When he's talking about "weapon of the weak", he doesnt mean Viets or German were weak, he means they were in a weak defensive or fleeing situation, they were not in an strong advantageous situation.
So many people in the comment section failing to understand that booby traps are "weapons of the weak" because (and only because) they are used by people LOSING ground, not people GAINING ground. If you are conquering territory uncontested, you won't get to put traps where your enemy is (because you're not there yet), and your enemy won't get to find them where you used to be (because they won't get there). It's literally that simple. It wasn't an insult.
when retreating from territory you are able to lay down boobytraps (pitfalls, roadside bombs, grenades tucked under a victim) in order to delay your opponents advance by reducing morale in his troops.
cheezymuffin uh no, no you cannot. You can destroy equipment and resources to thwart them, but traps have the same effects as mines, they eventually kill civilians.
when he said weapon of the weak he meant that if you are in a disadvantage they can be used efectively if you are not strong you have to be smart thats where these come in
+NotIrishRider well you need enemies exploring terrain that you had previous access to. So this would mostly be used by retreating forces or guerilla forces, and it's practically useless if you're gaining, not losing, territory.
My uncle was wounded twice in ww2, once by a wire strung across a road, the other a bed frame connected to the house wiring. 1 neck laceration, 1 electrocution.
+Kanakotka meaning that an Army or militia that is overwhelmingly stronger than it's enemy will not expend significant effort into booby traps since it can outright engage and destroy it's enemy in a more direct, efficient and guaranteed way. The North Vietnamese and their supporters could have never fought a conventional war against America, they would have been slaughtered within the first year at best. They were only effective because of their guerilla tactics (which included booby-traps) and because they knew the area they were fighting in better.
Richard Botellio Numbers or equipment has never made much of a difference in war, honestly. If you want to know about a numbers advantage and having an overwhelmingly stronger force, ask Russia how well their invasion of Finland went in 1916... or how well their other invasion went in 1945, or defense of Stalingrad for that matter. (even if they supposedly won that) As for equipment, just ask German WW2 effort, since they had a huge technological advantage across the board (if a growing lack of materials) against aggressors. I really dislike the connotation or tone of calling them weak or the connotation that you give that seems to imply almost that they somehow cheated. It's ingenious tactics, and they repelled a dangerous invasion by an aggressive foreign nation much larger and better equipped by them rather easily. This doesn't make them weak, this makes them strong and worthy of note. If you can't win a war where you have a technological advantage, and numbers advantage on every single possible metric, that means you're weak and foolish, not the enemy just because they use imaginative tactics against you. There's no honor in warfare. If you want to know if honor matters, stand among the fallen and ask.
1. I never implied or in any way said the"cheated" nor did I call anyone "weak". It is simply a matter of how warfare is fought. If you don't have tanks you aren't going to go attacking them across an open field, you ambush them in an area where their weaknesses are revealed. You seem to have completely missed any of the points I made. Yes the Germans had good equipment and well trained soldiers and yes they used booby traps, but it was not their only real method of fighting nor was it one that made a significant different in any of the battles they fought. 2.I served 6 tours in Iraq so I have stood among the fallen plenty.
Richard Botellio I must have got the wrong idea of an implication on the statement of "they were only effective because...". I do apologize on that. The tone of that sentence seemed like chiding them for using such tactics, but it seems i misinterpreted it now when i'm comparing it to the rest of your post now with more time.
qwertydoll Traps like the picture frame one were intended to be used in particularly intact and comfortable buildings that would be prime candidates for an officer to set up a command post from. Depending on the pace things are going at, he may be there for quite some time, so naturally he'll take some extra effort to make it feel more homelike. Imagine you're an officer in WWII, you've spent the last 6 weeks practically living in a glorified hole in the mud in your sector, and as the line has moved up, you suddenly find you have access to a lovely french manor house with relatively minor damage.
BDNeon Yeah that would be a deadly scenario. I think that's what makes the officers try to make those pictures go straight and get them blown up and also kid of making a whole lot of sense.
***** Exactly. Let's nuke 2 sparsely populated military targets. Hiroshima was the Japanese 2nd Army's headquarters. Nagasaki was a major munitions manufacturing center. These actions brought an immediate end to the most deadly war in recorded history. So, you're welcome.
+DrSeanKennedy "sparsely populated" the phrase that helps so many military men get to sleep at night. Fun Fact: They American military avoided bombing both cities so they would be "fresh" to test the nukes on. So yay, the comfortable families got to be nuked. Americuh!
Best way to avoid booby-traps would probably be to avoid anything man-made and mechanical when in a city environment. Basically: don't touch anything and worry about out of place floor-boards mostly.
I like how none of the speakers have a name or professional title and just aggressively explain the tactics behind of WWII booby traps to a shaky cam. I wish more tv documentaries were like this tbh
I disagree with his point regarding these as being weapons of the weak. If an army has an almost complete understanding of its territory it can make effective use of these weapons. They don't have to be at a disadvantage to use these, they can use them to put the enemy at a disadvantage. Knowing your surroundings, knowing where troop paths are, knowing where the best place to lay a trap, these are not the traits of the disadvantaged side, these are the traits of the side that knows how to win. Take the Vietcong for example, at no point would I ever consider them to have been the weaker/disadvantaged side. They knew everything about the land they were in. They also had the numbers and the equipment, and yet they still used booby traps.
I remember this booby trap warning ad at the cinema years ago, a German officer who has just been to the toilet, 😄pulls the plug and the whole thing blows up. 😄
the tilted frame sounds hard to succeed, normally the command would order soldiers to remove all the paintings to check if there were safes or hidden mechanisms behind it, sometimes even remove the wallpaper. tables, chairs and drawers have to be cleared out that is for sure.
