Was the Tiger I/II a waste of resources?

[Easy-8]

I think in the case of the Tiger I the answer is no as it was very useful in breakthroughs and firebrigade roles. Sure it cost a lot of time and money to build but it gave the Germans a lot of bang for their Reichsmark. Not to mention the propaganda value was off the charts.

In the case of the Tiger II I think it was a waste. It had poor mobility, was heavy and broke down a bunch. It was impressive but it wasn't practical. Its role was already filled by the Tiger I. The Germans would have been better off using those resources to crank out more tigers and panthers.

 

[MontyB]

I would be surprised if anyone felt the Tiger II was a great tank as it really was indicative of Germany's strange fascination with the idea that bigger is better.

However both the Tiger I and II need to be put into the proper context I think, in terms of the war in the west they were an over kill but when thrown up against the heavy Soviet armour such as the IS-2 they weren't such a silly idea.

I would also suggest that the Tiger I's biggest problem was its outdated design not surprising when you accept that it began its design in 1937, I think it would have been interesting to see what they could have done by maintaining the 56 ton weight and armament but using a modernised hull design (sloping armour) and the Tiger II drive train.
This would have effectively given them an upgraded Tiger while reducing the weight problem of the Tiger II on its drive system by 13 tons (roughly 20%), oddly enough I believe this was the German objective in the design of the Panther II which was 57 tons and used many Tiger II parts.

 

[Easy-8]

What I don't understand is why they didn't just slope the armor on the Tiger I in the first place.

 

[MontyB]

What I don't understand is why they didn't just slope the armor on the Tiger I in the first place.

For the same reason they didn't slope the Pz-I, II, III or IV, they were designed in the pre-war period where the concept of sloping armour was not a foreseen requirement, it really wasn't until the invasion of Russia and encounters with the KV-1 and T-34 that the benefits of sloping armour became apparent and as such you see it in the appearance of the Panther which began its design in late 1941 and all AFV's beyond that date.

I would suggest that if you look at the course of WW2 you will see that events in the east determined the development of the ground war and events in the west determined the air war.

So in terms of the question, no I don't think the Tiger I was a bad investment its kill ratio was excellent and the fear that just the thought of one being in the area put into the western allies it was enough to put troops into a defensive mode was enough to make it a worthwhile investment. The Tiger II was somewhat of a bad investment as it was just too heavy for its time but it was an evolutionary step between old technology (Tiger I) and new technology (Panther II and the E series) so just because it wasn't a great tank does not necessarily mean it was a bad investment if what came from it was better.

 

[Easy-8]

The T-34 was IMO the most important tank ever created. It not only led slopped armor and the buildings of legendary designs like the panther and tiger but it also modern day main battle tanks. classes between tanks (heavy, medinum, light and so on) obsolete now its all MBTs which is a mix of heavy and medinum tank charcteristics.

The Germans created some awesome weapons like the panther and tiger tanks, the ME 262 and the StG-44 among others. However there were a few wasteful products produced for example the V-2 (I know the rocket tech was revolutanry but it wasn't useful in a military sense), The Tiger II (we disagree on this) and the Bismarck class battleships (could have made more U-boats, planes, panzers which would have been more practical).

 

[MontyB]

The T-34 was IMO the most important tank ever created. It not only led slopped armor and the buildings of legendary designs like the panther and tiger but it also modern day main battle tanks. classes between tanks (heavy, medinum, light and so on) obsolete now its all MBTs which is a mix of heavy and medinum tank charcteristics.

I don't disagree with that although the Tiger was developed before the T-34 but there is little doubt in my mind that the German-Russian war shaped the development of ground forces for years.

The Germans created some awesome weapons like the panther and tiger tanks, the ME 262 and the StG-44 among others. However there were a few wasteful products produced for example the V-2 (I know the rocket tech was revolutanry but it wasn't useful in a military sense), The Tiger II (we disagree on this) and the Bismarck class battleships (could have made more U-boats, planes, panzers which would have been more practical).

