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The evolution of warfare in the 20th Century had resulted in ever-increasing challenges for the infantrymen. Beginning in the First World War, the average soldier was faced with stopping weapons that were unimaginable less than a decade earlier. For example, tanks and airplanes made their debut during World War I and the introduction of these weapons caused the armies of both sides to look for ways to counter the new threats.

The United States developed the .50-caliber machine gun during the 1920s and 1930s in order to provide the infantry with an effective antitank and antitank weapon. When compared to the lightly armored tanks of the period, this weapon was considered to be an adequate weapon. This remained the case until virtually the time of America’s entry into the Second World War.

The overwhelming success of the early German victories of 1039-1940 was due in large measure to the innovative and aggressive use of armored units. The U.S. Army recognized that it was unprepared to deal with the technology of modern armored warfare. With the advent of heavier armor, it was apparent that the standard antitank weapon, the .50-caliber machine gun, was totally inadequate. Clearly, a new type of antitank weapon capable of being used by an infantryman was desperately needed.

The weapon that is now commonly known as the bazooka was the result of a fortuitous and timely combination of two divergent technologies. The individual most responsible for the development of the bazooka was Leslie A. Skinner. The son of an Army surgeon, Skinner was born in 1900. He had a fascination with rockets since his early teens and had built a number of working models. He was appointed to West Point and was commissioned in the U.S. Army in 1924. He transferred to the Ordnance Corps in 1931 and was assigned to develop rockets fired from airplanes. Skinner was in the enviable position of having his vocation and avocation coincide. Skinner left his duties in 1933 to study for a year at M.I.T. and returned to Aberdeen Proving Grounds in mid-1943. He continued his experiments with rockets and often used his own money to fund the research. He was transferred to Hawaii in 1938 and his rocket research came to a halt until he was reassigned to Aberdeen in November of 1940. By this time, the German onslaught in Europe was in full force and the Ordnance Department wanted Skinner to concentrate on the task of developing an antitank weapon using his rocket research. Skinner had the good fortune of having a capable assistant assigned to the project, Lieutenant Edward G. Uhl. Skinner and Uhl began testing a prototype design in early 1942, which comprised a simple metal tube with an electrical firing system operated by two flashlight batteries. Skinner’s design overcame the typical problem common to other experimental antitank weapons being tested, that of excessive recoil. Since the tube was open at both ends, the rocket’s exhaust gases were vented out of the bank and the recoil problem was minimal. The new rocket launcher worked well but the weapon had one severe problem. It could not operate with an explosive charge large enough to penetrate a tank’s armor. As stated in the book “There’s a War to Be Won,”
“By the spring of 1942, Skinner and Uhl had broken the back of every obstacle but one; they didn’t have an effective warhead. They had a rocket that flew straight and true. What they didn’t have was a weapon.”

Even as Skinner was working on his rocket launcher, a totally unrelated Ordnance Department project was underway. In late 1940, a young Swiss engineer, Henry H. Mohaupt, approached the Ordnance Department with a proposal for a new type of antitank explosive. Mohaupt’s design was based on a previously discovered, but unrefined concept of the shaped charge. This type of warhead focused an explosive charge on a single concentrated point and allowed a relatively small amount of explosive to punch a hole through armor. Subsequent testing convinced skeptical Ordnance people that the concept worked. Since the threat of German tanks loomed large at this time, a crash program was started to develop an antitank grenade based on the shaped charge concept. In late 1941, on the eve of the U.S. entry into World War Two, the “Grenade, High-Explosive, Antitank, M-10” was adopted. Unfortunately, it was impossible to hand throw this three-pound grenade so an effort to develop a spigot-type discharger was started. This proved to be unsuccessful as the angle of trajectory was unsuitable. The only means left to project the M-10 was either via the rifle grenade launcher or by fitting a launcher to the standard .50-caliber machine gun. The extreme recoil generated by firing the rifle grenade version often resulted in the shattering of rifle stocks and at least two reported instances of the soldier’s shoulder as well), so severe was the recoil force that even the .50-caliber’s tripod was bent. While the Ordnance Department labored to develop a suitable projector, production of the M-10 continued.

