Buba
A total creep
The Pz.IV was good enough for this.
Simply have the F model with 7,5cm/L43 in quantity in 1941.
You are in charge of armored vehicle doctrine and design in 1939...
- Thread starter LordSunhawk
- Start date
Simply have the F model with 7,5cm/L43 in quantity in 1941.
sillygoose
Well-known member
Shouldn't have been too late, it was if anything more an issue of manufacturing abilities (the Panther didn't get into production until the 1942 expansion of AFV production facilities was completed) as the Germans went from not being able to produce an AFV over armored car weight in 1933 to being able to manufacture Tiger tanks in 1942. Had the Panther not been overweighted by Hitler's demands it should have been able to be ready sooner. There is also the issue of military spec, which guided the designers, so a lot of the issues were around what the military asked for rather than the lack of designer imagination. See how quickly they got the VK3002db ready, but it was turned down due to military demands requiring redesigns.
sillygoose
Well-known member
There was also a load of general stupidity with the Germans.
Like not recognizing the potential of sloped armor despite their half-tracks having 8mm sloped armor that deflected rounds which would otherwise pierce a flat (90 degree) plate of the same thickness.
And not realizing that all those obsolete Panzer Is can be converted into rocket launchers by mounting Nebelwerfers on them.
The main problem with the Germans is that they didn't simplify their weaponry and equipment until it was too late for them, resulting in a lot of wastage in the early war.
Also the use of slave labor lowered quality to an abysmal state.
They should have copied the US and used POWs and foreign laborers exclusively on farms and other forms of manual labor where sabotage was impossible, while their factory are staffed with German women.
A Panzer IV with sloped armor (Panzer III/IV style) and the 7.5cm L/41 is the German T-34.Probably the L/41 for 1941:
Pz.Sfl. II - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Lord Sovereign
The resident Britbong
Well, from a British perspective, we should have kicked the "Infantry and Cruiser tank" concepts to the curb and instead focused on a main battle tank for modern combined arms warfare (take a leaf out of the German and Russian books). Something like the Matilda, if not a bit lighter (for speed) with a slightly bigger gun (for enemy tanks), could suffice. Given that the Matildas scared the shit out of the Germans in France, with them having to roll out Flak 88s to stop them, we might have been on to a winner there. Of course, install radios and have them operate in large formations.
The "Crusader" meanwhile could have been reworked to be a great light tank for infantry support and screening the main advance for example. Granted, all this would preferably be working in tandem with modern combined arms warfare, thus a more aggressive RAF with strike bombers.
The British were actually quite a bit ahead of the world in tank design before classic officer class incompetence struck again. I sometimes wonder as to whether there should be a Parliamentary inquiry into how so many of our officer corps had brains less functional than Tiger tanks, because it has screwed us over for hundreds of years. At least that way we could identify the problem and stop it happening again.
The "Crusader" meanwhile could have been reworked to be a great light tank for infantry support and screening the main advance for example. Granted, all this would preferably be working in tandem with modern combined arms warfare, thus a more aggressive RAF with strike bombers.
The British were actually quite a bit ahead of the world in tank design before classic officer class incompetence struck again. I sometimes wonder as to whether there should be a Parliamentary inquiry into how so many of our officer corps had brains less functional than Tiger tanks, because it has screwed us over for hundreds of years. At least that way we could identify the problem and stop it happening again.
sillygoose
Well-known member
Hindsight is 20/20. There was reasons/ing behind what they did, so it's not a matter of stupidity, but of what in hindsight turned out to be incorrect reasoning...assuming that other options were even viable for them at the time given their means.
Sloped armor comes with drawbacks, including having a larger overall AFV for at least the same weight if not more with the same level of armor protection, so there were reasons not to adopt it at the time, including manufacturing complexity, a big issue in 1939 when the Pz III was just being introduced and the majority of German armor was Pz Is, IIs, and 38ts.
Rocket artillery had it's own limitations and wasting a precious AFV chassis on such early on wasn't really a viable plan, especially when halftracks could do the same. See the Panzerwerfer.
