Rendlesham Forest…, A Christmas Story from 1980 - Can We ‘Let it Be’?

More reading material to scour through.

DARPA fiscal year 1979 Research and development programs

Other new ideas or seed efforts we plan to undertake include:
1. Human Memory Augmentors
2. Optical Ceramics
3. Expendable electronic warfare jammers
4. Adaptive computer internetting
5. Focussed Ion Beam Processing
6. Biocybernetic Avionics For FY 1979 we are requesting $33.9M to allocate against new ideas or seed efforts.

www.dtic.mil...

Something for later.

THE APPLICATION OF BIOCYBERNETIC TECHNIQUES TO ENHANCE PILOT PERFORMANCE DURING TACTICAL MISSIONS. 1979

These and other engineering advances are certainly important. However, we believe that the pilot's effectiveness could be further enhanced if (a) his current status as a processor of information and as a decision-maker were monitored, and (b) he were coupled more directly with the aircraft subsystems from a control standpoint. We noted in the Introduction of this report that the program of biocybernetics research sponsored by DARPA has attempted to develop a communication channel for biological signals elicited during different mental activities.

www.dtic.mil...

a reply to: AdamE

It's certainly keeping you busy Adam.

a reply to: AdamE

Probably why the F35 helmets cost $1billion for all of them, reportedly at $400,000 a piece...

a reply to: mirageman

Very good points.

We can start with two possibilities:

A) They were unable to reach the 14 days orbit
B) They were unwilling to wait 14 days

A) seems to suggest either a technical failure or enforced re entry out of their control
b) Suggests they needed the photographs fast, or the orbit and locations photographed were radically altered. For instance, lower altitude to get more details, but an increasing drag.

The problem I have is that you can't have the RFI as being both the location of the control source and the landing site.

If it was the landing site, it didn't reland for three days.

If the satellite was returned to the Soviets then there really was nothing to hide. It was not going to topple governments or risk a war, surely?

a reply to: mirageman

The satellite being a red herring is probably true, if it was captured/shot down there would have been a lot of sabre rattling from the Soviet side and anger too, especially because of the tensions at the time. Even if they didn't want to publicly acknowledge the loss of such an asset there would still be documentation or other reports from their side to confirm it had been lost.

They probably knew there were nukes stored there and were reconning the area, right place, right time but just coincidence in my opinion.

a reply to: ctj83

If you check the Zenit-6 launch schedule running up to Christmas 1980 there were two week intervals between all launches from October onwards. They then reduce to around one a month afterwards. There could be a number of reasons for this including budgetary.

But these were all recon-satellites with hi-res photographic capability. So they were looking at or for something in that last quarter of 1980.

Going back to Winston Keech's commentary.

Paraphrasing that; he claimed that the satellite was being hit with local high power radars and ionospheric heating systems based in Northern Norway. The effects went on over 2 or 3 days during each pass to manipulate it into a freefall. Then it was recovered by the 67th ARRS based out of Woodbridge.



However I'd also think this was a somewhat dangerous experiment given that there was no guarantee where the satellite could come crashing down to any degree of accuracy beyond a 20 mile radius. It could smash into housing, schools, businesses and even military installations. Lives would be put at risk.

So I am not completely sold on this forced crash landing idea. But maybe there was some meddling going on and the satellite's mission was terminated two days early due to this? Does that explain anything else going on? I don't know. If such attempts to bring a satellite were being made I'd suggest we are looking the wrong side of the Atlantic for where technology to do that would be. We've mentioned it a few times in this thread.

All speculation of course.

But I suspect the answers to the RFI lie in Cold War shenanigans rather than aliens or time travel.

a reply to: mirageman

A precursor to Starfire or similar perhaps??

Starfire being at Kirtland AFB, odd how that place pops up all the time huh..

a reply to: mirageman

The only thing I could find on Norway and any potential connection there ( I don't believe Keech at all btw) but lets roll with it for now.

As far as Satellite weapons or defense contractors etc, Kongsberg Defence Systems seems to be the main one in Norway at the time and now. They are 50% owned by the government interestingly enough and also have a 50% stake in Kongsberg Satellite Services, which provides services for monitoring of satellites in orbit etc etc.

