All language subtitles for Wings.Of.War.S01E02.Bandits.Secrets.and.Spies.1080p.AMZN.WEB-DL.DDP2.0.H.264-RAWR_track4_[eng]

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NARRATOR:
For over a hundred years,

battles have raged in the air
for command of the skies.

If you don't have air supremacy,
you're in trouble.

Since its earliest beginnings
in World War I,

the aeroplane is the supreme
weapon of the Armed Forces.

This was a real battle
for civilization, for humanity.

It revolutionised battle

and changed the ways
war was fought and won.

The F-117 has obviously changed

how we design aircraft
and air campaigns.

War drove innovation in the skies.

What we hear from
the Air Force is

when the F-35 wasn't there,
a lot of others died.

When F-35 was there,
it reigned supreme.

Aircraft bred a new kind of hero.

The fate of entire nations

depended on the bravery
of a handful of men.

An appreciation of the extent
to which young men

were willing to put their lives
on the line for an ideal

is something we need to
remember more often than we do.

In this episode,

bandits, secrets, and spies.

The planes that fought using
stealth and spy technology.

All warfare is based on deception.

To strike effectively,
it's essential to know
your opponent.

Who they are, and where they are.

As with all warfare,

from the dawn of time
until the 21st century,

information is power.

The Blackbird is
the fastest aircraft ever built.

It pretty much was impervious
to enemy air defences.

At a blistering Mach 3,
it was back on home turf

before the enemy even realised
it had been compromised.

The capabilities of
the SR-71 camera systems

were absolutely astonishing.

As the military took flight,
so did the art of surveillance.

The British tended to use

substantial numbers of aeroplanes

to do reconnaissance
over the lines.

Pioneers in aerial photography

turned the Rumpler Taube
into the world's first spy plane.

The Germans experimented with
different colours and patterns

to counteract the aircraft
being seen from overhead

from observation balloons,

and in reverse, from the ground
from the trenches.

Their U-2 plane
broke new records in aviation,

flying higher
than any plane before it.

Their target was to carry out

strategic reconnaissance
of the Soviet Union.

It's illegal for an aeroplane

to violate a sovereign
airspace's territory.

Enter the ultra-secret
world of stealth.

The F-117 pilots were
collectively known as Bandits.

Stealing into the night
was the Nighthawk,

the world's first stealth bomber.

It was able to drop bombs without
anybody knowing they were coming.

So they unleashed,
not only surprise on the enemy,

but they also had
a psychological effect

that the bombs
were coming from nowhere.

Stealth is a world where you can
steal an opponent's secrets,

and disappear
in the blink of an eye.

(LIGHTNING CRACKS)

(DRAMATIC THEME MUSIC)

NARRATOR: It's the 1950s.

Tensions are running high
as the Cold War between America
and the Soviet Union deepens.

Both sides knew little
about each other's
new killer capability.

Ignorance fuelled paranoia.

MAN: The Soviet Union
was 8.5 million square miles,

a vast area, very difficult
to gain information,

and so before satellites,

that was extremely difficult
to collect information.

Espionage intensified.

Spies were pitted against spies.

The Soviet Union operated
behind a wall of secrecy

and isolated itself
from the rest of the world.

They called it the Iron Curtain.

MAN: The Soviet Union
was still a big unknown.

Were the Soviets developing
strategic bombers

that could reach the US
and deliver a nuclear weapon?

But this was 1953,
and the US had no aircraft

capable of gathering
the vitally-needed intelligence.

So, a little-known British bomber
was pressed into service.

MAN: It is the original
high altitude spy plane.

Before the U-2 came off
the drawing boards,

the CIA went to the British
and asked them if they couldn't

get this Canberra to fly higher
than the current flights.

It was doing of 50,000ft or so.

The English Electric Canberra
first flew in May 1949

and it was so successful,

they increased the wingspan
quite dramatically,

which enabled it to get
much, much higher

in order to conduct
reconnaissance missions

over denied territory.

So, the British modified it

by putting Rolls-Royce
Avon Mk.109s in it

and were surprised to find out
it would do 65,000ft.

