Instead of all those endless, almost pointless tank designs and production runs.

Would Germany be victorious in the battle of Kursk, and, at the very least, the Soviet counteroffensive would be defeated?

I would answer this question myself but I am not a Kursk expert.

I get the impression that for the German Panzer Arm, fuel seemed to be more precious than the machines themselves since only a small fraction of the German war economy was devoted to AFV.

With the Panther tank consuming 40% more fuel than a Panzer IV, many more medium tanks could be delivered into attack during strategic missions. Logistics within the Panzer Arm would be simplified. German infantrymen would get far more support, maybe up to double or more not only due to the high reliability of the Panzer IV compared to the horrible reliability of the Panther but also due to the vastly increased numbers of tanks in general.

The Panther tank, though impressive in theory, was actually prone to continuous breakdowns and has been described as a serious Nazi strategic failure, particularly in the German defense plan post Kursk. The Panthers were usually not operational and German units lost a lot of their tank support and were pushed back by Soviet armor forces.

When operational, the Panther proved itself in the Eastern front, but its advantages in front armor and excellent gun were nullified in the Italian and Western fronts against the Allies.

Ironically, it performed worse than Panzer IVs in the Ardennes offensive, due to its fuel hungry engine, less reliability, and the fact that all the close combat that negated its advantages.

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No, victory at Kursk had more to do with Soviet artillery superiority, improving infantry training, improving staff skill, better air support.

At the local level there would be a difference. Across the entire battlefield the difference would be small perhaps imperceptible. Well over 300,000 trucks supported the German ground and airforces in the West in 1944. Compare that to the several hundred Panther tanks available in the West.

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Zitadel was doomed to fail.

The Germans were so outboxed it was not an issue of weapons anymore. Read the operational history. The vaunted von Manstein had no clue what Vatutin and Zhukov were going to do to him. During the Battle of Kursk only less than one in ten German tanks were Panthers anyway, so a swap of tanks won't help them.

The Soviet strategic counteroffensive was going to succeed no matter what tank the Germans had because the suprise was complete and the Germans were outgeneraled. They had put their Panzer Corps in the wrong place and when von Manstein brought them up to parry the Soviets it was too late. And even then, the Germans had just absolutely no idea what they are up against and where the main battle is going to be throughout the course of the entire 1943 campaign.

But from a tactical point of view, I doubt going through more of the war with the same old Pz. IV would have have been viable. Germany needed a new meidum tank for 1944. Without the Panther, they'd lose much more quickly than otherwise--but it was not nearly good enough or even what it could have been.

A different kind of Pz. V was clearly needed for the job. A mechanical equivalent to the Sherman or T-34 but with the gunpower of the 75mm L/70 would have been sufficient for Germany's needs. T. A. Gardner on our broad and quite a few very knowledgible people on tanknet believe this is possible and within Germany's technical capabilities. Alas (or fortunately) they failed to do so.

Well said Triple C

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The Pz IV really wasn't quite enough tank while the Panther was way too much. At 28 tons the Pz IV as built was at its limit. At 45 tons the Panther was about 10 tons too heavy.

The early solution to this problem should have been for the Germans to take the route everyone else did. That is, build a tank that weighed in at about 30 to 35 tons that was as simple to build and relied heavily on already extant production as possible.

I see two high potential solutions for the Germans in this respect coming about the end of 1941:

The first is a stretched and widened Pz III. With 7 road wheels, slightly wider track, and a slightly wider body this tank could have taken an 75L48 gun. Add sloped armor and it would have been a decent design. This would have been about a 30 ton tank but quite capable for its size and weight.

The second is a retooled Pz IV. First, the suspension is beefed up by additional springs etc to take added vehicle weight. Next, it is spaced out from the hull like the E9 mod for a Sherman for a wider track to be used. The armor is rearranged to slope on all sides and a new turret taking a 75L55 gun is installed. This gives more than sufficent penetration power for the war period at least.
Add a slightly more powerful engine and new transmission to take the weight and you have a Pz IV na that is quite a bit better overall.

