Japanese Grenades WW2 - And why do they bash them??

An overview of Japanese Grenades used during the Second Sino-Japanese War and WW2.

Movies Featured:

My Way 2011
The Thin Red Line 1998
Letters from Iwo Jima 2006
Hacksaw Ridge 2016
Flowers of War 2011
Oba: The Last Samurai 2011
Windtalkers 2002
In This Corner of the World 2016

#ww2

[Jay-lnco]

According to Murphy's Law, all five second grenade fuses are three seconds.

[TheKsalad]

The grenade suicide scene in Letters is still one of the most heart-wrenching depictions of the Japanese military on film, the different ways each soldier comes to terms with their orders, goes to show it wasn't always gleeful or accepted openly

[User_Un_Friendly]

Most World War 2 grenades suffered from a misconception and wishful thinking. The idea of the bands and longitudinal cuts on the outer metal case of the grenade was intended to aid in fragmentation.

However, post WW2 actual experiments showed that good fragmentation of the grenade body happens when the cuts are made INSIDE THE CASE. This is why modern grenades are actually designed and built with a layer of pre-fragmented shrapnel sandwiched between the explosive filler and outer case. 😮

[EnclaveChad]

speaking of weird grenades, you should cover the italian "red devil" impact grenades. They are weird but advanced in their own way especially for ww2 standards.

[bangochupchup]

My dad was "peppered" by pieces from a Japanese grenade on Iwo Jima. A few pieces broke the skin but he was okay. He was later shot through the right shoulder and the war was over for him.

[tomawen]

Excellent video. I vaguely recall that when the Americans first encountered the Japanese "knee" mortar, they thought the leg brace (in how the mortar was carried) meant that the mortar would be braced on the knee/thigh when they dropped the grenade. Needless to say, American intelligence quickly revised their assessments when a number of American personnel experienced compound leg bone fractures from the impact of the grenade discharger firing (and quickly disproving that the mortar was braced on the leg instead of, as shown in your video, being braced by the ground).

[Yeeyeebrah]

I never really thought about what equipment the Japanese used compared to American or European. Very interesting to know what unusual tactics were developed.

[toughspitfire]

By the end of the war, just like Arisaka the quality control on the grenades declined as well. I read an account from Okinawa where a Japanese soldier who snuck up to an American position was killed when his grenade detonated before he could throw it. When the American soldiers found his body they surmised that the grenade may have instantly detonated when he hit the primer on his helmet.

[stevenbaer]

US Marines actually called the Japanese mortar as Knee Mortar that it rested on the knee and the cord is actually pulled down. Many of them actually suffered tremendously from a broken knee or maybe a broken thigh. It was actually rested on something else not on someone else's body.

[nicholassmith]

My grandfather told me stories of how when they were fighting Japanese in the pacific and how sometimes they hear the sound of the strike then a bang immediately after. Which was followed by the shooting stoping.

[matthewmarek]

Such clean and straightforward presentations with relevant film footage in the background. Really, I don't think history lessons could get much better.

[kahlzun]

That bit at the end, where the woman was struggling to keep her clothes clean of the falling ash, is a very human thing

[jimchoate]

Awesome. I've always wondered about those nades but never took the time to find out.
I've learned alot from this channel.

[jagdpanther]

To this day recently（18／3), one of this Japanese army grenade was found on a slope of rural area in Hong Kong, still lethal. It was disposed by Hong Kong police ordance team.

[ComissarYarrick]

Once the pin is pulled, mr granade is no longer your friend

[karoltakisobie]

Pottery grenade sounds like original grenades made way, way back.

[AgencyIsland]

the pottery grenades are one of my favorite underrepresented last ditch weapons, imagine throwing a grenade but it hits a wall and cracks in half before exploding. Wild stuff

the italians had the SRCM Mod. 35 "red devil" grenade with a pulled pin, and another pin that in theory was supposed to fly out while in flight and arm itself. however in the soft desert settings of ww2, the sand would often prevent the grenade from detonating, or the 2nd pin wouldnt remove itself and they would lay on the ground, often only needing a slight jostle to go off. Aren't grenades fun?

[Birdy]

Your blend of movies/anime to go with the subject matter is always fun to see.

[Scrantonicity]

Very informative and I appreciated the In this corner of the world clip, such and underrated film.

[ChrisS-fhzt]

The other thing about this grenade and why it was shaped like it was that it was an erzat design so that they could use them in Type 10 and 89 knee mortars if they ran out of the specially designed 50mm shells for the mortars.