My friend Herman Gunter III turned me on to “The Mysterious Case of Rudolf Diesel: Genius, Power, and Deception on the Eve of World War I” by Douglas Brunt (Atria books, 2023).
I am grateful: I learned a lot from reading it.
For the more mechanically inclined among you, Brunt shows us how critical Diesel’s eponymous engine concept was, in many arenas. Oil magnate John D. Rockefeller feared that the diesel engine would put his vast empire out of business. The diesel engine was ideal for submarines and giant battleships, something Winston Churchill and the British Navy recognized and encouraged. This infuriated Kaiser Wilhelm, since what would be the Great War was already brewing.
Diesel’s brilliant invention had made him vastly wealthy. Thus, the world was shocked when, in 1913, he disappeared from an ocean liner, leaving some of his clothing neatly folded on the deck. He was presumed drowned and lost at sea. Sometime later, a decomposing corpse was discovered in the water, with some of what were identified as Diesel’s personal effects in its pockets. The body itself was returned to the sea, ostensibly because of its rotting condition.
Hence, the “mysterious case” of the title.
Author Brunt deftly analyzes the many conspiracy theories that followed. “Rockefeller had him killed to save his own vast oil wealth!” “No, the Kaiser had him assassinated so Germany could rule the seas in the coming conflict!” “Hey, even the rich and famous can get so depressed they commit suicide!”
Brunt makes a strong case for another explanation: That the English colluded to fake his disappearance and spirited him off to safer parts of the Commonwealth, Canada or Australia, to continue his research on behalf of their military.
A fascinating read, altogether, which shows among other things that conspiracy theories are nothing new.
Since the diesel burns fuel oil, one wonders why Rockefeller would be worried about it. It’s still refined crude oil. OTOH, just because you’re a financial/power wizard doesn’t mean you can’t get some idiosyncrasies here and there.
I recall reading about the circumstances of Diesel’s death a long time ago.
Wiki puts the use of the diesel in subs and surface ships becoming widespread sometime around 1910. Not sure if there’d been enough time for diesel power to be a significant factor in large surface warships. Whacking Diesel doesn’t seem to make much sense, but then logic sometimes doesn’t factor into certain decisions. Wonder if there’s some inheritance thing or maybe intra company intrigue? Or, maybe faked his own death and went off to live out the rest of his life on hidden money?
As was said (but not by Talleyrand) of Napoleon’s execution of the duc d’enghien, it was worse than a crime, it was a blunder. Just because it doesn’t make sense, doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.
eponymous … Really?
You’ve been waiting all YEAR to use that, haven’t you?
Merry Christmas to you all.
I see what you did there…:-)
It the Germans did have a hand in Diesel’s demise, then I think it would be understandable. As I understand it, Diesel was sailing off to a meeting in London, England. Possibly to sell his services to the English. If so, it would make him a traitor to his own Fatherland.
Selling out his country for cash. Now, where have we seen recent examples of that?
We all know the historical penalty for treason. Americans seem to have become too weak and distracted to apply the appropriate penalties anymore. It is a fatal error.
Quote of the Day:
“A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself. For the traitor appears not a traitor; he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murderer is less to fear.”
– Marcus Tullius Cicero
Except that Germany was not at war with Britain, and the Diesel engine was not a “military secret”. By 1913, several countries were were manufacturing Diesel engines. France and the US had installed Diesel engines in submarines. Nor was Diesel himself the property of the nation. If he had chosen to emigrate and work in another country, he was free to do so.
History bore alert!
Probably best to stop reading now.
Ironically Mr Diesel laid the foundation for Germany’s later downfall.
The soviet tanks in WWII were diesel powered. That made them work better in the cold and the tank didn’t ‘brew up’ when it was hit. The crew was worth more than the tank and you usually lost the crew with the tank in German tanks.
And british and american tanks were even worse. The british army issued a small stove to its troops called ‘Tommy cookers’. The germans soon nicknamed Sherman tanks ‘Tommy cookers’ due to their propensity to burn british crews alive.
I was surprised by your comment. I was under the impression that German Tanks were also diesel powered. There is a line in the movie “Patton” where American Tanks are called “Purple Heart Boxes”. This was attributed to their having gasoline engines which caused them to ignite and burn when well hit. One general then comments that German Tanks are “diesels” and he implies that they are much better than the American tanks.
On doing some research, however, I find that Hollywood has got it wrong (again!).
