Soviet Reaction to the Tiger & Panther Tanks
Be sure to get Peter's book here: is-2tank.com
In this video we look at what the Soviet Head Armour and Tank Directorate ordered to combat the Tiger tank. Additionally, we also look at some of the changes they introduced in order to combat the Panther tank as well.
Disclaimer: I was invited by the Tank Museum at Bovington in 2022.
/ thetankmuseum
tankmuseum.org/
Cover: War Thunder screenshot.
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Samsonov, Peter: IS-2: Development, Design and Production of Stalin’s War Hammer. Military History Group: London, UK, 2022. Get it at: is-2tank.com
Samsonov, Peter: GABTU's Answers to the Tiger. Tank Archives, 2013. www.tankarchives.ca/2013/03/g..., last accessed: 21st February 2023.
Tiger Fibel (Tiger Primer).
yuripasholok.livejournal.com/
#SovietsReact #Tiger #tank
00:00 Intro
00:23 The involved Organizations
01:17 The Requirements
04:30 What and how were the Requirements fulfilled?
09:03 But what about the Panther?
11:15 Summary
Get Peter's book here: is-2tank.com
Hi Military, you should tell Finland to get some land back. Ukraine made it easy now.
Did you recently have an overdose of Warhammer 40k Orks? If so, I approve.
MOAR DAKA! Germans should have painted their tanks red for additional speed :p
but German tanks also was reaction to soviet ones, like when they met T-34 and KV-1
WOW did they have ADHD. So crazy that they couldn't whittle these goals down and simply make them more ubiquitous, while immediately engineering and making likely responses to the obvious response Germany would make to the improvements.
I didn't realize how much I needed to hear a serious Austrian accent pronounce "dakka", thank you, made my day!
Any time!
Nitpick, but pretty sure it's just "More DAKKA" (with a single DAKKA) and it refers to more volume of fire in general, not more firepower in general. So, more DAKKA better describes US tendency to put one or more .50 cals on everything. "What's that? A truck? Needs more DAKKA. Add two .50 cals on it."
@MaxRavenclaw but when orks fire their weapons, they shout "dakka dakka" which, with enough repitition is "attack, attack" slurred.
@@Lightman0359 I was more referring to the trope. To be fair I haven't played enough WH40k games in a while to say for sure, but as far as I know, the expression is either "DAKKA DAKKA" or "More DAKKA", but no "More DAKKA DAKKA". Correct me if I'm wrong.
@MaxRavenclaw it shows the calibre of this community that the nuances of orkish is what gets argued about... But yeah, I see what you mean. For some deep lore, there is a forge world (think ww2 era Detroit or Kharkiv but an entire planet) named Mordakka by the orks who captured it, since it gave them more dakka, the original name was Mordax
If you read Peter Samsonov's books (and I've read and recommend all three, especially his new IS-2 book), you see a bewildering list of Soviet agencies in charge of some aspect of tank development. Furthermore, these agencies and factories seem to get constantly reorganized throughout the the 1930s and 1940s. If there is someone here who is knowledgeable about both Soviet tank development and tank development in one of the other major armored powers in this time period, I would be interested to know if the Soviet situation is unique and therefore possibly a feature of its political system in general and Stalin in particular, or if this sort of constant flux was just a function of trying to get tanks right in a period of massive developmental shifts.
The Soviets would rename "Design Bureaus" if the head was purged or died.
Generally speaking, dictatorships are not efficient in structure or function. People become afraid to do anything for fear of offending the person in power. The current Chinese communist government is a good example of this. Everyone is afraid of Mr. Xi, so they don't do anything that seems like they are thinking on their own because Mr. Xi might have them demoted or executed. It is always the same with totalitarian regimes. So things that should be simple enough to organize become loaded with apprehension. And weird things happen when no one really knows what is going on, like the current spy balloon that the Chinese military floated over North America. Apparently Xi is very angry about this but no one knew that he would respond that way. The right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing. That is why Stalin died the way he did. He went to bed and had a stroke but everyone was too afraid of disturbing his sleep to check when he did not arise at his usual time. So medical attention was not able to be given to him due to him being a murderous tyrant. Xi may depart in a similar fashion. Hitler and his fascist Nazi party worked with private industry and were able to be more sensible (!?) in their organization of the economy. In so many ways fascists and communists are similar totalitarian dictatorships, but the economy runs somewhat better under fascist governments because they work with industry instead of taking it over and having to reinvent the wheel, so to speak.
A great series of videos to watch to give some insight to the situation is The Chieftain's armored doctrine videos. He has one for each of the major powers and while it doesn't go into the details of all the agencies involved, it's probably the best thing out there for the overall circumstances 1918-1939 that created the armored forces that fought the war.
@@brucenorman8904 Soviet give the same task to different bureaus and then they put the resources to the winner. But everything in this side of the world is purge and deaths because you know, is what everyones says.
