ORIGINAL: .50Kerry
ORIGINAL: Ursa MAior
ORIGINAL: Rune Iversen
The T34 was routinely holed by any of the upgraded german guns from 1942 forwards and is no different than the Sherman in this regard.
Onyl the 75mm german PAK 40 (?) was really effective vs the T34. Not the smaller calibers. But in Africa the PzIIIJ with 50mmL60 was capable dealing with M4s armour.
Yeah, but who here is actually proposing such things?
I no way I want to start a flame war I can send you PM about it.
Right, but magically, somehow when he "Super 34/85" faced the Sherman in Korea and on the Israeli frontier *somehow* the Sherman spanked the "Super 34" with the 76.
I have an inkling it had something in common with why MK IIs with pea shooters defeated the best Tanks in the world fielded by the French in 1940.
You can argue the physics 'til the cows come home and lose, I have posted detailed non-biased and consistent stats on it at the MCSH CoW forum and will be most pelased to reiterate here upon request. Rune is correct from a strategic point of view, if both sides can penetrate each other's armour then armour becomes a lesser concern than killing power in the "mobility/lethality/durability" triad. Germanfan when worshipping the mittens never quite gets around to explaining how a 40 widget tank even if it is 5 times as good as the 5 widget tank is a bargain if there is trainable manpower to man all the 5 widget tanks.
I am *certain* YOU will explain it to me and brief me in on how Wittman won the war with his hotrod though.
I think essentially, this is because Alliedfan tends to go google eyed at numbers, but not explore the context they are deployed in. You see, the fact that Germanfans 40 widget weapon is more expensive is only a disadvantage if Alliedfan can prove that Germanfan could have matched Alliedfans production run on 5 widget weapons.
Fact is, had the Germans binned the Tiger and the Panther, they would still not have produced nearly enough PZIVs to cope with the Tank force they faced on any frontier, never mind two or three frontiers at once.
That essentially made the 40 widget Panther the right strategic option for three reasons.
Firstly, the Germans were bled white on the eastern front. Their focus (given the laughable armament on the Sherm 75) was therefore on what Ivan was producing. His weapons got better and better and finished with the JS III which was as impressive a piece of kit as anyone produced in time to field. Therefore, to compete where it counted, they needed something more than 5000 MK III with the long barrelled 50. Had they gone the 5 widget route, it would be the accounts of German vets that would contain the stories of shells bouncing off, and the argument round here would be why the Germans never produced a Widget wonder.
Secondly, I just don't see that fielding more Panzer IVs was an option given you were essentially fielding a weapon that made more of the opposing Tank force useful. Even if they upped PZ IV production instead of producing the Panther, they weren't going to win the numbers game. However, by fielding more PZIVs, they were increasing the number of Tanks they deployed that didn't give Sherman crews nightmares.
In other words, you can field your 5000 Oliver McCalls (PZIVs), but my 8000 Lennox Lewises (Sherman) would be more worried if you were fielding 3000 Muhammed Alis (Panther). Quality is one way to narrow a number gap, otherwise, why move to the Abrams when you can crank out vast numbers of M60s if you put your mind to it.
Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, if you only have the fuel and logistics to field 1000 weapons, they might as well be 40 widget wonders than 5 widget death traps. This idea that the Germans should have binned the Panther and fielded twice the number of MKIVs extra fails hopelessly in the face of the German logistical situation. The number of weapons (regardless of how many Widgets they were) that were found abandoned clearly shows the Germans couldn't keep what they had supplied in the field. How fielding a lot more would have improved their overall situation is never explained. The only result of binning the Panther and cranking out extra PZ IVs would have been more motionless Tanks, occasionally burnt from the inside, waiting for curious Allied infantry to come across. Fuel and ammo only goes so far, field twice as many tanks and it goes even less.
By the end of the war, the tactical situation had returned to favour the defence in most situations, unless you could amass annihilating firepower as the Soviets tended to in the east. To be sure, I don't think the Germans for all their operational prowess realised this any better than anyone else, but in those operationally and strategically defensive circumstances, the Panther and Tiger made sense because at range, they were difficult to best when you cobined their armour, with the HV weaponry, with German sights.
Regards,
IronDuke
