The post-war cleavage in the Grand Alliance that had defeated the Axis powers, if it had not been abundantly apparent before, was epitomised by the Soviet blockade of Berlin in 1948. The blockade was called off in the late September of 1949 at roughly the same time as the British and US governments announced that the Soviet Union had successfully tested an atomic bomb. In the interim, the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation had been formed by mutual agreement between twelve western countries. Here were the exemplary conditions of the Cold War: two nuclear armed superpowers, with their allies on one hand, and satellites on the other, glowering at each other over the Iron Curtain. If this were not bad enough it was also the case that, worldwide, communism appeared to be a homogenous and expansionist ideology. 'The Chinese Communists ally ourselves with the Soviet Union' were the words of Mao on the 28th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China on 1 July 1949. By December of that year the Chinese Civil War was over with the final defeat, and withdrawal to Taiwan, of the Nationalists. This was followed, in June 1950, by the communist invasion of South Korea.
It was believed at the time that all manifestations of communism emanated from, and were controlled by the Soviet Union, and if mutually assured destruction was a term as yet in the future, mutual suspicion was, by the early 1950s, definitely established. For the US the problem was both simple and at the same time insuperable; to discover what the state of Soviet capabilities were, whilst the physical evidence of these capabilities was hidden deep inside Soviet territory - territory comprising somewhere around 15 per cent of the land area of the globe. Surveillance of Soviet installations was therefore extremely problematical, for not only was the sheer size of the Soviet Union daunting, but it was extremely well and efficiently defended with an integrated air defence system, effective, with its manned aircraft, to an altitude of some 50,000 ft plus. Since some western aircraft could exceed this altitude they were safe from interception by Mig 17s. However, the Soviets possessed other anti-aircraft weaponry with greater reach, all of which was under the command of a separate military branch: PVO Strany, the Anti-aircraft Defence of the Homeland.
The difficulties of aerial reconnaissance are perhaps epitomised by the experiences of one particular mission. In July 1953 a British RAF Canberra PR 3 was tasked with a highly delicate and dangerous mission: to penetrate Soviet airspace and photograph the missile test site at Kapustin Yar, near Stalingrad, in the Ukraine. This site was some 600 miles from the nearest friendly territory. Stripped of all unnecessary equipment and supplied with extra fuel the RAF did the job - just. The PVO Strany detected and attempted to destroy the aircraft, indeed they hit the aircraft several times, but it managed to reach landfall in Iran.
Apart from the physical difficulties of carrying out missions of this nature, there were supreme political risks also. As Eisenhower put it in 1959, apropos his fears over U2 overflights, 'nothing would make me request authority [from Congress] to declare war more quickly than violation of our air space by Soviet aircraft.' Clearly, unless and until science and technology could produce something that was beyond the reach of the then current Soviet air defences, the use of manned reconnaissance aircraft remained problematical. Yet without some form of reconnaissance capability the threat posed by the Soviets was unquantifiable, and the possibility of a Soviet nuclear strike increased fears, particularly American fears, of their capability. To jump forward a little, the complete answer to this problem was only to be solved eventually by the use of orbiting satellites, though aircraft such as the U2 were also very useful. The answer in the early 1950's however had to depend upon what was available then, and yet what was available, and adopted, looked backwards rather than to the future - back in fact to virtually the first method adopted by man to take to the air - to balloons. In fact this method was recommended by the US Air Force Scientific Advisory Board following meetings from the 11-15 September 1950. The board estimated that a balloon reconnaissance system could be operational in 1951.
Balloon reconnaissance
Balloons had a long history of utilisation for military purposes; tethered balloons had proved their value for observation and reconnaissance since the 19th century. During the Second World War they had provided a defence against bombing aircraft. Free balloons had been used for messages and escape during the 1871 siege of Paris, and they had been used for leaflet dropping during the First World War. They had made a reappearance during the Second World War, and they had also been used for strategic bombardment by the Japanese and by the British. These examples, however, formed little precedent for the technological leaps required in order to overcome the formidable factors of height and distance involved in releasing balloons over Western Europe and the Middle East, and attempting to recover them over the Pacific. These were, however, overcome, and the resultant devices formed the only means of penetrating Soviet airspace during the mid 1950s.