I know that the Brits played around with the yanki’s sherman tank, even after the yanks said that the gun was the biggest possible for the size of the turret in the sherman………….. And, with a clever bit of jiggery pokery, the Brits squeezed a gun in, that was capable of taking out everything except for the mous(I think that was the only one), and that was the Firefly, which the yanks were unhappy about, because they refused to use anything other than a yanki gun, even though the firefly(aka mayfly, or anything that used a C in the designation, because C denotes the use of the 17pounder) was a very capable beast, but they only US used Firefly that I can find evidence of, is that one tank used in the yankis constant history rewriter, hollywood, where they used one in the double rewriting of history, Fury(which according to most sources wasn’t used by the US, and so that’s one rewrite), which is based on the story of one of the worlds first tanks, which was used in WWI(which is the other rewriting of history, and just another case of yanks stealing other peoples glory, which goes alongside the supposedly needed enigma machine in U571, which is bollox, because the British captured their first German maritime enigma, before the yanks joined the war, and after they had been given the plans and a model from the brave Polish resistance)………..
What you do not see is Stalin constantly interfering in the process to the extent Hitler did. Yes, there were times when Stalin wanted to wrap his fame around a specific tank, but Hitler constantly was approving tank designs and changing things about them. Micromanaging stuff like this is ridiculous.
I disagree. Would apple have become apple if Steve Jobs wasn't a jerk off who was steadfast in his vision? Of course there is such a thing as micro management, Hitler I'm sure did too much of this. That said trusting the process is having faith in a machine which is made of human elements, more specifically imperfect pieces. These imperfect pieces tend to have thier own interests front and center, without focus these conflicting interests tear the the human machine apart.
The thing you gotta understand is that Stalin is originally a HR guy who weaseled his way to the top through controlling hiring, firing and promotions in the communist party by filling the ranks with those loyal to him. The fact that this was his background means that he has a very particular approach to things. He won't directly interfere with design and production unless you're late in schedule or the product doesn't meet inspector specifications. Failure probably means gulag depending on the mood at the time. People are just names on boxes. Hitler on other hand was a Military guy. He served in WW1 and early on in the war, he had a pretty good picture on how war is waged, what soldiers need and what are the horrible shit that commanders can do. This means he would see himself more an authority in the issue than most other leaders would, because he kind of were, even if he was only relatively low ranking soldier. For example, Hitler loved dive bombers because close air support would be something he would have loved to have had access to during WW1 as calling air strike on a bunker wasn't a thing you could feasibly do.
This depiction of Hitler is a popular myth. The surprising fact is that in most situations where Hitler interfered with things like war strategy and armaments, he was actually correct, especially in the first half of the war. Later in the war he made increasingly poor decisions, but by that point it mattered little. Hitler seems to have had a decent understanding of a wide range of topics, which allowed to him put things together and make better decisions than his subordinates. While many of his battlefield commanders were highly skilled, they often lacked proper understanding of the resources, economics and industry aspect of the war. This played out disastrously in Operation Barbarossa and Fall Blau, where Hitler lost faith in his generals because they kept focusing on winning tactical battles and taking cities when Germany was running out of time to capture the oil fields. Hitler's generals should have listened to him, but that is not the impression you will get from their post-war memoirs. As a set of technical examples, Hitler's push to up-armor the Panther and the Panther II project during early development was well-founded, considering the tank would have had only 60mm frontal armor and 40mm sides. If the armor was not increased to 80mm it would have been more vulnerable to US 76mm and Soviet 85mm guns. He also is often slammed for opposing the development of the STG 44 assault rifle. This is false. He did not cancel development of the weapon, and he was opposed to its usage early on because he did not want to send the new weapon to the front in numbers too small to make a difference, and because he recognized that producing the new intermediate cartridge would be too much strain for German industry and logistics. He was proven correct on both counts.
The Heer was responsible for most of that, with a const ant stream of "improvements" to a tank to the point where some models that were produced in large numbers for the Germans had at most 10 tanks produced to the same specifications, then the next ten or so would be made with other changes added. When Willow Run first started production they were having similar problems. So, one of the engineers? went to the Army Air Corps and got them to agree to waiting until a certain number of changes were accumulated before implementing them to the production models. This way they did not have to stop constantly and retool parts of the production line.
I find it interesting to compare the leaders' involvement in the military in general. Hitler seemed to be the most involved, and harmful to Germany's war effort. Churchill was probably second, Stalin third, and Rosevelt probably last, chiming in on the high-level strategy only. Just my impression from what I've seen.
I had no idea that bird strikes on the open end of an SPG (SU 76) was so dangerous. Good to know.
;)
good video mate. just a little extra for you: 10 57mm T-34s were manufactured in late September/ early October 1941 (all fielded in the 21st tank brigade). 1 additional T-34 '57' was manufactured in 1943 and sent to the 100th tank brigade of special purpose at Kursk, but was not used. Factory number 174 manufactured T-34-76s until September 1944, albeit mostly (not not all of them) OT-34 flamethrowing tanks. cheers mate! Francis Pulham
Not an expert, but certainly familiar. The war production board of the U.S. had way to many people with veto power over designs of specific pieces of equipment. Although, based on my reading (including the excellent "a war to be won" by Murray) the biggest factor in American tank design was actually making sure all tanks were designed for easy transport by rail and transport vessel. There were decisions that affected combat performance that were made entirely on the basis of not making rail transport difficult.
@Black Lesbian Poet Begone, Bot. You do not belong here.
@Black Lesbian Poet no
@@chadblake7142 And yet the US Army fielded one of the best medium tanks of the war despite those limitations.
@@executivedirector7467 One of the best in terms of reliability and numbers, that is, having serious competition with T-34 which had all that + typically better gun.
