Speaker 1: Yeah, welcome to stuff from the Science Lab from how
Speaker 1: stuff works dot com. Hey, this is Alice Madam Milk
Speaker 1: the science edit how staff works dot com. And this
Speaker 1: is Robert Lamb, Science Rider at how stuff works dot com.
Speaker 1: Today we're wandering into the world of weapons, and we're
Speaker 1: talking about weapons that change the world. Yeah, and uh,
Speaker 1: we're actually we're talking about this earlier. Um. The first
Speaker 1: thing that springs to mind is the Simpsons, right, of course,
Speaker 1: the Simpsons the tree House of Horror episode where King
Speaker 1: and Kodos take over the world. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's
Speaker 1: the one where they got to Morocco and the Simpsons
Speaker 1: going to Morocco and they buy that severed monkey hand. Yes,
Speaker 1: some monkey paw. That sounds much nicer than severed hand.
Speaker 1: And then they'll make a wish, right, and Lisa wishes
Speaker 1: for world peace, and poor Lisa backfires on her as
Speaker 1: as most of Lisa's plans seem to do. They burn
Speaker 1: and all the guns they you know, they other think
Speaker 1: they launched weapons into the sun or something, you know. Uh,
Speaker 1: So everybody's at peace, and that just makes us right
Speaker 1: for the picking for the aliens who might end and
Speaker 1: what enslave humanity with with what weapons, um, A slingshot
Speaker 1: and a club I believe for the weapons of King
Speaker 1: and Kotos. And then eventually the bar keep Mo manages
Speaker 1: to drive them away with I believe a board with
Speaker 1: a rusty nail in it. So these are examples of
Speaker 1: game changing military technologies. Each one just drastically changes the
Speaker 1: face of human or human slash alien conflict on the planet. Yeah,
Speaker 1: in real life outside of the Simpsons, we've had a
Speaker 1: few too, and uh they've shaped the way wars waged
Speaker 1: and and one or or lost, as the case may be.
Speaker 1: And when you look at these technologies, and when Robert
Speaker 1: and I were talking about them before, they you kind
Speaker 1: of see that they start to fall into um three categories. Right.
Speaker 1: So you have the weapons that expand the battlefield, the
Speaker 1: ones that you know make it bigger, you know, make
Speaker 1: the theater of war much larger, spanning continents and seas
Speaker 1: and all that. And you also these same weapons can
Speaker 1: increase the speed of war. And then there are weapons
Speaker 1: or technologies, as the case maybe that increase communication abilities
Speaker 1: between and among troops and soldiers or their ability to
Speaker 1: spa on enemy troops and movements and stuff like that.
Speaker 1: And then of course there's firepower, good old fashioned firepower.
Speaker 1: Now you might be thinking, well, why stuff in the
Speaker 1: science lab talking about military and and uh and warfare. Well,
Speaker 1: that's because basically the story of science is also the
Speaker 1: story of war, because heaven forbid humans invent anything, um
Speaker 1: that we can't turn around and kill the next guy with.
Speaker 1: All right, Gid Robert, all right, thinking that, note, let's
Speaker 1: let's head straight to I mean, what seems to me
Speaker 1: the and what historians and to agree is like one
Speaker 1: of the big game changing military technologies of all up
Speaker 1: all time, talking of course about the horse. The horse
Speaker 1: isn't necessarily something I would think about the technology, but
Speaker 1: a technology indeed for our purposes. Yes, And nobody's nobody's
Speaker 1: sure exactly when when when this this all began, But
Speaker 1: they say that initial domestication of the horse uh was
Speaker 1: probably um looked into just for food, just you know,
Speaker 1: taming the animal so that you could butcher it and
Speaker 1: need it. And at some point they started realizing, hey,
Speaker 1: I need a haul this from point A to point
Speaker 1: b um, so why don't I hook something up to
Speaker 1: the horse. They started using them as draft animals, and
Speaker 1: then at some point they're like, hey, I can uh,
Speaker 1: I can you know, ride this into war? And they
Speaker 1: started developing ways of using the horse in warfare, and
Speaker 1: they think the earliest example of this is five thousand
Speaker 1: years ago. Um. And there's evidence of of horse warfare
Speaker 1: of popping up in Eurasia between four thousand and three
Speaker 1: thousand BC. Are you able to ride a horse by
Speaker 1: the way, no, my uh, my, my wife is uh
Speaker 1: there's an accomplished writer and and love's horses. I have
Speaker 1: not actually gotten on one yet. She keeps threatening to
Speaker 1: make it happen or I think I would probably like
Speaker 1: ride maybe a pony or like a or a cart
Speaker 1: behind once with a camel. Yeah, like you set between
Speaker 1: the humps. It was kind of like the saddle set
Speaker 1: on top of the humps, some sort of zoo place.
Speaker 1: I wrote an elephant. I did write an elephant, excellent,
Speaker 1: but not a horse that I remember. So I have
Speaker 1: elephants been used in ballot? Probably not? Yes, yes, yes, Hannibal,
Speaker 1: oh yes yes, yes, okay, oh yeah, Lord of the Well,
Speaker 1: Lord of the Rings. Didn't actually happen, but still um yeah.
Speaker 1: Elephants in warfare are also pretty big, and in Thailand
Speaker 1: they were used. Elephants have have helped helped humans out
Speaker 1: in their in their warring. But anyway back to the horse.
Speaker 1: Another important factor in what they call the equine revolution
Speaker 1: is availability of food. And this is the trad transition
Speaker 1: from hunter gathering to um to actual agriculture. All right,
Speaker 1: before your hunting, gut hunter gatherers, you're gonna wage war
Speaker 1: for what just you know, oh, you're picking berries and
Speaker 1: from my shrubs. Right, But with the development of agriculture, um,
Speaker 1: suddenly there's the ability to have a true surplus of food,
Speaker 1: so you could actually attack the other guy and you'd
Speaker 1: have something, you know, really tangible to steal. And the
Speaker 1: horse about allows you to to not only get the drop,
Speaker 1: but to run away with the food. All right, um,
Speaker 1: because basically anybody can, in theory surprise another armed force.
Speaker 1: You know, you can creep up there on your feet.
Speaker 1: But then once you've surprised them, you're gonna have to
Speaker 1: make your getaway. And you can only run so fast,
Speaker 1: and the other guy I can run too, But the
Speaker 1: horse allows you to make us us steady escape. And
Speaker 1: from there this just kicks off a horse based arms race,
Speaker 1: all right. They start attaching clumsy wheeled vehicles to the horses,
Speaker 1: and these these evolved into chariots, which which were in
Speaker 1: a way another game changing technology because these were the
Speaker 1: basically the super weapons of the time. Um. Then you
Speaker 1: had other advancements such as stirrups and saddles. The stirrup
Speaker 1: was really important because you could actually set down in
Speaker 1: the saddle, put your feet back into the stirrups and uh,
Speaker 1: and put a lance under your arm and drive it
Speaker 1: directly into the enemies. You have the force of the
Speaker 1: horse behind the weapon. Um. Yeah, so the horse was
Speaker 1: a major contributor to our ability to destroy one another unwittingly.
Speaker 1: You can't blame it on the horses, definitely not. Mr
Speaker 1: d is not to blame. From there, it kind of
Speaker 1: goes along some more lines. Eventually we're able to develop
Speaker 1: steam technology and eventually eventually becombustion engine. All right, And
Speaker 1: this uh basically just picks up where the horse left off.
Speaker 1: And it alters the speed and range of war all right.
Speaker 1: We can travel um farther and we can travel faster
Speaker 1: and uh. And it also changes you know, it also
Speaker 1: changes what kind of supplies you're gonna need. It's no more,
Speaker 1: no longer do you have to worry about feeding the
Speaker 1: horses as well. You just have to keep the tank's
Speaker 1: gased up. Well don't they even use internal combustion engines
Speaker 1: on ballistic missiles. I think they do, so it's powering. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean yeah, combustion engines you know, lead to pretty
Speaker 1: much any kind of motorized weapon you can think of,
Speaker 1: from airplanes in the sky you know, to uh uh
Speaker 1: two submarines under the sea. Um, it's it just totally changes.
Speaker 1: And speaking of which, that's the other major transportation based
Speaker 1: game changing weapon technology, air power. And you know this
Speaker 1: is this is pretty obvious. It just opens an entirely
Speaker 1: different theater of warfare. All right. You suddenly you're able
Speaker 1: to to to fly over the battlefield provide air support
Speaker 1: for your troops. Therefore you need you don't. Therefore you
Speaker 1: don't need as many troops on the ground. Right. No,
Speaker 1: land is impenetrable now now, I mean we don't have
Speaker 1: to have Omaha beaches and stuff like that with troops
Speaker 1: washing up and these great waves on the shore. I
Speaker 1: mean we have air power, so I mean anything is game, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: they all they offered in an alternative to uh two
Speaker 1: typical land and sea invasion. You know, it's just another
Speaker 1: way into enemy territory. And at the time people thought
Speaker 1: that bombarding civilian populations would be the kind of thing
Speaker 1: that would just instantly bring about peace, that the nations
Speaker 1: would just crumble up far faster with that kind of
Speaker 1: threat over their heads. The horse, the combustion engine, and
Speaker 1: in power flight. All three of these have have changed
Speaker 1: how far we can we can travel, how we travel,
Speaker 1: and the speed with which we can get there. Um.
