• You are using the old High Contrast theme. We have installed a new dark theme for you, called UI.X. This will work better with the new upgrade of our software. You can select it at the bottom of any page.

Cold War history question for our vets

Status
Not open for further replies.
B

brigadier

Member
Joined
Oct 10, 2007
Messages
404
I have a quick question for you guys. One of my neighbors has been hanging out with this guy claiming to be a Viet Nam vet and that appears to be true. However, he has mentioned something to me that I have not been able to find any information to verify.
In a short debate, he claimed that there was a military engagement between US and Soviet Union forces during the spring of 1976. The details I have been given is that the engagement was the result of a USSR massacre in which the Red Army gun fire came to close to American forces (he never said what the American forces were doing there) and the US forces opened fire on the Red Army.
I am told that this happened in February or March and the man mentioned some place called: Lichtenfelds.

Does anyone know if there is any truth to this?
 
Maybe in Lichtenfels, Germany, maybe in the winter of 1946.

Lichtenfels is in northern Bavaria, close to the border w/east germany. It may have been a cross border incident where the Soviets were on the other side of the Main river conducting abuse of women or massacres of, well, lots of people like Russian POWs, Vlasov's Army, DPs from conquered states.

In my reading, many times GIs wanted to tangle with the Soviets over their gruesome behavior on their side of the border.

My friend's mother grew up in East Prussia and fled the Soviet advance. Her descriptions of their behavior are appalling.

No way in 1976.
 
There may have been "something" take place, but the more credible "rumors" are usually about "near incursions" from Soviet/Russian aircraft along the "buffer zone".

There was a lot of rumors about the USS Thresher having been torpedoed by a Soviet sub, back in 1963. The "official" word was that some pipes in the sub had eroded, and may have caused a fire which resulted with the sub imploding. Makes you wonder about the "erosion" theory, though, since the Thresher was launched in 1961!

There have supposedly been dozens of unidentified cold-water divers that have washed ashore in remote areas of Alaska....supposedly near junctions of the oil pipeline.
 
There may have been "something" take place, but the more credible "rumors" are usually about "near incursions" from Soviet/Russian aircraft along the "buffer zone".

There was a lot of rumors about the USS Thresher having been torpedoed by a Soviet sub, back in 1963. The "official" word was that some pipes in the sub had eroded, and may have caused a fire which resulted with the sub imploding. Makes you wonder about the "erosion" theory, though, since the Thresher was launched in 1961!

There have supposedly been dozens of unidentified cold-water divers that have washed ashore in remote areas of Alaska....supposedly near junctions of the oil pipeline.
Click to expand...

Whatever little else I know, I can set your mind at ease regarding the USS Thresher. A brazed joint in a seawater pipe exposed to submergence pressure gave way (bad QA on the brazing rod material and maybe a bad braze too), leaking/flooding large amounts of water into the engineering spaces. The spraying water also caused a loss of electrical power which scrammed the nuclear reactor. The procedures at the time caused them to lose all propulsion when this happened, and that combined with the water flooding in, and an unrelated failure of their air system prevented them from blowing their ballast tanks and going to the surface.

Operating procedures and QA on everything got changed a lot after that. I was fortunate to serve in submarines 25 years after the Thresher and we trained extensively on how it was going to turn out differently for us the next time we had a seawater leak (we had several ourselves, almost every boat does a couple of times).

That doesn't take away from your original point, though. You could make a stronger argument about the USS Scorpion being lost to an enemy attack in 1968 (the post-Cold War declassified explanation is that one of her own torpedos was faulty and detonated inside the Scorpion). See "Blind Man's Bluff" for a good write up of the sub stuff.
 
I agree with Slugless. There may have been an incident in 1946 between the US and USSR but no way in 1976. The Soviets committed a lot of atrocities during and immediately after the war against Russians, Poles, and Germans. It is entirely possible that American troops got pulled into a minor engagement after seeing the Soviets commit some of these acts.

But it is highly unlikely that there was any kind of military engagement between the US and the USSR during the 1970's.
 
First, i'm agreed that 1976 incident is a BS.

As for "atrocities" caused by Red army in Germany, there are two points: 1) many of those were greatly exaggerated due to political causes during Cold war and 2) Germans just got back some fruits from the seeds they sow extensively during 1941-44 on Soviet territories.
I guess our soldiers were less than happy after liberating just another KZ on the German territories.

as for Cold War activities, during my active service in Air Defense i saw an old poster with scores achieved by Air Defense through Cold War ra. It had well over 20 of NATO aircrafts listed that were shot down over USSR territories, the U2 being just one of them many.
 
A better name for the "cold war" would probably be the "Luke Warm War"
Lots of near misses and close calls and many examples of brinksmanship that we will like as not never hear about.
The Thresher (SSN 593) went down during sea trial out of Groton CT. had many shipyard people on board. I was on a ship of the same class, USS Haddo (SSN-604) so the Thresher history was part of our Culture to a somewhat greater degreee than the rest of the Sub community. The Scorpian which went down not far from the Azores is in my opinion still open for interpretation. But I will second the recommendation for the Book "Blindmans Bluff". it is a fantastic telling about the role of Submarines during the Cold War.
 
