Post by hardslack on Dec 13, 2021 16:52:27 GMT -5
This gets to WW2, bear with me!
Recently I have been reading "The Threat: Inside the Soviet Military Machine" by Andrew Cockburn.
His premise is that the USSR's capability had been vastly overstated/exaggerated by the United States military. (Likely mainly to continue building weapons and keep budgets growing, etc.)
One example, I'll summarize, is that soviet tanks all suck. Cramped, autoloaders dangerous to crew, slow, breakdown constantly, carry less ammo, have dangerous fuel/ammo storage so easier to kill, are hard to fight from due to limited gun elevation, bad viewports. The engines are all essentially the T34's. They breakdown really frequently, officially need overhaul after like, 80 hours of operation. The OPFOR forces at Ft hood or somewhere replaced all their soviet engines with something else. His thing also was the the engine being kept essentially the same, force the soviets to continue with the small height tank, more for the weight savings than the tactical benefit.
Super interesting to me, because the common thought about soviet tanks (and equipment in general) is that they are tough and reliable, if spartan.
This book is so consistently dismissive of soviet power, and general focus on logistics/ maintenance in general being so poor that the capability of the Soviets to pour through the Fulda gap seems unlikely, at least in numbers that overwhelm the Nato forces.
So, I wondered, if there is all this stuff out there about soviet tanks being so terrible, than how come this is the first I have heard? I was doing a little googling and found this site, that had some interesting sources that support the mediocre evaluation of the T-34.
So, in the spirit of the many 2nd Batt posts on ww2 myths, here's the one that the T-34 tank was a good tank.
link
In the comments, there are some interesting counterpoints. Personally the ones that have merit are those about the ease of manufacturing enabling the soviets to produce more, in more austere situations. For example, Christie suspension could use locomotive manufacturing experiences, no turret ring allowed turrets to be made by more factories. Still, it sounds like the T34 was a tank, that functioned, and therefore had some merits, but it had many flaws.
Recently I have been reading "The Threat: Inside the Soviet Military Machine" by Andrew Cockburn.
His premise is that the USSR's capability had been vastly overstated/exaggerated by the United States military. (Likely mainly to continue building weapons and keep budgets growing, etc.)
One example, I'll summarize, is that soviet tanks all suck. Cramped, autoloaders dangerous to crew, slow, breakdown constantly, carry less ammo, have dangerous fuel/ammo storage so easier to kill, are hard to fight from due to limited gun elevation, bad viewports. The engines are all essentially the T34's. They breakdown really frequently, officially need overhaul after like, 80 hours of operation. The OPFOR forces at Ft hood or somewhere replaced all their soviet engines with something else. His thing also was the the engine being kept essentially the same, force the soviets to continue with the small height tank, more for the weight savings than the tactical benefit.
Super interesting to me, because the common thought about soviet tanks (and equipment in general) is that they are tough and reliable, if spartan.
This book is so consistently dismissive of soviet power, and general focus on logistics/ maintenance in general being so poor that the capability of the Soviets to pour through the Fulda gap seems unlikely, at least in numbers that overwhelm the Nato forces.
So, I wondered, if there is all this stuff out there about soviet tanks being so terrible, than how come this is the first I have heard? I was doing a little googling and found this site, that had some interesting sources that support the mediocre evaluation of the T-34.
So, in the spirit of the many 2nd Batt posts on ww2 myths, here's the one that the T-34 tank was a good tank.
link
In the comments, there are some interesting counterpoints. Personally the ones that have merit are those about the ease of manufacturing enabling the soviets to produce more, in more austere situations. For example, Christie suspension could use locomotive manufacturing experiences, no turret ring allowed turrets to be made by more factories. Still, it sounds like the T34 was a tank, that functioned, and therefore had some merits, but it had many flaws.