The argument that had Germany not made the Bismarck or the Tirpitz it could have produced more weapons is a little bit superficial in my opinion because being able to make hundreds of tanks, uboats etc. ignores the fact that those weapons need to be fueled, equipped (ammunition made) and crews trained, essentially it ignores the logistics that putting one extra tank on the field requires which usually consumes a lot more resources that it took to make that one tank.

The other point is that it over looks the volume of resources the allies had to expend chasing them down, to catch the Bismarck they had to pull ships from as far afield as the Mediterranean, the Tirpitz only had to raise anchor and the allies diverted convoys to avoid it and while it sat at anchor half the British home fleet was kept on alert in case it moved.

The value of the Bismarck and the Tirpitz was not in what they did but rather in what it cost the allies to keep them in check.

As for the V-1/V-2 would it have been wasteful technology had the Germans focused them at the Normandy bridgehead, channel ports or Antwerp?

The problem with the V-1/V-2 was Hitlers insistence on firing them at cities, had he used them against the Mulberry harbours and embarkation ports supplying the allies in France it may have been a very different story as it was the allies had supply issues until the very last day of the war.

 

[MikeP]

Where is the dead horse beating anime when you need it?

They only managed to manufacture around 500 Tiger 2s.
They were made from inferior drive train components and had a ridiculously small power plant.
The majority broke down and were destroyed by their crews.
They had a relatively good thing going with Panther development and should have stayed with that.
Folks can't get away from the "jousting" mentality that tanks were created to fight tanks. That was a secondary mission.
A tank is a support asset and needs to be mobile. Tiger 2s failed in that. Apparently Tiger 1s were a bit more effective in that.

A lot of rethinking and development took place once the war got rolling. Armour only one such area.
Even with increased reliability, the Tiger2's weight would have hindered it.

It certainly had an effective PR program. I talk to a 517th PIR vet occasionally who still gets wide eyed mentioning them. He does admit to never having seen one, though.

 

[MontyB]

Where is the dead horse beating anime when you need it?

They only managed to manufacture around 500 Tiger 2s.
They were made from inferior drive train components and had a ridiculously small power plant.
The majority broke down and were destroyed by their crews.
They had a relatively good thing going with Panther development and should have stayed with that.
Folks can't get away from the "jousting" mentality that tanks were created to fight tanks. That was a secondary mission.
A tank is a support asset and needs to be mobile. Tiger 2s failed in that. Apparently Tiger 1s were a bit more effective in that.

A lot of rethinking and development took place once the war got rolling. Armour only one such area.
Even with increased reliability, the Tiger2's weight would have hindered it.

It certainly had an effective PR program. I talk to a 517th PIR vet occasionally who still gets wide eyed mentioning them. He does admit to never having seen one, though.

But to a large degree you could argue the same point about the P-51, the P-51-A and B were not great fighters until someone bolted in a different engine and it became the P-51-D arguably the best fighter of the war.

The Tiger II was effectively the P-51-A, it functioned in its role but it was nothing to write home about however given a years further development you may have seen a very different tank.

I would also point out that the Panther also had the same issues the Tiger II did however it had an extra year of development the Panther D was nothing to get excited about however the Panther G that rolled off the production lines a year later was considered by many the best medium tank of the war.

 

[Easy-8]

The argument that had Germany not made the Bismarck or the Tirpitz it could have produced more weapons is a little bit superficial in my opinion because being able to make hundreds of tanks, uboats etc. ignores the fact that those weapons need to be fueled, equipped (ammunition made) and crews trained, essentially it ignores the logistics that putting one extra tank on the field requires which usually consumes a lot more resources that it took to make that one tank.

Your forgetting firearms and ammo which do not require gas. I would take equiping every German soldier with a G43, StG-44 or FG-42 over two battleships anyday. And with more panzers and fighters they could have kept the Soviets away from the oil fields a little longer.

The other point is that it over looks the volume of resources the allies had to expend chasing them down, to catch the Bismarck they had to pull ships from as far afield as the Mediterranean, the Tirpitz only had to raise anchor and the allies diverted convoys to avoid it and while it sat at anchor half the British home fleet was kept on alert in case it moved.

The value of the Bismarck and the Tirpitz was not in what they did but rather in what it cost the allies to keep them in check.

I guess you could look at it that way. I mean Mosby's Rangers (150 men) tied down 40,000 Union troops in the civil war Geronimo and his small band of apaches had 25,000 troops chasing them. I tend to look at the whole economy of force things. For example - I am a huge fan of the Tiger but I would rather have 1000 Shermans/T-34s/Panzer IVs than 100 Tigers. I generally follow the rule of "impressive = impractical".

As for the V-1/V-2 would it have been wasteful technology had the Germans focused them at the Normandy bridgehead, channel ports or Antwerp?

The problem with the V-1/V-2 was Hitlers insistence on firing them at cities, had he used them against the Mulberry harbours and embarkation ports supplying the allies in France it may have been a very different story as it was the allies had supply issues until the very last day of the war.

You got me there.

 

[MontyB]

Your forgetting firearms and ammo which do not require gas. I would take equiping every German soldier with a G43, StG-44 or FG-42 over two battleships anyday. And with more panzers and fighters they could have kept the Soviets away from the oil fields a little longer.

No but shipping the ammo to the front does require fuel, manufacturing extra firearms/ammunition requires fuel, power and manpower, training and equipping troops to use new equipment requires time and manpower, producing tank/aircraft crews takes time and resources.

Logistics is a balancing act, just because you can produce a million more guns does not mean you can field a million more troops it is a process of balancing what you can make, move and maintain with what you have to equip.

I recall that for every 1 soldier New Zealand put in the field during WW2 it took 10 others to support and supply that soldier so while we could field an army of 200,000 men of military age we only had a population of 1.5 million hence we could not put every man of military age under arms.

Logistics is in my opinion the most over looked aspect of warfare.

 

[Easy-8]

Logistics is in my opinion the most over looked aspect of warfare.

Maybe so but I would say morale is often overlooked as well. As far as support goes combat troops accounted for only something like 40,000 out of a 500,000 man US force in "nam.

 

[crockett007]

If the German Luftwaffe had maintained air superiority in all theaters, the conversation around the Tiger would be much different today. Tanks need protection from aircraft. T2's were massacred in the Falaise, and in the retreat from the Ardennes mainly by airpower.

The T1, in tank to tank engagements around Caan, acquitted themselves admirably, but could not defend against allied air. Pz. Abt. 101 is a point in case.

 

[JOC]

T2-Tiger?

If the German Luftwaffe had maintained air superiority in all theaters, the conversation around the Tiger would be much different today. Tanks need protection from aircraft. T2's were massacred in the Falaise, and in the retreat from the Ardennes mainly by airpower.

The T1, in tank to tank engagements around Caan, acquitted themselves admirably, but could not defend against allied air. Pz. Abt. 101 is a point in case.

The P-47 and to a lesser extent the P-51 made mince meat of any armored vehicle caught out in broad daylight including Tiger and Panther tanks. This greatly hampered German mobility in Normandy. They had to move all their artillery and armor at night. However they had the advantage of knowing the terrain. It was said that one Tiger had a kill ratio of ~ 5 to 1 over the M4 Sherman. In 45 the US M26 Pershing showed up in Europe and made a much better account of itself.

It's difficult to say if the Tigers were a waste of German resources. They were an intimating presence on the battle field, but there was never enough of them. Less than ~2k of them were produced.
Germany produced ~ 3.3k Panthers and an even larger quantity of Panzer IV's. It's been claimed if they concentrated on these very capable machines they would have been able to field a great deal more tanks. These tanks were at least equal to or better than tanks encountered on either front.

In fact it can be argued that Germany made far to many varieties of Tanks, Tank destroyers, mobile guns in general, and this diversity was detrimental to their war effort.

 

[MontyB]

If the German Luftwaffe had maintained air superiority in all theaters, the conversation around the Tiger would be much different today. Tanks need protection from aircraft. T2's were massacred in the Falaise, and in the retreat from the Ardennes mainly by airpower.

