Comments by "Sar Jim" (@sarjim4381) on "Mark Felton Productions"
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While the Panther was inferior to the MiG in almost every flight characteristic, the two things it had going for it was better fire control and better guns. The 37mm Nudelman cannon was a bomber destroyer and not something useful in fighter to fighter combat. Its rate of fire was only 40 rounds per minutes and it only carried 40 rounds of ammunition when fully loaded. It was a devastating if it hit, but the chances of hitting a Panther tearing past you at 570 mph was slim to none.
The Nudelman 23mm cannon were much better suited for dogfighting.but the engineering evaluation of the MiG showed it was overweight. To reduce weight, the number of cannon was reduced from three to two, and the ammunition per gun to only 60 rounds. The gun was very fast firing at 850 rounds per minute, a good feature in jet combat, but the MiG carried a mere 60 rounds per gun. A pilot had about 10 seconds worth of shooting before he was empty.
The Panther had four 20mm AN/M3 cannon. They fired at the slower rate of 700 rounds a minute, but the Panther carried 190 rounds per gun. All four cannon could fire for about 23 seconds before the Panther ran dry. The Panther also had the advantage of a computing optical gunsight compared to the less sophisticated and less accurate gyroscopic gunsight carried by the MiG. Combined with a rugged airframe and superb Navy pilots, the Panther managed to bring down seven MiGs for the loss of two Panthers during the Korean War. With the arrival of the Cougar, a much more capable aircraft developed directly from the Panther, the Panther continued on in the fighter-bomber role. The last Panthers weren't retired until the mid to late 60's.
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This was really a classic type of Japanese operation. Overly complicated, dependant on split second timing, not enough manpower or weapons, no back up plan, and using a kamikaze type attack rather than the parachute assault the soldiers had actually been trained to carry out. Japanese intelligence of American strength on Okinawa was nearly non-existent, and the numbers of troops and fighters already on the island was far in excess of their estimates. A largely nuisance raid like Operation Gi-gou could never seriously impair America's ability to continue bombing the home islands.
Some historians believe Operation Gi-gou was simply an army demonstration of how they too were willing to engage in organized suicide attacks. Operation Ten-Go, the doomed suicide attack of the Yamato and her escorts headed to Okinawa, happened five weeks before Operation Gi-gou, and there was great pressure on the army to show they were fully committed to the defense of the homeland. This operation was to answer the criticism of the army that Japanese soldiers, while they fought to death in defensive battles, had no offensive plans, especially for suicide attacks, while the navy and air force were losing thousands of men a week in such attacks. The fruitless Operation Gi-gou would seem to have been a political response on the part of the army to save face and show the emperor they were also fully committed. On such things did the last days of the war turn for Japan.
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@sadwingsraging3044 141 US soldiers were executed in WWII, all except one for murder, rape, or both. The sole exception was the rather famous case of Eddie Slovik, executed by shooting on January 31, 1945 for desertion. The military had long =feared an outbreak of murder, rape, and/or looting as the military began to take over enemy countries. They used the executions and a way to underline the military's resolve not to let this happen. Given the millions of troops involved with the invasion and occupation of Axis countries, the number of US servicemen who were involved in such crimes was far lower than would have been expected, but the idea you'd be executed if you committed such crimes, or at least would if you were caught, seemed to have a salutary effect in diminishing such crimes.
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First, the U-571 probably had no deck gun, or at least a large caliber deck gun. They had been removed from almost all ocean going boats by the start of 1945 or earlier as it was far too dangerous to try to sink enemy ships by gunfire. She carried a quad 20mm flak gun and a twin 37mm AA gun. Throwing the ammo and torpedo detonators overboard was part of the surrender order sent by Doenitz, so that's not out of the ordinary. Some boats even jettisoned their antiaircaft guns as well so there was no armament above decks. Firing off the torpedoes to lessen weight and give the men more room for the voyage also makes sense. Throwing the logbook, ship's documents, code books, and the men's identification overboard was part of normal Kriegsmarine policy if a ship knew it was going to surrender and had time to jettison these items. Sabotage of the engines ensured the boat wouldn't be of immediate use ot the enemy.
