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Burnt ruins of German "Tiger" tank at Cori. Fifth Army. Cori area, Italy. 31 May 1944.
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Burnt ruins of German "Tiger" tank at Cori. Fifth Army. Cori area, Italy. 31 May 1944.
That main gun is a monster!
My favourite tank of WWII even though there were only 1200 of them produced due to the amount of effort required to build one it took a while to sort them out how best to deal with them, as one tanker who faced Wittmann head on at a very short range in his Sherman Commander Pat Dias found out.
Pats story was they were engaging the Tigers in a town and Pat spotted Wittmanns Tiger advancing so Pat backed the Sherman into a building to ambush Wittmanns tank from the rear the only logical place for the 75mm gun to have a hope of killing the Tiger.
Pat let Wittmanns tank go by thinking Wittmann had not seen him and when he thought it right came out of hiding to attack the Tiger from the rear, sad thing is Wittmann had noticed him and as Pats Sherman came out and turned onto the Tigers path he met it head on in his words "Not an ideal situation to be in." Pats Gunner got 2 AP rounds away which simply bounced off the Tigers armour as Pat said "I fired twice he fired once."
The explosion blew Pat out of his commanders hatch and killed two of his crew and luckily for Pat the Dr he was taken to was an eye specialist who passed a large magnet in front of his eyes to get all the steel splinters out and said to Pat if they had stayed in there for 24 hours you would be blind.
In looking at Pat on the interview he had suffered from the 88 round that entered his Sherman and as we know they were called Ronson lighters first time every time.
Pat admired Wittman as a Tiger Commander as he was efficient and ruthless, but was taken out by a Firefly from the rear and killed the force of the explosion blew the Tigers turret off killing the crew Wittmann included, the pics show the Tiger turret some distance from the hull.
Post script the hull shape on the tank in the top pic looks like it could be a "Priest."
Hi Mark - what I meant by the lighter quip is that when a Sherman was hit they ignited there fore the crews named them Ronsons due to the fact they lit up first time every time probably due to the radial engines diet of the fuel I guess, not an enviable thing but the USA were producing one complete Sherman every 30 minutes given the Tiger tanks full production of 1200 units
The Ronson system was a flamethrower for vehicle mounting developed in World War II and used by the Canadian Army and the United States Marine Corps.
The Ronson was developed by the British Petroleum Warfare Department in 1940.[1] Having insufficient range it was passed over for British use but taken up by the Canadians for further work. The Ronson was developed in time sufficiently to be used for production of the "Wasp MkIIC" flamethrower variant of the Universal Carrier.
From there it came to the attention of the US and adopted as the Satan. The US used an M4 Sherman tank adapted with a Navy Mark 1 flamethrower, which was a development of the Ronson by the US Navy.[2] These tanks were used in the Battle of Iwo Jima and during Operation Overlord. The Navy Mark I was also used on the Landing Vehicle Tracked LVT.
https://www.milsurps.com/images/impo...tank1968-1.jpg
[img]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ronson_flame_tank_Iwo_Jima.jpg[\img]
"The 88" deadly up to and including 2 miles. The Sherman's 75mm effective range was what? 500yds against 3.5" of armor. The Tiger had close to 5" frontal. Mr. Dias interview is gripping and to see what that encounter did to him physically yet he speaks of it with a chuckle is an inspiration.
The local VFW post in my hometown has an M7B2 out front. Fascinating vehicle.
Bob
Hi Mark - what I meant by the lighter quip is that when a Sherman was hit they ignited there fore the crews named them Ronsons due to the fact they lit up first time every time probably due to the radial engines diet of the fuel I guess, not an enviable thing but the USA were producing one complete Sherman every 30 minutes given the Tiger tanks full production of 1200 units
It is an interesting story it caused me to dig a little deeper
I have read where the "first time every time" quote was a post war ad campaign.
I did find references to ronson and zippo as flame thrower tanks but not as a reference to the m4 burning up
Also found this
"German tanks also used petrol engines yet avoid the 'catches fire with one hit' blame. It's not the fuel that burns, it's the ammunition. Once wet ammunition racks were installed, M4's had one of the lowest fire chances out of any tank in WWII. The Russians used the Sherman, and liked it. If they didn't why would they accept over 4,000 of them? Also, the Panther and Tiger were overweight badly engineered pieces of junk. 75mm-armed M4's culd penetrate the Tiger from the side at over 600m, and 76mm/17lber versions could penetrate the front from 1000m"
The truth probably is somewhere in between
In a long distance shoot out between these two rivals the Sherman at say 1000m - 1500m the M-4 will lose every time and very badly at that, in an interview I saw of a British tanker he stated the Tiger was like a nightmare, It looks like one, its getting close god it is a Tiger call in the RAF and get the Typhoons that is how they dealt with them.
