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Man has long applied the latest science
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to the creation of weapons,
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but the industrial age has seen unprecedented leaps
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in man's capacity to manufacture
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ever more powerful machines,
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machines capable of inflicting death and destruction
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on a massive scale.
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From hand grenades to howitzers,
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flame throwers to high explosives,
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and of course the ultimate in devastation,
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the atom bomb.
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This is the story of modern man's insatiable desire
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to land the killer blow
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on the pathway toward mass destruction.
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(dramatic music)
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Canon's first appeared on battlefields
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in the late 1300s.
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And during the Middle Ages,
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they became standardized, more common and more effective,
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both in siege roles and against infantry,
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effectiveness that led Shakespeare
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and his playing Henry the IV to have the character Falstaff
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describe his man before battle as food for powder.
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Cannon fodder was to become the popular term,
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but not even Shakespeare could have imagined
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the power of the artillery designs of the 20th century.
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Technology that would create food for powder,
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the like of which had never been seen before.
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The French 75,
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(gun firing)
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the gun from which all modern field artillery is descended.
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The Canon de Soixante-Quinze modèle 1887
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was the world's first truly modern artillery piece,
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and instantly made every other field gun
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in the world obsolete.
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Every major offensive that the French army took part in,
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in France on the Western front during the First World War,
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the French 75 would be the key part
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in the preliminary artillery bombardment.
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Weighing only 1500 kilograms in action,
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it fired a 75 millimeter shrapnel round
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weighing seven kilograms out to a range of 6,850 meters.
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But what was revolutionary about the French 75
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was that its seven man crew
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could maintain a steady firing rate
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of up to 15 rounds per minute.
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This unprecedented ability to provide rapid accurate fire
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was achieved by using a new and ingenious
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hydro-pneumatic recoil system.
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The recoil mechanism in this French 75
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meant that it can come automatically back
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to its original fire position
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and did not have to be re-aimed before it was fired again.
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The entire cycle,
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including the return took just two seconds.
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The gun also featured an all new rapid-acting
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screw-type breach mechanism
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into which was loaded an innovative fixed round
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with the time-fused shrapnel filled
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projectile and propelling charge
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pre-packaged in a brass case,
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which could be loaded in a single action.
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(explosion booming)
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A combination of innovations in a single weapon
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that led to destruction on a scale
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that had never been seen before.
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It is estimated that the allies alone
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fired over 5 million tons of shells during the Great War
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and the Germans, perhaps as much again.
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In all, over a billion projectiles plunged through the air
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in just four years.
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And when it wasn't raining lead,
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a deadly fog would drift in.
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On the evening of April 22nd, 1915,
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allied troops looking across no man's land
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in Southern Belgium saw a strange greenish-yellow cloud
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drifting toward them.
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The Germans had released 170 metric tons of chlorine gas
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along a six kilometer stretch of the front.
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More than 1100 troops would be killed
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and 7,000 injured in what was the world's
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first large-scale use of chemical weapons.
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The confined trench systems of World War I
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were ideal for achieving effective concentrations of gas.
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However, when it was released from cylinders
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on the prevailing wind as it was that day,
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it was impossible to control.
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Firing gas at the enemy using artillery was the solution.
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Chemical shells were first introduced by the Germans in 1916
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using 150 millimeter artillery.
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Independent of the wind,
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delivery of chemicals became a much more accurate affair.
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But gas, like any weapon evolves
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as a result of battlefield experiences.
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The main flaw associated with delivering gas via artillery
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was the difficulty of achieving a killing concentration.
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Each shell carried only a small payload
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and an area needed to be saturated
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to produce a cloud to be deadly.
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And both sides develop countermeasures,
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some primitive, others like gas masks
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becoming increasingly sophisticated.
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To nullify this in 1917, the Germans introduced a chemical
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which did not need to form a concentrated cloud
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to be effective.
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Mustard gas.
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A volatile, oily liquid that was heavier than air.
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Having settled on the ground and in the soil,
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mustard gas remained active for weeks,
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even months, depending on the weather conditions.
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Poisoning was by contact.
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Troops would march through contaminated areas
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unaware that they were being exposed.
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After returning to their trenches or barracks,
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they would then contaminate other soldiers.
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After contact, the skin of victims would blister.
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Troops would begin to vomit,
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suffer internal bleeding and eventually blindness.
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Between 35 million and 66 million shells
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filled with chemicals were fired during World War I.
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Although the strategic power of gas
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was not in the number of soldiers it killed,
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less than 1% of fatalities and only 7% of casualties
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were attributed to chemicals.
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It was in the psychological terror they caused,
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fear that in World War II would be delivered by size
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and on land, the largest allied weapon
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of the Second World War was the American M1.
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Introduced in 1943, the Black Dragon as it was called,
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was designed to penetrate thick concrete fortifications
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like those the allies expected to encounter
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along the German's Siegfried Line.
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The key to its destructive power was its caliber.
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The larger the caliber, the faster the projectile,
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the higher the payload you can accelerate.
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You deliver a much more intense,
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a much more dangerous explosive payload to the target.
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In the case of the Black Dragon,
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that amounted to a huge 240 millimeter explosive projectile
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that weighed 160 kilograms
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fired out of an 11 meter long barrel
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to a distance of 23 kilometers with pinpoint accuracy.
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(M1 firing)
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(explosion booming)
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Each shell impact from the M1 left a crater
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more than two meters deep and eight meters wide.
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And the radius in which a soldier
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could be rendered a casualty was unprecedented.
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For an un-entrench prone man
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up to 40 meters from detonation,
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death was almost certain.
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At a hundred meters from the blast,
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that same man would have a 50% chance
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of becoming a casualty.
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And potentially deadly shrapnel fragments
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could be thrown as far as one kilometer away
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from the point of impact.
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But the Black Dragon was a towed artillery piece.
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Before it could be fired,
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it had to stop, uncouple,
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set up and dig in.
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To fully exploit a tactical advantage
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on an increasingly mobile battlefield,
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it soon became clear that the artillery
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most capable of capitalizing on that advantage
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should also be mobile.
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All arms battle is dependent on uniform speed of action,
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tanks, infantry and artillery all working together.
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And as the Cold War got chilly,
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the Americans introduced a mobile weapon
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of extraordinary destructiveness,
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the M109.
(M109 firing)
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The original M109 was introduced in 1962.
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And with its seventh update, the Paladin,
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every aspect of its destructive capability
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has been enhanced.
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The M109 Paladin is a self-propelled howitzer.
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And so what that means
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is that you have a 155 millimeter gun fitted
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to a vehicle chassis.
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The addition of gun stabilization systems,
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automated gun laying and loading systems,
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to the 1960s chassis makes the Paladin
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capable of sustaining four rounds per minute,
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for four minutes without fully in placing.
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Together, a battery of six Paladins
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can deliver over a ton of ordinance permitted
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for each of those four minutes,
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an immense weight of destructive power
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delivered to a target.
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And the firing range of the Paladin
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has been extended from 24 to 30 kilometers
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with conventional shelves
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by fitting of a longer, lighter six meter barrel,
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range that extends to 40 kilometers
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with the use of rocket-assisted guided projectiles.
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Pull!
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(M109 firing)
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And it is those shells that do the damage.
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Improvements in high tensile steel
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has led to a reduction in the thickness of shell walls
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without loss of structural integrity,
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which has in turn allowed shells to carry more explosives.
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This combined with improved explosive compounds,
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give the M109 Paladin a casualty effect 400% greater
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than a similar weapon from World War II.
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Less steel, more destructive power,
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more accurately delivered.
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The M109 is currently undergoing a further update
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that will no doubt increase its ability
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to deliver heavy blows from well behind the front lines.
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(M109 firing)
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(explosion booming)
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But for an infantry man in the heat of battle,
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destruction is up-close and much more personal.
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Small bombs have been used in warfare since ancient times.
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The Greeks deployed fire bombs in antiquity,
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and since the invention of gunpowder,
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early versions of hand grenades
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with dangerously unpredictable smoldering fuses
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had been cautiously deployed mainly in siege situations.
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Considered obsolete at the outset of World War I,
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the demands of trench warfare saw the idea
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of hand grenades resurrected,
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redesigned and emerge as an indispensable item
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in the foot soldiers arsenal.
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Grenades put the destructive power
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of an artillery strike in an infantry man's pocket.
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And while initially they were thrown,
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the desire to project them farther
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led to developments that allowed the infantry man
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to expand his destructive reach beyond arm's length.
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In the latter stages of World War I,
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riflemen Lewis gunners and grenadiers
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were joined by the rifle grenadier.
