John W. R. Taylor, Date of Birth, Place of Birth, Date of Death

    

John W. R. Taylor

British intelligence analyst

Date of Birth: 08-Jun-1922

Place of Birth: Cambridgeshire, England, United Kingdom

Date of Death: 12-Dec-1999

Profession: writer, journalist

Nationality: United Kingdom

Zodiac Sign: Gemini


Show Famous Birthdays Today, United Kingdom

👉 Worldwide Celebrity Birthdays Today

About John W. R. Taylor

  • John William Ransom Taylor, OBE Hon DEng FRAeS FRHistS AFIAA, (8 June 1922 – 12 December 1999) was a British aviation expert and editor.
  • He edited Jane's All the World's Aircraft for three decades during the Cold War.
  • He retired as editor in 1989, just as the Iron Curtain obscuring the Soviet Bloc's technology started to lift. Taylor, who lived to the age of 77, was a master of a parallel art to Kremlinology, he could deduce the performance of Soviet military equipment from blurred photographs. "Thus in 1961, when Western intelligence was fascinated by early glimpses of a new Soviet bomber, the Tupolev Tu-22, many analysts estimated it could reach a speed of Mach 2.5 - more than twice the speed of sound.
  • But Taylor, after noting the shape of the aircraft's engine intakes, put the maximum at no more than Mach 1.4, which proved much closer to the truth.
  • In 1983, he analysed the MiG-29 fighter, whose agility was the cause of much anxiety amongst NATO's war-gamers; seven years later, when Jane's was able to check his suggested measurements, they were found to be accurate to within an inch.
  • " The Guardian, Tuesday 25 January 2000. Taylor was educated at Ely Cathedral Choir School (King's School, Ely) and Soham Grammar School in Cambridgeshire.
  • He trained as a draughtsman and joined Hawker Aircraft in 1941.
  • There he worked on the development of the Hurricane fighter and its successors.
  • His specialisation was rectifying design defects.
  • He joined Jane's as editorial assistant on Jane's All the World's Aircraft in 1955 and four years later he took over as editor.
  • Until the late 1960s he edited this volume with virtually no editorial support but his love of aviation was such that this was a challenge he enjoyed.

Read more at Wikipedia

See Also