SU-76M: Soviet Artillery Spam
The SU-76M was the second most produced Soviet Armored Fighting Vehicle of the Second World War, as such it was it was only second to the T-34. Yet, quite often it is portrayed as a tank destroyer, which is rather misleading, especially if one looks at the equipment and doctrine. In this video we look at the role, the history and the capabilities like armor, firepower and mobility of the SU-76M.
Disclaimer: I was invited by Militärhistorische Museum der Bundeswehr Dresden in 2021. www.mhmbw.de/
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» SOURCES «
Zaloga, Steve: SU-76 Assault Gun. Osprey Publishing: Oxford, UK, 2019.
A. Chubachin SU-76 Bratskaya mogila ekipazha ili orudiye pobedy, Moscow, Yauza, 2009.
Samsonov, Peter: Sherman Tanks of the Red Army. Gallantry Books: Horncastle, UK, 2021.
Glantz, David M.: Colossus reborn: the Red Army at war: 1941-1943. University Press of Kansas: Kansas, 2005.
Andorfer, Volker; Block, Martin; Nelson, John: Nuts & Bolts Volume 17: Pz. Jäger Marder III Ausf. M - Sd.Kfz. 138. Nuts & Bolts: Germany, 2003.
RH 2/1933: FHO Bewaffnung und Ausrüstung der Roten Armee.
Samsonov, Peter: SU-76 Manual. Tank Archives, July, 2015. Accessed: 5th August 2021. www.tankarchives.ca/2015/07/s...
Samsonov, Peter: The Red Army's Most Numerous SPG. Tank Archives, July, 2020. Accessed: 5th August 2021. www.tankarchives.ca/2020/07/t...
Samsonov, Peter: SU-12: The Ill-Fated SPG. Tank Archives, April, 2018. Accessed: 5th August 2021, www.tankarchives.ca/2018/04/su...
sovietarmorer.wordpress.com/2...
www.weapon.df.ru/potroh/su76/i...
#SU76M,#ArtillerySpam,#WW2
He did warn his friends that if their wedding reception was going to be held so close to a tank museum, he would have to excuse himself for some time.
I have heard rumors that the wedding was with a tiger as background :)
Are there photos of the lucky couple driving off in one of the tanks?
@@joshuastroup9157, "Just Married" banner in the back, and a bunch of cans strung together behind...
@@fuferito Not cans my dude, spent 8.8cm casings
@@fernandomarques5166 I was imagining tiny tanketes.
Something I find fundamental to Soviet perceptions and reporting is that they see things by their role rather than the object itself. A T34 with 76.2mm weapon was used in the exact same role as T34 with 85mm weapon, so they don't specify unless the weapon itself was relevant to the report. I see it with discussions of tanks in the 1970s, where T55s were often not specified by type despite their demotion to secondary tanks because T55 was still expected to perform all the same combat missions as the T72 and T64. A tank was a tank and used as such until it was clearly too obsolete, which was a long while in Soviet eyes.
An interesting approach, but one that carries a serious flaw: it allows for uses of a vehicle/weapon/system outside of its intended role to go unmentioned or overlooked. It also allows for information that could be important to be overlooked. When someone is pouring over reports, they could easily come under the wrong impression about things due to the lack of information that might not seem relevant to the one writing the report but could be very relevant to the people reading them later. Lastly, it has a major blindspot when it comes to multirole vehicles/weapons. If a tank starts seeing improvised use in the field as a sort of mobile artillery, the value and usage of that tank type can become overlooked or misunderstood. And expecting a T55 to perform all of the same combat missions as the T72 and T64 speaks of a glaring flaw in the thinking and organization of the Red Army. After all, if a T55 can perform all of the same missions as the next two generations of tanks, then it calls into question how much of an advancement those latter generations were.
@@Raptor747 It seems faulty, but bear in mind, the Soviet doctrine of Deep Operation was fundamentally attritional. They expected losses and focused on ensuring those losses paid off with victory. Deep Operations focused on simple ideas like stack massive reserves with tremendous firepower, ideally six or more for every anticipated enemy, and then grind the enemy down on a concentrated point until they broke through. In theory, you will break the enemy's local forces with the first or second waves, then have several waves of fresh forces ready to exploit the break though. The early waves, however, are not expected to come out of the fight in good shape, but it doesn't matter if the line is broken, it is broken, and your massive reserves of fresh tanks will run deep before the enemy can gel a new defensive line. In short, so long as the Red Army had the reserves to keep the fight moving forward, they would be winning so far as they were concerned. The way the Red Army kept the reserves up was by not discarding a weapon until it was clearly useless on the modern battlefield, and in the 1980s even, T55 was not useless. It was still a mobile and tough piece of steel that needed specialized anti-tank weapons to defeat and had the firepower to hurt most things it was likely to meet. What T55 couldn't defeat outright, it would overwhelm with local advantage in numbers. For sure, a unit of T55s would probably lose more than a T72 unit doing the same job, but the T55s would still be contributing to victory all the same.
