Dark Earth: History of the Tank

Ore even had one of those armoured steamwagons with him, reminds me of the steam tanks of the Stars and Stripes trilogy by Harry Harrison (yes i know it is one of the worst AH series around, but he steam tanks mention there are a nice tough).

American Tank Development Part III: The Second World War



At the time of the British and French declaration of war against Germany on September 4th 1939, the regular United States Army numbered just 238,000 men organized in 12 infantry and 3 cavalry divisions and ranked as the 18th largest army in the world, behind that of Portugal. This relatively small force was supported by 364,000 strong National Guard and the 240,000 men of the Organized Reserve. The Armored Force was equipped primarily with M2 light tanks and a mixture of old and new medium tanks, symptomatic of a distinct shortage of modern arms. As the dark clouds of war descended on Europe and the wider world, President Roosevelt declared a limited national emergency on September 8th 1939, increasing the size of the Regular Army to 300,000. This expansion saw the redesignation of the Armored Force as the 1st Armored Division and the activation of a new unit, the 2nd Armored Division. Both of these units would win particular renown on the battlefields of Europe when the United States finally entered the war in all its power and might.



After the fall of Poland, an uneasy silence fell across Europe as two great blocs faced off against each other over the heavily fortified Franco-German border. Quiet reigned on the Western Front, but in London, Paris, Berlin and Vienna, the lamps burned late into the night as great and terrible plans were forged for invasion, conquest and victory. Allied grand strategy called for a naval blockade of Germany and Austria-Hungary and a steady buildup of British Empire and French land and air forces in France for a great offensive by almost 200 divisions in 1942. This necessitated the acquisition of considerable amounts of equipment above and beyond the rapidly mobilizing productive capacity of both empires that only the United States could supply. Large orders for aircraft were placed in the first months of 1940 and discussions had begun regarding orders for M2 medium tanks. The organizational structure of the armoured divisions of the US Army was set at this point and it did not alter substantially for the remainder of the war. Each division was organized in three separate Combat Commands, which commanded various combinations of the five tank, four armoured infantry and three armored artillery battalions assigned to the division. This proved to be a versatile and balanced force structure in the various theatres it was employed in over the course of the war.



On May 10th 1940, the German Army came down upon the Low Countries and France like a wolf upon the fold, putting paid to any notion of distant or phoney war as the blitzkrieg turned west. The first phase of the German assault was barely held by the desparate commitment of all Allied reserves, but at a grievous cost. The Battles of Holland, Belgium and France showed that many prewar concepts of the utility of light tanks and fast medium vehicles had been made obsolete by the rapid advance of technology and tactics. The initial success of German Panzer IIIs and IVs and British Crusaders and Valiants and the performance of anti-tank guns of all sides provided the decisive blow to the advocates of the light, fast M2. The U.S. Army’s next medium tank would need to be able to strike heavily from a distance at mobile and immobile defences alike and this would require a powerful, heavy shell, the most optimum of which was fired from the anti-tank 3” Gun M5 then entering production.



As such, the Ordnance Department issued full design characteristics of a new 32t medium tank armed with a turret mounted 76mm gun on June 3rd 1940. This vehicle would become the M-4 tank, known later to millions across the world as the Sherman, but it would not be ready for production in the immediate future. An interim replacement for the M2 would be required. It came in the form of the M3 medium tank. Based on the chassis of the abandoned M2, the 29t M3 was always intended as a compromise vehicle, fielding a fixed 76mm gun mounted in a sponson in addition to its 37mm turret as a means of getting the necessary armament to the battlefield as swiftly as possible. It was protected by up to 68mm of frontal armour and reached a top speed of 23mph on good roads. It was fated to never see active service with the United States Army, but it would serve with no less than twelve other nations, including Britain, the Soviet Union, France, China and India. The circumstances by which this occurred require an examination of the pivotal events of the second half of 1940 and 1941.