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Rifle grenadiers fired a standard grenade
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fitted to a steel rod launched from an infantry rifle
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using a blank charge out to a range of up to 150 meters.
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A cup-type launcher was introduced later in World War I,
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a system that persisted through World War II,
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but using a propellant to kick the projectile
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out of a barrel creates recoil,
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and it is recoil that limits both the range
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and the size of the projectile that can be fired.
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It was the adoption of the high-low
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pressure ballistic principle
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that revolutionized grenade launches
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and led to weapons like the M203.
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The projectile in the M203
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is sent in a bi-chambered cartridge case
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with propelling cup fitted into the base.
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The cup contains the propelling charge
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and acts as the high pressure chamber,
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and the hollow cavity of the case,
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which surrounds the cup acts as the low pressure chamber.
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When fired, the high pressure
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does not directly act on the projectile
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as it would in a standard gun.
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But instead that pressure is allowed to bleed gradually
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into the hollow outer cavity at a controlled rate.
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This lower pressure then shoves
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rather than kicks the projectile out of the barrel
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at a constantly increasing muzzle velocity
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dramatically reducing recoil.
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As a result,
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the M203 which weighs just one and a half kilograms
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and attaches under the barrel of an infantry rifle
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fires a relatively large 40 millimeter shell
269
00:14:19,720 --> 00:14:21,630
weighing a quarter of a kilogram
270
00:14:21,630 --> 00:14:25,253
out to a range of 400 meters from a standing position.
271
00:14:27,180 --> 00:14:30,130
Weight and range that with a standard firing system
272
00:14:30,130 --> 00:14:33,710
would produce recall beyond human capabilities.
273
00:14:33,710 --> 00:14:37,300
And each high explosive grenade carries 32 grams
274
00:14:37,300 --> 00:14:39,693
of modern composition B explosive.
275
00:14:42,910 --> 00:14:45,700
And once you detonate the explosive,
276
00:14:45,700 --> 00:14:48,520
that sets up a chemically supported shockwave
277
00:14:48,520 --> 00:14:50,550
within the explosive material.
278
00:14:50,550 --> 00:14:53,010
That shockwave would move between five
279
00:14:53,010 --> 00:14:55,090
and eight kilometers per second.
280
00:14:55,090 --> 00:14:58,670
And it's the shockwave that does the damage to vehicles,
281
00:14:58,670 --> 00:15:02,272
it kills people and it destroys structures.
282
00:15:02,272 --> 00:15:03,980
While they don't release shrapnel
283
00:15:03,980 --> 00:15:06,330
in the quantities of the French 75,
284
00:15:06,330 --> 00:15:09,970
M203 shells have a similar casualty radius.
285
00:15:09,970 --> 00:15:11,560
And the arsenal includes rounds
286
00:15:11,560 --> 00:15:14,350
that can breach 75 millimeters of steel
287
00:15:14,350 --> 00:15:17,400
and a range of incendiary grenades.
288
00:15:17,400 --> 00:15:18,990
But incendiary weapons,
289
00:15:18,990 --> 00:15:20,937
like so much of the machinery of war
290
00:15:20,937 --> 00:15:23,383
have a history all of their own.
291
00:15:29,160 --> 00:15:31,710
In August, 1942,
292
00:15:31,710 --> 00:15:33,840
when the US Marines began the offensive
293
00:15:33,840 --> 00:15:36,250
on the Solomon's Island of Guadalcanal,
294
00:15:36,250 --> 00:15:39,120
they encountered numerous underground fortifications
295
00:15:39,120 --> 00:15:40,523
built by the Japanese.
296
00:15:41,610 --> 00:15:44,070
Direct assaults on those interconnected tunnels
297
00:15:44,070 --> 00:15:45,683
proved extremely costly.
298
00:15:47,370 --> 00:15:48,510
And to clear them,
299
00:15:48,510 --> 00:15:51,750
the Americans turned to a weapon that had in the past
300
00:15:51,750 --> 00:15:54,660
proved ideal for aggressive assaults on bunkers
301
00:15:54,660 --> 00:15:56,163
and entrenched positions.
302
00:15:58,490 --> 00:15:59,543
The flamethrower.
303
00:16:01,420 --> 00:16:05,880
Fire in warfare is as old as warfare itself
304
00:16:05,880 --> 00:16:08,840
and go all the way back to the use of Greek fire,
305
00:16:08,840 --> 00:16:10,060
all that sort of thing.
306
00:16:10,060 --> 00:16:13,669
So it's not surprising that developers, inventors
307
00:16:13,669 --> 00:16:17,460
and the military themselves started looking at how
308
00:16:17,460 --> 00:16:21,058
to make use of fire or flame.
309
00:16:21,058 --> 00:16:23,950
(soldiers shouting)
310
00:16:23,950 --> 00:16:25,870
First introduced onto the battlefields
311
00:16:25,870 --> 00:16:29,630
of World War II by the Germans in late 1914,
312
00:16:29,630 --> 00:16:32,600
the demoralizing physical and psychological effects
313
00:16:32,600 --> 00:16:35,666
of the new weapon that spewed flames 18 meters
314
00:16:35,666 --> 00:16:38,063
were immediately felt by the allies.
315
00:16:40,350 --> 00:16:45,080
You have two tanks, one tank will hold your gas.
316
00:16:45,080 --> 00:16:46,690
In this case, nitrogen gas,
317
00:16:46,690 --> 00:16:49,330
the other tank will hold your flammable liquid.
318
00:16:49,330 --> 00:16:52,470
The nitrogen gas will drive the petrol down the pipe.
319
00:16:52,470 --> 00:16:53,930
So when you pull the trigger,
320
00:16:53,930 --> 00:16:56,310
you're releasing it an element of the gas,
321
00:16:56,310 --> 00:16:58,933
essentially pushing the petrol out.
322
00:17:00,010 --> 00:17:01,710
As World War II approached,
323
00:17:01,710 --> 00:17:04,350
the basic fundamentals of the World War I design
324
00:17:04,350 --> 00:17:05,860
remained unchanged,
325
00:17:05,860 --> 00:17:08,950
a flammable liquid propelled by a gas.
326
00:17:08,950 --> 00:17:12,270
Although technological advances added to their lethality
327
00:17:12,270 --> 00:17:14,151
by introducing lighter cylinders,
328
00:17:14,151 --> 00:17:16,683
making flamethrowers man portable.
329
00:17:20,200 --> 00:17:22,880
Of course, portable is a subjective term
330
00:17:23,940 --> 00:17:26,040
and the American M1 flamethrower
331
00:17:26,040 --> 00:17:29,070
weighed a sizeable 32 kilograms,
332
00:17:29,070 --> 00:17:32,483
but they proved indispensable in certain situations.
333
00:17:33,770 --> 00:17:35,920
In the main they were used for structures
334
00:17:35,920 --> 00:17:38,070
to suppress bunkers.
335
00:17:38,070 --> 00:17:41,220
Examples of which would be the use of flamethrowers
336
00:17:41,220 --> 00:17:44,433
on Okinawa and coming to shore at Normandy.
337
00:17:46,090 --> 00:17:47,810
While the M1's range was greater
338
00:17:47,810 --> 00:17:49,530
than those of World War 1,
339
00:17:49,530 --> 00:17:52,220
at just 40 meters it involved the operator
340
00:17:52,220 --> 00:17:53,910
exposing most of his body
341
00:17:53,910 --> 00:17:56,399
when engaging suspected entity positions
342
00:17:56,399 --> 00:17:59,390
and the size of the tanks and general stance
343
00:17:59,390 --> 00:18:01,920
of the infantry men using a flamethrower
344
00:18:01,920 --> 00:18:04,090
made for a tempting target.
345
00:18:04,090 --> 00:18:04,923
That carrying it,
346
00:18:04,923 --> 00:18:07,850
what amounts to a flammable bomb on their back.
347
00:18:07,850 --> 00:18:09,223
They're very vulnerable.
348
00:18:11,470 --> 00:18:13,440
Ultimately portable flamethrowers
349
00:18:13,440 --> 00:18:15,623
gave way to tank-mounted flame guns,
350
00:18:16,490 --> 00:18:20,020
which offered better range, protection for the crew
351
00:18:20,020 --> 00:18:22,363
and made for a far more imposing threat,
352
00:18:23,800 --> 00:18:26,583
a threat that would of course be countered.