One thing about which very little was known (for sure) was the behaviour of high altitude wind currents. Prior to World War II, high altitude balloon ascents had been undertaken, the exploits of Jean Piccard, in America, and his brother Auguste, in Europe, being the most famous, but still the conditions in the upper atmosphere were imperfectly understood. A systematic study of these conditions was undertaken in the post-war period and understanding of the winter jet stream began to emerge. This wind blows west to east above a height of some 45,000 ft during the winter months and attains speeds of 100 mph and more. Here was a perfect medium for balloons to enter and be carried in an easterly direction - if launched from western Europe at the appropriate time, and maintained at the correct altitude, they would inevitably fly across the Soviet Union and emerge,if all went well, over the Pacific.
Maintaining balloons at that altitude was, however, no simple matter. The problem was partly solved by utilising fine steel shot as ballast. This was held in two large hoppers and prevented from pouring out - it poured like a liquid, but did not freeze like one - by a permanent magnet at the lower end. When a pressure-sensitive switch detected a drop in altitude it activated an electro-magnet that neutralised the permanent magnet and allowed the shot to flow out. Weight was thus reduced and altitude regained.
The material for the envelope of the balloon also presented difficulties. In the pre-war era rubberised fabric had been utilised, but the weight of such a material limited the envelope size. Various types of plastic were tried - but all had drawbacks - until finally Bakelite's DE-2500 was discovered to be ideal. Hydrogen gas was the lifting medium, less of a safety problem for unmanned balloons. In fact, two different balloon envelopes were used: the 128TT, which was some 176 ft tall and 128 ft in diameter when fully inflated to its capacity of 800,000 ft3; and the smaller, cylindrical shaped, 66CT. There were two types because the former, larger balloon, had a high failure rate and its production was terminated halfway through the projected run. The smaller version made up the numbers.
The payload consisted of a spreader bar, on top of which were five recovery parachutes and four packages of chaff; these latter were to assist in radar detection following the release of the gondola over friendly territory. Between the payload and the balloon was an emergency parachute, which would prevent the payload free-falling in the event of a catastrophic envelope failure.
Suspended at each end of the bar were the boxes of steel shot, and between them were the camera gondola, designated DMQ-1, and the control box containing the electronics. The camera gondola was a fibreglass box, 36 ´ 30 ´ 57 ins., heavily insulated with polystyrene foam both against the cold that would be encountered at the altitudes it was meant to operate at, and to ensure that it would float if it came down in the sea. The camera, which was made by one of five different companies - Kodak, Chicago Aerial, Fairchild Camera, Hycon Corporation, and Bill Jack Instrument - had a film frame of 9x9 inches and enough film for 500 photographs. It had two 6 in. lenses, one on either side of its underside set at angles of 34.5¡ to the horizon. The cameras under the 66CT balloons were set to take a picture every 6.25 minutes, whilst those under the higher-flying 128TT were set to take a picture every 12.5 minutes. Mounted in the underside of the camera gondola was a photo-electric cell that only activated the camera when there was enough light to allow it to function. Also carried was a small 16 mm camera, which indicated the balloon's altitude and azimuth, and took wide-angle views in order to give some indication of the general geographic indication. The whole payload was suspended from a rotator unit that slowly spun, allowing 360 degree coverage.
The control box contained, amongst other equipment, four timing systems: the first jettisoned the ballast and separated the payload and balloon if it had not attained an altitude of more than 15,000 ft within 30-40 minutes of launching. If this altitude were exceeded within the given time then the second timer activated the ballast control system. This would occur some 90-100 minutes after launch, and, all other things being equal, the device would maintain itself above its minimum altitude. The third timer activated the camera and its setting was dependent on local factors: the time taken to arrive over communist territory being the most obvious one. This timer would run for 126 hrs and then de-activate the camera - this was simply to conserve the battery and later modifications were made to allow the camera to operate until the film was exhausted. The final timer activated the high frequency radio tracking beacon. Timing was obviously crucial here; too soon and it would simply alert the Soviets, too late and the balloon might be beyond range of recovery. The control box also contained a radio receiver. Upon this receiving a pre-set code the payload would be separated from the balloon, a drogue parachute would deploy the recovery parachutes and the payload would descend.
