Best German Weapon of WWII

[cheddar cheese]

Is it all in Russian?

[Medvedya]

Not at all! They have an English language service. They love getting letters, so if you have any questions about Russian/Soviet military history, they're guaranteed to answer them for you on the radio!

http://www.vor.ru/world.html

You can write to any of the shows, but 'Moscow Mailbag' is the best one in my opinion. They reply to you personally by letter too, to tell you when your question is going to be broadcast.

Originally Posted by Medvedya

Depend what you mean by better. The German tanks were far superior as the engineering went, but it was this in itself which caused problems. If something broke (as it surely did) you needed specialist tools, parts, and skills to make running repairs.

In the case of Russian tanks, a strategically placed whack from a sledgehammer would often do the trick! Also, Hitler took the view that since sloping armour was used on Russian tanks, to copy it would be saying that the Bolsheviks could produce something useful - completely potty? Quite.

So the Tigers were forced to have flat angular armour everywhere, which added much more weight, and thus gobbled up more fuel, which leads on to the fact that German engines were petrol injection, rather than Diesel ones as was the case on the Russian tanks. It's much harder to start a petrol engine in extreme cold weather, and German tankers had to light fires under their vehicles to warm them enough to start! Again, the Russians had no such problems.

But outside of all of those practical considerations, the German tanks were much more sophisticated bits of kit.

German tanks had some superior engineering, particularly in the sights. But beyond that they had little advantage. The Tiger I was designed before the German experiance with sloped Russian armor. The Germans sure did apply the concept of sloping armor as soon as they saw it, as evidenced by the Panther and Tiger II designs.

While it is true some Russian tanks were built in such a hurry that they were flawed, most commonly the seams at a corner not fitting, this was hardly the norm. The T-34/85 is easily the superior tank when compared to the Panther in terms of reliability, mobility, and armor quality. It's gun was also about equal. And because they ran on diesel fuel, rather than gasoline, they were much more able to sustain a penatrating hit.

As German armor got thicker, it got softer. Armor quality on the Tiger and especially the Tiger II was poor, relying on sheer mass rather than quality to provide protection. Mass has to be moved, and these tanks were relatively immobile as a result. Russian thick armor on tanks like the JS-II was of much better quality than that on the Tigers.

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Lunatic

[cheddar cheese]

Originally Posted by Medvedya

Not at all! They have an English language service. They love getting letters, so if you have any questions about Russian/Soviet military history, they're guaranteed to answer them for you on the radio!

http://www.vor.ru/world.html

You can write to any of the shows, but 'Moscow Mailbag' is the best one in my opinion. They reply to you personally by letter too, to tell you when your question is going to be broadcast.

Cool! Ill look into that

[Medvedya]

Originally Posted by RG_Lunatic

As German armor got thicker, it got softer. Armor quality on the Tiger and especially the Tiger II was poor, relying on sheer mass rather than quality to provide protection. Mass has to be moved, and these tanks were relatively immobile as a result. Russian thick armor on tanks like the JS-II was of much better quality than that on the Tigers.

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Lunatic

The trouble is, the harder the armour, the more brittle it gets. The British who evaluated the T34 found the armour to be of a reasonably high quality (even with roughness of castings) and put it on par with some of the better German armour.

But while armour hardness is relevant, it is by no means the only important factor.

While high face hardness will help the armour defeat glancing impacts from soft-steel slugs, it also will tend to face-crack on heavy impact. Under these conditions, the strength and ductility of the metal behind the point of impact will determine whether the shock wave progressing through the metal thickness will break metal away from the inner face.

So, whilst the 45 mm front armour of the T-34 gives it a protection equivalent of about 140 mm, making it immune to the Tigers 88 mm gun, this was often offset by the nasty tendency of the brittle Russian armour to collapse when hit by a large round.

Originally Posted by Medvedya

The trouble is, the harder the armour, the more brittle it gets. The British who evaluated the T34 found the armour to be of a reasonably high quality (even with roughness of castings) and put it on par with some of the better German armour.

But while armour hardness is relevant, it is by no means the only important factor.

While high face hardness will help the armour defeat glancing impacts from soft-steel slugs, it also will tend to face-crack on heavy impact. Under these conditions, the strength and ductility of the metal behind the point of impact will determine whether the shock wave progressing through the metal thickness will break metal away from the inner face.

So, whilst the 45 mm front armour of the T-34 gives it a protection equivalent of about 140 mm, making it immune to the Tigers 88 mm gun, this was often offset by the nasty tendency of the brittle Russian armour to collapse when hit by a large round.