There is a soviet connection, to bring this nonsense full circle in terms of the Soviet union, Norway and the US;

"In 1987, Tocibai Machine, a subsidiary of Toshiba, was accused of illegally selling CNC milling machines used to produce very quiet submarine propellers to the Soviet Union in violation of the CoCom agreement, an international embargo on certain countries to COMECON countries. The Toshiba-Kongsberg scandal involved a subsidiary of Toshiba and the Norwegian company Kongsberg Vaapenfabrikk. The incident strained relations between the United States and Japan, and resulted in the arrest and prosecution of two senior executives, as well as the imposition of sanctions on the company by both countries."

Source

Also in an issue of New Scientist, dated from May 1987, there is descriptions of anti-satellite vehicles that could be deployed from F15s and destroy targets in space;

files.abovetopsecret.com...

As I said though.. I was going down a rabbit hole I didnt want to and didnt expect to find anything. The stuff regarding the MIC wanting further funding and their comments on the soviet side regarding anti-satellite weapons is surely interesting. The could have brought one of their own down or (insert any other theory here)

I thought I would include as the more I looked into it the more interested I got and I know the dates are after RFI, but we all know that what is recognised as existing usually exists considerable time before it appears in the white world.

I hope this ramble hasnt derailed the thread too much, but I did want to look into the satellite aspect of it from a different perspective than that of my own.

Pigsy

originally posted by: pigsy2400
CM was deemed a failure and picked up returns on aircraft that were not there.

As far as I was able to tell, that wasn't the problem at all, the transmitters were evidently "faultless" and were able to pick-up terrestrial as well as astronomical radio signals, effectively serving as a radio telescope. The problem lay, according to US sources, in reading the data. The computer systems, then available, were inadequate to the task, couldn't sift and seperate the information into any useful form. Or so they said. Either way it is highly unlikely that they simply gave up on the technology itself, they simply diversified it, put a lot of subsequent investment into computing systems.

I think it was already pretty much decided that they were going to dismantle the site even before the Cobra Mist Scientific Assessment Committee did the review though. There had been too much chatter in the press, it probably contravened SALT. It was unworkable in many respects simply due to the publicity.

They moved off the site really quickly though. The announcement was made on 29th June, by midnight on the 30th the station had been shut down. They took what they wanted/needed and left. As far as I have been able to find out, and correct me (anyone) if I am wrong, the subterranean stuff was left in place...for example the 80 acres of ground netting, and a copper box (?). I presume that it was easier to leave than retrieve, and perhaps extraneous anyway...or perhaps, as was always intended as part of the Cobra Mist mission, it was left in place to serve as a "test bed". I don't know enough, about anything, to know whether that was the case or not.

originally posted by: mirageman

Jenny Randles has participated in this thread to offer a lot of information on her work in the very early days of the case.

Jenny also authored a modern update to her work (Fortean Times – Feb 2016 Issue 337) where Cobra Mist is discussed.

Wasn't it Jenny Randles who claimed that there were naval vessels off the coast, at the time of the incident, engaged in some manoeuvres or testing? I am sure it was discussed, briefly, on the Burroughs thread, you posted another article by Jenny Randles (I think???). If I get chance I will have a dredge but as I recall, beyond Randles' very sparse reference to it, there was nothing more, information wise, to be had.

I should perhaps read the article you posted...I think that dates from after the discussion in question (or perhaps my inner clock is fritzed, I think though it was more that two years ago...was it? I'll have to check or just read the article first, might be quicker...) but it might cover it again, or ignore it

a reply to: KilgoreTrout

That maybe so but they did get returns that stated phantom aircraft and missiles being launched that weren't which is why it was handed over to SRI for further investigation.

Cobra Mist is in itself interesting, particularly it's proximity to Rendlesham but I don't feel that it has any connections to the incident itself only a curio due to how it worked and atmospheric oddities in the area, but the tinelines simply don't add up.

originally posted by: pigsy2400
a reply to: KilgoreTrout

That maybe so but they did get returns that stated phantom aircraft and missiles being launched that weren't which is why it was handed over to SRI for further investigation.

