10 Amazing Military Innovations

Copyright 2018 by Gary L. Pullman

Whether tactics, armor, communications, deception, transportation, or ammunition is involved, the military has long displayed the ability to develop amazing innovations. From the days of Alexander the Great to the time of Dwight D. Eisenhower and beyond, commanders, the military itself, and government agencies have employed advanced strategies, equipment, and technological marvels in support of its combat and combat-support missions. Here are 10 such innovations.

10 Guerrilla Warfare

The origin of guerrilla warfare (the use of small military forces to hit and run, rather than to engage in protracted battles with often superior bodies of troops) is lost in history. However, the Sythians' use of this tactic, as reported by the ancient Greek historian Herodotus, is considered one of the most effective. (LINK 1)

In particular, the Sythians practiced “swarming.” Several of their units would attack the enemy at the same time, moving “with the target in order to fracture it.” After the guerrillas broke the enemy force into fragments, causing confusion in their ranks, the Sythians' archers continuously bombarded them with arrows. (LINK 2)

Generally, swarming worked amazingly well. However, Alexander the Great (356-323 BC) devised a defense against the tactic. He waited until the Sythians swarmed a “bait-unit” before attacking them from all directions, applying the Sythians' own tactic against them. (LINK 3)

9 Land Bridge

The Phoenician city of Tyre presented a problem for Alexander the Great. Between the island and the mainland, the Mediterranean Sea was 5.5 meters (18 feet) deep, and there was almost “no land outside the walls” of the well-fortified city. How could he capture the island fortress? (LINK 4)

In 332 BC, he started by cutting Tyre off from resupply, but the city, warned of his advance, was already well stocked and “had its own fresh water.”After several attempts to conquer the city failed, Alexander ordered his men to construct a 200-foot-wide “land bridge” between the coast and the island, a feat which “took months.” When it was in place, he ordered his “siege engines” brought over the bridge and stationed along the city's walls. After seven months, the siege succeeded, as Tyre, running out of supplies, surrendered. Since then, an isthmus has formed around the land bridge, permanently connecting Tyre to the mainland. (LINK 5)

8 French Corp d’Aerostiers and U. S. Army Balloon Corps

In 1794, the French Committee of Public Safety formed a Corp d’Aerostiers (Corp of Balloonists) “to conduct aerial reconnaissance,” using these assets “during the battles of Charleroi and Fleurus later that year.” (LINK 6)

During the American Civil War, the Union commanded the Army Balloon Corps, employing balloons “around Washington DC and Manassas in 1861,” for reconnaissance “during the Seven Days Campaign in 1862,” and again “during the Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville campaigns.” Balloons were also used “in the western theater” in support of “the campaign against Island Number 10 in the Mississippi River.” Confederate balloons were employed around Richmond during the Seven Days Campaign (LINK 7)

Although some balloons used hot air, (LINK 8) many were filled with gas supplied by cities and “special inflation wagons” that “generated hydrogen” from “dilute sulphuric acid and iron fillings.” To relay intelligence, balloonists used “telegraph or signal flags.” (LINK 9)

7 Ironclad Warships

During the American Civil War, The Battle of Hampton Roads (March 9, 1862) pitted two ironclad warships against one another, the Union's Monitor and the Confederacy's Merrimack (later rechristened as the Virginia), as the South attempted to run the North's blockade of Chesapeake Bay ports at Norfolk and Richmond, Virginia.

The four-hour battle proved “inconclusive,” as their cannon balls bounced off the ships' iron armor. Finally, the Merrimack withdrew to Norfolk. Two months later, as “Yankees invaded the James Peninsula,” rebels, in retreat, “scuttled the Merrimack,” and the Monitor sank in a storm “off Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, at the end of the year.” Although the ships didn't last long, they “ushered in a new era in naval warfare.”

(LINK 10)

6 U. S. Army Pigeon Service

During World War I and World War II, the U. S. maintained the Army Pigeon Service, using 54,000 homing pigeons specially “procured, bred, [and] trained” for the missions of “communications and reconnaissance.” The “most famous of these war pigeons,” G. I. Joe, flew 20 miles in as many minutes to deliver a message that saved “at least 100 Allied soldiers from being bombed by their own planes” and was awarded the Dickin Medal “for gallantry.” The birds continued to serve their country until the Pigeon Service was discontinued in 1957. (LINK 11)

5 Inflatable Tanks and Aircraft

During World War II, German army aerial reconnaissance showing “hundreds of American vehicles” confirmed intercepted Allied radio transmissions that “two American divisions were on the ground.” Ground reconnaissance supported the intelligence, as “German observation posts reported hearing them moving in across the river.” In reality, they were observing nothing more than the Ghost Army, “1,000 men . . . pretending to be two divisions.” They did this by assembling hundreds of inflatable tanks which, from the air, looked real, and by employing “sounds and special effects” to support the illusion. Radio transmissions also seemed to verify the idea that a massive ground force had been fielded. The inflatable tanks were decoys. Their deployment convinced the Germans the Americans were planning to attack in one place while the real attack occurred elsewhere. (LINK 12)

To this day, the U. S. Army and other military branches use other inflatable decoys “to mimic highly sophisticated military weapons and equipment.” One supplier, Raven Aerostar, offers decoy SCUD Missile Launchers, missiles, tanks, HUMVEEs, trucks, radar systems, and other items that are “cost effective,” lightweight, and “easily deployable and operational in minutes.” (LINK 13)