The T1, in tank to tank engagements around Caan, acquitted themselves admirably, but could not defend against allied air. Pz. Abt. 101 is a point in case.

Agreed although had the Luftwaffe maintained air superiority on all fronts D-Day would never have happened, the Afrika Korps would have controlled the Middle East oilfields and Russia would have been in deep trouble.

However I am still to be convinced that fighter-bombers had as big an impact on tanks as is commonly thought.

If you look at Zetterling's book Normandy 1944 the Germans lost around 1500 AFV's (Tanks, Tank Destroyers, Assault Guns) of which only about 7% were determined to have been by aircraft.

In the Goodwood area a total of 456 German heavily armoured vehicles were counted, and 301 were examined in detail. They found only 10 could be attributed to Typhoons using RPs (less than 3% of those claimed), only 3 out of 87 APC examined could be attributed to air lunched RPs.

At Mortain it turns out that only 177 German tanks and assault guns participated in the attack, (75 less tanks than claimed as destroyed by aircraft) of these 177 tanks, 46 were lost and only 9 were lost to aircraft attack. Around 4% of those claimed.

When the results of the various Normandy operations are compiled, it turns out that no more than 100 German tanks were lost in the entire campaign from hits by aircraft launched ordnance.
Thus on a single day in August 1944 the RAF claimed 35% more tanks destroyed than the total number of German tanks lost directly to air attack in the entire campaign.

Or to be blunt the weapon that proved the most lethal to German armour was artillery not aircraft.

 

[brinktk]

Or to be blunt the weapon that proved the most lethal to German armour was artillery not aircraft.

(sing this in cadence) KING OF BATTLE! ARTILLERY!

Sorry, I couldn't help myself. You left an opening simply too wide to ignore! My redleg instincts kicked in and I felt compelled, almost involuntarily, to shout this cadence in my office after reading this comment. Thanks MontyB, you have given meaning to my day!

 

[JOC]

Goodwood

Agreed although had the Luftwaffe maintained air superiority on all fronts D-Day would never have happened, the Afrika Korps would have controlled the Middle East oilfields and Russia would have been in deep trouble.

However I am still to be convinced that fighter-bombers had as big an impact on tanks as is commonly thought.

If you look at Zetterling's book Normandy 1944 the Germans lost around 1500 AFV's (Tanks, Tank Destroyers, Assault Guns) of which only about 7% were determined to have been by aircraft.

In the Goodwood area a total of 456 German heavily armoured vehicles were counted, and 301 were examined in detail. They found only 10 could be attributed to Typhoons using RPs (less than 3% of those claimed), only 3 out of 87 APC examined could be attributed to air lunched RPs.

At Mortain it turns out that only 177 German tanks and assault guns participated in the attack, (75 less tanks than claimed as destroyed by aircraft) of these 177 tanks, 46 were lost and only 9 were lost to aircraft attack. Around 4% of those claimed.

When the results of the various Normandy operations are compiled, it turns out that no more than 100 German tanks were lost in the entire campaign from hits by aircraft launched ordnance.
Thus on a single day in August 1944 the RAF claimed 35% more tanks destroyed than the total number of German tanks lost directly to air attack in the entire campaign.

Or to be blunt the weapon that proved the most lethal to German armour was artillery not aircraft.

Monty without breaking out the books for numbers. Goodwood was one of Montgomery's several attempts. to take Caen with his giant columns of armor vehicles sent streaming side by side against the Germans. That is going head on into dugin 88's and panther, tiger and Panzer IV Tanks all which could outrange him and were on the high ground.

Also as far as Goodwood is concerned the Germans were prepared and knew the attack was coming. He tried this blunt head-on approach earlier several times earlier on Caen with similar poor results.
In fact it got so bad that Eisenhower was almost going to relive him of his command. For Clarity's sake, I never claimed that fighter bombers played a major role in the battle - combat for Caen.

 

[MontyB]

(sing this in cadence) KING OF BATTLE! ARTILLERY!

