Remains of WWII-era plane carrying U.S. diplomat and downed by Soviet bombers found by divers

A World War II mystery surrounding the disappearance of a Finnish passenger plane carrying American and French diplomatic couriers, which was shot down over the Baltic Sea, appears to have been solved more than eight decades later.

The plane was on its way from Tallinn to Helsinki when it was shot down by Soviet bombers on June 14, 1940 – just three months after Finland signed a peace treaty with Moscow following the 1939-40 Winter War. It was also days before Moscow annexed the Baltic States.

All nine people on board – a Finnish crew of two and seven passengers – died.

One of the first US casualties of World War II

American diplomat Henry W. Antheil Jr., now considered one of the first American victims of World War II, was aboard the plane when it crashed.

Antheil, 27, younger brother of acclaimed composer and pianist George Antheil, was on a rushed government mission to evacuate sensitive diplomatic pouches from the US missions in Tallinn and Riga, Latvia, when it became clear that Moscow was preparing to swallow the small Baltic nations.

The other passengers on board were two Frenchmen, two Germans, a Swede and a dual Estonian-Finnish national.

A diving and salvage team in Estonia said this week it had located well-preserved parts and wreckage of the Junkers Ju 52 plane operated by Finnish airline Aero, which is now Finnair. It was found on the small island of Keri, near the Estonian capital Tallinn, at a depth of about 70 meters (230 feet).

“We basically started from scratch. We took a totally different approach to the search,” said Kaido Peremees, spokesman for Estonian diving and underwater research company Tuukritoode OU, explaining the group’s success in finding the plane’s remains.

News of the plane’s fate was met with disbelief and anger by authorities in Helsinki, who were informed that the plane was shot down by two Soviet DB-3 bombers 10 minutes after taking off from Ulemiste Airport in Tallinn.

“It was unique that a passenger plane was shot down during a normal flight in peacetime,” said Finnish aviation historian Carl-Fredrik Geust, who has been investigating Kaleva’s case since the 1980s.

Finland remained officially silent for years about the details of the aircraft’s destruction, saying publicly only that a “mysterious accident” had occurred over the Baltic Sea because it did not want to provoke Moscow.

An 84-year-old mystery

Although well documented in books, research and television documentaries, the 84-year-old mystery has intrigued Finns. The case is an essential part of the Nordic country’s complex history in World War II and sheds light on its troubled ties with Moscow.

But perhaps most important is the fact that the plane crash occurred at a critical moment, just days before Josef Stalin’s Soviet Union prepared to annex the three Baltic States, sealing the fate of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania during the next half century, before finally recovering. independence in 1991.

Moscow occupied Estonia on 17 June 1940 and Kaleva’s doomed journey was the last flight from Tallinn, although the Soviets had already begun to impose a strict transport embargo around the Estonian capital.

The US Embassy in Tallinn has extensively documented and researched the case over the years.

Embassy spokesman Mike Snyder told the AP that “news of the possible location of the sinking of the Kaleva passenger plane is of great interest to the United States, especially since one of the first American casualties of World War II occurred, diplomat Henry Antheil as a result of the plane crash.”

Earlier this month, US Ambassador to Estonia George P. Kent shared a post on X which included photos of Antheil, Kaleva, and an American Foreign Service Association memorial plaque in Washington with Antheil’s name engraved on it.

Kaleva was carrying 227 kilograms (500 pounds) of diplomatic mail, including Antheil bags and material from two French diplomatic couriers – identified as Paul Longuet and Frederic Marty.

Estonian fishermen and the lighthouse operator in Keri told Finnish media decades after the plane crash that a Soviet submarine surfaced near the Kaleva crash site and recovered floating debris, including bags of documents, that had been collected by fishermen in the local.

This led to conspiracy theories about the contents of the bags and Moscow’s decision to shoot down the plane. It is still unclear why precisely the Soviet Union decided to shoot down a Finnish civilian passenger plane in peacetime.

“A lot of speculation about the plane’s payload has been heard over the years,” Geust said. “What was the plane carrying? Many suggest that Moscow wanted to prevent confidential materials and documents from leaving Estonia.”

But he said it could simply have been “a mistake” by Soviet bomber pilots.

Finding the wreckage

Several attempts to find Kaleva have been recorded since Estonia regained independence more than three decades ago. However, none of them were successful.

Not even the US Navy’s oceanographic research ship, Pathfinder, was able to locate the remains of the plane in a search carried out in 2008 around the island of Keri, in an undertaking commissioned by the Estonian government from the Pentagon.

“The wreckage is in pieces and the seabed is quite challenging, with rock formations, valleys and hills. It’s very easy to lose” small parts and debris from the aircraft, Peremees said. “Of course, techniques have evolved a lot over time. As always, you can have good technology, but you won’t be lucky.”

New video taken by underwater robots from Peremees’ company shows clear images of the Junkers three-engine landing gear, one of the engines and parts of the wings.

Peremees and his group are “absolutely” convinced that the parts belong to Kaleva because of the distinctive and recognizable design of the German-made Junkers Ju 52, one of the most popular European passenger transport and war planes in the 1930s and early of the 1940s.

The plane was operated by the predecessor of the Finnish national airline Finnair.

Jaakko Schildt, Finnair’s chief operating officer, described Kaleva’s downfall as “a tragic and deeply sad event for the young airline” that Finnair, then called Aero, was in 1940.

“Finding the wreckage of the Kaleva somewhat brings closure to this, although it does not bring back the lives of our customers and crew that were lost,” Schildt said. “The interest in locating Kaleva in the Baltic Sea shows the importance that this tragic event has in the history of aviation in our region.”

Peremees said his company will now focus on creating 3D images of the Kaleva wreckage and will discuss with Estonian authorities the possibility of collecting some of the items and, if found, the plane’s cargo and human remains.

Snyder, of the U.S. Embassy in Tallinn, said Washington is closely monitoring the diving group’s efforts.

“We are following the site investigation and will be happy to discuss with our Finnish and Estonian (NATO) allies any developments resulting from the recovery efforts,” Snyder said.

A stone memorial erected in the early 1990s to the victims of Kaleva’s crash is located in Keri, and the preserved old terminal building of Helsinki’s Malmi Airport, where Kaleva was due to arrive, has a memorial plaque installed in 2020 with the names of the victims.