Page 348 - The Chief Culprit

Notes to Pages 41–46 y 293

this tank —the pride of the British tank industry—could only handle its own weight on level ground
or while going down hills. Each armored column of Matildas was escorted by a group of heavy trucks.
eir task was to tow each Matilda uphill. e Matilda could only attack the enemy on level ground or
roll down at the enemy from the top of a hill. If the reader is interested, I highly recommend the incred-
ible book by D. Fletcher, e Great Tank Scandal (London: HMSO, 1990). By the beginning of World
War II on September 1, 1939, the British army had only two of those tanks. e tank was slow and had
a short range and unsatisfactory open terrain performance and reliability. All of the tank’s parameters,
with the exception of the armor, did not satisfy battlefield needs.
3. Encyclopedia of German Tanks of World War Two (London: AAP, 1978), 89.
4. M. Bariatinsky and M. Pavlov, Middle Tank T-28 (Moscow: Askold, 1993).
5. A. B. Shirokorad, e Genius of the Soviet Artillery: e Triumph and Tragedy of V. Grabin (Moscow:
AST, 2002), 141–42.
6. In the summer of 1941, the infantry tank Mark IV (A22) Churchill went into production in Britain.
e first production model had the following armor: frontal armor 101 mm, turret frontal armor 89
mm. However, the tank was very weakly armed: a 40-mm gun and two machine guns. e Churchill
had a very weak engine and, subsequently, low open-terrain capability and speed. e transmission was
unreliable. e tank had an old-fashioned design. e body was assembled on a sub-frame made out of
angle beams. Still plates were riveted to the sub-frame, with armor plating attached over them on bolts.
Although the armor was very thick, the design lacked rigidity. In the Soviet tanks, the body was a box,
welded out of armor plates. is gave the body superb rigidity. is was exactly the method used in the
model tanks. erefore, despite the impressive thickness of the armor, one is looking at a significantly
lower technological level in British tank building. Winston Churchill joked that the tank, named after
him, had even more shortcomings than he did.
7. Heinz Guderian, A Soldier’s Memoirs (Moscow: Voyenizdat, 1957), 231.
8. Ibid., 361.
9. e Wehrmacht’s Fateful Decisions (Moscow: Voyenizdat, 1974), 61.
10. Ibid., 101–2.
11. Heinz Guderian, Panzer Leader (London: Futura, 1974), 276.
12. “Second Partial and First Consolidated Report on Russian Medium Tank T-34,” Aberdeen Proving
Ground, Maryland (archive, 1943), 4.
13. “Military and Numeric Composition of the Armed Forces of the USSR,” Statistical Almanac, no.1 (June
22, 1941) (Moscow: Military History Institute, Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, 1994),
241.
14. I. Shmelev, e Tank’s History, 1916–1996 (Moscow: Tekhnika Molodiozhi, 1996), 145.
15. Starting on September 3, 1939, and through May 8, 1945, Britain produced 25,116 tanks; from 1939
to 1945 Germany produced 24,242 tanks and Japan produced 5,085 tanks. Altogether, this came to
54,443 tanks. In the years of World War II, from the beginning of production in September 1940 and
up to September 2, 1945, 54,853 T-34 tanks were manufactured.
16. Encyclopedia of German Tanks of World War Two (London: AAP, 1978), 261–62.
17. M. Bariatinsky, Soviet Armor, 1939–1945 (Moscow: Bronecollectsia, 1998), 13–14.Starting in 1940,
there were 33,805 T-34 tanks built, and 21,048 T-34-85 tanks were built from 1944 until the end of
the war.
18. 2,644 SU-85 were produced and 2,495 SU-100. Altogether: 5,139. Ibid, pp. 22–23.
19. Guderian, Panzer Leader, 283.
20. Steven Zaloga and James Grandsen, Soviet Tanks and Combat Vehicles of World War Two (London: Arms
and Armour Press, 1984), 175.
21. V. Chalmaev, Malyshev, ZhZL series (Moscow: Molodaia Gvardia, 1978), 299. Starting in 1942, in the
competition for the quality parameters of the tank guns, the German designers achieved outstanding
results. e 75-mm gun KwK 42 (with a 70-caliber barrel length!) that was used on a Panther gun
was a designer’s masterpiece. e 122-mm gun on the IS-2 and the 75-mm Panther gun had approxi-
mately the same effectiveness against the armor. e Panther gun’s low caliber meant higher speed. e
Panther’s load was 79 to 81 rounds, but only 28 on the IS-2. is difference was caused by the lower
internal volume of the IS-2 versus the “Panther.” Also, the 122-mm gun required bigger and heavier