Sherman in Western Europe

[pktaske]

Question here...I notice many people looking on with disdain and contempt for US decision to mass produce a tank such as the Sherman..while understanding the deficiencies of the Allied TD design (resulting in allied forces subjected to a more vulnerable position than they should have) , doesn't the Sherm make sense vs. an enemy lacking serious AFV numbers? I hear repeatedly that the lionshare of conflicts on the WTO was comprised mainly of infantry. If this was the case (and I'll assume it was), what's the misstep in the US strategy of fielding a easy to maintain tank that's made to suppress and eliminate the ground troop threat? Sure it was eternally frustrating when encounters with enemy armour left numerous burning hulks (and dead crews) on the battlefield, but it hardly was a great enough occurence to cause serious concern for the general war effort. Granted mass-produced mediocre tanks seem somewhat industrial and unglamorous but hey...

I'm sure this has been kicked around before but I guess I'm looking for some new insights as to why the Sherm was such a horrible beast...things other than how you can't dominate a CM QB with Shermans, how 1 Panther can hold off 10, etc...heard it. Maybe some un-run of the mill explanation of why fielding this beast almost resulted in us having to say hello starting with a G.

[LimShady]

Originally posted by pktaske:

Sure it was eternally frustrating when encounters with enemy armour left numerous burning hulks (and dead crews) on the battlefield, but it hardly was a great enough occurence to cause serious concern for the general war effort.

The Department of War regrets to inform you that your son is dead because we were stupid.

Okay I'll get serious now, I think that it was a "flawed" doctrine. Not insomuch that having armor breakthrough into the rear and shoot it up is bad, but that such as doctrine is dependant on having the ability to advance over long ranges and be generally mobile. IMHO, I don't feel that the war in the ETO was the open. THe combinations of rivers, forests, cities, bocage, strictly curtained the ability to the US armor to achieve the goals set forth in its doctrine. The apparance of German tanks that were slower, heavily armed tanks that could stand and fight was better suited to the defensive war they were fighting. Now, the US knew about the Tiger tanks since North Africa, but stalled the development of the Pershing and thus had no effective one-on-one counterpunch for it. Why engage the enemy at a disadvantage knowingly? It seems negligent to me (in hindsight of course). One other thing is that the US counter on superior mobility to flank the German tanks. As Belton Cooper put it, mobility is related to ground pressure. The US neglected to use the Christie suspension in the Sherman (until the HVSS?) so the Sherman could be faster, but would be more likely to bog off road due to higher ground pressure and smaller treads.

[This message has been edited by LimShady (edited 03-31-2001).]

[CombinedArms]

What I was not quite saying clearly enough on the previous "Sherman" thread was that--given the fact that you've got a reliable design that you can mass produce in great numbers, and that the war won't wait for a new, from-the-ground-up, tank design, a reasonable case can be for continuing to pump out those Shermans. But, in my view, the Shermans they pumped should have been more aggressively modified to cope with war conditions in 1944 and 1945--more welded-on frontal armor, as in the Jumbo, more 76 or 17-pounder guns, wet storage. All this could and should have been pressed sooner and more aggressively.

My sense is that these paths could have been pursued (as similar paths were in the case of air development) and yet they weren't, mostly because such paths didn't fit the mental paradigms of a few top officers.

All this is not to say that you can't win with Shermans; the Allies did win with them, and with the right tactics, you can too. But as Allies, I'd love to have a cross between the Jumbo and the Firefly, with all that frontal armor plus that great gun. This would have required some modifications--but I believe that with the proper will, tanks like that--or at least Jumbo 76s, a rough equal to the Panther, could have been produced in sufficient numbers to have had a significant impact. Instead, the US Army landed in France in June 1944 with essentially the same tank that had helped win the battle of El Alamein in Oct 1942. By that time, it was seriously falling behind in the race for armored superiority.

So my 20-20 hindsight armored procurement plan for the allies would be:

keep pumping out those Shermans but aggressively upgrade the armored protection, ammo storage, and gun-power. Pick up any good ideas you can from the British. Study what the Russians are doing. And get as many Pershings into the field as you can, as fast as you can.

[This message has been edited by CombinedArms (edited 03-31-2001).]

[This message has been edited by CombinedArms (edited 03-31-2001).]

[BloodyBucket]

The Sherman is not the only example of gear that could have been better. The magazine fed, fixed barrel BAR, the decision to stay with the 2.36 inch Bazooka, and the lack of a good antitank gun come to mind.

