The significant advantages introduced by the Tiger & carried through to the modern MBT include…
A liveable, roomy fighting compartment, so that 5 man crews were not exhausted by their own machine & with a turret basket [deck] that rotates with the turret…
A semi auto-trans & power-steering with the ability to turn on its own axis…
An optics fit that enabled accurate & effective target fixing/destruction at ranges that the Tiger was able to stand against enemy fire.
The larger Turret of the Tiger I was there because the much larger gun needs a much wider turret Ring to support it, and keep the Turret from leaving the Hull.consideration of crew comfort would be an unexpected benefit. (I will concede that compared to any Soviet tank, it would have seemed a limousine) It did have a novel transmission /steering design,also a needful thing when building a tank so large nothing you have on the shelf would work at all. but even so,it was not as reliable as it should have been as it retained the cumbersome rear gasoline engine, front drive common to all German Armor of that time. The sights were typically German, very well, and thoughtfully made, but not magic. All things considered, aside from it being larger, and heavier,(the only thing really going for it) it was not extraordinary. You would be better served by standing your argument on the fact that it has guns, a Turret, and tracks. And I believe that I’ve already mentioned that part. At their best, PZKW V, VI, and VII were equal to Post War allied armor, and upon the arrival of Rigid Composite Shot, Discarding Sabot, and HEAT munitions none of it really mattered anymore.
Personally, I’d look at what tanks stayed around postwar for any length of time - Centurion principally, as well as Panther, Sherman, T-34/85, IS-series and Pershing. Sherman and T-34/85 can be discounted a bit since they were built in such immense numbers that some are bound to have stayed in service, so we’re left with the Centurion (huge numbers built postwar), Panther (one regiment in France for ~5 years), Pershing (quite a few upgraded postwar) and IS-series (significant numbers built postwar). Not the Tiger.
Tanks in general have never fully lost their effect as “terror weapons”. This was, in fact, one of the major effects caused by the introduction of the first tanks in WW1. The German Army was well aware of this, and sought to limit the panic caused by the arrival of tanks on the battlefield by means of propaganda. One of the posters involved carried an illustration of a tank along with a slogan equating to the English slogan, “Don’t lose your head”. An early British tank officer, curious to learn the German reaction to his new weapons, was interviewing English-speaking German prisoners of war when he came across one of those crusty old sergeants for which the German Army was famous. Asked for his reaction to the “Don’t lose your head” slogan, the sergeant thougt for a minute, then asked, “Herr Hauptmann, how heavy is your tank ?”. “Oh, about 28 tons,” replied the Englishman. After some further thought, the sergeant replied, “Well, Herr Hauptmann, I do not see what use it would be for me not to lose my head when your tank is sitting on my chest”. One can see his point. Best regards, JR.
I was going to make this very point. The French kept a couple of units of Panthers and the Red Army I believe had them in reserve after the war for a time. In addition, the Panther’s hull was often adapted for industrial or agricultural uses. I have a picture of one as a crane (in France?) I believe!
One could argue that the Centurion and M-26 series were far more influential in post-war tank design. The U.S. Army used the M-60(A3) Patton series -a direct descendant of the M-26 Pershing’s hull layout- until the late 1990’s. In turn, the Pershing descended from the T-20/M-27 tank project, which was influenced by both the T-34 and the M-10 Wolverine as far as low profile and hull layout were concerned.
And the Tiger was influenced by the French Char B and started as a “heavy breakthrough tank” project. So, who influenced whom?
From ‘Tank Men’ again, p.299- views from the British, tankers & then official report on Tiger…
“It was a quantum jump ahead of our stuff”…
“It looked pretty formidable…sheer menace”…
“I looked at the long 88 sticking out from the massive turret & swallowed hard”…
“…comfortable…room to move…superior optics.”…
& “Basically an excellent tank…it presents a very formidable fighting machine which should not be under-rated.”
& from ‘Tiger Tanks at War’ P.76/80, Allied report on the Tiger in action…
“As previously experienced in the West with Allied tanks, it was often observed that Russian tanks declined to fight Tigers, or turned & fled after the 1st tank was knocked out.”
“German gunners could confidently engage opponents at ranges far in excess of their Allied counterparts.”