Code named Project Robin,

the English
Electric Canberra's mission

was to overfly Russia's
Kapustin Yar missile range.

In those days, they didn't know
what the Russian ballistic
missiles could do.

They needed to know what
kind of progress they'd made.

They needed photographs.

It was equipped with cameras,
and therefore,

gathered in the main,
photographic intelligence.

And it also had a variety
of recorders on board

to gather electronic
intelligence.

The mission objectives were to
take pictures of the launch area

and the rockets that were on
the launch area.

This is the aircraft
that flew that mission.

Larry Champion was part
of the Canberra's air crew.

We used to fly formation,
for example,

we would fly here,
and the bad guys would fly here.

They'd try to shoot us down and
come up like so, and stall out.

Those who know aircraft
know what stalling is,

but we were relatively safe
at 65,000ft.

(DRAMATIC MUSIC)

Russia and America engaged
in a deadly nuclear arms race,

each building up stocks
of intercontinental
ballistic missiles,

to strike at a moment's notice.

The concept of
mutually assured destruction

maintained a precarious peace
between both sides.

But maintaining a fragile truce,
depended on good intel.

The intelligence
was most important.

To keep the mutual
assured destruction

was the colloquialism of the day,
and that was the idea.

We knew what they had,
they knew what we had,

and therefore
the Cold War stayed cold.

Canberra's missions
were flown by the RAF.

America needed its own aircraft.

In 1954,

President Eisenhower approved
the ultra-secret project, the U-2.

It's the kind of thing
the US kept wraps on

because it was going to be
penetrating Soviet airspace.

They didn't admit
to its existence.

It was a covert operation
for good reason.

As you probably know,
it's illegal for an aeroplane

to violate a sovereign
airspace's territory.

Developments of the U-2
became a CIA project

led by agency chief
Richard M Bissell, Jr.

The U-2 was designed
to fly over the Soviet Union

and to not be detected.

And to do that,
it had to fly very high,

higher than any aeroplane
had previously flown.

This one is unique
because you're flying at

the very edge of the stratosphere
wearing a full pressure suit,

flying over some,

maybe some unfriendly
territory or areas.

That puts you, the pilot,
in some very difficult situations

that you have to deal with
on your own.

Flying the U-2 at its
operational altitude of 70,000ft,

is extremely hazardous.

CHRIS: The fastest
you could go in an aeroplane

was only a few knots different
from the slowest you could fly.

Pilots call it 'coffin corner'.

Fly too slow or too fast,

and the plane goes into
an uncontrollable dive.

So, the pilot had to fly
the plane between

a window of only about
seven or eight knots

at the very highest altitude.

The U-2 boasted
a new, large format camera

measuring 15 feet long
by 13 inches in diameter.

It had an unprecedented resolution

of 2.5ft from an altitude
of 11 miles high.

All of our imagery is rated
on a national scale.

It can be compared to something
maybe a satellite can see.

Despite the need for vital
military intelligence,

President Eisenhower
became concerned

overflights of the Soviet Union
might cause a war.

He knew what a provocation
these flights were,

and although he was
an ex-military man himself,

he was a very careful president.

The CIA reassured the president

that Soviet radar could not track
high altitude U-2 flights.

In 1956, President Eisenhower
gave the CIA permission

to fly for ten days.

They could launch as many flights
as they liked at that time,

but the big surprise
and the big disappointment

was that the Soviets
tracked those flights.

They identified them on radar.

These were Black Ops,

secret and covert operations
arranged by the government.

So, if the plane was shot down,
the CIA took steps

to ensure that the pilots
couldn't be taken alive.

When the U-2 first started flying
over the Soviet Union in 1956,

the pilots were given a means
to commit suicide

in the form of cyanide pills.

They faced a stark choice,
capture or suicide.

Legend has it, one of the pilots
who took out sweets with him,

nearly mistook the suicide pill
for one of his candies!

But it really is a legend
because the U-2 pilots

were encased in a pressure suit
and a pressure helmet.

The CIA took steps to make sure
there were no mistakes.

The CIA later changed
from the pills

to a rather clever disguised
Cyanide-tipped needle,

and hiding it
inside a silver dollar

because they simply thought the
Russians would not discover that,

whereas they might have
discovered the suicide pills.