It's unlikely that Wermuth was the boat's commander before the surrender. He was the equivalent rank of a Lieutenant (j.g.) in the USN. No submarine would normally have such a low ranking officer as captain. Even that late in the war, a full Lieutenant was the lowest rank to command a sub. My guess is they learned of the surrender during the unexplained two days in port at Skagerrak, Norway. I suspect they were actually in port on May 8, the date of surrender, not the March 5 he told interrogators. Disagreements between Wermuth and the actual captain broke out about what to do after the surrender. Wermuth wanted to make for a neutral port while the captain wanted to surrender and then return to Germany. As was the case with several other subs in Norway at the time, those who wanted to stay left the boat to make it back to Germany on some other German vessel while Wermuth and the remaining crew started out on their long voyage. He may have taken on some German sailors also wanting to make a breakout to flesh out the crew.
Wermuth stated they travelled 66 days underwater using their snorkel. I assuming they were alternating engines, something they would have done to extend the life of at least one of them. Wermuth stated he was originally going to try for Spain or Portugal but allied air patrols were constant and he didn't think he could make it to either port unharmed. The other alternative was Argentina. Wermuth may not have known that Argentina had declared war on Germany since it would have happened while he was enroute to Norway, and he was presumably a busy man after that. He knew that Argentina had a large German population and the government had Nazi sympathizers.
If my guesses about what happened are right, an underwater voyage of 66 days would have been about right running underwater at no more that seven knots for most of the voyage. Wermuth hated the Americans and the British. He was an ardent Nazi and expected to be tortured and imprisoned if he fell into allied hands. Some or all of his crew may have expected the same given Nazi propaganda about the brutal way German POWs were treated. I've never been able to find out where Wermuth was born, He was said to have no friends and never discussed his family with his men. It's possible his home was now in the Soviet area of Germany, and he didn't relish being welcomed home by the Soviets, who had a special distaste for U-boat captains and officers. Whatever the reason, it appears Wermuth and his men decided to take their chances in Argentina. His epic voyage still remains clouded in mystery, but no evidence has ever been brought force to support any of the many conspiracy theories about the U-530.
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A stroke of luck it could be, but postwar interviews and Japanese naval records do indicate that I-26 was there at the time and did indeed do the shelling. The idea that a USN submarine was the one doing the shelling and that the entire crew had remained silent all these years is just laughable. Japanese submarines were well known for their poor performance in surface actions. They gun itself was noted for excessive dispersion, and the I-26 didn't carry a director, since the ones in use by the IJN were too heavy to mount on a submarine mast. Aiming was done using telescopic sights on the gun mount, put them too low for reliable long distance shelling. Japanese submarine tactics were to rely on their excellent torpedos, only using their deck gun on vessels judged too small to waste a torpedo on. Since these were generally merchant vessels that were either unarmed or poorly armed, Japanese submarines would come to nearly point blank range to sink the vessel. In at least 50% of the attacks, the shells either missed or hit non-vital parts of the target. The Japanese sub would then dive to escape an attack, assuming her shells did sink the merchantman. Japanese submarines were just not very capable when it came to attacking land targets several miles away, something their gun crews rarely practiced for. Japanese sub commanders felt these attacks put their boats at unnecessary risk for very little benefit, so they rarely pressed home an attack, preferring to mount a mostly symbolic shelling. Cdr Yokota, captain of I-26, was noted as being a particularly unaggressive skipper, as shown by the poor war record of 1-26 while under his command.