The second phase of the Battle of France saw the British Expeditionary Force cut off and evacuated from the Channel ports and the French Army smashed back from the Somme-Aisne Line. The subsequent Fall of France came as a stunning shock to the American political and military establishment and everyday citizens alike. Technicolour newsreel images of serried ranks of German troops goose-stepping down the Champs-Elysees into the heart of the City of Light were met by silent audiences throughout the United States. Stern advocates of neutrality were silenced by increasingly strident calls to provide all aid necessary for the British Empire and Free France to carry on the struggle against the dictatorships, evoking threatening images of the prewar trans-Atlantic cruise of the Scharnhorst and the great circumnavigatory feats of the Hindenburg as evidence of German designs on the Western Hemisphere. President Roosevelt acted decisively to safeguard the security of the United States through three key policies – appropriating funds for the construction of 75,000 aircraft as part of $1.78 billion of new defence spending, expanding upon existing naval construction programmes to provide for a Two Ocean Navy, ordering the National Guard into federal service and instituting a peacetime draft for the first time in American history. The authorized strength of the Army was scheduled to rise to over 2.5 million men over the next twelve months as the United States girded its loins for the defence of freedom.



The British Army, having lost significant amounts of equipment in the successful evacuation from Dunkirk and the Channel Ports, had an urgent requirement for 2000 medium tanks to arm the swelling ranks of the Royal Armoured Corps and this swiftly increased to 5000 vehicles to supply the Dominions, the British Indian Army and the exiled vestiges of the French, Belgian and Dutch armies. British and Canadian production of the Crusader and Valiant would not suffice for the combined needs of the Allies for the forseeable future and so the eyes of London turned west across the wide ocean sea. The Anglo-French Purchasing Commission expressed a preference for the T6, but the threats to the Empire’s position in Africa and the Middle East made them eager to accept whatever tanks American industry could supply. An initial 2500 M3s were formally ordered in September 1940 and the first vehicles were delivered in March 1941. A total of 9845 were built between 1941 and 1944.



It is useful at this point to discuss the exact circumstances that lead to American tanks equipping much of the armoured strength deployed by the Western Allies. America’s industrial might was now entering the war on the side of the Allies in ever-growing force, but their capacity to pay for the vast quantities of tanks, artillery, aeroplanes, ships and munitions on order was increasingly limited. President Roosevelt had proclaimed that the United States would be the great Arsenal of Democracy in November 1940, but, by the end of the year, France, Belgium and the Netherlands had come close to exhausting their hard currency reserves by the nature of the broken-backed war and even the great wealth of the British Empire was being stretched. The dreadful images of the Blitz and harrowing tales of the German yoke that weighed heavily over Europe played their role in turning the tide of American opinion in favour of support of the Allies. After consultations with Churchill and Richardson, on December 16th 1940, President Roosevelt proposed a new policy of supplying arms to the democratic powers in return for credit, what would later become known as Lend-Lease. Hard negotiations followed over the course of December and January, with the British refusing to acquiesce to the effective liquidation of their assets in the United States and South America as a precondition of aid and the Americans taking a similarly hard-nosed approach to the question of unconditional aid. British fortunes were momentarily and literally raised after the fortuitous arrival of the long-overdue Martian convoy and an eventual compromise agreement was reached that was sufficiently nebulous so that both parties felt they had got the better of the deal.



The M3 first went into action with the Desert Army in mid-1941, where it proved to be a welcome complement to the Valiant and Cavalier, which had served as the mainstay of Imperial armoured strength in the Middle East to that point. Its heavy gun armament made it a match for the Panzer IIIs that made up the majority of the Afrika Korps’ tank strength and even enabled it to hold its own against the earlier models Panzer IVs in certain circumstances. It was given the nickname of the ‘General Grant’ by the British and Commonwealth troops in the Western Desert and built up a reputation for solid reliability. They were of particular use in the dogged defence of Tobruk by the Australian 9th Division, where their role as mobile strongpoints attracted significant renown. The growing number of Crusaders redeployed from anti-invasion defences in Britain in late 1941 allowed the Desert Army to move once again onto the offensive and Tobruk was successfully relieved in November. Many Grants were subsequently shifted to second line duties guarding the tenuous Ottoman frontier with armoured units of the British Indian Army. Their heavy guns once again decisively outmatched the older German and Austrian tanks operated by the Turks. A number of converted Grants served in infantry support roles in the early phases of the Burma Campaign with both British and Indian forces, but the type was mostly replaced by newer British and Canadian produced vehicles by late 1942. A total of 2173 were operated by British, Indian and Commonwealth forces between 1941 and 1943.



