This is the first comprehensive guide to the 57 nations that have submarines as part of their fighting force.

A complete compendium of the submarine badges of the world, dating from the Imperial Russian Naval Officer's Submarine School Graduation Badge of 1909 to the new South Korean Submariner's Badge issued in 1996. Covers all countries currently operating submarines as well as those no longer existing as political entities.

This is the first comprehensive guide to the 57 nations that have submarines as part of their fighting force.

Like its predecessors in the series, this book is an epic chronicle of previously unpublished topics, including the uniforms and equipment of the submarine force, PT boat squadrons, mine warfare men, gun crews, signalmen, and more. In addition, never-before addressed subjects including the U.S. Coast Guard, Merchant Marine, Public Health Service, Coast and Geodetic Survey and the Samoan Fita-Fita are examined. Clothing, accoutrements, insignia, small arms, knives, life jackets, novelty items and sweetheart jewelry are all covered.

Submariners are a tight knit group of men bound together by training and experience, and with a language all their own. That language is perhaps a little vulgar, but never intentionally demeaning, and a little irreverent but still worldly. This work is an attempt to preserve and explain some of these curious guys who so proudly wear a shiny metal pin that looks like a strange pair of fish on their left breast. This process of accumulating this new language begins in Boot Camp, and is added to with every change of duty station the sailor undergoes. It is heard aboard the boats and, unknowingly, by family members who can't understand terms like head, deck, and overhead, and who think SOS is a distress signal.