Long - Lost World War II Sub Likely Found

[DainBramaged]

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Lost-Submarine.html

For 60 years, Nancy Kenney wondered what happened to her father. The submarine that William T. Mabin was in disappeared while he and his crewmates were on a mission to attack a Japanese convoy in the last months of World War II. Now, the Navy says a wreck found at the bottom of the Gulf of Thailand appears to be the sub, the USS Lagarto.

''I have never in my life, unequivocally, felt such a high,'' said Kenney, who was 2 years old when her father and the submarine did not return from their mission in May 1945.

''We can just feel a sense of relief and a sense of peace in knowing what happened and where they are,'' said Kenney, of Lake LeeLanau, Mich. Navy divers on Friday completed a six-day survey of the wreckage site. They took photos and video of the 311-foot, 9-inch submarine for further analysis by naval archeologists.

The divers found twin 5-inch gun mounts on the forward and rear parts of the ship -- a feature believed to be unique to the Lagarto.They also saw the word ''Manitowoc'' displayed on the submarine's propeller, providing a connection to the Manitowoc, Wis., shipyard that built the Lagarto in the 1940s.

More at link.

How wonderful finally discovered, peace for some.

[Journeyman]

1. I live a few miles from the the U.S. Navy Submarine Memorial. . .

It's haunting to walk among the plaques and stones, each signifying a submarine that didn't return from its voyage. Unless their destruction is witnessed, on the official records lost submarines are considered to be still on patrol. The Lagarto is. . . or will be until its identity is confirmed.




There were 52 U.S. submarines lost in World War II. Of the 12,000 sailers who served as submariners in the War, one-quarter didn't survive.

[DainBramaged]

2. True heros, not like the Chickenhawks running our country now

[SquireJons]

4. Actually...

After Midway, the US Navy concentrated on commerce raiding, and many of the navy personnel didn't like it one bit. Commerce raiding is the practice of attacking mostly unarmed or lightly armed convoys that were manned by merchant marines. So essentially, they spent two years shooting fish in a barrel. Not exactly my definition of 'true heroes' but it wasn't their choice and the strategy worked.

There is no such thing as a good war, and heroes are not made of killers, even if they are doing what they must. The true heroes were those that saved innocent civilians, on either side. Escluding merchant seamen, US civilian deaths probably numbered in the hundreds during WWII, while Japanese civilians died in the hundreds of thousands and there were too many to count from England, Russia, Germany and France. We have such a distorted view of war in general, largely because of this.

[Mountainman]

6. What you say is one way of looking at it. Being in a war myself I don't

consider them to be killers. True they have killed, but on a man to man scale or a country to country scale it is kill or be killed. These people are placed in a position none of us would want to be in but the times and circumstances have a way of putting us where we don't want to be and making us do what ordinarily would not do. So to my way of thinking, using the everyday usage of the word killer doesn't fit this situation.

I don't know if you have ever had to be in that kind of situation but if not I think you should reserve judgment on those who have.

[SquireJons]

10. Killers does not mean murderers

Sorry if my post seemed to denigrate those who have risked or even given up their lives in the service of their country. There is a universe of difference between murder and killing during war. But the net result is the same. Ever since WWI, civilians have been considered fair game for slaughter. Personally, I think that is just wrong. So, I don't really reserve judgment against soldiers who kill other soldiers in battle, but I don't consider them to be heroes either. They are simply men doing the job given to them by their countries. Hero is a term I would reserve for those people who take risks to help non combatants who need help to survive. They come in all stripes and from all sides. No country has a monopoly on humanity, or lack there of.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

23. Friend of mine served on a sub.

Many attacked convoys, sure, convoys being escorted by sub-hunting destroyers.

Things look a lot different when your country sends you off to war, gives you torpedoes that don't work, and then has you face down an approaching Japanese aircraft carrier, a Japanese battleship (the Yamato no less) and several destroyer escorts steaming straight for you.

[DainBramaged]

12. When we were attacked on December 7, 1941

My father enlisted on December 8 1941. He spent his entire military career in North Africa and then Australia. If he were alive, he would agree with you about "no good war" but he would disagree with you about heroes being killers, and then probably strike you for such an asinine comment. When you save someone in combat who is there to protect the lives of the innocents from being destroyed by evil, those people are heroes. You seem to judge from written history, not from participatory experience.