It was with the loyalist Free French that the M3 saw its most protracted use, with vehicles filtering down from British units in 1942 and gladly welcomed by the nascent armoured forces being built up in Algeria and Morocco. A total of 3287 American-produced M3s were supplied to the Free French, firstly by Britain and then later directly from the United States. They remained in service throughout the remainder of the war, despite the M-4 Sherman supplanting them in frontline service in Italy, Spain and France in the final years of the conflict. Their two main roles were vital – training and direct infantry support. The disparate forces loyal to the French Crown came from across the world and the French Empire and all required re-equipment and training in the modern arts of mechanised warfare. When they were finally committed to battle, every operational French infantry division was supported by a battalion of Grants throughout the long and bitter fighting in the Mediterranean as the Trident Plan was put into action in 1942 and 1943, turning the tide against the Axis. The Sherman and Crusader may have amassed greater fame as the tanks of the Liberation of France, but behind them served the reliable and unspectacular M3.



The Red Army was the recipient of 1148 M3s, mostly in 1942, and they were regarded as unpopular, flawed vehicles compared to the powerful T-34. The significant difference in the Soviet and British Empire experience of operating the M3 can be ascribed to the harsh conditions of the Eastern Front and the presence of newer, more powerful German tanks. In such circumstances, the inability of the M3 to take a hull down position and its high silhouette proved to be distinct disadvantages. Many were thrown into the climactic Battle of Stalingrad that raged throughout the second half of the year, whilst others served in comparatively quiet garrison roles with Soviet armies in Mongolia and Tartary. The remaining Soviet M3s assigned to the Don and Stalingrad Front were converted to mobile anti-dragon gun carriers equipped with the potent M1939 85mm anti-aircraft gun as the Red Army battled the last desperate commitment of the bulk of the Drachenkraft over the steppe battlefields.



Chinese armoured forces were relatively few and far between due to the tyranny of distance and the tenuous supply routes connecting the vast expanses of China Proper with India and the outside world, but a total of 864 M3s were laboriously delivered via the winding Burma Road. They were used primarily for infantry support and enjoyed considerable success against the lighter IJA tanks in the Third Battle of Changsa in early 1942. The great Japanese push towards Chungking in the latter half of the year was barely held by Chinese forces and the newer Japanese Type 4 Chi-To medium tanks had the measure of the M3. The Imperial Chinese Army replaced the Grant in its frontline armoured units variously with the M4 Sherman, Valiant, Crusader and T-26 from July 1943, but some variants remained in service into the mid-1950s.



The M3 saw limited service with the United States Army and only 1573 tanks were operated as training vehicles during the early months of 1942. This force was swiftly replaced by the hundreds of M-4s now rolling off the assembly lines of the vast new tank arsenals in Michigan and Ohio. It would see far more active service in several variant forms, chief of which was the 105mm Howitzer Motor Carriage M7. A total of 7629 equipments were built between 1942 and 1945 and each U.S. armored division was equipped with three battalions of M7s, providing ample mobile fire support during the great advances across France, the Low Countries and Germany during 1944 and 1945. The 155mm M12 Gun Motor Carriage and the 155mm M14 Howitzer Motor Carriage were produced in somewhat lesser numbers – 423 of the former and 1261 of the latter being built between 1942 and 1944 – but this did not prevent them from having a significant impact on the battlefield. Captured German troops would often freely confess to having a fearful respect for the power of mobile American artillery throughout the war and the assorted self-propelled guns and howitzers based on the M3 chassis played no small part in this deserved reputation. The M3 Grant was ultimately a victim of the rapidly shifting tides of war; it was an excellent tank for 1940 that unfortunately entered service in 1941.



The M2 Light Tank similarly saw its initial war service with the British Desert Army in North Africa in 1941, complementing the Cavalier and quickly being labeled the Stuart. It was primarily used for reconaissance missions due its low fuel capacity limiting its effective operational range and a rather more sedate top speed. 2348 were supplied to the British Empire under Lend-Lease and they performed creditably outside of desert warfare. Large numbers were supplied to the Soviet Union (1765) and France (1249) in 1941 and 1942, with neither truly satisfied with the Stuart and preferring to use it for light cavalry roles such as scouting as compared to armoured combat. The US Army used the Stuart in both the European and Pacific theatres of operations and it enjoyed considerable success in the jungle conditions of the South Pacific islands, where Japanese anti-tank weapons and armoured vehicles were few and far between. The M2 Stuart was partially yet never fully replaced by the larger, more advanced M24 Chaffee light tank from early 1944. Overall, it performed adequately, but the tactical environment had moved beyond the interwar concept of the light tank.



