TANKS (1942), narrated by Orson Welles

"RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht" (ramblininexile)
06/02/2020 at 14:08 • Filed to: historylopnik

DISCUSSION (15)

davesaddiction @ opposite-lock.com > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht
06/02/2020 at 14:22

Tanks for sharing.

For Sweden > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht
06/02/2020 at 14:27

so many meme tanks

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > For Sweden
06/02/2020 at 14:41

it’s a vehicle dreadnought of destruction

Goggles Pizzano > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht
06/02/2020 at 15:43

Kinja'd!!!

RacinBob > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht
06/02/2020 at 15:58

“ A roaring plunging vehicle of death” —— For all that fight in them.....

Now with self igniting aviation gas.......

RacinBob > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht
06/02/2020 at 16:02

What a cute little “ 75" you have...... . I’ll bet the Germans just rolled their eyes when they saw our “ Dreadnoughts of Death” ..” Clause, Ve must have faster fuses, otherwise our shells will not explo de before they pass through the other side” .....

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > RacinBob
06/02/2020 at 16:32

Well, when it first went into action in north africa, it wasn’t a complete waste, as the Brits had literally no other tank worth engaging 88 crews with. That was the major point - HE rounds with range, something the 2pdr (and even the 6pdr) were wanky for. That was actually the main point. The scare they put into Rommel at their first appearance ended up being somewhat unjustified due to good tactics not having been developed for a two-gun tank, and poor early-war 75mm HE fusing, but come on now.

It wasn’t like the early ausfuehrung PIVs were shipping with 75s, and the Grants did have 2" of frontal armor. No worse a target than the PIII or PIV aside from being taller . Mostly, they took their losses against emplaced AT guns, the very problem they were present to *help* solve and were used ineptly against. Again, an awkward stopgap with flaws, but by no means useless.

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > RacinBob
06/02/2020 at 16:36

Not like gasoline was all that uncommon in AFVs ... yet. See also: Crusader, Valentine, A13, Panzer III, Panzer IV, Tiger I...

RacinBob > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht
06/02/2020 at 20:13

My take is that our war planners simply did not comprehend the next generation of German armor. your point. Of course our narrative is tainted by my recent read of Death Traps and the general under armor and under gunned shermans. https://www.amazon.com/Death-Traps-Survival-American-Division/dp/0891418148

An interesting takeway from the book was an explanation of why our Sherman 75 mm guns were inferior to the German’s ‘75's. The reason is that the US A rmy ordinance group insisted that the Sherman tank gun meet their general specification of being able to do a minimum of 10,000 shots before requiring replacement. This resulted on a short gun barrel and a small powder charge resulted in a tank that could not fight effectively against German armor.

The tank corps fought against the specifications, arguing most tanks would fire 100's not 1000's of shells to no avail. Our tankers fought and died because of a turf war between tankers and the artillery guys.

Actually per Wiki, the M3 was well thought of when first launched,

“ Design commenced in July 1940, and the first M3s were operational in late 1941. [2] The U.S. Army needed a medium tank armed with a 75mm gun and, coupled with the United Kingdom’s immediate demand for 3,650 medium tanks, [3] the Lee began production by late 1940. The design was a compromise meant to produce a tank as soon as possible. The M3 had considerable firepower and good armor, but had serious drawbacks in its general design and shape, including a high silhouette, an archaic sponson mounting of the main gun preventing the tank from taking a hull-down position, riveted construction, and poor off-road performance.

Its overall performance was not satisfactory and the tank was withdrawn from combat in most theaters as soon as the M4 Sherman tank became available in larger numbers. In spite of this, it was considered by Hans von Luck (an Oberst (Colonel) in the Wehrmacht Heer and the author of Panzer Commander ) to be superior to the best German tank at the time of its introduction, the Panzer IV (at least until the F2 variant). [4]

Despite being replaced elsewhere, the British continued to use M3s in combat against the Japanese in southeast Asia until 1945. [5] Nearly a thousand M3s were supplied to the Soviet military under Lend-Lease between 1941–1943.”

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > RacinBob
06/03/2020 at 10:05

And yet, the Germans until very late were using short guns in infantry support for a similar reason to US use of short 75s and French use of their short guns - not just a wear and tear issue, nor really a cost issue, but because low velocity guns are objectively better in infantry support in addition to cost advantages . High velocity makes for wider dispersal, requires thicker wall on the shell and less explosive charge, poorer fragmentation... If the majority of tank service is in infantry support, as it was in Europe, it suggests that recognizing the limits of one’s swiss army knife is better than trying to drive nails with it. More tank destroyers, more specialty role vehicles or heavy tanks.

