WEBVTT - The Modern Submarine 0:00:04.240 --> 0:00:07.240 Welcome to Tech Stuff, a production of I Heart Radios 0:00:07.320 --> 0:00:13.840 How Stuff Works. Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. 0:00:13.840 --> 0:00:16.960 I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with 0:00:17.000 --> 0:00:19.200 How Stuff Works in iHeart Radio and I love all 0:00:19.480 --> 0:00:23.279 things tech. And today we're going to continue our journey 0:00:23.640 --> 0:00:26.400 to the button of the Ocean, or at least our 0:00:26.440 --> 0:00:30.240 our journey to understanding submarines and how they work. So 0:00:30.320 --> 0:00:33.360 in our previous episode, I talked about the early attempts 0:00:33.360 --> 0:00:37.120 at building vehicles that can travel beneath the waves, and 0:00:37.159 --> 0:00:41.520 we learned about brave or perhaps fool hardy inventors who 0:00:41.520 --> 0:00:45.920 took great risks and sometimes perished in the process to 0:00:46.000 --> 0:00:49.440 come up with a working submarine. And nearly all the 0:00:49.479 --> 0:00:54.440 applications for the innovation were centered around warfare. There are 0:00:54.480 --> 0:00:56.360 a couple of people who are thinking about it for 0:00:56.760 --> 0:00:59.800 you know, like a pleasure cruise under the waters. But 0:01:00.040 --> 0:01:01.720 for the most part, people are thinking, how can I 0:01:01.880 --> 0:01:04.080 use this to sneak up on people I don't like 0:01:04.680 --> 0:01:07.880 and then blow them up real good? Now. I left 0:01:07.920 --> 0:01:10.679 off in the middle of the nineteenth century with a 0:01:10.680 --> 0:01:13.600 discussion on the submarines that were used during the Civil 0:01:13.600 --> 0:01:16.240 War as well as one that was built around that 0:01:16.319 --> 0:01:19.839 same time over in France. So let's pick up from there. 0:01:20.120 --> 0:01:23.480 And as I mentioned in that episode, I'll not be 0:01:23.560 --> 0:01:27.520 covering every single submarine or every single advance in submarines 0:01:27.920 --> 0:01:31.200 bit by bit, because that would take forever. We'd have 0:01:31.240 --> 0:01:34.559 to do fifty episodes. So we're going to be jumping 0:01:34.560 --> 0:01:38.039 around a little bit in this one. One innovation that 0:01:38.160 --> 0:01:43.759 isn't about submarines specifically would still contribute to their evolution, 0:01:44.120 --> 0:01:48.040 and that was the self propelled torpedo. In eighteen sixty eight, 0:01:48.280 --> 0:01:51.440 a man named Robert Whitehead came up with a design 0:01:51.680 --> 0:01:54.520 for an explosive device that could travel through the water 0:01:54.960 --> 0:01:58.360 using compressed air as the power source. Now keep in 0:01:58.440 --> 0:02:02.680 mind that up until all that point, submarines relied on 0:02:02.800 --> 0:02:06.000 either approaching a ship close enough so that you could 0:02:06.000 --> 0:02:11.120 physically attach an explosive mind to that ship, or having 0:02:11.160 --> 0:02:14.640 a spar mounted to the front of the submarine and 0:02:14.680 --> 0:02:18.280 then ramming a ship and the spar is tipped with 0:02:18.320 --> 0:02:22.040 an explosive, which clearly would put both the ship and 0:02:22.160 --> 0:02:25.680 the submarine at risk. That's how, in fact, the Hunley 0:02:25.880 --> 0:02:31.120 sank after it hit its target, the Hausatanic. But in 0:02:31.160 --> 0:02:34.400 that process, everyone on board the Huntley died. That's not 0:02:34.560 --> 0:02:38.160 ideal either. There was also the attempt to tow an 0:02:38.160 --> 0:02:41.640 explosive behind the submarine in an effort to set it 0:02:41.639 --> 0:02:44.280 on a course that would collide with the target ship. 0:02:44.320 --> 0:02:46.280 But that was also dangerous because if it collided with 0:02:46.320 --> 0:02:50.520 a submarine blow up prematurely. So the development of a 0:02:50.520 --> 0:02:53.320 projectile that could travel through the water would mean it 0:02:53.320 --> 0:02:55.920 would be possible to design a submarine that could be 0:02:55.960 --> 0:02:59.880 an effective military vehicle. You would have a torpedo tube 0:03:00.120 --> 0:03:02.720 that you could load a torpedo into. You would flood 0:03:02.760 --> 0:03:06.519 the tube and then you would activate the torpedo. If 0:03:06.520 --> 0:03:09.000 such a vessel could carry torpedoes like the ones that 0:03:09.040 --> 0:03:12.840 white Head was designing, then they could launch them at 0:03:12.840 --> 0:03:16.280 a target at a distance without putting itself in direct danger. 