German tanks in WW2. Were they really that bad?

reply to post by alldaylong

Jet engine development started in Germany in the mid 30s and enjoyed generous corporate support. As a result, Germany was the first country to fly a jet-propelled aircraft.

source

The first functional jet fighter planes were recovered at the end of WW2. Regardless of who constructed the engine, they had the first working fighter that was used as a basis for the Soviet and American developments.

Good read, my Uncle served for the Canadian Army and this is what he had to say about the sherman tank as well as the link I will provide at the end of this post.
"The high velocity German guns that could easily penetrate the Sherman's armor, coupled with vulnerable ammunition storage, gave the Sherman the nickname "Ronson," taken from the Ronson cigarette lighter. This was based on the Ronson Company's famous slogan, "lights first time, every time."
I think they had to use what they got and from my memories they did not like the sherman at all, at least to compared to what the Germans had for fire power and armour.
Link
www.chuckhawks.com...
Regards, Iwinder

reply to post by DarthMuerte


It's all conjecture I agree. However if the Germans win the Eastern Front where they had the bulk of all their military, it frees up a lot of troops and hardware. Plus they gain access to the Caucasus oil fields, eventually linking up with forces from North Africa.

I don't think they would have Lost North Africa, they would have taken Malta, Egypt and Suez. Sicily and Italy never get invaded...ect. It would have set in motion a whole other chain of events.
America would only have had Britain and the Pacific to work from. It's a great "what if point" in the war, that's for sure.

reply to post by Evolutionsend


You can compare the two "Inventors" here:-

inventors.about.com...

reply to post by alldaylong


You mean the guys that got to copy the captured design? Why? Read between the lines a little bit.

reply to post by Iwinder


The Sherman was his favorite, as a driver. I'm sure a gunner wouldn't have said that. He claims the Sherman was pretty fun to drive, and when compared to the larger m60, there's just no contest as to which he would rather be driving. He drove the M60 on his first tour to Vietnam though, being in an area that's not conducive to heavy tanks, it's not hard to see why he would not want to drive one.

reply to post by Evolutionsend


The only lines i need to read are:-

Sir Frank Whitles Jet engine was successfully bench tested in APRIL 1937

Van Ohain's was bench tested in SEPTEMBER 1937

That makes Whittles the first successfully built jet engine by 5 months.

End of

As a long time history buff, I will try to put my 2 cents worth. The Wehrmacht was the best trained army of its day. Their tanks over ran europe to the surprise of the rest of the world. The schutzstaffel,(SS) were the most commited fighting units also of its time. The M-48, Great little tank! That being said, it just was under guned with its 60mm main gun as compaired with the german 90mm. It was numbers, pure and simple. we were cranking them out by the thousands! The German army was fighting something like 26 other nations, the big three got most of the credit US, England, Russia. But there where others. Canada, Australia, The Free French, Poland, and the list goes on. All had men that gave their lives in this fight. If your grandfather is still with us, thank him for his service. Mine are gone, but they too fought in the european theater. And to the ones from the pacific theater as well a big thanks goes out to you!

reply to post by alldaylong

Whittle generally gets the credit for inventing the jet engine,however,Campini did get there before him,in fact if you go back to 1910,the Romanian inventor Henri Coanda demonstrated a functional jet engine,but his engine required a conventional internal combustion engine to start the jets impellers

Originally posted by alldaylong
reply to post by Evolutionsend

 

The only lines i need to read are:-

Sir Frank Whitles Jet engine was successfully bench tested in APRIL 1937

Van Ohain's was bench tested in SEPTEMBER 1937

That makes Whittles the first successfully built jet engine by 5 months.

End of

My opinion is that nobody should be arguing about whom invented the jet engine, why?
What good has come from this monstrosity?
Death raining from the sky, pollution to no end, Fast travel times with huge fuel consumption to boot.
Sure it got us into space....so to speak, what good has it done us here?
Ask the Iraqis who survived the bombings how they like jet engines?
It is without a doubt the most effective killing device every made.
How can you brag about this?
Regards, Iwinder

reply to post by Iwinder


Death is something the Naxi's did. We "provide aid".

The Germans had some impressive tanks and tactics. At the end of the day it was logistics that lost them the war.

Tigers were to heavy to expensive and to time consuming to build and sucked a lot of fuel. That aside, they were recognised as the best on the battlefield by the crews.

The Russians had a great tank T34, and built them faster than they could be taken out, about 1200 a month.
The Yanks had the Sherman, piles of crap (reportedly) as they had aircraft engines in them and the fuel required was not a wise choice for the battlefield. They were made as a Tank V Tank weapon, though not up to scratch. US air support kept the Shermans in the battle. 30,000 Sherms were produced to about 2000 Tigers.
Throw in the T34 and the nazis were completely outnumbered.

.....Well thats what I heard anyway

forum.worldoftanks.com.../topic/65529-sherman-tank-was-consider-an-engineering-disaster/page__st__40

reply to post by Evolutionsend

Dang, it left tread marks in the road. That's one way to tell if a tank is around, look for the track marks.

Bad? they were some of the best and some of their worst could take out some of our best.

Nazi engeneering, viehicles (including cars, tanks and planes) was actually known for its quality. The drawback however was that the Germans would produce many different types of tanks and planes for certain conditions, meaning that while in some cases they were extremely well placed in the given environment, in other cases they were terriblly placed. In a long drawn out war like WWII where supply lines were often cut, this was a massive problem. On the other hand the Soviets would mass produce 1-3 different types of planes or tanks and be able to dominate all round. It was a matter of "less is more" if you will.

reply to post by Evolutionsend


Likely someone already answered but it was a Diesel vs. Gasoline issue as I recall.

I hope your saying the Germans were easy to defeat. The millions of dead say otherwise.

reply to post by Blaine91555


Are you referring to my last post? If so, no I was referring to the way that our country currently incites violent crucifixions and calls it "offering aid". The Nazis called it what it was, death.

The scary thing is we are doing to our military exactly what was the downfall of the nazi military. Rather than simple easy to produce equipment we have went further and further down the path of the wunderwaffe, and one day I fear we will pay for it just as the germans did.

reply to post by roguetechie


We have enough weaponry to last this country until we run out of soldiers to issue it to. We even keep old armor in storage.