The T6 medium tank design was selected for full development by the U.S. Armored Force board on January 5th 1941. It was based on a modified M3 hull sporting a new 76mm general purpose main gun and a 500hp V12 General Motors diesel engine that powered it to a top speed of 32mph. In addition to the formidable main gun, it was equipped with the ubiquitous M2 Browning that featured on virtually every US Army vehicle from Jeeps to field kitchens. A prototype vehicle was completed on June 12th, with production of the standardized M4 medium tank following from July 25th. The first pair of production M4s from the Lima Locomotive Works went to the US Army and Britain for evaluation, with the latter proceeding with the previously agreed option for an initial 2500 vehicles. Mass production at the Detroit, Grand Blanc and Pittsburgh Tank Arsenals followed over the latter course of 1941 and early 1942 as American industry rose to President Roosevelt’s ambitious programme for the production of 125,000 tanks. Few knew that this seemingly impossible goal would be comfortably surpassed by the end of the war as the M-4 become the most produced tank in American military history.



The initial British tanks were delivered in early November 1941 and assigned to Commonwealth armoured units of the Desert Army. They were quickly given the nickname that would last throughout their career – the Sherman. Australian, New Zealand, Canadian and South African forces employed M-4 Shermans alongside their Crusaders and Churchills during Rommel’s furious offensive of January 1942 that saw him thunder forward from El Agheila, taking Benghazi and Bardia by storm and laying siege once again to Tobruk and Mersa Matruh. The Afrika Korps was stopped cold by Montgomery at the gates of Egypt at the First Battle of El Alamein on January 30th and the new American Sherman tanks played no small part in slowing and turning the tide of the attack before the Crusaders could deliver their swift repost, putting an end to Axis offensive action in Africa and setting the stage for the final act in June. 10,429 Shermans were supplied to the British Empire through Lend-Lease, with many tanks passed along to the Polish, Dutch and Belgian armies in exile.



The first US Shermans to engage in battle with the Axis were those of the 1st and 2nd Armored Divisions that spearheaded Operation Torch, the great Anglo-American amphibious landings in Portugal in July 1942. Their formidable combination of protection, speed and firepower decisively outmatched the Panzer II and IIIs of the German 10th Army and performed creditably against the feared 88mm anti-tank guns in the hard fighting up the bloody Tagus. As the Allies pushed towards Madrid, limited numbers of Panzer IVs, Panthers and Tigers trickled down to the battlefront in Spain and provided a qualitative match for the Sherman. The near disaster at the First Battle of Jarama was more a reflection of an overextended force, inexperienced command and doctrinal issues rather than the performance of the M-4. American tankers were able to regain something of an ascendancy by using the advantage of numbers and the excellent maneuverability of the Sherman and the first plans began for an improved variant armed with a 90mm gun. The first M-4s equipped with 105mm howitzers for specialized infantry support made their combat debut in December 1942 around Madrid and swiftly proved their value.



A new stage of the counteroffensive against the Axis in the Mediterranean opened with Operation Husky, the invasion of Sicily. On April 4th 1943, supported by mighty naval and air fleets, 219,000 Allied troops landed along the southern coast of Sicily and quickly established a firm beachhead. Over 600 Shermans were employed by US Army and Marine armored units in the grinding fighting against German, Italian and Austrian forces and they excelled in their intended role of heavy infantry support. Protracted resistance was broken by a coordinated push by the British Eighth Army and the US Seventh Army on April 10th, with the Axis troops having no answer to the massed naval gunfire of the Allied fleets, low level dragonstrikes by no less than six wyrms and the operational debut of several potent war gasses. The subsequent pursuit and exploitation phase of the Battle of Sicily was where the Sherman came into its own, enjoying a speed advantage over the British and Commonwealth medium tanks. They outmatched the Panzer IVs and P 32/40s of enemy armoured formations but continued to struggle against the heavier Panthers and Tigers. As the invasion of mainland Italy loomed, the morale and repute of US armored forces had never been higher. The landings at Salerno and Taranto lead to initial success, spearheaded by Allied tanks. This came to an abrupt halt along the formidable Gustav Line and armoured operations were overshadowed by traditional infantry and heavy artillery engagements reminiscent of the Great War. The strong Axis defences, particularly around Monte Cassino, held up the general advance for two and a half months before being broken by massed fire from heavy guns, combat giants, spellcraft and the heaviest tacticalt use of tunnelling since Messines Ridge in 1917. The difficult fighting in Italy continued into the new year, highlighting the need for an improved version of the Sherman to counter the heavier German panzers.