Still, the old saying that amateurs study tactics while pros study logistics explains much. The landing craft, truck and transport plane probably did more to win the war in Europe than a whole host of Pershings without them would have done.

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"Roll on"

[pktaske]

Originally posted by BloodyBucket:

Still, the old saying that amateurs study tactics while pros study logistics explains much. The landing craft, truck and transport plane probably did more to win the war in Europe than a whole host of Pershings without them would have done.

Love this quote..I'm a supply chain planner for 2 chemical plants..

[gunnergoz]

Yeah, I have to agree with much of what my pals here are saying.

Doctrinally, the Army leadership (McNair) was off the mark with the exploitation tank/tank destroyer sort of thinking.

As was said, though, "quantity has a quality all its own." Shermans were available in great quantity and they worked reliably. Even detractors of the Sherman concede it was dependable and logistically easy to support (compared to competitive designs).

American industry, based upon the automotive mass-production model, was perhaps the secret war-winner for us. That industrial base and the know-how behind it enabled all the war-winners (jeep, C-47, DUKW, Garand, LST, Victory/Liberty ships, CVE's, etc, etc to be procured in quantity and with relatively great speed. Design flaws and shortcomings were generally compensated for by the practicality and robustness of the designs that these teams came up with.

Some tank designs that the US came up with were plain bad...check out the M-6 heavy tank sometime. Fortunately, it never was fielded in combat. Others, like the M-24, were excellent for their day and intended use.

All in all, I'd rather have a brilliant logistical planner working for a middling general, than the other way around. That's the basic combination we had in the Gulf War and it worked in the 90's as well as it did for us in the 40's.

[Forever Babra]

No one seems to have touched on cost. Tanks ain't free.

[gunnergoz]

The statement that "tanks ain't free" is really most meaningful when considering the ingredients used to manufacture one, more than the dollar cost.

Costs really only seem to be a factor in peacetime, when politics and parsimony rule.

The Soviet's 40's economy just produced what it needed, based upon projections of resource and manpower availability. The contemporary US economy was essentially unlimited by comparison. The Brits did have economic woes but this was circumvented by lend-lease and grants from the US.

The driving forces really were the availability of resources (especially key ores, rubber and petroleum) and production capacity.

Some designs could be blessed or cursed depending upon their comparative need for critical minerals and ores. This meant that at the national level, planners had to decide in what proportions they wanted to procure tanks, warships (enormous consumers of high-grade steels and ores), planes (alloys and rubber) or other projects, including that little one named Manhattan.

The other factor that dictated tank design for the US was the issue of transportability. US planners deliberately limited US tank designs to certain parameters that facilitated transportation into the war zone. The tank designs had to fit into LST's, needed to be able to be winched into AKA's, fit upon rail cars, pass through rail tunnels, cross standardized bridges, etc.

This is a major reason why the M-6 heavy tank never saw combat. While it was recognized as an inadequate design, the main thing that killed it was the fact that overseas combat commanders knew that for each two M-6's shipped to them they could instead have 3 or 4 Shermans. They opted for quantity and ease of delivery.

[CombinedArms]

Originally posted by gunnergoz:

American industry, based upon the automotive mass-production model, was perhaps the secret war-winner for us. That industrial base and the know-how behind it enabled all the war-winners (jeep, C-47, DUKW, Garand, LST, Victory/Liberty ships, CVE's, etc, etc to be procured in quantity and with relatively great speed.

All in all, I'd rather have a brilliant logistical planner working for a middling general, than the other way around.

This is all quite true--and it's clear that the logistical geniuses of WWII were the Americans.

My own candidate for WAR-WINNING WEAPON among those gunnergoz mentioned was the LST. This Large Slow Target allowed the landings in Normandy to take place, far from a major port--the Germans never anticipated that we could supply a large army with materials unloaded directly onto a beach. Hitler & Co should have studied the recent experiences of their Japanese friends....

Then the Allies killed German logistics via the Transportation Plan, so that they could supply & expand their forces faster than the Germans with units only a 100-200 land miles away.

Of course, logisitics is only indirectly modelled in CM…which is maybe one reason why we all like to grumble about the Sherman. But if a decision to up-gun it had been made in late '42, that might not have put a crimp in the logistics, and that could have been done if there hadn't been a sharp divide between tanks and TDs in US doctrine.

[russellmz]

dont forget the little transport that actually carried the guys to the beaches...designed in new orleans by that guy stephen ambrose is always raving about.

http://www.battlefront.com/discuss/Forum1/HTML/017937-2.html

the best post of many great ones is harry yeide's. explains how sherman was not as bad as previously thought

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russellmz,

Self-Proclaimed Keeper for Life of the Sacred Unofficial FAQ.

