For centuries, humanity has shown a remarkable, if unsettling, ingenuity when it comes to warfare. This drive has led to countless casualties but also to some truly outrageous and ambitious schemes to gain an edge over the ‘enemy’. We’re about to explore some of these wild ideas – think deadly chemicals, innocently-flying balloon bombs, and even putrid fecal juice bombs!
Fortunately, many of these horrifying and sometimes downright strange inventions never made it to the battlefield. Here’s a look at 10 military inventions that, for various reasons, were never actually used.
10 The Military Grade Stink Bomb
Can you believe it? In 1943, the French military actually tried to create what they called a “military-grade stink bomb.” They tasked Private Ernest Crocker, a chemist, with this foul-smelling project. Crocker had previously worked on developing poisonous gases.
The goal was to produce a stink bomb for the French Resistance to spray on German forces, hoping to embarrass them and undermine their morale. After months of testing various putrid scents, Crocker’s team settled on a formula. It was a delightful cocktail of smells including urine, vomit, excrement, rotten eggs, rancid butter, and foot odor, all packed into a spray nicknamed “Who, Me?”
Around 600 units were ready for deployment. But, as fate would have it, the war ended before this pungent weapon could be unleashed on an unsuspecting enemy. What a miss!
9 The Goliath Tracked Mine
Does the name Goliath bring to mind ancient legends? Perhaps. In 1940, the German Wehrmacht stumbled upon a peculiar remote-controlled prototype vehicle near the River Seine. It was the creation of French vehicle designer Adolphe Kegresse. This discovery sparked German imagination, leading them to develop their own remote-controlled vehicle.
German engineers designed it as an anti-tank weapon, christening it the “Goliath Tracked Mine.” This vehicle, just over a foot tall and four feet long, could carry about 132 pounds of high explosives. Officers could steer it remotely, drive it under enemy tanks, and detonate the bombs.
However, the Goliath had its problems. Its remote control relied on a 2,132-foot-long cable, which enemy soldiers quickly learned to cut. It was also painfully slow, moving at only 6 mph, and its thin armor offered little protection. It often got stuck too. Predictably, attempts to use the Goliath in battles like the Warsaw Uprising and on Normandy beaches were largely unsuccessful, leading the frustrated Germans to abandon the project.
8 Fu-Go Balloon Bombs
Towards the end of World War II, in 1944, the Japanese military devised a devious, yet admittedly clever, plan to attack the U.S. with bombs. The idea? To launch paper balloons carrying explosives over the Pacific Ocean, driven by the jet stream, to spread fear and panic across the U.S.
The first “Fu-Go” balloon bomb was launched on November 3, 1944. Between then and 1945, Japan dropped about 1,000 of these across North America. Despite these efforts, only one balloon caused human fatalities. On May 5, 1945, a woman and five children were killed in Oregon when they accidentally detonated a bomb they found while playing.
Due to the uncontrollable nature of these balloon bombs and the unpredictable atmospheric conditions, the Japanese military eventually concluded that this experimental weapon was neither successful nor viable.
7 The Panjandrum
In 1943, the British military needed a weapon to break through the Nazis’ Atlantic Wall defenses. The Directorate of Miscellaneous Weapons Development (DMWD) was tasked with this challenge.
Their solution was the Panjandrum, a massive contraption featuring two large wheels connected by a sturdy drum-like axle packed with explosives. Rockets were fitted to the wheels to propel it forward. The plan was for the Panjandrum to race towards enemy defenses, crash into them, and explode, creating a breach large enough for a tank.
As you might imagine, things went wildly wrong during testing. The 70 slow-burning cordite rockets dislodged, flying off in all directions, sending dogs barking and generals fleeing for safety! The Panjandrum itself charged uncontrollably around the beach. Needless to say, no one dared to try this terrifying experiment in a real battle.
6 Rotor Cars
During World War II, the British army conceived the Hafner Rotabuggy. It was essentially a flying jeep, complete with a rotor and tail fins. A sublime name for a rather unusual machine!
Ultimately, the military never deployed this quirky vehicle in war. The main reason was that widely-used plane-powered gliders proved much more practical for delivering ground vehicles to remote areas. However, the dream of flying cars didn’t die; the concept was later revived with attempts to create Humvees with folding wings and collapsible motors. More recently, engineers have explored drone wings capable of dropping off cargo and wheeled vehicles. The rotor car’s dream, it seems, stubbornly lives on.