353
00:18:29,870 --> 00:18:32,763
Little more than a century ago at the Battle of Cambrai,
354
00:18:34,430 --> 00:18:36,800
the world witnessed the first mass attack
355
00:18:36,800 --> 00:18:38,710
by an innovative British weapon
356
00:18:38,710 --> 00:18:40,993
inspired by simple farm machinery.
357
00:18:42,360 --> 00:18:44,430
Despite early examples being slow,
358
00:18:44,430 --> 00:18:47,170
cumbersome and unreliable,
359
00:18:47,170 --> 00:18:48,920
they very quickly developed.
360
00:18:48,920 --> 00:18:50,213
And in less than 20 years,
361
00:18:50,213 --> 00:18:52,810
they had transformed the battlefield.
362
00:18:52,810 --> 00:18:55,900
If it's a straight tank versus infantry unit baffle,
363
00:18:55,900 --> 00:18:58,070
pity the poor infantry men.
364
00:18:58,070 --> 00:19:00,300
However, you can come up with a weapon
365
00:19:00,300 --> 00:19:02,600
that's flexible enough to get it into position
366
00:19:02,600 --> 00:19:05,970
when you need it to put overwhelming force
367
00:19:05,970 --> 00:19:08,420
on one spot on that tank.
368
00:19:08,420 --> 00:19:11,253
Well, that's the goal of the anti-tank role.
369
00:19:13,200 --> 00:19:14,980
By World War II improvements
370
00:19:14,980 --> 00:19:18,150
in the internal combustion engine gave tanks greater speed,
371
00:19:18,150 --> 00:19:20,613
heavier armor, and more lethal weaponry.
372
00:19:21,470 --> 00:19:23,430
The need arose for a mobile weapon
373
00:19:23,430 --> 00:19:25,630
that could put the power to stop them
374
00:19:25,630 --> 00:19:27,453
in the hands of an infantry man.
375
00:19:32,310 --> 00:19:34,280
This war moves fast.
376
00:19:34,280 --> 00:19:37,003
The Germans and Italians found that out in Africa.
377
00:19:43,920 --> 00:19:45,683
We picked up some things too.
378
00:19:46,992 --> 00:19:49,075
The Bazooka.
379
00:19:53,585 --> 00:19:54,714
The famous American bazooka
380
00:19:54,714 --> 00:19:58,297
nicknamed after the musical instrument that it resembled
381
00:19:58,297 --> 00:20:02,700
is a simple tube, the mechanical firing mechanism
382
00:20:02,700 --> 00:20:04,430
sort of like a giant gun,
383
00:20:04,430 --> 00:20:07,390
but it's essentially a guidance tube
384
00:20:07,390 --> 00:20:10,653
or an initial guidance tube for this projectile.
385
00:20:12,440 --> 00:20:13,850
The recoil was balanced
386
00:20:13,850 --> 00:20:15,890
by the countering forces of the projectile
387
00:20:15,890 --> 00:20:17,810
exiting the front of the tube
388
00:20:17,810 --> 00:20:20,630
and the propellant exiting at the rear.
389
00:20:20,630 --> 00:20:23,520
With a pistol grip and shoulder support made of wood,
390
00:20:23,520 --> 00:20:26,113
the unit weighed just six and a half kilograms.
391
00:20:27,959 --> 00:20:31,220
(explosion booming)
392
00:20:31,220 --> 00:20:34,530
And it was easy to operate between a crew of two,
393
00:20:34,530 --> 00:20:36,540
one to load and the other to fire
394
00:20:36,540 --> 00:20:38,400
the 60 millimeter projectile,
395
00:20:38,400 --> 00:20:40,400
which was capable of piercing armor
396
00:20:40,400 --> 00:20:42,423
up to 102 millimeters thick.
397
00:20:43,810 --> 00:20:46,070
Against all German tank types,
398
00:20:46,070 --> 00:20:49,523
often a single well placed shot was all that was needed.
399
00:20:51,570 --> 00:20:53,903
However, success was not guaranteed.
400
00:20:55,110 --> 00:20:56,464
You have the ability to reload,
401
00:20:56,464 --> 00:20:58,910
very important when you're trying to engage tanks,
402
00:20:58,910 --> 00:21:00,500
you might miss the tank.
403
00:21:00,500 --> 00:21:03,140
You might simply damage the tank.
404
00:21:03,140 --> 00:21:05,350
So to be able to find more than one shot,
405
00:21:05,350 --> 00:21:08,053
a reusable system is very useful.
406
00:21:09,030 --> 00:21:10,410
It was such an effective,
407
00:21:10,410 --> 00:21:15,070
portable destructive force that close to 500,000 bazookas
408
00:21:15,070 --> 00:21:18,273
along with over 15 million rockets were produced.
409
00:21:19,730 --> 00:21:21,550
But the Americans were not alone
410
00:21:21,550 --> 00:21:24,390
in looking to put highly destructive capabilities
411
00:21:24,390 --> 00:21:26,083
into the hands of their infantry.
412
00:21:32,200 --> 00:21:34,977
The Cold War era RPG-7
413
00:21:36,300 --> 00:21:38,750
can trace its roots back to the bazooka.
414
00:21:38,750 --> 00:21:40,200
And like it's forebear,
415
00:21:40,200 --> 00:21:43,540
this Soviet system follows the same simple principle
416
00:21:43,540 --> 00:21:45,060
of a reloadable tube
417
00:21:45,060 --> 00:21:47,860
that fires a rocket-propelled projectile.
418
00:21:47,860 --> 00:21:51,064
The differences between the two are in the missile.
419
00:21:51,064 --> 00:21:52,860
It looks like it's got a stick
420
00:21:52,860 --> 00:21:56,520
with a double conical shape on the end of the stick.
421
00:21:56,520 --> 00:21:58,750
When it's launched there are fins that deploy,
422
00:21:58,750 --> 00:22:00,930
they're spring-loaded fins that open up
423
00:22:00,930 --> 00:22:03,440
and that provides strength stabilization
424
00:22:03,440 --> 00:22:06,073
to the weapon system as it flies through the air.
425
00:22:08,370 --> 00:22:10,070
The RPG-7's rocket
426
00:22:10,070 --> 00:22:12,320
is initially thrown clear of the tube
427
00:22:12,320 --> 00:22:14,260
by a booster charge.
428
00:22:14,260 --> 00:22:15,340
Once in motion,
429
00:22:15,340 --> 00:22:18,430
the acceleration sets off a pressure-generated spark
430
00:22:18,430 --> 00:22:20,190
that ignites a sustainer motor,
431
00:22:20,190 --> 00:22:22,090
which accelerates the projectile
432
00:22:22,090 --> 00:22:24,610
once it's 11 meters from the launcher.
433
00:22:24,610 --> 00:22:27,250
By using this two-stage firing mechanism,
434
00:22:27,250 --> 00:22:31,140
the RPG-7 cuts the tube length from 1.5 meters
435
00:22:31,140 --> 00:22:34,393
as it was on the bazooka to just 90 centimeters.
436
00:22:35,760 --> 00:22:38,800
Projectiles up to 93 millimeters in diameter
437
00:22:38,800 --> 00:22:40,890
and four and a half kilograms in weight
438
00:22:40,890 --> 00:22:44,463
are fired at a velocity of 294 meters per second.
439
00:22:46,700 --> 00:22:49,282
And the warhead makes up most of the weight,
440
00:22:49,282 --> 00:22:52,210
which combined with the extra kinetic energy
441
00:22:52,210 --> 00:22:55,450
imparted by the rockets vastly superior speed
442
00:22:55,450 --> 00:22:59,040
means the RPG-7 can penetrate standard armor
443
00:22:59,040 --> 00:23:01,373
as thick as 750 millimeters.
444
00:23:03,040 --> 00:23:06,170
But by far the RPG-7's greatest asset
445
00:23:06,170 --> 00:23:08,530
is its simplicity of construction,
446
00:23:08,530 --> 00:23:12,733
which has seen over 9 million enter service since 1961.
447
00:23:15,440 --> 00:23:16,810
It's prolific,
448
00:23:16,810 --> 00:23:20,860
it's widespread, and the technology is reasonably old,
449
00:23:20,860 --> 00:23:21,913
but it's simple.
450
00:23:22,980 --> 00:23:26,870
Lots of Soviet engineering was simple and effective
451
00:23:26,870 --> 00:23:29,443
and the RPG-7 is no exception.
452
00:23:30,540 --> 00:23:34,670
The RPG-7 uses what is called a shaped charge,
453
00:23:34,670 --> 00:23:36,853
which is lethal against traditional armor.
