Best/Favourate Tank in the west

[Soren]

The muzzle velocity of the 122mm D-25T was 780 m/s, which would be considered high velocity that is correct.

Juha,

I don't really think that you can compare the performance of any Soviet tank against the Finnish with the same tanks performance against the Germans. You see besides for the few StuG IV's recieved late in the war, the Finnish didn't have many effective AT weapons. The Germans on the other hand had plenty of guns capable of taking out an IS-2 frontally at 2km or more, and thus they could deal with such heavy tanks a lot easier than could the Finnish.

The most effective breakthrough tank that the Soviets possessed was probably the T-34/85, and that simply because it featured a fast reload rate, decent armour protection and good speed. The IS-2 was IMO not a very good tank, it had a 3 man crew, a terribly slow reload rate (And when your optics are sh*t you want as many chances to fire as possible!) and was virtually as vulnerable from the front as the T-34 considering the type of guns the Germans fielded by the time of its arrival.

That the Soviets didn't mount the 100mm D-10 in the IS-2 instead for the slow 122mm D-25T was a big mistake, and one which atleast a few Soviet designers already had seen coming and were trying to correct but no avail as some of the fools at the top felt that bigger was always better.

 

[tomo pauk]

Yep, with 100mm gun and better optics set the IS-2 would've been the ideal tank of WWII; the ammo count would've benefited too. According to Soviet sources, the 122mm was chosen since it was readily available (100mm was naval calibre until 1944, so the production numbers were not up to what Russians were used to have).

The crew numbered 4, though. Three in turret.

 

[Juha]

Hello Soren
on Finnish A/T capabilities, yes Finns had fewer heavy A/T guns than Germans but we got 210 PaK 40s, and 46 the hybrid PaK 97/38, French 75mm on Pak 38 carriage. Germans had more but if you checked what an average German InfDiv had, they were not well eguipped with PaK40s either and after all there were not SO many 88s around. One reason why Soviet major attacks as a rule went through German MDLs after 43. And one detail correction just for accuracy, we didn't have StuG IVs but IIIs

IIRC JS had 4 man crew

One reason for 122 instead of 100mm was tube and ammo supply situation when the JS was designed, there were lot of more 122mm ammo and 122 tube production was higher.

Juha

 

[Juha]

Hello Tomo Pauk
again you beat me

Juha

 

[tomo pauk]

No problem

 

[Njaco]

Since everyone started to talk about Tigers, Kursk and tank losses, I wanted to post this. Not sure how accurate.

The Battle of Kursk

"...Myth #6: German forces were heavily supplied with Panthers, Tigers, and Elefant tank destroyers. While the Germans did decide to delay their attack so that more new weapons, such as the Panther and the Elefant, would be available, these weapons were not present in large numbers. A grand total of 119 Panthers went into battle with the Gross Deutschland Division (GD) on July 5th. After 65% of those went out of action, either damaged or destroyed, on the first day they ceased to play a crucial role in the remaining week's worth of combat. Note that there were absolutely no Panthers available to any other unit besides GD. The paintings and drawings of Panthers in battle at Prokhorovka are absolutely wrong: none of the three SS Panzergrenadier divisions used Panthers at Kursk. A total of 90 Elefants were available, and all of them were used by the 9th Army to help its divisions crack through the defensive lines on the north face of the Kursk salient. Despite the Soviet accounts which have Elefants participating in practically every battle on the north and south faces, Elefants were used only by the 9th Army, and only on the north face (primarily in the German assault on the town of Ponyri). Most of them were lost in the first few days of the fighting. Tiger tanks were equally rare. On the entire south face of the salient, only 89 Tigers started the battle. About half of these were in the heavy battalions of the three SS Panzergrenadier divisions and the GD. These four divisions started with 12 to 15 Tigers each, but by the second or third day of fighting, they were down to about 4 to 6 operational Tigers each. This situation remained until the end of the fighting. Popular drawings and paintings of waves of Tigers rolling toward the Russians are pure fantasy. The battle where Tigers are supposedly present in droves, at Prokhorovka, featured just 4."

 

[Juha]

Hello Njaco
Your quote is in essence correct but with a number errors in detail
Some correction, the so called Panther Brigade, correct designation PzR 39 which had under it PzAbtn 51 and 52 and had 200 Panthers, of which at least 2 burned out during the march from railhead to initial position. On the first dayy of attack it was stopped by a ravine and had that evening 184 Panthers ready action, on second day it attacked with other tanks of GD the second defence line of Soviets and that evening it had 166 Panthers ready to action, the third day something went badly wrong and in the evening there were only 40 Panthers ready action. On the evning of 10 July only 10, but after that the work of repair org began to show and on 17 July there was 44 Panther operational.
IIRC correctly the total losses of Elefants was 39 out of 90, so most of them were not lost.
The divisional Tigers were in heavy companies of divisional tank regiments not in battalions.
The number of tanks at Prokhorovka depended how one definite the area of battle, if the definition is between railway bank and Psel river at front the figure 4 sounds right without checking the number of operational Tigers on 12 July in Tiger Coy of LAH.

