Lots of shady missile deals went down in West Asia/North Africa in the 60/70s. Somewhat related: Israel was collaborating with Iran on missile projects but allegedly planned to deceive them by providing outdated missiles while using Iranian funds to develop superior versions for themselves [0].
I read from somewhere that Italy, Libya and some South America country were developing missile programs together, too. Probably from a book about Fiat I think.
>While Pahlavi's authorities were happy with this project and its advancement away from the eyes of the US in their view, Israel had carefully duped Pahlavi to secure its interests. According to Israel's plan, during this project, contrary to what Iran's top officials think, Iran would only achieve obsolete technology.
and in the original source [0]:
>A very senior source in the Israeli Ministry of Defense reveals that the weapons deal with Iran was fraudulent. With each of the six joint proj-ects, the Israelis planned to deceive the Iranians by providing them only an outdated version of the weapon in question, while using Iranian money to build a new generation for Israel's exclusive use.
Not sure what's the historical validity for that one source saying it was fraudulent, but this sure reads like anachronism. As someone that tries to defend him being part of selling ballistic missiles to Iran a very short time before it turning into a theocracy.
I am not completely inclined to believe Bergman because of me personally knowing one case where he published something completely wrong, and also this doesn't align with the cooperation Israel had with pre-revolution Iran.
Summary: Egypt was going to develop an indigenous fighter in the 1960's based off of a mostly finished Spanish design by a post WWII otherwise unemployed Willy Messerschmitt.
I First heard of the project via a pretty good youtube documentary https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nqIpJuqvsWQ Messerschmitt's Remarkably Good Supersonic Fighter (Not A Pound For Air To Ground)
The wonderful book "Rise and Kill First" is a history of Israeli assassinations, with their policy of going after the "head of the snake". There are some interesting sections on how Israel used assassination to inhibit missile programs in the Middle East, including Egypt. Its a pretty easy read despite being long.
I've been enjoying the Firefox translate, but for some reason sometimes it doesn't show the option to engage it, and I have to fall back to running things through duck.ai
Too shy to file a formal bug or let the cloud know what I'm OSINTing :-)
If you want an interesting related story that's so incredible people wouldn't believe if it was a film plot, look up Otrag. Not the Wikipedia page, that only tells a fraction of the full story. There's a documentary floating around somewhere about their work in Zaire under Mobutu before they started building ballistic missiles for Gaddafi.
Both cases remind me of Project Harp (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_HARP). After the project was shut down by the US and Canada, the engineer behind it (Gerald Bull) decided to work for Saddam Hussein to build a "Babylon Cannon" which then caused Mossad to 'intervene' in 1990:
I wonder how many similar but unknown cases there are involving former Soviet scientists and engineers trying their luck with 3rd world despots after the Soviet Union collapsed.
PS: just remembered that Willy Messerschmitt also ended up building a jet fighter for Egypt after the project was abandondend by Spain. Egypt then also eventually cancelled the project in 1969 though and instead decided to become close buddies with the Soviet Union - I wonder if that decision saved Messerschmitt from the same fate as Krug and Bull:
And Kurt Tank, father of the FW190 among other things, built the Pulqui for Argentina until it was nixed by a combination of the fall of Perón and heavy US pressure to make sure Argentina never developed a domestic fighter industry, after which he went to India and create the Marut. He could have been building them for the UK but they turned down one of the world's foremost aircraft designers because they couldn't see a need for him.
Fortunately, there is no need for despots in our superior first world, where all peoples are steered in eunuch-like consumerist subservience to the interests and designs of the City on the Hill, of an oligarchy with global pretense (which obviously includes the riches of the third world). The need for despotic punishment of insubordinate vassals does arise occasionally, but the lesson is quickly learnt and its repetition feared, so any rebellion against freedom and democracy is quickly stifled.
I wanted to provide a counter point, or rather, a more balanced and self-conscious vision. As to your definition of what "third world" meant, that's not how I remember it (but I grew up in West Germany, and the GDR may have defined terms differently). The "third world", according to the Western definition, definitely were those countries that were poor (and also perceived as primitive and culturally backwards, so the term eventually came to be seen as stigmatizing, at least with left-leaning people).
What you're referring to, the unaligned countries/states, were called "blockfreie Staaten", and they were not "promoted" in Western propaganda as featuring "despots", but still could end up being bombed (democratically), like founder state Yugoslaviya.
But it is also true that many "third world" countries joined the block-free group, so there is considerable overlap.
> As to your definition of what "third world" meant, that's not how I remember it
And the reading you adopted is a simplified superstition.