454
00:23:38,210 --> 00:23:40,730
Suddenly tanks were beatable,
455
00:23:40,730 --> 00:23:42,644
but in modern warfare,
456
00:23:42,644 --> 00:23:46,423
no single machine completely dominates for long.
457
00:23:50,640 --> 00:23:54,800
All weapons develop in response to improvements in others.
458
00:23:54,800 --> 00:23:57,100
The improvements in armor piercing rounds
459
00:23:57,100 --> 00:23:59,420
saw the design tension between armor
460
00:23:59,420 --> 00:24:03,140
and anti-tank weaponry swing in favor of the weapon.
461
00:24:03,140 --> 00:24:04,490
(RPG firing)
462
00:24:04,490 --> 00:24:07,260
With tanks rendered increasingly vulnerable,
463
00:24:07,260 --> 00:24:09,990
designers hit back in the 1970s
464
00:24:09,990 --> 00:24:12,733
with even more sophisticated defense systems.
465
00:24:14,470 --> 00:24:16,550
So one of the ways in which protection
466
00:24:16,550 --> 00:24:18,160
can be offered against something like
467
00:24:18,160 --> 00:24:19,920
your shaped charge weapons systems,
468
00:24:19,920 --> 00:24:24,093
such as an RPG-7 is by using explosive reactive armor.
469
00:24:25,430 --> 00:24:27,180
Explosive reactive armor
470
00:24:27,180 --> 00:24:30,430
consists of sheets or slabs of high explosive
471
00:24:30,430 --> 00:24:32,760
sandwiched between two plates.
472
00:24:32,760 --> 00:24:36,430
When hit by a shaped charge the explosive detonates,
473
00:24:36,430 --> 00:24:37,970
driving the plates apart
474
00:24:37,970 --> 00:24:40,490
and damaging the incoming projectile.
475
00:24:40,490 --> 00:24:43,760
Not so with the munitions fired by the javelin,
476
00:24:43,760 --> 00:24:46,783
which use an ingenious tandem warhead.
477
00:24:51,090 --> 00:24:53,840
The javelin is a guided missile
478
00:24:53,840 --> 00:24:57,930
and it carries on it a shaped charge weapon system.
479
00:24:57,930 --> 00:25:01,030
So where it makes contact with the vehicle,
480
00:25:01,030 --> 00:25:02,490
it detonates the explosive
481
00:25:02,490 --> 00:25:05,470
that propels a high velocity copper jet
482
00:25:05,470 --> 00:25:07,663
into the armor of the vehicle.
483
00:25:08,780 --> 00:25:10,540
A smaller precursor charge
484
00:25:10,540 --> 00:25:12,863
prepares the way for that copper jet
485
00:25:12,863 --> 00:25:16,010
by pushing through the explosive reactive armor
486
00:25:16,010 --> 00:25:18,810
and clearing a path for the larger main warhead
487
00:25:18,810 --> 00:25:21,273
to penetrate the targets primary defenses.
488
00:25:23,580 --> 00:25:25,200
Using a command launch unit
489
00:25:25,200 --> 00:25:28,010
that incorporates an integrated day-night sight,
490
00:25:28,010 --> 00:25:30,480
the missile is thrown free at launch.
491
00:25:30,480 --> 00:25:32,280
And like the RPG-7,
492
00:25:32,280 --> 00:25:35,283
only fires its rocket mortar once clear of the crew.
493
00:25:38,680 --> 00:25:40,670
Engagement of airborne, static
494
00:25:40,670 --> 00:25:42,380
or mobile ground-based targets
495
00:25:42,380 --> 00:25:43,870
is accomplished using either
496
00:25:43,870 --> 00:25:46,640
the traditional direct fire line of sight method
497
00:25:46,640 --> 00:25:48,810
or with help from the missiles inbuilt
498
00:25:48,810 --> 00:25:50,590
infrared guidance system,
499
00:25:50,590 --> 00:25:53,130
which can be programmed to attack armored vehicles
500
00:25:53,130 --> 00:25:54,313
at their weakest point.
501
00:25:58,510 --> 00:26:01,290
It does this by climbing to 150 meters
502
00:26:01,290 --> 00:26:02,639
as it reaches the target
503
00:26:02,639 --> 00:26:05,830
and then rapidly descending from a steep angle
504
00:26:05,830 --> 00:26:07,223
with devastating effect.
505
00:26:08,510 --> 00:26:10,090
Tank armor on its roof
506
00:26:10,090 --> 00:26:12,990
is inherently thin across the board.
507
00:26:12,990 --> 00:26:14,500
So now you've got projectiles
508
00:26:14,500 --> 00:26:17,270
are actually smashing down through the top of tank turrets
509
00:26:17,270 --> 00:26:19,550
rather than trying to penetrate through.
510
00:26:19,550 --> 00:26:20,383
The javelin
511
00:26:20,383 --> 00:26:23,820
is the latest in highly mobile battlefield destruction.
512
00:26:23,820 --> 00:26:26,260
But destruction on a far bigger scale
513
00:26:26,260 --> 00:26:29,010
gets delivered not from on the battlefield,
514
00:26:29,010 --> 00:26:30,793
but rather from above it.
515
00:26:39,130 --> 00:26:41,320
For the first time in man's history,
516
00:26:41,320 --> 00:26:43,650
World War I introduced the concept
517
00:26:43,650 --> 00:26:47,150
of what we now refer to as total war.
518
00:26:47,150 --> 00:26:49,720
And with the entire resources and populations
519
00:26:49,720 --> 00:26:53,280
of the belligerent nations mobilized towards the war effort,
520
00:26:53,280 --> 00:26:54,750
with every human resource
521
00:26:54,750 --> 00:26:58,260
considered a functioning part of the enemy's war machine,
522
00:26:58,260 --> 00:27:02,770
city factories, warehouses and even civilian populations,
523
00:27:02,770 --> 00:27:06,383
not just the military became legitimate targets.
524
00:27:09,400 --> 00:27:11,060
And during World War II,
525
00:27:11,060 --> 00:27:13,000
the rapid development of aircraft,
526
00:27:13,000 --> 00:27:15,520
in particular the long range, heavy bomber
527
00:27:15,520 --> 00:27:19,610
elevated the concept of total war to a new level,
528
00:27:19,610 --> 00:27:22,696
delivering wholesale destruction on entire cities,
529
00:27:22,696 --> 00:27:25,633
the like of which had never been seen before.
530
00:27:30,720 --> 00:27:33,380
On the 14th of March, 1945,
531
00:27:33,380 --> 00:27:35,420
the first of 42 new bombs
532
00:27:35,420 --> 00:27:38,933
were deployed over Germany's industrialized Ruhr Valley.
533
00:27:39,830 --> 00:27:42,820
Officially, they were uninspired designated
534
00:27:42,820 --> 00:27:45,293
as the Bomb, Medium Capacity.
535
00:27:46,680 --> 00:27:50,113
Unofficially, they were called Grand Slam's.
536
00:27:51,040 --> 00:27:54,230
Eight meters long and shaped like an artillery shell,
537
00:27:54,230 --> 00:27:55,860
the Grand Slam's warhead,
538
00:27:55,860 --> 00:27:58,940
which contained 4,000 kilograms of Torpex,
539
00:27:58,940 --> 00:28:02,462
an explosive 50% more powerful than TNT
540
00:28:02,462 --> 00:28:04,670
was detonated after the bomb
541
00:28:04,670 --> 00:28:07,000
had penetrated deep into the earth,
542
00:28:07,000 --> 00:28:09,280
giving a localized earthquake effect
543
00:28:09,280 --> 00:28:12,003
equivalent to 3.7 on the Richter scale.
544
00:28:13,840 --> 00:28:16,490
And the aircraft that carried these massive munitions
545
00:28:18,140 --> 00:28:19,893
was the Avro Lancaster.
546
00:28:24,460 --> 00:28:25,420
When it was designed,
547
00:28:25,420 --> 00:28:28,460
it was supposed to carry about 4,000 pounds of bombs.
548
00:28:28,460 --> 00:28:29,900
The British discovered that in fact,
549
00:28:29,900 --> 00:28:32,050
it was such a strong and robust airframe
550
00:28:32,050 --> 00:28:33,650
that it could carry more.
551
00:28:33,650 --> 00:28:37,610
So they invented the Grand Slam, 22,000 pounds.
552
00:28:37,610 --> 00:28:40,960
That's five times the bomb carrying capacity
553
00:28:40,960 --> 00:28:42,760
than when the aircraft was designed.
