We’ve gotten requests to talk about the balloon bombs that Japan used to target North America during World War II. But these were not the only balloons in use during the war, or the first balloons used for military purposes.

Research:

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Britannica, The Editors of Encyclopaedia. "airship". Encyclopedia Britannica, 11 Feb. 2023, https://www.britannica.com/technology/airship. Accessed 15 February 2023.
Czekanski, Tom. “Museum Acquires Item Related to the First African American Unit in Normandy.” National World War II Museum. 2/1/2020. https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/museum-acquires-item-related-first-african-american-unit-normandy
Drapeau, Raoul E. “Operation Outward: Britain’s World War II offensive balloons.” IEEE Power and Energy Magazine. September/October 2011. https://site.ieee.org/ny-monitor/files/2011/09/OPERATION-OUTWARD.pdf
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Knight, Judson. "Balloon Reconnaissance, History." Encyclopedia of Espionage, Intelligence and Security, edited by K. Lee Lerner and Brenda Wilmoth Lerner, vol. 1, Gale, 2004, pp. 91-94. Gale In Context: U.S. History, link.gale.com/apps/doc/CX3403300069/GPS?u=mlin_n_melpub&sid=bookmark-GPS&xid=3191fc84. Accessed 15 Feb. 2023.
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Maskel, Rebecca. “Why Was the Discovery of the Jet Stream Mostly Ignored?” Smithsonian. 4/2018. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/air-space-magazine/as-next-may-unbelievablebuttrue-180968355/
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“The First Air Raid Happened When Austria Dropped Bombs on Venice from Pilotless Hot-Air Balloons (1849).” 9/7/2021. https://www.openculture.com/2021/09/the-first-air-raid-in-history.html
Paone, Thomas. “Protecting the Beaches with Balloons: D-Day and the 320th Barrage Balloon Battalion.” National Air and Space Museum. 6/4/2019. https://airandspace.si.edu/stories/editorial/protecting-beaches-balloons-d-day-and-320th-barrage-balloon-battalion
Paone, Thomas. “The Most Fashionable Balloon of the Civil War.” Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum. 11/5/2013. https://airandspace.si.edu/stories/editorial/most-fashionable-balloon-civil-war
Rogers, J. David. “How Geologists Unraveled the Mystery of Japanese Vengeance Balloon Bombs in World War II.” https://web.mst.edu/~rogersda/forensic_geology/Japenese%20vengenance%20bombs%20new.htm
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Ziegler, Charles A. “Weapons Development in Context: The Case of the World War I Balloon Bomber.” Technology and Culture , Oct., 1994, Vol. 35, No. 4 (Oct., 1994). http://www.jstor.com/stable/3106505.

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Balloons of World War II