“A Cake with an Ejection Seat”

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That’s the title of this article in Spiegel (apparently not available online).

It tells the story of Dani, a Serbian air-defense soldier who shot down an American F-117A stealth fighter. Dani says he always enjoyed playing around with computers, and one day discovered a small midification to the Serbs’ ancient Soviet air-defense radar system that would make it possible to detect a stealth fighter. He suggested the change to the army brass.

In true Joseph Heller fashion, they told him to bugger off. But he tweaked his own unit’s machines anyway , and lo and behold, became the only person ever to shoot down an F-117A (the pilot was later rescued). He was promoted, but transferred out of the air defense troops because he had modified the computer system without permission.

Now Dani has returned to civilian life. He lives in the town of Kovin, near Belgrade, and runs a bakery. His best-selling cake?

The F-117A special, naturally:

[h/t Mica]

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8 thoughts on ““A Cake with an Ejection Seat””

  1. I havn’t read the article but a serious technical “problem” the US faced in the Yugoslavian war for the first time was the existence of so many people with mobile phones. Their echoed signals partly destroyed the invisibility of the stealth bombers…

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  2. I havn’t read the article but a serious technical “problem” the US faced in the Yugoslavian war for the first time was the existence of so many people with mobile phones. Their echoed signals partly destroyed the invisibility of the stealth bombers…

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  7. Mr. Dani’s “coming out” isn’t that fresh. Unfortunately, it didn’t add much to the speculation that has been surrounding the downing of the Nighthawk since it happened in March 1999, e.g. — did a MiG-21 fire on the F-117 first, were the Yugoslavs tipped-off by a spy inside NATO, etc., and of course, how was the SA-3 system able to detect the F-117.

    From the USA Today article I linked comes this highly informative gem:

    It involved “electromagnetic waves,” was all that Dani — who now owns a small bakery in this sleepy village just north of Belgrade — would divulge.

    That’s what the Associated Press — which is headquartered in a busy city by the Hudson River estuary — could report in 2005. I haven’t read the Spiegel article, but only from looking at it, I can tell it doesn’t have any more info.

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  8. Mr. Dani’s “coming out” isn’t that fresh. Unfortunately, it didn’t add much to the speculation that has been surrounding the downing of the Nighthawk since it happened in March 1999, e.g. — did a MiG-21 fire on the F-117 first, were the Yugoslavs tipped-off by a spy inside NATO, etc., and of course, how was the SA-3 system able to detect the F-117.

    From the USA Today article I linked comes this highly informative gem:

    It involved “electromagnetic waves,” was all that Dani — who now owns a small bakery in this sleepy village just north of Belgrade — would divulge.

    That’s what the Associated Press — which is headquartered in a busy city by the Hudson River estuary — could report in 2005. I haven’t read the Spiegel article, but only from looking at it, I can tell it doesn’t have any more info.

    Like

    Reply

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