ODD TALES FROM SECRET FILES

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-01208R000100090023-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 22, 2011
• Sequence Number: 23
• Publication Date: June 22, 1984
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

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Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/02/22 : CIA-RDP90-01208R000100090023-9
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22 June 1984
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'By Jo
hn'S
herwood
,THE WASHINGTON TIMES
the Central Intelligence
ency has reluctantly
opened for research more
'than 450 boxes-or once-
secret files of World War II's Office
of Strategic Services.
The agents at the CIA-succes-
sors to the dashing shies at OSS.
have hoarded the covert operations
-.ante tgence records for nearly 40
? ears.
Winnowing out the
drama .in these faded
'-papers depends
greatly on luck. A
proper card index file
is non-existent.
Two days of eye-
strain' in'a grim . and
chilly "researcher's
room. Then a random
opening of Box 37 of
109 of the OSS History
Office Files turns up_
this intriguing folder:
"NATO [North Afri-
can Theater Oper-
ations) Anthology.
Algiers. Vol. 1." A
coded opening page is
marked: "Secret -
Equals British Most
Secret
Hmmmm. "The
Simmons Beautyrest
Project: Sir Smokey
Chases the Holy
Grail:'
"Simmons" was the
an alert Danish scientist happened
by the strange, unarmed dud that
suddenly dived into the ground. He
took photographs of the damaged
bomb and gathered a lot of tech-
nical data.
"He had but a few hours to do
this," Lt. Downey wrote, "and was
successful in eluding.the Germans
who were on the ground in the
neighborhood awaiting to report on
the experiment. However,' the
Gestapo later captured this Danish
projectiles; most agreed that they
had some kind of wings and.tail.
Most also agreed that they'seemed
to change their course in midair
after launching."
A committee met in deepest
secrecy on Malta to study the bomb
fragments, and those involved were
forbidden to discuss the new
weapon with anyone.
By early November, the OSS
already had a plan and Lt. Downey
had a mission. The main objective,
he continued, "was,to
get physical posses-
sion of these bombs, if
possible, and in this
effort we were con-
tinuously running up
against a stone wall in
our efforts.
"It was not because
people did not want to
cooperate with us but.
everywhere we
turned we were told
the same old story=
'it can't be done: or tit
is impossible.' .It was
at this point-that our
nickname 'for 'the
bomb came into being
-'Holy Grail:
The first attempt to
steal the bomb was in
the middle of January
in Norway "where the
temperature is any-
thing but tepid, and
[we) trudged over
sixty, miles of the
roughest terrain con-
ceivable to get to
His mission impossible: Storm a
secret Nazi bomb plant and capture
the super-secret., "glider bomb."
code name for a top ..
secret mission under Lt. William ?'.
(Smokey) Downey, U.S.N.R., Secret
Operations Officer, North Africa.
His mission impossible: Storm a
secret Nazi bomb plant ("Beaut-
yrest") and capture the super-
secret "glider bomb" that was later
to become famous as the terrifying
.V-1 rocket that buzz-bombed Eng-
The mission would take almost a
year, cost many lives, and dispatch
agents around they world to Egypt,
Great Britain, Algeria, Norway,
Belgium, Holland, Denmark,
France, Italy, Greece, and America.
Let's have a look, then, at Lt. Dow-
ney's report, secret for four dec-
ades:
The' 'mission, of the highest
secret priority, was created after a
"radio-guided bomb" landed at 1
p.m. on Aug. 22, 1943 on the remote
Norwegian island of Bornholm on
an experimental flight. Incredibly,
patriot and he was shot to death"
The secret data, however, got
through. It reached. London
through the Norwegian Govern-
ment in Exile's Secret Intelligence
Corps. Inexplicably, the intelli-
gence never got to the United States
through the regular channels domi-
nated by the British.
"Nevertheless, and in spite. of
some opposition from our own peo-
ple in England:' Lt. Downey noted,
"the photos and technical informa-
tion was forwarded to the U.S. First,
and for reasons I'll never be able to
quite understand, I was told not to
send the material to Washington."
Also in September, 'the "radio-
directed flying bombs launched
'from& airplanes"?-were firstv`Spd by ;
the Germans in the Mediterranean
in a devastating attack on a crewed
British patrol boat. The unusual
missiles were described as "small
airplanes, rockets, and shell-like
Banack, the German-held airport
on the Arctic Ocean ... After five
weeks the teams reached the.air-
port and returned to their base, but
reported no trace of the bomb, nor
of the plane which carried the
radio-controlled bomb:'
Early in February 1944, they
decided to concentrate on getting
the radio mechanism, rather than
the rocket bomb itself, "because it
weighed but 50 pounds and ? was
about 3 feet overall, whereas 'the
rocket bomb, dubbed the'Robomb:
or the 'Buzzbomb,' and technically
known as the V-1, was believed to.
weigh 3,000 pounds, or even more."
The first of several tragedies
came when two OSS' agents .were
dropped behind the lines in France.
One of them died when he struck a
tree upon' landing, and' the other
was forced to return.
-lilt, Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/02/22 : CIA-RDP90-01208R000100090023-9