When the Marines took in 1945, they used more than bullets and resolve to clear the enemy from his warrens of caves and defensive positions – they also used flame tanks, horrific but effective weapons born of ingenuity and grim necessity.
“To the Marines on the ground, the , equipped with the Navy Mark I flamethrower, seemed to be the most valuable weapon employed in the battle of Iwo Jima”, wrote retired Col. Joseph Alexander in “Closing In: Marines in the Seizure of Iwo Jima.”
M4A3 Shermans equipped with the Navy Mark 1 flame-thrower
Leathernecks on Iwo used eight of the tanks, nicknamed “Zippos” to burn Japanese defenders from their underground hideouts and fixed emplacements. The grunts prized the devastating lethality of the flamethrowing tanks, which could broadcast hot death at a top range of about 25 yards for up to 80 seconds at at time – much farther and longer than a portable flamethrower pack.
Marines carrying individual flamethrowers were appealing targets for snipers. And although Hollywood has over-dramatized the danger of a bullet igniting a flamethrower’s fuel pack (usually only incendiary rounds caused an explosion), walking around in a war zone wearing a tank of flammable liquid does carry certain health hazards.
But the U.S. arsenal included no purpose-designed flame tanks; a team of what Alexander calls “field-expedient tinkerers” had to retrofit another retrofit to create Iwo Jima’s Zippos. Their base platforms, an M4 Sherman tank, “probably went through more modification and experimentation than any other American tank until that time”, wrote Andy Lightbody and Joe Poyer in 1989′s “The Illustrated History of Tanks.”
The first variant installed a flamethrower in place of the Sherman’s hull-mounted machine gun, but Alexander called this “a marginal improvement.” It had a short range, small fuel supply and an “awkward aiming process.”
So before the invasion of Iwo Jima, a group of , Army Chemical Warfare Service technicians and Fleet Marine Force tankers again modified the design by placing a Navy Mark 1 flamethrower inside the Sherman’s turret, Alexander writes. Crews could aim a turret-mounted flamethrower just as they would a conventional gun, in keeping with the tank’s original design.
The joint team had only enough time and material to modify eight tanks, but they gave the Marines a decisive advantage.
“The Japanese feared this weapon greatly, time and again, suicide squads of “human bullets” would assail the flame tanks directly, only to be shot down by covering forces or scorched by the main weapon”, Alexander wrote.
Former Lance Cpl. , who served with the flame tank platoon of 1st Tank Battalion during the Korean War, said Marines would cheer any time they saw the – the nickname given to the unit.
“They’d look up with wonder and amazement when they saw the double barrel and ask what’s this all about,” Ravino said about the response Marines had when the flame tanks rolled up to the front lines.
U.S. forces continued to use flame tanks and portable flamethrowers until the Vietnam War. In the post-Vietnam era, public opinion turned overwhelming against flame weapons, and the Defense Department stopped using them in 1978.
Marines used M67 Flame Tanks in Vietnam
Additional information on flame tanks used in the Korean war can be found in the book by Jerry Ravino and Jack Carty.