A Brief History of Unusual Objects Designed to Kill People from Far Away, Part 2: The Goliath, the Nazi's Remote-Controlled Self-Destructing Miniature Tank
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Since the Mongol bow we’ve seen a lengthy list of advances in long-range killing. Guns, machineguns, artillery, bombs dropped from planes, and Germany’s famous V-2 “flying bomb,” which is featured in many a World War II documentary.
But here we look at a lesser-known Wehrmacht design, which was not a bomb that flew, but that could be driven. It started seeing battlefield action in 1942. Roughly two feet tall, three feet wide and five feet long, the Goliath resembled a miniature tank, but one that had a long cable trailing behind it. This cable was over 2,000 feet long and had a real, live Nazi at the other end of it, driving the Goliath with a joystick like some deadly Atari game. When the “pilot” got the thing to its desired position, he pushed a button, and the 130 pounds of explosives inside the Goliath went KABOOM.
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