Interesting WWII facts

[Alexanderofmacedon]

A friend of mine's mom is a history teacher and while I was over, she gave me a book of interesting WWII facts. Tell any here you know of.

I'll start...

Did you know in WWII, in 1939 Germany owned 230,000 square miles of Antarctica?

[Ice]

# A number of air crewmen died of farts. (ascending to 20,000 ft. in an un-pressurized aircraft causes intestinal gas to expand 300%!)

[Kaiser of Arabia]

The legend that Polish lancers charged German tanks on horseback is a modification of the actual story. In reality, the Polish lancers had just routed a German infantry formation when it was ambushed by tanks. In the fleeing action, some of the lancers are reported to have charged the tanks.

[Kralizec]

Yeah, they send expeditions to the south pole. There are also conspiracy theories that say that the Nazis had a huge naval bay there for refueling their submarines. Supposedly Karl Donitz remarked to the allies something along the lines of "at this moment, the Third Reich is rebuilding her navy in a far away place!"

Wich is off course bull, but that would be excellent stuff for a badly written techno thriller. Fascists coming out of the ice, to conquer the world!

[cegorach]

The legend that Polish lancers charged German tanks on horseback is a modification of the actual story. In reality, the Polish lancers had just routed a German infantry formation when it was ambushed by tanks. In the fleeing action, some of the lancers are reported to have charged the tanks.

Krojanty 1st September 1939. No tanks but armoured cars of 2nd Motorised division, retreated with loses noone ever charged tanks, though at Wolka Weglowa there were 3 tanks which were not ready ( crews were restng) and Poles charged infantry position close to those.

Whe tanks were met by Polish cavalry it ended with loses, often much higher on German side.

[cegorach]

The only situation when cavalry unit stopped Panzer corps happened in Poland on 1st-2nd September 1939. 4th Panzer division lost many vehicles without much success and the entire corps stopped.

[Homo Sapiens]

The only attack on an mainland American military installation during World War II occured on the night of June 21-22, 1942. A Japanese submarine surfaced in the Columbia River in Oregon and fired shells at Fort Steven. The only damage reported was to a baseball field's backstop.

The only occupation of North American land mass during World War II occured on September 18, 1943. U-537 landed at Martin Bay, Labrador and the crew established an automatic weather station. They stayed the night on shore, then departed next morning.

[Aenlic]

Are you not counting islands which are a part of North America as part of the North American landmass? The Japanese bombed the U.S. military installation at Dutch Harbor on the island of Unalaska in the Aleutians on June 3rd, 1942 and landed an invasion force on the islands of Kiska and Attu, further west in the Aleutian chain. Both of these were part of the Territory of Alaska (which didn't become a state until 1959). I suppose a case could be made that they weren't on the American mainland, as islands; but I'd certainly call them part of the North American landmass as I would Vancouver Island or Baffin Island.

[AwesomeArcher]

# A number of air crewmen died of farts. (ascending to 20,000 ft. in an un-pressurized aircraft causes intestinal gas to expand 300%!)

Yes, that was interesting, i did a speech on the luftwaffe and i had that as one of my facts, another interesting one i had was that the soviet union downed more German planes by ramming them than shooting them.

[Homo Sapiens]

Are you not counting islands which are a part of North America as part of the North American landmass? The Japanese bombed the U.S. military installation at Dutch Harbor on the island of Unalaska in the Aleutians on June 3rd, 1942 and landed an invasion force on the islands of Kiska and Attu, further west in the Aleutian chain. Both of these were part of the Territory of Alaska (which didn't become a state until 1959). I suppose a case could be made that they weren't on the American mainland, as islands; but I'd certainly call them part of the North American landmass as I would Vancouver Island or Baffin Island.

Sorry Aenlic, I was meaning the North American mainland. If you were to include islands, then yes, the Japanese did occupy several Aelutian Islands, as well as Bell Island, Newfoundland.

[Aenlic]

Heh. OK. No worries. I was just confused and was trying to clarify. I thought that was the case and wanted to be sure. I had no idea that Labrador had been invaded, small as the invasion was!

[English assassin]

Eh? Surely Newfoundland is in the North Atlantic? What would the Japanese be doing in the North Atlantic?