@@genericpersonx333 That's all well and good but if you're ignoring the variant of vehicle involved you may find yourself simply wasting war material for no reason, after all an early war t34 simply cannot penetrate the armor of a panther frontally, there would be no benefit to allowing such a fight to occur, you would probably be better off cutting your losses and retreating to let the transmission break down
@@jankthunder4012 Western tanks in the 70s with exception of the Chieftain,AMX 30 later models and the M60A3 were wet paper. And even the T55 was capable against them with HEAT rounds. The Chieftan MK5 can be penetrated up to 3000m by the more modern soviet tanks using 125mm guns like T64.T72 with their bm-9/15/22 rounds. Also keep in mind that this was the point of the whole warsaw pact to have as much uniformity as possible. While the warsaw pact had pretty much the same quality in all fronts in europe,with emphasis on west germany,NATO had a huge disparity in quality,in italy T55s,backed up by two divisions of T64As faced M47,M48s,LEO1s with decisive artillery advantage on the WP side,In Norway Centurions,LEO1s faced T72s,T-55,T62s. Even in west germany WP had a quality advantage on the ground with T64B/A,T72,T55s.T64B in the 70s could have won battles easily for WP because it was immune to 105 rounds,had laser range finder,good stabilizator and the first ballistic computer,it was the Tiger tank of its era. No need display every type of vehicle really,because in WP they knew which kind of tanks they will face locally,so they provided the theater those kind of tanks they deemed enough. Why assign T64B equipped divisons to Itally front were second rate models and versions deemed more than enough. It was also avoided confusion,and made enemy intelligence work harder
@@vindicare9636 That's nice for the Warsaw pact but it doesn't really have any bearing on my argument.
I just love your analytical, clean, precise and understandable approach.
It results in rather interresting ways when a native german speaker presents in english and speaks russian words XD
The true german stereotype in action.
my favorite part about germans
Very Teutonic, Ja?
kzhead.info/sun/q6Wjhr6Qp4OKooE/bejne.html
"if you spam fast-moving artillery you win every battle(one way or another)" -Sun Tzu probably
lol I like that!
Sun Tzu, Art(illery) of War
The 1st Belorussian Front is a better epitome of the Second Amendment than Patton's Third Army. - Sun Tzukov
Eh ... humor aside ... Sun Tzu was a management consultant ... the person you want to listen to was von Clausewitz. .
@@lonelystrategos Have you read them? Because I have. I have, somewhere ... both of them in book form, although _The Art of War_ is tiny - there's so little in it. _On War_ was one of those Penguin Classics. Also - how many management consultants have you had experience with? When I was working we were required to attend two seminars - that I can remember - both - a complete waste of time ... and money. .
Finally the good ol' Su-76M gets some love. It is criminally underappreciated among WW2 buffs. It was one of the most important AFVs of the last 2 years of the war.
It's the one SPG that's 'reluctantly' in The Tank Museum at Bovington. When I asked why they didn't display any other SPGs (Arty) they told me that the Royal Artillery had those and (rather snobbishly) suggested that they were not tanks!
When I first go into looking at die ostfront in books and online I remember seeing these and wondering, what are those? Are they light tanks? Are they spgs for direct fire to support infantry? I never heard of them, I heard of t34 and kv and is2 but once I really started looking into German-Soviet war I realized the red army had a lot more different vehicles than I expected, I'm glad he's covering this because a lot of Soviet vehicles are ignored and you mostly hear of t34. It would be cool if he covers some other Soviet spg models like su122 su152 su85 etc
Big fan in Red Orchestra. A good crew could seriously mess with Axis.
@@steventhompson399 Only Su-85 (and its successor Su-100) is not an SPG but a designated tank destroyer. Su-76 is literally a field gun Zis-3 (also widely used in WW2) on tracks, with the same purpose, i.e. fire support. In theory can be used against tanks but normally shouldn't.
Only COH2 chads appreciate the Commie Slogger
I spent about 1,000 hours at the USMC Air Ground Museum restoring an SU-76 "donated" by the North Korean Peoples Army in 1950. The vehicle had been captured intact and a large white star had been painted over the red star. At some point it ran over a mine which pierced the hull on the starboard side, just aft of the drive sprocket. The explosion did very little damage except that a piece of shrapnel pierced the oil pan of the forward 6 six cylinder engine which eventually spun a bearing. The vehicle had been stored outside for most of her life and had been stripped of nearly everything not bolted down. The restorations branch curator, Mr. Joe Patan did miracles in scrounging some of the accessory items. Rather than making her a runner we pickled the engines, transmission, and final drive.
If that SU-76 could talk, it would have stories to tell.
" we need a mobile big gun" " for what purpose exactly?" " mobile big gun"
So more or less, you could say the SU76 was more of an assault gun that the StuG, since it remained in the primary role of an assault gun through out the war and did not have its primary purpose changed to be a tank killer. Not bad for a cheap way to stick a cannon on tracks.
I don’t think there’s a single tanker who’d like to be shot directly by this thing
@Mialisus sure but bullets don’t penetrate the armor 76mm packets of communism can penetrate the armor
Once guns became too big to hide behind a mole hill making them more mobile was the answer. The ability to provide direct and indirect fire was hugely important in the mid-stages of the war when Soviet artillery had excellent corps+ level firepower, but poor at the lower levels because of issues with C3 in more fluid situations at the operational and lower levels. By late war this had improved greatly and while they were not as flexible as American or British, Soviet, self-propelled guns, mortars and lighter artillery come in good numbers to make up for it. A Soviet infantry division in 1944 has a pretty good artillery capability to support itself.
the problem with the Su-76 is that it was originally made as a support tool, that is, when interacting with its tanks , it had to go in the rear, when interacting with infantry, to act from behind shelters or from ambushes (against tanks). But it was thrown into the spearhead of the attack in the troops, which led to very large losses, the crews did not like it. because they were suicide bombers, especially the driver-mechanic. As it was, this car was a compromise, since it used an already used light tank chassis, automobile engines, a gun already being produced, so it was very cheap to produce.
