Sherman Death Trap: Veterans vs Historians
HTML-код
- Опубликовано: 14 апр 2022
- Belton Cooper's book Death Traps is quite infamous for it's myriad of errors and other problems. Of course, it is very important to consider the context here, so both the division Cooper served in and also the fact that there was at least one ghostwriter involved.
And oh boy there are a lot of errors and some are quite weird as well. I look mainly at technical aspects here and some might consider those errors minor, but they are so consistently wrong and with a pattern that I am not sure if there was not actual sabotage or trolling involved.
Cover design by vonKickass.
»» GET OUR BOOKS ««
» The Assault Platoon of the Grenadier-Company November 1944 (StG 44) - sturmzug.com
» Army Regulation Medium Panzer Company 1941 - www.hdv470-7.com
»» SUPPORT MHV ««
» patreon, see videos early (adfree) - / mhv
» subscribe star - www.subscribestar.com/mhv
» paypal donation - paypal.me/mhvis
»» MERCHANDISE ««
» teespring - teespring.com/stores/military...
» SOURCES «
Cooper, Benton Y.: Death Traps: The survival of an American Armored Division in World War II. Ballatine Books: New York, USA, 2003.
Thomson, Harry C.; Mayo, Lida: The Ordnance Department: Procurement and Supply. United States Army in World War II. The Technical Services. Center of Military History, United States Army: Washington D.C., USA, 1991.
Hunnicutt, Richard Pearce: Sherman: A History of the American Medium Tank. ECHO POINT Books & MEDIA: Brattleboro, Vermont, USA, 2015.
Zaloga, Steven: Armored Champion: the top Tanks of World War II. Stackpole Books: Mechanicsburg, PA, USA, 2015.
Zaloga, Steven: Armored Thunderbolt: The U.S. Army Sherman in World War II. Stackpole Books: Mechanicsburg, PA, USA, 2008.
Zaloga, Steven J.: Panzer IV vs Sherman: France 1944. Osprey Publishing: Oxford, UK, 2015.
Spielberger, Walter J./Doyle, Hilary L./Jentz, Tom: Panzer IV und seine Abarten. Motorbuch Verlag: Stuttgart, Germany, 2019.
Newsome, Bruce: The Tiger Tank and Allied intelligence. Volume III: Tiger 131: from Africa to Europe. Tank Archives Press: Coronado, CA, USA, 2020.
Newsome, Bruce: The Tiger Tank and Allied intelligence. Volume IV: Capabilities and Performance. Tank Archives Press: Coronado, CA, USA, 2020.
Military Intelligence Division: Tactical and Technical Trends. War Department: Washington, D.C., USA, 1942-1945.
Tank and AFV News: Interview with Steven Zaloga, 27th January 2015: tankandafvnews.com/2015/01/27...
From the Editor: Debunking Deathtraps Part 1, 29th January 29 2015:
tankandafvnews.com/2015/01/29...
Statistics on M4 Sherman Page on Wikipedia
xtools.wmflabs.org/articleinf...
28 July 2002 Version of M4 Sherman on Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History...
#DeathTraps,#Sherman,#BeltonCooper
As an Infantryman, I loved the fire support tanks provided. But, as an Infantryman, I hated being around them because they were RPG magnets, and the guys firing the RPGs weren't exactly snipers...
Yeah, the Germans specifically in World War 2 noted that one should stay away from tanks in general and Tigers in particular, since a lot of stuff is coming their way.
Even in WWI tanks attracted all of the attention.
It's amazing how people are drawn to them.
@@michimatsch5862 I didn't mind people being drawn to them, so much as the rockets thoee people carried. Those things are really irritating!
@@MilitaryHistoryNotVisualized absolutely! Im sure there were plenty of conversations about it at the time.
"Look, buddy, it's a nice Tiger. It really is! And we're all super-happy that you're here with us! Lord knows those Soviets have really been giving us hell... And please don't think this is anything against you personally... but, my platoon and I are going to bivouac over there. Like, WAY over there... I'm talking more-than-the-firing-spread-of-a-Katyusha-battery far over there. Again. It's really nothing personal. We just want to, you know... live."
I didn't mind the tanks being around, as long as they stayed out of our way. Tankers have a bad habit of killing Infantrymen by driving over them, not just because they are bomb and missile magnets.
I am a 3rd Armored Division veteran (cold war and DS/DS). I met Belton Cooper at a 3AD Association Reunion back in the late 90s. He struck me as an earnest man who could easily be misunderstood. To this day, I believe his book did a very poor job of representing his views of both the Sherman and the losses. Of course, in conversation, when it was pointed out that 3AD saw more heavy combat than other Armored Division and also had a reputation for pushing the Germans much harder than other allied armored forces resulting in higher casualties, which he did not really have a good grasp on. I don't think he intended to be misleading, but I have long believed that he was used by a writer to forward an agenda.
Conspiracies might sell more books than "another ww II book"
this is a good example of why they call it the 'appeal to authority fallacy'
Belton Cooper was a smart man who could easily be considered an authority on the topic of tank repair. However he simply did not have the raw data necessary for his conclusions to be taken as inarguable fact.
I wonder if mid war there were mixed up intelligence reports or errors made simply measuring things like armor thickness. Leading to all this Fudd Lore tier misinformation.
@@michaelbaker8284 to my understanding, Belton Cooper's book was written well after the war when we had plenty if correct information. A casual watch of 60s and 70s war movies would be clear evidence of the misinformed "common knowledge" about the difference between German and American tanks.
Cooper was a jerk that complained about the poor armor on US tanks thru out the war. Ordnance decided to shut him up by allowing him to up-armor the single Super Pershing that was shipped over in late March of 1945. They made him stop after adding 5 tons with the tank getting knocked out a few weeks later by a Panzer 4 that put a round thru the side of the hull. The war ended a few weeks later where Cooper went home and Super Pershing into a salvage yard to be cut up for scrap.
When I started as a tanker in the mid 70s, the story of the Sherman being a death trap was common. As I went through Armor training and maintenance training, the real lesson was proper ammo stowage. Units that overstowed ammo or did not keep their tanks clean (from oil and grease) tended to burn but tanks who carried ammo in the proper storage bins and kept it clean has fewer issues. Later in my career I had the opportunity to interview and view the papers of Major (ret) James Burt MOH recipient in 2d Armored Division. 64th Armor's Burt spoke glowingly of his Shermans emphasizing their mobility, reliability and versatility while describing German tanks as mobile pillboxes. About the same time, I came across a great book written by a Russian Hero of the Soviet Union "Commanding the Red Army's Sherman Tanks: The World War II Memoirs of Hero of the Soviet Union Dmitriy Loza. Loza loved his shermans prefering them (both 75mm and 76mm) over T-34s, again for their mobility, reliability and versatility. In this case, I will go with the opinions of two highly decorated tankers over that of a maintenance officer.
Cboetigphond the agreement against M4 Sherman tank started with the Battle of the Bulge movie where M4 Sherman was show to be inferior Tank compare to the German Tanks Panzer IV, Panther and Tigers even President Ike Dwight Eisenhower called the film inaccurate at it premier, the movie. The movie Patton, the General playing Bradley criticized the 50 cal machine Gun because it went though German Half tracks bounce around not stop the vehicle, yet in real life action it well penetrated the German Half Tracks and Armored Cars damage or destroyed flesh, metals parts, shrapnel, fuels and start fire, even shot down German and Italian Planes form the ground, many Stuka Dive bombers, Single and Twin Engine fighters and Bombers fined out this lesson the hard way in North African Campagne afterward the Germany and Italian planes were force to go at a higher altitude, there was a case of a German FW 190 fighter got that lesson at the Battle of Anzio by M10 Tank destoryer 50 cal Ma Dece Machine Gun, anyway Hollywood like to praised the German war machines than they should overrated there performance.
@@bjornsmith9431 Hollywood likes to sell the plucky underdog story so it needed an overwhelming and monstrous enemy.
@@p.strobus7569 true👍.
@@bjornsmith9431 its "Ma Deuce" not "Ma Dece"
@@bjornsmith9431 Loved my .50 at various times I had an M85 and a M2HB while later I had M2 light barrel aircraft guns. The movie is not very good.
The "death traps" thing does seem to be a theme. Saw a video where the Sherman casualties were the main focus. This might be an extrapolation of the now rather hackneyed "Ronsons" version of the Sherman story. The thing nobody seems to notice (or mention) is that good or bad, previously shot-up tankers kept getting back into those things. That does deserve a lot of respect.
Also, Shermans were FAR better than the tanks that had preceded them. The crews genuinely liked them, and they were a match for P4s.
They were reliable, had a 75mm gun capable of firing both AP and HE rounds, and were relatively easy to maintain with replaceable parts. Compared with the M3 Lee/Grant (firing angle limitations), the M3 Stuart/Honey (light tank) or the Crusader (badly built) the Sherman wins hands down.
Arguably the Cromwell, Comet and Pershing were better, but they were later designs and were more complex to build and maintain.
@@mikereger1186 All such designs were nearly immedaitly replaced too, Cromwell and Comet with Centurion and the Pershing was replaced with the M46 which went on to serve along with the Late Shermans till the late fifties, only the introduction of the M48 finally saw the M4s going too.
@@spamuraigranatabru1149 the last time a Sherman was in combat was in Lebanon in 1982. The Isralis used them until the mid 1970s.
@@erwin669 Ayep, with the very last frontline service ones being withdrawn in the late twenty tens
My Great Uncle, My Grandfathers brother was a tanker in WW2 and beyond. Career Sergeant. He served in the Lee, Sherman and post war Pershing. From his tales it was rather clear he loved the Sherman the best. He felt it was like a sports car. According to him you could get it up to a decent speed, and even get the sucker to jump over ditches and such. A mental image that 9 year old Dukes of Hazzard me found awesome. And modern adult me shudders at the thought of ol' Uncle John launching a Sherman off sand dunes in North Africa. Looking back I assume he loved the Sherman best because he started out as a driver. And that's the tank he took into combat. I don't think anybody had much fun in the Lee's, save perhaps the Brits who viewed them as "better than walking". And by the time the Pershing came around he was a Sergeant so was always in the Commanders seat. Which wasn't as much fun. Plus while the Pershing had as much speed as the Sherman. You just couldn't get it to jump. It wanted to remain firmly on the ground. Further proof that it's the men who fight in the damn things that actually know if its a good tank or a bad one. Their standards may seem a bit strange to normal people. And if it brought them and their buddies back alive, it's a good one. Heck if they had 1 or 2 tanks shot out from under them, and they were still around to tell you the story 30 years later, it was a GREAT Tank.
If I remember correctly, the the only instance of the Sherman Tank being armed with the M2 75mm gun (which was significantly shorter than the M3) were the initial pilot models, one of which is at Bovington. The M2 was also used on the M3 Lee/Grant tanks with some later variants of the vehicles being upgraded to the longer M3 gun. All in all a great video as always, I actually had little idea that Death Traps was ghost written, and considering its age it sounds like it was written almost entirely based off memory and not from any real credible source.