The U-2 pilots prepare to overfly

hostile Russian territory.

U-2 operations
to spy on the Soviet Union

began in 1956.

One pilot in particular,

would soon embark on
a top secret mission

that would stretch US-Russia
relations to breaking point.

NARRATOR: It's the height
of the Cold War.

Both sides unleash their spies

to discover the secrets
of their opponents.

The US developed
stealth technology

as part of its armoury.

Although the Soviets
could track the U-2

in the northern parts
of its territory,

the Russians weren't aware
that Moscow and Leningrad
had been photographed.

The photographs also showed
MiG fighters

scrambling to intercept the U-2.

American President Eisenhower
was worried.

CHRIS: He knew what a provocation
these flights were.

And, although he was
an ex-military man himself,

he was a very careful president.

He never again gave the CIA

carte blanche permission
to fly a series of missions.

By the end of the 1950s,

tensions reached breaking point
between the US and Soviet Russia.

Cold War rhetoric
threatened nuclear war.

Russian Premier Nikita Khrushchev

boasted a Soviet missile could
deliver a five megaton warhead,

8,000 miles away.

America needed to know the facts.

Could they launch
intercontinental
ballistic missiles

from their own territory
over the pole,

and onto US targets?

Even though the CIA knew

the Soviets could spot American
U-2 planes on their radar,

the missions continued.

They knew they could still
outfly the missiles.

The altitude of the U-2
was sufficient.

Soviet surface-to-air missiles
couldn't reach them,

so they were still able to fly
without being intercepted.

Even if the Soviets
could detect them,

they weren't able
to do anything about it.

Gary Powers was chosen
for Operation Grand Slam.

He was their most
experienced pilot

with a record of
27 successful missions.

(DRAMATIC MUSIC)

But this mission
would be different.

CHRIS: Unlike previous missions

which launched and recovered
to the same base,

this was gonna be a mission

that's gonna fly all the way
across the Soviet Union,

launching from Pakistan,
but landing in Norway.

The flight plan was scheduled
for May 1st.

This would prove to be a mistake.

The date of May 1
was problematic

because it's a Soviet holidays,
it's May Day.

That meant there was very
little air traffic at the time.

As a result, any incursion
to Soviet airspace,

was that much more noticeable.

The Soviets began
tracking the U-2,

15 miles outside its border.

They reached a point 3.5 hours
into its mission over Sverdlovsk

where the Soviet Union
had a significant number

of their new surface-to-air
missiles, the SA-2.

The Soviets targeted their SA-2
surface-to-air missiles
on Gary Powers.

They launched a total of
eight missiles that day

from three different sites,

and just one of those missiles
nearly reached the U-2.

The missile had a proximity fuse

designed to explode
when it got close to its target.

One of the missiles
engaged the U-2 of Gary Powers

and explodes near the aircraft,

knocking off one of the wings,
making it unflyable.

Powers had no choice but to bail.

The G forces were pinning him
forward in the plane.

And, he realised that
if he tried to eject,

he'd probably have his legs
cut off by the canopy rail

because he was pressed forward.

So, he opened the canopy
and was sucked out

and then dangling
by his oxygen cord.

He was trying to free himself
while the plane was in freefall,

and was unable as a result,
to hit the self-destruct button.

The dying U-2 was still
loaded with spy cameras

and incriminating film.

But, the CIA had made
contingency plans for a crash.

There were a set of destruct
switches in the cockpit

which would operate
an explosive charge

to disable the camera
and its film,

so that hopefully even though
the wreckage would break up,

that was a big camera,

but the evidence that
it had been taking pictures,

would be destroyed
by this explosive charge.

But those switches
were beyond his reach

as he bailed out of the plane.

Powers survived the missile strike
and was quickly captured.

The crash didn't completely
destroy the U-2,

and the Soviets were able
to identify much of the equipment.

Initially it was thought
he had not survived the crash.

Information didn't come out
immediately he'd survived this.

On the 3rd of May,
NASA announced

one of its aircraft
making a high-altitude

weather research flight in Turkey,
was missing.

Russian Premier Nikita Khrushchev
remained silent.