As Skinner was working on a suitable warhead for his rocket, he came across some M-10 grenades at Aberdeen and it quickly became apparent that this was the solution that he was looking for. The M-10 grenade weighed three pounds and could penetrate about 80mm of armor. Skinner and Uhl fashioned the first projectiles from dummy M-10s found on the Aberdeen ranges and added a rocket motor and fins. In April of 1942, the Frankford Arsenal built a launcher based on Skinner’s design. The prototype had a 54-inch long tube which was 2.36-inches in diameter. The inside diameter of the tube was dictated by the outside diameter of the M-10 grenade. The length was calculated as the minimum needed to allow the rocket motor to completely burn out before leaving the tube.

Skinner and Uhl took their new weapon to be tested at Aberdeen and, as luck would have it, they arrived as a demonstration of various other antitank weapons was in progress. A moving tank was used as a target, and Skinner and Uhl quietly took up a position at the end of the firing line. Uhl had fashioned a crude sight from a piece of wire he found on the ground. As the tank approached them, Uhl fired a rocket and hit it. Before the tank could turn around, Skinner had reloaded and Uhl hit it with the sound round. Excited Ordnance officials quickly converged on the pair and were soon firing the new rockets as well. The result was that the new launcher was ordered into priority production.

It was also noted that when Skinner’s superiors at the Ordnance Department discovered that he didn’t “go through channels,” he “…found himself the guest of honor at a private, very through chewing out covering all the bases from lack of loyalty too insubordination.”

The new weapon was standardized on June 30, 1942 as the “Launcher, Rocket, Antitank, M-1” and the rocket as the M-6. The weapon was soon dubbed the “bazooka” since it had some resemblance to a musical instrument used by a well-known radio comedian of the day, Bob Burns. The term bazooka was never officially adopted, but it quickly caught on and was universally used throughout the war.

The General Electric Corporation was selected to build the new weapon and on May 19, 1942, the firm was given a purchase order to “design, develop and produce” 5,000 bazookas in 30 days. This was a month prior to the official adoption of the bazooka. GE accepted the order even though it would normally take at least six months to accomplish. General Electric’s Bridgeport Works tackled the job and within 24 hours, the first design drawings were finished. Four days later, several test models were in the hands of the Army for evaluation and by the end of May, 20 test models had been completed. The testing took two weeks before approval was given to start production. This left only eight days to manufacture the 5,000 bazookas. GE worked feverishly to complete the order. Steel was delivered from Pittsburgh by truck drivers working around the clock, and some material was delivered by aircraft. It is reported that an Army Ordnance officer working on the project was bringing a trunk load of bazooka stocks to the factory in his automobile and was stopped for speeding by a state policeman. When the policeman learned of the nature of the delivery, he provided a personal escort to the plant.

While General Electric was producing the M-1 launcher, the firm of E.G. Budd Company was working on its contract to make 25,000 M-6 antitank rockets and 5,000 M-7 practice rockets.

The Army desperately needed the bazookas in the hands of the troops soon to be sent to North Africa and every possible effort was made to speed production. As stated in the book “Men and Volts at War,”
“As the bazookas came off the line they were hustled into waiting Army trucks, and were on their way to a port of embarkation before the stain on the gunstocks was dry. The last of the 5,000 bazookas of this big job came off the line on the eighth day with 89 minutes to spare before the expiration of the Army’s time limit.”

The initial order for 25,000 M-6 rockets was increased in June of 1942 to 75,000 rockets. Also in July, the number of bazookas on order was increased to 75,000 with delivery to be made before the end of the year.