Juha

 

[Njaco]

Thanks for the correction. Thought it was an interesting site.

 

[Soren]

The IS-2 had 4 crew members (Which was too few), you guys are absolutely correct, don't know why I wrote 3.

As for the StuG's in Finnish Service, you were right there Juha, they were infact StuG III's. But the point stands, they were in short supply.

Regarding the weapons that the German divisions had I will have to disagree though Juha, the Germans did on average have a whole lot more guns available at the front line than the Finnish, and esp. if you include the mulitude of tanks TD's deployed. Also you need to remember that the various divisions worked in conjuction with each other, assisting each other when needed.

But you're right about the 88's, many people believe there were huge numbers of these deployed on every front, but in reality not very many were available.

 

[parsifal]

Since everyone started to talk about Tigers, Kursk and tank losses, I wanted to post this. Not sure how accurate.

The Battle of Kursk

"...Myth #6: German forces were heavily supplied with Panthers, Tigers, and Elefant tank destroyers. While the Germans did decide to delay their attack so that more new weapons, such as the Panther and the Elefant, would be available, these weapons were not present in large numbers. A grand total of 119 Panthers went into battle with the Gross Deutschland Division (GD) on July 5th. After 65% of those went out of action, either damaged or destroyed, on the first day they ceased to play a crucial role in the remaining week's worth of combat. Note that there were absolutely no Panthers available to any other unit besides GD. The paintings and drawings of Panthers in battle at Prokhorovka are absolutely wrong: none of the three SS Panzergrenadier divisions used Panthers at Kursk. A total of 90 Elefants were available, and all of them were used by the 9th Army to help its divisions crack through the defensive lines on the north face of the Kursk salient. Despite the Soviet accounts which have Elefants participating in practically every battle on the north and south faces, Elefants were used only by the 9th Army, and only on the north face (primarily in the German assault on the town of Ponyri). Most of them were lost in the first few days of the fighting. Tiger tanks were equally rare. On the entire south face of the salient, only 89 Tigers started the battle. About half of these were in the heavy battalions of the three SS Panzergrenadier divisions and the GD. These four divisions started with 12 to 15 Tigers each, but by the second or third day of fighting, they were down to about 4 to 6 operational Tigers each. This situation remained until the end of the fighting. Popular drawings and paintings of waves of Tigers rolling toward the Russians are pure fantasy. The battle where Tigers are supposedly present in droves, at Prokhorovka, featured just 4."

I think also that you need to treat this guy with some caution. I have not checked the veracity of his claims, but I will concede that they may be correct, with one important omission....he suggests that the tanks temporarily knocked out were recovered.....not true, because within a few days the Russians had overrun the German forward positions, denying the Germans the opportunity to recover the broken down tanks on the battlefield. This caused the germans tank losses to mushroom in the latter part of the campaign, something which this guy does not appear to acknowledge

 

[Juha]

Hello Soren
Yes Finns had, IIRC, only 29 StuG IIIs available on 1 Jun 44 plus some war booty T-34s and KVs rest of our tanks were mostly war-booty T-26s and BTs.
But only German Corps, which A/T numbers in June 44 I found easyly is IX Corps, it had 2 divs (to be exact one InfD and one KorpsAbt) and 26 (or 23) 50mm and 57 75mm or bigger. Numbers are on the eve of Soviet big Summer offensive, Oper Bagration. Not very much when compared to British InfD, which TOE in NW Europe incl 110 A/T guns.

Juha

 

[Juha]

On the 3rd day Panther losses, I dont have a good source on GD sector, but it seems that they were lost during the frontal attack on fortified village of Syrtsevo when attacking tanks run into minefield and were shot up by the strong A/T defences.

Juha

 

[Soren]

By June 1944 the Germans were however well equipped with weapons such as the Panzerfaust and also to a good degree the Panzerschreck. This made the ordinary infantrymen just as much of a hazard to the Soviet armour as did their guns, as many of these hand held AT weapons could penetrate over 200mm of armour, and sloping armour didn't help against them.

So besides the AT guns, tanks TD's the Germans also had weapons at ordinary infantry level which were extremely deadly to even the heaviest Soviet armour available. The Finnish didn't enjoy this luxury, they had to make good with their advantage of having a perfect defensive landscape.

