Posted on 02/21/2020 10:39:59 AM PST by Freeport
What flag is flying over Vietnam today? It ain't Old Glory.
That was the name of the book written by a lieutenant that wrote up daily battle reports as the liaison officer for the 3rd Armored Division Maintenance Battalion. The Shermans were out gunned against the German Tanks. In many cases the rounds bounced off the frontal armor of the German tanks.
BINGO!
Most German and American tanks destroyed in the war were taken out by anti-tank weapons. Tank-on-tank kills were rare.
I’m not sure they aren’t already here. The tech already exists, it just requires the money, talent and resources to put it all together.
I did read the book. It’s within reach. The book didn’t mention the other nickname for a Sherman tank which was a Ronson after the lighter manufacturer.
Panzerfursts were deadly.
Mostly thin armor, gasoline engines, undersized main gun.
It could aim faster and get off a first shot faster than a Tiger, but if that first shot just bounces off the Tigers armor, that Sherman crew was in for a world of hurt.
A high velocity 88 mm round turns into a white hot blob of molten metal on it’s way through a Shermans armor, the ammo inside the tank goes up, the gasoline ignites the crew is DEAD.
There was a reason the crews called them a “RONSON”, as in a Ronson cigarette lighter.
My Father was a tanker crewman from Normandy to Linz, Austria.
I think the British called the 75mm armed Shermans “Tommy Cookers”.
If I remember correctly he did have a few positive things to say about the E8 version of the Sherman.
I read somewhere that the 75 on the Sherman was an Americanized version of the French 75 of WWI fame.
: (
No
Could be; don’t know about that, but the first 75 mm guns on the Shermans were not high velocity because the designers were concerned about the crews wearing out the gun tubes to fast.
Kind of hard to wear out the tubes if your platform is destroyed in it’s first engagement.
The later models incorporated a high velocity 75 mm gun.
Could poke a hole in a Sherman with a sharpened stick? Those holes shot through the armor often ignited internal fires where ammo was stored?
The statement was true until the first Gulf War. Gulf War I was the fiorst time airpower was the primary fire with ground fire as secondary.
Col John Warden wrote about the “five rings” that make up strategic targeting and how air power is best used.
Attacking broad spectrum strategic target sets is a excellent way to crush the adversary. Yes, ground fire is essential, as is air and sea (and soon to be space) power.
Superb targeting along with precise weapons delivery are awesome enablers that gives airpower a capability not seen until relatively recently. For example, WWII took over 9,000 bombs from B-17’s to achieve as 90% Pk on a 100’ sized target, whereas Korea and Vietnam took about 30 bombs, and then, just using laser guided bombs in Gulf War I, one bomb was all that was needed for 90% Pk. Today we have JDAM weapons of even greater accuracy, and SDB bombs make the use of airpower more flexible.
Of course, we all know that a guy with a knife is the most precise weapon.
YUP; kinda sucks to win every battle and have the CIVILIANS and POLITICIANS back home tell you you have to lose the war.
I am sure all you Civilians and Politicians wonder why so many of us still HATE all of you commie c*ck suckers.
(perhaps not you, I don’t know you)
True, but it was used as a long campaign of its own. Then the ground forces went in as a separate campaign. It wasn't terribly well-integrated. OIF, however, used air power as an initial opening phase which led to a beautifully integrated air-ground force swarming Iraq in less time than the ODS air campaign alone took.
I was amazed at the maintenance intervals which meant frequent engine replacements given design screw ups for the original tank engines and unexpected usage of the trucks.
Yep.
They solved that problem in the early part of the war.
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