Russian armor was not really brittle (unless it was defective which some was). There is an ideal hardness. When tested, Tiger II armor was found to have a very high hardness on the face, up near a brinell of 700, but in just a few mm this dropped down to around 200. Most German late war armor lacked the face hardening. Russian armor was found to have a face hardness of something around 450 and was pretty consistantly 350-375 or so thereafter.

You are right, very hard armor tends to be brittle, but soft armor is also bad. When armor like on the Tiger II is hit, it does not need to be fully penetrated to kill the crew. Spalling (liqified steel) off the opposing face from the hit can easily do the job. The best armor is hard but not too hard on the face but is not soft underneath. Russian armor, especially near the end of WWII, was nearly ideal for the tech of the time.

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Lunatic

Originally Posted by RG_Lunatic

Russian armor was not really brittle (unless it was defective which some was). There is an ideal hardness. When tested, Tiger II armor was found to have a very high hardness on the face, up near a brinell of 700, but in just a few mm this dropped down to around 200. Most German late war armor lacked the face hardening. Russian armor was found to have a face hardness of something around 450 and was pretty consistantly 350-375 or so thereafter.

You are right, very hard armor tends to be brittle, but soft armor is also bad. When armor like on the Tiger II is hit, it does not need to be fully penetrated to kill the crew. Spalling (liqified steel) off the opposing face from the hit can easily do the job. The best armor is hard but not too hard on the face but is not soft underneath. Russian armor, especially near the end of WWII, was nearly ideal for the tech of the time.

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Lunatic

At the same time though, hard armour can be just as lethal. When an A.P round hits it, a few large chunks of armour pop inward to make a hole a bit bigger than the diameter of the projectile. These chunks may initially be moving fairly quickly, but having broken out at a relatively low force, they are probably barely even warm. Thus the damage they can do is minimal. The projectile itself, having lost little velocity, careers onwards. If it ricochets off the gun or a wall, it may spend all of its energy bouncing around tens or hundreds of times inside, with all the gory consequences.

For a given incoming round, the odds are very much higher that hard armour will result in a penetration. The reason that the results of a soft-armour penetration are so much more violent is that the armour died its own violent death trying to keep the projectile away from the crew. You're much, much more likely to end up dead behind hard armour than behind soft armour.

That depends on a lot of qualities of the armor itself.

Very soft armor is not good, it spalls to much. Very hard armor is not good, it shatters too much. The best armor is relatively hard on the face (but not extremely so) and "firm" underneath. This gives the best chance of defeating the shell on the surface, and having it bounce away, but if that fails, minimizes the damage.

Modern armor is generally 500 brinnel, but of course materials are better all around. In WWII armor of 250-350 brinnel was about the best it got, depending on ductility and tensil strenght qualities. Impurities in the armor, and uniformity of carbon content, were huge hurdles for that time.

Probably the best armor of WWII was the US tempered armor plates, which had both relatively high hardness and good tensil strength, but these were limited to a maximum thickness of about 1 inch and had to be flat. Tempered armor plates were used in aircraft, and you sometimes see one or more of them attached to the front of a Sherman.

German WWII armor became soft because they had very limited supplies of tungston for machine tools. 375 brinnel is about the hardest that could be machined with a tungston bit, and without such a bit it really drops dramatically. There was a huge political battle within the German war machine as to whether the available tungston should be used for making armor, or as penetators to defeat enemy armor.

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Lunatic

[Medvedya]

Originally Posted by RG_Lunatic

German WWII armor became soft because they had very limited supplies of tungston for machine tools. 375 brinnel is about the hardest that could be machined with a tungston bit, and without such a bit it really drops dramatically. There was a huge political battle within the German war machine as to whether the available tungston should be used for making armor, or as penetators to defeat enemy armor.

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Lunatic

This in itself leads on to an interesting bit of economic warfare. Portugal’s economic success hinged on its rich tungsten ore deposits. The Nazis were totally dependent on Portugal and Spain for its tungsten supplies.

Germany’s machining industry used tungsten carbide almost exclusively, whereas the U.S. was still largely using inferior molybdenum tipped tools, primarily because of the cartel agreement held with Krupp's of Essen concerning carboloy or cemented tungsten carbide. Britain and the U.S. agreed that Germany’s minimum requirements for tungsten were 3,500 tons per year.

Considering the quantity the Nazis required and the extraordinary means they went to aquire supplies of the ore, the Allies correctly guessed that for the Nazis, tungsten was a vital resource. It was equally important to the Allies, but the Allies were not solely dependent upon Portugal or Spain and could obtain tungsten from other sources.

