Information please.

Hello all, looking for some information in regards to the Germans first encounter with the T34.
My reason for asking is because I plan on doing a huge Dio. A T34/76/40 model being driven back to a railway head on the back of a Famo tank transporter. German troops crawling all over it, whilst it is stopped. Passing the other way will be p iv and P ii. Obviously crews looking at the T34 rather worriedly.
So which German Panzer division first encountered the T34, was Guderian involved at all I know he made comments about the T34.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

 

I really think it is such irony that the Soviet military at first turned it down. But the persistence of the designer made it come to fruition. Too bad he ended up dying from pneumonia after a proving trial for Stalin. Who knows what other vehicles he could have designed the man was brilliant in tank design. What a complete surprise the KVs and34s and even after the Germans had sent evaluation teams to Russia. The Soviets were good at hiding them but the soviets were totally convinced the Germans were hiding bigger more advanced tanks as well. Was the 75 pak 40 able to knock out those tanks. I haven't seen pics of Germans putting one on a recovery vehicle but there are lots of pics showing German soldiers climbing all over captured tanks. Even interesting pics of captured tanks reworked for use in the German army. Might have to do some captured Soviet tanks the Germans did some interesting modifications.

 

the T-34 and the KV designs, which were previously unknown, took the Germans by surprise.[4] Both types were encountered on the second day of the invasion – 23 June 1941.[5]

Half a dozen anti-tank guns fire shells at him [a T-34], which sound like a drumroll. But he drives staunchly through our line like an impregnable prehistoric monster... It is remarkable that lieutenant Steup's tank made hits on a T-34, once at about 20 meters and four times at 50 meters, with Panzergranate 40 (caliber 5 cm), without any noticeable effect.

German encounter of Soviet T-34 and KV tanks - Wikipedia

The KV tanks were usually assigned to the same units as the more numerous T-34 and, although they were much larger, their overall performance was quite similar; many sources discuss the impact of both types. The most common model of KV was the KV-1.

It was in the Battle of Raseiniai where German forces encountered the Soviet KV for the first time,

Battle of Raseiniai - Wikipedia

The 6th Panzer Division seems to be the answer.
The Soviet 2nd Tank Division from the 3rd Mechanized Corps attacked and overran elements of the German 6th Panzer Division near Skaudvilė on 23 June.

Skaudvilė (pronunciation (help·info), Samogitian: Skaudvėlė, German: Skaudwill, Polish: Skaudwile) is a city in the Tauragė district municipality of Lithuania. It is located 26 km (16 mi) north-east of Tauragė.

Guderian was in the AGC section, that is midlle Army Group.

Just a hunch but perhaps General Rauss was the first to encounter the t-34´s. That is Army Group North towards Leningrad.

Erhard Raus (8 January 1889 – 3 April 1956) was a general in the Wehrmacht of Nazi Germany during World War II. He commanded the 6th Panzer Division during the early years of the war on the Eastern Front before taking army and army group commands.

Erhard Raus - Wikipedia

Hope this helps.

 

But why didn't the Germans know about the kV and 34s, thought they had the best intelligence network. Plus didn't Hitler send guys to evaluate the Russian army. Like how could they miss something so crucial, and big especially the kV thing's as big as an elephant. Thanks for your time and information

 

I guess the Germans thought after Winter War they had mostly old and easy-to-kill tanks. I only know the Soviets visited Germany before Barbarossa and were keen to know about German tanks and believed after what the Germans showed ( up to PzIV short-barrel ) that the Germans were hiding the bigger ones. The mass production in the USSR for the T-34 and Klims was just speeding up and at the time of Barbarossa the Red Army had some 1,000 for the Army use. Have not read though about the Red Army showing their new better tanks to the German Army visitors which might indicate they suspected something is going on behind thei back?? At least the T-34 and Klims were a big surprise to Wehrmacht.