The advantage either way is that most of the new tank's mechanical systems are the same as previous models. Parts supply is simplified, tooling up is greatly simplified and, the old tanks are still usable and even can be stripped for parts to go into new vehicles if shipped back to the factory when deadlined or destroyed at the front.

One of the misteries of late WW2 is how the Germans mantained an effective fighting spirit practically until the end. I think having a "better" tank, when they could get it to work, did contribute to preventing a total breakdown of morale, a Pz IV equipped force that would barely hold it's own against the standard allied tanks (T34 and M4) and would be badly overmatched by the heavies (Churchill, M26 and JSII) may well be the last straw for a force already suffering against a strong allied arillery, air and often numerical superiority. The Tigers, unless we are thinking of totally unrealistic production figures, would not offset this as most units would not have any, in 1944/45 the tigers equipped a handful of batallions, even if you double that there are not enough to give even a company of tigers to each of the mechanized formations the Germans had.

I'd say that Zhukov gets to rosy of picture in most histories as well as the 'vaunted v. Manstein'. Zhukov found out what the Krauts were up to and simply massed enough men and material to stop it. If you look at the casualty figures the Germans came away with less dead, wounded, and missing in action. The Germans simply could sustain the losses though, the Soviets could and hence the Battle of Kursk was their victory(Thank goodness).

Yours,

Bill

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In my opinion, the Mk IV was good enough on both fronts. The Mk V was better because of its design. Both the V and VI had teething problems which were ironed out but their major flaw was they were over-engineered. The Tiger made an excellent tank for defense knocking out tanks from a distance which it could either break the enemy's offensive or knock a good percentage out prior to bugging out.

The Mk IV was a good design but was upgunned to its limit. In the West, it could hold its own. It was reliable and a proven vehicle. Paired up with the Tiger, it could have worked. Again, just my two cents worth.......in this economic times, figure out the worth.

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Just like the Germans needed fighters for the battle of the sky they needed tank destroyers to fight the enemy tanks.( Just my two cents here...)

Definitely Pz IV with long barrel would have made the core structure of the basic tanks for a year or two if necessary, but to save material they could have made better Stugs with a price of three Stugs for two Pz IV´s or better. Also to make the personal soldier weaponry more powerful the panzerfaust production should have been more boosted in which case every soldier could be a tank killer if necessary.

Would still like to have the Tigers but perhaps not King Tigers, and Panther production slowed down for future production.

Another element to boost might be the Ju87 and Henschel tank killers, which at least proved their worthiness in the Eastern Front.

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I think you are probably on the right track they would have been better with sticking to a few good designs instead of wasting resources on overarmored, underpowered deathtraps like the Elefant etc. I think you are right about the panther, the Germans produced over 4,000 of them (coompared to only about 1000 tiger 1 and 450 tiger 2's) so they obviously had high hopes for them to build so many. Like you say the Panther was a trouble prone nightmare from the get go. Hitler delayed the attack at Kursk (Operation Citadel) for weeks just for the Panthers to be ready, in the meantime the Russians used the delay and fortified Kursk so heavily that every army in the world combined could not have taken it.
The mark IV was a good all around design and was in production to the end of the war. It was not as good as a t-34 but they used the chassis for everything from assault guns to anti aircraft vehicles, you could probably call it the Nazi version of the sherman. They were tooled up to produce the mark IV and it was good enough to take on a T-34 if equipped with the long 75 mm, so they just kept on building them. The Tiger was not particularly reliable but more so than the panther and was a terrific tank killer as well as for its psychological effect. I believe the resources wasted on the panther should have gone to build more tigers instead. The tiger 2 was practically unstoppable except by its own unreliability, huge weight and slow speed and another waste of resources that could have gone to making more tiger 1s. So i think your conclusions about what they SHOULD have done are pretty much correct, you have to wonder what they were thinking by wasting time and resources building elefants, tiger 2s and even the gigantic "Maus" tank that never got into action.