I don't think that is accurate. German AFVs were much, much more reliable than their Soviet foes, which is partially why they ran rings around the Soviets in 1941-42 and were able to advance much further, much faster, against a much larger foe, with much less air support than the US did in 1944-45. The Soviets even pressed captured German AFVs into service because the chassis were more reliable and able to keep going much longer than Soviet period AFVs.
Slave labor wasn't a choice once the German workers had to be mobilized, so you have to make do if you're going to fight a war on that scale. German women weren't available in sufficient numbers and were largely already fully employed pre-war and don't necessarily have the body strength to do all the industrial labor tasks needed once the German men were mobilized. Again, only bad options, pick the least bad and run with it.
sillygoose
Well-known member
If you lighten them then they lose their protection and become vulnerable to other weapons. Stukas still killed Matildas and would more easily against large formations. The 50mm AT guns did too. Plus FLAK 88s would have still been there along with the 105mm L52 artillery pieces used in AT roles.
Plus that isn't even getting into their short range, as they were designed to be heavy breakthrough tanks to support infantry, not independently operating cruiser tanks.
Lord Sovereign
The resident Britbong
So the best course of action for the British would be "back to the drawing board?" Personally, I would agree with that assessment.
The Panzer IV was actually harder to make because the front part was not flat but slightly curved forward. Same thing with the side as well. And if you notice, the back part is also curving downwards. That's a lot of machining to do.
In contrast, the armor of the Panzer III/IV are just big flat pieces. That's a lot less machining to do.
Machining is the bit that takes the longest, so therefore the Panzer III/IV (Panzer IV with sloped armor) would actually take less time to manufacture.
True, but production of German halftracks literally only started in 1939. The SdKfz 251 was only introduced starting mid 1939. And Poland showed that Panzer Is were pretty much obsolete, so I don't see the problem with turning them into rocket launchers.
Hmmm... You're probably right.
I might have gotten that mixed up with German fighter production, which used slave labor extensively, resulting in fighter unit mechanics having to take apart the whole plane to check for sabotage before they could use it.
With German armor I believe it was a lack of raw materials that led to a decline in quality.
Soviet tanks had awful optics, which is one of the most important things once you button up hatches.
German women were available in sufficient numbers, except they were all sent to do farm work.
And if American women could do the same tasks as American men, why are German women incapable of doing the same?
Doesn't make sense.
Germany did adopt total war mode until 1943, by which it was already too late.
I definitely agree that having significant numbers of the F2/G in 1941 would have made a huge difference. But by the time the T-34/85 rolls out, the Pz IV is inferior again. The Germans really did need a (if not the) Panther.
Hitler's demands to uparmor the Panther greatly enhanced its survivability by 1944, much less 1945, but I think this is digressing from the main point. Would you please elaborate more on the 1942 expansion? I don't know as much about production, but do you not believe that the Germans could have started production of a sort of VK 30.01 (H) or VK 36.01 (H) in 1939/40 if it wholeheartedly tried?
The comment about designer imagination is just something I've noticed. The German designers were slow to embrace sloped armor and didn't seem to come up with a lot of great innovations. For example by 1945, German designers were still stuck on the Tiger II's layout while the Soviets were introducing Pike nose. Another example would be how none of the German jagdpanzers incorporated the effective commander sponson + cupola combination which were introduced on the Su-100. I understand that the Soviets had an entirely different philosophy to the Germans (and the rest of the West), which increased "hard" factors such as effective armor thickness and calibre size at the expense of lots of "soft" little discussed factors which proved just as important, but still, the Germans by the end of the war didn't have much going for them in armor design. Compare the IS-7 to the E-75 which were being designed in roughly the same time period for example.
sillygoose
Well-known member
Not sure greatly is what I would say the proper adjective there. Reliability, ease of maintenance, and speed were probably more important, hence the post-war Leopard 1 design with less armor and weight than the Panther.
Keeping to the original 60mm frontal armor design would have been better. Frankly I think the OTL vk3002db should have been adopted with the existing 75mm L48 gun, which was plenty for the period and then add in the heavier gun later.
The expansion of industry had been ongoing since 1932 and it was only in 1942 that the AFV production lines were fully completed based on the pre-war armaments industry expansion plan. Hitler launched the world war earlier than industrial preparations were prepared to handle. IIRC this is covered in Wage of Destruction and several German language books if you can read German.
