The Giant Killers

[xl_target]

I was on another forum recently and one of the members was building a remote control model of a PT Boat; PT 109. This particular boat, PT 109, has a fascination for many American's. This was the boat that was captained by a young warrior who was called "Jack", by his friends. When his boat was run down and cut in half by the Japanese destroyer Amagiri, he led his men to safety, by gathering them together and swimming to a nearby island. He personally towed a badly burned crew member with the strap of his life jacket held in his teeth.


"Jack" and his crew on the PT109 (extreme right)
Image from HERE

Many years later this young hero, John "Jack" Fitzgerald Kennedy became the 35th President of the US of A. Much has been written about this young man, about his politics and his morals but nothing can change the fact the the man was a genuine hero, led his men with distinction in wartime and upheld the best traditions of the US Navy.


Lt Kennedy on the bridge of his PT boat.
Image from HERE



These fragile plywood boats packed quite a punch and their crews were famous for their daring and courage. Their stories make exciting reading. I knew I had a book somewhere about PT boats. On searching, I found the book; "They Were Expendable". My copy was printed in 1944 (I was surprised). I also found the movie of the same name starring John Wayne. The events chronicled are the escape of General Douglas MacArthur from the Phillipines in the PT boats of Motor Torpedo Boat Squadron 3. I guess I 'm going to be busy for the next couple of days.

Since the camera was handy, I set up a quick photo with a 1911, my father-in-law's service blouse and an old knife. It looks like JFK has something similar on his belt in the first photo.




On further research, I found this fascinating video
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I always though that boats built out of plywood would be flimsy but here is some very interesting video from the Electric Boat Company (ELCO) that expalins how they were built.
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[slingshot]

Fantastic thread xl_Target.

[timmy]

XL, I love that movie "They Were Expendable" for a number of reasons. The movie does dramatize the true story of MacArthur's escape from Corregidor by PT Boat. It also somewhat overdramatizes what the PT Boats accomplished in offensive operations during the defense of the Philippines. The romance in the movie between John Wayne and Donna Reed was always a high point in the movie for me.

There's quite a story on the original design of PT Boats by the British, the copying of that design by the Americans, and the subsequent improvements on the original design by the Americans. Another good story is the use of the Packard V12s in the American PTs: Originally developed and discarded for aircraft use, their obsolescent separate cylinder design made them a good choice for PT Boat use from a maintenance perspective.

The matter of John F Kennedy is more controversial. Originally given a plush job in Naval Intelligence in Washington DC at the beginning of the War. (His father had been ambassador to the UK but was sacked by FDR for his defeatist slant, but old Joe still had more than enough influence to get JFK a cush job.) JFK's incessant womanizing had led him into an affair with a beauty queen, a former Miss Denmark, who was a noted nazi sympathizer. Some claimed that she was also a nazi spy, and the scandal of a naval intelligence officer conducting an affair with a suspected spy was enough to get him sacked. However, Old Joe's influence saved his commission and got him sent out to the South Pacific theater, where less "trouble" was available, and the news media was not able to ask penetrating questions.

On the night of the PT 109's sinking, there appear to be a number of contradictions with the legend that grew up around the incident after JFK's election and assassination. For one thing, the PT 109 didn't seem to respond to the radio messages of the oncoming Japanese destroyer flotilla heading in the direction of the PT Boat picket line the PT 109 was part of, and Kennedy's boat was sliced into by the IJN Amagiri before the collision could be avoided.

None the less, Kennedy's actions subsequent to the collision were the stuff of heroes, and he was decorated for saving his crewmen's lives.

I think that, perhaps, one of the most effective uses of the PT Boats was in the screen of the Surigao Strait phase of the Battle of Leyte Gulf, the last battleship to battleship action in history and also the largest naval battle in history. In that battle, luck played a significant factor, as well!

[essdee1972]

Just watched the movie (on Turner (TCM), I think) last Friday and here you had to come up with this thread!! Thanks, xl_target and timmy for the informative posts! Lazy day ahead, I know just how I will spend it .

[rraju2805]

Awesome

[Bhargav]

Thanks for sharing the info xl_target, I guess the car PT cruiser got its name from the boat ) I believe.

[timmy]

I'd like to add a couple of things:

The medal JFK was awarded for his heroism in saving the lives of his crew members is called the "Navy and Marine Corps Medal." You can see it described here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Navy_and_M ... orps_Medal

This has always interested me because the medal is awarded for non-combat bravery. In this case, JFK wasn't in combat when he saved the crewmen, even though they were wrecked in combat.

The interesting part to me is that my Uncle Joe was also awarded this medal for saving some sailors. He was on a landing craft anchored by a South Pacific island, and landing craft were being loaded. One of these, partially filled, overturned. My uncle dived in and saved several sailors. As I recall, he told me with great anger that some of the sailors couldn't even swim, and he considered this a bad mark on the Navy, to send sailors to sea without the ability to swim. I have also talked to men who were officers in the Navy during WW2, and they responded to my Uncle's statement with derision and anger, but I'd have to say that, given the fact that my Uncle was there and was decorated, he'd be better able to judge the ability of the men he rescued to swim.

As he told the story to my Brother, my Uncle continued to swim and ended up rescued by some islanders in a dugout. I understand they presented a spear to my Uncle to grab, but at first he thought they meant to kill him.