It seems that most tanks in WW II were gasoline powered. This includes American, French, British, and German Tanks. There were a couple of variants of the American Sherman tank that were diesel powered (such as the M4A2) but the overwhelming majority of Sherman tanks were gasoline powered.
Even the Russians had some gasoline powered light armor vehicles (EX: T-70, SU-76). However, their most common WW II tank (the famous T-34) was diesel powered.
I have heard it said that the T-34 was the best tank of WW II. Given the combination of its simple design, wide tread pattern, effective main gun, sloped armor, and diesel engine, I can see a strong case for that being true.
Diesel fuel is not good in cold weather. It gets thick, unless it is treated. There is summer diesel and winter diesel. You better not have summer diesel in cold weather. I barely know what I’m typing about, but I have seen diesel fuel thicken and get ice crystals in it during cold temperatures.
“Diesel fuel is not good in cold weather. It gets thick, unless it is treated.”
Very True. I remember seeing diesel powered trucks bog down (years ago) during a bitter cold snap. The temperature was -10 (Fahrenheit scale) with a wind chill of -30.
I believe bio-diesel and cooking oil are even worse. One of my engineering friends purchased an old, used, Mercedes-Benz diesel sedan a few years ago. He rigged it with a second fuel tank and a switch to go between primary and secondary tanks.
He had a long commute to work every day. So, what he would do is visit local restaurants and offer to take their used cooking oil off their hands. He would filter this used cooking oil and put it into his secondary tank. He would keep regular diesel fuel in the primary tank.
His M.O. was to start the car using regular diesel fuel. He would drive on regular diesel until the engine got hot. Then he would switch over to the secondary tank and drive most of the way to work using his free cooking oil fuel. Just before he got to work, he would switch back to diesel, from the primary tank, so that the fuel lines would be filled with regular diesel. He did not like leaving cooking oil in his fuel lines since it could jell during cool weather.
Certainly, he saved money on his fuel cost, on his daily commute back and forth to work, using this approach. However, I wonder if it was worth all the effort.
I think, as an engineer, he just liked “fooling” with this stuff. To him, it was fun and well as saving a spot of cash on his daily commute. 🙂
The crew was worth more than the tank….
I remember reading that American and British tanks were designed with heavily-armored crew cabins, while the engine cabs were more lightly-armored — sturdy armor on both would be so heavy the tank would lose mobility, so the Americans and British opted to protect the crew and sacrifice the tank. Russian tanks, on the other hand, featured heavily-armored engine and weapon cabs and lightly-armored crew cabs, implying a design philosophy that the tank was less replaceable — and therefore more valuable — than the crew.
Was that incorrect, or was it a standard from another era before or after WWII? I’ve heard and read credible sources noting that the Russians had more soldiers than they had equipment so it seems plausible that they’d design their tanks this way, but that doesn’t make it historically accurate.
Who’s John Galt?
Agree, this is great read. I never realized Diesel was the name of a person.
Interesting aside, the author is married to Megan Kelly.
Blessed Christmas to all.
Merry Christmas everybody!
Thanks for this year. As a left winger it’s been great to have conservatives who it’s posssible to debate with.
I think your arguments are wrong. But they ARE arguments; not invention backed up by abuse that passes for discussion on most of the net!
nicholas kane,
Thanks for being “a liberal with reason,” as Ed Koch (mayor of NYC) was. You are on the endangered species list, or, at least, your kind is not featured in the news.
Pat Condell is an atheist, but I LOVE to hear him speak, and agree with most of what he says. When listening to his speeches, I want to stand up and cheer.
Marine use of Diesel’s made a lot of sense. Small craft(like u-boats) could make it across the Atlantic to prey upon US merchant shipping of the East Coast. And they did!
Most WW II tanks were gasoline powered. A tank ‘brewing up’ was not an issue with its fuel, but nearly always propellant from the storage of main gun rounds. Early Sherman’s featured ammo stored haphazardly around the turret and the side sponsons. Moving ammo storage to the floor and, later, encasing bins in water dramatically cut the number of ‘brew ups’. Virtually every other tank had similar issues and Sherman ended up being safer than most for the crew. T-34’s were notoriously cramped with hard to use hatches.
Pretty sure EVERY combatant’s doctrine for tank warfare was to keep hitting a tank until it caught fire. Tanks that burnt out were unsalvageable.
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