Since then, we have lived with this clear understanding that we were making the best tank in the world. In general, as winners, we did our best. Best weapon, the best American Lend-Lease, the best American planes, and so on, and, of course, the tank.

But today with my guests, we will once again raise this very dangerous and controversial topic, with the same question: after all, which tank is the best, well, not that it showed itself in World War II, but at least it was appreciated by the users themselves as the most suitable for the assigned tasks.

Vyacheslav Len, collector, publisher, antiquarian, historian, gambling man who revives and returns to our country its history.

Yuri Pasholok, a historian of armored vehicles, an encyclopedist, a person who knows the answer to the very question about which we have gathered here for three. Hello.

S. Aslanyan: Well, now I will listen to you. So which tank is the best?

Y. Pasholok: Well, after all, the T-34 was recognized as the best tank of the Second World War.

S. Aslanyan: Shugurov, the kingdom of heaven to him, who graduated from Baumanku, and also understood something in tanks, every time it came to this maxim, he carefully remarked: “Well, he has a transmission tunnel, suspension, sights ... Well, in general, yes , overall, not bad".

I asked those people who fought in the T-34, what they think about this, they said different things, but most often they called the German T-4 (PzKpfw IV Ausf H), after modernization since 1943.

They considered him the best, although, in general, they fought directly with him, and once they won, they probably still possessed some kind of talent and vitality, because if the German tank was the best, and we won, then it also remains question.

Y. Pasholok: Well, on this occasion it is interesting to learn this information from the Germans. I can say that the modernization of the T-4, in fact, ended at the end of 1942. Because it turned out that further loading it with armor, in general, is useless, because then he would have to redo the chassis. Therefore, the German T-4 tank, it has 80 mm of armor in the forehead, on the hull, but in the tower - the same 50.

V. Len: But its advantage is that it was not as difficult to manufacture as the T-3 (Pz.Kpfw.III). The T-3 had torsion bar suspensions, while this one was completely different. The body was welded separately, there were no torsion bars,

it had completely different leverage, so to speak, and therefore was easier to manufacture. They could do much more, which was more than relevant for the Germans in the second half. Although the Germans themselves say that at the beginning of the war, the T-3 was more convenient for them. Well, that's in practice.

S. Aslanyan: Did the T-34 have any drawbacks?

Y. Pasholok: Yes, sure. I'll tell you more, the T-34 that we know did not suit our military already at the beginning of 1941. Firstly, they were not satisfied with the fact that, in fact, he pulled a two-seater car. Well, in fact, to be honest, the T-34 is a development of the BT tank. Very, very deep, but still it's BT. Well, with their cockroaches, with their flaws. Initially, the 17-18-ton vehicle began to weigh at first 27 tons, and by 1941, by the end, all 30.

S. Aslanyan: But what a motor.

Y. Pasholok: Well, the motor is not bad, but the problem, for example, is with the gearbox. The suspension was already considered unsuccessful. Moreover, initially the BT-20 tank, which is known as the A-20, the prototype of the T-34, was already initially said to its development: “Guys, should we make a torsion bar, otherwise we have a little goat back and forth when we accelerate , we slow down sharply.

S. Aslanyan: Well, yes. The problem of those who fought on the T-34, including in their description, boiled down to the fact that before firing it was necessary to wait for the tank to settle, until it swayed in all directions, and that was, in general, the wrong time, which one could afford under enemy fire while waiting to spend.

V. Len: They also fired on the move, but very rarely, and very few people could do it. Of course, I had to stop. As a rule, the signal to stop the mechanic was given by foot. The tank commander stabbed him in the back. It meant stop. Short stop. Indeed, the tank stopped swaying, and a shot was fired immediately. But, as a rule, they took this buildup into account.

S. Aslanyan: Of course, those who fought on it, they already knew all the features of the machine, and took into account, including this, but here is the episode reproduced in the film, fairly honestly, "In war as in war", when our unit is being redeployed self-propelled gunners, and they go out into a clearing, where three damaged T-34s, and one "Tiger". This ratio is one to three, in order to overwhelm one German, you had to spend three of your own ...

V. Len: Tiger needed much more. At least a company to be surrounded by. It was necessary completely ... All our tankmen tell us what it was necessary for six or seven tanks to circle around him at once, so that he did not have time. The main thing was to blind him, it was necessary to knock out all the observation devices for him.

A German tanker told me this, by the way. It was scary. Of course, when the observation devices were all knocked out, then they simply stopped, it was useless - where to shoot.

Y. Pasholok: But, in fact, in the case of the "Tiger" I can say that when we captured the "Tiger" near Leningrad and carried out their shelling, it turned out that the 76 mm projectile did not penetrate the frontal armor (and the sides, in general, too) from a distance 200 meters. Well, we can assume that almost only completely point-blank.

V. Len: Point blank.

Y. Pasholok: Yes. And only if they had caliber shells, which in 1943 they already had in service, then yes, something could be done.

S. Aslanyan: And our KV-1? Maybe he's the best tank?

Y. Pasholok: No, the fact is that the KV-1 is the case when the tank was overweight. The original tank, which was, it weighed 40 tons. The tank that went into production is the very first, 42.5. It already weighed 45 tons in 1941, at the beginning, and everyone loaded and loaded it, and it already weighed 47.5 tons in the summer. But in reality, he has a cast tower, we are already getting almost 50 tons of mass.

As a result, his side gears were flying, the clutches were on fire, and they were burning already at the beginning of 1941. The box was constantly flying out of him. And, in fact, this was the reason why the KV-1 was discontinued. They lightened it up to 42.5 tons, and it turned out to be KV-1S.

V. Len: But, the main drawback is its barrel, a 76 mm gun. In my opinion, it was a very good tank, the barrel would have been more powerful. But again, to increase the trunk means to increase the weight, which is what Yura was talking about. And significantly.

S. Aslanyan: The difficulty of controlling this tank was such that it was one of the few tanks that had two officer positions... The driver-mechanic was a junior lieutenant, an officer. This suggests what kind of incredible technique could be entrusted to such a qualified specialist.

V. Len: Everything is correct.

Y. Pasholok: Well, of course, this is a breakthrough tank. There must be an officer in the crew.

S. Aslanyan: But the officer was the commander and the officer was the mechanic. Two officers aboard one tank. Amazing staffing table.

Total. Does all of the above give reason to believe that the best tank could be, among other things, the T-34, but none of them was an ideal tank?

Y. Pasholok: The best tank of the war, the one that is produced in large quantities, more or less corresponds to its function on the battlefield, has a fairly simple design that allows it to be operated in battle conditions, and has a margin for modernization. Let's say the T-34 actually had a margin of modernization until the end of the war. The T-4, in fact, ceased, as I said, at the end of 1942. An English tank, for example, "Matilda", it ceased to be capable of modernization already, in fact, in 1941.

S. Aslanyan: Total. Is the portrait of the best tank already being danced from these, for example, the names mentioned? Or you still need to go through all our armed forces and mention the Americans, who also fought with us.

V. Len: The Americans with their "Sherman", of course, a good tank, comfortable, our tankmen say that it was a cool tank, but very often they say that they burned them themselves.

S. Aslanyan: Sabotage?

V. Len: Yes exactly. It is one and a half times taller than the T-34, and with a small 76mm cannon. He was kind of unsuccessful, in my opinion, in order to compare it with the T-34. The T-34 is much better than it.

Y. Pasholok: But in the case of the Americans, I can say this. The most the main task When the M4 medium tank was made, it was ... We already have the M3 medium tank in production, which is known as the "Lee", we need to unify the newest vehicle with it so as not to overwhelm production drastically. Therefore, the M4 is such a tank of compromise. Moreover, they began to replace it already in 1942, but the result was the Pershing tank at the end of 1944.

S. Aslanyan: Which one was how successful and successful?

Y. Pasholok: Well, they did it so that, in general, the medium tank actually turned like ... Well, 2 tons lighter than the Lee tank.

S. Aslanyan: Vyacheslav Len, a collector, publisher and specialist in military equipment, returning the pages of its history to our country, including in a living, materialized form, bringing from abroad at our own expense a lot of equipment that we somehow lost. Yuri Pasholok, a historian of armored vehicles, an encyclopedist, and, among other things, a master who with his own hands is able to revive, put on the move a tank. We are trying to find an answer to a question that is not an axiom, it is precisely the reason for discussion: what is the best tank in the Second World War? We have in service, how many were, because we had, to put it mildly, of different sizes in this respect.

Y. Pasholok: Well, we can say that the same Germans had the same thing.

V. Len: If not more.

Y. Pasholok: Yes, if not more. We must proceed from the following that the tank, in fact, becomes obsolete at the time it is put into service. Namely, the end of the 30s, when the T-34 was born ... By the way, such a small, interesting fact that the T-3 and T-4 did not suit the Germans already in 1938. The tanks that we know, "Tiger" and "Panther", are very, very much beefed up in armament and weight, tanks that were originally supposed to replace the T-3 and T-4. As a result, the T-3 was replaced by the Panther, which is twice as heavy.

S. Aslanyan: How ineffective is it?

V. Len:"Panther" is very effective.

S. Aslanyan: The fact of the matter is that the increase in mass, it cannot be said that, as with a woman, it greatly spoiled her figure, and everyone turned away from her.