"They had their chance- they have not lead!" - GW Bush

"They had mechanical pencils- they have not...lead?" - Jon Stewart on The Daily Show

[CRSutton]

The sherman is not as bad as some would have it. It was extremely reliable and had much greater track and engine life than pretty much any thing the Russians or Germans built. However, don't knock the people who put together the American war machine. It actually worked very well. There were obvious mistakes but our allies and enemy made just as many. Come now, who actually believed that the Maus would have had any use on the battlefield-yet the Germans constantly poured resources into dead end programs-and allocated precious resources into too many complicated AFVs thus diluting the efforts of their industry.

The wonder weapon of the war was the duce and the half truck. Even Joe Stalin admired that marvelous vehicle. Produced in untold countless numbers this great truck gave American infantry divisions true off road capability by virtue of its excellent 6X6 wheel drive. Even German armor divisions were somewhat road bound because virtually all German trucks had only one drive axle and German halftracks were always in short supply.

American troops rode to war in the best motor vehicles and the short coming of a few weapons was by far offset by the excellent inovation and output of American industry. If the Sherman was slightly inferior this flaw was offset by the excellent radios, special ammo, loads of machined guns, plentiful ammo, gyrostablizers, medicine, food and condoms that the U.S. was able to load them up with.

Who would dare match German synthic rubber sheaths with American rubber Trojans? Certainly not me.

[gunnergoz]

Originally posted by CRSutton:

...Who would dare match German synthic rubber sheaths with American rubber Trojans? Certainly not me.

There's a funny story about Truman's first meeting with Stalin, where Stalin complained about not getting enough of anything to fight the war. He said that the shortage of rubber meant that his troops could not have condoms for their manly needs.

Truman immediately told Stalin that he sympathized and would ship 1,000,000 boxes of condoms to the USSR as soon as possible. Stalin was pleased, if a little baffled with the quick offer of something so non-essential to the war effort.

When Stalin's attention was turned, Truman turned to his aid and him to have trojan make up 1,000,000 12-inch-long condoms and ship them to the Russkies, but first have the condom boxes labeled "Texas Medium."

[Guest Michael emrys]

Originally posted by CRSutton:

The wonder weapon of the war was the duce and the half truck.... Produced in untold countless numbers this great truck gave American infantry divisions true off road capability by virtue of its excellent 6X6 wheel drive.

If you are counting wheels, it was actually 10X10 as they had duals on all back axles.

Michael

[jasoncawley@ameritech.net]

The emphasis on logistics and total economy mobilization is on target in my opinion. But it does not excuse the failure to upgun the existing tanks. Uparmoring (beyond wet stowage, which made sense) was almost certainly not worth it for the Americans. But a few other war economy issues.

One fellow said the limit was raw materials, and mentioned alloys and oil. Not for the U.S. The only significant limits the U.S. hit were #1 manpower, the most critical of all, #2 shipping space, because everything had to go 2000-4000 miles to reach any battlefield, often through sub-infested waters, and #3, to a lesser extent, engineering and design capacity, mainly showing up in scarcities of particularly skilled workers.

The manpower trade off was the biggest issue for the war planners. Basically, you have to balance how many people will make the weapons vs. how many people to draft into the armed forces to use them. And for the U.S., in sharp contrast to e.g. Germany before about mid 1944, capital, cost, and raw materials were not a serious overall constraint compared to this trade off.

Per servicemember, the U.S. made available by far the most expensive equipment, especially in the form of airplanes and ships. There was a certain economy to this, because the people were scarcer, and moving them more difficult, which fades into the second issue.

At one point the U.S. was considering an army of up to 150 divisions. But this would have entailed an enourmous increase in demand for shipping to get them across the oceans and keep them supplied in combat, along with a large reduction in the work force making equipment for them. They pared back the force size repeatedly, which let the production stay high, and kept the shipping space demand lower. It still would not have been anything like enough on the shipping side, if code breakers, centimeter radar, and escort carriers hadn't won the sub war in the Atlantic at mid-war.

This environment has to be understood for all the rest of it. Shipping space is the bottleneck, and the way the balance works, you can only support a smaller force if anything you do raises shipping demand, because more people have to make the ships, and fewer can be supplied at the other end of the logistic chain.