Distinction between assault-gun , tank hunter (jagdpanzer) and self-propelled artillery are typically Western. Soviets had different mindset. They would often use even towed howitzers (122 mm) to fire at enemy AVF. For Soviets, SU-76 was simply self-propelled (divisional) gun that could be used in various ways, i.e. firing directly or indirectly at various targets. Now, chassis of a modified t-70 precluded use of heavier weapon on it, therefore there were limitations, but mission was always very broad.
13:08 "The chassis of the SU-76 was based..." Soviet tenk stronk tenk.
When I saw "Artillery spam", I thought "Artillery only".
Do I see a fellow gravy baby?!
Ustanovka means both an installation (process) and a self-contained machine for doing something, with its ancillary equipment. In artillery, it’s either a self propelled gun along with its chassis, or a ship-mounted gun turret.
Thank you for this. I played 'PanzerBlitz' from 1972 on, and the SU-76 allowed me to win many scenario's; using it to 'stiffen' infantry formations and 'leap' forward to small tactical objectives. It could never be a 'true' SPA piece, like Wespe or Hummel. Indirect sustained long-range fire was operationally beyond it(most of the time). Lack of radios and trained FOs(which were drained off to Tank Corps, Mech Corps, Tank Brigades, etc.) mostly limit it to close up engagements. 10 out of 10 if used correctly for infantry support. Once again, great video!
thanks for mentioning that game, I never heard of it before but just looked it up and it looks quite interesting.
Panzer Bush!
As a former US Army Artilleryman, I support fire support!
9:30 - true, and it`s actual for nearly all artillery in such situations.
ы ы ы ы ы ы ы ы ы ы ы
Fantastic content -- thanks! Since this AFV had so many roles, I would definitely be interested in learning more details about the different types of shells used. You have provided excellent content of this type for various German weapons systems, such as the Flak 88 and the Nebelwerfers. Were the shells for busting bunkers similar to the anti-tanks rounds? etc.
Absolutely all types of 76.2mm shells were used on this self-propelled gun, starting from the shells of the times of the Russian Empire for a cannon of the 1903 model and ending with the most modern ones at that time. And so the main 3 types: high-explosive fragmentation 53-OF-350 camulative D 53-BP-350M and sub-caliber 53-BR-354P
If your vehicle was built as a training vehicle, it may be a boiler-plate model. You look sharp and sound professional as always!
Wasn't built as one but was converted to a cutaway to be used as one by the Bundeswehr
@@lucaswatson1913 Understood. Some of the craftsmanship was rough. I was trying to explain why to myself.
@@logoseven3365 welcome to Soviet armour manufacture, building 13,000 in three has an effect on quality control
@@logoseven3365 I mean, the Soviets were trying to spam as many of the thing as they could. It happens that the cost for doing so is quality. Which the Sherman, especially early models, also suffered from.
The creation of the Su-76 was dictated by strict necessity, so initially there were many compromises. The Soviet army urgently needed a light and compact self-propelled gun, which would not take up a lot of resources in production (every gram of metal and every man-hour counted). After it turned out that there was little space left in the self - propelled gun for the loader and there was increased smoke in the cabin, a radical decision was made-to cut off the top and rear of the self-propelled gun, thereby making it so to speak a "convertible". It was a forced decision, there was simply no time and effort to develop something else at that time.
I love the clear, no-nonsense approach here.
Also, let's not forget about the heavy universal self-propelled installation ISU-152, which was also put into operation in 1943. It proved to be a very reliable and easily repaired machine. And its 152 mm gun perfectly destroyed enemy pillboxes and heavy tanks.
He seems to have upped his fashion game recently. Really looking professional now
Bernhard looks like James Bond with that suit!!! A stylish genius!!!!
Im surprised that you never spoke of the SU-76s initial steering system, driving each track with its own engine and transmission, and thus turning by running the engines at different RPMs. Its the main reason the SU-76M was made with the new coupled engine and traditional transmission layout.
I am so excited for this video. I had to comment before I even watched. This is my favorite Soviet tracked vehicle from WWII.
Same! I love this design. The t-34 85 is first tho.
Yes. It is a sweet little design.
Seconded. I've always been curious about this cute lil thing
Everyone seems to like it, Germans saw it as a legitimate threat. Too bad there was 1 very important person's approval that mattered to the tank designer that he didn't get. Straight to the frontlines he went. 5:10
@@LordSniggles wth are you talking about?? He went to the "frontlines" for the reluctance to admit his mistakes in design and trying to cover them up by blaming issues on other components. Go read the article which Bernhard is citing. And the issues were so severe that they led to 45% of SU-12 (aka SU-76) sent to the army to be out of service due to technical failures. The vehicle had to be hastily reworked by other people into SU-76M and only then it was able to join the fight successfully (and was built in numbers second only to T-34). But the cost was almost a year of delay, and that during the most critical time of war.
It is absolutely fascinating to hear history from another perspective and the sources you are able to get access to are phenomenal. Great job, love all the content. Thanks for sharing!
As a Company of Heroes 2 player, I feel that title.
*spams conscripts
You are not alone xD
@@Oppen1945 If the match turns into mobile tank battle then the Soviets are pretty much screwed, but Soviet infantry IMO are the most effective in the game.
@@Oppen1945 Especially the Soviet campaign is full of myths, lies and propaganda
@@229masterchief infantry spam is easily countered, there are still balance issues in the game imo.
4:11 Yuri Pasholok states in his article on the history of SU-76 that the SU-12 name was indeed used for the first design, which was in productuion in early 1943 and later renamed SU-76 in May 1943. 10:20 ...Which indicates this vehicle as the one made by GAZ from December 1944 onwards. Other makes didn't have this feature. 15:38 Side armour was made thinner arcoss the board at the same time as other armour plates were thinned down and roof was abolished in order to save weight - when SU-15 was made into SU-15M in late June and early July 1943 (as per State Comittee for Defense decree №3760ss), prior to SU-76M adoption. The P. Samsonov's quote c. 16:02 is an abridged form of several paragraphs of Yuri Pasholok's article on SU-76M, which provides more context to this topic. 17:58 It has to be remembered, however, that this number includes several hundred postwar-made vehicles.
This was called by Russian troops as the half-assed Ferdinand because it visually resembled it but had no back armor. Tankers hated it but infantry loved it because they could easily talk to the tank crew not walled off by armor and tankers eventually accepted it because if it was hit by enemy tank or RPG, they could just hop off it and not burn to death vs. regular tank. It was effectively used to support infantry assaults on positions where enemy didn't expect to see any tanks like bogs and flooded or wooded areas. It was good at suppressing lightly defended areas and was also very useful in urban fighting scenarios.
Drivers dont like it because he sat between engine and Fuel tank
A small correction: it wasn't called "half-assed" (as in, badly or shoddily made or designed), it was called "bare-assed Ferdinand" (голожопый Фердинанд).
@@ayebraine yup! that's what I meant when I said half-assed... but bare-assed is the right translation
Reducing the thickness of the side armor reduces weight more than reducing the thickness of the rear. Also, if the front of the tank is not facing the enemy then you are probably running and the rear is.
Dude, whoever makes the icons (infographics?) is very intelligent and talented in coming up with the ideas that support the message. Well done
I have a pretty long theory as to why the side armor might be thinner on the SU76M, but it's right at the bottom of this essay! skip down to the bottom to get the gist of it. Something you might find interesting. My grandad was an operator of the British 25pdr artillery piece. His piece was not used in any armored vehicle, but towed. As you probably know however, that gun made it into many self-propelled designs, for example, the Bishop. He told me they used to train anti-tank direct fire drills wherever he was based, probably around one of the D-Day landing training camps, as his service was just after the war had finished. I bet you this means that SPG gunners were also trained to fire the Bishop and other 25pdr artillery pieces in direct fire mode. The interesting thing is that he told me a story of when he was ordered to practice shooting a moving tank. The tank was put on rails and started moving back and forth. The first 2 shots his section fired knocked the tank right over onto it's turret, using AP ammunition, not HE. I'm betting other UK crews got this kind of training in SPG, and to the same effect. What I'm getting at is this: All the major powers during the second world war, came to the same conlusion by the end of it, or shortly after. The MBT was the best compromise of firepower and armor that could be mass produced. The Centurion, The Pershing, One of the big cats (or any really), were all the precursor to the MBT from each country. You may well be getting to this, as I'm only halfway through the video, but I think the SU76 was the precursor to a Main Battle Support Infantry tank developed by the soviets, just like the t34 was the precursor to the IS line of tanks, and then the t54. If the war had gone on any longer (luckily it didn't) I strongly suspect the STUG III/IV would have turned into the role the SU76 fills; A pz3 chassis which combines the role of anti tank, direct and indirect artillery, and anti-air. Namely, what you would get would be a SBT, or a Support Battle Tank. It's kind of what we have today with IVF's like the Bradley, but if a major war broke out the Bradley would almost certainly be heavily modified or scrapped for a newer support battle tank platform concept. If you did this, namely created one hull that could fit a package of platforms for engaging in anti-air or anti-tank, or anti-tank and artillery, you basically have the SU76 anyway. If the germans had gone down this same route, you would have ended up scrapping the Pz II models of AAA and the wirblewind, and creating a series of modifications for the PZ III which could do the job of every other tank chassis the german army had at that time. I suspect if this were to happen, the British and americans would have used the m3 Lee hull, or perhaps the Locust or Stuart light tanks. I don't know enough about the subject to know if that was what was already happening or not. But it makes sense to me. Both the Axis and the allies would then only have had to produce two types of Main Battle Vehicles; The Main Battle Tank, and the Main Battle Infantry Support Tank. I'd be willing to bet there is evidence in the literature to back up that claim. Nobody knew at that time the war was over after all. It's far easier to produce just two types of chassis, and then bolt everything you need to fight a war on them afterwards. Once you get the chassis right, anything you put on it becomes a significantly better armored fighting vehicle. Do you think this could be the reason the upper side sections of hull were so much thinner? Because they fully intended on making more designs based directly off the original SU76, and this was just the first one? A SU76 which was dedicated to artillery use, but could be used on the front line as infantry support, wouldn't need such a thick turret on the sides as it would either be facing towards or away from the enemy for it's primary role. Originally, the SU76 was supposed to be much more like a STUG, with the SU76M being used primarily in an indirect fire role. They were looking at BOTH the Stug and the Marder, and trying to combine it in to one chassis. Let me know what you think!
