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Thread: “Don’t shoot! We’re Republicans!”...

  1. #1
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    “Don’t shoot! We’re Republicans!”...

    Thanks to a series of incompetencies, the war nearly ended early for President FD Roosevelt and everyone else onboard the USS Iowa...
    Captain Wilfred decided to follow up with a torpedo drill, in which the Porter practiced mock attacks on the Iowa—with the torpedoes’ primer charges removed.

    Two mock torpedo launches went smoothly. But upon the third firing command at 2:36 PM, a 24-foot-long Mark 15 torpedo lept from the Porter and surged towards the Iowa.
    Even my own Dad was in harm's way as a drunken gunner fired a 5" into his neighborhood in the Aleutians...But the US Navy could finally declare itself safe as the Porter sank beneath the waves after dispatching a Japanese Val bomber in a kamikaze dive...The ship is seen below in its final moments......Ben

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    The future is forged on the anvil of history...The interpreter of history wields the hammer... - Unknown author...

  2. #2
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    Good story, Ben. I have to wonder why they would use charged torpedoes, even without detonators, for practice. Especially against a ship carrying POTUS. That's an explosion just waiting to happen.
    The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible - Arthur C. Clarke

  3. #3
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    Quote Originally Posted by Mike View Post
    Good story, Ben. I have to wonder why they would use charged torpedoes, even without detonators, for practice. Especially against a ship carrying POTUS. That's an explosion just waiting to happen.
    Bear in mind that very few of those who served in WWII were careerists...Most were draftees and reservists...Still that ship was a floating cluster****......Ben
    The future is forged on the anvil of history...The interpreter of history wields the hammer... - Unknown author...

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