The expression 'Tiers Monde' was coined by academician Alfred Sauvy in an article on l'Observateur (14 August 1952), to express that the countries not directly aligned to the "two blocks" are akin to the social "third state" as a worldwide class that will demand a better position.
> Nous parlons volontiers des deux mondes en présence, de leur guerre possible, de leur coexistence, etc., oubliant trop souvent qu’il en existe un troisième, le plus important, et en somme, le premier dans la chronologie. C’est l’ensemble de ceux que l’on appelle, en style Nations Unies, les pays sous-développés. [...] Ce qui importe à chacun des deux mondes, c’est de conquérir le troisième ou du moins de l’avoir de son côté. Et de là viennent tous les troubles de la coexistence. [...] Car enfin ce Tiers Monde ignoré, exploité, méprisé comme le Tiers Etat, veut, lui aussi, être quelque chose.
The expression 'Tiers Monde', which works as "the part to remember in the opposition of the two blocks at war", is coined mirroring the 1789 pamphlet of
Emmanuel-Joseph Sieyès "Qu'est-ce que le Tiers-État ?": «Que demande-t-il [le Tiers-État] ? À devenir quelque chose». And Sauvy stresses that the same rise is coming in the global context.
« the countries not directly aligned to the "two blocks" are akin to the social "third state" as a worldwide class » — That's the economic (rather than political) definition right there in 1952. Les pays sous-développés … et aussi exploités … le Tiers État.
Do you think the Soviets would have called the US aligned countries "First World"? ;)
The more 'correct' term for that modern/popular meaning of 3rd world is 'developing countries' (or in German "Entwicklungslaender"). But tbh, I have no idea when, how and why the transition from 'politically unaligned country' to 'underdeveloped country' happened in the modern popular opinion - the Wikipedia article has some ideas though - but tbh I would never have considered Cold Ware era Cuba or Vietnam to be "3rd world countries", and after 1990 the whole idea behind those "three worlds" has lost all meaning anyway, and especially after China had entered the chat.
Yugoslavia and Albania are more interesting cases though indeed, at least Yugoslavia tried to play both sides during the cold war, while Albania started as a very close Soviet ally but then moved towards China and then eventually ending up as completely isolationist.
Also as a clear example for a '2nd world despot' look at Romania's Ceausescu, and for examples of '1st world despots' look at Spain under Franco (easy to forget that Spain was a fascist dictatorship until the 1970s), or Chile under Pinochet.
> nobody uses the old definition because it's no longer WW2
These are Cold War terms (post WW2). And for the Cold War era it makes sense to use the original meaning.
IMHO the term "3rd world country" shouldn't be used in the first place when talking about the time after the early 1990s though. It's misleading and the "modern" meaning comes with a hefty whiff of implied racism/colonialism.
« quite literally » – Not what I remember, but okay, that may have been the original meaning before I "entered the chat". Then, it was associated with hunger, poverty, misery. I remember distinctly.
« Do you think the Soviets » – Right, that was silly. They had their own propaganda.
« Spain was a fascist dictatorship until the 1970s » – It seems the worst thing they ever did was aiding and abetting the U.S. Air Force. Certainly shameful, but then again "not a unique selling proposition" in Europe.
Funny enough the uploader has made that video unavailable in Germany (OTRAG was a German company, the first private/commercial aerospace company about 3 decades before SpaceX).
Scott Manley has a video about them, and that's also available in Germany ;)
Kind of sad that they didn’t work out. I really wish German industry had a little more willpower to get things done instead of giving up so easily. That’s one strength of the US. They just keep marching forward and have enough investors that are willing to take the risk.
I remain astounded that (a) all this footage actually exists and (b) someone made an entire documentary about it. I'd never heard of this stuff until I talked to someone who claimed to have helped finance the project at the time.
As far as I’m aware if you are talking about the Kinzhal it’s a quasi-ballistic missile not really a true hypersonic missile so it’s easy to intercept. They also claim a range of 2000km but that includes the airplane’s range.
Yes, the Kinzhal is a second stage of Iskander launched from a special Mig-31.
It is not necessarily a bad weapon but the key innovation was to save money by using the Mig as reusable first stage. Pretending it is in the same class as true hypersonic glide vehicles was just PR.
Russia is now giving up on it because it didn't work out for some reason, maybe the Migs are more expensive to operate than planned or the weapon has no element if surprise be if the special Mig starts you know the missiles are coming?
> hunting its top scientists [...] this discourages other scientists from following that career path
I take it you mean this literally (assassinations) rather than figuratively (getting hired by the competition).
> In recent years US has been hit so hard
Any evidence of this? Other than the storm in a cup that was the recent news of "dead scientists" that turned out to be a nothingburger.