Daaang! Y’all he upgraded to a fly Ass suit. Good for him! Lookin good
You could legitimately be a museum curator. You know your subject and your presentation skills are excellent.
15:57 - this fragment taken from "Самый массовый самоход Красной армии" by Юрий Пашолок.
5:53 - this is a strange statement. What is "the only pre-war Soviet tank designer that had survived the "Great Purge"? For example, Александр Александрович Морозов, one of T-34`s designers and future chief of development of T-64 worked on command positions from 1931, on T-34 from 1938.
Maybe the only guy on the council with the stupid name?
@@looinrims what?
Alexander Morozov? I guess.
@@hanhphuc166 yes
What was his rank at the time? Stalin eliminated many above a certain rank or command.
I remember one time being alone in World of Tanks with SU-76, with two enemy players. I sniped one in mid map, while other was taking my base. I had to chase back, and SU-76 was slow as a snail! I arrived at the base, he was firing on me and missed by just an inch, I think life flashed in front of my eyes in that moment.... He was 5-6 seconds away from capturing base... I aimed... terrain was rough and aiming was unstable... I got lock and I just clicked. It felt like time stopped... and then boom! A hit! That was the greatest adrenaline rush ever ! :D
Great title for this video. Interesting look at an "unglamorous" but important AFV. Also interesting that some crews installed improvisational top armor. Makes sense!
"So how many 76mm shells do you want to send at them?" "Yes."
"установка" can be "a device", "a mount" or "a piece", depends on particular purpose of it, like "артиллерийская установка" is not a mount for artillery, it's the artillery piece itself, the whole assembly. As "a device" it's somewhat akin to German "Geräte" or "Zeug", like there can be a big "radio device" - stationary one or on a truck.
Great stuff! Really enjoyed this one.
Thank you!
Bernhard, wie immer eine perfekte Analyse. Ich mag die Aufmachung deiner Clips mit den Piktogrammen sehr. Die Zitate dürftest du jeweils noch ein paar Sekunden länger stehen lassen.
It was good enough for the job,certainly better then infrantry support guns,plus if it went against a run of a mill german infantry division or axis allies divisions,with aduqate infantry support it did a decent job
People tend to forget, that German armor were always few and far between. This thing never had to be good enough to go toe-to-toe with any German tank. All it had to do was provide versatile fire support for the infantry. And should any German armor show up, the Su-76 would be just one of many things shooting at it.
Thank you - I always had a soft spot for the suka :)
wow you have an old youtube channel
The word you’re looking for is “Suchka”, which is a slang term meaning “bitch”. Not to be confused with “Suka(Cyka)”, the formal way of saying “bitch”.
Another Outstanding video and presentation.
Great source of info on a vehicle that is mostly overlooked despite its large numbers.
6:00 - 32 Tank Brigade, he died on 3 August 1943 near Малая *Томаровка* (everyone, who read about Battle of Kursk know this place).
Could you type the name of that place in latin alphabet?
@@klake5375 eng. Tomarovka, ger. Tomarowka. In Soviet documents it's sometimes not very correctly written as "Тамаровка" (Tamarovka / Tamarowka).
Yes. this was at the beginning of Soviet counter-offensive (Operation Polkovodets Rumyantsev). Heavy battles around that settlement on that very day.
Very informative!
5:02 - check out Юрий Пашолок`s articles about that, especially "Роковая самоходка".
90% of the people here have no idea what you have written.
@@cheese515 i hope, 100% of the people here can google what I have written.
@@TheSunchaster Yes, they can. But if you have something to say, and you want to share your thoughts, you cant just write something completely foreign and expect those who don't understand to just figure it out. They likely don't care enough, which is unfortunate because the things you have to say might be interesting.
@@cheese515 reasonably, but here is the comment on historical channel. History needs work with sources in many languages. And I do not see the point to write transcripted and translated names, they are useless in this case, you can`t find article by them.
@@TheSunchaster I was more so thinking that you could write the Russian words with Latin letters in parentheses after the Cyrillic.
I have to admit, he is quite dapper...
I saw the same tank you showed in this video when I visited Dresden, Germany few years back
Outstanding video and presentation.
I’ve always kinda just pictured this vehicle as a quick way to throw the over abundant 76 gun on some tracks and get some use out of it. When you got lots of these things acting as a fire support artillery, and occasionally switching to shoot at enemy vehicles, they made a bit of an impact. Of course they were easy to kill but they in return dished out a lot of shells before being destroyed
This is one of my favorite tanks. Its just a field gun on a chassis. Simple and effective
I love this format of the video! It's like a Detusche chieftan!
Good analysis. Your assessment in general is correct - the Su-76M was primarily used as infantry support SPG, not the breakthrough or anti-tank one. There were other SPGs for this role, such as Su-85, Su-100 whose primary role was dealing with tanks, or SU/ISU-152 meant to break through the fortified areas. Think of Su-76 as of very mobile division artillery capable of high rate of fire. When used properly, a group of Su-76s could deliver very dense artillery barrage, this is why it was so widely used on Eastern front. Anyways, great content. Keep up the good work!
Great work Sir thank you
6:59 - no, this is ordinary ZIS-3. ZIS-8 remained as experimental prototype that tested on one SU-12.
Based on? Source?