V. Len: She had a lovely trunk, lovely driving performance... On it you feel like driving a car, the handling is just crazy on this tank. You can shoot on the move completely calmly. She simply absorbs bumps, stones, everything imaginable and unimaginable. The tank was so successful.

Y. Pasholok: But there is a nuance. The problem is that the Panther, in fact, never became the main medium tank, because it was quite difficult to manufacture. Those firms that took up its production, they could not fulfill the plan that was supposed. Therefore, the "four" remained the main medium tank of the Wehrmacht.

V. Len: But, nevertheless, "Panther" about 5000 pieces, in my opinion, have been made.

Y. Pasholok: Well, actually, at this time the Germans were already thinking rather not about tanks, but about fighters. The most interesting fact is that the Germans have the most massive armored unit, the Geschutz, a self-propelled anti-tank gun.

V. Len: At first it was not anti-tank, but one might say anti-personnel. They entered Russia with a so-called "cigarette butt", with a barrel ... Well, they call it "fifty dollars" in slang, either in German or in Russian. This is a short barrel with a 50-mm one ... Well, first 50, then 75. The goal was to spit into the trench just like a mortar, as they say, there is no other name for it.

Well, then, by 1942 and at the end of 1941, other targets appeared. Everything that the Germans could achieve by an offensive war, they achieved. Then there were already difficult victories for them. Moscow nevertheless set a border for offensive German weapons. It was already more necessary to have defensive and, so to speak, anti-tank. Because Russia and Soviet Union, it is correct to say, and our allied countries have already produced such a quantity of equipment and tanks that it was necessary to fight with tanks precisely with equipment. The direct purpose of the tank.

S. Aslanyan: And at what stage did it become clear that the infantry had nothing to oppose? Was there such a moment in the history of the war when it was clear that such a technique could only be stopped by technology? Or is it still heroism and Mosin's rifle to the last?

Y. Pasholok: 1943 year. When the Germans massively appeared "Tiger" and "Panther", this was exactly the episode when the German army had a weapon that, well, let's say, if not everything is impossible to oppose, then at least it is very difficult. But this stage, in fact, lasted until the end of 1943.

But look what happened in 1943. They lost the Kursk Bulge. We rolled back further. The front rolled back several hundred kilometers very quickly.

V. Len: Resources. The resource war has already started, in principle. To put it mildly, a country that is richer, human and material resources, so to speak, resources, well, all equipment and so on, it will benefit. We have already begun to fight ... Many call it “throwing hats”, but this is not so. With our resources. First of all, human.

S. Aslanyan: But, nevertheless, it turns out that before 1943 it was still possible, one way or another, to resist the infantry tanks? After 1943, the armament from the German side had already acquired such a specific focus that an answer was needed at the level of comparable technology?

Y. Pasholok: Not only. First, we have cumulative grenades in service. First RPG-43, then RPG-6, which completely penetrated the Panther side. Secondly, they changed their tactics. The same anti-tank artillery, which the infantry always had, had several guns working at once, one machine at a time. As a result, it seems like the tank is intact, but it can no longer drive and shoot.

V. Len: There is no one.

Y. Pasholok: No one, yes.

V. Len: As a rule, the artillerymen tried first, if it was a large tank, to immobilize it, knock down one of the tracks, and then it became an easy target, it could not leave. And as a rule, if a caterpillar was knocked down, the tank stood sideways to the artillerymen, and as a rule, the artillerymen did not put one gun at a time. The tactics that Yura speaks about is crowded: there they put five guns all together and one off to the side somewhere, 300 meters away. And five were actually standing side by side, 20-30 meters from each other. Maybe even 15.

Y. Pasholok: Well, our sappers do not need to be written off, as it were. The failure of the German offensive on Ponyri, where "Ferdinand" (Sd.Kfz.184) participated, which could not be penetrated by anything ...

V. Len: This happened at the Kursk Bulge.

Y. Pasholok: Yes, on the Kursk Bulge. It was choked up thanks to our sappers. The Germans lost a whole bunch of these Ferdinands there, which were blown up by anti-tank mine screens.

V. Len: Since the "Ferdinand" did not have ... Surprisingly, a huge self-propelled gun, incredible, the best one could say (would be), but it did not have an elementary defense against infantry machine guns. It just wasn't. And so our sappers just burned them almost all. There were 90 of them in that place, and almost 70 were burned there.

Y. Pasholok: 35 irrecoverable losses at the Kursk Bulge.

V. Len: Irretrievable are torn to shreds. The Germans had a very large system, such a gradation, almost ten scales. Tank, in a word, if it was torn to pieces, then this is the tenth scale. And everything else, burned and so on, is treated, repaired, taken away, and the like.

Therefore, the Germans, when they talk about their losses at the Kursk Bulge, do not really need to listen to this, the real losses are by our standards ... We did not repair the T-34: it burned down and burned down. It was cheaper to re-do it than to take it to the factory, disassemble, sort out, and so on. The Germans had something else: if the tank did not fly to shreds, they restored it. They were dragged to the rear and sent to factories. It was cheaper for them. And we had a conveyor belt.

Y. Pasholok: In this sense, we can say that we didn’t shower them with corpses, we covered them with iron.

V. Len: Everything is correct.

Y. Pasholok: And by the way, with regard to the "Tiger" and their losses, one must bear in mind that, in general, behind every German tank battalion, in which there were "Tiger", there was an echelon with spare parts.

V. Len: Real train.

Y. Pasholok: In reality, the Germans won not because their tanks were better, but because they had much better material support and our, by the way, further victories, 1943 and beyond, firstly, we learned to fight, stopped these sketches, "We need to capture it by such and such a date", operations have already begun competently ...

This is clearly seen, for example, in the battles of 1944, when ours literally did not notice the German battalions "Tiger": he was rolled out - and, in general, that's all, no. This is the first thing.

Secondly, thanks to, among other things, the same Lend-Lease, we have good material support. American trucks, including ... Not just a truck, but there were also repair flyers and other vehicles. Thanks to all this, we received good material support, and this greatly affected the results.

V. Len: The flyers, by the way, were gorgeous, they were so well equipped. And welding machines, and lathes, and boring machines, and so on. In the field, it was possible to restore an actually blown up tank on a mine, and it was combat-ready.

S. Aslanyan: And besides the Lend-Lease fly-bys, what actually fought in our army? On the armored topic?

Y. Pasholok: Well, look, we have, firstly, looked at SPGs very seriously since the end of 1941. And the reason was banal: due to the fact that either the factories were evacuated, or the tractor factories stopped making tractors, and began to make tanks, a very comical situation turned out: we have guns, but we have nothing to carry them with. Therefore, we launched a program on self-propelled artillery, it worked for about a year, and as a result, in the winter of 1943, medium, light and heavy self-propelled guns were sent to our troops.

V. Len: Before that, of course, the artillerymen tell something terrible: they must be on horseback, they attach four horses where, where six - and they went, they dragged the cannon. It was, of course, a horse-drawn circus, so to speak. That's how we got to Moscow. And our guns were dragged from Moscow on horse-drawn vehicles.

S. Aslanyan: But after we replaced horses with self-propelled guns and used Lend-Lease for their intended purpose, purely technically (not to mention tactically) we became unequivocally victorious? Or was it still from the German side, unfortunately, that there were also quite combat-ready people and equipment?

Y. Pasholok: Well, the point here is that we need to look at the situation soberly and say that we have learned to fight, and we have received equipment that can really win.

V. Len: By the end of 1942.

Y. Pasholok: Yes. For example, the SU-152, a self-propelled gun that was originally developed for opening enemy pillboxes, turned out, in principle, to be a very good tank destroyer. It is she who is called "St. John's wort".

V. Len: By the way, ours just managed because of the hills ... If the "Tiger" could only shoot in a straight line, then the self-propelled artillery unit (well, Yura is talking about a 152mm one) could shoot like a canopy. Like a mortar. What our tankers used perfectly. They simply retreated beyond the hill, if they understood that one or two 34s had been burned in front of them, and they were hitting the Tiger, and the Tiger, as a rule, was a very arrogant tank, it burned calmly from 1.5 kilometers. -34 is ours. Our T-34 could plant it in the side from 500 meters.

S. Aslanyan: Vyacheslav Len - publisher, antiquarian, collector - well, a person, in general, who makes history not a dead paragraph in a textbook, but a living element of our modern life, you can go and see Lena's traces on Poklonnaya Gora, where part of him stands collection. Yuri Pasholok is a historian of armored vehicles, an encyclopedist, a person who knows why a tank drives and knows how to breathe life into it.

We just finished on light tanks, I was reading the combat log of one of our tank regiments, this is the end of 1941, the whole regiment was on "Stuart", and it had only one entry: "The regiment entered the battle."

V. Len: With a 37mm gun against the Germans with 75mm guns, of course, no other entry could have followed.

S. Aslanyan: Yes, just the regiment after that was gone, they did not reach.

V. Len: Everything is correct.

S. Aslanyan: They could not even sneak up, they just left, and on this the whole regiment was destroyed.

V. Len: 2008 units were delivered to us.

Y. Pasholok: No, there is something about a thousand, but, firstly, about the M-3 light, and in general, in principle, light American tanks, you can see very well on the site in Kubinka, the tallest tank is the American M5A1 ", light tank.

