3DHM-81. U.S. WAR AUTOMATONS 1941/45

Beyond The Battlefield

3D Printed figurines 1/72, 28mm & 1/35.

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Scale 1/72: 2.50€ per figurine // Scale 28mm: 4€ per figurine

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ENGLISH

This is the history of the most extraordinary device ever used in the US Army inventory, the M-1, Personnel, Automaton, eLectronic; pronounced “PAL.” Only now, seventy years after their invention has their role in the Second World War been revealed to the public for the first time and the incredible achievements of their inventor made known.

As early as the First World War the US military was working on pilot-less target drones to help train pilots. They tried various methods of remote control or self controlled vehicles and aircraft. The major user turned out to be the Army Air Corps for training fighter pilots and Coast Defense Corps for training anti-aircraft gunners. None of these devices was very sophisticated and none were ever good enough to be used in combat. Real human soldiers and airmen had to face the rigors and dangers of real warfare.

The United States Automaton Corporation, USA Corp. as it was called, was founded in 1919 as a way to reduce casualties in war. Dr. Ernest W. Handricksen, brain surgeon, and former CPT US Medical Corps, late of France in the Great War, was the founder and chief designer of the PAeL system.

Coming from a musical family, Ernest Handricksen was expected to follow his mother and father into show business. Instead, his musical talent was more mechanical and technical than inspirational. Still, it was good enough that he could work as a piano tuner and pay his way through medical school in the years before the First World War. Dr. Handricksen continued his studies until he became a brain surgeon of some regional renown in the Western United States.

When war with Germany came he enlisted as a doctor and was with some of the first American soldiers sent to France. Working on men injured in training accidents and later combat he was appalled at the human wastage and vowed to do something about it when the war was over.

While on leave in Paris he visited a museum and learned of the work of the French scientist, Jacques de Vaucanson. He had made automatons for the amusement of the royal court centuries earlier. As a brain surgeon in the US Army in France Dr. Handricksen saw the human body was like a machine, so why not make a machine like a human body? If a soldier could be replaced by a machine, the machine would not suffer pain and could be replaced or repaired by technicians in the field.

When the Armistice was signed in 1918, Dr. Handricksen returned to civilian life but wanted nothing to do with medicine for a while, so he could think about his next project. Working as an electrician and later for the telephone company to pay the bills, at night he would stay up late, working on designs for his human machine. By 1926 he realized he would need more money to build his automaton and so he returned to medicine.

Founding a small clinic south of Los Angeles, California, he treated the rich who frequented the beaches and spas in the area. At the rear of his clinic he built a laboratory to begin experimenting with his ideas for a human machine. By 1930 he had the final designs completed and he began construction of prototypes.

In 1937 until 1941, Dr. Handricksen went to France for two to three weeks every summer. He learned more about the works of Jacques de Vaucanson. He also founded a small subsidiary of his company, and called it the Société française d'automates, French Automaton Corporation. Several young French scientists and engineers worked on the PAeL project, primarily on the power generation and supply. Power generation was headquartered in Paris and power supply was designed in Vichy.

The result was that by late 1940, he introduced to the US Army his prototype for an automaton soldier. Impressed with the demonstration the Army ordered a test battalion based on a regular human battalion. Due to the very limited reasoning ability of the automaton, each automaton was assigned to a human soldier on a one to one ratio. So each unit was 50% humans and 50% automaton soldiers.

The unit took part in the Louisiana Maneuvers of 1940 with good results. The automatons maintained a high operational rate and performed their duties as expected. The project was given the go ahead to proceed with larger units.

The U.S. Army Automaton Corps was formed on September 14, 1941 with two divisions on paper, formed from one under strength National Guard division that was activated into Federal service. Due to the rapid expansion of the Army after Pearl Harbor the troops to form two divisions were not available, even the activated division was raided for troops to form the cadre of other new divisions. As a result, it was decided to start with a single regiment of infantry, the 1138th Regiment, Troop, Human, Experimental.

Each automaton had a control box in their chest and a sensor unit in their head. The sensor unit and control boxes were hand made by Dr. Handricksen. These devices were so secret that they were not even patented. Breaking one open allowed a certain liquid to escape and rendered the device useless. The devices were sealed at the factory and in the field could be replaced with a new unit, but could not be repaired.

The other components were made in Dr. Handricksens small workshop behind his clinic in California. Once the contract was lent for the first Corps Dr. Handricksen purchased a small factory and began series production in early 1941. Most of the employees were from the local area, both men and women. Dr. Handricksen continued to make the control and sensor boxes himself in his workshop.

