During WWII's Normandy Campaign the inability of Allied tanks to compete against their German foes, primarily in terms of armored protection and armamanent, was and remains today a fairly well known story. Nevertheless, what is often forgotten is that by the summer of 1944 the British had found a simple, relatively cost effective solution to the problems posed by hard hitting German AFV's (Armored Fighting Vehicles).
What the British had discovered was that if they took a 17-pounder L/55 anti-tank gun and employed tungsten armor-piercing rounds powered by a higher than normal amount of
The technical superiority of the T-34 (with a T-34/76 pictured here) in 1941,and during WWII in general has become the stuff of legend. Its apparent superiority has become so entrenched in the psyche of post WWII authors that it is now assumed without question. Some go as far as to claim the T-34 as “the finest tank of the twentieth century”, and that the T-34 “rendered the entire fleet of German tanks as effectively obsolete”.[1]
However, if battle performance was, and indeed still is, the ultimate determinant of the effectiveness of any weapon system, then unlike some
When discussing the January 1943 fighting between Germany and the Soviet Union the overwhelming majority of today's literature focuses on events at Stalingrad. In doing so, a major disservice is done to history, for in the first three months of 1943 the Red Army attempted to crush the German Sixteenth Army and Army Group North much as it had eliminated the German Sixth Army and attempted to destroy the German Army Groups in Southern Russia.
In Northwestern Russia the nearly one and one half year long German siege of Leningrad had precipitated yet another Russian relief attempt when the Second
