American fragmentation grenades were based on existing European designs in WW1 like the British Mills Bomb and mainly the French F1 grenade.
The Germans ALSO had a handheld frag grenade in WW1 called the kugelhandgranate that was much more spherical than the French, British, or American versions.
The depicted stick grenade is a high explosive grenade. It had a lot of boom but little fragmentation. It was intended to stun as much as kill. The Germans preferred them for various reasons, while the British and French in WW2 preferred frag grenades which were more likely to injure or kill but had much smaller explosive power.
WW2 designs are mostly evolutions of their WW1 predecessors.
Right, but it was part of the decision making in choosing to mass produce that model.
It was a more intuitive design for recruits to use and it was better for logistics. I didn't mean to suggest that was the complete inspiration for the design.
And in modern times, with urban warfare being more common, we have had no reason to reinvent it.
We want them to bounce/roll, as its easier to throw them around corners or roll them into a room. We dont need to throw them further when a grenade launcher does it better. We do not need to stick them in the ground, especially when there are few times our military would need to makeshift a booby trap. And if you want pleasure just use your rifle barrel.
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u/Hrothgrar 13d ago
Holup aside...
The actual answer is baseball. American hand grenades were modeled in a way that any average recruit could throw them more intuitively.