2nd ww tanks

depends on what you say makes a tank great. the German Tiger and King Tiger had superior firepower and armor but lacked resources to produce these tanks in large enough quanity to change the fate of the war. While the American Sherman or Russian T-34 lacked armor and great fire power but there speed and large numbers over whelmed the Germans.
 
yea the t-34, and what i find funny is how people seem to forget how revolutionary it was, i overnight made EVERY german tank obsolete, in response, many german generals simply wonted to copy it, they did not know what to do, if it were not for horrible crew training, and idiot generals, (stalin killed 2/3's of his generals in the thirties) they were world beaters.
They finally responded in the 1942-3, with the tiger and panther respectifully, these were great tanks but were overly complicated and expansive. The germans have a habit of over complicating things, ex. german cars. When not in the shop being repaired, they were exstremely effective, but the numbers were also inflated by the superior crews and tactics of the germans. A good tank crew is worth more then a good tank. look at the merkeva :)
 
I read a story that once a Soviet T-34 was sourounded by German tanks which opened fire. They kept firing at the T-34 for about a minute then stopped, and to their astonishment a extremely shell-shocked crew open the hatch and stumbled out.

Score 1 for Soviet design.
 
I was watching a show on the T-34 and the historian that was speaking had said they adopted very odd doctrine, such as going full speed and ramming a Tiger Tank.
 
ranger awesomness said:
depends on what you say makes a tank great. the German Tiger and King Tiger had superior firepower and armor but lacked resources to produce these tanks in large enough quanity to change the fate of the war. While the American Sherman or Russian T-34 lacked armor and great fire power but there speed and large numbers over whelmed the Germans.
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Lack of ability to produce in volume doesn't mean it isn't a great tank. The T-34 was a great tank, & produced in volume. The Sherman was a POS & produced in volume. In this case quantity beat out quality, but doesn't make it a great tank, the irony of "Built like a Sherman tank"!
 
justin1552 said:
I was watching a show on the T-34 and the historian that was speaking had said they adopted very odd doctrine, such as going full speed and ramming a Tiger Tank.
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Nothing odd about it, in 1943 most T-34s were armed with guns unable to penetrate Tigers frontal armor.

Of course the Western historian is more then likely full of sh*t since Western European history is heavily biased, there was no such doctrine as trying to ram a tank armed with a 88mm main gun more often then not would end up with an entire T-34 squadron being blown to bits.

However during large tank battles when visibility was low due to smoke Russians did ram tiger tanks routinely and the tactic was quite ingenious since it took out both tanks while the Western tankers pranced around afraid of sacrificing themselves and thus losing even more machines.
Zastava-Arms said:
I read a story that once a Soviet T-34 was sourounded by German tanks which opened fire. They kept firing at the T-34 for about a minute then stopped, and to their astonishment a extremely shell-shocked crew open the hatch and stumbled out.

Score 1 for Soviet design.
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There's better ones, a KV-1 stopping an entire German armored brigade for 3 hours, it destroyed a full company of IIIs and IVs, ran over an entire battery of arty including at least one 88 and when it ran out of ammo it started ramming/running over vehicles stuck on a road.

It took heavy artillery to bring it down.

While Russian tactics were horrible (if at all existent) in 41 their tank design was lightyears ahead of anyone else.
 
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the t34?
are you guys for real about those stories??? (serioisly dont think that is true) Russians fought a war of attrition and the reason they won was if the germans killed one tank five were coming straight at them...
because as far as i am aware that tank wasn't the best in the sense it was the terminator tank (like how man of the German tanks were)... but it was easy to mass produce, it wasnt really excellent in all areas but it didn't have any major deficiencies and it had spare parts available unlike any of the German tanks...
 
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captiva303 said:
the t34?

because as far as i am aware
The main problem here is that you're so f*cking not aware of anything its sad.

When Germans invaded Russia their best tank was a Pz IV while Russians had such beasts as KV-1 and KV-2 and T-34 which was frontally completely impenetrable to any German tank at the time, later on they came up with even better designs.
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Panzercracker said:
captiva303 said:
the t34?

because as far as i am aware
The main problem here is that you're so f*cking not aware of anything its sad.

When Germans invaded Russia their best tank was a Pz IV while Russians had such beasts as KV-1 and KV-2 and T-34 which was frontally completely impenetrable to any German tank at the time, later on they came up with even better designs.
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hahahahaahahahah.....
thank you for informing of me not knowing something that i already knew that not knowing anything caused me not to know what you already as i did too...
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Ahh, Operation Barbarossa. A topic that is near and dear to every tanker's heart. The Germans used the Pz III and IV heavily in the invasion (they committed 3,350 tanks to the push). Meanwhile, the T-34 and KV-1 were not yet available in large number due to the fact that the Soviets didn't put their tank production into high gear until AFTER the invasion. When the Germans struck, the KV-1 and the T-34 accounted for only 7% of the total Russian armored force combined. The T-34 was the best blend of firepower, protection and mobility of the war. It was the most heavily produced tank of the war and the second most heavily produced tank in history (behind the T-54/55 series). Tanks like the King Tiger had it beat for armor and firepower, but were a nightmare to keep in service and couldn't traverse the same sort of terrain that the T-34 could. The torsion bar type suspension used in the T-34 is still in use on major MBTs today (namely the Abrams) and the use of applique armor to cover it's weak spots was very practical and effective. The T-34 is undoubtedly the most influential tank design in history. 60 years later and you still see tanks being made with the same sort of sloped armor and suspension systems as used on the T-34. Why don't you see outrageously slow, and completely unreliable square boxes of metal with huge cannons on them now? Because the Tiger wasn't that great of a design, and was impossible to field on a large scale and terrible to support. Score another one for Russian tank design. They also used screen armor to protect against Panzerfaust warheads (an innovation that is still in use against RPGs to this day). No other tank has made the impact on history that the T-34 has. The Tiger may be cool to look at, but it was a tribute to Hitler's vanity and an attempt to reinforce the image of an overpowering and completely supreme Nazi force. It was built so big and expensive to shock people and inspire fear, but in the end it wasn't enough.
 
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That is a bit of harsh assessment of the Tiger I as it was the last of the "square" designs and it was a very effective vehicle, there is no doubt that it was expensive but I wouldn't relegate it to a just being a symbol of Hitler's vanity, as I have indicated in other threads had it been up to me I would concentrated on the Jadgpanzer-IV and Panther series after 1943 though.

As an interesting side note, a group of us once worked on a project to "redesign" the Tiger I with sloping body armour as part of an engineering class with some rather interesting results that left us wondering why Germany had not looked into during the war.
 
MontyB said:
That is a bit of harsh assessment of the Tiger I as it was the last of the "square" designs and it was a very effective vehicle, there is no doubt that it was expensive but I wouldn't relegate it to a just being a symbol of Hitler's vanity, as I have indicated in other threads had it been up to me I would concentrated on the Jadgpanzer-IV and Panther series after 1943 though.

As an interesting side note, a group of us once worked on a project to "redesign" the Tiger I with sloping body armour as part of an engineering class with some rather interesting results that left us wondering why Germany had not looked into during the war.
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ok, if a tank is out of action more then in battle, its a bad design, if you cant count on it being in battle, there no way you can plan. Also the allies surcumvet the huge armor with air support, i also find it funny how underratted russian aircraft are, the IL-2 was a great plane, and could pop a tiger like a can. Half the time, expecially with the western allies, upon sight of a tiger they stop and waited for aircraft to take it out. Score 3 for soviet design
 
MontyB said:
That is a bit of harsh assessment of the Tiger I as it was the last of the "square" designs and it was a very effective vehicle, there is no doubt that it was expensive but I wouldn't relegate it to a just being a symbol of Hitler's vanity, as I have indicated in other threads had it been up to me I would concentrated on the Jadgpanzer-IV and Panther series after 1943 though.
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I will admit that it's hard to stand next to a Tiger and not be in awe of it. I'm a tanker myself and something about the Tiger just stirs my blood. They have a cutaway Tiger on display at the Patton Museum at Ft Knox (which is where all of us 19 series people train) and it's pretty amazing. The thickness of the frontal armor is unbeleivable. As for putting more effort into the Panther, they tried. Unfortunately for the Germans, the war ended before it was done, and the only surviving Panther II is on display at the Patton Museum as well. It looks like a very promising design and if you've never seen it before here it is:
http://www.peachmountain.com/5star/Tanks_Patton_Tanks_PantherII_tank.aspx

Click the link right below it that says King Tiger to see the cutaway of the front armor that I was talking about. If you've never been to the Patton Museum and you love tanks, it's worth the trip. As a side note, the Sherman is sitting facing the Tiger. I remember my first trip to the museum, I was standing in between the two looking back and forth amazed that anyone would get in a Sherman and fight Nazi tanks. There is also a really good condition T-34 there and a lot of other good stuff there. If you look at the M1 Abrams page 2, disregard all those shots that look like they were taken of the commanders station. It's actually a semi scaled mock up and not real. The rest of the tank pics on that page are of a tank that was actually in the spearhead element for the strike on Baghdad in 2003. It was the platoon leader's tank for the lead company of the lead battalion during the drive to seize the city center. As a side note, if you want to just some completely absurd tanks then click the links for the T-28 and look at the gun on the M-29. I remember seeing the T-28 and thinking.... "what the hell happens if you throw track?"
 
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Tie between the German and Soviet's. Americans and British had the most but their standard were....poor. The German had one of the best divisions in the world and a few amazing tanks. Most of there armour was good but their fire power wasn't that amazing. The Soviet's had the T-34 which was a remarkable tank. The Germans actually feared it.
 
Yin717 said:
Tie between the German and Soviet's. Americans and British had the most but their standard were....poor. The German had one of the best divisions in the world and a few amazing tanks. Most of there armour was good but their fire power wasn't that amazing. The Soviet's had the T-34 which was a remarkable tank. The Germans actually feared it.
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Americans and Britsh had the most what? Tanks? That is not true at all. The Russians produced more tanks and self propelled guns than anyone else in the war. The Russians produced 105k tanks and SP guns during the war, compared to 88k from the US and 28k from the UK. Germany was right in the mix with 67k. I don't know if you are trying to say that the Russians and Germans had similar numbers, because that's not true. Or are you saying that the US or the Brits produced similar numbers to the Soviets? That also isn't true. Or did you mean the US and UK combined was on par with the Russians? That would be accurate, but that doesn't look like what you just posted. Can I get some clarification? The Russians produced 57k T-34s alone and it was the only tank of the war that was produced in greater numbers than the Sherman. The Sherman had a terrible service record compared to the T-34. In 3rd Armored for example, the division had 232 tanks assigned, but lost 1,300 tanks in the span of 10 months mainly due to combat damage (with half of those being completely destroyed). When your loss rate tops 580% you know you are doing something wrong.
 
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