@@looinrims "Роковая самоходка" by Юрий Пашолок
@@TheSunchaster based
I very much appreciate how you frame the rise of the SU-76 with the demise of the light tank, which should have happened sooner. As a tactical asset, the turret of the light tank was not as valuable as the larger gun of the SPA by even Barbarossa. The SPA with desanting troops also made a better IFV than most light tanks of WW2. The really problem with the light tank as a concept was the development of antitank infantry weapons, which made conventional tank tactics against infantry progressively suicidal.
the author says that the SU 76 did not have specialized sights for direct fire ... Only now he apparently is not very aware that the ZiS 3 is the last gun in the line of universal guns of 76,2mm caliber and from the very beginning it had armor-piercing ammunition, and standard sights were intended, among other things, for direct fire
Hey I enjoy your content very much, thank you
I _love_ the subtle hint of illustrating "fishy documentation" with a WH40k-chainsword at 14:25.
:)
I want to visit so bad! Thanks for a great video!
right? It looks like a *bad ass* museum.
Well done good sir. Any chance for a followup on the SU-76i?
Regarding the use against tanks: Consider the Pak 36 video, 15:35, section 84 of the manual which boils down to: "Position change only before engagement and only to previously designated positions. Once you engaged, you stay and fire until you or the tank unit is dead!" The gun was big enough to hurt a tank - even just throw it's tracks. At the same time, tanks would propably target the SPG if they got that close. And the SPG could propably not run. And protecting infantry against tanks is one role for "infantry support gun" systems. And it might even have been the only weapon capable of hurting a tank. So if a tank came into direct fire range, it was of course a priority target. It should not even need mention that they do. 15:30 Something worth considering is that the side had machineguns - the aft did not. Between the formation, security elements and those side MGs, enemy infantry should be much less likely to approach from the sides. The 15mm after would make sense it it should resist the (stronger) tank MG.
clearly a proper soviet solution to the issue of reduced enemy casualty values of continued light tank production A fine vehicle that served with distinction
It would say that the closest German equivalents to the Su-76M are the Sd.Kfz. 251/9 - Schützenpanzerwagen (7.5 cm KwK37) and the Sd.Kfz. 250/8 leichter Schützenpanzerwagen (7.5 cm). The halftracks with the short 75 mm guns that originally armed the StuG's also serve as a lightly armoured assault gun to support (mechanised) infantry.
Wrong. ZiS-3 field (or divisional) gun was a proper piece of artillery which packed much more punch (almost twice the muzzle velocity, twice rate of fire and twice the firing range). Germans did develop some field artillery with similar characteristics, but for some reasons never built/used them in numbers. And when they tried to put a field gun on chassis, with their love for big and heavy stuff they ended up with almost unusable 'Dicker Max'. Which was intended as an AT spg though. The closest equivalent would probably be StuG III with KwK40 L/43, but since it was designed more for AT purpose, it had more muzzle velocity (hence higher pen) but much shorter fire range. So still not exactly the same.
Nice great work
Thanx Bernhard. I didnt know it was the 2nd most produced. I also didnt know stalin was micromanaging production of AFVs. Can you tell us what the ammo load was? X amount of HE, X amount of AP, etc... That will often give at least an idea of the intended role of a vehicle. This is still one of the best channels on KZhead.
Stalin did not "micromanage", he assumed position of the People's Commissar (in essence, Minister) of Defense in July '41 and stayed in it until 1947. So it was his direct responsibility to approve and oversee production of all the armament, especially considering the limited resources. Prior to the war Stalin had much less say in the matters of weaponry as he had only political, not executive position.
Su-76 proved valuable in swampy terrain where it could pass much easier than T-34 while it had comparable fire power. Apparently this helped achieving surprise during operation Bagration. It was well loved by infantry it supported where it helped with cleaning fortified strong points.
But the crews hated it, lol. Cramped, no roof to keep rain out, just a smelly canvas, nice front target of the driver hatch. Barely sufficient armor. Geez, imagine being the driver between two HOT engines and the fuel... with ammo stowed right behind the fuel.
@@ShalaniUSA There are always detractors, as example Sherman was also harshly and often unjustly criticized after the war. When you are facing Kwk 75 or 88mm, being in smaller vehicle is definite plus, even if ergonomics suffer a bit.
@@ShalaniUSA They had a mountable tarp to cover from the weather. Do you really think they (or the crews of similarly open-roofed German Marders) were just sitting under the rain and snow? The roof was initially added on the suggestion of Stalin tho, and proven to be useful, but had to be removed from the mass-produced SU-76M due to the weight/gearbox issues of the initial design. The armor... this thing was not supposed to be on the frontline, first batch of them was delivered to the SPG artillery regiments to shoot things from afar. So it's not different from the armor on any other SPG or even some ATs like the aforementioned Marders. Personally, I don't like the design, but since it was produced in such numbers it means it was good for its purpose. It's not like there were no other potential replacements some of which even reached the prototype stage.
@@Tallorian i mentioned the canvas tarp. "Smelly canvas" is a tarp. They suck. Water pools on them, they leak, they smell, they do not keep the cold out well. I am a US Army veteran with lots of time in the field -I know tarps.☺
@@ShalaniUSA oh alright, sorry. Still, I think that even though the crews complained (and indeed this thing did not offer any luxurous conditions), in fact they'd prefer to stick to their SUs rather than get stuck with the same gun (field artillery ZiS-3) in its towed version of 1.1 tonne - completely outside, with no bullet/shrapnel protection but the frontal shield, no tarp, and very often surrounded by a very towing-unfriendly landscape, at least by "civilized" means like trucks.
