There is one in every crowd.

I think you are right. He said 3/4 ton truck ie a Dodge. The axle actually looks like a trailer axle.

Lang wrote: Eisenhower said "Damn jeeps are killing more of my soldiers than the enemy".

Certainly hundreds were killed and thousands injured. A lot to do with young blokes driving someone else's vehicle.

Lang

I think a lot of us dont understand or have any comprehension of is that most of the troops in WW2 had never driven a car or truck in their life until joining up

At least that is my understanding

So virtually zero experience at driving and been let loose in a poorly desgined machine it should be no surprise that many had no idea

Some like me still dont :side: :woohoo:


Paul

LOL

Me to Mrs

Stihl Lern n

Never stops

eye'll get there one day

LOL

cya

Ben Carlin found a good use for a GPA.

He drove it from the US to Australia including across all the oceans.

His car still exists in Perth.

The book Ben Carlin wrote :

"Half Safe" is in a display at Guildford Grammar School in Perth (Ben's old school). They brought it over to the military vehicle show at Corowa about 15 years ago and I got to drive it.

His first book only goes as far as Australia. Ben wrote the story of the rest of the trip back across the Pacific to USA but it was never printed. About 20 years ago his daughter convinced Guildford Grammar to publish "The Other Half of Half Safe". It is available by contacting the school and probably a better read as it goes over the first book then finishes the whole story. Just give the girl in the office a call and she will post it. Money goes to school funds.

His long suffering and always sea-sick wife jumped ship and he took on a young American "deck hand" for the Pacific via the Aleutians. Now Ben was, let us say an unusual fellow and didn't suffer fools so he and the Yank did not get on. The American wrote a book on the trip also and confirms Ben's opinion of him as a whiny woos.


Here is Part 1
vimeo.com/260080772

Here is Part two
vimeo.com/260080802

That is a truly amazing story isn't it? Just imagine trying to do that today. Jeez, the bureaucracy alone would kill you, let alone the danger in trying to stay afloat!

And of course our very own Hans Tholstrup and his numerous exploits (sea, land & air) including the time he skippered a Mini Moke across Bass Strait - although technically he floated it across in/on a rubber ducky!

hi All
the exchange rates for Jeeps was 2 for every kublewaggon, (trade between British and US troops, who wanted the Kb's)
the Kublewaggon was a better vehicle, less likely to roll over and gave a lot more protection than the jeep.
regs
Rupert

Rupert

I agree the VW was a great little machine and would have been a prize for anyone to have.

The story about trading jeeps (and other major equipment) by the Americans is very overstated. Equipment was sometimes exchanged informally by local arrangements but was a "semi-official" transaction. Things like two engineer units working together and the Australians had blitz tippers but were lacking a grader and the American unit having an extra grader but short of tippers. The CO's of the units might do a local deal and quite possibly the gear never returned by either side. Nothing would be on paper.

There is some belief that there were jeeps floating around in American units more or less for general use and poorly or even not accounted for. This is not true. Every bit of equipment belonged to someone who had to account for it. It was issued for a particular purpose with the attached maintenance and supply system tailored for its support. Detailed records were kept of every vehicle - how could they possibly be maintained or allocated for use if this was not so?

The only way American troops could get a jeep to trade would be to steal it. If it was one of their own unit vehicles they would have to fraudulently write it off in the paperwork or more commonly grand theft auto, outright steal it from outside the tent of the rightful owner or off the street. Jeeps were very easy to paint new identification numbers on. I have had 3 jeeps with the numbers drilled in the side so common was theft - normally vehicles just "borrowed" for short periods to get home after a night on the town.

Hundreds probably thousands of American soldiers did very unpleasant stretches in the big military prisons, many of them for major item theft, such as vehicles or black market dealing with misdirected or stolen military supplies.

There was no open dealing of major items it was all a risky operation with a jail term or at least serious punishment in the offing. A missing vehicle at a critical time could have very serious consequences on a battle. "For want of a nail a horseshoe was lost ................."

Lang