Published Messenger Newspapers, Adelaide, Wednesday, June 19, 2002


BLIND AS A BAT AND BATTY AS HELL


DURING World War II, off in the wild, blue yonder, the US Air Force fitted Mexican free-tailed bats with incendiary bombs on strings, intending to release them over enemy territory to do their worst. How a bat, even on massive doses of steroids, could ever manage to fly weighed down by a bomb on a string is beyond me. Never mind, the USAF expected the creatures somehow to do their patriotic duty, and to know exactly when to chew through the string to release the bomb on target. Strong and incredibly smart, too. I have heard rumours of a similar project involving bomber dolphins, trained to sink ships, but have never had it confirmed. One would hope dolphins were too smart to become suicide bombers. The USAF devised a technique by which the caged bats were parachuted over the drop zone and then released. Leaving aside the weight of the bombs, the other problem was the bats flocked together upon release, as bats are inclined to do. On one occasion, making a quick break for it, they left the test range in the desert and blew up several military buildings and an above-ground fuel tank in a nearby town. The best laid plans of fledermause and men. The Kamikaze Bats likely emerged around the same time as the US was developing the A-Bomb and one can imagine the boffins arguing heatedly about which project should be given higher priority. One cannot help feeling they got it wrong. My source for this batty anecdote is the reliable London Review of Books (April 4, 2002), therefore it must be true. Or true enough, anyway, to enter my growing file of silly idiot "military intelligence'', which started years ago on reading "Hitler - my part in his downfall" by Spike Milligan. Spike, who had served on the Home Front during WWII, reported that owing to a lack of guns, bullets or both, his platoon was armed with lengths of wood, which they aimed at targets on the rifle range and shouted in unison: ``Bang!'' Such stories restore your faith in harmless human bumbling although I suppose the wartime consequences could be potentially disastrous. Another account, also from the LRB scrapbook: During WWI this time, London was being bombed from zeppelin balloons in an early form of The Blitz that later wreaked so much havoc in WWII. The zeppelins had relatively quiet motors that were hard to hear at a distance, which naturally was of concern for the air raid defences. The military answer was to recruit blind men whose hearing was thought to be extra sensitive. And then to equip them with stethoscopes. Uh-huh. I shall report again on the strange workings of the military mind whenever new evidence comes to light. Over and out.