I get that it’s not ideal for the artillery guys firing high hundreds of rounds to dictate what the tankers are using because of lack of logistical duplication, and I get that the 76 should have made it to the front faster and better, but for the vast bulk of the fighting done by Shermans, it wasn’t against enemy tanks (!) . Getting a better 75 against tanks for general use means different breechblock production stateside, separate HE supplies than the artillery, and so on - not merely making a lighter barrel with permitted failures at 300rds . There are a lot of ugly tradeoffs, and mech cav was still a developing doctrine. Remember that before the M3 Lee/Grant, the use of 75mm was so spectac ularly w eighted to artillery use that they hadn’t even rigorously tested “flat arc” use of the HE fuse. What artillery asks for, artillery gets. Plus which, the 75 was perfectly OK based on the German tanks of ‘41, and ordnance didn’t predict the extent to which it would be outscaled by enemy armor. The Germans were already having problems supplying enough tanks - slowing that down further to make their tanks into unsupportable fortresses? Madness.

Up-armoring shermans in either field modification or factory improvement as the “Jumbo” had its own setbacks of that kind - worse off-road performance, bogging down, higher wear, higher fuel use, and so on. Unfortunately, the tank which was the best fit to ability to supply and support wasn’t one that clearly outmatched ze Germans.

I’ve heard it cited that Sherman crew losses were among the lowest losses of the entire war, across all disciplines. That doesn’t make tragic loss of crew due to poor judgment okay, nor poor morale due to fear of “Tigers! Tigers!” over the hill, but does go some way in a big picture to highlight relative priority. It’s a tightrope. Should there ideally have been more 76s or better, and more Jumbos? Surely. Should every Sherman have been a Jumbo with a 76 or better? The answer, surprisingly, is “probably not”. Certainly not before some time in ‘44.

Often highlighted are the several cases of “large number of shermans engages enemy, enemy scoffs, executes destruction” in building the case or lore of the “useless sherman”. Ignored in comparison are similar events on the Eastern front against Russian superheavies in defense , early Africa campaign events against Matilda IIs, and during the invasion of France, a situation in which a Char B-1 bis tank slaughtered 13 German tanks. The lesson in each is similar - poor tactics and inexperience against an ambush enemy with egregiously heavy armor whittle away numeric advantage faster than anything. Given that even heavily armored tanks have a history of terrible losses against ambush artillery that is merely *adequate*, you could as readily say the PIII was proved obsolete in 1940.

Which is all to say, to the extent Death Traps may offer a narrative that the Sherman was everything lore has attempted to build it as -a tissue paper pea-shooter-equipped Jeep in drag... that’s overselling it. Nader tract issues with hyper-focus. You might as readily ask why US forces were forced to hump the Garand when “grease gun”s were so cheap to make, and when German Stg. weapons were far more modern in our understanding. A more revealing question might be what tactical choices led to countering the better German tanks with Shermans the way they were, or what losses of effectiveness the German forces accepted for their infantry as a sacrifice for having so many fewer tanks. It’s been popular for a long time to say Sherman Bad, and while a book exploring why people say that is illuminating, the truth is a lot more complicated.

RacinBob > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht
06/04/2020 at 00:03

Brilliant reply, Thanks for your observations. I make design decisions for a living and do appreciate your thoughts on t rade offs . I suppose w e had P-47's and for the most part artillery superiority so it wasn’t all bad against the German tanks . We did win the war, didn’t we? Although you might not agree if you were a Sherman tank driver that was in a tank to tank battle.

An interesting sidebar is that may brother in law’s father was a mechanic in the 3rd ar mored division in WW2. I read the book and passed it on to his son. Also, if you haven’t read death traps, it is an interesting read.

BTW - How did you get to know so much about tanks?

RacinBob > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht
06/04/2020 at 00:04

PS - I suppose you are saying that Patton wasn’t a dummy.

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > RacinBob
06/04/2020 at 09:32

|How did you get to know so much about tanks?

Many misspent hours of intense boredom. Largely concentrated in the past eight months or so, but not all. One of my favorite war memoirs is by a tanker, and I got tired of not being able to keep types and distinctions straight so I jumped in.

The closest tanking in my family would be my grandmother’s brother, who was in Korea for the early parts. I *think* commanding a Chaff e e, but I didn’t really press him on the topic before he passed.

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > RacinBob
06/04/2020 at 09:50

I don’t know enough about Patton’s tactics in detail, or at least as much as I’d like, but I know he had a greater wisdom in logistics than Rommel did. The pattern which repeated itself in North Africa was Rommel attempting to achieve brilliant tactical victories deep into enemy territory at the expense of all his reserve materiel. He was great at setting ambushes and fortifying in the territories once there, but wasn’t without flaws.

I think in general, Patton was a similar hand at tactically applying overwhelming force... but didn’t tend to overplay his hand. All the braggadocio about not protecting his flanks didn’t equate to things like when Rommel took so long to take Tobruk due to making it there and running out of supplies several times - or not consistently, I don’t believe. Falling back to the logistical discussion, the best tanks are not only the ones you have and your enemy doesn’t, but the ones you can keep fueled and armed.

Or, to apply a quote from the man to the Sherman, a good solution applied with vigor now is better than a perfect solution applied ten minutes later.

RacinBob > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht
06/04/2020 at 10:19

Patton - War as I knew it is a good read. https://www.amazon.com/War-As-Knew-George-Patton/dp/0395735297/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2E9ZL2AAYR2UV&dchild=1&keywords=war+as+i+knew+it+patton&qid=1591280322&sprefix=War+as+I+%2Caps%2C213&sr=8-1