The M-1 bazooka weighed approximately 18 pounds and was 54-inches long with a 2.36-inch bore and was remarkably similar to Skinner’s original design. A front sight was welded on the barrel near the muzzle and could be used from either the left or right sides. It had four aiming points corresponding to 100, 200, 300 and 400 yards. The rear sight was a simple metal leaf. Two hand grips were welded to the bottom of the tube. The rear grip contained the trigger and electrical contact switches. A wooden shoulder stock was fastened to the bottom of the tube, held two dry-cell flashlight batteries in a sliding compartment. One battery provided the power necessary to ignite the rocket and the other was a spare. A circuit tester consisting of a single small light bulb was placed on the left side of the stock that could be used to check if the electrical firing systems was operational. This proved to be a valuable feature since malfunctions due to weak batteries were common.

The M-6 antitank rocket had a wire taped to the outside of the body that was fastened to a contact box on top of the bazooka’s tube. An electrical charge carried by this wire ignited the rocket motor. The M-6 was equipped with a safety pin that was removed prior to placing the rocket into the tube. This was necessary as an armed rocket could be easily detonated by dropping it. A bazooka team consisted of two men, the gunner and his loader. Basic ammo load consisted of two bags that each held three rockets.

The new bazookas were soon aboard troop ships headed for North Africa. The new weapons was classified as Secret and given the code name of “The Whip”. Virtually none of the troops had seen, or even heard of this mystery weapon prior to loading. Initial training took place on the transports and was handicapped by a shortage of manuals and qualified instructors. In spite of this lack of training, the bazooka was used during the landings at Oran, Algiers and Casablanca. Stories quickly made the rounds of the foxholes, including one about a soldier firing a single rocket at a small coastal fort and forcing the surrender of its garrison. Other stories went the rounds about tanks exploding from a single hit or a turret being knocked completely off of a tank. Another, often repeated story was the surrender of ten German tanks after the commander witnessed a tree shattered by a bazooka rocket, which caused him to assume his command was under attack by 155mm artillery. How many of these stories are true will never be known with any degree of certainty, but the stories are impressive and raised the troop’s confidence in the new weapon.

Needless to say, serious problems began to appear soon after the M-1 saw combat. Malfunctions were common, particularly with the rocket. It spite of the stories circulating among the troops, the commanding general of the Army’s Armored Command in Tunisia noted that “…could not find anyone who could say definitely that a tank had been stopped by bazooka fire.”

In September of 1942, 600 bazookas were shipped to the British in Suez for use by the Eighth Army. After a demonstration, the British concluded that “…the weapon was not suitable for desert warfare, since the desert provided none of the concealment that the bazooka operator needed to hide him from small-arms fire until the tank came close enough for his rockets to be effective.” The bazookas were never issued and were place in storage.

The bazooka was demonstrated to Soviet observers in May of 1942. They immediately requested a large shipment. Little is known of the Soviet’s use of their bazookas, but it is known that the Germans captured several. They copied the design and increased the size of the rocket to 88mm, and the resulting weapon was known to the German troops as the “Panzerschreck.”

So severe was the malfunction problem, that the War Department suspended its issue in May of 1943 until an evaluation could be conducted and improvements made. The evaluation centered on the unreliability of the M-6 rocket. The contact wire taped to the outside of the rocket body was easy to damage. High temperatures affected the reliability of the motor, resulting in a premature explosion. The bazooka itself was criticized for the exposed contact box and the lack of any sort of shield to protect the gunner from unburned exhaust. A redesign of the rocket motor and a change in the composition of the propellant fuel fixed the rocket issue and protective gloves and face mask were issued for the gunner. Such problems were understandable in a weapon that was rushed into production without the normal testing process.

While the Ordnance Department tinkered with the design, the Army high command was demanding a return of production of the bazooka, taking the viewpoint that infantry with a bazooka was much better than infantry without a bazooka.

The improved bazooka was adopted in July 1943 as the M-1A1. The changes include replacing the contact box with two spring contacts. Eliminating the front hand grip. The center of the tube was reinforced with wire for some 20-inches in order to increase its strength. Finally a removable truncated conical wire flash screen was added to the front of the tube to protect the face of the gunner. The M-6 rocket was replaced by the M-6A1 rocket which replaced the outside contact wire with an internal contact wire. These changes eliminated the major problems of the bazooka and the weapon began to be issued in large numbers.