On the movie "They Were Expendable," there is a part where they coerce a submarine captain to give them torpedoes. The PT Boats used a Mark VIII torpedo that was used in WW1 (you can read about its use in WW2 PT Boats here: http://pt-king.gdinc.com/Torpedo.html), but submarines were using a different torpedo at that time, whether the sub was an S-Class or "Gato" class. I'm not sure, but I believe that subs used a Mark X or Mark XIV by this time.

[Skyman]

Fascinating.Slick 1911.

[xl_target]

Fascinating.Slick 1911.

Thanks, Skyman.
However, you will notice that it isn't quite a GI 1911. It is too new for WW2.
You can tell by the sights, the drilled trigger shoe,the extended safety, the extended beaver tail and the lack of a solid hammer.


Here is a photo of the Colt 1911. You can clearly see the differences here.
From this site

[hamiclar01]

Interesting links. MT/ E boats have had a resurgence of interest in the modelling community of late. With several good kits and their detailing sets available.

I've just finished Tim Weiner's "Legacy of Ashes", on the heels of Fredrick Kempe's "Berlin 1961". I must say my impression of the young warrior called "Jack" appears to have lost much sheen . Weiner's book also disputes his war story.

[timmy]

Anand, try Seymour Hersh's The Dark Side of Camelot. You will not only lose the sheen and the bark, but the story will make you sick as well. Hersh is a pretty famous investigative reporter who blew the whistle on My Lai.

[hamiclar01]

Anand, try Seymour Hersh's The Dark Side of Camelot. You will not only lose the sheen and the bark, but the story will make you sick as well. Hersh is a pretty famous investigative reporter who blew the whistle on My Lai.

Thanks for the tip Timmy. Looks like his book is my next TDL. Both Weiner and Kempke referenced Hersch and wrote highly of him.

[timmy]

Here is a picture of the Packard 2500 cubic inch (41 l) V12 used in American PT Boats disassembled.



The picture above makes the single cylinder construction evident. Cylinders cast en bloc were an advance, since the entire casting adds to the longitudinal rigidity of the block. With the single cylinder construction, there are no block walls to stiffen the structure, only the head, in this case, adds to the block's stiffness. Still, the separate cylinder construction may have advantages for repair processes in situations without access to a full rebuilding facility.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/c ... 0_USAF.jpg

The above picture is too big to post. It shows the aero version of the same engine. The engine was originally intended for aircraft use.

http://img338.imageshack.us/img338/9360 ... 164324.jpg

The above picture is the real deal, a marine engine for sale. You can clearly see the separate cylinder construction, along with the marine water cooled exhaust manifolds and marine drive gearbox.

[xl_target]

As I mentioned before, much has been written about JFK.

Regardless of what he might have done before or after his stint in the Pacific, no one can take away from the fact that he went in harm's way for his country. From the comments of those sailors (in the History Channel video) and from the corroboration of the facts by his own crew, he was a hero and a well liked one at that. The US Navy sure though he was worthy of decoration.

History can be slanted many ways later but I'd much rather take the word of a common soldier or sailor than some liberal historian (Kempke was a commentator for Bloomberg News for years.. yes that Bloomberg. No I haven't read his new book yet) sitting safe in his office writing a book. It took guts just to go out there on patrol in a frail little plywood boat and face up against the might of the IJN and the vastly superior armament of their destroyers and cruisers. They did it in the daytime and at night, again and again, facing the unknown and they forced the IJN to stop risking their steel destroyers in "The Slot" and elsewhere. Those men mastered their fear, did their jobs and fought for their country. No one can take that away from them.

Then years later someone like a professor who has never left the school system will tell you how those soldiers, sailors and airmen were dupes and pawns of their government. They will discuss them and their actions with contempt even though their right to make those statements has been secured with the blood of those servicemen. If you read enough history, you'll read those opinions often enough. I've read enough about Kennedy's service in the Pacific, both for and against his heroism and I still come away convinced that many of those "historians' couldn't or wouldn't have done what he did. Belittling a soldier's service (especially in wartime) is utterly contemptible.

I also found this gem, Warner Brothers "Devil Boats". Yes there is a bit of Jingoism (expected in wartime) in there and the story is made up using stock footage but I think it is enjoyable nonetheless.

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[xl_target]

Some of Hersh's stuff is remarkable but as far as "the Dark side of Camelot", there is a lot of doubt about the veracity of Hersh's "facts" in that particular book. Unable at this moment to find some of the criticism on that particular book, here is what Wikipedia says about it. Ya, I know that one must take Wikipedia with a grain of salt, but....

Hersh's 1997 book about John F. Kennedy, The Dark Side of Camelot, made a number of controversial assertions about the former president, including that he had had a "first marriage" to a woman named Durie Malcolm that was never terminated, that he had been a semi-regular narcotics user, that he had a close working relationship with mob boss Sam Giancana which supposedly included vote fraud in one or two crucial states in the 1960 presidential election. For many of these claims, Hersh relied only on hearsay collected decades after the event. In a Los Angeles Times review, Edward Jay Epstein cast doubt on these and other assertions, writing, "this book turns out to be, alas, more about the deficiencies of investigative journalism than about the deficiencies of John F. Kennedy."[29] Responding to the book, historian and former Kennedy aide Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. called Hersh "the most gullible investigative reporter I've ever encountered.

The bolded text is my emphasis.