If you like in-depth researched videos on Military History and talk with experts, consider supporting me on Patreon: patreon.com/mhv/ The Panzermuseum's RUclips Channel is here and there will be English Videos in the future: www.RUclips.com/daspanzermuseum
on fuel side the discussion is easy: tank type dictates: scouting is gasoline and mai battletank is diesel (because it is a stronger engine on the torque side and the fuel doenst burn as easy as gasoline).
@@thethirdman225 i know but they are mostly running on diesel on parades and or using engines that are realted to the diesel engine by construction or turbines.
One interesting episode was in late 1939 when, after the Hitler-Stalin pact, the Soviets could put their hands on a Panzer III, and compare it. And indeed what they found is than in the "holy trinity", the T-34 was indeed superior, as its 45-mm armour was much thicker than the 30-mm of its opponent, and was sloped ans even when considering that the Germans used face-hardened plate, the ratio would still be 61 to 36 mm equivalent. Of course the 76-mm gun ont the T-34 was vastly superior to the 37-mm on the Panzer III, no contest here. Not only was the F-34 easily able to penetrate any German tank at the time while the PAK 36 and its derivatives would become to be known as "Panzeranklopfgeräte" (Tank door knockers), its HE projectile was also almost 10x as heavy. And despite having the firepower and armour protection of a contemporary heavy tank, thanks to its 500hp Diesel engine and wide tracks the T-34 had very good mobility as well; in theory making it the first ever Main Battle Tank, before the term was even invented. But they also found many things they liked about the Pz III. Many things like the superior workmanship and the complexity of its optics or drivetrain they found outside the possibilities of the Soviet industry at the time, but they identified three crucial engineering solutions that every future Soviet tank should include: - torsion bar suspension, giving it a smooth ride at high speed, while avoiding the huge impact on internal volume by the Chrisie-type suspension - 3-man turret with a commanders cupola, giving the gunner, the loader and the commander dedicated functions - good communication between tank, instead of only equipping command tank with radios The lessons were indeed learned, but too slowly adapted to counter Operation Barbarossa
The fundamental skill of a combat soldier (or tanker) in the US Army is "Shoot, move, and communicate". Tankers have to do this as much as everyone else. The card game you are referring to at about 10 minutes is known as "Top Trumps" in English (I have made the exact same comparison). Fully agreed on the importance of a tank suiting the requirements of the nation which built it, which may not be as important to any other nation. A good example of the crossover between training and ergonomics such as at 16:30 is the introduction of the automatic (Hydromatic) transmission on the M24. Suddenly drivers didn't need to be as highly trained to get reasonable capability out of the tank. See also fire control systems. An example of the nature of reliability at the crew level was the Dracula test in the UK. Both Cromwell and Sherman generally made every stage per day, but the Cromwell showed up later due to on-the-road breakdowns. The crew repaired them, but they got less sleep as a result, affecting their capability and morale. That all said, I wouldn't go as far as to say that the Holy Trinity is obsolete.
Please do inside hatch on Tiger II! Reason: it is like Chieftain - having impregnable armor on the outside, but the soft and squishy interior is susceptible to significant emotional event! Do it!!! Plz
Oh, speaking of Hydromatic transmission, what do you think about the ones on Tiger and Tiger II? Is the reduction in requirement for good driver a reasonable trade off for the increased complexity?
I'd argue, that the holy trinity is not obsolete, and far from it. However(!) it's focussing on one tank (model) in particular. In a world where units and combined arms exists this approach is naturally flawed. It's a good starting point to compare "hard" facts of a vehicle, facts that you can measure easily. The crews performance is very important, but how do you measure it? Reload speed? Target acquisition time? How good the driver is in terrain? That's hard to put on paper, where you can just put a ruler on the armour plate, write down the thickness and call it a day. That naturally leads to a few armchair generals and arguments like "The M4 Sherman pure shit and the Tiger II is the best tank in the world", completely disregarding that the Tiger II was a very much a mediocre tank (imo) because of its out of combat flaws like speed, reliability, steel quality, etc. tl;dr; Holy trinity is good for a first look at the model, but should not be used when discussing anything bigger.
BOND villain?!? No, no, no! Die Hard all day. He just poses as a historian. I am afraid that Bernhardt is already a hostage. Somebody get Bruce Willis, fast!
You really are a good interviewer. You know when to speak, you know when to listen, you allow both parties to inter - view (to exchange views). Awesome job!
But seriously they are both exemplary here. Too many people can't resist the urge to show how much they know even if it makes them look stupid in the end.
@@vdotme I really... really have a distaste for most YT collaborations. It usually becomes a popularity contest! "Im better than you" "No, im better than you!" "Im funnier than you" "No! Im funnier than you!" "I have more knowledge than you" "No!!! I have all the knowledge!" "Im talking now" "Yes, but I need to speak more than you do!" Its ridiculous! What happened to the good, old fashion, coherent, beautiful, intellectual, academic discussions?! The owner of this channel does it perfectly! He does a true inter-view. And, as a bonus, we can actually learn something meaningful :) Proper job!
As long as tanks don't have wings, they will always be flawed. Thanks for the interview, great stuff! There is something to be said about the 'simplicity' of the Trinity that covers tank design It gives us a good idea of what goes 'into' making a tank and the respective tradeoffs that come with it. Of course, there is more to it that once you go into detail and once you see how these 'hard' stats (as Ralf mentions with the Trump cards) actually perform in the field. Suddenly ergonomics, crew training, and communication get as important. It's similar with planes, the overall designs can give you clues to the respective qualities of the planes vis-a-vis but once the gloves are off, those qualities are suddenly put into balance by the way pilots use them. Also, just like with tanks we can see how their internal design often reflects their purpose. For example, on many of the early fighters of WW2, pilot comfort was somewhat omitted since those planes would usually only stay in the air for about an hour. So in the design, it wasn't 'as' importnant to provide a more comfy ride whereas late war, with the introduction of long-range escort fighters, crew comfort & ergonomics suddenly becomes more important and this is reflected in the aircraft themselves.
@@iceee420 Yes, and there was a Christie's tank with wings that was supposed to fly by its own. But the armor protection was ridiculous because it had to be light enough. Iirc prototypes were actually built and tested and found totally impractical.
i Hase heard from the Chieftain another Reosons against sloped armours that sloped armour when it sloped to the inside reduce space and sloped to the outside is not verry Usual .
I have commanded tanks AND designed them [a few years ago], so I found this talk fascinating. The trinity is not flawed, but it is not all-encompassing. It represents a set of trade-offs that determine the overall design. In WWII, a heavily armored tank with a large gun will likely have decreased mobility, a light, fast tank will have to reduce the weight of the armament and armor. The various potential design combinations then have to be evaluated in light of current doctrine and potential opponents. Advancing technology distorted this clean vision of a trinity of design trade-offs: the heavy tank disappeared and the medium tank became the main battle tank in the 1960's. In 1985, the M1A1 Abrams achieved all three elements at the same time: it was superior in all three values and had thermal sights on top of it, starting a bit of an arms race that left older tanks completely obsolete. Modern tank designs are now addressing long-range and all-round sensors [including aerial drones], active camouflage, crew automation, and maintainability - but only after the firepower, mobility, and protection are decided.
At some point, people began misinterpreting the trinity as the most important aspects of a tank instead of its original intention when it was really about those values being inevitable or direct trade-offs. That said, I'd still argue that the holy trinity is sort of a flawed concept because you can make trade-offs between other elements such as protection and ergonomics, which then invalidates the trinity anyways.
Emery Almasy The problem is more the way it’s used, not by professionals but by gamers posing as knowledgeable people or worse, historians. From my armchair, the holy trinity model is simply incomplete and is the basis for spec sheet warfare which ignores any and all tactical and strategic considerations. There is a train of thought on the interwebs which actively discourages people from looking beyond equipment and focussing solely on what they call “tech”, all the while ignoring the human factors and decisions which make for success in warfare.
@Michael Smith even smart bombs are stupid enough to be tricked I would not bet on tanks becoming obsolete, especially since they will be (wo)maned by only two people in a matter of years and possibly only one person in a matter of at most two decades. Then you can reduce size and thus energy consumption and thanks to massproduction you get a pretty cheap and yet very effective weapon; on top of that comes the fact that the ratio of fire- to manpower is incredibily good, if you can reduce the crew to two or even one. So my guess is that tanks are here to stay for quite a while.
@@IzmirWayne People says tha tanks are obsolete since WWI and th beginning of anti-tanks weapons, and your concept of one or two persons in a tank is pretty much as old... French were the ones who tried it the most, and it never worked very well, we expect the crew to do most of the job, serve the tank and maintain it, mechanics gets involved wen something is broken, and 2 guys (or even worse, one guy) having to fully maintain a tank in war situation is not good, more people in the tank means more people to maintain it and doesn't mean the job won't be well done if your loader is human and not a machine
@Xenomorph Captain Vex Ghost of the brony community you're right, I just see the word "que" and think they mean a line. whichever word they mean it's equally annoying
@@CCfiftyeight heh m8 Austrians are germans they just not allowed on paper to merge into one country anymore. And the fact that the prussians kicked them out in the first place was as i recall the start of the end for Austro-Hungary.
Definitely "decade". One good thing about Germany is that it learned from history. The rest of us just keep on producing conflict after conflict, with supposed "dickheads", even when there is no evidence to back up the purpose.
How not to be killed 1. Don't be there in the first place. 2. If you must be there do not be seen. - Camo and concealment 3. If you are seen do not be engaged. - Pulling back- Mobility 4. If you are engaged do not be hit. - Mobility 5. If you are hit do not be penetrated. - Armor 6. If you are penetrated do not be killed. - Layout Yea the trinity gets kind of confusing when you explore it.
Maverick_CIV 7. Use your brains. Lay an ambush and prosecute it with the utmost ruthlessness. Once you start shooting, you can’t stop until everyone else is dead or captured. 8. Don’t be squeamish.
@Maverick_CIV at number 3 I think you should add weapon system lethality as well as communications, if you can't kill it and have to move back you also need to communicate that. But as Bernd and Ralph say in the video, a lot of factors that sort of meld together.
There was a point that went past too quickly - German tanks being built around the load bearing capacity of German military bridges. This was also something that the Chieftain expanded on in the design of the Sherman. The Americans FIRST planning brief was to make a tank that weighted less than 40 tons. Why? Because that was the load capacity of the average crane in dockyards. His point was (from a non-European view point), it didn't matter how good your tank was if you couldn't get it into the battle field.