The easiest way to tell the ISU-152 from SU-152 is the SU has horizontally angled side armour that extends to the back, making the rear of the compartment narrow, similar to the front sides, kind of making a hexagon. The ISU simply has vertically angled plates near the back and the compartment stays almost a perfect box. The other way would be the deck. The ISU has the tent shaped grille where the SU has split flat ones.
Maybe this is just me but I find the SU-152 has its casemate angled more than the ISU-152, so they aren't that hard to tell apart really.
Isu is just a more accurate bonk than su. Stalin guides it more.
00:57 Well played Bernard, well played. 🤣 Nevah enuff DAKKA!
As we all know, there is never enough Dakka Dakka
‘Boy that’s a big mark 4, eh Ivan?’
Great work in making this video. Brilliant. Well done.
As usual, informative and well researched. Thank you my friend ;)
Going to Bovington (from US) Tankfest this summer with may dad, brothers, and sons. Can't wait to see these cats in action, in person!
Very good video. The Soviet tank design teams often clashed in terms of design philosophy and the camp which wanted to focus on reducing the effect of manufacturing existing designs and removal of unnecessary designs dominated in late 1942. This is why each version of the T34/76 tended to not offer much in terms of improved combat capacity, but was easier and simpler to manufacture. This was a key reason for the high production numbers the soviets achieved and this did work. There was a major push to discontinue the production of the KV tank as well, which was also gaining traction by early 1943. However when the Soviets first encountered the Tiger in late 1942 the opposing camp gained influence. The Soviets reaction of redeploying the 85mm Flak to an AA role to deal with the tiger was significant, as German aircraft was still a major issue in early 1943 and flak guns are not easy to hide. I suspect the Tiger and Panther were a significant factor in the development of the T34/85 and the continuation of the heavy tank concept, such as KV85, IS-1 and so on. The SU-85 and SU-100 may also have been a result of this, although I am uncertain. The SU-76, SU-122 and SU-152 were most likely a result of another driver, but perhaps the iSU-122 may well have been a result of the tiger and panther as well.
I love your organization videos, can we see a collaboration with you and @MilitaryHistoryVisualized to make videos?
@@scifidude184 I have no issues, but for me its just a hobby so my primary contribution would likely be data.
@@peterfmodel The major driver behind the SU-76, SU-122, SU-152 was the desire for mobile artillery support. The bigger the artillery piece, the more difficult it is to move the thing. In a rapidly developing breakthrough attack this would mean moving beyond the range of artillery support. Most artillery tractors were also quite slow, so having the guns advance at walking pace and then waiting for them to be deployed takes all the urgency out of an advance
@@stephenlitten1789 You are very correct. It should be noted there is different types of artillery support. The Russian tanks corps were light on indirect fire capabilities and they relied on Rocket artillery, which caused them major issues. Assault guns cannot replace indirect fire, although I must admit the SU-76 did have the elevation to conduct indirect fire. However the Russian did not do this very often, possibly due to a lack of expertise. Where you are spot on is the ability of lay down direct fire on an infantry position or fortified position. The tank corps did possess 120mm mortar batteries, but a SU-76 or SU-122 could get close to a target and take it out, while as you have indicated the 120mm mortar batteries were towed and took time to setup. 120mm mortar are not so good against a fortified position as well.
great video guys, really like your content, keep up the good work!
This was good info for everyone wanting to learn more about how this stuff really works. The response to a new enemy tank is NOT "we need a new tank too!" That is literally the most expensive and time-consuming way to react. The real response is "can we upgrade our rounds to obtain better performance?" and "can we upgrade the guns in our existing tanks?" Only if the answer to both of those is "No" do you get to the "we need a new tank" part.
Says a lot about warfare economy and different economic mindsets too.
Outstanding video!
Looking at the prototype delivery dates, it clearly seems they were expecting to find Tigers in Kursk as they prepared for the battle by that time.
Tigers were in use since September 1942, so they were "guranteed appearances" at Kursk. :) Panthers were new at Kursk, though.
They did find Tigers at Kursk. But they didn't have anything to fight them with. Most towed guns were 45mm, 76 mm and some 57 mm, 122 mm. T-34-76, KV-1 and KV-1s tanks were there. Little numbers of SU-76, SU-122 and SU-152 also probably were there. SU-85 got to the army in the fall of 1943 (as well as KV-85), after the battle in Kursk of July. IS-2 was made in Dec. 1943. In 1944 T-34-85 and ISU-122 became available. In Jan. 1945 SU -100 appeared. IS-3 and T-54 weren't in World War 2.
I think the extensive defences at Kursk did more to blunt the Tigers claws than any actual countermeasure weapons. As Kelly said "the Tiger is an open-country tank".
@@ooeyb Yes. USSR build lots of defenses with landmines and towed guns. Because Hitler wanted to put Panthers in the battlefield, but it took lots of time and allowed for USSR to make huge defenses.
Alot to do with stalin's (red orchestra) secret spy service operating in Germany
I remember from somewhere (please comment if I'm wrong) that the appearance of the Tiger and the Panther influenced the Soviet decision to not roll out the T-43, which was intended as an all-around upgrade of the T-34. Instead they took the turret of the T-43 and put it on the T-34, thus creating the T-34/85. The T-43 would have had thicker hull armour, but not thicker enough to be of much protection against the Tiger or Panther, so going for the T-43 would have given little additional advantage compared to the T-34/85 and thus not worth the increased cost and production disruption.
