Tank Battle

This has probably been posted before so sorry.
Which tank battle would you like to have seen. Not taking part on any side but as a neutral observer, a "fly on the wall" type of thing. It can be a large campaign or just a minor skirmish but remember you are neutral so no armchair generals refighting it please!

To start it off:-
Villers-Bretonnex on 24th April 1918. It was the first and it would be interesting to see lightly armoured British tanks armed with low velocity cannons or just machine guns coming up against heavily armoured German tanks.

 

Kursk

 

Is that the whole thing or Prokhorovka.

 

Gazala Battles

 

The whole thing, not just a decisive day.

 

Kursk, especially Prokhorovka. Or maybe Goodwood.

 

Tirgu Frumos, Romania, May 1944 (Grossduetschland).

Balabanowka, Ukraine, Jan 1944 (Schwere Panzer Regiment Bake).

 

I think for me it would be a toss up between Villers-Bretonnex on 24th April 1918 and Arras 1940

 

I forget the name of the battle, but it was the one where the German 88s turned Operation Battleaxe's tanks into smoking junk in North Africa.

 

Yes, it would have to be Kursk. Just get me a good spotter plane so I can go from battle to battle and not miss a thing!

 

But what about individual tank actions?
By that i mean heroic actions in which something extroardinary happens like the defeat of a whole tank colomn by a lone tiger tank? (sounds crazy i know :lol: :smok: ) But it actually happened during operation cobra.
more details if interested.

 

I would definately like to hear more - I know of no such events.

 

Yeah spill the good stuff 8)

KBO

 

I realized that this isn't very nice of me, since I know you'll refer to the Michael Wittman incident. The main problem is, that the popular version of this story (taking out a tank coloumn, etc.) is untrue.

 

Yes the column didnt intirely consist of tanks, but of halftracks and trucks, but mainly tanks though.

KBO

 

Yes, kbo is correct.
The column did not consist only of tanks, it consisted of Bedford BT Traclats, Bren gun carriers, trucks and even a towed 17 pounder!However, the column consisted of a number of cromwell tanks.


The story goes as follows:
The column reached a crossroads during a pincer move to encircle the germans to the north that were being hammered by operation cobra, but had to halt at a village to await the infantry to move up and support them. Suddenly a tiger comes running out of a cluster of nearby trees and starts firing rounds into the convoy as fast as the gunner could load. The allies gallantly fought back but the shells from there tanks richoted of the armour plating of the tiger which avoided most of the shells as the allies were caught by surprise and most of their first rounds were shot of prematurely. The tiger quickly fired off its last rounds of the skirmish and retreated into the cluster of trees before the allies had time to slam into it some of their heavy ordnance.
The most interesting aspect of thsi skirmish is that no referrence of it wasfound in german archives, leading historians to believe that the same tiger tank was destroyed the same day farther east before it had time to report.
I would much appreciate any comments you might want to add and if you have any idea of the fate of that tank.

 

What you are referring to is the battle inside Villers Boccage, where some tanks were detroyed, rather than the engagement where a number of Bren carriers and trucks were destroyed.

Common for all of these weapons was that none of them had the capacity to destroy the Tiger, and as soon as Wittman encountered the first Sherman VC, he retreated.

During a later attack, several Pz.Kpfw.IVs and Tigers were destroyed, evening out the score.

Christian

 

Operation Goodwood

 

The Allies lost a heck of a lot more armour during the Anvil operation for Caen then the Germans.

 

What Anvil operation?

There were three attempts to encircle the germans in Caen, one of which also included a direct assault on the city itself: operations Epsom, Goodwood and Charnwood. In Goodwood alone the British lost around 250 tanks against maybe a few Germans. Most of these tanks fell prey to entrenched 88mm guns in ground not suited for tanks.