@Carnivorus If I remember correctly, there were a lot fewer Pershings shipped than Shermans. And they would only require a slightly-above-average crane, if the average can lift 40 tons.
@Carnivorus Disagree, the did have problems with shipping significant numbers of Pershings. Also, How easy would it have been to get a Pershing to and over a beach in the Pacific? The USA fought all over the globe not just in Europe.
And similiar infrastructure and terrain restrictions is the reason for the short guns, narrow hulls and low weight of the Swedish pre 1950's tanks: their dimensions were kept limited by the railroad flat carriage width, railroad bridge load capacity and railroad tunnel standards as well as the weight limit and width of the average renaissance or medieval stone bridges that were still common as part of the rural road network. That because trains were the only realistic logistics option for any redeployment of armored formations in a very stretched densely forested and sparsely populated country like Sweden in the 1940'ies where 19th century living standards were the norm as soon as you got more than a mile outside any of the larger cities (cities over 20'000 inhabitants)
@CarnivorusNo, they didn't have problems shipping the Pershing, but that's because the Army took a look at the limitations of the Sherman with regard to weight, and increased it. The 40 ton limitation was imposed in 1941 when the first Lee-Grants came off the production line. However, the Pershing only reached Europe in 1945, by which time the lift capability had been increased to of 50 tons (and possibly even over 100 tons). The LCM2's could carry 15 tons, the LCM3 could carry 30 tons and the LCM6 could carry 32 plus tons, and the post-war LCM8 (currently in service) can carry 53 tons. Bridges also went substantial increase in carrying capacity during (and after) the war.
This could hold only after US forces already had big losses and were in France. It is actually pretty silly to think that US, a country without any limitations wouldn't be in the position to build a few cranes for tanks, considering how fast and easily they build cargo ships. What in fact happened is that US army miscalculated. They though shermans will be enough in France and actually left a few thousand models with 76mm cannon in Britain at the time of the invasion. Besides, I think Germans built their tanks to fit on the trains and equipped panthers and tigers with fording equipment.
So better than a trinity, a noninity: Protection Stealth (how easy to spot or hear the tank) Visibility (how easy to see targets and terrain around the tank) Firepower Mobility Maintainability Reliability Cost of production Communications Ergonomics can be subsumed under the others because it only matters so far as it affects those other things.
well, in that case, it was really "WTF", because what you can't see the camera stands behind a Armored car that sat in the middle of the hall, the path split around the armored car, it was even outlined with a redline. Additionally, the museum is small, so it should have been easy to avoid and also easy to see what was going on. It was not some mega-event like Tank Fest in hot summer heat etc.
It's sad that people can be that self-absorbed and oblivious to others, but setting-up a few meters of barbed wire would teach them. ;) Seriously, though, just four 1-meter poles on stands linked by tape would be pretty effective. Even when totally self-absorbed they wouldn't purposely not go around something that would inconvenience to _themselves_ to go through. I'm sure the same line-control stuff concession stands and ticket lines use are for sale to anyone.
Right. Structural strength and simplicity has value, as noted in the video. The Chieftain added that sloped armor cuts into interior space, which is precious.
it was good because it was designed to face 75mm shermans and t34 76 and the thing was simply put ,impenetrable for those plates at the ranges the Tiger was engaging them
Nice to see you working with Mr. Raths on this one. I watch documentaries (for entertainment only, along with a GIANT grain of salt of course) quite a bit and always enjoy his commentary when he is featured. Thanks for yet another great video!
As Mako below said, the Americans first planning restriction was a 40 ton limit, due to the load capacity of the dock yard cranes. If you could not load it onto a ship, it didn't matter how good the tank was, it was never going to get into the battle field.
4:10 The Vision Slits... Vision is actually critical, before you even get to the Armament, you have to Find the enemy, often looking through holes in the tank armor. (Now with Prisms, but still) What good is having Mobility, and Firepower if you drive right past the enemy? Likewise Communication, where's the rest of the tanks, and other vehicles? The infantry, who's fox-hole did we just run over, and where's the enemy? From the Operational standpoint, a lot of decisions made in Tank design involve getting the tanks to the battle. You don't just hop in, and drive there, so they had to be narrow enough to get on a train car, or light enough to drive over a bridge, while having a big enough gun, and enough armor for crew protection. How do you repair the transmission? Okay, how do you repair it in the field? (Keep in mind we're talking about a transaxel that weighs more than a Volkswagen.) ??? These are all questions that have to be answered before you even deploy tanks toward a battlefield.
@@gracefool Yes but not for the TANK. Battlefield mobility isn't operational mobility. That would be the train, or plane's mobility. When you get them to the battlefield, THEN the Tank's mobility comes into play.
Depends on the tank's role. If tank on tank combat isn't its primary purpose, but rather simply driving deep into the enemy interior to disrupt command, logistics, and morale, then you don't need to see as much when you're buttoned up.
@@IrishCarney Bullshit. You have to see where you're going, and you need to see enough of the ground to avoid Tank Tracks (Which are intentionally below the level of vision slits/Prisms) curbs, trenches, and so forth. People don't seem to realize how tanks turn, so a 4:curb can lock it into the same track it's alongside if it's too close. One of the reasons why Tanks are so useless-to-vulnerable in Urban Combat, specifically on roads designed for Cars, and Pedestrians.
Thank you some much for this video. I've learnt some new information and things that tank engineers thought about that wouldn't have never crossed my mind otherwise. Vielen Dank :D
yes, it's elements that are talked about, but it's good to summarize them and compare their influences... we don't always take them in account all together I think, so it's good to do so, especially since it's not modeled in games ^^
3:17 I thought he said 'depending on the dickhead you're fighting' and didn't bat an eye since I imagine in war the dickhead you're fighting is an extremely important factor.
Hmph an austrian and a german in Germany speaking english. Until about 100 years ago you would be speaking french, as would all nobility and you surely would be nobility. Military History Visualized von Habsburg and Ralf Raths von Hohenzollern.
@@luansagara but it did exist. French was even spoken by everyone at the treaty of Versailles, except Americans, they didnt speak French. French used to be what English is today - lingua Franca
You had me at the Monty Python reference. I'm loving the way you are talking and making films of it with others. That is the way to find out sometimes little but interesting things. You two worked really well together. You are really good at letting people speak and then making quick comments. And I found this guy to have some really interesting information. And I find that if you hear even the same thing said by someone else in a different way you tend to learn a bit more and remember it. Hearing another person say basically the same thing reinforces it in your mind.
Great video & you've definately proven IMO that the trinity of Firepovver/protection/mobility in tank design is indeed flavved, & though I vvas avvare of 1 of the other aspects that you brought up I never thought to take it into account , novvI realise hovv significant the error is . TY for making great videos about military history & all its aspects & to not be afraid of questioning things that most vievvers ( myself included ) thought vvere "vvritten in stone" . Keep up the great vvork !
I wouldn't say the "holy trinity" is obsolete, I'd say it's fine for an initial comparison between two vehicles the "stats" if you will. But if you really want to gauge the value of the vehicle on the battlefield you have to factor in so much more. And if you want the value of the vehicle on a campaign scale the list just grows longer.
I'd argue that training can sort of be considered part of the tank design, but only indirectly. A complicated design that requires more training time dedicated to lots of features or an over-designed piece of equipment is likely going to have fewer training resources and time left to produce crews of superior skill. On the strategic level, this becomes even more important - no sense having a tank you can produce in six hours if it takes six years to train the crew.
Actually you consider the quality of the people you are going to have on your tank crews as part of the design. High quality recruits in a country that is willing to devote lavish amounts of money on training them are going to have an easier time with high technology and will be able to utilize that tech to the fullest. Poor quality recruits and no willingness to devote lavish time and resources for training them demand a tank that is as simple as possible. Another factor to consider is tank cost vs reliability and maintainability. The US has always paid more for tanks in order to get tanks that were more reliable and easy to keep in running order. One of the thinks that made the M1 series tanks great is that a lot of thought went into how components were going to be accessed and removed for repair if needed. Every component in the turret that was not depot level maintenance was designed so that two people could remove it through the loader's hatch. You could replace the engine in under an hour.
But if you are an engineer talking to a politician then the trinity is a good tool for communicating overall suitability of the task and whether or not it makes sense to up gun or up armor etc.
Weapon systems integration is what our engineers talked about at McConnell-Douglas when we were upgrading the Apache helicopter. Prior to that it when the company was Hughes we met a very specific attack helicopter spec based on experience in Vietnam. One thing you didn't mention was what was acceptable human losses (no one officially talks about that).
A very worthwhile video. Going beyond the simplistic 'trinity' and exploring other factors that contribute towards the efficiency of a unit. I loved it!
Well, by definition not everythingthat works can be the best method and cost effectivity is just for those with not enogh time on theur hand and (or) not enough money. I mean, look at the Abrams, it is neither of them, compared to a Leopard and is still regarded as one of the best MBTs.
I thought the trinity of tanks was the Panzer IV, Panzer V, and Panzer VI. I really enjoyed this video, you two made a lot of good points about training and how it effects the tank in actual usage. Great job.
Das Argument mit dem Motorgeräusch ist interessant. Wir hatten damals in der Grundausbildung eine nächtliche Vorführung von Spz Luchs und Spz 10 kurz, wobei man den Hotchkis kilometerweit kommen hörte und den Luchs nur an seinen quischenden Bremsen ungefähr lokalisieren konnte. Der ziemlich große Luchs stand plötzlich neben uns.
Don't forget gun depression, Lindybeige and The_Chieftain had talked about how the Western tanks with taller turrets have better gun depression than the Soviet tanks so even though Soviet tanks are smaller they would have to expose themselves a lot more to be able to shoot at targets below them while most western tanks don't. The more depressed your gun is, the better chances of your survival.
Jinseual Good luck finding a suitable hill to make use of gun depression on the North German Plain. Centurions may have had a field day with Syrian T-55s at Golan Heights, partly due to what you said, but I don't think it can be generally applied as a major factor. Especially considering the geography of West Germany.
@@Jinseual Exactly, or you dig a depression (the tank equivalent of a fox/fighting hole) for the tank to sit in, with a ramp/slope in the front and/or maybe a berm in front and you can utilize your gun depression.
What do you mean? Should the crew get out to dig an artificial mound just to get good use of their depressed gun? I'm sure its a good thing to have on your tank, but in general terms, i think many other factors comes first.