Speaker 1: So these are all basically weapon delivery systems, and they've
Speaker 1: changed the way we wage war. Right, so if you
Speaker 1: have all these delivery systems, you have to have a
Speaker 1: means of controlling them and communicating with them, and you know,
Speaker 1: changing the game plan if if the troops are on
Speaker 1: the move. And so communication is a major theme within
Speaker 1: military technology. So before recent times, commanders could still reach
Speaker 1: their troops, but they just had to rely on stuff
Speaker 1: like you know, a guy running, or a guy on
Speaker 1: a horse, or flags or maybe and some guy standing
Speaker 1: on a hill watching everything, or the pigeon, you know,
Speaker 1: the messenger pigeon. But this is a problematic system, as
Speaker 1: Napoleon could attest you back in the day. Um, there's
Speaker 1: a story of Napoleon forgetting about a few thousand troops
Speaker 1: during the Battle of Jenna. So Napoleon surely would have
Speaker 1: appreciated the advances in communication that I've come about, like
Speaker 1: the advent of radio and it's subsequent introduction into the
Speaker 1: theater of war. So, first we had the wireless telegraph,
Speaker 1: and this led to lots of cracking codes and stuff
Speaker 1: like that, which I kind of love Enigma code so
Speaker 1: forth right, So you're communicating your message over wireless telegraph
Speaker 1: and granted it's getting the message are faster, but it's
Speaker 1: open to enemies and spies and stuff like that. By
Speaker 1: World War Two, though, you have shortwave radios and this
Speaker 1: was a huge thing for the Germans actually, because the Germans,
Speaker 1: as you guys might remember, did these coordinated blitzkrieg movements
Speaker 1: in which pilots and soldiers are all talking by radio
Speaker 1: and so you have one airplane who's providing cover and
Speaker 1: tanks are moving in and it's this kind of lightning war.
Speaker 1: That's the literal translation. Yeah, right. In addition to short
Speaker 1: ray radio, you have radar, and this is the first
Speaker 1: automated way to really see the enemy and be seen yourself.
Speaker 1: So goodbye to that guy in the bluff. Who's looking
Speaker 1: out for approaching troops or ships. Radar let us bounce
Speaker 1: radio waves or microwaves off solid objects and then alert
Speaker 1: us if say, an enemy plane is flying into our
Speaker 1: particular neck of the woods. Then this is actually another
Speaker 1: favorite because I love all spy stuff. You have the
Speaker 1: spy satellite, and this is as far back as the
Speaker 1: Cold War. Essentially countries have been sending up recon satellites
Speaker 1: to see what the other side is up to. Modern
Speaker 1: spy satellites can do more than just take photos. They
Speaker 1: can collect telephone, own radio, and internet signals. The problem
Speaker 1: seems to be is that sometimes these images or information
Speaker 1: that it captures seems to be a little blurry. Have
Speaker 1: you ever looked at some of these photos? Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: and I'm thinking of the rest of Development episode with
Speaker 1: the w m d s. But that's that's different because
Speaker 1: let's turn out not to be w m ds. But yeah,
Speaker 1: they there's you can only get so clear an image,
Speaker 1: and then you sort of have to decide exactly what
Speaker 1: you're looking at. Yeah. Yeah. And then beyond spy satellites,
Speaker 1: we have of course GPS, and this basically turns the
Speaker 1: world into a giant, instantly accessible map. And that's pretty
Speaker 1: handy if you're a soldier with no earthly idea where
Speaker 1: you are suddenly landed in foreign territory. So that kind
Speaker 1: of covers the major advancements and communications. But we saved
Speaker 1: the best for last, which of course is firepower. Well
Speaker 1: the best but also kind of the worst. Yeah. I
Speaker 1: guess the most impressive one, the most explosive one. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and yeah definitely has the most bag. Yeah. So let's
Speaker 1: move on to the big guns. First, we have gunpowder,
Speaker 1: and we have the Chinese basically to thank for this.
Speaker 1: They came up with it while they are trying to
Speaker 1: mix immortality elixers. Really they created the exact opposite of that.
Speaker 1: So the Chinese made early versions of gunpowder weapons um,
Speaker 1: including like bombs and guns, and even a type of
Speaker 1: cannon called get this, the flying cloud, thunder clap eruptor
Speaker 1: wow that I can just imagine the instructions for that,
Speaker 1: somehow being very hard to follow. So gunpowder of course
Speaker 1: changed China, and once it made its way across trade
Speaker 1: roots had also changed Europe and Asia, and it gave
Speaker 1: those people the abilities dominate over the barbarians. And it
Speaker 1: was also eventually said to have crumpled the Byzantine Empire.
Speaker 1: So gunpowder is a pretty game changing technology. But in
Speaker 1: addition to gunpowder, you have to have the ability to
Speaker 1: focus it right, you know, you have to be able
Speaker 1: to hit your enemy if that's what you're aiming to do.