554
00:28:44,090 --> 00:28:45,410
The Lancaster was born
555
00:28:45,410 --> 00:28:48,883
of the early war time experience of the Avro Manchester,
556
00:28:50,820 --> 00:28:54,143
a twin engine bomber first flown in 1939.
557
00:28:55,010 --> 00:28:56,280
Within mere months,
558
00:28:56,280 --> 00:28:59,020
it became clear that the all-new Manchester
559
00:28:59,020 --> 00:29:01,993
simply couldn't carry enough bombs far enough.
560
00:29:04,130 --> 00:29:05,582
Avro took the Manchester,
561
00:29:05,582 --> 00:29:07,530
revised the wing,
562
00:29:07,530 --> 00:29:11,130
added four 12 cylinder Rolls-Royce Merlin engines.
563
00:29:11,130 --> 00:29:16,130
And in early 1942, within just 18 months of being conceived,
564
00:29:16,150 --> 00:29:18,113
the Lancaster entered service.
565
00:29:21,310 --> 00:29:23,780
It was one of those examples of an aircraft,
566
00:29:23,780 --> 00:29:27,230
which is designed and which is perfect from the beginning.
567
00:29:27,230 --> 00:29:30,150
So most of the Lancaster's that were built and flown
568
00:29:30,150 --> 00:29:31,630
were Lancaster B1's.
569
00:29:31,630 --> 00:29:34,250
There wasn't a need for many subsequent marks.
570
00:29:34,250 --> 00:29:36,540
It didn't continuously improve.
571
00:29:36,540 --> 00:29:38,290
Using an all-metal construction
572
00:29:38,290 --> 00:29:40,870
that maximize structural strength per weight,
573
00:29:40,870 --> 00:29:43,670
the Lancaster was agile, easy to fly
574
00:29:43,670 --> 00:29:46,060
and capable of withstanding serious levels
575
00:29:46,060 --> 00:29:47,163
of damage in flight.
576
00:29:48,410 --> 00:29:50,240
And the durability of the design
577
00:29:50,240 --> 00:29:52,920
was enhanced by the fact that both the fuselage
578
00:29:52,920 --> 00:29:56,723
and the wings were assembled in modules, five a piece.
579
00:30:01,409 --> 00:30:03,100
But it was quite novel at the time,
580
00:30:03,100 --> 00:30:04,250
but it was built in sections
581
00:30:04,250 --> 00:30:06,570
and that meant that it could be repaired in sections.
582
00:30:06,570 --> 00:30:08,500
So if you came back from Dusseldorf
583
00:30:08,500 --> 00:30:10,350
with a hole in your wing,
584
00:30:10,350 --> 00:30:11,810
the wing was replaced.
585
00:30:11,810 --> 00:30:13,713
It's an example of where the RAF,
586
00:30:14,670 --> 00:30:16,500
indeed the aircraft manufacturers
587
00:30:16,500 --> 00:30:18,780
are adapting their construction methods
588
00:30:18,780 --> 00:30:21,540
to meet the needs of the people who fly this machine
589
00:30:21,540 --> 00:30:23,440
because they always came back damaged.
590
00:30:26,760 --> 00:30:30,817
In all, Lancaster's flew 156,000 operations
591
00:30:30,817 --> 00:30:35,817
and alone dropped over 618,000 tons of bombs over Germany
592
00:30:36,530 --> 00:30:41,530
between 1942 and 1945, destroying entire cities.
593
00:30:44,920 --> 00:30:46,270
And it did persuade the Germans
594
00:30:46,270 --> 00:30:48,620
that the war wasn't happening in Russia or in North Africa,
595
00:30:48,620 --> 00:30:51,053
or Normandy, it was happening in your street.
596
00:30:52,810 --> 00:30:54,010
So the bomber offensive, I think,
597
00:30:54,010 --> 00:30:56,400
was a crucial arm of the British war effort,
598
00:30:56,400 --> 00:30:58,120
especially the British war effort.
599
00:30:58,120 --> 00:31:00,483
And the Lancaster is at the heart of that.
600
00:31:06,500 --> 00:31:08,130
The Lancaster was one of the most
601
00:31:08,130 --> 00:31:10,590
iconic machines of World War II,
602
00:31:10,590 --> 00:31:15,100
a big, slow moving bomber that operated in huge formations.
603
00:31:15,100 --> 00:31:18,138
The Lancaster was not intended to evade enemy defenses
604
00:31:18,138 --> 00:31:21,490
so much as beat them into submission,
605
00:31:21,490 --> 00:31:23,700
but the years after the Second World War
606
00:31:23,700 --> 00:31:26,993
saw a shift in thinking when it came to strategic bombing.
607
00:31:28,860 --> 00:31:32,600
In early 1946, the US Air Force issued a brief
608
00:31:32,600 --> 00:31:35,930
for a strategic bomber that flew above defenses
609
00:31:35,930 --> 00:31:37,760
with the range to carry out missions
610
00:31:37,760 --> 00:31:41,550
independent of bases controlled by other countries.
611
00:31:41,550 --> 00:31:43,320
And so in 1948,
612
00:31:43,320 --> 00:31:45,750
Boeing put their faith in a new engine
613
00:31:45,750 --> 00:31:47,400
and pushed the design envelope
614
00:31:47,400 --> 00:31:49,113
as far as they thought possible.
615
00:31:49,980 --> 00:31:51,780
What emerged from that process
616
00:31:51,780 --> 00:31:54,980
was an aircraft with a wingspan of 56 meters
617
00:31:54,980 --> 00:31:56,820
that would incorporate the two great
618
00:31:56,820 --> 00:31:58,763
aeronautical advances of the time,
619
00:32:00,000 --> 00:32:04,503
the enduring B-52 Stratofortress.
620
00:32:06,796 --> 00:32:09,445
The B-52 bomber used a swept wing design
621
00:32:09,445 --> 00:32:12,310
and it was purely jet engine powered
622
00:32:12,310 --> 00:32:14,930
with a long narrow fuselage,
623
00:32:14,930 --> 00:32:17,960
which was primarily a series of bomb bays
624
00:32:17,960 --> 00:32:20,683
combined with eight engines on the wings.
625
00:32:22,870 --> 00:32:24,900
These advances gave the B-52
626
00:32:24,900 --> 00:32:28,960
an operational range of excess of 14,000 kilometers,
627
00:32:28,960 --> 00:32:32,580
a top speed of 1,047 kilometers per hour
628
00:32:32,580 --> 00:32:36,290
at a service ceiling of 16,000 meters,
629
00:32:36,290 --> 00:32:37,880
which allowed it to launch a strike
630
00:32:37,880 --> 00:32:39,863
from well outside enemy territory.
631
00:32:40,810 --> 00:32:43,540
And its extended range provides it with the capacity
632
00:32:43,540 --> 00:32:46,150
to loiter outside of combat zone
633
00:32:46,150 --> 00:32:49,983
while enemy defenses are subdued and targets are identified.
634
00:32:53,334 --> 00:32:55,700
Most of the lower central fuselage
635
00:32:55,700 --> 00:32:57,970
of the 48 meter long aircraft
636
00:32:57,970 --> 00:32:59,540
is given up to the storage
637
00:32:59,540 --> 00:33:02,423
of a 31 and a half thousand kilogram payload.
638
00:33:04,170 --> 00:33:06,340
With the B-52 capable of carrying
639
00:33:06,340 --> 00:33:09,633
a most astounding array of munitions in its bulky frame.
640
00:33:12,640 --> 00:33:15,288
It was designed at the very beginning of the Cold War
641
00:33:15,288 --> 00:33:19,540
and subsequently has out seen designs
642
00:33:19,540 --> 00:33:21,580
that were supposed to replace it.
643
00:33:21,580 --> 00:33:23,440
So many people thought that it would
644
00:33:23,440 --> 00:33:25,590
no longer be an operation, but it still is.
645
00:33:26,480 --> 00:33:28,670
The B-52 is a great example
646
00:33:28,670 --> 00:33:30,560
of the speed of aircraft development
647
00:33:30,560 --> 00:33:32,453
in the years following World War II.
648
00:33:34,850 --> 00:33:38,060
It boasted five times the payload of the Lancaster,
649
00:33:38,060 --> 00:33:40,680
an aircraft that less than 10 years previous
650
00:33:40,680 --> 00:33:43,283
had been the supreme allied strategic bomber.
651
00:33:45,140 --> 00:33:46,990
And it delivered that destructive force
652
00:33:46,990 --> 00:33:50,103
three times as quickly and four times as far.
653
00:33:52,530 --> 00:33:55,860
It is another example of an aircraft like the Lancaster
654
00:33:55,860 --> 00:33:59,393
that they just managed to get right the first time.