Just by reading the title I think: this will be a great video! My first spontaneus thought: context of application (where is the tank going to be used and by whom?). My second spontaneus thought: ergonomics My third spontaneous thought: communication My first elaborated thought: Looks like I already learned quite a lot from MHV and I can't wait to see this vid!
6:00 That's not really the reason for straight plates. Its because they offered a larger interior, so your crew is more comfortable and they have more room for ammunition and stuff. Why do you think all tanks post war abandoned all angling on the sides and back but they increased severely the angling on the front ? I don't know with what 2 bit engineer you were talking to, but there is no significant difference between how well a angled plate and a vertical plate are supported. Yes, there is a difference but is irrelevant. When we talk about penetration, what it matters is caliber of incoming round, kinetic force and how thick and angled your plate is.
In fairness, I'm not going to rule it out as having been an additional consideration. I'm going to presume that Ralf has read some of the original source material which you and I have not.
Great to see another video on this subject of the "trinity of tank design" Too many people put stock in just those three factors and fail to consider the myriad of other factors.
I recall reading about how late war Panthers had poor welds due to a lack of materials required in welding. The seams would split on the turret welds even when the armor was not penetrated. Gets to Ralf's point about quality of steel and its mounting.
One thing I used to hear quite often now is, oversimplified of course, that the russians could repair nearly everything with 3 tools while the germans needed at least three specialized mechanics to figure out the problem. As said, very oversimplified, but I find some truth in it. If you can easily repair minor damage caused by terrain or simle tear over time, then you save a huge amount of time and ressources (as in personel that coud work more efficient on other stuff).
DaNikolo not quite right. But the russians had one advantage. They didn’t imply parts that were expensive and thus hard to come by. On the other hand the germans did exactly this and the closer you come to technical perfection, the more complex it gets to fix problems that still occur from time to time. I am a mechanic and if I have some older cars ( like a '94 VW Golf III) in front of me, it is way easier to find and fix errors. If I have a VW Golf VII GTI for example, and it’s a more complex error, it often takes over an hour to find and fix them.
You are mostly correct. The Russians had a "battle life" of 3 months for their tanks so they didn't built it to have a 20 year life span. If it was still around after 3 months, all well and good. The Germans couldn't help but NOT go overboard on technical innovation because they couldn't see the tank wasn't going to last 20 years. However, with Panzer Iv's and StuGs on the Golan Heights in the 1960's, who am I to judge? But you do hit on one very important point, ease of maintenance. To have a transmission change, a Panther needed to have it's turret removed, all the interior front end removed and then the transmission removed - a three day job before you even replaced it. A Sherman could be towed in, the front end removed, an entire new front end and transmission bolted on and be back in service in under 3 hours. The benefits of the car industry and assembly line technology.
I think having such a sliding scale of comparison is what makes tanks such an interesting feild of study. Making an effective weapon is hard enough, making it mobilized, crewed well and long-lived, well, could talk about it for ages. Someone aught to make a RUclips channel about that... :-p Keep it up mate, good stuff.
A tank must move, shoot, and communicate. 1 If it can't communicate, it is a mobile gun, you can move and shoot. 2. If can't move, it is a pillbox, you can communicate and shoot. 3, If it can't shoot, you have a 63 ton portable radio. The real world has ten thousand factors. US tanks were superior in mobile war, in part because of their relative reliability, which enabled building concentrations, in part because of the stabilized sight and gun that permitted shooting while on the move. Shooting first was a great advantage.
Very good discussion about design and I would add a huge design factor logistics. We always considered logistical support in the design of aircraft. It factors into several of your points. Also as a designer I have had several what was I thinking incidents after we fielded the system.
Great video, we probably shouldn't call it the trinity, and more like the tank commandments. When I first saw the video I thought it was going to be about something Guderian talked about with 3 different types of tanks. If I remember correctly it is, recon tanks, anti tank tanks, and finally a heavy defensive tank.
Ralf Raths reminds of Ralph Finnes (Holly molly they even has the same first name!) in Schindler's list. In terms of look and specially manner of speech.
I think the trinity makes most sense from the perspective of design decisions within given constraints such as total weight that can be supported by logistics and infrastructure in the operational area. If you have bridges with strict weight limits and very rough terrain for example then total weight will necessarily be lower and thus sacrificing some protection for mobility and firepower would make sense. Determining the best fit into the strategic doctrine of the user is also important. If your country is tiny and the likely enemy approaches can be anticipated then defensive ambush tactics might be part of your doctrine. In that case, some mobility could be sacrificed for firepower and protection. If you have rough terrain with many opportunities for cover and concealment and a known likely enemy with armor that has excellent protection, then perhaps you would emphasize firepower over protection or even mobility. But none of this is comparative evaluation of a specific complete tank design against other specific tanks. It is just a thought of what features might be particularly well suited to your needs. Of course other features such as communication and fire control will also play a large role in how well the final design will perform in the tasks it is given.
So true! I believe video games and how they rate individual tanks often leads to this one-dimensional way of thinking. I really appreciate you guys and anyone who is digging deeper so we can understand the men who designed the tanks as well as the men who fought in them. It is sad that by the time video games, models, and museums made interest in tanks explode, that all the men who designed the World War II tanks had died. It would be very interesting to interview them. Thanks, keep up the good work.
On the issue of the crew needing or not needing a specialized crew, in "Panzer Ace" by von Rosen, the author constantly talks about how he and his crew would spend hours a day sometimes carrying out maintenance on their own tank, such as cleaning the air filters (vital to get out dust in the summer), changing the water, fixing tracks and wheels, etc. That's aside from the maintenance crews showing up to carry out more major repairs and tasks.
I was trained to be a cavalry scout on th M3 Bradley. I always thought it stranger that I would in in a vehicle taller and louder than the M1 that we would be scouting for.
Those were the days. A platoon of tanks and a platoon of scouts who always trained together. And knew that whatever happened - they could depend on each other. Which didn't stop us tankers from deliberately misidentifying the M3 CFV as a "BMP" just to screw with the scouts.
@@colincampbell767 After a NG ARTEP (where the 10th Mountain was the OpFor), the officers had an After Action Review to include everyone, which doubled as a learning opportunity, one officer went into bounding overwatch vs moving overwatch using M113s (the Scouts) and Tanks. During the exercise, the Tanks provided Moving overwatch for the Scouts through a highs shrub field. The Officer asked if a bounding overwatch could have been used, with the Tanks and Scouts taking turns providing overwatch. I (an E-4, but with prior service in the Active Army) kind of shocked everyone by saying you could, but I wouldn't. To the officer's credit, he asked why. I said the tanks were too valuable to risk, AND they do not have the visibility to adequately respond to the infantry hiding in the dense shrubs. Upon realizing I may have embarrassed the officer (my brain had been in a pure tactical evaluation mode), I immediately said my OPINION would be different in a more open field. LOL With regards to the shrubs, one of the guys on another track in my platoon had told me that they were engaging some infantry on their 10 o'clock. When an Ump "killed"the track. Because we had infantry and vehicles together, a track was not allowed to approach within 25 meters (don't remember exact distance) of infantry and any infantry that finds itself within 15 meters had to make themselves visible and were considered "killed". When the Ump walked over to the track, the track commander immediately started complaining that they were not "really" within 25 meters and they were going safely past them anyway. The Ump calmly said that the track was not "killed" because of the squad at his 10 o'clock, but the other squad that he did not see 15 meters at his 1 o'clock. LOL And this is with the driver, TC, and as much as four guys with their heads sticking out of the back top hatch looking. Good times.
Was it at least faster, more fuel efficient? That way you could zip away from the main body, then back again to deliver reports or the like. Right? Also, be careful what you wish for - the BMP-1 and 2 are VERY low slung, but so much so that main gun fires at the level of, not above the heads of, dismounted infantry.
@@IrishCarney The first true IFVs, rather than simply an APC! With that said, I think the BMPs would make poor scouts because the turret wa so small. It would if you had a turret that can fit two, the gunner and commander. Th gunner can look one through the gun optics and the commander can stick his head out for a bigger picture view. Also, people often underestimate the advantage of popping your headout to listen or even smell. Of course, these days, you can do a lot with just optics, particularly if you can raise a periscope. That would be ideal. Whether you have tracked or wheeled depends a lot on the terrain expected. There were occasions (area not that hilly, lots of roadways, light woods) where I liked the HMMWV as a scout vehicle. Edit: Sorry, did not answer your first question. The M3 was more fuel efficient, but not faster. The M1 can also accelerate faster. With regards to reporting, today, it is pretty much all done with the radio. We had a saying even back then, "First Out, Last In". First to go out to scout around and last in, screen the movement back. During exercises, we rarely passed back through friendly lines. Supplies was brought to us, to include fuel sometimes. We did practice passage of lines, but rarely. It was more of a commander and senior NCO thing to coordinate the passage of lines.
Maybe the term "trinity" could be replaced with "quadrinity," meaning "4" aspects of tank design. But when factoring in the human element and training, is there a "5" or "6" wording term along the lines, and spirit of _trinity?_
Great collaboration video @Military History Visualized ! If I was a billionaire I would pay some skilled engineers to design a modern engine and transmission purpose-built for a still-functioning museum Tiger I or Tiger II. Then I'd pay to have it manufactured and tested, after which I'd pay mechanics and the engine designers to install the new power-train in the old Tiger tank. Using modern materials like carbon fiber, titanium, high-grade steel, CNC machining, and 3D printing, it would be amazing to see what a fully-restored Tiger II could do with a modern 1500 HP engine and new transmission in it.
The Holy Trinity exist primarily because it provided book makers a clear way to compare tanks from different countries. Growing up I used to ponder why journalist covering sports could bring up obscure facts about players careers by memory. But journalist and book makers who covered military topics have never served or known people who served. So they work best describing a tanks armor thickness or a fighters top speed as if this is what wins combat.
Great show, very interesting from the German point of view, Bernhard your more about crew interaction and ergonomics and Ralf is more about engineering. And your analysis and conclusions that it's more than the holy trinity of firepower, mobility and protection, but it's a whole host of other factors too, we can sense what problems the Germans engineers and tank crews had to assess. Thank you for keeping history alive, God bless you both, your great.
