Author Archives: David Klaus

To me, it’s important to have some idea of how recurring words in another language are pronounced. I do not speak Romanian, although with all the official document translating I’ve been doing for the last couple of years I finally recognize the meaning of a few words in the language.

However, if you don’t speak Romanian either, the way their words are pronounced is not necessarily obvious to English speakers. I asked an acquaintance who is a native Romanian speaker to pronounce some of the words you may encounter as you learn more about the TIDAL WAVE operation. ...  (Read more)

It’s been quite a while since my last update and some of you may have been thinking the documentary is on hold or abandoned. Absolutely not!

I’ve unearthed a massive amount of previously unseen official information related to the TIDAL WAVE attack in Romanian, German, and British archives, and I’ve found several never-before-seen photo archives that include amazing TIDAL WAVE imagery.  ...  (Read more)

The Problems With Diaries, Photos, And Memory

If you’ve been following this project for any time you’re already aware that I put little emphasis on postwar reminiscences. The entire premise of my research has been to use as much original documentation as possible. ...  (Read more)

I’ve been going through a bunch of 9th AF (IX Bomber Command) crewmen’s diaries and decided to list the entertainment movies they saw from January to the end of July 1943. I doubt this is a complete list and I think some of the titles are wrong or misspelled, but hope it interests you to see the entertainment air and ground crews saw.

The dates are direct from the individual diaries. The movies would have “made the rounds” of the various units and obviously been shown on different dates at different units. ...  (Read more)

Loyalty among senior officers involved in TIDAL WAVE turns out to be a major part of the story, based on what I’ve uncovered during my research. I urge you to read the article at the link below to get a similar story that you’ll be able to relate back to TIDAL WAVE when you see my documentary.

If you personally have served as a military officer in any service in any country you’ll know instantly what I’m talking about because this loyalty has always existed everywhere men fight and you’ll have observed it or even been involved . . . for good or not. At a certain point it’s simply not avoidable. If you’ve served in an enlisted capacity you’ll also have a clear sense of what this is and what it means, especially because the same kind of loyalty has always existed everywhere at the non-officer levels too.  ...  (Read more)

23 aircraft went down in the immediate Ploesti area out of the 54 total lost on TIDAL WAVE. Aside from the apparently obvious reason, why did so many go down in the target area? What exactly did the crews face in there? It turns out there were two major reasons, one a serious technical error in configuration of the planes for the mission and the other the heavy flak. ...  (Read more)

Only 56 bombs out of 260 (22%) carried to target WHITE IV actually fell on the target, which was attacked by part of the 93rd Bomb Group before the assigned 98th Bomb Group arrived.

I just completed the analysis of this situation, which is quite important to the story of TIDAL WAVE results. We need to know WHY only 56 bombs fell on the WHITE IV when it was the most important target in Romania and the 98th Bomb Group sent the largest TW target force to attack that specific group of refineries. ...  (Read more)

It’s been quite a long time since I updated you on the status of my TIDAL WAVE/Ploesti documentary, and I assure you I’ve been working diligently. It’s not done yet, but I’m getting much closer to putting it on the street. ...  (Read more)

It’s been quite a long time since I updated you on the status of my TIDAL WAVE/Ploesti documentary, and I assure you I’ve been working diligently. It’s not done yet, but I’m getting much closer to putting it on the street. ...  (Read more)