Page 79 - The Chief Culprit

56 y e Chief Culprit

tank obsolete as well. But we will ask the same question: how could a tank be obsolete, if there
were no analogous tanks in the world, and its age was only between two and five years?
December 19, 1939, is the brightest and the most remarkable day in the history of
world tank design. On this day the Red Army received and enlisted an entire spectrum of
new armor-tank weaponry—the three newest tanks: the light amphibious T-40, the medium
T-34, and the heavy breakthrough KV tank. e T-34 is the best tank of all time. e KV was
the most powerful tank in the world during the first half of World War II, right up until the
Battle of Stalingrad. But the T-40 was no worse than these. In its class, it was also the best in
the world and also had no equal.
It is interesting that the Kremlin historians remember the T-34 and the KV, but forget
about the T-40. Meanwhile, the T-40 had a new, never-before-seen body shape, weighed 5.5
tons, and was armed with two machine guns: the large-caliber DShK and the regular DT. A
variant of this model, the T-40S, was armed with 20-mm automatic cannon instead of the
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DShK. By June 21, 1941, a total of 277 T-40 tanks were built.
By June 22, 1941, Hitler had on the eastern front 180 tanks in the under-six-ton cat-
egory. Not one of them was amphibious and not one of them could compete with the Soviet
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light tanks. Stalin, on the other hand, had more than 4,000 tanks in this weight category. All
of them were amphibious. Among them were 277 T-40s, which not only were amphibious,
but also were capable of using their large-caliber DShK machine guns (and of course the 20-
mm cannons) to pierce the armor of the German Pz-I tanks. Moreover, German Pz-I produc-
tion was stopped in 1938, and these tanks not only were obsolete but also heavily worn-out,
while the T-40 tanks were still in production, the paint not yet dried on many of them.
Foreign experts, those who understand even a little bit about tanks, talk of the T-40
with sighs of high regard. e vast majority of the T-40s were less than a year old. Some had
left the factory doors on June 21, and some were still in the factory courtyard. When did they
have time to become obsolete? When did they have time to become worn out? On June 22,
1941, on the eastern front, Hitler had 3,350 tanks in total of all types, all of them obsolete
and among all of them not a single amphibious one, while Stalin’s amphibious tanks alone
numbered over 4,000.
By overcoming stormy Lake Ilmen, even the oldest of Soviet amphibious tanks proved
the possibility of crossing the English Channel. But these tanks were designed for action on
lakes and rivers. For crossing the English Channel, Stalin had other designs in the works for
the future—the amphibious tank PT-1 and its variants. It weighed 14 tons, had a 500-horse-
power engine, a speed of 6 km/h in the water and could reach 62 km/h on land, and 90 km/h
when it shed its caterpillar tracks. is was a hybrid of a highway and an amphibious tank,
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a cross between a reconnaissance and a lightning battle tank. It was armed with a 45-mm
cannon and four machine guns. It had a crew of four men. e PT-1 had a large body and
impeccable floatability. is tank was designed and tested, but was not launched into series,
for now sailing across the channels was not in the plans. When it would become needed, it
could be launched into series.
e fate of Soviet amphibious tanks is a sad one: they were of no use in defensive war.
Where would they sail? Upon orders from the People’s Commissar for Defense, Marshal
of the Soviet Union Timoshenko, and the chief of the general staff, General of the Army
Zhukov, tens of thousands of tons of spare parts for the tanks, hundreds of thousands of tons
of ammunition and fuel, were brought out to the very borders of the country. In the first