Von Rosen commander of the Tiger Battalion 503 stated the Firefly with its 17PDR main gun did not give them much trouble at all I guess you would have to look at the kill ratio against each other on a 1-1 basis and you will probably find the Mk VI Panzer would lead the game.
I just feel for those poor tankers in the M-4's facing a Tiger or a Flak - 88 in the tank killing roll.
A quote I also read somewhere or on a doco you may have to send 5 Shermans to knock out a Tiger or Panther you may lose 3-4 Shermans but you will get them in the end having to face something like that is a bit like a WWII Japanese tank facing the M-4 Sherman simply no contest......:dunno:
The Russians had heavy tanks too. The Joseph Stalin series of tanks 1,2,3. These where the Russian answer to the Panther and Tiger. The M4 was obsolete before it left the factory that's a fact, we had no real answer except to up gun and stack sandbags, numerical superiority didn't hurt either. Even more reason to admire the crews who knew they out gunned and out Armored by just about every German AT weapon and of course tank on the field.
I see all the time folks saying things like "it took 5 Sherman's to kill a Tiger" or sometimes "it took 10 Sherman's to kill a Tiger". But you know what, nobody can ever seem to recall where exactly that number comes from. Who was keeping score anyway? I'm sure if you asked the average allied tanker in the ETO in 1944/45 he thought every German tank was a Tiger or Panther. Sometimes you just couldn't be sure, and there's that whole fog-of-war thing to consider. Since so few German tankers survived it is pretty hard to get an accurate accounting from them.
Gen. George S. Patton in a letter published in the March 31, 1945 issue of "The Army and Navy Journal" said:
"Since 1 August 1944, when the Third Army became operational: our total tank casualties have amounted to 1,136 tanks. During the same period, we have accounted for 2,287 German tanks, of which 808 were of the Tiger or Panther variety, and 851 on our side were M4. ..but let me add that the Third Army has always attacked, and therefore better than 70 percent of our tank casualties have occurred from dug-in anti-tank guns and not enemy tanks, whereas a majority of the enemy tanks have been put out by our tanks."
There are without doubt individual instances where a Tiger took out multiple allied tanks, but that doesn't make that the rule.
At the end of two weeks of fighting, the Panther regiments in the Ardennes were shattered, losing about 180 tanks or 43 percent of the starting force of about 415 Panthers. Of the remaining 235 Panthers, only 45 percent were operational, and the remaining 55 percent were dead-line with mechanical problems or battle damage. In the case of the US First Army, which bore the brunt of the Ardennes fighting, by the end of December in had lost about 320 Sherman tanks of which about 90 were M4A1/A3 (76mm), equivalent to about one-quarter of its average daily strength that month. Due to continual reinforcements, First Army had about 1,085 Shermans on hand at the end of December 1944 with about 980 operational and only 9 percent deadline with mechanical problems or battle damage.
One thing I think we can all agree on is for a war machine with total production under 1500 the Tiger earned a fearsome reputation on all fronts.
Wittmanns crew destroyed 119 tanks and numerous field pieces and light skinned vehicles now if every one in charge of a Tiger did that that is 119 x 1200 = 142,800 tanks? ummm sorta out of proportion isn't it then calling Tiffies to kill them that's cheating though Hans Rudel in his twin 37mm armed Stuka destroyed a bucket load of Russian tanks.
This does not include the Hetzers and other purpose built TK's just the Panzer Mk VI
Yes the Allies won over both adversaries thank goodness but you cannot deny the Germans built good kit anyway good thread enjoyable :thup:
I think the Tiger may be a case of the best being the enemy of the good enough. The amount of work, time, and materials necessary to build one complex and rather mechanically unreliable Tiger might have been better employed to make a whole lot of excellent, less complex, and more reliable but not quite as super tanks. Larger numbers of reliable tanks could have made a big difference. The Russian T34 is a good example and it is a great tank.
My Dad's uncle was an M4 commander in the Pacific. He said there were times a shell would go through a Japanese tank and explode behind it, that's how thin it's armor was. He also said he was very grateful he didn't have to come up against a German tank.