ripleofdeath
It was Popular Mechanics,.....not Science
and the artical's been updated......there were several saucer shaped craft under development...........Lockeed has a patent on one design to carry passingers ...from the 1950's.....
But read on about the other designs - Nuclear powered orbital launch platforms.......First strike weapons, developed by the same Nazi-American scientist's that created our ICBM's......................
This is from Popular Mechanics
In our July 1997 cover story, "Roswell Plus 50," POPULAR MECHANICS detailed how Air Force interest in duplicating Nazi technology led to two American flying disc projects. Project Silver Bug sought to build a vertical takeoff and landing aircraft. Project Pye Wacket was to create small discs for use as air-to-air missiles. Documents declassified since then point to a third secret project, a 40-ft. "flying saucer" designed to rain nuclear destruction on the Soviet Union from 300 miles in space.
Contrary to UFO literature, which claims the Germans were attempting to reverse-engineer a crashed alien vehicle of their own, these documents show a more practical reason for interest in saucers: They could take off without runways. Months of around-the-clock bombing by the allies had reduced German runways to rubble
Anticipating that the first generation of communist atomic bombs would be as heavy as those America had dropped on Japan, it seemed reasonable to U.S. defense planners that the Soviet air force, which then lacked a nuclear bomber, would try to adapt German disc technology. The United States was, after all, doing exactly the same thing with the V-2s and Nazi rocket scientists it had spirited away in Operation Paper Clip.
"Operation Paperclip" was the code name for one of the Second World War's most secret and ethically controversial projects. Its mission was to put former Nazi scientists and engineers on the U.S. payroll. The American public knew the secret of Los Alamos weeks after the first atomic bomb exploded. They would not be told of Paperclip until after men landed on the Moon, an event made possible by Paperclip rocket scientists.
America's nuclear flying saucer
The official designation for America's nuclear flying saucer was the Lenticular Reentry Vehicle (LRV). From 300 miles in space the LRV would be able to rain nuclear destruction on the Soviet Union, Red China and North Korea. It was designed by engineers at the Los Angeles Division of North American Aviation, under a contract with the U.S. Air Force. The project was managed out of Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, in Dayton, Ohio, where German engineers who had worked on rocket plane and flying disc technology had been resettled
The LRV escaped public scrutiny because it was hidden away as one of the Pentagon's so-called "black budget" items—that is, a secret project that is incorporated into some piece of nonclassified work. On Dec. 12, 1962, security officers at Wright-Patterson classified the LRV as secret because: "It describes an offensive weapon system." The project remained classified until May 1999, when a congressionally mandated review of old documents changed the project's status as a government secret, downgrading it to public information. The Department of Defense did, however, successfully seek to have the document's distribution restricted to defense contractors. PM obtained its copy as the result of a Freedom of Information Act request.
The Air Force acknowledges the Germans were working on a flying-disc craft, but says it was inherently unstable. Officials point to the failed Avro flying car built for the Army and a deteriorating plywood Horten wing, both on display in museums.
Declassified records obtained by PM in the course of its investigation suggest that these marginally performing craft were, in fact, shills intended to disguise the existence of more formidable flying machines. One of the most potent of these flying discs was developed under a secret program called Project Pye Wacket. Its objective was to design a 5-ft.-dia. liquid-fueled missile launch platform to protect U.S. bombers penetrating Soviet airspace.
In the end, the military would select conventionally shaped planes and missiles. As for the Horten flying disc that the Reich had hoped would turn the tide of battle, patent rights to a remarkably similar craft configured to carry "passengers" would be assigned to the Lockheed aircraft company. A cutaway diagram of this unusual craft appears on the top of this page.
Despite this information, the possibility that the object that crashed at Roswell was in fact one of the Horten brothers' creations misses the mark on two important details. The craft that Kaufmann claims to have helped recover was not round, but as his sketches showed, a lifting body. Also, he claims there was no fire damage, a virtual impossibility in the crash of a jet-powered aircraft.
A Japanese UFO
As our investigation neared its close, PM was alerted to a forthcoming release of documents that may fill in these two missing pieces of the Roswell puzzle. They may also explain two other curiosities: the presence of the crisscrossed radar-deflecting pattern on the bottom of the Roswell craft, and–to the consternation of those who seek an unearthly explanation for Roswell–the origin of the "dead aliens" who have so often been described as having Oriental features.
PM has been told that the documents scheduled for future release will tell of a Japanese counterpart to Operation Paperclip. One of its purposes was to determine if the Japanese had constructed a suicide-piloted version of the Fugo incendiary bomb.
Fifty years after the fact, the questions about Roswell still ring loud and clear. Our investigation leads us to believe the explanations that require an extraterrestrial presence, while possible, are nevertheless highly implausible. We're putting our money on a flying disc labeled "Made In Japan."
http://popularmechanics.com/science/space/1997/7/roswell_plus_50/index4.phtml
http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/military/2000/11/nuclear_flying_saucer/print.phtml
Those German's were ahead of their time, I've seen blueprints of BMW's 1940's military jet designs - No wonder they banned 'em from making aircraft......................
But in the end ...like I said - no little green men.
This machinery was ours, from the 1947 crash on...
TheVisitor
