Aeronautics Industry

Giovanni Abrate · Guest

A special program dedicated to the Judica-Cordiglia brothers will air in
Italy on the History Channel on May 18.
The program was produced for the History Channel a couple of months back and
features extensive interviews, historical footage and voice recordings from
the 1960s.
We understand the program will also air soon thereafter on many History
Channel feeds in several Countries.
Giovanni

OM · Guest

On Fri, 13 Apr 2007 10:23:19 -0400, "Giovanni Abrate"
<tryphon@adelphia.net> wrote:

mike flugennock · Guest

OM wrote:

Giovanni Abrate · Guest

Well, I am not in Italy and I am only a humble reporter!
They allowed me to contribute a chapter in their book, on the early days of
the Paperclip guys in the US.
I have a complimentary copy for you, by the way...
Take care,
Giovanni

"OM" <om@all_trolls_must_DIE.com> wrote in message
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Jim Oberg · Guest

Here is a draft statement I am preparing for my home page. I would
appreciate
any critical comments or proposed factual corrections to it.

1. In November 2006 I took part in an interview for a production of a
documentary called 'Space Hackers', that detailed the claims of two Italian
radio amateurs - the Judica-Cordeglia brothers --in the 1960s concerning
secrets of Soviet space missions. The brothers, in Turin in northern Italy,
operated an amateur radio receiving facility called 'Torre Bert'.

2. This statement for the record is an effort to insure an accurate public
disclosure of my true assessments of these claims.

3. I had a pleasant time with the documentary producers. I congratulated the
brothers for publicizing the way that amateur radio listeners could
contribute to investigating space secrets. The worldwide publicity around
their claims in 1961-1962 encouraged many other radio amateurs to attempt
their own 'space eavesdropping', sometimes with spectacular success. See for
example the story of Britain's "Kettering Group".

4. I also stated clearly that none of the more sensational Judica-Cordeglia
claims of secret discoveries were confirmed, and in hindsight, all records,
memoirs, artifacts, and interviews are totally inconsistent with any of the
stories being true. No space historian today believes that any of these
claimed events actually happened.

5. Late in November I received a copy of the brothers' new book, provided by
the generosity of Giovanni Abrate, one of the loyal supporters of the
brothers claim. I appreciate his generosity.

6. The title is "Dossier Sputnik: "..questo il mondo non lo sapra.".

I translate the title as the alleged quote from a stranded cosmonaut, "Else
the world will not find out."

7. Armed with some basics of Italian and pretty good Latin and French, and
with specific assistance from an Italian-speaking friend, I surveyed the
book's claims. I gradually became more and more dismayed with the contents.

8. The book appears to make no mention of the consensus of space historians
that the sensational claims were not credible, and the authors give no
replies to criticisms published over the past thirty years. Instead, the
book continues the pretense that such criticisms and refutations do not
exist.

9. As far as I could tell, the book provides no new independent confirmation
of any of the most interesting claims, except second-hand assertions from
the authors that other people did receive some of the same signals -- but
not verifiable statements directly from such alleged witnesses.

10. The book makes no mention (that I could find) that more than a
generation of Soviet-era and post-Soviet revelations about their cosmonaut
program provide not a single supportive datum of evidence concerning 'secret
lost cosmonauts'. In fact, the massive disclosures, interviews, memorabilia
sales, and more all establish quite conclusively that the claims (and names)
of such dead cosmonauts have no basis in reality.

11. The book provides no verifiable evidence for claims that signals
directly from the Vostok (Yuri Gagarin) spacecraft in 1961 were actually
received in Italy, especially since the orbit of the spacecraft was at all
times out of range of Italy and during the minutes of closest approach, on
its way back to Earth, the spacecraft was undergoing deceleration and plasma
blockage of radio. Voice signals recorded earlier and relayed by news agency
transmitters or even hams may have been received and misidentified, but I
have no reason to believe the claim that the brothers picked up authentic
live transmissions.

12. The book provides no verifiable evidence that live signals directly from
the Mercury-6 (John Glenn) spacecraft in February 1962 were actually
received, especially since the orbit of the spacecraft was at all times far
out of range of Italy. The claim that they determined the secret radio
frequency from a photograph of an antenna is not convincing since the
antenna they refer to is a post-landing rescue beacon, not even deployed or
activated until after the capsule was in the water.

13.. I am disappointed by the misleading attempt on page 258 to present a
Soviet drawing of Luna-3 (the backside imager of 1959) as a reliable
representation of Luna-4 (1965), which was an entirely different design that
by all available accounts had no in-flight imaging capability -- an
inconvenient fact regarding the claim to have received moon images from
Luna-4. What is now known about the Luna-4 spacecraft - from its builders,
from its documentation, from its factory museum - is that it had no intent
or even capability to take lunar surface images on route to the moon, and
the "Soviet moon photographs" released by the brothers must have come from
some other origin.

14. The new book provides no verifiable documentation about the claimed 1964
meeting at NASA headquarters except one poor photograph of the brothers in
front of the 'NASA' sign on the sidewalk in Washington, DC -- a photograph
that any tourist could make. No official named by the book has ever been
located (well, it WAS more than 40 years ago).

15. I am astonished by the poor quality and small size of the book's
illustrations, especially those (such as logbooks and maps) that if readable
might have presented corroborative and verifiable evidence to support the
claims. But as shown in the book's pages, no decipherable information can be
extracted from them.

16. I am tempted to conclude that the purpose of the book is nostalgic
glorification of the 'legend of Torre Bert' with no attempt at presenting a
fair, full, and credible discussion of the controversies over the claims. It
appears to be nothing more than a lengthy self-indulgent fantasy, and one
that is not as honest as the events demand.

