A Diabolical Device: The North Vietnamese Birdcage Mine

Many weapons bear their inventor’s name, or the name of the person who inspired the
weapon. Well known examples include the Browning pistol, Owen machine carbine, and the
Molotov cocktail. Other weapons have generic military nomenclature, such as the Standard
Missile 1 (SM1) or the M16A1 assault rifle. This paper analyses one weapon that has no
such known nomenclature, and which cannot be traced to any particular person: the North 
Vietnamese ‘birdcage’ pressure mine (actuator or triggering device). The birdcage mine
is a shallow-water influence mine actuated by the positive and negative pressure
generated by the hull of a passing vessel.