>tfw know literally nothing about WWII tanks I know everything about WWI tanks (because there were so few of them lol) but I literally can't name any WWII tanks besides the Sherman, tiger and T-34. I don't know which ones were good and which ones were bad, the only things I know are memes like: >German tanks were over-engineered garbage >Soviet tanks were mass-produced garbage Which I know can't be completely accurate. Furthermore, I literally have no idea whatsoever about what tanks the other countries used (Britain, France, Italy etc). I know there' a Japanese tank thread up right now, which is what inspired me to make this one.
So can anyone give me a basic rundown on the tanks of WWII? Which ones were the most produced/most used, which ones were best etc?
In a reciprocal exchange, I'd be happy to share my knowledge of WWI tanks for anyone who has questions.
>German tanks Expensive and unreliable, but when they did see combat they usually performed better than their enemy tanks, which didn't matter because they were heavily outnumbered most of the time.
>Russian tanks (T-34 specifically) A mixture of innovation and idiocy resulted in these being a mixed bag. Like the Sherman, they were easily mass produced, and they were quite innovative in their use of sloped armor, however, their lack of radios, good sights, and a dedicated commander position really hurt them on the battlefield.
>American tanks Contrary to what you probably assume, this tank was actually top-tier stuff when it came out. It's just that by the time the USA went to war with Germany it was an outdated design, but the USA figured keeping up mass production was more important than switching to higher quality tanks. While it did have problems with catching fire, it gets points for having many variations, such as the Firefly Sherman which could take on the vast majority of German armor.
Dylan Rivera
France actually had the best armoured tanks at the start of the war, the Somua S-35 and Char models were immune to the majority of German tank guns except at close range during Fall Gelb. Unfortunately for the French they deployed them piecemeal and the German air-ground coordination really fucked them up
Lucas Carter
Thanks for the reply. I've never heard of Shermans catching fire. I presume this only happened during combat due to exposed fuel or somesuch, but it'd be pretty funny to me if they just caught fire in general. I've heard about the Char 2C alright. It seems to me that France just got fucked by poor leadership, co-ordination (and to a lesser extent) morale in WWII.
Michael Rodriguez
There were issues with some of the French designs as well, the Somua's single man turret wasn't a very good idea
Henry Rodriguez
Shermans didn't catch fire randomly, you were actually right in that they had an exposed part that would catch fire easily when hit by shells, causing soldiers to nickname the tank "Zippo" or something like that for its weakness.
Grayson Wilson
I thought Zippos were the flamethrower-armed Shermans
Levi Kelly
The T-34 was initially very unreliable (it broke down significantly more than the German Panther) and it had terrible crew ergonomics and often lacked proper sights and radios (although they got better as the war went on). Many will often talk up the T34's sloped armor but it wasn't really that impressive. One thing it could do was repel shots from 37mm antitank guns, which were commonly used by the Germans. Additionally it has SOME survivabilty at long range against the kwk 43 75mm guns of the pz 4. The t34's 76mm gun was usuable but not super effective and not nearly as utilitarian as their German and American counterparts. It was later upgraded with a new turret and 85mm gun which was a good improvement and elevated the T34 to a decent medium tank (although still not reliable and relied on numbers). The pz4 was upgunned and uparmored in response to the t34 and was the main German tank in use (however the Germans relied on mobile tank-destroyers and assault guns). The Pz 4 had ineffective armor as it was not sloped at all and wasn't very thick. The Sherman and T34 could penetrate it quite well. The ps4 however did have an effective 75mm gun and could generally hold its own. The Sherman was probably the best of the three. It was very reliable, it had arguably the best armor, thickness and slope (several uparmored versions did have much more thickness), and it had the best armament (kind of). The initial 75mm gun was serviceable and had a number of utilitarian/anti-personal uses that other guns didn't. Later verions had a 76mm gun which had more armor penetration and could take down most German armored vehicles. The firefly, the british version, had an 18lber gun which was very effective and could penetrate the thickest parts of Panther and Tiger armor (tiger armor, though 4 inches thick, was completely unsloped and actually less effective than late war shermans). The shermans main strengths were its versatility, reliability, and ease of production.