 

Yeah read that too the Russians were convinced the Germans were hiding bigger tanks because they were already working on the kvs but I'm still surprised they had poor intelligence for the Russians. I heard that Hitler was convinced that the Russians were weak and not able to fight effectively because of the winter war. The Russians did seem unable to conduct effective combat operations, lack of resupply, poor intelligence and combat coordination. Stalin had himself to blame you can't dispose of 100,000 of your officer core and think things are gonna honky dory. Poor training poor leadership and lack of resupply caused large failure. I thought the part the call the sausage war or battle of the sausage was ridiculous. Why didn't they have adequate supplies was Stalin as stupid and thought they would run over the Finns in a few weeks.

 

Hitler´s view was clear: " Kick the door in and the rotten roof collapses in ". He was sure the Soviet resistance would be weak.

In Winter War the Soviets attacked due to snow along the roads, and the Finns cut the attacking armies and following reserves to small pockets and destroyed these one by one. If you destroy the convoy´s first and last vehicle the convoy is not moving anywhere. There were also many tactical flaws like that the tanks may not leave the roads to forest or fields etc.

Here is a photo what it looks like when two Soviet divisions are cut to smaller pockets:

 

Whatever happened to Tiger(P)?

I wonder if he ever got his diorama up and running?

This thread has the makings of something very interesting. And it brings to mind a question that has bothered me for a while....

If the T-34 and KV-1 represented such a profound shock to the German military, why didn't Germany simply copy the designs and put both of them into the field long before the arrival of the Panther and Tiger?

Why did it take so darned long for Panther and Tiger to appear?

Surely the best solution would have been to copy? No patent problems in wartime, no lawsuits filed for intellectual property rights.

So why did it take TWO YEARS for the German answer to the T-34 and KV-1?

Or were these two Russian designs not recognised as a significant threat for a lot longer?

I think the question should be posed..."Where in German records is the superiority of these two tanks FIRST ADMITTED?"

Thoughts on this topic would be appreciated

Bolshevik

 

Panther is definitely a t-34 copy. Wonder if the Germans had to make it more workable like commander cupola and the better shooting system and gun? Or just use German system as in Kursk the engines caught fire easily during cruising. Agree that simply turning the tank with new crew would be simpler.

 

The Panther was not a copy of the T-34. About the only thing derived from the T-34 was the all sloped armor, which the Germans were getting to in their own time.

The most direct German copy of the T-34, would be the Damlier Benz VK 30.01 tank(never put into production) which was basically a Germanized T-34.

As to why it took so long. The Germans didn't want parity with the Russian tanks, they wanted "better." As such, the size and weight of the German tank designs kept increasing. Of course, as size and weight went up, larger engines were needed, stronger transmissions, larger guns, wider tracks, etc.

All you have to do is look at the many German tank designs that were not produced to see how German tank design snowballed.

 

So, "wanting better" can be said to be a major cause of their defeat.

A straight copy would have been operational in a lot less time than two years.

As I alluded to before, maybe time wasn't seen to be a factor.

 

I would say it was their industrial capacity. They only made 24,000 Panzer IV, 5,000 Panther, and about 2,000 Tiger I & II.(Panzer III number escapes me ATM). As opposed to 50,000+ of T-34 and 50,000+ Sherman alone.

It could have been, but T-34s and KV-1s were not seen in great numbers early in the war. And those that were seen were handled poorly tactically.

So, while time was a factor(setting up production out of range of the Germans, increasing production, and learning how to properly use tanks en mass) for the Russians...The Germans did not see it that way - why rush, if the war with Russia will be over in 6 months to a year. And the Germans were doing just that, until it all fell apart in mid-late 1942.

 

Actually, through mid 1943 a large, but decreasing, portion of the Soviet's tanks were either older models (up through about early to mid- 42) or new light tanks like the T60 and T70.
A typical Soviet tank brigade might have just a handful of T34, mostly issued to the battalion and company leaders, while the rest of the vehicles were still pre-war types like the BT7 or T26. Or these could be new issue T60 or T70 tanks.

This meant that most of the time German panzers were facing mostly tanks they could easily beat with their Pz III and Pz IV with the 75/24 gun. It would only be a handful of the heavier T34 they had to deal with.

KV's were rare, and the Russians decided early on to limit production in favor of more light and medium tanks. When KV's were encountered they would be in separate tank regiments and very small numbers. While difficult to beat, their small numbers and unreliability made them manageable too.