This is probably my favorite tank-related video thus far as it brings up and dispels lot of the myths that are encountered in tank internet discussions - more specifically the insistence of many commentators to make sweeping judgments about a tank based on how they perceive its fulfills the trinity (leading many to over-value heavy tanks like the Tiger while undervaluing light but easy to camouflage tank destroyers), and how such discussions often turns into a meaningless “Trump Card” battle. That said what I feel that Ralf is getting at with regards to the crew training portion is that purely technical comparisons of the machines alone is inherently misleading because as you noted tanks operate as part of a team. Tanks should instead be judged in the context of how they operate within said teams. Purely technical discussions - while popular and often necessary limitations in terms of scope especially in consideration of video runtime - should therefore be supplemented with materials on how the tanks actually operated tactically, operationally, and strategically. I would suggest that instead of just Panzer III vs T-34 comparisons, there should also be a look at how a 1941 Panzer company stacked up against a 1941 Soviet tank company, and how a 1941 Panzer Division stacked up against a contemporary Soviet Tank Division. This in many ways would actually give viewers a good idea how training, support staff, and overall readiness affected the performance of tankers. And it would be a novel approach that is a step above all of the other RUclips videomakers who discuss this topic and limit themselves just to the technical tank discussions. This approach is also something Ralf mentioned in his video with The Chieftain - with the museum intending to switch the exhibits around so that tanks are no longer grouped together, but instead would be grouped with other equipment they tended to operate with. Such an approach would, at the very least, help combat the many persistent myths born out of assumptions made about tanks based purely on their technical stats. For instance depicting the Stug as part of an independent assault support unit that was attached to infantry Divisions would do much to combat the myth it was largely a “defensive” weapon. Similarly it would counter all the British authors claiming that the Panzer IV was an “infantry” tank when it was in fact designed to support other tanks and fast-moving troops like Panzergrenadiers, and thus is very different from the British infantry tank concept.
I never thought about the box on box effect but yes that makes a lot of sense. It's basically the i beam effect. If the side plates are supporting the plate getting hit, the chassis and frame doesn't get buckled by that excess force. It also makes for easier replacement of plates. How do you even repair a cast t34 hull after a compromising hit that doesn't burn out a hull?
Good discussion! Back in the time of the 1st World War, most all machinery was very prone to consistent mechanical problems, the amount of experienced service personal (mechanics) was lower than during the 2nd World War as well. I'm not sure about all automobiles but I know that the first few Ford models came with a lot of tools. I would also think that design/engineering with training the crew in mind would be backwards/counterproductive, the only exception to that would be a piece of actual training equipment but I also would think that training equipment is made after design is completed with at least some prototypes produced.
Great video. Agree completely that there is so much more than "the trinity" in discussing tank design. However, crew training requirements to fight the tank effectively is not outside the scope of tank design. Similarly, the logistics required to maintain a tank in the field, the communication between tanks (as you point out) -- as well as providing "situational awareness" beyond just communication with other tanks are all key. Another point you touch on -- but did not dwell on -- is designing the tank so that enough can be fielded to meet the needs/available resources of the country fielding them. I understand that you need to limit the scope of the discussion -- but the ability to produce, maintain and man tanks are every bit as important as the sexy aspects like firepower and armor.
I think the "Trinity" is a real thing, but it isn't a single description, it's pointing out the three aspects, and how they need to be balanced against each other in the tank design. That doesn't mean that the best designed tank will necessarily win, because Training, Logistics, Support are all hugely important, and no matter how well you balance the three aspects, if you're not trained/supplied/supported, you're screwed. The trinity IS still worth discussing, but as one one aspect, not the sole answer.
Surprisingly enough, the Trinity in a slightly modified form is not just inherent to tanks, but EVERYTHING that moves, be it a tank, a truck, a car, an airplane, a ship, a submarine or a space ship. For ALL of those vehicles, the maneuverability, the range, and the carrying capacity are three elements of design that always need to be taken into account. For tanks in particular, the carrying capacity is broken down into defensive and offensive capabilities, the defensive capabilities being armor protection among other elements (such as size of the tank, crew ergonomics and such), and the offensive capabilities being the Main Gun, but can also include secondary guns, crew visibility (how well can the crew see), ease of loading the guns among others.
Video misses the point - "Trinity" is about tank design not operations or tactics. Same as sports car design is about performance and handling not what type of radio it has or who's driving it.
The issue of reliability can also be looked at as how fast can they get the tank in to operation from a cold start i.e. from asleep in a tent to fully manned and ready to move and fire
I had an Uncle who commanded a Sherman in the Canadian army during WW2. He maintained that changing speed and direction on the way to finding good hull down positions were key to fight and survive. He only lost one crew member, his driver, to a round that went right through the drivers position His tanks ( he went through 5 in total) all had the 75 mm low velocity gun which he said was excellent for 95% of the situations he found himself in, particularly taking on infantry or Anti-tank positions. He used high explosive and/or mg fire on any building or tree line that looked like it might have an anti-tank gun or panzerfaust in it. Especially so in Germany vs France and Holland. One German gun crew put two rounds into the engine before perforating the crew compartment- very sporting of them. They all bailed out in record time and apparently much faster than when practiced. He did say it was quite good to have a Firefly nearby (common Canadian practice) if they encountered heavy German armour that hadn't been taken on by air support. He was quite happy with the Sherman - especially after wet stowage was finally brought in. They also figured out how to use a coin under the governor spring to get a bit more speed out of the the radial engine. They only did that when they knew they were probably going to be in actual combat They made their own boiling vessel by hanging a can of water in front of the engine exhaust - heated water up really fast. They also always "lost" the 50 cal to the infantry (very useful to supporting Bren Gun carriers) as it made an already tall tank more visible and could interfere with a hasty exit. Also NEVER sleep under a tank as the relatively narrow tracks of a Sherman tended to slowly sink into the soil during the night - they lost an entire tank crew when it rained one night and they suffocated as it crushed them.
Given the reliability issues of late WWII German tasks, one wonders how many tanks that Allied flyers claimed to have "destroyed" by air attack were already broken down. A working tank was much less likely to be visible from the air than one broken down along a road or stalled in the middle of a field.
Your not off as the other allies planes like the p40 where strapped rockets when they were not made for it. A lot of kills they claim can be brought down way above fifty percent
There were a couple of Irishmen who planned to declare war on the Soviet Union at one point, but decided against it when they learned that the Soviets had an Army of 50 million men. They couldn't figure out what were they going to do with 50 million Prisoners of War.
Despite our pugnacity and perceived expendability, the Irish were not used as shock troops as much as our Celtic cousins from Scotland. It's Scottish, not Irish bagpipes, that have echoed from hills all over the world, from Afghanistan to South Africa to New Guinea.
If you like in-depth researched videos on Military History and talk with experts, consider supporting me on Patreon: patreon.com/mhv/
The Panzermuseum's RUclips Channel is here and there will be English Videos in the future: www.RUclips.com/daspanzermuseum
on fuel side the discussion is easy: tank type dictates: scouting is gasoline and mai battletank is diesel (because it is a stronger engine on the torque side and the fuel doenst burn as easy as gasoline).
why would you want to complicated your supply line though
Irobert1115HD They are all multi fuel.
@@thethirdman225 i know but they are mostly running on diesel on parades and or using engines that are realted to the diesel engine by construction or turbines.
One interesting episode was in late 1939 when, after the Hitler-Stalin pact, the Soviets could put their hands on a Panzer III, and compare it. And indeed what they found is than in the "holy trinity", the T-34 was indeed superior, as its 45-mm armour was much thicker than the 30-mm of its opponent, and was sloped ans even when considering that the Germans used face-hardened plate, the ratio would still be 61 to 36 mm equivalent.
Of course the 76-mm gun ont the T-34 was vastly superior to the 37-mm on the Panzer III, no contest here. Not only was the F-34 easily able to penetrate any German tank at the time while the PAK 36 and its derivatives would become to be known as "Panzeranklopfgeräte" (Tank door knockers), its HE projectile was also almost 10x as heavy.
And despite having the firepower and armour protection of a contemporary heavy tank, thanks to its 500hp Diesel engine and wide tracks the T-34 had very good mobility as well; in theory making it the first ever Main Battle Tank, before the term was even invented.
But they also found many things they liked about the Pz III. Many things like the superior workmanship and the complexity of its optics or drivetrain they found outside the possibilities of the Soviet industry at the time, but they identified three crucial engineering solutions that every future Soviet tank should include:
- torsion bar suspension, giving it a smooth ride at high speed, while avoiding the huge impact on internal volume by the Chrisie-type suspension
- 3-man turret with a commanders cupola, giving the gunner, the loader and the commander dedicated functions
- good communication between tank, instead of only equipping command tank with radios
The lessons were indeed learned, but too slowly adapted to counter Operation Barbarossa
The fundamental skill of a combat soldier (or tanker) in the US Army is "Shoot, move, and communicate". Tankers have to do this as much as everyone else. The card game you are referring to at about 10 minutes is known as "Top Trumps" in English (I have made the exact same comparison). Fully agreed on the importance of a tank suiting the requirements of the nation which built it, which may not be as important to any other nation. A good example of the crossover between training and ergonomics such as at 16:30 is the introduction of the automatic (Hydromatic) transmission on the M24. Suddenly drivers didn't need to be as highly trained to get reasonable capability out of the tank. See also fire control systems. An example of the nature of reliability at the crew level was the Dracula test in the UK. Both Cromwell and Sherman generally made every stage per day, but the Cromwell showed up later due to on-the-road breakdowns. The crew repaired them, but they got less sleep as a result, affecting their capability and morale. That all said, I wouldn't go as far as to say that the Holy Trinity is obsolete.
Please do inside hatch on Tiger II!
Reason: it is like Chieftain - having impregnable armor on the outside, but the soft and squishy interior is susceptible to significant emotional event! Do it!!! Plz
Oh, speaking of Hydromatic transmission, what do you think about the ones on Tiger and Tiger II? Is the reduction in requirement for good driver a reasonable trade off for the increased complexity?
I'd argue, that the holy trinity is not obsolete, and far from it. However(!) it's focussing on one tank (model) in particular. In a world where units and combined arms exists this approach is naturally flawed. It's a good starting point to compare "hard" facts of a vehicle, facts that you can measure easily. The crews performance is very important, but how do you measure it? Reload speed? Target acquisition time? How good the driver is in terrain? That's hard to put on paper, where you can just put a ruler on the armour plate, write down the thickness and call it a day.
That naturally leads to a few armchair generals and arguments like "The M4 Sherman pure shit and the Tiger II is the best tank in the world", completely disregarding that the Tiger II was a very much a mediocre tank (imo) because of its out of combat flaws like speed, reliability, steel quality, etc.
tl;dr; Holy trinity is good for a first look at the model, but should not be used when discussing anything bigger.