Thus, one of the Allied goals was to deprive Nazi Germany of as much tungsten ore as possible. In this end, the Allies bought as much tungsten as possible from Portugal. The competition for the ore was intense and by 1943, to Portugal’s benefit, the price of ore had increased 775 percent over pre-war rates.

[plan_D]

The Panzerfaust for impact on the battlefield, alone. No other weapon caused such a dramatic rethink in armoured conflict. It was not the fact that this RPG was the best because it wasn't, what made it have such a large impact was the fact that it was one shot, one kill then drop it and run off. Disposable weaponary, easily mass-produced and deadly.

Soviet tank crews were forced to formulate ideas to cover every single part of the battlefield because German tank hunters could be anywhere. In Berlin, 1945, when the IS-2s started rolling down the German streets it was always one on the left covering the right, one on the right covering the left and one at the back covering both and ready to move up. Why? Because they knew that anyone could be in a building, cellar, under rubble anywhere with a Panzerfaust. Shoot it, and run off into the streets.

The U.S Bazooka was a heavy piece of machinery, and often required two people to work it efficiently. When an enemy armoured column is rolling through the streets, you want to be fast and mobile to hit and not be hit the Panzerfaust gave you this ability.

It's always hard when you only have one to choose because both the Mg-42 and Stg. 44 were brilliant pieces of weaponary and certainly they were revolutionary.
I would like to point out though that some 500,000 Stg. 44s were used by the Eastern German Army after World War 2. The Russians would have certainly seen them...

On the tank issue, going back to basics, the T-34/85 was not as good as the Panther Ausf G. The sloped armour on the Panther gave it more frontal protection than the Tiger Is slab-sided armour. After the intial clutch problems were sorted on the Ausf A the Panther proved to be reliable, it was fast and mobile. The 6th Coldstream Guards captured a Panther Ausf G that had been abandoned in full working order in the Ardennes Offensive, nicknamed it Cuckoo. They remark on the Panthers ability to hold the road in icy conditions when their tanks (most likely Churchills) were slipping and sliding all over.
The cannon on the Panther was superior to the T-34/85, the optics, the radio, the armour, the weapon on the Panther were all superior to that of the T-34/85. In fact, the comparable Russian tanks to the Panther would be the IS-1 and IS-2. The IS-2 could destroy the Panther at 1000m, the Panther could return the favour at 800m. Their armour was almost equal, the Panther was superior in equipment (Radio and optics) so had more tactical ability on top of more actual chance of striking the target.
The Panzerkampfwagen V Ausf G 'Panther' was probably the best all round tank of World War 2 but was unfortunately over-shadowed by Germanys dying war and the constant madness in Hitler to build bigger and bigger tanks.

Late in the war, everyone with a bit of sense realises that Germany was running low on...well...everything. This affected its tanks, of course, but it doesn't make the tank design any worse.

On the King Tiger, not one single King Tiger was destroyed through a frontal penetration. There is absolutely no evidence that this could have been achieved, in battle conditions. The only pictures of a King Tiger destroyed in such a way are from months after the war, when Russians were testing weapons on a captured Tiger II. And we all know, that sat in a field with a A-19 122mm cannon being rolled up at optimum range isn't battle conditions. The King Tiger also had, in that nice shiney slanted turret, the most powerful tank cannon of the war the KwK43 L/71 and the presence of the Tiger Royal alone caused fear.

Now, I'll leave it there. Feel free to state how unreliable and heavy the King Tiger was. Throw in a little bit about bridges, and the fact that most couldn't support it. And then, hopefully, state the malfunctions on the Panther Ausf A that caused it to set itself alight. And it's poor performance during Kursk with these malfunctions...

Well, only if you compare the 1943 T-34 to the late 1944 Panzer V Ausf. G.

Let's compare it to the 1944 T-34/85 okay? And of course keep in mind the Panther is a 45500 KG tank compared to the T-34/85's 32,000 kg, so it's not really the same class of tank.