[Brutus]

In the months between the Invasion of Poland and the start of "Fall Gelb" (German invasion of the Low Countries), the Dutch military attaché in Berlin, Major Bert Sas, was warned by German Abwehr-officer Col. Hans Oster about the data of the German invasion of the Netherlands. However, because Hitler kept postponing the date, Sas kept warning the Dutch Government regularly between 12 November 1939 and 9 May 1940. When the actual and final warning came, on 9 May, the Dutch Governement was so fed up with this they simply didn't believe him. That night, the Germans invaded. Most defences were not prepared.

The Dutch defenders against the German invaders used mounted cavalry against German troops in Groningen. The Dutch also pulled antique pieces of artillery out of the War Museum to use against the Germans.

[Peasant Phill]

Another 'fall Gelb' anecdote:

The strategy behind 'fall Gelb' was to rush through the Netherlands and Belgium to attack France and by doing so avoid having to fight mobilized armies. The Belgian fort of Eben-Emael was an obstacle in this plan. The fort was build after WWI and was one of the strongest in the world and was regarded as impenetrable. When the Germans attacked it took them just one day to force the defenders to capitulate and suffer only 6 dead and 18 injured. The Germans landed on the roof of the fort with gliders and used hollow charges to destroy the gun turrets. The interesting thing about it is that only weeks (I'm doing this from memory) before the attack there were trees on the roof, making a landing with gliders impossible. The trees were cut down in order to make place for a soccer pitch to entertain the garrison. Or how soccer caused the strongest fort of Belgium (wikipedia says of the world) to fall in just one day.

[Oaty]

http://www.5ad.org/AmazingFacts.htm

Seems a lot of these facts are flying around the web

[Duke Malcolm]

18. The Graf Spee never sank, The scuttling attempt failed and the ship was bought by the British. On board was Germany’s newest radar system.

Is this true? I'm sure I read once that some South American country wanted to bring the Graf Spee up from the depths...

24. During the Japanese attack on Hong Kong, British officers objected to Canadian infantrymen taking up positions in the officer’s mess. No enlisted men allowed!

I like this one, nice to see the officers keeping up the side.

[Brenus]

“Yes, that was interesting, i did a speech on the luftwaffe and i had that as one of my facts, another interesting one i had was that the soviet union downed more German planes by ramming them than shooting them.”
In doing that how many pilots did the Soviets lost?

[Keba]

In doing that how many pilots did the Soviets lost?

Total Soviet casualties (military, 1941-1945) mounted 8,668,400 soldiers, or more, they never were particularly truthful. I don't think an idividual pilot mattered a lot.

Unfortunately, the books I have with me do not contain precise division within that number.

[Banquo's Ghost]

Eh? Surely Newfoundland is in the North Atlantic? What would the Japanese be doing in the North Atlantic?

From the way I read it, the landing was via German u-boat (my bold):

The only occupation of North American land mass during World War II occured on September 18, 1943. U-537 landed at Martin Bay, Labrador and the crew established an automatic weather station. They stayed the night on shore, then departed next morning.

[AwesomeArcher]

“Yes, that was interesting, i did a speech on the luftwaffe and i had that as one of my facts, another interesting one i had was that the soviet union downed more German planes by ramming them than shooting them.”
In doing that how many pilots did the Soviets lost?

Well i dont know for sure, but it must have been a heck of a lot, but than again the soviet leadership during the war didn't care a whole lot about an indvidual pilot, kind of the like the japanese who trained their pilots only how to fly into a ship.

[hoom]

The Graf Spee never sank, The scuttling attempt failed and the ship was bought by the British

She sank all right, just in shallow water.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_depth/...ry/3490360.stm

[Brenus]

“kind of the like the japanese who trained their pilots only how to fly into a ship”
I just don’t believe in the story of “more rammed than shot down” The 2nd Allied As is Alexendar Pokrshkin.

“Pokryshkin was born on March 6, 1913 in Novosibirsk. In the air force he worked his way up from a military technician to a marshal of the air force. During the Second World War he flew 650 missions, carried out 156 fights and personally shot down 59 enemy planes. Pilots of Pokryshkin's 9th Guards fighter air division brought down 1,147 enemy aircraft. In the war he was awarded three Gold Stars of the Hero, many orders of the USSR and another 19 decorations of Asian, European and American countries. It ought to be noted that during the war none of Pokryshkin's wingmen was killed.” NONE was killed. That gives a other picture from the rammed thing isn’t it?