Available via interlibrary loan.
No I don't believe the VK3001 was viable in 1939/40 given that the Pz III only entered production in 1939 and it took until 1942 to get enough Pz IIIs and IVs in production to phase out the Pz Is and IIs and most of the 38ts. Still though in 1942 there were at least two new Panzer divisions (IIRC the 23rd and 24th) that mostly used French and Czech panzers until 1943. So output over plethora of designs is the way to go, especially given that existing production lines were not set up to handle 30+ ton tanks yet. That is part of the industrial expansion, making sure there are production lines with the equipment to make heavier AFVs. Hence why Henschel made the Tiger tanks, they had the equipment to handle very heavy equipment since they made locomotives primarily.
It wasn't German designers, it was military spec issued by the Waffenamt.
German army planners were less innovative in the interwar period than commonly thought.
Plus it's not like sloped armor didn't have its own drawbacks in term of design.
The Pike nose was a flawed concept in the end and never even saw combat use. Meanwhile post-war the US copied the Tiger II for their heavy tank design before deciding to just go for the universal tank concept. Ultimately everyone adopted the standard sloped armor design before modern composite armor took over and flat armor made a return.
The Jagdpanzers I think didn't have the cupola due to the problems of incorporating it into the design and the vulnerability it left for the commander if hit. After all it was a feature in regular AFVs, but commander casualties made an impression on German design philosophy. Soviets didn't care about casualties nearly as much.
I disagree about the Germans not having much going in terms of armor design, the E-series was quite innovative.
The IS-7 was largely a postwar design and was dumped in favor of the T-10.
sillygoose
Well-known member
The Germans didn't machine anything, they welded plates:
DTD Testing of Panzer III Armour Plate - Axis History Forum
forum.axishistory.com
Again, what machining? They welded the armor into place. The III/IV certainly simplified things, but it wasn't as compact and was heavier.
Huh? That specific model maybe, but the Germans had halftracks earlier than that.
Sd.Kfz. 10 - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Sd.Kfz. 9 - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Sd.Kfz. 6 - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Pz Is were used until 1942 in combat because of the lack of other panzers to replace them in panzer divisions.
Pretty much. Soviet optics actually were quite good, since they bought an old Zeiss plant pre-war. If anything they actually had better optics than the US going into the war, which IIRC the US report on the T-34 in 1942 even noted.
Not sure where you're getting that from, some 14 million German women worked in industry.
American women couldn't, largely that was black and hispanic men used for heavy labor. German women did more than American women in industry per capita, see Wages of Destruction. Stop listening to US wartime propaganda.
That was largely debunked years ago; Tooze in Wages of Destruction and Overy in his book on the German war economy demonstrated that the Germans were fully economically mobilized for war as early as 1938. They didn't get to Soviet levels of war economy until 1943-44, because that meant having something like 70% of the economy devoted exclusively to war production, which isn't politically sustainable for anyone, even the Soviets, except in extreme emergency.
Buba
A total creep
What you described is pretty much the Valentine.
Indeed its manufacture could be greatly simplified.
I don't have the figures on hand, but the price difference (as much as prices have a meaning in a command economy) between the Pz.IV and Pz.VI is simply shocking. Thing is the Pz.VI was designed with mass manufacturing in mind, e.g. the turret back and sides were a single casting bent into shape in a special press, and not a gazillion pieces fiddled together like a jigsaw puzzle ...
Soviets had Lend-Lease.
sillygoose
Well-known member
Yes, but lost about 50% of their economy in 1941-42, so L-L was helping make up for that loss...though it also added things that even the Soviets couldn't make for themselves in 1941 pre-war.
Not the point.
To make an armor plate that shape, you have to machine it down to that specific shape.
Because it sure as hell wasn't cast.
Weird curvy shapes are much harder to machine than straight lines.
Which were all preoccupied with towing artillery and AT guns.Huh? That specific model maybe, but the Germans had halftracks earlier than that.
Sd.Kfz. 10 - Wikipedia
Sd.Kfz. 9 - Wikipedia
Sd.Kfz. 6 - Wikipedia
Which circles back to my first point of the Panzer IV being difficult to manufacture.