I learned in world of tanks that it is best to move after shooting. once the enemy has identified you, it's time to get go
The Chieftain to the rescue! Love your channel!
guy is dressed like a Bond villain
Hahhahah SPOTON man.
Nope, a Bond villain needs to have a cat...wait...dont i see a 70ton cat there? OK,mb
My man is a bond villain
BOND villain?!? No, no, no! Die Hard all day. He just poses as a historian. I am afraid that Bernhardt is already a hostage. Somebody get Bruce Willis, fast!
What? Are you suggesting germans dress like (bond) villains?
You really are a good interviewer. You know when to speak, you know when to listen, you allow both parties to inter - view (to exchange views).
Awesome job!
First!
But seriously they are both exemplary here. Too many people can't resist the urge to show how much they know even if it makes them look stupid in the end.
@@vdotme I really... really have a distaste for most YT collaborations. It usually becomes a popularity contest!
"Im better than you"
"No, im better than you!"
"Im funnier than you"
"No! Im funnier than you!"
"I have more knowledge than you"
"No!!! I have all the knowledge!"
"Im talking now"
"Yes, but I need to speak more than you do!"
Its ridiculous! What happened to the good, old fashion, coherent, beautiful, intellectual, academic discussions?!
The owner of this channel does it perfectly! He does a true inter-view. And, as a bonus, we can actually learn something meaningful :)
Proper job!
As long as tanks don't have wings, they will always be flawed.
Thanks for the interview, great stuff! There is something to be said about the 'simplicity' of the Trinity that covers tank design It gives us a good idea of what goes 'into' making a tank and the respective tradeoffs that come with it. Of course, there is more to it that once you go into detail and once you see how these 'hard' stats (as Ralf mentions with the Trump cards) actually perform in the field. Suddenly ergonomics, crew training, and communication get as important. It's similar with planes, the overall designs can give you clues to the respective qualities of the planes vis-a-vis but once the gloves are off, those qualities are suddenly put into balance by the way pilots use them. Also, just like with tanks we can see how their internal design often reflects their purpose. For example, on many of the early fighters of WW2, pilot comfort was somewhat omitted since those planes would usually only stay in the air for about an hour. So in the design, it wasn't 'as' importnant to provide a more comfy ride whereas late war, with the introduction of long-range escort fighters, crew comfort & ergonomics suddenly becomes more important and this is reflected in the aircraft themselves.
Military Aviation History / there is one flying tank.....the A-10 thunderbolt.
Didnt they try wings on a tank so they could glide them down from planes?
Does parashute a tank from a plane count as flying? :D
@@iceee420 Yes, and there was a Christie's tank with wings that was supposed to fly by its own. But the armor protection was ridiculous because it had to be light enough. Iirc prototypes were actually built and tested and found totally impractical.
...hides flying tank....
What's up, guys. Our own Hans Gruber is headed for training right now, but will comment later.
I hope I get to visit DasPanermuseum one day! it's a biit of a trip from Canada.
Hans Gruber? Didn't John McClane ....? Oh well. "Happy trails, Hans"
#@@darthvader4316:
Well, it is just EUR 900 away (both ways)...
i Hase heard from the Chieftain another Reosons against sloped armours that sloped armour when it sloped to the inside reduce space and sloped to the outside is not verry Usual .
Did he take his little tank with him?
I have commanded tanks AND designed them [a few years ago], so I found this talk fascinating.
The trinity is not flawed, but it is not all-encompassing. It represents a set of trade-offs that determine the overall design. In WWII, a heavily armored tank with a large gun will likely have decreased mobility, a light, fast tank will have to reduce the weight of the armament and armor. The various potential design combinations then have to be evaluated in light of current doctrine and potential opponents.
Advancing technology distorted this clean vision of a trinity of design trade-offs: the heavy tank disappeared and the medium tank became the main battle tank in the 1960's. In 1985, the M1A1 Abrams achieved all three elements at the same time: it was superior in all three values and had thermal sights on top of it, starting a bit of an arms race that left older tanks completely obsolete.
Modern tank designs are now addressing long-range and all-round sensors [including aerial drones], active camouflage, crew automation, and maintainability - but only after the firepower, mobility, and protection are decided.
At some point, people began misinterpreting the trinity as the most important aspects of a tank instead of its original intention when it was really about those values being inevitable or direct trade-offs. That said, I'd still argue that the holy trinity is sort of a flawed concept because you can make trade-offs between other elements such as protection and ergonomics, which then invalidates the trinity anyways.
Emery Almasy The problem is more the way it’s used, not by professionals but by gamers posing as knowledgeable people or worse, historians. From my armchair, the holy trinity model is simply incomplete and is the basis for spec sheet warfare which ignores any and all tactical and strategic considerations. There is a train of thought on the interwebs which actively discourages people from looking beyond equipment and focussing solely on what they call “tech”, all the while ignoring the human factors and decisions which make for success in warfare.
Michael Smith They can already do that with reactive armour.
@Michael Smith even smart bombs are stupid enough to be tricked
I would not bet on tanks becoming obsolete, especially since they will be (wo)maned by only two people in a matter of years and possibly only one person in a matter of at most two decades. Then you can reduce size and thus energy consumption and thanks to massproduction you get a pretty cheap and yet very effective weapon; on top of that comes the fact that the ratio of fire- to manpower is incredibily good, if you can reduce the crew to two or even one.
So my guess is that tanks are here to stay for quite a while.
@@IzmirWayne People says tha tanks are obsolete since WWI and th beginning of anti-tanks weapons, and your concept of one or two persons in a tank is pretty much as old... French were the ones who tried it the most, and it never worked very well, we expect the crew to do most of the job, serve the tank and maintain it, mechanics gets involved wen something is broken, and 2 guys (or even worse, one guy) having to fully maintain a tank in war situation is not good, more people in the tank means more people to maintain it and doesn't mean the job won't be well done if your loader is human and not a machine
Two Germans dressed in black discussing the fine points of tank design. Que James Bond theme.
One German and one Austrian 😜
@@CCfiftyeight Even more dangerous! Two weeks until I see my Austrian relatives again for christmas ^^
@@CCfiftyeight so two Germans?
@Xenomorph Captain Vex Ghost of the brony community you're right, I just see the word "que" and think they mean a line. whichever word they mean it's equally annoying
@@CCfiftyeight heh m8 Austrians are germans they just not allowed on paper to merge into one country anymore.
And the fact that the prussians kicked them out in the first place was as i recall the start of the end for Austro-Hungary.
"Protection starts with not being seen." Cue Monty Python reference.
....and not being seen starts with avoiding the draft! "Win by not playing game".... old Tsun Tzsu philosophy.
The first rule of not being seen is to not stand up when they call your name.
Mr. Nesbit, can you stand up please? *BOOM!*
Wrong one of the big faults of the Sherman was it was too tall.
And that is why they're both still alive! They clearly know the importance of not being seen!
Military History Visualized: the answer is always it’s complicated. Also logistics.
3:16 ‘Depending on the Dickhead you are fighting’
I think he actually said "decade" but im not sure.
Definitely 'decade'
Decade. Definitely.
Definitely "decade".
One good thing about Germany is that it learned from history. The rest of us just keep on producing conflict after conflict, with supposed "dickheads", even when there is no evidence to back up the purpose.
Definetly Dickhead.
How not to be killed
1. Don't be there in the first place.
2. If you must be there do not be seen. - Camo and concealment
3. If you are seen do not be engaged. - Pulling back- Mobility
4. If you are engaged do not be hit. - Mobility
5. If you are hit do not be penetrated. - Armor
6. If you are penetrated do not be killed. - Layout
Yea the trinity gets kind of confusing when you explore it.
2. Know where the enemy is. -Optics and Communication
The other Trinity reliability, producebility, and suvivalblity
Simplfy tho
1,5. If you must be there, do not walk in front of the camera.
Maverick_CIV 7. Use your brains. Lay an ambush and prosecute it with the utmost ruthlessness. Once you start shooting, you can’t stop until everyone else is dead or captured. 8. Don’t be squeamish.
@Maverick_CIV at number 3 I think you should add weapon system lethality as well as communications, if you can't kill it and have to move back you also need to communicate that. But as Bernd and Ralph say in the video, a lot of factors that sort of meld together.
There was a point that went past too quickly - German tanks being built around the load bearing capacity of German military bridges. This was also something that the Chieftain expanded on in the design of the Sherman. The Americans FIRST planning brief was to make a tank that weighted less than 40 tons. Why? Because that was the load capacity of the average crane in dockyards. His point was (from a non-European view point), it didn't matter how good your tank was if you couldn't get it into the battle field.
@Carnivorus If I remember correctly, there were a lot fewer Pershings shipped than Shermans. And they would only require a slightly-above-average crane, if the average can lift 40 tons.
@Carnivorus Disagree, the did have problems with shipping significant numbers of Pershings. Also, How easy would it have been to get a Pershing to and over a beach in the Pacific? The USA fought all over the globe not just in Europe.
And similiar infrastructure and terrain restrictions is the reason for the short guns, narrow hulls and low weight of the Swedish pre 1950's tanks: their dimensions were kept limited by the railroad flat carriage width, railroad bridge load capacity and railroad tunnel standards as well as the weight limit and width of the average renaissance or medieval stone bridges that were still common as part of the rural road network.
That because trains were the only realistic logistics option for any redeployment of armored formations in a very stretched densely forested and sparsely populated country like Sweden in the 1940'ies where 19th century living standards were the norm as soon as you got more than a mile outside any of the larger cities (cities over 20'000 inhabitants)
@CarnivorusNo, they didn't have problems shipping the Pershing, but that's because the Army took a look at the limitations of the Sherman with regard to weight, and increased it. The 40 ton limitation was imposed in 1941 when the first Lee-Grants came off the production line. However, the Pershing only reached Europe in 1945, by which time the lift capability had been increased to of 50 tons (and possibly even over 100 tons). The LCM2's could carry 15 tons, the LCM3 could carry 30 tons and the LCM6 could carry 32 plus tons, and the post-war LCM8 (currently in service) can carry 53 tons. Bridges also went substantial increase in carrying capacity during (and after) the war.
This could hold only after US forces already had big losses and were in France. It is actually pretty silly to think that US, a country without any limitations wouldn't be in the position to build a few cranes for tanks, considering how fast and easily they build cargo ships. What in fact happened is that US army miscalculated. They though shermans will be enough in France and actually left a few thousand models with 76mm cannon in Britain at the time of the invasion.
