Top 10 tanks of the war

Please by all means, show where you think your information is valuable against people who've research for years and read about it (for years). T.A. Gardner knows his stuff, as well as Von Poop and the majority of this website. I don't really know what your getting at with your Sherman bashing? :|

 

And his ignorance and refusal to face the facts because they contadict what he wants to believe is pretty telling isn't it ?

 

i do have an extensive ww2 library, but what i primarily am, is a wargamer. i get my ideas of what i think of tanks from the way they perform in a field of combat, not from what i read in a book. the tank statistics for the rules i play were made by my father who is currently a history proffesor, who happens to specialize in ww2. in fact for the last nine years of his education(in the mid seventies-late eighties) he studied nothing but history, most of which was ww2. i tend to trust someone with proven credentials rather than someone whos credentials i dont know, and could possibly not exist.

 

So you must have extensive military experience in armoured vehicles to make such a claim?
Do you believe the designers, commanders, and men of World war 2 rolled dice and wielded tape measures in order to decide who lived and who died? No, of course you dont.
It would seem a pity if anyone really valued the stories told by a game over those more interesting & truthful ones told by documents, memoirs, oral history as presented by the veterans, the careful work of respected historians & serious amateurs, and importantly - the connections between those things.
A war-game may give insight into the successful applications of strategy or tactics, even one based on flawed data and widely accepted misconceptions, if this were not the case then the Kriegspiel would never have flowered among various staffs, but it's a thin approximation of the real world of steel & blood, and does not teach solid history.
My university library was strangely lacking in copies of Advanced Squad Leader, the dissertation/thesis stack was bare of even the most basic rule sets, no doctorate was ever given out for 'A new interpretation of Bruce Quarrie with particular reference to polystyrene hills & milliput'. What a foolish institution it was - the economics students should obviously have been playing Monopoly.


Cheers,
Adam.

 

Oooh, not quite. Matilda IIs weren't called the Queen Of The Battlefield for nothing. Furthermore they were used with great success against the Japanese throughout the war and were the only tanks that served right the way through the war unaltered and unimproved.

 

Is that at 0 or 30 degrees? It looks slightly high to me for 30. The 75mm gun had about 9mm less penetration than the longer-barrelled 6pdr. Of course this is all straight off the top of me head...

 

i have a few a few things to address... first of all von poop.. i think that you would be very interested in a book called "Normandy 1944" by nikolas zetterling. thats where i get my information on the tiger. and of course i have checked all of his sources. and again, the thickness of a tanks armor, and the penetrating power of a tanks gun is all transfered into wargames. and it just so happens that the sherman has thinner armor and a weaker gun. and to falkenburg.. if the only way you can join this conversation is to be quite rude and disrespectful to someone who is only trying to talk and tell what he has learned to be true, then i would appreciate it if you would kindly stop saying anything.. and to t.a. gardner.. everything i have ever read about the sherman is contradictory to what you have told me, but if you would be so kind as to tell me where you got those figures so i can look them up for myself, i will gladly do so. thanks

 

So you dismiss all books - except that one...

It is an interesting book, I've reached up and am flicking through it now (by sheer coincidence I got it from the library a week or two ago, I see from his website that he also is a wargamer) - but placed in the balance with a plethora of other recent titles from Buckley, Pallud et.al. it isn't the Normandy information panacea that many with a Germanocentric view of the fighting in that theatre currently claim it is.

What it certainly isn't is a complete reference on the Tiger, that subject tends to claim far more than a foot or two at least of the average obsessive's bookshelves from authors more dedicated to enquiring into that old thing .
And another recentish point on Normandy (that crops up here a few times - the search function is an instructive thing), - what benefit did any contemporarily possible thickness of armour give when assaulting HV guns at short ranges in that terrain...
It's often cited that the allies suffered so disproportionately against the Axis, yet when the tables were turned and the Germans were able to (or forced to) attack in that terrain their losses in armour and men were equal to those suffered by the allies. The bocage being far more significant as a military factor at that time than can be reflected in any obsession with penetration tables.

War and physics in the real world are infinitely complex things (funnily enough I seem to recall TA has a grounding in both, patronise at your peril ), mix in the plethora of other variables - doctrine, weather, motivation, training, dear john letters, propaganda, etc. etc. etc. - and the complexity rockets further.
Too much is often stated, as you seem to mate, as an absolute - whereas most things are always a hundred shades of grey.

