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RT Anti-Tank Guns


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There was dissatisfaction expressed in the past over the perceived uselessness of AT guns

I recall the US fielded towed 3 inch AT guns by the battalion yet only managed to account for a paltry few tanks. I've never seen a report on the success of the Brit towed 17 pdr. One would think if they had knocked out tanks by the dozen you would've read reports and/or anecdotes about it.

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I recall the US fielded towed 3 inch AT guns by the battalion yet only managed to account for a paltry few tanks. I've never seen a report on the success of the Brit towed 17 pdr. One would think if they had knocked out tanks by the dozen you would've read reports and/or anecdotes about it.

The Brits and Americans at this point in the war where constantly on the offensive.

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Regarding ATG effectiveness.

But by dawn the battalion had thirteen of its sixteen 6-pounders in position and six more of a Royal Artillery battery attached for the operation. As soon as it was light enough the men discovered they were close to an Italian tank lager, with a German lager also discernible a little farther away. Early in the day both tank groups moved and the Rifle Brigade quickly knocked out 14 enemy tanks. The 1st Armoured Division tanks now began to advance in accordance with the main plan and the Rifle Brigade scored further successes with its antitank guns at intervals during the morning against German and Italian tanks advancing to tackle the British armour. The climax came in the afternoon when the men of the Rifle Brigade found themselves (though they could not know this) in the path of Rommel's big counterattack of October 27. They continued to score hits on successive waves of tanks crossing their front to join the main battle-or advancing on them to put their troublesome guns out of action. They were an important element of the "immensely powerful antitank defence" of which Rommel spoke in his reference to this battle already quoted. In armoured warfare, as in air combat, it is difficult to establish exactly who is to be credited with how many kills , as an enemy may be engaged from several directions at once by different tanks and guns, and all will tend to say they scored the vital hit. The Rifle Brigade's claim was so remarkable that an inquiry commission examined it after the battle, taking evidence and inspecting the battlefield, making due allowance for wreckage that by then would have been removed. The commission officially credited the battalion with 37 tanks or self-propelled guns knocked out, 27 of which were still incontrovertibly there on the ground.

Majdalany, Fred (2013-03-25). The Battle of El Alamein: Fortress in the Sand (Kindle Locations 1593-1595). Endeavour Press Ltd..

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I recall the US fielded towed 3 inch AT guns by the battalion yet only managed to account for a paltry few tanks.

That was mostly due to a combination of two factors, neither of which was a reflection on the effectiveness of the gun itself. One was that by the time it was deployed, the US Army was seldom facing large tank heavy German formations. So fewer tanks to shoot at. Secondly, the US was seldom on the defensive, so what was needed were self-propelled guns, which in fact they had and which did most of the AT work.

But it is also true that the 3" ATG was an oversized brute that was difficult to conceal, like the British 17pdr, and might not have fared all that well even if it had had plenty of opportunities for use.

Michael

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MickeyD and Vanir - it is certainly true that the western Allies found their towed ATGs rather useless and SP ones much more effective. But then it is also true that they found their AAA rather useless and their artillery park extremely effective.

The reason being there were no targets for the narrower weapon, nothing of the sort they were designed to defend against. The western Allies were practically always attacking - one month of the ETO campaign was the only exception, pretty much, and a few days in a few places otherwise. And the Germans didn't have any air force left. They did have a few thousand tanks, all of twice, for about one month each time. Then they didn't.

In those circumstances, an SP TD battalion could be used as assault guns or even as self propelled artillery firing indirect fire missions. A towed TD battalion could --- be cannibalized for infantry, pretty much.

I do think an AFV AT mount is definitely more useful as a weapon system than a towed gun, as well as more survivable. It is more likely to be where you need it when you need it, to concentrate to fight, etc. But the western allies are not the best test of these things, simply because the threat faced was miniscule. The German armor force of 1944-5 in the west wasn't quite as neutered as their air force was - but it is still pretty awful. Numerically, I am talking --- there just wasn't any, for most of the campaign.

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The US Army found its towed tank destroyer battalions to be, overall, less effective than the self-propelled TD battalions, and by 1945 was replacing the former with the latter as quickly as they could.

I agree with Jason C here... the US were almost constantly attacking and we all know how effective AT-guns are on the attack :/

It's no surprise that the US found them lacking.

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Lack of flexibility and operational mobility were likely the primary factors in their obsolescence. But even on those occasions when they had the opportunity to be used, they were found to be less efficient killers than their motorized cousins.

The Ardennes doomed the towed tank destroyer battalions. The capabilities of the towed battalions had already been found wanting in the summer and autumn of 1944, and the lessons of the Ardennes campaign simply confirmed this. One study concluded that towed tank destroyer battalions fighting independently according to doctrine -- and not imbedded in an infantry division -- suffered a loss ratio of 3 to 1 in favor of the attacking panzers. When integrated against doctrine into an infantry defensive position, the towed antitank guns were barely adequate, with an exchange ratio of 1 to 1.3 in favor of the guns. In contrast, the self-propelled M10 3-inch tank destroyers had a favorable exchange ratio of 1 to 1.9 when operating independently without infantry support and an excellent ratio of 1 to 6 when integrated into an infantry defense as a support arm. The study noted that the towed 3-inch guns were successful in only two out of nine defensive actions while the M10 tank destroyer battalions were successful in fourteen of sixteen defensive actions against German tanks. The U.S. First Army's tank destroyer losses in the Ardennes totaled 119 weapons, of which 86 were towed guns, a remarkable disproportion that glaringly revealed the vulnerability of the towed guns.

-- Armored Thunderbolt, Steven Zaloga

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One reason ATGs became obsolete was that they needed to get larger and larger to be powerful enough to defeat the armour they were facing, and so lost their ability to hide effectively, which was their joint main advantage (the other being economy) over self-propelled guns. When improvements in shaped charges and rockets and guidance made infantry portable missiles more effective and stealthy than any KE-kill system they could hope to manhandle, the ATG had had its day.

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I'm reading Day of Battle and just saw a passage regarding a British study in Italy. The average spotting distance of a Sherman tank was 50 yards while the average distance they were killed was 80 yards. I think the author made this in reference to AT guns. Of course this is in context of Italy, but does seem like the changes in RT may be more on the correct side.

Some comments allude to the relative lack of use of American towed AT guns in the ETO. We'll see about that when the Buldge module comes out. They play some vital roles in that battle.

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