It is not just a point about "you can have more tanks if they are lighter". You can't have as many *riflemen* if they aren't lighter, because said riflemen will be spot-welding in a liberty-ship shipyard instead. Basically, I think the U.S. planners called this trade off darn near perfect, and uparmored tanks were therefore out of the question.

But upgunned ones were not. And here the third issue comes in, and I think the U.S. planners didn't allocate things as well as they could have. Engineering capacity refers to the ability to design, test, and field whole new systems. This not only takes lead time, it takes personnel, and those personnel are in the highest conceivable demand in wartime. They are needed literally everywhere - to rationalize production techniques, to develop new technical equipment, to act as foremen in plants doing detailed work, etc.

The U.S. had lots of this capacity, but it was still a scarce and valuable resource, simply because there is no real substitute for it. You can't train new people fast enough, to high enough levels of expertise to matter, in such short time frames.

The U.S. chose to put a lot of these resources on the bomb project, many others on bombers, and other aircraft, and many others on shipping, radar, code work, and production technique (including planning) for everything. There was a certainly logic in this. The personnel were thrown at the problems involving the largest amounts of capital, and the greatest technical challenges, with the idea that success in those areas would have the largest effects.

But the side effect of this was that less capital intensive areas of the war effort, were effectively starved of the technical personnel to innovate less capital intensive systems. An engineer working on a better tank gun in 1942, is one not working on a better fighter plane. The reason I think they got this one wrong, is they underestimated the impact of the general economic principle of diminishing returns.

There is something to be said for a portion of "a little everywhere" in economic allocations, because the obvious innovations in each field are likely to be easier to "reap", while still having a large impact. For example, a high velocity 76mm gun with abundant souped up ammo, fielded by 1944, would probably have had a much larger real impact that central fire control of remotely operated radar-direct 50 cal turrets on the B-29, or some other comparable whiz-kid success in a well-plowed area.

So they erred by starving the Army of tech, somewhat, because they underestimated the importance of tech in the "vanilla" areas, compared to the "gee whiz" areas.

That is independent of the question of actually upgrading to the 76mm in a timely fashion. There is really no excuse for that, it was pure stuff up.

It is also useful, though, to look at the approach the Germans took to some of the same problems. Because they made mistakes that were not the same, but in strategic effect were undoubtedly worse.

The biggest of these is the well known one, not to go to full war economy production at the time of the invasion of Russia, instead waiting until after the defeat at Stalingrad. Everyone recognizes how stupid this was, and that overconfidence was its basic cause. What is often not noticed is some of the side effects it had.

When economies go to all out war production, they get their big increases in total output by sacrificing other things to achieve that. And one of the things they sacrifice, is overall flexibility - the ability to switch the direction of production from one area to another, to change types, etc. It is comparatively easy for an economy that is not fully "taut", to switch what it produces. In a "taut" economy, doing so dislocates dozens of other tightly interrelated plans.

Speer recognized this, and knew the importance of standarization of types that is a kind of corollary to it. He was always trying to get people to settle on 1 or 2 things and then concentrate on getting more of them. But many discussing these issues, do not notice how timing of mobilization affected this and the related tech-fielded issues.

The Russians went to full war economy by the begining of 1942. They hadn't been able to earlier, despite wanting to, because they had to move their factories out of the way of the Germans. They immediately took the best design they had, which was an excellent one, and bet the farm (no, their physical lives) on it. They consequently made 50,000 of the things.

They made only one large-scale improvement to it, in the form of the T-34/85 - upgunning and a better turret to correct the largest weaknesses of the design they started with. Notice, though, that this innovation took more than 2 years - it wasn't until 1944 that the /85s were having an appreciable impact on the war. And that was ~6 months after they first faced the Panther. They also made SUs that used the same chassis and were reasonably effective as TDs.

Well, the U.S. went to full war economy around the same time, very shortly after Pearl Harbor. The best existing design on the boards was the Sherman, and they ran with it. Overall, more than 30,000 of them were made. Not being in combat, the pressure to upgrade the design was much less. Realistically, the U.S. got upgunned tanks about 6 months after they saw the deficiencies of the standard type in combat. They also put better guns on an effective series of TDs using the same or similar chassis.

Those two experiences are not all that different. The main difference is that the U.S. did not start the upgunning cycle until later, because they had not been in heavy action. They still should have anyway - some Tigers were seen in Tunisia e.g. But that is about the only thing to say against the overall performance.