There may have been a handful of the older "M3 style" suspension and M2 gun in North Africa, according to some photos I've dug up. In all likelihood none of them made it to Sicily.
The M4A1 in Bovington, named "Michael", indeed came with the M2 gun, but they later switched it to the M3, as it is today.
You can usually tell a M2 gun because it had that big round counterweight on the end of the barrel to keep the gun balanced for the stabilization system. The stabilization system was calibrated for the M3 which was 40 calibers long versus the m2 which I think was 32 calibers long.
Irregardless I read deathtraps and Coopers came ashore after D-Day from a LST onto the beach. He should have never even encountered a M4 with a M2 gun in the ETO since by 1944 any tanks issued with M2's would have been upgraded.
Very possible if Mr. Cooper saw any M3's or M4's equipped with M2's it was probably in training in the USA. If memory serves me correctly most of the pics of M2 guns were shown on training vehicles in the USA which would make sense to me. A training vehicle doesn't need the latest and greatest gun and a training tank with a m2 gun and counterweight can still be used to train the crew on the use of stabilization system and the M2 still fires all the same ammo as the M3 so works fine for gunnery training.
@@bencejuhasz6459 Also little fact= its the oldest sherman out there.
I remember the Chieftain did at least a video or two around this. If I remember correctly a couple highlights were:
Sherman's were doing better than average on survivability compared to other tanks of the war even in their worst variant, they improved over time to be among the best to survive a hit, having a numeric advantage over Germans had some implications on who is likely to be shooting first (thus who is likely to hit and win), while people died in them the rate was an order of magnitude lower than front line riflemen, while Tiger tanks could be a bigger issue for Shermans there was only like three engagements the US army came in contact with Tigers (and one was with the army air core not tanks, another they were parked on rail cars not ready to fight).
Somewhat related, the myth of it took multiple Sherman's to take out one enemy tank comes from doctrinal process than the design/weaponry, the US Army did not send one tank of any style after one enemy tank to have a fair fight like many internet arguments about tank specs seem to imagine happened, at minimum they sent a tank platoon after an enemy tank to have an advantage. If they came up against a platoon of enemy tanks, then they would send in a tank company. Regardless of the size they came up against, if there was other tanks/troupes doing nothing at the time, commanders may order them to go along too so as to have an even bigger advantage.
On that second part. While there is almost certainly an element of that, you always send a stronger force if you can, the more specific thing was that the basic operating element of US tank units was the platoon. So, unless you were in some exceptional operating circumstances you would send a platoon. So if someone says "there is a tiger (or an MG nest, or anything else warranting armoured support) over here, send tanks" they sent a platoon.
One of the common claims was "it took five Shermans to kill a tiger". And one platoon of Shermans was five tanks.
And no commander in his right mind wants to give a fair chance to the enemy. You aim to overwhelm the enemy to minimise losses on your side.
@@allangibson2408 If you're in a fair fight in a war, someone made a BIG mistake. sm
Yep, Chieftains _'Myths of American Armour'_ and _'Why the Sherman was what it was'_ talks are well worth viewing for anyone who hasn't seen them.
Yeah but Chieftain made an other error, he used data of the frist US army, which rarely engaged german heavy tanks or even german tanks in numbers, unlike the the third army and the British and Canadians troops.
I have a copy of an old US Army Journal of Recognition dated September 1943 which was disseminated among all Army troops, not merely among high-ranking officers or technical personnel. It includes details and specifications of both the short-barreled and long-barreled versions of the Panzer IV and notes that "Allied experts consider the Mark IV a good tank but inferior to the U.S. General Sherman." Furthermore, the Tiger Mk I is described and illustrated in detail in the November 1943 issue of the same publication. Consequently, it is obvious that the Allies were very familiar with the characteristics of both versions of the Mk IV tank by that time.
Bernard, I continue to respect and appreciate not only your thoroughness in script writing & production, but also by your commitment to Primary Sources and accuracy of information as is possible. Your reputation proceeds you, sir. Peace, Love, and History ✌️
My mothers uncle was a driver of an M4 in WWII and was part of the armored brigade that came ashore after the D-Day landings, he trained at Ft Knox since we live in Louisville KY. His tank was part of the tank unit that fought in the hedge row engagements. When his tank was sent to a farm house to support an infantry unit it was hit on the side by an anti tank German gun, the crew was killed and he was wounded and knocked unconscious. He woke up later that night to find his crew dead, tank knocked out and he could hear German soldiers talking outside the tank. He had to stay in his tank with his dead crew for three days until the Germans moved off. He never got over that incident and had nightmares the rest of his life. He never liked the M4 due to the amount of time they had to spend working on it
I saw a video on RUclips I believe it was interviewing the author of the book. I felt he had a very biased perspective on the M4 Sherman. Based on my dad's experience in the tank which was extensive, the tank was nowhere near as bad as this officer portrayed it. It wasn't perfect and it could be knocked out if you didn't have your eyes open and looking around all the time. But the same can be said of many tanks not just a Sherman. It would also include the panther, tiger and King tiger. My dad talked about shot traps and using the superior mobility of the Sherman to get around to the flanks and the rear of the German tanks so you can fire armor piercing rounds into their more vulnerable parts. He also talked about aiming for tracks. You don't have to blow a tank up in order to mission kill it and for it to be abandoned.
Exactly. The tank has not been made that cannot be knocked out by something (Matilda II was probably closer to that than even the Tigers when first deployed). The Sherman had few of the really bad points that bad tanks have. Also circumstances matter. The Panthers suffered more when they were on the offense, as Shermans were most of the time.
The tankers were instructed to shoot low at the big German tanks as soon as they spotted one since their 75mm and 105mm rounds did considerable damage to their road wheels, axles and tracks.
@@billwilson3609 you could also bounce an armor piercing round out of a 76 maybe a 75 off the ground and into the belly armor of a German tank it depended somewhat on the terrain.
@@JohnRodriguesPhotographer The M4's came with 5 user manuals that all crewmen had to become familiar with since it covered each crewman's responsibilities and how to perform those. The gunner's section showed how to bounce HE rounds with delayed fuses off hilltops so they'd explode above soldiers concealed on the other side. It also showed how to bank delayed HE rounds off masonry buildings to hit targets hidden by buildings. The manual showed a M4 at a street intersection concealed by buildings shooting a round at a 45 degree angle at a stone building with the round bouncing off to explode behind a barricade where soldiers had positioned an AT gun.
Here's the trick.
The Cheftain has posted the fatality rate of armored units in WWII. It's EXTREMELY low. Given the relatively high rate of Sherman tank losses, one can only conclude that most of the people IN Sherman tanks when they were hit, survived, because the Sherman was designed specifically for crew survival and easy crew exit.
In reality he hasn't, he has only posted a snippet from a report without mentioning any of the caveats that the report warns us about.
@@Dreachon The numbers are straightforward, less than 5% of all American tankers killed in action. Given up to 500% losses in tanks, that means a LOT of tankers got out of destroyed tanks alive.
Which pretty much makes the description of the Sherman as a 'deathtrap' about as accurate as calling the Merkava one.
@@andrewszigeti2174 Unfortunately that number is anything but straight forward, as I mentioned before the caveats in the report are a reminder that question should be made.
The report shows no officer losses in Armor branch, that is already one problem. Another is that the report tells us very clearly that the listed figure is only for the organic tank units of the Armored Divions.
That accounts for only about 40% of the US tank strenght, the remainder, about 60% served in the independent Tank Battalions which are not included in the figure.
And lastly, the figure is only for enlisted men whose branch of service was Armor, and here is resides a major issue as for some reason only a limited number of enlisted were ever reclassified as Armor.
The Sherman is by no means a deathtrap, I agree with that, but it is also by no means the safest tank of WW2.
@@Dreachon Independent Tank Battalions were considered Armored Force... What are you basing that notion off of?
@@peterson7082 Who says anything about them being not Armored force?
Read what I wrote, the casualty figures of the independent Tank Battalions were not included in the summary of enlisted men of Armor branch as can be read in the footnote of 'Army Battle Casualties and Non battle Deaths in World War II, Final Report, 7 December 1941-31 December 1946' from which Moran pulled the number.
It only counts enlisted men whose service branch was Armor and then only those of the organic tank units of the Armored Divisions.
The 2nd and 3d armored divisions were old-style tank-heavy armored divisions. That's why they were constantly used for assaults and saw the heaviest fighting and thus, losses.
My father served in the 2nd Armored division from the time it was formed at Ft.Benning until he he’d earned enough rotation points to return home which was in Germany while they were waiting on the Russians to take Berlin. I still have his Regimental history book,The history of the 67th Armored Regiment. And I have his division coin sent to him by the 2nd Armored Division association with the inscription on the back side “From Benning to Berlin the hard way.”
The 2nd Armored Division in my opinion does not get the recognition that it rightfully deserves.The reason for this is because some historians don’t like the fact that most of the enlisted men were from the south during the time of segregation and therefore looked down on by people who were not from there. Those men fought hard and shed much blood for this country and yet never received the full credit for their sacrifices.
Both of those divisions were crack divisions and the Germans respected and feared them for their courage and fighting prowess. The 2nd Armored Division and the 3rd Armored Division took on the best Panzer Divisions that the Heer and the SS had to offer and defeated them in brutal tank battles and afterwards were still able to advance up to 35 miles a day! Those two Armored Divisions were the finest Armord divisions that the U.S. Army fielded in World War Two.
@@jimhinchliffe969 Thank you for sharing that, I didn't know that about the 2nd Armored Division. From your your words I sense he's no longer with us but I do want to thank your father and his comrades and give them the praise they absolutely deserve.
My father was born on 27 December 1944 in Amsterdam, in the middle of what we here in the Netherlands call the hunger-winter. Men like your father fought so hard and shed their blood blood to liberate of my country, only 5 months later after my father was born. Things were extremely dire here at that point, my grandparents never talked about it but the liberation came just in time for them and him.
We celebrate our liberation and the men of the allied nations who made it possible on the 5th of May. I'll make sure to think of you and your father for a moment then.
@@exharkhun5605 Thank you Exhar for your kind words and God bless.
@@jimhinchliffe969 67th Armored rolled through my home village in 1945 and hammered my greataunts house with 50cals (I still got some of the bullets on my bookshelf). Any photos or information about the fighting in April '45 in that regimental history?
@@krautreport202 thank you so much for telling me about that. Off hand I don’t know but I can look and see.
It’s mostly a general history of the regiment when it was formed and a list of the men who served in the 67th Armored Regiment and where the Regiment fought. Could you tell me the name of the village?
Built to go and fight everywhere, from Europe to the Pacific, this tank has been unfairly maligned. Compare this to German made tanks, transported to their destinations by train, often fighting in defence.
Most tanks get transported by train, it's very common as it's an effective means of transporting large amounts of equipment.