V. Len: On which they landed, by the way, in large numbers in Normandy, but one must take into account, I will say separately about Normandy, only 60 defeated divisions opposed, and how many entered the Soviet Union - 300 units.

Y. Pasholok: 150 divisions in 1941 alone. As for light tanks, here you need to understand that, firstly, we did not really understand about German equipment, the same M-3 light tanks ended the war in 1945 as part of regiments, for example, in cavalry divisions, there are such.

S. Aslanyan: Well, we still have cavalry, the Germans no longer had cavalry since 1943, their cavalry remained as a branch of the army, in the form of cavalry reconnaissance companies with each SS regiment, and an element of the cavalry uniform - the famous yellow gap, yellow shoulder straps and yellow buttonholes - it flashed only among those officers who were in the cavalry in the First World War, and the German cavalrymen put the checkers back into the warehouses and caulked them into the chests just at the turn of 1942-1943, as the Germans did not have cavalry in the field.

Y. Pasholok: And our cavalry felt very fine until the end of the war. First, a breach is made, then cavalry is launched there, which begins to work very effectively in the rear, and each cavalry division had a regiment of at least 10 tanks.

V. Len: That's right, first we started with the tanks, we have already learned, under the machine guns, as it was at the beginning of the war, when the regiments lay down to go through the breakthrough, it was useless. One German describes, by the way, also from a cavalry division, which was stationed in Nakhabino, near Moscow, 20 kilometers from Moscow, we note, this is how our cavalrymen tried to break through, two regiments were seated there, just a terrible battle: they are against our cavalry, no one survived. One regiment, and after an hour and a half, in my opinion, the second regiment was laid down.

Y. Pasholok: Yes, and then we have a completely different picture, moreover, everything was thrown into our cavalry according to the principle "on you, God, that we do not want", therefore, in the same Lvov-Sandomierz operation, one of the cavalry regiments went into battle, having "Matilda".

V. Len: Well, yes, this is the old tank we just talked about, 1941-1942.

Y. Pasholok: The British stopped riding them in Africa, and we calmly used them in offensive operations.

V. Len: But they were designed for Africa, in which the sides are fully sewn with armor.

Y. Pasholok: And the same Valentine, which the British stopped actually using in battles in 1943 - they reached the end of the war here.

V. Len: And moreover, our tankers spoke very well of them due to the fact that they have a low hull, a really very low tank, and a low tower - they could sneak up on the Germans. They have rubberized tracks, a very quiet tank, it has a car engine, it got very close to the "Tiger" and could literally come in from the rear, and this case was described, in my opinion, in Hungary: two "Valentine" destroyed two " Tiger ”, incredible.

Y. Pasholok: And in general, if we are talking about the best tanks, then since we mentioned the Valentine, there are various disputes about which tank is the best of the light ones, but if you look at a sober look, then the British released into the war best light tank.

V. Len: Not average like the T-34.

Y. Pasholok: This is, firstly, the most massive British tank, which was produced not only in England, but also in Canada, by the way, the Canadians mainly supplied them to us, they did not produce for themselves. The tank is very technologically advanced, the tank was very reliable, it used a mass diesel engine, and, at first they used their own bus diesel engines, and then they began to use American diesel engines from "GM", by the way, the same ones that we then produced in Yaroslavl.

V. Len: And to this day they are releasing, modernized.

Y. Pasholok: In general, yes, this is the same diesel. And the most interesting thing is that this tank started with a 40-mm cannon, which, by the way, did not have high-explosive fragmentation ammunition, well, the British were like that, very peculiar.

V. Len: Only armor-piercing, against the infantry only armor-piercing could be fired.

Y. Pasholok: Yes, on the infantry - here you go, with machine guns. Real lords consider it wrong to hit the infantry with high-explosive fragmentation shells. Then they installed a 57-mm cannon, which also did not have fragmentation shells, and now the Valentine IX, which, in fact, came to us in large quantities - it was they who worked well for the Tiger, they were good tanks but not infantry, because there was so much room that they really didn't have enough room for a machine gun for the Valentine IX. The tank works - well, it will spit on someone with a blank. The Valentine X had already received a machine gun, but we had only 60 of them, or something.

On the other hand, we also had people with ingenuity, and they noticed: “So, guys, you are supplying us with 157 installations, - this was an American 57-mm cannon on the half-truck, - so, this is the same cannon, and to it there is a high-explosive fragmentation ammunition. Great, we will solve the problems with the actual US supplies. " The Australians, who fought in the Pacific with their Matilda and Valentine, solved the problem in a different way, they set up their own production, took ammunition from the Bofors anti-aircraft gun and used it, but here, in general, they solved the problem with ingenuity.

S. Aslanyan: And it turns out that the best tank of the Second World War is the Valentine, and with regard to the medium tank, which inevitably becomes the most widespread on the battlefield, the purpose of this title depends not only on its characteristics, but also on the economic component - on the production price. , from the cost price?

Y. Pasholok: Yes, and about this it is worth thinking about the fact that cheap tanks were produced in the Soviet Union. If I am not mistaken, the ruble exchange rate against the Reichsmark for 1940 was 2.1 rubles to 1 Reichsmark.

For reference, the T-3 cost about 120 thousand Reichsmarks, it is unarmed, well, somewhere between 130-135 thousand Reichsmarks, one tank. And now, attention, according to agreements between the Main Armored Directorate and the Kharkov Steam Locomotive Plant, also known as plant number 183, one T-34 cost 400 thousand rubles. So it turns out that our tanks, in general, are relatively cheap.

But it's one thing - Peaceful time, and another thing is war. By February 1, 1942, a T-34 without a walkie-talkie cost 240 thousand rubles. The T-34-85 cost, in my opinion, 190 thousand rubles by the beginning of production, then the price dropped to 170 thousand rubles.

S. Aslanyan: By what means?

Y. Pasholok: Simplification of the design, because, in general, to be honest, it is much more profitable for the manufacturer for the tank to be as labor-intensive as possible, so that it can raise the price. There were very serious battles on this issue, if someone thinks that money was not counted in the Soviet Union, he is very deeply mistaken.

V. Len: That the Germans, in principle, had not decided until the end of the war, everything is commercial there, all the factories belonged to private individuals, so Hitler could not break their price tags on tanks and so on, everything that I saw German is like a work of art , respectively, a work of art and costs the same. These tanks were so expensive, incredibly expensive to manufacture, and not only tanks - cars, and everything that is only connected with the war, respectively, we talked about resources

- German tanks could not be produced in such massive quantities, because they were super expensive during the war.

S. Aslanyan: Now it is clear what you have become an antique dealer.

Y. Pasholok: Regarding, by the way, German tanks. When at one time there was a big interview with the late collector Jacques Littlefield, who, in general, started with modeling 1 to 5, and ended up with the world's largest private collection ...

V. Len: Which, unfortunately, is now on sale.

Y. Pasholok: Yes, he said, “I looked at Sherman and he has four types of pipes. Then I looked at the Panther - and it has 20 types of pipes. "

V. Len: 26.

Y. Pasholok:"And after that I understood why the Germans lost the war."

S. Aslanyan: Due to the technical complexity.

V. Len: Everything is correct. It is Yura who means the tubes to remove the engine. On the Sherman, four pipes were unscrewed, and that's it, on the Panther - 26.

S. Aslanyan: Unrepairable.

V. Len: No, it is suitable, but it must be a specialist of the highest level, in order to change to "Sherman" any machine operator from the village who drove a tractor will calmly transfer this engine, but to "Panther" - only a specialist of the highest level, whom they have been educating for years ...

S. Aslanyan: And if, after all, the tactical and technical characteristics of tanks, the T-34 on the pedestal, are left in the bottom line?

Y. Pasholok: In general, yes, because the fact that

The T-34 was officially withdrawn from service in 1997, which says something.

V. Len: And our tankers, mind you, who won the Second World War, I believe that the back of fascism was completely broken by the Soviet Union, all the landings in Normandy and so on - these were all light walks compared to what happened with the Soviet Union, we must remember and respect their ancestors.

So, literally this Saturday, I was talking at Poklonka with the commander of the T-34-85 tank, Georgy Yegorovich Kuzmin, and so he said that the T-34-85 was the best tank, and he started the war in a motorized battalion on July 15, 1941 years, the tank received at Stalingrad. So, this man went through the whole war, and he said: "The T-34 was the best tank." I respect him, a low bow to all the tankers who fought on these tanks, it was they who defeated great Germany, and the myth about them was smashed here, on Soviet soil.

Y. Pasholok: Well, by the way, as far as British tanks are concerned, the British had such an excellent tank industry that the most massive British tank in the war was the Sherman.

S. Aslanyan: In total, the economy assigned its own idea of ​​which tank is the best, because the most affordable in production, and with all that, the T-34 is still really the best tank of the Second World War, because the economic component for it is a massive tank. especially the T-34-85 worth 190 thousand rubles, and the tactical and technical characteristics.

