Aphrodite: Desperate Mission

In the summer of 1944, with Nazi V-weapon sites threatening to devastate London, American military planners conceived one of the most audacious and desperate schemes of the entire war. They would pack war-weary B-17 bombers with twelve tons of high explosives, get them airborne with skeleton crews, arm the payload, and then bail out over friendly territory, leaving the planes to be guided by radio control from accompanying mother ships directly into their targets.

The technology was so primitive that one officer who saw the remote-control circuitry compared it to “something you’d make with a number two Erector set and Lincoln Logs.”

They called it Operation Aphrodite.

Volunteers were needed to get the drone planes airborne and arm the explosives before parachuting out. Among those who stepped forward for the Navy’s parallel program, Project Anvil, was Lieutenant Joseph P. Kennedy Jr., elder brother of the future President of the United States. On August 12, 1944, Kennedy and his co-pilot, Lt. Wilford Willy took off from RAF Fersfield. His last words, transmitted by radio, were “Spade Flush,” the code signal that he was about to hand over control and bail out.

Eighteen minutes after takeoff, the plane exploded. Kennedy and Willy were killed instantly. The target they died trying to destroy did not even exist. Allied intelligence had been wrong.

New York Times bestselling author Jack Olsen reconstructs Operation Aphrodite in full, from its desperate conception to its tragic execution, giving voice to the brave men who volunteered for missions that pushed the boundaries of both technology and human courage. This is a story of reckless valor, military innovation, and the terrible cost of war at its most desperate.

A gripping piece of largely forgotten history, told by a master of narrative nonfiction.