[Uesugi Kenshin]

Well not necessarilly, that is merely anecdotal evidence. But I'd still be interested to hear how it was determined that the Luftwaffe lost more planes to ramming than being shot down, and how large the difference was.

[AwesomeArcher]

I dont know that exact figures, but my guess would be that it isn't by too much.

Was pokryshkin the Soviets top ace? Because he looks small when compared with the top luftwaffe pilots. There are 36 known luftwaffe pilots with over 100 kills. Also three japanese pilots that had over 60 kills and even two pilots from finland with over 75 kills. Even though the U.S.'s top pilot only had 40 kills. We didn't fight in the war as long you the others and most of the great air battles were past.

[The Stranger]

the ramming was not ramming but doing sumthing with the wings. i saw it on discovery but i forgot how it was

[KrooK]

I'm not sure but one of german pilots got over 300 planes destroyed - mostly russian planes. I know that one of their bomber pilots destroyed over 500 russian tanks.

[GoreBag]

Canadians engaged the Japanese in combat before the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbour. The Japanese attack on Hong Kong was met by a mixed force of British, Indian and Canadian garrison troops. The Canadians were undertrained and undersupplied, since they were intended merely for show as a deterrent, but were the last defenders to surrender (which took place on Christmas Day).

[Redleg]

“kind of the like the japanese who trained their pilots only how to fly into a ship”
I just don’t believe in the story of “more rammed than shot down” The 2nd Allied As is Alexendar Pokrshkin.

“Pokryshkin was born on March 6, 1913 in Novosibirsk. In the air force he worked his way up from a military technician to a marshal of the air force. During the Second World War he flew 650 missions, carried out 156 fights and personally shot down 59 enemy planes. Pilots of Pokryshkin's 9th Guards fighter air division brought down 1,147 enemy aircraft. In the war he was awarded three Gold Stars of the Hero, many orders of the USSR and another 19 decorations of Asian, European and American countries. It ought to be noted that during the war none of Pokryshkin's wingmen was killed.” NONE was killed. That gives a other picture from the rammed thing isn’t it?

I believe its a myth also that grew from the early days of the German invasion into Russia. Before Russia got its act together but refused to give up any ground without a fight. With the outdated equipment of the Soviet Airforce prior to 1943, such a tactic would not be surprising considering the seemly ingrained desire to protect Mother Russia from the invaders.

From Wikipedia - other information is available also but it borders on increasing the myth of how many were done.

In World War II ramming (Russian: taran) became a legendary technique of VVS pilots against the Luftwaffe, especially in the early days of the hostilities in the war's Eastern Front. In the first year of the war, the Soviet machines were considerably inferior to the German ones and the taran was sometimes perceived as the only way to guarantee the destruction of the enemy. Trading an outdated fighter to a technologically advanced bomber was considered a good trade. In some cases, heavily wounded pilots or in damaged aircraft decided to perform a suicidal taran attack against air, ground or naval targets, similar to kamikaze (see Nikolai Gastello).

The first taran attack in World War II was carried out by the Polish pilot, Lt. Col. Leopold Pamuła on his damaged PZL P.11c on September 1, 1939, over Łomianki near Warsaw (taran is also a Polish word).

Nine rammings took place on the very first day of German invasion to the Soviet Union. About 200 (some estimates give the number closer to 500) taran attacks were made by Soviets between the beginning of Operation Barbarossa and the middle of 1943 when enough modern aircraft had been produced to make the tactic obsolete, even if Russian fighter pilots still are trained to perform it. Lieutenant Boris Kovzan survived the record of four ramming attacks in the war. Alexander Khlobytsev made three. Seventeen other Soviet pilots were credited with two successful ramming attacks.

[Avicenna]

I heard this from a friend, not sure if it's true though:

Luxembourg decided to support the Allies and sent their army of forty men South to fight Italy. On the way, they decided they didn't want to face certain death, and returned to Luxembourgh with forty-one men. They found a friend on the way.

[KrooK]

I know better fact.
When Rommel landen in Africa and attacked Brits, they sent tank division to stop it. Division has been withdrawed just before battle and when they got back to previous positions, it appeared that they got 10 tank more than they got at the beginning :)
Maybe these tanks simply copulated :P