How Chaff helped saved 450 bombers from FLAK destruction - a WWII FLAK Countermeasure Unsung Hero

Рет қаралды 24,342

Күн бұрын

US bombers deployed Chaff for the first time in December, 1943. The effect was profound, German gun laying radars could not accurately track or range the formation. The formations would be fired upon with inaccurate high ammo usage barrage fire. Post war surveys indicated usage of both Chaff and Carpet reduced the effectiveness radar direct FLAK fire by 75% which saved some 450 heavy bombers from destruction.

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@psikogeek Ай бұрын

I like it when the KZbin algorithm weeds out the chaff and shows me videos like this.

@andrewthomas5348 Ай бұрын

My dad did this during the war. I learned a lot! Thanks.

@seafodder6129 Ай бұрын

Never realized the length of the chaff determined what radar frequency it countered. Very cool info!

@witeshade Ай бұрын

Yeah antenna length is crucial for making radios work well. That's why algorithms developed in the 90s were so revolutionary for modern technology because they figured out ways to create tiny weird shaped antennas that allowed good reception, which could then be baked right onto circuit boards and chips.

@TheOfficial007 Ай бұрын

The circumstances of the frequency correlating with length had another unique occurrence during the cold war when the US would send up spy balloons over the soviet union. The dimensions of a steel rod in the system happened to match the russian radar frequency and thus lit up their radar alerting them.

@dfirth224 Ай бұрын

@@witeshade This is the reason modern cars have tiny antennas on the roof instead of the old wire whip antennas on the fender that people walking by like to break off. The reception is just as good or better. I like listening to AM / medium wave stations 150 + miles away. I am surprised that the tiny antenna works just as good as the old style.

@zacharyolson1297 Ай бұрын

😂😢@@witeshade

@zacharyolson1297 Ай бұрын

@@witeshade🎉❤😢😢🎉

@randomnickify Ай бұрын

Me: Expecting some advanced chaff deployment system Airforce: Dumping packets through the window :D

@Roddy556 Ай бұрын

There were signaling flare guns that had a sort of air lock for firing out of aircraft that were kind of neat and maybe more what you were imagining

@Roddy556 Ай бұрын

Look up Pressurized Flare Pistols

@user-vx2vl9cr5m Ай бұрын

So early chaff flares

@Roddy556 Ай бұрын

@user-vx2vl9cr5m I think the flares were strictly for signalling as there was no heat or infrared detection equipment but the delivery was more sophisticated than a hole in the wall.

@user-vx2vl9cr5m Ай бұрын

@@Roddy556 I meant the chaff

@stage6fan475 Ай бұрын

Thanks as usual for your diligent research. I was under the impression that chaff had worked well the first few surprise deployments, but that the Germans had switched frequencies or something to counter it. I had never heard it was such an ongoing problem.

@mrdjtoday Ай бұрын

Informative, interesting, and educating! Thank you for the great video.

@CzechImp Ай бұрын

Excellent, as always. Makes me wonder how much of Western Europe became covered with chaff debris, bullet casings, and bullet clips. I always thought my diet was high in iron...!

@GreenCanoeb Ай бұрын

My mom grew up in the Netherlands during WW II and has mentioned she and her friends would collect chaff to play with.

@iroll Ай бұрын

The Belgians still have the iron harvest every year, so you're not far off...

@anananandsdsdsds3486 Ай бұрын

In the more intensely fought-over areas, in particular the bits of France that saw the heaviest fighting of WW1, the estimated clean-up time of the worst areas is measured in _centuries_.

@twentyrothmans7308 Ай бұрын

My buddy in Germany goes metal detecting, finding spent munitions from the 1700s onwards. I don't know if chaff would register.

@kirotheavenger60 Ай бұрын

@@twentyrothmans7308it wouldn't - chaff is non-magnetic aluminium, and metal detectors are based on magnetic fields

@dave.of.the.forrest Ай бұрын

I was reading up a bit on the Kommandogerat 40 director. I'd love to see you make a video on it. Very interesting piece of kit.