I read the Germans in their memoirs about their enthusiastic reviews about our T-34, when in the village they knocked it out, approached an already defeated tank, ammunition was burning in the tank, and none of the Germans left, knowing perfectly well and being intoxicated by this legend - they they said that, of course, the ammunition would explode now, but "we know that his armor is so strong that nothing will hit us."

V. Len: And when the tower flew away with these Germans, when the high-explosive shells exploded, then they no longer thought about anything, and the tower, especially on the early T-34s, was one-two-three. God forbid, a direct hit, or diesel fuel began to burn after hitting the tanks - that's it, the tower - the first thing that flew away within a few minutes flew away 50 meters.

Y. Pasholok: In this case, it makes sense to just raise the issue of the shortcomings of the T-34, of which there were a sufficient number.

S. Aslanyan: Having made a remark that this is by right the best tank.

Y. Pasholok: Yes. So, firstly, this tank had tanks inside the fighting compartment with all the ensuing consequences for the crew. Actually, it is believed that a gasoline engine is more dangerous - not entirely true. The fact is that when it enters a half-empty fuel tank, it detonates no worse than an ammunition; a tank can not only fly away the tower, but also fly forward with a frontal sheet.

V. Len: The sides are widened - this is just the tank. The shells are when the tower flew away.

Y. Pasholok: Secondly, there was a big problem: the T-34 is really "blind". The Germans had a bunch of inspection hatches - this is also a drawback, since anything can fly into any of these hatches, and at the same time dignity, because the commander sitting in the commander's cupola sees everything. We simply did not have time to make the commander's cupola. It was supposed to be a tank with a torsion bar suspension, with tanks tucked into the aft, engine compartment, there should have been a three-man turret with a commander's cupola, reinforced with armor, but, unfortunately, all this was not done in time. In fact, we received such a tank only at the end of 1944, it was called the T-44. And the T-34 is, in fact, the vehicle on which they had to fight, just like the Germans had to fight instead of their VK-2001 and VK-3001 ...

V. Len: The predecessors of the "Tiger".

Y. Pasholok: Yes, and "Panther". They had to fight with what they have, with the car ...

V. Len: Which was adjusted in production.

Y. Pasholok: Yes, the T-3, which went into production in 1936, and the T-4, which also went into production in 1936. What other disadvantages does the T-34 have? Actually, the suspension is candlestick, "swinging" - by the way, the British did not have these problems. Why? Actually, the British, like us, bought a license from Christie, but we somehow stopped following Christie in the mid-1930s, and did it absolutely in vain, because in 1936 Christie introduced into the design of his tank a parallel shock absorber that solved the goat problem once and for all. And by the way, when they say that the Christie suspension is for light tanks - there is a very light tank like the Merkava, it has 70 tons of combat weight.

V. Len: Officially - but on the bottom a 10-ton slab from mines is installed.

Y. Pasholok: Yes, well, this tank has a Christie suspension, they just introduced a second shock absorber.

S. Aslanyan: What they use to this day. But the problem of visibility and sighting devices on the T-34 was solved ...

V. Len: In the early days, there was a problem.

Y. Pasholok: This means that there were no problems in terms of sights. The fact is that even dug TMFD sights are quite normal.

V. Len: This is the commander and gunner.

Y. Pasholok: And by the way, the Americans recognized them as much better than their own. The main problem was precisely in the observation devices. Firstly, we had a structure made of stalinite, such two pieces of iron, polished to a high shine. The tank will fire - it can burst. Then they changed it with great fights, the plant was very resistant to changing the stalinite for something else - they put prisms. But the problem: due to a violation of technology, they turned yellow very quickly. For example, in Gorky these prisms were made, but they did not have coal in the boiler room - as a result, they got a marriage.

V. Len: But at the beginning of the war, tankers very often describe mechanics - viewing devices were enough for exactly 10 minutes. What they were doing? Before the battle, the hatch is always open exactly on the palm. And so, they go into battle - as a rule, at first they did it, later they didn’t do it. One viewing device is opened, they look at it for 5-10 minutes, then the second. It is very easy - he leans back with his hands, they are right in front of the driver-mechanic, these two viewing devices, but after 15-20 minutes of the battle, you just need to open the hatch, and due to this, a lot of driver-mechanics died.

Both tank commanders and radio gunners describe this situation - very often driver mechanics died precisely because the hatch was open, the tank commander very often says that they are just headless - they are driving, driving, the tank has stopped, they cannot understand what is it, they put their head down - the mechanic has no head. This very often took place due to the fact that the hatch was slightly open on the palm.

The gunner-radio operator himself could not shoot in this tank, the viewing gap was literally 10 millimeters - it was impossible to observe the battlefield through this hole. All he did at the beginning of the war was to help the driver change the three-speed gearbox, outdated, and spin hand-rolled cigarettes for the driver, he was like an assistant to the driver. The radio, in principle, did not need it, it was possible to switch to the internal communication without it.

Y. Pasholok: There is also the problem that he could, of course, get somewhere from his course machine gun, but it is problematic, because he did not have a sight as such - he had a hole in the ball mount.

V. Len: The hole is small.

Y. Pasholok: Only in 1943 they began to introduce the device "PPO-8", which is a sight "PO" adapted for a ball mount for sniper rifle... This sight was actually put on since 1944, and even then not on all machines, but it went only in the T-34-85. As for observation devices, our armored models still have such a device as the MK-4. It is believed that this is, in fact, an English device, which was developed by the Polish engineer Gundlach, but the name "Wickers MK-4" and our name MK-4 have slightly different origins.

In this case, it is not a device, but a tank, a device similar to the device that is installed on the MK-4, "Churchill" tank. This is a prism, which consists of two parts, in the event of a fragment hitting, this upper prism was broken - you could open this prism, throw off the top and put a new one. In addition, it can rotate 360 ​​degrees, which is very convenient. Thanks to this, in fact, we have ceased to have a "blind" tank. Ideally, the T-34-85 in the turret, each of the crew members had an MK-4 sight, and the same thing on our heavy tanks.

V. Len: About T-34-85, modified T-34-76. A five-speed gearbox was already installed on it, which the tankers already rated as very good. I drove both the T-34-76 and the T-34-85. Very often, tankers write that on the T-34-76, immediately before the attack, they switched on the second gear, because on the battlefield they could not turn on the third gear, and accordingly, the tank was immobilized and became a target. As for the second period of the war, the T-34-85 had a good gearbox, and this problem for tankers was already gone.

S. Aslanyan: What was the crew of the T-34, how many people? After all, he was constantly changing in composition.

Y. Pasholok: Four people in the T-34, five people in the T-34-85.

V. Len: Very often, the early T-34-76 did not take a radio operator with them, because he is a useless crew member, in fact, as for the second period of the war, the crews were almost always full.

S. Aslanyan: What did five people do - positions?

Y. Pasholok: This means that the driver-mechanic, the radio operator, but then he is just a gunner, because the T-34-85 radio moved into the tower, respectively, the commander - he also became a radio operator, gunner and loader.

S. Aslanyan: All the same, the projectile supplier is such a position, without which you can go nowhere?

Y. Pasholok: Oh sure.

V. Len: Absolutely. And, by the way, on the early machines it was such a position - I will tell the episodes that the tankers told. During the battle, inexperienced loaders lost consciousness after the very first shots, the powder gases had nowhere to go, and, as a rule, T-34s went into battle with open hatches: in order for the loader, after the cartridge case was fired, to throw them into this hatch , because the sleeve lies at the bottom, and there the ammo rack continues to smoke, so the loaders tried to simply throw these sleeves overboard through the hatches during the battle.

Y. Pasholok: This is, in fact, a continuation of the shortcomings of the T-34. Based on the experience of Khalkhin Gol and the battles for Lake Khasan, it was decided that the tank should have one large hatch so that the commander could shoot back, he opened the hatch in front and could shoot from his personal weapons.

V. Len: Like behind a shield.

Y. Pasholok: Yes, but in reality it is a trap for the crew, because if the crew is injured, they will not lift this hatch.

V. Len: Yes, and by the way, no one closed the hatch - they tried to just tie the hatch to a string. The commander did it without fail. And they tried not to carry belts, harnesses, and so on, so as not to catch on during the evacuation from the tank. And there was an even bigger problem: the device for intercom, which is in a helmet, a very powerful plug, and very many wounded tankers did not jump out of the tank just because they could not pull out this device.

Y. Pasholok: By the way, the Germans have the same thing. When there were some legends that the German was chained in a tank, in fact, he just could not get out, he could get caught ...

V. Len: And flies back into the tank.

Y. Pasholok: His entire headset became his grave.

S. Aslanyan: They were Vyacheslav Len and Yuri Pasholok. We answered the question, which tank of the Second World War is the best. The answer is still the same - T-34.

Y. Pasholok: Absolutely right.

Although the First World War saw the appearance of tanks, the Second World War showed the real ferocity of these mechanical monsters. During the hostilities, they played an important role, both among the countries of the anti-Hitler coalition and among the Axis powers. Both warring parties created a significant number of tanks. Below are the ten outstanding tanks of World War II - the most powerful machines this period ever built.


10. M4 "Sherman" (USA)

The second largest tank of the Second World War. Produced in the USA and some others Western countries anti-Hitler coalition mainly due to the American Lend-Lease program, which provided military support to foreign allied powers. The Sherman medium tank had a standard 75 mm gun with 90 rounds of ammunition and was equipped with relatively thin frontal (51 mm) armor compared to other vehicles of the period.

