And we continue with our American Stories. Stephen Ambrose was one of America's leading biographers and historians. He passed in two thousand and two, but his epic storytelling accounts can now be heard here on our American Stories, thanks to those who run his estate. Our next story is the story of weapons in World War Two. Here's Steven Ambrose.

And we continue with our American Stories. Stephen Ambrose was one of America's leading biographers and historians. He passed in two thousand and two, but his epic storytelling accounts can now be heard here on our American Stories, thanks to those who run his estate. Our next story is the story of weapons in World War Two. Here's Steven Ambrose.

There were all kind of ways in which people could go about killing each other in the Second World War, or in destroying other weapons, or in destroying buildings and factories or bridges. Some of them were new, some of them were of World War One venig Some of them went back, although somewhat improved in designed to the American Civil War. Some were as old as warfare itself. That as a big generalization on the weaponry of World War Two. For the most part, the war was fought with the same weapons that were used in the First World War, although there were significant improvements in many areas, but very little of the weaponry that we associate with the Second World War in fact originated with that war. Obviously, not rifles or hand grenades or machine guns, but also tanks had come along in the First World War. There even were the bariest beginnings of aircraft carriers in the First World War. There were bombers in the First World War. There were weapons used in the First World Wars. You'll see that we're not used in the Second World War. Having said that, there were some tremendous breakthroughs in the Second World War. Uh, perhaps most dramatic were the coming of the intermediate range ballistic missile and the atomic bomb. And there was some awfully big advances in transportation in the Second World War. Well, the first thing you did in the Second World War when you took up a defensive position was to get the barbed wire stretched out in front of you. Right there. You got the simplest er type of weapon of war, not a weapon, really, but an implement of war that was developed on the Great Plains of North America because they didn't have any trees out there on any other way of making fences. So the barbed wire was developed not as a implement of war, but as a means of pinning up cattle. It proved to be ideal, however, to stop the momentum of a charging enemy, and was used by every side all over the world in the Second World War and put up in front of your position, and then behind that position and in front of it, if you could, you put in those devices of the devil known as land mines. Millions and millions of these awful things were put in place in the Second World War. Hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of them are still in place today, still live in France today. Do you know that they still lose between twenty five and fifty farmers every year plowing fields, partly because they go over mines, others because they go over artillery shells that didn't explode when they penetrated the earth. They're just all kinds of live ordinates all around the world. Vietnam, it's a terrible problem, all the land mines that are left over from that war. The land mines came and all types and sizes from small anti personnel, just gruesome things, the s mind that Rommel loved so much and the Germans used so widely, especially in defending the Atlantic Wall. You stepped on or near water, and it would trigger a device that would pop the mine up into the air to just about growing level, and then it would explode there. It's put a bit of terror into the hearts of men who saw happened to others, and it had a big effect, very often on slowing up the speed of advance. Other mines were big enough to blow up tank tracks and stop a tank. These would not respond to the pressure of a foot going over them. The soldiers stepping on would and set them off, but the heavier pressure of a weight coming from a tank or a truck would. Then you'd put your machine gun in place. After you had your barbed wire up in your minefield laid, you'd put your machine gun in place to cover as broad a field of fire as possible. The machine gun was a development of the very the end of the nineteenth century, and more so the first part of the twentieth century. Was extensively used in the First World War. Was the big killer in the First World War, and so too in the Second World War. It was an improved weapon in the Second World War it reached its peak. The best of all the machine guns in the Second World War was the German MG forty two, which had an astonishing rate of fire and a heavy caliber, a lot of hitting power to it, very high velocity, very accurate, very reliable weapon, but very heavy, heavier than the American machine gun. Much higher rate of fire. Americans complained about the Germans having the better machine gun except when they were having to lug their machine gun on an advance or carry it back with him on a retreat, and the American lighter machine gun was at that point to be preferred. And I make that illustration to point out that in weaponry is with any other manufacturer, product, or act, or with anything, whenever you gain something, you lose something. Germanys had a very reliable weapon that could throw out a hell of a lot of lead, but it was heavy, it was harder to produce. It was a lot more involved in just the weight of the gun too. To keep feeding that gun, you had to have almost continuous belts of ammunition make you had to carry an awful lot more ammunition with you, and you tend to be far more wasteful in firing the weapon than you were with American machine guns. Once that machine gun was put in place with sandbags around it or whatever protection you could get, and the field of fire was cleared out, then you put your infantry into the ground doug holes or a trench. Their primary job was to defend that machine gun, who was the primary weapon for defending the imubs position. Small arms in the Second World War were not much improved from those of the First World War. The American M one was a much better rifle than the Springfield nineteen oh three, but not all that much better. It was a semi automatic. The Springfield was bold action. The M one was a very reliable weapon. You could take it through a swamp, You could take it across the sand of a beach like Omaha, you could immerse it in salt water. You could punish that weapon in every way imaginable when it would come up firing. Wonderfully reliable weapon. But the German rifles were also very good, so the Russians, just about everybody had good small arms. Artillery in the Second World War was very similar to and in many cases identical with the artillery of the First World War. The most basic artillery piece of the First World War was also the most basic of the second. It was the seventy five milimeter cannon and had a reek that went up into the four or five six kilometers and more in some cases. The most feared artillery piece of the Second World War, the most respected, was the German eighty eight millimeter. It had a dual function. It was both Germany's number one anti aircraft weapon and their number one field artillery piece. The hilosophy of the eighty eight was such that you could lay those baby just flat out and fire straight across the field. And the veloscity was sege that the power of gravity wouldn't begin affecting it until it had gotten a long way out there, a lot further off than the seventy five did.

There were all kind of ways in which people could go about killing each other in the Second World War, or in destroying other weapons, or in destroying buildings and factories or bridges. Some of them were new, some of them were of World War One venig Some of them went back, although somewhat improved in designed to the American Civil War. Some were as old as warfare itself. That as a big generalization on the weaponry of World War Two. For the most part, the war was fought with the same weapons that were used in the First World War, although there were significant improvements in many areas, but very little of the weaponry that we associate with the Second World War in fact originated with that war. Obviously, not rifles or hand grenades or machine guns, but also tanks had come along in the First World War. There even were the bariest beginnings of aircraft carriers in the First World War. There were bombers in the First World War. There were weapons used in the First World Wars. You'll see that we're not used in the Second World War. Having said that, there were some tremendous breakthroughs in the Second World War. Uh, perhaps most dramatic were the coming of the intermediate range ballistic missile and the atomic bomb. And there was some awfully big advances in transportation in the Second World War. Well, the first thing you did in the Second World War when you took up a defensive position was to get the barbed wire stretched out in front of you. Right there. You got the simplest er type of weapon of war, not a weapon, really, but an implement of war that was developed on the Great Plains of North America because they didn't have any trees out there on any other way of making fences. So the barbed wire was developed not as a implement of war, but as a means of pinning up cattle. It proved to be ideal, however, to stop the momentum of a charging enemy, and was used by every side all over the world in the Second World War and put up in front of your position, and then behind that position and in front of it, if you could, you put in those devices of the devil known as land mines. Millions and millions of these awful things were put in place in the Second World War. Hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of them are still in place today, still live in France today. Do you know that they still lose between twenty five and fifty farmers every year plowing fields, partly because they go over mines, others because they go over artillery shells that didn't explode when they penetrated the earth. They're just all kinds of live ordinates all around the world. Vietnam, it's a terrible problem, all the land mines that are left over from that war. The land mines came and all types and sizes from small anti personnel, just gruesome things, the s mind that Rommel loved so much and the Germans used so widely, especially in defending the Atlantic Wall. You stepped on or near water, and it would trigger a device that would pop the mine up into the air to just about growing level, and then it would explode there. It's put a bit of terror into the hearts of men who saw happened to others, and it had a big effect, very often on slowing up the speed of advance. Other mines were big enough to blow up tank tracks and stop a tank. These would not respond to the pressure of a foot going over them. The soldiers stepping on would and set them off, but the heavier pressure of a weight coming from a tank or a truck would. Then you'd put your machine gun in place. After you had your barbed wire up in your minefield laid, you'd put your machine gun in place to cover as broad a field of fire as possible. The machine gun was a development of the very the end of the nineteenth century, and more so the first part of the twentieth century. Was extensively used in the First World War. Was the big killer in the First World War, and so too in the Second World War. It was an improved weapon in the Second World War it reached its peak. The best of all the machine guns in the Second World War was the German MG forty two, which had an astonishing rate of fire and a heavy caliber, a lot of hitting power to it, very high velocity, very accurate, very reliable weapon, but very heavy, heavier than the American machine gun. Much higher rate of fire. Americans complained about the Germans having the better machine gun except when they were having to lug their machine gun on an advance or carry it back with him on a retreat, and the American lighter machine gun was at that point to be preferred. And I make that illustration to point out that in weaponry is with any other manufacturer, product, or act, or with anything, whenever you gain something, you lose something. Germanys had a very reliable weapon that could throw out a hell of a lot of lead, but it was heavy, it was harder to produce. It was a lot more involved in just the weight of the gun too. To keep feeding that gun, you had to have almost continuous belts of ammunition make you had to carry an awful lot more ammunition with you, and you tend to be far more wasteful in firing the weapon than you were with American machine guns. Once that machine gun was put in place with sandbags around it or whatever protection you could get, and the field of fire was cleared out, then you put your infantry into the ground doug holes or a trench. Their primary job was to defend that machine gun, who was the primary weapon for defending the imubs position. Small arms in the Second World War were not much improved from those of the First World War. The American M one was a much better rifle than the Springfield nineteen oh three, but not all that much better. It was a semi automatic. The Springfield was bold action. The M one was a very reliable weapon. You could take it through a swamp, You could take it across the sand of a beach like Omaha, you could immerse it in salt water. You could punish that weapon in every way imaginable when it would come up firing. Wonderfully reliable weapon. But the German rifles were also very good, so the Russians, just about everybody had good small arms. Artillery in the Second World War was very similar to and in many cases identical with the artillery of the First World War. The most basic artillery piece of the First World War was also the most basic of the second. It was the seventy five milimeter cannon and had a reek that went up into the four or five six kilometers and more in some cases. The most feared artillery piece of the Second World War, the most respected, was the German eighty eight millimeter. It had a dual function. It was both Germany's number one anti aircraft weapon and their number one field artillery piece. The hilosophy of the eighty eight was such that you could lay those baby just flat out and fire straight across the field. And the veloscity was sege that the power of gravity wouldn't begin affecting it until it had gotten a long way out there, a lot further off than the seventy five did.

And we have more of these stories from Steven Ambrose, and a terrific job on this storytelling edity by our own Greg Hangler, and a special thanks to the Ambrose estate for allowing us to hear these terrific stories. Put it, there were all kinds of ways people went about killing each other in World War Two. Some were new and some were as old as warfare itself. But the improvements in these weapons staggering, and but the same old deal. You needed the barbed wire. Then there was, of course the machine gun, and then there were the holes you dig in the ground to protect that machine gun. The story of the Weapons of World War Two with Stephen Ambrose here on our American Stories

And we have more of these stories from Steven Ambrose, and a terrific job on this storytelling edity by our own Greg Hangler, and a special thanks to the Ambrose estate for allowing us to hear these terrific stories. Put it, there were all kinds of ways people went about killing each other in World War Two. Some were new and some were as old as warfare itself. But the improvements in these weapons staggering, and but the same old deal. You needed the barbed wire. Then there was, of course the machine gun, and then there were the holes you dig in the ground to protect that machine gun. The story of the Weapons of World War Two with Stephen Ambrose here on our American Stories