First translation is correct: While ustanovka does mean installation when translated literally, the meaning is that the "artillery installation" is now samo-hod-naya (self-walk-ing).
I died when he said samokhayongnya lmao
I always took it at face value, but you're clearly right that it is more flexible than simply a 'tank destroyer.'
Great vid
I would greatly one of you videos on the SU-76i.
Only three of them survived, 2 in Moscow and 1 in Sarny, Ukraine.
One thing I've noticed is severely lacking from KZhead is any info on the crew experience of maintaining and fighting in the Valentine tank. As the most-produced British tank of WW2, it seems to be a severe oversight! I'd love it if you were to remedy this.
"anyone" can read English, whereas few people can read German.
@@MilitaryHistoryVisualized of course, not criticising what you're doing, I love what you produce - just trying to get the idea out there 🙂
Great vid! One question... why is the logo for fishy a chainsword?
Warhammer 40K reference.
1:31 it's kinda both. This word changes meaning depending on context 🤷. Apparently it can even mean "plan of action" sometimes
Hehe, 14:14, "Documentation is "fishy"". I like the icon used, w40k chainsword! :D
I don't really understand this: the designer was punished because it was too bad. But they still produced 10k+ units and used it in East Germany and in Korea as well (a lot after WWII).
"What exactly are we building this vehicle to shoot at, comrades?" "That's correct."
I wonder if the armor thickness on the rear could be higher to increase structural integrity, since the sides would need less with the hull roof and superstructure being connected to them. Rear plate at 15mm would be around 300 kg, at 10mm around 200kg... Well i don't really see the use of a 1% (10 ton vehicle) weight increase in the rear for balance purpose, doesn't really seem like enough.
@@samhamsord7942 Whilst i did consider it, i don't think that's the case. The t-70 rear armor was more like 25mm and not the 15mm of the SU, also the T-70 has a very sloped rear whereas the SU has a pretty much vertical rear end. Whatever the reason, i don't think it was lazyness since there's some rather significant differences in the rear armor design of both vehicles.
This SPG was meant for second, or even third line artillery support. Hence, their armor was.. nominal. For this reason this vehicle was often called by the troops "naked ass Ferdinand" as a reference to the German Panzerjäger SPG.
Another possible translation for "samohodnaya ustanovka": self propelled emplacement. (I'm not Russian, I'm Croatian, but this seems to be in the spirit of the language, despite the obvious contradiction in terms.)
No, it`s not. "Установка" has many meanings, but not in such context, especially including that this is "САУ" - "самоходная артиллерийская установка", which is literally "self-propelled artillery mounting". "Самоходные орудия" also used, and this is literally SPGs.
@@TheSunchaster Quick dictionary search: emplacement - a structure on or in which something is firmly placed; a platform or defended position where a gun is placed for firing mounting - a backing, setting, or support for something Completely synonymous in this context. The word "artillery" is clearly ommited in "samohodnaya ustanovka", so I ommited it as well.
@@maddocpax788 I think the problem is the on English side, not the Russian one--"emplacement" implies a static, fixed setup, whereas a "mount" can be either fixed or mobile.
@@hailexiao2770 Yeah, alright. Words like mounting or platform imply immobility, but emplacement denotes immobility by definition. Using it in conjunction with self-propelled makes for an outright contradiction in terms. Not that these are uncommon in the world of AFVs, e. g. mobile pillbox or landship. But self-propelled mounting is a more elegant way to say it.
Love the suit. Just for Visualized right.
Slight correction about your pronunciation of Samokhodnaya Ustanovka/Самоходая Установка: in Russian, "kh" (or in cyrillic «х»,) represents the same sound as German "ch", not a hard K. Overall another great and informative video. Soviet assault guns aren't talked about enough, usually ignored in favor of the T-34.
I'm not sure which sight this had. The ZiS-3 gun had the PG 1-M periscope sight 3.7x magnification / 10.25° Field of view. One sources said the SU-76M had a tank periscope sight like the T-34/76 PT 4-7 or PT 4-14. 2.5x / 26° FOV. I would assume a sight with a wider FOV would be better at acquiring a moving target.
Thanks for an interesting video. I wasn't aware that SPGs were that common in WW2. I'm not sure if the British had them & they don't seem to appear in war movies.
We had various types as the war progressed based on tank chassis in service.
@@stevepirie8130 I did not know that. Thanks for the info
IIRC most numerous was the Sexton. Though it was produced in Canadian plants based on American Sherman chassis. American M7 was also used, known as "Priest" by the Brits.