Designed in 1941, the tank was named after the famous general. Civil war in the USA - William T. Sherman. The vehicle took part in numerous battles and campaigns from 1942 to 1945. The relative lack of firepower was compensated for by their huge numbers: about 50 thousand Shermans were produced during the Second World War.

9. "Sherman-Firefly" (UK)



The Sherman Firefly was a British variant of the M4 Sherman tank, which was equipped with a devastating 17-pound anti-tank gun, more powerful than the original 75-mm Sherman cannon. The 17-pounder was destructive enough to damage any known tanks of the time. The Sherman Firefly was one of those tanks that terrified the Axis countries and was characterized as one of the deadliest fighting vehicles of the Second World War. In total, more than 2,000 units were produced.

8.T-IV (Germany)



PzKpfw IV - one of the most widely used and mass-produced (8 696 units) German tanks during the Second World War. It was armed with a 75mm cannon that could destroy a Soviet T-34 at a range of 1200 meters.

Initially, these vehicles were used to support the infantry, but eventually took the role of a tank (T-III), and began to be used in battle as the main combat units.

7.T-34 (Soviet Union)



This legendary tank was the most massive during the War and the second most produced ever (about 84 thousand vehicles). It is also one of the longest-serving tanks ever produced. Until now, many surviving units are found in Asia and Africa.

The popularity of the T-34 is partly due to the sloping 45mm frontal armor, which was not penetrated by German shells. It was a fast, agile and durable vehicle, causing serious concern to the command of the invading German tank units.

6. Т-V "Panther" (Germany)



The PzKpfw V "Panther" is a medium German tank that appeared on the battlefield in 1943 and remained until the end of the war. A total of 6,334 units were created. The tank developed a speed of up to 55 km / h, had solid 80-mm armor and was armed with a 75-mm gun with ammunition from 79 to 82 high-explosive and armor-piercing shells. The T-V was powerful enough to damage any enemy vehicle at the time. It was technically superior to Tiger and T-IV tanks.

And although later, the T-V "Panther" was surpassed by numerous Soviet T-34s, she remained a serious enemy until the end of the war.

5. "Comet" IA 34 (Great Britain)



One of the most powerful military vehicles in Great Britain and probably the best that was used by this country in World War II. The tank was armed with a powerful 77mm cannon, which was a shortened version of the 17-pounder cannon. Thick armor reached 101 millimeters. However, the "Comet" did not have a significant impact on the course of the War due to its late introduction to the battlefields - around 1944, when the Germans were retreating.

But be that as it may, during its short service life, this military machine has shown its effectiveness and reliability.

4. "Tiger I" (Germany)



The Tiger I is a German heavy tank developed in 1942. He possessed a powerful 88-mm gun with 92-120 rounds of ammunition. It was successfully used against both air and ground targets. The full German name of this beast sounds like Panzerkampfwagen Tiger Ausf.E, while the Allies called this vehicle simply "Tiger".

It accelerated to 38 km / h and had armor without tilt with a thickness of 25 to 125 mm. When it was created in 1942, it suffered from some technical problems, but was soon spared them, having turned into a ruthless mechanical hunter by 1943.

The Tiger was a formidable machine that forced the Allies to develop better tanks. It symbolized the strength and power of the Nazi war machine, and until the middle of the war, no Allied tank had sufficient strength and power to withstand the "Tiger" in a direct collision. However, during the final stages of World War II, the Tiger's dominance was often challenged by the better-armed Sherman Fireflies and Soviet IS-2 tanks.

3. IS-2 "Joseph Stalin" (Soviet Union)



Tank IS-2 belonged to a whole family of heavy tanks of the "Joseph Stalin" type. It had a characteristic sloped armor 120 mm thick and a large 122 mm gun. The frontal armor was impenetrable for the shells of German 88-mm anti-tank guns at a distance of more than 1 kilometer. Its production began in 1944; a total of 2,252 tanks of the IS family were built, of which about half was the IS-2 modification.

During the Battle of Berlin, IS-2 tanks destroyed entire German buildings with high-explosive fragmentation shells. It was a real battering ram of the Red Army on its way to the heart of Berlin.

2. М26 "Pershing" (USA)



The United States created a heavy tank that belatedly took part in World War II. It was developed in 1944, total produced tanks amounted to 2,212 units. The Pershing was a more complex model than the Sherman, with a lower profile and larger tracks, which provided the vehicle with better stability.

The main gun had a caliber of 90 millimeters (70 rounds were attached to it), powerful enough to pierce the Tiger's armor. "Pershing" possessed the strength and power for a frontal attack of those machines that could be used by the Germans or the Japanese. But only 20 tanks took part in the hostilities in Europe and very few were sent to Okinawa. After the end of World War II, Pershing took part in the Korean War and then continued to be used in American troops. The M26 Pershing could have been a game changer if it had been thrown onto the battlefield earlier.

1. "Jagdpanther" (Germany)



The Jagdpanther is one of the most powerful tank destroyers in World War II. It was based on the Panther chassis, began operation in 1943, and served until 1945. Armed with an 88mm cannon with 57 rounds and 100mm frontal armor. The gun maintained accuracy at a distance of up to three kilometers and had a muzzle velocity of over 1000 m / s.

During the war, only 415 tanks were built. The Jagdpanthers were baptized by fire on July 30, 1944 near Saint-Martin de Bois, France, where eleven Churchill tanks were destroyed within two minutes. Technical superiority and advanced firepower did not have much impact on the course of the war due to the late introduction of these monsters.


The heavy tank "Joseph Stalin", better known as the IS-2, was named after the leader of the USSR and at the time of its appearance was the strongest in the world. Its armor successfully withstood the fire of German anti-tank artillery, and after modernization, when the "stepped" upper frontal part was replaced by its straightened configuration, it could hold at close range shells of the most powerful 88-mm anti-tank gun Pak 43. The tank itself was armed with a 122mm cannon, the shells of which pierced through such tanks as the PzKpfw IV Ausf H, PzKpfw.VI Tiger and PzKpfw V Panther tanks.

JagdPanther

According to the German classification, the JagdPanther is a tank destroyer. This vehicle is considered one of the best self-propelled guns of the Second World War. Having managed to fight on the Western and Eastern Fronts, the JagdPanther proved to be a dangerous enemy, its Pak.43 L / 71 cannon (88 mm, 71 caliber) pierced the armor of almost any Allied tank from 1000 meters.

M4 Sherman

The most massive tank American army during the Second World War, about 50 thousand of these machines were produced in total.

Simple and reliable, the M4 Sherman was loved by tankers. Its 75-mm cannon, equipped with a Westinghouse gyroscopic stabilizer, made it possible to fire fairly accurately even on the move. However, with the appearance of the PzKpfw.VI "Tiger" and PzKpfw V "Panther", its armor penetration was not enough, and subsequently the tank was equipped with a more powerful weapon. The main disadvantages of the tank were its high silhouette and weak armor, and the tank often caught fire when a shell hit it. The Germans even nicknamed the M4 Sherman as the "Burning Cauldron" or "Soldier's Bowler".

PzKpfw V "Panther"

This tank was created as a response to the Soviet T-34 and was subsequently to replace the Panzer III and IV. Due to the technological complexity of production, it was not possible to do this, as well as to bring the design of the tank to mind - the PzKpfw V "Panther" suffered from childhood illnesses throughout the war. Nevertheless, armed with a 70-caliber long-barreled 75 mm KWK-42 cannon, this tank was a formidable enemy. So, in one battle "Panther" SS Haupscharfuehrer Franz Faumer in Normandy destroyed 9 M4 Sherman and 4 more were captured completely serviceable. Not without reason "Panther" is considered by some experts to be the best tank of the Second World War.

PzKpfw IV

The main workhorse of the German armored forces throughout the war. The tank had a large supply for modernization, thanks to which it was constantly being improved and could withstand all its opponents on the battlefield. By the end of the war, when Germany's resources were depleted, the design of the PzKpfw IV was greatly simplified. For example, on the Ausf.J version, the electric turret drive, an auxiliary carburetor engine were removed, and in 1944 it was necessary to reduce the road wheels and abandon the zimmerite coating. But the tank soldier, as the "four" is also called, continued to fight.

Sherman Firefly

The British variant of the Sherman, armed with an excellent 17-pounder cannon, could withstand the German PzKpfw.VI Tiger and PzKpfw V "Panther". Moreover, the British gun had not only excellent armor penetration, but also fit into a standard tank turret.

The long and thin barrel of the gun required careful attitude: in the stowed position, the Sherman Firefly tower turned 180 degrees and the gun barrel was fixed on a special bracket mounted on the roof of the engine compartment.

A total of 699 tanks were converted: the crew of the car was reduced to 4 people, in addition, the machine gun was removed to accommodate part of the ammunition.

T-34

Adopted on December 19, 1941, the tank became a real nightmare for German tankers on the battlefield. Fast, agile and invulnerable to most of the Wehrmacht's tank and anti-tank guns, the T-34 dominated the battlefield for the first two years of the war.

It is not surprising that further development of German anti-tank weapons was aimed primarily at combating the terrible Soviet tank.