0:03:17.040 --> 0:03:20.720 Whitehead's torpedo design called for a pair of cylinders containing 0:03:20.720 --> 0:03:26.040 compressed air at ninety atmospheres, and these were within the 0:03:26.040 --> 0:03:28.400 body of the torpedo itself, took up most of the 0:03:28.440 --> 0:03:31.840 space inside the torpedo. In fact, the compressed air would, 0:03:31.840 --> 0:03:36.440 when released, force its way outward, turning mechanical components through 0:03:36.440 --> 0:03:39.559 a system of gears that transferred that motion to propellers 0:03:39.680 --> 0:03:42.440 at the base or the rear of the torpedo. There 0:03:42.480 --> 0:03:44.360 was also a rudder in the back that allowed for 0:03:44.440 --> 0:03:47.920 stability and some aiming capabilities. There's no real way to 0:03:48.000 --> 0:03:52.680 steer a torpedo once it left, not yet anyway. Whitehead's 0:03:52.680 --> 0:03:55.080 prototype could travel at a speed of six and a 0:03:55.120 --> 0:03:57.720 half knots that's about seven and a half miles per 0:03:57.760 --> 0:04:00.440 hour or twelve kilometers per hour, and it had a 0:04:00.560 --> 0:04:03.200 range of around two hundred yards or about a hundred 0:04:03.280 --> 0:04:06.320 eighty three ms. A ship, you know, the the over 0:04:06.360 --> 0:04:09.200 the waves kind of ship, was meant to launch it 0:04:09.240 --> 0:04:12.280 from a tube that was at or below the waterline, 0:04:12.560 --> 0:04:17.039 using either a gunpowder charge or compressed air. Whitehead and 0:04:17.080 --> 0:04:20.159 others would improve on that basic design, adding components like 0:04:20.240 --> 0:04:23.880 gyroscopes to help with steering and stability, but all that 0:04:23.920 --> 0:04:27.120 would happen over the course of the next few decades. Now, 0:04:27.279 --> 0:04:30.400 the military submarines I covered in the last episode were 0:04:30.480 --> 0:04:34.400 at best only partially successful, but there was a lot 0:04:34.440 --> 0:04:36.120 of work that needed to be done to make them 0:04:36.200 --> 0:04:39.560 a more reliable resource. Much of that work would be 0:04:39.560 --> 0:04:43.560 done by an inventor named John Philip Holland, who many 0:04:43.640 --> 0:04:47.479 call the Father of the modern submarine. Holland was born 0:04:47.720 --> 0:04:51.400 not in Holland but in Ireland, which I think he 0:04:51.480 --> 0:04:54.240 did as a joke to confuse me. He went to 0:04:54.320 --> 0:04:58.800 school in Limerick, so I guess this is happening. Get 0:04:58.839 --> 0:05:02.599 ready for some poetry. M M. John Philip was quite 0:05:02.640 --> 0:05:06.279 the boy wonder who flinched, not at high waves or 0:05:06.320 --> 0:05:09.520 at thunder. I don't care a pip. I built a 0:05:09.560 --> 0:05:12.799 new ship. I don't float on the sea. I go under. 0:05:14.160 --> 0:05:18.360 There's your Limerick. He studied engineering and worked on many hypotheses, 0:05:18.640 --> 0:05:21.680 including a paper about the possibilities of mechanical flight, and 0:05:21.720 --> 0:05:24.039 this would be years before the Right Brothers found success 0:05:24.040 --> 0:05:27.520 at Kitty Hawk. He also read about the earlier submarine 0:05:27.560 --> 0:05:31.200 designs in America during the Revolutionary and Civil Wars, and 0:05:31.240 --> 0:05:34.719 Holland was interested in these in large part because Ireland 0:05:34.839 --> 0:05:38.240 was under British control and conditions in Ireland were pretty 0:05:38.279 --> 0:05:40.919 harsh and a lot of blame was being thrown towards 0:05:40.960 --> 0:05:45.120 the British. Not only was there famine and disease in Ireland, 0:05:45.320 --> 0:05:49.000 but also some ruthless business practices were turning Irish families 0:05:49.000 --> 0:05:51.719 out on the streets. There was even a practice called 0:05:51.839 --> 0:05:55.320 leveling in which a landlord would evict a family, then 0:05:55.440 --> 0:05:59.440 strip the thatched roof off of that family's house in 0:05:59.480 --> 0:06:02.520 an effort to prevent them from moving back into their 0:06:02.520 --> 0:06:06.719 former homes. Holland was therefore interested in technologies that might 0:06:06.839 --> 0:06:10.679 help turn the scales against a force that otherwise could 0:06:10.680 --> 0:06:15.480 seem insurmountable. England's navy was the envy of the world, 0:06:15.520 --> 0:06:18.440 so how could Ireland ever stand up to them? Holland 0:06:18.440 --> 0:06:21.239 would immigrate to the United States in eighteen seventy three, 0:06:21.640 --> 0:06:24.920 and not long after he arrived, he fell and broke 0:06:25.080 --> 0:06:27.520 his leg, and he was laid up for a few months. 0:06:27.760 --> 0:06:30.599 So to occupy his mind, he began to seriously consider 0:06:30.680 --> 0:06:34.440 how one might overcome the challenges of building a practical submarine. 0:06:34.760 --> 0:06:37.560 He continued working on his ideas for a new submarine, 0:06:37.800 --> 0:06:40.200 and then he presented those ideas to the United States 0:06:40.279 --> 0:06:44.760 Navy in eighteen seventy five. The Navy initially dismissed the 0:06:44.800 --> 0:06:49.880 designs as quote a fantastic scheme of a civilian landsman 0:06:50.200 --> 0:06:57.920 end quote. The Navy was famously skeptical of submarines. Holland, undeterred, 0:06:58.080 --> 0:07:01.280 made a model nearly three ftlaw It's about thirty three 0:07:01.720 --> 0:07:05.360 or four cimeters in length, and demonstrated it at Coney 0:07:05.440 --> 0:07:09.600 Island in New York. The Fenian Brotherhood, which was an 0:07:09.680 --> 0:07:13.200 organization made up of Irish and Irish American people who 0:07:13.240 --> 0:07:16.600 believed Ireland had a natural right to independence from Britain, 0:07:16.920 --> 0:07:19.679 would end up funding his efforts to build a larger 0:07:19.760 --> 0:07:22.760 working model. This one, about twice the size of the original, 0:07:23.280 --> 0:07:26.480 was called the Fenian Ram in an article in The 0:07:26.480 --> 0:07:30.080 New York Sun. It was not named that by Holland himself. 0:07:30.400 --> 0:07:34.320 The Fenian Ram would reduce its buoyancy by taking on water, 0:07:34.920 --> 0:07:38.360 you know, otherwise known as ballast, but overall it would 0:07:38.360 --> 0:07:41.680 maintain positive bulliancy, so it wouldn't just sink to the bottom. 0:07:41.680 --> 0:07:44.520 It would actually bob up to the surface. But to 0:07:44.600 --> 0:07:48.640 maintain its position under water, the Fenian Ram depended upon 0:07:48.720 --> 0:07:52.160 a set of horizontal planes. They actually called them horizontal 0:07:52.240 --> 0:07:55.240 rudders back then. They're kind of like airplane wings, but 0:07:55.560 --> 0:07:58.400 you could angle them so that when there was forward 0:07:58.480 --> 0:08:01.840 motion from the submarine in the water, the water itself 0:08:01.880 --> 0:08:05.840 would push the submarine downward as it flowed over these 0:08:05.880 --> 0:08:09.440 horizontal planes, so kind of like how an airplane's wings 0:08:10.320 --> 0:08:14.840 create the lift in order to lift an airplane off 0:08:14.880 --> 0:08:18.600 the ground. These were sort of doing lift but in reverse. 0:08:19.000 --> 0:08:21.559 So if the sub we're moving, it could remain under water. 0:08:21.640 --> 0:08:24.040 But if it stopped moving, let's say the engine failed, 0:08:24.400 --> 0:08:27.760 then it would at least in theory, bob up to 0:08:27.880 --> 0:08:31.440 the surface and then whoever was in the submarine could 0:08:31.440 --> 0:08:34.440 get the heck out of it. The Fenian Ram also 0:08:34.600 --> 0:08:39.880 had a pneumatic gun that it could fire steel projectiles from, 0:08:39.920 --> 0:08:43.120 and those steel projectiles would be filled with dynamite, which 0:08:43.120 --> 0:08:46.840 sounds super safe. So this was kind of like a 0:08:46.960 --> 0:08:50.480 very primitive torpedo. And when not in use, then the 0:08:50.640 --> 0:08:54.240 guns who would be sealed with a cap, so you 0:08:54.280 --> 0:08:56.640 would have the cap in place until you're ready to fire, 0:08:56.720 --> 0:08:59.520 and then you would have to move the cap out 0:08:59.520 --> 0:09:02.520 of the way, fire the gun, and then hope for 0:09:02.600 --> 0:09:07.240 the best. I guess some shenanigans among the members of 0:09:07.280 --> 0:09:11.160 the Fenian Society would sour Holland on the whole experience. 