Now, the Germans had an extra year before going to war mobilization. For all of 1942, the U.S. and U.S.S.R. were basically sticking with what they had, while the Germans continued to develop better tanks in an economy that had not yet gone to war mobilization. They fielded the Tiger I in that period, developed the Panther, and put the Panther into action 6 months after the decision to fully mobilize.

No tank designed from the ground up after that date had a production run with as many as 4 figures. The only late war vehicle produced in quantity, designed after that time, was the Hetzer, a somewhat buggy design that used an existing light-tank chassis, which had become obsolete around the time mobilization began, and had been making marders in the meantime. It was better than a marder, that's about it.

The Germans could not afford to abandon a single chassis production line that was in operation the moment the decision to mobilize was made. The Pz II chassis was still being used for marders and wespes. The Pz38 chassis for marders and hetzers. The Pz III chassis for StuGs. The Pz IV chassis for Pz IVs, which were upgunned, and for Jadgpanzers. In consequence, only about 1/4 of the late war vehicle production, if that was of types more modern than these (Panther and Tiger chassis, mostly Panther).

If the Germans had gone to war mobilization at the time they invaded Russia, they probably never would have developed the Tiger or the Panther. They would have ramped the production of the Pz III and the Pz IV, as the best types they then had. They would have upgunned and TDed these chassis, fielding Pz IVs with long guns, and StuGs. Which would have resulted in a fleet very similar to those of Russia and the U.S.

They Germans had 2 more modern types because they waited a year and a half after the invasion of Russia, before committing their economy to a few types. They still only got about 1/4 of the later war production, of those newer types, while the rest were lighter ones not much different from the ones the Allies produced. And they were also outproduced overall, by 4 to 5 to 1.

If the trade off is 7500 Panthers from 1943-1945, and 2500 heavier types, or an increase to the 1944 production rate by the time of the Stalingrad battle, but making only Pz IVs and StuGs, which would you pick? To me it is obvious, the German chances would have been much higher, with a much bigger fleet of Pz IVs in 1942-1943, than with 1/4 heavy tanks well after the tide turned.

The adage includes "first", not just "most" (or biggest).

For what it is worth.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Michael emrys:

If you are counting wheels, it was actually 10X10 as they had duals on all back axles.

Michael

I believe the standard is to count the number of wheels with power going to them.

[M. Bates]

Cawley has a good point, imagine the Germans trying Barbarossa with a fat piece of junk like the King Tiger.

Yer Mk IIIs and MkIVs on the other hand were nippy and manoeuverable.

[PeterNZer]

Gimme 10 MkIvs over 1 KT any day of the week. Especially on the eastern front where much of the time conditions were hardly ideal for heavy tanks (bridges collapsed under their weight etc).

A related issue..

it always amazes me how odd the English tank designs are. There are some fast, well armored tanks but with total junk for guns! What were they thinking?! I mean, even for inf support tanks their early-war stuff stunk, and late war, why not throw some AP shells in there too!? Bloody poms

PeterNZ

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- Official owner of the sig files of Dalem, Croda and Joe Shaw -

Der Kessel scenario design group

Combat Vision movies

[Olle Petersson]

Originally posted by PeterNZer:

A related issue..

it always amazes me how odd the English tank designs are. ... I mean, even for inf support tanks their early-war stuff stunk,

What do you mean?

The Matilda(2) had a decent main armament, and then a coaxial 2pdr to use against enemy armour as well...

Cheers

Olle

[stevetherat]

What's with all this anti-Brit gonads Petal?

IM ever so 'umble O, the Brits did more R&D per capita than any other nation in that war. We constantly developed antidotes to problems the Gerrys were lumping on our shoulders during the entire course of the war. Our main (and HUGE) bugbear was the lack of resources. I'm not only talking of material resources, but adequate (an trained) human resources too.

While there is no way we alone could have fought this war, even with the aid of the Commonwealth, we could and did defend ourselves with a smidgen of honour. OK, so the Germs didn't put in a good enough effort (in the BoB), but I'm sure we would have held out. The price for our lack was the involvement and handing over to the American War Machine, and the subsequent bloated egos from their proclamations thet 'they' won the war.

No, don't get me wrong, I'm not anti-American in general, just the flag-waving ignorant ones that think the World begins and ends on their shoreline. The good thing about people who play this game (most of them) is that they realise the world is a bigger place than 50 states, and the Allies constituted more than those with the Stars and Stripes on their shoulder patches.

This opinion of us Brits, whatever it is, is formulated on the decisions and writings of a few. Yes, we had arrogant anus dwellers too and, unfortunately, they had very loud voices.