The T-34 was repeatedly upgraded throughout the war, the most significant improvement was the installation of a new turret with an 85 mm cannon, which made it possible to fight against German "cats": PzKpfw.VI "Tiger" and PzKpfw V "Panther". By the way, due to their simplicity and efficiency, these tanks are still used in some countries of the world.

T-44

Even more advanced than the T-34-85, the T-44 medium tank was put into service in 1944, but never took part in the war. Until the end of World War II, only 190 vehicles were built. The T-44 became the predecessor of the most massive T-54/55 tank in history. By the way, 44 did appear on the battlefield, but, however, in the movies and in the role of German tanks Pz VI "Tiger" in the film "Liberation".

PzKpfw.VI "Tiger"

The best means of dealing with T-34 and KV tanks were 88 mm anti-aircraft guns, and the Germans rightly decided that if such a weapon was adapted for installation on a tank chassis, then the USSR's tank superiority could be leveled.

A total of 1,358 PzKpfw.VI "Tiger" tanks were built. Armed with the 88mm Kwk L56 cannon, these vehicles wreaked havoc on enemy lines.

The tanker-ace Michael Wittmann, who fought on the PzKpfw.VI "Tiger", destroyed 138 tanks and 132 anti-tank guns of the enemy. For the Americans and their allies, the only means of fighting the Tigers was aviation. Thick frontal armor reliably protected the Pz VI from enemy gun fire. So, there is a known case when the tank received 227 hits, but, despite the fact that the tracks and rollers were damaged, it was able to go another 65 kilometers until it was safe.

"Tiger II"

"Tiger II", aka "King Tiger", appeared at the final stage of the war. This is the hardest and most armored tank the Wehrmacht. The weapon used was the 88 mm KwK.43 L / 71 cannon, which almost halved the turret. In fact, it was a modified and improved Flak 37 anti-aircraft gun for installation on a tank. Its projectile, at an angle of encounter of 90 degrees, penetrated 180 mm thick armor at a distance of one kilometer.

A wrecked tank was officially recorded at a distance of about 4 km. True, despite the thick armor, the tank was not invulnerable: by the end of the war, the Germans had lost their deposits of alloying metals, and the armor of the "Tiger II" became fragile. And the constant bombing of factories did not allow the production of these machines in the required quantities.

The history of armored forces begins at the beginning of the twentieth century, when the first models of self-propelled armored vehicles, more like matchboxes on tracks, nevertheless proved to be excellent on the battlefields.
The high cross-country ability of firearm fortresses gave them a huge advantage in trench warfare. A truly successful combat vehicle was supposed to easily overcome the trenches, barbed wire and the landscape of the forward dug by artillery preparation, inflict good fire damage, support the "queen of the fields" (infantry) and never break down. Unsurprisingly, the most influential powers in the world immediately jumped into the "tank race."

Dawn of the tank era

The laurels for the creation of the first tank rightfully belong to the British, who designed and successfully used their “Tank. Model 1 "in 1916 at the Battle of the Somme, completely demoralizing the enemy infantry. However, there were still decades of painstaking work on armor, rate of fire, maneuverability, it was necessary to change the weak carburetor engine to a more powerful diesel engine, come up with a rotating turret, solve problems with heat dissipation and the quality of travel and transmission. The world awaited tank duels and anti-tank mines, round-the-clock operation of steel plants, crazy projects of multi-turret monsters and, finally, the silhouette of a modern tank, carved in the fire and fury of wars of the twentieth century, now familiar to anyone.

The calm before the storm

In the 30s, England, Germany, the USA and the Soviet Union, anticipating a big war, were racing to create and improve their tank lines. Engineers-designers of heavy armored vehicles were lured away and outbid from each other by hook or by crook. For example, in 1930, the German engineer E. Grotte worked at the Bolshevik plant, who created a number of interesting developments that later formed the basis for later tank models.

Germany hastily forged the ranks of the Panzerwaffe, the British created the Royal Panzer Corps, the USA - the Armored Force. By the beginning of the war, the tank forces of the USSR already had two legendary vehicles that did a lot for victory - the KV-1 and T-34.
By the beginning of World War II, the competition to each other was mainly made up of the USSR and Germany. The Americans also produced an impressive amount of armored vehicles, only giving 80 thousand under lend-lease to the allies, but such fame as "Tigers", "Panthers" and "Thirty-fours", their cars did not earn. The British, on the other hand, because of the disagreements that existed before the war, in which direction to develop the tank industry, gave the palm and used mainly American M3 and M5 tanks on the battlefields.

Legendary WWII tanks

"Tiger" - a heavy German breakthrough tank, created at the factories of the company Henschel und Sohn. He first showed himself in a battle near Leningrad in 1942. Weighed 56 tons, was armed with an 88 mm cannon and two machine guns, and was protected by 100 mm armor. Carried by a five-man crew. He could submerge 3.5 meters under water. Among the shortcomings - the complexity of the design, high cost (the production of one "Tiger" cost the treasury as the cost of two medium tanks "Panther"), incredibly high fuel consumption, problems with undercarriage in winter conditions.

The T-34 was developed at the design bureau of the Kharkov steam locomotive plant under the leadership of Mikhail Koshkin before the war itself. It was a maneuverable tank, well protected by sloped armor, equipped with a powerful diesel engine and a long-barreled 76mm cannon. The reports, however, mentioned problems with optics, visibility, the tightness of the fighting compartment, and the lack of walkie-talkies. Due to the lack of space for a full-fledged crew, the commander had to act as a gunner.

The M4 Sherman, the main American tank of the period, was produced in Detroit factories. The third (after the T-34 and T-54) the most massive tank in the world. It has medium booking, is equipped with a 75-mm gun, and has successfully shown itself in battles against German tanks in Africa. Cheap, easy to operate, maintainable. Among the disadvantages: easily overturns due to the high center of gravity.

The Panther is a German medium armored tank, the main competitor to the Sherman and the T-34 on the battlefield. Armed with a 75mm tank cannon and two machine guns, armor thickness up to 80mm. First used in the Battle of Kursk.

Famous tanks of the Second World War also include the German fast and light T-3s, the Soviet heavily armored Joseph Stalin, which showed itself well during the storming of cities, and the founder of the KV-1 single-turret heavy tanks Klim Voroshilov.

Bad start

In 1941, the Soviet tank forces suffered crushing losses, since the German Panzerwaffe, having weaker light-armored T-4 tanks, in their tactical skills, in the coordination of the work of the crews and the command, were significantly superior to the Russians. The T-4, for example, initially had a good view, the presence of a commander's cupola and Zeiss optics, and the T-34 received these improvements only in 1943.

The swift strikes of the Germans were skillfully backed up by self-propelled guns, anti-tank guns and air raids, which made it possible to inflict massive damage. “It seemed to us that the Russians had created a tool that they would never learn to wield,” wrote one of the German generals.

Tank-winner

After the completion of the T-34-85, its "survivability" could seriously compete even with the heavily armored, but clumsy German "Tigers". Possessing incredible firepower and thick frontal armor, "Tigers" could not compete with "thirty-fours" in speed and maneuverability; they got stuck and drowned in difficult terrain. They required refuellers and special rail vehicles for transportation. Tank "Panther" with its high technical characteristics, just like the "Tiger", was distinguished by capricious operation, was expensive to manufacture.

In the course of the war, the thirty-four was modified, expanded the compartment for the crew, equipped with intercoms, and installed an even more powerful cannon. The heavy armor easily withstood the impact of a 37mm gun. And most importantly - Soviet tank crews mastered the methods of communication and interaction of tank brigades on the battlefield, learned to use the speed, power and maneuverability of the new T-34-85, inflicted swift strikes behind enemy lines, destroying communications and fortifications. The machine began to brilliantly perform the tasks for which it was originally intended. Soviet industry has established a continuous production of improved, well-balanced models. It is especially worth noting the simplicity of the design and the possibility of a quick and cheap repair, because for a tank it is important not only to efficiently perform combat missions, but also quickly return back to service after damage or breakdown.

You can find a model of that time that surpassed the T-34 in some characteristics, but it is precisely in terms of the aggregate performance characteristics that this tank can rightfully be called the best and most effective tank of the Second World War.

Constant attempts to bury the idea of ​​a tank do not find their realization. Despite the rapid evolution of anti-tank weapons, there is still no more reliable means of covering soldiers than heavy armored vehicles. I bring to your attention an overview of the outstanding tanks of the Second World War, created on the basis of the Discovery programs - "Killer Tanks: Steel Fist" and the Military Channel - "Ten best tanks XX century ". Undoubtedly, all the cars from the review are worthy of attention.

But I noticed that when describing tanks, experts do not consider its entire combat history, but only talk about those episodes of World War II when this machine was able to show itself in the best possible way. It is logical to immediately break the war into periods and consider which tank was the best and when. I would like to draw your attention to two important points.:

Firstly, strategy and technical characteristics of machines should not be confused... The red flag over Berlin does not mean that the Germans were weak and did not have good equipment. It also follows that having the best tanks in the world does not mean that your army will advance victoriously. You can be crushed corny by the amount. Do not forget that the army is a system, the competent use of its diverse forces by the enemy can put you in a difficult position.

