The Second World War Tank Crisis

[Chris Hall]

And, just to completely kill this debate ....... a tank that did fire a shot in anger during WW2, with French and Polish forces (and possibly German too) was the venerable Renault FT17. Does that make it a WW2 tank ? Of course not - it's a WW1 design. Also the Vickers Medium - an inter-War design that struggled on to the early Desert battles. And the Rolls-Royce Armoured Car ...... the list is long, and probably leads to madness .

But it's good to be able to debate such things. It all adds to the Real History of Armoured Vehicles.

Best wishes, and stay well,

Chris

[John Clarke]

Stephen
I wasn't going to mention the Covenanter. Like it's name sake, it would have been hunted down in the hundreds and killed.
(During the war Rodney)
It's true to say the British finally learned from their mistakes and from 1943 designed and produced a really good all rounder.
A Universal Tank to coin the phrase.
From 1943 the Germans of course went completely in the opposite direction.

[Stephen White]

A "don't know whether to laugh or cry" moment from Dick Taylor's book. Talking about the A24 Cavalier, he says:

"Confusion still reigns about the name: originally referred to as the Cromwell I, the name was changed to Cavalier in August 1942 when the Cromwell II was renamed to become the Centaur, and the Cromwell III became the Cromwell I.... how could that possibly cause problems? (At one point before this there was a suggestion that the A24 might be called the Tiger but it was pointed out that the Germans had got there first)".

[Stephen White]

Another interesting insight:

Dick Taylor notes that in 1942, the British Tank Board specified the priorities for tank design:

1. Reliability
2. Firepower - particularly in the anti-tank role but with a secondary capability against soft targets
3. Speed - as least as good as the German equivalent
4. Radius of action (ie range)
5. Protection - only optimised after the requirements above are satisfied, with a specified minimum
6. Ergonomics (stated as "a good fighting compartment")

This is fascinating. By 1942, most British tanks were chronically unreliable and their firepower was over-matched by German armour protection levels. The Tank Board clearly recognised what needed to be done and the result was two of the best tank designs of the war: Comet and Centurion, the Universal Tank concept which led to the modern main battle tank.

Contrast that with the German position. The German mid-war tanks, Pz III, Pz IV and Tiger were highly effective, capable of significant product development although the Tiger never achieved satisfactory reliability or operational level mobility. From that point onward, things went downhill. I've not seen anyone quote a formal statement of design priorities for the Heereswaffenamt but by 1942 it was probably something like:

1. Firepower
2. Protection
3. Ergonomics
4. Speed
5. Reliability
6. Radius of action

1942 was a turning point in the War and whereas the Allies were going over to the offence, Germany was equipping for defence. That would govern tank design priorities to a certain extent. Nevertheless, whereas the British were heading towards a truly balanced tank design in Comet and Centurion, in Germany, the opposite was true: the King Tiger, JagdTiger, Ferdinand/Elefant were increasingly unbalanced: good firepower, protection and ergonomics but very poor reliability, mobility, radius of action. Their direction of travel turned out to be a dead end.