OK...
> It was the wonder of it's time...and it's value transcended WW II, as it was
> a formidable tank in the Korean War also.
Disagree... it was a good tank, but not a "wonder". It was crude and
unreliable in the extreme, but filled a niche which was necessary (to
the Soviets) at the time. Even in the Korean War, the E8/76 Shermans
could best it easily, and had a far better record for longevity. To take
your logical assumption one step farther, the Israelis used modified
Shermans to great effect as late as 1967, against far superior tanks -
and T34s were long gone by then.
> However....... it was the product of WW II experience on both sides of the
> battlefield, and had some of the West's best designers helping out.
Could you elaborate with names and sources, please? In WW2, the Soviets
were notoriously suspicious of everything and everyone from the West,
and went out of their way to discredit us at any opportunity. I highly
doubt they had any major western talent in arms design, as that talent
would have been employed in Detroit, or at least would have influenced
U.S. and/or British tank evolution (Churchill was highly distrustful of
them anyway). As you may know, even the vaunted U.S. M26 bore no
resemblance to any Soviet "designs". Please correct me!
> Diesel fueled engines added to crew survivability. That was the major
> concern, not the availability of diesel fuel. Gas engine armored vehicles
> killed so many from after impact explosions.
Disagree again. When the Soviets requested armour through "Lendlease"
(we lent, they never leased), they demanded diesel vehicles because of
their supply trains, not because of a preference for a "better fuel".
Diesel is indeed much cheaper to produce, and can be handled much more
roughly, and the engines designed to run diesel don't have to be nearly
as sophisticated as those designed for gas.
We sent them (primarily) Canadian-manufactured diesel Valentines - which
they subsequently described as the best they got, BTW - and M4A2
[diesel] Shermans. The latter also saw long service and have been
vindicated as good vehicles by Russian authors whose works have been
released since the wall came down.
Regards the issue of gas vs diesel in catastrophic detonation, yes, gas
CAN burn faster, but the speed and degree of detonation after a fatal
hit was a function of design, rather than fuel. For example, it has been
documented that while the gas-fueled Sherman took approximately three
seconds to burn with an appropriate hit, the [also] gas-fueled Churchill
took an average of ten seconds to burn with the equivalent hit. It was
all in the layout, and proportionally MANY more T34s were destroyed on
the battlefield than western tanks.
The real crux of catastrophic detonation in WW2 tanks was not the fuel
type, but penetration into the ammunition storage areas; in this the T34
was every bit as vulnerable as Western tanks. It should be pointed out
that the crew survival rate of even the gas-engined Sherman, in the
summer of '44, was almost 75% - completely satisfactory from the Allied
perspective (albeit, in retrospect, completely unnecessary).
> Thanks to our providing thousands of Shermans to the Russians, they were able
> to have time to develop a really good tank.
The T34 was a stopgap measure which incorporated many concepts which we
now consider critical in armour development, but it sacrificed much more
in design and production shortcuts. The Soviets didn't care how many
they lost, only that more would be available to fill the gaps in their
formations; the crew survival rate was immaterial. IMHO, their chief
contribution to armour development was the 85mm gun, which proved that
an effective weapons platform could be made out of a mediochre tank. We
recognized this as well in the 90mm program, and, as above, the Israelis
took the offensive concept a lot further with the M50 Sherman
conversion, which of course again, was based upon a much more reliable
and survivable concept. The T34s were good, but not THAT good; the
evolution of antitank rounds outstripped their development very quickly.
-- Regards,Geoff Winnington-Ball MAPLE LEAF UP! ==> Zephyr, Ontario, Canada ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Maple Leaf Up - The Canadian Army Overseas in WW2 http://www.netwave.ca/~whiskey/mlu/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
=== To unsubscribe from the mil-veh mailing list, send the single word UNSUBSCRIBE in the body of a message to <mil-veh-request@skylee.com>.