I heard that on the Eastern Front ww2 the retreating Germans used to booby trap their M35?* Egg grenades. These came in two types; one with a blue cap which had a 5 second fuze , and red capped ones which had a 2 second fuze. The Soviets knew about that, though German soldiers used to swap the cap heads and leave them behind, Soviet units would collect them for use and the rest is history....
My created booby traps in ww2 Booby Traps of the WW2 have been a brutal traps. Many traps have been made from explosives. Landmines, bullet grenades, frag grenades, grenade sticks, YOU NAME IT. Motorcycle The motorcycle trick was when a soldier puts a grenade on a engine and when the enemy soldier gets to ride his motor, he will explode. Fake Pressure Plate. This will take longer. Every time you place a pressure plate on a hidden stump hole, the landmines goes under it. The pressure plate will be put on a 2 side cut box and a board. When the enemy soldier steps on the grass and mossy board. Basically they have a choice, stay in or walk past. Exploded Gate This trick is brutal nonetheless. Every time you put a bullet grenade in a tripwire hook. So the door is powered by a two way system. Place 3 bullet grenades in a tripwire hook. One tripwire hook can hold up a door. So when the enemy soldier explores a trench, they don't have sense and dont think that they know there is any trap, the bullet grenades activate and the enemy soldier gets shot by the bullet grenades. Hidden Rope. The trap is hidden by a string that is 7ft in diameter with 2 grenade sticks. Again the trap is hidden against a stump hole and a board box with one side cut through and one side cut loose between 2 sides. The board is unidentified from the grass. So when the enemy soldier gets in the grassy border he will explode when his foot touches the pressure string. Sometimes they put poisoned alcohol or poison up spit dirt mostly made by police guard dogs, over the string so it could spread infection with the injury
@propyropower lol, that was the point of booby traps. Its a psychological weapon for soldiers. Actually, its even more effective if the soldier survives the trap. You would have to use resources to fix the wounded soldier, hereby diverting precious medical supplies away from the front. Also, support for the war effort would decline when you see returned vets with missing limbs hopping around.
@propyropower Well it was not done when under fire but when the firings over. I've read Beevor's D-Day and he states that Germans usually booby trap the largest building they can find since that's where officers make their command posts.
Karl Fairburne is one of the deadliest snipers in gaming history. He appeared in the latest game of the Sniper Elite Serie: SE5. Speaking of booby traps, he added seasoning (poison) to Hitler's meal. Hitler then takes a bite of his sandwich. Seconds later, runs to the nearest toilet, vomits like hell, then immediately dies. Fairburne's lines were: "First meal of the day, last meal of Hitler's life."
@yootubematt if u outnumber the enemy 100 to 1 and theyr attacking you...would u go thru the trouble of making traps and then disarming them afterwards?
The skewed painting trap was a terrible but ingenious tool for killing. They were utilizing the vulnerabilities of those who have OCD. They were unaware of how much they were on the Deutschmark at the time but it is ingenious. The officers were more likely to be killed by it due to a correlation between intellect and neuroses like OCD. Fascinating, I wonder if I could resist? 😂
Imagine the ultimate booby trap: A random, shiny red button with the words “DO NOT PRESS” in the enemy’s language taped onto it that, when pressed, sets off a nuke explosion right then and there
IEDs can sometimes be triggered remotely, or with a timer. Booby traps need direct interaction from the victim(s) to be triggered. An IED can be a booby trap, but not all booby traps are explosive devices.
You guys obviously misinterpreted his use of the work "weak." He was using it in the context of the German retreat. No one sets booby traps when they are advancing, obviously, so those who are "weak" and retreating are gonna have to resort to booby traps to slow the enemy and provide tactical advantages. If the allied offensive was forced to retreat back, we would have used the same tactics, and would have, as a result of our retreat, been called the weak ones here. The use of drones nowadays is new technology that obviously wasn’t invented back then, and is a new tactic that America can use against the technologically behind Arabs.
It mite have started out a weapon for the weak ,or maybe a force who wasnt well financed ,but with the injuries it causes ,it dosent look weak .that shit looks pretty effective.
If you think about it, the shock of the fire and being engulfed in flames was more the cause of death then the flamethrower itself, once you're covered in fire most of your nerves are burnt off you don't feel a thing, besides the fact you can see your self buring you're pretty much fine.
Mate, i have no clue what makes you think that. Burning is one of the worst pain imaginable. The nerves "don't burn off", you are in agonizing pain for a long time, if you aren't "lucky" enough to pass out from the pain and the smoke.
German soldiers and Japanese soldiers often use their dead comrade for booby trap,resulting many casualties among allied soldiers, because they were obsessed with luger pistol and katana sword.
Its not a weapon for the weak . The picture was work of genius as were filling motorbike engines as the resulting shrapnel was lethal and physcologically put the fear of god into anyone finding a bike . Even ones found 70yrs later are carefully checked
+Michael Persson A booby was used to say someone was stupid. It comes from a bird that would land on ships and be captured and eaten, which was considered pretty stupid by sailors.
I have a picture on my wall with tanks that was in the Normandy campaign, and as a small *wink wink* I tilted it so if anyone comes into my room and askes why it's tilted I would tell them it's a reference to the strategy from this video
Love all these military experts. Unless the trap is able to degrade/disarm itself over a period of time, your ass will be held as a war criminal. Traps that are "missed" tend to only kill civilians after the invading forces bypass them.
