JF Ptak Science Books Quick Post
This thrilling nail-biter from the near future appeared in Popular Mechanics for December 1939. What we are seeing floated here (sorry/terrible) was a system of relatively primitive helium-filled air mines to guard against enemy attack from the air. There was no doubt the (fighting) end of the European and British part of WWII there would be a very major role played by aircraft. Bombing had already been introduced on a larger scale with German practice and assistance to Franco in Spain, and of course there was plenty of evidence for air power in the crushing of Poland just a few months earlier beginning 1 September and ending 26 days later--a victory and a defeat that shocked the military world. So much of the world had entered into war in the first two weeks of September 1939, and of course the U.S. reacted with predictable strong sentiments for isolationism.
I remember a headline--can't place where--reading it, years ago, announcing that the Olympic Games for 1940--that were to be held in Soviet-attacked Finland--were cancelled.
There was a simple idea behind the aerial minefield--take 5' diameter balloons, fill them with helium, attach a 40' line to it on one end with a bomb with 4 lbs of high explosive on the other; send them aloft, and then wait for a plane to hook one of the lines with a wing or tail or something. These were to be sent aloft by the hundreds if not thousands. Maybe this could work, I dunno--but what comes to mind is what happens with the hundreds of balloons that didn't have something run into it? They bomb would explode on contact, so at some point, they're all going to come down... There'd that, plus what if fighter planes came in before the bombers (once the Germans were close enough that is) and simply shot down the balloons? I imagine that they'd be used over rural areas where there could be some absorption of hundreds of falling failing bombs. Anyway, this idea seems a little problematic.
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