0:09:11.200 --> 0:09:14.440 In fact, one faction of this group it sort of 0:09:14.480 --> 0:09:19.240 broke apart, and one faction ended up stealing the Fenian 0:09:20.040 --> 0:09:25.400 Ram and almost immediately sunk it. Holland refused to work 0:09:25.440 --> 0:09:27.880 with them. They ended up storing it in a shed, 0:09:28.040 --> 0:09:30.760 and he famously said something along the lines of I 0:09:30.800 --> 0:09:34.440 hope it rots on their hands. He did continue to 0:09:34.440 --> 0:09:37.560 work on innovations with submarines, and in his mind the 0:09:37.600 --> 0:09:41.720 goal would be not to escalate tensions between Ireland and Britain, 0:09:42.080 --> 0:09:46.160 but rather to pave the way for world peace. He 0:09:46.280 --> 0:09:49.600 was thinking, well, if you know your enemy has a 0:09:49.600 --> 0:09:52.880 weapon that you cannot detect, you cannot see it, and 0:09:52.920 --> 0:09:55.640 that weapon could sneak up on you and destroy your 0:09:55.679 --> 0:09:59.000 most powerful ships, then you're not going to be aggressive 0:09:59.160 --> 0:10:03.280 towards that country, right. You already know if you're aggressive 0:10:03.280 --> 0:10:05.880 toward them, they can attack you without you seeing them, 0:10:06.160 --> 0:10:09.800 and they can lay waste to your forces and your shipping, 0:10:10.360 --> 0:10:12.719 and so it makes sense you'll back off. And then 0:10:12.760 --> 0:10:18.000 if everybody has these, no one would dare attack anybody else. So, 0:10:18.040 --> 0:10:20.520 in other words, it would be a weapon of deterrence. 0:10:20.559 --> 0:10:22.800 And it's sort of the same concept that would underlay 0:10:22.840 --> 0:10:27.960 the whole mutual destruction philosophy during the Cold War. And 0:10:28.000 --> 0:10:32.480 as we know, due to hindsight, this idea rarely works out. 0:10:32.640 --> 0:10:35.040 I mean, you could argue that the conditions in Europe 0:10:35.120 --> 0:10:37.240 leading up to World War One were kind of similar 0:10:37.280 --> 0:10:39.559 If everyone built up these big armies, no one would 0:10:39.559 --> 0:10:44.720 ever be so foolhardy as to use them. But at 0:10:44.760 --> 0:10:47.920 some point or another, someone tends to decide that it's 0:10:47.960 --> 0:10:51.240 worth the risk. We were lucky than no one thought 0:10:51.360 --> 0:10:55.160 that during the Cold War with nuclear proliferation, and we 0:10:55.200 --> 0:10:57.400 can only hope that the same will prove true in 0:10:57.440 --> 0:11:01.439 the future. Anyway, Holland would end working as a draftsman 0:11:01.559 --> 0:11:05.160 for many years until the early eighteen nineties when the U. S. 0:11:05.240 --> 0:11:08.720 Navy called for submissions for the design of a submarine. 0:11:08.960 --> 0:11:11.040 So the U. S. Navy was starting to come around 0:11:11.040 --> 0:11:13.480 to the idea. At this point, Holland decided to make 0:11:13.520 --> 0:11:16.680 an effort to win a contract with the Navy, and 0:11:16.720 --> 0:11:18.880 he sank a lot of his own money into this 0:11:18.920 --> 0:11:22.720 project and then sought investments from some businessmen to complete 0:11:23.040 --> 0:11:27.760 his submission. They formed what would become the Electric Boat Company, 0:11:28.040 --> 0:11:32.240 which would own all of Holland's patents. The Navy would 0:11:32.280 --> 0:11:36.760 insist on certain elements in the design, and Holland objected 0:11:36.840 --> 0:11:40.120 to those elements. Primarily, he objected to the inclusion of 0:11:40.160 --> 0:11:44.680 a steam engine because well, it would be really hot, 0:11:45.400 --> 0:11:47.960 but it was also what all the Navy's ships were 0:11:47.960 --> 0:11:50.600 relying upon for propulsion at the time, that this was 0:11:50.640 --> 0:11:54.640 what was generating the the power needed to propel ships, 0:11:55.120 --> 0:11:57.000 so they wanted their submarines to be working on the 0:11:57.040 --> 0:12:00.320 same principle. Holland pointed out that a boiler set a 0:12:00.320 --> 0:12:03.280 submarine would cause the interior of the submarine to heat 0:12:03.360 --> 0:12:06.880 up to intolerable levels. Even argued that maybe if you 0:12:07.240 --> 0:12:09.360 want to have a steamer, if you want to have 0:12:09.400 --> 0:12:13.400 a boiler on the ship, at least let me use 0:12:13.440 --> 0:12:16.560 some insulation to help shield the operator from the heat. 0:12:16.559 --> 0:12:18.520 But the Navy said, no, we don't do that for 0:12:18.559 --> 0:12:22.040 any of our ships. And the Electric Boat Company would 0:12:22.040 --> 0:12:24.520 comply with the Navy's orders and began to build a 0:12:24.520 --> 0:12:28.120 ship called the Plunger. But Holland's concerns proved to be 0:12:28.200 --> 0:12:32.880 on point. It was and you just couldn't stand to 0:12:32.960 --> 0:12:35.520 be inside this thing with the boiler going. It was 0:12:35.559 --> 0:12:38.880 just way too hot. The Navy would decide not to 0:12:38.960 --> 0:12:42.760 commission the Plunger, so the Plunger was never officially a 0:12:42.840 --> 0:12:47.000 Navy ship. Holland convinced his business partners to let him 0:12:47.080 --> 0:12:50.640 design an alternative to the Plunger. It was a submarine 0:12:50.679 --> 0:12:54.040 that he would call the Holland six. He had built 0:12:54.400 --> 0:12:58.439 five previous submarines. The Plunger was technically the Holland five. 0:12:58.960 --> 0:13:02.040 He was able to launch a new prototype submarine on 0:13:02.160 --> 0:13:08.400 May seventeen. This submarine was innovative for a couple of reasons. 0:13:08.840 --> 0:13:12.320 One is that it used a gasoline powered engine to 0:13:12.440 --> 0:13:15.880 operate when the submarine was surfaced. When it would go 0:13:15.960 --> 0:13:18.959 below the waves, then it could switch to a system 0:13:19.000 --> 0:13:23.080 of batteries and electric motors. The advances and electricity meant 0:13:23.120 --> 0:13:26.160 that Holland could build a system that didn't require combustion. 0:13:26.559 --> 0:13:29.320 Combustion works great when you have a way to vent 0:13:29.440 --> 0:13:34.120 fumes and you also have access to oxygen, because it 0:13:34.200 --> 0:13:36.640 needs oxygen in order for it to work, but if 0:13:36.640 --> 0:13:40.320 you're in an underwater tube, the combustion is not the 0:13:40.320 --> 0:13:43.880 most ideal method to power your propulsion system. The electric 0:13:43.920 --> 0:13:46.720 motors made it possible to build a submarine that could 0:13:46.720 --> 0:13:51.240 operate without the limitations of manpower or compressed air, though 0:13:51.280 --> 0:13:54.240 you would have to surface and run the submarine on 0:13:54.320 --> 0:13:58.440 its gasoline powered engine in order to recharge the batteries. 0:13:58.840 --> 0:14:02.040 Holland changed the center of buoyancy for this ship, as 0:14:02.040 --> 0:14:05.120 well earlier ships that he had built had put the 0:14:05.200 --> 0:14:07.840 center of buoyancy very very close to the center of 0:14:07.880 --> 0:14:11.240 the ship itself, so right smack dab along the middle 0:14:11.320 --> 0:14:14.559 of the length of the ship. Holland decided to change 0:14:14.640 --> 0:14:17.720 his design so that the center of buoyancy was moved 0:14:17.800 --> 0:14:21.680 further forward in the submarines frame. This would become a 0:14:21.720 --> 0:14:26.280 common feature in submarines after Holland's design. His ship had 0:14:26.400 --> 0:14:29.800 compressed air tanks as well. These were there to supply 0:14:29.960 --> 0:14:33.359 fresh air to the operator while the ship was going underwater. 0:14:34.120 --> 0:14:37.520 Had a telescoping air vent that could access air above 0:14:37.600 --> 0:14:40.440 water when the ship was not far from the surface, 0:14:40.800 --> 0:14:43.200 and of course the operator could open up the hatch 0:14:43.480 --> 0:14:47.320 of the submarine itself to access air once the submarine 0:14:47.360 --> 0:14:51.320 had surfaced. It's highly recommended you do not open the 0:14:51.400 --> 0:14:55.400 hatch when you're underwater. One other innovation that Holland made 0:14:55.440 --> 0:14:58.760 was in the ballast tanks. Earlier submarines had problems with 0:14:58.800 --> 0:15:02.240 stability when water in the ballast tanks would slash around. 