07/01/2024 Spagna, (España), Andalusia, (Andalucía), Málaga
“If you ever come across anything suspicious like this item, please do not pick it up, contact your local law and/or enforcement agency for assistance”.
The torpedo is set to blow up nearly 87 years too late. All theories as to the sinking of the Republican army’s C-3 submarine were thrown out except for the true one. The truth became known in November last year when it was announced that a research team had located the Nazi missile that sank the C-3 sub. It was already known that a German U-boat (U-34) had attacked the submarine, but material evidence was lacking. News of its discovery also revealed that the torpedo was still intact. Yes, very degraded and corroded from almost nine decades at the bottom of the sea, but an unexploded bomb. This confirms the hypothesis that the missile had passed through the hull of the sub without exploding. Although the torpedo had struck the submarine, the vessel quickly sank thanks to secondary explosions from air tanks and the weapons already onboard. As such, only three crew members were saved. The rest of the crew had no time to evacuate and they remain at sea, 70 metres down. As one chapter closes on the sinking, others open on what else to do within these waters. Perhaps the most pressing matter is how to recover and defuse the torpedo. There is also a rewriting of the history books, as this discovery confirms that Hitler did attack a Spanish vessel without officially declaring war on the Republicans. The official position, as stated to SUR by the Spanish government’s provincial office in Malaga, is that it has handed over responsibility for the Nazi torpedo to the competent authorities, namely the Guardia Civil (responsible for coastal security), and the navy, (owner of the shipwrecked submarine). Both are currently considering the best way to disarm the missile. Back in the 1930s this was a state-of-the-art weapon. The tip of the G7 model would be packed with 280 kilos of a German-invented explosive more powerful than TNT. Weighing 1,750 kilos and fired 800 metres away from its target at a speed of 30 knots, the ballistic device had enough force to pass through any vessel, as happened in this case. The surprising fact is that it did not explode. Engineer and merchant navy man José Luis Martín, who pinpointed the torpedo’s location together with José Antonio Hergueta (filmmaker and director of the documentary about the C-3 Submarine ‘Operación Úrsula’), has the answer. Being a new weapon at the time, German U-boats “were testing” their effectiveness and the German Reich’s support for Franco gave them the opportunity to run trials on real-life targets. This all started in the 1980s when US researcher Willard C. Frank Jr came across the first Nazi military documents to mention the sinking of a C-class submarine in Malaga in 1936. Javier Noriega, director of Nerea Underwater Archaeology and president of the CMMA (Clúster Marítimo-Marino de Andalucía, a group of private marine-related companies), took up the research baton and investigated the site of the C-3 submarine. He regards its sinking as an “episode of international relevance”. He adds: “This torpedo has huge historical significance from an archaeological point of view, showing that the German navy was getting underwater weapons ready for World War II and that they began trials in Malaga during the [Spanish] civil war.” The expert links this event from December 1936 to the bombing of Guernica four months later by the Condor Legion. These armed forces brought into play new aerial attack techniques, ammunition and all the horrors of war with their sights set on the future global conflict to be played out in Europe.
Photo-Source: surinenglish.com
La policía aprovechó para recordar que “en caso de encontrar cualquier tipo de proyectil, no se debe bajo ningún concepto manipular ni tocar, debiendo avisar a las fuerzas y cuerpos de seguridad a la mayor brevedad para tomar las medidas de seguridad necesarias”.
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