17. I communicated these concerns to Mr. Abrate in late November 2006, but
he was unable to provide any additional evidence enhancing the all-too-low
credibility of the original claims.

18. I offer no explanation of the gap between these claims and what seems to
be an authentic consensus of historians and of every other space radio
expert in the world. I did note references to how Italian journalists would
'camp out' at the Torre Bert facility just waiting for yet another
sensational revelation of Soviet space secrets that the brothers, first in
the world, kept discovering. Perhaps this situation can provide a basis for
speculation but not by me, at this time.

19. Two websites devoted to advocating the authenticity of the claims are:

http://www.lostcosmonauts.com/ and

http://www.judicacordiglia.com/

I note in passing that the 'Lost Cosmonauts' site declares a copyright on
Russian space photographs with cosmonaut-deletion forgeries, photos that I
first discovered and published in the early 1970s.

20. A good overview of the controversy can be found in Jeff Scott's

2005 article at http://www.aerospaceweb.org/question/conspiracy/q0235.shtml

Another good discussion is at
http://www.astrosurf.com/luxorion/qsl-torre-bert.htm

A technical analysis by one of the world's leading amateur 'space radio
listeners, Sven Grahn of Sweden (a veteran of the worldwide 'Kettering Group'
led by the legendary, late British schholteacher Geoffrey Perry), is at
http://www.svengrahn.pp.se/trackind/Torre/TorreB.html

21. My conclusion is that the new book provides no impetus to alter the
accepted historical assessment of these issues. Indeed, the poverty (nay,
complete absence) of any evidential or factual or logical support for claims
of alternate interpretations, seems to me to make a strong case against the
need to pay attention to such alternative speculations.

Jim Oberg · Guest

The book spells the family name as Judica Cordiglia. My bad.

"Jim Oberg" <joberg@houston.rr.com> wrote in message
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Giovanni Abrate · Guest

Hi Jim.
I understand that the second printing of the book has better pictures: I
haven't received a copy yet. The pictures in the first edition are rather
small.
My post was about the History Channel program, not the book: we'll have to
wait for the program to air before passing relevant comments.
In Italy, it will receive a public pre-broadcast screening in Turin, with
the Judica Cordiglia brothers attending and answering questions from the
public and the press.
Incidentally, only last week I received a message from a former USAF
intelligence officer, telling me that he could personally confirm the
veracity of 90% of the secret flights mentioned in the "Lost Cosmonauts"
website. This is only the latest in a number of similar supporting
correspondence received from various former intelligence officers in the
course of the last few years. At least one of them, I believe, corresponded
with you and provided a similar confirming statement.
I believe the History Channel program includes interviews with several of
the people who attended the intercepts as they occurred: some of these
persons are well known in Italy as veteran journalists or respected
scientists.
I look forward to the airing of the program in the US.
Take care,
Giovanni

Jim Oberg · Guest

Thanks for reminding me of this genre of testimony, Giovanni.
I've been familiar with such stories for many, many years, and
have categorized them as typical military-insider 'folklore' that
gets heard in halls, whispered around, absorbed into one's
own experiences (I call the process 'narrative centrification',
it's common in tales from workers in former secret projects, that
they first hear a rumor from a friend, keep retelling it, and with each
repetition move themselves closer to the center of the action until
they are the ones with first-hand experience, rather than hearsay.

Basically, many low-level military people back in the 1960s did believe the
reports of secret Russian cosmonauts. A famous example is the
long article in 'Ramparts' about 1971, treated in my articles on 'phantom
cosmonauts'. But there is no evidence that those stories were based on
actual military technological sources -- they seem to merely reflect what
was extant in popular culture. Robert Heinlein reported such a story that
was contemporary with an early Soviet space shot.

These are decades-old rumors. What is absent is an explanation of how the
now-accessible Soviet-era archives were so thoroughly (in this theory)
expunged of all records related to ANY such mission.

I've held the ORIGINAL diaries of Vasiliy Mishin in my hands, and spent
many hours poring through them. All sorts of secrets, and disasters, are
discussed in them. But nothing -- not a syllable -- about secret cosmonaut
orbital missions with fatal results. The same with Kamanin's diaries.

I am baffled to think of any explanation
except that these missions did not take place.

"Giovanni Abrate" <tryphon@adelphia.net> wrote in message
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Giovanni Abrate · Guest

"Jim Oberg" <joberg@houston.rr.com> wrote in message
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Jim Oberg · Guest

Fine, let's all talk to them. Please forward my name and email
and ask them to contact me.

"Giovanni Abrate" <tryphon@adelphia.net> wrote in message
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Greg D. Moore (Strider) · Guest

"Jim Oberg" <joberg@houston.rr.com> wrote in message
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Giovanni Abrate · Guest

That would be a breach of their confidence.
Jim, I believe one of them has corresponded or talked to you in the past.
As I said, I don't really care if others believe it, as long as I am
reassured by these independent corroborations. I am not out to make
converts....
Take care,
Giovanni

"Jim Oberg" <joberg@houston.rr.com> wrote in message
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Jim Oberg · Guest

You said one guy talked about his experiences at a dinner party.
Was that party 'private'? Did he have any expectation of confidentiality?

Sadly, I had little expectation that you would provide checkable
assertions for yet another "he-told-me-I'm-right-IN-SECRET"
datum. So far, all such claims by the J-C fratelli turn out the same way.

"Trust us."

I don't think most folks around here play by those rules.

Jim O

"Giovanni Abrate" <tryphon@adelphia.net> wrote in message
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Dale Carlson · Guest

On Mon, 16 Apr 2007 20:36:11 -0400, "Giovanni Abrate"
<tryphon@adelphia.net> wrote:

OM · Guest

On Mon, 16 Apr 2007 09:12:05 -0500, "Jim Oberg"
<joberg@houston.rr.com> wrote: