Wild_Bill_Kelso
Senior Master Sergeant
- 3,231
- Mar 18, 2022
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All the cruiser tank designs came with Close Support options, the 3.7 inch howitzer, but doctrine said tanks fight tanks. Despite this the official organisation of an armoured brigade in 1940 had 166 tanks including 18 CS but it does not look like many CS versions made it to the desert.
The CS tanks were issued on a scale of 2 per squadron (assuming they had two available.)
The 3.7 tank howitzer shared only it's bore dimension with the 3.7in pack howitzer. It was a pretty bad weapon all around.
It mostly fired smoke, sources vary on if it could fire HE or not. Apparently could, if HE was issued, which it often was not and if issued was around 10% of the ammo.
So you might have 4-10 HE rounds to support 14-16 tanks.
The muzzle velocity was 620fps, and the max range was about 2,000yds, however with that low a velocity getting a first or 2nd round hit at long range was nearly impossible.
The projectile weight was 10 1/2 pounds and even with a thin shell wall that is not enough explosive or more importantly, smoke compound, to really do the job.
The 3in Howitzer was the replacement used in the Maltidas, Crusaders, NA didn't see any CS Valentines. CS Matildas filled in for Valentine units at times.
3in How was a marginal improvement. Shell weight was up to 13 1/4-13 7/8lbs but max veleocity was only 700fps. sometimes give lower. Apparently more HE was issued. Against the Japanese HE was the dominate round.
Problem was that the support weapon had to pretty much weight what the 2pdr weighed and balance the same so they could use that aim using the shoulder piece arrangement.
Now try to lob even smoke rounds at targets 1800yds away when it took well over 9 seconds for the shell to arrive. Max range and practical range were not the same thing.
Basically the British tankers had the co-ax gun and firing 2pdr solid shot to deal with any and all battle field targets.
Radio use and Artillery support made advancements during this time but I am guessing it was in fits and starts. By the fall of 1944 the British army had the best rapid responce Artillery support network in the world. How long it took to get there is a question.
I think we will find that there were a host of small changes involved and not a few "key" changes.
Nice because mobile, but they still have 25 pounder, which is similar to a longer ranged 81mm mortar, rather than the 105.British got some Bishops into action.
They also got some M7s into action, together not even 20% of the field artillery.
More 6pdrs, The 6pdrs showed up in the spring but as the months went by their numbers increased.
The 4.5in howitzer was being phased out, not many left in the 2nd 1/2 of 1942 but the last didn't disappear until the end of the NA campaign. Maybe the last dozen hung on for months, I don't know.
Perhaps more artillery shells. 2nd Alamein opened with the greatest artillery bombardment seen in the west since WW I.
Not sure if there were more new guns involved or if all the old junk that was used in 1940/41 was finally gone in 1942.
They had about 100 Crusader IIIs at 2nd Alamein in addition to the American tanks. Not decisive but an indication that the average level of equipment was going up in a number of areas.
More AA guns? More 40mm and 3.7 to defend the front areas? maybe only a few batteries.
From Wiki
"Supercharge started with a seven-hour aerial bombardment focused on Tel el Aqqaqir and Sidi Abd el Rahman, followed by a four and a half-hour barrage of 360 guns firing 15,000 shells.[92][better source needed]"
This was on D +10, Nov 2. quibble with the numbers, The British were firing large numbers of shells on the 10th day of the battle.
Trying to sort through which area was responsible for which success in the battle is going to be a long undertaking.
You have hit some of the key points. A late 1944 Infantry division had almost 1000 radios, a 1939/40 division had around 40.How long it takes depends on a lot of factors, like are the artillery guns specifically targeted for that particular sector, do they have target reference points already, does the spotter who actually sees the target have authority to call artillery to that spot (or does somebody have to approve it)
And here was a difference in sights.German machine guns outranged the allied (except for M2) and that was another problem for the tankers, making them have to button up a lot.
I am not sure the British got many (or any) towed 105mm Howitzers. Could be wrong.The other biggest change on the ground I already covered - the 105 mm howitzer I think has a much better chance to knock out soft targets, over a wider area etc.
I am not sure the British got many (or any) towed 105mm Howitzers. Could be wrong.
They did get the M-7s but I don't know how much of the artillery park that made up.
There is no doubt the 25pdr was behind the curve in regards to it's HE performance regardless of what other attributes it had. It could outrange the 105mm but just barely.
The 5.5in was replacing both the 6in Howitzer and the 6in Field gun so things may have been getting more efficient even if the number of tubes wasn't changing much.
The two old weapons only had 8 degrees of traverse and so had limited fields of fire without digging out the recoil spade and repositioning the entire gun in the gun pit.
The 6 in Howitzer also only had 11,400yds of range.
Trying to sort through which area was responsible for which success in the battle is going to be a long undertaking.
True for this battle, and most other land battles I've read up on.
So on that basis alone, I'd say clearly, air forces were playing a major role in the shift of momentum toward the Allies.
These would all be Kittyhawk/P-40EsMarch - April 1942 Hurricane fighter bombers start carrying up to two 250 lb bombs, Kittyhawks carrying one 500 lb or 1,000 lb plus two 250 lb bomb, or three 500 lb bombs (later up to three 1,000 lb bombs for very short trips). (I)
The extra power varies with altitude and around 10,000ft the extra power was closer to 100hp. The 300hp was a lot closer to 6,000ft.This meant at lower altitudes where they usually flew (6-10,000 ft), they had potentially a lot more (300 hp+) power,
The P-40Ms( with the Higher altitude engine) was first delivered on On Nov 25th 1942. Too late for 2nd El Alamein. Production lasted until Feb 13th 1943. Of the 600 built 595 went to the British Commonwealth, Russia and Brazil. Some were passed back to the US in India to the South Pacific area.July 1942 Kittyhawk III (mostly P-40K type with some P-40M) arrive, with improved capability (K much faster down low, up to 1500+ HP, M with higher critical altitude of about 17k' rather than 12k for De and E type)