Lead Adventure Forum
Miniatures Adventure => The Second World War => Topic started by: twrchtrwyth on April 29, 2008, 12:10:07 AM
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Can't remember where I found this now, thought it may be of interest. My favorites are the buckle pistol, one shot flame thrower, chocolate bar grenade and the anti-tank donkey! :lol:
http://www.greyfalcon.us/Weapons.htm
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The Donkey is a classic, there is just something so bizarre about heavily armed animals.
The Soviet anti-tank mine dog springs to mind as another example.
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Thanks for the link. 8)
Very interesting designs judging from the photos the Germans came up with.
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one shot flame thrower
The Bundeswehr still equips one shot "flame cartridges" which are , naturally, way smaller than the bulky thing from these days.
(http://www.gebirgsjager.de/Bilder/ausruest/waffen/handflamm.jpg)
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I'm struck by two things - half of those weapons are complex SMG/assault rifle/LMG types, full of complicated machined parts. Inevitably they are quoted as being intended for the politically-connected units, the ones with the repeated letter. The other half of them look like you could make them from plumber's fittings and a sheet-steel stamping machine: fast, cheap, and they'd have to do. It seems like a metaphor for the Wehrmacht of the final days of the war: Precious resources being poured into complicated toys, while ersatz guns go to the hands of defenders ordered to stand to the last.
What a waste. What a maddening, futile, stupid waste.
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Good lord! :o
Some of that stuff is disturbingly thrown together. Krieg-bicycle? What is that in German? Its been a while since I had to speak it.
I echo Pete's sentiments. The people using this stuff must have thought it was the end of the world if this was all they were being issued with.
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Nice link to German discus grenades from there. Thanks. I've been wanting to see a picture of the WW1 version since I read about it in my WW1 engineers' manual.
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Love the Donkeyfaust! :lol:
The belt buckle gun reminds me of one I had as a kid. It was a metal derringer on a mount that swung out and fired a plastic bullet when you released the 'secret catch' and pushed your stomach out! I seem to remember it was connected with 'Have Gun Will Travel' for some reason.
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Poor old donkey :(
Explosive chocolate bar! Good grief, I'd fall for that.The ice mine is the most ingenious of the lot.
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I'm struck by two things - half of those weapons are complex SMG/assault rifle/LMG types, full of complicated machined parts. Inevitably they are quoted as being intended for the politically-connected units, the ones with the repeated letter. The other half of them look like you could make them from plumber's fittings and a sheet-steel stamping machine: fast, cheap, and they'd have to do. It seems like a metaphor for the Wehrmacht of the final days of the war: Precious resources being poured into complicated toys, while ersatz guns go to the hands of defenders ordered to stand to the last.
What a waste. What a maddening, futile, stupid waste.
So were you rooting for the Wehrmacht to win???? I would prefer more such waste, earlier :)
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Great link!
Just a friendly word of warning. Greyfalcon has a very definite political agenda. I would advise those going through his site to do so with a grain of salt.
-Doc
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Thank god the Nazi administration was so tied up with not concentrating ressources and wasting them.
Of course this general tendency of military research highly contradicts the general view of germans being efficient and well organized - but this is the difference between reality and cliché.
And it provides us with weird ideas....
I remember the one-shot flamethrower and the blatant "misinformation" of it being a device to blind crews of AFV.....
I just took a flight over the site linked, and my personal view is that apart displaying NS symbols at closer view and propagating the ubiquitous Nazi cliché of wonderweapons, it is grossely misleading.
The rarity of the displayed weapons is often due to their unawareness according to the standardized movie version of the german army and also due to the improvisational character but frequent use.
Misconceiving bicycle attachments as weapon mounts is really stupid.
Many were also standard issue for specialized troops and thus in small series.
Animals were used as "one-shot" devices, but believing that someone would fire a Bazooka from the back of a donkey.... give me a break!
The fact that WWII soldiers could not post silly prank pictures on the internet surely did not keep them from shooting them....
And finally, there are many examples of western allied troops improvising whatever was at hand, and also discarded weapons concepts and unused prototypes.
An interesting example is a mechanized american infanty regiment who's commander was hunting for downed allied aircraft in France in order to equip all his AFV with .50 cal MG....
PS : with "stupid" I meant the above linked site and in no way any of the users here - so no offence intended.....
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very nice the donkyfaust was awsome
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The site these are from is called "STRANGE VEHICLES OF PRE-WAR GERMANY & THE THIRD REICH". I'd post a link to the home page, but I've a feeling the German Police might not be quite so happy about that...
Google it.
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better not
the first one was already.....
though an interesting collection of ideas
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cool reference, thanks for sharing
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Interesting.
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Interesting indeed,and amusing.Sound suppressors on MG 34 o_o lol ? Some fakery as well. As for the donkey,I think donkeys would have been too valuable a beast to even consider.
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Would have rather committed them to the slaughter house.
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You don't have the slightest Idea how nice creatures donkeys are
I'd rather eat a dog (I wouldn't eat a dog anyway, but if it came to decision making :()
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Considering my experiences, I'd have to say otherwise. >:(
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Considering my experiences, I'd have to say otherwise. >:(
Now I am curious! lol
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I have to warn you though, curiosity kills the cat. ;)
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and the dog and donkey too, apparently :D
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Is it worth one of the seven? nine? how many lives? :D
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As many as needs be ;).