By June 26, 1942, US and Canadian antisubmarine forces had been fully aroused. This was particularly true with the attack by I-26, since Cdr Yokota was aware of the invasion of the Aleutian Islands starting on June 3. The main goal of the attack was not the lighthouse, but the radio station, one of the most important on the Pacific coast for both its long range transmitting capabilities and its RDF (radio direction finding) broadcasts used by merchant ships for locating their positions. Japanese intelligence on the exact location of the radio station was only approximate at best, and the radio towers weren't lighted, making them hard to see in the fading light, especially with the reported rough seas and two mile visibility in haze reported that night. The lighthouse keeper put out the light immediately after the first shell was fired, making locating the radio station that much harder. The radioman on the sub monitored the Point Estevan station as it continued to send out SOS signals, and the sub continued to shell, hoping that one would hit the radio station. Instead, the Japanese gunners were using the elevation of the light as their aiming point based on information the radio station was being the lighthouse, so their shell went harmlessly long into the uninhabited area further inland. I-26, fearing an attack by aircraft, moved back out to sea on the surface, using her high top speed of 23 knots to put distance between her and the likely point of of attack by arriving aircraft.
In fact, it took nearly 90 minutes for the first RCN (Royal Canadian Navy) Catalina patrol bomber to arrive over Point Estevan. Four other aircraft showed up in the next half hour, but the first Canadian subchaser took over four hours to arrive. By that time, I-26 was long gone. This was an acute embarrassment to the RCN, which had assured both its citizens and the USN that it was fully able to protect its coastline. The attack was reported as merely a bub firing a few shells and then submerging due to aircraft attack. This false report by the RCN has helped fuel the ridiculous conspiracy theories about an attack by a USN sub or even a Canadian cruiser. All the evidence points to the attack being exactly what it seemed - a Japanese sub shelling a relatively unprotected coastline. This is one of those continuing conspiracy theories second only to the sinking of the Australian cruiser Sydney , but being supported by nearly zero evidence.
Ironically, the attack by I-26 caused far more sinkings than her torpedoes and deck gun. All the Canadian lighthouses went dark and the RDF stations stopped transmitting after the attack. It's estimated that at least 15 merchantman were lost by running up on the many rocks and reefs along the Canadian Pacific coast with no lights or RDF stations to guide them.
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The Me-163 was built as a bomber destroyer, streaking through the formations in hope a few rounds would hit a bomber and bring it down. According to German testing, just four to five 30mm HE shells would cause fatal damage to an allied bomber. The problem was the 163 had very poor gunshights to begin with, and closing speeds of near 800 mph made hits as much a matter of luck as anything else. The Me-163 was never meant to be a dogfighter, a role excelled by the P-51. Most P-51's would just loiter above the bomber stream, wait for the 163 to run out of fuel, and jump it as its sink rate began to increase and maneuverability decreased. Somewhere between nine and eighteen allied bombers were lost to the 163 while at least 10 163's were shot down by the bombers themselves or escorting fighters. As far as I know, no 163 ever shot down a fighter in combat. The rocket fighter was a technological dead end, and Germany spent a lot of money, manpower, and resources it didn't have just to put a technically advanced plane in the air. It was not the only type of expensive weapon of doubtful utility developed toward the close of the war while looking for the wonder weapon that would win the war.
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Thanks for another interesting video. Syria was only in the Six Days War because of false reports that the IDF had been crushed and Egyptian forces were advancing n Tel Aviv. Not wanting to be left out of the division of territory after the war, the Syrian Army went into action. In addition to poor maintenance of its armored vehicles, they also had a plethora of types, from the Panzer IVs, Churchills, Shermans, and various Russian types, including the T-34 and T-54.