@williamromine5715 Ай бұрын

I knew chaf was used by the bombers during the war, but I didn't realize how effective it was. Considering how cheap it was, plus how many lives it saved, that guy who came up with idea, deserved not only a medal, but also a large monetary reward. It's interesting that chaf is still being used to protect bombers and fighters

@cattledog901 Ай бұрын

It was invented by a man named Deez

@donbrashsux Ай бұрын

The efforts in War are mind blowing what they came up with to counter the obstacles

@Legitpenguins99 Ай бұрын

Interesting to see how old tech is repurposed today while remaining identical in concept

@black_stream Ай бұрын

Super informative, thanks for making great videos.

@snipe1973xxl Ай бұрын

Some time ago I read that bomber crew members who were responsible for dropping "Window" bundles didn't really know what the purpose was. They were not familiar with "hi-tech stuff" like radar, etc. So they p**d on the bundles, left them close to the plane fuselage wall so that the bundles froze and dropped them like bricks, hoping that they'd cause some damage down on the ground

@vrdrew63 Ай бұрын

Outstanding explanation of the effectiveness of aluminium foil countermeasures during WWII. It's very helpful to see this put into a meaningful number of "saved" aircraft. I wonder if the RAF performed a similar analysis of its effectiveness in reducing night bomber losses.

@tylercarlson1659 Ай бұрын

Well explained and extremely interesting. Actual GOV documents in the vid and vintage video is so outstanding. Easy to digest complex details on old war equipment just makes me think of how far we've come from the tech we had vs. what we hide from the public at this moment

@jimmiller5600 Ай бұрын

Great video. Thank you!

@cgross82 Ай бұрын

Fascinating! Thanks for sharing this important historical information. I always appreciate your scholarship and use of primary sources during your research.

@WillN2Go1 Ай бұрын

So is there any relationship between the end of WWII, and the decline of the 'chaff' business, and the use of aluminum foil 'tinsel' on Christmas trees?

@dfirth224 Ай бұрын

Where do you think aluminum foil came from after the war? Reynolds Wrap, TV Dinner trays, etc. Before the war aluminum foil was only used to line cigarette packages.

@revolutionhamburger Ай бұрын

They spend enormous effort to develop radar and then some fellow tosses his empty sandwich wrappers out the window and all the electronic effort is ruined.

@dfirth224 Ай бұрын

The foil actually came from the makers of cigarette packages. During the War smokers wondered what happened to the foil liners. They were just told it was for the war effort.

@jbrown7403 Ай бұрын

Thank you! Really interesting!

@scottsmith2052 Ай бұрын

One of my favorite stories - the Allies invented it but didn't use it out of fear that the Axis would start using it. Likewise, the Axis invented it but didn't use it out of fear that the Allies would use it.

@givenfirstnamefamilyfirstn3935 Ай бұрын

Herman Goering went crazy, he demanded a cure saying the Allies would only have used it if they had effective countermeasures ready to protect themselves from copy usage by the Germans.

@davidkavanagh189 Ай бұрын

What do you mean? They did use it, a lot.

@Roddy556 Ай бұрын

@@davidkavanagh189facts

@SamBrickell Ай бұрын

@@davidkavanagh189 LATER they did. The allies only start dropping chaff after the allies were certain the allied radars could burn through it. (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaff_(countermeasure)#Second_World_War:~:text=For%20over%20a%20year%20the%20curious%20situation%20arose%20where%20both%20sides%20of%20the%20conflict%20knew%20how%20to%20use%20chaff%20to%20jam%20the%20other%20side%27s%20radar%20but%20had%20refrained%20from%20doing%20so%20for%20fear%20of%20their%20opponent%20replying%20in%20kind.)

@grizwoldphantasia5005 Ай бұрын

@@davidkavanagh189 They delayed it 18 months.

@rring44 Ай бұрын

I wonder if it would have been effective to send out pairs of very high altitude P-51s who would drop chaff at various intervals all around the routes bombers would be flying. I bet it would cause some confusion for the air defenses seeing radar returns everywhere.

@gort8203 Ай бұрын

The chaff was most useful in keeping heavy AAA from accurately targeting the bomber formations rather than deceiving the defenses as to their location. Some time after the P-51 escorts were available in numbers the USAAF often stopped trying to deceive the Luftwaffe about the locations of the bomber formations. The overarching strategy was to destroy the Luftwaffe, so they wanted to attract the intercepting fighters on to the bomber escorts so they could be shot down.

