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Concept
Bazooka
Summary
Bazooka (bəˈzuːkə) is the common name for a man-portable recoilless anti-tank rocket launcher weapon, widely deployed by the United States Army, especially during World War II. Also referred to as the "stovepipe", the innovative bazooka was among the first generation of rocket-propelled anti-tank weapons used in infantry combat. Featuring a solid-propellant rocket for propulsion, it allowed for high-explosive anti-tank (HEAT) shaped charge warheads to be delivered against armored vehicles, machine gun nests, and fortified bunkers at ranges beyond that of a standard thrown grenade or mine. The universally applied nickname arose from the M1 variant's vague resemblance to the musical instrument called a bazooka invented and popularized by 1930s American comedian Bob Burns.
During World War II, the German armed forces captured several bazookas in early North African and Eastern Front encounters and soon reverse engineered their own version, increasing the warhead diameter to 8.8 cm (among other minor changes) and widely issuing it as the Raketenpanzerbüchse "Panzerschreck" ("rocket anti-armor rifle 'tank terror). Near the end of the war, the Japanese developed a similar weapon, the Type 4 70 mm AT rocket launcher, which featured a rocket propelled grenade of a different design.
The term "bazooka" still sees informal use as a generic term referring to any ground-to-ground shoulder-fired missile weapon (mainly rocket propelled grenade launchers or recoilless rifles), and as an expression that heavy measures are being taken.
The name "bazooka" comes from an extension of the word "bazoo", which is slang for "mouth" or "boastful talk", and which ultimately probably stems from the Dutch bazuin (buisine, a medieval trumpet). The word "bazooka" appears in the 1909 novel The Swoop, or how Clarence Saved England by P. G. Wodehouse, describing the character Grand Duke Vodkakoff, and a musical instrument used in music halls:
I shouldn't 'arf wonder, from the look of him, if he wasn't the 'aughty kind of a feller who'd cleave you to the bazooka for tuppence with his bloomin' falchion.
Official source
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