Who are SRI? I thought SAC conducted the investigation?? A "phantom aircraft" is not an aircraft, it is a return that was undeciferable, or unclear, that was interpreted as an aircraft but turned out not to be an aircraft or otherwise visible object. The point being, my point being, the investigation concluded that the "transmitter was faultless". Receiving was the issue. "Phantom aircraft" only confirm that.

originally posted by: pigsy2400
Cobra Mist is in itself interesting, particularly it's proximity to Rendlesham but I don't feel that it has any connections to the incident itself only a curio due to how it worked and atmospheric oddities in the area, but the tinelines simply don't add up.

It's relevant because the whole area is, historically and currently, an area of strategic importance. The way in which the military authorities, British and US, behaved throughout the Cobra Mist endeavour, also provides some interesting insights.

a reply to: KilgoreTrout

I think Keech explained it as telluric currents creating radio waves through quartz deposits behind the array.

a reply to: pigsy2400

Also in an issue of New Scientist, dated from May 1987, there is descriptions of anti-satellite vehicles that could be deployed from F15s and destroy targets in space;

I think the Soviets would also be concerned with this report from 1980/81

a reply to: AdamE

OK but where are you going with this?

a reply to: mirageman

I think we can remove the satellite theory due to:
- Risk of war over stealing a Soviet Satellite
- Complexity of controlling re entry
- Danger of the satellite smushing part of Ipswich
- insistence of numerous dubious characters in the RFI pushing this story.

In fact, the RFI is the only time APEN were not pushing an exaggerated pro UFo agenda.

What we are left with is an odd 12 day orbit though.

originally posted by: mirageman
a reply to: AdamE

OK but where are you going with this?

I was highlighting the capability of the West on the back of a reply to pigsy2400 prior to 1987, in the run up to the RFI, alongside what may have interested the Soviets when it came to satellite surveillance at the time.

Maybe the Soviet thinking at the time was realisation of the potential of adapting a Stealth aircraft, or Stealth Drone and hit targets before the enemy could say 'What the **** was that" armed with a nuclear bombs.

Curiosity tends to kill the cat? or sat?

One last thing before I continue to celebrate Germany being knocked out of the World Cup, some more information on the potential of using Lasers to interfere with satellites, and how this is also an apparent issue to this day.

A high-power laser, on the other hand, is not limited by the elements of intercept geometry that matter in the case of sensor dazzling. Such systems could be used to inflict structural damage on a spacecraft by irradiating it with sufficient persistent energy to cause catastrophic failures to key subsystems like power generation, thermal management and communications. Inflicting such ‘out-of band’ damage merely requires the target satellite to pass within the broader arc of reach of the attacking laser system, which for all practical purposes means in proximity to the ground-based laser complex. Satellites in any orbit could be attacked by ground-based lasers, though the power required would vary with the altitude of the spacecraft, on the assumption that beam quality, the aperture of the director, and atmospheric distortion effects are not at issue.69 China is known to have lased US reconnaissance satellites, and its capability to inflict damage will only grow over the next decade

A similar situation obtains with regard to physically neutralising the global positioning system constellation. The precision navigation and timing data provided by this system are vital for military and civilian purposes worldwide. Both rely on the system for accurate location information, but military users also depend on it for accurate weapons delivery, synchronisation of operations requiring precise coordination, and successful search and rescue. Highly accurate three-dimensional location information requires four or more satellites to be within the field of view of the receiver. Since the global positioning system constellation comprises 24 spacecraft (plus spares) at 20,000km, where it takes each satellite 12 hours to complete one orbit, at any given time there are usually 5–12 satellites in view of most users, depending on topography. Physically destroying the constellation to deny the US military the precision navigation and timing data it has come to rely on would, therefore, require more than discrete attacks on a few satellites. Even more substantial attacks would only deny navigation and timing data for a part of the day

carnegieendowment.org...

a reply to: KilgoreTrout

Stanford Research Institute (SRI International)

Yes, an OTH radar system being in the vicinity is an interesting addition to the story arc considering how it works and atmospheric effects etc especially the effects of it that was des, my posts quite a few page back confirm my interest in this in the wider spectrum of the area and the RFI itself.

The issue is that we cannot attribute Cobra Mist to the incident itself, the timelines just don't match up. I am not disagreeing in the strategic significance of the area, just that the timelines within itself don't match.