@glennheth3472 Ай бұрын

6:02 They actually did experiment with sending P-38's over the target to lay chaff ahead of the formation.

@tokencivilian8507 Ай бұрын

I don't know how you keep doing it, but, you keep hitting home runs with your vids. Great dive into the period sources on chaff. I'm looking forward to the rest of the vids teased in this one.

@PeterOConnell-pq6io Ай бұрын

Wonder how long after chaff got deployed it took for Germans to figure out they needed to adjust the frequency of their UHF radar emissions. Didn't realize 'Window' offered much protection from the Germans Wurzberg fire control radar directed 88mm FLAK batteries. You learn something every day.

@Wien1938 Ай бұрын

From memory, it took 2-3 months to figure out how to counter WINDOW. The best book I've read on this subject is "The Other Battle" by Peter Hinchcliffe.

@lscott6088 Ай бұрын

Great facts!

@colinlegrys9434 25 күн бұрын

As a young boy in the 40s I remember collecting chaff, I do not know why we found it on the ground roughly between Brighton and London for us boys to collect, we would paste it together to make decorative paper chains!

@robertmoyse4414 Ай бұрын

On the night of 27-28 Feb 1942 British paratroops dropped on Bruneval, over ran the garrison, stole the critical bits of a Wurzburg radar, loaded them onto a landing craft and took them back home for the boffins to play with. Window/chaff was the one result of the raid.

@timlucas4014 Ай бұрын

I think the size of the chaff was the result.... They worked out the operating freq off the radar

@Graham-ce2yk Ай бұрын

@@timlucas4014 It also gave them some idea of what if any countermeasures to such things were fitted to the radar (None) and the quality of the operators (Not good) since they captured at least one of those.

@michrain5872 Ай бұрын

Window out the window!

@lachbullen8014 Ай бұрын

Question are you ever going to do a video on about early electronic warfare and early airborne detection...?

@ryanprosper88 Ай бұрын

I recently watched a video about the strategy of not having gunners in bombers and how that could've saved lives. Couple gunnerless nighttime bombers at high altitudes with chaff screening to confuse flak, bombers could have saved a lot of resources and been more effective.

@myradavis2599 Ай бұрын

US experimented with a foil wing that was released, rapidly falling to the ground, looking like a damaged plane trying to glide in safely. Idea was abandoned quickly.

@kenbb99 Ай бұрын

Big flak attack knocked back by a foil pack

@user-mj9fp6ox2j Ай бұрын

We also called it “window” and collected it to swop at school.

@matthew09ify Ай бұрын

The RAF called it window

@joeperson4792 Ай бұрын

Still used today to distract some type of missiles. That are radar guided.

@Allan_aka_RocKITEman 3 күн бұрын

CHAFF: Radars _foiled_ again...😉

@NathanDudani Ай бұрын

Window

@joeminella5315 Ай бұрын

👍👍👍👍👍

@karansingh1154 Ай бұрын

How successful would an ac130 like gunship would have been as a bomber destroyer?

@gort8203 Ай бұрын

It would have been shot down by escorts before it came within range of the bombers. If the bombers were unescorted it would have been shot down by them if it came with range of their defensive armament.

@alexandruraresdatcu Ай бұрын

How can chaff reduce effectivity by 75%, something doesnt add up, shouldn't it be above 90%? Looking from the German perspective a clear sky kill takes 2500 rounds and a chaffed sky takes 25000 to 40000 to get a kill, that is about 95% effectivity reduction..??...

@herschelmayo2727 Ай бұрын

A myth. All the radar operators did was switch to a frequency not sffected by the chaff

@grizwoldphantasia5005 Ай бұрын

There's no dial to select the frequency.

@mkaustralia7136 Ай бұрын

The Germans did not seem to have that ability given the competition

@robertmoyse4414 Ай бұрын

I've not seen any German source saying that. What's your original source?

@gort8203 Ай бұрын

He has no source, he's just making stuff up to get attention.

@danlowe8684 Ай бұрын

@@gort8203 I just made a post, with the source being physicist Freeman Dyson - a statistician at Bomber Command, as to the very short time that this technique worked.