What's this? True and accurate historical facts in KZhead comment section? Must be Christmas. :D
The T-43 had a completely different chassis design, so the main issue was shifting over production. The T-34 used a heavily modified christie suspension while the T-43 used a torsion bar suspension (like the KV and IS). Due to low production qualities, the torsion bar was quite prone to snapping.
Thank you I did not know there was T 34-57 this was very informative.
Thanks for all this deep dive material. Tanks interest me only a little, as rich boy toys or fantasy commuter vehicles, but the design and production tradeoffs are fascinating. I may be a logistics nerd at heart.
My grandfather’s battery of ZIS-2 57 mm antitank guns has killed 4 Panters at the Battle of Balaton. But he never specified were they shooting from the side or from the front.
Could be from the side shot. US(and England)also used a 57mm M1 gun. Four 57mm guns set up a AT gun trap for a Panther battalion in Alsace destroying 9 tanks by using side shots. Don't know if ZIS could penetrate frontal armour but 57mm M1 could not so maybe is a ambush also. ZIS 57mm was a very good gun.
Probably from the side the soviets got good at creating Interlapping AT emplacement the is designed to forced tanks to go around w/c exposes thier sides.
Regardless of the level of armor a tank has, you wouldn't shoot at it from the front if you had any choice in the matter.
@@jic1 battle of Balaton was a real slaughter even for the Great Patriotic War standards.
I'm by no means an expert, but I figure you wouldn't want to draw fire from a tank unless you knew for sure you were gonna kill it and also not bring that hull MG into the fight.
Great video!
Wow, what an awesome new direction for your channel. Taking us on adventures and inspiring us, and now teaching us in a concise and understandable way your key lessons. Ive seen many teachers and methods, but your content and way of explaining really hits the nail on the head. Just one question, while your riding weightless at speed, you're still squeezing the bike with your knees right? So vertically youre weightless through your ankles, knees, hips etc. But horizontally your squeezing during impacts right? Thanks a lot
Very interesting. Thanks a lot!
The Tiger is an example of how overemphasis on tactics at the expense of strategy is always a bad idea. It was tactically brilliant, could beat any of its contemporaries in a 1 on 1 or even 1 on 3, but that's irrelevant when you can only field 1 for every 50 Sherman or Soviet tanks. The Germans would have had a much better chance if they had just kept making the panzer 4 and bf109 in massive quantities and periodic upgrades rather than the ragtag high tech mini squads they had.
But would more mediocre vehicles have been a good idea given their fuel supply? Sure a tiger guzzles up a crap ton of fuel, but so do 50 Panzer IVs
Wasn't the first tests of the 122mm was of the A-19 800m/s gun? The JS tank had the D-25T 781 m/s gun.
I just ordered the book before even watching this. cool stuff or sehr gut!
Awesome! Thank you!
There is some inconsistancy in the IS-2 book. On page 53 if has the muzzle velocity of the D-25 as 781 m/s. But on page 108-109 it gives the muzzle velocity of 795 m/s. The penetrations on page 110 are for this muzzle velocity even though the foot note says it is for the D-25.
Well spotted! Each value comes from the respective document cited in that section. The doc on Maus penetration gives the muzzle velocity as 781 m/s, the gunnery tables give 795. I've also seen 800 in other documents, which I suspect is just 795 rounded up.
@@TankArchives What I have is the tank had the D-25T 122mm 781m/s L43 gun. The ISU-122 had a D-25 L46 795m/s gun but the ISU-122S had a L46 D-25S gun. I don't know if there was a performance difference with the D-25S gun. The towed A-19 was an 800m/s L46 gun. Some of this is from Vasily Fofanov's website.
@@501Mobius I'm not aware of any differences in ballistics between the D-25T and D-25S. The decree accepting the ISU-122S into service explicitly lists "122 mm D-25s (sliding breech) with identical characteristics to the 122 mm D-25 tank gun" as a part of the tactical-technical requirements. i.imgur.com/OGnMbWj.png I also have documents that in no uncertain terms talk about the IS-2 where the muzzle velocity is listed as 790 m/s (i.imgur.com/0wvIwKc.png).
@@TankArchives KZhead sometimes deletes comments with links that are not to youtube sites. This is my way around that limitation. Here is a link to the East German 1960 Table for the D-25T BR-471. The comments has the link to the PDF 1960 Firing Table of the D-25T and DJVU 1969 D-25 gun. kzhead.infoUgkx61zeZxah7v7p7jvP8b7-P_cq1s_krT8Y
That "more dakka dakka" got me rolling, great job! Also i guess Soviet and Germany is kinda same in that the higher up constantly changing and interfering with the development process, same same but different!
Very good. Thank you.
I expect that SU-100 had very good results against both Tigers and Panthers, for example around Budapest in autumn 1944.
I think the main difference between penetration of the 85mm & 122mm that's talked about at 11:05 is to do with flight angle at impact. An 85mm at 100m would be flying a lot flatter than a 122mm at 1400m.
Since the topic of the T-34 was brought up i was wondering what's the ergonomic difference between the T-34 1940 turret versus a T-34 turret from 1942 that is welded?
Right when I saw "57mm HE shell" I stopped video and went to check info about ZiS-2 and what I found... Was exactly what was said later in the video. Military History: 1 My over curiosity: 0
When I read that, I immediately asked Peter if that was a typo, then I read on and deleted my question in chat :D
The capture of the Tiger 131 was a like a cartoon with one of the luckiest shots in Tank History. 1st that 6 pounder shell dindn't had the Power to even scratch the Tiger's Armor. 2nd the "place" were the shell bounced and ending stuck between the mantlet and turret without detonate,is like winning the lottery. 3rd the crew was so inexperiente that as soon they realize that the Shell was in that place they took off without a second thought without trying to deal with that situation and did ignore completely Hitler's orders of destroying the Tiger in case of a malfunction or another issue that could cost the capture of the new "Wonder" weapon but the Enemy. PS: the most Ridiculous, Strange, Lucky and Hilarious capture of a Tiger I Tank ( or any other Tank) in History. PS: I really never understood why some people still keep trying to find any kind of issue or argument to Downplay the Real and True Powerhouse of a Tank that the Tiger I was on the Battlefield, specialy on the vast plains of the Eastern Front were the Tiger's 88mm gun ruled Supreme against any Soviet tank at ranges that soviets couldnt match. And if you consider that only 1.350 Tiger I were built,and from that number only 534 were combat losses. More Tiger's I were Lost by non combat issues,like mechanical problems or even by just running out of fuel that in Combat,and if you consider that at the same time the very small number of Tiger's available at any given time were responsable for destroying 10.000 thousand+ Enemy Tanks and 10.000+ thousand Artillery Pieces and thousands of other military equipment says it at all abaut the sheer Power and Dominance of the Tiger I on the WW2 Battlefields.
Not much said about the influence of Soviet doctrine on the tanks. The 2 piece shell on the 122 mm gum was tolerated because its main function was to reduce fortifications. The T34 faster tank was designed to exploit the breakthrough. While on tbe subject of what influenced what don't forget that the Panther itself was influenced by the T34 -76 as a result of the Guderian Commission that wanted the T34 copied entirely but never happened fir technical reasons.
Exploring all the options seems solid strategy.
Is there any data on the T-34/57 combat performance? I've heard about it from games and a few online sources, and it is mentioned as being a dedicated tank-killer in some of these sources. How effective was it in actual use?
Decently effective. However by the end of the war the 57 was not enough to fight panthers and tiger IIs, especially at long range. That gun has crazy velocity and remarkable penetration but it tended to lose energy at range. It was also built on the 2 man turret of the T-34, so ergonomically a nightmare to operate
@@000theUnforgiven000 Good thing there were only ~500 King Tigers
The arrival of the Soviet 85mm was the game changer when paired with the mass produced T34.
dude, the t 34 was terrible, even if it had been made to its actual tecnical specifications (which effectively not a single one was) it wouldnt have been particularly good
@@Helperbot-2000 they still won the war with it
@@juusto7171 no they did not, the soviets didnt win, the allies won. and do i need to remind you the soviet union got alot of supplies form the british and americans, and that if the soviet union fought alone against germany, the soviets would have literally ran out of tanks despite their enormous production number
@@Helperbot-2000es, the Allies won. And one of the countries making Up the Allies inflicted 80% of German casualties, using T-34s. It was very much capable of doing it's Job. Also, I would disagree with saying the Soviets would have lost fighting the Germans alone; they pretty much did for a few years, and they Managed to Stop them. Even before Major Lend Lease assistance at Moscow. Talking about T-34 production quality is also a subject, which can't simply be answered with "all were below spec". Specifications and production quality varied from Month to month and factory to factory.
@@harmdallmeyer6449 the total ammount of german casualties doesnt mean much when they had far higher casualties themselves, making the western front more "efficient" in K/D. and jkust because the t34 worked as a tank and could maybe protect against a bb gun with only an 80% crew mortality rate doesnt mean its any less shit of a tank. the a10 is beloved and has been used alot, that doesnt make it a good plane, its still a shit plane that was outdated before it was ever on the battlefield. you completely disregard the massive ammount of influence the british and american bidding war had on the availability of rare minerals to germany and they did already recieve aid before beeing officialy eligeble for lend lease, and before that november date they largely retreated with scorched earth while the far larger german losses happened after 1941. they N E V E R held the germans alone, they always had help, and dont forget britain and american ships were also under constant attacks while the germans invaded the soviet union, taking even more resources away. yeah the quality obviously varied as since it wasnt made to the specifications already, there obviously wasnt a set list of parts to cheap out on, but on the whole of it the overwhelming majority were low quality and we know about half of all t 34s were made specifically in factory number 183, which altho enormous, would definitely have had to cost cut significantly to make the ridiculous ammount of tanks it did, keep in mind its actual design specs would have made its price and labour needed about the same as a sherman. and especially considering how many they lost its obvious to see how cost cut they were.
Tbh i am glad that i can just go to Bovington. When I get to a certain point, I'll need them through and through.
Love the icon for “soft targets” being a teddy bear.
My God! That WW2 must've been terrifying! I"m just glad no one got hurt.
Yeah, someone might have died!
I just hope that 20 million Soviet Civilians and 8 million Soviet military were not brutally killed by this "hitter" guy
@@comradesocalistfromaustralia I hope that no people in ukraine died to famine and others to exhaustion hypothermia inflicted by this "stalin" guy
@@patri0tic Ikr... if you have done some research on Lenin, he personally wanted to keep Stalin away from leadership... but after he died, he couldn't do anything to stop him... in Lenin's own words he said "❖ Trotsky was the most capable, but far too arrogant. ❖ Stalin was too powerful, too rude, and he should be dismissed as party secretary." he did not want Stalin anywhere near leading to much as Lenin saw that Stalin was power hungry. Also it was not just inflicted to Ukraine, it was much of the USSR Aswell, and horrible weather conditions and droughts that stopped food production... Stalin really made a Brand new country only recently made in 1922 become a horrible dictatorship of pain and fear...
This reminds me of Billy Crystal joking that Japanese monster movies would have dialouge of someone saying "I hope no one was seriously hurt".
He actually said 'Dakka Dakka' Twice
I'm convinced tanks are obsolete until they can shoot like a fire prism. Dispersion shot for infantry and focused vs armor
"I didn't like the books I had on the subject, so I had someone write a better one." Nice.
Less well known is issue of steel quality, Germany being short of manganese and molybdenum, and later tanks had poorer quality steel as the shortage became more acute. Not to mention the flawed overlapping wheels
Not flaws, more so drawbacks.
“Overlapping wheels” reminds me of the quote “there are no solutions, only tradeoffs” -if you had no concerns of battle damage or reliability, im sure the overlapping wheels seemed like the right choice.. replacing the inside wheel when you’re in the field however, you might prefer the simpler design lol
Very intersting. I particularly like the illustration from the Tigerfibel. Never read it, apparently I should do that some time. And of course today is the day that I will actually order the IS-2 book.
Thanks for this interesting and detailed video, as always. The one thing that annoys me more and more over time is how anachronistic most people's view of WW2 is (and mine was for many years, so I get it). For example, most of the Tiger 1 solutions shown here arrived in mass after the Tiger 1 was supposed to have been completely replaced by the Tiger 2. Granted, due to shortages the Tiger 1 was used to the end of the war, but German critics will point to this and say "see, the Tiger 1 was vulnerable to all this stuff" completely ignoring the fact that the Tiger 2 had already been fielded by the time the Allies got around to developing reliable counters to it. You mentioned once that the German engineers had bet on this when they opted for the box design to increase interior space. All that to say it might have been worth mentioning the Tiger 2's relevance in this video, since it was definitely being used in 1944. In fact, it is confusing reading the memoirs of the 503rd since they rarely distinguish between the two models after they first talk about it, and given how most units never fully replaced all of their Tiger 1s you are left guessing which units were fielding which model at any given time.
1944 is a long year. The IS-1 and IS-2 arrived on the front lines in February and the first Tiger II was used in August. Tanks are also introduced gradually, so there were plenty of original Tigers to fight even after the first Tiger II hit the front lines.
The HE shells were they because of increased Infantry anti armour teams?
Soviets: "Awww, the Huns finally developed and fielded a heavy tank! Isn't that cute---" *spits vodka* "THE ACTUAL HELL!"
Just as an FYI, the SU-57 was using a US 57mm M1 gun, not the Russian ZiS-2 or ZiS-4 guns, though performance was similar. The T-70 SPG version was the SU-57B, and if you think its a Russian take on a Hetzer you arent far off, except that the armor is essentially tin foil, despite being enclosed. However it proved underpowered and slow, so it was not put into production. War Thunder has it though if you want to have a look.
Learned some good new things today from this video. Namely that Soviet armor and gun development is suprisingly beauracratic in the number of organizations involved. The things oen learns when consulting original sources. I share your frustration with Western sources, so much in the way of myths and misconceptions continue to persist and spread despite the efforts of you and others.
Vassili looked at Dimitri and said we gonna need more tanks.
I thought that the Soviets used a dissimilar penetration calculation methode then everyone else. Is the difference in armour penetration between soviet tests and the Tiger fibel you show here due to these different calculation methodes/values for armour penetrations or is there another reason for this? Can you elaborate on the differences in calculations?
No, it's because gemans have calculated those distances with the assumption that soviet guns are shooting the same advanced APCBC type shells as they do, while in actuality soviet AP shells were of a more primitive design and not as efficient against thick armor.
It feels like many here outplayed VAR Thunder. Over the entire history, most of the tanks were destroyed by artillery and aircraft, in extreme cases by infantry. The IS 2 tank was NOT designed as a duelist for Tigers and Panthers, it was a breakthrough tank with the ability to destroy concrete bunkers, and the ability to disable and destroy Tigers and Panthers was just a bonus.
Artillery is the king of the battlefield
Everyone loves to play the tank vs tank top trumps, yet most tank casualties were never from tanks.
I love the little teddy bear graphic to represent "soft" targets.
Did I hear Herr Bernard say “DAKKA DAKKA”? BAHAHAHAHAHAHA 😂😂😂😂😂
Several weapons stand out during WW2, tanks were one of them. But for the Ultimate in Fear casting an 88 smashing thru anything at 2000M was noted. The Sherman was tastefully branded the Ronson very soon after arriving to the German Nazifest in June 44. sparks up first time every time.