Even though the Syrians had over 1,000 tanks on strength, less than 300 were operation on the first day of the war. Israel swifty destroyed two thirds of the Syrian air force on the ground, ending any hope of close air support. Israel's aircraft were free to roam the Golan Heights, and any tanks that showed themselves were quickly attacked. There were a few hard tank vs tank battles when the Syrians were able to mount an armoured attack before the Israeli planes showed up, but many Syrian tanks were either abandoned by their crews or swiftly withdrew behind Syrian lines. The infantry was poorly trained and led, and it tended to break and run at the sight of Israeli tanks. The constant attacks by aircraft, while not really doing much damage to the Syrian defense lines, demoralized Syrian soldiers and caused many units to surrender en masse, sometimes killing their own officer trying to prevent the surrender. Syria had gotten itself in a war based on lies, and in a war it wasn't prepared to fight. All the Panzers in the world couldn't have helped them in 1967
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Great story. Many people in the US are somewhat familiar with the exploits of the LRDG due to the 1960's TV show "Rat Patrol". However, the producers decided to have three of the soldiers be Americans and only one British. This didn't sit well with British viewers, and even less well with Australians and New Zealanders, since the actual makeup of the LRDG was about half Aussies and Kiwis. The BBC pulled the show after six episodes. Australian TV showed it on Saturday afternoons. the traditional time slot for kid's shows. The show typically had three jeeps as a raiding party, far too few in real life, and they were armed with single M2 .50 caliber machine guns rather than the plethora of twin Vickers K and Lewis guns they were typically armed with, only having an occasional M2. Of course, being only a 30 minute show, there wasn't much time to develop historically accurate plots, even if the producers wanted to do so. It was primarily popular with kids who liked the shoot em up atmosphere of the show, and the show only lasted two seasons.
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One has to wonder how many other things could have gone wrong if this had been a real attack from the east.
The British sometimes had problems getting onto a war footing when the worst happened in the Falklands as well. The loss of HMS Sheffield showed this kind of confused thinking compared to the battle readiness of the captain and crew of her sistership, the HMS Glasgow, operating in the same task force. The Agave radar of the two Exocet carrying Argentine Super Etendards was detected at more than 40 miles out, and before the missile launch. As per policy, Glasgow sent out an urgent warning of the hostile aircraft to all ships of the task force over HF and UHF radio. The Sheffield's radio operators hadn't been monitoring the HF radio since that was a long range radio, and all ships of the task force were within 10 miles of each other. It never heard the UHF warning because Sheffield and HMS Coventry were carrying out idle chitchat on the UHF radio. The Sheffield's captain had decided that a submarine attack was the greatest threat and was zigzagging every 90 seconds, making the ship's radars less effective against an air threat. In addition to all this, the radar jamming transmitter on the Sheffield was non-functional All this confusion, failure to follow procedures, non-operative equipment, and general lack of situational awareness on May 25, 1982 caused the loss of an aircraft, and the loss of an irreplaceable destroyer and the deaths of 20 crew on May 4 of the same year.
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The US had operational Sikorsky R-4 helicopter squadrons in 1943, and they operated from ships and land. They were in Burma, the South Pacific, Burma, Britain, and Europe as the allies advanced. The Coast Guard gained a lot of experience flying the Navy version, HNS-1, on rescue and patrol flights along the US East Coast in 1944-45. The USN and RN flew R-4s from shipboard landing decks as early as 1944, and the USN was regularly flying the first vertical replenishment flight in the Pacific by late 1944. United Aircraft, Sikorsky's parent company, had built 100 R-4's by November of 1944. They were already building the R-5 (also named Dragon), a much larger and more powerful machine, by March, 1944, and the first went into service by February, 1945.
So, just to be clear, the Germans were not ahead of the allies when it came to helicopters in general. What they were ahead on what was the first heavy lift helicopter, the Fa 223. Even the Fa 223 was a dead end in terms of heavy lift birds as the the widely separated rotors required a plethora of chains, wires, and gears shafts, a fatal flaw that caused most of the Fa 223 crashes. Some of the design details were used in experimental US helicopters that led the CH-37 Mojave, largest helicopter in the world at the time of the first flight in 1953, and the first large enough a vehicle could drive onboard.
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