The same confident ability to tactically dominate the field of battle by superiority of arms as shown by the Tiger was
much in the mind of NATO for its MBTs… to counter the Red Army in the Cold-war & later still in the Middle East,Gulf/Iraq…
You repeat the same old things, thinking for some reason that this repetition will enchantedly prove your point. It does not.
It isn’t about it being ‘MY’ point…
Opinions are of little value , unless validated by facts…& from reputable sources, such as which I have provided…
Feel free to produce some [& make it non-propaganda please, such as Montgomery forbidding even the mention of the name ‘Tiger’, such was the rampant level of Tiger-enchantment, er, angst]
factual assessments, or 1st person accounts from sources of valid merit to support your rebuttal, rather than repeat yourself sans new information.
Your cited materials are nothing more than opinions themselves. I have no intention of engaging in your circular arguments, which are uncomfortably close to Trolling. There is no acceptance by me of your thoughts on the tiger I as being any manner of Genesis for present day MBT’s, a plainly expressed statement. I must reiterate, No Sale, I disagree entirely.
None of the above supports the gratuitous assertion below:
The same confident ability to tactically dominate the field of battle by superiority of arms as shown by the Tiger was
much in the mind of NATO for its MBTs… to counter the Red Army in the Cold-war & later still in the Middle East,Gulf/Iraq…
The Tiger had nothing to do with NATO’s development of MBT’s. Soviet tanks did! No one cared about the Tiger all that much by that point and they were more worried about fields of Soviet armor overtaking them. Also, the Arab-Israeli conflicts weighed in heavily as both sides were used as proxies to test technologies with the American made M-48’s and M-60’s being direct descendants of the T20/M-27/T-26E1/M-26 Pershing. The Centurion was essentially the improved version of the tank fielded at the end of WWII. The wars in Korea and Vietnam also provided some lessons contributing to Western dominance in the technology realm…
Jeeze , T-Geezer & N-Pdf, talk about not seeing the wood for the trees…
As for sale of the century, its pretty bleedin’ obvious that the qualitative heavy tank approach epitomised
by Hitler in the Tiger in WW2 is exactly what the NATO powers got around to implementing as a Soviet Tank Army counter…
Heavy armour[50/60+ ton] superbly gun equipped, & [fairly] survivable for its crews…
[Obviously again, updated technologically, but the concept is there, plain as day…],& even so, good ol’ Fe armour of decent thickness proved its worth against Soviet RPGs for the Aussie tankers operating Centurions in the 'Nam…
& that Tiger 12.2:1 kill/loss ratio, NATO sure bought it…
As for repeated & needless blathering on about ‘trolling’… its kind of an abuse of power too, really… isn’t it?
Published material that cites both experiential [veterans] empirical knowledge & contemporary official evaluation reports stacks up way more solidly than purblind ‘I’m not buying it’ re-iteration of less well informed ‘opinion’…
The lessons learned about sending in the likes of Sherman mediums was eventually learned, & even the M 26 Perishing didn’t cut it against the Tiger back in `45 [with still less gun/armour no & better power to weight ratio…] & needed significant revisions, with U.S. forces not really having a top-flite truly Tiger-like MBT 'til the Abrams, decades later…
Yawn, keep spinning yarns,perhaps you will convince yourself that you are correct,but anyone else, not so much.
Well, the British tried the super-heavy approach in the late 1950s with a Conqueror/Centurion mix. Ultimately both were replaced by the Chieftain, which was broadly a Centurion analogue (56 tonnes, .vs. 65/51 tonnes). The decision made was to go for a weight limit set by the available bridges, a sufficiently big gun to kill any existing MBT, and then the best armour/mobility compromise they could manage. Same design process as the previous British Universal Tank, the Centurion.
Indeed, looking at your description of “Heavy armour[50/60+ ton] superbly gun equipped, & [fairly] survivable for its crews…”. 52 Tonnes, it started out with the superb 17lb anti-tank gun and was very highly armoured, with the effective front and turret armour being significantly thicker than the Tiger. This isn’t copycatting however, but rather driven by the performance of the 88mm anti-tank gun and the engine and gun available.
