Midgets VI.

This is coolbert:

Italy in the pre-World War Two [WW2] era also made significant strides with regard to the development of midget submarines.

These were the CB class of midget sub.




We find the same arrangement for weaponry on this sub [CB] as you had with the Soviet Pigmei. Torpedoes, two of them, carried outside [outboard] the vessel in firing tubes. Two shots and that was that. Back to base. Again, used for harbor and coastal defense and special missions.

The Germans, after capturing the SOLE experimental Pigmei sub from the Soviets, had Italian designers examine the vessel. Surprisingly [??]:

"in August 1942, Pigmei was shown to Italian submariners . . . Its dimensions did not differ much from those of the Italian CB-type submarine, but its hull was better proportioned and longer. The submarine's trapezoidal house [conning tower] was rather large but narrow. There were two long recesses at the boat-s hull mid-height which served to accommodate torpedoes."

Perhaps this should not be so surprising. According to Suvorov:

"There may be some people who underestimate Italy as a country of great thinkers, but not the GRU [Soviet/Russian military intelligence]. The GRU knows that the Italians have very good brains, the brains of great inventors . . . The Italians were not especially brilliant in battle, and this obscured the extent of Italian achievement in military technology. In fact those achievements, especially in the spheres of aviation, SUBMARINES and high-speed launches, were really amazing. Before the War [World War Two] GRU Colonel Lev Manevich had shipped from Italy to the Soviet Union tons of technical documentation of tremendous importance."

Tons of documents!

TONS!!

coolbert.