@@Dreachon When you are attacking you dont have that luxury. You got to drive it.
@@joewelch4933 And? It is simply making the best use of available resources.
Soviets also transported large amount of equipment and tanks by railroads and later in the war the allies also began to make use of the railways that they had in their possession.
@@Dreachon The point is mechanical reliability is much more an issue on the attack than defense. For the US logistical constraints the Sherman was a great tank, and those logistical constraints seem to be ignored a lot by people.
@@joewelch4933 I wonder how the German tanks made it up to Moskau and Stalingrad. To my knowledge the Russian destroyed their railroads on retreat and used a different gauge. Normandy to Berlin is not even half of the distance, compared to Germany to Stalingrad.
Finding out that we have more to learn is never a bad thing.
I have this discussion in comments with the Chieftain and per the 1952 allied tank report only about 5,500 servicemen lost their lives in Sherman tanks. It was one of the most survivable jobs in the war.
World War 2 total US Armored force KIA 1605., 5500 may be total casualties. These numbers do not include officers. Further half of all casualties occurred outside of the tank.
@@brucenorman8904 you misunderstand. It's the allied tank report and the 5500 number is for allied servicemen in Sherman tanks, not just Americans.
@Military History not Visualized
I believe @Military Aviation History brought to our attention the case of "Survivorship Bias".
This is a case of the opposite.
This is "Attrition Bias".
I've been editing Wikipedia on and off for the last eight years, including creating lengthy articles from scratch. A few things about Wikipedia: many editors pride themselves on being good editors, but on NOT being experts on anything. All material is supposed to be sourced, though that wasn't a rule in the encyclopedia's early years. Also, there is a rule against drawing a conclusion opposite to that presented in a source using only that source's statements or statistics. So, anyone with no personal knowledge of a topic can paraphrase material from any source (with some exceptions for pre-determined unreliable or offensive sources), cite it, and it will stand as a valid edit for years.
Wikipedia has become a tool of the "woke"
Yeah ... that attitude of "no personal experiences" - is a problem. I can understand the reason for it, given the nature of Wikipedia but it IS a problem.
I use Wikipedia a lot and .. theoretically ... can edit it - though I never have - but as a Historian - there are real problems with the way it's organized.
Having a source for something doesn't mean it's of any value. As a Historian - one of the things you have to do - is pass judgment on sources.
Look at the Bull Shit in this article on Rex Barber
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rex_T._Barber
They have a "historian" local to Barber's home town who wrote something up claiming that Barber was the sole person responsible for shooting down Yammamoto. This is pure - undiluted - Bull Shit.
How do I know?
Because I *_AM_* a Historian (just not a published author).
What Barber's home down did - was organize an expedition to the crash site of Yamamoto's plane.
Here - according to the two pilots versions of what happened - Barber attacked the plane from the rear and Lanphier attacked from high on the right. Barber could see Lanphier but because he was behind him, Lanphier didn't know that Barber was even there.
I heard Lanphier speak once - and he said that what he did - was fire to clear his guns - and the plane flew right into it.
What does that mean?
If the plane "flew right into it" - the damage would all be at the front of the plane - which - as anyone who knows anything about WWII aerial gunnery - is more likely to do critical damage to the aircraft than hitting it from the back.
The wreck is on the internet. You can look at it and you can see the bullet holes in the stern of the plane. What about seeing any damage that Lanphier did to the front of the plane? Well ... the front of the plane was destroyed in the crash - so there IS no front to the wreck.
So ... what does that mean?
It means that while Barber can certainly claim that he hit the plane - he can't prove that HE shot it down and that Lanphier DIDN'T.
The problem here - is not between _which_ pilot shot down the plane - but Barber's contention that it was HE ALONE who shot it down.
As anyone who knows anything about Fighter Pilots can tell you - they are, in general, not short on ego. So I'm not in the least bit surprised that Barber want's sole claim for the kill. That's just fighter pilots being fighter pilots.
The Army - *_CORRECTLY_* as they have done time and time again throughout that war - awarded half a kill to each man. THAT was the right thing to do.
But - you have whatever twit wrote that article - that is clearly taking sides with the Barber faction and uses as their "source" something written by a "historian" and an expedition sponsored by - _Barber's Home Town_ . Can you imagine an expedition to the wreck made by Barber's Home Town - that would come back and say he didn't shoot down the plane? Can you imagine them even saying - they don't know? Of course not. Of course they're going to come back and say that Their Boy deserves all the credit.
Oh ... and the Governor of Barbers State - pronounced him as the _sole_ person to have shot Yamamoto down. As if that means shit.
As a Historian - you NEVER take any one source as gospel - especially - if they're obviously biased.
I use Wikipedia on a nearly daily basis because - for RUclips Comments - it's sufficient and they do an OK job (especially when it comes to how to spell someone's name ...). But - anyone doing serious research - should be looking through their sources. As a Historian - one of the things I value most about Wikipedia - is the way it's sources are listed - and I will look them up if I think I need to. As I did here.
.
@@BobSmith-dk8nw I recommend to friends that are in school that they use WP to find sources, then look at those sources and make sure they say what's in WP. A partial solution to the issue you talk about would be leaving it as is, but just before or after inserting a "responsible alternate opinion" from a different source. There is also a policy that "primary sources" of any type should be used on only a limited basis, if at all. Of course, WP is drowning in conflicting written policies.
@@robdgaming Yes. I would agree with that for the most part.
My biggest problem would be and one of the reasons I never actually made any contribution, was that I'm not sure how my assertion would be regarded that I had heard Lanphier state that he had fired his guns to clear them - and that the bomber had flown into it.
Would I cite Lanphier as the source, listing him as being a contributor to a "P-38 Convention" I attended? Here I would have a problem with citing the date as it was over 50 years ago and I don't remember exactly when that was.
I got to talk to Lanphier afterwards and he was a really nice guy.
Tony LaVier
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tony_LeVier
was also there which made it an extremely interesting, if small, event.
Then I have a problem with the removal of a primary source here
en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=USS_Card&diff=176551308&oldid=174579321
wherein there is a statement indicating just whether or not the USS Card "sank" or whether it merely touched bottom.
Given that the Communists who attacked it want to assert that it was "sunk" and the current article sides with their assertion, it is important that evidence be presented that the ship did not in fact come to "rest" on the bottom - but merely touched it - meaning that it did not "sink".
As with the Lanphier/Barber contention as who who shot down Yamamoto - this is a History Issue.
As a Historian - a statement like this from a first person source would be priceless - but - Wikipedia removes it specifially because it is a first person statement. Given that the person furnished their contact info - (which I'm not sure should be included) this is just the kind of information you would want. But - it was removed.
I happened to come across it - and was sorry to see it removed. However, one of the good things about Wikipedia is it's "History" function, which caused the statement to be preserved rather than just deleted. Thus I am still able to see it and now show it to you.
Sadly - there are other RL reasons for my lack of participation which are unlikely to change.
.
Personal accounts by Veterans are among the best resources a historian has at his disposal. Eye Witness testimony gives insight into what the people on the ground were seeing, hearing, feeling, etc. But when doing historical analysis, it's important for historians to draw on as many sources and resources as possible. After action reports, statistical analysis, unit histories and other sources of information are just as vital as personal stories. These provide context that an individual witnessing an event may not have access too. Furthermore, what one person sees can be very different from what another person see's. And two people fighting on the same side in the same battle can have very different experiences. Then there is also the general knowledge base of the individual providing the account. One of my favorite examples is from the book Currahee by Donald R. Burgett. It is a very good book and I highly recommend it. Burgett was a paratrooper in World War II fighting with the 101st airborne. At one point, he is describing a battle where his unit is being supported by a tank he calls a "General Grant". The problem here is that the Grant is a British version of the M3 Medium and the M3 Medium never saw action in Normandy. He later goes on to describe how the tank got destroyed and the location is was destroyed became known as "dead mans corner". And we know from pictures that the tank that was destroyed at dead mans corner was infact an M5 Stuart light tank. All of this is just a very long winded way of saying that Veterans can have the wrong information. Burgett was a paratrooper so there is no real expectation that he should know a Grant, from a Sherman, from a Stuart. Especially since the general names were not in common usage with American GI's. But he still thought it was a Grant and that is what he wrote in his book.
Personal accounts are good sources of information, but they must be carefully reviewed for accuracy. This becomes even more important the further away in time from the event. A good example of this is Pearl Harbor veterans that were station at Schofield Barracks. The barracks were never attacked by the Japanese. At least one movie depicted such an attack. Much later when interviewed many veterans from the barracks remembered Japanese aircraft attacking the barracks. They were quite animated in their assertion. Human memory is a fallable instrument.
I am a Desert Storm veteran who served with VII Corps, providing logistical support primarily to 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment (Battle of 73rd Easting), 1st Infantry Division, and VII Corps Artillery (largely MLRS). I can share many interesting stories and kept a diary during the war. However, I generally avoid reading first person combat accounts as I get tired of trying to sift the noise from the signal. Many witnesses rely too much on stories from others and their memories are often tainted by movies and documentaries they have seen.
I tried reading a book on the Battle of the Bulge recently made up entirely of first person accounts. I gave up about 2/3 of the way through as I just couldn't stand all the distortions any longer. German artillery for was mentioned about every five pages and only once was it ANYTHING but "an 88mm" firing at the Americans. This made very little sense considering most of the fire was indirect.
Give me military history written less dispassionately by less emotionally invested military historians working from many sources and trained in historiography. First person accounts are often borderline historical novels in my opinion.
@CK Lim While "dead men tell no tales," their deaths were recorded by their unit's Graves Registration detachment for notifying next of kin, the recording of unit casualties, the need to request replacement personnel, and so on.
The Sherman's poor reputation has largely been dismantled with facts by recent historians, with The Chieftain (Major Nicholas Moran, US Armor Branch) as the best known voice of this 'revisionist history.' Yes, Shermans were not built to battle Tiger tanks toe-to-toe.
Fact 1 - However, no tank anyone could build in WW2 could reasonably carry enough sloped steel to deflect armor piercing, 88mm rounds from a Tiger or Flak gun. Fact 2 - The grand total of all deaths to American armored crewmen who fought across North Africa and Sicily was 90. Presumably, you are familiar with the American drive from Morocco to Tunisia, punctuated by the Battle of Kasserine Pass. Hopefully, you are also familiar with Operation Husky, the invasion and conquest of Sicily with the US forces conquering the western and northern coasts. That's an average of 9 Sherman crewmen deaths per month for the ten months from November 1942 to August 1943.
Fact 3 - The majority of Sherman tank crewmen were killed while outside of their vehicle - mostly by artillery. Fact 4 - These casualty statistics are still available in the US Army's official archives from WW2. The people who disparaged the Sherman, like Belton Cooper, never consulted historical documents.
