Q-Ball
Posts: 5266
Joined: 6/25/2002 From: Chicago, Illinois Status: offline
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OK, completely OT I admit, but an interesting discussion..... Castor, point taken on kill rates. The Tiger/Panther were better tanks one on one. But these designs, and German tank designs in general, were a disaster for the overall war effort. The Russians had T-34s in 1941/42, yet the Germans, with PzIIIs and IVs still outkilled them. Why? Because the tank isn't the whole story. The Wehrmacht had superior leadership at the division level and below to the Russians throughout the whole war. The Germans outkilled the Russians in everything right to the end, because the Wehrmacht had superior leadership at the unit level. They had higher kill rates regardless of tank for this reason. The Germans built multiple models at a time, with many times several chassis at once, while the Americans were generally building only 1 tank, and 1 tank destroyer, and 2 types of chassis. The Sherman was not a brilliant design, but the overall PLAN that produced the Sherman, i.e. total industrial dominance, was brilliant. Anyway, back to the Pacific War.
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