Blake Johnson
Also. The "Shermans are tinderboxes" is kind of a myth and this is supported by statistical information. The Sherman had a vulnerable ammo rack that was quickly adjusted. Some have postulated that the Sherman was more susceptible to fire because it ran on gasoline instead of diesel however this is incorrect also. It is more or less true for any tank that it will catch fire readily if it is hit. Statistics have shown that a variety of German tanks caught fire at higher rates than Sherman tanks and the T34 was much much higher. A lot of the myths about these tanks are propagated by old programs from the history channel.
Joshua Wood
I think it worked like the Germans and "Zimmerit catches fire" myth in that people keep on hearing it while they're serving so just believe it without ever experiencing it themselves and then regurgitate it to their families when they return
Zachary Robinson
They were it's the other guy that's mixed up.
Dominic Peterson
Cont. The Russians had a variety of tanks in common use. Early on they had T26, t46, Bt4s and Bt7s which were lightly armored tanks. Due to their light armor and Russian tactics at the time they were pretty ineffective but the Bts were precursors to the designs of the T34. The Russians also the the KV tanks, named after Kliment Voroshilov. The KV 1 was very heavily armored and featured a 76 and later an 85mm gun. The KV2 was essentially the same tank with a far different turrent and featured a large 122mm howitzer. The KVs were effective but they were expensive to produce so instead they slowed produciton in favor of the T34. the IS 2 was a late war tank that was quite fast and had great armor but was not utilized much as it was late in the war. The Russians also had assault guns and tank destroyed like the SU 85/100 which had both 85mm and 100mm gunned version, they featured a low profile and sloped armor. The SU 152 and the ISU 152 each had 152mm guns, one of which was a howitzer, the other a more effective anti-tank gun, they used the IS-1/2 chassis. The SU 76 was an early war design that was probably the most common among Russian tank destroyers.
Landon Hill
Fact always has been the American Armored Force was the safets tank force in WW2. Despite their "sulerior germam engineering" panzer crewmen were more likely to die.
Jose Hernandez
The Easy Eight (M4A3-E8) Sherman is one of the best known late war Shermans, it was a 76 milimeter (you can tell by the mantlet, 75mm armed M4s have rounded gun mantlets and dome shaped turrets, 76 all have flat square mantlets and the sides of the turret are fully vertical.) Another cousin of the Easy Eight was the Jumbo, which was a 75 but had very thick armor. It was probably one of the best Shermans all around. A lot of people talk about the Firefly, which was a British variant with a very powerful 17 pounder gun, but the gun's breech and length of the ammunition were so big and long that it was very difficult to load effectively.
Henry Barnes
The Americans valued crew survivability a lot, which meant they had things like multiple escape hatches, interior padding, and (later) wet ammo storage.
Isaiah Long
Common misconception, because the American numbering system for tanks during WW2 was complicated.
In it's strictest definition, M4A3E8 referrs only to tanks with the Ford GAA engine (M4A3) and HVSS suspension (E8). There are M4A3E8's with 75mm guns, pic attached. The project for the T23 turret with 76mm, 2 hatches, and bustle is "E6". When the T23 turret and HVSS is combined, the higher model number (E8) is used.
The proper name for the "definitive" version of the Sherman is M4A3 (76) W HVSS. M4 tank, with Ford GAA engine, 76 mm gun, wet stowage, and HVSS suspension.
Aiden Reyes
t. herman shreft
Owen Price
This is why Soviet tankers preferred Shermans over T-34s, well that and they had leather seats which were quickly stripped.
Daniel Campbell
Was Tiger a mistake?
Adrian Lewis
The Chi-Ha is unironically a great tank.
Isaac Myers
yeah they should've just mass produced pz iv's and stugs while improving upon their design and making variants to deal with different situations but that isn't a german thing to do
Joshua Moore
It was outdated by the time of its completion, it was over engineered and on the verge of being too large to be usable, it was already too large to be practical. It also suffered from a number of mechanical issues from these factors. There is a reason why such tanks died away after the second world war.