655
00:34:01,910 --> 00:34:04,600
But aircraft development during the Cold War
656
00:34:04,600 --> 00:34:06,483
didn't stop with the B-52.
657
00:34:11,720 --> 00:34:14,200
The combination of cabin pressurization
658
00:34:14,200 --> 00:34:15,900
and jet engine technology
659
00:34:15,900 --> 00:34:17,930
provided bombers like the B-52
660
00:34:17,930 --> 00:34:20,290
with their main defensive capability,
661
00:34:20,290 --> 00:34:21,123
altitude.
662
00:34:22,120 --> 00:34:23,870
At 15,000 meters,
663
00:34:23,870 --> 00:34:25,860
they were able to operate safely
664
00:34:25,860 --> 00:34:28,640
well beyond the range of conventional ground-based
665
00:34:28,640 --> 00:34:29,923
ADI aircraft weapons.
666
00:34:30,979 --> 00:34:33,610
But by the early 1960s,
667
00:34:33,610 --> 00:34:36,450
new radar-guided surface-to-air missiles
668
00:34:36,450 --> 00:34:38,363
had changed the rules yet again.
669
00:34:40,172 --> 00:34:44,800
High altitude bombers suddenly became vulnerable.
670
00:34:44,800 --> 00:34:46,330
To defeat these systems,
671
00:34:46,330 --> 00:34:49,653
general dynamics responded with what was an all new concept,
672
00:34:51,220 --> 00:34:53,610
a long range supersonic bomber
673
00:34:53,610 --> 00:34:55,920
that rather than flying even higher
674
00:34:55,920 --> 00:34:57,630
would evade radar detection
675
00:34:57,630 --> 00:34:59,383
by skimming close to the ground.
676
00:35:02,600 --> 00:35:04,503
The F-111 Aardvark.
677
00:35:08,490 --> 00:35:11,070
The main system that we had to help fly at low altitude
678
00:35:11,070 --> 00:35:12,680
was the terrain following radar.
679
00:35:12,680 --> 00:35:15,000
So this was a forward-looking radar
680
00:35:15,000 --> 00:35:17,960
that actually gave us an interpretation
681
00:35:17,960 --> 00:35:19,340
of the terrain in front.
682
00:35:19,340 --> 00:35:22,470
We could link it in with the autopilot system
683
00:35:22,470 --> 00:35:25,050
on the aircraft such that you would actually fly,
684
00:35:25,050 --> 00:35:26,540
you could fly hands-off
685
00:35:26,540 --> 00:35:29,520
at anywhere from 200 feet to a thousand feet
686
00:35:29,520 --> 00:35:32,500
at any speeds up to 600 knots plus
687
00:35:32,500 --> 00:35:34,400
if you really wanted to go there fast.
688
00:35:37,210 --> 00:35:39,700
That terrain following radar system,
689
00:35:39,700 --> 00:35:42,400
which is standard in most of today's fighter jets
690
00:35:42,400 --> 00:35:46,830
was untried when the F-111 was first flown in 1964
691
00:35:46,830 --> 00:35:50,283
and gave the aircraft unprecedented assault capabilities.
692
00:35:51,160 --> 00:35:53,400
Undeterred by weather or darkness,
693
00:35:53,400 --> 00:35:57,410
the F-111 could enter enemy territory below radar level
694
00:35:57,410 --> 00:36:00,583
and proceed to attack its target at incredible speed.
695
00:36:03,960 --> 00:36:06,170
And it was equipped with two of the most powerful
696
00:36:06,170 --> 00:36:10,100
turbofan engines ever fitted to a production aircraft
697
00:36:10,100 --> 00:36:12,993
that also boasted another technological first,
698
00:36:15,790 --> 00:36:16,763
afterburners.
699
00:36:17,980 --> 00:36:19,470
Basically the afterburner system
700
00:36:19,470 --> 00:36:21,050
is you just pour a whole bunch of fuel
701
00:36:21,050 --> 00:36:23,440
down the back of the engine and the light it up,
702
00:36:23,440 --> 00:36:24,870
and that's pretty much it.
703
00:36:24,870 --> 00:36:26,620
And it just gives you extra thrust.
704
00:36:27,830 --> 00:36:29,230
Commonplace now,
705
00:36:29,230 --> 00:36:31,210
afterburners gave the F-111
706
00:36:31,210 --> 00:36:33,793
extraordinary performance capabilities.
707
00:36:34,949 --> 00:36:37,420
By using those afterburners,
708
00:36:37,420 --> 00:36:40,459
it could climb at close to 8,000 meters per minute
709
00:36:40,459 --> 00:36:43,730
and reach its service ceiling of 20,000 meters
710
00:36:43,730 --> 00:36:45,293
in less than three minutes.
711
00:36:47,860 --> 00:36:52,080
That puts the F-111 in strike fighter class even today.
712
00:36:52,080 --> 00:36:55,290
But despite being designated F for fighter,
713
00:36:55,290 --> 00:36:58,500
the F-111 was a genuine fighter bomber
714
00:36:58,500 --> 00:37:02,724
designed to carry a 13,500 kilogram payload
715
00:37:02,724 --> 00:37:05,480
to create an aircraft that could perform
716
00:37:05,480 --> 00:37:07,410
well under load at low speed,
717
00:37:07,410 --> 00:37:09,800
take off and land from short runways,
718
00:37:09,800 --> 00:37:12,312
and yet still fly it over Mach-2
719
00:37:12,312 --> 00:37:15,380
required another groundbreaking innovation,
720
00:37:15,380 --> 00:37:19,523
variable geometry, or what we know as swing wings.
721
00:37:21,960 --> 00:37:23,838
If you look at the slow speed aircraft,
722
00:37:23,838 --> 00:37:26,360
you'll see that it has a fairly straight sort of fat wing,
723
00:37:26,360 --> 00:37:30,180
a lot easier to generate lift at slower speeds that way.
724
00:37:30,180 --> 00:37:31,280
As you want to go faster,
725
00:37:31,280 --> 00:37:33,190
you actually want to go to more of a Delta shape,
726
00:37:33,190 --> 00:37:35,530
which is predominantly the sort of shape
727
00:37:35,530 --> 00:37:37,110
that you see in high speed aircraft.
728
00:37:37,110 --> 00:37:38,900
And that's where you start sweeping the wings
729
00:37:38,900 --> 00:37:40,253
back to 72 degrees.
730
00:37:44,460 --> 00:37:46,490
The F-111 remained in service
731
00:37:46,490 --> 00:37:49,883
with the US and Australian Air Forces for 30 years.
732
00:37:52,560 --> 00:37:54,003
But like to B-52,
733
00:37:55,270 --> 00:37:58,661
the F-111 was principally designed during the Cold War
734
00:37:58,661 --> 00:38:02,280
to deliver a weapon of such destructive power
735
00:38:02,280 --> 00:38:05,310
that when it was unleashed in 1945,
736
00:38:05,310 --> 00:38:07,183
it changed the planet forever.
737
00:38:14,760 --> 00:38:17,050
In 1939, a letter delivered
738
00:38:17,050 --> 00:38:19,740
by the esteem physicist, Albert Einstein
739
00:38:19,740 --> 00:38:23,100
to the then US, President Franklin D. Roosevelt
740
00:38:23,100 --> 00:38:26,400
resulted in the United States taking a gamble.
741
00:38:26,400 --> 00:38:30,030
As World War II erupted into a destructive global conflict,
742
00:38:30,030 --> 00:38:31,980
Roosevelt ordered the establishment
743
00:38:31,980 --> 00:38:33,930
of the US Uranium Project
744
00:38:33,930 --> 00:38:35,880
to investigate the possibility
745
00:38:35,880 --> 00:38:38,363
of creating a controlled chain reaction.
746
00:38:39,380 --> 00:38:42,260
In June, 1942, the Uranium Project
747
00:38:42,260 --> 00:38:44,650
fell under the control of the US military
748
00:38:44,650 --> 00:38:47,103
and was renamed the Manhattan Project.
749
00:38:48,900 --> 00:38:50,960
And in December of that year,
750
00:38:50,960 --> 00:38:52,913
under a Chicago football stadium,
751
00:38:54,840 --> 00:38:58,153
the world's first controlled nuclear reaction was achieved.
752
00:38:59,440 --> 00:39:01,110
With the war looking more and more
753
00:39:01,110 --> 00:39:03,370
like it would end in an allied defeat,
754
00:39:03,370 --> 00:39:04,700
what followed was the birth
755
00:39:04,700 --> 00:39:07,504
of the single biggest weapons development project
756
00:39:07,504 --> 00:39:09,463
the world had ever seen.