In fact, despite the Air Force Scientific Advisory Board’s hopes, in 1950, that a viable balloon system could be operational within a year, it was to be almost six years before the device, named WS—119L, (WS stood for Weapons System) was ready to be deployed. The intervening period was taken up with testing and proving the equipment; this was a new venture the like of which had never been attempted before. It was entitled Operation Genetrix.
There were to be four launch sites in Western Europe and one in the Middle East: Gardermoen, Oslo, Norway; Evanton, near Invergordon, Scotland; Giebelstadt, close to Wurzburg, and Oberpfaffenhofen, near Lindau, in southern West Germany; and Incirlik, near Adana, southern Turkey. On the 10 January 1956 the first nine balloons were launched by personnel of the 1110th Air Support Group - eight from Incirlik and one from Giebelstadt. The testing programme had established that the optimum method of actually getting the unwieldy balloons inflated and airborne, after many false starts, was by holding the uninflated portion of the envelope down under a roller. In this way only the inflated portion was allowed to rise as the gas was introduced. At the moment of launch the WS-119L payload was driven on a truck underneath the ascending balloon, the roller was released and as the balloon swung vertically it smoothly lifted away the payload.
One of the balloons failed soon after launching, but the other eight headed upwards into the winter jet stream, and then eastwards over communist territory. Five launches were made from Oberpfaffenhofen the next day, one from Evanton on the 12th, and three from Gardermoen on the 13th. On the latter date, the 6926th Radio Squadron (Mobile), deployed specially for the task in the Far East and Alaska, detected the signals from three balloons. Recovery of the balloons was the responsibility of the 456th Troop Carrier Wing, which had trained for mid-air retrieval. Elements of this formation were based at Okinawa; Itazuke, Japan; Misawa, Japan; Johnson Air Base, Japan; and Kodiak and Adak, Alaska. Mid-air retrieval was accomplished by using specially modified C-119 aircraft equipped with a grappling device for snagging the drogue parachute attached to the payload. Having accomplished this, the payload was winched aboard the aircraft through the rear cargo doors. Guided by the radio transmissions the C-119 crew homed in until they sighted the balloon visually, whereupon they transmitted the signal to release the payload and then made passes around it as it descended in order to effect a retrieval. In fact, on the first attempt at the real thing, all three payloads were recovered successfully.
During the first two weeks of the operation, 219 balloons were launched; 52 reached the recovery zone and the majority of these were recovered. Some of course started transmitting during the night or during bad weather, when airborne retrieval was impossible. On one occasion the balloon failed to respond to the signal to release the payload, and the aircrew had no option but to watch as it sailed on eastwards. At other times the payload released successfully, but it proved impossible to retrieve it in mid-air. If the location was known then a land or sea recovery could be made by helicopter; if not then it was lost.
One weakness of the scheme was the weather at the launch sites; obviously in order to make use of the winter jet stream the launches were attempted during the period when the weather in Western Europe was at its worst. Despite raising the daily quotas the schedule of launches was not met. Another problem was the Soviet reaction; no word of protest was received from the Soviet government until 4 February, but not one of the balloons launched between 26-30 January reached the recovery zone. Clearly the PVO Strany had evolved a method of dealing with them, assisted no doubt by the height restriction that had been ordered by the Air Force — the balloons were to fly at a maximum altitude of 55,000 ft (for the 128TT) and 46,500 ft (the 66CT). Quite why this restriction was applied is unclear, but it certainly added to the vulnerability of the system to interception and destruction.
The Soviet response
On 4 February the Soviets at last protested officially through their Deputy Foreign Minister, Andrei Gromyko. He handed a note to the US Ambassador in Moscow that accused the US government of 'gross violations of Soviet air space' and demanded that the US 'take measures for the prompt cessation of the impermissible activity of the American military organs'. The situation had become untenable for the US; not only was the weather preventing the scheduled number of launches taking place, but none of the balloons launched were getting through. Furthermore, the Soviets were making official protests at the programme and, perhaps naturally enough, exploiting it for propaganda purposes. The launches were halted on 6 February on the order of President Eisenhower - 1956 was an election year. It seems ironic that on the same date as the decision to suspend the operation was taken a balloon, launched on 31 January and the only survivor of the 18 launched that day, entered the recovery area and was successfully retrieved. Four more balloons were to make it through on the 8th, but only three payloads were successfully recovered. One was thought to be lost at sea but was subsequently discovered by Japanese fishermen.
