Amusing WWII Trivia

Larry Holt · Post by **Larry Holt** » Tue May 29, 2001 11:48 pm

Found on the Internet:

The youngest US serviceman was 12 year old Calvin Graham, USN. He was wounded and given a Dishonorable Discharge for lying about his age. (His benefits were later restored by act of Congress)

At the time of Pearl Harbor the top US Navy command was Called CINCUS (pronounced "sink us"), the shoulder patch of the US Army's 45th. Infantry division was the Swastika, and Hitler's private train was named "Amerika". All three were soon changed for PR purposes.

More US servicemen died in the Air Corps than the Marine Corps. While completing the required 30 missions your chance of being killed was 71%.

Generally speaking there was no such thing as an average fighter pilot. You were either an ace or a target. For instance Japanese ace Hiroyoshi Nishizawa shot down over 80 planes. He died while a passenger on a cargo plane.

It was a common practice on fighter planes to load every 5th round with a tracer round to aid in aiming. This was a mistake. Tracers had different ballistics so (at long range) if your tracers were hitting the target 80% of your rounds were missing. Worse yet tracers instantly told your enemy he was under fire and from which direction. Worst of all was the practice of loading a string of tracers at the end of the belt to tell you that you were out of ammo. This was definitely not something you wanted to tell the enemy. Units that stopped using tracers saw their success rate nearly double and their loss rate go down.

When allied armies reached the Rhine the first thing men did was pee in it. This was pretty universal from the lowest private to Winston Churchill (who made a big show of it) and Gen. Patton (who had himself photographed in the act).

Among the first "Germans" captured at Normandy were several Koreans. They had been forced to fight for the Japanese Army until they were captured by the Russians and forced to fight for the Russian Army until they were captured by the Germans and forced to fight for the German Army until they were captured by the US Army.

German submarine U-120 was sunk by a malfunctioning toilet.

Mumdaan · Post by **Mumdaan** » Wed May 30, 2001 12:40 am

omg that's good stuff )
hehe

TheZel66 · Post by **TheZel66** » Wed May 30, 2001 12:54 am

What happened to the Koreans? Boy, would that make a great non-fiction novel.

Dont tell me, they finished the war fighting for Korea, after they fought for US, captured by the Japaneese, then fighting for them, and captured by the Chineese, fighting for them....

Grumble · Post by **Grumble** » Wed May 30, 2001 1:19 am

It was a common practice on fighter planes to load every 5th round with a tracer round to aid in aiming. This was a mistake. Tracers had different ballistics so (at long range) if your tracers were hitting the target 80% of your rounds were missing. Worse yet tracers instantly told your enemy he was under fire and from which direction. Worst of all was the practice of loading a string of tracers at the end of the belt to tell you that you were out of ammo. This was definitely not something you wanted to tell the enemy. Units that stopped using tracers saw their success rate nearly double and their loss rate go down.

Never read this in any AAR I've seen. Actually success went up (in USAAF and RAF) when the guns were synchronized for 300 yards or less, this was more due to higher Pk than tracer issues. In both services, guns were originally synchronized for 600yds or more; much too far away for effective shooting. At this range, yeah tracers would have a SLIGHTLY different trajectory. Inside 400-500 yards, the ability to sight through the reflector while observing fire was quite an advantage (still is), with very little difference in trajectory.
Round counters (such as the Germans had at the beginning of the war) were certainly better than using tracers, but the disadvantage is not necessarily that the enemy realizes you're "winchester". If you are engaging, the target will go defensive until he realizes you aren't a threat. Assuming the guy survives to see your flurry of tracers, he still has to get you off his six and get into position to fire on you. I would doubt anyone would have situational awareness to track which of the bad guys is winchester and who isn't. The problem is one of mission management: I don't know how much ammo I have left, so do I separate and go home, or stick around.

RolandRahn_MatrixForum · Wed May 30, 2001 2:15 am

I think that most of these infos came from Dunnigan, James and Nofi, Albert: "Dirty little secrets of WWII". The info abaout the tracer ammo can be found on p. 194.
(BTW, the book contains a lot more interesting infos, I can only recommend it)

Kind regards,
Roland

Figmo · Post by **Figmo** » Wed May 30, 2001 5:02 am

Thanks Larry - those were great!! My wife liked them too!!

Figmo

tuppu · Post by **tuppu** » Wed May 30, 2001 10:02 pm

Q:Hmm... what did we learn about this?

A:In war everything is possible...

-Totenkopf

PS. Could you tell us where did you find this stuff?

ruxius · Post by **ruxius** » Wed May 30, 2001 10:41 pm

Very interesting..for those who can't find that book it would be very nice to read here more about.so whenever you want..you will not miss readers

Larry Holt · Post by **Larry Holt** » Wed May 30, 2001 11:33 pm

Originally posted by Colonel Totenkopf:
Q:Hmm... what did we learn about this?

A:In war everything is possible...

-Totenkopf

PS. Could you tell us where did you find this stuff?

on a subscription humor site, www.jokeaday.com They don't cover just military humor but this one case was very humorous.

RolandRahn Thanks for the orginal atribution to Dunnigan, James and Nofi, Albert