The idea sounds very plausible and it happens again and again elsewhere (e.g. Israel keeps taking out Iranian scientists). But I haven't heard anything major from the US, and I doubt the US would take it lightly and keep everything quiet, especially with the current admin who would kill for more media distractions for the people.
You don't normally hear about these things if/when they happen, there is no official reaction, and you don't normally hear about the retaliation, either.
Love it. Im not American nor have my country any interest in this, but definitely promoting the webz narrative that this is nothing, storm in a teacup, nothing to see here , move along while keeping wacking key figures, would be a plausible plan.
Fortunately governments dont care about reddit sentiment and they seem to be looking, per the CNN article.
The US acts as god, it can't tolerate any nation outpacing it, you are allowed to be a client state, never a sovereign one with your own currency, your own defense industry and your own energy independence
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Project_Flower
>While Pahlavi's authorities were happy with this project and its advancement away from the eyes of the US in their view, Israel had carefully duped Pahlavi to secure its interests. According to Israel's plan, during this project, contrary to what Iran's top officials think, Iran would only achieve obsolete technology.
and in the original source [0]:
>A very senior source in the Israeli Ministry of Defense reveals that the weapons deal with Iran was fraudulent. With each of the six joint proj-ects, the Israelis planned to deceive the Iranians by providing them only an outdated version of the weapon in question, while using Iranian money to build a new generation for Israel's exclusive use.
[0] https://books.google.com/books?id=NkxZcHL1xdYC&pg=PA6&redir_...
I am not completely inclined to believe Bergman because of me personally knowing one case where he published something completely wrong, and also this doesn't align with the cooperation Israel had with pre-revolution Iran.
In any case, it's theoretically possible, I guess
Summary: Egypt was going to develop an indigenous fighter in the 1960's based off of a mostly finished Spanish design by a post WWII otherwise unemployed Willy Messerschmitt.
I First heard of the project via a pretty good youtube documentary https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nqIpJuqvsWQ Messerschmitt's Remarkably Good Supersonic Fighter (Not A Pound For Air To Ground)
https://www.intelligence.org.il/?module=articles&item_id=16&...
Too shy to file a formal bug or let the cloud know what I'm OSINTing :-)
The language detection definitely isn't 100%.
On desktop there's always "Translate page" in the hamburger menu. On Android it's in the 3 dot menu, hidden behind "More".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerald_Bull
I wonder how many similar but unknown cases there are involving former Soviet scientists and engineers trying their luck with 3rd world despots after the Soviet Union collapsed.
PS: just remembered that Willy Messerschmitt also ended up building a jet fighter for Egypt after the project was abandondend by Spain. Egypt then also eventually cancelled the project in 1969 though and instead decided to become close buddies with the Soviet Union - I wonder if that decision saved Messerschmitt from the same fate as Krug and Bull:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helwan_HA-300
it's all human decisions. especially at institutional level, there's no causing others to act
> action by Bull that 'caused' a reaction by Mossad"
I object to the total abdication of responsibility for the “reaction”.
Fortunately, there is no need for despots in our superior first world, where all peoples are steered in eunuch-like consumerist subservience to the interests and designs of the City on the Hill, of an oligarchy with global pretense (which obviously includes the riches of the third world). The need for despotic punishment of insubordinate vassals does arise occasionally, but the lesson is quickly learnt and its repetition feared, so any rebellion against freedom and democracy is quickly stifled.
Back in the Cold War the 'division' of the world into power blocs was quite simple:
- 1st world: countries aligned with the USA
- 2nd world: countries aligned with the USSR
- 3rd world: independent countries that were neither aligned with the US nor USSR
E.g. in its actual meaning, 3rd world doesn't say anything about how rich or poor a country is, or about its form of government.
I wanted to provide a counter point, or rather, a more balanced and self-conscious vision. As to your definition of what "third world" meant, that's not how I remember it (but I grew up in West Germany, and the GDR may have defined terms differently). The "third world", according to the Western definition, definitely were those countries that were poor (and also perceived as primitive and culturally backwards, so the term eventually came to be seen as stigmatizing, at least with left-leaning people).
What you're referring to, the unaligned countries/states, were called "blockfreie Staaten", and they were not "promoted" in Western propaganda as featuring "despots", but still could end up being bombed (democratically), like founder state Yugoslaviya.
But it is also true that many "third world" countries joined the block-free group, so there is considerable overlap.
And the reading you adopted is a simplified superstition.
The expression 'Tiers Monde' was coined by academician Alfred Sauvy in an article on l'Observateur (14 August 1952), to express that the countries not directly aligned to the "two blocks" are akin to the social "third state" as a worldwide class that will demand a better position.