Production quantity (WWII timeframe only) - Panther Ausf. G: 3126 T-34/85 (1944): 17680 (T-34 wins)
Main Gun - Panther Ausf. G: 75mm KwK 42 L/70 T-34/85 (1944): 85mm gun ZiS-S-53 (tie)
Traverse (360 deg) - Panther Ausf. G: Hydrolic 60 secs. T-34/85 (1944): Electric 21 secs (T-34 wins)
Sight - Panther Ausf. G: TZF12a T-34/85 (1944): TSh-16 MK-4 (tie)
Fuel type - Panther Ausf. G: gasoline T-34/85 (1944): diesel (T-34 wins)
Power/wt. ratio - 15.4 hp/ton T-34/85 (1944): 16.3 hp/ton (T-34 wins)
ground pressure - Panther Ausf. G: 12.8 psi T-34/85 (1944): 11.1 psi (T-34 wins)
Turning radius - Panther Ausf. G: 10.0 m T-34/85 (1944): 7.6 m (T-34 wins)
Max. climbing gradient - Panther Ausf. G: 30 deg. T-34/85 (1944): 35 deg. (T-34 wins)
Fording depth - Panther Ausf. G: 1.9m T-34/85 (1944): 1.3m (Panther wins)
Range (km, on/off road) - Panther Ausf. G: 250/100 T-34/85 (1944): 300+/180+ (T-34 wins)
Speed (kph, on/off road)- Panther Ausf. G: 55/30 T-34/85 (1944): 55/30 (tie)
Turret Armor (Front/Side/Rear/Top) -
----- Panther Ausf. G: 110mm@79deg/45mm@65deg/45mm@65deg/16mm@0-6deg
----- T-34/85 (1944): 90mm@round/75mm@70deg/52mm@80deg/20mm@0-14deg (close but I give this to the T-34, the sides and rear are far superior)
Hull Armor (Front/Side/Rear/Bottom) -
----- Panther Ausf. G: 60mm@35deg/40mm@90deg/40mm@60deg/16-30mm@0deg)
----- T-34/85 (1944): 45mm@30deg/45mm@0deg/45mm@45deg/20mm@0deg (Panther wins)
Superstructure Armor (Front/Side/Rear/Top) -
----- Panther Ausf. G: 80mm@35deg/50mm@60deg/(i don't have fig. for rear)/40&16mm@0deg
----- T-34/85 (1944): 45mm@30deg/45mm@50deg/45mm@42deg/20mm@0deg (Panther wins)
Mantael - Panther Ausf. G: 100mm@round T-34/85 (1944): 90mm@round (Panther wins)

So, as I see it the Panther wins only in armor thickness in some catagories. But, Russian tank armor was better than German tank armor, having a brinnel value of around 350 as compared to German armor with a brinnel of only about 200 by this point in the war. Given this difference, it is not at all clear that the Panther really wins in the armor catagory. Furthermore, given it's 50% greater weight, the Panther has no where near 50% better armor protect even if the armor quality were equal.

In terms of mobility the T-34 wins almost every catagory. And, the value of running on diesel as opposed to gasoline is huge. Gasoline burns and explodes easily, diesel does not. This fact also allows the T-34 to safely carry external fuel tanks extending its combat range tremendously. And the much faster turret traverse speed is a huge advantage to the T-34.

As for radio equipment, the T-34/85 carried a variety of radios. But by late 1944 the RSB-1, RSB-FZT as well as the earlier 9RM and 94S sets were in use. However this is really not significant. By the beginning of 1945 over 40,000 radious had been provided to the Soviets by the USA, and large number also by the British (I don't have a figure). About 1/3rd of the Soviet tanks carried US/British radio sets. Futhermore the USA supplied the Soviet's with over 5 million radio tubes. The radio advantage the German's enjoyed earlier in the war was huge, but by the time of the Panther Ausf. G, Soviet radios were not that bad as compared to German radios, both had sets with about a 5-10 mile voice range in almost every tank.

As for the gun, the German 75mm KwK 40L/48 was superior against tanks as compared to the Soviet 85mm ZiS-S-53, but the 85 mm was superior against other targets (it fired a 50% larger round). Tanks are not really meant to fight other tanks, that is the job of tank destroyers. Also, the costly and complicated production of the Panther meant the T-34/85 vastly outnumbered them on the battle field.

As a general "tank", I think the T-34 was better than the Panther due to its superior range and mobility. For tank vs. tank combat, it is really not fair to compare the T-34/85 with the Panther Ausf. G given the huge difference in weights. As you stated, the JS-2 is the more legitimate comparision both in weight and numbers produced if you're looking at pure tank combat battling it out on open ground.

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Lunatic

[plan_D]

Excuse me that was a nice little comparison and completely bias in your favour. You mention the cannons and without giving the penertration capability you call it a tie. No, my friend. The Panthers 75mm was superior to that of the T-34s 85mm.

The optical sights on the T-34/85 only had a range of 2km, the Panthers had a range of 5km. Panther wins. See, just by naming them doesn't mean you can pass it off as a tie.

The armour on the Panther was just plain thicker and it had more armour protection. It was a superior tank, and by the way the T-34/85 was only upgraded once during World War 2 to the T-34/85-I so I can compare any T-34/85 with the Panther G and it be fair.

