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Essay Ten
Friendly Fire
I never heard the expression "Friendly Fire" during WWII. Artillery fire was
classified as outgoing mail or incoming mail, depending on which side fired it. However,
on rare and unhappy occasions outgoing mail landed in. The possibility of its doing so
was a constant source of concern, to the point of terror.
One of our observers overheard a conversation between two infantry privates
during our final exercise on desert maneuvers, before we even knew where we would be
going to fight. They were talking about, of all things, artillery battalions:
"I hear tell the 344th is a real good outfit. "
"Maybe so, but you can't beat the 915th. They ain't screwed up yet, but when they
do, they'll probably kill the whole regiment. "
Not quite correct, on either point.
An article I once read in the Field Artillery Journal catalogued 3200 different
possible, even common, human errors that could be made in any single fire mission.
Granted that this number was based on permutations and combinations, it is still large
enough to make you wonder that most fire missions do come out all right. I suppose the
odds on being hit by friendly fire are in the same order of magnitude as being in an
accident while driving on the freeways of Los Angeles.
My own first experience with the artillery laws of chance occurred during a
Service Practice (firing live ammunition) near Brownwood, Texas. In Service Practice
firing, the rounds had to land and burst somewhere. The government leased uninhabited
land for this, and the part where it was OK for the shells to land and burst was called the
impact area. An extra officer called a safety officer had to be with each battery (four
howitzers) when it was firing. He had the heavy responsibility to make sure it did not fire
in such a way that anything would land outside this impact area. He put up stakes in front
of each howitzer showing the maximum amount it could traverse (turn) to the right or left
and still stay within bounds. He also made a check of each howitzer to make sure the tube
was not elevated too much or too little so that the rounds would land short of or beyond
the impact area. He was authorized to take all the time necessary to make sure everything
was safe before any howitzer was allowed to fire; however in practice he tried not to slow
things down too much.
A 105 artillery round is composed of two sections: the projectile or shell, which
goes out the tube, flies through the air to the target (hopefully), and bursts; and the
removable cartridge case, a long brass cylinder that holds the powder which explodes and
pushes out the shell, just as gasoline vapor in a car cylinder explodes and pushes the
piston.
The powder comes in seven silk bags strung on a silk string. If the firing
command calls for "Charge 7," the round is fired with all seven bags in the cartridge case.
If it orders Charge 6, one of the cannoneers removes the top bag and holds it up for the
safety officer to see. For Charge 5, two bags are removed, and so on. The higher the
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