Project X-Ray: When the U.S. Military Enlisted Bats

Meg Godlewski

Tuesday, May 03, 2022 at 12:48 PM ET

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The Mexican free-tailed bat was chosen because of its sheer abundance. [Courtesy: U.S. Department of the Interior]

Key Takeaways:

During WWII, Project X-Ray was an experimental U.S. military program conceived by a dentist to weaponize Mexican free-tailed bats by attaching small incendiary devices to them.
The plan involved chilling bats into hibernation, attaching the bombs, loading them into canisters, and dropping them over Japanese cities, where the bats would ideally roost in wooden buildings and ignite fires.
The project faced numerous challenges, including issues with bat hibernation and behavior, premature deployment causing accidental fires on U.S. bases, and breeding cycles that slowed progress.
Project X-Ray was ultimately canceled in 1944, not due to ethical concerns, but because the military's focus shifted to the development of the atomic bomb, and no bat bombs were ever deployed in combat.

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During wartime, there is no shortage of experimental airborne weapons. Some, like the so-called dam-busting bomb, are successful. Others, like the one that attempted to turn Mexican free-tail bats into weapons of war, not so much.

How it Happened

In January of 1942, America was reeling from the attack on Pearl Harbor a month earlier, and the military was scrambling for ways to defend the United States.