4 Paratroop Dummies

Germany used paratroop dummies in 1940, when its troops invaded Holland and Belgium. The decoys were so successful the Germans used them again in 1944, during The Battle of the Bulge, when “several dozen straw[-]filled dummies” were “dropped on dummy landing zones to confuse the enemy.” Although the Germans lost the battle, their use of paratroop dummies was effective. (LINK 14)

The Allies soon used paratroop dummies of their own. George Freedman, “an American manufacturer. . . created a decoy for the British in 1939. Codenamed 'Rupert,' it appeared in Operation Titanic, a major deception ploy used during the June 1944 Normandy invasion.” Similar paratroop dummies were used until 1977. (LINK 15)

3 Defoliants

Well before Agent Orange was used during the Vietnam War, chemical defoliants were employed to kill trees and bushes. In fact, Agent Orange contains two of the earlier defoliant chemicals, compounds 2,4-D and 2,4,5-7. By mimicking “the effects of plant hormones,” these chemicals stimulate “plants into frantic growth before they wither and die.” British researchers “did most of the groundwork” that enabled “chemical plant growth regulators” to be used as “weapons” and for Agent Orange to be later developed. (LINK 16)

2 U. S. Interstate Highway System

In 1919, the U. S. Army conducted a test. A convoy of 81 trucks undertook a coast-to-coast journey, from Washington, D. C., to San Francisco, California, a distance of 5,232 kilometers (3,251 miles). “The convoy assumed wartime conditions—damage or destruction to railroad facilities, bridges, tunnels, and the like—and imposed self-sufficiency on itself.” The trip took 62 days. (LINK 17)

Having been impressed by the efficiency of the German autobahns he'd seen during World War II, when he'd been the Supreme Allied Commander in Europe, Dwight D. Eisenhower, now the U. S. president, “cited the 1919 convoy and his World War II experiences to persuade Congress to enact the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956,” which resulted in the U. S. interstate highway system, funded by gasoline taxes. Paradoxically, although it was designed to expedite the flow of troops, weapons, equipment and supplies in time of war, the system has had enormous peacetime economic benefits for the country. (LINK 18)

1 EXACTO Ordnance

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), a U. S. Department of Defense agency, has developed a smart bullet. The projectile's “real-time optical guidance” tracks and guides a bullet fired from “a standard rifle,” correcting its path, as necessary, as it travels toward its target. A February 26, 2015, videotaped demonstration shows “an experienced shooter” using the agency's Extreme Accuracy Tasked Ordnance (EXACTO) technology “repeatedly” hitting “moving and evading targets” and a “novice shooter using the system for the first time” hitting “a moving target.” (LINK 19)

DARPA program manager Jerome Dunn said the new ordnance “has demonstrated what was once thought impossible: the continuous guidance of a small-caliber bullet to target.” (LINK 20)

LINK 1: http://www.ancient-origins.net/news-history/scythian-tactics-and-strategy-devastating-guerilla-archers-part-i-003704
LINK 2: http://www.ancient-origins.net/news-history/scythian-tactics-and-strategy-devastating-guerilla-archers-part-i-003704
LINK 3: http://www.ancient-origins.net/news-history/scythian-tactics-and-strategy-devastating-guerilla-archers-part-i-003704
LINK 4: https://europeanhistory.boisestate.edu/westciv/alexander/07.shtml
LINK 5: https://europeanhistory.boisestate.edu/westciv/alexander/07.shtml
LINK 6: http://www.civilwar.org/education/history/civil-war-ballooning/civil-war-ballooning.html
LINK 7: http://www.civilwar.org/education/history/civil-war-ballooning/civil-war-ballooning.html
LINK 8: https://historyhodgepodge.com/2013/07/02/hot-air-ballooning-the-high-tech-way-to-spy-in-1861/
LINK 9: http://www.civilwar.org/education/history/civil-war-ballooning/civil-war-ballooning.html
LINK 10: http://www.history.com/topics/american-civil-war/battle-of-hampton-roads
LINK 11: http://armylive.dodlive.mil/index.php/2012/06/army-signal-pigeons/; http://armedforcesmuseum.com/carrier-pigeons-used-during-world-war-i/
LINK 12: http://www.voanews.com/content/fank-tanks-ghost-army-defeated-germans-in-world-war-ll/1667445.html (This link shows a photograph of soldiers assembling an inflatable tank.)
LINK 13: http://ravenaerostar.com/products/military-decoys/military-decoys (This link shows a video of a soldier inflating an inflatable tank.)
LINK 14: https://www.army.mil/article/3388/_quot_OSCAR_quot__Goes_to_War_/
LINK 15: https://www.army.mil/article/3388/_quot_OSCAR_quot__Goes_to_War_/
LINK 16: https://books.google.com/books?id=q7v_rDK0uOgC&pg=PA34&lpg=PA34&dq=this+horrible+natural+experiment+Perera+Thomas&source=bl&ots=HbDkNQCTEK&sig=aR2tiCHT5HbJfnwXrQg7Erv_4jU&hl=en&sa=X&ei=sxakU_rGO4qmsATLjIDYAg&ved=0CB8Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=this%20horrible%20natural%20experiment%20Perera%20Thomas&f=false
LINK 17: http://www.archives.gov/publications/prologue/2006/summer/interstates.html
LINK 18: http://www.archives.gov/publications/prologue/2006/summer/interstates.html
LINK 19: http://phys.org/news/2015-04-bullet.html (This link contains an interesting video demonstrating the effectiveness of the EXACTO ordnance)
LINK 20: http://phys.org/news/2015-04-bullet.html