Skunk Works: The Dream Factory for War

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[Chace]

My uncle worked there. As a child, he would give me all kinds of SR-71 swag (not a secret by then), until the invasion of Panama...and the reveal of the F117 Stealth Fighter. Then he could reveal that he’d been lying about working on the SR71, but had been working on the F117 all those years, and I got a gift package of F117 swag! I still have the shirt, tie, and tie-pin. Rest In Peace uncle Ray!

[MrAtrophy]

I met one of the designers of the f-117, and one thing he said he tells people first is that there is a 20-30 year gap between what he is doing and what he can talk about.

[twentypdrparrott]

The SR-71 in the Smithsonian has a painting of the little skunk on its tail fin. There is a tear dripping from one of its eyes. This signified the last flight for this particular plane.

[Swtum]

The book "Skunk Works" by former director Ben Ritch is a fantastic read. He was brought on by Kelly Johnson to work on the U-2, he was a key player on the A-12 and SR-71 projects, and is considered the "father of modern stealth" thanks to the F-117 project under his tenure as director.

[jasN]

I grew up in Palmdale, CA. I can't tell you how cool it was to see these planes flying, chasing each other in test missions, etc. All these planes that people only saw on TV, I would see almost every weekend morning, flying at breakneck speeds, causing things in your home to rattle when they created sonic booms high overhead.

As always, thanks to you and your team for another amazing video!

[garyleibitzke]

Kelly Johnson was a genius. One of, if not the best, aeronautical engineers of all time.

[Equationista]

Theme idea: semiconductor fabs. Each new generation required breakthroughs in material science, physics, chemistry, and, yes, mathematics. Currently, a new fab cost billions. You can't get much more megaproject-y than that!

[Real]

I love that the Nighthawk was the "Stealth Fighter" but did almost no fighting, just bombing. No one was going into a BFM fight with an F117. But then they developed an actual bomber in the B2 so now it wouldn't be right to call it the Stealth Bomber since B2 is definitely just that.

Raptor is the #2 most beautiful plane behind the F16 for me. Skunk Works is just one of America's greatest centers of aviation.

[edwardcnnell]

Skunk Works is part of the overall military strategy of the US born of the harsh lessons of WWII.

The US entered the war with many hastily developed weapons. It lacked a battlefield ready serviceable medium tank and quickly cobbled together the M-3 Lee tank which was sent to Briton for their use.

The US entered with the P-40 as it's main fighter and was outclassed by the Axis fighters. It also had the development of some better fighters that entered service in 1941 but the P40 was still the main fighter. There were navy fighters that had similar short comings.

What was learned that the policy of isolationism only allowed nations intent of conquest to invade allies and eventually wage war on the US.

All of that was couple with the advancement of the ability to project military power over long distances with increasing speed. By the time the war ended the forward staged invasion force of Normandy was replaced by an intercontinental invasion force to strike Japan.

The final factor was that new weapon systems were increasingly complex and development time significantly longer. The US would no longer be able to stand behind two oceans and play catch up to superior enemy weapons.

So the US has been developing weapons systems for tomorrow and replacements for the systems still in development trying to stay ahead of weapons development of potential enemies. This entails developing a system for a set of specifications, then developing to defeat a system an enemy would need to defeat that system. The goal of staying at least one or two steps ahead of all others,

The Skunk Works is actually a subset of a larger mega project.

[willjeffery]

I used to work amongst a small team in an experimental department for a Large Plant and agricultural tractor manufacturer. Our MD, after reading Skunk Works on holiday, personally bought all his engineers a copy. It is one of the most fascinating books I have read. Highly recommended.

[agtga]

Let's get a mega projects about Simon Whistler and how he runs 25, 000 YouTube channels lol.

[XYGamingRemedyG]

"I would link them below but unfortunately I've got 22 YouTube channels to run"

[joshuazelinsky]

Really well done as always Simon. Minor note: A sonic boom doesn't occur just when a plane goes through the speed of sound but occurs for the entire time it is going above the speed of sound. It comes across as just a single "boom" to a ground observer because the aircraft is only above or near them for a very small amount of time.

[truxlee]

The Lockheed "Shooting Star" eventually evolved into the "T-33 (T-Bird)" advanced trainer first used for qualifying experienced fighter pilots to fly pure jet aircraft. These trainer models were built in the USA, Canada, and Japan in fairly large numbers.

[kordin]

Simon's going to need to need to register as a defense contactor for the US and USSR, due to mega cash he's raking in off the cold ❄️ war

[trj]

Mega projects suggestion: the Snowy Mountains Hydro Electric Scheme.

[CP]

The book, "Skunk Works" by Ben Rich and Leo Janos is quite worth a read.

[alectorres]

Less of a megaprojects and more biographics one but maybe Clarence “Kelly” Johnson to father of so many of these megaprojects?

[NK-lhws]

requesting the enigma
and the decoding of enigma and machine that decoded it

[zevbleuler]

SR-71: by far the baddest looking aircraft anywhere... ever. (Works well too)