The radio equipment is actually quite important. While Russian tank crews were seen doing flag signals on the battlefield, the Germans had excellent radio coverage which increased their tactical capability. Shame on you for trying to write it off as being unimportant.

I am stating in tank on tank combat, the Panther is a better tank clear cut. The fact that Germany was dying doesn't make the Panther worse than the T-34 as it out-classed it, pure and simple. The losses to the T-34 by Panther alone show this.

If we're negating the comparison because of weight, the Panzer IV Ausf H was a fair and even match for the T-34, of any variant.

Originally Posted by plan_D

Excuse me that was a nice little comparison and completely bias in your favour. You mention the cannons and without giving the penertration capability you call it a tie. No, my friend. The Panthers 75mm was superior to that of the T-34s 85mm.

The optical sights on the T-34/85 only had a range of 2km, the Panthers had a range of 5km. Panther wins. See, just by naming them doesn't mean you can pass it off as a tie.

The armour on the Panther was just plain thicker and it had more armour protection. It was a superior tank, and by the way the T-34/85 was only upgraded once during World War 2 to the T-34/85-I so I can compare any T-34/85 with the Panther G and it be fair.

The radio equipment is actually quite important. While Russian tank crews were seen doing flag signals on the battlefield, the Germans had excellent radio coverage which increased their tactical capability. Shame on you for trying to write it off as being unimportant.

I am stating in tank on tank combat, the Panther is a better tank clear cut. The fact that Germany was dying doesn't make the Panther worse than the T-34 as it out-classed it, pure and simple. The losses to the T-34 by Panther alone show this.

If we're negating the comparison because of weight, the Panzer IV Ausf H was a fair and even match for the T-34, of any variant.

The penetration does not really matter that much, both tanks could kill the other at reasonable ranges (1000 meters). While the Panther's gun was superior against tanks, the T-34/85's gun was superior against all other targets. Neither could effectively hit and kill the other at significantly greater range than the other could, perhaps the Panther had a small advantage in this respect. On the otherhand, the T-34 could track a moving enemy tank better.

Losses to the T-34 by the Panther really do not show anything because in general the Soviets were on the offensive. This means the Panther's generally was hidden and had the first shot.

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Lunatic

[plan_D]

Of course the penertration and optics matter. The idea of tank warfare is to hit before being hit. The cannon gave the Panther the distinct advantage in this field, the most important field in tank warfare.

And the T-34/85 could not destroy a Panther at 1000m. Try 600m with a lucky hit.

On the optics note, 3km is a pretty damn big advantage actually. The Panther would strike down several T-34s before they were even in effective range, it's a well known fact and it happened all the time.

And the German defence measures in Russia didn't have them hiding their tanks all the time actually. It was the idea of mobile reserve and mobile "Flexy" defence. With local counter-attacks at flanks, this meant that tanks were used in the open in more cases than not. And even with that, the Panther still accounted for many more T-34s than T-34s accounted for Panthers.

And I forgot something there, the Panthers cannon could fire HE rounds which are required for taking out AT Artillery, so the Panthers cannon was just as good, most likely better at taking on other targets. In fact, a Russian AT cannon was more credit than a Soviet tank.

Well sure, since there were a lot more T-34's than Panthers to be killed (10:1?). And most of the T-34's killed were earlier T-34/76 and T-34/85 1943 model tanks.

Dead from the front the Panther did have an advantage, but from the side the T-34/85 (1944) was actually a little tougher.

After Kursk, where the German's got slaughtered, most of the "flanking attacks" were done with. The Germans often took up ambush positions, especially as the fighting moved into more and more rural terrain. Soviet doctrine was to push through by force of numbers, so of course they took higher losses. Stalin didn't care as long as the Germans were defeated.

If you look at the figures on the gun 85mm ZiS-S-53, it has sufficient penetration to kill a Panther from the front at 800 meters. The Panther's gun can kill the T-34/85 (1944) out to perhaps 1200 meters, so the Panther does have the advantage, but its not so huge as you are making it out to be. And again, the 85mm gun was more effective against infantry and other target types.

Again, the comparison is not fair if you are looking at equal numbers of tanks facing each other on open ground with no infantry support. For this you would need to compare it to the JS-2 (IS-2 as renamed after Stalin's death), which has better armor to the front, and totally outclasses the Panther armor to the sides. Either that or you have to consider the 6:1 numeric advantage of the T-34/85 (1944 model only) over the Panther Ausf. G.

The HE round from the 75mm Panther gun was smaller (2/3rds) that of the 85mm T-34 gun, so it was not equal in that respect.

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Lunatic