Perhaps slightly off topic, but right year....but I recall being a little worried while in Basic training at NTC Orlando (21 Jul 1976-15 Sep 1976) due to what was referred to as a "tree-cutting incident" on the Korean border wherein an American Officer or two were killed by N Koreans. This news came to we "boots" via our Company Commander, Petty Officer Bland.
Just a thought.
 
YUP! I was going to refer to the Tree Cutting Incident on the Korean DMZ. I was just an ROTC cadet doing my summer camp for six weeks. I also recall a chopper shootdown in the same area along the same time line. But wrestle with the Russkies using live ammo at the height of the Cold (luke warm) War?

Rubbish! I'll give you some more comfort: I've been a teacher of American Government and American History for almost 19 years. I've consulted my colleagues and they can't recall any such incident, either. Unless it was highly classified, these guys have been teaching here at the same inner city high school since 1974.
 
Okay, there was the USS Thresher, the USS Scorpion AND IIRC one called the USS SQUALUS? Right? That one went down and it was supposed to be carrying nuke tipped torpedoes. Can any of y'all squids confirm that one?
 
For the record:

I was serving on the General staff at that time.

RE: the OP's original question about Soviet troops in 1976.

I say again.

HORSE PUCKY!

Anyone need translation. Was that response Ambiguous?

Go figure.

Fred
 
USS Squalus - http://www.history.navy.mil/faqs/faq99-1.htm

C'mon guys just because "nobody" knows about it doesn't mean it didn't happen I know of several collisions (brushing incidents) between US Subs and Soviet naval units but finding documentation in the public sector is going to be iffy at best. So was a shoot out between US and Soviet ground troops a possibility, sure. Did it ever happen? Don't know, but don't think for a minute it would have made the 6 o'clock news with Walter Cronkite if the government could keep it quiet.
 
The History Channel stated that Soviet and US fighter pilots may have engaged in direct aerial combat during the Korean War. It is well known the Soviets sent "advisors" to China, but recently discovered soviet documents suggests that some chinese Migs were actually piloted by soviets.
 
I believe that there were a lot of “near-misses” and “training accidents” that the general public is unaware of. Without any way to verify, it is hard to verify stories such as the one told to the OP. Even if they are declassified, events like this are seldom taught in school. Check out the store of Operation Paul Bunyan.

Fred, could you clarify what you mean when you say that you were on the General Staff? Was this in the area that the incident was supposed to have happened? As a side note, IF this incident did happen and Fred was privy to the information, he would have been told to never tell anyone, ever. Sooo, by his denial, does that confirm that the incident really did happen? :D

As for the book, “Blind Man’s Bluff”, I totally recommend it also. A couple of points to note: Penny from the Horse and Cow preferred Black Velvet and it is interesting to note that it was shown that the Russians never intended a first strike.

I was onboard the USS BATON ROUGE (SSN 689) (oncoming helmsman/planesman) when we had our “bump” with the Russian sub. That was a surreal experience. Verification of my presence is “Cajun Meatloaf”.
 
The closest to an American-Soviet incident in 1976 was when a group of individuals from the Jewish Defense League were arrested for firing into the Soviet Mission to the UN in New York. They plead guilty to the charges.
 
One incident in which U.S. troops probably killed Soviet "advisors" occured in the 1971 Son Tay raid into North Vietnam. The Nixon Administration launched that raid to rescue American POWs who, unknown to military intelligence, had been moved. From what I heard, the American commandos shot up Soviet, Chinese and North Vietnamese troops.

It is quite possible that some of our members may have participated in this raid, or have heard of it.


Timthinker
 
They talk about no war in Laos and Cambodia also. But I know for a fact that we had troops in both places during Viet Nam. Both the US and the USSR did a lot of sneeky things in them days. Like stealing the plans to the B-29 and building the same exact plane.
 
A lot of vets have interesting tales to tell. Some are truthful, others are stories that have been told so many times the tellers start to believe them.
 
Reference the USS Scorpion, minutes before all contact was lost, the Scorpion reported that they were in contact with a Soviet summarine and asked for instructions. The concenus is that yes, the USS Scopion was sunk by a Soviet Sub. It was not carring nukes of any type
 
I had a buddy who was in the Army in Germany about that time. Apparently, some super secret spy plane got shot down on the east side (or maybe it was hit and then crashed on the west side?). Anyway, his job had him handling the disposition of a bunch of bodies. He thought it was a SR71 but it must have been a EC-135 type because of the number of casualties (20-30?).
 
the Scorpion reported that they were in contact with a Soviet summarine and asked for instructions.
Click to expand...

Pleae provide source reference. Not SOP to break radio silence when in trail or in contact with Soviet units.
 
Pleae provide source reference. Not SOP to break radio silence when in trail or in contact with Soviet units.
Click to expand...
especially since you would need to surface to do so.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Similar threads

W
  • Locked
Cold War/Current question
Replies
9
Views
644
sacp81170a
S
C
  • Locked
Are you a Vet?
Replies
14
Views
623
Art Eatman
A
C
  • Locked
November 30, 1939
Replies
13
Views
1K
strangelittleman
strangelittleman
T
  • Locked
Vet kills intruder. Good shoot or bad shoot ?
2 3
Replies
70
Views
4K
runfrumu
R
MatthewVanitas
  • Locked
Soviet Afghan vet's comments on Afghan warrior culture
Replies
12
Views
2K
shecky
S
Back
Top