Speaker 1: And so this is where proved gun barrels actually came
Speaker 1: into effect. So you want to take the big ones. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, what are you firing and what are you
Speaker 1: blowing up? You know, we've been talking about gunpowder, which
Speaker 1: is is pretty effective, but we also developed some pretty
Speaker 1: terrifying armaments on top of this. Um. First of all,
Speaker 1: there's biological and chemical weapons to consider. And by chemical,
Speaker 1: I mean technically gunpowder is a chemical weapon, but we're
Speaker 1: referring to everything that's not gunpowder or an explosive um,
Speaker 1: stuff like mustard gas, mustard gas um as far as
Speaker 1: chemical goes. And then for biological things like anthrax or vasualism, toxin,
Speaker 1: and these are pretty terrifying. And that with with all
Speaker 1: these is just in it allows you to kill more people. Uh,
Speaker 1: and not just people. I mean, chemical and biological weapons
Speaker 1: can be used against armies, but they can we live,
Speaker 1: you know, civilian populations where they can be used against plant,
Speaker 1: live crops, animal life. Um. And they've they've proven pretty
Speaker 1: tricky too that you can't you can't make a chemical
Speaker 1: weapon or biological weapon that only kills your enemies. You
Speaker 1: know it's gonna be dangerous to your troops as well. Um.
Speaker 1: And they're very difficult to control. The effects are are
Speaker 1: are unpredictable and uh I really you don't have to
Speaker 1: look at uh any further back in time than World
Speaker 1: War One to see just how like psychologically terrifying they were. Um.
Speaker 1: You know they were used to us a great effect
Speaker 1: into great terror during the First World War and m
Speaker 1: and as a result, you didn't see as as much
Speaker 1: use in the Second World War because all the major
Speaker 1: leaders in the Second World War had been troops in
Speaker 1: the First World War and they've seen the effects firsthand. Um.
Speaker 1: This will probably get cut, but there's a there's a
Speaker 1: great poem by Wilfred Owen dulcay at decloromst World War
Speaker 1: two poem. You've probably heard this right, gas gas quick boys,
Speaker 1: and ecstasy of fumbling fitting the clumsy helmets just in time.
Speaker 1: But someone's it was yelling out and stumbling and floundering
Speaker 1: like a man in fire or lime dim through the
Speaker 1: misty pains and thick green light as under a green sea.
Speaker 1: I saw him drowning, you know. So that's that has
Speaker 1: always kind of give given me the chills before. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so I mean terrifying weaponry, uh and you know, and
Speaker 1: and very effective. An ounce of bostilism toxin can kill
Speaker 1: an estimated sixty million people. So that's something to think about.
Speaker 1: As a result, they've been uh I think twenty two
Speaker 1: UH participating countries UM agreed to ban biological weapons in
Speaker 1: the nineteen two and there are a lot of similar
Speaker 1: bands on the table for UM and in place for
Speaker 1: chemical weapons as well. And then the big one, of
Speaker 1: course is nuclear armaments, the ability to split the atom
Speaker 1: and UM create a nuclear explosion. This particular weapon has
Speaker 1: UH fortunately only been used twice in warfare UM, once
Speaker 1: int Hiroshima where it killed ninety thod people and once
Speaker 1: at Nagasaki where it killed thirty five thousand people. And
Speaker 1: I think the the true terror this uh, this weapon
Speaker 1: is evident in how little it's been used. You don't
Speaker 1: have to look any any any further than the Cold
Speaker 1: War to see just how it can really just chill
Speaker 1: out UM military aggression at least overt military aggression um.
Speaker 1: And we're continuing to live in an age where military
Speaker 1: um a conquest defense is defined by the fear and
Speaker 1: the threat of nuclear weapons. Yeah, and then you have
Speaker 1: smaller robots like stuff they can search for booby traps
Speaker 1: like the pac bot, or you have bigger remote controlled
Speaker 1: trucks or tanks, you know, with computers inside them. And
Speaker 1: then you know, doing stuff like clearing minds, and then
Speaker 1: the drones like you said, doing recon in the air.
Speaker 1: And then eventually the robots take over and turn all
Speaker 1: the weapons on us, right right, And also we have
Speaker 1: clone armies. No, we don't have clone armies. That could
Speaker 1: be the way that that article didn't happen. Well, it
Speaker 1: wasn't for lack of trying. It was pitched right. We'll
Speaker 1: clone armies change the world or what we'll clone will
Speaker 1: clone armies take over? And okay, Roberts. So if you
Speaker 1: think we missed a military technology, send us an email.
Speaker 1: It's science stuff at howstuff works dot com. Or brush
Speaker 1: up on bots of the military kind of the top
Speaker 1: ten game changing military strategies over on the site. And
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