Many of the workers were Americans of Japanese ancestry and so when orders were given to intern them, nearly his entire workforce was taken away. Months of training his staff was wasted as his staff was now interned and unavailable to perform defense work. Weeks of wrangling with the military authorities and even a couple trips to Washington got him nothing and so Dr. Handricksen had to start over recruiting new workers and training them to make the automatons. Of course, the real solution to the problem was to simply train the automatons to make more automatons but it just did not occur to anyone at the time!

By now the Army had ordered 15,246 units to fill out the proposed two divisions. Since Dr. Handricksen was only able to make a dozen or so control units per day, it would have taken years to get to the number of automatons ordered by the Army. Others were brought in to help Dr. Handricksen but he took ten years to learn how to make these control units and he was a brain surgeon. They estimated it would take five to seven years to learn how to make the control boxes and sensor units.

While they could not learn how to make the control boxes and sensor units, the assistants did learn how to make some of the sub-assemblies that went into the control boxes and particularly the sensor units. With their help production rates were increased from ten to twelve per day to an average of 36 units per day. Two technicians were also assigned to on the job training with Dr. Handricksen to begin the years of training needed to make the units on their own. Over 30,000 PAeL units were known to have been produced during the war with some estimates of almost 50,000 units.

They worked five days per week but took off every weekend. The work was tedious and difficult and production fell off after about ten hours. Two full days were required for recovery so the eyestrain and hands were calm enough to resume work for the week. Dr. Handricksen was fifty-five years old when he founded the company and the strain of wartime production was taking its toll on him.

In November, 1941, a provisional platoon was shipped to the Philippines. The unit consisted of four 6 man squads, each with 5 automatons. The platoon headquarters was nine humans, including two civilian technicians from the US Automaton Corporation as advisors. The automatons were still secret which limited what they could do and so initially they were kept at Ft. Frank, on Carabao, one of the fortified islands in Manila Bay. They were mostly employed as stevedores and digging fortifications and filling sandbags.

The automatons naturally did not suffer from disease, but their human counterparts began to drop like flies soon after their arrival in the Philippines. The thirty-three humans were reduced to only fourteen by the beginning of February, 1942 due to disease, wounds and accidents. Since each automaton required a human PAL to operate, the unit was significantly degraded.

Just as the humans were stricken by disease, the automatons began to fall victim to the damp. The USA Corp. representatives had been sending messages back, almost from the beginning, that the automatons were not able to resist the effects of climate and salt water on the island.

Corporation representatives on the Philippines made some changes and were able to keep many of the automatons running. Dr. Handricksen began redesign of the electrical components to be more salt water and rust resistant. The reports of poor salt water resistance caused both the Navy and the Marine Corp to lose interest in the project.

In an effort to salvage something from the project in the Philippines, the remaining soldiers and automatons were reorganized into one large squad of twelve men and the ten remaining functioning automatons. They deployed to Bataan and there is some evidence that they participated in combat patrols and may have encountered Japanese patrols. After a couple weeks all the troops and automatons were taken back to Carabao and then all the automatons, functioning or not were taken to Army headquarters on Corregidor Island.

General Douglas Mac Arthur himself praised the hard work of the soldiers in the Automation Platoon and requested more such soldiers for the defense of the Philippines. Saying in part in a secret communiqué: “The hard work and dedication of these soldiers and the enthusiasm they have for their electronic charges is truly inspirational. This command would welcome as many of these PAeL teams as can be sent.”

Despite the capture of over 50,000 US Army and Philippine troops all the automatons we evacuated from the island in a US Navy submarine, as ballast! The submarine made a short stop at Pearl Harbor where the automatons were removed, cleaned, crated and then sent back to the Navy base in Long Beach, California. The two USA Corp. technicians, and several of the soldiers who had served with automatons were able to return on the submarine with the information they had gathered. Corregidor fell only a week later.

From there they were picked up by USA Corp. employees and taken back to the factory for analysis and repair. Dr. Handricksen was able to make a few adjustments and solve the rusting and corrosion problems. This in turn further delayed the deployment of the automations on a large scale basis.

Just after Pearl Harbor, The USA Corp. tried to send another representative and twelve additional PAeL units to the Philippines. While enroute there, their aircraft put down at Wake Island with engine trouble. After unloading the cargo the plane returned to Hawaii. The USA Corp. representative stayed with the PAeL charges, hoping to finish the trip to the Philippines or make use of them in the defense of Wake Island.

The contractor and the PAeL automatons he had with him were never heard from again. There is no record of him being taken prisoner or of being removed from the island by friendly forces. No mention of PAeL soldiers is recorded from the records of Wake Island defenders, but that could be due to wartime secrecy. It is thought that the Japanese may have captured the twelve PAeL units, but there is no record that they captured them or what happened to them.

By the time of the Army landing on Guadalcanal in October, 1942, the Army had a fully operational company of over 100 automatons and a like number of human soldiers. When Army troops took over control of the island, Able Company, 1st Battalion, 1138th Infantry Regiment, Troop, Human, Experimental landed with them.