Though the programme was not to be officially terminated until 1 March, 6 February was in fact the last date on which balloons under Operation Genetrix were despatched. So, close on six years of research and testing had resulted in a device that had had a field life of only 28 days. Had the operation yielded any results, and, if so were they commensurate with the resources expended? The 40 gondolas recovered yielded up some 13 thousand usable exposures, some 75 per cent of which came from launches from Turkey and so covered southern Siberia and Northern China. One important discovery, unknown before Operation Genetrix, was the nuclear refining complex at Dodonovo (N56¡ E93¡) in Central Siberia. However, this was obviously luck, as once the balloons were released there was no telling, within the known parameters of the jet stream, where they would go. Plainly this type of reconnaissance was too imprecise to be of great utility, and, fortunately for the US, the end of the operation more or less coincided with the introduction of the U2 aircraft, which first flew in August 1955 and went operational in the second quarter of 1956. This aircraft has its own story of course, and not without controversy. However, the termination of the Genetrix flights was not quite the end of US involvement with reconnaissance balloons.
WS-119L had proved that the concept of overflights of communist territory utilising natural wind currents was feasible, though in practice the results were disappointing. A new balloon, designated WS-461L, was however developed from the earlier versions and this was designed to fly at 100,000 ft - well above the range of any contemporary defensive capability. It also featured an improved panoramic camera, and, in contrast to the Genetrix balloons, would ride the summer jet stream from east to west. It would be launched off the east coast of Japan, from an aircraft carrier, USS Windham Bay, a World War II escort carrier, especially detailed for the task. Due to the difficulties experienced during the Genetrix operations with the failure of the radio signal to release the payload, the WS-461L was set to release its payload after a fixed period - set, apparently in error, at 400 hrs. In fact only three WS-461L reconnaissance balloons were launched and, because of political dithering, these were sent up at the very end of the weather window when the summer jet stream was slowing down in July 1958. Because of the weakening of the jet stream the timers that triggered the radio signal activated whilst the balloons were over Poland, thus alerting the PVO Strany and others. Worse, however, was the fact that when the payloads were released, they too fell onto communist territory and were captured intact with their state of the art cameras, and exposed film.
President Eisenhower was furious, complaining of a 'deterioration in the processes of discipline and responsibility within the Armed Forces', including 'unauthorised decisions which have apparently resulted in certain balloons falling within the territory of the Communist bloc'. 'The harm done by this kind of thing', he continued, 'to the conduct of our international affairs, and to our national security, is obvious.' In fact, the camera developed for the WS-461L balloons was later modified for use in the first American reconnaissance satellite, Discoverer, launched in 1959. Satellites were of course the real answer to the problems of overhead photographic reconnaissance, and the real value of the efforts to utilise balloons for the purpose may have been in the development of cameras that could operate from great altitude.
It might be thought anachronistic that in the era of atomic weapons and jet propelled aircraft recourse to the earliest method man had adopted to take to the air was sought, but given the technology of the time, and the need for information, it was all that was realistically available. The WS-119L and WS-461L reconnaissance systems probably represent the ultimate development of balloons as military devices. As the US Air Force official report on the matter stated it: 'Weapons System 119L was a reasonably effective means of obtaining pioneer reconnaissance at comparatively small cost.' Perhaps the last word should go to the author Curtis Peebles, who has researched the matter deeply: 'It seems fair to say that ...balloon reconnaissance ... was not able to meet the US need for information on Russia. But it was the first step. Such first steps are frequently tentative with many stumbles. What is important is where those steps lead. So it was with balloon reconnaissance.'
by Charles Stephenson
Aart, D. van der, Aerial Espionage, Airlife Publishing, 1985
Crouch, T. D., The Eagle Aloft: Two Centuries of the Balloon in America, Smithsonian Institution Press, 1983
Kirschner, E. J., Aerospace Balloons from Montgolfiere to Space, Fallbrook, 1985
Peebles, C., The Moby Dick Project: Reconnaissance Balloons Over Russia, Smithsonian Institution Press, 1991
Rechelson, J., American Espionage and the Soviet Target, William Morrow and Co, 1987