Cheers,
Adam

 

panther tiger2 tiger1 t34/85 pziv t34/76 sherman firefly pziii sherman churchhill

 

So you have the book? it really is brilliant, and of course i dont dismiss all other books, but i havent ever read anywhere about the sherman, the way that t.a. describes it. if anyone can tell me where to go for that information i would really appreciate. it seems that every book i have on the subject says otherwise. and i am well aware that normandy 1944 isnt a complete reference to the tiger. and funnily enough i happen to be one of the people with about a two and a half foot space on my bookshelf dedicated to the tiger.

As you said, the bocage is much more significant a military factor than penetration tables, i completely agree. im not making any claim that wargaming can compare to real life, but i do set up actual battles that were fought in normandy using french ordinance survey maps( the battle of rauray inperticular is quite interesting ) that do happen to be in bocage country. and while they all cant be transfered to the wargame table, many of the factors you stated such as weather and morale can be.

Laslty i just want to say that if i gave the impression that i think in absolutes, im terribly sorry, for that isnt the case. and i hope you dont think of this as an arguement, because i consider it a discussion, and am in fact enjoying it.

 

Well when you said the Sherman was horrible....

 

Perhaps then you should have clairified your statement as being your opinion then . Though it wouldn't change the facts that it wasn't. You might want to read this thread.

http://www.ww2f.com/battle-europe/25518-us-37th-armored-regiment-arracourt-battle-tanks.html

 

well, as i explained earlier, im talking in a tactical sense(the shermans gun and armor were about on par with a mkIV), while on the strategic level the sherman seems like a good tank( it doesnt break down, it has a decent speed, etc etc). falkenberg... while it seems you cant stop being rude(it must be in your nature) at least you have provided me with some supporting details, although it seems that the post just proves my point... you clearly stated that the sherman was inferior to the german AFVs used, and that mobility(a strategic not tactical factor) was their key to voctory. so while i do appreciate your attempt at proving your self, if someone could post an impartial(as in not on this website) link showing me the amazing strengths of the sherman i would appreciate it to no end. thanks very much.

 

Glad to hear it mate.
All I'll say is tread carefully with blanket statements, there can be sharks in these interweb waters .
Keep it chilled and nobody ever needs to get too nasty.

How about a refreshing turn to this thread (that'll no doubt get the poor old Sherman a further kicking from some), but what about some 'worst tens' to counter the best tens? Negative views often being as interesting as the positives. And I wonder if the M4 will really get a space among assorted Italian/Japanese jobs, and one rather infamous New Zealand example - I shall hide in an appropriate smiley for reasons of taste:

(I never knew you could do that with vbulletin!)

Cheers,
Adam.

 

top ten worst tanks...in no order at all...

type 89 medium tank
type 92 cavalry tank
type 94 tankette
type 95 ha-go
type 97 te-ke
mark 1
mark 2
type 3 ka-chi
type 2 ka-mi
type 97 chi-ha

mostly japanese... and some german

 

Look, I'm kind of tied up doing an operational wargaming and statistical analysis of a theoretical version of Sledgehammer involving an Allied landing in France at Quiberon Bay in November 1942 at the moment. Maybe when I'm done I'll post up a really super detailed analysis of the Sherman vs. T34. If I really get into to Hermann, you better brush up on your advanced statistics and calculus 'cause the equations are going to get complicated.
Oh, and as most of the regulars can confirm, I am neither rude to others nor am I a poiser. I know my stuff very thoroughly. I thought I'd add that as a sort of disclaimer up front. I will not insult or belittle you but will thoroughly analyze any post you make and return credible and well documented (sources on request usually for the sake of brevity) posts.

Here is a taste of a minitatures wargame rules set I developed with partial bibliography on a thread:

http://www.ww2f.com/simulations-gaming/18938-ww2-miniature-wargame-rules.html

 

LOL I have known T.A. for a long time and can attest to that . There are quite a few of us here that have been studying Military history for longer then some here have been alive . LOL

 

i meant nothing i said against t.a. , but against falkenberg, who im sure is a wonderful fellow. that being said t.a., i think i could handle the equations and would be very much interested in them if at some point you are willing to share. i would REALLY enjoy reading your analysis of the sherman v. t-34 ( t-34/85 i presume ). and once again, if you would be so kind as to post some off-site links to places where i can find some of you information on the sherman, i really do have a genuine interest.

i looked through those rules a bit t.a. and im surprised that you use a turn sequence and initiative as oppose to simultaneous moving and firing. how do you go about tank v. tank combat??

 

NOOOOOOOO!!!!!! Thats all we need! another OPINION thread!!!! LOL :headbash: How about one about the 10 mechanically unreliable or fuel inefficient tanks of the war? LOL

 

i can admit that german tanks would most likely make up the list. haha