Ronson adopted that Slogan in the 50s.
@@harmdallmeyer6449 do you have that documented? I'll look that up, cheers.
@@yabbadabbadoo8225 "From the Editor: Lights First Every Time?" On Tank and AFV News gives pretty good Insight. I also Heard that Ronsons were Not issued to regular soldiers, but rather to officers. The Standard lighter for an infantry or tankman would be a Zippo.
@@harmdallmeyer6449 well thats news to me? As 90% of the armed forces on both sides smoked even in combat, I doubt with near 100% confidence that any Major, Captain or Field Marshall would give 2 Hoots what a Grunt used to spark up a Durrie. As my old man served 22 years in the British REME and smoked since 12, he never left the house without 50 smokes and what ever lighter he could find.
Did they really write dates like "June 1st, 1943" in the Soviet correspondence? I would have thought they would use the day/month/year format?
I really don't know the German Tank numbers requested verses actually delivered during the war. I have seen the numbers produced vs allied production and it was night and day. While the cats were lethal it seems the production goals were never met.
Or if production goals were met, possibly achieved at the expense of producing spare parts, at least in 1944.
It’s very difficult to meet production goals when you constantly have to stop production to implement small changes because a new version was introduced every few months. German war manufacturing was extremely slow and wasteful. In 12 years the Germans made 10 million Mauser rifles. In three years the Russians made 21 million Mosin rifles. (Numbers from memory). Allied engineering often favored heavy concessions to concerns of economy. Specifications for the Jeep were written so they could be carried on cargo planes as well as transported on a standard shipping pallet. No piece of American equipment was accepted into service without a comprehensive accompanying guide on how to transport it by ship, by truck, and by train. British manufacturing paid special attention to components that could be replicated properly anywhere in the empire. Russian designs focused heavily on maximizing simplicity and volume of production to hit a benchmark of quality based on expected service life in the field. In particular today people will often deride the Russian approach to things as just cranking out cheap junk. All the facts were they were invaded by an army of 3 million hostile Nazis sense to kill every last Russian, they needed to produce every piece of equipment they could as quickly as they could to get it into the hands of soldiers because they didn’t officially on their soldiers in time the Nazis were going to kill them all. So there was a very heavy focus on simplified an expedited manufacturing with attention to detail and craftsmanship spared for key components. So you got things like the T34 which were very uncomfortable to be in and unpleasant to drive, and generally not even bothering to place quality of life or ergonomics on the podium, but they had sufficient guns, armor, and optics to fight, and the savings in those other areas meant they could be produced in bulk quickly. This emphasis on autonomy and production meant to the Russians were able to actually make enough tanks to save themselves when it came down to it.
With the exception of the pre-war and early war, target production numbers for German tanks and other AFV were almost never achieved. This varied of course, some designs came quite close to their goals, like the Tiger & Panther series, while others, such as the Tiger-II, fell far short.
German industry did not go into full war mode until 1944, unfortunately for them at the same time the allied strategic bombing campaign reached its peak. In 1940 Germany produced 1,800 tanks, of which the heaviest was the 18 ton Panzer IV. In 1944 they produced 19,000 tanks and assault guns (of which several 1000 were 45+ ton tanks), despite 40% of the production being bombed to smithereens. When going full out, German industry was second only to USA.
@@TTTT-oc4eb just did a quick check, in 1944 the soviets produced 28k tanks and assault guns, so I wouldnt say "second only to the USA". Also keep in mind that a lot of the reason is because it took them a few years to gear French industry towards producing german stuff, as the numbers you see are things produced using the resources and industry of occupied France and Czechoslovakia too.
The 88mm ammo on the Tiger and as an AA/AT gun was selected because the weight was calculated to be able to be able to be handled by the average soldier. And not too long to be clumbsy.
Like their Sherman allies, T34 crews learned better tactics the hard way against Tigers and Panthers. Well placed shots at correct angles and ranges were key. In the end it really came down to the Germans being overwhelmed by sheer numbers of T34's and Shermans. In nature a lone wolf against a Grizzly always loses but wolf packs regularly run fierce Grizzly bears out of their territory.
Lol the dakka, dakka dept.
It is interesting to see that even the Russian 85mm gun had issues with the panther's front armor. The complaint about the Sherman was that its 75mm gun was underpowered. The US, however, saw that the Sherman was adequate as it was and simply produced as many as possible instead of creating whole new tank designs to fight the Panther/Tiger. Soviet tank design has always fascinated me but I wonder how the US 90mm gun compared to the Russian 85mm gun.
well the US 90mm gun was fielded way later in the war, so it was probably better than its 85mm counterpart, now how would it be compared to the soviet 100mm?
@@panzerkampfwagenviausf.b2236 During WW2, the US 90mm was slightly superior, with post war ammunition, the 100mm was better.
The US 90mm could penetrate the Panther's UFH the Soviet 85mm could not.
In rough terms, the US 75mm was equal to the soviet 76mm, and the US 76mm was equal to the soviet 85mm. But those are *very* broad statements and a lot depends on the specific ammo being used.
0:58 so we’re just not gonna talk about this huh?
The Lion may be the King of the jungle, but the Tiger is the King of the battlefield.