Secondly, all disputes, "who is stronger, IS-2 or" Tiger ", do not make much sense... Tanks rarely fight tanks. Much more often, their opponents are enemy defensive lines, fortifications, artillery batteries, infantry and automotive equipment. In World War II, half of all tank losses fell on the actions of anti-tank artillery (which is logical - when the number of tanks went to tens of thousands, the number of guns was estimated at hundreds of thousands - an order of magnitude more!).

Another fierce enemy of tanks is mines. They were blown up by about 25% of combat vehicles. Aviation chalked up a few percent. How much is left for tank battles then ?!

Hence it follows that tank battle near Prokhorovka - a rare exotic. Currently, this trend continues - instead of the anti-tank "forty-five" are RPGs.

Well, now let's move on to our favorite cars.

Period 1939-1940. Blitzkrieg

... Pre-dawn haze, fog, shooting and the roar of engines. On the morning of May 10, 1940, the Wehrmacht breaks into Holland. After 17 days, Belgium fell, the remnants of the British expeditionary force were evacuated across the English Channel. On June 14, German tanks appeared on the streets of Paris ...

One of the conditions of the "lightning war" is the special tactics of using tanks: the unprecedented concentration of armored vehicles in the direction of the main attacks and the perfectly coordinated actions of the Germans allowed the "steel claws" of Goth and Guderian for hundreds of kilometers to cut into the defenses, and, without slowing down, move deep into the enemy's territory ...

Unique tactical technique demanded special technical solutions. German armored vehicles were required to be equipped with radio stations, with tank battalions there were air traffic controllers for emergency communication with the Luftwaffe. It was at this time that the "finest hour" fell Panzerkampfwagen III and Panzerkampfwagen IV... Behind such clumsy names are formidable combat vehicles that have wound the asphalt of European roads, the icy expanses of Russia and the sands of the Sahara on their tracks.

PzKpfw III, better known as T-III - light tank with 37 mm gun... Reservation from all angles - 30 mm. The main quality is Speed ​​(40 km / h on the highway). Thanks to the perfect optics of Carl Zeiss, the ergonomic workstations of the crew and the presence of a radio station, the troikas could successfully fight with much heavier vehicles. But with the advent of new opponents, the flaws of the T-III became more pronounced.

The Germans replaced the 37 mm cannon with 50 mm guns and covered the tank with hinged screens - temporary measures gave their results, the T-III fought for several more years. By 1943, the production of the T-III was discontinued due to the complete depletion of its resource for modernization. In total, the German industry has produced 5,000 "triplets".

The PzKpfw IV looked much more serious, which became the most massive tank Panzerwaffe - the Germans managed to build 8,700 vehicles. Combining all the advantages of the lighter T-III, the "four" had high firepower and protection - the thickness of the frontal plate was gradually increased to 80 mm, and the shells of its 75 mm long-barreled gun pierced the armor enemy tanks like foil (by the way, 1,133 early modifications with a short-barreled gun were produced).

The weak points of the car are too thin sides and stern (only 30 mm in the first modifications), the designers neglected the slope of the armor plates for the sake of manufacturability and convenience of the crew.

Seven thousand tanks of this type were left lying on the battlefields of World War II, but this history of T-IV did not end - the "fours" were operated in the armies of France and Czechoslovakia until the early 1950s and even took part in the 1967 Six-Day Arab-Israeli War.

Period 1941-1942. Red Dawn

“… From three sides we fired at the Russian iron monsters, but it was all in vain. The Russian giants came closer and closer. One of them approached our tank, hopelessly bogged down in a swampy pond and drove over it without any hesitation, crushing it with tracks into the mud ... "- General Reinhardt, commander of the 41st Panzer Corps of the Wehrmacht.

... August 20, 1941 KV tank under the command of senior lieutenant Zinovy ​​Kolobanov, he blocked the road to Gatchina for a column of 40 German tanks. When this unparalleled battle ended, 22 tanks were burning on the sidelines, and our KV, having received 156 direct hits from enemy shells, returned to the disposal of its division ...

In the summer of 1941, the KV tank smashed the elite units of the Wehrmacht with the same impunity, as if it rolled out onto the Borodino field in 1812. Invincible, invincible and incredibly powerful. Until the end of 1941, all the armies of the world had no weapons at all that could stop the Russian 45-ton monster. The KV was 2 times heavier than the largest tank in the Wehrmacht.

Armor KV - a wonderful song of steel and technology... 75 millimeters of steel from all angles! The frontal armor plates had an optimal angle of inclination, which further increased the projectile resistance of the KV armor - the German 37 mm anti-tank guns did not take it even at point-blank range, and 50 mm guns - no further than 500 meters. At the same time, the long-barreled 76 mm gun F-34 (ZIS-5) made it possible to hit any German tank of that period from a distance of 1.5 kilometers from any direction.

If battles like the legendary battle of Zinovy ​​Kolobanov took place regularly, then 235 KV tanks of the Southern Military District could completely destroy the Panzerwaffe in the summer of 1941. The technical capabilities of the KV tanks, in theory, made it possible to do this. Alas, not everything is so simple. Remember - we said that tanks rarely fight tanks ...

In addition to the invulnerable KV, the Red Army had even more scary tank- a great warrior T-34.

«… There is nothing worse than a tank battle against superior enemy forces. Not in terms of numbers - it was not important for us, we got used to it. But against better vehicles - it's terrible ... Russian tanks are so agile, at close range they will climb the slope or overcome the swamp faster than you can turn the tower. And through the noise and rumble you always hear the clang of shells on the armor. When they get into our tank, you often hear a deafening explosion and the roar of burning fuel, too loud to hear the death screams of the crew.... "- the opinion of a German tanker from the 4th Panzer Division, destroyed by T-34 tanks in the battle of Mtsensk on October 11, 1941.

Neither the volume nor the objectives of this article allows you to fully cover the history of the T-34 tank. Obviously, the Russian monster had no analogues in 1941: a 500-horsepower diesel engine, unique booking, 76 mm F-34 gun (generally similar to the KV tank) and wide tracks - all these technical solutions provided the T-34 with an optimal ratio of mobility, fire power and security. Even individually, these parameters were higher for the T-34 than for any Panzerwaffe tank.

The main thing is that the Soviet designers managed to create a tank exactly the way the Red Army needed it. The T-34 was ideally suited to the conditions of the Eastern Front. The extreme simplicity and manufacturability of the design made it possible in the shortest possible time to establish mass production of these combat vehicles, as a result - the T-34 were easy to operate, numerous and ubiquitous.

In the first year of the war alone, by the summer of 1942, the Red Army received about 15,000 T-34s, and more than 84,000 T-34s of all modifications were produced.

Discovery journalists were jealous of the successes of Soviet tank building, constantly hinting that the basis of a successful tank was the American Christie design. In a joking manner, the Russian “rudeness” and “uncouthness” got it - “Well! I didn't have time to get into the hatch - I got scratched all over! "

Americans forget that convenience was not a priority feature of armored vehicles on the Eastern Front: the fierce nature of the fighting did not allow tankers to think about such trifles. The main thing is not to burn out in the tank.

The "thirty-four" had much more serious shortcomings. Transmission - the weak link of the T-34... The German design school preferred a front-mounted gearbox, closer to the driver. Soviet engineers went for more effective way- transmission and engine were compactly located in an isolated compartment in the rear of the T-34. There was no need for a long propeller shaft through the entire body of the tank; the design was simplified, the height of the car decreased. An excellent technical solution, isn't it?

The gimbal was not needed. But control rods were needed. In the T-34, they reached a length of 5 meters! Can you imagine what kind of effort it took to the driver? But this did not create any special problems - in an extreme situation, a person is able to run on his hands and paddle with his ears. But what the Soviet tankers could withstand - metal could not withstand.

Under the influence of monstrous loads, the thrust was torn. As a result, many T-34s went into battle in one pre-selected gear. During the battle, they preferred not to touch the gearbox at all - according to the veteran tankers, it was better to sacrifice mobility than suddenly turn into a standing target.

The T-34 is a completely ruthless tank, both in relation to the enemy and in relation to its own crew. It remains only to admire the courage of the tankers.

Year 1943. Menagerie.

“… We went around the gully and ran into the Tiger. Having lost several T-34s, our battalion returned back ... "- a frequent description of meetings with PzKPfw VI from tankmen's memoirs.

1943, the time of the greats tank battles... In an effort to regain the lost technical superiority, Germany is by this time creating two new types of "superweapons" - heavy tanks "Tiger" and "Panther".

Panzerkampfwagen VI "Tiger" Ausf. It was designed as a heavy breakthrough tank capable of destroying any enemy and putting the Red Army to flight. By personal order of Hitler, the thickness of the frontal armor plate had to be at least 100 mm, the sides and stern of the tank were protected by eight centimeters of metal. The main weapon is the 88 mm KwK 36 cannon, created on the basis of a powerful anti-aircraft gun. Its capabilities are evidenced by the fact that when firing a trophy "Tiger" cannon, it was possible to achieve five consecutive hits on a target measuring 40 × 50 cm from a distance of 1100 m.

