APPLIED SYSTEMATICS — SCHMITT 335 



Men, expendable I assume, were landed from submarines on more 

 than one occasion to reconnoiter the places and the islands to be at- 

 tacked. They were also instructed to bring back what they could of 

 the animal life encountered. As important as was the knowledge of 

 the numbers and disposal of the enemy was the identity of the insect 

 vectors in calculating the risks of attack and casualties from disease, 

 which, more times than we care to admit, laid out more men than the' 

 enemy. The identification of dangerous insects in the war areas can 

 be speedily accomplished only because of the stores of knowledge that' 

 the taxonomists have accumulated over the years. They supplied 

 nnich exceedingly valuable information in other directions also. 



Something had to be done about floating mines drifting into our 

 coastal waters to menace shipping. Our patrol fleet needed to know 

 the paths they traversed through the sea, so that they might be inter- 

 cepted before their hostile mission could be accomplished. It was 

 also imperative to determine where the far more dangerous German 

 submarines sinking tons of shipping in the M^estern Atlantic and Carib- 

 bean areas had their bases for overhaul, refueling, and the replenish- 

 ment of stores. From the surfaces of tlie mines and submarines were 

 scraped marine growths and from the ballast and trimming tanks of 

 the few submarines that were captured intact were recovered traces 

 of bottom mud and sediments pumped into the tanks as the submarines 

 were anchored near, or rested on, the bottom of the shoal bays of their 

 rendezvous. These growths and the sediments, their mineral con- 

 stituents and contained organisms, were carefully examined and named 

 by appropriate specialists. When the identifications were checked 

 against the known distribution of the various materials it became pos- 

 sible to plot the probable paths of the mines and also to trace the sub- 

 marines to their bases where they could be destroyed. 



You may well remember the paper balloons with which the Japanese 

 so ingeniously took advantage of the curients of the upper atmosphere 

 for dropping bombs on the States during the war with a minimum of 

 effort and cost to themselves. Until recently it was not known that 

 during the 6 months that the Japanese continued this unique barrage 

 over 0,000 such balloons had been launched and evidence had been 

 found that 300, perhaps many more, had reached this country, some 

 traveling as far east as Michigan. These balloons and the bombs 

 they carried might luivc been frightfully dangerous. They could 

 kill and maim, start devastating forest fires, and, had tliey been so 

 employed, would have been capable of spreading disease and noxious 

 insect pests. How were we to stop them ? The balloons were so con- 

 structed that after the last of their bomb load was dropped an ex- 

 plosive charge destroyed the balloon. To keep the Japanese from 



