I am going to make some statements about the discussion of Soren and this anonymous "Lunatic", he truly is a lunatic that's for sure. I know this thread is old as all hell.. but I just can't sit idly by and watch this guy spewing american propaganda all over.
"[...]performed by the US Bureau of Ordnance US tanks were 5 times more reliable than their German counterparts."
Yes, how shocking. The *US BUREAU OF ORDNANCE* found that ***US*** tanks were far more reliable than their enemies tanks. Truly appalling, to see so much lies and "history" written here. It's like when the Soviets at Kubinka found out that their "blah blah" gun could in fact penetrate the front of a tiger and tiger 2. They fail to mention that they put the front at a 90 degree angle (King tigers case) and that they shot over 200 times on them. The problem is that people take tests made by "their own" and post it as fact if it is in favour of "their side".
Operation Barbarossa: Myth Busters Intro
Read that, that explains why every test ever made by both the US and the Soviet Union always say that their AFV's and planes are the superiour ones. Human nature is a core part of it
Lunatic even stated that the Wirbelwind and Ostwind had poor cover for the crew. Shortly after that he makes a ridiculous claim that the Halftrack has better cover. Hardly. That is not the case.
There we are. They're exposed, more so than the crew of the Ostwind and Wirbelwind were. Lunatic also said that the dual .50 cal gun carriages with poor armour (it's a truck.. come on) were better and more efficient. This is simply not true. He even brought up the "Surely 100 US AA halftracks are better than 10 Wirbelwind" statement. While this might be very true, we aren't measuring who could produce the most anti-aircraft vehicles. If you are going to compare them, compare them in a 1:1 ratio. Naturally, the US would produce more, as they had more factories and were sitting safely on their giant island, not getting bombed.
Also, I say that there is a reason the .50 cal machine guns were largely dropped. They used them on the F.86 Sabres at first, which proved to be inadequate. Nowadays every fighter uses cannons. The Germans used 20mms early and the Russians too, hell, even the brits used 20mms. The US were however, stubborn with their .50 cal machine guns.
Onto other matters. For the record, the MG151/15 (15mm) was barely used, on any plane. There were a few planes using them. They did have a better armour penetration as well, but overall they weren't commonly used. The MK103 could penetrate around 40-50mm armour at 60 degrees angle, which in turn means it would have no trouble with the top armour of some of their own heavy tanks, much less others' medium tanks. The Stuka with BK 37 would be carrying APCR rounds to take out take, which would be capable of taking out a T-34 or Sherman. When comparing penetration, we have to think about quality of the steel, it is widely known that the Germans had, and has some of the best quality steel in the world, especially at that time. The russians didn't even have close to it. This would lead to the Soviets testing on worse quality steel and Germans testing on better. There's also the different ways of measuring penetration. If I remember correctly the Germans were picky, they wanted a very high penetration chance to call it enough, while the soviets would go as low as 50% chance and say it was enough.
A thing to think of when speaking about German tanks unreliability is that much of this is exaggerated. There were also loads of sabotage going on, leading to more failures than normal. I would however, have liked some actual sources for the "Sherman in typical operation was about 1300 miles, for the Panther, it was about 400 miles, and for the Tiger I, about 100 miles." statement. These numbers seem like they're grossly under estimated. The Tiger surely could travel further than 100 miles, as well as the Panther. Earlier years, when the tanks were new, I am sure the breakdowns were more frequent, later in the war they were more stable. While they couldn't compete with the Sherman, they were still acceptable. The Sherman was of a much more simpler design. If I remember correctly the Sherman could not fire accurately at all while on the move. Not many tanks could during the period though.
Lunatic also said that the Germans should have focused on the PzIV, while this is somewhat true, they should have updated it too look more like the panther in shape, which the sloped front. But the old, quantity is better than quality isn't quite true. While the Americans used that "method" it doesn't necessarily mean it is the best way for everyone to do it. The Germans needed their more experienced tank crews rather than producing more PzIV which would have had trouble with later tanks such as IS-2. Their production was also limited because of bombings and as I earlier mentioned, sabotage was also a problem.
Someone else posted something about the T-34, while a good design in itself, it has some pretty debilitating flaws.
Operation Barbarossa: T-34 Myth Buster
Everyone should read this link, it is about the T-34 and why so many were lost of such a good design.
Lunatic was disgustingly Pro-US, to the point where it was almost ridiculous, saying that one thing that almost looks the same is better when it's of US make. I had to answer to stop this. Even if I am multiple years too late.