The Americans
stuck to their story.

On May the 7th, the Russians
paraded Gary Powers to the world

and revealed he confessed to
spying on the Soviet Union.

The US was caught in a lie.

They had to admit the missions.

Eisenhower has to make
a public statement,
unprecedented at the time,

saying, 'Yes, we have
conducted these missions.'

Premier Khrushchev had
no hesitation in exposing

America's spy operation
to the world's press.

They wanted to put him on trial,
a show trial,

all part of Khrushchev's
big propaganda effort

to exploit this incident
for all it was worth.

Gary Powers' trial began on
the 17th of August, 1960.

He apologised to the Soviets,

and was sentenced to
three years in prison.

Just two years later,
on the 10th of February, 1962,

as part of a deal,
the Soviets handed him over
at Glienicke Bridge,

between West Berlin
and Potsdam, Germany.

More than 50 years
after its first flight,

the U-2 remains
in frontline service.

The U-2 designed in the '50s,
first flight in 1955,

certainly not the same aircraft
our grandfathers would've flown.

This one is now the S model.

But in the age of satellites,
is the U-2 still relevant?

We are relevant because
of our dynamic re-tasking.

Satellites are very expensive
to manoeuvre,

but it could be deployed
anywhere in the world.

Certainly the Middle East
and over the Pacific theatres
is where we operate mostly.

The U-2 flies high,
but it is not stealthy.

To combat modern radar systems,

covert operations
demand stealth aircraft.

We turn to stealth
as much as possible

to try and gain that information.

For the Americans,
gathering secrets from the Soviets

meant creating a new plane with
cutting-edge stealth technology.

They turned to a much faster
aircraft that could fly higher.

The CIA set to work.

In the cloak and dagger world
of espionage,

its very existence was kept
a closely-guarded secret
for ten years.

Even its construction team
was sworn to secrecy,

and its design was revolutionary.

They developed the first
modern stealth plane,
The Lockheed Martin A-12.

ERIC: The A-12 is really
one of the benchmarks

of early stealth technology.

It was very important at the time
to fly really high, really fast,

but to have a really reduced
radar cross section.

It was made of new materials.

The design challenges
for the A-12

and the SR-71,
were significant,

because the parameters
they were designing for

were far in excess of any
current fighter aircraft.

The speeds they're talking about
were double the speeds

of contemporary fighter aircraft.

Powered by the J58
Turbojet engine,

the A-12 was fast too.

This was the largest turbo
jet engine of its day.

That was what was required to get
this aeroplane up to Mach 3.

It was designed to be able
to use its afterburner
for significant periods,

where most fighter aircraft
had maybe a minute on afterburner
at maximum speed.

ERIC: Some people say
it's fast as a bullet

but three times
the speed of sound,

over 2,000mph is pretty quick.

The A-12 was fitted with the
latest surveillance technology.

ERIC: The big thing for the A-12
was the cameras it carried.

There was three types
of cameras used,

and they were able
to capture swaths of land

between 40 miles wide
and almost 70 miles wide,

with a resolution down
to 12 inches from 70,000ft.

It was quite remarkable cameras

that were used and carried
by this aeroplane.

In 1968, the A-12
was put to the test

when North Korea sparked
an international crisis

known as the Pueblo Incident.

That's when North Korea
doing their sabre rattling,
captured a US ship,

that was on a spy mission
in international waters,
The USS Pueblo.

PAUL: The ship was boarded,
and was taken into tow by
the North Koreans.

It was very important for
the US intelligence community

to understand
what was going on here.

America was already embroiled
in the Vietnam War.

Now, there was the prospect
of another conflict opening up
with North Korea.

The only way to prevent it,
was to bring in the A-12

to see what the regime
was really up to.

If it was more than
sabre rattling,

if they captured the ship
as part of a bigger operation

to maybe invade
the South Korean Peninsula,

that was a whole other war
going on.

They wanted to accomplish
three things. Find the Pueblo.

Determine where
the crew may be held.

But more importantly, determine
if the North Korean military

was mobilising for
a bigger conflict.

