Question? Knee mortar

[CemalPasha]

Do modern armies still use knee mortars such as the Type 89? I recently learned that around 40% of U.S. casualties in WWII were caused by this small grenade launcher, which really shocked me.

 

[BravoZulu]

Do modern armies still use knee mortars such as the Type 89? I recently learned that around 40% of U.S. casualties in WWII were caused by this small grenade launcher, which really shocked me.

The casualties were caused by mistaken belief that the mortar was an actual "knee" mortar and fired the mortar while resting the base on the knee. False ideas around the mortar caused troops to think this is how it was fired.

To my knowledge there has never been a mortar that could be fired when actually resting it on a firers knee

The 40% of casualties reported was gained from a few reports from particular battles it wasn't responsible for all US casualties or even 40% of casualties, just in particular battles

 

[NebrHogger]

The majority of casualties were likely from 7.7 cal Arisaka bullets.