Besides, I think Germans built their tanks to fit on the trains and equipped panthers and tigers with fording equipment.
The Bob Semple
Perfectly Balanced
The one vehicle I don't think they took into consideration. :)
Best and sexiest tank ever
Hehehehehe New Zealand is finally on the map!
Definitely
As all things should be
Could this guy be more German? Ponytail, five o'clock shadow, and black turtleneck...
ja genau
They could wear Pickelhaube's on their heads and monocle's
huh never knew ponytails were part of my culture...
but yay for stereotypes
Needs angst and techno music.
Ralf Raths and Bernhard Kast I've been waiting for this way too long
So better than a trinity, a noninity:
Protection
Stealth (how easy to spot or hear the tank)
Visibility (how easy to see targets and terrain around the tank)
Firepower
Mobility
Maintainability
Reliability
Cost of production
Communications
Ergonomics can be subsumed under the others because it only matters so far as it affects those other things.
Stealth is part of protection
Tank nonagon?
>Firepower
>>Gun caliber
>>Effective range
>>Fire rate
>Mobility
>>Top speed
>>Cross country
>>Effective range
> Armor
>>Armor weight
>>Armor thickness
>>Active countermeasures
"Thinking about penal companies" LOL. You and Bismarck sure have a lot of people walk right in front of cameras without noticing what they are doing.
well, in that case, it was really "WTF", because what you can't see the camera stands behind a Armored car that sat in the middle of the hall, the path split around the armored car, it was even outlined with a redline. Additionally, the museum is small, so it should have been easy to avoid and also easy to see what was going on. It was not some mega-event like Tank Fest in hot summer heat etc.
@@MilitaryHistoryVisualized Don't worry about it, the camo sort of added to the atmosphere.
I basically lost interest once those two dumkopfs entered into the video....
they just assumed the camo made them invisible to the camera.
It's sad that people can be that self-absorbed and oblivious to others, but setting-up a few meters of barbed wire would teach them. ;)
Seriously, though, just four 1-meter poles on stands linked by tape would be pretty effective. Even when totally self-absorbed they wouldn't purposely not go around something that would inconvenience to _themselves_ to go through. I'm sure the same line-control stuff concession stands and ticket lines use are for sale to anyone.
I don't comment often but I commend you and your associate on a well thought out and presented edition.
Thank you.
I really enjoy these technical discussions that you and Bismarck do.
On top of that, thanks for another great year full of content!
Nice format- thanks for going out and interviewing, it brings out good conversation and different point of view!
But what about mice protection level? You cannot use tank if someone have eaten wires in it!
Finally someone metiones the idea
of the box style tank and that it wasn't nessecarly flawed :D.
The Chieftain also mentions this once, I think in his video on the T-34.
Right. Structural strength and simplicity has value, as noted in the video. The Chieftain added that sloped armor cuts into interior space, which is precious.
From all tanks first to cross my mind was maus
Please do not use your maus to click on this video.
it was good because it was designed to face 75mm shermans and t34 76
and the thing was simply put ,impenetrable for those plates at the ranges the Tiger was engaging them
Nice to see you working with Mr. Raths on this one. I watch documentaries (for entertainment only, along with a GIANT grain of salt of course) quite a bit and always enjoy his commentary when he is featured. Thanks for yet another great video!
Let's not forget that tanks have to be inside certain dimensions and weight due to rail tunnels and bridges.
As Mako below said, the Americans first planning restriction was a 40 ton limit, due to the load capacity of the dock yard cranes. If you could not load it onto a ship, it didn't matter how good the tank was, it was never going to get into the battle field.
Let's not forget the pepperoni nipples picture
looking forward to visit the museum soon!
enjoy and bring strong shoes, the concrete sucks out the warmth.
Excellent conversation! I really enjoyed this exchange.
Honestly, Republic Commando deserves a remaster
Not sure... we need an imperial commado more. I would much rather find out what happens to Sev than see him go MIA in HD.
That'll make a good movie too bad it not safe for Disney but instead another pointless movie
What does that have to do with this video?
Nothing, but he's completely right
@@USSAnimeNCC- oh I meant a videogame.
4:10 The Vision Slits... Vision is actually critical, before you even get to the Armament, you have to Find the enemy, often looking through holes in the tank armor. (Now with Prisms, but still) What good is having Mobility, and Firepower if you drive right past the enemy? Likewise Communication, where's the rest of the tanks, and other vehicles? The infantry, who's fox-hole did we just run over, and where's the enemy? From the Operational standpoint, a lot of decisions made in Tank design involve getting the tanks to the battle. You don't just hop in, and drive there, so they had to be narrow enough to get on a train car, or light enough to drive over a bridge, while having a big enough gun, and enough armor for crew protection. How do you repair the transmission? Okay, how do you repair it in the field? (Keep in mind we're talking about a transaxel that weighs more than a Volkswagen.) ??? These are all questions that have to be answered before you even deploy tanks toward a battlefield.
weight & getting into battle could come under mobility
@@gracefool Yes but not for the TANK. Battlefield mobility isn't operational mobility. That would be the train, or plane's mobility. When you get them to the battlefield, THEN the Tank's mobility comes into play.
Just a quick edit for you "Now with Prisms, but still" should actually be "Now with Cameras".
Depends on the tank's role. If tank on tank combat isn't its primary purpose, but rather simply driving deep into the enemy interior to disrupt command, logistics, and morale, then you don't need to see as much when you're buttoned up.
@@IrishCarney Bullshit. You have to see where you're going, and you need to see enough of the ground to avoid Tank Tracks (Which are intentionally below the level of vision slits/Prisms) curbs, trenches, and so forth. People don't seem to realize how tanks turn, so a 4:curb can lock it into the same track it's alongside if it's too close. One of the reasons why Tanks are so useless-to-vulnerable in Urban Combat, specifically on roads designed for Cars, and Pedestrians.
Tolles Gespräch! Es scheint so als haben beide voneinander gelernt.
Thank you some much for this video.
I've learnt some new information and things that tank engineers thought about that wouldn't have never crossed my mind otherwise.
Vielen Dank :D
yes, it's elements that are talked about, but it's good to summarize them and compare their influences... we don't always take them in account all together I think, so it's good to do so, especially since it's not modeled in games ^^
I love me some Ralf Raths, and I had no idea he ran the museum over there. He's done many great documentaries.
3:17 I thought he said 'depending on the dickhead you're fighting' and didn't bat an eye since I imagine in war the dickhead you're fighting is an extremely important factor.
Alec Beals hahaha I didn’t even notice it lmao
Dickhead has a different meaning in german
Your content is getting next level.
Hmph an austrian and a german in Germany speaking english. Until about 100 years ago you would be speaking french, as would all nobility and you surely would be nobility.
Military History Visualized von Habsburg and Ralf Raths von Hohenzollern.
But 100 years ago the nobility was pretty much powerless
@@luansagara but it did exist. French was even spoken by everyone at the treaty of Versailles, except Americans, they didnt speak French.
French used to be what English is today - lingua Franca
american spotted
@@vaahtobileet i doubt
Great commentary with both ideas and how conveyed from both of you. Excellent content and window into the knowledge of y'all
You had me at the Monty Python reference. I'm loving the way you are talking and making films of it with others. That is the way to find out sometimes little but interesting things. You two worked really well together. You are really good at letting people speak and then making quick comments. And I found this guy to have some really interesting information. And I find that if you hear even the same thing said by someone else in a different way you tend to learn a bit more and remember it. Hearing another person say basically the same thing reinforces it in your mind.
"Thinking about penal companies" had me spitting my drink!
Evilsamar lol, I read a semi-fiction novel about an axis penal company in WWII. They may have been danish
hmm, so pleasent to see two germans having a conversation in english :-)
Only 'cuz they're edited folks. Not lak us 'muricans
D**n google. What part of educated does that idiot word effing checker not find acceptable
Great video & you've definately proven IMO that the trinity of Firepovver/protection/mobility in tank design is indeed flavved, & though I vvas avvare of 1 of the other aspects that you brought up I never thought to take it into account , novvI realise hovv significant the error is . TY for making great videos about military history & all its aspects & to not be afraid of questioning things that most vievvers ( myself included ) thought vvere "vvritten in stone" . Keep up the great vvork !
I wouldn't say the "holy trinity" is obsolete, I'd say it's fine for an initial comparison between two vehicles the "stats" if you will. But if you really want to gauge the value of the vehicle on the battlefield you have to factor in so much more. And if you want the value of the vehicle on a campaign scale the list just grows longer.
I'd argue that training can sort of be considered part of the tank design, but only indirectly. A complicated design that requires more training time dedicated to lots of features or an over-designed piece of equipment is likely going to have fewer training resources and time left to produce crews of superior skill. On the strategic level, this becomes even more important - no sense having a tank you can produce in six hours if it takes six years to train the crew.
Actually you consider the quality of the people you are going to have on your tank crews as part of the design. High quality recruits in a country that is willing to devote lavish amounts of money on training them are going to have an easier time with high technology and will be able to utilize that tech to the fullest. Poor quality recruits and no willingness to devote lavish time and resources for training them demand a tank that is as simple as possible.
Another factor to consider is tank cost vs reliability and maintainability. The US has always paid more for tanks in order to get tanks that were more reliable and easy to keep in running order. One of the thinks that made the M1 series tanks great is that a lot of thought went into how components were going to be accessed and removed for repair if needed. Every component in the turret that was not depot level maintenance was designed so that two people could remove it through the loader's hatch. You could replace the engine in under an hour.
But if you are an engineer talking to a politician then the trinity is a good tool for communicating overall suitability of the task and whether or not it makes sense to up gun or up armor etc.
that was an outstanding discussion...loved every minute of it
Weapon systems integration is what our engineers talked about at McConnell-Douglas when we were upgrading the Apache helicopter. Prior to that it when the company was Hughes we met a very specific attack helicopter spec based on experience in Vietnam. One thing you didn't mention was what was acceptable human losses (no one officially talks about that).
A very worthwhile video. Going beyond the simplistic 'trinity' and exploring other factors that contribute towards the efficiency of a unit. I loved it!
The best method of design is that of "Whatever Works" and "What is Cost Effective".
Well, by definition not everythingthat works can be the best method and cost effectivity is just for those with not enogh time on theur hand and (or) not enough money. I mean, look at the Abrams, it is neither of them, compared to a
Leopard and is still regarded as one of the best MBTs.