Sorry, I couldn't help myself. You left an opening simply too wide to ignore! My redleg instincts kicked in and I felt compelled, almost involuntarily, to shout this cadence in my office after reading this comment. Thanks MontyB, you have given meaning to my day!

Happy to have been of service.

Monty without breaking out the books for numbers. Goodwood was one of Montgomery's several attempts. to take Caen with his giant columns of armor vehicles sent streaming side by side against the Germans. That is going head on into dugin 88's and panther, tiger and Panzer IV Tanks all which could outrange him and were on the high ground.

Also as far as Goodwood is concerned the Germans were prepared and knew the attack was coming. He tried this blunt head-on approach earlier several times earlier on Caen with similar poor results.
In fact it got so bad that Eisenhower was almost going to relive him of his command. For Clarity's sake, I never claimed that fighter bombers played a major role in the battle - combat for Caen.

Agreed but my response was to Crockett007s assertion about the effectiveness of air power against German armour.

 

[JOC]

Tiger II vs IS-2

I would be surprised if anyone felt the Tiger II was a great tank as it really was indicative of Germany's strange fascination with the idea that bigger is better.

However both the Tiger I and II need to be put into the proper context I think, in terms of the war in the west they were an over kill but when thrown up against the heavy Soviet armour such as the IS-2 they weren't such a silly idea.

I would also suggest that the Tiger I's biggest problem was its outdated design not surprising when you accept that it began its design in 1937, I think it would have been interesting to see what they could have done by maintaining the 56 ton weight and armament but using a modernised hull design (sloping armour) and the Tiger II drive train.
This would have effectively given them an upgraded Tiger while reducing the weight problem of the Tiger II on its drive system by 13 tons (roughly 20%), oddly enough I believe this was the German objective in the design of the Panther II which was 57 tons and used many Tiger II parts.

The Tiger Ausf B "King Tiger" was fielded just before "late 43 vs. early 44" for the IS-2 "Joseph Stalin". The IS-2 fared rather poorly against the Tiger Tanks due to it's lower rate of fire and slightly slower speed.
It's low rate of fire issue was resolved in the upgraded IS-3 in May 45, however by that time the war with Germany was over. It remained in service for > a decade.
The King Tiger was nagged by mechanical issues and was at times abandoned on the battle field.

As for whether or not the Tiger Tanks were a wasted resource I think they may have been due to the resources it took to fabricate the Tigers. The Panzer V AUSF G "latest version of the Panther line of tanks" was more than match for the T-34 and Germany produced 3126 of them in the last year of the war. In the same time period Germany produced less than 400 Tiger II's. If they focused there industry on producing more Panthers and no Tigers they likely could have made a good deal more panthers. Panthers took a heavy toll on Soviet Tanks and were likely the best tank of the war.

 

[MontyB]

I agree that the Panther line was the one that Germany should have focused on as opposed to Guderian who recommended the Pz-IV which I think would have been suicide for German tankers by 1945.

I have long held the view that building fewer Panthers while continuing there development toward the Panther-II and focusing on the Jagdpanzer-IV which used less resources than a Pz-IV while offering better firepower and crew protection than a Pz-IV as their main armoured vehicle.

 

[JOC]

Panzers

I think they stayed with the Panzer IV AUSF H due to the fact it was a reliable design that was basically an update of the earlier more dependable but outclassed Panzer designs.

They were producing similar quantities of this tank and the superior Panther designs and most Panzer divisions "ideally" had a similar number of each tank in 44.

The Jagdpanzer-IV came on board in late 43, it was an excellent design and accounted for heavy Soviet and Allied losses. ~2000 were built. I'm not sure when the Germans stopped production on the Panzer IV AUSF H, however Jagdpanzer-IV would seem to be a superior armored vehicle to the Panzer IV.

Both the Panther designs "especally Panzer V AUSF G and the Jagdpanzer-IV were excellent designs that lent themselves to higher quanity production.

The Jagdpather was one of the finest tank destroyers of the war with it's 88mm gun and should receive honorable mention

I'm sure that an issue that plagued the Germans was that they had to many different types of armored vehicles, to many parts, and likely drove Panzer mechanics nuts.