Fedden Mission

rdf:langString Fedden Mission

rdf:langString The Fedden Mission was a British scientific mission sent by the Ministry of Aircraft Production to Germany at the end of the Second World War in Europe, to gather technical intelligence about German aircraft and aeroengines. It was named for the Mission's leader, Roy Fedden. It visited Bad Oeynhausen, Bad Eilsen, Völkenrode, Braunschweig, Magdeburg, Oschersleben, Staßfurt, Dessau, Kothen, Nordhausen, Göttingen, Kassel, Eisenach, Frankfurt, Rüsselsheim, Darmstadt, Stuttgart, Esslingen, Reutlingen, Mengen, Lindau, Freising, Munich, Rosenheim, Kochel, Oberammergau, Kolbermoor, Salzburg, Spittal, Villach, and Klagenfurt. This is much less than the fifty-two locations they had intended to visit when the Mission began. The Mission was inspired in part by the similar American scientific mission, Operation Lusty, as well as by the German advances in jet aircraft and engines, as well as ballistic missiles, toward the war's end. It was also, in part, inspired by the desire to disarm Germany and prevent another postwar rise, like the one following the end of the First World War. (Unspoken, but also doubtless a factor, was a desire to keep Britain from becoming a second-rate nation.) In any event, the capture of German technology by both the United States and Soviet Union contributed to an acceleration of the postwar arms race. Organized at the instruction of Stafford Cripps, then Minister of Aircraft Production, the Mission consisted of Fedden; Dr W J Duncan, Professor of Aeronautics from University College of Hull, then seconded to the Royal Aircraft Establishment (RAE); J C King of RAE's Structural and Mechanical Engineering Department; Flight Lieutenant A B P Beeton, RAF, of RAE's Engine Department; Bert Newport of Rotol, Ltd. They were assisted by W J Stern of the Allied Control Commission and Wing Commander V Cross, RAF, the Mission's Liaison Officer to Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force (as well as its translator); their two RAF Dakotas were flown by F/L Reid, RAF, and F/L Cheany, RAFVR. These aircraft each carried one of the Mission's Jeeps, which they soon learned to unload and have on the road in only ten minutes. Everywhere the Mission went, it encountered looting by Allied troops and German civilians, and sabotage by German factory workers and the Heer (on Hitler's orders) The German scientists and technicians were, in general, very co-operative with the British interviewers, with Fedden mentioning "considerable apprehension" about their fate and some wishing to emigrate to the U.S. or Canada. (They had genuine concern about forced emigration to the Soviet Union, as many of the V-2 program scientists suffered.) The Mission particularly criticized the RLM for its starting and stopping of engine production programs.