How dare you besmirch their memories. It is you who has a distorted view, and it sickens me.:grr:

[Martti]

15. On the German side

three quarters didn't make it home.

War is Hell.

[IndianaGreen]

19. On the German side, my school bus driver was a U-boat crewman

and he was happy as heck to be alive and to be living in America (I was in 8th grade then).

[dysfunctional press]

22. so was the head mechanic at Santa's Village in east dundee IL...

when i worked there in the late 70's.
(i wore a beaver costume in the summer, drove the zamboni in the winter)

heinz stock was the mechanic- he had been a mechanics mate working on the diesel engines, and according to him, had to climb out over dead crewmen when his boat was captured.
even as he was getting older- he was in great shape, & with his tanned skin and thick wavy hair, wrench in hand and a smile on his face- he looked a lot like the classic arian worker you'd see in german statues and posters from the nazi era.

[Submariner]

3. USS Lagarto was one of 52 WWII submarines lost

May they rest in peace and not be disturbed by grave robbing salvagers.

[IndianaGreen]

8. Picture of seaman Mabin and engineer Jobe

Check the crew page here:

http://www.dbfnetwork.info/lagarto/?page_id=8

Jobe, J. CEMA



Mabin, W.T. SM1

[rzemanfl]

5. Two tourists drive into Manitowoc for the first time and get into

an argument about how the name of the city is pronounced. Being hungry, they stop for some fast food and to settle the argument they ask the person waiting on them "To please, slowly and clearly, say where they are." She says "Buur guur Kiiinnggg."

[ashling]

11. Cute, but it's Mexia, Tx.

and Dai - ry - queen.
:rofl:

[rzemanfl]

14. I used to live in Manitowoc. What makes Mexia hard to

pronounce? Don't you have a Burger King in Mexia? Even Brillion (between Manitowoc and Appleton) has a Diary Queen.

[ashling]

17. Mexi, Texas

some people say MEX-I-A
some people say MA-HEE-A
Some people are wrong.:)

[rzemanfl]

18. So, does it rhyme with dyslexia or not? n/t

[ashling]

20. not

[rzemanfl]

21. Thanks. I would never go to Texas of my own free will, but if

BushCo puts me in a concentration camp there, I will remember this.

[IndianaGreen]

7. A great story about Manitowoc Subs

It is becoming hard to envision how different we were as a nation in the pre-Bush days.

Manitowoc Subs

Cheese Workers and Cherry Pickers

With news that Manitowoc was now in the submarine business, employees and residents turned to the new task with a will. And although the Manitowoc Shipbuilding Company had a fully experienced and dedicated labor pool, outsiders couldn’t help but remain skeptical that a small Midwestern town could match the efforts at Portsmouth or Mare Island Naval Yards, especially with some unique fabrication methods not seen elsewhere.

The Manitowoc boats would be built in sections in a separate erection shop then moved to the building ways where they would be joined together. A reason for building the boats by sections would allow the workers to manipulate the entire sections with a special cradle so that the welds would always be down. This level of detail eliminated voids or fallout and created a much stronger hull or bulkhead.

The boats built in Manitowoc would be exact duplicates of the USS Growler (SS-215) and a full size mock-up was built so that workers could tour it in order to familiarize themselves with the complicated systems they would be building.

The normal work force at the Manitowoc Shipbuilding Company was around 500 employees, but by the fall of 1940, 1,200 more employees would be added to the program. Eventually the company would employ 7,000 residents of Manitowoc, Two Rivers and other neighboring communities; a number that would far exceed the original population of Manitowoc before the outbreak of the war.

The increased number of workers created the need for more housing in the Manitowoc area and the Federal Housing Authority paid 1.4 million dollars to build pre-fabricated housing which became known as Custerdale, which still stands today and is marked by streets renamed after the submarines built there.

http://www.dbfnetwork.info/lagarto/?page_id=57

[IndianaGreen]

9. Sketch of the wreck

http://www.dbfnetwork.info/lagarto/?page_id=10

[DainBramaged]

13. Thanks for all of the extra data, makes their sacrifice even more profound

[IndianaGreen]

16. Think of the contribution they would have made, had they lived

If there was ever a just war, World War II was most definitely it.

I am glad their families can now rest assured of what happened to these heroes.