(no subject)

[theweaselking]

The Bat Bomb: the end result of Project X-Ray, developed during WWII to drop on Japan.

The basic idea was that a bomb-like canister filled with bats would be dropped from high altitude over the target area. The bats would be in a sort of hibernation, but as the bomb fell (slowed by a parachute) they would warm up and awaken. At the appropriate altitude, the bomb would open and over one thousand bats, each carrying a tiny time-delay napalm incendiary device, would flutter away and roost in various nooks and crannies, many of them in extremely flammable wooden Japanese buildings. The napalm devices would go off more or less simultaneously, and thousands of little fires would start at the same time. Many of them would grow into large fires, and the ability of the Japanese firefighters to contain them would quickly be overwhelmed.

This is coming from a book by one of the designers that now I want to read. The excerpts, describing conversations between the Bat Bomb scientists as they discuss this foolish rival "atom" bomb nonsense and the fallout from an early test, are worth the click on their own.