 

[Soren]

Yep, with 100mm gun and better optics set the IS-2 would've been the ideal tank of WWII; the ammo count would've benefited too. According to Soviet sources, the 122mm was chosen since it was readily available (100mm was naval calibre until 1944, so the production numbers were not up to what Russians were used to have).

The crew numbered 4, though. Three in turret.

Don't know if it would've been ideal but it certainly would've been a whole lot better, esp. if other areas such as the radio communication equipment and so was improved as-well.

But one also has to think within the boundaries of possibility, and the gun was possible in the 100mm D-10, but the Soviets still lacked the know how and precision equipment to build proper optics, and their radio equipment wasn't particularly good either. Furthermore the 4 man crew was best increased to a 5 man one, and space inside the tank was best to be increased as-well to permit faster reloads, and that would nessicate a larger tank, probably in the 55 to 60 ton category. And by that point getting an engine powerful enough would've proven a challenge.

 

[Juha]

Hello Soren
Finns had also Panzerfausts and Panzerschrecks. Promlem on the first 2 days was that the stock was so secret that front line troops saw them first time when they were supposed to use them. A couple days late during the fighting in VT line that wasn't anymore that acute problem, troops had had 3-4 days to use to them.
Promlem with these was that they didn't always kill the tank, evemn if they penetrated, Soviet callled those small holes those hits made to armour as kisses of witch, IIRC.

It seems that standard German InfD had in summer 44 30-33 75mm or heavier A/T guns, that incl towed ones, SPs and StuGs, depending has it 2 or 3 inf regiments.

Juha

 

[Soren]

That's odd Juha, cause according to all I've ever read the Panzerfaust Panzerschreck usually only needed just one hit to destroy a Soviet or Western Allied tank. And having seen what happens to a tank being hit by hollow charge weapon I can tell you that I find it highly unlikely that anyone would refer to them as "kisses", esp. seeing that it's a rather violent way of taking out a tank with the crew being cooked alive and all.

I do however remember something similar being said by a Soviet tanker who refered to hits by AT rifles on his KV-1 tank, which is a whole different deal. So are you sure this isn't the same as what you're remembering?

 

[Juha]

Hello Soren
as I wrote, I wrote from memory but in this I'm rather sure. The Soviet antidose was not to lock turret hatches, so that the overpresuure caused by HC penetration dispaciated more easily. If nothing ignitate and nobody was in line of the melted metal, one closed hatches and continued action. It was nasty and bad for ears of course. And same happened in west. The first generation hollow charges had a good penetration power but lethality wasn't on the level of later HC ammo. Of course if something ignated that if the melted metal hit somebody that was lethal. And that goes only turret hits, hull hits had much better chance to ignite something.
And of course it is possible that the Soviets called A/T rifle hits on same name, even very possible that the name was first given to A/T rifle hits and later non lethal HC hits were called on same name.

Juha

Juha

 

[Soren]

Well I must say that I've never heard of it and I highly doubt it as-well. Also opening hatches wouldn't have helped much as besides for the overpressue generated a large number of melting hot fragments are also sent flying around inside the tank.

Also wouldn't it seem rather illogical to close the hatches after already having been almost impossibly lucky to survive the first hit as another one was soon to follow if the tank as much as moved an inch? I'm quite sure the preferred thing to do if you survived a hit by a Panzerfaust or Panzerschreck was to get the heck out of the tank at once and pray you didn't get shot in the attempt!

In short, knowing how hollow charge weapons work and having seen what effect they have many times, I very highly doubt that hits by Panzerfausts Panzerschrecks were ever referred to as "kisses", esp. seeing that 99% of the time it took just a single hit to destroy a tank. The instense shockwave, immense overpressue and temperature rise created inside a tank which armour has been breached by a HC projectile doesn't really seem like something someone would refer to as a "kiss".

 

[Soren]

The Panzerfaust Panzerschreck in action:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DQSFWXzcx14

As one can see the effects of these weapons are very powerful violent, and to no surprise the survival rate of men in tanks hit by these weapons was very low.

 

[Juha]

Hello Soren
as I wrote, HCs were developed over the time, Panzerfaust being one shot weapon, supporting infantry usually in hand. Open hatch is a call for handgrenade.
Bailing out when enemy infantry is within 30-90m is very risky.
Any sources to beck up that 99% claim?
Troops are cynical, that's why they called they tanks Ronson or aircraft Quarented Laquered Coffins etc. And after all the name wasn't kiss but kiss of witch, a bit difference.

Juha