"Svend" (svend)
03/22/2019 at 01:09 • Filed to: None
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"Svend" (svend)
03/22/2019 at 01:09 • Filed to: None | 3
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To the U.K. it was called BRIXMIS (British Commanders-in-Chief Mission to the Soviet Forces in Germany), to the U.S. it was USMLM (United States Military Liaison Mission).
It’s more a memento video of the camera guy’s tour than anything else.
BRIXMIS November 1988. Transit route from West Berlin to Mission House via Glienicke Bridge. Transit route from Michendorf in DDR on route 2 to Glienicke Bridge via Potsdam city centre and Mission House.
You can see some great old cars on the West German side, then Soviet stuff on the East German side.
The British and Americans had some interesting cars.
The French also had a mission FMLM/MMFL.
As did the Soviets in West German British, American and French sectors, SOXMIS/SMLM.
pip bip - choose Corrour
> Svend
03/22/2019 at 05:44 |
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music on the radio wasn’t great either.
cars were interesting. life appeared to be drab there
AuthiCooper1300
> Svend
03/22/2019 at 06:00 |
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A favourite subject of mine. I very strongly recommend you download and read this. It is fascinating in the extreme:
(There is another interview with Williams in the same channel.)
I seem to remember that Senator is not a pukka one, but a nice replica on a slightly more recent version.
Those cars were, by far, the most interesting of the bunch. Apart from skidplates, some armor and tons of fascinating little details they had been fitted with a Ferguson Formula 4WD system (similar to the one in the Jensen Interceptor FF). Very few were made, although I read somewhere that Ferguson also converted one or two Opel Monzas (same platform as the Senator).
If you look up BRIXMIS+Opel, Allrad+Senator, FF+Senator, Ferguson+Senator on Google Images you’ll also find tons of stuff, in particular an interesting feature
i
n a German Opel club magazine (translated from the English, I think) with one of the real ones. (Sorry, cannot find the link now).
I don’t think the BRIXMIS had any fatalities, but the French and American mission did. Interestingly the baddies in the whole situation seem to have been mostly the military and security apparatus of the GDR, rather than the Sovs; according to Williams, there still was (in the 80s!) very much an “us” (the WW2 Allies) and “them” (the Germans, or rather, the East Germans) mentality. Judging from how the Stasi and GDR military intelligence behaved, I am not surprised (the ramming incident is a good example).
For context about Warpac/NATO tensions at the time: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Able_Archer_83
I suggested the Senator BRIXMIS subject to Torch a couple of years ago, but as far as I know he has not done any articles on it.
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Svend
> AuthiCooper1300
03/22/2019 at 06:21 |
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It’s something I find very interesting and keep coming back to it as I come across more little bits here and there.
Seems the Americans and the French were prone to car chases from the Stasi, etc...
someassemblyrequired
> Svend
03/22/2019 at 10:03 |
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Fascinating video, I had heard of these missions but to get on a “ride along” is pretty neat.
I should do a writeup on crossing out of West Berlin to West Germany considering it has been 30 years
- it was a fascinating process. Domestic flight to West Germany? That will be on Pan Am, TWA, British Airways or Air France. By train? Take the Stasi Express run by the DDR. Driving? There was a huge procedure involved in using the surface routes. Activist or someone on the DDR’s radar screen? You could only fly and your ticket was subsidized.
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Svend
> someassemblyrequired
03/22/2019 at 10:42 |
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Ye’, this isn’t so much a mission as going from their headquarters and o perational centre in West Berlin to their Mission House in Potsdam and then returning.
The East Berlin train passed into West Berlin in a couple of places and wasn’t allowed to stop.
There is a web site worth a look.
Worth reading and listening to.
Bill Bur han s
http://www.coldwarspies.com/usmlm/usmlm_interviews/burhans/
Dave Paulson
http://www.coldwarspies.com/usmlm/usmlm_interviews/paulson/
Ed Corcoran
http://www.coldwarspies.com/usmlm/usmlm_interviews/corcoran/
James Holbrook
http://www.coldwarspies.com/usmlm/usmlm_interviews/holbrook/
Peter Sterne
http://www.coldwarspies.com/usmlm/usmlm_interviews/sterne/
.
.
http://www.6941st-gdbn.com/berlin-brigade/checkpoints/index.html
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someassemblyrequired
> Svend
03/22/2019 at 11:55 |
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Thanks, I’ll check those out. I have friends who were in the military in both West Germany and the DDR, and the mechanics of how it all worked is fascinating.
It’s amazing given the level
effort to maintain the separation between the DDR and the west that it took so long for East Germany to collapse.
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Svend
> someassemblyrequired
03/22/2019 at 12:12 |
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My grand father was in the Berlin airlift.
My family weren’t in Germany, they were in a group called the Royal Observer Corps and were tasked to monitoring fallout during the cold war, they were a continuation of the RAF plotters you see in British WWII films were they push aircraft figures around the map of the United Kingdom, however after WWII, going into the cold war they would Man bunkers from three Man bunkers up to massive government bunkers and in the event of a nuclear strike would go above ground and measure the height and distance of the blast to estimate it’s yield and would monitor wind direction. Those in the three Man bunker weren’t expected to live long as the bunker was essentially a small room with bunk beds at the bottom of a long ladder, a table, a secure telephone line, a chemical bin for a toilet and air filtration to see them through the task. Those in larger bunkers could hunker down for a few months. My mum, dad and cousin were in the ROC and their commanding officer, who later became my step-father was in, the ROC were disbanded in 1996 with most of their operations being redundant after 1991.
EDIT: Just remembered I h ad to thank her Group for their condolence card for my mother. 22 Group R.O.C. Forewarned is forearmed.
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someassemblyrequired
> Svend
03/22/2019 at 15:53 |
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Yeah apparently they are planning quite a celebration for the 75th anniversary of the Berlin airlift, been hearing some rumblings about that.
The ROC had an interesting history - given their mission, it’s a bit shocking that they were almost all
volunteers.
My condolences on the passing of your mother.