Harry Diamond was credited with developing the proximity fuze for artillery shells. (.pdf)
About a year before Pearl Harbor, the United States became interested in the development of the proximity fuze. It was calculated (and borne out in combat) that a fuze which would explode a projectile near a plane, or at the best height above a target on the surface, would increase lethality by a factor of five or ten.
Initial work was at the Carnegie Institution’s Department of Terrestrial Magnetism. Two or three months later, the National Bureau of Standards was brought into the program, and Harry Diamond was given responsibility for this phase of the Bureau’s work. Within about four months of the start of the program, Diamond’s group established feasibility of the radio proximity fuze through conclusive tests in bombs dropped at the Naval Proving Ground at Dahlgren, Va. Throughout World WarI I, this group acted as the central laboratory of Division 4 of the National Defense Research Committee, and Diamond was the central figure of the group. Much of the basic proximity fuze technology was developed under his direction.
This invention was extremely important to the ground war in Europe but was used effectively in a number of scenarios.
During 1943 approximately 9,100 rounds of proximity-fuzed and 27,200 rounds of time-fuzed 5-inch anti-aircraft projectiles were fired. Fifty-one percent of the hits on enemy planes were credited to VT-fuzed projectiles. The proximity Fuze equipped shells success in repelling air attacks against fleet units reached its peak when a task group in the Pacific reported the destruction of 91 of 130 attacking Japanese planes. This high level of effectiveness was to save many servicemen’s lives from the onslaught of Kamikaze attackers. Had not these Samurai minded pilots been removed from the air, they would have rammed their planes onto the decks of our navy vessels causing the death of many servicemen. The VT Fuzed shells were also used with great success in the Mediterranean and Atlantic theaters.
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During 1944 the intense warfare in the European theater of operations necessitated the lifting of the ban against the use of the fuze where it might be recovered by an enemy. On 12 June 1944 the first V-1 “buzz bomb” fell on London marking the start of Hitler’s massive effort to level the city by rocket. The all-out valiant effort of the Royal Air Force was not able to devise a good defense against this new weapon.
The Combined Chiefs of Staff reluctantly agreed upon the necessity of using the proximity fuze in the defense of London. Large numbers of anti-aircraft guns were moved to the channel coast where they could fire at the bombs over water. Success in destroying the V-1 rocket bombs by gunfire increased proportionally with the increase in the use of VT-fuzed projectiles. In the last month of the terrifying 80 days, 79 percent of the bombs engaged were destroyed as compared with the 24 percent destroyed during the first week of the attacks. On the last day of large-scale attacks only 4 Of 104 bombs succeeded in reaching their target. Some of the 100 destroyed are credited to the Royal Air Force and to the barrage balloons, but the majority of the V-1’s were victims of proximity-fuzed projectiles. There was little profit to the enemy with such a small percentage of success so Hitler turned the weapon on the port of Antwerp, which at that time was vital to the Allied supply lines. In the autumn of 1944 the devastating damage wrought while the Allies were redeploying anti-aircraft guns threatened to close the port. As the number of guns firing the proximity fuze increased, the damage decreased and the Allies were able to move their guns closer and to assume the offensive against the aerial targets. The defense of Antwerp resulted in the Combined Chiefs of Staff removing all bans against the use of the fuze which was most fortunate for the allied soldiers fighting there.
And it was so recognized. (.pdf)
The War Department later described inventor Harry Diamond’s proximity fuze as “one of the outstanding scientific developments of World War II … second only to the atomic bomb” in military importance
I bring you this bit of history as an introduction to the recent announcement of 2007’s top army inventions.
Every spring, the U.S. Army designates a set of top inventions from the preceding year. Rather than radical, out-of-the-blue creations, the list tends more toward refinements on existing gear, but that doesn’t make them any less significant for the soldiers who use that gear in battlefield conditions.
The top inventions for 2007, honored in a ceremony last month, like last year’s bunch has an emphasis on ways to reduce the threat of, or the damage from, improvised explosive devices. This year’s group also recognizes a novel technique for saving the lives of severely injured soldiers.
One of these inventions is an improvement upon existing fuzing technology, the XM982 Excalibur precision-guided artillery projectile. (relevant pictures here and here.)
The targeting information of the shell is programmed by a setter immediately before firing and further information is transmitted in flight.
The recognition of these advances comes from soldiers in the field.
Nominations were submitted from across the Army laboratory community and evaluated by Soldier teams from the Training and Doctrine Command and Army divisions.
“The Army’s greatest inventions are chosen by our customers – Soldiers who use the equipment in war zones and whose lives depend upon having the best equipment,” said Dr. Joseph A. Lannon, Armament Research, Development and Engineering Center director.
“There is nothing more satisfying and motivating to our workforce than knowing they have made a difference to our Soldiers on the battlefield,” Lannon said.
The Army’s 10 greatest inventions program was initiated in 2002.
Crossposted on Soccer Dad.
Oddly enough, my father was working on that program in 1945, having reached what he called the exalted rank of ensign in the Navy and therefore an officer and gentleman by act of Congress. He and his colleagues thought it was going to be the weapon that would win the war, and there was a reasonably good chance tht we would have the opportunity to continue working on the project in the field, i.e. the invasion of Japan, scheduled for that November.
Fortunately there was another bunch of guys working on a project that they, too, thought was going to be the weapon that would win the war. The other guys, thank goodness, were right.
Alex,
Was your father working on the proximity fuze or the time fuze? They were developed (as I understand) more or less in parallel, with the army developing the proximity fuze and the navy developing the time fuze.