Sadly, the movie "Fury" has resurrected the poor reputation myth. Personally, I would have gladly served behind two inches of 58 degree sloped steel instead of being an American infantryman in North Africa, Sicily, Italy, or Northwest Europe.
ruclips.net/video/TwIlrAosYiM/видео.html Fantastic video on Sherman development.
I love this aspect of history, fact checking to give perspective. Agendas being pushed are all around. For example, most books on WW2 fighter aircraft gives the Spitfire's as just under 600 km/h while the almighty P-51D Mustang being over 700 km/h. This blithely ignoring the fact that the Spitfire mark being used as reference was the Mark V entering service in early 1941 being held up against the much improved and upgraded version of the Mustang entering service in January 1944. If versions and data were to be matched, the Spitfire mark to compare the P-51D to would be Mk XIV, entering service the same month as the P-51D. And THAT Spitfire had a top speed some 14 km/h FASTER than the Mustang.
But, alas, there is almost always a perspective and agenda being pushed and it can be hard to distinguish relevant data from data used to promote a bias.
Very well done on this video to show how things can be pushed and skewed to give new impressions.
The propaganda behind much ww2 equipment is often over the top.
The problem with the spitfire was short range.
The truth is the p-47, was the fastest of all of them at high altitudes. It could fly anywhere in Germany with drop tanks.
On there way home, the p-47s were allowed to strafe anything moving on roads or trains. It was devastating German supply. They wanted the p-47s freed up for ground attack as the p-51s or even the spitfire is not what you want for ground attack. The radial engines on the 47s could take direct hits and get home. The inline engines were not good at that. So the p-51 got all jacked up to cover the bombers and the p-47 went to more ground attack.
"Iron Coffins" would be another good topic for Veterans vs Historians. I remember that book being pretty ridiculous in a lot of places. Some ludicrous claims about Uboat specs etc.
I agree, if you look at the actual combat stats taken just after the war instead of someones vague memories 50 years later you'll find that the Sherman was a far better tank than some people give it credit for.
If it was a bad tank,it wouldn’t have been produced in quantity or for the logistical advantages and reasons it was.
The problem wasn't "was it a good tank," and more "it was the wrong tank for the job." The US armored division lost so many young tank crews in their M4s (OK, I'll say) Shermans. With a heavier tank, many of those boys would have survived the war. Remember, anyone who calls the Sherman the "right tank" is also saying the do not value the lives of the crews.
@@princeofcupspoc9073 on average, a Sherman crew lost about .6 people per tank knocked out.
@@princeofcupspoc9073 if you looked at the stats you'll find that the American Sherman had the highest survivability rate of any tank in w.w.2. This includes the "heavies" tiger and panther.
@@princeofcupspoc9073 Wouda,Couda,Shouda,Arguments.
If that logic applied to jeeps every vehicle would’ve been a half track,every soldier supplied with a machine gun.
One thing I would point out. As far as I understand it, 3rd armored division primarily operated basic M4 (75mm) tanks at the time of the D-Day landings. By late summer of 1944 they started to receive M4A1 tanks equipped with 76mm guns. Since they did not operate many (any?) 75mm M4A1 tanks, and the M4 never was issued with the 76mm gun, it is understandable that someone in the 3rd Armored Division would think the primary difference of the two models of Sherman tank was the gun. From what I can tell from looking at photobooks of 3rd Armored tanks, the basic M4 (75mm)and M4A1 (76mm) were the two most common types of vehicle in service with that unit, and M4A3 tanks only start to show up in 1945.
It's been a long while since I read Death Traps, but I recall some other strange auditees not covered in this video:
The author of the book was also consistently wrong about different types of suspension, mixing up Christie suspension and torsion bars. Most times when they mentioned Christie they meant torsion bars.
The author of the book came off as a bit of a "Lost Causer" bemoaning the choice of names of Sherman and Grant for tanks.
Interesting point re the Lost Cause and the names. I'll have to read Cooper's book now, dammit!
Particularly as the names were chosen by the British forces not the American…
@@allangibson2408 don't British people know to name US tanks after the generals who committed treason in defense of slavery?
They were also letting black servicemen into pubs!
@@porksterbob The US didn’t name their vehicles until midway through WW2. The British named all of theirs from WW1 on (it saved confusion on various models) (The US had an M1 Light Tank, an M1 Medium Tank and an M1 Rifle and an M1 Carbine in service simultaneously for example (Ditto M2, M3 & M4…- spare parts ordering was a pain).
The US got into the act with some less controversial choices like Chaffee but still wound up with Forts like Bragg (actually one of two named after the most incompetent Confederate General).
@@porksterbob They actually did. The M3 Grant was the British variant of the M3 medium tank which lacked the cupola, and a new radio in the turret. The M3 used by the US was dubbed the Lee after Robert E. Lee. And the M36 Jackson Tank Destroyer the M3/M5 Stuart and were named named for Confederate Generals Stonewall Jackson and Jeb Stuart.
Always nice to see someone using those Zaloga interviews I did a few years back. Thanks!
I have long wanted to get a book written about my unit and it's experiences in combat. But to do it I'd need the help of a historian and/or writer. I can't remember everything accurately myself, and would need certain details researched and to work with other guys in my unit to the the details right. And anything we can't verify would either not be included, or pointed out to be uncertain.
My biggest regret was not keeping a journal of my deployments.
Belton Cooper’s “Death Traps” is a memoir of his experiences. Written long after the war. Read it as such.
His VERY LIMITED experiences. As a Sherman tank mechanic he only ever saw the beat up Sherman tanks. His entire perspective was biased.
@@thetruth-hl7ct Belten Cooper was also third line maintenance. The only tanks he saw were the ones the the first and second line maintainers couldn’t fix and get back into battle.
He got the inverse of “Survivor Bias”. He only ever saw the hard kills (usually by heavy artillery not German tanks).
@@allangibson2408 Very good point.
There may be a fairly simple reason for the weight discrepancies. IE the Imperial Long Ton, Imperial Short Ton, and of course the Metric Tonne all exist. As it happens Wiki goes into a little detail on this stating that M4 variants were from 33.3 to 38.1 Tonnes or 33.4 to 43 Short Tons. If we take 35 Tonnes as an arbitrary number which roughly approximates some variants, then this would be 38.5 Short tons but 34.4 Long tons. So getting his Short Tons Long tons and Tonnes mixed up could cause that error as it seems at first glance to be the right ratio of error.
It's possible but, IMHO, unlikely. In the US, actually using long tons is very rare and we use short tons (or metric) pretty much exclusively. The only major area I'm aware of where we really do a lot with long tons is ocean going vessels. The only way I can see this happening is if they where also pulling British sources of information and getting a conversion error from there somehow but that doesn't really account for the other dimensional errors in the book.
How can you tell a good tank from a bad tank?
If the tank crew lives to complain about their tank.
That and how well it follows the tenets of tank design. Mobility Protection and Firepower. Going by this, the M4 is an almost perfect balance of all 3 for the time.
Another phenomenally formed, researched, and written episode. I hope we get more veterans vs. historians
My grandfather had two brothers fight in WW2.
One in Europe
One in Pacific
Neither would talk about the experience except on extremely rare occasions.
As infantry the only comments I remember them saying were to stay the hell away from tanks, "they might shoot at you, they WILL shoot at the tank"
“Death Traps” really did ruin the image of the Sherman. When I picked up the book twenty years ago I was left wondering how the Allies in the West managed to beat the Germans using Sherman’s.
There are so many myths out there that got debunked only thanks to internet. And most of them seem to be aligned with Nazi propaganda. I hate the myth that the Wersal peace treaty caused a second war. In fact not enforcing this act and letting Germans whipe their ass with every single page of that document is what caused war. And a proper occupation of Germany after WWI would prevent WWII.
The Eastern front beat the Germans.
@@shatbad2960 a quite possibly false, misleading oversimplification of the largest conflict in human history
@@leesunghwa809 Not really, had the Eastern front not come to be, Germany would have held Europe. Huge amounts of man power and resources where used in that part of the conflict.
@@shatbad2960 we can never fully know the outcome of the war had the Soviets and Germans stayed in peace, but one thing for certain is that the National Socialist government was corrupt to its core and was not a stable government. This in the end would have lead to their collapse.
This was actually a very very interesting and thorough video. Well done.
Thank you very much!
Don't get too wrapped up in comparing our vs their tanks. Tank crew quality and battlefield support of ammo, fuel, intell.and replacement tanks is everything.
I was told by my grandfather that was in A Sherman tank in WWII. That he had a great respect for the German tanks. Especially the Panthers. They were simply in a different league than his. He never saw a Tiger. And he thought that was a good thing. I wish this guy could have sat down with him and been told what it felt like to find out there was German Panthers in the area. The look on my grandfathers face when he told me that was all you needed to see. It was a 2 minute conversation and only happened once. I wish I could have recorded it.
a 75 Sherman crew found why's to counter tigers and panthers by firing smoke shells at them forcing there crew to abounded there tank remember you don't have to pen the tank to defeat it
@@xahmadx6442 the fact you have to find special ways to deal with enemy tanks and not jut simply shoot at them should raise some bells and alarms. The Germans also found ways to deal with T34s and KV1s in 1941 but no one in the German army, not even the most ardent nazis would say these were optimal solutions.
You can develop tactics to fight enemy combatants armed with assault rifles while your men carry pistols, doesnt mean its an optimal solution. The optimal solution is to have at least parity if not superiority in the same class of weapon systems. One of the core capabilities is the ability to reach and threaten the enemy at great distance, surpassing the range of the enemy weapon system.
German tanks had that advantage after 42 its clear, and already the mere knowledge of it puts the other side in a defensive posture.
@@DD-qw4fz In the battle of aracore the Americans devastated a large German Force equiped with dozen of panther the Germans had the advantage of high numbers the panthers got defatted by 75 Shermans the panther was in the offense this battle is a good example of how tactics can defeat technological superiority and the real threat came from anti tank guns not tanks Anti tank guns are hard to spot and they hit hard that's why the Americans stick with there 75 Sherman it delivered a HE capable of knocking most of the anti tank crew
And one of the reasons why the Sherman is better than a panther or any German tank
It's very easy to modify for example
Sherman jumbo
with 177 effective armor thickness
Sherman Firefly
The 17 pounder has a pen of 200 better than the 75 of the panther
The Sherman 76
Good gun and ergonomics with fast reload
@@xahmadx6442 again. To bad my grandfather was not alive to talk to you. Pretty sure you would stop quoting Wikipedia and would have listened instead. It's easy to say how things go In a WWII tank from the comfort of your armchair. He was there. And from what I remember he did NOT share you opinion.
@@xahmadx6442 Arracourt shows how miserable the panzer brigades were, most of the crews had 10 days of training, there was no recon done and it was foggy and the U had air domination. It really didnt matter with which tank the Germans advanced it would end up the same.
Sherman proponent love to point at Arracourt as the ultimate argument but completely ignore other cases that dont go in Shermans favor.