5 The Bob Semple Tank
The Bob Semple tank holds the dubious honor of being called perhaps “the worst military tank man ever built.” It was a product of desperation during World War II, as New Zealand grew increasingly worried about a potential full-scale Japanese invasion. Facing the prospect of being cut off from Allied assistance and unable to produce armored military vehicles, the situation looked dire.
In response, Bob Semple, New Zealand’s Works Minister, hatched a “clever plan”: design a locally made tank using the chassis of a conventional six-ton bulldozer. Eighty-one D8 Caterpillar tractors were encased in sheets of corrugated iron. It soon became clear that this machine wouldn’t adequately protect its eight-person crew. As a remedy, six 7.62 mm Bren guns were attached to its front, rear, and sides.
The result? An awkward, mobile pillbox that could only move at a sluggish 14 mph. Unsurprisingly, the Bob Semple Tank was never used in combat and instead earned its infamous reputation.
4 Flying Platforms
Next up is the VZ-1 Pawnee, a one-person flying platform. It featured two rotors housed in a duct that kept it afloat, designed to allow a single officer to fire from the air. The catch? It lacked a tail rotor or fixed wings. To steer left or right, the pilot had to shift their body weight, which was obviously quite awkward.
Although the VZ-1 Pawnee performed relatively well during tests, military decision-makers never actually deployed it in battle. They considered it too small, too slow, and too delicate for real combat situations. And so, the Flying Platforms project came to an end.
3 Rocket-Bullets
MB Associates deserves credit for developing the Gyrojet, or the first Rocket Bullets, back in the 1960s. The Gyrojet was a family of experimental guns that operated in a novel way: instead of firing bullets, they fired tiny rockets, and did so almost silently.
However, this innovative gun—which some credit with a cameo in the James Bond movie You Only Live Twice—encountered numerous problems. Firstly, the rocket bullets only gained speed after leaving the barrel, making them useless for soldiers firing at close range. Additionally, the gun wasn’t very accurate and jammed frequently. Due to these shortcomings, the Rocket Bullets project was abandoned as it couldn’t make a meaningful impact on the battlefield.
2 The Stealth Helicopter
The RAH-66 Comanche was envisioned by U.S. military engineers as the quintessential 21st-century armed scout helicopter. Unfortunately, this disastrous program ended up consuming a staggering $6.9 billion from the U.S. Defense budget, with very little to show for such a massive expenditure.
What led to the downfall of the ambitious Comanche stealth helicopter program? Many point to three main factors: the emergence of drones, the fall of the Soviet Union, and sloppy engineering associated with the project. Consequently, the defense authorities decisively wiped out the RAH-66 Comanche program. It stealthily disappeared, seemingly never to return.
1 Bat Bombs
The Bat Bombs experiment was another costly failure. Shortly after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Lytle S. Adams, a dentist from Pennsylvania, approached the White House—specifically First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt—with what he believed was a brilliant plan for retaliation: attack with bat bombs!
The concept involved a bomb casing with over 1,000 compartments, each housing a hibernating bat attached to a timed incendiary device. A bomber would drop this “deadly” package over Japan at dawn, releasing the bats mid-flight. The bats would then swiftly disperse into roofs and attics across a 20–40 mile radius. When the timed incendiary devices ignited, a massive conflagration was expected to engulf multiple Japanese cities.
Incredibly, despite the outlandish nature of the proposal, the U.S. National Research Defense Committee took it seriously. Thousands of free-tailed bats were captured from Mexico, and tiny napalm incendiary devices were built for them to carry. After extensive tests, the development of a complex release system, and 30 rapid demonstrations by the Marine Corps—costing a whopping $2 million—the Defense Committee eventually halted the entire program. Millions of dollars were flushed down the drain on a weapon that never saw the light of day.
These tales of military ingenuity gone astray remind us that not every grand idea makes it to the front lines. Some are too impractical, some too costly, and others simply outpaced by changing times or technologies. Yet, they offer a fascinating glimpse into the creative, and sometimes bizarre, lengths nations will go to in the pursuit of military advantage.
Which of these unused military inventions do you find most fascinating or outlandish? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