In North Africa, rather than land at Casablanca with the bulk of the troops they were assigned to land at a small inlet just south of the city in November, 1942. The unit was Easy Company, 2nd Battalion, 1138th Infantry Regiment, Troop, Human, Experimental. Like the company on Guadalcanal they were composed of over 100 human soldiers and another 100 automatons.

General Patton hated the idea of using automation soldiers and so he kept them in their troop ships until almost all other troops had landed. Only when the Navy wanted their ship back did he consent for them to land. Once again reduced to stevedore duties and filling sandbags their full potential was not realized. At least one PAeL was captured by the Vichy French and sent on to the Germans.

In a report to General Eisenhower, Patton wrote, “The glory of war is for men. If men must share this glory it should be with war horse and war dog, and not a mechanical contrivance made not in the image of God but in the image of man.” As a result, the company and the remainder of the battalion were shipped to General Lloyd Fredendall in Tunisia.

In March of 1943 General Fredendall was relieved of command by General Patton and once again the automatons were out of favor with the high command.

In an effort to rid himself of these automatons, a second time, General Patton created a series of legal questions to tie them up from ever seeing combat, or at least minimize the numbers of them under his command.

Are these lawful combatants under the Geneva conventions?

If captured are the Germans required to treat these machines as human soldiers?

Are human soldiers required by military law to take orders from machine devices?

Patton even made a statement to the press that “While military men may be seen as machines, machines should not be seen as military men.” The project was so secret that General Eisenhower was able to get the story suppressed and in the event it was only published by The Review, a small weekly paper in South Pasadena, California.

Those PAeL Automatons who were left over from Tunisia were formed into assault groups for the invasion of Sicily. General Patton was slated to land with four battalions of PAeL troops but due to his dislike of them he managed to have two battalions transferred to the paratroopers.

The first ones for airborne assault were used in Sicily. In test jumps a major percentage of Automatons broke their ankles. A pair of pins that held the leg onto the foot was sheared off and one or both feet were often torn off upon landing.

One battalion trained all their men to repair their PAeL troops after a hard landing.

Each paratrooper assault battalion took a different tack to try and overcome this problem. One battalion tried training their soldiers to repair the damage to their PAeLs. Extra parts were made available and the Automatons jumped with their PAeLs.

The second paratrooper battalion tried training the PAeLs to repair themselves, but they just did not quite bend that way. They tried to get them to repair each other, but they seemed to refuse to learn how to do that. One battalion even took to calling the PAeL soldiers “mules” for their stubbornness. For the jump they 2nd battalion placed the PAeLs in cargo drop containers. This solved the problem of broken ankles, but created problems of its own.

The PAeLs could not remove themselves from inside the boxes. Once the cargo container was dropped the PAeL was trapped inside until a soldier could release them.

The airborne phase of the Sicily invasion was a disaster. Friendly fire from the invasion fleet hit many of the planes carrying paratroopers and PAeL troops. Many PAeL units went down with the planes or were jettisoned to make the planes lighter so they could avoid crash landings.

All of those PAeLs that landed in the ocean inside cargo containers were destroyed. Those that landed by parachute in shallow water were often able to walk along the bottom and make it to shore. One PAeL is known to have spent three days underwater before finally walking up on the landing beach.

Unlike General Patton, the Luftwaffe was very enthusiastic to get as many PAeL units as they could get their hands on. They were intended to use the piloted V-1 and V-2 missile system systems. The Army was dubious of this new technology, but the SS was very interested too and they obtained at least a few PAeL units to supplement their own rather advanced automaton program at the King Frederick the Great of Prussia Center for Automaton Research.

The Vichy French and the SS cooperated in the formation of the Jacques de Vaucanson Technical Institute to study the PAeL device, with facilities at both Vichy and Paris. As a result the Germans developed their own automation and deployed some of them on the Eastern Front. In secret meetings with Vichy French officials the Germans agreed to permit the French to manufacture automatons and send them to Russia in lieu of drafting French citizens to fight in the German army or sending troops there to fight there directly. The Soviet Union is known to have captured a few from the Germans.

The PAeL Automatons served nearly everywhere US Army troops served in World War Two. Many soldiers did not like serving with them. Their limited artificial intelligence meant that each PAeL had to have a human Pal to direct them. Since PAeL did not eat or drink, soldiers could not share a cup of coffee or a meal with them. Since the early versions could not speak, they could not have a conversation with their human counterparts.

The PAeL troops were designed to identify the enemy by the presence of enemy gear, especially headgear and weapons. The German helmet, the M43 Feldmutze cap, the German Kar-98 rifle, the German metal gas mask canister were key items of identification. When the PAeL did not detect these features they often would not fire on the enemy.

