The navigator© wrote:

.... FYI, the US team were having problems with flow separation at the control surfaces, a problem
solved by the British some years before ...

The way I heard it from an engineer who'd worked the project, the
separation was inducing "flutter" that lead to fatigue cracks. One day
an old broom pusher suggested they try putting dimples or slots in
various places. Stumped, they tried it and it worked, so they assumed
the broom pusher was one of a zillion extremely talented Europeans stuck
doing menial jobs after the war. But no, it came from practical
experience. "Did you ever see toilet paper tear at the perforations?" he
explained. A "sea story"? Prolly, but one at least as probable as
anything attributed to secret Brit archives .... (c: