How We Really Won The Battle Of The Bulge

[DGM]

Beginning with "The Twentieth Century With Walter Cronkite" I became quite a history buff of WWII. I've always thought it was Patton's armor and the skies clearing permitting air cover that won that battle.
Never being too old to learn something new, I just learned what really happened: It was the first time we used the new secret weapon: Proximity Fuses in artillery rounds.
I found this to be fascinating:

 

[Rider77]

Our neighbor who has now passed away at the age of 95, was a soldier in the battle of the bulge. He enlisted in the Army as soon as he got out of high school. Initially he served in the mountains of northern Italy. At a point in time soldiers were being pulled from other divisions and served as replacements to units engaged in the battle of the bulge. Such was the fate of our neighbor. During his later days before he passed away he discussed that time in his life. It was my honor to know him and he never before that time mentioned his Bronze Star or Purple Heart.

 

[Michael Z]

Interesting!
I found another video with footage of the fuse at work.

 

[DGM]

Our neighbor who has now passed away at the age of 95, was a soldier in the battle of the bulge. He enlisted in the Army as soon as he got out of high school. Initially he served in the mountains of northern Italy. At a point in time soldiers were being pulled from other divisions and served as replacements to units engaged in the battle of the bulge. Such was the fate of our neighbor. During his later days before he passed away he discussed that time in his life. It was my honor to know him and he never before that time mentioned his Bronze Star or Purple Heart.

It truly was The Greatest Generation. They DID save the world.

 

[Rider77]

Our next door neighbor was a WWII veteran, since passed away, initially with an infantry unit in the mountains of northern Italy. He was then transferred to another infantry unit as a replacement and participated in the now famous Battle of the Bulge. With most folks he wouldn't talk about that experience. Because I am a Vietnam combat veteran, he felt at ease to talk about some of that, not everyday just when something was on his mind about it. This man was just a little over 5' tall and thin as a rail. He still carried scars from his service along with a purple heart, and bronze star with v device. There wasn't any bragging from him, and he did and still does have my respect.

 

[JustDave]

Wow. That's a new one for me.

 

[Been There]

I remember when we were informed of these fuses during our studies of the different warfare that was used during WWI, WWII, Korean War and Vietnam War. The Navy first used these fuses while fighting against the Japanese during WWII in early 1943. The Japanese were taken totally by surprise of the Navy using these fuses inside of their anti-aircraft shells.

The idea was to explode these fuses near the target for maximum effect. The fuses or VT’s would send out a radio wave and when the wave bounced off a plane, which indicated motion, a circuit inside the shell detonated the VT causing an explosion and the shrapnel was shot out near the target. There was a small battery inside the detonator that was used to activate the detonation device.

The technology for developing the detonation device was at Johns Hopkins Physics Lab.