For example 2 panthers with veteran crews at the small town of Herrlisheim eliminated an entire weakened regiment of Shermans, the shock was so great over half of the unit gave up with intact Tank. ruclips.net/video/86K0ncTkAkA/видео.html
"And one of the reasons why the Sherman is better than a panther or any German tank
It's very easy to modify for example"
Sounds like a buzzword to me, most German tanks had numerous variants and some of the variants of the Sherman were made because the basic tank variant was missing either armor (Jumbo) or a good gun (firefly) .
It's my opinion that this book has done more damage to the Sherman's legacy than any amount of German ordinance ever did. I have been blocked by several "real" historians when (gently I might add) pointed out the survivability data that Zaloga, and others, including the Chieftan have published.
I face the same thing when pointing out the T-34s faults. A good enough tank that had problems.
@@ThumperLust Most of the T-34s faults were that the Russians did a shit job of putting them together. I would still argue that the Sherman was the superior design, but much of the 34s issues were because the Russians were cutting every corner they could. They were Litterally sending tanks to the front with gaps in the armor due to miswelds and borken welds.
@@joewelch4933 That and they did not initially have enough crew, an issue which was later remedied, though now seems to be repeating itself in the Ukr...
@@ThumperLust especially the early ones, e.g. the “mallet-shift transmission” that had a short working life.
Both Zaloga and especially Chieftain were busted by ppl of manipulating info to make the Sherman look better, for example proponents of the Sherman love repeating Morans only 1500 tankers died in a Sherman. Thats a nice looking figure, except there are issues with it. First its only US casualties, and in the west the biggest tank battles were actually fought by the British and Commonwealth forces, so ignoring them while they literally fought side by side on the same front as the US is problematic. Second issue, that number doesnt include officers as those were officially not a part of the armor branch, also doesnt include replacements that were taken outside armor branch and thirdly, most of the tank units were part of independent tank units inside US infantry divisions not armored ones...
On top of that only the dead are counted, not wounded, often times suffering terrible wounds, never to see combat again...
Just a small red flag to make you think about Molorans and Zalogas claims during the Battle of the Bulge , US tank crews were cut form 5 to 4, removing the radio operator, and infantry and rear echelon men were often times transferred over night to serve inside tanks...the short truth , US casualty reports when it came to actual branch combat losses are a mess...
In WW2 some of the Russian units that used the Sherman loved them. Also in the Korean War they did well against T34 that the North Koreans used
I appreciate your information. I have read his book "Death Traps" and thought it was accurate. Apparently it was not based on your discoveries. I shan't discredit Belton Cooper however as a source as I'm sure he was a man of integrity. His ghost writer on the other hand.....what a shame to take advantage of such a fine veteran. Thanks for the respect in which you treated this subject.
What I usually tell people who quote "Death Traps" is that it is written from the perspective of someone who specifically handled knocked out tanks.
It would be like having a book about the morality of man written by a homicide detective that sees death and murder all day. You'd think that humanity was mostly consisting of murderers.
I get your point but is humanity not consist of mostly murder? Most of the technological advancement happen because it allow us to murder other human better.
@@jintsuubest9331 How many people do you know who have murdered someone?
@@Oddball_E8 I think he is saying that homicide detectives are going to meet more murderers than me and you, and they may concluded that there are a lot more of them than there actually are.
@@dougerrohmer And that's my entire point.
All that Belton Cooper saw were destroyed and damaged Shermans all the time.
Of course he's gonna consider them death traps.
That is one of the worst analogies I’ve ever heard in my entire life.
Day in, day out...hosing out the burnt remains of men sent into battle with an increasingly inferior “zippo” AFV. Only the Japanese experienced worse casualties due to crap-tastic armor on the front lines.
Shermans were death-traps. I’m beside myself hearing “revisionist histrionics” like this.
Ughhh...!
13:55 this criticism by ‘the author’ is strange to me, as I could make the same criticism that nobody was celebrating the chefs in the divisions for keeping them fed and ‘functional’, like, no shit
As well as being heavily engaged, another reason for 3AD's heavy Sherman losses was that the division had more of them than most divisions. 2nd and 3rd Armored Divisions retained a regimental organization throughout the war, which gave them four medium tank battalions vs. three for most armored divisions, with 59 medium tanks per battalion, including six 105-mm armed Shermans listed in a TOE I have. My source is Stanton's "World War II Order of Battle" (enthusiasts beware, the book only includes US Army Ground Forces units).
Always great to get a new MHV or MHNV video, especially one that challenges accepted data points.
After a week of Covid, this video also cheered me up as it reminded me I have a ticket for Tiger Day at the Tank Museum, Bovington, next week 😀
Happy Easter Bernhard!
Excellent work. Thank you for this.
The story comes from the book “Death Traps” by Belton Y Cooper. I thought it familiar to a battle referenced within and then I saw an interview with David Ayers who confirmed it came from that book. However, Audie Murphy’s Moh stand on top of a burning M10 firing his 50cal and calling in arty on top was certainly a story of selflessness and courage without a doubt. I dont know how that man could walk w balls the size he had.
A late friend of mine was a tanker in the US 2nd Armored Div, and he and I talked a fair bit of the war and the equipment in it. He had nothing but good things to say about the Sherman. Another friend was in the Korean war and thought well of the Sherman.
Belton Cooper was a maintenance officers who jobs was to fixed and maintain Tanks and Tank destroyers, not frontline combat a rear with the gear guy or chap.
Thank you Bernhard - I was halfway through Belton Cooper's book when I watched your video. Now I have put it back on the shelf. I can't focus on books that I have good reason to think are quite unreliable. I think it only fair that you point me to best memoir in that area.
Sadly, I can't recommend any memoir in that area.
They weren't deathtraps because they crew could get out so quick. I think that should reflect in the numbers of allied tank crew killed from dday onwards. I remember the number being very small. Cheers for the upload.
Yeah, that number isn't the full story as the report in which it was published comes with several caveats.
If I recall correctly, tank Chieftain said that the Sherman crews suffered half a casualty per tank knocked out. I do not know who said that but I believe it was him in one of his videos. So yeah, that number is pretty damn small compared to most WW2 tanks which had this number sitting at around 2 to 3. Not only was the tank extremely easy to get out from, the transmission in the front was quite large and it often did block most of the shrapnel from frontal hits, allowing the crew to get out safely and the transmission was easy to replace as it took only a few hours and did not require any special tools, the crew could do it alone.
@@Mal101M Sadly there is no full number for the US, nor the Germans or the Soviets.
@@Lehr-km5be Sadly that number is the full number, sadly because Moran was careless in his presentation he has created this false narrative that only 3% of US tankers died.
The real number is going to be a lot higher, and given that the US during the Korean war reported roughly 1 dead tanker per knocked out tank it hints that far more US tankers lost their lives than people want to accept.
And saying that replacing the transmission did not require any special tools and that the crews could do it on their own? You how how utterly stupid that is.
You still need a crane to lift it, that's already special tools right there and outright prevents the crew from doing it alone.
@@Dreachon I could understand your point about the casualties, because I did not research it myself so you might be correct. 1 person dead per knocked out tank is still an impressive "achievement" though.
But when it comes to transmission repair I fully stand by my knowledge. I read about it in a number of publications and confirmed it at the museum and the fact that it was so easy to replace the transmission is exactly the fact that made Sherman so liked by it's crews. No, you did not need a crane to replace transmission. While for example the german Panther needed a crane to remove it's turret to then replace the transmission and such operation could take days (as it needed to be done in non-frontline workshops) that was not a necessity in Sherman. Having the transmission/final drive located in the front meant that two motor pool mechanics could remove the tracks, loosen the 12 exposed bolts on the front of the vehicle, disconnect the drive shaft and replace a faulty or damaged transmission within two or three hours. The radial engine was raised and as such did not block the removal of the transmission.
So no, I do not know how utterly stupid that is because that is literally how Sherman crews were able to remove and replace broken transmission within hours and did not need a crane to lift it :)
Churchill "The Sherman tank has maintained its reputation gained in Africa at every stage in the battles in Italy and Normandy." 1470
WAR SITUATION
HC Deb 02 August 1944 vol 402 cc1459-568
Loved your analogy so much I had to partake in the comments.
People really need to understand the tradeoff of logistics here. Tanks from America need to fit on rail cars and then on ships. Parts need to be standardized and replaced in the field. Also it cant be too expensive. It also needs to cross or go thru European bridges and towns.
The Sherman's were good, not great but good. Not the best tank in the world. But for a tank 10k miles from its factory, it was reliable and the allies had a quantity of men, materials and supplies.
That being said, military tech was a series of trial and error based on battlefield experience. The Russuans had that and learned to slope the armor of t34s. Making the armor better without sacrificing weight. Russian tankers were also shorter, thereby their tanks had a lower profile.
Usually watch your other channel, (MHV), but this video piqued my interest.
I do have one question though. Have you done a video explaining why the Panther tank series designations were so non-sequential, or is that one of those mysteries forever lost to historians?!
From what I know, lost.
Could the discrepancies in reported barrel lengths be due to inconsistency in including the breech as part of the barrel length?
Thanks- a great review of the issue.👍
Very nicely done. thank you
There's a possibility that the lone unnamed tanker at the end of his memoir might be my grandfather, he held back a platoon of German troops in a disabled Sherman while receiving multiple shrapnel wounds to his legs. He received a Silver Star for the action.
Did you have an error in the graphic at 8:16? At 7:14, the quoted muzzle velocity is apparently referring to the short barrel Pzkw IV (475 m/s), but on the graphic at 8:16, that same velocity is ascribed to the M4 Sherman.
When it came to ballistics, the early KWK 7.5cm L24 gun was on par with the U.S. 75mm pack howitzer which used as both artillery and on the M8 howitzer motor carriage. It was the initial German support weapon - low velocity for firing HE and AP - to supplement the little 37mm KwKs which had a tiny HE shell.
Great video
When you look at the evolution of just the ammunition storage in the M4, I think there is validity to many of Cooper's assertions. A gas engine, coupled with poorly stored, unprotected ammunition was, in fact, terrible. What the US Army did over the course of the war to rectify this is also generally unrecognized. (For example, Wet storage at the bottom of the hull vs. Sponson mounted ammunition.) What Belton Cooper was referring to as far as "Maintenance" was nothing to do with simple vehicular maintenance, but in fact--tank recovery and refurbishment on an industrial level. That industrial scale effort that kept his 3AD supplied with operational battle-ready tanks through the entire campaign. 3AD lost far more tanks than they had on their MTOE--but never went to battle short on tanks! There is great truth in much of what Belton Cooper talks about, but much inaccuracy in his details. Great respect for both the historical and first person opinions. Both must be taken in context.
And the ammo storage thing is probably isn't true. I heard the theory it was actually because of British tankers storing their ammo everywhere it could start a fire when hit.
even before wet storage, Shermans had excellent survivability. Escape from a Sherman was faster than most tanks. Sherman wasn't the only gasoline powered tank.
