- (Reuters) -- The U.K. considered training pigeons to
deliver weapons of mass destruction but changed its mind, government files
show.
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- It considered using the birds to deliver biological weapons
after World War II but decided the birds had outlived their usefulness
in battle.
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- Homing pigeons carried vital messages in wartime, and
the Pigeon Policy Committee of the day discussed training them to undertake
ever more daring tasks.
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- "We can now train pigeons to 'home' to any object
on the ground when air-released in the vicinity... Bacteria might be delivered
accurately to a target by this means," head of the Air Ministry Pigeon
Section Lea Rayner said in a 1945 report.
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- "With the latest developments of explosives and
bacterial science I suggest that this possibility should be closely investigated
and watched.
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- "A thousand pigeons, each with a two ounce explosive
capsule, landed at intervals on a specific target might be a seriously
inconvenient surprise."
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- But other committee members did not share Rayner's enthusiasm
and in 1948 the armed services said they had no further interest in pigeons.
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- The secret services, however, thought anti-British forces
would continue to communicate with each other via pigeons and asked a civilian
pigeon fancier to keep 100 birds for MI5 to use to prepare countermeasures.
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- But they abandoned that scheme in 1950.
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- The U.K. used about 250,000 pigeons to carry messages
in World War II and 32 of the birds received the Dickin Medal, the highest
award of valour for animals.
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- The birds were also used for aerial surveillance. At
the beginning of the 20th century Bavaria's pigeon fleet flew over Europe
with cameras attached to their bodies that took a series of timed shots.
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- - with ABC Science Online
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- ©2004 ABC
- http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/stories/s1113180.htm
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