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[sambojin]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franz_Helm

It turns out that that the dream of many great thinkers and !!scientists!! in dwarf fortress was completely real. In a war? Strap a rocket to a cat (or the other way around), light the fuse and hope for the best. Franz Helm, you are a genius! How hard to you think this would be to implement in DF, and if impossible, how hard do you think it would be to convince Toady to code it in?

It goes to show that no matter how disturbing your plans are for the kittens, someone probably outdid you in real life.

What are some of the other highly stupid, hilarious or downright bizarre forms of warfare that people know of that have been used throughout history? Post details or links please.

[Matoro]

...

Awesome. Just awesome.

Weird wars involving animals and stupidity reminds me of...

THE GREAT EMU WAR

So, once upon time, in wonderland of Australia, where wildlife is drawn straight from Dwarf Fortress, an incident happened. Emus happened. Emus came and started to terrorize Australian farm plots. The army was called to help, because why the hell not. Then Royal Australian Army showed how much it had been reclined since days of glory in Gallipoli (fortunately they recovered to kick some ass in World War II), since the emus proved to be just too tough nut to crack. Emus had Mother Nature herself in their side, and Australian Army fucked up every single time they clashed with emu battalions. Apparently the emus were either bulletproof or the Australians were just poor shooters. Even though the Australians gained some victories, the emus quickly switched to guerilla warfare. Eventually the Australian goverment striked back with new forces, and the emus were forced to retreat.

Later, Major Meredith, a officer who had the responsibility for the operation, said: "If we had a military division with the bullet-carrying capacity of these birds it would face any army in the world...They can face machine guns with the invulnerability of tanks."

Does anyone want to do some modding to emus?

[sambojin]

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emu_War
(yes, the Emu War really did happen. We get bored over here sometimes)


Strangely enough, we ended up using them in a twisted form of economic warfare. Knowing that they were invulnerable and very territorial, we started selling shares in them to gullible overseas investors, with the provision that they we free to take any meat or eggs they wanted as long as they got them themselves. So far no one has earned a damn cent from their investment, but it's still considered an amusing and interesting challenge by many to see if they can.

Considering the things have managed to live through the snakes, spiders, crocs, bunyips and drop-bears we have over here, I'm pretty sure they're safe from speculative investors for a while to come.

[neblime]

couldn't help but look at the see also section
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bat_bomb

[sambojin]

Not necessarily a war-fighting thing, more of a war-training thing, and you guessed it, from Australia again. We have a ranked donkey (or mule or ass or something) serving in our military. When a donkey outranks you, you know you need more training or that you'd better get better at your job. From memory it became an almost hereditary position, with new donkeys taking on the position after the last one died.

I can't for the life of me find the link for a reference. It's particularly dwarfish though. Many a goblin has been slain by a hoofed animal, whereas the average cheese-maker with a year's training doesn't do squat.

If someone can find a link to it (even if it's a myth) could they chuck it up here? Maybe it went on to become a politician? In theory it might go on to get a knighthood......

This isn't it, but here's a list of animals that would he welcome in any fort (even as dinner. "He served us well. And went down perfectly with a rum.")

www.listverse.com/2013/03/01/10-animals-with-awesome-military-careers/

Again, not it. But there's been some champion donkeys over the years. I'll find you one day, Sir!

www.militaryhistorynow.com/2012/07/31/those-brave-jackasses-meet-some-heroic-wartime-donkeys/

[sambojin]

Oh, and as a disclaimer, this thread isn't about animal warfare or glorifying any form of cruelty to animals. It's about the more idiotic things that humans have done in the name of war. Unfortunately, using animals for these ends ranks right up there on the scale of dumb. Working animals are a fact of life, so are beasts of burden, riding animals, and animals we eat. Such is life.

We can make jokes, be entirely black humored or macabre, but this is bay12. People have done a lot of bad things throughout history. This is meant to portray that, sometimes humorously, not condone it.

Throwing the rotten, diseased corpses and heads of your enemies over the wall at your current foes isn't in the game either, but it's a historical fact that people have tried it as a viable form of tactics. We really shouldn't be allowed to make war. We make it horrifying.

Thank god there's a game about adorable kittens and dwarves to take our mind off it.

[Matoro]

Well, let's take something slightly more positive (and by positive I mean something that causes less animal deaths).

Meet corporal Wojtek, a Syrian brown bear who served in Polish II Corps during World War II. His job was ammunition transportation. He enjoyed smoking cigarettes and drinking beer. He fought in Monte Cassino, which many of you can recall as a bloodiest battle of Italian front. And damn that bear was badass. Unlike many other animals in war, he returned home victorious and lived in Scotland for the rest of his days. There is even a statue of him in Edinburgh.

How the 22nd Artillery Supply Company wasn't immediately transferred to combat duty once Wojtek enlisted is beyond us. You don't need to be freaking Eisenhower to figure that if Wojtek was given some extra stripes, he could have trained an entire corps of Nazi-eating soldier-bears using bear-speak to plow a road from Italy to Berlin that would have ended WWII in the form of Wojtek personally eating Hitler.

[Pitchblende]

And in Norway, we have Sir Nils Olav, Colonel-in-Chief of the Norwegian Royal Guard. 

[palu]

I know this thread is supposed to be real stuff, but I cant help but be reminded of Sir Bearington. (Short version: D&D bear character that pretends to be human with maxed out bluff and disgiuse. Google it. It's very funny.)

[stabbymcstabstab]

How about the Soviet Tank dogs?(sorry no link)

Apparently training dogs strapped with enough high explosives to destroy a tank, to think running under your OWN tanks is the way to get fed is a bad idea.

[Matoro]

This one was technically James Bond's collague, wasn't he?

[Orange Wizard]

How about the Soviet Tank dogs?(sorry no link)

Apparently training dogs strapped with enough high explosives to destroy a tank, to think running under your OWN tanks is the way to get feed is a bad idea.

That's what I thought of when reading this thread. Here's a link.

[The Bastard of France]

Always nice to know that no matter what you do someone has thought of a more ridiculous plan than you