The Americans also had a “heavy tank.” Like the Conqueror, the M-103 was designed to counter the Soviet IS series and T-10. Both were expensive, somewhat unreliable, and were fielded in small numbers. I hesitate to call them white elephants, but neither proved particularity compelling nor much more effective than the standard “medium,” or main battle tanks of their respective armies. Medium tanks that are serviceable, as both the Centurion and Patton series were were much more effective at the end of the day than were behemoth garage queens. Even the Soviet IS-1/2 was designed to somewhat contend with the Tigers, but also to be a true “heavy breakthrough tank” the Tiger was originally envisioned as by that time it was becoming apparent the Soviets would need to be breaking-through German defenses. But its 122mm was less effective against other tanks than the Soviet 100mm cannon mounted on the T-55 series, which was a direct descendant of the T-34. In the end the T-34/76-85 had far more impact on modern tank design than did the Tiger, as it was the pockets of T-34’s and KV-1s that scared the bejesus out of the Germans with their under-gunned Mark III’s and IV’s…
The alleged kill/loss ratio by Tiger units was compiled by Wolfgang Schneider using German reports.
These reports were unverified (crews word taken at face value then halved by german high Command), so there is no actual proof (tanks shot more than once, ones returned to combat after repair - Tiger losses only included those totally destroyed but the allied tanks may have been repaired, all figures for allied tanks destroyed were also rounded up to nearest 100).
By the way Wolfgang Schneider’s ratio worked out at about 5.74:1 not 12.2:1 - three units had claimed kill/loss ratio over 12:1 and one having a ratio of 1.28:1
You do seem to have this problem…
As for sale of the century, its pretty bleedin’ obvious that the qualitative heavy tank approach epitomised
by Hitler in the Tiger in WW2 is exactly what the NATO powers got around to implementing as a Soviet Tank Army counter…
Then wouldn’t it have been the “qualitative” approach by Stalin? Or the French? It was after all the German Heer that was facing superior Soviet tanks that forced them to reengage their largely dormant tank design programs. And you’re giving that military idiot Hitler any credit? Really? He’s the one that overloaded the frontal armor of the Panther, making it nearly undrivable unless the side armor was so thin it could be penetrated by a 40mm Bofors firing AP shot! Also, the premature deployment of Tigers and Panthers, while still full of teething problems, delayed the German offensive at Kursk and allowed the Red Army to fortify the area and costing them the battle!
Heavy armour[50/60+ ton] superbly gun equipped, & [fairly] survivable for its crews…
Don’t forget expensive, transmission and drivetrain problems, and overall mechanical unreliability. And made in very small numbers because they were overly complex and expensive. Less than 1,400 against nearly 100,000 Shermans and T-34’s? Good luck!
[Obviously again, updated technologically, but the concept is there, plain as day…],& even so, good ol’ Fe armour of decent thickness proved its worth against Soviet RPGs for the Aussie tankers operating Centurions in the 'Nam…
& that Tiger 12.2:1 kill/loss ratio, NATO sure bought it…
Obvious to whom? You really think tank designers were reading about Tigers lol? Loss ratios? Very unreliable “statistics” based on dubious and faux reports. I think the 5-to-1 “kill ratio myth” of Shermans to panzers has been debunked. It was at most 2:1…
As for repeated & needless blathering on about ‘trolling’… its kind of an abuse of power too, really… isn’t it?