This came in the form of the M4A3E2, known unofficially as the Jumbo Sherman. It was protected by additional frontal and turret armour, carried the potent 90mm gun that had already proved its mettle on the M36 tank destroyer and was inscribed with a series of new protective runes. Extensive tests carried out by Miskatonic University showed that these would lower rates of combat losses by up to 6% in some conditions, although the crews did a higher rate of combat fatigue and disturbed dreams. These additions lowered the M4A3’s top speed to 25mph, but provided the capacity to take on even the behemoth Tigers and Lions on a relatively even basis. 879 were produced in time for Operation Overlord, the grand invasion of France on June 6th 1944 and their combination of protection and long range firepower were a welcome boon to the Allied cause in the Battle of Normandy that followed. The predominant Sherman used in the Battle of Normandy, however, was the 90mm armed M4A3E8, or the ‘Easy Eight’, named so because of its horizontal volute spring suspension, wide tracks and improved engine. It comprised the majority of the Shermans produced in 1944 and 1945 and remained in service with a number of armies for some time after the war.



Like the British, the US Army employed a number of specialized armoured vehicles based on the Sherman chassis for Overlord, including the Jackalope breaching tank, the Bowie flail tank and the Snallygaster assault tank, the last combining a twin Gatling gun, two barbed claws and a pair of side mounted Panjandrums. The most common variant employed in Overlord was the Duplex Drive tank, with a battalion assigned to each US assault beach on the morning of June 6th, where they were to prove invaluable in the early fighting to breach the Fuhrer’s vaunted Atlantic Wall. Their direct support in the destruction of enemy beach defences and pillboxes reduced infantry losses to acceptable levels, in conjunction with the use of LVTs. The M4’s reputation for rugged reliability and all-round performance was increased in Normandy where its relatively low rate of ammunition fires compared to previous tanks was noted by friend and foe alike. The finest hour for the Sherman came in the breakout from Normandy, when the M4 equipped the majority of the First, Second, Third and Fourth US Armies as they raced across France to the very borders of Germany itself. The sheer numbers produced in the vast arsenals of the Midwest overwhelmed every German attempt at defence to the west of the Siegfried Line and earned the admiration and gratitude of American and Allied infantrymen alike. By the final months of 1944, the M-26 Pershing was beginning to replace the Sherman in many US armoured divisions, but it still bore the brunt of the fighting in the largest American victory of the Western Front, the Battle of the Bulge. In that mighty engagement, thousands of M4s first stopped the southern German pincer cold and then forced them back inch by bloody inch into their doomed Fatherland. One of the most iconic images of the war was the sight of a lone American Sherman standing battered yet unconquered at Dinant on the Meuse, the wrecks of half a dozen German tanks and a company of infantry lying silently before it in the frozen field.



In the Pacific, the M4 made up the majority of the American tank force after 1942, supporting the Army and the Marines in the intense island-hopping campaign that took them from Fiji to Okinawa. The Sherman completely outmatched the lighter Japanese tanks encountered in the Marianas and Palau and were markedly superior to the larger concentrations of IJA armour encountered in the Philippines and Okinawa. In the campaigns on the Chinese mainland, it came into its own, smashing the main force of Japanese armour in a series of overwhelming victories. Over a thousand Shermans were employed in Operation Olympic, providing mobile firepower and solid protection against the full range of Japanese anti-tank weaponry and machinations. Few large scale tank battles occurred outside China, limiting the scope for the M-4 to show its full range of capabilities until the final year of the war, but it was universally considered as the preeminent tank in the Pacific theatre.



