From: Steve Grammont (islander@midmaine.com)
Date: Thu Jun 13 2002 - 01:59:50 PDT
Gordon and original poster (message never showed up on this end)
>The American halftrack was an armoured truck with two tracks on the back,
>in fact I remember that one US general was quite scathing about them in
>that he said that people using them thought they were in a tank but soon
>found out they weren't ( I think he was talking more about the armour than
>the mobility here) US halftracks were used in a variety of roles including
>ambulance and command, but all of them were hard trucks for combat areas.
It is also interesting to note that the US halftrack program was in
serious doubt in 1943 (I think), and killed off in 1944. The Army was
simply not convinced that these were the battlefield vehicles they needed
to be. Around about this time they started experimenting with purpose
built fully tracked APCs. The French and Canadians were probably the
first to field such vehicles though.
BTW, a German MG34/42 was capable of penetriting the armor on a US
halftrack at close (under 200m) range. As for German armored halftracks,
it took a US M2 .50 cal MG to penetrate the armor.
>The German semitrack was a whole different ball game. Most of the running
>gear appears to be full-track tank, and there seemed to be as many
>non-armoured tractor units as there were armoured ones. The armoured ones
>tended to be smaller too, and with the tracks running almost the full
>length of the vehicle the mobility would be very good.
The Germans made so many HTs it boggles the mind. They basically had the
following:
Tractors - Unarmored ranging from 1 ton to 18 ton. They were used for
the following roles:
a) Artillery Prime Mover - hauled pretty much anything, but especially
noted for towing 88mm Flak36
b) AAA Platforms - based on the above using single 20mm, quad 20mm, and
single 37mm AAA guns. Some later models, especially the SdKfz 7 series,
had partial or fully armored cabs installed either by sub contracting
factories or troops in the field.
c) Misc - specially outfitted to act as command vehicles, recovery
vehicles, ammo carriers, etc. Not primary use.
Combat Halftracks - designed to get into the thick of combat. Consisted
of two serires, the SdKfz/SPW 250 and the larger SdKfz/SPW 251. The 250
was built for recon units of Panzer Divisions, the 251 for general use
within Panzer Divisions (and the occasional "elite" PanzerGrenadier
Division). They were used for tons of different rolls:
a) The SPW 250/1, along with variants carried a half recon section of 4 men.
b) The SPW 251/1 was the standard combat APC which took one squad into combat.
c) AT platform on the 251 but a few on the 250. Usually under command of
armored infantry Platoon HQ for extra fire support.
d) Radio communications vehicles were used by commanders and Luftwaffe
forward controllers.
c) Infantry Gun support vehicle. Mounted 75mm low velocity guns pulled
out of older PzIV and StuGIIIs. Both 250 and 251 sported these.
d) AAA platform. Various configurations, almost all of which were on the 251.
e) Ambulance version of the 251.
f) Wire laying vehicles for... uhm... laying wire :-)
g) 82mm mortars were placed inside the fighting compartment of 250/2 and
251/2. The 250/2 was too small to handle much ammo as well, so a
dedicated ammo carrier version was paired up with it.
h) The 251/16 sported two flamethrowers with internal fuel tanks. Six of
these were in theory allocated to the Panzer Division's PanzerGrenadier
Armored Regiment only.
Uhmmm... probably a couple other uses which I can not remember off the
top of my head. IIRC the 251 family of HTs came in 22 different flavors!
Oddballs -
a) Kettenkraftrad was designed to lay communications wire and provide
light transport capacity for tough terrain.
b) Hybrids were formed from old domestic or captured light tank chasis.
The running gear was removed and placed into a new body which had wheels
in front. Most famous of these is the Maultier which was used as a
mobile rocket artillery platform.
c) Various small production run vehicles for purpose built uses.
>There is probably no fair direct comparison, but in general the US
>machines were less complex, easier to produce in quantity, pretty much all
>one size, lots of interchangeable spares, etc, etc, and the German
>machines were probably technologically superior but more difficult to
>build and provide spares for, though to be fair some of the big tank
>prime-mover versions probably shared a lot of engine and running-gear
>spares with the tanks they hauled.
This is a good description. One interesting thing to note was that US
troops having had a chance to play around with both favored the German
HTs for the following reasons:
1. Full armored protection for passengers - passengers could sit upright
and have some degree of armor over their heads.
2. Superior cross country performance. The interleved torsionbar system
the Germans were so found of provided a really smooth ride. This was
contrasted with the bucking bronco US HTs. Of course, this superior
performance, like many things German, was counter balanced by higher
maintainence and production costs compared to Allied vehicles.
Unlike the US, the Germans found more and more uses for HTs as the war
went on. Production was in full swing until the last day of the war.
However, supply was always WAY behind demand. For example, only 2 out
of 15 Panzer Divisions (I think I got the numbers right!) going into
Russia in June 1941 had their full complement of HTs. Most Divisions had
1/3 or less. It only got worse fom there!
Steve
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