. Better times than ours. And how cool is the Soviet anthem?

> enemy

For one to determine that soldiers are 'enemy soldiers' would there not have to be a state of declared war?

Re: During Cold War, CIA Plucked Soviet Submarine from Ocean Floor Using Giant Claw

#15

Post by jacquesm »

reaperducer wrote: post #6

"That May, Soviet operatives increased the amount of microwave radiation trained on the American embassy in Moscow." This was the 1970's. Today people eschew the idea of similar treatment of Western embassies in Cuba. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/11/world/americas/cuba-unite...

That may well have been to provide power to passive listening devices.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Thing_(listening_device)

Re: During Cold War, CIA Plucked Soviet Submarine from Ocean Floor Using Giant Claw

#17

Post by mikeash »

jacquesm wrote: post #14
Udik wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't find it very spooky. Moving though, considering it's a solemn burial of the bodies of enemy soldiers. And if really it was top-secret, it's not even propaganda. Better times than ours. And how cool is the Soviet anthem?

> enemy For one to determine that soldiers are 'enemy soldiers' would there not have to be a state of declared war?

That seems a bit too restrictive. I’d hate to tell a Vietnam vet that “Charlie” wasn’t technically the enemy since war was never formally declared. Or tell someone stationed at a base in Afghanistan right now that the people firing mortars into the base aren’t really enemies.

Re: During Cold War, CIA Plucked Soviet Submarine from Ocean Floor Using Giant Claw

#18

Post by adventured »

jacquesm wrote: post #14
Udik wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't find it very spooky. Moving though, considering it's a solemn burial of the bodies of enemy soldiers. And if really it was top-secret, it's not even propaganda. Better times than ours. And how cool is the Soviet anthem?

> enemy For one to determine that soldiers are 'enemy soldiers' would there not have to be a state of declared war?

You must always be at declared war with your enemies? And why would it need to be "declared" - which is a subjective premise from nation to nation. Throughout recorded history nations have fought proxy and covert wars against their perceived enemies with no declaration.

Ask Iran if they're at war with the US (maybe kinda sorta). Then ask them if the US is an enemy (definitely). The same would go for Iran and Israel. There's no confusion there, you can clearly have enemies without a declared war.

The instant prior to the declaration of war the other side wasn't an enemy? Logically it's not a sound concept.

Re: During Cold War, CIA Plucked Soviet Submarine from Ocean Floor Using Giant Claw

#20

Post by bigtex »

ethbro wrote: post #13
cm2187 wrote: post #5

There is a very interesting documentary on this expedition. One of the guys mentioned that when the grabber arm broke, they could see on their monitors an ICBM slipping through one of the tubes, heading down the bottom. Everyone in the room braced for the impact with the ocean floor...

There's a documentary called Azorian (was Prime streaming for awhile) that's decent. It had a fair amount of technical detail about the apparatus & failure.

That is the one. Excellent documentary and interviews several of the involved parties. The level of engineering that was described was truly astounding.
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