Initially they plan was to replace 50% of all units with PAeL Automatons, but soon it was realized that it was not practical for all units. Mess facilities were reduced to half size total with only 25% of the original human staffing. Medical units were reduced by 40% of their size, but this was made up by the need for repair teams for the PAeL Automatons. PAeL repair teams were co-located with medical units.

While PAeL soldiers did not really need clothing as such, it was realized that the distinctive US Army helmet was a key identifier of friendly troops. As such, the PAeL was often known to wear a helmet, and sometimes a uniform shirt. They had no practical reason to wear pants or boots and seldom wore them.

PAeL Automatons were the same size and weight as a large human solder, in the same proportions. They were six feet, two inches tall and weighted 250 pounds. They were designed as small as possible but Dr. Handricksen wanted them to be able to fit inside human vehicles, use human furniture and most importantly, human weapons.

While made of metal, the PAeL was not really bullet proof. They were deactivated with a gunshot to the head or center of chest. They did not feel pain and so would continue to fight even with terrible damage. They would never surrender as a part of their programming but would stop fighting and deactivate themselves at the order of their human Pal.

PAeL Automatons ran on electricity. They could be recharged from any automobile recharging system. Clips from the PAeL battery system could be attached to the vehicle battery and with the engine running the PAeL battery would be recharged in under an hour. PAeL batteries were usually recharged at charging stations and swapped out every day.

Some human soldiers would use the PAeL Automaton as a virtual slave. Digging their foxholes, and even using them as shields in combat were a few of the practices done by some “slackers.” These practices were officially prohibited and most soldiers greatly disrespected those soldiers who “mistreated” their Automaton.

Other soldiers loved serving with the PAeL soldiers and called them G.I. Joey, rather than G.I. Joe. They were often referred to as Pal Joey in dispatches, since they were classified.

Not long after the war, Dr. Handricksen was so worn out by his efforts in building the machines that he was forced to retire. He stopped building automatons and he ceased his medical practice by 1946. His company, the United States Automaton Corporation was all but bankrupt and he let all his employees go with the cession of war production. Dr. Handricksen died in obscurity in 1990.

There was some talk of declassifying the project and permitting the automatons to be used in civilian industry, but with the high unemployment following the massive wartime demobilization that idea was turned down. The remaining automatons were serviced and carefully packed away and stored in military warehouses in the California desert.

During both the Korean War and the Viet Nam Wars the PAeL program was re-initiated with small numbers of the automatons serving their nation again in Army uniforms. By 1973 with the withdrawal of all US military combat troops from Viet Nam there was talk of replacing most of them with PAeL soldiers but it was determined that there were not enough of them in stock to make a difference in a large unconventional war. Both times these mechanical veterans were cleaned, oiled, boxed up and returned to those warehouses in the California desert. Some of them had served in all three wars.

Sometimes a government becomes so vast and bureaucratic that it cannot even remember its own secrets. Some parts of it just get renewed out of habit and a desire not to cut a program that has provided jobs in a small community for decades. This is true for the program that stored PAeL system automatons in military warehouses in the California desert. The warehouses were well built and required minimal maintenance. They contained large numbers of automatons and vast amounts of WWII era and later Cold War weapons, vehicles, and equipment. There was even a small museum that no one ever visited.

The need for caretakers and security staff was small and the funds supported a small town that was near the base where the warehouses were located. Despite the ups and downs of government funding the warehouses continued to store their secrets, with few people really understanding the nature of the items stored there. Over time, what was actually stored there became unimportant. To the congressmen who represented the area over the decades it was important as a jobs creation project. The jobs created by the warehouses helped to keep people voting for him as long as the warehouses jobs kept them employed.

Many decades passed and the warehouses were guarded. The gravel was raked, the rocks painted and people forget exactly what was stored there. With peace, there was little reason to inspect the contents. The tanks, artillery, trucks and PAeL Automatons stayed sealed up in crates, in perfect condition for over a century.

Earthmen had found their way to other planets. A century after the end of World War Two humans found other intelligent life. One day a war broke out in outer space with that life. No one knows exactly what happened, but Earth was suddenly at war with an enemy on another planet. The Earth need for war machines was very pressing. The enemy had vast numbers but their technological development was not advanced. Even old weapons technology would work against this enemy.

The old warehouses were opened and the contents examined. Most of it was equipment from the middle to late 20th Century. It included vast numbers of automatons from the PAeL system. They were taken out of storage and sent into space by transport ships operated by the Earth Space Transport Command.

From low orbit they were transferred, along with a large number of military vehicles and tanks from a period called World War Two, into several huge transport vessels. Earth Space Transport Command sent dozens of transport ships into space, carrying weapons that were as much as a century old.

These ancient warriors continue to serve long after the war they were built for was over.