StR

Just realised I made no point at all in this post. What I wanted to say was that we had a 'make do' policy worse that any other. There were 4 main types of gun and all but the 17pdr was obsolete by the time it was introduced in a tank. The reliability of all tanks we produced was diabolical, but in parts we made some excellent discoveries, in particular, suspension, DS ammunition, speed/weight combinations.

[This message has been edited by stevetherat (edited 04-03-2001).]

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Olle Petersson:

What do you mean?

The Matilda(2) had a decent main armament, and then a coaxial 2pdr to use against enemy armour as well...

Cheers

Olle

It was also near invulnerable to anything but an 88.

British tank doctrine was right out of the trenches - looking back with 20/20 hindsight doesn't win anyone any medals. Do you guys realize the better part of the first 5 months of 1940 was spent by British infantrymen digging trenches? Some Scottish troops were still wearing kilts when the Germans invaded France. When the first Canadians landed in the UK, they practiced digging trenches, night time sentry duty, reliefs, etc., all in WW I style trenches on Salisbury Plain. To the generals, there was no need for a tank faster than a man could walk. In 1914, Brit generals also felt that "too many" machineguns would "upset the balance of firepower" in an infantry division, whatever that meant, and so they resisted the addition of MGs to their establishment.

It's easy to call them idiots now, but professional soldiers have always been rather hesitant to accept change. There were a lot of reasons the British never developed, say, the Sherman tank in the 1930s. Turret rings and railroad guages are just one issue. If they had as much money to throw around as the Germans (who were still using large number of PzKpfw IIs in 1940, not exactly the state of the art we would see 2 or 3 years after that) perhaps they could have done better.

[BloodyBucket]

Smallish landlocked country surrounded by enemies equals tactical innovation and excellence. (Germany, Israel)

Huge, bicoastal country with vast resources and technology equals logistical innovation and excellence. (USA)

Small island country without resources surrounded by enemies equals naval excellence and guts. (Brits, Japan)

I guess it is a nature or nurture argument.

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"Roll on"

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by BloodyBucket:

Smallish landlocked country surrounded by enemies equals tactical innovation and excellence. (Germany, Israel)

Huge, bicoastal country with vast resources and technology equals logistical innovation and excellence. (USA)

Small island country without resources surrounded by enemies equals naval excellence and guts. (Brits, Japan)

I guess it is a nature or nurture argument.

Great way to put it. Place Canada in the second category (BCATP counts as logistics) and Australia in the third (at least as far as guts).

[Olle Petersson]

One can also see what was available in the way of tanks, let's say at the outbreak of WW2. (September 1, 1939)

Britain:

- A bunch of Vickers light and mediums, the light tanks being fairly good.

- A couple of cruiser tanks, with MGs and 2pdr guns. (The 2pdr being the best tank gun in the world at the time, WRT AP performance.) Fast when moving straight ahead, but with mediocre armour.

- A couple of infantry tanks (Matilda 1 & 2), slow, but with more frontal armour than any ATG could penetrate. (Heavy AA guns aren't ATGs!)

USA:

- Several light tanks with crappy armour and armed with MGs only. (To be used by the cavalry.)

- About 40 "gun tanks"; light tanks armed with something heavier than MGs. (37mm guns or so.)

Germany:

- Several light tanks armed with MGs (and some 20mm guns). Very fast, but with crappy armour.

- A couple of PzKw III. Armed with MGs and 37mm guns. Moderately armoured. About equivalent to the British cruiser tanks, but with slightly better armour.

- A few PzKw IV support tanks. Short 75mm gun with less AP than the 37mm gun, but better armour.

(Sweden:

- Same number of "gun tanks" as USA, but fewer light tanks.)

In this comparison Britain doesn't seem to lag behind.

I haven't included France though, because I don't have those figures in memory. The tank fleet in France were generally better (technically) but smaller than the German counterpart.

Cheers

Olle

[M. Bates]

... ALSO don't forget that the Germans built 1,500 PzKw1's : Those Nazi Wagons were only good for parades.

[tailz]

Originally posted by PeterNZer:

Gimme 10 MkIvs over 1 KT any day of the week.

There was a solid little documnetary on German AFV's on History television (in Canada) that expressed the same sentiment. Considering it's initial design and purpose, the Pz IV was a remarkable vehicle, being substantially uparmoured and upgunned throughout its lifetime, mechanically very reliable and adaptable. Though not as feared as the Panther in '44, if there had been five times as many of them, they story may well have been different.

.02 pfennig