Had the Panzer IV used sloped armor that didn't have weird curved angles, it would have been easier to make.
And the Panzer III/IV had 6 road wheels compared to 8 on the Panzer IV.
That's less rubber used (circumference) and less time needed for production.
More Panzer IVs mean the Panzer Is can be freed up for rocket artillery conversions.
Quality dropped after 1941 and only got back up in 1943 because the factories had to be evacuated.
Might be true.
Nazis also wasted billions of RM and tonnes of resources on worthless prestige projects like the Autobahn, Olympics, and the new Chancellery.
Autobahn construction continued until 1941, when it was already clear that it didn't really have much of a military purpose.
Some war economy when your throwing money and resources into a prestige project that doesn't matter a shit in terms of war effort.
Buba
A total creep
No cupola on Jagdpanzers?
Funny - never noticed
Must had been some sort of executive decision, as the StuG III had it.
Like I said in my post - if made a German Panzer Tsar Shogun Supremo Overlord - I don't care beyond mid 1942.
Starting on the job in 1.I.1939 I'm not getting anything really necessary in quantity earlier than that.
I suppose I could get a Tiger lite - i.e. 40-45 ton class, using the vk.3000 designs - for 2nd half of 1941, maybe debugged and in quantity for summer of '42. But what for? The Pz.IV F/G rules over the two man turret, radioless T-34. The KVs are tougher to crack but they are few and can be left to the Nashorn's ...
Funny - never noticed
Must had been some sort of executive decision, as the StuG III had it.
By the time the T-34/85 rolls out, the war is lost.
Like I said in my post - if made a German Panzer Tsar Shogun Supremo Overlord - I don't care beyond mid 1942.
Starting on the job in 1.I.1939 I'm not getting anything really necessary in quantity earlier than that.
I suppose I could get a Tiger lite - i.e. 40-45 ton class, using the vk.3000 designs - for 2nd half of 1941, maybe debugged and in quantity for summer of '42. But what for? The Pz.IV F/G rules over the two man turret, radioless T-34. The KVs are tougher to crack but they are few and can be left to the Nashorn's ...
Even better, cancel the Panzer III and replace the KwK 37 gun on the Panzer IV with the Rheinmetall-Borsig 7.5-centimetre (3 in) L/40.8 gun from the:
Pz.Sfl. II - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
There's very little data on the gun (it was only ever used in combat on the Pz Sfl II) but reports from the DAK indicate it had good range and AT preformance as a lightly armored Pz Sfl II knocked out 3 British tanks before it was destroyed. And we don't know what kind of British tank it knocked out either, for all we know it could be 3 Matilda IIs.
And given that the Pz Sfl II started development in 1936, the gun was available in the late 1930s right around when the Panzer IV entered service.
A better gun would give those Char B1s, Matilda IIs, and T-34s a run for their money.
Buba
A total creep
1 - in my "I'm the German AFV Shogun" post cancelling the Pz.III was one of the first things to do
2 - thanks for pointing out that gun - I knew that what ended up as the L43 had some sort of earlier competitor but I knew next to nothing about it. This gun saves the hassle of developing the L43. And indeed will be ready for 1940. Actually I was ready to mount the FK38 as tank gun ...
sillygoose
Well-known member
You have a source on that?
Because they had other ones by 1939.
You haven't demonstrated your point actually is accurate though. Just asserted something and gish galloped with it.
Quality dropped because they prioritized output over quality.
The Autobahn actually was used for military operations. The other stuff was more political in use and as makework to get the population money in their pockets; I'd argue without that prerequisite the public wouldn't have tolerated any military spending while they were starving. That's something engineers tend to not consider with resource allocations: the actual needs of the public.
Now that said the Reichsbahn should have been a priority over the Autobahn, but at least the Autobahn had utility, as it allowed for forces to be driven around, like in 1936 in the Rheinland, 1938 in Austria and the Sudetenland, 1939 in core Czechia, in 1939 in Poland, and 1940 in France and the Lowlands. Plus of course in 1944-45. Don't forget that it also acted as a reserve airfield, as they had strips of straight, high quality paved sections as well.