BARBED WIRE "The Devil's Rope" & Bangalore Torpedoes

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Glidden fashioned barbs on an improvised coffee bean grinder, placed them at intervals along a smooth wire, and twisted another wire around the first to hold the barbs in a fixed position.

In the 20th century barbed wire gained importance as an instrument of defence through its use in wartime for entanglements and obstacles.

Gallipoli Peninsula, Turkey. October 1915. 

A comparison between Turkish (upper) and British (lower) barbed wire. The Turkish wire was composed of a single thick strand with a barb every inch. 

AWM G00961. 

Photographer: CEW Bean

Gallipoli Peninsula, Turkey. 1915. 

Two soldiers sit beside a pile of empty tins cutting up barbed wire for jam tin bombs. The bombs were made near the beach, a spot popularly known as the 'bomb factory' near Anzac Cove. All the old jam tins and other used containers were used to make bombs which were then filled with fragments of Turkish shells and enemy barbed wire which had been cut into small lengths.

The packs of five wounded men may be seen near the bodies of two of the four men killed; other dead are on the right behind the tangled wire. 

Barbed wire fence at Dachau Concentration Camp

Because these were covered by enemy machine guns, night and day, the bodies often had to be left "hangin' on the wire", sometimes for months.

In WW1 & WW2 the pickets that held up the barbed wire were a simple "half box" design. 2 sides of equal size in an "L" shape and with indentations along the side to allow wiring to be attached without slipping down. The base on some were straight to be driven into the ground, some were screw shaped to be screwed into the ground (for less noise).

These days, steel pickets are called 'star pickets' for their tri-angular shape. They have pre-stamped holes for easily fixing wire and they are dipped in bitumen-based paint to stop rust. Because of the tri-angular shape they are incredibly difficult to remove, particularly if the ground is moist but not wet. They were/are available in several different lengths. They are used to this day for fence posts in both temporary and long term fencing, both civilian and military.

Tobruk, LIBYA. 1941-09-17. 

Wounded soldiers being carried in through a gap in the barbed wire entanglements near HQ 2/23rd Infantry Battalion AIF. 

In addition to the stretcher patient another is being carried in, pick-a-back style.

Myrtleford, Victoria. 1943-11-05. 

Barbed wire entanglement, 15 feet (4 metres) in depth, around the outer boundaries of the 51st Australian Garrison Company Prisoner of War camp. The building on the right is the detention cells. AWM 059311

• Moveable barbed wire entanglements like this one became more common as war became more fluid.
• This style is also used as a "gate" filler for gaps in the fixed wire entanglements.

Overcoming barbed wire obstacles

There are 5 ways to overcome barbed wire.

• Blow the wire up with shellfire. 
  • This was shown to be largely ineffective as the explosions merely threw the barbed wired coils into the air, only to have them fall back to earth in even more tangled and impenetrable masses; later on in the war, the introduction of armoured barbed wire made it even more difficult to destroy.
• Drag the wire away with grappling hooks. 
  • Dragging the wire away by hand, when it was properly anchored, was/is almost impossible. Clearance could be achieved with large caterpillar vehicles, but their presence was a 'turkey shoot' for even the most inexperienced of artillery gunners.
• Cut gaps through the wire by hand using wire cutters, axes or specially adapted rifles.
  •  Cutting with wire cutters, or especially adapted rifles, was efficient but took a lot of time and made discovery by the enemy, and retaliation, almost certain. This meant that the work could only be done at night.
• Throw some sort of covering or pathway over the top of the wire.  
  • Placing boards or a ladder-like pathway over the wire was hazardous in itself, as the infantrymen had to be standing up to do it. But to cross the wire on the pathway was even more hazardous, as the target a soldier struggling across the pathway made was even higher on the "Yes please" list of German snipers..
• Destroy the wire with direct application of explosive charges. 
  • Removal by contact explosive was the only really viable option for very large entanglements, but that required specially tailored explosive charges. Hence the Bangalore Torpedo.

Bangalore Torpedoes 

A British Army Officer, Captain McClintock (of the Bengal, Bombay and Madras Sappers and Miners) designed the original Bangalore Torpedo in 1912. They were used as a means of exploding booby traps and barricades left over from the Boer and Russo-Japanese Wars. In WW1 they were used to destroy, deep, thick enemy barbed wire entanglements by being slid underneath (or INTO the wire) and then detonated.

They were portable and comprised of three parts.  The smooth, bullet shaped nose was designed to easily penetrate or slide under its target; a number of empty sections gave the torpedo its required length; and finally, additional empty pipes were filled with explosive.  The whole section was approximately 1.8 metres in length but could be extended with more empty sections..

During WW2 they were again used, particularly in Operation Overlord, the D-Day invasion of Occupied France. They were used as anti-personnel mine clearing charges. Each section is essentially a long metal pipe crammed with over 9 POUNDS of high-yield TNT. Manned and deployed by one or two soldiers or engineers, the explosive is placed below bunkers, near tank traps, and in/under troop obstacles (such as barbed wire entanglements) and then detonated with either a remote-controlled electric detonator, or in times of great combat urgency, a non-electric blasting cap with delayed-action fuse.

The Bangalore torpedoes we used in Vietnam were metal tubes four-feet long and several inches thick, filled with high explosive.  We used them alone, or tied together in a line with C-4 cord to collapse tunnels.  They could also blow openings in hedgerows where there might be booby traps.

How the PBI do it.

It requires courage, teamwork and training to do so.

The example shown here is for a concertina barbed wire obstacle supported by star pickets about 6 to 7 feet high ( 1.8 to 2 metres) and about 3 to 7 feet deep (1 to 2 metres deep) .

• The basic idea is this.
  • 1 or 2 soldiers run to the wire (with wire cutting pliers if available). 
    • If they are made casualties they are replaced, immediately.
  • They cut the top strands of the wire as close to the star pickets (or wooden supports) as possible.
    • If they have wire cutting pliers. If not, bad luck.
  • They then hold their rifle diagonally across the front of their body and throw themselves onto the wire, face down.
    • I have done this (not under fire) and it is not fun. The 'old soldiers' will tell you that (in a real war) by then you don't care...you are dead anyway.
    • In a deep entanglement another group of cutters might have to follow the first set and repeat the exercise.
  • Their entire platoon (about 30 men) run over their backs to the other side of the wire.
    • Not a lot of fun for the prone soldiers. If under enemy fire it's not a lot of fun for anyone.
  • The last 2 (or 4) soldiers through the gap lift the wire holders bodily off the wire and drag them across.
    • Boy, does that smart or what?

Overcoming a single barbed wire fence (above) is simple. High concertina wire (below) is harder)

Palestine. 1941-10.

While the first members (cutters) who are wearing heavy gloves, flatten themselves on the cut barbed wire the rest of the Section or Platoon race over them to advanced positions through the breach. This scene  from a demonstration by AIF troops on the different methods.

• Folding wire cutters, Allied issue, 1917, worn on the belt in a canvas pouch.

On one side it is marked Pat No. 17886... C.H. Pugh Ltd. Birmingham England. No.1 Mark ...., though it is a lightly stamped marking and a little unclear, these are  the No.1 Mark II version. There is also a Broad Arrow acceptance stamp on the mounting bracket.

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