Just three days later,

a mission was scheduled
out of Kadena with the A-12,

a Black Shield sortie,

and it flew three passes
over North Korea.

They were able to prove with just
three overflights of A-12s,

that the North Korean military
was not mobilising,

and they can allow diplomatic
processes to get the crew back.

It took 11 months
but they did get the crew back.

But we avoided that bigger war.

It proved the technology.

It proved that triple sonic
reconnaissance worked.

I would say the A-12 not only
changed the course of history
in that area,

but maybe prevented a larger war.

And once you deal with
the North Koreans,

you deal with the Chinese.

So, if we had gone off
a little half cocked

with the North Koreans
during the Pueblo incident
and maybe attacked them,

things might be very,
very different today

and not very good.

As good as it was, the A-12
was simply a curtain raiser

to its faster,
more dynamic successor,

a plane that would
rewrite the rulebook.

The Blackbird SR-71.

(EXPLOSION)

NARRATOR: By the 1960s,

global tensions threatened
to descend into all-out war.

The developments
of stealth technology

offers a vital lifeline
to keep the peace.

Enter the Blackbird,

generally regarded as America's
most successful spy plane.

The SR-71 has a much
bigger sensor suite.

It could carry a number of
sensors that included cameras,

electronic intelligence
gathering, infrared cameras.

The SR-71 was
particularly effective

because of its speed
and its altitude,

so nothing could
actually catch it.

The Lockheed SR-71 was a pure
reconnaissance aircraft.

It was triple sonic,

so therefore it would cruise
in afterburner at Mach 3.2.

That's about 2,200mph.

That Blackbird is the fastest
plane ever made, period.

But, breaking aviation records
almost broke the plane.

The other problems were at that
altitude and at those speeds,
were the temperatures.

The skin of the aircraft,
depending on where
on the aircraft,

could be anything from 250
to something 550 degrees.

At Mach 3, the heat generated
from air friction alone

would simply melt the plane
mid-air.

They had to find new solutions.

Things like aluminium structures
simply weren't up to the task,

so they had to turn to new
materials such as titanium.

The interesting side story

is titanium reserves in US were
actually quite insignificant

and most of this titanium could
be found in the Soviet Union.

They had to use third parties
and front companies

as a subterfuge to manage
to get enough titanium to build
the A-12 and the SR-71.

The Soviet Union actually helps
build the SR-71 and the A-12.

(CHUCKLES)

The SR-71
flew on the edge of space

at a record-breaking
altitude of 85,000ft.

From 15 miles high,

the Blackbird's camera
photographed targets in
astonishing detail.

Stealthy, secret and quick.

MAN: The SR-71
is a 35-mile-a-minute aircraft.

You don't have to worry about
being shot down

with a surface-to-air missile.

The Blackbird could go where
no other plane would dare fly.

It was an aircraft that could
fly over heavily-defended areas

and that's why it was selected
to go ahead and fly

the Yom Kippur missions in 1973.

October the 6th, 1973.

The simmering tension
between Egypt and Israel

boils into all-out war.

Soviet-backed Egypt and Syria

attack Israel
and invade the tiny state.

The Middle East was the new
frontline in the Cold War.

US-backed Israel,
vigorously defends itself
against overwhelming odds.

An Israeli defeat could lead
to a global nuclear conflict.

The Soviets launched Cosmos 5,
a spy satellite,

bringing them immediate
intelligence from the battlefront,

putting them ahead of the US.

The United States
could not spare a satellite

to put into orbit
over that battlefield area.

So instead, they called upon
the services of the SR-71.

The mission was called
Operation Giant Reach.

Operation Giant Reach
was an SR-71 mission

over the Middle East
during the 1973 war.

It was to survey the area

and see how the Israelis
and Arab forces were configured

whether they were living up
to agreements made,

in order to help broker a peace.

The original flight plan
was just over eight hours,

which allowed the SR-71
to stop over in England to refuel,

and the crew to rest.

But, the British government
had other ideas.

And the British said,
'You can't land here.

'We don't wanna support anything
going on in the Middle East

cos we rely so heavily
on Middle East oil.'

So, instead of 8.5 hour mission,

it turned into 11 hours
and 20 minute mission

flying out of New York.

