Wacky Weapons Concepts

[the ace]

Originally Posted by Fodder76

Training dogs as anti-tank weapons takes a certain kind of imagination I suppose.

Yes, causing an entire tank division to retreat because the dogs prefer your tanks is a minor flaw.

[Fodder76]

Originally Posted by copenhagen

That worked didnt it?

Well enough that by 1942 the Germans were shooting all dogs on sight.

It still sounds like something Dastardly and Mutley would have come up with (though I can't see that episode ending well for Mutley)

[wayneok]

Who, Me?:
A bad odor weapon to humiliate the enemy


Who Me? was a top secret sulfurous stench weapon developed by the American Office of Strategic Services during World War II to be used by the French Resistance against German officers. Who Me? smelled strongly of fecal matter, and was issued in pocket atomizers intended to be unobtrusively sprayed on a German officer, humiliating him and, by extension, demoralizing the occupying German forces.

The experiment was very short-lived, however. Who Me? had a high concentration of extremely volatile sulfur compounds that were very difficult to control: more often than not the person who did the spraying ended up smelling as bad as the sprayed. After only two weeks it was concluded that Who Me? was a dismal failure. It remains unclear whether there was a successful Who Me? attack.

Pam Dalton, a cognitive psychologist at the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia, describes the smell of Who Me? as resembling "the worst garbage dumpster left in the street for a long time in the middle of the hottest summer ever".

[Mountain Man]

The problem with the dogs was that they were trained on Soviet tanks, which used diesel, to attack German tanks, which used gasoline. The dogs got confused in combat and headed back to the tanks that smelled familiar.

The CIA wired up a cat to serve as a microphone to listen to Soviet Embassy personnel in Washington, D.C. who discussed sensitive issues in a park to avoid being over heard. All went well until the cat was run over while approaching the park bench.

Pigeons were trained to keep anti-shipping bombs on course by pecking at the image of the target on a TV screen, which sent steering commands to the fins. It actually worked, but was overtaken by more advanced targeting systems.

Another system was tried using a cat to steer dive bombs onto Japanese enemy carriers on the assumption that the cat would do anything to avoid the water. It failed, primarily because (a) cats don't hate water, and b()the G-forces rendered the cat unconscious immediately after launch.

Quick trivia question: which animal has received the most medals for service in combat?

[Centurion40]

I can't find anything on it, but I remember seeing footage of an experimental anti-tank weapon. It was a sort of rolling mine that used small explosive charges to propel itself across the battlefield towards enemy tanks.

[Mountain Man]

Originally Posted by Centurion40

I can't find anything on it, but I remember seeing footage of an experimental anti-tank weapon. It was a sort of rolling mine that used small explosive charges to propel itself across the battlefield towards enemy tanks.

A better one was Barnes-Wallis's Grand Panjandrum, a giant wheel propelled by rockets that was supposed to roll up the invasion beach and destroy obstacles. You can find footage of that one.

[PhilipLaos]

Originally Posted by Mountain Man

A better one was Barnes-Wallis's Grand Panjandrum, a giant wheel propelled by rockets that was supposed to roll up the invasion beach and destroy obstacles. You can find footage of that one.

I did see footage of that a while back. The giant wheel with explosions going off all around its circumference was on a beach where it was being demonstrated and going off in all and unpredictable directions sending soldiers and the other observers scattering everywhere and running for cover.

I believe the design was scrapped after that.

EDIT: Found a clip of it.



Philip

[Mountain Man]

Originally Posted by philiplaos

I did see footage of that a while back. The giant wheel with explosions going off all around its circumference was on a beach where it was being demonstrated and going off in all and unpredictable directions sending soldiers and the other observers scattering everywhere and running for cover.

I believe the design was scrapped after that.

EDIT: Found a clip of it.



Philip

Not just "soldiers", but the high-ranking officers gathered to observe.

[Carl Schwamberg]

Back in the early days of muzzle loading artillery someone thought of linking two cannon balls with a long chain. Loaded in two cannon that would be fired simultaneously the balls would drag the chain along and cut down a entire column of enemy soldiers. When tested one cannon fired a second or two before the first, causing the ball & chain to wrap around the other cannon, that fired shortly after

Linked shot worked in a fashion when both were fired from the same cannon. Mostly used in naval battles IIRC.

[Mountain Man]

Originally Posted by Carl Schwamberg

Back in the early days of muzzle loading artillery someone thought of linking two cannon balls with a long chain. Loaded in two cannon that would be fired simultaneously the balls would drag the chain along and cut down a entire column of enemy soldiers. When tested one cannon fired a second or two before the first, causing the ball & chain to wrap around the other cannon, that fired shortly after

Linked shot worked in a fashion when both were fired from the same cannon. Mostly used in naval battles IIRC.

Chain shot was very popular in the Age of Sail as a means of destroying sails, halyards, masts and standing rigging.

On the subject of explosives, the British developed a very useful squash head charge to be fired by the spigot mortar in their Churchill engineer assault vehicles in order to demolish fortifications, walls and so forth.

Obviously, bigger is better, so a much larger device was created to be launched by fighter-bombers against ground targets. Code named Conker Nut, it discontinued almost immediately when the troops complained bitterly that it was more of a threat to them than to the enemy.

Jurassic Park Rule #1...

[NoPref]

Bates Eight-Barrel Bottle Thrower. Used rubber band (or spring?) propulsion to hurl self-igniting molotov cocktails about 100 yds (with a tail wind). Proposed as a weapon for the Home Guard which could be manufactured by companies that could only work light metal and used commonly available bottles as ammo.

[Dibble201Bty]

The strange case of Waterloo bridge, Georgi Markov and a poisoned umbrella!....Well, possibly.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgi_Markov

Paul

[surfinbird]

The weather-control program in Vietnam is one of the weirdest weapons/campaign i have ever heard of. I know it's primary mission was to wreak monsoon weather over the Ho-Chi-Minh trail and North Vietnam to frustrate supplies, agriculture and industry; can anyone shed some light?

[andrewza]

Originally Posted by Mountain Man

Quick trivia question: which animal has received the most medals for service in combat?

[/FONT]

Dog?
Any case the dog holds the record for being the only animal commissioned in a defense force, AKA Abel Seaman Just nuisance RM Based in south Africa simonstown

[PhilipLaos]

Then there are the US Navy's mine detection dolphins currently on deployment in the Persian Gulf.

Surely, they're entitled to some kind of military award.


Philip