Now you're talking my language.....StuGs rule

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3 months to be exact. That is a lot of time for the Russians to prepare and the Germans paid the price

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Bill,

In my opinion, the situation was more complicated than that. If you read the actual account of the campaign, not just confined to the Kursk-Orel but also the subsequent Soviet counteroffensive, you would find that von Mastein got sucker punched while looking at the wrong way throughout the battle. It was apparent that von Manstein 1. Had no idea about the Russian operational intent 2. Could not locate the Russian mobile groups and 3. When he found them he was unable to destroy them.

Best,
Triple C

I think the case can be made that the Pz. IV was becoming increasingly inadequate. Even in the West, the long-barrelled Pz. IV was inferior to 75mm Sherman tanks in most combat situations except long range engagements around 900m. Considering at the height of Allied powers US tanks outnumbered the Germans 20:1, some better tanks were clearly needed.

I agree the StuG III/IV was a wonderful vehicle given German priorities, though they really weren't up to the task of making up for lost tank strength.

It is certainly great to have the ability of hindsight, to know all the combat records, the flaws and the advanatages of each tank, and to know how to improve them.

However the Germans at the time didn't have hindsight, they tried and tested there equipment and at the time they used the information they had, they mad desicisions based on the information.

Sure they could have done better in many places, but they didn't have second chances, Both the Panther and MK IV were (after they sorted of out the kinks) both reliable tanks that could certainly hold there own against the majority of the allied tanks, which most were there equals, other medium tanks.

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Robert,

Kursk was the Soviet evolution of their Stalingrad strategy. Make the Hitler focus on a fixed battle of attrition in the center holding him off , while your reserves are built up and redeployed to the flanks and then fall upon them when the bulk of the reserves are committed to battle and unable to respond. Mind you if your strike through the middle, forces the Russians to equally committee his strategic reserves, then stalemate results. Kursk very nearly worked in that regard.

This is what both Hitler and Stalin wanted Kursk to be. Mansteins strategy had little to do with what happened, since his original plan was for an extension & continuation of the successful spring 'back handed blow'. That would have worked had it been followed through, but it was only intended to be a small scale line straightning exercise back in April.

With regards the larger picture of panzer forces, the more individual models of each type you produce the more industry you waste in costly time consuming and resource consuming small scale industries instead of reaping the advantage of economy of scale. If you guys ever get their you'd be shocked the difference.

BTW the Pz-IV was fine against T-34 and Sherman through 1943. It was only the next step [Sherman 76 & T-34/85] they could not match. But those were implemented in response to Tigers and Panthers and bears .

Remove them and these improved models might not appear until 1945.

Finally the Replacement for the Panzer IV was not the Panther but the VK20, developed from 1939 on.After the experiences of 1939/40 itwas being improved, and was more of a miniture Tiger hull with a Panzer III turret.

But during the summer of 1941 it morphed into the VK 24, which was had sloped armor that resembled a shortened panther hull with Panzer III turret and the Squeezbore gun. Presumedly once that proved a failure they would have fallen back on the 75L48 gun. The VK 20 would have started out in the 20 ton region and could grow to ~ mid 20ies , while the VK-24 was 24 tonner that could grow to ~ 30 tons.

The Panther was the result of Hitlers demands for a tank to out class the T-34. They just took the VK-20/24 design , enlarged the hull increased the armor and morphed it into the VK 30 design.... to meet Hitlers demands.

Cant believe im asking this, but was it really that long??

For some reason im drawing a blank...


But I know that Hitler also delayed the attack to reinforce the Tigers. Extra armor was to be put in the front as the T-34/85 could penetrate it head on.

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I thought the T-34/85 didn't materialize until late 1943, after Kursk?

Im not sure you are right about that. The heaviest armor on this tank, like amost all others, was in front, on the turret and on the mantlet. I have seen many pictures of Tigers that were shot and hit by other tanks or anti tank guns and it failed to penetrate. Whats more in many circumstances the tiger's 88 would blow up the T-34 long before it was within range of the T-34 gun, even the t34/85

Germany needed to implement the Entwicklungskommission Panzer mid 1943 in order to have any chance of keeping pace with the allied build up in armour.

Some of the projects under the Entwicklungskommission Panzer attached.

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