It would be the longest mission
a Blackbird had ever flown.

In the early hours
of October the 12th,

Jim Shelton took off from Griffiss
Air Force Base in New York,

on his vital
intelligence-gathering mission.

You wanna be over a target area

somewhere between
11 and one o'clock

to go ahead and get
the brightest sun.

Also, that allows
the photo interpreters

to have bits of shadows
so they can determine elevation,

heights of buildings,
and things of that nature.

Jim Shelton's mission
was top secret.

Neither the Egyptians
nor the Israelis knew about it.

The intelligence officer said,

'Don't be surprised
if the Israelis or Egyptians shoot
at you."

Undaunted, the SR-71
entered Egyptian airspace

and began photographing
its armed forces.

Jim Shelton's navigator
Gary Coleman,

alerts Jim with urgent news.

So now as we're coming down
the Suez, Gary tells me

Egyptian surface-to-air missiles
are tracking us.

It's not only the Egyptians
that are tracking the Blackbird.

As the US hadn't notified
the Israelis,

even though they were allies,

the Israelis weren't aware of
any incursion in their airspace

so they did launch some
surface-to-air missiles
against the SR-71.

Jet fighters are scrambled
to intercept the Blackbird.

JAMES: Then we get towards
Cairo area.

I could look down
and see contrails,

but I couldn't tell exactly

if those were Egyptian or Israeli
contrails I could see below us.

But, the Blackbird flew too high
for the fighters to attack.

Jim Shelton's crew began
to photograph the region.

The SR-71's nose camera

can capture an entire country
on film in just one hour

on 10.5 thousand feet of film.

Its mission provided
vital intelligence

that quite literally
changed the world.

It allowed the US to broker
a peace deal between Egypt

and Israeli Prime Minister
Golda Meier.

What I had heard was that

the State Department
advised Golda Meir

that she was further into Egypt

than she was letting
the rest of the world know.

She wanted to know how
and they said,

'We've got this photo.
Here's the battle line.'

And there's no arguing
against the photo

that shows troops
up so far into Egypt.

She'd backed up a little bit

when they finally signed
their negotiating treaty.

In its 35-year service record,

not one Blackbird SR-71 was lost,

demonstrating just how far
stealth ingenuity had come

since its inception.

Stealth technology has its roots
back in World War I

when Germany's
Rumpler Taube aircraft

experimented with camouflage.

You can barely see them
when they come over the lines.

To try to position yourself

to intercept them when they're
coming back is almost impossible.

The Rumpler Taube was used
for reconnaissance.

It was the first of its kind.

It had a translucent fuselage
which made it very difficult

for ground-based observers
to detect.

The early Rumpler Taubes

were very, actually,
flimsy aircraft,

and because of the nature
of the linen

covering the fuselage
and the wings, and the tail,

they're almost invisible
from the ground

because it's like
looking right through them

if the sun is shining.

These reconnaissance aircraft

also had an early form of stealth
technology applied to their wings

It's called
the lozenge camouflage.

The Germans experimented with
multiple colours and patterns

to counteract the aircraft
being seen from overhead

from observation balloons,

and in reverse from the ground,
from the trenches.

From the outset,
aircraft proved its ability

to capture vital intel
through reconnaissance.

In World War II,
British radar technology

brought even greater powers
of intelligence gathering.

There were hundreds of stations
across the coast,

all the way up from Scotland,
all the way down the south coast.

What was critical about
the radars was that

they were able to tell
something was coming in

at what height, what distance,

which direction
it was travelling.

It was tracking something
coming through,

and how many were coming in.

So, we needed to know
how many bombers were coming in,

how many Messerschmitts were
supporting those bombers,

and therefore how many fighters
and which squadrons we needed

to get up into the air.

Both sides were in a race to
develop the best radar systems.

But, as soon as one side
gained an advantage,

the other side found ways
to block it.

Germany had perfected a top secret
airborne radar system

known as Liechtenstein,

an aircraft-mounted radar
that was state-of-the-art.

The Liechtenstein radar is
a German airborne radar

that's used to detect
track and attack Allied bombers

and the Allied bomber offensive.