@@Enthropical_Thunder Either way "Whatever Works" is a good methodology.
@@conorclimo8534 It is certainly not bad if it works and cost effectiveness is a very good bonus ;D.
I thought the trinity of tanks was the Panzer IV, Panzer V, and Panzer VI. I really enjoyed this video, you two made a lot of good points about training and how it effects the tank in actual usage. Great job.
Das Argument mit dem Motorgeräusch ist interessant. Wir hatten damals in der Grundausbildung eine nächtliche Vorführung von Spz Luchs und Spz 10 kurz, wobei man den Hotchkis kilometerweit kommen hörte und den Luchs nur an seinen quischenden Bremsen ungefähr lokalisieren konnte.
Der ziemlich große Luchs stand plötzlich neben uns.
Don't forget gun depression, Lindybeige and The_Chieftain had talked about how the Western tanks with taller turrets have better gun depression than the Soviet tanks so even though Soviet tanks are smaller they would have to expose themselves a lot more to be able to shoot at targets below them while most western tanks don't.
The more depressed your gun is, the better chances of your survival.
Jinseual Good luck finding a suitable hill to make use of gun depression on the North German Plain. Centurions may have had a field day with Syrian T-55s at Golan Heights, partly due to what you said, but I don't think it can be generally applied as a major factor. Especially considering the geography of West Germany.
@@K_Kara With human ingenuity you can make artificial mounds on some strategic positions.
@@Jinseual Exactly, or you dig a depression (the tank equivalent of a fox/fighting hole) for the tank to sit in, with a ramp/slope in the front and/or maybe a berm in front and you can utilize your gun depression.
Jinseual Why be resourceful when you can moan about equipment?
What do you mean? Should the crew get out to dig an artificial mound just to get good use of their depressed gun? I'm sure its a good thing to have on your tank, but in general terms, i think many other factors comes first.
Nice video. I was at the museum this summer. Great place to vsit, and huge ammount of vehicles.
Just by reading the title I think: this will be a great video!
My first spontaneus thought: context of application (where is the tank going to be used and by whom?).
My second spontaneus thought: ergonomics
My third spontaneous thought: communication
My first elaborated thought: Looks like I already learned quite a lot from MHV and I can't wait to see this vid!
6:00 That's not really the reason for straight plates. Its because they offered a larger interior, so your crew is more comfortable and they have more room for ammunition and stuff. Why do you think all tanks post war abandoned all angling on the sides and back but they increased severely the angling on the front ?
I don't know with what 2 bit engineer you were talking to, but there is no significant difference between how well a angled plate and a vertical plate are supported. Yes, there is a difference but is irrelevant. When we talk about penetration, what it matters is caliber of incoming round, kinetic force and how thick and angled your plate is.
In fairness, I'm not going to rule it out as having been an additional consideration. I'm going to presume that Ralf has read some of the original source material which you and I have not.
Great to see another video on this subject of the "trinity of tank design" Too many people put stock in just those three factors and fail to consider the myriad of other factors.
I recall reading about how late war Panthers had poor welds due to a lack of materials required in welding. The seams would split on the turret welds even when the armor was not penetrated. Gets to Ralf's point about quality of steel and its mounting.
"The squishy stuff inside". Thank you for this 😂
Sounds like an engineer's definition. Source: I'm an engineer. :D
I love Ralf! Thank you Bernhardt for this series of videos, the best ones so far ( for me)!
One thing I used to hear quite often now is, oversimplified of course, that the russians could repair nearly everything with 3 tools while the germans needed at least three specialized mechanics to figure out the problem. As said, very oversimplified, but I find some truth in it. If you can easily repair minor damage caused by terrain or simle tear over time, then you save a huge amount of time and ressources (as in personel that coud work more efficient on other stuff).
DaNikolo not quite right. But the russians had one advantage. They didn’t imply parts that were expensive and thus hard to come by.
On the other hand the germans did exactly this and the closer you come to technical perfection, the more complex it gets to fix problems that still occur from time to time. I am a mechanic and if I have some older cars ( like a '94 VW Golf III) in front of me, it is way easier to find and fix errors. If I have a VW Golf VII GTI for example, and it’s a more complex error, it often takes over an hour to find and fix them.
You are mostly correct. The Russians had a "battle life" of 3 months for their tanks so they didn't built it to have a 20 year life span. If it was still around after 3 months, all well and good. The Germans couldn't help but NOT go overboard on technical innovation because they couldn't see the tank wasn't going to last 20 years. However, with Panzer Iv's and StuGs on the Golan Heights in the 1960's, who am I to judge? But you do hit on one very important point, ease of maintenance. To have a transmission change, a Panther needed to have it's turret removed, all the interior front end removed and then the transmission removed - a three day job before you even replaced it. A Sherman could be towed in, the front end removed, an entire new front end and transmission bolted on and be back in service in under 3 hours. The benefits of the car industry and assembly line technology.
Damn, I love this Museum, seeing this King Tiger next to the Sturmtiger and all the other amazing vehicles around there was awesome.
"the crew, the squishy stuff inside" that cracked me up! great and educational conversation.
I think having such a sliding scale of comparison is what makes tanks such an interesting feild of study. Making an effective weapon is hard enough, making it mobilized, crewed well and long-lived, well, could talk about it for ages. Someone aught to make a RUclips channel about that... :-p
Keep it up mate, good stuff.
Tank nonagon?
>Firepower
>>Gun caliber
>>Effective range
>>Fire rate
>Mobility
>>Top speed
>>Cross country
>>Effective range
> Armor
>>Armor weight
>>Armor thickness
>>Active countermeasures
This was an interesting discussion and has altered some views of armor's role on the battlefield for me. Well done and very informative.
A tank must move, shoot, and communicate.
1 If it can't communicate, it is a mobile gun, you can move and shoot.
2. If can't move, it is a pillbox, you can communicate and shoot.
3, If it can't shoot, you have a 63 ton portable radio.
The real world has ten thousand factors. US tanks were superior in mobile war, in part because of their relative reliability, which enabled building concentrations, in part because of the stabilized sight and gun that permitted shooting while on the move. Shooting first was a great advantage.
Very good discussion about design and I would add a huge design factor logistics. We always considered logistical support in the design of aircraft. It factors into several of your points.
Also as a designer I have had several what was I thinking incidents after we fielded the system.
It's a Beautiful Tank!
Great video, we probably shouldn't call it the trinity, and more like the tank commandments. When I first saw the video I thought it was going to be about something Guderian talked about with 3 different types of tanks. If I remember correctly it is, recon tanks, anti tank tanks, and finally a heavy defensive tank.
Ralf Raths reminds of Ralph Finnes (Holly molly they even has the same first name!) in Schindler's list. In terms of look and specially manner of speech.
I think the trinity makes most sense from the perspective of design decisions within given constraints such as total weight that can be supported by logistics and infrastructure in the operational area. If you have bridges with strict weight limits and very rough terrain for example then total weight will necessarily be lower and thus sacrificing some protection for mobility and firepower would make sense. Determining the best fit into the strategic doctrine of the user is also important. If your country is tiny and the likely enemy approaches can be anticipated then defensive ambush tactics might be part of your doctrine. In that case, some mobility could be sacrificed for firepower and protection. If you have rough terrain with many opportunities for cover and concealment and a known likely enemy with armor that has excellent protection, then perhaps you would emphasize firepower over protection or even mobility.
But none of this is comparative evaluation of a specific complete tank design against other specific tanks. It is just a thought of what features might be particularly well suited to your needs. Of course other features such as communication and fire control will also play a large role in how well the final design will perform in the tasks it is given.
So true! I believe video games and how they rate individual tanks often leads to this one-dimensional way of thinking. I really appreciate you guys and anyone who is digging deeper so we can understand the men who designed the tanks as well as the men who fought in them. It is sad that by the time video games, models, and museums made interest in tanks explode, that all the men who designed the World War II tanks had died. It would be very interesting to interview them.
Thanks, keep up the good work.
At 6:30 the supporting structure of 'the Germanic 'cube on cube'' a great explanation of the design Tiger 1 etc.
On the issue of the crew needing or not needing a specialized crew, in "Panzer Ace" by von Rosen, the author constantly talks about how he and his crew would spend hours a day sometimes carrying out maintenance on their own tank, such as cleaning the air filters (vital to get out dust in the summer), changing the water, fixing tracks and wheels, etc. That's aside from the maintenance crews showing up to carry out more major repairs and tasks.
great interview!!!
Love your content. Thanks for another great video (and yes, I know I'm half a year late!).
I was trained to be a cavalry scout on th M3 Bradley. I always thought it stranger that I would in in a vehicle taller and louder than the M1 that we would be scouting for.
Those were the days. A platoon of tanks and a platoon of scouts who always trained together. And knew that whatever happened - they could depend on each other.
Which didn't stop us tankers from deliberately misidentifying the M3 CFV as a "BMP" just to screw with the scouts.
@@colincampbell767
After a NG ARTEP (where the 10th Mountain was the OpFor), the officers had an After Action Review to include everyone, which doubled as a learning opportunity, one officer went into bounding overwatch vs moving overwatch using M113s (the Scouts) and Tanks. During the exercise, the Tanks provided Moving overwatch for the Scouts through a highs shrub field. The Officer asked if a bounding overwatch could have been used, with the Tanks and Scouts taking turns providing overwatch. I (an E-4, but with prior service in the Active Army) kind of shocked everyone by saying you could, but I wouldn't. To the officer's credit, he asked why. I said the tanks were too valuable to risk, AND they do not have the visibility to adequately respond to the infantry hiding in the dense shrubs. Upon realizing I may have embarrassed the officer (my brain had been in a pure tactical evaluation mode), I immediately said my OPINION would be different in a more open field. LOL
With regards to the shrubs, one of the guys on another track in my platoon had told me that they were engaging some infantry on their 10 o'clock. When an Ump "killed"the track. Because we had infantry and vehicles together, a track was not allowed to approach within 25 meters (don't remember exact distance) of infantry and any infantry that finds itself within 15 meters had to make themselves visible and were considered "killed". When the Ump walked over to the track, the track commander immediately started complaining that they were not "really" within 25 meters and they were going safely past them anyway. The Ump calmly said that the track was not "killed" because of the squad at his 10 o'clock, but the other squad that he did not see 15 meters at his 1 o'clock. LOL And this is with the driver, TC, and as much as four guys with their heads sticking out of the back top hatch looking.