In addition to its high flatness, the KwK 36 inherited a high rate of fire of an anti-aircraft gun. In combat conditions, the "Tiger" fired eight rounds per minute, which was a record for such large tank guns. Six crew members sat comfortably in an invulnerable 57-ton steel box, gazing out at the wide Russian expanses through high-quality Carl Zeiss optics.

The bulky German monster is often described as a slow and clumsy tank. In reality, the "Tiger" was one of the fastest fighting vehicles of the Second World War.... The 700-horsepower Maybach engine accelerated the Tiger to 45 km / h on the highway. This thick-skinned tank was no less fast and maneuverable on rough terrain, thanks to an eight-speed hydromechanical gearbox (almost automatic, like on a Mercedes!) And complex side clutches with a double power supply.

At first glance, the design of the suspension and the caterpillar propeller was a parody of itself - the 0.7 meter wide tracks required the installation of a second row of rollers on each side. In this form, the "Tiger" did not fit on the railway platform, each time it was necessary to remove the "ordinary" caterpillar tracks and the outer row of rollers, instead of installing thin "transport" tracks.

It remains to be amazed at the strength of those guys who “shooed” a 60-ton colossus in the field. But there were also advantages to the strange suspension of the "Tiger" - two rows of rollers ensured a high smoothness of the ride, our veterans witnessed cases when the "Tiger" fired on the move.

The Tiger had one more drawback that frightened the Germans. It was an inscription on a technical memo that was in every vehicle: “The tank costs 800,000 Reichsmarks. Take care of him!". According to Goebbels' twisted logic, the tankers should have been very happy to learn that their "Tiger" is worth like seven T-IV tanks.

Realizing that the "Tiger" is a rare and exotic weapon of professionals, German tank builders created a simpler and cheaper tank, with the intention of turning it into a massive Wehrmacht medium tank.

Panzerkampfwagen V "Panther" is still the subject of heated debate. The technical capabilities of the car raises no objections - with a mass of 44 tons, the Panther surpassed the T-34 in mobility, developing 55-60 km / h on a good highway. The tank was armed with a 75 mm KwK 42 cannon with a barrel length of 70 calibers!

An armor-piercing sub-caliber projectile fired from its infernal vent flew 1 kilometer in the first second - with such performance characteristics, the Panther cannon could pierce any Allied tank at a distance of over 2 kilometers. The armor of the Panther was also recognized as worthy by most sources - the thickness of the forehead varied from 60 to 80 mm, while the angles of inclination of the armor reached 55 °. The board was less protected - at the level of the T-34, so it was easily hit by Soviet anti-tank weapons. The lower part of the side was additionally protected by two rows of rollers on each side.

The whole question is in the very appearance of the "Panther" - did the Reich need such a tank? Perhaps you should have focused on modernizing and increasing production of the proven T-IV? Or spend money on building invincible Tigers? It seems to me that the answer is simple - in 1943, nothing could save Germany from defeat.

In total, less than 6,000 Panthers were built, which was clearly not enough to saturate the Wehrmacht... The situation was aggravated by the drop in the quality of the armor of tanks due to the lack of resources and alloying additives. "Panther" was the quintessence of advanced ideas and new technologies. In March 1945, near Balaton, hundreds of Panthers equipped with night vision devices attacked Soviet troops at night. Even that didn't help.

Year 1944. Forward to Berlin!

The changed conditions required new means of warfare. By this time, the Soviet troops had already received heavy breakthrough tank IS-2, armed with a 122 mm howitzer... If a hit from a conventional tank shell caused local destruction of the wall, then a 122 mm howitzer shell demolished the whole house. Which was required for successful assault operations.

Another formidable weapon of the tank is a 12.7 mm DShK machine gun, mounted on a tower on a pivot mount. Bullets heavy machine gun got the enemy even behind the fat brickwork... The DShK increased the capabilities of the Is-2 by an order of magnitude in battles on the streets of European cities.

The armor thickness of the IS-2 reached 120 mm... One of the main achievements of Soviet engineers is the efficiency and low metal consumption of the IS-2 design. With a mass comparable to that of the Panther, the Soviet tank was much more seriously protected. But the too dense layout required the placement of fuel tanks in the control compartment - when the armor was penetrated, the Is-2 crew had little chance of surviving. The driver, who did not have his own hatch, was especially at risk.

Liberation tanks IS-2 became the personification of Victory and were in service Soviet army nearly 50 years.

Next hero M4 "Sherman", managed to fight on the Eastern Front, the first vehicles of this type came to the USSR back in 1942 (the number of M4 tanks delivered under the Lend-Lease M4 was 3600). But fame came to him only after massive use in the West in 1944.

Tank "Sherman" - the pinnacle of rationality and pragmatism... It is all the more surprising that the United States, which had 50 tanks at the beginning of the war, was able to create such a balanced combat vehicle and riveted by 1945 49,000 "Shermans" of various modifications. For example, in ground forces used "Sherman" with a gasoline engine, and the Marine Corps received a modification of the M4A2, equipped with a diesel engine.

American engineers rightly believed that this would greatly simplify the operation of tanks - diesel fuel could be easily found on sailors, in contrast to high-octane gasoline. By the way, it was this modification of the M4A2 that entered the Soviet Union.

No less famous special versions The Sherman, the Firefly tank hunter armed with a British 17-pounder cannon; "Jumbo" - a heavily armored version in an assault body kit and even an amphibious "Duplex Drive". Compared to the swift forms of the T-34, the Sherman is tall and clumsy. Possessing the same armament, the American tank is significantly inferior in mobility to the T-34.

Why did the command of the Red Army like Emcha (as our soldiers called the M4) so ​​much that elite units, for example, the 1st Guards Mechanized Corps and the 9th Guards Tank Corps, were completely transferred to them? The answer is simple: "Sherman" had the optimal balance of booking, firepower, mobility and ... reliability.

In addition, the "Sherman" was the first tank with a hydraulically driven turret (this ensured special targeting accuracy) and a vertical stabilizer for the gun - tankers admitted that in a duel situation their shot was always the first. Of the other advantages of the "Sherman", usually not listed in the tables, was low noise, which made it possible to use it in operations where stealth is needed.

The Middle East gave the Sherman a second life, where this tank served until the 70s of the twentieth century, having taken part in more than a dozen battles. The last Shermans have completed their combat service in Chile at the end of the twentieth century.

Year 1945. Ghosts of the coming wars.

Many people expected long-awaited and lasting peace after the horrific sacrifices and devastation of World War II. Alas, their expectations were not met. On the contrary, ideological, economic and religious contradictions have become even more acute.

This was well understood by those who created new weapons systems - therefore, the military-industrial complex of the victorious countries did not stop for a minute. Even when the Victory was already obvious, and fascist Germany was struggling in its death throes in the design bureau and in factories, theoretical and experimental research continued, and new types of weapons were developed.

Particular attention was paid to the armored forces, which had proven themselves well during the war. Starting with bulky and uncontrollable multi-turreted monsters and ugly tankettes, in just a few years, tank building reached a fundamentally different level. where again faced with many threats, tk. anti-tank weapons have evolved successfully. In this regard, it is curious to look at the tanks with which the Allies ended the war, what conclusions were drawn and what measures were taken.

In the USSR, in May 1945, the first batch was rolled out of the Tankograd factory workshops tank IS-3. New tank was a further modernization of the heavy IS-2. This time, the designers went even further - the inclination of the welded sheets, especially in the front of the hull, was brought to the maximum possible. Thick 110-mm plates of frontal armor were positioned so that a tricycle, conical, forward-extended nose section, called the "pike nose", was formed.

The turret received a new flattened shape, which provided the tank with even better anti-cannon defense. The driver received his own hatch, and all viewing slots were replaced with modern periscopic instruments. The IS-3 was several days late by the end of hostilities in Europe, but the beautiful new tank took part in the Victory Parade along with the legendary T-34 and KV, still covered in the soot of recent battles. A clear change of generations.

Another interesting novelty was tank T-44(in my opinion - an epoch-making event in Soviet tank building). Actually, it was developed back in 1944, but did not have time to take part in the war. Only in 1945 did the troops receive a sufficient number of these excellent tanks.

A major drawback of the T-34 was the forward-shifted turret. This increased the load on the front rollers and made it impossible to strengthen the frontal armor of the T-34 - "thirty-fours" and ran until the end of the war with a 45 mm forehead. Realizing that the problem could not be solved just like that, the designers decided on a complete rearrangement of the tank. Thanks to the transverse placement of the engine, the dimensions of the MTO have decreased, which made it possible to mount the turret in the center of the tank.

The load on the rollers leveled off, the frontal armor plate increased to 120 mm (!), And its slope increased to 60 °. The working conditions of the crew have improved. T-44 became the prototype of the famous T-54/55 family.

A specific situation has developed overseas. The Americans guessed that in addition to the successful Sherman, the army needed a new, heavier tank. The result was the M26 Pershing, a large (sometimes considered heavy) medium tank with heavy armor and a new 90mm cannon.

This time the Americans failed to create a masterpiece. Technically, "Pershing" remained at the level of "Panther", while possessing a little more reliability. The tank had problems with mobility and maneuverability - the M26 was equipped with a Sherman engine, while having a mass of 10 tons more. The limited use of Pershing on the Western Front began only in February 1945. The next time the Pershing went into battle in Korea.