757
00:39:10,950 --> 00:39:13,870
The Manhattan Project that the Americans developed,
758
00:39:13,870 --> 00:39:16,300
which was the scientific and the military
759
00:39:16,300 --> 00:39:19,060
development of these weapons was just enormous.
760
00:39:19,060 --> 00:39:21,550
I mean, literally hundreds of thousands of workers
761
00:39:21,550 --> 00:39:25,170
worked on sites, what 17 sites in 12 states,
762
00:39:25,170 --> 00:39:27,940
huge secret cities built across the US
763
00:39:27,940 --> 00:39:30,800
all feeding into this enterprise.
764
00:39:30,800 --> 00:39:32,730
It was a colossal program.
765
00:39:32,730 --> 00:39:35,810
One team at Los Alamos led by Robert Oppenheimer,
766
00:39:35,810 --> 00:39:37,790
worked on the physics of the bomb.
767
00:39:37,790 --> 00:39:41,210
Huge industrial plants in Tennessee and Washington state
768
00:39:41,210 --> 00:39:43,830
were established to extract the plutonium,
769
00:39:43,830 --> 00:39:45,880
each arm of the massive operation
770
00:39:45,880 --> 00:39:48,400
working in extreme secrecy.
771
00:39:48,400 --> 00:39:50,840
After five years of frenetic research
772
00:39:50,840 --> 00:39:55,140
and billions of dollars on July, the 16th, 1945,
773
00:39:55,140 --> 00:39:57,763
the Manhattan Project came to fruition.
774
00:40:04,030 --> 00:40:07,513
A device was successfully exploded in the New Mexico desert.
775
00:40:09,150 --> 00:40:11,410
With a force of 22 kilotons,
776
00:40:11,410 --> 00:40:14,786
the equivalent of 22,000 tons of TNT,
777
00:40:14,786 --> 00:40:17,523
it dwarfed anything that had come before it.
778
00:40:19,524 --> 00:40:22,250
One of the most profound and moving aspects
779
00:40:22,250 --> 00:40:25,270
of the whole atomic weapon story
780
00:40:25,270 --> 00:40:27,270
is that the men, mostly men,
781
00:40:27,270 --> 00:40:28,980
the men who developed the bomb
782
00:40:28,980 --> 00:40:30,690
were the first to become aware
783
00:40:30,690 --> 00:40:33,910
of what the destructive capacity of the bomb was.
784
00:40:33,910 --> 00:40:36,350
And they debated within themselves
785
00:40:36,350 --> 00:40:39,940
whether or not they should be allowing this to happen.
786
00:40:39,940 --> 00:40:43,030
And I think one of the considerations that swayed them
787
00:40:43,030 --> 00:40:46,630
into regarding this as being justifiable
788
00:40:46,630 --> 00:40:47,810
was that that many of them knew
789
00:40:47,810 --> 00:40:49,250
exactly what they were up against.
790
00:40:49,250 --> 00:40:51,870
Many of them were Jewish refugees from Nazi Germany,
791
00:40:51,870 --> 00:40:54,270
who knew what had happened to Europe's Jews
792
00:40:54,270 --> 00:40:57,053
and knew the costs of not defeating Nazi Germany.
793
00:40:59,750 --> 00:41:01,010
And while the atomic bomb
794
00:41:01,010 --> 00:41:03,514
may have been designed with Germany in mind,
795
00:41:03,514 --> 00:41:07,220
by the time the atomic bomb was completed,
796
00:41:07,220 --> 00:41:11,240
Hitler was gone and the Germans had surrendered,
797
00:41:11,240 --> 00:41:14,053
but the allies were still at war with Japan.
798
00:41:17,660 --> 00:41:22,462
A little after 8:15 AM on the 6th of August, 1945,
799
00:41:22,462 --> 00:41:27,260
the Enola Gay, a heavily modified B-29 bomber
800
00:41:27,260 --> 00:41:30,280
dropped a device measuring just three meters in length,
801
00:41:30,280 --> 00:41:35,280
71 centimeters in diameter and weighing just 4,000 kilograms
802
00:41:35,350 --> 00:41:38,947
over the unsuspecting Japanese city of Hiroshima.
803
00:41:46,490 --> 00:41:50,850
Hiroshima, a manufacturing center of 350,000 people
804
00:41:50,850 --> 00:41:53,750
located about 800 kilometers from Tokyo
805
00:41:53,750 --> 00:41:55,500
had not been randomly selected
806
00:41:55,500 --> 00:41:57,930
as a target for the atomic bomb,
807
00:41:57,930 --> 00:41:59,870
it had been chosen.
808
00:41:59,870 --> 00:42:02,670
Firstly, because up until this point in the war,
809
00:42:02,670 --> 00:42:04,050
unlike Tokyo,
810
00:42:04,050 --> 00:42:07,710
it had been largely unscathed by conventional bombing.
811
00:42:07,710 --> 00:42:10,893
And secondly, because the city was flat.
812
00:42:15,848 --> 00:42:20,848
(airplane roaring)
(dramatic music)
813
00:42:23,650 --> 00:42:24,942
The bomb went off,
814
00:42:24,942 --> 00:42:27,500
three and a half kilometers of destruction,
815
00:42:27,500 --> 00:42:31,450
a fireball that big killed probably 80,000 people,
816
00:42:31,450 --> 00:42:34,920
more or less instantly wounded about another 80,000 people.
817
00:42:34,920 --> 00:42:36,430
And because it was a flat site,
818
00:42:36,430 --> 00:42:39,660
the impact of the bomb went for miles and in a circular way
819
00:42:39,660 --> 00:42:41,440
diminishing as it progressed,
820
00:42:41,440 --> 00:42:43,990
but still devastating, utterly destroying the city.
821
00:42:45,690 --> 00:42:48,210
When Little Boy as the bomb was called
822
00:42:48,210 --> 00:42:51,240
detonated 580 meters above the city,
823
00:42:51,240 --> 00:42:55,713
it did so with a force equivalent to 15,000 tons of TNT.
824
00:42:56,580 --> 00:42:57,700
As it exploded,
825
00:42:57,700 --> 00:42:59,760
intense heat rays and radiation
826
00:42:59,760 --> 00:43:01,430
were released in all directions
827
00:43:02,290 --> 00:43:06,500
and almost instantly 13 square kilometers of that city
828
00:43:06,500 --> 00:43:08,403
was transformed into ruins.
829
00:43:11,740 --> 00:43:13,810
And when that city's devastation failed
830
00:43:13,810 --> 00:43:15,920
to elicit a Japanese surrender,
831
00:43:15,920 --> 00:43:18,700
just three days later, a second weapon,
832
00:43:18,700 --> 00:43:20,553
Fat Man was deployed.
833
00:43:21,400 --> 00:43:24,800
But heavy smoke and cloud cover over the city of Kokura
834
00:43:24,800 --> 00:43:28,350
caused a mid-mission diversion to the secondary target,
835
00:43:28,350 --> 00:43:30,563
the port city of Nagasaki.
836
00:43:31,410 --> 00:43:33,740
Not an ideal target from the bomb makers point of view
837
00:43:33,740 --> 00:43:35,910
because it was a hilly, it was in a valley.
838
00:43:35,910 --> 00:43:37,620
And so the blast was constrained,
839
00:43:37,620 --> 00:43:39,913
but even so it killed 40,000 people.
840
00:43:41,100 --> 00:43:42,770
Fat Man had an energy yield
841
00:43:42,770 --> 00:43:45,907
of approximately 22 kilotons of TNT.
842
00:43:45,907 --> 00:43:48,660
And the fireball caused by the explosion
843
00:43:48,660 --> 00:43:51,089
was 280 meters in diameter,
844
00:43:51,089 --> 00:43:53,340
creating a surface temperature
845
00:43:53,340 --> 00:43:55,853
of around 5,000 degrees Celsius.
846
00:44:01,390 --> 00:44:03,850
The role of the two weapons in ending the war
847
00:44:03,850 --> 00:44:06,640
remains the subject of ongoing debate.
848
00:44:06,640 --> 00:44:09,160
Emperor Hirohito's decision to surrender
849
00:44:09,160 --> 00:44:12,380
was also influenced by Russia's invasion of Manchuria
850
00:44:12,380 --> 00:44:16,240
and declaration of war against Japan on August 8th.
851
00:44:16,240 --> 00:44:18,160
But one thing is certain,
852
00:44:18,160 --> 00:44:20,353
the world has never been the same since.