@@bobstitzenberger1834 Gasoline and accompanying explosive fumes may not have been a great choice but yes, at least the fuel was isolated from the crew compartment by a metal bulkhead, in contrast to the thin metal tins of fuel which rode in the fighting compartment next to the crew in T-34.
However the flaws of the early Sherman in ammo storage are shared with every other tank of the time, they are not a unique flaw of the Sherman and neither is the petrol engine. They are not valid criticisms of the early Sherman in isolation. The later wet stowage Sherman's stand out as WW2 tanks that didn't have atrocious ammo storage.
Practically every WW2 tank used gasoline, except the Russians. I think a good argument can be made that the Sherman was the best WW2 tank.
When the Sherman was first introduced in North Africa, It was the most powerful tank in service. Only when the Panzer 4 was up armored and up gunned could it match the Sherman. The Tiger did outclass the Sherman but they were so few in number they could not turn the tide. Patton wanted nothing to do with the Perishing. He believed with Sherman's, he could outflank the enemy. If and when Tigers were encountered, Patton relied on Tank destroyers which were able to take out Tigers. The EZ-8 and Firefly were a better answer to the Tiger than the Pershing
No US armor commander wanted a heavy tank in 1942 so production of the M6 was cancelled by the War Department. Ordnance began designing a replacement for the M4 that year and by the Spring of 1943, had the T25 design worked up and asked for 250 to be made for field testing and training the crews and mechanics for it. The armor commanders were anxious to see it's bugs worked out due to having an electric drive that allowed it to travel at the same speeds in forward and reverse. At that time, the US Press had the voting public in a panic about the big German tanks blowing away the M4 which made the US Congress nervous since they were up for re-election in the Fall of 1944. Since the War Department got their funding from Congress, the worried Congressmen and Senators were able to demand for a heavy tank to be designed, built and in action before the '44 Fall Elections. Ordnance redesigned the T25 into the T26 heavy by December of '43 and had approved for production in February of '44. Ordnance then let out contracts to build the assembly plant and have the components made. The plant was completed in September with the components finally showing up by mid November where 17 was assembled and 26 in December. Ordnance followed Congress orders to have the first 20 made shipped ASAP to Europe, where they arrived in Antwerp in February of '45 without being tested and without trained crews, mechanics and spare parts (Ordnance did test the first 3 made by running them non-stop around a test track for 500 miles. One made it while the other two lost road wheels after 300 miles. Ordnance told Congress that was normal wear and tear so the M26 was good to go to battle straight off the production line.). The Army naturally refused to use any until March to get Ike out of hot water with Congress and General George C. Marshall. The Army also wasn't interested in using the single Super Pershing that arrived in late March so Ordnance allowed Lt. Belton Cooper to add armor to the tank since he felt the M26 also had thin armor. They made him stop after adding 5 tons to the front of the hull and turret with the tank being knocked out a few weeks later by a Panzer 4 that put a round thru the side of the hull.
There's a tendency to treat the memoirs of veterans with an unmerited deference that fades only slowly with time. General readers are prone to this error, but historians are by no means immune.
"Death Traps" is one of the WORST and MOST INACCURATE alleged histories of US Army tank warfare during WWII ever. Way back in 2009, the wikipedia article for the M26 Pershing tank was hugely based on this book and contained all of the factual mistakes from that book, especially the part where Gen. Patton was the one most responsible for the Pershing tank not being developed in time to be more involved in the war. All of that is refuted by Zaloga's "Armored Thunderbolt" book. I rewrote almost the entire Pershing tank article on wikipedia, basing the rewrite mostly on Zaloga's book and Hunnicutt's book on the M26 Pershing. The bulk of that rewrite is still there
Remember it's a memoir first and foremost- but is written in an attempt to be a history of the U.S. Armored Force.
@@peterson7082 I've read "Death Traps" cover to cover. You are only half right about the book being a memoir. Belton Cooper was a liaison officer in the US Army whose job it was to survey the post battlefield destruction and to get the salvage and repair crews to pick up and fix the knocked out tanks. And so he saw a LOT of knocked out American tanks and dead American tank crewmen. Those were the memoir parts of his book, and were decent. The other half of the book was a wholly unhinged and un-informed rant about how inferior US tanks were compared to the "vastly superior" German tanks, and about how Gen. Patton was the one who prevented the timely development and deployment of the Pershing tank. Cooper even created a long stretch of a fictional monologue that he claimed came out of Patton's mouth, giving his reasons for not needing the Pershing tank. These claims about Patton were all pure imaginary garbage. Patton was a battlefield commander, and was NOT the guy in charge of making such major homefront production decisions for the entire US Army. In his book "Armored Thunderbolt" Zaloga went through the National Archives and found documents pinning the true blame of the delay in development of the Pershing tank on Gen. Lesley McNair, the head of Army Ground Forces.
"Vastly superior German tanks" was a repetitive mantra throughout Cooper's book and got to be REALLY tiresome by the end of the book. Anybody with the slightest bit of knowledge about German tanks would know that they had their major weaknesses also. Zaloga gives a much more balanced explanation of the good and bad points of the M4 Sherman tank in his book "Armored Thunderbolt" and pointed out that the Sherman tank was more than capable of taking out the great majority of German armored vehicles. Tiger tanks were actually relatively rare, and both Tiger and Panther tanks had weak side and rear armor and could be taken out by Sherman tanks from a side or rear ambush, if the Tigers and Panthers didn't first break down or run out of gas first. Tank losses also always tended to be much heavier for the attacking side, and the US Army was usually on the offensive. The defending side could take advantage of terrain and preparation and got off the first shots, which usually determined the outcomes of individual tank to tank combat.
So, only about half of "Death Traps" is Belton Cooper's personal war memoir. The other half is pure fake history, just complete useless garbage. Unfortunately, during that time period, the fake history of this book did get injected into the popular pop cultural discussions of WWII tank history. I do take satisfaction in having started the process of completely expunging it as a reference source from wikipedia articles, back in 2009.
@@gandalfgreyhame3425 I understand, as I read it as well
The US Army had the M6 heavy tank in 1942 but it's production was cancelled that year due to continuing mechanical problems and the Army deciding that they had no need for a slow heavy tank that couldn't keep up with their advancing forces. Ordnance started designing a replacement for the M4 as soon as it went into production in 1942 and by the Spring of '43 had the heavy medium T25 ready for testing. They requested for 250 to be built to train the crews, mechanics and work out the bugs of it's electric drive that would allow it to go the same speeds in forward and reverse. That got blocked by Congress, who was alarmed that the Press had the public worked up over US tankers not having a heavy tank that could take on the Tigers and Panthers. Congress was worried about the Fall Elections in 1944 so demanded the War Department came up with one ASAP and get to Europe before the elections. The WD told Ordnance to get on it so the T25 was redesigned into the T26 that was approved in December of '43 and ordered into production in February of '44. Ordnance had to get a factory built and equipped plus had to line up parts suppliers. The factory was ready by September with parts starting to arrive in November due to delays the suppliers experienced with obtaining needed machinery and materials. They assembled 17 in November and 26 in December with the first 20 made being shipped off to Europe ASAP by orders from Congress. Those arrived in Antwerp in February of 1945 where the Army refused to use them since none were tested and came without trained crews, mechanics or any replacement parts. The Army relented in March to get Ike out of hot water and divided up the 20 between the armor units. Those made little difference on the battlefields so were a complete waste of tax payers dollars.
@@billwilson3609 The problem with the T20, T23, T25 was that none of them were enough of an improvement on the M4 to be worth disrupting production in the middle of a war just to replace a tank that was getting the job done.
Belton Cooper saw the results of German shells that easily penetrated the Sherman tank. He rightfully was not impressed with the Sherman. He knew US industry could have made a tank with superior armour giving *greater crew protection.* That was his *prime* point. A very valid point. Other points such as the standard 75mm gun was not up to destroying many types of German armour, are quite secondary to crew protection.
another great video sir.
Great points made in this video and in the comments about the book being based on that of a maintenance officer who may have been very knowledgeable, but whose perspective was not the best and whose ghost-writer appears to have sensationalized the most negative information he gathered on the Sherman.
Is it fair to say the US doctrine wasn't geared for tank-on-tank, but to use the tank to support infantry, and use artillery, anti-tank (and even air support) to deal with panzers?
According to Nicolas Moran, statistically the Sherman was the safest tank of WWII. But that doesn't matter. How we perceive things is so much more important than actual facts. Soldiers and news reporters believed the Sherman to be a death trap, so the reputation stuck. This is why myths, rumors and propaganda are so powerful. You don't need facts to have your thoughts and emotions manipulated.
This is from a German Paratrooper in Normandy D day to Falaise: - if the M4 was hit with a Panzerfaust it went up every time and the crews never got out "poor bastards". These would have been first production run i.e. no water stowage of ammunition and floor 1 cm deep in petrol that would go to flashpoint when the panzerfaust jet came through at 1000C. He said they were sitting ducks (coz in Bocage separated from infantry support?). All it took was someone to pop up from a ditch with a Panzerfaust and it was over.
My memory from reading Cooper is that he only ever seemed to be describing tanks that I seemingly had been penetrated with solid shot and no explosion. Germans used two types of Panzergranit, the more common one with an explosive charge in the base, and the less common pure solid shot. It seems that the ones hit with solid shot could be repaired and put back into service.
More interesting is the subject he actually knew something about - namely the mechanics. He said that out of of 50 Shermans, 15-20 could be expected to fall out due to major or minor mechanical issues during a 50 km road march. Shows that no WW2 tank could be said to be really reliable, only "relatively" reliable by WW2 standards.
That seems outright false. The Brits tested the M4 and found that it's by far the most reliable medium tank they could get their hands on by several magnitudes. A 40% failure rate on a relatively short march seems unlikely given even the British tanks were not that bad.
@@ArchOfficial But what did the Brits have to compare with? Of all British medium/heavy tanks,only late war Churchills as well as Cromwell could be considered reliable, everything else were abysmal.
During a 10 day period in the outbreak phase from Normandy, 290, 20% of Commonwealth Shermans, broke down to the extent they were considered losses. The single Cromwell unit actually did slightly better.
This is 1944 - even your vanilla family car could break down at any time, and cars have always been much more reliable than tanks. Road marches are tough even on modern tanks.
@@TTTT-oc4eb That's my point, most tanks are unreliable junk compared to the M4, even in an era where most vehicles break down regularly.
@@ArchOfficial My point is that the M4 probably was relatively reliable by WW2 standards - but that doesn't really say much. It is quite possible that it was the best - but it is impossible to know if it was because of the tank itself or due to US logistics. US and German tanks were operating under very different conditions.
In Korea the M4A3E8 (HVSS) - the last and best of the Shermans - had an availability rate of 80%, compared to 65% for the M26 Pershing. From May 1944 to the end of the year the Panther and Tiger had an average availability rate of 70%, resp.73% . But this only tells a part of the story, because more Tigers (and probably Panthers as well) were out due to combat damage than breakdowns - so the big cats and the Sherman is probably pretty close, especially compared to the Sherman versions of 1944. Even many of the notorious final drive failures on the big cats were due to combat damage, as they were very vulnerable to artillery.
