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Tank Hack Ensured Farmland Didn't Thwart the Invasion of Europe
szczys writes: Ingenuity reigns supreme when trying to overcome obstacles standing in your way. So was the case during the Allied invasion of Europe during WWII. Land features in the Normandy bocage region were especially difficult for tanks to navigate. The obstacles were earthen dikes topped with mature trees originally put in place to contain livestock. The solution was to reuse materials from the Axis' own anti-tank measures to build a tank attachment to cut through the obstacles. The Allies were able to take the Axis by surprise as it was assumed the armored divisions wouldn't be able to break through this area.
Reminds me a little of the proboscis they bolt to the front of some heavy armament today to deal with land mines and such, and in a slightly different way, the cages they build around Strikers to deal with RPGs...
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
One of the best ones I have heard about is the hacking of the Dutch telephone system by the insiders. They had special "area codes" that bypassed main trunk exchanges but allowed the resistance fighters to communicate using the regular telephone system. If Gen Montgomery knew about it or had used it, his Operation Market Garden (movie: A Bridge Too Far) might have gone differently, they last bridge group might have learned the the German General Model and his panzer divisions were being held in that area as reserve and for refitting and they were in a position to cut off the lines of communication. Need to look it up.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
The D-Day plan included the capture of Caen on D-Day itself. If you ever visit Normandy, it is obvious that the river valley around Caen is the only good way out. The German's realized this too, and sent every possible unit there to keep the British from seizing the exit from the beaches. Battle after battle erupted in front of Caen to keep the Allies in. The Allied plan took the bocage hedgerows into account. They were protection from German counter-attack while the American Army took the port of Cherbourg and the Cotentin peninsula to serve as the staging area for incoming units to prepare for the breakout. With the main German force facing the British at Caen, the only other way to break out from the beachhead was through the bocage. This had never been part of the Allied plan, so it took some improvisation to develop tactics to break out.
Lets look at how a hedgerow is created. In medieval Europe fields were sectioned off into small areas with hedges between them. Every year due to frost action rocks are driven to the surface by frost action. Every year farmers go through their fields and throw these rocks into the hedges. Over the decades and centuries these hedgerows become very solid. In effect they were stone walls with hedges on top and there were a lot of them on Normandy. here is a better explanation of why hedgerows were a problem.
From the article:
When demonstrated for General Omar Bradley, he was impressed enough to order them built in quantity for the tanks. Eventually the prototype became an engineered product (dubbed the “Culin Rhino Device”) that was fitted to many tanks before being shipped over from England.
I wonder how long it took, from the demo for Gen. Bradley, until the device was fitted on tanks sent over from England. Hopefully not too long. Imagine the tanks being made in the US today. How long would it take before they were outfitted with the "tusks"? Senator #1: "I demand that the tusks be made in my state." Senator #2: "No - make them in my state, or I'll vote against them being made at all!"
In related news, U.S. Air Force instructs airmen on exactly how to praise the F-35. The Air Force should reject the F-35 for its many flaws, and demand their money back. Sigh. Some things really were better back in the past.
Um, who is getting shot at in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere? Dumbass.
If I remember correctly, the annual death toll in Iraq and Afghanistan is roughly the same as... one day on Omaha Beach, or about six hours on the Eastern Front.
I grew up around a WW2 paratrooper, Normandy, Holland, Bastogne (frostbite), Germany (shot). According to him it didn't matter if the war is big or small, popular or unpopular. Bullets and shrapnel do the same thing to a soldier. Getting shot at is getting shot at, whether you are alone, one of ten, or one of a thousand. If you went into harms way for your country you deserve respect, period. That was his lesson during the Vietnam war. Can't imagine him having a different opinion for Iraq or Afghanistan. Especially since I've seen videos of troops from his unit, then 502 PIR now 502 INF, doing room clearing in an urban settings. Something he did in Europe and disliked very much.
Not sure TV, cable, or movies are places to learn our history. And sadly, History Channel has fallen apart.
The HBO miniseries "Band of Brothers" and "The Pacific" are pretty good from a historical perspective. Very respectable adaptations of books written by a well regarded historian who did great research or written by veterans themselves. Read them all plus Winters' book. Sledge's "With The Old Breed" was probably the standout for me among the veteran's books. Very well written, of course he had been a university professor for decades by the time he authored his book.
HBO's "The Tuskegee Airman" seemed a respectable attempt at telling that story. It may have been a little more fictionalized given its time constraints, more composite characters and coalescing of events for example, but it certainly seemed far better than the Lucas "Red Tails" mess from a historical perspective. "Red Tails" went from beyond dramatic license and into cartoonishness IMO.