October Sunrise : Bush Sr.'s secret SR71 flight from Paris / Iranian Hostage Crisis Negotiation

I believe that there was a trade off between the Reagan Campaign and the Iranian Revolutionary Government.

I have never seen the part of Bush being in Paris as essential to the story. In fact, if you believe in the version that I believe, Bush visiting Paris for secret negotiations doesn't make that much sense.

I look at the SR 71 claims as limited hangouts to divert attention to the actual conspiracy that is alleged.

Haven't looked into this story for at least 10 years now, though, so I may be a bit behind. Anything new that I missed?

reply to post by Zaphod58


Wow!

The "modifications" came from the OP, it said there were several passengers on board, and that the plane had been modified.

Otherwise, I didn't know all that other stuff. I remember during the Gulf War in 1991, they were talking about how the bombing runs took off from Kansas City and refueled mid-air, and ran their mission, and then landed back in Kansas City. Apparently they ran 2 crews on the aircraft at the time.

I've always heard they were not allowed to land off-base at all.

Thanks for the info.

Originally posted by iwan2ski
reply to post by getreadyalready

 

Sorry, as a prior B-2 Crew Chief, I can tell you that we land them where ever we want as long as there is a long enough run way and ample security to encircle the craft. Of course this is usually done in the cloak of darkness whenever possible, but not always a must.

Thanks.

Apparently the newscast that I remember had it wrong.

Is it true that they sometimes run two crews onboard the B2 for long runs? That is what I remember them saying during the 1991 War in Iraq. That the planes would take off and land back in Kansas City without ever touching down anywhere else in the world, with something like a 20 hour mission to drop ordinance in Iraq. Does that sound like what might have happened in 1991, or am I remembering it completely wrong, or was the newscast wrong?

I find Russbacher's story a fanciful tale. IF the Paris meeting took place, why would Bush, even if he was the VP designate needed to have been there, when Casey was in charge?

Russbacher is certainly an interesting character.

However it happened, this releasing the hostages after the swearing in was embarrassing for Carter and lead to the October Surprise investigations. Below is even another story of what happened

In 1996, while meeting with Palestine Liberation Organization leader Yasir Arafat, Carter reportedly raised his hands into a physical stop position when Arafat tried to confess his role in the Republican maneuvering to block Carter’s Iran-hostage negotiations.

“There is something I want to tell you,” Arafat said, addressing Carter at a meeting in Arafat’s bunker in Gaza City in the presence of historian Douglas Brinkley. “You should know that in 1980 the Republicans approached me with an arms deal [for the PLO] if I could arrange to keep the hostages in Iran until after the [U.S. presidential] election.”

a very interesting read

Originally posted by andy06shake
reply to post by buster2010

 

"It's designed to do that. The seals fully seal when they reach high altitudes."

Why is that? Leaking fuel and supersonic travel did not work out to well for the concorde, i know its not relavent, and it happened on take off just wondering why the SR-71 leaks.

I mean safe enough for civilian transport, obviously they must be safe with them costing so much, but then theres the Space Shuttle, that did not work out to well on certain occasions.

edit on 17-7-2012 by andy06shake because: (no reason given)

The Concorde is a nice plane but it flies neither as high or as fast as the SR 71. The SR 71 flies a full 1 mach faster than the Concorde. The SR 71 flies high enough that a lot of airplane pilots mistook it for a UFO.

reply to post by andy06shake


I think it is due to the seals being calibrated for higher altitudes. If they were calibrated for normal altitudes then at the higher ones they would expand too much and be defective. So at least when it is parked the seals usually leak. Can't remember where I learned that though.

Originally posted by Signals

A BAC 111 aircraft, which had been reconfigured to carry a sufficient amount of fuel to travel 3,600 miles, left Andrews Air Force Base in the late afternoon of October 19, 1980.

I don't think it could be done. The longest ranged BAC-111 was only capable of 1900 nautical miles fully loaded. They would have had to more than double the range of the aircraft. Jet A-1 weighs almost 6.8lbs/gallon, that means that they would have run out of weight before they could have carried enough fuel. And an inflight refueling mod would have been talked about all over, just for the unusual aircraft involved. The Rolls Royce RB.163 Mk506-14 could only put out a little over 10,000lbs of thrust per engine, the 511-14, 11,000lbs, and the 512-14DW 12,500lbs (rough numbers). That meant the max take off weights for the engines were 79,000lbs, 88,000lbs, 98,000lbs, and 104,000lbs.

Without knowing the exact fuel burn numbers, I can't tell you exactly what the range would be for each variant, but I don't think they could carry enough fuel to go 3,600 miles to Paris from Andrews.

reply to post by getreadyalready


They usually land at Diego Garcia to swap crews, but never shut engines down.

One of the funniest things is that one of the most necessary pieces of equipment for them to do the mission is a chaise lounge from Wal-Mart.

They were simming the flights, real time, and one of the pilots went out and bought one to lay out in the cockpit. They would let one crew member sleep a few hours, while the other monitored instruments, then swap out. They'd sleep a couple hours at a time, and be good for the entire mission if necessary. Some of the early missions they really did fly a crew 40+ hours, hence the desperate need for the lounger.

reply to post by Zaphod58


That's a lot of numbers to try to figure out and it just doesn't matter/

The obvious choice is inflight refueling, come on we do it all over the world on a daily basis. Rome's guards reach far and wide

reply to post by Signals


Not on a plane that started life as a commercial airliner. There are very very few transports (ie C-135, B757, Gulfstream classes) that are capable of in flight refueling. And even the ones that are, very very rarely use it. It's a very expensive modification to add to an airplane that didn't have it installed from the get go, and it's very complicated to do. You can't just slap a system on and say "Ok, go refuel in flight." You have to test it, and test it, and modify it.

Originally posted by getreadyalready

Originally posted by iwan2ski
reply to post by getreadyalready

 

Sorry, as a prior B-2 Crew Chief, I can tell you that we land them where ever we want as long as there is a long enough run way and ample security to encircle the craft. Of course this is usually done in the cloak of darkness whenever possible, but not always a must.

Thanks.

Apparently the newscast that I remember had it wrong.

Is it true that they sometimes run two crews onboard the B2 for long runs? That is what I remember them saying during the 1991 War in Iraq. That the planes would take off and land back in Kansas City without ever touching down anywhere else in the world, with something like a 20 hour mission to drop ordinance in Iraq. Does that sound like what might have happened in 1991, or am I remembering it completely wrong, or was the newscast wrong?

Actually the B-2 wasn't used during Operation Desert Storm in 1991. That was the F-117 Stealth Fighter/Bomber. However, we did set a record during Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003 for longest continuest operation flight from Whiteman AFB to Iraq and back. There is only room in the craft for 1 crew of 2 pilots. So 1 pilot would fly for about 8 hrs while the other slept on a cot in the back. Keep in mind that the cockpit of a B-2 Bomber in about the size of a small minivan, so not much room to moving around.

(sorry it took me a while to get back to you, I've been stuck on other threads lately)