Manila Gold: Tales of the USS Trout and the War in the Pacific in World War II

Shaking his head in disgust, Commander Chance Abbott, the skipper of the USS Trout, lamented, “You line up a submariner’s dream shot and the torpedoes blow up halfway to the target.” “In theory, a torpedo with a magnetic detonator only needs to get close to the target,” said Ron Mercer, the Trout’s executive officer. “Yeah, in theory. But they’re either running too deep and passing under the target or blowing up on the way to the target like ours just did,” said Abbott. He shook his head. “They never really tested these things.” At the beginning of the war, defective torpedoes were more the rule than the exception. America’s first line of defense was shooting duds. Beginning with the Japanese sneak attack on Pearl Harbor, relive the tales of the USS Trout; defective torpedoes, the liberation of Philippine treasure, MacArthur’s daring escape from Corregidor, exciting detailed submarine battle sequences, as well as the Battle of the Coral Sea, Jimmy Doolittle’s Tokyo Raid, and the Battle of Midway.