Talk:Tunnel rat

Opening heading
"Of Puerto Rican descent'? Is that because Puerto Ricans are skinny little guys? Is this factually accurate? Wetman 05:05, 5 May 2004 (UTC) Yes this is accurate. For a good account (and statistics of actual tunnel rats) see the book "the tunnels of cu chi" by Tom Mangold and John Penycate Uh, the Cu Chi tunnels that were found by the Australian Engineer's Division of 4RAR that later were named the Tunnel Rats before it became a popularised American section of militaria you mean?  :P Sorry, I think you might be mistaken.  The Australian's never really refered to themselves as "tunnel rats" but rather "ferrets" instead.  It was the Americans who began using this term. "Ironically, among the favorites were the German Luger and Walther pistols..." Why is this ironic? They're good weapons. Or is this ironic because the United States was once at war with Germany? —Ortchel 03:47, 12 June 2006 (UTC) Excellent question. I'm removing the word "ironically." "The Australian's never really refered to themselves as "tunnel rats" but rather "ferrets" instead." Umm... No. That is wrong. Despite what you may have heard, the australian and Zew Zealander tunnel rats did indeed refer to themselves as "tunnel rats". To that end, I am adding them to the article. CeeWhy 07:47, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Official designation
Is there an official designation for the "tunnel rats"? It doesn't sound like a phrase that would be used by the government. Twin Bird 17:19, 8 August 2005 (UTC)
 * In the book "The Tunnels of Cu Chi" by Tom Mangold and John Penycate they were called 'tunnel soldiers'. I don't imagine they would have an official desigantion, though the military did try to develop technology for them.  But it always came back to handgun and toarch being the best equipment. GraL (talk) 16:44, 16 December 2008 (UTC)


 * IMO 'tunnel rats' was a popular name only (although certainly worthy of an article). The Australian teams were usually military engineers (AKA 'Sappers'), and AFAIK that was their official designation. Anotherclown (talk) 03:24, 2 July 2010 (UTC)

Tunnel rats
My husband was an Australian tunnel rat, and can confirm that the Australians used this term.

Snakes, etc. were not just natural inhabitants of the tunnels. A favourite booby trap was to fasten a venomous snake inside a bamboo tube and fix it to the ceiling. Hungry and angry, it would bite the first person to come within reach. Tunnel rats learned quickly to detect the smell of snakes.

removed poem
I've removed the link to the poem because it didn't contain anything of factual significance and the language ('gook' and 'spook') could offend. no wrong —Preceding unsigned comment added by 163.153.55.14 (talk) 18:33, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Forest Gump
How is there not a reference to the movie Forest Gump? There was a scene in which Forest was given gun and a flashlight and crawled into a hole. Now that I know the context, it is clear that he was playing a tunnel rat. Michael.Urban (talk) 20:21, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

Gump never climbs down the hole. Hence not a tunnel rat. As I recall he didn't get farther in than his shoulders. 68.153.29.23 (talk) 02:49, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

Ethnicity
It seems pretty silly to say the tunnel rats were exclusively white and Hispanic when there's a picture of a black on on this very page. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.2.247.88 (talk) 23:54, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

Then you should do something about it. Actually, I'm about to, so just go back to sleep :) Limeguin (talk) 02:38, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

The quote from the source says "almost exclusively", so one picture of an African American tunnel rat doesn't actually disprove the claim. Unless I hear otherwise within a week or so I will amend the sentence to remove the "disproven" claim but will keep in reference to the picture. 99.240.139.189 (talk) 04:08, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

The Avenger(Book by Frederick Forsythe)
The main character in the book has a spell as a tunnel rat, and the book goes into some detail, for instance regarding the snakes in bamboo tubes, rats, spiders, ants, the u-bends to trap gas and of course the problems encountered with large caliber weapons in such a cramped environment, including the use of grenades and its effect on how much oxygen this leaves you with... Only fiction I know but as always with FF researched pretty well. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Narcissus417 (talk • contribs) 14:28, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Neutral Point of view?
This article is written exclusively from the point of view of the US army, with no attempt to record the point of view of the vietnamese who built these tunnels: Should we change the article title to Tunnel warfare? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Filceolaire (talk • contribs) 10:03, 23 December 2009 (UTC)
 * why did they choose to dig tunnels?
 * what were the tunnels used for?
 * Who made these tunnels?


 * The article is about the tunnel rats, not the tunnels so I don't see the POV issue that you raise. Anotherclown (talk) 03:26, 2 July 2010 (UTC)

Requested move
do not move, since page Talk:Tunnel rat had concensus not to move. Anthony Appleyard (talk) 14:50, 8 February 2010 (UTC) Tunnel rat (military) → Tunnel rat — A short reason for page name change. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.94.249.50  (talk • contribs)  18:57, 30 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Oppose, no reason give, nor can I think of one. – ukexpat (talk) 02:10, 1 February 2010 (UTC)


 * Support, despite failure to provide reasoning. The disambiguation page at Tunnel rat lists three other meanings besides this one; two are clearly derivative of this one, and the other ("a rat in a tunnel") is just dumb. It makes sense to name this one the primary topic. Propaniac (talk) 16:23, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

Moving/dab
I'll be quick, and blunt. You're idiots. I know, I know. That's not very "Wikipedian" of me. But, come on. The "debate" was a three-way vote. You ask large number of people, they'll tell you this name is ambiguous. Come ONNN! Besides, I'm just being bold. Now, if you excuse me, I have some work to finish. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.142.152.104 (talk) 03:58, 21 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Okay. You know what, that was wrong. Not most of it, but the "idiots" thing. That's old Ace. Let me just make my case, with four main points: 1. The name is verifibly ambiguous, with at least three popular uses. 2."Searches/views" are invalid because, as one of the debators said, people could easily be looking for something else and just happening upon this page. 3. One reason I left Wikipedia (mostly) was because of bureaucratic formalities like the electoral debates. Three people showed up! That's grounds for trying again with better advertising, not leaving things as is. 4. If I'm wrong,--riight--another debate might bear that out. As people if they think the article should be moved back. I doubt you'd get a consensus. Which, again, is part of the problem. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.142.152.104 (talk) 03:51, 22 June 2010 (UTC)