According to field trials results on captured Panthers (data is from the trials result table stored in Central Ministry of Defence Archive (of the Russian Federation) - fund 233, register 2356, file 406) 85 mm D-5S tank gun could penetrate frontal armor of a Panther tank from up to 1000 m using BR-365 shell (e.g. blunt-headed with ballistic cap) including gun mask. BR-365P APCR shell is indeed ineffective against slopped frontal armor of a Panther due to ricochet, but that's not what you are saying in the video. Blame Samsonov fellow.
PS: the reason behind increasing caliber of IS-2 gun wasn't anti-tank, but rather the need in a weapon more sutable of defeating concrete field fortifications. IS-2 wasn't meant to be a glorious tank destroyer like Tiger tank, but rather a breakthrough tank which would penetrate defence lines more akin to british infantry tanks.
Absolutely correct on all counts.
Do you have a scan of this document? I haven't seen any proving grounds trials showing such an effect. ф.233 оп.2356 is the Operational Research Department of the 1st Belorussian Front if I'm not mistaken, so I'm wondering where they got this data from.
Nonsense. East German firing table shows it only penetrates 82mm at 30° at 1000m. 1945 Russian ARTKOM calculated firing table it only penetrates 83mm at 30° at 1000m. Most of the so-called test firing were at 100m with the charges reduced to simulate hits at longer ranges. The soviets often miscalculated the impact velocity that their shells should reach at specific ranges.
@@501Mobius lol right, it must be because Germans are known for always telling the truth while Soviets are known for not knowing how to math Get real dude, your 20th century propaganda stinks
More Dakka Dakka!
We need more DAKKA-DAKKA
More dakka dakka
So…the Tiger tank is directly responsible for the 100mm gun used on the T55 around the world…crazy
Warhammer is a great name for a tank line.
The Soviet answer to the Tiger was the SU-152mm.
Us and UK has Firefly But USSR had IS-2
The chairman is back
Why wasn't the D-10 gun used for heavy tanks? I always assumed it was developed too late to be mass produced so it was limited to just SU-100s. But, this video suggests that the goals were set at the same time. Wouldn't the 100 gun be superior to the 122 gun due to more rapid rate of fire and to a more compact size? It loaded faster and achieved excellent penetration of German armor and was a powerful enough gun to deal with the infantry. ISU-122 and ISU-152 could be then used in their intended roles as demolishers of fortified positions.
I can’t remember, but I think I covered it in my IS-2 video.
@@MilitaryHistoryVisualized i will check it out. Thanks!
Soviet reaction: more artillery.
I'm always surprised by the number of shots they waste shooting at the strongest points ! Hit the track frist , turn it into a none moveable pill box then you can maneuver around it to hit it's weak spots or let soldier play with it's traped crew..
HEADS UP!... YT has "unsubscribed" me 3 times since the end of January for no reason. If you were subscribed, check and make sure you are still subscribed. And if you aren't subscribed you should be.
Hmm, seems to me like it was bigger DAKKA DAKKA.
"Dakka Dakka" video
Russian tanker: hahaha look at the cute little heavy tank. Yokov, bring up the kv2
Dakka is MG, right? A machine gun tank....
Good or not, I still love the Panther tank
rotten ideology aside, Panthers are probably best designs of ww2(w/o their child problems ofc) Still, i very much adore simple and effective USSR tanks.
I wonder what their reaction would be to the Ratte.
0 comments and likes? Let me fix that real quick.
Probably laugh their asses of as its stuck in mud/has no fuel/is out of ammo.
Bomb the shit out of it?
@@Aaahrg this. Edit: just imagined them laughing at the poor thing and then requesting a B4 artillery strike, think how long would it take ratte to be desintegrated from this realm? lol
@@panterka.f That and bridges, tunnels, towns and woods would be insurmountable
Very interesting episode, however, I wish you would stop confounding my long held opinions by citing factual evidence from primary sources.
isn't the is chassis a modified kv chassis though
That of the Tiger? Nope.
@@MilitaryHistoryVisualized no no i was talking about the IS series of tank chassis
@@ligmasurvivor5600 the only thing that's even similar is the torsion bar suspension, number, and position of the road wheels. The hull, fighting compartment, turret, engine compartment, weapons, etc were all completely new.
@@TankArchives ooh ok i see
Idk why you someimes pronounce the SU as soo,,but u say it as it is meant sometimes too,is it because its faster or easier to say soooo
It is "meant to be" pronounced as soo since it's how it is pronounced by the Russians, and SU is just a transliteration of their abbreviation and not some english pseudonim. And I believe it's also how it would be pronounced by the Austrians/Germans (the channel owner is from Austria).
@@sphairat6637 good to know👍
Orkz iz da bugezt un da strungezt! MOAR DAKKA!!
Saumur museum > Bovington museum
I love how the first tigers where abandoned around leingrad first combat taken by soviet
Birds were the real enemy!
Ya mean daka daka dak
They made an IS2
Just stay 2300 meters away and wait for it to break down, if it comes to you pretend to be a gas station and then fill the petrol tanks with warm borscht.
stabiler österreichische akzent(, oida)
In Kursk the T34s got close up and punched holes in Tigers even rammed them as the Germans were down to kids and less skilled tankers.
Russian Fozzie Bear after telling a joke: "Dakka Dakka!"