Austin Young
the Pz IV reached its peak with H there were experiments trying to improve it further with sloped armor and whatnot
the heavy german tanks was a result of a crisis that came from 2 sources
Limited manpower: you cant afford to lose your crews, mass produced panzers without above avarage protection is not good enough
Limited resources: you dont have the resources nor the capabilities to produce enough of those
so they tried to produce armor that are more protected, so you lose less better armament, so you destroy more
the idea is to use them as a shock force in smaller numbers, it obviously failed because a world war is a war of economies aswell
Robert Turner
PzKpfw IV is cute and my waifu
Angel Howard
>unreliable A common meme
Jaxson Perry
I keep hearing this stupid statement again and again
Do you really think they had the manpower and materials to spare?
Kayden Murphy
they had the materials to spare building the maus and other retarded designs so yes.
Isaac Ross
>A maus >thousands of stugs
stop and pull your head out of your ass
Adrian Taylor
You know that saying "A little learning is a dangerous thing"?
Evan Torres
>and other retarded designs
John Brooks
The Gustav and the V3 would like to talk to you.
Sebastian Reed
Working on prototypes is the same as building thousands of tanks? Why are you being so non-specific?
Thomas Young
Jagd- tiger/panther, Elefant.
There were lots of impractical and not very well thought out german designs.
Ethan Williams
Maybe when it started being produced in '38. The problem is that it was still utilized as their MBT until the end of the war.
Josiah Gutierrez
Like the zero I guess
Hunter Ward
>Jagdpanther >bad
Chase Richardson
Entered the war too late.
Leo Roberts
In defense of the Elefant, it was basically just a recycling program because that dummy porsche already built 100 Porsche Tiger hulls before the German picked the Henschel Tiger. It was a better use of these hulls than just letting them rust away.
Joshua Powell
You're right that is complicated. Good to know though, I never would have known that otherwise.
Aaron Young
It's not 100% a myth. Shermans burning was more due to a tactical choice by the Germans than anything intrinsic to the tank's design.
Remember, most of the time the Shermans saw action, the U.S. was on the offensive, and regardless of German performance, the U.S. was likely to hold the field at the end of the day. That means that if the tank is only knocked out but not completely wrecked, there's a good chance that the American mechanics would be able to fix it. So Germans had a tendency to shoot tanks until they started burning or blowing up, even if they were out of the action, a degree of thoroughness that was unnecessary on the other side of the field.
Xavier Mitchell
What gets complicated is that you can't entirely separate tank design, which is what most autists are concerned with, with things like overall tactics and other supporting arms. Tanks are a part of a military *system*, and ultimately, they can't be much more effective than the army itself.
So when you had the infamous 'sickle cut' in the Battle of France, possibly the finest moment of German armor, it was mostly done with outdated, even then, panzer 2s, not even the more modern panzers the Germans had available, and on a pure technical level were vastly inferior to most of the French tanks. But it didn't matter, as the French armored doctrine used tanks as something to protect the artillery, a rapid reserve to be rushed into place when needed, as opposed to a force that exploited a breach made by other arms at Sedan.
What made German armor, especially early war armor, so effective wasn't design or engineering, it was a superior tactical and operational toolkit that was more suited for what tanks were good at. And then later in the war, the shoe was often on the other foot. Things like Panthers and Tigers get a lot of fame, but they weren't good tanks as *tanks*. They were at best good ambushing anti-tank guns, and often not even that great at that.
Liam Kelly
As for British tanks, early on in the war, they were using a very stupid mindset left over from WW1; you essentially had two specialized tank arms. You had the "infantry tanks", like the Matildas, which were slow, heavily armored behemoths, designed primarily to obliterate fortifications and break something like a trench line. On the other hand, you had cruiser or cavalry tanks, which were supposed to be a pursuit element when the enemy line broke. They were to be fast, thinly armored, well gunned for fighting other tanks.
