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My father was in the RCAF and was in the running to fly the Arrow if it was built (he did see prototypes). IIRC, he said the Americans wanted the designs destr
by BareNakedCoder 6y ago
My father was in the RCAF and was in the running to fly the Arrow if it was built (he did see prototypes). IIRC, he said the Americans wanted the designs destroyed because they feared the Canadians were not secure enough and so it might be stolen by the Soviets. It was during the coldest parts of the cold war after all.
- aerostable_slug 6y agoThis is the reason. One of my mentors was part of this effort; the Canadians were riddled with Soviet agents. EDIT: downvoted for facts. Here's a reference: But until then his assignment was to become Soboloff so convincingly that nobody would ever suspect he was a Soviet spy. Eventually, he was given responsibility for managing five recruited agents, including a Communist Party of Canada member from Toronto who worked for the company developing the Avro Arrow and provided its engineering schematics to the KGB. https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/the-spy-named-gideon-book-tells-story-of-russian-illegal-sent-to-canada-and-betrayed https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/the-spy-named-gideon-bo...
- jbay808 6y agoI wonder if Russia might have the best-preserved schematics now?
- coopsmgoops 6y agoAn engineer actually smuggled out a set of plans out. And it only recently came to light. The plans were being exhibited in Winnipeg (I think) just before this whole covid thing happened.