1. The thinner side vs rear is a weight issue. The vehicle is 5m in length and yet only about half as wide. Two slightly thicker side plates would have weighed down the vehicle more than adding a roof! 2. Soviet Divisional artillery is really the originating arm of the Su-76M, much like how the Stug was descended from Infantry guns. The difference is, in the German Army they had proper howitzers (105 - 150mm). The Soviet Infantry Division by contrast lost these big howitzer guns in the post-Barbarossa reorganization (they went to Artillery Divisions which supported Corps or Army level formations) which also reduced their manpower to less than 10,000. As a result, the only artillery support most Soviet infantry could expect to have organic to their Division was the 76.2 Divisional guns; which had to do double duty as indirect fire pieces AND infantry guns. 3. The Germans designating the Su-76M as an "assault gun" is a major distinction that proves it wasn't really meant to be a tank destroyer. Contrary to popular belief, Stugs were never fully converted into primarily anti-tank units. Indeed the Stug 1944 manual states that while destruction of enemy tanks is of prime importance, a Stug is not a Panzerjaeger and should resist being used as such. The reason for this is that the role most often ascribed to the Stug - that of an ambush vehicle against tanks - was actually a role that was most often relegated to towed anti-tank units. And note that the Germans called their towed anti-tank guns "Panzerjaeger" too; not just the ones mounted on a vehicle. Stugs and other better armored vehicles were instead saved for counterattack. And while it is a common refrain that "Stugs are so easy to flank because they lack a turret", in reality a flanked tank is also in trouble and would be turning the whole vehicle towards the flanking enemy and not just the turret. Indeed, when you really think about it; having a gun in front of the the vehicle doesn't make it worse at attacking the enemy with a known location (as would be the case in a counter-attack to support the infantry) - you are moving towards the enemy and your main armament is pointed at them already. It is only really problematic if you are advancing without recon and knowledge of the enemy's location. In that regard, the Su-76's lack of armor likely wasn't as big an issue so long as it could hang further back and fire almost indirectly; hence the decision to lighten armor, remove the roof, and add an artillery sight. Contrary to common belief also, tanks and other AFVs actually fired indirectly all the time too; indeed the turreted American destroyers are confirmed to have fired more shots indirectly. Its only really an issue if the Soviets advanced blindly and the Su-76s get ambushed by an undetected enemy... In which case their odds of survival are probably only slightly worse than when a tank gets ambushed. That Su-76 and Soviet tank losses overall were so high is likely more a reflection of this "move forward without proper recon!" mindset more than the actual technical qualities of the vehicles themselves.
Some people think that Ustanovka means something about emplacement, but it's not. Ustanovka got the parent word of ustanov - part of technological operation executed without re-tooling or dismounting the billet. So the "Ustanovka" means "Technological machine" which performs certain array of tasks without need to be remodeled. This half-factory slang blabber actually runs very deep in Soviet/Russian military. That's why russian weaponry prototypes are called Izdelie (Which essentially means "Hand-crafted thing"), that's why snipers don't hunt, don't kill, just work, that's why you don' "aim" big guns, you "zameryaesh" (Measure) and so on.
I hope some time you do a video of the rd that came before this. The Su76i. Before all the bugs were ironed out of this Russian TD of which there were plenty, the Russians took captured German Stug tds and made the Su76i. Its a fascinating story. It was beloved by its crews for its excellent automotive qualities, its gun and its wonderful heating system in the winter. It even served in numbers at Kursk. The newer Su76 was a open top arty/Td. It had no such German engineering or creature comforts. It was much cheaper to build and make many of being all Soviet engineering.
By the way any chance to see a video on soviet war tractors and other improvised heavy vehicles of ww2 era?
5:19 - this is постановление ГКО №3530 "О самоходных установках СУ-76". KZhead deleted previous comment because of link for scanned original document on special site of РГАСПИ.
nothing in the spam filter :( just checked.
@@MilitaryHistoryVisualized i wrote email with the link and some details, check out (the title starts with "GKO")
@@TheSunchaster thank you!
"Samokhodnaya ustanovka" is short for "smokhodnaya artilleriyskaya ustanovka" which would mean "Self propelled artillery unit" given the context. Abbreviation SAU does exist on its own tho but designated to howitzers and long range artillery as opposed to SU which designated to field artillery.
SAU is in fact interchangeable with SU and basically is the same. You could easily find nominations like "SAU SU-100". The thing is, SAU is an umbrella colloquial abbreviation - basically, all that has a gun and a tracked chassis could be called a SAU. While SU is a military nomenclature model designation, as opposed to tanks (T) or developments (Obj./Object). That's why all of those are SUs despite completely different roles: SU-14 (howitzer artillery), SU-152 (assault gun), SU-100 (tank destroyer) and SU-76 (field/support gun).
Didnt know it replaced light tanks, this thing might deserved much more respect than it got
I remember this thing from the original red orchestra. great fun bombarding the last cap from out of range of enemy panzerfausts
Yessss, I loved using this on that game too lol. I would just follow the guys in the better tanks and wait for them to get in a jam with the enemy then just toss shells over them in support till someone finally killed me lol.
Love these in Steel Division 2.
I prefer the 203mm and 280mm. Or the German 100mm or even better then 21cm.
5:11 the hand of stalin , nuff said.
In the Red Army ,the Su-76 SPG had a nickname "голожопый Фердинанд" (the bare-assed Ferdinand) for its general Ferdinand-like appearance and the lack of protection from the rear (and the top).
The Marder III tank destroyer used captured Soviet 76.2 mm F-22s. So the SU 76M definitely could be used in anti-tank role, suffering the same weaknesses as the Marder III, with one exception. As far as I understand, Germans used captured ammo as well, and would eventually turn into a big problem.
you don't need "wonder weapons" to win a war. you just need simple machines which is easy to make, easy to operate and easy to train!
And an industry that can build thousands of them "by yesterday". Which the Soviets had.
@@imrekalman9044 Indeed true. Soviets had massive resources and manpower as well.
The SU 76 was apparently known to its crews as " The B.tch ". I think that tells you something about its ergonomics.
What sort of museum invites you to look at their armor, but doesn't let you get inside it
Nice job. I'm sure "Chieftain" would approve.