0:15:02.280 --> 0:15:06.479 I talked about that with l Planeur, the French submarine 0:15:06.680 --> 0:15:10.000 from the last episode. So Holland's solution was to make 0:15:10.040 --> 0:15:13.800 certain the ballast tanks would be completely full with no 0:15:14.280 --> 0:15:17.160 free air space inside of them. That way, the water 0:15:17.280 --> 0:15:21.880 couldn't slash at all. It was completely occupying the space 0:15:21.960 --> 0:15:25.160 inside the ballast tanks. That allowed for controlled diving and 0:15:25.200 --> 0:15:29.600 ascending using just those horizontal rudders, those horizontal planes I 0:15:29.640 --> 0:15:32.440 mentioned earlier, and using the forward motion of the ship 0:15:32.560 --> 0:15:36.400 to guide the submarine. He also moved the horizontal rudders 0:15:36.400 --> 0:15:39.880 to the end of the ship towards the propellers, and 0:15:39.960 --> 0:15:42.920 that meant that a small change in the orientation of 0:15:42.960 --> 0:15:46.760 the rudder would result in a much greater change for 0:15:46.800 --> 0:15:48.240 the rest of the ship. It's kind of like the 0:15:48.360 --> 0:15:52.280 lever effect. Holland demonstrated the Holland six to the Navy, 0:15:52.320 --> 0:15:55.440 which put it through numerous paces. The Navy was staffed 0:15:55.440 --> 0:15:59.200 with admirals who were still incredibly skeptical about the capabilities 0:15:59.240 --> 0:16:01.560 of an underwater ship. I mean, there was no deck 0:16:01.640 --> 0:16:04.280 for you to strut upon and to be all grand 0:16:04.360 --> 0:16:07.320 and stuff while you commanded your men too, you know, 0:16:07.640 --> 0:16:11.760 needlessly sacrifice themselves over and over again. So how could 0:16:11.760 --> 0:16:17.640 this be a proper use of a sailor's time? But 0:16:17.760 --> 0:16:20.960 the Holland six completed all the tests very well, and 0:16:21.040 --> 0:16:24.840 ultimately the Navy commissioned the ship as the USS Holland, 0:16:25.360 --> 0:16:28.560 and The Holland would become the first real practical submarine 0:16:28.680 --> 0:16:31.920 in the U. S. Navy's fleet, and it established the U. S. 0:16:32.040 --> 0:16:36.640 Navy's submarine force. The Holland was armed as well. Originally 0:16:36.640 --> 0:16:39.600 it had three armaments. One was a torpedo tube from 0:16:39.640 --> 0:16:43.080 which the Holland could fire whitehead torpedoes like the ones 0:16:43.160 --> 0:16:46.680 I mentioned earlier. A secondary port above that one would 0:16:46.680 --> 0:16:49.200 allow for a pneumatic gun to fire what they called 0:16:49.240 --> 0:16:53.360 air torpedoes, pretty much what the Fenian Ram could do. 0:16:54.000 --> 0:16:56.800 There was a third gun, which was another pneumatic dynamite 0:16:56.840 --> 0:17:01.320 gun that would face backward. It's on the stern of 0:17:01.360 --> 0:17:04.200 the submarine and would face behind it. The stern gun 0:17:04.240 --> 0:17:06.960 would end up being scrapped in favor of an improved 0:17:07.000 --> 0:17:10.200 exhaust system, since the gasoline engine would generate some pretty 0:17:10.280 --> 0:17:13.160 nasty fumes in operation and needed to have a clear 0:17:13.200 --> 0:17:16.840 way to exhaust those fumes and get fresh oxygen into 0:17:16.880 --> 0:17:20.399 the combustion chamber. The Holland served as a Navy ship, 0:17:20.760 --> 0:17:23.800 largely being used in experimental missions to help refine the 0:17:23.840 --> 0:17:28.280 design and construction of future submarines, but by the nineteen thirties, 0:17:28.320 --> 0:17:31.480 the Navy had decommissioned the Holland and she was scrapped 0:17:31.600 --> 0:17:36.119 in Boston, and only a plate bearing her name remains, 0:17:37.520 --> 0:17:40.480 a metal plate that is not a dinner plate. As 0:17:40.520 --> 0:17:43.520 for the Electric Boat Company, they would sell submarines to 0:17:43.520 --> 0:17:47.480 the U. S. Navy, to Japan, to Russia, and even 0:17:47.600 --> 0:17:51.560 to the Royal Navy of the United Kingdom, the dreaded 0:17:51.600 --> 0:17:55.880 force that Holland had plotted against many years earlier. As 0:17:55.920 --> 0:17:58.439 for Holland, he would work for the Electric Boat Company, 0:17:58.480 --> 0:18:00.560 but over time he began to dis agree with the 0:18:00.600 --> 0:18:04.600 board of directors, primarily over submarine designs that he considered 0:18:04.640 --> 0:18:09.120 to be unsafe. After several accidents on submarines, many named 0:18:09.160 --> 0:18:13.240 after Holland himself, he decided to resign from the company. 