> Nous parlons volontiers des deux mondes en présence, de leur guerre possible, de leur coexistence, etc., oubliant trop souvent qu’il en existe un troisième, le plus important, et en somme, le premier dans la chronologie. C’est l’ensemble de ceux que l’on appelle, en style Nations Unies, les pays sous-développés. [...] Ce qui importe à chacun des deux mondes, c’est de conquérir le troisième ou du moins de l’avoir de son côté. Et de là viennent tous les troubles de la coexistence. [...] Car enfin ce Tiers Monde ignoré, exploité, méprisé comme le Tiers Etat, veut, lui aussi, être quelque chose.
http://www.homme-moderne.org/societe/demo/sauvy/3mondes.html
The expression 'Tiers Monde', which works as "the part to remember in the opposition of the two blocks at war", is coined mirroring the 1789 pamphlet of Emmanuel-Joseph Sieyès "Qu'est-ce que le Tiers-État ?": «Que demande-t-il [le Tiers-État] ? À devenir quelque chose». And Sauvy stresses that the same rise is coming in the global context.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_World
Do you think the Soviets would have called the US aligned countries "First World"? ;)
The more 'correct' term for that modern/popular meaning of 3rd world is 'developing countries' (or in German "Entwicklungslaender"). But tbh, I have no idea when, how and why the transition from 'politically unaligned country' to 'underdeveloped country' happened in the modern popular opinion - the Wikipedia article has some ideas though - but tbh I would never have considered Cold Ware era Cuba or Vietnam to be "3rd world countries", and after 1990 the whole idea behind those "three worlds" has lost all meaning anyway, and especially after China had entered the chat.
Yugoslavia and Albania are more interesting cases though indeed, at least Yugoslavia tried to play both sides during the cold war, while Albania started as a very close Soviet ally but then moved towards China and then eventually ending up as completely isolationist.
Also as a clear example for a '2nd world despot' look at Romania's Ceausescu, and for examples of '1st world despots' look at Spain under Franco (easy to forget that Spain was a fascist dictatorship until the 1970s), or Chile under Pinochet.
These are Cold War terms (post WW2). And for the Cold War era it makes sense to use the original meaning.
IMHO the term "3rd world country" shouldn't be used in the first place when talking about the time after the early 1990s though. It's misleading and the "modern" meaning comes with a hefty whiff of implied racism/colonialism.
« Do you think the Soviets » – Right, that was silly. They had their own propaganda.
« Spain was a fascist dictatorship until the 1970s » – It seems the worst thing they ever did was aiding and abetting the U.S. Air Force. Certainly shameful, but then again "not a unique selling proposition" in Europe.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=EA0XfkboFIY
Scott Manley has a video about them, and that's also available in Germany ;)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ed4w4Cz5ccU
PS: GP probably meant this one (this is just the trailer of a German documentary from 2018):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXDdKuRANbc
I remain astounded that (a) all this footage actually exists and (b) someone made an entire documentary about it. I'd never heard of this stuff until I talked to someone who claimed to have helped finance the project at the time.
It is not necessarily a bad weapon but the key innovation was to save money by using the Mig as reusable first stage. Pretending it is in the same class as true hypersonic glide vehicles was just PR.
Russia is now giving up on it because it didn't work out for some reason, maybe the Migs are more expensive to operate than planned or the weapon has no element if surprise be if the special Mig starts you know the missiles are coming?
I take it you mean this literally (assassinations) rather than figuratively (getting hired by the competition).
> In recent years US has been hit so hard
Any evidence of this? Other than the storm in a cup that was the recent news of "dead scientists" that turned out to be a nothingburger.
The idea sounds very plausible and it happens again and again elsewhere (e.g. Israel keeps taking out Iranian scientists). But I haven't heard anything major from the US, and I doubt the US would take it lightly and keep everything quiet, especially with the current admin who would kill for more media distractions for the people.
“FBI looks into dead or missing scientists tied to NASA, Blue Origin, SpaceX” (fortune.com)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47858246
233 points | 3 months ago | 170 comments
That being said: https://edition.cnn.com/2026/04/21/us/deaths-disappearances-...
Fortunately governments dont care about reddit sentiment and they seem to be looking, per the CNN article.
The US acts as god, it can't tolerate any nation outpacing it, you are allowed to be a client state, never a sovereign one with your own currency, your own defense industry and your own energy independence
See also:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassinations_of_Iranian_nucl...
And in current era:
https://www.newsweek.com/chinese-scientists-have-been-dying-...
Suffice to say: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_dinar