While the Matildas service record isn't completely terrible (think Operation Compass, where they just pulverized Italian forces some 10 times their size which simply couldn't hurt them), they were too inflexible to be worth much. (And the cruisers, in general, just had terrible records). But again, a lot of that was due to tactics. In North Africa, the British generally thought that the way to counter an enemy tank was to send your own tanks, especially your cruiser tanks, towards it. Time and time again Rommel would order his tanks out, and when the British sent their own to chase his, he would have them turn tail and run straight back to his own anti-tank guns, which would shred the British vehicles. It wouldn't be until El Alamein that the British would do the same thing.
Also, the British received over 17,000 Sherman tanks; late in the war, American tanks, (possibly with modifications) were what the British were using by and large.
Julian Ward
I'm pretty sure a huge contributor to the myth was that Germans had a tendency to shoot at enemy tanks until they had a complete guarantee they were knocked out (a flaming wreck) so weeks later when Allied forces noticed that almost every Sherman was a burnt out mess they assumed that was what knocked it out
Easton Bailey
One of the best ways to learn the basics is wikipedia, they even have lists of every tank used in the war. Here's a few important tanks from each country you might want to read about
USA >M3/5 Stuart >M3 Lee >M4 Sherman >M26 Pershing >M10 Wolverine >M18 Hellcat
UK >Crusader >Matilda II >Churchill >Cromwell >Comet Germany >Panzer I, II, III, and IV >Stug III >Panther >Tiger I and II USSR >T-34 >IS-2 >KV-1 and KV-2 >SU-76 and SU-85 Japan >Type 95 Ha-Go >Type 97 Chi-Ha >Type 3 Chi-Nu
Caleb Sanders
>stug >tank. ISHIGGITY NIGGITY BIX NOOD
Oliver Harris
not this again.
Jace Sanders
...
Henry Cooper
Given that OP said he knows next to nothing about WW2 tanks I doubt the lack of SPG clarification offends him. Curb your autism
Parker Harris
>SU-76 and SU-85 >tanks. >Type 3 Chi-Nu >never even saw service
Justin Barnes
I'm working on a project right now so I'm going to help OP with Soviet tanks:
In 1941, most of the Soviet tank park were "obsolete" (actually comparable to German designs of the time, if rather lightly armored) tanks whose production had ended in favor of the T-34 and KV. Unfortunately, this meant they had run out of spare parts years ago. Most of these older tanks ended up either having not worked for years, or had to fight where they broke down. Suicidal orders of counter-attacks for each inch of ground simply accelerated their destruction, to the point that by 1942 only a handful remained. The T-34 was still an unreliable design, and the KV while basically undeadable was too slow for the vast maneuvers of that year. The T-34 and KV still triggered a major overhaul of Germany's tank philosophy, as they could destroy any German vehicle at normal combat ranges, while the Germans had to get to "oh shit nigga too close" range to stop it. However, so many tanks were lost that the Soviets needed to pad their inventories with light garbage like the T-60 and then T-70 for the next two years. Germany began aggressively upgunning their tanks and introducing special snowflake ammunition for the remainder so the T-34 increasingly lost its advantages. T-34 improvements were frozen until 1944 because of the need to spam as many as possible. It wasn't until March of 1944 that a ergonomically decent and up-gunned T-34/85 was introduced. It still had much the same armor as it did in 1941. The light tank factories instead made the SU-76, which was effectively a light tank with the same gun as the now-obsolete T-34/76 strapped to the top. Finally, most Soviet losses were due to primitive ergonomics in that they had two tankers with bad optics in the turret as opposed to three with GLORIOUS GERMAN GLASS in the German ones. This changed with the T-34/85 but again, the armor barely nudged upward in the intervening 4 years.
This is my summary for 6th graders.
Kayden Young
> XD you called SPGs tanks u dummy Explain in what way this matters when my post was aimed at OP who said he knows next to nothing about WW2 era tanks, we all know the difference so you're just being autistic at this point >Never saw service = not important Japan didn't field many tanks during the war but the Chi-Nu is a great example to show people that Japan at least had some serviceable designs but lacked the resources to produce them
Blake Clark
>Explain in what way this matters when my post was aimed at OP who said he knows next to nothing about WW2 era tanks, we all know the difference so you're just being autistic at this point It's very simple. OP wants to learn about tanks, not "something that sort of resembles a tank but isn't."
