…Bill Gunstons book “By Jupiter” had been re-issued by the Rolls-Royce Heritage Trust and is a far superior treatise anyway.

The comments Peter Pavey makes about “By Jupiter” are interesting…I found it fascinating but (personally) it wasn’t nearly technical enough.

Walri? Don’t you mean Walruses? 🙂

Probably has more to do with the lack of suitable sea or lake facilities than the need for any walrus to be at a fighter station. Also wouldn’t they be safer on land (from storms), deteriorate less quickly and be easier to maintain?

Just my two cents.

When there is only one skin of metal between you and billions and billions of litres of water a collision with another object that damages that skin lets in lots of water really quickly.

Thanks for clearing that up for me…I had no idea. :rolleyes:

I am not stupid enough to think a chat with me will change opinions that have developed within the clutches of western propaganda.

‘Clutches of western propaganda’…are you serious!

What I meant was that if DNA could be extracted from ‘the’ body today it would surely be possible to prove that it was Crabb. His relative would not object in all probability and the expense would be relatively small.

And what I meant was that if that DNA could be tested now it could also be possible that the test proves the body found was not crabb.

Of course…(I assumed) that goes without saying…but thanks for pointing it out.

…if it was having their head and hands removed that killed them then you don’t need another reason to remove them…:D

You are really not helping your case by this sort (:D) of comment.

Yeah…a body found at sea in a wetsuit… what a crazy idea… it has to be crabb… who else would wear a wetsuit while at sea?

Actually in 1956 it would have been extremely unusual. The Aqua-Lung had only been commercially available in Britain for about five years and the number of people involved in sport diving were very small (especially in cold British waters). Also you ignore the fact that any missing sport diver would have been reported missing.

So in your view he is not mistaken…he is a liar. He claims to have killed Crabb but also claims he saw crabb fixing a mine to the ship. Interesting you believe only half the story.

You seem to be arguing that Crabb had his throat cut while planting a mine…

…and yet that he still managed to defect. So what do you believe?

In 1990 a former member of Soviet Naval Intelligence by the name of Joseph Zwerkin claimed that Crabb had been seen in the water around the Ordzhonikidze and that a Soviet sniper had shot him.

Now we have two statements made by former Soviet personnel…are they both true?

I am fairly new to these forums and have noticed that there are some thread replys that contain photos but I am not seeing them?Can someone tell me if I am going wrong somewhere!!

There is a limit to the space each member has to store photos. It is possible that members may have deleted photos from older threads to free-up space. If you tell me the title of the thread and post number I’ll see if I can see the photos.

That’s a nice photo you’ve posted by the way. 🙂

Suspicions and proof are two different things. You don’t let a secret agent go out on a secret mission with evidence that points directly back to those who sent him. Plausible deniability.

I understand the principle of plausible deniability but I think the British would struggle to apply it in this case even if Crabb didn’t have a nametag in the back of his wetsuit.

Assuming it was Crabbs body in the first place.

Identification under those circumstances would have been extremely difficult whoever it was!

I am sure he knew plenty of RN tactics the Soviets would be very interested to learn about. It might be possible that he defected but after 12 months was not happy and wanted to go home again… hense two months later his body is found…

Wouldn’t be the first defector to change their minds… and the Soviets might not have wanted to show their hands at what they had learnt from him… ie what RN methods of operations were compromised…

Surely his knowledge would have been limited by his rank and his speciality, and he had been out of Royal Navy service for a few years.

Also would the British send somebody with sensitive information on such a risky mission in the first place and if he did go missing wouldn’t they just assume he had been compromised just to be on the safe side?

DNA wouldn’t have been an option at the time. The body may have been disposed of by now…

Of course I realised that DNA identification wouldn’t have been available in 1956 so that was exactly my point. As I said:

“I didn’t know until recently that his last surviving relative still favours the kidnapping / brainwashing / abduction theory. It raises the interesting question of what was done with ‘the’ body and whether there would be any chance of a DNA confirmation of his identity.”

What I meant was that if DNA could be extracted from ‘the’ body today it would surely be possible to prove that it was Crabb. His relative would not object in all probability and the expense would be relatively small.

Assuming it was the body, to end or reduce the conspirasy theories. The Head and the Hands were removed more likely to conceal the identity rather than to instill fear… otherwise cut off the arms and legs as well… a dismembered torso creates more fear than a headless handless corpse… which limb was removed first and was he alive when the head was removed etc etc are a much more fearful message than identifiable hands and head.

That is an extremely disturbing line of thought…you are not online from some sort of ‘secure facility’ are you?

Again a vicitim of organised crime might have their heads and hands removed for more careful disposal to hide the identity… but if it really was crabbs body why would they want to hide crabbs identity?

Are you seriously suggesting that a victim of ‘organised crime’ that was the same build as Crabb would be likely to be found wearing exactly the same wetsuit as Crabb? And if it was a crime victim why would the British government claim it was Crabb? That is truly ludicrous!

I don’t think anybody was trying to hide the identity of the body I think they were trying to show that it wasn’t…that it couldn’t have been…an accident.

I would have been quite embarrassing it Crabb’s body had washed up during the actual British-Soviet talks but I don’t suppose anybody thought it would wash up fourteen months later.

If you agree that the likelyhood that the body found was crabbs is so low that we can discount it then I will happily ignore the likelihood that Crabb was planting mines.

Why should I do that? Those two possibilities are not mutually exclusive.

To be honest I don’t know where you stand on this issue. You have given argument against every point I have raised but haven’t ever indicated what you actually believe is the most likely explanation.

Can you at least do me that courtesy?

…I take the more pragmatic view that memory is certainly fallible and people lie for many reasons. Yes, I have some doubts, but I am waiting for more information before I make a decision, whereas some seem to have tried and convicted him of purgery already.

Memory can be fallible but is it really conceivable that this man cannot remember whether he killed somebody under these circumstances?

Unfortunately we don’t have the luxury of knowing all the facts and if we did there would be little point in having a discussion about them.

The Kursk SANK. For a collision to have SUNK it the vessel that SANK the Kursk would have had to hit it hard enough to sink itself. That is my claim.

Fair enough. In your previous statement you seemed to be claiming that the Kursk would certainly survive, and that the NATO submarine would certainly be sunk, in any collision.

I’d maintain that even though a NATO submarine has a hull that is inherently more likely to sustain damage in a collision it is possible, but highly unlikely, that the Kursk could have come off worst in a collision. This is not intended to be any criticism of the design of the Kursk but as you once said “position of the shot is rather more important than the calibre used”.

Seems you are showing your own prejuduces… obsolete? dangerous?

Actually I was quoting Admiral Vladimir Kuroyedov, Commander-in-Chief of the Russian Navy, at the official Russian court of enquiry.

Anyway, I’m tired of talking about the Kursk here, I don’t think we disagree fundamentally about any aspect of that tragedy and I’m not even sure how we got to this point in the first place…I propose a truce…how about it?

We should start another thread to talk about submarine design and submarine accidents as it is a fascinating subject…if that isn’t blasphemy on an ‘aviation’ website!

I’ll happily continue to post about the ‘Buster’ Crabb incident and I’ll try not to get drawn into any distracting East versus West discussions.