The Polish Army Had an Actual Bear That Carried Artillery Shells and Held Military Rank

 In 1943 Polish soldiers stationed in Iran came across a young Syrian brown bear cub that had been found wandering alone after hunters had killed its mother.

They adopted him. They named him Wojtek.

Over the next two years Wojtek became one of the most remarkable animals in the history of any military.

How Wojtek Became a Soldier

The bear grew up with the soldiers of the Polish II Corps. He traveled with them, ate with them, and learned to mimic their behaviors. He enjoyed cigarettes, which soldiers gave him and which he learned to eat rather than smoke. He drank beer. He learned to carry heavy objects after watching the soldiers work.

When the Polish II Corps was assigned to the Allied campaign in Italy a bureaucratic problem arose. Military regulations did not permit animals on troop transport ships. The soldiers solved this in the most logical way they could think of. They officially enlisted Wojtek as a private in the Polish Army, giving him a name, a rank, and a service number.

Private Wojtek shipped to Italy with his unit.

What He Did at Monte Cassino

In May of 1944 the Allied forces launched their assault on the heavily fortified German position at Monte Cassino in central Italy. It was one of the most costly and difficult battles of the entire Italian campaign.

The Polish II Corps fought at Monte Cassino. And Wojtek worked.

Having watched soldiers carry ammunition and supply crates he understood what was expected of him. At Monte Cassino he carried artillery shells and supply crates to where they were needed. He worked alongside the soldiers he had lived with for years.

After Monte Cassino he was promoted to corporal.

What Happened After the War

When the war ended Wojtek went with the Polish soldiers to Scotland where the II Corps was demobilized. He spent the rest of his life at the Edinburgh Zoo where Polish veterans visited him regularly until his death in 1963.

A statue of Wojtek stands in Edinburgh's Princes Street Gardens. There is another in the Imperial War Museum's American Air Museum. There are others in Poland and in Canada where many Polish veterans settled after the war.

He was a real bear. He held a real military rank. He carried real ammunition in a real battle. And he is one of the most genuinely lovable figures in the history of any conflict.

In a war defined by enormous suffering and industrial scale destruction, Wojtek the ammunition-carrying corporal bear is one of the stories that reminds you that history is also made of small, strange, and sometimes wonderful things.

Robert Lee Beers III is a writer and digital preservation advocate based in North Charleston South Carolina.

Australia Declared War on Emus in 1932 and the Emus Won

 In 1932 the Australian government declared war on emus.

This is not a joke. It is documented military history. And the emus won.

What Happened

After World War One the Australian government gave former soldiers land grants in Western Australia to farm. The area was already home to large populations of emus. Large mobs of emus, sometimes numbering in the tens of thousands, were destroying the crops the farmers had worked hard to establish.

The farmers appealed to the government for help. The government's response was to send the military.

In November of 1932 a small military unit arrived in Western Australia armed with two Lewis guns and ten thousand rounds of ammunition. Their commander was Major G.P.W. Meredith of the Royal Australian Artillery. Their mission was to reduce the emu population.

What they found was not what they expected.

The emus scattered whenever soldiers approached. The birds moved in small groups that were hard to target and impossible to herd together for efficient elimination. When soldiers did manage to open fire the emus absorbed bullets with what observers described as supernatural durability and kept running.

Major Meredith noted that the emus seemed to be able to face machine guns with the invulnerability of tanks. He said they could face bullets like Zulus whom even dum-dum bullets could not stop.

After several days of mounting ammunition expenditure and minimal emu casualties the operation was called off.

It was restarted a few weeks later. It went the same way. The military withdrew again.

The ornithologist overseeing the operation recommended the campaign be abandoned. A parliamentary debate in Canberra discussed the failure. A member of parliament suggested the Major involved should be given a military medal but with emus on it.

What the Emus Did Right

Looking at this from a purely tactical standpoint the emus did several things that made them nearly impossible to fight effectively.

They dispersed when threatened instead of bunching together. This is an excellent counter to area weapons like machine guns which require concentrated targets.

They were fast and unpredictable on open ground.

They were physically tough. Emus are large birds built for running across harsh terrain.

None of these were strategic decisions. They were just what emus do. But they were enough to defeat a military operation backed by the Australian government.

The emus were declared the winners by virtually everyone who studied the operation afterward including Australian ornithologists and military historians.

The farmers eventually got relief not from guns but from fencing programs that kept the emus off the crops.

The Great Emu War is funny. It is also a genuinely interesting story about the limits of military solutions to problems that require different approaches. Sometimes the problem is not one that bullets can solve.

Robert Lee Beers III is a writer and digital preservation advocate based in North Charleston South Carolina.