"More interesting is the subject he actually knew something about - namely the mechanics. He said that out of of 50 Shermans, 15-20 could be expected to fall out due to major or minor mechanical issues during a 50 km road march. Shows that no WW2 tank could be said to be really reliable, only "relatively" reliable by WW2 standards." do you have a link on this, is this Beltons book ?
Ive red on a forum long time ago a short snippet on the Commonwealth tank issues during the Normandy breakout, a crapload of Shermans broke down on road marches, with a clear note in the report, these were mechanical losses, not combat ones of any sorts...
Links would be appreciated, as you can see ppl are just repeating the same old mantras and claims, without actual evidence...
It's a great video, thanks. Very interesting statistical data. He did not know in detail the American armored units in the European theater.
15 Divisions, 4,200 Shermans With 4 lost, the 3rd Armored alone accounted for 23% of all these casualties (about 826 Shermans). Very very good. Greetings.
Ah, yes, the book that shall not be named
Thanks!
Thank you!!!
Who knew that shade could be a projectile.
From the interviews I have seen of WW2 vets, they liked the Sherman well enough as long as fighting the three main German tanks was not included. The Mark IV was basically a match for the Sherman. Fighting Panthers and Tigers ranked at the bottom of their enjoyable tasks for the day. It could be done but was profoundly risky for a Sherman. The German 75 and 88 mm cannons were better than a Sherman's, unless you had a Firefly with its 17 pounder or the American 76 mm. One thing Allied tankers seemed agreed on was that the armour was simply not thick enough at three inches. One British tanker related how a German shell, it may have been an 88 mm, came through the front of his Sherman's turret, passed between his knees, and came to rest in the engine compartment. Not my idea of fun. A few inches higher and he'd have been singing soprano in his church choir. There are a lot of stories of similar nature. Tank on tank and the Sherman was not ideal, especially in head on attacks. Attacking from the side changed your odds for the better. Used against infantry with high explosive shells and the Sherman tankers were happy.
Canadian Sydney Radley-Walters described defeating a Panther with an ordinary 75 mm Sherman. He said if he was within 800 yards he would bounce a shell off the underside of the turret's rounded mantle and down onto the driver, which would penetrate the thin upper armour of a Panther and kill him. Again, who wants to do that for a living? I think you would end up in the psych ward in short order. He also said you could try to bounce a shell off the ground under the Panther and hope it went through the floor. Same likelihood of spending time in the psych ward, with recurring dreams of the Panther's 75 mm cannon staring right at _you!_ At one point in the Normandy campaign Radley-Walters considered himself invulnerable to German attacks and had to be forced to take some rest time. He did, however, end the war with 18 or 19 confirmed enemy tanks destroyed, the highest scoring Western Allied tank commander of WW2.
And if it was a Tiger, it was basically suicide unless you could get behind it and put a round up the tail pipe due to the thinner armour on the rear. Thankfully, Tigers were very few and far between.
Anyway, that's what I've heard from interviews with vets. 🤷♂️😮😲☹️😥
ruclips.net/video/qtoSAKlvwhk/видео.html good information here
Got to talk to an old tanker who was on the M48 105mm gun project. He was a tanker in France/Germany 44 - 45. He said that the only German tank he really feared was the Panther, because it was faster better armored and had a better gun. The closest he came being hit was in France, his tank was going up a small rise/slope he had ordered the driver to stop when they crested. When they crested and the tank stopped it rocked forward, just as the tank rocked a German pak 40 fired going for a belly shot, the round passed beneath the tank, lucky for him he saw the muzzle flash and opened up with the 50 cal and had the gun put he into the gun, killed most of the gun crew the rest surrendered.
Nicely done. Thanks!!!😉
Churchill tanks had heavier armoured protection than most other allied tank in the mid war. They were also roomier inside. The crews preferred the Churchill over Shermans, as you had a better chance of survival.
*approving Chieftain noises*
I am sorry to say that when I was teaching history in secondary schools I repeated the "tommy cookers" line on Shermans, basing my view on secondary sources that clearly drew on Cooper's book. I wish I could apologise to my students for that.
I would add that this isn't just memoirs created decades after the fact, even things like After Action Reports and other documents created at the time often have errors like overstating the enemy by identifying Panzer IVs as Tigers etc.
A soldier can provide great information on a soldier's perspective of the war. But a soldier's perspective is necessarily limited and (with a few exceptions) they are not any more qualified to comment on the big picture any more than any non-soldier.
I'm probably wrong but iirc the M4A1 (76M1) was the designation for an M4A1 with a 76mm gun in the 75mm turret
There was a variant of the M4A1 with a 76mm gun but the real difference was that used a cast hull instead of the wielded hull of the M4. Most US designations of the time were designated variants form changed such as that. The Canadian Ram was even given a M4 designation.
I've read Cooper's book and it's shocking to find out how inaccurate it is. If 3rd Armoured had the heaviest tank losses in the ETO,and Belton had to recover many knocked out Sherman's, it's understandable that he had a very negative view of American tanks.
Cooper inspected tanks that were brought to the main repair depot in the rear. Those were either shot up, needed an overhaul or burned up. Cooper assessed their damage or wear to determine if those were worth repairing or being parts donors. He also was required to make verbal reports to the division brass about the number of tanks brought in, the number repaired and the number scrapped then answer any questions they may have.
Cooper started complaining about the thin armor on US tanks in 1941 after being sent to Fort Knox to learn tank tactics. Nobody liked him due to that so his superiors decided he'd cause less trouble by assigning Cooper to that job.
All you have to do is look at the number of killed US tankers as a percentage of the total and compare to the pour bloody infantry. Then go, hmmmm which one would I be better off as, a tanker, or an infantryman?
If Cooper's reporting is somewhat faulty, the responsibility for that lies completely with the Wehrmacht for not keeping him on the mailing list for technical data on the tank.
To be fair, they had the wrong email address.
Take the time to find a library with a copy of the US Army's multi-volume history on WWII, which includes analysis of what worked, what did not work. It will give you a solid basis to evaluate the history of the M4A in comabt.
Thanks
It's interesting how the M-4's reputation has been rehabilitated by solid research. My own father was a pilot. The best airplane of World War II? the one that brought him home.
Wet ammo stowage was a great idea in WWII. We see in Ukraine lots of more modern Russian tanks which DO NOT have wet ammo stowage. Upon penetration, they pop their turrets and the main gun propellant burns ferociously.
Although not the focus of the video, I'm surprised there was no correction of the Wiki calling the Sherman a "Main Battle Tank", since that designation didn't arise until after WW2
Wikipedia is alarmingly dodgy for that kind of thing, the article about the A10 is half bullshit
Well by modern standards it can be seen as MBT similar to the T-34 which combined the infantry and calvary tank roles into one vehicle which would make it an MBT by the modern definition. There is also a tendecy to retroactively add designations for example after NATO started adopting Assault Rifles in the 70s they made the definition battle rifle for the full-size cartridge rifles they were replacing along some older rifles like the M1 Garand.
I appreciate the video and the corrections to figures provided and to updated statistics. I appreciate accuracy, in all things. So, thanks for that. And thanks for providing corrections to your video, as well, in the captions (while only few, again, I appreciate accuracy). If Lt. Cooper could have corrected statistical errors in his printed book, be them his or his "ghost writer's," (ie. typist's) I have no doubt he would have.
That said... Lt. Cooper's statistical errors don't change the big picture:
If a German tank could punch through the frontal armor of a Sherman... and lets face it, most could...
If a Sherman's A/P rounds (75 or 76) bounced off the frontal armor off of most German tanks... and most did...
If Shermans became mired in mud that German tanks (with wider tracks) could traverse... which was often the case...
If, prior to hostilities, I witnessed an arrogant General overrule a superior U.S. tank vs. the Sherman... which he did...
If my duties included traveling through enemy territory to deliver loss reports/secure replacement tanks... and it was...
If one of my jobs was overseeing the washing out of the remains of knocked out Sherman tank crews, patching up the holes, painting over the gore inside and redistributing the armor to replacement crews... and it was...
Well...
No disrespect to the author of this video but... no amount of statistical bean crunching and decades-after-the-fact error correcting (where tank dimensions, capacities and dates are concerned) is going to change the historical fact that the Sherman was under-armored and under-gunned for the German tanks they KNEW they would end up facing 1:1 AND the German high-velocity anti-tank batteries they KNEW they would encounter.
And before the flamers come forth shouting that "they were not expected to fight 1:1..."
Fair enough, but this does not change the fact that 'no plan survives first contact.' A more contemporary version would be "evabody-gotta-plan till they git hit..." ~ Mike Tyson. This was as true back then as it is today. Any military commander will acknowledge this.
Finally, Lt. Cooper was not part of one tank crew. He recovered, repaired, maintained and supplied armor to NUMEROUS tank crews. He talked to surviving tank crews in theater... about engagements, armor, maintenance needs... He had a MUCH bigger picture of what was going on (at that time) than that of any one tank crew's account.
With that, it's my belief that "Death Traps" is a completely appropriate title.
This video, while informative and very instructive for those crunching exact historical dates, armor measurements and capacities... please do keep in mind, it was made by (again, no disrespect intended) a man who was born decades after the war, with more than two decades of subsequent research available to him (1998-2022). If you want to rattle off precise measurements of X,Y or Z gun tube from the conflict... again, good video.
If you want a vivid first hand account from a highly-educated armored maintenance officer who was there in
Northern Europe (D-Day to VE-Day), on the move with one of the most heavily-engaged U.S. armored divisions in the war...
read the book.
>If one of my jobs was overseeing the washing out of the remains of knocked out Sherman tank crews, patching up the holes, painting over the gore inside and redistributing the armor to replacement crews... and it was..
I've seen this mentioned multiple times but that wasn't a repair shop's job. That was the job of quartermasters. By the time a tank got to a repair depot, human remains would have already been removed. In fact, it was a pretty big deal at the time that the US was choosing to have its dead buried in local war cemeteries instead of paying for them to be shipped back stateside, so there was a lot of oversight on how the dead were handled. With the frequency Cooper claims to have found limbs, why weren't other repair shops reporting the same? And why was he hosing the remains down in the first place? Mortuary Affairs probably wanted as much of the body as they could get ahold of for the burial. So much of Cooper's story doesn't add up.
@@Humorless_Wokescold
If one were to venture as far as the dust jacket of his book, Cooper's divisional assignment and primary missions are clearly and concisely listed.
Lt. Cooper was an Ordnance Lieutenant in the Third Armored Division. He traveled WITH the armored division as it attacked south and eventually east across Europe. He was not part of any "repair shop." He was also responsible for traveling back through bypassed enemy territory (regularly) to Battalion HQ, where vehicle loss reports were delivered and replacement vehicles were obtained.