Like the Grant, the Sherman was employed by a considerable array of Allied nations and is considered the most widely used Western tank of the Second World War. The Soviet Union was the second highest recipient with 5964 M4s, 4829 were received by Free France, 2493 went to China and 452 were delivered to Greece. The Red Army regarded the Sherman favourably and they were used extensively in the August 1945 invasion of Manchuria against the Kwantung Army with considerable success. The French 1st Army was exclusively equipped with the Sherman during its drive from the Anvil beaches of Southern France to the Danube and two hundred of these tanks would go on to serve with the Far East Expeditionary Corps in the immediate aftermath of the Pacific War. An incredible total of 75,682 M-4 Shermans of all types were built during the Second World War – 2456 in 1941, 20,469 in 1942, 24,983 in 1943, 19,214 in 1944 and 8570 in 1945. It also served as the basis for a number of self propelled artillery pieces in much the same manner as the Grant, including the M40 155mm Gun Motor Carriage (752), the M41 155mm Howitzer Motor Carriage (1287) and the M43 203mm Howitzer Motor Carriage (545).



The Stuart, Grant and Sherman light and medium tanks comprised the majority of American tank production during the war, but just as in other wartime powers, the role of the heavy tank was not ignored. The M1930 was never regarded as fully satisfactory and had in any case been left behind the tide of European tank development by 1940. The US Army Ordnance Corps had been working on a 70 ton heavy tank design since August 1939 and a single turreted design equipped with a medium velocity 120mm heavy gun adapted from the older naval 5”/25 gun was selected for development in March 1940 as the Heavy Tank T1. Production of a powerpack sufficient to propel such a heavy tank at a useful combat speed was a distinct challenge that was never satisfactorily solved; an adapted version of the Wright R-2600 and a hydramatic transmission was selected by a specialist committee of dwarven experts from the Society of Automotive Engineers. Protected by up to 6” of frontal armour, the T1 entered production in December 1941 as the M6 Heavy Tank after a long and convoluted process fraught with difficulties and the attentions of gremlins; it is thought that the latter first crossed the Atlantic in July 1941 onboard a British freighter, quickly taking up residence in the war production factories that sprang up across the United States and remaining a vexatious irritant to this day.



The 73t M6 could reach a top speed of 20mph in combat conditions and carried one of the heaviest armaments of any Allied tank of the Second World War, consisting of a coaxial 37mm gun, two .50 calibre heavy machine guns and four .30 Browning medium machine guns. 2398 were built between 1941 and 1944, when production ended in favour of the Super Pershing; 287 were supplied to Britain via Lend-Lease in 1942, serving in the last stages of the Desert War and being given their lasting sobriquet of the Lee, after the redoubtable Confederate general of the Civil War. A limited number were used in the Philippines, China and Japan during 1945, but the main theatre of their employment by the US Army was Western Europe. Their heavy protection and firepower of the M6 proved more suited to the Italian campaign, with its peculiar tactical environment, but independent heavy tank battalions served with each US corps during the Battle of France and the final triumphant invasion of Germany in 1944-45. The Lee was a slow, preponderous vehicle more suited to positional fighting than mobile warfare, in much the same manner as the British Cromwell, but was useful in the heavy engagements along the Siegfried Line and the crossing of the Rhine. It swiftly exited American service at the end of the war, with a number being sold to Mexico, Brazil and Argentina in the late 1940s.



Design work on a heavier follow-up to the M4 had been underway since late 1941. The rapid changes in armoured warfare over 1941 and 1942 had a great influence on the parameters of the T26 heavy tank, with emphasis placed on a powerful engine, strong protection and the ability to field a gun with greater performance than the 90mm then in service. The prototype of the T26 was completed in June 1943, weighing 50t and armed with the new 105mm gun jointly developed with Britain. Objections were raised regarding complicating the logistical supply chain from the United States to Europe and the initially troublesome transmission, but the experience of extended combat against German Panthers, Tigers and Lions in Spain and Italy overcame institutional intertia and the M26 entered production in November 1943. It was dubbed the Pershing in honour of the revered commander of the American Expeditionary Force of the Great War, General of the Army John J. Pershing. A gradual shift from the manufacture of M4s occurred over the course of early 1944 and over 1200 were available for Operation Overlord.



The Pershing was able to engage all models of the Panther and Tiger Is on even or better terms and was second only to the brobdingnagian M6 Lee for survivability in the bocage. Like every American tank, the M26 proved vulnerable to German Panzerfaust and Panzerschreck attacks on their flanks and rear, but could shrug off frontal hits from the feared 88mm in many circumstances. An uparmoured version known as the ‘Super Pershing’ served in limited numbers in the Battle of the Bulge and the invasion of Germany, but the sacrifice of 5mph of speed was seen as beyond the point of diminishing returns for European operations. 350 Super Pershings were employed in Operation Olympic in independent heavy tank battalions, where they proved effectively invulnerable to conventional Japanese anti-tank weapons and did fearful execution with their barbed canister shot. A total of 6239 Pershings were built in 1944 and 1945, providing the basis of the postwar American tank park. The M26 chassis also served as the basis for a number of self propelled heavy artillery pieces, including the M92 240mm Howitzer Motor Carriage (392), the M93 8” Gun Motor Carriage (103), the M94 250mm Mortar Motor Carriage (86) and the M95 360mm Bombard Motor Carriage (54).



