the aforementioned saucer project.
The third design attributed to the Miethe-Belluzzo Project comes
to us from and article by Jan Holberg in an August 20, 1966
article in Das Neue Zeitalter and also from Michael X. BartonCarl F. Mayer-Hermann Klaas connection (16) (17). This design
was capable of vertical take-off. Klaas provides internal detail
which has been reproduced here.
At first, this appears to be a push-pull propeller system driven
by a single engine. It is not. Neither are the twelve jet
nozzles unsupported in any way as depicted. The real answer to
this mystery is that this drawing is incomplete. With the
completed parts depicted, a radial turbojet engine of special
type would appear. Design one differs from design three in that
the latter, with its centrally located cabin and symmetrical
arrangement of twelve adjustable jet nozzles, is controlled by
selectively shutting off various jets through the use of a
surrounding ring. This allows the saucer to make turns and to
take off vertically.
Recently, a German researcher, Klaus-Peter Kothkugel using Vesco
as his source (18), has proposed an engine which links the
designs one and three, and possibly even design two, while
supplying the missing pieces needed to make the engine depicted
air-worthy and resolves other problems. This engine was invented
by a French engineer, Rene Leduc and probably acquired by the
Germans during their occupation of France.
If a flying saucer equipped with this engine were viewed from the
outside, no rotating parts would be visible. This is because the
engine was totally contained within the metal skin of the saucer.
It did rotate but this rotation was within the saucer itself and
not viable from the outside. An air space existed all around the
spinning engine, between it and the non-rotating outer skin.
This engine was a type of radial-flow jet engine. It was this
type of engine which probably powered all of Dr. Miethe's saucer
designs. It is also the prime candidate for the post-war design
of John Frost, the "Flying Manta."
The Flying Manta actually did fly. Pictures of it during a test
flight are unmistakable. They were taken on July 7, 1947 by
William A. Rhodes over Phoenix, Arizona. It almost goes without
saying that the time frame, July of 1947, as well as the
geographical location, the American Southwest, as well as the
description of the flying object itself, beg comparisons to the
saucer which crashed at Rosewell, New Mexico, earlier that same
month.
If one looks at what is known of Dr. Miethe's saucer design, the
Leduc engine, and the Frost Manta, it must be acknowledged that a
connection between these three not only explains apparent
inconsistencies in the existing Miethe designs but also links
them to the post-war American Southwest, the precise spot where
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