As Cooper details in his book, one of his primary missions in the ETO was to locate disabled vehicles (tanks, tank destroyers, half-tracks, trucks, jeeps, etc. ), assess their condition and when repairable, recover and return them to the Vehicle Collection Point (VCP). At times, this was done under fire.
It doesn't take much discernment to realize that this/his mission made Cooper one of the first responsible for approaching and assessing the damage to a shot-up Sherman tank. (ie. He had to stick his head in the turret and hull openings, look past the gore and assess internal damage and determine if it was a candidate for recovery/repair). If not repairable, or if required repairs surpassed the capability of the mobile VCP, disabled vehicles were to be left in place for later retrieval by Battalion personal
@@frodrickfronkensteen9241 No, I haven't read Death Traps and I have no plans to. Every review I've read makes it sound over emotional to the point of parody. The quotes I've seen from the book make Cooper sound like a bad soldier. Maybe those quotes aren't representative of the whole book but frankly, I don't care. Cooper gets enough wrong that I seriously question how much is actual memory vs how much is stories he's repeated until they became memory. Even the favorable reviews of Death Traps contain quotes that sound too hyperbolic to be credible.
For example. One reviewer shared quote after quote where Cooper says something to the effect of 'this was a pivotal, game changing moment in war.' WWII, as told by Cooper, only had pivotal moments. Being briefly left in charge for 12 hours? Pivotal! A poorly coordinated German attack? A massive counter offensive that threatened to break Allied lines!
I'm going to be blunt. I don't trust what Cooper has to say about WWII and I think the dismissal his fanbase shows towards historians and engineers makes it pretty clear this isn't about historical accuracy. Bean counting is important when you're trying to build an accurate picture of what happened. Bean counting is how you reconcile Cooper's claim that he was regularly washing away the remains of tankers with the actual American crew fatalities. When John Hopkins University examined tank fatalities in WWII they looked at 274 medium tanks. Out of 1370 crewman (accounting for infantry made part of the tank crew) you had 171 deaths and 466 wounded. That study was done in 1951 when the records were much more readily available and could be cross referenced with newspaper stories everyone was already familiar with.
So how do you (and I do mean you) reconcile Cooper's claim that he was frequently washing out human remains with the numbers all the bean counters report? And keep in mind that the bean counters are also including in those 171 deaths soldiers who were gunned down after egressing from the disabled tank. It doesn't add up. The likeliest explanation is that Cooper is exaggerating the things he saw.
@@Humorless_Wokescold Did I say Cooper "was frequently washing out human remains?" I went back to my posts above, thinking I mispoke. Ya, I did NOT say that. And I'm pretty confident that Cooper did not make that claim either. Did he have to witness it, and at times, oversee such tasks... I believe he did.
Maybe the reviews were not accurate and/or exaggerated? Or maybe some reviews were written based solely on other reviews by people who have not read the book?
Cooper DOES detail what had to take place to repair/restore a knocked out tank/vehicle. Part of that DID include removing human remains, washing the inside of the tank (as best it could be), applying fresh interior paint (as practical), etc. I don't recall Cooper ever claiming to have removed human remains himself.
Maybe the reviewers mispoke?
And maybe this is age or generational or whatever, but... I don't read reviews. I read books.
And having read the book (any book), I can then arrive at my own conclusions... not have others influence what I read or don't read. And I think that is a large part of our society's current devolution... people watch what they are told to watch, read what they are told to read, follow the crowd, stay in line... and then they believe they arrived at their own conclusions. --- Sorry for digressing to current events. I just think where we depart is how we approach historical research.
Where research is concerned... a case-in-point...
In my younger more mobile years (and when I had some disposable income), I drove to a deceased relative's WWII tank battalion reunion several states away, initially to learn more about his war experiences. I ended up returning to subsequent reunions to do (informal) interviews of the surviving veterans (at the time, most in their early to mid 80s). Each one of them, to a man, were fantastic human beings. Just a great bunch of guys, most with families accompanying them. All willing were given interview slots where very casual, private but un-timed question/answer dialogues took place. When the questions ran out, I'd just sit and listen to them talk and remember.
During these interviews, every veteran, to a man... mispoke or misremembered (at least some) technical figures, historical dates, exact measurements, distances, etc.
All of them.
I can't even begin to imagine what I WOULD NOT HAVE LEARNED... if... I had packed up my gear and walked out after hearing the first veteran misplace a decimal or fail to accurately remember a statistic of "this" or "that..." or if I had skipped the reunions altogether... due to an unfavorable review about the men or their war time memories.
At any rate, peace and safety to you.
I couldn't imagine the terrible sights inside a knocked out tank they had to get back into service.
One guy said: There's no amount of paint that will cover the smell of death inside a tank.
An alternate POV would be the Chieftain's videos on the Sherman
Friends father commanded am M18 with a 76mm gun. He stated that the M18s did well against the German tanks. He stated most of the tanks he encountered did not have turrets. Dad played with an M36 with a 90mm gun that crumbled a derelict Tiger tanks glacis plate.
What people don’t understand is the Sherman had the equivalent armor on the front with its slope that the Tiger did. That says a lot in protection just shows the biggest issue with the Sherman was it was undergunned.
It didnt, Moran is trying to mythbust while creating even more new myths that go in favor of the Sherman.
Armor/steel composition, overmatch and above all the armor penetration capability of the enemy guns is what matters.
If your armor is 90 mil thick but your enemy has standard AT guns that punch ovr 115 mils of armor at 1000 meters guess what, doesnt matter that it "close to Tiger protection" , your are still dead, meanhile the enemy with "just"20 mill more armor than a Sherman" while being shot at by inferior guns wont be threatened until combat gets under 500 meters.
I agree that generally a veteran's account can be less accurate than that of a well read historian, I say that as a 25 year British army veteran who served both in the infantry and the REME. I may have been able to field repair AFVs, gained some knowledge of their use in warfare and the appearance and characteristics of enemy vehicles but that doesn't make me an expert. The passing years have also taught me not to trust what I once perceived as fact, also, soldiers have a tendency to denigrate the usefulness of their equipment, in my opinion. Or perhaps that's a British trait.
One might call back to the discussion of the A10 acting as a ground attack aircraft. Distancing the actual statistics (even after dealing with the mess that gathering such numbers and evaluating them is) from the experience on the ground can be a mess.
If something's a pain in the rear, I can't imagine someone who's life depends on it having a very positive view on it's failures, even if it is statistically better than an alternative. Maybe it shows more about how equipment can affect morale in excess of it's technical value.
My Grandfather was a career soldier, and ended up in Gds Amd with 9 Coldstream in '44. He maintained the Churchill was the very best tank on the field on account of having bailed out of three and survived to tell tall tales to his grandson... I think his logic was that a tank was a fire magnet, so best be in one that could take a hit. Mind you, he also had a strange affection for his Webley and Sten, which by all account were bloody horrid things.
@@duncanhamilton5841 sounds like a glass half full kind of guy. Probably less optimistic people tend to hate their equipment, while more optimistic ones swear by it
I was friends with a US infantry Marine who saw combat in Afghanistan.
Most of his descriptions of his equipment went like this: “It sounds cool, but it actually kind of sucked.”
I know a few rank and file one-enlistment Marines with similar opinions.
Conversely, when talking with a few other infantry Marines with longer service records and 3+ combat tours, they had drastically better opinions of their equipment.
For example, both praised the M240B for its ability to put out high volumes of fire. Both generally liked their rifle optics. One said that his M110 was the best rifle he’s ever used.
The one who fought in the early GWOT in Iraq said tanks were amazing force multipliers. The one who fought more tours in Afghanistan said they were useless.
The true uniting factor is that both of them are deaf as doornails and have bad joints and backs.
The Chieftain makes a good point that he is an expert not because he is a tanker but because he is a (albeit not formally trained) historian
Despite the book's shortcomings, Death Trap is a fascinating look at a little recognized but critical aspect of war. Cooper's job was to visit the front every night to determine the parts needed to repair the repairable vehicles, race back to the nearest supply depot, and race back with a truck load of parts before dawn. Spark plugs were a constant need. He came under German fire repeatedly and accidently wrecked more than one jeep.
Cooper didn't do that. He only inspected damaged and worn out armor towed back to main repair shop far in the rear. The tankers had a forward repair station about 1/3 mile away from the front lines where they could drive back to for quick repairs or have mechanics come to them if disabled. That repair station had a store of parts with more available at a forward repair depot further back from the front lines where tanks that required more time consuming repairs could be towed. Obtaining additional parts was a time consuming affair due to the paperwork involved so had a parts runner taking in parts orders once a day to keep the repair stations' inventory fully stocked.
I refuse to believe anyone could get that many things wrong in such a consistent pattern simply by mistake. The information in Death Traps must be deliberately false. Whether this is Cooper's fault or that of his ghost writer, I can't say, but you don't downplay American equipment and play up German equipment in every single example unless that's what you're trying to do
Yeah the most interesting thing I took from this video. Someone very purposely published disinformation regarding designations and measurements.
But why?
@@ausaskar if it bleeds it leads in the news anyway... so Create the version that Bleeds it sells more books, and most folks won't do the research and learn they were deceived.
The measurements would work out fairly ok if you assume an inch is equal to a nice, round 2 cm (instead of 2.54 cm) when converting from metric to American units.
@@ausaskar Sensationalism sells more books.
It doesn't help the Cooper was a recovery officer in charge of towing damaged M4 Sherman's back to rear areas for repairs and refurbishment, all he saw were destroyed Sherman tanks and I believe that played a hand in turning his worldview of the Sherman being a death trap.
During the pre internet years, the Sherman was always compared unfairly against the German big cats by Panzerphile war gamers who usually happen to be... Americans. Belton Cooper's book only serve to convince them even more with confirmation bias. In reality the Sherman was a good tank, not perfect, but good enough. US Army Shermans were KO'd mostly by well positioned AT guns, well hidden TDs, AT mines, and infantry AT weapons.
According to a American study direct enemy fire accounted for 54% of tank losses, 20% were mines, infantry AT weapon only accounted for some 7.5%
The British experience in NW Europe(aka ETO) is analogous and comparable to the US’s. It can be assumed that these figures for NW Europe/ETO would be similar. The American Study’s samples show the British had more causalities, percentage wise, due to gunfire than American forces. In 1944 for example, the study showed that 50.9% of Amerian tanks sampled were lost due to gunfire compared to 59.2% of the British.
Gunfire in all its forms causes the majority of Allied tank casualties. A British Report, broke down a sample of British tank casualties down further. Splitting up the gunfire into AT Guns, Tanks, SPGs, along with Mines and Bazookas(Hollow Charges).
Anti-tank guns 22.1%, tanks 14.5%, spg 24.4%
Hasnt the Sherman the best survival rate of the war?
YES 🤣
i think hollow charge shell of kwk 37 had about 450-475 m/s. Muzzle velocity.