Although the improved M-1A1 solved many of the earlier problems, there were still issues that need to be corrected. The electrical firing system still had problems, especially in the Pacific Theater. Corrosion of the firing mechanism due to the constant dampness was an ongoing problem. A percussion firing system using a .410 gauge shotgun shell was tested, but eventually, electro-plating of key parts was implanted.

Perhaps the greatest drawback of the M-1 and M-1A1 bazookas was their 54-inch tube was cumbersome to carry through heavy undergrowth and was unsuitable for airborne operations. At the urging of the Airborne Command, the M-9 bazooka, a launcher that could broken down into two separate components was adopted for service in October of 1943. In addition, the battery firing system was replaced by a trigger-operated magneto, the wooden shoulder stock was replaced by a metal, two-position, shoulder rest and a safety switch was added. Troop trials showed that the coupling mechanism was not as sturdy as necessary and was further modified and entered service as the M-9A1. The rockets were further modified with reshaped ogives to lower the angle of effective impact and cylindrical fixed fins to increase stability in flight. The cones in the warhead were changed from copper to steel, which improved armor penetration by 30%. In addition, better waterproofing of the fuse assembly increased reliability under inclement conditions. This was adopted as the M-6A3.

The M-9/M-9A1 was much easier to carry as it could be disassembled into two sections, which could then be clipped together for carrying. The M-9/M-9A1 weighed 15.87lbs was 5 feet, 1 inch in length when assembled and 2 feet, 7.5 inches long when disassembled.

For much of its service life, the bazooka used crude metal sights, these did not allow for precise sighting and were prone to damage. An optical ring sight was designed for the M-9, but its construction required the use of optical calcite, which was in short supply. A marginally improved metal sight bar with a rear peep sight was designed and in service by January of 1944. In August of 1944, a much improved optical reflecting rear sight that did not use any scare materials was developed and entered service as the T-90 by September of 1944.

General Electric remained the primary producer of the bazooka for much of the war until June of 1944, when the small firm of Cheney Bigelow Wire Works of Springfield, Massachusetts was awarded a contract for M-9A1 launchers. By May of 1945, GE had produced some 450,000 bazookas (all variants) and Cheney Bigelow about 40,000 M-9A1s. Philco Corporation Metal Products Division had also manufactured a number of bazookas in WWII, but the exact number has never been confirmed.

The last major variant of the bazooka consisted of a tube constructed of aluminum that reduced the weight down to 10.88 pounds. This was later standardized as the M-18 and was slated to replace the M-9A1. GE was working on the initial order of 500 M-18s when the war with Japan ended.

The 2.36-inch bazooka M-1/M-1A1/M-9/M-9A1 saw widespread use throughout the war. While generally effective, it was not always equal to the tasks at hand. As an antitank weapon, it met with mixed success. It was relatively effective against the earlier German tanks and was normally devastating against the lighter Japanese tanks. As the Germans fielded tanks with heavier armor, the bazooka often proved inadequate. With the thicker armor protecting the front, sides and turret, the GIs had to attempt their engagement with shots at the rear of the tank, down through the thinner deck armor, or use the rocket to knock off a tread or otherwise disable a tank without destroying it. The bazooka was also used to engage enemy bunkers and other emplacements.

In spite of its problems, the bazooka was a very important infantry weapon for the U.S. military. It was arguably the best weapon of its type fielded in quantity by any nation with the exception of some of the German designs. Perhaps the greatest compliment to the bazooka was that paid by the Germans, who copied the design.

By October of 1944, it was recognized that the 2.36-inch rocket could not penetrate heavy armor, the development of a larger 3.5-inch rocket was stated and was standardized after the end of the war as the M-20. This version saw use in the Korean and Vietnam Wars and can still be found in service in many third world countries.

Perhaps the best description of the bazooka and its impact could be found in “There’s a War to be Won”:
“It (the bazooka) had its flaws and limitations, to be sure, but it was a remarkable weapon for all that. Skinner and Uhl had done what hardly seemed possible---they had put a man on an equal footing with a tank.”