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Suicide torpedoes were proposed by the Polish military in 1939 and the program appears to have gotten as far as signing up recruits but to my knowledge none wer

by trzy 4y ago

Suicide torpedoes were proposed by the Polish military in 1939 and the program appears to have gotten as far as signing up recruits but to my knowledge none were ever deployed.

zaphirplane 4y ago
> signing up recruits I understand there is a serious and dire aspect to this, not specific to the polish. Still recruiting for this is too close to exploiting vulnerable devastated individuals
robonerd 4y ago
The Nazis planned to use similar suicide tactics with a manned version of their V-1 cruise missile. They built and flew prototypes, but Hitler was persuaded to drop the project before it was put to use. Formalized suicide attack programs with purpose-built hardware are chilling to think about, but there is also a broader class of suicide attacks that include impromptu decisions and last resorts which seem easier to understand. On both sides of WW2, there are cases of pilots trying to crash into the enemy after realizing their fate was sealed anyway. This may have happened with an American B-26 at the Battle of Midway, and one of the Japanese pilots who attacked Pearl Harbor apparently announced his intention to do this before the battle (in both cases they missed their target.)
- trhway 4y ago
  >a broader class of suicide attacks that include impromptu decisions and last resorts which seem easier to understand. In USSR/Russia such attacks by Soviet soldiers (using say your body to close the machine gun embrasure) have been widely celebrated. Where is similar behavior by Ukrainian soldiers against Russian forces in today's war is blamed by Russian propaganda on "Ukrainian nationalists being pumped full of drugs".
- jillesvangurp 4y ago
  The Russian army also had some chilling tactics. Basically they had more soldiers than guns during the battle of Stalingrad. So they sent them in pairs where one person was supposed to pick up the gun in the (likely) case the other person got shot. To prevent people from refusing orders, they simply shot anyone running the wrong way. Ordering people to march towards (almost) certain death is probably as old as war is. What set the Japanese apart is the fanatical culture that resulted in people volunteering for this. The modern equivalent would be suicide bombers.
  - the_af 4y ago
    Your understanding of the Red Army is incorrect. Please cite academic sources (so not Enemy at the Gates, awful movie) showing that at Stalingrad the Red Army had "more soldiers than guns".
    - golergka 4y ago
      Never saw that movie, but it's pretty much common knowledge in modern Russia, and was described in very numerous accounts by war veterans.
      - the_af 4y ago
        It's still wrong. The Red Army didn't have a guns shortage at Stalingrad. "Common knowledge" is not knowledge, not in "modern Russia" either. Cite one academic source, please.
  - corrral 4y ago
    > The Russian army also had some chilling tactics. Basically they had more soldiers than guns during the battle of Stalingrad. So they sent them in pairs where one person was supposed to pick up the gun in the (likely) case the other person got shot. To prevent people from refusing orders, they simply shot anyone running the wrong way. Ordering people to march towards (almost) certain death is probably as old as war is. This was depicted in the film Enemy at the Gates (2001)—and probably other, earlier films, I'd expect—and then strikingly similarly (i.e. they likely deliberately modeled their version on the scene from the film) in the first Call of Duty game (2003), back when that series was all WWII shooters.
    - the_af 4y ago
      It should be noted this was false at Stalingrad, and "Enemy at the Gates" has a terribly inaccurate depiction of that battle. There are no reliable sources stating that the Red Army [1] had more soldiers than guns by that time. Just some pop culture from a terrible movie that has somehow permeated into "knowledge" about the Eastern Front. [1] also wrong to call it "the Russian army", it was the army of the Soviet Union and had non-Russians.
zardo 4y ago
The first submarine that sunk an enemy ship (h.l. Hunley) was a suicide torpedo with a crew of 8.
- saberdancer 4y ago
  Not intentionally.
  - corrral 4y ago
    My recollection from Cussler's version of the story was that the detachable torpedo on their bow (the idea was to ram a pointy torpedo on the bow of the sub into the enemy ship, detach, then it blows up on a delay so the sub could escape, IIRC) got stuck and didn't detach properly.
    - robonerd 4y ago
      Historically, torpedoes were bombs on the end of sticks that you'd ram the enemy with, but these were generally not intended to be suicide weapons (the stick was for safety.) Self-propelled torpedoes came later, and the original bomb-on-a-stick sort of torpedo may now be called "spar torpedoes."
    - zardo 4y ago
      All that's known for sure (since it was found and raised a few years ago) is that it was close enough to the explosion for the shockwave to kill the crew, but far enough away to not damage the sub itself.
- jessriedel 4y ago
  The Hunley was not a suicide torpedo. It was a new and highly dangerous submarine. The crew died shortly after sinking the Union’s Housatonic, but their death was accidental rather than a necessary part of the attack method. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H._L._Hunley_(submarine) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H._L._Hunley_(submarine)
  - 4y ago

by trzy 4y ago

Suicide torpedoes were proposed by the Polish military in 1939 and the program appears to have gotten as far as signing up recruits but to my knowledge none were ever deployed.