Published material that cites both experiential [veterans] empirical knowledge & contemporary official evaluation reports stacks up way more solidly than purblind ‘I’m not buying it’ re-iteration of less well informed ‘opinion’…
It just gets annoying with the same wrong, pedantic, unproven assertions. You’re posting a few opinions of WWII Allied tankers in awe of the very few Tigers they ran into while they were winning the war. How would that ever relate to post-war tank design? The creation of modern tanks starting with the M-1 series was simply a natural progression that had much to do with experiences in Korea, Vietnam, and Arab-Israeli conflicts. Certainly men like General Abrams were armored warriors in their WWII careers, but the resulting M-1 was as much designed from lessons of the Tiger relating to how NOT to design a tank as much as how to design a tank…
The lessons learned about sending in the likes of Sherman mediums was eventually learned, & even the M 26 Perishing didn’t cut it against the Tiger back in `45 [with still less gun/armour no & better power to weight ratio…] & needed significant revisions, with U.S. forces not really having a top-flite truly Tiger-like MBT 'til the Abrams, decades later…
What are you basing this all on? LOL The M-26’s could hardly find any Tigers, but did have a superior kill ratio. I’ll look it up in Hunnicutt’s seminal book on the subject. So, try being a bit consistent at least? I can get the figures. The M-26’s had a low power-to-wight ratios, but they were also based on reliable and proven technology and could easily be upgraded once the U.S. Army was serious about it. I’m aware a Tiger got a lucky shot of a silhouetted Pershing at night as it was illuminated by fires behind it and the Tiger drew first blood. But the Pershings as well as the Jackson “Sluggers” could penetrate the Tiger’s glaces as superior ranges and the 90mm gun was actually superior to the German 88mm is nearly every way - except for how it was deployed. There were also a couple of “Super Pershings” built with a massive high velocity 90mm modified gun that could probably knock the turret off the Tiger. Both the British and American Armies also had wartime “heavy breakthrough” designs like the Tortoise and the T-28 project. Both were impractical and unnecessary and Patton just pierced the Siegfried Line using mostly Shermans…
The “lesson learned” regarding the Sherman was not to send the exact same tank into combat you had in 1942 in 1944. I think you are also quite ignorant of U.S. “Tank Destroyer” and armored doctrine at the time and of the fact that the Americans initially believed that only tank destroyers should fight tanks while the Shermans should enfilade the enemy like cavalry. This retarded U.S. tank development as stalwarts like Gen. Leslie McNair adhered to this failed doctrine to the end of his life (in Normandy) despite all evidence and voices to the contrary and Ike himself had to order the M-26 Pershing into production over the objections of idiots like him. The U.S. Army also has over 100 Firefly Shermans mounting the excellent British 17-pounder gun built, but gave them to the Brits as the 90mm gun mounted tanks made them unnecessary. There were huge rows and conflicts - and some rumored fisticuffs - between Army Ground Forces Command and the U.S. Ordnance Dept. The latter pushed for more advanced tank designs, like the T-20 series projects, to replace both the Sherman and tank destroyers in general. The projects ultimately resulted in the belated M-26 Pershing, which could have been deployed as soon as August of 1944. The U.S. probably could have fielded essentially a more effective T-34-like tank in 1943 with the M-27 design mounting the 76mm gun, but fools kept their silly “theological adherence” to the Tank Destroyer Doctrine and rejected the designs…
The lessons learned about sending in the likes of Sherman mediums was eventually learned, & even the M 26 Perishing didn’t cut it against the Tiger back in `45 [with still less gun/armour no & better power to weight ratio…] & needed significant revisions, with U.S. forces not really having a top-flite truly Tiger-like MBT 'til the Abrams, decades later…
Incidentally, the M-26 Pershing had exactly the same power-to-weight ratio as the Tiger or 11 horsepower per ton, it also had substantially lower ground pressure.
As far as losses, the information I gleaned was that the Pershing called “Fireball” was knocked out by a Tiger in night fighting at near pointblank range of 100 yards. Three 88mm shells hit the tank with one penetrating through the machine-gun port, spinning around inside killing the driver and loader. Fireball had been back-lit by fires burning behind it making it an easy mark for Tiger. However, the Tiger backed up to avoid counter fire and became stuck on a pile of rubble and was hastily abandoned by its crew. The panzer was captured completely intact and Fireball was repaired and returned to service some weeks later.
A second encounter took place on the drive to Cologne where an M-26 encountered a Tiger supported by two late generation Panzer Mark IV’s. The M-26 promptly fired it’s excellent, but scarce, T33 90mm tungsten core rounds downrange disabling the Tigers final drive from 1000 yards, then following up with a kill shot. Then the Pershing wiped out both IV’s, brewing them up with a single T33 round each - then firing several high explosive rounds to kill the escaping crews…
It was that ‘idiot’ Hitler who insisted that the Tiger get an 88… a novel idea opposed by ‘negative wave’
types who said it would never work, since such a long overhanging gun would not be operationally practicable… but the modern MBT sports one all the same…
The U.S. military researched the M26 VS the Panther & Tiger, finding that it was inferior, both in combat cross-country soft ground mobility & in gun/armour performance…
The cast armour was significantly less penetration resistant than the RHA plate construction of the Tiger.