Good times.
Was it at least faster, more fuel efficient? That way you could zip away from the main body, then back again to deliver reports or the like. Right? Also, be careful what you wish for - the BMP-1 and 2 are VERY low slung, but so much so that main gun fires at the level of, not above the heads of, dismounted infantry.
@@IrishCarney
The first true IFVs, rather than simply an APC! With that said, I think the BMPs would make poor scouts because the turret wa so small. It would if you had a turret that can fit two, the gunner and commander. Th gunner can look one through the gun optics and the commander can stick his head out for a bigger picture view. Also, people often underestimate the advantage of popping your headout to listen or even smell.
Of course, these days, you can do a lot with just optics, particularly if you can raise a periscope. That would be ideal. Whether you have tracked or wheeled depends a lot on the terrain expected. There were occasions (area not that hilly, lots of roadways, light woods) where I liked the HMMWV as a scout vehicle.
Edit: Sorry, did not answer your first question. The M3 was more fuel efficient, but not faster. The M1 can also accelerate faster. With regards to reporting, today, it is pretty much all done with the radio. We had a saying even back then, "First Out, Last In". First to go out to scout around and last in, screen the movement back. During exercises, we rarely passed back through friendly lines. Supplies was brought to us, to include fuel sometimes. We did practice passage of lines, but rarely. It was more of a commander and senior NCO thing to coordinate the passage of lines.
Maybe the term "trinity" could be replaced with "quadrinity," meaning "4" aspects of tank design.
But when factoring in the human element and training, is there a "5" or "6" wording term along the lines, and spirit of _trinity?_
Great discussion. "The squishy stuff inside." Nice. I suppose 'Squishy' is a key aspect: training, ergonomics, communication, tactics, even strategy.
A fascinating and thought provoking video. Many thanks!
Great collaboration video @Military History Visualized ! If I was a billionaire I would pay some skilled engineers to design a modern engine and transmission purpose-built for a still-functioning museum Tiger I or Tiger II. Then I'd pay to have it manufactured and tested, after which I'd pay mechanics and the engine designers to install the new power-train in the old Tiger tank. Using modern materials like carbon fiber, titanium, high-grade steel, CNC machining, and 3D printing, it would be amazing to see what a fully-restored Tiger II could do with a modern 1500 HP engine and new transmission in it.
The Holy Trinity exist primarily because it provided book makers a clear way to compare tanks from different countries. Growing up I used to ponder why journalist covering sports could bring up obscure facts about players careers by memory. But journalist and book makers who covered military topics have never served or known people who served. So they work best describing a tanks armor thickness or a fighters top speed as if this is what wins combat.
Great show, very interesting from the German point of view, Bernhard your more about crew interaction and ergonomics and Ralf is more about engineering. And your analysis and conclusions that it's more than the holy trinity of firepower, mobility and protection, but it's a whole host of other factors too, we can sense what problems the Germans engineers and tank crews had to assess.
Thank you for keeping history alive, God bless you both, your great.
Excellent discussion. Would be nice to get a current tank engineer and tank commander to participate in a future discussion.
Overloaded suspensions of the King Tiger is the biggest flaw by far
Excellent discussion!
great video!
This is probably my favorite tank-related video thus far as it brings up and dispels lot of the myths that are encountered in tank internet discussions - more specifically the insistence of many commentators to make sweeping judgments about a tank based on how they perceive its fulfills the trinity (leading many to over-value heavy tanks like the Tiger while undervaluing light but easy to camouflage tank destroyers), and how such discussions often turns into a meaningless “Trump Card” battle.
That said what I feel that Ralf is getting at with regards to the crew training portion is that purely technical comparisons of the machines alone is inherently misleading because as you noted tanks operate as part of a team. Tanks should instead be judged in the context of how they operate within said teams.
Purely technical discussions - while popular and often necessary limitations in terms of scope especially in consideration of video runtime - should therefore be supplemented with materials on how the tanks actually operated tactically, operationally, and strategically.
I would suggest that instead of just Panzer III vs T-34 comparisons, there should also be a look at how a 1941 Panzer company stacked up against a 1941 Soviet tank company, and how a 1941 Panzer Division stacked up against a contemporary Soviet Tank Division. This in many ways would actually give viewers a good idea how training, support staff, and overall readiness affected the performance of tankers. And it would be a novel approach that is a step above all of the other RUclips videomakers who discuss this topic and limit themselves just to the technical tank discussions.
This approach is also something Ralf mentioned in his video with The Chieftain - with the museum intending to switch the exhibits around so that tanks are no longer grouped together, but instead would be grouped with other equipment they tended to operate with.
Such an approach would, at the very least, help combat the many persistent myths born out of assumptions made about tanks based purely on their technical stats. For instance depicting the Stug as part of an independent assault support unit that was attached to infantry Divisions would do much to combat the myth it was largely a “defensive” weapon. Similarly it would counter all the British authors claiming that the Panzer IV was an “infantry” tank when it was in fact designed to support other tanks and fast-moving troops like Panzergrenadiers, and thus is very different from the British infantry tank concept.
I never thought about the box on box effect but yes that makes a lot of sense. It's basically the i beam effect. If the side plates are supporting the plate getting hit, the chassis and frame doesn't get buckled by that excess force. It also makes for easier replacement of plates. How do you even repair a cast t34 hull after a compromising hit that doesn't burn out a hull?
Good discussion! Back in the time of the 1st World War, most all machinery was very prone to consistent mechanical problems, the amount of experienced service personal (mechanics) was lower than during the 2nd World War as well. I'm not sure about all automobiles but I know that the first few Ford models came with a lot of tools.
I would also think that design/engineering with training the crew in mind would be backwards/counterproductive, the only exception to that would be a piece of actual training equipment but I also would think that training equipment is made after design is completed with at least some prototypes produced.
Great video. Agree completely that there is so much more than "the trinity" in discussing tank design. However, crew training requirements to fight the tank effectively is not outside the scope of tank design. Similarly, the logistics required to maintain a tank in the field, the communication between tanks (as you point out) -- as well as providing "situational awareness" beyond just communication with other tanks are all key. Another point you touch on -- but did not dwell on -- is designing the tank so that enough can be fielded to meet the needs/available resources of the country fielding them. I understand that you need to limit the scope of the discussion -- but the ability to produce, maintain and man tanks are every bit as important as the sexy aspects like firepower and armor.
can you make a video talking about the different kinds of tank shells and how they worked
I think the "Trinity" is a real thing, but it isn't a single description, it's pointing out the three aspects, and how they need to be balanced against each other in the tank design.
That doesn't mean that the best designed tank will necessarily win, because Training, Logistics, Support are all hugely important, and no matter how well you balance the three aspects, if you're not trained/supplied/supported, you're screwed.
The trinity IS still worth discussing, but as one one aspect, not the sole answer.
Surprisingly enough, the Trinity in a slightly modified form is not just inherent to tanks, but EVERYTHING that moves, be it a tank, a truck, a car, an airplane, a ship, a submarine or a space ship. For ALL of those vehicles, the maneuverability, the range, and the carrying capacity are three elements of design that always need to be taken into account. For tanks in particular, the carrying capacity is broken down into defensive and offensive capabilities, the defensive capabilities being armor protection among other elements (such as size of the tank, crew ergonomics and such), and the offensive capabilities being the Main Gun, but can also include secondary guns, crew visibility (how well can the crew see), ease of loading the guns among others.
Video misses the point - "Trinity" is about tank design not operations or tactics. Same as sports car design is about performance and handling not what type of radio it has or who's driving it.
The issue of reliability can also be looked at as how fast can they get the tank in to operation from a cold start i.e. from asleep in a tent to fully manned and ready to move and fire
Is there an online publication of the engineer notebooks in designing the tanks? I wanted to read and do some of my own research
I had an Uncle who commanded a Sherman in the Canadian army during WW2. He maintained that changing speed and direction on the way to finding good hull down positions were key to fight and survive. He only lost one crew member, his driver, to a round that went right through the drivers position His tanks ( he went through 5 in total) all had the 75 mm low velocity gun which he said was excellent for 95% of the situations he found himself in, particularly taking on infantry or Anti-tank positions. He used high explosive and/or mg fire on any building or tree line that looked like it might have an anti-tank gun or panzerfaust in it. Especially so in Germany vs France and Holland.
One German gun crew put two rounds into the engine before perforating the crew compartment- very sporting of them. They all bailed out in record time and apparently much faster than when practiced.
He did say it was quite good to have a Firefly nearby (common Canadian practice) if they encountered heavy German armour that hadn't been taken on by air support.
He was quite happy with the Sherman - especially after wet stowage was finally brought in. They also figured out how to use a coin under the governor spring to get a bit more speed out of the the radial engine. They only did that when they knew they were probably going to be in actual combat
They made their own boiling vessel by hanging a can of water in front of the engine exhaust - heated water up really fast. They also always "lost" the 50 cal to the infantry (very useful to supporting Bren Gun carriers) as it made an already tall tank more visible and could interfere with a hasty exit.
Also NEVER sleep under a tank as the relatively narrow tracks of a Sherman tended to slowly sink into the soil during the night - they lost an entire tank crew when it rained one night and they suffocated as it crushed them.
Given the reliability issues of late WWII German tasks, one wonders how many tanks that Allied flyers claimed to have "destroyed" by air attack were already broken down. A working tank was much less likely to be visible from the air than one broken down along a road or stalled in the middle of a field.
Your not off as the other allies planes like the p40 where strapped rockets when they were not made for it. A lot of kills they claim can be brought down way above fifty percent
Thanks again for the great debate
sooo, seven seconds in and i'm getting heavy vibes that these two guys are going to takeover the world using sharks with lazerbeams on their heads.
Just send in the Irish, tanks are expensive.
How about an Irishman in a tank? (Just asking for a friend...)
@ They cant, there are no potatoes left.
There were a couple of Irishmen who planned to declare war on the Soviet Union at one point, but decided against it when they learned that the Soviets had an Army of 50 million men. They couldn't figure out what were they going to do with 50 million Prisoners of War.
Despite our pugnacity and perceived expendability, the Irish were not used as shock troops as much as our Celtic cousins from Scotland. It's Scottish, not Irish bagpipes, that have echoed from hills all over the world, from Afghanistan to South Africa to New Guinea.
Y is it always my peeps? 😅
Great to see an intelligent, engineering view of what a tank is for. Very nice.