zaphirplane 4y ago

> signing up recruits I understand there is a serious and dire aspect to this, not specific to the polish. Still recruiting for this is too close to exploiting vulnerable devastated individuals

robonerd 4y ago

The Nazis planned to use similar suicide tactics with a manned version of their V-1 cruise missile. They built and flew prototypes, but Hitler was persuaded to drop the project before it was put to use. Formalized suicide attack programs with purpose-built hardware are chilling to think about, but there is also a broader class of suicide attacks that include impromptu decisions and last resorts which seem easier to understand. On both sides of WW2, there are cases of pilots trying to crash into the enemy after realizing their fate was sealed anyway. This may have happened with an American B-26 at the Battle of Midway, and one of the Japanese pilots who attacked Pearl Harbor apparently announced his intention to do this before the battle (in both cases they missed their target.)

trhway 4y ago
>a broader class of suicide attacks that include impromptu decisions and last resorts which seem easier to understand. In USSR/Russia such attacks by Soviet soldiers (using say your body to close the machine gun embrasure) have been widely celebrated. Where is similar behavior by Ukrainian soldiers against Russian forces in today's war is blamed by Russian propaganda on "Ukrainian nationalists being pumped full of drugs".
jillesvangurp 4y ago
The Russian army also had some chilling tactics. Basically they had more soldiers than guns during the battle of Stalingrad. So they sent them in pairs where one person was supposed to pick up the gun in the (likely) case the other person got shot. To prevent people from refusing orders, they simply shot anyone running the wrong way. Ordering people to march towards (almost) certain death is probably as old as war is. What set the Japanese apart is the fanatical culture that resulted in people volunteering for this. The modern equivalent would be suicide bombers.
- the_af 4y ago
  Your understanding of the Red Army is incorrect. Please cite academic sources (so not Enemy at the Gates, awful movie) showing that at Stalingrad the Red Army had "more soldiers than guns".
  - golergka 4y ago
    Never saw that movie, but it's pretty much common knowledge in modern Russia, and was described in very numerous accounts by war veterans.
    - the_af 4y ago
      It's still wrong. The Red Army didn't have a guns shortage at Stalingrad. "Common knowledge" is not knowledge, not in "modern Russia" either. Cite one academic source, please.
- corrral 4y ago
  > The Russian army also had some chilling tactics. Basically they had more soldiers than guns during the battle of Stalingrad. So they sent them in pairs where one person was supposed to pick up the gun in the (likely) case the other person got shot. To prevent people from refusing orders, they simply shot anyone running the wrong way. Ordering people to march towards (almost) certain death is probably as old as war is. This was depicted in the film Enemy at the Gates (2001)—and probably other, earlier films, I'd expect—and then strikingly similarly (i.e. they likely deliberately modeled their version on the scene from the film) in the first Call of Duty game (2003), back when that series was all WWII shooters.
  - the_af 4y ago
    It should be noted this was false at Stalingrad, and "Enemy at the Gates" has a terribly inaccurate depiction of that battle. There are no reliable sources stating that the Red Army [1] had more soldiers than guns by that time. Just some pop culture from a terrible movie that has somehow permeated into "knowledge" about the Eastern Front. [1] also wrong to call it "the Russian army", it was the army of the Soviet Union and had non-Russians.

zardo 4y ago

The first submarine that sunk an enemy ship (h.l. Hunley) was a suicide torpedo with a crew of 8.

saberdancer 4y ago
Not intentionally.
- corrral 4y ago
  My recollection from Cussler's version of the story was that the detachable torpedo on their bow (the idea was to ram a pointy torpedo on the bow of the sub into the enemy ship, detach, then it blows up on a delay so the sub could escape, IIRC) got stuck and didn't detach properly.
  - robonerd 4y ago
    Historically, torpedoes were bombs on the end of sticks that you'd ram the enemy with, but these were generally not intended to be suicide weapons (the stick was for safety.) Self-propelled torpedoes came later, and the original bomb-on-a-stick sort of torpedo may now be called "spar torpedoes."
  - zardo 4y ago
    All that's known for sure (since it was found and raised a few years ago) is that it was close enough to the explosion for the shockwave to kill the crew, but far enough away to not damage the sub itself.
jessriedel 4y ago
The Hunley was not a suicide torpedo. It was a new and highly dangerous submarine. The crew died shortly after sinking the Union’s Housatonic, but their death was accidental rather than a necessary part of the attack method. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H._L._Hunley_(submarine) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H._L._Hunley_(submarine)
- 4y ago