0:18:13.320 --> 0:18:17.359 He retired by seven and he died about seven years later, 0:18:17.440 --> 0:18:20.600 just before World War One, when the submarine would be 0:18:20.640 --> 0:18:24.159 put to great use in war. I'll explain more in 0:18:24.240 --> 0:18:26.960 just a moment, but first let's take a quick break. 0:18:34.480 --> 0:18:36.680 One thing I want to talk about before I get 0:18:36.800 --> 0:18:39.440 right back into the history of submarines is the use 0:18:39.560 --> 0:18:42.320 of periscopes, and a periscope is a device mint to 0:18:42.400 --> 0:18:46.080 conduct light from one area to another for the purposes 0:18:46.119 --> 0:18:48.480 of seeing what the heck is going on in some 0:18:48.600 --> 0:18:52.040 area that would otherwise be inaccessible. So it's done with 0:18:52.160 --> 0:18:55.840 mirrors and prisms, and it captures the light from one 0:18:55.960 --> 0:18:59.360 spot and then conducts that light to another spot. It's 0:18:59.400 --> 0:19:01.679 kind of like looking through the viewfinder of a camera, 0:19:02.200 --> 0:19:06.919 except that the lens is positioned somewhere, you know, maybe 0:19:06.960 --> 0:19:10.960 several feet away from you, like above you, and uh. 0:19:11.119 --> 0:19:14.040 It's an ingenious invention. And there are not a lot 0:19:14.040 --> 0:19:17.480 of details about when periscopes were first added to submarines. 0:19:17.520 --> 0:19:21.200 They had been known for a long time before submarines 0:19:21.400 --> 0:19:25.120 started to use them, but it was fairly early on 0:19:25.440 --> 0:19:29.479 with submarines to to have periscopes. Collapsible periscopes would have 0:19:29.520 --> 0:19:32.680 to wait for a little bit longer, but even they 0:19:32.680 --> 0:19:36.520 would become pretty common for submarines by the nineteen tens. 0:19:36.960 --> 0:19:39.320 With a periscope, a submariner could get a look at 0:19:39.320 --> 0:19:41.879 what was around a submarine without the sub having to 0:19:42.000 --> 0:19:45.040 fully surface and you know, someone would have to open 0:19:45.080 --> 0:19:46.760 up a hatch and stick their head out and go, 0:19:46.840 --> 0:19:51.320 what's going on this side. With Holland's innovations, more companies 0:19:51.400 --> 0:19:55.760 began building submarines, and because of the clear military applications, 0:19:56.200 --> 0:20:00.240 the world powers all got into the game. Over in Germany, 0:20:00.359 --> 0:20:05.040 shipbuilders were making onto our sea boats or U boats, 0:20:05.720 --> 0:20:10.360 while Holland was demonstrating his gasoline electric hybrid. Germans were 0:20:10.400 --> 0:20:15.240 working with steam powered subs, but engineers soon graduated to 0:20:15.320 --> 0:20:18.439 other types of engines, and by the early nineteen tens, 0:20:18.920 --> 0:20:23.600 Germany had successfully launched submarines using diesel engines when they 0:20:23.600 --> 0:20:27.119 were on the surface and electric systems when they were underwater. 0:20:27.680 --> 0:20:31.880 One class of these submarines, the Unite teen class, would 0:20:31.960 --> 0:20:36.000 end up playing a pivotal role during World War One. 0:20:36.440 --> 0:20:41.000 Submarines were still a new concept in naval warfare, and 0:20:41.040 --> 0:20:45.280 they proved to be devastatingly effective in disrupting shipping lines. 