853
00:44:26,350 --> 00:44:28,070
One of the claims that's made
854
00:44:28,070 --> 00:44:31,300
about the use of Little Boy and Fat Man on Japan
855
00:44:31,300 --> 00:44:33,810
was that one of the major reasons for doing it
856
00:44:33,810 --> 00:44:35,410
was not so much to defeat Japan,
857
00:44:35,410 --> 00:44:37,080
but to signal to Russia
858
00:44:37,080 --> 00:44:40,240
that the US had this incredible new capability,
859
00:44:40,240 --> 00:44:41,380
whether that's true or not,
860
00:44:41,380 --> 00:44:42,840
I certainly don't know,
861
00:44:42,840 --> 00:44:44,650
but what is certainly true
862
00:44:44,650 --> 00:44:47,330
is that the creation of atomic weapons
863
00:44:47,330 --> 00:44:49,880
radically changed the global strategic environment.
864
00:44:52,100 --> 00:44:53,300
A change that would lead
865
00:44:53,300 --> 00:44:58,277
to a 40 year period of uncertainty known as the Cold War.
866
00:45:05,210 --> 00:45:08,760
In 1945, there had been just three nuclear weapons
867
00:45:08,760 --> 00:45:10,170
on the planet.
868
00:45:10,170 --> 00:45:13,690
By 1950, there were 304,
869
00:45:13,690 --> 00:45:18,123
299 in the US arsenal and five in the Soviet Union's.
870
00:45:19,770 --> 00:45:21,929
So we entered into the era of the Cold War,
871
00:45:21,929 --> 00:45:23,130
and it was a cold war for a reason,
872
00:45:23,130 --> 00:45:24,980
though there were many hotspots,
873
00:45:24,980 --> 00:45:26,920
the two great powers that were competing
874
00:45:26,920 --> 00:45:28,880
never went to war against each other.
875
00:45:28,880 --> 00:45:30,800
And probably the main reason for that
876
00:45:30,800 --> 00:45:32,623
is the existence of nuclear weapons.
877
00:45:34,600 --> 00:45:37,530
But even a Cold War can be won.
878
00:45:37,530 --> 00:45:39,230
Determined to maintain their lead
879
00:45:39,230 --> 00:45:42,050
in what was now a nuclear arms race,
880
00:45:42,050 --> 00:45:44,160
in October, 1952,
881
00:45:44,160 --> 00:45:46,810
the Americans conducted Operation Ivy
882
00:45:46,810 --> 00:45:49,803
on the Eniwetok Atoll in the Marshall Islands.
883
00:45:51,810 --> 00:45:54,760
The plan was to detonate a device named Mike,
884
00:45:54,760 --> 00:45:57,000
an experiment with a higher yielding form
885
00:45:57,000 --> 00:45:58,760
of nuclear explosion
886
00:45:58,760 --> 00:46:00,730
that derives a significant proportion
887
00:46:00,730 --> 00:46:03,073
of its explosive energy from fusion.
888
00:46:05,690 --> 00:46:07,371
A Thermonuclear device,
889
00:46:07,371 --> 00:46:12,113
Mike was the first of what we now know as a hydrogen bomb.
890
00:46:14,865 --> 00:46:19,865
At 7:15 AM local time on the 31st of October, 1952,
891
00:46:19,950 --> 00:46:22,280
Mike was detonated from a control ship
892
00:46:22,280 --> 00:46:24,603
stationed 55 kilometers away.
893
00:46:26,500 --> 00:46:29,230
The detonation resulted in a massive explosion
894
00:46:29,230 --> 00:46:32,870
equivalent to 500 times the explosive force
895
00:46:32,870 --> 00:46:36,880
of the bomb dropped on Nagasaki just seven years earlier.
896
00:46:36,880 --> 00:46:37,880
Four...
897
00:46:37,880 --> 00:46:38,880
three...
898
00:46:38,880 --> 00:46:39,882
two...
899
00:46:39,882 --> 00:46:40,715
one.
900
00:46:46,490 --> 00:46:49,029
After the test was confirmed to the public,
901
00:46:49,029 --> 00:46:53,120
Time Magazine reported that, "The force and horror
902
00:46:53,120 --> 00:46:56,325
of atomic weapons has entered a new dimension.
903
00:46:56,325 --> 00:46:58,890
The first full-dress, H-blast
904
00:46:58,890 --> 00:47:00,600
turned the mid-Pacific sandspit
905
00:47:00,600 --> 00:47:03,917
named Elugelab into a submarine crater."
906
00:47:04,790 --> 00:47:06,333
And indeed it had.
907
00:47:07,260 --> 00:47:11,320
Elugelab, the atoll on which Mike's detonation took place
908
00:47:11,320 --> 00:47:12,423
was vaporized.
909
00:47:13,630 --> 00:47:15,410
The explosion produced a fireball
910
00:47:15,410 --> 00:47:17,600
six kilometers in diameter
911
00:47:17,600 --> 00:47:20,833
and a mushroom cloud 160 kilometers wide.
912
00:47:22,190 --> 00:47:24,940
Unsurprisingly in 1952,
913
00:47:24,940 --> 00:47:27,993
it was the largest nuclear explosion ever detonated.
914
00:47:31,000 --> 00:47:33,540
And as the tests continued on both sides
915
00:47:33,540 --> 00:47:36,440
and with the development of missiles to deliver warheads,
916
00:47:36,440 --> 00:47:39,350
the numbers of nuclear weapons skyrocketed,
917
00:47:39,350 --> 00:47:42,253
a proliferation to change the nature of warfare.
918
00:47:43,370 --> 00:47:46,858
(explosions booming)
919
00:47:46,858 --> 00:47:48,930
At the heart of the idea of nuclear deterrence
920
00:47:48,930 --> 00:47:52,860
is something called mutually assured destruction or MAD.
921
00:47:52,860 --> 00:47:55,550
And that term is quite literally chose,
922
00:47:55,550 --> 00:47:57,560
the idea is that you would be simply mad
923
00:47:57,560 --> 00:47:59,090
to start a nuclear war
924
00:47:59,090 --> 00:48:01,180
because where the other side had the ability
925
00:48:01,180 --> 00:48:03,870
to wipe you out if you launched against them
926
00:48:03,870 --> 00:48:05,300
and they had the ability to launch
927
00:48:05,300 --> 00:48:06,490
before you could guarantee
928
00:48:06,490 --> 00:48:09,248
that you'd taken out all of their nuclear capabilities
929
00:48:09,248 --> 00:48:10,380
in starting a war,
930
00:48:10,380 --> 00:48:13,003
you would essentially choose to destroy yourself.
931
00:48:13,910 --> 00:48:18,550
In 1955, there were 2,636 warheads
932
00:48:18,550 --> 00:48:22,180
of which the Americans had 2,400.
933
00:48:22,180 --> 00:48:27,180
By 1965, that number had increased to over 35,000
934
00:48:27,660 --> 00:48:30,343
as the US and Russia battled for supremacy.
935
00:48:32,700 --> 00:48:34,650
With enough weapons to destroy the planet
936
00:48:34,650 --> 00:48:36,160
several times over,
937
00:48:36,160 --> 00:48:38,323
an uneasy status quo emerged.
938
00:48:40,040 --> 00:48:42,730
Great powers simply couldn't afford
939
00:48:42,730 --> 00:48:44,360
to go to war with one another.
940
00:48:44,360 --> 00:48:46,940
And that's what nuclear deterrence relies on.
941
00:48:46,940 --> 00:48:51,080
The incredible power of the opposing nuclear forces
942
00:48:51,080 --> 00:48:53,510
means that there are no rational ways
943
00:48:53,510 --> 00:48:55,493
to start a war with one another.
944
00:48:56,400 --> 00:48:57,930
At the height of the third phase
945
00:48:57,930 --> 00:48:59,300
of the Cold War,
946
00:48:59,300 --> 00:49:03,033
the world was home to over 61,000 nuclear weapons.
947
00:49:05,320 --> 00:49:08,703
That number has now dropped to a little over 16,000.
948
00:49:09,560 --> 00:49:11,240
(explosion booming)
949
00:49:11,240 --> 00:49:13,153
But should they ever be used,
950
00:49:13,153 --> 00:49:15,210
mass destruction would result
951
00:49:15,210 --> 00:49:18,020
of a kind that the men of World War I,
952
00:49:18,020 --> 00:49:21,703
a mere 100 years ago could never have imagined.
953
00:49:29,723 --> 00:49:32,473
(dramatic music)
74442
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