I just got back from seeing Indiana Jones 4. It was pretty good, except for this idiot and his fat wife who sat next to me who kept going back for more pop and popcorn (via where I was sitting) for the whole movie, laughed at the most plebian of jokes, and who would guess the endings to lines, out loud, when it was delayed for dramatic or humorous effect.
Anyway, he was fighting the Soviets this time (it’s set in the 50’s). I noticed something in one of the chase scenes. The soviets have ducks!
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| American | Soviet |
How could this have happened? The DUKW or “Duck” was an American invention during World War Two as part of Operation Mullberry and Overlord as an amphibious truck and marine transport. But who let the Russians copy it? Honestly, someone musta fucked up.
Well…maybe the duck isn’t that complicated and they have engineers too. They coulda just figured how to make em themselves. But what about other stuff, important stuff….like heavy bombers or spacecraft. BUT WAIT!
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| American B-29 “Superfortress” | Soviet Tu-4 “Bull” |
That’s right. The Soviets stole the B-29. In 1945! When it was literally the most advanced, most deadly piece of military hardware anywhere in the world. Before this, they barely could manufacture small and medium range/size bombers, and had no perceived ability to manufacure a heavy bomber of any kind! The story behind this: American crews bombing Japan who were forced to ditch in Russia had their planes confiscated before being shipped back to the Allies. So the Soviets just took em apart, built their own, and put it out on the runway. I’m surprised the USA didn’t make a bigger stink about this at the time, but I guess they were our ‘allies’ and they wouldn’t have the bomb for eight more years.
Forty years later, the space race had been won by the USA, but the USSR was still struggling to compete. And then they resorted to cheating.
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| American Space Shuttle and Soviet Buran |
It has been pretty well established that Soviet agents stole the plans to the shuttle and built their version. In fact, some of the NASA guys from that time said they would have sent the plans to the Russians if they had asked for them, so it wasn’t the biggest thing ever. But I thought the CIA had a handle on counterintelligence. Apparently they didn’t. I guess they never got their hands on our nukes. To the public’s knowledge. But I bet in….fifty years or less there will be tons of declassified documents about how the KGB got their hands on almost everything or something like that. Of course, nothing that they managed to steal from us worked the same way, or really at all. I mean, the USA got most of the good scientists from Germany and smart talented people tended to stay places where they would actually get rewards and not just medals. Lest we forget their other terrific accomplishments like the Caspian Sea Monster:
The worst combination of jet plane and boat ever conceived, this ‘Ekranoplan’ exhibits the least useful aspects of both. It only flies a few feet above the surface because of ground effect, but can accelerate to 200 knots, making it incredibly dangerous on anything but perfectly calm seas. Then it sunk in water just shallow enough to allow its ridiculous tail fin to stick out as what has been called a ‘death cross’.
And yes of course Clunkline’s favorite insane Russian…thing…
Antonov An-40
This is of course a T-60 tank attached to glider wings. It was gonna be towed to a battle field and would drop to the ground, roll to a stop, and start a-tankin’. On its only test ever in 1942, the best test pilot in Russia had to emergency land the damned thing after the bomber almost crashed because of the tank’s incredible drag. He made it though, then drove back to base in the tank. That’s right. In addition to having to be incredible pilots to fly it, you also had to be trained as tank drivers. Go Russia.