0:20:45.720 --> 0:20:48.840 A submarine could approach a target ship with almost no 0:20:49.000 --> 0:20:53.080 warning before firing upon it, and it didn't take long 0:20:53.119 --> 0:20:55.119 for the British to look into ways to counteract the 0:20:55.200 --> 0:20:58.840 threat of submarines, leading to the development of explosives that 0:20:58.880 --> 0:21:01.720 could be set off under water. These became known as 0:21:01.880 --> 0:21:06.080 depth charges. They weren't effective as weapons unless they happened 0:21:06.119 --> 0:21:10.120 to explode really close to a submarine, but they were 0:21:10.200 --> 0:21:14.800 effective deterrence, probably because being aboard a submarine that's just 0:21:14.920 --> 0:21:18.360 in decent working order is already pretty darn risky. If 0:21:18.359 --> 0:21:21.000 you start hearing explosions going off, even if they're not 0:21:21.160 --> 0:21:23.720 right next to you, you're probably having a lot of 0:21:23.760 --> 0:21:28.200 second thoughts. In nineteen fifteen, a U nineteen class submarine 0:21:28.240 --> 0:21:31.680 called s m U twenty and yes, I know it's confusing, 0:21:31.720 --> 0:21:34.720 but that's because there were four submarines that were in 0:21:34.760 --> 0:21:37.560 the U nineteen class, the first of which was U 0:21:37.640 --> 0:21:40.359 nineteen and then the other's U twenty twenty one and 0:21:40.359 --> 0:21:44.159 you twenty two. Anyway, it fired on a cruise liner 0:21:44.280 --> 0:21:48.119 called the Lusitania. The ship was struck by a torpedo 0:21:48.560 --> 0:21:51.199 and it sank in less than twenty minutes, with the 0:21:51.280 --> 0:21:55.520 loss of nearly twelve hundred people. The Germans maintained that 0:21:55.600 --> 0:21:59.320 the Lusitania was being used to move munitions in addition 0:21:59.359 --> 0:22:02.880 to acting as a cruise liner, which the UK government 0:22:02.920 --> 0:22:07.639 denied for decades until more recent years when they owned 0:22:07.720 --> 0:22:12.080 up to it because salvage operations would have encountered potentially 0:22:12.200 --> 0:22:15.800 dangerous conditions due to the explosives that were in fact 0:22:15.960 --> 0:22:19.720 on board the Lusitania. The sinking of The Lusitania, which 0:22:19.840 --> 0:22:23.280 had nearly a hundred thirty American citizens on board, would 0:22:23.280 --> 0:22:25.880 also end up setting the stage for America to get 0:22:25.920 --> 0:22:29.959 directly involved in the conflict a couple of years later. Now, 0:22:31.119 --> 0:22:35.800 this involves having to talk about some political concepts that 0:22:35.880 --> 0:22:39.600 are not directly related to submarines. Germany's use of submarines 0:22:39.600 --> 0:22:42.960 prompted the UK to outfit some merchant ships with heavy 0:22:43.000 --> 0:22:46.040 guns that could easily be concealed and then brought to 0:22:46.119 --> 0:22:51.560 bear on a submarine once it's surfaced. These ships were bait. Essentially, 0:22:51.640 --> 0:22:54.800 they were bait meant to lure German U boat commanders 0:22:55.119 --> 0:22:57.720 to maneuver into a position where the U boats could 0:22:57.760 --> 0:23:00.960 be attacked and you could are you that it was 0:23:01.040 --> 0:23:04.800 this practice that set the conditions necessary for a tragedy 0:23:04.840 --> 0:23:07.720 like the sinking of the Lusitania to happen. So let 0:23:07.720 --> 0:23:14.280 me explain. For more than a century, the practice was 0:23:14.560 --> 0:23:18.960 for all military ships to follow what we're called cruiser 0:23:19.240 --> 0:23:23.800 rules or prize rules. These rules stated that a government's 0:23:23.920 --> 0:23:29.880 ships would not fire upon civilian or merchant vessels without warning. 0:23:30.280 --> 0:23:35.080 So you could stop a vessel, You could sail up 0:23:35.119 --> 0:23:38.520 to a merchant ship or a civilian ship, and you 0:23:38.520 --> 0:23:42.080 could demand that they do whatever. They could surrender the 0:23:42.119 --> 0:23:44.879 boat or they could leave the area, and then if 0:23:44.920 --> 0:23:47.840 they did not do that, then you would have the 0:23:47.920 --> 0:23:51.000 authorization to fire upon that ship. But you couldn't just 0:23:51.119 --> 0:23:55.600 fire upon them with no warning. And typically the way 0:23:55.640 --> 0:23:57.720 this would work is that you would stop a ship. 0:23:58.119 --> 0:24:02.520 You would then transport all the crew and passengers off 0:24:02.600 --> 0:24:05.280 of the ship to some safe location, and then you 0:24:05.280 --> 0:24:09.360 could search the vessel for any sort of contraband like munitions. 0:24:10.359 --> 0:24:14.760 The Q fifteen boats those are the heavily armed merchant 0:24:14.880 --> 0:24:18.960 vessels that the British were creating. They could fire upon 0:24:19.200 --> 0:24:23.719