Work on a successor to the M2 Stuart began in earnest in early 1942 and was coloured by the battlefield experiences of that year. The concept of the light tank had shifted from a fast, lightly armoured vehicle employed for infantry support and general scouting to a medium vehicle suitable for armoured reconaissance in force. It would need to carry a 75mm gun and have a top speed substantially greater than that of the medium tanks then in enemy service or projected. The Ordnance Corps began design work in February 1943 and the prototype of the Light Tank T24 was delivered in October. It was a 24t vehicle protected by up to 2” of armour and capable of reaching a road speed of 40mph, whilst still retaining substantial striking power through the 75mm Gun M6 L/45. A contract for 5000 vehicles was issued in January 1944, which was soon increased to 10,000; a total of 7942 had rolled off the Cadillac and Massey-Harris assembly lines by the time production was stopped in September 1945. It was nicknamed the Chaffee by the British in a signal honour to the late General Adna Chaffee, the ‘Father of the Armored Force’. The British, Canadian and United States Armies all employed the Chaffee in the European Theatre of Operations in 1944/45 and it was regarded as a serviceable vehicle and a definite advance on the Cavalier and Stuart; the M24 remained highly vulnerable to the full range of German anti-tank weapons. In the Pacific, the Chaffee’s mobility and firepower gave it a somewhat higher reputation and many were retained for service in the Allied occupation forces in postwar Japan.



The United States Army employed a range of tank destroyers and assault guns in the Second World War in three specific production generations. The first vehicles entered service in 1942 and were both based on the chassis of the M4 Sherman - the M10 tank destroyer, armed with a 76mm gun, and the M13 assault gun, equipped with a fixed 105mm howitzer; 5428 of the former and 1114 of the latter were built in 1942 and 1943. They were satisfactory for the initial opponents encountered by the US Army, but became rapidly obsolescent in the face of heavier German armour. The M18 90mm tank destroyer, known by its British nickname of the Hellcat, and the M23 155mm assault gun were the response to these new challenges and they wrested back the initiative in Italy, Spain and France from the Axis in the Allied offensives of 1944; 2819 and 772 of each were built respectively from November 1943 to September 1944. The M18 Hellcat held the distinction of being the fastest US armoured vehicle of the war, being capable of speeds up to 50mph. The final American tank destroyer of the war, the M36, carried the powerful 105mm gun used on the Pershing and, although only produced in small numbers (659), proved highly effective in combat and more than a match for any German tank.



By September 1945, the United States of America stood astride the globe as unquestionably the most powerful military force, industrial power and nation in the world. This status was due in no small part to the sheer scale of her war production and the American tanks of the Second World War serve as an example of the maxim that quantity has a quality all of it’s own. However, it would be a distinct disservice to the US armoured vehicles of 1940-1945 to give the impression that their major worth was in their mass. Whilst no single American light, medium or heavy tank can be said to be the utmost best in its class, the ultimate forms of the Sherman and Pershing were certainly the equal of any other Allied or Axis vehicle.

Okay, what do in need to think of this.

Wonder if Israel will need to build the Super Sherman ore does not need it due to be tied to the British Empire.

So in the Darkearth verse, has Israel like OTL collaborated on the development of the Chieftain ore is it a British design only, also i do not hope it not uses a multi-fuel engine as specified by OTL NATO.

So it is a heavier tank than OTL.

A because reading the Wiki article i saw the weight being 55 long tons (62 short tons; 56 t) so i was not sure if i read it right.

So the Chieftain is going to be bought by the Netherlands, in OTL the Netherlands tested one Chieftain alongside a Leopard in 1968 but the the Leopard was eventually selected largely because of the Chieftain’s poor construction quality, especially the engine, which leaked so much oil that the engine compartment turned black, i do hope that is not the case here in the Darkearth verse.