KV-1 in mine clearing duties:
By the way the word “electronic” in the epigraph in not correct, it should said “electric”.
must have hard to taskeout the tank
There’s something bulky about it that makes it seem like a way too easy target. And it also looks like it would tip over very easily…
Big target but heavily armored, note in the video that there are no penetrations.
KV-2 inmobilizated in a swamp, I am not sure if this tank mounted some special short howitzer or is that the gun get stuck in the backward recoil position…
Hello PK,
From what I can observe, it looks as though the gun recoil reservoir has been drained of oil, then the gun fired, and thus the gun made useless. If the KV2 was being abandoned, the crew would then have taken the breech-block from the gun breech and removed it (perhaps dropping it in the swamp), making the tank useless to enemy troops.
Such a precaution would be normal, and would result in the appearance of the main armament as the picture shows it: because the tube would be unable to return to battery without the recoil mechanism working.
Granted, I am “guessing” a little, but the picture certainly fits the circumstances I outline above. Wiser heads than mine may know more, I admit that. It does seem plain though that what I outline above is high among the likeliest of explanations.
Regards, Uyraell.
God observation, good observation, I just noticed the two holes below the barrel.
Thanks.
KV-2 in German service (Panzerkompanie z.b.V 66). This unit was originally deployed for Operation Herkules, the intended invasion of Malta. Note the German commandant’s cuppola on the turret.
That would be a nasty surprize for the britons :mrgreen:, fortunately from them it was never used in Malta invation role.
They would have definitely been surprised. They probably would have announced that the Germans seem to have a new monster tank. 
I have to say it’s somewhat weird when you see images like that. Nothing in the environment indicates that there has ever been a tank battle there, and if it wasn’t for the destroyed machine, you would think that nobody would ever bother to fight up there…
Nah. They would have had to float it to Malta. And KV1s don’t float! 
Incidentally, it seems the Heer loved to send captured tanks put into service to islands, as German impressed Char B1s were sent to the Channel Islands…
Well, maybe they thought that the Tanks on islands were more as a kind of ‘reserve’, so they chose to use captured ones and not ‘waste’ some of their own…
It doesn’t matter, as Malta was never invaded nor was an Axis invasion even attempted, despite huge Axis efforts to reduce Malta from the air and sea.
In case it’s not already known, Malta is the only entity apart from a person to receive the highest British award for civilian bravery, the George Cross. In strict British and Commonwealth usage, it is Malta GC. The GC is second only to the VC in bravery awards.
I suspect that that is the case. But I also think the Heer was thinking of the operational radius of the Char B being reduced and the resulting need for maintainability and spare parts being reduced. The tanks also would have been very effective against anything the Allies could field into 1943. So it was simply the case of maximizing their assets.
To add to that, I don’t think a German operation on Malta would have went very well. But of course they never had the necessary air, nor naval, superiority to even attempt it…
“OP Herkules” was planned as an airborne operation by combined German and Italian paratroops, scheduled for spring 1942. The Kreta experiences however were pretty much the reason Hitler cancelled the whole thing.
Dunno. It might have been possible, at the right time in the early part of the war, such as attacking Malta with airborne etc instead of Crete in 1941. But that wasn’t a sensible or even realistically available step at the time as Crete was necessary to close the door on the Allied (i.e. British Commonwealth) defeat in Greece to exclude the Allies (i.e. British Commonwealth) from the Balkans and thus a toehold in Europe.
But as the Germans and Italians combined never managed to reduce Malta nor even to mount an invasion, even when Malta and Britain were at their weakest and the Italians and Germans weren’t, you’re probably correct.
Interesting sidelight is that after the devastating German paratrooper losses in Crete Hitler is reputed to have ordered that German paratroopers would never be used again in a major airborne assault, but in the proposed but never implemented Operation Herkules Hitler approved the use of major paratrooper units for the invasion of Malta.