The 90mm gun was both less accurate & had less penetrative capability than the German weapons
[or British 17lb AT gun].
A British Tiger evaluation found, [ from Tiger Tanks at War P.80]
" A 5-round grouping of 16 X 18 in was obtained at a range of 1,200 yards."
& on p.118 a U.S. report compares them…
" … the 90mm gun on the T [M] 26 is almost comparable to the [early] 88mm…but does not
obtain the necessary muzzle velocity to penetrate the Mark V or Mark VI from the front".
A Tiger ace Otto Carius -who survived the war to write a book of his experiences ‘Tiger im Schlamm’…
“Again & again, we admired the the quality of the steel on our tanks. It was hard without being brittle.
Despite its hardness, it was also very elastic. If an anti-tank round didn’t hit the tank’s armour plate dead on, it would slide off on its side & leave behind a gouge as if you had run your finger over a soft piece of butter.”
As for the value of the opinions of the men who had to take on the Panther & Tiger, while their concerns did not bear fruit in time to spare the needless carnage during the war, it did eventually sheet home to ensure that if they ever had to face Stalin’s hordes, they would have something more Tigerish to do it with…
The technical evaluations were quite unequivocal in pointing out superior qualities, but other considerations made adopting some of the solutions pioneered by the Tiger… take some time… hence power steering didn’t happen in NATO tanks `til years later…
LOL Um, where is your source for this? The 88mm was put in because it was a trump card the Germans used as they designed the guns and trained the crews to fire at both ground and aerial targets. However, the Panther’s 75mm KwK 42 L/70 was actually much more effective…
The U.S. military researched the M26 VS the Panther & Tiger, finding that it was inferior, both in combat cross-country soft ground mobility & in gun/armour performance…
LOL A link to that report, please…
The cast armour was significantly less penetration resistant than the RHA plate construction of the Tiger.
Was it? Actually, the Tiger idiotically did not employ sloped armor making it heavier and necessitating heavier armor than it would have needed otherwise…
The 90mm gun was both less accurate & had less penetrative capability than the German weapons
[or British 17lb AT gun].
Um no. No it didn’t. It depended on the ammunition and the variation of the gun. The T50E2 gun mounted on the Super Pershing was theoretically the most powerful…
A British Tiger evaluation found, [ from Tiger Tanks at War P.80]
" A 5-round grouping of 16 X 18 in was obtained at a range of 1,200 yards."
& on p.118 a U.S. report compares them…
" … the 90mm gun on the T [M] 26 is almost comparable to the [early] 88mm…but does not
obtain the necessary muzzle velocity to penetrate the Mark V or Mark VI from the front".
It depended in the ammunition used. BTW, were these guys on hallucinogenic drugs? From Wiki:
From a 30 degree angle of attack, the M4 Sherman’s 75 mm gun could not penetrate the Tiger frontally at any range, and needed to be within 100 m to achieve a side penetration against the 80 mm upper hull superstructure.[21] The British 17-pounder as used on the Sherman Firefly, firing its normal APCBC ammunition, could penetrate the front out to 1000 m. The US 76 mm gun, if firing the APCBC M62 ammunition, could penetrate the Tiger side armour out to just over 500 m, and could penetrate the upper hull superstructure at ranges of 200 m. Using HVAP ammunition, which was in constant short supply and primarily issued to tank destroyers, frontal penetration was possible out to just over 500 m. The M3 90 mm cannon used in the late-war M36 Jackson, M26 Pershing, and M2 AA/AT mount could penetrate its front plate at a range of 1,000 m, and from beyond 2,000 m when using HVAP.[22]
…
A Tiger ace Otto Carius -who survived the war to write a book of his experiences ‘Tiger im Schlamm’…
“Again & again, we admired the the quality of the steel on our tanks. It was hard without being brittle.
Despite its hardness, it was also very elastic. If an anti-tank round didn’t hit the tank’s armour plate dead on, it would slide off on its side & leave behind a gouge as if you had run your finger over a soft piece of butter.”
I guess he didn’t drive the Tiger Royal, a tank that suffered severe spalling problems despite its massively thick armor, due to poor quality late war steel…