It's the mainstay
of the German night fighters

and more advanced than designs
the Allies had at the time.

This meant that Germany was able
to see deep into British airspace.

But events were about to

swing the balance of power
very dramatically.

(ENGINES ROARING)

NARRATOR: In World War II,

the struggle for dominance between
Germany and Britain intensified,

as both sides engaged in
a technological arms race.

It's a constant battle
between innovation in radar

and stealth technology.

May the 9th, 1943,

on the German-occupied
airfield of Aalborg, Denmark.

Luftwaffe flying ace
Heinrich Schmitt

takes off in his Junkers
with two other crewmen,

and disappears into the mist.

The aircraft is one of
the first 12 Junkers Ju 88

fitted with the new radar system.

But, Schmitt is not
planning a raid.

He's defecting.

Pilot Heinrich Schmitt cannot
reconcile his love of flying

with the Luftwaffe's
bombing campaign.

Schmitt was disillusioned with
the German regime at the time.

After a raid on the undefended
Spanish town of Guernica,

the pilots were taken on a visit

to see the devastation
they'd caused on the ground.

He was shown
the devastation afterwards,

the number of bodies
of women and children,

and swore not to use
air power again offensively,
regardless of situation.

Schmitt was horrified.

As a result
he was determined to defect

and also hand the British this
copy of the Lichtenstein radar

hoping to at least
give the British a leg up.

Schmitt had a fiancee
and she was Jewish.

While he was away flying,

she was taken to
a concentration camp and executed.

So, Schmitt was determined
to defeat the Nazis,

whatever the cost.

He began feeding intelligence
reports to his father
in Switzerland,

a former German diplomat who had
also rejected the Nazi cause.

Helped by his father, he began
to live two lives on the base.

One as a pilot. A second as a spy.

And help was close at hand.

The second crewmember
was Paul Rosenberger.

He was partly Jewish, which is
quite unusual for the Luftwaffe,

so he was also
politically motivated to defect.

Schmitt's chance came when his
crew was sent out on a sortie

to shoot down an unarmed
civilian Mosquito plane

flying from Scotland
to neutral Sweden.

On May the 9th, 1943,
they set off.

They flew out towards
the North Sea,

keeping the aircraft below radar.

A few miles from
the Scottish coast,

Schmitt appears on Allied radar

and two Spitfires are scrambled
from RAF Dyce.

They're quickly intercepted,
and Schmitt waggles his wing tips

to announce their intention
to surrender.

Allied planes escort the Junkers
back to the airfield.

The prized
Liechtenstein technology

is handed to
the Allied scientists.

Schmitt and Rosenberger had given
the British a vital advantage

over the Luftwaffe.

From its earliest beginnings,

stealth technology has provided
crucial intelligence

to military commanders
and world leaders.

For nearly 80 years,
spies ruled the skies,

but the Holy Grail of invisibility
eluded the US Air Force,

until the arrival
of a game changer.

The Lockheed F-117,

otherwise known as the Nighthawk.

But this wasn't just a spy plane.

This one can take out
the opposition.

The key combat role for
the Nighthawk during Gulf War

was attacking high-value
and highly-defended targets
in the heart of Baghdad.

The Nighthawk was the world's
first true stealth bomber.

Partly driving
the need for stealth

was the US experience in Vietnam
where they lost a lot of
aircraft

due to Soviet-controlled
surface-to-air missiles
in North Vietnam.

The programme to develop
the Nighthawk
was a Black Ops project.

Very few people in the Pentagon
even knew it existed.

The aircraft was delivered
to the United States Air Force
in 1982 through 1990.

Through most of that period,
it was a programme in secret

that the United States Air Force

kept from the public
and the world.

The Nighthawk's
distinctive angular lines

make it undetectable by radar.

The engine's exhausts
are two rectangular slits

located above its wings
to reduce infrared emissions,

and its distinctive faceting
reduces radar detection.

Faceting is the use
of flat panels

to diffract radar signals,
so the radio energy from a radar

is diffracted in such a way it
doesn't return to the radar dish.

Therefore there's
no radar return.

It has a radar signature
smaller than a marble.

But its angular, stealthy shape,

makes it inherently
unstable in flight.