Imagine for a second if someone said >I don't know much about air warfare in Vietnam. Can you tell me about the important airplanes of that war? >Here's information about the Chinook! It doesn't actually answer OP's question.
Julian Phillips
Japanese tanks were useless to the development of tanks, OP doesn't need to know about them and the same goes for SPGs. OP didn't ask for AFVs, he asked for tanks.
Christian Lopez
I've never in my life come across someone that asks to learn about tanks and then specifies that they absolutely don't want to learn about tanks. Generally when someone who knows little about tanks asks for info about tanks what they mean armor in general but because they don't know much about tanks they don't know to specify the difference Regardless I doubt including 3 SPGs is going to ruin OPs day
Bentley Ramirez
You're also a retard for saying Japanese tanks aren't important, he asked for some info about tanks used in WW2 which includes Japan and even said a Japanese thread inspired him
Lincoln Taylor
Then you should've also included: France, Italy, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Hungary, Romania and so on.
Ethan Carter
You can if you'd like, I gave a brief rundown of some important tanks used by some of the major combatants of the war but if you'd like to list every tank used by every country go ahead
Noah Hall
>I've never in my life come across someone that asks to learn about tanks and then specifies that they absolutely don't want to learn about tanks Yes, because that would be a contradiction. Regardless, when someone says that they want to learn about tanks, they presumably don't want to learn about things that AREN'T tanks, so what you're talking about has no meaning unless you're actually claiming that various SPG's are in fact tanks.
> Generally when someone who knows little about tanks asks for info about tanks what they mean armor in general but because they don't know much about tanks they don't know to specify the difference Translation: Ignorant people are ignorant and don't understand the full ramifications of their terms. The proper response is to EDUCATE them, not to keep their ignorance strong.
Let's also talk about the SPW 250 and 251, the PSW 233, the SdKfz line, the M2 halftrack, and the various GMC's the Americans used. It won't hurt him, he can't tell that they're not what he asked for!
Leo Wood
>Czechoslovakia This. You can't just talk about German armor but leave out glorious PzKpfw 38(t)
Dominic Wright
If you seriously think an SPG like the Stug III is as far off from a tank as a Halftrack you're a retard. All of the SPGs I listed are directly based on existing tanks and at the end of the day the roles they fulfill are identical to some of the roles tanks were used in
Ethan Mitchell
Jesus christ we've had this discussion millions of times on this board, nobody gives a shit about the nuanced differences between a tank and an SPG because it literally just comes down to the role they were used in. The S-103 is a tank despite lacking a turret and the Hellcat is an SPG despite possessing a turret
Jacob Lee
Can't we just skip this retarded discussion for once?
Liam Flores
>If you seriously think an SPG like the Stug III is as far off from a tank as a Halftrack you're a retard No, I don't. I'm saying like a halftrack, or a self-propelled anti-aircraft gun, they resemble a tank in some respects but are not in fact tanks.
> All of the SPGs I listed are directly based on existing tanks So were the GMC and Sdkfz anti-aircraft chassis. What the hell does this prove?
>and at the end of the day the roles they fulfill are identical to some of the roles tanks were used in And not other roles that tanks were used in, which is one of the reasons they're not in fact tanks.
Samuel Roberts
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO NOT THIS DISCUSSION AGAIN NOOOOOOOOOOO
James Nelson
...
Sebastian Brown
If you want to find other people who care this much about the minor differences in tank classification you'd probably be more at home on the WoT forums
Hudson Lee
>I would rather be wrong than be right. After all, concern for accuracy is only for those mentally deficient autistic people.
Brayden Thomas
its subjective anyway.
Asher Gonzalez
>I cannot comprehend the fact that other are ok with simplify things because they know the meaning remains intact, I must have every detail specified in writing otherwise my autism kicks in
Oliver Young
The Hellcat was a TD, not an SPG.
Aiden Morgan
...
