Titanic Expedition Was a Cover For Secret Navy Missions

By Alex in Weapons & War on Nov 28, 2008 at 3:41 pm

Robert Ballard, the explorer who found the wreckage of the Titanic, has just revealed that the expedition was actually a cover story for the US Navy about two lost nuclear submarines:

The Navy was not interested in the Titanic. … I mean, they funded the technology because it had so many military applications. And I was a naval intelligence officer for 30 years, and so I did a lot of missions for the Navy. Many remain classified, my best stuff. Rats …

Yes, the Titanic was a cover for a series of military operations. The Titanic was here, and over here was the Scorpion and over here was the Thresher (as he says this, he arranges three objects on a tabletop, roughly in a line, the center one depicting the Titanic).

And had that not occurred, I probably would not have found the Titanic because they wouldn’t have funded me. I mean, if the Titanic was in the Indian Ocean, it’d probably still be in the Indian Ocean. But … it was straddled by two very interesting subs that we had lost — and the Scorpion was lost on war patrol … and it was carrying nuclear weapons. So it was a very hot sub to the Navy …

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  1. Geekazoid
    Nov 28th, 2008 at 3:47 pm

    They had a documentary about this not too long ago and explained the situation that the Navy was able to provide the funding and the cover. Fascinating stuff.

  2. Evilbeagle
    Nov 28th, 2008 at 4:04 pm

    Fascinating indeed. Basically killing two birds with one stone.

  3. sigh
    Nov 28th, 2008 at 4:30 pm

    I heard about this a while ago. Of course, wording it like that is not totally accurate. It wasn’t “cover” it was more like, “we need you to find these subs, if you happen to find the Titanic, more power to ya!” There wasn’t anything subversive as the article implies.

  4. Johnny Cat
    Nov 28th, 2008 at 5:29 pm

    “Scorpion” and “Thresher” would make good titles for blockbusters. (Calls Jim Cameron.)

  5. Rocky Rook
    Nov 28th, 2008 at 5:46 pm

    That was quite a titanic find.

  6. Ikuto
    Nov 28th, 2008 at 7:19 pm

    I think you mean James Cameron.

  7. Johnny Cat
    Nov 28th, 2008 at 9:53 pm

    His friends get to call him Jim.

  8. raina_c
    Nov 29th, 2008 at 1:40 am

    Very clever of the government.

  9. DOJ
    Nov 29th, 2008 at 9:58 pm

    you learn something every day

  10. vero4902
    Dec 5th, 2008 at 10:23 pm

    That is really interesting! Very cool that he was able to check out all three wrecks.

  11. ADEDOKUN SEUN
    Mar 12th, 2009 at 8:11 am

    i’m interested in the science fiction about the sunk TITANIC of April 14 1912


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