The aircraft has very poor
aerodynamic qualities,

so it needs a computer to fly it,
it's an unstable aircraft.

Not designed with aerodynamics
in mind, but stealth.

That was first and foremost.

JAMES: They showed me this F-117,
the stealth fighter,

the first one coming down
the assembly line,

and I looked at that aeroplane,

I said, 'It'll never fly,
but would make a nice tie tack.'

The Nighthawk requires constant
flight corrections from a computer
to maintain flight.

The shape of the aeroplane
does make you think that it's...

There's a lot of ones and zeros
making that thing fly.

It has four computers
that make the thing fly.

Without computers,
the aeroplane won't fly.

The F-117 is silent, stealthy,

and comes with a powerful
sting in its tail.

Armed with laser-guided bombs,

it eliminates ground targets
with devastating efficiency.

1991, the Nighthawk briefly
emerges from the shadows

when America announces
its existence.

The reason? Iraq's increasing
defiance against the West.

International tensions run high,
but Iraq refuses to back down.

Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein

declares that he's preparing for
the mother of all battles.

The Nighthawk is about to play
a crucial role.

On the 17th of January, 1991,

Desert Storm kicked off.

America's President Bush

leads an international coalition
to strike Iraq.

The F-117 was deployed
in Operation Desert Storm

primarily to attack
strategic targets.

This was the Nighthawk's
first real test.

Was it truly battle ready?

The F-117 Nighthawk
really did receive

a true baptism of fire
during the Gulf War

when it was pitted against

some of the most highly-defended
targets on the planet.

That Nighthawk pilots
lived up to their given name.

The call sign of F-117 pilots
were bandits.

The F-117 fleet began their
long journey from the US,

finally landing in Saudi Arabia
on the 20th August,

after a gruelling 15-hour
non-stop flight.

The F-117 struck
early in the morning

on the 17th January, 1991,

directly into Baghdad,
and the intent was, is that,

using the stealth capability
of the F-117,

we could employ more stealth

by taking out the eyes and ears
of the Iraqi leadership.

Iraqi power stations,

military headquarters
and communications sensors,

were all targeted and destroyed
by the Nighthawk.

It had about
a 900-mile combat radius

it employed from Saudi Arabia,

and attacked principally
on the opening parts
of the war in Baghdad.

Then throughout the war,

it continued to employ against
command and control,

strategic targets, nuclear,
biological and chemical targets

and a lot of the hardened
aircraft shelters.

As a matter of fact, out of 600
aircraft shelters in Iraq,

375 were struck
throughout the war

by either 117s or F-111s.

It conducted 1,300 sorties

and scored direct hits
on 1,600 high value targets,

dropping 2,000 tonnes
of precision-guided bombs.

It was able to drop bombs without
anybody knowing they were coming,

and so they unleashed
not only a surprise on the enemy,

but had a psychological effect
that the bombs were
coming from nowhere.

The F-117 guys had the maxim,

'We own the night.'

70 to 75% of the bombs

were direct hits
on the exact location,

which was revolutionary
in warfare.

The success of the F-117
was a game changer.

I personally think that
the F-117 has revolutionised

the way we employ airpower
in the 21st century.

The F-117 was
the first platform we used

that allowed us to use
stealth technology

and precision-guided munitions
in concert,

to achieve effects immediately
in the battlespace,

and to essentially
blind the enemy leadership.

Stealth is an essential
art of war.

In the 5th century BC,

the legendary Chinese
battle general Sun Tzu,

used stealth
as one of his key tactics.

26 centuries later,

stealth planes
follow his legendary doctrine.

It's as dark and impenetrable
as the night.

It takes the enemy by surprise,
and strikes like a thunderbolt.

Today, stealth is taking the form
of unmanned drone aircraft,

flown by pilots from
the other side of the world,

capable of launching
attacks from five miles up.

In the future, we'll see
fully autonomous drones

spying, surveying, and striking.

Stealth began as the unseen
spy in the sky.

Now, it's an essential part
of aerial warfare.

The next generation
of jet fighters and bombers

fitted with stealth technology,

ready to attack under
the cloak of invisibility.

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