Carson Cruz
> 76 mm Gun Motor Carriage M18 was not an SPG > GUN MOTOR CARRIAGE
Ethan Mitchell
No the hellcat was a fighter plane
Caleb Rivera
It was clearly a tankette
Robert Lee
Tank threads are making me hate the StuG because of the autistic shitshows that it causes. Which sucks, cause the StuG is great.
Aiden Foster
I have a soft spot for the tiger after reading Carius.
Alexander Brooks
Hahah is the ''everything on tracks with a gun is a tank'' autist back again? Didn't you get your ass handed to you last time?
Ethan Green
Honestly, this guy (or guys) seem to be even worse: you have posts in the thread implicitly admitting that yeah, they're not tanks, but the distinction isn't important and should just be ignored, because OP is ignorant about the subject and couldn't tell the difference anyway.
Asher Lee
>distinction is not important WATCH IT CHRISSY
Michael Edwards
The Tiger is the katana of tank discussions. Normalfags think it's the best tank ever because that's what movies say. Half-educated people, hipsters and anti-wehraboos go around proclaiming it's the worst tank ever because it can't live up to the hype. Absolute brainlets say it was a mistake and Germany would've faired better (or won the war, top kek) if they had build mord Panzer IIIs, IVs and StuGs instead.
Jackson Cooper
...
Hudson Carter
The Stug II is actually a tank. The term originates from turretless infantry support vehicles of WW1. The Stug III and IV were commonly used in tank roles and anti-tank roles. Its for all intents and purposes...and literally, a tank.
my favourite tank, instrumental in the north african campaign and was more than a match for the panzer III and IV
Anthony Ramirez
>unreliable no. They didn't make the tanks or parts in the numbers needed to have spare parts on hand, because their industrial capacity was stretched to the fullest Something breaks down on a sherman? you got heaps of knocked out shermans to steal parts from. something goes kaput on a panther? Good luck finding those replacement parts, bub. So they would let these tanks run as long as they worked "well enough" because they had a war to fight dammit.
Anthony Lopez
Proves nothing at all. You're literally trying to attach one meaning to a set of vehicles which had numerous overlapping roles. There are plenty of SPGs and assault guns which have turrets and plenty of tanks which do not. Maybe you should define "tank" (which by the way, is not a technical term) so you actually have ground to stand on.
The Sherman with the 75mm for example was meant to be used for infantry support and its 75mm gun was most effective using HE as an anti-infantry gun. Meanwhile the Stug III and IV has a similar role but was often used and classified within a group of vehicles that could and were used in anti-tank engagements
Hudson Anderson
All German tanks were shit, all American tanks were shit, the T-34 was a meme, the only good tank of WWII was the Polish Kurwa 360 which consisted of a bag of potatoes strapped to a mule, very reliable and easy to replace parts (as long as you had enough potatoes).
Nathaniel Evans
Ehh, they were 'unreliable'. See: the Panzer Lehr's 30 Konigtigers that never left for Normandy because they were all in the shop for not working without ever seeing combat (this was the same case with Elefants and other big AFVs, oddly enough late war Panthers and Jagdpanthers did not have this problem as by late 1944 and early 1945 there were finally enough of them).
Jason Scott
The French had really good tanks, high armour and good firepower, they just fucked up with coordination. A lot of French tanks were more advanced than when they saw action and honestly France could've probably kept up with late war tanks using the one they had and were designing in 1940.
Christopher Martin
Nice flat front armor, dork.
Jayden Wilson
>Proves nothing at all. Did you read it? YOu'll see that the Stug is classified as a "SP gun", not a tank.
>There are plenty of SPGs and assault guns which have turrets and plenty of tanks which do not. Which does not mean that an assault gun and a tank are interchangeable terms.
>Maybe you should define "tank" (which by the way, is not a technical term) so you actually have ground to stand on. A tank is a vehicle that its operators designate as a tank, using whatever specific doctrinal or technical criteria they might happen to use, which will of course vary from country to country.
>The Sherman with the 75mm for example was meant to be used for infantry support and its 75mm gun was most effective using HE as an anti-infantry gun. This is bullshit. FM 17-10 (Which you should read some day), first off differentiates the roles of tank division tanks, and the tanks assigned to tank battalions of infantry divisions; the latter were the "infantry support" vehicles, not the former. But to put your retarded assertion to bed.
> Attacking tanks frequently encounter hostile tank units unexpectedly. At other times they may be required to attack hostile tanks deliberately in order to break up an attack or a counterattack. It is therefore necessary that all personnel be carefully trained in recognition of hostile and friendly tanks;
And then goes on to suggest actual tank vs tank tactics. These are in fact the same tanks that are using the 75 mm gun.
>Meanwhile the Stug III and IV has a similar role but was often used and classified within a group of vehicles that could and were used in anti-tank engagements Show me a single contemporary document from a military operational manual that classifies a Stug 3 or 4 as anything but a self propelled gun.
Isaac Lee
French tank problems had more to do with doctrine than with the actual mechanical features of the tank itself. I would recommend this as a general essay on French tactical/operational thought in 1940,
>Everything is there to protect the artillery as it goes about flattening the enemy. >Never, ever stray away from your artillery >No, not even then.
Henry Rivera
Meh. The early French tanks were well armored and pretty reliable but they used obsolete suspension designs. They were perfectly usable for the time but heavier late war tanks would have required a different design paradigm which would have made their early war tank designs irrelevant to any new design continuum.
Kevin Nelson
>A tank is a vehicle that its operators designate as a tank, using whatever specific doctrinal or technical criteria they might happen to use, which will of course vary from country to country. So you admit the difference and terminology is completely arbitrary? Fantastic. >Sherman Ofcourse they have anti-tank tactics and doctrine for the Sherman, it doesn't change the fact that the Sherman was intended for infantry support. Its like you're completely ignoring American tank doctrine in general, which favored having Tank Destroyers (which were colloquially and even officially called tanks by the men who used them) be used against armor. >Show me a single contemporary document from a military operational manual that classifies a Stug 3 or 4 as anything but a self propelled gun. Show me a single shred of evidence refuting the idea that the Stug III and IV were very often used as anti-armor vehicles and/or infantry support in the same vein as proper "tanks"
Leo Perry
This thread needs more pictures of tanks.
Isaac Parker
>So you admit the difference and terminology is completely arbitrary? Fantastic. No, I'm saying that different militaries use "tanks" for different purposes. Attempting to make a one size fits all definition based on usage is bound to fail, which is why the definition needs to be tailored to individual militaries, sometimes even across individual time periods. Role is important, but since for instance in WW2, Germany and Britain had very different armored doctrines in 1941, trying to characterize a vehicle based on role is going to lead to a different conclusion whether or not it's a German vehicle or a British one.
>it doesn't change the fact that the Sherman was intended for infantry support. Please cite something to this effect. Here are the premier American armored manuals of the war, show me where it says that tanks, or M4's in specific, are meant for infantry support.
> Its like you're completely ignoring American tank doctrine in general, which favored having Tank Destroyers (which were colloquially and even officially called tanks by the men who used them) be used against armor. TD doctrine was intended to use TD's in a very limited role, counterattacking after breakthroughs. They were not intended to be offensive weapons against tanks.
>Movement to firing positions so as to intercept hostile tanks by arriving sufficiently in advance of the tanks to permit proper emplacement and concealment of tank destroyers. (The following is italicized) Tank destroyers ambush hostile tanks, but do not charge nor chase them.
Please cite the claim that American TD's were colloquially and even officially called tanks.
Eli James
>Show me a single shred of evidence refuting the idea that the Stug III and IV were very often used as anti-armor vehicles and/or infantry support in the same vein as proper "tanks" This is a misnomer. You would have to apply it to German notions of what a proper "tank" mission is, because StuGs are German vehicles employed by the German military.
In this case, we again do not get to the conclusion that StuGs are "tanks" because Germans viewed a tank's primary role as one of exploitation after a breakthrough; a breakthrough that was usually caused by infantry and artillery elements. StuGs were not used for this role, are unsuited for it, and are therefore not tanks.
Jayden Davis
>this thread needs more pictures of tanks *posts picture of a self-propelled gun*
